A big chunk of my work time in recent weeks has been going into getting Netdata set up to monitor our server fleet. Where we already have it in place, it’s an amazing help in investigating resources issues and bottlenecks. I’m looking forward to getting alerts about issues that might occur soon. Well, I don’t look forward to getting alerts, but I’d rather be alerted about risks when they’re building up than when they already hit. And that’s what Netdata is going to make possible by extrapolating historic data.
I’ve finally managed to make the continuous integration process for our Chef cookbooks reliable by switching from Docker to VirtualBox. Before, we tried to run our tests in Docker, and that failed far too many times because of issues with iptables, systemd and similar system-level components. To be precise, we still use the Gitlab runner for Docker, but I’ve built a custom Docker image that allows test-kitchen to use VirtualBox VMs just like our development machines.
The Windows laptop that replaced my iMac works beautifully for both work and gaming but is far too heavy to lug around except for longer vacations. That’s why I got myself a lightweight companion in the Schenker VISION 14. I wanted to run it with Linux but was disappointed that that’s only possible with firmware that TUXEDO Computers keeps for themselves. I installed the Windows 11 beta instead and was again pleasantly surprised.
Despite, or maybe because of, all these accomplishments, I felt quite drained from Wednesday on. That’s why I skipped my live streams on Wednesday and Friday. I was able to recover nicely over the weekend, so I’m going to do my work in the public later today again.