knolleary2022-12-31T22:51:19+00:00https://knolleary.netNick O'LearyA sign of life2022-12-31T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2022/12/31/sign-of-life<p>With a couple hours of 2022 left, I thought I’d slip a post in under the wire, just so there would be something showing up for this year.</p>
<p>I’ve quoted it a few times: writing is a muscle that needs exercising. Like real exercise, I find it much easier said than done.</p>
<p>Looking back at 2022, I can see all sorts of reasons why not much has happened here. My day job is particularly time consuming and I made a very conscious decision to spend less time sat on the sofa with the laptop out in the evenings.</p>
<p>Looking ahead to 2023, I’m going to try to find a better balance. I have a growing list of side projects and hobbies I want to dedicate some time to.</p>
<p>But that’s enough for now.</p>
<p>If I’ve sprung up unexpectedly in your RSS feed reader, than I’m happy that’s all still working. Happy New Year and all that.</p>
Weeknotes 92021-03-23T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2021/03/23/weeknotes-9<ul>
<li>
<p>This week I have been on “holiday” having <a href="/2021/03/16/19-years-7-months-3-days-an-ibmer/">resigned from IBM</a>.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>With the kids in school and Jo working, the temptation is to just keep plugging
away at the next Node-RED feature. There’s certainly plenty to do - with the 1.3 release
just waiting for me to get some documentation written.</p>
<p>But I need to take some time to decompress. In a couple weeks I start a New Thing
that’s going to keep me very busy - so for now, I relax.</p>
<p>Tomorrow a bunch of plywood and MDF arrives for a few DIY projects I’ve got planned.
That should let me relax whilst keeping a different part of my brain busy.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>The fact I started these weeknotes on a Tuesday was an entirely random thing - I just
felt like doing it then and there. The fact I left IBM on a Tuesday and I start the
New Thing on a Tuesday is one of those weird and happy coincidences.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>I <em>think</em> I’ll take a short break from these weeknotes. And then Season 2 will
start as an ongoing record of the New Thing.</p>
</li>
</ul>
19 years, 7 months, 3 days an IBMer2021-03-16T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2021/03/16/19-years-7-months-3-days-an-ibmer<p>Back in <a href="/2011/09/03/10-years-an-ibmer/">2011 I wondered whether I’d still be an IBMer in 10 years time</a>. Well, I now have an answer to that question: no, I won’t be.</p>
<p>Today, March 16th 2021, is my last working day at IBM. I have a couple weeks of holiday to use up and then, after 19 years, 7 months and 3 days, I will no longer be an IBMer.</p>
<p><img src="/blog/content/2021/03/ibm-sign.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>That still feels an odd thing to write even though I’ve known this was coming for little while now.</p>
<p>Through-out my career at IBM, I’ve often wondered what would pull me away from the relative comfort of the institution that is IBM.
I have certainly had occasional offers from different companies and many of them would have been interesting, engaging work. But none of them quite sparkled enough to draw me away.</p>
<p>I knew in my head what my dream opportunity would be - to have the freedom to build something <em>bigger</em> with Node-RED whilst continuing to lead the open-source project. But what were the chances of that ever happening?</p>
<p>To cut a long story short, just such an opportunity has presented itself.</p>
<p>In that post from 2011 I wrote:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Will I still be here in another 10 years? I don’t know. If I am, I hope it isn’t because it was the easy option.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The decision to leave was certainly not the easy option - on the face of it, it’s perhaps the biggest risk I have taken in my whole career. But after a lot of consideration, I’ve decided it’s a risk worth taking. The opportunity is too unique and having just turned 40 I decided, if not now, then when?</p>
<p>I’m going to save the details of what’s next for another time - this post is more about looking back.</p>
<p>IBM Hursley has been my professional home ever since leaving University. I think in that time I have worked for 13 different managers, across 5 different organisations and held a wide variety of roles. I’ve worked with teams all around the world, contributed to products used by our biggest clients and spoken at lots of conferences. I’ve been on <a href="/2010/04/22/how-i-got-onto-prime-time-bbc-one/">television</a>, spent time wiring up sensors in an <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/XFUQtIir0D/">Ice Cream factory</a> and, of course, created <a href="https://nodered.org">Node-RED</a>.</p>
<p>Being able to turn what was a side-project into a full-time role has been a pretty incredible experience - one I still look back on and can’t quite believe happened. I could never have done this without the support and trust of those around me - being largely left to my own discretion to lead the project and build the community around it. That independence didn’t come for free - there were certainly times of personal frustration at the lack of further investment. I have also spent the last two years with this growing sense that the penny would drop at any moment and I’d be told to work on something else.</p>
