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I've been working at cross purposes the last couple of days.  My little electronics project is such a success it's keeping me from working on it, even as I'm spending time on it!

I''m trying to do all my work now on a test article that I can run on battery power.  Some things I can't do that with, but right now I most need to debug the new voltage level detector in that test article.  Problem is, a few days ago I began testing to see how long the flasher could run on battery power.  I put four new AAA batteries on it, figuring they would last for 20 to 36 hours.  Mirable dictu, I'm past 90 hours and it's just reached the 1.3 volt/cell plateau.  AAA page, first discharge curve should be the most representative load in terms of curve shape.  That means that the flasher should run for 440 to 480 hours on these tiny batteries, and over two thousand on the C cells I mean to use it with!  That's darn good--flashing hours won't take as much as I feared from battery lifetime--but I'll have to cut this test short to get work done.

I also have to work on my much-modified "pigeon" flasher--but I don't want to get tied up in that until I have the detector working.  I also have a start-up problem on the flasher: when it's turned on the capacitors draw so much current to charge that the voltage drop resets the timer.  I think I can fix this with a resistor that will slow the turn-on of the MOSFETs that feed the flasher.  It's just a matter of finding the right value.  Thing is, I want to test the fix with the cheapest carbon-zinc batteries I can get my hands on--and it's getting hard to find them nowadays.

And then the pigeon flasher.  I promised to send the final circuit drawing to the guy I cribbed it from.  It's a surprisingly subtle design that can maintain a steady flash rate over a wide voltage range.

But right now Im going to work on Chapter 4, and then I'll see if I can find those cheap batteries.

From Maxell ad of 30-odd years ago: "With some tapes, you can't tell your brass from your oboe."

My favorite: "He can't tell a burro from a burrow!"

"Oh, hey! I love these things!....Crunchy on the outside and chewy center!"

As I look at the revised Chapter 4 and consider other revisions, I find myself thinking that the first scene should now be moved earlier, even before Chapter 2.  Even before that, I see a lot of things to improve in it.

I see Slash as the sort of person who has a mean streak, but will hold it in check until he has an excuse to exercise it.  If he has an easy win in the ring, he'll humiliate the oponent; if it's a hard win, he'll fight to inflict as much lasting pain as possible.

Will he fight for the right side?  Yes, if it profits him, or if there's no other sensible action.

Can the real Brekin improve him?  Will he fight for her?  I'm not sure.  He's a slave to his appetites and his pride, much more so than Kha.

Not exactly a bug, but on the home page smartphone version under the visit groups head, the links for the forums are so small it's hard to hit them without hitting either the group link or the first posting link.  It's not so bad in landcape, but in portrait it's a problem.

Maybe turn that into a button extending to the available L/R margins?

Sol said he put a test chapter up for me but I haven't found it.  The email address he sent from rejects replies, and I haven't heard back from him on the reply I sent to the address he gives here.

Sol, tell me where to look and I'll go over the chapter in fine detail.

Review is up.  Man, is Kha cold###########did you pick a tough scene to write!

Following up on the review -- but the whole town isn't in danger of the Elemental residue on the charm.  The Chaos-triggered fires pose some danger, but the real danger is that the charm used to be--and still is!--a Covenant Gem.

With regard to place and description, I wonder if you and I know places differently.

Before I take a trip, I often study the route with Google Maps and look over the satphotos around the places where  I will have to turn.  I study them from above and envision them as they must view from the road.  Then when I drive, I recognize those nearly as if I had seen them before.

So for me, giving a 'map' of the place is the natural kind of description.

In other news, I have a battery-powered version of the timer/flasher portion working.  The breadboard I'm working forces me to compromise the layout a bit but not too much.  I found a couple of errors in my layout drawing for that part, and discovered that the inrush for the switched power caps causes the timer to reset.  I can reduce the capacitance, but instead I want to try turning the  switching MOSFET on a little slowly.

Later!

Four words: DBMS.  Four more: ACID.

Your wish is my suggestion.

Chapter 4 up.  I need to go sleep..  What time I have tomorrow/today has to be spent on circuit work--and on reading your reviews, of course

Still  working on chapter 4.  I spent six slow but productive hours yestereve.  (Where 'eve' ends near dawn.)  It will be over 4k words.