paleBlue @paleBlue@qoto.org

So suddenly there’s a lot of attention around email and it’s exposing how many people in the web community still use Gmail. Like actually trust all your personal information and communication (and that of your potentially marginalised or vulnerable contacts) with Google. 🤮

There are a lot of hard problems and lack of alternatives when it comes to rights-respecting technology. But email (as imperfect as it is) has a fair few affordable alternative providers. Small change, big difference.

Do me a favor, if you spend any time at all writing using a pen, get yourself a fountain pen. They are so much nicer.

In the days of uncertainty and fear, please share something that made your day today :))

I'll go first: I got to be home with my family after 10 weeks of school.

@freemo I remember that example from the following:

https://youarenotsosmart.com/2013/05/23/survivorship-bias

I wish this blog kept posting more like this!

Some of my absolute favorite Tolkein quotes:

“A man that flies from his fear may find that he has only taken a short cut to meet it.” -- The Children of Hurin

“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”

“I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.
"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” -- The Fellowship of the Ring

“A single dream is more powerful than a thousand realities.”

"Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.” -- The Fellowship of the Ring

“What do you fear, lady?" [Aragorn] asked.
"A cage," [Éowyn] said. "To stay behind bars, until use and old age accept them, and all chance of doing great deeds is gone beyond recall or desire.” -- Return of the King

“Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisioned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape?. . .If we value the freedom of mind and soul, if we're partisans of liberty, then it's our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can!”

“But I have been too deeply hurt, Sam. I tried to save the Shire, and it has been saved, but not for me. It must often be so, Sam, when things are in danger: some one has to give them up, lose them, so that others may keep them.” -- The Return of the King

#LOTR #tolkein #quotes #english #writing #LordOfTheRings #quote

I'd say this sums up our philosophy on #QOTO rather well

"People must be trained to desire, to want new things, even before the old have been entirely consumed. [...] Man's desires must overshadow his needs."

It's embarrassing, frustrating and angering to realize how many times I fell for this.

FlightGear is a free, open-source, cross-platform flight simulator.

https://www.flightgear.org

Mac download is 1.8 gigs, expanding to 2.72 gigs. Waiting for that expansion as I type this.

#toyprogrammingchallenge

I want to propose a programming challenge. This could be fun for beginners and experienced programmers as well. It is language agnostic. It might even be more about community than the programming part itself. The challenge itself should not take more than an hour. But it shouldn't be so simple that you don't have to put in a little effort. I will propose the first one, and those who participate are welcome to propose the next and as we can agree on it we can go off and knock it out.

Once you see other people's results you can modify your own, or even propose something to make someone else's better or faster or fix a bug that you find.

These can become toy programs for you to have around for testing concepts, and helping to try out other languages.

If you are interested or know someone else who might want to play too share this with them.

I guess we can use this thread to get started, and I guess i am supposed to use a hashtag for something like this so how about #toyprogrammingchallenge

I will try to work in Python at least in the beginning but you are welcome to work in whatever you are comfortable with.

#toyprogrammingchallenge
First challenge:

"Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall"

Generate the whole song from "Ninety-nine" to "No". The output should look like :

Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall.
Ninety-nine bottles of beer. Take one down,
pass it around... Ninety-eight bottles of beer.

(You know what the middle looks like)

Two bottles of beer on the wall.
Two bottles of beer. Take one down,
pass it around... one bottle of beer.

One bottle of beer on the wall.
One bottle of beer. Take one down,
pass it around... No bottles of beer.

I won't put too many specifics on how you get there, but the output should be words, not numerals :) Try to write clean, maintainable and visually understandable code.

Let see if I am alone or anyone wants to play along. :)

Here is my first attempt total time 48 minutes.

https://git.qoto.org/Absinthe/ninety_nine_bottles

If you post something on social media, you are explicitly inviting people to comment and share their opinions. If that is not your intent then set privacy settings accordingly.

Regardless if you post something and are offended by respectful differences of opinion, and go so far as to silence those opinions, then **you** are the problem.

If you expect people to listen to your views on blast without giving them the common decency to reply, and be listened to in return, its time for you to reevaluate yourself because you are likely the perfect example of why the world is falling apart right now.

I used to use #JuiceSSH #Android app for my SSH needs. But since the last update was June 2017, I searched for a new one.

So far I'm satisfied with #Termux, no root required. Termux is also available in the #Fdroid repository, which is a plus.

Site etiquette indicates my first toot should be by way of an introduction. Seldom comfortable tooting my own horn (pun intended)* I'll keep this brief(ish).

I am a philosopher and historian based in Sydney and currently a doctoral candidate at the #Macquarie Business School; researching Edmund #Burke and his implications for executive leadership.

I chose to undertake my study in a business school, grubby though commercial ends may seem to elevated minds, because Burke was an intensely practical thinker. As he noted:

'‘The End of learning is not knowledge but virtue; as the End of all speculation should be practice of one sort or another… [for] Knowledge is the Culture** of the mind; and he who rested there, would be just as wise as he who should plough his field without any intention of sowing or reaping.'***

In this context, it seems fitting to attempt to apply Burkean research to practical ends.

I am also a passionate advocate for technology reform, which drew me to Mastodon, as I do not think unrestricted access to an individual's data is necessary for the provision of services. #ProtonMail, #Signal, #Threema, #NextCloud, #Mastodon and co. are all demonstrating that FAANG methods are not the only viable way of providing digital connections.

N.B.:
*Thinking intended puns, I am always reminded of the joke about a man who entered a local newspaper's pun contest. He sent in ten different puns, in the hope that at least one of the puns would win. Unfortunately, no pun in ten did.

**Culture in the original sense of ploughing for sowing later.

***Burke, A Note-Book of Edmund Burke, 82-83.

#introductions

Where is the Hall of Fame for developers that committed bug-free code? 🤔

...

whenever I actually watch lobbyists speak at hearings I am reminded to work even harder on encouraging "oh do I really know enough to speak?" experts I know to call up the legislative staffers and ask for an invitation to give oral testimony at these things. #nysprivacy

Good morning lovelies, may you have a nice day

absolute truth, fuck the majority.

Its funny cause its true.