Author Topic: The computing stuff rant thread (Read 410664 times)

iddu · « **Reply #2200 on:** 12 November, 2020, 12:47:15 am »

Quote from: Afasoas on 11 November, 2020, 12:00:40 pm

Why do OEMs have to use proprietary connectors when there are STANDARDS?
Please desist.

The cunning plan for turning my old Lenovo IdeaCentre into a slient PC has faltered because there are almost 4 USB style connectors that attach the case to the motherboard with very non-USB-esq pin outs and get this, a ribbon cable that connects into what resembles a PCIe x1 connector. Discovering the pin out for the power button etc looks a destructive process in smashing off the top of the case and examining the PCB.

Have a rummage through https://www.laboneinside.com/?s=ideacentre for anything useful...

Mr Larrington · « **Reply #2201 on:** 12 November, 2020, 01:41:24 am »

So you want to rejibble all that stuff and have it working by tea-time tomorrow, yes? Well, it'll help if you don't leave an entire directory tree out of your jibblesome activities. Which omission means that the whole thing has to come apart and be put back together with the missing bits included, and remembering that “shiny” is not technically a colour. Pssssssssss <== sound of leaking gumption.

It was all so much simpler before They “improved” it a couple of updates ago.

Afasoas · « **Reply #2202 on:** 12 November, 2020, 12:48:12 pm »

Quote from: iddu on 12 November, 2020, 12:47:15 am

Quote from: Afasoas on 11 November, 2020, 12:00:40 pm
Why do OEMs have to use proprietary connectors when there are STANDARDS?
Please desist.

The cunning plan for turning my old Lenovo IdeaCentre into a slient PC has faltered because there are almost 4 USB style connectors that attach the case to the motherboard with very non-USB-esq pin outs and get this, a ribbon cable that connects into what resembles a PCIe x1 connector. Discovering the pin out for the power button etc looks a destructive process in smashing off the top of the case and examining the PCB.

Have a rummage through https://www.laboneinside.com/?s=ideacentre for anything useful...

Thanks for the thought .. sadly nothing there looks too helpful.
I could sell it for more than the price of a new AM4 mobo, Athlon 3000G cpu and an 8GB stick of memory. I guess that's what I'll do?

FifeingEejit · « **Reply #2203 on:** 12 November, 2020, 02:12:20 pm »

Just found out that live code for a legacy architectural smell* bears no resemblance to code in our repository.
The repository was baselines in 2016,we have done no releases since.

Many WTFs are being thrown around just now.

*"common code" yes we have about 20 different informal forks of it but still what's on the 20 different "forks" should match the repo...

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TheLurker · « **Reply #2204 on:** 12 November, 2020, 02:14:25 pm »

Seriously!? Bloody glad I don't have your job.

FifeingEejit · « **Reply #2205 on:** 12 November, 2020, 02:33:06 pm »

Oh yes and the change is to replace all the old email addresses used for error reporting with the new ones...

It fecking reeks.

It's not too bad Tbh, other than the reeking that is.
It's part of a variety of legacy apps that are being disposed of at an indeterminate period in the near future, I'm off frdiay/Monday and have conveniently decided to use my protected training time today, someone else can rebaseline while wondering htf this has happened.

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FifeingEejit · « **Reply #2206 on:** 13 November, 2020, 01:13:43 am »

I spent the afternoon failing miserably to help fix a JPA issue and also to get maven plugins other than the java compiler to fire on life cycle goals.

Maybe I should have visited ColdFusion land after all...

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Mr Larrington · « **Reply #2207 on:** 15 November, 2020, 05:57:39 pm »

Today I are mostly trying to install the 20H2 update on a Win 10 box. I are not succeeding. I are planning hideous revenge on Microsith.

Mr Larrington · « **Reply #2208 on:** 15 November, 2020, 06:13:38 pm »

And another thing. Plz to not be failing to load webby pages, fondleslab, and making me think the internet connection has died on its arse, given that the BHPC's online AGM starts in three-quarters of an hour.

Kim · « **Reply #2209 on:** 15 November, 2020, 06:16:19 pm »

Quote from: Mr Larrington on 15 November, 2020, 06:13:38 pm

And another thing. Plz to not be failing to load webby pages, fondleslab, and making me think the internet connection has died on its arse, given that the BHPC's online AGM starts in three-quarters of an hour.

This. Did YACF have a wobbly a few minutes ago?

Mr Larrington · « **Reply #2210 on:** 15 November, 2020, 06:18:40 pm »

Quote from: Kim on 15 November, 2020, 06:16:19 pm

Quote from: Mr Larrington on 15 November, 2020, 06:13:38 pm
And another thing. Plz to not be failing to load webby pages, fondleslab, and making me think the internet connection has died on its arse, given that the BHPC's online AGM starts in three-quarters of an hour.

This. Did YACF have a wobbly a few minutes ago?

I reckon so, if it happened to you as well. I was in the Coronalurgi thread in POBI when it declined to load the next page. A couple of times. Of course by the time I'd checked the status on the router this place was fine again.

Kim · « **Reply #2211 on:** 15 November, 2020, 06:21:20 pm »

Smokeping confirms it. Brief total packet loss at about 18:05. And it's being sluggish now.

Feanor · « **Reply #2212 on:** 15 November, 2020, 06:21:54 pm »

Yes and its still having issues.
Ive seen some SMF cant connect to database errors.
Some topics slow to load.

Looks like database gremlins.

