[HN Gopher] Make It Yourself
___________________________________________________________________
Make It Yourself
Author : deivid
Score : 585 points
Date : 2024-11-01 13:09 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (makeityourself.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (makeityourself.org)
| fsmv wrote:
| Pretty cool that it's just free and there's really no pretext
| just a compilation of cool projects. Almost makes me feel like
| I'm missing something.
| 0xdeadbeefbabe wrote:
| You are missing time. Time will make the links break, and time
| will make the component parts harder to find, etc. Also,
| managing this catalog over time isn't glamorous enough for a
| headline or even a pretty picture. Economies change over time,
| and doesn't that go without saying?
| maxerickson wrote:
| It's interesting to consider the complaining about the PDF in
| this context. Using a paginated format and calling it book
| does quite a lot to state that it was created at a moment in
| time.
|
| A resource, but also a particular end product, a piece of
| art.
| qazxcvbnmlp wrote:
| Can you buy this as a printed book? The design/inspirational
| quality is exceptional.
| jiri wrote:
| Without clickable links to actual content it is not very useful
| to have it printed.
| jvanderbot wrote:
| Wait, so adding clickable links would make it _more_ useful
| after being printed??
|
| In all seriousness, I, too, immediately wanted to buy it for
| the coffee table and to thumb through for inspiration in an
| analog way.
| nuancebydefault wrote:
| You took parents sentence too literally. After having it
| printed it is without clickable links and hence not very
| useful.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| You took parents sentence too mundanely. Why not add some
| basic capacitive or resistive touch layer to each page,
| so touching what was a link would be detectable, and then
| have a microcontroller blast the corresponding URL over
| whatever bullshit Bluetooth Low Energy iBeacon-like
| marketing spam protocol currently works best?
| marci wrote:
| Or... Make-it-Yourself, in this style:
| https://www.crowdsupply.com/sutajio-kosagi/steam-stories
| leowoo91 wrote:
| QR code per item would be helpful with the printed version
| probably
| lurn_mor wrote:
| Funny, I have a folder of links of this very stuff: Future rainy
| day projects. Oh, to have the free time and focus!
|
| Good job on the illustrations and the cultivating of so many
| projects into one book. I think you've given me a lifetime of
| weekend projects!
|
| One note: you might want to put 'download' in the link to the
| PDF, so it downloads instead of showing up in a new browser
| window, which seems to be your OG design choice: <a
| href="https://makeityourself.org/MIY.pdf" download
| target="_blank"><div class="download">Download</div></a>
| rafaelalb wrote:
| You mentioned the folder, now please share it! I enjoy these
| ideas very much.
| nativeit wrote:
| It's one of the main reasons I use Notion.so and its extremely
| flexible "database" pages, I can quickly drop links into them,
| and expand as-needed with more details.
|
| I use git repos for anything that gets far enough to warrant a
| folder with files, but only because I tend to swap computers
| too often to reliably maintain a fixed file directory, but
| along the way I found that "plain git + files" is a
| surprisingly effective foundation for a project/knowledge
| management system.
| chrismorgan wrote:
| > _One note: you might want to put 'download' in the link to
| the PDF, so it downloads instead of showing up in a new browser
| window_
|
| I strongly disagree with this suggestion. My browser _is_ my
| PDF viewer, if I want to actually download the PDF I can do it
| after the browser renders it.
|
| There are precious few situations where <a download> is
| appropriate for PDF files. This is certainly not one of them.
| The user probably wants to view the content, let them handle it
| however.
|
| The experience of PDFs that insist on triggering a download is
| sufficiently unpleasant that I use a browser extension
| <https://addons.mozilla.org/en-GB/firefox/addon/no-pdf-
| downlo...> that removes any `Content-Disposition: attachment`
| headers, and inserts `Content-Disposition: inline` headers,
| which in Firefox (but not Chrome, I believe) overrides even an
| <a download> attribute.
| joekrill wrote:
| Why a PDF? The PDF is just pictures of things that link to an
| external site (Thingverse, various blogs, etc) where you find the
| actual instructions. The PDF itself doesn't contain instructions
| at all - just an index/catalog, really.
