*Caution* the sexy girl in my avatar may have fire.

February 04, 2025

I wonder if they gave up, after seeing how poorly Copilot was received.

I would recommend Linux Mint because, first, it’s the one everyone says, and second, it was the Linux OS that I started with, fresh off Windows.

Both are bad reasons to pick a distro to recommend. Better reasons would be

1. You got some experience with that distro and you’re willing to help the newbie in question, with issues that they might have.
2. The distro offers sane out-of-the-box defaults and pre-installed GUI software.
3. The distro is reliable, and won’t give the newbie headaches later on.

why not just skip the middleman and get right into the distros that have a bit more meat on them?

Because a middleman distro is practically unavoidable.

You don’t know the best distro for someone else; and if the person is a newbie, odds are they don’t know it for themself either. So the odds the person will eventually ditch that distro you recommended and stick with something else are fairly large.

Cinnamon vs. KDE Plasma

I have both installed although I practically only use Cinnamon (due to personal tastes; I do think Plasma is great). It’s by no ways as finicky as the author claims it to be.

Plasma is more customisable than Cinnamon indeed, but remember what I said about you not knowing the best distro for someone else? Well, you don’t know the best DE either. You should rec something simple that’ll offer them an easy start, already expecting them to ditch it later on.

So, why don’t I just recommend Linux Mint with KDE Plasma? Well, the cool thing about abandoning Cinnamon and embracing KDE Plasma is that it unlocks a ton of distros we can pick from.

That’s circular reasoning: you should ditch Mint because of Cinnamon, and you should ditch Cinnamon because it allows you to ditch Mint.

Bazzite, Novara, CachyOS

Or you can install all those gaming features in any other distro of your choice.

Fuck. FUCK. I’m seeing it.

Ellesmere and nearby islands are Patrick’s head. Bob’s cig is Alaska. Baja California is the cape. That dick-shaped province in SE USA is the seahorse’s snout. Quebec is the seahorse’s “mane”.

The funny… if this stuff continues we’re going to need a new USA flag.

Indeed. It’s too cluttered, violating good design principles. For example, four stars would be enough. Of course, this means merging a few provinces here and there, but that’s easy. Also make sure to rename them, to fulfil Glorious Taco Hair’s ambitions.

Here’s my proposal.

This made me think on the potential roles the three outer planets* (Uranus, Neptune, Pluto) in the scheduler.

• Uranus: looking at things from a new angle. Innovation, intuition, ruptures with tradition. Higher octave of Mercury; so if Mercury is ruling network and I/O tasks, perhaps Uranus could rule specifically data creation and writing?
• Neptune: elevating things past the concrete, into the abstract. Inspiration, illusion, refinement. Higher octave of Venus; so if Venus rules desktop and UI processes, Neptune could focus on the windowing system.
• Pluto: changing the nature and “hidden-ness” of the things. Metamorphosis, unearthing, cycles of [con/de]struction. Higher octave of Mars; so if Mars handles CPU hogs, Pluto could handle specifically things that have to do with cryptography.

*before the “ackshyually” crowd points this out, the word “planet” in Astrology is used to convey any moving (from our PoV) celestial object. It includes things Astronomy wouldn’t consider as planets; such as the Sun (a star), the Moon (a satellite), and Pluto (nowadays a dwarf planet). So the situation is a lot like tomatoes being fruits, you know? “Yes” or “no” depends on the definition, and the definition is built around a purpose.

Also I’d like to point out that, although I learned a fair bit of Astrology in my teens and 20s, I don’t take it seriously. It’s mostly babble, like tarot; but just like tarot, it’s fun babble.

Be glad they didn’t include Neptune, Uranus or Pluto.

Imagine some system task running like your computer was a potato. Then you look for the reason, and it’s because the task is a CPU hog, and its associated planet is in Cancer/Scorpio/Pisces. Now imagine the associated planet was Pluto, that spends ~20 years per sign. (Note some astrology schools do take those planets into account.)

In fact even system daemons and kernel threads (Saturn) will be a mess, 2.5 years per zodiacal sign.

So yeah, fucking dumb idea. But brilliant at the same time.

Non-photosynthetic plants (like ghost pipes) are typically rather small parasites of other plants, that for some reason lost access to good sunlight (such as being so deep in a forest that other plants call dibs on those yummy photons). I don’t see how it would be the case here, given the fossil in question is 8m tall, and apparently it predates actual (Viridiplantae) trees. And I think the same reasoning applies to a potential Rhodophyta = red alga.

Because of that I think it’s way more likely the taxon in question is related to both, but part of neither. And the reason it’s heterotrophic (as per Wiki article) is because it never developed something similar to photosynthesis on first place.

In fact the size is bugging me. Why did it grow so big? Plants usually do this because they’re trying to outcompete other plants, but that doesn’t make sense here.

