Warm and damp. Maybe some rain, although I doubt it. We’re supposed to be in a tiny little strip of weather according to the map. That almost never holds true, so I think we’ll luck out. Yesterday was overcast, warm, and muggy all day.
I got up on the roof early and installed my new camera. Got it aimed and focused in only one extra trip up, but forgot to check that the microSD card was working. I’ll have to get to that another time. I am all out of time budget for the camera project. (It is recording on the NVR)
My wife is at GS camp learning how to teach canoeing to the girls, and the kids are home with me.
Today is also the monthly meeting for my non-prepping hobby. I have some parts for one of the guys who bought stuff from me last time, so I’ll probably swing by and just drop them off. Then it’s home to the list.
And at some point, I’ll swing by the rent house and get measurements for what will fit in the fridge spot in the cabinets. I’m pretty sure the Lowe’s near me has one in stock that will fit, but I’d sure like a scratch n dent if I can find one. The tenant says “no hurry, the fridge part still works fine.” Weird, but I’m over wondering what’s wrong since the fridge is probably 20 years old and has a bunch of cosmetic issues too. And if anyone is wondering, yes, new HVAC board, new dishwasher, cheap dryer, new dryer, new fridge, some plumbing work, etc WILL eat most of the profit from your rental. That’s why small landlords tend to be handy, and go for scratch n dent whenever possible, and cut more corners than they should.
Non sequitur, anyone else wear the little locator nibs off your keyboard? The actual letters are still on the keys, which are very shiny (in proportion to how often they get used), but the little nibs are worn away. The spacebar also has a gentle depression in it where my thumb rests… I’ve got a gamer keyboard with cherry switches sitting here, I should probably get that swapped in. This original Dell keyboard is as old as the machine, which shipped with win8.1, so it lasted pretty well. I picked up the new keyboard a couple of weeks ago because I noticed that sometimes the shift keys don’t work, but I hadn’t noticed the nibs being worn off. In the last couple of days I noticed that I keep putting my hands in the wrong place on the home row. Add it to the list, or just do it right the f now?? List. Now there are other things to do.
I’m sure there are things on your list, and time is getting short. After all, the end is nigh- er…
Keep stacking.
n
Yes. Try dots of epoxy, next time you have some epoxy out. You’ll need less than a cubic millimeter per keycap.
Yes, and that’s if your tenants are honest and not idiots. If your tenants are destructive — not necessarily malicious, just morons — it can get really bad. If you have trouble collecting the rent and live in a state which strongly favors tenants over landlords, it’s not worth doing. I frequently regret having sold the house in which I was renting out three apartments, but then I remember the aggravation and the regret goes away.
I was unable to (legally) evict one non-paying tenant. She lived there six months rent-free, IIRC, and worked the system to get delays of court orders and what-not. I found out later that she was third-generation welfare parasite and her mother and other relatives gave her tips. She finally moved out when the power company cut off her utilities. Not sure how they (legally) managed that in the middle of a New York winter, but they could afford more lawyers than I could, which is probably all the explanation needed.
MIL has become comatose, does not respond to anything. Hospice says hearing is the last sensory function to cease so she apparently can still hear. The condition is caused by the drugs to keep her comfortable and her body shutting down. I remember my aunt in the same condition, basically a shell of a person. The wife is there with her and may be with her mother when the golden bridge is crossed. I expect I will be leaving tomorrow for the long drive to San Antonio. Hospice nurses are apparently fairly good at predicting the demise based on much experience with the death process from natural causes.
Sorry to hear about the turn for the worse, Ray.
I’m in North Austin/Round Rock if something comes up that requires assistance.
Speaking of keyboards, I recently purchased a das keyboard with Cherry MX Brown switches, with a 10 key. I have been searching for an eternity to find a keyboard with a Mac layout that was not optimized for gaming or have neon lights blinking all over the place. As the most casual of gamers, I did not feel the need to invest in fancy optimizations of the colors that it is capable of flashing, nor the different keyboard layouts that adhere to whatever game that is popular this hour. My typing speed has drastically increased overnight with this gem. The keys are a little loud in the morning when everyone else is sleeping, but the difference in feel between that and the “chicklets” that are on the Apple Magic Keyboard is stunning. It is a wired keyboard.
