@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

ratkins

@ratkins@mastodon.social

I miss Usenet. Don’t make me miss Twitter too.

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

cstross, to random
@cstross@wandering.shop avatar

Some thoughts on spam:

  1. Right now it's a single idiot running a scripted Joe Job. But we know how spam ecosystems develop. The next steps are inevitable.

  2. Next, someone will release an activitypub spamming script. It will hammer on servers to create throwaway accounts then use them to post.

  3. This will drive a bunch of small servers off the fediverse and cause acrimonious defederation squabbles.

  4. Surviving servers will limit sign-ups, requiring proof of humanity (or identity).

/1

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@cstross I just got rid of my copy of “How to make money on the Information Superhighway” (which I bought, about 25 years ago, from a second hand bookshop—primarily to take it out of circulation.)

thomasfuchs, to random
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io avatar

I know weird opinion, but if it’s “Chrome only” it’s not the Web.

It’s Flash, but worse.

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@thomasfuchs I phrase this as “if it only works on Chrome it’s not a ‘web app’, it’s a ‘Chrome app’”. And as someone who’s not fond of web apps at the best of times, I really hate this.

TheWarOnCars, to london
@TheWarOnCars@mastodon.social avatar

"When you drive a massive SUV you’re saying three things: I don’t care about the environment. I don’t care that I’m more likely to kill pedestrians in my car. I don’t care that there isn’t room for my car and others to co-habit smoothly on London’s streets."

https://www.standard.co.uk/comment/london-suvs-cars-pollution-climate-change-b1127839.html

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@TheWarOnCars It’s amazing how the author of this piece can simultaneously be so precisely correct and also utterly insufferable.

malware, to random
@malware@hachyderm.io avatar

holy fuck do I feel old

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@malware Unless you’ve been coding for decades, you’ll have no idea how abysmal git’s interface is because you’ve never used anything else.

sdw, to random
@sdw@mastodon.social avatar

just remember, when you die in visionOS, you die in the real world

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@sdw Would Apple allow a “falling simulator” on the visionOS store? 🤔

TLB73, to random
@TLB73@topspicy.social avatar

And you thought a bastard file was funny.

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@TLB73 New term of endearment just dropped.

jonty, to random
@jonty@chaos.social avatar

Given a million years I would never guess this is how you relax a ferret

video/mp4

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@jonty I will keep this in mind the next time I have a tense ferret.

SwiftOnSecurity, to random

There is a massive disconnect between the kind of attacks security professionals imagine by resourced attackers just like them, and what dipshit teenagers with more time to waste than God in an empty universe actually try for weeks.

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@Enigma @SwiftOnSecurity LOL @ “Advanced Persistent Teeenager”

carnage4life, to random
@carnage4life@mas.to avatar

It’s ironic that GM decided to pull CarPlay and Android Auto in favor of their in-house infotainment systems only for their software to be so buggy that they’ve had to stop selling the Chevy Blazer EV until they fix the system.

Car companies are a great example of how culture eats strategy for breakfast. It’s a smart strategy not to be dependent on Apple and Google for key software. But if you can't execute a transition to a software development culture then it's dumb.

https://www.theverge.com/2023/12/23/24013357/2024-chevy-blazer-ev-stop-sale-software-problems

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@carnage4life I’ve always said it was a race between Tesla getting good at manufacturing before the legacy car companies got good at software and you can guess who I’m backing in that one…

dmoren, to random
@dmoren@zeppelin.flights avatar

Real-time video of Apple Park today.

Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory Tantrum GIF

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@stevetures @dmoren There is definitely a bit of a throwing-the-toys-out-of-the-pram vibe in this one. I find it interesting Schiller (as “Apple Fellow”) gets quoted. Like it’s him personally who’s pissed off about it all.

polotek, to random
@polotek@social.polotek.net avatar

Here’s a big secret that people don’t want you to know. If nobody is able to give you clarity about the scope and scale of a request, sometimes that means you get to decide. It’s really cool when that happens. Don’t waste it.
https://soc.jrconlin.com/@jrconlin/112374476337793296

ratkins,
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@polotek @jrconlin You are correct, and the thing to do is try and constrain the scope to “one point”. There will be fixes that are smaller, there will be things that blow up due to unknown unknowns but on average, every chunk of value you deliver will be “one point” (in practice something like 2-3 “ideal engineering days”.) If you build a reputation for delivering on this cadence that’s how you gain trust, including forbearance when things go south.