<p>Getting my Senior Technical Staff Member promotion at the end of last year was a long held goal of mine and something I’m immensely proud of having achieved. I had joked privately that getting that promotion would likely accelerate the time when I had to either move on from Node-RED to work on more IBM-strategic things or move on from IBM entirely. I honestly hadn’t expected that to happen so soon.</p>
<p>I’m sure there’s lots more I could write about my time at IBM. Perhaps I will - once some more time has passed and I can put things into perspective.</p>
<p>To all my former colleagues - I will miss you all. Leaving the Hursley community will be one of the hardest parts of leaving IBM. It has been made slightly easier by the fact we haven’t been on site for over a year now. I went into Hursley for the first time in a year last week to clear out my office. It was a strange experience to visit the site without its usual buzz of activity. But I was grateful for the time to pack up and have one last wander around without lots of people there.</p>
<p>Stay tuned for news of what’s coming next in a couple week’s time.</p>
<p><img src="/blog/content/2021/03/hursley.jpg" alt="" /></p>
Weeknotes 72021-03-09T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2021/03/09/weeknotes-7<ul>
<li>
<p>Had a bit of a DIY mishap this week. Whilst putting some shelves up in T’s room,
I managed to drill all the way through into his sister’s room. One of her Beanie
Babies came very close to getting a hole in the head. Nothing that a bit of polyfilla
can’t fix - the wall that is.</p>
<p>It did make me realise how thin and hollow the wall joining their bedrooms is. It’s
That’s sent me down the rabbit hole of how to improve the sound insulation of
an interior wall. Most solutions seem to involve adding extra layers to the
outside of the walls. It feels like there should be some way of filling in the
cavity - as you would external walls.</p>
<p>Any ideas? More research needed.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>My gmail email address is <code class="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">nick.oleary@....</code>. What not every knows is gmail actually
ignores the <code class="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">.</code> in the address. This means <code class="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">nickoleary@...</code> also works, as would
<code class="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">n.ickoleary@gmail...</code> and so on. I’m sure there’s a reason for that, but it does
mean I quite regularly receive emails for other people because they have missed
typed their address. It’s always a fun experience to see how companies handle
that when I report it.</p>
<p>In the past I’ve received the complete confidential company accounts for an Australian
winery. The accountant asked me to not open the attachments and delete them.
I’ve received the tickets and itinerary for a family of four’s break to Cancún, which sadly
clashed with a holiday we already had booked. In that instance the itinerary also
had the wife’s email address listed, so I managed to reunite them.</p>
<p>I’m currently receiving monthly reminders to get a different Nick O’Leary’s Toyota
serviced somewhere in Texas. And just this evening I’ve received a receipt for
$400 and confirmation of subscription to some sort of medical services company.</p>
<p>If you’re going to use someone’s email address as a key part of the service you
provide, verify the email address.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>We finished watching The Great this week. It may not be the most historically
accurate program, but it’s been very watchable. Nicholas Hoult is clearly having
a lot of fun playing the unpredictable and hapless Peter III. Looking forward
to the second series whenever that may arrive.</p>
</li>
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<p>We’ve still slowly working through the last series of Downton Abbey having had
a break from it for a few weeks. Only a few more episodes to go and then the movie.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>I’ve failed to read a single page of Mythos for yet another week. And the pile
of other books to read has grown. I’ve got a couple weeks holiday coming up soon - whilst
we won’t be going anywhere (kids in school, we’re still all locked down etc), maybe
I’ll get some more reading done through the day… I suspect that’s wishful thinking.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>Interrupting these weeknotes as I’ve just discovered our drains are blocked and
close to overflowing. An early trip to screwfix to get some drain rods
then.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>The calm before the storm. But more on that next week.</p>
</li>
</ul>
Weeknotes 62021-03-02T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2021/03/02/weeknotes-6<ul>
<li>
<p>Not much to share this week. But rather than skip it, lets get something written down.
Apologies in advance.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>Having signed up to Spotify last week, this week we went through our boxes of CDs
and systematically ‘liked’ them all on spotify. That way we can hide the CDs in the
loft but still browse what we’ve got in the app. No idea if that makes sense,
but it felt useful to do. Is that how everyone else does it?</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>I did a click and collect at IKEA this weekend. As I arrived, they took my order
number, took a note of my car number plate and asked me to park and wait in the car.
