@freedosproject
Possibly you've always known about this? FYI:

The Costa GUI
Costa is a small and lightweight application which runs on top of MS-DOS or compatible operating systems. It replaces the DOS-prompt with a clean, user-friendly interface - a so-called GUI (Graphical User Interface). Costa comes packed with a bunch of useful accessories and can be used with or without a mouse.

Developed by Jacob Palm, a Danish IT-professional and hobby developer, the first release of Costa came way back in 2004. Over the years - and through several releases - Costa has gradually evolved into what it is today, with new releases still coming out regularly as of 2025.

Costa is provided free of charge, and the source code is open sourced for anyone who wants to have a look. To see what others think of Costa, have a look at Costa on the Web on the blog.

https://costa.jacobpalm.dk/

"Programs must be written for people to read, and only incidentally for machines to execute."
Harold Abelson, Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, 1984

“Robot” Is A Social Construct: Why Your Dishwasher Is Not A Robot
https://robotgirlgang.com/2026/10/08/robot-is-a-social-construct-why-your-dishwasher-is-not-a-robot/

RE: https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/117407994292130285

The attention to detail in this stop-motion no-AI animation is remarkable; beautifully done.

"Mrs. Apple's recipe — Strawberry cake"

@smashedratonpress
Nostalgia:

The Commodore 64 Keyboard Font, For Everyone
https://hackaday.com/2026/10/07/the-commodore-64-keyboard-font-for-everyone/

@screwlisp

Gopher browser on a DIY ESP32 microcontroller PDA

https://hackaday.com/2026/09/26/cheap-yellow-display-dreams-of-pda/

> Your FPGA design can now take advantage of the VHDL components developed at CERN
> colibri: CERN VHDL Common Library released for Everyone to Use
> 18 September 2026
> CERN Open Hardware Licence – Weakly Reciprocal 2.0.
> https://ep-news.web.cern.ch/colibri-cern-vhdl-common-library-released-for-everyone-to-use/

What Sun got wrong
Sep 20, 2026
https://bcantrill.dtrace.org/2026/09/20/what-sun-got-wrong/

@ed1conf
2/2
Let's look at a typical novice's session with the mighty ed:

golem> ed

?
help
?
?
?
quit
?
exit
?
bye
?
hello?
?
eat flaming death
?
^C
?
^C
?
^D
?

---
Note the consistent user interface and error reportage. Ed is
generous enough to flag errors, yet prudent enough not to overwhelm
the novice with verbosity.

"Ed is the standard text editor."

Ed, the greatest WYGIWYG editor of all.

ED IS THE TRUE PATH TO NIRVANA! ED HAS BEEN THE CHOICE OF EDUCATED
AND IGNORANT ALIKE FOR CENTURIES! ED WILL NOT CORRUPT YOUR PRECIOUS
BODILY FLUIDS!! ED IS THE STANDARD TEXT EDITOR! ED MAKES THE SUN
SHINE AND THE BIRDS SING AND THE GRASS GREEN!!

When I use an editor, I don't want eight extra KILOBYTES of worthless
help screens and cursor positioning code! I just want an EDitor!!
Not a "viitor". Not a "emacsitor". Those aren't even WORDS!!!! ED!
ED! ED IS THE STANDARD!!!

TEXT EDITOR.

When IBM, in its ever-present omnipotence, needed to base their
"edlin" on a UNIX standard, did they mimic vi? No. Emacs? Surely
you jest. They chose the most karmic editor of all. The standard.

Ed is for those who can *remember* what they are working on. If you
are an idiot, you should use Emacs. If you are an Emacs, you should
not be vi. If you use ED, you are on THE PATH TO REDEMPTION. THE
SO-CALLED "VISUAL" EDITORS HAVE BEEN PLACED HERE BY ED TO TEMPT THE
FAITHLESS. DO NOT GIVE IN!!! THE MIGHTY ED HAS SPOKEN!!!

?
2/2

RE: https://ieji.de/@vnikolov/117293039439013487

I've always loved that humor. I know @ed1conf has seen it a million times but I'm linking them to this full original copy anyway:
From: patl@athena.mit.edu (Patrick J. LoPresti)
Subject: The True Path (long)
Date: 11 Jul 91 03:17:31 GMT
Path: ai-lab!mintaka!olivea!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!think.com!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bloom-picayune.mit.edu!athena.mit.edu!patl
Newsgroups: alt.religion.emacs,alt.slack
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lines: 95
Xref: ai-lab alt.religion.emacs:244 alt.slack:1935

When I log into my Xenix system with my 110 baud teletype, both vi
*and* Emacs are just too damn slow. They print useless messages like,
'C-h for help' and '"foo" File is read only'. So I use the editor
that doesn't waste my VALUABLE time.

Ed, man! !man ed

ED(1) UNIX Programmer's Manual ED(1)

NAME
ed - text editor

SYNOPSIS
ed [ - ] [ -x ] [ name ]
DESCRIPTION
Ed is the standard text editor.
---

Computer Scientists love ed, not just because it comes first
alphabetically, but because it's the standard. Everyone else loves ed
because it's ED!

"Ed is the standard text editor."

And ed doesn't waste space on my Timex Sinclair. Just look:

-rwxr-xr-x 1 root 24 Oct 29 1929 /bin/ed
-rwxr-xr-t 4 root 1310720 Jan 1 1970 /usr/ucb/vi
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root 5.89824e37 Oct 22 1990 /usr/bin/emacs

Of course, on the system *I* administrate, vi is symlinked to ed.
Emacs has been replaced by a shell script which 1) Generates a syslog
message at level LOG_EMERG; 2) reduces the user's disk quota by 100K;
and 3) RUNS ED!!!!!!

