Hmmm interesting
#general-chat
dusty citrus
timber goblet
what do people do with fpga at maker scale?
vernal gale
use it as a learning tool to design CPUs, or some other hardware like a video chip
designing a cpu isn't as hard as it sounds
a simple one anyway
timber goblet
bummer - I'd love an excuse to get set up for it, but CPUs aren't for me (been there done that)...not sure what sort of video chip you'd mean, like graphics primitives?
vernal gale
like a simple graphics card, or some kind of video signal processor
timber goblet
I wonder if there's something fun with SDR.
vernal gale
possibly
you could probably write something to decode the signals
or transform them somehow
timber goblet
I don't understand DSP. It looks like there's some cheese down this hole 😃
vernal gale
haha
dusty citrus
But I am thinking of creating a CPU with TTL logic chips
timber goblet
on FPGA - so https://opentechlab.org.uk/videos:013:notes was a lot of fun to watch
late fulcrum
Arduino has rolled out their MKR Vidor 4000 which includes an FPGA, and they said they're going to be bringing FPGA programming to everybody, but I don't think that's quite there yet.
dusty citrus
I mean
Hope arduino will be able to accomplish that
Then I could experiment with FPGAs
late fulcrum
There was the open source "icestorm", and now there are newer open source projects "Symbiflow" and "nextpnr" which I'm looking at. There are some amazingly affordable FPGA breakout boards out there too.
dusty citrus
Nice
late fulcrum
Thanks to tannewt for pointers to those two
dusty citrus
I could develop my own CPU like that now!
late fulcrum
In a related notion, the Alorium people have implemented an ATmega328 on an FPGA with room left over, and are offering it in an Arduino form factor. It's US$75, but nicely done https://www.aloriumtech.com/xlr8/
dusty citrus
I will think of buying a FPGA board but..I have no money
late fulcrum
I used to play with the earlier GAL/PAL technology, which then moved to CPLD (you can get CPLD boards for under US$20) then FPGA. I'm hoping some of my earlier learning will still be useful (I'm guessing so as VHDL is still used, although it has been joined by VeriLog).
dusty citrus
Wait is a CLPD same as a FPGA?
late fulcrum
It's the same general idea, but an earlier, more primitive technology. Which can be great for learning on, since it's cheap, less complex, and less proprietary.
dusty citrus
Back then in 5th grade I thought that programmable hardware is a myth
late fulcrum
I was a little older than that when I came across the notion of replacing gates with PROMs to get "universal" gates. I spent a while drawing out logic tables and satisfying myself that there are indeed 16 possible 2-input gates, and that a gate can be replaced with a lookup table.
That was also about the time I was seeing the notion of a PROM used as a trivial sequencer, with its outputs driving its inputs via a latch or counter.
dusty citrus
I just hope that I can build something with my z80
Maybe do some manipulation of the inputs to drive motors
late fulcrum
The early PAL chips weren't even doing that, they just had an input decoder, a matrix where you could set fuses to connect rows and columns, and output registers.
dusty citrus
So a built PROM right?
late fulcrum
Yeah, a PAL was basically a PROM wrapped with some simple and/or logic and registers.
dusty citrus
So making it a early programmable FPGA
late fulcrum
A nice basic runthrough (with good diagrams) here https://www.slideshare.net/ammarajaved940/programmable-logic-devices-30961988
Right, first there were PROMs, then PAL, then CPLD, then FPGA.
dusty citrus
That's pretty cool
late fulcrum
Getting a Z80 going isn't that tough. At a minimum, I think you just need a clock generator and a reset circuit. But you'll need to hook up some RAM before you can do much with it.
I'm not surprised to find there's a Z80 implementation for an FPGA https://opencores.org/projects/a-z80
Alternatively, there's the Z8 series, which is like a microcontroller version of a Z80 with RAM and ROM on-chip. Those are even easier to get going.
There's even the newer Z8 Encore series, including one member with flash ROM, 1kB RAM, and an adorable 8-pin DIP package.
This stuff still amazes me, as it wasn't that long ago that a minimal CPU setup was a big 40-pin chip, a half-dozen more big chips, and a whole lot of connections. Now you can get a more capable system that's self-sufficient and fits in the same package as a 555 timer.
For reference, this system is the one I learned on (originally it was just the front board)
late fulcrum
A friend of the family and I built it. It's the Motorola 6800 evaluation board. The chip on the lower right is the 6800, and the chip on the lower left is the "Mikbug" ROM. In-between are 6 6810 128-byte static RAM chips. Above those are the clock generator and some I/O chips.
dusty citrus
Wow
Retro looking
Its just amazing how I am 14 and I love these kind of old hardware
late fulcrum
With 768 bytes of RAM, there wasn't room for an assembler, so I'd have to write the programs in assembler, hand-assemble them into hex codes, and type the hex into the thing. It was tedious, and I learned A LOT. And I was about your age when I did that.
late fulcrum
The 6800 has some special two-byte instructions to accessing memory in "page zero", so I would tend to put my variables there. Page one held the stack, and the rest of the memory was for my program, and any variables I couldn't fit into page 0. All that stuff is still available today, for people who want to play with it, as well as the microcontrollers that reduce all that onto a single chip. Learning how to do even a simple program in assembler is probably worth the effort (PIC, AVR, and ARM all have fairly human-readable assembler).
dusty citrus
Back then couldn't you upgrade the RAM on the thing?
late fulcrum
The board itself only had 6 RAM sockets. However, the bus was brought out on the edge connector on the bottom. What we ended up doing to save money was build a converter from Motorola bus to the more popular S-100 bus (it's hiding inside the box), then adding on 4kB S-100 memory cards (those are the other cards behind the CPU board). So that thing now has 16kB of RAM to play with, enough to run BASIC, an assembler, or other programs that were considered "large" back in the 1970s.
dusty citrus
What about the boards at the back?
late fulcrum
Those are the 4kB RAM boards. The heatsinks are for the 7805 regulators that each powered a row of RAM chips (each 4kB board drew about 3 amps of power, so all that RAM ended up eating a good bit of power).
dusty citrus
I thought RAM takes low amounts oh f power
late fulcrum
It does these days, but most RAM these days is dynamic RAM, this was earlier static RAM, which ate a lot of power. Basically lots of 21L02 chips.
late fulcrum
Yeah, lots of them. This is a wonderfully retro miniature computer based on an 1802: http://www.sunrise-ev.com//membershipcard.htm
A web search for a CPU name and "computer kit" will yield lots of options. For example, "Z80 computer kit" gives lots of results, including this nice one for $45 http://cpuville.com/Kits/Computer-kit.html
late fulcrum
There are add-on boards to support that and other useful things http://cpuville.com/Kits/Z80-kits-home.html
dusty citrus
I see...
late fulcrum
If you want to get the experience of an early 8-bit computer on the cheap, there are goodies like the Kim Uno https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1BrtXRscLn8
dusty citrus
Lots of opportunities and kits
late fulcrum
Yeah, you're not alone: there are a bunch of people interested in playing with barebones computers.
dusty citrus
I just think that I am the only young kid interested in old computers
No wonder I dont have that much friends
late fulcrum
Far from it! There are a bunch of us out here. That's one thing I like about the internet, it makes it easier to find far-flung like-minded people.
late fulcrum
Agreed. For a while, I thought I was the only one fascinated by the bootstrap process, how a CPU goes from power on with a blank memory to a known state, ready to accept keystrokes. The journey involved learning about power on reset, which led to how interrupt vectors work, which led to how the memory map was set up. I just ate it up, my (few) friends thought it was a big yawn.
So years later, when I get an idea to creatively use the memory on a processor, and I have to hack up the IDE to customize the memory map, I'm not afraid to dive in and do it. This translated directly into cool job opportunities.
late fulcrum
I was never fond of the X86 architecture. Currently I'm working for a subcontractor for IBM.
dusty citrus
I want to think of creating the first parallel CPU
late fulcrum
That could mean any of several different things. At one point, you could process 4 bits at a time with a 2901 chip, and hook up as many as you wanted to process as many bits as you liked at once.
The TTL 74818 ALU was also a "bit slice" architecture like the 2901, and you could hook up multiples of them to process more bits at a time.
Oh wow, I found a discrete implementation of a 74181, this is wonderful https://hackaday.io/project/25596-mega-one-8-one
dusty citrus
wait can you hook up 2 of the TTL ALUs together and it will be a 8 bit ALU?
late fulcrum
Yup. The early PDP-11 computers used 4 of 'em to operate on 16-bit words.
dusty citrus
Nice
late fulcrum
The only issue is propagating the carry bits fast enough, which is why the 74182 carry lookahead chip was available: it would do the carry calculations independently, so you could use up to 4 74181 chips in parallel without slowdown (you could use more 74182 chips if you wanted to use more than 4 74181 chips in parallel).
dusty citrus
But I wonder how can I put in the Control unit with the ALU in a small space
In order to make it small
Like making small cores
On a circuit board
late fulcrum
ALU based technology is rather old, so it tends to be big DIP packages: there's a limit to how small you can make things that way.
tame saddle
@thin canopy are you watching the PyCascades stream? this music talk is quite interesting.
thin canopy
@tame saddle Wasn't able to. Too. Much. Snow. To. Shovel. Have to catch it later.
tame saddle
well, it turned more into a data sciency thing. but still a good look into Spotify's API and how they use signal processing to gather a lot about a typical piece of music.
thin canopy
That would be interesting.
tame saddle
and ice that back! or...lay in the snow mounds that you've just made.
thin canopy
Ha! It's mostly better than a gym membership, just colder. Great for meeting new neighbors, too.
tame saddle
true on all points. but i still don't miss it... 😄
late fulcrum
These zero-height (embedded in the PCB) pin receptacles look handy for people trying to squeeze a design into minimum space. https://www.mill-max.com/new_products/detail/181
dusty citrus
I like old retro flip switches on the first personal computer
late fulcrum
The Pi based PDP-8 emulator really does a nice job with the retro presentation (and it's not insanely expensive) http://obsolescence.wixsite.com/obsolescence/pidp-8
late fulcrum
It's just a way to represent numbers that's reasonably compact and reflects how the bits are arranged. A while back, people used octal, which has 3 bits per digit, so an 8-bit byte was 2 and 2 thirds digits. Hex represents 4 bits per digit, so a byte neatly fits in 2 digits.