| SamBam wrote:
| Seems like it would be a lot more accessible for a lot of
| people if it were a set of HTML pages.
|
| I expect that whatever was used to create the PDF could be
| configured to produce a website...
| thecatspaw wrote:
| also on a webpage you would be able to filter it by available
| tools/knowledge
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Or not. Maybe you'd get "infinite scroll". Or some other
| modern webdev bullshit that's strictly inferior to PDF (or
| plain HTML) and CTRL+F.
|
| I'm actually surprised by the anti-PDF sentiment here (in
| general case, not necessarily this book). Modern web is so
| bad, that almost every day I end up on some page that would
| be strictly better if it were a PDF. So, to play devil's
| advocate, PDFs are cool because:
|
| - The links may rot, but _they remain_ , and so does
| surrounding content. Once you get a PDF, no one can take it
| away from you.
|
| - It's self-contained. It can easily be transferred between
| devices and read without an Internet connection.
|
| - _It 's a file_. Yes, it's important to mention because in
| 2024, files cannot be taken for granted.
|
| - Rich format without spurious dynamics and other web
| nonsense. Sure, PDFs technically can run arbitrary
| JavaScript, but hardly any reader supports that.
|
| - Can't track you or spy on you (theoretically it could, in
| practice, see previous point).
|
| I could come up with a few more. Point being, you could do
| worse, and modern web quite often _is_ worse.
|
| As for what could be an even better format, my mind is
| drawn towards CHM[0]. You know, like the help files in old
| Windows software. A self-contained file built of
| interlinked HTML pages, complete with index and internal
| search/xref. Kind of a better EPUB[1].
|
| (Ironically, marketers should actually _love_ PDF - total
| control over presentation is exactly what they 've been
| trying to gain on the web all these years.)
|
| --
|
| [0] -
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Compiled_HTML_Help
|
| [1] - Despite being _a decade older_.
| larodi wrote:
| I guess the sentiment is because
|
| a) it cannot be automatically reflowed
|
| b) it's a complete mess of a file format with tech deb
| spanning 30 years
|
| c) the linked ressources info
|
| Everything else is fine with it and apparently lotta
| folks write plenty of software to read it.
|
| Perhaps epubs (and .mobi etc) come close but they are not
| universally adopted
| pjerem wrote:
| I do agree, especially on
|
| - It's self-contained. It can easily be transferred
| between devices and read without an Internet connection.
| - It's a file. Yes, it's important to mention because in
| 2024, files cannot be taken for granted.
|
| (Btw it's a sad state of affairs that we can less and
| less own our files)
|
| But I do think in the post here, the issue is that the
| PDF in itself is pretty useless : it doesn't contain any
| information and only links to ... websites.
|
| (Btw I wouldn't criticize this a lot because I'm
| admirative of the indexation work, it's pretty cool !)
| deivid wrote:
| n-o-d-e publishes most (all?) projects as open source, I'm sure
| the book sources are/will be available somewhere
| treefarmer wrote:
| Had the same thought - it's also annoying to update the PDF
| once links die, so I doubt that'll happen often. I guess it
| might be helpful if you want it as a coffee table book...
| seemaze wrote:
| While I enjoy the content, I find myself surprisingly annoyed
| at choice of PDF as the format. It's the worst of both
| traditional and web publication modes; low accessibility AND
| low portability
| nlarion wrote:
| This isn't the first time I've read a comment criticizing
| PDF, but it is the first time I can recall the Portable
| Document Format (PDF) being accused of low portability.
| seanw444 wrote:
| Yeah that is ironic regarding both the name, and the fact
| that it's one of the most viewable formats on any given
| system.
| deskr wrote:
| > most viewable
|
| It is, but the UX trying to read a A4/letter sized PDF
| document on a phone is absolutely horrible.
| sophacles wrote:
| This is basically the same reason I think sports cars are
| horrible... trying to fit a 10 ton roll of steel in the
| backseat is nearly impossible.
| deskr wrote:
| It shouldn't be. 10 tons of steel takes up just about
| 1,300 litres. That should fit nicely in the back seat.
