Paul Smith
LightNews LightNews
banner
smith.dev
Paul Smith
@smith.dev
1.3K followers 300 following 280 posts
Program the computers. Gov tech founder, dad, and O’s fan in the US Midwest. I enjoy weightlifting. I collect spores, molds, and fungus. Making my mind a sunless place

Co-founder/Chief Technologist of Ad Hoc
Posts Replies Media Videos
smith.dev
This game has been so fun. Wildly entertaining
January 14, 2025 at 3:27 AM
smith.dev
This game will determine which is the greatest city on earth: Oklahoma City, or Cleveland 💥
A TV screen showing an NBA basketball game between OKC (Oklahoma City Thunder) and CLE (Cleveland Cavaliers). The score is OKC 114, CLE 118 with 4:36 left in the 4th quarter. The game is being broadcast on ESPN. The TV appears to be mounted below some bookshelves filled with various books, and there's a partial view of what looks like a couch or furniture piece at the bottom of the image.
January 9, 2025 at 2:33 AM
smith.dev
Wirth circa ‘86 already got there on window placement
A paragraph of text discussing how overlapping windows mirroring stacked documents on a desk is not an ideal metaphor for computer interfaces. The text argues that partially hidden windows typically need to be brought to the top and made fully visible before use, and that the substantial implementation effort required outweighs the insignificant advantages of this design approach. It concludes by stating it's an example where a complication's benefit is incommensurate with its cost.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​ A sentence fragment that continues from a previous paragraph, stating that their solution is much simpler to implement while having no real disadvantages compared to overlapping windows: tiled viewers as shown in Figure 2.1.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​ A page showing Figure 2.1, titled "Oberon display with tiled viewers." The image contains a structured layout of the Oberon operating system interface, including a system diagram in the center showing module relationships (with components like System, Edit, Net, Backup, TextFrames, Printer, MenuViewer, and Oberon), surrounded by tiled viewers showing various system commands and file information. The diagram is structured hierarchically, with Oberon at the base connecting to Viewers, Texts, and Reals. The page also includes code snippets and system commands in separate tiled sections around the main diagram.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​
December 24, 2024 at 8:57 PM
smith.dev
Close-up of the back cover of a vinyl record featuring a compilation of soul Christmas songs. The tracklist is visible, listing artists like Little Johnny Taylor, Rance Allen Group, Mack Rice, Rufus Thomas, Albert King, Staple Singers, Isaac Hayes, The Temprees, and The Emotions.
December 24, 2024 at 6:58 PM
smith.dev
Stax Records xmas comp, 1982
December 24, 2024 at 6:55 PM
smith.dev
Hanging with Saint Niklaus 🎅
Photo of cover of textbook “Project Oberon: The Design of an Operating System and Compiler” by Niklaus Wirth and Jürg Gutknecht
December 24, 2024 at 3:32 PM
smith.dev
Added a couple of lines to my home-manager config, and now I get instant loading of dev environments when I cd into them with direnv. (I was missing the nix-direnv integration, which caches the evaluation and the resulting environment.)
A terminal screenshot showing a diff view of changes made to a Nix configuration file 'common/users/shared-user-config.nix'. The diff shows line numbers 43-53, with new lines in green and old lines in red. The change is configuring direnv with bash integration and nix-direnv support A terminal screenshot showing direnv loading output. The user has changed directory to "Desktop/pushup/v0.3/". The output shows direnv loading an .envrc file, using flake, and loading a cached nix-direnv dev shell. There's a long list of exported environment variables including various Nix-related configuration settings, compiler flags, and build parameters. A red arrow points to the line "direnv: nix-direnv: Using cached dev shell".
December 20, 2024 at 8:41 PM
smith.dev
Cleaned up my giant old MP3/FLAC collection (passed it through MusicBrainz Picard app), found a place for it on my home network, and served it up with Navidrome. Wired up to ListenBrainz - feels like the good ol' scrobble/last.fm days.
A screenshot of a music streaming service dashboard showing recent listening activity for user "pauladamsmith". The interface displays a list of recently played songs with album art thumbnails, song titles, artists, track lengths, and timestamps. The layout includes a navigation sidebar on the left with options like Feed, Dashboard, and Explore. The main content area shows "New listens since you arrived" and "Recent listens" sections, featuring tracks from artists like Joe McPhee, Elvis Costello, Gillian Welch, and others. Each song entry includes options to like, add to playlist, and play the track.
December 18, 2024 at 10:12 PM
smith.dev
A black weight plate ornament reading "MERRY LIFTMAS" and "45 LB" hanging on a Christmas tree decorated with colorful lights. The tree lights create a festive backdrop of green, blue, red, and yellow illumination around the ornament.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​
December 17, 2024 at 3:39 AM
smith.dev
New NATO phonetic alphabet just dropped
An alphabet poster with vibrant illustrations of animals representing each letter. From A to Z, the poster includes an alligator, butterfly, crab, dog, elephant, frog, giraffe, hawk, iguana, jellyfish, koala, lion, monkey, narwhal, octopus, penguin, quahog, rabbit, sheep, turtle, urchin, viper, walrus, X-ray fish, and zebra.
December 14, 2024 at 5:21 PM
smith.dev
December 8, 2024 at 8:30 PM
smith.dev
Been staring at it a lot the last two days: it’s a great logo.
This photo shows the interior of the Walter Schroeder Aquatic Center, featuring its logo on a white wall above the pool. The logo consists of three blue wavelike shapes and the text “Walter Schroeder Aquatic Center.” Below it is the motto, “The Schroeder Way: Be Great • Act With Integrity • Expect Success • Team First.” In the foreground, there are blue-and-white triangular flags hanging above the pool, with swimmers and spectators sitting on benches along the pool’s edge. A digital clock displaying “28:16” is mounted on the wall to the left. The environment suggests an active swimming practice or event.
December 8, 2024 at 4:12 PM
smith.dev
Starting my upscale coatery
December 8, 2024 at 2:43 AM
smith.dev
Doing a cycle of increased volume/reduced weight. Still progressive overloading, but modulating reps, rest time, sets, as well as weight. Never done 10 reps at RPE 9-10 before. 245# for 2 sets. #weightlifting #strengthtraining
December 6, 2024 at 3:21 PM
smith.dev
T Wolves court looks like they put a Windows 10 splash screen on an LCD under the key
December 3, 2024 at 2:29 AM
smith.dev
I’m also closed for routine loudening
Empty Bottle ad. Calendar of events. One says “12/3 Closed for routine PA loudening”
November 30, 2024 at 10:28 PM
smith.dev
Have used this Work Sharp system for about a year. Crazy sharp edge, idiot proof operation. 🔪 🦃
A knife being held in a Work Sharp knife sharpening holder Six kitchen knives of various sizes laying on a tea towel on a counter Close up of a carving knife cutting through a printed piece of paper
November 28, 2024 at 7:10 PM
smith.dev
Tried out Hevy for the month. It’s good 👍 hevy.com/workout/258c...
Calendar with marks indicating dates in November I worked out. “you worked out 11 times” B workout 1 x Deadlift (Barbell) 2 × Bench Press (Barbell) 3 x Chin Up 3 x Leg lifts
November 27, 2024 at 3:57 PM
smith.dev
God, what a dream these Wago mini bus bars are to work with. If you’re still using wire nuts, you owe it to yourself to check these out.
Photo of a in-progress light switch replacement with many electrical wires going around and some terminating together into little orange blocks
November 23, 2024 at 7:16 PM
smith.dev
NYT Cooking has dialed in the easy but crowd pleasing and veg weeknight dinner. It’s been a load-bearing pillar of the fam. Gnocchi and sprouts w brown butter, came together in 20
Photo of gnocchi and sprouts cooked in a skillet
November 20, 2024 at 11:35 PM
smith.dev
Ah whoops, cut off not intentional

