@underlap@fosstodon.org
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

underlap

@underlap@fosstodon.org

Husband, father, grandfather, follower of Jesus, but very much a work in progress.

Retired software developer, visiting lecturer, IETF editor. Likes repairability. BTW I use arch.

Hobbies: reading, blogging, running, sailing.

Delighted to live in Winchester, UK. Involved in a local church.

Banner: Derwent Water
Profile picture: Dorset coast

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

timbray, to random
@timbray@cosocial.ca avatar

Brace your eyes. Here’s a tour of high-end turntables, priced between $10,675 and $500K (no, really). When it comes to the design visuals, “restraint” is not on the menu. https://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/2023-editors-choice-best-turntables-10000-up/?mc_cid=00f29d6af6&mc_eid=a2cee37f05

JR Transrotor Orion turntable
Basis Audio A.J. Conti Transcendence turntable with SuperArm 12.5

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@timbray A blind comparison would be fun.

ben, to workersrights
@ben@werd.social avatar

I wrote this years ago, but I stand by it. Building downtime into your work and lifestyle improves your creativity, relationships, productivity, and health. Are you ready? Let’s go. #work #balance https://medium.com/s/story/rules-for-resters-809e368c0fdb

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@ben Very good. I decided to work a 37 hour week while working for an American company (in the UK) in my twenties. I continued this until retirement. I felt it improved my productivity, but, more importantly helped the quality of my family life and enabled me to develop interests outside work. I am continually shocked at the US workaholic culture and productivity myth and don't understand why more workers don't see through it.

ben, (edited ) to technology
@ben@werd.social avatar

One reason of many why open sourced protocols are more secure: backdoors can't be kept hidden and abused by manufacturers and state actors. This was a serious breach and had the potential to destabilize nations. Secret and proprietary never means more secure. #Technology https://www.wired.com/story/tetra-radio-encryption-backdoor/?utm_source=werd.io&utm_campaign=mastodon&utm_channel=mastodon

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@ben Agreed, but https://blog.acolyer.org/2016/09/09/reflections-on-trusting-trust/

mike, to random
@mike@fosstodon.org avatar

Today we had our 7777th report. Reports aren't something I like to deal with, but I do feel like this is a milestone of sorts. has been around for just shy of 6 years, which means we've been handling over 1000 reports a year, every year, since it's inception. I feel like I need to say a solid thank you to our moderation team, both past and present, for all the hard work they do and have done to keep Fosstodon a place we like to call home. Thanks so much to all of you.

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@dev_ric @mike Agreed. The apparent friendliness here is probably down to the moderation team. Many thanks to them!

It would be interesting to see some stats of what happened about the reports.

underlap, to stackoverflow
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

What, if anything, will protect stack exchange from enshitification? Is allowing LLM Q&As a step in that direction?

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@timbray Fixed, thanks. I started with two t's but was misled by an article that I now can't find.

Interesting observation (as usual). Reminds me of the sequence of video conferencing platforms that went down the tubes. Zoom is currently fine, but perhaps merely overdue a meltdown.

ben, to random
@ben@werd.social avatar

Got into the daycare we wanted. Fuck yeah. 👊

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@ben Delighted to find you on Mastodon! Your posts on Threads were one of the few reasons I hadn't completely given up on the platform. But now I basically have.

I can delete the Threads app and save myself a lot of wasted time. Hurray!

Maybe I'll dip back in there if they ever add ActivityPub support so I can port my followers and those I follow across to Mastodon. Maybe.

#threads #TimeSink #SoLongAndThanksForAllTheFish

danyork, to internet
@danyork@mastodon.social avatar

“Very bad laws are still laws. The Tories are about to pass one that will make the damage caused by Brexit seem like a fart in a hurricane: the online safety bill. It will ruin your experience of the internet. Guaranteed.”

——
The online safety bill: taking a sledgehammer to the internet in the UK?
Using the Online Safety Bill to prevent harm to children is like saving them from drowning by boiling all the water in the UK into space
https://yorkshirebylines.co.uk/politics/the-online-safety-bill-taking-a-sledgehammer-to-the-internet-in-the-uk/

#internet #uk #OnlineSafetyBill

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@danyork If true, one of the scariest statements in that article was "One of their key luminaries at an earlier stage of the process was Nadine Dorries."

I don't think I've seen "luminaries" and "Nadine Forties" in the same sentence before.

timbray, to random
@timbray@cosocial.ca avatar

Hey, a minor announcement: An IETF thing I helped with has been approved and will be getting an RFC number in a few weeks: https://www.ietf.org/archive/id/draft-ietf-jsonpath-iregexp-08.html

A small-ish subset of regular expression syntax/semantics, should work interoperably across the (many) popular regexp implementations.

Mostly for use in other specifications I think?

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@timbray Congratulations to you and Carsten! Let's see who uses this, apart from JSONPath...

benjaminhollon, to random
@benjaminhollon@fosstodon.org avatar

For any Linux enthusiast, administrator, developer, systems engineer, or overall neck-beard, the terminal is the meat and potatoes of a good chunk of day-to-day work and interaction with Linux. Your terminal's shell is a powerful tool to make your work easier and more fun to work with.

Configuring your shell to work for your needs is a useful skill to have and is at the heart of automation in your terminal environment.

https://tty1.blog/articles/shell-yes/

Special thanks to @btp for this guest article!

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@benjaminhollon @btp Excellent! Thanks.

robpike, to random
@robpike@hachyderm.io avatar

Never better! Went for a nice trip.

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@robpike Get well soon, especially your neck!

timbray, (edited ) to random
@timbray@cosocial.ca avatar

Dropped by Bluesky for the first time in a while. I'm a Fediperson but still have sympathy with what they're trying to do, and the tone seems to have stabilized for the moment.

