Puntos suspensivos...

S25 Half Marathon 2026

2026-04-24T16:53:00.002+02:00

This was posted on LinkedIn on 20th April

A year ago I would have thought this was impossible, and yet it happened yesterday. I finished my first race, a half marathon!

The real challenge has been keeping the discipline to show up for the training sessions on my own over the long cold winter, even if it meant running while snowing in the evenings or along frozen tracks in Grunewald. In retrospect, signing up for another race later in Spring or in early Summer would have been much better. Lesson learned for next time.

Kudos to my brother for coming all the way from Madrid to run along with me. Without him it would have been even harder. With him it was still hard but also fun, and this will become a core memory. Even more so as arriving at the Olympic Stadium through the marathon gate was truly magical.

Vacaciones 2026

2026-04-11T11:26:00.001+02:00

Busy previous week in Poznan - Gandía - Alcalá de Henares - Meco

Miles - Flixbus - bus - flight - underground - Cercanías - bus - Cercanías - high speed intercity train - Cercanías - bus - car - flight - regional train - S-Bahn - bus

LinkedIn Queens

2026-04-11T11:06:00.001+02:00

This makes me a bit proud, I have achieved many times top 10% and top 5% rankings. Around 20 days ago (forgot to post it here) was the first time I got to be in the top 1%. No idea if this is true or just engagement tactics though. Maybe there should be a queens.com, similar to chess.com

Puntos Suspensivos en papel

2026-03-13T08:25:00.000+01:00

Casi mil páginas, muchas fotos y muchas entradas en los casi diecinueve años del blog. Me encanta el detalle de diseño con los tres puntos en la banda, con uno diferente de color rojo en cada volumen.

Half Marathon preparations

2026-03-07T11:33:00.006+01:00

Only six weeks left until the S25 Half Marathon here in Berlin. Good that the weather has improved and the icy days are over. Quite some work to do though until race day. Today I was curious about the track so I plotted it in https://www.plotaroute.com/runningrouteplanner and I was pleased to see that it is mostly flat, and actually not much different from my usual training track. I also found out that I can generate gpx files and upload them to my mobile, which seems quite useful.

Maybe one weekend I will do my long run there to get familiar with the track.

Puntos Suspensivos 2007 - 2025

2026-02-28T09:02:00.002+01:00

Ya están en camino tres volúmenes con casi mil páginas en total con las entradas de este blog del 2007 al 2025. Todo mucho más rápido de lo que me pensaba.

more html tools

2026-02-07T22:38:00.006+01:00

Using AI I have created a landing page for whatever html tools I create in the future, even if they are only useful to myself. If curious, have a look at https://jccabrejas.github.io/

Splitting images

2026-01-31T13:19:00.001+01:00

Today I decided to scan an old album of photos from almost 30 years ago. To save some time and effort I started scanning the photos three at a time and then four at a time. Which of course means that photos need to be split later. For this I used this prompt with Gemini and it worked as a charm. First time I do not have to change anything in the code.

Build an artifact that lets me split a photo into several subphotos of equal size.

There needs to be a field in which the user can select the photo (upload from computer or paste).

There needs to be a field with a template for name of resulting subphotos

Then the user has three options to split the photos:

3 photos horizontal split

3 photos vertical split

4 photos

After one of these three options is selected the user will be able to review the result before each photo is saved (some guidelines will be overimposed to the original photoo). It will be possible to adjust the guidelines horizontally and vertically as appropriate)

Once reviewed it will be possible for the user to download each single photo. The name of the files will include the template provided previously by the user plus a string with time stamp to avoid duplications and overwriting existing files.

No React.

__________________________________________________________

From this

to this

HTML tools

2026-01-10T16:16:00.003+01:00

I came across Useful patterns for building HTML tools by Simon Willison and found it very interesting so decided to give it a try at some point, ie today.

A colleague will be running the London marathon and looking into the training plan, I thought it would have been nice for the organizers to allow you to download an ics file rather than a pdf file (or both). Something you can add to your calendar with no effort.

https://www.londonmarathonevents.co.uk/sites/default/files/2025-10/2026_TCSLM_Beginner_Training_Plan.pdf

So, enter html tools using Gemini. Needless to say, it took several iterations, so I really need to work on my prompts.

