Ariel Millennium Thornton @arielmt@computerfairi.es

I think I was just spear-phished by an idiot. A typical "DHL consignment couldn't be delivered" spam sent to my ISP's abuse desk, but the attachment was named "DHL_RECEIPT.PDF.gz". Who gzip's anything on Windows? (Does Windows even *have* gzip support?) Anyway, save & check out:

Remember the lobster from the GEOS demo? It apparently has a hidden history, only a part of which was ever revealed: "[...] been multiplying so fast we've had to build new corrals and feeding troughs just to keep up with our stock. We can't even ship them off to makret fast enough before they've gone and created more of [...]"

This ✨ sparkly shellscript princess ✨ spent her weekend writing a shellscript to convert numbers from one base to an intermediate representation to another base. The result is the most uselessly useful shellscript I've written in a *very* long time, a script to convert a conventional date into a Rickdate string: https://thornton2.com/rickdate.html

Pictured: my sense of accomplishment.

While adventuring in the lands digital, refrain from stabbing thy trustworthy companion, ye olde Amiga 500.

It took 20 years for me to take this picture. IDK if the larger one works, but the smaller one still works.

I have finally, actually finished a project I started: my static website generator! Of course, immediately after I uploaded the package, I spotted typos & grammatical errors, & I had to pack up & upload a revision.

http://files.thornton2.com/amtswg/ if you want to check out the tarball & my samples, or http://files.thornton2.com/amtswg/amtswg-1.1.tar.gz if you want to check out just the tarball.

They're out of fresh strawberries. Guess I'll have to get the recycled strawberries instead.

box(){ t="$1xxxx";l="";c=${2:-=};i=${#t};until [ $i = 0 ]; do l="$l$c";i=$((i-1));done;printf "$l\n$c $1 $c\n$l\n"; }

# A slightly longer but more portable (& BSD-friendly) version of the bash box function in https://mastodon.social/@climagic/100792670341617316

For children who aren't ready to read "To Serve Man" yet:

Another game I've been wanting to play since the '90s is a Game Boy game called "Catrap," a puzzle platformer. It was released in Japan as "Pitman," but c'mon, "Catrap" is a cooler name.
http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/catrap/catrap.htm

As little-known as the game is, I'm surprised it actually has fan art: https://www.deviantart.com/horriblepencilist/art/AKA-Pitman-268812260

I'm playing it as Catgirl instead of Catboy because of course I am. :3
🐱

... Why do you go through the trouble of writing documentation fitting perfectly into the help manual system that's been around literally my whole entire life plus a few days, then just landfill it in the docs directory instead?

I took the Arcade Classics Centipede box apart enough to see what's inside it. It looks like a nintendo-on-chip board with all the interface pads directly soldered to everything else.

I couldn't lift the plastic display bracket out without risking breaking the plastic frame, & I probably broke one of the frame's plastic screw threads putting it back together.

An RPi would be a tight fit, unless it's a 0 or 0W.

Those "Arcade Classics" mini retro games (about 6" or 15cm) in the toy aisles? I should've known I wouldn't get an authentic arcade-version experience from any of them when I saw the Pac-Man one: fixed-position LED style.

I got Centipede, & all I know is it's almost but definitely *not* the arcade version. (Maybe it's the Atari 7800 version? I only had the 2600.) Yay for retro games being the in thing, but I still feel cheated.

Another review: https://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.com/2017/08/basic-fun-for-retro-gamers-stealth.html?m=1

"Just run the power lines up from the underground junction straight up a conduit. It'll be fine."

Pictured: The last computer display on which it was appropriate to put avatars and user-interface elements in circles.

Oh, hey, the store has a better selection of new breakfasts!

New av made by a cute generator. I'm not a fan of circle avatars, so I post-edited mine. (redraft, now with 100% more picture) http://charat.me/profile/create/

Good to know I'm not imagining the unusually huge temperature swing, & maybe good to know I've got at least another 3 days of it I have to endure. I'm about halfway between those dots at the bottom that say "Datil" and "Socorro." ❄️

Attention staff:

Effective immediately, we are switching to to an Extreme Programming workflow. Please report to the new XP room to get settled in. Your workstations have already been assigned.