I was updating a README.md and realized I was about to trigger a pointless pipeline build. Had I Googled it, it might have taken ten minutes to "StackOverflow" the answer. Instead, AI told me to add an exclusion to the YAML file’s trigger, and now I know:
Jan David Narkiewicz (Developer)
Tuesday, April 14, 2026
Azure Pipelines: Not triggering a build when README.md is edited
Wednesday, January 7, 2026
macOS: Capture Video's Frames using Bash
The blog will cover how to screenshot a video on macOS using Bash. Videos typically run at 24 FPS or 30 FPS, so taking a screenshot every second will likely capture a representative frame of the video. macOS provides a command-line utility, screencapture, that takes screenshots.
The man page for screencapture is viewed as follows:
Below is a screenshot showing the key command-line arguments of screencapture:
When running screencapture from a macOS terminal console, a window may be displayed by the system. Permission will have to be given for Terminal to access the computer’s screen and audio. Similarly, when running screencapture in a Bash script from Visual Studio Code, the same permissions will have to be granted to Visual Studio Code.
To screenshot a video, run the Bash script. Then display the video full screen. The script will capture an image each second. By default, the script runs for 26 minutes, as a great many shows are 24 minutes long. A command line is provided to change the script duration.
If you are reading this, you are a developer. The command line for the script is readable in the comments. The script is less than two hundred lines of code, but most of the work is processing the command line.
Here is the script in its entirety:
Tuesday, December 23, 2025
macOS: Configure Visual Studio Code to Run the Bash Debug Extension
The Bash Debug Extension, as of version 0.3.9, requires at least Bash 4.* or Bash 5.* to be installed. macOS natively has Bash 3.2 installed.
A convenient way to install Bash is with Homebrew. If Homebrew has not previously been installed, it can be installed as follows. From a terminal session, invoke the following to install Homebrew:
/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"
The Homebrew installer provides the following steps to finalize the installation for the current user:
Install Bash (currently 5.3.9) using Homebrew:
brew install bash
To run the latest Bash, specify the pathBash attribute in launch.json as follows:
Monday, September 29, 2025
Git Command-Line: Listing All Untracked Files
When a new folder is added to a local Git repo, "git status" only shows the folder name:
On branch bug/jdnark/1234408-Fix-Automation-Unzip
Untracked files:
(use "git add <file>..." to include in what will be committed)
CICDAutomation/
To see all the files that are untracked, and not just the folder, use the following:
An example of the files that are untracked is as follows:
Monday, September 22, 2025
Visual Studio Code: A launch.json for Python Development
Having spent years as a PowerShell developer, I find myself in need of a launch.json file for Python work. To add the launch.json file, create a new file under .vscode in Visual Studio Code. An example launch.json is as follows:
The configuration, Python: Current File, allows me to debug the current file I have open. The configuration, Python: Upload CVEs, is specific to a script I am debugging (upload_cve_docs.py) and the parameters associated with that script.
Older version of launch.json specified:
Using the above type attribute will display the following message as the attribute value python has been deprecated:
WSL/Ubuntu: Make Visual Studio Code Always Use Your Python Virtual Environment
Recall from WSL: Install Azure OpenAI SDK that in order to install the Azure OpenAI SDK on Ubuntu, a virtual environment had to be used. When running Visual Studio Code and developing with Python, the terminal associated with this virtual environment must be used; otherwise, the Azure OpenAI SDK-related packages will not be found.
This is not an issue when running an interactive terminal. Each time an interactive terminal is opened, .bashrc contains the following line, which facilitates access to the virtual environment:
The Ubuntu instance that is running will always access the virtual environment during development. Every time Visual Studio Code is launched from Ubuntu, the Python interpreter associated with the virtual environment must be used.
To set this behavior globally, as opposed to per-project, open Visual Studio Code from your WSL Ubuntu instance such as:
From Visual Studio Code, press Ctrl+Shift+P (Command Palette) and search for:
The example above is from my personal environment, so use your own specific virtual environment setup.
The python.defaultInterpreterPath setting points Visual Studio Code to your virtual environment. The setting python.terminal.activateEnvironment ensures it is auto-activated in the integrated terminal.
Once these changes have been made, save the file and close it.
Moving forward, every folder you open in Visual Studio Code will default to the virtual environment interpreter automatically.
This can also be configured on a per-folder basis by editing .vscode/settings.json, adding the following lines, and saving the file after modification:
Again, the settings shown above (python.defaultInterpreterPath) are specific to my environment, and you should use your own virtual environment settings.
Sunday, September 21, 2025
AI: Sample Dataset – National Vulnerability Database (NVD) CVE
Any AI needs seed data such as critical business data. With the help of ChatGPT, I created a Python app that downloads records from the National Vulnerability Database (NVD) CVE feed. This data is a structured dump of security vulnerability records retrieved from the REST endpoint:
The file size for all records in 2024 is approximately 100 MB. Be aware that Microsoft's documentation specifies Azure AI Search pricing as follows, where the size limit of the Free tier is 50 MB:
An example record retrieved from the National Vulnerability Database's CVE feed is as follows:
"id": "CVE-2024-12345",
"title": "Buffer overflow in XYZ software before 1.2.3 allows remote code execution.",
"description": "Buffer overflow in XYZ software before 1.2.3 allows remote attackers to execute code.",
"severity": "CRITICAL",
"score": 9.8,
"cwes": ["CWE-120"],
"references": ["https://vendor.com/security/advisory/123"],
"published": "2024-03-05T17:00:00Z",
"last_modified": "2024-05-01T12:34:00Z",
"source": "nvd"
}
The data endpoint rejects too many requests and cannot handle large requests. To work around this:
- A paging strategy was implemented where records were retrieved 120 days at a time.
- A current status checkpoint file, checkpoint.json, was maintained so the query could restart from the failure point.
- Iterations made use of timeouts (time.sleep) between page retrievals and between retries after errors.
On any failure, simply wait a few minutes and the code will restart from the last point of failure.
The Python code is as follows:




