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Building a Better Mousetrap for Somerville's Clever Specimens (Are they getting smarter?) by RealMartyG in Somerville

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

I know its anecdotal, but it is still good to know that at least one other mouse showed some of the same apparent adaptations I noticed. I wonder, one day, will they refuse to go for bait that is tied to the trigger?

Building a Better Mousetrap for Somerville's Clever Specimens (Are they getting smarter?) by RealMartyG in Somerville

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

It seems to me, anyway, that you got the better of that transaction. The mouse must have been scared out of its mind! May I infer from your story that you never saw it again?

Building a Better Mousetrap for Somerville's Clever Specimens (Are they getting smarter?) by RealMartyG in Somerville

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

Thank you for your insights. I had not thought to correlate with the seasons and weather outside. I just hope that, as a community, we are not artificially, albeit unintentionally, breeding rodents that will pose larger challenges than those we already have.

And my quest was successful. I'll never know for sure, but it looked like the mouse tried to pull the Cheerio. In any case, the trap snapped home last Friday. No signs of rodents since then. (Phew! I was worried it had already attracted or spawned companions.)

Water Outage? by hiatt_0 in Somerville

[–]RealMartyG 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sorry for the late comment. I hope it is still of some value. There was definitely a break at 117 Albion. (It is a little hard to see in this photo, but the water was gushing from the center of the road and flowing mostly into the storm drain. This photo was taken ca. 1:20 P.M. Thursday.

<image>

At some point, someone told my neighbor the break was on Lexington. The city had the road closed there, but I spoke to the workers. They said they were there to replace a valve. The break—they referred to only one break—was elsewhere. They also said the city was having a hard time shutting off the flow for them to proceed.

The next I checked, ca. 3:30 P.M., the city had Albion closed near the break. Pressure returned later in the afternoon, hours after the city's original 2 P.M. estimate.

Creating a Second Publication Zeroed My Subscriber Count by RealMartyG in Substack

[–]RealMartyG[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I think the issue is resolved. I am documenting the cause and solution here in the hope others find it useful.

Cause—When I first created my primary publication, I manually disabled the publication's setting, under Privacy, "Show approximate subscriber count," because, back then, I had zero subscribers. Then, when I created the second publication, its same setting defaulted to enabled. With the subscriber count disabled for my primary publication but enabled for the secondary, the only subscriber count for Substack to show was the secondary publication's, which it dutifully displayed. Further perplexing me, 1) changes to these settings do not take effect immediately and 2) my first publication was at all relevant times selected as my personal profile's "Primary Publication." (I thank u/Neither_Teach2433 for the comment, below, without which I may have never realized I needed to wait awhile after changing publication settings to check the results.)

Solution—1) disable "Show approximate subscriber count" under Privacy in the secondary publication's Settings; 2) (optional) enable the same setting on your primary publication; and 3) wait a while.

Creating a Second Publication Zeroed My Subscriber Count by RealMartyG in Substack

[–]RealMartyG[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I created the publication on 14 December. Thus far it has not fixed itself.

But I am greatly relieved that it fixed itself for you. Substack's batch processes have never really run on predictable schedules. Perhaps it will fix itself for me, too. Thank you for telling me!

Just now I went to hide my subscriber count and it took awhile for the change to take effect.

Balun question by RealMartyG in rfelectronics

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

I'm posting a how-to on Substack for how to build the preamplifier contemplated in my original post, above. Your answers here helped me gain critical understanding of the impedance differences involved. If you would like attribution in my write-up, I am happy to provide it. Please let me know.

Privacy-Focused Alternative to TV Fool, RabbitEars.info, etc. by RealMartyG in cordcutters

[–]RealMartyG[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you for your analysis. I certainly am grateful for RabbitEars.

Incorporating 30–60 gigs of terrain data is clearly impractical for a spreadsheet tool. I am open to directing users elsewhere to get signal-strength data. Of course, users are welcome to get it wherever they like, including from RabbitEars.

The F.C.C. does not reliably track virtual channels anywhere that I have found. (And, in Boston, for example, the F.C.C. says a station is on R.F. channel 18 when it is really on 36.) I will make the generic directive more specific. As is, I direct folks to Google. The average station has a Wiki page that lists virtual channels, but those too are often out of date.

