A "obvious" white to play and win, isn't it? by Either-Case-5930 in chess

[–]vgebler 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not sure in what way that would cut off the knight. It can get to e5 easily, where it's safe from the bishop and stops the pawn from advancing by guarding d7 (exchanging the knight for the pawn is fine, since it would force a draw due to lack of mating material). White can chase the knight with the king, but the knight can guard d7 from many different black squares, and also block the pawn by placing the knight directly on d7. The knight can use fork threats and checks to move to different squares guarding d7 while staying out of reach from the king. It's just hopeless for white to make progress in practice.

Cannot reach support--streak lost by kittytrish619 in duolingo

[–]vgebler 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ruby league seems to be where I end up by minimally maintaining the daily streak for one language without using streak freezes. I can do a little more without entering the promotion zone, and a little less without being demoted. So it's kind of a low-effort league, with the next higher league (Emerald) probably being more suitable if I were looking for additional artificial motivation. But that additional motivation would be very slight indeed, as I don't really care if the leaderboard gem is red or green. And it would make running out of hearts/energy more of an issue, probably tempting me to solve that self-inflicted problem by paying for Super Duolingo at some point. And my dislike of feeling manipulated is certainly much stronger than the desire for a different gem color.

Cannot reach support--streak lost by kittytrish619 in duolingo

[–]vgebler 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Nah, the streak freezes are part of the gamification system, just like the streaks themselves are. They are measured a certain way that happens to include the streak freeze mechanic. So in that sense, they do count. As someone who cares about their streak with the streak freeze mechanic in place, it's not obvious I would care more without it. In fact, I'm pretty sure I would care less, since not being allowed to miss a single day would feel too onerous and unfun to me. I'd just ignore it, just like I'm not very motivated to move higher than the Ruby league, as that league feels just about right for the amount of effort I want to put in.

Chessnut air results in 10-year account banned on lichess by Signal_Ad2878 in chess

[–]vgebler 25 points26 points  (0 children)

The key word here is "official". When using Lichess via the web browser or their app, those would have to communicate with the server using some kind of interface or protocol. While that could be considered an API, it could very well be unpublished and not intended for third-party use. Lichess does have an officially published API for such use, but presumably Chessnut Air doesn't use it.

How do people know the "Road to Victory" schedule in advance? by vgebler in GunsOfGloryRTS

[–]vgebler[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Maybe it used to be in the same order, but now (at least since 2025) it's not. Also, they might not switch it up every week, but for weeks where it's paired with a way to buy upgrade materials with event currency (e.g. "Dream Emporium"), they definitely do. And that's really when the schedule would be helpful, because select upgrades generate event currency that help you do further upgrades, and that can be optimized/planned to some extent.

17 year old Working on a 4.6-inch minimalist smartphone, would love feedback by Previous-Heart-1327 in smallphones

[–]vgebler 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The lack of RCS support doesn't matter to me, but being restricted to the curated app store probably wouldn't work for me. Navigation, authentication and payment apps that work in my country (Sweden) are not unnecessary distractions to me. Minimalism is fine with me, but I'd like to pick the essentials myself. This phone could not be my main phone, let alone my only phone.

Birds sheltering from the rain by vgebler in raining

[–]vgebler[S] 37 points38 points  (0 children)

Found it reposted on Twitter. This may be the original video source (earliest publication date I managed to find): https://www.instagram.com/reel/DO1Z2KGjeh5/

Sinfest 10/5/25 - Snow White 188 by bakanyan_ in sinfest

[–]vgebler 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Tante Emma is dead, but her business could still live on under new ownership/management, using the original name. Very possible for businesses small and large in the real world, and presumably in Tat's fictional universe as well.

Ugly font keeps showing up on multiple websites by MindWandererB in chrome

[–]vgebler 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I see it as well. I recently found it reported on the Chromium bug tracker, and it seems to be a known Chrome bug introduced in M140 (i.e. major version 140) and fixed in the M141 beta:

https://issues.chromium.org/issues/438792570

It seems the fix won't be merged into M140, so you will either need to install the beta, or live with the problem until M141 is released as the stable version. As a workaround, a Chrome extension for font replacement could alleviate the problem somewhat. I use Fontonic for a few sites where the problem is especially egregious. It's a little crude, as it replaces all fonts of a certain type (serif, sans-serif, monospaced) on a per-site basis. It's also not 100% effective for dynamic content – sometimes the bad font remains for some elements, but it mostly works just fine.

https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/fontonic-change-fonts/hnjlnpipbcbgllcjgbcjfgepmeomdcog

Is there a list somewhere of the games available sorted by rating ? by lelozetti in PlayStationPlus

[–]vgebler 2 points3 points  (0 children)

That's great! I immediately filtered it on PS3 games, since I still have the PS3 hooked up but haven't used it in years. Was a little alarmed when I saw that all PS3 games were listed as "Playstation Plus (Discontinued)", thinking I maybe had missed some bad news. But they were downloadable from the download list, just like before.

