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Get (your files) organized & have a (backup) plan!

Suddenly I find myself trapped in my own home due to COVID-19. It’s not really a big deal because I work from home normally. But it has changed my weekend plans drastically. So it’s time to start tackling one of my 2020 goals:

Organizing all of our digital files and having a consistent back-up strategy.

Continue reading “Get (your files) organized & have a (backup) plan!”

Organization

At our house important files mostly fall into two realms: Photos and Music. Many people have at one point decided to keep all of their photos or music with a 3rd party service like Flickr or iTunes. That’s fine, but you just have to be prepared to commit to them like a marriage – except they decide all of the terms – it’s not a mutual agreement. Personally, no matter if I upload my photos to a 3rd party service, I always keep the originals on a disk in my home so I can own my own content.

But this becomes an issue when everyone in your family isn’t on the same page. I have some photos on a USB drive and on my computer, and my wife has done the same on a different USB drive and computer. We need a way to have photos accessible in a consistent place, and make sure they’re getting backed-up.

When it comes to shopping for a big hard drive to store all of this stuff, I try to find whatever is the best space-per-cost within my budget. At one point I had devised a “2×100” rule: I get the biggest drive I can for $100 and consider buying two of them (for redundancy). As disk sizes increase, once a drive is available that is 2x the size of my current one for $100, I replace them. Currently you can get up to 4TB drives for $100.

I bought a 4TB drive to use as network attached storage to act as our central storage place. I attached it to a Raspberry Pi using a USB/SATA hard drive dock and share it read-only over the network using Samba. It shows up as a Windows-style network share on all computers and other devices like AppleTV & FireTV (using VLC). For read-write access, I use SSHFS so authenticated peeps can write to the disk and move files around.

We’re still working on how to consistently name our photo albums, but having them in one place that gets backed up off-site is a big win.

Backups

I used to be an amateur network administrator. In my back-office (laundry room) I had a tower server that had 6 disk drives. A 3-disk RAID5 for backups, a 2-disk RAID0 for temporary storage (for MythTV recordings), all in swappable drive trays. Then there was one more disk hard-mounted for operating system boot-up. It worked for a while, but when I was going to have to replace the 1000-Watt power supply for the second time, I thought maybe there’s a better way. One thing I hadn’t considered before is: the more disk drives you have, the higher chance of having a drive fail – an increased chance of the click of death was always in the back of my mind. Using one big disk with a Raspberry Pi is much simpler, smaller, and uses much less power.

With all disks on-site, there is still the chance of everything getting destroyed by fire. To handle off-site backup I had used CrashPlan, but that didn’t pan out – time to look for something different. Since we have quite the collection of different computers here – Linux, MacOS & Windows, I looked for a consistent backup solution that is operating system agnostic. I wound up going with Duplicati using Backblaze’s B2 for off-site storage.

All of our computers use Duplicati independently to backup to B2. The Raspberry Pi does as well to backup our photos and music.

The Setup

I’m still working out (and documenting) the details of our setup, but I plan on highlighting some specifics of our setup as I’m able to prove them out. If you have any tips or strategies you could offer, please let me know in the comments!

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What’s in my WGI (Drum Corps/Marching Band) instructor’s bag?

While I proclaimed myself to be the 40 year-old WGI virgin, I’m really not new to the whole scene. I’ve been a member of several marching organizations, both winter and summer, since 1991. I’ve also had the privilege of working on the instructional staff of a few groups. One thing a new instructor can do correctly out-of-the-gate is being prepared. Here is what is in my bag that I bring to every rehearsal. There are some extras that you can include for summer drum corps & marching band as well.

Continue reading “What’s in my WGI (Drum Corps/Marching Band) instructor’s bag?”

Gock block

The Latin Percussion Jam Block Medium (Red) is the gold standard of all things pageantry.

Drum stick

You’re going to need something to hit said gock block. I picked up a pair of marching snare sticks at a drum corps show. They’re much beefier than a normal snare stick and you can tape them with electrical tape for even more durability.

Hearing protection

Some people say they can’t hear all the detail with earplugs in. It’s probably time for an upgrade. I have a set of Earasers and they’re amazing. Yes, they’re $50 and they’re worth it. Also, if you loose one, you can buy the missing side for $25. Personally I can hear more detail with them in as it filters out a lot of the background noise and echo.

