hamtron5000

joined 1 year ago
 

does anyone here have experience hosting a Signal proxy and/or a Tor relay? there's a blog post on signal.org asking for folks to help, and i can but i don't know enough about network security to feel safe/confident doing some of this stuff. same with Tor - i've always wanted to host an exit relay (and in fact have this whole long theory about how every public library in the US should host an exit relay, but that's for another post someday maybe).

do any of you have experience with doing this? what kind of best practices would you recommend? any good resources on protecting your network that you might point me to? i will be getting my Net+ cert within the next year but for now i am starting from "enthusiastic beginner" and want to be helpful, but careful.

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

dang, the bookbinding looks super cool! good for you. i am slowly beginning to investigate a partnership between my workplace (in the IT field, and we do a lot of ewaste recycling) and the local migrant center to provide them with a bunch of machines for things like GED, citizenship study, and communication.

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 2 points 3 months ago

good luck and good powerthrough!

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 4 points 3 months ago

i'd love to see photos!

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

i'm recovering from COVID (ugh, it's terrible) and we have both been too wiped out to cook lately, so i did not get to it. it's on my list for either Thursday night or this weekend, though. i'll post a reply and maybe some photos if it goes okay.

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 9 points 3 months ago (1 children)

for myself, i have been an unproductive lump for weeks due to oppressive heat in my part of the world. and also laziness, and internalized pseudo-Protestant work ethic guilt, and other stuff. but i do have some plans. i live in the arid southwest of the USA (well, extreme western Colorado but it's effectively the arid southwest, climate-wise). i've got some potato plants that are growing which have largely been watered via a rain barrel i have set to collect water from our downspout in our backyard. i have three more such rain barrels which i plan to install.

my mother gave me a gift certificate to a local nursery, so we're going to plant native/xeric bushes and trees on the west side of our house which is currently essentially bare and exposed to late afternoon glaring, hot sun.

we're adding cellulose insulation to our attic in September, and once the heat has died down a bit we are going to finish covering out front yard in cardboard and mulch, hopefully in time to plant some winter cover crops. we also planted an apple tree last year that has survived the winter and the summer thus far.

lots to do, and little energy to do it with unfortunately. i'm feeling really depressed and shitty about climate stuff right now, which is why i made this post; i'm hoping i can get some secondhand positivity or enthusiasm to help me get going to actually do some of the projects i have in mind.

 

This is a place for you to talk about things you've been working on, projects that you think are cool, things that you're doing and etc. I'm hopeful that seeing people's cool projects and efforts can be inspiring to the rest of us!

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 2 points 3 months ago (3 children)

thank you! my wife and i take turns cooking and it's my night tonight, i think i will give this a shot!

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 2 points 3 months ago (7 children)

do you have a good mujadara recipe that you like? i've made it before but it was incredibly bland despite caramelizing the onions for what felt like 100 years.

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 3 points 3 months ago

ooh, excellent ideas, thank you!

 

Hi all - what are some of your go-to foods? I've been doing a lot of the microwaveable processed stuff for convenience's sake, but I'd like to do a bit more cooking if possible. I don't meal prep at present but am interested to hear what y'all find easy and tasty and actually make regularly.

Thanks!

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 1 points 6 months ago

verdict: it was not terribly helpful. gonna try Hugo next. https://gohugo.io/getting-started/quick-start/

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

i don't know if this link is great, but it's one that i'm going to read and try to follow along with. https://stablepoint.com/blog/how-to-host-your-own-website

[–] hamtron5000@slrpnk.net 6 points 6 months ago (4 children)

to answer my own question, i have planted two rows of potatoes this spring - my first garden that i've ever been involved with! and yes, two rows of potatoes is barely a "garden" but it's a start. i want to grow food i will actually eat, so we planted an apple tree last fall and potatoes this spring. i am hoping to also do a three sisters garden this year, but we'll see. i also potted a Scotch Bonnet plant that i bought accidentally online while trying to buy actual Scotch Bonnet peppers, ha! this will be great for the Nigerian-style jollof rice i make on weekends, and anything Caribbean inspired that i cook which calls for that specific flavor and heat profile.

i also started a Calibreserver based out of my home server setup, which will be accessible to the neighborhood i live in - i bought a domain name and am learning about what all is necessary to statically host a website. this is the first part of my dream to start being a community sysadmin for my neighborhood, where i can provide resources that are freely available to my neighbors, and we can all add content and features as time, skill, and desire allow.

finally, i have dusted off Laika, my old trusty two-wheeled steed. she belonged to a coworker's husband who never rode, so i got it for free last fall! I have not historically been a cyclist so I am working towards it. I bought a rack i need to add to the bike, and hope to get some different tires. add in a trailer, and you have a great errand-runner, which is my goal here.

 

(image via daily-dragon-drawing on tumblr, specific post here)

happy spring to many - here in western Colorado we're vacillating between warm and cold in a true, classic Colorado manner.

i do these posts about praxis periodically because i seek inspiration and motivation for concrete actions i can take in my life, and you, the community of people who are into solarpunk, are creative powerhouses. with that in mind, what kind of projects are you all working on, or have you seen going down? any ideas that you're excited about doing as the weather gets warmer?

thanks for being rad, friends.

