On 1/3/25 3:49 PM, rbowman wrote:
> On Fri, 3 Jan 2025 08:41:35 -0500, Andrzej Matuch wrote:
>
>> I had a similar experience a week or so ago. I was sitting in a
>> supermarket parking lot in my new QX60 when the daughter of the guy who
>> parked to the left of me decided to open her car door wide and smack my
>> vehicle.
>
> That's something I have to watch very carefully. I've got a 2 door
> hatchback and the doors are wide enough to allow a hypothetical person to
> get in the back seat. I folded the back seats forward the day I took
> delivery of the car so that's a moot point but sometimes to avoid contact
> I have to slither out through a partially open door. When they layout
> parking lots for maximum volume they ignore about 50% of the vehicles will
> be oversized pickups that really makes the situation worse.

A common 'zoning' req for biz is to have x-number
of "parking spaces". So, they mark 'em out for
Mini-Coopers - not Expeditions.

On 1/3/25 7:49 PM, D wrote:
>
>
> On Sat, 3 Jan 2025, rbowman wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 3 Jan 2025 12:30:44 +0100, D wrote:
>>
>>> Reminds me of old Saabs. Those had what you could call a bumper!
>>
>> What era? The only Saab I drove was a girlfriend's. It was a 92 or
>> maybe a
>> 93, I forget which. It did have a bumper of sorts.
>>
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagmar_bumper
>>
>> Those were bumpers!
>>
>> Trivia: The Dagmar the bumpers were named after was an actress's stage
>> name that went back to a TV show we alwayes watched, 'Mama', aobut an
>> extended Norwegian family.
>>
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mama_(American_TV_series)
>
> This is a beautiful bumper:
>
> https://www.startpage.com/av/proxy-image?piurl=https%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2Fe%2Fe5%2FSaab_900_GLE_%282%29_%28crop%29.jpg&sp=1735951735T1b8aa114fd353d88b4d34fd3554f5b9455c5317dadea52d972489e1e4be614a0
> .
>
> I think there's a sabb with an even wider one, but cannot find it. I saw
> it in a garage many decades ago.

Old truck I owned, fitted 8x2 'C'-beam as rear bumper.

A common trick at the time was for perps to fake a
'rear-end accident' using a stolen car - and when
you got out they'd all jump you. I think someone
tried that on me once ... just left 'em in the road,
barely scratched the paint on the bumper :-)

On 1/3/25 4:14 PM, rbowman wrote:
> On Fri, 3 Jan 2025 11:28:27 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>
>> Odd, since MATE - a superset of GNOME - expects you to use a menu. Its
>> very XP like.
>>
>> And since XP was what I was running when I switched entirely to Linux, I
>> didn't have to relearn very much at all..
>
> My first Windows box was 3.1 with the Program Manager. That was a little
> primitive. Windows 95 introduced the Start Menu and for better or worse
> became what I thought the desktop should look like.
>
> I forget all the managers I tried on Linux in the early days. mwm, tmw,
> FVWM, IceWM, Sawfish, etc but I preferred the ones that looked like
> Windows.

My fave is still LXDE ... just enough GUI and
behaves in a sane manner. Never liked LXQt though.

If no LXDE, then XFCE.

As for Winders ... Win-1.1 can be had from archive
sites. Make a DOS VM then install. Oh WOW ... it's
just as awful now as I remember :-) Some of the
stuff for C-64/128 at the time was nicer.

This laptop is MX, with LXDE.

Oh, oddity, have an old BYTE magazine with a
REVIEW article of Win 1.1 ........ that's a
keeper !

On 1/2/25 5:22 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> On 01/01/2025 22:01, D wrote:
>>
>>
>> On Wed, 1 Jan 2025, chrisv wrote:
>>
>>> -hh wrote:
>>>
>>>> (snipped, unread)
>>>
>>> Around your family, you like to pretend that you're a good person,
>>> don't you, -highhorse.
>>>
>>> If only they knew what an asshole you are, how eager to attack decent,
>>> reasonable people you are.
>>
>> If you don't read what you comment on, aren't you afraid that you are
>> missing important parts of the argument? Also, how can you build
>> spiritual bridges of love between two human beings that way?
>
> He doan want no stinkin' spiritual bridges of lurve.
> Cash or credit card only.

