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Description
Hacker Public Radio is an podcast that releases shows every weekday Monday through Friday. Our shows are produced by the community (you) and can be on any topic that are of interest to hackers and hobbyists.
686 Episodes
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References in order of first mention
Daytimer -
https://www.daytimer.com/
PalmPilot -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PalmPilot
Gina Trapani -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gina_Trapani
Todo landing page -
http://todotxt.org/
Todo file format -
https://github.com/todotxt/todo.txt
Dropbox -
https://www.dropbox.com/
Simpletask -
https://github.com/mpcjanssen/simpletask-android/
QTodoTxt -
https://github.com/QTodoTxt/QTodoTxt
Synology DS220J NAS -
https://global.download.synology.com/download/Document/Hardware/DataSheet/DiskStation/20-year/DS220j/enu/Synology_DS220j_Data_Sheet_enu.pdf
Ice_recur -
https://github.com/rlpowell/todo-text-stuff
Py_recur -
https://github.com/TASpinner/py_recur
Microsoft todo -
https://to-do.office.com/tasks/
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02 Less Common Reactor Types
In this episode we discuss some of the less common historical reactor types.
These are a mixture of less common commercial types and some experimental or research reactors.
I will cover advanced or future designs in another episode.
03 Minor Successes
04 Magnox
07 AGR - Advanced Gas Cooled Reactor
10 LWGR - Light Water Graphite Moderated Reactor (RBMK)
14 Historical Oddities or Dead Ends
15 Organically Cooled Reactors
16 Organically Cooled and Moderated
18 Organically Cooled and Heavy Water Moderated
24 HTGCR High Temperature Gas Cooled Reactor
28 HWLWR - Heavy Water Light Water Reactor or SGHWR - Steam Generating Heavy Water Reactor
31 Reactors Making a Comeback
32 Pebble Bed Reactors
33 AVR
35 THTR-300
36 South Africa, China, and the US
39 Making a Come Back?
40 MSR - Molten Salt Reactors
41 Slow or Fast Neutron Reactors
42 Fuel
43 Salts
44 Why Some Variants Use Dissolved Fuel
46 History
47 Types of Molten Salt Reactor
48 Pros and Cons
52 Overall
53 Conclusion
In this episode we discussed some of the less common historical reactor types.
As we have seen, there have been a number of different reactor designs which were less commercially successful for one reason or another.
Some of them may make a come back however, particularly as the basis for a small reactor.
In the next episode we will describe fast neutron reactors.
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Background
I have a very old
EPSON R300 inkjet printer
It has served me well for many years. I thought it was at least 10 if not 15 years old. I got it before I even became interested in Linux. For many of those years now I have been using this printer extensively on Linux.
It has been a really good printer and has been incredibly cheap to run. Many years ago I got a number of sets of ink for it. I think they only cost me £15! A colleague at work later on gave me more sets of ink. I ended up with a large bag full of ink cartridges which I have been working my way through ever since.
I used the printer infrequently for many years. This is far from ideal for an ink jet printer as doing so tends to cause the ink jet nozzles to clog up. Unsurprisingly in later years it has become somewhat temperamental. The problems consisted of paper mis-feeds (Probably down to the rubber take up rollers going hard over time) and missing bits of print (This I assume due to infrequent use of the printer and age of ink jet cartridges all of which were well out of their expiration date).
The mis-fed paper could be solved by individual feeding each sheet through the printer. The poor / missing print could be solved by a combination of running the print head clean routine or by replacing the offending cartridge.
Latterly I had print problems again and as per usual after cleaning the heads and then finally changing the cartridge the printer resumed printing normally.
Shortly after this I bought myself an Apple iMac mini and thought it could be useful to be able to print from it. I visited the EPSON website downloaded and installed the EPSON print driver for my trusty R300 printer.
I tried printing from my iMac and received a warning stating something like some of the components within your printer are worn and may need servicing. I’d never seen a message like this before as I normally print using open source print drivers on Linux which never report such things.
When I tried printing on my Apple Mac no black text was visible on the page. I tried running the head cleaning routine and this made no difference. I eventually had to resort to changing the colour of the text within the LibreOffice document. This allowed me to print text that was at least legible.
At the time I was a little suspicious of all this as the printer had been working so well just a few days previous. I plugged my trusty printer back into my trusty PC running an old version of Ubuntu using the open source printer drivers. Fired up LibreOffice and tried to print a document. To my surprise the printout was very good. While it was not as good as when the printer was new the quality of the black and coloured text was actually very good.
My suspicion though I can’t prove it is that the EPSON print driver has worked out that the printer is 10 plus years old and needs to be returned to EPSON for servicing (or to purchase a new printer). To ensure this the driver is crippling the output from the printer.
The Open Source print drivers have none of the nefarious nonsense and allows the printer to operate. As I said I cannot prove any of this however I’ll leave this up to you decide what you think is going on here.
At this point I was going to end the podcast however the story didn’t end there.
The story continues
My mother wanted me to print out some holiday insurance documents for her. She sent me a copy of her documents as I told her my printer was working again. The first page printed out slightly faintly but was readable the other pages seemed to print using invisible ink. I tried cleaning the heads but it made no difference. It’s looking a bit like my printer or at least the cartridge is past its expiry date.
Clearing out our loft I found the original box for my EPSON R300 printer and discovered that it was purchased in May 2005. This means the printer is now over 20 years old! At this point I decided that it was maybe about time that I replaced our ageing printer.
We use the printer very infrequently and rarely need colour. For this reason I decided this time to buy a laser printer since I believe these don’t tend to dry out like ink jet printers and are less likely to suffer with infrequent use. Only time will tell though I don’t expect this one to last 20 years!
Finally after all this I am not sure if using the EPSON driver had anything to do with the final demise of my printer though who knows. As Klaatu would say I leave that up to you dear listener to decide.
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A two-part conversation about what it’s really like being a woman in tech for almost three decades. Content Warning: The F word probably makes an appearance multiple times.
