Crespyl's recent activity

  1. Comment on What's a setting that you'd recommend? in ~tech

    Crespyl
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    I have an odd one. If you've enabled developer options on your Android phone, you have access to a feature that I kind of think ought to be under the accessibility options: "Show taps". All it...

    I have an odd one. If you've enabled developer options on your Android phone, you have access to a feature that I kind of think ought to be under the accessibility options: "Show taps".

    All it does is provide a subtle visual hint wherever you tap on the screen, which isn't much, but I find it useful feedback that the phone is doing what I want/that I did press where I intended to. It also helps make things clearer when I'm casting or screen recording.

    I've had it enabled since I found it years and years ago, it's one of the first things I set up on a new phone (along with MessageEase ThumbKey as my keyboard).

    3 votes

  2. Comment on Request: resources for learning digital electronics in ~comp

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    My gut reaction, as someone currently enrolled in a 16 week Digital Applications class, is that that is a wildly ambitious course to have no prerequisites and to try to cover everything from...

    My gut reaction, as someone currently enrolled in a 16 week Digital Applications class, is that that is a wildly ambitious course to have no prerequisites and to try to cover everything from boolean algebra to CPU design and assembler in only 9 weeks.

    I don't have a lot of material to offer, though as ackables suggests, nand2tetris is a great project to work through.

    One resource that has helped me in the early stages is https://www.boolean-algebra.com/. It'll help show how to work with boolean algebra, and can also build k-maps and circuit diagrams.

    4 votes

  3. Comment on Is Tildes protected from malicious actors, aka paid trolls, aka bots? in ~tildes

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    https://xkcd.com/810 All that aside, I'd prefer to know I'm conversing with actual humans, but at this stage if someone set up an LLM bot with one of the major providers and set it loose here, I'm...

    If the bot doesn't violate rules and norms here then presumably it would just continue.

    https://xkcd.com/810

    All that aside, I'd prefer to know I'm conversing with actual humans, but at this stage if someone set up an LLM bot with one of the major providers and set it loose here, I'm not sure we'd be able to spot it quickly, depending on the prompting and integration. Known bots that provide useful functions can be great, but they're deterministic. Maybe I'd feel better about a flagged bot account that could be summoned with a keyword? Eh.

    I'm here to talk to people. Maybe one day software can graduate to people-ness, but we're not there yet.

    18 votes

  4. Comment on How are Framework Laptops? in ~tech

    Crespyl
    Link
    I've had a Framework 13 for about three years, and I've been pretty happy with it. I got the "DIY" version that comes without an OS, and put Arch on it (btw). I've been pretty happy with it;...

    I've had a Framework 13 for about three years, and I've been pretty happy with it. I got the "DIY" version that comes without an OS, and put Arch on it (btw).

    I've been pretty happy with it; performance is good (though the fans get quite loud under load) and I've not really had to do anything terribly strange to get, for example, the fingerprint sensor working.

    Biggest downside is definitely battery life, I get around four hours, maybe 5 if I'm lucky or use it lightly, usually less. That's after using some power managenment tools to tweak things and swapping out the HDMI port (which apparently had/has some kind of firmware issue that keeps it awake and using power even if there's nothing plugged in, this may be fixed in newer models).

    There's also no dGPU of course, so many games won't run great, but that's to be expected. I'm not sure if it would support an external GPU or not. Dota 2 works more or less acceptably, Deadlock not so much (the last time I tried it anyway).

    It works well for my school and development needs, but I'm hoping some day there'll be an ARM mainboard that I can upgrade to...

    2 votes

  5. Comment on Modos debuts an open-source e-paper with a 75-Hz refresh rate in ~tech

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    I think it's becoming more common, but full refreshes are still occasionally necessary. I can sketch lines on my Kobo (via Plato) and only the pixels I touch are updated. The "framerate" of the...

    I think it's becoming more common, but full refreshes are still occasionally necessary.

