Category: Geeky Stuff

Getting Back into Ham Radio (aka UV5R Basics)

Getting back into ham radio was a long drawn out process for me, and I must admit it’s still ongoing. I don’t necessarily need it for anything, and I’m not one to just sit and chat with strangers, or get into a club of any sort. It’s just not who I am. But, I did …

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Adventures in GitHub (and why I just use Bash)

First let me say- I am not a software developer. But, I’ve written several scripts for system administration of Linux servers. You might say they are programs, but if you ask me, they’re just elaborate one-liners that outgrew the the command line! But they have indeed grown, and one of them is 250 lines at …

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Garage Sale Find: Sangean ATS 505

The Find: A Sangean ATS 505 Shortwave Radio Ah, garage sale season. I love it! There are a number of things I look out for specifically when going to garage sales but I’ve been on the prowl for a shortwave radio for years. Over the weekend, I ran across a Sangean ATS-505. It was in a …

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Adventures in Servers, Part II

In my previous post I mentioned that as a result of a company-wide layoff, my company-supplied server was going to go away. What to do? I think I got it all covered. I wrote up the majority of my adventure at Tidbits For Techs, my Other Blog where I talk about the grittier side of …

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Adventures in Servers

So, the site is loading on its new server. DNS is setup, the whole bit. I’m using Virtualmin on CentOS 7. Previously, I was using a VPS provided by my employer, but they are laying off their remote workforce, and so my server, and my job, are going away. It’s time that I had an …

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What is a Container? And how is it different than a Virtual Machine?

What is a Container? How is it different than a Virtual machine? I’ve been wondering about this- I see lots of hype about how great containers are but I really didn’t understand them. Mind you, I don’ t need to understand them, professionally or otherwise. But still, I like keeping up on what’s new. This article …

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Living like Thoreau.. not all it’s cracked up to be?

image shamelessly stolen from http://juneauempire.com/neighbors/2013-02-24/accumulated-fragments-bear-man-admiralty-island-part-3

This article captures the essence of desire that lurks in many of us- to get away from it all and enjoy the peace and quiet in solitude. As a bona-fide introvert, one of my most memorable camping trips was solo. But this woman did more than that. She lived in the Alaskan wilderness and captured …

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Chewed up and Spit out: Slashdot and SourceForge up for sale

Yep, that’s right folks. After Slashdot.org decided to inflict its Beta system on everyone (and recently changing the front page so that it doesn’t even resemble its former self), and after SourceForge started adding crapware to downloads, DHI Group (Formerly Dice Holdings, Inc.) has seen fit to put them up for sale. To quote: “DHI …

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Do you remember the Amiga computer?

When I was a kid in the mid 80’s, I had a friend named Gerald. He was a couple of years older than me, and therefore much cooler by default. We had two major things in common: Legos and Computers. We both had legos, but he had a much cooler computer. I had a TRS-80 Color …

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So I built an AC Welder from Microwave Oven Transformers.

When I tell people that I built my own welder, I usually get mixed responses. Some people say “Wow, COOL!” and others look at me and probably wonder where the bodies are hidden. Truthfully, my quest to build my own welder started when I didn’t have the money to buy one and desired to learn …

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