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“Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” — Mike Tyson

“Man is the only animal for whom his own existence is a problem which he has to solve.” — Erich Fromm

📡✨ Extensions

And just like that, I realized it's easy to build a Chrome extension to serve as a front end for my bookmark manager web app. It's super easy to do... according to Claude AI. Filed in my small projects bin. 💪🏻

AI Isn't Black and White

People of all ages and backgrounds come together outdoors, connecting ideas and technology to illuminate the diverse and collaborative nature of AI innovation. Okay, this will probably sound controversial, but that's not my intent. I'm just sharing my thoughts because AI is everywhere right now, especially on social media and in blog posts. These views range from fairly neutral:1 • Manton Reece • Tom Casavant • Paul Thurrott • Richard Campbell To fairly positive, with the idea that you need to learn or use AI because... • Jim Mitchell • Numeric Citizen • Leo Laporte • Hey Loura • Ricardo Mendes To more negative views, often focused on whether AI's value proposition can actually justify the money being spent: • Ed Zitron People tend to frame the debate as two opposing camps: camp 1 wants nothing to do with AI, and camp 2 wants to hand it control over everything....

Analytics dashboard with Tinylytics

If you're using Tinylytics for your blog, Scribbles now surface this data straight in your dashboard. It's all automatic and you don't have to do anything extra — just add your Tinylytics code to your blog, write, gain some visitors and the analytics will flow straight in. It's super simple and it allows you to filter by date, using quick filter, or custom dates. Additionally you can filter by path or country. If you need more, you can head on over to the main Tinylytics dashboard. Whilst Tinylytics is powerful I kept everything minimal for now. If there are requests to bring more data across, let me know and I'll make it happen. With everything enabled, you can also see a small analytics pill on your post edit screen. Clicking on it will show you a proper graph as on the main dashboard. If you have any Kudos, it'll also...

📡✨ Features

Similarly, for Steve Jobs, Dropbox was a feature rather than a full product. That's when Dropbox approached Apple for a buyout. He would probably suggest that AI is also a feature, not a standalone product.

And so the attempt to rearrange the deckchairs on the Titanic of British governance begins…

re: Who Knows You Blog

JTR recently shared his thoughts on this question that has been making the rounds over the past few weeks, and I thought I'd share mine. Its complicated when I think about it. I've been blogging for quite some time, and its come up to most of the people in my life that I'm close with (family and a few friends), but its not something that any of them follow. Sure, they've dabble with reading for a few weeks here and there, especially if I've been in a bad place, but I'm almost 100% confident that if you were to ask anyone in my life what my domain name or even blog title, they couldn't tell you. It's not something that gets asked about, and years ago it used to bother me that folks in my real life didn't bother to visit, but those days have long passed. When I'm not...

Airspace: A Polished Fix for a macOS Friction Point

Airspace, an app I downloaded today, has a lot going for it. It removes a classic Apple friction point by letting you name your virtual desktops, customize their appearance, and assign keyboard shortcuts to jump between them. It also helps me illustrate a point. Making a decision about the right price for an app has to be one of the hardest parts of releasing something new. Some of the most versatile and useful apps in the Mac ecosystem are priced absurdly low. I am looking at you, BetterTouchTool. On the other hand, we have all seen apps with plenty of competitors that still carry what I consider an absurdly high price. My favorite example is the clipboard manager, Paste. In reality, every software purchase comes down to what we value. Some people have strict requirements around aesthetics and would rather pay for polish than use something more functional. I think...

A Few Good Things - Vol. 21

Trail Out UpdateA couple of years ago, I wrote about Trail Out, a spiritual successor to Flatout. The game was definitely a lower-budget release, but the gameplay was a lot of fun. I didn't mind the game being so unpolished, but I did grow frustrated as I tried to complete the story mode but fell short due to a lack of races and the expectation of perfection in every race. So, eventually I gave up on it. Well, Trail Out was recently released on PS5 and I guess they made some updates. The game has been cleaned up quite a bit, it looks better and the glitches are gone. It feels more like a proper release and they even added new events to make completion easier. I've put fourteen hours into this game, so I obviously like it, and I'm excited to finish it up. Second Oldest Footage from an...

