Things I build, break, fix, and write about

1 September 2026
Privacy boundaries when AI touches government records

AI governance gets awkward fast when government records are involved, because the model is rarely the problem. The problem is the sloppy boundary around it, the sort I have seen quietly turn a harmless prompt into a route through records nobody meant to expose.

1 September 2026
Metadata schema choices for content libraries

Structured metadata only works when it matches how people actually retrieve content. I have seen neat schemas fail as soon as the library meets real...

31 August 2026
Federation trade-offs in self-hosted social feeds

Federation looks tidy until you let it touch the edges, and then the odd cases arrive fast. I prefer self-hosted social feeds that stay explicit about...

31 August 2026
FireAvert Z-Wave stove shutoffs for offline safety

FireAvert’s setup does the part that matters without asking Home Assistant to babysit it, which is exactly how I want stove protection to behave. The...

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20 February 2026
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19 February 2026
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19 February 2026
Firewall rules for model extraction attempts

Firewall rules for model extraction attempts AI models exposed over APIs get probed. A lot. Sometimes that is just noisy curiosity. Sometimes it is patterned traffic meant to map out model behaviour...

18 February 2026
Integrating AI software configurations in your homelab

Plan and version your homelab so AI software configurations remain reproducible, secure and easy to roll back. You should automate provisioning and testing, segment workloads on separate VLANs and...

18 February 2026
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17 February 2026
Training users to avoid LNK file threats

Mitigate Windows LNK file risks effectively by implementing key security measures and user training. Protect your system from shortcut vulnerabilities today.

17 February 2026
Security Advisory – 17 Feb 2026

Daily security advisory summary for 17 Feb 2026, selected for UK homelab and sysadmin readers.

16 February 2026
Maintaining user agency in AI decision-making

Maintain clear AI control by keeping decisions visible and reversible so you retain agency in your homelab; require explicit confirmation for critical actions, log inputs, model version and confidence...