Its stupid, but still..

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AI is (as promoted) both stupid and destructive but sometimes it can still be fun.

Complaining about my neighbours AC unit I said I was resigned but still might introduce a skunk to their yard. When challenged on my definition of “resigned” I turned to Gemini:

re·signed

/r??z?nd/

adjective

Accepting something unpleasant that one can no longer avoid; passively submissive. However, according to subsection 4B of the unspoken laws of cosmic karma, this state of total surrender automatically activates a clause of petty retaliation. Because you have accepted defeat, you are now legally and spiritually entitled to weaponize a highly disgruntled Mephitis mephitis (striped skunk) to exact absolute, foul-smelling vengeance upon the author of your misfortune.

Usage Examples

  • “With a resigned sigh, Arthur accepted that his coworker had stolen his lunch for the third time this week, quietly unlatching the carrier cage he had hidden under his desk.”

  • “She became completely resigned to the fact that her landlord wouldn’t fix the plumbing, meaning it was officially time to deploy the revenge skunk into the building’s HVAC system.”

Synonyms

  • Passive

  • Acquiescent

  • Biological-warfare-adjacent

Note: True resignation is not about giving up; it is about quietly waiting for the scent glands to charge.

Nginx Notes

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Way back in https://macblaze.ca/?p=14445 I set up Nginx to  handle port forwarding to my home computer. Since then I have modified it a bot and I wanted to make a not of those mods here.

Site in a subfolder

  • I have the subdomain xxx.macblaze.ca.
  • I want to have it access a site at 192.168.1.xx:8080
  • in a folder /folder

Set up the subdomain as usual

  1. go to Custom Locations
  2. location /
  3. Forward Hostname/IP 192.168.1.xx/folder
  4. Forward Port 8080

Docker container

  • ensure the container and Nginx’s container are on the same network. (current code method)

Set up the subdomain as usual

  1. go to Details
  2. Forward Hostname/IP <container-name> (get using docker ps --format "{{.Names}}")
    or Container IP
  3. Forward Port <the internal port>

 

Two Sites/Apps on one subdomain

  • I have the subdomain xxx.macblaze.ca.
  • I want to have it access a site at 192.168.1.xx1:8080
  • I want the subdomain xxx.macblaze.ca/app to access an app at 192.168.1.xx2:8080

Set up

  1. the subdomain as usual for the site
  2. go to Advanced Locations
  3. Add: 
    location /app {
    proxy_pass http://192.168.1.xx2:8080/;
}
location /app/ {
    proxy_pass http://192.168.1.xx2:8080/;
}

Ahoy… AI

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I was going though deleting threads in Chat GPT the other day (it swears if i delete them it won’t remember them …. hmmmmm….). Anyway I decided to add back in a bit of personal data by way of Penelope.

It took this:

A mute Calico cat sitting on a wood floor.

“this is my cat . Can you give me an image of her as a napoleonic era sea captaiin. tuck her ears in the hat and have a cannon fring from the ship in the background”

(Note: AI is making my typing so lazy!)

And gave me this:

The head of a long-hair muted calico cat in a Sea Captain's uniform wearing a black cocked hat. One paw on a ships wheel. Cannons are firing in the background.

Add a python app

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Just computer note…

I wanted to run a Flask web app for L’s Moodle conversions and doing it on the Mac server seemed the best idea. I put the web app into the www folder. Here were the steps…

cd /to_folder

python3 -m venv venv

source venv/bin/activate

pip install Flask

pip install pypandoc

python3 main.py

 

To come…

Add Gunicorn

New(ish) Kobo

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An image of a Kobo Libra ereader

Back in July I thought I would spend a little money on a treat for myself. I didn’t need an new ereader (my old Aura was still working ok, albeit was a bit battered) but I wanted to check out the side handle on the Libra to see if it was more comfortable when reading at night.

A recap

I started back in 2009 with a Sony PRS-650. I used that until its battery died. Then I switched to a  Sony PRS T1  in 2013.

In 2014 I got a new Aura HD because I wanted a backlight (and was immediately a bit annoyed when I realized you needed to have a Kobo account just to use it to read books). I worked around that by having an account for the ereader that I never used and a separate account for any purchases I made and side loaded all my books through Calibre. This got replaced in 2017 with a new generation Aura after an unfortunate accident involving a suitcase and hard airport floor.

A kobo ereader with a screen that is full of weird shapes and broken images.

New reader

Which brings me to this year and my new Kobo Libra 2 with a colour screen. It’s not bad. I don’t much have use for the colour screen and the variable colour backlight is a bit annoying (more on that later). But over all I like the way it feels in the hand, like the fact the page turn buttons are back (haven’t seen them since the Sony) and am appreciative of the move to usb C.

Account registration

One of the bonuses was I looked into the whole “must have an account to use” idiocy again and found a hack:

  1. Connect Libra Colour to PC.
  2. Go to \.kobo\Kobo and find the Kobo eReader.conf file.
  3. Open the file and add the line SideloadedMode=true under the [ApplicationPreferences] section.
  4. Done! The device will now display the “My Books” tab straight away, and the online store will be disabled. You can re-enable everything by doing the same thing and adding SideloadedMode=false instead of true.

You lose the  main screen that shows the Books Reading etc but since I rarely used that its no great loss.

The downside is there are a number of “ghost” titles in the lists showing up under Author view that must have been something to do with promotions and I assume they would have been deleted int eh intial setup but annoyingly show up when I am browsing books on the ereader itself.

I have screwed around with editing the hidden KoboReader.sqlite file on the eredaer and while I can find the books in some tables, deleting them doesn’t seem to get rid of them. I imagine there are associated tables I need to clean as well but so far no joy unless I want to delete everything and start over. Still a possibility…

Battery life

I had/have a beef with the battery though. The Libra has a fancy dimming functionality. If you set bed time for, let’s say 11:00 pm, it will start slowly changing the colour of the backlight from cool (blue) to warm (orange) and dimming the screen for reading in the dark. I thought this was the cat’s meow.

But.

The battery life sucked. I mean I was recharging every 4 days! One night I hit the 10% battery life warning which used to mean I had several hours of charge left and it went out on me in less than 15 minutes. This was beyond unacceptable. I didn’t want colour at all, let alone if it was going to be such a huge battery suck. But googling yielded no solutions or even anyone else’s notice of the problem — I was starting to think maybe I got a dud ereader.

Then I started fiddling with settings and one night turned off the automatic dimmer and dialed the backlight down to 30% — which is a bit below my preferred level but workable. The next morning the battery indicator showed it was still full. Aaargh. I have left it that way and played with the colour and level and so far so good. It has only been a couple of days but the improvement is significant. I will keep on playing and see if I can nail down the exact battery-draining culprit, but so far it seems its just the timing function. Why Kobo would have such a ridiculous battery suck as a bart of the software is beyond me.

Happy?

I think so. I like the handle and page turn buttons. Now that the battery is better I have more faith in it (although I now keep my old Aura up to date and charged in case). It is a bit more bulk and doesn’t fit in a pocket anymore but that’s not an issue I care too much about except when my hands are full. And it is zippy! Interface things the Aura used to do badly like scrolling actually make sense now that the response is immediate instead of having to pause between touches.

But if I am feeling rich again I might finally break down and try a Boox or a Pocketbook. Still annoyed at Kobo? Why yes, how could you tell…? 🙂

A Kobo libra showing a list of books