mastodon - Link to source
Here's the christmas question of the day. Do you believe that the 12 days of christmas compounds or just lists the things you get as a reminder? Watched some christmas movie I had never heard of with Eddie murphy in it called Candy Cane Lane where this dude signs a contract with an elf gone bad (think sell your soul to the devil). Elf tells him that he needs the five golden rings or he'll turn into an ornament but gets him on a technicality by saying nope, you really need 40 rings because 5 golden rings appears 8 times in the song. Sneaky. So. Does it compound? or no. Thoughts?

mastodon - Link to source
Last week, I threw together Syntherceptor, a SAPI5 synthesiser which speaks using NVDA. This is useful for apps like Komplete Kontrol, Surge, etc. which use SAPI5 but you'd prefer the speech output to happen using your NVDA synthesiser and settings. This also prevents voices from speaking over each other, allows you to interrupt speech with a key press, etc. There is an existing project called NVDASapi which already does this, but we can't seem to identify or contact its developer, it isn't open source, it doesn't interrupt speech when the app requests it and it's a bit tricky to install. That said, Syntherceptor is very early in development, so you may wish to tread carefully. If it crashes, it'll probably crash the app you're using, so save your work regularly, though I haven't seen that happen yet. syntherceptor.jantrid.net/

Syntherceptor

syntherceptor.jantrid.net

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Christmas PSA about not being a dick

Sensitive content

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Can you imagine if the billionaire tech bros were spending all their energy developing solutions to clean the planet and distribute resources better instead of incessantly enshittifying our lives and trying to devaluate labour?

What a different world that would be.
I wish them all a Ghosts-of-Christmas experience.

This entry was edited (2 days ago)

friendica - Link to source

@Friendica Support i really wish there was another option for having a dark theme in #Friendica. i would like having a multi-shade black / charcoal page, with lavender / violet accents, but so far have not found a way to achieve it (note, for many years i used to use the #Stylus AddOn, with which i created numerous custom themes for many sites, but a year ago i disabled it & others as part of my desire to begin minimising all non-essential AO attack surfaces). Though in many ways using #DarkReader for Friendica is quite good, overall i tend to eschew it being on for this site, coz it hides that handy temporary shading highlight of posts in a thread for which a Notification was received.

The small number of current dark themes offer me a rather unappealing colour choice.

The custom theme option initially excited me, til i realised, afaict, it is based on the Light theme, with no Dark theme option, so that all the dialogue boxes & dropdown menus remain eye-piercingly bright white, that hurts my eyes. The least-worst i could conjure was

{"nav_bg":"#54207b","nav_icon_color":"#f3d0f1","link_color":"#5b38a6","background_color":"#5b4d71","background_image":"","contentbg_transp":"42"}

but as mentioned, too much blinding white remains.

inevitably then, i keep returning to the so-called Black theme, but it is... quite boring. the entire page is simply all a single "shiny" black tone, with my chosen accent relieving the monotony. compare this to the so-called Dark themes, to see the difference; they use different shades of the base colour, which is more visually appealing, creating a "panelled" effect.

#friendica #stylus #darkreader @Friendica Support
in reply to Droppie [opensoc]

friendica - Link to source

Droppie [opensoc]

well well well, i have synthesised a pretty comfy workaround. the basic problem ofc remains, which is why i call this a workaround not solution.

  • my daily browser is :firefoxnightly: , hence can/does use the Mozilla-created AddOn #SideView (which tbh i always misremember as being #OpenInSidebar)
  • i have reverted my #Friendica Settings Display theme to the default Light [ow ow ouch, my poor eyes!]
  • i have re-enabled the AO #DarkReader for this site (eyes go phew!)
  • once again now, per my OP, if i access my received Friendica Notifications in the main page, Dark Reader entirely hides the momentary shading / highlighting of the applicable post... ie, most unhelpful
  • however, when viewing my account in the sidebar, via Side View, the Dark Reader AO does not work, so i see only the underlying Light theme. this is usually a large disadvantage IMO of using Side View, but in this specific scenario, it is actually handy...
  • if, hereafter, i open my account Notifications not any more in the main page, but in the sidebar, still being the Light theme means i now DO get to see that helpful momentary shading / highlighting of the applicable post
  • yes it is blinding, but less so than the main page coz its area is much smaller, plus i am only in that sidebar view for seconds, after which i revert to its default, being #TreeStyleTab.
  • so far, this new workflow seems quite good

fwiw.

