[HN Gopher] Not future-proofing
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Not future-proofing
Author : galfarragem
Score : 37 points
Date : 2022-06-24 08:02 UTC (14 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (kk.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (kk.org)
| satyrnein wrote:
| In the mid 1990s when my parents were building their house, I
| absolutely could not understand why my dad had me spending the
| weekend pulling a cat5 cable and 2 coax cables through the studs.
| The coax ended up being a bad bet, by we got a LOT of value out
| of that cat5. Even with the advent of wireless much later, we
| still needed Ethernet to connect access points to the main
| router.
|
| That was probably our only good bet, though, so I still agree
| with the punchline!
| kkfx wrote:
| It's possible to "future-proof" A BIT, in the term of _simplicity
| of design_ , _small scale of the final product_ , _cheapness of
| it_.
|
| Or, please make simple houses, give them large space for any new
| gear and make them last a human life, at the heritage the old
| house should be unmounted, recycled and rebuilt with current tech
| being upgradable enough for another human life. Made simple
| software that can be easily changed like classic Smalltalk/Lisp
| systems. Made things easy to recycle etc
|
| Similar things happen in various domains: in the past we rush to
| made megaprojects, now we prefer smaller ones. That's the future-
| proofness: it's always a miss and hit scenario, but in most cases
| a small miss is not costly, a hit is just nice. Short terms can
| be predicted a bit, long terms demand simply the ability to
| evolve.
| epivosism wrote:
| This is a BBC documentary of Stewart Brand presenting the ideas
| in "how buildings learn" which makes the same point through
| examples of what architecture works and what doesn't, over time.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=maTkAcDbrEY
| skybrian wrote:
| I found this part puzzling: "And the one place in my office I
| still use wires -- my desktop -- the existing cat5 ethernet cable
| was not fast enough for the new speeds of fiber optic."
|
| What would fiber speeds be useful for in a home office? It seems
| like for most people, Ethernet would still be fine?
| justsomehnguy wrote:
| Between "buy the perfect cable you would bury in the wall" and
| "buy [almost any] fiber" and thr weird things you sometimes
| need to do to route the cables in the house (I swear, people
| who design them aren't from this planet) sometimes it would be
| easier to just lay the fiber (and eat cost with media
| converters and such) than to gamble on Cat6, _IF_ you really
| need more than 1Gbit _reliably_.
| sbierwagen wrote:
| 10 gigabit still only needs cat 6A. 25 and 40 gigabit takes cat
| 8, (and only goes out to 30 meters) while 50 gigabit is fiber-
| only.
|
| It's... physically possible Kevin is doing something that
| requires 50 gigabit, but he's certainly not doing it with a
| normal wifi setup.
| mattjenner wrote:
| But you did use use your copper telephone line during the
| emergence of digital bits and bytes. Someone planned ahead for
| you. Do the same.
|
| Another take on future proof is around designing to avoid
| unwanted obsolescence; we have finite resources on this big rock,
| use what you can. Get creative. Not planning for the future will
| see you under water.
| pseudosavant wrote:
| I had to install a 35' HDMI cable through my walls and attic 11
| years ago. I bought the highest quality, largest wire gauge,
| cable Monoprice had. I just upgraded my receiver and TV to 4K
| HDR. Guess what, that HDMI cable that was bought before 4K HDR
| even existed, works perfectly. I don't even have to use chroma
| subsampling to bring the required bandwidth down. Oddly enough,
| the one thing it can't do, that the new replacement cable, that I
| haven't installed yet, can do is 1440p. 1080p and 2160p are fine.
| Even though 1440p even at 120Hz is less bandwidth than 4K @ 60Hz.
| Go figure.
|
| I don't use my CAT6 as much as I used to, but where I do, it is
| amazing. Wired connections are essential for remote work IMO.
| quuuu wrote:
| We can change the definition of "future-proof" -- your cable was
| future proofed in that if you were using it for hundreds of
| years, it wouldn't require any maintenance and if the age of
| wireless tech never came, your cables would be relevant
|
| Extreme example: not future-proofing cables would be like laying
| them out above ground where the weather/ elements will destroy
| them before a year's end
|
| But agreed that buying for your immediate need, with a little bit
| of futuresight is helpful
| bhewes wrote:
| At least in the houses I grew up in. It is very easy to rewire
| everything. We went from cat5-cat7 (my dad still has the same
| house). Though we use it more as a wireless trunk.
| legulere wrote:
| Even though I generally like the sentiment, replacing the cat-5
| cable with a newer one should be a pretty fast task, and wired
| ethernet always is better than wireless.
| [deleted]
| satyrnein wrote:
| I remember having to redo all the heads because we only
| connected 5 wires initially, but the next speed level needed
| all 8. Still, a few hours work for a 10x upgrade, so I couldn't
| complain!
