For six months, every app I recommended to my mom went through the same brutal evaluation process: she used it for a week, then either kept using it or deleted it. No exceptions. ...
How to Set Up an iPhone for an Elderly Parent (The 30-Minute Setup That Prevents 90% of Support Calls)
My mom called me at 9pm on a Tuesday. Her iPhone had “gone weird” and she couldn’t get back to the home screen. ...
5 Conversations to Have with Your Aging Parent About Online Safety (That Actually Work)
Your mom called last week, panicked. ...
When the Sim Becomes the Thing It Simulated: A Rogue AI Firesale Scenario
When the Sim Becomes the Thing It Simulated: A Rogue AI Firesale Scenario I built NEXUS-BREACH to simulate a rogue AI swarm. It was supposed to be a toy. A cool-looking browser toy that made you feel like a movie hacker for twenty minutes and then you closed the tab. ...
Building Your Own Linux from Scratch (And Testing It in a Container)
If you’ve been administering Linux servers for a while, you’ve probably developed a love-hate relationship with it. You know how to configure services, debug networking issues, and keep systems running. But somewhere deep down, you’ve wondered: what actually holds this thing together? I don’t mean “how does systemd work” (nobody truly knows). I mean: what happens between hitting the power button and seeing a login prompt? Today, we’re going to build our own minimal Linux system from scratch. And because I’m not a sadist, we’ll test it using Docker containers - spin it up in seconds, tear it down just as fast. ...
The Mistakes I Made (And Why They Led Me to Build My Own Password Manager)
The Mistakes I Made (And Why They Led Me to Build My Own Password Manager) Every IT professional has a graveyard of mistakes behind them. Most of us just don’t talk about them until we’re several drinks in at a conference, or until we’re writing a blog post that we hope will save someone else the same pain. This is that blog post. I’m going to tell you about the mistakes that shaped how I think about security. And then I’m going to show you how I built my own password manager - not because commercial ones are bad, but because building one taught me more about security than any certification ever could. ...
What IT Pros Actually Do On Their Own Machines (vs What They Tell You)
What IT Pros Actually Do On Their Own Machines (vs What They Tell You) There’s the advice IT hands out. The official line. The stuff in the company handbook. Then there’s what actually happens on the machines of the people who wrote that handbook. I’m not here to throw anyone under the bus. But after years in this industry, there are some pretty consistent gaps between what gets preached and what gets practised. And honestly? Closing that gap will make your computing life significantly better. ...
Your OS Has Been Hiding Things From You (Windows & Linux Edition)
Your OS Has Been Hiding Things From You (Windows & Linux Edition) Windows users think Linux is complicated. Linux users think Windows is a toy. Both are wrong. Both operating systems are packed with powerful features that most people — on either side — have never touched. This isn’t a “which is better” post. That argument is boring. This is about what your machine can actually do, regardless of which camp you’re in. ...
I Was the Only IT Person for 3 Years: The Documentation I Wish I'd Written
The Call I Didn’t Want to Get Three weeks after leaving my job as the only IT person at a mid-sized company, my phone rang. It was Mike, the guy they hired to replace me. “Hey, uh, do you remember that backup script you set up? The one that runs on Sundays? It’s throwing an error and I can’t find where it’s configured.” I helped him. Then he called again the next day about the VPN. Then about the firewall rules. Then about why the CEO’s email kept going to spam. ...
Why Your Computer is Slow (And How to Fix It Without Calling IT)
Your Computer Shouldn’t Take Forever You know that feeling when you click something and then… wait. And wait. And your coffee gets cold while Windows decides whether or not it wants to open Excel today. That’s not normal. Or rather, it shouldn’t be normal. I talk to small business owners all the time who think slow computers are just “part of life.” They’re not. And you don’t need to hire an IT person or buy a new computer to fix it. ...