Mikrotik Routerboard

Bandwidth Management My need for bandwidth management (aka Traffic Shaping) is a result of my desire to live in the countryside. Low population means little incentive for commercial companies to install fibre. No fibre means slow broadband over a piece of overhead wire installed in the 1970s. I found various articles about traffic shaping on… Continue reading Mikrotik Routerboard

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Categorized as General

GoPro Hero 8

I bought a GoProd Hero 8 back in August 2021. The sole justification was to attach it to my bicycle to capture events on my daily commute to and from Plymouth. The time has now come to say what I like and what I don’t like about it. Likes Picture quality is fantastic. In fact,… Continue reading GoPro Hero 8

DNSSEC signing a zone

Every time I add a new domain, I wade through the process of how to generate the required keys and how to get the records that need to be published at my upstream registrar. Hopefully this will help in future! First off, some assumptions: Bind is installed and running Zones are in /etc/bind/zones Keys are… Continue reading DNSSEC signing a zone

Raspberry Pi – GPS

I recently wanted to set up a Stratum 1 time source using a Raspberry Pi (running Arch Linux).  I bought the excellent Adafruit Ultimate GPS Hat and dutifully soldered on the connector.  So far so good.  Unfortunately, from that point on, I found lots of conflicting information.  Not, I hasten to add, because the sources… Continue reading Raspberry Pi – GPS

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Categorized as PC Stuff

systemd Cheat Sheet

systemctl List units systemctl systemctl start/stop/restart/reload unit systemctl status unit systemctl is-enabled unit systemctl mask unit – Prevent a unit from starting systemctl unmask unit – Allow a unit to start systemctl reboot/poweroff Copy the unit file and create a custom version (overriding the original) systemctl edit –full unit Show units that failed to start… Continue reading systemd Cheat Sheet

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Categorized as Debian

Elite Dangerous – Is this love?

The announcement that Frontier Developments were going to produce a new version of Elite caused a stirring in my, long inactive, game-related synapses.  Since original Elite I’ve been a dormant gamer, other than brief interests in long-ago versions of Doom and Quake.  The stirring was sufficient to justify a crowd-sourcing contribution and some researching of GPU’s… Continue reading Elite Dangerous – Is this love?

Parish Council Co-Option Process

With an advertised vacancy on St Mellion Parish Council, I’ve been reading up this morning on how the co-option process works.  If ten parishioners formally request an election there will be no co-option but for the purposes of understanding the process, I’m assuming this won’t happen. The co-option procedure is well documented at various places… Continue reading Parish Council Co-Option Process

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Categorized as St Mellion

No Solar, No Access

Yesterday saw the first regular Parish Council meeting since 9th July.  Although meetings happen on a monthly basis, August is the annual exception and no public meeting takes place.  In the intervening period, the council have clearly been anything but idle. First of all, we got the excellent news that the planning application for the… Continue reading No Solar, No Access

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Categorized as St Mellion

Section 106 – Two weeks today

Two weeks ago today, I blogged about my concerns on how St Mellion was considering spending the Section 106 money provided by St Mellion International Resort.  That Blog entry contained a letter that I’d sent to Christine, The Parish Clerk.  Despite Christine forwarding it to the Parish Councillors, I’ve not had a reply from them… Continue reading Section 106 – Two weeks today

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Categorized as St Mellion

Problems with me carrots!

Yesterday saw the planned, informal meeting in St Mellion to discuss the need for allotments.  Allan Cavill from the National Allotment Society came all the way from Taunton to talk about allotments in general and specifically about St Mellion’s wish to establish allotments within (or near to) the village. Prior to the meeting I was… Continue reading Problems with me carrots!

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Categorized as St Mellion

Not Smiling

I recently received a letter from Smile, the Internet bank advising that my credit card is due to expire. They’re quite right, it expires at the end of August 2013. The next part of the letter came as a complete surprise to me.  It says: We regret we are unable to issue a new card… Continue reading Not Smiling

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Parish Council Extraordinary Meeting

On the 13th September 2007, a Section 106 agreement was signed by four parties: Caradon District Council Bennelong Golf (St Mellion) Ltd Nat West Bank Cornwall County Council The agreement relates to planning application E2/06/01399/OUT that grants St Mellion International Resort permission for a number of enhancements, including the construction of 265 houses. Although a… Continue reading Parish Council Extraordinary Meeting

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Categorized as St Mellion

The need to be quorate

To extend my recent blatherings about St Mellion Parish Council, I thought I’d do a short post on the recent issue the council had to address in order to remain quorate.  First though, what exactly does “quorate” mean? In order for an organization or government body to conduct business, there must be sufficient eligible voters… Continue reading The need to be quorate

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Categorized as St Mellion

A month on in the parish

It’s been just over a month since I first expressed my opinions on the St Mellion Parish Council elections. There have subsequently been two monthly public meetings of the council and I’m pleased to say that I found them energetic and constructive. The new clerk, Christine, is bursting with enthusiasm and seems to already have… Continue reading A month on in the parish

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Categorized as St Mellion

Cycle Navigation by GPS

When you use a SatNav in a car, the objective is usually to get from Point A to Point B in the most efficient manner.  When you cycle, it’s more frequently a requirement to get from Point A to Point B via a specific route.  It might be a scenic route, a flat route or… Continue reading Cycle Navigation by GPS

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WordPress Brute-Force Attacks

A post on Twitter today alerted me to the fact that my WordPress application was probably under brute-force attack.  A growing series of links told me reasons why it was happening, methods for understanding the degree of the problem and what to do about it.  Some of the answers were good but the majority were… Continue reading WordPress Brute-Force Attacks

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Categorized as WordPress