Remembering Cal Van Dyke
Stories about a friend, colleague, and genuinely good man, written down while they are fresh.
Posts by Category
personal
“It is well” — This Old House, Day 6
City sewer but no city water - three tanks in the basement and pipes like a steam ship.
“As Is” — This Old House, Day 0
Two words I never expected to sign on a house offer, and what the inspection turned up.
This Old House
I accidentally bought a 97-year-old house, and want to keep track of what we are getting into.
“Knob and Tube”
Ceramic knobs, ceramic tubes, two conductors, and three days of electricians in a 1923 house.
Thought-Ending Cliches
The phrases we reach for when we want a conversation to stop, and why they deserve a name.
Ninja, Master Chief, Snow Speeder–Travel Around The World
Three geocaching travel bugs, 34,639 miles, and a few countries I did not expect.
Losing 70 pounds
Seventy pounds in seventeen weeks - the what, the why, and where we go from here.
Candyland, LCR, and Warstorm
Three games that seem fun until you start thinking about them - and why that matters for kids.
Book Review: Think and Make It Happen
Some genuinely useful ideas, but not the one book that solves everything. Two or three stars.
One Month of No Fast Food or Drive Thru
One month without a drive thru, made public so someone will ridicule me if I slip.
How I broke my arm and will now set off every metal detector
Ice under snow at the end of the driveway, and my first attempt at typing in four days.
Where does all the money for schools go?
Everyone says what they would cut first. Nobody explains where the per-student money goes now.
Why I am voting for Nessie
Full disclosure - I am 50% Scottish. Here are my five reasons for this ArtPrize vote.
Fearless by Max Lucado
A well-timed book against the spirit of fear running through nearly every headline.
Homemade Kubb Set Plans and Report
Building a Kubb set from dimensional lumber, with plans and a report from the yard.
Marie Catrib’s Restaurant Review
A Valentine’s lunch date in East Grand Rapids, at a place sourcing food from a scooter trip away.
Outliers by Malcom Gladwell
Gladwell links the Beatles, Bill Gates, and Korean plane crashes - and makes it work.
2009 Reading List – Already out of control
Eleven books arrived in one week, six of them due back soon. Anyone want to read along?
2008 Retrospective
A Shuttle launch, two puppies, an ankle fusion, and the least hi-tech gadget of the year.
Another reason I love Woot.
A shipping delay notice with an actual sense of humor, which is rare in retail.
Someone had to do it!
One of those personalized Flash videos everyone was passing around in 2008.
Day 1 – Festival of Faith and Writing 08
My fourth Festival of Faith and Writing, a Chabon keynote, and why I keep coming back.
Florida Gem #2 – Honeymoon Island / Caladesi Island
Two Florida state parks with almost nobody on them, and the three reasons why.
April issue of EGM reveals Bungie’s next project: Lego Halo – Joystiq
A very good April Fools gag - and a reminder that LEGO Halo would actually be great.
Florida Photos
A slideshow of photos from the Florida trip.
Vacation Update
Coco Beach, terrible bandwidth, and T-minus two days to a Shuttle launch.
Lost English word – "delight" (and other vacation tangents)
When did anyone last say something delighted them? A word that kept coming up on vacation.
Missing You
A rough trip down, and then a view of the pool that makes it hard to complain.
Retire Fire Extinguishers
You cannot just throw an expired fire extinguisher away. Here is what you do instead.
This can’t be a real picture … can it?
A live surge protector, a pool, and a pair of flip-flops. Surely this is staged.
2008 Goals – Take 2
More goals for 2008 - foosball, the user group, staying debt-free, and shipping something in WPF.
2008 Goals – Take 1
Goals for the year, starting with learning a new language - and I think I will do both kinds.
2007’s Resolutions in Review
Looking back at 2007, starting with the year I turned the car radio off.
New Scientist: The Santa Delusion
An article on Santa that got stuck in my head, and the social angle nobody argues about.
Florida Freeze
Plan a trip to Florida and watch the record cold move in right behind you.
Heading "South" – Any Ideas?
Three weeks out, driving south from Michigan, and still no plan. Ideas welcome.
N.J. Orders HIV Testing For Pregnant Women – washingtonpost.com
Doing the math on 230,000 mandated tests, and what that money could buy instead.
Surprise Hit – Play & Freeze Ice Cream Maker
The surprise hit of Christmas - a goofy ball that makes a quart of ice cream if you play with it.
