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akoster

836 karma · joined August 3, 2014

[ my public key: https://keybase.io/akoster; my proof: https://keybase.io/akoster/sigs/TtMkM5FstvZhWQqr08mMrjwkiXP_aykR-SU5OolWMk8 ]
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akoster··on Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old
Great story and brings back great old and recent memories! I recall the massive magazine rack at my local Fry's Electronics and was very glad to see that on a recent trip to Micro Center, they still have quite a selection in their newsstand / checkout aisle including the print editions [0] of Linux Magazine [1] which still includes free Linux distribution installer DVDs! Are you still using Slackware these days? As a daily driver? On a hobby box?

[0] https://linuxnewmedia.square.site/ [1] https://www.linux-magazine.com/

akoster··on Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old
I can only imagine in that era there was quite a bit more learning forced upon you than these days with our plethora of (somewhat) standards-compliant hardware and in-tree drivers. Though I'm definitely going to be channeling some of those experiences as I got a kernel-panic during the first boot after installing Slackware 15.0 on a newly built AMD B550 chipset / AMD Ryzen 5700G -based PC. I'm thinking its likely something to do with a combination of LILO, an NVMe interface SSD and EFI/CSM but I hope to get to the bottom of it. Worst case scenario, I perhaps can update the kernel via the bootable ISO as that was stable as a rock during the install.
akoster··on Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old
Very nice! Was there a reason your school gave out Slackware installer floppies? Was it required for a class? Or through a student organization? And if you recall, were you running a Creative SoundBlaster? Ad Lib? Gravis ultrasound?
akoster··on Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old
Wow! 75 floppies! That sounds like a lot! Was that Slackware 1.x? 2.x? And this sounds like a very interesting story: can you elaborate on any architecture details, equipment, getting other ISPs to peer?
akoster··on Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old
Wow! It sounds like you have seen a lot of major changes! But so far, no SysVinit->systemd nor dropping 32-bit i586 package builds for Slackware 15.0 and -current [0][1]. As someone new to Slackware I appreciate the balance of having lots of pre-built packages and just about everything that's not included as a build script on SlackBuilds.org (known as SBo by many) [2]. Are you still using Slackware today?

[0] http://www.slackware.com/changelog/stable.php?cpu=i386

[1] http://www.slackware.com/changelog/current.php?cpu=i386

[2] http://www.slackbuilds.org/

akoster··on Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old
Its quite amazing indeed! For the curious, here's the changelog for stable releases 14.0 [0], 14.1 [1], and 14.2 [2]. Not all packages are updated (such as the kernel version, but many critical attack surfaces are such as curl [3], ca-certificates, and sudo. Also note that for Slackware 14.0 and 14.1 releases, this was prior to the Mon Aug 3 19:49:51 UTC 2015 bump of the build architecture from i486 to i586 builds [4]. This means that one should be able to run currently supported Slackware 14.0 and 14.1 on any 486 compatible processor, and Slackware 14.2, 15.0 and -current on Pentium-compatible i586 CPUs since they are still building 32-bit packages [5][6]!

[0] http://ftp.osuosl.org/pub/slackware/slackware-14.0/ChangeLog...

[1] http://ftp.osuosl.org/pub/slackware/slackware-14.1/ChangeLog...

[2] http://ftp.osuosl.org/pub/slackware/slackware-14.2/ChangeLog...

[3] http://www.slackware.com/security/viewer.php?l=slackware-sec...

[4] http://mirrors.slackware.com/slackware/slackware-current/sou...

[5] http://www.slackware.com/changelog/stable.php?cpu=i386

[6] http://www.slackware.com/changelog/current.php?cpu=i386

akoster··on Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old
Where I’m living ADSL is still exciting (and one of only 2 options for wired Internet service). Currently on 2 (semi-stable) 60mbps down / 15mbps up pairs bonded together sold as a 100mbps down / 20 mbps up service. I keep it because the cable provider charges a ton for anything over 10mbps up when not on a promotional rate.
akoster··on Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old
I’m still getting more comfortable with it myself but appreciate the ethos and decisions made by Pat and the development team. Just installing 15.0 now as a second OS on my mom’s newly built PC.
akoster··on Google Groups has been left to die
Thanks for mentioning Eternal September [0]! I used their site in the past but had been using http://news.aioe.org [1] up until it went offline [2] possibly due to a disk failure [3], as it seemed more performant than Eternal September. As far as no-cost text-only newsgroup read/write access, I think we are down to Eternal September and possibly the BlueWorld Usenet Farm[4]. Though arguably, if I'm interested in keeping newsgroups alive, perhaps paying for access from a provider such as EasyNews, GigaNews, etc. [5].

[0] https://www.eternal-september.org/

[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20221220194002/http://news.aioe....

[2] https://old.reddit.com/r/usenet/comments/10m9n22/aioe_gone/

[3] https://groups.google.com/g/eternal-september.support/c/Elen...

