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2026/07/16 | RSS, Blogging, Reading
There is an interesting discussion going around about whether or not you should read blog posts exclusively from the RSS reader’s browser or directly from the author’s site. Here are my thoughts on the matter.
2026/07/10 | Plain Text, Indie Web, Pandoc
One of the easiest things to create for yourself is a “Link in Bio” page. This time, I do it with Pandoc.
2026/07/06 | Pandoc, Photos, Blog, Indie Web
Want to have a photo or image blog or website instead of a writing-centric one? It is pretty easy to set up photo posts with Pandoc!
2026/07/02 | Writing, Journaling, Plain Text
I have always struggled with journaling, but now I have found a process that works for me… most of the time.
2026/06/28 | Blogging
This past week, I made a major change to my blog. I prepped and I polled and I tested and retested. Then, I finally published and tested and refined and tested and republished. When it was all done, I stumbled across Robert Birming’s post reminding me, and the rest of us, that our blogs won’t explode. Well, I am living proof of that.
2026/06/27 | Blogging, Pandoc
A couple weeks ago, I talked about blogging with Pandoc. Now, I am thinking about using this simple framework to replace my mkdocs-material site.
2026/06/20 | Open Source, Digital Self-Reliance, Blogging
I have noticed a growing trend across the Indie and Small Web, algorithmic community-based voting to surface good blogs. Is the Indie Web beginning to experience its own voting evolution in the same vein as social media? Is the Indie Web part of an inevitable ouroboros?
2026/06/15 | Blogging, Writing, Indie Web, Open Source
I am always on the lookout for ways to lower the barrier for people to not only start blogging, but also to help them retain ownership of their content and keep it evergreen.
2026/06/05 | Productivity, Writing
After stumbling upon a video about “writerdecks,” I went down the distraction free writing rabbit hole. After way too many videos and researching and testing, I think I might have an idea that will work for me.
2026/05/24 | Plain Text, Productivity
As I continue to move my documents from the cloud and make them platform agnostic by converting them to plain text, I wanted and needed a universal way to search across all my files by tag or content. Since everything is in plain text, there is no reason to over complicate it. I can just grep it.
2026/05/17 | Digital Self-Reliance, Indie Web, RSS, Fediverse
As you leave traditional social media and other algo-driven platforms for a more quiet digital life, you may find that your digital garden is a little too quiet. The peacefulness and solitude of digital self-reliance may feel more like digital isolationism. Must we truly sacrifice reach and recognition for digital peace and freedom?
2026/05/10 | Plain Text, Productivity
As I slowly move my life away from the cloud and back to my local machine, I am embracing the simplicity and elegance of plain text. This includes applying plain text workflows to my daily life such as my plain text cookbook.
2026/05/04 | Indie Web, Blogging, Open Source
Last year (almost to the day), I posted how easy setting up a blog is with mkdocs and surge.sh. Well, now that I have migrated this site to Codeberg, I thought I would update that post. Spoiler Alert, It’s still easy.
2026/04/26 | Technology, Philosophy, Digital Self-Reliance
It’s time to intentionally slow down the technology in our lives so our brains (and often our emotions) have time to react, think, and respond appropriately. We do not always have to maximize efficiency and minimize friction. Less efficiency and more friction often leads to deeper connections of ideas, the creation of knowledge that we can recall, or the spark of creativity. It’s time to slow things down and use technology with intention.
2026/04/17 | Plain Text, Blogging, Writing
Plain text files built the internet before technology stacks were a thing. Honestly, there is no reason why your web presence cannot just be a simple TXT file.
2026/04/10 | RSS, Technology, Philosophy
Leaving a predatory platform’s algorithm feels like going into some form of recovery. However, RSS cannot fix all of your content consumption problems. Recovering from “the algo” takes self-discipline and curation.
2026/04/05 | RSS, Technology, Philosophy
What if you could take your attention back from big tech? Well, you can and fairly easily with RSS. RSS is more than a protocol, it is a philosophy.
2026/03/28 | Plain Text, Indie Web, Asciidoctor
One of the easiest things to create yourself is a “Link in Bio” page. Asciidoctor and surge make it even easier.
2026/03/22 | Blogging, Indie Web, Careers, Digital Self-Reliance
Nowadays, LinkedIn seems to be the defacto platform for job hunting, but it tells future employers nothing about who you are. Your best career representative is actually your own professional blog or portfolio.
2026/03/13 | Plain Text, Indie Web, Asciidoctor
Want an online presence, but you don’t want to build a website, or blog, or self-host? With really basic terminal dabbling and asciidoctor you can quickly make a minimal, simple profile where you own your data.
2026/03/07 | Books, Productivity, Plain Text
I think I finally may have found a great way for me to track my reading without the use of predatory platforms and cloud-based services; a plain text Kanban board dedicated to books and reading.