Merry Christmas
Wishing everyone a safe and blessed Christmas.
The Bible According To Google Earth
What the Garden of Eden, the Ark, and the Red Sea might have looked like from orbit.
Pretend to be a Time Traveler Day – Saturday 12/8
Not quite Talk Like a Pirate Day, but there are some very good ideas here.
Blizzard Warning!! FOR HAWAII!!
Now that is something you do not hear every day.
Survey: Few believe a good education is necessary
Fewer than a third of Michigan residents think a good education is essential. Rant on.
Health Care
A Dave Barry quote that sums up at least one side of the health care debate.
Pet Peeve #26
A Black Friday price drop on Vista Home Basic, and three things about that tag that bothered me.
Oxford Word Of The Year: Locavore
Locavore takes Word of the Year - and a good idea gets the name it needed to catch on.
Chuck Norris Political Ad
Chuck Norris finally has some fun with his own Facts, in a surprisingly creative ad.
Walking pneumonia
When that cough isn’t just a cough - and why I am glad I went to the doctor.
Bowling for Junior Achievement
Bowling for Junior Achievement, which reaches 60,000 West Michigan students a year.
If You’re Happy and You Know It…
Some days you just need a little laugh, even the geek kind.
Any good new fall TV?
Down to two shows I watch regularly, and looking for something worth adding this fall.
Show and Tell #5: Cub Scouts – Then and Now
Cub Scout books from 1962 and 2004 side by side - how little changed, and what actually did.
Show and Tell #3: International Pen Pals
Signing up for ten pen pals in the early 80s, and how many of them actually wrote back.
Crazy Canadian Dime
A Canadian dime I could not read, and what it took to figure out what was on it.
Show and Tell #2 – Community College Computer Course
Learning to program on a green-screen terminal, and taking the same class twice for the lab time.
Show and Tell #1: Life’s Experiments (1981)
A floppy diskette from 1981, and a story that probably no one remembers but me.
Collection/Addiction #2: Games
Five tubs of board games, and the hard job of deciding which ones to keep.
Remaining Collection/Addiction #1: Books
Thirty years of collecting books, and every excuse I used along the way.
Not Moving Sale
Doing the math on moving in a terrible housing market, and deciding to stay put.
Habits of Highly Effective Brains
Ten habits for keeping your brain in working order - and I can testify first-hand that they work.
Pessimistic Shipping Dates
A book shipped from 159 miles away with a two-month delivery estimate. Yes, I did the math.
tech
Password guidelines from NIST preview major changes
The draft NIST guidelines finally admit what everyone already does with their passwords.
QR Codes and URL Shorteners – Beware
You would never click that URL. So why do you scan the code that hides it?
Circle with Disney
A small box that budgets, filters, and enforces screen time. There is no filter for stupid.
Windows 8 Fatal Flaw – ARM Tablets only in Unmanaged Environments?
Forget the Start menu argument - ARM tablets that cannot join a domain is the real problem.
EBook Innovations Needed
Four things my Nook still cannot do, that someone with time and resources really should build.
Nook Simple Touch Reader – First Month
A month on the Nook Simple Touch, including what a typical reading day actually looks like.
iPad Hands-On Impressions
Twelve iPads on a table at lunch. I did not buy one, but it is a milestone at $499.
Mouse Mischief: Multiple Mouse Support in PowerPoint with the MultiPoint Mouse SDK
Multiple mice in one PowerPoint, no programming required - a Saturday morning worth spending.
Evaluating the iPad: Consumer vs. Creator vs. Cross Platform
A lifelong Apple fan works out why the iPad announcement left him underwhelmed.
Success in drying out waterlogged Laptop
A drink went into the laptop and it survived. Here is exactly what I did, step by step.
Brother Color Laser Printer HL-4040CDN
A color laser for the house at $279, and why that is no longer overkill.
Dell Latitude 2100 “kidbook” – Detailed First Impressions and Tips
Not a netbook but a kidbook - a laptop actually designed for daily use by kids in schools.
NECC 2009 Themes
Skimming the NECC program for the themes that never change, and the ones missing in 2009.
Windows 7 Makes Vista Look Like “New Coke” – Tips and Impressions
Windows 7 on both my machines, and why so much of what I like is really disappointment with Vista.
