Blogging to work out my thinking about issues in technology, programming, religion, and politics.
I legitimately miss this age of computing. RedHat Linux 6, Windows 98 and NT 4, Mac OS X, Solaris, HP-UX, IRIX, AIX, and BeOS. It was a great time to be a “computer guy.” We were all trying to figure out what it could be. Now we have <gestures at everything>… this.
Fun fact: Be (the company) noticed this screenshot and comments I made about their OS on my website back in those days, and sent me an actual CD with the latest version.
Meet the new C64 Edition from the 8BitDo Keyboard line. Packed with programmable keys and an intuitive control panel.. Compatible with Windows and Android.
This hits all the right notes for me. I recently bought a full set of SA Retro keycaps for my WASD CODE v2 (in blues), on my Mac. While pricey, I love them. I get warm fuzzies every time I sit down at it. I use this board on my Mac, and out of a dozen mech’s I’ve tried, I just don’t think it gets any better than a WASD.
The article also mentions new buckling spring boards. I have a Mini M from Unicomp on my work computer. The action doesn’t seem as crisp as I remember on actual Model M’s from back in the 80’s, but given that it’s supposed to be the same internals, made on the original tool dies, I have to chalk it up to memory. I like it too.
For “just” $110, I will probably buy one of these. I don’t have a Kailh-based board, though I’ve liked the feel of that brand of switches in various testers I have.
Sigh.
<gets out wallet>
AI-powered PCs built for a new era of work We are excited to announce the first Surface AI PCs built exclusively for business: Surface Pro 10 for Business and Surface Laptop 6 for Business. These new PCs re
Source: Introducing Surface Pro 10 for Business and Surface Laptop 6 for Business | Microsoft Devices Blog
I just love how Microsoft sticks “FOR BIZNESSSSSSS!” on the end of things. “Skype FOR BIZNESSSSSSSS!” “Teams FOR BIDNESS!” “Outlook FOR BIZNAAAAAS!” Sigh. How can you take this stuff seriously? Anyway.
Windows stays because Microsoft caters to corporations which abuse the poor, defenseless OS into doing things like locking users out of changing the desktop background and the sleep timeout. Until Apple offers power-hungry corporate IT middle managers the same level of user-hostile malfeasance in the name of “security,” Microsoft will hold the high ground in corporate deployments.
This becomes a self-perpetuating cycle of not-so-micro-aggressions, as it continues to skew all the Microsoft-bought-and-paid-for Gartner polls that show how much more prevalent Windows is over OSX, and self-justify corporate America that they’re doing the right thing. This, in turn, leads to an entire sub-industry of corporate “security” software which must be installed on Windows, because, bought-and-paid-for auditors told them they had to.
Thus, I wind up with a corporate laptop with something like 3 or 4 different “endpoint” security products installed on it, and something like 30-40 different scripts and checks that run almost by the hour to make sure that the inherent weaknesses of Windows hasn’t compromised our precious meeting PPT’s, which corporate IT considers as sensitive as the US nuclear arsenal codes.
Apple offers an alternative to this madness, and I’m very glad they do. I would rather they stay as they are rather than corrupt their ecosystem in this way to make some corporate sales, and I will happily continue to use my personal MBP to do as much of my work as I can.
A few weeks after our conversation, Apple released version 10.8 of Logic Pro, its flagship digital audio workstation (DAW) and the big sibling to GarageBand. Stuffed inside the update was Mastering Assistant, Apple’s own take on AI-powered mastering. If you were a Logic user, you suddenly got this capability for free—and you could run it right inside your laptop, desktop, or iPad.
Source: AI can now master your music—and it does shockingly well | Ars Technica
Keep in mind, they’re not talking about mixing, but mastering, which are two very different things. I’ve tried a service that did this a few years ago, and, it did really well, even back then. If you’re not semi-knowledgable about this space, it might scare you, but there have been hardware versions of this sort of thing for decades. It’s more science than art. There’s just no amount of listening on various speakers and in different rooms that can dial in whole-mix EQ so that it sounds right on everything these days. The process is, in fact, very mathematical, and can be automated. In short, “nothing to see here; move along.” This is just the next logical step.
Despite all the buzz around internet-connected smart cars at this year’s CES in Las Vegas, most folks don’t want vehicle manufacturers sharing their personal data with third parties – and even say they’d consider buying an older or dumber car to protect their privacy and security.
Source: Surveyed drivers prefer low-tech cars over data-sharing ones • The Register
It doesn’t matter. Like with TV’s and appliances, going forward, you simply won’t be able to buy a product without privacy-invading spyware pre-installed. Eventually, it will be in them all. So we’ll wind up with things like this, in everything:
WTF! Why is my LG Washing Machine using 3.6GB of data/day? pic.twitter.com/xQqQicTqxI
— Johnie (@Johnie) January 9, 2024
I guess the machine was hashing bitcoin? I don’t know.
