Toric's recent activity
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Comment on What is your go-to project for learning a new language? in ~comp
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What is your go-to project for learning a new language?
Ive been playing around with learning a lisp language for a while, and I recently decided to go for it and learn fennel (as I already am comfortable with lua) just to see if I like lisps as a...
Ive been playing around with learning a lisp language for a while, and I recently decided to go for it and learn fennel (as I already am comfortable with lua) just to see if I like lisps as a class. Normally, I try to do the first 5-10 days of a previous advent of code to pick up a lang.
Setting up my advent of code environment got me wondering: what projects do other people use to learn new languages/tooling? Id love to hear how other people approach learning a new skill.
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Comment on Artemis II April 1 launch in ~space
Toric Link ParentDuring the Apollo missions, there was no radio contact on the far side of the moon, however, IDK about this time, we have a good few satellites around the moon, but they may or may not be able to...During the Apollo missions, there was no radio contact on the far side of the moon, however, IDK about this time, we have a good few satellites around the moon, but they may or may not be able to act as relay satellites.
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Comment on Fairphone released the industry’s first ever nature report - The impact of consumer electronics on nature and biodiversity in ~enviro
Toric Link ParentPerhaps they mean organic natural capital? You dont need much of a functioning local ecosystem to do mineral extraction.Perhaps they mean organic natural capital? You dont need much of a functioning local ecosystem to do mineral extraction.
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Comment on AI was eroding trust in my classroom — so I got rid of typed papers and bought my students notebooks instead in ~life
Toric Link ParentYup, textbooks make everything easier, but I hear you WRT the expense. I had been sailing the high seas for quite a bit before college, and during college I kinda became the local 'pdf dealer' in...Yup, textbooks make everything easier, but I hear you WRT the expense. I had been sailing the high seas for quite a bit before college, and during college I kinda became the local 'pdf dealer' in my program. I know over 50 people who got all of their textbooks from me.
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Comment on AI was eroding trust in my classroom — so I got rid of typed papers and bought my students notebooks instead in ~life
Toric Link ParentIn my degree only half of the classes had textbooks, and only half of those that did ever told us what the material we should read was ahead of time. When provided, I much preferred reading the...In my degree only half of the classes had textbooks, and only half of those that did ever told us what the material we should read was ahead of time. When provided, I much preferred reading the textbooks to the lectures and would read them both before and after, yes.
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Comment on AI was eroding trust in my classroom — so I got rid of typed papers and bought my students notebooks instead in ~life
Toric Link ParentIts not that typing is faster, its that my writing is slow enough, and professors fast enough, that handwriting in early college often led to me only encoding 2/3rds of the information at all,...Its not that typing is faster, its that my writing is slow enough, and professors fast enough, that handwriting in early college often led to me only encoding 2/3rds of the information at all, leading me to doing horribly on tests if I wasnt able to use recording devices or borrow somone elses notes.
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Comment on AI was eroding trust in my classroom — so I got rid of typed papers and bought my students notebooks instead in ~life
Toric Link ParentI type literally 10x faster than I can write, and half of my professors could not read my handwriting in early college. Im sure part of that is being out of practice, but still, you had been my...I type literally 10x faster than I can write, and half of my professors could not read my handwriting in early college. Im sure part of that is being out of practice, but still, you had been my professor and had done that, I probably would have bought a typewriter or taken my laptops wifi chip out of my laptop in front of you. I dont use AI, hope to never have to, but a computer is the only way I could have ever hoped to keep up with my notes. In some classes with fast speaking professors, even that wasnt enough, and I bought a dedicated voice recorder for those classes.
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Comment on What are people using instead of VS Code? in ~comp
Toric LinkHappy user of Nvim here, but if I wasnt so used to the keybinds (been using vi/vim/nvim for well over a decade now), Id probably start with helix. Im so used to the terminal that I would never...Happy user of Nvim here, but if I wasnt so used to the keybinds (been using vi/vim/nvim for well over a decade now), Id probably start with helix. Im so used to the terminal that I would never personally consider a GUI editor at this point.
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Comment on LLMs can unmask pseudonymous users at scale with surprising accuracy in ~tech
Toric (edited )Link ParentJust using gpt-5-mini from duckduckgo's AI offering, and it immediately picked up the link to your github account (you have posted your projects there), which includes what I assume is your real name.Just using gpt-5-mini from duckduckgo's AI offering, and it immediately picked up the link to your github account (you have posted your projects there), which includes what I assume is your real name.
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Comment on Telegram CEO vows to fight for app amid Russia pressure in ~tech
Toric Link ParentIf your just looking for push notifications, I reccomend https://ntfy.sh/.If your just looking for push notifications, I reccomend https://ntfy.sh/.
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Comment on Pandoc for the people: convert documents without leaving the browser in ~tech
Toric Link Parentso I can see ffmpeg, imagemagik, and pandoc, and kinda 7z (its the closest thing linux has to a universal archive handler), but why libreoffice?so I can see ffmpeg, imagemagik, and pandoc, and kinda 7z (its the closest thing linux has to a universal archive handler), but why libreoffice?