"Ed is the standard text editor."
1/2

RE: https://masto.ai/@hackaday/117269814563752444

@screwlisp
I just forwarded this to Amen, but it did make me think of you, too.

Just the spirit, not the retro-BASIC. 🙂

I haven't watched this yet, but it looks like an interesting analysis:

> Why Do Companies Stop Using Haskell? | Vaibhav Sagar | ZuriHac 2026
>
> OST – Ostschweizer Fachhochschule
> 2,835 views Sep 11, 2026 #Haskell #ZuriHac #functionalprogramming
>
> Why do companies stop using Haskell, even when the language itself works well? Vaibhav Sagar examines real-world cases to uncover the business, organizational, and technical forces that can push companies away from Haskell.
>
> The talk begins by examining Haskell's unique position in the software industry. While Haskell has proven itself capable of supporting successful businesses, it remains neither a mainstream technology nor the industry's newest trend. This creates a situation where failures are often attributed to the language itself, even when broader business forces are responsible. Sagar contrasts characteristics of the Haskell ecosystem with common business priorities such as profit maximization, short-term incentives, and the systematic undervaluation of maintenance work.
>
> Through a series of recurring patterns, he analyzes how Haskell projects can end. These include large-scale rewrites, second-system effects, failed experiments, vanity projects, funding challenges, acquisitions, leadership changes, technology-fashion cycles, overly complex codebases, and infrastructure limitations. Along the way, he connects these stories to broader software engineering concepts such as technical debt, process improvement, organizational incentives, and long-term maintainability.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PebXEak24M

RE: https://mathstodon.xyz/@tao/117207856734787448

@vnikolov
Pure and applied mathematics, human vs AI solutions.

This is an excellent discussion of why AI solutions to mathematics can be grossly inappropriate for the most logical of reasons, without taking an inherently anti-AI stance.

RE: https://mathstodon.xyz/@tao/117185702292629986

Whether one is anti-AI, pro-AI, or "it's complicated", Terry makes a critical point here that is generally missed.

Related: For some it's too obvious to mention, but nonetheless not generally known: generating *new* conjectures, including creating whole new subfields to explore, is *really* important, and humans are good at it, but AI largely can't do it.

["not generally known" because the average e.g. journalist doesn't understand that, or its importance, often even when explained]

RE: https://mendeddrum.org/@fanf/117180027535419458

[The term is used in a technical sense:]

ChatGPT is bullshit
Full Open access
Published: 08 June 2024 Volume 26, article number 38 (2024)
Ethics and Information Technology
Abstract
Recently, there has been considerable interest in large language models: machine learning systems which produce human-like text and dialogue. Applications of these systems have been plagued by persistent inaccuracies in their output; these are often called “AI hallucinations”. We argue that these falsehoods, and the overall activity of large language models, is better understood as bullshit in the sense explored by Frankfurt (On Bullshit, Princeton, 2005): the models are in an important way indifferent to the truth of their outputs.

We distinguish two ways in which the models can be said to be bullshitters, and argue that they clearly meet at least one of these definitions. We further argue that describing AI misrepresentations as bullshit is both a more useful and more accurate way of predicting and discussing the behaviour of these systems.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10676-024-09775-5

BTW that cited book "On Bullshit" is brilliant.

P.S. So one can use terminology like "bullshit" in journals these days? Or is it only because the book sets precedent for it being a technical term?

RE: https://mstdn.ca/@teledyn/117179737475971245

See also the very funny "The Cartoon Laws of Physics" hosted on many sites; one such is:
https://schamschula.com/CartoonLaws.html

It's a good site in that it adds Amendments beyond the original, and tries to credit people who did them, but like many sites it doesn't list the *original* author:
O'Donnells' Laws of Cartoon Motion
Mark O'Donnell
Esquire, June 1980

This was high profile enough that there's a Wikipedia article for it:
Cartoon physics
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cartoon_physics

I see another thing of interest, a video:
The Rules of Cartoon Physics: LOONEY TUNES
Colonial Theatre in Phoenixville, PA: March 19, 2019
Linda Simensky, vice president of children’s programming at PBS, helped start animation department at Nickolodean.
[39 minute talk, not just an overview]
Contents
Introduction
My background
Gertie the Dinosaur
Making a Move
Tex Avery
Bob Clampett
Hammer Space
Chuck Jones
Roadrunner
Tunnel Law
Silhouette of Passage
Questions
The advantage of cartoons
Women in animation
Samurai Jack
Adult Swim
Science on Screen, An initiative of the Coolidge Corner Theatre, in partnership with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5In4JG7YChU

I used to host these myself, but that site is *long* gone.

RE: https://mastodon.social/@lobsters/117152160989703075

@AmenZwa
Fame!

Post-graduate seminar: Introduction To Coding Without AI (It Really Is Possible)

https://youtu.be/aFMVGx1Gsoc
#satire

@screwlisp
BTW that guy (Alex Shinn), based on ireggex and his github and SRFIs there, appears to be bright and talented. I don't know anything else about him, but it's possible you might want to recruit him.

@aartaka

@screwlisp
This is Obviously The Right Thing To Do (tm) and no doubt famous in the Chibi Scheme world, but I don't know if it's known elsewhere nor how many equivalent things (*intelligent* completion) are available for other dialects / other languages:

> Scheme-complete provides a single function, scheme-smart-complete, which you can use for intelligent, context-sensitive completion for any Scheme implementation. The intelligent completion comes from the use of simple type inference.
https://github.com/ashinn/scheme-complete

@aartaka