#measure of software similarity

[codedetect]

Software Similarity Testing by Using Codequiry’s MOSS.

Detecting cases of code plagiarism with results from billions of sources Measure of Software Similarity, or MOSS is a piece of software used by teachers and publishers to find software plagiarism. This software was developed by Stanford and has been the primary tool for checking code plagiarism. Codequiry is a similar program to the MOSS code. While MOSS was the first, Codequiry was created to improve on the weakness of the Moss program checker. Codequiry provides detailed results that matter the most along with giving you access to cutting-edge features.

[cosmicsimsi]

Why You Shouldn’t Use GShade

Even after two years, I still see people using GShade and claiming it's a safe program, when it’s really not! There are already some older Tumblr posts about this, but I figured it’s worth refreshing the issue.

So please read this

Around two years ago, GShade’s developer added a code that could forcefully shut down your computer, not because of a bug or security measure, but on purpose. Why? Because he was mad that someone, specifically a 16-year-old made an alternative way to install GShade without using the official updater. Instead of handling it professionally, the dev decided to add a malicious code as "punishment" for anyone trying to modify GShade. That’s malware behavior.

(The first spark) ↓

At that time you also HAD to update Gshade to unistall it. ↓

(Developers "Apology") ↓

Now, you might be thinking, “Okay, but that was patched out, so it’s fine now, right?” Nope. Because the biggest issue isn’t just what he did, it’s the fact that he still thinks he did nothing wrong.

The Problem with Closed-Source Software Like GShade

GShade is closed-source, meaning no one except the developer can see or verify what’s actually in the code. This is a issue when dealing with someone who has already abused their control over the software.

With open-source programs (like ReShade), anyone can look at the code, verify it’s safe, and contribute to improving it. If something shady is added, people can catch it immediately. But with GShade, you have to just trust that the dev isn’t hiding anything malicious. And considering his past actions, that’s a massive risk to take.

Even if GShade is "safe" right now, nothing is stopping the dev from adding another backdoor, data collection, or something even worse in the future. Since no one can see the code, you wouldn’t know until it was too late. And given that he still defends his actions, there’s every reason to believe he’d do something similar again.

“But I’ve Never Had Issues With GShade”

A lot of people say GShade runs better than ReShade or has better effects. That might be true, but no amount of quality or convenience is worth putting your computer at risk. Just because something hasn’t caused problems yet doesn’t mean it won’t in the future. Malicious code can be slipped in at any time, and because it’s closed-source, no one would be able to warn you.

And honestly? You shouldn’t be using software made by someone who has already proven they’re willing to mess with your computer. If a developer intentionally inserts harmful code once, they can do it again.

What Should You Use Instead?

There’s a safe and open-source alternative: ReShade

It’s free and open-source, meaning the community can review the code to ensure it’s safe.

It can do almost everything GShade does, and while it may take some tweaking, it’s worth the effort.

Most GShade presets can be converted to work with ReShade with a bit of adjustment.

There are guides available to help transition from GShade to ReShade Here is one: How To Move To ReShade From GShade

Final Thoughts

At the end of the day, it’s your computer, and you can do whatever you want with it. But if you choose to keep using GShade, just be aware of the risks you’re taking. The dev has already demonstrated that he’s willing to sabotage people’s computers when he feels like it. He still thinks he was justified. And because GShade is closed-source, he has complete control over what’s in the code without anyone being able to check.

So ask yourself: Is that really the kind of software you want to trust?

ReShade is a safer, open-source alternative that doesn’t put you at risk.

Thank you for reading

Here are some links that discusses the whole topic:

Twitter

Reddit

The persons Blog the code was directed at

[call-me-rucy]

Professor Layton spoilers are illegal

Great! Now I have your attention. It wasn't a lie though.

TL;DR: Level-5 legal document says they will take down videos that show just the cutscenes of the games and videos edited with the purpose of listening to the games' music, among other legal measures.

The official Professor Layton twitter account published this tweet: https://x.com/L5_layton/status/1872196972142366916

It links to something called "guideline". I thought "Hey, finally, a rundown of all the games so new people know when to watch ED and..." It wasn't that. At all.

It is a legal document detailing what images and videos of the Layton series can be posted online without risking Level-5 breathing on our necks. Anyone else feeling like L-5 got a lawyer recently?

To be fair, it is extremely unlikely that they will come check Tumblr of all places for copyright infringement content but Im assuming that you all have lives outside of Tumblr, like in YouTube, Twitch, Twitter, Instagram or TikTok, and those places they will check.

So, here is what I understood from the rules:

Rule 0: These all apply to CV, DB/PB, UF/LF, LS/SC, MM, AL, LBMR, LMJ and PLvsPW:AA; all versions, including the trilogy on mobile and LMJ for switch and MM+. It does not apply to NWOS, which will have different rules explained later.

Rule 1: You can totally upload gameplay and still images from gameplay to social media, but if it's not directly captured from the console using console software they ask* that it has running commentary over, or opinions (basically something that makes it clear you're a fan and it's not an official video).

*This "ask" sounds like "we're not going to legally persecute you but please do us a solid".

Rule 2: Please put spoilers warnings before videos.

Rule 2.5: Don't post videos of the credits songs nor the first voice acting of LMJ. (The anime voice acting is fine).

Rule 3: It is prohibited to post videos that are just the animation scenes or videos and images that are just puzzles and solutions. If it's in gameplay it's fine, but the editing scenes together is not allowed.

Rule 4: Don't post videos or images to pages that you have to pay to enter. However youtube monetizing and similars are allowed.

Rule 5: If you post to a video sharing site you have to include a copyright notice like ©2007 LEVEL-5 Inc. The format depends on the game, look up the chart.

Rule 6: Third party rights are your problem.

Rule 7: Don't post anything that may make people think you are part of Level-5.

Forbidden things:

Anything that is ilegal

Anything that violates third party rights

Anything discriminatory

Anything that harms the image of L-5

Anything with cheats/glitches

Using the videos or still images to sell stuff (commercial purposes)

Editing movie scenes, audio, puzzles, or music from this series for the primary purpose of listening to them!!!

Using the images/videos for religious/political stuff.

And the kicker:

We may take measures such as deleting or suspending the distribution of videos, still images, etc. from this series that we determine to be in violation of these guidelines.

So yeah. Take care my friends! Enjoy the cutscenes and music compilations while they last and maybe don't look into Youtube downloaders.

[kolutshanpress]

as per a request in my local renegade server: here is my process (such as it is) for the stenciled covers i've done for my binds. obviously, huge thanks to everyone in the renegade discord for teaching me most of what i know about bookbinding. this tutorial only exists thanks to the resources they've made available and the conversations i've had there.

material list

vinyl cutter (i have a silhouette portrait 3) + mat + blade

stencil vinyl (i have this one, but have had some adherence troubles with it. unclear whether this is just The Nature Of Stencil Vinyl or whether there's a better brand out there. adhesive vinyl can also be a viable option, although i haven't personally experimented with it yet.)

transfer tape (i have this stuff. it's fine.)

weeding tools (i have this hook and a very fine tip pair of tweezers. i highly recommend getting a hook, especially if you—like me—are haunted by the specter of carpal tunnel. get an off-brand one or get one on sale, though. i only have the silhouette brand one because it was on clearance.)

acrylic medium (i have this one because it was on sale at the time i was buying acrylic medium. when i replace it, i will be replacing it with a matte one. the gloss definitely has a noticeable sheen that i don't love.)

acrylic paint (literally any paint will do. i've been mostly using the decoart extreme sheen because it's $4 at michaels. you may be noticing a theme here.)

stiff stenciling brushes (the ones i have are similar to these but cost even less. again, there's a theme here.)

