Author: Jack Baty

  • Will Ferrell on boring people

    Immature is a word the boring people use to describe fun people.

    Will Ferrell

  • Fixing backups on the UGREEN NAS

    Running the Backup and Sync app on the UGREEN NAS would fail with the following:

    “Failed to perform “MyMedia”. Reason: “Path does not exist/No permission/Insufficient capacity/Incompatible with the external device system”

    Not very helpful.

    Some poking around pointed to illegal filenames for exFAT. I searched for the files using the following:

    find . -name "*[\"*:<>?\\|]*"

    This found more than 100 files. I asked Claude to help with a script to rename the files. I chose “-” for the replacement character. Here’s what Claude came up with:

    find . -name "*[\"*:<>?\\|]*" -depth | while IFS= read -r file; do
      dir=$(dirname "$file")
      base=$(basename "$file")
      new_base=$(echo "$base" | tr '":*<>?\\|' '-')
      
      if [ "$base" != "$new_base" ]; then
        mv -n "$file" "$dir/$new_base"
        echo "Renamed: $file -> $dir/$new_base"
      fi
    done

    Renaming the files worked, and the backup ran without error.

    One other note, UGREEN support was fast and friendly, which I appreciate.

  • Ted Nelson on the future

    I have seen the future– and it irks.

    Ted Nelson, 1996

  • Roll 063 (2025), Rolleiflex 2.8D

    This roll of expired Tri-X was languishing in the camera, so I forced myself to finish it with the usual self-portraits and dog photos.

  • Thursday, November 20, 2025

    • STATUS: Using every single bit of software ever released, seems like.
    • TODO: Therapy, grocery shopping, some housework.
    • READING: “The Let Them Theory” by Mel Robbins. It’s a little too self-helpy for me, but we’ll see.
    • LISTENING: Getting Killed, by Geese

    Now Playing: “Getting Killed” by Geese

    Geese was mentioned by Nick Cave in the latest Red Hand Files, so I thought I’d give them a listen. I’m not sure it’s my favorite, but it sure is interesting!

  • @jbaty @jack I wanted this to be a thing… but I fear it is far too complex!

    November 20, 2025, 2:48 pm 0 boosts 0 favorites

    It’s a little confusing, for sure. The plugin seems to be getting a lot of the developers’ attention, so I’m optimistic it’ll get simpler. For now I’m just happy that the bear can dance 🙂

  • I miss fun Twitter

    An absolute classic. Makes me laugh every time. People are funny.

  • Now Playing: David Byrne, Who Is the Sky?

    He keeps going and going. Fun, interesting song writing here.

  • Posting from the iPad

    I’m not an iOS guy, but sometimes it’s nice using the iPad on the couch or in bed. A disadvantage of using an SSG for blogging is that posting from mobile, while possible, is a convoluted mess.

    Using WordPress via the JetPack app on the iPad is not the worst experience. At least it’s possible. So that’s what I’m doing here. I’m relaxing on the basement couch with the dog sleeping next to me and typing this on the old iPad Pro with keyboard. It’s a refreshing change of pace, even if it’s not something I’ll do all the time.