Today's discovery: The Victor Reader Stream (second generation) has a micro SD card under the battery. It acts as internal storage but also has the operating system on it. And that operating system is ... Linux, from 2010, with Busybox. I'm very interested to try and get SSH running, but I don't think the binaries are there. It looks like there is support for serial of some kind. The OS partition is 100% full. I'll reimage a second micro SD card at some point and find out how much I can tinker with it before it breaks. If anyone wants a dd dump of the entire card, let me know.
What I'd like to see, if it's possible to get this, is an unencrypted OS image of the _third_ generation Stream. Not to reverse engineer it for competitive purposes, of course, just to satisfy curiosity about how the system software evolved.
@matt It'd be worth looking for a manual firmware update file if that still exists. If it's a full image and not a dump, this should be possible. I think it's very unlikely that the third-gen uses something as basic as an SD card for storage, but it'd be interesting to take one apart to find out. It doesn't feel like a compelling upgrade, and other than Bluetooth and USB C, I'm not sure why it needed to be a whole new device. It sure as shit feels just as slow as the second-gen.
The firmware update files for Chameleons, Mantises and Brailliants also have Linux images in them.
I suspect the serial port you're speaking of is for UARD. Most devices of this kind have an UARD port somewhere, mostly used for diagnostics and debugging, although access to it often requires some disassembly.
@miki The SD card is under a piece of tape, and I can tell there are some pins next to the card, so I was wondering whether that was the serial port in question. It looks like it does have serial enabled out of the box. I haven't gotten around to modifying the OS yet, but I could probably give myself remote access over wi-fi.
on bluesky there has been controversy over someone getting suspended over saying that they want to throw someone else into a wood chipper. that's why here on the fediverse we are adding a button that throws people into a wood chipper
A Washington DC based international television and radio broadcast network is making a significant reduction in its operations and will make a complete liquidation of all excess television, radio, studio production, field production, switching, broad…
I remember my own experiments with “AI” a long time ago. It could be fun (AI Dungeon, anyone?) even if it couldn’t produce reliable results. But it was also extremely inefficient. Like: even on a GPU, producing a single moderately long response would occupy the entire GPU for seconds! Meanwhile my web server can handle thousands of parallel requests on much cheaper hardware and with a fraction of the power usage. So surely nobody would attempt this at scale…
I clearly underestimated the industry’s dedication to burning money and resources (often enough literally) while chasing the newest fad. investor.nexteraenergy.com/new…
Duane Arnold Energy Center restart to strengthen American energy grid resilience; Iowa's only nuclear facility is targeted to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2029 Project expected to create approximately 400 direct, high-quality full-tim…
So OpenAI managed to lose $11.5 billion in just one quarter. Not quite unexpectedly given how expensive it is to improve and simply run their machinery and how little money it brings in. theregister.com/2025/10/29/mic…
And that is totally fine of course as long as this still counts as a huge success, so that even more investor money flows in. And OpenAI (just as everyone else in AI) keeps raising the stakes to justify their need for more money. Now if that isn’t a Ponzi scheme…
At this rate it cannot be long until the bubble bursts. You cannot bring in an investor with pockets as deep as Microsoft’s every few months.
I’m pretty sure that all those AI companies hold a meeting somewhere and brainstorm bad ideas to outperform each other. Burning massive amounts of power? Nah, too trivial. Let’s support it by building new nuclear plants! No, been there. We can shoot data centers into space! That will take too long. Why don’t we involve AI when military decisions need to be made under extreme pressure?
Well, we have a new contender.
“Microsoft and nuclear power company Westinghouse Nuclear want to use AI to speed up the construction of new nuclear power plants in the United States.”
Sure, why not put a bullshit generator in charge of designing something that could contaminate a huge chunk of land for the foreseeable future if done wrong?
Tech companies are betting big on nuclear energy to meet AIs massive power demands and they're using that AI to speed up the construction of new nuclear power plants.
I just donate to the @gnome project / foundation. This time I could only manage 10USD! But please if you can spare some money! Support one or more #opensource projects! It does actually make a difference!
"Remember when you thought age verification laws couldn't get any worse? Well, lawmakers in Wisconsin, Michigan, and beyond are about to blow you away.
It's unfortunately no longer enough to force websites to check your government-issued ID before you can access certain content, because politicians have now discovered that people are using Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) to protect their privacy and bypass these invasive laws. Their solution? Entirely ban the use of VPNs.
Yes, really.
As of this writing, Wisconsin lawmakers are escalating their war on privacy by targeting VPNs in the name of “protecting children” in A.B. 105/S.B. 130. It’s an age verification bill that requires all websites distributing material that could conceivably be deemed “sexual content” to both implement an age verification system and also to block the access of users connected via VPN. The bill seeks to broadly expand the definition of materials that are “harmful to minors” beyond the type of speech that states can prohibit minors from accessing—potentially encompassing things like depictions and discussions of human anatomy, sexuality, and reproduction.
This follows a notable pattern: As we’ve explained previously, lawmakers, prosecutors, and activists in conservative states have worked for years to aggressively expand the definition of “harmful to minors” to censor a broad swath of content: diverse educational materials, sex education resources, art, and even award-winning literature."
