Category Archives: Uncategorized

Fix off screen windows in Windows 10

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Do you have windows which are stuck off screen and there is no Move options in the right click menu on the taskbar, even if you hold the Shift key? Read on for a solution!

  1. Left click the app’s icon on the taskbar icon. If the app has more than one window open, click on the appropriate thumbnail.
  2. Press and hold the Alt key on your keyboard then press the spacebar and release. This will bring up a menu on one of your visible screens.
  3. Click ‘Move’ on the list, and use the cursor keys (the arrow keys) on your keyboard to move the program. The window will continue move while the key is held down. The window will usually be to the left or right of the screen where the menu popped up, but you may have to experiment to see where it is to move it back.

That it! Good luck!

Local Weather forecasting

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Just a quick note to enquicken someone else’s google seaches in the future,

For local weather forecasting based on ambient air pressure, the algorithm you need is the Zambretti algorithm .

The original Hackaday article on this is here:
https://hackaday.com/tag/weather-forecast/

And some useful matlab code to get you started is here:
https://w4krl.com/zambretti-forecaster/

Finally, some tags to help google air pressure wheel forecast ambient air pressure bmp280 bmp180 air pressure forecast etc.

Arduino Variable Types Explained

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Here’s something for reference.
I can never find just quite the succinct reference to Arduino Variable types. Nowhere could i find a list of minimum and maximum values, the bits, and the memory used by each variable type.

Neither was there any clear definition of meaning of ‘unsigned’, which just means no plus or minus signs in this type – that is all numbers positive. This increases the highest number that can be stored in the same memory. (thank me in the comments).

Usage Variable type Bits Min value Max value Ram usage Comments
common boolean 8 TRUE FALSE 1 byte
common byte 8 0 255 1 byte
– char 8 -128 127 1 byte  A single ‘character’ e.g. ‘a’ is a single char.  Represented by chr(65) or the binary: 01000001
– word 16 0 65535 2 byte
common int 16 -32768 32767 2 byte
– unsigned long 32 0 4,294,967,295 4 byte
common long 32 -2,147,483,648 2,147,483,647 4 byte
common float 32 -3.4028235E+38 3.4028235E+38 4 byte
The below types are only included for compatibility or further study.
redundant unsigned char 8 0 255  1 byte use byte instead
redundant unsigned int 16 0 65535  2 bytes use word instead
redundant double 32 -3.4028235E+38  3.4028235E+38  4 bytes use float instead
The below types are special types (see arduino.cc)
special string variable  1 byte + x An array of chars
(used for storing strings to modify)
special enum variable  N/A Like boolean but custom fixed set of values allowed instead of TRUE/FALSE.
special struct variable  N/A Public sub variables
(as if you’d made a public class)
special pointer  N/A I’ll be honest, I wasn’t sure the use of this one. Here for completeness though!
Source: https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/data-types-in-arduino
Source: https://playground.arduino.cc/Code/DatatypePractices
Remark: “Unsigned” means no negative sign. This increases the range of positive numbers available.
Remark: Unsigned variables that exceed their capacity roll over back to zero. This could be useful to iterate through arrays of limited length

PPS If anyone can figure out how to properly format this table so it looks nice, with ‘center’ aligned text, please let me know wordpress was being frustrating!

(The formatting css is in the source, see the table tag)

Excel tip – adding two numbers where one is text

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Just a quick tip as i couldn’t quickly find the answer in google.

If you have two cells of data and you want to add them when one might have text instead of a number, use the SUM function.

For instance

Class Section 1
QTY		 Section 2
QTY		 Totals
Robots 10,000 1,000 =sum(B2:C2)
=11,000
Humans 9,000,000,000 n/a =sum(B3:C3)
=9,000,000,000
Plants n/a n/a =sum(B4:C4)
=0

I also searched for: sum two values if isnumeric, excel add two numbers if text only include the non text and excel add two numbers if text.

Office music

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isolation with headphones

or Togetherness by synchronised streaming?

​

Apps used: 

  • Logitech media server (aka squeezebox) – running on a  Raspberry Pi
  • Squeezer (Android) for remote control, queuing tracks, playlist management and synchronising the players
  • SB player (Android) to play the 

    Ps, it’s way past my bedtime! Insomnia is a pain. Goodnight all. 

    Nail surgery; aka needle phobia

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    So, by the time this gets published, I’ll have had nail surgery. Partial nail avulsion, is the technical term. Part of my nail is getting cut off, then the nail bed killed with a chemical. This is actually the second time I’ve had this done on this particular toe, just the other side’s gone bad this time.

    Part of the process involves having local anaesthetic injected into the toe. It is really quite painful, and I’m told makes the toe swell quite impressively as the anaesthetic goes in. I mention this, because I’m terrified of needles and injections. When I’m in the same room as one that I can see, I almost can’t take my eyes off it, it just seems like a thread. Nuts, but there we are.

    I’ve told this story a few times, but not to my blog I think. It goes back to when I was in hospital, going to have an appendectomy because my appendix was threatening to go pop. Junior doctor decided it would be a great idea to draw blood, and leave a port type thing in my elbow so that they could push anaesthetic in later at need.

    So, in went the needle.. and ow. Very ow. Very very ow. Apparently, I’ve inherited veins that seem to move, and don’t like to be pinned with needles very easily. Eventually, he gave up and pull it out. The needle that’d been very straight going in, was now bent 90 degrees. I don’t know how he did it, but ow ow ow ow.

    Refused to let him try again, refused to let a senior doctor try again. In the end they agreed to use anaesthetic cream on my palm, then take the blood they needed from there. Anyway, ever since I’ve been scared of injections and needles. Yay! Surgery’ll be fun 😉