FITCAMX Dash Cam (RAV4)

Hanging out in the RAV4 Prime forums over on RAV4World is dangerous: people are always posting the cool accessories and customizations they’ve made to their vehicles. Based on some threads there (and in the Facebook group), I decided to try installing a dash cam! The recommended model was the Fitcamx Dash Cam but according to their …

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Jamming with the Jammy Jellyfish

Tomorrow It’s “gonna be May” which means it’s time for my annual spring sports update and Ubuntu upgrade! wrapping up their season, the Cavs exited the play-in tournament (losing to both the Nets and Hawks (who in turn were both eliminated in the next round)) the newly renamed Guardians have started their “inaugural” season 9-12 …

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2022 Toyota RAV4 Prime

At the end of February my (until now) trusty 2013 Toyota Highlander had a sudden and unexpected engine failure which, no longer having a working car, sent us on a stressful week and a half of decisions, research, and frustrating shopping (it is really not a good time, supply-chain wise, to be buying a new car).  …

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Indoctrination of the Impish Indri

Note: found this in my drafts … guess I forgot to post it back around October 17th, oops! It’s October … time for cooler (?) weather, fall sports, and a new Ubuntu distro! After a winning a franchise record 100 games, the Tampa Bay Rays’ season ended quickly in the ALDS losing in 4 games …

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Building the Altair-Duino

It’s been over two years since my last classic computer kit build and I was getting that itch to add more blinkenlights to my collection. Chris Davis’ Altair-Duino kit has been on my radar since last December when I saw it on episode #797 of Steve Gibson’s Security Now! podcast (which also introduced me Oscar …

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Hangin’ with the Hirsute Hippo

Spring is here (although my parents up in OH just experienced a late-April snow storm!) which means it’s time to upgrade my Linux server to the new Ubuntu release, 21.04 (Hirsute Hippo). First, the obligatory check-in on my spring sports teams: the Lightning will be heading back to the playoffs to defend their Stanley Cup …

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Putting it all together – Ring, HomeSeer, and Alexa integration

2021 Home Security/Home Automation Re-Design [ Part 3 of 3 ] A lot of my old Pulse automations were based on my ADT alarm sensors: open the door into the garage, turn on the garage lights; alarm armed in Away mode, randomize the indoor lights to make the house look occupied; burglar alarm goes off, …

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HomeSeer HomeTroller Pi and HS4

2021 Home Security/Home Automation Re-Design [ Part 2 of 3 ] As I posted a few weeks ago, back in January I decided to cancel my ADT Pulse service and replace it with a Ring Alarm security system. It wasn’t a 100% feature-complete replacement though, I still needed something to handle the home automation side …

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OctoPrint and the OctoPi

Now that I’m semi-comfortable with the 3D printing process for my Ender 3 Pro (download/create model, slice STL in Cura, save GCode to micro SD card, put micro SD card in printer, print model), I wanted to eliminate the “sneakernet” step of manually shuffling the SD card between my PC and the printer and enable some more …

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