Tobias Reithmeier

Part 1 of the four-part series "Humans, Agents, Mandates: The Web Learns Identity". Part 2 (Human or Machine?) follows on September 5, part 3 (When Your AI Agent Pays) on September 8, part 4 (When Your Agent Represents You) on September 12. Imagine losing

Part 6 of the series "Smart Home in Practice". Parts 2 to 5 brought the heat pump onto the local hub. Now comes the instance that turns it all into a system: a home-grown energy management. Part 7 shows the PV setup behind it, Part 8 takes stock. Energy m

There's a moment when many photographers question their Adobe subscription: the next price increase. In 2025 it happened again - the classic photography plan with 20 GB rose from 11.83 to 17.99 euros a month in Germany, and for new customers it was replac

Part 5 of the series "Smart Home in Practice". Part 3 connected the heat pump via Modbus, Part 4 identified the registers. Now comes the reward: values the vendor app never showed - and what they mean. The vendor app showed three things for my heat pump:

Anyone who buys a 3D printer prints a boat, a dragon and a phone stand in the first week - and then faces the real question: what is this thing actually good for? After years with several printers, countless spools of filament and a shop in the making, my

Part 4 of the series "Smart Home in Practice". Part 3 ended with the question of how you know what hides behind register 12 when no datasheet matches. Here is the answer - and it works for any Modbus device, not just heat pumps. Modbus is a wonderfully si

The password is dying - more slowly than announced every year, but by now visibly. Since May 2025, Microsoft has been creating new accounts without a password by default, Apple and Google have integrated passkeys deep into their systems, and major service

Part 3 of the series "Smart Home in Practice". Part 2 told why the heat pump is moving from the cloud to the local hub. This is the implementation - Part 4 covers the register hunt, Part 5 the diagnostics. The good news first: the indoor unit of the LG Th

Hardly any app ships without an AI feature these days - a chat assistant here, generated text or images there. Which raises the question for every app developer: what does the EU AI Act actually demand of me, and starting when? The short answer: less than

Part 2 of the series "Smart Home in Practice". Part 1 made the case for running this home locally. Parts 3, 4 and 5 show the implementation: wiring, register hunting, diagnostics. On 21 July 2026 at 05:05, my heat pump stopped talking to me. It did not st