Alyn

Into reading, SciFi, musical electronics, and vintage vehicles. Sidelines: gaming (generally chill exploration type and racing sims,) acoustic percussion and post-Roman history. He/Him

Header image is from https://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/apps/YourNameInLandsat-main/index.html
A: Farm Island, United States of America
L: Xing Jiang, China
Y: Tasman Glacier, New Zealand
N: Yapacani River, Bolivia

Born @ 336.96ppm CO2

Public Key

npub1j9vc333reae7t842ewekx23lr4vfqmxaht3dh66s9zvackmryw0q7htswp

NIP-05 Address

[email protected]

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsfzkvgcc3u7ul9n64vhvmr9gl36kysdnwm4ckmadgz3xwutd3j88spz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerfw36x7tnsw43qt5jjge

Publishing to

relay.ditto.pub

Author Public Key

npub1j9vc333reae7t842ewekx23lr4vfqmxaht3dh66s9zvackmryw0q7htswp

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Last Notes

2026-08-08 12:59:25 GMT

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@nprofile…qvan @nprofile…s8fp
I understand what they've said even if I don't understand the mechanism - presumably relying on Kindle Unlimited payments.
Anyway, as I tried to indicate, I'm interested in buying the book however it can be achieved outside Amazon, and if that's ARC's through BookFunnel, so be it.

2026-08-08 12:16:51 GMT

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@nprofile…qvan @nprofile…s8fp
Yeah, Amazon _exclusivity_ is a deal-breaker for me too. We DO support artists (of all stripes) here, and therefore some people here do not support the extractive practises of the most parasitical enterprises. Everyone makes their own choices, and has their own red-lines though.
By all means add me to the list of people being updated if it gets wider distribution.

2026-04-25 20:09:26 GMT

Request please for anyone who knows Sheffield in the UK. I'm up there on my birthday supporting my daughter who's competing in a fencing tournament at the EIS building on Coleridge Road. Is there anywhere nice within say a 15 minute walk were we could go eat in the evening afterwards? Not really looking for chains, but local experience/advice.
#sheffield #advice #food

2026-04-17 14:52:39 GMT

Thanks to @nprofile…58gl , @nprofile…65q8 & @nprofile…zx3a, I've ended up buying an Xteink X4. Picked it up from ebay from a UK importer, and it came with a screen protector and mag rings, but they didn't have the cases.
I 3D printed one of the slide-on ones but it just doesn't feel nice, so I've made a fold-over magnetic case mostly using some resources I had lying around. Had to buy a small amount of felt for the lining and 3D printed some strengtheners to form the spine and protect the front.
https://stockroom.wandering.shop/media_attachments/files/116/420/513/891/680/902/original/f76f8d96f0c58f69.jpg
https://stockroom.wandering.shop/media_attachments/files/116/420/514/421/593/343/original/3398acca83fa2a6c.jpg
https://stockroom.wandering.shop/media_attachments/files/116/420/514/955/807/734/original/45249a8e2b71cfc9.jpg
https://stockroom.wandering.shop/media_attachments/files/116/420/515/339/640/466/original/b28714cd18986faa.jpg

2026-04-09 15:13:23 GMT

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@nprofile…65q8 Thanks. Yes, must be a different reason, since I can back up two of the partitions successfully in the debug page.
I'm having another go directly into a mobo USB port instead of a hub. If this fails I'll have to install a Chromium browser on a different computer.

2026-04-09 15:07:25 GMT

Anyone else with an #XTeink X4 had trouble with the #CrossPoint firmware site not being able to backup the existing firmware? I keep finding it gets to 100% on the "Read Flash" stage and then reports an error saying "No serial data received." Does the same on the debug page for the app1 partition too, but not for otadata nor app0.

2025-10-17 07:42:16 GMT

Excellent long-form post/article here from @nprofile…vqut (who I'm astonished I've not followed before now) detailing an exchange with an individual who seems not only anti #solarpunk, but almost militantly opposed to actually thinking about their lack of understanding.
What their writing has done for me is to put some proper flesh on the bare-bones arguments I've been making when talking to others about the ideas.
https://brightflame.com/in-response-to-misinformed-criticism-of-solarpunk/

