If anyone else wants the closest thing to a MBP running Linux without waiting for Asahi to fully work, I can highly recommend the HP ZBook G1A.
* It has an all-aluminium chassis that feels a lot like a MBP.
* Hardware all works - fingerprint reader, webcam, suspend etc etc. Takes a bit of work, but all works in the end. Helps that HP ships them with Ubuntu as official option.
* Strix Halo chipset, which is basically AMD's attempt at an Apple Silicon type design. Single big chip, with unified LPDDR5X-8000 RAM (up to 128GB!) shared between CPU and GPU (which is surprisingly strong as well, 40 CU!). This thing is a beast for local LLMs!
Only downside really is the battery life. I haven't played around with it too much, I think there's a bit more room with custom tuned profiles, but rn I get like maybe 6 hours on a good day?
For full disk encryption you need DSM >= 7.2 and you can either, store it locally (useless) or in a KMIP server. [0]
As a KMIP server you use:
- Another Synology NAS with DSM >= 7.2
- A KMIP compatible key server
Except for the demo implementation that Synology uses (PyKMIP), all the KMIP compatible servers I've found have licenses in the tens of thousands a year. So if anybody has any suggestions to substitute PyKMIP...
I firmly believe that differentiable logic CA is the winner, in particular because it extracts the logic directly, and thus leads to generalize-able programs as opposed to staying stuck in matrix multiplication land.
> I think Windows still offers easy screenshotting of frames from DRM video not because the streaming services somehow don’t care about what Windows users do
This is incorrect. The DRM on Windows varies based on the browser. Trying playing Netflix in Edge vs Chrome and take screenshots. The video will be black on Edge but visible on Chrome. If you use Ctrl-Alt-Shift-D on Edge or Chrome to bring up the stats or view their test videos at https://www.netflix.com/watch/80164785, you can see that Edge plays 4k HDR but Chrome only plays 1080p SDR. Netflix allows 1080p with weak DRM but requires strong DRM for 4k.
There are similar restrictions for mobile devices, VR headsets, etc. where the resolution is limited on certain devices and browsers because of their DRM configuration.
- Bring bug spray & hat
- Drive to Playalinda, arriving ~4am
- Pay for a park pass for entry
- Park
- Sleep for a few hours in your car
- Get up and watch a rocket launch
From beach or short walk back up entrance road for a good view across one of the ponds, depending on pad.
Chain of Lakes Park (Titusville) is a nice alternate. Huge park, tons of parking and space to watch. Really good views if you feel like sneaking across the railroad line on the shore. Hint: hide from any white railroad company trucks. Ignore the wooden viewing stand, as it's camped out by tourists and photographers who can be territorial.
Was easy. Early is key to avoiding all the bullshit. Once you're in and parked, you don't have to worry about anything else.
Be prepared for a scrub on any given day though. Florida mornings tend to be more reliable than afternoon / evenings, due to weather (afternoon monsoon).
Seeing two SpaceX Heavy boosters do near-simultaneous boost-back landings was awesome, including the sonic booms as they decelerated coming in.
A technical pleasure and also very good glimpse into the Apollo team - working together, to land on the moon. It is a fun easy read, written by the fellow in charge of programming the guidance computer on the lunar lander. It is also a great snapshot of that time in history, the excitement of Apollo, and with the frustration of the Vietnam war going on, some protests, etc. Just a hint - the main programmer, was an English major, and his use of the right words, were a key factor in the success of of creating an efficient and effective computer language
Kicad. Went from zero to fully working, quite complex digital board with it.
A few tips:
Use ultra librarian for parts when possible. They're usually better.
Making your own footprints is a pain but necessary sometimes. FreeCAD is another OSS tool that also has its rough edges but is good enough. Use the sketcher tool and the datasheet to build up all the lines you'd need (including for cutouts, pads, silkscreen, etc), export as DXF, then import into KiCad's footprint editor. You can then switch layers for each line or use them to position pads such that they're fully accurate and you don't have to think too hard about offsets and whatever.
Find (or make!) a good part manager if you're populating your own boards. I wrote some simple REPL around sqlite in Node.js for working with parts, and have a cheapo barcode scanner from Amazon to work with mouser IDs and the like to "check out" parts as I populate. In hindsight, I wish I had written it in Python. I also use this tool to convert the BOM kicad exports into a more reasonable format for buying. I also subtract away the parts in the DB I already have so I don't keep buying extras of stuff. Just an idea.
Our local TV station weatherman has a YouTube channel[1] where he geeks out every morning about the weather, providing a much more detailed forecast than he has time for during the brief windows he has on the TV news. Walks through the HRRR, NAM, GFS, satellite pictures, and other sources of information. It's a nice compromise if you find the raw data to be overwhelming.
Nick Carver, a photographer, had a really interesting video recently where he explained the progression of light at sunset. Prior to watching the video, I understood the primary phenomenon of Rayleigh scattering, so I didn't really expect to learn anything. However, there's a lot more going on as the sun sets than I realized. The properties of sunlight (color, hardness, direction) shift in interesting and surprising ways even after the sun falls below the horizon.
The segment begins at 7:10, but if you already have a basic familiarity with the science, you can probably skip to 12:00.
Try Anti-Anti-Debug [0]. It's a simple extension to bypass those kinds of anti-debugging techniques. Made it in a few hours a while ago for similar reasons.
I’m currently in the middle of maple syrup season. I’ve got 75 taps in on my property with room for maybe another 25 more if I wanted to add to the workload. There’s no chance at profit on this scale but it’s a nice relaxing hobby and keeps you and your friends and family stocked with the best syrup you can find all year long. Last year I planted about 50 more sugar maples and I intend to plant about 100 more this year. It takes 30-40 years for a tree to mature to the point that it can be tapped, so it’s not likely I’ll ever tap those trees myself, but hopefully I’m setting up my descendants with a potential maple syrup kingdom.
What resources would people recommend to a software developer who wants to understand more about hardware at this level?
How can I go from only knowing the basics to being able to reverse-engineer a schematic from a die photo, as in this article and this recent tweet [0]?
waffles are the perfect comfort food during these times- 2c flour, 1.75c milk, 1/2c melted butter or oil, big pinch of salt, 4tsp baking powder, 2 eggs. Throw in some vanilla or other flavor concentrate if you'd like!
* It has an all-aluminium chassis that feels a lot like a MBP.
* Hardware all works - fingerprint reader, webcam, suspend etc etc. Takes a bit of work, but all works in the end. Helps that HP ships them with Ubuntu as official option.
* Strix Halo chipset, which is basically AMD's attempt at an Apple Silicon type design. Single big chip, with unified LPDDR5X-8000 RAM (up to 128GB!) shared between CPU and GPU (which is surprisingly strong as well, 40 CU!). This thing is a beast for local LLMs!
Only downside really is the battery life. I haven't played around with it too much, I think there's a bit more room with custom tuned profiles, but rn I get like maybe 6 hours on a good day?