Damned straight !!!

First there's "love", then they want you to help
clean out their garage .......

On 1/3/25 7:32 AM, chrisv wrote:
> 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:
>
>> OpenSUSE is also great - but I'm worried about how
>> it uses the now IBM-owned sources.
>
> Are you saing that they use source code that is owned by IBM and not
> released under any open-source license?

They use RHEL stuff - and RHEL is now IBM.
Best line I could get is that you're now
basically an unpaid beta tester for IBM.

Still, for NOW, it's still a very good distro.
A bit 'fat' - not too snappy on a Pi - but
the ez tools alone make tons of stuff MUCH
quicker and easier. I've set up RAID sets
The HARD Way, with OpenSUSE it's max 30
seconds in a GUI ... and it even gives you
helpful hints about how to set some of
the more esoteric params.

On 1/2/25 4:50 PM, -hh wrote:
> On 1/2/25 4:29 PM, Farley Flud wrote:
>> On Thu, 2 Jan 2025 16:11:11 -0500, -hh wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> For example, good luck finding a 1/2" power drill for sale new today for
>>> just $100 which will last for even 10 years of use, let alone his
>>> "25-50" claim:  the days of bulletproof all metal body Craftsman or
>>> Black & Decker power tools are long since gone.
>>>
>>
>> I don't need "luck".  I purchased a Milwaukee 1/2" for about $100
>> (maybe more maybe less).  Milwaukee power tools are renowned throughout
>> the industrial trades as being perhaps the ultimate in quality.
>
> Yeah, Milwaukee's good, but they're not $100.

I've had probs with battery-pack life, same
with DeWalt ....

Mostly have Makita stuff now.

However Dad's mid-60s metal-body SKIL drill
still works perfectly ...

He DID have one with like a 7/8th chuck and
a big accessory handle. Low speed, ultra-
torque. Mostly used to drill big holes in
concrete. Damned thing could literally break
yer arm if it hung up. Lost in fire I think ...

> Grainger's price is $187+:
>
> <https://www.grainger.com/product/3DU39>

For fun, check Grainger wholesale -vs- retail
prices. It'll SHOCK you sometimes :-)

> Of course, you're free to go buy from someplace else, where you're
> taking a risk on codeshares or counterfeits ...
>
> ... as well as to post the receipt to substantiate your price claim.
>
>
>> Furthermore, all metal body construction was abandoned long ago due
>> to the shock hazards.  The durable polymers that are now used are more
>> than an adequate substitute.
>
> Oh, I'm quite aware of that, because the hand-me-down that I got had to
> get tossed at <40 years age because it was shorting out to the body.  I
> used it for awhile wearing workgloves before getting fed up and a 1/2"
> Craftsman- it lasted only around 15 years before it died.  These days, I
> look to Dewalt, Bosch or Makita as first string.

Metal body is GREAT - and will take a lot more abuse
than today's plastic wonders. But you DO need to use
a polarized plug - some get retrofitted with a 3-wire
cord to add a real fer-sure ground.

Oh, battery paks, DO look up the 'jump start' trick
where you use some kind of power supply, or even another
good lithium pack, to momentarily charge the 'dead'
battery. Most commercial chargers assume ZERO volts
means a dead pak ... but often the pak is perfectly
good, just needs a tiny one-volt charge or so to
fool the charger.

There's a similar trick with NiCad paks - involves
higher voltage, wires, and a FILE. You drag one
wire along the file to pulse energy into the pak
and disrupt 'bridging'.

