Weekend Reading — The Bob Ross of programming

Yogthos

Tech Stuff

Don’t Taste One Coffee

The thing is, this is also true for making decisions in other fields, especially in Product, whether prioritizing a feature or making a whole roadmap, or hiring onto your team. You will always make better choices when you give yourself the space and process where you consider and discuss alternatives and the trade offs between them.

Ethan Marcotte

every tech company designing products that assume a fast, reliable, always-on network connection is henceforth required to use hotel wifi for a month

these are just the rules i do not make the rules

Saethelred the Unsteady

My thoughts and prayers go out to #voyager1, which after journeying for half a century to reach interstellar space is still expected to answer fucking work emails

mhoye

Devs sometimes talk about being "close to the metal" but there is no other software engineering team in the world right now that are simultaneously working as close to and as far away from the metal as the people keeping Voyager working.

Windows 11 Start menu ads are now rolling out to everyone Good news: the operating system you paid for will now show you ads!

“The Recommended section of the Start menu will show some Microsoft Store apps,” says Microsoft in the update notes of its latest public Windows 11 release. “These apps come from a small set of curated developers.” The ads are designed to help Windows 11 users discover more apps, but will largely benefit the developers that Microsoft is trying to tempt into building more Windows apps.

Microsoft has released the source code for MS-DOS 4.0 Not to be confused with the far more popular MS-DOS 3.0:

Microsoft's version of MS-DOS 4.0 was originally released back in 1986 after a joint development with IBM for portions of the code, and a somewhat difficult relationship between the two at the time led to two branches eventually being released, MS-DOS 4.0 and what is now referred to as IBM DOS 4.0.

isBooleanTooLongAndComplex Is it?

Jessica

I think programming is like running a dishwasher. It always takes longer than you think and some stuff is never as clean as you expected it to be.

Gottfried Szing

If you want to drive someone crazy, do not, never ever , use the normal keyboard layout. Especially when it comes to passwords. Use something weird, like alphabetically sorted characters. 😵‍💫

Peoples

Graham Sutherland

the upside of having ADHD is that I can complete a month's worth of work for a whole team in the space of a weekend and a couple of evenings.

the downside of having ADHD is that I keep putting myself in situations where I need to complete a month's worth of work for a whole team in the space of a weekend and a couple of evenings.

Foone

we need a bob ross of programming

bamfic

Many decades ago, I was once a product manager. I could not get engineers to write documentation. They hated it. They just wouldn't do it. So I just wrote it myself, wrong, just made shit up and guessed the best I could, and sent it to them for review. And instantly got back copious notes, corrections, explanations, and, well, documentation, which is what I wanted in the first place. It was easy.

Business Side

StillIRise1963

I think we can now stop saying “google it” when looking for info. No one will find it there.

The Man Who Killed Google Search The reason Google Search quality is bottom tier and no path for getting better:

Since Prabhakar took the reins in 2020, Google Search has dramatically declined, with the numerous “core” search updates allegedly made to improve the quality of results having an adverse effect, increasing the prevalence of spammy, search engine optimized content.

Jason Koebler

If you add "reddit" to the end of search terms so that you can find posts by a real person, I have bad news: AI is beginning to poison Reddit in an effort to game Google results

The Tech Baron Seeking to “Ethnically Cleanse” San Francisco Everything you need to know in this one sentence: “Balaji has the highest rate of output per minute of good new ideas of anybody I’ve ever met,” wrote Marc Andreessen. Besides Balaji Srinivasan and his Gray Pride parade idea, this post also reminds us of Garry Tan, current YC CEO.

Dare Obasanjo “CEO walks out into the rain and is surprised he gets wet.”

Machine Intelligence

I Witnessed the Future of AI, and It’s a Broken Toy The Big Thingification isn't going all that well:

As the party wound down, news of the first bug arrived: There was no way to change the time zone on the devices, many of which were programmed by default to the West Coast. Turns out the future is stuck three hours behind.

Ex-athletic director accused of framing principal with AI arrested at airport with gun This is the future of AI, except it’s happening right now:

Pikesville High School’s former athletic director Thursday morning and charged him with crimes related to the alleged use of artificial intelligence to impersonate Principal Eric Eiswert, leading the public to believe Eiswert made racist and antisemitic comments.

Report Details Turmoil Behind Apple's AI Efforts, 'Siri X,' and Headset Voice Controls And I quote:

Siri's usage and engineers lacked the ability to obtain basic details such as how many people were using the virtual assistant and how often they were doing so. The data that was obtained about Siri coming from the data science and engineering team was simply not being used, with some former employees calling it "a waste of time and money.”

Stephen Hackett

Logitech slipped some ChatGPT into its mouse software, and a gross directory into everyone's Home folder.

Insecurity

Windows Defender attack can delete databases This is so simple and yet so damn effective:

The researchers point out such access is easy: registering as a new user on a website, and using a name that contains a byte signature, could see an EDR perceive a database as dangerous. So could using a byte signature in a comment on a video.

Data Breach at Kaiser Permanente Affects 13.4 Million People Some exec needs to get fired, but of course they’ll blame it on an intern:

The breach involved unintended transmission of personal information to third-party vendors, including major tech companies Google, Microsoft Bing, and X (formerly Twitter), via installed online technologies on Kaiser’s websites and mobile apps.

xssfox

As a user,
I want your application to randomly steal focus
So that,
I enter my password managers main password into a chat box

How Long It Would Take A Hacker To Brute Force Your Password In 2024, Ranked Fortunately my password which is fairly short and 20 years old would still take 479 years to crack.

Everything Else

Lee Carvallo

ADHDean

Of course I let stuff live in my head rent-free. I’m no slum lord.

Dgar

Surgeon: Relax David, this is a small surgery. No need to panic.

Patient: My name is not David.

Surgeon: No, my name is David.

Natasha Jay “Shamelessly pinched from the World Bollard Association ™️”

Elon Musk – Dead at 52 – Says There Is No Need for Misinformation Laws Perfect:

The Tesla and X owner, who is believed to have died from a heroin overdose while watching animal porn, said he would fight any attempts to stop the spread of misinformation on his platform.

Deniz Opal

Their problem with protestors is not that they "disturb the peace". It's that they disturb the violence.

It's Going Down “Neoliberalism in one photo.”

Flashdancer

Studio Apartment Available:

• Pet-friendly.
• Located next to bridge.
• No strings attached.