iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

I still can’t get over the km long ramp at Confederation GO Station in Stoney Creek for people with mobility issues.

An incredibly long concrete ramp inside of a building dedicated to housing the ramp.

Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

I haven’t baked bread in a month! Needed to get back into the habit. I didn’t mess around with the new bread pan and just used tiles and a water tray like I’m used to. Also, the poolish was 48hrs old and I wasn’t sure how it would turn out. Wouldn’t do that again though.

Two fat baguettes with golden brown crust.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 26/01/2026

This is because we made fun of Nic Robertson. We’re being punished for our winter hubris.

A 4’ wall of snow blocks a lane way. The snow is sparkling purple in the cool street light. Two warm lights glow from within, buried in the wall of snow. The person taking the picture is about half done clearing it and will go on to clear his neighbours’.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 23/01/2026

I accidentally spilled hot coffee on my sleeve and it froze instantly 😆. That convinced me I should probably cut my walk short and go back inside. Still a beautiful sunny day in Hamilton Ontario.

The sleeve of a black jacket with frozen drops of coffee on it. There is a block sidewalk covered in salt behind it, and snow in the corner of the image.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 22/01/2026

My old twitter account was TheGrittyDev and I moved here about a year ago. If I follow you, there's a good chance we were mutuals. I used it for DMing and keeping up with peers. I'm sad that network is gone, so let's remake those connections!

A screen grab of the @TheGrittyDev twitter account header

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 31/12/2025

I was designing a birthday card the other day and needed to redraw this mouse at least five times before it stopped looking like a penis.

A pencil sketch of a cartoon mouse that apparently, at some point, looked like a penis. It no longer looks like a penis. It looks like a mouse with big ears, big feet, floppy tube arms, buck teeth, and tiny eyes. It is generally charming and - again - looks nothing like a penis.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 29/12/2025

There we go! A background water material made using the normal map from one crumpled piece of paper. #gamedev #unity3d

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 28/12/2025

The lost crumpled paper water shader has been rewritten, saved, and checked into the repo. Now I can make the shore foam look better. #gamedev

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 28/12/2025

Making a water shader that looks like crumpled paper. Funny when you accidentally invert the colours. #unity3d #gamedev

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 17/12/2025

A Fold Apart used emissive glow so the player stood out in puzzles on small screens. They popped too much on big ones though. I wanted to try fresnel edge glow, but it made the character look like a cutout. But then adding a smoothstep to the world normal y made them pop AND blend #unity3d #gamedev

A screen capture of the Unity Scene editor showing two blue cartoon characters. The one on the right is glowing slightly and doesn't look like they're part of the larger office scene that they're standing in. The one on the left has a slight glow around most of them that makes them stand out from the background, but the glow is not present under their feet, so they still look like they're standing in the room. There is a screen capture of a shader tool showing how the glow was limited with an arrow pointing to the character on the left.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 02/12/2025

Much better. Still I didn’t score deep enough so they didn’t rise the way I wanted. Lots of room for improvement. Not sure how my very first batch was amazing and my next two have been not at all that.

Uniform raw baguettes. Lookin’ soft and fluffy.

Brown crusty baguettes with somewhat uneven colour. You could eat these.

Nicely browned underside of bread. It is not at all burned like yesterday’s batch.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 02/12/2025

Even when you’re not a beginner, sometimes you just screw it up (like I did today) and need to try again (like I will tomorrow).

Six unbaked baguettes rising nicely in a baker’s couche (a linen cloth for doing the final rise on some breads)

Five baguettes with crispy brown crusts but the tops are flatter than they should be.

A hand turning over one of the baguettes to reveal that it is burned on the bottom and probably very bitter tasting. This baguette does not look yummy at all. You probably don’t want to eat it. It may make a good club for self-defence though.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 21/11/2025

My adorable enemies continue to vex me.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 20/11/2025

I usually bake my baguettes on unvarnished quarry tiles but I decided to give a baguette oven a go and it produces a different but very nice result. I will need to reduce my recipe a bit so they don’t swell to fill the whole thing next time. Crust was great.

Raw baguettes sitting in a back ceramic tray with grooves made to hold them.

Baked baguettes with a golden brown crust. They have puffed up and two stuck together.