>> But this is all totally superfluous.  The main point of the OP is that
>> commercial software companies can easily produce software that can
>> last decades, if not forever, but such software would literally destroy
>> them as a business entity.  Therefore they are forced into extortionate
>> practices just to keep alive.
>
> Depends on the use case, as well as the business model.  For example,
> there's code that's been use for ~50 years but its not been static the
> entire time:  there's invariably places for improvement & patches.
>
>> FOSS, OTOH, has no such ridiculous concerns.
>
> If that were truly a characteristic unique to FOSS, then Linux
> (including Android) would never have had any security patch updates.

Most ALL code of any size and scope can be "improved".
If not 'security' then streamlining. And yes, some of
the basic algos go all the way back to young Bill Gates.
They used to have contests - who could do what in the
least number of bytes/cycles. Bill often won.

(and then the blood-signed contract ... :-)

On 1/3/25 6:45 AM, D wrote:
>
>
> On Fri, 3 Jan 2025, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:
>
>> On 1/2/25 6:22 AM, D wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, 1 Jan 2025, chrisv wrote:
>>>
>>>> D wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>> Your other two recent posts were deleted, unread.
>>>>>
>>>>> This sounds to me like you admit defeat. (snipped, unread)
>>>>
>>>> Trolling 101.  Claim victory in the midst of defeat.
>>>>
>>>> The reality is that I'm so much better that after making my point I
>>>> can ignore what dipshits say, with the confidence that no decent
>>>> person would side with the dipshit.
>>>>
>>>> Your 4:01 post was deleted, unread, as will every post that you make
>>>> in this thread, from now on.
>>>
>>> Ahh... I won! It was a good fight chris, but you met someone better
>>> and lost. =)
>>
>>  Ah ... "The Wars" return ...... not unexpected alas ...
>>  seems a 'Human Thing", the quest for elevated 'status'
>>  forever and always. On This Episode of Game Of Thrones ...
>>
>>  Fortunately it's not 'war' over Linux Stuff again (yet).
>
> No I think it is just because someone pulled in comp.os.linux.advocacy.
> Seems a lot of trolls reside there. I looked into it, found it way to
> annoying, and stopped. But I got a reminder of why I stopped reading
> that group.

I also cut it out ... a lot of 'political' group trolls
somehow found it. If you want pointlessly vicious, the
political groups have it. They'll roast people for not
believing the sky is green ... and then roast you for
believing it is ...........

(only seen a green sky a few times - big hail and/or
tornadoes followed)

>>  Hey, I can't program a TCP stack from memory or know
>>  every detail of sockets at the ASM level (and no, I did
>>  not have an extensive ed in every 'philosophy')- guess
>>  that  makes me totally inferior and useless. Always
>>  was a Jack Of All Trades, Master Of Few.  Whatever,
>>  I ain't that proud, good for what I'm good for and
>>  that's good enough  :-)

On 1/3/25 6:52 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> On 03/01/2025 11:45, D wrote:
>> No I think it is just because someone pulled in
>> comp.os.linux.advocacy. Seems a lot of trolls reside there. I looked
>> into it, found it way to annoying, and stopped. But I got a reminder
>> of why I stopped reading that group.
>
> Yup. Ain't that the truth.
>
> Linux is good all by itself. Doesn't need advocacy.

Ummmm ... SORTA does. A problem is that surprisingly
few people even know that M$/Apple alternatives
exist at all. Doesn't hurt to enlighten.

On 1/3/25 9:06 PM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> On 04/01/2025 00:43, D wrote:
>> Negro has also become a symbol word.
>
> You have to be really uneducated and thick not to know it simply means
> 'black'.

A LOT of people are really uneducated and thick ... just sayin'

However they DO vote, DO contribute to political parties, DO
scream and rage and influence public policy ......

Esp in the USA, 'negro' means more than 'black' too - it
evokes a lot of history and attitudes.

I'm old enough to remember 'whites only' and 'colored'
signs on things ... and the big Bubbs that'd enforce it.
Hell, even the sheriff was KKK ... his daughter married
one of my uncles .........