In this episode, Lee sits down with Elsbeth to talk about her long, winding, sometimes ridiculous, often inspiring journey through the IT industry — starting all the way back in 1997. If you’ve ever worked helpdesk, ever had a customer say “my cup holder broke” (yes, the CD tray)… or ever felt underestimated in a room full of engineers, this one’s for you.
Because we throw around some tech terms in the conversation, here are a few friendly definitions so everyone can follow along.
Terms We Mentioned (in plain English)
QA (Quality Assurance)
Think of QA as the people who try to break things
on purpose
so regular users don’t break them
accidentally
.
They test software, hardware, websites — you name it — to catch bugs before they cause chaos.
If it’s glitch-free, a QA person probably saved the day behind the scenes.
Content Moderation
This is the work of keeping the internet from turning into the Wild West.
Moderators review posts, comments, images, and videos to make sure they follow community rules and don’t harm users.
It’s a mix of tech tools and human judgment — and yes, it can get intense.
Building PCs
Where many IT careers start! Building PCs is basically grown-up Lego:
picking parts
assembling them
hoping you don’t zap anything with static electricity
praying the cable management gods smile upon you
It’s one of the most empowering skills in tech and often the first time someone realizes,
“Oh hey… I can actually
do
this.”
Gender Equality & Inequality
Gender equality means giving everyone the same chance to succeed — no matter who they are.
Gender inequality is what happens when that
doesn’t
happen.
In tech, inequality often looks like:
being talked over
being paid less
being assumed “non-technical”
having to prove yourself twice as hard
being the only woman in a room… again
Elsbeth has seen all of this firsthand since 1997 — and she’s got stories.
End-User
The
end-user
is simply the person who actually uses the product.
Not the engineer who built it.
Not the manager who approved it.
Not the QA who tested it.
The end-user is the human at the end of the chain who clicks the button, pushes the key, taps the app… and finds entirely new ways to break things no one expected.
Understanding them is the secret superpower of tech.
Neurodivergence
Neurodivergence means brains come in many beautiful varieties — like ADHD, autism, dyslexia, and more.
Neurodivergent people often bring incredible strengths to IT, including creativity, pattern spotting, hyperfocus, and out-of-the-box problem solving.
They can also face misunderstandings in workplaces that weren’t designed with different brains in mind — something Elsbeth talks about openly and honestly in this episode.
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In our next look at the game mechanics for Civilization V we examine the topic of Science and how to win a Science victory. This is something that has been in Civilization from the very beginning, but in Civilization V there are some changes worth addressing.
Playing Civilization V, Part 7
Science
In most respects this is not all that different in Civ 5. Most of the techs are the same, there is a tech tree that is pretty similar, and you need to keep up in Science for any victory condition you are seeking. You may want to just beat your enemies into submission, but if you are using Chariots while they have Tanks, you aren’t going to have success. But also it is obvious that if you are going for a Science victory, you need to really focus on this. So many of these tips should be followed for any victory condition, but should be mandatory if you are going for a Science victory. The mechanics of researching technologies is that you have to accumulate a certain amount of Science to discover a new technology, but this amount goes up over time, so you have be continuously looking to increase your output of Science to keep up. for instance, one of your first Techs would be Pottery, which has a cost of 35 Science. But in your Capital city you get 3 Science from your Palace, and let’s say you have a population of 2, so you are generating 5 Science per turn. That means you will research Pottery in 7 turns. But the Education tech costs 485 Science, Astronomy costs 780, Scientific Theory costs 1650, Plastics 4700, and Particle Physics 6000. These are all key techs to advance your Science to a Science Victory. So you can see that you need to be continually increasing your Science.
To start with, Population=Science. You get one Science for every one point of population. That does not, however, mean that you need to have a lot of cities to get there. 4-5 well developed cities are quite sufficient, and adding more cities can cause Unhappiness problems. Since higher population itself can cause Unhappiness there is no good reason to add to the problem.
Buildings
The next boost you can give to Science is by building city improvements. The first, which comes early in the game, is the Library, which is available once you research Writing. A Library boosts the Science output of a city by one Science for every two citizens (roughly a 50% boost, rounded down), so building those early pays off. Because advancing through the tech tree is a process of accumulating Science, the earlier you can get these boosts the better. The other population-based boost is the Public School (available when you research Scientific Theory), which also boosts Science by one for every two citizens, and also offers a Specialist slot for a Science Specialist. And since more population means more Science, the Granary (available when you research Pottery) is a good building because it helps to grow your population.
There is one other building worth mentioning which is the Observatory (available when you discover Astronomy). It doesn’t depend on population, but on location. You have to have a city that is located directly next to a Mountain to build this, but it adds 50% to the Science output of the city. Mountains are otherwise useless (unless you are the Incas), but if you want a Science boost and happen to see good location (the ideal spot is an isolated mountain that is not part of a mountain range so you don’t lose farming and mining production) this can be great boost.
Scientist Specialists
You can at a certain point take some of your citizens out of the farming and mining and turn them into Specialists, but you have to have a slot for them, and those slots come in buildings as well. We’ve already mentioned Public Schools providing one slot. Universities (available when you discover Education) provide 2 slots, as well as boosting the city output of Science by 33%. The other Science building, which comes late in the game, is the Research Lab (available when you discover Plastics) which adds another Specialist slot, plus 4 Science, and then adds 50% to the Science Output of the city. It comes too late to help much in most of the Tech Tree, but is essential to research the Space techs, which are very expensive.
Wonders
The first one to try for is the Great Library. It gives you a free Library in the city, +3 Science per turn, and a free tech. Use the free tech to get an expensive tech like Philosophy. Oracle provides 1 Great Person Point per turn towards a Great Scientist. Hanging Gardens provides +6 Food per turn (boosting your population), and a free Garden which boosts your Great Person Points by 25%. Leaning Tower of Pisa increases your Great Person Points by 25% in all cities, plus a free Great Person of your choice when you build it. Porcelain Tower gives you +50% from Research Agreements, plus a free Great Scientist. and Hubble Space Telescope provides two Great Scientists, a free Spaceship Factory in the city where it was built, and +25% production for spaceship parts.
