A Crummy Commercial

I saw a couple of items concerning navigation recently.  One was this Veritasium video on GPS jamming in Europe: source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tz23G_UXCGA Those wacky Russians !  The one thing they didn't mention was who tipped off the GPS researcher to the jamming in the first place.  Probably the same one who provided the raw GPS data ? The other was this IEEE Spectrum article on using magnetometers for navigation: https://spectrum.ieee.org/magnetometers-hidonix-astranav-gps-alternative Both are interesting - one thing that I've been interested in as a property owner is just where are property lines that aren't line of sight from the corner stakes that the surveyors drive in.  At one time I looked at DGPS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differential_GPS But apparently DGPS is gone in the US.  But you might be able to do a local DGPS, say put a DGPS broadcast station at a known point (USGS benchmark or the corner stake of a property)  then...

Before the June 3 2026 game between the Brewers and the Giants - here is Brewers pitcher Robert Gasser getting stronger ?   source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCGer90o57o I just happened to see this tweet, the photo is amazing: source:  https://x.com/ukpackers/status/2062272827898646941 Nicholson AND Nitschke working on a movie, who knew ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_(film) source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MoIFxrXU-v8 For 1960s Packers fans, Ray Nitschke doesn't get much screen time but at least it's pretty early in the movie so you don't need to watch the rest if you don't want to. And here is the most profound part of the movie at about 43:10 in: "Pleasure, the inevitable byproduct of our civilization - a new world, it's only preoccupation will be how to amuse itself - the tragedy of your times, my young friends, is that you may get exactly what you want" In other words: it's Huxley's  Brave New World BTW, in this zoom in yo...

I finally found the CQ Magazine article by W1FB from October 1997 on an antenna switch construction project.  I've mentioned it several times, for example: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2022/10/dougs-desk-in-cq-magazine.html Here are the schematics: I remembered the article as using automotive relays (aka Bosch) which is correct BUT I also remembered it as employing a power saving circuit for the relays - that isn't true. So I don't know if I am thinking of a different article/author or ?? Here is a short relay power saver video: source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqLfx7yIhIE It shows the concept of bridging a series resistor with an electrolytic cap - this allows the relay to pull in but the relay current decreases as the cap is charged. I don't know what to say about my memory though :( Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm

I *think* I have bats - no belfry here but bats that roost at night by the front door.  I see the signs, yuck.  So I thought I'd setup the trail cam overnight to confirm.  But all I got was this: An old geezer barely awake.  Also I didn't have the cam aimed high enough - there's no viewfinder. This reminded me of an episode (season 3, episode 22 per PlutoTV) of The Andy Griffith Show where Barney sets up a camera to catch a thief at the gas station.  Here is the cam (a folding camera yet) with a string on the shutter: Route the string: Finally attach the string to the door: Then Barney opens the door: The next day after the robbery Gomer comes in with the picture of the thief: I hate when that happens :)   I'll try it again tonight - if I get skunked again maybe I've discovered that the trail cam is actually a scare-bat ?   Update, 2026-06-04:  Skunked again !  All I got was this IR perp photo:   I'll try one more night and then de...

I've been toting my credit cards in the home made shield mentioned here: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2026/04/shield-me.html But it occurred to me: the new Moto G 2025 phone has NFC, right ?  Yup.  So I downloaded an app called NFC Tools.  Also I had bought an NFC Arduino shield which included a couple of NFC tags.  So, I dug out the (unused) NFC Arduino shield and got out the tags from the bag. One tag was a white card, it's a white card, the blue tinge must be from the north light ?   the other was a blue key chain tag.  So first the white card, unshielded it reads fine: when shielded, the card doesn't read: The blue tag unshielded: The blue tag shielded: So the simple copper tape shield seems to do the job, nice ! Why not just use my credit cards in the test ?  Feeling a little paranoid I figured that although the app is certified safe - data isn't swept up to the cloud, if I don't try the credit cards then I don't have to worry that the info would g...

I saw this on Ebay: Source:  https://www.ebay.com/itm/287339757881 It's a small, notecard sized display - E-paper like the various E-book readers.  The virtue of E-paper is that it requires no power to keep alive.  Indeed these Ebay displays are powered by NFC (near field communication) like the smart credit cards.  So it doesn't need a power supply, just an NFC signal to upload the image you want to display.  Then the image persists even if there is no signal present.  This NFC signal probably comes from an app for an NFC enabled phone, which I now have !  But it could come from something like an Arduino with an NFC shield. But you are probably thinking: can't you just write (or use a computer printer) a message or image on regular paper or card stock - that doesn't require any keep-alive power, right ?  That's certainly true, as I said, it's almost irresistible :( I was thinking of E-paper for a clock display but there are two problems, this NF...

As often happens I'll get an email out of the blue: your reserved library book is available - often a book I barely remember reserving :)  This time it is Chip War by Chris Miller.   An interesting book although since it's from 2022 in some ways (the recent AI craze) it's aged out. (Actually the AI boom is addressed in this edition with an extensive appendix).   Here are a few observations on the book: The Transistor Girls by Paul Daniels => As my Grandmother might have commented:  "spicy" https://archive.org/details/bwb_P9-EJQ-315/page/146/mode/2up GCA => I confess I'd never heard of this company, they invented the stepper lithography at the suggestion of Morris Chang (founder of TSMC) ?  But they dumped Nikon as the supplier of their optics so Nikon went into the stepper business, listened to customers and did better than GCA. Micron => Everyone has heard of Micron in Idaho but I didn't know of their relentless focus on cost and process improv...