So 0xa5 (a5 in hex) is 1010 0101 in binary. Since we don't have 16 digits to work with, we use the letters "A" through "F" for the digits 10 through 15.
dusty citrus
I better off with binary
I sounds easy and I can count In binary
Just by using my fingers
late fulcrum
I'll use binary when it seems clearer. For example, here's an excerpt from my character definitions for a 16-segment display: ```c
0b0000000110110001, // 33 /exclam
0b1000000010000000, // 34 /quotedbl
0b1101101110111011, // 35 /numbersign
0b0101101110111001, // 36 /dollar
karmic kite
I entered the realm of vertical monitors... you can see so much more code!
timber goblet
@late fulcrum, an hour ago I didn't know about the pidp-8, and now I must have one. I wonder if you're going to make a habit of this.
late fulcrum
I'm horrible that way. You should see my basement.
proven olive
@karmic kite I just added more monitors. Although a vertical one sure is tempting... Going to build a new PC before I add monitors, though.
karmic kite
its really nice for css and terminal sessions especially
I took these two off old ATM's. I thought touch capabilities would be gimmicky but they work pretty sweet
late fulcrum
Tempted to add a third monitor myself. It's also tempting to buy a new computer (there's a nice updated one available) but the existing one does the job, and should be able to support 3 monitors.
Alas, my old pivoting monitor died, so they're all landscape so far. However I have some ideas for a cheap portrait monitor...
karmic kite
Working IT a number of years ago, alot of people resisted even a second monitor. But after they got a second monitor they never wanted to go back
Then the one guy in our department set up a 8 in a 2x4 array with 22" monitors
late fulcrum
When I worked on an Army base, there were stacks of monitors and mount racks lying around, so I made a 3x2 array and plugged them into my laptop (which offered a little seventh screen). A few other people attempted it, but their laptops didn't want to drive that many screens.
late fulcrum
Not even that, I was using USB-DVI adapters for the last few.
dusty citrus
WHAT
late fulcrum
That laptop had a fairly low-end GPU that was happy driving three screens, so I used adapters for the rest. The adapters weren't super fast, but I could watch videos on them if I wanted to, but mostly I had screens full of text as I was programming.
I don't know of any laptops with 6 video outputs...
dusty citrus
I mean
karmic kite
I've ran alot of usb vga dongles. Windows 7 didn't really appreciate them
dusty citrus
If you have a powerful GPU then it could drive many displays
karmic kite
Maybe display port with daisy chain?
late fulcrum
The Army gig was in the years before Display Port, so there wasn't a provision to daisy chain monitors (there was DVI splitter available to split up a really high rez virtual screen across several physical monitors, but it wasn't cheap).
karmic kite
Fair enough
umbral phoenix
When people talk about the inception phase of OO design, they aren't kidding. Each abstraction and inheritance is a new dream layer. Only the machine is reality. 😄
patent ibex
dusty citrus
Guys what kind of FPGA do you reccomend? I'm thinking of programing a FPGA as a CPU
grave crest
@late fulcrum check craigslist/letgo/etc for dell 2007fp and 2001fp monitors. They are 4:3 IPS panels that were rockin’ good in their day.
Now, they’re still solid — but can be found for sub-$50. Their stands have height, tilt, and rotation adjustments.
Oh, they are 1600x1200 native resolution. And built like tanks. I have a few of each — and for those prices, unbeatable performance.
late fulcrum
I wonder who made 'em.
grave crest
Good ol’ Dell. Say what you will, but their high end panels have usually been impressive, even for years after release.
I even have a 2011 version of their 30” monitor at 2560x1600. Best “TV” display I own.
late fulcrum
As far as I know, Dell didn't build any of their panels, they just rebrand something.
grave crest
Hmm, I can’t say for sure either way. But I will say the used market has a lot of these — offlease, etc.
spice moss
loud escarp
hex editor fun
dusty citrus
what happens when your GPU becomes sentient
late fulcrum
Yeah, that or Deep Dream
lilac tangle
Looks like you’re messing with 8-bit indexed color bitmaps
dusty citrus
i did think of AI alot
and creating a real life terminator and injecting the AI into the robot
blazing pond
Well, MicroCenter just treated me very well. Got a BeagleBone Black on clearance for $5
grave crest
oooooo
blazing pond
gonna make some BeagleLogic capes and turn it into a logic analyzer
grave crest
How'd you do that @blazing pond ?
blazing pond
Well, they put a BeagleBone original starter kit on clearance, and they didn't have one so they made the substitution without asking me
grave crest
not a bad deal
blazing pond
According to its image, it's been sitting on the shelf since 2014 so I can see why a retailer would do that
Especially with all the shiny new Adafruit stuff there
That said, what they gave me isn't what they were clearing out, per se...;
worthy socket
https://youtu.be/A3aoZs-ay7o This gives proof and explains it simply. Please vote if able.
loud escarp
If you're into dad jokes, easter eggs, clever editing, and machining, the latest This Old Tony is great:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTG1TTR1CJk
timber goblet
I have a DRO from that family on my mill - hate it. it seems needlessly weird.
timber goblet
forest geyser
Can someone help me solve this
I need to find the 4th term of the binomial expansion of (x^2-2y)^6
Idk what to do past this
late fulcrum
Hmm, you left out the Σ (summation) term. Basically, you break that down manually, so you'll get a bunch of terms of the form you derived, with r iterating through its range of values, so if r=1, you'll get (4 choose r-1) x^(4-r+1)•y^(r-1) or (4 choose 0) x^(4-0)•y^(0), all added together. That's the binomial expansion.
There's a good explanation here https://www.mathsisfun.com/algebra/binomial-theorem.html
grave crest
Discount on a MacOS app bundle that contains several seriously useful programs. Below link is not an affiliate link.
Worthwhile programs in this bundle:
- Fantastical 2: an excellent calendar & reminder, with a very clean design.
- PDF Expert: a very solid PDF editor, cross platform too (ios)
- iStat Menus: get performance stats on your machine
The rest I haven't used, and I feel they are middling. But Fantastical or PDF expert go for $30 on sale normally by themselves. So $30 for the entire bundle isn't too shabby.
https://stacksocial.com/sales/the-epic-mac-bundle-ft-fantastical-2-pdf-expert
blazing pond
Application-Specific Integrated Circuit. A "custom chip"
vernal gale
I seem to have fried a raspberry pi. Don't suppose these things have any warranty to speak of?
the 3.3v regulator is working, but usb and hdmi are broken
no bootloader splash or nothing
oh there's a #help-with-linux-sbcs
I'll crosspost
leaden parrot
I am the master of ancient weird hardware. Now if only they paid me the big bucks for this :3
ocean sigil
<@&327289013561982976> this is a fake link ^^
viral spruce
@ocean sigil removed + reported the link URL
swift hatch
Clever how the url is to the "LATLMES" not "LATIMES".
ocean sigil
I fell for it 😦
viral spruce
Phishing links are always tricky to spot
ocean sigil
feel free to remove the whole discussion
abstract violet
Nice work @languid pagoda !
languid pagoda
Thanks! That means a lot actually lol. I wonder what is so weird about the video though.
leaden parrot
That moment you're working on a transmitter and think it looks like someone jammed a 3d printer in it
late fulcrum
At first I thought "that's a big cavity" but on second glance, I think it's a vacuum tube.
dusty citrus
it looks like some nuclear reactor
deft depot
are you sure the last engineer didn't leave his thermos behind?
leaden parrot
The actual tube is in there at the bottom
Looking down on it. It's in the chimney there
deft depot
a colander
leaden parrot
I totally failed to notice how the plate blocker in this thing worked. The tube's anode / plate is external - you can see it here as the middle of the big radiator. The RF output and 8000 vdc are connected by the chimney clamped around it
I guess the chimney isn't DC grounded at the top, I kinda recall it having a big PTFE ring up there
late fulcrum
Plate blocker? I'm familiar with a grid stopper, but what's a plate blocker? Like a coupling capacitor?
dusty citrus
what kind of FPGA board do you guys recommend?
late fulcrum
There are a few choices out there, depending on what you're looking to do. Do you want open source software, or are you happy with proprietary software that only runs on one or two kinds of systems? Do you want lots of I/O, or something basic? Do you want integrated peripherals (switches, displays, stuff to play with)? Do you want to use it with the Arduino IDE? Is cost a factor? Size?
