revivinglaziness's recent activity

  1. Comment on Introductions | March 2025 in ~talk

    revivinglaziness
    Link Parent
    Well, there was this article a few days ago -- which is probably true. But if I had to put everything I've learned over two decades into a short list? You'll get paid to do the most stupid things...

    If you work in IT and have any career advice I'd love to connect and hear what you have to offer!

    Well, there was this article a few days ago -- which is probably true. But if I had to put everything I've learned over two decades into a short list?

    • You'll get paid to do the most stupid things ever. Nearly every job is 80% being a gofer (where's that document I was looking for? how do I do X again?), 20% keeping the lights on, and <1% solving challenging technical problems.
    • Channel your ennui into a useful hobby. Learn a different operating system, programming language, set up a home network from scratch, whatever. But don't do it to check a box: do it to solve a problem or make your life better somehow. You'll remember it better that way.
    • Have a sense of pride and care, but not too much. Your co-workers will be how you get better jobs in the future if they remember you fondly, and they are also best positioned to make your life miserable if they don't like you. So reserve most of your empathy for the people on your team, but remember to keep some empathy for yourself: you matter, and so does your mental health.
    • Politeness costs nothing. Smile, nod, quietly make a note of who the annoyance was, and vent to your friends later. You should do this even when someone is talking utter nonsense about Gartner quadrants, blockchains, quantum, and AI. (Sorry if that's your manager, though. Find a different one.) The exception is real verbal abuse: don't stand for it, don't let it slide, and don't let bullies go unchallenged.
    • Layoffs happen. They're not your fault and you should never feel bad about them -- whether you're caught up, or feeling survivor's guilt for having escaped. (Unless you're an executive. Then it was your fault, and you should feel bad.)
    • Don't worry about perfection. 99% of the time, you're not actually a rocket scientist, saving real human lives, or making the world a better place. Most IT work is really the equivalent of duct-taping things together, and there is a never-ending pile of tickets waiting for your attention. Learn when something is "good enough" and when to invest extra time fixing annoyances.
    5 votes

  2. Comment on Introductions | March 2025 in ~talk

    revivinglaziness
    Link
    How long have you been on Tildes? How did you find out about us? I've been lurking since 2021-ish; I saw a thread on Reddit, read more, and thought the ethos was intriguing, but wanted to observe...

    How long have you been on Tildes? How did you find out about us?

    I've been lurking since 2021-ish; I saw a thread on Reddit, read more, and thought the ethos was intriguing, but wanted to observe for awhile. I joined in mid-February (thanks @TheMeerkat).

    How did you choose your username?

    I used a password manager to generate it. This one felt amusingly paradoxical.

    What are your interests?

    I enjoy learning more about the cool things that science makes possible, from space rockets to microphotography. I'm fond of speculative fiction, because exploring new and remixed literary worlds is one of the few guaranteed ways to get myself out of a thinking rut. I like some video games for that same reason, but I like games even more for their amazing soundtracks -- and I collect those, too.

    I'd like to learn more about how to make software development more sustainable and secure, especially when it comes to the squishy human side of things. This usually means everything from usability studies to database query optimization.

    I'm especially grateful to the folks who continue to share, but also write, about all of their hobbies and interests too. Keeping the original 'spirit' of the Internet alive, even if it's off the beaten path of the Top 1000 sites, never fails to make me feel more hopeful about life in general.

    Do you want other users to PM you from this thread?

    Only if they think I'll be charming, rather than tedious. (Thanks, Oscar!)

    Give us a fun fact or link!

    "Things you're allowed to do" -- this article helped me realize, as an adult, that I could go beyond what my upbringing taught me was 'acceptable' to do and pay for help with. I still won't write in my books, though.

    5 votes

  3. Comment on Life altering PostgreSQL patterns in ~comp

    revivinglaziness
    Link
    Thank you for sharing this! I'd seen many of these but not all in one place. This is my first time seeing enum tables, but I like the idea of that pattern a lot. It matches well with the liberal...

    Thank you for sharing this! I'd seen many of these but not all in one place.

    This is my first time seeing enum tables, but I like the idea of that pattern a lot. It matches well with the liberal (and justified, IMO) use of FK constraints they suggest. But I think it could also help avoid the need for some schema migrations, which are always a little bit nerve-wracking no matter how well you automate them.

    1 vote

  4. Comment on eBay privacy policy update and AI opt-out in ~tech

    revivinglaziness
    Link Parent
    Most recently: https://tildes.net/~tech/1maf/firefoxs_new_terms_of_use_grants_mozilla_complete_data_processing_rights_of_all_user_interactions I do this often, too. My working hypothesis is that...

    Also: what Firefox news is that exactly? :D (I use Firefox for browsing Reddit and only for that.)

    Most recently: https://tildes.net/~tech/1maf/firefoxs_new_terms_of_use_grants_mozilla_complete_data_processing_rights_of_all_user_interactions

    Most of the time I decide the content wasn't worth the effort.

    I do this often, too. My working hypothesis is that content quality is inversely correlated with the number of unique domains a page tries to load resources from.

    So far this hasn't been an issue but things may be about to change and I'm not sure how to handle it yet.

    You mentioned 'collaborators' -- are they folks that you could encourage to sign an agreement of some sort? Even if it's not a business relationship, many open-source projects have codes of conduct (and project licenses) that can help corral some potential avenues of disagreement.

