We need to stop killing people twice every year for “War Time“ It doesn’t work, if you want more daylight wake up earlier or stay up later. We could probably also stand to lose a few time zones but that’s an argument for another day that is also based on the fact that the world is so interconnected and electric lights aren’t going anywhere.

There was actually more to say but as a few former coworkers know I am pretty passionate about ending the clock diddling

Videos since I last checked in:

Luna Spends a day with Maryland Tesla Club at Leonardtown Wharf

My wife Luna and I went to a Meeting of the Maryland Tesla Club called Southern Maryland Tesla Takeover where we all met outdoors and kept our distance on this beautiful day. While I was goofing around with the 8K 360 camera Luna went on a stroll with the 5.7K 360 camera, and apparently almost dropped it. She's speaking a mix of Thai and US English while she livestreamed on her phone.

Teslaquila Unboxing - Tesla Tequila

We ordered Tesla's Tequila November 6th, It arrived on February 10th, This Tesla Alcohol product aka Teslaquila gets unboxed! Elon Musk initially had Teslaquila as an April Fool's joke where he pretended Tesla went bankwupt and he relabeled a bottle as Teslaquila. We were extremely excited to see both that the product was real so we ordered it on the spot, I wish we had ordered two bottles. We enjoyed this Teslaquila unboxing and can't wait to see what the next limited-edition Tesla, SpaceX, Boring Company, or other Musk company product is.

Tesla Smart Summon as seen from inside Model X P100D

Using Tesla Smart Summon in a parking lot, as seen from inside the car. I used Tesla Smart Summon's Come to me feature to call the car over to me from across the parking lot, with my phone. The car did a fine job even though it arrived on the wrong side of the road.

Tesla Software Update 2021.4.11 - Deep Dive

This bug fix update to the 2020 Tesla Holiday Update bears version number 2021.4.11 and contains a few changes not listed in the release notes. Acceleration off stoplights and following a lead car varies from leisurely to adequate. Stoplight control beta performance with flashing yellow lights is poor. Navigate on autopilot is back to another good release both in steering performance and the way that it plots a course. We try Navigate on Autopilot with compound onramps and off-ramps as well as with compound exits and entrances. This time autosteer is adequate with curves handling them fairly smoothly with little uncertainty, the same goes for the slight turn it used to dramatically exaggerate as if it were a tight turn merging onto I-95 North from Woodbridge it is now slightly exaggerated. Autosteer still veers immediately when the lane grows wider. The interference with trucks I saw a few Deep-Dive videos ago remains gone at all speeds. The vehicle did not play chicken on any lane changes. We try Smart Summon to target and then we use Smart Summon's Come to Me feature a few times. We also play a round of Tesla Puppy in an empty office park. This deep-dive saw no surprises that we noticed versus other 2021 updates including 2021.4.6. We did hear of a few owners complaining that their greenlight chime disappeared after this update and for some it came back the next day others it did not come back, ours was ready to go from our first traffic light. There were no visible signs of Holiday Update part 2.

It chased me! - Smart Summon

While filming our testing of Tesla Software update 2021.4.11 I had my car chase me around an empty office park, like a puppy. This is very similar to hide and seek or tag. The car can travel up to about 6 miles per hour while being Smart Summoned and you can check the progress in the app, currently, while Smart Summon is active you are expected to keep an eye on the car in case it gets into trouble, much like a real puppy. Eventually, the car will "reverse summon" or Smart Autopark where it will drop you off at the door and use its cameras to read signs and all of its sensors to find valid parking spots. Right now Tesla Smart Summon is useful in a handful of scenarios such as assisting disabled drivers, getting the car out of a tightly squeezed parking spot, traversing mud/snow/puddles so you don't get your feet wet. Less common uses are calling the car away from ambush able spots like near a hedge or a streetlight that has gone out, or if someone has stuck a lure to your windshield/windshield wipers. This Tesla Summon parking lot experience was quite a blast!