All that said, one useful starter platform that ticks a lot of those boxes is the Lattice iCEstick. Another is the Arduino MKR Vidor 4000. Yet another is the Alorium XLR8.
dusty citrus
@late fulcrum alright that's a bit tad hard for me
late fulcrum
Oops. Believe it or not, I'm trying to be helpful.
late fulcrum
Basically, you can get in the door for about $13 for a nice CPLD breakout board.
late fulcrum
Yeah, you'd want to bring those lines out to I/O pins so you could see what they're doing.
dusty citrus
@late fulcrum also I do want hook up RAM chips to it
late fulcrum
Depends on what you want to do with it. Some FPGAs have on-board RAM you can use. However, if you're bringing out the address and data buses, it's not too tough to bring out some control signals too to enable hooking up RAM.
blazing pond
old EDO DRAM in SIMM modules is pretty easy to work with. There are even Arduino "libraries" (thin wrappers of bit-banging small commands and refresh on a timer) to work with it, though an Uno needs all of its pins to access about... 256k of the stuff
half drift
I love you all!
dusty citrus
sounds a bit complex but i will learn slowly
swift hatch
Modular patch I made last night -- really interesting effect from feeding Music Thing Modular Chord Organ back into itself via Mutable Instruments signal inverter. https://youtu.be/444ac02LXHY
atomic badge
I was really disappointed in 60 min. last night as they had a story about women in tech and trying to get girls in the K-3 grade groups. There was no mention of @viscid folio . The story was taking place in NY.
dusty citrus
IM IN NY
half drift
hah yes I got the very 1st YouTube View on the newest adafruit video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmUeu0AsZBw
rare raven
rofl I just had one of these moments.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AynXoLjYrKc
....
trying to figure out why a battery pack wasn't providing power...
....
about to take it apart and realized it had an on/off switch...
....
....
in the off position.
old fjord
dusty citrus
hey guys
i have some earbuds and the right side stopped working
im not sure how to fix the problem
late fulcrum
Two main possibilities: a broken connection or a broken transducer. By far the most likely (unless you've been driving them REALLY hard) is a broken connection, and the likeliest place for the broken connection is at the plug end (the second likeliest place is at the earbud end).
timber goblet
eagle users - not sure if I'm doing library management wrong, but the very first part I tried to drop, huzzah 8266 board - isn't in the library. am I that unlucky, or doing it wrong?
dusty citrus
@late fulcrum the thing is I think the problem is in the ear bud itself because I think something disconnected
half drift
@timber goblet from https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit-Eagle-Library ?
timber goblet
yeah, I seem to be browsing that - and it's mostly discrete parts. I see a featherwing pinout and one or two other ada-looking things, but not breakout boards. it's okay if they aren't there, they don't claim to be complete, just...surprising.
feels like I'm in the wrong category somehow.
vernal gale
boards are sometimes available as fritzing objects, dunno if that helps you
timber goblet
I'm glad fritzing exists and I won't use it 😃
vernal gale
also, the eagle files for all the boards are open source, as full projects, not as library components
dunno if you can like, import a project into another project or something
I don't use eagle much
timber goblet
I did find those, https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit-Huzzah-ESP8266-Basic-Breakout-PCB in my case. I wondered if that was my path. I want it for circuit diagrams, not board layout, though - this particular 8266 is going to hang from its wires. so I guess it's easy to make a part, but I didn't think it'd be my first part!
(yes, I know, if I'm such an animal I should just use fritzing)
rotund echo
I just managed to replace broken usb port in a pendrive
echo agate
Congrats 😃
rotund echo
With no hotair
Just soldering station
echo agate
That's my favorite way of doing rework, hot air is for quitters! (Or really difficult parts)
proven olive
Hot air is less likely to cause damage to the PCB, though. Especially with things that have many pins.
rotund echo
Yeah, I had to use the trick with copper wire to heat all the pads at the same time
echo agate
Having some of the special low-melting point solder for those is nice.
grave crest
From the adafruit shipping notification:
**Keep in mind the UPS service guarantee are suspended if delays are caused
by bad weather or other disasters. We cannot refund shipping fees if your
package arrives late due to snow or other natural disasters UPS anywhere
along your package's route. Meteors, natural disasters, aliens, terrorism,
incursions from other dimensions, etc.**
Meteors, natural disasters, aliens, terrorism, incursions from other dimensions, etc. I wonder what happened to prompt such a warning... 🤣
half drift
I just saw a massive meteor about 15 minutes ago in Maine; will this affect my shipping?
It was heading west, probably landed in New Hampshire. It's probably fine.
grave crest
Aliens were hungry for a pint of Ben & Jerrys. You can't get Cherry Garcia on Alpha Epsilon V.
unkempt fog
@devout ravine May i use that image over in my FRC teams coders channel?
devout ravine
@unkempt fog Absotudely. We actually just set up our pit at Comp.!
unkempt fog
@devout ravine Awesome. What's your team number? Added it to my list to watch this weekend.
devout ravine
@unkempt fog 5056
unkempt fog
5534 here. We don't play till week4. LOTS of coding time left to make the magic happen 🙄
covert spire
Amusing to use Discord to cross team chat
unkempt fog
@covert spire The internets are good for that 🤣
covert spire
Tru story
devout ravine
@unkempt fog @covert spire Would y'all be up if I made a cross-team server for being nerds?
echo agate
That feeling when both types of arduino you have lack the USART external clock pin when you really want to use it ;_;
devout ravine
devout ravine
@unkempt fog @covert spire If you guys want, I made a cross-team server at https://discord.gg/JrZJxuS. Note to everyone else; this is for FIRST Robotics team members only.
echo agate
Got the signal I needed, just had to unhook an LED 😎
half drift
@timber goblet asked about low-profile earmuffs for noise cancellation a few days ago; apparently engineers from Boston University have developed a new material that could help with super-low-profile noise cancellation applications.. of course it's a long way from market
timber goblet
@tribal brook actually - I just said I ❤ my peltors 😃
quiet urchin
@unkempt fog @devout ravine good luck! From FTC 8490 here.
half drift
@timber goblet ah right it was @tribal brook
covert spire
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/criticalrole/critical-role-the-legend-of-vox-machina-animated-s
I found a very popular Kickstarter
ocean sigil
stuck moth
thanks for the link @ocean sigil
vernal gale
@dusty citrus I found this video of a guy making a risc-v processor out of discrete logic https://diode.zone/videos/watch/f215760f-87df-4b81-88f4-c1a6b13dc6fb
late fulcrum
At first I read that as "discrete components" which would be even more mind-boggling.
shrewd hatch
vernal gale
@shrewd hatch there's a #books-and-tutorials channel
shrewd hatch
my bad didn't see it
vernal gale
no worries, I put some raspberry pi stuff in here because I forgot there was a raspberry pi channel
so it happens to everyone
terse knoll
Thanks, both of you. I love HB & now know where to find more book/tutorial info.
echo agate
If anyone else enjoys working on micros sans the arduino, Microchip has a 40% off coupon code for the Atmega4809 Curiosity Nano, $6 after savings. It's a nice upgrade from something like the atmega328p, tons of new peripherals and features.
dusty citrus
So I had been thinking of creating a real working terminator which could function just as in the movies
I'm not sure how can I make it work though...
Any suggestions can help
shrewd hatch
here is a cursed question i am watching a division 2 video and it got me wondering how would a tech cache work irl
deft osprey
Happy Pi Day
spice moss
π🥧
dusty citrus
There is a gforth for Android!
@late fulcrum
Google Play (Android hand-held OS application installation):
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=gnu.gforth&hl=en_US
shrewd hatch
i like how no one has tried to take on the cursed question
vestal phoenix
As Pi day comes full circle, here's hoping everyone got around to making something.
covert spire
I ate pizza
echo agate
I am having the most frustrating problem with poking bytes through SPI on an atmega, looks perfect on the scope, messed up coming out of the receive register. It's perplexing
late fulcrum
Wrong SPI mode?
echo agate
I'm in the right SPI mode as far as I can tell (this datasheet is pretty rough), things are more turning out garbled than completely wrong
My scope is showing me 0xFF 41 5A FF FF (good data, I expect this). What I get out of the receiver is 0xFF 83 B4 FE FF
echo agate
I've taken to staring at the datasheet until I hopefully see what register I'm not using right or something. 🤔
echo agate
Enabled the internal TX-RX loopback and it's still goofy. Whaaaaat the heck
timber goblet
is it consistently those values out of the receiver? if it wobbles a bit, is your clock clean?
echo agate
Yeah, it's pretty consistent. Clock looks good.
timber goblet
83 is 41 slipped by one bit, with a one added; if 5a slipped one bit it'd be b4...
