general-chat

[tardy badger]

Lol

These all work, yay

[rapid geode]

nice

[burnt tendon]

I have a bunch of fun random electronics bits that I could arguably make marketable it's just that the idea of someone placing an order and me fighting with executive function that's depleted after a work day to get it organized and shipped doesn't sound very appealing.

Also, I have no student loans to offset so while it's better to support the student loan debt cancellation, letting those people with student loans grind their side gig also helps a little bit.

[solar kindle]

Possibly useful info for whomever: #10 musical wire is almost exactly the same diameter as 22AWG hookup wire (0.61mm vs 0.64mm). Handy if you need a springy conductor in an electromechanical design that'll connect to, say, a breadboard or a 0.1" pitch socket connector.

[burnt tendon]

I guess you could call that a sound idea.

[solar kindle]

"Why yes officers, there is a perfectly legitimate reason for this spool of piano wire being on my workbench."

[ebon dew]

Lectronz & Tindie need their own Mastodon. I'm perfectly fine with independent makers advertising on Mastodon for electronics that I might want like stuff from todbot, solderparty, unexpectedmaker, skerr, and hundreds of others. Stuff I don't need is Lenonvo, AMD, Gigabyte, MSI advertising more stuff that has massive backdoors to spy on me. At least with microcontrollers I can see the code and how it's being used.

[burnt tendon]

Yah, I mean there's a reason why there was a big movement to Mastodon off of Twitter and then it kinda sputtered.

But, yeah, it's been a point of argument since the ARPANet days about what "Advertising" and "not-advertising" is.

[ebon dew]

At some point the mass advertising campaigns degrade the overall quality of the content. Like TV commercials being given more and more airtime vs the TV show itself until eventually you're mostly watching TV commercials instead of actual content. Youtube is heading that way and making the same mistake that TV did.

[rapid geode]

Hmm. so what would make the most sense for a device that will pull a cable. An rc servo spooling it up. or a motor driving a screw. pull is about 35-40mm. I needs to resist back driving when there is no power to it.

ponders

[ebon dew]

advertising is disruptive to content ingestion. the more disruptive and intrusive the more people are going to just... turn it all off.

[raw jasper]

"content" "ingestion"

[ebon dew]

digestion.. i might have mixed those two up 😛

[raw jasper]

Nah, I am just not a fan of the term "content"

[rapid geode]

i injested the contents of this bag of doritos

[ebon dew]

well according to youtube i'm a "content creator"

it's one of those george carlin soft word changes from "programming"

i'd rather be programmed with electronics, mechanics, DIY repair than brainless consumerism... which is why i highly enjoy Adafruit programming.

Head-On, apply directly to the forehead vs how to change a sparkplug on a V8 camaro.

some programming is intended to make you dumb, junk food for the mind. i'd rather fill my brain with quality knowledge if possible. that's why i watch adafruit and many like them.

i guess it really all just comes down to intention

is skerr trying to make me smarter by learning fpga with icyblue? yes. therefore i'm ok with that advertising.

[rapid geode]

ha

[burnt tendon]

No, skerr is the Riddler and it's like that scene in Batman Forever where all of his little boards are soaking up everyone's mental energy and he's in his lair with some weird two-faced character trading off on who gets to use the Box.

[ebon dew]

https://tenor.com/view/laughing-laughing-hysterically-laugh-batman-riddler-jim-carrey-gif-22704892

[burnt tendon]

Exactly.

[ebon dew]

the batman franchise has come a long way.

[rapid geode]

has it really though?

seems like it went right back to where it was

literally

[ebon dew]

https://tenor.com/view/the-batman-riddler-no-no-no-no-noooo-riddler-no-no-no-no-gif-25498499

[rapid geode]

k, i see some neat little linear rc servos

but none specify if you can back drive them

[ebon dew]

umm most linear servo's just switch polarity to change directions right? if it goes out it has to be able to go in.

[burnt tendon]

At this point in history, given everything, I actually like campy batman far more than dark and gritty batman.

[rapid geode]

not what i mean

i mean can you push it by hand when its not powered

i need one that locks

like a worm gear does

[ebon dew]

i far prefer the new riddler based on the zodiac killer personality. far more realistic.

and heath ledger's joker which unfortunately we'll never see again 😦

i was surprised to find out adafruit doesn't carry any linear actuators, went looking for them the other day and couldn't find any.

no, most linear actuators you can't push back down as they're designed to apply force.

[burnt tendon]

I mean, I mostly stan (and ship) Harley and Ivy because I can relate to hanging out with circus folk and other weirdos and meaning well yet somehow ending up blowing up Gotham City.

[ebon dew]

depends on the size of the actuator perhaps and how much force is required.

[rapid geode]

100n

as small as possible

i think spooling might be better.

ooh, i could steal a guitar tuner's guts.

[ebon dew]

there are plenty of examples of 3d printed actuators on printables

[rapid geode]

spool cable on a disc, then drive work with a regular servo.

hm, no, not regular servo. need many turns

[ebon dew]

the smaller the actuator probably harder to get the fine tooth gears with fdm.

[rapid geode]

put the pot on the disc and make sure it only goes one turn. (15mm diam will do that)

this has to be all metal

no plastic

[ebon dew]

lego has a worm gear set can maybe make one but metal gears will always offer more torque.

[rapid geode]

well, the housing will be plastic for proto

[ebon dew]

yeah

[rapid geode]

guitar tuner is a perfect little brass worm gear. i have dozens of those lying around

18:1

[ebon dew]

for the gear perhaps but the actuator piston would be another challenge.

[rapid geode]

there is no actuator piston. it will spool cable on a disc pulley

[ebon dew]

might be able to find tiny actuators on amazon or something. i was looking for kind of the same thing.

wanted to make an antenna mast that popped up, commonly used for robots in star wars kind of thing

want to put one in my mail boombox with a lora mast just for giggles

[rapid geode]

the guitar thing will be perfect i think. just needs to be repackages and then the ends machined to accept servo on one and disc on other.

[ebon dew]

if you have machining capability sounds like a good plan

[rapid geode]

yeah thats the easy part

ha

gears are hard

so store bought ones ++

ha

[ebon dew]

you can machine your own gears with the right setup, very technical though.

oh but probably not tiny ones like you need nvm

[rapid geode]

so. thats the mechanicals. then it needs a control, which is basic rc servo control really. buttons for command. and then a way to "porgram" is. whihc at least for now can just be usb to a pc

it has to have 12 positions wihc i have to "find". then store

[ebon dew]

i'd like to think the programming part would be the easy part

[rapid geode]

in future youd want an app and some automation

yes, i think at least for v1 programming is trivial

[ebon dew]

itsybitsy nrf52840 bluetooth app can do it. BLE controls were quite easy to setup.

[rapid geode]

move manually to position 1. write down value into chart. then hard code all 12 into program. then have a way to do a global offset on the fly to account for cable settling

i have uh... teensy m0? i dont remember. need to check. worst case i buy something new.

[ebon dew]

i think erin st blaine did a learn guide last month using one of those small LED RF controllers, could do something like that with IRremote too.

[rapid geode]

power will be the big concern later on. it needs to wake up with the button, do its thing, then go back to sleep. so the battery lasts weeks or even months.

but for now, if it lasts 1 day that sfine.

with bluetooth not active of course

hm

[ebon dew]

anything to do with wake buttons i immediately think of esp32 but then your project would have to be wifi controlled somehow.

pico w might be suitable too

[rapid geode]

why would buttons need wifi?

its just a button

not a wireless button

[ebon dew]

that's one of the nice things about adafruit stuff. you want to make a project, there's like 10 different ways to skin that cat.

[rapid geode]

wireless is only for a future app for configuration

im not sure what a good battery is. I have m4 feather express. and an M0 blufruit feather. and a clue.

clue has no charging right?

k. ill use the m4 express i think then for first proto. just to make things easy.

with a little lipo

[fossil dawn]

Pico w has pretty bad deep sleep capabilities afaik. At least there is none in the arduino-pico core because apparently the deep sleep (from pico-extras I think) from raspberry pi is kinda buggy

[tardy badger]

Surprisingly, if you’re willing to turn off basically everything, you can get the RP2040 down to ~180uA

Not amazing, but better than you’d think

[rapid geode]

oh right, the rp ones. would that be better/easier than the m4?

as a first proto test

[tardy badger]

M4 could probably be better optimized for power

RP2040 didn’t have low power in mind when it was made

[rapid geode]

ah ok

[raw jasper]

M4? I thought apple's chips went up to M3

[tardy badger]

?

[umbral phoenix]

M4 = Microchip SAMD51

microcontroller

[tardy badger]

yeah, Cortex M4

RP2040 is an Cortex M0+

[umbral phoenix]

dual-core (RP2040)

[raw jasper]

Ah, lol, that was some confusion 😅

Actually, how was apple even able to use M* names in the context of ARM microprocessors when ARM's licensed implementations already use the Cortex-M? moniker?

[umbral phoenix]

market power

[rapid geode]

yes i need an apple m4 to control a servo. its very demanding. it needs to move clockwise.. AND counterclockwise

😛

[umbral phoenix]

it's like Desert Power, but with dollars

[raw jasper]

https://tenor.com/view/spin-rainbow-circle-gif-15688575

[rapid geode]

vroom

that wheel means its beating windows

:x

anyhow

[olive dome]

How about Cortex-M4 vs CM4 (Compute Module 4)

[glad ruin]

Completely different

[rapid geode]

bmw m4?

[olive dome]

Yeah that is what I mean, their are other examples of similar name but different stuff

[umbral phoenix]

M4 bolts and nuts

[rapid geode]

the bmw likely has some m4 processors in it helt on by m4 bolts

[olive dome]

Normally we will add a C to indicate Cortex-* but even with that you still run into like CM4 vs CM4 naming

The contex is important

[glad ruin]

Pretty sure they just trademarked Cortex-M4.

[rapid geode]

its easy. one is a fruit. one is a pie. one is a um... where was i going with this?

[olive dome]

Trademark has nothing to do with short name people comes up with.