My guess is that it’s a relative of red algae and plants/Viridiplantae, but not quite either.

At least one source mentions it produces lignin or something similar; lignin is present in both clades I mentioned. However since it doesn’t do photosynthesis we can rule out belonging to those clades, I genuinely don’t think evolution would favour ditching phycoerythrin or chlorophyll, so odds are it never developed either.

Just as a heads up, you accidentally posted the same question four times.

That said yes, it’s piracy.

Exactly. It’s everyone else’s traffic, pollution*, risk of death, increased distances, so goes on.

*electric cars alleviate the issue, but do not erase it. Pollution is not just what leaves the exhaust pipe, it’s everything, starting when the car is made.

That explains the number. Point still stands, though; it isn’t just a ragebait comparison, it highlights the amount of space needed for car infrastructure. You argue the space in Huston would be otherwise wasted because the rest of the province is empty, but remember when you mentioned Rome in another comment? Well, Lazio isn’t exactly a desert. And you might not see something as egregious as this, as it’s split all around the city, but it’s still space being used for cars instead of something else.

Another thing this comparison highlights is the amount of resources that goes into car infrastructure. And that still applies even in an otherwise empty province.

I just realised that cars in urban environments are a damn good example of the tragedy of the commons. Each car is

• a big but individual plus (fast transport) for its owner.
• a small but cumulative minus for everyone.

So if there’s just one or two cars it isn’t a big deal. But as more people get cars, those small minuses pile up, and fuck with everyone — including the car owners. Eventually reaching a point the “big plus” from car usage is overshadowed by all those “small minuses” from everyone else’s car usage.

This sort of situation cannot be solved by individual decisions; because, even in an environment where everyone would be better off without cars, not having a car is still worse than having one, because of that big plus. You need collective decision and action, to either lower that “big plus” (so there’s less reasons for the individual to use a car), or lowering that “small minus” (so your car ownership becomes less problematic for the others).

With that in mind, car infrastructure like the one in the second pic is completely the wrong way to go; it’s increasing both the big plus (cars become more viable) and the small minus (it’s space you can’t simply walk / bike through).

You’re missing the point.

The idea here is not to dick-fight countries. It’s to highlight the sheer amount of space that is wasted by infra-structure made for cars instead of people. The example would still work if both areas were controlled by the same government.

Is this clear now? Side note 2.3M / 53k ≃ 43, not 132.

I’ve switched systems some 15? years ago. But my mum did it recently, so I asked her this question. (Disclaimer: she isn’t the one managing her machine. Guess who does it.)

She claims it’s basically the same thing. She was surprised her start menu got different some days ago (when I updated her Mint), but it was the good type of surprise, like, “ah, it shows my profile pic now!”. Then she rambled about things that disappear from her email, but that is not an OS issue, it’s PEBKAC (she’s extremely disorganised). And… that’s it.

In the hypothetical situation Windows desktop monopoly is over, there’ll be at least some internal pressure to do so. Cost of switch (in money = work hours) might be a pain, but if they believe they’ll profit more by using some competitor that is not Windows exclusive, they’ll eventually do it.

I had to dig through their annual report to find it:

Server products and cloud services revenue growth

Revenue from Server products and cloud services, including Azure and other cloud services; SQL Server, Windows Server, Visual Studio, System Center, and related Client Access Licenses (“CALs”); and Nuance and GitHub

So it includes Windows Server, but it’s way more than just that.

Hot takes are good when they’re like a campfire: other people gather around and start talking. This, though, is more like lighting a pile of used toilet paper on fire.

With the shit in the TP being false equivalence. It compares two situations (AI usage vs. the usage of other tools) as if they were the same for the sake of artistic credibility, when they obviously are not.

I saw in a recent Youtube video that between web services and AI, Windows licencing is only about 10% of Microslop’s business.

That’s correct. Here’s some data on Microsoft’s revenue:

40%     Server Products and Cloud Services
22%     Office Products and Cloud Services
10%     Windows
 9%     Gaming
 7%     LinkedIn
 5%     Search and News Advertising

IDK if that number is true, but it sure would explain how much they’ve put into user experience.

It does but it’s really short-sighted from MS’s part. Sure, Windows might be only 10% of its business, but the other 90% heavily rely on it. Or rather on Windows being a monopoly on desktop OSes; without that people Windows servers, Office and MS “cloud services” (basically: we shit on your computer so much you need to use ours) wouldn’t see the light of the day.

Worst hypothesis, even if counting just to 8, you’re still using a single hand, so it’s an improvement over counting to 5 with fingers. Couple it with the other hand and you’re counting up to 64.

There’s also the Chisanbop method @hesh@quokk.au mentioned, for that your unbending joint shouldn’t be an issue, and it allows you to count to 9 with a single hand (99 with both).