Non sequitur, anyone else wear the little locator nibs off your keyboard? The actual letters are still on the keys, which are very shiny (in proportion to how often they get used), but the little nibs are worn away. The spacebar also has a gentle depression in it where my thumb rests…
The keyboard on my T470 deteriorated pretty quickly after I bought it new, with lots of shiny keys and a huge smooth spot on the keyboard. Plastics aren’t the same as of late.
I don’t use the machine nearly as frequently as my work laptops, and I don’t take the ThinkPad on the road for vacations lest I be tempted to use it for work.
Thanks for the offer but I think we are good. I may be interested in a meet and greet (done this with Nick and Lynn) for lunch or something. Put a name with a face. I think Mr. ATOZ is located in SA also and may try and set something up.
Send me contact information to “rayt four-three-five at comcast dot fishing-device”. Cell phone number would be preferred. And I don’t sell the information unless someone offers me $50K for your phone number at which point you lose. Nick and Lynn both have my contact information.
I am leaving today about noon for the drive to SA. Will try and drive 8 hours today if possible. Will be in SA for a week, maybe more. No one thinks MIL will last more than a couple of days. Would have some issues to settle with remaining property and bank accounts.
My best wishes for you, Mr. Ray. Of course I would help in any way I can. Unfortunately, I got word yesterday I have to go to Vegas tomorrow for work (my first flight in a year). Then packing supplies for one of our programs for “GEAR UP” in Oklahoma City. We are driving there in MrsAtoz’s Battlewagon. Two day drive, four day program, then on to SA. OKC is our first, in-person, program in a year. Daughter #3 lives in SA and just had her baby, so Gamma is gonna spoil it rotten.
Daughter #3 lives in SA and just had her baby, so Gamma is gonna spoil it rotten.
Buc-ee’s has cool baby gear.
Send me contact information to “rayt four-three-five at comcast dot fishing-device”. Cell phone number would be preferred. And I don’t sell the information unless someone offers me $50K for your phone number at which point you lose. Nick and Lynn both have my contact information.
I’ll send the cell number. It is pretty useless for effective marketing since the 813 area code is Tampa.
When I first got the number 20 years ago, I used to get calls from people with Cuban-sounding accents wanting to know if my boat was still for sale.
I joked with my wife that the return phone numbers were from Useppa, an island off the FL coast where the CIA ran training operations for Bay of Pigs back in the day. Interestingly, Ross Perot also had a home there in the 90s after it turned into a swank private resort.
If your wife needs a break while you are down there, go find Schilo’s. The cheesecake makes most things better. 🙂
@Greg Norton
The second is two-fold: a) are these API’s building blocks of the universe and can’t be expressed in another way, or 2) did Google steal them because it saved them money and time and they are sweaty pasty-faced liars with enough lawyers to make a 100-fold good start at the bottom of the Atlantic ocean?
“The Java decision with regard to Android predated Google acquiring the project. Andy Rubin had already launched one OS, the Danger platform, with Java APIs free of any interference from Sun, the original copyright holder of Java.”
Bit more to the story:
Sun Was Close to Licensing Java Patents to Google for $28M
Google and Sun Microsystems’ discussions to co-develop Android ultimately broke down because of disagreements over control of the platform, Google wrote in a trial brief late last week related to its dispute with Oracle.
The document contains a number of details about the development of Android, including that information Sun at one time was near agreeing to license 2,000 Java patents to Google for US$28 million over three years. Oracle bought Sun last year and then filed a lawsuit charging Google with infringing Sun’s Java patents and copyright in Android. Google denies wrongdoing.
Although portions of the document are redacted, it says that both Oracle and Sun considered making their own Java phones, which would have competed with Android.
Google previously said that it rejected a $100 million offer from Sun to license Java patents.
Although portions of the document are redacted, it says that both Oracle and Sun considered making their own Java phones, which would have competed with Android.
The document also shows that Google was banking on Sun being unlikely to sue, due to the company’s expressed policy of asserting patents only for defensive reasons.
Google went on to argue that because Sun didn’t later pursue Google for patent infringement, Google didn’t know it was infringing and thus didn’t do so willfully. In repeatedly referring to Sun’s policy of not pursuing patent infringers, Google appears to back up some critics who have suggested that the search giant knew it was infringing patents but counted on Sun not to pursue it.
