The “Clean Energy Performance Program” is not needed to meet climate goals, and might actually undermine them.

Consider Waxman-Markey. That’s the name of the “cap and trade” climate legislation that passed the House but failed in the Senate in 2010. It had a climate goal of reducing U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 17 percent below 2005 levels by the year 2020. Instead, the U.S. reduced its emissions by 22 percent.

Had cap and trade legislation passed in the Senate, emissions would have declined less than 22 percent, because Waxman-Markey so heavily subsidized coal and other fossil fuels. As the Los Angeles Times reported at the time, “the Environmental Protection Agency projects that even if the emissions limits go into effect, the U.S. would use more carbon-dioxide-heavy coal in 2020 than it did in 2005.”

The same thing would likely have been true for the Clean Energy Performance Program, which lock in natural gas. Consider France. According to the Commision de Regulation de L’Energie, €29 billion (US$33) billion was used to purchase wind and solar electricity in mainland France between 2009 and 2018. But the money spent on renewables did not lead to cleaner electricity. In fact, the carbon-intensity of French electricity increased.

After years of subsidies for solar and wind, France’s 2017 emissions of 68g/CO2 per kWh was higher than any year between 2012 and 2016. The reason? Record-breaking wind and solar production did not make up for falling nuclear energy output and higher natural gas consumption. And now, the high cost of renewable electricity is showing up in French household electricity bills. //

What threatens the continued operation of nuclear power plants, and nuclear energy in general, is the continued subsidization of renewables, which the Clean Energy Performance Program would have put on steroids. Under the program, utilities would have received $18 for each megawatt-hour of zero-emissions energy it produces between 2023 to 2030, on top of the existing $25 per megawatt-hour subsidy for wind energy.

Under such a scenario, notes energy analyst Robert Bryce, a wind energy company "could earn $43 per megawatt-hour per year for each new megawatt-hour of wind energy it sells. That’s a staggering sum given that the wholesale price of electricity in New York last year was $33 per megawatt-hour. In Texas, the wholesale price of juice was $22 per MWh.” //

A better approach would be for Congress to seek nuclear-focused legislation to expand nuclear from its current 19% of U.S. electricity to 50% by 2050. It should take as a model the British government’s announcement yesterday that it would put nuclear energy at the center of its climate plans. Global energy shortages triggered by the lack of wind in Europe have led nations to realize that any efforts to decarbonize electricity grids without creating blackouts must center nuclear power, not weather-dependent solar and wind.

Electrical engineers should understand what power factor correction is, why engineers should correct power factor, the evolution from power factor to true power factor and various power factor correction techniques

The American astronauts calculated critical course-correction maneuvers on their HP-65 programmable hand-held during the rendezvous of the U.S. and Russian spacecraft.

In the 1920's, Jan Lukasiewicz developed a formal logic system which allowed mathematical expressions to be specified without parentheses by placing the operators before (prefix notation) or after (postfix notation) the operands. For example, the (infix notation) expression

(4 + 5) × 6
could be expressed in prefix notation as

× 6 + 4 5 or × + 4 5 6
and could be expressed in postfix notation as

4 5 + 6 × or 6 4 5 + ×
Prefix notation also came to be known as Polish Notation in honor of Lukasiewicz. HP adjusted the postfix notation for a calculator keyboard, added a stack to hold the operands and functions to reorder the stack. HP dubbed the result Reverse Polish Notation (RPN) also in honor of Lukasiewicz.

In the years that followed, computer scientists realized that RPN or postfix notation was very efficient for computer math. As a postfix expression is scanned from left to right, operands are simply placed into a last-in, first-out (LIFO) stack and operators may be immediately applied to the operands at the bottom of the stack.

Local, have a controller plgged in and go to settings > gameplay > "Use multiseat for this session" and make sure you're in orbit camera.

BeamMP Bringing Multiplayer to BeamNG.drive!
With a smooth and enjoyable experience.

One of the best tools in the engineer’s lightning protection toolbox is a tried, true and frequently underutilized friend, the ferrite toroid.

The principle is quite simple. If you have two (or more) conductors passing through a ferrite, such that the net sum of their currents is zero, then the ferrite is an inert object, just sitting there waiting for something to happen.