2025-08-15 16:57:47 GMT

Great to see my wife's new book has been picked up by a good number of book bloggers to review and talk about next week. I've not been able to find any of them with federated accounts sadly.
https://adults.amysparkes.co.uk
Blog page links in the reply & feel free to boost this post (but maybe not my own reply).
#Players1715 #bookstodon #books #IndieAuthor #IndiePublishing #blogs #BookReview
https://stockroom.wandering.shop/media_attachments/files/115/033/746/403/141/045/original/cd3671853f784b59.jpg

2025-07-29 07:51:13 GMT

IT'S LAUNCH DAY!
So although I didn't write this book - it's my wife's work - I've been heavily involved in getting it published. We'd really like it to be read widely and appreciated, so any boosts are hugely encouraged!
Purchased e-book versions are DRM-free.
E-Pub on Kobo (and Kobo-Plus):
https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/ebook/the-players-act-1
Ebook on Kindle:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DY8CM3LX
Paperback on Amazon:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/106832791X
Or available to order from most (UK) bookshops.
#bookstodon #BookLaunch #books
https://stockroom.wandering.shop/media_attachments/files/114/935/429/320/424/803/original/019350b8a47153b0.mp4

2025-07-24 14:26:40 GMT

We had some great news today, and were over the moon to see my wife's book, 'The House At The Edge of Magic' shortlisted for the Barnes & Noble Children's & YA Book Awards! A huge honour.
Congratulations to all the other authors and illustrators of course!
#bookstodon #books #kidlit #childrensbooks
https://stockroom.wandering.shop/media_attachments/files/114/908/652/538/709/528/original/132ea0e3ee00c81a.jpg

2025-07-16 08:17:44 GMT

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@nprofile…qz4x
Got upset enough that I now run a small instance of #searxng which does a similar thing to #Kagi (searches across multiple services) but without its own index - a metasearch engine essentially.
Strips out ads and AI responses and was moderately useful a little while ago for ascertaining that Google had heavily de-prioritised a blog post by @nprofile…5k2y - the interface indicates which services provided which results.

2025-06-11 09:42:20 GMT

In the Mastodon web interface, there's an option to filter based on the content of profiles. Does anyone know if there's a method of using this to filter so that ONLY posts from verified accounts are shown (i.e. the filter should be hiding NON-verified accounts).
@nprofile…g8jv @nprofile…u9u3
#filter #mastodon

2025-06-05 10:23:16 GMT

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@nprofile…dwme
Lovely - thank you. Just re-tagging in @nprofile…x759 so his followers get the chance to see the fix implemented too!
I've got your repo setup in f-droid, so I'll be on the spot once the next update hits!

2025-06-05 07:09:05 GMT

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@nprofile…dwme
Fair enough - I wasn't making an aesthetic judgement. I'm sure it would be fine at 72dpi, but on a high-dpi phone screen the bars don't separate enough.

2025-06-05 06:23:21 GMT

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@nprofile…x759
@nprofile…dwme Fedilab has made an attempt. At first I thought it had combined all the quotes, but the blue line DOES change thickness by one pixel per level.
https://stockroom.wandering.shop/media_attachments/files/114/629/319/047/241/986/original/93ceddf63404ca21.png

2025-05-30 14:46:21 GMT

So my wife @nprofile…6dsu is releasing a new book at the end of July and is premiering the first chapter in her newsletter this weekend. The Players Act 1 is light/humorous historical fiction about a troupe of "strolling players" (travelling actors) in early 18th Century England.
It'd be lovely for people to know about it, maybe sign up to the newsletter and perhaps even pre-order the DRM-free ebook.
https://buttondown.com/AmySparkesAuthor
https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/ebook/the-players-act-1
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DY8CM3LX
#books #bookstodon

2025-05-27 12:53:23 GMT

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@nprofile…x759 @nprofile…32kp And we love you for it!
I've had to educate a number of acquaintances that buying an ebook (from Amazon in their cases), reading it, and then returning it inside the returns window royally screws the author, NOT Amazon.
That's before the ones who unapologetically use those "certain sites" because it's easier than a library and react to the argument of "an unpaid author can't write more," with the fact that there are more books available than they'll ever read anyway.

2025-05-27 12:36:57 GMT

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@nprofile…32kp I wonder if the "strength" of the prices of eReaders is related to the level of ebook piracy. Sellers hoping to recoup profits lost on an ebook reader sold at a loss by selling ebooks at greater markup may have been undone by #booktok and its promotion of certain sites and the expectation that books should not be paid for. I wonder what the percentage of ebook readers paying for the books they read is - it sometimes feels that paying readers of ebooks are a niche of a niche of a niche.

