megane_kun

joined 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Not too sure if they outright lied, but I suppose we can say that they used the change to make their drives seem larger!

That's why I wished computer people had used a prefix system distinct from the SI ones. If we're measuring our storage devices in yeetibytes rather than gigabytes, for example, then I suppose there's less chance that we've ended up in this situation.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

I realized why I didn't think of base 2 in my previous reply. For one, hexadecimal (base 16) often used in really low-level programming, as a shorthand for working in base 2 because base 2 is unwieldy. Octal (base 8) was also used, but not so much nowadays. Furthermore, even when working in base 2, they're often grouped into four bits: a nibble. A nibble corresponds to one hexadecimal digit.

Now, I suppose that we're just going to use powers of two, not base-2, so maybe it'd help if we do a comparison. Below is a table that compares some powers of two, the binary prefixes, and the system I described earlier:

Decimal value Value with corresponding binary prefix Hexadecimal Value Value with prefixes based on powers of 16
2^0^ 1 1 1 1
2^4^ 16 16 10 16
2^8^ 256 256 100 256
2^10^ 1 024 1 Ki 400 1 024
2^12^ 4 096 4 Ki 1000 4 096
2^16^ 65 536 64 Ki 1 0000 1 myri
2^20^ 1 048 576 1 Mi 10 0000 16 myri
2^24^ 16 777 216 16 Mi 100 0000 256 myri
2^28^ 268 435 456 256 Mi 1000 0000 4 096 myri
2^30^ 1 073 741 824 1 Gi 4000 0000 16 384 myri
2^32^ 4 294 967 296 4 Gi 1 0000 0000 1 dyri
2^36^ 68 719 476 736 32 Gi 10 0000 0000 16 dyri
2^40^ 1 099 511 627 776 1 Ti 100 0000 0000 256 dyri
2^44^ 17 592 186 044 416 16 Ti 1000 0000 0000 4 096 dyri
2^48^ 281 474 976 710 656 256 Ti 1 0000 0000 0000 1 tryri
2^50^ 1 125 899 906 842 624 1 Pi 4 0000 0000 0000 4 tryri
2^52^ 4 503 599 627 370 496 4 Pi 10 0000 0000 0000 16 tryri
2^56^ 72 057 594 037 927 936 64 Pi 100 0000 0000 0000 256 tryri
2^60^ 1 152 921 504 606 846 976 1 Ei 1000 0000 0000 0000 4 096 tryri
2^64^ 18 446 744 073 709 551 616 16 Ei 1 0000 0000 0000 0000 1 tesri

Each row of the table (except for the rows for 2^10^ and 2^50^) would be requiring a new prefix if we're to be working with powers of 2 (four apart, and more if it'd be three apart instead). Meanwhile, using powers of 16 would require less prefixes, but would require larger numerals before changing over to the next prefix (a maximum of 16^4^ - 1 = 2^16^ - 1 = 65 535)

One thing that works to your argument's favor is the fact that 1024 = 2^10^. But I think that's what caused this entire MiB vs. MB confusion in the first place.

However, having said all that, I would have been happy with just using an entirely different set of prefixes, and kept the values based on 2^10^.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I guess? I just pulled that example out of my ass earlier, thinking well, hexadecimal is used heavily in computing, so maybe something with powers of 16 would do just fine.

At any rate, my point is that using a prefix system that is different and easily distinguishable from the metric SI prefixes would have been way better.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago (6 children)

I think the biggest mistake there is using SI prefixes (such as kilo, mega, giga, tera) with bytes (or bits) to refer to the power of two near a power of ten in the first place. Had computer people had used other names for 1024 bytes and the like, this confusion between kibibytes and kilobytes could have been avoided. Computer people back then could have come up with a set of base·16 prefixes and used that for measuring data.

Maybe something like 65,536 bytes = 1,0000 (base 16) = 1 myri·byte; ‭4,294,967,296 bytes = 1,0000,0000 (base 16) = dyri·byte; and so on in groups of four hex digits instead of three decimal digits (16¹² = tryri·byte, 16¹⁶ = tesri·byte, etc). That's just one system I pulled out of my ass (based on the myriad, and using Greek numbers to count groups of digits), and surely one can come up with a better system.

Anyways, while it'd take me a while to recognize one kilobyte as 1000 bytes and not as 1024 bytes, I think it's better that ‘kilo’ always means 1000 times something in as many situations as possible.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 4 months ago (2 children)

If the earliest sports were a way to practice skills needed for hunting or warfare, then making an e-sport out of spreadsheets is going back to the roots of sports. It's practicing skills needed for your daily job.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

I've used Librewolf until pretty recently and I say it's not for everyone. It's hardened Firefox made into its own thing for people who want the benefits of hardened Firefox but don't want to go through the effort of hardening their Firefox install.

There are some sites that wouldn't work in the strictest settings. As far as I remember, the most problematic sites with Librewolf are those that demand way too much in terms of privacy and security, so I took it as a given that if a site doesn't work with Librewolf (with me using the default settings), it's not worth it to enter to begin with.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

This might be a stupid question, but I‌ wonder why they (datacenters) can't recover the water they use especially if it's in the order of magnitude that it significantly impacts water resources in their area.

I might be missing something big here, but I am imagining water-cooled systems that transfers heat to the water, but the water is otherwise unused. This water might not be able to be fed back (to the water sources in the area) as is, but it can be cleaned up and cooled down, and then be used for other purposes, right?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

Back when I tried it, I only had it in one device--which is great, since I dunno if I can do it on more than one device, let alone worry how a hardened Firefox mobile would even look like.

I actually don't remember if the settings change with updates. But I suppose they don't (as they don't either with Librewolf). What I meant with "hard to maintain" is basically keeping note that the hardened Firefox config doesn't behave like vanilla Firefox (and isn't expected to). Making some temporary changes to accommodate a "necessary evil" website, you'd have to make note what setting you "temporarily" have to change it to, what the hardened config should be for that setting, and most importantly: remembering to change it back to the hardened config.

So, I guess it's not really a matter of maintaining the config than being aware of all those config changes (from default). With LibreWolf, I'm just brushing it off as "yeah, that's how LibreWolf works."

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

More importantly, using Firefox (or any of its forks) would mean less people are dependent on Google's Chromium. With less people depending on Google's Chromium, the less Google can swing its weight around, imposing its dictum on unsuspecting users.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (2 children)

I tried using hardened Firefox before moving on to use LibreWolf. Manually hardening Firefox is arguably more powerful than what you'd have with LibreWolf out of the box, but the effort involved in making those changes in the settings and remembering what they are (what they were by default, and what they were changed to) makes it hard to maintain.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

I looked it up and it looks great. Currently downloading it to give it a try. I wonder how it compares to LibreWolf though.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago

Yeah, I remember the IT department at work back then (circa 2006) recommending Opera to me. It had features that are more or less mainstream now, like tab reloading on a timer, and all that while running smoothly than any other browser I've used at that time.

Since then, I've tried a lot of browsers like Vivaldi and Maxthon, but for some reason or the other, like being bloated, or being taken over by entities I don't trust, had found a reason to move to a different browser. Currently using LibreWolf, and I hope I won't have any reason to switch browsers anytime soon.

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