Programming

Programming or coding

Javascript Button Masher

A few years ago, I embarked on a journey to create a special game for my son, known as the Toddler Button Masher. Initially developed using Unity, it quickly became a source of endless amusement for him. When he hit a key, it changed the background and played a sound. Toddlers are easily amused, as […]

Photo Backup To Network Drive

While cloud photo storage definitely has some advantages for sharing and backups, the cloud is really just someone else’s computer. I wanted an easy way to store backups of family photos from a mobile device to a network drive. I recently found a nice replacement for a custom solution with PhotoPrism, OpenMediaVault and PhotoSync. Home […]

Litterbug Built for Web in Phaser

Welcome to my latest project, Litterbug! In this game, you’ll take on the role of a trash collector in a bustling city, racing against time to pick up as much garbage as possible. But be warned – litterbugs are out in force, trying to snatch up as much trash as they can. This Phaser-based game […]

Fallout Explore for Atari 2600

Fallout Explore is a retro-style adventure game inspired by the iconic Fallout series. Set in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, the game challenges the player to explore a dangerous world filled with hostile creatures, limited resources, and hidden treasures. Using classic Atari 2600 graphics and sound effects, Fallout Explore centres on a vault dweller scouring an apocalyptic […]

BASIC Games Reborn

The astounding success of Wordle had me thinking about the BASIC program that it very closely resembles. In my copy of BASIC Computer Games from 1970, it is simply called Word. A player guesses a five-letter word and the computer tells the player which letters are matches and whether they are in the correct position. […]

WordPress, Google PageSpeed Insights and Google AdSense

I was checking in on the status of my website in Google PageSpeed Insights using the Lighthouse scanner built into Google Chrome. I wasn’t happy with the results. Why The Scores Dropped The scores were all green last time I checked. I hadn’t made any updates to theme since then. However, I do know that […]

Check-in Calendar and Log

Over the course of 2020 and 2021, different countries and regions imposed various levels of restrictions on gatherings. In Canada, employers were required to have employees work from home where possible. I have been working from home since March 2020, and work for a small business that has managed to coordinate the small number of […]

Bash Script To Backup Folders and Databases using a Cron Job

I sometimes find I need a simple script to backup one or multiple folders and databases. This script just takes a list of pre-defined folders and databases, compresses the folder contents, and executes a database dump. A maximum of seven backups are kept, any older ones are deleted. Customize the first six variables as needed.

Updating A Gulp Script

One of the challenges with development is that tools and libraries evolve over time. It often becomes necessary to either upgrade to a newer library or change libraries entirely. The update from Grub 3.x to 4.x required a bit of refactoring. Neither script is overly complex but there is enough there to illustrate some of […]

WordPress, Google PageSpeed Insights and WebP Image Formats

If you evaluate your website using Google PageSpeed Insights, you may find it complaining that you’re not using the WebP image format. First Scan The first scan with PageSpeed Insights gave me pretty good results for desktop, and somewhat poor results for mobile. The highest rated opportunity promised to save seven seconds in load time. […]