In this vein, there was another post/comment that I read about how the guy blocked a device from getting to the internet in the wifi router, and the manufacturer actually noticed, contacted him, and told him that he had voided his warranty! Stupid and scary.
I’m GenX. I’ve been programming since I was 10. I’ve been programming professionally for 30 years now. I live with computers and software all day, every day. I am comfortable in macOS, Windows, and Linux. I want to share a couple of screenshots from my PS5 to Reddit. Seems simple, right? So how do I get them off the console, and onto a computer?
A rant on Reddit — before it was removed — surprise, surprise — confirms I’m not missing anything. I’m 54 years old. I live with bad apps and software and services like this every day, and I get sick of it. I have no idea how regular people are dealing with all of this “technology.” It makes no sense to me, and I’ve literally grown up with it. How can this be the best “we” can do here? Why aren’t we living in the future yet?
When BitCoin prices were spiking a year ago, people concerned with such things started pointing out that the energy required to perform all the mining could power a small country, and lamented the implied acceleration of the destruction of the environment due to the CO2-producing energy sources that were running overtime because of it.
It occurs to me that a massive portion of the US economy now relies on digital advertising, which is unquestionably one of the least efficient investments in the world. Does anyone have any idea what the electrical costs per dollar of ad revenue is? I mean, it must be profitable, or they wouldn’t do it, but it surely must be one of the lowest returns per environmental impact in the entire spectrum of capitalism. So, sure, complain about cryptocurrency “setting the earth on fire” to make some investors billions, but Google gets a free pass on miles and miles of private server farms cranking away 24×7 running their ad services and the auction house to make their trillions?
And that’s just Google, the poster child of this kind of thing. Where’s the outrage from the colossal carbon footprint of the overarching, advertising-based economy? I can’t remember anyone ever bringing this up. I think it should make people wonder why this isn’t seen anywhere. Could it be that the very companies making the most money from this activity are actively suppressing this kind of criticism?
On the other hand, they’ve convinced a company named SiFi Networks to build a $500 million open access fiber network at no cost to taxpayers. SiFi Networks will benefit from a tight relationship with the city, while making its money from leasing access to the network to ISPs.
For 25 years, I’ve been saying that every house needs to have a fiber drop, owned by the city, just like electricity, water, and sewer, through which the resident can contract with service providers to get whatever digital services they want. Looks like this may be exactly what’s happening in Cleveland. Finally.
Source: iOS 17 Includes ‘Grid Forecast’ Feature to Let You Know When ‘Cleaner’ Energy is Available
This makes about as much sense as Microsoft automatically setting all the power options in Windows to be the most conservative and least performant, including — in an absolutely baffling move — to automatically turn off Bluetooth after a minute. Say what!? Yeah, my Bluetooth mouse and keyboard would suddenly stop working after about a minute. I searched for and found updated drivers. I upgraded Windows. I reset things. I rebooted. And rebooted.
There was a lot of hair pulled before I figured out the power saving setting was the problem, because there isn’t any scenario in the entire world where I would think this would even have been an option that someone was told to take the time to code, make a UI for, and merge into Windows. The only possible reason would be to save literally one penny of electricity, over the course of a year, at the expense of making Bluetooth… COMPLETELY USELESS. Well done, guys.
Now I see the insanity is spreading. It’s not enough that we have to go over every device with a fine-toothed comb for security, opting out of spying, and blocking ads. Now we have to go through the options to make sure that they’re not “helpfully” being invisibly and silently hobbled against their intended, normal usage by companies who want to report to their investors that they’ve saved a collective X number of kilowatt hours by their pernicious power settings.
If you have a corporate- or school-issued computer, you have no control over it. Unless you wipe it and reinstall the OS, and even then, of course, they could leave things in the BIOS, and probably do. Then again, you barely “own” devices you buy, but that’s another rant. Here’s the task list for my corporate laptop.
Sigh
So let’s see…
Thirty one jobs. Only one of these is mine, to do the one thing I need this (secondary) computer to do.
This machine bypasses my carefully-curated and ad-blocked local DNS. I don’t know what it uses for DNS, but I see that it doesn’t operate over port 53, and I don’t care to know any more.
It also won’t print to a printer in your house. I think I tried to print to a printer at the office once, and give up after one try, because I knew it was going to be futile. Basically, no one prints anything. They must save a TON on printer costs as a company. Most printouts are a waste of resources anyway, so this might actually be genious.