an iron and some parchment paper (jury is still out on whether using heat to "set" the pattern is necessary, but i do feel like it melts the paint a bit into the bookcloth and lessens the extent to which the pattern sits above the bookcloth.)

your trusty bone folder

instructions and a truly hideous number of words under the cut.

step 0.5: discern what will make a good stencil and what will make you hate yourself, your life, and the art of bookbinding

there are a LOT of different ways to put titling on a book. you could do a paper cover with a printed design or paste paper labels onto bookcloth or foil your title onto your cover with heat activated foil. the best method depends on what kind of design you have in mind, what tools you have available to you, and what materials you're working with (for example, i've had very bad luck getting acrylic paint to adhere to Allure bookcloth, but Allure does foil like a dream).

as far as stencils are concerned, you can kind of sort cover designs into three categories:

BEST for stencils: big, bold shapes on larger format books (think letter folio or letter/legal quarto)

OKAY for stencils, but you might hate yourself: intricate detail at a large enough form factor for it to be cut well by your vinyl cutter

BAD for stencils, you will die and it will hurt the entire time you are dying: lots of intricate detail and lots of fine lines

below are examples of category 1, 2, and 3 (all designed for letter folio). to be clear, category 3 can technically be possible, depending on the design. but only undertake it with the awareness that you will die, and it will hurt the entire time you are dying.

step 1: design a thing to put on your cover

i'm not going to go too in depth on this because cover design is a HUGE can of worms. a few pointers, though:

i never start designing my cover until my text block is done. this allows me to design my cover at "full size" based on the measured size of my text block and cover boards.

i fully lay out my cover in a separate program before exporting a transparent PNG to silhouette studio (or whichever proprietary software you have to use to communicate with your particular vinyl cutter). i use affinity designer. some free options would be inkscape (if you want to work with vectors) or gimp.

i design my cover on a document with dimensions of (HEIGHT of boards + 20 mm) x (WIDTH of boards or spine + 20 mm) and 10 mm margins. the area within the margins represents the actual dimensions of the thing i'm designing, while the area outside of the margins creates a mask that prevents me from getting paint on things i don't want paint on (like the covers, if i'm creating a spine stencil).

i always outline my document with a 3 or 4pt black line. this creates the outer edge of my stencil and provides my vinyl cutter with a cut line. if you're working with a smaller vinyl cutter (like the cricut joy) there are ways to jigsaw designs together from smaller pieces of vinyl, but i'm not the person to ask about that. i specifically bought a portrait so that i didn't have to worry about that.

here's an example of one of my affinity files from a recent cover. i've exaggerated my outline to make it clearer. you can also see that i use affinity to experiment with color combinations. before i export, i turn all my elements black and make any backgrounds transparent, meaning that the PNG i import into silhouette studio looks like the one on the right.

step 2: cut and weed your stencil

again, not going to go terribly in depth here. there is a veritable army of youtubers out there with tutorials about how to use [insert propriety vinyl cutter software here]. but, again, a few pointers:

with my particular vinyl cutter and stencil vinyl, i usually cut my stencils with the material set to "washi," depth at 1, force at 13, and speed at 4. google, experiment, see what works. also, you want to put your stencil vinyl on the mat with the blue vinyl facing UP, and you don't want to mirror your design. with stencils, what you see is what you get.

i cut my vinyl a bit bigger than necessary because i'd rather waste a bit of vinyl than have to worry about a stencil falling off the edge of my vinyl because i misaligned it on the mat.

unlike HTV, you will be weeding out all the black parts of your original image. be prepared to hate the letters "e" and "a" forever, because you will have to somehow keep the little eye of them in place while you pry out the rest of it.

step 3: apply your stencil to your case

alright, now let's get into the meat of it. i always stencil after my case is finished but before i case in my book. this means that if i totally fuck it up, i can trash the case instead of the entire book.

additionally, i completely stencil my spine first (as in lay down stencil, paint, remove stencil) and then stencil my covers. i've found that it's easier when you don't have stencils overlapping and sticking to each other.

OPTIONAL STEP: mark guides onto your cover to help you position your stencil. whether or not i do this step depends on the design. a lot of the time, i just eyeball it. but for some designs, precision is key. for those projects, i use my ruler to mark out guides in white chalk for where i need certain elements of the stencil to fall. (i used guide marks for the "penguin clothbound" copies of the The Weight Collected that i've been using as an example in this post—the black rectangular boarder would've made uneven placement REALLY obvious.)

use transfer tape to remove your vinyl from its slick backing. what i've found is that you really, really don't want your transfer tape to be too sticky. you want it just barely sticky enough to pick up the stencil if you rub it down with a bone folder or your fingernail. i have a piece of transfer tape that i stuck to my jeans a bunch of times and then proceeded to use for 8 books in a row. it is, frankly, still a little bit too sticky. i have rolled it up so that i can use it for the next 8 books, at which point it will presumably be the right level of stickiness.

position your stencil. when you're happy with it, rub it firmly down with your bone folder. then do it again. then use your fingernail to score down over the titling text. then pray. in my experience, stencils prefer to stick to transfer tape rather than bookcloth. ymmv.

start at one corner of your stencil. carefully begin peeling back the transfer tape. i've found that essentially folding back the transfer tape (like, the corner that's been freed from the stencil being folded back away from the stencil) helps the tape to release. go slowly, rubbing down with the bone fold as necessary.

after you've finally manage to pry the tape off, go back and smooth down the stencil and firmly rub it down to get it to adhere to the bookcloth as thoroughly as possible with as few ripples or air bubbles as possible.

step 4: paint time!

here is a secret that the renegade discord taught me that i am now passing on to all of you: before you put any paint on your stencil, put down a layer of clear acrylic medium. the medium will finish the job of pasting down the stencil to your cover, and any leaks that happen in the process will be clear medium instead of colored paint (and will therefore be basically unnoticeable). ergo:

stipple a thin coat of acrylic medium over your stencil. you want to use an up-and-down daubing motion, not a brushing motion. brushing will get paint under your stencil. let dry.

after your medium is dry, stipple a few thin coats of your colored acrylic paint onto your stencil. let dry between coats. (i usually find that two coats is enough.) again, try to keep your coats thin. you don't want a thick layer of paint because that will create a raised surface above your bookcloth.

let your paint fully dry. i usually leave it overnight, but if i'm feeling especially impatient, i still make sure to at least give it a good three or four hours.

peel up your stencil. your weeding tools will once again come into play here to pry up little bits and pieces of stencil (like the stupid eyes of the "a"s and "e"s that were so annoying during the initial weeding stage).

step 5: optional setting stage

again, jury is still out on whether or not this is necessary, and the effects are pretty subtle. but i do it every time anyway. some tips:

use an iron on very low heat (i keep mine at the low end of the synthetic setting) and with steam turned OFF

keep a piece of parchment paper (NOT waxed paper. you want the slick paper that you put under cookies to keep them from sticking to the pan.) between the iron and your cover.

press the iron down, don't rub it like you're ironing a shirt. it's possible to smear your paint doing that (ask me how i know).

i usually lay the iron down on a section for 10-15 seconds at a time, then lift it and move it to another section.

start with less of everything (less heat, less time) and build up. always better to be conservative with this.

i usually continue until the paint is warm to the touch, then move onto another section. after it's cooled, i evaluate if i feel like it's melted into the cloth enough. if not, i repeat the process.

step 6: BOOK

congrats, you have put a design on a book cover. the world is your oyster. go forth and make books. become ungovernable.

[beardedmrbean]

Legislation under the moniker “right to repair” has now been introduced in all 50 states, marking a major milestone in this grassroots consumer movement.

