ptz

By old-timey names, I mean ones that you don't typically associate with anyone alive or younger than like 70.

Examples being:

• Burl
• Mildred
• Herbert
• Agnes
• Evelyn (not as rare at the others, but getting there)

I've always liked the name "Opal" but I've only ever known two in my life. I was like 10-12 at the time, and they were both pushing 90.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.federate.cc/post/1318383

That command prompt.

Android updates are undergoing a revolution as we speak. Is it a positive thing, though? We will see. Google’s focus on N+3 for everyone might make it more common for OEMs to provide 2 or 3 platform updates, but on the other hand, in the cases where they want to provide more updates than it’s expected of them it gets way more complicated than before. It might also cause a feature stagnation, stripping users of useful improvements.Where is Google leading us? I don’t know, but I think we will find out very soon.

I was doing some research on putting a custom GSI ROM on an older device and stumbled on this article. It's from 2022, but should still be accurate.

If you've ever wondered about how Android updates work and why some devices seemingly have arbitrary cutoff points for updates, this article explains why.

I won't spoil the read, but things are actually better than they used to be with one glaring regression in the form of GRF (Google Requirement Freeze)

Github seems to be down.

Edit: After I made this, their status page finally updated to indicate an issue.

Update - We are experiencing interruptions in multiple public GitHub services. We suspect the impact is due to a database infrastructure related change that we are working on rolling back.

Tax Act sends multiple promotional emails daily. Attempting to unsubscribe does nothing, and I've tried for months.

Finally, today, I opened the browser dev console and see that it's throwing JS errors when you attempt to save. I'm 100% sure this is a feature and not a bug. The only other way they will remove you is by writing a physical letter and mailing it out to them.

Moral of the story: Do not use TaxAct. Fuck Tax Act.

For the first time in 6 or 7 weeks, it was cool enough last night to open the windows instead of running the A/C. Before bed, I opened up all the windows downstairs and upstairs to make sure there was good circulation.

That part was successful; house was 72 degrees when I got up this morning and very comfortable. Maybe I'll even weep a little less when I open this month's power bill. Except, what's that horrible smell?

Nearly gagging, I think, "Aww, man. Did one of the dogs have an accident?" The smell is omnipresent throughout the house, but after checking everywhere, no obvious source could be found.

As I stepped outside with the dogs, the stink became much thicker, and I realized what I smelled inside was coming from outside. The whole neighborhood reeks of dead animal, and now so does my whole house.

Update: Just called animal control, and they're going to come out and try to find/remove it.

Title ☝️

The vast majority of the massive, metallic towers the city commissioned to help low-income neighborhoods access high-speed 5G internet still lack cell signal equipment -- more than two years after hundreds of the structures began sprouting across the five boroughs. Just two of the nearly 200 Link5G towers installed by tech firm CityBridge since 2022 have been fitted with 5G equipment, company officials said. Delayed installations and cooling enthusiasm around 5G technology have discouraged carriers like Verizon from using the towers to build out their networks, experts say. The firm only has an agreement with a single telecommunications carrier to deliver high-speed internet, stymieing its efforts to boost mobile connectivity citywide.

The 32-foot-tall structures, which resemble giant tampon applicators emerging from the sidewalk, offer the same services as the LinkNYC electronic billboards that popped up around the city in 2016. Those were also installed by CityBridge. Both the original Link kiosks and the 5G towers provide free limited-range Wi-Fi, charging outlets and a tablet to connect users to city services. Data shared by the company shows that 16 million people have used the internet at kiosks since 2016, and the attached tablets are used to call for city services thousands of times each month. But unlike the LinkNYC kiosks, each new tower is topped with a 12-foot-tall cylindrical mesh chamber containing five empty shelves reserved for companies like Verizon and T-Mobile to store the equipment they use to transmit high-speed 5G internet service to paying customers.

Emphases mine because of that hilarious but completely spot-on description..

The U.S. FTC, along with two other international consumer protection networks, announced on Thursday the results of a study into the use of "dark patterns" -- or manipulative design techniques -- that can put users' privacy at risk or push them to buy products or services or take other actions they otherwise wouldn't have. TechCrunch:

In an analysis of 642 websites and apps offering subscription services, the study found that the majority (nearly 76%) used at least one dark pattern and nearly 67% used more than one. Dark patterns refer to a range of design techniques that can subtly encourage users to take some sort of action or put their privacy at risk. They're particularly popular among subscription websites and apps and have been an area of focus for the FTC in previous years. For instance, the FTC sued dating app giant Match for fraudulent practices, which included making it difficult to cancel a subscription through its use of dark patterns.

[...] The new report published Thursday dives into the many types of dark patterns like sneaking, obstruction, nagging, forced action, social proof and others. Sneaking was among the most common dark patterns encountered in the study, referring to the inability to turn off the auto-renewal of subscriptions during the sign-up and purchase process. Eighty-one percent of sites and apps studied used this technique to ensure their subscriptions were renewed automatically. In 70% of cases, the subscription providers didn't provide information on how to cancel a subscription, and 67% failed to provide the date by which a consumer needed to cancel in order to not be charged again.

They used to put the affected versions in the email, but that stopped a few months ago. Now it's just a vague "product is affected, click the link to learn more". Every. Time. the support part of their site gets hugged to death as if the uptick in traffic to it is completely unexpected.

So now I have Schrodinger's vulnerability until whatever potato-class servers they have their support bulletins running on frees up enough slots to render a frigging static HTML page.

It's almost as bad as news teasers that are like "Is something in your house going to kill you in the next 30 seconds? Find out more at 11!"

How dare I polish and remove kludges from previous releases. 😆

Also, none of those kludges would have even been necessary if the project scope was properly defined from the start and the project manager didn't let the users keep trickling in new requirements without also extending the deadline.

So yeah, how dare I go back and implement something the way it should have been done the first time?

Like the title says, what's the best story you have of personally "sticking it to the man"?