sincle354

Both because they are the ultimate tools in maneuvering a terrible, terrible development environment. For reference, Sigasi Studio costs 2,000$ PER YEAR, and it still doesn't work for our dev environment!

Let me paint a picture: Corporate job that won't let you download anything except whatever you can smuggle through a git checkout. It took a month to convince IT to download vim 9.0 on the server. The programming language? VHDL and SystemVerilog and UVM. Horrible language support that relies on proprietary compilers/simulators, and always the ones you aren't using. The one you are using is so obtuse that it has literally 50 configuration files for a single project. All of it is run with a janky python script with half of the flags not working. LSP support is out of the question since it dynamically pulls files from god knows where with at least 10 layers of ../ relative pathing.

All I can do on vim is

• ctrl+p for fuzzy file finding and a massive blacklist of intermediate files to ignore,

• a custom :Make command with custom errorformat that you can navigate through,

• Universal Ctags with per library indexes to reference those far off files,

• and a fuckton of grepping for when Go To Definition (ctrl+]) grabs the wrong location.

Vim's autocomplete is almost always good enough. If my laundry list of plugins break, I can literally fix them on the spot and even submit the merge request on github. If you take into consideration all of this configuration and learning effort, I still save hours of navigating through the hundreds of files I have to essentially reverse engineer. My coworkers are all electrical engineers and it shows They're using godforsaken nedit with no syntax highlighting...

From a software engineering view: Lots of rebuilding the wheel, now with Internet Explorer dependencies. Large tech firms are more and more bureaucratic rather than innovative. Startups slurp up VC funding for the next 200 or so unicorn investments. NVIDIA is THE ENTIRE S&P 500 at this rate with SERIOUS "Peak of Inflated Expectations" valuation. Elon Musk.

All the while the majority of the job is fixing the mistakes of the past, of yourself and of some code monkey in 2003. There's this theory that code replicates the structure of the design team. When that team spans an entire corporate hierarchy with SCRUM standups every 2.5 milliseconds, you wonder if you could do the equivalent of the ending of Office Space to the codebase.

I'm sorry, I'm just... anyway, a sage piece of advice. For the love of all that is holy, write requirements BEFORE doing validation for Aerospace applications, and DO NOT OUTSOURCE THE REQUIREMENTS WRITING. That is all.

Alternately, a picture of Our Great Leader/The Honorable Chairman/Gandhi/A stolen NFT, depending on the theatre.

If you want any encouragement, one of the DDR regulars at the arcade was a totally non-college age woman who needed a hand brace due to some age-typical RSI, I presume. That is, I could only assume because she played up at the 13s (well near 9 footers and above) with dogged passion. I don't even know how old she was because she had that cardio build, the kind you might find a Zumba enthusiast with. I'm not being ageist here: I'm more terrified of the 30, 35 year olds on the machines because I know their passion dictates their body and not the other way around. If you can't take the high impacts on your joints for higher speeds, it's always just fun to play the medium level charts and maybe even go for high scores. She didn't need to go high and that was fine.

If you wanna get back into the grove, YouTube has all of the charts of the better songs available. Just... load up Captain Jack (Grandale Mix), AFRONOVA, Dynamite Rave. Get back in the groove without a pad and just feel it come back! Unfortunately official cabinets have lost the rights to many of the older classic songs, but StepMania doesn't care :). And if you do pick it back up and wanna chase the new stuff, well, you're gonna have to dance for that privilege.

Actually my self esteem increased this past few years but I won't pass up an ADHD infodump opportunity. DDR is, IMO, the most efficient path for videogamer enthusiasts to transition to healthy exercise.

DanceDanceRevolution (DDR) is an arcade rhythm game that is certainly not dead, much to your surprise perhaps. The Japanese arcade scene is a whole, far more in depth iceberg to chip at, but trust me when I say Konami focusing on machines did not (only) mean pachinko machines, it also meant their multiple arcade rhythm games under the Bemani brand.

I am not kidding when I say there was a DDR setup in my middle school in southern USA. I started a bit there, but I never got real dedicated gameplay until there was a new DDR cabinet installed at both Dave and Busters and a local arcade joint. Having access to a machine can be substituted by a home pad. Please, buy the L-TEK pad without the bar. Cheapest exercise equipment out there at 250 + shipping from Poland.

You start off just browsing the songs in the roster until you find ones you like. There's some token English licensed songs, but the bulk come from Konami original songs and a selection from the massive library that is the Rhythm Game Song Genre(TM). Most weebs get their beginnings from anime OPs and TouHou and Vocaloid, so if you have early YouTube nostalgia jump right into Bad Apple and Night of Nights. Later on you get addicted to the super high BPM (400+) techno mixes of the "Boss" songs (more on that later).

So how is gameplay? Visually, four lanes of arrows travel from the bottom to the top, indicating when you have to step and in what direction on the four directional pads at your feet. You should learn quickly that keeping your feet on the arrows and never stepping in the center is the key to actual gameplay. The song's patterns are designed to lead one into another. It's far from dancing, but you transition from paying attention to each arrow to just stepping to the beat. You internalize patterns and you get better, right?

But then, there's a hurdle. Some songs demand you turn your hips and move your right foot on the left pad and vice versa. Difficulty is based on number 1 to 19, so you keep track that you can pass 11s, but not 12s. Each new song introduces new patterns in ordering and timing. Your old highest level becomes your warmups as you get better and better. You start to take a liking to faster, more complex rhythms like triplets, syncopated notes, and more sounds that a drummer doing prog rock would grok. One particular song has you galloping like a horse to Japanese festival music. If you know, you know.