If $50 is too steep, at least get a free pair of the foam plugs offered at literally every music venue. It will save your eardrums from all that gock-blocking you’ll be doing.

3-ring binder with drill and music score

I’ve tried electronic drill books on e-readers and tablets, but a printed score and drill sheets never run out of battery. Also, they’re visible in bright light and you can easily annotate them with changes. Sometimes old school is the way to go. Even if it’s not your preferred choice, it’s a great back-up. I put my pages in sheet protectors and always print double-sided to keep the weight (and waste) to a minimum.

Pencil

For making annotations, duh. Also good to have if your members forget one – and they will.

Competition Badge

Being on staff, you probably have a badge to get into shows. They don’t give out replacements, so always put it back into your bag so you have it on contest days.

Valve Oil

This is more of a courtesy to brass players. Yes it’s their responsibility to oil their own valves. But inevitably someone will need something in the warm-up arc before a contest, when their case is a million miles away. I bring this to warm-up at the contest as extra insurance.

9v Battery

This is for Dr. Beat. Love him or hate him, the doctor is in the house, and he’s here to stay. If you are a percussionist, you probably already have a Dr. Beat – if not, get one. If you’re everyone else that relies on someone bringing a Dr. Beat, do them a solid and bring an extra 9v battery for it. That thing can go through a 9v like nobody’s business.

Pro-tip: instead of clicking “stop” on your Dr. Beat at the end of your rep, get in the habit of pressing the power button for extra battery savings.

Smartphone Apps

Here are my favorite apps:

Peterson iStrobosoft – Best, easiest to read, stand-alone tuner app. Period. Yes, it’s expensive at $10. Best $10 tuner you’ll ever buy.

TonalEnergy Tuner – Wicked awesome app. Fantastic tone generator for getting your drone on. Great for members as well – put it on a tablet and start practicing and it will tell you what is out of tune.

Metronome – lots of choices here. I’m currently using Frozen Ape’s Tempo.

Competition Suite – A service for judges tapes. Make sure you’re set up with the right permissions before you go to your first competition.

Voice Recording – whatever voice recorder app is included is fine. Useful for making rudimentary recordings or even doing a mock judges tape.

Spotify – Or something else to play music if you want to do a visual warm-up to music (or just jam out in general).

GroupMe / Facebook Messenger – Something to keep in touch with the other staff.

Notes – An app to make notes for things you’d like to fix (and how) and ideas for next rehearsal. I like Simplenote.

Drillbook Next – I prefer printed charts, but that’s me. If you’re going all-in with paperless make sure everyone is on board.

Headphones & Adapter

Bring your headphones if you want to listen to judges tapes before critique. If you’ve got an iPhone, don’t forget the 3.5mm dongle adapter in case you want to plug it into a sound system and blast to some tunes.

Bluetooth Speaker

Useful for listening to judges tapes aloud with staff or for sharing them with the members.

DCT

I’m old school. I love DCT for keeping lips working. I keep it in my winter bag because it can be very dry, even indoors. A must for summer – bonus that it has sun protection built-in.

Summer Stuff

These are things I add to my bag when summer rolls around. Most of this is for weather – in particular the sun.

Hat

Must have – keep that sun off of your face.

Sunscreen

There are some dummies out there that are still looking to work on their tan. Skin cancer is real. If you’re planning on marching or teaching for multiple summer seasons and you want to have a normal lifespan, put some damn sunscreen on, and do it on the regular. I consider SPF-50 to be the minimum, 30 if there’s absolutely nothing else available. If I can, I go for SPF 70-100 broad spectrum.

Sunglasses

While you’re at it, protect those baby blues.

Sun sleeves

These are the best inventions ever. Put on a t-shirt, then put on your sun sleeves. Columbia has these wicked Freezer Zero sleeves that have a cooling sensation when they get wet (from sweat). Fantastic, 💯, A+, would wear again.

Rain Poncho

This doesn’t have to be fancy, just something that will keep you dry. Ideally it can roll up and be stashed in your bag without taking too much space.

Extra socks

For when it’s rainy. Never underestimate how miserable you’ll feel with wet feet. Fresh, dry socks are the answer to a rainy day’s misery.

