lbutler

30 ms·

1.
by lbutler 10mo ago
I'm building epanet-js[0], a local-first web application for simulating water network. The goal is to replace clunky, expensive enterprise desktop tools (which often charge $10k+ for a wrapped version of the open-source US EPA engine).
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Epanet-JS October 2025 Progress Report(epanetjs.com)
1 points by lbutler 11mo ago|0 comments
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by lbutler 1y ago
The GIS system is generally the base for a hydraulic model. You use that data to build a connected graph structure that the hydraulic engine, EPANET, uses to run calculations to figure out the pressure at the nodes and also flow rates in pi
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by lbutler 1y ago
Currently the two largest vendors of hydraulic modelling software are Autodesk and Bentley. Both have taken the EPANET engine and created private forks in the 90s/2000s and never contributed back. The commercial tools have made it easi
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by lbutler 1y ago
One of the two authors of epanet-js here - you can check out the source code for the app here: https://github.com/epanet-js/epanet-js
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by lbutler 1y ago
We created this from a fork of Placemark[0] to give water utilities an alternative choice to the big players, Autodesk and Bentley. The majority of commercial modeling software uses the U.S. EPA's engine and adds a nicer interface. The
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Show HN: Epanet-JS – A local-first, FSL-licensed app for water network sims(app.epanetjs.com)
3 points by lbutler 1y ago|1 comments
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by lbutler 2y ago
I’m building a local-first web app, and SQLite works well for my case since a single project can be contained in one database file, just like users are used to with existing desktop applications. What I’d really like is an easy way to sync
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Big Companies Cashed in on Mississippi's Water. Small Towns Paid the Price(nytimes.com)
3 points by lbutler 3y ago|0 comments
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Placemark is now open source(macwright.com)
3 points by lbutler 3y ago|3 comments
11.
by lbutler 3y ago
At the start up I work at [0], we use an open source library I developed to run hydraulic models of water networks in JavaScript [1]. A hydraulic model may be between 1-10MB and the simulation results can end up being 100+MB of time series
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by lbutler 4y ago
For those that haven't seen them, the two Technology Connection videos on dishwashers are must watch 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rBO8neWw04 2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ll6-eGDpimU
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by lbutler 4y ago
I've found decent success sharing short product features videos, always less than 15 seconds, on LinkedIn. Making the videos run much faster than normal, at least 1.5x and up to 3x in parts means you can provide a lot more density of i
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by lbutler 4y ago
I'm a civil engineer and I wrote an open source library that compiled a C library to javascript for my own personal projects - epanet-js [1] A water utility in Spain spun off a start up called Qatium [2] and they used my library as the
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by lbutler 4y ago
I created a handful of application around water engineering/modelling [1], plus an open source library to run the simulations in javascript [2]. A water utility in Spain spun off a start up to create a similar web based water modelling
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by lbutler 4y ago
I work as a water engineer, specializing in building hydraulic models so water utilities can simulate their network. A big part of that is calibrating them which can be time consuming, you look through hundreds of options. I create a few we
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by lbutler 5y ago
Many thanks to tsholmes for finding a solution and sharing it with me. He has requested the full amount be donated to Nine Lives Foundation, proof of donation can be seen here: https://ninelivesfoundation.networkforgood.com/
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by lbutler 5y ago
I've had confirmation from a couple of sources now that this is indeed a SQLite file, or at least a derivative of it, with some key information missing. If you email me how you know it is a SQLite file and what is missing, I can also s
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by lbutler 5y ago
SEEKING FREELANCER | $2,000USD bounty - Work complete, and bounty donation at users request I'm working on an open-source library in a niche civil engineering field. I have a proprietary file format that I would like to decode and supp
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Show HN: Simulate Water Network Shutdowns(shutdown.modelcreate.com)
1 points by lbutler 5y ago|0 comments
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by lbutler 5y ago
EPANET ( https://github.com/OpenWaterAnalytics/EPANET & https://www.epa.gov/water-research/epanet ) Chances are the water network that's connect to your home was modelled using this FOSS
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by lbutler 5y ago
I think the vast majority of this thread agree with you that what we saw in the article was incredibly dangerous to the employee. In my example these sites are unmanned 99% of the time but if there was an operator on site and someone back i
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by lbutler 5y ago
When I worked at a water utility we would occasionally have people breaking into our remote sites like water towers either to vandalise them or climb the assets for the view. When you just want people off your site ASAP we found providing t
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by lbutler 5y ago
A webapp to help me calibrate hydraulic models of water networks. The original concept was in excel and VBA. I ended up pulling out the engine as a separate open source library which I've used on a few other projects. https:/&#x2
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by lbutler 5y ago
I'm a Civil Engineer who spends roughly half my time programming. While I'm not the best engineer or programmer out there, blending both skills has been a massive advantage for my career. My boring advice is to just start solving
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by lbutler 5y ago
In the video comments he includes a link to a tutorial but essentially he is dumping all the frames and then running a script to content aware scale down the frames 50% and then merges it all back together.
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by lbutler 5y ago
You can also apply this to each frame in a video for a rather interesting effect. My brother has a YouTube channel full of content-aware scaling videos: https://youtu.be/a8k3b-QNbhs
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by lbutler 6y ago
Simulating water distribution networks in JavaScript. I maintain a JS conversion of the EPA's simulation engine EPANET. https://epanetjs.com/ https://github.com/modelcreate/epanet-js I've bui
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by lbutler 6y ago
I finished the website for my open source library to simulate water distribution networks, epanet-js. Can't imagine there are too many civil engineers here specializing in water modelling, it's a pretty niche field! https:/&
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by lbutler 6y ago
Thanks! If you're interested I wrote an article listing all 7 FOSS apps I created this year on LinkedIn [1], I also have a site for my main library [2]. I'll eventually convert part of one of these into a B2B app to keep what I do

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