| Remember to secure your load.
| MikeTheGreat wrote:
| > Remember to secure your load
|
| I don't know much about steel coils, and I'm hoping that
| something that fits in your back seat isn't as dangerous
| as those featured in YouTube videos, but the idea that
| the primary concern is just strapping the thing down is
| kinda funny
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RC6pn8n7MeY
|
| https://www.youtube.com/shorts/kDGfk-dOjq8
|
| https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=steel+coil+u
| nwi...
| nox101 wrote:
| No one wants to carry a 10 tons rol of steel in a sports
| car. The majority of people getting a PDF on their phone
| though, do want to be able to read the information in it
| easily and they can't.
|
| So no, that's not the same type of complaint
| drekipus wrote:
| only a4 sized pdf.
|
| You can make a phone-sized PDF and it'll be just fine.
|
| it's not the file format.
| chrismorgan wrote:
| And then the experience on a _larger_ screen will be bad.
| rixed wrote:
| It is, unless PDF supports reflow?
| sethammons wrote:
| By design it doesn't. It is a stated goal.
| esperent wrote:
| Shouldn't " _portable_ " in the context of a document
| format mean " _comfortably viewable on most systems_ "
| rather than " _yeah you can view it but it 's gonna suck
| and you'll get eye strain_"?
| metadat wrote:
| I believe this is called "responsive design", a useful
| but differentiated concept.
|
| It's pretty cool how PDFs don't typically load resources
| from an external website or CDN. They are self-contained,
| and thus demonstrably portable.
|
| Gross analogy: Have you ever been to a multi-day music
| festival? A port-o-potty in the dark is disgusting, but
| still somewhat useable compared the alternative of going
| to the bathroom in public. PDF artifacts are in the same
| ballpark.
| nox101 wrote:
| I'd call it low-portability. They're designed for large
| screens yet they're often viewed on phones where you need
| to manually zoom in and view each page some tiny portion at
| a time.
|
| Was at a restaurant with a QR code that led to a PDF if
| their paper menu. It was horrible. For reference it was the
| Ralph Lauren Cafe in Omotesando Tokyo.
| sethammons wrote:
| A pdf should not reflow nor be responsive. Aside from
| zoom/pan, how else could you possibly interact? I think
| it works fantastic, like holding a magnifying glass and
| panning around a surface
| wittjeff wrote:
| https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/reading-pdfs-
| reflow-ac...
| lostlogin wrote:
| Oh wow, that's awful. 'Like the web, but on a pdf and
| done entirely by Adobe.'
| wccrawford wrote:
| That's exactly why they're saying it's "not responsive".
| It wasn't designed to be, and it's not.
| rad_gruchalski wrote:
| PDF is over 30 years old. I'm pretty sure people had
| different idea of ,,portable" back then. It's still
| really good for printing...
| wpm wrote:
| I'd prefer a static PDF I can pinch, zoom, and move about
| on my own than some crappy, overwrought, slow, "mobile"
| website that forces me to jump around to different
| sections of the menu with links that it *hides* anytime I
| scroll, which of course I have to because only 3 menu
| items are going to be able to fit on the screen at a
| time.
|
| All that, VS a PDF that shows the entire menu that I can
| navigate spatially, show as much as I want depending on
| light levels, interest, and screen size, and can all fit
| in one, static tab.
|
| Of course, the real answer is that electronic menus at
| sit down restaurants opened with QR codes are trash.
| Paper never really had these problems unless the
| restaurant was bad at menu design. I dislike being forced
| to use my phone at all when I'm out with friends or
| family for a nice dinner. Growing up, if I used my phone
| at the dinner table I would've been scolded.
| musicale wrote:
| Covid probably had something to do with the PDF menu
| trend. I think we can go back to printed menus now.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| When the PDF is a version of the paper menu, we can
| understand they only produced one version, and the
| alternative was no digital version at all (which is the
| case for an awful lot of restaurant)
|
| If it's PDF or nothing, I'll be glad to take the PDF.
