“…I really don’t want to have to wipe the thing because it’s running a headless OS”

I feel like logging in as root on a headless system and hoping you type the command(s) to restore functionality is a rite of passage.

After reading a few of these I feel like I was either a very boring grad student, or my professors were all very chill. (Or maybe just subject to male privilege.)

A few run-ins with IT, but I don’t think I ever got nasty letters from professors…

I’ve been pleased with it. Family is very relaxed about projects like this, but yeah it’s low power draw. I don’t think I have anything special set up but the right thing to do for power would be to spin down drive when not in use, as power is dominated by the spinning rust.

Uptime is great. Only hiccups are that it can choke when compiling the ZFS kernel modules, triggered on kernel updates. It’s an rpi 3/1GB RAM (I keep failing at forcing dkms to use only 1 thread, which would probably fix these hiccups 🤷).

That said, it is managed by me, so sometimes errors go unnoticed. I had recent issues where I missed a week of rsync because I switched from pihole to technitium on my home server and forgot to point the remote rpi there. This would all have been fixed with proper cron email setup…I’m clearly not a professional :)

Not the same, but for my Immich backup I have a raspberry pi and an HDD with family (remote).

Backup is rsync, and a simple script to make ZFS snapshots (retaining X daily, Y weekly). Connected via “raw” WireGuard.

Setup works well, although it’s never been needed.

Link(s) in post contain punctuation and break, at least on my client. Here’s the codeberg link (working);

https://codeberg.org/BobbyLLM/llama-conductor

In much of California, it’s not the electric energy costs that are high, it’s the delivery/grid fees. Not that it matters as far as the electricity bill goes, but it’s worth noting.

On my recent bill I paid 16¢/kWh for on-peak electric generation and 49¢/kWh for electric delivery. (There’s a small baseline credit for delivery so it’s a little more complicated, but you get the idea.)

So if someone tries to tell you electricity is expensive because CA is a hippie state with lots of solar, I would be a little skeptical.

You can’t beat

🤔

They made the decision that would save the most lives, which is their job.

But they lied to the public, which undermines trust; IMHO this was a myopic decision.

As for the people doing what’s best for society, that’s antithetical to American individualism

Can’t speak for everyone, but Flex Alerts in California do indeed work (it’s when we’re asked to reduce energy consumption).

your faith was proven wrong with both masks and toilet paper being bought for resale at predatory prices, or just to maintain personal supplies at the expense of everyone else.

That’s a fallacy/faulty generalization — I’m not saying everyone behaves well, but from my experience, the vast majority do. The pandemic for me was a time where I really felt like we looked out for our fellow people, at least locally.

In 2020 they recommended against face masks for non-healthcare workers. My understanding is that they did this to conserve masks for healthcare workers, as did the WHO. IMHO that was a really shitty thing for them to have done. Presenting all the facts and pleading with the public would, I think, have resulted in higher trust in them as an institution, ultimately saving lives, but that’s just my opinion I guess.

But yeah, completely agree that even then it was more or less well meaning, as opposed to now.

https://www.superbowl-ads.com/1997-tabasco-mosquito/

Best ad ever IMHO (sorry for funky link, YouTube if you prefer).

No dialog, no rampant consumerism (hot sauce is a necessary food), no sex/sexism, no emotional manipulation.

From link:

NOTE: The script is broken, DO NOT ATTEMPT TO USE THE SCRIPT NOW. Attempting to run it may get your account flagged stopping you from trying face verification either temporarily or permanently, forcing you to use your ID.

pr: https://github.com/xyzeva/k-id-age-verifier/pull/12

Given that they specified “caffeinated tea” as also conferring benefit, I would guess it’s the caffeine that’s the active substance here.

Or, malicious compliance by someone with a moral compass. Best is to somehow leak documents wholesale. But if that’s not possible, I think the next best way to all but guarantee that the information gets out is to do a lousy job censoring, and let “The Internet” do the rest. It also makes the administration look even more stupid, especially in the eyes of technically minded folks.

But yeah, not the best and brightest, that’s certainly a possibility.

High frequency is generally bad for transmission line losses, so getting power from A to B is better at lower frequency — DC is a great option here.

If we switched to DC, many things would still flicker though as they would presumably use switching power supplies, but those could be relatively high frequency like you said.

Interestingly, airplanes use 400Hz, as transmission over distance doesn’t matter, and transformers can be made much smaller/lighter.

The model certainly works for other things — municipal broadband in the USA is often very well regarded.

They say “everything’s bigger in Texas,” but maybe that’s just because California hasn’t whipped it out until now…

Yeah, good point. The “app setup” is built into android and iOS as far as I can tell (generating matter credentials, etc.). Better than 3rd party IMHO but not ideal, and a nonstarter for a lot of folks. Hopefully HA will come out with their own onboarding process at some point.

Fair enough; I have a dedicated SSID which is VLAN’d off from the rest of my network with no Internet access. Only my HA server can talk to those devices.

+1 for ThirdReality. They’re a little pricey but I’ve generally had good luck with them.

I’ve also had pretty good luck with cheap Matter-over-wifi bulbs. Pairing them can be a little finicky and needs to go through an Android or iOS process, but after pairing you can block Internet access for them and they work great local-only.

There’s a bug in some wifi matter bulbs where they crash, especially when going from off to a desired brightness/color state (as in, “light on” works but “light to 50%, 3000K” will crash the bulb).

I don’t think you understand what local control of smart devices means…