mtjm @mtjm@mtjm.eu

I'm a software developer interested in some things I'm not doing professionally like applying CS to programming, UX design or making useful software.

My current hobbies are video games, learning to play musical instruments and drawing. I collect lists of ideas like queries for testing search engines.

I hope this #introduction won't be my only post where I'm not writing about non-working things.

I'm a software developer interested in some things I'm not doing professionally like applying CS to programming, UX design or making useful software.

My current hobbies are video games, learning to play musical instruments and drawing. I collect lists of ideas like queries for testing search engines.

I hope this #introduction won't be my only post where I'm not writing about non-working things.

An insurance company sent me my new policy: as an encrypted #PDF, without stating the password anywhere. So I had to run pdfcrack for almost four minutes to get the password.

Many Internet anti-spam techniques work over the #phone: I have many blocked #spam numbers (after a single call), greylisting (most people call again if I don't pick up if away from the phone), protocol checks (if someone speaks the same "hello" before I reply then I block them as a spammer), a kind of CAPTCHA (if I ask "do you offer in-room photovoltaics?" the spammers hang up, since they do). Same as email, I feel all of these techniques could prevent real helpful humans from contacting me.

I looked for a #literate_programming tool that is not specific to a single programming language, supports macros (as in one code fragment defines a function with a reference to a statement in its body added by another code fragment, with correct indents for Python), can be easily installed from repos that I already use and does not require TeX output (I hope to post something to that newer thing also called Web). I found exactly #org_mode Babel, it seems to do everything that I need.

#VESA mounts seem standard, except that the usual VESA 75x75 screws are much too deep for a #Wacom Cintiq 16. (Using a two monitor adjustable stand with my usual single monitor, I already see improvements in ergonomics and cable management on my desk.)

I never noticed so much need for #Emacs keybindings until getting a #keyboard without arrow keys (a Ducky One 2 Mini). Combinations like C-p or C-n work well (fifth finger of the left hand over the left Ctrl key), the simulated arrow keys don't (Fn-k, Fn-i where Fn is the second rightmost key under my right palm). My only problem is software like Firefox not using Emacs-style key bindings. (And adapting to a slightly wider spacebar than on my other keyboards.)

My computer #keyboard stopped working (not responding to key presses, after unplugging and plugging again the backlight was off). After disassembling it I learned that its USB cable has broken (with unisolated wires touching each other) and that despite its otherwise higher quality than the cheapest keyboards that I used it also has rubber domes. I might attempt to repair it later.

Upgraded from a five year old DVI cable to a nine year old one; now I get real colors instead of additional magenta and the image is not flickering.

One of the things I like about #git_annex is accessing its data via git and usual shell tools, so without learning any specific git annex commands I can check e.g. if all my ebooks would fit an ereader device: (echo print\(;git diff `git hash-object -t tree /dev/null`|sed -rn 's,^.*\.git/annex/objects/.*s([0-9]+)--[^-]+\.epub$,\1 +,p';echo 0\))|python3

Of my 2021 new year resolutions, I succeeded at "do easy X every day" and "do easy Y once early in the year", instead of "always do Z" I solved the underlying problem differently; I failed at all unclear or hard resolutions. (Some problems are remembering the resolution when being able to progress it and setting realistic goals.) I feel I should have learned this in two weeks, not a year, if doing any agile project.

One of the things I like about Rust's memory safety is that rustc randomly crashing motivated me to run memtest and find a faulty DIMM. I too often assume that random segfaults and hangs are a normal consequence of usual software quality and not hardware issues or problems that I can fix.

What I most like in the #SmackJeeves "renewal" is that most comics that I used to read there are also hosted elsewhere, so I can change the links in my feed reader to sites that still provide RSS. I hope future technologies will automate finding which platform hosts a work.

Migrated my laptop running Debian from btrfs to ext4. What I did wrong: (0) continuing to run btrfs after it got uncorrectable errors and remount read-only several times (it might work better in some more usual use cases than mine); (1) not rebuilding initramfs after the change, making mount fail; (2) passing a different label to cryptsetup luksOpen than in /etc/crypttab, causing an infinite loop in initramfs.

I dislike exactly two things about the #Firefox reader mode: (1) it replaces the URL with an about:reader one, but keeps displaying the original one in the address bar (so I don't see why bookmarks are separate with and without it) (2) it's too common in Web design to make pages unreadable when it's disabled.

https://xkcd.com/1205/ might be a good rule when working, but not when using a computer at home: automating the task might be more fun, I might learn more, while spending much more time than just doing the task. (I'm not sure this would convince me to learn the Emacs style of regular expressions; I always have to guess how many backslashes to add to turn a trivial POSIX ERE into an Emacs regexp.)

Received the #fsfbulletin. I was surprised seeing the envelope with proper diacritics in my name and address when Polish companies still use replacement character boxes in invoices.

Seen a "disable adblock or register" banner (disabling adblock doesn't hide it); it should have been "practice #adblock element hiding or disable #PrivacyBadger and get tracked more".

Set up a Mastodon instance; finally had an opportunity to use Docker with a real-world application.