artvandelay's recent activity
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Comment on America's longest small town, Route 66 in ~travel
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Comment on What have you been eating, drinking, and cooking? in ~food
artvandelay LinkBeen trying out potato recipes recently, tried 2.5 recipes recently. Hash browns Probably the easiest one to make. Just grated a potato, washed it, squeeze dried it, pan-fry it in 1tbsp of butter....Been trying out potato recipes recently, tried 2.5 recipes recently.
- Hash browns
Probably the easiest one to make. Just grated a potato, washed it, squeeze dried it, pan-fry it in 1tbsp of butter. The way I made it was to let the potatoes brown nicely for the first 5 minutes, then keep stirring and letting it sit for 2 minutes at a time, getting it to a nice mixed crispy/fluffy state. Served it alongside a handful of greens.
1.5: Hashbrown egg hash
Calling this 0.5 since its mostly the same as the above and not sure if this is the right name. While my potatoes were frying up, I diced a bell pepper small and cooked it with the potatoes. Once they were like 75% cooked, I cracked in some eggs and just cooked everything together. Honestly tasted really good and seems fairly balanced to me once I added a side of greens again.
2: Home fries with peppers and eggs
Another way of serving the above basically. I followed this recipe from Adam Ragusea to make this brunch for dinner and I really enjoyed it. Never made home fries before and had too small a pan for my 1 large russett potato but things turned out perfectly crispy and not too greasy since I was pretty conservative with my butter/oil. In his recipe, Adam serves it with over-easy eggs but I just hard boiled them since I was feeling lazy.
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Comment on What did you do this week (and weekend)? in ~talk
artvandelay Link ParentYep, we're training an internal coding model, part of the work is seeing how well our internal model does on certain tasks and comparing it to the existing industry models. Definitely agree that...Yep, we're training an internal coding model, part of the work is seeing how well our internal model does on certain tasks and comparing it to the existing industry models. Definitely agree that AI can give you more autonomy. I was a pretty well-oiled machine back in March/April when I had a few workstreams going on in parallel and AI was helping me stay on top of all of them.
It really does remind me of Dilbert haha. Funnily enough, leadership make an apology a few weeks ago about how they handled this re-org and vowed to change a few things. The first thing they called out was the snacks in the office? I can't recall a single person really complaining about office snacks so I don't know what possessed leadership to address that first lol.
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Comment on What did you do this week (and weekend)? in ~talk
artvandelay Link ParentI have nothing against the AI industry but the AI work I'm doing is none of the cool, fun parts imo. The AI work I'm doing is just generating data that would then potentially be used to train...I have nothing against the AI industry but the AI work I'm doing is none of the cool, fun parts imo. The AI work I'm doing is just generating data that would then potentially be used to train models. It's pretty menial work without a real feedback loop.
⚠️Rant incoming, sorry ⚠️
In standard software engineering, I start with a ticket where XYZ metrics are low. I work on things that would hopefully improve those metrics, deploy those changes, and then watch how my changes affect XYZ. If it improves, my job is done and I move onto the next thing. That feedback loop is critical and I really thrived on it. With this AI data generation work, all I do is throw my code into the void. The only signal I get is if my code is high-quality enough to be used. I am not told what makes my code high-quality enough to be used. The only thing I am told is that I have to generate two chunks of data a week. There is no feedback loop. I don't even know how career progression is supposed to work given everyone, from people with 6 months experience to 16 years, is doing the exact same work.
The new AI org I'm in is also just impressively unstable. Major things change every single day. Org updates shared in the morning are outdated by the afternoon. There are different "tracks" of work you could be assigned so that a large breadth of data is generated and you're supposed to be assigned a track for the week on Monday. Often times, they (leadership) will just change your assignment mid-week and go "oops, now you have to work on this". For a company that prides itself on corporate transparency (which still exists in other orgs), this new org is frustratingly opaque and leadership doesn't seem to really understand why people are upset.
I'm glad I still have a job and still earn what I do even with my reduced workload but it's just not what I want to do.
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Comment on What did you do this week (and weekend)? in ~talk
artvandelay LinkFairly chill week (and weekend prior to said week). July 4th weekend was last week and my city had a big fireworks display that ended up being quite disappointing unfortunately. Wasted 3 hours of...Fairly chill week (and weekend prior to said week). July 4th weekend was last week and my city had a big fireworks display that ended up being quite disappointing unfortunately. Wasted 3 hours of my evening trying to both get there and then ended up seeing just flashes of light haha. That weekend wasn't a total wash though, went up north from my city and explored a famous lighthouse which was quite fun.
