converser.nz

NZ Tekonverse

  • Lubuntu vs Debian / LXQt

    As we well know my preference is very much the use of Debian rather than Ubuntu. I do this because Debian better supports experienced Linux users like me. Debian however omits firmware drivers for non-free hardware by default which means a lot of fiddling to download and install and there are some other capabilities like…

  • Tech giants need to be reigned in before they start ruling our lives

    As if there wasn’t enough bad PR already over Google and Facebook, here’s an article about how some guy got a lifetime ban from AirBnB. He gets no right of appeal or anything. They do not have to explain or account to him or anything that would be considered fair (maybe he has recourse in…

  • Python Scripting [4C]: Exif Based Image Renaming 3

    After letting this one slide for quite a while, I picked it up again yesterday and have completed most of the coding. This is the full code to date (barring any further modifications found to be needed after testing). The script is run from the directory that is to be acted upon and takes no…

  • Raspberry Pi 4 Released

    Raspberry Pi Foundation has announced the release of Raspberry Pi Model 4. RPi4 adds a number of new features over the Model 3, including dual HDMI 4K displays (via micro connectors), USB-C power connection, USB 3 ports on board and a choice of 1 GB, 2 GB or 4 GB onboard RAM. There is a…

  • Integromat as an alternative to IFTTT

    For the last few years I have made a lot of use of IFTTT for automated web integration between my blogs and Facebook pages. IFTTT is quite good for this and I still use it to this day, with multiple IFTTT accounts as each account can only work with one Facebook page at a time,…

  • Privacy concerns about Big Data well-founded

    Since I wrote about escaping from Google’s walled garden on my Android phone, I have made some effort to further implement this on my desktops as well. Geoffrey A Fowler is a columnist in the Washington Post and he has written a number of articles about these privacy concerns about Google’s vast data mining efforts…

  • Buster moves to RC1

    I have put a 240 GB SSD into the computer that I edit the map mosaics on (in Gimp) which gives me 200 GB of swap file space so that large projects can be handled more readily. I have no actual intention of going beyond 100 layers as in the present projects; it will be…

  • Python Scripting [6C]: Layer Sidecar Duplication & Renaming for NZ Rail Maps 3

    After the use of the duplicate.py script for a while, an amendment has been decided upon and implemented this week. This is to simply duplicate the sidecars where there is no change of pixel size involved.  For example it may be just a case of the prefix being changed. To implement these changes the following…

  • Using a Raspberry Pi headless

    I have used several different systems that connect to a tethered mobile connection for ministry related activities that shouldn’t be tied to the shared internet connection that I use for most other things, out of respect for the people who own that internet connection and whose IP address is tagged to every activity. What one…

  • NZ Rail Maps: Optimising Gimp and using 4x4x4 grid for mosaics [4]

    Last time I posted I wrote about my experiments rescaling layers in Gimp from 0.4 metres to 0.2 metres pixel spacing and 0.3 to 0.15 metres pixel spacing and seeing how these matched with the NZR station surveys. I am still in two minds about whether to go with 0.2 metres from 0.4 metres source…