#friendica #darkreader #sideview #treestyletab #OpenInSidebar

mastodon - Link to source

Bluesky suspending antifascist researchers for sharing publicly available information about literal nazis.

Should be no surprise considering bsky constantly protects nazis, the far right, and all flavors of bigotry at the expense of Palestinians and trans women.

Fortunately, their information already spread so far and wide that at least half of the Blood Tribe nazis lost their jobs following the mass doxx. Chris Pohlhaus, leader of BT, estimated financial losses at over $2 million lol. Happy holidays!

Screenshot from a post by @svartflagg on Bluesky: I’m back after a 3 day suspension for sharing a link to publicly available police reports exposing Blood Tribe nazis. They also removed the post. Bluesky evidently prioritizes the protection of literal, active nazis over community safety. Unfortunately for BT, they’re already in the sunlight now :)

mastodon - Link to source

#AndroidAppRain at apt.izzysoft.de/fdroid/?radd=1… today brings you 15 updated and 1 added apps:

* Auto Light: a specialized replacement for the standard Android adaptive brightness feature 🛡️

6 #Magisk modules have been updated at apt.izzysoft.de/magisk

Enjoy your #free #Android #apps with the #IzzyOnDroid repository :awesome:


IzzyOnDroid F-Droid Repository

This is a repository of apps to be used with your F-Droid client. Applications in this repository are official binaries built by the original application developers, taken from their resp. repositories (mostly Github, GitLab, Codeberg).
IzzyOnDroid App Repo
#android #free #apps #AndroidAppRain #magisk #izzyondroid

mastodon - Link to source

I suspect far too many of us are trapped in cycles of escape that consume all our time, attention, and energy rather than the things we would like to create.

I'm hooked on watching hours of YouTube videos, and I justify it by clinging to the positive that is that it feeds my 'random number generator' and allows my brain to do a lot of thinking in the background.

But I have all sorts of projects that I'd like to develop and work on that I never seem to have the time or energy for.

I talk myself out of blocking time for things because my attention might be called away or I will spend the next 82 hours working on it because of hyper-focus.

I'm personally averse to routine, and that's something I'm working to change, or at least do in moderation.

Then, I feel overwhelmed and reload the YouTube tab, and queue up another video.

Problem for future Bob. ;)

mastodon - Link to source
Usually when Christmas is over, I instantly cut the Christmas music with a click. This has been the case for years. This year, what I will do instead is disable it, re-enable the normal music, then let the Christmas music empty itself from the queue. This way, rather than closing out with a bang, we slowly return to normality. Hopefully this keeps the
spirit going for a bit longer, without an abrupt ending.

mastodon - Link to source

During the year’s busiest season of charitable giving, donors may wonder whether the nonprofits they are considering donating to are going to be good stewards of their money.

Our Nonprofit Explorer can help you look into that: propublica.org/article/propubl…

#Nonprofit #Charity #Research #Donate #Holidays #Finance


Nonprofit Explorer Adds Powerful Tools to Help You Research Organizations’ Financials