All of the above are World Wonders, which means you are in competition with other players to build them, and only one player can be successful in each case, so you won’t get them all. You can sometimes rush a World Wonder by “chopping”, i.e. using your workers to cut down Forests for added production, but you need to have high production cities to build Wonders in general. There is one National Wonder to focus on, though, the National College. Every player can build their own version of any National Wonder. The National College can be built only when you have a Library in every one of your cities. Your strategy should be to build it as soon as possible, so don’t build more than 3-4 cities before you get to this. It gives you +3 Science, plus an increase of 50% in the Science output of the city you build it in.
Great Scientists
As you work on your Science you will accumulate Great Person Points towards getting a Great Scientist. Some wonder produce Great Person Points, and all of your Science Specialists produce Great Person Points as well. As these add up you will suddenly see a Great Scientist appear. In the early game, the best thing to do is use this Great Scientist to build an Academy. Move the GS to any tile within your city and create the Academy there. It will yield at least +8 Science, bu there are also modifiers that can add to that. The alternative which is better later in the game is to use the Great Scientist to get a free Tech discovery. The reason is that early in the game that +8 Science is very significant, and it can accumulate over time. Combine that with things like an Observatory and a University that increase the city output and it can add up nicely over time. But by perhaps the Medieval Era, and certainly the Renaissance Era, you start running out of time for that accumulation. Meanwhile, the techs have gotten so expensive that a free Tech is the better option.
Research Agreements
These become available once you research Education. You have to have a Declaration of Friendship with the other player to create one. You each put a certain amount of gold into the pot to fund the research, and after a period of time (usually 30 turns) you each get an amount of Science from it. The way it is calculated is based on the partner that produced the least amount of Science during the agreement. From a science standpoint if you are ahead in Science it probably won’t benefit you to enter into the agreement. But it does build your relationship with the other player so I wouldn’t avoid them altogether. If you are behind in Science it can help you, of course.
Policies and Ideologies
Given that you should probably be building tall (4-5 cities) instead of wide (8-12 cities), it makes sense to start out with Tradition instead of Liberty. But once you get to the Renaissance you will want to enable the Rationalism tree to maximize your Science. When you get to Ideologies, you have a choice to make. Ignore Autocracy as that is not a Science-oriented choice. If you have 3-5 cities, Freedom is the best Ideology because Specialists require less food (Civil Society), and have reduced Unhappiness (Universal Suffrage). With a wide strategy (more than 5 cities) Order starts to look better. Getting Worker’s Faculties will give +25% Science from every Factory.
Exploration and Techs
Exploration is generally a good idea for a variety of reasons, but one to focus on here is the effect of meeting other players. In the first place, if you find other players who have researched techs you do not yet have, you can trade for them. You do this whenever possible. Remember, the other players will all be trading with each other anyway, so if you don’t participate you will simply fall behind. If you have a nice tech and can trade it to just two other players, you will jump up two techs along the tech tree, and that can be huge. If you hold onto it as a secret, some other player will research it, and they will trade it and get that boost instead. So trade whenever you can. Another advantage is that when you discover that another player has a tech you don’t have yet, your cost to research it goes down.
Trade
This is the next Science boost we will cover. when you set up a trade route with either another player or a City-State, one of the benefits can be an increase to your Science. The main benefit of trade routes is money, at least the way I play, so I will always start by looking for the best addition to my Treasury, but if I can choose between equivalent monetary rewards but one trade route offers more Science I might prefer that if I am going for a Science victory.
Choosing an Empire
There are many Empires you can play, and some of them are oriented to a Science victory. The two obvious choices are Babylon and Korea. Babylon gets a free Great Scientist when you discover Writing, which is very early, so you should use it to put down an Academy. And it earns Grea
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lrest=0;
while true; do
echo refreshing project list;
tsk=$(task +PENDING _unique project | shuf);
for x in $tsk;
do
echo proj:$x;
dispmd="task proj:$x ready || task ready";
[[ $lrest -eq 0 ]] && dispmd="task ready";
timeout 1500 watch $dispmd;
((lrest=lrest+1));
echo "begin break with enter...";
read;
resttime=5;
if [[ $lrest -gt 3 ]]; then
resttime=15;
lrest=0;
fi;
while [[ $resttime -gt 0 ]]; do
echo $resttime minute rest;
sleep 60;
((resttime=resttime-1));
done;
echo "break over, enter to continue...";
read;
done;
done
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I am subscribed to a number of YouTube channels, and I am sharing them with you.
Links:
https://www.youtube.com/@civilization
https://www.youtube.com/@sixtysymbols
https://www.youtube.com/@SophieAlloway
https://www.youtube.com/@SpaceRocketHistoryChannel
https://www.youtube.com/@StamFine
https://www.youtube.com/@Stubagful
https://www.youtube.com/@Suibhne
https://www.youtube.com/@talkmoretalksolobeatles
https://www.youtube.com/@TTBFromTheRoad
https://www.youtube.com/@theark2544
https://www.youtube.com/@TheBeatles
https://www.palain.com/
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Hello, again. This is Trey.
Welcome to part 6 in my Cheap Yellow Display (CYD) Project series. Thank you for hanging in there with me on this rambling series. If you wish to catch up on earlier episodes, you can find them on my
HPR profile page
https://www.hackerpublicradio.org/correspondents/0394.html
To review, my project is to build a portable morse code "Keyer memory" which can be connected to any of my amateur HF transceiver radios by simply plugging it in to the code key input port. This is based around an ESP32 platform which comes prepackaged on a yellow PC board with a color touchscreen display, WIFI, and Bluetooth. We fondly call this contraption the Cheap Yellow Display.
So far, I have defined the necessities, collected the required hardware, and failed miserably building the graphical user interface (GUI).
While I sort out the technical challenges getting my GUI code to play nicely with the CYD's touchscreen, it is important that we spend some time discussing Morse code itself, and the timing standards we will need to follow.