DockDoor Pro - The Dock Apple Wouldn't Build

When the free app DockDoor was released in 2024, it was the first time I had seen a developer add window previews to the Mac Dock in much the same way that other operating system from Redmond handles them. For kicks, it also included a Windows-style application switcher, also free. I have been updating some older reviews, so I went back to check on DockDoor. Not only does the original free version still exist, but the developer has also added a paid Pro version with a much larger feature set. The splash page for DockDoor Pro puts its claim front and center: DockDoor Pro - The Dock macOS Deserves The official native Mac dock replacement with profiles, live window previews, media controls, a file tray, magnification, and everything Apple left out. That is bold, but defensible. What It DoesThe real question with any Dock utility is whether it replaces the...

📡✨ Trails

I just had a clear idea for my next web application: a site to share, in chronological order, the places visited during a trip. It will be named Numeric Citizen Trails. My next trip is to France in June. I should have enough time to develop this application by then. I can't wait to get started. First step, writing the set of queries for Claude AI. 🗺️

→ Links 🔗 iOS Version Releases History

This website was not functioning or being updated for some time until recently. I'm glad to see it back and active. Although I don't want another beta for iOS 26.6, it seems the trend is unlikely to favor my preference. https://www.thinkybits.com/blog/ios-versions/

re: radio is cool, actually

Last week, I read a post by Stephen which was a response to gb's post: radio is cool. I recommend you check out both posts, and Stephen's post particularly because he works in the radio industry and obviously has more to say on the subject than I would. However, I wanted to use this post as a jumping-off point for my thoughts on radio. I recently posted that I began listening to the radio again, and it's been a delight. I would say I stopped listening to the radio probably sometime around 2002-2003. I had a six-disc CD changer in my Miata, what did I need the radio for? I loved burning CDs and controlling my own music, so the thought of listening to ads, stupid morning shows, and music I didn't like really turned me off. So, I spent the next twenty years only hearing the radio in the...

Bartender Enters a New Era with Top Shelf

For the past few weeks, I’ve been beta testing a new release of Bartender; an app with an interesting, and at times slightly controversial, history. Despite that, it’s a utility I’ve relied on for years. I recently did a deep dive into the problems macOS changes have created for menu bar managers and what those changes mean going forward. Even with a few lingering issues in the category, I still came away viewing Bartender as the best overall option for serious Mac users. The new release, called Bartender Pro, expands beyond traditional menu bar management with a feature called Top Shelf. The idea is simple: turn the MacBook notch into something genuinely useful instead of leaving it as dead space. The developers are entering an increasingly crowded area occupied by apps like Droppy and DynamicLake Pro, both of which are also trying to claim that piece of Mac interface real estate. Top Shelf supports temporary file storage,...

New Droppy Release is a Full Featured Utility Suite

An update to Droppy by developer Jordy Spruit dropped this weekend. What started as a free notch app has evolved into a paid, but still inexpensive, suite of Mac productivity tools. The licensing recently changed so that Droppy’s one-time payment now gets you a license for two Macs instead of one. The change is retroactive and applies to all users. From now until May 31st, the price is €6.99. After that, it will be €9.99. Both prices include lifetime updates, including major version releases. Droppy is written in native Swift. It’s signed and notarized by Apple, runs on macOS 14 and later, and ships without analytics or third-party trackers. Spruit says, “v14 contains more than 100 user-visible bug fixes and dozens of performance improvements, all driven by feedback from the Discord testers I’ve been working with daily for months.” My Personal Use CasesIn previous versions of Droppy, I’ve used the notch based...

• 💅 Tweaked the colouring of the pager in the default theme (version 2) to match the blog accent colour.

The Assembly

Season 2 of my favourite TV show has just dropped. If you haven’t watched The Assembly on ITV, do it now. It’s unmitigated joy and heart from start to finish. (Possibly UK only 😕).

There’s a difference between being condemned to suffer and being free to suffer.

“It doesn’t matter who you are or how much practice you’ve done: right now, there is just what's noticed without a noticer.” — Just what’s noticed

A Tinkering Day

Late last night, I discovered Walmart was selling a 6 TB hard drive for $125. It's not the greatest deal in the world, but with today's pricing I'll take it. Having a second drive gives me the space I need to make some changes. The drive was delivered from my local store this morning, so I got to work on finishing up some mini-tech projects I had sitting around. First, I went to work on my new budget emulation machine. I moved some more games over and then compressed the games with a built-in compressor. That saved me even more space, so now I can keep expanding my PS2 library which already sits at over fifty games. I also watched a few YouTube videos so I could learn how to make adjustments to improve the graphics. My first attempt went quite well, although I am experiencing some slow down in...

