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I converted a rotary phone into a meeting handset

stavros.io

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Re: I converted a rotary phone into a meeting handset

#41

Post by ThePowerOfFuet »

foobarian wrote: post #35

Since you didn't modify the original phone, I wonder if the oldschool dialing way of digit-banging would work. For each digit N, you hit the hangup button N times, pause, then go to next digit. Used to do that on our family's Pupin that looks like this one [1] [1] https://in.pinterest.com/pin/rare-vintage-pupin-bakelite-rot...

>For each digit N, you hit the hangup button N times, pause, then go to next digit

N+1 times for each digit N. The digit 1 was two clicks of the hookswitch, and the digit 0 was eleven.

Re: I converted a rotary phone into a meeting handset

#42

Post by fuzzfactor »

stavros wrote: post #28
wongarsu wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's difficult to offer unlimited usage of something that's so expensive to run. OP could have used a $20/month Claude or Cursor plan for "unlimited" usage within their quota had they been willing to use a different model than the $75/Million Token Opus 4

I would have, had I realized how much it would cost.

Well if cost is an object, there's always the quick & easy way :)

>Vintage Retro 3.5Mm Telephone Handset

https://www.amazon.com/Telephone-Receiver-Radiation-Micropho...

Re: I converted a rotary phone into a meeting handset

#45

Post by shermantanktop »

thih9 wrote: post #16

> Half an hour and fifty dollars later, I realized I had spent fifty dollars on this, and that this was not sustainable because, if anything, the code was getting more and more buggy the more Claude fixed it. Off topic, this has been my experience with AI so often that it prevents me from exploring AI uses more. I liked Cursor’s “auto” plan but that now seems gone. I’d happily switch to a provider that offers a simil…

It is possible to radically increase your chances of success. You have to speak the LLM’s language, just like you write Java or Rust. But it doesn’t come with a language spec, so you get to figure it out by trial and error. And a model change means revisiting what works.

Lots of tips on how to do this out there but one thing I do is have it try, throw away everything it it did, and try again with a completely restated question based on the good bits in what it was able to produce.

E.g., if you ask for a web app that does X and it produces a working web app that doesn’t do X, throw that away and just ask for the web app scaffolding. You’ve still come out ahead even if you take over fully.

Re: I converted a rotary phone into a meeting handset

#46

Post by stavros »

jtwaleson wrote: post #44

Very cool but I think my wireless bluetooth one is even cooler ;) https://blog.waleson.com/2024/10/bakelite-to-future-1950s-ro... It actually supports using the rotary dial to call phone numbers on your smartphone.

I think my full-blown mobile rotary phone is EVEN cooler:

https://www.stavros.io/posts/irotary-saga/

It actually makes calls itself and has a SIM.

Re: I converted a rotary phone into a meeting handset

#47

Post by shermantanktop »

jjkaczor wrote: post #24

Interesting - summer 2024 I picked-up an old rotary, my plan is to make it ring when a "insert-corporate-instant-messaging/voip/meeting" application call comes in... But time, no time...

There’s almost always time, as in wall clock time. It’s usually energy and attention that is in limited supply.

Re: I converted a rotary phone into a meeting handset

#48

Post by pimlottc »

jon-wood wrote: post #13
WesolyKubeczek wrote: post #2

If you use such a thing on a regular kind of meeting that happens over zoom or similar, your arm will atrophy and fall off from having to hold that thing for the duration. The only remedy I see is to give everyone such a contraption and make it mandatory.

Back in the day when phones of this style were the only ones available we learned to hold the handset between our shoulder and our ear, leaving both hands free for other things.

That’s why you’d get the big foamy cushion you could stick on the back so you could rest it on your shoulder

Re: I converted a rotary phone into a meeting handset

#49

Post by xhkkffbf »

jtwaleson wrote: post #44

Very cool but I think my wireless bluetooth one is even cooler ;) https://blog.waleson.com/2024/10/bakelite-to-future-1950s-ro... It actually supports using the rotary dial to call phone numbers on your smartphone.

Someone should make a Bluetooth box that outputs to a standard phone connector so any standard phone would work. Has anyone done that?

Re: I converted a rotary phone into a meeting handset

#50

Post by nirav72 »

eniac111 wrote: post #19

https://petrovs.info/post/2023-01-12-shaiba/ This is my USB rotary dial. It's always fun with the young people when I bring it to IT conferences.

I bet the reaction was similar to what my teenage kids had when I showed them some VHS tapes I found in storage.
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