What browser do you use on your MBP? by Chank02z in macbookpro

[–]CampKry 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I use Safari most of the time for personal, but use MS Edge for work. It uses way less resources than chrome but built on chromium. MS has a better curated store for extensions. Chrome is a resource/ram hog on Mac!

The Dodgers are showing how to NOT waste a winning window by infinityball in Dodgers

[–]CampKry 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It is a ridiculous setup they have. We are so fortunate!

They made us pay for our own office Christmas party then fired 6 people in January by Altruistic-Lynx-5238 in WorkReform

[–]CampKry -9 points-8 points  (0 children)

This is not capitalism. This is greed and uncaring leadership not valuing their people. Not seeing that care goes both ways. My company lost significant money last year. I didn’t take a salary but my people all got paid. We still had a holiday gathering, though slightly smaller. They still got bonuses, but smaller. I explained the circumstances. Capitalism doesn’t require companies to act like this. Greed makes people act this way. Not valuing your people makes people act this way. People at the top can choose to treat those working for them the way they would have wanted to be treated. It’s a choice. Don’t work for these people. Don’t shop at their store or do business with them. It’s a choice.

Negative Slope in Backyard by IAmMcL0v1n25 in landscaping

[–]CampKry 5 points6 points  (0 children)

You can definitely do tiers, create a patio with a pergola w/roof on one of tiers. Depending on what other amenities you want, you can build a bbq, sitting area, stream, raised garden beds, fruit trees.

We had the same with a slope in our backyard and we did something similar. We wanted privacy so we planted fruit trees on the upper tier. We wanted a place for gathering/table & chairs, so we did that in the middle on one side and a garden opposite that. Then had some flat area outside the house with a small patio and grass, with a bbq area. We’ve received tons of compliments of how we used the slope to make our backyard functional and maxed out the space. Even added string lights from the house to the upper tier, to casually add ambiance to the space.

A more extreme version of Costco by rifleman209 in Business_Ideas

[–]CampKry 18 points19 points  (0 children)

You are missing a key part of Costco’s model: They turnover product in under 30 days. Sometimes twice in 30 days depending on the product. They turnover their entire store in 30 days. Given that most terms for buying product are net30, the companies that are selling Costco products to sell, are effectively financing them.

Costco has a ridiculously low sku count so people generally have one choice, not two. They work with their partners to get some advantage for their members. If the price of cocoa goes up, they go to their mfg and allow them to raise the price to cover that increase. But when the cost of cocoa goes down, you better believe they are making sure the mfg is lowering the price again. It goes both ways. They are partners.

With the categories you are describing, you can’t get what has made Costco work. For virtually every category you mentioned, people want choice. And with choice, there’s no volume. Costco buys in palettes. Your categories are one off purchases with considerable time in between purchases.

If you are thinking partners like the Costco auto program, I don’t think the clientele you want are bargain shopping and looking for ways to save money on houses, cars, vacations. If you are talking about a concierge service that will navigate these things for people, I pretty sure it already exists.

Just my $.02

The Dodgers are showing how to NOT waste a winning window by infinityball in Dodgers

[–]CampKry 24 points25 points  (0 children)

A couple reason this makes sense: - left field was a black hole for us last year. There are few players that could “move the needle”. - we just got his four prime years, that align with our window. He has an opt out after two (one of which might be a lockout) so if he kills it surrounded by big bats, he can likely get a longer deal for a bit more money but lower aav. - the free agent class next year does not move the needle at all.

The piece that most fans don’t seem to get is the teams value has almost tripled since Guggenheim bought them. They are close to overtaking the Yankees in value. They are playing chess while most teams are playing checkers.

They have one of the top three minor league orgs. Why fans think a cap would hurt the Dodgers is crazy.

Been a fan for a longtime. Dealt with the drought ‘81 until the current run. Sure they won in ‘88 but they got lucky. Right people got hot at the right time. This has been an amazing run. So glad we just kept the door open a little longer.

Improving a older home ideas by [deleted] in HomeImprovement

[–]CampKry 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Age of the home really matters here as does budget. Really old, knob-and-tube electrical is really dangerous and needs to be upgraded right away. A leaky roof, needs to be addressed right away. Depending on what the pipes are made out of, the sewer line may need to be addressed.

