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First hand experience with TSA biometric collection in airport
  • Same for me: just say no, and they say OK. Effortless but the option is totally invisible.

    The irony is, I've seen the staff stop using the face scanner for everyone halfway through the line to speed things up. So its not saving time, just costing money to increase surveillance.

  • Suggest me a book on algorithms
  • I agree, and here's a few different avenues of examples:

    1. If trying to get past interviews, Leet code and hacker rank can be great. They're not so great for real world problems, but not bad.

    2. Advent of code is a good middle ground between theory and practice in my opinion.

    3. To really learn real world problem solving, I'd recommend implement a specification, without looking at existing implementations. For example, make a basic regex engine (formal Regular Expressions not PCRE expressions), or try to implement the C Preprocessor, or the JS event loop.

  • Question: Random Browsing Tools (Dilute and Confuse)

    Fingerprinting isn't always possible to defeat, and its not always possible to avoid making accounts (work and school accounts)

    However, it should be possible to fill up tracked data with meaningless garbage and reduce the signal-to-noise ratio. Ex: a bot that browses random products on amazon to reduce profiling accuracy.

    Do you guys know of any tools that do this? Anything from browser extensions to command line scripts, to anonymous group-accounts.

    15
    A System for Handling 1 Compromised Key

    I'm asking for existing tools/systems that let me programmatically say: "here is my public key, BUT if each of these 5 other public keys all send a signed message saying that my public key has been compromised, then you should mark my public key as compromised, and use the new one they provide". (This is not for a particular task, I'm just curious if any existing auth systems are capable of this)

    I call the idea "guardian keys" because it could be friends' public keys or or just more-securely-stored less-frequently-used keys that you control.

    NOTE: I know this would not work for data encryption. Encrypted data is simply gone if a key is lost. But, for proving an identity, like a login, there could be a system like this but I don't know of any

    11
    Transparent Wood: Solarpunk fantasy in reality

    I don't think I've seen any solarpunk art (much less real world construction) with transparent wood, so I wanted to share

    Not only is transparent wood real but apparently it has been around in labs for a bit. Take a look! (And let me know if this is old news for you)

    Article: https://arstechnica.com/science/2023/12/why-scientists-are-making-transparent-wood/

    Wikipedia with video: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transparent_wood_composite

    Original paper publication: https://45-79-48-20.ip.linodeusercontent.com/s/trDsHKKWwsHsQZ5

    2
    Why don't computers have "computer-numbers" equivalent to phone numbers

    Why doesn't every computer have 256 char domain name, along with a private key to prove it is the sole owner of the address?

    Edits: For those technically inclined: Stuff like DHCP seems unnecessary if every device has a serial number based address that's known not to collide. It seems way more simple and faster than leasing dynamic addresses. On top of that with VOIP I can get phone calls even without cell service, even behind a NAT. Why is the network designed in such a way where that is possible, but I can't buy a static address that will persist across networks endpoint changes (e.g. laptop connecting to a new unconfigured wifi connection) such that I can initiate a connection to my laptop while it is behind a NAT.

    • Yes, it would be a privacy nightmare, I want to know why it didnt turn out that way
    • When I say phone number, I mean including area/country code
    • AFAIK IP addresses (even static public ones) are not equivlent to phone numbers. I don't get a new phone number every time I connect to a new cell tower. Even if a static IP is assigned to a device, my understanding is that connecting the device to a new uncontrolled WiFi, especially a router with a NAT, will make it so that people who try to connect to the static IP will simply fail.
    • No, MAC addresses are not equivalent phone numbers. 1. Phone numbers have one unique owner, MAC addresses can have many owners because they can be changed at any time to any thing on most laptops. 2. A message can't be sent directly to a MAC address in the same way as a phone number
    • Yes, IMEI is unique, but my laptop doesn't have one and even if it did its not the same as an eSim or sim card. We can send a message to an activated Sim, we can't send a message to an IMEI or serial number
    115
    Web Devs: is there a phone-number-less AUTH that still prevents bots?
    • I make websites
    • If someone is banned twice (two accounts) I want it to take them more than 5min and a VPN to make a 3rd account
    • I'm okay with extreme solutions, like requiring everyone to have a Yubikey-or-similar physical key
    • I really hate the trend of relying on a phone number or Google capcha as a not-a-bot detection. Both have tons of problems
    • but spam (automated account creation) is a real problem

    What kind of auth should I use for my websites?

    38
    Convincing: How do you convince the unconvincable?

    Often we dig our own grave making people "defend" their opinion. Instead of winning them over, we push them to become more and more entrenched in their opinion as they build larger mental defenses against the challenges we present. So I want to hear from you:

    How do you avoid putting people on the defensive? (Even though those people had a strong alternative opinion)

    What was a time where the opposite happened; all the facts were there, but absolutely no one was convinced by the talk?