…
“Sun had a long-standing, publicly announced policy of using its patents only defensively,” Google wrote in one instance.
The argument that Google didn’t know it infringed patents could be a difficult one if a hotly contested email is allowed at the trial. The email, written by Google engineer Tim Lindholm, advised Android’s chief that he had investigated technical alternatives to Java but concluded that the company needed to negotiate a license for Java. Google has been trying to prevent the email from being displayed to jurors.
https://www.cio.com/article/2403311/sun-was-close-to-licensing-java-patents-to-google-for–28m.html
So the answer is somewhere between $28 and 100 million, and they are pasty faced liars claiming that they didn’t know they were infringing.
SCOTUS has opened a can of worms by not simply following the law. Their “derivative” reasoning leads to absurdities in which IP holders lose control of their property if a potential competitor moves first. Had Oracle/Sun gotten into the Android phone business, we’d have a different result here. If they got into it today, they’d have a competitor freely using their IP with no compensation in money or in reciprocal rights to Google IP use.
So now the small inventor without the resources to develop everything flowing from their invention has no negotiating power with the big boys.
[note: the above article is from 2011]
@Steve Larson
“Speaking of keyboards, I recently purchased a das keyboard with Cherry MX Brown switches, with a 10 key. ”
What model?
I have a FB friend that is a chemist at a wastewater treatment plant at a not so small but not large town. Their nemesis is the use of “flushable wipes”. They aren’t. They clog pipes (Google “London Fatberg” for an even more extreme example). They clog pumps. They should be thrown in the trash.
SCOTUS has opened a can of worms by not simply following the law. Their “derivative” reasoning leads to absurdities in which IP holders lose control of their property if a potential competitor moves first. Had Oracle/Sun gotten into the Android phone business, we’d have a different result here. If they got into it today, they’d have a competitor freely using their IP with no compensation in money or in reciprocal rights to Google IP use.
Anyone can download and use the Android source code to go into the smart phone business. Google’s IP on Android is in the services which are accessed via add on libraries such as the Play Store, Maps, and Mail.
I don’t believe Amazon originally had a license for Android on their tablets. They may now just to avoid problems, but that doesn’t extend to the services.
Oracle/Sun in the smart phone business. Now, that’s funny. At GTE, we were under NDA and management fed hookers/steaks (*in my opinion*) for years to cover for Sun’s hardware problems, particularly the memory issues on the E10000, their flagship server.
As for small players, among other fallout, a decision in the other direction would have eventually brought the Posix vendors down on Linus Torvalds, who freely admits targeting their APIs with his kernel, cribbing right out of the standards book, resulting in the eventual dominance of Linux in the Unix space since the big players found it difficult to move their legacy platforms towards the Posix standards.
Best wishes Mr Ray
Steve, when one daughert was living in NY I was thinking to buy for her and after that let, your comment states it is not good, money saved
Drwilliams, I thought exactly the same, regardless I dont like Larry and his friends, but, remember when 2 elephants fight, ants suffers
best regards
I have a FB friend that is a chemist at a wastewater treatment plant at a not so small but not large town. Their nemesis is the use of “flushable wipes”. They aren’t. They clog pipes (Google “London Fatberg” for an even more extreme example). They clog pumps. They should be thrown in the trash.
Flushable wipes seem to be a common problem in Western countries.
In San Antonio, the recycling services have a huge problem with disposable diapers going into the bins which should be filled with just “clean” recyclables such as newspapers, glass, and empty plastic bottles.
Interesting about the key nubs; never heard that before. Easy fix, as suggested. The letter markings on old quality keycaps are molded deeply, so never wear off. Some keycaps have them closer to the surface, and those can wear off. I wonder about the illuminated ones’ longevity.
I sure like my OmniKey Ultra keyboards. I have used one so much that its Esc key is failing. The switches can be easily replaced, and I have several spares. The one I am currently using has occasional keyswitch bounce issues, which results in multiple characters per keypress. These keyboards went through multiple revisions of their electronics for this issue. I have two more working spares, and will give them a try. It’s always something.
