Cavelab blog

Improving dark mode and syntax highlighting

Sat, 10 Feb 2024 09:18:21 +0100

In May last year; I did some changes to the dark mode theme and syntax highlighting on this blog. Resulting in higher contrast, improved syntax highlighting in light mode, and a few others things.

It took me a while to get around to document this, but here we go 👇

New tools over the Christmas holidays

Mon, 05 Feb 2024 08:51:26 +0100

Over the Christmas holidays, organizing some tools, I realized my screwdriver collection was in pretty poor shape. I can’t even remember the last time I purchased a new screwdriver…

I actually think most of them were in a tool-box that my wife had — when we first met. I’ve bought plenty of tools over the years, but new screwdrivers, apparently.

So; I ordered some Wera screwdriver sets, and a few other things 👇

Arch Linux laptop power — suspend, battery, and charging

Mon, 29 Jan 2024 08:30:02 +0100

I recently got a new laptop, (well — not new, but new to me), a HP ZBook 15 G5. After installing Arch Linux and the i3 wm I spend some time setting up power management, suspend on idle, and figuring out the state of the battery.

Making my own NVR — with a streaming proxy and FFmpeg

Thu, 25 Jan 2024 22:55:08 +0100

I’ve been thinking about getting some CCTV cameras for a while, and last summer I purchased two Reolink PoE cameras. The footage is stored on a SD card, and uploaded to a local FTP server.

But I also wanted to record continuously, without getting a dedicated Reolink NVR. I’ve seen some YouTube videos by Tall Paul Tech where he uses FFmpeg to record CCTV footage — so let’s do that! 🙂

Microblogging in Hugo — using Todoist tasks

Tue, 23 Jan 2024 22:28:17 +0100

I’ve had a recurring thought, following by some intense Googling — using this Hugo powered site to microblog. The idea has been fueled by two desires; owning my own “microblogging” data — and making it quicker, and easier, to post something on my own domain.

Being able to quickly snap a photo with my phone and publish it is not so easy with a static website. So I got the idea of using the Todoist app, and their API to post, build, and publish.

This is the story of how I did it, and why it wasn’t a good idea.

Running CAT6 to the 2nd floor den — another interior wall

Sat, 25 Mar 2023 09:49:41 +0100

I first got started on the network run from the attic switch to the 2nd floor den — back in October of 2021. I finished it a year later, so it’s about time to get this blog post published 😛

Build and deploy Hugo with Make

Sun, 26 Feb 2023 12:18:58 +0100

I’ve written before about how I deploy this blog using Drone.io. It works well, and does exactly what you’d expect.

Lately I’ve started looking into reducing complexity in homelab systems that I use — and using “a Continuous Integration platform for busy development teams” felt a bit overkill for this tiny blog.

So I switched to something simple; GNU Make.

Arch Linux — local caching repository and AUR build server

Sat, 25 Feb 2023 12:51:24 +0100

I’ve set up a local Arch repository, a dynamic reverse proxy cache using nginx — and a local “build server” for AUR packages, using aurutils.

Here is how, and why 👇

We got married!

Sun, 05 Feb 2023 09:47:23 +0100

Mona and I got married in January 😃 We had a small civil ceremony — and dinner with our kids, parents, best man, and maid of honor.

Afterwards we were driven to Plaza Hotel in Oslo, where we spent the weekend ❤️

Adding support for multiple series per post — in Hugo

Sun, 15 Jan 2023 10:33:29 +0100

I’ve previously implemented a series taxonomy in Hugo, but it only supported a single series per post and used intersect which is kind of slow.

Here is my improved implementation of a series taxonomy in Hugo 👇

Running CAT6 to the twins' rooms — inside interior wall

Sun, 08 Jan 2023 19:04:08 +0100

We recently moved the twins into their own bedrooms, after sharing a room for nine years — it was finally time for some privacy 🙂

With their own rooms; they also got their own computers — a life long dream 😉 Those computers needs network, proper network, not Wi-Fi.

Raspberry Pi security alarm — the basics

Fri, 30 Dec 2022 13:06:51 +0100

In November last year — I started building a DIY security alarm system, using a Raspberry Pi as the controller. My plan was to make a self-sustained system, using proper alarm hardware — like PIR sensors and sirens.

Integration with Home Assistant would be an add-on, not a requirement. I wanted the system to be as redundant and fault-tolerant as I could make it.

This is a pretty long story, with some twists and turns — let’s get into it 👇

Pulling CAT6 cable in existing conduit

Wed, 28 Dec 2022 14:47:40 +0100

We recently put up a wall in our previous family/play room — to make another bedroom, with a hallway outside. I might want an access point in that hallway at some point.