If, as in the case with a surge or lightning strike, the current on any conductor increases, such that the net current is no longer zero, then the ferrite core saturates, creates a magnetic field and attempts to induce an equal and opposite current flow in the other conductor(s) — in effect, trying to maintain the zero net total current.

For this reason, ferrites are a very good tool in many ways, not the least of which is lightning protection. Used on a coaxial cable going out to the antenna system, they can also be useful for finding ground loops.

If you have a ground loop, such that not all of your return current is through the coax shield, the ferrite will saturate — and quickly (depending on the amount of the imbalance between feed and return) get physically warm … in extreme cases, I’ve even seen them explode!

Easy to Install

You want ferrite toroids at the output of the transmitter, preferably before the point where the coax shield is connected to the station reference ground (usually where the coax enters the building, but not always, so keep an eye out).

In the course of the installation, ferrites can and should be placed on pretty much every current carrying conductor, including AC lines, remote control feeds and audio/AES lines (don’t forget the STL antenna cable).

For any cable where there is a safety ground connection (for example, the antenna feedline ground referenced above, or an AC mains surge protector), ensure the ferrites are installed between the ground and the equipment being protected. That makes the reference ground connection look like a better path than the equipment, by raising the effective impedance lighting or surge current has to overcome to get to the equipment.

Another use for toroids is helping to reduce pickup (for example, the RF from your AM station getting onto the audio feed for your FM station). The principle is much the same as for lightning protection: The ferrite will help to filter any signal that is not present in equal amplitudes in both the feed and return paths.

Nautel offers several ferrites that can help, and you can order them via our Parts Quotation Request form at http://support.nautel.com/parts.

Some useful part numbers:

• LXP38 — this is a 3/4-inch inside diameter toroid, good for RF rejection and lightning protection on small signal cables.

• LP23 — a 2-1/8-inch inside diameter toroid, good for most heavier AC cables and coax up to 1-5/8 inches (as long as the connectors aren’t already installed!)

• LP32 — a 4-1/8-inch inside diameter toroid, good for the really big AC and RF cables (again, this won’t fit over a 3-1/8-inch EIA flange, so keep that in mind when planning)

• LA52 — a small (1/4-inch inside diameter) clip on ferrite that helps to keep higher frequency (FM) RF out of control and signal wiring. Impedance curve shows 320 ohms at 100 MHz, so it wouldn’t be so good for an AM station, but definitely useful for a higher power FM.

These are RF band-pass filters/shorted quarter wave shorted stub traps. They are a DC short that will pass an FM radio frequency with little or no attenuation. //

Above is the test setup required to calibrate the trap to the correct frequency. A return loss bridge is used in conjunction with an RF spectrum analyzer and 50-ohm dummy load. The analyzer display is a VSWR picture of the performance of the trap at the frequency of interest.

These filters are normally used at the output of an FM (88 - 108 MHz) solid state broadcast exciter as a voltage spike protector. It is, in essence, a shorted quarter wave stub made of 50 ohm transmission line. They are needed on FM transmitters where the next stage of amplification is a tube. An arc in that tube could send a spike of hundreds or thousands of volts back to the exciter causing failure of the exciter's output stage.

Since the filter is DC shorted at the end, it presents a direct short to any DC voltages. It passes the FM frequency of interest because the cable is cut to an exact length. Each filter is cut and tested using a spectrum analyzer with tracking generator and return loss bridge. The return loss at the specified frequency is typically 45 dB, which a VSWR of 1.01:1.

Sometimes they are used at the output of a low power FM station or an FM translator to give lightning protection to the final amplifier. They will also help reject second harmonic radiation as well as offer some attenuation to carriers that are not on the frequency they are cut for. //

Another piece of protection equipment you may want to consider is a shorted quarter-wave stub. One can be placed on the output of an FM exciter, ahead of a tube transmitter, so that any tube arcing is shorted to ground and will not be fed into the exciter.

Our Radio World colleague Mark Persons has an interesting article on his website www.mwpersons.com describing its use. Select “Tech Tips” and look for “Stub Protector for FM Exciters and Transmitters” under the FM Tips column.

The quarter-wave shorted stub connects between your transmitter and your antenna system to short the center conductor to ground. This provides lightning protection for your transmitter. Should lightning strike your tower, the high-voltage pulse travels down your transmission line and meets the stub, where it is shorted to ground.