Parsley, Pot Roast, and Changing Tastes

“Why 1980s Meals Were Always Garnished With Parsley - Food Republic From steak dinners to bowls of soup, 1980s restaurants topped nearly every dish with a sprig of parsley. But why was this garnish so ubiquitous? — Food Republic (@foodrepublic.bsky.social) on bluesky (source)” I saw this Bluesky post come across my timeline because I follow Food Republic, and it got my attention. When I was a kid and teenager, I did not like parsley. But now, in my 50s, I actually do not mind it. I started using it after following some recipes from Chef Jean-Pierre, who has a YouTube channel. It really did make my pot roast pop and helped brighten the dish after a long cooking time. It is strange to think that this may be why parsley was used so often in the 1970s, when I was growing up. “Parsley signaled sophistication. During the decade, French cuisine...

→ Links 🔗 Are You OK Digg?

Digg is back... well, sort of. After a failed rebirth attempt, now they try again, but this time, it's quite different. It seems all about AI gathering news about AI. I live their new logo, though. https://di.gg/ai

→ Links 🔗 More Than Seven Years Ago

I posted this on Micro.blog more than seven years ago: The Return of Micro Blogging? It's been a long time since then, and so much has happened on Micro.blog. https://blog.numericcitizen.me/2018/10/13/the-return-of.html

away from hospitals

If someone today would ask me what a desire of mine could be, staying away from hospitals would be really high on the list… P.S. = don't worry, it's a routine check… but I'm tired of doing them already!

Pillars of Creation

All it took was an iconic image and a heavily loaded name and Science entered the world of myth without even realising it.

⚠️ Politics! 😱

Interesting times in British politics. The (now historical) main two parties, Labour and Conservative, are effectively dead, replaced by a range of smaller parties known more for so-called fringe policies. Effectively the Conservatives have been replaced by the more right wing Reform Party and Labour have seen their majority divided up between the Liberal Democrats and Greens. Meanwhile in Wales Plaid Cymru (Yay, Go Wales!) have become the larger party, just. In Scotland the SNP have cleaned up leaving everyone else behind fighting over scraps. I have no idea what any of this means but only to note that the next General Election in 2029 will see the Parliamentary map completely redrawn out of all recognition.

“When you find your way, you will also find many teachers standing in your way.” – Dōgen

Beast (2026)

Tonight I watched Beast, an Australian MMA film starring Daniel MacPherson, Bren Foster, and Russell Crowe, with Luke Hemsworth in a small role. I'm just gonna say it, and I know it won't be everybody's cup of tea, but I loved this flick. The film does nothing original. It recycles half a dozen combat sport movies and can best be described as a B movie Rocky if it was a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie. Maybe that's not fair, the acting, directing, and even cinematography definitely eclipses anything Van Damme did, but it has that spirit and I'm all about it. I wouldn't want to ruin the plot, but the gist is, a former fighter is forced back into the ring for one final match after falling on hard times. It's a lot more complicated than that, but any additional info would ruin the ride. If you like solid fighting flicks,...

A Few Good Things - Vol. 20

WKRP in CincinnatiA radio station in Cincinnati, Ohio has acquired the call letters WKRP, thus creating WKRP in Cincinnati just like the fantastic 70s sitcom. CurrentI picked up Current a month or so ago, and I honestly felt like it was a bit overwhelming. It just required more energy than I was willing to spend on setting everything up. Well, I found a little time to read through the documentation on the website and suddenly it all started making sense. I love that I can have real people that I know, with their real names listed so I don't miss their posts amongst the sea of everything else. It's a new app, and constantly improving which I appreciate. I wasn't as thrilled with the performance on my Macbook, but I do like the layout on the Macbook. I'm hoping I can make the move from NetNewsWire because I'd love to...

Liqoria: The Mac Dock Player That Should've Been Built In

The promise: A universal music controller that lives in your Dock and unifies Apple Music, Spotify, browsers, and more with animated artwork, real waveforms, and native Apple design. If Apple were the company that so many people pretend that it is, it would make a music controller lives in your Dock and plays not just Apple Music but also Spotify, Youtube and more with animated artwork, real waveforms, using real native Apple design. The reality though, is that Apple Music is a storefront, not a music player. Thankfully, we now have Liqoria, which quietly removes the whole category of app-switching annoyances that plague every other macOS music player. The Dock placement is better than notch-only players. The feature set makes it more than just a controller. The design is more native-feeling than 99% of indie apps. Liqoria proves three myths wrong at once: • that all miniplayers belong in the...

Meaning is the mind’s imaginary friend.

At a certain point life becomes its own entertainment.