• Re: software situation

    From john larkin@jl@glen--canyon.com to sci.electronics.design on Mon Mar 30 16:00:03 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 09:02:28 -0700, Ross Finlayson
    <ross.a.finlayson@gmail.com> wrote:

    On 03/30/2026 07:44 AM, john larkin wrote:
    On Sun, 29 Mar 2026 20:54:28 -0700, Ross Finlayson
    <ross.a.finlayson@gmail.com> wrote:

    On 03/29/2026 03:24 PM, john larkin wrote:
    On Sun, 29 Mar 2026 14:29:32 -0700, Ross Finlayson
    <ross.a.finlayson@gmail.com> wrote:

    On 03/29/2026 12:39 PM, Don Y wrote:
    On 3/29/2026 5:53 AM, Ross Finlayson wrote:
    That seems to speak to "proximity" and "affinity", with regards
    to "coherency", and "mobility". To "move" state, about state & scope >>>>>>> or the contents of (some of) memory and registers, of a process or task,
    here is described as "re-seating" which is also the usual enough >>>>>>> idea in programming like C and C++.

    My goal is NOT to disrupt the "programmer's model" for "average
    developers". They should truly be able to think that they are running >>>>>> on a uniprocessor but without any guarantees as to throughput
    (to accommodate sharing the physical processor, communication
    overhead, etc.).

    They shouldn't need to know where "they" are executing or that the >>>>>> resources on which they rely may not be local.

    "Advanced developers" attend to the dynamic reconfiguration of
    the system (at runtime). So, THOSE developers build applications
    that are given the ability ("capability") to relocate resources,
    kill off tasks, spawn new ones, etc. Because they, presumably, have >>>>>> a more detailed understanding of the "System" beyond the scope of
    some particular application/task within it.

    Perhaps the most usual example is pre-emptive multithreading itself, >>>>>>> about basically the state as a stack, and "process control block" >>>>>>> and "thread control block" usually enough, about context-switching. >>>>>>
    I support a heterogeneous environment; an object can be migrated
    to a different processor *family* at any time (while executing).
    You shouldn't care as long as the interface (methods) to the
    object remain available (for the capabilities you have been
    granted) along with the current state of the object.

    Similarly, the algorithms used to implement those methods (as
    well as internal data members) can change dynamically -- as long
    as the interface functionality remains immutable.

    For example, I create namespaces -- (name, capability) dictionaries -- for
    each process. If you only need a few registered names (stdin, stdout, >>>>>> stderr),
    the code that implements that is entirely different than the implementation
    that tries to manage hundreds of named entries.

    As it should be. (because "you" are "billed" for the resources that you >>>>>> use, you'd not want to bear the cost of an implementation that did more >>>>>> than you needed -- just like you wouldn't develop a standalone device >>>>>> with more complexity/cost than necessary!)

    If names are insignificant (e.g., akin to file descriptors), then an >>>>>> implementation might use a single "char" to represent a name, giving >>>>>> you access to ~200+ unique names of the form "a", "b", "^X", "\b", etc. >>>>>> Or, treat that char as an 8 bit int -- 0x01, 0x02, 0x61, 0x62, ... >>>>>> (do you really *need* names like "Object 1", "Object 2", etc.?)

    In this "Critix" concept, or "DeepOs" (or "BeepOs/DeepOs"),
    the idea of the "re-routine" as a model of asychronous concurrency, >>>>>>> is a little different than the usual idea of a co-routine, which >>>>>>> is usually enough a fork in the process model, then about signals >>>>>>> as IPC with PID and PPID, vis-a-vis, fibers and threads or events >>>>>>> and task queues, basically the re-routine never "blocks" and has >>>>>>> no "yield" nor "async" keywords in the source text, instead any
    call to a re-routine implicitly yields, and then the re-routine
    is run again later, the re-run, where as the re-routine is filled in, >>>>>>> then then the re-routine adds a penalty of basically n^2 in time >>>>>>> to be completely non-blocking and where asynchrony is modeled in >>>>>>> the language as the normal procedural flow-of-control.

    "Yield" is just a hint to the scheduler. If you have a preemptive >>>>>> implementation where "time" can be a preemption criteria, then a
    task need never "suggest" a good place to relinquish the processor. >>>>>>
    OTOH, if you can only preempt when the task invokes an OS primitive, >>>>>> then you have to be wary of a developer spinning without ever giving >>>>>> the system a chance to "interrupt".

    Then, as that's only in the kernel itself, that n^2 might seem a >>>>>>> huge penalty, yet, it's actually quite under that, since as the
    re-routine its data (in a stack) is filled in, then most of its
    routine is cache hits, the "memoized" calls to the re-routine.

    About the allocator, then this design concept basically is for
    making use of virtual memory, to be able to "re-seat" the memory >>>>>>> of a process without changing a process' view of the memory.

