For those too lazy to go digging:
https://cdn.xcancel.com/pic/orig/7498ED4A7CB57/media%2FGu8ks...
Original tweet: https://xcancel.com/Astro_Ayers/status/1940810789830451563
Thank you!
Readit Newswaltwalther commented on The April Fools joke that might have got me fired oldvcr.blogspot.com/2025/... · Posted by u/goldenskye
123456
edit: What now?
...just wait for the email, click the link, enter your credit card number, and...
waltwalther commented on DoubleClickjacking: A New type of web hacking technique paulosyibelo.com/2024/12/... · Posted by u/shinzub
Double clicking on the web is extremely common with older less technically adept users. This same cohort is also the most susceptible to scams.
This. I have told my eighty-year-old parents this many times over the years, but it doesn't seem to stick.
waltwalther commented on The magic of DC-DC voltage conversion (2023) lcamtuf.substack.com/p/th... · Posted by u/_Microft
My cousins did this to me as a kid. I thought it was great that a little battery could give such a huge jolt simply reversing the input side of a step down transformer to the output side.
As kids we had rudimentary knowledge of what a transformer did since our country used 220v but most of our electronics came from the U.S. and needed a step down transformer.
...and it really is a pretty good jolt if I remember correctly. After reading this post I considered rebuilding my project and showing it to my wife....but that's probably a bad idea lol.
waltwalther commented on The magic of DC-DC voltage conversion (2023) lcamtuf.substack.com/p/th... · Posted by u/_Microft
> The basic concept is that when you put current through an inductor for a while, then disconnect it, you get a big voltage spike.
That's actually usually not true, as the vast majority of DC to DC converters are step-down converters: you do not want the voltage to spike. And in general, it isn't really a "spike".
A better way to think about what is happening is that passing a current from a power supply through an inductor transfers energy into the magnetic field. When you stop doing that, the magnetic field diminishes, transferring energy back into current. But this time, you direct the current into the circuit.
The trick is that by picking the timing and other parameters correctly, you can pick the voltage of the downstream current. Specifically, you can do this because the voltage across the inductor is a function of the slope of the strength of the magnetic field around the wire in the inductor. Pick a different slope, and you can pick a different voltage. Since you usually want a stable voltage, the graph of the magnetic field strength will be (roughly) a sawtooth, and the graph of the induced voltage will be (roughly) a square wave (I am simplifying here for understandability!). A sawtooth shape has a consistent current slope, which leads to a consistent voltage.
This brought back a great memory from my childhood. When I was a boy, in fourth or fifth grade, my dad showed me how to give my friends an electrical shock with a transformer and a 9-volt battery.
I made the design my own by mounting the transformer to a 4x4 piece of scrap plywood, and then cutting out two square 'finger pads' from a tin can, and screwing those into the plywood also.
Add in some wire, a switch, a battery, and a little patter, "place your two fingers on the shiny pads and this will make music....using your mouth as the speaker" and your parents get a call from the principal.
Honestly, I always thought I was the only one who did this. My dad was a practical joker with a sense of humor that only he understood.
My dad died last February. This was a wonderful memory that made me smile. Thanks Hacker News for two memories in a weeks time!
waltwalther commented on Appalachian Trail Hiker Photo Archive athikerpictures.org/... · Posted by u/bookofjoe
Wow - thank you!
Thank you!
waltwalther commented on Appalachian Trail Hiker Photo Archive athikerpictures.org/... · Posted by u/bookofjoe
That was a very touching anecdote that stole away the mundanity of reading the morning news. I had to go look. These are the things that make life so human. Thank you for sharing with us.
Thank you for your comment.
waltwalther commented on Appalachian Trail Hiker Photo Archive athikerpictures.org/... · Posted by u/bookofjoe
Sorry for your loss. You have a way with words, keep writing please.
Thank you.
Funny story. I first heard of the Waze app while reading a Car & Driver magazine in my doctor's office nearly 15 years ago (possibly before 2010). There was an article on illegal cross-country car racing. One of the drivers said something like, "I use a combination of radar detector and Waze to avoid the police."
I had no idea what Waze was, and researched it as soon as I got home. It has always been crowd-sourced, and there were not many users back in those days (at least in my area), but I used it and spread the word anyway,