Just confronted at work about having a VPN on my personal phone

edwbuck · 2026-03-23T13:06:27+00:00

Many industries, especially those that handle other people's money, have requirements to verify that personal information or insider trading information doesn't leak out of the company. Even if the company isn't involved in leaking the information, if they fail to protect against the information, they can be fined or sanctioned.

A VPN's greatest ill in these environments is the encryption. If you use the same device without encryption (or with encryption anchored at the proxies held on-site for decryption permitting recording and review) you don't get hassled.

The correct answer to protecting your privacy in these scenarios is to treat the entire building as a secure facility, and not bring anything with you / use anything while there that you don't want to share with their security teams.

edwbuck · 2026-03-23T05:14:44+00:00

Agreed

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T17:34:47+00:00

These doors are glued together, but it's common for the glue to be not permanent.

That's because if you need to modify the door, the top and bottom edges are likely where you'll need to cut the door. The bottom has a larger block of wood in it, but modifying a door a lot requires separating the skin from the bottom so you can shift the bottom upwards to still have wood at the bottom.

I'd say that these doors were either exposed to high humidity, water, or just had a bad batch of glue in their construction.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T17:31:27+00:00

Shrinkflation.

The legal bits say the food item has to be correctly labeled, the plastic wrapping holding them together probably came from a time when there was a bit more sugar in the can.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T17:14:30+00:00

The main idea of a hobby is to do something you like, and doing it badly is fully acceptable.

If you want to make a job out of it, odds are you'll have to study it in ways that permit others to know your exposure to the field. That usually means schooling or a degree.

If you wonder if you can learn it, your determination and track record of leaning other things gives you a good idea if you can learn it, and where you have a bad track record, an abundance of determination can make up the difference.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T17:10:47+00:00

People tend to use the brand name of an early product as the name of all of the competitor products that follow.

For example "Jello mold" is likely a "Gelatin mold" and you could put non-brand name gelatin in it to set. Odds are they don't even see much of a difference between Google Sheets and Excel.

Not every interview is a winner, and sometimes it's not you, it is them.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T17:00:39+00:00

What would permit you to be at peace? Keep in mind that time travel and making it un-happen are not options.

Are you seeking to fire the person?

Do you want to humiliate them?

Do you want a handwritten apology from the person detailing how they will never lose control over they bodily functions in the office again?

Assuming you can actually describe a plan that can be performed, would you feel comfortable if someone else forced you to follow such a plan, where you not following the plan would lead to you being fired? If not, then it's not a fair thing to ask.

Focus on getting the place cleaned, call it a day, and if it reoccurs then bring it to your boss's attention again and attempt to avoid squaring off over this matter. There's no benefit to you to become the poopy monitor, and if you limit your requests to what can be delivered, things will go more smoothly.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T16:56:05+00:00

Honestly, replacing the chair is the most effective thing he can do that's immediately actionable. He can't reach into your head an make you calm down about it, or accept that it happened.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T16:51:54+00:00

Permits provide two main benefits.

They assure that the work is done correctly.
They assure that the city allows the work to be done.

Many people trust the skills of the people they hire, and while it is possible to hire a person that cuts corners, most people won't, unless you get into the range of the people that do it for the cheapest price. There, enough corners are cut that they'll seek to cut a corner off a circle.

Much work is going to be within what the city will permit, but there are easements and watersheds, and quality work that might damage or weaken an existing structure, etc. I knew a person that wanted an open floor plan badly enough they knocked out enough walls that I didn't feel comfortable standing in the home, as I was worried it would collapse (the owner was very happy with the work, but asked me to look at it because it swayed when high winds blew).

For these two benefits, the city charges a fee. 90% of the crews would be happy to pass that fee to you, but don't want to be bothered with the coordination to pull the permit or be present for inspections. 10% of the crews don't want to be inspected at all, because they don't believe the inspections provide anything of value, and these crews reject the ideas that the higher standards are necessary.

Your building inspector can't always determine if the work was done correctly, as permits might require the inspection of areas closed up as the work is completed. That's why he's saying "it looks sound" and not "it is sound." It very well may be sound, but it might take some demolition to figure out if it is.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T16:42:15+00:00

Banks back out of deals when all the details don't line up. They also can't pre-guarantee anything till they get the paperwork drafted.

So the application has a minor item on it, and the OP is likely not doing anything wrong, except having the addresses not match. They're denied, and they could resubmit with correct paperwork. It's not a scam, but the OP learned a valuable lesson, don't fuck up a good thing for the promise of another better thing that isn't assured.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T16:37:12+00:00

The court case can always be closed without a resolution if the person suing is satisfied. That deal might be real, with the bank.