The stub is virtually invisible to your transmitter and offers 0 dB of insertion loss and an input VSWR better than 1.01. Return loss values are typically greater than –50 dB. Both fixed and frequency-agile models are available.

A real benefit is that the stub is maintenance-free, even after a discharge. There are no parts to replace.

The shorted stub acts as a broadband filter, and in sites where FM is collocated with AM, the latter signal is reduced by more than 30 dB. //

https://www.xenirad.com/

To see how burgeoning lumber prices are impacting the U.S. housing market, we’ve calculated the number of single family homes that could be built with $50,000 worth of lumber. First, we established the following parameters:

• Lumber requirements: 6.3 board feet (bd ft) per square foot (sq ft)
• Median single family house size: 2,301 sq ft
• Total lumber required per single family house: 14,496 bd ft

Based on these parameters, here’s how many single family homes can be built with $50,000 worth of lumber:

Date* Lumber Price Total Lumber Purchased Total Homes Built
2021-05-05 $1,635 per 1,000 bd ft 30,581 bd ft 2.11
2020-05-04 $343 per 1,000 bd ft 145,773 bd ft 10.05
2015-05-01 $234 per 1,000 bd ft 213,675 bd ft 14.74
2010-05-01 $270 per 1,000 bd ft 185,185 bd ft 12.77

By practically any measure, the world today is more peaceful and less war-torn on a global scale, relative to the past.

For instance, declarations of war between nations and soldier casualties have both dropped drastically since the 20th century. Yet, military spending has not followed this trend.
The Top 10 Military Spenders

According to SIPRI, global military spend reached almost $2 trillion in 2020. The top 10 countries represent roughly 75% of this figure, and have increased their spending by $51 billion since the year prior. //

The U.S. isn’t labeled as a global superpower for nothing. The country is by far the largest military spender, and its $778 billion budget trumps the remainder of the list’s collective $703.6 billion. On its own, the U.S. represents just under 40% of global military spending. //

Military expenditures as a percentage of GDP can be used to compare military spending relative to the size of a country’s economy.

When looking at things this way, many of the top spenders above do not appear. This may be an indication of their economic prowess or a demonstration that the money might be used for other vital areas such as education, healthcare, or infrastructure.

#1 🇴🇲 Oman Middle East 11.0%
#2 🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia Middle East 8.4%
#3 🇩🇿 Algeria North Africa 6.7%
#4 🇰🇼 Kuwait Middle East 6.5%
#5 🇮🇱 Israel Middle East 5.6%
#6 🇷🇺 Russia Europe/Asia 4.3%
#7 🇲🇦 Morocco North Africa 4.3%
#8 🇮🇶 Iraq Middle East 4.1%
#9 🇺🇦 Ukraine Europe 4.1%
#10 🇵🇰 Pakistan South Asia 4.0%

If you look at the inner-city areas of Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, or New York, you find a laundry list of issues, from homelessness to rampant crime to cold-blooded murder, almost exclusively attributable to a liberal-socialist policy that has been codified into law. And what does the progressive-left say is the answer? Whaddya know! More Government. More Socialism.

That doesn’t mean that Conservative policies don’t often require force to implement or that those policies don’t create problems bigger than those they intended to fix; it’s just that Conservative policies do those things less often. If Conservatives stuck more often to Conservative principles, they would seek to remove the barriers and triggers which create the problems we are seeing in the first place, the majority of which can be sourced back to the government. Libertarian-leaning conservatives, such as me, are so often frustrated because we watch so-called “conservatives” believe that the answer to the problems caused by socialist policies is simply more government, in the hands of these “conservatives.” What makes conservatives who engage in this action hypocrites is that they are acting like the very liberals they criticize. //

This brings us back to the statements made by the Former President on Monday at COP 26 Climate Summit in Scotland. As always, Obama started with some pandering nonsense which led him to commit what is, to my people, a grievous cardinal sin:

“Since we’re in the Emerald Isles here, let me quote the bard, William Shakespeare, ‘What wound,’ he writes, ‘did ever heal but by degrees.'”

Yes, while the President spoke in Scotland, he suggested they were in Ireland and quoted an Englishman. //

“I can afford to give up a lot of my current lifestyle to benefit the planet because I’ll still have a lot left over. A lot of folks don’t have that cushion. So that means that any climate plan worth salt has to take these inequities into account.”

