Misctech

The holidays have passed and it’s a new year. You probably have a gift card or two and haven’t decided how to use it yet. Allow me to help:

Buy that fancy keyboard you’ve been coveting. Yes, the $100+ model. And get the good mouse/trackball while you’re at it. Just do it.

If you’re reading this, you’re probably a “knowledge worker”, developer, data wrangler, or technical writer. You spend hours every day at your computer, hammering away at the keyboard. Why are you still using that $10 membrane keyboard and $5 corded mouse that the company has a 10-year stockpiles of?

Last week I wrote about our FRC team, asking for support in in the form of a cheering section. Today, I’m asking for more assistance for these amazing students.

Things went better than expected at the Finger Lakes Regional event and TAN[X] 3003 was part of the winning alliance. This means that we earned an invitation to the 2023 World Championships. You can watch all of our qualification and playoff matches via YouTube links on The Blue Alliance. They also appeared in a local news segment about the event.

For the past few years, I have been a mentor for FIRST Lego League and now FIRST Robotics Competition at our school. When I was in high school, I participated in some of the early seasons of FRC and now with the addition of FLL, my kids have gotten involved at an earlier age and really latched onto it. So of course, I talked myself into helping out with the program. And they’re stuck with me for a while; my son is a sophomore, and when he’s a senior, my daughter will be a freshman and she’s champing at the bit to get into the “big” competition (after 2 years of FLL).

TL;DR: My home firewall/router is slow, please help me pick out a new one.

After replacing my firewall/router/WiFi access point one too many times, I’m ready to get off the upgrade treadmill and buy something better than the consumer-grade gear sold at Staples.

I’ve found myself traveling quite a bit this year, with more travel on the horizon. Like many, I travel with a fair bit of technology and of course that means keeping things charged - both on the go and at rest.

And, like a lot of folks, before every trip I found myself running around the house collecting cords, chargers and adapters to toss into a Ziplock bag. Then unpacking and returning them to their correct places when I got home. It works, but what a pain!