👋 Welcome

I created this site as a way of showcasing my projects, or other general ideas. It’s a sort of engineering portfolio, if you will.

This is just my personal blog site, feel free to get in touch with me using the icon links below.

Sharing same Bluetooth device on Windows/Linux dual-boot

This is a guide written on how to share the same Bluetooth device(s) across Windows and Linux without having to uniquely pair each. ...

October 14, 2023 · 2 min · Bastian de Byl

OpenPGP: Updating Key Expiration

It’s a good idea to update your GPG key(s) before they expire. Mine is set to expire year, from whence I last updated the expiration. Let’s explore how this is done! ...

February 17, 2020 · 4 min · Bastian de Byl

STM32F0 with libopencm3 - Part 1: Simple Timer

After having reviewed Part 0 of this series, we can now explore controlling GPIO with the hardware timers! Other tutorials have used the Systick timer as a good introduction to adding a delay for blinking an LED. However, it is my belief that this leads to confusion for beginners and only opens the door to misunderstandings. That being said, we will be using timers and their associated GPIO ports with Alternate Function modes. ...

February 12, 2020 · 7 min · Bastian de Byl

STM32F0 with libopencm3 - Part 0: Simple GPIO

One of the simplest projects to get started with the STM32 microcontroller series: turn on the lights! ...

December 11, 2019 · 6 min · Bastian de Byl

Auto-complete for libopencm3 in Emacs

With some minor dependencies, it’s fairly straightforward in setting up your Emacs workflow to include IntelliSense-like auto-completion! ...

October 18, 2019 · 2 min · Bastian de Byl

Installing a Hardened Linux Kernel (Arch Linux)

It’s generally good security practice to ensure that you’re running a secure kernel, and the best way to do so is by running a hardened Linux kernel. ...

July 30, 2019 · 2 min · Bastian de Byl

Password Checking Script

Having been inspired by the HIBP1 password checker, I set out to write a script with the following goals: Check for duplicate/re-used passwords Check the strength of each password Check passwords against the pwnedpass API ...

April 13, 2019 · 5 min · Bastian de Byl

ThinkPad USB Port Fix

From the moment that I first had my (used) ThinkPad X220, the bottom-right USB port nearest to the SD card reader had been broken. The pad (or bolster) was missing, along with 3 out of 4 pins having been completely broken off. Needless to say this required fixing. ...

February 28, 2019 · 4 min · Bastian de Byl

OpenPGP: Best Practices (and Git)

I decided to start signing my Git commits for personal, and work Git repositories. Currently, most third-party Git repository hosts only support signed commits and do not support signed pushes. ...

February 17, 2019 · 3 min · Bastian de Byl

A Study in Aperture

I found out recently that using the maximum aperture for a lens can have deminishing returns. Simply put: it makes the image look “soft”, or otherwise out-of-focus. In this post I aim to find out find the best acceptable aperture setting for a specific lens. ...

January 16, 2019 · 2 min · Bastian de Byl