That leaves me with just one question: What the hell is stopping you? //

If, again, climate change was such a grave threat to our existence, and immediate action is necessary, why would you only give up some? Why would you not give it all up? Why wouldn’t you take the totality of the action available to you, with as much immediacy of which you were capable, to combat climate change? And why is it that Obama thinks he can state so openly and plainly that he just isn’t doing anything and is waiting for others to tell him what to do when he is there, demanding action? Would not the sentence, “I have given everything up to help contribute to climate change goals,” or even “Here is the immediate action I am taking to help combat climate change,” serve his agenda better than, “Welp, someone hasn’t made me do anything yet.” Is the left’s only motivation for an action done so at the end of a barrel of a gun? //

No one in socialism sees themselves as “the worker.” They all envision themselves as some grand societal architect, and that they, in their endless benevolence, will do what is best for the rest of the plebes. It is only when they realize that they too will have to live under the rules they are setting, that they seek ways to create exemptions for themselves, because well, their benevolence has earned it. Obama’s words are no different. He wants to plan. He wants to discuss. He wants to pontificate. But when the sustainable rubber hits the road, he has less than zero intention of ever committing to, let alone engaging in, any meaningful change in his life.

While the name of Singapore Airlines debuted in the 1970s, the carrier’s history traces back to a few decades prior amid the creation of Malayan Airways Limited in 1947. This airline became Malaysian Airways Limited in 1963 before taking on the name of Malaysia-Singapore Airlines Limited in 1966. Singapore Airlines began operations under its current moniker in 1972, going on to become a global powerhouse and achieving numerous awards thanks to its welcoming service. //

The Ocean Steamship Company of Liverpool, Straits Steamship Company of Singapore, and Imperial Airways came together to incorporate Malayan Airways Limited (MAL). The region where this outfit started flying was the recently-formed Malayan Union, which was a combination of the Malay states and the Straits Settlements of Penang and Malacca. The Federation of Malaya was formed in 1948, which underwent several transitions in the following years. //

After launching flights to the United States a few years before, 1972 saw the launch of two names that are still influential forces today. Malaysia-Singapore Airlines split to give both to Singapore Airlines and Malaysia Airlines Systems, with operations of both commencing on October 1st. Notably, Malaysia Airlines System also still flies today, under the brand of Malaysia Airlines. //

Singapore got the 1990s going with the opening of Changi’s Terminal 2. There was also a series of fleet renewals as the airline expanded, such as the $10.3 billion order for 22 747-400 and 30 A340-300 jets in 1994. //

Singapore Airlines stopped flying the 747 for passenger services in 2012, but the family remains in its fleet as a freighter. //

Continuing its trend of experimenting with widebody aircraft, Singapore Airlines introduced the Airbus A380 to the world on October 25th, 2007. This behemoth flew commercially for the first time between Singapore and Sydney. This inaugural flight had 455 passengers and 30 crew members on board. It was joined by the A330 just two years later.

For those who want to lock things down without going offline and moving to a bunker in New Zealand, the first step is to assess the following things:

• What in my digital life can give away critical information tied to my finances, privacy, and safety?
  • What can I do to minimize those risks?
  • How much risk reduction effort is proportional to the risks I face?
  • How much effort can I actually afford?

First, if you're not at home, you should always lock your device before you put it down, no exceptions. Your phone should be locked with the most secure method you're comfortable with—as long as it's not a 4-digit PIN, which isn't exactly useless but is definitely adjacent to uselessness. For better security, use a password or a passcode that's at least six characters long—and preferably longer. //

Second, set your device to require a password immediately after it’s been locked. //

Also, regularly back up your phone. //

[Don't install bad apps -- consider carefully where it comes from, what it does, if you really need it.] //

Consider turning off Wi-Fi when you’re away from home. Your device may otherwise be constantly polling for the network SSIDs in its history to reconnect automatically or to connect to anything that looks like a carrier’s Wi-Fi network. When this happens, your device gives away information about networks you’ve seen and might allow a hostile network access point to connect. Also, your phone's Wi-Fi MAC address could be used to fingerprint your device and track it. //

The same goes for Bluetooth. If your device has Bluetooth turned on, it’s broadcasting information that could identify it—and you. //

Along those same lines, name your device anything other than [Your Name]’s iPhone. Your phone's network name is broadcast all around you, and it's like holding up a beacon saying "Hello, my name is..." //

[Malware protection on your PC] Even allowing Windows Defender to run in the background provides a significant bump in protection over nothing, and disabling it without a very good reason is a very bad idea. //

[Keep your OS & software up to date -- install updates as soon as they are available ]

[Turn on Windows Firewall when in public]

In the event that your physical device is compromised, you can minimize damage by caring for your actual data. To prevent all types of data loss, back up your data—in encrypted form and offline (either locally or in the cloud) so that ransomware doesn’t get the backups, too. Keep multiple backups just in case, because if your latest backup contains the compromised or encrypted files, it's useless.