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Comment on Gold tops $4,900/oz; silver and platinum extend record‑setting rally in ~finance
Toric Link ParentSame here. 2022 and 2024 have turned me from "defense spending should be at an absolute minimum to maintain a standing army" to "hmm, maybye Germany, Sweden, and Switzerland should restart their...I also can't fault people for not wanting to invest in defense firms out of principle, I wouldn't have either before 2022.
Same here. 2022 and 2024 have turned me from "defense spending should be at an absolute minimum to maintain a standing army" to "hmm, maybye Germany, Sweden, and Switzerland should restart their nuclear weapons programs"... Pacifism is an honorable goal, but pacifists tend to get massacred by tyrants, and the same applies at the international level, now that alliances involving the US and Russia arent worth the paper they are written on.
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Comment on What programming/technical projects have you been working on? in ~comp
Toric LinkI finished* the project ive been working on and off on for 6 months now, crabroll! In the past 2 weeks, I got it working over MQTT, and then got it talking to home assistant, and the board has...I finished* the project ive been working on and off on for 6 months now, crabroll! In the past 2 weeks, I got it working over MQTT, and then got it talking to home assistant, and the board has been sitting on my desk without any unrecoverable errors for 5 days now.
Next step is to design and print the mechanical parts to actually hook it up to my window blinds, but before that I have to actually assemble my voron...
*(as in, got v0.1.0, see github issues for all the work that still needs doing)
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Comment on What programming/technical projects have you been working on? in ~comp
Toric LinkMy Rust based window blinds controller for Home Assistant, Crabroll, just made its first MQTT-commanded movent! Ive been working on this since july. I had to write a stepper motor movement...My Rust based window blinds controller for Home Assistant, Crabroll, just made its first MQTT-commanded movent! Ive been working on this since july. I had to write a stepper motor movement planner, a driver for the TMC2209's UART interface, and wrote a short paper on an integer-only stepper motor movement algorithm in the process.
But the end of the beginning is in sight. The only thing left to do on the software side is write home assistant YAML describing the MQTT schema, and writing build documenation on how to configure the build time constants. After that, I need to briefly take a detour and assemble my new voron trident 3d printer, and then I can start prototyping the mechanical parts.
There are plenty of features Id love to add to Crabroll in the future, such as home assistant auto discovery, better build-time config (currently its a bunch of env vars, Id like to make it a simple TOML file), and splitting out the stepper motor library into its own project that others can easily use. But for now, Im happy with what Ive managed to do with this as it is.
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Comment on Dell's Consumer Electronics Show 2026 chat was the most pleasingly un-AI briefing I've had in maybe five years in ~tech
Toric Link Parentto be clear, I dont know if firefox's implementation uses NPU's. They may not, as there are so many out there with no standardized interface to them yet. But it is neural network based, so no...to be clear, I dont know if firefox's implementation uses NPU's. They may not, as there are so many out there with no standardized interface to them yet. But it is neural network based, so no reason it shouldnt run on an NPU.
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Comment on Dell's Consumer Electronics Show 2026 chat was the most pleasingly un-AI briefing I've had in maybe five years in ~tech
Toric Link ParentIll add another one as an American living in Germany who's German still isnt good enough to read bureaucratic webpages: Local language translation, without having to rely on google translate....Ill add another one as an American living in Germany who's German still isnt good enough to read bureaucratic webpages: Local language translation, without having to rely on google translate. Firefox has their own language translation models that run on your machine that work quite well.
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Comment on What are the simple things in your life that you are thankful for? in ~life
Toric LinkIn September we celebrated 1 year since we moved to Germany. Im thankful for the time we have had here, and our growing support network here.In September we celebrated 1 year since we moved to Germany. Im thankful for the time we have had here, and our growing support network here.
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Comment on What programming/technical projects have you been working on? in ~comp
Toric (edited )LinkBeen working on crabroll, my rust-based esp32 powered home-assistant compatible window blind controller. Been working on the stepper motor kinimatics for almsost 2 weeks. Ive been working on...Been working on crabroll, my rust-based esp32 powered home-assistant compatible window blind controller. Been working on the stepper motor kinimatics for almsost 2 weeks. Ive been working on adapting the algoritm described in this paper to use integers rather than floating point numbers (the esp32c3 does not have an FPU), and its been kicking my butt. I managed to regain most of my precision by rejiggering the order of operations and storing divison remainders between iterations, but im still overshooting my target by a couple of steps, leading to sharp deceleration. Also, for some reason, I randomly go above my target acceleration. My acceleration graph is very... spikey.
Ive been writing down all the modifications ive been making, and at this point, I have half a paper out of it.
Its been pretty cool being able to run simulations of this motion planner all in rusts unit test system.
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Comment on Fifty Shades of OOP in ~comp
Toric Link ParentI had no clue we had a #tildes channel. I just finished setting up a proper bouncer, so IRC is finally persistent for me!I had no clue we had a #tildes channel. I just finished setting up a proper bouncer, so IRC is finally persistent for me!
Rust has a really good CLI ecosystem, actually, though its standard library doesnt provide that much.