Oddly enough, Curmudgeon's Better Half has been easier to source than my Economist subscription has been to sort out.
Happiness: I have been able to lay hands on another crate of this nectar.
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Oddly enough, Curmudgeon's Better Half has been easier to source than my Economist subscription has been to sort out.
Happiness: I have been able to lay hands on another crate of this nectar.
And everyday stuff of phoning doctors and pharmacists to organise the (ever-changing) details of my mother's life.
That's a very elegant solution your friend came up with. Unfortunately, I lack the circuitry skills required to work something like that out, so I'm relying on my tenuous grasp of terminal and Python to get me through it. My current plan is pretty rudimentary; I only have a radial dial on my washer, so I'll tape on a couple wires that'll make contact when the dial is in the off position. I also have a cheapo light-switch-shaped flashlight, which I'll repurpose as a case for the Pi. I can use the switch on the flashlight as an enable/disable switch for notifications, so that when the Pi reads the state of its pins and detects continuity across the switch and the wires on the dial, it'll send an email to my phone's number (@ whatever domain forwards emails to text).
The dial can spin indefinitely, so I'll probably strip one of the wires and use it as a brush after adding a conductive ring so that the wires won't get twisted over time. I'm opting for text notifications because… I mean, to be honest, there's just something so asinine about getting a text from your washer that I can't resist.
I strongly recommend an optical sensor over an electrical one.
The primary electro-optical element is called a photo-interrupter. It's basically an LED and a phototransistor together in a molded case. There's a gap between the two, so if you put something like a piece of cardboard between them, the optical signal is interrupted, and the transistor turns off. Remove the cardboard and it goes on again.
The total circuitry is simple enough I could advise you on it. Start a thread, maybe in Mac Programming, because that's where some other electronic stuff sometimes shows up. If you have a soldering iron and a modicum of skill using it, it won't be difficult. If you don't, you can practice soldering on some inconsequential things first. It's a lot like using an Xacto knife: practice makes perfect, but plan to make some mistakes early on.
I'll even find a part for you at Digi-Key. Since your washer dial has 3 separate OFF positions, I recommend buying at least 3 detectors, so you can put one at each distinct OFF position. I suggest buying a couple extras, so if one dies from clumsy soldering or mistaken connections, you don't have to reorder.
Thanks for the advice. Why do you recommend photosensors over electric? Are they more reliable, safer, or both?
Absolutely, insofar as the clock on your iPhone does away with wristwatches, but neither do if you're a fan of messing with electronics or traditional timepieces respectively.
I stopped wearing a watch when I got my Nokia 3310.
I used to mess with electronics. But Dave up years ago. It was more fun before they invented the microchip!
Both.
Exposed electrical contacts can feed undesirable voltages to things that touch them. The degree of undesired consequences depends on several things, including the voltage and the available current. Depending on what's actually providing the power, it could cause problems in the source of the power, i.e. the Pi's power supply, or more likely, the Pi that's being powered from the same supply (power loss, or damage to the supply and/or the Pi). The low voltage (5V or 3.3V) probably isn't anything to worry about in terms of electrocution hazard, but it could be a problem if it's short-circuited for a long period of time (overheating in supply) unless something is done to limit the current.
Exposed electrical contacts can degrade over time, especially in the presence of moisture, and sometimes more quickly than one might think. Degraded contacts can fail to register a closure, or can get stuck in the closed position. Also, wires can bend and get stuck.
If you really want to try electrical contacts, there are better arrangements that don't have a brush & wire on the moving part.
If you want to try something non-optical, there are magnetic sensors (reed switches are the simplest), which would need a small magnet mounted on the dial. Magnetic sensors may have proximity problems in this situation, because a magnet strong enough to activate a sensor is probably strong enough that it can't distinguish between OFF and the last 5 minutes or so of the dial position. Optical sensors can be precisely placed, and since the sensed element is a physical object (cardboard or plastic interrupter), it can be adjusted so it triggers only when the last mm or so is traversed.
This is heading off-topic for this thread, so I advise starting a new thread and asking the moderators to move these posts there, by reporting the first post of the side track.
What’s on my mind?
The new Mac Mini.
I'll reserve judgment on the new MBA until I have read some (trusted) reviews.
How many ports does it have?
In my experience, a new device (or dramatic revision or update) may require six months to a year of alterations, revisions, or plain tweaking to get over its inevitable teething problems.
Ah.
So the old reliable MagSafe is gone, then? My 11" MBA has two ports plus the charger; the 'old' 13" MBA has three.
Well, two is certainly better than the one on the MB.