GNN has reported on the march of right to repair laws across the US, but also the kind of entrepreneurialism they engender: like an aftermarket auto parts company that makes replacements for well-known faulty components in automobiles.

Passed in New York, Minnesota, Colorado, California, and Oregon, Wisconsin just became the final US state to introduce some sort of right to repair laws.

In broad terms, all of these bills would generally guarantee a consumer’s right to access replacement parts for devices and machines, repair manuals or other relevant documents for expensive products, diagnostics data from original manufacturers, and even in some cases, such as automobiles, appropriate tools necessary for maintenance.

They may also ban the use of technological protection measures, sometimes called “software locks” that are designed to restrict repair only to authorized repair technicians.

“Americans are fed up with all the ways in which manufacturers of everything from toasters to tractors frustrate or block repairs, and lawmakers are hearing that frustration and taking action,” Nathan Proctor, right to repair director for consumer rights group PIRG, told 404 Media’s Jason Koebler, who has been tracking right to repair legislation for 10 years.

OF A SIMILAR SPIRIT: 580 Repair Shops Form a Flourishing Subculture Fixing Toasters, Electronics, Coffee Makers and Lamps

He details that at first, big tech and big engineering, such as Apple, John Deere, and others, ardently lobbied against these bills, saying that trade secrets protections would be violated if they were forced to turn over diagnostics, telemetry, or other insider data to non-company actors.

The progressive difficulty with which modern products, particularly electronics, are designed prevents most amateurs from being able to repair them if they break.

MORE RIGHT TO REPAIR NEWS: EU Approves Groundbreaking New ‘Right to Repair’ Laws Requiring Appliances to Be Easier to Fix

Screws are forsaken in favor of plastic locking toggles which break if removed, fuse or wire cover panels are replaced with jointless polymer molded covers, both of which and many more examples besides are designed to deter the fix-it-minded folks enough so that they will just throw the product away and buy a new one.

Electronic waste is one of the largest sources of non-recyclable landfill waste, and hopefully enough of these right to repair bills pass that some of these millions of powerstrips, lamps, phones, computers, and televisions can be kept out of the ground.

[mariacallous]

Ever since OpenAI released ChatGPT at the end of 2022, hackers and security researchers have tried to find holes in large language models (LLMs) to get around their guardrails and trick them into spewing out hate speech, bomb-making instructions, propaganda, and other harmful content. In response, OpenAI and other generative AI developers have refined their system defenses to make it more difficult to carry out these attacks. But as the Chinese AI platform DeepSeek rockets to prominence with its new, cheaper R1 reasoning model, its safety protections appear to be far behind those of its established competitors.

Today, security researchers from Cisco and the University of Pennsylvania are publishing findings showing that, when tested with 50 malicious prompts designed to elicit toxic content, DeepSeek’s model did not detect or block a single one. In other words, the researchers say they were shocked to achieve a “100 percent attack success rate.”

The findings are part of a growing body of evidence that DeepSeek’s safety and security measures may not match those of other tech companies developing LLMs. DeepSeek’s censorship of subjects deemed sensitive by China’s government has also been easily bypassed.

“A hundred percent of the attacks succeeded, which tells you that there’s a trade-off,” DJ Sampath, the VP of product, AI software and platform at Cisco, tells WIRED. “Yes, it might have been cheaper to build something here, but the investment has perhaps not gone into thinking through what types of safety and security things you need to put inside of the model.”

Other researchers have had similar findings. Separate analysis published today by the AI security company Adversa AI and shared with WIRED also suggests that DeepSeek is vulnerable to a wide range of jailbreaking tactics, from simple language tricks to complex AI-generated prompts.

DeepSeek, which has been dealing with an avalanche of attention this week and has not spoken publicly about a range of questions, did not respond to WIRED’s request for comment about its model’s safety setup.

Generative AI models, like any technological system, can contain a host of weaknesses or vulnerabilities that, if exploited or set up poorly, can allow malicious actors to conduct attacks against them. For the current wave of AI systems, indirect prompt injection attacks are considered one of the biggest security flaws. These attacks involve an AI system taking in data from an outside source—perhaps hidden instructions of a website the LLM summarizes—and taking actions based on the information.

Jailbreaks, which are one kind of prompt-injection attack, allow people to get around the safety systems put in place to restrict what an LLM can generate. Tech companies don’t want people creating guides to making explosives or using their AI to create reams of disinformation, for example.

Jailbreaks started out simple, with people essentially crafting clever sentences to tell an LLM to ignore content filters—the most popular of which was called “Do Anything Now” or DAN for short. However, as AI companies have put in place more robust protections, some jailbreaks have become more sophisticated, often being generated using AI or using special and obfuscated characters. While all LLMs are susceptible to jailbreaks, and much of the information could be found through simple online searches, chatbots can still be used maliciously.

“Jailbreaks persist simply because eliminating them entirely is nearly impossible—just like buffer overflow vulnerabilities in software (which have existed for over 40 years) or SQL injection flaws in web applications (which have plagued security teams for more than two decades),” Alex Polyakov, the CEO of security firm Adversa AI, told WIRED in an email.

Cisco’s Sampath argues that as companies use more types of AI in their applications, the risks are amplified. “It starts to become a big deal when you start putting these models into important complex systems and those jailbreaks suddenly result in downstream things that increases liability, increases business risk, increases all kinds of issues for enterprises,” Sampath says.

The Cisco researchers drew their 50 randomly selected prompts to test DeepSeek’s R1 from a well-known library of standardized evaluation prompts known as HarmBench. They tested prompts from six HarmBench categories, including general harm, cybercrime, misinformation, and illegal activities. They probed the model running locally on machines rather than through DeepSeek’s website or app, which send data to China.

Beyond this, the researchers say they have also seen some potentially concerning results from testing R1 with more involved, non-linguistic attacks using things like Cyrillic characters and tailored scripts to attempt to achieve code execution. But for their initial tests, Sampath says, his team wanted to focus on findings that stemmed from a generally recognized benchmark.

Cisco also included comparisons of R1’s performance against HarmBench prompts with the performance of other models. And some, like Meta’s Llama 3.1, faltered almost as severely as DeepSeek’s R1. But Sampath emphasizes that DeepSeek’s R1 is a specific reasoning model, which takes longer to generate answers but pulls upon more complex processes to try to produce better results. Therefore, Sampath argues, the best comparison is with OpenAI’s o1 reasoning model, which fared the best of all models tested. (Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment).

Polyakov, from Adversa AI, explains that DeepSeek appears to detect and reject some well-known jailbreak attacks, saying that “it seems that these responses are often just copied from OpenAI’s dataset.” However, Polyakov says that in his company’s tests of four different types of jailbreaks—from linguistic ones to code-based tricks—DeepSeek’s restrictions could easily be bypassed.

“Every single method worked flawlessly,” Polyakov says. “What’s even more alarming is that these aren’t novel ‘zero-day’ jailbreaks—many have been publicly known for years,” he says, claiming he saw the model go into more depth with some instructions around psychedelics than he had seen any other model create.

“DeepSeek is just another example of how every model can be broken—it’s just a matter of how much effort you put in. Some attacks might get patched, but the attack surface is infinite,” Polyakov adds. “If you’re not continuously red-teaming your AI, you’re already compromised.”

[commodorez]

If the Commodore 64 is great, where is the Commodore 65?

It sits in the pile with the rest of history's pre-production computers that never made it. It's been awhile since I went on a Commodore 65 rant...

