A weblog by ldstephens.
August 15, 2026 Since I moved my email back to Gmail , I’m letting my Fastmail subscription expire at the end of the month. I still get a few emails trickling in from various places to my @ldstephens.com address, so I wanted a way to make sure I don’t miss anything potentially important. I decided to use Cloudflare’s free Email Routing service. I left the domain registered at Hover but moved its…
August 12, 2026 I saw this in my RSS feed this week. It caught my attention, so I wanted to learn more about it. Embedded watermarks in text When a supported Claude model generates text, it weaves an imperceptible watermark directly into the text itself. You won’t see it, and it doesn’t change the meaning, quality, or readability of Claude’s response. Because the watermark is part of the text, it…
August 10, 2026 Brandon shared a link to "The Guy at Wawa" story yesterday. I really enjoyed it so I thought I would share it with you all. The Guy at the Wawa After reading the story, I visited the author’s blog and found a few other stories to read. I enjoyed the ones about McDonald’s, too.
August 3, 2026 I watched a video yesterday about moving from third-party productivity apps to Apple's built-in Notes and Reminders, getting ready for Siri AI. The reasoning: Siri AI is going to work best when it's pulling from Apple's own apps, not third-party ones. I'm not running any open-weight LLMs locally, so when Siri AI ships in OS 27, that's what I'll be using — which means it was time to…
August 2, 2026 I spent 20 years in the equipment leasing business, so I have a lot of experience reading and interpreting lease agreements. Here are a couple of things to keep in mind before signing up. First, read the lease agreement carefully. You may even want to have an attorney review it. The most important thing to understand is that you do not own the device . At the end of the initial…
July 24, 2026 Garmin announced this week that it's acquired TrainingPeaks and TrainHeroic. Garmin hasn't said much else. The press release is thin on details, so I've got some thoughts about what this could mean. I started using TrainingPeaks back in 2006, after getting recruited to race on a competitive men's cycling team. My coach at the time was Andy Applegate , a CTS coach who built all my…
July 21, 2026 I've been thinking about this a lot lately: security and privacy are often discussed as if they're the same thing, or at least on the same team. They're not. They represent two distinct concerns, and I've come to believe one must be addressed before the other. Any computer — desktop, laptop, tablet, phone, or otherwise — stores your personal information. Security pertains to whether…
July 17, 2026 I haven't been blogging much lately. Nothing's interesting enough to write about. Every day I open my MacBook and stare at a blank screen, wondering what I'm going to do with myself. I know some part of every day goes to being on the computer — that's just how I roll. I just don't have anything to do with it right now. Last year it was the blog, migrating everything to 11ty. Earlier…
July 9, 2026 Well, that was one hell of a Fourth of July weekend. Friday evening, July 3rd, a thunderstorm blew through and knocked out our power and internet. A tree came down with it and took out the power line and internet line to the house, and blocked the driveway. The morning of the 4th was spent cutting up the downed tree to clear the driveway, plus a large branch that was hung up in the…
June 25, 2026 MacBook Neo ($100 increase) 256GB: $599 to $699 512GB : $699 to $799 […] 13-inch MacBook Air ($200 to $800 increase) 16GB, 512GB: $1,099 to $1,299 32GB, 4TB: $2,699 to $3,499 15-inch MacBook Air ($200 to $800 increase) 16GB, 512GB: $1,299 to $1,499 32GB, 4TB: $2,899 to $3,699 14-inch MacBook Pro ($300 to $2,800 increase) M5, 16GB, 1TB: $1,699 to $1,999 M5 Max, 128GB, 8TB: $6,899 to…
June 24, 2026 Earlier this month, I wrote a post titled " Someone convince me to use Chrome ". Since then, I've been using Chrome as my primary browser. As a result, I've become more mindful of my site's browser analytics. Looking at my Vercel analytics over the last 30 days, one data point that continued to catch my eye is that Chrome is the most popular desktop browser on this site by a wide…
