voxel

Low bit and retro developer

itch.io: https://voxel.itch.io
blog: https://thomaspurnell.com
storage capacity: 1.44MB
pronouns: he/him

Public Key

npub1q6hhuente686t039lsj75cen650kufxyvyulufq2cv3ta0wegcwq8lkcxa

NIP-05 Address

voxel_at_merveilles.town@momostr.pink

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsqdtm7ve4uara9hcjlcf02vvea28mwynzxzw07ys9vxg47hhv5v8qprpmhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumt0d4hhxarj9ecxjmnt3fapjl

Publishing to

relay.momostr.pink

Author Public Key

npub1q6hhuente686t039lsj75cen650kufxyvyulufq2cv3ta0wegcwq8lkcxa

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Last Notes

2026-05-03 15:34:05 UTC

Gemini is *almost* perfect for browsing on retrocomputers. The SSL requirement is a big hurdle though. I wanted to use AmiGemini to browse gemini capsules on my :amiga: #Amiga which doesn't quite have enough RAM for SSL support, so I modified a local nginx instance to proxy the requests and do all the SSL nonsense. I'd prefer to keep it all happening on the Amiga but this is a good compromise.
Blogged the config in case it's helpful to someone someday, but please read the whole article first if you plan on using it.
https://www.thomaspurnell.com/020_AmiGemini_nginx_forward_proxy/gemini_nginx_forward_proxy.html
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/116/511/368/528/220/759/original/a558424247b7893f.png

2026-04-25 02:15:35 UTC

Really pleased that #audacity audio editor can export :amiga: #amiga compatible audio samples in the year 2026
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/116/462/929/425/345/751/original/90aa10efcae26b42.png
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/116/462/932/644/152/216/original/50084f750ae29b48.jpeg

2026-03-21 01:46:13 UTC

My second hand kobo from 2014 has always had miserable battery life but lately would randomly freeze, sometimes for *days*. Finally switched out the battery last night and found the culprit of the freezes, one of the chips was slightly dislodged and making intermittent contact. Currently my only functional soldering iron has a tip as thick as a thumb, but I managed to reattach the chip and can now hopefully enjoy weeks of books between charges.
Also I don't recommend trying to remove glued down lithium batteries at 2am because a possum started hissing outside my window and I thought the old battery was going nuclear
#righttorepair
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/116/264/608/670/490/242/original/59369188d7b405bf.jpg
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2026-03-15 23:37:06 UTC

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this sounds a lot more clearcut than how I'd personally interpreted the rule. Maybe the jackpotmaxxing rule could be clarified to literally say 'no AI discussions on public local timeline', else I think this will be a recurring issue.
As currently written the rule reads to me as only 'AI promotion' or 'AI good' posts forbidden.

2026-03-04 00:23:10 UTC

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ignoring the device for a moment, what the heck is going on with that bird?

2025-11-01 18:57:31 UTC

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I read blindness and it gave me a real chill. What a great book - though I did have to stop to look up if it was intentionally written in such a strange style without punctuation, or if I'd downloaded the output of a broken OCR

2025-10-10 22:52:58 UTC

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two I've already read, so a well aimed list. Thanks!

2025-10-10 14:18:09 UTC

Travelling soon, please give me your #fiction recommendations! I normally read military flavoured hard SciFi, but I'm open to all suggestions. Normally I don't get much of a response to such requests, so PLEASE recommend me something to read, especially if you've written something yourself #bookstodon

2025-09-08 05:40:46 UTC

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even kobolds deserve to rave

2025-07-03 06:05:23 UTC

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this is the kind I have. Do the handles unscrew so you can adjust the leverage?

2025-05-11 01:47:30 UTC

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trying to imagine what elf's games would have actually been like if they'd had this kind of soundtrack 😳

2025-05-07 04:12:28 UTC

Had a #krita morning and drew a 90s scifi anime lady. 70% happy with her. #theWorkshop
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/114/464/560/650/809/484/original/9fd81fc234256c7e.png
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/114/464/573/735/374/485/original/898194f7a4bcbaff.mp4

2025-05-02 09:07:03 UTC

For reasons not truly known to anyone, one of our state funded free-to-air tv channels* broadcasts The Fifth Element, five times in a row, on May 5th. Last year they only showed it once and people were offended, so this year it's once again five times in a row.
*SBS Viceland.
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/114/437/431/999/147/688/original/00a76a99b73d0847.png

2025-05-02 04:28:30 UTC

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how do you detect zinc screws? I have some (supposedly) steel screws that barely respond to a magnet, so I've no idea how I'd work out which was which

2025-04-27 00:22:00 UTC

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thank you! I think I'd seen this before but somehow assumed it wouldn't apply to user avatars. I just tried it and it worked
For the record, the option I toggled is the last one shown here, which has disabled animated avatars
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/114/407/064/298/406/399/original/2700d4619f47dd2f.png

2025-04-27 00:14:11 UTC

The ability to hide media you don't want to see on #mastodon is one of my favourite features - is there a way to do this for user avatars too? I don't want to resort to blocking someone just for having a distracting animated avatar with a flashing background, but I'd prefer not to see it.

