Category: tech

Minecraft

Just over a year ago I ran a Minecraft server on a used Windows 8 tablet converted to Windows 10. It soon became apparent it wasn’t the best solution so I looked around and eventually figured out https://mcprohosting.com would give my daughters and me the best and cheapest performance.

We picked a world seed, fired it up and began to explore. My youngest daughter took to it like a, er… child does to new things, and explored the world, made and built things, exploited it as far as it could go, and then pretty much left for places she could more easily interact with her friends. No great loss there.

Before their boredom set in I built a scale model of our home and let the girls furnish it – and populate it with Mollie cat and Ruby dog.

But the very best thing I did was creat a perpetual morion machine using red stone and plungers. Here’s the YouTube video, screenshot not long before I closed the hosting account:

 

Incidentally, if I’d not closed the account and the details hadn’t been removed from the server, Mollie & Ruby would probably be a bit hungry by now, I can’t recall if we left the doors open when we left! (There were plenty of sheep and cows and chickens around, don’t worry)!

TwigPen

I'm just about to turn off the IFTTT trigger that tweets notification of my blog posts to Twitter. I've written a wrapper for Python's 'Twython' module; one that provides auth and, right now, the ability to post a tweet. Fingers crossed, hoping it seamlessly replaces IFTTT.

It's called TwigPen, a name borrowed from my pnut.io social network app PigPen. It's used like this from within a Python script:

import TwigPen

…some code to define tweettext…

TwigPen.postsomething(tweettext)

TwigPen Oops 3

After it simply failed to tweet, I rolled the TwigPen code into rssupdatepnut; what follows is a repeat of my previous posts.

-mild bleating follows-

An updated version of my previous post follows. Executive summary: "Doh!"

-original below-

Oops! I forgot to git pull origin master the updated script from the rssupdatepnut GitHub repo.

…

Daft Baz scratched head for a few minutes thinking the script'd failed for some techy reason. No, simply PEBKAC.

Am I feeling lucky?

-original above-

It turns out I messed up here too, with the result below:

$ python3.6 rssupdatepnut.py

File "rssupdatepnut.py", line 81

TwigPen.postsomething(pnut_message)

^

IndentationError: unexpected indent

I'd better fix it then, instead of blogging about it!

TwigPen Oops 2

An updated version of my previous post follows. Executive summary: "Doh!"

-original below-

Oops! I forgot to git pull origin master the updated script from the rssupdatepnut GitHub repo.

…

Daft Baz scratched head for a few minutes thinking the script'd failed for some techy reason. No, simply PEBKAC.

Am I feeling lucky?

-original above-

It turns out I messed up here too, with the result below:

$ python3.6 rssupdatepnut.py

File "rssupdatepnut.py", line 81

TwigPen.postsomething(pnut_message)

^

IndentationError: unexpected indent

I'd better fix it then, instead of blogging about it!

PSA heat

It snowed again, the gritter failed to make an impact (but I'm not sure one came this way.) The school was shut so World Book Day didn't happen here, my wife was late from her night shift (waiting for staff to arrive), and the boiler stopped working.

What to do when the condensing boiler repeatedly stops working in the winter, it gurgles like a boiling kettle before the error indication appears, and resetting the thing fails:

It's likely that the condensate drain pipe is frozen outside the home.

  1. Find the condensate drain pipe; it'll project out of the bottom of the boiler case,
  2. Locate it outside,
  3. Pour hot water over the pipe outside,

If that doesn't clear the ice:

  1. Turn off the boiler at the mains switch,
  2. Find a bucket or a washing up bowl,

At this point I must stress that you need to be aware if you mess this bit up the very least of your worries will be the size of the repair bill:

  1. Disconnect the pipe from the bottom of the boiler and collect the spurty water on the wall behind and the floor beneath the boiler, anywhere but the bowl or bucket,
  2. Leave the vessel there to collect water,
  3. If you have a hose that you can connect to the drain fitting, fit it and drop the end into the vessel until the outside temperature rises,
  4. Turn the boiler on again; no gurgling!

Machine

The new washing machine is… it's got more programmes than the previous one, and more flexibility too! I'm…

/me rubs thighs enthusiastically…

Apologies to those of you on pnut,io who saw the multiple postings when my rssupdatepnut app failed; all I had to do was add code to overwrite the previous post date file with the latest post's date, if they were different.

RavPower case review

RAVPower Battery Case for iPhone 6 / 6S with Apple MFi Certified Extended Battery Charger with 3000mAh 125 Percent Extra Battery

Toilet proof?!

By Amazon Customer on 29 November 2017

Verified Purchase

Mine survived a trip to the u-bend yesterday. Don't try this at home; I did so you don't have to!

Disclaimer thingy: a quiet buzzing and a refusal to charge for hours afterwards might be a reliable indicator the device wasn't meant for this kind of adventure.

Was this review helpful to you?

[Helpful] [Not Helpful] [Report]