ultrascience labs
This brand makes the thing which a consumer is satisfied with. - engrish.com
lab notes
Research articles and blog posts, some of it evergreen. Included archived blog posts restored from previous website incarnations.
r & d
Work logs for past and present hobby projects. Case mods, electronics, models, woodworking, vintage audio.
linkroll
A cultivated collection of link to sites of all types. Currently working on a linkroll and directories section - a linkroll of linkrolls.
current news
RSS headlines. Sources are subject to change. I try to use sources that are relatively resource light, and produce feed XML docs that aren't ridiculously boated. As usual, tread carefully in the comments sections, for example slashdot is a good source for headlines, but the comment section is full of Libertarians.
slashdot
- Fox Is Buying Roku For $22 Billion - 2026-06-15 12:00
- Google CEO Largely Avoids Discussing AI In Stanford Commencement Speech - 2026-06-15 11:00
- Swiss Voters Reject Proposal To Cap Population At 10 Million - 2026-06-15 10:00
- Are Many College Students Losing the Ability to Read? - 2026-06-15 06:34
- IT Workers Are Now Struggling to Find Work, as 'Picky' Companies Demand AI Skills - 2026-06-15 02:04
hackaday
- Downloadable Xbox Thumbstick Toppers Give Gamers Accessibility Options - 2026-06-15 10:30
- Picking a CRC - 2026-06-15 09:00
- Wooden Piano Keys Hold Your Less-Wooden, Not-Piano Keys - 2026-06-15 06:00
- The Y2K Bug in BSD 2.11 that Survived 2000 - 2026-06-15 03:00
- IKEA Storage Box Just Happens To Make Great Printer Cover - 2026-06-15 00:00
neatorama
- Cat Walks on Stage during Performance of <i>Romeo and Juliet</i> - 2026-06-15 09:10
- The Many Pseudonyms of Benjamin Franklin - 2026-06-14 22:25
- The Bad Blood Between Elvis and The Beatles - 2026-06-14 21:01
- Scientist: Almost Everyone Veers to the Left When Walking Randomly - 2026-06-14 14:41
- Destinations and Vistas That Must be Timed Just Right - 2026-06-14 08:08
NPR
- Soccer Edition: Watch World Cup highlights from across the NPR Network - 2026-06-15 11:09
- As the U.S. turns 250, this historian has blunt advice: 'America has to grow up' - 2026-06-15 10:42
- Former American businessman detained in Myanmar after alleged financial misconduct - 2026-06-15 07:45
- As Luigi Mangione's lawyers head to court, support grows for the accused 'vigilante' - 2026-06-15 06:48
- Trump announces deal to end war in Iran. And, how to stay safe in deadly heat - 2026-06-15 05:59
jacobin
- Aparna Raj Demands Housing Justice in DC - 2026-06-15 10:52
- ICE Is Targeting the Lawyers of Immigrant Children - 2026-06-15 09:10
- How Penn Graduate Workers Got Their Union Contract - 2026-06-14 07:55
- Europe Doesn’t Know How to Respond to China - 2026-06-14 07:50
- The Super-Elite Is Tightening Its Grip on Combat Sports - 2026-06-13 07:55
404media
- Judge Rules Blacked.com Can Sue Meta for Scraping Its Porn - 2026-06-15 09:53
- It Is Trivially Easy to Use Reddit to Manipulate AI Search, Research Suggests - 2026-06-15 09:19
- The OPSEC Rave Wave (with Imani Thompson) - 2026-06-15 07:59
- Scientists Discover Vast Ancient ‘Necropolis’ Teeming With Strange New Creatures - 2026-06-13 14:10
- ‘You Will Not Speak on Flock Tonight’: County Commissioner Refuses to Let Residents Opposing Flock Speak at Meeting - 2026-06-12 11:10
techdirt
- Flock Is The New Tool Of Choice For Cops Who Love Stalking Their Exes - 2026-06-15 11:27
- Opposition Mounts To Trump FCC Plan To Kill Burner Phone Anonymity, Ramp Up Surveillance - 2026-06-15 07:37
- Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt - 2026-06-14 14:00
- This Week In Techdirt History: June 7th – 13th - 2026-06-13 14:00
- American Diabetes Association Fucked Up Real Bad Trying To Placate Trump Administration - 2026-06-12 21:39
the register personal tech
- Classic ASCII game NetHack debuts version 5.0 just 11 years after last major release - 2026-05-05 01:32
- Bad news for OpenClaw stans: Apple’s Mac Mini now starts at $799 - 2026-05-04 16:46
- Ask.com, former home of search butler Jeeves, closes just as conversational search comes back - 2026-05-04 00:13
- Where to buy a non-Apple, non-Google smartphone - 2026-05-01 10:24
- That old phone in the kitchen drawer could save an industry - 2026-05-01 09:16
