It is a treat, here in late 2021, to see this article make a splash on that newfangled “social media.” How far we’ve come in a third of a century… with the essential tools to enable a truly mobile lifestyle now in every pocket and backpack. When I took off on a “computerized recumbent bicycle”…

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by Steven K. Roberts Friday Harbor, Washington As this paleo-technomad pushes seventy (!) there have been a few reminders of mortality… not to mention a noticeable reluctance to go gallivanting up hills every time I need something. This has become more of an issue lately with a little medical distraction, so my first solution, given…

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by Steven K. Roberts updated: January 20, 2024 Latest updates: A stunning performance of the Velvet Vanguard battle ballet by Abyss Knights, Gabriel does an IDU run with a smuggled VR headset, and we chat with Salvo the Unmerciful (the author of Brutal Arrows, modeling his formal robes in the photo above). The full collection…

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Over the years, there has been one stylistic constant in my pursuit of übergeekery: equipment consoles. It started one 1964 afternoon in Louisville, when this skinny 12-year-old electronics-obsessed geeklet got a peek at how the big boys do it. Via a ham radio friend, I had wangled an invitation to visit the avionics maintenance shop…

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Coronavirus will echo for decades. Everything was normal… then suddenly we were on sabbatical from our own timelines, routines disrupted by intimations of mortality… priorities shifted, values inverted, unspeakable things whispered, stats obsessively reloaded. We watch the news in horror, contemplate de-facto partnerships, ache at disconnections, and muse about the messes we will leave behind…

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Tools for exploring the aquatic environment by Steven K. RobertsNomadic Research Labs — May 4, 2018 One of the strongest motivations behind the Datawake project is to extend my human sensorium, letting me see into otherwise invisible realms. This takes many forms: data collection systems fed by environmental sensors, embedded probes that report conditions I would never otherwise…

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I’ve recently been enjoying immersion in a sort of ham radio for introverts… a new digital mode called FT8 that allows weak-signal communication on all the HF bands from 160 to 6 meters via tiny 50Hz-wide signals exchanged by time-synchronized computers running WSJT-X. A complete exchange takes a minute and a half, with the connected machines…

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A driving force in my years of building technomadic machines has been a toolset for seeing the world beyond the limitations of my usual senses… something that is not only intrinsically fascinating, but essential for diagnostics. The latest addition is a FLIR ONE thermal imaging camera (the Gen-3 USB-C model for Android; there is also…

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During my years in Friday Harbor, mostly living aboard Nomadness and Datawake, I have kept a low profile in the local media. This was an exception, with an enjoyable interview with Hayley Day that became a front-page piece in the weekly paper… along with a related editorial. Here’s a photo of the front page, with…

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(photo above: the heated seat of the bidet, as viewed by the FLIR ONE thermal camera) This is the new control console for my toilet aboard Datawake, which has just had a major upgrade. Although most of my attention in the last year and a half has been on the übergeeky systems in the lab, there…

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