locked out

[John Larkin]

On Mon, 3 Jun 2019 17:10:15 -0700 (PDT), mpm <mpmillard@aol.com>
wrote:

On Monday, June 3, 2019 at 12:23:10 PM UTC-4, Joe Chisolm wrote:

I had a nest a few years back. What a piece of junk. I now have
a simple thermostat - set the temp and it will either heat or cool
to keep that temp. We live and work out of the house so I dont need
some programmable crap....

For me, it's our crap Whirlpool piece of shit refrigerator.
I fucking hate it! (And I don't normally say "fuck" in open forums!)

If you EVER think about buying one of these... RUN !!

I would call it "junk" also, but that would be totally unfair to actual junk.
I can promise you this: I WILL NEVER -- NEVER -- NEVER BUY ANYTHING WHIRLPOOL AGAIN.

EVER. (And it's so bad, I don't even want to kick it the curb for fear that somebody else might have to deal with it.)

I might also note that its icemaker was very obviously designed by a team of fantastically incompetent imbeciles, but that too would be an unfair comparison to actual imbeciles.

My whole evening is now shot to hell just thinking about it.

Relax. Have a cold beer. Or maybe a warm beer.


--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc
picosecond timing precision measurement

jlarkin att highlandtechnology dott com
http://www.highlandtechnology.com

 

[John Larkin]

On Mon, 3 Jun 2019 19:34:31 -0500, amdx <nojunk@knology.net> wrote:

On 6/3/2019 4:20 PM, Joe Chisolm wrote:
On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 09:38:33 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 11:22:59 -0500, Joe Chisolm
jchisolm6@earthlink.net> wrote:

On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 08:19:25 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

https://www.fastcompany.com/90358396/that-major-google-outage-meant-
some-nest-users-couldnt-unlock-doors-or-use-the-ac

The key lock on my house has been reliable for 25 years. Ditto my
thermostat. Why would anyone spend $270 for a lock that won't let you
in?

Our cabin came with a smart thermostat that guests were always leaving
in weird states. I replaced it with a simple one that has a dial to
set temperature, and one switch for the fan, ON-AUTO. It had another
switch OFF-HEAT-AC but I removed that one, so the heat is always on
and can't be set below 40F.

Seems like some people have enough "smart" gadgets that they can't do
anything without their phone.

I bet Google knows when you come and go, knows what temperature you
like, knows what food you order, knows where you go, knows what you
buy,
reads your email, puts all that info together.

I had a nest a few years back. What a piece of junk. I now have a
simple thermostat - set the temp and it will either heat or cool to keep
that temp. We live and work out of the house so I dont need some
programmable crap.

Amazon stuff is real touchy about net access. They assume always on
completely reliable net connection. I've done some test. Unplug the
ISP link (local lan up and running) and you can cause a fire-tv to hang,
you have to power cycle it. Modern crop of programmers dont seem to
understand the concept that the net can and does go down.

Once we design a product with a uP and an FPGA, it's tempting to keep
adding features, the theory being that every feature might get us some
additional sales. So we have to keep remembering that the basic
functions have to be easy to understand and evoke.

My favorite button on my Rigol scope is DEFAULT SETUP. Get me the hell
out of here.

In consumer electronics, buttons and LEDs are cheap, and code is cheap,
and there are no conventions for user interfaces, and "features" seem to
sell. So hidden internal states and bugs profilerate.

A dishwasher needs two buttons, WASH and STOP. Two LEDs, WASHING and
DONE. One of ours has a zillion touch-sensitive buttons that operate
randomly if someone brushes the front with their belly when they use the
sink. You need a flashlight to see what the buttons do, because they are
labeled in black print on stainless.

Our washing machine is the same. We got a LG top of the line, rave
reviews. Full of buttons and leds. Load sensing, water saving with
"True Balance Technology". Another POS. Software bug will say
it's out of balance. Dumps water in, sloshes clothes about, starts
to spin. Software bug says "out of balance". Dump water in,
slosh clothes around, spin ... out of balance ... repeat, repeat
and repeat. It wastes a bunch of water trying to balance
because of the software bug. The fix is to call the repair
tech ($$$) to come replace the control board ($$$). By the
time I spend all that money I can buy a new "dumb" washer.

