2018 on Camping Coder

Maxing out the Mini Delta 3D printer

Mon, 15 Oct 2018 00:00:00 -0500

It’s been a bit since the last post as we’ve been adventuring a lot lately. We’re getting ready for Halloween by printing out ghost decorations on the Monoprice Mini Delta and we’re maxing out the build volume in the process. Follow along and check out how to get the most out of the little printer.

With Halloween around the corner, I was feeling a little behind the curve when it came to all the cool stuff that I could print out for the holiday found on Thingiverse. I looked at dozens of spooky items, but kept coming back to the same will it be big enough thought. This is mainly because the Mini Delta can only print 110mm (4.33") in diameter, but I typically only go to 90mm (3.54") just so I have a little give. About the time I was going to give up the search I found it - a PacMan Ghost Lantern!

Scaling woes with 3D Printing

Wed, 11 Jul 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Overall

If you’ve been following along with the 3D printing series you’ll know that it’s fairly easy to use a Chromebook to print to your 3D printer using an AstroBox Gateway Raspberry Pi 3 Kit. For a while now it’s been perfect while learning the ropes of 3D printing, but now I’ve moved into an area where I want pre-existing parts to integrate into my projects and that’s where the problem is. With the current setup of a Monoprice Mini Delta and the Astrobox there is no easy way to adjust for your machine’s particulars. Follow along to see how I’ve mitigated the issue for myself and you can leverage the same solution too!

3D Printing with Astroprint

Wed, 27 Jun 2018 00:00:00 -0500

If you read any of the other posts in the 3D printing series you’ll know that after reading The MagPi issue 69 I think that the itch of 3D printing had solidly re-emerged in me. Additionally, if you’ve looked around Camping Coder you’ll also know that I’m a huge fan of Chromebooks in general. That’s where the AstroBox Gateway Raspberry Pi 3 Kit comes into play. It’s an awesome little tool which will allow you to easily print to your Monoprice Mini Delta from your Chromebook.

Installing an Atwood Air Command on a Trail Manor

Wed, 13 Jun 2018 05:00:00 +0000

Based on the post silence is not golden where our air conditioner failed after a few seasons, we swap another air conditioner out at about the same age - this time on a TrailManor. Follow along with the replacement to see how it turned out!

Note

We covered many of the reasons that we like the Atwood Air Command unit in the Installing Atwood Air Command write-up, so we won’t rehash those here. We’ll keep this article mainly to what is needed when swapping out the air conditioner on a TrailManor.

Monoprice Mini Delta

Wed, 06 Jun 2018 00:00:00 -0500

After reading The MagPi issue 69 I think that the itch of 3D printing had solidly re-emerged in me. About five years ago, I was very close to building one from scratch, but cost really kept me away. In the issue, MagPi shows off a $100 kit printer, and lets face it - for $100 you really can’t go wrong.

Like any good nerd I started learning everything that I could about that one. Two of the major barriers were that it was on a multi month back order, which I really don’t have patience for and the other was the eight plus hour build time - between all of the other things in this season of life there really isn’t eight hours to build a printer to be had.

3D Printing from a Chromebook

Wed, 30 May 2018 00:00:00 -0500

If you’ve been following us for any length of time you probably already noticed that we huge fans of Chrome OS. With that there are often issues that need to be worked around or dealt with when working with a highly secured OS, with a semi limited app ecosystem. One of them is that you cannot simply go install an application to run your 3D printer. With restrictions though sometimes better more innovative processes can flourish. Follow along with us as we show you how we got into 3D printing for only a few hundred dollars and a Chromebook!

Trailer Batteries 101

Wed, 23 May 2018 01:00:00 -0500

One of the hidden things that no one really talks about - mainly because it’s more of a ‘have to do’ is camper batteries. They are definattly not exciting, but they are needed to keep you’re trailer functioning the way it was designed. We’ll cover what the gibberish numbers mean on this post and how to pick up a replacment.

The 800 pound gorrilla

No, I’m not talking about the weight of the battery in your rig, I’m talking about all the information out there that says to upgrade here or there. Don’t get me wrong, I like to upgrade things, but it’s only when it makes sense. That means being honest with yourself on how your going to use you camper.

Hugo and droppy, Chromebook friends

Wed, 16 May 2018 00:00:00 -0500

droppy logo

If you read the post on Hugo + gulp = Chromebook awesomeness then you know that there are a lot of steps in it, and a lot of parts moving to make the solution work. While it does meet the need I noticed that it’s a little much for daily use. That’s really where droppy comes into the picture. It runs on Raspberry Pi’s, so its light weight, and has a great interface - best of all it has a code editor built right in!