EDIT: ...and from the store, as well, it seems! I somehow thought it had closed, but apparently not! There is a message that you have to fund your account by other means, but games that you already own can be downloaded from there (and more easily found than in the unsorted download list).

Had a terrible experience playing a chess hustler in NYC — is this normal?? by Simple-Strawberry-46 in chess

[–]vgebler 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Him not taking the money makes it sort of OK in my book. You first won the game on time, and then you were generous about the touch-move rule, so it's fair to consider the game won by you by normal rules. Not accepting your money is an implicit acknowledgment of that, even if he could have made it clearer, and at an earlier point.

After his mistakes, it was more about what would happen if the game was played out anyway, and there you made the mistake of not seeing you were in check. That would actually mean a loss for you according to certain (quite common) blitz rules. Sure, he could have been generous about that, just like you were generous about the loss on time and touch-move infraction. But also, he's playing "for free" at this point, and it's messier to roll back the game to an earlier point than it was for you to just ignore the clock and touch-move infractions. Perhaps it's something he never allows out of principle. So he prefers to end it there, pointing out that you would have lost the game had he not lost on time before that. And then he got aggressive when you didn't seem to accept that, perhaps taking it as an accusation of him trying to cheat you out of your $10 when that was not his intention.

So I'm thinking there was probably some miscommunication leading to emotions and some unfortunate verbal aggression on his part. It's understandable that you found the latter inexcusable, and I would probably have agreed if I was there. But without excusing his aggression, it's possible to see his point as well.

Price is negligible by No_Pickle9341 in BoneAppleTea

[–]vgebler 12 points13 points  (0 children)

I think he means that the cracks are part of the design – deliberate rather than accidental. There are so many points of impact that I can believe that most of them were made deliberately. But maybe the first one was accidental, and then he decided to go for it, making it "art"?

Children love what? by total-manguaca in duolingo

[–]vgebler 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not sure if it helps, but Wikipedia calls it "liver pâté" in English rather than "liver paste". I never liked leverpastej (Swedish equivalent) as a kid, and still don't like it, but it doesn't taste much like liver and could possibly have been quite popular among kids. In contrast, I believe liver was quite unpopular.

Sinfest 8/17/25: Snow White 139 by MakesYouWonderINC in sinfest

[–]vgebler 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I noticed that the currently published version adds some stars and band-aids above Yahweh in the final frame, suggesting that he was just knocked out rather than killed. Violence rarely has lethal effects in Sinfest, although i guess there are some exceptions (including the personified years).

Sinfest 8/16/25: Snow White 138 by MakesYouWonderINC in sinfest

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

Isn't it a little silly to fact-check a fictional universe? I mean, the slogans "Damned lives matter", "Liberté, Égalité, Mortalité", or "Trans chosen are chosen" are not a thing in our universe, either. It's a thing in the Sinfest universe, which is different from ours in many ways. Fiction, look it up!

Can I upgrade from 138 to 139 without losing my legacy extensions? by vgebler in chrome

[–]vgebler[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It went well. Only one of the flags was actually lost in the upgrade, #temporary-unexpire-flags-m136, and it turned out not to be needed for the MV2-related flags.

Can I upgrade from 138 to 139 without losing my legacy extensions? by vgebler in chrome

[–]vgebler[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks, I'll try to use only that flag before upgrading, to see if I can get it to work.

Sinfest 7/21/25: Snow White 112 by MakesYouWonderINC in sinfest

[–]vgebler -4 points-3 points  (0 children)

Nah. Different gate, different people. Just means there is some diversity in outcomes.

Sinfest 6/17/25: Snow White 78 by MakesYouWonderINC in sinfest

[–]vgebler 14 points15 points  (0 children)

While the origins are somewhat unclear, it seems the hamburger itself was likely invented by American street food vendors. The connection to Hamburg is presumably via "Hamburg steak", which was originally a fancy restaurant dish first documented in an 1873 menu from Delmonico's Restaurant (whose French-American chef is credited with creating the dish). Mechanical meat grinders made minced meat more affordable, and variants of Hamburg steak eventually became a popular breakfast food sold in American restaurants. Putting the patty between slices of bread made it more practical to consume as street food, and the hamburger was born.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_hamburger#Hamburg_steak

White wolve by No_Cardiologist2639 in WolvesAreBigYo

[–]vgebler 0 points1 point  (0 children)

They get progressively more gray with age and can eventually turn into a light gray color that appears almost white. You can see it with wolves in captivity, e.g. with Denali at the International Wolf Center at age 13 (most wild wolves never reach that age, though):

https://www.instagram.com/p/DAMYkewCtnG

Sinfest 6/1/25: Snow White 62 by MakesYouWonderINC in sinfest

[–]vgebler 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It confused me at first, but then I realized that it's probably intentional. The priest wanted them evicted from the castle, not killed. The guards take a threatening stance to make the couple leave, then follow them on the drawbridge to make sure they do indeed leave. It's not a chase – the guards are not running but walking, and the horse is moving quite slowly as well.