Tim Small

@tim@mastodon.energy
110 Followers
192 Following
731 Posts
Hygrothermal and energy performance of buildings. Embedded control and monitoring software. Computer Science, Physics. Jack of a few trades.
Twitter@linuxtim
emailtim@buttersideup.com
Tim SmallMay 16
Show threadjasegMay 16
@tim @doctormo oh god, this table with poorly aligned numbers typeset in a proportional font is kind of offensive lol
Tim SmallMay 16
Show threadEwen McNeillMay 16

@tim that looks like 1 page per day (not great, not terrible). How did they get to 321 pages??! Is it most of a years worth of billing detail all at once? 🤔

(And yeah, properly encoded even 48*80 characters per page, plus a graph with the same number of data points, ought to be ~5-10kB per page properly encoded in a PDF. So maybe ~3MB or so without any type of dictionary compression, for 321 pages.

Tim SmallMay 16
@doctormo Each page does have a nice graph on it, but still I reduced the file size by 34% by running it through ghostscript (lossless conversion). These files are made available to download permanently through their web site, so they're paying for some extra useless storage there too. The download URL points to AWS, so their S3 bill must be fearsome.
Show threadTim SmallMay 16
@brunogirin For some reason the bill covers the electricity consumption from 21st June 2024 to 4th May 2025. One day per page. They had been crediting me for solar generation and charging for gas consumption, but not billing anything for electricity consumption.
Tim SmallMay 15
Show threadbert hubert 🇺🇦🇪🇺🇺🇦May 15
And not only was this predictable it was predicted: https://berthub.eu/articles/posts/you-can-no-longer-base-your-government-and-society-on-us-clouds/
It is no longer safe to move our governments and societies to US clouds - Bert Hubert's writings

The very short version: it is madness to continue transferring the running of European societies and governments to American clouds. Not only is it a terrible idea given the kind of things the “King of America” keeps saying, the legal sophistry used to justify such transfers, like the nonsense letter the Dutch cabinet sent last week, has now been invalidated by Trump himself. And why are we doing this? Convenience.

Bert Hubert's writings
Show threadTim SmallMay 15
@TimWardCam @zleap@qoto.org Yep, I presume it's something like this however there's probably no law/rule which prevents them splitting the pdf in half and sending the bill as two separate emails, and there's certainly nothing to prevent them optimising the PDF so that it is 34% smaller (with no change in quality) - both of which I managed in 2 minutes (using ghostscript, including time to look up the necessary gs options).
Show threadTim SmallMay 15
@Martinius @zleap@qoto.org I ran it through ghostscript, and that shaved 34% off (no change in quality). That is still apparently slightly too large for my mail relay (after mime base64 encoding) but after the radical innovation of splitting it into two PDFs, I successfully sent it to myself in two emails (from a different email account hosted elsewhere).
Octopus make all of my historic bills available to download via an AWS URL, so I suspect they are paying 34% too much on their S3 bill.
Tim SmallMay 15
JuneSim63May 15

For the first time, the growth in China’s clean power generation has caused the nation’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions to fall despite rapid power demand growth.

The new analysis for Carbon Brief shows that China’s emissions were down 1.6% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2025 and by 1% in the latest 12 months.

#China #CO2Emissions #CleanEnergy

Analysis: Clean energy just put China’s CO2 emissions into reverse for first time - Carbon Brief
https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-clean-energy-just-put-chinas-co2-emissions-into-reverse-for-first-time/

Analysis: Clean energy just put China’s CO2 emissions into reverse for first time - Carbon Brief

For the first time, the growth in China’s clean power generation has caused the nation’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions to fall despite rapid power demand growth.

Carbon Brief
Tim SmallMay 15
Tim Harford May 15

The value of institutional memory

In 1978, a dredging gang working for British Waterways was struggling with a problem. They were trying to clear obstacles on the Chesterfield Canal so they could stabilise a concrete wall — not an easy day’s work. But what really had them stumped was a heavy iron chain on the canal bottom. After various attempts, they hooked the chain to their dredger. That did

https://timharford.com/2025/05/the-value-of-institutional-memory/

#UndercoverEconomist

The value of institutional memory

In 1978, a dredging gang working for British Waterways was struggling with a problem. They were trying to clear obstacles on the Chesterfield Canal so they could stabilise a concrete wall — not an …

Tim Harford
Tim SmallMay 15
Octopus Energy posted me a 321 A4 page electricity bill printed out on paper as a physical 5cm thick package (on their "Agile tariff" the rate changes every half hour, so there are 48 line items per day). I enquired as to why they'd done that?
Apparently they tried to email it first, but the 15 MB email exceeded my email server's size limit, so they posted a hard copy instead.
×
Tim SmallMay 15
Octopus Energy posted me a 321 A4 page electricity bill printed out on paper as a physical 5cm thick package (on their "Agile tariff" the rate changes every half hour, so there are 48 line items per day). I enquired as to why they'd done that?
Apparently they tried to email it first, but the 15 MB email exceeded my email server's size limit, so they posted a hard copy instead.
Show threadEarth NotesMay 15
@tim Goodness! I used to get paper itemised phone bills like that way back when, when I was running UUCP / dial-up service and had most of the street's phone lines coming to may house. (The residue of that cable co is within Virgin Media or Liberty or whatever it is now...)
Show threadDave SmithMay 15
@EarthOrgUK @tim I used to work for a company that wrote telecoms billing software, and there was one customer of a provider who would get a 90kg bill every month.
Show threadUkeleleEricMay 15
@tim you couldn't make it up. Octopus seems to be a bit erratic with billing. We have been with them for some years now. Every now and again, they forget to bill us (or credit us) for one of the three things they should (Gas usage, Electric usage and Electric export). Last bill time (the 19th), the gas and Export were fine. Until after the end of the month, there was a statement saying that some items were being manually reviewed, so I expected the Electric bill to appear eventually. 1/2
Show threadGraham Sutherland / PolynomialMay 16
@UkeleleEric @tim they messed up my billing enrolment and didn't charge me for over a year (I didn't notice, as far as I knew it was going out), then demanded several thousand in back payments all in one go. I eventually got them to strike off a lot of the debt because it was their fault, but it took me another 14 months to pay it off and the financial impact has sucked.
Show thread✧✦Catherine✦✧May 16

