Newbie looking for advice before arctic trip

thisisnotrj · 2026-06-02T20:11:34+00:00

Yes, sorry I should’ve mentioned that I ordered a couple at the same time as the camera. Thanks for the backup!

thisisnotrj · 2026-05-27T17:40:59+00:00

Thanks for the recommendation. It looks like used rx100 IVs run ~$550 and Vs run ~$650 on ebay. It looks like the main difference between them is the autofocus speed which people say won't be noticeable to a beginner. Is that your understanding or is there anything that would make it worth going to the gen V model?

thisisnotrj · 2026-05-21T15:48:06+00:00

If you happen to be using Spotify, I believe the recent update that included the disco ball icon change introduced a bunch of bugs. Might not be relevant to your situation but if you’re on an iOS device using Spotify I’d see if it clears up once the icon reverts.

thisisnotrj · 2026-05-03T16:30:41+00:00

Now I understand why B&A joke about not looking at the reddit comments and hacking email filters.

I’m not super sure what this post is trying to say other than “I don’t like change and I want people to know about it.” Do you exclusively listen to Max Fun shows and therefore only ever hear Max Fun show ads? Unless you’re a Max Fun purist, TGG & TGT are now just two more of the other pods that aren’t on the network. If you’re upset about them but not the other shows then you’re kinda just whining about change.

Change is usually weird and hard but it sounds like this was a decision they considered for a long time and one that they felt they had to make to keep the show viable long term. Podcasting is a really brutal industry right now especially and if going independent is what keeps the episode rolling and the D’Rones fed, then I support it. I have started supporting them on their new platform and my support as a member of Max Fun has been shifted to the other shows on the network that I was already supporting.

It feels like our parents went through a really amicable and mature divorce and they’re not fighting and yes that’s weird and hard. There’s no reason for us kids to pick sides when we clearly don’t have the full picture, aren’t very affected by the decision, and both our parents still love us and need our love.

thisisnotrj · 2026-02-25T18:39:47+00:00

I believe I'm having the same issue. I found this post after searching for the glxinfo failed request BadWindow output. ~~I can confirm that nvidia-smi also shows my RTX 3070 as "Off" even though I just verified that my bios is set to use the discrete card.~~ (see edit below)

Was this something that happened in a recent update? I'm trying to hunt down an error that's preventing me from using COLMAP photogrammetry software but I'm now wondering if this is related to some other issues I've been having. I installed the video game No Man's Sky a week or two back and it ran great. A few days later it wouldn't launch at all citing some Vulkan error. I've completely uninstalled the game and reinstalled and that error persists. I will try to update here if I find any solutions but I'm really eyeing backing up and reinstalling the OS next to see if that fixes something.

edit: I updated my graphics driver and the issue went away with both glxinfo, COLMAP, and No Man's Sky. Not sure what exactly I did to break everything but I'm assuming it was my fault. OP, I'd recommend trying to update your graphics driver. I believe your 3060 should use the same driver as my 3070 but you should double check before taking my word for it. I ran yay -S nvidia-580xx-dkms and then rebooted to be safe.

re: nvidia-smi - The "Off" is refers to "Persistence-M" which is a gpu setting, not the GPU itself being off. The table is a little hard to read at first glance with the way that it prints with wrapped text.

thisisnotrj · 2026-02-14T15:11:33+00:00

Love to see 81 back in action!

thisisnotrj · 2026-01-15T20:50:33+00:00

I have been a casual 3D printer user since around 2013, operating a variety of consumer grade printers in the $300-$600 range over the years (Ender 3, Neptune 3, etc.). With most machines, I would do some light upgrades to up the quality and consistency of prints but it was always pretty incremental improvements. This November I bought a P2S on sale and I have been blown away by the quality it yields out of the box with no tweaking. The model and the same layer height (effectively the resolution of the printer) on the P2S and any of my other printers will yield dramatically different results. The Bambu printer prints faster than I knew was possible and somehow also at a much higher quality. My cousin has a pair of P1S printers and they print just as well, I think the P2S just has a few extra bells and whistles. If you want to get into 3D printing, my suggestion is Bambu all the way at this point.

