Blog

No, I have not sold my soul, v2

This is true despite the fact that I am moving my websites (including this one) away from OVHcloud and/or self-hosting, and am making a shift to using Microsoft 365. Some will never believe that nor accept what I have to say about it, but for me it’s the right decision.

Halting 'Infrastructure via code' project

While our internal tests (using private data that would need to be replaced with dummy data) of a full config were successful, frustrations with ‘our’ OpenStack hosting provider has led to the conclusion that it’s not a viable cloud alternative for us. In addition, is our finding that this approach involves more effort than if Terraform were a viable option, so if we were to continue with public cloud infrastructure we would prefer services with which we can successfully use Terraform.

Web design after all

I’ve ended up doing some frontend web design after all, and have also enjoyed working with the Hugo static website generator.

How not to rebuild a WordPress site

So far the upshot of this is to not expect a simple Export/Import process with WordPress, especially when it comes to the Media Library, if one wants to rebuild a site at the same domain, rather than a domain move, with the previous domain still active.

Archives: Rent or own?

… that got me interested in the question, “How long before one reaches the break even point on the purchase of a residence compared to a lease?”

The problem with thin (pools & volumes)

Linux LVM thin pools and volumes initially seem to be a great way maximize the use of hard drive space by using only the space that is actually allocated to files. There is a major fly in the ointment though. Thin pools cannot be reduced in size.

Archives: Dating with accelerators

I’ve pulled an undergraduate paper (written almost 30 years ago) about Dating with Accelerators, which is about using an Accelerator Mass Spectrometer to achieve very high accuracy radiocarbon dating with small samples.

Facebook "meltdown"

If my feed was showing me what ’engaged’ me why did I get fed up and leave? There are several parts to the answer, but an important piece is the problem that Facebook’s algorithm is largely an uncontrolled ‘positive feedback loop’.

Backing up is hard to do

In my opinion, Windows is deceptively clear and smooth, but when once one really shines a light on it, one finds significant imperfections. Linux may feel a little less polished, but is more what you see is what you get (or better) — there are imperfections for a power user / developer like me, but those idiosyncrasies are minor compared to the more problematic ones found in Windows.