pseudolobster's recent activity

  1. Comment on Are there any good online CS degrees? Is it advisable to enroll into an online CS degree? in ~comp

    pseudolobster
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    As others have stated, unless you're looking for a piece of paper saying you know programming, your best bet is free courses. I can recommend MIT's opencourseware or Khan academy

    As others have stated, unless you're looking for a piece of paper saying you know programming, your best bet is free courses. I can recommend MIT's opencourseware or Khan academy

    1 vote
  2. Comment on What did you do this week (and weekend)? in ~talk

    pseudolobster
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    I went to go see Adam Conover's standup comedy show in Vancouver the other day. I have nothing but good things to say about his show and visiting Vancouver in general, however I needed to leave...

    I went to go see Adam Conover's standup comedy show in Vancouver the other day. I have nothing but good things to say about his show and visiting Vancouver in general, however I needed to leave before 5am to get to downtown before 10:30 and that was a huge slog. I was suddenly reminded about my age and how I'm too damn old to wake up early, travel 5hrs and go to the venue after 4hrs sleep after 20 hours of being awake. By the time the show started at 7PM I was exhausted and nearly falling asleep. I actually felt really bad for yawning since it was an intimate venue and I was in the first couple rows, so he definitely saw me. Anyways, totally recommend Adam Ruins Everything's standup tour.

    1 vote
  3. Comment on How are you preparing for a fascist America? in ~society

    pseudolobster
    Link
    Canadian here, I'm buying a gun. Never thought of buying one before except for target shooting, for which I can normally just go to a range, but now I feel like owning one is important for some...

    Canadian here,

    I'm buying a gun. Never thought of buying one before except for target shooting, for which I can normally just go to a range, but now I feel like owning one is important for some reason.

    Elbows up.

    5 votes
  4. Comment on Notorious image board 4chan hacked and internal data leaked in ~tech

    pseudolobster
    Link Parent
    Exactly. It's not often that journalists get what 4chan is about. Yes, it's toxic as all hell, and you probably shouldn't go there, and if you do, make extra sure you don't let the toxic part...

    Exactly. It's not often that journalists get what 4chan is about. Yes, it's toxic as all hell, and you probably shouldn't go there, and if you do, make extra sure you don't let the toxic part become a part of your identity, but it's just an anonymous imageboard.

    I'm not defending it since there's a lot of shitty people there, but it's refreshing to see someone reporting it like it is.

    Anyways, please flag my parent topic as offtopic since we're not talking about the hack anymore.

    12 votes
  5. Comment on Notorious image board 4chan hacked and internal data leaked in ~tech

    pseudolobster
    Link
    This is a really level-headed synopsis of the site, imho. It's a stupid meme site that happens to be flooded with porn and gore, but also happens to be big enough to be influential and therefore...

    4chan is an ostensibly anonymous internet forum that functions like the dark underbelly of the web. Most of the time, it’s an image board that seems to be populated by bored users who try to shock each other often by posting some of the most vile content imaginable. Other times, 4chan’s cultural exports seep into the real world as innocuous memes or as hateful rhetoric that inspires right-wing terrorism.

    This is a really level-headed synopsis of the site, imho. It's a stupid meme site that happens to be flooded with porn and gore, but also happens to be big enough to be influential and therefore has become the source of a lot of mainstream online hate movements and like, straight up terrorism.

    Weird to see online journalism giving such a concise read of a nuanced topic, insomuch as they could have just said "Known terrorist forum 4chan" instead.

    34 votes
  6. Comment on What have you been putting off/procrastinating about doing? in ~life

    pseudolobster
    Link Parent
    I'm going to reply under your post since I also have a semi-abandoned NAS project I've been meaning to get around to forever now. There are many reasons I've procrastinated on this, and like you...

    I'm going to reply under your post since I also have a semi-abandoned NAS project I've been meaning to get around to forever now.

    There are many reasons I've procrastinated on this, and like you it's come down to "Well, it's currently working" — However, it's running off individual 8tb drives with my collection spanning several such drives that are getting to be almost a decade old. I really need to replace this or I'm going to regret it.

    I bought the thing, realized I have nothing that takes a VGA input, found a monitor I could borrow, tried to set it up, realized although the SFP+-to-copper adapters were recognized they could never get a DHCP address, gave up on the whole thing. I bought new SFP-RJ45 adapters for 1gbit but I'm back to not having any VGA devices, fueling the procrastination.

    I once had lofty goals of installing proxmox with a bunch of cool VMs doing *arr things, a PFSense or OPNSense VM as a router, maybe a little webserver as a treat.

    7 votes
  7. Comment on Kindle modding wiki in ~books

    pseudolobster
    (edited )
    Link
    In a reply to another comment I mentioned the mobileread forums, which are an incredible resource for kindle modding and jailbreaking. That sent me down a nostalgia rabbit hole. In addition to...