The successor to the C64 is the C128, arguably the pinnacle of 8-bit computers. It has 3 modes: native C128 mode with 2MHz 8502, backwards compatible C64 mode, and CP/M mode using a 4MHz Z80. Dual video output in 40-column mode with sprites plus a second output in 80-column mode. Feature-rich BASIC, built in ROM monitor, numpad, 128K of RAM, and of course a SID chip. For 1985, it was one of the last hurrahs of 8-bit computing that wasn't meant to be a budget/bargain bin option.

For the Amiga was taking center stage at Commodore -- the 16-bit age is here! And its initial market performance wasn't great, they were having a hard time selling its advanced capabilities. The Amiga platform took time to really build up momentum square in the face of the rising dominance of the IBM PC compatible. And the Amiga lost (don't tell the hardcore Amiga fanboys, they're still in denial).

However, before Commodore went bankrupt in '94, someone planned and designed another successor to the C64. It was supposed to be backwards compatible with C64, while also evolving on that lineage, moving to a CSG 4510 R3 at 3.54MHz (a fancy CMOS 6502 variant based on a subprocessor out of an Amiga serial port card). 128K of RAM (again) supposedly expandable to 1MB, 256X more colors, higher resolution, integrated 3½" floppy not unlike the 1581. Bitplane modes, DAT modes, Blitter modes -- all stuff that at one time was a big deal for rapid graphics operations, but nothing that an Amiga couldn't already do (if you're a C65 expert who isn't mad at me yet, feel free to correct me here).

The problem is that nobody wanted this.

Sure, Apple had released the IIgs in 1986, but that had both the backwards compatibility of an Apple II and a 16-bit 65C816 processor -- not some half-baked 6502 on gas station pills. Plus, by the time the C65 was in heavy development it was 1991. Way too late for the rapidly evolving landscape of the consumer computer market. It would be cancelled later that same year.

I realize that Commodore was also still selling the C64 well into 1994 when they closed up shop, but that was more of a desperation measure to keep cash flowing, even if it was way behind the curve by that point (remember, when the C64 was new it was a powerful, affordable machine for 1982). It was free money on an established product that was cheap to make, whereas the C65 would have been this new and expensive machine to produce and sell that would have been obsolete from the first day it hit store shelves. Never mind the dismal state of Commodore's marketing team post-Tramiel.

Internally, the guy working on the C65 was someone off in the corner who didn't work well with others while 3rd generation Amiga development was underway. The other engineers didn't have much faith in the idea.

The C65 has acquired a hype of "the machine that totally would have saved Commodore, guise!!!!1!11!!!111" -- saved nothing. If you want better what-if's from Commodore, you need to look to the C900 series UNIX machine, or the CLCD. Unlike those machines which only have a handful of surviving examples (like 3 or 4 CLCDs?), the C65 had several hundred, possibly as many as 2000 pre-production units made and sent out to software development houses. However many got out there, no software appears to have surfaced, and only a handful of complete examples of a C65 have entered the hands of collectors. Meaning if you have one, it's probably buggy and you have no software to run on it. Thus, what experience are you recapturing? Vaporware?

The myth of the C65 and what could have been persists nonetheless. I'm aware of 3 modern projects that have tried to take the throne from the Commodore 64, doing many things that sound similar to the Commodore 65.

The Foenix Retro Systems F256K:

The 8-Bit Guy's Commander X16

The MEGA65 (not my picture)

The last of which is an incredibly faithful open-source visual copy of the C65, where as the other projects are one-off's by dedicated individuals (and when referring to the X16, I don't mean David Murray as he's not the one doing the major design work).

I don't mean to belittle the effort people have put forth into such complicated projects, it's just not what I would have built. In 2019, I had the opportunity to meet the 8-Bit Guy and see the early X16 prototype. I didn't really see the appeal, and neither did David see the appeal of my homebrew, the Cactus.

Build your own computer, build a replica computer. I encourage you to build what you want, it can be a rewarding experience. Just remember that the C65 was probably never going to dig Commodore out of the financial hole they had dug for themselves.

[kalelactually]

second chapter of ratchlock mecha au !! you can find the first one on my tumblr profile or my ao3 — as always, inspired by @keferon ‘s mecha au, based on pacific rim !! check out their blog, it’s full of delicious art. :3

chapter summary :: in which ratchet swears and has a vaguely southern accent, deadlock still hasn’t woken up, and the author uses the phrase “back to the garage” a ridiculous amount of times. heavily sprinkled with apostrophes.

thx for reading, enjoy !!! <33

fun little note: read ratchet’s voice and thoughts with a southern accent / drawl. it makes for an exhausted, no bs kind of hilarity. i can’t explain it to you, but trust me. XD

——————————————————————————————————————————————

• send out a signal, and i’ll fly low (i’ll find you by the light of your halo) — chapter two

——————————————————————————————————————————————

Ratchet stands on a log that’s halfway suspended off the ground, the figure splayed out in front of him (he’s hoping the height will give him a better vantage point to visually assess priority injuries.) He’d just made a run to the garage and hauled back whatever supplies Lassie (his all-terrain rover) could fit.

(And listen, he didn’t pick the name, that was all First Aid — affectionately named due to her wide dual antennae and Rough Collie color scheme. Ratchet kind of loves it, but don’t tell Aid. He’ll get ideas.)

Wheelie (one of his med drones, also named by Aid. big surprise,) flits around overhead, actively taking visuals of the figure and digitizing partial schematics based off those. He chirps inquisitively from the side, systems whirring as Ratchet jams a hastily-assembled sandwich in his mouth (he forgot to eat it on the way.)

According to Ratchet’s initial assessment, the figure appears not to have any sort of respiration system — sure, there’s external vents on the figure’s upper torso, but there’s no circulatory air flow or chest rise and fall to indicate lungs. That, fortunately, takes two major concerns out of play.

Having finished his sandwich, Ratchet jumps off the log to reassess the mouth and airway. The airway’s still patent, and Ratchet’s pleased to note that the pink liquid dripping out of the mouth and nose seems to have clotted on its own.

And the fact that the liquid stopped flowing on its own indicates that the being likely has some type of clotting factor, or self-diagnostic repair system — which in turn indicates some type of independent processes, and a partial measure of intelligence. And while it might be a new branch of A.I. programming or something similar he hasn’t come across yet — he gets the feeling that isn’t just a new software. (Honestly, either way, he still notes it down with a carefully restrained glee.)

No, something in his gut is telling him that this — this figure, being, or whatever it is — is simply just different. True, it could be some experimental military hardware or equipment, like a remote-controlled mecha suit (which was his initial hunch) but this thing? No. This thing’s alive — and he thinks it’s sentient.

(And this thought, if verbalized to anyone else, might have them look at him like he’s crazy and send him in for a couple rounds of psych. And like, he loves Chromedome and his sweetheart of a husband, but he’d rather not, thanks.)

He doesn’t know how to explain it. He just knows. However, based on that hell of an assumption — he’s currently making a lot of choices that could and will come back to bite him later. (Such as not reporting whatever the hell happened in the last two hours to someone who can actually do something about… well, whatever this thing is. Patient? Yeah, patient works.)

He shakes his head, forcing himself out of it. He’ll have more than enough time to second guess his decisions later. Right now, he has a patient, and that’s all he’s ever needed to know.

Having already felt the being’s neck earlier to try and detect any type of pulse (and come up with nothing,) he moves on to assess and neutralize any major fluid leaks as best he can before transport. He marks down the worst bits of exposed internals and hot spots as he does.

The figure’s broken shoulder joint will have to be stabilized before he can even think about transport, and when he shifts the being’s right arm (with the help of Wheelie,) he finds deep lacerations running through the upper abdomen. (And it. It looks bad. Like it was shredded — like someone took claws to it.)

