This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

UPDATE: It was the power supply. I've never even heard of such a weirdly anal issue, but after installing a new one, everything is a-okay.

So, I've never really had issues with power supplies, and generally have always troubleshot (troubleshooted? trouble...shot?) my own issues with no real, well, issues. Until now.

The other day, I got a helluva deal on a 6800 XT on Facebook Marketplace, the guy had the printout with the receipt, it's still under warranty for two years, whole shebang. So I upgraded from a Vega 56 to it. And there were zero issues. Admittedly, my power supply is only 650 watts, so I thought I might be missing some wiggle room there, and was prepared to need to upgrade. But the other night, it was fine. I stress-tested with a nearly-maxed-out 100+ FPS Cyberpunk 2077 and had zero issues, and followed that up with moderate use 144 FPS board games and things for the next few hours with a friend.

And sometime after I went to bed (I left the computer on because I'm a bad man who doesn't take care of his things or some other vaguely acceptable excuse), Windows Update occurred. Again. It's been raising hell on me in the middle of the night any time I leave my computer on, but whatever. So in the morning (this was Sunday), I saw it wasn't working right, and just kind of... shitting itself. Had trouble getting out of BIOS, all this other stuff. Eventually, I realized it was ignoring my SSD, and after unplugging everything else and forcing it to boot from my SSD with the Windows 10 install on it, it said the install was borked and asked me to do recovery steps. None of them really worked. So at this point, I was assuming that I might have hit something with the SSD and damaged the SATA controller when moving the power for the GPU or something.

So today, I got a new NVMe drive, booted from a 16gb flash drive, installed Windows 11 on it, and everything was fine. I was able to create a functional Windows 11 install, and it was fine. Until I got to the login screen. As soon as the screen asking for my PIN (on a complete, 100% valid Windows install) would load, that first frame, it would shut down hard. No BSOD, nothing. Just immediate shutdown. So I thought, "well, this seems like an issue for the POWER SUPPLY!" and removed the GPU, plugging my main monitor directly into the motherboard. Now, it was shutting down and power cycling before it even hit the BIOS, which is... weird as hell? So I thought "well, it gets further when a video card is in, let's put ye olden Vega 56 in and see how far that gets me!" and... it just works. I'm typing this from my fresh Windows 11 install with zero perceivable issues.

So my question is: How is it that my computer was perfectly fine on Saturday night with my new video card under 100% load, but by the next day would decide seemingly at random based on some sort of schrodinger's cat theory when it would shut down and when it wouldn't.

So, in summation, the four inconsistent scenarios, in tl;dr form:

• New RX 6800 XT is installed, computer runs fine at 100% load while stress testing and then for hours afterward
• 6800 XT installed, Windows won't boot and the power supply seemingly gives up
• No video card installed, the computer starts power cycling before even reaching the BIOS
• My old Vega 56 installed, everything is perfectly fine

So, obviously there's something weird going on with my power supply, but if someone can set my sights on exactly why all of this has happened, and what the proper solution to make sure it doesn't again, or just... I don't know, typing this all out has made the last day and a half of my life feel much more worth it.

And as an aside, my theory for why Windows was broken and I assumed my SSD was dying is as such: When it did the Windows Update and started trying to install it was the first time it powered down with no warning, which just broke Windows mid-update in a bad way.

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

I'm doing a bit of Typescript programming and started using zod for input validation. It has a fair number of convenience methods, one of which is brand(). This creates a unique type, much like the newtype operator in some languages. This is despite TypeScript not having unique types by default; TypeScript implements structural typing.

The technique used to implement unique types has been known for a long time, but it's new to me. You can declare a type with an extra field that doesn't really exist.

There seem to be several variations on how to do this. They seem to be mostly equivalent, but the ergonomics might differ. (Some might have better compiler errors that others?) The basic requirement is that the imaginary field doesn't get in the way in normal use, but it's incompatible with other types, causing a compiler error if they're mixed.

One way goes like this:

declare const brand: unique symbol;

type Brand<T, TBrand extends string> = T & {
  [brand]: TBrand;
}

It can be used to declare branded types like this:

type TopicId = Brand<bigint, "TopicId">;

const myTopicId = 123n as TopicId;

This trick relies on the fact that TypeScript's type checking is unsound. We can lie to the type checker. Intersecting T (in this case, bigint) creates a subtype of bigint with an imaginary field. The field's type is declared so the field requires a specific string, so it's going to be incompatible with just about any other type, unless you use Brand to give it the same name on purpose. (The field doesn't actually exist and no string is actually stored there.)

To create a TopicId value, you use "as" to explicitly downcast bigints to TopicId's. Then you can use them just like a bigint, except that there will be compile errors if you use them wrong.

A less strict approach is to make the imaginary field optional, described here as "flavoring" but I don't think that's in common use? Then you could assign bignums without doing a cast, but the type is still incompatible with other branded type. This reminds me of how types work in Go.

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/19

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

It's been years since I've had to use a an actual computer for anything serious and I want to regain my literacy with them. The height of my computer usage was the Windows XP/Vista era. I got it because I wanted to throw myself into a couple of different programming/coding courses.
I chose the Surface Pro because of the detachable keyboard/stylus setup and the fact that I don't have a good way to set up a desktop computer. Also I've always fantasized about being able to do work in a coffee shop or in a comfy chair by a lake lol.
Can anyone share some tips/tricks that might be useful to me? Anything from hotkeys, task management related things, or just general quality of life things I should know about would be super helpful. I'm so used to smartphones being able to do everything and feel like I'm a little in over my head here. Thanks in advance.