[rapid geode]

cable puller. bit tricky to machine, maybe a good use of an aluminium 3d print.

[olive dome]

Thus you have all different kinds of confusion

[olive dome]

recommend JLCPCB's 3D metal printing service

[rapid geode]

jlc? i thought it was pcbway

[olive dome]

This cost me 8USD for one part

[rapid geode]

i was just gonna do shapeways.

oh, wow

nice

[olive dome]

on the left is metal print, on the right is MJL

[rapid geode]

i tried pcbway but they rejected my model with no explanation

(i assume too thin(

[olive dome]

What's great for JLCPCB is that it will warns you but you can take the risk yourself by clicking a box

[rapid geode]

ah cool. sorta like shapways used to do

[olive dome]

The part you just saw has <1mm wall thinkness so thay've warned me

[rapid geode]

the next part will be the frame to hold this and the worm drive and a servo mount.

oh, cool

its aluminium:?

sls

dmls, or whatever

[olive dome]

SLM, Steel

[rapid geode]

ahh. neat

[olive dome]

But I realized it might not be a good choice if you need Parker screw lol

I can't tight the screw on the part you just saw

[rapid geode]

i dont see any printing service on jlcpcb

[olive dome]

3D one

Quote -> select 3D printing

https://3d.jlcpcb.com/

[rapid geode]

found it

thanks

so only stainless steel

[olive dome]

yeap

[rapid geode]

thats fine for a prototype

[olive dome]

aluminium needs surface finish right?

[rapid geode]

ish. for me mostly it needs to be light

but, with printing you can make things webbed and hollow, soo

maybe no big deal

[olive dome]

Yeah I'm kind of shock how dense it is

[raw jasper]

I mean, yeah

[rapid geode]

$8. ha. i guess that min order on steel

[olive dome]

shapeways looks pretty cool too, I want to do translucent print

JLCPCB recently added that option

[rapid geode]

ive used shapeways a lot. its tells you errors, etc. pretty advanced. but not really cheap

k, so its $8 no matter how many. i guess thats min labour per individual part. interesting.

i have some other things... haha

but, focus. im gonna design this project around using jlc.

steel

[olive dome]

Yeah I think that is the min order price

[rapid geode]

and sla resin for the tactile button surfaces. sls nylon (or mjf) for the housing

this will be fun

ill use the feather m4 since its here and easy to swap in a blutooth one later

also this product can then be made open hardware

hmmmm

[olive dome]

their MJF printed part has some dust left on the surface, I'm not sure if that is normal for MJF (given that is is printed from dust)

[rapid geode]

yeah. sls and mjf are very similar

[olive dome]

But overall I'm very happy with the result

[rapid geode]

mjf is more.. solid? dense?

i think from a post process

how accurate was the slm part diemsionally?

does it come out on size

[olive dome]

I haven't tried SLS, only MJF

[rapid geode]

oh i thought the little gear was metal

[olive dome]

Oh yeah that one is

[rapid geode]

ha, all the acronyms are confusing sorry

haha

[olive dome]

Sorry I thought you mean SLA

Ahhhhhhhh

What ever

The steel print is pretty accurate

But I don't have any method to measure the tolerance

[rapid geode]

ok

ill just make the precision holes slightly undersized and redrill them

to hold the worm

I'll probably need 4 separate steel parts.

shipping is reasonable too. thats another thing that hurt pcbway. shipping to canada was bad

[olive dome]

I don't like DHL and FedEx shipping price to US either

[rapid geode]

this is dhl, $23cdn. which is fair.

ha. found another part, but its compalining it needs to be thicker than 2mm... its 1.9

sigh

[olive dome]

I think they are still charging for "Emergency Situation Surcharge"

[rapid geode]

i added something tot he model to make it fit

wow. so its a bicycle disc brake rotor. 140mm diam. $33.

ah yes, im getting an $8 surcharge

for it being flat and thin

but, neat. this looks very promising to get my whole project printed for little more than $100

[rapid geode]

Hmm. was going to cnc these individually, but printing 100 in stainless is $33us (plus shipping tax etc).

well that solves that

(they are the key cap stems if you want to make wood or resin key caps that are durable)

1.2-1.3 grams each.

[raw jasper]

I came across the new 2D mario platformer promo video thing

"Super mario bros. wonder" or something

I'm surprised at the direction they went, and how positive the reception is. On the other hand, even the original mario had smiling clouds, so this is just the logical next step

[rapid geode]

what was the direction?

[rapid geode]

im ghetting distracted with all the old projects i can print for $8

ha

[raw jasper]

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

[violet parcel]

fun evening water pipe broke on the apartment above fire department is here

i am trying to make sure all my electronics and computers are safe atm the water was coming out of their apartment in the hallway too

[raw jasper]

Make sure you are safe too

[rapid geode]

eep

[tranquil swallow]

My brain keeps swelling but idk if I should see a dr

[rapid geode]

o_O

um, hospital?

[tranquil swallow]

Visiting the hospital is a practice in futility I’ve had a UTI for over 3 years every time I go there and tell them nothing happens

[rapid geode]

....

🙂

[tardy badger]

my now turing complete 8 bit CPU https://github.com/skerr92/oak832128

it just needs an instruction fetch module and instruction memory 😛

[violet parcel]

bah doesnt really matter that much for here

[rapid geode]

well it matters to the other guy that shoul go to the hospital

[violet parcel]

just that i didnt lose any electronics and my losses of other things are minimal except the cleaning will cost a lot

oh i didn't see that i meant my life story doesnt matter much for here ....

[rapid geode]

ha, nah. i was just pointing out that the hospital comment was not for you

[violet parcel]

yeah i didnt see that was kinda in a panic since 7h45pm and just saw ningen comment and i didnt understand why you wanted me to go to rhe hospital

[rapid geode]

ha

i cant decide what to metal 3d print first.

[tranquil swallow]

Butterfly knife

[rapid geode]

ha\

besides being illegal... id have no use for that made of soft stainless steel

[tranquil swallow]

How much did the machine cost your workplace

[rapid geode]

O_o

what machine?

[tranquil swallow]

I assumed you were messing around with a DMLS at work

[rapid geode]

oh, no. this is just a service someone mentioned earlier.

its cheap (ish) so i want to try it

[burnt tendon]

One of my longstanding sads is that I worked at a company with some SLM printers and I never got to print anything on them

Well, that, and it was a cool idea that's probably never going to pan out.

[rapid geode]

boo

I never take advantage of clients stuff. Mostly cause i never even think of it

ha

[rapid geode]

looks like a thing...

[violet parcel]

Im having a fan party 🤣 😢

[rapid geode]

a second thing to go around the first thing. were up to $17.. :p

the other cover part is where the worm gear and servo will mount. and then a plastic cover box will house the feather and battery

[dusty citrus]

I'd push if I asked for free prints? Lol

[tardy badger]

Welp, Russian Civil War was not on my 2023 Bingo Card

[patent hemlock]

concur - my first thought was "whoops!"

also - got my "name change" thru Discord 🎉

[tardy badger]

This was my first thought

https://tenor.com/view/hehehe-ghehe-reptile-laughing-gif-gif-26223253

Seeing Wagner and Putin/Shogin go back and forth for the last few months, I figured it would boil over

But Ukraine is apparently taking advantage of the collapse and making gains

So, yay democracy

[patent hemlock]

tbh, i was kinda waiting for this - "independent mercenary group" is straight out of any number of genre thriller types (i was more thinking Pournelle, actually, until this happened)

[rapid geode]

It was inevitable sadly.

[fresh niche]

I am pretty sure a assasanation will happen in the future

Apparently russia is purging its "unloyal" army or something so i expect 2-3 more years of increased oil prices

[patent hemlock]

i don't think a simple defenestration is going to work this time... 🪟

[rapid geode]

no. I see a long horrible colaps and deconstruction of russia.

we'll see

[burnt tendon]

You have no idea how excited I was when I was in Czechia at Prauge Castle and there was the window that was used for the Defenstrations of Prague.

My wife has a BS in history and has been dealing with my shenanigans for quite some time now so she was unsurprised.

[urban arrow]

😄 Hey I just read where Python indeed was named after Monty Python (a series my wife doesn't get, but makes me hurt from laughing). Well, "Bring out... The Comfy Chair!"

[rapid geode]

Cool. I BS history a lot too....

runs

[fresh niche]

Not really,russia has high internal integration and the youth are brain washed to love the soviet days. The war will continue till putin gives up. That means no oil in my country so i have to keep taking the awfull bus system

[glad ruin]

Well, I know of one youth (16) who isn't. He's currently staying indoors in Rostov.

[rapid geode]

we'll see

[glad ruin]

Sounds like Lukashenko is mediating some sort of negotiation between Putin and Prigozhin.

[raw jasper]

I hope he'll be OK...

[glad ruin]

My comment was nearly as long as the article...
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/24/open-source-and-giving-back/#comment-6655724

[patent hemlock]

"Suffice to say... " indeed - definitely applies a new wrinkle around patents, copyrights, and "open source"

[rapid geode]

ordered 2 parts in staineless from JLCPCB. they are reviewing. one part is $9 and one is $62. should be entertaining

ha

little clamps to hold the vise on my cnc table

[violet parcel]

I once sent a design that would have costs 102000$ but thankfully someone intercepted it and questioned it

[rapid geode]

ha

[violet parcel]

In my autocad course we made any part we wanted at the first lab under 90x90x90 mm and they would machine it etc

[rapid geode]

these are pretty small parts. $62 is technically 4 parts combined. so, $16 each. which is far cheaper than anything i can buy off the shelf

[violet parcel]

but I didnt know about not using to many numbers after the dots and the option was on xx.0000 mm by default

[rapid geode]

oooh

precision = $$

ha

[violet parcel]

yeah, and special training and very expensive machine and equipment to check it (micrometer precision)

[rapid geode]

when i send stuff to my friend i colour code the model. blue is "i dont care". green is "needs to be nice and smooth" and red is "as precise as you can make it without driving the price up

easier than trying to call out actual dimensions

[violet parcel]

they basically told me I ordered something that was aviation/space speced and it would have cost a lot of money if I had ordered it at an engineering job without the supervision at the university

[rapid geode]

but that only works with him cause he knows what i need anyway

[violet parcel]

because in an engineering job theyd assume you know you are doing

[rapid geode]

ha

i assumenothing

sharp corners is another thing people dont think about. "i want an inside pocket 50mm deep with a 1mm radius corner"

no, no you dont

[violet parcel]

they mentionned that I think but I wasnt the one whose bad part was presented in front of 400 students for this just the 65.0000mm thing 😄

[rapid geode]

haha

second part in my order. $9.

tiny bike part

that $5 each. for something that normally costs $32. but i will need to rethread it and clean it up so thats the trade i guess.

