Notices by Trevor Flowers (trevorflowers@machines.social)

Fair notice: I regularly delete toots, especially if they attract bad attention.

An open inkjet printer?
You have my attention.
https://www.hackster.io/news/the-open-printer-is-a-raspberry-pi-zero-w-powered-fully-open-highly-flexible-inkjet-printer-30948a1787cc
https://www.crowdsupply.com/open-tools/open-printer

Even if you don't believe like I do that a well resourced Servo project provides our best path out of the Google Web and into a new Open Web, I think many of you might find it interesting to read the monthly updates to see how a modern web engine comes together. It's juuuuust a little bit more complex and neat than NetPositive, the first browser I worked on.
https://servo.org/blog/2025/09/25/this-month-in-servo/

A fun new game:
0) notice a big story unfolding
1) write down each spicy revelation and its source
2) don't repeat them (hard, I know)
3) wait seven days (even harder)
4) check several reliable sources for their most recent coverage
5) for each revelation that turned out to be barely true or straight BS, blacklist that source as unreliable
6) if that's all or most of the revelations then sit by a large body of water and ask yourself what the sources had to gain
7) goto 0

You know how a bunch of people promoted the rumor that the shooter's bullet etchings supported trans rights?
Reporting suggests that was 100% bullshit spread in the AFT.
If you immediately believed that rumor then I sincerely and not in a "gotcha" way suggest that you take a hard look at your confirmation bias and your media awareness.
Check sources, esp. if it's punching down. Some trans people *will* lose their lives because of these rumors.

I'm not a big fan of the WSJ but at least they did eventually admit their mistake. Too bad they didn't do their job in the first place and wait to see reliable photographic or direct evidence.
https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/charlie-kirk-shot/card/ammunition-in-kirk-shooting-engraved-with-transgender-antifascist-ideology-sources-pdymd1sXXMSlVRhpvR4b

Also, if you saw someone spread that rumor then watch to see if they publicly issue a correction. If they don't then they're an unreliable source and you should ignore their bullshit.

If you're into physical control design and you need a new rabbit hole for the downfalling then I recommend looking into "color control surfaces" used by colorists, the people who post-process images (still or moving) for a variety of characteristics like hue, luminance, and contrast.

I guess I picked a bad day to stop making miniatures. 😸
But seriously, it has six GPIO pins, 12bit ADC, and native support for ISRT, I2C, and SPI. 16k of memory is tight these days but still amazing in that package.
It would be very cool for @adafruit to make a public spec like the Feather but for boards the size of a tic-tac. https://www.ti.com/about-ti/newsroom/news-releases/2025/2025-03-11-ti-introduces-the-world-s-smallest-mcu--enabling-innovation-in-the-tiniest-of-applications.html

TIL about Embassy, a Rust environment for embedded work on small-ish chips like the RP2040 and ESP32s. I have a few ideas for small devices for camper vans so maybe if I can make time this Summer I'll give it a try. My initial impression from reading the docs is that it's early days but could be handy.
https://embassy.dev/

Hell, yes. We need more of *this*.
https://drewdevault.com/2025/01/16/2025-01-16-No-Billionares-at-FOSDEM-please.html

I understand all of the tradeoffs that make diesel, petro-gasses, and wood attractive for heating and cooking in vans.
I understand that making them safe is well understood.
I'm not there, yet. Maybe a few cold nights shivering and eating trail mix because my batteries are borked will do the trick. 😹
#vanLife

Ok, I've started packing up tools and materials I won't need until I have some sort of shop space on the new land. The plan is to have that in place by early Summer but I expect 2025 to be chaotic for supply chains and prices so 🤷♂️. Maybe it'll all live in a storage unit or shipping container while I hunker down on raw land.
#coldToast

This is a dry fit of a smol DECtape TU56 into Eurorack rails. Ignore the finish (that's a paper print instead of vinyl, draft quality 3D prints, etc) as this is a size test more than anything. Imagine a couple of these racks on your desk, filled with SMBs, SSDs, and a variety of hardware both fun (tiny spinning tape drives!) and useful (floppy drives that read SD cards!). That's the Desktop Computer Lab concept.
Next unit on my list is a PDP-11 controls panel.
#desktopComputerLab

@will @technomancy A dang nice keyboard (via Keybordio).

I'm a believer in modding tools to make them fit for purpose and that has the nice side effect of making them feel more "mine" instead of controlled by the manufacturers.
Even taking a minute to remove unnecessary stickers and then gaffer tape over logos has a large positive effect on my feeling for a device.
A few years ago I started covering logos for filming and realized it quiets my mind to remove them from my view. Now I cover logos on almost everything, including my TV remotes!
#shopLife

After a ~year of development, the 1:3 scale working VT100 terminal is ready to go!
🎉
https://store.transmutable.com/l/small-vt-100
🎉
It has a tiny working USB keyboard with ~80 keys. It has a cute little 3.5" display panel. It may be the cutest thing I've ever created but you tell me!
🤷
To celebrate the completion of what turned out to be a bear of a project, for one week there's a $75 discount code for friends of smol retros: DINGDANGFRIENDS
🛁
Ok, time for me to take a bath and weep for exhausted joy.

Hey, you. Yes, you.

Remember this:

👉 You are deserving of love. 👈

Every day, just for being alive. Down days. Up days. In the gutter days. On the moon days.

Every ding dang day.

You are deserving of love.

💛

If you're into #retrocomputing and someone gives you a hard time, just remind them that a fair portion of the world's infrastructure is old af.
https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/storage/german-navy-aims-to-replace-aging-8-inch-floppy-drives-with-an-emulated-solution-for-its-anti-submarine-frigates

Hey, #retrocomputing folks. Is there a common name for this category of wedge-shaped toggle switch, as found on the PDP-11/70 and other machines of that era?