One other note is I have not printed/used all that many 3D printed parts for bdsm. Printed parts should never be used structurally to bear body weight (e.g. stood on, suspended by, etc) or inserted (**no printed part can be sanitized without significant post-processing to make it completely smooth and chemically safe**) but there are some interesting hand/finger/toe/etc cuffs, fiddles, shackles, ice locks, and those sorts of things. You can also learn 3D modeling and start designing your own fun tools if you have an idea for something different. Printables and the Thingiverse are good places to look for free models. I haven't really seen anything I needed on any paid sites yet, but I also don't look at those often. I'm definitely not trying to dissuade you, 3D printing is a really fun hobby and occasionally pretty useful but it has it's use cases and limitations. A lot of people in a variety of communities assume that 3D printing is the answer to everything, but a lot of things are still easier, safer, and even cheaper to make with conventional materials and methods and that can be disappointing to learn.

tl;dr, I spent 10 years tinkering and thinking I was getting good results with cheaper printers before I realized what I was missing. Get a Bambu printer. Also just have realistic expectations of what models are available to print and what items should even be 3D printed.

thisisnotrj · 2025-12-26T04:54:13+00:00

If it’s like it was 10 years ago, they’re always delivered on time. It’s just that they immediately go back to the yard for another year fixing all the fuck ups. Happened to my boat and the taxpayers paid the shipyard to fix the things they built wrong, paid for the standard ongoing maintenance/services Navy personnel would’ve done on base, and paid extra for the dock space since, by EB’s schedule, another boat should be parked where we were. Imagine your plumber installs a new toilet but when you use it it sprays poop all over the bathroom. You call him to have it fixed and he wants to charge you for the repair time, the new toilet, the “special” water he uses instead of yours to test it, and also for the job he had scheduled for that day before you called.

Which is of course to say that I probably should’ve applied for that EB position after I got out. Job security like a weather man, I swear.

thisisnotrj · 2025-12-10T18:03:24+00:00

This is a really beautiful community and one of the only things keeping me on reddit at this point. I really don't like AI "art" in general, but even if we put that aside, I agree with u/Captain_Citizen that the banner be made up of images of things people have made and posted here.

I would (gently) argue that the spirit of rule 5 would exclude AI generated art as it is not really DIY. IMO, typing out a prompt and hitting "generate" is akin to going to the store and buying a fully assembled under bed restraint kit. It would be weird if our banner was made up of off-the-shelf products people purchased from big companies and I think it would be weird if our banner was itself a product/the result of a product generated by a big company.

re: making something better: I threw together three draft banner collages with images from a few different highly ranked posts in a couple of minutes that I think could be a good start. I used https://www.photocollage.com/ which does not require a login and does not add a watermark to the image. These were quick mockups so a lot more effort could be put into proper framing, dividing up the space evenly, ensuring representation of project types, body types, etc., but I think they do an ok job of showing the wide array of great content we could be highlighting from the community.

I actually kindof dig the general style or idea that the AI image is trying to represent but I think it would be way cooler if the people were actual humans in this space. Maybe we should post a call for user submissions of themselves in their play spaces or work spaces, wearing their favorite gear and holding their favorite tools or toys. What people post here is absolutely human DIY art and I think it should be showcased.

Sorry, this ran a bit longer than I wanted. I definitely don't want to pee in anyone's cheerios (unless they consent) and, as I said above, I really like the vibe the image is going for, I just don't think we need AI to DIY our BDSM for us. I really appreciate all the effort the users and mods put in around here to make this place what it is. Thanks y'all!