[4] https://usenet.blueworldhosting.com/

[5] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Usenet_Providers_and...

akoster··on A targeted crackdown on “junk fees” makes a lot of sense
Just an example of a large municipality doing this: In NYC food establishments must accept cash as of November 2020

https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/new-york-city-cash-law-...

akoster··on F2.org (Graphics Version)
Indeed! Loads great over 56k dial up and 100Mbps VSDL alike
akoster··on F2.org (Graphics Version)
A text version is available as well: http://f2.org/t/
akoster··on A collection of Soviet control rooms (2017)
Great find! Reminds me of this 2020 post:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23334339

https://designyoutrust.com/2018/01/vintage-beauty-soviet-con...

akoster··on Reddit's photo albums broke due to Integer overflow of Signed Int32
Reminds me of a similar Chess.com iPad app issue from a few years back https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14539770
akoster··on The 6.1 kernel is out
Exciting, but I can’t wait for the further updated floppy driver in the upcoming 6.2 release! https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.2-Floppy
akoster··on Tell HN: Happy Thanksgiving
Happy Thanksgiving! May your thoughts be considerate, your stomachs be full, and your wallets not too empty (especially after this weekend)! Thanks for being an awesome, kind and thought-provoking bunch!
akoster··on Election Software Executive Arrested Due to Potentially Storing Data in China
Original Source: https://da.lacounty.gov/media/news/head-election-worker-mana...
akoster··on Wikipedia Speedruns
Reminds me of playing Prof. Robert West's implementation called "Wikispeedia" back in High School after AP CS Exams (and trying to call out anyone using the Find feature of their browser!) It's still playable here: http://www.wikispeedia.net/ which redirects here: https://dlab.epfl.ch/wikispeedia/play/ but originally hosted here: https://www.cs.mcgill.ca/~rwest/wikispeedia/project.php. But its great to see folks are iterating on this concept further with a different UI and more features.
akoster··on Ask HN: Do You Yahoo?
I check the news and finance. Quite a few relatives use Yahoo! mail and fortunately its UI has been relatively static for the past half-decade [0] (although AOL mail takes the cake in the static -- and usable -- UI department [1])

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahoo!_Mail#2011%E2%80%93prese...

[1] https://thenextweb.com/news/aol-mail-gets-a-refresh-would-li...

akoster··on Ask HN: Anyone making software for kiosks, infotainments or similar?
I used to work for an avionics company’s in-flight entertainment (IFE) division for just one year. IIRC the business model primarily involved selling new systems to airlines to be installed into newly-delivered aircraft and secondarily upgrading those systems hardware, software and content.

The hardware stack involved PPC-based servers connected to what was essentially switches that serve groupings of 4-6 seats that distribute power and connectivity to what was essentially embedded low power x86 PCs with touchscreens attached (for the prior generation of hardware) or modified android tablets (for the current generation of hardware) all connected via Ethernet.

As for the software stack, everything ran a modified version of fedora Linux and sshd. For the seat-back units, they either ran an X11 server on the prior generation units or the android runtime for the current generation of units. Atop that the QML runtime ran 80% of interfaces on both generations that users interacted with. The other 20% were games and other 3rd party android apps we distributed typically not written in QML. There were also a few parts of the interface (diagnostic screens, etc) written using android widgets or IIRC qt (or perhaps even Xt?) and then maybe one or two legacy systems we supported which were written in the pre-QML era using android widgets , or Qt.

Often airlines would request content updates, which would include new movie releases (many of which were still in theaters. IIRC this was a selling point of buying a traditional IFE system over iPads since our company had a close relationship with several studios, acquiring the rights for films much quicker than other distribution channels). Content updates also included new or patched games and often updates to the UI with new commercial advertisements, new theming for a holiday or new language translation options. Most of this data needed to be loaded to the flash memory of each seat back unit (gui, games, commercials and a few movies) with the rest needing to be loaded to the head end units which there could be 2-8 all over 10/100 or 10-BASE-T Ethernet networks. This was cleverly done via libtorrent, installed on every unit. I was always blown away by the speed of these BitTorrent-powered content upgrades even on aging early- and late- 2000s embedded hardware and Cat3 Ethernet.

akoster··on GCC Rust Approved by GCC Steering Committee
Great news! Hopefully this means that Rust will now support GCC's supported architectures [0] in addition to their own quite impressive and continuously improving list [1] [2], including those that are less popular these days. I hope this will directly help issues experienced by the Debian Ports project [3] [4], Gentoo Linux [5] [6], and possibly Alpine Linux [7] and NetBSD [8].

[0] https://gcc.gnu.org/backends.html

[1] https://doc.rust-lang.org/rustc/target-tier-policy.html

[2] https://doc.rust-lang.org/nightly/rustc/platform-support.htm...

[3] https://web.archive.org/web/20220223133124/https://people.gn...