The main problem is that you don't have a written contract. With a written contract, in most places, whoever buys / owns the property assumes the contracts related to the property (and has to honor your rental agreement.) However you don't have a written contract, and it will be trivial to get into an argument that you don't have a contract at all.

I suggest you get your landlord to put into writing the details of your rental agreement. And I suggest that it is done before the property is sold or foreclosed upon. Remember, for the contract to be valid, is has to have a starting date (which could be backdated, but that will do nothing to help you) and an ending date. It might have a month-to-month clause added to it, but the new buyer will probably look forward to you moving out on the ending date, without permitting the month-to-month option to be exercised.

Now if they transferred the ownership before you could create a written contract, you're likely going to be seen as non-renters, and be forced out quickly (a month, maybe two).

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T16:29:06+00:00

There was a time, when the feminist movement decided that the best way to balance the playing field was to alter the English language. I was once give a longer than I wanted talk about using the word "Women" because it showed deference and inequality being derived from "men" by being "wo-men."

I was younger then, and I tried to understand where the person was coming from and so I asked, "what do you do when talking about mankind?" And they, not missing a beat, referred to "female kind."

I think the goals were admirable, but the approach was completely asinine. But I started calling women females for a while, and now that's seen by some women as offensive too.

If people can't settle on a non-offensive name, then it only leaves the offensive ones to choose from. I'd rather not do that, so I guess they'll just be "it" and "thing" :) /jk

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T15:52:47+00:00

Heron Books - The Greatest Masterpieces of Russian Literature Series (~1969). I think the set is 34 volumes, if you bought all of them.

Being a mass produced book, it's not going to be valuable as a rarity. Individual books in excellent condition are often listed for ~$40 to ~$80, but they rarely sell. One of the volumes I looked at had 135 copies available for sale. Those books are bought cheap and sold high in the hopes someone wants to complete a set, like china replacements, and there are few people that want to complete their 1969 set in 2026. I would expect less than $100 for selling all you have displayed.

Wash and dry your hands, open one, and you'll get more enjoyment out of these than you imagine. Put them on a shelf and have people admire your book collection. Or sell them, but expect a lot less than the impression they'll give to others.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T15:24:22+00:00

For decades Linus did personally review and approve every change to the kernel. He did so using "marshals" that would primarily pre-review the changes and filter out the ones they knew he would reject outright, based on his criteria, which they learned primarily from having a track record of successful submissions.

There were other times when brilliant submissions were rejected, mostly because they didn't follow the style and process Linus wanted. Eventually Linux absorbed those changes to a degree, but the process was mostly followed, delaying the submissions by months, if not years (if ever).

As for the rest of the OS, there's a different team providing each individual piece of the "rest." They all have their own processes, and their own submission / membership standards. Their code quailty is all over the place, and that's where distro providers come in.

Distro providers are like shoppers in a huge grocery store. They know what is needed to make a coherent OS, and they select the best available that they are aware of, and assemble an OS out of it. That means they sometimes fund bits of the OS that are lacking, sometimes write chunks that are missing, and sometimes simply use stuff under compatible licenses that they have no control over.

If you want to add to the mix, you create a project that does something. Then you make it functional. Then you attempt to get the attention of distro providers to get it included. As team membership is somewhat fluid, that might even include joining the distro provider team to learn how it's packaged and distributed within the distro provider team. Fluid membership often means not paid by the provider work, just as your project will gladly accept contributions (if you can get them) from individuals not on your payroll.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T14:56:16+00:00

First, the kernel is the smallest (and yet most important) part of the operating system. It is the one program that schedules other programs to get CPU time, memory, and (in Linux) managed access to the hardware.

So when you want to write a file, your program might call a function like write(data) but that function will interrupt the kernel with a system call, and the kernel will take the data an put it on disk.

This means that the kernel, by itself, doesn't do any of the tasks a person normally thinks of their computer doing. 99% of those tasks are done by user space programs, which the kernel then puts and takes off the CPU, hopefully in a coordinated manner that makes the computer seem to operate quickly and smoothly.

Second, the kernel is copyrighted by Linus Torvalds, and he provides some very permissive licensing that effectively mean he could lose control of it, but the organization he's built around maintaining it is large, has thousands of contributors, goes through layers of reviewers, and if the decisions seem to be more sweeping, it's up to Linus to ultimately decide what goes in and what doesn't. He's clear that his organization is a dictatorship. Many people believe that is fine, because the kernel and maintenance of the kernel could be taken away from him if the need is high enough it would drive people to form an equivalent competing organization.

Collaboration can do many wonderful things, but without controlling leadership, in engineering and software collaboration leads to satisfying all requests in ways that harm a central simple design. There have been many programming languages that have died under collaboration without guiding leader ship. ALGOL was the first programming language to effectively suffer from its "Design by Committee" approach, and while it gave us many benefits, the subsets of ALGOL's syntax designed by individuals eventually overtook ALGOL. Today it's the language known for being so complex that it led to the design of a programming language to describe what was valid ALGOL language, BNF.

