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Author: matt

Snow socks are better than chains

Snow socks are better than chains

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I am definitely sold on snow socks. Just like him, I couldn’t believe they were as good as chains. It seems so counter-intuitive. Yet, in some cases (like stopping distance), they are even better than chains. Snow socks are slightly easier to put on than chains too.

What’s nice about snow socks is that you can use them on bare pavement – unlike chains that often quickly get destroyed unless driving really slow. With socks, you can drive on bare pavement for a while until you find a safer spot to pull over to take them off.

I also found they were astounding on ice as well. The first time I used them, I was on a stretch of road that looked like glass. It was so slick I could barely stand on it when I got out of the car. I put the socks on, and drove without a single problem. Amazing. I will probably never go back to chains.

His video does a great job of comparing the two in actual conditions. His conditions were lots of fresh snow, but I can confirm on hard-packed roads and/or straight ice, they work just as exceptionally.

The only downside of socks is that they can get little holes if you drive on a lot of rocks or dry pavement for too long. However, in several years of occasional use, they are very small and do not affect the performance. Personally, I found chains only lasted about 2-3 seasons anyway – and socks cost just about the same; so I don’t see this as a big deal. If they get too shredded, I’ll just buy a new set.

Hiromi Uehara

Hiromi Uehara

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Hiromi Uehara, in my opinion, is one of the greatest largely unknown pianists of our time. She is part of the rising Japanese inflation with jazz that has become a growing centerpiece of modern Japanese culture. The thing that most makes her stand out (and makes has amazingly unique in the normal jazz scene) is her absolutely crystal clear technical ability and mind blowingly accurate control of her dynamics. It is like listening to a concert-pianist technical expert, one that has mastered every nuance of the piano’s tones and dynamics, and yet is playing what is usually a more ragged jazz genre.

Here’s a song of hers that I have been listening to and keep listening to again and again. The crystal clear runs without a hint of slur or slop along with dynamics are astounding. Each listen I’m more amazed at how there is not a single sloppy note or missed dynamic in the whole piece – and that each note plays perfectly into the mood and feel she is weaving:

It makes me believe the purported story by someone who attended a master class by house band member Tony Grey. Grey is a bass player who record and toured with Uehara. He told the class that every morning he and the other bandmates would wake up with a hand written note that detailed every single mistake they got wrong the night before.

Here’s another astounding piece that demonstrates an ever increasing progression of the most crystal clear jazz improvisation on top of a well known tune. She first imitates a harpsicord by putting metal rulers on the strings, but I think it really gets amazing starting around 3:04, 5:15, and 7:05.

The demonstration of technical perfection while progressing through every jazz style in the book blew my mind again and again. A modern Japanese artist performing a German composer’s music remixed in the jazz style from African Americans on an instrument invented in Italy. Amazing.

Prevent Windows 10 from automatically upgrading you to Windows 11

Prevent Windows 10 from automatically upgrading you to Windows 11

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Nobody seems to want to upgrade from Windows 10 to Windows 11. Now late 2022, only about 15% of users have upgraded or bought machines with Windows 11 – despite it being out for well over a year. Even the Steam Hardware Survey indicates a 28% install rate on some of the newest/highest end gaming systems.

There’s a whole host of gripes about Windows 11. There have been performance and compatibility issues that are not present on Windows 10. Others greatly dislike the UI changes (this is my big gripe). Still others mention being told their hardware is incompatible. However, you may, like many others, find yourself FORCED to upgrade to Windows 11 whether you want to or not. Windows has a nasty habit of pushing such upgrades without asking.

If you want to make sure you don’t get a Windows 11 upgrade but still keep getting Windows 10 updates, you can try this trick:

First, navigate to Windows Update, then hit Pause Updates on that page.

Run services.msc, find the Windows Update service and Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS), right click on them and pick Stop.

Next, browse to C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\, and delete the contents.

That is it. The two services will eventually restart on their own, and next time it checks for updates it will only get Windows 10 updates.

