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Articles

This page lists all articles in reverse chronological order. Use the Categories page to view the list of categories or Search to locate a particular article.

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  • 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).

  • Free Password Generator for Windows

    Sunday, January 25, 2026 at 04:35 PM in Delphi, Microsoft Windows

    While I sat around the house waiting for Winter Storm Fern to hit us, I decided to spend some time finishing a simple Windows application I started a while back; a simple Password Generator for Windows.

  • Added Eleventy-Fetch to the Site

    Tuesday, January 13, 2026 at 07:13 AM in Eleventy

    AI Generated   The article discusses how the Eleventy Fetch plugin can be used to cache API requests in al 11ty site. By making a few changes to the code, the plugin handles data processing automatically. This simplifies the code and reduces the need for manual data conversion. Additionally, the plugin supports custom headers and options for more complex API calls. Overall, implementing the Eleventy Fetch plugin can improve performance and reduce the risk of rate limiting when making repeated API requests on a website.

  • Eleventy Require Not Defined in ES Module Scope

    Sunday, January 11, 2026 at 07:13 AM in Eleventy

    AI Generated   I recently published a new Eleventy plugin that generates a list of links from the current page. However, when I tried to implement it on my site, which was still running on Eleventy 2.x, I ran into module problems. After upgrading to Eleventy 3.x, I still encountered errors. It wasn't until I sought help from the Eleventy Discord community that I realized I had missed fixing `require` statements within my site's modules and global data files.

  • Eleventy Adding Page Links to a Post

    Saturday, January 10, 2026 at 07:04 PM in Eleventy

    AI Generated   I created a plugin called Eleventy Plugin Markdown Post Links that adds a list of links to the top of my posts. The plugin has options for different types of lists and can generate links based on a minimum number specified. I implemented it on my site with a collapsible link list feature. You can find the source code on GitHub and a demo site showcasing the plugin's capabilities.

  • Robinhood Withdrawal Attempt Detected

    Monday, January 5, 2026 at 07:05 AM in Phishing

    Received a simple phishing email today; this one's interesting because the scammers sending this email avoided many sophisticated ways to make this email look legitimate and simply pushed me to call a number where they'll supposedly help me resolve the issue.

  • Goodreads Reading Challenge 2025

    Monday, December 29, 2025 at 08:40 PM in Miscellaneous

    I checked out my Goodreads Reading Challenge statistics for 2025 and I did quite well against my goal this year. I've been working through all of my old books I've had lying around and trying to minimize new book purchases (with little success). If I read in 2026 like I did in 2025 (and previous years), I should be able to get through most of them next year.

  • Phishing Marriott Pillow Promotion

    Wednesday, December 24, 2025 at 07:38 AM in Phishing

    I received a lot of new spam and phishing messages lately; I have some analysis articles queued up to write. For this post, I'm writing about a very professional looking phishing email that appears to be from Marriott. I'll prove here that the message is not from Marriott and they're not giving customers free pillows.

  • Firebase Hosting a HTML Boilerplate Site

    Thursday, November 20, 2025 at 05:45 PM in Cloud Development, Web Development

    Last night, I started playing around with a new Firebase project; deploying a hosted web app with some functions. I decided to use the HTML Boilerplate template for the web app and want to run a build before deploying the web app to Firebase. Looking around at the documentation, I struggled to find an easy way to do this.

  • UPS Tracking URL Builder

    Friday, September 26, 2025 at 08:52 PM in Miscellaneous, Delphi

    When you order packages online, a lot of vendors provide you with a tracking number instead of a tracking URL for your package. Or, when you get a tracking URL from UPS, the URL has a bunch of extra junk in it that isn't needed to actually track the package. In frustration, I built a little Windows app (in Delphi, of course) that takes a UPS tracking number and converts it into a tracking URL you can use to, you know, track the package.

