Jimmy

I have a beard. I like dinghys.

I'm up in sunny Heretaunga, just on the edge of town near orchards, its lovely. In my day job i'm a networking engineer I think. When not working I cook, try to produce more of our food in a wee garden, very slowly build a sailing dinghy and spend too much time on 'puter games.

Fediverse.info: #fedi22 #boatbuilding #cooking #gardening #jukeboxfridaynight

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Last Notes

2026-05-03 20:33:39 UTC

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@nprofile…v9wr @nprofile…xpw3 I'm hopeful, but not optimistic.
Orgs are still all in on cloud stuff like AWS, Azure etc even though most of the ones i've seen haven't realised the benefits promised and have instead just got themselves hopelessly tied onto the platforms.
Lots of orgs kicked up a stink about the VMWare pricing changes, but I haven't seen many successfully migrate yet.
And yeah your article was written a decade ago, talking about practises that had been going on for some time then & in the intervening many places have only gotten more firmly latched onto MS.
Sometimes I think I just need to win lotto & get out of the game & stop having the argument :)

2026-05-03 20:25:33 UTC

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@nprofile…v9wr @nprofile…xpw3 with a lot of job insecurity around I suspect some are jumping on the bandwagon purely as a mechanism to hopefully save their careers. Few in IT want to be out there job hunting in NZ right now. That’s true for the more tech focussed roles and the more human facing ones. I would guess near everyone at the coal face is working under the fear that the bosses assume AI can replace them.
But I have hope now orgs realise the AI companies can rug pull and bump pricing on a whim. Very few employees can demand a tripling in salary or they’ll refuse the work.

2026-04-25 01:51:04 UTC

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@nprofile…xpw3 yikes, what model is yours, I might need to pay closer attention to mine!

2026-04-22 21:37:54 UTC

Did somebody share Nicola Willis being Edgelered recently where Graeme pointed out they're borrowing more money than the last Labour govt?

2026-04-12 19:00:42 UTC

I'm somewhat confused. The US is angry that Iran is exerting effective control over the Strait of Hormuz and limiting who can or can't enter.
This is causing economic hardship for everywhere as so much oil & other critical bulk goods originate on the other side & transit the strait.
One can imagine many countries are expressing disappointment at Israel & the US precipitating this by conducting an illegal war against Iran which resulted in Iran doing what Iran said it would do & block the Strait.
So, in an effort to resolve this problem and unblock the strait; Trump & the US are now planning to blockade the Strait of Hormuz altogether & not let any oil or cargo ships through?

2026-03-27 20:27:52 UTC

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@nprofile…vvev it sure does I went on an excursion through the gorge last year & the bought it up for Art Deco weekend too I think.

2026-03-27 18:01:24 UTC

More railcar thoughts while I wait for my breakfast to cook.
If you're not already at an airport, and even worse if you're not in a city with an airport then your total travel time when flying is actually a lot worse than it appears. ie, the convenience & speed of flight for domestic travel is kinda a myth.
I like to use an imaginary journey between Stratford & Waipawa as an illustration as its a not entirely unrealistic journey that is currently very awkward flying.
Just driving to the airport at each end is likely 90 minutes plus of driving. So even with the best case scenario of a connecting flight with flight times of 2h 30, then you're still looking at 4 hours minimum total travel time let alone having to get to the airport early to check-in & do luggage drop.
So even if a railcar journey between those two towns, changing lines in Palmerston North took 6 hours* that's only half as bad as the best possible scenario flying.
*Bearing in mind we have NZ rail speed records from pre WW2 doing similar journey lengths in far less time than this.

2026-03-26 19:16:47 UTC

While im getting excited about battery & hybrid railcars, its worth noting that even diesel railcars are a way more efficient forms of transport than planes or busses.
So even if we couldn't adopt the electrical tech now, we could still use railcars to reduce private passenger vehicle journeys & thus overall energy consumption.

2026-03-26 17:56:01 UTC

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@nprofile…tkzw Initially I wondered if it felt a little like science fiction back when they started it - perhaps to the audience not your friend. But stuff in the ballpark is an actual reality now.
eg: https://www.stadlerrail.com/en/solutions/rolling-stock/mainline-rs-zero
And seemingly all they've had to do is take a tried and true unit (RS1) and just update the energy systems.
This one wouldn't be perfectly suitable everywhere (no indication of how large the battery is), but i'd guess it could comfortably run between Palmerston North & Hamilton, and then extend its journeys beyond that thanks to the battery.

2026-03-25 22:02:37 UTC

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@nprofile…tkzw Cool read, are these railcars that are actually being produced anywhere?
Might need to rethink the Hawkes Bay line though, there's near 0 chance it'll ever be reinstated north of Wairoa to Gisborne, and even Napier to Wairoa is up in the air.

