Thoughts on Tech, Music, Politics

  • Mailbird 2.0 Review

    I’d like to consider myself a child of the modern world, but … email. I’m a slave to it. I have a number of different enterprises that I run and look after, I administer 7 of my own Google Apps Domains not to mention looking after a few more for my clients (schools) who have […]

  • On the Microsoft Pro-EU position – how not to write a letter

    I wrote in a previous post that I have a gut feeling about the EU referendum. In fact I have a gut feeling about most things, which is all the more reason I like to subject myself to criticism. Come and knock spots off me, show me how I’m wrong. In fact I’ll go out to […]

  • On Empathy, and the Referendum to Leave the EU

    Many months ago and early on in the unfolding story of the British referendum to leave the EU, it was common to hear the electorate – at least presented by the media – decrying “we feel that neither side has really come up with a good enough list of reasons to” [delete as appropriate]: leave / stay […]

  • Dynamic DNS using Linode and local powershell script

    After noip.com and dyndns.org shut their doors to all but non-paying customers, I spent many years without being able to reliably access my home network from outside. Of course, it was always possible to do without dynamic DNS by making a note of the current IP address and use this for as long as the […]

  • My KeePass to LastPass Migration Woes!

    Preliminary This blog post details the technical difficulties faced when trying to migrate from using KeePass to LastPass. KeePass has been an excellent password companion for the last 6 years and I’ve been using MiniKeePass for iOS, loading my password safe from Dropbox quite happily. But since starting to use a Chromebook I’ve been increasingly […]

  • OLED from BuyDisplay.com – Mat’s Hookup Guide

    Here’s a quick hookup guide and sketch to get the ER-OLEDM032-1W display to work with Arduino. We are going to use the u8g library to drive the OLED. The ER-OLEDM032-1W is a 256×64 graphic OLED module costing $26.56. White on black. I bought mine from eBay although the Chinese brand BuyDisplay.com sells them directly. There are two […]

  • From Russia With Cash – barking up the wrong tree

    I have no links with estate agents in my life. I don’t like them, I don’t dislike them. As a portrait photographer or in any other capacity, I’ve never had one as a client myself. Channel 4 last night aired a documentary called “From Russia With Cash”. It featured secretly-filmed property viewings by a fictional […]

  • Assembled MQTT Lightswitch – version 1

    Really quick post showing latest progress of the fancy light switch. What do you think? A bit too colourful? It is a bit colourful for my liking. On the other hand the colours do add meaning to the buttons: blue = presets (obvious) red = all off (haven’t added this to display yet, you can see below […]

  • Open Letter to Nick Clegg: please re-stand at our party’s leadership election

    Dear Nick, “He had to go”; a very British leadership response that shows humility in the face of defeat. Where, in other countries, leaders of defeated parties cannot help themselves but try to hold arrogantly to power, the expectation of a party leader in this situation is to fall on the sword. Swiftly. Graciously. With […]

  • Multi-zone audio: a discussion of the options

    Multi-zone Audio: the last 15 years Multi-zone audio has been possible in the home for decades now, but until recently has only been an option for the super-house; the high price of systems and installation meant it was out of reach for the average home. The first cheap device I know of that opened-up multi-zone […]