 

Imagine I want to create a local internet for my community. Things that will be useful, helpful, and easy to use. Ideally, setup/maintenance would be relatively straightforward too, since I will for the time being at least be running this solo.

So if I'm going to be the community SysAdmin but also have free choice of what to run, what would you think about the following ideas of things to share with people?

-Radarr (movies) -Sonarr (TV shows) -Lidarr (music) -Calbire (or Readarr I guess, for books) -Jellyfin (media streaming) -Nextcloud (file sharing)

And then as for me myself, I'd probably set up a Graylog Open instance to aggregate issues, and have a couple of separate physical servers for these different things.

Do you think that would be helpful/useful/fun for getting community members to think about the potential of hyperlocal internet?

Alternatively, are folks doing this already? If so, how do you have this kind of thing set up?

If I'm dreaming big, I would also love to set up a mesh relay to offer this intranet stuff to the community.

I'm hoping that these ideas are solarpunk enough and selfhosting enough to warrant community feedback.

Basically, I guess, are there any other community SysAdmins out there doing this kind of work?

Thanks for your time.

 

Hello all, happy early spring to those of you who are experiencing it! Here in western Colorado, we've got our tiny rainy season going on. what are you doing in your communities, in your gardens, in your organizing spaces? what kind of cool praxis have you got going on?

 

middle-aged IT generalist guy, United States. from left, lens cleaning cloth, REI 1L nalgene, handkerchief, coffee tumbler, ridge wallet, generic grid lined notebook, Leatherman Signal, Pilot G2 .07 pen, keys for work with included tiny flashlight, and phone case (Peak Design Mobile) to represent the phone (Pixel 7 Pro) used to take the photo.

not pictured: car/bike keys, as the wife has the car today and it was snowing so i didn't bike, and wristwatch because i forget, constantly, that i'm wearing it; it's just a part of me. generic Timex Weekender with a nylon strap. does nothing special but tells me the time, accurately, on a face i can read, even in the dark.

1
submitted 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) by hamtron5000@slrpnk.net to c/utilitycycling@slrpnk.net
 

https://imgur.com/a/ivFq4VE

Hi all,

A coworker gifted me a free Trek 4500 from the early 2000s, largely unused in the last many years. It sat in my back yard for a few months while I thought about what to do with it; I've finally made the first movement towards having a badass utility bicycle.

Step one involved knowing that I like a more upright riding position and am not the most comfortable or agile person on a bike (that's nice-speak for "I'm a pretty fat guy" and "I never really rode bikes as a kid so I learned how in my mid-20s and am still not 100% comfortable with it"). So I bought a pair of swept-back handlebars which I then kept in a closet for a month, lol.

Finally I decided to just move forward, so I took the bike to the local bike shop and had them do their inspection, basic needed maintenance, and installation of the handlebars. Now I have something fairly comfortable which also looks kind of neat.

Four more things I have planned to do:

  • Add a back rack that I have on an old trashed frame also in the backyard.
  • Acquire and add fenders. While it rarely rains here, when it does I'd like to be prepared.
  • Acquire and add a front rack, since this is going to be largely for groceries and errands.
  • Add a bike trailer, again for groceries and errands.

Other possibilities include a different seat, a handlebar bag in lieu of a front rack, essentially anything else to make it cool and functional.

Do y'all have any recommendations for stuff that might be worth adding or doing to this bike to make it comfortable for someone overweight to commute with and do basic errands and groceries with?

 

well, my plan was to fix up a free entry-level mountain bike a coworker gave me - and, to be clear, i still intend to do it. however! i ran out of time, money, and know-how, all relatively quickly. and combined with that, i also decided somewhat last minute that i don't really want to drive to work any more in 2024 if i can possibly help it.

so instead i dusted off my electric chariot, my Shadowfax, my E-Motion ebike which i have named "Thora". she's my go-to ride in nice weather, but has been packed up for the winter. last night i got her out of her "garage" and charged her up, and this morning i did my quite short 1.5 mile commute in cold weather for the first time. 21 degrees F, -6 degrees C.

just wanted to say, i super appreciate all the advice shared in my other thread about winter biking. i wore my snowshoeing coat, gloves and glove liners, and a stocking cap. it worked! the only rough part was my face; it got so cold i got a headache. that said, i can just try a scarf tomorrow.

here's to functional transportation, even in the wintertime.

 

welcome to the first day of the New Year here where i am, in Western Colorado, USA. i am feeling an uncharacteristic sense of optimism today; any day can be full of new beginnings, but how great is 1/1/24 to also be full of opportunities?

speaking of which, what kind of actions have you been taking recently, or do you plan to take in the near future? how are you bringing solarpunk into the world?

may 2024 be a good year for you and yours, and me and mine, and ours, and humanity, and the earth.

 

'sup, comrades?

hope you're well. what's going on in your worlds? how have you been spending your time, energy, and interest? any cool praxis in your worlds?

 

hi all - i am wondering what your daily riders look like - for example above i have my ebike (a secondhand Eco-Evo by Easy Motion), which is my summer daily driver since i can charge it with solar energy and don't get as hot cycling (i'm fat and i live in a desert, which is a miserable combo sometimes).

right now i'm working on putting together a winter "acoustic" bike by putting together a bunch of parts stripped from old bikes i've salvaged or been given, but i'd love to see any ideas for what folks ride.

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