Nostr notes by Alice Averlong🏳️‍⚧️

I also like how Nixifying this program has made it take much ...

2026-05-19T01:32:04+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…r2ke
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I also like how Nixifying this program has made it take much longer to launch, which is just great because I already was annoyed at how slowly it launches, given that one of the required maneuvers is to repeatedly launch it as you binary-search the starting parameters

it turns out mid-migraine is not the best time to do linux ...

2026-05-19T01:29:10+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…w8yj
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it turns out mid-migraine is not the best time to do linux software installation

if I was like 15% more angry and spiteful I'd be forking this ...

2026-05-19T01:23:49+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…w7qf
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if I was like 15% more angry and spiteful I'd be forking this software and the other software it relies on.

but I'm not, so I'll just complain instead

it's really great that this python script now requires me to ...

2026-05-19T01:22:44+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…mvw2
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it's really great that this python script now requires me to run a nix daemon to use it

definitely an improvement on the previous version where you had to, like, set up a virtualenv and compile a module

instructions: "just run nix build!" actual nix: $ nix ...

2026-05-19T01:19:45+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…svy6
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instructions: "just run nix build!"

actual nix:
$ nix build
error: experimental Nix feature 'nix-command' is disabled; add '--extra-experimental-features nix-command' to enable it

coming back to a project I've built before (and even sold ...

2026-05-19T01:11:31+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…ruc6
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coming back to a project I've built before (and even sold hardware for!) only to discover their main repo is now partially vibe coded AND you have to install Nix to build it now

there should be a word for that specific experience where you ...

2026-05-19T01:11:02+02:00

there should be a word for that specific experience where you need to do a computer task you've done a couple times before, but it turns out they've made it way more annoying since the last time you did it

one of the many ways you can be really annoying to your loved ...

2026-05-18T23:53:38+02:00

one of the many ways you can be really annoying to your loved ones is offer to log into their accounts to do the car payments or whatever and when it sends their phone a 6-digit code to verify your account, let them read it out to you and then go "BUT HONEY, IT SAID TO NEVER SHARE IT WITH ANYONE!"

I've done that three times today, and I'm somehow still married

the four canonical bool values are, of course: tNo, tYes, tMaybe, ...

2026-05-18T23:02:15+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…4x26
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the four canonical bool values are, of course:

tNo,
tYes,
tMaybe,
tLim

- cb += (1 << cbit) + ((luCur >> (cbit + 1)) & ...

2026-05-18T12:49:37+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…qnag
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- cb += (1 << cbit) + ((luCur >> (cbit + 1)) & ((1 << cbit) - 1));
+ cb += (1 << cbit) + ((luCur >> (ibit + cbit + 1)) & ((1 << cbit) - 1));

ahh, of course. such an obvious mistake

the worst part is that I have no guarantee that this C++ ...

2026-05-18T12:40:16+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…keyy
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the worst part is that I have no guarantee that this C++ decompression code has ever worked.

the original programmers write an x86 assembly version and a cross-platform version, but this program only ever came out on x86.

So did they ever test this code? Did they ever even RUN it?

dunno!

oh it was also trying to load MIDI files backwards because it ...

2026-05-18T12:33:33+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…z5aq
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oh it was also trying to load MIDI files backwards because it thought not being on a 386 meant that we had to be big-endian

I also have C++ code that supposedly can compress. is it broken? ...

2026-05-18T12:24:59+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…njgp
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I also have C++ code that supposedly can compress.

is it broken? who can say

it's also EIGHT THOUSAND LINES of assembly because why not ...

2026-05-18T12:23:18+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…t8d6
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it's also EIGHT THOUSAND LINES of assembly because why not manually unroll your loops?

why is it that I always end up having to reverse engineer ...

2026-05-18T12:20:51+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…lt72
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why is it that I always end up having to reverse engineer compression code?

There's something like FIVE implementations of this decompression routine:
x86 assembly
C++ (broken)
C#
Rust
Python

naturally I need a working C++ one, but that means having to figure out what's wrong with the existing code

For bonus points: there's actually TWO compression routines, each slightly different. and potentially broken

oh sweet jesus, they handle displaying the splashscreen by ...

2026-05-18T11:03:01+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…pdnu
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oh sweet jesus, they handle displaying the splashscreen by busy-looping the CPU for 4 seconds.

