Nerd on Benny Simmonds

Books

Fri, 27 Jan 2023 20:42:36 +1100

2023

To Kill a Mockingbird by Lee, Harper
Own the Day, Own Your Life: Optimised practices for waking, working, learning, eating, training, playing, sleeping and sex by Marcus, Aubrey

2022

The Dream Machine by Waldrop, M. Mitchell
Absolute FreeBSD by Lucas, Michael W.
Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World by Newport, Cal

2021

Revolution in The Valley: The Insanely Great Story of How the Mac Was Made by Hertzfeld, Andy
Kingpin: How One Hacker Took Over the Billion-Dollar Cybercrime Underground by Poulsen, Kevin
The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story by Lewis, Michael
Ghost in the Wires: My Adventures as the World’s Most Wanted Hacker by Mitnick, Kevin D.
Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Metaxas, Eric *
1984 by Orwell, George
Atomic Habits: An Easy and Proven Way to Build Good Habits and Break Bad Ones by Clear, James *
Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel by Potts, Rolf
American Kingpin: The Epic Hunt for the Criminal Mastermind behind the Silk Road Drugs Empire by Bilton, Nick *
The God Delusion by Dawkins, Richard

2020

Into the Wild (Ebook) by Krakauer, Jon *
The Last Wish (The Witcher, #0.5) by Sapkowski, Andrzej
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Dick, Philip K.
Alan Turing: The Enigma by Hodges, Andrew

2019

Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Harry Potter, #1) by Rowling, J.K.
Ultralight Backpackin’ Tips: 153 Amazing & Inexpensive Tips for Extremely Lightweight Camping by Clelland, Mike *
Turn The Ship Around! by Marquet, L. David

2018

Microserfs by Coupland, Douglas *
Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments with Truth by Gandhi, Mahatma
Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Cialdini, Robert B. *
The Mythical Man-Month: Essays on Software Engineering by Brooks Jr., Frederick P.

2017

The Cuckoo’s Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage by Stoll, Clifford
Savaged by Systemd: an Erotic Unix Encounter by Lucas, Michael Warren

DVD backups on GNU/Linux

Fri, 21 Jan 2022 16:44:23 +0000

This is how I like to create digital copies (i.e., backups) of my physical DVD collection, which I own legitimately. I don’t condone piracy or theft.

Backup instructions

Rip physical DVD media makemkv
Transcode mkv to m4v container using Fast 1080p30 preset in handbrake. Passthrough UTF-8 subtitles if you like those.
Copy to media backup server rsync --protect-args -av --progress Season8 "shnerg@172.16.1.32:/data/TV/Penn & Teller Bullshit/"

Software

MakeMKV transcoder that deals with proprietary (and usually encrypted) disc into a set of MKV files
Handbrake general video transcoder

The C source is available as tarballs makemkv-bin-1.16.5.tar.gz and makemkv-oss-1.16.5.tar.gz. The Linux release includes full source code for MakeMKV GUI, libmakemkv multiplexer library and libdriveio MMC drive interrogation library.

My Glorious GMMK Pro 75% custom keyboard

Thu, 13 Jan 2022 20:25:50 +0000

Last year I decided in addition to my amazing ErgoDox EZ to look for a 75% layout keyboard (think a more minimal version of ten-keyless).

After wasting far too much time on r/MechanicalKeyboards the Glorious GMMK PRO hit my radar. Short for Glorious Modular Mechanical Keyboard, the pro version cuts the previous full sized keyboard version down to a 75% design with a digital rotary dial.

GMMK PRO is an ultra premium, gasket-mounted 75% layout keyboard built for enthusiasts, gamers, and professionals.