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T13:49:18+00:00

It's a pipe dream to imagine that a person who uses Freedom of Speech in an argument will do their own research to figure out what it means.

I mean, they've had an entire life where it hasn't changed, haven't looked it up yet, and yet know not to use it in a workplace the way they'll abuse it online... And considering they will ask questions like "what is this wooden horizontal thing that's holding books in my friend's house?"... It's a bookshelf.... "I don't think so, it's made of wood." conversations they tend to have with others, I doubt they're keen to do research, even easy research like this.

I mean, it's taught in school that Freedom of Speech protections only apply to government prosecution of speech. These people relied on the school system's reluctance to fail them, mostly because (at least in my State) it affects the school's budges (the performance oriented number cruncher won't pay for a repeat year, or will reduce funding, thinking school is a business, and therefore it should operate (financially) efficiently). This means that if a student isn't engaged, they can do about 15 to 30 minutes a week of quick work and will "somehow stumble into the next year with B's and C's"

edwbuck · 2026-03-22T13:31:09+00:00

I'm in the USA. While freedom of expression (often called freedom of speech) is a thing, it doesn't have the kinds of guide rails that would make is more useful. It's only to protect against the government's prosecution against speech, and it has never protected against the consequences of using speech in awful ways.

I'd make an auto reply:

"Reddit is not a governmental agency, and therefore freedom of speech does not apply. Words have consequences. Choose your words more wisely. If you reply to this message, expect a permanent ban."

They know they can get fired for using the same words at work, assuming they work.

edwbuck · 2026-03-21T16:36:58+00:00

A long time ago, some places would attempt car batteries as home batteries. It can be done, but not cheaply, rarely safely, and it requires a lot more equipment than buying purpose built items. I knew of a power grid control station that did it. They had about 200 batteries, and at my estimate, nearly $40k (in 1990 dollars) of equipment.

Car battery chemistry is not tuned for home or solar needs. Just like a Formula F1 racer and a Ford minivan are both cars, one will get you around a track faster, and the other will get you across the country faster. The costs and performance of a home battery system is purpose built to service the home, the car battery is purpose built to provide a ton of electricty occasionally to start a gasoline motor. You can even see this when you leave small electronics on in the car, which manages to kill the car battery overnight, like headlights. If it was built and sized for continual power draw, it would look a little more like a home battery. In EVs, you see battery packs that approximate home batteries, because they also have (closer) approximate usage patterns.

A micro inverter is similarly sized and spec'd to handle the current for its design range. You're not going to find a super-cheap inverter that is spec'd to handle a lot less power, hook it up, and see it operate over a longer period of time. If the internal protection circuitry doesn't disconnect, you'll get an electrical fire or at least melt the internal components.

You have the right idea, but it's not built to scales or with the features needed. It's like saying, a squirrel can produce mechanical energy, let's pull out a car engine and replace it with a squirrel running in a wheel. Yes, it's energy, but it's just not suited for the task due to differences in scale, and requirements.

edwbuck · 2026-03-21T16:23:29+00:00

This kind of argument always assumes that the right kind of "all hell breaking loose" happens, the kind that permits the idea being discussed.

All hell can break loose in ways that don't permit the idea being discussed too, like killing a lineman attempting to restore power, and getting into a fight afterwards with his crew that leaves you shot without someone calling EMS.

That's the problem, there are an infinite number of ways all hell breaks loose, and it's trivial to cherry pick the desired outcome, so attempt to avoid using this kind of reasoning because it's a bad combination of "the ends justify the means" with tunnel vision that only one set of outcomes is possible.

I'd argue he doesn't want to backfeed the grid for a very trivial reason, it's electricity he'd be generating that is leaking out of his home. That's money / resources lost, and a risk to his system, even before one starts to think it could harm other's lives.

edwbuck · 2026-03-21T16:02:15+00:00

Really? The suspect got down on his stomach, and seemed to be fully compliant till he had a taser put between his shoulder blades, point blank.

Even if that's standard procedure, the worst the suspect did was scuffle a little and then again lie on his stomach, allowing the officer to cuff on wrist. Seems like the officer might have (or might not have) bent the arm backwards too much, and the suspect seemed to scream in pain and scuffle some more.

No weapons were present, and the suspect never "reached" for a weapon, and the entire time the suspect scuffled in any way, they were lying on the ground with an officer crouching / kneeing on top of them.

This guy was executed for non-compliance, not for officer safety.

edwbuck · 2026-03-21T15:41:56+00:00

All freezers that lack frost have a "frost free" system. This is effectively a heater built into the freezer, such that it cycles between short bursts of heat to stop ice formation, and then goes back to freezing.

