DEV Community: Owen Ross

Bot accounts are the bane of my existance

Owen Ross — Mon, 26 Oct 2026 11:41:11 +0000

Recently I posted a post asking people how to make a small laguage model.

That post recived the largest amount of reactions, but only one comment. That commentwas "nice!".

My coping mechagnisim

I have unfollowed all accounts that I have no doubt of the fact that they are bot accounts, this works because they will try and keep you as a follower by liking and or commenting on your posts aswell as blocking them so they dont end up on my feed.

I would write a script to block a list of users and share it with the community however the api doesnt allow for it

Why I switched to AFFiNE for my notes

Owen Ross — Thu, 22 Oct 2026 10:31:44 +0000

Ease of import

AFFiNE allows for .md, pdf and images to be imported.
This allows obsidian notes to be imported.

Price

Self hosting AFFiNE comes at no cost as well as basic cloud sync. There are paid plans you can use.

Self hostability

Self hosting a AFFiNE server is low difficulty, low maintnance, low resource consumption and allows for access controll and other cool features.

The setup is fairly intuitive and only requires 5 steps when installing with docker compose.

How do I create a custom ai model

Owen Ross — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 23:23:33 +0000

Hello DEV Community,

Just wondering how do I make a AI model

Why I’m wondering

To learn about this technology so that if AI does take our jobs I will at least have some chance of staying relevant

Why I write Success Criteria before I enter the IDE

Owen Ross — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 08:54:37 +0000

thinking about what sub tasks i have for a certain task helps because instead of trying to do everything at the same time you can do it in chunks.

For example you dont build the frontend before you build the backend, otherwise functionality would be little to none

How do i retrieve request body items in flask

Owen Ross — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 07:56:44 +0000

Hello DEV Community,

Just wondering how to retrive attributes in a post request body in flask

Top 10 things i use on my server

Owen Ross — Tue, 20 Oct 2026 00:25:33 +0000

ftp

Transferring and editing files on the fly is a good ability

Shell In A Box

If something breaks I can fix it, even while I’m away

Remote sublime

I like to edit my files on multiple devices

Netbird

This allows me to access my ports remotely

Node JS

Runs my web server the way I want it to.

Docker

If Im spinning up a pentest lab like old Wordpress or owasp juice shop, I can do so with ease

Cron

Update my services and automate my tasks

ntfy

Sends me a push notification when a error or important event occurs on my server

actual

Helps me keep track of my budget without requiring me to download a mobile app or give my data away

Pi hole

A dns server that allows me to block phishing, tracking and advertising websites

Cristmas lights with low cost ESP32

Owen Ross — Mon, 19 Oct 2026 20:21:13 +0000

Software

To start playing around with ESP32 lighting you need WLED. To install WLED on your ESP head over to https://install.wled.me/

Hardware

You will need an addressable string of lights. I recommend ws2812 as each light is individually addressable which means that you can do cool effects.

You will also need a power supply. Make sure it’s either 5v or 12v. Keep in mind that you should chose the voltage that your string says and use a voltage limiter on your controller if it is above 5v

Wiring

For information on lighting visit https://kno.wled.ge/basics/wiring-guides/

Why I use supabase and you should to

Owen Ross — Sun, 18 Oct 2026 12:03:45 +0000

Features

Supabase comes with a auth function as well as OAuth
Comes with a backup feature (premium only)
REST API
easy backend JavaScript integration

Pricing

Unlike many other database services there is a free supabase plan and the most of the supabase platform is opensource

Security

Supabase has SQL injection protection so that you dont have to worry about firewalls.

How do I add RSS feeds to my website

Owen Ross — Sun, 18 Oct 2026 10:08:36 +0000

Hello DEV Community,

If anyone has experience using RSS technology please leave a comment linking any guides that you know.

What your IDE says about you

Owen Ross — Sat, 17 Oct 2026 04:32:19 +0000

This post is just my thoughts and is not meant to be taken seriously

Notepad/mousepad/textedit

You spend your time on things more important than installing a IDE.

Nano

You dont leave the terminal, or you dont have a desktop environment

Emacs

You love customisability, im guessing you use hyprland or similar

VScode

You love integrations and the AI chat window

GitHub web editor

your not bothered to run git clone, or your on a mobile device

Sublime

Your using a old device, or you just like simplicity

Jetbrains suite

You have infinite disk space

Why you should switch to sublime text

Owen Ross — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 19:57:00 +0000

What I was using previously

Prior to this I was using vscode however my laptop is old and vscode uses a fair bit of ram. (Check https://dev.to/dev2023-op/why-i-gave-up-on-vscode-4g42 for more info)

What I like about sublime

Emmet on sublime is less intrusive and doesn't auto fill without you asking it to. Sublime is faster and lighter for those on old devices.

Your leaking SEO

Owen Ross — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 11:41:11 +0000

Approximately 95% if the web have bad seo and as a result have little to no traffic. (source)

How to detect these errors

The two main tools to check for seo errors are w3 validator and google lighthouse. These tools will tell you what to fix and in most cases how to fix them

How to fast track page indexing

Make posts on online communities(check the guidelines first) aswell as frequently updating your website.