I am not going to dive too deeply into the history behind telegraphs and Morse code, but it is very interesting. If you want to learn more, Wikipedia has the origins and evolution written out quite nicely at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morse_code
For our purposes, we will fast forward from the year 1820 (When telegraphy began) all the way to 1865 when the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) standardized, what it called "International Morse Code". When I say Morse Code for the remainder of this podcast, I am referring to this ITU International Morse Code.
Morse code typically includes the following characters:
The 26 letter basic Latin alphabet
The Indo-Arabic numerals 0 to 9
There is also a single accented Latin letter (É), which is written as an E with an accent mark, and a handful of punctuation marks.
These characters are encoded using a sequence of short and long signals. Each short signal is referred to as a
dit
. Each long signal is referred to as a
dah
. At a young age, I began to refer to them as dots and dashes, as this is how they are usually written. For example, the letter "A" consists of a single dit followed by a single dah. When written out this would look like a period followed by a hyphen (what some might call a minus sign) .-
This encoding method allows messages to be sent by
turning on and off an electrical signal. This could result in a light flashing or a tone sounding to the pattern of the signal. The timing of a dit and dah, along with the spacing between them is carefully defined.
Morsecode.world does a great job explaining the timing, and you can find their explanation at
https://morsecode.world/international/timing/
It all starts with the dit, or more accurately, the amount of time the dit signal is turned on. We will call this length of time 1 unit. We will get to the actual length of time for a unit later in this episode. For now, it is just one unit.
So, if a dit is 1 unit long, a dah will be 3 units long, so there is an obvious and consistent difference between a dit and a dah. Also, empty space between elements of the same character is 1 unit long. The space between characters should be 3 units long.
Let's demonstrate using the letters H, P, & R.
An "H" would be 4 dits ….
A "P" would be 1 dit followed by 2 dahs and ending with 1 dit .--.
An "R" would be 1 dit followed by 1 dah and ending with 1 dit .-.
Remember when we send these grouped together like a word, we need 3 units of spacing between each character. You can hear this now. This is Morse code for the letters "HPR" at 15 words per minute .... .--. .-.
That is the perfect segue to the next section, words per minute.
The speed of morse code is measured in "words per minute". But how do you calculate this when some characters are short (Like the letter "E" which is only a single dit long), and other characters are long (Like the letter "J" which starts with a single dit and is followed by 3 dahs)?
And that's just letters. What about words? We have short words and long words. How can we standardize on words per minute with so much diversity of length?
Well, thanks to the French, we have a quite elegant solution to this problem. Well, not the French in general. Just PARIS.
PARIS is the standard word which has been agreed upon to be used for determining the speed of Morse code. The word PARIS is 50 units long.
"P" = dit(1) + (1) + dah(3) + (1) + dah(3) + (1) + dit(1) = 11 units
{Space between letters} = 3 units
"A" =
dit(1) + (1) + dah(3) = 5 units
{Space between letters} = 3 units
"R" =
dit(1) + (1) + dah(3) + (1) + dit(1) = 7 units
{Space between letters} = 3 units
"I" =
dit(1) + (1) + dit(1) = 3 units
{Space between letters} = 3 units
"S" =
dit(1) + (1) + dit(1)
+ (1) +
dit(1)
= 5 units
{Space between words} = 7 units
11+3+5+3+7+3+3+3+5+7 = 50 units
Here is the word PARIS sent at 15 WPM .--. .- .-. .. ...
Morsecode.world again does a great job explaining the maths for how many milliseconds long a dit should be for a specific WPM of code (
https://morsecode.world/international/timing/
) But, no... We could not keep it that simple. Some guy named
Donald R. "Russ" Farnsworth had to complicate things and increase the gaps between letters and words to make interpreting code much easier. There are even more maths for Farnsworth timing...
Wait a minute. When did I start saying "Maths" instead of "Math" like a normal North American? What is the reasoning around pluralizing "Math" anyways? Which way is more original English, "Math" or "Maths"? This sounds like a show idea for someone other than me. If you know or are interested in researching it, I look forward to listening to your show in the future.
ANYWAYS, there IS much more MATH about Farnsworth timing on another page on Morsecode.world. (
https://morsecode.world/international/timing/farnsworth.html
). But I don't want to get into all of it in detail here. Not when there is a shortcut we can use in our code. Simplified, we can take 1,200 and divide it by the WPM we desire, and it will give us a close enough approximation of the number of milliseconds long a dit should be.
For the 15 WPM messages you have heard throughout this episode, a dit was 1200/15 = 80 ms in length. If I speed it up to 20 WPM (The speed at which I try to practice) a dit will be 1200/20 = 60 ms long.
This will be an important calculation for us as we develop the code we will later be using to construct our messages using the CYD.
And this is also a good stopping point so that I can get back to trying to build that infernal GUI.
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Last Month's Shows
Id
Day
Date
Title
Host
4521
Mon
2025-12-01
HPR Community News for November 2025
HPR Volunteers
4522
Tue
2025-12-02
Lee interviews Elsbeth about SL Shop and Hop event
Elsbeth
4523
Wed
2025-12-03
Nuclear Reactor Technology - Ep 1 - Nuclear Basics
Whiskeyjack
4524
Thu
2025-12-04
Living the Tux Life Episode 3 - Automating the Install
Al
4525
Fri
2025-12-05
Using mail merge in thunderbird
Ken Fallon
4526
Mon
2025-12-08
Baofeng and SDR++
Lee
4527
Tue
2025-12-09
Overly Complicated Media Ripping setup
Archer72
4528
Wed
2025-12-10
Photography software
Henrik Hemrin
4529
Thu
2025-12-11
yoga370 review
Brian-in-Ohio
4530
Fri
2025-12-12
Playing Civilization V, Part 6
Ahuka
4531
Mon
2025-12-15
HPR Beer Garden 6 - Imperial Stouts
Kevie
4532
Tue
2025-12-16
Cheap Yellow Display Project Part 5: Graphical User Interface
Trey
4533
Wed
2025-12-17
Nuclear Reactor Technology - Ep 2 Nuclear Fuel
Whiskeyjack
4534
Thu
2025-12-18
Reviving My Kawai K4 Synthesizer
Claudio Miranda
4535
Fri
2025-12-19
Living the Tux Life Episode 4 - Various software I have been using
Al
4536
Mon
2025-12-22
Welcome to the Linux Community
Deltaray
4537
Tue
2025-12-23
“Elsbeth in IT: Since ’97” (Part 1)
Elsbeth
4538
Wed
2025-12-24
HPR Branding
Ken Fallon
4539
Thu
2025-12-25
YouTube Subscriptions 2025 #11
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4540
Fri
2025-12-26
Arthur C. Clarke: Other Novels, Part 1
Ahuka
4541
Mon
2025-12-29
HPR Beer Garden 7 - UK Christmas Ales
Kevie
4542
Tue
2025-12-30
Can Haiku Mumble?
