Clete's Blog

Terraform AWS QuickSight User Pruning Module

Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I created a Terraform module that saves you money by cleaning up unused AWS QuickSight users. By default, AWS charges a monthly fee for each user provisioned in QuickSight, indefinitely. This module scans for unused users and automatically deletes them, saving money. It is called terraform-aws-quicksight-user-pruning-module.

I also wrote a blog post about it at the official State Farm Engineering blog and feel free to leave me a comment below if you have any thoughts to share.

BitTime

Wed, 08 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0000

BitTime is a binary clock app for macOS, iOS, iPadOS, and watchOS that shows the current time in binary. Choose from multiple formats and themes. Other features include complications (watchOS), widgets (iOS + iPadOS + macOS), and spotlight support (iOS + iPadOS + macOS).

Requirements

macOS 13.0+, iOS/iPadOS 17.0+, or watchOS 10.0+

Privacy Policy

BitTime does not collect, store, or transmit any data. All processing happens entirely on your device.

Pagemaxxer

Sun, 05 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Pagemaxxer is an iOS Safari Web Extension that rewrites article text into slang from various eras and cultures. It is powered by Apple’s on-device Foundation Models (Apple Intelligence). Everything runs locally on your device with no server involved.

How It Works

While browsing Safari, tap the extension and press the button. The extension intelligently locates the article body and sends each paragraph through Apple Intelligence for transformation. The rewritten text replaces the original in-place on the page.

UniFi USW-Lite-8-PoE Switch Only Supports 21 Character SNMP v2c Community String

Fri, 14 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Having trouble? Reduce your community string length

Improving my e-mail IP reputation automation script

Fri, 22 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Introduction

In Improving e-mail IP reputation with automation, I described a Python script that selects a random e-mail from a large list of e-mails, sends it to a target e-mail address, and another script which marks all emails at the destination as read.

Originally my solution was working great. My IP reputation was good, and all my legitimate e-mails were being delivered.

The Problem

Unfortunately, I was running this on a small EC2 server, and I was running out of CPU credits and it was also causing excessive disk I/O due to swap usage.

Default CloudWatch Log Retention

Thu, 21 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

I created a Terraform module that sets a default log retention period for all CloudWatch Log groups in a region. It saves money by deleting old, unneeded logs. It is called terraform-aws-default-log-retention.

I also wrote a blog post about it at the official State Farm Engineering blog and feel free to leave me a comment below if you have any thoughts to share.

About

Mon, 07 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

I work for a Fortune 50 company, where I am a Principal Technology Engineer. My focuses at work include improving engineer experience and enabling innovative new technology approaches. I’m active in recruiting activities. My daily job puts me in a position where I am able to help others make their apps better, which is something I love.

Skills

I tend to dabble in a little of everything from infrastructure to data to application development. My interests primarily center around the application development world. I’m enthusiastic about using open source software to build solutions quickly and with quality.

Terraform for backing up Arq to S3 Glacier Deep Archive

Sat, 04 Mar 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Introduction

AWS S3 Glacier Deep Archive can be a cost-effective method to back up your files in a secure manner to the cloud. I’ve written about the costs in the past, and now I’d like to show you how to get a S3 bucket and credentials set up to back up to Glacier Deep Archive easily.

To create the AWS resources, we’ll use Terraform, which is a multi-cloud Infrastructure-as-Code product. The major benefit of using Terraform is that the configuration is automatically managed by code and not reliant on a user manually clicking in the console to create resources, which can be error prone. Terraform makes managing and scaling infrastructure easy.

Improving API Performance with HTTP Keepalive

Sun, 05 Jun 2022 00:00:00 +0000

It’s been a while since I’ve written on my personal blog. That’s because I’ve been busy writing a large article for the official State Farm Engineering blog! I’m really excited about this blog post because it provides a major tangible and easy-to-adopt benefit for many cross-platform APIs.

Please give the full blog post a read at the official State Farm Engineering blog and feel free to leave me a comment below if you have any thoughts to share.

DynamoDB Ingestion to an Enterprise Data Lake

Wed, 14 Jul 2021 00:00:00 +0000

I wrote my first blog post on the State Farm Engineering blog! It’s all about DynamoDB data lake ingestion and how I arrived at my first implemented design.

Please give the full blog post a read at the official State Farm Engineering blog. Feel free to leave me a comment below if you have any thoughts to share.

Improving e-mail IP reputation with automation

Wed, 03 Mar 2021 00:00:00 +0000

The Ban

Thanks, Microsoft

This past Saturday, I replied to a long-running e-mail thread with an invitation to join a Zoom meeting for Sunday School class the next day.

That’s pretty standard right? It’s literally copy/pasted from Zoom’s website. I’m certain that millions of such messages have been sent this past year. Wrong I was! My IP has had nothing but good e-mails coming from it for the past few years, but this one stepped over the line. Microsoft, which owns Live, MSN, Outlook, and Hotmail, decided to block my server.

Backup to Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive - Cost Analysis

Tue, 16 Feb 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Overview

Think about your backup plan. Do you have one? Ideally you should be following something similar to the 3-2-1 backup strategy of having 3 copies of data: two local and one offsite. I personally follow a modified strategy of 2 local and 2 offsite. One offsite is on a server that I own in another state, and the other is stored in Amazon S3.

For my backups, I use Arq Backup. The strategy described below will work with other solutions too, but note that my experience is solely with Arq.

Hello World!

Tue, 16 Feb 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Hello… world?

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public static void main(String[] args) {
  System.out.println("Hello World!");
}

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export default () => {
  console.log("Hello World!")
}

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def __main__:
  print("Hello World!")

package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
  fmt.Println("Hello World!")
}

Who are you?

Professionally, I’m a technology enthusiast. As a kid, I broke the family desktop frequently enough that my parents bought me my own computer. My dad brought home a Red Hat Linux CD set one day and I installed my first Linux OS. From there, I started getting into programming, beginning with Visual Basic 6, followed by PHP. I dove into Gentoo Linux where I learned a lot about the inner workings of operating systems. Gentoo has a heavy emphasis on compiling your own Linux kernel. I spent hours going through every kernel menu, looking at every module, picking my scheduler, and tuning it to the nth degree. I chose my compiler arguments and heated my room by recompiling the entire OS multiple times.