Mega issue: Coding AI agents that blew my mind, Pixel pup makes a cameo, Pocket shuts down
Plus, BBC's bald baby Merlin, an upcycle project of the week, my latest video, Patrick Stewart weirdness, and AI website builders that fail
I’m David Gewirtz. Welcome to this week’s Advanced Geekery newsletter. It’s been an exciting week. Let’s dive in.
Welcome new readers!
We had a big surge in new subscribers this week. Welcome everybody! Grab a cup of your favorite beverage and make yourselves comfortable. I pushed out a double batch of articles this week, plus there’s a bunch more cool stuff to enjoy.
My latest video
Now that the Anycubic Kobra 3 Combo is working, it’s time to finally set up the Kobra S1, Anycubic’s Bambu X1 clone. Here’s that build, along with a cameo from Pixel.
My articles
Here’s a quick recap of the articles I published in the last week on ZDNET.
Copilot's Coding Agent brings automation deeper into GitHub workflows: Microsoft just gave GitHub Copilot the power to create, modify, and submit code independently. Here's what this approach means for developers, workflows, and the future of programming careers.
OpenAI upgrades ChatGPT with Codex - and I'm seriously impressed (so far): With the new Codex AI agent, entire development tasks can now be handed off to the cloud.
I let Google's Jules AI agent into my code repo and it did four hours of work in an instant: In the time it took to make coffee, Google Jules rewrote major parts of my code. I didn't just watch it work, I shipped its changes. This is real. But there are also real big caveats.
Mozilla is so out of Pocket for shutting down one of my favorite apps: With years of carefully saved reading material at risk, longtime users of the social bookmarking service are furious. Here's what happens now.
The remote work essentials small business teams are relying on in 2025: Small businesses are ditching cubicles and embracing flexibility. Here's how digital workspaces and smarter collaboration tools are driving the new era of hybrid productivity.
Looking for an AI-powered website builder? Here's your best option in 2025: If you think AI website builders are plug-and-play, think again. My in-depth test revealed inconsistent tools, missed opportunities, and a clear winner you might not expect.
Must-watch YouTube
Moving on, let’s queue up some interesting YouTube videos for your entertainment and edification.
I’ve always found Disney World to be a horrid place, but the engineering that drives it can be fascinating. In this video, a civil engineer describes why Disney World has no mosquitoes.
I don’t think this is a joke and it’s almost too weird to be a hoax. Patrick Stewart (the octogenarian, not the 80s TNG version) is in some kind of spaceship bridge shilling for, and I sh#t you not, DeLorean. Yeah, the car company, or at least a car company. Or something having to do with blockchain. Seriously, this makes no sense. Here’s the about page. Let us know in the comments if you can parse this into anything other than an AI hoax.
After that, let’s lighten things up a byte. Sebastian the crab sings to Ariel about the benefits of programming in C.
Tool (and project) of the week
My wife and I decided to update our ancient, rusty metal mailbox. We used a few cans of spray paint, inhaled noxious fumes, got paint all over ourselves, and made magic upcycling our own mailbox.
The standoffs holding it up are shipping corners from the Anycubic S1 from the video at the beginning of this issue.
We used two coats of Rustoleum 2X Gloss White paint+primer. But, because the local hardware store guy told us to never trust a paint+primer to truly function as an actual primer (he said “Prime the world!” and used whole bunch of salty words about how your paint will chip off if you trust a paint+primer), we first used two coats of Rustoleum Universal Bonding Primer. By the way, we bought both of these at our local hardware store (support your local hardware store!), even spending a few bucks less than the price Amazon is hawking them for.
My tool of the week, though, is something I bought on Amazon because our local primer fanatic doesn’t stock it (he probably thinks that real men don’t need spray triggers).
That said, the little spray trigger mod shown in the first picture above is a huge help. We still got paint all over everything, but it was much easier to control the spray with the trigger action than it would have been by pushing down the tip of the can.
Note: As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
Interesting reads
And now, some good stuff from around the Internet, well worth checking out.
Tom’s Hardware has a piece on the probably rising price of 3D printing.
Apparently, Merlin appears as a “balding child who issues edicts to King Arthur wearing no underwear.” This according to a BBC story about a newly-recovered 700 year old manuscript entitled, Suite Vulgate du Merlin.
Yeah. That’s a good place to stop. Hard to top a bald baby Merlin. Stay tuned for more next week. In the meantime, hang in and rock on.
Send in your projects
I’d like to regularly spotlight a reader project or two here. Your project doesn’t have to be a big Kickstarter launch. If you’ve built something cool, it has some pretty pictures, and you’re proud of it, I might be able to share it here.
If you have a photogenic reader project, send an email to me at david@zatz.com with the subject “READER PROJECT,” a few pictures, and a short one-paragraph description. If you have a social media link or a link to the project, include that, too.
Both my EPs are now streaming
Available on all your favorite streaming services.
More clicky
I’ve got a lot happening all over the web. Here are links to my various stuff:
House of the Head: home for my published music
ZATZ Labs: where I host my published software projects
Feel free to dig around, visit, and say hey!
Leave some comments
Substack supports comments, so feel free to leave some. I promise to read them. Just, please, let’s keep our personal politics out of any discussion.
That should do it for this week. This newsletter is really starting to pick up subscribers. Please help it out by sharing links on all your socials.
Have a great week!
Disney World has no mosquitoes. -- you might want to look at the comments