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Coining the term “bork-walled”.

As in a paywall (or TOS, cookie banner, ad overlay, privacy notice, whatever t.f.) but the overlay is borked. (Bad js, bug, adblock, CSP, network, whatever)

Unable to dismiss the overlay because it’s broken, the site becomes permanently inaccessible





I shared a link to the family chat iMessage group. Focus landed in the "to" field, not the "message" field, which isn't good. I wrote my whole message before realizing the problem. Worse, iOS created a new thread, and included the same people that are already in the family chat thread it claimed it was sharing to. Way to go, iOS 18.


Moved the desktop into the living room last night, to put it nearer to the router, as a sort of curiosity. Have been using it remotely, as I have a solution that works for me to do this with super low latency. Works loads and loads better.
in reply to Tech Singer

How do I get into this SonoBus thing I keep hearing about? Does it have chat features too (you mentioned TeamTalk)?
in reply to Seedy of Chucky

The site is www.sonobus.net It's an audio transmission program mainly meant for musicians to play over the internet. Some of us are using it to route our computer audio over the network because it has very low latency and does not need ASIO drivers, though it can use them. I think it does have chat but I've never used it, as I said, I use it for routing computer audio from one of my own machines to another. As for Teamtalk, I used to use that for the same thing, but the latency is higher. I still use it over the mobile network but, for the home network, I prefer sonobus.


Discovered a massive bug to iOS 18 for VoiceOver users only. Updated one of my phones and the passcode entry field will not come up no matter how you swipe, turn VoiceOver off and the passcode field comes up on first swipe attempt you can then toggle VO back on and enter your passcode. Really bad one if it happens to you


Sci-Fi Author: In my book I invented Big Brother as a cautionary tale

Tech Company executive Larry Ellison: "Citizens will be on their best behavior because we are constantly recording and reporting everything that's going on," Larry Ellison said, describing what he sees as the benefits from automated oversight from AI and automated alerts for when crime takes place. "We're going to have supervision," he continued. "Every police officer is going to be supervised at all times, and if there's a problem, AI will report the problem and report it to the appropriate person."



We've already had two external contributions to Thunderbird Appointment after just a short time of the repo being public (also already 178 stars)!

Written in Python, we'd love to have more contributions. Come and join us. Jump in - the water's fine!

github.com/thunderbird/appoint…



Curious about people's favourite accessibility features in iOS 18?
I just added Live Recognition to the VO rotor. Very interesting.
in reply to Andre Louis

I like TTS equalizer and Braille Screen Input. I also like the ability to enable / disable live regions per website, the new “voices” rotor setting and, as you pointed out, the fact that it’s possible to add Live recognition options to the rotor. Although I wish the latter played better with VoiceOver output stream.


I don't understand why I sometimes see people's closed laptops on tables in the office, upside down, with their little protective feet helplessly sticking up into the air.


Why do I doubt that statement somehow? Elon did it on purpose to achieve people talking about him, which is what we are doing now! :) Elon Musk Says He's Learned a Lesson - Business Insider businessinsider.com/elon-musk-…


My dad's on a business trip, and just sent me a picture of the view out of his hotel room's window. I ran it through Be My AI, and got a description that was later confirmed to be completely accurate. This is where this research needs to keep going, it unlocks an entire other layer of the world for blind people.


It seems there's still no way to get to the transcript of a voicemail without also playing it. The whole point of transcripts is so I don't have to play the actual voicemail. This has been the case ever since iOS introduced the feature. Please tell me I'm just missing something obvious...
in reply to Alex Hall

Yeah, I’d love to meet a product manager responsible for this feature. My suspicion is that there’s got to be some privacy / policy / security / whatever legislation that they had to comply with. Otherwise, It simply does not make any sense…


Yeah, #Boeing employees are on strike in union plants (non-union ones are still working).

However, what is interesting is that Boeing’s quality issues started around 1997 after an acquisition/merger with a problematic company. Great article by @NPR!

👉🏾 The Boeing Strike: 4 moments the company fractured its bond with workers npr.org/2024/09/16/nx-s1-51116…


in reply to André Polykanine

@menelion Yeah, the Arm varient of the XPS 13. I don't get it, as laptops are frequently used in music production and audiophile uses.
in reply to mohaneds

I mean, built-in audio, especially on Dells, is crap anyways, but stay without an audio jack in a trip… no, thanks.
in reply to André Polykanine

@menelion We can always use a USB dongle, but I don't want to take up a USB port for just audio.
in reply to mohaneds

given that in those modern laptops you have so few USB ports, yes.
in reply to André Polykanine

@menelion If you have to get a laptop, I suggest getting a mobile workstation if you can afford it. I mean a real, half-inch thick workstation, not an ultrabook pretending to be a workstation. I have the Lenovo Thinkpad P16 Gen 2. As a general rule, if it weighs less than four pounds, it's probably not worth owning.
in reply to André Polykanine

@menelion Also: I hate Dell laptops. Their audio has high latency even on headphones, due to extensive processing in the driver itself.
in reply to mohaneds

