Andrej Friesen - ajfriesen

Andrej Friesen

Hey, I am Andrej and I run this blog.

Free your robot vacuum from the cloud

Home Automation

Free your robot vacuum from the cloud

How to use the robot vacuum without a cloud and integrate it with Home Assistant. With that, some pros and cons of a used older robot vacuum.

USB-C Dongle attached to laptop

Why is Ubuntu using WiFi when I use a dongle with ethernet?

How to set priorities for ethernet and WiFi connections in Ubuntu 20.04.

pc-switch PCB with D1 minipc-switch PCB with D1 mini

Long due pc-switch update and testing a Discord server

Small pc-switch update. Let's try a Discord server to help each other out on pc-switch problems.

Interactive gif showing AOL connecting

Moving and Internet Chaos

Moving to a new home and chaos with internet in Germany.

State of the ARM NAS in 2022

Is it worth running an ARM NAS in 2022? I have checked the market and found a few DIY ARM NAS solutions.

Passwordless SSH login with YubiKey and FIDO2

How to use your YubiKey with OpenSSH to authenticate securely against servers without a password.

Water leak sensor in water container

Home Automation

"Smart" Blumat Water Container with Home Assistant

Automatically water plants with physics and a simple water container thanks to the Blumat system. Additionally, detect if the water container is empty with Home Assistant and get notified.

Brick which looks like a face

Updates and Musings 14 - Analytics, Updates, and Blogposts

Logos from Ghost, Docker, Watchtower, MySQL

Keep your self-hosted Ghost blog up to date - fully automated

How to automatically keep every docker container up to date. Here we will keep a Ghost blog up to date as an example.

Modding an iPod Classic - 1 TB and bigger battery

Modding an iPod Classic - 1 TB and bigger battery

How to mod an iPod classic with SD Cards and a bigger battery.

Old doorbell on wall

Home Automation

Make your old doorbell smart with Home Assistant and ESPHome

Make your old doorbell smart with Home Assistant and ESPHome

Weekly Musings 13 - Managing Tabs, Books for babies

Weekly Musings 13 - Managing Tabs, Books for babies

Screenshot of tabli the chrome extension

Today I learned

How to Manage Your Browser Tabs - You do not have a Tab Problem!

You will learn how to manage a lot of browser tabs the easy way and find everything in a breeze!

Weekly Musings 12 - April 2022 Statistics

Weekly Musings 12 - April 2022 Statistics

Synology DS415+ does not boot - How to fix it!

Home Lab and Hardware

Synology DS415+ does not boot - How to fix it!

How to fix Synology DS415+ boot problem and the story behind that problem.

Weekly Musings #11 - self-hosting Ghost, Hugo to Ghost migration, broken Synology DS415+

Weekly Musings #11 - self-hosting Ghost, Hugo to Ghost migration, broken Synology DS415+

Logos of stripe, mailgun, docker-compose, docker, Caddy, MySQL and Ghost

Self Hosting a Ghost blog with docker-compose, Mailgun setup, and Stripe subscriptions

How to run your Ghost blog with docker-compose, set up Mailgun for mails, and stripe for paid subscriptions.

Migration from Hugo to Ghost for www.eliora-tanzania.org

Migration from Hugo to Ghost for www.eliora-tanzania.org

Migration of EliOra Tanzania, a Hugo project goes to Ghost.

Weekly Musings #10 - gitconfigs, Ghost blog subscriptions, Ansible raw reboot

Weekly Musings #10 - gitconfigs, Ghost blog subscriptions, Ansible raw reboot

Reboot with Ansible raw ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

How to reboot a server with Ansible when Python is not available and you have to use the raw command.

Today I learned

Separating git config for several git servers

How to configure you .gitconfig to use different accounts for several git servers.

Face in a a beer

Weekly Musings #9 - pc-switch update, upcoming website move, self-hosted platforms

3D model of my pc-switch PCB

pc-switch version v1.1

Here I show you how I added proper labels to my pc-switch PCB.

A boat which looks like a blue whale

Weekly Musings #8 - Backups, Steam Deck, and Tracking Changes on Websites

Screenshot of Changedetection

How to Track Changes on Websites without RSS or Mail Subscription

How to track changes on web sites which do not offer RSS feeds or email subscriptions.