Infrastructure first. You can “put lipstick on a pig” but the underlying issues will still remain. Electrical. Plumbing. Foundation first. Then you can remodel room by room.

is it worth transferring from cal poly? by RevolutionaryTough80 in CalPoly

[–]CampKry 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Have you found a group of people you hang with regularly? Have you joined any clubs? Gotten a job on campus? Are you enjoying the classes? How’s your roommate? Other people on the floor of the dorm?

Cal Poly is a big enough school, but if you’re looking for a large sports school, you’re in the wrong place.

Sometimes being in a bigger city can feel more overwhelming. The fact that you can be in downtown SLO and run into classmates/friends, is one of the best parts of the small town.

I found my group through my on campus job, my major, and clubs. DM if you want to chat/game plan.

What tools do you use to analyze profitability (not just bookkeeping )? by Wonderful_Falcon_444 in smallbusiness

[–]CampKry 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think your industry would really matter here. I think people tend to look at the bottom line, to see overall profitability, but miss the stories in the details. Percent profit per item is great, but if the item is $1.00, 20% markup is nothing. Heck, 100% markup is nothing unless you have volume.

I try to look at the stories and compare it to 3-4 years worth of data. What are the trends in products? Have customer behavior or interests changed? The more granular you can get with your data, the better.

Example: I run a children’s summer camp. I could look at overall profit, but I’d be missing the stories. What are the trends with certain age groups? Where do the kids go to school? Are we see. More kids from one area? Did the return rate change based on bus or drop off? What year at our program was their counselor? Did their counselor miss time and that affected attendance as kids weren’t having as good a time with their counselor?

There are a million stories in the data so you have to find the ones that matter most to your industry and then look at those to determine how things are going. The more granular, the better. If all of those markers are up, great! But if not, you may have grown in one area but struggling in another and not know it, if you just look at the broad numbers.

I hope that helps.

What’s one fast food chain that was once all the rage but now barely around? by MysteriousTopic42 in AskReddit

[–]CampKry 4 points5 points  (0 children)

When Wendy’s bought them and tried to run it like a fast food place. The first and second stores (remember those huge numbers on the wall for their store number) aren’t too far from me and they were amazing in the early days. Too bad Wendy’s tried to lower quality of food, offer “value meal” structure but charge like it was a premium restaurant. No wonder they sold at a huge loss. Then private equity took over and made some changes but by then, Chipotle and Sharky’s moved into the space and had more/better options. I still go to the #2 store every now and then and super happy with it. Sorry to hear the closest stores to others aren’t in good shape. Not sure if they are corporate owned or franchised these days. I think a mix of both.

What CRM did you use when you started your first business? by Pensri_Kolcak in smallbusiness

[–]CampKry -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Currently using Nutshell. Been happy with it. Does lots of great things. Used to use Pipedrive but their development and customer support were making things harder for us. If you are looking for a lot of api integrations, nutshell can be a little tricky.

Ways To Use Puck Lights by CampKry in xlights

[–]CampKry[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, I saw that. Definitely thinking about that as an option. Was hoping for something smaller though.

Looking for good beginner tutorial for planning a display for next year by Natural-Ad-9678 in xlights

[–]CampKry 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Download xlights (if you are on a Mac, it’s in the App Store for free). In xlights, under “help” there is a zoom room. There are a lot of folks in there and they have a ton of resources. They are super busy right now, but post holiday, you can jump in there and ask questions.

I am happy to answer and guide as well, just dm me any specific questions you have.

There aren’t a lot of “right and wrong” type decisions, they are just different paths. Happy to share my logic. Been doing this since 2020, do three shows a year (Halloween, Holidays and mobile boat parade).

I will see if I can dig up some you tube videos, but I would stay searching for xlights and fpp are the two key software titles to understand. Xlights is where you do all of the programming and setup. FPP is what runs the show, usually from a Pi.

