Useful Software, TV Dramas, Home Servers

Dearest Gentle Reader,

February has whizzed past. I spent the month working hard, watching TV, and tinkering with my spanking new home server setup. February's soundtrack has been a Spotify playlist called Lost in Translation. It's been on loop. I haven't been able to stop listening to it. Some of the Brazilian (?) / Portuguese (??) songs in the playlist are SO good. They remind me of the movie Chef for some reason. Funny brain with its funny associations.

Useful Software

My first major product launch at work happened at the beginning of the month. Kagi Translate is now available on Android and iOS! You can read more about the launch on the Kagi blog.

It feels GREAT to get this one out the door. I've been working on it ever since I joined Kagi. The app took many shapes and forms during the course of development. Shipping the first version has been a huge weight off my shoulders. I can now shift gears into an iteration mindset to make the app better and better!

This launch marked several milestones for me: my first launch at Kagi, my first product launch featured on Reddit (oof!), and the first time I launched something I considered to be 'useful software'. I have worked as a professional software engineer for close to eight years now. Yet, there have been only a few instances where I felt like I built something truly useful to people. That's unfortunately the reality of most jobs in tech. What you make doesn't really get used in any meaningful way. You're serving a client, who's serving a CEO, instead of building things for a real group of users. That is why this launch is extra special. I feel fortunate to be able to provide a valuable tool to a passionate group of Kagi users.

The initial response has been lovely. We got some press by The Intelligence, Fast Company, and regional publications like Tuga Tech (translated article here). More than press, I've loved reading and responding to feedback coming in from the Apple and Google Play stores.

Take Translate for a spin the next time you want to translate something. The app also has a built-in dictionary which can be used to search words and phrases in any language. There is also a nifty little proofreading tool. My favourite, however, is how we do image translation. We do contextual translation, rather than literal translations that bigger players like Google and Apple do. This lets us translate a food menu for you and provide you with the translated menu and rich information about the dishes on the menu.

Download Kagi Translate for Android or iOS.

DRAMA!

It's been too frickin long since I watched a proper television drama series. Over the last six months or so, my girlfriend and I fell into the trap of watching familiar, comfort sitcoms. How I Met Your Mother to be exact. We were having a good time with the show. One night, we randomly decided to start watching The Crown. It was my first time watching it and her second. And, WOW did it feel SO good to watch. Comedies are great. They are comfortable and light. But, BOY did we miss something nice and meaty. The Crown is a perfect comeback show too. So many layers to it: national politics, family politics, history, scandal. Delicious.

Bridgerton is back for its fourth season too. It's not as complex or meaty as The Crown, but we're big fans. I've been enjoying the latest season, much more than the last one. We're left with one episode. Excited to finish it as soon as I hit publish on this newsletter.

It feels good to be watching dramas again.

Home Server Land

After contemplating and researching for months, I bought a mini PC and dove head first into the world of home servers. The primary objective for my server is to run a Plex media server. Plex is a neat little tool that allows you to stream any of your media (movies, music, photos) to literally any device. Suppose you — cough cough — have a digital copy of a movie you own as a DVD. Load it onto Plex and you can stream the movie on your phone or TV.

Now, you might ask why this is so special. If you have a digital copy, why can't you just put it on your phone and then watch it? Yes, you can of course do that. However, the beauty of Plex is that once you add your media to it, you can make it available to others too. You can even watch the media with others with synced playback. Think Netflix party but for your personal media. When I first learned about this, it was a total game changer for me. I could finally watch all the movies and TV shows I own as DVDs and Blurays with my long distance girlfriend. Magic.

For the last few years, I've been running Plex on the cloud on a virtual computer. You have to pay a monthly subscription for this. At the end of 2025, I decided that it was worth the effort to set up a server at home instead. Hardware innovations over the years has made doing such a project super accessible. Just look at how adorable the mini PC is:

So smol. So strong. I call it The Intersect. IYKYK

I've been tinkering with Intersect this past month and have learned a ton about networking, running home servers, linux, port forwarding, and the pain of dealing with Indian ISPs. The Plex server is up and running. I am still ironing things out as I use the server. My YouTube feed is now filled with videos about home servers. I have more ideas about what I can do with The Intersect. I want to try and set up a tool called OpenClaw next to use as my personal AI assistant. Immich is next on the cards to let me build-my-own-Google-Photos at home. Exciting!

That's another issue of CC wrapped up. Thank you for reading till the end. I hope you're enjoying the newsletter so far. I certainly am. I feel like I have a rhythm and some momentum with these now. I have the itch to experiment more with the format too. Maybe some recurring segments? Music recommendations? Apps? What would you like to see more? Hit reply and let me know!

I've started transitioning from hot to cold coffee. Iced pour-over coffee is back. Iced lattes will follow soon. Winter rituals are getting replaced with summer ones. Time goes on and so shall we. Stay hydrated, buds! C'mon C'mon!

More soon,