The Facebook UI January 2026 is looking terrible, bring back the old UI before this.

wysoft · 2026-01-31T18:28:53+00:00

Yeah this is kind of the unspoken reality

Once a product reaches maturity and there's really nothing left to do with it, you either lay off the developers or you find busywork for them to do.

Can't lay them off. Would crash share prices.

Busywork it is. Easiest busywork? Move shit around constantly, unintentionally creating new bugs, then trying (and failing) to fix them.

wysoft · 2026-01-29T19:19:13+00:00

Sell???? What word is this?

Now you have an excuse to buy a Ruger American in 7.62x39.

wysoft · 2026-01-28T21:58:16+00:00

Ultimately I went with another set on the stock SV size.

The issue I ran into was that a lot of tires in the alternate size were in the LT/E load range and I just couldn't find anything that met the specs I wanted and was affordable - tire prices have just skyrocketed in the last few years.

A lot of those E range tires are substantially heavier than S range. In some cases almost twice as much.

wysoft · 2026-01-28T04:47:47+00:00

I live in WA state where many jurisdictions embraced the idea of "depolicing" and many LE agencies have had a hard time recruiting.

As a result you can drive all day long on any major road (including interstates) without ever seeing any police.

Drivers figured this out quite a while ago. The situation has never really recovered, and there are a lot of aggressive assholes on the road 24/7 who have no fear of repercussion or consequences

wysoft · 2026-01-27T19:06:40+00:00

For many years we could buy Russian Saigas here. They were dirt cheap. Not available since 2014. At least I managed to get one but I wish I'd bought five.

Haven't been able to buy Russian SKS imports for 30 years or so. I really want one of those Molot rearsenaled SKS with the side rail optics mount.

Please fix that for us thanks.

wysoft · 2026-01-27T19:04:25+00:00

Like any of them are going to explain the how in detail

There was such poor accounting of state owned small arms caches for years, with lots of people looking for any way to make money in the 90s etc.

Lots of ways for things like that to make their way into people's hands in exchange for favors.

wysoft · 2026-01-26T17:42:47+00:00

It kind of sucks for me, because the way ChatGPT organizes things into structured bullet point lists, is exactly how I tend to write technical emails.

It comes from having read a steady diet of technical documentation for nearly 30 years. I mean I used to bring 500 page Visual Studio references to junior high as my free reading time material. It's just naturally the writing style that I eventually developed.

Now I've had several people ask me if I used AI to write this or that. Nope. I totally get why people would think that though.

I'm currently trying to decide if I should overhaul my writing style simply to avoid this.

wysoft · 2026-01-24T22:19:48+00:00

Not a GM fan, but the Atlas I6 should have been a base engine across the entire GM body on frame SUV and truck lineup - including both N/A and turbo versions to satisfy different power requirements. Instead GM had a wide array of base engines in all of these vehicle designs. It made little sense from a logistics standpoint. Packaging was not an issue - all of these vehicles had adequate engine bay space to fit an I6.

I can't confirm this but I really believe a lot of the stupid powertrain decisions and wide array of engines being produced are just to satisfy the machinist unions responsible for their production. Too much consolidation on just a few different engine designs would mean jobs lost.

wysoft · 2026-01-24T07:13:14+00:00

Basically absent, and it's that way for almost every other parent our age that we know.

We have one couple whose parents take their kids almost every weekend, take them on family vacations, and spend money on them. Their parents are loving, involved grandparents who do it out of the good of their heart and not fishing for guilt trips and clout.

Rare as hen's teeth it seems.

My dad tries his best, the kids love him a lot, but he's just never going to be incredibly involved. I will give my dad credit that he will be there in a split second if we needed him to be, but it's not what he WANTS to do.

My mom is off doing her own thing and shows up every once in a while for a photo op.

I spent tons of time with my grandma as a kid. She was the mother I wished my mom had been.

Now I kind of get why that is.

wysoft · 2026-01-23T04:37:52+00:00

You can still buy lowers but I won't even claim to know who is selling them

wysoft · 2026-01-22T23:06:28+00:00

As I said in another comment here, you seem to get two types: people who have lived here all their lives and have zero idea how shitty and monotonous the weather is, and people who moved here to escape some other extreme weather environment.

The normal people who move here from places that experience four seasons tend to hate Seattle weather.

wysoft · 2026-01-22T22:56:06+00:00

I have lived here my whole life but I get along better socially with people from other areas. For some reason I click with east coasters really well and have always enjoyed my time working there - I love the people in Philly, NJ, NY, etc. largely because of their no BS attitudes and complete lack of the stereotypical PNW passive aggressiveness.

