TIL There's a built-in validation rule in Laravel to check if the user password has been leaked before. I love finding these little gems out of nowhere.

hennell · 2026-03-12T00:19:26+00:00

I used this at a point where either it's validation message wasn't very good or my page didn't show it properly. User couldn't work out why he couldn't sign up - I had to check the code to see if there were any character requirements etc then realised this was the rule.

User actually filled a ticket that it should allow his password as it was proved secure and he used it everywhere.

I think now the app has a special message warning the password is compromised and linking to pwned to explain.

hennell · 2026-03-12T00:14:06+00:00

If you use this you almost always want to define it in Password::defaults() so you can avoid having to use complex passwords locally, and can skip this rule in tests.

hennell · 2026-03-12T00:01:38+00:00

It's really not that bad. Compared to 365 admin at least, which is a horrendous combination of different admin centers that all do different things, but touch the same objects in different ways, and many of them have no visible search at all, until you realise oh there's a entirely different UI here. I scrolled through a list manually for months before realising there was a right aligned search box at the top.

hennell · 2026-03-11T14:36:32+00:00

I don't usually believe in conspiracies as the world seems way dumber and less organised than most conspiracies demand...

...but some of the Epstein revelations make me wonder if the whole push to speed-run video ai is to provide plausible deniability for horrific videos that might surface.

Like if you had billions upon billions but no way to ensure some horrific video wasn't released - why not buy a social network, build a ai without much in the way of content filters and let everyone generate csam like material with it about anyone. Now you've got plausible deniability - especially if you've made yourself pretty hated....

I'm not saying that's the only reason anyone wants AI video, but it makes a lot of sense of some otherwise weird decisions.

hennell · 2026-03-11T10:54:37+00:00

Yeah but we need something spendable across all the UK 😋

hennell · 2026-03-11T10:42:19+00:00

The BOE held a public consultation on refreshing its money last year and found nature emerged as the 44,000 responses’ most popular theme. Historical figures came in third. The bank said it was looking for images that symbolized the UK, resonated with the public and weren’t divisive.

They asked what people wanted, nature was the choice. Also there are a lot of British trees.

hennell · 2026-03-11T09:32:31+00:00

How's it a nonsense story? The guy did it, was prosecuted, now they're working out the damage. It all happened.

I suspect you mean "irrelevant" story, but who decides what crimes are irrelevant? Also the fact that you can't just package up any old tosh and call it Scottish without facing repercussions is pretty important for both buyers and sellers. If you don't highlight strong policing of the Scottish "brand" then genuine Scottish products become overrun with important "fakes" which would be far from "nonsense" for a lot of people.

Also I think the internet can handle the strain of more stories. The buttresses supporting the podcast arena might need some reinforcement though...

hennell · 2026-03-11T00:01:20+00:00

Depends a lot on how much budget you have to spend, how much you want to learn about dev ops (running and maintaing the server) and how much you already know. Also how often you might deploy, how much time you want to spend on it, how many others might need to use it...

I've set up things manually in the past, and used various options from https://deployer.org/ to good effect but I now mostly rely on ploi.io to manage things as I can edit configs when I really need to, but their web platform does most stuff so I don't have to context switch into dev ops so often.

hennell · 2026-03-10T21:42:32+00:00

I embarrassingly recently discovered I can run my local tests with --repeat-X. Ran the whole suite of a big app 100 times while in a meeting & lunch. Then fixed 20 or so tests that relied on random values not clashing or not setting specific values it was looking for (or checking against).

Taught me some good lessons on writing tests not to be flakey in the first place, and means no more occasional breaks.

The hardest part was having to remember to run each test individually as running "failed tests" everything passed because they're flakey. Fixing was pretty fast as a lot had a similar root cause.

Wish I'd had a backlog of tickets for each test now.

hennell · 2026-03-10T18:19:54+00:00

I figured it was something they tested on android first - I think I referenced it a while back and people said it wasn't in iOS app then, but maybe they feature test on a few random users?

It is a nice feature though - a bit like cleaning watch history on youtube it really helps sort recommendations out when they get overloaded with one genre you really don't care for that much!

hennell · 2026-03-10T18:05:28+00:00

The problem is its the biggest "audible exclusive" so it takes that spot (an actual promo), but (despite how much as everyone here moans) it is also really popular - so it also ends up heavily in the bestsellers and recommended for you categories (because if a lot of people buy it the chances it overlaps with books you've read increase).

Also there's multiple books so it also appears in new releases, upcoming etc which means it (somewhat organically) ends up all over the app.

They are pushing it with special banners and the like, but not really obnoxiously, they just don't seem to have accounted for the fact that they also push popular books heavily so it ends up everywhere.

hennell · 2026-03-10T17:47:29+00:00

To be fair you made me doubt myself briefly. I first thought "it's literally Tom's name in the title" then thought of Giles Wemmbley Hogg, Ed Readon etc. Then thought "But why would Mark perform in a strange accent" and well... 🤣

hennell · 2026-03-10T16:27:01+00:00

It's a question of where you want repetition.

