So I left for the weekend to visit family, came back -- avoided contact with sick people the whole time -- only to find my wife was sick with a cold and she didn't tell me and now I have it

Just pisses me off because I've been able to go a couple years without getting anything and now this. It always ruins my week. I can't get shit done because it's a constant nuisance disrupting my concentration

People who are coming to the #FOSDEM this week-end : please do not forget to wear a facial mask to protect yourself and others. Flu this year is pretty agressive and the orange code for respiratory infections has been raised by the Risk Management Group.

#retoot can save lives.

#brussels #respiratoryInfections #covid #flu #mask

This entry was edited (3 hours ago)

RIP Gladys Mae West, the Pioneering Black Mathematician Who Helped Lay the Foundation for GPS

openculture.com/2026/01/rip-gl…

FYI, I reviewed my account on dragonscave again: @jonathan859@dragonscave.space, this is not an advertisement, but as I'm feeling rather emotional again I'm shifting the kind of personal ranting posts and also other stuff that's not my typical tech timeline to there. Also to filter who sees what, in terms of post privacy etc. I'll probably share more occasional stuff like music I like or other stuff I don't wanna spam to uninterested people as well. Looking forward to nice interactions.
This won't change a whole lot for this account over all.

Habe beim "Entrümpeln" noch einige DVD´s und Blu-ray´s gefunden, die ich gegen Übernahme der Portokosten abgeben möchte. Wer mag darf gerne eine kleine Spende dazulegen, aber das bleibt euch überlassen.

Die DVD´s und Blu-ray´s werden als ein Paket abgegeben. Der Aufwand ist mir zu hoch sie pro Stück zu versenden.

Ein Boost wäre nett, Danke !

#verschenken #dvd #bluray #boost

This entry was edited (7 hours ago)

In 2026, it'd be nice if we could scrap euphemistic terms like 'special needs' 'Additional needs' 'different abilities' 'very special kids' or anything 'inspo-p0rnish such as 'Autism is a superpower!'. Instead, use the words 'Disabled' 'Disability' ... it's not an offensive term. In fact, many disabled people find these sugarcoated terms actually offensive. And let Autistic and other neurodivergent people decide if they have exceptional powers, or are disabled by societal structures. Or both at once.
Thanks :) 🙏💪 ❤ #disability #neurodivergence #ableism

So what is development like for the BTSpeak?

Are you limited to making apps that only work with desktop mode, or can you do things that also integrate with the non-desktop experience? (Not up on my BTSpeak terminology so maybe there's a better description for "non-desktop-mode experience" but hopefully what I mean is clear)

What is development like? I know there are Python tutorials but is it limited to Python? Or can you build a TUI-style app and adapt it to work with specific keycodes/conventions?

Are there any developer docs?

I've had an idea for something that would likely be great for the BTSpeak and other notetakers for a while now, and my assumption is that the BTSpeak is probably the most open/easy to develop for. If that's correct, I'm curious what that process looks like.

On this day, forty years ago: 28 January 1986.

I was working on my astronomy PhD in the terminal room at the Royal Observatory Edinburgh.

Someone came in & told us the awful news. After so many launches & astronauts, we’d grown blasé & didn’t pay much attention anymore.

That changed in 73 seconds on that cold day & we learned again that space is hard.

I still remember their names:

Onizuka, Smith, McAuliffe, Scobee, Jarvis, Resnick, & McNair.

Ad astra, STS-51L Challenger crew ✨

#space

This entry was edited (7 hours ago)

Most hashtags are pretty obvious, you just put # in front of a topic. For example if a post is about coffee it might have the tag #Coffee

However, many popular hashtags have difficult-to-guess names, so I've started a list to help people discover them:

➡️ fedi.tips/fun-and-useful-hasht…

Copy-paste a hashtag into the search box in Mastodon if you want to browse or follow it.

If you have suggestions for non-obvious hashtags that should be added to the list, let me know in the replies 🙂

#FediTips

If you would like to help financially support the development of a new Wayland compositor for Xfce, you can do so by contributing funds via our #OpenCollective accounts.

For US contributions:
opencollective.com/xfce

For EU contributions:
opencollective.com/xfce-eu

These contributions will help pay for the funding of longtime Xfce core developer Brian Tarricone to create xfwl4, a brand-new Wayland compositor for Xfce.

Thank you for your support!

#Xfce #Wayland #Rust #FOSS #Linux

From the Slint email list:

Dear all.

I am very sad to inform everyone that our friend Didier died last week.

Early 2015, I asked on the slackware list if brltty could be added in the
installer ; Didier answered promptly that he could do it on
slint. Afterwards, he worked hard so that slint became as accessible as
possible for visually impaired people.

You all know that all these years, he tried and succeeded to answer as
quickly as possible to our issues and questions.

He will be irreplaceable.

@Friendica Support

There is a fork of Mastodon available, called "Glitch Edition", that has some special features implemented. My new instance at social.defocn42.net is running this fork.

I came upon an interesting error when trying to connect to the instance. Adding the user "m1rk0@social.defcon42.net" failed because of an unknown network. Then i tried it the other way around from the Mastodon instance and could follow myself on Friendica. The connection is now mutual and the Mastodon instance is recognized as "glitchsoc".

Are there known issues with glitchsoc and Friendica? It's weird, that the connection can be established only from one side and is working normally afterwards.

Looks like the UK does not have our back:

"Keir Starmer rejected his Canadian counterpart’s call for mid-sized countries to band together in the face of unpredictable global powers — and insisted his “common sense” British approach will do just fine."

Like I said, we'll find out who our friends are.
politico.eu/article/keir-starm…

#CSS `@custom-media` available behind a flag in Firefox Nightly

Lovely syntax, just lovely.
nerdy.dev/custom-media

#css