johnvaluk

I learned from experience that spending years at the same chair and desk can do even more damage. As part of my rehab, I switched to a laptop so I could move from couch to chair to table to standing desk easily. I also highly recommend using a motorized adjustable desk, now that goods ones are easily available and affordable. A perfectly customized height for sitting or standing is just a button push away, and I can use multiple monitors again.

For anyone affected by this, a simple trick to reviving a Sansa Clip+ that won't turn on is to hold the power and home button simultaneously for about 20-30 seconds. Let go and press the power button and it might turn on.

I'm not sure what causes these players to become unresponsive. It's happened to me when it tries to play an unusual file or after I've transferred music to the device and left it plugged into the computer for a while.

They are still my favorite standalone portable mp3 player, even with the stock firmware.

Hatari is also available on Linux and includes a Falcon emulator for those of us who lusted after one but were never able to purchase it.

Comcast Business requires customers to use a gateway provided by Comcast to support static IP addresses. I was thrilled to finally get IPv6 support, but it seemed impossible to prevent Comcast from inserting their own nameserver in IPv6 leases, which broke my network. I tried running my own dhcpdv6 and radvd servers to no avail. This took me way out of my comfort zone and much deeper into the weeds of IPv6 than I ever expected to go. I finally disabled IPv6 (and I can't even tell you how I did it) to get things working properly again. Maybe I don't have the required skillset to implement IPv6 properly, but I really got the feeling that Comcast introduces unnecessary obstacles for business customers with slightly advanced needs in order to serve the lowest common denominator (aside from my special requirements, IPv6 mostly worked out of the box, which is probably their goal).

Did you lock your keys in your trunk and need your key to unlock the trunk release? No problem, just pull off the casing with your hand and poke the mechanism with a stick. Let's face it, car security is generally a game of rock, crowbar, towtruck.

"Cover art specifications: A perfect square."

...which we will butcher by rounding the corners in all of our apps.

I have a workflow that that depends on complex ImageMagick commands that can take several minutes to run. GraphicsMagick is faster, but ImageMagick produces much higher quality results for my use case, so I stuck with it. Since they forked 20 years ago, neither is a drop-in replacement for the other and each has its own strengths.

If I could switch back to Freshservice circa 2018, I would do it in a heartbeat. Every change they've introduced since then is perplexing.

I agree it's wasteful and the trend is getting worse, but 5+ years of reduced tech support calls from family for such inexpensively performant devices is an incredible value. I'd wager more Windows machines were tossed into landfills simply because they were compromised within 3 years.

Most Intel-based ChromeOS devices from before 2017 are still easily recyclable into capable machines if you can flash the firmware and install Linux. I use several for for DNS/DHCP/media/file servers and test machines. Some of them have batteries that outlast my newest laptops, so a UPS is unnecessary.

It stinks that recycling unsupported devices is getting more difficult, but it's happening across the board regardless of platform. I'd still recommend a ChromeOS device to nontechnical users for a worry-free experience.

So true. The shell encourages one to reason about and simplify workflows by leveraging programs that already solve the complex problems. I'm continually amazed at how many lines of code I can replace with a Bash one liner.

I got vaccinated because I didn't want to die from COVID. I'm okay with getting an annual booster, as I am with getting an annual flu vaccine. The risks of not getting vaccinated were too high for me to accept.

I'm still interested in how resistance to the disease emerges in the unvaccinated population. It will help to inform our response to the next pandemic.

Men who don't suffer from Alzheimer's disease are far more likely to get their Viagra prescriptions refilled.

Honestly, no. The whole process felt like a scavenger hunt. In theory, it should be simple: 1) Connect a drive containing media to a USB port. 2) Enable DLNA server. 3) Select the server in a DLNA client and play the media. It sounds like something that should be a standard feature in any smart TV or networked media device. It's surprising how many bugs and bad interfaces I encountered along the way.

Once I got it working, I liked the built-in DLNA media server in my particular ASUS router enough that I retired my Jellyfin server.

