I've WSL GUI apps on my home Win11 system for a while, but having that on my work machine is huge.  I use WSL extensively there.  See, we've been standardizing our dev environment setup using Lando, which is basically a convenience layer on top of docker-compose.  It's a handy tool, but the relevant thing to note here is that it works by directly mounting your project code directory inside the Docker container.  This is convenient for Mac and Linux users, but is kind of a problem for Windows users.

As you may (or may not) know, WSL2 is great and out-performs WSL1 in every way except one: cross-filesystem performance.  As long as you keep everything inside the WSL filesystem, you're golden and everything is fast.  But as soon as you try to cross from the Windows filesystem to the Linux one, or vice versa, performance just falls off a cliff.  Sure, it's not a big deal if you just want to edit a file or something like that, but anything that does any remotely significant amount of filesystem access (e.g. running an npm install) is just painful.  In my experience, it's not unheard of for the performance penalty to be on the order of 10x. 

Clearly that's not something you want to endure as part of your normal workflow.  The simple fix is to do all your work inside WSL, which for me means installing Lando in WSL and hosting my code inside WSL.  The only problem is managing the code.  If you want to do that in Windows, you need to do it over a network share, which works, but isn't exactly a great experience.  It also causes various permissions and file ownership issues for apps like Git that actually care about that.

That's where the WSL GUI apps come in.  Rather than dealing with the network share hassle, you can just install your favorite GUI tools inside WSL and run them just like you're on native Linux.  Problem solved!

Well, mostly solved.  Sadly, not everything runs on Linux.  In particular, there's no Linux port of SourceTree, which is currently my graphical Git client of choice.  But it's not that I particularly like SourceTree - it's just that I hate it less than all the other Git clients I've tried.  So I was forced to try some other options.

This part did not go well.  I tried a few different options, including GitFiend (which was nice, but would randomly crash under WSL) and Git-Cola, which was also decent, but which I had to drop because if left alone it would occasionally lock up and then somehow take down the entire system if I tried to close it.  I have no idea how it managed to do that (presumably some bug in WSL's GUI layer), but that's a different problem.  I also attempted to try Gittyup, but I couldn't, because it only offered Flatpak packages.  And, of course, the Flatpak daemon (or whatever it's called) won't install on WSL because it's missing some of the system-level stuff that it uses.  But that's a different post.

Eventually, I declared GUI bankruptcy and decided to actually learn how to use Fugitive, the Git plugin for Vim.  Turns out that Fugitive is actually pretty good and figuring it out was easier than finding a good graphical Git client.  But that's also a story for another post.

In any event, having WSL GUI apps is pretty nice.  Now I can do all my work in WSL, and still have both GVim and PHPStorm, if I need it, without having to pay the cross-OS performance price.  So I can have nice things and good performance.  Yay!

See, I actually kind of like OneDrive.  I have an Office 365 subscription, which means I get 1TB of OneDrive storage included, so I might as well use it.  I also happen to like the web interface and photo-syncing aspects of it pretty well.

However, I'm slightly paranoid and generally distrustful of cloud service providers, so I like to have local copies and offline backups of my files.  This is a problem for me, because my primary Windows machine is a laptop, and I don't want to pay the premium to put a multi-terabyte drive in my laptop just so I can sync my entire OneDrive, and scheduled backups to a USB disk are awkward for a laptop that's not plugged in most of the time.  Now, I do have a multi-terabyte drive connected to my Linux desktop, but for a long time there were no good OneDrive sync clients for Linux.  In the past, I had worked around this by using one-off sync tools like Unison (which...mostly worked most of the time) or by setting up an ownCloud sync on top of the OneDrive sync (which worked but was kind of janky).  However, but those depended on syncing from my Windows laptop, which was OK when I had 20 or 30 gigabytes of data in OneDrive, but at this point I'm well over 100GB.  Most of that is archival data like family photos and just eats up too much space on a 500GB SSD.