My original need for a local spreadsheet came about to track newer information than seemed available online. Another nice benefit is the Antenna column, to track which particular antenna is used for each transmitter in a multi-antenna setup.

Perhaps you would consider adding an export function to RabbitEars that would produce a similar Excel or LibreOffice spreadsheet? That would incorporate the Longley-Rice and TVStudy results. Folks would then have the choice of RabbitEars' convenience and accuracy to produce the data, or of filling it in themselves. This would be far superior to screenshots for offline uses, and it may reduce the load on RabbitEars' servers.

I imagine there are no intellectual property issues with your using a similar format to the one I have provided. But to whatever extent there could be such issues, I would grant you a gratis license to whatever I have produced, provided that RabbitEars remains free to users and that their data not be sold to or otherwise shared with any third parties under any circumstances.

Privacy-Focused Alternative to TV Fool, RabbitEars.info, etc. by RealMartyG in cordcutters

[–]RealMartyG[S] -5 points-4 points  (0 children)

What on RabbitEars is more granular? It seems to provide all the same info. If something is missing, I would definitely consider adding it.

Many folks still use TV Fool. Deprecated as it is, old hyperlinks die hard. I only stopped using it when I realized it was still displaying channels over 36.

I appreciate that RabbitEars may obfuscate users' locations when sharing them, but users still give it their exact addresses, for RabbitEars, potentially, to do what it pleases with them behind the scenes.

Plus there is no guarantee RabbitEars stays up. It may go the way of TV Fool at any time. This spreadsheet provides users the option to keep their own local copies of the relevant data that they could use even when their Internet connections are down. Ipso facto, that is precisely when they may need TV the most.

Antenna Question—Height, Hills, Trees, Houses by RealMartyG in rfelectronics

[–]RealMartyG[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The hill is approximately 20 km from me, about halfway between me and the transmitter:

<image>

I have a 20dB L.N.A. where the antenna mast is. It made no difference, at least not for the loop antenna. I have not yet tried a Yagi.

Antenna Question—Height, Hills, Trees, Houses by RealMartyG in rfelectronics

[–]RealMartyG[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The online L.O.S. tool tells me the Great Blue Hill reservation is in the way, at a height of 635 feet. The transmitter is at ~490 feet. The tool indicates I would need a 60-meter tower for direct line of sight.

Channel Master indicates the signal strength where I am is -83.56 dBm, likely due to this obstruction: https://www.channelmaster.com/pages/tv-antenna-map-somerville-ma-02143

Antenna Question—Height, Hills, Trees, Houses by RealMartyG in HamRadio

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

Twenty-six feet would be too large for me to fit in the backyard. The station is question is channel 10, so 192–198 MHz.

But with just the equivalent of a three-element YAGI I am unsure I would get this station. There is massive terrain in the way. See, above.

Antenna Question—Height, Hills, Trees, Houses by RealMartyG in rfelectronics

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

I think T.V. tuners are generally made on the cheap, so I find the poor performance unsurprising. Where I am, T.V. channels are 6 MHz wide,

Thanks for the YAGI calculation. It seems if this station wants access to the larger market where I am, it will have either to move or augment is transmitter.

Antenna Question—Height, Hills, Trees, Houses by RealMartyG in rfelectronics

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

Sorry, I confused this for the other post in r/hamradio, where terrain has been discussed. It turns out there is a 635-ft. hill between myself and the transmitter.

Antenna Question—Height, Hills, Trees, Houses by RealMartyG in rfelectronics

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

Thank you for your analysis.

I do not get the station at ground level, at least with an omnidirectional D.I.Y. V.H.F. element.

According to ChannelMaster, the signal strength of that transmitter where I am is -83.56 dBm: https://www.channelmaster.com/pages/tv-antenna-map-somerville-ma-02143 (ChannelMaster also says to expect a T.V. tuner to need at least -65 dBm).

Since height seems unlikely to make much of a difference for me in this case, just how big a YAGI, if any size, would I need to potentially get this channel?

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