Anyhow, I have 30 invites that I haven't thought about in a while, so, giving them away. Reply to this post if you want one. In case that's more than 30 people I will invent totally arbitrary and questionably fair criteria for handing them out.

Maybe stop if there are already a huge number of replies.

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@timbray Can't spare the time, but I'd be interested if you'd care to blog about Bluesky.

feditips, to random
@feditips@mstdn.social avatar

In case you missed it, all links on Mastodon count as 23 characters towards your limit, no matter how many characters the link really is.

So, you don't need to use link shorteners on Mastodon as they won't actually affect the link's length.

Mastodon does this because it's better for everyone's privacy to avoid link shortener services, it means people can see what they're clicking on, and the link won't stop working if the shortener service shuts down.

More info at:

➡️ https://fedi.tips/you-dont-need-link-shorteners-on-mastodon/

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@feditips Nice! I notice that the CW counts towards the limit too, rather than having its own limit. I wonder about alt text on images?

timbray, to random
@timbray@cosocial.ca avatar

Strong piece, about an aspect of the that has been on my mind:

https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/is-it-hot-enough-yet-for-politicians-to-take-real-action

  • what will it take to flip the switch and create a global emergency mindset that will force the political action necessary to save our descendants’ lives?
  • when the switch flips, what are the top 10 painful high-impact things we could do to break the carbon curve’s back?
underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@timbray I think ethical investment by individuals as well as pension funds etc. could have a major effect by incentivising appropriate corporate behaviour.

See, e.g. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58544966 and https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/money-finance/shopping-guide/ethical-investment-funds.

Another source (https://makemymoneymatter.co.uk/21x/) claims "Cut your carbon 21x more than going veggie, giving up flying and switching energy provider simply by making your pension green."

timbray, to fediverse
@timbray@cosocial.ca avatar

Hey, enjoying the summer? Long weekend for Canada Day up here.

How about amusing yourself with an essay on #Fediverse Governance, with #FaceBlock & #fedipact as a case study… Is that an exciting topic or what?! https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/202x/2023/06/24/Fediverse-Governance

11. Most Fediverse instances are run by a single person who has essentially dictatorial control, usually a software professional who did the work to set the instance up and continues to co-ordinate its care and feeding. Most of these people are decent and competent. Some are neither. 12. Most Fediverse instances are funded by voluntary donations run through Patreon or equivalent.

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@timbray I wonder if we will end up with sections (maybe partitions?) of the fediverse that federate freely within each section but which block other sections. An an extreme example, I wonder if truth.social federates with gab (and will threads federate with both of them)?

It's interesting that many of the current instances in the fediverse seem to have compatible values, e.g. left, liberal. Did the Mastodon CoC set the tone? https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/blob/main/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md. Or are these values prevalent among techies?

underlap, to random
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

Everything must be paid for twice https://www.raptitude.com/2022/01/everything-must-be-paid-for-twice/

benjaminhollon, to random
@benjaminhollon@fosstodon.org avatar

Installing Debian 12 now. Wish me luck.

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@benjaminhollon I really liked Debian!

Shame it couldn't handle my graphics card (https://gist.github.com/glyn/b61d087f08f9ed0e0ca051228ed1676a), but hopefully YMMV.

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@benjaminhollon @Anachron Debian's slower updates attracted me too, but after I switched to an older kernel (because of graphics problems), it felt like I was living on borrowed time. Plus I would hit bugs or missing features because of lagging behind. So it wasn't quite the sweet spot I'd imagined.

Now on arch, I occasionally hit bugs after a rolling upgrade, but, so far, these have been resolved in a couple of weeks after another rolling upgrade.

void is tempting because of no systemd...

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@benjaminhollon @Anachron I wonder how tricky it would be to set up dual-boot, e.g. arch plus void, so I could switch distros with an easy way to revert?

timbray, to random
@timbray@cosocial.ca avatar

This is actually not about XML, despite the title, it's about us geeks being fashion victims, and I really enjoyed reading it. https://www.bitecode.dev/p/hype-cycles

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@timbray Spot on. Shame hype cycles take so long to dissipate. 5-10 years?

governa, to random
@governa@fosstodon.org avatar
underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@governa Just one?!

timbray, to random
@timbray@cosocial.ca avatar

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-weekend-essay/the-case-against-travel

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@_dm @timbray Our family uses a synonym for souvenir: tat.

benjaminhollon, to random
@benjaminhollon@fosstodon.org avatar

I don't read the news. I've mentioned this.

But… I'd kinda like to keep up on news related to Climate Change (as long as it doesn't get into politics, which I'm NOT interested in reading news on). Are there any good dedicated sources for that? Preferably something with :rss:.

underlap,
@underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

@benjaminhollon I doubt that Climate Change can be isolated from politics, so maybe try this: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-crisis

kev, to Futurology
@kev@fosstodon.org avatar

deleted_by_author

    •
    underlap,
    @underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

    @kev Why not encourage Meta to create Mastodon accounts, share their plans openly, and solicit open feedback? 😉

    underlap, to random
    @underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

    Having spent my career in system software, I have next to no interest in web technology. So I have tended to use third party sites, such as blogger and wordsmith.social, for blogging. I can write basic HTML, but I prefer markdown or LaTeX. I don't own a single domain and I'm happy with that.

    Is there a better sweet spot, or site, for those of us who would like to avoid the kind of bit-rot described in @timbray's recent article? https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/202x/2023/06/21/CSS-plus

    Suggestions welcome.

    underlap,
    @underlap@fosstodon.org avatar

    @timbray Tempting!

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