The Blog of Dr. Moron

I’ve recently started the process of converting some software documentation that was originally written for LaTeX and converting it to a newer documentation system called Sphinx. I like the LaTeX implementation much, but the Sphinx documentation provides some important advantages. First, Sphinx is designed to provide html output that will be easier for users to find and reference (while also providing pdf files similar to LaTeX). Second, with the Breathe extension, Sphinx can pull documentation directly from source code. [Read More]

This is my trusty Cannon ZR40 camcorder. This particular camcorder uses MiniDV format tapes. During the 2000’s I recorded hours of footage onto these tapes that are hanging around my house. I originally bought a camcorder with this format knowing that I would eventually want to transfer the video to future formats. At the time, I had the ability to transfer videos to a computer, but I didn’t have the storage to save much. [Read More]

Before I start, let me say that everything in this blog is stupid. You should not do the things I report on here. What I did will likely cause damage to property and possibly great harm to your person. That is, you might get hurt or die. You have been warned. With that, let’s get to the fun. This started with a project my wife started with the family. She brought several wooden snowflake cutouts to paint as a family project. [Read More]

I recently had the pleasure to host another session of VisLies. As an early demonstration of lying with visualization, I presented these 2 graphs taken from data provided by the CDC for US states.1 The first plot seems to suggest that more vaccinations cause more people to die. The second plot, built from the same source data, suggests that more vaccinations prevent deaths. They cannot both be right. The difference is easily explained. [Read More]

Years ago, we bought an advent calendar for our kids. It is a wooden structure comprising 24 hinged boxes. Some time in November, my wife would fill the boxes with little trinkets. Then, each day in December leading up to Christmas the kids could open a box and get a little surprise. Years have passed, and the kids have outgrown the little stamps and stickers that typically populated the calendar. [Read More]

Update: December 15, 2024 Since writing this blog post, we have created several new rooms and puzzles. For many new ideas, please visit me at https://www.open-sesame.xyz/. As with many people around the world at this time, our family has been pretty much stuck at home for social distancing. Recently our daughter had a suggestion to entertain ourselves: We could build escape rooms for each other. As typical with such a suggestion, I at first dismiss this as being too hard, and then get obsessed about it and do it anyway. [Read More]

As of this writing, China is battling a fierce outbreak of a new coronavirus, which is also threatening to spread to other parts of the world. It’s scary. And that means it is also very important to keep things in perspective. Panicking and overreacting will make things worse for everyone, including yourself. Which brings me to this map showing the spread of the 2019-nCoV coronavirus. This and several more like it have been featured in articles from The Sun. [Read More]

Consider the lowly chart. Chances are you have seen quite a few, perhaps in advertisements, news, reports, or papers. You have probably even made a few yourself for school or work. There was a time when making such figures was an arduous chore. But now every spreadsheet program worth its salt can quickly plot its data, and several programs and libraries are dedicated to plotting charts. A small montage of plots. [Read More]

This summer our family took a vacation in southern California, and we had a fun excursion to the Disney theme parks. What I particularly enjoy about Disney’s parks, apart from the technically impressive rides themselves, is the attention to detail for the whole experience from the moment you enter the park to the time you leave. You can see little details in everything from the escalators in the parking garage to the storefront facades to the activities in line. [Read More]

This winter I decided to consolidate my TiVo DVR service to a single Roamio that has one subscription and can stream a show to other rooms over the home network. The service is a lot nicer, but there is a catch. The TiVo units will not let you do this over a WiFi network, which is what I (and many households) use to connect network devices. Apparently, the TiVo engineers have deemed WiFi networks too unreliable to stream HD video signals, so that means I have to find a method to wire the devices across my house. [Read More]