And don't just back up your data, use full-disk encryption. Period. It's a one-time setting to activate and there are no excuses for not using it. Full-disk encryption transparently encrypts your hard drive so data can’t be read off of it without your credentials. //

Wi-Fi access points and routers that support firmware or software updates add another layer to the security of your devices while web browsing. If you have an older Wi-Fi access point that you can’t update, toss it. //

And, finally, use a password manager. An easy-to-guess password renders all other security efforts moot. Whether it’s a password built into your web browser of choice or a standalone program, use one. Chrome, Firefox, and Safari all have reasonably secure password managers, and you can replicate passwords for web accounts across devices. If you don't like the idea of a password manager because you're one of those folks who just uses letmein123! as your password everywhere, you need to decide if the convenience is worth the price you'll eventually pay when you're compromised. (Spoiler alert: it's not.)

You can do a number of things to reduce the risks posed by data breaches and identity fraud. The first is to avoid accidentally exposing the credentials you use with accounts. A data breach of one service provider is especially dangerous if you haven’t followed best practices in how you set up credentials. These are some best practices to consider:

• Use a password manager

• When possible, use two-factor or multi-factor authentication ("2FA" or "MFA"). This combines a password with a second, temporary code or acknowledgment from someplace other than your web browser or app session. Two-factor authentication ensures that someone who steals your password can’t use it to log in. If at all possible, don’t use SMS-based 2FA, because this is more prone to interception.

• Set up a separate email address or email alias for your high-value web accounts so that all email regarding them is segmented off from your usual email address. This way, if your primary email address is caught up in a data leak, attackers won’t be able to use that address to try to log in to accounts you care about.

• If you're a US resident, make sure to claim an account for your Social Security number from the IRS for tax information access and other purposes.

• Consider locking your credit reports to reduce identity theft risks.

Unfortunately for this young family, though, their nightmare was not over. Instead, two months after their child was returned to them, they received a letter from DCFS notifying them that their names were being added to the state’s registry of child abusers.

It’s “like a nightmare that won’t end,” the father, Chris, told WDSU in their report.

But it is all too common.

Yes, even when the parents have been found “not guilty” of any criminal charges. Even when the family court judge orders the baby returned, declaring that the home is safe.

The system is deeply flawed, preventing most parents from getting any kind of legal due process until after their name has been added to the roll.

At least in Louisiana, it looks like their names are not added until their appeal is waived or concluded. Chris and Tess won their appeal, so their names never actually went on the list. But this is not the norm in every state. And the harm to families is real.

Attorney Andrew Brown of the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) is an ally of the Parental Rights Foundation, working together to bring reform in this area. Andrew was also quoted in the WDSU report: “When you separate a child from their family, you are guaranteed to cause trauma to that child, even if it’s just for a week.”

That’s why we drafted a model bill to provide due process before a parent’s name goes on the list. It’s why we introduced that model to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in 2019 and secured their endorsement of it.

It’s why we supported the work of Brown’s TPPF to bring that model to fruition in Texas during the 2021 session. And it’s why we’re gearing up to introduce similar legislation in additional states in 2022. //

If you know a lawmaker willing to champion such a bill, send them the model (available online here) as a starting point. Then email Michael@ParentalRights.org and let me know who you’ve reached out to (and, ideally, any response you receive).

Tulsi Gabbard 🌺
@TulsiGabbard
The prosecutor in the Rittenhouse trial clearly didn’t do due diligence before making the decision to prosecute. This tragedy never would have happened if the government carried out its responsibilities to protect the safety, lives and property of innocent people.
7:01 PM · Nov 10, 2021

My company policy states I must put all passwords in a password safe shared with management. Is this secure?

