mighty_atomic_c

I've had some success converting an old printer to do pen plotting, but I haven't tried PCB manufacture yet because Sharpie marker does not do a sufficient, reliable job at working as a mask. I haven't been able to even use it to touch up my own projects!

My experience is mostly with warmed Ferric Chloride as the etchant, so perhaps ymmv with other etchants. However, in my case, glossy photo paper + laserjet transferred with clothes or hair iron (a tedious and awful process) works well, but Sharpie has not been able to help me touching up any areas damaged by the transfer.

If anyone else has a better mask suggestion than Sharpie, I could try out that sort of thing instead.

For a while I committed to at least using DDG for sanitization/anonymisation of my Google searches with bangs:

  !g <query>

There is always value in trying other engines, but it's come such a long way since I've first started using it exclusively about four years ago.

Watch the range over time, though. The cells in even the latest Nissan Leafs do not have any charge or temperature conditioning for the batteries, so they are likely to age poorly basically anywhere with more than 1 season.

If you care for the batteries nicely (drive slow, don't slam accelerator, avoid winter), I'm sure they'll last a good long time, but the battery is a consumable that will need to be replaced sooner than most other major components, I think the Leaf has them under the rear seats, and may be a pain to deal with. If your Leaf has fast charging, it's advised to avoid using it too often because it will heat the batteries and may reduce charge over time.

I guess the skimping of quality here seems short-sighted, but every EV has some weird, questionable choices to cut down on weight.

It is a matter of order. First, we learn how to terraform ourselves out of our inadvertent unhelpful terraflopping, then we use that learning to terraform anywhere we go. :)

> No one "pioneered the west". Various groups of people with powerful technology traveled west and stole land from other groups of people.

The people crossing the land bridge to North America from Asia pioneered the west. Or perhaps they considered it East since that's the direction they took to get here. Anyway, I think the point is that humans have an insatiable desire to explore. We have adapted to so many adverse climates here on Earth. And we got around quick with just a lot of bravery, teamwork, and cleverness. I've read that early peoples coming out of Africa swam from the eastern portion towards modern-day Yemen, and then there are the incredibly skilled Polynesian sailors of the Pacific.

> ... without prioritizing equalizing the gains of science and exploration and those gains actively stratify society further.

Technology is all about tools. Science is a process by which we build knowledge. They are not good or evil on their own, that is ultimately a reflection of whomever leverages these tools. I agree that equitability is not a default; privileged few can use their advantages to gain influence, and then repeat until monopoly or oligarchy come to pass.

> I am trying to make a case for focusing out scientific efforts of improving the lives of everyone on the planet. Without spreading the achievements of science and technology to everyone on the planet, humanity is doomed.

Sure, that's a reasonable thing to argue for and I broadly agree. Not all technology benefits humanity; making better bombs with science and technology does harm. Better surveillance measures undermines privacy, and these abuses of science and technology can stalk and kill just as readily as they can benefit us all. It all depends on how it is used.

But space exploration is something that really benefits humanity! There was a boon of technology that benefitted everyone in the wake of the hubbub of the space race. I don't know how it rates with all the other things we could possibly spend money on improving society, maybe below feeding the desperately hungry and below ecological restoration of course. But space has been a great, diverse source of technology, an infinite fount of curiosities, and I believe that if many more people gaze at the Earth from orbit, that a more global perspective will emerge, and this in turn could help direct funds to better causes.

Oh my Goddess, there is nothing worse than hearing: "It's on the website".

Yeah, that's unhelpful if "the website" is a sprawling, vast wasteland. Finding a specific thing on an obese, convoluted site is like trying to find the bucket of ice cream in Siberia. I always check the site first, so if I am calling... it's because your website is pretty bad.

So if I do find the thing I need and it is broken, then I call and dodge the idiot AI, and the beleaguered agent or offers the pathetic advice of: "It's on the website". I tell them it doesn't work, and this has led to two outcomes, either the agent tries to do it and it is so broken and fucked up that they tell me that's it's down and I have to call back or try the website days or weeks later, or I am lucky and the agent has to do a tedious task that I would have preferred to do myself online.

Oh my goodness, I love icarus verilog, I wish there was a push to get to icarus systemverilog...

... or a more recent version of the verilog standards ...

Same reason you can't drug up or taze the special goose to produce more golden eggs.

Long term high intensity output will lead to burnout, even if the salary is 10x people would struggle and crash. Pushing at 100% full enthusiasm is like sprinting, it is not possible to maintain that intensity for very long. It can be fun, it can be productive, but the wiser approach has the long-term and end in mind.

Oh no! My mother's maiden name is _invalid_!

Just go with the snark and out in a joke answer that you will find funny. Some of my security questions are hilariously inapplicable, so the first silly, snarky thing I think up is likely to be memorable. It is also a little hard to guess unless you know me really well to an unlikely degree, and it won't stick out as much as a sore thumb in multi-choice situations.

"The Dispossessed" was incredibly interesting abd my favorite novel from Le Guin so far.

6 characters? Let me guess, were there restrictions on character space and case?

One place I had an account has a password input that restricts all of those, so it's like an 8-10 character string of all capital letters. I don't understand it at all.

Necronomicon quote? Nice. This has me thinking about what I can do to make my security answers to security questions untethered from PII. A book quote is a really good idea.

Can confirm. I had a trippy experience where I had on one monitor some RTL+simulation for our chip up for view, on another I had the PCB schematic I had helped design, and on my third I had the GUI and embedded toolchain development environments up, and on my desk I had an oscilloscope measuring that PCB running that firmware. It was basically rolling through the list and really fun!

Sous vide burssels sprouts?

I mean, sous vide is amazing, but have you ever had your sprouts crispy? I used to be pretty indifferent to them until my fiancee cooked them up crispy.

Hmm... Now I'm thinking about food, oh look, its lunchtime.