> The big mistake I see people make is not knowing when to quit.
This is sage advice. I spent the better part of a day trying to steer Gemini into correcting an inconsistency when I likely could have solved it in under an hour. I think persevering with Gemini was due to a number of factors, including novelty, stubbornness, and (unfortunately) not knowing in detail what Gemini had written up to that point.
I eventually studied the resulting code, which ended up having a number of nested 'hacks' and required refactoring - more time wasted, but still much faster overall.
Kind of a silly personal anecdote, but growing up, my father had a unique "strained" nostril breathing pattern and bad sleep apnea + COPD. I became 'hyper aware' of people's breathing patterns - to the point where people at work had fun with it - standing behind me breathing normally. I could identify who it was > 90% of the time (they were not trying to breathe quietly or differently). I often thought of people's breathing signature as sort of factor to identify them by. I certainly didn't think I was the first person to note this.
More interestingly, I'm also able to pick out people who have early signs of "decreased health" based on their breathing pattern at rest - I don't think it's overly difficult.
This study appears to cover both aspects - creating a breathing fingerprint and estimating BMI. I certainly wasn't aware of breathing differences associated with cognitive state. Bravo to the researchers for formalizing all of this - hope some positive interventional techniques are driven by these findings.
Your thoughtful question is definitely along the lines where the research could change health outcomes. Apple Health currently tracks trends over time and can alert if any disconcerting trends are identified. If Apple were able to capture a breathing signature at rest, say once a month, trends could be identified (via training data, as you mention) and data optionally provided to healthcare providers.
Some people who are alone (including my father) have no idea that they have sleep apnea or 'odd' breathing - for apnea, they're obviously asleep, and for other breathing factors, it's usually a slow and unnoticeable progression.
Interestingly (or possibly not), I made this [0] comment here (on HN) some time ago and was quickly informed that my technique was used in the 1960s to identify moving celestial objects in successive astronomical photographs. [2] I kind of assumed is was a fairly well-known technique, but didn't realize it also had practical use!
Here's something rather mundane, but definitely works for me: open Internet Archive's Audio section and choose "This Just In". Click on the first interesting thing you see and let it play. Most things I choose are pretty good to so-so, but sometimes I find a real gem (e.g., 3-hour-long John Peel radio captures transferred from cassette from the late 1970s).
It's all rather random but relies somewhat on your gut instinct. I find it more enjoyable than the top music streaming services. Case in point: someone uploaded an excellent field recording of a Bruce Hornsby concert from 2017 yesterday - listened to the whole thing a few times already (and I'm not really a big fan, but he's a great showman).
Now that I've finally mastered replacing Apple Watch batteries (and replacing one incredibly small battery connector I managed to lift off the board), I asked my son just this morning what we do with the three outdated models we have lying around (we "abandoned" the watches when the batteries wouldn't last even 1/2 a day).
This looks like a great solution to repurposing our old watches.
I should have a guide, but haven't created one yet - don't want to derail the thread, but here are a few pointers:
- The iFixit Apple Watch teardown is surprisingly effective - way more heat (and patience) is required then they indicate
- Using an X-Acto blade between the frame and glass really works well without damaging a single component (please be careful and alternate heat and prying)
- You may also need to replace the deep-press bezel - consider ordering one prior to your repair
- The battery glue is very, very persistent - lots of unnerving heat and prying
- Use a needle to separate the upper and lower battery connection on one side of the connector
- Three different replacement bezel glue rings all released over time - Permatex black gasket maker is the only thing that worked to reattach the display
Good luck, and I hope this helps save a few watches from being recycled prematurely
First off, congratulations on the sale - sounds like the right time and the right reasons for you, and you're 100% right on the seemingly 'backwards' nature of incentives and rewards when working for a large org. I was somewhat saddened when the logo changed (I suggested an alternate), but completely understand your rationale.
As a side project, I'm currently working with a hardware founder (I'm primarily software) who exited twice before having his "clock cleaned" by overseas competition steal and undercut his patented products on his third venture, which caused him to all but close shop and retire early. He's back I think due to boredom, but I'm seeing just how difficult hardware is. Why do you think hardware doesn't generally have the same level of 'respect' as software? From what I can see, it should be held in much higher regard with a correspondingly higher level of compensation. Is it literally just the current ability for hardware to be reverse-engineered and undercut?