As the title says, my company has a policy that all passwords to e.g. our workstations and server logins must be stored in an online safe. I won't say which one but there are some out there you can look at promising the end of password pain. These passwords are then shared with the company's management - I don't know how that bit works, but they can read the passwords too. //

None of the reasons you've given are valid reasons for escrowing your password. There's only a couple valid reasons for escrowing any sort of "authenticator" information. A couple others have touched on these, but I'll try to clarify a bit.

1. Encryption Keys: It makes absolute sense for the organization to have access to escrow copies of your encryption keys. After all, the data you're encrypting (provided you're only using your company's encryption for work purposes, of course) is their data in the end anyway. So, they need to retain access to that data in the event you lose your key or you are separated from the company. However, the encryption key should not be the same key you use for digital signatures. Also, they should not have actual access to your authenticator - the passcode you use for the key. Instead, they should have their own escrow key that works with their authenticator to decrypt your data.

2. Failsafe Accounts: It also makes sense that the organization should have backup copies of credentials necessary to access an Administrator-level account in the event the System Administrator's own account is locked out, or they depart the company. However, the credentials should not be for the System Administrator's own account. They should be for a local system account whose sole purpose is for emergency use. To that end, the account should also never be used for non-emergencies and its usage should be closely monitored and alerted. Traditionally, credentials for accounts like these are sealed in tamper-evident envelopes and stored in a secure, physical vault. It's conceivable that there may be digital equivalents, but I personally wouldn't trust those without a thorough review.

There's two big reasons why it's a bad idea for management to have your password. The first reason is potentially very bad for you, as it could end up causing otherwise unnecessary work for you if things go wrong. However, the second actually turns this around and makes it potentially worse for the company than it is for you if things go really wrong.

1. Potential For Abuse: The obvious one - managers now effectively have unrestricted access to the systems, regardless of whether they should, with the same privileges you have. Most simply this means that the managers may leverage this to do things on the system that they otherwise should not be doing. This also leaves the potential for them to bypass your position whenever they want to rush a particular change along without following standard procedure.

2. Loss of Non-Repudiation: Once someone else has your credentials - and, especially in a case like this where it can be proven they do - they can impersonate you on any systems where those credentials are valid. This makes it difficult to definitively prove that any actions taken by your account were actually taken by you. If a manager does decide to use your account, and ends up royally screwing up the system, it won't be very easy to use you as a scapegoat even though your account is in the logs. Worse for the company is, if you do something to royally screw up the system while your managers have your password, they'll have a harder time proving that it was actually you that did it.

TL;DR: There's no good reason I can think of for management to have any of your passwords. As for the reasons they've given:

1. "If you forget your password..." another System Administrator can reset it for you. Or, management can "break the glass" on the emergency account (see "Failsafe Accounts" above) and do it themselves.
2. "If you turn evil..." again you can be locked out by another System Administrator, or the emergency account. //

No, it is not a good idea. Thomas explained why it doesn't achieve its own goals, but it is worse than that.

Consider what happens when a rogue employee misbehaves causing damage to the company.

During the trial, you are subpoenaed to testify about logs showing that it was the employee who caused the damage, and are asked who else could log in as this employee. You truthfully answer that anyone with access to the safe including all of management could log in as that employee and your logging systems would be none the wiser.

Anything that blurs the distinction between actor and authenticating credentials seriously undermines the company's ability to use access logging to discourage misbehavior or recoup damages.

Managers often hand out passwords to subordinates when an IBAC system fails to explicitly handle delegation, but this is the reverse of that case, where the blurring affects the credentials of the much larger group of lower-level employees.

Appendix A of NIST 800-63B addresses this well. Avoiding password patterns is specifically why they recommend against arbitrary password complexity requirements and arbitrary password expiration times. Passwords should only be force expired on events. Timed expiration and complexity rules encourage patterns that make the password weaker. //

Levenshtein distance as a proxy for password strength is extremely limited, for the reasons that schroeder has outlined. And the user experience will probably be poor.