    Of course. But, with VMM, you can do so much more:
    - CoW semantics
    - DSM
    - remapping "defective" memory
    - releasing memory that will NEVER be revisited
    - universal call by value (for large arguments)
    etc. None of these things need impact the developer.

    This can help avoid both syscalls and memory fragmentation,
    since memory paging basically is performed by the user-space
    process in its time instead of by the kernel. This has the
    usual guarantees of process memory that it's to be visible only
    to the process itself unless explicitly shared, that then being
    treated as a usual sort of shared resource in the distributed sense. >>>>>>>
    The syscalls by a process essentially yield (the process yields
    to the scheduler), about ideas like round-robin and fairness
    and anti-starvation and incremental-progress in the scheduler,
    while it's so that until a process gets any other signal and
    only touches its own memory that's non-yielding, then about
    the machinery of pre-emptive multithreading or context-switch
    and as with regards to hyper-threading or the interleaved contexts >>>>>>> on the double-pipeline CPUs, the idea being that context-switching >>>>>>> is along the lines of basically a periodic signal interrupt.

    But you have to guard against "non-cooperative" (and even HOSTILE!) >>>>>> actors who may wish to compromise performance by monopolizing resources >>>>>> (of which the CPU is but one).

    Using resource ledgers lets you constrain an application (process) >>>>>> to a subset of the available resources. Putting runtime constraints >>>>>> on memory, time, etc. lets you remove a "bad actor" from the set
    of processes eligible to run. A persistent store lets you remember >>>>>> this decision so you don't "readmit" the process at some future date! >>>>>>
    Notions of "Orange Book" and "mandatory access control" then
    are considered "more than good ideas" with regards to the allocator >>>>>>> and scheduler of resources in computation.

    Capabilities implicitly limit the actions that can be performed (i.e., >>>>>> methods that can be invoked) on an object. E.g., I can let you
    LOCK a door but never UNLOCK it. Or, let you open a door EXACTLY
    once, and never again!

    How you refine your "permissions" is something that belongs in the >>>>>> objects themselves -- not layered onto a "filesystem" as an afterthought.



    Hey, thanks for writing. Since all we know about each other
    are these brief exchanges, filling in some detail helps a lot
    to understand, or rather, get an idea, of an estimate of the
    depth of the comprehension of the whole machine stack.

    The idea of a kernel or operating system (executive, scheduler,
    ..., interactive "operating system") for "commodity" architectures
    these days is that it's pretty ubiquitous the various chips'
    architectures, then that PCIe is on everything PC, then about
    usually enough USB, then about the NIC and USB root, those are
    pretty much ubiquitously PCIe devices, or as after UEFI and ACPI
    and the SMI or as about DeviceTree, ..., it's ubiquitous,
    after "economy of scale" a simple enough "economy of ubiquity".

    So, the chips are almost all 64-bit their native word width, though
    agreeably sometimes it's 128, and they have various vector or SIMD
    instructions, then as with regards to fitting two operands in a word, >>>>> the SWAR approach, about vectorizing the scalars, and word and
    double-word and word and half-word.

    Then, here mostly the consideration is the "head-less" or "HID-less", >>>>> there's no human interface device involved in server runtime images
    for things like running services or usually enough "boxes" or "nodes". >>>>>

    Then, for compiling existing sources, it seems the easiest way to
    do that is to implement profiles of POSIX, or posix base and pthreads. >>>>> That then of course is much the traditional UNIX account of where
    "everything is a file", though, the operating system itself doesn't
    need to be implemented that way, just surface the usual objects as
    they are as primitives, and mostly as having file handles.
    (If the sources compile and run the same behavior some won't know/care.) >>>>>
    Then, objects, according to "naming and directory interface" usually >>>>> enough, Orange Book for example defines granular access controls,
    so, including all things like files.


    About quota and limits and the like, and about the perceived value
    of pre-emptive scheduling to avoid "hogging", or thrashing, here
    is an account of basically unmaskable uncatchable interrupts that
    have as a signal handler the operating system code on the core
    that results making the task yield, then necessarily enough using
    the usually context-switch machinery to pause it and restart it.
    Most code eventually touches system calls, and if there's a spare
    core it might actually be the idea to let the compute-intensive
    routine employ the entire core.

    The many-core architectures of these days, even fifteen or twenty
    years ago with "AMD Bulldozer and 8 cores" and the like, these
    days usual PC or server chips have scores of cores, ..., often
    for example with the idea of running a giant hypervisor then
    as many virts, ..., like a Kubernetes cluster for example, ...,
    or simply a ton of virts, ..., these days a single board is
    as a model of a distributed system internal to itself.


    The idea for allocation and sharing that "fairness is a matter
    of mechanism, not policy", is for the usual ideas of "thoughput"
    and "transput" as Finkel put it in "An Operating Systems Vade Mecum", >>>>> about I/O and queues, and limits.


