lemmefixdat4u
@lemmefixdat4u@lemmy.world
- Comment on Would it count in basketball, if a player found themselves directly under the hoop, threw the ball up through the hoop from underneath, and the ball fell back down, again through the hoop? 2 months ago:
Same in NCAA and FIBA. The moment the ball enters the cylinder from below, it’s the same as going out of bounds. Play stops and the ball is awarded to the team that did not touch the ball last.
- Comment on If malls continue to shut down and decay over the next twenty years, someone should turn them into retirement communities for GenX and Millennials. 3 months ago:
How do earth-sheltered homes comply? I’ve seen a few, and they have no windows in most of the rooms, including bedrooms. And there’s a few who’ve taken to living in caves, old mines, and decommissioned missile silos. There must be an exception to this code.
- Comment on I want to donate old work shirts, but I don't want people to be mistaken for employees there. How do I remove the logos? 3 months ago:
Cut them up and use them for rags, or deface the logo with permanent marker before donation. Clothes that are not fashionable don’t sell. They end up in huge bales. A few are sold to clothing recyclers (cut up for industrial rags or shredded for felt), but most end up in countries where they disrupt the local garment economy, become landfill, or are burned, contributing to air pollution (do search for “clothing in Atacama desert” or “donated clothing in Africa”).
I only donate quality items in good condition that I would buy. Cheap clothing refills my rag bin. If you’re really feeling guilty about not donating used clothing, the best way to assuage your guilt is to become a resale store customer.
- Comment on Bet y'all are very familiar with this 3 months ago:
My grandkids use it. Gotta train them young. Thanks McD’s! (They even painted it orange)
- Comment on brewing tea with space vacuum? 4 months ago:
If you place a tea bag in a cup of water at 20C in a thermally isolated vacuum chamber, when the chamber pressure is reduced to or below the vapor pressure of water at 20C (about 17 torr, or 1/3 psi), it will begin to boil. The vapor produced will be at 20C and the water in the cup will be 20C and begin to decrease, because of latent heat of vaporization needed for the liquid/gas phase change. The water will continue to boil as long as the pressure is maintained at or below the vapor pressure of water at that temperature. Eventually, the water reaches 0C. Then it will stop boiling and begin to freeze as the latent heat of fusion provides the necessary heat to continue evaporation. When all the water has converted to ice, the vapor pressure is greatly reduced. The ice will sublime (go from solid to gas) still, but as that continues to cool the ice, the vapor pressure also drops. As the temperature drops, sublimation will slow until it is nearly zero. So you would end up with a tea bag encased in ice.
In your example, if you suddenly exposed to the cup and tea bag to the vacuum of space by rapidly venting the air, the water would explosively evaporate, shredding the tea bag. You’d be left with bits of tea leaves, an empty cup, and a lot of very fine ice crystals.
- Comment on If global warming is a biproduct of humans, wouldn't the logical answer be to kill 2/3rds of the humans? 4 months ago:
I see it as one possibility of many. Measures currently employed are limited because most countries are democratic, where politicians must appease the people to stay in office. China could implement one-child because they are a de-facto dictatorship.
- Comment on The interior of your house is hot, the exterior cool. What would the most efficient orientation be for a box fan? Pushing hot air out of a window or pulling cool air in through it? 4 months ago:
I’ve tried it many ways. The most efficient method using a fan is to open the windows in a room on the leeward side of the house, then place a fan a few feet in front of the door, blowing air into the room. It’s more efficient because the impelled air will entrain surrounding air moving a greater volume through the doorway and out all the windows in that room. Then open windows in the farthest rooms to get a cross breeze.
Also look into an attic fan. They exhaust hot air from the attic, and it makes a world of difference in keeping your interior cool. Another trick is to mount shade cloth 6 inches away from the sunny walls of your home. It absorbs most of the solar radiation and keeps your walls cooler.
- Comment on If global warming is a biproduct of humans, wouldn't the logical answer be to kill 2/3rds of the humans? 4 months ago:
Logically, killing humans would be way down on the list of potential Global Warming solutions. We would have to exhaust all other methods first. Just banning private vehicles would save a few billion from extermination. Green energy tech and Nuclear power would save more. Vegetarian diets even more. Reducing organic waste, involuntary birth control, carbon sequestration - it’s a long list of better incremental solutions. They may be more costly than extermination, but they’re infinitely more ethical. It’s only logical if that’s the sole solution that ensures some of the population survives. We’re a long way from that condition.
