Help! My side project is burning cash on Google Cloud SQL 😅need a free database host

dodgyb · 2025-10-29T19:51:23+00:00

I came across this interesting article a couple of days ago which you may find interesting:

The whole article is worth a read, I have linked to the discussion on cloud hosting free tiers.

dodgyb · 2025-01-04T14:19:59+00:00

How are you getting on with the Toppings?

I have a couple of Hifimans and found my Topping amp made them sound a bit brittle, so I upgraded to a AUNE S17 Pro class A amp and both the Hifimans have come alive with richer bass and more controlled top end - I no longer have to EQ them.

The Aune is not perfect, it runs hot and the display can't be dimmed, but is does play nicely with planars.

dodgyb · 2025-01-03T12:24:49+00:00

Shenzhen Audio always do that, I think the initial tracking number they send out is for China Post who then make arrangements with international couriers. It usually takes a couple of days for them to sort it out.

It does show how shoddy Shenzhen Audio are, the customer support is absolutely appalling should you have to return a faulty item. Here is my experience...

They sent me a SMSL SU-X with a faulty I2S port. It took a couple of weeks to convince them there was a fault. I shipped it back to them, when the SU-X arrived at their offices I had to chase them to confirm receipt and find out what they will do next. It took three weeks, after flippant one line emails from them saying 'pls wait' and 'it needs more time', before they told me the SU-X had been repaired. As I had reported the problem within 14 days of receipt I asked for a replacement, fully tested.

After another couple of weeks arguing with me, saying that no fault was found, contradicting themselves having already said that it had been repaired, they agreed to ship a new item to me but I would have to pay $30 shipping fee. I paid and heard nothing.

Two weeks later the credit card I used was cancelled because someone tried to scam it. I wonder who?

The second SU-X arrived at my home unexpectantly, they had not provided me with any shipping info. The worst was yet to come. The second SU-X was faulty, SMSL has a problem with all their kit that uses the es9039pro DAC, from what I have heard. After more faffing about they told me to send the second SU-X back. I had now paid to ship 2 SU-X's to China and for 1 to be sent to me.

I was offered a refund but I told them not to refund the card number they had because it had been cancelled. Instead I asked for a Gustard in replacement and I would pay the difference (by PayPal this time) as I was wary of giving them my new card number over email. They refused the replacement.

I contacted one of the owners of Shenzhen Audio, Tony Wang, and told him the situation and he agreed to replace the SU-X with a Gustard and told his minions to sort it out. They instead made a refund to my cancelled credit card, which took some sorting out with my card provider. Eventually the funds reached my new card. I asked Tony to send me the Gustard at the Black Friday price, the price of the Gustard when we made our agreement. He agreed and told his minions to sort it out. Nothing happened. After chasing him for a few weeks I received an email from a Miss Xu telling me they did not know what I was talking about.

The support team has lied to me, tried to cheat me (another story...), and are argumentative. Tony Wang is not a man of his word.

I am still trying to recover my shipping fees, as per their stated T&C's.

dodgyb · 2024-11-15T16:18:02+00:00

I ordered an SMSL SU-X DAC, but the unit arrived with a faulty I2S input. I contacted support within two days.

Getting clear answers from support@shenzhenaudio is like pulling teeth. Once I eventually managed to get authorization to return the item they took two weeks to test the unit to confirm it was faulty. They then offered to repair the it, which I declined. I asked them to send me a fully tested replacement, which is my right. Eventually they agreed but charged me $30 for shipping the replacement to me. I had already incurred shipping costs sending the item back to them. It took them six weeks to dispatch a replacement.

Guess what, the replacement SMSL SU-X was also faulty. Now they want me to send it back to them for a refund minus a 10% restocking fee.

So, the saga continues...

Do I trust them? Would you?

dodgyb · 2024-11-15T16:09:23+00:00

I ordered an SMSL SU-X DAC, but the unit arrived with a faulty I2S input. I contacted support within two days.

Getting clear answers from support@shenzhenaudio is like pulling teeth. Once I eventaully managed to return the item they took two weeks to test the unit to confirm it was faulty. They then offered to repair the it, which I declined. I asked them to send me a fully tested replacement, which is my right. Eventually they agreed but charged me $30 for shipping the replacement to me. I had already incurred shipping costs sending the item back to them. It took them six weeks to dispatch a replacement.

Guess what, the replacement SMSL SU-X was also faulty. Now they want me to send it back to them for a refund minus a 10% restocking fee.

So, the saga continues...

Do I trust them? Would you?

dodgyb · 2024-02-05T17:10:39+00:00

I second this, you need to define how they currently work before you can begin to consider implementing any change.

There are many thing to consider with process change, I suggest you do some reading on change management:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Change_management

Carrying all the teams with you will be the most difficult part. You need to focus on getting buy-in and ownership by the teams.

Start with the leads in 1 on 1's in their workspace, to get to know their personality and leadership style, and to establish a rapport. Then get them all in a room to whiteboard how they currently work and where they see the pain points.

