Activity from Tell Me No Lies
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Need a standardized web-accessible flash card list format
I'd like to produce an app that lets you run through your flash card deck in a particular way. Neither Anki nor Quizlet make it easy to import their decks and I'm looking for ideas. My fallback is the first two (or maybe more) columns of a Google spreadsheet. Is anyone aware of a standardized format I could use instead?
Looking for highrise hotel overlooking a busy harbor
I've got a week to kill and I'd like to do it sitting in a hotel room and watching the ships come and go. Cost is an issue -- flying there and back (starting in Mexico City) plus the cost of the hotel -- but other than that and a preference for staying out of the snow the world is open. Suggestions?
Looking for a small library newsletter mailer
I'm setting up the mass mailer for a 3000 person email list that belongs to a small library. Email goes out about twice a week. There's no way they can handle a sendy server of their own and the Easysendy evaluation has gone disastrously. Mailchimp seems to be the default here but the cost is prohibitive. How do you handle newsletters for your small, poor, technologically challenged organization?
Recent experiences with Alibaba
My purchase attempt through Alibaba has stalled with Alibaba rejecting my PayPal and displaying that the credit card I gave them as an alternative was declined despite the fact that the credit card company has no record of them trying it. Had I not done business through Alibaba in the past I would be walking away right now, but I’m willing to give them a little leeway. Is Alibaba still a reliable broker?
Best way to remove a 1" stumbling block for the mobility impaired
I've got a 1" rise between the porch and house that is just made to trip over/annoy people in wheelchairs. Obviously I can build a small ramp but before I do I thought I'd see if people who are currently dealing with mobility issues had any thoughts on best practices.
Interpreting resistance data for my freezer sensor
I ordered a replacement thermistor for my freezer, but decided to check it against the table in the service manual before installing it. I'm having trouble understanding the results, specifically why I'm seeing roughly twice the resistance I expect.
Do I need stairs and a ramp in a backyard swimming pool?
Following up on this question, I've started to question why I'm setting aside space for stairs.
Have you had delayed antidepressant withdrawal symptoms?
I just finished a slow taper off of duloxetine (aka Cymbalta). It's a process I've gone through a few times and there have been very predictable side effects involving dizziness when standing, bursts of tinnitus, and most notably excessive sentimentality. This time the side effects have been delayed and I'm wondering if that's A Thing.
Placement of busbars on smartfilm
I'm investigating smart film for a project and I'm having trouble finding recommendations for the placement of busbars. For small samples putting them next to each other on the same edge appears to be preferred, but there are references to putting one at each end for longer pieces. I've also seen two busbars at each end. Is there a formula for this?
Sendy hosting for the tech illiterati?
I'm researching Sendy solutions for a volunteer organization that has a monthly newsletter with ~2000 users. I can do the setup, but I need it to work and keep working while hiding as many gory details as possible. And of course it needs to be ultra-cheap and come with a free pony. Suggestions?
Going with basic aluminum/steel window frames
I need to replace some window frames in my house, but they'll be painted so I don't particularly care what they look like. I have access to some skilled craftsmen who will have no trouble producing a custom set of casement windows. Is there any reason to get fancy?
Getting baking soda to stick to a metal window frame
I'm using a paste made from baking soda and water to remove rust from metal window frames. The frames are not removable and the paste (which needs to stay on for an hour) tends to slide off shortly after being applied. It seems like it needs something to make it a little sticky without interfering with the rust dissolving properties. Suggestions?
Gracefully accepting this mortal coil
So at some point I was yanked out of the void and ended up with a body. The body is fine but I have always been really pissy about the maintenance — at a minimum it needs food, shelter from the elements, regular sleep, and a bit of exercise. I resent all of it. Have you felt this way and found your way to a better place? How did that work?
Cooling off instead of sweating all day
I do cardio in the morning but to prevent excessive sweating all day I take significant steps (cold water, cold shower, air-dry in cold air, ice packs in key spots) to bring my core temperature to the point where I'm only lightly sweaty. But now I'm wondering how much of the benefit of raising my heart rate and forcing my body to cool itself I'm losing, particularly in terms of calories burned. Anyone know?
18th and 19th century emigration restricted due to knowledge and skills?
I am trying to hunt down the truth of a vague memory I have that, as part of keeping a competitive edge, European countries in the 18th and 19th centuries would not allow people with particular expertises to emigrate. For example, a person who had designed a particularly efficient mill would not be permitted to emigrate and presumably share the secret with a new country. Does this sound familiar to anyone?
What makes a backyard pool physically nice for adults?
I live in the tropics and am putting a small (10x20 foot) sunken pool in the backyard. I’m choosing features for people 50 and over. I’ve got lights below the water line and shallow steps with a rail. What should the basic depth be and do I need a deep end? What else?
Potential energy of a Prince Rupert’s Drop?
I’d like to replace the powder charge in my 7.62 NATO round with a Prince Rupert’s Drop. Forgetting the mechanics for a second, how big does the drop need to be to release the same amount of energy in the explosion?