LG dryer is a POS also. "Sensor dry" does not work. We have to
put it on timed dry, go check when it "dings", run it some more.

Lowe's has a 35% off washer/dryer sale going on. Time to
go get something simple and rid ourselves of the current frustration.


Good luck, I'm not sure simple is available.
I feel the same about a microwave, give me a mechanical timer over
a keypad and several extra buttons.
Visited my daughter recently, went to make coffee, I see you can make
full pot, small pot, large cup, small cup and a couple other volumes. So
I spin the knob to set for one cup, but I can't see the mark to align
with the one cup icon. I got out a flashlight and started looking it
over, no arrow, no dot. So I called my son over and ask him, he looks
for a few seconds, then hits the power bottom leds light up, I see it is
set for a small pot, I twist the knob and watch the F'ing pretty leds go
around indicating the brew size until I get to one cup. Grrr...

Mikek

I have a neat red plastic drip cone and a plain metal kettle.


--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc
picosecond timing precision measurement

jlarkin att highlandtechnology dott com
http://www.highlandtechnology.com

 

[Sylvia Else]

On 4/06/2019 2:22 am, Joe Chisolm wrote:

Modern crop of programmers dont
seem to understand the concept that the net can and does go down.

We had a debacle recently here in Australia, because some bright spark
thought it would be a good idea to have children sit a nation wide
time-constrained exam by way of a web page.

It didn't go well.

Sylvia.

 

[Winfield Hill]

krw@notreal.com wrote...

What's AC ?
Air conditioning. We don't actually have any.

We don't either. But we do have two heat pumps. ;-)

Hey, for cooling, heat pumps = AC. It's
for heating that they change their stripes.



--
Thanks,
- Win

 

[Clifford Heath]

On 4/6/19 12:01 pm, Steve Wilson wrote:

One really important thing to do is seal all the openings in the ceiling.
You would be amazed how much heat you can lose in the winter due to warm
air leaking into the attic.

I'm currently cold despite having the heater on due to the cold blustery
wind blowing up through the floorboards, and looking at electric
staplers to fix some sarking down in the garage. We don't do USA-style
basements here in Australia, and my office has no carpet.

Clifford Heath

 

On Tue, 04 Jun 2019 02:01:48 GMT, Steve Wilson <no@spam.com> wrote:

Winfield Hill <winfieldhill@yahoo.com> wrote:

krw@notreal.com wrote...

What's AC ?
Air conditioning. We don't actually have any.

We don't either. But we do have two heat pumps. ;-)

Hey, for cooling, heat pumps = AC. It's
for heating that they change their stripes.

Very much agree. I had a home in Cupertino that used a heat pump. It was OK
in the summer, but useless in the winter when you need it the most.

How could a heat pump not work in silly valley? It doesn't usually
get below 20F, here, but they work fine. My brother even had one in
the Philly burbs.

I have now switched over to Heat Recovery Ventilation(HRV). This provides
year-round ventilation for the entire house or apartment. It can conserve
up to 90% of the heat in your home during the winter, and reject an equal
amount of hot outside in the summer. No moving parts except the fans.

I'd like to have one for the basement but it couldn't work alone.

All you need is a small heater in the winter, and perhaps a portable air
conditioner for those really hot days in the summer.

One really important thing to do is seal all the openings in the ceiling.
You would be amazed how much heat you can lose in the winter due to warm
air leaking into the attic.

Completely sealing a house isn't good either.

 

[Steve Wilson]

Winfield Hill <winfieldhill@yahoo.com> wrote:

krw@notreal.com wrote...

What's AC ?
Air conditioning. We don't actually have any.

We don't either. But we do have two heat pumps. ;-)

Hey, for cooling, heat pumps = AC. It's
for heating that they change their stripes.

Very much agree. I had a home in Cupertino that used a heat pump. It was OK
in the summer, but useless in the winter when you need it the most.

