Richi's blog

A blog about personal projects and experiences

  • Visiting the doctor after 20 years

    My wive usually rolls her eyes, when I tell her: “No, I don’t need that medicine. My immune system can cope with that, and needs to be trained.” or “No, I don’t need that painkiller as long as the headache is not overwhelming. My body reminds me that I should not shake my head too […]

  • electrum server on a cubox

    I don’t even remember if there were alternative wallets available when I started with BitCoin. I used the reference implementation exclusively for a long time. Now there is a wide variety to choose from. They fall in three main categories: full node, light client and web wallets. They are nicely listed and explained at bitcoin.org full node Every […]

  • Hello Kitty

    Since she was a kid, my wive dreamt of having a pet, preferably a cat. Our kids also said they would love to have a cat or a bunny or a turtle or… I grew up with animals. We had cats and dogs and sheep and goats and chicken and once even a pig. We […]

  • HW1 tiny BitCoin hardware wallet

    While the trezor is certainly a great device for securing BitCoins, I’m also interested in alternative hardware wallets. Even in my very first discussions about increasing the scurity of BitCoin we talked about SmartCard solutions. After all, that’s also how I secure my GPG keys. But a regular SmartCard alone only protects the keys. If […]

  • What could go wrong when ordering pizza?

    For some months now it was possible to order pizza for BitCoin in our area. I wanted to give it a try since it was announced. But only last Thursday, I proposed to my coworkers to order pizza. And that I would pay with BitCoin. It was meant as a demonstration how cool the virtual […]

  • Paracuda walk & fly

    In the Paracuda paragliding club, we distribute the organization of the events among the members. So I agreed to organize a “walk n fly” event in October. Usually pilots go up with a cablecar to go flying. This saves us from having to carry the equipment for too far. But for people that want to […]

  • The Rise and Rise of BitCoin

    As part of the Zürich Film Festival last week, they presented “The Rise and Rise of Bitcoin“. I couldn’t make it to one of the screenings where the director and the main actor were present. The room was fully booked, which I noticed with delight. I didn’t learn too much from the film on the […]

  • Presentations with code that actually works

    I don’t do presentations that often these days. And if I do, more often than not, they contain some form of source code. With most things you write, you refine it over and over. This is especially true with stuff that you present. Applied to code snippets, that can mean you test it initially, but […]

  • The phone book of the internet age

    When I was a kid, the main means of communication with remote friends was using telephones. If I didn’t know the phone number of their parents, I looked them up in the phone book. The phone books also contained the postal address. So if I wanted to send a letter or a packet, I could […]

  • Trezor BitCoin HardwareWallet

    Today I received my Trezor BitCoin HardwareWallet. When I ordered it in June 2013, the expected delivery Date was October. But as it happens all that often with BitCoin related hardware, the dates get pushed back. They offered a device with plastic case for XBT 1 and one with an alloy case for XBT 3. […]