Mo @mo@nitech.online

(I don't schedule it to be annual, it's just that it seems to be that the Christmas break is the only opportunity I actually get to maintain the server.)

Just tried the annual update of this Mastodon server and had to give up because it looked like I was running out of memory. 🙁

Hosting company got back to me and said they could migrate in all my existing devices. For about £7 per device per year. That’s not happening.

Back to using the Cloud Key locally!

It’s Christmas, so that can only mean one thing... HOME NETWORKING TIME!

Except my new UniFi Switch is registered with a cloud hosted controller, and I’m stuck waiting for support to help me out with it. Very tempted to just reset it and adopt into the existing controller pending a full migration.

@bolster didn’t seem to take. But I remembered to sign back in eventually!

@nivrig @d3z @paddy wonder if the Fediverse can support a Slack style of chat.

Channels could be based around hashtags, threads based on replies. With the right client you can marshal regular Mastodon-style messages into something more akin to Slack, and with restrictions on federation (eg no incoming follows supported) you can have the effect of a private server.

@nivrig @d3z @paddy I’m not opposed to paying for stuff myself, or taking donations. All depends on how people use it - if it’s just a dumping ground for their own private communities, then I’m not advocating that individuals or donations pay for that.

That said, I’m not sure people would move from Slack. Many companies are using Slack these days and it’s very handy to have NI Tech stuff in the same window as the work stuff. (Though for some, I guess it’s a downside).

@nivrig @d3z @paddy I think it has mostly blown over already.

Self-hosting isn’t the worst in the world though. A self-hosted Slack clone would be really nice.

Merry Christmas nitech.online!

@nivrig @d3z @paddy morning

@d3z @paddy as for Discord vs Slack... I’m probably seeing something that isn’t there, but I feel like there’s a generational divide between them. Discord seems like the platform of choice for a younger group.

@d3z @paddy this was posted by Claire over on the Slack this morning: https://slackhq.com/an-apology-and-an-update

Turns out that Core Data is not very intuitive when you come back to it for the first time in about 3 years.

Following up on my Python build woes last week, I finally got it sort of working.

In the end it was trying to use libraries that were in both `/usr/local/lib` (for `libpython`) and `/usr/local/lib64` (for `libssl` and `libcrypto`), but my existing configuration for the Python build was only looking in `/usr/local/lib`.

Next step is to figure out why Python isn't building/installing to `/usr/local/lib64`.

Have to say though - Docker really makes this kind of thing a lot easier than it used to be. Trying this in the past used to be way harder - when the environment is contaminated with leftovers from previous failed attempts, it can be hard to determine if your process will actually work in a clean system.

Today in "Shouldn't we be past this shite": trying to compile Python to use a non-system version of OpenSSL.

* Can get Python to compile and work, but it pulls in the system OpenSSL.
* Can get Python to compile, link against the non-system OpenSSL, but can't find libpython.
* Can get Python to compile, link against libpython, but is unable to find libssl/libcrypto

I’ve been working in the software industry in Belfast for over 17 years, and I’ve been to a lot of university careers fairs in that time. I got to attend more at UUJ and QUB over the last couple of days and it got me really enthusiastic about the future of software engineering in Belfast. As a hiring manager, there were so many people that I wanted to take on straight away, and can’t wait to talk to them all in the upcoming interviews.

That said, I definitely find it harder to get moving with VS Code. Some of it is overcoming muscle memory, but some of it is a clunkiness that I thought they’d have sorted out by now. The extension installation UI is abysmal for a start, and opening a new window results in a soup of stuff on the screen that doesn’t feel conducive to getting started.

It was time. Atom has become so damn slow and kludgy for everything I'm doing these days that I've given up and am given VS Code another whirl.

@noodles I prefer mostly hating OmniPlan