Kim · « **Reply #2213 on:** 15 November, 2020, 06:26:03 pm »

On a related note, I'm failing to press-gang barakta into joining in with the AGM. I know she isn't a member, can't currently cycle, and is terrified of someone trying to co-opt her as treasurer, but really, those are all rubbish excuses...

She can try out the realtime captioning software she's been testing, for SCIENCE.

Jaded · « **Reply #2214 on:** 15 November, 2020, 10:30:08 pm »

If the Zoom AGMs I've been to recently are anything to go by, there won't be any checking of eligibility to vote of people that bother to turn up.

FifeingEejit · « **Reply #2215 on:** 15 November, 2020, 10:33:13 pm »

Quote from: Kim on 15 November, 2020, 06:26:03 pm

On a related note, I'm failing to press-gang barakta into joining in with the AGM. I know she isn't a member, can't currently cycle, and is terrified of someone trying to co-opt her as treasurer, but really, those are all rubbish excuses...

She can try out the realtime captioning software she's been testing, for SCIENCE.

Having once acted as treasurer for a club I can say that fearing being cooped as treasurer is definitley a valid excuse.

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Kim · « **Reply #2216 on:** 15 November, 2020, 11:29:53 pm »

Quote from: FifeingEejit on 15 November, 2020, 10:33:13 pm

Quote from: Kim on 15 November, 2020, 06:26:03 pm
On a related note, I'm failing to press-gang barakta into joining in with the AGM. I know she isn't a member, can't currently cycle, and is terrified of someone trying to co-opt her as treasurer, but really, those are all rubbish excuses...

She can try out the realtime captioning software she's been testing, for SCIENCE.
Having once acted as treasurer for a club I can say that fearing being cooped as treasurer is definitley a valid excuse.

I've been volunteering to audit the ALC's accounts for the last couple of years as a preventative measure against it.

FifeingEejit · « **Reply #2217 on:** 15 November, 2020, 11:36:39 pm »

That's an approach I both endorse and use.

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Mr Larrington · « **Reply #2218 on:** 15 November, 2020, 11:59:21 pm »

Why! The! Fucking! Fuck! Of! Fuckhamptonshire! Are! Yahoo! Making! It! So! Sodding! Difficult! To! Use! With! Thunderbird?

ian · « **Reply #2219 on:** 16 November, 2020, 09:51:09 am »

Running out of space on my mothership Macbook, I closed off Friday evening by deleting some old crap. Ah, two versions of Cisco AnyConnect VPN client. Hmm, that looks like an older one, I'll uninstall it. I was feeling trigger happy at that point. Burn baby burn.

Can you guess what happened this morning? OK, no bother, I'll use the mothership's self-service software tool to re-install it.

Blessed Finestre, dear mothership, a version from five years ago that's still 32-bit (and thus won't run)? IT Hell Desk, here I come.

citoyen · « **Reply #2220 on:** 16 November, 2020, 11:13:41 am »

Quote from: Feanor on 15 November, 2020, 06:21:54 pm

Looks like database gremlins.

I assumed someone had forgotten to put 50p in the meter. But good to know it wasn't just me, whatever the cause.

citoyen · « **Reply #2221 on:** 16 November, 2020, 11:18:25 am »

Quote from: ian on 16 November, 2020, 09:51:09 am

Running out of space on my mothership Macbook...

But were you really running out of space? My rant is that when I installed Big Sur on my laptop the other day, it was telling me I didn't have enough space on the hard drive, even after I'd gone through and removed everything non-essential, emptied the bin etc etc. For example, it claimed I had 13GB worth of shit in my Documents folder, but when I looked, I could barely make the contents add up to 1GB.

Seems to be something to do with how it stores the information from what I can ascertain - it doesn't actually check the contents every time you ask it, so the details could be out of date and you have to wait for it to update itself, whenever that may be.

Also seems to be a glitch in Dropbox that it will claim that files are taking up space on your HD even when you have storage set to cloud only. (Yes, I do know about the option in Dropbox settings to fix this, but it doesn't seem to work reliably.)

ian · « **Reply #2222 on:** 16 November, 2020, 11:29:13 am »

Yeah, it's been mostly cluttered up for a while, but I got 20 GB back mostly through offloading files to OneDrive and deleting piles of old applications. And evidently, one that wasn't so old. I technically need a new Macbook but I just can't face the process (and I'm not sure they're still offering Macs, there's been another round of IT outsourcing) and it still works fine.

Usually the macOS upgrade installs spawn a load of temporary files (and the download itself is 12GB) – so I imagine you need the better part of 20GB free. I haven't put Big Sur on that machine yet, ironically the reason being that it usually breaks the VPN (which I need).

citoyen · « **Reply #2223 on:** 16 November, 2020, 11:34:13 am »

Quote from: ian on 16 November, 2020, 11:29:13 am

(and the download itself is 12GB) – so I imagine you need the better part of 20GB free.

It was demanding another 16GB for the installation process even after I'd completed the download. Which is just silly. But since most of the softwares I use are available in the App Store these days, it was easy enough to offload a bunch of them and reinstall post upgrade.

Mr Larrington · « **Reply #2224 on:** 16 November, 2020, 11:45:48 am »

Yesterday I made a list of all the Stuffs I'd need to reinstall if the only solution to my current Windows update conundrum is “nuke from orbit”. There's about seventy of the wretched things. No, add one for the very handy AdjustPlayCount utility for frobbing iTunes after you've reinstalled Led Zeppelin. Uninstalling all the updates applied since this nonsense began and trying again seems preferable to a couple of days of titting about doing that.