First prompt

Build an artifact that lets me open a pdf file. The file has a training plan to run a marathon and only pages 3 and 4 are relevant as they contain a table with the training plan. Pages 1 and 2 can be dismissed.

There needs to be a field in which the user can select the date of the marathon. The artifact will then generate calendar entries (ics file) for each day in the plan back from the date of the marathon. Each day is either a "Rest day" or a day in which you have to run or walk (or both). Rest days can be dismissed.

For each day in which there is a walk or run planned there is small text with a description.

It will be possible for the user to download those ics file. No React.

As an example, if the selected date is April 26 2026, then the plan will start 16 weeks before.

Second prompt

Dismiss the parsing logic and simply include the text in each cell of the table for running days

At this point I remembered that Excel can parse pdf into columns so I gave it a try (not perfect) and changed the prompt so that it would accept a slightly edited excel table (maybe I should have tried uploading the excel file instead)

Third prompt

ok, the parsing of the pdf file is not working. Instead of loading a pdf file, the user can paste an excel table. First column has week number, columns 2 to 8 have plans for each day of the week

Fourth prompt

That did not quite work. Each cell has text delimited with inverted commas ("). All text needs to be part of the training activity. Do not dismiss Rest days, however do not include them in the ics file

Fifth prompt

all text within " characters needs to be displayed, not only the first row

Sixth prompt

This looks good, please express distance in km, not miles

Seventh prompt

MIN stands for minutes, not miles

Eight prompt

This looks good. It should be possible to edit rach row in the schedule

After these prompts, which did not really take long, I got this (note it works even with typos in the last prompt, yes, read it again). Nice and sweet.

2025: A year in review

2026-01-03T14:15:00.001+01:00

Now that the holidays are almost over, it is a good time to write about 2025 before the normal routine starts. All in all, 2025 was a pretty good year. Holidays again played a big role, and similar to 2024 this was mainly because of sharing them with family. We spent a few days in Easter and in October to enjoy the sun in Spain, enjoyed a busy Summer road trip to Belgium and Netherlands with one of my nieces and, again, but not quite the same, I took on the challenge of the Camino de Santiago, this time with my brother. Difficult to say what was the highlight of the year with so many good breaks. Following on what hopefully by now is a tradition, I wrote a couple of booklets with my travel notes, both or the Camino and the business trip to India.

If I thought I did well in 2024 regarding keeping physically active, 2025 was in a league of its own. I lost more than 10 kilos in six months through a combination of running, exercise and better nutrition, focusing on creating habits rather than quick returns. I started again the C25K programe and ended up running 10 km several times through the year, not to forget the multiple times I have been to Teufelsberg on 20+ km treks training for the Camino. No surprise then that the 165 km in early September including a 50 km final day was more fun than pain.

Work wise, another very busy and successful year thanks to the great team, which keeps changing and evolving and never stops to amaze me with their skill and dedication. 2026 will be again a busy year in which I am making my best to see challenges as opportunities while still trying to have fun and enjoy what we are building.

Civil ET&S Award 2025

2025-12-14T12:52:00.003+01:00

Posted in LinkedIn earlier this week

What a great way to finish the year, really honoured to be part of the team which has received the Civil ET&S Award in the Engineering Excellence category.

Nice example of how collaboration across Services, Digital & Engineering working as one team towards a common objective really makes a difference.

Kimon Abu-Taa, Theodora Tzortzoglou, Christian Otterbach, Oguzhan Bozkurt, Theresa Robinson, Łukasz Więckowski, Alberto Bava, José Manuel Sarrión Navarro, Luca Fontana, Pasquale D'Urso

Business trip to India

2025-12-05T08:55:00.001+01:00

I posted this in LinkedIn a few days ago

Kristian Harder and I visited Tata Consultancy Services in Bangalore and Pune two weeks ago, and I would like to thank the whole team for making us feel truly welcome, specially our hosts Anil Gangolli, Ronney Samuel and Sneha Sikchi (Malpani).