>Why do you think hardware doesn't generally have the same level of 'respect' as software? From what I can see, it should be held in much higher regard with a correspondingly higher level of compensation. Is it literally just the current ability for hardware to be reverse-engineered and undercut?
Oh, my perception of hardware engineers is that they are held in similar regard to software developers.
If they do get less prestige, my guess is that it just comes down to money. The margins on pure software products are so high, so software businesses can afford to pay their software engineers really well. I've heard that typically hardware products sell for about 3-4x their bill of materials, so that eats up a huge chunk of your profits. And then there are all the other costs like storage, shipping, fulfillment that are nearly zero for a software business but significant for a hardware business.
I think for similar reasons, we don't see a lot of successful hardware startups. The VC money is probably flowing much more heavily toward software, so we hear of fewer hardware unicorn companies.
My findings are the same - having spoken to a founder working in robotics, with a successful product and a sizable customer base, he has spent a very long time looking for funding.
Well said. I've likened technical hobbies to Joel trying to hide memories of Clementine deeper and deeper in the recesses of his mind - away from Lacuna's eraser. Somehow when what hobbyists love to do becomes "for the masses", it becomes less interesting, which means digging deeper for hobbies that are largely shielded from the public. I think that's partially where innovation comes from.
When my kids were younger, they used to subscribe to a children's magazine that featured a monthly "spot the difference" puzzle. They were amazed when I used to glance at the image and rattle off the one obscure difference they missed.
My trick was based on "magic eye" images I used to enjoy. When I saw the side-by-side drawings used by the puzzle, I wondered what would happen if I "fuzzed" my eyes as if I was looking at a magic eye photo. To my surprise, all of the items that were different between the two images "vibrated" or "shimmered", while the rest of image stayed steady. I repeatedly fuzzed and focused to spot all the differences in a matter of seconds.
Yep, I do this too. One thing that's cool is viewing stereograms that have differing colors. Some people apparently can see new colors via this method that is not simply a mix of the two colors.
In in astronomy, they used to use a similar technique to 'spot the difference' between photographs of the night sky to find moving objects. They used a special stereo microscope that would place one image in front of each eye. The images were of the same part of the night sky, but separated by time. I saw one recently at the Palomar Observatory.
Here is a more elaborate one from the National Air and Space museum:
https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/microscope-ast...
I also recall playing a black-and-white space game (top-down scroller) for the original Macintosh where the instructions asked you to tape a piece of cardboard to the middle of the display such that each eye had a separate image of the split screen, which ended up providing a 3D effect without special glasses. I can't seem to recall what the game was, but I could play without the cardboard using the same vision technique (the 3D effect was very pronounced when playing in a dark room).
I've been addressing my glucose intolerance issues through an ultra-low carb diet for over a decade, and while I've cut out almost all products with natural or artificial sweeteners, my two remaining sweeteners of choice are stevia and aspartame. I use a combination of those for the occasional baked good, such as almond cookies or pudding as per diabetic recipes from the 1800s [0]. The recipe calls for saccharin tablets, which were used as a sweetener for almost 100 years; the question I always ask is, "Did bladder cancer rates increase in diabetics using saccharin over almost 100 years?" If the answer is no, then why replace an inexpensive sweetener with Aspartame? If Aspartame has not created a wave of new cancers in its user base, then I ask myself, "Why replace another inexpensive sweetener with sucralose?"
When I started my new way of eating, I ordered sucralose drops (because at the time, I wanted to "test" all sweeteners), and while the drops themselves did not increase my blood glucose, to me, sucralose left a very sickly-sweet, unpleasant feeling at the back of my tongue. My pedestrian understanding of the process used to make sucralose is that it takes tons of sugar to create pounds of sucralose – not sure if that contributes to it being sickly-sweet.
The WHO is right in cautioning the use of any sweetener (natural or artificial), but it seems silly to single one out at this time. I'm confident that in 40 years, sucralose will be explicitly added to the list (and industry will switch yet again to the latest artificial sweetener).
This is sage advice. I spent the better part of a day trying to steer Gemini into correcting an inconsistency when I likely could have solved it in under an hour. I think persevering with Gemini was due to a number of factors, including novelty, stubbornness, and (unfortunately) not knowing in detail what Gemini had written up to that point.
I eventually studied the resulting code, which ended up having a number of nested 'hacks' and required refactoring - more time wasted, but still much faster overall.
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