Just for a moment, forget all of the technical pros and cons, the static typing, just-in-time compilation, operator overloading, object orientation to the max...

Is there a programming language that you've just found to be... fun?

Is there one that you'd pick above all else for personal or company projects, if you had your druthers, because you would simply be so excited to use it?

And then, is there something missing in that "fun" language that's preventing it from actually becoming a reality (i.e. small community, lack of libraries, maintenance ended in the 80s, etc.)?

Hey, good people of Tildes!

I'm building a self-help web app, a small part of which I'd like to involve some pixel pets. I like pixel art and it'd be great if I could create some. Though, the truth is, I can't draw for shit, I have little to no imagination, and I'm afraid even if I put the time and effort into it, I still may not produce something I'd call good enough to put on the website. I also lack the motivation to spend a lot of time learning how to create good pixel art, as I only need it for this project.

I thought about paying some professional(s) to do it but that would probably break the bank for me, as I want to offer the users a lot of pixel pet options, which brings us to what I guess is the only remaining option.

I found some services that offer AI-generated pixel art. This one in particular looks like what I'm looking for and also offers animations. While watching a demo of it on YouTube, I noticed a few comments voicing concern about the ethics of selling art that's generated using models trained off of unpaid artists' work. While this is not a new topic, I admittedly hadn't given it much thought before, as I've never used, or planned to use AI-generated art in a meaningful capacity.

While I'm not sure whether it changes much, for what it's worth, I should note that my web app is going to be free, open-source, and ad-free forever.

What are your thoughts? Also, I'd love to know if there are options that I missed!

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/25

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/24

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

Two hours ago I randomly thought "hey, why not do LFS?", so I opened my laptop and started following the book. I've heard a lot of people say that LFS is great for learning how a Linux system works. However, so far it's just been a guide on how to compile different software and what autoconfig flags to use. I thought that maybe further chapters will have more information on how things work, but it seems like they all just contain a one-line description of a program and compilation instructions.

If anyone here has done LFS, did you actually learn anything from it? Is it worth spending more time on?

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/23

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/16

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

I am an experienced programmer (mostly M$ stack -- C#, etc).

I started learning mobile Android development a few months ago, learning both Kotlin and the larger Android development environment at the same time. I got bogged down in tutorials and guides, because half of them teach Jetpack Compose methodology and half teach XML layout ... and, often enough, don't bother to mention which method they're using.

Which should I learn first? I am initially interested in learning Android dev for my own hobby/fun/side projects, but I would--ultimately--like to be able to put "Android developer" on my resume.

Jetpack definitely looks better, more modern, more OO, and I expect it will eventually become the new standard ... but that could still be many years down the road. Also, while it might be "better"--especially for larger projects--it also smells more complicated.

So, ultimately, I guess I should learn both if I actually intend to become an Android dev ... but I should definitely get comfortable with one, first ... so, which one?

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/21

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/2

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

I have been having fun learning about generative AI. All in the cloud -- I got some models on hugging face to work, tried out Colab Pro, and found another cloud provider that runs SD models (dreamlook.ai if anyone is interested).

It's got me curious about trying to run something locally (mostly stable diffusion/dreambooth, possibly ollama).
I currently have a Thinkpad T490 with 16 gb ram and the base-level graphics card. I haven't actually tried to run anything locally, on the assumption that it would be extremely slow. I saw that you can get an external GPU, though I also saw some reports of headaches trying to get external GPUs up and running.

I am curious what a workstation might cost that could do a reasonable job running local models. I am not a huge gamer or have any other high performance needs that are not currently served by the Thinkpad; not sure I can justify a $3000 workstation just to make a few jpgs.

I would be happy to buy something secondhand, like if there was a good source of off-lease workstations.

Alternatively-- if you have a similar computer to the T490 and do run models locally, what sort of performance is reasonable to expect? Would it be enough to buy some more RAM for this laptop?

Thanks for any advice!

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/20

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/14

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/15

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/18

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

Have any of you tried out fossil as an alternative to git? I have been using it for about a week, and I think I am in love. I have used git for years, since having some sort of source control is absolutely essential in programming. But I never liked git or felt comfortable using it. Within a week of messing with fossil, I feel like I understand it and can use it without a guide or external tools. It also has an issue tracker, forums, and a wiki built in.

Fossil Versus Git

I recommend reading all of that, especially section 2.5. Their description of cathedral style development lines up much more closely to everything I have worked on than git's bazaar style. Another thing I love is the ability to have the same repo open in multiple different folders at the same time. Basically everything about fossil lines up much more closely with what I think a source control program should be, at least for my use.

Today's problem description: https://adventofcode.com/2023/day/17

Please post your solutions in your own top-level comment. Here's a template you can copy-paste into your comment to format it nicely, with the code collapsed by default inside an expandable section with syntax highlighting (you can replace python with any of the "short names" listed in this page of supported languages):

<details>
<summary>Part 1</summary>

```python
Your code here.
```

</details>

I have a NAS with a ton of photos and documents that have remained untouched for around 6 years. I uploaded all that stuff to OneDrive. Tidied it up and kept using OneDrive mostly. But I also sent stuff to the NAS. They have diverged.

I'm thinking about ways of restructuring/sorting my NAS to match my OneDrive so that I can then sync the two. I thought about making a python script that would just match on file names and move them to the correct location.

Figured before I did I'd ask if anyone else had any other suggestions