Last month I was pulled into this new AI org at my company and they had their on-site (corporate lingo for gathering) for this new org this week. I have been a handful of on-sites in my short career so far and I have never seen one where people were less eager to be there than this one. This on-site was also a waste of time, there were multiple presentations that just regurgitated info we'd gotten a month prior. I'm actively trying to switch teams but the ball is in the court of the hiring managers so I can't really do much.
Sorry for my usual work rants in this weekly thread, it's become a bit of a pattern haha.
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Comment on Give me your culture clash stories in ~travel
artvandelay LinkI talked about Korea in my last comment of this topic so this time I'll talk about Japan! First culture shock was just how tightly packed businesses can be in a building and how things often hide...I talked about Korea in my last comment of this topic so this time I'll talk about Japan! First culture shock was just how tightly packed businesses can be in a building and how things often hide in plain sight. My second shock was just how widespread cash and, more importantly, coins are in day-to-day life there.
For the first point, I don't just mean that every building has a different business on each floor, that I see here in the states as well. But what really got me was just how much they try to maximize the space for the business in said building. In the US and the few parts of Europe I've been to, when an elevator in a building opens its doors, it opens to a small foyer/shared space type area before you walk into the business itself. Often, this is where the stairs also connect. Throughout Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya, and Hiroshima, it was common for the elevator doors to just open up into the business itself. It was just little odd to me stepping into an elevator from the ground floor and then when the doors open, you could be in the middle of a restaurant, or a stationery store, or whatever. The stairs would also be weird to me since it'd be completely separated from the stores themselves and be absolutely tiny.
As a result of such high density, it's easy to miss a restaurant or a store you want to go to. Countless times on both my trips to Japan, I would miss whatever shop I wanted to go to since they wouldn't have any obvious signs pointing to it. I remember once my friends and I wanted to go to a jazz bar we'd seen on Google Maps. We got to the building and at first we were confused if we were even in the right area since the building just looked like an apartment building. Even entering and taking the stairs up one floor, it felt like just going through an apartment building. We soon ran into the wife of the owner of the jazz bar that then told us that the unmarked door at the end of the hallway we were in was the jazz bar we were looking for.
In other discussions of culture shocks of Japan, people always bring up the widespread use of cash but what really got me was the widespread use of coins still. Not just in vending machines but cash registers and even some stores would rather you pay in coins than bills. I've never carried around more coins in my pocket in my life than when I was in Japan. More than once I'd often just pull out a handful of coins from my pocket when paying for something and the cashier would help me pick out the most optimal coin combo to pay for whatever I was paying. I eventually learned to just pay for my convenience store purchases with coins to go through them but I now have a concerning number of 1 yen coins in my drawers at home.
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Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games
artvandelay LinkSuper Mario Sunshine through Super Mario 3D All Stars: I never played the original as a kid so this is the first time I'm experiencing Sunshine. This game is rage inducing to me for some reason....Super Mario Sunshine through Super Mario 3D All Stars: I never played the original as a kid so this is the first time I'm experiencing Sunshine. This game is rage inducing to me for some reason. Part of it I think is I'm just used to the QoL niceties in modern games. Part of it I feel as input lag? Not sure if its the game or my TV or my controller but timing things just right is really hard and there are certain things that I've just given up on because I couldn't figure out how to adjust my timing for the input latency. That being said though, fun game overall.
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Comment on European Parliament achieves upgrade to air passenger rights in ~transport
artvandelay Link ParentAh yeah I'd heard about the latter, think under the term "skip lagging". Making it easier to keep your itinerary if you miss the first leg of a journey makes sense to me. There have been many...Ah yeah I'd heard about the latter, think under the term "skip lagging". Making it easier to keep your itinerary if you miss the first leg of a journey makes sense to me. There have been many times where I've seen frantic person or family show up to the gate just as the doors close and they now have to rush to rebook or do something else. Skiplagging is in a gray area to me and I don't want to start an argument in here so I'll just leave it at that lol.