@gsuberland @UkeleleEric @tim oh, me too! then they messed it up *again* and tried to charge twice the amount they should have

fucking garbage company. does anyone know an energy provider that isn't?

Show threadGraham Sutherland / PolynomialMay 16
@whitequark @UkeleleEric @tim idk tbh. the weird thing about Octopus is that they're basically the only energy company that's actually transparent and communicative about their pricing changes, and doesn't seem to be run by old oil barron types, but at the same time their backend metering and billing tech is an absolute shambles despite outwardly looking way more modern and polished than the competition.
Show threadUkeleleEricMay 15
@tim But a random nearly £50 credit for electric dating back to September 2022 (!) was there! When our next Gas and Export come through, what's the betting they will still forget our electric usage, and I will have to remind them (in the meantime, our balance looks better, so I'm not worried).
Show threadJohnMay 16

@UkeleleEric
@tim

I had this when I had to keep asking them for a bill each month and the trick is, is you put them in a position where they'd have to hand you something known as a lock letter, which they will not want to do. as then you can complain to ofgem

So the question to ask them is," what do you have to do in order so that I don't have to ask you again?"

also just bypass ocotpus' support on email and email greg@octopus.energy and you'll be escalated to the top tier support.

Show threadPaul SuttonMay 15

@tim Is it any wonder this country is so messed up

1. Why not make it a HTML page on a website
2. Why not make it downloadable, usually pdf or erk DocX Ideally include odf
3. Send e-mail linking to said document

Show threadMartiniusMay 15
@zleap @tim I think it should also be possible to get the pdf size below 15MB. Isnt it mostly black and white text?
Show threadTim SmallMay 15
@Martinius @zleap@qoto.org I ran it through ghostscript, and that shaved 34% off (no change in quality). That is still apparently slightly too large for my mail relay (after mime base64 encoding) but after the radical innovation of splitting it into two PDFs, I successfully sent it to myself in two emails (from a different email account hosted elsewhere).
Octopus make all of my historic bills available to download via an AWS URL, so I suspect they are paying 34% too much on their S3 bill.
Show threadTim Ward ⭐🇪🇺🔶 #FBPEMay 15
@zleap @tim There is an API. There's probably a law/regulation saying that they have to pro-actively send you bills rather than leave it up to the customer to query the API.
Show threadKim Spence-Jones 🇬🇧😷May 15
@TimWardCam @zleap @tim
They’d probably be legal if they sent a one-page summary bill with a link to the detail.
Show threadTim SmallMay 15
@TimWardCam @zleap@qoto.org Yep, I presume it's something like this however there's probably no law/rule which prevents them splitting the pdf in half and sending the bill as two separate emails, and there's certainly nothing to prevent them optimising the PDF so that it is 34% smaller (with no change in quality) - both of which I managed in 2 minutes (using ghostscript, including time to look up the necessary gs options).
Show threadGary Parker May 15
@tim @bert_hubert
Show thread`Da ElfMay 15
@tim Must ... Control ... Fist of Death™.
Show threadMarkNMay 15

@tim The mail must get through!

LoL

Show threadGrant StephensMay 15
@tim haha, had the same thing happen to me when the email bounced. They also couldnt tell me what it'd bounced.
Show threadKevin RussellMay 15

@tim

Wow, dumb answer.

We don't know how to administer a company, is truer, but you wouldnt to be recorded saying it.

Show threadBruno GirinMay 16
@tim if it's for 1 month, that's 10 pages per day, 5 line items per page. Maybe they can optimise their bill format?
Show threadTim SmallMay 16
@brunogirin For some reason the bill covers the electricity consumption from 21st June 2024 to 4th May 2025. One day per page. They had been crediting me for solar generation and charging for gas consumption, but not billing anything for electricity consumption.
Show threadArielMay 16
@tim (slow clap)
Show threadDragonMay 16
@tim I suppose linking to a download in the "my account" area of their website would have been too sensible?
Show threadNicolas SAPA May 16
AMEX have the same fallback if their email bounce.
You also get a letter telling you what happened and that they will still try to send you an email before sending you a physical mail.
Show threadmraaaaakMay 16
@tim To say nothing of their monthly Spin The Wheel game for which they had to add an explanation about how it wasn't a lottery and it's okay for it to be rigged despite appearing like a regular, fair game of chance.
Show threadHelix May 17
@tim
How much does it weigh?
Show threadSteve Hill 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🇪🇺May 18
@tim been there, done that. Although in my case it was because their mail server was sending malformed mails which mine rejected. I pointed out that I could just download the bill from their website, but they said that legally they had to send one so it carried on for a year. I'm sure legally they don't need to send anything *that* detailed - a summary and a pointer to their website for more detail would surely be fine?