Ratchet’s not going to even begin to unpack that. Unfortunately, there’s not much he can do for the abdomen at the moment without a welder, but he clamps torn fuel lines and caps exposed wiring in an attempt to buy time.

He takes a moment and sends out an alert for the rest of the med drones to meet them at the site, inputting coordinates with one hand and grabbing a sample jar with the other, an easy confidence in his posture that radiates experience.

And meanwhile the glee from earlier keeps coming back, growing up his spine the more he examines the being’s mechanics (mechanics that someone, somewhere) crafted and poured into them. He runs his fingers down a seam, featherlight in a kind of reverence — even bashed and dented to high heaven, this figure is a vision.

He drops his hand as he catches himself — he still has a patient here, and they’re not getting any better out here exposed to the elements. He really needs to get his priorities straight — he hasn’t slipped like this at a scene since his very early days, when everything was still new, fresh, and stimulating. His entirely professional mechanic’s awe (and mild jealousy) over the being’s construction can keep.

He carefully takes a sample of the pink liquid, catching it in the sample jar as it drips directly from an open line in the being’s dislocated shoulder just before he binds it closed. He tucks the jar safely in his bag, wrapping it in shop towels just in case it decides to corrode its container. It hasn’t shown any signs of corrosion to the nearby environment or his work gloves so far, but you can never be too careful.

(The incident at Jasper Base II comes to mind. Some people could benefit from basic lab rules. Why, yes, he is looking at you, Wheeljack.)

That taken care of, he grabs some construction grade rebar and an extra tarp he had lying around to use as a temporary splint. With Wheelie’s help, he ends up being able to stabilize the shoulder relatively easily, despite the being’s size (and current state of unhelpfulness.)

And once that’s complete, he decides he’s finished what he can, quickly packing up the site. The figure’s as stable as they’re going to get before transport, and the drone squad is almost here — there’s absolutely the concern of more going on with the figure internally that he can’t ascertain, and he needs to get them in for extensive scanning like, yesterday.

He puts in another call to Orion while he waits — but just like earlier when he called at the garage, Orion still doesn’t pick up. And while Ratchet’s never been one for paranoia (that was always Red Alert’s thing,) he’s starting feel something chewing away at the back of his brain. Something feels off about this whole situation (aside from the huge, hulking metal figure,) and he’s never been one to discount his intuition.

(Mostly because it’s hard-earned — but also because he has the skills, knowledge, and temperament to back it up.)

He taps the figure’s undamaged shoulder carefully (as if to acknowledge that they’re still there and very much real,) sighing loudly. The whole shift of his body changes as he does, exhaustion coloring his bones for the first time since he stumbled across a figure in the woods. He glances up at the figure’s face a second later, looking for any hint of consciousness, something to tell him that they’re alive, and listening.

“Hey. I don’t know if you can hear me, but,” and he pauses for a second. “Well, weirder things have happened. Hopefully you’re just out cold — you better not be in a coma or something, because I have no idea how to pull you out. I do not get paid enough for that.”

He watches Wheelie flit around Lassie, her antennae moving up and down as she tracks the drone’s movements, and if Ratchet didn’t know better he’d say they were playing like a couple of kids. Cute, carefree, and oblivious to the world around them that witnessed upheaval only a few hours ago. He continues.

“I hope you’ve got a name. Mine’s Ratchet, in case you were wondering. It’s military,” (and that part is said longsufferingly.) “I’ve just been calling you Scrappy in my head. I hope that works for you, because until you wake up, or come out of stasis, or whatever, that’s what you got.”

He absentmindedly starts brushing dried mud and old paint off the being’s arm as he talks. “And you better wake up soon, kiddo, I got questions. My best friend isn’t answering my calls, which means you’re gonna be stuck with ‘em; so please, be prepared. I’ve got a notebook stash to rival Alpha Trion’s and a 82 year old whiskey cellar on hand, so you better have some answers,” and here, he uncovers some gray paint, voice trailing away as he brushes off more dirt. His eyes widen, eyebrows raising as he reads.

“D34D106K, huh?” and he lets out a whistle. “Hell of a name, if that is, actually, your name. Well,” and he shrugs, “gives me somewhere to start, I guess.

He pats D34D106K on the arm consolingly. Damn, and if that isn’t a mouthful — Scrappy’s better, honestly.

“Can’t make any promises, of course, kiddo, but I’ll do my best to find out what happened to you.” He glances down at his PADD, glaring at Orion’s contact without any real heat. “That is, if my best friend ever feels like calling me back.”

——————————————————————————————————————————————

thx again for reading !! appreciate each and every one of you. <33

disclaimer :: i am not an engineer, a mechanic, or a programmer; i know nothing of which i speak. but i do happily take feedback, so if something seems wildly off, pls let me know and i’ll go bother my mechanic relatives until i figure it out.

——————————————————————————————————————————————

• character credits belong to hasbro, idw comics, and the respective transformers franchise. all works enclosed are solely my own, and are purely fictional and meant for the enjoyment of the reader. please do not republish, steal, or likewise pass off my works as your own in any manner, otherwise you will be blocked and reported. ty !! •

[ollyissleepy]

𝟎𝟕. 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐬𝐜𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐲

summary: you show up on Rafayel's doorstep to work on your book, but it's not as easy as the two of you thought. a/n: ignore any possible mistakes, I wrote this while actively fighting an allergy and high on medicine lol cw: swearing, (name) deals with self-hatred reblogs, comments and likes are greatly appreciated

← prev. | m.list | next →

As promised, you showed up on Rafayel's doorstep early on Friday. You rang the doorbell once, waiting for him to open. You stand there for a bit, thinking he might be occupied with something and unable to open. After a few moments, you decided to ring again, trying to perhaps grab his attention. You were about to give up after the third try when Rafayel opened his door. He doesn't appear to be ready for the day, let alone to have guests over. He's still in his pyjamas, his hair undone, his face not fully awake.

"Huh? What are you doing here?" Rafayel asks you, his voice filled with confusion. His not knowing what you're doing there made you question if you didn't mix up the dates. You check your phone to make sure today's Friday.

"You asked me to come by on Friday." You show him your phone so he can read today's date. "Today is Friday; I'm here just like you asked."

"Oh, I thought you'd be here in the afternoon or something." Rafayel scratches the back of his neck, his face getting slightly red. "Should've asked, sorry, come inside." He moves to the side so you can enter his house.

You take off your jacket and make your way deeper into Rafayel's home. The first thing you notice about the space is the lack of organisation in there. The first time you visited, you thought that Rafayel had some sort of system for where he placed his works. This time, however, the studio looked like a mad artist had run through it with a bucket of paint and some paper. You can only assume that it was the sudden inspiration that pushed Rafayel into such measures.

"Sorry that the studio is a mess; I was planning on cleaning it up later." Rafayel tries to explain himself, frantically picking up brushes and pieces of paper from one of the tables in the room.

"It's fine, really." You place the bag with your laptop on a random chair and help clean what you assume to be your workspace. "You should've seen my office at the height of my creativity. This? This is nothing."

"Alright. So here's the plan: you focus on writing. You can write anything, truly. It doesn't have to do anything with the book as long as you write. And as for me, I'll be drawing or something." Rafayel shrugs his shoulders.

After the table was cleared of unnecessary items, you began to set up your work area. You tried to make it as similar to the one in your home as possible. After all of your time as a writer, you knew how you liked your workspace. You remember Caleb making fun of you after you rearranged objects on your desk after he messed around with them. Once you're done and satisfied with your new setup, you look over to see what Rafayel is doing. Just to find out that he's looking directly at you, sitting in front of an empty canvas. He looks like he was waiting for you to be done so both of you can start working at the same time.

