Tech Tidbits & More

Welcome to the Internet Home of John M. Wargo; I created this site back in 2009 so I could post articles about things that interested me. Herein you’ll find articles on a lot of different topic areas: Mobile development, Web development, Internet of Things (IoT), and a lot more. Every time I learn some new technology or complete some cool or interesting development or IoT project I publish an article here.

You’ll also find information about my books, source code projects on GitHub, and articles published in or on other sites or magazines, even videos of my many conference presentations or project demonstrations. I’m also especially fond of the series of Stupid Developer Tricks posts.

You can view all articles in reverse chronological order, or you can find articles by category. Of course, if you can’t find what you need in those views, use Search to find anything anywhere on the site.

Recent Posts

• Note: An AI Generated pill displayed in the list below indicates that the post description displayed on the page was generated from the post content using Generative AI (GenAI). The post content itself was written by a human (me).

• Adding Sidebars to an Eleventy Site

  Date: Posted Sunday, November 3, 2024 at 02:43 PM  | Categories: Eleventy

  I decided recently that one of the things missing from this site was the ability to have call-outs in the content. My buddy Scott Good was here this weekend working on something in my workshop, so, while we waited for some glue to dry, I asked him to add some call-out CSS to the site. After he left, I added some code to the site to make it all work.

• No Posting

  Date: Posted Tuesday, October 15, 2024 at 07:53 PM  | Categories: Miscellaneous

  Wow, no posts from me in a while. I apologize for that, but I've been spending a lot of time in my workshop making sawdust, and I've not had much I wanted to blog about.

• Flame Throwing Pumpkin

  Date: Posted Tuesday, October 15, 2024 at 07:34 PM  | Categories: Arduino, Internet of Things (IoT)

  Back in 2019, I decided to finally start work on a Flame Throwing pumpkin project for Halloween. I saw some projects like this in the past, and I wanted to do my own version. Some projects do some pretty sophisticated things to make a flame thrower in a pumpkin (like using a solenoid to push down the nozzle of a spray can (hair spray or WD-40)) but others use a simple air freshener (short spurt) in front of a candle.

• Cloned Tool Shopping

  Date: Posted Wednesday, July 24, 2024 at 07:26 PM  | Categories: Woodworking

  As you probably know from this site, I'm a geek and a software developer. I'm also a woodworker and it feels like I'm going to pull in more woodworker stories this year - mostly because I've been doing more woodworking than coding lately.

• Oval Router Template

  Date: Posted Sunday, July 14, 2024 at 08:41 AM  | Categories: Woodworking, 3D Printing

  Over the US 4th of July holiday, we were hanging around with family when my sister in law mentioned that she wanted to get an Owl House for her back yard in order to attract an owl to live in her yard. I'd never made an Owl House before, so I quickly volunteered to make one for her.

• Google Functions Deploy Module

  Date: Posted Thursday, July 11, 2024 at 06:41 PM  | Categories: Cloud Development

  Describes a node.js based CLI I created to make it easier to deploy multiple Google Cloud Functions with a single terminal command.

• Spam Chase Auto Pay Disabled

  Date: Posted Thursday, July 11, 2024 at 07:31 AM  | Categories: Phishing

  I received another supposed Chase Bank Phishing email the other day and thought I'd spend some time analyzing it.

• Connection Request

  Date: Posted Tuesday, July 9, 2024 at 07:48 AM  | Categories: Miscellaneous

  I often get LinkedIn connection requests where I just don't understand the potential connection value.

• Generating Post Descriptions Redux

  Date: Posted Monday, July 1, 2024 at 09:04 PM  | Categories: Artificial Intelligence

  AI Generated   I recently published a post about 3D printing but forgot to set a description. Luckily, I used the Describer GenAI extension for Visual Studio Code to quickly generate a description for me. It only took a few clicks and seconds to add a nice description to the post before publishing it.

• 3D Printing Paradise

  Date: Posted Monday, July 1, 2024 at 08:40 PM  | Categories: Project Builds

  AI Generated   I bought a 3D printer during the pandemic but struggled with it, so I upgraded to a P1S printer from Bambu Lab. The new printer is enclosed, self-leveling, and fast, making it easier to use. My daughter loves using it for cosplay projects. I also bought a lot of filament and have been impressed by the quality of free models available online. I recently used the printer to create a wooden enclosure for a T5 e-Paper display unit, but had to find a 3D printer plan for a better fit due to the unit's design. The prints turned out amazing, and I'm excited to see the final result.