I KNOW PROGRAMMERS WHO CARE ABOUT MULTITASKING AND THEY'RE ALL COWARDS

IT'S CRASHING ON BOOT BECAUSE THE BOOLEANS ARE TOO SMALL

2026-05-18T10:25:57+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…6wc8
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IT'S CRASHING ON BOOT BECAUSE THE BOOLEANS ARE TOO SMALL

I did get the debugger working. One minor issue: it runs at ...

2026-05-18T10:22:31+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…p039
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I did get the debugger working. One minor issue: it runs at 640x480.

I have 31 errors and all of them are failing to call this NO-OP

2026-05-18T10:08:57+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…nydz
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I have 31 errors and all of them are failing to call this NO-OP

so if DEBUG isn't defined, this function is never called. and ...

2026-05-18T10:08:40+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…6jzg
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so if DEBUG isn't defined, this function is never called. and if vcactSuspendCheckPointers isn't 0 or cb is 0, this function's main code block doesn't run.

and if it is 0, and cb isn't 0... IT DOES NOTHING

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I'm starting to think this code was written by someone with a ...

2026-05-18T10:00:43+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…nrm5
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I'm starting to think this code was written by someone with a deep and unrelenting grudge against the C standard library

we can't use memcpy/memmove, we have to reimplement it as ...

2026-05-18T10:00:20+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…js70
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we can't use memcpy/memmove, we have to reimplement it as CopyPb and swap the order of the pointers!

obviously it's src, dest, not dest, src

this is fun. I am down to like 8 errors, and I fix the first one. ...

2026-05-18T09:58:29+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…y7h8
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this is fun. I am down to like 8 errors, and I fix the first one.
This changes the number of errors left by random.randint(-80,80)

GST::FAddRgch ahh yes, methods written by people who were scared ...

2026-05-18T09:46:03+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…am7p
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GST::FAddRgch ahh yes, methods written by people who were scared of vowels and thought the solution was Hungarian notation

surely it'll be easy to fix this oh that had some downstream ...

2026-05-18T09:42:57+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…qyyl
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surely it'll be easy to fix this
oh that had some downstream impact, it's calling methods that aren't const-clean.
surely that'll be easy to fix
oh

I'm up to 119 compiler errors (from 1) now

some punk 31 years ago was tired of dealing with "correctly ...

2026-05-18T09:31:09+02:00

some punk 31 years ago was tired of dealing with "correctly matching const char* vs char*" so they just did

#define CONST

and now it's my problem

yet another day of "are they intentionally developing this ...

2026-05-14T04:45:38+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…sz7q
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yet another day of "are they intentionally developing this shit with anti-debugging features or is it just a side effect of their frankly insane software stack"

I have no idea what monitor ever supported both DDC and ...

2026-05-14T04:31:22+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…9gjg
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I have no idea what monitor ever supported both DDC and software-triggered degaussing. I'm guessing the answer is "not any monitor you could ever afford"

fun fact: did you know you can call a win32 API to degauss a ...

2026-05-14T04:30:48+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…5cjj
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fun fact: did you know you can call a win32 API to degauss a monitor?

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/highlevelmonitorconfigurationapi/nf-highlevelmonitorconfigurationapi-degaussmonitor

anyway the reason I was hacking this is that I want to know how ...

2026-05-14T04:30:22+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…v6v4
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anyway the reason I was hacking this is that I want to know how it communicates with my monitor, so I can do it myself instead of using their weird abomination of an app.

Answer seems to be SetVCPFeature & GetVCPFeatureAndVCPFeatureReply from the DirectX Video Acceleration (DXVA) API

they wrote the app in C++ in MFC so they're using some ...

2026-05-14T04:25:59+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…d6u8
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they wrote the app in C++
in MFC
so they're using some embedded COM HTML view

this isn't Electron, it's a DIY Electron clone

so the program is by Portrait Displays, Inc. with a copyright ...

2026-05-14T04:22:00+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…9c90
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so the program is by Portrait Displays, Inc. with a copyright date of 1993-2023.

And I was wrong. It's not electron. It's worse.

welcome to 2026 where it's normal for your monitor control ...

2026-05-14T04:11:32+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…tmdv
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welcome to 2026 where it's normal for your monitor control app to be implemented as half a million characters of javascript

yep it's electron. The monitor utility is a webpage. why not

2026-05-14T04:04:32+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…tsk2
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yep it's electron. The monitor utility is a webpage. why not

today in "huh, they built it with THAT?" Asus ProArt ...