Edit – If you want an extra layer of assurance, run the tool InControl from GRC, this free utility changes a few Microsoft sanctioned registry keys to specify what version and feature update of Windows you want to remain on. There are also details on those registry keys for those that would rather manually configure it themselves: https://www.grc.com/incontrol.htm

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Hiking boots are out

Hiking boots are out

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I ran across this interesting article on The Trek.co about what footwear people wore while hiking the 2190 mile Appalachian trail. Taking many weeks to complete, the trail is a grueling test of equipment. Most trail hikers ended up wearing out 4-5 sets of shoes – matching the recommendation to retire shoes after 500 miles of hiking.

The most interesting point to me was that hiking boots were not high on the list of footwear hikers have been wearing. While still recommended for snowy sections, the vast majority of the hikers used trail runners. When I started hiking decades ago, I actually preferred hiking easier trails in more rugged tennis shoes too. I somewhat feel vindicated. 🙂 The data they collected for the last 2 years shows boots were only worn by around 10% of hikers. There was also the trend that people that started with hiking boots were more likely to end up switching to trail runners during their journey.

Shoe satisfaction showed 91 percent of respondents who began their hike in trail runners said they were happy with their choice. On the other hand, only 64 percent of hikers starting in hiking boots were satisfied.

For all shoe types, fit was one of the most important factors in switching footwear; which just reinforces the age-old wisdom to get plenty of long miles in your boots/shoes before major trips to make sure they don’t have any hot spots, issues with swelling feet, or other similar problems. I personally find the adage of ‘breaking in’ boots/shoes to be complete bunk. In my experience, if the shoes don’t fit and aren’t comfortable right off, they never become so later.

You can read the rest of the excellent article since it also has recommendations and breakdown of hiking shoes, socks, and other equipment they most used. The summary was this:

  1. The trend of most hikers wearing trail runners over heavier, sturdier boots continued this year; the numbers were about the same as last year with a slight (3%) dip in popularity for trail runners.
  2. While boots may still be preferable during the snowy sections, we recommend that hikers planning thrus or long sections consider lightweight, more flexible shoes for the majority of their hikes.
  3. In general, thru-hikers should plan to go through four to five pairs of trail runners or two to three pairs of boots.
  4. Altra remains the top brand for trail runners, and the most popular model was the Lone Peak.
  5. Topo Athletic made the list for the first time, ranking in the top 4 brands and boasting the third most popular model overall with the Ultraventure.
  6. Darn Tough, Injinji, and Smartwool socks were all well-represented on the AT, but Darn Tough was by far the most popular with 75 percent of respondents using them.
  7. Injinji is the leader in sock liners, used by almost a third of respondents.
Finding fun things to do in Portland

Finding fun things to do in Portland

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Here’s some great links to find interesting and fun things in Portland.

  • Theater
    • Portland Theater – Despite the name, this is probably the best list of all upcoming theater shows, music concerts, and other events coming to Portland.
    • Magenta Theater – live theater in downtown Vancouver, WA
    • Love Street Playhouse – A great little local playhouse in Woodburn, WA
    • Coaster Theater – Play house in Cannon Beach, OR
  • The Old Church downtown Portland that hosts lots of free lunchtime and afternoon concerts
  • Here for Portland – Website with a list of local events created as an attempt to repair the damaged reputation of Portland after the riots and homeless crisis downtown.
  • PDXLive – concert lists
  • Secret Portland – This site has a bunch of sister sites for other major cities that covers unusual and interesting local events, shows, and artistic events.
  • Axios – Has a good list of weekend fun, events, festivals, etc.
  • NearHear – Website that locates bands playing near wherever you are.

Summer events:

Completely isolated PC’s are vulnerable to data theft – via their switching power supplies.

Completely isolated PC’s are vulnerable to data theft – via their switching power supplies.

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“Air gapping” is a security measure that involves a computer being physically isolated and incapable of connecting wirelessly or physically with other computers or network devices. It’s used in high security setups. The idea is that if the system is physically incapable of connecting to other systems or networks, it should be safe. Right?

A new attack method named COVID-bit uses electromagnetic waves from power supplies to transmit data from air-gapped systems. Using this attack, even if the computer is completely isolated and unplugged from the internet, the researchers demonstrated collecting information emanating from the device by a nearby smartphone or laptop over a distance of at least two meters – even if a wall separates the two.

Researchers created a malware program that regulates CPU load and core frequency in a particular manner to make the power supplies on air-gapped computers emanate electromagnetic radiation on a low-frequency band (0 – 48 kHz).

