I love this! Is there a larger technologist wiki from which you can learn the principles of how to actually build everything from raw materials and generic tools?
Examples: casting iron, making blades, making paint, making plastics, making printer ink, making pharmaceuticals that actually work, etc.
It really seems that at this stage in the game we should be able to form "off-grid" villages that actually have a pretty good standard of living. Or is that all forbidden knowledge in this stage of our technological enslavation? ;)
> "off-grid" villages that actually have a pretty good standard of living
Sure, if you consider 1920s era technology to be a reasonable standard of living. Or I suppose you could cheat and import a computer or two? Not sure how you're going to fabricate high performance solar panels on your own though.
I don't know about a single Wiki but casting metal, making blades, and various pigments (so paints and inks) should be readily doable at home and the information readily accessible. Some end products have significant barriers in terms of equipment and skill though, so pick carefully.
Making plastic products might be quite involved and require specialized equipment depending on your desired starting point and polymer. (At the other extreme, 3D printing objects from purchased filament is easy but seems like it defeats the described purpose.)
A number of basic pharmaceuticals (opiates, aspirin, a few others I don't remember off the top of my head) can be readily manufactured at home if you have a garden and don't mind committing multiple felony offenses in the process. Most chemical synthesis is quite involved though and pharmaceuticals in particular tend to consist of difficult to work with organic molecules.
Pharmaceuticals and plastics are both pushing into the realm of organic chemistry which isn't very accessible without significant time spent studying. Unfortunately chemistry outside of a company or research institution has also been more or less criminalized at this point across most of the world. The vast majority of basic reagents will be classed as precursors to either illegal drugs or explosives. (Yay freedom!)
The only problem with YouTube is that it's not organized. It's not indexable or printable. Videos are on Google's servers - here today and gone tomorrow. Videos are GREAT for stuff that you can't put into text, and YouTube excels at getting info out there from people who aren't that good with computers :)
What I'm thinking is a real-life open-source "tech tree".
If we ever need this, I wouldn’t count on the ability to watch YouTube videos.
Books printed on acid-free paper or clay tablets do not copy as easily as bits, but are a lot more durable.
An alternative is to make lots of digital copies of sites like these. That’s cheaper than printing them, but a bit less durable.
I wouldn’t know which of these would be the statistically optimal (as in: information isn’t destroyed, will be found by those who need it, and can be read) method, but I don’t think YouTube is.
> there's an abundance of this type of content on Youtube
.. who makes their money monetizing the content of others.
I respect this guy for staying off the commercialized hosting site and having such a simple, functional website. That is even before my kudos to his work toward duplicating technology from the ground up, and then documenting both success and failure. The latter is something many programmers, including myself, tend to defer until the end of time.
Applied science is a channel in a similar vein. Tackles a lot of interesting engineering projects and walks through all of his results till getting his final product. Really interesting stuff.
This is more like what everyone dreamed primitive technology would be. Instead every video is him using the same four techniques over and over again and not progressing through the tech tree.
This is really close to what a default blog site would look like using Svelte: same load times and essentially identical date/title blog post format is almost what you get out of the box, with Svelte and Sapper, the router.
Anyway, if this is something you like, that's one way to get it on your own domain name, without compromising on 'bloat' or load times.
I feel the same way. I might borrow some of the techniques. The plain text with <br> tags makes for really clean code on the index page and I like how the dates are done there too. Last week I created the Neat CSS framework to try to distill my own thoughts on minimal site design.
I disagree with a couple decisions, such as the font size, font tag, the table, and using non-breaking spaces to indent paragraphs, but I applaud this person for keeping it simple.
They probably didn't expect their code to be scrutinized, either. The content is great and I'm only being critical because I like it's simplicity so that got me to look.
On mobile Firefox, the Reader mode does a great job of making the articles readable, though.
So, mobile-specific default CSS would probably be ideal, but this kind of site also shows off the advantages of just doing the simplest thing, and letting the agent optimize for the user.
yeah, the main page doesn't even use css, it's only html tags. you might ask the author to add viewport scaling on the <head>, even if it will kinda break the zen of the html:
You are right, though it is a shame a proprietary meta tag shoehorned into a CSS feature is now required to make unstyled webpages legible. With the fixed-width layouts of the 00’s there could conceivably be a justification, but never with CSS-less webpages. With all that said, I hope more people keep leaving out this tag, to remind some smartphone users that, despite all the wonders their $1000+ device can do, it doesn’t get unstyled HTML.
I can confirm, working with clay allows a singular focus that one cannot get another way. There is nothing to be looked up, nothing to be copy and pasted from some mailing list or forum. Some techniques are explained on videos on line, but for the most part, it is you and the medium.
Depending on where you want to spend your energy and in what capacity, you can play with the clay and get analytical with the glaze or swap them, play with both or calculate with everything, your choice. We don't normally have these choices.
This is like the Primitive Technology channel on Youtube. From the about page:
'Primitive technology is a hobby where you build things in the wild completely from scratch using no modern tools or materials. These are the strict rules: If you want a fire, use a fire stick - An axe, pick up a stone and shape it - A hut, build one from trees, mud, rocks etc. The challenge is seeing how far you can go without utilizing modern technology. I do not live in the wild, but enjoy building shelter, tools, and more, only utilizing natural materials. To find specific videos, visit my playlist tab for building videos focused on pyrotechnology, shelter, weapons, food & agriculture, tools & machines, and weaving & fiber.'