2026/02/22 | Technology, Careers, AI
I recently learned that some companies require employees to meet AI usage quotas. Is that really indicative of a tool that solves a problem or just inventing a “problem” for a tool to solve?
2026/02/14 | Books, Writing
In August 2025, I decided to read for at least two hours per day. Surprisingly enough, I have maintained that habit. Now, I intend to do the same with writing.
2026/01/31 | Indie Web, Digital Self-Reliance, RSS
The freedom to share information world wide is what made the internet great. So, why do we allow tech bros, social media, and AI to limit or even control what news and information see. It’s time to we rely less on these predatory platforms and curate our own news and information experience with RSS.
2026/01/23 | Digital Self-Reliance, Audio
As we continue to move into 2026, I want to talk about my continued journey towards digital self-reliance. This time, I am focusing on my audio needs.
2026/01/10 | Writing, Blogging, Site News
I have decided to try something a little different. I am going to include my social media posts here, as well. So, you can follow me on my socials or just follow me on my own site!
2026/01/01 | Indie Web, Blogging, Site News
I am back from my holiday hiatus and plan to start writing again; however, I have made some changes to the site as well.
2025/10/18 | Reading, AI
Even though AI has become a hot topic in the last few years, scifi has been warning us of it’s potential threat since the 1950s. Project Gutenberg has an AI bookshelf that provides several stories, novellas, and novels that explore AI’s potential impacts on humanity.
2025/09/28 | Books, Reading
Benjamin Franklin, known as one of America’s founding fathers, was an avid reader and mostly self-educated person. Over the course of his lifetime, he acquired a massive library of books on a wide variety subjects. In his autobiography, Franklin recommends several books that led to his self-education; many of which are available for free.
2025/09/21 | Books, Reading
When I heard of this month’s Indie Carnival theme the first thing that popped into my mind was The Maltese Falcon.
2025/09/14 | Books, Reading
Looking for some random science fiction short stories to kill an afternoon? Then, look no further than these retro pulp magazine scifi short stories!
2025/09/13 | Books, Reading
I am updating the Clippings page to include links to the Harvard Classic’s volumes one through ten. I have also added a Classics page to provide the list in it’s entirety… (Well, I am working on the “entirety” part.)
2025/09/05 | Books, Reading
Last time, I wrote about how reading is down across the globe. In this post, I talk about how you can get back into reading by reading short stories. I also link to a few of them that I find interesting.
2025/08/31 | Books, Reading
I recently read a few unsettling statistics about reading in America and it has prompted me to make some changes.
2025/08/16 | Blogging, Writing
Call it what you will, writer’s block, brain fog, lack of focus, etc. I have not been writing as much lately.
2025/07/27 | AI, Technology
Almost every day, I must prove to the world wide web that I am human and you probably do, too.
2025/07/25 | About Me, Careers
Today, I experienced RTO and it was so nice, I plan to do it again.
2025/07/24 | Blogging, Writing
This week, I tried to update some of my outdated workflows and it did not go as planned.
2025/07/20 | Indie Web, Technology
Lately, I have stumbled across some pretty cool tools focused on the indie web. So, I thought I would try out a few.
2025/07/17 | AI, Education
As many schools struggle with how to handle the emergence of “AI” (actually LLMs), it may be time to look to the past to ensure our educational future.
2025/07/11 | Indie Web, Technology
A great post about net nostalgia really got me thinking.
2025/07/07 | Plain Text, Productivity
I have finally taken some time to refine my personal Kanban and Zettelkasten processes.
2025/07/06 | RSS
A quick look at RSS and how to use it.
2025/07/04 | Blogging, Indie Web
Recently, @david@sunny.garden wrote, “I love the idea of having a personal site online. But then I wonder, ‘Why? What would make it important enough to prioritize over other ways to use my time?’ Thoughts?” So, I thought I would share mine.
2025/07/03 | Blogging, Indie Web
Since “joining” the indie web, I have been down.
2025/06/28 | CLI
There is nothing like a TUI (text user interface) to really help me focus. So when I stumbled on Toot TUI, I had to give it a try. Now, it is probably one of my favorite terminal applications.
2025/06/27 | Writing, Journaling
Every year, around this time, I try to start journaling. And every year, about this time, I fail. But, hey, at least I am consistent.
2025/06/23 | About Me, Social Media
I recently went on vacation and, for the first time in years, I applied the concept of sleep to virtually every aspect of my digital life.
2025/06/20 | CLI
As I age, I find myself gravitating more towards CLI and TUI applications that can be run from a terminal emulator. And honestly, I am not sure why.
2025/06/16 | About Me, Reading, Writing
There are three things a man must do before he dies, plant a tree, father a child, and write a book. When I read the topic for this month’s Indie Carnival, this quote immediately came to mind. So, I decided to explore why.
