Dan Q

Month: April 2019

Enable Private DNS with 1.1.1.1 on Android 9 Pie

This is a repost promoting content originally published elsewhere. See more things Dan's reposted.

Recently, Google officially launched Android 9 Pie, which includes a slew of new features around digital well-being, security, and privacy. If you’ve poked around the network settings on your phone while on the beta or after updating, you may have noticed a new Private DNS Mode now supported by Android.

This new feature simplifies the process of configuring a custom secure DNS resolver on Android, meaning parties between your device and the websites you visit won’t be able to snoop on your DNS queries because they’ll be encrypted. The protocol behind this, TLS, is also responsible for the green lock icon you see in your address bar when visiting websites over HTTPS. The same technology is useful for encrypting DNS queries, ensuring they cannot be tampered with and are unintelligible to ISPs, mobile carriers, and any others in the network path between you and your DNS resolver. These new security protocols are called DNS over HTTPS, and DNS over TLS.

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Bad: Android Pie makes it harder (than previous versions) to set a custom DNS server on a cellular data connection.

Good: Android Pie supports DNS-over-TLS, so that’s nice.

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Word Ladder Solver

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It’s likely that the first word ladder puzzles were created by none other than Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), the talented British mathematician, and author of the Alice’s adventures. According to Carroll, he invented them on Christmas Day in 1877.

A word ladder puzzle consists of two end-cap words, and the goal is to derive a series of chain words that change one word to the other. At each stage, adjacent words on the ladder differ by the substitution of just one letter. Each chain word (or rung of the word ladder), also needs to be a valid word. Below is an example of turning TABLE into CROWN (this time, in nine steps):

TABLE → CABLE → CARLE → CARLS → CARPS → CORPS → COOPS → CROPS → CROWS → CROWN

In another example, it take four steps to turn WARM into COLD.

WARM → WARD → CARD → CORD → COLD

(As each letter of the two words in the last example is different, this is the minimum possible number of moves; each move changes one of the letters).

Word ladders are also sometimes referred to as doublets, word-links, paragrams, laddergrams or word golf.

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Nice one! Nick Berry does something I’ve often considered doing but never found the time by “solving” word ladders and finding longer chains than might have ever been identified before.

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Non Stop Hammer Ti.me

You know how sometimes I make a thing and, in hindsight, it doesn’t make much sense? And at best, all it can be said to do is to make the Internet more fun and weird?

Hammer Logo

I give you: NonStopHammerTi.me.

Things that make it awesome:

  • Well, the obvious.
  • Vanilla Javascript.
  • CSS animations timed to every-other-beat.
  • Using an SVG stroke-dasharray as a progress bar.
  • Progressively-enhanced; in the worst case you just get to download the audio.
  • PWA-enhanced; install it to your mobile!
  • Open source!
  • Decentralised (available via the peer-web at dat://nonstophammerti.me/ / dat://0a4a8a..00/)
  • Accessible to screen readers, keyboard navigators, partially-sighted users, just about anybody.
  • Compatible with digital signage at my workplace…
Digital signage showing NonStopHammerTi.me
My office aren’t sick of this… yet.

That is all.

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The British-Irish Dialect Quiz

This is a repost promoting content originally published elsewhere. See more things Dan's reposted.

What is your name for the playground game in which one child chases the rest and anyone who is touched becomes the pursuer?

Pretty accurate for me, although my answers to some of the questions – representing the diversity of places around Great Britain that I’ve lived and some of the words I’ve picked up along the way – clearly threw it off from time to time!

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Review of Exeter Gardens

This review of Exeter Gardens originally appeared on Google Maps. See more reviews by Dan.

Exeter Gardens, 37A Oxford Rd, Kidlington OX5 2BP, United Kingdom.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐

Moderately well-tended but short walk between Oxford Road and Exeter Park, squeezed between Exeter Hall and The Key doctors practice. Nice decking and benches, but otherwise nothing to recommend it except as a route to the park itself.

Review of Grovelands Play Area

This review of Grovelands Play Area originally appeared on Google Maps. See more reviews by Dan.

Grovelands Play Area, Kidlington OX5 1AZ, United Kingdom.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐

Small play area with the bare essentials for keeping a small child distracted: swingset, roundabout, small climbing frame with slide. All metal equipment, so gets cold in the winter! Might as well make the extra walk to nearby Exeter Park!

Review of Exeter Park Play Area

This review of Exeter Park Play Area originally appeared on Google Maps. See more reviews by Dan.

Exeter Park Play Area, Exeter Close, Kidlington OX5 1AB, United Kingdom.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Since the 2018 renovation of the play area and the surrounding park, this has gone from being a good to a great place to take small children. Play equipment includes a well-equipped sandpit, multiple climbing frames with monkey bars, firemans poles, and slides, “little ones” area with miniscule frames, musical instruments, see-saw, swings of various kinds including a large tyre swing, rope climbing frames, and a “racing” pair of ziplines. Exercise equipment is also available nearby, as are plenty of benches including picnic benches and a reasonable-sized (free) car park.

Review of Exeter Recreational Ground

This review of Exeter Recreational Ground originally appeared on Google Maps. See more reviews by Dan.

Exeter Recreational Ground, 2 Yarnton Ct, Kidlington OX5 1AU, United Kingdom.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Excellent, conveniently central play area for Kidlington. Renovated in 2018 with new play and exercise equipment including trampolines, not one but two ziplines, and a wonderfully imaginatively-imagined sandpit, it’s equipped to keep little ones entertained for hours. There’s also a large field for sports/dog-walking, a community space, and an adequate amount of (free) car parking.

Review of Grovelands Superstore Handy Stores

This review of Grovelands Superstore Handy Stores originally appeared on Google Maps. See more reviews by Dan.

Grovelands Superstore Handy Stores, 49 Bellenger Way, Kidlington OX5 1TR, United Kingdom.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

A surprisingly wide selection of goods available at just about any time you might need it, served by friendly staff. Plenty of parking if coming by car, conveniently just off the main road through Grovelands estate.