sciencedaily
- Millions take calcium and vitamin D for stronger bones. A major review finds little benefit - 2026-06-15 07:44
- This popular brain supplement was linked to shorter lifespans in men - 2026-06-15 07:27
- NASA spots giant ocean swell that could signal El Niño’s return - 2026-06-15 07:09
- This strange material can become strong or fall apart in seconds - 2026-06-15 06:54
- New GLP-1 diabetes pill delivers major weight loss and blood sugar control - 2026-06-15 04:45
space.com
- 'Everybody came with their A-game': Oscar-winning sound editor Andy Nelson talks reuniting with Spielberg & John Williams for 'Disclosure Day' - 2026-06-15 12:00
- NASA X-ray spacecraft discovers supernova wreckage at the heart of the Milky Way - 2026-06-15 11:00
- Live from the moon! How lasers connected us all to NASA's Artemis 2 astronauts on their epic lunar trip - 2026-06-15 10:00
- Hubble spies a swarm of stars in a strange, irregular galaxy | Space photo of the day for June 15, 2026 - 2026-06-15 09:00
- Scientists find strange changes on sun hours before a powerful X9 solar flare: 'I was not expecting what I found' - 2026-06-15 08:00
space news
- DARPA to explore ways to rapidly rebuild satellite networks if attacked - 2026-06-15 08:55
- What’s the Best Way to Monetize Space Energy? - 2026-06-15 08:06
- Sustained maneuver has a propulsion problem - 2026-06-15 08:00
- Missile production push runs into solid rocket motor bottleneck - 2026-06-13 23:00
- Revised Artemis lunar lander plans take shape - 2026-06-13 12:19
phys.org
- The galaxy's spin is hiding in the hum of gravitational waves - 2026-06-15 12:20
- Listening to political opponents who share common values can ease polarization - 2026-06-15 12:20
- Critical cellular system discovery may lead to treatment of some cancers - 2026-06-15 12:00
- Brain scans predict how fast adults learn new languages - 2026-06-15 12:00
- Northern permafrost switches from carbon sink to carbon source earlier than thought in models including deep soil carbon - 2026-06-15 11:59
onion latest
- MLB Demands Return Of All Foul Balls - 2026-06-15 08:00
- Study: Majority Of Middle-Aged Men Lack Support Network They’ll Need To Handle Neil Young’s Death - 2026-06-15 08:00
- Back Of Gatorade Bottle Features Recipe For Gatorade Casserole - 2026-06-15 08:00
- Study Finds iPhone Lowered Birth Rate - 2026-06-12 08:00
- Embarrassed Woman Scrambles To Stop Emotionally Resonating With Movie Before Lights Come On - 2026-06-12 08:00
changelogs
April 2026
2025-04-03 - linkroll - added more links.
December 2025
2025-12-22 - r & d - Infrastructure worklogs updated in shop rehab redux
November 2025
2025-11-09 - updated the ticker links to open in new tabs.
2025-11-07 - updated yellow to version 0.9.16
July 2025
2025-07-15 - linkroll - added links to the esoterica, linkrolls, design inspiration, and woodworking sections.
March 2025
2025-03-10 - r&d - Added the "rei & asuka" entry under r&d -> case mods -> legacy case mods. I also realized that I also got my Dragon case work log entered but forgot to update the change log to document it. So check that out too, I guess.
February 2025
2025-02-26 - Spent a few days messing around with the site layout. Went crazy with the icons and integrated them into the nav areas of the site. I created new layouts to generate dynamic icon-based navigation. I also pushed the "about" sections to the bottom of their respective sections.
2025-02-20 - linkroll - Alphabetized the linkroll categories. Working on putting together a linkroll/directory category.
December 2024
2024-12-20 - lab notes - Taking advantage of the new lab notes blog format and manually importing content from the previous iterations of the site. I've imported both Greymatter versions of the blog (thanks to the Internet Archive) and I'm working through the Drupal blog posts pulled from the backups I restored in October. I'm including comment text inline with the post content - click "read more" under any of the older blog posts to see them. I should also note that since these restored posts are over 15 years old many of the links are dead. I'm linking to Internet Archive pages contemporary to the date of the blog post in question where needed and when possible.