I know nothing about SPI but that's pretty suspicious.
echo agate
I agree that it seems shifty (in a literal sense)
timber goblet
does SPI have stop bits?
echo agate
Nope
timber goblet
want to bet? 😄
echo agate
This is the receive data with SPI decoding on the scope, it's all very well-formed
timber goblet
...seems like your receiver might be eating a bit, thinking it's protocol.
echo agate
That makes some sense, but figuring out if I'm doing something wrong or if it's errata or what, that's the challenge
timber goblet
what's the part? I probably can't help but it's time I learned something about SPI.
timber goblet
so the protocol has stop bits and parity, and you've told the scope what to expect so it matches, only because it expects no stop and parity bits. if you're seeing values that slip by one bit, mismatching on stop or parity is...surely why?
also I need such a scope - it hadn't even occurred to me to let a computer parse bits for me.
echo agate
There's no stop bits or parity for SPI, those features are turned off. In SPI, you chip select, then just start clocking bits.
timber goblet
I mean, sure, but your receiver disagrees with you 😃
...but so does loopback, and that's weird.
echo agate
Exactly what I was thinking.
timber goblet
what's your receiver? RS485 bit not set right? sorry if I'm wasting your time.
echo agate
I didn't even touch the register that bit is in until I wanted to turn on loopback enable
The microcontroller is acting as SPI master to a playstation (1/2) controller.
half drift
in europe pi day is 22/7
errant atlas
in soviet russia, pi counts you.
dusty citrus
Exactly
late fulcrum
Cool Pi day accomplishment: https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/compute/calculating-31-4-trillion-digits-of-archimedes-constant-on-google-cloud?mod=djemCIO
sturdy oyster
When did Adafruit start collecting sales tax for shipments to other states? I live in GA, and this Adabox is the first time I have seen this.
dusty citrus
For pi day I want to get my raspberry pi to print out prime numbers non stop. Anyway to do it?
errant atlas
@sturdy oyster I didn't get sales tax in VA
but let me double check, I could be wrong
Nope, no sales tax.
sturdy oyster
strange. I'll have to shoot an email and see what's up. Thanks for checking @errant atlas
errant atlas
👍
tame saddle
@sturdy oyster I imagine it's related to this: https://ajc.com/news/state--regional-govt--politics/new-year-means-new-internet-retail-tax-for-georgia/n6Nrz6EKaSLezkv7qVzkVO/
sturdy oyster
That's one thing I really dislike about living where I do. I live in GA, but all my tv channels, and radio, comes out of South Carolina. Keeping up with events in my own state can be tough.
errant atlas
In Virginia, I get CBS, NBC, ABC etc.. twice. We get the Washington DC stations and the Richmond, VA stations. We're over saturated with the news
sturdy oyster
I live near the SC border (about 30 miles), but I am 70 miles from Atlanta, so I get all South Carolina stuff. Booooo........
dusty citrus
I'm in Richmond
timid pebble
That RISC-V project is dangerously cool.
dusty citrus
There’s a prediction that Saturn will be destroyed in around 500 quadrillion years due to “proton decay”. What exactly is that?
I tried researching, but I don’t get it
shrewd hatch
@late fulcrum have you played with tensor flow before
half drift
anyone play this Mho's Resistance for Android? I still haven't made it past the first quest
late fulcrum
I've just done a few basic things with Tensor Flow, a while back.
late fulcrum
Was considering @grave crest 's suggestion on old inexpensive Dell monitors when I got an email about clearing out Apple Cinema Displays for under $100 and couldn't resist. Wow, this sure is a nice monitor.
grave crest
Apple's Cinema displays are extraordinarily solid panels. I'm jealous.
late fulcrum
Here's the link if you want to pick one up https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/bargain-bin/displays
Personally, I think the 23" for $179 is a better deal, but the 20" sure is cheap and they still have one left (they had 17 yesterday).
grave crest
You can't go wrong with them -- Apple took serious pride in having top-of-the-class consumer displays.
They've since gotten out of that part of the business, but such is life -- things change.
I still think getting a used dell 2001fp or 2007fp for sub $50 is a better value -- and couple that with a DVI-to-HDMI adapter, so you can use any old HDMI cable.
left abyss
timid pebble
A colleague recently replaced a Cinema Display with the latest Wacom 4K. Not a downgrade - that thing is a beast 😃
late fulcrum
I did eye a Cintiq, but decided not to splash out that much money and stick with my old Intuos at least for now.
timid pebble
I just need my keyboard and a couple of basic monitors. He is excellent with a stylus though, so our team is definitely better for it 😃
half drift
whoa.. legoland New York is coming in 2020 and they are hiring over a thousand people https://www.legoland.com/new-york/jobs/
barren bay
Resistor from inside
late fulcrum
I remember John Cleese explaining why they did that.
half drift
@quiet urchin FLL?
quiet urchin
@half drift they want to mentor FLL(first LEGO league ) teams on property
dusty citrus
new make magazine came
left abyss
Can you send me pics of the board pullout?
slim prism
spice moss
https://twitter.com/wasmweekly/status/1108615601801646081?s=12 if you have followed things of webassembly
Twitter
left abyss
@dusty citrus added!
grave crest
echo agate
I can see my house from here!
compact heath
This is related to electronics but not adafruit in specific but I'll ask it anyways:
In this video, the guy is attempting to fix a flash drive chip in a very bad state, and he's doing something with the soldering iron and the chip's pads.
I'd love to understand what he is doing with it, because I can tell they look better in the end, but I have no idea what the weird liquid he uses is for or what it even is... Thanks!
https://youtu.be/zcUv6bpc4NU
(Louis Rossmann)
9:50 for a time where he applies it
He does it other times earlier but it's the only time I can recall now
noble pasture
That's flux. Louis's work is mesmerising to watch 'eh?
It cleans contacts, and allows solder to stick better/flushes contaminants out.
compact heath
Thanks a lot for explaining!
quiet urchin
@left abyss you can find it online
compact heath
That's surprisingly specific and helpful, thanks madboger!
old fjord
When it's Saturday and you get an Adafruit package.
From Spiderman Into the Spiderverse
tame saddle
For any ASUS computer/motherboard users (like myself): https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/pan9wn/hackers-hijacked-asus-software-updates-to-install-backdoors-on-thousands-of-computers
old fjord
yikes
lilac tangle
Heh, good thing I haven’t updated my Asus computer in a long time. It just remains off.
echo agate
Inductor happy cat face 😺
hearty falcon
Wow! Thanks for the heads up. I was always suspect of ANY preloaded proprietary software
grave crest
@tame saddle Thanks for the heads up. I wish all updates on all devices could be made to opt-in instead of forced (Win10!) or annoyingly-persist-with-multiple-notifications-a-day-I'm-looking-at-you-Samsung-Galaxy-and-Apple-iOS-phones.
For the reasons of update security & integrity, among others.
I know, I know -- there are ways to quiet those alerts. Even if just temporarily.
....looks over at the sledgehammer in the garage... [thinking] No, Mr. Certainly. That's not a temporary solution.
timber goblet
in eagle - how do folks do naming impedance matching? I have a "design block" for an 8266 huzzah, with names like "GPIO12", which I want to hook into an overall design where "GPIO12" is assigned to mean "LED_G". do I let it change the design block name, or create some sort of bridge, or call it GPIO12 all the way out to the LED? or...create a connector somehow, since I have a physical one?
I tried dropping a wire with a different label on each end - it promptly made the labels the same.
spice moss
devout ravine
echo agate
One of the engineers I support at work has that picture hanging in his cubicle, haha
spice moss
what is the machine on farms?
echo agate
Combine?
spice moss
the formula for above with power we call it Puimuri in finnish
where PUI is power formula and middle M is nothing then other is URI
echo agate
I was wondering what the logic behind the name was 😃
spice moss
its easy for memorize
spice moss
Puimuri is harvester machine if i remember right
echo agate
I searched it and lots of pictures of combine harvesters pop up
spice moss
so in PUIMURI you could say that M means middle like a splitter of 2 formula
late fulcrum
I'm reminded of "Eli the ice man".
echo agate
My brain can never make proper sense of eli the ice man, but V = L(di/dt) and I = C(dv/dt) stick with me really well 🤔
jolly pewter
I advised not touching soldering iron tips. :3 I poked my self by accident. Left middle finger knuckle.
echo agate
Ooch
echo agate
New toy day, the highest V of all STLinks!
thin whale
Where do you see the full member count of a discord server?
stuck moth
?membercount
solar ridgeBOT
dusty citrus
i was playing caps until one was almost was about blow up
loud escarp
Protip: just because your nose is stuffed up that doesn't mean chewing peppercorns will have no consequences
vernal gale
I've done that
half drift
Wasabi helps... If you can find authentic radish
late fulcrum
I went to my local sushi joint and was thrilled to get genuine wasabi: I glanced over to where the chefs were working and saw them grating it the traditional way on sharkskin. I was most honored and impressed.
edgy apex
I'm going to a computer museuems warehouse tomorrow 😁
The last time I went I got a vt220
Any suggestions on what to look for?
sturdy oyster
Was looking up motors today on Amazon, and saw this. I don't think I'll be buying these.
The red box was not in the original
late fulcrum
Virtual Boy!
dusty citrus
tfw no 32bit nintendo chip project
adafruit-nintendo-virtuab32 library ya know what i mean
Nintendo '95 VUE-VPU, 9520KK023
Nintendo NVC-VUE, (C) NEC '91 '93 9520KX003
Nintendo VRM-VUE, 9508KU028
Toshiba TC511664BJ-80 128 KB of DRAM
Toshiba TC511632FL-70
Nintendo '95 VSU-VUE ATT, 9507A3014
Texas Instruments 57A5CXK, HCU04
a lot of kit for a "failed" system lol
the NEC V60 was used for Sega Virtua Racing
late fulcrum
Failed or not, I still play mine.
late fulcrum
No, didn't see that one. I have the Vectrex multicart, it's neat, it would be cool to have a VB one.
ocean sigil
Check the date when reading this -- otherwise 😉 https://hackaday.com/2019/04/01/bye-bye-vi-gnu-linux-distros-drop-support/
late fulcrum
Reminds me of the old ed rant: https://www.gnu.org/fun/jokes/ed-msg.html
plain cedar
Is it me or does the back of the pyportal look something like a combinqtion TNG visor and Maximillian robot from old black hole movie .. either way it's staring at me
late fulcrum
Glowy!
late fulcrum
An old project (analog vector generator), I just like how this picture came out. I suspect if I were building it today, I'd use an ItsyBitsy instead of a Boarduino, but AdaFruit has long offered some great breadboard-friendly options.
echo agate
(Boring Industry News) Renesas has acquired IDT in the continual march towards everything being owned by 1 company
spice moss
wild junco
random question is there a web site like code academy but is not code academy ? im trying to learn python but not a fan of there course ( only on the P2 course before paying for P3 to try it out )
stray wind
@wild junco There are plenty. I don't know them all off the top of my head. Udemy is another one though. they appear to have a number of Python courses. I don't know their fee structure though.
wild junco
thanks for getting back to me ill check Udemy out 😃
wild junco
@stray wind looks like they have a sale on 10 euros for a course might grab it 😃 ( sorry if i was not meant to tag you still getting to no all the rules ) https://www.udemy.com/complete-python-bootcamp/
stray wind
No worries! If you're responding to something, it's fine to tag someone. 😃 Excessive tagging otherwise should be avoided.
wild junco
👍
cedar heath
Weird question, I just visited AliExpress for the first time in many years. And I'm looking at this solar robot kit for kids, and in every photo the robot's "eyes" are censored with pixelation.
