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There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

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Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#321
post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Absolute nightmare. Yes, but still probably a million times easier for both the building management and the software vendor to have a SaaS for that, than having to buy hardware to put somewhere in the building (with redundant power, cooling, etc.), and have someone deploy, install, manage, update, etc. all of that.

> with redundant power, cooling, etc The doors the system controls don't have any of this. Hell, the whole building doesn't have any of this. And it definitely doesn't have redundant internet connections to the cloud-based control plane. This is fear-mongering when a passive PC running a container image on boot will suffice plenty. For updates a script that runs on boot and at regular intervals that pulls down the la…

Those devices can be trivially power cycled, and won’t have as many issues with dodgy power. Some PC somewhere with storage is a bigger problem.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#322
post #102

These products are targeted towards high school teens and middle schoolers, carry a number of serious health risks, and anyone involved in making them can rot in hell.

They’re better than cigarettes, so they’re the lesser evil.

They're not. The list of drugs found in them is terrifying:

https://www.unodc.org/LSS/Announcement/Details/8afbc6e8-9439...

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#323
post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Yet, I still need to wait about 1 second (!) after each key press when buying a parking ticket and the machine wants me to enter my license plate numbe…

That's programmer incompetence. Unfortunately pervasive, especially with devices like parking meters, EV chargers, and similar, where the feedback loop (angry customer) is long (angry customers resulting in revenue decrease) or non-existent.

It could be a management problem instead also, while developers are just following instructions sent by management

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#324

As a smoker who transitioned to vaping, I see immense health benefits. My home country (India), and others (Singapore, others?) have outright banned all electronic cigarettes which is a regulation I hate. I acknowledge that vapes reduce barriers to entry to kids. This is partly solvable in countries with strong governance. But disposables? Ban that shit

Have you seen the list of substances found in these things?

https://www.unodc.org/LSS/Announcement/Details/8afbc6e8-9439...

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why stop there? I think more or less every non-durable product manufacturer (say, lifespan less than 5 years) should be required to take the product back at end of life and dispose of it properly. Trash is an enormous externality. I'm talking about plastic clamshells, container lids, "disposable" storage containers, the lot.

Switzerland has something like this for "eWaste", it's called the ARC [1] (Advance Recycling Contribution). For any electronic device you purchase a small tax is collected and used for the recycling and collection of the future waste it will generate. The collection mandatorily happens in the shops that sell electronic devices, you don't have to return them to the exact store where it was purchased, as long as they s…

> For any electronic device you purchase a small tax is collected and used for the recycling and collection of the future waste it will generate.

I call bullshit on these initiatives. It is a tax, period. The government collects money and it does... stuff. It is not a deposit, so it doesn't incentivize people to return the thing, and it is too general to de-incentivize particularly bad products like disposable vapes.

The tax can be used on recycling efforts, and it probably is, however you don't need a specific tax for that. These investments can come from other sources of government income: VAT, income tax, tariffs, etc... I don't think people are paying a "presidential private jet tax" and yet, the president has his jet, and hopefully, all government effort for the environment is not just financed by a small, specific tax. Saying a tax is for this or that is little more than a PR move, they could do the same by increasing VAT, and I believe it would work better, but that's unpopular.

> The collection mandatorily happens in the shops that sell electronic devices

That is more concrete.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#326
post #299
post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone was locked out in a building am staying at (40 something stories) for several hours. When I asked the concierge if I can have a look at the system, it turns out they had none. The whole thing communicated with AWS for some subscription SaaS that provided them with a front-end to register/block cards. And every tap anywhere (elevators/doors/locks) in the building communicated back with this system hosted on A…

> Absolute nightmare. Yes, but still probably a million times easier for both the building management and the software vendor to have a SaaS for that, than having to buy hardware to put somewhere in the building (with redundant power, cooling, etc.), and have someone deploy, install, manage, update, etc. all of that.

>than having to buy hardware to put somewhere in the building (with redundant power, cooling, etc.), and have someone deploy, install, manage, update, etc. all of that.

You don't need any of that. You need one more box in the electrical closet and one password protected wifi for all the crap in the building (the actual door locks and the like) to connect to.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#327
post #299
post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone was locked out in a building am staying at (40 something stories) for several hours. When I asked the concierge if I can have a look at the system, it turns out they had none. The whole thing communicated with AWS for some subscription SaaS that provided them with a front-end to register/block cards. And every tap anywhere (elevators/doors/locks) in the building communicated back with this system hosted on A…

> Absolute nightmare. Yes, but still probably a million times easier for both the building management and the software vendor to have a SaaS for that, than having to buy hardware to put somewhere in the building (with redundant power, cooling, etc.), and have someone deploy, install, manage, update, etc. all of that.

The system was not built with resiliency in mind and had no care/considerations for what a shit-show will unfurl once the system or the link goes down. I wonder if exit is regulated (you can still fully exit the building from any point using the green buttons and I think these are supposed to activate/still work even if electricity is down).

> Yes, but still probably a million times easier for both the building management and the software vendor to have a SaaS for that, than having to buy hardware to put somewhere in the building (with redundant power, cooling, etc.)

A isolated building somewhere in the middle of the jungle dependent for its operation on some American data-center hundreds of miles away is simply negligence. I am usually against regulations but clearly for certain things we can trust that all humans will be reasonable.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#328
post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Absolute nightmare. Yes, but still probably a million times easier for both the building management and the software vendor to have a SaaS for that, than having to buy hardware to put somewhere in the building (with redundant power, cooling, etc.), and have someone deploy, install, manage, update, etc. all of that.

> with redundant power, cooling, etc The doors the system controls don't have any of this. Hell, the whole building doesn't have any of this. And it definitely doesn't have redundant internet connections to the cloud-based control plane. This is fear-mongering when a passive PC running a container image on boot will suffice plenty. For updates a script that runs on boot and at regular intervals that pulls down the la…

You know what else would suffice plenty? Physical keys and mechanical locks. They worked (and still work) without electricity. The tech is mature and well-understood.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#329
post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Now that it is a pity that when people talk about saving the planet everyone keeps rushing to dispoable electronics, what serves me to go by bycicle to w…

> Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Yet, I still need to wait about 1 second (!) after each key press when buying a parking ticket and the machine wants me to enter my license plate numbe…

It could also be intentional UX design. Or a result of the keyboard hardware.
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