The most difficult math problem in this year’s HSC

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The “HSC” in Australia is the “High School Certificate” which you get when you graduate high school. In order to do that you have to take the final exam, known as the “HSC exam”, or simply the “HSC”.

When I did the HSC 24 odd years ago the top level maths course (which I took) was called “4 Unit Maths”, whereas these days the top level course is now called “Maths Extension 2”. I expect the difficulty increased over the decades too.

Here’s the hardest question from this year’s Maths Extension 2 HSC paper:

There’s an article about it all in the newspaper today: ‘Not seen a question like it’: The most difficult problem in this year’s HSC.

I don’t remember enough about complex numbers, geometry, and trigonometry to answer this question, it is quite beyond me.

Early Content #11: Demo of the ALKOY Capacitor Discharge Pen | In The Lab With Jay Jay

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This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video on this show’s homepage which is here.

You can support this channel on Patreon: patreon.com/JohnElliotV

In this video I demo my new ALKOY Capacitor Discharge Pen.

The bench multimeter I use in this video is my OWON XDM1041 and the bench power supply is my RIDEN RD6006.

The demo circuit used a 1KΩ 1/4W resistor, a 25V 330μF electrolytic capacitor, and an 18V supply.

Thanks very much for watching! And please remember to hit like and subscribe!

Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

Yum Cha Heat Shrink Wire ConnectorsThis is an image of the product.

Let’s go shopping!

Prototype Circuit Board

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Also variously known as “stripboard” and “veroboard” I got myself some of this TZT 10PCS DIY 2.5×6.4 2.5*6.4CM Prototype Paper PCB Universal Experiment Matrix Circuit Board Single Row Continuous Hole 25x64mm. AU$4.71 for 10 pieces, delivered. The boards are fairly small, 25x64mm.

And also some of this: diymore 5PCS/Lot 50X100mm 2-3-5 Joint Universal PCB Boards Single Side Copper Prototype Print Circuit Boards Breadboard. AU$4.28 for 5 pieces, delivered. These are a little larger at 50x100mm.

I still haven’t found exactly what I’m looking for when it comes to stripboard, gonna keep my eye peeled. This is what I have so far:

FILCO Majestouch 2SS Edition Keyboards

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I ordered two new keyboards this morning. I got a 104-key one and an 87-key one. The gory details are documented on the keyboard page on my wiki.

Usually I like to buy V3 keyboards from WASD Keyboards in America. But the price for the two keyboards delivered would have been AU$841, which was just a bit too expensive for me.

So I had a bit of a hunt around and I found these Japanese FILCO Majestouch 2SS Edition keyboards on Amazon:

They both come with MX Speed Silver switches which are the ones I like.

While I was researching I found the following content mill articles which I enjoyed reading to learn more about mechanical keyboards:

Adrian Black goes PRO

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In my feed today a note from Adrian Black from Adrian’s Digital Basement that he was retiring from his infosec job and going full-time content creator for his YouTube channels. His announcement is here. It’s fun because I managed to be the first person to wish him luck and my name was in the credits because I now support him on Patreon! You can see the proof in the screenshot below! :)