Anything else?

Did I forget something? A small first aid kit comes to mind, but I bet there’s more. Let me know in the comments what you consider essential.

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Mississippi St. Road Diet Plan

It’s been a while since I’ve written about any urban design stuff. Part of it is because I’ve realized that real change is never sweeping, it is incremental, which can be incredibly frustrating. But I’ve learned to to have patience, as long as things look like they’re heading in the right direction. Also, as part of Fridley’s Environmental Quality and Energy Commission (EQEC), I’ve seen several of the cities’ initiatives first hand, and and I feel like they are generally heading in the right direction.

It’s Happening!

I wrote about the idea of a road diet on Mississippi St. over 6 years ago. I told myself that if it ever happened, I had done my job. And as it stands, here we are:

Continue reading “Mississippi St. Road Diet Plan”

Slash 4×4 Crawler (Part 5) Fenders and Bumpers

With the Jeep body painted, I just needed to add a couple more details… Fenders With the tires slightly wider than the TRX-4 249mm width, I wanted to make sure the Jeep body didn’t look too skinny. I found these rubber fender flares on eBay which were originally designed for a Cherokee XJ body, but […]

The post Slash 4×4 Crawler (Part 5) Fenders and Bumpers appeared first on Meatball Racing.

With the Jeep body painted, I just needed to add a couple more details…

Fenders

With the tires slightly wider than the TRX-4 249mm width, I wanted to make sure the Jeep body didn’t look too skinny. I found these rubber fender flares on eBay which were originally designed for a Cherokee XJ body, but would likely fit the JK Rubicon Unlimited just as well.

I left some of the lexan overhang on the fenders purposefully to attach these fenders.

Continue reading “Slash 4×4 Crawler (Part 5) Fenders and Bumpers”

XPS 13 Developer Edition Settings

Here are the other miscellaneous settings I’ve done with my new XPS13 Developer Edition. It doesn’t cover all the settings I like, just the ones that seem to be particular to this laptop.

My favorite feature by far is the built-in firmware update functionality:

Continue reading “XPS 13 Developer Edition Settings”

The light at the bottom/front of the case isn’t well explained. It turns solid white during charging. It blinks white occasionally and what that means still remains a mystery ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

It for sure goes amber when there’s 10% or less battery life remaining.

Settings Reference

Here are other settings in detail that I did in other posts:

HiDPI with Wayland and a non-HiDPI external monitor.
Using the ~~Windows~~ Linux-X/C/V key combinations for Cut/Copy/Paste.
Chaining Dnsmasq and resolveconf for the best DNS setup.
USB-C adapters – go big or go home.

Boot time

The boot time on this laptop is strangely long – consistently 2 mins 20 seconds before I would see the login screen. I changed the grub configuration so I could see what the hold-up was by pressing escape on the splash screen. I also used systemd-analyze blame to confirm what I saw: the network.service was taking too damn long. Turns out it was my fault. Ubuntu 18.04 introduces a service called netplan to handle network adapter configuration. I had added a loopback alias like I normally do the old way. Netplan didn’t like that, so I removed my lo:0 entries from /etc/network/interfaces and added the following netplan configuration file:

sudo vi 02-loopback-alias.yaml

network:
  version: 2
  renderer: networkd
  ethernets:
    lo:
      match:
        name: lo
      addresses: [ 10.254.254.254/32 ]

Then I applied the change with sudo netplan apply. Boot time went from over two minutes to under 20 seconds.

It’s not immediately apparent that the loopback alias is available from looking at ifconfig. Instead use ip address to confirm it’s there:

1: lo: <LOOPBACK,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 65536 qdisc noqueue state UNKNOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/loopback 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd 00:00:00:00:00:00
    inet 127.0.0.1/8 scope host lo
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet 10.254.254.254/32 scope global lo
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 ::1/128 scope host 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever

X Applications that Require Root (sudo)

Because I’m running Wayland, apps that you can normally start with sudo (like synaptic) will give this response on the command line:

Unable to init server: Could not connect: Connection refused (synaptic:29383): Gtk-WARNING **: 13:31:07.736: cannot open display: :0

Here’s one solution, but I instead put the file in ~/.config/autostart/xhost.desktop.