Does anyone have any idea why they would do that? It's so weird I have to know.
dusty citrus
This is annoying
How can I raise the height of the board a little?
Is there a type of break-away pin that is longer?
vernal gale
stacking pins
vernal gale
also, digikey lets you search by contact length which I think is pin height
dusty citrus
Also, how does my SPI spider look?
vernal gale
hmm?
dusty citrus
It makes "in-circuit programming" more comfortable
vernal gale
cool
dusty citrus
I took the programmer and rearranged the pins so I could plug it around my pins
Of the AVR
Bad phrasing there :/
Also, you seem to be a circuit python person
Any microchips in the area?
vernal gale
I'm not sure what you mean
dusty citrus
I know nothing
vernal gale
but yeah I'm sort of a circuitpython person
dusty citrus
Like AVRs
person
dusty citrus
What's special about it?
dusty citrus
I see
vernal gale
and beginners
dusty citrus
Adafruit seems to be pretty fond of CP dev boards for kids, no?
vernal gale
yeah they're big on accessibility
sturdy oyster
@wild junco beware of udemy. Some courses are good, some not so much. They do have some decent python courses. I prefer coursera. The courses are paid, but most of them can be audited for free. You get the same course, just no digital certificate or some levels of instructor/peer access.
also....udemy always has that "sale". They send emails every few days reminding me to "act now" because some great sale is ending, but the prices never change. I think I did the same course you linked a while back for the same price.
wild junco
@sturdy oyster thanks for the heads up i looked at a few of the courses and i can see what you mean i ended up with that one thinking for 10 moneys its no big loss if the course is pants . ill have a look at coursera next time im looking for a course 😃 . i used to use lynda.com before linked in deleted my account and tried making me pay like double + for it on linked in 😦
echo agate
Having too darn much fun
late fulcrum
Now THAT looks familiar!
echo agate
It's a little like doing a puzzle, like Picross but backwards
late fulcrum
Yup. It's kind of fun and meditative.
echo agate
AVR to the max
proven olive
@cedar heath do you have a link? My guess is some sort of automated thing flagging it as "eyes" and auto-blurring to protect privacy
Oh, wow, that was a chat jump of almost a day
grave crest
@proven olive ok, I'm not the only one experiencing that too.
It's not until I forcibly scroll down when it decides to refresh with the "50+ messages missed"
Me --> "Oh. Well, that's good to know. Thanks discord? 😛 "
proven olive
If you haven't looked at chat for a while it'll not scroll
grave crest
peers at chat out of the corner of his eye.
cedar heath
Found it again, there's actually multiple listings for this product, all seem to have censored eyes. But other robots don't:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Solar-Power-Robot-Kits-Children-DIY-Solar-Toys-13-In-1-Educational-Solar-Power-Kits-Novelty/32964075296.html
dusty citrus
Would the universe be destroyed in instants if an object of infinite heat suddenly came into existence?
I feel like talking about it
late fulcrum
Hmm, heat is molecular motion, so infinite heat would mean all the molecules of the object would exit the universe instantaneously. So the results would depend on what kind of particles were involved, and how many of them. If they were neutrinos, I don't think we'd even notice. If they were electrons, you'd get all sorts of effects as the electrons' energy coupled out as a spray of photons. If they were heavier particles, they'd knock holes in stuff on their way by, so you'd have microscopic pockmarks in everything (density of pockmarks would depend on number of particles and distance from epicenter).
I'll caveat all of that with "I am not a physicist" and "I'm just guessing".
I'm minded of James Hogan's excellent novel "Thrice Upon a Time", which also involved microscopic pockmarks in things but differently.
dusty citrus
Woah
You got me there
I forgot about heat being molecular vibration
Well, I assumed that the object would hold itself together
late fulcrum
Hmm, that's a horse of, um, every possible color at once?
dusty citrus
Now, something that is hot, when touching something else, takes a certain amount of time to transfer a certain amount of heat from itself to the other object. Called conduction. Now, if I think of radiation: capping this with the same thing you did. I'll guess that radiation is being able to take a certain amount of time, to transfer a certain amount of heat, over a certain area depending on how much energy you have to be bigger or smaller. Now if the energy there were infinite, the area of transfer would be infinite. And with conduction and radiation alike, infinite heat would take an infinitely small amount of time (literally 0 picoseconds) to transfer an infinite amount of thermal energy. Then the objects it affects would be absolutely every object in existence, and every object in existence would contain infinite energy, like the first object did, and an unimaginable cataclysm would unfold across all of space in less than the quadrillionth of the blink of an eye
How fascinating
What do you think?
late fulcrum
I don't think the transfer speed scales with the temperature quite like that (it seems to me like its similar to voltage vs current). Or, to put it another way, it could only propagate at the speed of light.
dusty citrus
Ahhh
late fulcrum
Similarly, if the object were of non-infinite size, the area of transfer would be limited by its dimensions.
dusty citrus
Now that I think about it, radiation is a wave, right?
late fulcrum
It has both wave nature and particle nature (and that's conveniently overlooking quantum chromodynamics).
dusty citrus
That can't go faster than light, then
late fulcrum
Unless you invoke tachyons or other exotica, right.
dusty citrus
I'm a little confused. The electromagnetic spectrum is energy, correct?
late fulcrum
If tachyons do exist, I would expect this sort of situation to produce them in abundance.
dusty citrus
I'm an 8th grader. What is happening. Hahahaha
late fulcrum
Right, it's energy, considered as waves, photons, or both 😃
I'm a nut who reads too much science and science fiction and enjoys bizarre thought experiments.
dusty citrus
Like this?
late fulcrum
Bingo.
dusty citrus
Awesome
So, electromagnetism has more energy the higher its frequency
What would infinite energy do there?..
Would it even be a wave anymore?
late fulcrum
Opinions vary, but my guess would be that it behaves like a "blackbody" at infinite temperature, so it would produce all wavelengths, but the shorter wavelengths would predominate.
For reference, this is just one wall of one room in my house.
dusty citrus
Wow!
Charismatic
What I'm thinking about this is that energy created cannot be destroyed. But to make an infinitely energized object, we have to bypass the first rule there.
But the question is, what would happen to that energy we created?
late fulcrum
Right: we'll allow that as a starting condition.
So you have something like a quasar or supernova, but even more so: spewing out lots of all kinds of energy in all directions, bathing the rest of the universe in the resulting shower of energy.
dusty citrus
If that were to happen, it would spew out, yet again, infinite energy. Because infinity cannot be divided
Oooooooh, boy
My head is spinning now
late fulcrum
Right, all the objects nearby would be heated and re-radiating energy too.
dusty citrus
So, it would be a never ending supernova of infinite energy transfer
I don't understand what exactly decides what form energy takes
late fulcrum
Yeah, that's about how I view it: an ever-expanding wavefront of everything being heated to incandescence and madly dumping energy in all directions.
dusty citrus
This is our thought experiment, so we can just say it will start as heat and build on that, but I'd like to know
late fulcrum
The principle of entropy tells us that energy tends to take more disordered forms (like heat), but when you have enough heat, energy starts to be pushed out in other forms (like light from an incandescent filament).
(one of the books in that picture has a lot of really well written explanations on this sort of thing, including many thought experiments of its own: "Decoding the Universe", by Charles Seife)
late fulcrum
Always good to share stuff like that, thanks!
sturdy oyster
I don't know if it's time based or what, but I just noticed that the color temperature of my new laptop display has gotten decidedly warmer tonight (I have my old one running next to it). It was very blue (daylight) earlier in the day , but now it is much more muted and warm tonight. I'm kinda digging it
grave crest
@sturdy oyster It could be something like the program called "f.lux"
sturdy oyster
Maybe @grave crest . If they hadn't been sitting side by side all day as I shifted things I need, it would have gone unnoticed. It's a cool feature.
grave crest
If it's MacOS, there's a built in feature called "night shift".
