Category: How To

How to Setup Ecobee and Geofence using Homekit

Tim 27 Comments

I recently set up two ecobee4 smart thermostats in my home. I choose ecobee over nest because of the native Homekit integration. The overall installation was not too difficult since I had existing C-wire’s in both of my units.

One of the biggest features smart thermostats give you over a standard thermostat with a schedule is the ability to know whether you are home or away. They can do this by using the built-in motion sensors which exist in the thermostat and remote temperature sensors or a geofence using your phone’s GPS. Geofence is my preferred method because if someone is home and decides to take a nap, the thermostat could go into away mode while geofence knows your true location and can set the thermostat in Home or Away mode. Read More

How to Exclude Files When Zip in macOS

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When using macOS zip tool from the command, you may want to exclude certain files by name or extensions. I often need to do this when automating extension bundles for a release. Here is the command I use to exclude __MACOSX and DS_Store files that macOS creates.

zip -r deploy.zip . -x ".\*" -x "\_\_MACOSX" -x "*DS_Store"

The -x flag exlcudes files that match the pattern. Here is a list of other options for the zip command line tool.

PUBG Xbox One SSD

Tim 1 Comment

PUBG has been out on Xbox for over a year now. The devs have been working on improving the game but it still has issues loading building. This is especially apparent on Vikendi when landing castle. The one solution that improves performance, is an external SSD. This allows you to load buildings and guns quicker. It also appears to prevent glitches when driving across the map when objects fail to load.

Lots of players now are using SSD’s so you are at a real disadvantage if you do not. For around $50, I highly recommend getting an SSD. Here is a tutorial on how to transfer games to the SSD.

Link to Buy SSD Hard drive

John Deere Gator XUV Battery Mod

Tim 4 Comments

The battery life for the John Deere Gator XUV made by Peg Perego is around 25 minutes. I wanted to see if it was possible to double the battery life. After some research, I decided the best option was to add an additional 12v 12Ah battery in parallel. This would double the battery life without increasing the voltage. Increasing the voltage could damage the motor.

 

Parts Needed