Maiden Speech of Hannah Beazley MLA, Member for Victoria Park
My wife has presented her maiden speech to the Parliament of Western Australia, as the Member for Victoria Park.
It was an honour to be in the public gallery to watch her deliver this speech. It’s been a long journey, but the reward makes it all worthwhile!
I have such a blast recording @HemisphericViews with @martinfeld and @Burk. A consistent highlight of my fortnight.
I’m loving my new Asus ZenWifi mesh devices. Way faster than my old Google Wifi. It took an entire weekend of research and a lengthy Craft document with input from @Burk but I’m sure it has paid off. My internet is now the best it can be.
As an update to my last post I’ve stress tested my wifi signal and I feel relieved. My crappy router is still crappy and a mesh network is necessary. Money not wasted.
A New Internet Stack
My entire internet stack is being rebuilt. I changed ISP. The new ISPs connection uses a different protocol which wasn’t working with my Google Wifi, so I’ve temporarily reverted to my modem/router which has been in bridge-only mode for the past 3 years.
Now my wifi is faster than it has been in ages. Problem is, I don’t know whether it’s the new ISP or the removal of Google Wifi. So much for A/B testing. I do know that the last few firmware updates for Google wifi have been reported as being terrible for impacting overall speeds.Last night, before this change and after a weekend of research, I ordered the Asus ZenWifi XT8 to replace the Google devices.
So Google Wifi was always going in the bin, but now I don’t know whether I’ve set fire to a bunch of 💵 by buying the Asus, when I may have been able to keep the household running on my clunky D-Link DVA-2800 DSL modem/router.
Isn’t hobbyist computing fun?
So with all my wifi research, I haven’t bought any new hardware, but I have signed up to a new ISP. 🤷🏼♂️
I’m losing confidence in my Google wifi mesh setup. Is Eero any better? If I spend on a network upgrade I’d like for it to be appreciably better.
I’ve got new glasses. I hate getting new glasses. Everything looks wonky through them and there’s always that feeling the prescription is wrong. New glasses are an anxiety creation machine.
Thanks for your post about Daily Notes in Craft, @toddgrotenhuis. I’ve switched to Craft after trying Obsidian, and also being a Dynalist user.
Soul, 2020 - ★★★★★
A beautiful surrealist movie that was pitch perfect. Elements of Mr Holland’s Opus in the story.
Fixing the Big Sur proxy icon delay globally
I had previously bemoaned the fact that the proxy icon is now hidden behind a hover delay in Big Sur.
Listeners of Hemispheric Views will be aware of my love for the macOS proxy icon.
I am overjoyed to learn that macOS-magic-man Brett Terpstra has found a way to have the proxy icon ready for action without delay. Thank you, sir, for fixing what Apple broke.
Look at this wally, repping the @hemisphericviews merch.
Crap. I think I’m getting into Obsidian. Just when I thought I’d settled on Dynalist and DEVONthink.
Donnelly River in the south-west of Western Australia features kangaroos and emus that are not at all fussed with people.
I’ve discovered the ability to install GUI-based apps via Homebrew Casks. Saves mucking around with .dmg files, dragging and dropping to the Applications folder. Still fun to learn new things about computing!
Discovered my internet was slow. After factory restores and firmware updates for all my networking devices, I’m back to full speed. I wonder for how long my network had been non-optimal?
My Version of the MacSparky Status Board
Recently David Sparks has posted a number of blog entries about his status board creation1. This takes the form of a kanban board of significant projects that he manually updates, providing a graphical overview of his work and life.
I’m a big fan of tools based around the lean methodologies, so I was immediately taken by his idea. I’ve done similar things in the past, but David inspired me to build one with a new approach.
HyperPlan is my Preferred Software
Whereas David uses OmniGraffle, I have chosen to use HyperPlan. I have previously written about my love of HyperPlan.
What makes HyperPlan great for the construction of a status board is that it is data-driven and dynamic. David takes time each week to edit and change his status board in what is effectively a graphics application. By using HyperPlan, I can change database entries and the software intelligently reconstructs the status board. I have freedom to change the variables I want to ‘pivot’ the table around.
I can create and save ‘views’ of my data, which allow me to construct a status board that has the three key elements of my life: work, family, and me — and elect to view all or some of these. I can focus only on work by hiding the others, or I can view them all together in one kanban board, but still split by these roles.
The following image shows the card layout of a status board displaying key projects across all three of my areas of responsibility:
Whereas this redacted image shows my work projects, and demonstrates how the fields can be shown on each card:
System-based URLs for Contextual Computing
HyperPlan has the ability to add hyperlinks to each card. This enables me to adopt David Sparks' contextual computing linking. I am able to add links to OmniFocus projects, Hook references, or DEVONThink locations all within the relevant card. A right-click on the card allows me to jump straight to any of these locations.
Fun and Engaging
I appreciate David sharing his thoughts and ideas around the construction of a status board.
In building my own, it has been a reminder of how I can make work fun and engaging. The efficiency and pure project-processing of OmniFocus is great, but it doesn’t do visualisation. This status board is nice to look at, easy to update, and allows me to consider how loaded up my life is at any particular point in time.
I’m going to make this a key part of my personal management approach.
Frenzic
Frenzic: Overtime – Coming Soon to Apple Arcade • The Breakroom
All of us here at the Iconfactory have dreamt of creating a sequel to the original Frenzic, which first debuted on the App Store thirteen years ago. Thanks to Apple Arcade, that dream is about to become a reality.
Has it really been 13 years since Frenzic? I played it constantly on my iPod touch taking the bus to work. Excited to see it returning. I like this new approach from Apple Arcade.
Back to the Future Part II, 1989 - ★★★½
Not as tightly managed as the original but still fun. The Almanac is a classic MacGuffin.