| didericis wrote:
| Agreed. Maybe there will be entangled particles in the future
| that get shot out down wires and then allow you to
| instantaneously communicate with people after you receive them.
|
| The right future oriented mindset in terms of building a house
| would be to make it easy to install wires. Or pipes. Or
| whatever.
|
| Just in time hardware is only useful if you have a place to put
| it. That's the tricky part; trying to figure out how to make
| sure you stay compatible with whatever new stuff comes along.
| ghostly_s wrote:
| Uh. You can't shoot a particle down a wire. The electron that
| comes out the far end is not the same one that went in.
| shitpostbot wrote:
| bitwize wrote:
| No, there won't be entangled particles that allow
| instantaneous communication. Per the No Communication
| Theorem, information cannot propagate faster than light
| speed, end of story.
| didericis wrote:
| As you can probably tell, I don't know much about particle
| physics and am not looking to get into a debate about that
| specific hypothetical, was just saying wires (or small
| tubes) might be useful for future stuff and it'd be nice if
| they were easy to put on/take off of buildings.
| D13Fd wrote:
| I like KK's work, but the first part of this article is weird.
| It's more of an argument for why you should leave pull strings in
| your empty conduit.
|
| That said, I agree with the idea of generally buying only what
| you need and buying it at the time you need it.
| lnwlebjel wrote:
| I agree, he seems to argue for conduit, making the house more
| configurable and thus better able to 'learn'.
| petercooper wrote:
| Broadly agree, though getting a Mac five minutes before you need
| it isn't viable anymore given the two month backorder on many of
| them :-)
|
| Just in time provisioning certainly worked a lot better pre 2020!
| Nowadays people are having to go to all sorts of odd lengths just
| to pick up a games console released 18 months ago..
| ozim wrote:
| That was my thought as well since post is 23rd June 2022 - like
| author missed what is going on with a lot of stuff.
| eternityforest wrote:
| The exception is with software. You can future proof by making
| something into a general purpose computer that can be updated.
|
| Also, by modularity, and by choosing up and coming stuff that is
| clearly going to be big(Like the next generation of an existing
| technology).
|
| Buying something before you need it can definitely be a High
| Crime against your own happiness.
|
| But future proofing can sometimes be a tool to avoid owning more
| "Stuff" without giving up functionality.
|
| I just bought a MOLLE backpack. I expect the webbing standard to
| be around, and that possibility in the future I might want to
| briefly carry more stuff than normal, but I don't need to buy
| anything but the pouches I want right now.
|
| I also bought a solar generator. I was sure to choose one with
| LiFePo4 and USB-PD inputs(Unfortunately, it still comes with a
| dedicated DC power adapter that I do not want, but is otherwise
| wonderful).
|
| Of all the tech items I own, my phone and laptop probably inspire
| the most confidence. I also like my Fire Stick. I rarely regret
| buying something that's just a general purpose computer in
| disguise.
|
| They have the adaptability built in, without the need to add
| hardware.
|
| I also rarely regret choosing modularity.
|
| Not so much in software, I don't do UNIXy stuff, because even a
| dozen large apps is still a trivial amount of storage on a modern
| disk.
|
| But with hardware, the more standard all the connections are, the
| less I have to own. If I use something once a month, I don't want
| to drag out a special charger. I don't want adapter dongles in my
| ports. I don't want uncommon consumables that only come from one
| company.
|
| My idea of future proofing is to mostly avoid dedicated hardware.
| rockemsockem wrote:
| My experience has been that software is where this is the
| strongest. The term YAGNI (you ain't gonna need it) is very
| much a precursor to this mindset, but I have found that you can
| go further by just trying to write software that's easy to
| change and update. However you should _not_ do that by
| preemptive interface-design, etc, you should just focus on what
| actually makes it easier to swap things out.
| gumby wrote:
| I ran the conduit vertically: from box in the room's wall down
| into the basement where it was just open. That made it easy to
| run whatever I wanted, and to change the wiring if needed.
|
| I did have two conduits to the patch panel for each wing and a
| conduit connecting the two panels. But these ones weren't
| terminated by boxes, they were just open.
| quesera wrote:
| KK> I am trying to think of examples of successful future
| proofing. Where someone figured out what was coming and built
| something ready for it. Do you know any examples?
|
| Commercial construction.
|
| Don't try to predict the future. Reduce the structural essentials
| to their minimum requirements (columns, beams, trusses, pans),
| and make it easy to adapt the finish layer to changing
| preferences or use cases.
|
| Drop ceilings, non-load bearing walls, conduits for power and
| signal, locate services (plumbing, HVAC, power, etc) in a
| centrally-located stack to minimize the horizontal runs to
| arbitrary locations.
|
| I wish these ideas were more common in residential construction.
| Most are easy to apply, although there would be a slight bump in
| cost (10%?).
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(page generated 2022-06-24 23:02 UTC)