November 2024
2024-11-18 - linkroll - Adding more links new categories over the last several days. A bit of styling on the headers to improve readability.
2024-11-02 - Updated the styling for the ultrascience_efc theme used on the lab notes pages.
2024-11-02 - lab notes - adjusting content sorting. Lab notes is now in a blog format, using tags to sort blog entries and logn form research articles.
2024-11-01 - linkroll - Added new links
2024-11-01 - Added ticker feeds
October 2024
2024-10-31 - Working on the front page layout. Rolling latest changes into the changelogs. Still messing with the ticker feeds.
2024-10-30 - Updated Datenstrom Yellow to version 0.9, installed ticker extension for displaying RSS feed content. Currently just dumping it on the bottom of the homepage. I also installed the blog extension. I'm also considering other structural changes to the site.
2024-10-22 - lab notes - new article "A Site Recovery 15 years in the making" created to track archived site recovery work. Article is live, but very under construction
2024-10-22 - Been working on recovering the circa 2005 version of the site from my old backups. At the time it was using Drupal 4.7 running on a typical LAMP stack. Recovery work will be logged in a new lab notes article.
2024-10-04 - homepage - added icons, refreshed intro copy, cleaned up changelogs
September 2024
2024-09-16 - r & d - Whitewings worklogs updated under paper airplanes
2024-09-16 - lab notes - Updated the "whitewings" lab notes entry in the "models, hobbytronics & programming" notebook. Added links for model and manual scans. Updated the History of Jet Fighters and Volume 1 worklogs to include a list of models with assembly and flight reviews. Work will be ongoing there as I build and fly models.
2024-09-09 - r&d - Started work on the "Whitewings - History of Jet Fighters 1992" worklog under the r & d section
August 2024
2024-08-01 - August was offline work
July 2024
2024-07-15 - r&d - Started work on the "Whitewings - Excellent Paper Airplanes Volume 1 1980" worklog under the r & d section
2024-07-01 - lab notes - Created the "whitewings" lab notes entry in the "models, hobbytronics & programming" notebook
April 2024
2024-04-17- homepage - Continuing updates - all experimental. Added a current research section as a kind of "now" page.
2024-04-16 - lab notes -New article published "why we are still using 88x31 buttons"
2024-04-04 - homepage - Cleaning up changelogs and latest changes on homepage, added intro copy.
2024-04-04 - linkroll - Added a "categories" list.
2024-04-04 - homepage - Adding icons and images for interest.
2024-04-01 - r&d - Completed the "mdportal elite" entry under r&d -> case mods -> legacy case mods
March 2024
- r&d - Started with restoring my 'ancient' case mod project logs and updating them for the new site.
Updated theming for the R&D section of the site.
2024-03-06 - lab notes - New article published "windows xp running on a vm"
2024-03-01 - lab notes - New article published "searching for search"
February 2024
2024-2-30 - linkroll - Added new category papercraft
2024-2-23 - linkroll - Added links to tools and resources I've been using to build this site.
2024-2-23 - Applied font sub-setting to drastically reduce font download size, played with header font styling.
2024-2-3 - Updated blue theme colors for the landing page and played with background images and styling in general.
January 2024
2024-1-28 - linkroll - Added more links to the.
2024-1-26 - Working on categories/layout for the linkroll.
current research
Web
Thanks to my restored backups and the Internet Archive, I was able to pull in the blog content from my pre 2010 Greymatter and Drupal versions of the site in the lab notes. Content is tagged with "greymatter" and "drupal" as appropriate. Old comments are included. I'm still working on old project logs.
Hardware
Workshop reorganization has continued through the fall and into winter. But along the way I've knocked out a few projects and made headway on others. Details coming.
Papercraft/Models
Paper airplanes made for some fun summer and fall flying, but wet and cold winter weather has settled in so I've been spending time on the model railroad layout. It's a mixed-gauge two-level layout consisting of HO and HOn30. The main HOn30 in-town streetcar loop track has been laid and wired, and I've laid track on the HO portion. Details coming.
Infrastructure
Shop re-org and updates continue. I still need to document the work so I can keep track of it in the future - if only I had a website for tracking projects...
about
Welcome to the labs. Back in the early 2000s I was playing with case mods and website design and I set up this domain as a homepage to share my projects and sandbox to play with various development tools and styles.
I dropped it after several years, but lately I've wanted a place to record and share my old and new project work again. So I re-registered the site and dusted off my old data files.
system status
Generator: Datenstrom Yellow version 0.9.16