Tech Trends and Netbooks
Notes from Keith Brophy’s tenth Tech Trends night, starting with the buzzword bingo card.
What would make a good/great Netbook?
Where One Laptop per Child missed, and what I would actually want in a Netbook for my kids.
Lessons from Keynote #2 – Steve Jobs
The iPhone 3G was the headline, but 42% of the WWDC sessions told the real story.
Lessons from Keynote #1: Bill Gates
Bill Gates’ last keynote as chairman, and what actually mattered in it.
Community Clips
Screen capture with narration that uploads itself - and a test of whether I can write a post in ten minutes.
Cool Tools: Window Clippings
Screen capture that knows you want the window, and cleans up whatever Aero let bleed through.
Cool Tools – ZoomIt v1.8
A free utility that does three things and does them very well - and saves every presentation I give.
Why I like Twitter
I thought Twitter was a waste of time. Six months later, here is why I actually use it.
A few coming privacy / personal information services
Two services that feel inevitable after a week of handing my card details to gas pumps.
First Amazon non-DRM music purchase
My first DRM-free album, after losing too much music to iTunes limbo.
Computer Handyman and Plumber
Home servers and media boxes are arriving faster than the people who can set them up.
15,000 digital pictures (& counting)
Fifteen thousand photos and no good backup story left. How is everyone else handling this?
My Chumby
My geek present this year - a little WiFi touch screen that pulls down widgets all day.
Cool Tool: Tourist Remover
Take a few photos of the same thing and let the software delete everyone who wandered through.
MS Math Add-In for Word 2007
You thought spell check was cool - Word 2007 will now simplify, graph, and solve for x.
6Gb of memory – Now What?!?
Six gigabytes of RAM for $50, and the strange pressure of having more machine than I need.
The Joy of Tech comic… laughter is the best tech support.
Crossing the digital divide means nothing without the educational change to go with it.
MapQuest, Google Maps, Virtual Earth, Yahoo? Anyone?
Every mapping site will route between two points. I want to know how far six hours gets me.
Useless data – but interesting
How many mouse clicks does one person add to the world in a month? I measured mine.
Made in America: By Robots
A t-shirt that says a lot in three words, especially if you grew up near Detroit.
My next car – ideas? Electric? Alternative Energy?
No purchase imminent, but thinking through electric and alternative energy for the next car.
Google Reader: Trends
The Trends page in Google Reader knows exactly how many of those 9,564 items I really read.
UC Berkley launches YouTube channel
Berkeley puts full courses on YouTube, free - and puts them everywhere you already watch video.
Useful Microsoft Word Feature
Type =rand(x,y) in Word and get real filler text instead of mashing the keyboard.
Statetris – USA
Tetris meets the fifty states - and a good example of something a plain web page could not do.
Birthday Stuff – new Nano
A birthday iPod Nano 3G - shorter, wider, thinner, and with a screen you have to see in person.
Michigan Legislature Bills RSS Feed
An RSS feed of what the Michigan Legislature is actually working on this week.
Windows Vista Service Pack 1 Beta
Vista SP1 is coming - so do you upgrade now, wait until spring, or run the beta?
Tafiti (beta)
A Silverlight search concept from Microsoft that lets you shelve and stack your results.
64-bit Vista Oddness
A few gotchas worth knowing about before you move to a 64-bit version of Vista.
Quad-Core Laptop
Admitting I was wrong - a quad-core laptop is coming, for $10,000 and almost no battery life.
Turn On Channel 8
Microsoft’s new community site for students who want to code, connect, and create.
development
M4 Mac, Ollama, and Mandelbrot Sets
Local AI/LLM goodness for Developers
Flutter on Raspberry Pi — Fall 2022
The parts, the steps, and the verdict - Flutter has arrived for regular use on the Raspberry Pi.
Mueller “Netyksho” Indictment — an InfoSec Perspective
Not a political post - a fascinating read on spearphishing and being careful what you click.
The Case for Flutter — Mobile Meta Apps
The handful of apps you should be able to build in any mobile framework - and how to grade the result.
The Case for Flutter — Mobile-Oriented Architecture
Mobile is not just a smaller desktop. A framework for saying why a mobile feature is actually good.
The Case for Flutter
After a talk, an app in the stores, and a lot of notes - why I have grown to really like Flutter.
Flutter Talk Links
The handout links from my Introduction to Flutter talk at THAT Conference 2018.