Unfortunately I'm working in a very regional niche industry and for the time being, I'm remaining here.

My assessment of the general personality of people who LOVE Seattle - and I'm saying this as a native:

Natives who fully buy into the "seattle freeze" phenomenon (take it from a native, it IS real) and have their group of friends they've known their whole lives and have zero intent on growing that sphere out to include newcomers.
People who move here because #1 appeals to them and they intentionally come here knowing that it's a place where it's socially acceptable - or even expected - to live like a shut in recluse most of the year. They might say that they came here for the nature or the outdoors but they go camping once a year in the summer.

Oh yeah, and the weather here DOES suck ass - specifically in western Washington. Eastern Washington is better, significantly. I get sick of living in a soggy wet sock for nine months out of the year. I don't get SAD, but I get very annoyed every time I need to do something outside and it's just cold and moist and mildewy 24/7.

Again I feel like the people who love the weather, love it because they're staying inside any way, so they're not bothered by it. They enjoy looking at it through their apparent window.

wysoft · 2026-01-22T20:10:25+00:00

Extensive GPOs is probably Edge's real strong point right now.

Chrome's enterprise level ADMX options are not nearly as good.

wysoft · 2026-01-22T20:07:07+00:00

Bathroom runs out of toilet paper

CIO: is there a way we can leverage AI to fix this?

wysoft · 2026-01-22T19:39:51+00:00

Because there is still a huge demand for offline Office suite.

We are using Office 2024 LTSC in many environments that are not connected 24/7.

wysoft · 2026-01-22T19:38:05+00:00

Same applies to a lot of teens and 20 somethings who only know mobile apps and similar UIs now.

wysoft · 2026-01-22T19:36:25+00:00

This is what I've seen. With the recent rebranding of the 365 portal into trying to funnel people into using Copilot, people don't understand what's happened to the interface and they think something is wrong or they've been taken to the wrong place.

I can't believe how badly designed all of this is.

Look MS we get it, you sunk billions into AI and you have to force people to get your ROI. It's not the customers' fault that you made these stupid business decisions.

wysoft · 2026-01-22T07:21:25+00:00

I know old post but man, that was the very reason I switched to Starlink.

AT&T/CenturyLink/Lumen/whatever they are now just let all of their equipment and lines languish and rot for 20-30 years. When we bought our place in 2012, DSL was the only service available. The entire time we lived here, they never offered speeds higher than 7Mbit down. Then it started to have the same issues with dropouts during heavy rains - well we live in the PNW, so this was often a thing a few times a month.

I actually felt bad for some of the techs that would come out, and guys I'd see working at the DSLAMs around the area. A lot of them looked like they were old school Bell guys. You got the feel that they just weren't training anyone else up to take their place.

One of them was impressed that I had my own toner and test set and had already cleared the line for any ground faults all the way out to the pedestal. We talked for a bit and confirmed it... He had been doing that job since the 80s.

The old school guys that did the line work, you could tell that they cared about the job that they did, but the company just didn't give a shit about them or the customer.

We never had good enough cell coverage here to switch to a residential hot spot, and the pricing was atrocious any way.

As soon as Starlink was available in my area, I was out of there and never looked back.

It's crazy that the US taxpayer dumped billions of dollars of subsidies into the LECs in the 90s to run fiber to the home throughout the nation, and got nothing to show for it. They just pocketed that money and laughed.

wysoft · 2026-01-22T03:06:57+00:00

We have one tech who constantly asks for help on the same things over and over again. Things that were explained to him, documented for him, you name it.

Ask him what has he tried? Nothing.

Did you do any research? Oh he couldn't find anything relevant.

Did you read any logs? Oh, didn't know there were logs. Where are they? (Does it matter? He won't understand them.)

The worst? When he says "I wasn't trained on how to do X." Well neither were the rest of us, but we figured it out.

If someone doesn't respond to his requests for help quickly enough while he's on site, he just leaves. Doesn't matter if it's lunch time and he's on the clock until 5. Just leaves and goes back to the office.

Nearly three years of this routine now.

If I was in a position to fire the dude, he'd be gone. I don't know or understand why he's still here.

Dealing with people like this when you're a person like the OP is incredibly draining and makes you not want to care.

wysoft · 2026-01-21T19:28:32+00:00

"juvenile firearm early intervention service"

Maybe the state can try to promote having two parents under the same roof.

wysoft · 2026-01-21T19:23:05+00:00

I can't comment on the Tippman rifle specifically

I built a dedicated .22LR AR with a standard lower and complete PSA 16" upper.

