Alaska Question

 On The Final Meeting of the Roman Senate Nobody knows when the Roman Senate had their final meeting. The Roman Senate was once the most powerful governing body in the world, or at least it was according to the Romans. Then Rome became an Empire. The Senate didn't go away when that happened, but its power diminished. It continued to decline as the power of the Emperor grew. The Empire fell to the Goths, and the Senate, still in existence, continued to dwindle. However, even then it didn't go away entirely. By the early Middle Ages, the once mighty Senate of Rome, the very one that once dominated the known world, was little more than a social club. That's right, the organization that was a direct continuation from the days of the republic continued to meet and have opinions, but those opinions were meaningless when it came to setting policy. The ruling Emperor didn't even live in Rome anymore, and territory in Italy was being passed around to various states like the Lomb...

 On the Software for a New CNC Router An organization I run, Juneau Makerspace, has recently gotten a new CNC router, a big machine that will carve shapes out of wood from a digital file. We had our first class on how to use it the other day and it was my first introduction to the new machine. I've used older ones, so I was familiar with the process, I just needed to learn the ins and outs of the new software. All of that is just prologue to compare the old software I first used to the new version. The interface of the old software was meant for people who knew what they were doing. You had to set measurements and values yourself and were responsible for making sure the machine was cutting where you wanted it. The new software had a detailed step-by-step process built in that prevented the user from moving on to the next step without completing the current step, either by inputting they had done it or a sensor on the machine showing it had been completed. This was great as it meant...

 On Surviving the Great Internet Outage of 2025 I'm calling it the Great Internet Outage of 2025 at least until the next one. The going conspiracy theory is that it was somehow Musk who cut off the internet to Juneau, Alaska a few days ago to try and get more people onto Starlink. Probable? No. Would he do it though? Probable. The exact moment I noticed my connection was down was when I spotted a notification from a Discord channel dedicated to my favorite podcast, "The Film Reroll." As the podcast uploads very irregularly, an update from that discord meant either there was a new episode, or something worth noting had happened to one of the hosts. So I clicked. The post didn't load. I checked my connection status. The internet was out. I could only watch as the YouTube video I had up playing music slowly reached the end of the buffer. Then silence. I immediately checked my phone to see if it was just my computer, my router, or a bigger problem. Cell service was out. T...