iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 01/10/2026

Session stealers don't hack you. They become you. Mine skipped my 2FA, spammed my friends a crypto scam, then muted them all so nobody could warn me. Turns out it's not just me. Minecraft mods, Steam Workshop, even GitHub got hit the same way. #infosec #cybersecurity #discord Full write up:

blog.budget-engineer.com

Infostealer Hit My PC: Discord Hijacked, 2FA Bypassed

I got hit by a session stealer, then found thousands of others. How trust chain attacks work, why 2FA misses them, and what to do.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 10/09/2026

Built Blissboard: a shared corkboard for D&D that lives on the TV. FastAPI + WebSockets under the hood, so notes, images, videos, HP bars sync live to every tablet and laptop at the table. Local only for IRL games, Audio only on the TV. #dnd #homelab

Screenshot of a wood-panelled corkboard interface titled the party. Left side shows sticky notes reading Corvus got drunk and sang a song, said his real name is Sylas, Willow is in her winter state again, and Scribbles is asking for gears again, plus a pinned photo of a yellow brick road. Right side shows a Fantasy Tavern video thumbnail with a play for everyone button, and a party panel with HP bars for Corvus 80/80, Willow 65/65, and Scribbles 70/70, an add party member field, and a fireplace widget at the bottom.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 06/09/2026

Yeah this. Got a pipeline pulling 36 news RSS feeds straight into a read-only Discord (split by local/world, per country). Cost some time but then its been running without any input since. Building your own is way better then paying for someone else's product.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 04/09/2026

Built LootGoblin, a Discord bot for D&D party inventory. Tracks loot, gold, locations. Pairs with a webpage using Discord auth tied to guild ID. No more "who's got the poison keg" arguments. #DnD #Homelab

Image 1 (inventory list):
Discord bot embed titled "LootGoblin Inventory — All Locations" showing party items with location tags: Midnight Tears at Shivera communal, Oil of Slipperiness at Wagon, Poison Keg at Wagon (note: 40 flasks or 160 vials contraband), Potion of Poison at Shivera communal, Red Wing Host ceremonial arm-band at Wagon, Red Wing Host whetstone at Wagon, Reinforced Shield at Wagon, River Survey Map at Wagon. Footer reads "Page 2/4 · 32 item(s)".

Image 2 (party gold):
Discord bot embed titled "Party Gold" showing 13pp 7gp 1sp 5cp, totaling 13715 copper.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 30/08/2026

Im running a $52 optiplex 7050 atm.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 30/08/2026

writersroom, actualbudget, dnd-map, findit-custom, esphome, uptime-kuma, portainer, adguard-home, immich, zigbee2mqtt, custom-dicebot and dicebot mini, gitea, synapse, cryptpad, trilium, mosquitto , audiobookshelf, immichframe, lorebot, searxng.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 30/08/2026

Here is what i have mostly. blissweather-custom, custom dnd suite, wud, crafty, jellyfin, home-assistant, filebrowser, cloudflared, vaultwarden, beszel, forever-jukebox, jellyseerr, nut-upsd, multi server speed test, n8n.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 22/08/2026

Well guess I know what im gonna do today lol.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 22/08/2026

Okay I need more info. Beamng and Home asstant.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 21/08/2026

Turns out you can just measure your HVAC instead of guessing whether it's knackered. Supply and return temps into Home Assistant. Every sawtooth is a cycle, delta stays 18-20F. ESP32s and temp probes. Now maybe I can catch it going bad before it's another 5k bill... #HomeAssistant #Homelab #hvac

A dark-themed Home Assistant line graph showing two HVAC temperature sensors from 8:00 AM to 10:00 PM. The blue line is return air temperature, sitting between 68 and 73F, rising gradually through the afternoon to a peak near 73F around 5:30 PM before dropping back to 68F by late evening. The orange line is supply air temperature, running between 48 and 55F with a repeating sawtooth pattern where each spike marks a cooling cycle. The gap between the two lines stays roughly 18 to 20F throughout the day.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 21/08/2026

Here's what that actually looks like. Pulled this out of a PSU yesterday. The X on top is a pressure vent, scored in so the can splits there instead of exploding. It's split both arms and vented, hence the soot. It didn't dry out quietly. It went. Also, dust adds heat. Heat kills PSUs. #homelab

Extreme close-up of the top of a black cylindrical electrolytic capacitor inside a power supply. The metal top has an X-shaped pressure vent scored into it, which has split open along both arms. Black soot radiates outward from the centre of the split. Other components and circuit board are visible blurred in the background.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 21/08/2026

PSA: your PSU has a shelf life. Caps dry out or worse. When one goes it can take other components with it. The 80+ badge is efficiency, not lifespan. The warranty is the real number. Once it's up, treat the PSU as a maintenance item. Replace it on your schedule, not on its schedule. #pcbuilding

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 21/08/2026

Elizabeth Feinler (1931-present) Ran the ARPANET directory from 1974 to 1989. Her team invented .com, .edu, .gov and .org, and built the first WHOIS server. Every domain you own traces back to her filing system. #WomenInTech #Selfhosted

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 13/08/2026

Seeing all the post of the solar eclipse with people saying its their first one, makes my heart happy. Its a surreal moment. While I didnt get to see this one I was fortunate enough to experience one Apr 8, 2024. Here are the two best pics I was able to get on that one.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 08/08/2026

Security? Properly isolating that open port costs about what a Realm does, once you've bought a switch or rented a VPS. Then there's CGNAT and dynamic IP. Also to note some consoles you have to jump through hoops to connect to a self hosted server. But after all that you would control it = win

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 07/08/2026

This was me but then i said nope its time... backed up everything and updated it all........it was a heart pounding moment.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 07/08/2026

And then here you can see when the new system got online. Just some graphs for the graph nerds out there like me.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 07/08/2026

Well one thing good about esp32s and a Homelab you can see when your central AC fails in real time..... yesterday was a long day. #esp32 #homelab #hvac #selfhosted.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 21/06/2026

Right! So many over engineered setups online. It scares off a lot of people from even trying. Glad to finally see someone else homelabing on a budget. Have you ran into any issues with the 5060?