alper, to random
@alper@rls.social avatar

Cycled a bit through this weekend and saw placards for what is an effective altruist pro-life extension party participating in the coming election redo: https://verjuengungsforschung.de

"Where would you like to live in 800 years?"

ratkins, (edited )
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

@alper I unironically think this is awesome and would vote for these people if I could. One of my unpopular opinions is that living forever would be awesome and if I was a little bit younger or a little bit richer I would probably be able to do so.

ratkins, to BurningMan
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

With much relief I declare the control box electronics of the Technocolour Dreamcoat v3 (beta) complete. I now have a expander board in a 3D printed control box with two buttons and a pot which register in the Pixelblaze UI. Double check what your pull-down resistors are pulling down to, kids! Now it’s a simple (!) matter of software…

ratkins, to random
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

God damn it I wish Reddit and Twitter would stop with the needy “engagement” push notifications. Yeah sure, I posted in that sub last week to ask a specific question I don’t care about anything else going on there.

ratkins, to BurningMan
@ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

So is pretty cool, see you at ! Or, you’ll see me rather 😉 https://forum.electromage.com/t/the-technocolour-dreamcoat-phone-free-burning-man-2023-edition/3115

ojala, to random
@ojala@mastodon.nz avatar

deleted_by_author

    •
    ratkins,
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    @ojala @akosma “he also has a habit of naming things after himself”
    😂

    But yes.

    ratkins, to random
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    I acknowledge it’s difficult to come up with a single slang word for the Euro which is pronounceable and not vulgar in twenty different countries, but it’s been twenty five years! Work it out!

    ratkins, (edited ) to BurningMan
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    Grinds my gears that the only practical venue for planning a camp is—still, in 2023—Facebook Groups.

    ratkins, to random
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    Hobbyking’s catalog is incredibly irritating. “Hey, here’s a huge list of all the stuff you can’t buy!”

    ratkins, to random
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    I have a cadence sensor on my bike and it didn’t “just work” with watchOS 10/ios 17, do I have to do anything?

    simonbs, to random
    @simonbs@mastodon.social avatar

    Today, I’ve been using ChatGPT a lot to create SQLite queries. I provide it with the schema for all my tables in SQL and ask it to create queries based on specific needs that require reasoning about relationships across 5-6 tables. It works surprisingly well! ChatGPT takes advantage of features in SQLite that I had no idea existed to ensure that the result rows match my needs in great detail.

    ratkins,
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    @simonbs I write the tests in advance and get ChatGPT to write me all the queries. It’s amazing, such a productivity boost.

    ratkins, to random
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    What’s the best of the “I want to go somewhere for a holiday, I’m not sure where, give me options” sites?

    ratkins, to random
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    Even before the latest shenanigans, I still haven’t found a reason to use anything but the built-in macOS Terminal.app.

    ratkins,
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    @nat Um…

    ratkins, to random
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    So this new EU App Store conditions thing. Do I have this right that they’re aiming for ad-supported games and free-to-download apps that support external services (Uber, Facebook, food delivery…) with this “platform fee” but as an unintended consequence they’re going to destroy the life of the next person who comes up with something like Flappy Bird?

    ratkins,
    @ratkins@mastodon.social avatar

    @corduroy No, certainly not the virtuous cycle of the best apps (due to being written against the richest APIs) encouraging customers to buy into Apple’s hardware ecosystem one $1300, 40% margin phone at a time.

    There are absolutely factions inside Apple who still in their heart of hearts believe the App Store was a mistake and dirty third party devs shouldn’t be allowed to sully their pristine platform with their poor taste garbage, let alone make money off the back of Apple’s hard work.

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • JUstTest
  • thenastyranch
  • magazineikmin
  • ethstaker
  • khanakhh
  • rosin
  • Youngstown
  • everett
  • slotface
  • ngwrru68w68
  • mdbf
  • GTA5RPClips
  • kavyap
  • DreamBathrooms
  • provamag3
  • cisconetworking
  • cubers
  • Leos
  • InstantRegret
  • Durango
  • tacticalgear
  • tester
  • osvaldo12
  • normalnudes
  • anitta
  • modclub
  • megavids
  • lostlight
  • All magazines
    •