Funny that the first post sticks out from the rest (a digital project vs. the physical ones). Notably it's more 3x3 a lot of the time. I wonder if the creator also felt like they had to make use of all the 3 pixels of horizontal space for some of these characters. The lowercase "l" is what I'd be using for a "1", with my lowercase "l" being 2 pixels wide, for instance.
I thought the 4x4 grid was an odd choice, especially when calling it the "smallest" font. 5x3 is one fewer pixel of area per character, and about 10x more legible IMO.
Funny enough, I do have a 4x8 pixel RGB display, which frustrates me because I've long thought of 5x3 as the only viable tiny font. I might get more use out of it with this 4x4 font.
Examples: casting iron, making blades, making paint, making plastics, making printer ink, making pharmaceuticals that actually work, etc.
It really seems that at this stage in the game we should be able to form "off-grid" villages that actually have a pretty good standard of living. Or is that all forbidden knowledge in this stage of our technological enslavation? ;)
https://www.howtoinventeverything.com/
https://www.amazon.com/Knowledge-Rebuild-Civilization-Afterm...
I really admire this kind of mother day "renaissance man" :-)
1: https://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/tangled/
2: https://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/gcnc/
3: https://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/electronics/
btw first time I notice you cannot edit your posts past certain time, apparently?
Sure, if you consider 1920s era technology to be a reasonable standard of living. Or I suppose you could cheat and import a computer or two? Not sure how you're going to fabricate high performance solar panels on your own though.
I don't know about a single Wiki but casting metal, making blades, and various pigments (so paints and inks) should be readily doable at home and the information readily accessible. Some end products have significant barriers in terms of equipment and skill though, so pick carefully.
Making plastic products might be quite involved and require specialized equipment depending on your desired starting point and polymer. (At the other extreme, 3D printing objects from purchased filament is easy but seems like it defeats the described purpose.)
A number of basic pharmaceuticals (opiates, aspirin, a few others I don't remember off the top of my head) can be readily manufactured at home if you have a garden and don't mind committing multiple felony offenses in the process. Most chemical synthesis is quite involved though and pharmaceuticals in particular tend to consist of difficult to work with organic molecules.
Pharmaceuticals and plastics are both pushing into the realm of organic chemistry which isn't very accessible without significant time spent studying. Unfortunately chemistry outside of a company or research institution has also been more or less criminalized at this point across most of the world. The vast majority of basic reagents will be classed as precursors to either illegal drugs or explosives. (Yay freedom!)
Each of those products requiring completely different tools, skills and materials.
The Open Source Global Village Construction Kit. Blueprints for building the tools to build up a village.
What I'm thinking is a real-life open-source "tech tree".
Books printed on acid-free paper or clay tablets do not copy as easily as bits, but are a lot more durable.
An alternative is to make lots of digital copies of sites like these. That’s cheaper than printing them, but a bit less durable.
I wouldn’t know which of these would be the statistically optimal (as in: information isn’t destroyed, will be found by those who need it, and can be read) method, but I don’t think YouTube is.
.. who makes their money monetizing the content of others.
I respect this guy for staying off the commercialized hosting site and having such a simple, functional website. That is even before my kudos to his work toward duplicating technology from the ground up, and then documenting both success and failure. The latter is something many programmers, including myself, tend to defer until the end of time.
https://www.youtube.com/user/bkraz333
It seems like even scientists struggle to replicate experiments.
source(just listing his age as "mid-30s" in 2017 but close enough): https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/15/youtube-primitive-technology...
* use of HTML tables, month-first dates
Anyway, if this is something you like, that's one way to get it on your own domain name, without compromising on 'bloat' or load times.
https://neat.joeldare.com
I disagree with a couple decisions, such as the font size, font tag, the table, and using non-breaking spaces to indent paragraphs, but I applaud this person for keeping it simple.
They probably didn't expect their code to be scrutinized, either. The content is great and I'm only being critical because I like it's simplicity so that got me to look.
To each, their own.
On mobile Firefox, the Reader mode does a great job of making the articles readable, though.
So, mobile-specific default CSS would probably be ideal, but this kind of site also shows off the advantages of just doing the simplest thing, and letting the agent optimize for the user.
I bought into that hype back in the day. I don't anymore. They're a tool, they're not inherently good or bad.
When you don’t want that kind of styling you are better off not using tables, instead of making them work for you.
I guess that is exactly what you are saying though ;)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Stone
Depending on where you want to spend your energy and in what capacity, you can play with the clay and get analytical with the glaze or swap them, play with both or calculate with everything, your choice. We don't normally have these choices.
'Primitive technology is a hobby where you build things in the wild completely from scratch using no modern tools or materials. These are the strict rules: If you want a fire, use a fire stick - An axe, pick up a stone and shape it - A hut, build one from trees, mud, rocks etc. The challenge is seeing how far you can go without utilizing modern technology. I do not live in the wild, but enjoy building shelter, tools, and more, only utilizing natural materials. To find specific videos, visit my playlist tab for building videos focused on pyrotechnology, shelter, weapons, food & agriculture, tools & machines, and weaving & fiber.'
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA
Funny enough, I do have a 4x8 pixel RGB display, which frustrates me because I've long thought of 5x3 as the only viable tiny font. I might get more use out of it with this 4x4 font.
https://simplifier.neocities.org/fluxset.html is very interesting, for example.