[jazzyjackson]

There is middle ground between individuals and governments… I may not need automatic accounting and inventory via spreadsheets at a small scale, but being able to model the next 3 days of weather based on local conditions without any expectation of online communications could come in pretty handy

[palmotea]

> I may not need automatic accounting and inventory via spreadsheets at a small scale, but being able to model the next 3 days of weather based on local conditions without any expectation of online communications could come in pretty handy

Alright. You have a computer in your possession that is vastly more powerful than an 8-bit machine built from scavenged parts.

1. Do you actually "model the next 3 days of weather based on local conditions without any expectation of online communications" with it?

2. If not, do you know how to built the required sensor suite and write the software to do that?

I feel like you're misunderstanding computers as magic boxes that can do some useful thing with little effort. But this is supposed to be a form of software engineers, building a weather forecasting system would be hard to do even with full access to a university library, Digikey, and the money to work on it full time. But we're talking about doing it with scavenged components while you're hungry looking for food.

[vel0city]

Weather forecasts get to be useful when you have samples from a wide range of locations. A few weather stations on maybe a few acres of land wouldn't really get you decent weather predictions. You wouldn't know about some disturbance in the upper atmosphere leading to the jet stream pushing that cold winter blast further South than typical leading to the freeze that destroys your crops. You wouldn't know about that hurricane growing off the shore.