Smart Summon - Tesla update 2021.4.11

While filming our testing of Tesla Software update 2021.4.11 I had my car chase me around an empty office park, like it was playing hide and seek or tag. The car can travel up to about 6 miles per hour while being Smart Summoned and you can check the progress in the app, currently, while Smart Summon is active you are expected to keep an eye on the car in case it gets into trouble, much like a real puppy. Eventually, the car will "reverse summon" or Smart Autopark where it will drop you off at the door and use its cameras to read signs and all of its sensors to find valid parking spots. Right now Tesla Smart Summon is useful in a handful of scenarios such as assisting disabled drivers, getting the car out of a tightly squeezed parking spot, traversing mud/snow/puddles so you don't get your feet wet. Less common uses are calling the car away from ambush able spots like near a hedge or a streetlight that has gone out, or if someone has stuck a lure to your windshield/windshield wipers. This Tesla Summon parking lot experience was quite a blast!

Smart Summon navigates unmarked bend

While filming our testing of Tesla Software update 2021.4.11 I had my car try to find me around a dark unmarked corner, it navigated it slowly but confidently this one was an interesting one to watch. The car can travel up to about 6 miles per hour while being Smart Summoned and you can check the progress in the app, currently, while Smart Summon is active you are expected to keep an eye on the car in case it gets into trouble, much like a real puppy. Eventually, the car will "reverse summon" or Smart Autopark where it will drop you off at the door and use its cameras to read signs and all of its sensors to find valid parking spots. Right now Tesla Smart Summon is useful in a handful of scenarios such as assisting disabled drivers, getting the car out of a tightly squeezed parking spot, traversing mud/snow/puddles so you don't get your feet wet. Less common uses are calling the car away from ambush able spots like near a hedge or a streetlight that has gone out, or if someone has stuck a lure to your windshield/windshield wipers. This Tesla Summon parking lot experience was quite a blast!

Catch you on the flipside

Kacey

Transportation as a service

This is where the industry is headed, will it remain affordable? It will happen simultaneously while the industry switches to Electric Vehicles. I’m concerned about how people will treat the vehicles. I’m thinking I will want to own and operate a few of these and have one car that is just for me and my family. Set the car-pods up so that they go to a detailer after every trip and then they get back on the road is what I’m thinking.

All Electric Houses

I was watching Belinda Carr’s latest video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1weD9ZvYxTw and while I like the diversification of energy idea, electric lends itself to that, it makes the most sense to me to have on-site storage via battery, flywheel, or something else. Couple that storage with renewable or zero-carbon sources and it seems that all electric is the right move now that we have the technology to make it work efficiently and reliably at an affordable price.

Loud Exhaust in residential zones

Several of my neighbors or people who drive past where we live now have vehicles that you can hear coming and going, even ones not perceived as powerful (even the “powerful” ones would be embarrassed by my electric minivan Tesla Model X P100D) it seems some are taking extra effort to make more noise at two and three in the morning. What is the point? Also seems they don’t understand the concept that every decibel you can hear is that much less power put to the ground.

ADFS Service failures

I had a few ADFS (Active Directory Federation Services) Servers that would have various log on issues in event viewer as well as being unable to complete configuration after installing the AD FS Role. Thanks to Brian Reid ADFS Service Login Failures and a Simple Fix – C7 Solutions I was able to realize that blanking out the password in the Services MMC allowed me to start the service one time because the password was wrong due to my use of GMSAs (Group managed Service Accounts) GMSA passwords are handled by the domain controller similar to LAPS so whatever is in that properties box under the username and password is wrong. As Brian points out clearing that makes the computer ask the Domain Controller for the current password and lets you start the service.

The problem that Christopher Hinkle and I were having is that the same problem would happen at each restart of the system. Over on a SQL site Pinal Dave https://blog.sqlauthority.com/2019/02/27/sql-server-sql-service-not-getting-started-automatically-after-server-reboot-while-using-gmsa-account/ found tweaking dependencies worked for him, it did not work for me, but commenter Michael had a solution for his SQL system that I tweaked to work for my ADFS Servers the first one has been working for months but this week I ran into the problem again and found next to nothing online but remembered that I am obsessed with OneNote and my answer was right in there. The solution to ADFS Error 700 7000 7038 7034 and a host of net.tcp//localhost:1500/policy running in read-only mode errors was to do the following:

• Modify this registry value - Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\adfssrv

• Value: ServiceAccountManaged

• Datatype: REG_BINARY

• 01 00 00 00

• In PowerShell start-service adfssrv

• restart-computer

• After the computer comes back, in PowerShell again, get-service adfssrv

You should now see your service is running if you’ve already successfully configured it with the password blanking method.

