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chiph

8,813 karma · joined June 28, 2012

chip holland dot com
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chiph··on Mercurial, 20 years and counting: how are we still alive and kicking? [video]
I just installed it on a Raspberry Pi (with an otherwise too-small-for-any-other purpose SSD) for use at home. I wanted something with low power consumption, and I didn't want to have a single point of failure by running it in a container alongside everything else.

The only hiccup was forgetting that when pushing via the SSH connection, it will have paths relative to the home directory of my hg user.

chiph··on They Said It Would Cost $54M. We Said "No Thanks."
> They understand the business processes they’re digitizing.

I feel this has more importance than they think. Outside consultants would not have had this domain knowledge and would have spent months learning it. And then would have had to fix their mistakes because they misunderstood something (billed to the province, naturally)

chiph··on Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes
Thank you for posting this. I have enabled them at home and work. I am really tired of having to look for a window's shadow to resize it. Which is problematic when you run a black desktop.

Having to resize a window by grabbing it just outside the visible border is so wrong.

chiph··on I'm writing a history of Visual Basic, Chapter 1 is up
Perhaps the VBRUNxxx.dll files were distributed with Windows later, but not at first. You had to include them in your install diskettes.
chiph··on The brave souls who bought a used, 340k-mile rental camper van
"Runs and Drives" for $4300 is a bargain. All the other features were a bonus.
chiph··on Chevrolet Performance eCrate package (400v/200hp)
There will be torque multiplication by the transmission in 1st through 2nd so it won't be as much of a dog as you think. Race car, no. But it'll hold it's own in modern traffic unlike a lot of older cars.

Out of curiosity I looked up the ratios for the mentioned 4L60 transmission: 1st is 3.059:1, 2nd is 1.625:1, 3rd is direct drive at 1.00:1 and 4th is overdrive at 0.696:1. Then you'll have the ratio in your rear differential, whatever that happens to be.

My high school car was a 1975 Impala with the 350 cubic inch small block V8. Because of the Malaise Era emissions laws, it only produced 145hp but still had decent torque at 250ft·lb. It had a huge amount of space under the hood so perhaps this could fit both the motor and battery in there? (F/R weight balance being ignored)

Your point about people comparing this against the LS crate motor is correct IMO. This will be an expensive low-volume kit until (if!) economies of scale kick in. Only bought by people who want something different to show off to their friends at the weekend car shows.

chiph··on 245TB Micron 6600 ION Data Center SSD Now Shipping
A few months ago I finished building a new media server based on UnRaid. I populated it with WD 26TB drives. At the time they were about $400 (steep, but a decent capacity/dollar buy). Now they are nearly $1000 on Amazon, a 250% increase. I just hope I don't have a drive failure.

With regards to the new Micron SSD - I wonder how they keep it cool? I don't see coolant ports on it so they must strap a heatsink on.

chiph··on StarFighter 16-Inch
Do these user-configurable laptops come with a mesh bag to hold their parts? Like the camera on the StarFighter, and the modules on a Framework. Would be a cool branding opportunity.
chiph··on I built my own hair electrolysis machine
Also a hairy man. I got a small amount done about 20 years ago because I didn't want to end up with "old man ear hair" like my relatives (TMI, sorry).

At the time, a visit was $60. It wasn't painful but I did feel a twinge/shock for each hair. Multiple visits are required because of how follicles work - they grow hair in phases. The technician would treat the ones she saw, but then I had to wait until the next growth phase to return for her to get the next batch. About 10 trips in all.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_hair_growth#Growth_cycle

chiph··on A 3D Body from Eight Questions – No Photo, No GPU
So perhaps you need to present them with a more complete solution. Develop or source a faster laser cutter. And find a small factory in an area with skilled labor (central North Carolina still has people who can cut & sew). And develop a process in the factory to keep all the panels for one item of clothing together from cutting to sewing to shipping (maybe a bucket?).

It'll be a bespoke item at premium prices, no question. How big is the market for this? I don't know, but my feeling is that it's older women.

chiph··on A 3D Body from Eight Questions – No Photo, No GPU
Not just oversized - undersized also happens. Most cloth is still cut by hand using large electric saws and it's just not that accurate. (caution: loud music)

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/jvQHvz4GlPQ

Notice that the panels are marked out with chalk and if the operator doesn't stay square to the table, or isn't diligent in marking up the panels, they won't be consistent with the brand's standard sizing.

