Greetings all over again~!

Howdy Boyz~!

Been a while since I've been here,
but thought to let you all know that I was.
I took a year off of my plans to convert my mill to
better learn about Linux and take care of my family.

Having done that, I'm ready to dive in again~!
I never stopped thinking about it, and so
have some questions to fire off already. :)

What's the state of EMC these days?
Last I heard, there was some talk of redoing the code of it.

I've got one of the old Dan Mauch 4 axis encoder
boards and wondered if I could hook up a linear scale to it?
Anyone ever do that?

Anyone ever find inexpensive linear scales?

Has anyone come out with an inexpensive ballscrew solution for mini mills?

Referencing a thread from today, I understand that the cheapy
DROs are not suitable for use as encoders, but does this also
include using digital calipers for the same purpose?

Other than that, what else is happening, guys? :)

Best,

Weyland