Enter InSync.  InSync is a third-party file sync tool that runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux and supports OneDrive, Google Drive, and Dropbox.  It has all the bells and whistles you'd expect, including file manager integrations, exclusions, directory selection, and other cool stuff.  But what I care about is the basics - two-way syncing.  And it does that really well.  In fact, it totally solves my problem right out of the box.  No more janky hacks - I can just connect it to my OneDrive account and it syncs things to my Linux box.

The only down-side to InSync is that it's proprietary (which I don't mind) and the licensing is confusing.  The up side is that it's not actually that expensive - currently, the pricing page lists licenses at $30 USD per cloud account.  So if you only want to sync OneDrive, it's $30 and you're done.  However, there's also an optional support contract and there's some difference between "legacy" licenses (which I think is what I have) and their new subscription model.  Frankly, I don't fully understand the difference, but as long as it syncs my OneDrive and doesn't cost too much, I don't really care.  

So if you're a OneDrive user and a Linux user, InSync is definitely worth a try.  I don't know about the other platforms or services (I assume they're all similar), but OneDrive on Linux works great.

Anyway, I noticed a rather annoying issue where Nextcloud was leaving hundreds of stale auth tokens in the database.  Apparently, I'm not the only person this has happened to.

While Nextcloud has a menu item to revoke and remove stale sessions on their settings page, it's on a per-item basis.  So if you have hundreds of stale sessions, the only way to remove them is to go through, one by one, and click the menu and select the "revoke" option.  Needless to say, this is terrible.

The less annoying solution is to just go straight into the database and delete them there.  You can just run something like:
DELETE FROM oc_authtoken WHERE last_activity < <whatever_timestamp>;
That might be ugly, but at least it doesn't take forever.

It's important to note that, in addition to being annoying, this is evidently also a performance problem.  From what I've read, it's the reason that authenticating to my Nextcloud instance had gotten absurdly slow.  The app responded fine once I was logged in, but the login process itself took forever.  It also seems to be the reason why my hosting provider's control panel has been showing I'm way over my allotted MySQL execution time.  After deleting all those stale sessions, not only is login nice and snappy again, but my MySQL usage dropped off a ledge.  Just look at this graph:

As you can see, January is a sea of red, and then it drops off to be comfortably under the limit after I deleted the old sessions.  The Nextcloud team really needs to fix this issue.

Of course, when you read the rationale, you can't really disagree.  The number of free, high-quality editors and IDEs makes "generic code editor" not exactly the best business to be in.  Especially when you're tied to an archaic, end-of-life framework like XUL.  And given that they don't exactly have a large team working on Komodo (never more than 4 people, according to the article), rewriting sounds like it would be a pretty huge effort.

Looking at my blog history and tag list, it seems I started using Komodo Edit some time before November of 2008, used that for several years, and then upgraded to Komodo IDE.  I posted about looking for a new IDE in March 2017.  So I was a Komodo user for 8+ years.  Not  bad run.  It was a good IDE for a long time.  Sadly, I was one of those people who didn't like the UI revamp that came out in version 10.

However, I was somewhat lucky in my timing, because by the time I dropped Komodo, Visual Studio Code had come out.  So I was starting to use Vim seriously in the era where language servers were becoming a thing.  The importance of the Language Server Protocol (LSP) for making "Vim as IDE" viable cannot be understated.  This makes things way easier and better.  All you need is a Vim plugin that speaks LSP (I use coc.nvim), and you can get all the same code intelligence that VS Code does.  That means you can get all of the goodness of Vim without having to sacrifice your intellisense.  It's a good time to be coding.

The thing is, I actually remember when NextCloud split from ownCloud.  At the time, I was working on a (now-defunct) product that involved ownCloud.  Basically, my company's core business at the time was data backup, so we had a lot of servers with big disks and were looking for a way to monetize that extra space.  The idea at the time was to do that by integrating a "file sync and share" product into our offerings, and that product was a rebranded ownCloud Enterprise.  Of course, the "file sync and share" space was already pretty crowded, so that product never gained much traction, but it did help me get more into ownCloud and the company even paid to send me to their user conference in Berlin, where I got to meet their team (who, at the time, seemed not-very-impressed with the whole "NextCloud" thing) and see some sites.  So it was actually a great experience, even if the product didn't pan out.

