Brucemcjones

Nixie tubes, while built during the vacuum tube era of the mid-20th century, still exist in a niche among hackers. It’s quite the task to get them up and running due to a number of quirks, so getting an entire clock to work with Nixie tubes is a badge of honor for those who attempt the project. For anyone thinking about trying, [Tomasz] has written an extremely detailed write-up of his Nixie clock which should be able to help.

There is a lot of in-depth theory behind Nixie tubes on [Tomasz]’s page that he covers in the course of describing his clock. As far as the actual project is concerned, this is a simplified design which uses one board for the entire clock, including circuits for the lamps, drivers, microcontroller, power supply, and DC/DC conversion. This accomplishes his goal of making this project as small as possible. The Nixies he chose were IN-12 which are popular in his Eastern European home, but could be sourced from eBay and shipped anywhere in the world.

There is a lot of documentation on the project site, including schematics, microcontroller code, PCB design, and even screenshots of the oscilloscope for various points in the circuit. While this might not be the simplest Nixie clock ever, it is certainly close, more easily readable, and the most detailed build we’ve seen in a while!

Filed under: clock hacks

Google:

Google Inc. announced today that it has entered into an agreement to buy Skybox Imaging for $500 million in cash, subject to adjustments.

Skybox’s satellites will help keep Google Maps accurate with up-to-date imagery. Over time, we also hope that Skybox’s team and technology will be able to help improve Internet access and disaster relief — areas Google has long been interested in.

I’m sorry, Skybox, not Skynet. My bad.

NYT: Phil Jackson Gives Knicks’ Carmelo Anthony a Plan C.

The 2014 Alabama League of the South State Conference was held last Saturday at the League facilities in Wetumpka, just outside of Montgomery. The focus of the presentations was on nationalism and activism. Dr Michael Hill, the League president, spoke at the conference, as did Ed Wolfe, Chairman of the Georgia League, and Brad Griffin, founder of Occidental Dissent. SNN covered the event and has pictures, audio and videos. Click here for the full report.

Rome, Italy, Mar 29, 2014 / 04:10 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Fr. Angel Fernandez Artime, a Spaniard who most recently served as provincial in southern Argentina, was elected rector major of the Salesians of St. John Bosco March 25.

“I abandon myself to the Lord,” Fr. Fernandez said upon his election. “We ask Don Bosco and Mary Help of Christians to accompany us and to accompany me, with my brother Salesians and with the Congregation, and I accept with faith.”

Fr. Fernandez was born in Gozon-Luanco in Spain in 1960, and made his first profession in 1978. He took perpetual profession in 1984, and was ordained a priest in 1987. He holds a doctorate in pastoral theology, and a licentiate in philosophy and pedagogy.

He has served the congregation as youth ministry delegate, director of the school at Ourense, member of the provincial council, and as vice provincial, and then provincial from 2000 to 2006, of Leon.

In 2009, he was appointed Salesian provincial for southern Argentina, a post he held until his election as rector major. It was in this capacity that he came to know, and worked with, Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio of Buenos Aires.

He had been appointed in December as head of the new Seville province, though it has been impeded by his election as rector major.

According to a source in the Salesian congregation who spoke with CNA the day of the election, Fr. Fernandez was chosen with respect to his knowledge of Pope Francis and of the Roman Pontiff’s sense of mission, with the congregation demonstrating its desire to follow in the Pope’s missionary path.

Fr. Fernandez was chosen on the first ballot of the Salesians’ 27th General Chapter, the theme of which is “witness of the radicality of the Gospel: work and temperance,” focusing on missions.

According to the source, the discussions in the general chapter were around two possible profiles for the new rector major: the first was of someone able to perpetuate the charisma of the congregation, and who would at the same time show an affinity with Pope Francis.

The second profile was to choose someone from a young Church, as happened during the last general chapter, when Fr. Pascual Chavez Villanueva, from Mexico, was elected.

The discussion about possible candidates was initially stuck on the names of Fr. Francesco Cereda, regulator of the general chapter, and Fr. Fabio Attard, general councilor for youth ministry, considered the most important post in the Salesians, after that of the rector major.

As rector major, Fr. Fernandez will oversee the Salesians’ celebration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of their founder, St. John Bosco.

The celebrations will begin Aug. 16, 2014, and will end Aug. 16, 2015. In the midst of celebration, an exposition of the Shroud of Turin will take place, and it is possible Pope Francis will visit Turin next May to venerate the Shroud and take part in celebrating St. John Bosco.

