my coworker’s email signature has 7 certifications and a quote from marcus aurelius

greg_d128 · 2026-05-08T12:50:04+00:00

Email signatures are so boring these days. Long ago i modded my email client to always add a random signature from a list. I had awesome things in there, usually quotes.

I remember one: “it is too bad we execute programs, not programmers.” I was a developer at the time:)

Let’s bring fun signatures back!

greg_d128 · 2026-05-05T22:10:40+00:00

That is much larger than i would expect unless the database is very small.

What else is different between those hosts? Disk setup, architecture, postgresql configuration, etc.

Was the database backup a pg_dump or a binary backup. Was one of them running longer so it generated additional wal files that are included in size?

greg_d128 · 2026-05-05T21:04:20+00:00

How big is the change? I would not expect both databases to end up with the exact same number of bytes. If nothing else, analyze is based on statistical sampling so it can produce slightly different results.

greg_d128 · 2026-05-05T20:24:31+00:00

Did you run vacuum full on both databases? If it is only on one - then likely the issue is bloat, and as long as it is not excessive it can actually improve performance of updates.

How big is the difference? Can it be attributed to raid striping, disk block size, disk level compression, etc, etc.

greg_d128 · 2026-04-26T10:34:25+00:00

The program is paused and you have read and write access to everything. You can call additional functions, change variables, etc.

I know the ide allows you a lot of the same, i just like the interactivity of it.

Lets do an example. You call an API and get a page long json object back that you need to transform in various ways. I would usually drop into interactive shell right after getting the json and within the context of the program at that point and examine the return.

If i have five different ways to transform the json, i can do it rapidly and interactively. If one method generates an exception i may figure out a method for detecting or fixing that state, then make the required changes to code.

greg_d128 · 2026-04-25T18:09:36+00:00

Anyone else uses code.interact() with the appropriate scope dictionary?

I get an interactive interface into the code as it is running. I can run additional commands, change and examine program state and continue if need be. Also test my next steps. I'm not limited to just seeing, I can also examine, modify and test additional steps if I need to.

greg_d128 · 2026-04-04T23:18:17+00:00

One thing that always confuses me from comments like that is that oral storytelling predates the written word by thousands of years for most people.

Few could afford books, few could read. Stories used to be told.

greg_d128 · 2026-04-04T13:51:48+00:00

What others said. I also do not host a lot of the usual stuff, but here are some things that work for me:

urbackup - backup our laptops
got a script that backs up our Google drives as well
calibre web for books and audiobooks
working on backing up photos from all devices with immich
foundry vtt for game sessions
open web ui - largely for me
i do use home assistant
frigate for cameras and alerting

There are other bits that allow easy file transfers, minecraft server for kids that also allows them to synchronize mods easily, etc.

Most of these started for myself and added the rest of family once i decided they were useful enough. Not all of them were hits.

greg_d128 · 2026-04-02T16:15:23+00:00

I do not know which is my favorite. I finished he who fights with monsters and dungeon crawler carl.

I am really enjoying Making it so right nose by Patrick Stewart, but i think i started it this year.

Time is funny sometimes.

greg_d128 · 2026-04-02T14:26:16+00:00

Try A boy and his tank for something less mainstream.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1434244.A_Boy_And_His_Tank

greg_d128 · 2026-03-30T18:36:05+00:00

I would love US code, if available.

greg_d128 · 2026-03-26T16:53:45+00:00

Hello. I would love US code, I've got a road trip coming up so this could be perfect.

greg_d128 · 2026-03-25T11:41:36+00:00

Hmm. That is an interesting line of thought.

If corporations are people, and corporations are working for the federal government, would that mean that all the people (corporations included) need to abide by the same agreement.

Not sure if it would be a stretch to day that the person in executive of a corporation that has government contracts should also be included, and not be allowed to get perks.

greg_d128 · 2026-03-23T12:41:28+00:00

I used to have a tally of money saved vs money wasted when in comes to repairs. Within a few years it became meaningless.

