Notices by Alex Hall (alexhall@mastodon.social)

I have a question for any Irish or British followers I might have. I just checked out on a website, and it automatically made an account for me. The email I received said I should follow the link to "nominate my password." Is "nominate a password" a phrase? I'm fairly sure the company, McNeela Music, is based in Ireland, though I could be assuming that because of the instruments they focus on.

I never realized how wide a picture taken on iPhone is. It captures what I want, but there's also a bunch of stuff on the sides I don't want. If I want a picture of just something with minimal background, how do I do it? Is that what zooming is for?

I've never been a big braille reader, at least not for pleasure reading. I read many books and assignments during school in hard copy braille. But when reading, I prefer human narrators, then synthesized speech, then braille. I sometimes wonder if it's worth getting a copy of a book from NLS or Bookshare and putting it on my Orbit, reading only in braille. It's not convenient, the ergonomics aren't great, and it's slower. Still, I wonder if I'd enjoy it more than I expect.

I recently found a bakery that has perfect pecan pie squares. The crust is good, the filling has the right amount of sweetness and a great texture, and the nuts are good. It's what I want pecan pie to be. Both sadly and thankfully, this place isn't within walking distance.

In iPadOS 18, I'm liking BSI the more I use it. The command mode is cool, and I can see the appeal. But the text review stuff is almost nicer. I can move around, select, and edit, all in braille. Honestly, I prefer this to the rotor. Activating with the default gesture is easier the more I do it, and it doesn't seem possible to hit dots in such a way that exiting BSI accidentally is a problem. I kind of want this on my phone.

If you use a standard American English keyboard, do you use your right pinky to hit hyphen, equas, or backspace? I find I miss the first two more often than not, no matter how I work on it, so I often reach up with my right index finger instead. Backspace is easier to hit, being bigger and at the end of the row, but I still find myself using my right index or middle finger. I don't know why those three keys give me so much trouble.

My laptop is connected to a USB-C dock. The power just went out for about 20 seconds as the power company replaced our meter. The laptop, despite having a healthy, fully-charged battery, shut down. When it booted back up, it didn't start my startup apps, and all my stuff from before the shutdown was closed. All I can think is a power spike hit the dock, and then the laptop, so it panicked and turned itself off. It doesn't make sense, but I don't know how else to explain it.

@GreenSkyOverMe Nothing I or my coworker could think of, no.

My Lyft home from work is usually $15-$20 before tip. Today, it was almost $37, and I don't know why. Same pickup spot and destination, same Lyft type, same everything. I last took this ride two weeks ago. I can't find a way to message Lyft about this in the app. I guess I'll be trying Uber from now on.

I recently discovered something about the paper towel dispensors at work. I have no idea if it's universal or not. If you don't need the full towel they dispense by default, you can gently tug the towel at any time during the dispensing process. The dispensor will immediately stop. Now I want to test other dispensors to see how common this is.

@jcsteh Wasn't Semaphor abandoned or something? Or was that a different web-based Mastodon client?

@TheQuinbox Thanks, that explains a lot. I wish it were a system-level thing like on the Mac. Ctrl-backspace for word, win-backspace for line.

In Windows, does ctrl-backspace erase by word everywhere, or do apps have to implement that? One thing I love in macOS is deleting by character, word, or line, and I know deleting by word sometimes works in Windows. I also feel like it's randomly not worked. Did I imagine that, or are there places it just isn't supported?

Not to be a downer, but it's World Braille Day in 2024. We have artificial intelligence that can describe images, pocket super computers, cheap monitors... and $700 for 20 very loud cells is still the best braille displays can do. Want quiet cells, or multiple lines of braille? Pick one, because you can't have both. In either case, start applying for loans or hope your credit card has good financing.

I was just told about this software. It mimics most of what I love about QMK: homerow modifiers, layers, remapping keys, and more, but it does so at the OS level. This lets it work on any keyboard, such as a laptop. I'm guessing the configuration is accessible, as it's a LISP-style file you load from the command line. I'm going to try this. GitHub - kmonad/kmonad: An advanced keyboard manager https://github.com/kmonad/kmonad

A dream last night involved a freezer with an SD slot in the bottom, alongside some physical controls. Insert a card with music on it, and the freezer would play the music in a random order. Use the buttons to control the volume and playback. Honestly, I'm surprised no company tried to market something like this ten or fifteen years ago.

I just realized that Christmas in 2024 will fall on a Wednesday. I don't think I get Christmas Eve off, so 2024 will be the worst time for a holiday: smack dab in the middle of the week. Normal weekend, work two days, have a random day off, work two days, normal weekend, repeat for New Year's Day.

One advantage of braille is being able to quickly count how many digits are in huge numbers. I know my display has 32 cells. Examining this number, I have one empty cell on the right, and the number sign. I instantly know there are 30 digits. Try that on a monitor! Yes, this rarely comes up, and yes, I'd still rather be able to see a real monitor. But it's one tiny thing I'm faster at than sighted people. Let me have it.

From what I was told, you start the app, then hold your phone to your chest with the camera facing out and slowly pivot. Once the camera sees the traffic signal, it'll tell you if you can cross or not. Hold still, and wait for the app to indicate it's safe to cross. Very cool stuff, but will I do this while I'm listening to traffic and have a dog or cane in one hand?

Someone told me about the OKO app today. It uses a phone's camera and AI to recognize when a traffic signal indicates it's safe to cross a street. I remember it coming out, but I figured it wasn't going to work well so I never tried it. I'm told it's actually quite something. Has anyone used this? It sounds like yet another great app I'll only truly use when I can have it running on AR glasses.