The Wiert Corner – irregular stream of stuff

Jeroen W. Pluimers on .NET, C#, Delphi, databases, and personal interests

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Archive for April, 2026

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Analog Audio over Cat 5/6/7 – Building your own panels – YouTube

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/27

Interesting blog post on patch panels for audio with XLR connectors and ethernet over twisted pair (best to use shielded cable): [Wayback/Archive] Analog Audio over Cat 5/6/7 – Building your own panels – YouTube.

--jeroen

Posted in 19-inch rack, Appliances, Audio, Ethernet, Hardware, Home Audio/Video, LifeHacker, Media, Network-and-equipment, Power User | Leave a Comment »

Watering plants; nice Dutch thread with lots of useful tips

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/27

Interesting Dutch thread on watering plants: it’s not so easy, but the tips in the tread help:

[Archive.is] Jason 🚀 on Twitter: “Hoe weet je hoeveel en wanneer je plant water nodig heeft?”

General guidance:

–jeroen

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in LifeHacker, Power User | Leave a Comment »

ANWB slaat alarm over uitblijven oplossing stoppen met 2G netwerk | Kassa – YouTube

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/24

Allerlei apparaten, ook bijvoorbeeld slimme meters en valbeveiliging voor ouderen of mensen met een handicap, hangen af van 2G en dat gaat binnenkort uit.

2G – voor velen meer bekend als GSM – werd in Nederland in 1994 geïntroduceerd (eerst als GSM 900 en later ook als GSM 1800) en was altijd een superbetrouwbaar netwerk. Het deed het vrijwel overal en dat ruim 30 jaar lang.

Als laatste provider in Nederland stopt KPN eind 2027 met 2G, dus er is nog ongeveer anderhalf jaar om te zorgen dat oude apparatuur vervangen wordt, of – voor het geval van auto’s – dat regels rond APK worden aangepast.

Haast is dus geboden.

[Wayback/Archive] ANWB slaat alarm over uitblijven oplossing stoppen met 2G netwerk | Kassa – YouTube

--jeroen

Posted in Cellular telephony, GSM, Power User, Telephony | Leave a Comment »

Screenshot of Pitfall II: Lost Caverns (Apple II, 1984) – MobyGames

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/24

[Wayback/A] Screenshot of Pitfall II: Lost Caverns (Apple II, 1984) – MobyGames

Pitfall II: Lost Caverns (Apple II) screenshot:Title screen (this version has been cracked)

Memories of Apple II, ][e and //c.

There was quite a good crack-scene in The Netherlands with a well known name “The Redhead”.

Back then I didn’t know about the BBS systems involved:

  • NEABBBS: 020-717666 (which was ran by Max Keizer and part of FidoNet)
  • NABBS: 03200-28717 (which I could hardly find any other information about, the areacode was part of Lelystad)

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Posted in //e, Apple, Apple ][, BBS, FidoNet, History, Power User | Leave a Comment »

Shoe horning Arm Mac hardware plus OLED screen in a iMac G3 case 

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/23

Only do this when your G3 is broken beyond repair!

This particular example shows how to shoe-horn an Apple Silicon based Mac Mini into a the very first incarnation of an iMac: a classic iMac G3 case restoring both plastic, and using 3D printed mounts to ease assembly/disassembly.

Still cool as it is flexible so also allows for other Mac hardware like a Mac Studio.

The screen is a 14 inch 16:10 screen which is very expensive over here:

Video: [Wayback/Archive] I built a MODERN iMac… – YouTube

Query: [Wayback/Archive] mac studio in imac g3 3d print at DuckDuckGo

3D prints of a different project:

Likely a 4:3 OLED screen has less visible bezels.

--jeroen

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Posted in Apple, Apple Silicon, ARM Mac, Classic Macintosh, Development, Hardware Interfacing, iMac, Mac, MacMini, Power User | Leave a Comment »

Is Agile dead? Only for places where it is suffocated by rules

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/23

Over the last few years I have seen more and more posts where people are fed up by Agile.

