Since D&D gained prominence in the late-70s, it's been a game that outsiders to the hobby don't really understand. It has held the stereotype as that weird maths game where kids play as wizards in basements, or to some: a game that trains you in black magic to be devil worshippers.

D&D is experiencing a boom right now in popularity as the nerdy is becoming cool and many people who would never have dreamt of playing have found themselves with a new hobby. Whether you hold one of those views previously mentioned or are otherwise curious: What would you like to know about D&D and by extension - Tabletop Role-Playing Games?

-LTADnD

I wouldn't really consider it a hobby, but couldn't think of where else to try and have this discussion.

How many of you have ever heard of, or even considered the idea of alternative keyboard layouts!? As unanimous as it is, why are the letters of the alphabet even placed that way on our keyboards anyway? Alternative keyboard layouts attempt to optimize the layout by placing letters in such a way as to make typing more ergonomic. Often ideas include focusing on the home row, rolling fingers, alternating hands, high frequency letters on index and middle etc.

Some examples to look into if you've never heard of the concept:

• Dvorak, the most well known alternative keyboard layout. Prioritizes alternating hands by separating vowels and consonants by hand.

• Colemak. As opposed to Dvorak, prioritizes rolling the fingers rather than alternating hands and attempts to limit same-finger bigrams.

• BÉPO, a layout optimized for the French language!

• Others include Carpalx, Workman, MTGAP, Norman and many, many more. Creating rather than using layouts has sort of become a hobby for some...

So what do you think? Supposed ergonomics vs standardization. Would you ever consider switching or do you think it's a bunch of hocus pocus? Perhaps you have switched or tried to switch and would like to share your experience.

I think it would be sensible to have an option to tell a user if a link was already submitted to a particular group recently. I don't think they should be stopped from posting it, but these reminders would be helpful to avoid needless duplication.

Example of what happens without this. u/cfabbro said this was planned for the future but I can't find it in the docs.

Thoughts?

I'd have to go with The Long Walk, personally. It's quite haunting, the way they had every choice to sign up, but chose to anyway. The way they never quite get used to seeing their fellow walkers get shot. I love the ambiguous fascist state: what exactly happened to America in the Long Walk? There is an oblique reference to fighting Nazis in the 50s for instance, but the time period is never quite mentioned.

All in all, it's remarkable, but terribly sad. It reminded me of boys going off to war, and the truth behind all ambition.

Okay, I know the obvious answer is the history of the files. But how can I, from the command line, really understand what is hiding inside that .git directory?

Today I was doing one of my periodic disk space audits, trying to figure out where my usage goes. This comes from having a 64GB drive mounted as /home on my Linux laptop. I found some 15G of old video files to delete today, so I'm no longer as pressed for space. But my interest was piqued by one thing I have downloaded from Github that is ~120 megs for a very simple program. Poking around further I find that most of that usage is a single file:

$ ls -lh withExEditorHost/.git/objects/pack/pack-df07816cd15fb091439112029c28ebc366501652.pack
-r--r--r-- 1 elijah elijah 102M Mar 14 23:28 withExEditorHost/.git/objects/pack/pack-df07816cd15fb091439112029c28ebc366501652.pack
$ file withExEditorHost/.git/objects/pack/pack-df07816cd15fb091439112029c28ebc366501652.pack
withExEditorHost/.git/objects/pack/pack-df07816cd15fb091439112029c28ebc366501652.pack: Git pack, version 2, 299 objects
$

Is there a unzip or tar xzf equivalent for Git pack files? Naive usage of git unpack-file is only generating errors for me.

Not the release date (last intel: not in 2018, that's all we know), but the content. What's going to happen? Who's going to die? Here are my brief guesses for some of the main characters:

Jon: Inhabits Ghost for a while after his human body's death (like Varamyr in the ADWD prologue), then gets resurrected by Melisandre. GRRM has said he always found it cheap that Gandalf returned hardly the worse for wear in LOTR, so I'm interested to see how Jon's different. In the show he seems slightly more carpe-diem, but it also seems like the show has mostly forgotten about it.

Stannis: Takes Winterfell (look up the Night Lamp theory if you're not familiar with it) from the Freys and Boltons, and holds onto it against an eventual siege by the Others.

Bran: The show has probably disproven this, but I still think he becomes a prisoner of the Others next to his uncle Benjen, because the Others can't kill a Stark for some reason.

Sansa: I think Harry the Heir turns out to be a nightmare, but Sansa learns to deal with him and use the power of the Vale to help the Starks in their fight to retake Winterfell.

Arya: I think she comes back to Winterfell and gives the gift of mercy to her mother, after seeing what she's become.

Daenerys: I think she'll have a longer experience taking over the Dothraki than in the show, and she'll fly west across Essos, laying waste to the free cities and setting the slaves free. In Westeros it will be completely unclear to everyone whether she's mad or not.

Tyrion: I think he will continue to fall into moral decay and after becoming a close advisor to Dany will encourage her "fire and blood" side. (Especially since she's his aunt!)

Theon: Something about "what is dead may never die, but rises again harder and stronger" makes me think he's coming back as a wight.

Victarion: Blows the horn and dies from it.

Cersei: I think Jaime will kill her, and fairly early on. I think Aegon will have the role she had in the most recent seasons of the show.

Jaime: I think he survives the confrontation with Lady Stoneheart and, disillusioned with both her and Cersei, leaves high society to lead the Brotherhood Without Banners.

Brienne: Someone has to die with Lady Stoneheart, right?

Aegon: I think he successfully conquers King's Landing. He'll eventually die by foolhardiness, but probably not for a while.

What do you all think? Anyone I'm forgetting?

I no longer listen to the radio, nor do I discuss music much with friends. My favorite hometown station even switched to Christian rock. So now I'm no longer discovering any new music, and I have no idea what's good. What do you do to keep up with what's good these days?

I've personally read The Silmarillion 3 times and have found comfort and connection with the book and its stories. Sure, the names are still intimidating and the geography confusing sometimes but all that is part of the enjoyment for me.

What I mean by "treat yourself" is something which makes you happy, not just something which satisfies an urge. We all get days where we just want to gulp down a nice plate of spaghetti but what meal do you prepare/buy for yourself when you really want to eat something special?