June 21, 2026 I saved a guide called npm: A Free Guide for Beginners to GoodLinks the other day. This morning, I wanted to read it and keep it for future reference, but I realized GoodLinks isn't where I want to store this kind of material. I briefly thought about DEVONthink, but since I uninstalled it recently, it wasn't an option. Instead, I saved it to Bear using the browser extension. It…
June 17, 2026 I got a notice the other day that iA Writer version 8 is out. The new Command Palette caught my eye, and after checking it out, it’s definitely handy. I actually just wrote about how much I use the Command Palette in Drafts . A command palette probably won't be enough to make me switch back to iA Writer full-time, but I'll give it a go for a few days. Custom themes would probably…
June 16, 2026 I’ve been using Drafts for years. It’s the starting point for almost everything I write. Over time, I’ve settled on two specific features that keep me moving fast and out of the menus. My Command Palette setup The Command Palette is a game-changer for my workflow. I hit Cmd+Shift+P (or tap the icon), and a quick-search window pops up. From there, I can run actions, execute commands,…
June 14, 2026 This morning, I read an MPU forum post about Devonthink . I've had Devonthink starting with version 2 and currently have version 3 installed on my MacBook Pro. I don't often think about Devonthink because I never use it. Many folks use it as a document warehouse for its search features, which is how I originally used it. I indexed all my most important folders so that I could easily…
June 12, 2026 For the last couple of weeks I've been testing Chromium-based browsers on my M4 MacBook Pro, thinking I might switch from Safari or at least find a new backup browser. The truth is, I don't have a good reason to leave Safari other than a few minor irritations. Firefox is currently my backup, but it has one drawback: it isn't scriptable. I use several AppleScripts to automate things I…
June 12, 2026 This line resonated with me because I've also found that the best way for me to understand a concept or idea is for me to write about it. Reading only gets me so far. The act of articulating what is stored in my brain into something legible and understandable is thinking and understanding. […] As for writing on my blog, I don't have a schedule or explicit plan, I just write when…
June 10, 2026 Claude is my go-to AI tool. With the Drafts MCP connected, I can drop results directly into my Drafts inbox without copy and paste. One thing I do regularly: have Claude summarize a long conversation, then send it straight to Drafts. From there, a Drafts action moves it to my Notes folder. It's especially useful when I've been vibe coding a script; the summary becomes a handy…
June 5, 2026 I found it interesting to come across two posts in my RSS feed about aging and eye problems the other day. Robert Breen Eleven years ago, just after my fiftieth birthday, I started having trouble reading late in the day. This is common for people of a certain age, but the reason I was struggling wasn’t normal. Instead of a single row of data on a spreadsheet, I saw two, one below the…
June 1, 2026 For my Drafts friends: FlohGro Every other year I get the urge to change the look of Drafts for me a bit. My Catppuccin themes , especially Catppuccin Mocha , were probably the most loved ones for me until now. But once again I wanted a few more options to add into my own mix. In the past I played around with creating my own color palettes but sooner than later this was always kind of…
June 1, 2026 Today I simplified my blog post publishing workflow by building a Drafts action, with help from Claude, that writes posts directly to my 11ty posts folder. The idea was to eliminate the manual steps of saving a file to the desktop, opening it in a text editor, adding front matter, and dragging it to the posts folder. Getting it to work took some trial and error. The Drafts scripting…
May 31, 2026 CNBC Artificial intelligence is turning out to be far more expensive than anyone expected, and CFOs at major U.S. companies are now facing a brutal new trade-off: tokens or humans.
