RProj.ART Newsletter - January 2025

Hello everyone,

Welcome to the first RProj.ART Newsletter of 2025! This month has been filled with exploration, tech adventures, and some unexpected challenges. Let me take you through what I’ve been learning, building, and discovering in January.

Raycast: The Spotlight Replacement You Didn’t Know You Needed

I’ve been using Raycast as my Spotlight replacement, and I can’t believe it took me this long to make the switch. Here’s why it’s become an essential tool in my workflow:

• It comes with an extensive library of extensions that expand its functionality far beyond basic searches
• The speed is noticeably faster than Spotlight, making my workflow much more efficient
• Unlike Spotlight, Raycast actually provides helpful and accurate responses for calculator queries
• The development team is actively improving it, with regular updates and new features

If you’re still using Spotlight and find yourself frustrated with its limitations, give Raycast a try. The learning curve is minimal, and the productivity gains are substantial.

Web Development Adventures

I’ve been diving deep into web development this month, with a focus on the Astro framework for rebuilding my personal website:

• After years of paying for a website hosting service that hasn’t improved and now looks outdated, I decided it was time for a change. This coincided perfectly with a web development project at Ringling that expanded my skills.
• Having a meaningful personal project has provided excellent motivation to learn and apply these new skills.
• The best part? I’ve set up a CI/CD (Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment) pipeline using Sevalla, which means my site is hosted for free and automatically updates whenever I check in changes to GitHub!

This automation has been a game-changer for my workflow, allowing me to focus on content creation rather than deployment logistics.

Proxmox on Mac Mini: Breathing New Life Into Old Hardware

That Mac Mini sitting under my TV has found new purpose:

• I’ve converted it into a Proxmox server, allowing me to spin up and experiment with various IT and development containers and servers
• The learning curve has been steep but incredibly rewarding. Understanding virtualization at this level has opened up so many possibilities!
• I’m now hosting several services on my home network - if there’s interest, I’d be happy to write a more detailed breakdown of this setup in a future newsletter

It’s amazing how much utility you can get from repurposing older hardware with the right software.

A Close Call: The Looming Drive Failure

In the midst of my Proxmox experimentation, I had a close call that serves as a reminder about the importance of backups:

• While setting up the Mac Mini as a Proxmox server, I forgot to transfer all my files off an external drive
• When I installed software to read the RAID array on the external enclosure, it alerted me that my internal instrument drive (running on an NVM M.2 card) was about to fail
• Surprisingly, Apple’s software couldn’t read the SMART data that would have warned me earlier
• I quickly ordered a replacement and took the opportunity to update the card hosting it for future expansion
• The warnings proved very real - during the data transfer, several sectors failed to read properly

This experience reinforced the importance of regular backups and monitoring drive health, even on systems that might not make it easy.

T3 Chat and the Discovery of Theo

One of the most unexpected but valuable discoveries this month has been Theo’s live streams:

• It started with a YouTube notification that he was live - I decided to check it out and was immediately hooked
• In just one 4+ hour stream, I learned more about web development than I had in weeks of other resources
• Beyond the technical content, I found an intelligent community and gained insights on a wide variety of topics within web development
• I now follow his Wednesday afternoon-evening streams religiously and continue to learn a ton
• Theo recently launched T3.chat, a lightning-fast wrapper around almost all publicly available AI models - it’s become my go-to AI tool across all my devices

Finding a knowledgeable creator who resonates with your learning style can accelerate your growth in any field - I’m grateful to have stumbled upon Theo’s content.

Looking Ahead

As we move into February, I’m excited to continue these projects and start some new ones. The website development is progressing well, and I’ve got plans to expand my home server capabilities. I’m also looking forward to sharing more detailed tutorials based on what I’ve learned if there’s interest.

What tech adventures have you been on lately? Any particular topics from this newsletter you’d like me to explore in more depth next month? Reply to this email and let me know!

Until next time,

Keith

RProj.ART Newsletter is sent monthly with updates on what I’m learning, building, and discovering in the worlds of technology, productivity, and creativity. If you know someone who might enjoy this content, feel free to forward it their way!