    I can sketch lines on my Kobo (via Plato) and only the pixels I touch are updated. The "framerate" of the drawing is pretty high and feels smooth. During reading page flips are fast and not really distracting, but every now and then you get some "ghosting" of words from previous pages that don't quite get cleared, and a full flash-refresh is necessary to reset the display.

    I think the devices tries to do the full refresh every so many pages, or at chapter breaks, whichever is sooner.

    11 votes

  6. Comment on Hollow Knight: Silksong will cost $20, releases Thursday at 7 am PDT/10 am EDT in ~games

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    Took me a couple hours of intermittent retries on Steam to get through, but I finally did! And... (Surprising no one) it's more Hollow Knight! This will be great for people like me who loved the...

    Took me a couple hours of intermittent retries on Steam to get through, but I finally did!

    And...

    (Surprising no one) it's more Hollow Knight! This will be great for people like me who loved the first game, and probably just as offputting for anyone who didn't care for it. Personally, I'm thrilled, and can't wait to get back to exploring.

    5 votes

  7. Comment on $30K Ford EV truck due in 2027 with much-simpler production process in ~transport

    Crespyl
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    I wonder what the timeline was for this compared to the Slate EV truck being announced. There's always been a market for smaller light trucks, electric or otherwise, but it seems (to someone who...

    I wonder what the timeline was for this compared to the Slate EV truck being announced. There's always been a market for smaller light trucks, electric or otherwise, but it seems (to someone who doesn't pay a lot of attention to trucks) to have been kind of underserved for a long time.

    Now we have two companies targeting that market, seems like a good thing.

    5 votes

  8. Comment on <deleted topic> in ~tech

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    There's an old game from 2000 called Noctis, which IIRC was almost entirely written by one guy. Noctis was pretty much a pure exploration game, in which you'd fly a spaceship around a procedurally...

    There's an old game from 2000 called Noctis, which IIRC was almost entirely written by one guy. Noctis was pretty much a pure exploration game, in which you'd fly a spaceship around a procedurally generated universe and land on planets, explore, take pictures, and write notes that other explorers could read (by way of manually emailing the dev your notes and downloading packages of compiled notes later on).

    The game had limited visibility, but became a cult hit (for very small values of cult), and the dev had/has his own quirky hand-coded web forum where people could talk about the game and other topics, including the devs other interesting projects.

    That forum became one of the first "internet homes" young me found, where I could share fanart I'd made in Blender, ask dumb questions, learn a bit about programming, play a MUD, and get to know some people I still recognize when I hop back on.

    Unfortunately in the last few years it seems to have gone offline, but there's still a discord with a handful of oldtimers hanging around. It's not the same, but I'll always have the memories.

    The Dwarf Fortress forums played a similar role, but that was a much more notable game and thus a much larger forum experience as the game got more popular.

    16 votes

  9. Comment on Modern masculinity and The Critical Drinker in ~life.men

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    Practical Engineering is also on there, as is Legal Eagle. I'm also partial to Jetlag: The Game which is a kind of low-budget Amazing Race done by the team behind Wendover/Half as Interesting.

    Practical Engineering is also on there, as is Legal Eagle.

    I'm also partial to Jetlag: The Game which is a kind of low-budget Amazing Race done by the team behind Wendover/Half as Interesting.

    9 votes

  10. Comment on Is anyone working on an Android version of ICEBlock? in ~comp

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    They don't go into the technical details that allow Apple to (allegedly) send push notifications without somehow tracking device and/or account ids, but I'm skeptical that it's really that much...

    They don't go into the technical details that allow Apple to (allegedly) send push notifications without somehow tracking device and/or account ids, but I'm skeptical that it's really that much more secure than what Google is doing.

    Even if all the metadata stays in Apples servers instead of with the devs, that's still a giant weak point that can be directly attacked, either through technical or legal means.

    I'm prepared to believe that Apple would fight harder for their users privacy than Google would (they have been pretty good about that in the past, though not perfect), but there are other options for notification that don't rely on either corporation; they're just less efficient (various forms of polling/long-polling, other channels like email or signal, local mesh networks like briar(?), etc).

