Fixing issues with VirtualBox Guest Additions for Ubuntu 20.04

I recently installed Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (Focal Fossa) (dated 23 April 2020), with the intention of creating a VM using VirtualBox 6.0.22 (released 15 May 2020). I had issues with VirtualBox guest additions, and this is how I solved it. ...

31 May 2020

How to download videos from YouTube

Wondering how to download a video from YouTube, with audio and subtitles intact? Here are a couple of methods I’m documenting in case I ever need to use them. ...

30 May 2020

Fixing high-DPI (retina) screenshot metadata

On my MacBook Pro with retina display, when I take a screenshot, the image is saved with a DPI of 144. But, using ImageOptim to compress the image with Strip JPEG/PNG Metadata enabled will remove (or reset) the DPI setting to 72 DPI - resulting in a double sized image when displayed in Preview and Quick Look. Here is how I correct this. ...

10 May 2020

macOS zsh configuration

From macOS Catalina 10.5 onwards, zsh is the default shell, instead of bash. I have a lot to learn about this shell, and so far, this is how I configured zsh… There is an overload of snippets on-line, but I’ve not seen a post doing what I do, so hopefully this helps someone! ...

7 May 2020

De-bounce butterfly keyboard double keypress with Karabiner-Elements

Grrr, to no one’s surprise, my MacBook Pro with butterfly keyboard is experiencing keyboard issues. In my case, a keypress on “j” is often triggered twice, resulting in “jj”. And with the lockdowns, I don’t want to risk a repair! So, here is a quick workaround using Karabiner-Elements v12.9.0. ...

24 Apr 2020

CSS tips to avoid Javascript

Recently I’ve been building a few web sites without JavaScript where possible, relying instead on modern browser support for CSS. Here are some things I’ve figured out, including toggling the NavBar burger dropdown, smooth scrolling, showing and hiding modal dialogs with transitions! ...

3 Apr 2020

Static domain name resolution for Kubernetes pods

I recently needed to setup a Kubernetes cluster without an external DNS and without Internet access. In the old days, static IPs could be mapped to FQDNs by creating entries in the hosts file, but that won’t work with Kubernetes. With Internet access, the typical solution would be to use a wildcard DNS like xip.io or nip.io. Instead, the workaround is by hardcoding the mapping in the CoreDNS configuration. ...

31 Mar 2020

Fixing Grav Admin Panel URL redirect on a local computer

While testing out Grav, it’s quite easy to setup a local instance on a macOS computer, since macOS already comes with a suitable web server (Apache 2.4.x and PHP 7.x). I never realized I didn’t actually describe how I set it up, but just wanted to point out one important change. ...

17 Mar 2020

Choice of home screen icon with DuckDuckGo

Ah, just as I post my method of creating a shortcut with an icon of my choice on the iPhone home screen - which I demonstrated with Firefox - along comes a browser that allows a choice of icons out-of-the-box! ...

2 Feb 2020

Shortcuts on iPhone home screen

Here’s how I “changed” an app’s home screen icon on iPhone. I’m so OCD that I want my home screen dock icons (the tray at the bottom) to be all of the same colour! Actually, changing an icon is not possible, but creating a new shortcut with an icon of my choice is! ...

23 Jan 2020