My current setup is Uptime Kuma sending notifications via Ntfy.

I need to resolve the issue of what to do when the internet is down (and thus Ntfy cannot be reached), but it has so far done everything I want it to do. It also means I get push notifications on all the devices I care to receive them on.

My understanding of the way that recipes are written is that ingredients are put in a list so you know if you have everything you need, or if you need to run to the store). There is no point in trying to make those new brownies if I check my pantry and I am missing the brown sugar and the store is closed.

I do suspect that most people writing recipes are the kind to plan and prepare. Admittedly, it helps for working through the recipe for the purposes of writing it.

The most recent recipe i transcribed was, very much:

• Result
  • Ingredient
  • Ingredient
  • Do something with 'em
• Result …

The only times I have had my mind changed are when I merely listened, and heard, and said nothing. It is tough to be vulnerable enough to be open to change. I think that even approaching it as a debate implies being combative, and thus makes it hard to be vulnerable.

There is also that some people just aren’t online to convince anyone of their point of view, or to be convinced otherwise, but just to say what they want to say and find people who agree with them. You’re most likely not going to change their mind because they just aren’t even in a position to entertain that there is something that could change.

There is one time I’d like to think I brought up something that the person hasn’t considered… But, if I’m generous, it only brought nuance to the subject.

I would love to see a grand sci-fi game that’s a mixture of Titanfall and mirror’s edge.

You would have open world runner sections where your entire job is to run messages between agents on a city/station that is working hard to steer the war… and then you go and do big stompy robots combined arms, titalfall-esque fighting, just open world instead of the (rather great) map, point-to-point of the original.

Alternatively, just give me either a single player or MMO implementation of The Allbright System.

Whatever I choose, I would just like the engine to be released under GPL, and the assets under CC-3.0-BY-NC-SA so that it lives on, regardless of however well it does.

FWIW, in Portugal, during my youth, I ate at the cafeteria rather often. It was decent food for the most part (it was also my first exposure to soy minced meat). It was hot, didn’t involve carrying a lunchbox, and it was tasty and convenient and cheap. Eventually I opted to go back home because I lived close enough to walk, and mom’s food is better.

We did not get ways to heat up food (though I bet you could have asked the cafeteria staff if you needed it) of our own, though.

My hobbies boil down to doing things that I have enjoyed enough to put in time and effort into them, with little regard for it beyond working out for me. I could go into more detail, but at the core it is all about it has to do with how I experience the world and how I engage with it, and that these hobbies enhance how I do that and thus make the time spent on them enjoyable, ensuring thus I keep doing them.

Here is a non-exhaustive list of things I do:

• Reading, which the to read pile keeps growing.
• Writing, both non-fiction and fiction
• Video games.
• Tech stuff in general
• Every now and then I bike around, because I just enjoy it
• Photography, every now and then

Why did I get into them? Because I enjoy doing them!

I like reading, because it’s fun to read a story, and because it’s fun to read about others perspectives, and because it is fun to learn. I like **writing **because I like putting my thoughts in order, and it helps me think, and it helps me communicate. I like being able to share something with someone else and feel like I managed to get something across. **Photography **also fits into this because it is a way for me to capture what I see (and often, what I don’t see) and share it with others. And, often, it serves as a way to focus me onto what is around me in ways that I never would have otherwise.

Tech stuff? Well, I like gadgets and machinery. In another life, I would have delved into hardware instead, making weird gadgets and one offs. Instead, computer and software are my thing. Video Games are

Biking: because I get to go fast and be active. More engaging than walking. Not as awful as running.

I also recently took a look at Meshtastic, though that has been burning along in the background due to physical constraints. Radio things are fun, though in this case the driving factor was… worries about the world at large.

It has to do with the stroke you make as you write. In all three ways that I know how to write by hand (full cursive, my actual current style, and print), crossing the ts and dotting the is is just the last stroke(s) of writing the word. The word is not complete until those are done, just like an A (if you write it as a ball with a tail) is not complete without its tail, and sword is not complete without a d at the end.

You keep track on your head the same way you keep track in your head that a word is not finished up until you have written all the letters in it. My first language uses accents, and it is the same process. And yes, you can forget, not just for longer words. Teachers would certainly mark it on homework and tests. I struggled with accents, in general, but just like learning how to spell a word, you just practice it when you get it wrong until you get it right and it becomes muscle memory for how you write that word.

My signature doesn’t, however, since I have not built enough muscle memory to reproduce it. Yes, it is technically cursive, so that part is easy to get right; but the flourishes that make it a signature instead of just me writing a word like every other kid who learned the same cursive style would aren’t muscle memory due to lack of practice.

