Notices by Jeff Grigg (jeffgrigg@mastodon.social)

@Infoseepage @teledyn @davidho.bsky.social

Summary:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fahrenheit_451

@catsalad

"Kitty!!!" ^-^

🧍♀️ 🐈 … 😻

@Infoseepage @MaryAustinBooks

Yes; exactly!
You might *get* bad "bird flu" from your cat(s)!

Outdoor cats are likely to chase, catch, and eat sick birds.

.

This is why I stopped petting other people's cats that I see in the neighborhood: Cats and humans can share a number of respiratory diseases, including SARS, COVID, the flu, and maybe colds.

@georgetakei

It's the Pirate Barney!

@br00t4c

Oh, so that's *the real reason* they decided to hold it indoors! 😱

@mekkaokereke @tomjennings

The World Bollard Association on "X" (formally "Twitter")

https://x.com/WorldBollard/

@ryanc

"3 + 3 * 3 = __"

(and fill in what you think the answer should be)

😆

@jasongorman

For decades, I've said that if you're doing long, boring, repetitive work in software development, then you're doing it wrong: You should extract reusable code, or automate it.

@gerrit @baldur @ton

Current marketing of Generative AI as "AI" (seemingly intentionally) confuses: There is a lot of non-Generative-AI and statistical methods and heuristics that are still useful and good for large dataset initial analysis. And have been since long before the Generative AI fad.

“Each [programmer] could be functioning more efficiently, with greater satisfaction, if he and his manager would only learn to look upon the programmer as a human being, rather than another one of the machines.”
— Gerald Weinberg, 1971

@deepbluev7 @charliermarsh

If a code review were being done as a *discussion between peers*, then it would be far more appropriate to say, "Hmmm… I was thinking I would have done it this other way. But are there advantages to this way?" And that opens up a discussion. A text comment, marked as a required "todo," blocking merge, is a challenge, not a discussion.

During discussion, the reviewer might agree that what the submitter did was the best choice.

@deepbluev7 @charliermarsh

It seems unfortunate that, as an industry, we've largely fallen into the rut that "code review" is "leaving comments on a pull request, some of which block the merge."

The original code review research, which justifies the practice, was a *DISCUSSION* of the code being reviewed. Not asynchronous socially disconnected text comments.

…

@sjvn

It's the perfect size for the queen, who is right there! ^-^

@catsalad

Another of that breed:

@dlgeek @ryanc

Yes.
And given that the opposite of "git push" is "get fetch", shouldn't the first be called "get throw"?

@grrrr_shark @varx

Actually, insightful investigation has shown that LLMs are *no good at summarization*.

They do not and cannot understand the *meaning* of the text. So they can't pick out the most important parts.

All they can do is show you the most frequently repeated or similar parts. And often, that's the *least* important stuff:

It often takes lots of evidence to reach a conclusion. And you have to eliminate alternative theories.

Volume is NOT importance!!!

@bontchev @rbairwell @GossiTheDog

"According to information obtained by LBCI, initial reports suggest the pager server was compromised, leading to the installation of a script that caused an overload. This likely resulted in the overheating of the lithium battery, which then exploded."

https://www.lbcgroup.tv/news/lebanon-news/796406/understanding-the-pager-and-how-it-can-explode/en

@bontchev @rbairwell @GossiTheDog

The batteries used in phones and laptops can be overloaded. They may catch on fire and possibly explode. This can be done by software, on the cheaper relatively modern devices.

Doesn't surprise me at all that Israel might have done this.

@Leuenberg @bontchev @rbairwell @GossiTheDog

These are the most precise figures that I see:

"At least nine people, including a girl, have been killed and 2,750 wounded in simultaneous explosions of pagers used by Hezbollah members across Lebanon."

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/9/17/israels-war-on-gaza-live-38-killed-as-israel-risks-becoming-pariah

@Leuenberg @bontchev @rbairwell @GossiTheDog

It appears that it was mostly injuries:

"People were seen lying on the pavement with wounds on their hands or near their pants pockets, where the devices were."

https://thehill.com/policy/international/4884318-pager-attack-lebanon-syria-hezbollah/

[I saw another report that some people threw the phones when they got hot, shortly before they exploded, avoiding injury.