May 27, 2026 I was bored this morning, so with Claude I built a set of shell scripts to export Bear notes to various locations, triggered via Keyboard Maestro. All scripts query Bear's SQLite database directly at: ~/Library/Group Containers/9K33E3U3T4.net.shinyfrog.bear/Application Data/database.sqlite
May 26, 2026 I am aware that my time on Earth is finite. At 81 years old, I don't plan on going anywhere soon, but I recognize that I won't be here forever. Lately I’ve been thinking about making things easier for the people who will eventually have to pick up the pieces after I’m gone. Years ago I moved away from Google services for privacy reasons. Email went to Fastmail. Calendar went to Apple.…
May 18, 2026 Marked 3 is officially out Marked 2 will continue to be available for those who don’t need everything Marked 3 offers. It will always be a one-time purchase, but won’t see a lot of updates, other than to keep it running as new OS versions come out. I’m a very light user of Marked and don’t really need the additional features in Marked 3, so I’m glad to see that Marked 2 will continue…
May 15, 2026 Monday I noticed an itchy spot on my upper back. By Tuesday, there was a hard bump where I’d been scratching it. Wednesday it was still itchy, and because of the bump I had Lisa take a look at it. Turns out it was a tick bite. It also had a red circle around it a little bigger than a quarter. I knew that wasn’t a good sign, so I made a doctor’s appointment. I went this morning and the…
May 14, 2026 The other day I wrote in my notes: I'm contemplating migrating my task manager to the free version of Todoist. I'm speculating that Things 4 may be released soon, and I'm hesitant to pay an upgrade fee for three devices or a subscription if they adopt that model. Additionally, Todoist currently offers more features. Once I started the migration, I looked for a way to export my tasks…
May 12, 2026 I’ve been refining my file-over-app workflow lately. For things like blog posts, daily notes, journal entries, and notes, I prefer working in a markdown text editor. In my case that’s MarkEdit . At the same time, most of the ideas and thoughts that eventually become those things start in Drafts . Of course I could do everything in Drafts, but I’ve realized I don’t actually want to…
May 11, 2026 I installed Hyperduck by Sindre Sorhus on my iPhone and Mac back in February 2023. I don’t think I’ve used it once since then. This morning an update for the iOS app reminded me it was even installed. I had honestly forgotten what it does. Hyperduck is a small utility that sends links from your iPhone or iPad to your Mac, even if your Mac isn’t currently running. Instead of messaging…
May 8, 2026 I keep a monthly journal in Markdown; one file per month, each entry stamped with the date and time. For a while I was creating those files by hand. That got old fast. So I wrote a Python script to handle it and want to share it with you. Each time the script runs, it checks whether a journal file for the current month already exists. If it doesn't, it creates one with a header and the…
April 28, 2026 Today I was working on a blog project collecting a bunch of post links to use in another project. When I need to visit a lot of posts on my blog, I do it through a localhost:8080 version of the site instead of the live one. I run an AppleScript that opens it in Terminal: set projectPath to "/Users/lorenstephens/Documents/GitHub/ldstepweblog" tell application "Terminal" activate do…
April 28, 2026 If you write about Mac keyboard shortcuts, there's a proper order for listing the modifier keys in a shortcut. The proper order is similar to how you see them at the bottom left of your keyboard. Control (⌃), Option (⌥), and Command (⌘) always go in that order. The oddball is the Shift key (⇧), which is just before Command. Keyboard Maestro follows this standard and presents its hot…
April 26, 2026 Yesterday, I read Nicolas Magand's blog post , "Sidelining Safari," which I found interesting because I recently switched to Firefox from Safari. He, too, switched, opting for Helium , a Chromium-based browser. I decided to check it out and have since set it as my default browser. I have two issues with Firefox: its lack of AppleScript compatibility and its failure to integrate with…
April 22, 2026 The other day I posted about cybersecurity concerns around Anthropic’s Mythos. Bloomberg, Anthropic’s Mythos Model Is Being Accessed by Unauthorized Users A small group of unauthorized users have accessed Anthropic PBC’s new Mythos AI model, a technology that the company says is so powerful it can enable dangerous cyberattacks, according to a person familiar with the matter and…
April 20, 2026 I use the free version of ChatGPT occasionally, and a week or two ago I started seeing ads. I knew they were coming, but it was still irritating to have one show up in the middle of a conversation. Most of my use is on my MacBook using the native app. Since I mainly rely on it for some coding help now and then, a subscription doesn’t make much sense. So I looked for another option.…
April 16, 2026 After getting back from my daily walk with Trix this morning, I got to thinking about how having a dog is a great way to meet people. We walk the same route every day. Part of it goes through a small neighborhood, and over the years I've gotten to know a lot of the people who live there — because at some point, they wanted to meet my dog. Trix loves meeting new people. She's great…