[dusty citrus]

I don't grasp it
What's the usage/bike's part?

[violet parcel]

Im trying to find a 3d printed cat

which could move etc

but google is acting like chatgpt

[rapid geode]

like a sony dog robot?

[rapid geode]

derailleur hanger.

2 of them

hopefully they dont get annoyed i connected them

[dusty citrus]

Ah I see thank you

[violet parcel]

I tried binggpt too that yeah what you say is exactly want I dont want. I want a cat I can modify the inside to add leds/sensors and move the parts of the head around. Not just a low-effort 3d model to print and keep around like a decorative trinket. Also I want it to breath fire or ice(the last one was a joke but it didnt get it)

I knew it would just give me a low-effort low-poly filled 3d model to print like a trinket

[dusty citrus]

Then learn a cad and do it yourself?

Or any 3d modeling software

[violet parcel]

I want to see if that exists first beforewe I reinvent the wheel

after all there is one but without cad/project files on the arduino projects website

[late fulcrum]

yeggi.com?

[solar kindle]

Any of these close to what you need? https://www.stlfinder.com/3dmodels/?search=Articulated+Cat

[rapid geode]

i want a robot cat that will chase squirrels away from my fruits

[raw jasper]

The comment below reads "What in the world is that..... Too scary....."

[tranquil swallow]

I want a robot cat that drives the local fauna to extinction

[raw jasper]

Watching the video, it definitely gives off a "wrong" vibe

[dusty citrus]

I found it hilarious
But that's my sense of humor that's bad

[violet parcel]

Looks like a puffercat. Kinda like a catfish but puffer fish + cat instead of gold fish + cat

[late fulcrum]

I was thinking that was nightmare fuel, but I'm illiterate in hiragana

[raw jasper]

If you're feeling like picking them up, https://realkana.com/ is what I used back in the day

[violet parcel]

what about learning chinese for electronics ? Any chinese learning tool but only for electronics ?

[raw jasper]

You learn Chinese, and pick up electronics-related vocabulary along the way. For example, by repeatedly trying to read whatever you're interested in until, after a few years, it finally works

There's no way to learn Chinese (or any other language) "only for electronics"

Now, regarding actually learning Chinese, I wouldn't know what pointers to give you. I don't know a word of Chinese myself

[violet parcel]

but there are some english learning boook focused on business jargon

and like some tests like TOEIC

[raw jasper]

Yeah, that's BS

Good luck closing a business deal using a phrasebook

[violet parcel]

or even some quick methods like when you are just travaeling so you survive (order food/find your hotel/get directions etc)

[raw jasper]

Good luck understanding the directions

[fossil dawn]

aren't they for when you already know the basics of the language? 🤔

[raw jasper]

Seriously, beyond a very basic level of communications (think "I'm lost and need help, bring me a doctor, I need medicine/water/etc"), there's no royal road to language learning

I should know something about that, English is my second language 😅

[violet parcel]

gets on the ground is pretty useful to know as well nowadays

to survive the police as a tourist

[raw jasper]

If, for any reason, you are worried about that kind of encounter as a tourist in a foreign country, it might be best not to travel there

[violet parcel]

You can be randomly be stopped on the borders in the EU

[raw jasper]

I wouldn't know what advice to give you. I prefer traveling to places where I know the local language to some level that can facilitate at least basic communication

But I think, that, if, for some reason, you were stopped on the border, of all places, the agents there would know to interrogate you in English!

(And, in most, if not all, democratic countries, you are entitled to an interpreter)

[late fulcrum]

I picked up enough Russian to more or less glean what I needed from data sheets. Fortunately, most Russian technical terms are basically transliterated from English, so just knowing the sounds of the Cyrillic letters is largely sufficient. Japanese is next level, however. I can sound out katakana, but that's only useful for the terms (mostly foreign ones) that use that script.

[raw jasper]

Would you like to learn more Japanese? If so, I could suggest some resources

(I'm somewhere at the late beginner/early intermediate level)

[late fulcrum]

It's not a particular goal, just the sort of thing I pick up when I need it. Come to think of it, that's the same way I learn electronics.

[raw jasper]

Out of curiosity, what do you need Japanese for?

[late fulcrum]

It turns out a lot of electronics comes from Japan

Also manga, anime, etc. 🙂

[raw jasper]

I'm not particularly a fan of manga/anime/etc. I enjoy learning the language

And, surprisingly, it's helped me with my work

[late fulcrum]

I got into anime a long time ago when a friend in Japan would just record 6-hour chunks of broadcast television and send us the tapes. I quite enjoyed 1000年女王, 宇宙戦艦ヤマト, and 銀河鉄道９９９ when they were airing.

But I realize it's not for everybody

[umbral phoenix]

I had trouble understanding directions some local guy gave me in Scotland one time. Good thing he pointed.

[late fulcrum]

One of my cow-orkers was surprised when I trotted out the Hindi word for "magic" when I did a quick fix. I'd picked up a smattering of terms watching Bollywood movies.

[raw jasper]

銀河鉄道９９９ is probably a reference to 銀河鉄道の夜 (ginga tetsudou no yoru, night on the galactic railroad), a well-known (in Japan) children's novel by Kenji Miyazawa

(I don't know anything about the anime though)

[late fulcrum]

I was expecting to have more trouble than I did when touring the Orkney islands of Scotland, as the Arcadian dialect they speak there is said to be difficult, but happily, I was able to follow most of it. Glaswegian, on the other hand, eluded me utterly.

[raw jasper]

It's a pretty tough book to read. At my current level, I gave up partway through.

I am going to try again some time though.

[late fulcrum]

Unsurprisingly, I'm not familiar with ginga tetsudou no yoru

[raw jasper]

It's a pretty sad book, in a way. It opens like this: (TL mine, might be inaccurate. I cross-checked with deepl though)

「ではみなさんは、そういうふうに川だと云われたり、乳の流れたあとだと云われたりしていたこのぼんやりと白いものがほんとうは何かご承知ですか。」先生は、黒板に吊した大きな黒い星座の図の、上から下へ白くけぶった銀河帯のようなところを指しながら、みんなに問をかけました。

"As such, do you know what that faintly white thing, of which it has, in a way, been said that it's a river through which milk has flowed?" Said the teacher, pointing at the large constellation map that had been hung on the blackboard, which was covered from top to bottom in hazy white, resembling a sash, and asking everyone.

You can see how dense the prose is 😅

[late fulcrum]

Indeed.

I recognize a few characters here and there (such as the no particle)

[raw jasper]

Actually, the sentence parsed much better this time than the last time I tried reading it

[late fulcrum]

Cool! Progress!

[raw jasper]

Maybe!

(FYI, text is from aozora bunko, the Japanese equivalent of project Gutenberg)

[cunning frost]

The TL's mostly correct, just with a slight mixup with what the teacher is specifically pointing at. They're pointing at the hazy white sash running across the map instead of just the map itself.

[raw jasper]

Thanks!

Out of curiosity, are you a learner, or native speaker?

[cunning frost]

Learner but I'm technically (as in freelance) a JP-EN translator, which kinda just came about because of learning.

[raw jasper]

Well, then you're far ahead of me :) 🍻

[cunning frost]

It's all good. You really justy have to keep at it.

[raw jasper]

Yeah, I know. I learned English once. Obviously, Japanese is harder, but I know what to expect of the process

[cunning frost]

The funny part about Japanese is that it seems complex because it's asking a lot out of you when you try to interpret it. Otherwise, it's pretty simple.

[raw jasper]

The trick is to start being OK with most of the things being implied. I guess.

So, any recommendations?

[cunning frost]

Yup. Don't take anything seriously. They all have some meaning but it's not always that. Context is king.

[raw jasper]

(or tips, or anything that comes to mind)

[cunning frost]

I dunno. I know a lot of reference books but really, just follow what you intend to use the language for and you'll get somewhere. People always recommend learning kanji early on and just grinding it out. But as someone who has maxed out Wanikani, it doesn't work unless you start applying it. That said, I've gained a level of recall from it that I can more or less guess the meaning/reading of kanji at a glance.

[raw jasper]

No language learning technique works unless you start applying it, not even language schools/private lessons

As good ol' Euclid once said, there's no royal road to geometry

Or language learning. Or anything, for that matter

[cunning frost]

Yeah. Stay curious and follow those obsessions.

Heck, even my foray into electronics is mostly fueled by a breadcrumb trail of random ideas. XD

[raw jasper]

Thinking about it, I'd like to work on getting used to parsing out longer sentences, like the one I posted

[cunning frost]

The key for parsing long sentences is to find the verb, and by extension, the noun that is being acted upon. Essentially, as you read, you're just piling up meaning upon meaning until you can finally dump it on the right word at the end.

So for that sentence, it's ところを指し

[raw jasper]

Yeah, that's how it works. It still tires me out though. Gotta keep doing it until things end up working naturally

The fact that every learning resource out there focuses on getting you to understand the equivalent of これはペンです with the grammar point du jour doesn't help :P

[cunning frost]

Yeah. It'll work out eventually. I got the sense of it as I started working because you start seeing patterns. Or more practically, if it doesn't make sense, it likely doesn't.