| squarefoot wrote:
| PDFs were born to make real life documents manageable in
| digital form, that is, letter, legal, A4 etc; nothing
| that would (and could) have been used on a phone back
| then. If they don't display properly on a phone I'd say
| it's on the phone itself. They're not computers
| usability-wise, not even close: too many compromises with
| ergonomics, information density and readability fighting
| against each other in the name of portability. That
| restaurant had sloppy management/techies, as finding that
| the .pdf was the wrong size would probably take ten
| seconds to any of them, the correct the problem by having
| the QR point to a correctly sized .pdf generated
| automatically by reading the same db the bigger .pdf was
| created from. PC sees the link to the bigger one, phone
| reads the QR containing a link to the mobile one. not
| hard at all to solve, it's not a .pdf format fault.
| MajimasEyepatch wrote:
| Dynamically generating PDFs on the fly based on the
| user's screen size sounds downright Kafkaesque. I feel a
| deep sense of dread any time I have to touch PDF-
| rendering code. Any halfway decent CMS (or just plain old
| HTML and CSS) can easily create a good-looking,
| responsive, accessible webpage with a fraction of the
| work. Leaning on PDFs in this case is a classic example
| of, "When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like
| a nail."
|
| The PDF format can't necessarily be blamed for its
| inability to be responsive to screen size, but that's one
| of several good reasons to discourage the use of PDFs for
| purely digital documents. Its design is linked to a
| specific historical context, and it should be limited to
| that context.
|
| (Of course, I imagine the actual reason for the PDF is
| that it's just an export of the
| InDesign/Photoshop/whatever file that was used to create
| the original paper menus. There probably is no
| "database.")
| Supermancho wrote:
| > Any halfway decent CMS (or just plain old HTML and CSS)
| can easily create a good-looking, responsive, accessible
| webpage with a fraction of the work.
|
| Easily? Because it's not a fraction of the work. Let's
| just assume you mean to use someone else's solution (of
| the literal thousands, each with their own quirks), to
| make your bespoke website.
|
| PDFs have a standard. Libraries to resize are not
| difficult to find. Most people are able to run a PDF
| through their printer driver for a resize, because it's a
| solved problem.
|
| I would say creating a job that outputs a bunch of PDFs
| is going to be easier than a build system for different
| devices (CMS or not), every time.
| MajimasEyepatch wrote:
| Sure, they can render at different resolutions, but I
| don't think I've ever seen a PDF that has a responsive
| layout. A restaurant website is probably going to use
| some very user-friendly CMS like Squarespace that can
| absolutely provide you with easy responsive layouts.
| musicale wrote:
| Large screen phone + landscape mode if needed usually
| works for me.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| > low accessibility AND low portability
|
| The two main pain points everyone said PDF had solved for
| documents, when it was introduced.
| lostlogin wrote:
| A growing horror is how Windows handles them. On a Mac they
| open and work fine, but on Windows they grind the system to
| a halt. What's going on?
| Y_Y wrote:
| This sounds like a good job for a fancy LLM.
|
| "For each entry in this PDF, follow the link and give a
| structured explanation of how to make the thing."
|
| I don't know if any off-the-shelf tool is capable of that today
| though.
| croes wrote:
| A picture says more than 1000 words
| wutwutwat wrote:
| pdf is a common malware delivery mechanism
| Waterluvian wrote:
| Yeah it seems like a wrong choice. It's useless in any context
| that cannot be linked back to the actual content. It's a 220
| page printable index.
| freefaler wrote:
| It's a strange choice to put a PDF with links on a website that
| contains just links. Why don't put the links on the web site,
| as the web was invented to be used for? What's the benefit?
| saintrain wrote:
| Never done it before, but https://cloudconvert.com/pdf-to-html
| did a very nice job in about a minute
| marvinborner wrote:
| For context since it's not mentioned on the website: This is a
| project by n-o-d-e[1], they make blog posts and videos about diy
| tech/mods. This specific project is described in [2].
|
| [1]: https://n-o-d-e.net/
|
| [2]: https://n-o-d-e.net/makeityourself.html
| sxp wrote:
| They also have techno-optimistic YouTube channels that I love.
