Author: Lisa

Deregulation

I’ve always believed anarchy was a wonderful governance methodology — for very small communities of highly intelligent, self-aware individuals. I do not find the methodology scalable.

Pure free market principals suffer from the same problem. The free market involves informed actors making rational decisions. Rational is the word that always stood out to me — how many decisions (purchasing or otherwise) are truly rational?

But a recent report regarding a study from before there were regulations about disclosing the source of a study’s funding highlights the “informed” component. How can you be an informed actor without regulations that ensure the “facts” are not being paid for by industry associations?

This isn’t to say I believe we limitless regulations to avoid the possibility of an individual making a poor devision, or that it wouldn’t behoove us to review existing regulations to determine if they are still sensible. But I cannot understand anti-regulation fervor.

 

Debate “Instant Replay”

This: http://www.salon.com/2016/09/13/an-open-letter-to-the-commission-on-presidential-debates-bring-on-instant-replay/

Like my proposal of allowing AMT-exempted tax deductible donations to departments of the federal government, the implementation would be a little tricky but the outcome incredible. There are well defined facts, questionable facts, and then “facts” that have some kind of spin. It would be difficult to stick to the well-documented facts (is some research paper published by a group who got funded by someone benefiting from the result of the research still a “fact”?). I think I would stick to opponent flagged comments too — having a limited number of wrong challenges discourages challenging every statement. But as long as your challenge is substantiated, it isn’t like you’ll find yourself halfway through the fourth quarter, fourth down two yards from the goal line, and unable to challenge a call.

Alternately candidates could be provided a list of their top n lies and told that any of these statements will be immediately challenged by the moderator. The FBI says you were careless … you can say you thought you were doing everything you could, but were found to have been careless. There are recordings of you supporting a war, you can say you changed your mind as new information came to light (why no one does this is beyond me – the “he was for it before he was against it” thing a few elections cycles ago seemed to have such an easy answer to me. I was not privy to all of the information the President had available. Based on the information we were provided at the time, I was for it. Now that new information has been made pubic, I have changed my mind) but you cannot just say you opposed it.

OpenHAB Through A Reverse Proxy

This isn’t something we do, but my Google dashboard says a lot of people are finding my site by searching for OpenHAB and reverse proxy. I do a lot of other things through Apache’s reverse proxy, so I figured I’d provide a quick config.

To start, you either need to have the proxy modules statically built into Apache or load them in your httpd.conf file. I load the modules, so am showing the httpd.conf method. I have the WebStream module loaded as well because we reverse proxy an MQTT server for presence – the last line isn’t needed if you don’t reverse proxy WebStream data.

LoadModule proxy_module modules/mod_proxy.so
LoadModule proxy_http_module modules/mod_proxy_http.so
LoadModule proxy_wstunnel_module modules/mod_proxy_wstunnel.so

If I were reverse proxying our OpenHAB site, I would only do so over HTTPS and I’d have authentication on the site (i.e. any random dude on the Internet shouldn’t be able to load the site and turn my lights off without putting some effort into it). There are other posts on this site providing instructions for adding Kerberos authentication to a site (to an Active Directory domain). You could also use LDAP to authenticate to any LDAP compliant directory – config is similar to the Kerberos authentication with LDAP authorization. You can do local authentication too – not something I do, but I know it is a thing.

Once you have the proxy modules loaded, you need to add the site to relay traffic back to OpenHAB. To set up a new web site, you’ll need to set up a new virtual host. Server Name Indication was introduced in Apache 2.2.12 — this allows you to host multiple SSL web sites on a single IP:Port combination. Prior to 2.2.12, the IP:Port combination needed to be unique per virtual host to avoid certificate name mismatch errors. You still can use a unique combination, but if you want to use the default HTTP-SSL port, 443, and identify the site through ServerName/ServerAlias values … Google setting up SNI with Apache.