2025-04-26 23:22:45 UTC

I recently bought a 3D printer, which for most people is probably a solution looking for a problem to solve. Much like generative AI, I don't think 3DP is particularly useful to most people.
But as with genAI, there's a real authorial sense of proprietorship to the outputs for many people. Someone that downloads a model dragon, perhaps scales it a little, and hits print will act as if they've performed some kind of creative act. Just the same as the 'artists' who feel that they've really made art by tweaking their AI prompt for a couple of minutes.
Local markets and maker faires are slowly being overrun with stalls selling articulated dragons designed by an artist but then printed ad infinitum by printer owners who feel that by choosing which colour to print in, they've had transformative input into the design process.
👴✊☁️
#rant

2025-04-09 05:58:24 UTC

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I use and adore Mesen2, primarily for the incredible debugging tools. It's a multisystem emulator and so probably not the right choice for informing design of your own emulator, but for me it's an essential nesdev tool

2025-03-31 09:55:34 UTC

I have a bit of a #famicom collection. I don't chase the pristine cartridges and pay a fortune, I'm opportunistic and grab the cheaper 'well-loved' carts. Most of them are damaged in some way and have grime that can't be easily removed without risking cracking the shells. You can see that here on the side seams and how the label is peeling away at the top.
I'm planning a little web/video project to share my love of 'medium-condition game cartridges' and have been taking some test shots.
#nes
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/114/256/438/335/400/827/original/15398af55ccbfb7e.mp4

2025-03-30 08:05:58 UTC

Slow copying some files to an old laptop and decided to make some labels for my general use #floppydisks
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2025-03-30 06:13:30 UTC

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did you know worlds-most-popular-kids-game Roblox 'borrowed' Bob's 'oof' sound from this game as their default death sound for many years? There's so many kids that recognise it as 'the roblox sound', and it even migrated from there into music and meme videos, until Tommy Tallarico finally got them to admit they'd taken it without permission

2025-02-17 03:33:53 UTC

Dreamt my glasses had xscreensaver support, had to shake my head every ten minutes to avoid colourful graphics taking over my vision
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/114/017/119/520/422/739/original/05cd7eac92f29bff.mp4

2025-01-30 17:44:28 UTC

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but most importantly, did you manage to open the jar?

2025-01-13 11:57:17 UTC

Playing in #krita and making a fake #cd32 game disc out of a sketch I was unhappy with.
Frustrated to discover krita doesn't really have a 'follow path' tool for text, I want to put some 'small print' that follows the curve of the CD, but every method I've found involves converting the text to bitmap and deforming it severely
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/113/820/908/498/517/080/original/8e1600555138e1e3.png

2024-11-10 02:21:19 UTC

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Dear Santa: I would like the giant double-handled brain mug for christmas please
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/113/456/263/320/947/421/original/476ff6582627a43c.png

2024-11-10 02:19:38 UTC

comfort binging older anime and rewatching Dragon's Heaven, which could also be titled 'what if Moebius had made Mecha anime'
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2024-11-03 23:47:48 UTC

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impressive, quite long lived for a rabbit

2024-10-23 00:01:43 UTC

💿 There's a #dreamcast #gamejam in December, early starts are allowed. Some prizes available and the possibility of being included on a physical compilation disc. 💿
https://itch.io/jam/dream-disc-24
Never programmed for the DC before? There's #raylib support via 'RaylibDC' if you know C, or a cool looking lua game engine https://antiruins.com/engine
#gamedev
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/113/353/782/940/725/478/original/e111dfbdc31ddbc8.png

2024-10-17 00:41:34 UTC

My colourful #famicom collection. Almost 100 games, mostly nabbed for just a couple of dollars each. These all work, though some need a little mechanical persuasion to make contact with the cart header on the console. Lots of nice games here, a few awful ones, but none that take more than two seconds to start up and get playing :flan_cheer:
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/113/319/953/446/760/487/original/632abab897decda1.jpg
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2024-10-11 01:09:39 UTC

