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Jailbird

142 karma · joined December 1, 2011

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Jailbird··on Butlerian Jihad
The book starts out thousands of years after it's all over... but later books (prequels) get into into it for us die-hard followers of the series.
Jailbird··on Show HN: Reladraw – A diagram language where you decide where to place things
(since you ask...) Edges drawn with right angles would be a nice option.
Jailbird··on The quiet renovation at Bitwarden
We say "are bears Catholic?" when in more polite company and we can't get away with asking if the Pope shits in the woods :)
Jailbird··on Empty Screenings – Finds AMC movie screenings with few or no tickets sold
Adding on and being specific: AMC in the GSP mall in Paramus, NJ. Assigned seating for sure.
Jailbird··on Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players
That was my thought when watching the video. The robot is the size of a room if you count all the cameras.

It's like the pitch-o-matic 5000 from Futurama.

Jailbird··on Show HN: What if your menu bar was a keyboard-controlled command center?
I may have missed it, but may I assume a device license is transferable? I mean to transfer it when I ditch my Mac for a new one, so I'm talking about my devices only. I'm just asking to be clear, especially given use of the word "lifetime". Thanks!
Jailbird··on Rubio stages font coup: Times New Roman ousts Calibri
I cross my sevens!

I'll consider starting to slash my zeros. Seems legit.

Jailbird··on 1M Downloads of Zorin OS 18
Did we learn nothing from "A View to a Kill" ?
Jailbird··on Zed is our office
There are canvases.... Some similarities if you squint. Clearly not for code use but for shared durable notes....
Jailbird··on Postgres LISTEN/NOTIFY does not scale
I've seen both of these philosophies. I liken them to religions, the believers are devout. Code is King vs the DB is King.

I'm personally Code is King, and I have my reasons (like everyone else)

Jailbird··on Sri Lanka scrambles to restore power after monkey causes islandwide outage
OK, in all fairness I did think all we were talking about was the trigger, not the underlying vulnerable system (which I already had understood to be less than solid over the years.)
Jailbird··on Sri Lanka scrambles to restore power after monkey causes islandwide outage
I heard similar but haven't found a "no, it wasn't a monkey" article yet.
Jailbird··on Do-nothing scripting: the key to gradual automation (2019)
I'd say that's about the process itself, not the script mirroring the process.

Fix the process, fix the script. Onwards....

Jailbird··on A simple math error sparked a panic about black plastic kitchen utensils
Probably not by Black Plastic Kitchen Utensil Co., though...
Jailbird··on We can now fix McDonald's ice cream machines
What are good places to start down this rabbit hole? (for those willing to have their illusions tarnished? )
Jailbird··on Sound-suppressing silk can create quiet spaces
My first thought was that airplanes need noise canceling for the engine sounds. There's a real difference in a long flight with and without noise canceling headphones. Effective (better?) noise cancelation for the whole cabin would be impactful.
Jailbird··on Gas utilities used tobacco tactics to avoid gas stove regulations
OK yeah, I was just attempting not to project authority but let the data (which I didn't have handy) be the important part.
Jailbird··on Gas utilities used tobacco tactics to avoid gas stove regulations
I'm definitely not an expert, but I would say nothing of note has changed with our utility bill since we replaced the gas cooktop with an induction cooktop. The marketing will tell you it's more efficient because all the energy goes into the cooking (heating the pot) instead of heating the room as with gas. But hey, that's marketing.

One other concern was control: we did find out that the power levels on our model were not linear. The first 5 were all low power for low power needs (eggs, sauces, etc) and then 6 through 9 were much larger increments for high power needs (e.g. frying).

Our experiment before committing was using a plug in cooktop. We got a good one, and even though it was "only" 1800W it made many meals. It's power settings were linear but offered us 0-100% in 1% increments (amazing control! Love that thing.)

Jailbird··on Gas utilities used tobacco tactics to avoid gas stove regulations
After trying induction for a couple of years, I now believe it's superior to gas.
Jailbird··on EBCDIC Is Incompatible with GDPR
I've seen that forever and not just on United. I have thought it's something about the underlying SABRE system that many airlines use. Maybe someone here knows more.
Jailbird··on United Airlines plans to board passengers with window seats first
The article mentions they only plan to do this starting at group 4... So that's

1. All pre boarding (military, families with small children, wheelchairs, etc)

2. Global services

3. Group 1

4. Group 2

5. Group 3

6. Group 4

7. Group 5

I also think Group 2 often seems to me to be the most populous one... that may just be my experience.

I guess now I can see why they'd only save 2 minutes.

Edit: formatting, formatting and more formatting

Jailbird··on Firefox desktop extensions coming soon for the upcoming Android release
Chiming in: on my Android, I do have FF Nightly as my default browser for the whole phone. Recently some Google apps have begun to use Chrome, ignoring the system setting, but mostly, the setting is honored. There might be a few other exceptions but again... mostly honored. (Phone is a Samsung Galaxy S23)
Jailbird··on JavaScript state machines and statecharts
You probably correctly noted the gap between the founder's understanding and the ability of the engineering team to articulate ongoing concerns.

Stepping past that, which they shouldn't, maybe in that gap, the founder picked a tool, perhaps prematurely. They also sought out a more experienced engineer to bridge the gap. Who knows if the engineering team even noticed the gap and attempted to improve communications somehow.

Jailbird··on Making Go telemetry opt-in is a mistake
I'd say there are times when bad data is worse than no data. Consider that the farther away you get from it, the parties involved are either unaware or unwilling to treat it as bad data, so they make make harmful decisions.
Jailbird··on This one-page calendar will change how you view the year
Cute... mental note to either write a generator for these or throw some formulas into Excel Probably will NOT get around to it, though....
Jailbird··on Challenging algorithms and data structures every programmer should try
There was one at work in the 90s. Few of us had heard of it but the search properties against our data in memory were practical and useful (it wasn't just spinning the propeller on our beanies). For years, whenever I'd mention it, no one knew what it was....I suppose it's become more known in the past 10 years.
Jailbird··on A legal dispute that will test the limits of fair use
That seems plausible too, and also lines up with what's happened to copyrights in the US...I can't speak much to real estate, but I'd say copyright went way overboard.
Jailbird··on A legal dispute that will test the limits of fair use
True - I meant the unethical-but-mechanically-possible act of having someone show you the place, then being a jerk and contacting the seller directly.

edit: to be clear, I don't condone that at all, I just mean that's what I considered in thoughts about why we need laws that cover such things.

Jailbird··on A legal dispute that will test the limits of fair use
I've wondered the same thing at times. I eventually came to the conclusion that there are intangible things that society values and must create (concoct) laws to protect the ones that are much too easily subvert or bypassed in ways that effectively remove the valued thing from society.

I'm not sure it's the best analogy, but I considered the protections given to real estate agents as something similar. Why can't people just go negotiate directly with the sellers? I won't go into all the obvious details but there's real work back there, just as with art, and the end result isn't protected very well on its own, hence the need for laws, even silly sounding laws.

Jailbird··on The obsessive pleasures of mechanical-keyboard tinkerers
Interesting - I do still want to stick with off the shelf. I have a WASD V3 (so no QMK there afiact) but also a MacBookPro - for which I'd happilly buy an [off the shelf] external keyboard to get QMK/ZMK, or really - layers/combos/more-keys-as-macros/etc. Since I'm thinking external, that's why I was looking for off the shelf options where it does seem the firmware is all-powerful.
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