Within your VirtualHost definition, you need a few lines to set up the reverse proxy. Then add the “ProxyPass” and “ProxyPassReverse” lines with the URL for your OpenHAB at the end

ProxyRequests Off
<VirtualHost 10.1.2.25:8443>
        ServerName openhabExternalHost.domain.gTLD
        ServerAlias openhab
        SetEnv force-proxy-request-1.0 1
        SetEnv proxy-nokeepalive 1
        SetEnv proxy-initial-not-pooled
        SetEnv proxy-initial-not-pooled 1

        ProxyPreserveHost On
        ProxyTimeOut 1800

        ProxyPass / https://openhabInternalHost.domain.gTLD:9443/
        ProxyPassReverse / https://openhabInternalHost.domain.gTLD:9443/

        SSLEngine On
        SSLProxyEngine On
        SSLProxyCheckPeerCN off
        SSLProxyCheckPeerName off
        SSLCertificateFile /apache/httpd/conf/ssl/www.rushworth.us.cert
        SSLCertificateKeyFile /apache/httpd/conf/ssl/www.rushworth.us.key
        SSLCertificateChainFile /apache/httpd/conf/ssl/signingca-v2.crt
</VirtualHost>

Reload Apache and you should be able to access your OpenHAB web site via your reverse proxy. You can add authentication into the reverse proxy configuration too — this would allow you to use the OpenHAB site directly from your internal network but require authentication when coming in from the Internet.

Sleeping Bag Mathematics

I purchased two yards of the 44″ wide printed star fabric and one yard of the 60″ wide fuzzy green fabric. The fabric arrived, the zipper bits arrived, and then I thought “self, what dimension would make a good toddler sleeping bag?”. Wrong order of operations there.

Now the question is “what dimension sleeping bag can I make with the fabric I already purchased?”. Folding in half along the shorter side yields a 22″ wide sleeping bag. Anya’s waist measurement is 20″, and 22″ seems awfully snug even now. So I’ll use the measurement along the selvage edge as the sleeping bag length. 37″ is a little shorter than she is now, but my sleeping bags (not the camping-in-the-Artic mummy ones) have usually come up to my shoulders … so 37″ will work for years. Then the print’s is folded along its length and the fuzzy folded along its width making a 30″ wide bag. It’ll be 37″x60″ unzipped – which will make a decent “snuggling on the sofa” blanket after she outgrows it as a sleeping bag. Or so I’m telling myself 🙂

Removing Weeds From Walkways and Patios

We have an aversion to chemical herbicides – both run-off and run-on (Anya feet), so have been trying to find a good way to keep the weeds out of our stone/brick patio and walkways. Crawling around and pulling weeds is rather effective. Anya beams with pride each time she gets a root too. But it isn’t a sustainable weed-control method for the entire space. The string trimmer can be used to quickly cut existing growth, but since the roots remain … they return right quickly. I imagine the root system can only sustain regrowth for so long, but we’ve never managed to chop them enough to prevent regrowth.

We had to clean our water softener’s brine tank – and I figure there had to be some basis in reality for the stories about Scipio Aemilianus salting Carthage after the Third Punic War. Not reality of the “he really did it” sense, but it isn’t like folklore has conquerors spreading well composted manure over the fields to render the soil useless. We pored the brine over our stone patio (I’m sure salt isn’t good for stone … but it had to go somewhere). There is one particular low-growing brownish-red weed that still grows, but it blends in well enough with the stone that I don’t really notice it. Other than that, though, *no* weeds for the entire summer. Burned the lawn some, and this is only useful if you find yourself with thirty gallons of brine that need to be dumped somewhere.

Next year, I have more techniques that I want to test: vinegar, baking soda, and boiling water. Hopefully we’ll find a few more approaches. Then next Spring, we’ll do a controlled experiment. 1/n of the patio and 1/n of the front walkway will be weed-controlled with each method. We’ll see which one kills the weeds without running off into the surrounding lawn and which prevents new growth for the longest time.

Owl Backpack – Done!

Anya’s backpack is done! The embroidered eyes turned out really well, and his wings flap a bit as she walks.

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I think the piping turned out really well, and the side pockets work well (had a little bag of pretzels in there). I used little push button cord locks — Anya thinks they look like ladybugs. It’d be really cute if they made them in red with black dots to *really* look like ladybugs).

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I moved the strap mount points – the bag didn’t sit properly when the straps were attached at the seam between the semi-circle and the rectangle. Moving the straps up to the top seam had the bag hanging nicely off her back.

