2025-01-01
Hello 2025
Happy 2025!
Once again solstice has occured and once again the year according to the Georgian calendar increments.
I did not list any resolutions in my last entry, so there is no need to evaluate, how I fared, but read on.
Most notable in 2024
- The SAT-nav notebook worked, although battery life once made for a premature black screen.
- The rs485 comm board has seen considerable progress in the first half of the year. The drop down converters work, the radio does work, too. And for the first time the rs485 connection is stable, such that I can upload my application without thinking! This is clearly better that what I had before. However, the rfm69hw radio is a modern beast laden with modern features. I will admit, that I have not succeeded to tame this beast completely. I managed to run data telegrams from one station to the other for over 30 days straight. But gnuradio keeps seeing nasty side band emissions and I'm at a loss, what causes them. It might be, that my code does not switch off the power amplifier stage fast enough. But I'm stuck at this point. I hesitate to attribute this to gnuradio on my machine, although I have seen funny side emissions on transmitters other than my own, too. I'm not yet ready to call this an artefact of my RX equipment, from antenna to waterfall diagram on the screen.
- Power outages and earth quakes have not been noticeable where I live during the entire year.
- After 16 years I have changed my webspace/email provider. The old one has switched off the only somewhat important service (mailing lists) and is in the process to move email (everything?) to Microsoft based technology, thereby increasing fees to levels unimagined before. No, thanks. Still, that is a lot of totally unneeded work.
- I mentioned that I picked up learning Spanish again, however, this lasted for half the year and then ceased. While I don't like the modern day gamification of even repeating vocabulary, this is all my own laziness.
- For the first time in my life I did consciously observe an appearance of aurora borealis at my fairly low latitude! It was red, not nearly as spectacular as the pictures on APOD[a], but still impressive. It lasted for maybe 15 minutes and then disappeared. This kind of red glow might be missed easily by an unaware spectator.
Hopes for 2025
Vi calls them hopes, rather than resolutions[b], and I like that.
So, I picked three things from the all too long list of opportunities.
- Pick up Spanish again --- I have invested too much time during my life into this to just let it rot. I can travel and get by, but I cannot read a newspaper or magazine easily. So: ¡Otra vez!
- Instead of mindlessly pressing refresh at the news site, I'd rather watch videos from the vast archives of FOSDEM[c] and The Congress[d]. Or youtube, if it need be. And don't confine this to computing. There are a lot of very interesting things out there.
- Install a proper noon indicator after all these years. Our house has a south facing wall, which lends itself to such a thing. I have made measurements already, so all there is left to do, is to actually build and mount a better gnomon (shadow indicator) and then place either a straight line (indicating true noon), or a figure eight analemma complete with calendar marks on said wall. How hard can it be? Vi Grey has put up such a thing[e].
The problem with my eyes has been reduced quite a bit. I can go about my days with little changes, for which I am very grateful. It would hit me very hard to not see anything at all.
Cheers, and Happy New Year!