Book 3. Section VI.

Blowing other people’s runny noses, with your mind.

We used to read both versions in high school French class. There was much more slang in French. Many of these were replaced by silly puns in English.

Even the names: Getafix the druid was originally Panoramix. Dogmatix the dog was Idéfix (this is actually a pretty good translation, keeping the core idea of single-mindedness, plus it has Dog in it).

The chief and bard names are the worse. Abraracourcix is a reference to someone prone to violence in French, which is why he keeps getting angry and red-faced. There’s a whole plotline about him having to go to a spa so he can lose weight and relax. Not sure why they renamed him to Vitalstatistix in English.

And the noisy bard goes from Assurancetourix (comprehensive insurance joke) to an unsubtle Cacofonix. But to answer your question, most of the bad puns were added in the English translation.

FWIW, they did a reverse butcher job with Harry Potter books. The French versions literally translated the British expressions word-for-word to the point they made no sense.

Pretty cool.

I’ve been noodling on what else you can run inside a GPU shader. Problem was data persistence. This is a pretty interesting approach.

Wonder what kind of performance you get running something like this on a bare, high-end GPU (outside the VRChat/Unity scaffolding).

Only 6 takers on the KS with a long way to reach funding level. My guess is they’ll have to relaunch while focusing on end-user benefits and software instead of hardware specs.

The Qualcomm IPQ9574 is a pretty high-end WiFi 7 platform. If someone already has a decent router, it’s a bit of a waste. The main processor is the Rockchip RK3588 module which already has dual NPUs. Adding another AI coprocessor means the system drivers have to be tweaked properly to use the right coprocessor. That’s why I think it’s important to see how they’ve implemented the software.

The RK3588 is a couple years old. Rockchip already announced the RK3688 but my past experience with them was they first released mobile versions and it took a while (1-2 years) before they made dev boards and server BSPs available. The 3688 also has a much better, faster NPU w 20 TOPs – not as beefy as the Metis with 214 TOPs – but OK for basic local inference.

All the communication slots are good for remote office or High Availability – a bit wasted IMO for home use, unless you need LoRaWAN, satellite, or multiple 5G lines.

If you badly want to use a 3588, BananaPi makes a pro board at a fraction of the price. Otherwise, for basic home server use, an old Intel laptop or headless desktop, reflashed with Debian or Ubuntu will do.

Again, I really like the hardware mix they have. It’s great for a small office or a research lab, but IMO a bit overkill for home use.

Pretty loaded package. Love how expandable it is.

In its current configuration, it looks a bit underpowered for local AI (16GB), but there are a lot of slots to add your own M.2 board.

I’d be concerned about driver support. Given all the hardware, the burden is on the admin software to help with configuring all the knobs and buttons. Didn’t see any mention of that on the KS page. Mostly hardware specs (which again, are pretty good).

I’d want to know more about the software. If it requires downloading tar archives and manually configuring things, it’s not meant to be used by non-devs. They claim it was designed for medical office use, but for that they would definitely need an end-user friendly interface with a LOT of sane defaults.

Also, allowing only 15 days for a hardware KS is a bit strange. It takes a while to spread the word in the device community and get backers. Not much time to make a decision or get budget approved for a $2K+ device.

On infinite repeat.

Always been amazed this song doesn’t get used for Rickrolling during the last two months of each year. It’s a systemic failure.

Obligatory Leslie Nielsen bathroom scene: https://youtu.be/pdE83FX-Mto

150 miles of range. They’re still not serious about EVs.

I got a couple of these off AliExpress. Added printed labels on the drawers. Work pretty well. For larger projects, a plastic shoebox with all the bits and bobs needed for that one project.

What’s amazing is the acquired skill to adjust the curve in any direction the pitcher wants to apply.

FWIW, a similar concept applies to curving soccer balls.

Saw him perform this live a while back. Whole place was singing along to this song. Thanks for bringing back the memories.

According to the article, the air smells like rotten eggs, there are sulphur-converting bacteria in the air, tiny little midges everywhere, and that dude just stands there with no protection other than an overall and a helmet.

Oh yeah, and a crap-ton of spiders.

Self-amputation.

Transitive Law does not apply.

I was just informed on another thread there are 5 dishwasher related ones.

Just got my flu and COVID shots. Guess I know what I’ll be watching ALL DAY tomorrow.