Wife’s new-ish Dell notebook has a surprisingly nice keyboard feel, but the layout was done by a comtortionist. I could never use it very long. I still remember Jerry often repeating “function keys on the left, where God intended them.” What I mostly dislike is the capslock key where the Ctrl key should be. I know there is remapping software, but wouldn’t put it on my wife’s computer. She is a good typist, but doesn’t use Ctrl or F-keys. Funny how some people are irritated by things others don’t even notice.
Wouldn’t Jeff be pursuing automation regardless? Or is that the plan anyway and fewer roadblocks without a union in the way?
He is. Amazon bought a company that makes robots for warehouses. They already have robots that have bins on them that contain smaller items. They drive themselves to worker stations where the workers pick the item and box it.
If the first world wants to compete with the third, in labor intensive fields, they HAVE to automate. That’s just economics.
I drove a forklift in a steel reprocessing plant for a while. I LIKED driving the fork, but humans on forklifts have accidents, do stupid things, and are generally likely to eventually make a big and costly mistake. I had a 30K pound capacity Hyster up on two wheels once. Just about sh!t myself before dying or being horribly maimed. Recovered and then SLOWED THE F DOWN. Had a fork operator drop a 300 pound coil of steel (tiny thing really) from 16ft up and land 6 feet from me. That was a really good example of why you don’t stand under or near a moving load. Saw the concrete block wall with the two blocks punched out when a fork hit the wall. Saw a jack@ss get his foot run over while messing with a driver on a moving fork truck. Saw what happens when a 10K pound block of steel sheets keeps moving when the forktruck stops suddenly, if the stack isn’t strapped (think 5 ton razor blade moving fast at ankle height.)
Add in the filth of truck exhaust and tire wear, and you have a very unpleasant working environment, that is often hot as Hades and dark as a tomb.
n
“Wife’s new-ish Dell notebook has a surprisingly nice keyboard feel”
–even though this stock dell keyboard has flat “stylish” keys, there is a fair amount of travel and decent feel. It was certainly “good enough”. Most of the 1.8M words I think I’ve written on prepping and related topics were written on this stock keyboard, so pretty good value for money.
n
The weather was very threatening this morning with a strange color to the light, and lowering clouds. Some scattered rain spatters too. Very nice at the moment with 77F and 58%RH, sunny with a nice breeze.
Went to my meeting this morning. I was the only one wearing a mask. Everyone else was vaccinated or recovered. I guess that technically, I’m good too, it’s been exactly 2 weeks from my shot.
I was running late so I emailed a heads up to my daughter. She ended up freaking out because I was late, and she realized she couldn’t get in touch with anyone. Half her devices were out of battery, the phone in the house doesn’t have any working extensions, and she couldn’t call me. Wife was not answering her phone either. She never checked her email. She eventually called the grandparents on facetime and had them text me. Grandpa didn’t have MY contact info, but grandma did. What a cluster. My comms plan needs work and beefing up. Good dry run, and scared her enough that any lessons learned should stick. Prepper fail.
n
Went to my meeting this morning. I was the only one wearing a mask. Everyone else was vaccinated or recovered. I guess that technically, I’m good too, it’s been exactly 2 weeks from my shot.
VA in Austin has sufficient J&J vaccine that they opened up access to family members of Vets and staff.
The next step that they are contemplating is opening up vaccinations to the general public, but the concern is logistics in Austin, where people seem to be more hysterical about the virus than elsewhere in Texas.
@Ray – If your wife isn’t vaccinated and wants the shot while she’s here, check with the Austin VA Outpatient clinic at the Met Center. It would be a quick trip up 35 and the toll road. The clinic sits across the runway from the Austin-Bergstrom main terminal.
AL has opened up vaccinations to everyone over 16. I got my son scheduled yesterday to get his first shot today. The wife is scheduled for tomorrow. Both Pfizer.
No more mask mandate in AL, but plenty of places still requiring masks. I stopped at Wal Mart this morning and ask usage was about 50%.
My company is still requiring mask usage, and probably will be among the last holdouts. To say they lean left is an understatement…
Muskogee Creek Indian Nation has had several vaccination events open to the general public in the Tulsa area in the last couple of weeks. They use the Moderna vaccine and seem to have a large supply. No appointment, photo ID, or proof of membership required.
