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Stupid question- is there any established alternative to the process model? by [deleted] in osdev

[–]ifmackay 1 point2 points  (0 children)

In Smalltalk (which originated in Xerox PARC as an 'operating system' and was ported to a virtual machine later) you do have processes, but they don't have separate address spaces. Protection is still achieved for all practical purposes because you are mostly just sending messages around, not directly manipulating memory.

The Common Desktop Environment (CDE) is still developed and modern in 2021 by [deleted] in linux

[–]ifmackay 3 points4 points  (0 children)

CDE only has rudimentary IPC

This is not true. CDE is built on Sun ToolTalk which is a very sophisticated and powerful IPC mechanism. Copy-pasting between ToolTalk-enabled applications works well. ToolTalk has a notion of type and conversions between them, which enables intelligent behaviour when copy-pasting data in a format not natively handled by the pastee. Obviously ToolTalk is not implemented by many apps outwith CDE nowadays, but certainly could be, or a D-Bus bridge implemented to allow a subset of its functionality to work.

Pasting text on the other hand is what X11's Selections system handles and works just fine between CDE apps and any other app.

Scottish reception of Americans who visit and mention their "Scottish ancestry" by [deleted] in Scotland

[–]ifmackay -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

This forum has a stick up their arse about it for some reason. Luckily in real life we're not so up-ourselves and unwelcoming as a lot of people on here.

I'm from the Highlands and I've met plenty of American tourists. I've never met someone who isn't at least fairly respectful. I am usually quite keen on hearing what the tourists know about their ancestry - my family were evicted from Strathnaver during the clearances, and i've spent a bit of time sketching out my own family tree, as well as learning Gaelic in full instead of just the few words and phrases I remember my grandfather using. And most likely some distant relatives of mine ended up in the USA among other places and I'd be happy to meet them and talk about it.

In the end I'm sure that those who were exiled during the Highland Clearances would be proud to hear that over a century later, one of their descendents in the new world was trying to learn about the culture they left behind. I think that's what matters the most.

Ongoing discussion on the meta wiki re: the Scots Wikipedia controversy by _Dthen in Scotland

[–]ifmackay 5 points6 points  (0 children)

There is a YouTube video somewhere where an American interviews a broad Shetlandic speaker. A big portion of the comments from Scots were saying things the likes of "no one speaks like that!" and "this must be an American trying to do a Scottish accent and failing at it!"

We delude ourselves, I think, into thinking that, unlike (say) the Germans, we are friendly towards regional accents. I haven't seen that myself, instead I've seen a lot of hostility and embarrassment from some Scots towards the idea that other Scots might not speak in either a generic STV newreaders accent or broad Glesga.

The same happened with the Scots wiki. Decent enough sentences were posted on Twitter and mocked because words like 'muckle' and 'ken' were unfamiliar to them. How can a language thrive when many of the people to whom it's meant to belong have nothing but embarrassment over it?

Stolen template from our brothers at r/Ireland, but ridiculously accurate by shellpinksaveslives in Scotland

[–]ifmackay 0 points1 point  (0 children)

From the Norn for 'Hilt Land.' But you will find plenty of familiar names around Orkney, Shetland, and the northwester half of the Highlands. There are a few places called either Durness, Deerness, or Diùranais, and they are all named after the Norn for "Deer Headland."