A few minutes later someone brought my order out in a trolley, wiped the handles
and then left me to it. All told, I was there for about 10 minutes. It was bliss.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>Just a few days of home schooling left (for now). In amongst all of that, we got the
email confirmation that T has got into the local secondary school. It <em>should</em>
have been a formality given its right next door to his current school and it’s
walking distance from our house. But until you see it in writing, you just don’t know.</p>
<p>It’s still 7 months away, but I really can’t comprehend him going to secondary
school. I hope most of the current disruptions have passed by then so he can
have a relatively normal experience moving up. Not going to think about it.</p>
</li>
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<p>I’ve run out of interesting things to write about. It’s late, I’m tired, my
laptop battery is dying and we’ve just remembered we’ve got to put the cover
on the duvet before we can go to bed. That’ll do.</p>
</li>
</ul>
Weeknotes 52021-02-23T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2021/02/23/weeknotes-5<ul>
<li>
<p>After half-term last week, we’re back to home schooling. But now we have the
prospect of schools reopening in two weeks time.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>GeoGuessr Addiction</strong></p>
<p>I’ve got fairly addicted to <a href="https://www.geoguessr.com/">GeoGuessr</a> over the
last couple of weeks, having stumbled over <a href="https://www.youtube.com/c/GeoWizard">GeoWizard’s YouTube Channel</a>.
Essentially you are shown a Google StreetView image and you have to figure out
where in the world you are.</p>
<p>It has a number of different modes - including the far easier(!) task of just having
to identify the country. In the normal mode you are free to move around and
explore the area to try to find clues. There are other modes where you cannot
change the view at all - all you have is the one image.</p>
<p>Having played a few maps that are restricted to the UK, you soon realise we
have a <em>lot</em> of country roads that go on for miles with absolutely no hint as
to where they are.</p>
<p>With a free account, the site limits you to one game a day - I lasted a week
like that before paying up to satisfy my craving.</p>
</li>
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<p><strong>Farewell Napster. Hello Spotify</strong></p>
<p>A bunch of the digital services I pay for all seem to renew around now. It made
me realise I ought to take stock of what I do and don’t pay for and see if there
are better options.</p>
<p>A good case in point is Napster - yeah I know. We got a 6 month free subscription
a few years ago when I bought a set of Sonos speakers, and it has just hung around.
In recent weeks, probably since upgrading to Big Sur on my laptop, its being getting really
unreliable - killing the browser tab if I leaving it playing in the background
for too long. I then had a frustrating morning when the app just refused to play
anything at all.</p>
<p>So I thought it was time to try something else - cancelled the membership and signed
up to Spotify. I then discovered the Spotify player in Chrome was showing a lot
of the same issues - so perhaps it was more a Big Sur/Chrome/media type issue, but anyway…</p>
<p>One immediate advantage is the Spotify app which just works and comes with Sonos awareness
built it. It’s just that bit easier to switch between playing on my headphones
and the Sonos next to my desk without having to switch between lots of apps.</p>
</li>
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<p><strong>Redundant CDs</strong></p>
<p>Speaking of listening to music, we spent some time sorting out boxes in cupboards
this weekend. Boxes from when we moved house over two years ago that got shoved in
a cupboard and largely forgotten about. A couple of those boxes contain all of
our CDs, and we’re now faced with the choice of what to do with them.</p>
<p>They are largely redundant - we can ask Alexa to play pretty much anything we
want at any time.</p>
<p>But the CDs do still serve a purpose - even if we don’t physically play the CDs
they are tangible things we can browse through to pick what we might want to
listen to. The kids both have CD players in their rooms - and we’ve slowly introduced
them to new (old) music by giving them CDs from the box they may like.</p>
<p>Inevitably, they are only going to get more redundant. At some point the kids
will have devices that will be able to play anything they want and we’ll
no longer be telling them off for getting their finger prints all over the
shiny side of the discs and causing them to skip endlessly.</p>
<p>So do we sell them? Is there any market for 2nd-hand CDs these days? I suspect
the effort of cataloging them all in order to sell will cost far more in time
then we’ll get back financially. There must be a more charitable solution.
