#Open Source

Pondering a backup scenario that involves a bit of bash scripting, veracrypt containers and optical media, seeking sanity checks

We are trying to grow a new FOSS collaboration community.

Outsource your GitHub CI to a VPS: cheaper, faster, and a free backup server too

Self-hosted GitHub Actions runners on a small Hetzner VPS cut my CI wall-clock from ~12 minutes to ~3 minutes for about half the price of the GitHub-hosted minutes I was burning. Here's the full setup…

Make links to your blog render the custom "View publication" card + CTA

Short guide. The mechanism is simpler than it looks, and it doesn't involve any /.well-known file or DNS TXT record.

Unicorns Build Monocultures

Every few months, Australia’s business press discovers a new emergency. Right now it’s the capital gains tax. According to the usual commentators — founders, VCs, and their aligned media — Labor’s mov…

Eyes Wide Shut

A few days ago I was listening to an episode of It Could Happen Here — Cooper Quintin and Colonel Panic from the EFF walking through the American surveillance state. Flock cameras on every corner. Cel…

Don't Let the Asphalt Bury the Garden

I’ve spent 30 years watching tech cycles come and go, from the first dial-up modems in rural Austria to the mesh networks I’m currently stringing across the Australian bush. Each time a “next big thin…

ATmosphere Conf 2026: the internet built for people, not platforms

370 people in Vancouver, 500 online, all working on the same question: what does the internet look like when users own their data? Highlights from the AT Protocol community conference.

Small Steps For Agent-Friendly Codebases

Updating an open source library taught me a valuable lesson for making your codebase agent-friendly — small steps can have a big payoff.

AI slop is drowning communities. Verifiable track records can fix it.

AI-generated junk content is flooding every community platform. Traditional moderation can't keep up. Portable, cross-platform contribution history is a structural fix that addresses the root cause.

LPWAN Meshes: Reticulum - Where I Landed

After years of experimenting with various LPWAN mesh networking technologies, I’ve settled on Reticulum as my primary LoRa mesh platform. It emerged as the clear frontrunner not because it’s simpler t…

LPWAN Meshes: MeshTastic - The Gateway Drug

For many new to LPWAN mesh networking, MeshTastic often appears as a starting point due to its affordability and active community. It can get you from zero to sending a basic mesh message relatively q…

Barazo: community forums where members own their data

I'm building an open source forum platform on the AT Protocol. Members log in with their Bluesky account, posts live on their own data server, and reputation follows them across communities.

BigTech independence update: cleaning house for local AI

Three months after my original BigTech independence article, here's what changed and why I'm building infrastructure for local AI.

A practical guide to building your own antifragile tech stack

Seven principles for evaluating technology choices, reducing vendor lock-in, and building a more resilient digital setup. The decision-making framework behind the tools.

Start building Anti-Fragile communities, your community deserves it

Over 20 years building communities around open-source platforms, I've watched a pattern repeat. Communities feel invincible until the moment they collapse. Learn how to build anti-fragile communities …

How I reduced my BigTech dependencies in 2025 (and why you should too)

A detailed guide on moving away from vendor lock-in and Big Tech subscriptions to build a more robust, privacy-friendly, and antifragile tech setup using open source alternatives.

Monarch: Minimal, Manageable, Migrations 🦋

Introducing Monarch, a simple yet flexible migrations library for Swift that helps manage user data changes across app updates with minimal hassle.

Building A Customizable Framer Component

A technical walkthrough of building a customizable Framer Code Component for Buttondown email signups, complete with Property Controls and open source code.

Introducing Recap: What's Old Is What's New Again

Open sourcing Recap, a Swift library for creating beautiful What's New screens to highlight app updates and keep users informed about new features.

Twitter Space: Making Data Storage Magical with Boutique

I joined the Github DevRel team to discuss building Boutique, my "magical" library for data persistence. We also dive into my journey from Twitter to indie development, and the harsher realities of op…

Reflections On An Open Source Project

Personal reflections on building Boutique and Bodega open source projects, covering the ups and downs of creating something valuable for the Swift community.

Model View Controller Store: Reinventing MVC for SwiftUI with Boutique

Introducing Boutique, a new architecture that reimagines MVC for SwiftUI by adding a Store layer to handle state management and data flow in a familiar, approachable way.

Often Confused Commerce Terms

Let's set the record straight about some often mixed up terms in commerce