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jarfil

1,141 karma · joined December 17, 2014

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jarfil··on Backdoor in upstream xz/liblzma leading to SSH server compromise
Archiving the repo doesn't stop the downloads. They would need to rename it in order to prevent distro CI/CD from keeping downloading untrustworthy stuff.
jarfil··on LogoFAIL: Secure Boot bypass with manipulated boot logos
But UEFI can have pretty graphics and mouse support, so it must be better... /s

Now seriously, TPM and GPT are improvements. Customizable SecureBoot along with disk and RAM encryption, are also nice.

jarfil··on LogoFAIL: Secure Boot bypass with manipulated boot logos
It doesn't help that much of the "C development community" is made of electronics engineers writing "some code to make the hardware work", instead of people with a focus on security.

It's similar to the "C++ developer community" being made of CS people writing whatever abstract thing they wish, then blaming the compiler for their code going belly up on one of the myriad of "undefined behaviors".

jarfil··on Twitter has officially changed its logo to ‘X’
Is that TBM small enough to fit on a SpaceX Starship and send it to Mars?

I always thought Boring was a project intended for digging a base on Mars, fitting a whole Tesla in the tunnel would be even more than what's needed to connect some underground habitats.

jarfil··on Twitter has officially changed its logo to ‘X’
It's both.

Trademark law requires registering for a series of categories where a product seeks protection, with each category being relatively specific.

At the same time, suing someone for Trademark infringement requires a judge to decide whether it could "potentially induce confusion in the user".

Could an app be confused for a sausage? Could it be confused for a sneaker?... I'd say not, but I'm no judge!

jarfil··on Reddit Threatens to Remove Moderators from Subreddits Continuing Blackouts
It is an issue of trust precisely because a third party controls the platform. If mods actually owned the infrastructure for their spaces, there would be no trust involved, they'd just own it.

In this case, mods trusted the company making a promise about the platform, breaking that promise breaks the trust in the company, and makes the platform risk plain to see for all.

jarfil··on Reddit Threatens to Remove Moderators from Subreddits Continuing Blackouts
Mastodon, Lemmy, kbin, and the fediverse in general, are right now experimenting an unprecedented growth in number of instances, users, and activity.
jarfil··on Reddit Threatens to Remove Moderators from Subreddits Continuing Blackouts
Reddit is failing right now.

Popular communities already had a lot of people who wouldn't engage in positive discourse, only offset by those massively downvoting and reporting the "noise" comments.

Now that they're the only ones left, all discourse is disappearing, getting replaced by cheap quips and memes.

jarfil··on Reddit Threatens to Remove Moderators from Subreddits Continuing Blackouts
Q1) Sure, why not. Plenty of power tripping people out there wishing for a turn at the banhammer.

Q2) No. The communities are already failing just because the exodus of power users is causing a lack of self-moderation via up/down votes. Add to that random tyrants who haven't built the community, and there is no way for them to survive.

jarfil··on Reddit Threatens to Remove Moderators from Subreddits Continuing Blackouts
Indeed. It can however interact with Lemmy and kbin, which are direct Reddit replacements.
jarfil··on Third-party Reddit apps are being crushed by price increases
"Relay for reddit" offers a good experience: removes header and footer on scrolling, shows a list of post titles with previews, hides all actions behind a finger flick, with less used ones in expandable menus.
jarfil··on Third-party Reddit apps are being crushed by price increases
Teens/young adults, or really anyone "new" to the web/internet, haven't learned yet the importance of information transmission speed, or which use patterns will make them lose more time than get them something worthwhile in return. They're also discovering a lot of "basic" stuff in all types of content, so are more tolerant of what more seasoned users would call repetitive crap. That includes ads, which they are more likely to perceive as novel and entertaining, even be happy to see some of them.
jarfil··on All Bitcoin private keys are on this website
Find the key in no time, but how much time for the information to reach us? If it's a cube close by, then great, but most of them would still be millions of light years away.
jarfil··on Tact Filters (1996)
It used to be that people using the Internet would realize, or were made to realize, that text communication lacks many of the non-verbal cues, so one should always try to avoid offending others, while when in doubt pick the least offending interpretation of what someone else has written.

