My typical workflow: here’s a thing I need to do. Hm. That seems more difficult than expected. What’s easier than that? And easier than that? No, that’s silly and overcomplicated. Easier than before that? Can I live with that? Probably. Not what I wanted but A-OK.
Tech
VMware Fusion 12 Player
Saturday, August 22, 2020
It is pretty awesome that VMware Fusion Player is replacing VMware Fusion Standard and Player is free for personal use. This is weird to me since I never expect a company to stop asking for money for great software. Now, it seems, I can upgrade VMware Fusion 11 Standard to VMware Fusion 12 Player for free and not miss anything. So weird! I guess VMWare wants to focus on business users and don’t want to cater to end-users like me.Upon a recent update to VMware Fusion 11.5.5, sound began crackling in Windows 10. For some reason
sound.virtualDev = "hdaudio"
was missing from my .vmx file so Windows 10 was using VMWare’s generic audio drivers. Added that line into the .vmx file and all is well as now Windows is using its High Definition Audio device drivers. Thanks to this AppleVis post for giving me the idea.
Follow up: I just noticed that this AppleVis post reported nearly the same issue I had and the same fix. Apparently this may be known to be an issue at VMWare.
Keep MacBook from Sleeping with Lid Down
Saturday, May 30, 2020
The MacOS app Amphetamine is pretty slick. As promised, it keeps my MacBook Air awake even if the lid is closed and there is no external display attached. So now I can run it as a part-time file server (via SFTP and Secure ShellFish for iOS). At least, that’s the plan. Since it is running on a laptop, I really appreciate the audio alert it’ll give if I unplug the MBA while Amphetamine is keeping it awake.I finally got around to messing with iStat Menu's Time menu and I’m sold. Having a calendar and events embedded in the clock is lovely.
Upgraded to 16" MBP ❤️
Sunday, May 17, 2020
Since 2010, I have always had a 13” Mac laptop — now I’m on a 16” MacBook Pro and I love it. I upgraded from a 2018 MacBook Air. I waited for the new 13” MBP. The new 13” MBP had the necessary Magic keyboard but didn’t satisfy in terms of evolution: its screen was not 14” as rumored; it has the same thermal system; the same speakers; and the same mic.Why must Apple hide three finger drag on their touch pads under Accessibility? It’s my favorite touch feature of the touch pad.
Fruit Tree Irrigation: an Experiment
Sunday, April 26, 2020
For several years I’ve watered my fruit trees using a Generation 2 Rachio controller and their irrigation method called “Flex Daily”. This method relies on many variables, a few of which I can only make good guesses at. For example, my soil’s Available Water Capacity from the U.S. Soil Survey. Flex Daily on Rachio is really designed for watering lawns, and I don’t care about lawns. I water fruit trees with unevenly spaced emitters.I can never remember brackets or parentheses for Markdown links!
With [Watchsmith](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/watchsmith/id1483088503), I get a hamburger when my move/exercise/stand goals are met.
Apple delayed shipment of 2020 MacBook Air. Understandable. Buyer’s remorse came fast and furious so I canceled. I’ll keep mashing those butterfly keys for a while longer.
I’d say nationwide telework went very well this last week. Only had a few hours of repeat VPN disconnections. Bandwidth was not constrained relative to my home internet. Good job, CIO staff!
“Hey Siri, play some music.” “Okay, let’s kick things off with Widespread Panic.” 😳
Working from home today - nationwide stress test of VPN.
Not going anywhere unless necessary so time to try Sous Vide London Broil. Just under two pounds of meat held at 132°F/55.6°C for 8 hours. Just salt and pepper for the beef. Will sear it to finish.
At the USDA, I’m not allowed to telework as I haven’t been personally affected by SARS-CoV-2. I’m capable of telework and I prefer it. Guess they’re waiting for mass infections at workplaces first. USDA significantly curtailed telework ~two years ago.
A Very Good Overcomplicated Journal Workflow
Friday, March 6, 2020
Our journal workflow is probably more complicated than it needs to be. There’s room to optimize this workflow. It grew out of our moving away from Day One when they went to the subscription model. At the time there were some terrible limitations and we wanted none of it. Instead, we went with a semi-automated method involving iOS Shortcuts, iOS Notes, 1Writer, Homebrew (for Pandoc and LaTeX toolchain), and my favorite Swiss army knife GraphicConverter.Wednesday, February 19, 2020 →
The pull to “like” on Twitter is impressive. I’m doing my best to refrain but my finger has a mind of its own.
House Wiring is an Adventure
Saturday, February 15, 2020
I finished installing some new switches today. Worst thing I found in the existing wiring that I could fix myself was paint coated copper under the wire nuts. Whoever did that must think wires work off of luck that the wire nuts cut into the copper or magic or induction. Pictured below are neutrals that were paint covered. And you wouldn’t be wrong to guess that the grounds were also covered in paint.Upgraded from (down/up) 175/6 Mbps to 300/11 Mbps soon as I hit the “order” button. $1 less, too. No contract. Worth checking Xfinity internet-only plans periodically! Unreasonably excited at double up speeds.
Caseta & Dimming LEDs
Thursday, January 2, 2020
I replaced a Caseta dimmer switch with the non-dimming version as I’m installing a ceiling fan w/light soon. I’m getting used to tucking and bending wires just so and shoving the switch in with screws ratcheting it snugly in place. I’ve found dimmer switches are difficult since they can’t have anything but lights as a load and those lights (especially LED) better be perfect in their dimming logic and signal response.The [iRobot Braava m6 has a threshold problem](https://homesupport.irobot.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/21012/kw/Threshold) and it is a bit frustrating but workable. In my case it can easily go from laminate (higher) to linoleum but not the other way. It’d perhaps take just a quick rev of the wheels to hop back over up to laminate.
Nest Cam vs HomeKit Secure Video
Sunday, December 1, 2019
There’s been some frustration with the current state of HomeKit Secure Video, but coming from a very pricey Nest Cam IQ Outdoor that basically is useless without another subscription (cancelled when they removed camera features), HomeKit Secure Video is a revelation. I’m using a Logitech Circle 2 with HomeKit Secure Video and its non-delayed, non-lagged, over the LAN, live video starts… every… single… time. Compare this behavior with always having to toggle the Nest Cam IQ Outdoor Cam off and on to get past the blue spinning wheel and get a several second delayed live video.Test from MarsEdit - does RichText convert to MarkDown? Does it bold? Who needs Italians when they steal arctic circle candy? Is underlining for chumps that know nothing of hyperlinks? All these answers and more… to come.
Sometimes my Sonos goes out of sync with the HomePod. The HomePod appears to then go through a process to resynchronize — maybe 75% successful. They’re within earshot of each other so makes since a HomePod might do some fancy sync.
Wednesday, November 27, 2019 →
HomeBrew and SuperDuper! just released MacOS Catalina support so I suppose I will try to upgrade today…
Full Random Albums Playlist Shortcut (Apple Music)
Saturday, November 16, 2019
I love listening to full albums. But often I’m not in the right mood to choose them. So a long time ago I created a Shortcut that creates an Apple Music playlist of a variable number of full, track list ordered albums. It allows you to unselect albums that you have a strong opinion to not listen to. The shortcut unfortunately needs at least a 1 second wait between adding albums or it’ll silently fail and the playlist won’t be complete.Pleased that my HomeKit devices still worked from the Home app during a big Comcast (Xfinity) & Verizon internet outage. Pretty sure Alexa and Google alternatives would have been dead.
Old iPad Pro 9.7” just got replaced by an iPad Pro 11”. I did not expect to be impressed by the differences but dang that’s nice!
I have some anxiety over the iOS 13 Reminders upgrade button. If I upgrade, then my partner has to upgrade, and she lives on reminders. So if the upgrade goes wrong… 😱📱