[4] https://lwn.net/Articles/771355/

[5] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26097153

[6] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26203853

[7] https://wiki.alpinelinux.org/wiki/Architecture

[8] https://www.netbsd.org/ports/#ports-by-cpu

akoster··on “I’ll tell you a story about how my telegram messages were read in real time.”
Though my heart goes out for what happened to Rina, despite her claims that the 6 group chat participants were careful, I resonate with this reply [0]. Most likely, one of her group chat participants may have left a web or desktop session logged in to a public pc or that of a friend or family member who's home may have been raided by the authorities, allowing them access to a logged in session. Another option is they may have done so via malware [1] or a fake site [2]. Or since the government may work closely with mobile operators a SS7 attack [3] or even having an employee of a mobile operator redirect a login text message may all be in the cards and much more accessible than a pricey Pegasus or other mobile attack vector as Rina suggests.

I highly recommend to everyone using Telegram (or other web services) to enable their 2nd factor authentication [4]. This combined with reviewing your active sessions and the Telegram channel for login notifications can allow you to defeat any of the above attacks (with the possible exception of the recovery@telegram.org email service?)For Telegram, this will prompt for a password in addition to the required code sent to another active Telegram session or if not, via SMS. You can provide an email address for recovery purposes or avoid that entirely (which may be a problem if this password is forgotten).

In addition, recently I was prompted in the Telegram settings pane to confirm my number has not changed, and that I still remember my password, even providing a way to test it. I am not sure what would happen if I said I forgot it (would I be allowed to reset it? would all other active sessions be signed out?) but it seems the Telegram team is making an effort to keep users safe in light of attacks on SMS.

[0] https://twitter.com/white_shy/status/1518908527934423040 [1] https://www.zdnet.com/article/telegrab-malware-hijacks-teleg... [2] https://usa.kaspersky.com/blog/telegram-accounts-stealing/14... [3] https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/hackers-hijac... [4] https://telegram.org/blog/sessions-and-2-step-verification

akoster··on Fedora 36: A brave new (DRM/KMS only) world
A complete side tangent: How does one prevent pingbacks from content-less "blogs" (which seem to be optimizing for clicks)? (I see 3 pingbacks from lzomedia.com, makemoneyonlinecom.com and imoneyhub.com at the above link)
akoster··on Venmo forces binding arbitration unless you opt out by mail before June 22
The FTC needs to make a “click to register, mail to modify your preferences” illegal similar to how “click to subscribe, call to cancel” is now outlawed https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29250063

P.S.: At least can venmo be compelled to act or confirm our choice if we are forced to mail in their form? Can they claim they never received it, that it was printed incorrectly (since the form isn’t a PDF and can be easily rendered differently by various browsers) or missing some specific info?

akoster··on The Uber Bubble
Im glad to hear Uber/Lyft/Ride Sharing App pricing has matched that of cabs in London. In New York it was close (at least pre-COVID). I took would always opt for a yellow cab at those crazy prices (making sure that the meter was on, unless I negotiated a price). I'm not sure what cabbies in New York must pass but Definitely in places like London where cabbies must pass but hearing a little about "the knowledge" [1] for London cab licensing, and experiencing their true professionalism, I only wish that a similar test could be administered to anyone professionally driving any vehicle in the city must take.

[1] https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/3307245/the-knowledge-taxi-tes...

akoster··on 70,000 Russian IT professionals have left the country
For folks who are leaving the neighborhood and looking for work, check out this telegram group “IT Evacuation” [1]

[1] https://t.me/joinchat/AAAAAE3nUawZ4YX6AtDCFg

akoster··on Mariupol computer retro museum has been destroyed
Source (in Russian) [1] and future plans for a virtual museum [2]. A huge loss but glad the curator is safe. Слава ретро-компьютерам!

[1] https://m.facebook.com/it8bit.club/ [2] https://it8bit.club/blog/muzeya-kompqyuterov-v-mariupole-bol...

akoster··on Hacking Google Maps with a wheelbarrow full of phones
Saw this from 2020 IIRC but great post! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22242419
akoster··on Ask HN: Looking for reading materials for Linux desktop as daily driver
Igor Ljubuncic of Dedoimedo posts a lot about his experiences using various linux distros and configuring them to his liking [1]. Recently he posted about planning to migrate to Linux (from windows) [2]. Hope this might help!

[1] https://www.dedoimedo.com/linux.html [2] https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/windows-moving-away-sw-c...

akoster··on Vintage Startup Employee Swag?
I acquired a Sun mug and card deck from a discard pile at an internship about 7 years ago, a few years after the acquisition by Oracle. Also in the pile was a mug with the pre-merger/acquisition Broadcom big sinc function logo. Glad to see this post that I'm not alone with a small collection of vintage tech swag. (Now I just need to find a Wang Laboratories bag like an older prof proudly carried around...)
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