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Hello! I'm Alex, and I'm an avid technology enthusiast. I love tinkering with Linux in particular, which I've been using since 2007. I recently earned my CompTIA A+ certification, and am working towards my CCNA next.

My dotfiles repository captures as much of my setup as possible. It's configured as a NixOS Flake on systems with the nix package manager, while also supporting other system types using the chezmoi dotfile manager.

When I'm not on my computer, I enjoy playing hockey and lifting weights, and I recently took up the piano as well.

Projects

Self-Hosted Services

Recently I've started working on running my own private network services instead of relying on cloud services. For this I lean heavily on Tailscale to connect my devices without exposing them to the broader internet. So far, I have set up:

  • Nextcloud for files, photos, contacts, and calendars.
  • Syncthing for syncing files. Nextcloud is configured to show and manage files I sync with Syncthing.
  • Paperless-ngx for managing documents and digitizing paper records.
  • Forgejo for private git hosting and issue tracking.
  • Vaultwarden for syncing and managing passwords and other secrets.
  • Miniflux for reading articles and other feeds from the web.
  • hledger-web for tracking my finances away from the computer.
  • Anki sync server for syncing flashcards.
  • Portunus for centralized user management with LDAP.

Next on the list is Immich for better photo management and a Matrix server for secure communication. Most of the code for these services are currently in my dotfiles repository.

Eventually I intend to invite friends and family to use these services too, once my setup is a bit more stable and I can be reasonably sure that my tinkering won't negatively impact anything they start to rely on.

Nonguix

In 2019, I started the Nonguix project. Nonguix is a software repository for GNU Guix, an advanced research package manager and operating system. It provides non-free software which can't be included in the main software repository for policy-related reasons. Nonguix is still going strong today with many talented contributors, although I'm no longer very active in the project.

Other

You can also find some of my code in projects like NixOS, GNU Guix, XMonad, Nagios, OpenWrt, and various Emacs packages.

Certifications

CompTIA A+ (April 2024)

  • Industry standard certification establishing competency as a computer technician.

Education

Bachelor of Arts - Linguistics (May 2014)

University of Minnesota-Twin Cities

  • Courses included computer programming, formal languages, and computational linguistics.

Technologies

This website was crafted with Emacs and Hugo. You can find the source here. Some other technologies I know include:

  • Web Technologies

    • HTML
    • CSS
    • JavaScript
  • TCP/IP and networking fundamentals
  • Linux (Debian, Red Hat/CentOS, NixOS, Guix System, and others)
  • Shell scripting (bash, sed, awk, PowerShell)
  • Git version control system
  • Go
  • Python

Contact Me

If you'd like to get in touch, you can reach me through email.