2026-05-14T04:00:57+02:00

today in "huh, they built it with THAT?"
Asus ProArt ChromaTune. It's a little app that sits in your windows tray and can switch between your monitor's color palettes. You can either do it manually, or you can tell it to automatically switch when you run certain programs, so you can do things like "always use sRGB mode when I'm in photoshop".

Wanna guess how they built this?

traditionally I've been a sort of hybrid, doing most of my ...

2026-05-13T06:36:21+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…ugn4
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traditionally I've been a sort of hybrid, doing most of my programming from a seated position, other than back in the early 2010s when I experimented with a standing desk.

Since the whole bedridden thing I've written more and more of my code horizontally, but I'm slowly working my way up to hybrid stances

are you a horizontal or vertical programmer? ...

2026-05-13T06:35:18+02:00

are you a horizontal or vertical programmer?

So I was bedridden for 16 months, and I've been focusing on ...

2026-05-13T02:56:21+02:00

So I was bedridden for 16 months, and I've been focusing on getting employed since then. I'm making progress but I'm still up to my ears in debt from being sick for so long, and I'm out of food & rent money.

If you've got a couple dollars, it'd really help. Thanks so much!

https://ko-fi.com/fooneturing #mutualaidrequest

Setting up age verification for my BBS It's simple: if you ...

2026-05-07T23:05:35+02:00

Setting up age verification for my BBS

It's simple: if you know what a BBS is and manage to connect to it, you're clearly over 18.

It's time. Fetch me the Jar-Jar mouse. ...

2026-05-04T22:45:46+02:00

It's time. Fetch me the Jar-Jar mouse.

It has been located. Windows 98 install files are being copied ...

2026-05-03T23:25:17+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…08nt
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It has been located. Windows 98 install files are being copied now

the moral of the story is that when something about computers ...

2026-05-03T22:46:21+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…uqw6
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the moral of the story is that when something about computers seems too good to be true, it probably isn't true.
Computers never make THAT much sense

NOPE! It's physically but not electrically compatible with ...

2026-05-03T22:45:34+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…9us7
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NOPE!

It's physically but not electrically compatible with CompactFlash!

which frankly makes so much sense that I'm amazed I've ...

2026-05-03T22:45:13+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…zx05
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which frankly makes so much sense that I'm amazed I've never seen another laptop do it. the CF connector is designed to be compatible with IDE! why didn't every laptop do this?

Also, I'm adapting a CF card to IDE44, and the drive sled PCB seems to be adapting it right back to CF. Can I skip the adapters and just plug the CF card into the laptop directly?

so back in the pre-sata, pre-m.2 era, laptops usually used 44-pin ...

2026-05-03T22:43:28+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…c7xl
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so back in the pre-sata, pre-m.2 era, laptops usually used 44-pin IDE, which is a terrible connector. So to fix this, they'd have a little adapter in the drive sled that'd adapt 44pin-IDE to some more sturdy connector.

This laptop seems to have used the CompactFlash adapter for that connector

BUT THEN IT GOT WEIRD ...

2026-05-03T22:40:40+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…fz9c
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BUT THEN IT GOT WEIRD

So I got the 44pin to IDE adapter, stuck a CF card in it, and ...

2026-05-03T22:39:22+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…zml0
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So I got the 44pin to IDE adapter, stuck a CF card in it, and shoved it in the drive sled.

alice! hey alice. future alice listen to me: when you do set up ...

2026-05-02T10:49:25+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…rm4m
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alice! hey alice.
future alice listen to me: when you do set up the CF to 44pin thing, partition and format it using the DOS disk in the laptop, then remove it again connect it to your laptop and just copy over windows 98 or whatever. don't deal with serial or floppies

so probably I copy over something that'll let me null-modem ...

2026-05-02T09:13:30+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…pg8x
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so probably I copy over something that'll let me null-modem the serial to my main laptop

it's kinda hilarious watching bluesky users talking about how ...

2026-05-01T08:36:41+02:00

it's kinda hilarious watching bluesky users talking about how they have to stay on the site, even as it gets worse, because they can't go back to twitter!

which is the only other option available

It's amazing how fast attitudes to security in the industry ...