- Comment on is there a set top media player that doesn't require an online account? 4 months ago:
Pay-as-you-go phones work. A $15 (sometimes free) basic cellphone with a few minutes are all you need. Once the account is set up, the phone isn’t needed. I’ve made quite a few Google throw-away accounts this way. Just never lose your password and don’t turn on 2FA.
As far as Google tracking goes - you can firewall off all the Google servers if you dislike them, or use a router that connects through a VPN if you need that level of privacy.
- Comment on is there a set top media player that doesn't require an online account? 4 months ago:
An Android TV box doesn’t -need- Google once you’ve downloaded all the apps. But you do need it to keep all those apps up to date. I’m not sure what you gain with not having an account attached to the device. All those streaming services you mentioned require accounts. What’s one more?
- Comment on Comcast to Launch Peacock, Netflix and Apple TV+ Bundle at a ‘Vastly Reduced Price’ 5 months ago:
No gold. It’s what they charge us privileged Californians.
- Comment on Comcast to Launch Peacock, Netflix and Apple TV+ Bundle at a ‘Vastly Reduced Price’ 5 months ago:
It’s $210 a month plus $30 in taxes and fees for 400 mbit internet with a 1.2 TB usage cap and a mid-tier programming package renting one cable box (required) and one cablecard for the Tivo box. Some months I exceed my internet cap and have to pay $10 for every 50 GB over the limit. Welcome to California living.
- Comment on Comcast to Launch Peacock, Netflix and Apple TV+ Bundle at a ‘Vastly Reduced Price’ 5 months ago:
Remember when TV used to be free, except that you had to watch commercials? I pay $2800 a year to this company for Internet and TV - and I still have to watch commercials. What’s wrong with this picture?
- Comment on Why does Sync not display some comments? 5 months ago:
I also see this. The only way I can see the missing comments is by sharing the link to a web browser. Then the missing comments can be read in the browser.
Another variation of this issue is when a comment has collapsed replies. For instance, I see “3 replies” beneath a comment. When I tap it, it disappears, but no replies are shown. Again, I can read them if I share the link to the thread to a browser.
- Comment on If I wanted to, hypothetically, guarentee that I shit my pants 2 to 6 hours from now, how should I do it? 5 months ago:
Sandwich bag full of shit placed in your shorts 2-6 hours from now. Then sit down firmly.
Or talk to the homeless guy in Walmart. He seems to have this one down pat.
- Comment on How do people actually dumpster dive to get free food? Are there any other cheap/free ways like this to get food? 6 months ago:
Jesus. Nobody should ever go hungry. Have you tried asking the manager/owner of the local grocery if you can have food destined for the dumpster? Talk to some of the employees too. While I’m not hard up for food, i got friendly with the folks running the deli section. If I show up when they close the deli, they’ll give me everything left in the hot deli case for the price of one serving, because otherwise they’re going to throw it away.
- Comment on Putin’s one-way ticket to The Hague: international law experts, judges, and diplomats on a hypothetical trial of the Russian dictator 6 months ago:
Putin will probably say that Russia is not the USSR and did not sign the Geneva Conventions, just as he did with the 1994 Budapest Memorandum that gave security guarantees to Ukraine in exchange for surrendering her nuclear weapons.
I doubt that he will be tried for anything. His most likely end is by assassination, as he’s done to so many opponents. Live by the sword, die by the sword.
- Comment on If presidential immunity is absolute.. 6 months ago:
That’s a good point. President orders hit, pardons the co-conspirators, turns the reigns over to the VP who then pardons the President. The perfect crime.
- Comment on If presidential immunity is absolute.. 6 months ago:
Nothing other than common decency stops a president from executing all rivals of their party, pardoning all those involved, then resigning from the office, turning it over to the VP, before Congress could impeach. Now if the only remaining members of Congress belong to the President’s party, the odds of impeachment diminish significantly. In any case, only one person - the President - could ever be held responsible.
But anyone dumb enough to try this would start Civil War 2.0.
- Comment on How to get wood sealant off of a window 6 months ago:
A “Mr. Clean” sponge (one of the white ones) or a knock off. It cuts through haze and overspray on glass. I used it for the windows when I was spray painting the eaves and forgot the spray shield.
