Dispatches¶

A Quick HAProxy Load Balancer for VMware Cloud Foundation Operations

When I need to stand up a quick load balancer for VMware Cloud Foundation Operations in the lab, I don't want to rebuild the same HAProxy configuration by hand every time. I just want a small Debian or Ubuntu VM, a VIP on the right VLAN, a backend pool of appliance nodes, and a fast path to getting the service online.

This helper script is what I use for that job. It prompts for the virtual IP, netmask, redirect FQDN, and backend node IPs, then wires up the network interface, installs HAProxy, generates a fresh configuration, and restarts the required services. It is intentionally opinionated, which is exactly why it's useful in a home lab.

Maintain Formatting of Embedded Terraform Provider Examples with terrafmt

When a Terraform provider repository ships Markdown documentation full of example configuration, those snippets are part of the product. If they drift out of style, or worse, stop parsing as valid HCL, users feel it immediately. terrafmt is a small tool that helps keep embedded Terraform examples formatted and syntactically correct in both local workflows and CI.

terrafmt scans files for embedded Terraform configuration, extracts the matching blocks, parses the HCL, formats it, and then either shows the diff or rewrites the file in place. It recognizes embedded configuration in a few very practical forms:

• Markdown documentation files with fenced hcl, terraform, or tf blocks
• Go source files that return raw strings
• Go source files that build examples with fmt.Sprintf(...)

In other words, terrafmt is a bridge between "this is documentation" and "this is still code."

Orange and White '79

Linux Commands Reference: Essential CLI Categories for Daily Work

The Linux command line is one of those skills that keeps compounding. Once you can inspect a system, trace a process, move data safely, and answer your own questions from a shell prompt, you stop waiting on GUIs and start working at the speed of the machine. This reference gathers 15 essential command categories into one practical page you can keep nearby, whether you are building confidence or sharpening the habits that make day-to-day operations smoother.

This is not meant to be a memorize-everything-in-one-sitting tutorial. It is a working reference positioned between beginner comfort and intermediate fluency, with a handful of deeper operational workflows where extra context matters most.

Inside My VS Code Setup: Theme, Extensions, and Settings

If you spend hours a day in your editor, your setup stops being a cosmetic preference and starts becoming part of how you think. Mine has evolved into a very opinionated VS Code environment tuned for the work I do most often: Go, Python, PowerShell, Ansible, Terraform, Markdown, YAML, JSON, and a steady stream of GitHub-driven automation.

Earlier this month, I wrote about why I use JetBrains GoLand and PyCharm over VS Code for some language-specific work. That's still true. But VS Code remains one of the most useful tools on my machine because it is fast, flexible, and easy to shape around the task in front of me.

This post is a tour of the setup I keep coming back to, the one that feels like home every time I open VS Code.