Unfortunately, decades of eternal September seem to have washed many of those lessons away. With the rise of professional trolls, and the inherent instinct to make a scene of some, now we have people trying to offend on one side, and people trying to get offended on the other... while they're both trying to be the loudest and drown out everyone else.

jarfil··on Cancel We The Web? (2020)
On the other hand, following that logic, in times of peace the soldiers of yesteryear are out of work.

I'm not a fan of cancel culture, but it might be just a sign that priorities have changed for people. Maybe the basic software liberties are enough for most, and it's no longer enough to fight for OSS, but instead time to consider "how" to fight for it. In a sense, it could be seen as a victory.

jarfil··on Loopy Pipe Network Converts back-and-forth flow into one-way flow
Isn't this the same principle behind a Tesla valve?
jarfil··on Is This a Branch?
I've been messing around with some code that uses:

  #define TERN(c, a, b) c ? a : b
I'm not a fan of ternaries, but that macro makes it kind of more ligible.
jarfil··on Google reportedly peeks into Android data to gain edge over third-party apps
All I care about is whether this is opt-in and whether I can decide to not give then that data.

Other than that, Google being able to process more data about their own platform than others, is something to be expected.

jarfil··on US citizens warned they face arbitrary arrest in China
I'm not sure China is underestimating anything. They had an asset, in the form of millions of underqualified workers, and they've used it, to manufacture cheap stuff. But with increasing automation, that asset was never going to last; every passing year it's becoming easier for other countries to replace Chinese manufacturing with local developments, and I think they know it.

In order to stay relevant, China needs a better educated workforce, but in order to control those better educated people, they will need ever better control mechanisms. I doubt they'll be able to make it work in the long run, so they likely will need to change strategies, but right now it makes sense.

jarfil··on Exciting Days for ARM Processors
They will likely have some Apple specific features, but I doubt they'd want to make them incompatible to the point of requiring a software rewrite compared to other ARM chips. Just recompile your stuff, jump through whatever hoops you need to publish it, and that should be it.
jarfil··on Sonder: E-Ink Keyboard
Some people know several languages, but it's difficult to learn a locale well enough to 100% touch type when you only have a keyboard in a single locale, and don't use some of the languages as often as others.

Also, per-software layers with action icons instead of learning alphabetic shortcuts.

jarfil··on Sonder: E-Ink Keyboard
My optimal keyboard would have: mechanical switches, per-key RGB LEDs, MX keycaps with translucent borders to see the LED lights ("pudding" style), per-key legends that would change with the keyboard language and layers.

I only want to be able to look at the keyboard when I'm not familiar with the layout, but I want to be able to do that.

jarfil··on Sonder: E-Ink Keyboard
Eink used to be expensive, have slow refresh rates, and no color. OLED screens on the other hand have vibrant colors and can show videos. The concept of OLED keycaps is still superior, but it needs to be realized much better and much cheaper to be a top seller.
jarfil··on IPFS 0.5
The ping from Earth to Mars varies between 360 and 2600 seconds, so 30 might still be fast enough for an "interplanetary" thing.
jarfil··on US states set to reopen as coronavirus could push jobless rate to 16%
Reopening or not is a simple balance between "risk of avoidable deaths" vs. "risk of economic damage". Different people put a different value on each one of those, which makes it a political decision.
jarfil··on Coronavirus Country Comparator
People normally don't care about realtime death stats, so in many places there is a delay on reporting because nobody ever cared about doing it any other way.
jarfil··on Researchers discover ferroelectricity at the atomic scale
If I get that right, a 1nm layer should behave more like an ideal material, rather that the average of several multi-nm hysterons.
jarfil··on Void Linux: Some Context for Recent Events
Also the #StayAtHome seems to bring out the best and the word in people, and he mentions having covid-like symptoms right before all of this. That amount of stress can be bad.
jarfil··on X410 – X Server for Windows 10
Have you tried Cygwin's X server? I've been using it for many years already with no problems, and it's free (both as in beer and as in freedom).
jarfil··on L.A. Times to Furlough Workers as Ad Revenue ‘Nearly Eliminated’
The fun part about this virus is that it works on a 10 day delay, so you can either prevent infections long before it has a chance to start killing people, or you can start dealing with the epidemic once it's too late to stop it.

Also, California ICUs are at 80% capacity, so there isn't that much room left to relax unless you want them to get verwhelmed and start sending people back home to die.

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