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4543
Wed
2025-12-31
Nuclear Reactor Technology - Ep 3 Reactor Basics
Whiskeyjack
Comments this month
These are comments which have been made during the past month, either to shows released during the month or to past shows.
There are 27 comments in total.
Past shows
There are 2 comments on
2 previous shows:
hpr4424
(2025-07-17) "How I use Newsboat for Podcasts and Reddit"
by Archer72.
Comment 5:
Ken Fallon on 2025-12-02:
"Checking for أحمد المحمودي to see if there are issues."
Comment 6:
أحمد المحمودي on 2025-12-03:
"download-filename-format for HPR podcasts"
hpr4520
(2025-11-28) "Arthur C. Clarke: Rama and Sequels"
by Ahuka.
Comment 1:
morhook on 2025-12-30:
"programmer and content creator"
Comment 2:
Kevin O'Brien on 2025-12-30:
"Glad you liked it"
This month's shows
There are 25 comments on 11 of this month's shows:
hpr4521
(2025-12-01) "HPR Community News for November 2025"
by HPR Volunteers.
Comment 1:
Archer72 on 2025-11-30:
"Silent key"Comment 2:
Trey on 2025-12-01:
"Silent Key Archive"Comment 3:
Trey on 2025-12-01:
"TuxJam CYD Episode"Comment 4:
candycanearter07 on 2025-12-12:
"thoughts"Comment 5:
Archer72 on 2025-12-19:
"Re: thoughts"Comment 6:
candycanearter07 on 2025-12-21:
"Re: Re: Thoughts"
hpr4522
(2025-12-02) "Lee interviews Elsbeth about SL Shop and Hop event"
by Elsbeth.
Comment 1:
candycanearter07 on 2025-12-13:
"peek into the community"
hpr4523
(2025-12-03) "Nuclear Reactor Technology - Ep 1 - Nuclear Basics"
by Whiskeyjack.
Comment 1:
bjb on 2025-12-04:
"Love your show/series, thank you"Comment 2:
Kevin O'Brien on 2025-12-04:
"Looking forward to more"Comment 3:
Trey on 2025-12-09:
"Looking forward to this series"
hpr4526
(2025-12-08) "Baofeng and SDR++"
by Lee.
Comment 1:
Trey on 2025-12-09:
"SDRs"
hpr4529
(2025-12-11) "yoga370 review"
by Brian-in-Ohio.
Comment 1:
Paulj on 2025-12-31:
"Thanks - great show"
hpr4532
(2025-12-16) "Cheap Yellow Display Project Part 5: Graphical User Interface "
by Trey.
Comment 1:
norrrist on 2025-12-16:
"starting small "
hpr4533
(2025-12-17) "Nuclear Reactor Technology - Ep 2 Nuclear Fuel"
by Whiskeyjack.
Comment 1:
bjb on 2025-12-18:
"Thank the host for interesting series"
hpr4535
(2025-12-19) "Living the Tux Life Episode 4 - Various software I have been using"
by Al.
Comment 1:
candycanearter07 on 2025-12-19:
"cool setup!"Comment 2:
Archer72 on 2025-12-19:
"Tmux"
hpr4536
(2025-12-22) "Welcome to the Linux Community"
by Deltaray.
Comment 1:
Archer72 on 2025-12-21:
"Brilliant!! "Comment 2:
Torin Doyle on 2025-12-22:
"Deltaray did a fine job in covering GNU/Linux aka Linux, here."Comment 3:
Ken Fallon on 2025-12-22:
"Agree"Comment 4:
Deltaray on 2025-12-26:
"Thanks"Comment 5:
Morhook on 2025-12-30:
"Good talk CliMagic"
hpr4538
(2025-12-24) "HPR Branding"
by Ken Fallon.
Comment 1:
candycanearter07 on 2025-12-24:
"interesting peak of behind the scenes!!"Comment 2:
Steve Barnes on 2025-12-24:
"Merci!"Comment 3:
Archer72 on 2025-12-29:
"Re: candycanearter07"
hpr4543
(2025-12-31) "Nuclear Reactor Technology - Ep 3 Reactor Basics"
by Whiskeyjack.
Comment 1:
L'andrew on 2025-12-31:
"Praise for this series"
Mailing List discussions
Policy decisions surrounding HPR are taken by the community as a whole. This
discussion takes place on the Mailing List
which is open to all HPR listeners and contributors. The discussions are open
and available on the HPR server under Mailman.
The threaded discussions this month can be found here:
https://lists.hackerpublicradio.com/pipermail/hpr/2025-December/thread.html
Events Calendar
With the kind permission of LWN.net we are linking to
The LWN.net Community Calendar.
Quoting the site:
This is the LWN.net community event calendar, where we track
events of interest to people using and developing Linux and free software.
Clicking on individual events will take you to the appropriate web
page.
Any other business
Thanks to all 57 HPR contributors in 2025!
