I hate that! Especially when it was the correct version and then magically one day it is some other one. One time it played that awful pop version of Professional Widow by Tori Amos and that was very upsetting until I found the normal version that sounds awesome.

I saw that thumbnail of the table and immediately knew what channel it was.

The Casual Vacancy

I forced myself to finish it at the time, but I hated every single moment. They were all bad people and I had zero sympathy for any of the kids or adults, except for the one girl who died at the end. Obligatory Rowling can jump off a cliff too.

I didn’t finish the last couple books, but I did enjoy it fully knowing the subject matter was about Revelations. I mostly read it as a kid and re-read for a bit as an adult. I did not grow up in a religious household. There was a point though where the books went a little too off the rails, and I gave up.

I miss HEB sometimes back from when I was a kid. They were trained to bag things “correctly” and was one of the few places that didn’t drive my dad insane. They banned plastic bags here shortly before Covid and I have used self checkout since with the nice big reusable ones that I can fill how I want. They would barely fill one bag and then demand another or start pulling out flimsy paper bags that will tear while trying to get my groceries up the stairs. I would bring 3 and it still ended up with me re-bagging it all and dealing with them saying I didn’t have enough bags.

Fuck you

This is really fascinating! Today I learned.

Yeessss. Danger 5 is amazing.

It works amazing if your throat or sinuses are infected. I have taken 800mg of pills and barely take the edge off. 100-200mg of children’s liquid ibuprofen is complete relief and it tastes good. Once in a while I will get a bad sinus infection that ends up in the back of my throat and the pain is so bad I can’t swallow water. I got the trifecta once that included my ears and I had to get some drops from the doctor.

I have to use hotdog. I have EOE and got a round one stuck in my esophagus for hours once. The hotdog ones break easy. I basically bite it into thirds and can safely take them that way. I could never break the round ones.

It was the SCADA view right? A lot of SCADA software is basically running on top of windows, though you typically would never see the desktop. Ignition at least is cross platform, but that is because the server is Java and Jython. A big part of why things are running on windows is due to OPC, which was traditionally all DOM and .NET. It is basically a standard communications protocol and is what allows your HMI/SCADA to communicate with PLCs. Otherwise, you use proprietary drivers and native PLC specific protocols.

SCADA programming/design is kind of an art and is usually written by an either an overworked engineer or someone who had far too much time on their hands. You basically build screens using specialized software, hook up buttons and UI elements to PLC signals, and pass some signals from the UI to the PLC. They are all heading in the Edge/iot/cloud/web based/techno-babble direction these days…

Ignition, programming software is free!: https://inductiveautomation.com

Some other random ones I have seen or used in the past: https://www.siemens.com/global/en/products/automation/simatic-hmi/wincc-unified.html https://www.aveva.com/en/products/intouch-hmi/ https://www.rockwellautomation.com/en-us/products/software/factorytalk/operationsuite/view.html

Thank you for answering the question! I am genuinely both trying to make a point and still be open to try new things. To me, there seems to be a real downward turn on UI/UX in a lot of applications these days, corporate included. When they mentioned the bit about supporting corporate, I have a hard time believing they will get very far with that customer group right now.

I really wish software, especially FOSS, would stop making the UI the afterthought. I try to keep a holistic view when designing things and everyone has a seat at the table. I wonder if projects are boxing themselves in and making it harder for the UI teams to properly integrate, and vice versa? I will happily take criticism and ideas from pretty much anyone, especially outside my immediate teams.

I am pretty out of the game on that as I spent quite a few years doing controls engineering instead. I am back in Software now and I feel old and a little lost. I graduated back in 2012 and we didn’t have all of these crazy developer roles and more specialized degrees. They were trying to get a Game Design program started when I graduated, and it was supposedly a mess for a few years.

But my question is about the user experience and UI. I can run a docker script, but I care about the thing I can see and interact with.

All I read is Marketing Tech Speak that sounds no different than anything else that gets advertised in my face. At work, we use Teams. It is a pain sometimes when it gets a little buggy, but integrates into SharePoint/OneDrive and the noise suppression in meetings is pretty awesome. At home I use discord or GChat because that is where all my friends are. I don’t assume I have privacy on any of these platforms and they all work on my phone and computer.

