I’m beautiful and tough like a diamond…or beef jerky in a ball gown.

  • 34 Posts
  • 161 Comments
Joined 4 months ago
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Cake day: July 15th, 2025

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  • The only reason I gave up on Docker Swarm was that it seemed pretty dead-end as far as being useful outside the homelab. At the time, it was still competing with Kubernetes, but Kube seems to have won out. I’m not even sure Docker CE even still has Swarm. It’s been a good while since I messed with it. It might be a “pro” feature nowadays.

    Edit: Docker 28.5.2 still has Swarm.

    Still, it was nice and a lot easier to use than Kubernetes once you wrapped your head around swarm networking.


  • I had 15 of the 2013-era 5010 thin clients. Most of them have had their SSDs and RAM upgraded.

    They’ve worn many hats since I’ve had them, but some of their uses and proposed uses were:

    1. I did a 15 node Docker Swarm setup and used that to both run some of my applications as well as learn how to do horizontal scaling.
    2. After I tore down the Docker Swarm cluster, I set them up as diskless workstations to both learn how to do that and used them at a local event as web kiosks (basically just to have a bunch of stations people could use to fill out web based forms).
    3. One of them was my router for a good while. Only replaced it in that role when I got symmetric gigabit fiber. Before that, I used VLANs to to run LAN and WAN over its single ethernet port since I had asymmetric 500 Mbps and never saturated the port.
    4. Run small/lightweight applications in highly-available pairs/clusters
    5. Use them to practice clustered services (Multi-master Galera/MariaDB, multi-master LDAP, CouchDB, etc)
    6. Use them as Snapcast clients in each room
    7. Add wireless cards, install OpenWRT, and make powerful access points for each room (can combine with the above and also be a Snapcast client)
    8. Set them up as VPN tunnel endpoints, give them out to friends, and have a private network

    Of the 15, I think I’m only actively using 4 nowadays. One is my MPD+Snapcast server, one is running HomeAssistant, ,the third is my backup LDAP server, and one runs my email server (really). The rest I just spin up as needed for various projects; I downsized my homelab and don’t have a lot of spare capacity for dev/test VMs these days, so these work great in place of that.





  • I had the same thought.

    Couple of possibilities:

    Spoiler
    1. Animals don’t seem to be infected in the same way humans are, and rats bite on their own anyway. Perhaps it was just a carrier rather than part of the hive. While it showed the same symptoms as later humans who became infected that doesn’t necessarily mean it was part of the hive. The zoo animals that were let loose definitely do not seem to be part of the hive (they attacked “them” who couldn’t defend themselves).

    2. If the rat was part of the hive, then it could just be the “biological imperative to spread” loophole that allows them to assimilate without consent.


  • :::spoiler

    They also seem to do 100% of everything they’re told to do.

    I’m also wondering if that is just to placate the immune until “They” figure out the fix. Assuming “they” truly cannot intentionally cause harm to another living thing (and nothing so far has indicated that to be untrue), then the immune population (no matter how tiny) could be considered a threat and acting like a doormat is just “their” way of dealing with that.

    Since they don’t consider assimilation to be harm, once “they” figure out how to infect the immune, I think things could turn quite a bit darker after that (but still with the creepy cheerful demeanor).

    Edit/addition: While “they” seemingly cannot cause harm to people, they don’t seem to be limited such that they’re forced to prevent harm from occurring.

    Evidence:

    1. Carol was close to heat exhaustion when burying Helen. “Pirate Lady” only suggested she drink some water but did not force her to.
    2. “They” don’t seem to care that the dangerous zoo animals mauled/killed people
    3. “Pirate Lady” flat out said “they” could not protect Carol and the other “immune” from each other.

    Between that and the “biological imperative to spread” loopholes, I’m definitely curious where those go.

    :::

    I’m genuinely excited to see where this goes.


  • "Them" Theory

    I think, at face value, “they” are truly benign in their own way. However, because “they” don’t consider assimilation to be causing harm, merely a biological imperative, ultimately humanity and Earth are merely going to be vessels for “them” to further procreate.

    In the first episode, the astrophysicists were discussing the massive energy requirements and how it would have taken an antenna array the “size of Africa” to send that signal.

    My theory is that is the endgame for earth/humanity (and was what happened on the planet where the signal originated). “They”, while benign and otherwise passive, will use “their” hive mind and a significant portion (or all) of Earth’s resources to build another transmitter to further spread.

    How much of humanity is lost in that endeavor and how much resources remain afterward are yet to be determined though. Maybe “they” leave a remnant population, maybe “they” don’t.




  • do GSI roms still contain google binaries (play store, play services, etc…) or is it similar to a AOSP rom where its just a bare android image

    Yes. That’s to say they can be either depending on how the ROM was built. All of the GSI ROM builders I’ve worked with usually have multiple releases of the same build with different configurations: root, no root, with Google services (often MicroG), without Google services, combinations of both, etc.

    To my understanding, GSI ROMs are basically just the “userland” portion of a full ROM. Basically they use the stock/existing kernel, drivers, etc but replace the rest of the system that runs on top of it. If memory serves, they’re possible due to Project Treble. Sadly, they still require an unlocked bootloader to install, so they’re not a total fix-all.

    They’re also very generic generic images (hence the “G” in the term). They’re not optimized for any specific device and can be hit-or-miss feature wise depending on the device. If you’re already reading about a specific device on XDA forums, then you’ll probably be able to see what works and what doesn’t.

    TL;DR: Running a GSI ROM is like upgrading to a newer Linux distro but without upgrading the kernel.




  • A database can be used to plug into any number of applications that run on top of it as well as be easily shared by multiple people and centrally backed up. Auditing, logging, and row and table level access controls, and other measures can be easily added.

    Excel files (or even MS Access files) as “databases” are often just people emailing around a file or accessing it from a shared drive. You end up with a split-brain situation at best and at worst you’re dealing with constant file corruption from multiple people thinking they can access it from a shared drive at the same time.

    Then you get vendor lock in and are forced to keep MS Office professional licenses because Shawn created some stupid Access “app” 10 years ago which is “THE DATABASE” and no one understands how it works.










  • At least in the default UI, it’s still not working right. It’s all treated as the title of the spoiler.

    Most clients require it as :

    :::spoiler Title that shows when collapsed
    The rest of the text that should be hidden in the collapsed part.
    
    More text that should be hidden.
    :::
    
    Title that shows when collapsed

    The rest of the text that should be hidden in the collapsed part.

    More text that should be hidden.