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Curious_Canid

@ Curious_Canid @piefed.ca

Posts
5
Comments
116
Joined
9 mo. ago

I am owned by several dogs and cats. I have been playing non-computer roleplaying games for almost five decades. I am interested in all kinds of gadgets, particularly multitools, knives, flashlights, and pens.

  • I Changed A Car Battery

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  • My other car is a Subaru Outback. It is the car that was designed by engineers. And it is wonderful.

    Every technical aspect has been thought through in every direction until it made the most sense. Everything from the functioning of the drivetrain through the style and positioning of the readouts provide a lot of useful information without being cluttered. The seats are comfortable and the control are egonomic. Things are easy to access, both inside and outside.

    It handles like a much smaller car, but it's wide enough to lean into corners without reducing traction on the inside tires. There is plenty of power and the symmetric all-wheel drive puts it wherever it needs to go. The active safety features provide useful guardrails and emergency backup to the driver, and they make long-distance driving easier and more comfortable. It even gets surprisingly good fuel efficiency.

    Finally, I was once in a really bad accident with my previous Outback. A driver T-boned me, in the middle of a busy intersection, right on the passenger door, while doing around 50 mph. It rolled the car two full times, and it only stopped because it hit a van while vertical and bounced off the side.

    The outside of the car was thoroughly destroyed.bbThe passenger compartment was untouched, except for all the windows breaking. The airbags kept everything firmly in place instead of flailing around. The curtain airbags, in particular, kept my head from bouncing off the pavement through the broken side window as it rolled.

    When it finally stopped, my passenger and I were a little dizzy, but otherwise perfectly fine. Our most serious injury was an eighth inch cut on my hand from a piece of glass. We received immediate medical attention, but after thorough exams, they were surprised to admit that we were not injured. We walked away from it. Needless to say, I replaced that car with the exact same model.

    Subaru has consistently added new technology as an option, then made it standard after it proved itself. That's how they have acquired all-around disc brakes, symmetric all-wheel drive, anti-lock braking, "Eyesight" collision avoidance, and any number of other small, but useful features. While other car companies win awards for design, Subaru has won a lot of awards for their engines and drivetrains. Engineers.

  • I Changed A Car Battery

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  • That is certainly true. It could always be worse. :-)

  • Position Smart Interval minimum is too long

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  • It was a good idea, but it did not change the intervals that are allowed.

  • Position Smart Interval minimum is too long

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  • Changing the role hadn't even occurred to me. I'll give that a try.

    Thank you!

  • meshtastic @lemmy.ml
    Curious_Canid @piefed.ca

    Position Smart Interval minimum is too long

  • Meshtastic @mander.xyz
    Curious_Canid @piefed.ca

    Position Smart Interval minimum is too long

  • Watch buyer meme

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  • Wow! Just wow.

    I hadn't heard of that, and it sounds completely insane. I've never been interested in automatics, so I guess I've never had to deal with the level of pure hype that can come with them. It amazes me that people put up with it.

    I am one of the heathen and not a real collector, although I do enjoy looking at all the beautiful and fascinating automatics. I always wear a Citizen Skyhawk A-T Titanium Blue Angels, a Casio Pro Trek 3500T-7, or a Samsung smartwatch. They make me happy, as well as doing the job.

  • meshtastic @lemmy.ml
    Curious_Canid @piefed.ca

    Does the Meshtastic app allow any configuration of channel appearance?

  • Meshtastic @mander.xyz
    Curious_Canid @piefed.ca

    Does the Meshtastic app allow any configuration of channel appearance?

  • Trump administration designates Iran as a state sponsor of wrongful detention

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  • I used to think it was a lack of self-awareness, but it has become clear that they simply don't care if they are known to be inconsistent, dishonest, and cruel. There have yet to be any negative consequences for it. Their base doesn't seem to care about anything but "winning". The definition of "winning" changes from day-to-day, but that's okay because very little of this is about issues. It is simply about the competition itself.

  • This is Jelly. Jelly almost burned the house down this morning.

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  • How is she ever going to learn chemistry if you keep shutting down her experiments?

  • Random.sheep

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  • My random Border Collie thanks you.

  • Turns out Generative AI was a scam

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  • I write software for a living and I have worked directly with LLM backend code. You aren't wrong about the exceptions, but I think they actually reinforce my main point. If you play with the parameters you can make all kinds of things happen, but all of those things are still driven by the existing information it already has or can find. It can mash things together in random new ways, but it will always work with components that already exist. There is no awareness of context or meaning that would allow it to make intelligent choices about what it mashes together. That will always be driven by the patterns it already knows, positively or negatively.