I have now switched over to Heat Recovery Ventilation(HRV). This provides
year-round ventilation for the entire house or apartment. It can conserve
up to 90% of the heat in your home during the winter, and reject an equal
amount of hot outside in the summer. No moving parts except the fans.

All you need is a small heater in the winter, and perhaps a portable air
conditioner for those really hot days in the summer.

One really important thing to do is seal all the openings in the ceiling.
You would be amazed how much heat you can lose in the winter due to warm
air leaking into the attic.

 

[Sylvia Else]

On 4/06/2019 1:19 am, John Larkin wrote:

I bet Google knows when you come and go, knows what temperature you
like, knows what food you order, knows where you go, knows what you
buy, reads your email, puts all that info together.

And they can gradually degrade your living experience, and then offer to
sell you an upgrade to put you back to where you were previously.

Sylvia.

 

[John Larkin]

On Mon, 3 Jun 2019 19:34:31 -0500, amdx <nojunk@knology.net> wrote:

On 6/3/2019 4:20 PM, Joe Chisolm wrote:
On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 09:38:33 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 11:22:59 -0500, Joe Chisolm
jchisolm6@earthlink.net> wrote:

On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 08:19:25 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

https://www.fastcompany.com/90358396/that-major-google-outage-meant-
some-nest-users-couldnt-unlock-doors-or-use-the-ac

The key lock on my house has been reliable for 25 years. Ditto my
thermostat. Why would anyone spend $270 for a lock that won't let you
in?

Our cabin came with a smart thermostat that guests were always leaving
in weird states. I replaced it with a simple one that has a dial to
set temperature, and one switch for the fan, ON-AUTO. It had another
switch OFF-HEAT-AC but I removed that one, so the heat is always on
and can't be set below 40F.

Seems like some people have enough "smart" gadgets that they can't do
anything without their phone.

I bet Google knows when you come and go, knows what temperature you
like, knows what food you order, knows where you go, knows what you
buy,
reads your email, puts all that info together.

I had a nest a few years back. What a piece of junk. I now have a
simple thermostat - set the temp and it will either heat or cool to keep
that temp. We live and work out of the house so I dont need some
programmable crap.

Amazon stuff is real touchy about net access. They assume always on
completely reliable net connection. I've done some test. Unplug the
ISP link (local lan up and running) and you can cause a fire-tv to hang,
you have to power cycle it. Modern crop of programmers dont seem to
understand the concept that the net can and does go down.

Once we design a product with a uP and an FPGA, it's tempting to keep
adding features, the theory being that every feature might get us some
additional sales. So we have to keep remembering that the basic
functions have to be easy to understand and evoke.

My favorite button on my Rigol scope is DEFAULT SETUP. Get me the hell
out of here.

In consumer electronics, buttons and LEDs are cheap, and code is cheap,
and there are no conventions for user interfaces, and "features" seem to
sell. So hidden internal states and bugs profilerate.

A dishwasher needs two buttons, WASH and STOP. Two LEDs, WASHING and
DONE. One of ours has a zillion touch-sensitive buttons that operate
randomly if someone brushes the front with their belly when they use the
sink. You need a flashlight to see what the buttons do, because they are
labeled in black print on stainless.

Our washing machine is the same. We got a LG top of the line, rave
reviews. Full of buttons and leds. Load sensing, water saving with
"True Balance Technology". Another POS. Software bug will say
it's out of balance. Dumps water in, sloshes clothes about, starts
to spin. Software bug says "out of balance". Dump water in,
slosh clothes around, spin ... out of balance ... repeat, repeat
and repeat. It wastes a bunch of water trying to balance
because of the software bug. The fix is to call the repair
tech ($$$) to come replace the control board ($$$). By the
time I spend all that money I can buy a new "dumb" washer.

LG dryer is a POS also. "Sensor dry" does not work. We have to
put it on timed dry, go check when it "dings", run it some more.

Lowe's has a 35% off washer/dryer sale going on. Time to
go get something simple and rid ourselves of the current frustration.