2026-04-29T00:01:30+02:00

It's amazing how fast attitudes to security in the industry has changed. Like, I remember in 2023ish spending a while working on a system to securely trigger remote builds, because we couldn't have our slack chatbots on the same network as our Jenkins server

And in 2026 they just give a 3rd party LLM write access to both + the git repo

Closest I've found yet is Logitech Signature Slim K950 at ...

2026-04-22T22:19:07+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…q3ts
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Closest I've found yet is Logitech Signature Slim K950 at 685g

sadly my PCjr can't run windows 95

2026-03-23T07:04:18+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…qntw
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sadly my PCjr can't run windows 95

BTW with the "pop quiz" my current best solution is 13

2026-03-23T06:26:01+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…snya
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BTW with the "pop quiz" my current best solution is 13

yeah but "sage" in the 2ch/4chan context is the japanese ...

2026-03-21T00:35:45+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…3q6m
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yeah but "sage" in the 2ch/4chan context is the japanese word 垂げ, meaning "down".
It's "sah-gay"

I think I need more coffee, I just wrote this code: ...

2026-03-12T01:32:50+01:00

I think I need more coffee, I just wrote this code:

line=line.rstrip(line)

Donk. This Foone is under new management: I'm Alice Averlong ...

2026-03-05T06:45:08+01:00

Donk. This Foone is under new management:

I'm Alice Averlong now.

maybe I'll plug both [fox|flux][flux|fox] into my program, so ...

2026-01-02T13:59:58+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…9ukq
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maybe I'll plug both [fox|flux][flux|fox] into my program, so there's a 50% chance it tries to render your floppy disk using a half naked furry

I've not experienced the fancy new haptic feedback things in ...

2025-11-29T05:58:59+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…am6k
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I've not experienced the fancy new haptic feedback things in modern video games, maybe they're good enough that just haptic motors would be enough

maybe use a metal mousepad and then electromagnet the mouse to it

2025-11-29T05:56:55+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…lptj
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maybe use a metal mousepad and then electromagnet the mouse to it

maybe make an optical mouse that's got a ball, so the ball ...

2025-11-29T05:53:47+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…dtl9
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maybe make an optical mouse that's got a ball, so the ball rolls freely until it turns on an electromagnet?

I want a mouse that has brakes. You could make it have resistance ...

2025-11-29T05:53:17+01:00

I want a mouse that has brakes.
You could make it have resistance to crossing over button edges

"You can download EnVision Publisher for Windows from our ...

2025-11-21T02:28:51+01:00

"You can download EnVision Publisher for Windows from our hidden page. To obtain the URL to this page you need to contact us by phone or email. "

what

Nostr event nevent1qqsve727j2nr4mhlea9fv7djkjh2rqgez24f8h44e3p4qcx9qsssndgzypqu6zq47lamhz9uevaxj960qgw8wv0t03kk2qkspev3yn2d5ksdu98du2y

2025-11-11T06:03:31+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…x37j
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hey 2001 foone: save yourself a lot of time by scripting a jpeg ...

2025-11-06T09:02:46+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…ehq4
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hey 2001 foone: save yourself a lot of time by scripting a jpeg resizing/recompressing tool so that you can tell it "give me this jpeg under 75k" and it'll compress it for you at various sizes until it finds the best-quality-without-going-over-75kb file.

I have resumed the folly of 3d printing after a nearly year long ...

2025-10-15T13:26:07+02:00

I have resumed the folly of 3d printing after a nearly year long hiatus

place your bets until how long it'll be until I'm ranting about how printers are a sin against man and god

Well, I'd like to at least extend my thanks to Framework for ...

2025-10-09T13:33:49+02:00

Well, I'd like to at least extend my thanks to Framework for finally helping me get over my disappointment that they didn't hire me last year.

4chan's dead, tumblr is NSFW-warning people for posting arms, ...

2025-04-15T21:21:54+02:00

4chan's dead, tumblr is NSFW-warning people for posting arms, bluesky didn't upload the screenshot of tumblr censoring the arms, only mastodon still functions!

I swear to god if there's quadruple packets I'm going ...

2025-03-06T21:45:34+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…lldw
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I swear to god if there's quadruple packets I'm going to.... return this device to the video game history foundation

yes lets read all 3 button presses from a 2 button packet I'm ...

