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@jonny when I first had to use Linux as an entire laptop OS and not just on a server, figuring out *how to unpack an archive* was nontrivial -- didn't have the command line tools I wanted yet and I thought that when I was seeing the contents in the extract utility gui, it was unpacked, when really it was a view into the intact archive.

When I had to use windows for something I was really stuck when `ls` wasn't a valid command. No idea how to move forward. And I didn't know how to interact with the OS in gui form.

First time getting a bucket full of source code that wasn't python, I didn't know the convention for how to compile it. Very few READMEs actually say, you need to say "make" in this directory, or you need to put this thing here in your path. And you've got to already know all the file extensions and which ones might contain instructions and scripts.

First time trying to set up a raspberry pi, I was reading "flash this" and "run that" but not "plug this in there and make it start up" or "you're gonna be typing on your laptop to control this other piece of electronics that doesn't have a keyboard."

There's a truly massive knowledge gap before most beginner guides are helpful and where you don't know what terms to search for.

long, computer/programming information inaccessibility 

i was playing an in-browser game with someone last night and got to talking and i mentioned i was a programmer. they said they had always wanted to learn, and so i suggested the time tested strategy of just getting mad whenever a computer didn't do something they wanted it to. they mentioned hating some features of the game, and since the game's code is clear (semi-retro Angular) and comes with a sourcemap i recommended they try taking a stab at reading it. i gave them some tips on starting points and how to read it. we were playing a game so i wasn't necessarily trying to teach, just give them a starting point for later if they wanted.

they told me that they would try but the learning curve was always a cliff, and i knew they were right but holy SHIT they were so immediately right. they asked me how to save the source to read later, and there isn't actually a way to save unpacked sourcemap code from firefox. I said your best bet was to just copy and paste each file, or since they already had homebrew and npm, they could try copy/pasting something like wget URL; npx unpack file; open . and linked them to this package which to me is super clear, but they were just dumbfounded by it.

They were (correctly) like "you say follow the instructions there but the word "instructions" is nowhere on this page, literally the entire thing is code. there isn't even a download button or anything, how do i get the program, what the fuck is this site?" Every part of what i was telling them was totally new to them, I thought that "just open this program and copy and paste this text" would be doable even if they didn't get what was going on, just so they would have something to look at later, but that act of exposure was so discouraging I felt bad and we just quit the game and i talked them through some of it. We got stumped at merely trying to download the code. Not even reading it yet, definitely not trying to run it.

I've taught ppl to program to a level of basic self-directedness maybe a dozen times, and every time I remember just how inaccessible this whole racket is. I remember all that extremely well myself, and I still am not close to being able to imagine what a really legible programming ecosystem would look like

@njion I swear, the education system is an authoritarian nightmare and the main reason people tolerate it is just ideological inertia combined with denying the autonomy of students as not exactly "full people".

apparently some people go to bed and just...sleep??? they don't plot a 7 book epic fantasy series or softly broil in existential dread or replay every mistake they've ever did??? and the wake up [checks notes] REFRESHED?!?! i just- it sounds a bit fake

nothing I drew today turned out good, so this house is going for a stroll.

#MastoArt
#StrollUary (?)

robot that is compelled by the Second Law of Robotics to follow instructions, however it is very creative in how it parses these instructions

slang psa, misogynistic hate campaign, cultural appropriation 

for anyone who doesn't know, the expressing-approval-of-someone's-politics sense of "based" was popularized by white supremacist Gamergaters after they appropriated it from AAVE: dictionary.com/e/slang/based/

anyone who does know and says it anyway, eat shit and die

muting notifs

Fedi, recommend me a time tracking program without bullshit.

Current use:
I have a text file on my desktop called today.txt. At the top is this:

Mon xx
Tue HS
Wed II
Thu ER
Fri VP
-------
VP: Arcade steady
II: Improbable Island
HS: House Stuff
PF: Pinball freelance
ER: Errands
xx: none of the above

and I just note down what I did that day, and underneath is today's date and what I wanna do today, and then what I wanna do this week, and this month.

This setup is fine and it works and there's no fuss at all, it takes me two keystrokes at the end of the day to say what I did, BUT, remembering what the hell I did last week is an Issue.

Difficulty level: Linux and Android. I don't want to open a terminal. I don't want to mess about telling software who the client is, I'm the client. I wanna click a couple things and be Done. I'd like to do this on my phone as well if possible, I have a Nextcloud setup and can sync arbitrarily from my desktop to my phone if the program exposes its data files. I'm not giving anyone my email address or signing up to any online web app, I want a program for my computer.

Bonus: show me a coloured-in calendar with the various Things Wot I Did in different colours.

As simple as my today.txt, but it records back further than a week. Ideas, go!

*closes code editor*
"Ahh, end of work day, finally. Time to start on personal project."
*opens code editor*

okay but has someone written like. a contrarian c compiler. a c compiler that on purpose, whenever anything is left up to the implementation, does whatever GCC and LLVM don't?

the fediverse game of
"is it an alt account or a headmate"
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