btrettel

66 ms·

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by btrettel 7y ago
The University of Texas at Austin has statisticians faculty, staff, and students can consult with for free: https://stat.utexas.edu/consulting/free-consulting I've used the service before and can recommend it. Don
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by btrettel 7y ago
I'm only "incredulous" if the anti-cycling arguments don't make sense. Personally, I don't have a major problem with the "ferrying kids around" argument. But the groceries argument is much weaker than you
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by btrettel 7y ago
I didn't watch the video, and was just responding to the idea that going into the "car lane" is bad.
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by btrettel 7y ago
In Austin, TX, I rarely have found that I truly need to take a shower, even when it's over 100 F. When I was less experienced this was more of a problem but now I reduce my speed, take a shorter route if possible, and change to a wet t
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by btrettel 7y ago
I acknowledge that people's preferences vary. I don't recommend cycling to everyone. But I also believe many people are mistaken about their preferences. Using your example of physical activity, I find that people greatly overesti
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by btrettel 7y ago
I think many drivers have inaccurate views of how good the various alternatives are. As a cyclist, I've had drivers tell me over the years that going from A to B is practically impossible on a bike, but I often find it perfectly reason
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by btrettel 7y ago
In many instances a cyclist riding in the "car lane" is not illegal. It's not in Texas, in fact, it's legally required in some instances. I'm a cyclist, and recently I had a driver road rage at me because I was usin
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by btrettel 7y ago
Few US drivers seem to appreciate how "subsidized" parking is (and by consequence, driving). The fact that most places in the US have parking minimums means that, for example, I end up paying $100-$200 more per month for rent than
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by btrettel 7y ago
My incomplete ~240 page dissertation takes about 2 minutes to compile until complete (i.e., running multiple times to get references right, etc.). No TikZ at all, Intel Core i3 dual core processor, normal hard drive.
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by btrettel 7y ago
Cyclist here. In my experience a horn works best if the driver is distracted. This is one major reason I have an air horn on my bike.
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by btrettel 7y ago
I'm not certain. I don't recall the signs when I started in 2013. The one EHS document I can find that mentions the posters is dated 2014: https://ehs.utexas.edu/documents/EHS-AnnualReport-2014.pdf
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by btrettel 7y ago
At the University of Texas at Austin they have a "Lavatory Safety Update" that's usually posted at eye level above the urinals. It discusses lab safety related issues.
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by btrettel 7y ago
I remember the order for ln -s because the third argument is optional. If you omit the third argument the command will create a symbolic link in the current directory with the same filename as the original.
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by btrettel 7y ago
Yes and no. The result was a factor of 4 too high (edit: 3.3, to be more precise), which is conservative for certain applications. But for those applications I'd argue that you are typically confident that your device is in the atomiza
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by btrettel 7y ago
Even in science there is too little due diligence. I'm nearly done a PhD in mechanical engineering. Recently I was writing the review section of my dissertation and I decided to check one of the most used results in my field, the most
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by btrettel 7y ago
Probably a year or more ago I compared some data on FOIA request processing times reported by US government agencies against an exponential distribution (not power law). I used the given mean and compared the predicted median against the ac
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by btrettel 7y ago
A power law distribution is roughly as easy to work with here as exponential. The blog post contains the power law results for this case, which are fairly easily obtained through a conditional average (conditioning on t > t_0). The impor
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by btrettel 7y ago
Note that one property described is not true of all distributions. I've used the exponential distribution to predict completion times before, and the exponential distribution has the simple property that on average completion is always
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by btrettel 7y ago
I run Linux and use full disk encryption, but I also have a few encrypted directories using EncFS. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EncFS Right now it's just for sensitive documents (i.e., anything that could be used
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by btrettel 7y ago
I've had similar experiences as a cyclist. I've gone through cyclist stop sign enforcement twice (no ticket for me as I follow the law), but I haven't personally seen distracted driving enforcement ever since I moved to Austi
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by btrettel 7y ago
I have mixed experiences tapping on cars to get drivers' attention. Most drivers will react okay, but there are a few who'll freak out about you touching their vehicle. Lately, if I'm close enough to touch their vehicle I&#x2
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by btrettel 7y ago
Quotes from the linked article: > The city responded to what is truly a life and death crisis by erecting small yellow signs which read: Seniors Safety Zone: Drive Slowly. One more piece of city signage for drivers to ignore as they race
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by btrettel 7y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SQ3R As recommended by the book "Your memory: how it works and how to improve it" by Ken Higbee. As I recall, Higbee says there are many reading comprehension methods, but the fu
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by btrettel 7y ago
Yes, moving to where cycling is more common definitely would help in this theory. After writing my post I've found there's a lot of research in this area: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inattentional_blindness
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by btrettel 7y ago
As a cyclist who wears hi-viz clothing every time I ride (even in broad daylight), I'm somewhat amazed by how many drivers still don't see me. When I have the opportunity I'll ask a driver who clearly missed me what I could h
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by btrettel 7y ago
I believe my phone was compromised via CamScanner, and I factory reset my phone, changed the passwords to every account I used on my phone, and rotated every entry in my TOTP app. Not sure if any of that was necessary, but better safe than
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by btrettel 7y ago
I don't think that list is accurate. I installed CamScanner on Aug. 23, got a text about apparently being signed up for a $5/month service called GameZone at about 4:30 am on Aug. 24, and factory reset my phone the afternoon of Au
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by btrettel 7y ago
A university website linked to in the article suggests that a helmet that costs half as much as the one advertised in the article performs slightly better: https://www.helmet.beam.vt.edu/bicycle-helmet-ratings.html Look for
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by btrettel 7y ago
Cyclist here. In my experience, the majority of the time a driver stops or parks in the bike lane in an urban area in the US (e.g., I live in Austin), there's a legal parking/stopping spot within a reasonable walking distance, oft
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by btrettel 7y ago
I've had good luck getting Google to mark books as public domain, at least if they are government publications. Here's what I do: I click on the "Report an issue" link at the bottom, select "I have a question or fee

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