Wekiwa Springs State Park Camping Spring 2018 update

Wed, 09 May 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Wekiwa Springs State Park
Address	1800 Wekiwa Cir, Apopka, FL 32712
Overall	4.2
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

Hugo + SHH - gulp = a new workflow

Thu, 03 May 2018 00:00:00 -0500

If you ready the post on Hugo + gulp = Chromebook awesomeness you’ll know that I’ve been adjusting my workflow to get Hugo to live reload on Chrome OS. While that solution worked okay, there were a few issues with it.

First off, the process required that a gulp task be setup to sync the files with the Termux. This isn’t a big deal, but as a project grows there’s more to sync, which causes the process to slow down. Additionally, it stores a duplicate of the files, which digs into the precious limited space on many Chromebooks.

Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park camping and star gazing

Tue, 01 May 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park
Address	33104 NW 192nd Ave, Okeechobee, FL 34972
Overall	2.6
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

git stash and pop

Thu, 26 Apr 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Sometimes you’re in such a rush to write code that you forget to switch branches and only realize later that oops… wrong branch! What do you do then? Some might even be tempted to copy their code elsewhere, switch branches and then copy it back. Well, there’s a better, more graceful way called stash and pop that comes into play. Not only do they give you a way to temporarily store your code on a branch, but they let you move it to other branches as well.

Sebastian Inlet State Park almost beach camping

Tue, 17 Apr 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Sebastian Inlet State Park
Address	9700 South Highway A1A, Melbourne Beach, FL 32951
Overall	2.6
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

Adding search to Hugo with elasticlunr

Thu, 12 Apr 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Well, it finally happened. Shortly after our 50th post, we realized without using google or in current post links it was becoming harder to find articles that had been written in the past. It’s not a secret that we use Hugo, and it is a great platform for static sites, just not for search. After searching on search for Hugo we’ve finally implemented a solution that works for us without the need for outside services.

Hanging out at Lake Kissimmee State Park

Tue, 10 Apr 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Lake Kissimmee State Park
Address	14248 Camp Mack Rd., Lake Wales, FL 33898
Overall	3.2
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

How to use git flow

Thu, 05 Apr 2018 00:00:00 -0500

git flow is among one of my favorite ways to teach git, and frankly one of my favorite ways to use git. It’s a pattern to follow and one of the best parts about git flow is that it makes automation on top of git very simple. Additionally, most of the graphical user interfaces already have it built in, so you can’t lose.

What is it really?

git flow is nothing except a git branching model. If you already read git branches simply explained and git Merges Demystified in our git series, then you have all the tools needed to start using git flow. Initially published by Vincent Driessen, the git flow model has been a welcomed pattern for git branching and from there the tie ins to it have been just flowing.

Post Number 50

Tue, 03 Apr 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Camping Coder Logo

It’s hard to believe that this is the 50th post on Camping Coder. Over the last few months, there has been an awful lot of rapid learning involved. Much of it caused by just not knowing, or at least thinking about certain things.

Our top 5 unknowns

While not the hottest topic in the world here are the top five things that were not expected when starting this blog.

Themeing gisty

Thu, 29 Mar 2018 00:00:00 -0500

gisty logo

Refactoring gisty~

When I initially wrote gisty~ it was a quickly put together application, and I even waited a bit to promote the application. Not to say that it was bad, but function was its primary goal. Ascetics was fairly low on the priority list at the time. At that time, it was all about the GitHub Application programming interface (API) calls to accurately pull the data needed, and to do it the same every time. Now six months later after using the application, some much needed attention has been given to the user interface (UI).

Long Point Park - Camping on the Indian River

Tue, 27 Mar 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Long Point Park
Address	700 Long Point Rd, Melbourne Beach, FL 32951
Overall	2.8
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

Running Tmux for Termux on a Chromebook

Thu, 22 Mar 2018 00:00:00 -0500

It’s the little things that make writing code much more enjoyable. While I have been extremely happy since resetting my Chromebook back to stock, since I can run all the applications that I need - I really wanted multi window for Termux. While Chrome OS will not let you run multiple copies of Termux there is an application called tmux which will allow you to split up the one window into many regions.