So I repurposed a telephone outlet and conduit, to run a CAT6 cable from the hallway down to the patch panel in the basement.

Knot Resolver — with ad blocking

Tue, 27 Dec 2022 22:25:45 +0100

I stumbled onto NextDNS recently — it’s like a cloud hosted Pi-hole. I tried it for a few days, but this post isn’t about that.

Reading about the different block lists in NextDNS, and digging deeper into DNS ad blocking gave me motivation to change my current setup — and that is what this post is about 🙂

Trying Netbox for my homelab and home network

Sun, 25 Dec 2022 22:11:07 +0100

Searching for a tool to keep track of IP addresses; I stumbled onto Netbox — and was blown away by what it could do 🤯 I could put everything there: racks, servers, patch panels, Wi-Fi access points, power distribution, network runs. Everything!

Reducing our energy consumption

Sun, 30 Oct 2022 09:09:13 +0100

With the electricity prices we’ve seen in Europe lately — I wanted to see if we could reduce our energy consumption. I’m specifically looking at “wasted” energy, meaning usage we can reduce without even noticing it.

Collecting logs with Grafana Loki and Promtail

Sun, 07 Aug 2022 11:09:59 +0200

Having a central place to view or search through server logs is awesome. I’ve used Graylog in the past, but I’ve always felt it was a bit cumbersome to set up and use — and it felt overkill for my need.

Instead I gave Grafana Loki and Promtail a try 👇

A few more ventilation automations in Home Assistant

Thu, 04 Aug 2022 08:58:44 +0200

Controlling my Komfovent balanced ventilation system through Home Assistant — opens up a world of possibilities.

Here are three automations I use to make the system a bit smarter 🙂

Making planter boxes for Mona

Tue, 26 Jul 2022 09:50:41 +0200

Mona needed more places to plant her flowers, so I built her some planter boxes — using impregnated wood and lining the inside with landscape fabric.

D-Link DGS-1210-28P initial setup

Sun, 24 Jul 2022 11:08:36 +0200

The Unifi UAP-AC-M access point in my garage stopped working a few weeks ago. Or, the device didn’t stop working, it still showed up in the Unifi controller and I could ping it. But it stopped providing Wi-Fi connectivity — my phone connected, but got no network access…

I remembered experiencing this before — the VLANs for user and guest Wi-Fi wasn’t allowed through the D-Link switch. I had simply not configured them, but why was it failing now?

Trying to log into the switch — I found that it no longer got an IP from the DHCP server. By all accounts; it looked like the switch had been reset.

Updated plans for my home network

Sat, 23 Jul 2022 10:55:51 +0200

Last year — I wrote about plans for my home network, or home network v2, as I called it. Let’s take a look at what I have done, what remains, and what has changed since then.

A few Wi-Fi improvements

Fri, 22 Jul 2022 10:52:40 +0200

After my Wi-Fi mapping adventure — I found a few spots with low Wi-Fi signal. Both kids’ rooms on the 2nd floor only had mediocre signal, at -67 and -68 dBm 2.4 GHz, and the side garden had -71 dBm — which is terrible!

I also discovered that Mona’s side of the bed had much worse Wi-Fi signal than my side. This was because I had a clear line of sight to the UAP-AC-IW in the den, but the signal to Mona’s side had to go through a wall and her wardrobe…

Simply not acceptable, something had to be done!

A life update

Thu, 21 Jul 2022 15:26:26 +0200

Hello again reader; I’ve been AFK for a few months — got fed up with computers and did other things 🙂

Setting up a virtual VyOS router

Mon, 04 Apr 2022 08:21:21 +0200

I’ve had many routers over the years — Linksys WRT54GL, Linux and iptables, ASUS RT-N66U, Ubiquiti USG, OPNsense, Ubiquiti EdgeRouter, and MikroTik CCR1009. At least those are the ones I can remember.

But I’ve been fascinated by VyOS ever since I first heard about it, even more so after using the EdgeRouter CLI. As both VyOS and EdgeOS are forks of Vyatta.

Fascinated and intimidated is probably more accurate — the lack of a GUI doesn’t give you a lot of help… But at the same time, it’s a great learning experience — you have to know and understand what you are doing 🙂

So I set out to replace my internet facing router — with a virtualized VyOS instance 🙂

More ducts for the balanced ventilation

Fri, 25 Mar 2022 16:39:20 +0100

We got balanced ventilation installed last year, and have been very happy with the system 🙂 But we quickly found that we needed to expand it into two more rooms — the 1st floor bathroom, used as the laundry room, and the play room, which will be a bedroom at some point.

Time to fix that 🙂