Charles Stanhope @cstanhope@social.coop

Out of nowhere the warnings flashed red on his screen. David cursed as he ripped his oxygen mask from his sweat drenched face. He couldn't get timing closure on the design.

He was barely hitting 1.1GHz, and his goal was 1.5GHz. It was likely going to take weeks to untangle the longest paths causing the delays. They might even need to re-architecture some pieces.

1/n

The alien noisily screeched as it broke into TV broadcasts and video streaming the world over. "TZAG!" the alien continued, baffling the stunned audiences as it waved appendages in a friendly, but slightly unsettling, manner.

I just played around switching monitors while the system is running. The TV isn't 1600x900, but it does its best to display it and vice versa with the monitor. The WiFi problems seem to follow the resolution and not the monitor. Faskinating... Anyway, despite little glitches like this, it's amazing what you get for $100.

(I shudder to consider the externalized costs that are probably lurking in the shadows.)

Well, I don't have another micro HDMI cable, but I happen to have a small TV. The monitor I was using supported 1600x900@60Hz. This little TV gives me 1360x768@60Hz. The WiFi appears to be reliable now. So the problem is either the monitor causing interference through the cable*, or the Pi is self-interfering when driving a monitor at the first frequency.

* Through the cable because I suspect it is not over the air. While troubleshooting, I used a USB WiFi dongle which worked fine.

I had a hunch, so I went downstairs to check and the HDMI display was off. I wake up the display, head back upstairs, and the flaky ping results started again. I've repeated this twice now... Hmmm...

(This is not my only example of wondrous junk, just the latest. Considering the price pressure everybody is under, it's amazing we get any stuff that works. Alas that's probably only possible due to massive cost externalization.)

I had a damaged HDMI cable, so I took advantage of the situation to do a quick teardown. It looked amazingly well put together with shielding in the appropriate places except there was not a twisted pair to be seen. Sometimes I feel like we live in an age of wondrous junk.

(I appear to be deliberately avoiding negative topics today. That's probably for the best...)

"People on the Street React to the Moon in the Most Awe-inspiring Way":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuH6kdN6NBs

I'm not one for "reaction" videos, but it was nice to see people apparently reacting to their first view of the moon through a telescope.