penguin42

ajft, 2 days ago to retrocomputing

Happy World Floppy Disk day to all who celebrate (5.25”)

Yeah yeah, 'merkin dates I know, just accept it and be amused

#retrocomputing

stefanha, 2 days ago to random

An easy way to kick off an unattended Linux reinstall:

# kexec --load path/to/kernel --initrd path/to/initramfs --command-line ...  
# systemctl kexec  

No need to set up a PXE server or attach an ISO through a BMC. You can find the kernel, initramfs, and command-line in the installer's network booting documentation.

avavsystems, 4 days ago to random

Todays #RetroTech Old Tat
Nearly killed me, managed unload
The BEAST

Ampex Data Products CP 100

It’s history seems a mystery
1” Tape
14 Tracks
Not Video, not Helical Drum
Audio would have been 16 Tracks
Gent was told “used for Data originally”
Bloody heavy & HUGE

Thoughts?

image/png
image/png
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johncarlosbaez, 8 days ago (edited 7 days ago) to random

When Maxwell realized in 1862 that light consists of waves in the electromagnetic field, why didn't anyone try to use electricity to make such waves right away? Why did Hertz succeed only 24 years later?

According to 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘔𝘢𝘹𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘢𝘯𝘴:

"Since he regarded the production of light as an essentially molecular and mechanical process, prior, in a sense, to electromagnetic laws, Maxwell could elaborate an electromagnetic account of the propagation of light without ever supposing that ether waves were produced purely electromagnetically."

In 1879, a physicist named Lodge realized that in theory one could make "electromagnetic light". But he didn't think of creating waves of lower frequency:

"Send through the helix an intermittent current (best alternately reversed) but the alternations must be very rapid, several billion per sec."

He mentioned this idea to Fitzgerald, who believed he could prove it was impossible. Unfortunately Fitzgerald managed to convince Lodge. But later he realized his mistake:

"It was FitzGerald himself who found the flaws in his "proofs." He then proceeded to put the subject on a sound theoretical basis, so that by 1883 he understood quite clearly how electromagnetic waves could be produced and what their characteristics would be. But the waves remained inaccessible; FitzGerald, along with everyone else, was stymied by the lack of any way to detect them."

In 1883, Fitzgerald gave a talk called "On a Method of Producing Electromagnetic Disturbances of Comparatively Short Wavelengths". But he couldn't figure out how to 𝘥𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘤𝘵 these waves. Hertz figured that out in 1886.

sharewarewolf, 12 days ago to free

#Free to a good home: One Radius PowerView 0346/0347 SCSI video adapter.
#RetroComputing #SCSI #Macintosh

The back of a dark gray case with two screw heads in the upper corners. Upper left is a barrel jack for power and a SCSI ID selector. Below those are Mac and PC video connectors. Two Centronix SCSI connectors are to the right.
The label on the underside, printed in light gray on the dark gray plastic. radius PowerView Model 0346/0347 5 Vdc 1.5 A, plus FCC information. Made in USA.

rogerggbr, 13 days ago to random

@connections thought you folks would appreciate this plaque, spotted yesterday. Last exchange to be automated in Ireland was in 1987. I'm thinking of the operators still working up until then.

berrange, 13 days ago to random

PSA: if you're using GitLab CI and run builds with TSAN in that CI, you might notice crashes since ~1 week ago. GitLab updated the Google COS version in their shared runners, and this brings a kernel running with "vm.mmap_rnd_bits = 31". This is unfortunately incompatible with LLVM < 18, which only supports 'mmap_rnd_bits' value up to 28. https://github.com/google/sanitizers/issues/1716 Lacking root, you can't change the sysctl but you can use 'setarch -R make ....' to turn off VA randomization to avoid the bug.

tony, 16 days ago to random

deleted_by_author

transdiffusion, 23 days ago to random

FROM THE NORTH, THIS IS GRANADA

Our new subsite with 250 articles about #Granada TV's studios, people and programmes from the pan-North 5-day era 1956-1968

https://granadatv.network/

ranjit, 24 days ago to random

just learned about telepathic snail telegraphy!! from @loriemerson's talk

🐌 〰️ 🐌 〰️ 🐌 〰️ 🐌 〰️ 🐌

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasilalinic-sympathetic_compass

chesterbr, 27 days ago to VintageOSes

Growing up with MS-DOS, I knew its role in today's Windows' usage of \ to separate directories and / for command-line arguments (choices that sound quirk-y in an Unix-influenced world that uses / and -, respectively.)

