Weldawadyathink's recent activity
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Comment on A pregnant teenager died after trying to get care in three visits to Texas emergency rooms in ~health
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Comment on Reddit is profitable for the first time ever, with nearly 100 million daily users in ~tech
Weldawadyathink LinkI guess this answers the question “will people leave Reddit because of the api changes” once and for all. What I wanted out of Reddit and what the company wants out of Reddit are very different....I guess this answers the question “will people leave Reddit because of the api changes” once and for all. What I wanted out of Reddit and what the company wants out of Reddit are very different. And it seems like the company’s version is appealing enough to the vast majority of the population. Sad, but it was nice while it lasted.
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Comment on Best solution to extract PDF data? in ~comp
Weldawadyathink Link ParentOne of those people was me, and I was planning to suggest PQ. I’ve used it for PDF data before, and it works quite well, as long as it doesn’t have to OCR and the PDF is set up sensibly. It sounds...One of those people was me, and I was planning to suggest PQ. I’ve used it for PDF data before, and it works quite well, as long as it doesn’t have to OCR and the PDF is set up sensibly. It sounds like that is your use case, so it should work great.
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Comment on Timasomo 2024: Final Updates in ~creative.timasomo
Weldawadyathink LinkI would say I failed. Unfortunately life got in the way. I got sick partway through the month, Space Age released, and I have been traveling for the past week. This project had to take a back...I would say I failed. Unfortunately life got in the way. I got sick partway through the month, Space Age released, and I have been traveling for the past week. This project had to take a back burner. I will be trying to make a good loaf, and I think it’s possible, but I didn’t succeed within the month.
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Comment on Very unusual behaviour trying to use Duck Duck Go. Any suggestions for what to do? in ~tech
Weldawadyathink Link Parent/u/archevel is correct on both counts. The whole point of dns is that ip addresses are ephemeral. In the modern world, dns is used to localize people to the nearest server. You do not want to be.../u/archevel is correct on both counts. The whole point of dns is that ip addresses are ephemeral. In the modern world, dns is used to localize people to the nearest server. You do not want to be using a DDG server from the USA normally. I have a personal server in the US, and I am in France right now. General interaction with that server is always annoying just because of the light speed lag to get across the Atlantic. It is possible to have a single IP address that goes to the nearest server (1.1.1.1, 8.8.8.8, and most other global DNS servers do this), but it takes BGP shenanigans and doesn’t make sense until you get to the scale of Cloudflare, Google, or other CDN.
The certificate issue is also exactly what archevel supposed. The certificate is perfectly valid for https://duckduckgo.com but not for https://ipaddress. It would be extremely weird for DDG to also issue their certificates for their ip addresses as well. It would be more unusual if you didn’t get an error accessing by IP.
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Comment on ‘I grew up with it’: readers on the enduring appeal of Microsoft Excel in ~tech
Weldawadyathink Link ParentTypescript is a strict superset of JavaScript. If you remove the type annotations without changing anything else, you can put typescript code into a JavaScript compiler unmodified and it will work...Typescript is a strict superset of JavaScript. If you remove the type annotations without changing anything else, you can put typescript code into a JavaScript compiler unmodified and it will work exactly the same. In fact, there is a proposal going through ECMA (they are the governing body for JS. In fact, JS is properly called ECMAScript) to have the standards allow interpreters to do exactly that (it wouldn’t check the types, it would just ignore the type annotations.
Typescript does two things. First, it “compiles” TS code into JavaScript. It can output valid JS for any flavor of JS you want. So you can program with all the latest JS language features, and TS will compile it back to the JS from internet explorer 6, if you want. This part doesn’t have to even check types if you don’t want it to.
The second thing it does is “compile” time type checking. It’s important to note that TS has zero runtime type checking. If you have a number variable in TS, and no type errors, it’s still possible at runtime for that variable to be changed to a string and break your program. TS helps prevent these errors, but doesn’t remove them entirely (depending on how you use it).
Those two aspects are very powerful, but they aren’t the heart of the programming language. When you program in typescript, you are really just writing JavaScript. You just also include some extra info that isn’t included in the final output. So yeah, TS is kinda like a sister language to JS. And yes, it’s a fantastic tool to have in your toolbox. The amount of programming resources that have been put into making JavaScript fast and reliable for browsers means it’s one of the fastest interpreted languages. I’ll always love python. It’s what got me to like programming. But JS is fantastic.
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Comment on Playdate Stereo Dock shelved in ~games
Weldawadyathink LinkThis is unfortunate, but props to them for not releasing a sub-par product. With the goodwill generated by how good the play date is, they could easily burn that and sell a ton of cheap Bluetooth...This is unfortunate, but props to them for not releasing a sub-par product. With the goodwill generated by how good the play date is, they could easily burn that and sell a ton of cheap Bluetooth speakers for a lot of money. But a quality product should come first. More companies should learn from Panic.
