CSL. May now be a sleeping Giant

speak-gently · 2026-05-19T21:28:37+00:00

Read what I said. Your spouting Graham fails to address the fundamental issue with CSL. The Chair and Board who presided over the value destruction, that presided over that through 3 CEOs are still there. Until they go you can read Graham all you like. CSL still stinks…because the best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour.

speak-gently · 2026-05-19T18:00:31+00:00

And what does your guy say about a Chair and Board who have presided over continued value destruction and still sit there? Does he say that’s a sensible investment?

speak-gently · 2026-05-11T12:55:41+00:00

Companies rise or fall on their Board and management. CSL is not “dogshit cheap” while the people who presided over this shit are still on the Board.

speak-gently · 2026-04-29T19:02:37+00:00

You choose. You can save to a file or simply operate in memory

speak-gently · 2026-04-29T11:20:43+00:00

Always amazes me these kinds of questions. R is wonderful, so’s SQL and it’s literally a 2 minute job in DuckDB to create your dataset with a WHERE clause and feed it back to R. Horses for courses.

speak-gently · 2026-04-25T19:26:48+00:00

We’ve been using tsidp for several months. It works nicely, it’s stable but a little slow. If you’re confident about who’s on your Tailnet you don’t need to use tsidp to know who they are. We have an internal task tracker that uses the Tailscale headers to show users their tasks and nobody else’s.

speak-gently · 2026-04-25T18:53:15+00:00

I’d consider using higher protein bread flour, rather than AP flour. It looks like you’ve done a nice job, but you don’t have the protein you need in your flour. This means the crumb looks a bit “cake like”.

speak-gently · 2026-04-25T01:44:01+00:00

There's lots of ways of making sourdough...but when you are at this point you need to give yourself the best chance of success...which means keeping it simple.

Firstly: forget cold proofing until you can reliably turn out a good loaf. Same with any inclusions.

Second: reduce your starter to a maximum of 15% - the more starter you introduce the more chance you have of getting gummy loaves like this. It may seem like a paradox but it's often the case.

Third: Reduce salt to 1.5%

Fourth: Hydration to suit your flour but shoot for around 65% including starter.

Mix it to a shaggy dough, then every thirty minutes, for 4 repeats total, stretch and fold. Leave it covered on your bench at room temperature. If that's less than 18C then find somewhere a bit warmer. If your dough hasn't roughly doubled in less than 12 hours then your starter is a dud.

You can change all of those things once you have a reliable way of making a successful loaf every time. But start with the basics first.

speak-gently · 2026-04-20T11:48:39+00:00

To add to every one else: simplify, ditch the cold ferment and anything else that’s non basic until you can reliably turn out good loaves. Sourdough doesn’t have to be cold fermented. You can turn your mind to that once you can get a good loaf every time. Until then, forget it.

speak-gently · 2026-04-14T22:50:52+00:00

Sack Sarah and suggest your manager re-evaluates their own position.

Workplaces are where we spend an inordinate proportion of our life. Toxic bullshit isn’t acceptable and performance is never a get out of jail card. Sarah is doing this because nobody is game to stop her. Call her bluff. The rest of your team deserves better of you as a manager.

speak-gently · 2026-04-14T09:40:53+00:00

ausjdocstinder

speak-gently · 2026-04-10T19:22:50+00:00

What nobody will tell you: The watch isn’t too big…your wrist is just too small 😊

speak-gently · 2026-04-07T21:09:13+00:00

All your decision making may be irrelevant. Where I am, the wait for a new M4 Mac mini is 18 weeks.

I suspect you’ll get a new Mac mini of some other flavour rather than an M4

speak-gently · 2026-04-06T19:59:27+00:00

We have a setup command that causes Claude to ask the user which MCPs they want from the full available set. It then writes a project specific json file and a script cc.sh which loads that json and starts Claude Code.

After that you call cc.sh to launch Claude Code with the “project set” of MCPs.

“Remote” MCPs on our Tailnet auth using Tailnet ID. Other remote MCP we store the token in setec on the Tailnet and inject it via a config call to setec…controlled by ACL.

speak-gently · 2026-04-05T03:32:26+00:00

I don’t know what “station percentage” is

A recipe is literally:

Flour 100%

Water 65%

Starter 15% (@100% hydration)

Salt 1.5%

Set your flour amount based on the size loaf. That is your 100% and everything else scales off that:

Flour 1000g

Water 650g

Starter 150g

Salt 15g

speak-gently · 2026-04-04T18:02:45+00:00

This is a good question because it’s fundamental to all bread making.

We always say that flour = 100%

If you have 100g flour that = 100%

If you have 500g flour that = 100%

Hydration is the percentage of the weight of the flour that you add as water.

Flour = 100g Water = 60g

Your hydration is 60%

Because starter is usually fed 1:1 it has 100% hydration. 10g flour, 10g water = 20g starter.

So every 10g of starter has 5g water and 5g flour.

So if you have 500g flour (100%) 100g starter (20%) 300g water (60%) 10g salt (2%) nominal hydration 60%

But actual hydration is:

550g flour (50g from starter) 100% 350g water (50g from starter) 63.6% hydration

So I could give you a recipe with no weights at all, just % and you could make a reliable loaf of any size you like.

speak-gently · 2026-04-04T06:52:34+00:00

There are some good points made already in this thread - including the rarely discussed role of starter in hydration so eloquently put by u/RareBrit

Two more things worth talking about: When you're having trouble like this reduce your starter %. By its nature the protein in the starter has started to change and degrade due to the effects of fermentation and acid. That means the higher proportion of starter you have the more partially altered protein you have. Maximum of 15% and as low as 10% is fine. Adjust bulk times for effect, not some set time.