Ahuka,
Al,
Antoine,
Archer72,
beni,
Brian-in-Ohio,
candycanearter,
Celeste,
Claudio Miranda,
Daniel Persson,
Dave Hingley,
Dave Morriss,
Deltaray,
dnt,
Elsbeth,
folky,
FredBlack,
gemlog,
hairylarry,
Henrik Hemrin,
Honkeymagoo,
HPR Volunteers,
iota,
Jerm,
Jeroen Baten,
Jezra,
Ken Fallon,
Kevie,
Kirbotica,
Klaatu,
ko3moc,
Lee,
Lochyboy,
Major_Ursa,
Manon,
Marc W. Abel,
mightbemike,
Moss Bliss,
MrX,
murph,
norrist,
operat0r,
oxo,
Paulj,
Reto,
Rho`n,
Shane - StrandedOutput,
SolusSpider,
Some Guy On The Internet,
Swift110,
thelovebug,
Thibaut,
Trey,
Trixter,
Trollercoaster,
Whiskeyjack,
Wojciech
Provide feedback on this episode.
This show has been flagged as Clean by the host.
I am subscribed to a number of YouTube channels, and I am sharing them with you.
Links:
https://www.youtube.com/@RickStevesTravelTalks
https://www.youtube.com/@RickStevesEuropeOfficial
https://www.youtube.com/@ringostarr
https://www.youtube.com/@RBReich
https://www.youtube.com/@RobWords
https://www.youtube.com/@rockhall
https://www.youtube.com/@RowanJColeman
https://www.youtube.com/@RoyalCaribbeanBlog
https://www.youtube.com/@SabatonHistory
https://www.youtube.com/@sassygamerlady
https://www.youtube.com/@ScienceNewsMag
https://www.youtube.com/@NASAScience
https://www.youtube.com/@sciencium
https://www.youtube.com/@scifri
https://www.youtube.com/@SciShow
https://www.youtube.com/@SciShowPsych
https://www.youtube.com/@scishowspace
https://www.youtube.com/@securitynow
https://www.palain.com/
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Refs:
https://www.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=2BSD/man/last.u
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Util-linux&oldid=271104508
https://kernel.googlesource.com/pub/scm/utils/util-linux/util-linux/+/612721dba838fe37af543421278416bb7acf770c/login-utils/README.admutil
https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-haardt-9087023/details/experience/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/peterorbaek/details/experience/
https://flameshot.org/
commands:
ping yahoo.com
traceroute -m 100 bad.horse
mtr www.yahoo.com
scrot
flameshot
zless messages.1.gz
bzless messages.1.bz
xzless messages.1.xz
last -10
last reboot
last $USER -10
People involved:
mtr:
Matt Kimball
Roger Wolff
scrot:
Tom Gilbert
zless and related commands:
Paul Eggert
last command:
Howard Katseff
Michael Haardt
Peter Orbaek
Provide feedback on this episode.
This show has been flagged as Clean by the host.
03-Reactor-Basics
01 Introduction
In this episode we will describe the basic features and characteristics of reactors together with descriptions of the most widely used commercial reactor types.
03 Fast Versus Slow Reactors
04 Slow Neutron Reactors
06 Fast Neutron Reactors
08 Reactor Moderators
10 Light Water
11 Heavy Water
13 Graphite
14 Unmoderated
15 Coolants
16 Common Coolants
17 Alternative Coolants
18 Primary and Secondary Coolant Loops
20 Steam Generation
23 Brayton Cycle Gas Turbines
24 Refuelling Method
25 Main Commercial Reactor Types
26 PWR - Pressurized Water Reactor
28 BWR - Boiling Water Reactor
29 PHWR - Pressurized Heavy Water Reactor
33 Conclusion
We have covered the main reactor characteristics.
These characteristics can be mixed in various ways to give different reactor types.
The characteristics also affect the types of fuel that can be used.
We also covered the three main commercial power generation reactor types.
In the next episode we will describe some of the less common historical reactor types.
Provide feedback on this episode.
This show has been flagged as Clean by the host.
Haiku: https://www.haiku-os.org/
BeOS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BeOS
Mumble: https://www.mumble.info/
HPR NYE Show: https://hackerpublicradio.org/new_year.html
How to Connect to HPR Community Room using Mumble: https://hackerpublicradio.org/mumble-howtoProvide feedback on this episode.
This show has been flagged as Clean by the host.
With Christmas approaching (and actually gone by the time this is posted), Kevie, Dave and Paul try out a variety of Christmas ales from the UK. Dave opts for
St Peters Christmas Ale
, Kevie samples
Samuel Smith's Winter Welcome Ale
and Dave supports his local brewery, Purple Moose, with a mug of
Merry X-Moose
.
Connect with the guys on Untappd:
Dave
Paul
Kevie
The intro sounds for the show are used from:
https://freesound.org/people/mixtus/sounds/329806/
https://freesound.org/people/j1987/sounds/123003/
https://freesound.org/people/greatsoundstube/sounds/628437/
Provide feedback on this episode.
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This brings us to a look at some of Arthur C. Clarke's other
stories, The Sands of Mars (1951), The Deep Range (1957), and The
Fountains of Paradise (1979). These are just a few of his
well-regarded stand-alone novels.
Links:
https://www.sffworld.com/forum/threads/the-clarke-asimov-treaty.46067/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sands_of_Mars
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islands_in_the_Sky
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthlight
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Space_Trilogy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Deep_Range
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolphin_Island_(novel)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ghost_from_the_Grand_Banks
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fountains_of_Paradise
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buckminsterfullerene
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Sold_the_Moon
https://www.palain.com/science-fiction/the-golden-age/arthur-c-clarke-other-novels-part-1/
Provide feedback on this episode.
This show has been flagged as Clean by the host.
I am subscribed to a number of YouTube channels, and I am sharing them with you.
Links:
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfessorofRock
https://www.youtube.com/@ProgAxia
https://www.youtube.com/@quill18
https://www.youtube.com/@RachelFlowersMusic
https://www.youtube.com/@RadioFreeSkaro
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvpxXoojGDRVA7zLYlY-48g
https://www.youtube.com/@ralphtownermusic412
https://www.youtube.com/@RandyRainbowOfficial
https://www.youtube.com/@realfastspanish
https://www.youtube.com/@realtimehistory
https://www.youtube.com/@RealLifeLore
https://www.youtube.com/@pickupchangetoe
https://www.youtube.com/@RichieCastellano
https://www.youtube.com/@RickBeato
https://www.youtube.com/@rickbeato2
https://www.palain.com/
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HPR Branding
This episode refers to the initial release of
https://repo.anhonesthost.net/HPR/hpr_documentation/src/branch/main/branding.md
The Intro
Duration
It will always be 30 seconds long and in some edge cases may be slightly longer. The following table will help put that into context. It gives the percentage of the show the intro takes related to the length of the shows.
