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This is some awesome community service from a kick-butt family.

Not the Bee

I vividly remember 2004 when I decided to specialize in MySQL because the year before I was homeless and living in my car.
It’s been a long road and an amazing journey ever since.

Planet MySQL

A relational database is more than a data bank, it’s a profound philosophical expression.
This is the second and final part of “Lessons From 20 Years Hacking MySQL”.

Planet MySQL

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Many job openings in UX assume very specific roles with very specific skills. Product designers should be skilled in Figma. Researchers should know how to conduct surveys. UX writers must be able to communicate brand values.

This article is part of our ongoing series on UX. You might want to take a look at Smart Interface Design Patterns 🍣 and the upcoming live UX training as well. Use code BIRDIE to save 15% off.

The Many Roles In UX

Successful candidates must neatly fit within established roles and excel at tools and workflows that are perceived as the best practice in the industry — from user needs to business needs and from the problem space to the solution space.

There is nothing wrong with that, of course. However, many companies don’t exactly know what expertise they actually need until they find the right person who actually has it. But too often, job openings don’t allow for any flexibility unless the candidate checks off the right boxes.

In fact, typically, UX roles have to fit into some of those rigorously defined and refined boxes:

“V”-Shaped Designers Don’t Fit Into Boxes

Job openings typically cast a very restrictive frame for candidates. It comes with a long list of expectations and requirements, mostly aimed at T-shaped designers — experts in one area of UX, with a high-level understanding of adjacent areas and perhaps a dash of expertise in business and operations.

But as Brad Frost noted, people don’t always fit squarely into a specific discipline. Their value comes not from staying within the boundaries of their roles but from intentionally crossing these boundaries. They are “V”-shaped — experts in one or multiple areas, with a profound understanding and immense curiosity in adjacent areas.

In practice, they excel at bridging the gaps and connecting the dots. They establish design KPIs and drive accessibility efforts. They streamline handoff and scale design systems. But to drive success, they need to rely on specialists, their T-shaped colleagues.

Shaping Your Own Boxes

I sincerely wish more companies would encourage their employees to shape their own boxes instead of defining confined boxes for them — their own unique boxes of any form and shade and color and size employees desire, along with deliverables that other teams would benefit from and could build upon.

🏔️ Hiring? → Maybe replace a long list of mandatory requirements with an open invitation to apply, even if it’s not a 100% match — as long as a candidate believes they can do their best work for the job at hand.

🎢 Seek a challenge? → Don’t feel restricted by your current role in a company. Explore where you drive the highest impact, shape this role, and suggest it.

✅ Searching for a job? → Don’t get discouraged if you don’t tick all the boxes in a promising job opening. Apply! Just explain in fine detail what you bring to the table.

You’ve got this — and good luck, everyone! ✊🏽

Meet Smart Interface Design Patterns

If you are interested in UX and design patterns, take a look at Smart Interface Design Patterns, our 10h-video course with 100s of practical examples from real-life projects — with a live UX training later this year. Everything from mega-dropdowns to complex enterprise tables — with 5 new segments added every year. Jump to a free preview.

Meet Smart Interface Design Patterns, our video course on interface design & UX.

100 design patterns & real-life examples.
10h-video course + live UX training. Free preview.

Smashing Magazine

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I don’t know about you, but I’d consider this pig-on-pig crime.

Not the Bee

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You’ve almost certainly picked up some bad grilling habits. Here’s how to right the ship.

Photo by Eric Yang for Gear Patrol

Whether you’re a grilling novice or have been the go-to grillmaster at family cookouts for years, odds are you’ve picked up some bad grilling habits without realizing it.

In the realm of grilling advice, shortcuts and mysticism are trusted as law, and “the way we always do it” reigns supreme. One summer long ago you may have learned the basics of grilling from a friend or relative, which means it’s likely you’ve been subjected to such drivel.

From the myth of grill marks to the hidden dangers posed by metal wire brushes, here are nine bad grilling habits you need to unlearn before firing up your next cook.

