
Basic Flashlight Tutorial - Tomte
http://www.asos1.com/flashlight/flashlight01.htm
======
dmd
> Most people think it's normal to have to beat on a flashlight to make it
> work. We do it without thinking. It's almost as if it's coded into our DNA.

Can someone (perhaps older than me (I'm 38)) explain this sentence? I have no
idea what it even means to "beat on" a flashlight. You push a button, it turns
on. What is there to "beat on"?

edit: Weird. I guess I've never used a cheap flashlight, because I've never
had this experience.

~~~
yoz-y
At least in almost every horror movie there is a scene when somebody goes down
to the basement. Their flashlight starts flickering, then turns off, then they
hit it with their hand a few times and it works again. Finally it inevitably
fails again and the person gets eaten.

~~~
vkjv
> then they hit it with their hand a few times and it works again.

Just in time to see the antagonist right in front of them.

~~~
eumoria
BOO

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unwind
I love this! It's also awesome that the author considers it "basic", at that
size and depth of detail.

I mean, it describes the voltage-boosting circuitry of the Proton almost to
the point of reverse engineering it. That's great (in my book), but not very
basic. :)

~~~
semi-extrinsic
This is good, I agree, but I have one major criticism: no mention of safety
concerns for running non-rechargeable lithium batteries like the CR123 in
series.

There are some true horror stories out there from people who have suffered
chemical burns and permanent lung damage, even hydrogen fluoride poisoning
just from operating those normally, with a manufacturing fault in one of the
cells.

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zodPod
I'm so glad this is ACTUALLY an article about flashlights and not some hip new
product called Flashlight... Risky click there.

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lunchladydoris
It's sites like this that make me love the Internet.

~~~
criddell
A few months ago I looked to buy a new flashlight and was shocked at how many
choices there are.

All I wanted was a light with two modes - on and off. _Maybe_ a low-light mode
for insane battery life in a prolonged emergency. I wanted it to run on
batteries I can find in a gas station. I went into the rabbit hole and never
actually bought anything. I started to make a spreadsheet with all the options
and features then wondered what the hell I was doing and gave up.

~~~
creeble
Ha, this cracks me up. Been there for sure.

I find it increasingly difficult to find flashlights that don't four or five
modes of operation, especially bright ones that use 16450 (or is it 18450?)
batteries. And they all seem to have slightly dodgy switches that change the
mode with the slightest touch.

Brightness and barrel construction are all great, but please just give me an
on/off light with a solid switch!

~~~
alasdair_
The problem is that once you get past a few hundred lumens, "on/off" doesn't
really work well. I have a small Nitecore flashlight with a since cell in it
and it puts out 850 lumens on maximum. That's too much to read a book at night
with, yet it's great for finding a lost dog in the woods.

~~~
criddell
Off - low - high is fine.

I don't want strobe, I don't want morse code, I don't need five brightness
levels.

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sixothree
My number 1 rule for buying a flashlight: Never buy a flashlight made by a
battery manufacturer.

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Ph4nt0m
It certainly seems like a basic/simple topic but it is hard to see what other
branches you could have covered except maybe laser diodes. Would you put those
in a separate category or they could be considered as a flashlight with a very
narrow beam?

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dmux
NSFW Warning: Had a popup appear with nsfw content on it.

~~~
alfanick
A thread just on top of the flashlight one is "When Pseudosex Is Better Than
the Real Thing" – I thought "oh it must be sex stuff trend on HN today"

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_RPM
This web page froze my web browser due to the multiple tracking domains it
loads. I flagged this.

~~~
lorenzhs
It also contains a link to the tracking dashboard that leaks all analytics.
It's the
"[http://extremetracking.com/<redacted>"](http://extremetracking.com/<redacted>")
link at the very bottom of the source. Among others, it lists visitor IPs and
referrers. That information really should not be public. But honestly, I
wouldn't have noticed without your comment - uBlock Origin prevented loading
of the tracker.

~~~
gog
Seeing this makes mi nostalgic. That tracker was insanely popular in the time
before Google Analytics existed.

Back then privacy was not an issue, just by being on the internet you were the
weird one :)

I just checked, their domain name is 17 years and 9 months old.

~~~
_RPM
How does it determine the search engine queries leading to the page?

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mnw21cam
Note: This web page is about electric torches. Might be good to change the
title?

~~~
edwhitesell
Well, the title of the page is "Basic Flashlight Tutorial", so it matches as-
is.

Of course, Electric Torch is UK terminology (may be used elsewhere that I'm
unaware of) However, Flashlight is used in the US/Canada.

~~~
sosuke
Electric Torch sounds awesome, like something from a D&D guide. I'm going to
try to use that next time I ask my wife where the flashlight is. On an iPhone
in the UK is the flashlight button labelled electric torch?

~~~
rikkus
We call them personalTelephones here, old chap.

~~~
overcast
You call the Flashlight app, "personalTelephones"?

~~~
dsp1234
iPhones => personalTelephones

i => personal

Phones => Telephones

It's a joke based on British formal speech

~~~
overcast
I get that. They were responding to what they call the Flashlight App on the
iPhone.