    I feel like solarpunk has a lot of obvious-once-seen ideas and powerful "ahh-ha" moments. But if we can't convince others to take a glimpse from our perspective, not much benefit will come from it.

    26
    Tell me your Best Software Haiku

    My friends and I did this a while ago and it was quite fun.

    14
    Question: Any Serialization Lang for Pure Functions

    JSON and YAML work great for passing data between languages.

    However, sometimes, I have a pure function like y = mx + b, that I would like to pass between languages (for making plots).

    What operators should be available? I think jsonnet's standard library(skip to the math operators) is the perfect example of a useful set of operations that could be shared across basically all programming languages. The operations would take/return json values rather than working with language-specific data types.

    My question is does such a language exist already?

    Close candidates:

    • Dhall and jsonnet are pure languages that generate json. But AFAIK they can't actually serialize pure functions. They can only use pure functions as a shorthand for generating json. I want to actually save/send functions over the wire.
    8
    How can I "watch" a post?

    This might be a limitation of Lemmy or voyager, but is there some option for me to "watch" or "subscribe" to a post and be notified of new comments?

    Especially relevant to asklemmy since occasionally I see a post before there's any answers.

    10
    ADHD Small Group + a Coach

    I'd like a small group with strict/well-defined meeting times that has a coach/conversation-conductor to keep topics on track. I feel like it would work really well if advice was given/received by others with ADHD, while having a leader do stuff like

    • make sure 1 person doesn't dominate the conversation
    • keep meeting notes
    • call/text people who miss a meeting
    • follow up with people who said they were going to do something

    But I've never really heard of such a system.

    I've found at least two online services, but I don't really know if they're worth trying. I'm curious on your opinion and/or if any of you have tried something similar.

    There's "Study Hall" which I'm not sure is what I'm really looking for https://adult-study-hall-by-adhd-rewired.mn.co/sign_up?plan_id=230880

    Then this site seems to have good coaching https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37252231

    9
    A Simple Improvement for Bots

    If a human posted every 5 min, got 0 upvotes for 20 posts straight, we would ban them for spam. If bots would limit themselves to posting once a day, or once a week, and only post the top-voted non-duplicate post of that timeframe, it would be a dramatic improvement. For once, we might actually see real-lemmy posts along side bot posts, instead of the community being exclusively bots (or 99% bot posts) or exclusively Lemmy users.

    I would tell the bot creators myself, except I don't know how to get in contact with them. Is there a consistent way to contact a bot creator?

    6
    Feedback: A Library of Tools

    I plan to speak to my city council about creating a tool library, where citizens use their existing library card to checkout tools. To make the idea a bit more robust, I'm also planning to require citizens deposit something as collateral when checking out a tool.

    However.

    I live in Texas (I love Texas). Thankfully my city council is receptive, but I know they're going to need compelling evidence before approving something like this.

    So, if you guys have any advice, or examples, particularly of this kind of system working in the US, I would love to hear about it!

    8
    Feedback: A Library of Tools

    I plan to speak to my city council about a tool library, and literally have citizens use their existing library card to checkout tools. To make the idea a bit more robust, I'm also planning to require citizens deposit something as collateral when checking out a tool.

    However.

    I live in Texas (I love Texas). Thankfully my city council is receptive, but I know they're going to need compelling evidence before approving something like this.

    So, if you guys have any examples, or advice, particularly of this kind of system working in the US, I would love to hear about it!

    2
    Discussion: Your IRL Solarpunk Themes

    Cyberpunk themed rooms are pretty common, but I don't want to limit solarpunk discussion to just rooms; It could be as big as getting your city council to add a greenway, or as small as finding a nice desktop wallpaper. I'd like to hear about it. I'll start off with a few of my own:

    • I got a sunlight alarm clock; best decision I've ever made. The minimal design of this one is great except for one thing; you have you take 5 min to drill a hole in the dead-center of the speaker to kill the alarm noise. It's the only way to disable the sound. I'm sure there's other good options as well.
    • A couple years ago I got an EcoFlow battery with a small 100W solar panel. I mention it specifically because, unlike other batteries, the EcoFlow was extremely repairable, while also having top of the line specs (at least a couple years ago). I still haven't hooked up the solar panel to the grid, maybe next year.
    • I know plants help a ton, but you're going to have to get plant tips from someone else. Maybe someone will have some fake plant recommendations for me.
    • String lights and LED strips work wonders, both indoors and outside. Higher quality string lights (the lights are close together, bulbs are usually brighter and classic-looking) are quite a bit better than the cheap amazon ones, but even the amazon ones add atmosphere. Combine them with cheap timer-sockets and outdoor light sensor sockets to make a nice automated system.
    • I know it's kind of weird to consider going somewhere as part of a "theme" but I haven't found a farmers market that wasn't nice community. Last week I got an IRL side quest; one of the vendors heard I was going to visit the other market location and asked if I could bring a jug of sweetener to his counterpart there. Sometimes the people are them most important part of a theme, so I recommend participating in a market.
    • For transportation, there are some truly great e-options as of late. It's $300 for a cheap-but-good electric scooter on Amazon. I've also got an overpowered e-bike (Onyx RCR) and even at $4000 it's cheaper than a couple years of a car insurance and gas. Silently zooming with the confidence of being able to charge it off a solar panel is a really pleasant feeling.
    • Finally I've recently attended my first city hall meetings, and it's been shocking how helpful the city staff is. Absolutely nothing like the DMV or national politics. For example, I was told about a "SeeClickFix" app, and it has been great for getting street lights fixed.