    "Interrupts" are the events, "coherent cache lines" the units of
    serialization of memory, DMA is the bulk transfer medium in protocol, >>>>> a byte is the smallest addressable memory unit, these are mostly
    the ordering guarantees, all else "undefined".

    Proximity, affinity, coherency, mobility, ....


    We build electronics. Our new PoE instrument line uses an RP2040
    dual-ARM chip overclocked to 150 MHz. It costs 75 cents in any
    quantity.

    We call the two CPUs (and the two ends of the box) Alice and Bob.

    Alice does the ethernet and usb i/o, command parsing, calibrations,
    all that slow floating-point management. Bob does the realtime i/o,
    fixed-point, directly or through an FPGA.

    All programmed in bare-metal c with no OS. Abstraction=0.

    Seems to work.


    John Larkin
    Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center
    Lunatic Fringe Electronics


    That seems cool. So, you wrote your own USB and packet stack?
    Or, it's a system-on-chip?

    I drive my tractor with my hands on the wheels and the sticks
    and the levers and the other levers and the feet on the pedals
    and the other pedals and my rear in the seat, ..., abstraction = 0.



    We use the WizNet ethernet chip and the code that they supply. It's
    more than a mac/phy: it handles packets and protocols, including UDP.

    The RP2040 has a built-in USB interface. The electrical interface to
    the USBc connector is two resistors. It looks like a COM port to the
    users. What's really slick is that the USB can also run in a mode
    where it looks like a memory stick. To reload the systrem code, we
    boot into memory stick mode and the user then drag-drops a single file
    to update the box: Alice code, Bob code, and the FPGA config.

    Tractors are cool. Physical and basic.


    John Larkin
    Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center
    Lunatic Fringe Electronics



    Trying to figure out "commodity" computing above "embedded"
    computing, and to be able to explain it and thusly give an
    outline, an abstraction itself, of the connections and the
    circuits, has that these days at least for "commodity" general
    purpose computing, there's a great "economy of ubiquity" so
    that whence there's a model of the bus as almost always PCIe,
    then about clock signals and clock drivers and clock interrupts,
    about power management and power states, about variously the
    ideas, here they're mostly ideas first as I'm not that great
    of a computer engineer, about differential pair lines and the
    other serial protocols usually enough, then about SATA mostly,
    is then mostly about PCIe and DMA and then a miniature fleet
    of cores, these being themselves often single or "hyper" threaded,
    it's not moving that fast the platform, to basically make for
    it a model of computation as it embodies itself.


    Here's a bit of a podcast, 44:35 - 49:55 sort of talks about
    these things, there are others. "Reading Foundations: denser tensors".



    This discussion drifted into operating systems, or schedulers
    as they may be or executives plainly, in the context of the
    software more generally there's much to be made of "logic
    extraction", since, pretty much all sorts of source code
    pretty much lives in a world of types and among models of
    computation, and so, according to the shape in the logic,
    there's much to be made of flexible or "polyglot" parsers,
    basically into representations of state and scope, and for
    example into making natural diagrams of the flow-graph,
    this is just "modern tooling to make sense of complexity",
    instead of "ignore the man behind the curtain in the
    booming voice of Oz".



    Absolutely.

    John Larkin
    Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center
    Lunatic Fringe Electronics
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  • From someone@cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com to sci.electronics.design on Mon Mar 30 23:30:02 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    People start paying attention when extreme weather is involved. The forecasting is accurate enough these days to give people plenty of time to prepare. U.S. East and Gulf coasts rely on it.
    --
    For full context, visit https://www.electrondepot.com/electrodesign/software-situation-4399817-.htm

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  • From someone@cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com to sci.electronics.design on Mon Mar 30 23:30:01 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.
    --
    For full context, visit https://www.electrondepot.com/electrodesign/software-situation-4399817-.htm

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  • From someone@cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com to sci.electronics.design on Mon Mar 30 23:30:02 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    The CEOs are now starting to lay themselves off.

    Most CEOs are using the embrace of artificial intelligence as a cover to lay off staff and cut payroll costs in the name of rCLefficiency.rCY But a couple are using it as an excuse to lay themselves off.

    https://gizmodo.com/ai-just-one-shotted-another-ceo-2000738610
    --
    For full context, visit https://www.electrondepot.com/electrodesign/software-situation-4399817-.htm

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  • From john larkin@jl@glen--canyon.com to sci.electronics.design on Tue Mar 31 11:01:41 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone <cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Dang, they promised us rain this week. Didn't get any.


    John Larkin
    Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center
    Lunatic Fringe Electronics
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  • From Jeff Liebermann@jeffl@cruzio.com to sci.electronics.design on Tue Mar 31 13:54:57 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 11:01:41 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com>
    wrote:

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone ><cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Dang, they promised us rain this week. Didn't get any.

