Blog entries from July, 2026

When I originally setup Zigbee2MQTT on a Pi I followed the recommended path for Linux, which was to install Node.JS, clone the Zigbee2MQTT repo and then start it up. That first startup would install dependencies and build the app.

Over time I was able to at least once use the provided upgrade script to upgrade to the latest version in-place, but it then got to a point where the upgrade would crash the Pi and fail. Due to the Pi I am using only has 512MB (some reserved for video which I don’t use) one recommendation was to set memory limits for the build, but that just caused the build to fail with an out of memory error.

So I didn’t upgrade.

I knew I needed to get the upgrades working so when I started considering upgrading the Pi I use for Kodi an additional benefit was that I could replace the Pi 3 A+ with a Pi 3 B+ that has double the memory. But then what would I use the current A+ for? It felt a bit of a waste to upgrade the hardware for just the build process, because otherwise the A+ is running Zigbee2MQTT fine.

I preparation for a potential new install of Zigbee2MQTT I went back and reviewed the install instructions, which is when I found that their recommendation is now to just use Docker. I am fine with using multiple docker containers on my linux box to run various services, but it still felt a bit wrong to have a computer for a single task running a full operating system which then runs docker for a single container…

But it works and I have now upgraded Zigbee2MQTT to the latest version without upgrading hardware.

Later this month I am heading up to Sydney and have built in three full days to wander around with my camera. As well as researching new places to go I was also looking back at my past photos, only to find that on a previous trip in 2008 (the early days of me having a DSLR) I had only done something with two images, and then left the rest.

While there were no spectacular shots, there was enough there to end up with a decent selection so I put them up as an album: Sydney 2008

I then looked further into my older photos and found a few more trips or events where I had more unprocessed photos, so I worked my way through them and put up four more albums:

• Puffing Billy 2009
• Yarra Valley Hot Air Ballooning 2009
• Cape Otway Day Trip 2010
• Phillip Island 2011

My photos after these have been suitably processed, so now I need to get back to what I have taken over the last year.