Mistake 1: Aiming for grill marks

Sing it from the rooftops: Steaks, pork chops, chicken and anything else that goes on the grill are not bettered by lines.

As leading internet grill sage Meathead Goldwyn writes, these marks represent “unfulfilled potential.” Grill marks show where the Maillard reaction — that wonderful process that makes the sear so desirable — was and was not successful.

A proper piece of grilled meat should be covered in Maillard reaction, and it should be a uniform brownish color, not pitch black.

Photo by Mitch Kwitek for Gear Patrol

Mistake 2: Thinking more smoke is better

Plumes of white-grey smoke are a sign of poor fire management, not good barbeque.

That thick, cloudy smoke is the result of coals or wood that aren’t completing the combustion process in the fire, which causes the fuel to launch microparticles into the air and onto your food. This doesn’t taste like smoke, it tastes like burn.

The salve is a hotter fire, which results in the whispy blue smoke pitmasters want.

Mistake 3: Not using a meat thermometer

The thermometer built into your grill’s hood — yes, even your super-expensive grill — is mostly useless. Brands don’t invest in quality thermometers, and, even if they did, it would cover the less useful half of temperature tracking on a grill.

Unless you and your family are fond of undercooked meat, the internal temperature of a piece of protein will always be more important than the temperature on the interior of the grill.

Get a temperature probe from a brand such as Thermoworks and quit doing that thing where you touch the steak and then your thumb — it’s weird and ineffective.

Photo by Chandler Bondurant for Gear Patrol

Mistake 4: Spraying Pam on the grates to prevent sticking

A common method to ensure food doesn’t stick to grates is to spray the burning-hot grates with Pam cooking spray or wipe them down with an oily paper towel — this is folly.

Oil applied to grates of a lit grill, unless the grill is operating at a low temperature, will do nothing but burn. When the oil lands on the grate that has surpassed its smoke point (which is typically 400 degrees and below), it instantly smokes up and carbonizes on the grates. This is more likely to make things stickier than they already were.

The fix: Simply oil the meat itself before placing it on the grill.

Mistake 5: Believing BTUs are everything

Short for British Thermal Unit, the BTU represents the amount of the heat required to raise the temperature of one pound of water by one degree Fahrenheit. BTU counts are plastered all over many gas grills, but the measurement has issues.

For one, it’s typically measured at the grill’s maximum output, which is not how we use grills at home. In the grilling world, it’s also more of a measure of how much fuel a grill burns to raise the temperature, which means a highly inefficient, fuel-eating grill can earn a massive BTU count.

Instead of BTUs, ask for maximum temperature when shopping for natural gas or propane grills.

Photo by Gear Patrol

Mistake 6: Using lighter fluid

Google “lighter fluid health concerns” to get a taste of what nastiness comes with your need for a faster fire. What’s more, there’s an option that’s nearly as quick, and comes with less potential for actual explosions — charcoal chimneys.

Coals in the top, paper in the bottom and a lighter is all that’s needed to get coals hot and ready to grill in 10 minutes or less. Plus, it doesn’t smell nearly as bad.

Mistake 7: Cleaning the grates with wire a wire brush

Though it’s been reported on over and over again, it bears repeating: metal wire grill brushes can be dangerous.

The bristles may dislodge from the brush, wedge themself in the grate and enter the food on the grill. This can result in a trip to the hospital at worst and significant pain at a minimum.

A common hack to avoid using the brush is to crumple up a ball of aluminum foil tightly on some tongs and scrub the grates until clean. It’s best to do this after turning up the heat on the grill to allow leftover food to carbonize and then waiting for it to cool down before scrubbing.

Photo by Chase Pellerin for Gear Patrol

Mistake 8: Soaking your wood chips

Think about why you heard you should soak wood chips (or, heaven forbid, logs of wood) before grilling — “it keeps them lit longer.” Technically, that may be true, but there’s a big problem.

The wet wood can’t smoke, which is what it’s there for, until it rids itself of the water that’s covering it. That smoke that comes off the wet chips when you throw them on hot coals? That’s steam, and you just significantly lowered the temperature of your coals, which is bad news.

