Matt Ellery

Ohai #France, great to see you again.

I hope you don't mind me saying that you're incredibly hot. Because of human driven climate change.

Just a reminder for anyone in #Horsham

Andy at AD Cycles is a magician and cyclists will be immeasurably poorer when he retires.

My touring bike's front wheel suddenly started to make a horrible clicking, rumbling noise today. Not good.

I'd never had the nerve to do it before, but thanks to St. Calvin at Park Tools I managed to open, clean, and re-grease the front hub this afternoon. It was surprisingly easy.

#biketooter

New blogpost: Diary - summer 2026

https://mattellery.co.uk/posts/2026/07/31/diary-summer-2026/

Oh no, I'm falling down the #selfhosting rabbit hole.

I set up a VPN on a #raspberrypi on Sunday.

I bought a small form factor PC from ebay on Monday.

Tonight I've been comparing networking options, and debating SAS vs SATA hard drives.

Send help.

I've finally caught up on the #TourDeFrance highlights. For what it's worth, here are some thoughts:

- I don't understand people who say that Pogi makes the race boring. There's so much more to the TdF than the competition for the yellow jersey.
- That said, he is unstoppable when he decides to go for the stage win.
- It's great to see some new riders coming forward, now that the big beasts of the 2010s have retired.
- I hope Vingegaard races next year, but the signs don't look good.

1/3

This afternoon's project is complete - I've successfully set up a wireguard server on an old Pi that I wasn't using any more. 😎

Intrusive thoughts are good, actually.

@edintone@mastodon.green Yes, we absolutely should have our own version! From west - east: 1) Lodsworth-Dial Green-Gospel Green-Plaistow-Loxwood-Rudgwick 2) Storrington-West Chilt-Barns Green-Christ's Hospital 3) CH-Dragons Green-Shipley-Ashington 4)Warninglid-Cross Colwood Lane-Bolney-Twineham The problem is that there aren't enough quiet east-west roads to join them all together.

@ericsfraga@fediscience.org OK, you're going to have to forgive me but it's rare that I actually get to use knowledge from my Politics degree. The ballot numbers do technically mean that your vote isn't 100% anonymous, but the list must never leave the polling station during the vote, and gets sealed when polls close and there's an extraordinarily high bar to unseal it again. There has to be compelling evidence of fraud. Also, the number isn't assigned to you until you vote.

@ScubaET@masto.ai I didn't, thanks!

Important #puffin news: The National Trust has set up a puffin cam. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/live/zt3MCinVr5Q

#nature #birds #NationalTrust

@Floppy@mastodon.me.uk You've prompted me to ask a question on the OSM forum: https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/is-there-a-tag-to-define-the-regular-and-continual-presence-of-wildfowl-birds/143575

@Floppy@mastodon.me.uk It's complicated. OSM isn't really suited for storing temporary information (the classic example is that it's not recommended to map temporary roadworks). As it happens I cycled past the pond in question a few days later and there were no ducks, so I removed the tag. However, I wouldn't be against adding a tag on Cootes Farm Pond and the pond in Horsham Park to indicate that there are usually some sort of wildfowl in the area.

@Floppy@mastodon.me.uk @dan@axillae.telent.net I don't know of anyone else (on Mastodon) that lives in Horsham, although I think @edintone@mastodon.green is in the area and @ericsfraga@fediscience.org is in Crawley.

@Flummic@floss.social I don't mind at all, and thank you!

@Edent@mastodon.social Thanks for letting me know, I'll put that on the list for the next fettling.

New blog: Fettling the backend of my website

I've followed the lead of @neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk and @Edent@mastodon.social in adding human.json to my site. Thanks for the prompt, youse.

If anyone feels like adding my site then I say thank you, and fill your boots. I've also added a note on AI to my About page.

And if there's anyone using human.json who would like me to add them then let me know, I'd be happy to view more human generated content.

https://mattellery.co.uk/posts/2026/04/04/fettling-the-backend-of-this-website/

Pals, I'm looking for any personal recommendations of #cycling helmet cameras that are #linux friendly.

By Linux friendly I mean that I would be able to reliably extract the footage. I don't want or need any specific software that comes with the product.

Please, only recommend if you've got personal experience.

#askfedi

@kelson@notes.kvibber.com @gibr@masto.bike Please don't. Tagging the existence of wild animals is way too ephemeral IMO. The only widely used tags that are in any way close (https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:horse and https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:dog) are intended to specify access restrictions for domesticated animals.

@alerque@mastodon.social I agree. I've left a note on the changeset.

@owiecc@en.osm.town Just the one swan, actually.

Today's fun #OpenStreetMap edit is someone adding ducks=yes to a pond.

@Thayer Would this be of interest to him? We're based next to Gatwick Airport. https://stem.caa.co.uk/work-experience-at-caa/

@robinince@mastodon.social Thank you for all the years of excellent science broadcasting. You have let down no-one. The BBC has failed you.