I’ve got one of those KeepConnect smart plugs which monitors a few different external servers and their own cloud, and automatically power cycles its outlet if things don’t work. They’ve damn near doubled in price since I’ve bought mine but it does work very well for me. Annual fee is reasonable too.

I could build something similar but I have too many projects as it is, and I feel I’d be fiddling with it endlessly just because I can. This is literally set and forget and in the last 2y it’s cycled the outlet 48 times, most of them in the middle of the night, presumably with my cable provider maintenance windows.

I’ve always felt that Quebec has been on the right side of these kinds of issues. They get heat for anti-Islam rhetoric but they apply the rules to all religions, which IMO is the right approach.

Exactly this. I use Shelly relays in the switch boxes and use the physical switch as an input to the Shelly relay. I have a couple AliExpress zigbee relays too that work well.

The trick is with three/four way switches where the smart relay needs continuous power and to be physically located at the end of the chain where power is actually switched to the light or outlet. Took me a while to figure that out but an SPDT relay with 120V coil solves that. The problem is space: fitting the relay to provide continuous power to the smart relay and the smart relay itself into a standard junction box with a physical switch and all the usual mess of wiring is not easy.

… not equipped to handle what, exactly?

Sexual assault is a pretty serious charge, and it appears in this case that the alleged victim seriously damaged her own credibility on several claims. I fully admit to not knowing a lot of this specific case but it sure seems like the justice system prevailed in upholding justice given the facts we have.

Hudson’s Bay doesn’t exactly have much for a luxury experience either. At one point when I was a kid maybe, but they’re a loooong way from that point in their history.

“I moderate heavily. If someone is rude or abusive, their comment isn’t published. Unless it’s really funny.” :-)

Gang of Four?

unless I am very much mistaken this is only true for air source heat pumps. If you’re in a cold environment I would expect you’d want a ground source heat pump instead, although the installation cost for that will be significantly higher than air source.

Exactly how I feel about it as well.

Kinder Surprise are readily available all over the US. The yellow plastic egg has been modified so it essentially splits the two halves of the chocolate egg, but I see them for sale at every grocery store, Walmart, etc.

They used to be banned, but not for quite some time now.

I’ve never seen a window AC with mechanical knobs not cycle the compressor when it hits the temperature set by its thermostat. The fan might run 24/7 but the compressor? How could it possibly regulate temperature otherwise?

Monitor the current with the smart plug. When you want to turn it off, wait for the current to drop for a few minutes (this means the compressor is off/unloaded) then power off the outlet.

Might be an idea.

Why not if (f & (F_1 | F_3)) {? I use this all the time in embedded code.

edit: never mind; you’re checking for both flags. I’d probably use (f & (F_1 | F_3)) == (F_1 | F_3) but that’s not much different than what you wrote.

My car is a diesel. I believe catalytic converters are the usual fare for gasoline engines.

It’s just like the DEF tanks on 18 wheelers. I buy a 10L jug of it from Walmart for something like $10. In my trunk there’s a panel you remove and under it there’s a small cap very similar to the gas cap. Remove that, hook up the DEF bottle hose (the bottles come with a 12-15" corrugated hose) and very slowly pour it in. You don’t want to spill that stuff, it’s nasty not because it’s urea, but because when it dries it kind of crystallizes and makes a real bloody awful mess.

Replace the cap, replace the panel cover, close the trunk and you’re done for another 9-15mos.

It’s my understanding that the cheat was in all TDI models, but the smaller Jetta was particularly bad because it didn’t have a urea system and the fix for that model was to retrofit one. My Passat may have needed a more robust urea injector and not just software, but I can’t remember now. Either way on my year/model the fix was barely noticeable.

The dumbest part is that after I got my car updated (the Passat only needed a firmware update) the fuel economy was not even one MPG worse. It’s been a decade and I’m still regularly getting slightly better than 50MPG on the highway and low-30s in the city. There was no reason to cheat.

I’m currently driving that VW TDI – best car I’ve ever owned in 35 years. Next vehicle wasn’t going to be a Tesla, but perhaps an F150 Lightning if they ever get their head out their asses and offer a regular old e-pickup – I don’t want quad cab and a short bed, just two doors and a regular full size bed would be great. Alas, that’s hard to find in ICE, let alone electric.

those appear to be physical clones, not electronic equivalent clones. How is this specific company any different than the dozens of other earbud clones out there?

Between (old) reddit, phpbb and smf… the old reddit model wins by a landslide in my opinion. I’ve used all of these over the years and absofuckinglutely HATE phpBB and SMF, with SMF earning slightly less hatred than phpBB.

I’m also old enough to have downloaded .QWK files for offline BBS forum reading/replying and even connecting to the internet over a FidoNet-internet bridge. Lemmy did the exact right thing in copying reddit’s format.