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 01:26:24 +0100, D wrote:

> On Fri, 3 Jan 2025, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>
>> On 03/01/2025 13:32, -hh wrote:
>>> Sea levels have already risen by 4 inches since 1993, and hard science
>>> has found the primary energy imbalance reason why:  its
>>> anthropometric.
>>
>> Sea level rise has been 3mm/yr for the last 4000 years. Nothing has
>> changed
>
> Let me also add that the dutch have been able to handle it for several
> 100s of years, so there absolutely nothing to be worried about. It is
> natural, and we can handle it perfectly.

Neal Stephenson's novel 'Termination Shock' is complex like many of his
books. The base theme is in any geoengineering attempt to mitigate climate
change there will be winners and loser. What seems like a good idea for
one area might cause the Indian monsoons to fail.

A main character is the queen of Netherlands who tries to travel around
incognito and one of the events in a North Sea tsunami when the
Maeslantkering fails.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maeslantkering

It doesn't get the best reviews. It's 700 pages with many threads. Some
are offended by hints the Greens couldn't fix their eBike, let alone the
climate.

The reviews aren't as bad as those for his latest, 'Polostan'. It too is
convoluted but what really set people off is it is the first in a series
and ends abruptly. A lot of indie authors do that but each book is under
$5 or generally free to read with KindleUnlimited, not $15 for the kindle
version. I guess he's working on his retirement plan.

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 01:51:38 +0100, D wrote:

> I think all the ones that use traditional databases I encountered are
> using either mysql, mariadb or sql server for linux which I think was
> free for a while. Sql server for linux was a joke. The company was
> offered help to migrate to mysql or mariadb, refused, since they were
> microsoft loyalists, and continued to live with downtime every month,
> rather than switching.

MySQL lost it's shine when it was bought and part of the team forked off
MariaDB. I've never used either.

Esri's Workgroup configuration use SQl Server Express which is free. It
works well with the limitation that a database cannot exceed 10GB. That's
perfectly adequate for most of our sites since the only want data for
their county. If you get greedy and want half the state it's time for the
full SQL Server.

Where it falls short is when you're trying to store years of incident
data. Depending on the site you might get five or six years before you
have to start purging. otoh the price is right compared to a DB2 or full
server license.

It was a little rocky to begin with but Esri now works fine with
PostgresSQL. For a long time the spatial extender package for DB2 was an
extra cost option but it's included with the base license now.

On Fri, 3 Jan 2025 20:27:33 -0500, Andrzej Matuch wrote:

> Conserving energy and water is only important to those of us who aren't
> tasked with spying on everyone.

/in the initial phase No Such Agency's Bluffdale center had a little
energy problem. They could run the machines or run the cooling system.
Fireworks ensued.

Speaking of spying Musk could quickly provide the FBI with a map of the
Las Vegas Cybertruck's route by accessing the charging station data. Minor
problem if you have your heart set on a Tesla. No more off grid
adventures, fueling from 5 gallon gas cans.

On Fri, 3 Jan 2025 22:29:13 -0500, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:

> I knew a guy who made bumpers out of two large wooden utility poles
> he'd cut to size and shape. Older Chevy 3500 series. Looked 'rugged',
> kinda 'back-country'. Damned things were a good 8" thick and about
> 12" tall. No little old lady was gonna so much as dent them in a
> parking-lot oopsie.

It would make sense around here where the deer and the antelope play -- in
the road. Scratch the antelope. They're lightweights. It the elk and moose
that can really do a number.

I had a deer riding on the hood of my last Toyota. No fatal damage. The
hood still closed although it had a new sculpted look and a few nylon ties
took care of the plastic pieces.

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 01:38:10 +0100, D wrote:

> You should be happy that you (most likely) have never tried to park in a
> european garage located in the old parts of town. Bacteria have a hard
> time fitting in those parking lots.