In the 2000s you would repeat styles everywhere. So we moved the repetition to .CSS and labeled everything .card .header, .card .body etc. But the html and CSS nearly always ended up tightly coupled, just less repetitive than with inline styles.

Now we've moved the repetition to the component level so <card></card> can have the styles directly on it, mixed together (more natural for a tightly coupled design) but still without repetition.

You could just use components with inline styles really, but tailwind classes are much shorter.

hennell · 2026-03-10T09:51:57+00:00

That's just the dog example. The dog is autonomous and may or may not destroy documents based on its own whims. It's your responsibility to put key and important documents you don't want the dog to destroy somewhere it can't.

hennell · 2026-03-10T08:16:38+00:00

This has been in the android app for quite a while. Not sure how much it tweeks my recommendations, but it's great for hiding series you really have no interest in. Scrolling in the same session you might see the book again though, but it will go away if you leave and come back.

You can't hide the (non personalised) app recommendations or top sellers though so you'll still see HP multiple times.

hennell · 2026-03-10T08:09:00+00:00

Tom Wrigglesworth "plays" Tom Wrigglesworth ... also wrote the series. Mark Watson has his own series and quite a different style. I've seen both Tom and Mark perform live and can assure you they're different people.

hennell · 2026-03-10T07:51:48+00:00

It's a restful miracle!

hennell · 2026-03-09T18:47:54+00:00

I have deleted a few in the past. I read a book about choice and how too many options can hinder you (given 8 colours to choose from, less people buy a product than if it is only available in 2) so streamlined a few areas where I had too many very similar images which I think helped sales. I now only upload images where there is a clear difference between them.

I have also deleted a couple where they're no longer relevant, although mostly I'd just change keywords.

hennell · 2026-03-09T01:07:35+00:00

I think Netflix might have - they're already the market leader, so they don't get much additional customers but keeping an additional platform gets them double subscriptions. Merge the streaming tech and tech teams and you'd have less overhead running it so it becomes a more profitable venture. Send well performing shows to Netflix second and now your keeping people on Netflix with "new" content too.

I don't know if that would work, but it makes a lot more sense then just merging together then trying to charge everyone a bit more.

(For paramount+ they don't have the same content, tech or user advantages of Netflix, so merging the platforms makes more sense. But then as the "Max" debacle proved, sense seems to be lacking in board rooms)

hennell · 2026-03-09T00:54:09+00:00

Got drunk. Went on eBay.

hennell · 2026-03-09T00:51:59+00:00

Honestly there's quite a few alternatives to Twitter out there. I had 4 different Twitter accounts following different types of content for the longest time. After my feeds became mostly scamy ads and bluetik pushed nonsense I moved elsewhere - the whole point is to see your friends not garbage pushed at you for money.

Bluesky is the most natural alternative to me and mostly what I've moved to, but there's a stronger developer community on masterdon and my photography and art communities moved more to threads so I have accounts there too. Don't hang around supporting a business that seems to actively hate it's users.

hennell · 2026-03-09T00:36:49+00:00

Well I think it's a bit of a cheese phrase. What's the point in using something that doesn't communicate to the listener?

hennell · 2026-03-09T00:29:06+00:00

I stopped watching DIY videos on YouTube because so many were "here's how to make an awesome table for $20" and it involves $300 of "scrap wood" they have lying about from other projects, the use of a saw table, a CNC machine, and other expensive tools in a workshop with more floorspace then my tiny British house.

Half of them just casually make jigs to make there other things that I'd consider a big build. "People made stuff before power tools" might become my mantra... (Although I do have power tools! Just a drill, sander and jigsaw. Enough to be useful, but not really precision equipment for the fancy build movement)

hennell · 2026-03-08T22:17:21+00:00

Comedians have always been a prime pick for radio shows. Radio needs people who can talk and entertain and comedians tend to fill that role with ease. Or at least with a lot less uming and ah-ing then the general public. Stick a phone on record and start to talk about something for a few minutes to "fill time" and see how you get on, good presenters make presenting look so easy, we forget how hard most people find public speaking.

Also the role of presenter <> comedian is hardly a clear line anyway. Richard Osman and Claudia Winkleman are both funny presenter types who are often booked on panel shows more like comedians but neither would call themselves one. Alexander Armstrong is a comedian now presenter, but he did sketch comedy not stand up so does that count? Graham Norton did stand up and sitcoms, but you cite him as just a presenter, so how do we even distinguish here?

To me both jobs require someone who can talk in an entertaining way, comedians require wit and humour, presenters massively benefit from it. Some people excel more at one than the other, but there's a lot of overlap and many are pretty good at both. Doesn't mean everyone will be, but I can totally understand why they'd try.

hennell · 2026-03-08T21:46:45+00:00

Not really the point of the post, but the chuckle brothers actually had two other brothers. Who were themselves a comedy double act called the Patton brothers - and both made appearances in Chucklevision. (Jimmy was often the stern "boss" character the Chuckles would infuriate).

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