1.7% of an average show (29 minutes 30 seconds)
0.1% of our longest show (7 hours 27 minutes)
187.5% of our shortest show (16 seconds)
Breakdown
Generation
The intro is generated by the
process_episode.bash
script and uses the
say.php
file to generate the data.
The text is
created
using
piper test to speech
. It was previously created using
espeak
, and we are open to
suggestions
on how to improve it.
The text is played over the HPR Theme Music
Theme Music Credits
The background is an arrangement by
Maestraccio
which is released under the
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)
license, of the HPR Theme, composed by
slick0
which has
No Copyright
applied.
Message
To effectively communicate an event it’s important to convey the answers to
Who?
,
What?
,
When?
,
Where?
, and
Why?
The Five Ws is a checklist used in journalism to ensure that the lead contains all the essential points of a story. As far back as 1913, reporters were taught that the lead should answer these questions about the situation being reported.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Ws
What?, When?, Where?
The first sentence is always
This is Hacker Public Radio episode (show id) for “(day of week)” the “(day number)” of “(month and year).
Saying the name of the show at the beginning of an episode is called establishing
brand recognition
. It is standard for podcasts, TV and Radio shows as well as on broadcast networks, not to mention the pre-rolls in a movie.
We started to do it because some of our Visually Impaired users appreciated knowing what show is playing. Now the same reason can be applied to everyone as the use of visual controlled
User interfaces
have diminished. Most people control the playlist with headset or voice controls.
Saying the show id, and date is common where there are a lot of episodes eg: news or weather shows. It is often skipped where the content is sufficient to identify the episode, eg “the last episode of the foo bar baz podcast, or the last Saturday Night Live”
We include the show id and date to allow the listener to refer to the episode easily. As we have literally thousands of shows, we need to help people identify which show they are now listening to, so that it can be easily shared, or commented on.
What? Why?
We always include
Today’s show is entitled. (title)
. If the episode is part of a series then we also include
It is part of the series (series name)
. We always include the show
(synopsis)
.
This tells the listener what the show is about. It allows them to skip the episode if they wish. They may wish to do this for many reasons, for example:
because they are not interested in the topic,
they wish to listen to it while in front of a computer to reference the accompanying show notes,
they are listening in public and the topic might not be appropriate.
Who?
The next part will either be
It is the first show by new host (host name)
,
It is the (multiple of 10)th show of (host name)
, or
It is hosted by (host name)
We are required by the
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)
license to credit our hosts, so we do.
We think it’s important to highlight new hosts especially, so our community we encourage them to continue to contribute.
It’s also nice to call out hosts who have been contributing a lot by highlighting each 10th show they send in.
Where?
We always include
and is about (minutes)minutes long
to give people an idea of how long the show is.
Normal broadcasts have to fit neatly into a standard TV/Radio Broadcast schedule. Many podcasters now follow the same tradition of having episodes of a predictable length. Eg: 30 minutes or an hour.
On HPR,
there is no restriction on how long the show can be
so it’s desirable to give the listener a way to know how long the episode is so they can plan accordingly.
Warning
We always include either
It carries a clean flag
or
It carries an explicit flag
.
This is also common for broadcasts where they are dealing with a topic that may be disturbing to some people.
What
We always include
The summary is. (summary)
.
As this also tells the listener what the show is about.
License
In the event that the show is not released
CC-BY-SA
we include
Todays show is licensed under a (license_long_name) license.
Outro
Theme Music Credits
The background is an arrangement by
Maestraccio
which is released under the
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)
license, of the HPR Theme, composed by
slick0
which has
No Copyright
applied.
Over the music is the following text recorded by
Manon
which has
No Copyright
applied.
You have been listening to Hacker Public Radio at
hackerpublicradio.org
.
Today’s show was contributed by a HPR listener like yourself.
If you ever thought of recording a podcast, then click on our contribute link to find out how easy it really is.
Hosting for HPR has been kindly provided by
anhonesthost.com
, the
Internet Archive
and
rsync.net
.
Unless otherwise stated, today’s show is released under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)
license.
Discussions about the HPR Theme
2023-04 intro
2022-03 Great Intro
2022-03 TTS
2022-03 The TTS voice
2021-11 Theme - was “Possible cause and solution to subscriber attrition(trying again without encryption)”
2020-08 the voice
2019-11 Ken’s Voice Is Better Than espeak
2018-09 HPR Branding
2018-09 Accordion outro
2018-10 Intro volume
2018-10 TTS over intro music
2016-02 speech synthesis during intro
2015-12 How to check if the intro and outro are added
2015-02 Intro and Outro
2014-12 Outro Theme
2014-12 Bug Fix HPR Intros
2014-11 MaryTTS, clipping
2014-11 An HPR Theme Question, And First Time Member
2014-02 What’s the word on intro and outro clips?
2011-09 HPR Theme
2009-06 my eps for HPR and intro
Provide feedback on this episode.
This show has been flagged as Explicit by the host.
A two-part conversation about what it’s really like being a woman in tech for almost three decades. Content Warning: The F word probably makes an appearance multiple times.
In this episode, Lee sits down with Elsbeth to talk about her long, winding, sometimes ridiculous, often inspiring journey through the IT industry — starting all the way back in 1997. If you’ve ever worked helpdesk, ever had a customer say “my cup holder broke” (yes, the CD tray)… or ever felt underestimated in a room full of engineers, this one’s for you.
Because we throw around some tech terms in the conversation, here are a few friendly definitions so everyone can follow along.
Terms We Mentioned (in plain English)
QA (Quality Assurance)
Think of QA as the people who try to break things
on purpose
so regular users don’t break them
accidentally
.