It's unfortunately no longer enough to force websites to check your government-issued ID before you can access certain content, because politicians have now discovered that people are using Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) to protect their privacy and…
I’ve been testing a theory: many people who are high on #AI and #LLMs are just new to automation and don’t realize you can automate processes with simple programming, if/then conditions, and API calls with zero AI involved.
So far it’s been working!
Whenever I’ve been asked to make an AI flow or find a way to implement AI in our work with a client, I’ve returned back with an automation flow that uses 0 AI.
Things like “when a new document is added here, add a link to it in this spreadsheet and then create a task in our project management software assigned to X with label Y”.
And the people who were frothing at the mouth at how I must change my mind on AI have (so far) all responded with resounding enthusiasm and excitement.
They think it’s the same thing. They just don’t understand how much automation is possible without any generative tools.
This is pure programming. Now when the customer gives you a requirement to mark the task as urgent if the document contains an attached image containing an oil leak... that's something simple programming is not going to solve.
This video has annoyed a lot of Serbians.==========https://gamersupps.gg/Lazeruse code 'lazer' 10% off purchasessomething something Wifu cup.==========The So...
People who self-host (anything, not just Mastodon). Are you running services at your house? If so, are you hiding them behind a VPS that tunnels to your home's IP?
CC @neil , because you're the first person I thought of that would be able to answer.
@Štěpán Škorpil @Neil Brown @The Last Psion | Alex Everything at my apartment. I'm Lucky to have /56 ipv6 range and single ipv4 addresses from my local Isp. Then I am hosting different things for more friends at the VPS.
práve som stál asi 9 minút v okolí večierky ktorá je od nás asi 150m za rohom... viete čo mi to pripomenulo? prečo mi C ostala/vá tak dlho pri srdci, bola "normálna" aj keď sme boli celkom mimo
👎 praha je porad prdel vychodu. misto toho aby ridice poslali jinudy — ostatne sedi v aute, neboli je to —, nebo provoz omezili, poslali celou silnici na chodnik. a chodce do prdele. v ulici mezi hlavnim a masarykovym nadrazim, kde vicemene nonstop proudi davy lidi. pro mnohe z nich to je taky prvni dojem z prahy
Přesně to jsem si cedil mezi skřípající zuby, když jsem tam potřeboval projet od hlaváku do hybernské s kočárem. Lidi ve vyhřátých plechovkách si to štrádujou po chodníku a já si to v tý zimě musel objet.
A ani značený to pro chodce nebylo!
Jdu od hlaváku až k zastávce, přejdu Bolzanovu a vidím že to dál nejde, protože chodník je celej pro auta. Přejdu zpět Bolzanovu, jdu podél ulice a hledám přechod abych se dostal přes Opletalovu. Po 150m to vzdávám, spokojím se s dírou v zábradlí a i s kočárem přebíhám na pankáče Opletalovu. Tam místo chodníku najdu takový ty rošty se zábradlím přes výkopy, pracně se tam motáme s kočárem mezi bloudícími turisty s kufry smeřujícími k nádraží. Hodně jsem si zanadával.
když jsem tam jel já, tak se muselo až za tu zastávku v opletalce. Jinak to všude bylo obehnaný stavebním zábradlím. Tam zas nebyl funkční přechod, ale já už byl dožranej a střihl jsem to tam.
Getting towards the end of the working week and I find myself writing QA steps like: "Open the application on iOS with TalkBack running." Nearly there...
This is TERRIBLE! Mozilla people who used to follow me here... Talk some sense into your coworkers/management!
People don't use Firefox because it's loaded with crap and AI, they use it because it's not corporate owned and not feeding all your browsing data into the data machine. AI is not of any benefit to add to your browser, no matter the hype.
Windows needs a built in AI model that all developers can use in their applications. Companies should learn from @Apple and add on device AI into their operating systems. #AI, #FoundationModels
Blind Telegram users. Under no circumstances should you update Telegram on iOS to the latest version. The developers have broken all accessibility. When using the VoiceOver screen reader, it is now impossible to type text messages or record voice messages. VoiceOver no longer focuses on these elements.
@lanodan yep, works natively on FreeBSD via the compat layer
The appimage should actually just work as-is, but it errors on fusefs for some reason. I haven't investigated that. I'm sure someone knows what the deal is and how to fix it.
he is crazy #lazerpig #f111
Matt Campbell
in reply to Simon Jaeger • • •Simon Jaeger
in reply to Matt Campbell • • •Matt Campbell
in reply to Simon Jaeger • • •Quin
in reply to Matt Campbell • • •miki
in reply to Simon Jaeger • • •Most of HumanWare is Linux based these days.
The firmware update files for Chameleons, Mantises and Brailliants also have Linux images in them.
I suspect the serial port you're speaking of is for UARD. Most devices of this kind have an UARD port somewhere, mostly used for diagnostics and debugging, although access to it often requires some disassembly.
Simon Jaeger
in reply to miki • • •miki
in reply to Simon Jaeger • • •miki
in reply to Simon Jaeger • • •