It really depends. Either a permanent ink pen + something to write with, praying that I can make a record that will outlive me…

A waterproof kindle (or similar ereader) loaded with an offline copy of wikipedia and a solar charger + usb cable might be right up there.

Probably a good knife. A really good backpack, perhaps? A first aid kit instead?

It is challenging to decide, because here is the thing: if I am put in the middle of nowhere, I am going to be a stranger at the mercy of whoever I happen to meet first, or whoever in power happens to hear of me first. So, chances are I, foreigner who does not speak the local language, would not fare rather well. In this one, self-defense tools, such as the knife, and other camping-useable gear (covers, first aid kits, water filtration systems, etc) would be immensely more useful than other options.

If, instead, I was dropped somewhere near somebody sympathetic, or at least not bound to kill me immediately, I might manage (assuming I survive the environmental shock) to become useful enough to not kill. Here, wikipedia would certainly be useful, and at that point I might make enough to resolve the record-keeping aspect by virtue of getting compensated.

In this later case, besides the kindle + solar charger combo, I would bring my DSLR (and it would be a DSLR and not a Mirrorless, or other such cameras). I have a really neat variable travel lens that should be very damn useful for the military (either for a general or for scouts), and it should work with no batteries for seeing.

I’ve been slowly setting up my own services locally, and one of the issues I quickly ran into was simple: what’s the point of running the uptime monitor in the same machine? Granted, it still serves is purposes, but…

So, if you do find a way to get something going, I think it’d be really cool. My biggest concern would be, though, on how to ensure you don’t accidentally build a DDoS network instead. A though issue I have no idea how to solve, but which should be solvable!

The issue with “children” local accounts (assuming they ever remained 100% local anyway) is that for it to be effective, you would have to control who install the OS for it to be effective.

I have been managing my own OS install since I was a teen, so I could have just created an adult account for me. But, okay, you could say that you could just regularly check your child hasn’t reinstalled the machine.

Well, see, they could just install a Virtual Machine. There is plenty of Virtual Machine software out there, and then we’re back at whoever installs it being responsible for filling in that information. And Virtual Machines are very useful for a bunch of things: from running software not made for your hardware (see Android emulators, WSL), to being safer around dodgy software.

You could counter that by not letting them install things with your permissions… but there are portable versions of software that people make for a bunch of reasons which don’t recall an installation. And I am not talking about hypotheticals: back when I was in school people would carry portable versions of games in USB sticks to copy around school machines so they could play video games during IT class.

Never mind that it means that whenever they want to install something, they will poke you about it, and now you’re on the hook for reviewing that. Which you should already be doing because you care about what your child does and they don’t have the years of experience to not break their OS.

But if you are doing that, why not use proper parental control software that let’s you have much finer-grained control over what they can see or not online, along with other controls around how much time they can spend on the machine and a few nicer things?

There are a multitude of reason why I like it.

The most important is that I am not wasting an hour and change commuting. I don’t need to worry about train schedules. Commuting by car would have been worse: I’d spend hundreds of euros on gas and tolls, never mind parking. I also don’t have a bunch of dead time I cannot really take advantage of. Sure, some of it I could use to read in public transport, or listen to podcasts, but there is a limit. I am prone to motion sickness, so there are limits to when I can do it and for how long. And during peak hours? The experience of getting on a train is, sometimes, not great. Too many people, too hot. As much as I love public mass transport, the experience during peak hours is miserable.

The other thing about WFH, in my current setup, is that… I can just step away? I have gone to a friends house to give them and/or deliver something during work hours because I just have enough time. I have driven parents for appointments because it was quick enough, or I could just take my work laptop with me and work from the car. I have worked from another country entirely, and the biggest difference was the timezone. And if I really want to, I can visit a teammate and work from his house instead!

There are few other reasons why work from home is great, though they are not that important in the grand scheme of things. In the places I have worked, we have had open spaces. This means noise. Others might need to be on a call, or you might need to be on a call. It means that multiple people in the same call is now an exercise in mute discipline so you don’t distract others hearing themselves through your microphone. It also means I cannot just pace around while on a chat, which I sometimes do thanks to the wireless headphones I invested in. Actually, it means I need to use my headphones much more because if I want music, I need them on, whereas at home I can just use speakers instead?

We do get togethers once a month, though I don’t go to all of them. We also are relatively liberal with audio chats for not so serious subjects. I don’t feel lonely for two reasons: I just deal well with calls and other such ways of interacting with people; and I can use the extra time I don’t commute to actually go out with people I like after work.