Every few years over the past entire quarter damned century I find myself wrestling with how to monitor non-Windows devices. Every time I try using some form of SNMP-based system. Every time I end up with something either barely-workable or non-functional.
This go-around came about because after we left ConnectWise Automate for NinjaOne (née Ninja RMM) we lost the ability to monitor our clients’ NAS devices via SNMP. Let’s be clear: Automate’s implementation was solidly in the “barely-workable” category… but it did work. Just, barely.
Yes, we made the change-over last year. Yes, I’m just now getting to this. We’ve had a lot going on.
I went into this project with more than the usual amount of optimism. NinjaOne very specifically notes that they support QNAP and Synology devices in their NMS (network monitoring system), so how hard could this possibly be to get working?
With last week’s power plant completion I was nearly at the point of kicking off production of the various Phase 4 space elevator shipment parts.
Nearly.
Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like Hub.
The only remaining part not already in production was the modest but expensive Electromagnetic Control Rod. So, armed with a few key alternate recipes and the knowledge of exactly where I wanted to construct the factory, I set to work… after complicating the task by doing some math and making a big decision.
Verticality isn’t something you normally try for with Fuel Generators, and yet, here we are.
I’m happy to state that the original site’s power plant is now online and on track to running at maximum capacity. Why did I bother, though, when the Blue Crater’s power plant worked out just fine?
Yesterday an idea came to me. It was a tiny idea, but it involved spending a few minutes in the Blueprint Designer in Satisfactory. At the time, my Mk2 Blueprint Designer sat on a random square of floating foundation tiles a short jog away from my Hub space.
Then I thought, I can do better than this.
It’s been ages since I used those glass floors as roofing material. I’m quite pleased with how this turned out.(more…)
Last month I watched a YouTube video discussing various nifty, fancy keyboards. One was the ND104 from Chilkey, the main selling points for which are that it’s solidly constructed and has the option for whisper-quiet key switches. Given that my appreciation for good old-fashioned “clacky-clack” mechanical keyboards has waned in recent years, I perked up at this. I’m not wild about announcing my keyboard activity to the whole house, and even less so about announcing it when it’s game time, chatting or streaming especially.
So I pulled the trigger on purchasing what is, essentially, a birthday present to myself. Mind you… I did this just before Lunar New Year, ordering a Chinese piece of hardware. D’oh. Cue a two-week wait for the shipping stuff to actually happen…
At any rate, the aluminum brick with keycaps stuck on it has arrived.
If the left side of that box looks weird, it’s because of the partial slip-cover that I shifted a bit out of alignment when setting up for this picture.
Seriously. For the size of the box, I just wasn’t expecting the sheer heft. That’s the sign of quality construction, right? Right.
And it looks so crisp and pristine in its plastic wrapping! Too bad this spiffy new device is going onto my perpetually-dusty desk…
Technically I probably could have used the same cable as was already in place for the Kensington (USB-A at one end, USB-C at the other) but it felt wiser to just use the equipment it came with.
So… after all that, how is it?
Mechanically it’s superb. I love typing on it, the keys are as quiet as I hoped for and it doesn’t feel “mushy” or like I’m not getting enough feedback. The RGB-ness is subdued; this isn’t a “gaming keyboard” per se. I haven’t figured out what I’m going to program the “summon Calculator app” button for, yet, but in the meantime having a “summon Calculator app” button isn’t the worst idea. (I play Satisfactory. Go on, ask me how often I do math-y things. And yes, there’s an in-game calculator function but it shares UI space with the entire rest of the in-game codex, so that’s not always practical.) The volume knob works as intended, each “tick” moving the main computer volume option up/down two integer values, which suits me fine.
What, right out of the gate, am I less wild about? Uh, for starters… I had to swap two keycaps almost immediately. Look closely at the above image and see if you can spot them. Quality Control, folks! Also, in order to do actual customization you must load a particular web URL into a Chrome-based browser… Firefox’s engine will not do. And even then, apparently there’s a known bit of finicky behavior when it comes to customizing the images you can choose to display on that little LCD screen next to the volume knob. (I tried two different images, meeting the required specifications, and… nothing. Zilch. No love.)
So… literally three hours in and I already have some minor frustrations. But they are indeed minor. I don’t care if the screen ends up staying on “clock” mode or “weather” mode all of the time, really. The keycaps are easy to pull and swap, no big deal there. The device does what I paid for, superbly. At the end of the day, that’s all I really wanted. Everything else is irrelevant.
Would I recommend this keyboard? Yes… but keep in mind that it’s not cheap. I blew my “playing around” budget for a couple of months on this, and that’s without accounting for the surprise import duty cost that nobody bothered to mention up-front. I sure hope this thing lasts for a decade or so, because… oof.
In the meantime, though: It’s a joy to use. I’m glad it’s here.
Now I just need to find something to cover it at night to keep at least some of the dust out. (The Kensington came with a dust cover, and no, it doesn’t fit the Chilkey properly at all. Alas.) I know we’ve got some tea towels stashed various places around the house…
I took the week off from actual game progress, but not from the game entirely. Just, mostly.
Here’s a view of the (nearly) finished building from the back.
As previously stated, I intend to fully enclose as many completed factory buildings as I can stand to before I feel an overwhelming compulsion to do Literally Anything Else. This morning, as part of this project, I took on beautifying the Aluminum Works.