The alternative is they go back into a box in the loft and we’ll forget about them.</p>
</li>
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<p><strong>DNS woes</strong></p>
<p>Moments before I was due to start my Twitch live stream last night, I saw some
notifications that the Node-RED flow library site was down - Cloudflare returning
some big nasty-sounding errors.</p>
<p>I went ahead with the live stream, but decided not to try fixing it whilst streaming
as it would likely involve logging into various services and I didn’t want to
risk showing things on the stream that I shouldn’t.</p>
<p>I carried on with my planned content for the stream, but my head really wasn’t
in the right place to spend the time pushing pixels around the screen whilst
trying to improve the layout of the MQTT nodes.</p>
<p>Once I finished the stream, I dug into the errors and found the misconfiguration
that had caused it.</p>
<p>Here’s what had happened as best I understand it.</p>
<p>We use Cloudflare to manage the DNS of all Node-RED websites. The flow library
itself runs as a DigitalOcean App.</p>
<p>DigitialOcean also use Cloudflare to manage the DNS services for their systems.</p>
<p>The flow library configuration in Cloudflare had it set in Proxying mode - so
all traffic would flow via Cloudflare. It turns out you cannot do Cloudflare proxying
on top of another Cloudflare managed domain that is owned by someone else.</p>
<p>The annoying thing was this misconfiguration was done when I moved the flow library
to DigitalOcean back in November. For some reason Cloudflare happily let me
configure it like that and waited until 3 months later to sudden start complaining
about it.</p>
<p>The fix was to turn off proxy mode and switch to just DNS for the flow library.</p>
<p>I do have a draft blog post that describes the work I did to migrate the flow
library to DigitalOcean. By “draft blog post” I mean I have a almost blank
markdown file in my drafts folder with the title set. In this 2021 spirit
of just writing things down, I should probably get that draft drafted.</p>
</li>
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<p><strong>Digital Service inventory</strong></p>
<p>I wrote a couple bullet points ago about taking stock of the digital services
I pay for - before getting distracted about CDs in boxes. Rather than bury it
in weeknotes, I think I’ll do a separate blog post that lists them off. I think
it’ll be interesting to record it so I can see how the list changes over time.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>That’ll do for this week.</p>
</li>
</ul>
Weeknotes 42021-02-16T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2021/02/16/weeknotes-4<ul>
<li>
<p>I may be a day late writing this post, but as I get to chose the filename,
I’m putting yesterday’s date on it and this little indiscretion will be long
forgotten. Assuming I don’t highlight it in the opening paragraph.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>It’s half term so the kids are at home, playing with each other and annoying each
other. We’re going for walks around the town when it isn’t raining too hard.
And plenty of Animal Crossing is being played. It’s much like term time - just
with a lot fewer English and Maths lessons sprinkled through the day.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Rubber ducking</strong></p>
<p>I’ve been focussed on getting Node-RED 1.3 ready to release. The plan had been
to get it done by the end of January - trying to keep up a milestone release
every 3 months. The problem with having a plan like that is if you don’t have
the people helping to do the work, then things take longer.</p>
<p>There’s a particular feature we’ve been talking about for a long time - well
over a year. It’s not a feature I’m particularly enthusiastic for, but I can
see why its needed.</p>
<p>It’s also the sort of feature that needs prolonged focus and attention to get
right and one that a design on paper can only get you so far.</p>
<p>That’s where I’ve unexpectedly found myself over the last couple weeks - reworking
the initial draft implementation to fill in the missing pieces of the design.</p>
<p>There was a part of the design that I had originally pushed back on and suggested
a different approach was needed. On last week’s twitch stream, I talked through
some of the design challenges of this feature. In doing so, I released the source
of those challenges came from the part I had pushed back on - the original
proposed approach was actually closer to what was needed, although still not
ideal.</p>
<p>It was a good reminder that being totally heads down on something can mean you miss
the bigger picture. Spending that time to step back and talk through a problem
can make a real difference.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Fixed vs Growth Mindsets</strong></p>
<p>I was sent a link to <a href="https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/01/29/carol-dweck-mindset/">this article</a> about
Carol Dweck’s work on how your mindset can affect the outcome of what you do.</p>
<p>It talks about there being two types of mindset. A fixed mindset is resistant
to change, avoids conflicts and obstacles, and prefers to stick to the path
well trodden. Conversely, a growth mindset is one that embraces change, is persistent
in the face of setbacks and recognises that hard work is needed to a achieve goals.</p>
<p>A fixed mindset leads with a desire to look smart - hence the tendency to avoid
anything that puts that at risk.</p>
<p>A growth mindset recognises that looking smart isn’t the goal - its to actually
be smart by learning and that any set backs or obstacles are just ways of learning.</p>
<p>As Edison said, albeit perhaps not precisely as quoted:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I have not failed 10,000 times. I have not failed once. I have succeeded in
proving that those 10,000 ways will not work. When I have eliminated the
ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I recognise a lot of the traits of a fixed mindset in myself. But I also
recognise the positive feeling I get when I act with more of a growth mindset.</p>
<p>Even when it comes to chores - like filling in my tax self-assessment. I always
put it off because it feels like an obstacle to doing what I want (ie, <em>not</em> filling
in daunting tax forms with vague penalties if I get any of it wrong). But then
I just get on with it and it never takes very long because my tax affairs are
pretty mundane and for the last couple of years has resulted in a nice little
rebate from HMRC. The more you do something, the easier it becomes and it stops
being a chore.</p>
<p>I think writing these weeknotes fits in with this model as well.</p>
<p>I had long meant to do it, and have had a couple of aborted attempts in the past.