If you haven’t done that then you can run start-service adfssrv and then run your ADFS configuration script or the configuration wizard from Server Manager or Windows Admin Center.

No more wondering “Why does my Windows Service keep forgetting its password?” Or staring at “The service did not start due to a login failure” filling up your event viewer.

Videos

Since the last post the following videos have posted

What if you get your finger caught in the Tesla Model X Ice Breaker?

After our previous video on the Ice breakers folks asked what happens if you get your finger caught in the mechanism. https://youtu.be/6cgSQM2yhEo

In this video we simulate a finger with a carrot, the results were not pretty unfortunately.

How does a car with no door handles do in ice or snow? Tesla has equipped each side of the Model X front doors with an Ice Breaker, to open the door with more force than the regular door motors offer.

Don't put your fingers or anything else inside the deployed icebreakers, they do not sense pressure or anything and retract with a similar force to their deployment, but if you or a child does get caught, don't panic. Press the door button or pull the door handle again and the car will re-deploy the Model X ice breaker mechanism and at this point you should quickly remove the obstacle (body part or foreign object).

What has your experience been with the Model X ice breakers? This was literally the second time my Model X P100D has deployed either of the icebreaker units.

Luna Spends a day with Maryland Tesla Club at Leonardtown Warf

My wife Luna and I went to a Meeting of the Maryland Tesla Club called Southern Maryland Tesla Takeover where we all met outdoors and kept our distance on this beautiful day. While I was goofing around with the 8K 360 camera Luna went on a stroll with the 5.7K 360 camera, and apparently almost dropped it.

Catch you on the flipside

Since the last update there have been a few changes and some small wins

Musings

Daft Punk split/retired 😢😭

This group was there for most of my musical life to-date with them running from 1993 to 2018 I will miss their occasional releases of outstanding music. Thankfully they did take the time to make us a goodbye message in the form of this video, which to me looks like it was recorded at the time of their last music video but even if it wasn’t they made it fit the continuity.

Nails in the road

One of my friends in Spain got an unrepairable nail in his tire and that got me thinking I wish there was a way to tag everything that made it into a truck, van, or trailer (we have RFID today) and then the tire shop could bill the, umm jerks (I used another word in our chat), that let stuff fall out for each tire. Then of course regular car insurance could help with the bills so if someone made the occasional mistakes it'd be an uncomfortable reminder $20-50, but if they did this all the time they'd get dropped by their carrier and be responsible for today’s multi-hundred-dollar tires. This would also offer protection if they had a crash where cargo spilled, the police report and insurance would protect them from that load getting them canceled. This is a pipe dream but it’s a shame that innocent people must pay the price for a bunch of careless jerks in a rush. Thankfully, the place I buy my tires includes road-hazard insurance with each tire sold, I’ve had to use it twice now and it was fairly painless. I did buy coverage for the tires on the Model X immediately when we bought it when we did the paint protection film, ceramic coating, and the ceramic coating of the interior.

Small Business and European Google/Bing maps:

We then thought of solutions for non-techie small businesses that can’t be bothered to keep their schedules and even if you call ahead, they might still not be there by the time you arrive. We thought about wireless smart buttons next to the open close sign at the front door, or on the light switch for their parking lot sign that would update their website and Google & Bing Maps to show the place as currently closed along with their listed business hours. I like being able to come and go but yeah you should be there when you say you are, I get that stuff comes up with small business. My next adjustment for the ultra lazy or careless/forgetful proprietors/employees was to link the status to the alarm or key cylinder on the front (customer) door that updates the maps, this would be awesome!

 Work

I had some successes wrangling and securing a rowdy IIS and .Net application and we left off trying to get its particular SAML situation working while I troubleshoot certificates on another SAML app that uses ADFS.

