2,407 karma · joined February 14, 2012
It's not a tablet-doable thing, really, and I don't really want to take the effort to get it in an app store. But adding touch-able buttons made it a bit nicer UI overall, so I'm glad I did it. Now this person, and anyone else, can also use it with a touch screen if so desired.
But I recently got a Yogasleep Dohm Classic [1] and it really does sound better. Placed across the bedroom, with the two controls adjusted just... right... it makes that really nice water-rushing proper white noise sound. I do not like electronic ones at all, but there's something about this one which uses an actual fan + ports for the noise that is great.
I've also put it on a smart switch that I control from Home Assistant and this has made it even better. Specifically, I have an automation which gradually fades in some lights beginning 15 minutes before my alarm actually goes off [2]. I added turning off the white noise machine to the start of lights fading, and between the gradual light and sound change, I just sort-of wake up rather naturally a few minutes before the alarm noise starts.
(Just the lights were fine before, but the cessation of white noise adds a little more. And a "Bed Time" automation shuts off all the lights in the house, turns on the white noise machine, etc.)
[1] https://yogasleep.com/products/dohmclassic [2] https://nuxx.net/blog/2026/01/28/hue-a-better-sunrise-bulb/
Some folks take this over the top and do a weird, false-feeling thing like sprinkle the person's name into conversation over and over, or at the start/middle/end. And it makes the conversation feel stilted, fake, and like a situation is being forced. And that casts a negative light on the overarching idea that people like being remembered, and their own name is a big part of that.
As another person for whom relation stuff does not come naturally, this was incredibly helpful because little pieces of advise really do work, because they really are nice things to do/say.
A favorite example of mine, when starting to talk to someone who probably already doesn't care for you is to find something -- anything -- that it's clear they like or chose, which you also happen to like, and pay it a genuine positive complement. And perhaps talk about it a little bit.
Because yes, the remote stuff -- and PlexAmp just working the same wherever I am -- is the huge part of it. Music sits on my NAS and things... just work.
I also really like how easy the caching and offline mode is, because I frequently find myself driving in areas without mobile data service. I keep a couple favorite albums downloaded to my phone, then knowing the app will cache the next ~2 albums of queued tracks generally makes it Just Work.
I use Plexamp on desktop/laptop computers and then the Android and iOS apps for on-the-go music. I tried Symfonium [1] because it seemed promising and would give me a Jellyfin path, but it was weird and kinda buggy and ate my phone's battery.
I'm hopeful there'll be a good replacement available eventually, but for now, I just have to stick with Plex.
Works out really well.
I build and maintain trails for hiking and mountain biking. We build a new trail or change a route and I can just put it in OSM and off it goes into all the other systems. And then I can pull the data back and use it to make maps for planning, signage... whatever.
Google you just give them data, in their format, without all the nice OSS tools that have developed around OSM and... Let them use it. I'm wholly uninterested in contributing to Google, most especially because the barrier to entry is so high.
Powerful, but very not straightforward.
Summary quote from IMDB: "The U.S. President, low in the opinion polls, gets talked into raising his popularity by trying to start a cold war against Canada."
Also, it kinda sounds like the UNAS might not be supporting ADS' for some reason? That alone could be a problem later on...
I can just turn it off. I can unplug it from the network if I'm worried. I can easily isolate it network-wise using just a VLAN and normal firewalls. Hardware connectivity (ESP32 stuff I'm doing this weekend) -- as you describe -- is just easier.
Very much so. When she (my wife) was first looking at getting one I went down the whole "maybe you should get an X, Y, or Z instead..." and then began thinking about her having to learn a more complicated design package, seeing how cheap some of the different Cricut tools can be when bought on sale, and I realized that it probably was just fine.
Sure, it's not a pro level device, but it did allow her to easily get shapes cut out of vinyl or cardboard or whatever with very little ease. The software worked for someone without a background in traditional design software. And it really didn't cost that much.
Few years on she still uses it, it works well enough... And that's it.
I sometimes/often think/realize the HN crowd falls hard into the technical perfect-is-the-enemy-of-good, and a number of the replies here clearly illustrate that.