Fun with Application Security - Beer City Code Conference 2017 - RECAP
Slides from my application security session at Beer City Code in Grand Rapids.
Silverlight Certification Test – Passed
Passing MCTS 70-506, and what is worth reviewing even after years of real Silverlight work.
TalkTimer app for WP7
Green, yellow, red - building a Windows Phone timer app for our Toastmasters meetings.
Why I make a fuss over the release of Visual Studio 2010
My kids asked why I was acting like it was Christmas. Here is the short answer for non-programmers.
What is hypervideo anyway?
What hypertext did for text, hypervideo does for video - and I first tried it on laserdisc in 1992.
Silverlight Kata: IFS Fractals: Full Solution
The finished fractal kata - full source, a live demo, and how the pieces fit together.
Silverlight Kata: IFS Fractals: The MessageBus
Part three of the fractal kata - wiring up a MessageBus so the controls stop knowing about each other.
Silverlight Kata: IFS Fractals: Automating the Transforms
Part two of the fractal kata - encapsulating an IFS transform and driving the iterations from code.
Silverlight Kata: IFS Fractals with TransformGroup and MessageBus
A code kata for practice, not production - IFS fractals in Silverlight, starting with the transforms.
CodeMash Apps for iPhone
CodeMash opened up its schedule as web services and let the community build the apps.
What I Learned at the Silverlight Partner Summit 2009
Notes from Redmond, starting with why community is the only way this learning actually sticks.
Confusion and FUD around Silverlight PDC Announcements
Two Silverlight rumors from the PDC, each with a smidgeon of truth and a lot of FUD.
Programming for Today’s Kids
Every computer used to come with BASIC. Here is what has finally replaced it for kids.
Kodu Review and First Impressions
A visual programming language you drive with an XBox controller - and all three kids are hooked.
Silverlight 101 Presentation and Files from .NET University West Michigan 2009
Slides, code, and references from the Silverlight 101 session at West Michigan .NET University.
What is CodeMash?
Explaining the conference behind all those confusing tweets my friends keep asking about.
ImplicitStyleManager – Hidden Gem in the Silverlight Toolkit November 2008
The Toolkit’s quiet best feature - theming a whole Silverlight app without touching every control.
MVC Beta – Non-GAC implementation
Referencing the MVC beta DLLs locally, and the one property that makes it actually work.
Silverlight IRL #2 – Fast Data Access w/ NHibernate
Wiring up WCF services and NHibernate models behind a Silverlight app, in five steps.
Silverlight IRL – Requests
After a year of real Silverlight work in health care, here is my wish list for the next version.
Silverlight Proof-of-Concept – Top 10 Questions to Be Answered
Ten things we have to prove before betting a multi-million dollar business on Silverlight.
MVC Tips and Tricks from WMDoDN 08
Slides and code from my Day of .NET talk, with detailed posts on the demos to follow.
Microsoft, Nokia Put Silverlight On Mobile Devices
Silverlight is coming to Nokia S60 and Series 40 phones. So how do I get started?
Microsoft DreamSpark
Thousands of dollars of professional development tools, free, as long as you are a student.
Draft of HTML 5 Hints at a Brave New Web
Native audio and video, real page structure, and the long-overdue death of the frame.
Silverlight wins the Gold at the 2008 Olympic Games
NBC will stream 3,000 hours of the Olympics on Silverlight - a bold line in the sand.
Programming WPF: Books: Chris Sells,Ian Griffiths
The best single book on WPF, and the last of my seven WPF books I expect to buy.
Bug or a Feature
The right cartoon at exactly the wrong time of year, while trying to ship software.
Now we’re talking!! ASP.NET 3.5 Extensions Preview
MVC, Entity Framework, and Astoria all in one preview - the highlights from my perspective.
Bug vs. Feature
When life gives you lemons, file it as a feature.
Silverlight 2.0
Silverlight 2.0 delivers just about everything people were asking for - starting with real controls.
VS2008 on Vista x64
How to get Visual Studio 2008 installed on 64-bit Vista without leaving the box in a bad state.
Visual Studio 2008 plug-ins (warning Silverlight 1.1)
Install notes for VS2008, which add-ins survived the move, and why to wait on Silverlight 1.1.
Visual Studio 2008 Ships
Visual Studio 2008 and .NET 3.5 are out - start your downloaders.
