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patwolf commented on Walkie-Textie Wireless Communicator   technoblogy.com/show?2AON... · Posted by u/chrisjj
threemux · 7 days ago
While I highly doubt you'd ever get in trouble, data transmissions on GMRS are severely restricted by the FCC. You obviously need the license (though it's just a fee and covers your whole family).

In any case, I'm pretty sure this device is illegal to use for short text messages. It doesn't appear to comply with several of the restrictions on digital emissions in 47 CFR 95.1787(a), namely it appears to have a removable antenna. Removable antennas are fine for regular GMRS use, but not when the device can send digital emissions.

https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/part-95/subpart-E#p-95...

Also I'd be shocked if it enforced the time limits for digital transmissions in software. This leads me to believe it's not actually type-certified for use which then calls into question anything else it does. Caveat emptor.

patwolf · 7 days ago
The antennas on mine don't appear to come off, at least not easily. I read somewhere that they came off on the early models but are now glued.

It does enforce time limits. If I send a message or something that uses digital communication (like gps coordinates), it won't let me send another one immediately after.

patwolf commented on Walkie-Textie Wireless Communicator   technoblogy.com/show?2AON... · Posted by u/chrisjj
patwolf · 7 days ago
For anyone looking for an off-the-shelf solution for wireless texting, I've used the BTECH GMRS-PRO. You can send messages on the device, but it's much easier to connect it to your phone via BLE and text through the app.

However, it uses GMRS bands, not LoRA, so all the FCC restrictions apply.

patwolf commented on Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels   lithub.com/how-big-agricu... · Posted by u/littlexsparkee
motorest · a month ago
> It's explained in the article. People aren't going to starve to fill their gas tank so you need to grow more corn to offset that used for biofuel. To do that can require destroying other carbon sinks (wetlands are the example given, sometimes dried and then burned) to turn them into fields.

The key point is that biofuel replaces fossil fuel. Meaning, instead of having a system that inputs carbon into the environment, you have a system that recycles carbon already in the environment.

It's impossible to argue against this is a significant and unequivocal improvement.

The points you raised were about corn-based biofuel. Surely you are old enough to hear the comotion about switchgrass, and how it would be the primary crop driving biofuels. I feel like framing biofuels as a corn-based crop is a red herring.

> All of these factors have to be included in lifecycle assessments, (...)

Yes, including those from fossil fuels.

patwolf · a month ago
> Surely you are old enough to hear the comotion about switchgrass

I hadn't heard "switchgrass" since GWB mentioned it in his State of the Union years ago. Did it end up becoming a significant source of biofuel?

patwolf commented on VA Tech scientists are building a better fog harp   arstechnica.com/science/2... · Posted by u/PaulHoule
vtbassmatt · 2 months ago
As a Hokie, it drives me crazy that journalists (and ESPN) continue to use the non-name “VA Tech”. It’s VT, Virginia Tech, or the full name, Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University. https://brand.vt.edu/licensing/university-trademarks.html#tr...
patwolf · 2 months ago
I occasionally hear people pronounce it out loud as "vah tech". But seeing it written "VA Tech" is even more bizarre.
patwolf commented on XSLT – Native, zero-config build system for the Web   github.com/pacocoursey/xs... · Posted by u/_kush
patwolf · 2 months ago
I'm old enough to remember when Google released AJAXSLT in 2005. It was a JS implementation of XSLT so that you could consistently use XSLT in the browser.

The funny thing is that the concept of AJAX was fairly new at the time, and so for them it made sense that the future of "fat" web pages (that's the term they use in their doc) was to use AJAX to download XML and transform it. But then people quickly learned that if you could just use JS to generate content, why bother with XML at all?

Back in 2005 I was evaluating some web framework concepts from R&D at the company I worked, and they were still very much in an XML mindset. I remember they created an HTML table widget that loaded XML documents and used XPATH to select content to render in the cells.

patwolf commented on Updates to Advanced Voice Mode for paid users   help.openai.com/en/articl... · Posted by u/mfiguiere
patwolf · 3 months ago
I was using it earlier today and noticed something was different. It sounded more lethargic, and added a lot more "umms". It's not necessary bad, just something I need to get used to.

I always get a laugh asking it to talk like an Ent, and I made sure to check that it could still do that.

patwolf commented on The Decline of Battery Life (2021)   brainbaking.com/post/2021... · Posted by u/akyuu
patwolf · 3 months ago
The Game Gear, Atari Lynx, and TurboExpress all got around 4 hours of battery life and burned through 6 AA batteries.
patwolf commented on The Illuminated Gospel of St John   cambridge.org/universityp... · Posted by u/ycombinete
jfengel · 4 months ago
That is indeed stunning. John is the most poetic of the Gospels. The King James translation isn't especially accurate, but it's powerful. It deserves a good illuminated edition.

I'd love a set of annotations of the inspirations for each illumination. Medieval illuminations are heavily coded and full of allusions that would go over my head.

patwolf · 4 months ago
I had heard KJV had some translation issues, but I'm surprised to hear that about John. I tried to learn Koine Greek, and a lot of the lessons started with John 1, so I always assumed it was one of the easier things to translate.
patwolf commented on mIRC 7.81   mirc.com/... · Posted by u/futurecat
patwolf · 4 months ago
I haven't used mIRC since the 5.X days, but I recall the author always included an updated profile photo in the about page. It was interesting to watch him age with each release update.

I downloaded this version to see if that was still the case, and sadly the about page no longer includes a photo.

patwolf commented on mIRC 7.81   mirc.com/... · Posted by u/futurecat
marsavar · 4 months ago
Gosh, that brings back memories! I remember having so much fun coding my own trivia bots in mIRC Scripting Language (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIRC_scripting_language) over 20 years ago.
patwolf · 4 months ago
Same. mIRC scripting was really what motivated me to learn to program. I had tinkered a little bit with BASIC before that, but mIRC was what kept me interested. It's one thing to write uninteresting "hello world" CLI apps, but mIRC scripting was something you and your friends could immediately interact with. I wonder if kids today have something similar...maybe Roblox scripting?

u/patwolf

KarmaCake day1144November 19, 2014View Original