Bluetooth Mouse

My Microsoft Mouse 3600 seemed slow at first, so I turned the mousepoll up to maximum velocity. I’m not sure if it’s 100%, but I do think it feels better.

Deep Sleep

I’ve always been envious of MacBook owners being able to close the lid of their laptop and come back to it days later without losing any charge. I made these changes to better the battery savings, but I still manage about 8% charge loss per day that it’s not fully off.

Are there any configuration changes I missed? This thing is still pretty new, so I’m also still getting used to it. Let me know in the comments if you have any other tip/tricks.

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XPS Developer Edition – USB-C Dongles

I’ve seen the future of mobile computing and it (unfortunately) is dongles

Continue reading “XPS Developer Edition – USB-C Dongles”

Dongles in Theory

I purchased a Lenovo C109 6-in-1 USB-C hub from Amazon, and here’s its normal state of connection. Clockwise from the top it’s complete with HDMI (adapted to DVI), USB, USB-C Power-in from the Dell power adapter, and Ethernet.

The more I thought about my dislike of dongles, I thought about the alternatives. Laptops are getting so small and that they can no longer fit a standard size Ethernet port on them. So do we get docking stations instead? That sounds decidedly worse. I do like the fact that I can plug the USB-C power input on either side of the laptop (although Dell recommends the upper left port). So, dongles it is.

Remember what the laughing guy said about bringing a bag of dongles everywhere you go? Lenovo must have watched the video as well because they included a nice felt bag 😂

A nice thing is about most USB-C multi-function dongles is they have a USB-C port for power delivery, sometimes labeled “PD”. So you plug your power adapter into that, and the multi-function adapter relays power to your laptop. That way there’s only one thing plugged into the laptop – everything else plugs into the dongle.

Dongles in Practice

Here’s where it goes south…. the multiple functions of the adapters don’t always work. I thought it was just my adapter, but after combing through at least 20 different multi-function USB-C adapters on Amazon, I realized all of them suffer from a collection of these issues:

Overheating
Unable to deliver full power from charger
External monitor doesn’t re-initialize when awoken from sleep
Wired Ethernet doesn’t work reliably
Wired Ethernet floods network if dongle has power but it not plugged into computer

My issues are with power delivery, wired ethernet, and the external screen coming back after sleep. 😞

I first noticed the issue when I encountered was this BIOS message after rebooting with the dongle plugged in.

The Lenovo 6-in-1 (and/or the accessories I’ve elected to use) are using enough power to get the BIOS to complain at boot that the power supply is down 10 watts. Thankfully they let you know that this warning can be disabled in the BIOS.

Here’s where you can find the setting in this abomination of a graphical BIOS:

SRSLY – what ever happened to a good old text interface where I could navigate without using the trackpad?!?

Another power issue I had with the Lenovo dongle is it apparently cannot deliver enough power for my particular USB DVD drive. I have a LG Slim Portable DVD Writer and when it’s plugged into the dongle with a disc inserted it keeps spinning up and then acting like it was disconnected. Then it reconnects and spins up again and disconnects ad nauseum. But if I plug it “directly” into the laptop using the included Dell USB to USB-C adapter, it works fine.

After talking with some co-workers, one solution is to get a monster USB-C adapter like the CalDigit T3 Plus:

So I guess a docking station-esque adapter it is… at least this one is universal and should connect to any laptop with USB-C.

Have you had any luck with multi-function USB-C adapters? Let us know in the comments what you like and what you don’t.

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B6.1 Carpet to Dirt (Clay)

Off-road carpet racing is gaining more and more traction, literally. It is especially convenient to race on carpet surfaces up here in Minnesota – inside in the winter. Also the track can be configured in off-road and on-road configurations, allowing proprietors the opportunity to serve both off-road and on-road racing enthusiasts. The Team Associated RC10B6 […]

The post B6.1 Carpet to Dirt (Clay) appeared first on Meatball Racing.

The Team Associated RC10B6 is the first iteration of RC10 kit to come in both a carpet and a dirt version of the car. I had the opportunity to pick up my friend Chad’s B6.1 carpet car as he was switching to the TLR buggy platform. Chad’s B6.1 included everything and the setup was already dialed for carpet. I was glad to drive it as-is at MMR, Dollar Hobbyz, and Thunder Road carpet tracks.