But there's a catch, a limitation: your own body. Nearing difficulty 12 and 13, you're doing the equivalent of a decent jog for around two minutes, right? You might start needing some time between songs to take a break and drink some water. At 14 and 15, you're going for something called High Intensity Interval Training. That is, you go at your MAXIMUM SPEED for as long as the song demands you go. You don't give up because that means losing and you paid for this arcade game, right? You push and push and sometimes fall over, but eventually you're running ragged at 600 steps per minute begging that your life bar doesn't sink anymore. You need more training. The next song is 440 BPM with 880 steps per minute.

You want it. You want to play the harder songs in the difficulty ranking. You start to jog outside of the game on treadmills and otherwise. You put on the same heartrending songs and you find yourself sprinting desperately for 2 minute bursts because it's impossible to stop while the song is playing. I'm running for almost an hour straight, and I get a head start at running progress because of my DDR experience! It pays off and you can play up to 15s, but there's still 4 more levels until you get to 19. Over 4 years (at college, see?) I bike to the arcade, I play my heart out, I bike back. My blood pressure decreases, I breathe slower and deeper, and my snacking habits are at least counteracted. Best videogame of my life.

Only downside? I can't convince anyone outside of the rhythm gamers at the arcade that the music is good. The rhythms of those "Boss" songs are etched into your soul by the end. I can namedrop MAX 300 and everyone in the scene can practically play the song out in their heads. It's literally a lifestyle hobby, and a rather healthy one at that.

Everybody Wants To Rule The World is the best song. Absolutely the closest I've ever gotten to drifting peacefully in the starry night sky. I wanted to cry when it was over. The ride operates on a 1-reservation a day system because it's THAT good. I'm so sad I can't ride it forever...

Disney Imagineers hiring PHDs in gravitational physics, with the research facilities actually disguised as said Guardians of the Galaxy Ride.

If you want to know where I stand, my trans boyfriend came out a long time into our long distance relationship and he wanted surgery. I was a bit torn on the idea, but what really sold me was that he was gonna have a dick if he did surgery. THAT was cool with me, and likewise with the body shape thing. Boobs, ass, vagina, dick is all good with me, balls included.

And the cool thing is? He's having second thoughts on it now that he's moved in with me and away from their parents. Given the freedom to choose gender identity regardless of their body, they are a lot happier and don't need to pigeonhole themselves into a sexual/gender stereotype. I, for one, don't care. His sexual orientation is demisexual due to need for emotional connection, whilst mine is pansexual(?) because I honestly don't care. He does it for me and that's great.

It might be comforting to know that pansexual as a label exists and that your preferences are shared with others. You might find quite the assortment of... 2d images online. By the ratios it's 8:5:1 for female bodies:male bodies:female bodies with dicks. Really, it's not that uncommon. You might find even more freedom once you find the people that give you the liberty to truly own my desires. Feel free to interact with femboys, strapon girls, intersex people, whatever and wherever. Your sexual arousal needs no words to justify itself.

Mine is infinite ADHD moments where I aim to expel as much information for the internet as possible. I have been accused of typing like ChatGPT. I can and will link to Wikipedia with reckless abandon and use parentheses (with reckless abandon).

NovelAI is an amazing tool if you want to write stories. Cost: 10-25$ with a free trial, of course. In comparison to GPT-style LLMs, it has far less general knowledge, but it has immense training on online books and fanfiction. If you start writing a story, it will start emulating your style and producing great details with perfect grammar. And the best part? Born out of the dumpster fire of AI Dungeon, no censorship on anything. Full, unabridged NSFW, gore, suicide, war, torture. I've written a medieval war story turned isekai (with authentic battle damage) turned smut. Sadly, unless you wanna rip the leaked parameters floating around 4chan, you can't selfhost. You can store it locally and in a file or in your cookies, and it does have free remote storage too.

Ugh, I keep wanting to add more edits. It has great AI generation bundled in, with most people (notably Japanese) coming for that. All Danbooru trained. Yes, that means what you think it means.

There are caveats, though. You need to actually put in some effort for your first prompts and tweaking the configs. Thankfully, the UI is GORGEOUS. A quick ask on the Discord can give you the up-to-date best options anyway, and they're quite helpful. The AI needs some rather intensive editing, but that's the thing: It's as if NovelAI is the writer and you are the editor. And it's damn good at writing. Railroad onto plot point and it will shine like diamonds in one or two runs through the AI. And? If you get really into the nitty gritty with their actual fantastic documentation, you can do stuff like inject AO3 tags into your story to induce a particular mood, theme, tone, genre, style, etc. I legitimately am going to tell my future kids that I did AI the cool way.

It's one thing to be evil, but it's another thing to be evil AND incompetent. Do one or the other, never both. Don't do a Russia worse than Russia. People are counting on us to do the right thing after we exhaust all of the alternatives.

Can I at least wish that they would die in a manner most befitting of the way that they have lived? Thematically appropriate. Dies in the limelight with comedic timing after being asked to prove his mental acuity. Funeral is televised with literally everything gold plated. Crowdfunding for said event drains potential Republican fundraising efforts for a solid decade. Post-Trump Republicans trying to play up the demagogue position labeled as the new RINOs. All January 6th insurrectionists ultra convicted. Trump Estate dissolved pending all litigation. GOP decides not to go full crazy without demagogue support. Democrats win three straight elections as MAGA Republicans get roped into SovCit demonstrations that have no popular support at all.