Good luck, I'm not sure simple is available.
I feel the same about a microwave, give me a mechanical timer over
a keypad and several extra buttons.
Visited my daughter recently, went to make coffee, I see you can make
full pot, small pot, large cup, small cup and a couple other volumes. So
I spin the knob to set for one cup, but I can't see the mark to align
with the one cup icon. I got out a flashlight and started looking it
over, no arrow, no dot. So I called my son over and ask him, he looks
for a few seconds, then hits the power bottom leds light up, I see it is
set for a small pot, I twist the knob and watch the F'ing pretty leds go
around indicating the brew size until I get to one cup. Grrr...

Mikek

On our microwave, only the button digits 5678 and 9 work. That can be
a challenge for cooking and especially for setting the clock.

The door handle broke long ago, but I kluged up a new one. Microwave
handles break a lot.


--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

lunatic fringe electronics

 

On Tue, 4 Jun 2019 12:09:33 +1000, Clifford Heath <no.spam@please.net>
wrote:

On 4/6/19 12:01 pm, Steve Wilson wrote:
One really important thing to do is seal all the openings in the ceiling.
You would be amazed how much heat you can lose in the winter due to warm
air leaking into the attic.

I'm currently cold despite having the heater on due to the cold blustery
wind blowing up through the floorboards, and looking at electric
staplers to fix some sarking down in the garage. We don't do USA-style
basements here in Australia, and my office has no carpet.

"USA-style basements aren't ubiquitous in the USA, either. In fact,
they're rather unusual in the Southern and Western states where it's
relatively flat. In Northern states, the foundation has to be below
the frost line, so might just as well make that space usable. In
locations where the frost doesn't penetrate very deep, this is an
unwanted expense. It's only on hillsides, where one side of the house
is below grade, where you see basements. These are known as "walk-out
basements" (for the obvious reasons) and are very nice. ...and no,
you can't have mine! ;-)

It sounds like you have construction that we would call a "crawl
space", where there is unheated air below the house? It's not sealed
off at all? Where that's done here, the crawl space is usually sealed
from the outside air and insulation is added in the house floor. We
don't use sarking boards, either, rather sheet goods. When I had a
(partial) crawl space, I added insulation and then put house wrap on
the "cold" side to help seal it some more.

The other construction method (most common here) is just pour a
concrete slab and build on that. No air under it at all.

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Mon, 3 Jun 2019 17:10:15 -0700 (PDT), mpm <mpmillard@aol.com>
wrote:

I would call it "junk" also, but that would be totally unfair to actual junk.
I can promise you this: I WILL NEVER -- NEVER -- NEVER BUY ANYTHING WHIRLPOOL AGAIN.

Don't forget to also blacklist Maytag, KitchenAid, Jenn-Air, Amana,
Gladiator GarageWorks, Inglis, Estate, Brastemp, Bauknecht, Ignis,
Indesit, Consul, and possibly Hotpoint, Diqua, Affresh, Acros, and
Yummly, all of which are owned by Whirlpool Corp:
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whirlpool_Corporation#Major_brands>


--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Mon, 3 Jun 2019 17:10:15 -0700 (PDT)) it happened mpm
<mpmillard@aol.com> wrote in
<a08904e7-1ba7-4fd8-9bda-16326abe7e8e@googlegroups.com>:

On Monday, June 3, 2019 at 12:23:10 PM UTC-4, Joe Chisolm wrote:

I had a nest a few years back. What a piece of junk. I now have
a simple thermostat - set the temp and it will either heat or cool
to keep that temp. We live and work out of the house so I dont need
some programmable crap....

For me, it's our crap Whirlpool piece of shit refrigerator.
I fucking hate it! (And I don't normally say "fuck" in open forums!)

If you EVER think about buying one of these... RUN !!

I would call it "junk" also, but that would be totally unfair to actual junk.
I can promise you this: I WILL NEVER -- NEVER -- NEVER BUY ANYTHING WHIRLPOOL AGAIN.

EVER. (And it's so bad, I don't even want to kick it the curb for fear that somebody else might have to deal with it.)