Silver Springs State Park Camping review

Tue, 20 Mar 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Silver Springs State Park
Address	1425 NE 58th Ave, Ocala, FL 34470
Overall	4
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

Scheduling code deployment with Bitbucket

Thu, 15 Mar 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Having a deployment pipeline is an awesome thing, it eliminates the mundane task of deploying changes. Really let’s face it, if a task is boring or mundane, then there’s likely a chance where a mistake could happen. Sometime though there’s a need to re-deploy, or at least deploy code at a certain time, and that’s where an overlooked feature in Bitbucket pipeline comes in which is simply called Schedules.

Schedule button

Celebrating one year on Pi Day

Wed, 14 Mar 2018 00:00:00 -0500

The Jupiter 67 company turns one year old today - yea! Being the nerds we are, we incorporated on March 14, 2017. It started with Jupiter67 Company being the main company name. My Job Maps came at the same time and is an application that Dan is creating for small service businesses to track their customers. Shraderland Designs was then created and is Jessie’s decal business through Etsy. Camping Coder is the camping blog that Dan writes (and Jessie proofreads) that is part camping journal, part tech blog, and part customer review. Gisty is a gist manager - think Evernote for code - that was created by Dan after his gist manager couldn’t provide everything he needed.

Serverless dynamic content with Hugo and JavaScript

Thu, 08 Mar 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Wow that’s a $10 title, but it’s really the goal of this post - to show you how you can use Hugo and still retain all of the JavaScript goodies for dynamic content. For those who don’t know, in general for dynamic content you will typically require having a server with a database somewhere which allows you to request data. With Hugo there is no database, or place to pull the content, at least at first glance.

Camping at Lake Louisa State Park

Tue, 06 Mar 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Lake Louisa State Park
Address	7305 U.S. Highway 27, Clermont, FL 34714
Overall	3.8
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

git Merges Demystified

Thu, 01 Mar 2018 01:00:00 -0500

Last time in our git series, we looked into branching and merging - setting the ground work for how to merge code when your working by yourself. While that is all well and good, the real power is in collaborating with a team. In this post, we discuss the dreaded merge conflict, what they are, and how to resolve them.

Setting the stage

To explain a merge conflict, it is easier to tell the story of two developers - in out case Dev A and Dev B. They are both awesome developers and always branch from the right branch, check in their code, and write great commit messages. They have both been assigned to different features on our project.

Wekiwa Springs State Park Camping review

Tue, 27 Feb 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Wekiwa Springs State Park
Address	1800 Wekiwa Cir, Apopka, FL 32712
Overall	4.2
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

git branches simply explained

Thu, 22 Feb 2018 01:00:00 -0500

So far in our git series, we’ve taken a look at all the steps needed to start using git to track and store your code. We haven’t looked into one of the most powerful parts of git which is branches. Branches solves the problem where you might be working on X at the moment, but Y needs attention now. Branches additionally help when working with other people on projects. For example, when I first started writing code this seemed so easy and my steps usually included something like:

Lowepro camera backpack review

Tue, 20 Feb 2018 01:00:00 +0000

Ratings
Link to product
Would we buy it again?	Yes
Value	High
Ease of use	Easy

For a while now we have been struggling with how to carry all of the kid-o’s stuff and all of the camera gear. It’s a funny thing, before kids we simply would leave the camera out and about or toss it in a simple backpack. That really does not work in the post-kid world, and keeping a nice camera in a bag that does not protect it is not the best idea either.

Hugo + gulp = Chromebook awesomeness

Thu, 15 Feb 2018 00:00:00 -0500

One of my favorite things about writing code is that you can learn or fail fast - typically the failures teach you a lot more too. The quick iterations really are fun and when they make your day just an increment better, you get a sense of accomplishment. If you’ve read my initial running Hugo on a Chromebook post which was followed by the Hugo on 100% stock Chromebook you’ll get a sense of how the little iterations make a difference.

We visit Jetty Park Campground

Tue, 13 Feb 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Jetty Park
Address	400 Jetty Park Rd, Cape Canaveral, FL 32920
Overall	4.2
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

Applying and removing vinyl

Fri, 09 Feb 2018 00:00:00 -0500

Florida Adventure Tracker

Tools you’ll need

Scraper - I like this one, but any will do
Dawn or Ajax to remove any wax
Painters tape - about one foot

Applying the decal

Applying the Adventure Trackers decals is a fairly easy thing to do. First, make sure to use Dawn or Ajax to clean off the surface (if it’s the outside of your camper!) to remove any wax or other sealant. I also use alcohol to ensure the surface is free of any contaminants that could prevent the decal from adhering.