Pandemic must be psychologically over in my Great Plains state as evidenced by the sheer volume of traffic I encountered when leaving my home this morning. I haven’t seen roads that crowded on a Saturday since pre-pandemic. How annoying. I miss the good ole days of last Spring when the roads were empty. lol
No more mask mandate in AL, but plenty of places still requiring masks. I stopped at Wal Mart this morning and ask usage was about 50%.
Alabama was late to the mask mandate kabuki, and the media successfully tied the surge in numbers last July to the state’s reluctance to impose the lock downs. Businesses there will be late to unmask, much like Texas.
Not that I’m going to complain. I believe my challenge to the “Move Over” law ticket I received there the last weekend in June was successful because I clearly communicated to the court that I was interested in discussing the Alabama State Patrol’s lack of a mask policy in effect when approaching my vehicle on the weekend when the numbers began to spike, particularly the officer who communicated with us directly leaning into our passenger side window where my high-risk wife was sitting.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00TU7UA86/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1&tag=ttgnet-20
Everything old is new again…
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/northern-ireland-violence-worst-years-trouble-fears-return
” but we still need to implement all the Agreement’s commitments.” –that would be 20 years later, and I’d guess, it ain’t happenin’ dude.
–and “peace walls”. How could I have forgotten about that bit of newspeak?
n
Carvana called at 2 PM to confirm my appointment, and arrived right at 3 PM. The rep verified the info, I signed some paperwork, and parked the car in the street in front of the house. She handed me a copy of the paperwork and a check. She then put the keys in a lock box and locked the car. A truck will come pick up the car in 24-48 hours. I can’t believe how easy the transaction was. I’ll let you know if the check bounces on Monday…
“On the Oceans of Eternity: A Novel of the Change (Island Book 3)” by S. M. Stirling
https://www.amazon.com/Oceans-Eternity-S-M-Stirling/dp/0451457803/?tag=ttgnet-20
Book number three in a three book apocalyptic alternate history time travel series. This trilogy is the prequel to the fifteen book Emberverse (“Dies The Fire”) series. I read the well printed and well bound MMPB published by ROC (Penguin) in 2000 that I just bought in 2021.
In the sudden blink of an eye, the island of Nantucket and its 6,000+ inhabitants plus a Coast Guard training sailing ship with a crew of 300 are transported back to 1,250 BC. Over 3,000 years in the past in the same place. But every one outside of Nantucket is still the same in the past.
It has been ten years since the event that threw the island of Nantucket into the past. The islanders have been very busy feeding themselves and exploring the rest of the very primitive world. They have made friends. And enemies. And the traitor William Walker took 30+ islanders, a ship, many guns, and hass setting up his own Mediterranean kingdom in what is now known as Greece. The Islanders have built Babylon into a stronghold.
My rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Amazon rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars (246 reviews)
And if anyone is wondering, yes, new HVAC board, new dishwasher, cheap dryer, new dryer, new fridge, some plumbing work, etc WILL eat most of the profit from your rental. That’s why small landlords tend to be handy, and go for scratch n dent whenever possible, and cut more corners than they should.
Try having five rental properties. The maintenance is eating us alive last year and this year. $10,000 to $20,000 per year for $136,000/year in income at 100% rental. I maintain half of the office building and warehouse myself. Fifteen new light fixtures for the warehouse, all 16 ft to 30 ft off the ground. Many broken pipes with the deep freeze this year. Lots of miscellaneous plumbing and other crap.
Wouldn’t Jeff be pursuing automation regardless? Or is that the plan anyway and fewer roadblocks without a union in the way?
If energy and transportation costs really do increase as much as Mayor Pete and Plugs seem to want, the Brown Truck Mall And Food Court will become economically un-viable without significant automation, time-motion optimization of jobs enforced by computer, and/or further exploiting loopholes in the law like gig workers and Amazon’s fine parsing of truck regulations behind their delivery van shapes.
The big problem for all sectors of retail right now as the economy reopens outside of Texas and Florida is that people spent a year at home, making the equivalent after-tax income of $50k/year streaming Baby Yoda, more if they had a “work from home” job.