Today I start with a blank page and think what on earth am I going to write?
People are going to read this and if its a bunch of mundane nonsense then that’s
going to reflect poorly on me. And I don’t want people to think poorly of me.</p>
<p>But putting this in terms of a growth mindset, the only way I can write content
people want to read is to write content.</p>
<p>A fixed mindset can feel like a warm blanket keeping you safe from the real world.
And to be frank, there are some days I can think of nothing I want more.</p>
<p>But its the growth mindset that, whilst it may not feel natural, is the way
to achieve more things - whatever that may be.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Remote reading</strong></p>
<p>I skim read <a href="https://amzn.to/3aqE8Jt">Remote</a> by David Heinemeier Hansson and
Jason Fried of <a href="https://basecamp.com">Basecamp</a> last night.</p>
<p>I say I skim read it because I don’t think I was the target audience for much
of it. As someone who has been working remotely this past year (like everyone
else), but also as someone whose work is predominantly in the open source realm,
I’ve been working remotely for a long time. Even when I work with colleagues,
they are typically in the US so all the same principles apply.</p>
<p>So a lot of the book was familiar. There were some interesting thoughts around
how to build culture in a purely remote organisation. You don’t get the same
water-cooler moments you might get in a physical space, but there are ways and
means to approach that.</p>
<p>The book also listed out a number of online tools that can be used to help
facilitate a remote working experience. Although as it was published 8 years
ago now, the list is slightly dated.</p>
<p>Would be interested to see what the best of breed tools are today.</p>
</li>
</ul>
Weeknotes 32021-02-09T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2021/02/09/weeknotes-3<ul>
<li>
<p>Still going for Weeknote Tuesdays. Four weeks and counting.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>This last week got unexpectedly expensive. A new dishwasher (replacing a 13?
year old one that had started to play up), a new phone (replacing a 3 year old
one that had started to plummet from 50% battery to 0 in a matter of seconds)
and a new MacBook Pro (decided it was time to have my own personal machine
rather than lean too heavily on my work-provided laptop).</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>The dishwasher was easy quick and easy to replace. Only one incident where I
thought the water supply was turned off but it the little plastic valve handle
was broken, so when I turned it, it actually rotated in place and left the water
very much still on.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>The phone, a Google Pixel 4a, wasn’t too much work to migrate from my previous phone.
Sure, I had to get 1Password installed early on to save me typing all of those
randomly generated passwords too much. Oh, and I had to migrate all the 2FA
tokens over. The last time I had done that, 3 years ago, Google Authenticator
didn’t (as far as I can remember) offer a way to migrate. So with that in
mind, I spent an hour manually resetting the 2FA setup on about a dozen services
so I could get it setup on the new phone. I tweeted my angst and of course
someone helpfully pointed out that Google Authenticate <em>does</em> now provide a way
to migrate the tokens without having to reset anything. Lesson learnt for next time.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>The laptop, a Macbook Pro with the new M1 chip is a lovely machine. Not had
time to do a lot with it yet. Didn’t have the energy to do the 1Password dance
on a second device whilst also getting my phone setup. I went with the 8Gb rather
than 16Gb version. Whilst it saved some money, the main reason was the 16Gb version
had a month-long shipping delay whereas the 8Gb would arrive the next day.
