Words, code, and information security in Portland, Oregon

This is the website of Erik L. Arneson. I am a freelance writer and software developer in Portland, Oregon.


Blog Posts

  • OMSI Science on Screen Wrapup

    My talk at OMSI last night, “Computers and the Dawn of Modern Cryptography,” went really well. It was a great crowd and there was a good Q&A session afterwards. I’m going to keep this post really brief. First, there will be slides for my talk. Following that will be a brief bibliography if you’re interested in learning more about this fascinating topic.

  • OMSI Science on Screen: The Imitation Game

    On March 28th, I will be giving a lecture called “Computers and the Dawn of Modern Cryptography” at OMSI as part of their Science on Screen program. I’ll be speaking and answering questions just before a screening of The Imitation Game, starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Keira Knightley. I am really excited about this opportunity! Please come down to OMSI for an informative lecture and an excellent film.

    Buy Tickets Here

  • From StartCom to Let's Encrypt

    This past Fall, a bunch of big names removed StartCom from their trusted SSL Certificate Authority list. As a result, when I renewed my SSL certificates this year, I went with Let’s Encrypt. It was a pleasant experience, because Let’s Encrypt uses a command-line client called Certbot that does most of the heavy lifting for you.

  • Installing Ansible 2.2.0 on a Raspberry Pi

    Ansible is a powerful IT automation tool with lots of modules and active development. Unfortunately, the only version available for stock Raspberry Pi is old. I wanted to use some of the newer modules and features, so I needed to install at least version 2.2. This tutorial will walk you through installing Ansible 2.2.0 on a Raspberry Pi running Raspbian “jessie”. The version of Raspbian I did this on was tagged “2016-09-23”.

  • Using Amazon S3 as a Nette Service

    Nette is a popular web application framework for PHP. It is mostly pretty well documented and easy to use. Recently, I needed to upload media from a Nette application to Amazon S3. This is how I created an S3 service for my Nette application. You will need to be familiar with Nette and have an existing Nette application to follow along.

  • A Poor-Man's Dynamic DNS with Ansible and Amazon Route53

    I wanted to be able to configure a DNS hostname dynamically, but couldn’t find an easy-to-use dynamic DNS client that suited my needs. Using Ansible and Amazon Route53, I put together a quick, effective solution.

  • Alternate Ways to Call wp-cron

    WordPress includes a job scheduling system called wp-cron. The default method for scheduled jobs is for wp-cron to be checked on each page load, which has the potential to slow down your website while background jobs are run. Check out these other options that help maintain the user experience on your WordPress site while still running important tasks in the background.

  • Still Doing Well with SSL

    I renewed my SSL certificate today and updated the configuration. Still doing pretty well!

  • OpenPGP for WordPress Now Supports Contact Form 7

    OpenPGP Form Encryption for WordPress now supports Contact Form 7. You can download version 1.4.0 at the WordPress plugin site and start using a safer contact form on your website today!

  • Pono Rez WordPress Plugin

    Together with Commerce Collective, ((I started working with them last year, remember?)) we have built a WordPress plugin to allow Activities & Attractions Association of Hawaii (A3H) to quickly and easily integrate activity bookings and sales into their WordPress websites.

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