| There haven't been any new videos for a while, but some of the
| older ones are worth watching:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/@NODEtv/videos
|
| https://www.youtube.com/@MOSFETnet/videos
|
| I think all of the videos have a written version on
| https://n-o-d-e.net/ for those who prefer that style of
| content.
| readyplayernull wrote:
| Anything on DIY piezoelectric actuators?
| dharma1 wrote:
| love the illustrations! all custom made?
| aydgn wrote:
| what are the other options?
| egypturnash wrote:
| Stock illustration sites. Renders of stock 3d models. Stolen
| without credit. AI generated.
| Karliss wrote:
| None of those are options for this thing. They are all real
| DIY projects that some people have made. Some of these
| especially 3d printed ones have 3d models made by authors
| of each project. Still takes time to make clean and
| consistent illustrations out of them, probably less bad
| once you do it hundred times in a row and have a good
| workwflow. But for others especially ones made of cloth
| there is no choice other than drawing them by hand. I guess
| you could speedup the process by tracing over a photo. As
| for stolen without credit aspect, at the bottom of each
| page there is a projects name, author and website where it
| was posted, it also functions as link. One thing that could
| be better is making links accessible in printed version
| either as text or QR code of them, currently you can only
| access them only in digital version.
| stonethrowaway wrote:
| WARNING:
|
| Do try this at home.
| ben_ wrote:
| As cool as this is, it seems a bit bare? Titles/descriptions are
| hidden away at the bottom of each page and all the renders are
| plain black and white (which makes me ask why pdf anyway?)
| without detailing purpose or use (where not obvious)
| ben_ja_min wrote:
| Thank you so much for sharing! I needed an inspirational smack in
| the face and this did the trick.
| julianeon wrote:
| I was just thinking that I pour most of my "Make It Yourself"
| energy into making food (which doesn't make an appearance here,
| logically enough).
| duckmysick wrote:
| I'm curious about printable hinges. Has anyone tried them? How
| sturdy and reliable are they?
| hendry wrote:
| Why isn't this a Web page?
|
| Sidenote: I want to get started with wood working, can anyone
| recommend a resource?
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| That's a pretty broad statement. Do you own any woodworking
| tools? Do you want to make furniture or do you want to make
| decorative pens on a lathe? How new to it are you?
|
| I started with just a circular saw and a drill (would not now
| recommend [1]) and bought "handy panels" from the local big box
| store to make crappy book cases and such. I was very much
| demonstrating the aesthetic of the School of College-Dorm.
|
| Eventually I got a table saw and started making MAME cabinets,
| dance pads, etc.
|
| When I eventually started seeking out better quality plywood I
| began to make things like speaker enclosures (and better
| looking book cases).
|
| I was getting into woodworking when television was still a
| thing so Norm Abram's "New Yankee Workshop" on PBS was my
| inspiration. Not only is a lot of that on YouTube now [2], but
| so too are hundreds of others uploading videos on woodworking.
| We live in a rich time when it comes to hobby how-to videos.
|
| I think of YouTube sometimes more as inspiration ... where I
| want to get to. For example I like Paul Seller's videos [3]
| where he makes everything more or less with hand tools.
| Ishitani Furniture [4] is my where I wish I were.
|
| But if videos are not your thing, archive.org is back and their
| Magazine Rack [5] has plenty of magazines on woodworking. Just
| look around.
|
| [1] Forget the circular saw unless you're doing hime
| construction. Opt for an inexpensive "panel saw" instead -- and
| also an 8' sheet of 1-inch-thick insulating foam to put down
| underneath the wood you'll be cutting on the floor of your
| basement or driveway.
|
| [2] https://www.youtube.com/@newyankeeworkshop
|
| [3] https://www.youtube.com/@Paul.Sellers
|
| [4] https://www.youtube.com/@ISHITANIFURNITURE
|
| [5] https://archive.org/details/magazine_rack
| criddell wrote:
| What are the big differentiators between a circular saw and
| panel saw? I'm just getting into this stuff myself and have
| been using a circular saw and a Kreg track/guide system.