Day of .NET Ann Arbor
A great Saturday in Ann Arbor, and a good reason to help start one in Grand Rapids.
Silverlight 1.0 Released
Silverlight 1.0 ships for Windows, Macintosh, and Linux - let’s see where developers take it.
Microsoft Open Source Projects
Open Source and Microsoft are not opposites - nine CodePlex projects I have actually used.
Laptop vs. Desktop for Development
Going back to a desktop after years on a laptop - the pros and cons of each for development.
science
Maker Faire Detroit 2011
A science fair times a thousand, with some state fair and Star Trek convention mixed in.
West Michigan FIRST Robotics Regional Competition
A Saturday in the pits at the FIRST Robotics regional, plus my first YouTube video.
Lunar Eclipse 2008
Clear skies, a reasonable hour, and a red moon I had forgotten was that dramatic.
First "’Bots on the Rock" Meeting a Success!
Eleven kids, six robots, three laptops, and one minefield rescue on the first night.
Shuttle Launch Experience
Seeing STS-122 leave the pad in person, and the Kennedy Space Center tour the day before.
Shuttle Launch Passes Arrived!
The passes came through for the February 7th launch, along with security rules that make the TSA look relaxed.
Astronomy "Craft"?
A string of beads that teaches the real spacing of the solar system - and where Pluto went.
Tribot Sumo Test #1 – WallBot
A LEGO sumo robot built in one sitting - mostly a wall, with one sensor peeking through.
Mousetrap Cars – Any advice?
Seven Cub Scouts, no mousetraps yet, and no practical experience. Advice welcome.
Celestron – LCD Digital Microscope (LDM)
A home microscope that is neither a plastic toy nor a CSI prop. Maybe this is the compromise.
Return of the Heathkit HERO – now with Visual Studio
The Heathkit HERO I used in high school is coming back - this time programmed in Visual Studio.
First Lego League Regional Robotics Competition
A Saturday at the FIRST Lego League regional, where the robot is only a quarter of the score.
Science Museum – Launchpad Online – Launchball
A little Tetris, a little Lego, and some physical science - a nicely addicting puzzle game.
Howtoons: The Possibilities Are Endless!
A comic book that gets kids building things - and makes the case for why that matters.
"WIRED Science" on PBS
The most interesting, intelligent, and still entertaining science show on TV right now.
Solar Decathlon 2007 – LTU: ALOeTERRA
Twenty university teams building solar houses on the National Mall - including the only one from Michigan.
Celebrating space: it’s 50 years since Sputnik
Fifty years since Sputnik - both a long time and a remarkably short one.
More Crystals
A month of growing alum crystals, and what looks like a pocket full of diamonds.
Howtoons – The Infamous Marshmallow Shooter
Five PVC marshmallow shooters built in ten minutes, at about $1.60 each.
Wal-mart Telescopes
A computer-controlled Meade scope in a backpack, on a Wal-mart shelf right next to the candles.
First Dangerous Crystal
The first crystal out of the Dangerous Book experiment - a 1cm pyramid, almost perfectly clear.
Mr. McGroovy’s Box Rivets
Rivets made for cardboard, so the box fort finally outlasts the duct tape.
Google Earth – No, Google Universe …
Google Earth flipped inside out, so you can explore the night sky most of us can no longer see.
Germany Exploring The Moon Too
NASA, China, and now Germany - the Moon is about to be a very busy place.
Crystal Experiment – Take 1
Growing alum crystals on a string with the kids - and learning some patience along the way.
links
Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, December 9, 2024
What is new and interesting in the world of tech, design, and leadership?
Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, December 2, 2024
What is new and interesting in the world of tech, design, and leadership?
Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, November 25, 2024
What is new and interesting in the world of tech, design, and leadership?
Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, November 18, 2024
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Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, November 11, 2024
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Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, November 4, 2024
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Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, October 28, 2024
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Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, October 21, 2024
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Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, October 14, 2024
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Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, September 30, 2024
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Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, September 9, 2024
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Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, August 26, 2024
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Interesting Links for the Week of Monday, August 5, 2024
What is new and interesting in the world of tech, design, and leadership?
Post Interesting Links to Blog 12/08/2009
Links saved from Diigo - the college football bowl schedule.
Post Interesting Links to Blog 11/27/2009
Links saved from Diigo - Catan Portable Edition.
Post Interesting Links to Blog 07/31/2009
Links saved from Diigo - the GR Social Marketing group and tomorrow’s meetup.