    The line of clouds crosses the California coast about 50 miles south
    of San Francisco. The SF Bay area shows mostly clear skys, while to
    the south, the missing rain clouds are moving inland: <https://www.windy.com/-Satellite-satellite?satellite,36.831,-117.809,6> <https://www.windy.com/-Menu/menu?rain,36.831,-117.809,6>
    In Ben Lomond, I'm under the clouds and seeing only a little rain,
    which barely registers on my rain gauge. The forecast is more of the
    same through Weds evening. Sorry.
    --
    Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
    PO Box 272 http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
    Ben Lomond CA 95005-0272 AE6KS 831-336-2558

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  • From Jeff Liebermann@jeffl@cruzio.com to sci.electronics.design on Tue Mar 31 14:15:51 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone <cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    Baloney. ECMMF AI data has been available since July 2025 in the form
    of AIFS (Artificial Intelligence Forecasting System). <https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/dataset/aifs-machine-learning-data> <https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/datasets/open-data>

    At this time, the crown jewels of AI startups are the details on how
    they generate their predictions. In other words, their source code
    and system architecture. They're not about to give that away for free
    and certainly not without an NDA. There are probably some open source
    AI initiatives which might include AI weather prediction models. Try
    your luck:
    <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_artificial_intelligence>

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Do you really need to know how an internal combustion engine works in
    order to operate the vehicle?
    --
    Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
    PO Box 272 http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
    Ben Lomond CA 95005-0272 AE6KS 831-336-2558

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  • From john larkin@jl@glen--canyon.com to sci.electronics.design on Tue Mar 31 15:06:33 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 13:54:57 -0700, Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>
    wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 11:01:41 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com>
    wrote:

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone >><cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Dang, they promised us rain this week. Didn't get any.

    The line of clouds crosses the California coast about 50 miles south
    of San Francisco. The SF Bay area shows mostly clear skys, while to
    the south, the missing rain clouds are moving inland: ><https://www.windy.com/-Satellite-satellite?satellite,36.831,-117.809,6> ><https://www.windy.com/-Menu/menu?rain,36.831,-117.809,6>
    In Ben Lomond, I'm under the clouds and seeing only a little rain,
    which barely registers on my rain gauge. The forecast is more of the
    same through Weds evening. Sorry.

    They just need bigger computers.


    John Larkin
    Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center
    Lunatic Fringe Electronics
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  • From Jeff Liebermann@jeffl@cruzio.com to sci.electronics.design on Tue Mar 31 16:14:37 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 15:06:33 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com>
    wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 13:54:57 -0700, Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>
    wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 11:01:41 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> >>wrote:

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone >>><cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Dang, they promised us rain this week. Didn't get any.

    The line of clouds crosses the California coast about 50 miles south
    of San Francisco. The SF Bay area shows mostly clear skys, while to
    the south, the missing rain clouds are moving inland: >><https://www.windy.com/-Satellite-satellite?satellite,36.831,-117.809,6> >><https://www.windy.com/-Menu/menu?rain,36.831,-117.809,6>
    In Ben Lomond, I'm under the clouds and seeing only a little rain,
    which barely registers on my rain gauge. The forecast is more of the
    same through Weds evening. Sorry.

    They just need bigger computers.

    They also want all the CPU's, memory, video cards, cooling water,
    electrical power, government support and investors on the planet. If
    they can't get these, they threaten to put the data centers in orbit.
    All this to obtain better weather forecasts. Meanwhile, I can do as
    well with my Ouija board and weather rock: <https://www.google.com/search?udm=2&q=ouija%20board> <https://www.google.com/search?q=weather%20rock&udm=2>



    John Larkin
    Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center
    Lunatic Fringe Electronics
    --
    Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
    PO Box 272 http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
    Ben Lomond CA 95005-0272 AE6KS 831-336-2558

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  • From Ross Finlayson@ross.a.finlayson@gmail.com to sci.electronics.design on Tue Mar 31 16:43:07 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On 03/31/2026 04:14 PM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 15:06:33 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com>
    wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 13:54:57 -0700, Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>
    wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 11:01:41 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com>
    wrote:

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone
    <cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Dang, they promised us rain this week. Didn't get any.

    The line of clouds crosses the California coast about 50 miles south
    of San Francisco. The SF Bay area shows mostly clear skys, while to
    the south, the missing rain clouds are moving inland:
    <https://www.windy.com/-Satellite-satellite?satellite,36.831,-117.809,6> >>> <https://www.windy.com/-Menu/menu?rain,36.831,-117.809,6>
    In Ben Lomond, I'm under the clouds and seeing only a little rain,
    which barely registers on my rain gauge. The forecast is more of the
    same through Weds evening. Sorry.

    They just need bigger computers.

    They also want all the CPU's, memory, video cards, cooling water,
    electrical power, government support and investors on the planet. If
    they can't get these, they threaten to put the data centers in orbit.
    All this to obtain better weather forecasts. Meanwhile, I can do as
    well with my Ouija board and weather rock: <https://www.google.com/search?udm=2&q=ouija%20board> <https://www.google.com/search?q=weather%20rock&udm=2>



    John Larkin
    Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center
    Lunatic Fringe Electronics

    They can't much get _bigger_ computers, only _more_ computers.


