[HN Gopher] Simplifier
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Simplifier
Author : _sbrk
Score : 213 points
Date : 2020-05-29 15:55 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (simplifier.neocities.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (simplifier.neocities.org)
| aspenmayer wrote:
| 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.'
|
| https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA
| petrocrat wrote:
| This is like the Open Source Ecology project but for computing
| hardware.
| oftenwrong wrote:
| I have to say that aside from a few things* this is what I
| consider the _perfect_ blog design in terms of structure,
| styling, layout.
|
| * use of HTML tables, month-first dates
| ken wrote:
| I agree -- it looks exactly like a Gopher page.
| _sbrk wrote:
| I'm curious; why do you feel HTML tables are bad?
| oftenwrong wrote:
| They are bad for things that are not tables. I suppose the
| blog index is a table, though.
| flobosg wrote:
| "In my times, we designed sites using only tables and
| handcrafted 1 pixel spacer gifs! And we did just fine!"
| jamesrcole wrote:
| On mobile the text is very small.
| Yen wrote:
| Agreed. As-is, it's a poor mobile experience.
|
| 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.
| slx26 wrote:
| 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: <meta name="viewport"
| content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
| ezequiel-garzon wrote:
| 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.
| momentmaker wrote:
| Dr. Stone is also a fun way to learn some interesting science
| when everything has became primitive.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Stone
| brundolf wrote:
| Was just about to post this! It's a shockingly educational
| show, and it's really fun to see hard science get the hyper-
| romanticized "anime treatment"
| nixpulvis wrote:
| Just opening now; this looks amazing. I can't wait to read
| through it all!
|
| https://simplifier.neocities.org/fluxset.html is very
| interesting, for example.
| flobosg wrote:
| Nice site. It reminds me of the Primitive Technology channel:
| https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA
| oh_sigh wrote:
| 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.
| sitkack wrote:
| 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.
| 52-6F-62 wrote:
| This is really interesting. Bookmarked.
| Paperweight wrote:
| 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? ;)
| nerdponx wrote:
| Not a single condensed source, but there's an abundance of this
| type of content on Youtube, from both hobbyists and
| professionals.
| _sbrk wrote:
| > 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.
| Paperweight wrote:
| 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".
| Mite_ wrote:
| 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.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/user/bkraz333
| Someone wrote:
| 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.
| 0xdeadbeefbabe wrote:
| > Or is that all forbidden knowledge
|
| It seems like even scientists struggle to replicate
| experiments.
| habitue wrote:
| There is a book called "How to Invent Everything, A Survival
| Guide for the Stranded Time Traveller"
|
| https://www.howtoinventeverything.com/
| bredren wrote:
| It this like the popular 90s illustrated The Way Things work
| with a sci-fi angle?
| amelius wrote:
| There's also: "The Knowledge: How to Rebuild Civilization in
| the Aftermath of a Cataclysm"
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Knowledge-Rebuild-Civilization-
| Afterm...
| marcosdumay wrote:
| Iron, blades, paint, plastic, ink, and specially
| pharmaceuticals are generic names for a huge diversity of
| products (or components).
|
| Each of those products requiring completely different tools,
| skills and materials.
| main_gi wrote:
| 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.
| alanbernstein wrote:
| 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.
| liveoneggs wrote:
| you can read it?
| Jenz wrote:
| This is very cool
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(page generated 2020-05-29 23:00 UTC)