James Read

My purchasing power for gadgets exceeds my free time to actually play with them. ;-)

Waiting for CSS Masonry for 5 long years, but it's getting there; https://webkit.org/blog/17758/when-will-css-grid-lanes-arrive-how-long-until-we-can-use-it/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

Don't underestimate the impact of compound interest, they said! In a game I'm creating, I added .5% interest per minute (per tick), and over 3 days 261 gold has become 707 billion gold! Now, how can I get those interest rates in real life?!

"Opus? Who cares about Opus? Codex 5.3 has been the industry standard for the last 20 minutes" https://www.youtube.com/shorts/vGKC9LpGnOQ

My kids seem to be compiled with -vvvv on at runtime, should have compiled with -g.

I know a lot of customers who waited for this - they've been using it in preview - and now will appreciate that it's GA! Put simply, this provides better security controls for those containers that need to connect directly to Azure resources on ARO: https://red.ht/49WpoB8

Just a normal Sunday morning; an AI is writing a tech spec for constraint solver for my game, and I'm folding laundry... #coding #ai #gamdev

The Architectural Problem with Clawdbot/Moltbolt/OpenClaw - it tears down security walls we've build around our apps for the last 2 decades; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9acrso71KU

Time to upgrade my #homelab timeserver from GSM+NTP to GPS/Galileo+PTP.

Super interesting, and exiting to see progress with #Azure Maia! :-) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIQe7PvjoX4

I've been trying to understand the wider NVidia portfolio for a while, and took the time to write up my extensive notes as a blog post; https://blog.jread.com/posts/nvidias-2026-portfolio/

New blog post, My Multi-Cloud Usage in 2026; Azure, Linode, Hetzner, Cloudflare workers and Runpod; https://blog.jread.com/posts/a-snapshot-of-cloud-provider-usage-in-2026/

Dubious looking 4-computer, 4k, 4 DP KVM

Place your bets on this KVM switch being capable of switching 100Gbps of display port over 4x computers.... #homelab #battlestation

Upgrade time - need better management of my VLANs at home! #selfhosted #homelab

This is what happens when you "vibe" too hard; gocyclo -over 4 .
119 main setupLevel main.go:363:1

Too good: #vibe coding reality; https://youtube.com/shorts/1_rSrkXovOk?si=s7wo8WpXnsFO3AgB

I've built a lot of apps, and I keep coming back to the web as the platform of course, especially in 2026. That’s saying something from a terminal addict and self-hosting enthusiast. PWAs + modern web APIs have crossed a threshold: offline-first, installable and performant, and can feel "native".

Well that's a first, my Wife complained her "internet was going slow"... it was.... the Ethernet connection had negotiated itself to 10BASE-T. Okay. Well, I guess we'll try re-plugging that. 1000BASE-T restored. Thanks Windows.

Just released a series of fixes and improvements for #OliveTin, including theme support, calendar with logging, webhooks, and updates on notification blocking, plus enhancements in security and testing consistency. https://github.com/OliveTin/OliveTin/releases/tag/3000.9.0

2026 is going to be a year focussed on resilience for #OliveTin - https://blog.jread.com/posts/2026-is-the-year-of-olivetin-resilience/

My kids are tech-privileged. They're playing Super Mario 64 on the steamdeck via #RetroArch, and wanted to play Kirby. While they played, I SSHed onto the Steamdeck, and #GitAnnex get'ed the Kirby ROM from my fileserver. #techdad

I may have 4k monitors, but I think I only have 640p eyeballs :-/

Some fantastic perspectives on this video - really easy listening, just useful nuggets of info in the #AI #DevOps space; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BX9lPK1JGn4

I've been enjoying #Cursor a lot over the last year (although it wasn't love at first sight!) - although there is still very much a place for #neovim #vim https://blog.jread.com/posts/i-use-cursor-ai/

I'll never miss an opportunity to make blog posts about things I learn, or assume incorrectly!;
https://blog.jread.com/posts/copying-files-to-microsd-cards-faster/

Massively enjoyed the @Level1Techs DGX Spark GB10 review, in particular because of the showcase of how you actually use the Spark software platform; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lqd2EuJwOuw #AI #Nvidia #Level1Techs

I really do like #Ventoy - a boot menu for USB keys, so you can select from any available ISO. I made a super quick blog post about it; https://blog.jread.com/posts/ventoy-for-usb-boot/

I just thought I'd do a bit of a new year's clean of my office, of the random tech that's accumulated, and so far I've found 7 disconnected monitors, ranging from 17" to 24"/1080p. Seven of them. Eugh.

Blog post I forgot to share; D2 is a great diagramming language for architecture diagrams
https://blog.jread.com/posts/d2-is-a-great-language-for-architecture-diagrams/

The most amusing talk of #39C3 I've watched so far this year - Hacking washing machines https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1S-PVo3GlA