Quebec City is as close to a European town as we get. We went there on our
honeymoon in my Lincoln Continental.

https://www.classic.com/veh/1962-lincoln-continental-sedan-2y82h406575-
pgKPY1p/

5500 pounds at the curb, 430 ci engine to motivate it. We stayed at the
Chateau Frontenac.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ch%C3%A2teau_Frontenac

When I saw the lay of the land I parked the Lincoln and rented a Dodge
Colt, a rebranded Mitsubishi when Japanese cars were barely roadworthy. In
the Lincoln I could cruise at 100 while my bride snoozed. In the TonkaToy
I could get up to almost 25 before her panic attack set in but it handled
a city with its roots in the 17th century.

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 02:04:57 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

> On 04/01/2025 00:38, D wrote:
>> You should be happy that you (most likely) have never tried to park in
>> a european garage located in the old parts of town.
>
> My current car is simply too wide to fit my current garage

Trade it for a Sunbeam Alpine; it will fit.

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 01:43:35 +0100, D wrote:

> As a counter to that, I've started to drop a few "negros" in
> conversations here and there out in town, and I also started to wear my
> MAGA hat on the streets of Stockholm.

When I was growing up niggers preferred to be called Negroes. It's hard to
keep track. Of course when I was growing up we also had polocks, wops,
kikes, and and other designations. My mother was politically correct
before her time and would accuse my father of sounding like Hitler.

The punchline is she thought any male Negro over the age of five was going
to rape her. My father had no problems with niggers. They were just people
until proven differently. I learned about hypocrisy and pretty words
early.

I don't have a MAGA hat. In the summer I have a NRA hat that I wear
hiking; that's almost as good.

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 02:06:17 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

> On 04/01/2025 00:43, D wrote:
>> Negro has also become a symbol word.
>
> You have to be really uneducated and thick not to know it simply means
> 'black'.

The best PC invention is latinx. It sounds like something you take when
you haven't shit in three days. I don't even think the latinx people care
for it. Indian is touchy too. Some are into 'Native American', some
aren't.

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 01:49:55 +0100, D wrote:

> I think there's a sabb with an even wider one, but cannot find it. I saw
> it in a garage many decades ago.

Oh, the 900. I've seen a few of those. Saabs always were a minority brand
in the US. I liked the old ones, but there were some really strange beasts
like the Sonnet II. I don't know why there was a Volvo on every block
while Saabs were driven by middle-aged lesbians.

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 01:47:27 +0100, D wrote:

> I am surprised that eco-fascists are not protesting against the big IT
> corporations. But most likely that would not result in higher taxes and
> more power to socialist politicians, so that is probably why they are
> ignored.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bright_green_environmentalism

They love their technology. They want their iPhones, VR goggles, AI
friends, EVs and so forth to be powered by some unspecified miracle,

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 01:33:42 +0100, D wrote:

> Hallucinations will probably have to be "fixed" by either hiring
> africans to double check answers, sorry "fact check", and then store
> those so that similar queries are redirected to those canned answers.

https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/12/journal-editors-resign-to-protest-
ai-use-high-fees-and-more/

"In-house production has been reduced or outsourced, and in 2023 Elsevier
began using AI during production without informing the board, resulting in
many style and formatting errors, as well as reversing versions of papers
that had already been accepted and formatted by the editors. “This was
highly embarrassing for the journal and resolution took six months and was
achieved only through the persistent efforts of the editors," the editors
wrote. "AI processing continues to be used and regularly reformats
submitted manuscripts to change meaning and formatting and require
extensive author and editor oversight during proof stage.”

"There is certainly cause for concern when it comes to using AI in the
pursuit of science. For instance, earlier this year, we witnessed the
viral sensation of several egregiously bad AI-generated figures published
in a peer-reviewed article in Frontiers, a reputable scientific journal.
Scientists on social media expressed equal parts shock and ridicule at the
images, one of which featured a rat with grotesquely large and bizarre
genitals. The paper has since been retracted, but the incident reinforces
a growing concern that AI will make published scientific research less
trustworthy, even as it increases productivity."