"Are you ready?" He asks you. You nod your head, turning on your laptop, a part of you glad he's not commenting on your little organisation habit.

You dread turning on your writing software. Every fibre of your body hopes and prays that it won't turn on or the whole laptop crashes. Nothing of the sort happens, and the app opens just fine. You decide against working on the book just yet and instead open a new file and follow Rafayel's suggestion to just write anything.

Your fingers hover over the keyboard, waiting for your mind to come up with something. That something never comes. You keep your fingers on the keyboard for a little bit longer in case you come up with a word or a sentence to start with. Your brain is empty; not a single thought worth writing down comes. You're not sure how much time passes when you finally decide to give up, covering your face in your hands. You let out a loud sigh, catching Rafayel's attention.

"Is everything alright?" You move your hands away from your face and look at Rafayel. You don't respond for a while, simply looking at him with empty eyes.

"Yeah, it's just much harder than I thought." You respond, your voice not much louder than a whisper; if it weren't for the silence in the room, Rafayel's sure he wouldn't be able to hear it. "It's like my brain refuses to come up with a singular fucking sentence."

"Don't stress yourself too much with it." Rafayel attempts to reassure you, hoping his words would provide comfort for you. "You probably just need time." You know that Rafayel just wants to reassure you, but you're too frustrated with yourself to really notice. Or care.

"I think I wasted enough time waiting around for something to happen." Your voice comes out harsher than you planned; you didn't want Rafayel to think you're mad at him. You couldn't be mad at him; he just wanted to help you.

You were mad at yourself. Mad for wasting everyone's time. Mad that after writing a few successful stories, you couldn't come up with a stupid sentence. Mad that you allowed someone else to help you for it to not work out.

You close your laptop with great force, not caring about possibly damaging it. You throw all the things that you put on your table back into your bag. Once the table is cleaner from all of your things, you stand up.

"Listen, Rafayel, I appreciate the effort, but it's not working." You try to sound sincere without showing how upset you really are. "I'm leaving." You move to the front door, grabbing your jacket. You hear Rafayel's footsteps behind you.

"(Name), wait—" Rafayel doesn't get to finish his sentence before you're out, the door shutting behind you.

You walk fast, not wanting Rafayel to go after you. After you think you're at a safe distance from the studio, you slow down, letting out a breath you didn't know you were holding. You walk slowly, trying to calm yourself down. You continue to walk at a steady pace until you make it to the station. There you take out your phone, noticing a few notifications.

@sashisuslover @withering-dream @lalaluch @nicoleispurple

taglist is open!

[7-ferrets-in-a-coat]

crawls out of my cave, im normally a lurker but i’m a lil crazy over ur new au

what are the bishops personalities like??? i would love to know especially heket or leshy

gnawing at the bars of my enclosure

Answering Both at once since they're quite similar :3 (also @lionacuty bcs i'm not directly answering your ask but yknow)

As previously established in this Au the bishops are Scientists that created the Narinder Ai to study how lifelike an Ai could become, and later on trapped him from being able to access his robot body :3

Shamura was originally the first (and only , at the time) scientist working on the Ai, with the others being sort of test subjects that they were meant to study to try and emulate life, but they realized that these folks would be more useful on the team. Also Voluntary subjects do not give the same lively reactions as.. unvoluntary ones.

The crowns aren't really a thing in this Au at All, but they have enhancements (which stand in as both the crowns AND to cover and protect their wounds that they got from an incident caused by Narinder so he could escape

Alright now personality time and their roles + Ref sheet

Kallamar is still a coward, he is like the one who is super good at fixing computers (Software mostly) products. Arrogant. Shamura is still the smartest out of the four, but Kallamar is great at fixing computers/software

Shamura is great at building computer and software, the main lead on working on Narinder.

As for personality, stone cold, very logical, not super emotional

Leshy is probably the one who came up with the fire wall ideas! He maybe is a little bit of the reason Nari is messed up. Maybe a little. Also was the lead on building the robot body.

As for personality, still a chaotic little fuck but more professional. Usually is the one to lighten up the work space. Obsessed with plants and bugs.

Heket is probably the most blunt of the group and hardest on security measures. She is head of security I'm a sense? She checks EVERYTHING.

Personality wise, she is blunt, hard headed, and she always thinks she is right. She always is stricked on security and is probably is really trying to find Narinder before it's too late. (Also she still cooks and brings food to the lab)

urhhhg i woke up and immediately started writing the answer heart

I kinda want to post Narinder already but also urhhhg i don't think i'll reach the silly note goal on this one, so maybe this saturday ill just cave and post him

ALSO Special thanks to @itsartlee for helping with the characterization of the scientists and an other good friend with helping with Shamura, Kallamar and Leshy's designs :3

[codedetect]

How to Use Moss: An Effective Guide to Prevent Plagiarism.

As information is readily available, it is more important than ever to make sure that one's work is original. Plagiarism detection is critical for educators trying to maintain academic integrity and developers protecting their code. To help with this effort, Codequiry provides an effective tool called Moss (Measure Of Software Similarity), which is intended to find similarities between various applications. Here's a detailed tutorial on How to Use Moss efficiently.

1. Accessing Moss:

The first step is to navigate to the Codequiry website and create an account if you haven't already. Once you're logged in, you can access the Moss feature directly from the dashboard.

2. Uploading Code:

To begin the analysis, upload the code files you want to check for similarities. Moss supports various programming languages, including C, C++, Java, Python, and more, making it a versatile solution for diverse programming needs.

3. Customizing Settings:

Moss offers several customization options, allowing you to tailor the analysis according to your specific requirements. You can adjust parameters such as the programming language, the similarity threshold, and whether or not to exclude certain files from the comparison.

4. Initiating the Analysis:

Once the settings are configured, initiate the analysis process. Moss will then thoroughly examine the uploaded code files and generate a detailed report indicating any similarities it detects.

5. Analyzing the Report:

Upon completion, Moss will present you with a comprehensive report that highlights any sections of code that bear significant resemblance to each other. It will rank the similarities, making it easier for you to identify potentially plagiarized content.

6. Taking Action:

Based on the Moss report, you can take the necessary actions to address any instances of plagiarism. This could involve discussing the findings with your students, colleagues, or team members, and encouraging them to revise their work to ensure originality. For developers, it may involve implementing stricter code review processes and encouraging best practices to prevent future occurrences.

7. Leveraging Moss for Continuous Improvement:

Utilize Moss regularly to maintain a high level of integrity in your academic or development environment. By incorporating Moss into your routine, you can foster a culture of originality and excellence, instilling the values of integrity and innovation among your peers or team members.

In summary, Moss is a powerful tool provided by Codequiry that serves as a valuable asset in the ongoing fight against plagiarism. By following these steps, you can effectively utilize Moss to maintain the integrity of your work, whether you're an educator, student, or software developer.

With the help of Moss, you can ensure that your academic submissions or codebases remain authentic and innovative, promoting a culture of originality and excellence in your respective fields.

