hah. so i haven't lost my memory yet. never found one when j was a car enthusiast. however i had an acura nsx which in a way was like a lotus. but j also think the honda s2000 has a lot of lotus vibe
Why are some people still spreading misinformation that "masks only work when everyone wears one," and use it as a personal excuse not to mask as "no-one else is."
It isn't all or nothing. While it's safer when more people mask because there's less virus in the air, a well-fitting mask protects you even if no-one else masks.
At a pretty countryside campsite at seven am: A small human (4?) is skipping next to Dad. She says: "Dad I really NEED to SING!" Dad says: "Well sing then. Just do it quietly, eh. Let people wake up properly before ya unleash the force."
At a campsite on a sunny winter's morning, a man (40s?) is whistling while frying up eggs and mushrooms. He cheerfully calls out, "Breakfast's ready! Get out here and check out this view!" His words are met with a series of dramatic groans from the tent next to him, in the key of "nope."
A grey horse with a dishevelled winter's coat of hair has broken into a vege garden. (Oh no!) His human is huffing and heaving on his halter but Stubborn Horse refuses to move. He's not leaving until he munches on something delicious. Ohh these growing carrots look promising.
A woman (60s?) has just pulled up her vintage station wagon next to a charmingly ramshackle cottage. A young human (5?) bolts from the house, straight into a huge hug. Moments later he's helping Gran unpack, excitedly telling her about all the things he wants to show her! (They're REALLY cool!)
A man (30s?) is walking along an isolated stretch of beach with mountains in the distance. He's holding a metal detector and is studiously waving it over the sand. On his heels a Jack Russel terrier is doing his own detecting, studiously sniffing, snuffling and sneezing away at promising smells.
Mississippi writer and bestselling author Greg Iles has died at the age of 64 after battling multiple myeloma, an incurable blood cancer. His passing marks the end of a remarkable literary career deeply rooted in the American South, yet reaching readers worldwide. magnoliastatelive.com/2025/08/…
Mississippi writer and New York Times bestselling author Greg Iles died Friday morning at the age of 64 after a courageous battle with multiple myeloma, an incurable blood cancer.
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I think it can actually meet the spec on the laser printers; of course you have to actually get the definition you render to match the pixel size and alignment all the way down to the printer.
Hmm (checks PDF spec); looks like a PDF line width of 0 means smallest device width; there's also a thing called 'stroke adjustment' intended to make a line uniform thickness inspite of device limits.(it's switchable). It wouldn't surprised me if there was other stuff it could detect.
Ok so I just got done watching the Windows portion of the Windows Central Podcast, and I personally have mixed feelings about where Windows is heading. On one hand, we're possibly getting a system-wide dark mode, finally. But on another hand, the boss of Windows teased what the future of Windows will look like, and its not good. According to an independent interview with the guy who is in charge of the Windows team, by 2030, they want Copilot to always be running all the time, listening for voice commands. This means Windows will be listening for voice input 24/7 as a trinary mode of interaction in addition to keyboard and mouse. This is especially problematic for PCs that come with internal microphones, as they pick up system audio and thus are a problem for people who use screen readers. Apparently, Apple and Google are working on similar projects for iOS, macOS, Chrome OS, and Android. So it looks like this is where the future is heading, but I'm just hoping we will be able to disable voice interaction. However it seems unlikely ssince the interview also suggested removing the complex UI that is toolbars, menus, and your basic common controls such as sliders, checkboxes, radio buttons, dropdown menus, lists, etc. There is already public backlash for it, though it seems we've allowed this to happen because of the rise of all of these AI services, to a point where it's too late to go back. Microsoft and these other companies don't have a choice, and its a lose lose situation for all parties involved. This is going to be fun to deal with from an accessibility point of view. Not to mention we'll also be getting the crappy category view for the start menu in 24H2 as a cumulative update.
For system information tools, I still love Astra32. It shows info like S.M.A.R.T status for hard drives and reads them through its own driver, not Windows hardware probing only, and I could not find other tools that do this and present it in a nice accessible list with tree views. Ram speed, even CPU feature breakdown and manufacturing info, all there. astra32.com/
ASTRA32 is a powerful tool providing diagnostics and complete information about your computer system. It scans the actual hardware, not the Windows Registry. It also offers such features as a HDD Health Status checker and Drivers Troubleshooter.
Is it supposed to cause my USB audio device to abruptly disconnect upon clicking continue, hold for a while, and then restart my computer? Or was that a crash?
@x0 ahaha haven't seen that one! What odd behavior for that. Sometimes the window can look like it's frozen as it scans, but that's about the only side effect I've seen, and a slight hang if you stay in it as it does so. The other tool I tried is SIV (System Information Viewer) 5.82 - but a lot more sparce, everything is one menu and less readable since it's just dumped in as text and not a list to the window. Still good for some of that detailed info and I think they also use a low-level driver to do the trick.