[raw jasper]

Oh it was better before you edited it lol

[cunning frost]

lol. I'll edit it back

[raw jasper]

There are some authors/lyricists/whatever who (seem to) pile on nonsense for the sake of nonsense

Just for the sake of seeming deep, or edgy, or philosophical

It ends up collapsing into white noise

[cunning frost]

That's actually the worst part of translating. Making sense of the author. Because some authors really do just want to flex and it doesn't translate well at all.

[raw jasper]

Ah yes, here's a bunch of obscure Buddhist lingo you'll need the ２０ volumes of the 日国 to parse!

[cunning frost]

Yup. And they all get translated differently because there really is no one right way to do it.

[raw jasper]

(For people following this convo: 日国 = abbreviation for Nihon Kokugo Dai Jiten, possibly the largest dictionary in the world, spanning 20 volumes - 19 + 1 appendix, these days there's an electronic version -, which attempts to trace all possible meanings of a word, from oldest to newest. Due to the nature of the dictionary, many antiquated and obscure words can only be found there. I have attached a photo of the physical volume set)

I have no idea whether the English language has an equivalent (or whether another language has a larger dictionary), but my native language, for which I had to use a paper dictionary in school, surely doesn't

Correction: The second edition has 14 volumes. The first had 20.

Apparently, the physical volume set is still sold, and goes for the equivalent of 658.34USD in Japanese Amazon

[crystal ore]

The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) would probably be the closest well-known equivalent.

[raw jasper]

At 20 volumes, it certainly seems like it. Thanks!

[violet parcel]

wow this brand appliances service manuals are very detailed with pcb, schematic etc
where as my appliances almost says nothing in the service manual

[glad ruin]

This is how everything used to be. Appliances, test equipment, etc.

[violet parcel]

PCB section has 4 pages showing the pcb in different layers too

With this Id know exactly what wire in the connectors do what if I want to use an MCU to monitor it in a lot of details

[violet parcel]

There is hope because asian brands (south korea/japan) always have been more open about their business and appliances. Like in many japanese manual reports they will tell you exactly where their factory is even how much they pay per units of their major class of raw materials and so on. It will also have a detailed list of all subsidiaires

It would probably be much easier for them to follow right to repair regulations, just move the contents of their service manuals to the owner manual

Where as many american brands seems to be ------- 10k ohm thermistor ------ then you look at it and it's in a box with a PCB, with a 12 wires cable. All represented by a single line in the wiring diagram

[tardy badger]

Because people generally have terrible senses of humor, Celine Dion is back at #12 of the top 100 with My Heart Will Go On following the titanic sub incident.

[glad ruin]

This doesn't apply to companies like Sony.

[violet parcel]

sony make appliances ?

[raw jasper]

huh? Which Japanese equipment manufacturers are you talking about?

[raw jasper]

I... am not sure what to think of that

[violet parcel]

Ive seen mitsubishi/sumitomo/lg annual reports go pretty deep into information like that

[tardy badger]

It’s really dark humor

And no one in this world is conceivably going to heaven if they listened to that song this week.. 😝

[violet parcel]

as they are chaebols/zaibatsu with tons of affiliated companies under their names (not necessairly owned by the main mitsubishi companies - just agree to share the same value) and they will go into a lot of details of where their main factories/mines are and so on

[violet parcel]

Ive been listening to it for the last year as I do a full-scale version in minecraft as my base

the only video with many shots I need to model the hull came from the titanic music with that song slapped over it

[tardy badger]

Let me rephrase, no one who listened to it in response to the Titan sub incident

[raw jasper]

The zaibatsus do not exist any longer in the form they did pre-WW2

You are probably looking for "keiretsu"

[raw jasper]

Yeah, that's an awful lot of dedication to one "joke"

[tardy badger]

I listened to it after learning about its rise to the top 100 simply because it would be an ear worm if I didn’t 😛

[violet parcel]

The context is they are making gallow humor jokes about the victims being met on the grand staircase of the titanic by rose and jack in heaven with various dialogues being added as caption

[glad ruin]

At this point someone needs to make a massive buoy and put it at the Titan(ic) wreck sites.

[raw jasper]

...And now I have "my heart will go on" playing in my head. Congratulations

[tardy badger]

And I have like 15 ear worms that won’t go away no matter the number of times I listen to the songs

Thanks neurodivergence

[raw jasper]

After enough years, somebody is bound to build another shabby sub to see the Titan(ic)

[violet parcel]

you gotta admit though the celine dion made the rest of sony possible, hundreds of millions for the first playstation and for sony music to be all over the world 🤣

[raw jasper]

The first playstation sold well because sony offered retailers way way better margins than nintendo, who were motivated to promote it over the n64

[tardy badger]

I’d like to use James Cameron’s

[raw jasper]

(That's, at least, the story I remember reading)

[tardy badger]

He’s been to the titanic 33 times

[glad ruin]

It will be a monument to the futility of human arrogance.

[violet parcel]

James cameron used mir russian subs

that are now retired and in display in a museum

[raw jasper]

That one is probably bound to work. He probably hired somebody who knew what was doing

A lot of somebodies probably

[violet parcel]

the last individual sub james cameron used doesnt look very safe either

[raw jasper]

I feel it already is. Two "unsinkable" wrecks on the same site

[tardy badger]

James Cameron actually has an associates in like advanced tech manufacturing or something like that

[glad ruin]

Only visible if you go down 2 miles in ice cold water.

[raw jasper]

Judging by the typos, it seems I'm getting tired

[tardy badger]

Kind of interesting

[violet parcel]

Also I almost once sank near the empress of ireland wreck

[raw jasper]

I need to print that

[tardy badger]

Same

[violet parcel]

discord N2O detected 🤣

[glad ruin]

Larger version
https://images-ext-2.discordapp.net/external/JUOghJG1JcUW83xRQVGSH6T48HKRYtFroEJL8RypNxs/https/64.media.tumblr.com/cdf7f794e6fe935161524c21e2b0f846/0da1f378450ae2a2-6f/s1280x1920/dc714472388dfc1849632c31b072061415939ad4.jpg

[glad ruin]

Only basic

[raw jasper]

The alveo acceleration development flow seems weird. First, you develop an RTL kernel that supports a specified AXI interface. Then, you interface it with the rest of the system using vitis HLS

[violet parcel]

but it says it's a sticker from another discord Im not on ?

tiredsleepy
This sticker is from a server that is either invite-only or unavailable. Learn more about using custom stickers.

[glad ruin]

Yeah, because it's from a private server

[raw jasper]

yeeh, basic discord angina medication supports that afaik

(context)

[violet parcel]

yeah that is why I said N2O, the word is blocked because of spammers/scams

[raw jasper]

I just saw your "previously known badge". I knew you seemed familiar!

[violet parcel]

me ?

[raw jasper]

yeah

[violet parcel]

pleads not guilty

I just changed my nickname from MulhorandEmperor a couple of days ago

I know probably nobody care but this is the specific shot I needed a lot. I use the 4 chimneys as Mekanism Thermal evaporation plant for my 2 fusion reactors where the coal burners used to be at the bottom. Also the life boats are actually moving spaceships

[raw jasper]

(insert scooby doo unmasking meme)

[raw jasper]

You work in film?

[violet parcel]

Titanic cabins in 1st class (the basic 4000 US$ ones in today money) were also just 3x3x3 m so very very small. When they see it wasnt a cruise ships it's really true, It was just a room to sleep in basically (but still quality furnitures)

[violet parcel]

No I used the ship plans to make my base in minecraft

[raw jasper]

oh ok

[violet parcel]

And that titanic recreation game that is still at the demo stage as well so I could make the nice common room like the paris cafe that was on board the titanic

[rapid geode]

i worked on a titanic show once

not as exciting as you might expect.

:x

haha

[violet parcel]

I think it's a bit unfair honestly and I wish I would have used another ship

many old military ships also have a lot of plans available and ww1 and ww2 had a lot of ship sanks sometimes with more peoples

the empress of ireland was much more tragic for instance but the titanic has some sort of mythical status

I actually merged a lot of cabins becuse most of the cabins were surprisingly very smalls and too small to use as rooms for a base in minecraft

[rapid geode]

yeah titanic i guess being biggest, or being called unsinkable got it fame. most people survived though

[violet parcel]

while I originally wanted to individually identify each room as long as the origina passengers in them

[rapid geode]

several large ships sink every year apparently. but usually few if any people goe sdown with it

[violet parcel]

before I fell in the waters near the empress of ireland wreck I didnt understand how peoples could die in such shallow waters with the side of the river only a couple hundreds of meters away but falling in them (I was watching whales and a ship water tank blew which sent me over) amde me realize the water is very cold even in june

when I hit the water I instantly understood why. Had the luxury of it happening in the day with clear weather and very sunny day

I stopped going in cruises after the titanic movie...

[blissful roost]

I went on a wonderful cruise around the Caribbean in 2014, for our honeymoon.

[rapid geode]

did it sink?

runs

[blissful roost]

7 days cruise, 2 nights in old San Juan, Puerto Rico each end.

[violet parcel]

I know it's an irrational phobia but Im absolutely terrified at the thought of being in the middle of the ocean with the cost thousands of miles away with no hope of being found and not even being able to drink the water

[blissful roost]

If it did, we obviously survived... and I missed it. 😅

[rapid geode]

ha

[violet parcel]

And whenever I see a cruise ship I cant help but identify all the features that are like the titanic and hwo things are exactly the same that made it sank

[blissful roost]

We had a balcony room, so at least we weren't in the middle of the ship.

[violet parcel]

Like they even have doors with balconies now to help the ships sinks even faster 🤦

Im not even sure I even know how to swim anymore

[raw jasper]

Plot twist: Armand is a ghost

[rapid geode]

ghost ship?

was that a movie?

i forget

[raw jasper]

I guess making a model of the titanic in a kids' block game didn't help :P

[blissful roost]

BOO! 👻

[raw jasper]

(minecraft fans, forgive me, for I am speaking in jest)

[rapid geode]

ha

[raw jasper]

https://tenor.com/view/ghost-pirate-dance-monkey-island-gif-12929936

[violet parcel]

nah that's ok it doesn't trigger me also it's not in water it's in space

[rapid geode]

space titanic, like doctor who?