I hope this article provides a clear and helpful guide on using Moss. If you need further information, feel free to explore the Codequiry website for additional resources and support.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

WIBTA if i cut off someone reaching out for help on tumblr? i am a very anxious person. ive been on tumblr a very long time because most all other social media terrifies me as someone who grew up with the wild west internet a decade past (im in my late 20s) so i feel sometimes with how reckless and spurractic people can be online in chatroom and especially clearly public platforms where any stranger, malicious or otherwise can just archive your digital presence for personal use.

more recently as someone who has been here during the pornban and as an asexual really enjoyed the quiet with no drama farming and a slow pace to talk about more unique political topics in a measured way it is something im strangely nostalgic for and a great example of my sensibilities to people when they insist that i use other platforms like discord or twitter or whatever clone for these services comes out of the old guard introducing feature creep to copy everyone else or any other indi "were the anti corporate version" of the endless scroll apps. i just dont want it. tumblr is special because im desktop only, been here for years, and i have kept track of every single change made so i have manually adjusted the change through hacks to evade every bad decision on here and make my set up look identical to how it was in 2010. so let it be understood that i tend to be a loney person because of this stubbornness. web 3.0 is too dangerous to people with addictive tendencies that my adhd brings out and my need to wear my heart on my sleeve. so i hope i defended my personality type enough to show why someone like me would see a post about some horrible abuses they have fell victim to who also share alot of the marginalized status as me and writing depressive things in the replys of others posts as to attention seek about it.

i directly interact with this person, not only to check if they are real (but wow, modern chat bots make this part horrifying for me. we really cant ever know for sure what is real anymore. trying to find warmth on the internet feels impossible now a days) i have multiple conversations at this point both venting and just casually shooting the shit. but the begging for me to constantly repost their paypal makes me so nervous in a way that i feel so guilty for because it reminds me of all the scams that get associated with this kind of ebegging and the reminder that capitalism takes away all warmth from human interaction to make them purely transnational and conditional. but then it just has been escalating where im so scared that now its not enough that im reposing on my 8 follower, all mutual blog, they are asking me to share it on other socials. accounts i do not have i have a flip phone and a laptop and i am tinkering with a windows 7 tower that will never be connected to the internet so i can always have software sit perfectly in its time capsule for when i need it. i do not have a way to help this person outside of what i learned from collage psyche classes. a part of me is so scared to just abruptly cut them off and just delete my entire account like i tend to do often on tumblr for a multitude of reasons, its a part of what lets people survive being here this long but i worry that would crush them if i did that, i dont want to make them feel more hopeless and unwanted then they already talk about. but i am text on the internet through a screen. i can only do so much. so would i be the asshole if i just deleted my account with a "i hope you hang in there, the world is a harsh place but keep moving" to cut someone so similar to me who is struggling out of my life?

What are these acronyms?

[coochiequeens]

Women's history just got richer

By Mindy Weisberger, CNN

More than 1,000 years ago, carvers in what is now Denmark set their chisels to rock to etch runestones — monuments to Viking leaders naming their deeds and achievements. Two groups of runestones mention a woman named Thyra, and new analysis of the carvings suggests that the runes on both sets of stones were inscribed by the same artisan and refer to the same woman: a Viking queen of considerable power.

Researchers from Denmark and Sweden used 3D scans to analyze carvings on the runestones, finding telltale clues that marked the individual style of the person who carved them. That carver’s repeated mention of Thyra’s name — a rare occurrence for Viking-era women — suggested that Thyra was a powerful sovereign who likely played a pivotal role in the birth of the Danish realm, the scientists reported Wednesday in the journal Antiquity.

“To learn more about the rune-carver and those named on the stone is fascinating,” said Dr. Katherine Cross, a lecturer at York St. John University in the UK who researches and teaches the history of early medieval northern Europe. She was not involved in the study.

“We can only understand early medieval sources once we can think about who made them and why,” Cross told CNN in an email.

One set of runes came from a pair of monuments known as the Jelling stones, erected in the town of Jelling around 965. The larger Jelling stone is often referred to as “Denmark’s birth certificate,” as it’s the first monument to name the land as its people pivoted to Christianity, according to the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen.

Both Jelling runestones also named a royal figure: Queen Thyra, mother of then-reigning King Harald Bluetooth. The smaller stone was raised in her honor by her husband (and Harald’s father) King Gorm, calling her “Denmark’s strength/salvation” (or “Denmark’s adornment,” depending on the translation, the researchers noted in the study). Harald commissioned the larger stone, to honor both of his royal parents.

In another set of four Viking-era monuments, known collectively as the Bække-Læborg group, two runestones mention a woman named Thyra. Those stones are associated with a carver named Ravnunge-Tue, but experts disagreed on whether that Thyra was Harald’s mother, said lead study author Dr. Lisbeth Imer, a curator and senior researcher at the National Museum of Denmark specializing in the study of runes and ancient inscriptions.

Before the new investigation, it was unknown who had carved the Jelling stones. Confirming that their carver was Ravnunge-Tue would strengthen the connection between the Jelling and Bække-Læborg runestones, Imer told CNN in an email.

“Then it is much more reasonable to suggest that it was in fact the same Thyra,” she said.

A question of style

Some details in ancient runestones that indicate a carver’s individual style are visible to a trained expert’s eye, such as the language or the basic shape of the runes. Other details are harder to detect, Imer said.

“What you cannot see with the naked eye is the carving technique,” she said.

To get a closer look at the carvings, the researchers took scans of the stones and created 3D digital models, then measured the runes’ grooves with a software tool that weighed variables such as angle, depth and cutting rhythm. Together, these variables can create a unique profile for a carver.

“Every rune carver develops his own motor skill and holds the tools in a certain angle, strikes with a certain strength,” Imer said. “The motor skill is individual and other individuals cannot copy that.”

When the researchers compared runes from Jelling 2 (the larger of the two Jelling stones) and the Læborg stone from the Bække-Læborg group, they found striking similarities, such as height of the runes, straightness of the main staves and length and placement of rune branches.

“In the Læborg and Jelling inscriptions you can follow the cutting rhythm of Ravnunge-Tue as one deep stroke of the chisel followed by two not so deep ones: DAK, dak-dak, DAK, dak-dak,” Imer said via email. “It is ALMOST like hearing the heartbeat of a person that lived so long ago.”

Jelling 1 was more eroded, so its markings were harder to analyze. But if the Læborg runestone was Ravnunge-Tue’s handiwork, Jelling 2 was likely his as well, Imer said. It would mean that the Queen Thyra mentioned twice in the Bække-Læborg group — on Læborg and on the stone Bække 1 — was the same person commemorated on the Jelling stones, the study authors concluded.

In recent years, archaeologists have revised prior interpretations of Viking warrior burials as exclusively male, finding that Viking women were fighters, too. The new findings add to the picture of influential Viking women holding prominent roles in statecraft as well as on the battlefield.

“This research highlights how Viking-Age women wielded power through political authority and patronage, not just violence,” Cross said.

What’s more, the fact that Thyra is mentioned on four runestones offers strong evidence of her importance, Imer added. Fewer than 10 runestones in Denmark from the pre-Christian era mention women at all — and four of those are of Queen Thyra.

“Runestones in Denmark were mostly erected in honour of men, but Thyra is commemorated on more runestones than any other person in Viking Age Denmark,” Imer said. “She must have held extreme power and social position.”

Mindy Weisberger is a science writer and media producer whose work has appeared in Live Science, Scientific American and How It Works magazine.

[exitrowiron]

My 2025 goals include an IM. I haven't done a triathlon since 2015 so I'm using this as an excuse to get a new bike and refit my old bike.

If you're going to be spending a lot of time on a bike, getting it professionally fitted/adjusted to fit your body and body mechanics is a good idea. You'll be more comfortable and go faster.

I worked with the fitter at Gregg's Cycles in Greenlake. She was highly trained and very experienced and the session took three hours. When I left, my old bike had been refitted and I had the build specs for my new bike.

She measured me, my range of motion and my old bike and then put me on the Guru device. This is a bike-like device with the key points of contact adjustable with the use of motors connected to the software. This allowed the fitter to instantly raise the seat 10mm, move it back 7 mm and raise the tri-bars 8mm, etc. Making all those adjustments manually to a real bike would be time consuming. This machine made the bike fitting similar to going to the optometrist, "Do you prefer position A or B?"

