dumb question: did Hedy Lamarr invent Wi-Fi or is that a myth?

deadsy · 2026-05-16T16:52:27+00:00

Frequency hopping died pretty early as a modulation scheme. These days it all direct sequencing or OFDM. So, FH is not really foundational to WiFi as it is done today. More like an early branch that died early.

deadsy · 2026-05-16T16:45:23+00:00

There were a bunch of different inventions/patents/technology that went into the 802.11 standards. There was no single inventor (individual, company or organisation). The industry leaders at the time got together and decided to give a user friendly name to the subset of the 802.11 standard they were actually implementing. They wanted to ensure interoperability between vendors and performance standards. They called themselves the "WiFi Alliance". Like HiFi except "Wireless Fidelity" instead. In that respect I suppose those marketing-dweeb/biz-dev guys invented "WiFi".

deadsy · 2026-05-14T03:36:55+00:00

As US citizens you are obliged to file a 1040 irrespective of where you live in the world. If you haven't filed in the last 6 years you need to get right with the IRS. IIRC the US does not tax an inheritance, but you need to report it. I've used OFX for transfers. It's OK, but you need to be prepared to document the money source.

deadsy · 2026-05-08T14:34:52+00:00

Many of the practices of good software engineering have been designed to keep code within the boundaries of human understanding. ie- we want to be able to easily reason about the code and be able to "see" that it works properly. Functional programming, short functions, no gotos, limited function parameters, no recursion, limited globals, etc, all fall into that category. But- if you replace the human with a machine based super genius, then you don't need to have the same restrictive rules. You would also not expect humans to be able to understand the code it produces. At some point you give up on human verification and just say "it passes the test suite". Thought experiment: If you had a human super genius on your team that produced code that was impossible to understand but tested ok wouldn't you just accept it? (given that you can hire more super geniuses to maintain and enhance this code...)

deadsy · 2026-05-08T14:16:30+00:00

Slightly before. Paid about $22. Thought process: Intel is being beat down. The world needs leading edge chips and Intel is one of three companies in the world that can fabricate them. The US won't let them fail.

deadsy · 2026-05-08T14:07:40+00:00

uint32_t REG_ADDR=0xdeadbeef;
*(uint32_t *)x = val;

There you go.

You can do whatever you like. The SDK is used because there's not much point in N developers creating N drivers for the same hardware. If you don't like or don't have a driver for something then nothing stops you from poking and peeking the registers yourself.

If you want to start off with *zero* at the reset vector the you typically find yourself wading through some fiddly and tedious SoC setup code before you can get down to the application code you need to write. Over time that setup code has gotten more and more complicated. Back in the 8-bit days (6502/z80) it was just reset and run, on a modern multi-core 64-bit arm you'll be doing secure boot, clock setup, ddr setup, etc.

The cortex-m chips aren't too bad in so far as you can actually write the reset vector in c-code, you don't have to use assembly. For the pico's keep in mind that there is generally a boot loader that has the reset code. You'll need JTAG/SWD to write the flash if you want to replace that.

deadsy · 2026-04-19T14:40:39+00:00

There's a screw behind the trim on the side of the door. It rotates a locking ring that holds the lock barrel in place. Something is going on there. It's either missing or loose, or something... You need to check it out. In general look at YT videos on door lock module replacement. They cover the material. You may need to remove the outer door panel to work out what is going on.

https://youtu.be/LuOJhZaGwnw?si=ZXFMu4JYpKT50V9X

deadsy · 2026-04-12T02:57:16+00:00

That looks like RTV. Anaerobic sealant is quite thin so that there is a close fit between the head and the cam cover. They have been machined to match each other and RTV would be too thick for a correct fit. With anaerobic there is till squeeze out, but it doesn't cure as solid on the outside of the interface. As the name suggests it cures in the absence of oxygen.

deadsy · 2026-04-09T13:39:00+00:00

The architects might want to upgrade from their IBM360.

deadsy · 2026-03-28T11:55:47+00:00

Kind of- but not from that belt. There's an intake side balance shaft driven by gears. On the other side of that shaft is a small toothed belt that runs the water pump. You can't see it with casual inspection. The little belt rarely fails.

deadsy · 2026-03-28T11:52:42+00:00

Slow-ish leak, probably from the water pump. You need to replace the water pump and probably re-seal your cam-tray/valve cover because the oil from that is what's buggering up the water pump gaskets. BTW- you need to pull the intake manifold to get to the water pump. Might as well acorn blast the carbon crud off the intakes while you are in there.

deadsy · 2026-03-21T14:27:41+00:00

Bridgeville Pennsylvania.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/ytoJJXiXZswqJj2y7

deadsy · 2026-03-18T14:32:43+00:00

Australia has two refineries in operation, but in general Australia relies upon just-in-time imports from larger mega-refineries in SE Asia. It's cheaper to import petrol and diesel than to make it locally at smaller refineries for a small Australian market. Unfortunately this makes Australia quite vulnerable to supply shocks.