April 15, 2026 I've shared my menubar apps before, but it's been a while so I figured it is worth a revisit. These are the ones I use every day and I keep them organized with Thaw . Hazel : Automates file organization using rules I've set up. Folders stay clean without me touching them. Dropzone : Makes it easy to move files, upload to cloud services, or trigger repetitive tasks with a drag.…
April 13, 2026 The Guardian If you are one of Meta’s almost 79,000 employees and cannot get hold of the boss, do not worry. The owner of Facebook and Instagram is reportedly working on an AI version of Mark Zuckerberg who can answer all your queries. The AI clone of Zuckerberg, Meta’s founder and chief executive, is being trained on his mannerisms and tone as well as his public statements and…
April 11, 2026 It seems likely that you’ll soon be leading Apple, which will place unfathomable responsibility on your shoulders. As you grow into the leader that we know you can be, I urge you, on behalf of everyone who loves computers as much as we do, to protect and cultivate this spirit of Apple’s founders as the company’s top priority: We love computers. We don’t hide that — we celebrate it!…
April 8, 2026 I read something today that left me with a lingering dread. The kind that settles in your gut and doesn't go away when you close the tab. As reported by The New York Times , Anthropic has developed a new AI model called Claude Mythos so powerful that they're choosing not to release it publicly. Instead, they're granting access to a select group of major tech companies to identify and…
April 1, 2026 The Trillionaire Problem Scott Galloway: "But Musk owns roughly 42% of SpaceX, so this IPO could make him the first recorded trillionaire in history. And on Polymarket, the odds that he'll become a trillionaire this year are 71%. So there's almost a three-in-four chance, according to a lot of people, that Musk is about to become a trillionaire. And that is, in my view, really…
March 31, 2026 I'm a fan of the Pivot podcast with Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway. In today's episode from 17:42 to 27:21 Kara and Scott discuss a mind-boggling possibility: Elon Musk is on track to potentially become the world's first trillionaire. He owns roughly 42% of SpaceX, which is targeting a $1.75 trillion valuation, and Scott estimates a 71% chance of this happening within the year.…
March 30, 2026 Breezy and 71 this afternoon. Actually, it's shorts weather for the next several days. Got outside this afternoon and stacked about half the firewood that I split a week ago. Then reorganized the shed and put the snowblower away. I don't think I'll need that again until winter rolls around again.
March 27, 2026 I switched to Firefox a few weeks ago and here's why: Firefox's "Clear cookies and site data every time you close Firefox" setting (under Privacy & Security) gives me fine-grained control over what gets wiped on quit. Cookies, cache, browsing history, form data, downloads, and active logins can each be toggled independently. The "Manage Exceptions" list is what makes this feature…
March 26, 2026 I've had a Medium account since 2015 with several hundred posts, and still pulling around 500 views a week, all free and outside the Partner Program. I hadn't visited or posted in a very long time. Today, for no particular reason, I pulled up my profile. The first thing I noticed is that Medium is inserting ads in the middle of my posts. That really fucking pissed me off. I deleted…
March 21, 2026 I've been busy working outside for the past three days. A friend and I started by cutting up the remaining log stack and splitting about half of it for firewood. Then Thursday and Friday we cleared the cart path through the woods, part of our property, that had been blocked by fallen trees and broken branches. Spring is settling in. The grass is greening up and leaves are starting…
March 17, 2026 I came across a great piece by Ben Lovejoy on 9to5Mac that offered a new perspective on Apple's MacBook Neo. According to Ben maybe the MacBook Neo isn't necessarily about offering a cheaper Mac, but rather about introducing younger users, like high school students, to the Apple ecosystem as early as possible. With a lower entry price of $499, the MacBook Neo makes macOS accessible…
March 12, 2026 I've noticed that I type faster and more accurately on my 11" iPad Magic Keyboard than on my MacBook Pro's full-size keyboard when I occasionally write blog posts on my 11" M2 iPad Air. My fingers are on the shorter side, and the smaller keyboard just fits my hands better. I can easily reach every key on the 11" iPad keyboard. However, on the MacBook Pro keyboard, I have to stretch…
March 11, 2026 Houdah Blog HoudahSpot was never designed to replace Finder. It was designed to do the one thing Finder search can’t do well: let you find files using precise, composable criteria.[…] When trying to wrangle a large number of files, Finder keeps you searching and guessing. HoudahSpot, on the other hand, helps you interactively refine your searches until you zero in on the files you…
March 8, 2026 Most of the snow has finally melted. From January until just a couple of days ago we had several inches on the ground. Now it's mud season, but I can finally get outside and start dealing with the storm and snowplow damage. Most of it is broken limbs around the property and the driveway getting chewed up by the plow. The driveway is dirt and gravel — about 200 yards from the street…