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Mead Experimentation

We are experimenting with different honey concentrations and different yeasts to make mead. We’ve got 71b to make a dry mead (with different concentrations of honey) and then 47b to make a slightly sweeter mead.

Researching the process, we decided on three nutrient additions – a blend of 50% Go Ferm and 50% Fermenaid K. Added 1/4 teaspoon of nutrients shortly after the yeast was pitched. Added another a couple of days later … and then couldn’t figure out when the almost-done state was and failed to add the third addition.

Now we’re just waiting for it to ferment.

 

Owl Backpack: Halfway Point

The interior is almost complete — I still need to stitch the zipper strips onto the bag, but it actually looks like a bag now:

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The side pockets are assembled and ready to be attached. I really like the grommets.

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The back of the backpack has been assembled too — the straps are mounted & the D-rings are in place.

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We went to Joann this evening and picked up a zipper foot, so I can get the piping stitched up tonight.

Owl Backpack: Beginning Assembly

Anya’s owl backpack is starting to come together. I’ve got all of the pieces cut, and the insulation bits are glued to the laminated bits. The glue needs to set for 24 hours.

The owl has been assembled – I want to embroider the face and maybe some zig-zag lines on his body and wings. The face and wings have a thin batting so I’ll get a quilting effect with embroidery. The body (pocket) does not have any batting because it is already a little thick with the laminate layers.

I’ve got the bias strips cut for the piping, and we picked up some 325 paracord to use as the “string” in the piping. Tomorrow, we’ll get the grommets installed on the mesh pocket casing. We should start assembling the bag once that is done!

 

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Owl Backpack – Cutting Pieces

I just started cutting the pieces for Anya’s Owl Backpack (a pattern we found on Moda BakeShop). I am making one tweak to the pattern — the front pocket (a.k.a. the owl’s body) is going to be lined in the laminated fabric. Leaky pens, melted crayons … hopefully this will mitigate staining.

We finished cutting the front and back pieces tonight. Tomorrow, we’ll cut out the top/side/bottom rectangles. I didn’t realize the bird fabric is 54″ wide … this may be the lining for several backpacks as Anya grows 🙂

I think the polka-dot fabric looks rather nice with the laminate. There’s a bird the same shade of blue, and there’s a bird the shade of pink I’ll be using for the piping and zipper.

IMG_20160825_232312

The pattern itself I found a little hard to follow. I love that they save paper/ink by not printing a bunch of rectangles, but there are instructions to cut a specific size rectangle from one of the fabrics or another scattered throughout the document. I read through the entire thing three times before I found the rest of the backpack back exterior. To avoid missing any pieces, I searched through the document for the string ‘cut’ and listed out each piece. This list is categorized by fabric. Odd, since they have a “recipe” at the beginning of the article, that they don’t do something similar.

Laminate:
(2)    15 1/2 x 2 1/2    zipper opening interior
(2)    8 3/4 x 4 1/2    side of backpack interior
(1)    10 1/2 x 4 1/4    bottom of backpack interior
(2)    <backpack back pattern>    front and back
(2)    <owl belly pocket>    owl pocket lining

Insul-brite
(2)    8 x 4        side of backpack insulation
(1)    10 x 4        bottom of backpack insulation
(2)    <backpack lining pattern>    front and back

Twill:
(2)    15 1/2 x 2 1/2    zipper opening exterior
(2)    8 1/2 x 4 1/2    side of backpack exterior
(1)    10 1/2 x 4 1/2    bottom of backpack exterior
(1)    10 1/2 x 9    backpack back
(1)    <backpack back half-circle>    backpack back
(1)    <front back pattern>    front
(2)    22 x 4    straps
(2)    2 1/2 x 4    strap attachment mount

Mesh:
(2)    5 1/2 x 7 1/2    mesh pocket

Piping Fabric:
(2)    7 1/2 x 3 1/2    mesh pocket casing

Random fabrics for owl:
(1)    <owl pocket lining>    owl pocket
(2)    <owl face pieces>    owl face
(4)    <owl wing pieces>    owl wings