How is the user experience? Ultimately, give me privacy, but if the user experience and UI don’t give any improvements over the corporate ones, I will have to try it some other time.

That is some definite bullshit. I am both a software developer and a controls engineer. That stuff irritates me to no end, but I also understand how these systems can fail. They will always protect themselves over the user/customer, so thus we suffer. Hell, I used to do Amazon projects on the controls/industrial side. Amazon had their own software systems that they built/stole running things overall, so thankfully I didn’t have to deal with trying to make them happy on the software side too. I much prefer programming the machinery.

Wtf. They must have screwed something up with a software update. Worst case you charge back, but that might get your account banned…

I always take it to my UPS store down the road instead of boxing it up and sending it out. You don’t package the item up at all. They scan the barcode on my phone and take the item. Done, return processed. If they steal it afterwards, not my problem since the code was scanned and you get a notification/receipt. They have a lot of strange locations you can take it to, including random big box stores.

Ok. Let’s do this! If you have a 4 cup pyrex/microwavable measuring cup, it is much easier.

• Sauce pan with a lid. Nonstick is fine.
• 2 cups of rice using dry measuring cup
• 3 cups of water
• Salt if using unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons of butter

1. Put empty pan on stove and set heat to medium-high. If these are steel pans, stick to medium. Go towards high if nonstick as it takes a bit to heat up.
2. Put water and butter in microwavable cup and throw it in the microwave until it starts to simmer, maybe 3 minutes? Depends on microwave and dish.
3. While you are waiting on microwave, put dry rice in pan and gently stir/fold. They will start to turn white, but don’t let them burn. If you need to take the pan off and turn the heat down, do it. We are just preheating the rice and pan up. Add salt if needed.
4. Get ready. As soon as that water is hot enough to boil or close to, take it out, pour it in the pan. It will be violent.
5. Do a quick stir, throw the lid on, and turn the heat down to the lowest setting. The water should fully cover the rice.
6. Walk away. The bottom might toast a little, but that is fine as long as it doesn’t full on burn.

After 20 minutes or so, you can do a real quick check and if it looks kind of wet, throw the lid back on and wait.

At this point, you should have perfectly acceptable rice. Take the lid off, stir the rice with a more folding motion to let it steam any additional moisture out.

Long tangent, but I got the Edge or whatever stupid expensive version they have for the extra triggers/levers underneath. I have really small/short palms and don’t have the reach to push all the buttons properly. I wouldn’t be able to play Elden Ring at all without them. I roll and use potions with the levers instead. Even then, it is still painful after a while and some of the contortions I have to do at times can be annoying.

I have the issue of barely having enough “wrap” with my palm and pinky to grip around the hand things that are angled down a little too much. I absolutely despise that the dpad is one of those rocker pieces underneath instead of individual buttons. I will accidentally do a direction I didn’t intend because I rocked the down button too far to the right. It is because the controller still isn’t straight when I hold it. lt is partially rotated in my hand so I can get a little more reach upwards and it makes the dpad usable. Having to compensate the direction of joysticks is super fun. I basically have to death grip the controller with my right pinky and tightly squeezed palm to keep it stable.

When that accessible controller came out for the Xbox I was super bummed it wasn’t for all platforms yet. Doesn’t help I would need to have 2 kits to be able to have separate sides like joycons. Joycons have been my favorite controller of all time as I can comfortably hold them. I tried making a proof of concept sort of gel/shredded memory foam cover, which did help, but it didn’t solve the severe pain in my palm, especially the area under my pinky that I use to death grip the controller. After seeing the glove Martina made after she cut off her pinky, I want to try and make a glove next to take the pressure off, improve grip, and sort of brace/support the part of my hand that I keep hurting.

It sucks that accessories keep getting more expensive. I haven’t had any issues my my edge, but you bet I would be utterly infuriated if it didn’t last when it is almost half the price of the console itself. I have some mechanical keyboards and those things can really get up there in price too. Ergonomic mice are not exactly cheap either. I hate having to use a trackball but so far the only comfortable one is that Logitech one and I have to use the extra angled base it comes with. I game with it.

That blows. I never had a ps4, so I don’t know the whole deal about modding/rooting it. It is crazy that some of these devices have “fuses” that can brick your device if tampered with. It is my device dammit.