- Comment on Is it Possible for a 55inch LED TV to Run on Only 50W or am I Being Scammed? 8 months ago:
It could, probably at the lowest brightness setting. If it was an OLED TV it could use under 10 watts while displaying a black picture. An LCD TV would be measured at the lowest backlight brightness. So YMMV, depending on how dim a picture you’ll settle for.
TV tech has come a long way though. My old 25" CRT TV choked down 240W. The 70" LCD currently on the wall does about 90W. And the 27" TV in my office setup sips 15W.
- Comment on Can I Use my Multimeter to Test How Much Power my Appliance (TV) is Using? 8 months ago:
If your meter can measure AC millivolts, use a shunt. You’ll have to build a special cable from an extension cord. Cut either the live or neutral wire, insert a shunt, which is a resistor with a very low resistance (typically milliohms), then provide some taps at either end of the shunt. Make it all electrically safe. You don’t want to do the 50/60 Hz Shuffle.
Plug in the extension cord, plug your TV into the extension cord, then measure the AC voltage across the shunt while the TV is operating and apply I=E/R. Now you know the current in the circuit. Measure the wall outlet voltage and use P=IE to determine the power. The measurement is accurate when the power factor of the device being tested is close to 1.
But honestly, plug-in consumer-level power meters like the Kill-A-Watt are MUCH safer to use, relatively inexpensive, and work for appliances with power factors that are not 1 (like motors). They read out voltage, wattage, and energy usage (KWh).
- Comment on Sign up on services without phone number? Is it possible? 8 months ago:
If you’re in the US, a Google VOIP number is free. The only service that won’t accept it is - Google. The drawback? You gotta use it every now and then or they’ll reclaim the number. And Google listens to all the conversations and texts.
- Comment on What’s Usenet and how can I access it with modern hardware (phones/laptops)? 9 months ago:
You can subscribe to Easynews. It’s Usenet turned into a website. There’s a built in search engine (supports regular expressions), retention going back to 2008, spam and malware filtering, and multiple servers located in the US and Europe. You choose whether to use the web or a Usenet client. Probably the easiest way to use this neglected corner of the Internet.
Even Usenet gets censored, but there a window of a couple days between posting and takedown where the file is available. We see this a lot with major studios who pay investigators to identify infringing material. To get around this, some uploaders are encrypting their content, and you’ll need the description key.
- Comment on KFC be like... 10 months ago:
Wish granted! Air fryer fried chicken
Personally, I use sous vide to cook the seasoned chicken at 155F for 90 minutes, then coat it in batter/oil mix, roll it in seasoned panko and put it in the air fryer at 450F for 10-15 minutes. No pot of oil or grease splattered all over the stove. Chicken is tender, juicy, well-seasoned, has a crispy, crunchy crust, and is never raw at the bone.
- Comment on What's a word that means a common saying which is arguably untrue? 10 months ago:
Whoever came up with the “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” adage never met a person with locked-in syndrome. That’s where you’re totally paralyzed but also totally conscious. There have been patients where the doctors thought they were in a persistent coma, but they were actually going crazy trapped in their own skulls.
- Comment on Lifehack for naive schoolchildren 10 months ago:
Not quite the same as the two magnets. If you have a big fan and a square sail, you’re moving air, which has mass and is not attached to the boat. That alone will cause a force that moves the boat backwards. The moving air that hits the sail will not fully cancel that force due to frictional losses and air spillage from the edges.
Racing yachts are a different story. They have rigid sails that are shaped like airfoils. Blowing across an airfoil causes lift. So a big fan blowing perpendicular to the axis of the boat across such a sail would move the boat forward. But it’s much more efficient for the fan to blow backwards without the sail, hence airboats and hovercraft.
- Comment on How old are you? 10 months ago:
Ahhh, the good ol’ days playing Wumpus - “I smell a Wumpus!” - or “Adventure” - “It is dark. You may be eaten by a grue.” Went through rolls of paper in the old teletype.
- Comment on What are some common everyday examples of this phenomenon? (see body) 11 months ago:
The most prevalent has got to be, "We prayed and -insert name- recovered - it’s a miracle!
And if the person dies: “It’s the will of God.”
- Comment on Why are there circles of melted snow on this icy pond? 11 months ago:
Gas bubbles from rotting vegetation are the likely cause in this instance. See this article for an explanation: