One year ago today: September 25, 2013, Margaritaville.
Five years ago today: September 25, 2009, big empty town.
Ten years ago today: September 25, 2004, seafood.
This is raw content, no photos yet. The bad news is after two months of planning, I didn't make it to NOVA. Details below. Wait, I do have a picture. This is an 1895 hand-cranked dishwasher. There. Don't say I didn't deliver.
It’s get ready time for the Nova meet-up, but in this modern day and age, I’m guessing they won’t again cancel at the last minute. Still no Internet service from the office, so I’d have to check at the library. Again proving that Generation Y is lost without their toys, they have no method to contact people. So I’m going out there, if they are not open for business, I’m going to a coffee house. I win either way.
Now, Nova is as likely to be insulted as impressed by the DrawBot. They are assuredly not the same caliber of scholar from my university days. Standards have gotten so low that most students don’t even seem inquisitive. The focus is to get the degree to get a job so you don’t have to work for a living. It was the same in 1980, but you still had to get educated in the process. Not no more.
Consider this. What are the two most prominent effects of this lowering of standards? Easy: nobody to share the work with and focused skill-sets. There is no group at Nova I could confidently assign some teamwork. Everybody is in it for themselves. This means every project takes forever. But it also means the necessary brainpower for success is concentrated in one or two key people. Sooner or later, the class dummies get around to admitting that, usually against their wills.
So today’s morning mini-lecture is scaling. This won’t be on the exam, but here’s where I get to explain a complicated process without using any math. Scaling is necessary when your input device does not produce a range or type of values compatible with your output device. Your spinning car tire needs intermediate steps to work with your speedometer.
In robotics, this happens so often I consider it to be a specialty, though not overly so. This, I think, is where digital philosophy pays off. If you can reduce your input to a digital signal, scaling it to your output requirements becomes relatively easy compared to mechanical differences. There, your lesson for today without any complicated formulas. But before you run out and try it, there is something you should know. And listen up, because it could cost you to find this out on your own.
Microprocessors don’t like non-integer arithmetic. Every non-trivial scaling function involves division. To get anything like efficiency, you will need to know your bit-wise arithmetic formulas. And the people who design microcontroller commands are monstrous bastards about that, every mother’s son of them. You’ll see.
End of lesson.
NOON
Here's another unrelated photo. Well, not related except to y'days post of a covered bridge, now included below. I happen to like covered bridges. Or at least would like to if I ever see one. This is called the "Humpback" bridge. That's my thumb.
I can’t understand Congress. They will outlaw the worst of regular advertising scams, but nothing to protect you on-line. It should require permission for anybody to put anything on your computer. On this brand new computer, the first time it was connected to the Internet, it blocked 932 tracking attempts, and 14,000 “passive” threats. Good advice—don’t even accidentally click on anything that says Softonic.
I spent the late afternoon with the Arduinos. They don’t interact well with Windows, again the problem is recognizing the COM ports. It seems the Arduinos have a built-in driver that is supposed to find a free port when a USB cable is connected. But sometimes it chooses to just sit there. It’s maddening as there are no commands to troubleshoot the problem. As usual, there is a certain brand of computer user who never in a lifetime experiences the troubles I do with the system. There’s a reason for that, you know.
EVENING
No Nova. So I watched the movie “Fast & Furious”, with a plot full of holes. Like, why risk jumping on moving oil trucks when all they have to do is shoot out one tire? Or am I just being critical because the screenwriter’s meeting last night was partially about continuity. That’s the guy who makes the scenes appear connected and such. You know, so both scenes have the same number of clouds in the sky.
One [great] question was asked [at the meeting] about “King Kong”. You ready? If the islanders built the fence to keep the giant animals out of the village, why did they make the gate so big?
Here is the transcipt of y'day's "library post".
Still using the library computer. Note to my inventor buddy, Collin: I consider golf an industry, not a sport. It is elitist and the challenge of the game, such as it is, does not attract real athletes. I agree with exclusive clubs to keep out the riff-raff, but golf does not qualify as a category of exclusiveness in my books. Just a different kind of riff-raff, more concerned with trying to prove otherwise. Sorry folks, not only do I not like golf, I don't like the people who do like it.
Okay, but this is not the real post for today. I had no electric now at the trailer court. It was establish in 1962, and although it was one of most desirable spots for decades, it has fallen into disrepair as the owners are really hoping to be bought out by the casino. Except the casino daily has an empty parking lot twice the size of the court. So go figure.
Anyway, I missed Nova. Just around departure time, it began to sprinkle too much for a safe trip. Now, if you saw it you might say it's nothing, but it is a fool who takes unnecessary chances. And Nova is a 30+ mile round trip. Wait, there's more. Around two in the morning, the electric began to fizzle. It's done this before after a lingering rain storm. I'm telling you, this means trouble.
One of my goals was to be the first in my gang to drive through a covered bridge by sidecar motorcycle. So, I resolved to find the closest such structure from here. Madison County is too far away and besides, I don't do housewives. Here it is. Kudos to anyone who knows where to find this. All I can say for now is I am looking at it very closely.
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