Hello everyone!

It has been way too long since I posted here at the site. In fact, it has been two months as of today.

My last post was about some Edge (Chromium) updates in late September and prior to that I had three posts in July about mirroring your phone’s screen, the consolidation of links to Microsoft Insider programs into one page, and some early July updates on Windows 10 19H2 and 20H1 builds.

All of this was proceeded of course by the retirement of the Observed Tech PODCAST. After 311 episodes and 10 years of getting behind the mike on most weeks to keep an eye on tech, it was time to bring it to a close. Everyone’s response has been tremendous and so supportive – I appreciate so very much. By the way, since the show was closed out in mid-June, you all have continued to listen to Observed Tech from its archived shows. Over the course of the last four months 72 different episodes of the show have been listened to more than 2,100 times in total!

I know those are not crazy numbers but to me they are amazing because more than 2,100 listeners wanted to check out the show. Thanks for that!

OK – enough of the reminiscing. Let’s do that catching up thing shall we?

So the reason for such a long absence on the site is that we have started a new journey, we being my wife and I, as we learned this summer that we had been selected to begin formation as a Permanent Deacon in the Catholic Church. The application process took a little less than a year and included putting together documentation, filling out various forms, and a few different interviews.

We learned of our acceptance into the program about a month before our orientation. Since then it has been a combination of getting enrolled and starting classes online with the Pontifical College of Josephinum (Diaconate Institute) and beginning our local classes. Plenty to keep engaged and busy but learning and experience so much about my faith in this process. I acknowledged the call to the diaconate many years ago and now that journey has formally started and it is a true blessing in so many ways.

One way I am going to integrate my faith into my work here at WindowsObserver is a new podcast. Over the last several weeks, I have been working to establish a format for this new show and the time to get back behind the microphone is quickly approaching.

I have selected my intro/outro music which will be a portion of the song Mountains All Around Us by Scott Holmes. Roughly that cut runs from about 10 seconds into the song until about the 45 second mark. Scott graciously offers his music at no cost for non-commercial use and he has a great selection of stuff on his site if you are looking for music for your non-commercial purposes.

Next up is the podcast graphic but first it might help to share the show’s name – Faith, Tech, and Space.

Observed Tech listeners will know me for those last two subjects of tech and space. It is only natural that I continue to talk about those areas in this new show because they are areas I continue to be involved with and track. The faith part is likely a new thing about me for many of you but since it is such an important part of my life, as it has been and will be, then it is a key element of this new show. I intend to share some of my experience going through formation in the Permanent Diaconate, but to also talk about tech and its impact on faith and vice versa.

With that said, here is what the shows logo will look like:

Faith, Tech, and Space PODCAST Logo

The very talented graphic artist Florin Bodnarescu, aka @Sszecret on Twitter, created this. If his name is familiar, that is because he also created the new site logos for WindowsObserver and WinObs WiKi back in February of this year.

So with format, music, and graphics worked out – what is left to get the first episode recorded?

Well, I still have to figure out the ins and outs for adding a second podcast channel to WindowsObserver using the spectacular WordPress Powerpress plug-in from Blubrry. My plan is to keep the Observed Tech archive intact and in place and run Faith, Tech, and Space alongside that channel. This is possible using PowerPress – I just have to find the time to sit down and work it out plus do some testing.

The last aspect will be deciding on the frequency. Ideally, I would like to get back to a mostly weekly show, and that is potentially possible at certain down times of my formation when classes are not in session, but realistically I think every two weeks is more reasonable and occasionally once per month might be necessary.

In the world of tech, things move very fast, so this will impact the shows format and what subjects I cover depending on the time between shows. So expect a little bit of timely items to be discussed but also broader subjects that are not so time sensitive. However, just like Observed Tech in those early days, I imagine things will get adjusted along the way as I settle into the routine for the new show. I am very excited to bring this to all of you in the very near future.

Over the next few days, I am going to try and catch-up on some tech news here at WindowsObserver. That will includes updates about Windows 10 and its development, Microsoft’s Chromium based Edge browser, and Microsoft hardware updates.

Although I had to change my approach to link and content sharing on Twitter, just can’t risk another suspension for tweeting out good tech links, I am still quite active on Twitter everyday. Join me there if you have any questions about any of this information in the catch-up or just to say hello.