But the question is still academically interesting, and may be useful as a component for some use cases - so it still deserves a thorough answer. :D

Generally, the minimum Levenshtein distance between a previous password and a new one should be the same size as the minimum length of a randomly-generated password that would resist brute force (adjusted to the attacker's threat model). But it's important to note that even this minimum is often inadequate. //

Best case - the passwords are entirely randomly generated, both initially and later. In this case, Levenshtein distance isn't as relevant (or rather, measuring the Levenshtein distance between two randomly generated passwords is just a proxy for measuring the quality of their randomness). //

If we assume all worst cases (human-generated password, poor password-selection strategy, etc.), the answer should be clear: the amount of change in the password should itself be enough to withstand attack on its own - totally independent of the previous password (as if the first password was empty), and as if it was stored using a very fast hash like MD5. This is reduced to how fast we can reasonably expect a randomly generated password to be exhausted for a given threat model, and is covered well elsewhere (but can often hover around 13-15 random characters). //

In other words ... just like Shannon entropy, usefulness of Levenshtein distance as a measure of password strength is really only useful in cases where the passwords are already randomly generated. And if you're doing that, you already have the information necessary to keep them strong, without trying to measure the difference between two of them.

In even other words ... very low Levenshtein distances are an OK proxy for password change weakness, but high Levenshtein distances are a very poor proxy for password change strength. So my answer tries to find a balance between the two.

u/ABC_AlwaysBeCoding (OP)
....
A few days in I started to see some unexplained panics/freezes. Some Steam games would fail validation... Something was wrong. I ran btrfsck and... it reported problems. I couldn't repair them without booting off another disk so I found my Manjaro USB key I made and booted off that again and attempted to --repair the btrfs drive.

FAIL. It was unable to do it. Unrecoverable errors. The partition was basically hosed! WTF? Luckily I only had "game data" on it and it was all synced with the cloud!

Initially I blamed BTRFS. I was mad. I had heard Ubuntu 19.10 now has experimental ZFS-on-root support out of the box. I was intrigued. I said "fuck it", made an installer key and wiped my disk and ran with it.

Things went fine until... I was installing some big game and... things just stopped. But not like "hang" stopped, I could still move windows around and keyboard input still appeared on the screen, which told me the CPU and GPU weren't the cause... fuck, it's something with the drive. It only cleared on reboot. I was afraid my data or filesystem got corrupt... turns out the former did not happen and the latter is virtually impossible with ZFS (yessss), so I tried again. Again, under heavy usage things eventually just froze. I kept trying different things now that I could duplicate it. I had the idea of forcing heavy activity via manually triggering a scrub and then watch zpool status in another window.

And then sonofabitch, I finally saw it. The drive that had just reported as ONLINE during the scrub, suddenly reported "SUSPENDED: One or more devices are faulted in response to IO failures." zpool clear did not clear it. But now I KNEW it was a drive (or enclosure, or cable, or mobo) issue. I immediately suspected the drive cable (as one does, who has been doing this sort of thing for a while), finally found another USB-A 3.1 to USB-C cable from Plugable that looked solidly built, and substituted it.

BOOM. ALL PROBLEMS WENT AWAY.

So OK, the enclosure guys (really cool enclosure, btw) sent me a bad cable with it. It happens. But...

SOLD... on ZFS. //

u/atemu12
The things btrfs check reported might've been benign warnings, false positives and/or fixed on mount.

--repair the btrfs drive.

RTFM

Warning

  Do not use --repair unless you are advised to do so by a developer or an experienced user, and then only after having accepted that no fsck successfully repair all types of filesystem corruption. Eg. some other software or hardware bugs can fatally damage a volume.

Not reading the manual results in:

Unrecoverable errors. The partition was basically hosed! //

u/ABC_AlwaysBeCoding (OP)
Fair enough. Thing is, --repair may be dangerous but it seems to be impossible to corrupt a ZFS filesystem because there isn't even a way to run any sort of --repair short of a resilvering/scrub. But yeah, I was inexperienced with both of these filesystems, as you can tell.

Btrfs will try to continue regardless of error

This is absolutely the wrong strategy. Once corruption starts, it usually spreads. I think ZFS does the right thing here, even if it is inconvenient (and to be fair, if I had a mirror, it probably would have just continued as well... I think? Maybe I'll keep the bad cable to do resilience testing).

BTRFS basically uses the Golang strategy (ignore errors, be squishy and nondeterministic, just keep going), ZFS uses the Erlang/Elixir strategy (fail fast, fail hard, be brittle and deterministic, restart cleanly) and I am most definitely in the latter camp based on 20+ years in the industry getting paid to program while doing sysadmin for fun or necessity.