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geocrasheron A scientific curiosity that happened to me

Yep I mentioned that in a comment below, an accidental semiconductor IS possible, but that wasn't my point really. I get the arguers point though, a headboard implies accidental, I wasn't thinking of it that way. But anyway, as we've established, both improvised and accidental are possible and documented.

geocrasheron A scientific curiosity that happened to me

I admit, it's apocryphal. But, if there is a gap anywhere in joint in the headboard, and it oxidized, that's likely enough. Still, I believe my family. Maybe I have details wrong (likely) but it was a headboard and they heard radio from it.

geocrasheron A scientific curiosity that happened to me

Where did anybody say accidentally? I said it could be improvised. Are you arguing just to argue?

Edit: I realize that the headboard story implies an "accidental" semiconductor. And yes that's totally possible.

geocrasheron A scientific curiosity that happened to me

   Calling bullshit. Semiconductors cannot be "improvised". PN junctions aren't found anywhere accidentally.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxhole_radio

   One common type was made from an oxidized razor blade (rusty or flamed) with a pencil lead pressed against the blade with a safety pin. The oxide layer on the blade and the point contact of the pencil lead form a semiconductor Schottky diode and only allow current to pass in one direction.

geocrasheron A scientific curiosity that happened to me

Indeed, in some cases all you need is an antenna, a semiconductor of almost any kind (which can be improvised) and an audio amp. In some cases, it's all-in-one. My family used to talk about a brass headboard that you could hear Morse code from, coming from the local military base.

geocrasheron A new era for Arecibo

Oh goodness... I didn't expect to shed a tear at the end of that. What a gorgeous bit of writing. I can only aspire to be such a powerful storyteller as Mr. Chiang. Thanks for sharing.

geocrasheron Modern Linux Tools vs. Unix Classics: Which Would I Choose?

Author here.

Definitely not. I wrote it to parse the already very nicely formatted output that I had. For example to get value B so I could search replace based on value D, when values A,B,C,D, are in order on separate lines.

valueb=$(grep D $json -B2| grep B)

now valueb = B when I started with D, and I can sed 's/B/D/' pretty easily. Now, the JSON I got were a big giant blog as it often is, I'd have had to at least use gron, which is a nifty tool I learned about by posting this here, and for that I'm grateful!

geocrasheron Modern Linux Tools vs. Unix Classics: Which Would I Choose?

Replace kitchen space with head space.

geocrasheron Being a bash developer in the 21st century (2021)

Sure, Windows doesn't have "legacy" like VMS or Unix etc, but it's been in use by every day people longer than any other current OS except for MacOS, which really isn't the same OS it launched as, whereas Windows has maintained backwards compatibility (for better for for worse) for decades. So.. Legacy? Why not.

geocrasheron Being a bash developer in the 21st century (2021)

I'll check it out- but the problem is portability. The script I wrote may need to run on machines that don't have anything but awk sed grep cut etc...

That being said, I'll check it out on my local machine :)

geocrasheron Being a bash developer in the 21st century (2021)

It's funny that you mention that! I was discussing it with a co-worker to see if they were any better with JQ than I was. They weren't. But then I realized I probably could have used chat GPT to do it. It really is a great tool for that kind of thing.

geocrasheron Being a bash developer in the 21st century (2021)

This post inspired me to add a similar post to my own blog. Why?

Today I needed to parse some JSON at the command line and do some basic search and replaces and convert it all to CSV. The API call was easy enough with wget, and I was going to use JQ to parse the JSON. But after fiddling with it for 20 minutes and not having much luck, I resorted to my favorites:

Awk, sed, grep, cut. Save API call output to a couple of temp files, parse it with the aforementioned Unix staples in a for loop, And unless time than it would have taken me to properly learn JQ, I had the output and was able to ship it off to my customer.

Sometimes the best tool for the job is the tool you know, love, and trust.

geocrasheron Vultr.com Ubuntu OS used non-random passwords between 10/11/22 and 9/12/23

   Hello,
  
  We are writing to inform you that the "ubuntu" user account on your vultr.com subscription may have a non-randomized password. Providing secure, reliable, and performant products and services is our highest priority. As part of this goal, Vultr proactively identifies potential areas of risk to our customers and works to diligently resolve any findings with minimal service impact. While we are not aware of any disclosed issues related to this finding, we have taken precautionary measures to mitigate any potential risk as well as providing this notification.

   Here's what you need to know:
    - All Virtual and Bare Metal servers deployed with Ubuntu from the Vultr OS Library between October 11, 2022 and September 12, 2023 may have a non-randomized password for the "ubuntu" user which could present elevated risk for unauthorized access.
     - New instances from Vultr's OS library deployed after September 12, 2023 are not affected.
     - New instances deployed from snapshots created from affected instances may also be affected, however we have implemented automation with cloud-init to disable the password for the ubuntu user at the time of deploy.