The Electron app felt a bit weird, but I was able to accomplish the goal of cutting out my design at a desired size, so I didn't think any more about it. <shrug>
It seemed more to me that their app leans hard into getting people to buy vector designs through them, and making it easy for those who might not even understand what a "vector" graphic is, but it didn't seem to preclude me from cutting out my own stuff.
If you want a Free work-alike, why don't /you/ put in the work and make it happen?
(And so, so many little bugs in my map thing from upthread were these odd timing quirks when a user didn't have good service and one check would run and leave something else hanging resulting in a blank map. <sigh>)
The main idea was to solve the gap of how many trail systems have colored loops, or signed/colored loops made up of multiple "trails", and Trailforks (et al) has no concept of that. So the situation a user finds themselves in is being at a trail, with Trailforks up, wanting to follow the "Orange" loop (for example), and Trailforks doesn't show that.
Hopefully the "Orange" loop is documented as a route, but this stuff often gets missed, and is still awkward since the image of the map still doesn't match the signs.
So my goal was to show the map close to what's physically there, use OSM data as much as possible, and filling in gaps for what OSM doesn't capture, rendering it all into a static map that also happens to work offline. For some specific examples, compare these two systems and their print, Trailforks, and trailmaps.app maps:
RAMBA: [1], [2], [3] Shelden Trails: [4], [5], [6]
There is the same kind of gap when compared to RideWithGPS, Strava, Gaia, etc.
And also, I'm a volunteer with our local trails non-profit. I want anyone and everyone to be able to find maps so they can enjoy the trails. A /lot/ of trail clubs are starting to replace maps with a link to Trailforks, which I believe does riders a disservice because it both requires an app and account and (if a user is trying to view a map out of their home area on a phone) payment. It's literally locking the basic info about a trail -- the map -- behind a semi-paywall. By making a system like this for our local trails I've helped completely avoid that mess. And so I made the map generator open as well so other techy folks can do the same or build on this.
This generated-static-map system does have the downside of being single-person-ish manually managed, and the maps do NOT update automatically. But I also see this as a feature, just like the print maps and in-person signage they are designed to complement.
I've prattled on a little more about the what-why-etc over here on my personal blog if you're interested: https://nuxx.net/blog/2026/06/25/trailmaps-app-map-generator...
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[1]https://static.wixstatic.com/media/9d19d2_b85c5684f54a4fdc85...
[2] https://www.trailforks.com/region/ramba-trails/
[3] https://trailmaps.app/ramba/
[4] https://www.metroparks.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/2022-S...
[5] https://www.trailforks.com/region/stony-creek-metropark/
Each map is 16MB - 20MB in total, so this is all nice and simple to do. Even on a slow 3G connection it's only a minute or so for a full map update to stream in.
The whole point of this system was to take a snapshot of data (mostly OSM), add on some local things that can't really be represented in OSM (like WHICH parking lots are most appropriate, stylistic overrides, system descriptions, etc) and display them. Because of issues I've had in the past with well-meaning-but-misguided OSM mappers wrongly editing trail systems I did not want anything that pulls live.
And then by having purely static content the hosting is very cheap and easy, there's no security concerns around... well... anything dynamic on the site. And each map is portable were I to want someone else to host them. And literally in a couple of years if I haven't updated the map it won't change yet still will work, and that's fine and accepted for this use. Sort-of like a mobile version of a traditional print map. Kinda like the print workflow of editing/design/etc and then rendering the PDF, but web.
This all aligned nicely for me to have a tool that works this way, with each map generated by a tool.
(Sort-of disclaimer: It was also a big personal project in learning to work with AI stuff for development. I knew and understood the inputs and outputs, was able to design the UI, handled/managed all the testing... But I didn't have to worry about the actual-code part. I was able to make pretty quick progress and iterate nicely on my ideas.)
Happy to talk, etc, more about it too. Either here, or contact info is on the site.
Also, apparently Apple really doesn't like approving apps that are basically wrapped PWAs (Google will, I guess?) so that is yet another check against bothering with an app.