They produced some nice work! https://www.knoll.com/designer/Lella-and-Massimo-Vignelli

They look okay to me, insofar as SU handles shadows ...... errrrr ....... which isn't great

Yes, indeed. 'Nice' places in hospitals really lift the spirits. I've been visiting hospitals lately and can testify to the restfulness of 'nice' places to sit and relax or just view through a window.

Dale, At the same time I doubt Yamaha would have been able to create Venova with the help of computers, so in a way its a result of digital input ..... me thinks!

Yes, Dale, good or even bad design is difficult to pin down. An engineer friend of mine simplified it, for himself at least, "If it looks right, it more than likely is right!". It's hard to argue with his logic.

Dale, you forgot to mention ... it's also thief proof!

Hi Guys,

Of late I have been researching various ways on how a person could actually live 'off-grid'. I've come across quite a number of good ideas and one such idea that I picked up on this morning is the HomeBiogas system.

It's simple, reasonably low cost and most importantly easily maintainable for 'off-griders'. I'll probably make a 3D model soon and post here.

Just a moment...

(www.kickstarter.com)

Mike

Hi Mac Users,

I still working with my 2012 MacBook Pro Retina. I bought it about 3 years ago on the Apple Refurbished Site with a very high spec.

I was hoping that the 2016 MacBook Pro would offer a huge improvement in performance over what I have but was disappointed. I will be waiting to see what comes out in 2018. Hopefully, I will see a 32Gb Ram and powerful graphics card options.

In the meantime, I'm reading up on external graphics card option now that High Sierra is supposed to offer better native support.

I have found a site, https://egpu.io that has a load of interesting upgrade options and case histories. Here is a case history similar to my setup, https://egpu.io/forums/implementation-guides/2012-15-macbook-pro-retina-650m-107010gbps-tb1-akitio-node-mac-oswin-10/

I have yet to figure out if its possible to get an eGPU operating natively with Mac OS, e.g. not on Windows running on a Mac or the need for a separate monitor.

I am also keeping in mind that whatever I go for must be compatible with my next MacBook Pro that I imagine I will be buying in late 2018, refurbed of course!

Here are some links within the site I am reading,
https://egpu.io/external-gpu-implementations-table/?table_filter=">TB3%20"

I would appreciate any thoughts you Macbook Pro users here might have about this kind of a tempory upgrade.

Mike

@pbacot said:

I'd like aN "airtight and breathable assembly", but not sure what that means.

@pbacot
Yeah, of the face of it, that doesn't make sense but I imagine what is meant is that vapor only is allowed to escape.

@Majid
I've replied to you on PM.

Hi All,

I came across an interesting article in Treehugger, Zero House! After reading about and viewing the slides I came to the conclusion that it's really not that that difficult to build an 'off grid' house provided one is reasonable with their use of electricity.

Here is a cross-section showing how things are put together.

I like the use of birch ply finished interior walls, straw insulation, Rewall Essentialboard as the exterior wall finish, fiberglass framed windows and of course stick-on photovoltaic panels.

The designers/producers have kept the whole building process simple and 'scaleable', meaning that this construction method can be used to build houses for the average western family.

Further detail can be found here,
https://www.treehugger.com/slideshows/green-architecture/zero-house-big-nothing/

Apple Engineer Talks About New 2016 Macbook Pro
https://youtu.be/-XSC_UG5_kU

PS: If you understand Spanish, turn the speaker off.

Hi Guys,

While checking out whats new on Kickstarter this evening I came across the Mouse Ledge.

I thought it would make life more comfortable while I work with my Macbook positioned on a Belkin CoolSpot Cushion on my lap with legs on the coffee table ..... believe me, it's an ergonomic working position!

At $13 I thought it was a steal so I backed it. Fingers are now crossed that it will go into production. You can check it out here,

Just a moment...

(www.kickstarter.com)

Mike

NUMS! A handy numeric keypad for the Macbook Pro
https://sketchucation.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=72%26amp;t=67911

One major item missing on the Macbook Pro is a proper numeric keyboard section. It becomes very tiresome crossing back and forth to hit numbers 1-0 on the keyboard. I find the Virtual NumPad on the CadMouse a great time saver but it's nicer to have something that gives the 'click' feedback.

Rich O'Brien sent me a link to NUMS a couple of weeks ago and I got excited about the idea ..... yeah, I need to get a life!

Anyway, I scoured around for the best price as I thought the $50 MRP a bit on the pricey side. After I located a site selling NUMS for €17 with free shipping I stumped up and order.

NUMS arrived a week later in a really nice presentation box and I was able the set it up in a minute even though the installation instructions were in Chinese.

I stumbled around a bit trying to locate the NUMS driver but located it after a while. In fact, I emailed NUMS looking for the driver location and received a return email, so good service there.

By the time I got the return email with the drive link I had already located the driver and was 'clicking' on my in-built NUMS MBP numeric keypad. Apple should have thought about this a long time ago but no matter, I have one now.

Here are the links,

https://keypad.sinaapp.com/?lang=en

Where I purchased,

https://www.tinydeal.com/multifunction-nums-smart-numeric-keypad-trackpad-protector-022mm-p-164249.html

I've been waiting to see how High Sierra handles eGPU and it looks that things are heading in the right direction.

Check out 'Hands-on: macOS High Sierra’s native eGPU support shows promise [Video]'
https://9to5mac.com/2017/06/07/hands-on-macos-high-sierra-native-egpu-support-shows-promise-video/

I've also managed to get a good workaround for a numeric keypad on my Macbook Pro. It's a clear plastic overlay for the trackpad called Nums. I won't say any more on this thread but will create a new dedicated topic on Nums.

Once done I will put a link here.

I was being tempted to move away from my Macbook Pro and back to a more powerful Win laptop that featured a more powerful graphics card.

However, it looks like Apple have seen the light and with the newly announced OS High Sierra, existing Mac users will be able to run external graphics cards. From what I gather it will have to be an AMD card but that's okay by me as they appear to be less costly than the nVidia equivalents.

I will now wait to see if the 2017 Macbook Pro includes 32Gb of ram as I'm finding that 16Gb not enough at times. If this happens I'll upgrade if the price is more realistic, which I believe to be the case if rumours are true.

Always a pleasure to view and learn from your work jo-ke

Guys, check this site out, http://abillionlives.com

I just watched the documentary and it looks like Govs, Big Pharma and the tobacco industry is winning the battle to have vaping products banned in the US and heavily taxed in the EU.

I'm going to quit cigs when my current supply of rolling tobacco runs out, probably in a week or so. I doubt vaping products will be banned in Ireland but I have no doubt the Gov would be more than willing to go along with heavily taxing the juice .... bastards!

Mike

Hi Kathryn,

Yes the 'Add Icon' plugin works fine with SU Pro 2017. Like you, I find the visual help when digging around in files very useful.

Mike

@mike amos said:

We will face more and more cost for drinking water over the next ten years and it will be no joke then. http://www.middleeasterner.net/blog/2015/2/9/the-thirst-is-real-water-scarcity-and-solutions-in-the-middle-east

Ireland is in a mess with regard to the new Water Board was set up to centralise the charging for water. It hasn't worked as there has been a mass revolt across the country and more than 40% of users did not and will not pay.

It is not that folks don't want to pay for their use of water. I think it's more a case of them not wanting a centralised controlling system that could easily be sold off to big corporations.