   Here's what we have done:
    - Vultr has taken steps to ensure newly deployed instances are not affected.
    - Vultr has scanned for affected instances and disabled the password for the "ubuntu" user wherever it was found to be accessible.
    - Vultr has not accessed any data on your instance.

   Here's what you need to do:
    - Even though we have taken precautionary measures, it is recommended that you delete the ubuntu user, or change or disable its password.


    - Take the opportunity to review some security best practices here: https://www.vultr.com/docs/security-best-practices-for-vultr-instances

   If you have any questions or concerns, please contact our account management team by opening a support ticket here:

   https://my.vultr.com/support/create ticket/

   Thank you for your business,
   ---The Vultr.com Team---

geocrasheron Slums in Delhi were flattened before the G20 summit

I think it's one of those things where the medium is used correctly to tell the story. The web has the ability to be more than just "digital newspapers" as in the past, and this is what happens when showing advertisements isn't the first priority of the storyteller.

geocrasheron Slums in Delhi were flattened before the G20 summit

That opening picture, with the scroll effect. I don't know if I have ever seen such an image used so effectively. The transition from line art to a real picture was so subtle that I was just stunned to find out it was real. And that had such an immediate impact that it brought a tear to my eye.

I can't remember there ever being a time in my 30+ years of being online that web design caused such a reaction.

Haven't even read the article yet...

geocrasheron Ask HN: Should I get a stand-up desk?

Perhaps so. I've always called them sit-stand desks, because at one point there was a definite difference between the naming of the two.

geocrasheron Ask HN: Should I get a stand-up desk?

You want a sit-stand desk, not just a standing desk.

geocrasheron ‘Blue lights’ flash in sky moments before Morocco earthquake

    Maybe we could have a parallel twin site for non serious "news"?

https://fark.com

Yep, it's still around

geocrasheron The Carrington Event of 1859 disrupted telegraph lines

     And, don't forget, a lot of power plants need power to be re-started. They don't all have backup gas turbines to get going again.

That made me think of this Everyday Engineering video "What Is A Black Start Of The Power Grid?"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOSnQM1Zu4w

geocrasheron Secret government telephone numbers

    The labels on these buttons, FO, F, I, P, for Flash Override, Flash, Immediate, and Priority, directly reflected the nuclear C2 scheme at the time.

Wait... was this the inspiration for Crash Override's handle in Hackers? The more I look, the cooler that movie gets.

geocrasheron The curl-wget Venn diagram

To me the real takeaway here isn't related to wget or curl. It's related to using the right tool for the job, whatever that is.

geocrasheron How did Stripe come up with its name? (2015)

I always figured it was a play on words based on the stripe on the back of a credit card, the magnetic strip.

geocrasheron No way in or out of Burning Man after storm

I didn't say it would dry up today, I said it'll dry up quickly when the rain stops.

geocrasheron No way in or out of Burning Man after storm

I live about 2 hrs south of BM quite near the route that all the burners take to get to BM. It's rainy, has been for the last two days. But this is Nevada. It'll dry up and be like it never happened in no time.

geocrasheron No way in or out of Burning Man after storm

Darmok and Jalad at Gerlach

geocrasheron Acronym’s new computer with Asus is bonkers, but that’s the point

This looks more like a high end cyber deck than a usable laptop.

I LIKE IT.

geocrasheron Bears Are Climbing Half Dome in Yosemite National Park

   Whether at camp or on the trail, they advise always to keep backpacks and scented items within arm’s reach since bears and other animals like the Half Dome ground squirrels will approach unattended bags quickly and will try to take their contents.

This is especially true of raccoons! My wife almost lost her whole backpack this way, and the only food it contained was some Doritos. Trash panda's aren't discriminatory.

geocrasheron Ask HN: Any interesting books you have read lately?

Agreed, a fantastic book!

geocrasheron Maui wildfires are 'apocalyptic' as people jump into the ocean to flee

   “I grabbed some people I saw on the street who didn’t seem to have a good plan. And I had told them, ‘Get your stuff, get in my truck,’” he said.

No matter where you live: Have an emergency kit, a plan, and practice it at least once a year.

https://www.ready.gov/kit

geocrasheron Ask HN: What's the coolest physical thing you've made?

Cool! I have built Hadley, a 114mm Newtonian that is mostly 3d printed.

https://miscdotgeek.com/3d-printing-the-hadley-114mm-newtoni...

It's done now, and has produced some nice images, but I need to spend more time with it to get planetary images etc.