Sometimes dirt is fun too. There’s a clay track called The Toy Box about 45 minutes away in Wisconsin. So I was wondering, what would it take to get my carpet car race-ready for high-grip dirt and clay?

Continue reading “B6.1 Carpet to Dirt (Clay)”

B6.1 Clay Setups

I took a look at two Spencer Rivkin setup sheets for the B6.1D and the B6.1 – they’re both using “carpet car” 3-gear/laydown motor & transmission setup. What does this mean? It means on high-traction clay surfaces, the B6.1 carpet car is just a few parts away from being dirt ready.

Two cars?

I know a lot of people who race both clay and carpet like to keep two separate cars for each. It’s much easier to have a specific car with a specific setup ready to go. That way you can race carpet at MMR on Friday night and hit the Toy Box on Saturday without any setup time in-between.

Why I’m sticking with one car

I’m not interested in getting another buggy for dirt. Mostly because of cost, but there are other reasons. I don’t tear down my cars often to go through them and check everything. Switching my car from carpet to dirt and back forces me to go through all of the hinge pins and shocks to make sure everything is moving smoothly.

I typically only race at one place on a given weekend, so I have all week to switch the setup. Changing the setup, including changing shock oil, only takes about 1-2 hours.

Parts & Tools

For parts, it comes down to these parts

Tires (and wheels)
Springs
Ball Differential

If you’re starting with a race-ready B6.1 set up for carpet racing, it’s about $120 to get everything you need for dirt: https://www.amainhobbies.com/account/wishlist/show/635249

For tools, the only new thing you might need is a hex wrench for the ball diff. You can get a tool like this https://www.amainhobbies.com/team-losi-racing-aluminum-hex-differential-wrench-tlr-22-tlr2950/p203513 or you can just get a 1.5mm hex wrench and cut it short with a dremel:

This allows you to sneak the wrench behind the dog bone while everything is installed in the car so you can adjust the tightness of the ball diff.

Here’s a great video for breaking in a ball differential if you’re installing it for the first time:

It also has tips for setting the tightness of both the diff and the slipper clutch after break-in.

Talk to other racers, and have fun

The best thing you can do before starting to convert your buggy from carpet to dirt is talk to other racers that frequent the dirt track you want to race at. Find out what tires (and compound) they’re using. Then find out what shock setup they’re using (springs and oil). Those two things alone will have the biggest impact on how well your car handles the dirt, and consequently, how much fun you’ll have.

The post B6.1 Carpet to Dirt (Clay) appeared first on Meatball Racing.

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Windows-X/C/V Cut/Copy/Paste in Ubuntu

The last time I’m going to refer to it as the Windows key is in the title and in this sentence. We’ll go by it’s rightful name, the Super key. To make mine extra super, I cover the Windows logo with a Linux Penguin logo. I got this one from ThinkPenguin.com:

After using a Mac for about a year, I started to really like the approach of using the Command key for clipboard operations. Mostly because I still use the command line very often and I want to continue using Control+C for cancel. It’s like having your cake and eating it too. Why not put the Super key to use on my Ubuntu system for the same purpose?

We’ll cover the setup on several different applications. I like to add Cut, Copy, Paste at a minimum as well as Select All and Undo (since the A and Z keys are also in the vicinity). In cases where it’s possible, I’ve also mapped Redo as Shift+Super+Z since some programs would use Shift+Control+Z for Redo.
Continue reading “Windows-X/C/V Cut/Copy/Paste in Ubuntu”

Programs

I’m not going to cover all of the applications that I use, just a few to get you started 🙂 What I like about my approach is in most cases I’m not overriding Control+A/Z/X/C/V. We’re augmenting it by adding Super+A/Z/X/C/V so using the control key will still work.

Here’s what we’re going to cover:

Gnome (mostly to remove other Super bindings)
GTK
Gnome Terminal
VSCode
Emacs
Nautilus (Gnome’s File Manager)

Gnome

We need to “free up” some of the default Gnome keybindings found in Ubuntu 18.04. Bring up the system Settings and navigate to Devices -> Keyboard. Type “super” there to filter all of the shortcuts to just those that use the Super key.