    "Why do they hire economists?"
    "To make the weather man look good."


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  • From Jan Panteltje@alien@comet.invalid to sci.electronics.design on Wed Apr 1 06:41:06 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>wrote:
    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 15:06:33 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com>
    wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 13:54:57 -0700, Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> >>wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 11:01:41 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> >>>wrote:

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone >>>><cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their
    conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Dang, they promised us rain this week. Didn't get any.

    The line of clouds crosses the California coast about 50 miles south
    of San Francisco. The SF Bay area shows mostly clear skys, while to
    the south, the missing rain clouds are moving inland: >>><https://www.windy.com/-Satellite-satellite?satellite,36.831,-117.809,6> >>><https://www.windy.com/-Menu/menu?rain,36.831,-117.809,6>
    In Ben Lomond, I'm under the clouds and seeing only a little rain,
    which barely registers on my rain gauge. The forecast is more of the >>>same through Weds evening. Sorry.

    They just need bigger computers.

    They also want all the CPU's, memory, video cards, cooling water,
    electrical power, government support and investors on the planet. If
    they can't get these, they threaten to put the data centers in orbit.
    All this to obtain better weather forecasts. Meanwhile, I can do as
    well with my Ouija board and weather rock: ><https://www.google.com/search?udm=2&q=ouija%20board> ><https://www.google.com/search?q=weather%20rock&udm=2>

    windy.com is very good here.
    And local weather radar:
    https://www.knmi.nl/nederland-nu/weer/actueel-weer/neerslagradar

    --- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Jan Panteltje@alien@comet.invalid to sci.electronics.design on Wed Apr 1 06:45:52 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>wrote:
    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone ><cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional
    weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    Baloney. ECMMF AI data has been available since July 2025 in the form
    of AIFS (Artificial Intelligence Forecasting System). ><https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/dataset/aifs-machine-learning-data> ><https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/datasets/open-data>

    At this time, the crown jewels of AI startups are the details on how
    they generate their predictions. In other words, their source code
    and system architecture. They're not about to give that away for free
    and certainly not without an NDA. There are probably some open source
    AI initiatives which might include AI weather prediction models. Try
    your luck: ><https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_artificial_intelligence>

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Do you really need to know how an internal combustion engine works in
    order to operate the vehicle?

    It may help a lot!
    Same for motorbikes etc..
    --- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From john larkin@jl@glen--canyon.com to sci.electronics.design on Wed Apr 1 00:49:31 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On Wed, 01 Apr 2026 06:41:06 GMT, Jan Panteltje <alien@comet.invalid>
    wrote:

    Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>wrote:
    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 15:06:33 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> >>wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 13:54:57 -0700, Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> >>>wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 11:01:41 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> >>>>wrote:

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone >>>>><cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their
    conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Dang, they promised us rain this week. Didn't get any.

    The line of clouds crosses the California coast about 50 miles south
    of San Francisco. The SF Bay area shows mostly clear skys, while to >>>>the south, the missing rain clouds are moving inland: >>>><https://www.windy.com/-Satellite-satellite?satellite,36.831,-117.809,6> >>>><https://www.windy.com/-Menu/menu?rain,36.831,-117.809,6>
    In Ben Lomond, I'm under the clouds and seeing only a little rain, >>>>which barely registers on my rain gauge. The forecast is more of the >>>>same through Weds evening. Sorry.

    They just need bigger computers.

    They also want all the CPU's, memory, video cards, cooling water, >>electrical power, government support and investors on the planet. If
    they can't get these, they threaten to put the data centers in orbit.
    All this to obtain better weather forecasts. Meanwhile, I can do as
    well with my Ouija board and weather rock: >><https://www.google.com/search?udm=2&q=ouija%20board> >><https://www.google.com/search?q=weather%20rock&udm=2>

    windy.com is very good here.
    And local weather radar:
    https://www.knmi.nl/nederland-nu/weer/actueel-weer/neerslagradar

    Windy is very similar to https://www.ventusky.com. V has nice visuals
    but the forecasts are petty bad.


    John Larkin
    Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center
    Lunatic Fringe Electronics
    --- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Jeff Liebermann@jeffl@cruzio.com to sci.electronics.design on Wed Apr 1 09:11:16 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On Wed, 01 Apr 2026 06:45:52 GMT, Jan Panteltje <alien@comet.invalid>
    wrote:

    Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>wrote:
    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone >><cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional
    weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    Baloney. ECMMF AI data has been available since July 2025 in the form
    of AIFS (Artificial Intelligence Forecasting System). >><https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/dataset/aifs-machine-learning-data> >><https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/datasets/open-data>

    At this time, the crown jewels of AI startups are the details on how
    they generate their predictions. In other words, their source code
    and system architecture. They're not about to give that away for free
    and certainly not without an NDA. There are probably some open source
    AI initiatives which might include AI weather prediction models. Try
    your luck: >><https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_artificial_intelligence>

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Do you really need to know how an internal combustion engine works in
    order to operate the vehicle?