While the attack requires at least one instance of physical access to install the malware, such attacks have happened. Examples include the Stuxnet worm in Iran’s uranium enrichment facility at Natanz, Agent.BTZ that infected a U.S. military base, and the Remsec modular backdoor that collected information from air-gapped government networks for over five years.

Mordechai Guri explains the primary source of electromagnetic radiation in switched mode power supplies is due to their internal design and switching characteristics in the technical paper. “In the conversion from AC-DC and DC-DC, the MOSFET switching components turning on or off at specific frequencies create a square wave,” the researcher details. The electromagnetic wave can carry a payload of raw data, following a strain of eight bits that signify the beginning of the transmission.

The attack works against air gapped pc’s, laptops, and even a raspberry pi. The receiver can be as simple as a cell phone.

Definitely worth a read.

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Quantum Computer solves 3,854 variable BMW sensor placement problem in 6 minutes

Quantum Computer solves 3,854 variable BMW sensor placement problem in 6 minutes

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Quantum Computing Inc used their new Entropy Quantum Computing (EQC) quantum based hardware solution to solve BMW’s 2022 Vehicle Sensor Placement Challenge (VSPC) in just 6 minutes. It marks a new high water mark in the ability of quantum computers to solve real-world problems.

The 2021 BMW Group and Amazon Web Services (AWS) Quantum Computing Challenge included a Vehicle Sensor Placement use case that challenged participants to find optimal configurations of sensors for a given vehicle that would provide maximum coverage (i.e. detect obstacles in different driving scenarios) at minimum cost.

The problem consisted of 3,854 variables and over 500 constraints. Placing sensors in vehicles – and especially autonomous vehicles – is an incredible challenge. A multitude of variables have to be taken into account – variables such as chassis design (which has implications on vehicle security), absence of obstruction (different placements offer different fields of view or allow for lower error possibility), wind resistance and weight balancing to name a few.

Although QCI placed as a 2021 finalist, its 2022 acquisition of quantum photonics systems company QPhoton provided a powerful suite of new quantum hardware technologies, including EQC. As a result, QCI today presented BMW with a 2022 solution: a superior sensor configuration consisting of 15 sensors yielding 96% coverage using QCI’s quantum hardware and software system.

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Tips from a digital nomad

Tips from a digital nomad

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Paul Hunkin is a 36 year old developer that’s been to 83 countries and works as a digital nomad. His original article is something of a plug for Upwork – a freelancing platform. Upwork’s 2021 survey estimates that 40.7 million American professionals were expecting to be fully remote in the next five years (consider those marketing numbers). Hunkins, however, does has five tips he learned from his decade doing remote work abroad that I thought were helpful:

  1. Figure out how to make money before you leave
    You need to have marketable skills, a track record of earning a living online, and have a method to make money online abroad with those skills before you leave. Hunkins started doing freelance jobs while at home in New Zealand on Upwork. He built up his portfolio to the point he could charge $120/hour for jobs and $200 for hour-long consultations.
  2. Pick a home base
    He spent the first few years traveling from place to place, but found it got exhausting always moving around. He established a home base to explore from even if he was not there all the time. Having a more permanent address also had tax benefits if he picked the right countries.
  3. Ensure you have what you need
    Vetting what you need to do your job is important. Fast and stable network connectivity is critical if it’s your job so double-check. Easy transportation from where you are staying to key services is also important (mass transit, grocery, airport, etc). He preferred Airbnb’s since some have more comfortable dedicated work spaces. He also says you must be aware some countries like China or the Middle East that block apps like Skype and WhatsApp.
  4. Stick to a daily routine
    “Wherever I am in the world, I get up at the same time, do my email, then plan the day.” He might spend part of his day exploring a new city, but ticks tedious tasks off his to-do list first. “You must get the work done before the fun stuff.” Hunkins always stays available – by iPad or phone – during client’s core business hours and works a 40 hour week every week.
  5. Loneliness is a thing
    The social aspect of work disappears when you are in a different time zone, so meeting people outside the office is critical. Expat groups exist everywhere and that’s a great first place. You can find them on Facebook and expat Slack channels. He also suggested booking a co-working space to meet other like-minded folks.

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