If you’re worried about wood burning too fast, place it around the edge of your coal bed. Just don’t soak it.

Mistake 9: Using water for flare-ups

Applied by a spray bottle or dumped from a cup, water is not the solution to large flare-ups. Water serves only to spread the burning fat — the cause of the flare-up — around the grates and coalbed.

That’s problematic for the same reason water doesn’t smother a grease fire in the kitchen, and water also creates huge plumes of charcoal dust which can coat your food and create undesirable flavors.

Instead of panicking, close your grill’s lid and the vents. Fire feeds off oxygen first and foremost, so cutting off the supply will dull the flame in the least harmful way possible.

Gear Patrol

I know I’ve spent this series telling you to avoid optimizing too quickly, but I want to…Laracasts

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Stop wracking your brain for passwords and network IDs. This under-the-radar tip lets visitors hop on your home Wi-Fi in a flash without revealing your password.

​eero

Sharing your Wi-Fi network details with friends and family while visiting your place doesn’t require dictating awkward network IDs or passwords out loud. It also doesn’t require writing down sensitive information anywhere. 

Instead, you can pass someone a printed QR code or show them the code on your phone. 

Once guests scan the code with their phone’s camera app, which many people are now familiar with as a consequence of the pandemic, a pop-up message will ask if they’d like to join your network. After hitting “join,” they’ll be automatically signed on without selecting a network name or typing in a password. The QR code will never expire as long as your network details remain the same. This QR code-based login ability was one of the most significant benefits of the Wi-Fi Easy Connect Standard, launched and announced a few years back. 

There are several ways to generate a QR code for your Wi-Fi network. Below, you’ll find several methods we recommend.

THE EASIEST WAY TO CREATE A WI-FI NETWORK QR CODE

Ben Bowers for Gear Patrol

This free website (and others like it) are the easiest way to generate a QR code for your Wi-Fi network. Visit the link, enter your Wi-Fi network name and password, and hit “generate QR Code.” You can even make the code look nicer by choosing different frame designs. 

The catch is that you share your Wi-Fi network details with a third party. So, if you’re conscious of your network security or are concerned about sharing private information online, the other methods below are better bets.

How to Create a WI-FI NETWORK QR Code on ios

Creating a QR code for your Wi-Fi network on an iOS device is a bit more tedious than on Android, though it’s still generally easy. The best part about this method is that you aren’t sharing your Wi-Fi network details with outside parties, so it’s very secure. Here’s what you need to do

STEP 1:

• Open the shortcuts app on your iPhone or iPad.
• Tap the gallery icon at the bottom of the app screen.
• Tap on “Shortcuts for Accessibility” at the top of the screen.

Ben Bowers for Gear Patrol

STEP 2:

• Tap “See All” to the right of access tools
• Scroll down the list of shortcuts shown on the next screen until you see “QR Your Shortcuts.”
• Tap the small plus sign in the corner of the QR Your Shortcuts colored block. This will add the shortcut to your list of shortcuts.
• Now, go to your list of added shortcuts. To do this, tap on the shortcuts icon at the bottom of the shortcuts app screen on the far left. Then tap the “All Shortcuts” folder at the top.

Ben Bowers for Gear Patrol

STEP 3:

• Tap the small plus sign in the corner of the “QR Your Shortcuts” colored block. This will add the shortcut to your list of shortcuts.
• Now, go to your list of added shortcuts. To do this, tap on the shortcuts icon at the bottom of the shortcuts app screen on the far left. Then tap the “All Shortcuts” folder at the top.

Ben Bowers for Gear Patrol

STEP 4:

• Tap the rounded square icon on your list of added shortcuts labeled “QR Your Wi-Fi”
• This will cause a pop-up to appear asking you first to input your Network name. Type in the name and hit done.
• Next, another pop-up will appear asking you to input your password. Once you’ve added in your password, hit done.