I mean - ideally a set of panels of a piece of clothing would be cut by computerized laser so it's accurate to what the buyer needs. But that costs too much and takes too long.

chiph··on A 3D Body from Eight Questions – No Photo, No GPU
Twenty or so years ago, Levis had a program called Personal Pair (they paired with a firm/product called Intellifit) where you would step into a millimeter wave 3D scanner and get your precise measurements.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1IceHjADbQ

Which you could use to get a custom pair of jeans made just for you. This failed partly because the target market turned out to be middle-aged adults (that buy fewer pairs), and not 18-25 year olds like they were hoping. Partly over privacy concerns. Partly the ability of the factory to make jeans to that tight of a tolerance. And partly because it was promoted like it was a novelty ("Consumers love it!"). Mentioned here previously:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2444319

But with this software - the tolerances are looser, so the clothing becomes more manufacturable. And the measurements can be anonymous - you don't feel like you're stepping into a TSA scanner for everyone to see.

I hope they are able to make relationships with multiple clothing brands so shopping from home will become less hit-or-miss. The benefit to the brands is going to be fewer returns for size issues.

chiph··on The Classic American Diner
I've never had a bad meal there. My favorites are the pancakes and the chicken-fried steak.
chiph··on The Classic American Diner
I took a visitor from Finland to a Jim's location in Austin, and they were in awe. "It's just like from the movies!" (because it was - it has been used several times as a filming location).

If you have a classic diner in your town, take your foreign guests there for the experience.

chiph··on Air is full of DNA
That's something that would have to be addressed at the trial by the defense attorney raising challenges.

If the DNA is present, it's present - barring any procedural mistakes by the forensics technicians (mislabeled sample, dirty lab equipment, didn't follow manufacturers instructions, etc). Or deceit by one or more members of the forensics team to implicate the suspect.

chiph··on Air is full of DNA
Depends on how they're using it. To find an unknown person and prove they were at a scene - yeah you'll have the 100 person's worth of DNA to sort through and then match against a (presently) incomplete DNA database. But if you already have a suspect and need to place them at the scene, if their DNA is one of the 100 then they have shown that.
chiph··on The electromechanical angle computer inside the B-52 bomber's star tracker
Once in the Southern Hemisphere, they'll need to pick a new set of stars. So their declination would still be expressed negatively?

Or is it that they considered the need to navigate below the lower fourth of Argentina a distant possibility?

chiph··on The electromechanical angle computer inside the B-52 bomber's star tracker
> The Atro Tracker also has declination limits of +90° and -47° and a lower altitude limit of -6°. The latitude is limited to the range between -2° and +90°; the system automatically switches hemispheres so both the North and South latitudes are usable.

Why would the system need to have a much greater range of declination (celestial sphere) than latitude (Earth spheroid)? Because the Astro Tracker and Angle Computer could flip over to the Southern hemisphere (was this automatic or was there a switch?) having that much declination range seems unnecessary. Perhaps to allow for pitch of the aircraft in flight?

BTW, being able to operate in both the Northern & Southern hemispheres was an important capability for the B-52. Previous bombers (B-36 mostly) had the range but not the reliability or in-flight refueling for global reach.

Sadly, I didn't get the chance to look at the B-52 at the Museum of Flight when I was there. If you ever meet Charles Simonyi, please thank him for his support of the museum.

chiph··on Hyperscalers have already outspent most famous US megaprojects
It took a while to reach full production rate for the F-35. Partly because the supply chain (mostly US based because of the Buy American Act) had to come up to speed[0]. But also because there were running-changes being made to the plane, necessitating changes to the production line to accommodate them.

The F-22 production tooling is supposedly in storage at Sierra Army Depot. Why there and not at the boneyard at Davis-Monthan is an interesting question[1]. Spooling production of the F-22 back up will take less time than originally, but still won't be quick (a secure factory floor large enough has to be found, workforce knowledge has been lost, adding upgrades, etc.)

[0] Scattered across as many congressional districts as possible.

[1] I was at Sierra in the 80's on TDY and it was all Army and Army civilians. A USAF guy like me really stood out.

chiph··on Intel Xpress Resurrection: Reviving a Forgotten EISA Beast
The PS/2 also used configuration disks for their Microchannel machines - not sure about the lower tier machines that were ISA - I don't recall if you still played "jumper madness" with them.