Post Interesting Links to Blog 07/30/2009
Links saved from Diigo - a possible output caching option for ASP.NET MVC.
Post Interesting Links to Blog 07/28/2009
Links saved from Diigo - a good source of free vector clip art.
Post Interesting Links to Blog 06/30/2009
Links saved from Diigo - netbooks landing in school districts, and SMS polling for presentations.
jobs
Don’t Get Cut by Hanlon’s Razor
Hanlon’s Razor tells us not to assume malice. Dreyfus, Dunning, and Kruger guide us towards what to assume instead.
The Seven Stages of Job Satisfaction
The mental stages job seekers go through over time, and the main factors that influence movement and decisions.
Laborer, Craftsman, and Artist
Thirty years of software labor and craftsmanship - and why artistry has been the elusive one.
The critical value of the in-person “rock tumbler” for polishing products and people
Remote, in-person, or hybrid - what the whiteboard and the napkin still do that cameras cannot.
Quit Bowling, and Start Digging Ditches – WCAGLS Day 1
Two lines from Seth Godin and Steven Furtick that I am still thinking about days later.
Lessons Learned: Craftsmen and artists of all types have a lot in common
Ten things I learned at a writers conference that apply just as well to building software.
Toastmasters for Techies
A new Toastmasters group in Grand Rapids, and the five things that got me in the door.
Continuous Learning Lessons from Leaf Blowing
Teaching my daughter to run a leaf blower, and everything corporate training would have done instead.
How I Got Started in Software Development
First program at 11 on a Commodore PET, and the librarian who let me disappear for the afternoon.
PC ProSchools of Grand Rapids
A Microsoft training facility in Grand Rapids I had never heard of, and a tour I did not expect.
Passed a Microsoft test – last minute 2007 goal achieved!
Passed 70-536 in the last week of the year, plus ten things on the exam that surprised me.
Bill Gates: The skills you need to succeed
Seven skills from Bill Gates that read a lot like the questions we use to interview new team members.
If you have to work in a cube …
If I have to work in a cube, I want one like this - separate from the house and steps from fresh air.
Sharpen the Saw for Developers
Scott Hanselman’s ideas for keeping developers current - book libraries, brown bags, and Nerd Dinners.
Unskilled and Unaware of It
How knowing less about a skill or topic gives the impression that you know much more than you really do.
The Dreyfus Model of Skills Acquisition
The skill levels people go through - from Advanced Beginner, to Competent, to Expert, and Master.
blog
Rebooting the blog in WordPress
Back to blogging after a hosting disaster, this time on WordPress - and here is why.
Blogging Drought – Cheap Computer – ‘Bots on the Rock
Sickness in the house, a robotics club race coming up, and my fast computer is now just normal.
BlogEngine.NET 1.3 released
Upgrading the blog to 1.3, and the one place SQL Server 2000 made me work for it.
BlogEngine.NET 1.2
Upgraded the blog over lunch, and it was relatively painless. Now to get back into the code.
Post from the Road
Speaking a blog post into a phone and having it post itself - just to see if it works.
Starting fresh
Time to move to a new blog platform - BlogEngine.NET
ai
MCP Security Framework - June 2025 Updates
MCP Security, Authentication, Authorization, Best Practices, updated June 2025
LLMs get their own OWASP Top 10
An updated list for 2025 of risks and mitigations for LLM applications
Reducing Shady ChatGPT Code Suggestions with Custom Instructions
Old frameworks, unsafe ciphers, and code that will not compile - a set of Custom Instructions that helps.
AI Tools: Is it Ethical? Legal?
Is using AI coding tools cheating? The legal answer is unknown, so here are both arguments.
ui
Reason #458 People Don’t Like Computers
Search results that found plenty and showed me none, then asked if I was satisfied.
Genealogy made easy
A Genealogy app called Family.Show using WPF
physics
Water Weenies and Crystals
Latex tubing, surgical clamps, and a supply of Aluminum Sulfate - summer projects with the kids.
Wii Physics – Measure your 0-60 time with a Wiimote
The Wii remote as a cheap 3-axis accelerometer - measuring G forces and your 0-60 time.
nature
New Top Bird in the yard:Dark-eyed Junco
A new bird visitor that winters in Michigan - the Junco
World Animal Day – boston.com
Narwhals in Arctic Bay - a photo so strange I could not tell whether it was real.