Having done some research, I convinced myself that 8Gb would be plenty for
what I’ll be asking of it.</p>
<p>I did weigh-up whether the new machine needed to be a laptop at all. I’d seen
a few people on twitter have this debate. Given I’m working at home for the
foreseeable future, there’s no real need for a device I can take out of the house.
So something like a Mac Mini would do the job just as well. Not to mention,
it’s a personal machine and not a work machine, so the whole working-at-home
thing is a bit of a red herring.</p>
<p>Ultimately I decided I still wanted to be able to roam the house with the machine.
How else would I get these weeknotes written at 11:30pm at night whilst watching
TV?</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>I did my first Node-RED Office hours last Friday. I had two calls with people
in the community, the first discussing how to remotely manage Node-RED across
a collection of devices in far-off locations. The second call was looking at
a plane tracking system that uses Raspberry Pis and Software-Defined Radios
to intercept the various radio signals (and satellite comms) emitted by planes
to track them in the sky. You can find out more <a href="http://thebaldgeek.net/index.php/flight-radar/">here</a>.</p>
<p>I’ve got another two calls scheduled already for this week - looking forward
to see what topics they bring.</p>
<p>If you want to schedule some time with me for a chat about Node-RED, then
you can do that <a href="https://calendly.com/knolleary">right here</a>.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>I’ve failed to read a single page of my book this week; too busy getting
things done in the evening to leave myself any time to read.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>I did review four chapters of a Node-RED book that is being published later
this year. I’ve always wanted to write a Node-RED book - and have certainly been asked.
But there are two things that hold me back. Firstly, I’m aware the Node-RED
project documentation needs lots of work. My natural sensibility is to think
any effort writing words about Node-RED ought to go into the documentation for
all to benefit from, rather than into a book for people to buy.</p>
<p>My other worry is the time it takes to do properly. <a href="https://dalelane.co.uk/blog/?p=4277">Dale has written a book</a>
which I look forward to getting. But I know from our conversations how much work that was
to do. Anyone who manages to do something like that above and beyond they day job
has my admiration.</p>
<p>So I was happy to act as a technical reviewer for this new book. It’ll be nice
to add an English-language Node-RED book to the two Japanese ones I already
have.</p>
<p>I think there is still plenty of room for other Node-RED books to get written.
Something for another day.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>We watched <a href="https://amzn.to/3q5FkYp">Wonder Woman 1984</a> this week. It was okay.
The DC universe just don’t engage with me the way the Marvel universe does.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>Speaking of which, WandaVision is very good. I have to admit, after three
episodes of retro-style sitcom it didn’t feel like it was getting anywhere.
It felt like it needed to shift gears and for things to start happening.</p>
<p>And then episode four arrived and the gears were definitely shifted and things
happened.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>Are these weeknotes interesting to anyone? The content may not be riveting,
but as long as I keep writing them, then they are working for me.</p>
<p>There’s some stuff on the horizon that I’m itching to write about. But as these
are meant to be about what I’ve done this week, not what’s coming up, I mustn’t
get ahead of myself. Maybe I’ll start blogging non-weeknote things at some point.</p>
</li>
</ul>
Opening a new iTerm window on OSX2021-02-07T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2021/02/07/opening-iterm-shortcut-osx<p>I just got a new MacBook Pro (13” M1 8Gb 512Gb if you must know). This is my
third Mac but the first I have bought for myself - the other’s being
work-provided machines.</p>
<p>I’m taking my time to set it up - doing it afresh rather than just blindly copying
over all my settings. Whilst it’s more work to do it this way, it happens rarely
enough that I find it a soothing process. It also helps to clear out the cruft
that has gathered in my setup over the years. Given I’ve only <em>just</em> updated my work
MacBook to Big Sur, I’m also taking my time to see what’s changed.</p>
<p>One of the things I setup on my first laptop a long, long time ago was global
keyboard shortcut to open a new iTerm window. So long ago, I couldn’t remember
how I had done it and had to figure it out again.</p>
<p>So to save future me some effort, I thought I’d document how I’ve done it. There
may be other ways of doing it, but this is what works for me.</p>
<ol>
<li>Install <a href="https://iterm2.com/">iTerm2</a>. There instructions may work with the default
terminal app, but I’ve never tried it as I’ve always gone straight to replacing it
with iTerm2.</li>
<li>Open the “Automator” app and create a new “Quick Action” document.</li>
