Tech, music, and other transmissions from a GenX systems guy in Denver.
// recent posts //
- [ jd303 ]
Greetings, fellow network hoarders. Today we're setting up Samba on the pi - SMB shares accessible from Windows, Mac, and Linux without installing anything on the client side. Your pi becomes a NAS. This is part 4 of the CTLab Homelab series.
These detailed instructions are for the sysadmins that want to know what's actually happening on the wire. If you're a lamer and just want the files, head to warez and let the bootstrap handle it.
[ read more ][ jd303 ]Greetings, fellow silicon soldiers. Today we're installing Claude Code on the Pi we set up in part 1 so it runs as a persistent session you can SSH into from anywhere. Your dev environment, always on, always where you left it. This is part 3 of the CTLab Homelab series.
Again, these are detailed instructions on how to do this for the wannabe wizards. If you want to be a lame voodoo programmer you can also just skip to the warez section and use the bootstrap to get this all running immediately.
[ read more ][ jd303 ]Greetings, fellow packet rats! Today we're adding Pi-hole to the stack: local DNS, ad blocking, and custom hostnames for every service on the network. This is part 2 of the CTLab Homelab series. Part 1 covers OS setup, Docker, and nginx.
Don't forget, these are detailed instructions on how to do this for real h4x0rZ that want to know how things work. If you want to fail at your Guru Meditation you can also just skip to the warez section and use the bootstrap to get this all running immediately.
[ read more ][ jd303 ]Greetings, fellow baud bandits! Running a home lab is something every 31337 h@ck3r needs to do. Today we'll be learning how to run a local web server on a Raspberry Pi 5 using nginx and Docker Compose. In future installments of this series, we'll install Pi-hole for local DNS (and ad-blocking) so everything gets a real hostname on your network, create a local Certificate Authority for secure connections, set up Home Assistant, and lots of other interesting things!
[ read more ][ jd303 ]pixie_technologist spent the week of July 27-31, 2026 at Silicon STEM Academy's Circuits & Sensors: Smart Device Lab camp. This one's hers, written herself, no interview this time.[ pixie_technologist ]What are you reading this on? Your phone? Computer? Inside of that small device is a series of complex soldered bread computer chips, wires, buttons, and more. Do you know how to make a computer? Most likely, your answer is no.1 But, I do. This summer, I went to a camp that taught me how to make a game-boy, a device similar to what you're reading this on right now. Using the same techniques used to make the modern phone and computer we all know and love, I made an electronic that's commonly known. Let's dive in.
[ read more ][ jd303 ]The pixie_technologist post was about a kid who could show you a scoreboard: a robot, a science fair display, judges, a ribbon, tangible artifacts that all came with a result attached.
yummy_artisan doesn't operate that way.
About six months ago he announced he wanted to learn drums, with no explanation beyond simply wanting to. I didn't buy him a kit or sign him up for lessons. Instead, I printed out 12 practice patterns and told him he had 2 weeks to learn them. I wasn't going to remind him or ask twice. If he learned them, he could take lessons.
[ read more ][ jd303 ]I love real data. A thousand actual responses beat one VC's keynote pitch every time. There's some hype baked into a self-selected survey, sure, but it's still real people describing real problems, how they think, how they're actually using these tools, day to day.
[ read more ]
[ jd303 ]This is a data dump post. This is the post with the most. There is lots of miscellanea, this is what we saved for later. This is the stuff that got cut, this is the overflow glut, for time and space and the recaps, here's what fell through all the gaps. Four keynotes deep and nothing's lost: Fable, Sonar, DeepMind, and cost, Dreaming, DSPy, and the code that's secure, robots still standing, still not quite mature.
[ read more ][ jd303 ]Somebody in AIWF scheduling has a sense of humor, intentional or not. Thariq Shihipar opened Day 3 at 9:05, followed twenty minutes later by Tariq Shaukat, who actually acknowledged the coincidence on stage himself. Two Tariqs, back to back, and I couldn't tell you if that was deliberate booking or just how this industry works now. Fun way to kick off the day, but it's not what actually stuck with me.
[ read more ][ jd303 ]Denver is a city that goes to sleep at 10pm on weeknights. Some weekend evenings, it might be up till 1 or 2am with the bars and clubs letting people out, concerts ending, the Nuggets or Avs fans grabbing a pint after extra time in the game, maybe a bacon wrapped sausage scarfed down as you're heading back to your home. But on a Sunday night? Maybe a few service industry folks, and that's it. San Francisco? It's much more awake. Bike couriers with boomboxes playing techno with shiny bright LEDs flashing, drunk girls spilling drinks over the floor of my hotel, tech bros bouncing around outside, it was still pretty lively when I got to my hotel.
[ read more ]