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Cake day: September 27th, 2023

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  • (Side note, I just realized I said the times slightly wrong. We actually wanted it on at 6:30 and off 15 minutes before sunrise.)

    Yeah, I had it turning off before sunrise just fine. The problem is that we didn’t want to turn them on until 6:30, but on the longest day of the year, sunrise actually happens at 6:14, which means that the lights would get the signal to turn off before they got the signal to turn on, which would mean that the lights would stay on all day until the night automation turned them back off again at 10pm. Which…probably doesn’t make a difference, but it would bug my totally-not-neurodivergent brain.

    Anyway, I don’t use Home Assistant, but that’s probably the one I’ll choose the next time I move.





  • I spent way more time than I care to think about figuring out how to get my porch lights to come on at 7am and turn off 10 minutes before sunrise without breaking when sunrise happened before 7am. I tried some serious Rube Goldberg nonsense in multiple iterations, until finally I decided to just add another “turn off the lights” at 9am every day. Most of the time it doesn’t do anything because the lights are already off, but on DST day it accomplishes my goal of making sure they don’t run all day, since 9am is always after sunrise.




  • I’ve only ever met two types of IT professional. Either:

    • Their home network is immaculate and smooth as butter. It connects quickly and integrates with everything. They can manage it all from their phone, but they don’t have to because it’s all automated. Their server room (a) exists and (b) is cable managed. There’s a wireless access point and connected smart speaker in every room, including the garage and the back patio, but they’re carefully located for maximum sound coverage and to prevent signal interference. Their home theater is substantially better than a movie theater, and their media server is packed to the gills with content. Network security is hardened, with bespoke subnets for every user and tunneling for the media server and smart home functions. You feel a sense of calm and ease when connected to their network. “Everything I do at work, I try out at home first.”

    Or:

    • Their “home network” is a single Belkin router from 2011. They’ve had it since college, and it takes 9 minutes to reboot (which they have to do daily). It doesn’t even have Tomato on it and still uses the default password. They still watch OTA TV and Blu-Rays, so the wifi is exclusively connected to the smart switch that their tea kettle is plugged into so they can start their hot water before they come downstairs. You feel guilty even asking for the wifi password. “Why would I do any network stuff here? I do IT all day at work, the last thing I want to do is even touch a Cat5 cable at home.”