I really like sharing knowledge with others, and that's what this website is mostly about (with the exception of a rant here and there, when I need to vent some...).

So, whenever I manage to create something that doesn't just fulfil my needs but also works for somebody else, I gain a fair bit of happiness (quite important for an otherwise extremely unsocial introvert like me).

Here's an example: I created my Sun to PS/2 keyboard converter because I needed something like it, and since posting my solution here I've heard from a few others who have built my contraption successfully. The most recent of those who reported back, Edward Robbins, has a subtly different model Sun keyboard and it took us a few email exchanges and experiments to determine how the one (undocumented) extra key on his keyboard could be made to work - but we got there.

Without the net he and I would never have gotten in touch, let alone ended up benefiting mutually from each other's efforts.

[ published on Sun 28.10.2012 19:35 | filed in interests | ]

For three+ years I've been content with my Hanlin V3 but as it has become more and more unreliable and its flaws more annoying, a week ago I bit the bullet and replaced it with a Nook Simple Touch (for a measly $90). This post is about reducing the porky Nook to its useful Nookleus, so to speak.


click here for the rest of the story...

[ published on Thu 18.10.2012 12:45 | filed in interests | ]

But dog-shaming.com is pretty hilarious.

[ published on Tue 16.10.2012 22:25 | filed in interests/humour | ]

Yesterday I sold my remaining 122 issues (10+ years' worth) of National Geographic Magazine (for one dollar), because I need the space in my bookcases and I can't stand the shallow and jingoist bias of the texts anymore.

Looks weird without the yellow spines on the shelf; I pretty much grew up with NGS magazines as my parents had a subscription starting when I was about three or four years old. I loved the magazines as a kid, and they were my prime reason to learn English early (the other was that my parents occasionally discussed things in English when they didn't want us kids to understand them...).

I still love the quality of the photographic work, but somehow that does no longer offset the nature of what is covered (or not) and how it is covered...

[ published on Sat 13.10.2012 13:51 | filed in brainfarts | ]

Snow causes havoc across eastern OZ :-)

[ published on Sat 13.10.2012 13:50 | filed in interests/au | ]

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