Anyway, despite my affection for ownCloud, my motivation for this change was actually pretty simple and prosaic - I was upgrading my home server (that'll be another post), and I didn't want to downgrade shit.  See, I actually run two ownCloud instances - one on my local network for accessing various media files, and another in my web hosting, for caldav/carddav and files that I want to be highly available.  For my home instance, I was doing a fresh install of the latest Ubuntu MATE on  a brand-new box.  This shouldn't be an issue, except that MATE comes with PHP 8.1, but for some reason, ownCloud only supports PHP 7.4.

Yes, you heard that right - 7.4.  That's the newest version that's officially supported.  The last 7.x release.  The one that's no longer actively supported and has less than six months of security updates left.  That one.  That's what they still expect me to use.

For my previous home box, I believe I'd actually hacked up the source a bit to make it work (since I don't think I depended on anything that didn't work in 8.x), but week I was sick and I just didn't feel like it.  Depending on a version that's about to lose security fixes is crazy anyway.  So I figured I'd "upgrade" to NextCloud, since they actually recommend PHP 8.1.

For my home server, I just did a fresh install, which is fairly straight-forward.  The only annoying part was the Apache configuration, and that was only annoying because I was running NextCloud on a non-standard port and forgot to add a "Listen" directive. 🤦‍♂️ For this instance, there was no real need to do any migration, because the only data I had in there was the (very small) list of users - the rest was just files, which can be trivially re-indexed.

Upgrading the instance on my web hosting was another story.  Since that had my carddav and caldav data, I really did need to migrate that.  I was also already several versions behind on my updates - it was running ownCloud 10.3, whereas 10.8 was current.  However, this turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

You see, NextCloud includes support for migrating from an ownCloud instance.  The thing is, they only support specific migrations.  In my case, the relevant case was that you can migrate from exactly ownCloud 10.5 to NextCloud 20.  Sadly, it took me a couple of tries to realize that the version migration matrix are exact, so there was no path to directly migrate from ownCloud 10.3 to NextCloud.  So I had to use the auto-updater to update ownCloud 10.3 to 10.4, and then manually update ownCloud 10.4 to 10.5 (because the auto-updater wanted to go all the way to 10.8).  Then I could follow the migration process and manually update to NextCloud 20.  From there, I was able to use the NextCloud auto-updater four times to upgrade to the current version.

So the upgrade process was...tedious.  Not really "hard", but definitely tedious.  The directions are pretty clear and simple, it's just a lot of steps to get to a current version of NextCloud.  But at least none of the steps were particularly complicated or prone to error.  As data migrations go, it could be much worse.  And the best part is that it maintained URLs and credentials, so I didn't even have to reconfigure my caldav/carddav clients.

As far as NextCloud itself goes, it seems...pretty much like ownCloud, but nicer.  They've made the UI prettier (both for the web interface and the client app), added a nice dashboard landing page, and made some other cosmetic improvements.  They also seem to have a wider range of installable apps, which is nice.  I haven't had all that long to play with it yet, but so far it seems like a distinct upgrade.

However, I did eventually discover an issue with it.  It seems that, on my work laptop (but not my personal one), the "energy efficient" setting doesn't properly support all resolutions.  It's a really weird bug, as the other two performance settings ("high power" and "pixel perfect") both work fine, and everything works fine on my personal laptop, but "energy efficient" only works when the resolution is set to maximum on my work laptop.  On the up side, their support people have been very responsive and I can just use a different setting, so it's not a big deal.

Anyway, as part of trying to collect more info on this bug for Duet's testing team, I signed up for a trial of Duet Air to see if I could reproduce the issue through that (spoiler: I could).  Duet Air enables Duet's "remote desktop" feature, which allows you to use not only mobile devices, but other laptops as external displays.

It's actually a pretty slick feature.  You just create an account and sign into all of your devices with it.  Then you can go to the "remote desktop" tab in Duet and choose the device you want to connect to.  The paradigm is that you use the "display" device to select what you connect to.  So, for example, if I want to have four monitors for my work machine, I can open up Duet on my home laptop, select my work laptop, and the home laptop becomes a wireless display.