It caused NVDA to not just stop talking about an actual audio drop-out, which is indicative of the signal to this headset being lost. But it never said disconnected. I've also used HWInfo322, which lets me view everything in a tree, but yeah I think it might have crashed my computer.
@x0 huh, I didn't even realize it generate a log? I've run it on like, a dozen of laptops over the last ten or so years but never saw such oddness! very interesting and baffling in a way, unless it's pausing on some sort of, nonstandard controler it can't read and the driver bales, taking the system with it, because we all know how stable kernel-level drivers are on Windows and the amount of amazing unfettered access they have to things. :D
@media_dept UK citizens and residents are free to continue using the matrix.org homeserver. We continue refining our approach to complying with the Online Safety Act, and we'll continue to do our best to stick with approaches that don't involve handling anyone's government-issued ID or biometrics -- as we view those as at significantly at odds with our commitment to protecting privacy.
@archos včera jsem zkoušel taky, ale byl v oparu, takže to nešlo. Chci ještě vyzkoušet 2x Barlow čočku, mělo by to ještě 2x přiblížit. Máme teleskop od dubna a až teď jsem měl večer energii to konečně rozjet! 🙂
One thing about being a tech nerd and cybersecurity specialist is that I do not use technology as a "regular person" would use it, so I often find bugs, misconfigurations, security isuues - and also usecases unexpected by the creators of anything I use.
Long story short, I spent an hour trying to set something with my telco provider, almost rage quitted and then I gave up and just installed their app on my regular phone, enabled the thing, and uninstalled it.
Why does every company nowadays have an app for everything, which itself is usually just a web wrapper, but they don't provide the same features via their website? (that's rhetorical question ofc, I worked for too many such companies and their creative marketing departments ...)
PSA (unless this is old news, in which case forgive me): Discord Canary has just randomly shown me an hCaptcha challenge when trying to place a call. I can no longer place calls on Discord. I don't know if this is generalized, AB testing, a rollout, or what it is. What I do know is that if this continues, it's time to find a different platform to chat on until or unless hCaptcha and/or Discord decide to respect the right to privacy of those of us who cannot complete a typical Captcha. Not that the so-called "accessibility cookie" (fuck off) would even be a viable option for the Discord app.
@pitermach It's been there for years yeah, and any time you need to reset your password or something like that it appears. I also heard of at least one person who failed it so many times due to how terrible it was that they got basically permanently locked out of their account. They apparently did actually enable the text responses, though, so I guess at least there's that.
@x0 @pitermach No text response on the standalone app. Also this is *when placing a call*. On a *logged in account*. From one day to the fucking next. No. Cannot get past it.
@x0 @pitermach No idea if it's just VoiceOver being a bitch on the web. I mean, that never happens, so why would it happen this time? Right? It uh... Never happens, does it?
@x0 Could also just be HCaptcha or Discord being dumb. Not like I haven't seen Recaptcha disable audio because it thinks you're sending too many requests sooopp…
@x0 @pitermach This is usually a "risk level" thing.
If your network is "risky", those might go away. Same with Google's audio captchas, which Google is very quick to lock you out of.
This can be caused e.g. by the previous owner of your IP address installing some dodgy software and unwittingly becoming part of a botnet.
It doesn't even have to be outright malware either, plenty of software that lets you "make money by walking x steps per day" or gives you access to a free VPN is like that too.
@miki @x0 @pitermach Yes, I'm aware, I'm pretty sure we all are. Again, the relevant issue for this post is not with them having you prove your humanity, but with them having you prove it in more and more situations, with them choosing hCaptcha, and most of all with hCaptcha's practices. And with VoiceOver being a piece of garbage, of course.
@miki @x0 @pitermach I don't think there's anything inherently wrong in denouncing a practice that you think is questionable without an immediate counterproposal, especially given that I'm aware of my own ignorance when it comes to this.
Very crude language, sorry, need to yell at the world a little
Sensitive content
God damn it. Seriously this shit pisses me the fuck off. The fact that this platform can make the decision from one day to the next to completely exclude a collective and we all are absolutely powerless to do anything about it just kills me. Especially because hCaptcha is aware of how much of a disgusting piece of utter garbage their supposed accessibility solution is. Some of us may have people we communicate with exclusively through Discord, and now we may very well have been isolated from them because in however many fucking years the invasive ass hCaptcha cookie has been a thing, our complaining that it just isn't the way to go has been less important than... Uh... Blah blah blah profit something money blah blah data blah. This just makes me so damn irrationally angry. K bye
Heading down to the MIDI room to pull another file off the shelves. Today's file: po_flaph. Internal title: Flaphead. An interesting experimental electronic track, with heavily pitched, filtered and chorused instruments, making some highly unusual sounds. As played by Nuked SC-55 with the mkII ROM set. Composed by Aphex Twin, remixed by Kenji Tanaka. MIDI: drive.google.com/uc?id=1_YvBQW…. Original zip: web.archive.org/web/1998120208…. Original song: youtube.com/watch?v=j79314QEDD….