Food

Luna has been working out our new popcorn machine, it’s super quick, easy to use and easy to cleanup. We liked it so much that we added it to our Amazon Store

Luna made the chili this week with Scotch Bonnets from one of our hydroponics gardens, she was afraid it would be too spicy but since my mom’s side of the family is from Jamaicia that wasn’t the case, it smelled like some family meals and the temperature was definitely turned up but I found it manageable. The chili was just as delicious as usual, I did have to clear the empty bowl quicker than normal as it smelled like fire 😅.

Fitness

I missed two days of squats because my knees were acting up but have managed to hit the crunches and pushups the whole time. I’m down .2 pounds and up .2% bodyfat, and down .1% muscle mass.

I haven’t been getting enough sleep, several days saw me going to bed a few hours before sunrise, and depending on if the next day was a workday was whether I got a restful sleep or not, even if the sleep was restful the quantity was insufficient so that has been adding up unfortunately. Mini goal, start going to bed by roughly midnight at the latest for a while.

Rode Wireless Go II

Rode released their Wireless Go II system this morning, all the new features had me ready to click the buy it now button, I’ll be waiting to see some reviews and for some more income to come in. I’m sure the reviews will be fine

Videos:

We’re well on our way to meeting the two videos per week goal, here are most of the videos published since the last blog entry, I skipped the shorter smaller duplicate of one video (posted to see how the shorts shelf treats 360 videos, weirdly but very well, next time I’ll try just rotating it 90 degrees)

Tesla Dashcam USB Setup 2021 - No Computer needed!

For 2021 setting up your Tesla Dashcam aka TeslaCam is now easier than ever as Tesla has made it a one button process! First you'll need a USB 3.0 Drive (USB3 Thumbdrive/Flash Drive) or an Endurance SD Card and adapter or an SSD (Solid State Drive).

 I use the Vectotech 512 GB SSD https://amzn.to/3sdOGBK

Next, you'll plug it in near your cupholders (Model S& Model X prior to 2021 with MCU2), or under your phone charger (Model 3 and Model Y prior to 2021), or in your Glovebox 2021 and newer models.

 Then you'll open the controls menu (The icon of your car in the lower menu bar)

and go to Safety & Security menu, then there'll be a format USB button under the Dashcam section of the menu. This will erase the drive by reformatting, and it'll name the volume and create the required folders.

 *If your drive is partitioned with music or something else on another partition, DO NOT USE THIS METHOD* as it will erase your custom partitions and use the whole drive for Tesla cam.

 While I'm in here I make sure the save clips on honk is enabled as I remember to hit the horn in my adrenaline fog but I've forgot to click the little icon or hit my 3rd party dashcam's save button several times, never failed to hit the horn.

 If you drive is full of Sentry Mode clips and you've saved everything you need this is a great way to erase everything and start fresh with your drive.

 The car will keep an hour loop of everything it sees while this drive is in and the recording isn't disabled, honking with the save on honk setting or pressing the save button on the top menu will keep the last 10 minutes for you while the rest of the unsaved, non-sentry footage is overwritten after it is aged by 59 minutes.

 As of the 2020 holiday update, if Sentry Mode has a panic event any you then insert a drive and (assuming it wasn't already setup as a TeslaCam drive) run this procedure the car's dashcam will save the event to the FSD computer or MCU and then move that recording to your newly available drive for you to give the footage to the police or your insurance company, or you can review it yourself or submit it to  @Wham Baam Teslacam   😘.

 Using this method for your Tesla Dashcam USB setup, isn't the only method but it is the easiest with a one button procedure and no need for a computer or phone.

Tesla Software Update 2021.4.6 - Deep Dive

This bug fix update to the 2020 Tesla Holiday Update bears version number 2021.4.6 and contains a few changes not listed in the release notes. Acceleration off stoplights and following a lead car varies from leisurely to adequate. Stoplight control beta performance with flashing yellow lights is mixed. Navigate on autopilot is back to another good release both in steering performance and the way that it plots a course.

 We try Navigate on Autopilot with compound onramps and off-ramps as well as with compound exits and entrances. This time autosteer is quite competent with curves handling them smoothly with no uncertainty, the same goes for the slight turn it used to dramatically exaggerate as if it were a tight turn merging onto I-95 North from Woodbridge.