Help me overcome my fear of shallow water tables
The city I’m in sits on 3 feet of topsoil on top of a mile thick limestone pancake (a karst landscape). I’m thinking of adding a pool and filling it with groundwater. I already use well water for landscaping but I’m not ready to swim in it yet.
Metafilter Expats: How to live in a corrupt country?
A few years ago I moved to a country where corruption is endemic. As of late I've met more and more people (generally low level government clerks) who accept bribes as a matter of course in their jobs. On one hand it offends me to my little Protestant core and on the other they're just taking part in an economy that existed long before they came along. If you've lived this, how did you adjust?
Help me be okay releasing okay software
Yes, the perfect is the enemy of the good but when it comes to releasing apps I lack the skills to make it even that far. I’ve always worked where people with many complimentary skills cooperated to get products made, and I’m driven to despair about how much will be done half-assed if I do it myself. Unfortunately consultants are not in the budget.
Are there any good papers on lithium/psilocybin interactions?
The only paper I’ve found so far is this one [pdf] which has extremely unreliable data due to sample bias. Has any solid data been produced?
Website software for a vanity site
I create a lot of very (often absurdly) specific utilities that I would like to make available to the internet at large. Providing the source on github is a no-brainer, but I'd like to have a spiffy central landing spot that could provide pointers and in many cases web versions of the utilities themselves. I could do something primitive on my web server, but I thought I'd see if this rang any bells for anyone.
Durable chemical resistant gloves for the workshop
I have a variety of substances (ethanol, acetone, kerosene, etm.) that I occasionally need to work with. Permanent gloves would be best although I'm open to disposables. The complication is that they need to safely survive storage for long periods at a minimum of 110°F. 130°F would be better. Recommendations would be gratefully received.
Expressing a line figure as a set of triangles
Before I reinvent this triangular wheel I thought I'd see if there's already some code that does this. The figure will be an outline although there could be loops (an 8 for example). Failing an existing algorithm, if you have a clever idea feel free to share. The more the merrier!
Why aren’t flight attendants suing en masse for wage theft?
With the welcome news that Delta is going to start paying flight attendants for their work during the boarding process, the question arises of how they and all the other airlines have been getting away with wage theft all these years. It seems like a pretty clear cut case of requiring people to work unpaid time. Why haven’t they been sued to oblivion and beyond?
My spiffy orange peeler keeps ripping oranges in two
Got myself a mechanical orange peeler which worked perfectly out of the box. Once. Since then about a quarter of the way through the orange rips in half. I've tried various blade depths, speeds, and regular unclogging of the cutter. Turning both ends of the orange in sync works a bit but is still finicky. Do I just have wimpy oranges? Any special tips would be much appreciated.
Looking for relaxed day hikes in northern Washington
I'm looking for some day hikes (7 miles tops) in Washington State that are within a few hours drive of Seattle and likely to be relatively empty in early June. I'll probably want to get a hotel somewhere in the area and do a different hike every day for three or four days. Suggestions?
Help me manage the heat of my bed
It’s the hot season where I live and the main bedroom (the coolest room in the house) is around 90F for most of the day. When it’s bed time and I turn the AC on the air cools off quickly enough, but the bedding and in particular the mattress take a minimum of an hour to get to room temperature (generally around 75F). Are there tricks for dealing with this?
Comparing pictures with different light levels
I have a bunch of images of the same objects from the same angle but at slightly different light levels. I'd like to identify pictures of the same objects -- I would normally use color histograms as a rough pass, but I'm unsure how to modify the histograms to adjust for different levels.
Logging house voltage
My power company gives me a putative stable 135V. I’m not convinced. I was going to use a DC converter and step-down circuit plugged into an Arduino for long term sampling, but I thought I would see if anyone had a better suggestion first.
Help me take a snapshot of my health
I've been watching my friend's bodies deteriorate lately and noted that there are only x-rays (for example) taken after the fact when something goes wrong. I'm looking for ideas of what to record at a thorough checkpoint instead: skin cancer screening, colonoscopy, comprehensive x-rays of the entire skeleton and brain scans for a start. What else do you think I need for a real baseline?
Curated collection of college courses
I would like to find an organized collection of all the recorded college courses out there. It would be nice to browse by topic, by university, by year, etc. Apple had a good thing going with iTunes U but seems to have abandoned any browsable structure along with the app.
Doing something nice for the bride at the last minute
A friend of mine is getting married this weekend. I was going to limit my involvement due to Covid in any case, but omicron is in full bloom where I’m at and there ain’t no way I’m going near a social event. She’s very chill, there won’t be an issue, but I’d like to do something nice for her since I can’t attend. Suggestions would be welcome.
Visualizing "Fear has much imagination but little talent"
I'm trying to create a medium sized line drawing illustrating the phrase "Fear has much imagination and little talent" but I'm blanking on ideas for it. There are at least two basic interpretations 1) "Fear makes things look really scary even though they're harmless" and 2) "You can get carried away with being afraid of something but you're not accomplishing anything" but any other interpretations would be fine as well.
