Weeknotes 196

The number of programmers who don’t seem know how a mailing list works is concerning for the profession.

When machines/nodes are added to your tailnet the keys used are set to expire – a reasonable default. However, Tailscale does not tell you when a key is about to expire or has expired.

This is a long way of telling you I’ve lost access to a remote node on my tailnet. And I won’t be able to get access again without physically being in the same room. Not the end of the world but a lesson I feel I should have seen coming.

If you’re wondering just how bored I am, and why wouldn’t you be, this week I bought a multi-pack of A6-sized expandable file folders to organise my conference sticker collection.

A few words about indie app business

My recommendation is to diversify. Don’t just have one app, but also don’t have 10 apps – you won’t be able to keep up with all of them. Have 2-4 solid apps. One of them may be the main source of income, but have some fallback app(s) that can keep you afloat if something like this happens to you.

Wise words.

Now just the small task of coming up with a any single app idea and mustering the motivation required.

Finally, a modicum of success in one of my projects. Money was indeed thrown (I bought this doo-dad) and I have managed to mount some of my office artwork in a satisfactory way. But boy, did I fuck it up a lot first. This is what test pieces of mounting board are for. Always buy extra.

Meet Rayhunter: A New Open Source Tool from EFF to Detect Cellular Spying

Rayhunter is a new open source tool we’ve created that runs off an affordable mobile hotspot that we hope empowers everyone, regardless of technical skill, to help search out CSS around the world.

CSS (also known as Stingrays or IMSI catchers) are devices that masquerade as legitimate cell-phone towers, tricking phones within a certain radius into connecting to the device rather than a tower.

What’s New in Neovim 0.11 – a new major release of Neovim.

How to handle working software

You have stumbled onto the dark matter of our industry - our ultimate goal and worst nightmare: working software.

I’ve felt this exact thing, but not often, which is a sad state of affairs indeed.

More bank account incompetence – two examples this time.

1. The bank have decided it’s important that I accept a dialog in their iOS app which would let me accept payments via my phone. I won’t be doing this, and I don’t want to give you permission. Of course, there is no way to say “no” they just re-prompt you until the end of time. It’s a good job I don’t need to use the app very often.

2. Banks are required to collect personal information for “checks”. I understand this. But if you’re going to ask for it it would be cool if your app worked when trying to submit it, yeah?

Is the 1% extra interest I’m receiving worth this?

I’ve been trying out Quiche Browser (terrible name) on iOS as a replacement for Arc Mobile which I’m pretty sure The Browser Company are getting bored of. I’m not loving it so far. I will persist for a bit longer.

Encoder Comparison – x264 vs x265 vs VP8 vs VP9 – Compare different codecs interactively, nice.

Last week I decided to return one of the “non-working” Game Boy Color screens to whence it came. The helpful support person said they would check it over when it arrived back with them, and guess what? It worked. They hooked it up, and it worked.

Whilst it’s good to know the unit it definitely working, this lays the blame for it not working with my GBCs squarely on my shoulders. A long email thread ensued and they were very helpful in trying to get it working for me, alas they were also stumped. Still, I have some generic advice and vague plan on how to move forward but I am not optimistic. And, of course, I spent more money.