 The interference with trucks I saw on the two Deep-Dive videos ago remains gone at all speeds. The vehicle is still willing to play chicken on lane changes to see if it make a move seeing if the person already in the lane will make way or close the gap.

 We try Smart Summon to target and then we use Smart Summon's Come to Me feature.

 This deep-dive saw no surprises that we noticed versus 2021.4.3 but we were looking at back to back updates with that one following the 2021.4.2 update by less than a day and this one a week later.

 We did hear of a few owners complaining that their HVAC would go out after this update and for some it came back with an MCU reboot and others that didn't bring back the climate control system.

 There were no visible signs of Holiday Update part 2.

 Tesla Software Update 2021.4.3 - Deep Dive

This bug fix update to the 2020 Tesla Holiday Update bears version number 2021.4.3 and contains a few changes not listed in the release notes. Acceleration off stoplights and following a lead car varies from leisurely to adequate. Stoplight control beta performance with flashing yellow lights is mixed. Navigate on autopilot is back to another good release both in steering performance and the way that it plots a course.

 We try Navigate on Autopilot with compound onramps and off-ramps as well as with compound exits and entrances. This time autosteer is quite competent with curves handling them smoothly with no uncertainty, the same goes for the slight turn it used to dramatically exaggerate as if it were a tight turn merging onto I-95 North from Woodbridge.

 The interference with trucks I saw on the last Deep-Dive is gone at all speeds.

 We try Smart Summon to target and then we use Smart Summon's Come to Me feature, the car is back to following the rules of the road rather than cutting across the parking lot it followed the aisles and went around correctly.

 This deep-dive saw more changes that we initially expected but we were looking at back to back updates with this one following the 2021.4.2 update by less than a day,

 There were no visible signs of Holiday Update part 2.

 This video's Smart Summon Testing was performed at Saratoga Shopping Center in front of Giant Food just past Starbucks.

 Tesla Autopark in 2021.4.3 - 8K 360º

Watch a Tesla Model X P100D Autopark in this 8K 360º video.

Several viewers have requested a view outside the car during a Tesla Autopilot, so during our testing for our Deep-Dive video on Tesla Software Update 2021.4.3 we tossed the 360º camera up in the air and captured this and it was long enough for a YouTube #Shorts so we ran a poll and our viewers demanded we release this video. The system continues to behave smoothly and get uncomfortably close to nearby cars. Getting the P to pop up and offer to Autopark the car was reasonable and didn't present too much difficulty and the car did not seem too choosy with spaces this time around.

Multi-Car Crash Florida - Merritt Island, outside Loggins Realty

My wife and I were returning from watching SpaceX launch the first Falcon Heavy Rocket launch one of the first Tesla Roadsters into space at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, we were to meet up with friends for pizza. This young driver made the mistake of failing to look left and right before entering the road and ensuring they had clear sightlines and drove out into the street causing a multi-car crash.

Just in front of Loggins Realty here is what we witnessed:

The red Corolla caused the multi car crash by striking the CR-V because they couldn't see it and cut out through the line of cars waiting for the light to change. The CR-V had the right-of-way and was already at speed when it collided with the passenger-side front fender launching it into the tan Sienna. I put the Tesla Model S 90D into reverse and stabbed the lightning 🌩 pedal for one beat to get some distance between the scene unfolding before us. Two people were taken by ambulance and a few more treated at the scene.

The police looked at the footage on my laptop but didn't have anything to store the footage, they said they'd call if they wanted it and give my contact info to the lawyers, but here we are 3 years later with no request.

That’s all for now, we’ll catch you on the flipside.

I still don’t know what I want to do with a blog, but what I’m conceptualizing now is a social media platform that I control, no character limits or restrictions, not that I ever say anything that’d get me kicked off a platform. I’m picturing for now putting small updates here and then summarizing them with a short video on the YouTube channel semi-regularly and we’ll see where it takes us.

Amazon Store

So, let’s get into it, for starters Amazon determined that I am an influencer and allowed me to start a virtual store! I’ve taken the opportunity to start cleaning up our Gear Page, and anything on there that can be found on Amazon is now in the store. I took all the original posts’ text and dumped it into the Store’s link on the gear page until I decide how I want to format things.