Somehow a rat with big balls really upset them.

On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 01:13:08 +0100, D wrote:

> Somehow I think they lost control over the movement. It is fun to see
> the wringing of hands of a lot of communists and socialists from the 60s
> who were "all in" russia, and to see them explain what's happening there
> now.

It's not as entertaining as the whiplash suffered by the CPUSA members in
the '30s and '40s when they got the latest memo from Moscow.

On 1/4/25 1:16 AM, rbowman wrote:
> On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 02:06:17 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>
>> On 04/01/2025 00:43, D wrote:
>>> Negro has also become a symbol word.
>>
>> You have to be really uneducated and thick not to know it simply means
>> 'black'.
>
> The best PC invention is latinx. It sounds like something you take when
> you haven't shit in three days. I don't even think the latinx people care
> for it. Indian is touchy too. Some are into 'Native American', some
> aren't.

I use "AmerIndian".

Likely NOT much actual "Indian" in AmerIndians ...
but maybe SOME. Not like JUST northern Siberians
and Sammi ever crossed over to the American
continents, whomever found/heard might of as well.
A fair span of 'easy' transit time.

Oh, there are NO "Native Americans" ... just
"first ones here".

On 2025-01-04, 186282@ud0s4.net <186283@ud0s4.net> wrote:

> Most ALL code of any size and scope can be "improved".
> If not 'security' then streamlining. And yes, some of
> the basic algos go all the way back to young Bill Gates.
> They used to have contests - who could do what in the
> least number of bytes/cycles. Bill often won.

The tricks he used would get people fired now.

> (and then the blood-signed contract ... :-)

I remember shooting someone out of the saddle when
she claimed that Lord Bill was a programming genius.
He was no such thing - but he was a _marketing_ genius.

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Growth for the sake of
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | growth is the ideology
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | of the cancer cell.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | -- Edward Abbey

On 2025-01-04, The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> wrote:

> On 04/01/2025 00:43, D wrote:
>
>> Negro has also become a symbol word.
>
> You have to be really uneducated and thick not to know it simply means
> 'black'.

s/black/Black/

The same thing happened here in Canada when the word "indigenous" was
introduced. About two weeks later it became mandatory to capitalize it.

The hypocritical thing about capitalizing "Black" is that hardly anyone
capitalizes "White". This is itself a form of racial discrimination.
In the name of equality, the only way you can capitalize anything is
to establish a rule that all racial designators shall be capitalized.
A touchstone in these cases is to see what people do with "Brown".

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Growth for the sake of
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | growth is the ideology
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | of the cancer cell.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | -- Edward Abbey

On 1/4/25 1:08 AM, rbowman wrote:
> On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 01:43:35 +0100, D wrote:
>
>> As a counter to that, I've started to drop a few "negros" in
>> conversations here and there out in town, and I also started to wear my
>> MAGA hat on the streets of Stockholm.
>
> When I was growing up niggers preferred to be called Negroes. It's hard to
> keep track. Of course when I was growing up we also had polocks, wops,
> kikes, and and other designations. My mother was politically correct
> before her time and would accuse my father of sounding like Hitler.
>
> The punchline is she thought any male Negro over the age of five was going
> to rape her. My father had no problems with niggers. They were just people
> until proven differently. I learned about hypocrisy and pretty words
> early.
>
> I don't have a MAGA hat. In the summer I have a NRA hat that I wear
> hiking; that's almost as good.

My father was a racist - northern racist. However
he WAS kinda odd about it. He'd sometimes rant about
'niggers' but most any 'negro' he ever worked with
was "OK" - sometimes they'd be over for dinner ...
and this was "the south". Even saw him stand up to
the Jim Crow bubbs once or twice. My mother had
been raised with her fam/brothers often employing
and working closely with 'negros' and didn't freak
about it at all.

In short, the 'racism' picture even in the southern
USA was not as simple and monolithic as the usual
rhetoric/media likes to portray. Reality would not
be as 'politically useful'.