    17 votes

  11. Comment on A literature clock in ~books

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    me too man, me too.

    wish there was an option to pause

    me too man, me too.

    1 vote

  12. Comment on A literature clock in ~books

  13. Comment on Do you have a favorite publisher? in ~books

    Crespyl
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    I don't generally notice publishers, but when I was a kid I used to read a lot of books that were either Tor or Baen. I think Baen published a lot of the David Weber/Ringo books I was reading a...

    I don't generally notice publishers, but when I was a kid I used to read a lot of books that were either Tor or Baen. I think Baen published a lot of the David Weber/Ringo books I was reading a lot of at the time. IIRC they (Baen) still operate their "free library" at their website, with a selection of their books.

    1 vote

  14. Comment on Eddington | Official trailer in ~movies

    Crespyl
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    hey, I liked it! It's super long (around three hours iirc), deeply uncomfortable/unsettling, has some very strange digressions part way through, and ends on a kinda weird note. It's a very strange...

    hey, I liked it!

    It's super long (around three hours iirc), deeply uncomfortable/unsettling, has some very strange digressions part way through, and ends on a kinda weird note.

    It's a very strange experience, but also pretty memorable to me. I liked the ride it took me on, and the best bits were pretty strong. Whether it's a good movie or not is beyond me, and I acknowledge that I've got weird taste.

  15. Comment on Looking for indie co-op games recommendations in ~games

    Crespyl
    Link
    We Were Here series is good fun for two players if you haven't seen it. The first episode is free, if a little rough, but the series gets increasingly polished as it goes on. Each player has...

    We Were Here series is good fun for two players if you haven't seen it.

    The first episode is free, if a little rough, but the series gets increasingly polished as it goes on. Each player has different information and tools and you have to work together to solve puzzles and progress through the world, uncovering little bits of story as you go.

    1 vote

  16. Comment on What is a non-problematic word that you avoid using? in ~talk

    Crespyl
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    "Hacker" meant something closer to "scrappy developer" a long time before it came to refer to unauthorised access. It has its roots in the MIT model railroad club, if I recall correctly. "The...

    "Hacker" meant something closer to "scrappy developer" a long time before it came to refer to unauthorised access. It has its roots in the MIT model railroad club, if I recall correctly. "The Jargon File" has some oral history of the term.

    See: https://www.catb.org/jargon/html/H/hacker.html

    13 votes

  17. Comment on Mozilla will shut down Pocket and Fakespot in ~tech

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    It seems like I read that KOReader supports Wallabag, which might be an option, but I've always just used the native Nickel interface and haven't made the jump to KOReader.

    It seems like I read that KOReader supports Wallabag, which might be an option, but I've always just used the native Nickel interface and haven't made the jump to KOReader.

    1 vote

  18. Comment on Mozilla will shut down Pocket and Fakespot in ~tech

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    Pocket is natively integrated into my Kobo e-reader, and I use it pretty frequently. I never loved the way it was shoved into Firefox, but did appreciate the service. I'll be sad to see it shut...

    Pocket is natively integrated into my Kobo e-reader, and I use it pretty frequently. I never loved the way it was shoved into Firefox, but did appreciate the service. I'll be sad to see it shut down entirely.

    12 votes

  19. Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    I think that's the "Quick Access Menu" (QAM) button, usually used to open that sidebar/popup menu with performance settings/brightness/etc.

    I think that's the "Quick Access Menu" (QAM) button, usually used to open that sidebar/popup menu with performance settings/brightness/etc.

    3 votes

  20. Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games

    Crespyl
    Link Parent
    I've also been working on Blue Prince, and without spoiling things I can say that I hit credits a while back and am still very much invested in the house and its mysteries. There's so many layers...

    I've also been working on Blue Prince, and without spoiling things I can say that I hit credits a while back and am still very much invested in the house and its mysteries.

    There's so many layers of puzzles beyond just the stated goal, it's been so much fun. I've even been sharing it with my dad who's gotten pretty into it as well.

    5 votes