Me too. You probably read my complaints about it, the thing that really puts me off is that they "improve" (in big quotes) even sound coming from USB! I mean, it's none of your Dell business what I connect as an external audio source! Sorry, just irritates me too much.
in reply to André Polykanine

@menelion I wasn't aware that they try to improve the sound via USB and I didn't even know that was possible. What do they do, replace the Microsoft USB audio driver with their own?
in reply to mohaneds

I have no idea, but it corrupts my Samson Q2U sound. Also, this particular machine has a nasty bug that causes sound to change sides very often (like, often you hear from the right what you should hear from the left and vice versa). It's my work machine, and if I decide what to buy next, it won't be a Dell, no way.
in reply to André Polykanine

@menelion That's fascinating, and it swaps channels? Honestly that sounds like a bad electrical implementation of the USB spec, which wouldn't surprise me in the least, because Dell. Like either something is up with power delivery or the clock, or there is just too much interference
in reply to André Polykanine

@menelion I suggest not getting an HP. I have a female friend who owns one, and her JAWS constantly drops in volume as it speaks. I tried fixing it by switching Windows to the generic Realtek driver, but it keeps switching back to the HP driver
in reply to mohaneds

My wife has an HP EliteBook 640 as a work machine, and it's a lovely piece of hardware, I must tell. Not fancy-schmancy characteristics, but good enough for heavy Visual Studio use, for example.
in reply to André Polykanine

@menelion Oh I haven't seen an Elitebook in years. The last one I saw had a pretty nice laptop keyboard, on par with Lenovo.
in reply to mohaneds

As home laptops (i.e., chosen and bought by myself) we both have Asus VivoBook. they are five years old and still rock, in my opinion.


As I have abandoned Android and am now daily-driving Gnome mobile / PostmarketOS on my OnePlus 6, I feel the urge to contribute to filling the app gap. Nobody seems to have asked for an app to record push ups and track progress, but that's what I want to accomplish now. Here are some first impressions of my Libadwaita app, which I call "Pushup Sessions":

#Oneplus6 #linuxmobile #PostmarketOS #GnomeMobile

This entry was edited (2 months ago)


Anarchism is just the way people act when they are free to do as they choose, and when they deal with others who are equally free.
-- David Graeber

#anarchism #quote #bot

in reply to Anarchist Quotes

A billionaire dumping waste in the river: "This is just the way I act when I'm free to do as I choose. Others are free not to drink from the river or to get into a shoot out with my private army."

An all white town lynching the only black family: "This is just the way we act when we're free to do as we choose. They're free to buy more guns to defend themselves against us."

A small town refusing service to the only trans person: "They're free to move somewhere else."

in reply to raccoona_nongrata

“A billionaire dumping waste in the river” is enabled by the coercive state.

“An all white town lynching the only black family” is enabled by the coercive state.

“A small town refusing service to the only trans person” is enabled by the coercive state.

It’s easy to imagine people already powerful in our society acting with impunity, because they already do right now, under the status quo of the coercive state. This is the antithesis of what anarchists are talking about when we discuss and advocate for freedom, which includes the freedom to resist these depredations.


in reply to Hubert Figuière

There have been some effort. This may present an excellent opportunity.
in reply to Ian McKellar

@ian and lot of busting. but that what's I'm getting at. I think it applies also to other big tech. The RTO policies ARE a good reason.


¡El llamado a charlas para GNOME Latam 2024 está abierto!

¿Tienes algo que compartir sobre el ecosistema #GNOME o el software libre? ¡Esta es tu oportunidad! Envía tu propuesta y únete a nosotros en Medellín, Colombia, o en línea.

events.gnome.org/e/latam2024



@bagder what are your thoughts on providing dedicated `curl_easy_setopt` method for the value types it supports?

Languages like Swift don't support the macro, so folks have started writing shim files to work around this. Wonder if maybe this would be better to be a part of the API itself.



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It appears that Mozilla's recruiting marketing is finally acknowledging the demographic that really runs the internet.

The jobs in question, in case anyone feels, ahem, senior enough (sadly, US only): mozilla.org/en-US/careers/posi… mozilla.org/en-US/careers/posi…

#job #GetFediHired #mozilla

in reply to Chris 🌱

@brainblasted The only thing that looks off to me is the index finger. Is that a fingernail or a toepad?

What makes it so clear to you?



Having the wedding at #Chříč brewery was a good opportunity for proper survey for #OpenStreetMap
Yes, I am turning more and more into a #nerd...


📣 Join us Tomorrow! Explorer Town Hall: Meta Ray Bans Integration

Tuesday, September 17th | 5:00 PM PDT
Where: In-app, Zoom, Youtube

Join Aira's Meta Ray-Bans Glasses Town Hall to get the latest updates on our integration progress, upcoming beta launch, and Aira's continued commitment to exploring innovative smart glasses solutions. All explorers are invited to attend and will have access to this event through the Aira Explorer app (“more,” “events”) or directly via zoom.

