SeTec Astronomy @SetecAstronomy@hackers.town

Just found a whole batch of Hackers.town people languishing in my Follow queue.

Locals should drop me a line when following so I can approve. Not currently accepting outside follows.

#Reintroductions? But I never did #Introductions...

I'm a weird guy who decided to base his profile on the movie Sneakers. I love technology, probably more than is healthy. My interests tend to revolve in a cycle but in the spirit of hackers.town I try to keep it to infosec and general internet nerdery.

I live with a migraine 24/7 so don't be surprised to see the occasional related toot.

Fun STA Fact #4 (collect them all!): A Canadian goose once attempted to carjack me.

Cc @thegibson FYI. Not sure what hash tag you're using for your project.

The Etherpad is down due to power/internet outage. No ETA at this time

#WeAreNameless

New strategy.

Looking over the scattered rubble and thinking "Nope, can't deal with that cause X, or that cause Y or that cause Z." is not working. Sorted it all into little piles instead. "This pile goes there, that ones goes there, that ones goes there." Who cares if I can do that now or not. At least it's not a disorganized mess anymore. And strangely, half the bench top made an appearance.

Now to just keep whittling away at these, one put-away pile at a time.

One of the problems is that I lack anywhere to store partial cables. That is, the kind where one end has been hacked off. There's a stack of DB25, 10-pin IDC with rainbow ribbon, cut up USB and audio, and all sorts of other bits of this and that sitting there right now. I have specific places for storing various types of intact cables, but I need something convenient to the bench for these.

I guess a random box will do for now.

I really want to go fiddle with random things on the bench, but it's covered in homeless junk from my cleaning episode.

Very very close to shoving it all in a box. Which I really do not want to do.

I should ... uh ... do ....

*thud*

Yeah. Maybe just lay here face down for a while.

Just saw a reference to 3D printing and face shields for covid-19.

I suddenly have this suspicion that 3D printing is going to be another one of those product groups where I'm going to find reduced availability and higher prices.... (like common PC peripherals right now)

Just spent waaay too long looking at pegboard and bench accessories on Thingverse.

I've been leaning towards a 3D printer for a while now. I think it's getting closer.

Maybe I can rig up my eyelids so that when my eyes close I get a zap. I'm sure that's the road to healthy habits.

This is normally the point in the day where I nap for a few hours, but I've been finding that I've been staying awake for longer and longer periods before sleep. Last night it was rather difficult to fall asleep, and was very late (early?) before it happened. So maybe no nap today.

Supposed to be browsing the timeline while eating lunch, instead I'm just browsing the timeline.

This happens a lot. I get lunch out, I find something to read while I eat, and then I just read.

Well. #i3wm is throwing a fit and not working. In some ways it's a relief. I didn't have the spoons to invest in setting it up well, and otherwise it was just a little confining.

There's a Gnome extension called Gtile that looks to do pretty much what I want. The downside being that Mint doesn't really support Gnome so it'd be An Adventure installing it. And I'm not sure I'm in the mood for a total reinstall.

We'll see what happens.

I have a few of these old-school (ha!) Larry Lights and they have all eventually developed the same problem. When initially turned on they light fine, however any movement results in flickering of the LEDs to the point of uselessness.

I was able to disassemble and clean one. It had never experienced leaking batteries, there was no corrosion inside. The issue appeared to be related to the fact that the power button rotates inside the housing with the pocket clip. Because of this, the positive end of the batteries connect via a pair of metal disks (with a small spring at the end of battery itself).

The best I can figure is that the spring is worn and not providing constant contact between the plates as the flashlight is jostled. I'm not quite sure if I should just try shoving another firmer spring in there or give up on them as a poor design.

I like these lights, I had one as a radio tech and it got daily use before I had to quit working. I'm pretty sure Dad has at least one as well, so if I could devise a fix I could probably revive three or four of these.

Decided to do some much needed maintenance on the TARDIS today. A bit of CA adhesive for the plastic bits, some white glue for the peeling labels, and some pliers to carefully remove the shattered bulb. Oh, and a little cleaning.

Good as new!

I think it's time to do something else for a bit actually.

Test fit before I glue the switch into place. Everything is a scant millimeter from fitting where it goes.

Where's my hammer?

Seriously regretting not tacking wires on the LED PCB now. I'm seeing spots from trying to get the probes onto the pads.

Ugh. I just realized that I was about to hook both of these LED assemblies up to the batteries directly.

The controller board is useless. It has a decent current leak and will suck a trio of AAAs dry overnight.

But I have no idea how to even figure out what value resistor(s) to put in here. There's a single LED in the center that provides the focused light, and there's a ring of 10 that provide ambient light. Typically they don't both run at the same time, but lacking a proper controller I'm just shoving a toggle switch in it from another more-disposable flashlight.

I have a working light identical to the one I'm hacking back to life. Voltage isn't hard to determine without modifications, and I can make a pretty good guess at current just from measuring it's current draw at the battery terminals. (I'd really rather not do anything more invasive than unscrew bits of the good one, it still works after all)

Hmm. Need a decent soundtrack for some flashlight hacking.

Thinking some 80s/90s is what I'm in the mood for today. But where to start?

I suddenly find myself imagining that within The Lego Group there are warring factions fighting for and against the introduction of various new bricks.

> The 2-stud 1x3 plate would solve building integrity issues where historically a single-stud 1x2 plate and a smooth 1x1 plate have been used.

> We've gotten along just fine all these years without your new-fangled confusing plates. The 1x2 single stud plate should have never been introduced in the first place!

> Spoken like someone who only had Mega Blocks as a child!

> Mega Blocks? I bet you had those horrible Tyco knock offs!

[Discussion degrades from here, like a wall made of non-staggered blocks.]