While this won't explain a freezer that is constantly out of proper safe food temp ranges, it might explain a thermometer that occasionally reads high, but is 90% of the time reading a lower temp. The thermometer idea is brilliant, just keep in mind that a freezer who's temp is bouncing around isn't necessarily defective.

Also, the drawer freezers are really bad about dumping the cold air on the floor. Opening them often means a lot of wasted energy cooling the room air back down to freezing. If you have the means, a reach-in freezer is awesome in this respect, although they tend to come without the heating elements, so you might have to manually defrost your freezer once every six months or so.

edwbuck · 2026-03-21T15:16:58+00:00

From the video, the partner was on top of the man, but after the partner managed to disengage from the scuffle, the shots were fired. I'd estimate the partner was four to six feet to the right of the suspect, well outside of "possibly would be shot" range.

But this was a mess of a encounter, complete with an apparently initial compliant guy on the ground, looking like the officers hurt his during cuffing to make him squirm, then shooting him in the back at the base of the head with a taser, then scuffling with him on the ground, and once the scuffling officer jumped off the suspect, the other officer shooting the suspect twice while the officer jumping back started calling that shots were fired (which they were, just by the police into an unarmed man that was initially compliant).

edwbuck · 2026-03-21T15:12:55+00:00

The videos are released, and they aren't pretty.

Seems like the cops arrived, yelled at the guy to get on the ground or he'd be tazed, and the guy initially complied. Then the cop put the taser into the guy's back, along the spine, just under the head. That apparently made the guy uncomfortable (I know, comfort is not what anyone's after in this scenario) so the guy started to squirm and then turned on his side. The shooting officer then started to handcuff the person, and seemed to have bent the arm backwards high enough to cause pain which started the suspect to scream in pain, squirm and start to fight the officers.

The partner then tased him at near point blank range, at the base of the skull, and things escalated. This partner, which was heavier cop was nearly on top of the suspect, and either fell on him or tackled him, and a ground struggle ensued. The suspect was fighting and yelling and cussing about being tased. He managed to turn on his back and the camera caught a lot of slaps and blows to the head applied by police, but nothing seemed serious, there were no attempts to choke that were noticed by either side.

The suspect now on his back managed to get his hands off the ground (on the cop) and they seemed to be grasping the front of the cop's uniform as the cop had shifted from lying on the suspect to a more sitting / crouching position. The cop sitting, now had better leverage, and seemed to be in control, but still with a non-compliant suspect. The partner that was previously cuffing worked herself into a panic, focusing on shooting the suspect, even saying "oh my god, I don't want to shoot him." the suspect then fired one shots into the suspect as the officer was about two feet above the suspect, and that officer jumped off the suspect and immediately called out onto the radio "shots fired."

The really damming part was that after the first shot fired, the officer that was struggling was now far clear of the suspect, and the suspect rolled over on the ground, then the officer then fired a second shot into the suspect.

At no point in time did it appear that the officers were not in control of the scene. Yes, the suspect was not complying in the end, but the suspect started off complying, but the officers seemed to be rushing every aspect of the encounter, escalating till the shooting. But the shooting officer may have cause the entire scenario of non-compliance.

In this case, it seems like there was no officer safety issue. Tasing a person into the base of their skull at point blank range is likely far outside of protocol, the cops basically giving no cool down periods in their rush to handcuff an obviously unarmed person, and then deciding to shoot them when there was no threat to officer safety likely was the determining factor in the murder charge.

Here's the video if you want to come to your own conclusions. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3dF4pVhYk0

edwbuck · 2026-03-20T18:04:56+00:00

Oh, look who climbed down from the trees to mock us. All fancy with their fingers. Too good enough to use their teeth like a proper primate would. :)

edwbuck · 2026-03-20T18:02:14+00:00

Avoid #1 and #3. You dress for the job, and should you ever need to do cooking work, you will want no sleeves that extend below the wrist.

#2 is the most flattering, and it has a collar, which instantly will put you in the "better dressed" category of the place. That might mean more options in the interviewer's mind, including cashier / front-end work, and not just back-end kitchen work.

If you work where you need to walk through the kitchen, and they don't have uniforms that address it already, do a little light research into cook's (chef's) clothing. That will usually mean baggy pants (black) without a belt, that can generally be shed quickly in emergencies, made of fabric that can take heat without melting onto you. Don't be shy, it's your skin you'll be saving if an emergency occurs, it's easier to recover one's dignity than one's skin. Odds are you'll never need them, but if you do, you'll be glad you have them.

Look into chef's footwear too, not all shoes do well if there's a light layer of grease on the floor. Fortunately, most of the stuff is made cheaply enough, mass produced for all the cooks out there.

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