A Marine's Home Workshop on Okinawa

 

Sergeant Malik Pugh recently won the Navy-Marine Corps Achievement Medal for stepping forward and 3D printing a part that was needed to put a satellite terminal back in operation.  That's was great, but even more interesting for us is the fact that Sergeant Pugh has a home electronics workshop in his place on family quarters on Okinawa.  See picture above.  

The workshop seems to be focused on RC cars, robots and drones, but there is clearly ham radio potential there.  This may be the first time since David Cowhig WA1LBP's tour on the island in the early 1990s that we see a workshop like this one.  David was 7J6CBQ and, in addition to his duties at the American Consulate at Naha, Okinawa, served as 73 Magazine's "Hambassdor" (I was the Hambassador to the Dominican Republic at the same time).  

Read about Sergeant Pugh here: 

https://www.stripes.com/branches/marine_corps/2023-12-25/mobile-satellite-communications-marine-japan-award-12465031.html  

A Nice Searchable Compilation of "Hot Iron" Issues

Tom K4ZAD writes: 

Bill,

This might make good copy for the SolderSmoke Daily News:

     https://www.w4npn.net/hot-iron-searchable-compilation/

Also it should be noted that starting with issue #122 W4NPN, Frank
Barnes is editing Hot Iron with help from the former editor G6NGR, Peter
Thornton. See: https://www.w4npn.net/hot-iron-directory/

I view the Daily News frequently, and also use the topics index on the
left when seeking more info on a subject. It often helps.

Tom    K4ZAD

https://www.w4npn.net/hot-iron-searchable-compilation/

https://www.w4npn.net/hot-iron-directory/

1000 Mile QSO with KC5U using Modified CB Rigs (video)

Eldon KC5U saw my blog posts about Jerry K5JC’s mods to the PLL02 CB rigs.

Here is the mod: http://www.jcoffman.net/WB5RUA/10_meter_AM_conversion_w_Photos.html

Eldon did the mod and we have been trying to make contact. We did so today. It was very cool. I was on my GE rig; Eldon was running a JC Penny! (See video above.) 1054 miles. Thanks Eldon. And thanks Jerry!

The New Display: The PHOLED

 

At first I thought, "faux-OLED"?    Then I thought, maybe an OLED from Vietnam (like the delicious soup)?  No, that was not it.  But this IEEE article explains how new blue phosphorescent materials fix OLED display weaknesses: 

https://spectrum.ieee.org/blue-pholed

Sci-Fi Series with an Apollo-era Vibe

Kind of fun.  The Apollo-era and Saturn V stuff bring back memories of 1969 and all that. It is a series that you can watch on Apple TV. 

Here is a review: 

https://www.wired.com/2023/12/geeks-guide-for-all-mankind/

Computer Science is DOOMED Because Humans are Bad at Programming (Video)

Wow, this video of Dr. Matt Welsh's presentation to the CS-50 class at Harvard really put the whole AI, large language model into perspective. It came at a very good time for me, because for past week or two I have been struggling with what was, essentially, a programming problem.  (Dean KK4DAS got it fixed, but the fact that it wasn't easy made me think about the software problems discussed in the video.) 

So much great stuff in this video: 

-- Shel Silverstein!  Yes!  We have discussed him before. The guy who wrote both kids books and articles for Playboy magazine.   The author of "The Cover of the Rolling Stone" for Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show ("The thrill that'll hit ya...") 

-- Pong.  Toy Story (Mark K6HX worked on this).  War Games. 

-- The connections between EE and CS.  Slide rules. 

-- "ChatGPT is like an eBike for the mind."  (But it seems like the jump from Rust to AI is a lot more significant and involved than the jump from bike to eBike.) 

Matt's presentation made me feel a LOT better about never having learned a programming language. And it made me feel a lot better about never having forced my kids to "learn how to code."  I always thought that there would be PEOPLE who were better at this.  As it turns out, the AI is better at that.  

Matt's admission that we don't really know what is going on in the large language models was really interesting.  Especially his description of the "empirical discovery" of the need to use the phrase "let's think step-by-step." 

His description of the cost economics behind today's programming vs. the cost of future (AI-based) software development should be quite sobering for many.  

I found the video on this article: https://thenewstack.io/if-computer-science-is-doomed-what-comes-next/

Pete Juliano N6QW Completes Another Orbit -- Happy Birthday Pete

 Today is the birthday of Peter Juliano, N6QW.  Happy birthday Pete! 

Make Your Own SDR Software! And, "Analog Man" by Joe Walsh of the Eagles (WB6ACU)

The above video appeared on Hack-A-Day this morning.  ON THE SAME MORNING, Bruce KK0S happened to send me this version of Joe Walsh WB6ACU's song "Analog Man." This version has the lyrics.  Thanks Bruce. 