    It may help a lot!
    Same for motorbikes etc..

    Oddly, driver training schools don't include much on how internal
    combustion engines function. Most of the training is on how to
    operate the vehicle with maybe a few maintenance hints (put air in the
    tires, check the oil, keep the windows clean, etc). Some of my
    friends struggle with opening the door when they forget their wireless
    key fob at home. Judging by appearances, driving to the supermarket
    and back, without hitting anything, is a major accomplishment that can
    be achieved without knowing how the engine works.

    It's the same with AI weather forecasting. Members of the GUM (great
    unwashed masses) do not need to know how an AI is used to produce a
    weather forecast. To them, the process might involve a weather rock: <https://www.google.com/search?udm=2&q=weather%20rock>
    or Ouija board:
    <https://www.google.com/search?q=ouija%20board&udm=2>
    and they would accept the results. Hopefully, they would also know
    what to do about the results and be able to decode the forecast terms.
    How many of these do you know?
    <https://www.weather.gov/bgm/forecast_terms>

    Knowing how sausage and weather forecasts are made does not make
    either more digestible.

    Incidentally, while attending college in the 1960's, I worked part
    time as an auto mechanic (floor sweeper) at a Ford dealer. I met
    quite a few drivers. I noticed that the stunt and race car drivers
    were terrible at maintaining their vehicles, while the mechanically
    inclined did well on maintenance, but were not very good drivers. I
    guess that also applies to electronic design. There are those that
    can design, but can't operate their designs and those who can do
    amazing things with the final product, but couldn't design anything
    that actually worked or could be manufactured. Similarly, computer
    programmers should not attempt to operate a screwdriver.
    --
    Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
    PO Box 272 http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
    Ben Lomond CA 95005-0272 AE6KS 831-336-2558

    --- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Ross Finlayson@ross.a.finlayson@gmail.com to sci.electronics.design on Wed Apr 1 09:43:53 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On 04/01/2026 09:11 AM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
    On Wed, 01 Apr 2026 06:45:52 GMT, Jan Panteltje <alien@comet.invalid>
    wrote:

    Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>wrote:
    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone
    <cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their conventional
    weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    Baloney. ECMMF AI data has been available since July 2025 in the form
    of AIFS (Artificial Intelligence Forecasting System).
    <https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/dataset/aifs-machine-learning-data>
    <https://www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/datasets/open-data>

    At this time, the crown jewels of AI startups are the details on how
    they generate their predictions. In other words, their source code
    and system architecture. They're not about to give that away for free
    and certainly not without an NDA. There are probably some open source
    AI initiatives which might include AI weather prediction models. Try
    your luck:
    <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_artificial_intelligence>

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Do you really need to know how an internal combustion engine works in
    order to operate the vehicle?

    It may help a lot!
    Same for motorbikes etc..

    Oddly, driver training schools don't include much on how internal
    combustion engines function. Most of the training is on how to
    operate the vehicle with maybe a few maintenance hints (put air in the
    tires, check the oil, keep the windows clean, etc). Some of my
    friends struggle with opening the door when they forget their wireless
    key fob at home. Judging by appearances, driving to the supermarket
    and back, without hitting anything, is a major accomplishment that can
    be achieved without knowing how the engine works.

    It's the same with AI weather forecasting. Members of the GUM (great unwashed masses) do not need to know how an AI is used to produce a
    weather forecast. To them, the process might involve a weather rock: <https://www.google.com/search?udm=2&q=weather%20rock>
    or Ouija board:
    <https://www.google.com/search?q=ouija%20board&udm=2>
    and they would accept the results. Hopefully, they would also know
    what to do about the results and be able to decode the forecast terms.
    How many of these do you know?
    <https://www.weather.gov/bgm/forecast_terms>

    Knowing how sausage and weather forecasts are made does not make
    either more digestible.

    Incidentally, while attending college in the 1960's, I worked part
    time as an auto mechanic (floor sweeper) at a Ford dealer. I met
    quite a few drivers. I noticed that the stunt and race car drivers
    were terrible at maintaining their vehicles, while the mechanically
    inclined did well on maintenance, but were not very good drivers. I
    guess that also applies to electronic design. There are those that
    can design, but can't operate their designs and those who can do
    amazing things with the final product, but couldn't design anything
    that actually worked or could be manufactured. Similarly, computer programmers should not attempt to operate a screwdriver.



    Floor sweepers for whatever reason have their own sort of electrical
    profile (goldcarts, forklifts, floor sweepers/polishers, ...),
    perhaps because they're fundamentally not stationary. So, motors
    and batteries and the like are defined in terms of them as applications.


