My New Webcafe
Another post, another blogging framework... except this time, I don't plan on changing any time soon. Unfortunately yes, the joke from the last post is still valid.
A lot has changed since November 2025, when I updated the blog and figured I should add a little note in. Even more has changed since July 2024, when I made my first and only proper blog post. It's about time I do some catch-up to make this make sense in retrospect. I'm writing this at an hour where I can't write anything that makes sense, so bear with me.
What's Changed
My writing style's a bit different. I've come to appreciate simple, precise sentences, especially as I write more software documentation. This is largely inspired by Go's standard library documentation, writings in man pages, and a few other sources like that. If I picked up creative writing again I obviously wouldn't use this style exclusively, but it would be a useful tool. Perhaps that "cold, calculated" expression would be easier to achieve, now that I've practiced communicating succinctly.
I have written a lot of software since July 2024... a lot. I'm still having fun, learning new things and pursuing software craftmanship. For as long as that keeps up, I don't expect to code any less. As far as projects go, here's a non-comprehensive list that makes me look busy:
- A Caves of Qud to Dungeons and Dragons statblock generator, wiki peruser, and all-around campaign management tool for a DnD campaign I plan to run, nicknamed "quDnD".
- quDnD's associated player wiki.
- An all-purpose management tool known as radsm. Think ticketing system, but you can tinker with automation rules to get it to do precisely what you want.
- An unfinished roguelike with morphing mechanics called Eidolon
- A little library that serves an internet radio broadcast given a bunch of music files, called icy. It's what plays the music on the boombox of this website.
- Oh yeah, this website :^)
- A little chat app that I hacked together in a day, to test out message encryption in the browser. It still trusts the server to send the correct public keys, so it's not great. I've added admin announcements, friends and groups since it started. You can have a look here.
- All the projects I'm doing / have done professionally, outside of hobby software.
I'm also running more software. Recently a media server, file server, my own mail server, matrix homeserver, and my own projects of course. It does mean I'm taking on the security holes of everything I run, so I should probably be more vigilant around updates and alerts...
My values around software have also changed. I find the pursuit of quality software an admirable, yet somewhat dying trait. At the very least, I want to be one other person striving for programs that people can depend on and genuinely appreciate. I feel like most corporations started out this way, but lost the human element at some point. As it stands, Microslop, Amazon, Google and Meta only live for the short-term interests of their shareholders. Software craftsmanship is still very much alive in open-source software, but as generative AI threatens to convince executives and junior developers alike that slop is acceptable, I do wonder what the future of OSS will look like. It's uncertain times, but I think it's all the more important that people write software for people.
I'm no longer using a static site generator for flipfloppy.net. This is <em>artisanal</em> HTML and CSS you're seeing :^) The idea for this website was inspired by onionboots' excellent, if not somewhat overdramatic video about the indie web. It got me thinking of the cool, technically challenging things I could create to make my website my own, seeing as I'm in the biz, and I have some more plans in that regard. My pixel art on this site could be better, but it's not like it has to be good.
That's all for now. Thanks for stopping by and reading this far. If you'd like to send me a message, you can do so at