Ben Bowers for Gear Patrol

STEP 5:

• A QR Code should appear after completing step 4.
• Clicking done will complete the process.
• You can then tap the QR Code image to pull up a variety of options like saving the QR code to your photos or files.
• Once the code is saved in your photos or files, you can easily print out a physical copy to have people scan.

Ben Bowers for Gear Patrol

How to Create a WI-FI NETWORK QR Code on AN ANDROID DEVICE

Since the launch of Android 10, creating a Wi-Fi network QR code on Android just takes a few taps. Here are the quick steps to follow.

• First, go to the settings page.
• Select network & internet from the list.
• Select your Wi-Fi network’s name and then tap the small gear to the right. This will reveal your network details.
• Tap the share button shown on the right hand side, towards the top of the screen.
• Depending on your device, you may be asked to verify your identity by inputting your phone’s security code or scanning your fingerprint. Once you’ve done that, a QR code should appear.
• The best way to prevent having to do this over and over again is to take a screenshot of the QR code on your device. Next, crop the screenshot to only show the QR code and save it to your photos or files to pull up later. You can also print out a physical copy.

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Gear Patrol

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There are so many folding knives aimed at the outdoors these days that there’s bound to be some overlap. In some cases, that overlap might even be intentional — so intentional, in fact, that when you Google one knife and another one comes up in the results, you can confirm you’re not crazy. This is really happening.

For years, the Benchmade Bugout has been a dream come true for those folks who want a durable, reliable, medium-duty folding pocket knife without the heft. At 1.85 ounces, Benchmade aced the weight challenge. It also hit a home run with the choice to go with S30V blade steel, a wicked popular stainless steel. And the cherry on top, the knife carried Benchmade’s Axis lock. For less than $200, the Bugout became a no-brainer in the world of EDC knives.

This year, CJRB Cutlery reached out to see if I wanted to test out its newest outdoor-focused knife, the Hectare. CJRB deemed it the brand’s “first EDC-focused knife featuring a fast and reliable crossbar lock.”

Looking at the pictures and reading the specifics, I couldn’t ignore the similarities it drew to the Bugout: roughly the same size, sub-3-ounce weight, and a very similar, albeit less refined, design. It fits well in the “Hiking and Backpacking” knife category.

Accepting the offer to test and review the Hectare was a no-brainer.

In short: The CJRB Hectare proves that you can get more bang for your buck. By taking cues from one of the most desired hiking and backpacking EDC knives on the market, CJRB created a $50 knife that questions the need for a $200 one. If you don’t want to spend a lot on a knife but want to experience the hype surrounding the Benchmade Bugout, the Hectare will get you there.

CJRB Hectare Knife Review

Design & Features

The CJRB Hectare is a lightweight, durable, reliable backpacking knife. It features a skeletonized steel frame and G10 handle scales, and deep-carry pocket clip. For a lock, the Hectare relies on a crossbar-style lock. The Hectare has an overall length of 7.35 inches, 3.15 of which make up the AR-RPM9 drop-point blade.

Additionally, the Hectare comes in at a trim and lean 2.69 ounces — a shoo-in for backpacking and EDC requirements.

Last month, Knife Steel Nerds, which I consider to be the authority on knife steel, claimed that Artisan, the parent company of CJRB, made false claims about its AR-RPM9 steel. Dr. Larrin Thomas, the brainpower behind Knife Steel Nerds and inventor of MagnaCut steel, claimed that AR-RPM9 steel was not a powdered steel as Artisan had claimed.

In the end, Artisan apologized for the mistake; however, it seems like the future of AR-RPM9 hangs in the balance. It may need to be reevaluated and renamed. The “P” stands for “Powdered” and the “9” stands for the number of elements in the steel, but there are only 7.

Still, it is nearly identical to 9Cr18MoV, a Chinese high-carbon stainless steel known to excel in edge retention, toughness, abrasion resistance, and corrosion resistance. So politics aside, 9Cr18MoV stands as an excellent budget steel.

