Ben Sturmfels stumbles@identi.ca
Ballarat, Australia
Free software activist who loves riding bikes and flying kites. Lead developer at www.sturm.com.au.
Jason Self at 2021-08-18T13:35:45Z
I upgraded the GCC I use for kernel compiling to 11.2.Ben Sturmfels likes this.
Jason Self at 2021-08-19T13:27:32Z
Hey, it's me. I'm still alive and well....Alexandre Oliva, Stephen Michael Kellat, Ben Sturmfels likes this.
Karl Fogel at 2020-04-28T14:18:51Z
Is it just me, or is there a general feeling in the air that GNU Guile is starting to come into its own? I seem to keep running into examples of it being used as an extension language. All anecdata, and I haven't dug deeply, but if this is a growing trend it's a welcome one!Ben Sturmfels likes this.
I sure hope so! Where have you run into it recently? Guix is the main one for me at the moment.
Distopico at 2020-04-07T23:25:20Z
Mediagoblinstill here! -> https://mediagoblin.org/news/still-here-in-2020.htmlBen Sturmfels likes this.
Karl Fogel at 2019-11-14T20:27:18Z
.@WellsFargo rep: "Sorry your card didn't work. I need to verify your identity. Can you give me a number to text you a code at?"Me: "Uh... but... that's not how... you need to have my phone number already, otherwise..."Rep: <complete non-sequitur in response>Me: #HeadDesk(1st non-sequitur: "Well, a phone number could be a land line, which can't receive texts. So we need you to give us a number." Next: "Well, would you like me to use some other way to verify you?" I said "No, *I* know who I am! I just don't understand why *you* accept this!")Ben Sturmfels, McClane likes this.
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Damn, that's secure xDDD
Your data (and money?) seem to be in good hands 😅
Tiempos modernos
EVAnaRkISTO at 2019-10-06T17:45:54Z
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Phone Greylisting
David Chung at 2019-09-30T21:55:43Z
I recently adopted a new policy for my phone, which is similar to greylisting on mail servers.
For all unknown numbers, I try to answer the call muted. I try to avoid hinting autodailers that my number is valid by sending them to voicemail.
If I hear an autodailer, I stay muted, report the FTC violation, and add the number to my blacklist at the carrier level.
If I hear silence, I stay muted, and assume an autodailer is waiting for a greeting then add the number to the blacklist.
If I hear a human, I stay muted unless they address me. If they hang up and redial, I address them then.
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Amitai Schleier at 2019-09-04T19:34:17Z
notqmail 1.07 shipped two weeks ago. We immediately got to work on what will become 1.08.
Already merged: https://github.com/notqmail/notqmail/wiki/notqmail-1.08
Coming soon: https://github.com/notqmail/notqmail/wiki/Roadmap#108Ben Sturmfels likes this.
Jason Self at 2019-08-31T17:04:43Z
I noticed that the zipper for the laptop compartment on my backpack was open. I'd been walking around with that for about half an hour. I'm glad it didn't fall out.
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Karl Fogel at 2019-08-28T22:16:24Z
I'm mainly interested in articles that show I was right:https://stackoverflow.blog/2017/06/15/developers-use-spaces-make-money-use-tabs/(Up next: Writers who use two spaces after a sentence-ending period -- the way God intended -- get published more often?)Ben Sturmfels likes this.
Jason Self at 2019-08-23T17:38:31Z
This trip is starting out great: You want to upgrade me to first class? Well, if you insist... :)
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Amitai Schleier at 2019-08-20T15:26:52Z
Announcing the initial 1.07 release of notqmail, a community-driven fork of #qmail that begins where netqmail left off: https://notqmail.org/1.07Themes for this release:- Fix broken builds (FreeBSD, macOS)- Make packaging easierI'm proud to be one of several developers bringing this valuable #LegacyCode back to life. Here's my personal blog post telling this first chapter in the story of notqmail: https://schmonz.com/2019/08/20/announcing-notqmail/#smtp #LegacyCodeRocks #c #dev #pkgsrcBen Sturmfels likes this.
Jason Self at 2019-08-21T12:54:13Z
A guy brought his guitar onto the city bus. He was playing it for everyone while the bus rolled along. It was nice.
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Jason Self at 2019-08-16T12:38:36Z
I have to say that setting up a RAM disk (using tmpfs) in order to do all of the kernel compiling completely in RAM on my librebooted Asus KGPE-D16 didn't speed up compiling as much as I had expected it would have. It takes about 15 minutes to build 1 kernel package with make -j32. I was predicting about half that.