If it's Win10, then I'm not too sure if there's a default built into the OS.
sturdy oyster
It's an HP
I know there's a "night light" setting that I haven't bothered setting up that should do similarly on Win 10, but I didn't realize it did it already
As much as I hate Apple, their user experience is on point
grave crest
Sounds like it's been setup. It's a nice feature, I've used it for quite some time. You don't realize it until you turn it off....then it's blinding.
sturdy oyster
Yeah, I never would have noticed it if I hadn't seen the difference in the monitor next to it
dusty citrus
So weird seeing atmel now as pic
dusty citrus
late fulcrum
I'm glad Microchip got over their "everything is proprietary and undocumented" attitude (which is a large part of what drove me away from PIC) before they absorbed Atmel.
late fulcrum
Trackwise just shipped a flexible printed circuit board a whopping 26 meters long (for use in a UAV to replace a bunch of wiring harnesses). https://www.trackwise.co.uk/innovation/worlds-longest-multilayer-flexible-printed-circuit-spans-26m-metre-85-feet-wings-of-unmanned-aerial-vehicle/
dusty citrus
i remember having to code for pic in asm.
i actually loved it and wish more chips would offer the knowledge tools and documentation.
late fulcrum
I always wrote in asm for PIC, but was annoyed there were no free options for a compiler (doing long division in asm is a pain).
dusty citrus
my teacher was really confused when he saw me do a left shift to divide by 2
ocean sigil
left shift is multiply by 2, no? right shift = divide...
or did I miss something about the PIC?
late fulcrum
I do remember learning that doing things the usual way on PIC was inefficient, it really paid to use the rich set of bitwise operators.
dusty citrus
oh i got my dirrections mixed up sry
honest field
Hello all,I am new to Circuit Python, been playing with the learning guides, but I would like to use the PyPortal with a raspberry pie running OctoPi to monitor my 3-D printer, since it's running locally, not really sure how to get the data out, I guess she would need some type of a webhook, any ideas? Thanks
tame saddle
@honest field i would ask the question in #help-with-circuitpython . polling through WiFi may work (pi webserver, or an iot service), but UART connection may work as well.
honest field
@tame saddle Thank you
idle iron
zhōngwén CP, how do i move on? im stuck on it, i dream of it, i eat it, i sleep it. , i 💩 it....
ivory moat
@late fulcrum , @jagged siren , @hallow skiff here is a video which starts with a Gopro mounted below the frame of the mountain bike. See how the camera (so the frame) is stable and the fork is moving up and down like hell.
https://vimeo.com/41200900
hallow skiff
Okay, what are you trying to measure? Extension/compression of the fork, amirite? Did you come to a final answer for the maximum predicted Gs?
queen geode
@sturdy oyster if you are using windows 10 they have a setting now. Search in your search bar in windows 10 for "night light setting"
late fulcrum
rotund echo
Is switching from mp3 320 to aac 320 worth it? Is it possible that my mp3 library will some day become unplayable?
late fulcrum
If you have good high frequency hearing and are listening in a quiet environment, the AAC version will likely sound better. For listening in a car, it doesn't matter much.
rotund echo
Ok, thanks
dusty citrus
Sooooo
Yeah.....
Really odd question, but I can't google it, so I'll just ask
Does anyone know why I'm feeling a horrid, uncomfortable pulling here?
It's so.....annoying.....
It won't go away..
torpid belfry
You might have a rib or your clavicle moved out of place.
dusty citrus
I have a feeling it's using my computer too much
You know the tough muscle connecting the end of the neck and the shoulder? The one that is stretched when you tilt your head to the side?
That's it
I think that's a large tendon, actually..
late fulcrum
Hot tub, mild muscle relaxant, and a good night's sleep? Often works for me.
swift remnant
Alternate ice and heat on it. And take a break
grave crest
See a doctor if it persists.
Ice and heat are great short term relief that have very few negative side effects, if any.
I would analyze your posture and working environment, you may need to change things to be more ergonomic. But what I find helps the most is frequent breaks. Stand up, move around, stretches. A variety of movements and breaks will cause less harm in the long run than repetitive motion.
dusty citrus
guys
i want to warn you something
so a friend of mine is creating a botnet and he is targeting raspberry pis
be careful
idle thorn
Just checking if my nickname changed here.
spice moss
runic elbow
Just when you thought photos of space couldn't be any more beautiful
spice moss
watching spaceX falcon9 and they did something miracle with falcon9 heavy
late fulcrum
Bluetooth low energy transmitter uses only 600µW while transmitting. https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/semiconductors/design/teenytiny-bluetooth-transmitter-runs-on-less-than-1-milliwatt
sleek urchin
Star Wars: Episode 9: The Rise of Skywalker https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adzYW5DZoWs
spice moss
Legos and Starwars 😃
idle iron
not sure why but i just had to change my DNS to google's my internet stopped working some kind of DNS attack???
late fulcrum
Could be your provider, if you're using their local (caching?) DNS.
late fulcrum
A couple of years back, AdaFruit Daily had a helpful hint on op-amps: "LM741 pain – Just because a part is popular, it doesn’t mean it is good. The LM741 is useful for many beginner circuits but if you are having a lot of trouble getting it to behave try upgrading to a more modern TL072." I realized that the TL072 was (then) 42 years old, and got curious, leading to this entry in my blog: https://bodger.dreamwidth.org/23664.html
sturdy oyster
I think I've spent too much time coding in the arduino IDE lately. I was typing something today and noticed that I had capitalized the word "Serial" several times in the middle of sentences out of habit.
dusty citrus
I use a lot of double closed parens at the ends of sentences (from too much programming (but then again, why not?))
Sometimes I do it another way (by using shorter enclosures) (since that's less strange to me).
late fulcrum
I vaguely remember (from the Chicago Manual of Style?) that nested parenthetical comments are to use alternating parenthesis and square brackets, but it just feels odd to me to do so (and then I'd want to use braces for a third differentiator).
dusty citrus
Yeah I have another cheaper style manual (Chicago should be at the public library; glanced through it once .. definitely a standard at the time).
I'll have to look to see what they recommend.
I probably need to find a Kerouac novel to get any good examples of multiple uses of parens in a single utterance .. I don't remember if he used them extensively or not.
He was a punctuation savant, iirc. ;)
ivory moat
Off topic, sorry to share but Notre Dame de Paris is currently burning down to flamme 😦
Very sad
dusty citrus
rotund echo
Why is LM324 & LM358 being discontinued? Are there any alternatives?
late fulcrum
I doubt they're being discontinued, but they are fairly old devices.
swift remnant
Visited Notre Dame last summer with my wife... it is a sad day.
proven olive
I was happy to learn that it's significantly less damaged than I expected. We'll only learn the actual extent in the next few days, but still
swift remnant
Yeah, they did get it under control. Still, it is devastating. It's not the nicest or the most awe inspiring cathedral I've ever been to, but it has a lot of meaning for Parisians and for Roman Catholics.
ocean oxide
Up late. AGAIN. Answering some Discord DMs, finishing some assignments, and researching into projects. My eyes feel like they were open underwater. These Cyxus glasses help with dry eyes and headaches. Have had mine since Friday. Can for sure tell a difference.
ocean oxide
@viscid folio what is the most interesting project you have done? And what is one you might be doing now?
viscid folio
ocean oxide
oh ok
spice moss
not in vegas?
hoary sail
Hey folks, I think this is a great opportunity for the Adafruit community! (Full disclosure: I helped work on the website) https://www.toolfoundry.org/
They're running an accelerator focused on low-cost scientific tools, each team gets up to $50,000 in no-equity funding. If you're interested, I'm happy to try and answer any questions, but you can also sign up for a webinar on their site.
ocean oxide
@viscid folio @mint hearth Random question, how many 3d printers do you have at Adafruit?
rotund echo
@late fulcrum
swift remnant
They're not discontinuing their opamps
Some versions are discontinued, but the series is still in production with several versions
Product page with link to that datasheet: http://www.ti.com/product/LM358-N
ocean oxide
@here Anyone working on any projects? (whether it be interesting or not)
late fulcrum
I'm always working on some projects (currently, time circuits, core memory, and CRT power supply).
rotund echo
I'm always working on a project too.
My current projects are: Arduino-based digital clock with DS3231 and 16x2 LCD (working prototype, waiting for parts), ArduinoISP programming shield (waiting for parts), audio signal level indicator with LEDs (concept) and 5v buck regulator with LM2576 (working device, testing)
Here is a picture
tender nimbus
I really want to buy some Proto Boards get some Parts ordered and start soldering. But Oh Boi the exam starts tomorrow and I am broke. 😢
ocean oxide
@late fulcrum Nice!
@rotund echo Cool
@tender nimbus I know I probably can buy a CPX and a some other neccesities and that's it
tender nimbus
Mmm I see
ocean oxide
I think I might've misunderstood your context when you said "I am broke"
ocean oxide
<Bangs head on wall> Ugh sorry about that
dusty citrus
rotund echo
Umm, does lm2576 heat up a lot when drawing 3 amps from it? Or am I overloading it?
rotund echo
Maybe the layout is bad?
late fulcrum
It could get warm if you're operating it without a heatsink.
tender nimbus
Buck converters are so efficient but ugh designing them is so confusing.
echo agate
The LM2576 isn't cursed with too much efficiency, hahah.
rotund echo
Yes, I am running it without a heatsink
But I'm an idiot and fitting one in there won't be easy
Also the voltage drops to 4.7v
(I have a 5v version)
echo agate
What's your input voltage?
rotund echo
7.4v
🤔 maybe cable I used to connect it has a high resistance?