First Impressions

I take no issue with a company like CJRB making a knife so similar to a popular knife made by a premium brand. I was eager to see how a knife that costs more than $100 less compares to the knife that inspired it. While I didn’t expect this knife to behave like the Bugout, when it arrived, I was pleasantly surprised.

Though all crossbar lock mechanisms look and perform in a specific way, there are a lot of different versions of it on the market. Out of the box, the crossbar lock on the Hectare was a little resistant to being activated. That’s due to some differences in machined tolerances and the use of heavier springs.

CJRB’s choice to go with caged ball bearings around the pivot complements the axis lock nicely, allowing the blade to swing open smoothly and lock up tight like a tiger.

I like CJRB’s decision to use G10 handle scales. They’re durable and provide an excellent grip. On the Hectare, CJRB machined them to allow the knife’s steel frame to nest into them. This increases the overall foundation of the knife without impacting its size. And it keeps the weight under 3 ounces.

But even with this full frame embedded into the handle, the Hectare still exhibits the known flex that the Bugout has when you squeeze its handle with the blade open. This is a clear indication that this is a light- to medium-duty pocket knife.

In the Field

Out in the world, the Hectare performed really well for a $50 knife. Heck, its overall performance was on par with a $200 alternative. I had some concerns it wouldn’t hold up to use and abuse at the level I treat the knives I test. But those all washed away within the first few uses.

I never thought it would fall apart on me, but $50 sits on the low end of the spectrum for what I consider a reliable knife. So, while I’m not shocked that the Hectare made it through a few months of living with me, I am surprised at how well it held up overall.

I hate to be the guy who says he spent a lot of time cutting rope and cardboard with his knives, but I actually did with the Hectare. Both rope and cardboard (along with meat) can dull a knife edge quickly. I’m happy to say that wasn’t the case here. After 4 months, the blade needed to be honed to return to its factory sharpness, but it was far from dull.

After opening and closing the knife via the crossbar lock several times, I decided to rub it down with a Scotch Brite pad. The machined-in tapers on the buttons were a little annoying and got caught on my thumb, irritating my skin. It’s either a process CJRB missed or didn’t think was necessary. It’s by no means a deal-breaker, though, and is easy to fix.

Like all of the knives I test, the Hectare spent plenty of time in the elements and dirt getting wet and gritty. At no point did it falter. Even now, the knife doesn’t show any signs of wear or tear.

But I will say that the pocket clip on the Hectare is a little sensitive. At some point, the clip pulled away from the surface of the handle scales. It’s not a lot to cause any issues in carrying, but it should be noted.

Ergonomically, I had no issues using the Hectare in demanding situations. It still has the flex that’s associated with the Benchmade Bugout, but I’ll chalk that up to being the nature of the beast. Though it’s noted and noticeable on both knives, it does not impact performance.

In Conclusion

It’s key to keep in mind that any lightweight knives, from any brand, are medium-duty at best. You can’t baton the spine to split kindling or pry with them. They are designed to prep a tinder bundle and food for the fire, or open boxes from Amazon — stuff like that.

Though the form and finish of the Hectare might be missing some of the geometry that make the Bugout look more refined, it’s hard to ignore the fact that both knives function the same. That includes the AR-RPM9 steel.

No, I am not saying that AR-RPM9 is as good as S30V in the long run, but it’s good enough for the day-to-day use the average person doles out. It may turn into sand after 20 years of abuse, whereas S30V will still be riding high. Maybe I’ll swing back around and write a long-term review about it then.

All in all, the Hectare serves as another indicator that budget knives have their place in the viable EDC knife market. Brands like CJRB, CIVIVI, and SENCUT prove you can get a quality knife at a lower price.

The steel may not have a buzz-worthy name, but that won’t impact the way it performs. In the case of the Hectare, you won’t find any issues unless you want to. This knife exceeded my expectations, sore thumb and all. Expect to see the Hectare in the next update of the Best Knives for Hiking & Backpacking.

The post The CJRB Hectare Does Everything the Most Famous EDC Outdoor Knife Can, for $100+ Less appeared first on GearJunkie.

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