[blissful roost]

I'm actually the creepy old guy in a costume, from a Scooby-Doo cartoon.

[violet parcel]

And I jokingly added vertical cruise missiles launchers on the front part of the ship where rose and jack stood in the movie for the icebergs 🤣

[raw jasper]

LOL

[violet parcel]

no I cant really go to that level of details in minecraft and add like shielding/force fields etc

can only add oxygen machines with a zone of effect

so it's the water version, but merged cabin, with a slighter better height and wider deck (to account for walls taking 1 meter vs 10 cm in the original)

[tardy badger]

https://tenor.com/view/spongebob-squarepants-spongebob-squarepants-moving-behind-the-rocks-moving-gif-23430878

Me after dying in a submarine Accident

[blissful roost]

Are you.... Skerred.. ?

[tardy badger]

Maybe if I lived closer to the ocean?

Largest body of salt water near me is the Great Salt Lake and it’s like 30ft deep (27m)

[raw jasper]

"Great Salt Lake" reads to me how a planetary architect would name their Dead Sea knockoff

[violet parcel]

I like how original they were back then in naming things

like take the name of some city in the world, use it a dozen of times across the US to name small cities

Great Salt Lake ... hmmm let's name it ... Salt Lake City ?

[blissful roost]

Travel far enough in any country, you'll reach water eventually. 😛

[raw jasper]

It's a pretty old phenomenon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandria_(disambiguation)

[violet parcel]

yeah but this is an historical figure who asked peoples to name their cities after him as he founded/conquered them

where as the US seems to have done it to ripoff the names of british cities out of spite

[raw jasper]

I thought it was similar, with the British naming their colonies after something from the motherland

[violet parcel]

but that doesnt explain all the vancouvers, torontos, the calgary, the quebecs, the montreals and the winnipegs in the US

pretty confusing for a canadian. Copyright law was clearly not around back then 🤣

[blissful roost]

Absolutely no-one:
Americans on Quora: "Why does England have so many places named after cities in the USA?"

[raw jasper]

I don't think you can copyright a city's name. I guess you could trademark it

But that'd be a whole other can o' worms

[violet parcel]

My statements are in jest obviously 😄

hence the 😄 and 🤣 at the end of them

[raw jasper]

👍

[late fulcrum]

There's a "Paris" and a "St. Louis" not far from here

[violet parcel]

does this seem easy to hook up to these connectors on an appliance ?

I mean it's probably just a digital signal to know something is on

[late fulcrum]

It looks like the fine pitch pins are logic level signals (at various voltages like 5V and 13V), and the widely spaced pins are AC signals

[violet parcel]

and the digital signal is 0 / less than a cutoff voltage when it's off

[fast steeple]

Hi, just joined. Currently playing with SSD1681 display using pi pico. Just a quick question with the pi pico SPI setup as "board.SCK1" doesn't exist in the board module.

should I post this in the help-with-circuitpython page?

[rapid geode]

What's a good micro button type that doesnt need a pcb? Can sit in a 3d print by itself.

[raw jasper]

Out of curiosity, where are 12v logic levels used, beside rs-232?

[late fulcrum]

Old style CMOS, and apparently that appliance?

And relay computers

[violet parcel]

would their logic signals be 13V too then ?

how do I find out what is their cutoff voltage for a logic 0 vs a logic 1 ?

maybe Im wrongly assuming this is simple

but normally electric machines at 120/240V are and their control signals is basically turn on/turn off

I dont see why they would need to make it more complicate x all these connectors and make their appliance more expensive than needed for themselves or uses like a military encryption on thse basic logic signals

[rapid geode]

wormy

decides i could print my own worm gear integrated into the pulley

O_o

[quaint marsh]

Yes, that’s the place

[rapid geode]

censorbot didnt like big bunny?

ha

or whatever that was

[violet parcel]

that particular appliance even has debug modes that are nice enough to tell you if the problem is the electronics in the peripheral (like a short in ice maker or a dead sensor) or the whole peripheral

so if you hook up to the control wire you could probably use it to even check your own circuit (am I preventing it from working correctly with my mods)

My question is: Would a man in the middle MCu "attack" like this actually works here if I splice the logic control wire to go to my MCU and to the controlled electric machine or my cunning plan wont actually work ?

[blissful roost]

https://tenor.com/view/blackadder-cunning-plan-gif-20823198

[rapid geode]

hm

its a thing all right

Lx

I need to find a nice micro servo now.

hmm. i guess its not quite a servo i need. the encoder/pot needs to be on the ring gear part, not the worm. hmmm. hmmm.

[sudden basin]

what device would one recommend for stereo audio playback from mp3 and enough io for the 3x4 Phone-style Matrix Keypad? maybe need 10mb storage

simulating a phone

[tepid niche]

Is anyone able to log into TinkerCAD?

It was working yesterday but now I get a timeout when trying to log in.

Fails at this redirect: https://api-reader.tinkercad.com/auth/

[quaint marsh]

Curious as to why stereo is needed for simulating a phone. Will there be two outputs?

I’ve had success using a raspberry pi pico. PWM audio output provided plenty of quality for a phone, and the pico has plenty IO. Only thing missing is the 10mb.

[late fulcrum]

Planned obsolescence + money selling parts

[late fulcrum]

A MP3 shield or a Music Maker Shield, and pretty much any CPU (even an old Arduino would do)

[late fulcrum]

My answer is: maybe

[violet parcel]

sure but I just want to intercept the communication between boards. That still let them sell callous parts

if I read whats going on between the fridge and ice-maker unit that still let them sell purposely low lenght of life ice maker

until I get tired of it and upgrade the CW/CCW motor etc in it

right ?

[late fulcrum]

For the first one, I was just replying to "I dont see why they would need to make it more complicate"

They're hoping you buy a whole new 'fridge when the ice maker quits.

[tardy badger]

Jokes on them, I’m buying a counter top ice maker

[violet parcel]

I see but I dont think they would go as far as to protect the signals on the wire since most peoples dont have the knowledge to open it or to understand what's going on ?

Isnt that a case of adding 20% effort to blocks 80% of the peoples ?

[late fulcrum]

Yeah, I doubt it's complex.

[dusty citrus]

its about capping the market, maybe most people don't, but there's always someone that might, if you make it more annoying, the lesser the people

[violet parcel]

I mean my relatives are the perfect example

I said this and most of them are trembling in fear that I may void the warranty (just a 1yr warranty 🤣) or that I get arrested by the fridge version of MPAA

and nobody has even mentionned mains yet

that is despite having relatives who have high mechanics ability and who fix their own cars or who are city plumbers

[late fulcrum]

While there are a few people who might start probing signals, it's not worth it to the company to make the signals hard to modify, as a) very few people will want to do so, b) paying engineers to do that is expensive, and c) it would lead to more failures and reputation loss due to perceived low reliability

My dad was like that, when I started repairing the neighbors' televisions and radios, he had bizarre visions of the local repair shops coming after me for taking away their business.

[violet parcel]

yeah my relatives also think I need some sort of federal appliance repair license to do that

that is just a requirement from companies before they give you their manuals and ndas to sign

ie: credible appliance repair school etc

[late fulcrum]

I rarely bother getting manuals

[violet parcel]

Seeing that my 3d printer has an open-source board with detailed instructions with the programming port intact was a very nice bonus that I didnt expect

[late fulcrum]

I do appreciate that sort of thing

[violet parcel]

Not sure if that qualify as a silver lining

but with this water damage big industrial stuff in my partment

the very wet climate outside is much easier to endure

It's bit hotter than normal inside because of the heat generated by these machine but they make my whole apartment much more dry than normal too

it's like amazonia weather outside currently

[rapid geode]

its only 28 outside. arizona is 45

😛

ha

[fresh niche]

Damm arizona is colder than i thought it would be

[rapid geode]

shh

[tardy badger]

109°F, not bad

Phoenix is currently 100°F or ~38°C

[rapid geode]

that would be death here

ha

once in a while it hits 40 ish here.

horrible

[tardy badger]

It sometimes hits 38-40C here

[low palm]

How many lines of code would most people consider to be a "big" embedded project?

[wanton thistle]

Depends on how involved it is. Something like PID is only a few lines of code but can be complex

[patent hemlock]

to be brutally honest, it also depends somewhat on the skill level of the developer - someone who is extremely fluent in whatever language would tend to write more compact code naturally

plus LoC can be very misleading - embedding function calls within function calls, for example, reduces LoC but does not decrease complexity/degree of difficulty

if you're thinking about "will this fit on the board", LoC likewise may not be a good measure but you can probably figure out some relative sizes based on various trial programs

[rapid geode]

anything past blinking a light is big for me.

:x

[south light]

lines of code I agree is a bad metric. What counts as a line

if you're writing a 256 entry lookup table in your code - which you may have a valid reason to do though I would typically question that - then is that 256 lines of code? Is that actually increasing the complexity of the project or contributing to the project being big?

[rapid geode]

my metric is how pleased with myself i am when it works 😛

[patent hemlock]

"hey, it didn't blow up/destroy itself this time!" ... 10 seconds ... "drat"

[rapid geode]

ha

i did a big program to process 3d models from a game. take them all in, scale them consistently, set origins, rename, resave in multiple formats with all their textures and submit notes to production. i was very pleased when i got actual files to come out.

ha

[late fulcrum]

I did something like that for first round training of a neural net to recognize Lego bricks.

[glad ruin]

I wouldn't underestimate the utility of a 256 entry lookup table in a microcontroller, or for that matter even on a full PC.

[south light]

I'd question it. The answer to the question may still be that it is completely required

[patent hemlock]

that's why there's 16 gazillion "code metrics" that you can analyze with - but i've got my personal set of "metrics"

• does it run?
• does it run "well" and "correctly"?
• can i understand the code quickly give a general knowledge of the language
• did anyone bother to put comments in there so it's plain what the thing is doing

[low palm]

What would be the alternative to the lookup table?