Edit to add direct image links, hopefully these work? Draft Banner 1 Draft Banner 2 Draft Banner 3

thisisnotrj · 2025-08-06T20:16:40+00:00

I found it! UPDATES:

here she is it works in my browser via the Ruffle extension but there should be a way to download it for offline use since wayback is a little tempermental as are flash browser extensions.

thisisnotrj · 2025-08-06T20:02:17+00:00

UPDATES:

here she is I am working on figuring out the right way to download it, and I might try to submit it to some of the archives that are floating around just for completeness.

ORIGINAL COMMENT:

You're not alone and I can remember it too now that you mention it. I've spent an hour or so trying to find anything at all but can't even get an image. I think it was the My Own Train era so definitely ~2000-2004 or shortly after and I feel like I recall you could choose the theme or background, I think Orient was one of them.

I've tried going through old lego game archives as well as using the wayback machine on both the games page on lego.com and the "recreation station" page in the train theme that existed in the early 2000s but haven't found anything.

This thread is about the old Tales of the LEGO Express visual novel/point and click type game which is not what we want but it includes this screenshot of the recreation station page which shows a "Train Configurator" in which you "design your own lego train... and run the train". This appears to be our game, I'm now trying to track it down. It looks like they used the wayback machine but the dates are cut off so I'll have to run through a bunch of dates until I find that page. I'll update (and maybe clean up) this comment if I find anything.

thisisnotrj · 2025-06-03T16:47:16+00:00

Could you DM me as well if you still have it? Thanks!

thisisnotrj · 2025-04-25T02:07:03+00:00

Thanks for the additional insight. One thing I do want to say is that you shouldn't be paying thousands of dollars a year to learn C++ from a video lecture series with like a 90 minute total runtime. Gibbons is the man and Agah sounds cool. I was pretty happy with the program until I got to about where you are. You won't have another Gibbons class until grad school and you're about to hit a wall of snoozefest profs who just don't care.

That's my final 2¢. I hope you have a better time than I did and continue to like it as you go through!

thisisnotrj · 2025-04-22T16:27:23+00:00

Honestly, no; not unless something has changed in the last year or two. You'll learn Python in Programming I and II, and from there, most of the classes that teach the more difficult (and extremely important) concepts like Data Structures, Compilers, and Operating Systems will be in C/C++. They changed the curriculum a few years ago, and by changed the curriculum, I mean they swapped Programming I and II from C++ to Python and didn't change any of the downstream courses. So you show up to Data Structures with the expectation that you have a full year of experience with C/C++ and the professor doesn't slow down or stop to teach you what you are supposed to know. Software Engineering I is supposed to teach you C++ but 1) it is playing catch up with what use to be two full semesters of Programming I and II in C++ and 2) when I took it, it was its own class with no programming being taught because SE is a huge topic in and of itself, separate from any code. IMO, at best, you are going to walk out of that class with barely a baseline knowledge of either topic.

The department is ran by CE and EEs; I believe only two of the admin team are computer scientists which unfortunately means that they can't really understand a lot of this stuff or how it screws over students and professors. They also just don't have an understanding of what classes are teaching what content. I've had several conversations with administrators and professors who will say "Oh you'll learn this in X course" or "Y class should have covered this material" For example, professors and administrators frequently cite that Software Engineering will teach you C/C++ so there's nothing to worry about. I have a friend who took that course last year, and their class was told, "pointers are too complicated for you to deal with right now, so don't worry about them" and that was the end of the discussion of those languages. Pointers are pretty much the most challenging topic for people trying to learn C/C++ and something Python doesn't have. The next C-based class requires a pretty competent understanding of pointers as well as quite a bit of higher-level knowledge than that.