2025-05-09 19:59:10 GMT

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@nprofile…x759 @nprofile…sc3p
Got my email about 15:10 BST here are the links it contained (I paid successfully):
Print & Digital: https://buy.stripe.com/bIYeV57WR5pt2TC7sv
Digital Only: https://buy.stripe.com/3cs9ALb93dVZ65O6oq

2025-05-04 16:10:16 GMT

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@nprofile…lwhf
And also with you.

2025-04-15 18:29:27 GMT

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@nprofile…x759 You know @nprofile…6dsu and I have been considering this with her new book. We've gone no-DRM partly since it will be broken anyway at some point - it's no real protection.
People who would never have paid for her book will still never pay for it. People who want the convenience of store/reader integration will still pay for that. People who find it for free somewhere MIGHT pay for it if they like it and find a little note telling them how to. And sideloaders can just get an epub off KoFi

2025-03-05 11:35:37 GMT

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@nprofile…sszg
I hope I made it clear that I think this is a good thing, especially when compared to the practises @nprofile…a46y talked about.

2025-03-05 11:29:13 GMT

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@nprofile…a46y
Every time this is asked, the same company name comes up. Mythic Beasts has been very good to me, but refuse to sell at a loss to gather users. It makes their prices reasonable, but not cheap. They also live here @nprofile…sszg

2025-02-03 07:35:43 GMT

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@nprofile…x759
Funny, I had a very similar plan this weekend. I only got as far as installing Kiwix on my Windows machine and downloading the .zim files for Wikipedia and WikiMed illustrated versions. I shall probably investigate running a Docker container to host it on the network and copy the zim files somewhere the container can access.

2025-01-07 10:16:18 GMT

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@nprofile…x759 @nprofile…lfq2 @nprofile…xt5t Slightly different methodology for me - I've been adding radio URLS to the favourites - that seems to work no matter which theme is active.
In the absence of embedded art being included with the music stream (not sure if that's a me problem or a stream problem), I've also added the "Catellite" image as the logo for the favourite so it displays on the screen of the devices I'm listening on. URL here:
https://theindiebeat.fm/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/cropped-Catellite-rounded-corners-192x192.png

2025-01-01 10:54:19 GMT

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@nprofile…x759 On the hosting RSS side of things, I'm sure you have a solution in mind. However...
When I had a similar requirement (hosting audio readings to allow unsighted participants in a discussion group to access group notes), I used this to generate an RSS feed from a folder of MP3 files which was then available in podcast apps:
https://gist.github.com/vsoch/4898025919365bf23b6f

2024-12-19 10:35:37 GMT

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@nprofile…x759 I remember reading in your initial Lyrion setup post that you weren't sure about getting players working in concert playing the same thing. Did you find the "syncronise" player setting? Now the second one of mine has turned up, I've ticked that and set it to follow my original device, and it keeps close time (within 1ms I reckon) across radio, local files, podcasts, and BandCamp.

2024-12-18 15:23:24 GMT

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@nprofile…x759 And it's all playing nicely! LMS talks to the NAS (which has exposed a bunch of broken ID-3 tags to be fixed), talks to the RSS feeds of podcasts, and talks to #BandCamp via the "Band's Campout" plugin. It'd be nice if the podcasts could sync to my #Gpodder service on NextCloud, but maybe that's a bit much to ask for! @nprofile…mj9a #ComfyChannel is added to my Favourites, so all is right with the world!
Except I've just found another LSB Radio at Cash-Converters....

2024-12-12 22:54:25 GMT

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@nprofile…x759 Well, I've taken the plunge, so I'll give it a go. Thank you for pointing it out. Just got LMS up and running in a container on an old Fujitsu Futro that's also running Jellyfin so I can re-use the mapped NAS connection - much like you did.
A secondary purpose is to get BandCamp access, so I've found the relevant plugin for that too. Doesn't show up in the Material interface, but does in Default - I can live with that.
Waiting for the box to be delivered now...

2024-12-03 13:51:08 GMT

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@nprofile…cl5w Interesting. So, two questions...
1) Is this why a lot of northern european late 1st millenium shields are round - so the opponent can't be sure what angle the defender's arm is at?
2) Bearded axes are not ideal commuting accoutrements, for sure, but what if a meter-long pole with a pronounced hook on the end was carried around, and also served another purpose?
🌂 ☔

2024-11-30 12:33:25 GMT

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@nprofile…32kp I tried this on my IceShrimp instance and indeed got back a back a bunch of JSON. However, the second item in the <fields> section appeared to break things. It was for my verified website, and the end of the website URL included <\/a> which I suspect is not correct.
The website item in the <fields> section WITHIN <source> was correct though.