Our teams have been working together for several years and there is a strong foundation to continue our collaboration, based on our common commitment to deliver high quality data and software products. Thanks for letting us take part in your townhall meetings to provide context on Business Aviation and how we use data to drive decisions and enable value.

On a more personal note, playing cricket for the first time and doing it in India will be a cherished memory.

Mumbai airport

2025-11-28T18:11:00.002+01:00

India - Bangalore and Pune

2025-11-28T18:09:00.003+01:00

Business trips are always busy and you end up seeing hotels, airports, offices and restaurants (if you are lucky). Not everything is nice, however there is always a chance to capture beauty when you see things through the eye of a photographer

Doha

2025-11-28T17:58:00.003+01:00

Turns out you can see a fair amount of Doha in a long layover en route to somewhere else, which is what I did a couple of weeks ago. Just get a transit visa, jump in the metro with a day pass and be willing to do quite some walking (we clocked over 30 thousand steps).

Camino 2025

2025-09-13T10:00:00.000+02:00

Camino Planner: Godesalco.com

Yet another incredible adventure on the Camino de Santiago!

2025-09-13T09:08:00.000+02:00

Over seven days last week, my brother and I walked ~165 km from St Jean Pied de Port to Logroño. We faced plenty of challenges, from an extremely rainy and steep first stage—an 8 km climb to a refuge at 800m after a nine-hour journey—to a scorching 50 km final day in 30°C heat. That last day alone set a new personal record for most steps: a whopping 72k!

This experience felt very different from last year's journey. It was a powerful testament to how much my physical condition has improved, and a great reminder that my training and wellness goals are paying off.

As always on the Camino, we met many amazing fellow pilgrims. It was inspiring to connect with those on their full journey to Santiago, not just walking a few days like us.

This journey wasn't about stepping out of my comfort zone, but rather about expanding it. The rewarding feeling of meeting a great challenge is what I've come to know as "type 2 fun."

Here's to a greater sense of well-being and more rewarding adventures ahead!

#CaminoDeSantiago #Wellness #OutdoorAdventure #Gratitude #PersonalGrowth

This was originally posted in LinkedIn

Running and hiking is fun

2025-06-28T13:22:00.003+02:00

It's been a while since the last post. Running is going great, I finished the C25K as planned and kept running regularly two or three times per week, at some point starting to do slightly longer routes. And then, all of a sudden, last week I went out for an easy 6 km run, however half way through I decided to make it 8 km and a bit later I thought I may as well do 10 km. Slow average pace of 6'47", pretty constant pace throughout (max 6'42" and min 6'47") despite a few unexpected ups and downs in the unplanned route. Even better, when I finished, I was tired but not exhausted and definitely proud of myself, quite some progress in the last months.

At the same time I have been doing some longer walks each weekend, around 20 km each, with a full backpack and with repeat ups and downs in Teufelsberg Rodelberg. Training for El Camino!

C25K 2025 edition

2025-03-25T20:28:00.008+01:00

I started jogging again a few weeks ago. In fact, tomorrow I will start week 4, so far so good.

PS April 11th: Finishing week six, 25 minutes without stops. From now on, it´s "just" 25, 28 & 30 minutes of running in weeks seven, eight and nine. Almost there and it feels like I could run 30 minutes already now anyway.

C25k Plan | Couch to 5k - C25K Running Program

El pájaro grande se come al pequeño

2025-02-14T20:27:00.000+01:00

Muy apropiado en estos tiempos que corren en los que parece que la ley del más fuerte está a punto de imponerse.

Bluesky posts and followers

2025-02-07T20:49:00.001+01:00

Now that I am posting a random photo each day, I find myself looking forward to see which one will be posted. A few days ago an old photo got almost 300 likes and yesterday another old photo got also ~300 likes and over 30 reposts.

I have also been looking at my followers in Bluesky, most of which follow me because of one list I am in.

