Category Archives: Computers

“Edge City” is back!

Apparently “Edge City” is now being syndicated on GoComics, so I’ve updated the comics aggregator to get it from there instead of Comics Kingdom.

“Tina’s Groove” and “Edge City” unavailable in comics aggregator due to Comics Kingdom shenanigans

Users of my comics aggregator who are also Comics Kingdom subscribers may have noticed that Tina’s Groove and Edge City have been missing in the aggregator for more than a week. This is because they are also missing on Comics Kingdom, which has stopped updating them without explanation. This is not the first step this… Read More »

“Baby Blues” disrupted in comics aggregator during transition from King Features to Andrews McMeel

Users of the comics aggregator who are also Comics Kingdom subscribers may have noticed that the comic strip Baby Blues is no longer available as of January 12. Apparently syndication of this strip is moving from King Features (Comics Kingdom) to to Andrews McMeel (Go Comics) as of February 1, and the maintainers of Comics… Read More »

Hack of the day: enhancing Eastern Bank deposit notification emails

I have my Eastern Bank account configured to email me notifications about checking deposits. There are three problems with these notifications: They include only the amount of the deposit, not whom it’s from. They only put the deposit amount in the body of the email, not in the subject. They email me about every deposit,… Read More »

Comedy of errors trying to update my bank account info everywhere

My bank was recently acquired. The migration of accounts into the new bank’s infrastructure happened over the weekend, and this morning at 8am, we were officially able to log into the new online banking site. We were told that any direct deposits or debits we had configured with the old bank’s routing number would automatically… Read More »

Hack of the day: using the Google Fi “Messages for Web” app on Linux to open “tel:” links from the browser and elsewhere

Over on Github, I just published some code I wrote to implement support for “tel:” links for Google Fi’s Messages for Web app on Linux. In other words, if you have Google Fi and you use Google’s Messages for Web app on Linux, then once you’ve deployed my solution, if you click on a phone-number… Read More »

Vanguard bug temporarily rewrites history and dramatically over-reports some account values

UPDATE [October 14, 2021]: Vanguard has confirmed to me that this issue was caused by a bug in a software update they released to their web site and then fixed a day later. See the end of this blog posting for their response. Executive summary Some time between 6:00am US/Eastern on September 14, 2021 and… Read More »

DisplayLink isn’t quite working in Ubuntu 21.04 (Hirsute)

[This article is obsolete, see the update here.] Earlier, I wrote that the current DisplayLink release for Ubuntu was finally compatible with Ubuntu 21.04 (“Hirsute Hippo”). I’ve since learned that I wasn’t entirely correct. It turns out that if you have a DisplayLink hub plugged into your Ubuntu 21.04 box when you boot it up,… Read More »

Another another bad user experience from Amtrak

Great news, y'all. You get two "Why is @Amtrak service so terrible?" stories in one day! How exciting! (See the last installment at https://twitter.com/jikamens/status/1407335005450342403) #TrainTwitter 1/ I'm taking the Acela home tonight, so I figured hey, what the heck, I'll use one of my upgrade coupons to hop into first class and enjoy unbridled Acela… Read More »

Yet another bad user experience from Amtrak

It's time for my next installment of "Why is @Amtrak service so terrible? It doesn't need to be this way." Check out the last chapter at https://twitter.com/jikamens/status/1217620947781541889. Today's topic: how to make a pre-trip Covid-19 check form as difficult as possible to fill out. #TrainTwitter 1/ I got a notification on my phone that I… Read More »