| lemonberry wrote:
| I own Kreg's track saw and table. It's great if you're
| doing a lot of sheet cutting. But if you're just getting
| started I'd recommend a regular circular saw. You can
| always clamp a straight board or level to a sheet to
| simulate a track.
|
| A couple of tips: You'll need a lot of clamps. Don't spend
| much money on tools until you know what you're going to
| build. It's really easy to get caught up in precision and
| having everything cut perfectly. This is important in
| finish work, but for everyday stuff you don't need to worry
| about it.
|
| If using hand tools is of any interest to you, I highly
| recommend the Anarchist's Design Book, Anarchist's Tool
| Chest. All by Christopher Schwarz and available from his
| press Lost Art Press. I discovered them via a comment here
| a few years back. His basic philosophy is woodworking for
| regular people to make stuff that are going to last and
| usable. Lost Art Press' website has a lot of book samples
| and full books in PDF form. It's worth checking out.
|
| Good luck!
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| I think a Kreg track saw is a better place to start than
| a circular saw. I think the cleaner, more precise cuts
| you get with the track saw will help encourage a new
| woodworker.
| criddell wrote:
| What I have is a circular saw (specifically a Skilsaw).
| There's a sled that you clamp on for use on the Kreg
| tracks. When I have it set up like that, is it similar to
| what I could do with a panel saw?
| mft_ wrote:
| A few thoughts:
|
| * Circular saw: a basic hand-held circular saw that can cut
| through stuff.
|
| * Track saw: the cousin of the circular saw; comes with
| (essentially) a big metal ruler which the hand-held saw
| part 'locks' into. This means it can be super-accurate (to
| a fraction of a mm) and also do very long straight cuts
| (limited only by the length of your track). Personally,
| highly-recommended, and can sometimes do work that almost
| nothing else can, especially if you're working on a larger
| scale. Can do everything a circular saw can, but a lot more
| besides, and can cut boards into larger pieces than a table
| saw can manage.
|
| * Mitre saw: a circular saw on a tilting rotatable arm,
| that allows you to do precisely-angled repeatable shorter
| cuts. For example, great for cutting lumber down into lots
| of shorter lengths for a project, or creating angled cuts
| for the corner of a frame, or similar. Recommended.
|
| * Table saw (I think this is what you mean by panel saw?):
| an upside down circular saw sticking up out of a wide flat
| table, with an adjustable 'fence'. Great for quick
| efficient repeatable cuts on boards; for example, if you're
| making a load of shelves, or drawers, and lots of the
| pieces have the same width, you set your fence once than
| then push the board through the saw multiple times. Can
| also do mitre cuts but not as conveniently as a mitre saw.
| Can also cut 'rabbets' (slots) in wood more easily than
| most other tools. Recommended.
| mft_ wrote:
| Try Steve Ramsey:
| https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBB7sYb14uBtk8UqSQYc9-w
|
| He's got a very nice approachable style (almost the Bob Ross of
| woodworking?) and has some great beginner videos, including
| guidance on which tools to prioritise (and deprioritise) at the
| start of the hobby. He also sells a course with plans for
| gradually increasingly challenging projects. No affiliation,
| just watched a lot of his videos when I was first getting
| started with woodworking.
|
| There are also (as you'd expect) thousands of other Youtubers
| doing woodwork, too. Steve's just a great starting place.
| giarc wrote:
| Join a Makerspace (if you have one near you). Getting started
| with woodworking can be tough if you don't have the right
| tools. A makerspace likely gives you access to thousands of
| dollars worth of tools for the fraction of the price. It also
| likely has lots of people with more experience that are willing
| to help you learn.
| 12thhandyman wrote:
| I recommend you visit a forum called diychatroom.com for more
| relevant discussion
| elcapitan wrote:
| It looks really cool, but is this more than a curated list of
| projects from various 3D model and DIY sites, with some sort of
| line art instead of the usual photos/STL renderings? I sometimes
| go explore nice models on those sites too for inspiration, but I
| don't really see the advantage of this presentation format.
| ada1981 wrote:
| Could be cool as a print / bound book with QR codes linking to
| each project.
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