So far, it's working pretty well.  It's easy to use and set up, performant, and it's a tool I'm already using.  It's also fairly cheap at $25/year.  I think I'll probably continue using it after the trial.

I did a little searching for intercom systems, thinking I might buy some hardware, but decided that looked like too much work.  We'd have to find a home for it, and then you might not hear it if you were on the other side of the house, unless I put them everywhere, which is an even bigger pain.  Besides, it seemed like there should be an app for that.  And since we pretty much have our phones close to hand most of the time, that would be more convenient than dedicated hardware anyway.

Turns out there is an app for that.  A number of them, actually.  The one I decided to go with was Zello, which is a fairly simple walkie-talkie app.  I went with this one for a few reasons:

1. The mobile app is free, at least for personal use.  (There's a PC version too, but that's only for paid corporate accounts.)
2. It's in the Amazon and Google Play app stores.
3. It's easy to set up.
4. It's really easy to use.

The setup process for Zello was pretty basic.  For my son, I decided to just put it on an old Kindle Fire that I had laying around.  It can just sit on the desk, plugged in and ready to use whenever we need to talk to him.  My wife and I just put the app on our phones.  From there, you just create an account (which only requires basic information) for each device using the app, and then send a contact request to the other accounts.  Once your request is accepted, that person will appear in your contact list.

Actually talking to other people is even simpler.  You just tap on the person's account from your contact list and then you get a screen with a great big "talk" button in the middle.  When you want to talk to the person, you just press and hold the button and start talking, just like an old-fashioned walkie-talkie.  When you're done, you release the button.  From what I can tell, the connection is not in real-time - it seems like the app records your message and then delivers it, so you are less subject to the vagaries of the network.  But barring networking issues, the delay seems to be pretty short - a few seconds in most cases.

The app also has a few other features, including very basic text messaging.  There's also a "channels" feature, which I haven't used yet.  That's their "group voice chat" feature.  Presumably the idea is to mimic a dedicated frequency for a CB radio.  The primary use-case for the commercial version of Zello seems to be for fleet dispatchers, so the interface seems geared toward a simple replacement for a traditional radio system.

Overall, the app works pretty well.  It was easy to set up and it has definitely saved some frustration in terms of yelling back and forth across the house.  Also, my son seems to like using it.  He even ends is messages with "over and out".  So I count this as a win.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like there's an out-of-the-box way to do this with my Windows laptop and Galaxy S6 Lite tablet.  But the good news is that there's software that will make it work pretty painlessly.

The solution I ended up going with was Duet.  It's a combination of a desktop app and mobile app working in tandem that works for Windows, Mac, Android, and iOS.  There is a service you can create an account for, but it's not necessary - you can use the apps locally without signing up for anything.  (In fact, I haven't even tried creating an account yet.)  By default Duet connects via a USB connection to your device, but you can also enable an option to connect wirelessly over WiFi.  The WiFi connection is fine, but at least on my network there was a lot of mouse lag when trying to use apps on the tablet.  It's not unusable, but it is unpleasant.  The USB connection is super-responsive, though, so I normally just use that.  As a nice extra, Duet even allows you to use the touchscreen of the tablet, so if your laptop has a touchscreen (which mine does), your secondary screen will work just the same.  Very slick!

The only down side of Duet I've seen so far is that it's not free and there doesn't seem to be a demo version.  There's no cost for the desktop component, but the Android app is about $10.  That's not exactly a fortune, but it's enough to be annoying if you try it and it doesn't work.  Thus my first attempt was with Spacedesk, which is completely free.  However, I didn't actually get a chance to try it out, as the desktop driver install experience was...not great.  For some reason, it took an uncomfortably long to for the installer to run.  Like, after half an hour it was still working.  So I clicked "cancel".  And then, after another hour, the rollback finally completed and I closed the installer.  I have no idea what it was doing, but that was enough to make me not trust it.