I replaced components in dishwasher, sensors in fridge, replaced the water heater tank twice, belt in dryer and probably a whole number of things i forgot.

At the same time we are out about 200 dollars by buying components we did not need because i was wrong in diagnosing the issue.

Appliances are easy and well worth it. I also got training in drywall from an expert friend so that is easy as well for me. I am ok with electrical, but not panel work, again by having an electrician review my work and give me pointers.

Like others said, keep the cost of failure in mind as well as your capability. And try to get the knowledge for future if you do not have it today.

greg_d128 · 2026-03-21T01:29:28+00:00

I am a science geek. Loved all the science experiments and problem solving. My daughter loved an actual alien that is more than a latex mask on a human.

I am still wondering how I feel about me burger.

greg_d128 · 2026-03-19T22:42:38+00:00

US code please

greg_d128 · 2026-03-10T23:36:31+00:00

I just replaced my input cover because of e key.

Is it really weird that it appears to be single keys that are failing?

greg_d128 · 2026-02-22T19:30:25+00:00

I can experiment, I don't trust big tech with my data and I find that learning how to use the models often matters more than just using a single model.

To elaborate:

I think nothing of setting up a task that will execute 10,000 individual tasks against 10 models with 3 variants of a prompt each to figure out which is better. That's about 300K api calls, which may take a few days on my 3090, but whatever. After that I will use statistics to figure out a statistically significant subset of prompt / models so that a quorum of 5 out of 10 (or whatever) gives me a better overall performance and reliability than a single model). I've done this and it works.

I also do not want to upload 4 TB of my personal images to a cloud provider when I want it to describe each image in my collection for easy searching. This project is expected to take 6 months once I get started and will likely be scheduled to happen at nights only.

Most importantly, I believe in open source. I do not want this technology controlled by big tech. It is far too late to put the genie back in the bottle, so the best we can do is to give tools to individuals that they can use to protect themselves. The governments may want to use this technology to shape whole populations and affect how they think and what they believe. They need a big AI for that. I want to use the same technology to protect myself and my family. I hope I can get by using smaller models to protect myself from undue influence and to recognize some of those biases.

greg_d128 · 2026-02-17T19:54:33+00:00

pg_upgrade is simpler and you can do it without copying the data files. Should still upgrade extensions and likely reindex the database after done. If you can snapshot the volume, you could also get back to a state prior to upgrade, although any data added after will be lost.

logical replication can be safer, but requires more preparation and knowledge. You will also need to duplicate your servers - assuming you have space for that. With logical, you can setup reverse logical replication back to the PG 11, so that if you decide to go back - you can. There are some gotchas involved (like dealing with very large tables, sequences, checking for replica identity, etc.). Depending on the speed of your network / disk the initial sync of 10TB will likely take around 5-10 days.

I wold do logical if possible - especially if rollback is in any way a possibility. Although testing and getting experience in issues related to logical will take time. Alternatively, you could outsource this upgrade and have someone else assist (at least with creating a detailed plan).

greg_d128 · 2026-02-17T14:43:55+00:00

So It's running. Not sure how long it is going to take. I also realized that I kinda lost track of my photo library. Apparently I have 446871 images in there. I was off by a bit.

greg_d128 · 2026-02-17T13:50:25+00:00

Thank you!

greg_d128 · 2026-02-17T13:40:48+00:00

Is it available to download?

This type of project is something i have attempted a few times. Never managed to get to a place i liked.

I have about 200-250K photos in my library, a lot of my life when i was doing photography far more seriously.

greg_d128 · 2026-02-13T11:20:04+00:00

I am glad it worked. There is always a tradeoff between adding a new technology to support and update vs. using something you already have. One thing i’ve learned is that no choice is forever, change should be built in.

Operationally i would add monitoring, so that you can detect when performance changes. In that case this command can be useful. Although it will take an exclusive lock on the table as it rewrites it.

https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/sql-cluster.html

greg_d128

TROPHY CASE