"Hone" is an interesting word.
[QUOTE]honed; honing
Definition of hone

(Entry 1 of 3)
transitive verb
1 : to sharpen or smooth with a whetstone
2 : to make more acute, intense, or effective : whet helped her hone her comic timing— Patricia Bosworth

hone noun
Definition of hone (Entry 2 of 3)
: whetstone

hone verb (2)
honed; honing

Definition of hone (Entry 3 of 3)

intransitive verb
1 [B]dialect : yearn —often used with for or after[/B]
2 dialect : grumble, moan[/QUOTE]I first picked it up in the first sense, immediately above. A line in a folk song actually handed down in my mother's family, (though it is well known,) uses the word in this sense. The song is Barbara Allen. I can only find different versions, thus far which contain fragments of the rather involved tale in the version I learned.
In any case, the lines in question are[INDENT]lightly tripped she down the stair
he trembled like an aspen
tis vain, tis vain, my dear young man
to hone for Barbara Allen
[/INDENT]This aside, I think an argument can be made that 'honing' as in sharpening is a sort of narrowing down; as in narrowing the options down to a sharp edge of a conclusion or an arrival. This might also be related to the sense of 'honing one's skills.'


I posted in Muzak a recording of Barbara Allen very similar to what I know.

[URL]https://www.mersenneforum.org/showpost.php?p=531220&postcount=937[/URL]

[QUOTE=kladner;531222]...This aside, I think an argument can be made that 'honing' as in sharpening is a sort of narrowing down; as in narrowing the options down to a sharp edge of a conclusion or an arrival. This might also be related to the sense of 'honing one's skills.'
[/QUOTE]

[U]There is a third[/U]: Many years ago, I worked in a manufacturing facility which made rear lighting assemblies for automotive and heavy truck use. This included trailers.

I worked in injection molding where all the lenses were made. All the larger lenses had an area made up of concentric circles beginning near the center and extending outwards to the edge. This part of the mold was known as the "honed" area. The molded lenses were tested on an hourly basis around the clock.

Heated "shots" of molten plastic, around 400°F, would tend to polish these rings. If the honing rings became too shiny, the lenses would fail the quality test. This test was done in a 50 foot tunnel painted flat-black on the inside. The illuminated light assembly on the wall at one end. Light sensing devices at the opposite end would measure the amount of light scattering at shallow angles relative to 90° from the dead-center of the lens. A low reading would indicate too much light was traveling directly from the center of the lens. If this happened, then the mold would be disassembled and the individual rings would be honed to the proper dullness. 80,000 to 100,000 shots was typical between tear-downs.

Attached in an image of a honed lens. So, the next time you get close to the rear of a semi-trailer, you will know why the lights are so bright.

[I]We seem to have gotten way [U]off-topic[/U][/I]. :smile:

[QUOTE=storm5510;531266]All the larger lenses had an area made up of concentric circles beginning near the center and extending outwards to the edge.[/QUOTE]Isn't that a [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel_lens]Fresnel lens[/url]?

[QUOTE=James Heinrich;531268]Isn't that a [URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel_lens"]Fresnel lens[/URL]?[/QUOTE]

I believe it is. Just on a smaller scale than a lighthouse.

LED arrays have made all this quite obsolete now, at lease in automotive safety lighting. Lenses are now designed around the arrangement of the LED's.

I loved that job for all the scientific aspects of it, and it gave me a sense of responsibility. I was in my early 20's back then so having that was unique.

Just in case anyone is interested in wasting some more time...

The "conversation" on [URL="https://barbadosunderground.net/2019/11/24/power-probe-blp-a-must/"]Barbados Underground[/URL] continued.

With a bit of a [URL="https://barbadosunderground.net/2013/01/25/notes-from-a-native-son-an-open-door-immigration-policy-can-also-be-letting-in-trojan-horses/comment-page-1/#comment-1267732"]tangent into immigration policy[/URL].

It's sometimes fun being me... :chalsall:

[QUOTE=chalsall;531458]Just in case anyone is interested in wasting some more time...

The "conversation" on [URL="https://barbadosunderground.net/2019/11/24/power-probe-blp-a-must/"]Barbados Underground[/URL] continued.

With a bit of a [URL="https://barbadosunderground.net/2013/01/25/notes-from-a-native-son-an-open-door-immigration-policy-can-also-be-letting-in-trojan-horses/comment-page-1/#comment-1267732"]tangent into immigration policy[/URL].

It's sometimes fun being me... :chalsall:[/QUOTE]

Entertaining....

Quick update...
 

Hey All. Sorry for my "lurking" (including even PMs)...

I'm still "limping" after the power failure... Can't go into all the details, but along with other "fun" the new MB I purchased, an ASRock H310CM-HDV, won't support both the onboard Intel-based video and a discrete GPU card at the same time. It's supposed to, but refuses to "in situ".

And, of course, neither support more than two monitors at a time... I can't work effectively with only two monitors!!!

Anyway, nothing I can do about that until tomorrow, so I'm going to try to get some issues out of my queue today.

P.S. I find it amusing that I have become so dependent on so much screen real estate. Remember how much we all used to accomplish with only 40 (or if we were lucky, 80) columns of text? :smile:

[QUOTE=chalsall;531799] Remember how much we all used to accomplish with only 40 (or if we were lucky, 80) columns of text? :smile:[/QUOTE]

Indeed. And 2K of RAM. My first computer, a Southwest Technical Products kit based on the Motorola 6800 processor, came with 2K of RAM standard. When I bought my kit I purchased it with the optional 2K upgrade, so I was really uptown with my 4K of memory. :)

[QUOTE=chalsall;531799]...I can't work effectively with only two monitors!!!

P.S. I find it amusing that I have become so dependent on so much screen real estate. Remember how much we all used to accomplish with only 40 (or if we were lucky, 80) columns of text? :smile:[/QUOTE]

"I can't work effectively with only two monitors." :shock:

When I started trade-school back in 1987, I saw both 40 and 80 columns. The vast majority were monochrome, and MS-DOS was the rule of each day. It's amazing how some of us got by with only "C:\>" on the screen when we started up, if we had a hard-drive inside. Many did not. Then, it was startup with a five-and-a-quarter floppy. The full-height floppy drives in the IBM's grunted all the way. :smile:

I still miss my C>64.

I decided to do an experiment with my HP. I added a second hard drive, and moved the plugs to that drive and installed Ubuntu on it. This kept the Windows drive intact. After some studying here, and other places, I have managed to do with it what I wanted. [I]Mprime[/I] seems to do really well.

This machine has a GPU in it, and I saw a lot of references to Nvidia during the OS install. I looked around here today and I saw no mention of any program which could use the GPU in a Linux environment. I found that rather amazing. Perhaps I did not look where I should have. Is there no such animal?