will

Where there is a Will

Will McGugan's Blog

I am a freelance software engineer living in Edinburgh.

I post mostly about tech (particularly Python) and photography.

Background: A code monkey

Nov 25, 2015
in Tech

Using a Raspberry Pi + Camera to Monitor the Nocturnal Activities of Tropical Insects

Raspberry Pis are useful little computers. I own several, since I work with them in my day job, and I thought it was about time I put one to use.

I also happen to keep tropical insects. Specifically, beetles. These are not your garden variety beetles, unless you happen to live in a rain forest. The ones I have at the moment are elephant beetles which come from Central and South America. Here's a photo:

Male elephant beetle. Banana for scale.

These insects are mostly nocturnal. During the day they tend to burrow under their bedding material (moss), or hang out on a branch. But during the night, they can be quite active. I know this because in the morning they have re-arranged the branches in their tank. continue reading…

Nov 23, 2015
in Tech

Moya Template Language

Moya's template language is a spiritual successor to Django, and Jinja templates. It borrows a number of constructs from both, and adds a few of its own.

There is a slight difference in the syntax in that variables are substituted with ${variable} rather than {{ variable }}, but tags still use the familiar {% tag %} syntax.

Template languages are generally quite extensible, so there is probably nothing that Moya templates can do that Django / Jinja can't (via a plugin or extension), but there are a few things which are I think are more elegant in Moya's templates language (and built-in). I'm going to talk about a few of them in this post.

How often have you written code like this? continue reading…

Nov 20, 2015
in Tech

Deploy Encrypted Notes 1.0.0 to Heroku

A few weeks ago I built a little web application to store notes, which encrypts your notes in the browser and stores them in the cloud (yeah, I hate that term). The idea was that even if the server was compromised, nobody could read the notes without a password.

From the server logs it looks like a few people at least are actively using it, even though there is a big warning saying it is for testing only. No idea for what of course, because even in the admin all I can see is a string of random characters.

This is how notes are stored in the database.

I've jumped straight to version 1.0.0 with the latest release, since it has been running quite happily for quite some time with no issues. It's still 'use at your own risk', but it is such a simple application that there is so little to go wrong. continue reading…

Nov 20, 2015
in Tech

Deploy Moya Techblog with Heroku

A quick way to get Moya Techblog up and running (or just to test it) is to deploy it with Heroku.

If you click the following button, it will deploy Techblog on a public server:

When that's done you should have a working version of this site (sans my content obviously). It's remarkably easy to customize if you aren't happy with my coder design skills.

There is one caveat you should be aware of; Heroku has an ephemeral filesystem, which basically means that your uploaded files will disappear after a while. That is bit of a deal-breaker for a site designed for photography, but there is a solution. You can host your uploads with Amazon S3.

To use Amazon S3 with Techblog, set the following environment variables (you will have a chance to edit these when you deploy): continue reading…

Nov 19, 2015
in Tech

Introducing Moya Techblog, a Blogging Engine for Coders and Photographers

I've had a blog on my vanity domain for nearly a decade now. For the last 6 years, it has been powered by Django Techblog, which I wrote out of my frustration with syntax highlighting plugins in Wordpress. Techblog has happily served my blog those 6 years, with only minor hiccups when I half-heartedly ported the code to the latest Django.

There was nothing terribly wrong with Django Techblog; it had multiple blogs, tags, search etc., but there were some annoyances that I didn't have the motivation to do much about. The custom markup system I used was clever, but I would often forget the syntax! The support for images was rudimentary and the single-threaded comment system wouldn't notify me of replies. continue reading…

Nov 16, 2015
in Tech

Looking for an experienced Python Developer

My client, WildFoundry, is looking for an experienced Python developer to join us. We work in the field of IoT, and you will get to work with a variety of really cool technologies. Here's the job description:

WildFoundry is seeking a senior Python web application developer on a 8 month contract to help us in the development of the dataplicity Internet-of-Things platform (dataplicity.com). You would be expected to work from your home or own office most of the time and very high quality candidates based in Slovakia, Poland and the United Kingdom will be considered.

This is an unbeatable opportunity to work from home, earn excellent rates and join in with fast growing projects. continue reading…

Nov 8, 2015
in Photography

Photographing Wild Bears in Finland

This year I spent my birthday in a Forest in Finland with no company other than about dozen (wild)! Eurasian brown bears and more mosquitoes that I care to count.

I stayed at Martinselkosen wilderness centre, in the North of the country. Comfortable enough, plenty of rustic food, and surprisingly decent coffee.

After a night in the Wilderness centre we were to stay in the Forest hide, which is regularly visited by a dozen or so bears and cubs. On the way to the hide, one of the other photographers suggested that my 500mm lens was too long. She was right, the large communal hide was directly in front of a clearing where food was left to attract the bears . At times the bears were so close all I could shoot was a patch of blurry fur. continue reading…

Jun 28, 2015
in Tech

Build a database driven Markdown Wiki in 25 lines of code

This screencast demonstrates how to build a database driven, Markdown powered wiki from scratch in around 25 lines of code. Lines of code is of course a poor metric, but I think the end result of part 1 (more planned) packs quite a lot of functionality for what is very simple and readable code. I'll be building on this code in future screencasts, to create something which is more feature complete.

I found creating this to be a challenge; thinking, typing and talking is about 50% more things than I can do at once! Hopefully I'll master it as I go.

For more information on Moya, please see www.moyaproject.com.

Jun 14, 2015
in Tech

Moya 0.5.14 released

Today I released v0.5.14 of Moya, my no-Python Python web framework.

The no-Python probably needs some explaining… Moya is written in Python, and can be extended in Python, but runs web applications written in an interpreted language called Moya code (name is uninspired, I know).

This release was primarily driven by development of Bean Counter, a web app that manages virtual currency. Essentially it's online banking for internet based ‘money’, intended for use as a community currency.

In tandem with this release I've also added a couple of re-usable libraries which, I think, add a significant amount of value to Moya. The first is Moya Logins which creates OAuth Sign In buttons, i.e. Sign In with Google etc. The second is Moya Auto, which adds AJAX powered auto-completion to form inputs. continue reading…

Apr 12, 2015
in Tech

Fuzzy Matching video on Webucator

Nat Dunn of Webucator has created the following video based on my post about Sublime Text Fuzzy Matching with Javascript:

There's a lot more interesting content on his Webucator channel. I recommend checking it out!