Have there been fundamental changes for home VR in the last five years?
I got rid of my disused VR rig five years ago but I thought I’d stick my toe back in. A lot of the equipment is looking very familiar, and while it looks like there have been some small advances in controllers the software seems to still only recognize the same basic inputs. Is there anything new over the last five years? New uses, new types of equipment, new concepts?
Looking for Contractor-ware, Mac preferred or possibly web-based
I'm doing a little contracting and am wondering if there is a lightweight turnkey solution for creating/logging contracts, tracking work, and generating invoices. Obviously this is doable through a mix of tools but I'm wondering if there are good packages already out there.
Tell me of the desolderers of your homeworld Usul.
I'm thinking it's time to move up from the solder sucker to something more professional. Solder guns with a vacuum built in look interesting, but never having used one I'm not sure what to look for. Suggestions would be gratefully received.
What's stopping us from grabbing 16 Psyche?
Even if 16 Psyche is worth 1% of it's supposed potential value it would still be worth spending many billions to get our hands on it. What are the sticking points?
I figured it was time to update these....
Metafilter Usage Graphs 2018-2021 I figured it was time to update these.
Looking for a grizzled, bloodied iOS engineer to learn from
I am a grizzled, bloodied embedded systems engineer. I’ve been poked by just about every pointy bit in the software development process from architecture to design to code to tools. I have emerged from the process with a solid conviction on how to do all of it The Right Way. I would like to meet my iOS counterpart, or even better multiple counterparts who strongly disagree with each other. Can anyone help point me to such people?
Help me take amateur photos of arteries in my wrist
I’d like to get good pictures of the colors (visible and infrared) of the arteries in my wrist. Is there a useful technique for increasing the transparency of the skin at the moment of the picture? Somehow I’m thinking that a very bright flash might do the trick, but I’m not sure what color that would be or even if it would work.
I can build or buy any equipment necessary.
Ship a 400 lb package to be held for pickup in Laredo
I need to ship a 400 lb package to Laredo, Texas to be held for up to a week so someone can pick it up for me. Are there companies that specialize in this kind of thing? I could ship it to some friends in Texas and have them drive it down on the day but I would prefer to skip the complication.
Excessive humidity and mechanical devices
I'm bringing an elliptical trainer into a very humid (think Southern Florida) area and am trying to decide about placing it. Choice one is inside the house in a room that gets about 4 hours of air conditioning a day. Choice two is outside in a very well sheltered patio. I'm worried that choice two will create a much greater maintenance issue than choice one. I didn't grow up in a humid area so I have no instinct for this. Help?
Sticky gel used to hold electrical connectors
When I was dismantling a 3d printer I found the gel in this picture spread over sockets anywhere a cable might vibrate out of its connector. It's very sticky and rubbery. It took some pulling but in the end it separated cleanly from the board surface. Any ideas what it is?
Good Spanish translations of Alice in Wonderland Poetry
I’d like to find some high-quality Spanish translations of the poems from Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. At minimum I’d like to get my hands on Jabberwocky, The Lobster Quadrille and The Walrus and the Carpenter. Something like this German translation of Jabberwocky is what I have in mind. (That site has several Spanish translations but I don’t know how to judge them.)
Looking for a catalog of book spines
I'm looking for pictures of the spines of every book ever published, including every changed version of the art.
It's a small ask I know, but if someone knows of a good place to start that would be very helpful.
Is my meat beating the heat?
My walk back from the grocery store is usually about 30 minutes in 95 to 100°F heat. The contents of my backpack are noticeably warm when I arrive at home. For this reason I’ve avoided buying refrigerated chicken, pork, beef or fish to store in the refrigerator but I don’t know if I’m being over cautious. Assuming it’s safe, is the temporary rise in temperature going to affect the taste or texture?
How do you commission a statue
I think we can agree that any overgrown garden is a candidate for a Laputian Robot. The question is, how do I get one built? I assume I would approach a metal worker but what are they going to need from me? I've collected a few pictures but I don't know if that's adequate. I'm sure I could get quite a few frame grabs, and if necessary I can model the whole thing in 3D and provide detailed blueprints. What would an artisan want from me?
Getting a message out to blue people
I (along with several thousand other people I'm sure) have something I'd like to say to Democratic voters in heavily blue and heavily red states. It's not controversial, I'm just trying to get a thought out there. How does one do this on various budgets?
Who said "Security is inversely proportional to convenience"?
Who said "Security is inversely proportional to convenience"? I first heard it in the early 1990s, but it easily could be centuries old. Quote sites aren't helping out.
Waterproofing 150 windows
I have 60 year old iron-frame windows in my house. Either in the original construction or in the years since gaps have appeared. They range from 1/32 to 1/4 inch. When the rain blows from a particular direction they leak like sieves.