    Sometimes ignorance allows a false sort of confidence that translates
    to bravado, "invincible ignorance", "the perceived immortality of
    the unwary", ....

    Experience brings for most people a familiarity with maintenance.

    That's a good one the "sausage and weather forecasts" bit,
    speaking yet to usual accounts of "knowing where the food comes from"
    and besides "thoroughly chewing the food".


    --- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Don Y@blockedofcourse@foo.invalid to sci.electronics.design on Wed Apr 1 10:35:15 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On 4/1/2026 9:11 AM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

    Oddly, driver training schools don't include much on how internal
    combustion engines function. Most of the training is on how to
    operate the vehicle with maybe a few maintenance hints (put air in the
    tires, check the oil, keep the windows clean, etc). Some of my
    friends struggle with opening the door when they forget their wireless
    key fob at home. Judging by appearances, driving to the supermarket
    and back, without hitting anything, is a major accomplishment that can
    be achieved without knowing how the engine works.

    Most software is taught as "do this to get that", "click here for <whatever>". Do you really understand how a wordprocessor stores a document? How
    it searches it, rejiggers it to accommodate text insertions and deletions?

    Do you care? (perhaps if you end up using one that has been naively
    designed where inserting a single character at the start of the document requires EVERYTHING that follows to be "moved down"...)

    It's the same with AI weather forecasting. Members of the GUM (great unwashed masses) do not need to know how an AI is used to produce a
    weather forecast. To them, the process might involve a weather rock: <https://www.google.com/search?udm=2&q=weather%20rock>
    or Ouija board:
    <https://www.google.com/search?q=ouija%20board&udm=2>
    and they would accept the results. Hopefully, they would also know
    what to do about the results and be able to decode the forecast terms.
    How many of these do you know?
    <https://www.weather.gov/bgm/forecast_terms>

    Traditional weather forecasters likely rely on an understanding of how fluids behave in a given "volume". AI forecasters will likely leave many of them scratching their heads as they look for patterns that may not be immediately explained by geography, winds, pressures, etc. Because AIs aren't limited
    to looking at the "current conditions".

    Knowing how sausage and weather forecasts are made does not make
    either more digestible.

    Incidentally, while attending college in the 1960's, I worked part
    time as an auto mechanic (floor sweeper) at a Ford dealer. I met
    quite a few drivers. I noticed that the stunt and race car drivers
    were terrible at maintaining their vehicles, while the mechanically
    inclined did well on maintenance, but were not very good drivers. I
    guess that also applies to electronic design. There are those that
    can design, but can't operate their designs and those who can do
    amazing things with the final product, but couldn't design anything
    that actually worked or could be manufactured. Similarly, computer programmers should not attempt to operate a screwdriver.

    This seems to (almost) be universally true. E.g., give a
    "repairman" a blank sheet of paper to start a design and
    the first thing he'll do is turn it over, expecting the
    "missing writing" to be on the back side. The same is true
    of most "coders", technicians, etc. The good ones can
    suss-out someone else's design but usually don't know where
    to *start* on one. And, are quickly ineffective if a change
    propagates "too far" into the existing design (as that would
    require more knowledge of its overall "structure")

    Perhaps the most challenging task is preparing *user*
    documentation for a product/design. Being able to imagine how
    someone (unfamiliar with the product) will best comprehend
    its purpose and usage. And, how a seasoned user will think of
    accessing that documentation, later -- what "keywords" will
    he seek in an index, etc.?

    The same is true of most hardware/software designs -- "where
    do I *start* to understand it?" (hardware often easier as
    it's largely visible)

    I am always amazed at how many "engineers/programmers" are
    tasked with designing products -- instead of domain experts.
    You invariably end up with something that looks (and acts)
    like it was designed by an engineer/programmer, completely
    clueless as to what a "real/typical" user would expect in
    such a device. And, the designer puzzled by why others
    find it such a mismatch!

    --- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Jeff Liebermann@jeffl@cruzio.com to sci.electronics.design on Wed Apr 1 17:39:52 2026
    From Newsgroup: sci.electronics.design

    On Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:49:31 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com>
    wrote:

    On Wed, 01 Apr 2026 06:41:06 GMT, Jan Panteltje <alien@comet.invalid>
    wrote:

    Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>wrote:
    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 15:06:33 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> >>>wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 13:54:57 -0700, Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> >>>>wrote:

    On Tue, 31 Mar 2026 11:01:41 -0700, john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> >>>>>wrote:

    On Mon, 30 Mar 2026 23:30:01 +0000, someone >>>>>><cffbf4deb9142bce48974efc0e64dede@example.com> wrote:

    ECMMWF has access to an AI weather forecaster that they refuse to use beyond in-house study. They continue their
    conventional weather forecasting operations as usual without it.

    This is unlike many other applications, where people use AI without a clue as to how the AI is arriving at its results.