It looks pretty thin
I should measure voltage on the input
echo agate
The datasheet characterizes the 5V LM2576 with input voltage starting at 8V
Insufficient input voltage is probaby your issue there
rotund echo
Yeah, I get around 6.6v on its input because of my thin wires
echo agate
And the low input voltage isn't going to be great for efficiency either
BJT switchers though, whew.
rotund echo
I calculated efficiency for this voltage and I got 72% so I guess its not that bad
I got some thicker input wires but now the input voltage breaks down even more @echo agate
echo agate
Do you have a good amount of capacitance at the input of the regulator?
rotund echo
100uF 25v electrolytic + 1uF 50v ceramic
Both as close to the IC as possible
echo agate
That part sounds pretty good then
rotund echo
Any other sugestions?
echo agate
How exactly did you mean that "the input voltage breaks down even more", like it's now lower at the switcher?
rotund echo
No, its drops lower under load than it did with thinner wires
I measured an output voltage under heavy load and it is around 3v
But agin not sure if my heavy load isnt too heavy
Its 4.9v under 1A load
@echo agate you gave up on me?
echo agate
I'm at work and they expect me to solder! 😛
Remaining thoughts are still 1. Insufficient input voltage for maximum rated current output, and 2. getting really hot will throw off the part's regulation
Do you have equipment to measure the duty cycle of the switch node?
rotund echo
Nope, unfortunately I don't have a scope or anything like that
echo agate
How about a multimeter with duty cycle measurement?
rotund echo
I have a Fluke 86V, will it do that?
I got it recently and I am still rearning how to use it.
echo agate
Do you mean the 87-V?
rotund echo
Yes
echo agate
That meter will do duty cycle, I'll check if it can do duty cycle at the switching frequency
Should be able to produce a meaningful measurement at 50kHz, even if its not terribly accurate
rotund echo
I connected it to switching node, set it to volts dc and pressed Hz button twice
But it only says "OL"
echo agate
Can you lower the load current and see if the reading goes in range?
rotund echo
Its not loaded
echo agate
Oh. Can you load it at like... 1A then?
rotund echo
Ok
echo agate
And to verify, you want to measure from pin 2 of the LM2576 to GND
Hmmm actually dangit, we'd need an external switch to see this measurement. Nevermind ;_;
rotund echo
It says 92%
echo agate
My assessment is still that you don't have enough input voltage going to the LM2576, which causes the regulator to fall out of regulation once it hits its max duty cycle (typically 98%)
rotund echo
Ok, I'll try to find some kind of 12v supply/battery, but maybe not today since its getting pretty late
echo agate
That's definitely the first thing I'd try. Increase the input voltage, or alternatively find a switcher with an integrated FET 😛
late fulcrum
The LM2576 does have an integrated switching transistor.
rotund echo
Maybe LM2678?
late fulcrum
Or LT1170
rotund echo
both pretty expensive though
I'll probably just use the regulator I made for low current applications and I'll make another one for high current
echo agate
Yeah, for $6/single quantities on digikey, I wonder if you could get an entire switching module for that much
late fulcrum
Makes sense. I built a lot of low current regulators out of the DIP-8 packaged LT1072. For more current, it can make sense to examine both the integrated and external switch variants.
echo agate
late fulcrum
You can also add an external FET to the LT107x/117x chips in common gate configuration to keep the current monitoring advantages and fast switching (AN19, page 53 explains it).
echo agate
POLs are nice once you get to some of the higher current outputs
And you barely even have to put anything together
late fulcrum
Pololu also offers already-built buck regulators to 15A output, they're pretty nice.
Or you can just use a UBEC for 5V@3A https://www.adafruit.com/product/1385
The product page has a link to the MP2307 chip the UBEC uses as a buck regulator.
echo agate
A proper synchronous regulator, too. Modernity is always nice 😃
ocean oxide
Random question, but does anyone have a favorite type of coffee? 🙃
echo agate
My favorite is "with lots of sugar and flavoring"
rotund echo
I don't like coffee
ocean oxide
@echo agate My friend has coffee and we call it milk and sugar with a teaspoon of coffee. Lol
echo agate
My kind of coffee, I have wimpy taste buds
ocean oxide
I usually have half a 1/4 cup of milk and 2 spoonfulls of sugar.. to help the coffee go down, yes, the coffee go down. Just 2 spoonfulls of sugar...
swift remnant
Espresso with Demerara sugar
ocean oxide
Sounds good 😋
dusty citrus
So i had been thinking of building a portable 8 bit computer for programming in BASIC is it possible to build one? I had been looking at the DUO computers and i took inspiration of it
late fulcrum
Yup, it's possible.
dusty citrus
@late fulcrum how? i really want to create something that i like
late fulcrum
Which part? Building an 8-bit computer, or adding BASIC to it?
dusty citrus
building it first
late fulcrum
Two more questions: did you want to design it yourself or use an existing design, and how portable are you looking for?
late fulcrum
Here's one based on an 1802 http://www.sunrise-ev.com//membershipcard.htm
Here's a Z-80 design http://cpuville.com/Kits/Z80-kits-home.html
dusty citrus
is it possible to install basic?
dusty citrus
alrighty
i will look into them
but can i use a microcontroller for more portability?
with a screen and a keypad
late fulcrum
It can be done https://hackaday.com/tag/basic-badge/
late fulcrum
I'd be tempted to use a mini Bluetooth keyboard instead of trying to roll my own.
late fulcrum
Something sajattack found the last time we talked about this https://www.tindie.com/products/electronictrik/blackberry-q10-kb-prototyping-breadboard/?pt=ac_prod_search
dusty citrus
Hmm
Looks cool
I really like portable mini computers
They are more secure and cooler looking
late fulcrum
Ah, then skip the Bluetooth 😃
late fulcrum
Poking around to see if those old chips were still available. I was disappointed when the Z84C0006PEC was marked as obsolete and unavailable, but it turns out that it was replaced by the lead-free PEG version. I also see that I can get 6, 8, or 10MHz for the same price.
late fulcrum
Heh, title is wrong, that chip is a 68020, which is pretty powerful. I have a couple of computers that use them.
dusty citrus
Oooo
Im thinking of creating a computer with that chip
But i just wish i can learn more
late fulcrum
16MHz, 32 bit.
late fulcrum
Its ancestor, the 68000, was available in a big 64-pin DIP
late fulcrum
Designing a board to seat the 114-pin 68020 would be tricky, but that big DIP you could (theoretically, at least) pop onto a breadboard.
late fulcrum
Musing on old TTL chips, I wondered which one had the fewest transistors. I finally came up with with the 7430 8-input NAND gate, which contains a total of four transistors.
dusty citrus
So what were you trying to build?
late fulcrum
Just musing on old chips. I had read that you could build any logic function out of nothing but NAND gates, and the 7400 NAND chip was the simplest one. I imagined that's how the chips worked, with gobs of NAND gates in them, but then I discovered they don't make 'em that way.
Hooking up RAM isn't too hard: you hook up the address and data leads, then add a little logic to derive the read, write, and chip select signals.
late fulcrum
You'll need a clock generator too, but yeah, that's about it.
Excellent writeup (for yet another CPU) here: http://wilsonminesco.com/6502primer/addr_decoding.html
dusty citrus
Nice
Its amazing how we can do things like this with old chips but newer ones are impossible
late fulcrum
Depends on the chip. I've breadboarded things with bare AVR, PIC, and MSP430 chips successfully.
They're even easier than the older ones, as they have their own clock generators and built-in RAM and (some sort of) ROM.
late fulcrum
With power comes ... responsibility? Complexity?
dusty citrus
Hmm
I guess
Wait
So
I can run a z80 barebones
But idk how to program ROM chips
late fulcrum
Not too hard, really. You basically write to them like RAM, but more slowly, and supply a "programming" voltage (like 12V). Or you can use flash memory instead. Or (a favorite of mine) use FRAM.
late fulcrum
Yeah, the certified/guaranteed ROM programmers (like Data I/O's offerings) are expensive. However, the actual process is pretty straightforward. There are inexpensive programmers out there too (look at TL866A and the like on eBay).
vernal gale
it's very small
vernal gale
Messy desk for scale
dusty citrus
Ouch
late fulcrum
A home rolled EPROM programmer https://github.com/TomNisbet/TommyPROM
dusty citrus
Can i program a Rom just by using switches?
late fulcrum
My workbench...
dusty citrus
Jesus Christ
late fulcrum
Yeah, you can program a ROM using switches. You might need a pulse generator too.
fickle slate
@dusty citrus "I can run a z80 barebones" What you can do is wire an arduino mega, the z80, and the ram chip on the same data/address bus, and run some certain signals from the arduino to the z80. You can then program the arduino mega to receive an assembled z80 program over serial, write that program to the ram chip, and then "start" the CPU, which will begin executing the program from the ram chip. The arduino can also detect I/O requests from the z80, and act as a proxy between the z80 and your PC.
Sorry if that doesn't seem clear. I've built such a thing and can offer some more in depth info, but be warned, programming the arduino to correctly handle all the data/IO is no easy thing;
Main post doesn't have any in depth info, and other posts in the thread are about LCDs iirc
TLDR: Use an arduino mega as a ROM programmer / bootloader and as an IO proxy between the z80 and your PC (or another IO device like an LCD or buttons or whatever)
rotund echo
@dusty citrus I programmed 2kB EEPROM completely by hand. It is totally possible but it takes REALLY long. It took me around 3 months.
It helps to have a piece of paper with data written on it so You don't waste time trying to figure out what to program
late fulcrum
An Arduino as CPU support logic is a creative approach.
fickle slate
You need an arduino mega though, as the total number of pins needed is over 32, and it helps to have 3 sets of 8 pins that are on the same pin banks for faster data read/write speeds
late fulcrum
Makes sense to me. I was guessing it used low-level (byte at a time) I/O, in order to be (barely) fast enough.