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Comment on British startup plans to supply solar power from space to Icelanders by 2030, in what could be the world's first demonstration of this novel renewable energy source in ~space
Weldawadyathink Link ParentI think that might just be terminology that seems confusing if you don’t have the context. High frequency radio is indeed high in the context of radio waves, but all waves in the radio spectrum...I think that might just be terminology that seems confusing if you don’t have the context. High frequency radio is indeed high in the context of radio waves, but all waves in the radio spectrum are quite low. It’s 3 to 30 MHz, whereas microwave is 2.4 GHz. The wavelengths are 10 to 100 meters, whereas microwaves are 1m to 1mm. So while it being “high” frequency sounds scary, it’s actually quite low frequency.
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Comment on Announcing the Tildes Backlog Burner event for November 2024: Shrink your unplayed games list this coming month! in ~games
Weldawadyathink LinkUnfortunately I won’t be participating this time. The dang Factorio devs went and released space age. I can’t bear the thought of playing anything except that for the time being. Have fun y’all; I...Unfortunately I won’t be participating this time. The dang Factorio devs went and released space age. I can’t bear the thought of playing anything except that for the time being. Have fun y’all; I will be following these threads.
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Comment on ‘I grew up with it’: readers on the enduring appeal of Microsoft Excel in ~tech
Weldawadyathink Link ParentChatGPT is pretty terrible at powerquery. It would often give me syntactically incorrect code and be unable to fix it. The most I could use it for was finding new PQ features. I would often need...ChatGPT is pretty terrible at powerquery. It would often give me syntactically incorrect code and be unable to fix it. The most I could use it for was finding new PQ features. I would often need to look through Microsoft’s documentation and reimplement what I needed myself. It isn’t a great experience.
The main draw for me is the type system (very surprising 😜). First, there are a few other things I like, and then I’ll wax poetic about TS. I like the idea of pure functional programming. FP is obviously doable in almost any language, but it feels at home to me in JS. I really like chaining operators with “.” on the new line in JS. You can do the same in python if you wrap the entire thing in parentheses, but that feels slightly clunky. I like the ()=> lambda syntax better than the lambda() syntax. These all are very minor annoyances. These alone wouldn’t make me choose one language over another
Now for the type system. I am not experienced enough to weigh in on the fundamental question of static or dynamic type systems. What I can say is this: static type systems seem fine for mature projects that are mostly self contained. Dynamic types seem much better for getting a project started from scratch.
I work best when I can see something working quickly and make many small iterations from there. JS in general seems more suited to my programming approach. I have my editor set to save on every change, and the code is executed immediately on save. So as soon as it is syntactically valid, I get an output. I know immediately if something is right or wrong. I don’t need to go through the steps of compiling and executing like for c or c++. I don’t know if python has a similar watcher utility, but for JavaScript it is so essential that it is built into projects like bun, deno, and I think node is working on it too.
A dynamic type system also works well for my preference to have something simple working and iterate from there. I don’t really care in the beginning if some variable is a string, integer, object, array, etc. just run my code and see if it works. If my code doesn’t work, me fixing type annotations is a waste of time. Then when I have something working, I can go back and annotate types to make sure it’s reliable and correct. This is where typescript separates itself from python. Python does have function type annotations, but if I recall correctly, it does not give you errors if you pass an incorrect type. You can write a typescript program with absolutely zero type information by using the “any” type everywhere. The once you are ready to add types, you change one line in your tsconfig and fix all the errors. So TS can be a fully dynamic or fully static type system.
Furthermore, TS has excellent support for very complex types. Let’s say you have an api that returns json with two keys: objectType and payload. ObjectType is just a string, but payload is an entirely different object depending on the value of objectType. I don’t know if python’s type annotations can do that, but TS will handle that with ease. JavaScript in general also maps much better than python to JSON (to be expected since JSON came from JS). These two combined make working with JSON way easier in TS than Python. Even if you do it in python, you won’t be able to have your editor autocomplete accessors within a deeply nested object structure.
That turned into a long diatribe, but I hope it makes some sense. Modern typescript is a fantastic language.
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Comment on No, raising the minimum wage does not hurt US fast-food workers in ~finance
Weldawadyathink Link ParentI read online about people who never cook for themselves, but I have never met one in real life. I grew up same as you, with eating out being a luxury. When I was young, it was possible maybe once...I read online about people who never cook for themselves, but I have never met one in real life. I grew up same as you, with eating out being a luxury. When I was young, it was possible maybe once or twice a week. When I was older, and when I was on my own, it was attainable almost never. My family is above the median income in my city according to the census bureau. This begs the question: why the change in affordability in dining? Restaurants in 2004 could set their prices such that an above median family could afford it a few times each week. Apparently restaurants in 2024 have to price their menu such that the same family can only eat out once or twice a month. What changed?