    Dang, they promised us rain this week. Didn't get any.

    The line of clouds crosses the California coast about 50 miles south >>>>>of San Francisco. The SF Bay area shows mostly clear skys, while to >>>>>the south, the missing rain clouds are moving inland: >>>>><https://www.windy.com/-Satellite-satellite?satellite,36.831,-117.809,6> >>>>><https://www.windy.com/-Menu/menu?rain,36.831,-117.809,6>
    In Ben Lomond, I'm under the clouds and seeing only a little rain, >>>>>which barely registers on my rain gauge. The forecast is more of the >>>>>same through Weds evening. Sorry.

    They just need bigger computers.

    They also want all the CPU's, memory, video cards, cooling water, >>>electrical power, government support and investors on the planet. If >>>they can't get these, they threaten to put the data centers in orbit.
    All this to obtain better weather forecasts. Meanwhile, I can do as
    well with my Ouija board and weather rock: >>><https://www.google.com/search?udm=2&q=ouija%20board> >>><https://www.google.com/search?q=weather%20rock&udm=2>

    windy.com is very good here.
    And local weather radar:
    https://www.knmi.nl/nederland-nu/weer/actueel-weer/neerslagradar

    Windy is very similar to https://www.ventusky.com. V has nice visuals
    but the forecasts are petty bad.

    John Larkin
    Highland Tech Glen Canyon Design Center
    Lunatic Fringe Electronics

    Windy does not generate their forecasts. They simply repeat, combine
    and reformat what they get from other sources: <https://community.windy.com/topic/12/what-source-of-weather-data-windy-use> <https://windy.app/support/windy-app-weather-forecast-models.html> <https://www.windy.com/info>
    If you switch between the various sources, you will get radically
    different forecasts. In my never humble opinion, the best sources are
    those derived from ECMWF which is the default.

    Most of the forecasts rely heavily on NWS (National Weather Service).
    NWS produces forecasts in various formats often using different
    models. The result is that if you compare the NWS forecasts, they're
    all quite different. In the list below, try comparing the various
    weather.gov forecasts (for my location), and you'll probably notice
    major variations.

    Incidentally, I subscribed to Windy.com and pay $19/year. The main
    benefit for me is 1 hr forecast resolution instead of the default 3 hr resolution.

    Here is a list of what I use for weather forecasting. All the links
    are centered on my house in Ben Lomond, California. It should be
    fairly easy enough to relocate them to your area and tweak the
    shortcut.

    California Weather Watch: <https://www.youtube.com/@CaliforniaWeatherWatch/videos>
    Daily forecasts for California. Produced daily at about 9am PST.
    Select the most recent video.

    College of DuPage - Nexlab <https://weather.cod.edu/satrad/?parms=regional-w_southwest-09-200-1-100-1&checked=map&colorbar=undefined>

    NWS Radar - 30 min history <https://radar.weather.gov/?settings=v1_eyJhZ2VuZGEiOnsiaWQiOiJ3ZWF0aGVyIiwiY2VudGVyIjpbLTEyMS43ODYsMzcuMzEzXSwibG9jYXRpb24iOlstMTIyLjEwMywzNy4wNTZdLCJ6b29tIjo5LCJsYXllciI6ImJyZWZfcWNkIn0sImFuaW1hdGluZyI6ZmFsc2UsImJhc2UiOiJzdGFuZGFyZCIsImFydGNjIjpmYWxzZSwiY291bnR5IjpmYWxzZSwiY3dhIjpmYWxzZSwicmZjIjpmYWxzZSwic3RhdGUiOmZhbHNlLCJtZW51Ijp0cnVlLCJzaG9ydEZ1c2VkT25seSI6ZmFsc2UsIm9wYWNpdHkiOnsiYWxlcnRzIjowLjgsImxvY2FsIjowLjYsImxvY2FsU3RhdGlvbnMiOjAuOCwibmF0aW9uYWwiOjAuNn19>

    NWS 6 day history graphs <https://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?w0=t&w3=sfcwind&w3u=1&w5=pop&w6=rh&w7=rain&w13u=1&w14u=1&AheadHour=0&Submit=Submit&FcstType=graphical&textField1=37.0813&textField2=-122.093&site=all&unit=0&dd=&bw=>

    NWS 5 day local forecast <https://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lon=-122.09304015350371&lat=37.08133745279595>

    Windy.com <https://www.windy.com/-Rain-thunder-rain?rain,36.573,-122.095,8,p:cities>

    Zoom Earth <https://zoom.earth/maps/radar/#view=37.0905,-122.0892,8z/date=2026-03-31,14:40,-7/overlays=wind>

    There's a completely different set of links for fire related info,
    marine weather, and aircraft weather. They change constantly. The
    links listed about are the one's I've been using currently.
    --
    Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
    PO Box 272 http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
    Ben Lomond CA 95005-0272 AE6KS 831-336-2558

    --- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2