@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

vaurora

@vaurora@wandering.shop

Systems programmer, writer, cat appreciator

The artist formerly known as vaurorapub on Twitter and infosec.exchange

I post about computers, nuclear stuff, science fiction, and science fact. I have ADHD so I'm into things that are Novel, Interesting, Challenging, and Urgent.

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

janl, to random
@janl@narrativ.es avatar

Just watched The Princess Bride for the first time ever. AMA.

Three men stare down a cliff, middle guy says inconceivable

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

@janl do you have any plans to rewatch it?

cammerman, to random
@cammerman@mstdn.social avatar

I'm giving some more Brandon Sanderson a try. I have a bunch of friends who are big fans and I keep feeling like I'm missing something.

I read the Mistborn series and mostly liked it, with caveats. I'm now on the second book of the "second Mistborn" series and I'm not sure I will make it to the end of this series.

I have struggled to put into words my feelings about Sanderson, and especially about this second series. But I think I just had an epiphany.

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

@jarulf @cammerman there’s a reason this autocomplete exists

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

People have a hard time taking information into account in speculative fiction about superpowers or magic or advanced technology. Take a superhero who can make things out of ice condensed from the air. Writers often have them make increasingly complex objects, like cages or lenses. Okay, what is stopping them from making a piece of ice with the entirety of Wikipedia engraved on it microscopically? You see the problem I hope

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Similarly, there’s an argument going a round about hope and climate change that says that in time travel fiction, we accept that one person changing one small thing can radically change the future, so why can’t we do that now? Because the time traveler knows which small thing to change. We information-poor non-time-travelers just have to guess and do as many things as possible in the hopes that some of them will be the right things

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

This is also why the best career advice is often “do a lot of different things until you figure out which things you like to do and can get paid to do.” I had no idea I would enjoy and get paid to be a DEI teacher for techies until I did it a dozen times

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

So which one of you is the light-leaver-onner and which is the light-turner-offer?

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

I would love to see a passionate defense of leaving lights on. As a lifelong light-turner-offer, my first Dutch winter is making me question the moral correctness of my actions

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Hey guess what! My bike is much easier to pedal when it has 80 PSI in its tires than 30 PSI. Pass it on!!

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

@quixoticgeek somehow the bike I bought in Europe came with tires listing the pressure in PSI and kPA?? Also what do you recommend for rain/ice/slippery conditions? I was just keeping them “low” but it tuned out to be too low 😂

skinnylatte, to random
@skinnylatte@hachyderm.io avatar

One of the reasons I very much dislike some of the anti-progressive candidates running for elections this year, is that for the entire six months they were campaigning to recall Chesa, their (not Asian) campaigners were yelling at ME outside Trader Joe’s constantly and telling ME I was anti-Asian for not wanting to recall Chesa. So the ‘lean into AAPI race politics and make it conservative’ angle is very obvious to me

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

@skinnylatte ugh, I had blocked out the six months during which every grocery store in SF had an incredibly aggressive and racist volunteer standing outside shouting at people about the DA and the school board

mishellbaker, to random
@mishellbaker@wandering.shop avatar

I have got to figure out how to get out of this rain-funk before the rain stops, because I cannot wait until Thursday to Do Things.

I moved to Los Angeles for a reason. GIVE ME MY SUN BACK.

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

@mishellbaker moving to Amsterdam has been An Adjustment. My blue light glasses are saving me

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

me: I think I’ll take a break from paid work for a few months, be creative and explore new things

also me: gotta schedule some time to send all these invoices

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Speaking of, EU folks who have to deal with VAT: what invoicing software/system do you like? I am paying an account to do bookkeeping so I don't want or need any accounting features

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

@janl okay, we are talking about software, you are correct 😂

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

I am learning the neighborhoods of Amsterdam by buying things on Marktplaats. Today: Oud-Zuid by way of a cheetah-print fietstas

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

European free/open source folks: is there a wiki or something that lists sources of small grants for open source work? I am thinking stuff like the NLnet NGI0 or RIPE NCC Community Project Fund grant programs, things that an individual human living in the EU can apply for.

(If there isn’t such a resource, tell me your fave grant programs and I will start one!)

https://nlnet.nl/news/2023/20231201-call.html
https://www.ripe.net/support/cpf/

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Related: the theme of the OW2 conference this year is open source funding. And it is in Paris in June 😍

https://www.ow2con.org/view/2024/Call_For_Presentations

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Neat Rust job in Amsterdam working on the backend of the open source grant application program

https://nlnet.nl/foundation/jobs/developer-rust.html

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Some researchers from University of Toronto are interviewing folks about the application of codes of conduct in open source, looking for real world experience. Sounds like a 30 minute video call. More info and sign up link here:

https://discourse.sustainoss.org/t/invitation-to-participate-in-research-study-on-code-of-conduct-in-open-source/1456

recursive, to random
@recursive@hachyderm.io avatar

I decided it would be more me to go by my middle name, and after a couple weeks I'm pretty sure this is the right thing so I'm gradually rolling it out everywhere.

https://hachyderm.io/@recursive/111793000928954653

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

@recursive I really love this name! I also promoted my middle name, but to my last name in my case. I feel like the middle name is often where the people giving the name feel the most freedom to make it beautiful and meaningful

mwichary, to random
@mwichary@mastodon.online avatar

A cool lil training station where you can practice mounting your bike to a bus in peace.

image/jpeg

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

@mwichary @waldoj aaaaa I wanted this when I lived in SF so bad. I never did dare to put my bike on the front of a MUNI bus for fear of not being able to do it quickly enough

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Now you can test your IP fragmentation knowledge! ... If you have a MacOS or Linux machine, and a network configured to correctly generate ICMP TTL/Hop LImit exceeded messages...

https://valerieaurora.org/fragquiz.html

Thanks for letting us play the game live in the plenary today! Our group score:

.--
.+.
.+.
+.+
+.+
+..
..+
..+
..+
+--
+++
+..
My fragquiz score: 15/19

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

I wrote up my IP fragmentation game for @LWN - my first article there in about a decade! Currently subscriber-only:

https://lwn.net/Articles/960913/

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

I am appreciating the optimistic proposals in the comments to permanently fix all IP fragmentation problems forever :)

vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Haha this is so freaking cool: Erik Auerswald wrote a bash script to probe PMTU using the ping command and several different search algorithms. Truly a masterpiece

https://lwn.net/Articles/961385/

https://github.com/auerswal/sft/blob/master/pmtud

vaurora, to random
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Making a living as a writer in 2023 is so weird. Your choices are:

  • nepo baby staff writer for legacy media fawning over billionaires and peddling fascism
  • writing 3 email newsletters a week and making the most obscure one subscriber only
  • organizing a community of your fans and charging for access to it
  • starting your own publishing business and asking fans to pay you up front to write the next book
vaurora,
@vaurora@wandering.shop avatar

Hey, someone wrote a whole article about the inescapability of self-promotion and marketing skills for artists today:

https://www.vox.com/culture/2024/2/1/24056883/tiktok-self-promotion-artist-career-how-to-build-following

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