I am currently struggling with some DNS server problems.  Dean KK4DAS is helping me.  In spite of many years on the internet, this DNS problem has reminded me that, like Joe Walsh, I am an analog man.  I mean, just take a look at my Mythbuster rig: (1382) Mythbuster for Lamakaan ARC - YouTube

But there are limits to my analog fanaticism.  First, while Joe proclaims that he is looking for an analog girl, I very luckily found a digital girl.  Elisa is quite digital.  Second, even though digital tech is not my thing, I am willing to accept its usefulness.  I mean, there is so much we wouldn't be doing if we were all "analog men." Like going to the moon. 

This is a hobby -- it is all for fun.  Whatever floats your boat, right?  Still, Joe's song reminds me a bit of the old "SPARK FOREVER!" that you can still see on old QSL cards. That's kind of sad.  I just recognize that my comfort zone is more analog than digital.  

Check out the Hyderabad, India Hamfest! LARC-6

This all looks very familiar.  It is very much like the hamfests and rallies I've seen in the US and UK. 

Note in the video above that we see the HF Signals table and our good friend Farhan VU2ESE.

I was privileged to speak to the convention about my Mythbuster transceiver: 

https://soldersmoke.blogspot.com/2023/12/mythbuster-video-for-lamakaan-amateur.html

  

Joseph VU2JQE recorded and uploaded many short videos on the LARC-6 convention and hamfest.  You can see the on his YouTube page:  https://www.youtube.com/@VU2JQE  Thanks Joseph and thanks to the Lamakaan ARC. 

Mythbuster Video for the Lamakaan Amateur Radio Club of Hyderabad, India

I was really pleased when Farhan asked me to speak at this year's Lamakaan Amateur Radio Club convention.  He asked me to talk about my Mythbuster 75 and 20 meter SSB rig.  It was especially nice to talk about this rig because so much of the inspiration and circuitry for it came from Farhan's BITX rigs.  

I recorded a video so that we could avoid WiFi trouble -- the video appears above.  Below you can see photos of the convention and the presentation of the video.  

Thanks Farhan and thanks to the Lamakaan ARC! 

Super Solar Storms May Not Be So Rare

 

Click on the image for a clearer view

Yesterday's Washington Post had a good story about large solar storms.  We are all aware of the Carrington Event (September 1859) but there were others.  The Japanese painting above depicts an event of February 4, 1872.   

From the Washington Post article: 

Around 11:30 p.m. on Feb. 4, 1872, the sky above Jacobabad suddenly brightened, as if a portal to heaven had opened. A passerby watched in amazement and terror, while a pet dog became motionless, then trembled. The godly glow morphed, from red to bright blue to deep violet, until morning.

Electric communication cables mysteriously glitched in the Mediterranean, around Lisbon and Gibraltar, London and India. Confused telegraph operators in Cairo reported issues in sending messages to Khartoum. One incoming message asked what was the big red glow on the horizon — a fire or a faraway explosion?

This of course reminded me of the event that I witnessed as a teenager in New York in 1972: 

 https://soldersmoke.blogspot.com/2009/09/carrington-flares-aurora-where-were-you.html  

That post has resulted in a steady stream of comments, mostly from non-hams.  Apparently people remember seeing the event, then search the web for clues as to what it was.  Google brings them to that post on the SolderSmoke Daily News.  The comments are usually along the lines of, "Wow!  I saw it too!"  Very cool.  

Help! Bill Needs Computer/Website/DNS Help!

Some SolderSmoke fans have noticed that many links to earlier podcasts (and other things) have disappeared from the SolderSmoke Daily News blog.  This is my fault.  I am trying to correct it, but have been having a tough time.  This is definitely a problem that is outside my analog, discrete component comfort zone.    

The host is Bluehost.  They also are the DNS host.  This morning I wrote to them explaining the problem: 

 -- For many years I have had a website on Bluehost called soldersmoke.com.  On this website I stored many (around 250) .mp3 files, a .rss. and other important files.  

-- On November 20, I created a WordPress site on bluehost: https://dqu.......

-- On November 29, I attempted to have my Bluehost soldersmoke.com site point to the new WordPress site. I may have renamed the WordPress site.

 

-- After carrying out this action on November 29, I was dismayed to find that all of the many .mp3 and .rss files I had on the soldersmoke.com site are no longer accessible.

 

-- I have carried out backups of the soldersmoke.com site going back to November 15.  While these backups appear successful, the files remain inaccessible.

 

-- I think there is a pointing/naming/DNS problem that remains to be resolved. 

-- Please go back to the pointing/naming action I took on November 29 and undo or reverse this action so that the files that I have on the soldersmoke.com site are again accessible. 

-- I am not concerned about the new WordPress blog --  can recreate this later.  

With help from Dean KK4DAS we will today again attempt to fix this problem.   But if anyone out there has any good ideas on how to fix this,  please let me know.  

Thanks,  73  Bill