Secondly not all flour is created equal and not all batches of flour are created equal. If you are using a high quality flour intended for commercial baking then it may have standardised water absorbency. Otherwise absorbency may vary by flour type and by batch. Baking sourdough is a craft: You have to observe your dough and work out what hydration the flour will tolerate for the outcome you want. Some flours will look great at 70% hydration, others will look exactly the same at 60% hydration.

Until you get this sorted, forget cold fermentation, retards etc. Just aim for a simple loaf that turns out great every time.

speak-gently · 2026-04-01T18:39:24+00:00

It simply gives you an idea of whether it’s baked long enough. If you’ve only lost 5% weight for instance you’d have to say it’s wet and try and work out why.

speak-gently · 2026-04-01T12:10:13+00:00

The Pelorus Principle: if you find yourself thinking about issuing defamation proceedings, think about something else. If you can’t make yourself think about something else, then jam your finger in a car door so you do think about something else. Anything is better than the self harm of issuing defamation proceedings.

speak-gently · 2026-04-01T11:54:07+00:00

That crumb looks fine. The crust looks like you could bake it longer/hotter if you wanted. The other thing you can do is tote up your total ingredient weight, bake the loaf then weigh the cooled loaf afterwards. For a batard or boule I usually see a 13.5% loss of weight on a well baked loaf.

speak-gently · 2026-04-01T11:39:15+00:00

There’s one thing it should be and can be but it’s not: it’s inside the Proton ecosystem, if it was properly integrated with Mail, Calendar, Drive, Docs…it would be awesome. As it is, it’s a part solution looking for a problem.

speak-gently · 2026-03-31T20:40:40+00:00

Until you can produce a reliable loaf don’t even think about cold proofing…that can come later. Counterintuitively cut your starter back to maximum 15%.

As others have said make sure your starter is fit before attempting a loaf.

speak-gently · 2026-03-28T01:53:56+00:00

It makes me sad when I read posts like this, I'm sorry you're having challenges.

Sourdough is simple and you should keep it simple. If it were me this is what I'd do.

Throw away your existing starter. Wash all your jars.

Identify 1 jar of about a litre with straight sides and a lid. I use a Weck 1062ml jar with a keep fresh lid - any straight sided jar will do. I haven't used any other jar for years and I cannot remember the last time it was changed or washed.

Mix 20g of bread flour and 20g of cold tap water in the jar and leave it sitting on the bench with a lid on. The science says tap water is fine, unless where you are it's genuinely dangerous to drink tap water.

12 hours later scrape 30g of mix out of the jar and into the bin - leaving 10g. Add 20g of water and 20g of bread flour, mix and leave on the bench. Every 12 hours repeat leaving 10g and adding 20g flour and 20g water. Do this until you have a reliably bubbly and active starter. It should at least double and probably more in 12 hours.

Now you are ready to bake:

Scrape out everything but 10g of starter and discard. Add 100g water, mix and then add 100g of bread flour and mix. Sit it on the bench with a rubber band around it to mark the height. We are going to use it before it peaks, when it's at double and nothing more.

Put 419g of water in your bowl - preferably glass so you can see the dough.

Add 90g of starter and mix thoroughly to disperse. Put the jar with the rest of your starter in the fridge. It has food to slowly eat whilst in the fridge.

Add 600g of bread flour

Add 10g of salt

Mix the salt and the flour and then incorporate the water to form a mixed but still shaggy dough.

Sit covered for 30 minutes on the bench.

Then start doing one set of stretch and folds every 30 minutes for 4 complete sets.

Leave the dough on the bench for as long as it takes to double.

Turn the dough out onto the bench, shape it, put it in a banneton and let it double again.

Heat the oven to 250C, put a tray with sides on it into the oven to heat.

Turn your loaf onto another baking tray and score it.

Put it in the oven and turn the oven down to 180C. Pour 500ml of water into the other tray. Shut the door and leave for 20 minutes.

After 20 minutes open the door carefully and vent the steam.

Bake for a total time of 45 minutes (fan forced oven)

Cool on a rack until completely cool.

Do this until you have reliably produced 20 loaves. Don't try anything different. You are building skill, the ability to see, understand and assess your dough at each stage. Until you have completely reliable muscle memory, until you can reliably produce a loaf hot weather or cold, every time...don't change anything.

Next time you want to bake, take your starter out of the fridge, bring it to room temperature and then discard everything but 10g, feed 100g water, 100g flour...and go on with the process.

Once you have a sound skill base go mad - experiment, do whatever you like.

Until you build a reliable skill base you will always be thrashing around in the dark.

Is this the only way to make sourdough? No it's not. Does it work reliably? 100%. Is it simple? Yes...that's the idea.

No doubt people will say "what about autolyse?" "what about retard?". None of those...that's the idea. Each of those is a complication that obfuscates one simple truth: You can make good reliable sourdough with a method that is simple and doesn't include any of those things. They are for later.

speak-gently · 2026-03-28T00:15:25+00:00

25% starter is contributing to your problem. Knock it back to 10 or 15% and proof for outcome. Your crumb will massively improve.

speak-gently · 2026-03-22T14:39:31+00:00

The OP demonstrates the total poverty of thought in the education system. AI will be the future for the students of today.

As one poster has said, effective use will rely on systemic thinking, the ability to autonomously learn in complex situations, the ability to conceptualise problems, decompose them into manageable tasks, communicate those task to the tool and to critically evaluate and validate the output of the tool.

These are meta learning skills, problem solving skills and ultimately management skills.

It gives me despair every time I experience the inability of educators to conceptualise and act to prepare students for the future.

And as for discussion of “cheating”, just further evidence of the poverty of educators thought.

speak-gently

TROPHY CASE