2024-11-23 23:25:54 GMT

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@nprofile…7766
Yeah, I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm wrong, but I think it does that to avoid all your notifications data going through Google's servers. If you're installing fedilab from fdroid anyway, it's pretty simple to also install ntfy to provide open-source notification services though, so I didn't find it an issue.
@nprofile…ttkq @nprofile…dwme

2024-11-23 23:20:18 GMT

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@nprofile…dwme
I'm a fan too. I particularly like the way it handles multiple accounts. I have two Mastodon and one Iceshrimp, and it works well across all three, BUT ALSO allows me to boost a post using any of the accounts while I'm browsing the timeline of any of the others. Like if I see a gaming related post I want to boost while scrolling my more general account, I can boost it on my mstdn.games account. It's a brilliant idea executed so simply!
@nprofile…ttkq

2024-08-17 16:22:55 GMT

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@npub1vt6…w2mw YES! Got one! Looks like it's sold well.

2024-07-10 09:15:09 GMT

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@npub19lt…qfjk
Unethical would have been demoing the bugs to their other customers along with your open tickets.

2024-03-19 20:13:36 GMT

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@npub198t…hasj What voltage does it need? If it's 12V, there's a company called Blind Spot in Scotland that make a USB-C (PD) 12V-3A cable. I use one for powering a Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera (with the alternate end on for the camera). They shot it powering an ATEM Mini Pro - not sure if it's the ISO varient.

2024-02-21 18:39:23 GMT

Has there just been a new version of @npub14t2…nx8c released?
Got a notification that my container was out of date and the image I'm being offered is dated 21st Feb, but there's no release for February noted on the blog and I've not seen anyone talking about it here.
#snikket

2024-02-21 14:22:17 GMT

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@npub198t…hasj Thanks for that, and the associated blog post.
On a practical level, do you book it as "payment for services" since you aren't receiving an actual object or receiptable licence for your company's money?

2024-02-21 10:04:05 GMT

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@npub198t…hasj
Not looking at the AI aspect really, but does your business contribute financially to the people making the Free software you use? If so, how?
I'm not asking to try to make a point, but because we're using some free Open Source software that we feel we ought to "donate" to. A ltd company giving money away to something that's not a charity seems non-trivial from an accounts perspective.

2024-01-29 12:25:08 GMT

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@npub19lt…qfjk Knowing you can't see likes or replies on the location posts, let me report that both my accounts can see photos and parse the alt-text correctly.
It appears neither can handle the location in the way you intend though. I'll use your form of words from the Mastodon Issue to pop one on the #IceShrimp repo if that's OK.

2024-01-28 21:39:52 GMT

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@npub19lt…qfjk
I've tried following from Mastodon and IceShrimp instances just to see if there's a difference.

2024-01-10 20:03:41 GMT

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@npub14t2…nx8c Great, thanks for the work you do. Had to update to a dated Docker tag because the plain "stable" and "beta" didn't support ARM64, but I'm there now.

2024-01-07 18:29:59 GMT

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@npub1npy…3sf4 My wife and I run a small, (almost) brand new production company. For the most part we contract out the editing and stuff, but for smaller or passion projects we do it all in-house.

2024-01-07 17:06:16 GMT

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@npub1npy…3sf4 Although I've now paid for #DavinciResolve Studio, I have in the past uploaded a video to #Vimeo, used the auto-generator they supply for subtitles, exported the subtitle file and added it into the project.

2023-08-02 07:54:22 GMT

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@npub1hyk…3p33
Thanks, Hardback pledged with ebook add-on (just in case anyone else is looking for an audiobook-free combination in the rewards).

2023-07-18 09:14:57 GMT

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@npub120z…33r2 I don't think FORCING publicly visible blocklists is the correct way to go.
I know some smaller, protective Mastodon communities have deliberately not made theirs public because Bad Actors scrape the lists and then harass the admins to know why they've been blocked and demanding restitution - pretty sure @npub1xcw…c6lj was involved in a thread where this was explained recently.

2023-06-26 07:22:56 GMT

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@npub19lt…qfjk
And from your graphs, it seems "you need a South-facing roof," is similarly so. Our pitch is E-W too, and installers have told us it's not worth doing.