The widely held belief is that more “Joe Bucks” are on the way and the eviction moratoriums will continue. Why work some job with a machine supervisor docking your performance rating because you scan items every 11.2 seconds instead of 11.0?
Pearls Before Swine: Greg The Grammarian
https://www.gocomics.com/pearlsbeforeswine/2021/04/10
No freaking way.
@Alan Larson
Thanks for the keyboard link. Same model I was looking at.
Sorry about botching your name earlier. Also mistyped “Android” when I meant “Java”, so it’s clear that my sugar/caffeine ratio was off this morning. I blame it on the fresh lemon old-fashioned donuts, and I am unanimous in that.
This is pretty dang cool.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/lost-golden-city-rises-egyptian-sand
n
–it’s not actually rising by itself, like something from The Mummy, much to my regret.
@Nick
When I took forklift training in Missouri for a job in the 1970’s they had an award-winning video with a graphic representation of someone in steel-toed shoes losing half a foot to a forklift. Management was very serious about training as someone had run their forklift off a loading dock and into the water just a couple months before. Water in that case being Mississippi River.
“Pearls Before Swine: Greg The Grammarian”
No freaking way.
My friend’s husband who is an adjunct English instructor at a public university in the Northeast has a serious problem with “it”.
I ain’t no expert. During my time as a TA in WA State, I graded 30 page Software Engineering design documents with Word. Minimum word count, decent diagrams, and no squiggly lines was an ‘A’. Amazingly, people still flunked the assignments.
The professor was supposed to be teaching IEEE spec document preparation; I had no clue about what meeting that spec involved, and I doubted the CS PhD did either.
Ironically, the prof is now department chair after less than a decade from her first day as Assistant Professor.
I blame it on the fresh lemon old-fashioned donuts, and I am unanimous in that.
Yum. Food!! Lemons!!!
ITGuy1998, thanks for your posts about Carvana. I really appreciate your shared experiences. I still think I will consider them first, assuming they cover our area. Didn’t think about that, but they seem to, possibly at additional costs. My biggest barrier is to decide on exactly what I want. I have narrowed it down, but need to do more work. Some of this is hard.
I have a friend who used to rely on a good dealer salesman when buying a new car. In the last ten years, he has bought just one car, and he was shocked at the experience. He said the sales people didn’t know anything about the cars, and expected HIM to know what he wanted. Of course, that is my normal MO when buying a used car, so I had never considered that angle.
@JimB
Some people make lemonade, some people make donuts, some people walk by the donut rack and donuts fly into their basket.
Given that I put myself into a sugar coma by eating 3 glazed and an apple fritter from Shipleys this morning, I’d say “sometimes you drive by a donut store and 2 pounds of sugar jumps down your throat…”
n
Masters today at Augusta was rain-delayed for a bit more than an hour in about the middle of the round, so everyone had to recalibrate for the slower greens.
A few minutes ago there were three lead changes in 90 seconds as the top three players had eagle-birdie-eagle.
CBS must have 100x the number of cameras they used 40 years ago.
@Nick
The glazed ones are medicinal–they keep you right regular.
I love how all these social media influencers, and other arab apologists have been whitewashing the UAE, and other middle eastern “resort” places.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9457199/Nevada-man-51-arrested-Dubai-smoking-marijuana-legally-America-days-arrived.html
–boo fukcing hoo.
–they are fundamentalist muslim countries. They beat women for driving, being uncovered in public, or dating. They beat men for drinking alcohol. They kill gays. They want your money, and will barely tolerate western behaviour in order to get it. Plus, they LIKE looking at european sluts and whores (their words) because you’d never see a muslim woman in those circumstances. You can’t bring a bible or a cross into SA. You can’t drink alcohol in most of the countries. They engage in sex slavery of women, and straight up slavery of men by taking their passports away and working them without compensation.
everyone who goes there with the idea of encouraging others to go there is complicit.
Let them learn to drink oil and eat sand.
n
Whenever I read one of these stories, I wonder which adult shot the kid, and then blamed the other kid….
Cell phone number would be preferred. And I don’t sell the information unless someone offers me $50K for your phone number at which point you lose.
How about a buck ?