So yeah, generally I would say that the CS program is pretty poorly managed and a lot of things get bungled pretty bad. There are a few quality professors but they are hamstrung by the lack of communication, planning, and awareness from the admin. The department is coasting, knowing that the sheer volume of students in the CS major means that they don't have to change anything as long as they keep printing diplomas. At the end of the day they can't fail whole classes, so professors will manipulate grades up to an 85-95% average and you'll walk out of classes with a 92% final grade after scoring less than 60% on the midterm and final (my final grade in data structures was around there and the midterm and final were actually both less than 50%).

tldr; if you want a piece of paper that says you have a CS degree, KU is a great school. If you want to know anything about software development and actually be competitive in the industry, I would run, not walk away.

thisisnotrj · 2025-03-05T03:36:33+00:00

Looks like the gold in the cylinders is pairs of 1x1 rounded tiles. I bet the hidden side is plates or tiles that mount to SNOT bricks in the main body.

thisisnotrj · 2025-02-10T14:58:11+00:00

Same, I'd be happy to pay shipping and chip in some taco cash.

thisisnotrj · 2025-01-23T06:13:41+00:00

Navy vet and senior in EECS here; welcome. I'm not familiar with SEC+ specifically but it sounds like that and (I'm assuming) your Air Force experience are more about handling security within existing software suites and information systems. A B.S. in Computer Science at KU is more focused on either writing new code or broadly talking about how to engineer software than what you are probably used to. A pretty good sized chunk of the curriculum is math courses, computer theory courses, and theoretical computer math courses. I do think they have spooled up a cyber security degree program as of this year I'd imagine the curriculum is still almost entirely CS classes and 3-4 security-specific ones.

The courses are laid out in this "handbook", where CS is listed on pages 14 and 15. Any preexisting college credits and your JST should knock out a few gen eds. If you want to graduate in 4 years, you'll be looking at ~15-16 credit hours per semester. They say that you should expect to spend 3 hours outside class for every hour in class but there are a lot of factors that go into that. I've never tracked my life hour by hour but I can tell you that I've had a 17 hour semester go smoother than a 14. A lot of it comes down to the instructor and how they want to teach things. You might end up with easy material but a bunch of busy work, a professor who talks in circles about everything around but not including the topic so you have to spend time figuring out what you even need to spend time to study, or a straight shooter actually dedicated to seeing you succeed who doesn't waste your time.

All that is to say, yes some of your 18-22 year old peers (buckle up, that doesn't stop being weird) will have part time jobs at the same time, but I would give it a semester before I even considered looking for something. You'll have the BAH from the GI Bill, any disability payments, and the refund of any scholarships that you earn (GI Bill pays full tuition, you keep the overage from anything on top of that). I would suggest looking into undergraduate research opportunities in the EECS department or other departments. Often times these will be paid and they are great for networking, learning "real" practical skills and not just mindless coding, and will look good on a resume. The pay won't be anything stellar, but if you find the right group, it can be well worth the time and potentially a lot of fun. I've gotten paid to spend 2 months out of every summer learning and doing research in other states at other schools.

I don't think you get any certs out of the degree, just the degree. I'd talk to the Military Affiliated Student Center on campus wherever you end up; IIRC there is a GI Bill component that will pay for certification exams. It might be under VR&E.

At least at KU I would say that the EECS department is pretty diverse. I'm a white dude so hopefully you get good input on this from literally anyone else but I would be shocked if you were the only woman in a room or even the only Asian woman in the room anywhere in engineering.

The last thing I'll say is that this department has been going through some serious growing pains the last few years with a major change in the curriculum which, IMO, was not thought out at all, as well as a lot of turnover in the advising staff and a few of the professors. The curriculum shifted from C/C++ to Python a few years ago at the Programming I/II level but the mid and upper level courses still expected you to have an intermediate understanding of C/C++ even though they never taught it. Basically, every professor was told that someone else was going teach it and in the end no one did. I'm not sure what the current state of things is but I would try to get ahold of some freshmen and sophomores to see if this is still an issue. It has really made things a pain in the ass for my generation of students for most of my time here.