[patent hemlock]

a bunch of smaller lookup tables 😀

(nested)

to be honest, in one way that increases the complexity because now you're dealing with "sub tables", but on the other hand you've made it easier for comprehension and encapsulation

[late fulcrum]

Oh, I've done things like mathematically calculate out the values (either once, or on the fly) instead of using an explicit table.

[patent hemlock]

heh - i was thinking "state machine" type look up table: e.g. if button[0] blah() else if button[1] blech() else if button[2] foo()...

[urban arrow]

Well said. I wrote some time ago that my 2 favorite words, which used to be "let's eat", are now "It's working!"

[wanton thistle]

man I dont like PID loop tuning, especially when you are heating up air. It just takes so long for air to come back down to temp.

[south light]

some things can be computed algorithmically, and depending on language, you can algorithmically define the table at compile time. It really depends. I have seen people hardcode ADC count to mV calculations in LUTs, but that calculation is cheap to do, and they were only using to compare against a set threshold for a low battery and didnt need the full LUT. Other times the computation might be too expensive and the LUT is better, then its a choice of hard code, use compiler tricks to compute at compile time, or in some cases, compute it once in live app and reuse those computations.

I dont think LUTs are a blanket never do. Its just when I see them, its worth having a quick think about could it be better, and also where best to place it for code legibility as they are often a big chunk of lines for nothing.

For the low battery example, you could also just hardcode a check in raw ADC counts, if your battery low happens to come out as a reading of 4020 or something off of the ADC (totally random number I keyed in and not representative of any particular chemistry, adc bit depth or bit alignment) then theres no need to even convert the ADC reading at all, just check if its greater than 4020 or not

[rapid geode]

Anyone got a link for some good all metal fast micro servos? or should i just go random aliexpress?

[low palm]

Ah, that sounds more or less like what I've learned about them; not always the best idea when working with MCUs unless efficiency / complexity isn't a concern.

Thanks for the explanation

[south light]

LUTs often come down to space versus time

It may be that the computation is expensive

But then the table has to sit in some space somewhere....m

[patent hemlock]

i got my cheapie MG90 from Amazon, but they seem to be holding up at about $2.50 USD

[raw jasper]

Well, if you have all the time in the world, feel free to use an infinite series to compute your function du jour

[south light]

In regards to that typo on end of last message, I'm not gonna edit it out. It highlights another issue with hardcoded LUTs, particularly large ones, easy for a typo to slip in and go unnoticed for quite some time. Hobby project it might not matter, safety critical application it might. But there's procedures you can put in place around that

[patent hemlock]

that's what exec("some completely arbitrary code") is for, right? 😃

[rapid geode]

cool. needs to be all metal though, including the housing.

[raw jasper]

I think you misunderstand me; I was referring to storing your math function in a lookup table vs using, say, its Taylor series to iteratively compute it

[south light]

Another interesting one you don't tend to see in embedded but is kinda fun to have a go at. Memoisation, not a typo

[rapid geode]

oh, i see. they are metal gears.

neat. /me lools deepr

[patent hemlock]

nope - i got it (i was trying to make a joke)

[raw jasper]

Sorry! ^_^

[patent hemlock]

np - just having a nice chat! 😀

[patent hemlock]

the name on this thing seems accurate: https://www.amazon.com/Perfect-Waterproof-Brushless-Extremely-Shockproof/dp/B09Y4NZJBJ/ref=sr_1_9?crid=12PJL37J5TE4Z&keywords=amazon+all+metal+servo&qid=1687733945&sprefix=amazon+all+metal+servo%2Caps%2C166&sr=8-9&ufe=app_do%3Aamzn1.fos.f5122f16-c3e8-4386-bf32-63e904010ad0

[rapid geode]

ha. but that ones huge. i need super tiny.

[south light]

Memoisation/memorization in a sense gets you a slowly built up over time LUT. Effectively you start with an empty lut, and every time you call into it for a result, if it's not there, compute and store it. Can be beneficial. Can be worst of both worlds.
With all things in computing. Got to evaluate your options and be pragmatic

[rapid geode]

🙂

but i think you put me on the right track, thanks

[wanton thistle]

servocity has some

[raw jasper]

On the other hand, you can just be a guru and come up with the equivalent of the fast inverse square root for your function

(And go down in history ;>)

[south light]

I shan't repeat them but I love the comments in that code

[raw jasper]

Yeah, it reads like even the author was completely surprised by the fact it worked :P

[south light]

I think anyone that reads it is surprised it works, even when they know how it works

It's not crazy accurate, but it's also surprisingly good for what it is, more than good enough for its application

[raw jasper]

And now we are coming full circle, what with using fp8 for neural networks

(kind of)

[south light]

Heck, you can even see in the actual code, commented out was an attempt at having it refine the result over multiple iterations (which does work). But it was good enough for the game in one

Supposedly by about 20 iterations you'll have more inaccuracy due to floating point than the algorithm and it would have been faster than calculating the square root more traditionally.

Today. Most desktop CPUs will calculate 1 / sqrt faster than quakes fast inverse square, but even so, it's a cool little compsci curiosity I think

[raw jasper]

I wonder if they do it by regular LUT+interpolation, or by using some crazy ungodly pipeline

[south light]

I've heard claims of both so I wouldn't be surprised if there's a mix of solutions

There's a lot of tricks used for sine now. Like a fast approximation that only works for the first 90° of sine

But then you only need to compute the first 90 degrees anyway as the other 270 are all just horizontal or vertical flips

And likewise cosine is just offset

So even if you use a LUT you can get away with a pretty smol one

[raw jasper]

I mean, if you work at the scale of tens of nanometers, you can get away with a few small ROMs in your cores

It's not like in an FPGA where one mathematical look-up table will take up an entire BRAM

[south light]

Wouldn't surprise me that much to find intel just have a massive lut for some common math operations, though I don't believe they do

[raw jasper]

Why wouldn't they? It makes sense for things like sin, cos, etc

[south light]

But with gigs of ram being the standard. Wouldn't be surprised if that's something the OS is doing these days, dunno. A nice research avenue later

[south light]

ISA compatibility mainly

I've not heard of such instructions existing despite making sense to implement that way.

[raw jasper]

I think FSINCOS is a thing

[olive dome]

cough... cough ...Pentium FDIV bug..... cough... cough

[raw jasper]

lol yeah, a LUT was to blame for that right?

Apparently, software is faster than fsin/fcos in intel asm:

One directory includes an implementation in C, contributed by IBM. Since October 2011, this is the code that actually runs when you call sin() on a typical x86-64 Linux system. It is apparently faster than the fsin assembly instruction
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2284860/how-does-c-compute-sin-and-other-math-functions

[glad ruin]

Yes

You would be surprised. Lookup tables can save a lot of space and significantly reduce complexity in a number of problems. Unless the operation is trivial, they are also the fastest assuming they don't have to be stored in DRAM.

[raw jasper]

(it appears many GNU libm functions completely operate at the software level, without calling any FPU functions at all!)

[south light]

Interesting little thing there, they mention .net calling c libs. How the times have changed, but it is a decade old post

[raw jasper]

I'm not familiar with .net tbh

[south light]

But one of the things that has actually contributed to modern dotnet being faster is actually cutting it the c libs and implementing everything natively in c#

Once upon a time c# and .net indeed worked by most of the math lib being a C lib that was interopped into, likewise plenty of other stuff too

[glad ruin]

As far as lookup tables being inefficient in FPGAs is concerned... LUTs are literally the fundamental building blocks in an FPGA.

[south light]

But no longer the case today. It's all written in managed code.

[raw jasper]

I was referring to implementing lookup tables for mathematical functions, in which case the tools will probably place it in block RAM to avoid the area hit

[glad ruin]

Just because the code exists there doesn't mean that is what the compiler uses every time.

[glad ruin]

Yes, and BRAM is still decently efficient.

[south light]

Interop into C already has an overhead in Java, python and other managed languages and some of the math operations in raw c# are faster than the interop overhead was costing. Plus by being in managed code it can benefit from JIT optimisations, interop doesn't

Doesn't mean all interop is bad btw, there's still a lot for some essential stuff

[raw jasper]

Of course. It is a finite resource though, and eating up an entire 18kB BRAM block for, say, 256 values is a bit hard to the stomach :P

[south light]

Can't interact with underlying OS without interop

[glad ruin]

Yeah but at the point you are running in a managed language you're already introducing a lot of overhead no matter what so the performance hit isn't as noticeable.

[south light]

Some benches now are matching or beating C on hot paths

Modern JITs can be crazy fast

But even then, gonna have a start-up cost

[raw jasper]

On the other hand, in some situations, you could beat an inefficient C program in R if you really wanted to ;)

[glad ruin]

Yeah well C isn't really a "fast" language. It all depends on what the compiler does.

[south light]

But hey, anything that makes your managed environment faster than it was is a good thing

[dusty citrus]

Rust is also popular those days, ain't it?

[south light]

Rust is indeed the new hotness for a lot of folk

I'm yet to dedicate time to sitting down, playing with it, using it in anger, but it's on my to-do list

[glad ruin]

Claiming that <language> is "fast" is a bit of a fallacy in my view. Some languages and implementations have built a reputation for being slow but blanket statements and comparisons such as "it's as fast as C" are rather meaningless.

[dusty citrus]

Mah at the end of the day whatever works is fine, there are n ways to do the same job

[south light]

There's always an objectively bad way to do the job though, which doesn't mean don't do it because that itself can be an interesting exercise

But rarely a best way

[raw jasper]

Same here. There appear to have been some recent situations regarding the project (or the community surrounding it?) that are kind of discouraging me from picking it up until the path the language will take is clearer

[south light]

I solved works pre interview assessment entirely in LINQ once just for fun. Absolutely hideous code, very badly performing. But it worked

But that was the exercise for myself, can I do it in LINQ? Answer. Yes

[glad ruin]

LINQ does make some things very convenient, if you don't care about performance.