2025/06/15 | Blogging, Indie Web
While scrolling through the #indieweb category of my rss
feeds, I came across several blog posts about whether or not adding a
comment section to your blog posts or site was a good idea. I figured I
would throw in my two cents.
2025/06/14 | CLI
Here is a list of the nerdy ways I check the weather on my Debian plus Xfce laptop.
2025/06/11 | Productivity, Writing
This evening I hid behind Productive Procrastination instead of writing.
2025/06/01 | CLI, Technology
I have repurposed some old laptops into pet cams with the motion Linux application and Dropbox.
2025/05/25 | Indie Web
As the indieweb grows, I thought it would be nice to share a few of my favorite blogs and sites.
2025/05/17 | About Me
My science fiction activity has been pretty light this week, but here are my scifi distractions for the week.
2025/05/15 | Blogging, Indie Web
As I venture out into the indieWeb, I often ask myself, “Is my site too simple?”
2025/05/13 | Plain Text
Proof positive that I may not have enough to do today.
2025/05/10 | About Me
Here is a list of my science fiction related posts and activities for the past week (or so)!
2025/05/02 | Blogging
Building a blog is hard. Umm, actually…it’s not. You can build a blog with just three commands using Material for Mkdocs and Surge.
2025/04/28 | Education, Open Source
With the recent attacks on basically all bodies of knowledge, it is time that scientists, educators, librarians, and all other knowledge workers or volunteers open and decentralize their research, data, and educational content.
2025/04/06 | Open Source
Most of the software and services that I use are free and open source (FOSS) and I live a completely normal life… and you can too!
2025/03/28 | Fediverse
Here is a collection pictures that I posted on my Pixelfed account.
2025/03/24 | CLI, Plain Text, Productivity
Let’s take a look at my Zettelkasten notetaking workflow on the Linux Command Line. Trust me, it’s simple.
2025/03/17 | CLI, Plain Text, Productivity
You do not need a lot of fancy tools or subscription services to apply Kanban in your personal or professional life. Honestly, you do not even need a dedicated tool. You can create an easy Kanban workflow with default computing tools.
2025/03/15 | Site News
Sometimes, I have a lot to say. Sometimes, I don’t. From now on, when I do not have much to say, but still want to say or share something, I will just add to the Chatter.
2025/03/13 | Productivity
Without even realizing it, I have applied the concepts of Kanban and Timeboxing to my Social Media and RSS habits… and it appears to have helped me limit the amount of time I spend on doom scrolling.
2025/03/08 | Site News
I recently asked for some tips on improving my site. In doing so, I learned about slash pages.
2025/03/04 | Asciidoctor, Blogging
So, you want to tweet, toot, or microblog, but you don’t to use a predatory platform and you do not want to maintain your own server? Then, build your own microblogging page with Asciidoctor!
2025/03/02 | Asciidoctor
Ever wanted to create a photo wall, video wall, or audio wall for your site? Well, if you can make a list, you can build a wall… with Asciidoctor.
2025/02/26 | Asciidoctor
Ever needed to create a quick slide deck to share with someone in a non-editable format? Asciidoctor-pdf may be the quickest way to create nice looking PDF slide decks.
2025/02/22 | Site News
Commenting on posts directly from Mastodon is now available!
2025/02/21 | Productivity, Technology
If you are familiar with the Firefox web browser, then I am sure you are familiar with its reader view functionality. Wouldn’t be nice if you could surf the entire web in reader view mode only. Well, you can (almost).
2025/02/19 | Blogging
Ever wanted to blog, but thought, “I don’t want build a website or be a web master. I just want to write.” Well, good news. With Asciidoctor and Surge. You can worry less about the “technical stuff” and focus on publishing your writing.
2025/02/17 | Asciidoctor, Careers
We all have heard the resume advice, “tailor your resume to the job you are applying for,” but who has time for that when it may take 200 applications to get an interview? Well, asciidoctor-pdf may be able to help.
2025/02/15 | Pandoc
Ever wanted to create a quick presentation that results in a polished slide deck? Then, check out Pandoc!
2025/02/13 | Asciidoctor, Open Source
If you are interested in Genealogy, but are worried about how to document your research; you could check out technical writing tool chains.
2025/02/11 | RSS
Did you know that you do not have to rely on an algorithm written by someone else to deliver current and interesting content to you?
2025/02/10 | Digital Self-reliance, Fediverse, Open Source
With the “enshittification” of the internet by technology companies, government organizations, and generative artificial intelligence, should we apply the principles of self-reliance to our digital lives?
2025/02/09 | Education, Fediverse, Open Source
The U.S. government is targeting scientific data, research, and information repositories; is it time for scientific institutions to embrace open science?
2025/02/08 | About Me, Site News
Welcome to the ReadBeanIceCream blog and thanks for stopping by! Want to contact me?