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 21/06/2026

Personal projects are taking a backseat. I made one reddit comment that turned into a full on discord server and minecraft server build out. I have been working on a website for it. Fun little project tho. Will share the site when its done. Crazy how strangers can sometime meld into a team.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 21/06/2026

My whole lab runs on a $52 optiplex 7050.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 21/06/2026

Compose all the way. Started with CasaOS moved to Portainer. Optiplex 7050 (main node) running more then it should. Most used Self-Hosted is vaultwarden and gitea. I tried to go cheap, hints the name. Then found esp32s.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 12/06/2026

Idle watts is not bad. Though the price to purchase one kinda out ways that. Like my $52 optiplex running 40 ish contains idles at about 15 watts. Size can be very important also. I have a pi4 that works really well as a immich frame/home asstant hub. Thanks for the reply!

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 12/06/2026

Genuine question: why are people still reaching for Raspberry Pi for homelabs? #homelab #selfhosted #raspberrypi

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 12/06/2026

Welcome to owning your own data!

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 11/06/2026

Salad unless Im lazy then Sandwich unless Im super lazy.... then cheese and crackers with pickles on the side.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 11/06/2026

One of my favourite scenes I've ever played. Mogwit gave a cursed quickling proper fey rites. Oak. Lavender. Salt. Sylvan spoken to the wind."Nobody deserves to die twice." #DnD #TTRPG

leaflet.pub

Nobody Deserves to Die Twice

One of my favorite scenes from the DnD game im playing.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 11/06/2026

Tests 2 and 3 are up test 3 was your suggestion. It all took way longer then i thought, but blogs are up and repo. blog.budget-engineer.com

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 11/06/2026

Gave this a lot of effort/time but I'm only human. If I missed something, let me know. I tried to be detailed, organised, and concise.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 11/06/2026

What can A.I. really do? 17 A.I. models. 3 tasks. Single shot each no retries, no hand-holding. Web dev, Python, summarisation. Some failed embarrassingly. Raw outputs public. web/api and local. blog.budget-engineer.com github.com/Pctest-dev/a... #AI #webdev #Python

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 10/06/2026

Lynn Conway (1938–2024) Redesigned how microchips are designed at Xerox PARC. Her methods are in virtually every chip made since the 80s. IBM fired her in 1968. She rebuilt her career quietly, changed the industry anyway. Trans woman. The work speaks for itself. #WomenInTech #Pride

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 07/06/2026

That's exactly it! The trust boundary question is skipped past. "It's local so it's safe" isn't an argument, it's an assumption. LLMs are still new tech and most users haven't learned the safeguards or the full pro/con yet. That conversation is well overdue.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 06/06/2026

Consumer facing frontier model regulation is one (GOOD) thing, but the open weight local execution problem sits outside both state and federal frameworks entirely.... no bill aimed at "companies" touches a model running on someone's hardware with no API call involved.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 06/06/2026

I wrote about this 8 months ago but for local Llm.. I have since updated it with the new information. the fronter models are just one side of the coin. Here: blog.budget-engineer.com/the-local-ai...

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 06/06/2026

Been talking about this but with local ran llm about 8 months ago just posted an update Here: blog.budget-engineer.com/the-local-ai...

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 06/06/2026

Great ideas adding to the spreadsheet now.

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 06/06/2026

Want to add to that? Move from consciousness to competent blog.budget-engineer.com/the-local-ai...

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 06/06/2026

I started a test series that does this. Only have one finished atm. It takes a lot of time. Less about whats the best and more how each preform a particular job. Any suggestions for tests? blog.budget-engineer.com/ai-test-1-we...

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 06/06/2026

All this talk about AI and a post I saw here on Bluesky got me thinking what can these models actually do? So many many hours later, learning curves, and reading here is what i found. Heads up none are really one shots like a lot of people say. blog.budget-engineer.com/ai-test-1-we...

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 05/06/2026

Thats good for frontier models but what about local ran? blog.budget-engineer.com/the-local-ai...

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 05/06/2026

Thats good for frontier models but what about local ran? blog.budget-engineer.com/the-local-ai...

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 05/06/2026

We spent years worrying about AI becoming conscious. We forgot to worry about it becoming competent. blog.budget-engineer.com/the-local-ai... #AI #Cybersecurity #LocalAI

blog.budget-engineer.com

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 04/06/2026

The Kratos fanbase has a very specific energy. Very attached to their big sad daddy... oof

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Budget Engineer @budget-engineer.com · 04/06/2026

1. access to good mentorship, time, and the right environment bonus for minds that can spot the small syntax errors 2.Data still sparse but average with 10 other skills sounds better anyway 3.Same way already knows or searches the error, or ya know A.I. since that’s how that got there.

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