My ZFS SSD pool seems to be working!

My ZFS SSD pool seems to be working!

I moved my main hypervisor, Alpha, into a new server case; a compact Inter-Tech with 8 hot-swappable bays in the front.

I also moved the four SSDs over from the failed ZFS SSD pool project, and this time it worked! 😃

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My 100th post — and some thoughts on writing

My 100th post — and some thoughts on writing

This is my 100th post! 33 posts (one third 😮) of those were written in 2021. And it’s only the beginning of May 🙂

I’ve tried and failed at blogging several times before, changed platform, and failed again. But this time I have managed to keep it going, at least so far, since I migrated back to Hugo in January.

I’m still migrating content from my old wiki, and have about 25 posts left. I’ve built and documented my electronics projects since 2006, so it’s nice to have all that history in one place — this blog.

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Topping E30 DAC, on Arch Linux

Topping E30 DAC, on Arch Linux

I’ve been looking for a reasonably priced DAC for a while. I’m not an audiophile — but I do enjoy high quality, clear and true audio.

Yesterday I received the Topping E30 DAC — which, according to Passion for Sound offers “Amazing Value & Performance!” 😃

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Dominant color background on cover images — with Hugo

Dominant color background on cover images — with Hugo

I recently added a CSS background color to my cover images, using the dominant color from the cover image itself. It is a nice effect, and gives the appearance of faster load time — should the image take some time to complete.

For my transparent cover images; I made the background very opaque, providing a soft touch of color. I think it looks nice 🙂

Here is how I did it. 👇

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Implementing photo gallery posts in Hugo

Implementing photo gallery posts in Hugo

I’ve been thinking about adding some kind of photo implementation on this blog since I first set it up. I didn’t really know what I wanted, or how I wanted to use it - so I’ve been putting it off.

The last couple of weeks I’ve been more interested in photography, even borrowed a macro lens to see if that is something I enjoyed (it was 👍)

It’s time to tackle the photo implementation!

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First real macro photos — Mona’s flowers

First real macro photos — Mona's flowers

I’ve been fascinated by macro photography lately — and as luck, or fate, would have it; Mona is sowing lots of flowers right now 😄

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Three useful Ansible info playbooks

Three useful Ansible info playbooks

I recently started upgrading my servers and containers to Ubuntu 20.04. I made three Ansible playbooks to get information about which hosts I needed to update.

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SIOS — the serial protocol syntax I made

SIOS — the serial protocol syntax I made

When I first started making AVR modules, there was no Raspberry Pi or ESP8266. Arduino was introduced in 2005, the same year I started with the AVR microcontroller. But I didn’t know of it until many years later.

There weren’t any Wi-Fi enabled microcontrollers at that time. Both Ethernet and Bluetooth interfaces were more expensive, and harder to interface. So I ended up using the good old serial port.

I made my first module with a serial interface in 2007. RS-232 was cheap, and easy to implement.

With RS-232 I got a way of getting data between the microcontrollers and the computer, but I still needed a defined syntax. So I set out to make one, and called it SIOS — Serial Input/Output System.

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After trying a lot of task managers, I came back to Todoist

After trying a lot of task managers, I came back to Todoist

I’ve tried a lot of task managers. Todoist was the first task manager I used, back in 2015. I was very happy with it, got premium, but stopped using it about 1½ years later — so what happened?

The answer is rather simple; I got overwhelmed. Not by Todoist, but by the tasks. It may seem counter-intuitive to stop using a task manager when the tasks become overwhelming — and it is. Instead of tackling the growing number of tasks, I convinced myself that the problem was the tool; Todoist.

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New tiny pipe — and more pipe tobacco

New tiny pipe — and more pipe tobacco

I recently got into pipe smoking, and I have enjoyed it a lot. There is a certain amount of peace and mindfulness about it that I really enjoy.

So I felt it was time to get another pipe — and some more pipe tobacco 😃

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