~1.2k followers. Number of posts of each account is shown both as color map and size of the bubble (also log scale dealing with accounts with 0 & 1 posts as if they have 1.5 posts to avoid minus infinite or zero size).

Insights

~300 accounts have not posted at all yet. They may be new accounts, or they may be lurkers.

About half of the followers have less than ten posts

~80 accounts have more than 1000 posts

1 account has over 25k posts (!) and as far as I can see, it is not a bot.

PS Feb 8th: I will run this as a cron job each week. Let´s see what it looks like in one year time.

Even more flet adventures

2025-02-03T11:11:00.004+01:00

The automated posts of random photos started well, however I wanted to have customized messages for each photo. That means writing a short message for each one. Not difficult, but tedious. Enter Gemini and flet.

I used this prompt to create a skeleton script of what I wanted. Of course the script did not work out of the box even after a few attempts. Still, good enough to start the debugging and make something useful.

I would like to create a flet app which allows the following:

-select folder with images (jpg and png file formats). Do not use filedialog for this. Use filepicker

-for each photo, the user can create image captions which are saved in separate text files (same name as photo, just with .txt extension)

I ended up with less than 80 lines of code to create this mini tool, which made the whole task a lot easier. At some point I may give a try to one of the image captioning ai models in Huggingface. Just not sure I want my photos captioned without supervision and the posted.

PS: I downloaded the Salesforce/blip-image-captioning-base model from Huggingface and gave it a try. Considering the low effort the hit rate is not bad. Still, not something I would trust being posted without supervision. The automated text generated for the five photos above was:

a photography of a rose

a photography of a road in paris

a photography of a clay sculpture of a man with a boxing glove

a photography of a jet engine

a photography of the tokyo tower

PPS: For comparison, I got myself an API key for Google Gemini and used "Describe this photo. The resulting text must have at most 250 characters." Wow. This is not even the latest model, as I used Gemini 1.5 Flash

A single, red rose, partially open, is shown against a blurred green background. The rose's petals are a blend of deep red and lighter pink, showcasing delicate texture. The stem and leaves are visible.

A high-angle, long shot reveals a wide, tree-lined avenue cutting through a lush green park. Vehicles travel along the road, leading toward a distant cityscape under a cloudy sky. A television tower is visible on the horizon.

A small ceramic figurine, resembling a gnome, sits on a white surface. It has a large red nose, brown body, and a dark green hat. The background is plain white.

Black and white photo of a large turbofan engine. The engine's fan blades are prominent, filling most of the frame. It's displayed indoors, in what appears to be an airport terminal.

Tokyo Tower, a red and white lattice tower, rises above lush green trees under a partly sunny sky. The tower is partially obscured by the foliage.

P³S 5th Feb: Posts will now have the AI generated description as Alt text

Hello automated posting of photos in Bluesky

2025-01-31T17:56:00.003+01:00

I posted a daily photo in IG for a long long time. This time round, I will be posting a photo each day in Bluesky using a script. Plus it is a random photo from a folder containing a few hundred of them, so it is also a surprise for me which one ges published each day. I would love to add Alt text, but that would require to run them all through some sort of AI (aka learning how to automate it). Not quite sure about that from the ethical point of view (plus who says the descriptions will be any good). On the other hand, creating descriptions for hundreds of photos is quite some work. Need to think about it.

More flet adventures

2025-01-19T17:05:00.004+01:00

After getting the photo collage desktop app to a reasonable state, I am looking now at using it as a web app, which turns out to be reasonably straight forward, although a few tweaks are required here and there. I got myself a small server in the cloud to do some trials and so far I managed to set up nginx as a reverse proxy, set up certificates with certbot, and set up two separate apps side by side which are launched as services.

Lots of learning. Also plenty of issues to fix so it shows well on mobiles and tablets and to manage upload and download of files. Still, plenty of fun.

Good bye, CalendarPuzzle bot in twitter

2025-01-18T16:12:00.003+01:00

After a bit more than three years, today the CalendarPuzzle posted its last post in Twitter. Sorry for the followers there, I do hope that they will make their way to Bluesky and follow the bot posting there.