Always expand the Fantastical editor popover

My preferred calendar app for the Apple ecosystem is Fantastical as I've found that it meets my needs well. One minor irritant is that the editor popover defaults to a collapsed view and I have to expand it to see everything, in particular the notes field which I use frequently. I recently discovered that there's a hidden preference to change this. It's set via a custom url of x-fantastical3://defaults?key=AlwaysShowAll&value=1&type=bool&group=1. Just click this link to set… continue reading.

Posted on 21 January 2025 in Computing Leave a comment

Global git ignore patterns

One thing that I've found helpful is to add a set of patterns to my global git ignore file (config/git/ignore for me) that allow me to create temporary files that are automatically excluded from git. The patterns I use are these: # Ignore a file by renaming it with ignore its name *.ignore ignore.* *.ignore.* This lets me create a file with a prefix ignore., a postfix of .ignore or add .ignore. somewhere in the… continue reading.

Posted on 14 January 2025 in Computing, git Leave a comment

Enabling a focus mode when an app is running on Mac

When I'm on a Zoom or FaceTime call, I want stop all notifications on my Mac so that I'm not distracted by them and would like this automated. It's not easy to tell when a call is happening, so I simplified the problem to stopping all notifications if the Zoom or FaceTime is running as I only run these apps if I'm on call. To do this, I created two Shortcuts to turn the Do… continue reading.

Posted on 7 January 2025 in Computing Leave a comment

2024 in pictures

As usual, at the end of the year, I look back over the photos I have taken and think about the year. This year I have published 1162 photos to Flickr. It has been a good year, seeing friends and family, taking photos, attending conferences all coupled with enjoyable work for a good client. I am pleased to have kept up with taking a least one photo every day as part of my Project 365,… continue reading.

Posted on 31 December 2024 in Me, Year in Pictures Leave a comment

Developing rst2pdf with uv

Thanks to Kyle and Lorna, we've moved rst2pdf's development out of the dark ages of setup.py and into uv with pyproject.toml. As a result, I've changed the way I develop rst2pdf locally; these are my initial notes. Set up Python environment Given a clone of the rst2pdf git repository, do this get going: $ uv sync –all-extras This will create a virtual environment in .venv with all dependencies installed. It will also install Python if… continue reading.

Posted on 24 December 2024 in Python, rst2pdf Leave a comment

Sunrise and sunset times on the Mac command line

I recently discovered the /usr/libexec/corebrightnessdiag command line tool on macOS. In particular, /usr/libexec/corebrightnessdiag nightshift-internal will give information about when the Mac's nightshift settings, including when sunrise and sunset are! $ /usr/libexec/corebrightnessdiag nightshift-internal Night Shift Status { AutoBlueReductionEnabled = 1; BlueLightReductionSchedule = { DayStartHour = 7; DayStartMinute = 0; NightStartHour = 22; NightStartMinute = 0; }; BlueReductionAvailable = 1; BlueReductionEnabled = 0; BlueReductionMode = 0; BlueReductionSunScheduleAllowed = 1; Version = 1; } Night Shift Sunset/Sunrise {… continue reading.

Posted on 17 December 2024 in Command Line, Computing Leave a comment

Internet Speedtest from the command line

We recently changed ISP to Aquiss who could not have been more helpful with pre-sales and support for the change over from BT Internet. Aquiss do not provide a router, so I removed the BT Smart Hub and put in a Ubiquity UCG-Max and connected it up to my existing AC Pro Ubiquiti access points. Obviously as it was a new provider, I tested the speed with WiFiman on my phone and was surprised that… continue reading.

Posted on 10 December 2024 in Software Leave a comment

Running DisplayLink Manager on Mac without the purple icon

I recently acquired an Elgato Prompter which acts as an additional screen on my Mac. It does this using DisplayLink and the DisplayLink Manager app needs to be running. A new security feature of the newer macOS versions is that when your screen is being recorded, an icon is displayed in your menu bar. It looks like this and cannot be disabled: Certainly unmissable! This icon is displayed nearly all the time DisplayLink Manager is… continue reading.

Posted on 3 December 2024 in Computing, Software Leave a comment

Testing internal network speed with iperf3

I've been playing with different Ethernet network adapters to see if I can maximise the throughput to my Mac as my ethernet didn't seem particularly faster than WiFi. To test the speed, I want to use my internal network only as going onto the Internet will create too many variables. iperf3 is the solution for this. Running the test To run a speed test with iperf3, you need two computers: one to act as the… continue reading.

Posted on 26 November 2024 in Computing Leave a comment

Prepending to the terminal's prompt

For some work I'm doing, I have been given access to a Linux box that is part of a legacy production system. The first thing I have done is updated the terminal prompt to include the word PRODUCTION in red, by adding this to .bashrc: export PS1="$(tput setaf 1)PRODUCTION $(tput sgr0)$PS1" The nice thing about doing it this way is that I don't have to worry about whatever is in PS1 already. Not the most… continue reading.

Posted on 19 November 2024 in Computing Leave a comment