ohhey[blog]

Consumers of People - Weeknotes for 2023-03-03

We don't have to shout any more Happy people, the kind who eat sandwiches together, are boring. They don’t buy much. Their smartphones are six vers... Read more

Small Community is Good Community

Community is on my mind today and I think it's because of three different, but related, experiences I've had in the last couple of days. I'm readin... Read more

Corgis From the Sky! - Weeknotes for 2023-02-20

What a headline The Jerusalem Post had one of the best headlines covering an astronomical event in Texas this week: Corgi-sized meteor as heavy as ... Read more

Notetaking as a Functional Habit

Whatever you use, remember that these notes are necessarily only an intermediate form. They don’t become understanding or thoughts until you integr... Read more

Easy Layout for iPad Sketching

Once upon a time, I made videos for my students using a sketchnote-style layout. I would have the notes diagrammed and then talk over them while ma... Read more

Roofball - Weeknotes for 2023-02-13

Midwest is best YouTube recommended what is probably the most midwest video I've ever come across. It's the 2008 Roofball World Championships and i... Read more

Quick Text Analysis with Google Apps Script

We needed to do a survey at work that included some open ended questions. We don't have access to a survey platform like Qualtrics, so we have to u... Read more

Check Your Hallways - Weeknotes for 2023-02-06

Look at this I need to do more reading, but go look at Bonfire just for the illustrations. Flask is 13 years old and my web platform of choice. Her... Read more

Improving Team Awareness

Doug Belshaw shared a post on team status meetings and why they're generally a waste of time. It got me thinking about two things I'm trying to imp... Read more

Back to Nova Launcher

Last summer, I moved my phone to KISS Launcher. I use search across the board on my computer and I thought having the same toolset on my phone woul... Read more

Goodbye Twitter

My time on Twitter has come to an end. It's been 12 years since I joined and this is - honestly - a sad decision for me. When I created my account ... Read more

Down With the Sickness - Weeknotes for 2023-01-30

Interesting reads The hidden purple memorial in your browser - reddit link, the full backstory Dr. TJ Kendon - on what appears to be a new blog - h... Read more

Conditioning and Learning

I don't think there's a question in my mind about the stages we go through as we learn new things. Much learning seems to be rooted in habits and r... Read more

My Leadership Lens

This year, part of my job has taken on a functional team-leader role. I'm not a leader in the sense that I'm evaluating my team members, but my rol... Read more

Should We Condition? - Weeknotes for 2023-01-23

Here are some interesting things and half-formed thoughts from this week: Shorts I'm trying to use Helix as a main editor. There is some growing pa... Read more

This Was Written with Helix

I'm writing this blog post using Helx. This is the first time I've really committed to using a terminal-based text editor, focusing on keyboard com... Read more

I've Moved My Blog...Again

Welp, I've done it again. I decided to go back to static instead of using WordPress. I want to explain why I made that choice and go over what I'm ... Read more

Yes, You Can Use ChatGPT with Students

We got talking about ChatGPT yesterday at work and surprisingly, none of us have really been asked by teachers to block it from students. It could ... Read more

The Red Ranger Rides Again

This is a story about one of those life events that seems routine that turns upside down real quick. The Red Ranger herself It started as a routine... Read more

Mastodon is Not a Twitter Replacement

The great Twitter Migration is causing all sorts of hype around Mastodon, but, in my opinion, for the wrong reasons. People disillusioned with Twit... Read more

More Flexible Test Databases in Flask

I've been longing for an easier way to manage test data in Flask. Specifically, when running automated tests, I wanted an easier way to populate a ... Read more

Dune Hikes

In September, it was my family's turn to battle COVID-19. We're not sure who brought it home first, but it hit me first. Hard. Not as hard as a lot... Read more

Dealing with Bad Questions

...not all questions are created equal and some questions inhibit learning. Source: Yes, There is Such a Thing as a Bad Question — Teachers Going G... Read more

Break's End

The end of summer break is always a little weird. I have a shorter vacation than normal because of the nature of my job, but going back to work at ... Read more

Coming Back Around

This week, my wife pointed something out to me: our entire dinner was either something we grew or something we helped raise. Vegetables from our ga... Read more

Cloud Power

Summer brings some pop up storms at the end of the day when the humid air starts to cool. They often form over Lake Michigan to the west and slowly... Read more

Recent Happenings

We're in the throes of summer and there have been a number of events, ranging from new construction (because there is never enough stuff to build),... Read more

Adventures in Building an Interactive Apps Script Sidebar

Now that I've finished a rewrite of an application in HTMX, I wanted to see if HTMX could be used to enhance the use of Google Apps Script sidebar ... Read more

Moving from Svelte to HTMX

Last year, I built an event registration tool for our district, mainly to keep track of what professional development we were doing and try to get ... Read more

Sort a Google Sheet with Vertically Merged Ranges

This is a quick tip, but if you've ever tried to sort a sheet with vertically-merged rows, you've probably been disappointed. Here's an example: If... Read more

That Time I Deleted a Database

I've been hobby programming for several years that has spilled over into making applications for staff at school. One of those tools is a website t... Read more

Systems of Trust and web3 in Education

This post has been percolating in my mind for several months. It started as an opus that sat stale in my drafts because I didn't want to wrestle th... Read more

Check for alt tags with a Bookmarklet

tl;dr If you want a quick way to check if images on a webpage contain alt text (for screen readers), I made a bookmarklet that will blur images wit... Read more

Because Everything is a Priority...

My job for the last six years years has been to identify and provide professional development for staff. We set goals, looked at upcoming challenge... Read more

Using Google Apps Script as a Webhook

Google Apps Script projects can be published as web apps when you’re done with them. This is helpful if you’re building a tool with a simple UI (us... Read more

Get in touch

Comments are always open. You can get in touch by sending me an email at brian@ohheybrian.com