    In a reply to another comment I mentioned the mobileread forums, which are an incredible resource for kindle modding and jailbreaking. That sent me down a nostalgia rabbit hole. In addition to using my kindle as a VNC client to connect to an android VM, turning the thing into a cursed android tablet, I remembered I actually wrote a frontend for the VNC client that prompted you for a username and password.

    With such limited options that were available I drew a text UI using some sort of ncurses plugin for ZSH, which ended up implementing touch support, full cursor support, etc. I'm kinda proud how it works despite how incredibly janky it is. Also I named all my variables "poop" because I'm an adult and that's my choice.

    https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?p=3241063

    2 votes
  8. Comment on Kindle modding wiki in ~books

    pseudolobster
    Link Parent
    I've never owned a kobo but I've heard the same thing from other people. Apparently it's much more open and easy to modify whereas the kindle is always phoning home to mama Bezos. That said I'm...

    I've never owned a kobo but I've heard the same thing from other people. Apparently it's much more open and easy to modify whereas the kindle is always phoning home to mama Bezos.

    That said I'm still rocking a first-gen paperwhite I jailbroke over 12 years ago. It's been on airplane mode almost its entire life except a few occasions I've needed to use its terrible web browser in an emergency. In that time I've used it as a ssh client, a vnc client (connected to a VM running android so the thing acted like a cursed android tablet), I've played sudoku, chess, etc on it, installed custom fonts and other ebook reader software on it, etc.

    It's never updated or bricked itself in all that time. Shout out to mobileread forums where I got all the info to mod it.

    2 votes
  9. Comment on Looking for games you can play on a laptop with a trackpad in ~games

    pseudolobster
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    Could you give a list of what genres you're interested in? There's a lot out there. Plus do you have a gaming console and can you connect your gamepad to the laptop? Because that opens up a whole...

    Could you give a list of what genres you're interested in? There's a lot out there. Plus do you have a gaming console and can you connect your gamepad to the laptop? Because that opens up a whole ton of genres. Likewise, if you can use a wireless mouse on your thigh, that also opens up some genres versus a trackpad.

    Off the top of my head, looking at my steam library, in no particular order, FTL: Faster than light, Civilization, Balatro, Slay the Spire, Factorio (on peaceful), are all top tier games that are either turn based or reaction times aren't an issue.

    Dwarf Fortress is an amazing game, but it's a commitment. I haven't played much of the steam release, but the original had literally no mouse support out of the box. Everything was done using a cryptic set of keys that changed on every single menu. Yes, if you're a masochist, you enjoy really, really, really deep roguelikes with advanced physics simulations and emerging gameplay, you should definitely try it, but be aware it's a slog at first to get familiarized and get any enjoyment out of it whatsoever, let alone the stories that people tell. By the time you can truly enjoy Dwarf Fortress, there's probably a support group out there for you.

    10 votes
  10. Comment on Daychilde's walking thread in ~life

  11. Comment on The Tiny Soapbox: a platform for small, low-stakes rants in ~talk

    pseudolobster
    Link Parent
    That's their business model. Consumer-grade inkjet printers have usually been subsidized by ink sales; for decades now. They've always been a loss leader, and people have come to expect to buy...

    That's their business model. Consumer-grade inkjet printers have usually been subsidized by ink sales; for decades now. They've always been a loss leader, and people have come to expect to buy something for fifty bucks from Staples.

    Buy a monochrome laser printer instead. Brother still makes some good models. Otherwise buying anything used is probably still fine as long as you can still find toner and roller replacement kits.

    Usually a $20 small-office-home-office business grade laser printer from craigslist / marketplace / etc will last you five to ten more years for a $40 investment.

    So long as you don't need colour you can often get tens of thousands of pages from a single $20 toner cartridge, which doesn't go bad or dry up like inkjet cartridges do.

    6 votes
  12. Comment on The Tiny Soapbox: a platform for small, low-stakes rants in ~talk

    pseudolobster
    Link Parent
    Omg yes, absolutely agree. The only thing about metric that bugs me more than that is how the kilogram is the base unit. Why? I get that they're using an artifact, and having 1000x as much mass...

    kilo/hecto/deca should be K/H/D

    Omg yes, absolutely agree. The only thing about metric that bugs me more than that is how the kilogram is the base unit. Why? I get that they're using an artifact, and having 1000x as much mass helps with stability but why not just define it as 1/1000th the mass of that artifact (or planck constant times cesium times speed of light or whatever) and make that, the gram, as the base unit?

    5 votes
  13. Comment on The Tiny Soapbox: a platform for small, low-stakes rants in ~talk

    pseudolobster
    Link
    I think we should normalize using unusual SI prefixes. The other day I said "500,000 kilometres", why not use megametres instead? Ten milligrams is a centigram, people. Wake up.

    I think we should normalize using unusual SI prefixes. The other day I said "500,000 kilometres", why not use megametres instead? Ten milligrams is a centigram, people. Wake up.