I tend to see one of 4 approaches to these modern day 8-bit CPU boards: 1) gates, 2) PROM/flash/FRAM, 3) PAL/CPLD, 4) another CPU. I've avoided the PAL/CPLD ones, as they tend to require arcane toolchains.
I'm tempted to just try lashing a CPU to a FM18W08 FRAM chip and use it as both RAM and ROM.
dusty citrus
@fickle slate i do have a arduino mega so i guess i can do it
fickle slate
I can probably dig up some code
I don't have any schematics buts it's not that complicated, mostly like "connect D0 to pin 54, connect D1 to 55 etc"
grave crest
timber goblet
on impulse I bought a https://www.pololu.com/product/3168 - holy cow, I'm impressed with the production quality. how can they do enough volume to justify these nice molded parts?
grave crest
@timber goblet What's that?
timber goblet
just a cute balancing robot. I expected 3d printed plastics and only tolerable tolerance, but it's a lot better than that.
dusty citrus
@fickle slate could you send me the schematics? I would really want to build it
late fulcrum
After talking about old 8-bit machines, I thought about my old 6800 I originally learned on. I managed to find the hulking power supply for it (12V at 10 amps), and figure out the switch settings and fix a couple of broken connections. I also had to make a serial adapter (it uses TTL levels over [of all things] a 1/4" stereo phone jack) to an FTDI cable. Powered it up. No dice. Debugged with an Analog Discovery 2. Finally figured out the reset switch needs to be SPDT.
And it works!
fickle slate
@dusty citrus Tomorrow I'll try to write out the "schematics", and send the code in a DM 😉
late fulcrum
We all start out as beginners.
dusty citrus
I just wanna be in a community where people sorta have my own interests also
Kids at my school look at me weirs because of my interests
But mostly i dont care
late fulcrum
It was the same when I was in school.
hasty quarry
Well
I don't get looked at weird. I think people think it's interesting in my school.
But the thing is, I seem to have made a reputation, and now I get asked for help at least 30 times or so in computer science class, and people are kind of rude to me when I refuse to help them for having my own work to do.
It's odd
There's this "I don't need you anymore, I figured it out" sass in the air
late fulcrum
Some people seem to play a game where they're both lazy (and want someone else to help) and want to one-up people.
hasty quarry
That's exactly it
If they figure something out, they tell me first
Or they yell it out nice and loud
fickle slate
@hasty quarry only help people who deserve it
As in, who ask nicely and don't Demand it
left oriole
Anyone see the new Twilight Zone last night? Thoughts? 😃
ocean oxide
OH NO!! Someone broke out of the code! 😂 Misplaced an endl (\n)
timber goblet
USB hub comes with a 2.5a AC supply! note: must not exceed combined current of 900mAh. 😡
late fulcrum
After getting the old 6800 system going, I grabbed an old KIM-1 off the pile and tried to get it going. There was something wrong with the power supply, it drew too much current. There was also a broken connector pin. Because of both of those, I decided to try to power the board directly. It too drew too much current. I tried to chase down what was drawing all that power by measuring voltage drop on the power/ground traces and it looked like the culprit was a 7406 chip that's part of the display driver. I rounded up another one and a socket, and removed the original. A quick check showed the board still drew too much power. A lot more debugging showed most of the chips on the board were pulling too much power. I suspect something bad had happened sometime in the past and blew the power supply as well as most of the chips. Trying to decide whether to bother further with it.
dusty citrus
I remember something about the KIM but not much.
Clearly I haven't seen a photo of a completed unit before. ;)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOS_Technology
I do recognize this logo, though. ;)
rotund echo
@ocean oxide c++?
vernal gale
@dusty citrus this logo? ;P
no working sids were harmed in the making of this picture
dusty citrus
@vernal gale ah, nice.
I'm aware of your work in Rust (which I know next to nothing about).
vernal gale
yeah I'm also a commodore fanatic
if you want to learn more about rust I like this video https://youtu.be/_wy4tuFEpz0
it's a bit dated but most of it holds up
dusty citrus
The thing is, if I learn it, it's still obscure. ;)(
bare metal using Atmel Start is still obscure, but it's sponsored by the manufacturer.
Plus my aim was always to learn forth (the language) and everything else is a stepping-stone towards that one goal.
But I'm very impressed the Rust folks are already onto SAMD51 M4 chips. ;)
late fulcrum
I think the Forth guys may be too.
Amusingly, I found a Forth implementation for the 6800 when looking for a 6800 assembler.
I picked up a bunch of Forth writing diagnostics that run under OpenPROM without needing to boot an OS.
dusty citrus
I had ideas to write an entire sytem from within the OpenFirmware interface to my iMac G4 (in 2002 or so). ;)
(it's basically a Forth)
vernal gale
@dusty citrus I'm the one that added samd51 support 😃
dusty citrus
@vernal gale That's great! SAMD51 is a bit different from SAMD21 though some analogies hold. ;)
plain cedar
simple edge
A brilliant piece of computer science comedy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TFDG-y-EHs
tiny moat
?serverinfo
solar ridgeBOT
adafruit
polar coral
I don't know where else to put this, but here's a tip: you can use voicemod as a pretty good noise gate for your mic, and it's much easier to set up than a lot of the pro stuff out there.
thorny herald
Hi guys, I would like to start my own startup business about smart farming systems basically. But now I need few answers. I will be very pleased if you can answer my survey including only 3 main quesions. Thanks a lot! https://drive.google.com/open?id=1aDiA7LNIIDOSNtLVSJ7VVE5aVIEMz-Sk8JHfxbOMr1s
ocean oxide
@rotund echo Yes
rotund echo
👌
ocean oxide
Anyone know the function for a delay in cpp?
rotund echo
I guess it waits a set amount of time and continues on with the program
jagged siren
C++ sleep function? sleep_for() (https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1658386/sleep-function-in-c/40783579) might be the only real standard in C++11 and higher, but on an OS-dependent level, could just be sleep. And for Arduino, it's just delay().
late fulcrum
For Arduino, you can use millis() and a compare loop. For other systems, if there's access to a time function (there generally is in Unix systems), you can do a similar approach.
umbral phoenix
or was that a C preprocessor question?
queen geode
are any of the CircuitPython devs running linux as their development environment? If so what distro?
dusty citrus
What do you want to know?
crisp ridge
@queen geode I use Fedora -- all of the packages needed for building CircuitPython are available in the official package repositories
queen geode
just curious if one distro is prefered for CP development
vernal gale
the lead developer primarily uses Mac OS X afaik
crisp ridge
Fedora was my preference before I ever touched CP.
ocean sigil
Ubuntu 18.04 works well.
vernal gale
btw I use Arch 😛
fair summit
@queen geode I use Ubuntu 18.04 (with cinnamon desktop). The main thing is to match whch arm toolchain version we're using, regardless of platform. We are currently using gcc 7.3.1.
late fulcrum
This I2C adapter with an I2C map screen and analyzer looks really useful for debugging I2C problems (there's an SPI version available too). https://www.seeedstudio.com/I2C-Driver-Adapter-Easily-Driver-I2C-Devices-p-4022.html.html
hallow rapids
i've seen that, does look good. poss more useful for SPI
ocean oxide
I think I'm in looooove
proven olive
@ocean oxide What is that? It looks vaugely familiar, but I've seen a bunch of SBCs recently...
proven olive
ahhh, ok!
ocean oxide
Anyone seen Endgame yet? Thoughts?
proven olive
Have not seen it yet (We're going on Wednesday). While I personally don't mind too much for spoilers, be aware that others are sometimes bothered by them
dusty citrus
There is a new spoiler tag, here in Discord, but I don't know how it is invoked.
https://support.discordapp.com/hc/en-us/articles/360022320632-Spoiler-Tags-
Hmm. That seems to show ||how to do it||.
I would mark it conspicuously, as it's a new Discord feature and people will click on the spoiler without realizing that's what it is (and is for).
proven olive
@dusty citrus Good point.
You could do things like "Spoiler for Movie Here: ||Spoiler||"
dusty citrus
They got me with a 'clever' use of 'got' and I clicked on the spoiler to realize that 'got' meant Game of Thrones. Too late, though.
My response was "if you had even used 'GoT' I might have noticed."
Click on the black text on the right,
for a Game of Thrones spoiler: ||Jon Snow is alive||
ocean oxide
||I hate that IRON MAN DIES!!!||
dusty citrus
Sys32 ||you ruined the whole movie for me. ;) j/k||
ocean oxide
Nis you scared me for a second! Lol XD
dusty citrus
Mainly because ||I will probably never see that movie. ;)||
dusty citrus
I just don't have access to things like that. Things meaning free movies worth watching.
I have a Roku, the very definition of things not worth watching, due to commercial interjections on a more or less constant basis.
Roku is okay for YouTube - that's all I get out of mine.
turbid echo
Guys what twitch streamers do you like?
idle iron
how do i use bot to see how long ive been in discord server for? is that still a thing?
tame saddle
?whois @idle iron
solar ridgeBOT
hexthat#2155
solar ridgeBOT
Andon#8175
proven olive
Oh neat, I've been registered on Discord longer than I thought.
plain urchin
?whois @plain urchin
solar ridgeBOT
aptitude#6588
grave crest
?whois @grave crest