- The channel debated the historical myth of “interchangeable parts,” with kanzure_ citing a 2008 paper (“The Legend of Eli Whitney and Interchangeable Parts”) arguing that Whitney’s 1798 demonstration to Congress was largely theatrical and that true interchangeability was never achieved at scale.  
- Participants explored the need for machine-readable, standardized datasheets for non-electronic components (nuts, bolts, kitchenware, etc.) to enable automated part substitution in open hardware designs; existing electronics standards like ECIX XML and ThomasNet/Globalspec were noted as partial precedents.  
- kanzure_ posted links to technical resources: NIST’s revived National Design Repository (gicl.cs.drexel.edu/repository), STEP/ISO-10303-21 CAD files, TDML timing-diagram markup, and sample ECIX component XML (KM736.xml) to illustrate current data-exchange formats.  
- Development discussion on the SKDB (Structured Knowledge Database) project centered on how to represent “ingredients” in fabrication recipes—whether as abstract OOP classes, SKDB packages, or simple material-plus-measurement tuples—and the trade-offs between breadth-first BOM/BOT lists versus fully computable assembly graphs.  
- samrose announced work with Open CASCADE and set up a public Mercurial mirror of SKDB (socialsynergyweb.org/hg/repos/hgwebdir.cgi/skdb/) plus a Hatta wiki, asking about licensing; kanzure_ confirmed GPL for the combined codebase.  
- A brief side-thread on steganography produced procto’s link to “unistegpy,” a Python tool that hides text in Unicode homoglyphs (mockingeye.com blog post), and jokes about sending weakly-encrypted taunts to the CIA.  
- gene recounted that Dow Chemical process plants are conceptually modular (“like Legos”) but require custom catalysts and connections, reinforcing the gap between modular ideals and real-world chemical engineering.  
- kanzure_ received an unsolicited email from an Austin CPU-architect/UT-PhD-student/patent-agent requesting a meeting, prompting discussion of defensive publication strategies such as Mark Tilden’s open-sourced nervous-net patent.