The fact that we keep re-inventing wheels and that programming is still too hard even in well trodden areas is just an indictment on the whole industry. And we get away with it via dodgy licenses and business practices that would be laughable, or possibly criminal, anywhere else.
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We computer nerds need to face up to the fact that our industry sucks. It is basically terrible at what it does with fundamental flaws in *everything* involved with how we do it. Decisions initially made decades ago just to get things working are still with us. Von Neumann hardware allows buffer overrun exploits and countless other bugs, unsafe languages underly everything, crappy “engineering” methodologies and just plain terrible lazy programming.
#programming #software #computers
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One of my many problems is that I can’t put things down and stop. I’m currently working on an application that put together all my translations of Fiore dei Liberi’s manuscripts on mediaeval combat. This means not only can I endlessly noodle with tweaking the application’s software, I’m endlessly tweaking the translations. "Just one more little change and I’ll stop for lunch. ARRRGH! WHY IS IT MIDNIGHT!!!”. Put the keyboard down Bruno and just walk away.
Don’t like Apple Intelligence on MacOS 27 and the multiple gigabytes of space it consumes, you can now remove it all with a command tool.
@iandunt.bsky.social You chaps really need to do a pod on the Effective Altruist cult and the “AI safety” weirdos. They’d just be weird and funny if they didn’t have billionaire followers and a Vice-President in tow. Ian Duncan has a great over view.
https://www.iankduncan.com/personal/2026-09-16-sex-ai-and-the-apocalypse
@glloyd I was doing those changes to your PR at the time. Your code officially causes brain bleeds (because it’s so clever).
So it looks I had a transient ischemic attack this afternoon, a deeply unsettling experience. Accident and Emergency sent me for a CT scan which fortunately showed no obvious brain bleeds, but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t a TIA. Being referred onto a specialist clinic and prescribed large doses of Aspirin meanwhile. Bother.
I’ve just spent an evening and morning tidying up a C++ library of mine and open sourcing it on codeberg.org. It’s yet another typelist manipulation library, one of which really should be part of the standard library. Anyway, this is my take on it.
https://codeberg.org/bruno_nicoletti/typelist/src/tag/v1.0.0
C++ programming question, godbolt link below. I’m computing std::strings at compile time via nested function calls, and due to the constexpr rules, I can’t leave the result in heap allocated storage. So I’m using a std::array to store the result and I use the size of the computed string to initialise it. Ideally I’d like to put that in a function, but the constexpr rules force me to use a horrid macro. I can’t think any other way to do it.
So, how will the ChatBots kill us all? By the looks of it, not via the “Singularity”, but by hallucinating the contents of intelligence reports to the US military and starting a war with China as a result.
RE: https://mastodon.green/@davidallengreen/117252275966778140
David Allen Green is right again. Arresting grannies as terrorists for holding signs while masked black clad men disrupt critical infrastructure and now threaten RNLI volunteers. Compare with what happened to JSO activists who hadn't actually done anything.
"Not long ago, Just Stop Oil activists were given long sentences for simply discussing blocking infrastructure. In contrast, the balaclava-wearing gangs now do much the same with apparent impunity. One could almost call it two-tier justice."
Don’t make the mistake of being brown and staying in a UK hotel, as the mindless racist thugs may have a go at you. https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2026/sep/09/protestors-outside-portsmouth-hotel-confuse-pakistan-cricket-team-migrants
Watching Channel 4 News's investigation into the funding of Reform and Farage, it looks to be a pretty dirty business all round with secret illegal donations galore. Possible criminal activity by senior figures in the party.
The mountains of the English Lake District looking over Ambleside towards Langdale. Challenging my still not quite recovered Achilles tendon.
It’s cloudy today in London, which makes me quite happy. Probably the first time I’ve ever felt that.
Now is the right time to attack the Fire Nation!
Eclipse be happening, cheap pinhole cameras for the win!
If you live in London and suffer with the depredations of Thames Water and their dumping of raw and partially treated sewage into the Thames, then you might be interested in signing this petition to Parliament to ensure that sewage works meet appropriate standards. I kayak on the Thames and it is pretty foul at times.
And to be clear, the Police totally screwed up with how they handled the crime and Nowak may still be alive otherwise.
While the usual vile folk like Farage make racist hay over the tragic murder of Henry Nowak by Vickrum Digwa, a Sikh Britain, they are unsurprisingly quite about the murder of Matt O’Gara. Billy Allison has been charged with the crime, Allison is a white Britain and campaigner for Raise the Colours and Operation Stop The Boats. Seemingly murder committed by white bigots seems not to bother Farage and friends.
https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/lamppost-flag-campaign-founder-charged-murder-5HjdZt2_2/