I think they intentionally shuffled the order to thwart people trying to do a 1:1 mapping to A-F but like I say, everyone tries to anyway 🤷
November 20, 2024 at 10:31 PM
smith.dev
Our local school district moved to standards based grades this year

Better call my kid Arby’s cause they got the “meets”
Portion of a PDF describing standards based grading, which lists Meeting, Progressing, Beginning, Extends, and Insufficient Evidence as student measures
November 20, 2024 at 10:16 PM
smith.dev
good
photo of Skittles pop’d freeze dried candy product
November 16, 2024 at 8:48 PM
smith.dev
Side project: a shutter speed measurement device. Your film camera might claim 1/125 of a second, but this will tell you more accurately. Uses an IR emitter (on the little remote; yellow LED just tells you if it’s on), sensor is on the main board. Hold one in front of shutter and other behind.
Photo of two DIY electronics circuits, showing batteries Photo of two DIY electronics circuits, same devices as previous image, showing front sides: OLED display of measurement result, and a glowing yellow LED
November 13, 2024 at 3:31 PM
smith.dev
After some quiet agitation the Y where I work out replaced one Smith machine with a new squat rack, and the other strength training dorks and I are giddy. We take what we can get in a 100+ year-old place
Photo of a squat rack in a gym
November 13, 2024 at 3:07 PM