    It's like doing chemistry by picking random bottles from the shelf and dumping them into a beaker to see what happens. You could make an amazing discovery that way, but the chances of it happening are very, very low. And even if it does happen, there's an excellent chance that you won't recognize it.

    I'm in favor of using LLMs for tasks that involve large-scale data analysis. They can be quite helpful, as long as the user understands their limitations and performs due diligence to validate the results.

    Unfortunately what we are mostly seeing are cases where LLMs are used to generate boilerplate text or code that is assembled from a vast collection of material that someone who actually knew what they were doing had previously created. That kind of reuse is not inherently bad, but it should not be confused with what competent writers or coders do. And if LLMs really do take over a lot of routine daily tasks from people, the pool of approaches to those tasks will stagnate, and eventually degenerate, as LLMs become the primary sources of each others' solutions.

    LLMs may very well change the world, but not it in the ways most people expect. Companies that have invested heavily in them are pushing them as the solutions to the wrong problems.

  • Turns out Generative AI was a scam

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  • LLMs are not capable of creating anything, including code. They are enormous word-matching search engines that try to find and piece together the closest existing examples of what is being requested. If what you're looking for is reasonably common, that may be useful. If what you're looking for is obscure, you may get things that don't apply. And the LLM cannot tell the difference. They can be useful but, unlike an LLM, you need to understand the context to use them safely.

    I think the most interesting thing about LLMs is actually what they tell us about the repetitive nature of most of what we do.

  • Cheerful Tuesday... what's made you laugh or smile recently?

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  • I have been delighted by a relatively new Fediverse community called "Fox News" It is, of course, for news about foxes. Just the idea is delightful. And it doesn't hurt any that the content is mostly pictures of foxes being adorable. My dog likes to ready over my shoulder when I'm scrolling through it.

  • Showerthought: I think one of the many reasons why the brazenly corrupt and cheats are worshipped and even elected, is because the supporters low key want to cheat and get away with it themselves.

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  • I think you are basically right. They will put up with almost anything, as long as their leaders tell them they are inherently superior to {fill in the blank}. And that the only reason they aren't treated that way is because the opposition is keeping them from their rightful place. They don't want to earn it. They think they deserve it, just for being {fill in the blank}.

    It mostly comes down to racism, but it can also include misogyny, homophobia, religious fanaticism, nationalism, and almost anything else that can be used to differentiate between them and groups of others. The key is that they don't have to do anything to feel superior. They just are. That makes it seem obtainable, no matter how ridiculous that looks from outside.

  • Good Talk -- Do Canadians Really "Hate" Americans?

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  • Hey, not all of us are stupid. I mean, I am, but not all of us.

  • How does the weather affect your mood?

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  • Fall is probably my favorite season, followed closely by winter. I do use full-spectrum lights to compensate for the shorter days, but overall I think my mood is better during that time. Winter in a forest is one of the most beautiful things in the world.

  • Alaric says abolish mornings

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  • I stand with Alaric! Where can I buy a campaign button?

  • Trump Says Climate Repeal Saves $1.3 Trillion. The EPA’s Math Differs | The agency’s own cost-benefit assessment for revoking the endangerment finding points to steep costs that may outweigh savings

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  • Why does anyone still bother to read sentences that begin with "Trumps says...". Whatever it is, you know it's going to not only be a lie, but a particularly unconvincing lie. The only times he doesn't lie are when he says something that isn't true because he doesn't understand the subject.

    A free press should report such things as "Trump inaccurately claims...".

  • "Noble legacy"

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  • "Do what we want or we'll bring democracy to your country."

  • What unusual/uncommon item(s) do you always keep around for a perfectly logical reasons?

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  • A small marlin spike. It's surprising how often I want to untie knots in all kinds of things. A marlin spike makes that easy.

    Earplugs. They can obviously be used for protection from overly loud environments. They're also great for shutting out voices, music, or other noise when you're trying to read or focus on a task. I like the Loop Switch 2 plugs because they're small, versatile, and effective.

    Ultralight folding bag. I carry a 19 liter bag (Nanobag Sling) with shoulder-length handles that folds down to about the size of my thumb. Any time I need to carry more things than will easily fit in my hands, I pull out the bag. It also lets me support awkward or heavy items using my shoulders and back instead of my hands and arms.

  • Do you read books on your phone?

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  • DRM is always a moving target. For a long time I used the free DeDRM tools in combination with Calibre to remove it from Kindle books, but that software is no longer supported. There are several commercial options. The only one I've found that has really kept up with the changes is EPubor Ultimate.

    When the big change hit, almost nothing worked for a while. EPubor got their DRM-removal working again in a month or so. Since then, I don't think they've ever been more than a week behind in updating their software to deal with the changes.

    I hate DRM. I pay for everything I use and feel that I should be treated as a valued customer and not as a probable thief.