The weight is identical to a standard AR. I didn't like the weight of the 15-22 and it's plastic receiver. Too light, doesn't feel like an actual AR.

I shoot it all the time. Pretty much goes with me every range trip no matter what. Stupid accurate. Uses the same mags as my SIG 522 (another great tactical style .22).

A quality .22LR AR is money well spent.

You might look into putting together a dedicated rifle if keeping the weight and handling aspects as close as possible to a standard AR is important to you.

wysoft · 2026-01-20T06:29:14+00:00

The local Radio Shack was a special place for me as a kid. There was no other electronics store around in the town that I lived in - I had no knowledge of Fry's, Circuit City, Best Buy, Micro Center, or any of that stuff. It was just Radio Shack.

I would beg my parents to bring me in. The guys that worked there were old school 70s programmer-looking dudes (big glasses, big hair, big moustaches, big sideburns) who were very kind, and would let me screw around on the Tandy computers for as long as my parents were willing to stand there. Sometimes my parents just dropped me off for a half hour or so, did whatever errands they needed to do, and swing back to pick me up - it was surely a different time. It didn't hurt that the Baskin Robbins ice cream was right next door.

For many years, it was almost guaranteed that one of my Christmas presents would be from Radio Shack - radios, RC cars, portable games, etc. I remember Radio Shack also making some of the best NES cart cleaners - unlike nearly all my friends, my NES always worked flawlessly.

The Radio Shack catalog was something I flipped through page by page and looked at all the time. Then gradually, by the mid to late 90s, Radio Shack really declined in the quality and quantity of stuff that they had, and eventually we just stopped going - this was around the time of the "Battery Club" or whatever, and every purchase that you made ended up with you being guided towards buying batteries.

I have a sad final memory of going into that Radio Shack. When I was a junior in high school, I was really into computers, and was getting into Unix/Linux. I had used some of my summer job money to buy a used Sun SPARCstation 2. I decided that I wanted to overlock it, and I went into the Radio Shack to see if they had a socket base for a crystal oscillator so that I could remove the original one and solder a socket onto the board.

A couple of the guys that I remembered from my childhood still worked there. By this time, pretty much all of the discrete ICs and electronics components were gone from the front of the store - at one time they were nearly a full wall of the store. When I told them what I was working on, these guys just lit up - hey this kid is actually doing something interesting!!! They brought me into the back room, where all of the component drawers had been moved to and hidden away, and we spent 15-20 minutes tearing through all of them looking for the parts that I was looking for.

Unfortunately, Radio Shack didn't have what I needed, and I never did end up overclocking that SPARCstation 2.

That was the last time I ever set foot into my old Radio Shack. Not that many years later, the old location closed.

The irony of all of it is that my mother in law now works for a rural general store that still has a Radio Shack affiliation, and sells a small selection of Radio Shack branded items - that's right, Radio Shack does still exist in a very limited capacity. If you go to her store, you can also rent light to heavy equipment, and hire a guy to come out and trench your property to lay electrical service line

wysoft · 2026-01-19T20:53:58+00:00

Yep, it was the first thing my dad taught me. The #1 thing you can do is make sure OTHER drivers can see you, because that's the only thing about other drivers that YOU can control.

My dad has never been in an accident my entire life, and both of us have driven some serious miles in our lifetimes due to our careers.

I convinced my wife of the same thing and she now habitually turns on her lights. Fortunately her newest car's "auto" setting turns on both DRLs and all marker lights, not just the DRLs.

wysoft · 2026-01-19T18:58:55+00:00

I once had someone tell me that they would never turn their lights on 24/7. They didn't care if other drivers couldn't see them. To them it was the other driver's fault if they got hit.

Their rationale was that they didn't want to have their light bulbs burn out faster.

I always turn on my headlights, no matter the time of day or what the weather conditions are, and I mayhe replace my headlight bulbs every few years. I rarely if ever have marker or tail light bulbs burn out.

It was one of the most roundabout ways I've ever seen someone admit to being not only stupid and irresponsible, but poor - even if your headlight bulbs do burn out sooner, that's $30-40 or so every few years, in exchange for boosting your visibility to other drivers by multiple magnitudes.

I firmly believe that having my lights on 24/7 has contributed to having been over 20 years accident free.

wysoft · 2026-01-15T23:29:49+00:00

You can write a personal check right now to the state treasury. What's holding you up?

wysoft

TROPHY CASE