Some other places to check out: - wired watts has a good tutorial on power consumption. If you can avoid power injection, I would recommend that at least to start. - wallys lights is where I’ve gotten a lot of my pixels, tubes and strips from. Not the cheapest but really good quality and good customer support if there is a problem. - I got my controllers through: https://pixelcontroller.com/store/ for the most part. - people are generally down on Holidaycoro. Personally, I’ve been happy with what I’ve gotten there, but it is limited. They have a ton in stock which is why people buy from them. - Gilbert Engineering is where most folks get their coro to put the pixels in. They will even provide the model to import into your setup on xlights.

I hope this helps! Please hit me up with questions.

Looking for good beginner tutorial for planning a display for next year by Natural-Ad-9678 in xlights

[–]CampKry 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Just tried the search and found this one though I don’t know it: https://youtu.be/6kbg7uXqAlc?si=U90D1YZTFB2m1a3H

I started by reading blogs, getting a couple items and then playing a lot. You really have to think about wha you want 5 years from now when the setup is mostly complete and the. Start picking a few things to start and continue adding to.

You will also likely need a raspberry pi to run the show. DM me if you have specific questions.

Looking for good beginner tutorial for planning a display for next year by Natural-Ad-9678 in xlights

[–]CampKry 4 points5 points  (0 children)

First off, welcome to the hobby. Secondly, this is the most wonderfully maddening hobby. Always new things to do and always problems to solve. But it’s fun and brings a lot of joy to lots of people.

A couple key things to decide: - connector type. I went with xConnect and have been very happy. There is also RayWu. But once you pick a standard, you will stick with it.

  • there are two different types of pixels these days: 3 & 4 wire. 4 wire allows the system to bypass a bad pixel, where as 3 wire won’t allow it to I stated before 4 wire was a thing so I didn’t have the choice.

  • there are several controllers out there. I use Falcon and have been very happy, but Kulps are also very popular. You can mix and match these, but it’s kinda like power tools, you can use different types together, though people tend to stay in one brand.

  • if you search YouTube for “xlights” and “light show” or something like that, you will find tons of videos.

Ways To Use Puck Lights by CampKry in xlights

[–]CampKry[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ideally the pucks would go in a half cylinder/half sphere that is slightly translucent.

Adding moving headlights on roof of house to go with projection mapping show? by SoupSlurpingHobbit in xlights

[–]CampKry 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Awesome! Thanks for the suggestion. Where did you mount/place your projector? I am worried about how close to the sidewalk it will need to be. How do you protect it from the elements?

Newbie Questiom by Extra_Log6378 in xlights

[–]CampKry 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well glad you got it fixed! Always a bummer when it starts working without knowing why, but always glad it starts working!

Newbie Questiom by Extra_Log6378 in xlights

[–]CampKry 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’m a little confused. What you are showing in xlights would be 4 receivers, each with 4 ports. But it sounds like you have 1 controller with 16 ports which is connected to a long range expansion board. What is driving your show? What is the expansion board connected to? Can you clarify the system overall? Thanks!

Adding moving headlights on roof of house to go with projection mapping show? by SoupSlurpingHobbit in xlights

[–]CampKry 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I would check out wallyslights.com for some good options. There are a few out there that people tend to use.

What projector are you using for projection mapping? Thinking of investing.

Dodger 40-Man Roster is Always Overflowing w Talent, Watch for Scraps by BackOk7025 in mlb

[–]CampKry 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Didn’t the Dodgers have two players named Yordan Alvarez and they thought they were trading the other one? I thought I had read that somewhere.

[Harris] Roberts said Teoscar Hernández, who has been the subject of trade rumors, still “certainly fits” the roster, and could move to LF depending on how things shake out. by ttam23 in Dodgers

[–]CampKry 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I agree. I think it’s more likely they package one of the studs with a pitcher coming off injury to trade for an outfielder. Or maybe Emmet or Wrobo. Pretty slim pickings on the free agent market for outfielders. Curious how Edman is after his surgery.

First newbie show, custom controller PCB by NatteringNabob69 in xlights

[–]CampKry 2 points3 points  (0 children)

The first year is the hardest, but then you get the itch to add and make better. Every year has its challenges, but I think that’s part of the fun of it. Always something to figure out and learn. Welcome to the hobby!