Is this “best” project I’ve seen? In terms of tech,quality,etc No. Neither are mine. This guy built a really fun project for his kids.

I love this. As AI slop gets increased, I hope that content like this starts to get filtered up to the world.

I also learned about a web-ring from his website. I think this is an artifact from the early Internet. I hope this gets more popular for website discovery reasons

https://webring.stavros.io/

I thoroughly enjoyed it. No BS, no ads, no sale pitch, no AI, no pretending, nothing. Just a stranger sharing with the world a project he built at home.

Those picture of the welds are inspiring. It is as honest as it gets. Loved it.

Thank you.

What the heck is it doing on HN's front page?

If you look at the dependency chain to accomplish the task, it’s a true yardstick for any modern civilization,economy,nation.

MechE things for the most part

I can track money spent and earned down to the penny.

Takes less than 20 mins a month to update/manage it. I actually enjoy having sit-down time to "do finances". Keeps me leveled, and forces me to think about how much money I spent and the value I gained from the expenses.

I treat any of my public facing information as a honeypot for nerds (i.e like-minded people). In real life, if I meet interesting people, I point them to my website. If they reach out with questions, I know I found "one of my people".

On a similar note, if I an idea, project or thought of mine could benefit someone else and allow them to learn and gain from it. I'd like to publish it with my privacy in mind.

At work, I work. At home, I do home things. When I work and home at the same place i find it very hard to switch into either mode.

This effect is greatly magnified when you have kids.

I worked remote for a bit , and my overall happiness levels increased when I started working at co-working space. Granted my commute is less than 15 min.

My gym schedule has improved since it’s on the way to the coworking space.

I think the best setup is hybrid IMO

So when working from home, the best way to enable actual work getting done is to have a work room that's dedicated to doing work in, and nothing else. No kid's toys allowed in there, no kids allowed in there, no videogames installed on the PC in there, and so on. This was what it took for me to achieve what I believe to be my maximum focus.

I have issues getting to the gym as well, and you describe the externalization that made it easy for me to get to the gym every day as well. For me it wasn't about having the gym on the way to something, but rather having every aspect of my environment upon waking up keyed to the goal of getting me out of the house and into the gym. So my gym clothes are underneath my feet when I swing my legs out of bed, so I just chuck them on out of habit. My gym shoes are visible from the bathroom near the door so I can't help but see them when I go in to brush my teeth and then come out after. My gym card is out and visible as well.

I've learned my brain is too squishy to be depended upon, but when I leverage externalization and make the universe be my brain for me, I can get stuff done I never thought I'd be able to do. Sometimes the easiest way to do that is to get a job that provides a lot of structure for you, but my hope is that that isn't truly necessary for everyone, because having the ability to set your own workspace is hugely freeing and something I think everyone should have the right to do.

I had an advantage in the big push to WFH because I have really bad ADHD and already knew I couldn't trust my brain, and had already read a bunch of books on ADHD and focus and motivation, and so had the strategies ready to go. I feel like if people who prefer office environments, specifically for the reason that they focus better there, had these same strategies, they might be able to find their home office (or a coworking space or library) just as effective as their work office.

And this happens at the office, too. There are always ways to slack off, you don't need to already be using your sweet gaming pc or whatever. Mindlessly browsing HN or what have you "while compiling" has the same effect.

That said, I think both hybrid/distributed teams and individuals suffer a bit from mixed remoteness, and I'd strongly consider working somewhere where in-person teams are fully so (eg not mixed with remote folks) and vice versa.

This seems like it will be a growing problem with increased autonomy on the roads

I'm not aware of the inner workings of automotive lidar, but I can't imagine building one that didn't work that way.

Why?

It’s almost too easy to add one compared to writing your own functions.

Now compare that to adding a dependency to a c++ project

I want solar but I don’t want the liability of a roof install with leaks and servicing.

I’ve landed either on a solar pergola or a solar fence . Both concepts seem like a no brainer.

I like the solar fence since it allows you to cleverly avoid setback requirements that normal structures have.

I’m glad people like Joey are doing projects like this.

Talk to your AHJ before spending any money.

Also expect a dove colony to enjoy the new comfort. All your neighbors will thank you for their homes turning into guano rocks, a sight once reserved to adventurous travelers.

Their nests, which will quickly accumulate under your roof's panels, offer not one but two existential threats for your home: They can catch fire when too dry, but also act as a water barrier, pushing the water into your roof.

Near me there are new builds with panels integrated flush into the roof. This seems like a much better way to do it, and will become the norm long term.

We were not quoted for the mesh in our install and the day the panels were fitted we had a bird build a nest on another part of the roof, some quick research suggested that people in the area _highly_ recommend getting it, so we had it added at an absolutely ridiculous markup that added a whole year to our ROI but it needed to be done.

Obviously there is a solution, but I'd say the vast majority of either fanatics or normies tinkering with the idea of installing a solar roof know anything about those severe problems.

I've installed one recently. I've asked every prospective contractor for the job beforehand about whether I should get some mesh around it. All said they never heard of such a problem. And if virtually all the people that installed all these roofs in your area tell the same story, what do you do?

Half a year later the whole block turned into Guano dump and once the plague is there, mesh around the panels won't do – you need to install spikes as well, because as long as not every solar roof in your vicinity is "meshed" these colonies are still going to use your roof for their "business" as well.

EDIT: Since you've mentioned ROI, the premium for installing the panels with the mesh directly would have been around 500€, having to do it separately (plus the additional spikes) cost 2500€

Where the dc arc-fault protection referred to in Rule 64-216 is not located at the module, photovoltaic source circuit insulated conductors and cables installed on or above a building and installed in accordance with Subrules 1), 2), and 3) shall be provided with mechanical protection in the form of an enclosed raceway or other acceptable material to protect against damage from rodents.

I think you missed the word "don't" in there, in which case, totally agree.

Despite the installer I used being highly recommended and supposedly extremely reputable (and owned by a major energy supplier), they made no effort to educate me on the various options, I came into this knowing little to nothing about having a solar installation in my home and what scenarios, and solutions were available.

Once I'd agreed to the install, I spent days researching and learned there was a _huge_ host of choices, decisions, configurations etc they just didn't bother to tell me about.

I had to go back and do the upsell for them because I had learned I needed these things (such as the bird mesh).

Best I can tell, is that green incentives in the UK are pushing installers to churn out cookie cutter installs at an alarming rate regardless of its suitability; at no point did they discuss whether I wanted blackout protection (gateway/off grid), didn't ask or even mention the existence of bird mesh, no questions of monitoring, massively under specified the battery capacity for the size of my home, and didn't account for the fact my wife and I work from home every day.

On the mesh point, that's how they got me; they know the cost of installing it later is immense, so they over-charged to add it to my purchase when the scaffolding was already up and installers already on site, and I had no choice or it would have cost me 4-5x more to do it later.