Terence Eden. He has a beard and is smiling.

Terence Eden’s Blog

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Book Review: Rhetoric of InSecurity; The Language of Danger, Fear and Safety in National and International Contexts - Victoria Baines

· 1 comment · 700 words


Book cover featuring a wireframe drawing of a city.

This would be a best seller if it had been entitled "Everything I learned about national security talks, I learned from Cicero". Preferably dumbed-down to accompany a Netflix series about sexy Romans. Instead, it is a scholarly work which takes the reader through the art of rhetoric and how it is used and abused by modern speech-makers. It specifically looks at things through a National…

I've locked myself out of my digital life

· 139 comments · 1,500 words · Viewed ~58,831 times


Photo of a house engulfed in flames. Photo taken by Wikimedia user LukeBam06.

Imagine… Last night, lightning struck our house and burned it down. I escaped wearing only my nightclothes. In an instant, everything was vaporised. Laptop? Cinders. Phone? Ashes. Home server? A smouldering wreck. Yubikey? A charred chunk of gristle. This presents something of a problem. In order to recover my digital life, I need to be able to log in to things. This means I need to know my u…

Certified Blockchain Professional - Module 16: Blockchain as a Service

· 200 words


Logo for the Certified Blockchain Professional.

As previously discussed, I'm doing the Certified Blockchain Professional course. It is self-directed learning, so I'm going through it at my own pace. In order to consolidate my learning, and help organise my thoughts, I'm blogging about my reflections on each module. These are mostly notes to myself - but I hope if you find something interesting (or incorrect) that you'll leave a comment. I…

Paper Prototype CSS

· 11 comments · 400 words · Viewed ~8,096 times


An HTML table - every element is askance.

Introducing Paper Prototype CSS. When I first started designing the OpenBenches website, I wanted to make it look deliberately crappy. I didn't want the people testing it getting too hung up on what it looked like. I've found that some beta testers can only focus on whether the colours are right, or if things should be placed on the left or right. So I wanted something which mimicked "Paper…

Certified Blockchain Professional - Module 15: Security in Blockchain

· 450 words


Logo for the Certified Blockchain Professional.

As previously discussed, I'm doing the Certified Blockchain Professional course. It is self-directed learning, so I'm going through it at my own pace. In order to consolidate my learning, and help organise my thoughts, I'm blogging about my reflections on each module. These are mostly notes to myself - but I hope if you find something interesting (or incorrect) that you'll leave a comment. …

Gadget Review: Yet another WiFi enabled smoke alarm

· 1 comment · 550 words · Viewed ~555 times


A small smoke alarm in the palm of someone's hand.

After reviewing the X-Sense Home Security Kit, I decided to also review their wireless smoke alarms. As I said at the time, the interlinked alarms were great - but didn't connect to the hub. That means you have to be physically present in the home in order to hear the alarm. Well, X-Sense were listening! They've sent me the X-Sense Mini - it's a WiFi smoke alarm which integrates with the X-Sense …

Certified Blockchain Professional - Module 14: Scalable Blockchain

· 1 comment · 450 words


Logo for the Certified Blockchain Professional.

As previously discussed, I'm doing the Certified Blockchain Professional course. It is self-directed learning, so I'm going through it at my own pace. In order to consolidate my learning, and help organise my thoughts, I'm blogging about my reflections on each module. These are mostly notes to myself - but I hope if you find something interesting (or incorrect) that you'll leave a comment. …

Certified Blockchain Professional - Module 13: Blockchain Project Implementation

· 2 comments · 600 words


Logo for the Certified Blockchain Professional.

As previously discussed, I'm doing the Certified Blockchain Professional course. It is self-directed learning, so I'm going through it at my own pace. In order to consolidate my learning, and help organise my thoughts, I'm blogging about my reflections on each module. These are mostly notes to myself - but I hope if you find something interesting (or incorrect) that you'll leave a comment. The…

Book Review: The Box - How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger by Marc Levinson

· 350 words


Box cover showing a blueprint of a shipping container.

In April 1956, a refitted oil tanker carried fifty-eight shipping containers from Newark to Houston. From that modest beginning, container shipping developed into a huge industry that made the boom in global trade possible. The Box tells the dramatic story of the container's creation, the decade of struggle before it was widely adopted, and the sweeping economic consequences of the sharp fall…

Certified Blockchain Professional - Module 12: IOT

· 1 comment · 300 words


Logo for the Certified Blockchain Professional.

As previously discussed, I'm doing the Certified Blockchain Professional course. It is self-directed learning, so I'm going through it at my own pace. In order to consolidate my learning, and help organise my thoughts, I'm blogging about my reflections on each module. These are mostly notes to myself - but I hope if you find something interesting (or incorrect) that you'll leave a comment. Can…

Certified Blockchain Professional - Module 11: Industry Use Cases

· 550 words


Logo for the Certified Blockchain Professional.

As previously discussed, I'm doing the Certified Blockchain Professional course. It is self-directed learning, so I'm going through it at my own pace. In order to consolidate my learning, and help organise my thoughts, I'm blogging about my reflections on each module. These are mostly notes to myself - but I hope if you find something interesting (or incorrect) that you'll leave a comment. …

Designing for non-rectangular browser windows

· 8 comments · 550 words · Viewed ~5,180 times


A smartphone in the shape of a triangle.

How I miss the days when phone manufacturers were innovative. Nowadays everything is just a boring black rectangle. Tawanda Nyahuye👨‍💻@towernterHow to end a frontend developer's career pic.x.com/AYsI0pghh5❤️ 5,589💬 151🔁 006:19 - Fri 06 May 2022 I imagine that this (concept) device would probably just put the browser only on one row / column. Probably sensible, but utterly BORING! Let's imagine …