tal

tal, 2 years ago

Kbin doesn't presently auto-hyperlink the !sub text.

I expect that it will in the future.

tal, 2 years ago

I think that "magazine" is fine. As is "sublemmy". But I kind of am not enthusiastic about having two different words for them, unless there are future plans for them to act very differently.

From a user standpoint, unless he's talking about the internals of the server involved, there isn't really a difference. Saying "sublemmy/magazine" is just verbose and annoying. I'm on Kevin, but I want to be able to refer to magazines/sublemmies in a way approachable to all the people reading the content.

tal, 2 years ago

Whilst I was trying to get a grip on how Lemmy & kbin interact, Lemmy seems to have blocked kbin access.

That was lemmy.ml, not all of Lemmy. Lemmy.ml is an important instance -- one of the larger Lemmy instances, and it is run by the Lemmy devs -- but it's still but one instance among many.

tal, 2 years ago

I like that kbin/lemmy we can choose whatever fucking avatar we want instead of being limited to customizing our snoz or wtf Reddit calls their mascot thing.

"Snoo". It's a space alien.

tal, 2 years ago

I asked someone who wrote a huge reddit post about it, and they responded with "idk, I just looked at it and didn't get it."

UI labs record a person trying to use something for the first time so they can see what they get stuck on. Like, mouse movements, clicks, even eye-tracking.

Not saying that the Lemmy or kbin devs should be doing that right now, as they've got full plates. Or that Reddit did this. But understanding where and why people get stuck is a big part of working on UIs.

tal, 2 years ago

The only time it's disappointed me was when I was trying to use it -- among a variety of other substances -- to deal with something other than sticker goo.

A few years back, a bunch of electronic devices were sold in the US that used some sort of rubberized coating that gave them a nice grippy feeling. Unfortunately, it turns out that after a couple of years, the coating degraded and turned into an incredibly sticky mess. I had a Grundig G6 Aviator shortwave radio that was affected, as well as a few other devices. It felt a bit like sticker adhesive, but trying to clean the stuff off with Goo Gone didn't work well (ultimately, isopropyl alcohol and a lot of elbow grease wound up being my most-successful combination).

But for what it is actually billed for, adhesive residue, I've had good experiences.

Note that Goo Gone, or at least the variant I have, has a quite-strong citrus smell, which I assume is there to mask some less-pleasant smell that the active ingredients have. So when I use the stuff, everything nearby smells like oranges for a while. Haven't had a situation where that's a problem yet, but thought I'd mention it in case it would be an issue for anyone else using it.

tal, 2 years ago (edited 2 years ago)

A couple points:

The lighter fluid that the parent poster is talking about, Ronsonol, is not the stuff that goes in butane lighters, nor is it the "lighter fluid" used to start charcoal barbecues. He's talking about the stuff that goes into Zippo and similar refillable lighters, stuff that's also called "naphtha".

If you want to use it as a solvent with much frequency, you can get the stuff at dramatically-lower unit prices in much larger containers than what Ronsonol is sold at.

https://www.amazon.com/2-Pack-VM-NAPTHA-QT-KLEAN-STRIP/dp/B01LWRQPWK/

Keep in mind that this is potent stuff and can damage some surfaces. For example, another user is talking about using Goo Gone above to remove adhesive from paint on a wall. Naphtha is more-or-less paint thinner -- your wall's paint will dissolve in it. It'd be fine on glass, what OP is intending it for, but if you use it elsewhere, be careful with it, try it on a small amount of the surface somewhere first to see if it damages it.

It can also cause skin irritation. Probably not a big deal unless you're regularly using it, but worth keeping in mind.

I also have a container of white spirits, which are similar but less volatile.

tal, 2 years ago (edited 2 years ago)

If it's a rubberized coating on new devices, it may be a similar formula that doesn't have the degradation problem. I haven't personally had any devices do that in several years (not saying that there aren't products that do, mind).

And I remember that when the coating was new, before it broke down into a horrible sticky mess in a few years after purchase, it did feel pretty good to me. And it seemed pretty durable -- like, it didn't wear through or anything.

Just that when the Stickyocalypse did happen, it was awful.

I remember reading on Reddit once that people who bought a variety of dress shoes with a particular type of substance used in their soft soles had something similar happen. For a few years, many types of shoes from different manufacturers would break down and degrade in the closet. You take them out after a couple years, and they just crumbled apart. Wasn't a sticky mess, but I bet that people who rarely wore those shoes were pretty irked.

googles

Here's an example of one manufacturer that sold affected shoes. Apparently the problem was polyurethane being affected by hydrolysis.

Anyway, point is, the industry moved away from that particular fiasco after a couple of years when the problem came to light, switched to similar substances without the problem. I wouldn't be surprised if the electronics industry has done the same.

tal, 2 years ago

I don't smoke, but I absolutely adore the sound that a Zippo makes when flicked open and struck, and wanted to get one a while back. I was kind of appalled at the fluid pricing -- the Zippo-brand fluid is even pricier, and I've seen the Ronsonol fluid itself recommended as a lower-priced alternative.

There are a lot of other things that people can burn in the refillable lighters, but I went through various testing that other people did and tried some myself, and none other than naphtha are really satisfactory. Some -- like white spirits -- aren't volatile enough, and won't maintain a consistent flame. Some, like gasoline, or low-water-content isopropyl alcohol, are too volatile and evaporate even more quickly than the regular fluid does or risk making an out-of-control fire.

Also works for the hand-warmers, which use the same fuel (and go through a great deal more of it than the lighters, so it's more-important there).

On an side note, I really wish that lighters of that sort would introduce some type of gasket that isn't dissolved by the fuel to help reduce the fuel vapor leaking out of the device when closed, or maybe some sort of other mechanism that seals the fuel reservoir off when the lighters are closed. As it stands, for a regular smoker, the fuel loss isn't a huge deal, but for someone who infrequently uses a lighter of the sort, the fuel loss is much more obnoxious -- it only takes several weeks for the reservoir to empty itself, in my experience.

tal, 2 years ago (edited 2 years ago)

WD40 is great for dealing with things that are rusted in place, which is what it's supposed to be used for. It's just that it's not a great lubricating oil, and people often recommend it for use as that. Too thin and leaves a waxy residue to repel more water from rusting the surface, which you often don't want in things that you're lubricating.