I might also note that its icemaker was very obviously designed by a team of fantastically incompetent imbeciles, but that too
would be an unfair comparison to actual imbeciles.

My whole evening is now shot to hell just thinking about it.

I bought a whirlpool washer, it broke down in the guarantee.
Man came, replaced the control board, saw me tinkering with 'tronics
gave me the old board.
Did some measurements on it, defective power regulator.
Got 5 of these regulator chips from ebay, for a few $, you never know...


Also have a Whirlpool dryer.
broke down some month later, took the board out, sure same regulator!
ebay regulator in, but also added a big VDR and spark gap to protect it against mains spikes (was the reason it failed).

Then a few month ago my Whirlpool washer died again,
but his time water had got into the controller (probably my fault) and shorted the PCB
black tracks and killed a MOSFET, took one from that old board and fixed it.

You got to keep going

But.. if you do not know 'tronics you need an expensive repair every time.
Their power regulator circuit was really bad.

I have a Whirlpool magnetron + resistive heater oven that cooks everything even pizza, and it works great
it has many menus, you do need the manual.
So again YMMV.

 

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Tue, 4 Jun 2019 11:44:51 +1000) it happened Sylvia Else
<sylvia@email.invalid> wrote in <glm0olF5ttbU1@mid.individual.net>:

On 4/06/2019 2:22 am, Joe Chisolm wrote:
Modern crop of programmers dont
seem to understand the concept that the net can and does go down.

We had a debacle recently here in Australia, because some bright spark
thought it would be a good idea to have children sit a nation wide
time-constrained exam by way of a web page.

It didn't go well.

Sylvia.

Some month ago it happened several times you could not pay in the shops
with your chip card....
Few people carry that much cash around anymore here, big damage to the shops,
no sales, could not even order online, bank software was 'hacked' they said.
My test showed I could reach them but their servers were dead.
Well..

It is getter weirder all the time.
I have more than one bank account (backup), one just changed the system
and send me an email the old system would no longer work after June 1.
OK, for the new system I needed an android app or a special scanner.
But you could not order the scanner, could only order it 2 weeks ago,
So came May 31, and no scanner delivered (I do not use android crap),
so I transfered all money to my other bank.
THEN called the helpdesk where my scanner was.
Oh, that will take 4 weeks...
So how does one pay with online banking then? (just teasing),
could not care less as I only left 50 $ in that account.
Oh no problem use the old system.

Bunch of idiots !

My take on it is: Get some gold.
I case it all breaks down that will keep you going.

 

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Mon, 03 Jun 2019 17:49:17 -0700) it happened John Larkin
<jjlarkin@highland_snip_technology.com> wrote in
<eufbfehd7r06d9nsee8gmbuaofdqtmmn9s@4ax.com>:

>I have a neat red plastic drip cone and a plain metal kettle.

Same here for coffee, but use Brazilian beans and heat the water in the microwave.

 

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Mon, 03 Jun 2019 16:20:39 -0500) it happened Joe Chisolm
<jchisolm6@earthlink.net> wrote in
<4ZWdnZG44Lu6EmjBnZ2dnUU7-aednZ2d@earthlink.com>:

Our washing machine is the same. We got a LG top of the line, rave
reviews. Full of buttons and leds. Load sensing, water saving with
"True Balance Technology". Another POS. Software bug will say
it's out of balance. Dumps water in, sloshes clothes about, starts
to spin. Software bug says "out of balance". Dump water in,
slosh clothes around, spin ... out of balance ... repeat, repeat
and repeat. It wastes a bunch of water trying to balance
because of the software bug. The fix is to call the repair
tech ($$$) to come replace the control board ($$$). By the
time I spend all that money I can buy a new "dumb" washer.

LG dryer is a POS also. "Sensor dry" does not work. We have to
put it on timed dry, go check when it "dings", run it some more.

I have a LG robotic vacuum cleaner,
most of the time it is stuck screaming at you that it is stuck,
had a big speaker and amplifier.
POS.

Bought some cheap other one that actually can get under the bench and TV table.
But it is faster hovering yourself and that does not turn over the plant pots.

