Amiga: My Alternate History
Just a few days before Christmas Day, 1989, I excitedly carried home one of the greatest Christmas gifts I have ever received. I vaguely remember going with my stepdad to the university computer store (The "MicroCentre," it was called; no relation to the large, currently-extant computer store chain) to pick …
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Use what works for good
Exactly a month ago, I wrote an article challenging the prevalent pragmatist-argument for choice in the digital world.
I'd like to refine that thought a bit further, based on recent experiences.
A little over a week ago, I started crafting an article covering FOSS keyboards for Android. This is one …
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So, I Guess I'm a Vampire, Now
As anyone who knows me on the Fediverse can tell you, I've been a bit of a light-theme snob. (If you're not sure what I'm referring to, I'm talking about whether text on a screen (computer or otherwise) is chiefly light colors on dark colors (dark theme) or dark colors …
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The KGB, the Computer, and Me
Last night, I re-watched The KGB, the Computer, and Me, a 1990 episode of NOVΛ chronicling Cliff Stoll's efforts to catch a West German hacker who was using the Lawrence Berkeley Labs' computer systems to hack into military computers in the late 1980s.
I say re-watched, because I …
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FOSS Games, Part II
I got a lot of wonderful feedback on my original FOSS Games are actually pretty good! article, and I wanted to share with you all the information that was so kindly shared with me.
Here are some FOSS games highly recommended by the community, although I have not personally played …
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FOSS Games are actually pretty good!
There's a lot of talk about gaming in Linux these days, and that's exciting, because it's drawing attention to Linux's capabilities. While the games being spoken of are mostly proprietary (and pretty awful, from a software-freedom perspective), it's good to see people getting interested in Linux, even when for only …
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LLMs are Perfect
LLMs (Large Language Models, colloquially referred to as "A.I.") are perfect...
Perfect exemplars and the very embodiment of the brain-rot of our society.
Much like so many loud voices in society today, the LLM is incapable of discerning reliable from unreliable sources, identifying the origin and validity of a …
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Web 1.0 is (unironically) going great
I resolved never to put a web browser on this machine, which is a Thinkpad X200t from early 2010 with the Libreboot firmware flashed to it, and the wifi card replaced with a FOSS-driver-loving atheros-based card. Ever since I got it in early 2019, it's been my "writing machine," my …
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On the Fediverse and FediFriends
You may have seen me mention The Fediverse or "FediFriends" in previous posts. Now, I anticipate that 100% of my readers are already in the Fediverse (or within a rounding error of 100% 😄), but just in case someone doesn't know, the following is a succinct description and discussion of the …
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Using `cal` and plain text to track things, Part II
Back in September, I posted about using the output of cal
and plain text to track things. Here is the example of that format I listed in the post:
August 2023
Su Mo Tu We Th Fr Sa
. 2 3 . 5
. 7 . . . . .
. . . 16 . . .
. . . . . 25 .
. . . 30 .
2023/08/02 326 45 …
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