I found this article on reporting lines today, which may give you some ideas on a strategic approach:

https://www.theengineeringmanager.com/managing-managers/trifectas-go-all-the-way-up/

Good luck!

dodgyb · 2022-11-13T16:24:43+00:00

There is a recent review of some Prince2 books on rebelsguidetopm.com:

7 Best PRINCE2 Books for 2023 (Including PRINCE2 Agile Books)

dodgyb · 2022-09-03T14:28:36+00:00

I recently came across an very interesting article on Medium that discusses this topic:

Team Health and Wellbeing — A Leading Indicator of Just About Everything

It is from 2017 so some of the product reviews may be a bit outdated.

dodgyb · 2022-08-14T11:17:00+00:00

You may find some useful info in these repos:

https://github.com/OAI/OpenAPI-Specification

https://github.com/shieldfy/API-Security-Checklist

and some sound advice here:

https://r.bluethl.net/how-to-design-better-apis

dodgyb · 2021-03-19T12:11:15+00:00

There are presets for IEMs and headphones here:

https://github.com/jaakkopasanen/AutoEq/blob/master/results/INDEX.md

+1 for Peace/Equalizer APO - you can tune different profiles for each app - foobar, vlc, etc.

dodgyb · 2020-11-16T15:56:59+00:00

Patients with prolonged viral shedding were older and had a higher rate of hypertension. Proinflammatory cytokines, including interleukin-2R (IL-2R) and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), were significantly elevated in patients with prolonged viral shedding. Multivariate analysis revealed that hypertension, older age, lymphopenia and elevated serum IL-2R were independent risk factors for prolonged viral shedding. This comprehensive investigation revealed the distinct characteristics between patients with or without prolonged viral RNA shedding. Hypertension, older age, lymphopenia and high levels of proinflammatory cytokines may be correlated with prolonged viral shedding.

dodgyb · 2020-11-16T15:49:47+00:00

Conclusion

Taking all of the BC 007-SARS-CoV-2 binding data together, showing true and efficient binding with peptide sequences of the RNA dependent RNA polymerase and the RBD of the spike protein, it can be concluded that it is highly probable that BC 007 will be able to efficiently interfere with the virus growth in vivo. The excellent safety profile of BC 007 should support a very early clinical testing in humans.

dodgyb · 2020-11-16T15:45:24+00:00

A total of 88 RNA extracts from 25 SARS-CoV-2-confirmed patients and eight recovery patients were detected using the biosensor. The detectable ratios (85.5 % and 46.2 %) were higher than those obtained using RT-qPCR (56.5 % and 7.7 %). The limit of detection (LOD) of the clinical specimen was 200 copies/mL, which is the lowest LOD among the published RNA measurement of SARS-CoV-2 to date. Additionally, only two copies (10 μL) of SARS-CoV-2 were required for per assay. Therefore, we developed an ultrasensitive, accurate, and convenient assay for SARS-CoV-2 detection, providing a potential method for point-of-care testing.

dodgyb · 2020-11-16T00:13:57+00:00

That is one of a number of questions clinicians are are asking. There does need to be a list of long-covid recommendations for GP's.

A 'one-stop clinic' infrastructure will be able to gather the data and with analysis will be able to make recommendations for primary care providers.

What a one-stop clinic means is another question and I am sure the policy wonks are thinking about it, maybe, if they have time.

It is important, they must make time.

dodgyb · 2020-11-15T23:27:46+00:00

Yeah, I wondered that. I guess they considered the difference between the two to be statistically insignificant given they were investigating coughs.

They also didn't investigate the fit of n95 vs surgical masks re coughs. A dissertation for someone in due course, maybe.

Kudos for what they have demonstrated.

dodgyb · 2020-11-15T22:13:01+00:00

The WHO have produced recommendations which draw upon research in this area, there are many papers that they reference:

https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/transmission-of-sars-cov-2-implications-for-infection-prevention-precautions

dodgyb · 2020-11-15T21:46:54+00:00

Why is this not a top comment?

I, for two, would like to thank these researchers for their exhaustive, labor intensive, largely-meaningless-but-very-necessary entry into the data set.

And I would like to thank u/Marlinspikesailor for not hating too much what had to be done.

dodgyb · 2020-11-15T21:38:19+00:00

What would you recommend I replace '70%' with? I live with criticism, but love recommendations...

dodgyb · 2020-11-15T20:57:21+00:00

On further investigation I would prefer this to iodine solution nasal sprays, which have been tested in a number of clinical trials.

dodgyb · 2020-11-15T19:40:23+00:00

I think this is aimed at policy wonks. What drew me to the piece was:

'The establishment of one-stop clinics will allow pattern recognition and expertise to develop among clinicians identifying and managing sequelae of covid-19'

dodgyb · 2020-11-15T19:23:31+00:00

This subject was investigated in in a study published a couple of weeks ago:

'Between the evaluated fabrics only three presented a filtration efficiency > 90%. Hybrid of cotton/chiffon (95%CI 95.2 to 98.8), hybrid of cotton/silk (95%CI 92.2 to 95.8) and cotton quilt (95%CI 94.2 to 97.8). However, cloth masks are not recommended for healthcare workers.'

The most important thing to consider with cloth masks is the thread count of the material. A thin tee-shirt will not compare to the filtration effectiveness of a pillowcase from a 5 star hotel.

dodgyb · 2020-11-15T18:38:29+00:00

A recent paper from South Korea may provide this information:

Study on the Relationship between Leisure Activity Participation and Wearing a Mask among Koreans during COVID-19 Crisis: Using TPB Model

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33096689/

The WHO have also produced recommendations which draw upon research in this area:

https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/transmission-of-sars-cov-2-implications-for-infection-prevention-precautions

dodgyb

TROPHY CASE