I simply changed Super+A and Super+V to Shift+Super+A and Shift+Super+V. You can see the customized shortcuts highlighted in bold.

Install Gnome Tweaks:

sudo apt install gnome-tweaks

After it’s installed launch Tweaks and navigate to the Keyboard & Mouse section.

Move “Overview Shortcut” from left super to right super, effectively disabling the overview on most laptops since they don’t have a right-side Super key. You can still access this functionality by pressing Super-S. Apologies to anyone that has a right-side Super key 😢

GTK

GTK keybindings will cover many applications – this setting alone might get you about 80% there. It will work on Firefox and Chrome – plus Electron apps based on Chrome like Simplenote and VSCode. Not all bindings will work in all apps (like Select-All, Undo & Redo) but Super-X/C/V should. Plus we’re augmenting the existing Control-A/Z/X/C/V so those will continue to work.

vi ~/.config/gtk-3.0/gtk.css

@binding-set gtk-super-cut-copy-paste
{
        bind "x" { "cut-clipboard" () };
        bind "c" { "copy-clipboard" () };
        bind "v" { "paste-clipboard" () };
        bind "a" { "select-all" (1) };
        bind "z" { "undo" () };
}

* {
        -gtk-key-bindings: gtk-super-cut-copy-paste
}

Details: https://askubuntu.com/a/851055/803610

Gnome Terminal

In 18.04 you can just go to Edit -> Preferences and set Copy, Paste and Select All in the Shortcuts section:

VSCode

Rather than using the keybinding editor in VSCode, I like to just open up the user keybindings.json file and add my keybindings as additions.

vi ~/.config/Code/User/keybindings.json

Super-X/C/V is already working from the GTK settings, so we just need to add the following to get Super-A/Z for Select-All/Undo/Redo:

// Place your key bindings in this file to overwrite the defaults
[
    {
        "key": "meta+a",
        "command": "editor.action.selectAll", "when": "textInputFocus"
    },
    {
        "key": "meta+z",
        "command": "undo", "when": "textInputFocus && !editorReadOnly"
    },
    {
        "key": "shift+meta+z",
        "command": "redo", "when": "textInputFocus && !editorReadOnly"
    }
]

Emacs

vi ~/.emacs

Yes I realize the irony of editing my .emacs file with vim.

Add the following lines:

;; Mac-style cut/copy/paste
(global-set-key (kbd "s-x") 'kill-region)
(global-set-key (kbd "s-c") 'kill-ring-save)
(global-set-key (kbd "s-v") 'yank)
(global-set-key (kbd "s-a") 'mark-whole-buffer)
(global-set-key (kbd "s-z") 'undo)

Nautilus (File Manager)

I adapted a program called BackspaceBack.py to do my bidding within Nautilus.

sudo apt install python-nautilus
mkdir -p ~/.local/share/nautilus-python/extensions
vi ~/.local/share/nautilus-python/extensions/KeybindingRemap.py

You’ll have to restart nautilus for these to take effect. Just log out and log back in to put the settings into action.

Looking Ahead

The way to do this has changed over the years from one major release to the next, so I won’t be surprised if some configurations are different for Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, but we’ll just have to wait and see. If you have any additional apps and configurations you’d like to add, let everyone know in the comments!

← Summary Only

Organization

Backups

The Setup

Gock block

Drum stick

Hearing protection

3-ring binder with drill and music score

Pencil

Competition Badge

Valve Oil

9v Battery

Smartphone Apps

Headphones & Adapter

Bluetooth Speaker

DCT

Summer Stuff

Hat

Sunscreen

Sunglasses

Sun sleeves

Rain Poncho

Extra socks

Anything else?

It’s Happening!

Feature Request: Acknowledgement

Fenders

Bumpers

Settings Reference

Boot time

X Applications that Require Root (sudo)

Bluetooth Mouse

Deep Sleep

Dongles in Theory

Dongles in Practice

B6.1 Clay Setups

Two cars?

Why I’m sticking with one car

Parts & Tools

Talk to other racers, and have fun

Programs

Gnome

GTK

Gnome Terminal

VSCode

Emacs

Nautilus (File Manager)

Looking Ahead