They test software, hardware, websites — you name it — to catch bugs before they cause chaos.
If it’s glitch-free, a QA person probably saved the day behind the scenes.
Content Moderation
This is the work of keeping the internet from turning into the Wild West.
Moderators review posts, comments, images, and videos to make sure they follow community rules and don’t harm users.
It’s a mix of tech tools and human judgment — and yes, it can get intense.
Building PCs
Where many IT careers start! Building PCs is basically grown-up Lego:
picking parts
assembling them
hoping you don’t zap anything with static electricity
praying the cable management gods smile upon you
It’s one of the most empowering skills in tech and often the first time someone realizes,
“Oh hey… I can actually
do
this.”
Gender Equality & Inequality
Gender equality means giving everyone the same chance to succeed — no matter who they are.
Gender inequality is what happens when that
doesn’t
happen.
In tech, inequality often looks like:
being talked over
being paid less
being assumed “non-technical”
having to prove yourself twice as hard
being the only woman in a room… again
Elsbeth has seen all of this firsthand since 1997 — and she’s got stories.
End-User
The
end-user
is simply the person who actually uses the product.
Not the engineer who built it.
Not the manager who approved it.
Not the QA who tested it.
The end-user is the human at the end of the chain who clicks the button, pushes the key, taps the app… and finds entirely new ways to break things no one expected.
Understanding them is the secret superpower of tech.
Neurodivergence
Neurodivergence means brains come in many beautiful varieties — like ADHD, autism, dyslexia, and more.
Neurodivergent people often bring incredible strengths to IT, including creativity, pattern spotting, hyperfocus, and out-of-the-box problem solving.
They can also face misunderstandings in workplaces that weren’t designed with different brains in mind — something Elsbeth talks about openly and honestly in this episode.
Provide feedback on this episode.
This show has been flagged as Clean by the host.
Below are some links to help you find related software and resources:
Beginner-Friendly Distros
https://linuxmint.com
https://ubuntu.com
https://fedoraproject.org
https://pop.system76.com
Help & Community
Linux Questions —
https://www.linuxquestions.org
Reddit r/linux4noobs —
https://www.reddit.com/r/linux4noobs
Stack Exchange Unix/Linux —
https://unix.stackexchange.com
Ask Fedora — https://ask.fedoraproject.org
Ubuntu Forums —
https://ubuntuforums.org
Local & Live Community
https://www.linux.org/forums/
https://freegeek.org/
https://mastodon.social
https://fosstodon.org
Software Alternatives
GIMP (image editing) —
https://www.gimp.org
Krita (digital painting) —
https://krita.org
Inkscape (vector graphics) —
https://inkscape.org
Blender (3D modeling & animation) — https://blender.org
LibreOffice (office suite) — https://libreoffice.org
Ardour (audio workstation) —
https://ardour.org
LMMS (music production) —
https://lmms.io
Kdenlive (video editing) —
https://kdenlive.org
Linux Gaming
Steam for Linux —
https://store.steampowered.com
ProtonDB compatibility reports —
https://www.protondb.com
Lutris game launcher —
https://lutris.net
Provide feedback on this episode.
This show has been flagged as Clean by the host.
Show Notes
System Monitoring & Metrics
Prometheus
Open-source monitoring and alerting toolkit for collecting and storing metrics.
Documentation
:
https://prometheus.io/docs/prometheus/latest/installation/
Prometheus Node Exporter
Hardware and OS metrics exporter for Prometheus.
Guide
:
https://prometheus.io/docs/guides/node-exporter/
Grafana
Open-source analytics and visualization platform for monitoring metrics.
Docker Installation
:
https://grafana.com/docs/grafana/latest/setup-grafana/installation/docker/
Featured Grafana Dashboards
Power Information Dashboard
:
https://grafana.com/grafana/dashboards/12542-power-information/
Node Exporter Full
:
https://grafana.com/grafana/dashboards/1860-node-exporter-full/
Power Management & Battery Tools
TLP
Advanced power management tool for Linux that optimizes battery life.
Installation Guide
:
https://linrunner.de/tlp/installation/index.html
Battery Uptime Timer Script
Custom script for monitoring battery usage and uptime.
GitHub Repository
:
https://github.com/mralc/Battery-uptime-timer
Setting Battery Charge Threshold
Limit battery charge to extend battery lifespan:
echo 90 | sudo tee /sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/charge_stop_threshold
Note: Adjust the value (90%) and BAT0 according to your system.
Caffeine
Prevents your system from going to sleep or activating the screensaver.
Project Page
:
https://launchpad.net/caffeine
Backup & File Sharing
LocalSend
Open-source cross-platform alternative to AirDrop for sharing files locally.
Website
:
https://localsend.org/
Déjà Dup
Simple backup tool for GNOME desktop environment.
GNOME Apps
:
https://apps.gnome.org/en-GB/DejaDup/
FOX Clone
System backup and cloning tool for Linux.
SourceForge
:
https://sourceforge.net/projects/foxclone/
Terminal Utilities
Tmux
Terminal multiplexer that allows multiple terminal sessions within a single window.
GitHub Wiki
:
https://github.com/tmux/tmux/wiki
Provide feedback on this episode.





awesome
Its an interesting topic you bring up. personally I am appalled by scarecrow tactics. I'd like to offer a different view. There is lots wrong with capitalism. First thing is that capitalists believe their system is the only answer. The hangover after our last industrial revolution gave us shorter working days, safety rules and employee rights at work. Currently there is lots of demand out there for sabbaticals or people taking a break. so hell yeah, give me a robot who does my job so I can recover from stress, spend time with my children or travel, do volunteer work. Why do we doubt Basic income? currently those breaks are only available for the rich or singles or childless. Have you seen a happy cashier? Have you heard a mine worker shouting: yes - let's continue ruining my lung instead of giving me proper training so I can work in a solar panel farm. and for the doctors! I have met so many who were an utter waste of my time. yes, give me the Watson system. I had to retrain in my job