Monalisa in dots

 

I decided to create my own filter. This is my attempt to simulate Stipplegen. The good news is, it works! The bad news is, it's too limited to be usable is broad applications. Also, the user interface is practically non-existent. 

Code: WaterColorBot

 The code for interfacing with WaterColorBot directly seems to be buggy. The AxiCli program just doesn't do it. This annoys me very much since Inkscape works just fine. The problem is Inkscape has big User Interface (UI) problem,  and I can't do good work in any reasonable way. 

So, I did what I had to do so many times, and that is write my own code. The biggest obstacle is the SVG format. The info on SVG out there is somewhat sketchy and incomplete, by which I don't mean the feature set. I mean how to Interface into different programs. 

Fortunately, I found out later, after 5 hours of frustrating research, that Inkscape is capable of exporting different format. I simply exported an optimized, minimal SVG, and cut out the data part. I still don't know how the header is formed, but it's good enough for me to insert my own data.

The result is good enough for me to get something worthwhile to show. Of course, it's still very rough, but I successfully did the hires grace.jpg example picture that is supposed to be used by Stipplegen. I couldn't get Stipplegen to work, either. It's not updated to Processing 3, after all. 

Life Reset 2022

Today is the first day of the rest of my life. How many times have I been saying these things? Well, here's another reset coming up. I decided to embrace minimalism lifestyle. That means I'm discarding everything I own that does not fit into the car. I guess it helps that I have a cargo van. The fact that I'm moving to another state is a great impetus of doing so. I guess I just lost confidence in Colorado. It was neutral for the longest time, but not anymore.

Still, there's a lot that I'm discarding. DVD movies, certainly. Books, magazines, and other reading materials. Nintendo games. I have already focused on Nintendo games, but I'm keeping only Nintendo 3DS. Gameboy is out. So do many other games, mostly board games. Lots of clothes and kitchen implements. Toys and computer stuff.

I'm still sorting the stuff, so that it will pack nicely. Marie Kondo book is nice. It helps me pack efficiently. Or, as efficient as can be. It still took me about 3 tries, throwing out half the stuff each time. The last packing was only 4 hours. That's a great improvement from 3 days. Still, I don't want to spend more than a couple of hours.

It's interesting to see what's left. A carry-on luggage of clothes. Raspberry Pi computers, with portable monitor and battery pack. There's a YouTube studio package in a bag. Some precious collection of books. Some food prep stuff, which is included in camping equipment, both backpack and car camping. 

There's other miscellaneous stuff, but if I can't remember using them, then may as well discard them. I learned it the hard way. There's no need to store stuff you don't use. Make sure that you use all the stuff you keep, and your life will be more fulfilling as a result. Above all, don't wait. Keep at it everyday, and treat it as daily personal improvement habit.

My goal is to fit my life into 3 bags: A personal bag, filled with precious paper and other irreplaceable item. A carry-on backpack, enough to go globe trotting. And a big wheeled duffel bag. Furthermore, there's also extra stuff, such as camping equipment, and work related items. Otherwise, that's it.

It's a great thing that we have cloud services. I can do quite a bit of things with my phone. About the only thing that it can't do is heavy duty data entry. Even that is not impossible, just very, very slow. So, I'm happy with the current pace of technology. Everything else is extra.

Gamestop event

 

You would think that those Wall Street traders are smart, and that your retirement money would be safe with them. Turns out, not so much. The reason why the price is skyrocketing is because short sellers sells more stock than what is available on the market. Obviously, some people are going to get burned. 

Those traders are gambling with your money because they certainly don't do so with theirs. All the previous stock market movies come to mind. This will end up in a crash. I just hope that the bad players get their comeuppance properly. 

Lesson: Never short more than what the market can bear!

2021 is sure shaping up to be an interesting year after such horrible 2020.

Hackspace 39

 

HackSpace magazine #39 is out, and it's sold out already. Do you think that the fact it has a free microcontroller inside the magazine has anything to do with it? 😄

At least it has support for C and Assembly coding. I just hope that it's not buried under micro python coding coverage. 

Too much ads

 That's an ad from YouTube. The yellow marks shows that there are 9 ads in a one hour show. This is the first one. That's not 50 seconds ad. That's 50 minutes ad. I'm thinking that there's something seriously wrong with that. Who would want to watch a 50 minute ad, 9 times, in a one hour show?

David Allen Books

 So, this year, my resolution is to Getting Things Done and Making It All Work. Both are books by David Allen.

I have way too many projects going on, and last time I checked, I have 4000 books scanned in,  and not only it's not over yet, but I also have paperwork to scan in also. David suggested that you should dump everything into the IN box. I don't think I have a big enough box for that. So, I will need to do it in stages.

On the good side, I did increase my typing speed to a minimum 60 wpm, and up to 100 wpm. Also, I'm finalizing my journal form. So, hopefully I'll get at least a handle of workflow, instead of being overwhelmed by it, like last year.

Today is a new day. The first day of the rest of my life. Welcome to the year 2021!