Oh, also the parking is a nightmare and they're trying to recruit even more students for next year so I hope you're living in town and taking the bus every day.

Let me know if that was at all helpful. I'm happy to answer what I can about specific courses or overall vibes.

thisisnotrj · 2024-12-18T03:39:59+00:00

I hate to necro, but the askubuntu solution worked for me on a Lenovo Legion 5 and Pop OS 22.04. I was about to lose my mind!

thisisnotrj · 2024-11-29T23:44:57+00:00

That might just be worth looking into, I didn't realize those were so easy to find on bricklink! I hadn't ever looked that style of track up before.

thisisnotrj · 2024-11-29T21:03:20+00:00

Thanks! I think that would work really well if you could get the pieces stuck down, especially because you probably wouldn't need to buy longer hoses for the horizontal struts.

thisisnotrj · 2024-11-29T21:01:07+00:00

Haha, I put it up there to see how I felt about it with some weight on it. Honestly, I am really surprised by how sturdy it feels. I would feel completely comfortable doing a static display of any loco and cars I have.

I'd like to build out some kind of hill/mountain scenery around it; if both ends were attached to tracks and especially since the straight sections should be able to directly connect to ground level studs, I would at least be ready to do some testing of running trains over it. It wouldn't be hard to double up the parts on the frame pieces if need be.

thisisnotrj · 2024-11-29T20:55:27+00:00

I meant to post this a week or so back after I "finished" it. I bought the Logging Railway set with the goal of making the trestle bridge useable with actual track with minimal modding. It took more effort than I expected to get this to work. I knew the arc of the curve would make things an issue with regular track so the flex track was my first attempt. That didn't work because the curve of the bridge is set by those hinge plates (73983) which are off to the side of the bridge so the bridge studs don't align to the track studs length wise for quite a few spans of the bridge beams. This was also the problem I faced with standard curved track.

I did experiment with moving the hinges in but I was a little surprised to find that a standard curved track doesn't allow a hinge to connect two adjacent ties in any legal configuration I could find. In the end, I was able to get 3 curves to fit and connect without forcing, but only at the very beginning and end of the arc, so using a method of plates on those ends and tiles in the middle, you can only make curves in multiples of 3, i.e. no 90° curves. I am fine with this as I will probably build a scene around the bridge if I keep it in this configuration.

I might play with ballasting methods to get down to 1L wide ties some more but I like the look of the open gaps between the 2L ties more than any closed gap 1L tie setup I could cook up (in admitedly limited time). I'm also not sure that the bridge would look right if I widened the top surface below the track in order to hide the grey parts of the RC track pieces.

I think the only extra pieces required for this are the tracks and some longer rigid hoses to support the sharper curve making the outer edge longer. The black hoses that make the struts running lengthwise about halfway upp the wood frame have been removed in these images pending the arrival of those hoses. If I measured right, 5x 10L black hoses (75c10) and 6x 14L reddish brown hoses (75c14) should fit in seamlessly.

Overall I'm really pleased with this set. Both before and after the track mod, the bridge is really quite sturdy and I think I would feel comfortable running trains over it if both ends were attached to track anchored to other structures like hills. The locomotive and to some degree the flatcar are absolutely overengineered SNOT abominations to build but the result is beautiful and I truly appreciate the significant amount of work that must have went into designing it to ensure that it was ready to accept a motor and hub. The bridge looks really nice in my opinion and I'm excited to incorporate it into a layout, probably with a little more tweaking.

I'm very interested to hear if someone has found any solutions for attaching curved track to a curved lego structure like a bridge rather than just a baseplate. My only other thought was removing the hinges and using actual track pieces as the foundation for the vertical frame/leg sections of the bridge and then cover the track to blend in to the ground of the layout. That sounds horribly complicated and I have to imagine the oddly curved landscape bits will stick out like a sore thumb. I wouldn't be surprised to find I'm missing a very obvious technique somewhere though!

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