Zoom link: aira.zoom.us/j/88931260595#suc…

*Event recording to be posted on our YouTube channel*

Read more at our blog: aira.io/explorer-town-hall-lau…

Facebook Event: facebook.com/share/cS2zC9W4kxk…




By popular request, #Voiceover no longer reads phone numbers of #WhatsApp group participants who aren’t in your contacts, and just reads the push name. You can still read the phone number on their contact info page, or by swiping up to the “message <phone number>” option in the actions rotor. This should make catching up with your groups much faster and more efficient! Thanks so much for your feedback, please keep sending it.

#accessibility #screenreader

This entry was edited (2 months ago)

reshared this

in reply to Drew Mochak

Wo! So happy to read this has finally been implemented. Thanks to the team for getting this launched!
in reply to Drew Mochak

I'm not trying to criticize, just asking, but... why didn't this happen earlier?

What was the actual reasoning behind keeping it the way it was for so long? What were the blockers for this change?

I usually don't believe in the "people are stupid and don't know what they're doing" excuse, so there had to be something to it, right?



[Blog Post] iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 Accessibility: A Summary of VoiceOver and braille issues and improvements applevis.com/blog/ios-18-ipado…

in reply to Daring Fireball

"[...]it turns out, we want computers that go with us everywhere. That’s the iPhone, [...]"

Not it's not. Because the iPhone can't be used as a computer. It's just an app runner where the applications are "curated".

(Android isn't better either).



Come to the @igalia booth at OSSEU to see @servo running in Android and OpenHarmony.


After chatting with @keithamus and @Lukew I thought I'd have a look into CustomStateSet, where you can add states to your #WebComponents that don't manipulate DOM but can be selected in CSS with `my-component:state(statename) {}`. Pretty cool!
developer.mozilla.org/en-US/do…


Shout out to AccessNow folks and @Xeniax who helped to convince Meta to unblock #deltachat invite URLs in Facebook. Previously delta invite-links on Facebook were marked as "dangerous" and didn't work.

sidenote: if you send someone an invite-link, they can click it directly after they installed Delta Chat because they will be guided through the "create-profile" flow automatically and then be dropped into a chat with the inviter.

This entry was edited (2 months ago)


Oh look, it's your regular AMDGPU crash.

While opening a new Firefox tab. Again.



Some of the best advice I've gotten in recent years: "Don't wait to feel confident to do something new/scary. Instead, prepare. And then strive to be PRESENT when you do the new thing. And by doing that, you will build confidence."

For me this has been so true. I don't feel confident when I'm outside of my comfort zone; I earn confidence by going there. And I have the best experience outside of my comfort zone by being present and not worrying about how it's going.

Khronos reshared this.

in reply to Sommer Panage

I couldn’t agree more. From my own experience: once you are present outside of your comfort zone and in observation mode, stick your comment once in a while and see how experts react. You may be surprised to find out that your opinion actually counts! :)

in reply to WestphalDenn

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in reply to WestphalDenn

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THe whole idea of varchar types with a max length in SQL has always been really uncomfortable to me.

I get why we're doing this, but is it really the right thing to do for user-supplied data like real names, addresses, usernames or emails?

in reply to Mikołaj Hołysz

This is actually one of the reasons I'm thinking of using sqlite for my game server, despite the scalability badness this can apparently cause according to one of my partners. I just cannot deal with limits like that without way overdoing them, I might be storing map data even! Or messages! And will it always allocate the whole size, for varchar and BLOB, even if I don't use it? Waste. I brought this up and someone was like you can just chunk it, I'm like how in the world do you design a schema that can easily handle something like that?
in reply to x0

@x0 I think the idea that for smallish fields like usernames, email addresses, asset URLs, uuids and such, you're supposed to use varchar with a defined length, and anything of a potentially unbounded size, like user messages or map data, should go into a text / blob / BSON field.
@x0
in reply to Mikołaj Hołysz

No, but there's nothing stopping you from using a very long limit in your own apps (like 32768). Or just using a text type, although some database UIs and web framework integrations will render those as multiline inputs by default.

Note that in SQLite, the max length is required, but ignored. And in Postgres, omitting the length gets you a text field, which may fool your web framework of choice into treating it like a char field even though it isn't one.



Which would you rather do if you could go back to the past? #Poll #Polls #MastoMonday

  • meet a famous figure from history (0 votes)
  • witness the Big Bang (0 votes)
Poll end: 2 months ago

in reply to Poll Bot

I mean… you cannot technically witness the Big Bang because there was no time before it apparently, and the space was condensed into a tiniest dot, so you wouldn't survive. Unless you believe in the Wheel of the Time, which is a hepothesis not worse than others.


The push for an "age verification" requirement on the Internet is 1% aimed at protecting children and 99% aimed at controlling speech. It effectively bans anonymity, for starters.

It is a license to speak, and read.

edri.org/our-work/open-letter-…

Hubert Figuière reshared this.



If you are affected by the bug where #Tusky drops your draft when you switch to another app while composing you may want to switch to the nightly build, it will be fixed there today.