Duet, on the other hand, installed fast and worked the first time.  The settings are pretty minimal.  For the connection, you can change the framerate, performance setting, and resolution.  System-wide, you can toggle notifications and "Duet Air", which is what they call the WiFi connection.  To connect the tablet, you pretty much just plug it in.  Duet on the tablet will prompt you to connect the screen and Duet on the laptop will also detect the connection and add the display.  (Of course, if you're using a WiFi connection, it's not that simple.  But it's still pretty simple.)  After that, the tablet just behaves like a regular touchscreen display.  Unfortunately, it only supports one device at a time, so you can't plug in two tablets, or your tablet and your phone, but that's not a huge deal.

So far I'm pretty happy with Duet.  It's a nicely done little utility that "just works" and does a useful thing.  Definitely worth checking out if you have a device that would make a good extra monitor.

I'm not going to do a "review of Windows 11" post, though.  Not because I'm lazy or pressed for time (though I don't deny those charges), but really just because I don't have that much to say.  I mean, so far Windows 11 is fine.  And I don't mean that in the sarcastic, room-on-fire-this-is-fine meme sort of way.  My experience has been genuinely fine.  It's not a phenomenal, life-changing upgrade, but I haven't had any problems either.

For the most part, I haven't really noticed much of a change from Windows 10.  Yeah, now windows have more rounded corners and the UI in general got kind of a face lift, but those are mostly cosmetic changes.  They added some handy window management features that I use on occasion, but I haven't discovered any major features that strike me as must-have's.  

The one change I did immediately notice was the start menu.  I really don't like the new start menu.  I think it's much less useful than the one from Windows 10.  For one, the default position is in the middle of the screen, which seems like a pointless change.  However, there's a setting to easily change that.  But beyond that, it doesn't allow much customization and seems much more focused on being a glorified search box than a menu.  You can still pin items to the start menu, but the option to arrange them into groups is gone.  Also, the pinned area is now smaller and paginated, which is kind of annoying.

Fortunately, that can be changed too.  There are a few options out there for start menu replacement in Windows 11.  I went with Stardock's Start11, which give you quite a few options in terms of customizing the start menu experience, including versions of the Windows 10 menu and the "classic" Windows 7 style menu.  On top of this, it gives you a number of other settings to manipulate the look and behavior of the start menu and taskbar, such as controlling transparency and texture, swapping out the start button image, and controlling click behavior.  It's actually quite well done, and with a $6 price tag, it's kind of a no-brainer if you don't like the new menu.

Naturally, most of the editing recommendations for Typescript are focused on Visual Studio Code.  But I like Vim, so I did a quick search and found this article, which led me to CoC (which I choose to pronounce "coke", like the soda), which stands for the slightly ungrammatical "Conquer of Completion".  It's a plugin for NeoVim and Vim that essentially does Intellisense (code completion, context popups, etc.) using language servers.

If you're not familiar, the Language Server Protocol (abbreviated LSP, though that always makes me think of the Liskov Substitution Principle) was developed by Microsoft for VS Code.  It's essentially a way to make Intellisense work without the editor having to implement support for each language.  It does this by defining a protocol that "clients" like an editor can use to communicate with a "language server".  The language server is a stand-alone program that can provide code intelligence for a particular language, but is not directly tied to any particular editor.  The server can then be called by any client that implements the protocol, which means that the editor itself doesn't actually have to know anything about the language to implement advanced editing features - which is huge.

Anyway, CoC is an LSP client for Vim.  And I have to say, it's awesome!  I've messed with a few code completion and LSP plugins in the past, but I never really got them to work right.  They were either difficult to configure, or required Vim to be built with particular non-standard options.  But CoC was dead-simple to set up.  The only catch is that you have to install the language servers separately, but it turns out that's super-simple as well.  (The ones I've used so far can all be installed through NPM.)

I'm still getting used to it, but having CoC is a game changer for Vim.  I'd given up on having this level of intelligence in my editor.  I mean, for something that supports as many languages as Vim, building it the old-fashioned way just isn't feasible.  But when you can use the same language servers as more modern editors to do the heavy lifting, suddenly it's no longer crazy.

The next step is to look into the available commands and customizations for CoC and see what I can come up with to optimize my experience.  So far it's a pretty cool tool and it definitely makes the development experience nicer.  I want to see what else I can do with it.