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180711000
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @05:35PM
(#65961610)
Attached to: Author of Systemd Quits Microsoft To Prove Linux Can Be Trusted
By this time, there are a lot of replies to you, but I'll try to add a little more context.
I think a lot of the "visceral hate for systemd" comes from not only the "it's not the Unix way" mindset, but that systemd comes across as "change for the sake of change". From my probably limited perspective, I don't feel that it really gives much of value, but it has made my life harder. I have new commands to learn, new text files in strange places to learn/create, and it's honestly hard to debug. A shell init script is easy to find and easy to debug, add a "set -x" to the top and then watch to see what went wrong and fix it. While there might be a way to do that with systemd unit files, I've never seen a way to see every command it does. Logging at the earlier stages is also pretty spotty (having your system fail to boot and not finding any logs is really maddening -- happened only once, but it never happened under init-scripts because there was always a *text* log somewhere). Leonard should be verbally smacked for creating binary log files, even if there is a text *option*.
I understand how/why we have systemd. There was a lot of arm twisting by Redhat, and the people that like/need it the most are the distro maintainers, not people doing sys-admin work -- who are the ones that tend to feel the pain the most. I admin my home machine and a few at work. Most of the time, stuff just works, but when it doesn't work systemd is extremely annoying and I feel the hate because I sort of have to relearn the unit file stuff all over again because I touch them so infrequently, unlike an init [shell] script that was created from a template and is easy to work on. Yes, we've adapted; but it was forced on us for what appears to be little good reason, therefore many of us are not fine with it. HTH...
180689686
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @02:45PM
(#65957282)
Attached to: Microsoft Admits Windows 11 Has a Trust Problem, Promises To Focus on Fixes in 2026
Sorry, too late. The trust was killed by MS a long time ago and I don't think they can get it back. I've pretty much weaned myself off of MS products at home; the last remaining one is Onenote which I use via the web interface and even there I'm slowly pulling the information off and deleting notebooks.
I only use Windows when forced to at work, and even then, I do my best to live in the WSL world. I've got some time left before I retire, but I'm really looking forward to retirement and ending the MS world.
180682398
comment
bykbrannen
8, 2026 @10:31PM
(#65955878)
Attached to: Urban Expansion in the Age of Liberalism
Well, the downside of living in Houston with no zoning is that people are allowed to build in areas that are prone to flooding when it gets lots of rain. Those areas need to be denied to build on so it can turn back into the marsh it was before it was "built up". "No zoning" is great until greed causes people to do stupid things.
180679150
comment
bykbrannen
8, 2026 @12:25PM
(#65954638)
Attached to: Asteroid 2024 YR4 Has a 4% Chance of Hitting the Moon
I've seen the movie, several of them actually. Don't worry, it will work out OK for us, even if that asteroid is really super dense (like neutronium) so it does really break up the moon and send part of it to Earth. The only real question is who is going to play "the pretty scientist" because you have to have one of those to save the day. :)
180644958
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @01:34PM
(#65944698)
Attached to: When Two Years of Academic Work Vanished With a Single Click
Exactly, why are his "chats" that important? If it produces something useful, like a new idea to pursue or a good summary, you'd think that'd be copied somewhere, not left in his chats only. Or his chats should have been "here's my data synthesize it for me" and the output should have been copied somewhere else. Chats should be thrown away at the end of each day. It the work was important, it should be in his research books or docs as you say.
I find it hard to be sympathetic for him and do hope he's learned his lesson.
180644892
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @01:25PM
(#65944680)
Attached to: When Two Years of Academic Work Vanished With a Single Click
Totally agree, don't use Word docs to store your info. Store your "doc" as HTML (or MHT if you must have 1 file at the end), or LaTeX, or AsciiDoc, or whatever text based format you want ... just don't store it as a binary blob. Honestly, HTML4 is good enough for most docs that I've seen which are almost all text plus the occasional picture/image, and it can do tables too as well as stylesheets. There are even WYSIWYG programs for creating and editing HTML and LaTeX if you need that.
180644784
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @12:59PM
(#65944608)
Attached to: 'Almost Everyone' Laid Off at Vimeo Following Bending Spoons Buyout
I don't see much of a difference between your 2 examples. In either case, cutting costs by laying people off happens, so knowledge and skills are sucked off, money is definitely sucked off. Perhaps the difference is in the end-game in some way, but it doesn't seem like it matters because the "original company" is dead either way.
I recently got laid-off from a PE buyout that decided to "cut costs". Not fun.