One of the biggest markup restaurants in the US have is on wine. It is pretty standard to have at least a 100% markup above the exact same bottle in a wine shop. Usually 200 to 300% is more common. I have also seen bottles above 400% markup. I’ve now been living in France for a few months. That same markup does not exist here. Of course there is a small markup on wine, but nothing close to even 100%. And I can assure you that the food is not outrageously marked up instead. If all these restaurants can survive and thrive here in France without outrageous prices, why can’t they do the same in the USA?
I am sure there is some nuance I don’t understand, but it feels like restaurants and business owners are lying through their teeth to try and squeeze more blood from the stone.
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Comment on ‘I grew up with it’: readers on the enduring appeal of Microsoft Excel in ~tech
Weldawadyathink Link ParentAgreed. Powerquery is essential for csv data. Excel doesn’t natively support quoted commas in a csv file unless you import using powerquery. Although even powerquery will default to...Agreed. Powerquery is essential for csv data. Excel doesn’t natively support quoted commas in a csv file unless you import using powerquery. Although even powerquery will default to QuoteStyle.None instead of QuoteStyle.Csv for some stupid reason.
Also you can import a range of documents using powerquery quite easily. It’s explicitly supported too, and not just a hack that technically works. But the user interface for doing it is so opaque that you pretty much have to know it exists before you can find it. You start by importing a folder data source. It gives you a table with file names, folder paths, other metadata, and the binary contents of the file. From here, you can do any manipulations you would like to select the files, for example string extraction to select a specific range of dates. Then if you “expand” the binary column field (I forget the actual name of the operation, but it’s one of the options at the top of the column), powerquery will do a bunch of stuff for you. It selects one of the files as a sample file. You fill in any mutations you want to that file (promoting the header row, changing data types, removing columns, etc). Powerquery applies those same functions to all of the targeted files and combines those separate outputs into a single query. Once you get the hang of it, it’s very simple to set up and quite powerful.
That being said, if you have a python setup that works for you, keep using that. The only advantage powerquery has over a skilled python dev is that it’s installed by default on almost all corporate computers. I am reasonably proficient in python, but not as experienced as it sounds like you are. And after I found typescript, I don’t really like writing python anymore. I would much rather run typescript, but it doesn’t have the same support for pandas and other useful libraries.
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Comment on ‘I grew up with it’: readers on the enduring appeal of Microsoft Excel in ~tech
Weldawadyathink Link ParentAll of those are why I hate excel. Also poor options to have multiple users editing the same document. In theory multi user editing works with OneDrive/sharepoint. In practice, it breaks almost...All of those are why I hate excel. Also poor options to have multiple users editing the same document. In theory multi user editing works with OneDrive/sharepoint. In practice, it breaks almost every single time I used it. It might be okay for very simple spreadsheets, but for anything complex it breaks so quickly.
But I have one nitpick/question about your issue list. Compatibility issues. I will admit that I didn’t have much need to open old excel files, but my impression was that excel compatibility was legendary. The latest excel 365 has native support for the excel file format used back in 2003. I am kinda tempted to build out a spreadsheet in the copy of excel I have for my Mac Plus and see if it can open on my modern copy. Heck, excel still has known bugs because fixing them would break old spreadsheets (the 1900 leap year bug was apparently copied from lotus 123 to maintain compatibility). Excel even has some examples of forward compatibility I found. They made a LAMBDA function that, combined with the name manager, allows you to define custom functions without using VBA. I wanted to use this for sheets for my job, so I had IT install the version (I think 22h2 or 23h1) before it was deployed to the entire company. I was fully expecting sheets made with lambdas to break when my coworkers with old versions opened them. But they could open them without error, and the calculations still worked perfectly. They couldn’t see the nice lambda formatting, but as long as they didn’t change my formulas, it worked on their version of excel that was released before lambdas existed. Personally I have never seen excel intercompatibility issues.
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Comment on ‘I grew up with it’: readers on the enduring appeal of Microsoft Excel in ~tech
Weldawadyathink Link ParentI didn’t mention it explicitly, but power query is the big reason I can’t use libreoffice calc, Google sheets, or Apple numbers. Once you get a feel for it, power query is fantastic, as you say. I...I didn’t mention it explicitly, but power query is the big reason I can’t use libreoffice calc, Google sheets, or Apple numbers. Once you get a feel for it, power query is fantastic, as you say. I don’t think there is any tool on the market as flexible and powerful as powerquery. At one point I tried to replicate a relatively simple PQ ETL logic into python, specifically pandas. Pandas did some things better, but it was much more clunky to set up. I wish there was a tool like powerquery that exported into pandas, parquet, or similarly flexible format without having to use excel.