The local IBM tech had consolidated a lot of the files onto a few diskettes so he didn't need to carry around a briefcase full of them. Made his job much easier.

chiph··on Live Nation illegally monopolized ticketing market, jury finds
In college I worked at a record store that had a Ticketmaster machine. At the time, it was a custom ticket printer with CRT terminal and modem that took up a lot of counter space. When you camped out and bought a ticket the moment they went on sale you got an actual ticket, with perforations. Lots of people saved their stubs as collector's items. The surcharge was: $2.50

That paid for the equipment, maintenance, the ticket stock, the central computer, but not the leased phone line (the store paid for that).

These days, you're using your computer, your paper (or phone), and afterwards you have nothing collectible. The surcharge can be $40 or more.

Why the huge difference? It can't all be inflation. I think it's primarily because of monopolistic power and collusion with the venue[0]. But also - when bands toured back then it was considered supplemental income to the sale of the album. These days they hardly make anything off album sales/streaming, and more of their income comes from touring (ticket and merchandise sales).

[0] You could buy tickets at the venue and not pay the surcharge. But now Ticketmaster gets their cut even if you do that.

chiph··on Amazon to acquire Globalstar and expand Amazon Leo satellite network
If you haven't read Eccentric Orbits: The Iridium Story you should. The system was operational, but Motorola's dysfunction and impossible sales goals leading to disillusionment meant that Dan Colussy & team was able to pick it up for $25 million (development price: $5 billion)
chiph··on Nowhere is safe
State actor, yes. But not a Tier-1 state actor anymore.
chiph··on The Hateful Eight is 85% of S&P 500 Decline
I think the point was that those stocks are causing the S&P to be overweight towards those firms that are highly invested in AI. It's like comparing personal wealth when Warren Buffet and Bill Gates are included in the list - the average ends up far above the median.
chiph··on Midnight train from GA: A view of America from the tracks as airports struggle
The S-Line project is underway in NC and VA. It will rehabilitate an abandoned line (the former Seaboard Coast Line) to allow faster travel between Raleigh and Richmond. It won't be electrified but will allow trains to run at up to 110 mph/177 kph which is a big improvement over the current 60-70 mph (when the passenger train isn't being delayed by a freight train).

They are currently doing a couple of grade-separation bridge projects in north Raleigh and some minor curve straightening. Since the S-Line is not currently being used they can straighten many of the curves since there won't be any impact to existing operations.

The S-Line right of way is owned by CSX and they will be running freight on it. The budget wasn't there to acquire all of it by NCDOT and VA and dedicate it to passenger service.

https://www.ncdot.gov/divisions/rail/s-line-projects/raleigh...

https://vapassengerrailauthority.org/projects/richmond2ralei...

chiph··on Tracy Kidder has died
I love the book. We had an Eclipse MV/8000 at college. And abused the hell out of it - when one of my classmates compiled their ADA programs we knew to take a coffee break.

But I can't help but think that the book helped normalize death-marches in the industry. I'm still recommending it to colleagues, but with the caveat that we are not in a "do or die" situation, so go home and get some good sleep.

chiph··on CT Scans of Health Wearables
Sadly no. They were found unconscious, then taken to the hospital where the doctors determined that brain death had occurred.

While I don't have diabetes, I will be getting an advance directive made. This was horrifying.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advance_healthcare_directive

chiph··on Apple's 512GB Mac Studio vanishes, a quiet acknowledgment of the RAM shortage
I think it's unlikely that Apple is paying the spot price for memory. They almost certainly negotiate delivery/price contracts in advance. Maybe the contract for the chips used in the 512GB model will expire soon?
chiph··on CT Scans of Health Wearables
A friend's coworker had their pump lock on, and inject the entire reservoir of insulin into them. They were discovered in their home by the police after family members lost contact. No idea if it was an Omnipod, but I would hope that all insulin pumps have a separate watchdog circuit to prevent this.
chiph··on Cash issuing terminals
Many years ago, I worked on a project in Tennessee where the bank was installing computers in their branches (previously the tellers were using mainframe terminals). At the same time, they were consolidating the leased data lines to the branches to save money, as everything there was now a network device - including the ATMs.

The IBM representative on our team was working behind the through-the-wall ATM, routing some wires when a customer walked up (you could see them via the camera). Being a prankster, he started talking to her in a robotic voice: "Please insert card", "Please choose a transaction", etc. After a few of these he couldn't hold back any further and started laughing. The customer got the joke and started laughing too: "I knew someone was back there!"

Briefly, he was their first (and only) talking ATM.

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