2025-03-06T21:42:28+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…2aru
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yes lets read all 3 button presses from a 2 button packet
I'm sure that won't desync the everything

oh god it might not be corrupted. I might just be ...

2025-03-06T21:28:51+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…qgp0
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oh god it might not be corrupted. I might just be misunderstanding the protocol. it might be saying "hey this packet has two keypresses"

I could solve the protocol problem by just accepting corrupted ...

2025-03-06T21:27:55+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…8xl6
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I could solve the protocol problem by just accepting corrupted packets, EXCEPT one of the header bytes for the packet is also a position on the wheel, so every time you glitched the protocol by pushing keys too fast, it'd think you yanked the wheel to the right

this mainly is going to make the joystick a nightmare to program. ...

2025-03-06T21:17:49+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…kjtu
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this mainly is going to make the joystick a nightmare to program. it keeps getting stuck thinking I'm doing like, up + down + down-left

oh hey this has a coin acceptor. I should play a mame game with ...

2025-03-06T20:38:02+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…uyan
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oh hey this has a coin acceptor. I should play a mame game with it. pole position, maybe?

Sometimes I wish I wasn't a retrotech reverse engineer. ...

2025-02-24T18:23:13+01:00

Sometimes I wish I wasn't a retrotech reverse engineer.

Because see, if you're not one, you get to live 2025 without any chance of having to ever think about fucking MFC

I wonder how bad an idea it is to mount a raspi pico at a ...

2025-02-17T21:28:31+01:00

I wonder how bad an idea it is to mount a raspi pico at a 90-degree angle to a PCB

an image from the alternate universe where USB never existed so ...

2025-02-08T04:27:02+01:00

an image from the alternate universe where USB never existed so our parallel ports just kept getting bigger

(I'm a pope, so that's okay)

2024-12-14T23:20:11+01:00

In reply to nevent1q…f82m
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(I'm a pope, so that's okay)

I decided to foolishly glance at the service manual for my ...

2024-12-05T02:38:23+01:00

I decided to foolishly glance at the service manual for my current Fucking Laptop and YOU HAVE TO REMOVE THE CPU HEATSINK TO SERVICE THE KEYBOARD!?

The next big thing: VGA-C. analog video, but you don't have ...

2024-10-28T03:42:03+01:00

The next big thing: VGA-C.

analog video, but you don't have to flip the cable to make it fit!

Huh. I just snipped a VARTA battery out of a 486. It reads 3.0v ...

2024-10-03T01:42:38+02:00

Huh. I just snipped a VARTA battery out of a 486. It reads 3.0v and hasn't leaked.

This thing is nearly 25 years old!

why did we invent a new kind of battery that can burst into ...

2024-10-03T00:07:27+02:00

why did we invent a new kind of battery that can burst into flames when punctured or bent and then started GLUING it into everything?

I keep seeing webmasters talking about how to block AI scrapers ...

2024-09-17T00:05:58+02:00

I keep seeing webmasters talking about how to block AI scrapers (through user agents and IP blocks) and not enough webmasters talking about the far better option of rigging their site to return complete gibberish or transgender werewolf erotica* when AI scrapers are detected.

*depending on which one you think is funnier to poison the AI models with

I think Samsung should really taunt Apple and have the Galaxy S25 ...

2024-09-11T05:01:44+02:00

I think Samsung should really taunt Apple and have the Galaxy S25 phone have a 1/4" headphone jack

Do they actually make reliable microsd cards, or are they all ...

2024-08-30T04:55:36+02:00

Do they actually make reliable microsd cards, or are they all just shit that'll die after a few months of use?

So this was a computer designed for people who just needed ...

2024-08-23T23:03:44+02:00

In reply to nevent1q…8vxe
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So this was a computer designed for people who just needed something cheap to do word processing and the like. The details on the specs are rare, but apparently it has 5 megabyte of ROM, 4 megabyte of RAM, and 1 megabyte of flash storage.
Since this is the NB-80C, it's got a 10.4" 640x480 color LCD. (the NB-60 has a 9.4" 640x480 greyscale LCD)

I got a bulky tablet computer from ewaste and it turns out the ...

2024-08-21T21:34:43+02:00

I got a bulky tablet computer from ewaste and it turns out the operators of this tablet created an add-on which involved INJECTION MOLDING a piece to hold a USB serial adapter and USB HUB to the back of the tablet.

so much work and expense for so little results