Notes on Mark B Tomlinson

Power Toys Light Switch

Tue, 14 Apr 2026 22:34:00 +0200

Toggle themes in Windows 11 using Power Toys and the shortcut:

Ctl Shift Win - D

Quick Access To WSL

Wed, 08 Apr 2026 16:28:12 +0200

To open the Windows Subsystem Linux from the File Explorer enter the following in the address bar: \\wsl$

to open a specific Distro add it to the path, for example: \\wsl$\Debian

Changed Blog Landing Page

Wed, 08 Apr 2026 01:22:19 +0200

After some thought and because I am now posting these notes as well as normal posts, I have decided to revert to a landing page for my blog.

I think it is clearer and a cleaner access point for my notes and posts.

Windows 11 Theme Shortcut

Tue, 07 Apr 2026 12:40:27 +0200

I have been frustrated by Windows 11 inability to consistently use my preferred theme, especially during the Night-Day theme changes. To this end I found a way to create a Desktop shortcut to the theme I want to use. Far easier than constantly opening Preferences. Create a Shortcut to the saved desired theme in this folder:

%localappdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Themes

Update:

This is no longer working for me, as it is with Windows and its inconsistency.

Setup Custom Domain

Fri, 03 Apr 2026 16:16:37 +0200

Finally got around to setting up a custom domain, not hard but quite involved and required some serious concentration and patience, due to DNS record delays.

April Reminder Do A Post

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 10:25:00 +0200

I am apt to forget to post in my blog as I am often to disctracted by the real world and so it slips my mind. So a note to self (like it will make a difference) post something, anything!

I Haven't Posted Anything

Wed, 18 Mar 2026 20:00:38 +0200

I feel like I should post something but I really don’t feel like. I don’t feel I have anything positive to post about in terms of CG or anything else at the moment.

So this is in lieu of a post proper, a little note.

Renamed Description

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 17:19:29 +0200

The contents of the post were still called Description now they are Contents to match the dialog.

Post Description Wrong

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 16:47:38 +0200

The notes Contents were still is the capatalize function, commented out now.

So This Should be Working 😀

Segmentation Fault On Linux

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 15:15:28 +0200

So it isn’t just Mac that is throwing up an error, also happening one linux. now i have managed to check the code on Debian it is clear something is wrong with the installation or calls in both.

it seems to be related to QApplication, but i can’t be arsed to track it down any further.

time for a rewrite using QWidget only.

Created A Post Symbolic Link

Thu, 05 Mar 2026 04:18:32 +0200

This will allow me to keep the desktop post shorcut while editing and renaming the python applications.

A special case will be needed on windows but the mac and linux versions should work the same…

Check For Directory

Wed, 04 Mar 2026 16:02:27 +0200

Create a directory if it doesn’t exist:

import os.path

isdir = os.path.isdir(postpath)
if not isdir:
    os.mkdir(postpath)

How To Pause Unix Shell Script

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 16:38:21 +0200

You can pause the execution of a shell script using read like this:

read -t 5 -p "press any key to resume, will exit in 5 sec ..."

The -t is the time in seconds and the -p is the pause followed by a message.

Changed Page Style Of Notes

Wed, 25 Feb 2026 13:05:06 +0200

I didn’t like the list style of the original notes page so removed the list.html from the theme/layouts/notes directory. This is now the default theme list as used in tags etc.