180640820
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @06:56PM
(#65943086)
Attached to: Half the World's 100 Largest Cities Are in High Water Stress Areas, Analysis Finds
Hmm, 10x the cost, and of course let's not forget that you have to dispose of the "brine" responsibly. Or else find a way to keep taking stuff out of the brine until you're left with only solids like salts and minerals which can be used elsewhere (probably terribly expensive). Still, it is doable if we really want more fresh water.
It still comes down to which do you want more: (1) water to drink or (2) cash in your pocket and no water to drink.
180640556
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @05:28PM
(#65942936)
Attached to: Half the World's 100 Largest Cities Are in High Water Stress Areas, Analysis Finds
We have a lot of water, but it's the wrong "type". Many of those major cities are near a coast, so how about building some desalination plants. What? That's too expensive? Then either stop using so much or stop complaining. (For example, maybe stop watering hay, alfalfa, etc with ground water in stressed areas and grow that stuff elsewhere that isn't so stressed; or build a large scale purification system to treat waste water and make it potable.) I know my view comes across as harsh, but we have a technical solution that will solve the problem if people really care enough.
Sure, the price of water may go up. Yes, we may have to build more nuclear plants to run them, or add commercial solar farms and run the treatment plants only during the day. Maybe we'll need to raise taxes on the rich to pay for it. Whatever, we have a way to solve the problem if we have the guts to do so. Of course, this is really a political problem and politicians rarely have the guts to fix any hard problem.
180640470
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @05:04PM
(#65942888)
Attached to: Schools, Airports, High-Rise Towers: Architects Urged To Get 'Bamboo-Ready'
I read somewhere that wooden buildings are generally rated to only about 7 stories. So as you say, there won't be any high rise buildings.
180635596
comment
bykbrannen
1, 2026 @07:33PM
(#65940824)
Attached to: Half of World's CO2 Emissions Come From Just 32 Fossil Fuel Firms, Study Shows
That would be drill (including moving lots of equipment around), pump, transport (probably several times), then refine ... then lots more "work" before the results make it somewhere to be used. Each stage creates emissions (including waste ones), usually from power generation required to run it.
180635544
comment
bykbrannen
1, 2026 @07:18PM
(#65940798)
Attached to: Nova Launcher Gets a New Owner and Ads
I was avoiding all updates on my old Pixel 4a because they were doing their best to shove Material 3 at me (which I don't care for). Despite my not updating, some how the default Pixel launcher got updated. While I can configure the colors to "Basic" and avoid some of the color problems, what I can't avoid is the new launcher now has minimum sizes for some of the widgets.
For example, I used to have my calendar widget at 3x2, which allowed me to keep my most used app icons on the home screen ... and the screen was "full" as in no unused spaces. The new Pixel launcher says I can't reduce the calendar widget below 3x3 so now all of my icons won't fit. Ugh!
In researching launchers, I almost installed Nova until I saw it had ads. Surprisingly to me, the Microsoft launcher did not and has a very good rating (it just wants to send all of your searches to Bing, but I don't care as I don't use the search widget). So it's installed and I'm pretty happy as it lets me do my calendar widget at 3x2 and also gives me an extra row of icons per screen.
180620978
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @12:57PM
(#65937568)
Attached to: Amazon CEO Jassy Says Tariffs Have Started To 'Creep' Into Prices
Another example is the "Chicken Tax" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax) from the 1960's, that's still in force today. It's what prevents importing small/light trucks from Europe, so we can't have the Toyota Hilux and similar useful vehicles (which American manufactures only grudging produce a few examples of).
180620728
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @12:18PM
(#65937448)
Attached to: Netflix Wants Plots Explained Multiple Times Because Viewers Are on Their Phones, Matt Damon Says
Back in the old days, :) there were multiple movies that had built in intermissions beyond "The Ten Commandments". There are at least 3 others I can think of off the top of my head:
* My Fair Lady
* The Sound of Music
* Reds
* 2001 A Space Odyssey (?)
* Fantasia (?)
(in addition to "Gone with the Wind" and "Ben-Hur" from the first list). I have vague memories of the last 2 having intermissions as well, but I'm less sure about them. I'm sure there are others.
"Monty Python and the Holy Grail" is another with an intermission, but it is stupidly short on purpose. :)
Why are so many Christians God fearing instead of God loving?
You need to use the second meaning not the first meaning of fear, then both halves of your (whimsical?) question become positive.
noun (2): profound reverence and awe especially toward God
180557680
comment
bykbrannen
2026 @11:42PM
(#65914164)
Attached to: Microsoft May Soon Allow IT Admins To Uninstall Copilot
At home, sure, been on Linux since 1995. The problem is we get forced to use it at work, on the work supplied computer. The trick now is to install WSL and then live in that as much as possible and not use Windows for anything (except IT generally forces you to use Outlook).
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