After several false starts, I finally figured out how to configure the DLNA server in my router to serve files from USB-attached storage to the smart TVs on my LAN. Then I installed the VLC app on my iPhone and it discovered the DLNA server immediately as a UPnP File Server in the Network tab. It works pretty well, except it doesn't show the cover art for music files. The MacOS app also discovers the server, but the interface is completely different. Overall, I'm impressed, though I did have to do some online searching to figure out how to do some basic things like random play (you have to start playing a song to access the shuffle icon).

You can load music on an Apple Watch, but it's probably not worth the effort for most people. The only time the feature is useful is if you're nowhere near your phone.

I've been experimenting with isolating work activity from personal activity. It's amazing how difficult it is to prevent information from leaking between networks and applications. It's hard to find alternative solutions for entrenched convergence/convenience features like copy/paste, messaging and entertainment. Working remotely reveals too much about your personal and work relationships to corporations and VPNs only help to connect more dots. I can't curl up in a hammock with 3 laptops and a phone on a nice day, so I keep returning to a single device that does it all.

I've used Roku in various incarnations (box, TV) since it was released and was excited when the official YouTube app was finally available. But lately, it's been painful to watch YouTube due to the constant and disruptive advertising. Part of me is looking forward to the app being pulled from Roku, since it's so much like the cable TV experience I thought I was escaping. I don't feel this way about the other premium channels I use (Netflix, Prime Video). Is it worth paying for YouTube? Will pulling the app make it impossible to use the premium (paid) service on Roku devices?

My common sense is tingling, telling me that Apple's eventual move will be one of malicious compliance, finally implementing e2ee in a way that provides them with culpable deniability and users with a much desired privacy enhancement.

Well put. But isn't the concern here with some utilities becoming ... people? Either way could result in disfigured souls. Is AI simply a pursuit of slavery without guilt?

Location has has become a huge thorn in Google's side in a number of areas:

- Geographical location of data (Data regions) for Google Workspace

- Culpable deniability about a user's location when anonymously accessing Google Maps

- Compliance with local laws where the user is physically located when accessing a service

- Region locked applications

- Financial/banking restrictions

I'm sure there are more. Google is justifiably concerned about compliance and liability. That's the incentive for these changes, not improving the user experience.

I wish Microsoft had continued to develop Windows Phone as an alternative to Windows, instead of trying to incorporate some features into Windows as Metro, which met with inevitable backlash. I would have loved to see it evolve into a tablet/touchscreen laptop platform on its own merits.

Note that seasoning cast iron has nothing to do with flavor. It refers to the coating that develops after seasons of use. The primary benefit is that it prevents rust. A very nice side effect is that food tends to stick to it less. Seasoning is best accomplished in a controlled environment, but it's also fine to just start using it (with oil) and lightly clean without soap after use. Eventually, it might start to develop a useful coating in key areas.

You know those completely useless files (.DS_Store, ._foo.bar, etc.) that you see whenever you expand an archive or clone a repository from a developer who uses a Mac? Finder drops those turds.

I'm having a hard time accepting the premise of this article. Does it contain any verifiable facts?

Thanks for the clarification. I wasn't aware of this defensive mechanism and only noticed the suspicious probes.

All of the IRC channels I used to visit had very high signal to noise ratios, but I ultimately abandoned the platform for two reasons:

1) Penetration testers relentlessly scanned my IP address every time I connected.

2) Endless PMs pleaded for help recovering accounts with "forgotten" passwords on various servers.

I never fell victim, but got tired of feeling like a target.

Does that bypass any alerts that would be presented to the user by the browser?

While the threat of publication is a risk, the data has already been breached and you are no longer compliant with the law.

This appears to depend on user interactivity. How would you silently (and accurately) use this technique to fingerprint a system for cross-browser tracking?

This is common in the Enterprise and makes me wonder how many companies are undermined by their own accounting/billing departments. Typical problems include:

1) Vendor agrees to to NET 60, but begins to display warnings to end users on day 30.

2) We want to purchase 100 licenses in bulk, but vendor will only sell individual licenses directly to each user, who must pay using the vendor's payment system, with no exceptions or alternatives.

3) Vendor does not have a method to process payment for multiple invoices combined in one check.

4) Vendor sends invoice to wrong account at the same enterprise (way too common).

What's frustrating about these examples is that there is no sales pitch needed; we've already decided to purchase the product. Taking our money shouldn't be the hardest part.