The whole fundament if Agile, or better any lightweight methodology, is to be able to flow as a team. That is only possible when the flow is not disturbed by a truckload of rules or schedules overloaded with ceremonies.

The best way to implement over the last 40+ years I have been in IT is to use common sense.

This basically has not changed since before “I think, therefore I am” (Cogito, ergo sum), so please read this other quote from René Descartes‘s same book “Discourse on Method” where* he begins by allowing himself some wit:

Good sense is, of all things among men, the most equally distributed; for every one thinks himself so abundantly provided with it, that those even who are the most difficult to satisfy in everything else, do not usually desire a larger measure of this quality than they already possess.

Or in other words*:

Everyone has a similar and sufficient amount of common sense, but it is rarely used well.

For me, lightweight methodologies vary by team and project and always involve both critical thinking and together with other team members regularly thinking about:

  1. why to do things
  2. how to do these things
  3. the steps to perform the how
  4. when to change parts or all of the above three points

Agile Software Development is that simple.

Oh: always think about why Software Development or any other work you are involved in differs much or little from Lean Management in car manufacturing (the place where many people advocate the Agile methodologies in Software Development are supposed to stem from: strongly disagree with that as they have their own origin. Try to think about why I disagree, even if your opinion differs from mine).

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Posted in Agile, Development, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

LR: “warming myself on this post li…” – Gamedev Mastodon

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/22

(This post too suffered from the WordPress.com missed schedule bug which has been unfixed since 2012)

[Wayback/Archive] LR: “warming myself on this post like a space heater…” – Gamedev Mastodon

[Wayback/Archive] Post by @jensfoell.de — Bluesky

Dr. Jens Foell ‪@jensfoell.de‬

OpenAI: We’re burning money like the Joker. A miracle needs to happen for us to turn a profit

Microsoft: Please please use our AI systems, we’re teetering on the edge here

Anthropic: I wonder what’ll kill us first: lawsuits, regulations or model collapse

Media and universities: AI is here to stay

In other news today, in addition to the earlier leaked Anthropic AI model, Mythos got leaked as well – [Wayback/Archive] Dany :verified_gay:: “Ah yes, the almighty Mythos, …” – HSNL Social:

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Posted in AI and ML; Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning, Development, Generative AI, LLM, Missed Schedule, Power User, Software Development, WordPress | Leave a Comment »

Memories of my AS/400 and OS/400 days: PUB400.COM – Your public IBM i server

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/22

[Wayback/Archive] PUB400.COM – Your public IBM i server:

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Posted in AS/400 / iSeries / System i, COBOL, Development, RPG, Scripting, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

Hacker Hosting

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/21

Reminder to self: [Wayback/Archive] Hacker Hosting

HackerHosting biedt Hackers, die samenkomen in hackerspaces, in hotels en op campings de mogelijkheid om te genieten van hoge kwaliteit hosting in Nederland, tegen een tarief waarvoor zelfs ‘kippenschuur-hosters’ en ‘brandgevaarlijke-datacenter-hosters’ het niet doen.

Via [Wayback/Archive] Angry Nerds 278 – Corrigendum – YouTube

--jeroern

Posted in Development, Hosting, Internet, ISP, Power User | Leave a Comment »

Updating Microsoft Office on Windows from a batch file

Posted by jpluimers on 2026/04/21

This batch file works for modern Click-to-Run (sometimes called ClickToRun, Click2Run or C2R) based Office installations (note the odd lowercase microsoft shared which indeed is the actual directory name):

if exist "%CommonProgramFiles%\microsoft shared\ClickToRun\OfficeC2RClient.exe" (
  "%CommonProgramFiles%\microsoft shared\ClickToRun\OfficeC2RClient.exe" /update user
) else (
  echo could not find the Office Updater
)

This for sure does not work for MSI based Office 2013 and lower (which are updated through Windows Update anyway). Since I only have 2021 online (Click-to-Run) installs and higher to test with: those work fine.

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Posted in Batch-Files, Development, Office, Office 2021, Office Development, Power User, Scripting, Software Development, Windows, Windows Development | Leave a Comment »

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