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Progenitor of the Weird Knife Wednesday feature column. Is “column” the right word? Anyway, apparently I also coined the Very Specific Object nomenclature now sporadically used in the 3D printing community. Yeah, that was me. This must be how Cory Doctorow feels all the time these days.

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Cake day: July 20th, 2023

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  • From TFA:

    Manufacturers may comply through three methods specified in Section 6(2) of the bill: integration of the algorithm in the printer’s firmware, integration in preprint software, or a handshake authentication design between software and printer.

    Nobody’s going to do this in the printer itself; the spyware will be built into the slicer.

    Ultimately this will be trivially easy to defeat no matter what moronic legislators who possess no technical knowledge think. The real dangers are more subtle, not least of which being the chilling effect if this passes effectively instructing all 3D printer manufacturers not to sell anything in Washington state since total compliance as the bill proposes is indeed effectively impossible, and the penalties for presumed lack of compliance are high. The most realistic outcome for a private individual vis-a-vis potentially printing a ghost gun is not necessarily having their printer tattle on them, but the state having yet another byzantine felony they can charge people with if they get caught after the fact with whatever-it-is they have. Never mind the 1st and 2nd amendments, the only realistic avenue for enforcement of this on private individuals will run afoul of the 4th.




  • I’m in agreement with the others. This is a printer issue, not a model design issue. Any current printer in good working order and running non-insane settings should be able to print a 90 degree inside corner like that with no problem.

    Some possibilities:

    Your Z offset may be set too high, so that your first layer height is too tall. This will result in the first layer’s extrusions not sticking to the bed and each other, peeling off in strings like you see here.

    Flip this over and show us the bottom of it. The effects of a too-high first layer should be readily apparent. That’s where my money is.

    Your printer may also be attempting to round the corners too fast. You could slow down your print speed, or adjust your linear advance settings. If you are using Prusaslicer or a derivative thereof (Orca, Qidi, etc.) there are built-in calibration prints you can run that will provide you a range of values to inspect my physically printing them, and allowing you to choose from the value that produces the best looking result. Ideally your linear advance/pressure advance setting should be tuned for each spool of filament, but in reality most people (myself included) don’t bother until they observe an issue. I use the same settings for all PLA, and a different set of settings for all PETG, and another for ABS, etc.








  • Douglas Adams, apparently ever prescient, was on top of this long before the rest of us. This is from The Long Dark Tea-Time Of The Soul, which I will remind you was published in 1988 and in the foreword says it was typeset on a Macintosh II:

    There was a pay phone in one of the dark corners where waiters slouched moodily at one another. Dirk threaded his way through them, wondering whom it was they reminded him of, and eventually deciding it was the small crowd of naked men standing around behind the Holy Family in Michelangelo’s picture of the same name, for no more apparent reason than Michelangelo rather liked them.

    He telephoned an acquaintance of his called Nobby Paxton, or so he claimed, who worked the darker side of the domestic appliance supply business. Dirk came straight to the point.

    “Dobby, I deed a fridge.” (At this point in the book, Dirk has recently been punched in the face and is talking funny due to a broken nose.)

    “Dirk, I been saving one against the day you’d ask me.”

    Dirk found this highly unlikely.

    “Only I wand a good fridge, you thee, Dobby.”

    “This is the best, Dirk. Japanese. Microprocessor-controlled.”

    “What would a microprothehtor be doing in a fridge, Dobby?”

    “Keeping itself cool, Dirk. I’ll get the lads to bring it round right away. I need to get it off the premises pretty sharpish for reasons I won’t trouble you with.”

    “I apprethiade thid, Dobby,” said Dirk. “Problem id, I’m not home at preddent.”

    “Gaining access to houses in the absence of their owners is only one of the panoply of skills with which my lads are blessed. Let me know if you find anything missing afterwards, by the way.”











  • Qualified immunity protects government actors from civil penalties (lawsuits) as a result of their actions while on duty and when not violating the constitutional/civil rights of citizens (that’s the “qualified” part). I.e., you can’t sue the cops for the damage to your doorframe after they kick your door in serving a warrant. It does not protect government actors from criminal prosecution and does not grant them license to violate existing laws, and it never has.

    This is also true for ICE, which is why Vance and Stephen Miller are suddenly so keen to start screeching that they think ICE now magically has “absolute” immunity, which there is also no legal basis for whatsoever. Those pulling the strings know that ICE is in fact routinely breaking the law, and they’re desperately trying to get out ahead of it while anyone believes that any shred of equal protection under the law still exists.