<li>Configure it so it receives “no input” in “any application”</li>
<li>Add a “Run AppleScript” action and set its contents to the following:
<div class="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge"><div class="highlight"><pre class="highlight"><code> on run {input, parameters}
tell application "iTerm"
create window with default profile
end tell
return input
end run
</code></pre></div> </div>
</li>
<li>Save the document, giving it a catchy name like “iTermLauncher”</li>
<li>Open the “System Preferences” app and go into “Keyboard”</li>
<li>Under the “Shortcuts” tab, select “Services” on the left and then scroll all
the way to the bottom of the list. You should find your “iTermLauncher” service
under the “General” section.</li>
<li>Click on it, then click the “Add Shortcut” button. Enter the shortcut you want to use,
I went with <code class="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">Cmd-§</code> as it’s unlikely to clash.</li>
</ol>
<p>And with that, you’re done. You should now be able to hit your shortcut to get
a new iTerm window open. OSX may ask your permission to run the launcher the first
time you trigger it with a new application in focus, but that soon passes.</p>
Weeknotes 22021-02-02T00:00:00+00:00http://knolleary.net/2021/02/02/weeknotes-2<ul>
<li>
<p>This is my third set of weeknotes, but for nerdy reasons I started counting them
at 0. I think I regret that already. Off-by-one errors through-out.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>Working at home means it takes a particular effort to hit the 10,000 step target
each day. Even if it is an entirely <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/sep/03/watch-your-step-why-the-10000-daily-goal-is-built-on-bad-science">arbitrary target</a>, it’s still a target that feels good to hit.
Not hitting means I’ve probably spent too long sat in front of the computer - something
that happens all too often.</p>
<p>Since the kids have been home-schooling, I’ve found I’m hitting the target
more frequently as we make sure the kids are getting enough exercise and not
stuck in the house all day.</p>
<p>Looking for the small positives of the various lock-downs we’ve been in since
last March, it’s true to say we’ve explored the area around our house far more
than we would have done otherwise.</p>
<p>This past weekend we managed a 5 mile loop from our front-door that managed
to wear the kids out. It wasn’t the most picturesque route, but its fun exploring
the footpaths that join the streets you’d normally drive straight past.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>In mundane home-office news, I’ve turned my desk around so I now sit looking
into the room with the window behind me. I had originally planned to do it
the other way around - so I could look out of the window, but that would mean
my webcam would then get a full view of the room and leave nowhere for the mess
to hide. We decided that wasn’t for the best.</p>
<p>As it is now, the webcam gets a better backdrop without me having to worry
if there are any clothes drying in the background - something I have only
been caught out by once…</p>
<p>You can see it all in action in <a href="https://youtu.be/eqeuf38Ul_0?t=216">this week’s Twitch stream</a>.</p>
<p>I’ve also mounted my <a href="https://amzn.to/3rj53wK">monitor on an arm</a> so I could raise
it up a bit. Works well so far, although some more playing is need to get everything
in the right place.</p>
<p>I also need to find a new home for my Raspberry Pi that was <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BznvXssJLr9/">mounted to the back of the monitor</a>.
I’m thinking I’ll fix it onto the underside of the desk somehow to keep it
out of sight.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>Inspired by a tweet by <a href="https://twitter.com/simonw/status/1355228000548126721">Simon Willison</a>
I’ve setup <a href="https://calendly.com/knolleary">office hours</a> where anyone can
book time with me to talk about Node-RED.</p>
<p>I’m using Calendly to let people sign-up for a time slot without having to do
the awkward email back and forth to find a free time.</p>
<p>Calendly provides some really nice options to help manage this. I’ve told it
I’m available all day on Fridays for 25 minute calls - but that it should only allow
a maximum of 4 calls on any one day. It’s also synced up with my Google Calendar
so I can easily block-out times when I’m otherwise unavailable.</p>
<p>If you want to schedule some time with me for a chat about Node-RED, then
you can do that <a href="https://calendly.com/knolleary">right here</a>.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>We’ve started watching <a href="https://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-great">The Great</a>.
More historical costume drama/comedy. The first episode has just dropped off All4 - which
is why we started it at 11pm last night even through Jo had to be up at 6am for work.
But so far worth a watch if you can find it.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>I have read about 4 pages of Mythos in the last week. Will do better this week.
Just not tonight as it’s now 11:58pm as I write this. Better get it published
whilst it’s still Tuesday.</p>
</li>
</ul>