FoxQuirk 🦊 @quirk@computerfairi.es

Tragedy

a wonderful MSPaint comm drawn by
https://theroguez.bsky.social!

This was done a few weeks back, but didn't have chance to post due to VF and other factors

"haha, I'll just write a quick thread extension to show what I want to do!"

(* 48 hours later *)

"pthreads is a joke and the vendors both should not and can not be trusted with public API surfaces."

It only gets worse, too. There's not just 1 way to spell "set name of thread" in pthreads.

There's fucking five.

• pthread_setname_np(pthread_t thrd, const char* name);
• pthread_set_name_np(pthread_t thrd, const char* format, const char* name); // ??? HUH
• pthread_set_name_np(pthread_t thrd, const char* name);
• pthread_setname_np(const char* name); // Apple doesn't let you pick the thread, because Of Course They Don't
• pthread_attr_setname_np(pthread_attr_t* attrs, const char* name); // This is the correct way, but only available on specific IBM platforms

I also haven't included ANY of the return values (because for some of them, it's different for some fucking reason).

These people couldn't design a good API if it spit on their face.

Writing a paper about my adventures with pthreads is gonna be great.

Surprisingly, it's not the Windows thread API that's awful, it's just pthreads.

pthreads is garbage.

Everyone has so, SO many pthread_foo_np -- where the np at the end stands for "nonportable" -- things to do bogstandard basic shit that it's infuriating, and even if you're working with "just" pthreads, in practice it's actually more fucked than just working with the win32 thread API or TlsAlloc.

POSIX just keeps churning out bad API after bad API.

So, its not just me? #adhd #selfcare #meme

A mesmerizing timelapse of the Sun in ultraviolet light, captured by the SDO spacecraft over the course of a month.

Credit: NASA/SDO

#sun #nasa #space #astronomy

OH: a computer cannot wear thigh-high socks, therefore a computer must never be allowed to program a computer

oklch is the color space you should be using in 2025, here's a great color picker & converter for it (since dev tools are lagging behind): https://oklch.com

Vaginal dilation therapy is the name given to a treatment for many vaginal and pelvic floor conditions. It involves inserting a medical device called a dilator into the vagina. There's two main benefits that vaginal dilation can achieve: to stretch the tissue of the vagina, and/or to train the pelvic floor muscles to relax.

A typical vagina and pelvic floor is already very stretchy - big enough for a baby's head to come out of it. But sometimes there's a medical to stretch or retrain.

Since we're launching our stretch goal for our fundraising campaign, we'd like to mark the occasion by talking about something stretchy: vaginal dilation therapy. This common treatment is surrounded in myths, misconceptions and stigma. Let's bust it today. https://www.gofundme.com/f/btscc2

Jeopardy finally got around to sending the photos from the weird modelling shoot they had us all do, including this one

A thing I've been thinking about a lot is how, whether, technology like computers and computer screens could be made "locally", i.e., within a limited area and without access to global trade in parts and minerals, even if you have to make drastic trade-offs to get there

https://www.theverge.com/news/631357/elecom-power-bank-battery-sodium-ion

Forgot to post these games I found in IKEA the other day.

The light goes on and she sees me standing in her bedroom, the contents of her drawers strewn across the bed and floor. As she screams in horror, I say 'We care about your privacy, you can choose how your data is managed by these two thousand vendors'. With the blood draining from her face in shock, she stammers 'y-y-yes I don't wan-' I interrupt, screaming 'LEGITIMATE INTEREST! LEGITIMATE INTEREST! LEGITIMATE INTEREST!'.

The extractive tech playbook:

1. Target an industry where people create actual value
2. Build an app that makes transactions marginally easier
3. Burn billions in capital to subsidize artificially cheap services & kill the competition
4. Bleed everyone dry

https://www.joanwestenberg.com/the-great-tech-heist-how-disruption-became-a-euphemism-for-theft/

I'm reading a 1987 Japanese magazine named Hacker and it's adorable. Besides talking about all kinds of bootlegs and erogames, it's got how-to instructions for how to defeat copy protection on PC-88 games. Like, here's how you format a disk and then run this BASIC code to copy the WIZARDRY game disk.

It's on the archive. There's some nudity in it, so beware:

https://archive.org/details/Hacker-No-7-March-4-1987/