OTOH I have a LG MDISC DVD burner and that works OK, YMMV.

 

[Clifford Heath]

On 4/6/19 1:00 pm, krw@notreal.com wrote:

It's only on hillsides, where one side of the house
is below grade, where you see basements. These are known as "walk-out
basements" (for the obvious reasons) and are very nice. ...and no,
you can't have mine! ;-)

No need, I have one. A drive-in basement, no less

It sounds like you have construction that we would call a "crawl
space", where there is unheated air below the house?

That's normal here, but our block is a series of sandstone terraces with
the house built on the first step. We excavated some rock, laid
concrete, and now I have 850 square feet of floor space with an 8'
ceiling and a single-width roll-a-door for the car.

> It's not sealed off at all?

It needs to be well vented or everything goes either rusty or mouldy.
And even then it's an issue.

We
don't use sarking boards, either, rather sheet goods.

Sarking here is a flexible foil sandwich. It's required e.g. under
weatherboards for safety against bushfire embers (no gaps bigger than a
3mm rod could enter), apart from the thermal benefits. Point is, the
sarking goes under whatever comes next.

The other construction method (most common here) is just pour a
concrete slab and build on that. No air under it at all.

Common enough here too, if you can find or excavate a flat surface.

Clifford Heath.

 

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Tue, 4 Jun 2019 07:04:33 +0100) it happened Tom Gardner
<spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote in <RRnJE.374114$SH1.131223@fx03.am4>:

On 04/06/19 06:26, Jan Panteltje wrote:
I have more than one bank account (backup),

That's only sane.

Fraudsters deplete an account.

ATM systems go down.

India I've come across some /cities/ which only took
Mastercard, and others that only took Visa.


My take on it is: Get some gold.
I case it all breaks down that will keep you going.

I have that too, but the denominations are excessively
large.

True, OTOH there are gold shops buying even in small villages here,
you could always cut up a Mapleleaf

One advantage of Britannia and Sovereign coins in
the UK is that if their value goes up the taxman
cannot claim capital gains tax.

Why not? Because those coins are legal tender with
a stated face value.

Of course in a real disaster scenario it is hard to tell,
I noticed the gold shop uses some computer to get latest price...

Sailboat, sail away, live on dry food and oranges, watermaker, catch fish...
to an not contaminated place...

 

[Jeroen Belleman]

Clifford Heath wrote:

On 4/6/19 2:38 am, John Larkin wrote:
On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 11:22:59 -0500, Joe Chisolm
jchisolm6@earthlink.net> wrote:
Amazon stuff is real touchy about net access. They assume always on
completely reliable net connection.

Once we design a product with a uP and an FPGA, it's tempting to keep
adding features, the theory being that every feature might get us some
additional sales. So we have to keep remembering that the basic
functions have to be easy to understand and evoke.
A dishwasher needs two buttons, WASH and STOP.

Yes, THIS! Every button you add make the other ones less useful, less
findable, more cognitive load. It doesn't matter what text you put
behind them or how good the designer of your icon graphics is, you are
presenting people with a choice of actions, and they can't choose an
action until they've understood what the alternative actions are.

This "need to know" is reduced in children, who just push things and
observe outcomes, which is why older adults often need to get a child to
help with technology like remote controls, etc.

Clifford Heath.

Maybe we should let children pilot the 737-MAX.

Jeroen Belleman

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 04/06/19 06:26, Jan Panteltje wrote:
> I have more than one bank account (backup),

That's only sane.

Fraudsters deplete an account.

ATM systems go down.

India I've come across some /cities/ which only took
Mastercard, and others that only took Visa.

My take on it is: Get some gold.
I case it all breaks down that will keep you going.

I have that too, but the denominations are excessively
large.

One advantage of Britannia and Sovereign coins in
the UK is that if their value goes up the taxman
cannot claim capital gains tax.

Why not? Because those coins are legal tender with
a stated face value.