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what a nice copy! Does it have the CDROM? Here's mine on the shelf with friends
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/113/286/113/879/710/985/original/5e8a8880f0faa8c7.jpg

2024-09-30 12:01:34 UTC

Happy spooktober 🎃
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2024-09-17 02:14:35 UTC

I bought some #famicom games via buyee.jp, a middleman proxy service that let me buy from domestic Japanese auctions, consolidate the orders, and then forward in a single package to me in Australia. Cost a little more than I expected because the domestic shipping wasn't included in the displayed price for some items, but it worked out to be less than a third of what the local eBay scalper traders are asking, especially for Layla
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/113/150/456/012/331/011/original/2aca7bdc560cfd6a.jpg

2024-09-09 08:12:39 UTC

client: we can't restore from our backup, can you help?
the 'backup': three years of logs stating that the backup failed (ssh error 'Permission denied (publickey))', no other data
me:
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/113/106/581/094/613/578/original/8c276910f38e2817.mp4

2024-09-08 05:46:23 UTC

Hah, today I learnt that the wireframe 'CGI' in Escape from New York, used for Snake Plissken to make a stealthy glider entry into the lawless prison island by air, was actually 'faked' by building a model of Manhattan covered in reflective tape. In 1981 this was the cheaper solution for a movie with limited budget
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/113/100/334/511/463/382/original/0aca30dee466eebd.mp4
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2024-09-04 04:55:50 UTC

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I was playing the #famicom port of #wizardry emulated on my 3ds handheld, but took a break from it after hearing a rumour that I might be getting a certain gift on father's day (September in Australia) and guess what just showed up today!
Once again I'm faced with save files potentially almost as old as myself. Tempted to keep ガイア (Gaia?) the 15 year old level 28 Dwarven Samurai with outrageous stats and loot
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/113/077/406/338/870/982/original/9037c5a107d05770.jpg
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2024-08-23 08:20:48 UTC

9 year old just saved over a homework file instead of opening it and has suddenly developed a lot of complicated feelings about computers not being quite as wonderful as previously believed.

2024-08-19 09:56:02 UTC

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it is double sided, and all pads on the left have the strip on the left, and all the pads on the right have the strips to the right 😅

2024-08-19 09:41:50 UTC

I'm trying to learn more about these (anti ESD?) thin tips on signal pads, full width on power pads. Any hints?
If you zoom in closely to my blurry picture, pins 1, 16 and 30 are wide almost all the way to the edge of the board, whereas the others are shorter, but then have a tinnny thin strip that extends to the edge
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/112/987/999/438/101/639/original/84dcbf9b4880ded4.jpg

2024-08-18 04:56:50 UTC

my response to being asked to provide a 'vscode json build configuration' for some project
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/112/981/242/864/944/185/original/4c7883e8c9ad1883.png

2024-08-17 10:49:49 UTC

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Released a free #MSDOS game for the Dos Games July 2024 #gamejam, a competitive tower building game in hell for one or two players
https://voxel.itch.io/demonic-foundations
#gamedev
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/112/976/961/765/072/706/original/62f87377c071ad59.png
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2024-08-14 15:10:35 UTC

stayed up too late writing an 'ai' opponent player for my #dosgamejam entry - someone better play this game when it's done or I'll have to also write ai commenters to leave nice feedback on its itch.io page #msdos
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/112/961/008/248/059/547/original/20be11279127f7b9.mp4

2024-08-04 02:03:36 UTC

Released a little Game Boy Advance rom for #gbajam https://voxel.itch.io/game-boy-advance-quokka-wokka that you can play on an emulator or real hardware. It's a simple 'single screen arcade platformer' in the vein of Bubble Bobble and Rodland. Mostly made using a raspberry pi 😊
#gamedev
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2024-08-02 10:39:51 UTC

Started playing the #nes / #famicom version of Wizardry, an ancient grid based dungeon crawler. Though I'm sure there are more complete maps online, I'm making my own as I play and it's as much fun as the game itself. The game is pretty sneaky and has silent teleports, hidden doors, one way doors, and magically dark areas with zero visibility that require you to bump your face into the walls to map it out 😊
https://assets.merveilles.town/media_attachments/files/112/891/947/466/467/700/original/2557211e7d55f9a7.jpg
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2024-01-26 02:19:43 UTC

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8k of inline css is slower for everything after the first page load. External resources are cached in normal circumstances, and if your site is multiple pages instead of some ajaxian 'app', every page you visit will be 8k heavier with inlining, vs the 20 to 120 millisecond delay you might add by having to request the external stylesheet.
This is assuming a single stylesheet of course. If you're using 20 of the things it probably plays out differently