Time is running out. Sign up for the Visual Studio Code Course happening tomorrow. We will be sending out notices to attendees at 8:00 PM Eastern. Late submissions will be sent information by 11:00 AM Eastern time on Saturday morning. Here is the link: bits-acb.org/visual-studio-cod…
Welcome to the BITS Visual Studio Code Mastery Workshop We’re excited to have you join us on Saturday, August 16th from 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM Eastern for a four-hour journey into the world of Visual S…
I was away all of last week and couldn't post, but just wanted to say a huge thanks to Jeff and everyone else who put this event together. Planning to join BITS soon and look forward to many more events like this in the future.
Question for #blind people who work with tactile graphics, such as @ChanceyFleet: If you're reading a PDF that has an illustration in it, and that illustration is already a vector graphic (not a raster/bitmap image, like a JPEG or PNG), do you have an easy way of pulling out that vector graphic so you can convert it to a tactile format?
It is my understanding that images in the PDF format are one of Portable Pixmap (PPM), Portable Graymap (PGM), Portable Bitmap (PBM), or JPEG files. Am I mistaken about this?
@twynn That tool only extracts raster/bitmap images in the PDF. It's also possible for a PDF page to include vector graphics, not embedded as image objects per se, but simply part of the stream of graphics commands that make up the page, intermixed with (and possibly including) text. Recognizing the difference between those vector graphics and plain text probably requires some kind of layout detection heuristic or machine learning model.
"I gave all my Apple wealth away because wealth and power are not what I live for. I have a lot of fun and happiness. I funded a lot of important museums and arts groups [...] I never look for any type of tax dodge. I earn money from my labor and pay something like 55% combined tax on it. Life to me was never about accomplishment, but about Happiness. I developed these philosophies when I was 18-20 years old and I never sold out."
Daughterr's got a small fridge for drinks in her bedroom. Also uses it for the occasional ice pack after a dance or gym injury. But today it's full of ...
@mcourcel ha it has been a quieter-than-usual summer vacation, I'll admit. Hoping she'll join me for a horror movie or something together at the weekend before the next stage of our home renovations kicks back into gear next week.
Native support for large attachments is the only main pain point in day to day usage.
Once you start using DeltaChat you quickly forget the technical architecture that people get so upset about (oh no, email!!!) because it works so damn well.
Fast, reliable, you can send messages even if you're in an elevator, a cave, under the sea, in the woods with bad signal coverage, etc. None of this "message could not be delivered" garbage like with other messengers. The message will be successfully delivered when there's connectivity just like you expect.
Like an outbox. From email. Remember writing and sending emails without being dialed up yet?! Yeah, like that. Just works. RT: chaos.social/users/delta/statu…
What are the main obstacles for you to adopt usage of #deltachat apps with your families, friends or communities?
if you have other issues than the poll options please add to the replies.
2012: "Secure boot is a plot by Microsoft to kill Linux" 2025: EA's insistence on invasive anti-cheat results in a bunch of Windows users managing to get their secure boot configuration into a state where their GPUs no longer work and there's no recovery path: reddit.com/r/Battlefield/comme…
Microsoft would have to be *very* bad at this for a plot to have backfired this badly
@usul I told my brother after we succeeded getting both his gaming PC BIOSes upgraded and Windows successfully running SecureBoot for the BF6 beta that this game is going to make the SecureBoot statistics skyrocket
They had like 550,000 players online during the *beta*. It was nuts. Great game too
I did see however that there was a stupid incompatibility some people hit where they were unable to play BF6 until they uninstalled Valorant (?) because of an incompatible anti-cheat detected
Microsoft really needs to just throw the Xbox team at this problem and build a unified kernel-level anticheat framework into Windows which every game can utilize... this is just getting ridiculous
Friends, please stop linking to Spotify like it’s ok.
The company steadily siphoned money from independent artists, then spent millions to host Joe Rogan, then littered their library with AI music, and now the CEO is investing in AI weapons.
There are plenty of less damaging ways to listen to music and podcasts.
One thing I've always been told as a blind person by mom is, "you're like a yapping duck. You yap yap yap. It's been scientifically proven that blind people talk more than sighted people, so that's why you tell everyone everything." Well, you know what, that skill comes in really handy when writing bug reports or telling a team just what to do in what order, I tell you what. I don't care if I'm a yapping duck, I'll yap away all day if I have to get my point across.
𝖏𝖆𝖊[Ø]™
in reply to feld • • •didn't lotus used to be made with toyota chassis and drivetrain? i remember something about this. but maybe im thinking infinity/nissan.
that's a pretty blonde!
feld
in reply to 𝖏𝖆𝖊[Ø]™ • • •𝖏𝖆𝖊[Ø]™
in reply to feld • • •feld
in reply to 𝖏𝖆𝖊[Ø]™ • • •