  • Learning Progressive Web Apps Site Shutdown

    Sunday, September 7, 2025 at 01:11 PM in Miscellaneous, Mobile Development, Web Development

    Back in the middle of 2019, I published my last book: Learning Progressive Web Apps. It was probably my most mainstream book, a book about web development rather than my highly focused books on mobile development for PhoneGap and BlackBerry. I was really proud of that book, it was just the right length and the publisher printed it in color which made the content more interesting.

  • Spacing Slats Evenly

    Wednesday, July 16, 2025 at 07:24 AM in Woodworking

    When I built the love seat I described in my previous post, one of the assembly tasks for the seat was to screw slats to the frame spaces a quarter inch apart. Since each slat was 46 inches wide, I had to come up with a unique approach to doing this consistently with only a single pair of hands.

  • Drilling Holes Consistently Across Multiple Pieces

    Sunday, July 13, 2025 at 01:46 PM in Woodworking

    For a woodworking project I completed recently, I had to drill 16 countersink holes in the same location across 8 boards. I created a jig to make this easy and consistent.

  • Setting Windows File and Directory Timestamps to Now

    Sunday, June 29, 2025 at 06:18 AM in Microsoft Windows, Delphi

    When working on a book and sometimes while writing software applications, I like to set my project files (Word documents or other files) to the same timestamp. I'm not sure why I started doing this, but it allows me to set a sort of release grouping on the files based on timestamp.

  • Install Windows DLL Using Inno Setup

    Saturday, June 28, 2025 at 05:50 PM in Delphi

    I recently wrote a Delphi application for Windows that implements a Windows Shell Extension which means I must distribute it as a DLL. I've used Inno Setup for a while now to create and publish Windows installers, but I'd never created one before for a DLL.

  • Magnetic Dust Collection Port

    Saturday, June 28, 2025 at 03:19 PM in Woodworking

    Dust collection is a pretty big problem in my workshop; I've ignored it for a long time, but I decided I had to do something about it. My router table has built-in dust collection under the table and in the fence, but if I'm not using the fence, I make quite a mess in my workshop.

  • Delphi Single Instance App With Runtime Parameters

    Sunday, June 15, 2025 at 03:58 PM in Delphi, Microsoft Windows

    AI Generated   In the article, I learned how to prevent multiple instances of a Delphi application from running simultaneously and published a complete sample application demonstrating it. By assigning a unique name to the application and implementing code to check for existing instances, I can ensure only one instance runs at a time. The article also covered passing command-line parameters between instances and activating the initial instance when a second one is launched.

  • Published Subdirectory Copy v1.1

    Saturday, June 14, 2025 at 12:45 PM in Delphi, Microsoft Windows

    When I created my Subdirectory Copy application, my use case was copying a single set of files to a flash drive. As I got closer to releasing the product, I started thinking more about how users would use it and I realized that the application had to be able to manage multiple filesets for copying.

  • TechSmith Windows Snagit Stops Loading or Capturing

    Friday, June 13, 2025 at 07:45 PM in Microsoft Windows

    A few weeks ago, Snagit stopped launching its capture window on startup (yes, I had automatic launch at startup configured) and stopped being able to capture accurately 90% of the time.

  • Simplifying Copying Music Files to a Flash Drive

    Friday, June 6, 2025 at 02:56 PM in Microsoft Windows, Automobiles

    AI Generated   I created a Windows application called Subdirectory Copy (SubCopy) to automate the process of copying music files from my computer to an external drive for my car's music player. By populating the root directory with my music files and selecting the artist folders to copy, I can easily update my music collection on the external drive.

  • Acura MDX Play Music on USB Flash Drives

    Thursday, June 5, 2025 at 06:48 PM in Automobiles

    In Audi Q7 Drive System Failure I described a problem I had with an Audi Q7 I owned. As soon as I got it back from the dealer (after waiting almost 6 months for them to fix it), I immediately traded it in for a 2025 Acura MDX. The replacement engine they installed in the car had 10,000 more miles than the one that broke, so I knew it was a ticking time bomb.

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