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Comment on European Parliament achieves upgrade to air passenger rights in ~transport
artvandelay Link ParentThese seem reasonable but I'm a bit confused by the last one. An example situation is like say I had a LHR->CDG round trip ticket and an unrelated issue on the train to the airport causes me to...These seem reasonable but I'm a bit confused by the last one. An example situation is like say I had a LHR->CDG round trip ticket and an unrelated issue on the train to the airport causes me to miss my flight and I have to book a different flight for LHR->CDG. Is it just saying that I'm still entitled to my CDG->LHR return flight for no fee? I haven't experienced such a disruption before but seems fairly reasonable.
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Comment on Why does WhatsApp drain so much phone battery? in ~tech
artvandelay Link ParentIf I remember correctly, the OS does pull the notification from Apple's servers but then WhatsApp decrypts the notification content to show you the details like contact name, message content,...If I remember correctly, the OS does pull the notification from Apple's servers but then WhatsApp decrypts the notification content to show you the details like contact name, message content, profile photo, etc.
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Comment on Why does WhatsApp drain so much phone battery? in ~tech
artvandelay Link ParentWhatsApp has a chokehold in the majority of the world with like 90% market penetration in most parts. Even with the rise of Signal and the existence of Telegram, WhatsApp was just at the right...WhatsApp has a chokehold in the majority of the world with like 90% market penetration in most parts. Even with the rise of Signal and the existence of Telegram, WhatsApp was just at the right place at the right time and now both people you interact with daily and businesses you interact with all exist on it. They do a really good job of keeping you locked in.
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Comment on TV Tuesdays Free Talk in ~tv
artvandelay LinkNeeded something light hearted to follow up Game of Thrones, along with something I can kinda just put on in the background as I work-from-home so I've finally restarted Curb Your Enthusiasm. As a...Needed something light hearted to follow up Game of Thrones, along with something I can kinda just put on in the background as I work-from-home so I've finally restarted Curb Your Enthusiasm. As a fan of Seinfeld, Curb felt like the natural next step in that progression and I tried starting it a while ago. I got through most of season 1 but then dropped it as life got in the way. Life is a bit out of the way at the moment so I can start this again. It's very much a product of its time but its fun watching Larry David dig himself into a hole he can't get out of.
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Comment on Why does WhatsApp drain so much phone battery? in ~tech
artvandelay Link ParentI should've clarified sorry, I think it still pulls notification content in the background with background processing disabled. I think if you completely disabled notifications from those group...I should've clarified sorry, I think it still pulls notification content in the background with background processing disabled. I think if you completely disabled notifications from those group chats, that processing would stop.
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Comment on Why does WhatsApp drain so much phone battery? in ~tech
artvandelay Link ParentI think those group chats could be a culprit as well. The app has to process those incoming messages in the background. It doesn't just do a bulk pull on app launch.I think those group chats could be a culprit as well. The app has to process those incoming messages in the background. It doesn't just do a bulk pull on app launch.
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Comment on Why does WhatsApp drain so much phone battery? in ~tech
artvandelay (edited )LinkI'm not a WhatsApp user but I am an iPhone user. I don't think iOS is super accurate with its background power calculations. Sometimes I see apps on there that I know do not do much background...I'm not a WhatsApp user but I am an iPhone user. I don't think iOS is super accurate with its background power calculations. Sometimes I see apps on there that I know do not do much background processing showing up for more time than I even use them. I also know that Apple has its own tricks to make its apps look a bit better here.
I know that for iMessage at least, iOS doesn't count its background processing time the same as it does for third party apps (like WhatsApp) since iMessage is built on Apple's push notification service which is a constantly running system service. iMessage's background processing doesn't show up under "iMessage" but under a generic "System Services" label. Since Apple also separates out video calls into Facetime (also under a separate service), video call processing also shows up separately.
WhatsApp here can then look worse since all of its background processing for messages (like E2EE processing), processes for voice and video calls, location services, etc. are all counted under one big WhatsApp label. So WhatsApp's battery usage here can vary wildly on how you use it. I don't really use WhatsApp much beyond the odd call here and there with family elsewhere in the world and very limited messaging with them. I never see WhatsApp in my battery usage despite my battery health being down to 83-84% as well. I can imagine if you take a lot of calls through WhatsApp, it can show up here under background processing since it has to actively use system resources in the background while you're in a call.
