In recent years there has been a lot of talk about solar and more renewable energy. In USA the recent IRA has provisions for extending solar and renewable energy, and the Florida governor last year supported Solar benefits which turn out to be helpful in many natural disasters, making an energy grid more easily self-sustainable after hurricanes that are common to that state. What if we could go over a map and see what buildings are the best candidates for solar generation? OpenStreetMap has not just street maps, but many other features, including building coordinates, which can give us polygons that can calculate areas for potential solar!
Continue reading “Where are the big roofs for Solar? A mathematical look at pulling data from OpenStreetMap”ChatGPT is bad at math? Turns out, so is Microsoft’s assistant.
Recently it was noted, by Arstechnica and others, that ChatGPT doesn’t seem to be great at math questions – recent tests have found one can get wrong answers much more often than a calculator, and even apologize if you insist that it is wrong (suggesting it doesn’t know math after 2021… lol). but what about other similar assistants?
Continue reading “ChatGPT is bad at math? Turns out, so is Microsoft’s assistant.”How to build your own ChatGPT-style chat bot
In recent months, new inventions like ChatGPT have been said to be possibly the end of society, or the saving of society… but maybe this is something that is something very similar to what has been hyped before?
Continue reading “How to build your own ChatGPT-style chat bot”Computer vision and insect vision – compared
If you have been experimenting with the widely used OpenCV project, you may have found the StereoSGBM functionality that tries to find the difference between two images to find depth!
Continue reading “Computer vision and insect vision – compared”Another look at Zipf’s law, and you can chart it yourself!
In a previous post I showed some interesting facts about Zipf’s law and how many different things show a pattern of logarithmic decrease with the most popular or numerous item largely being much more so than the very rare ones – in a logarithmic pattern. Let’s look at that pattern and how you can chart it…
Continue reading “Another look at Zipf’s law, and you can chart it yourself!”FOSDEM – coming up this weekend!
FOSDEM is coming up with a variety of topics, from Javascript to security to Haskell…
Continue reading “FOSDEM – coming up this weekend!”NodeRed for Onstar access for GM/Chevy vehicle access
In recent years there has been a surge in popularity of Chevrolet vehicles like the Chevrolet Bolt and, coming soon, the Equinox EV. There has also been increased popularity for Linux phones like the Librem phone, but unfortunately there has been no equivalent for the “myChevrolet” app for your own computer or Linux-phone… unless you know where to look.
Continue reading “NodeRed for Onstar access for GM/Chevy vehicle access”MakerFaire Central Oregon 2022
This year’s MakerFaire had some great additions and some new booths… Check out a few of the highlights:
Continue reading “MakerFaire Central Oregon 2022”Knime conference coming up
Next week the KNIME fall conference will be happening, Nov 14-16. For mathematicians or anyone wanting to look at some useful AI/Machine learning tools, this should be an informative conference! I’ve seen some previous sessions with interesting demos and overviews of new features they add to this open-source tool. Virtual passes are free to the live-streamed event! If it is like past online lessons, it is likely they will also be available later from their Youtube channel page.
Plus codes as an easy location-sharing option
You may know of grid squares for general location in a ham radio contest, or the What3Words system with its easy access if you have network access, but there is another often-used location project you may not have heard of which is also easier than sharing a long latitude and longitude number!
Continue reading “Plus codes as an easy location-sharing option”