[south light]

Agreed

[glad ruin]

(Or the overhead associated with accessing the information in a database is the primary time drain)

[south light]

I did have a bit of code I was working on earlier this year that just to prove concept, I quickly spat out in LINQ because ez and see the thing work. But threw benchmark dotnet at it. Started refactoring and trimming down (keeping old version around for reference in benches)

On an input array of 100000 items (representative of live app, heck, frozen from live app). Went from about 6mb of heap allocations to 0 bytes. 750 times speed improvement

Difference. Took maybe two hours to write out the linq free version to the 5 minutes in LINQ

It is unit tested of course

[glad ruin]

LINQ can still iterate far faster than the GUI can update.

[south light]

And thing is, the slow linq version, was still fast enough that if it was running as say a rarely performed UI interaction? It would have probably been fine and not worth the two hours spent replacing it. But it was on a hot path, it was worth the two hours.

Just got to be pragmatic and evaluate the exact scenario

Did a similar exercise this week but to less drastic result and not with LINQ, but it was another hot path where the performance did matter

Plenty of other places I look at, eh, youre gonna run and take 2ms longer than the alternative once every 5 minutes. Not worth my time right now

[glad ruin]

Back when I was doing stuff with WinForms I was shocked by the fact that there is no rolling log/terminal style UI element.

[south light]

Yeah you'd have had to shoehorn something else into doing it

And I think you still would have to

[glad ruin]

I ended up implementing a custom (data bindable) circular buffer class that could read data from am AsyncQueue and update a ListBox because every other method I tried was painfully slow.

[south light]

I'm working on one .net app on 3 platforms with 3 guis (lots of legacy codebase and at time, cross platform GUI frameworks for dotnet were all miserable in some way)

So get the pain of making something look same in wpf, gtk and apple cocoa

Combined with not much great documentation for the latter two in c#

[glad ruin]

GUI code is not my happy place.

[south light]

Tbf, not much great documentation for the latter full stop

[glad ruin]

I can do it, but it is boring and obnoxious.

[south light]

I've more recently been doing code lower down Inthe depths of the app, but turns out every GUI framework has weird quirks

Gtk is weird. WPF is weird. Cocoa is weird. And they all choose to be weirdest at the most inopportune moments

[glad ruin]

Yes

Hence the reason I avoid them.

[south light]

Cocoa is particularly painful for one reason only

[glad ruin]

Apple.

[south light]

It's designed for objective C, and objective C's multiple inheritance in particular

C# doesn't have multiple inheritance. So you're left with some shoehorning that results in very very verbose code to do tasks that are easier in objective C

[glad ruin]

I have never needed to write objective C, and I would prefer to stay that way

[glad ruin]

Yeah and interfaces are... painful.

[south light]

Want to make a table control in cocoa? Can't just instantiate one, cocoa expects you to subclass for most of your instances of the base class

Fine, you subclass it

Eh no can do, got to subclass four classes to do that

So to use 1 table in a view. Nah, that's 4 new classes you gotta make

Alternatively decide if it really needs to be a table control

More seriously I did go and make 1 implementation that covers most of our applications usage and therefore is used across most of the Mac GUI rather than 20 odd implements

[glad ruin]

Half the time I also end up throwing away half of the autogenerated code from WinForms and programmatically instantiating anything more complex than a button.

[south light]

Objective C allows overriding class behaviour on a single instance, and multiple inheritance. Between them making tables much much easier to work with than they are in c#, but that is just ultimately downside of wrapping a GUI framework into a language it wasn't meant to be consumed in

[glad ruin]

Objective C allows overriding class behavior in a single instance
This is scary for... multiple reasons. Especially since ObjC is still C.

[south light]

I'm not a fan of the winforms designer. The XAML designers for WPF, WinUI and MAUI are better but I'm still happier hand writing it

[glad ruin]

XAML I've heard is problematic.

[south light]

And yes, ObjC is an, interesting, language. And not necessarily interesting in the right ways

Honestly biggest issue with the XAML stuff off the bat is learning curve. But it's not too bad.

But, object life cycles are not as clear

[late fulcrum]

I greatly prefer ObjC to C++, but I'm a weirdo

[tardy badger]

I prefer circuitpython to C++

Unfortunately circuitpython isn’t as fast as C++ and it’s “open source” so it would never get used in really any gubment related projects 😛

[late fulcrum]

The gubmint has some peculiar ideas about what's appropriate. There is an open source initiative in many departments, however.

[tardy badger]

I’d use circuitpython for my day job in a heartbeat

Some work I’m doing at my day job is related to the OSDR stuff but that’s all I can really say. You can find more details in press releases funny enough

https://www.l3harris.com/newsroom/press-release/2023/06/l3harris-awarded-81-million-contract-connect-multi-orbit-satellite

Fun stuff really

Well, not what I do anyway

[night crescent]

The Desk of Ladyada - You need to calm down! https://youtu.be/m8NEA9xLCXc

[rapid geode]

k, i cant find my feathers n such. i can get a feather rp2040 though tomorrow. is that a good choice for circuit python or should i try to find the M4 feather?

all this thing does is read buttons and move a servo and read one potentiometer. and maybe flash an led.

im going to get the featehr servo wing too. cause i cant find many 3.7v servos that are suitable.

[tardy badger]

Nice

[rapid geode]

nice is not an answer :x

hahaha

[late fulcrum]

The wing doesn't generate the 5V supply for the servos, you'll still need to get that somewhere.

[rapid geode]

err, i thoguht it said it did. must have misread

[late fulcrum]

The RP2040 is fine with CircuitPython

There are a few wings available, some of them have onboard PWM generators so you can run a bunch of servos without using up too many GPIOs, but most of them have something like a terminal block for servo power input.

[rapid geode]

https://www.adafruit.com/product/2928

"it is 5V compliant, which means you can control it from a 3.3V Feather and still safely drive up to 6V outputs (this is good for when you want to control white or blue LEDs with 3.4+ forward voltages)"

hm. does seem to use separate power

bah

maybe just need a boost instead. take the battery to 5+v

[late fulcrum]

That's one approach, if your battery has sufficient current capacity. Or you can have a separate, higher voltage battery for servo power.

[rapid geode]

the feather has to charge the battery.

so i think im stuck with 1s lipo

3.7v

boost not in stock.

grumblecakes

[late fulcrum]

It looks like product ID 2030 is in stock

[rapid geode]

ah yup

also https://www.adafruit.com/product/4654

since its not going to logic, this might work

tinier too

[late fulcrum]

Good find!

[rapid geode]

$23, woo. plus digikey shipping. shrug

oh i need buttons first

i should do big glowy arcade buttons as a joke 😛

no tactile switches in stock. boo

ah, i finded. it is digikey after all. hahahah

ordered, woo. will order the cheap amazon servo for software testing. then i can get all the basic functions sorted out

then i will take over the world!

[patent hemlock]

https://giphy.com/gifs/dollars-amount-sEULHciNa7tUQ

[glad ruin]

[south light]

How big a servo do you need because most hobby servos will operate down to 3V or so

But they do lose a lot of torque and speeeeeed

A little 9g servo can indeed also work off a 5v1a booster

And a full size if you aren't loading it up

[fervent wasp]

Anyone have links to info on printed/living springs, thicknesses, loads, design considerations, etc

[lavish mirage]

I hope it includes math and statistics

[fossil dawn]

why would it? You don't need to understand that stuff. Just type your questions into the AI and you get a result that you can 100% rely on. It's always correct and exactly what you want. It's AI after all. You don't even have to proof-read it before handing it in as an essay or using it as an argument in court
|| 😝 ||

[south light]

^ this. And the code it produces is always perfect too

[fossil dawn]

of course. If it doesn't work, you just made a mistake while copy-pasting

[tranquil swallow]

Only a matter of time before all conversations are AI prompts with minor adjustments by the user, once phones integrate it into their keyboards

Perhaps with better AR hardware integration all physical conversations will be AI driven as well

Maybe with better biotechnology we’ll just offload all of the brains work to AI

[fossil dawn]

I'm planning to build a drone. Do you recommend I go intel or AMD?
Does AMD's better multi-core performance apply to quadcopters or only once you go octocopter and more?
||just a meme. Found these motors and thought they were kinda funny.||

[patent hemlock]

that's one big drone - i'm assuming you'll probably want to use laptop-grade cpus to try to avoid heating issues - at that size, it pretty much doesn't matter which processor: it's going to depend on what controller boards you can find that will drive the motors, etc.

[fossil dawn]

sorry, just joking because I found intel branded motors funny 😆

and no issue with heating on a drone. Just fly fast enough and you don't need a fan on the heatsink😝

[patent hemlock]

i'm working on my first cup of coffee and thought that was a CPU cooler - now i see the windings 🤣

[fossil dawn]

😆 ☕

[raw jasper]

nvidia

https://developer.nvidia.com/blog/skydio-2-jetson-tx2-drone/

😅

[fossil dawn]

btw those intel drone motors are apparently from "Intel falcon 8 plus" from 2016

[raw jasper]

https://lanoc.org/images/reviews/2017/noctua_aseries/image_26.jpg

I wonder what those giant borg fans on the back would be used for, considering noctua fans are intended for PC builds afaik...

[rapid geode]

for pc cooling.

there are a few cases that take one huge 180mm fan in the front

but noctua fans are also used in industrial applications. control cabinet cooling etc

[raw jasper]

At that point, just get a server. I imagine the noise will be just as ear-deafening :P

[fossil dawn]

isn't it generally larger fan => can spin slower to move the same amount of air per minute => quieter?

[raw jasper]

Honestly, I have no idea. I am not a fluid dynamicist(sp?)

hmm, it looks like the 200mm noctua fan has a noise level of 18.1 db(A), while the 40mm one goes up to 14.9 db(A)

[patent hemlock]

i did a Bachman-Turner Overdrive concert - those are silient 😀

[raw jasper]

How does your audiogram look like now?

[patent hemlock]

got some dropout in the lower frequencies, but overall managed to recover

fortunately it was only once and only for about 90 minutes - but since i was working the concert, the in-house comms also picked up the audio (because at that volume, what wouldn't) so it might have been somewhat louder and definitely more directed --- my ears were ringing for 3 days

[raw jasper]

Oof. Glad you're OK now

Did you go to an ENT immediately after the fact?

