This article describes what I think is the simplest possible Kafka Connect set-up, using a single-node Kafka installation. To ensure that the principles are clear, I use only a text editor and command-line tools to run the Connect infrastructure and deploy the connector.

Attaching high-capacity hard disks has always been a bit of a problem for the Raspberry Pi. In this article I describe a simple modification to a Waveshare USB HAT, that allows it to power both the attached drives and also the Pi itself.

The Raspberry Pi has a bunch of GPIO pins we can use to connect push-buttons. But how do we interface push-buttons to an application that expects only keyboard input?

This article is part of a series on building a custom Linux installation for a Raspberry Pi-based appliance. It explains how to make a bootable SD card with Pi firmware, a Linux kernel, and a shell. It's about as minimal as a Linux system can be.

Was there ever a golden age of the apostrophe, when everybody used it the same? No.

You think Apple was an innovator in the world of personal media players? Think again.

ActiveMQ and Kafka are both open-source, Java-based, message brokers with applications in inter-process communication. But can they be used interchangeably?

This simple analog computer has served humanity for more than four centuries. Shouldn't we try to preserve it?

People are increasingly using smart watches and fitness watches for tracking health metrics. Is it wise to do so? (Short answer: probably not.)

Why an expensive smart watch is still less good than a cheap Timex, when it comes to telling the time.

Using simple file and string handling techniques in the Bash shell.

This question is not particularly easy to answer, but understanding the implications helps.