2026-03-25 18:06:06 UTC

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Actually im curious what other swing for the fences ideas folks have?
Re my previous suggestions, the obvious way to fund them is to cancel any of the Roads of Notional Significance that haven't started digging yet & redirect all that funding.
Here's another idea - invest in double-unit electric rail cars, and high capacity charging at stations to re-introduce regional passenger services.
Obviously slower than taking an ATR72 or small jet between regions, but with the advantage of stopping at small places along the way. Services like this have rail available still in NZ.
New Plymouth-Palmerston North-Napier is there and links through all of these towns as well: Inglewood, Stratford, Eltham, Hawera, Whanganui, Marton, Feilding, Ashurst, Woodville, Dannevirke, Waipukurau, Waipawa, Hastings.
A lot of the stations need work, and to make them really useful commuter services as well a lot of the abandoned sidings would need to be reintroduced. Eg on the Hawkes Bay side Takapau, Otane, Pukehou (Te Aute), Pakipaki, Whakatu, Clive, HB Airport & Bayview all had, or could have simple sidings to allow for short smaller unit passenger services.

2026-03-25 17:46:36 UTC

$50 is not nothing, but the way its been applied, and who misses out is pretty crap.
And it doesn't help with the problem namely reduced amounts of fuel available at higher costs - potentially for an extended period.
NZ needs to reduce the amount we are using, and to refocus what we are importing to users who are unable to change their consumption habits rapidly - Ag, Freight, and some businesses like builders, plumbers etc.
- Make Public Transport free, now.
- Expand PT services so they run more frequently at peaks and for a greater portion of the day.
- Encourage/mandate WFH days to reduce the amount of trips being made in private vehicles.
- Provide subsidies to freight being transported by rail or coastal shipping.
- Find some 2nd hand corolla style coastal freighters.
- Where city layouts allow for it, close lanes to vehicles and make them cycle only.
- Invest in secure stowage for cycles in more places: supermarkets, business hubs, shopping centres.
- Massive subsidies on domestic solar & battery storage.
I'm sure I could think of other things, but like the Covid disruptions this is an opportunity for positive transformational change that will increase NZs energy independence forever, we just need a government with the will to say goodbye to fossil fuels and hello to the future.

2026-03-19 19:10:19 UTC

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@nprofile…xpw3 And that political process seemed to be making headway until Drumpf tore the whole thing apart.
NZ's political class keeps tying us closer to these morons and I just can''t shake the "with allies like these..." feeling.

2026-01-16 02:25:08 UTC

There's obviously a lot seriously wrong with ICE, but wearing khaki and bush camo when standing around snowy urban environments is stupid.

2025-11-09 03:43:53 UTC

The sunlight has been particularly golden here in Heretaunga - Hawke's Bay this afternoon. An effect of the smoke from the fire over Tongariro way perhaps?

2025-11-02 00:25:25 UTC

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@nprofile…p7rx It was bad wasn't it, all washed out and sort of blurry but still seemed at least 1080p

2025-11-01 19:08:30 UTC

Broadcaster's showing a start time for a match which doesn't kick off for another 70 minutes is rather annoying.

2025-10-29 20:45:12 UTC

Luxon having a wee tantrum at Hipkins pointing out the absurd unfairness of him earning $600,000 untaxed from flipping properties when people who work have every dollar taxed is to me a sign that he knows his position is weak and hard to defend.
#nzpol

2025-10-18 18:05:39 UTC

Hmmm, looking more & more like Sodium Ion battery tech might be about to pop off at the consumer level.
Lower overall capacity for the volume & weight but ought to be cheaper, more efficient and cope with low temperatures better.
Probably not suited for vehicles, but for static home power storage they could be the go.

2025-08-14 21:19:13 UTC

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@nprofile…l5w8 any idea if there’s a calendar of events not on Facebook for folks that gone want to get zucked?

2025-05-07 21:08:15 UTC

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@nprofile…6t6n I suspect the biggest challenge we have to overcome is the capture by the US cloud giants here.
It goes beyond regulatory, corporate capture is massively embedded as well.

2025-04-04 21:21:51 UTC

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@nprofile…jc9n heh, not for me - that took me down to antarctica!

2025-04-04 21:16:33 UTC

Are there any friendly geologists out there that might care to enlighten a curious mind about how the topography around 44°02'08.7"S 168°28'02.0"E in just north of the Cascade river gets formed?
Looking at it in 3d that arc almost looks like the segment of a crater or something. It really leaps out as something a bit unusual when doing a map level flyby of that part of Aotearoa.