The Salesians are present in 132 countries, and have more than 10,00 priests and 15,000 religious.

by Smitty (h/t Bearing Drift) A polished ad from the former RNC chief: While I still think Howie Lind and Shak Hill are great guys (the former, a retired squid has my nod for large, haze gray reasons) we’re talking about going after an entrenched, useless tool of an incumbent. Maybe if Governor. . .um. […]

sciencehabit writes "Looking a bit like a dolphin, but with a long slim snout filled with pointy teeth, one species of ichthyosaur was practically invisible in the murky depths of Jurassic seas, thanks to dark pigmentation that covered its entire body. That's one conclusion of a new study that provides an unprecedented peek at the coloration of sea creatures alive during or soon after the dinosaur era. The approach involves bombarding fossils with charged particles and then analyzing the particles that are knocked from the surface, which reveals remnants of ancient pigments. Dark pigmentation may have helped ichthyosaurs and other predators camouflage themselves in the murky depths while they hunted prey."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

by Fred Reed
The other day I was thinking, which I know better than to do, and I started pondering the American economy, which ain’t got the chance of a frog in a French restaurant. Nobody else’s does, either. It’s just that we got there first. Start with work. Just about nobody likes it. I hear folks...

Read the rest at Taki's Magazine

Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "For many education advocates, the arts supposedly increase test scores, generate social responsibility and turn around failing schools but research that demonstrates a causal relationship has been virtually nonexistent. Now the NY Times reports that with the opening of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, a large-scale, random-assignment study (abstract) of school tours to the museum has determined that a strong causal relationship does in fact exist between arts education and a range of desirable outcomes. Students who, by lottery, were selected to visit the museum on a field trip demonstrated stronger critical thinking skills, displayed higher levels of social tolerance, exhibited greater historical empathy and developed a taste for art museums and cultural institutions. Moreover, most of the benefits are significantly larger for minority students, low-income students and students from rural schools — typically two to three times larger than for white, middle-class, suburban students — owing perhaps to the fact that the tour was the first time they had visited an art museum. Further research is needed to determine what exactly about the museum-going experience determines the strength of the outcomes. How important is the structure of the tour? The size of the group? The type of art presented? 'Clearly, however, we can conclude that visiting an art museum exposes students to a diversity of ideas that challenge them with different perspectives on the human condition,' write the authors. 'Expanding access to art, whether through programs in schools or through visits to area museums and galleries, should be a central part of any school's curriculum.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

By Edward Pentin | Plans are reportedly afoot to relocate the U.S. embassy to the Holy See to the grounds of the American embassy to Italy. The move has yet to be publicly announced, but it looks set for completion by January 2015, according to...

Is This Where Some Pope Francis Fans Exit The Bus? - Frank Weathers

Can You Imagine Hearing This in Church? - Jason Liske, Ascn Mt. Crml
10 Tips To Help You Stay a Sane & Effective Catholic - Nicole DeMille, IW
Women Deserve Better Choices - Brianna Heldt, Just Showing Up
A Meditation on Love and Lament for the Church - Msgr. Charles Pope
Chesterton Chats - Kevin O’Brien, Waiting for Godot to Leave
Reason Should be Open to God - Leonard Franchi, Mercatornet
PopeWatch: Archbishop Leonard Blair - Donald R. McClarey JD, TACthlc
Pope Francis, Poster Boy for Today’s Catholics - Cristina Odone, Tlgrph
Why Is Jesus Bleeding? - Lauren Meyers, Ignitum Today
Humanae Vitae: Responsible Fatherhood - Kevin Aldrich, Catholic Stand
Being, Miracles & God: Answering a Reasonable Atheist – Mark P. Shea
Defining “Young Adult” - Elizabeth Teixeira, Ignitum Today
Abp. Hart of Melbourne Fights for the Seal of Confession - Fr. Z’s Blog
The Path to Peace in 4 Little Words - Donald DeMarco PhD, NCRegister
Belgium Bishops Attack Proposed Euthanasia Law - Madeleine Teahan
Tribalism, Scientism & Explosive Growth of Racism - J Jones & J Zmirak
On W. C. Fields’s Tombstone - Fr. James V. Schall SJ, University Bookman
Polling the Laity is Always a Bad Idea - Austin Ruse, The Catholic Thing
Pope Francis Rejects the Spirit of Vatican II – BigPulpit.com
Looking for the GOD & CAESAR news website, click here.
Looking for the Byz Pulpit news website, click here.
For the TUESDAY AFTERNOON EDITION click here.

The post TUESDAY MORNING EDITION appeared first on Big Pulpit.

There’s a new shampoo in town. And a mane like that is one of the reasons why Loki can’t catch a break. The kids know. Roll clip, Heh!

Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "The NYT reports that when Edward Snowden was working as a CIA technician in Geneva in 2009, his supervisor wrote a derogatory report in his personnel file, noting a distinct change in the young man's behavior and work habits, as well as a troubling suspicion that Snowden was trying to break into classified computer files to which he was not authorized to have access. But the red flags went unheeded and Snowden left the CIA to become a contractor for the NSA so that four years later he could leak thousands of classified documents. In hindsight, officials say, the report by Snowden's supervisor and the agency's suspicions might have been the first serious warnings of the disclosures to come, and the biggest missed opportunity to review Snowden's top-secret clearance or at least put his future work at the NSA under much greater scrutiny. Had Booz Allen or the NSA seen Snowden's CIA file before hiring him, it almost certainly would have affected his employment says Dashiell Bennett. 'The weakness of the system was if derogatory information came in, he could still keep his security clearance and move to another job, and the information wasn't passed on,' says a Republican lawmaker who has been briefed on Snowden's activities. It's difficult to tell what would have happened had NSA supervisors been made aware of the warning the CIA issued Snowden in what is called a 'derog' in federal personnel policy parlance."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Da Nang, Vietnam, Jun 29, 2013 / 04:04 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Bishop Joseph Chau Ngoc Tri of Da Nang recently said Mass in honor of Father Vincent Capodanno, a U.S. chaplain killed during the Vietnam War, and encouraged his people to ask the priest's intercession.

Ted Bronson, a retired Navy Captain, told CNA June 26 that Bishop Tri “is a brave bishop, fostering Capodanno under the umbrella” of Vietnamese communism.

The Mass, said on June 14, marked the 55th anniversary of Fr. Capodanno's priestly ordination. Fr. Capodanno was ordained for the Maryknoll Missionary order, and later became a chaplain for the U.S. Navy.

While with Maryknoll, Fr. Capodanno served in Taiwan and Hong Kong, and then requested to be reassigned as a chaplain with the Marines. He was sent to Vietnam in 1966, and requested an extension to his tour of duty when it was up.

On Sept. 4, 1967 his unit was in the Que Son Valley near Da Nang, and became outnumbered by North Vietnamese forces. As American soldiers were being gunned down, Fr. Capodanno went about giving Viaticum and Anointing to the dying, and medical aid to the wounded.

Shortly after reassuring a wounded Marine, Fr. Capodanno went to another soldier who had called out for help. Both he and the solider were shot, and died. He was awarded the Medal of Honor in 1969.

His citation for the Medal of Honor says he “left the relative safety of the company command post and ran through an open area raked with fire … disregarding the intense enemy small-arms, automatic-weapons, and mortar fire, he moved about the battlefield administering last rites to the dying and giving medical aid to the wounded.”

“Upon encountering a wounded corpsman in the direct line of fire of an enemy machine gunner positioned approximately 15 yards away, Lt. Capodanno rushed a daring attempt to aid and assist the mortally wounded corpsman. At that instant, only inches from his goal, he was struck down by a burst of machine gun fire.”

“By his heroic conduct on the battlefield, and his inspiring example, Lt. Capodanno upheld the finest traditions of the U.S. Naval Service. He gallantly gave his life in the cause of freedom.”

According to Beth Crumley, a writer at the Marine Corps Association and Foundation, Fr. Capodanno had written his commander shortly before his death, “I am due to go home in late November or early December. I humbly request that I stay over Christmas and New Year’s with my men. I am willing to relinquish my thirty days leave.”

Fr. Capodanno's cause for canonization was opened in 2002, and he is designated a Servant of God.

“To move the cause forward, hopefully soon into the Roman phase, the Archdiocese for Military Services has launched the Capodanno Guild,” Judy McCloskey, a member of Mission Capodanno, told CNA June 25.

“Several alleged miracles are being reviewed for consideration” of the cause, she added.

The June 14 Mass was held in Da Nang's cathedral, and drew at least 500 participants, both Vietnamese and Americans. It was organized after Bronson visited Da Nang and Bishop Tri last August.

Bronson called the Mass “more than I could have dreamed,” attributing its success to the intercession of his guardian angel, as well as that of Fr. Capodanno.

He described the challenges facing the Mass, which came from Vietnam's communist government.

The agents who visited Bishop Tri leading up to the Mass “objected the first time to 'U.S. Navy' being displayed on the banner. At their second visit, they objected more strongly to the image of Fr. Capodanno on the battlefield. That's why we did not process the banner at the Mass.”

Present at the Mass were three policemen, Bronson added.

Yet “Bishop Tri told me he will repeat this Mass every June 14 with these words: 'It will be easier next year.'”

“This is all that I could pray for,” Bronson reflected.

He added that Bishop Tri intends to mention Fr. Capodanno to Pope Francis in his next ad limina visit, scheduled for 2014.

An example I often use to illustrate the reality of vanity, is this: look at the peacock; it’s beautiful if you look at it from the front. But if you look at it from behind, you discover the truth… Whoever gives in to such self-absorbed vanity has huge misery hiding inside them.

-Pope Francis