Texas Adventure Tracker

Tue, 06 Feb 2018 01:00:00 -0500

Texas… Why do you have so many counties!? It can take over 14 hours to drive from one side to the other, so there is definitely a lot to see in your state, but 254 counties are a lot!

The no hook up sites

Fun facts

Smallest County by size: Rockwall County
Biggest County by size: Brewster County (over 3 times the size of Delaware!)
Interesting name(s): Coke, Deaf Smith, Love, Real, and Tom Green Counties

As you may have read in the article introducing Shraderland Designs, this all started out when Dan and I wanted to track our adventures around Florida on a county basis since we never left the state. I spoke with a local vinyl shop and after getting a quote of nearly $300 for just one decal (not including design time), I taught myself how to create one!

Resetting My Chromebook Back to Stock

Mon, 29 Jan 2018 00:00:00 -0500

With all the news coverage of the Meltdown, Spectre and whatever name exploits in the media, when I received the chance to upgrade to the newest version of Chrome OS, I jumped on it. This particular version for my ThinkPad Chromebook also included a firmware upgrade, which to me meant something new - I have not seen a firmware update in Chrome OS until then. The downside of the update is that it required a ‘Power wash’ of Chrome OS, essentially resetting the machine back to stock. I thought about it for a little and decided to take it a step further and take the machine out of developer mode and see if with Android apps if I could mitigate the need for the elevated permissions on Chrome OS.

In between trees at Tomoka State Park

Wed, 24 Jan 2018 05:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Tomoka State Park
Address	2099 N Beach St, Ormond Beach, FL 32174
Overall	3.4
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

Introducing gisty

Fri, 19 Jan 2018 00:00:00 -0500

gisty logo

Over the years I’ve come to save snippets of code that solve my problems from my projects or the various places on the internet. Doing so has allowed me to be able to quickly reference a block of code from months or years ago. Not only does this save me time, but allows me to continuously update how I’m writing code and apply best practices in a consistent manner.

Cypress Campground our Legoland go to

Tue, 16 Jan 2018 05:00:00 -0500

Ratings how do these work?

Name	Cypress Campground
Address	7400 Cypress Gardens Blvd, Winter Haven, FL 33884
Overall	4.4
Bug
Amenities
Staff
Cleanliness
Surroundings

Regional location

Automated code deployment with Bitbucket and Docker

Thu, 11 Jan 2018 00:00:00 -0500

You’ve probably heard of Docker, but don’t have the time needed to learn or implement it - you probably also want to start automating your builds, because who likes to deploy code? In this post, we’ll cover using Docker to deploy code using Bitbucket Pipelines. It will be high level on what docker is and enough to either use someone else’s Docker image or build your own - without needing to install Docker on your machine. We will then use that image to deploy our projects source code using Bitbucket Pipelines.

Atwood Air Command

Tue, 09 Jan 2018 05:00:00 +0000

Ratings
Link to product
Would we buy it again?	Yes
Value	High
Ease of use	Easy

If you read our silence is not golden post then you’ll already know that we replaced our Coleman Mach 8 with an Atwood Air Command in the Fall of 2017. This post is to review the major standing out points of the swap and to review the Atwood Air Command after four months of usage. We won’t do a step by step on the installation, as that would be even drier than talking about different coding frameworks.

What's a remote in git

Thu, 04 Jan 2018 00:00:00 -0500

git logo

In the last installment of the Learning git series we took a look at how to start using git to version code. Now that we know how to commit our code, we need to know how to share it, or at least back it up. This is where the remote command comes into play with git.

In general, a remote is literally a remote from your current machine. You can set it up a few different ways, but I’ll cover the central repository pattern here. With that pattern you can think of a remote as just a big cloud data store -it’s more than that, but let’s move on for now.

Silence is not golden

Tue, 02 Jan 2018 00:00:00 -0500

One our last trip to Blue Springs State Park we came back to our camper from tubing in the spring to silence. Normally this is a welcome sound, with two kids under four it’s not even something that we are accustomed to. In this case it was not golden - our air conditioner had died.

Typically, we can recover from minor failures like our experience at Oscar Scherer where the electrical input to the camper had issues. With air conditioning however, it is almost never a minor failure, especially since they are typically a ‘closed’ system. Nevertheless, we went through the typical recovery steps. Cycle the breaker, wait a few minutes, listen and then an amazing loud thud thud thud screech - at that moment we knew that this trip was over.