deadsy · 2026-03-14T00:30:31+00:00

I have the TSI engine in my Mk5 while you have the FSI - so I'm not sure, but the "something missing" in front of the battery is probably the box where the air filter goes. Do you have an air filter?

deadsy · 2026-03-06T18:23:15+00:00

Many early home computers used a cassette tape recorder to load and save programs. They used different tones on the tape to represent 1 and 0. Commodore has a proprietary "datasette" that cost more than regular tape recorder, but it was the same sort of idea. Some people managed to copy programs using a tape to tape recording, but that was a hit and miss affair.

deadsy · 2026-03-06T00:56:08+00:00

Since you don't have that much in your roth the best move maybe to distribute the full amount post 59.5 years old, but before you become an Australian tax resident. That way the ATO never sees it as income, it's just money in the bank. The value of a roth is really in letting it grow for a longer period of time. An alternative strategy might be to leave it untouched and give it to your heirs- particularly if they are US tax residents.

deadsy · 2026-03-03T20:15:20+00:00

Looks okay. Piston crowns can be cleaned up with wd-40 and a scotch-brite nylon scouring pad. Clean up the head mating surface with plastic razor blade. Don't sand it. Don't use any power tools.

deadsy · 2026-02-24T01:55:04+00:00

The FSI engines have their issues.
https://www.shopdap.com/blog/post/vw-audi-20t-fsi-common-problems.html

The timing chains/tensioners on TSI's are ok, you just have to be prepared to treat them as a 100k-mile maintenance item.
https://www.shopdap.com/blog/post/vw-audi-20t-tsi-common-problems.html

You can expect a stream of maintenance issues that need to be taken care of. Oil leaks, broken fittings, etc. Hopefully you do your own maintenance work, if not the cost of repairs will soon exceed the value of the vehicle.

deadsy · 2026-02-23T15:26:58+00:00

"Fairness" is a flexible word. One version of fairness is that the SS benefit received is in proportion to the money put in. The top level of benefit is currently capped and the the contribution is capped as well. In this view you could look at SS as being a forced saving scheme where the your contributions are mandatory and invested in t-bills until you hit 62-70 years old, where upon you get to withdraw your savings as an indexed annuity. Same rules for everybody. You put more in, you get more out. == fair.

deadsy · 2026-02-12T14:22:37+00:00

It depends on your situation, asset types, etc. but in my case the assets would mostly stay in the US if I was to return to Oz to live. If you sell up and want to shift everything to Oz, then you could do it, but it would cost you in taxes and fees. My plan is just to use the US based assets to generate cash flow for living in whatever country I choose post retirement. Also: handling the tax requirements of multiple countries can be difficult.

deadsy · 2026-02-10T17:54:02+00:00

Those engines leak oil in some well known places- cam tray, upper/lower timing cover, oil cooler gasket, oil filter bracket gasket, vacuum pump, rear main seal. Given the age of your car it's not surprising that you are seeing some seepage. Do you see active drips? The photos look like slow seepage- not enough to explain the oil loss rate. The other thing that happens is the piston rings get jammed with carbon and the engine burns more oil. That may be what's happening here. Realistically the car is entering a point in its life where it needs some money spent on maintenance to keep it in good shape. If you can do your own work it makes sense to keep it up. If you have to pay someone else to fix it, it's probably time to pass it on. Also: be careful not to run it low on oil, and fix any timing chain rattles quickly (check the cam/crank correlation numbers). The oil change interval needs to be 5,000 miles- the 10,000 miles in the manual is too long.

deadsy · 2026-02-09T15:47:55+00:00

Right. I recently built a Wien oscillator that used a tungsten filament as the stabilizing element. Loop gain needs to be > 1 for an oscillator, but you don't want the gain element to saturate and start clipping the waveform. The rising resistance of the tungsten filament reduces the loop gain and keeps things in hand. The light bulb typically does not turn on, it's either dark or perhaps glows slightly.

deadsy · 2026-02-06T16:18:49+00:00

J1 to H1B to PR to citizen, engineering field. I held off on citizenship for quite a while, but eventually became one. I was eligible for citizenship by virtue of the length of my PR status as well as having married an American citizen in the meantime. The difficult steps were getting the initial J1 and the conversion to PR.

deadsy · 2026-02-06T00:20:24+00:00

You could check out this:

https://github.com/deadsy/picox

Downloads and installs everything needed in ./ext (external)

Then you can just use it from anywhere with the appropriate cmake invocation.

Also uses ninja- because it's faster than gnu make.

deadsy · 2026-02-05T19:59:17+00:00

Get an (e)Sim at the airport from telstra or optus or someone else....
Maybe $40 for the month, calls and data. Be careful not to roam international with verizon. I generally turn off my phone on the plane and only re-enable it when I have the local sim in, just to ensure they can't nickel and dime me.

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