Baguettes on a cooling rack with one cut to reveal an uneven crumb pattern.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 19/11/2025

Baking bread and I wish I had taken a picture of my first batch. Yeast was dead (but still smelly 🤔) and made baguette-shaped yoga mats. I don’t have a good source for fresh yeast, so I bought quick rise dry yeast (first time ever!). That made blimps! Rise is great but I prefer fresh yeast flavour.

Two very puffy, blimp-shaped, baguettes sitting on a wire cooling rack. They have a lovely golden brown crust. You can tell they are crunchy on the outside and soft inside.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 17/11/2025

Despite Stoney Creek being a very windy area, and all other stations having wind shelters, the designers of the Confederation GO decided they were not necessary. ⬇️

Black pillars flank the ramp of the accessibility platform. This shows the only shelter as the doors next to the elevator.

A long concrete train platform with no wind shelters.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 17/11/2025

On the platform side there are two elevators, and a single staircase to access the platform. ⬇️

The long concrete hallway at the end of the ramp and stairs. This leads under the tracks to the area under the platform.

Two elevators adjacent each other. They are used to access the platform.

A long narrow staircase. The only way to access the platform other than the elevators.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 17/11/2025

I have people in my family who use canes and walkers and they would struggle at this station. Instead of having an elevator, like nearly every other station, they constructed an entire building just to hold one of the biggest ramps I have ever seen ⬇️

The interior of the Confederarion GO station entrance. The entire structure seems to have been made to house a single, giant, ramp built in a switchback style. A Presto Card reader is at the right side of the frame.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

Always funny to run across something like this, years later, in functional software, and having only the vaguest idea why I made this decision.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 13/09/2025

The weekend started with plumbing maintenance. I had to break through concrete to get access to a back water valve that the installer sealed up. Turns out they need maintenance every year and wow did this ever. Now onto more pleasant landscaping. Today is putting down retainer for a path.

Scattered tools (angle grinder, hammer, chisel, etc.) next to a hole cut in concrete to reveal a large open pipe.

A small dirt hill surrounded by yellow and pink string pulled tightly at perfect angles to map out a long pathway cut into the clay ground. Both cut and natural stones surround the pathway, waiting to be put in place.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

They need to change the AI icon, and then when you click on it, there is a popup that says “Get out”. Pinterest has been ruined by AI, making it difficult to use for reference anymore, as clout-chasers make infinite copies of what’s popular completely burying other stuff in an avalanche of sameness

Stick figure icon with arms folded behind their head and feet kicked up on desk. Source: Lazy Icon https://www.flaticon.com/free-icon/lazy_198149

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 28/01/2024

Hahahaha! I have solved the left/right evenness problem. Equally crispy crust along the length. The last thing to do is to figure out how to do this faster so I don’t lose as much heat when I open the door of my cheap oven. The bread at the back is turning out way nicer than the bread at the front.

Two crusty baguettes baked to a golden brown, cooling on a wire rack atop a wooden table. The baguette at the back is an even brown colour while the baguette at the front is darker on its back side.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 21/01/2024

Good crumb but crust could be crustier. It is great near the edges of the tiles I bake on. So I guess it is getting the most steam. Next time, I will try separating my tiles and cutting my parchment paper so steam moves around it more.

A baguette cut in half to reveal irregular holes. It has a crusty pointed end with a thicker crust, but as you move towards the center of the baguette, along the length, the crust gets thinner.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 21/01/2024

This week’s baguettes used a bit more water, a longer proof, I put my tray of boiling water in the oven early to build up more steam, didn’t open the oven for 15, let heat out then kept baking at lower temp for another 5. Also proofing in a couche helped the bottom, and I cut better ears.

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 18/01/2024

These comments are funny, but it's also a relief to get rid of them when a system is re-written.

An image of computer code comments. The background is black and the text is green. The comments read: This is leftover from the old build. I don't remember why we did this, and at this point, I'm afraid to take it out

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Steven B Smith 👻 @sbsmith.bsky.social · 14/01/2024

I was trying a slightly different mix and temp to get crustier baguettes and made the mistake of peeking at 10 mins. Lost the heat and steam at the front of the oven (you can tell by the parchment). Still a decent result. Also browning on the bottom was great.

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