Hello, I’m Barry (he/him), a software engineer and technology leader with experience building teams, websites and apps. I live in a village in Hertfordshire, UK, with my wife and two sons.
This is my personal website where I post all my articles, notes, photos, bookmarks and checkins using my own software. View the full archives.
Read more about me, how to contact me and how to follow me.
Weeknotes
Recently
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Week 202 - Garden
I’ve been tracking my blood pressure twice a day for the last couple of weeks. It was prompted by a routine check-up where... -
Week 201 - Mice
I’ve been hearing scratching noises in my office wall recently, especially behind one of the power sockets. I unscrewed the... -
Week 200 - Super-soaker
It must have been hot this week: the bedroom Dyson fan was turned to 10, curtains were shut in the daytime and the paddling... -
Week 199 - Bucket
Pulp were even better than I expected at the O₂. Andy, Matt, Mike and I joined the other nineties indie kids, along with a... -
Week 198 - Gaming
We have a Switch 2! I missed the pre-orders and so assumed I’d have to wait, but on launch day I found one in stock at Argos... -
Week 197 - Elbow
Another welcome Bank Holiday Monday. The sun was shining and so I took my youngest across the road to the park with his... -
Week 196 - Glasses
I’ve been enjoying a nostalgic look back through archives of the Warwick Boar – the student newspaper I worked on from 1997... -
Week 195 - Winners
The last time I saw Rialto was in the nineties with Andy while we were students. We saw them again this week at Scala. Big... -
Week 194 - Flowers
Yet another welcome bank holiday Monday to start the week. Ignoring the boys’ protests, we dragged them away from their... -
OpenAI buys Windsurf for $3B. Not bad for “just” a VSCode fork. As an early Windsurf paying customer, I’m curious but wary of what comes next.
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Week 193 - Repair
It’s been shorts weather. Lovely. I decided to invest in our backup setup at home. Although our Macs and photos are backed... -
Week 192 - Smell
Poppy the cat had a couple of accidents this week. First, she wee’d on my pants left in a washing pile in our bedroom. The... -
Week 191 - Egg
It was the second week of the Easter holidays for our boys, and thanks to Good Friday, it was also a shorter working week... -
Week 190 - France
We came back on Monday from a week’s holiday in France, which is why these weeknotes are a little late. Sorry about that. We... -
Week 189 - Injury
We had another leak from our bathroom into the server/fusebox cupboard below, caused again by the bath’s shower wand... -
Week 188 - Mother
I had holiday to use up before the end of March so I took Friday off. L and I drove into town for some shopping before a... -
Week 187 - Singing
The interviews have been better after last week’s fake-candidate fiasco, in that we have real people turning up. I treated... -
My favourite band, Gene, are reuniting for their first gig in 21 years 🎉 I was at their last one in… 2004. See you in Hammersmith 🤩
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Week 186 - Fake
I’ve started interviewing again at work this week. We’re hiring software engineers to work remotely in the UK. However, it’s... -
Week 185 - Pancakes
L was working every day this week so I walked the boys to school before returning to WFH. Plenty of extra steps 💪 This also... -
Week 184 - Cat
Poppy, our elderly tabby cat, has been poorly this week. She seemed her usual self during the day but we found morning... -
Week 183 - Loud
It’s been half-term holidays for the boys. It’s been nice having them around while I’ve been working from home the end of... -
Week 182 - Celebrate
So much birthday-celebrating this week. First, C had his early birthday party at DJ’s Jungle, starting with soft play, then... -
Week 181 - Eggs
I caught the early train into London on Wednesday for a breakfast meet-up. Joel had kindly invited a group of people he’s... -
I’ve released a new minor version of #micropublish that supports the new2022 IndieAuth spec change to support Server Metadata for endpoint discovery as an alternative to the existing (legacy) headers/body methods.
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Week 180 - Substance
I watched a few films and plenty of TV this dark, wintry week. For some reason I hadn’t seen Dead Man’s Shoes, despite... -
Week 179 - Loaf
It’s been a very quiet week, Monday especially so with my US colleagues off work. Of course there was a change in president... -
Week 178 - Maximum
I finally felt better after post-Christmas stomach cramps. I had the same pains a year ago so there’s a pattern: I wouldn’t... -
Week 177 - Freezing
Back to work. I’d had almost three weeks off for Christmas, and felt a few night-before nerves similar to the ends of school... -
Week 176 - Fire
We made it out for New Year’s Eve - to Jenny and Ian’s in the village for drinks and lots of party food. Our boys are still... -
Week 175 - Christmas
As is now traditional, I marked the start of Christmas festivities by picking up the meat order from our village butchers. H... -
Week 174 - Church
I finished work before Christmas a little earlier than previous years because of a few extra holiday days I needed to take... -
Week 173 - Rainbows
Our gas boiler had its annual service but also needed a new expansion tank and sensor. That’ll be £770, please. Ugh. I’m... -
Week 172 - Wind
H has been accepted into the advanced group of his Players Academy football training sessions on Monday nights. We’re very... -
Week 171 - Advent
The Christmas tree is up and decorated. I’m not sure why but L relented and allowed us to use multi-coloured tinsel this... -
Week 170 - Eating
It was my birthday this week. I don’t always take time off work to celebrate, but with a few holiday days left in the bank I... -
Week 169 - Electronic
I had another brief, last-minute trip to Munich this week. I flew out on Thursday afternoon and was back home late on... -
Week 168 - Night
Two actual nights out with my wife this week! The first was to see The Bluetones in Hitchin on Thursday. It was our fourth... -
Week 167 - Magic
I had a couple more nights by myself this week while the rest were still away. I cooked myself an amazing ribeye steak (and... -
Week 166 - Trophy
It was H’s ninth birthday this week. He’s now at an age where he no longer wants toys. Instead he received a football kit... -
Week 165 - Hike
This week I flew to Munich for just 24 hours to visit a customer for a workshop. It was a pretty short and expensive but... -
Week 164 - Nuclear
My cold from last weekend kept me off work this Monday. I was still foggy the next morning so didn’t risk the drive up to... -
Week 163 - Celebrities
I joined Andy in London for another live recording of Richard Herring’s Leicester Square Theatre Podcast (or as the cool... -
Week 162 - Running
It was the one week each year when I don’t need heating or cooling in my office. So much rain though. I was in the air when... -
Week 161 - Watch
I was in the office for a couple of days this week and felt very tired as a result. How ever did we all survive doing this... -
Apple Store, Regent Street, London on the Apple iPhone 16 and Watch 10 launch day.
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I was just adding a gig I’m going to on Last.fm when I saw my “member since” date: 16 August 2004 😯. That’s 20 years of scrobbling (since its Audioscrobbler days). Newer than my Gmail account but older than Twitter.
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Week 160 - Flights
I flew back to Altium’s HQ in San Diego this week for a few productive days of workshopping. It’s a long way to travel -... -
Week 159 - Cricket
The boys went back to school this week to start a new year. They’re growing bigger (and cheekier) than ever. Both bounced... -
Week 158 - Car
I sold my Audi S3 this week. I bought it new almost 11 years ago and it’s been an excellent car. It’s taken me to-and-from...