    61 votes
  14. Comment on Three Cheers for Tildes: App updates and feedback (April 2025) — Version 1.4 adds a text size setting in ~tildes

    pseudolobster
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    Hi @talklittle, I've gotta extend my thanks to you for developing this, and investing your efforts into Tildes as a community in general. Do you have a Patreon or any other ways for users to...

    Hi @talklittle, I've gotta extend my thanks to you for developing this, and investing your efforts into Tildes as a community in general. Do you have a Patreon or any other ways for users to support your efforts financially? I don't use the app but I'd be willing to donate to a coffee/beer fund towards app development. @Deimos won't take my donations towards Tildes itself. I'd be happy to throw ten or twenty bucks towards your efforts some time.

    PS: Recently someone asked about hosting their own version of Tildes. I recall you were saying you were making work towards a Docker version. Any updates on that?

    10 votes
  15. Comment on What is the policy on discussing emulation in ~games? in ~tildes

    pseudolobster
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    Thanks for the @. I remember this thread, but I'm less than 50% sure that was the one I was thinking about. I actually still kinda think the one I was thinking of might have been directly related...

    Thanks for the @. I remember this thread, but I'm less than 50% sure that was the one I was thinking about.

    I actually still kinda think the one I was thinking of might have been directly related to ROMs. But, I could be mistaken.

    Anyway, yeah, the sentiment is the same.

    2 votes
  16. Comment on What is the policy on discussing emulation in ~games? in ~tildes

    pseudolobster
    Link Parent
    This is an edge case. I really doubt it will ever become an issue, especially if your translations are unique and made by hand, however I think if it came down to it, you still shouldn't repeat...

    This is an edge case. I really doubt it will ever become an issue, especially if your translations are unique and made by hand, however I think if it came down to it, you still shouldn't repeat more than a paragraph or three.

    If you translate and repost the entire article verbatim, in my opinion I think it's still copyright infringement. I am not a lawyer, and this is not legal advice. I do not work for Tildes, and my opinion is that of a layperson.

    4 votes
  17. Comment on What is the policy on discussing emulation in ~games? in ~tildes

    pseudolobster
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    I have nothing more than a vague recollection at this point but I do believe he's weighed in on this before. I recall there's some stupid precedent where linking to a site that's infringing leaves...

    I have nothing more than a vague recollection at this point but I do believe he's weighed in on this before. I recall there's some stupid precedent where linking to a site that's infringing leaves you liable for some reason.

    I swear I'm not just talking out of my ass but rather extracting tiny nuggets of legitimate knowledge, from my ass, and sharing them with you.

    edit: Can't find it. I tried. I think it might have originally been about torrent sites. In any case I think the gist was "Talk about piracy if you want, but don't directly link to any actual piracy sites."

    19 votes
  18. Comment on What is the policy on discussing emulation in ~games? in ~tildes

    pseudolobster
    Link
    Emulation is fine. Talking about emulation, including talking about piracy is fine. Linking to ROM repositories is not.

    Emulation is fine. Talking about emulation, including talking about piracy is fine. Linking to ROM repositories is not.

    27 votes
  19. Comment on Artificial incompatibility - a rant (Dell notebook) in ~tech

    pseudolobster
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    I could make a similar rant about my Lenovo P15 Gen2. I used to buy HP Elitebooks and then Zbooks, but this time I decided to buy a thinkpad after all these years. I've always been told they have...

    I could make a similar rant about my Lenovo P15 Gen2.

    I used to buy HP Elitebooks and then Zbooks, but this time I decided to buy a thinkpad after all these years. I've always been told they have very good linux support, and that was a huge factor for me.

    That has not been not my experience. On windows, everything fucking flies, it's so buttery smooth, I can play RDR2 maxed out at 1080p or medium at 4k seems playable.

    I think I first installed Pop_OS! because it has good Nvidia driver support especially for laptops. Bad news, the mouse cursor is laggy as fuck, clicking on things takes ten seconds. Switched to vanilla Ubuntu. Same thing. Installed vanilla debian and manually installed xfce. Believe it or not, same issue. Mouse is even laggy like windows 95 style.

    Nvidia RTX A4000 GPU but I'm not even sure that's the problem. What I ended up doing is installing KDE, which I haven't used since the 90s, but that seems to have fixed my problem of massive lag of seconds or more, with the cursor trailing seconds or even minutes past when I moved the mouse.

    I tried X, I tried waylaynd. I spent about ten hours on getting it to work, but now that it does, I have absolutely no appetite to figure out what the actual problem is.

    All I know is thinkpads are not some magically supported laptop. I had waaaaay better luck with my unsupported Zbook X360 with its weird sensors and stuff. Thing was a hybrid laptop/drawing tablet, and for whatever reason switching between the two on vanilla linux was seamless. Whereas a $7000 workstation laptop the linux zealots decree as the best linux laptop brand, shits the bed here hard.

    5 votes