I never understood why MSFT - a very Unix-aware shop, having released their XENIX a year before MS-DOS - went with such an odd choice, until I looked at the (recently open-sourced) MS-DOS source code.

The files include documentation for computer manufacturers (so they could write compatible BIOS code, customize distribution, etc.), and this piece on MS-DOS 2.0 (which introduced subdirectories) suggests that - as usual in those times - the party behind the odd decision was none other than IBM:

https://github.com/microsoft/MS-DOS/blob/main/v2.0/source/README.txt#L41-L55

#msdos #windows #retrocomputing #ibm #unix

fj, 28 days ago to random

IBM is suing LzLabs, which helps its clients migrate away from IBM computer mainframe technology onto open source alternatives, claiming it wouldn't be able to do so without "reverse engineering mainframe technology”.
https://sifted.eu/articles/ibm-lawsuit-zurich-startup-lzlabs

larsmb, 1 month ago to microsoft

I just tried to help a friend and found this - wait what, Save As a PDF in MS Office on your local computer, it ... funnels your local document through their cloud service? 🤯

Sure, no data leak at all.

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice/forum/all/office-for-mac-saving-as-pdf-requires-internet/a14c45c6-c524-4e77-9f01-5fc62ded14cb

#Microsoft #WTF #LibreOffice

stgraber, 1 month ago to random

A customer of mine is looking for a #Wayland expert to contract, related to frame capture as part of a streaming stack. Let me know if you or someone you know would be a good fit!

gsuberland, 1 month ago to random

just putting it out there: this article is uninformed garbage and constitutes wholesale misinformation. please ignore everything this person says on the subject of microarchitecture because they don't have a single fucking clue.

https://hackaday.com/2024/03/21/why-x86-needs-to-die/

regehr, 1 month ago to random

this has to be one of my all-time favorite bug-finding techniques: in your widely deployed software, at very low probability, you put a new heap allocation next to a protected page. performance is unaffected and the bugs that you find are those that actually matter to users in practice.

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2311.09394v2.pdf

fsphil, 1 month ago to random

Twins! A typical clutch in this box is about 6-8 eggs, so quite a way to go yet.

wezm, 1 month ago to random

Mother-in-law was almost scammed into handing over bank details yesterday after calling a number shown on a website claiming that her computer was locked due to malware.

The scam website was hosted several sub-domains deep on windows.net, which not only looks like a legit Microsoft domain, it is owned by Microsoft and they use it for Azure, including Azure Files! 🤦‍♂️

Even worse Firefox makes the windows.net bit more prominent in the URL bar (Chrome and Safari do not appear to).

th, 1 month ago to random

We’ve cast off lines and put Honolulu to our rudder. Soon we’ll leave Hawaii in our wake as we sail on towards Japan.

hrw, 1 month ago to random

IRC's not dead!

And gets new client for environment which probably never seen IRC client before.

https://axleos.com/an-irc-client-in-your-motherboard/

azonenberg, 1 month ago to random

New video upload! Finished editing just in time.

"Introduction to Ramen and Ramune Spectroscopy"

https://youtu.be/CjfLq3RsJbU

stefanha, 1 month ago to random

Is it time for supply chain safe programming languages?

https://blog.vmsplice.net/2024/03/where-are-supply-chain-safe-programming.html

kernellogger, 1 month ago to linux

Lasse Collin's patch-series updating the #LinuxKernel's #xz code that a few days ago hit #linux-next was dropped for now until backdooring of upstream xz is understood better:

https://lore.kernel.org/all/20240329195602.382cb1c99bb70e3d8c6093ae@linux-foundation.org/

hailey, 2 months ago to random

what on earth is going on over at C++

are they ok

RichiH, 2 months ago to Electronics

Question for the #electronics or maybe #electricity bubble:

If I have a relais rated for switching 20 A at 230VAC, can I use the same relais for switching 20A at 24VDC? My intuition is yes, but I can't seem to be able to find a clear answer as the Internet is littered with discussions about using AC for DC switching and vice versa whereas my interest is on the "it's already switched" side.