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keitmo

227 karma · joined September 23, 2010

[ my public key: https://keybase.io/keithmo; my proof: https://keybase.io/keithmo/sigs/m99sDky3GkxQBN3yiDqXlrRWl8PqBFrZw9S4zLxx5-8 ]
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keitmo··on Type Server Protocol
...365
keitmo··on Parametron: 50s Japanese computer that uses neither transistors nor vacuum tubes
"SQUID Sandwich" would be a great band name.
keitmo··on A Physicist Rigged His Pet Hamster’s Wheel to Upload to Strava
“eat-sleep-run-repeat" -- relatable.
keitmo··on Moving beyond fork() + exec()
NT performed unnatural acts to implement fork semantics for the POSIX subsystem.
keitmo··on Why is almost everyone right-handed? A new study connects it to bipedalism
I'm right-handed, but I snowboard goofy. Coincidence (or not?) my left leg is dominant. I can kick a ball just fine with my left foot, but when I try to kick with my right foot I feel like I'm going to capsize. When I'm riding a bike and I have to stop, my right foot goes down. When I start again I use my left leg to muscle the crank through the first revolution or two.
keitmo··on Backblaze has stopped backing up OneDrive and Dropbox folders and maybe others
It seems to me that Backblaze does NOT exclude ".git". It's not shown by default in the restore UI -- you must enable "show hidden files" to see it -- but it's there. I just did a test restore of my top-level Project directory (container for all of my personal Git projects) and all .git directories are included in the produced .zip file.
keitmo··on The biggest CRT ever made: Sony's PVM-4300
> Touching the circuit board on the back of the CRT tube by mistake trying to troubleshoot image issues, “fortunately” it was a “low” voltage as it was a B&W monitor….

My father ran his own TV repair shop for many years. When I was a teen he helped me make a Tesla coil out of a simple oscillator and the flyback transformer from a scrapped TV. It would make a spark 2 or 3 inches long and could illuminate a florescent light from several feet away. It definitely produced higher voltage than normally exists in a TV, but not orders of magnitude more. The high voltage circuits in CRTs are dangerous as hell.

keitmo··on Windows drive letters are not limited to A-Z
On systems with a single floppy, drives A: and B: were two logical drives mapped to the same physical drive. This enabled you to (tediously) copy files from one diskette to another.
keitmo··on Today I Learned: Binfmt_misc
> but it's an example of why it's a bad idea to "cleanup" a system from a virus without a full reinstall

This x1000.

keitmo··on The Rapper 50 Cent, Adjusted for Inflation
I've always thought of him as Nibble.

2 bits = a quarter (25 cents), 4 bits = 50 cents

8 bits = byte, 4 bits = nibble

Therefore 50 Cent = Nibble.

keitmo··on JSON River – Parse JSON incrementally as it streams in
It's also known as JSONL (JSON Lines).
keitmo··on Robert Redford has died
"Remind me to make you an honorary blind person."
keitmo··on I use zip bombs to protect my server
As a former boss used to say: "Unlimited is a bad idea."
keitmo··on Linux from Scratch
I went through the LFS process back in 2003 or 2004. I didn't have a Linux system handy, so I built it with Fedora 3 running under VMWare on a Windows XP laptop. It was not speedy.

I tried to automate the process as much as possible. There's a separate Automated Linux From Scratch project, but I choose to roll my own. This was my first experience with Bash scripts -- I developed skills (and bad habits) that I continue to use this day.

keitmo··on Vera Rubin's primary mirror gets its first reflective coating
That was breathtaking.
keitmo··on How does the classic Win32 ListView handle incremental searching?
Back in the day (1991 or so) during my brief time as a UI person we called the first mode "H for Hawaii" and the second "HAW for Hawaii". We never attempted the "why not both" option.
keitmo··on 4B If Statements
I'd like to see a fully distributed version. All you need is 4B hosts (IPV6 FTW) named N.domain.com (where N varies from 0 to 4B-1). The driver app sends N to the first host (0.domain.com). Each host compares the incoming N with their N.domain.com name; if they match, return the host's true/false value. If they don't match, forward the request to (N+1).domain.com and return the result.
keitmo··on Othello Is Solved?
I read an article many years ago on programing Othello. I think it was BYTE Magazine, circa early 1980s. It mentioned pitting an app using a simple heuristic technique similar to the one you describe against an app using an equally simple (but devastatingly horrible) "flip the most squares" approach.

The heuristic algorithm won by a landslide -- 60 to 4 or worse (I don't remember exactly).

keitmo··on Ask HN: Is HN Dying?
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headline...

"Betteridge's law of headlines is an adage that states: 'Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no.'"

keitmo··on Ways to shoot yourself in the foot with Postgres
Here's one that bit us a few years ago:

SEQUENCEs, used to implement SERIAL and BIGSERIAL primary keys, are not transacted. "BEGIN; {insert 1,000,000 rows}; ROLLBACK" always adds 1,000,000 to the table's primary key SEQUENCE, despite the ROLLBACK. Likewise for upsert (via INSERT ON CONFLICT).

The end result: A table's SERIAL (32-bit signed integer) primary key can overflow even when it contains far fewer than 2^31 rows.

keitmo··on PFC bans are going to change waterproof garments
For years I've said "any clothing manufacturer that promises something is both 'waterproof' and 'breathable' is lying to you".

Shakedry actually delivers on this promise.

FWIW I do endurance cycling in the Seattle area, a.k.a. "The Pacific NorthWET". We tend to stress the hell out of waterproof clothing.

keitmo··on Shimano Forces Hammerhead to Remove All Di2 Related Functionality From Karoo
"A KMC chain will work with a Shimano derailleur. Shimano should have no problem with that."

IMO if Shimano could DRM their chains and other consumables they would.

keitmo··on Outhorse Your Email
Neigh.
keitmo··on Tell HN: Amazon's book search is gamed, keyword-stuffed, and inaccurate
Cory Doctorow's take: https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/27/not-an-ad/#shakedowns
keitmo··on Storks Deliver Babies (p= 0.008) (2000) [pdf]
My mom was an OB/GYN nurse for several decades. She worked in Active Labor for many years with a nurse named Alice Stork.

This Stork did indeed deliver thousands of babies.

keitmo··on Nominative determinism in hospital medicine (2015)
My mom was an OB/GYN nurse for many years. She worked in Active Labor with a nurse with the last name "Stork".
keitmo··on The New Ten-Factor Authentication Processes
The 11th round involves identifying a correct Nigel Tufnel quote from "This Is Spinal Tap".
keitmo··on Game where you build a CPU and assembly language from circuits
The reminds me of Rocky's Boots(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocky%27s_Boots) taken up a few levels.
keitmo··on Garmin obtains decryption key after ransomware attack
The outage took out at least some of their aviation services. If they are unable to update routes and IFR approach procedures then lives could indeed be at risk.
keitmo··on C implementation of Tic-Tac-Toe in a single call to printf
"The determined Real Programmer™ can write FORTRAN in any language."
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