[patent hemlock]

i was 19, so ... no 😀

FYI for the curious, BTO is reknowned for being the "loudest rock band" with concerts regularly going over the 100db mark

these guys cranked it to 12

[raw jasper]

I remember reading that a prescription of corticosteroids immediately after sudden hearing loss can help improve outcomes. Not a doctor, though, so anyone reading this take it with a grain of salt.

[violet parcel]

@raw jasper I think I see the delivery truck for my rtl-sdr 🤣

Did I mention my package was inspected 8 times at the border (toronto-pearson)?

It will be fine I promise. It's part of the questions to study required for an ham license in Canada

[tranquil swallow]

My brain keeps having moments where I’m incapable of complex thought

In fact all thoughts cease to make sense

[stuck moth]

Please post this as text, not an image.

[fossil dawn]

did you copy paste that from microsoft onenote? 😄

[regal mortar]

yes copy past from word

i purchased Adafruit 9-DOF Orientation IMU Fusion Breakout - BNO085 (BNO080) - STEMMA QT / Qwiic, I need to link them and conect them to a battery and some type of data storage

the website mentione STEMA QT cables but I am not sure which I need

also a controller board is mentioned

I need help please

i want to use the data collected during human movement to drive a musculoskeletal model https://simtk-confluence.stanford.edu:8443/display/OpenSim/OpenSense+-+Kinematics+with+IMU+Data

[cerulean lotus]

trying to find out what type of connector the 2mm pitch ones on this are https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/adafruit-industries-llc/1919/6827079 . want to see if they’ll fit with this https://www.adafruit.com/product/2671

[ancient rivet]

should work ok. but note the crimp housing on the 2mm end are multiple 2x - i.e. not single like the 2.54mm end.

[mild lark]

Does AdaFruit sell any optoisolators?

[cerulean lotus]

thanks!

[oblique lantern]

Hello, does anyone know if it is fine to connect an on-off switch to a lithium ion battery power line? (So the on/off switch would interrupt the " + " line)

[crystal ore]

Yes, though you would want the switch to be rated for the voltage and current... A little DIP switch wouldn't be happy with a RC battery pack.

[oblique lantern]

Ah okay, that's great to know! Thank you very much, I was just going to use a regular one lol

[late fulcrum]

I'm not aware of any, but there are plenty available on DigiKey and various surplus vendors if you're looking for quantities, don't want to spend a lot of money, and are flexible on specifications.

[half plank]

How do I use oled to be the display for a raspberry pi zero instead of using hdmi

Preferably a 1-2 inch screen

[glad ruin]

It is possible with fbcp or by messing with device tree overlays. I once set up the 128x64 OLED pHAT to do it. I don't remember exactly how I managed to make it work but I did.

[half plank]

I mean by usign the display in pins on the top 4 pins seperate from the gpio

[glad ruin]

Which pins?

You mean the DSI connector?

[glad ruin]

Oh, that's the old analog video interface. I don't think you'll be able to find an OLED that accepts composite video.

Might be able to drive an old TV with it though.

[half plank]

is there a converter

[glad ruin]

You'd probably have to build one.

An RP2040 would theoretically be capable of doing the conversion.

[half plank]

what would i be convetin g

[late fulcrum]

There are some small LCD displays that accept composite video like that

But I don't know of an OLED one.

[half plank]

does adafruit sell one

[late fulcrum]

Amusingly, yes: https://www.adafruit.com/product/911

[half plank]

How big is the controller board

[late fulcrum]

From the product description page I linked to: "Control board measures 47.3mm x 32mm"

[half plank]

Geez is there a smaller one

or how do i do it throiugh gpio

[late fulcrum]

That's getting into specialty parts, but you can control a smaller OLED display via I2C or SPI on GPIO pins, but it wouldn't automatically act as the monitor, that would take additional coding

I did just give away a pair of 3/4" color composite video displays

[glad ruin]

This is what it would take to build one yourself:

ADC (~12Msps, 8-12 bits per sample) ▶️ sample buffer ▶️ digital filter to de-embed VSync and HSync ▶️ map sample data to pixels (with interpolation as necessary) ▶️ perform color space conversion (YCC to RGB) ▶️ "packetize" the RGB data and send it to the destination display
🔁

[late fulcrum]

I do still have a 40mm color composite display, but I'm pretty sure it's not what you're looking for, as it's a CRT display, so involves high power draw, bulk, and high voltage

[glad ruin]

What exactly are you trying to accomplish here? Is there anything preventing you from using a more conventional interface?

[half plank]

sure, i have no idea on how to code one

[late fulcrum]

Fortunately, other people seem to have done the heavy lifting https://github.com/raspberrypi/linux/blob/9de205a1a4376ed40c70a85152aee177b6867dd6/arch/arm/boot/dts/overlays/README#L3813

[glad ruin]

Yeah that's what I used to get terminal output on the 128x64 OLED pHAT.

You have to use a custom font to make it work at a resolution that low.

[burnt tendon]

You know, it's sad that I can never find an un-altered picture of really old computer monitors.

All I can find is... composite photographs.

[crystal ore]

Yeah, the special-effects industry loves green screens.

[glad ruin]

I think you missed the pun.

[burnt tendon]

I think EdKeyes knows what to expect from me at this point.

[crystal ore]

Au contraire, I'm one of @burnt tendon's fans. 😁

[burnt tendon]

(I can never be helpful enough to be a Helper lest I lose my proud punster status)

[half plank]

Ok, thank you. Is there some tutorial that I could follow to set up two display that are the same

Through qpio

[fresh niche]

Aggggghhhh

Why

[patent hemlock]

if we're talking early stage PCs, that might be a herculean task, but i'm sure there's some diamonds in there

[jovial crane]

Do you use MPLAB X IDE a lot?

[wanton thistle]

Yes, for my personal projects

[late fulcrum]

How old is "really old"? I have an old Wyse terminal (1980s vintage), a Commodore 1802 (1970s vintage), a Sony monitor for Sun computers (in their weird 1152x900 resolution), some Silicon Graphics monitors (1024x768), an amber screen LG monitor for an Atari ST, etc.

[raw jasper]

There's a pun underneath, I don't think they were being serious ;)

[late fulcrum]

That'll teach me to read stuff literally when I just woke up!

[late fulcrum]

I'll share a pic of vintage CRT electronics anyway (in this case, an analog oscilloscope)

[glad ruin]

7000 series Tek?

Oh, nope it's got tubes.

[late fulcrum]

500 series Tek

Here's one of my 7000 series ones

(and a peek of a 5000 series in the upper right corner)

Working on old Tek scopes is where I got my first taste of the joy that is silver bearing solder. The scopes themselves even had a little spool of the correct solder inside, as using non-silver-bearing solder would leach the silver out of the bond that held the contacts in the ceramic strips.

They did toy with the fun notion of "let's stuff a scope into a plugin" too. This could arguably also be a "500 series" scope, but it's a TM 500 series one.

Culminating in this meme, which I couldn't resist making

[glad ruin]

Oh nice you have one of those? Someone at Tek that I walk to work with on some mornings told me the story behind them.

[late fulcrum]

The switch to having a single person build the CRTs?

I picked it up, along with a couple of other TM500 modules, because I liked the look of it. I had to repair the TM500, and the odd custom module someone had built. The scope is better off than it was, but it still needs a fair amount of work.

[glad ruin]

No, the story behind why Tek built a TM500 scope module

[late fulcrum]

That one I don't know. They ended up building a whole series of them, the larger ones took two bays.

[jovial crane]

Nice I would like to hear more about this. I have a few failed attempts using that environment. Do you ever program Feathers directly via USB rather than with JTAG/ATMEL-ICE?

[wanton thistle]

So I use the Pickit 3 and the interface built in. But I also use the interface that's external when I use a different compiler for my pics. I don't have experience with programming the feather using that interface. I don't see why not though

[jovial crane]

OK~ in linux command line in the past I was able to use bossac (bossa?) and friends to program binary files over USB into SAMD21 feathers. I was hoping a similar technique could work here

[fair summit]

you can also convert .bin to .uf2 and use the UF2 aspect of the bootloader

there is a python script to do that

you would want to offset your executable to past the bootloader

[jovial crane]

That does sound viable. I prefer bypassing that UF2 altogether personally. Incidentally, is this the right chat area for me to be poking you all about this??

[fair summit]

well, it's not arduino; ⁠help-with-projects might make sense. You're kind of on your own wrt the IDE: we have no experience with it. But we can help you with bootloader issues. Does the IDE handle Arduino-style bootloaders at all, or are you using bossac manually? Is it your intention to get rid of the existing bootloader or use it?

you want uf2conv.py, which is here: https://github.com/microsoft/uf2/blob/master/utils/uf2conv.py and is also supplied a lot of other places (in various arduino board support packages, for instance)

[jovial crane]

IIRC the UF2 does both the SAM-BA protocol as well as the file drag/n/drop approach. In any case I prefer to keep whatever bootloader is present. And whether the IDE handles that kind of bootloader at all was kind of my initial question too

Moving over to #help-with-projects

[glad ruin]

From a person I know at Tek:

SC501, designed by Matt Zimmerman from failure analysis after he saw over 80% of the miniscopes CRTs get thrown out due to high power consumption and thought he could do something with the rejects. He was my coworker's mentor.

They were apparently used mostly in biomed applications.

[raw jasper]

Here's some belated electronic coffee! ☕

I came across some realtek marketing material today. I was positively surprised when I found out they were still using the crab logo

[late fulcrum]

They're fairly low bandwidth, so that would make sense. I'm thinking of adapting one for vector art. Happily, the power it takes from the TM500 is pretty basic, just plus and minus 33V.

[raw jasper]

Most biomed things I can think of run at a few KHz at best, so this little scope (5MHz IIRC?) would have been more than sufficient

[glad ruin]

Yeah, and biomed doesn't really need much for triggering in most cases either I imagine.

[raw jasper]

TBF, most usecases I can think of also require acquisition