Anyway, I shall read the reviews, and give them six months to a year to address any of the inevitable teething problems that may arise.
And hopefully revise the keyboard too. Unfortunately, the new Air inherited the recent butterfly keyboards.
I am waiting on reviews of the Mac Mini and paying more medical bills off before I jump. In specs, the Mini is what I expected and most of what I hoped for. May finally wave goodbye to the iMac after 20 years when I am ready to upgrade next year.
Ah, ugh.
That butterfly keyboard?
One can only express the fervent - but possibly forlorn - aspiration that it may have undergone major modification and significant improvement since it first made its unwelcome appearance a number of years ago.
I agree with your ugh on that butterfly keyboard. Not sure if it’s the very slightly improved keyboard from the 2018 MBPs or a variant of the 2018 keyboard.
Agreed. Need to see what the specs are on the internal graphics. Need it to run a pair of 4 k displays.
Yes sir.Been busy with work and family, so I haven't read much tech news in the last few months. There's a new mini?
https://www.apple.com/mac-mini/
Hopefully this thread is a good place for this, but I kind of struggling with Apple as a whole right now - I've been an Apple user/fan/whatever for decades at this point and have totally been fine with the ongoing march of simpler/more minimal, even if it is less upgradeable/repairable. In general, things like my "sealed" 2014 Mac mini or iPad tend to just work, be fast enough for a long enough amount of time, etc.
There's the price hikes recently for certainly nice upgrades (the mini's higher starting price sort of balances to be the price of the models I've bought in the past anyway), but there's also a lot of questions/annoyances that remain. I've been avoiding the notebook line for the reasons many have cited—I suspect many people would've been ecstatic if they took the old Air, put a Retina Display and a USB-C port, and called it a day. The iPad Pros seem fantastic, but I also sit there and wonder if for my needs, they're that much better than me upgrading a regular iPad twice or three times as often—if you start spec-ing anything out, it gets well past Mac territory quickly.
Finally, my Watch was bricked with 5.1 and it seems that everyone is being told different things by Apple, not to mention AppleCare+ might be getting quicker repairs even though we all are at about a month or less in purchase dates? Most of the gadgets I brick at my day job at least have some sort of backdoor to get firmware loaded back on...what if the Series 3 had been hit with this and people were out of warranty? Pay Apple to un-brick your Watch?
There seems to be a few different mindsets out there regarding Apple, especially from users of their products—the ones that think everything that has happened since Tim Cook took over has been worse, those who have kind of gone with the flow and maybe offered some constructive criticism, and those who have basically bought into every change. I typically have fallen in the middle, more towards being accepting of changes, but I just kind of needed to whine. If you've read this far, thanks.
Plus, at the end of the day for a company of that size, they generally provide pretty good service and if it is as they say about privacy, they're doing much more than many others out there.
There's the price hikes recently for certainly nice upgrades (the mini's higher starting price sort of balances to be the price of the models I've bought in the past anyway), but there's also a lot of questions/annoyances that remain. I've been avoiding the notebook line for the reasons many have cited—I suspect many people would've been ecstatic if they took the old Air, put a Retina Display and a USB-C port, and called it a day. The iPad Pros seem fantastic, but I also sit there and wonder if for my needs, they're that much better than me upgrading a regular iPad twice or three times as often—if you start spec-ing anything out, it gets well past Mac territory quickly.
Finally, my Watch was bricked with 5.1 and it seems that everyone is being told different things by Apple, not to mention AppleCare+ might be getting quicker repairs even though we all are at about a month or less in purchase dates? Most of the gadgets I brick at my day job at least have some sort of backdoor to get firmware loaded back on...what if the Series 3 had been hit with this and people were out of warranty? Pay Apple to un-brick your Watch?
There seems to be a few different mindsets out there regarding Apple, especially from users of their products—the ones that think everything that has happened since Tim Cook took over has been worse, those who have kind of gone with the flow and maybe offered some constructive criticism, and those who have basically bought into every change. I typically have fallen in the middle, more towards being accepting of changes, but I just kind of needed to whine. If you've read this far, thanks.
Plus, at the end of the day for a company of that size, they generally provide pretty good service and if it is as they say about privacy, they're doing much more than many others out there.
I’m headed to another Immigration Ceremony Friday. This one is for a friend’s 22 yo daughter. She’s quite a young woman. She came to the United States as a junior in high school with minimal English skills. She graduated with honors and has carried a 4.0 in biology and chemistry at University. All she does is study and plan her future....oh and shop ha ha. She loves to shop.