YouTube

I’ve been wanting to start the Deep-Dive video tests for Tesla Software update 2021.4.3 as it rolled in right when I was wrapping up the Quick-Look video into 2021.4.2, but the weather has been miserable. Yes, I’ve got all wheel drive and decent tires, what concerns me is everyone else on the road, Tachikoma is our only vehicle, and I can’t afford to have it go down for us being impatient, so when the winter storm warning is lifted, we’ll be out in the streets testing and filming to see what Tesla hid this time in a bugfix update.

I’ve gone through and caught back up on comments as Dan C and Dan H at vidIQ (affiliate) gave me some pointers at managing YouTube’s comment system, so I addressed some comments I previously missed.

YouTube comments: Thank you all for leaving such thoughtful comments and questions. I do get a fair share of trolls and negative comments or unhelpful non-solicited solutions to problems I’m not experiencing or don’t perceive as problems but on the whole you folks have been quite welcoming and I’ve enjoyed the experience.

Work

I get my extra day off this week so that’s exciting, I also was able to push through some roadblocks systems were giving me so that is exciting. My experience with Microsoft AppLocker came flooding back while assisting a friend once I was able to remember the name of the technology, helped them glide over some problems I first had implementing the tech, especially the missing start menu on Windows 10 and Windows Server 2019. The trick is to set default rules for both “Executable Rules” and “Packaged app Rules” click each category and right click in the right pane and select create default rules. Many people overlook the store apps thinking since they don’t use the store that they don’t use any store apps, this is extremely far from the truth as both 10 and 2019’s Start Menu uses store tech, and the calculator and a few other in-box apps that an office worker might use as well. Look at this screenshot from my home computer for clarification. We can get further into AppLocker if you want but this isn’t the focus of today’s post.

Home

Luna made her award-winning (she won the office competition twice) Vegan Chili again and I’m stoked to eat it for dinner, right now it’s in the slow cooker but I can hear her prepping it to serve! She ended up pouring this over assorted pasta noodles and I’m eating it as I edit this post, it is good but will be better after sitting in the fridge overnight and then warming again in the slow cooker.

Friends

A few friends were making fun of me last night for ensuring I got a place the car fits in, and then letting it sit outside during an ice-storm. I’ll need to clean out the garage to fit the car, we were doing great with it until the last trailer load when everything just landed and stayed in the garage. We’ve moved a few boxes and items but not enough. I did get a new scanner and unpacked the shredder so that’ll take care of a few boxes. Next, we’ll need to sell things we don’t use that aren’t playing the roll of cold backup items, like how we have the GoPro Hero7 Black in case something happens to the Hero8, I don’t need 8 ergonomic keyboards (or however many there really are) and some old hard drives won’t be going into the NAS or the PC so they can go after I verify the contents, and hopefully find my old crypto-coin wallet.

Health / Resolutions

I don’t normally do resolutions but after the year we had for 2020, I was compelled to set and complete some goals for this year.

My social media friend and fellow Youtuber Arash Malek Arash Malek 🦆 (@MinimalDuck) on his channel: Minimal Duck has been daily Vlogging, which is pretty difficult from my experiences posting videos daily. One thing he’s been doing all this year is doing 100 pushups every day, I had resolved to do pushups, sit-ups, squats, and crunches everyday this prompted me to edit my goal and I also picked 100 push-ups as it’s quite tough to sit there and just watch his videos while he’s there doing a push-up montage knowing I’ve still got another 40 reps to go. After a few weeks I settled on 3 sets of 40 pushups giving me 120 but being easy to remember to do enough and making up for any poor form.

Besides the push-ups my resolutions are to:

• Publish an average of two videos per week on the channel which would see me adding a minimum of 104 videos this year.

• Lose 50 pounds by year end, the details of this one was at a minimum to come down one pant size, and the weight could go up if it were muscle, at the time I was 28% fat according to the scale.

• Free up the NAS of all unfinished videos

• Have no moving boxes full of stuff.

That’s all for now, catch you on the flipside,

Kacey