Speaking of keyboards, I recently purchased a das keyboard with Cherry MX Brown switches, with a 10 key. I have been searching for an eternity to find a keyboard with a Mac layout that was not optimized for gaming or have neon lights blinking all over the place. As the most casual of gamers, I did not feel the need to invest in fancy optimizations of the colors that it is capable of flashing, nor the different keyboard layouts that adhere to whatever game that is popular this hour. My typing speed has drastically increased overnight with this gem. The keys are a little loud in the morning when everyone else is sleeping, but the difference in feel between that and the “chicklets” that are on the Apple Magic Keyboard is stunning. It is a wired keyboard.
I have been using a Logitech G610 at the house for a year and a half now. Works well and I ignore the flickering lights since it a gaming keyboard. I love the noisy keys but the wife does not when she goes to bed. And since I use a modified hunt and peck keyboarding style, I don’t need any location nibs and actually do not have a clue what they are.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01CDYB8AG/?tag=ttgnet-20
At the office, I still use my 1992 Northgate Gold 102 with the 12 function keys on the left side for left handed debugging. I love it as the ultimate clacker.
https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/northgate-omnikey-102-early-gold-1846397607
“I don’t need any location nibs and actually do not have a clue what they are.”
–the little bumps on the f and j keys so you can put your hands inthe correct touch typing location on the ‘home row’…
n
“I don’t need any location nibs and actually do not have a clue what they are.”
–the little bumps on the f and j keys so you can put your hands inthe correct touch typing location on the ‘home row’…
n
None on my Logitech G610 that I can find.
ADD: Wrong, there is a small bar across the bottom of the F and J keys. I can barely feel the bar and used a flashlight to see it.
I learned how to type on Univac 1108 operator console when I was 11 years old. It was an old surplus teletype console from what I could tell. The keys were all upper case and 3/4 inch travel so you had to pound them real hard. My future computer keyboards were just as manly XXXXX masculine XXXXXXXX hard to use.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletype_Model_33
The classic forklift safety video / slasher flick:
https://www.filmportal.de/video/staplerfahrer-klaus-der-erste-arbeitstag-2001
I had typing in high school. Actual Typing 101 on manual and electric. No “keyboarding skills” for us. I was much more accurate at the same speed on the manual, with lots of key travel.
This keyboard has as much wear on the backspace key as the spacebar…
n
Scrambled to get the wife’s second shot on Tuesday. Called many places and only one had Moderna. Their allotment was full but said sometimes people don’t show and if that happens wife will be first on the standby list. Success, she got the shot. I got my second one on Thursday. My arm is still a little sore but that was the only reaction.
My standards may be low, but not that low. How about $2.00.
A friend told me a story about himself, don’t know if it was true, but it was funny. He asked a lady if she would sleep with him for $1 million dollars. She said of course. He then said how about $2.00. She replied “I am not a prostitute”. To which the friend replied, “Yes, you are. Now we are just negotiating price”. I think it was true because he had a black eye for several days.
Currently in Malvern AR for the night. Drover 9 hours today, still have 8 hours to go, somewhere around 550 miles to travel. I was doing OK until it got dark. Decided to stop and not push myself.
Major accident on I-40 before Little Rock blocking the west bound lanes. Traffic was at a complete stop. At least an hour delay, maybe more. Since I was about 1/2 mile past an exit to an alternative, I did what dozens of other people were doing, and I have never done before. I drove the wrong way on the shoulder to the exit. Had to drive in the grass at one point because some trucker decided to play traffic cop and block the shoulder.
Will get a bacon/egg/cheese biscuit and a large Dr. Pepper tomorrow before starting the rest of the journey.
MIL is still alive, doped up on Morphine. Responds some times but usually not. Wife says she broke down and cried when she told her mother “If you see Jesus walking by, grab his hand”. Wife rarely cries so this is really hitting her hard. Memo to self: “Don’t be a rectum orifice no matter how tempted.”
“RIP Prince Philip, Royal Climate Skeptic”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/10/rip-prince-philip-royal-climate-skeptic/
“Prince Philip was a climate change sceptic. In correspondence to Spectator Australia contributor and author Ian Plimer back in 2018, the Duke of Edinburgh not only compliments Professor Plimer on his most recent book, The Climate Change Delusion, but also praises his previous book ‘Heaven and Earth’, which similarly questioned the ‘missing science’ behind the global warming scam.”