I know Meta is a company not to be trusted but with an app as mature as WhatsApp, I'm not sure how much trickery they can really do for background processing. iOS is both really strict with its background processing allotments (so I imagine WA have optimized the shit out of things) and a bit enthusiastic with how it calculates battery usage. I'm sure there are engineers at Meta who's job is solely dedicated to finding little loopholes for background processing and performance but there's only so much cat-and-mouse hunting/chasing that can be done for an app used by half the world.
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Comment on What have you been listening to this week? in ~music
artvandelay LinkDon't have any specific songs or artists to even call out this week, been too busy to even pick certain ones so I've just been letting YouTube's mixes pick music for me and it's been doing a solid...Don't have any specific songs or artists to even call out this week, been too busy to even pick certain ones so I've just been letting YouTube's mixes pick music for me and it's been doing a solid job. I've been on a Japanese jazz fusion tear recently that hasn't changed this week. Lots of Masayoshi Takanaka, Masato Honda, and more in there.
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Comment on Thoughts on graphene OS? in ~tech
artvandelay LinkI don't run Graphene myself but have a few friends that do. They've had a good experience themselves, though sometimes RCS gets a bit fucky and their messages only send as SMS. Not entirely sure...I don't run Graphene myself but have a few friends that do. They've had a good experience themselves, though sometimes RCS gets a bit fucky and their messages only send as SMS. Not entirely sure if that's Graphene's fault or the carrier however. Other than that, no issues, no constantly tweaking settings to get the basics functioning.
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Comment on Sony is closing the PS3 and Vita digital stores in ~games
artvandelay Link ParentYeah I've seen a lot of cynical takes around this but supporting an online service for 20 years is still impressive to me. While it certainly is easier to get consoles with physical media up and...Yeah I've seen a lot of cynical takes around this but supporting an online service for 20 years is still impressive to me. While it certainly is easier to get consoles with physical media up and running by just buying a cartridge or disc second hand, it doesn't mean that it is impossible to do with digital-only consoles.
Your point on seeing a PS3 at an antique shop reminded me that recently i saw a 3DS (released 2011) in a vintage tech museum, which hit me hard.
It's definitely interesting to see the convergence between PCs and consoles (at least at the architecture level). One other thing I do wonder is that with costs also converging between consoles and PCs (though PCs still being quite a bit more expensive at the higher end), is how multiplayer will be handled. Consoles for the last 20 years have charged users a subscription fee for multiplayer gaming but with Steam, that gaming is free. With the Steam Machine blurring the line between console and PC, would that push console manufacturers to a more similar structure? Is there a timeline where we might see console subscriptions be limited to game renting/streaming like Xbox Game Pass/Nvidia GeForce Now with multiplayer becoming free?
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Comment on Midweek-ish Movie Free Talk in ~movies
artvandelay Link ParentDetails w/ spoilers Yeah one of the things I enjoyed most about Obsession was that it didn't over-do it in terms of jumpscares. The writers really knew how to get under your skin with various...Details w/ spoilers
Yeah one of the things I enjoyed most about Obsession was that it didn't over-do it in terms of jumpscares. The writers really knew how to get under your skin with various scenes and just make you as uncomfortable as possible.
The car murder scene is probably one of my favorite scenes in the movie because you entirely expect it to happen but you just don't know when it'll happen. It made my friends and I jump out of our seats.
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Comment on Too Much Media in ~movies
artvandelay Link ParentI think the copy then becomes illegal but the US government won't be knocking on your door until you try to profit off that copy. Obligatory "I am not a lawyer" warningI think the copy then becomes illegal but the US government won't be knocking on your door until you try to profit off that copy. Obligatory "I am not a lawyer" warning
There's so much to see out there, it really helps bring the scale of the US into perspective when you pass by these smaller towns. For my own shorter road trips, I have started doing something similar and avoiding the main interstate since the time difference isn't massive and I enjoy the journey. There's a treasure trove of smaller towns in my region, usually with anywhere between 1-3k people living in each one and its such a joy being able to stop, grab a drink or a snack, snap some photos, chat with some people, truly recharge and then continue on my drive.
I gained a new appreciation for the natural beauty of the US after taking a course in university, titled Nature and American Culture. It provided an interesting look into how our country has used our natural landscape overtime and how that's shaped our cultural fabric. It was fascinating to see how we sold the beauty of our landscape to draw people to expand westward and then again to help grow our population and legitimize our very young country early in its life.