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 04/06/19 02:50, John Larkin wrote:

On Mon, 3 Jun 2019 19:34:31 -0500, amdx <nojunk@knology.net> wrote:

On 6/3/2019 4:20 PM, Joe Chisolm wrote:
On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 09:38:33 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 11:22:59 -0500, Joe Chisolm
jchisolm6@earthlink.net> wrote:

On Mon, 03 Jun 2019 08:19:25 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

https://www.fastcompany.com/90358396/that-major-google-outage-meant-
some-nest-users-couldnt-unlock-doors-or-use-the-ac

The key lock on my house has been reliable for 25 years. Ditto my
thermostat. Why would anyone spend $270 for a lock that won't let you
in?

Our cabin came with a smart thermostat that guests were always leaving
in weird states. I replaced it with a simple one that has a dial to
set temperature, and one switch for the fan, ON-AUTO. It had another
switch OFF-HEAT-AC but I removed that one, so the heat is always on
and can't be set below 40F.

Seems like some people have enough "smart" gadgets that they can't do
anything without their phone.

I bet Google knows when you come and go, knows what temperature you
like, knows what food you order, knows where you go, knows what you
buy,
reads your email, puts all that info together.

I had a nest a few years back. What a piece of junk. I now have a
simple thermostat - set the temp and it will either heat or cool to keep
that temp. We live and work out of the house so I dont need some
programmable crap.

Amazon stuff is real touchy about net access. They assume always on
completely reliable net connection. I've done some test. Unplug the
ISP link (local lan up and running) and you can cause a fire-tv to hang,
you have to power cycle it. Modern crop of programmers dont seem to
understand the concept that the net can and does go down.

Once we design a product with a uP and an FPGA, it's tempting to keep
adding features, the theory being that every feature might get us some
additional sales. So we have to keep remembering that the basic
functions have to be easy to understand and evoke.

My favorite button on my Rigol scope is DEFAULT SETUP. Get me the hell
out of here.

In consumer electronics, buttons and LEDs are cheap, and code is cheap,
and there are no conventions for user interfaces, and "features" seem to
sell. So hidden internal states and bugs profilerate.

A dishwasher needs two buttons, WASH and STOP. Two LEDs, WASHING and
DONE. One of ours has a zillion touch-sensitive buttons that operate
randomly if someone brushes the front with their belly when they use the
sink. You need a flashlight to see what the buttons do, because they are
labeled in black print on stainless.

Our washing machine is the same. We got a LG top of the line, rave
reviews. Full of buttons and leds. Load sensing, water saving with
"True Balance Technology". Another POS. Software bug will say
it's out of balance. Dumps water in, sloshes clothes about, starts
to spin. Software bug says "out of balance". Dump water in,
slosh clothes around, spin ... out of balance ... repeat, repeat
and repeat. It wastes a bunch of water trying to balance
because of the software bug. The fix is to call the repair
tech ($$$) to come replace the control board ($$$). By the
time I spend all that money I can buy a new "dumb" washer.

LG dryer is a POS also. "Sensor dry" does not work. We have to
put it on timed dry, go check when it "dings", run it some more.

Lowe's has a 35% off washer/dryer sale going on. Time to
go get something simple and rid ourselves of the current frustration.


Good luck, I'm not sure simple is available.
I feel the same about a microwave, give me a mechanical timer over
a keypad and several extra buttons.
Visited my daughter recently, went to make coffee, I see you can make
full pot, small pot, large cup, small cup and a couple other volumes. So
I spin the knob to set for one cup, but I can't see the mark to align
with the one cup icon. I got out a flashlight and started looking it
over, no arrow, no dot. So I called my son over and ask him, he looks
for a few seconds, then hits the power bottom leds light up, I see it is
set for a small pot, I twist the knob and watch the F'ing pretty leds go
around indicating the brew size until I get to one cup. Grrr...

Mikek

On our microwave, only the button digits 5678 and 9 work. That can be
a challenge for cooking and especially for setting the clock.

I had one like that; realising that the timer is
a simple decimal downcounter that can be preset
to "out of range" values (e.g. 90s) made life
tolerable for me.

The door handle broke long ago, but I kluged up a new one. Microwave
handles break a lot.

Door seals are one thing I don't want damaged
on a microwave.