Well, what do you know, the man had common sense. Unlike his sons.
I learned to type in ~6th grade on my parents’ Olympia typewriter. Still have it. Took typing in HS. Like Nick, we used manuals, plus one tank of an electric. I also could type faster on the electric, but more accurately on the manuals.
My wife typed a lot on Selectrics. I liked their action, but not the type obscured by the ball. I used to do newsletters with moderately complex layouts, and seeing the copy was essential. Ah, those were the days. Not.
Re keyboards, the Selectric set the over-center standard for touch. Later, at an employer, I had an original 6MHz IBM PC AT with one of the best keyboards ever, the buckling spring, F-keys on the left, Model (can’t remember) IBM heavyweight. It was great, but I later had a Compaq board that felt slightly better, and was quieter. Moral: shorter stroke and lighter touch really was better. The Northgates I have are similar to that Compaq, but noisier. Second moral: TRY different boards long enough to determine the best for you. Third moral: when you find the one, buy several, and store them carefully. All boards wear out.
Re keyboards, the Selectric set the over-center standard for touch. Later, at an employer, I had an original 6MHz IBM PC AT with one of the best keyboards ever, the buckling spring, F-keys on the left, Model (can’t remember) IBM heavyweight. It was great, but I later had a Compaq board that felt slightly better, and was quieter.
Model M. Unicomp in Lexington, KY ended up with the tooling and will sell you a new Model M.
They are noisy as ever, however.
I have a Model M from Unicomp, but I gave it up in favor of a cheap Dell rubber dome keyboard when my kids complained about the noise.
…when my kids complained about the noise.
Mebbe you are getting DEEF!!
The Northgates I have are similar to that Compaq, but noisier. Second moral: TRY different boards long enough to determine the best for you. Third moral: when you find the one, buy several, and store them carefully. All boards wear out.
My Northgate Gold 102 has not worn out yet after 30 years.
And the dadgum function keys belong on the left side of the keyboard !
Model M. Unicomp in Lexington, KY ended up with the tooling and will sell you a new Model M.
That might be true, but I had the earlier Model F, for the PC/AT. I looked up Model M boards, and all I saw have the F-keys at the top. These are the later models. We had them on PS/2 computers. Did some more searching, and it seems I had a fairly rare (if you consider ~100k production rare) PC/AT Model F board. There is also a far more popular Model F for the PC/XT, which confuses searches. Here is one:
https://www.modelfkeyboards.com/product/last-one-original-ibm-pc-at-keyboard-thoroughly-cleaned/
The reason I remember it is the odd placement of the Esc key in the number pad area. Also note that this was a different design buckling spring action, with capacitive “contacts,” which are said to be more durable than the all-mechanical key switches. All I know is that it was very noisy, but had a very precise feel. I will put this little bit of research in my archives.
HP had capacitive keyboards without buckling springs on some of their workstations. The ones I used had a solid feel, but were silent unless hammered on. However, they built resistive force over travel, and felt very different from most other keyboards. They were said to last a verrry long time. All I know is that it seemed long, and I wouldn’t want to type on one for many hours.
Some day, all this will be moot. We will somehow transfer thoughts directly to words on the screen. Speaking of, I have done some dictation on my phone. It is pretty good, but I wish the industry had continued development on the old IBM Via Voice. Yes, Dragon took it over, but, no, it didn’t advance much before it was abandoned. It was expensive. Now, we have speaker-independent dictation which is not as accurate.
And the dadgum function keys belong on the left side of the keyboard !
“…where God intended them to be.”
–Jerry Pournelle, said many times.
Phones are cheap. 🙂
Surely not using those terms…
Hospice got it right. MIL did not make it past Saturday. She crossed the golden bridge at 2115 (09:15 PM) CDT. Wife was not in the room but got called quickly by the staff. Leaving now to continue my journey and it is 0250 in the morning. Another 8 hours to go. It will not be a fun week.
Safe travels, Ray. Your wife needs you.
Best wishes, Ray, especially for your nighttime drive on little sleep.
There’s a reason most people don’t have children with their cousins.
My condolences Ray.