    1 vote

  5. eBay privacy policy update and AI opt-out

    ~tech Ask
    eBay is updating its privacy policy, effective next month (2025-04-27). The major change is a new section about AI processing, accompanied by a new user setting with an opt-out checkbox for having...

    eBay is updating its privacy policy, effective next month (2025-04-27). The major change is a new section about AI processing, accompanied by a new user setting with an opt-out checkbox for having your personal data feed their models.

    While that page specifically references European areas, the privacy selection appears to be active and remembered between visits for non-Europe customers. It may not do anything for us at all. On the other hand, it seems nearly impossible to find that page from within account settings, so I thought I'd post a direct link.

    I'm well aware that I'm anomalous for having read this to begin with, much less diffed it against the previous version. But since I already know that I'm weird, and this wouldn't be much of a discussion post without questions:

    • How do you stay up to date with contract changes that might affect you, outside of widespread Internet outrage (such as recent Firefox news)?
    • What's your threshold -- if any -- for deciding whether to quit a company over contract changes? Alternatively, have you ever walked away from a purchase, service, or other acquisition over the terms of the contracts?
    46 votes

  6. Comment on Tildes Minecraft Survival in ~games

    revivinglaziness
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    EDIT: Fixed! And thanks to @IsildursBane for debugging help. In case it helps someone else, what ended up working for me is: Calculating the "default" nether coordinates of the both the original...

    My portal broke, unfortunately -- I created a second portal in my base that is too close. I'll fix it soon™, but right now the nether roof portal is one-way.

    EDIT: Fixed! And thanks to @IsildursBane for debugging help. In case it helps someone else, what ended up working for me is:

    1. Calculating the "default" nether coordinates of the both the original (roof-linked) and the secondary portals, using their Overworld coords
    2. Carefully moving the secondary portal's nether end to be >16 blocks away from the roof portal's default coords, but <16 blocks from the secondary portal's defaults
    3. Going through the new nether end of the secondary portal, finding myself in a weird cave in the Overworld with nothing else nearby, destroying THAT portal, and running back to my base

    Step 3 probably isn't necessary but I suspect the game created an extra Overworld-side portal while I was figuring this out.

    2 votes

  7. Comment on Anyone interested in trying out Kagi? (trial giveaway: round #2) in ~tech

  8. Comment on Tildes Minecraft Survival in ~games

    revivinglaziness
    Link
    While feeding cows this morning, I noticed that the auto-cooked-chicken farm (at the community farms) seems to no longer have any chickens present. Also, it was randomly dispensing lava, which...

    While feeding cows this morning, I noticed that the auto-cooked-chicken farm (at the community farms) seems to no longer have any chickens present. Also, it was randomly dispensing lava, which seems suspiciously correlated, if not necessarily causative. Not sure how to fix.

    3 votes

  9. Comment on Tildes Minecraft Survival in ~games

    revivinglaziness
    Link
    Just posting a thank-you note here -- the folks I met on the server have been very welcoming and patient with my many, many questions. The builds I've visited have been extremely creative. I'm...

    Just posting a thank-you note here -- the folks I met on the server have been very welcoming and patient with my many, many questions.

    The builds I've visited have been extremely creative. I'm especially fond of the sheer variety in the shopping mall, but also the organic feeling of the main town.

    15 votes

  10. Comment on What video game mods do you play, or have played in the past? in ~games

    revivinglaziness
    Link
    I concur with others for Skyrim, Dragon Age: Origins, and Minecraft! But no one has yet mentioned World of Warcraft, or Stardew Valley, so I will... While others did mention Starcraft, I think...

    I concur with others for Skyrim, Dragon Age: Origins, and Minecraft! But no one has yet mentioned World of Warcraft, or Stardew Valley, so I will...

    While others did mention Starcraft, I think it's important to note its historical contribution to modding. Many of its mods (e.g.: Defense of the Ancients) were springboards for what eventually turned into new game genres (e.g.: MOBAs). In my opinion, the primary reason for this was that Blizzard concurrently released a capable, relatively user-friendly Starcraft map editor. That editor permitted easy exploration, editing, and creativity, along with the game itself assisting in distribution for those mods. Without that editor and the built-in support for sharing, I don't think that Starcraft would have lasted as long or been nearly as popular as it became. (And in support of my belief: Starcraft 2 did not include a map editor until years later. While that's not the only factor, and while SC2 was still a commercial success, it's hard to argue that it commands the zeitgeist of real-time strategy like its predecessor.)

    In a similar way, World of Warcraft ("WoW") offered support for user modding that other MMOs did not. While the capabilities were much more limited than Starcraft--changing NPCs' textures was discouraged and could lead to user bans; the game wouldn't automatically share mods between users playing together--it still exposed more of the game's internals than similar products of the time. And to my point above, I believe at least part of the game's success was because its freedom of UI customization allowed audiences to change how they interacted with the game itself. While I don't recall any massive game genres being created here, WoW's modding ecosystem did create a cottage industry of modding support sites that helped users download, share, and collaborate on mods.

    Finally, while Stardew Valley isn't quite in the same industry-changing leagues as the first two games, it's one that I've particularly enjoyed the mods for. After beating the game "legit", for example, it's nice to focus on the things I like (farming crops, low-stress mining) and less on the things that feel necessary but aren't fun to me (fishing mini-game, farming stone to make skull cavern staircases). Less enlightened gamers might describe them as cheats. /s

    In all of these cases, and my personal experience, mods do two key things: (1) increase the longevity of enjoyable play, and (2) decrease user interface friction, whether by changing visual elements or methods of gameplay interaction. I believe that none of the games folks are talking about here--regardless of size, scale, or success--would be as successful as they were, without allowing or permitting user-initiated modifications.

    1 vote