And on top of all of that, powerquery can execute arbitrary python scripts. So it’s literally more powerful than all of python (okay that might be a bit hyperbolic, but it’s really powerful). My job for the last 3 years was almost entirely powerquery. It is one of the best parts of excel.
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Comment on ‘I grew up with it’: readers on the enduring appeal of Microsoft Excel in ~tech
Weldawadyathink LinkThis is a fluff piece with no real content. All it really says is “these three random people use and like excel”. I don’t really have anything to say on this article. Excel is fantastic and I love...This is a fluff piece with no real content. All it really says is “these three random people use and like excel”. I don’t really have anything to say on this article.
Excel is fantastic and I love it! I also despise it with every fiber of my being. I truly think that nobody can ever love excel without also hating it, unless they don’t really use it very much.
Spreadsheets are central to computing. After all, basically all data in the world lives inside a database at some point. A database is nothing more than a spreadsheet without a front end. Fundamentally there is nothing that can be done in a database that couldn’t also be done in a basic spreadsheet program. Postgres will always be better for large data sets and transactional data, and duckdb will always be better at handling massive amounts of data, but they are both fundamentally identical to a spreadsheet.
Having access to a spreadsheet is a huge productivity boost. Once you get some experience, a spreadsheet starts looking like a fantastic hammer for every nail you come across. Excel in particular has so much cruft built in to solve all sorts of issues people have. That, I think, is why excel is the best spreadsheet program. I’ve tried libreoffice calc, and I keep coming back to apple numbers and wanting to love it, but I always end up back on excel. When you hit a limit in one of the other office programs, you are at the limit. You will never be able to do what you want to do. Excel doesn’t really have limits. When you hit what looks like a limit, you can find some ancient forum post with some magic formula, or some VBA script and get your task done.
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Comment on Vivaldi 7.0 has been released in ~tech
Weldawadyathink Link ParentIs that actually an issue though? They will get swapped out to the page file as soon as the memory is needed and never swapped back.Is that actually an issue though? They will get swapped out to the page file as soon as the memory is needed and never swapped back.
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Comment on Halfbakery - a collection of half baked ideas in ~misc
Weldawadyathink Link ParentMy parents could get some good use out of those. They have a cement tile roof. There are zero roofers in the area that will agree to do any work on it. Every single solar panel installer runs away...My parents could get some good use out of those. They have a cement tile roof. There are zero roofers in the area that will agree to do any work on it. Every single solar panel installer runs away as soon as they realize it. But none of these companies properly train their sales people. They act flabbergasted when we tell them that their company refuses to install solar panels on our roof. Some of them even argue with us.
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Comment on Arm is cancelling Qualcomm's chip design license in ~tech
Weldawadyathink Link ParentThanks! I tried out the internet archive’s app after I commented, but it seems they are still not back to full functioning after their hacks.Thanks! I tried out the internet archive’s app after I commented, but it seems they are still not back to full functioning after their hacks.
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Comment on Arm is cancelling Qualcomm's chip design license in ~tech
Weldawadyathink LinkAnyone have a paywall bypass? Bloomberg seems to think I might want to pay 275€/year for access. How is that even close to reasonable?Anyone have a paywall bypass? Bloomberg seems to think I might want to pay 275€/year for access. How is that even close to reasonable?
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Comment on Apple’s AirPods Pro hearing health features are as good as they sound in ~health
Weldawadyathink Link ParentThey have! AirPods with ANC, released at the iPhone event a month ago.They have! AirPods with ANC, released at the iPhone event a month ago.
It’s mostly up to the legislative branch. The judicial branch only decides interpretations of existing laws. Their recent ruling was effectively “abortion bans have always been legal in the US; we are just clarifying it now though”. If the legislative branch doesn’t like the court’s rulings, they need to pass a new law saying that the right to an abortion is legal. If they do that, the only recourse the cours have would be to rule that this law was unconstitutional. If they did that, the legislative branch could pass a constitutional amendment. If that were to happen, there would be nothing the judicial branch could do (in theory).
So all of this fighting is just because the legislative branch hasn’t (for a variety of reasons) passed a modern and explicit law. We are relying on decades old laws that aren’t very explicit and hoping the courts rule in our favor. Take, for example, France, who already had free access to abortions. After the Row v. Wade shitshow, they passed a constitutional amendment affirming abortion as a constitutional right. Now it would take a constitutional amendment to reverse that right, and it’s protected from political manipulation like we have in the US.
Edit: about the presidential role in this, there isn’t much they can do. The only thing like a law they can do alone is an executive order, which isn’t even really a law, and would never be able to override case law or actual law. They would need to not veto the law that the legislature sends them (or the legislature needs to override the veto). In fact, the vice president actually has more power in this situation. They are the president and tie breaker vote in the senate, so they have some control over the laws that are discussed and passed.