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Karl Fogel at 2019-08-15T17:04:34Z
I just found what appears to be a translation (that I did not know about!) of my book into Czech: https://knihy.nic.cz/files/edice/tvorba_os_softwaru.pdfIf you read enough Czech to tell whether this is a decent translation (or at least is not one of those obviously-machine-generated ones), please let me know.Ben Sturmfels likes this.
Jason Self at 2019-08-15T13:06:34Z
As a left-handed person it takes care to write without either smearing on either the paper, my hand, or both. Plus, the world is filled with lots of objects useful only to right-handed people. Like scissors. Lefty scissors are impossible to find when you need them. As a child I had to teach myself to use right-handed scissors rather than struggling with backwards scissors that didn't cut properly. They still feel backwards. Oh, the pains that right-handed people will never know...
David "Judah's Shadow" Blue, zykotick9, Ben Sturmfels likes this.
@jxself@identi.ca I heard a story once about a professor (sociology I think?) That used left-handed vs right-handed to explain privilege.
Indeed. It's odd that I write with my left but hold, throw, cut, point, type with my right.
Now I wonder if there's a left-handed piano.
Amitai Schleier at 2019-08-12T18:52:36Z
In my triumphant(?) return to Developer on Fire:
- relearning how to learn from a kid
- relearning how to work w/an extraordinary teammate
- gaining self-awareness via unusual feedback
- White Dude’s Guide To Inclusion
- being more effective together
https://schmonz.com/talk/20190812-developer-on-fire/Ben Sturmfels likes this.
Ooop - there's a broken link "Developer on Fire" on that blog post.
Thanks, I'll have to check out this podcast!
Fixed, thanks!Jason Self at 2019-08-13T13:02:27Z
Trisquel's default browser is wonderfully named: Abrowser. If only everything else were so generic: Ashell, Akernel, Adistro, etc.
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What a boring world 😅
I have the opposite problem in Guix; there's all these packages with short interesting names like "prank", but it turns out to be for analysing DNA sequences or some such bio-medicine/science use. Gah! No use to me!
Karl Fogel at 2019-08-09T20:41:14Z
It's not enough to coddle your underperformers if you don't also punish those who consistently do great work.True organizational excellence comes from embracing both edges of the sword.To those who already live this creed: thank you. Thank you every day.Ben Sturmfels likes this.
Karl Fogel at 2019-06-28T16:47:01Z
Hey, folks, what's your best current answer to a person who says "I'd like to get more involved in open source -- how do I find a project that will be appropriate for me?" I get this question all the time. I used to point them to @OpenHatch but alas it's now defunct.
Thoughts?Mike Linksvayer, AJ Jordan, Ben Sturmfels likes this.
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Sure project you use is the obvious answer and the many ez bug aggregators since, before(?), and including OpenHatch underwhelm, but here's another take: find something important to work on e.g., https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/priority-projects is one take.
Relatedly I'd love to see Effective Altruism evaluation of FLOSS generally, and methodology applied to evaluating FLOSS projects.
This seems like a good time to also plug https://www.appropedia.org/Welcome_to_Appropedia as sort of being at the intersection of open [everything] and distributed exploration potentially effective interventions.Oh, one other obvious approach: tell them about a project you contribute to and can give pointers on contributing to, or even mentor.
For you https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Contributing.html ?
Another: projects that you have confidence are well run and welcoming, because you've evaluated them. For you https://sfconservancy.org/projects/current/
:)Reposted above comments at https://twitter.com/mlinksva/status/1145384664124706816 and added a few more, below...
Finally, https://opensource.guide/how-to-contribute/#finding-a-project-to-contribute-to … includes standard project you use advice, plus list of ez bug ~aggregators, plus quote from you @kfogel but some or all of that material may benefit from updating.
Finally', [project you use] but with a job/company bent: project your employer/company depends on that you can get permission/away with contributing to on the job. Super soft pitch https://opensourcefriday.com/businesses
Finally'' next level of Finally', appropriate project is one you can get hired to contribute to, so find job that requires contributing to an open source project. After hire, that open source project is the appropriate one for you to get involved in.
» Karl Fogel:
“[...] "I'd like to get more involved in open source -- how do I find a project that will be appropriate for me?" [...]”
In my opinion, if they are currently using FLOSS programs they can pick any of the ones they use so they won't need any FLOSS directory to find the right one for them. I think they must be honest with themselves about what their skills are (not just programming) and how much they want to get involved.
The most basic thing they can probably do to help is to spread the "FLOSS word" among their family, friends and acquaintances. To me, that's beeing involved in FLOSS already. Of course, the next steps could be help translating software, giving answers/support to other people using the same software and, finally, get involved in the development of the code.