You can now search for organizations that have reported a significant theft, as well as those that have had auditors flag serious financial issues.
Andrea Suozzo (ProPublica)
#charity #research #nonprofit #donate #finance #holidays

iceshrimp.net - Link to source
Today I learned why Sonata #TTS created a framework to run AI voices outside of #NVDA. First, NVDA doesn't come with all of the #Python standard libraries. Second, there's no good way of updating dependencies in a bundled addon. Third, NVDA really, really hates it if you include several hundred dependencies in your addon. Anyway, here's kitten TTS, the other synthesizer I wanted to try with NVDA. Unfortunately, the model doesn't support streaming output, so even though it's actually faster than Supertonic, it feels slower when used with NVDA. Also, it takes several minutes to install, makes NVDA startup 30 seconds slower, and freezes the change synthesizer dialogue for about 45 seconds when you open it. It does miss words less frequently, though, and pronounces text better. The ultimate result of my two-day investigation is that even the highly optimized open-source AI imbedded models are not yet ready for screen reader use. Some tree-shaking could fix some of these issues, but it still won't allow for streaming, so it's not worth it. I'd really like to know what Microsoft and Narrator are doing to get the natural voices so snappy. github.com/fastfinge/kittentts-nvda/#screenreader

GitHub - fastfinge/kittentts-nvda: proof of concept kittentts synthDriver for NVDA

proof of concept kittentts synthDriver for NVDA. Contribute to fastfinge/kittentts-nvda development by creating an account on GitHub.
GitHub
#screenreader #python #nvda #tts

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mastodon - Link to source
A Sound Canvas takes on beatboxing. And it... actually kind of works.
This is a karaoke cover of Dopamine, a song composed by WING of BEATPELLA HOUSE, a South Korean beatboxing group.
Two versions of this cover exist. A simplified version designed for sound cards from DREAM SA, which are essentially compatible with the Roland SC-88, and a second one designed for the SC-8820. Both covers lean into the strengths of each source.
Both played on my SC-8820.
From KY Entertainment karaoke machines.
DREAM SA version sequenced by Yunseong Choi (최윤성) currently unsure who the 8820 version's sequencer is due to encoding issues with the file.
Original song: youtube.com/watch?v=qlrpeYdm9E….
MIDIs: drive.google.com/uc?id=1kILmA1….


WING - Dopamine (Official Video) (BEATBOX)

WING - Dopamine (Official Video) (BEATBOX)Stream : https://wing.lnk.to/dopamine[Credits]Executive Producers | SINZO, Eli BackerAlbum Producers | SINZO, HissA...
YouTube
This entry was edited (2 days ago)

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Before heading to the Hill Country to spend Christmas with my grandparents, I stayed up a little too late packing and writing. This post is a quiet reflection on the past year, family, and trying to slow down even when I am not very good at it.

taylorarndt.substack.com/p/pac…

Merry Christmas to those celebrating. Wishing you a gentle day.

#Christmas #Family #Reflection


Packing Bags and Packing Thoughts

Taylor Arndt (Taylor’s Substack)
#christmas #family #reflection

mastodon - Link to source

I GOT A STORY TO TELL ALL OF YOU.
AND @ChrisDuffley you might like this, so i'm pinging you in.
so it's Christmas day, right? around I dont' know, 9 ni the morning, we open presents. there's a few things I got like (yes) a brand new mini PC, small yetp owerful, and gummy bears, chocolate bars. that was it.....except it wasn't!
after my sister and I (at least I thought) was done, I get told there's an extra present waiting for me. I get drove to a hill as part of our property, and what to I find?
and i'm not kidding, what you're about to hear what I found is totally real.
a 100 feet #ham radio tower. yes, I now have a ham radio tower ready to be installed and, once I get my license, used! I can't believe it! this has to be one of the best Christmases ever!!

I don't know how it was done, but now I have a 100feet ham towert!

#ham @Christopher Duffley - KC1WXP
in reply to -/mondstern

mastodon - Link to source

Sylvia

Linux Mint is a good choice :)

There may be some Linux cafés or repair cafés near you willing to help with this. endof10.org/places/ lists a few but I am sure more exist :)

Maybe people at the Linux Mint forum on forums.linuxmint.com/viewforum… know places you can go to too but I have no experience with that.


Find Linux Support

Here is a list of repair cafes, independent shops, organizations, groups, and collectives where you can get help with Linux on a regular basis.
Find Linux Support | End of 10
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