    It's not much, but that's all my tips.

    Got any string lights of your own to show off? or maybe some watering systems, or plant tips? I wish we had an r/battlestations equivalent

    1
    Compiling To Logic Gates

    TLDR; do you know of any general purpose languages that can also compile a function to some representation of AND/OR gates (or NAND gates, or whatever)?

    Edit: actually any algebra/formal-logical system is also fine (not just boolean algebra).

    Yes, a A LOT of additional info is needed, like defining how input/output is defined, and I am interested in how those would be specified. I'm not interested in printing an actual circuit, just the boolean-logic level. And I'm mostly asking because I feel like most compilers can't generate a clean/mathematical representation from their AST. There's AST to IR, there's hard-coded optimizations on the IR, and then there's hard-coded mappings from the IR to assembly, but at no point (AFAIK) is the code turned into a algebraic/logical system where something like De Morgan's Law can be applied. And that seems really sad to me.

    So you could say my real question is: what compilers have a strong logical/algebraic internal representation of their own AST?

    Maybe something like Haskell or Prolog do this. The Wolfram Language almost certainly does but it's closed source.

    0
    Foot Pedal Recommendations

    I know, this isn't a keyboard post, but lets be real, if there's any communities that would know/care about programable foot pedals it would be this one.

    I'm looking for a USB foot pedal, ideally something clicky-feeling, with decent-resistance, short travel distance. I only need 1 pedal but something with more than one is fine. I don't need anything premium; I'm just browsing amazon I can't really spot the difference between mushy garabage and decent-ish build quality.

    Any recommendations?

    (Non-USB recommendations are fine; hopefully this post will be useful to others considering a foot pedal)

    10
    I made my own front! XD Font
    github.com GitHub - jeff-hykin/xd-font: 💾 ✅ A custom ligature font based on Iosevka, because Font Fira is for casuals

    💾 ✅ A custom ligature font based on Iosevka, because Font Fira is for casuals - GitHub - jeff-hykin/xd-font: 💾 ✅ A custom ligature font based on Iosevka, because Font Fira is for casuals

    GitHub - jeff-hykin/xd-font: 💾 ✅ A custom ligature font based on Iosevka, because Font Fira is for casuals

    Its not much, as its a variation on Iosevka, exclusively for programming, and I made it a while ago, but I wanted to see what the community thinks. (I tried including a picture with the post but it failed to upload for some reason)

    I'd love to see more open source self-made fonts. Any criticisims on functionality, or recommended changes are welcome.

    3
    Privacy Respecting Ring Doorbell Equivalent?

    I couldn't find a post in this community about cameras so I figured I'd make one. Requirements:

    • No "sign up" required to record video
    • Video is stored locally
    • Video is in a non-propriatary format
    • Can work offline

    Optional/Discussion Points:

    • Can wireless connectivity be hardware disabled
    • Can auto-update be disabled
    • Does the device try to "phone home" if it is connected to wifi
    • Disk encryption would be nice but I doubt that'll be an option for anything other than self-hosted stuff

    Does anyone know about Lorex (it seems more privacy centered)?

    I'm highly technical, so feel free to mention self hosted raspberry pi soltuions as well.

    25
    Used Ergo-keyboard Market (Question/Discussion)

    I love a lot of the keyboards on here (especially ones with an integrated track ball) but I'm a poor grad student under deadlines; even most kit-boards are too much of a time sink for me to soldier together.

    I know at least some of you like trying new boards all the time. And I'm guessing some of you have one or two daily drivers and then 3 older boards; maybe one that was a prototype build, or a novelty micro-board that was fun to just play with but not use, etc.

    I would be happy to effectively fund a new kit/build for someone by buying one of those older (assembled) boards, but I don't know where to look.

    Is there any kind of used market, or do you guys have any recommendations?

    16
    InitialsDiceBearhttps://github.com/dicebear/dicebearhttps://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/„Initials” (https://github.com/dicebear/dicebear) by „DiceBear”, licensed under „CC0 1.0” (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)JE
    jeffhykin @lemm.ee
    Posts 23
    Comments 431