robryk @robryk@qoto.org
I enjoy things around information theory (and data compression), complexity theory (and cryptography), read hard scifi, currently work in infosec, am somewhat literal minded and have approximate knowledge of random things. I like when statements have truth values, and when things can be described simply (which is not exactly the same as shortly) and yet have interesting properties.
I live in the largest city of Switzerland (and yet have cow and sheep pastures and a swimmable lake within a few hundred meters of my place :)). I speak Polish, English, German, and can understand simple Swiss German and French.
If in doubt, please err on the side of being direct with me. I very much appreciate when people tell me that I'm being inaccurate. I think that satisfying people's curiosity is the most important thing I could be doing (and usually enjoy doing it). I am normally terse in my writing and would appreciate requests to verbosify.
I appreciate if my grammar or style is corrected (in any of the languages I use here).
Joined Nov 2020
robryk
boosted
2677. Two Key System
title text: Our company can be your one-stop shop for decentralization.
(https://xkcd.com/2677)
(https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2677)
robryk
boosted
I'm looking for an USB XLR interface that's Linux-friendly. Currently I'm using Behringer UMC202HD and it's constantly problematic.
Boosts welcome!
robryk
boosted
It used to be the case in #Haskell that
:t 3
would give you
3 :: Num a => a
but
let x = 3
:t x
would give you
x :: Integer
because storing a value in variable forced the system to commit to a specific type.
Nowadays, though, the latter gives you
x :: Num a => a
What changed? I'm at a loss as to how to search the web for an answer to this one.
possible electrical energy shortage
I'm surprised that I haven't seen any appeals to clean the radiators in the fridges. (And now am trying to figure out how to get at mine.)
robryk
boosted
twitter quote on CS
there is NO field that more grievously overestimates the layman's understanding of what they do than computer science. if you do too much programming you ascend/descend to an entirely different plane of existence where you think that regular human beings know what linux is
https://twitter.com/katiedimartin/status/1569530531959967746
Do you know of any text media (e.g. newspapers, but also blogs that aspire to journalism) that "show their work"? More precisely, ones that describe not only what they figured out, but also how they did that and, ideally, also the failed avenues. An example of a publication that goes in that direction (but not as far as I'd ideally want to see someone go) is Bellingcat.
Maybe you know journalists who publish (with a delay and redactions, for obvious reasons) log of all the research they're doing?
So, apparently swiss aviation regulator has restricted the number of passengers on a single historic aircraft as a permanent safety measure (in response to an accident from 2018).
If we ignore the effect on the price (by way of reducing total passenger throughout), I think this actually reduces safety. Ensuring safety of an aircraft takes work that mostly doesn't change depending on the number of passengers. Thus, aircraft with fewer passengers require more effort per passenger. So if the amount of passengers remains constant, we end up with more work (incl. more work for authorities) for the same level of safety.
Is there a mechanism (other than reducing the total number of participants) that could cause this change to improve safety?
I just learned of https://github.com/pixeldesu/fediverse-friendly-moderation-covenant (from the koyu.space's open singups announcement) and noticed the "this is from a bygone era" warning that you've added a few days ago. That warning confuses me: I don't understand what changes make it undesirable to adopt such rules. Would you mind elaborating a bit on that?
(Obviously feel free to not answer, or answer in any less public way if you prefer that.)
@moonbolt It just occurred to me that you might enjoy http://freefall.purrsia.com and might be unaware of it.
robryk
boosted
> We discover ÆPIC Leak, the first [...] CPU bug that leaks stale data from the microarchitecture WITHOUT using a side channel. [...] leaks stale data incorrectly returned by reading undefined APIC-register ranges.
> ÆPIC Leak is like an uninitialized memory read in the CPU itself.
What a wonderful time to be alive. https://aepicleak.com/
So, apparently not all dessicants are safeish to eat: CaO is apparently used as a dessicant (the reason it's not safe to eat is that it generated a surprisingly large amount of heat when reacting with water).
I'm curious why are dessicants from lime preferred (ever). The pictured bag is from a package of seaweed, which makes me doubly surprised: one might e.g. not notice that the dessicant bag has ruptured.
Why do ~all mice and trackballs have keys with short travel? For keyboards, ~most custom builds use switches with large-fraction-of-cm travel. For mice and trackballs, I haven't seen a single custom build (not ploopy, not a few other trackballs or mice I've seen) that uses something other than microswitches, perhaps with a level arrangement, that gives travel in the range of a single mm.
What would be wrong with a mouse (or a trackball) that used mechanical keyboard switches for buttons?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Filkers is a very varied collection of individuals
https://nitter.net/fchollet/status/1550930876183166976
I am really confused. This seems like Amazon being (wilfully?) blind to people using their platform for copyright infringement against book publishers. Do book publishers have ~zero clout? If CDs were still common, would Amazon be just as passive if this were happening to music?
Random, riddle-ish:
Population of Goms, VS (in Switzerland) is going to be 10x normal for the next two weeks.
TIL:
https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=milk
> milk (n.)
> (...) Of milk-like plant juices or saps from c. 1200 (...)
robryk
boosted
The sigil was drawn in ash, salt, and blood. The candles, carefully placed at the cardinal points, flared up, as a tired figure appeared.
"You have misspelled Azth'luh."
"I didn't," the summoner said.
"There, you have written Azth'loh. Summons an editor, not a demon."
"I know."
#MicroFiction #TootFic #SmallStories
Some part of our "ability" to read things from faces of other humans seems to be projection, while we intuitively think otherwise: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuleshov_effect
I enjoy things around information theory (and data compression), complexity theory (and cryptography), read hard scifi, currently work in infosec, am somewhat literal minded and have approximate knowledge of random things. I like when statements have truth values, and when things can be described simply (which is not exactly the same as shortly) and yet have interesting properties.
I live in the largest city of Switzerland (and yet have cow and sheep pastures and a swimmable lake within a few hundred meters of my place :)). I speak Polish, English, German, and can understand simple Swiss German and French.
If in doubt, please err on the side of being direct with me. I very much appreciate when people tell me that I'm being inaccurate. I think that satisfying people's curiosity is the most important thing I could be doing (and usually enjoy doing it). I am normally terse in my writing and would appreciate requests to verbosify.
I appreciate if my grammar or style is corrected (in any of the languages I use here).
Joined Nov 2020
