The working from home thread: tips and advice

I was reminded of the need for diversity in tech and software development today when a BAME colleague on a 25+ attendee Zoom briefing tried to use the digital background function and it blanked him out instead and he spend the entire meeting looking like the fucking Predator in a conservatory.

Thought I'd posted about this at the time, but Scan were doing a daily deal on the Logitech K270 wireless keyboard mouse combo for ~£20.

Brief review... if you can get it for <£20 posted it's a passable option for a cheap wireless keyboard and mouse, but I wouldn't recommend it/pay more.

-ive: feels cheap
-ive: elongated shape of the menu / app key ( ≣ ) means it gets bumped
-ive: some how feels small to type despite not being that small
-ive: bit noisy

+ive: is cheap
+ive: elongated shape of the menu key meant I discovered it
+ive: fairly compact
+ive: key stroke is pretty comfortable for a cheap keyboard
+ive: useful shortcut keys without overdoing it

Will still pick up something better at some point, but it's a useful thing to have and moves me back to a desktop work position.

Also picked up one of these to eventually replace my pads and MDF blocks. Given that it's a non-urgent item I thought I'd save the Amazon markup and source from China.

My work laptop has given up, IT services aren't responding, my home PC won't connect to the internet and I don't reaaally want to have to put in the time to set it up for work anyway. Such a ballache.

I’ve got a call this afternoon about June furlough. Assume they’ll extend me past the initial 31 May deadline, but don’t know until the call.
Sport is starting to slowly return, could be surprised and they say I’m back working in June. In my head I’m out until end of June.

eeesh, well my work laptop (HP) has started running the battery down while connected to AC and then announcing it has to shutdown immediately - at the moment, restarting lets it charge again, but I have no idea how many ‘goes’ I get before it becomes an expensive/useless brick. Keeps Excel interesting at least : /

My laptop screen died earlier this month. I got in touch with IT, emphasised that my work involves a piece of software that is not compatible with a small screen, that in an ideal world I would have two screens, that I didn't have space to house an external monitor, and please just something with a large screen otherwise I can't do my job properly. Please.

They sent me a laptop with a 13" screen.

IT support is non-existent for my broken laptop it seems, so have been spending a load of time moving my dev and writing environments across to my home pc, different OS. It's been such a headache. Normal productivity is expected of course, and I've done effectively nothing meaningful for a week.
Can't wait to handle all my filenames with colons etc in them.

What OS allows you to name a file using a colon? I recall ‘Classic’ Mac OS used it for (ummmm directory changing?), and it’s verboten in Windows. Haven’t tried it in Mac OS X because why would you do that? : )

I was on ubuntu for work, files saved with a timestamp, riddled with stupid characters. Never thought I'd be forced onto windows, oops!

Ugh. I need a micro-HDMI to HDMI cable very fast - anywhere know if there is anywhere open in inner London that I can cycle to and pick up one of these?

Haha. Whoa. Yes. Good luck : )

Argos have them. They do some thing that if you order before 1pm you can collect from a Sainsburys after 4pm.

Otherwise my guess would be try and get lucky at one of those food store/poundshop/mobile phone places that are scattered around.

Thank you

I've got the same, particularly screenshots. Found there was absolutely no way to move/remove them except booting off a live USB

live USB

Mm this is my plan after having no luck with cygwin

I find it amusing that your external keyboard appears to be smaller than your laptop keyboard.

That's the strangest office I've seen for some time. Well done :)

I've got child-proof edge padding on my desk, because I'm a frickin' child. No because I smash my knees into it constantly and then throw it across the room and couldn't afford to continually replace the monitors I broke. Comes in different coloured self-adhesive strips.

My external keyboard works. My MacBook Pro kybrd ds nt.

Yeah, just looks weird to me. I have big hands so laptop keyboards are usually annoying bastards so I'll always throw a full size one at them if I can. Plus I smash fuck out of mine and they're cheaper than laptop keyboard swaps :)

Microsoft whiteboard - it's an easy add on to Teams meetings, but can you add it to Teams chats?

I seem to have moved to the spare bedroom for the work day, it's the most significant use of the room in it's current configuration that it has seen (it was previously my workshop when I was buggering about with the flat). I'm quite enjoying it, and James the cat comes and joins me whilst I work.

Having a separate room to work in is definitely a bonus. It makes it feel like the end of the day when you change room and means you don't have to unplug everything and move.

Unfortunately there are two of us and only one spare room ...

AliExpress version of this NULAXY Laptop Stand:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07P6X63SD/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_i_e9M0Eb6389D11

arrived after £12 customs (well £8 handling and £4 customs).

It's good.

Exactly what you expect.

Going to buy another one, so we have one each.

Probably quicker to just buy from Amazon rather given that after customs the $25 + £12 isn't that much cheaper and took longer.