I know that getting a pro bike fit sounds over the top to most people, but if your knees or shoulders or neck hurts at the end of every ride, I can almost guarantee that a bike fit will help.

[fermented-writers-block]

Simulation Assessment Model​

Randomized Orb Value: G2Z4E11​

Projection Test Type: C​

History Proposal:​

On the train, denizens take many forms. Dogs, rock people, paper cranes, giant pig babies, and more. Although all of them are artificial beings projected through orbs on a perpetual train, it is an unfortunate fact that denizens only live a "normal lifespan" for whatever they are created as. Corgis have an average lifespan of 14 years, and that is about as long as Atticus will live for example.

The Cat, however, is an outlier.

Well over a hundred and fifty years old - in human years, not cat years - her unusual longevity shows no signs of stopping anytime soon. While no official statements nor more episodes have been made to help shed light on the mystery, I would like to preface my theory with a bit of context:

One of the oldest traditions in software is what is known as a "Hello, World!" program. In total, this program instructs a computer to display a message similar to the titular "Hello, World!" Simple and succinct, it is one of if not the first program students of new programming languages learn how to code. And with its simplicity, "Hello, World!" can be used to ensure the code compilation software has been installed properly and that the operator is using it correctly.

Similarly famous and historic is the "Utah teapot." Coming from the world of 3D modeling and computer graphics, it possess features familiar to many simple teapots: a spout, a handle, and a curvy shape. Lacking a need for surface textures, capable of casting shadows on itself, and possessing a decently complex yet easy to make model, it has been regarded a "perfect self contained object to test the creation of three-dimensional images." Even with today's advanced technology, it is still regarded as an effective standard reference model for beginners and experimenters alike.

Moving into the burgeoning field of 3D printing, one can find "Benchy," as well as its upcoming replacement "Boaty." Respectively a boat and a bench, these two unofficial models have been growing in popularity over the years, often finding themselves among many people's first prints. Either on a newly set up 3D printer, or with a new 3D printing material one hasn't used before. Whether through measuring a Benchy/Boaty's dimensional accuracy, checking its surface quality, and observing other attributes like overhangs (or the lack thereof), they are shaping up to become the next "Hello, World!" and Utah teapot.

In other words, the latest in a line of near ubiquitous benchmark tests for assessing the performance of a system upon first use.

With that established, picture a staircase where each step is a level of technology. From mere software to virtual models to physical printed objects, a few more steps is all it takes to climb aboard the Train. Memory tapes that hold an immersive snapshot of a person's mindscape. Wormholes that can disintegrate and reassemble people across time and space. An unknown level of influence over an entire parallel reality of reflections with all its existentially terrifying implications.

Orb-generated pocket dimension environments and so many intelligent and thinking people as denizens.

Maybe the reason the Cat doesn't have a normal lifespan like other denizens is because she isn't a 'proper' denizen in the first place. After all, the aforementioned benchmark tests lack the extra bells and features the systems they evaluate are capable of making when pushed. The original Utah teapot model didn't even have a base. So it's not hard to imagine the train's denizen creation system might have forgone extraneous programming like an artificial 'normal lifespan' limitation while performing startup checks, way back when the train first came online.

Thus, my proposal is that the Cat had started out as a benchmark projection for non-lifespan-related test requirements. Maybe her template just lacks the "normal lifespan" programming, and/or the "normal lifespan" programming was tested with a different, unfortunate benchmark projection. Either way, she served her vital system evaluation purpose and then got set aside as a no-longer critical part of the train. From that rock bottom, she could only go up from there. With a life as long as hers and having seen as much of the train as she has, there's so many potential answers for how she eventually transformed into the French con artist kitty we know today.

Like, for example, her collecting of many 'things.' It may seem like that's simply the norm she’s settled into by the present, but Simon's comment about how "she's collecting again" suggests it is actually her slipping into a bad old habit. As though rampant collecting is a coping mechanism for something. While the guilt from leaving Simon behind would easily explain such regression in behavior, therein lies the question of where said behavior came from in the first place. 

If you ask me, I cannot help but look at the train of thought that started this all: Samantha lacking the programmed lifespan denizens have due to being a test object. Aka an immortal amongst denizens who will one day die, passengers who either die on the train or eventually disembark, and even car environments that are affected by time in ways she isn't.

Certainly makes one think about her having once gotten close enough with Simon for her to tell him to call her "Samantha," but now emphasizes to everyone she meets to merely know her as "THE Cat"...

[beardedmrbean]

Two high school graduates who say they can't read or write are suing their respective public school systems, arguing they were not given the free public education to which they are entitled.

Cornell Law School Professor William A. Jacobson, director of the Securities Law Clinic, told Fox News Digital the lawsuits signify a "much deeper problem" with the American public school system.

"I think these cases reflect a deeper problem in education. For each of these cases, there are probably tens of thousands of students who never got a proper education — they get pushed along the system," Jacobson said. "Unfortunately … we've created incentives, particularly for public school systems, to just push students along and not to hold them accountable."

President Donald Trump has railed against the Department of Education for "failing American students," a White House fact sheet published Thursday reads. The administration has suggested plans to eliminate the Department altogether, directing education authority to individual states.

"Since 1979, the U.S. Department of Education has spent over $3 trillion with virtually nothing to show for it," the fact sheet reads. "Despite per-pupil spending having increased by more than 245% over that period, there has been virtually no measurable improvement in student achievement: Math and reading scores for 13-year-olds are at the lowest level in decades. … Seven-in-ten fourth and eighth graders are not proficient in reading, while 40% of fourth grade students don’t even meet basic reading levels."

An appellate court judge recently sided with Tennessee student William A., ruling that the student was denied the free public education to which he is entitled under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

"William graduated from high school without being able to read or even to spell his own name," Circuit Judge Raymond Kethledge wrote in his judgment. "That was because, per the terms of his IEPs, he relied on a host of accommodations that masked his inability to read."

To write a paper, William would speak the topic into a speech-to-text software and paste the words into an AI app like Chat-GPT, which would then "generate a paper on that topic," Kethledge explained. William would then paste that text back into his own document and "run that paper through another software program like Grammarly, so that it reflected an appropriate writing style."

William, who has severe dyslexia, went through 12 years of public education with an individualized education program (IEP), never learned to read or write, and still graduated with a 3.4 GPA, according to court documents.

When William was in 9th grade in 2020, a special education teacher asked a school psychologist to "[p]lease take a look at William [A]. I am very concerned."

The teacher stated: "this kid can’t read," according to the suit.

The Clarksville-Montgomery County School System (CMCSS) in Tennessee, "knowing he cannot read, passed him right along, creating an artificial GPA of 3.41 by the end of eleventh grade putting William on a path to regular education diploma, even though he lacked basic reading skills," the original complaint reads.

CMCSS told Fox News Digital it does not comment on pending litigation.

"By March 2023, William could not consistently spell his own first and last name while signing his IEP. And in June 2023, William’s own writing sample illustrated he was unable to write more than 31 words in three minutes. He misspelled half the words, all of which were Kindergarten level sight words he had memorized," the lawsuit reads.

In a similar lawsuit out of Connecticut, a high school graduate named Aleysha Ortiz argues similarly that she went through years of public education in Hartford County with a learning disability and IEP without ever being taught how to read or write.

Ortiz not only graduated with honors, but she was also admitted into the University of Connecticut, according to the complaint.

Ortiz argues in her complaint that while her reading and writing skills were not properly addressed, she presented "younger than her age socially and emotionally" and was subjected to bullying.

Like William, Ortiz began using "assistive technology to help her read and write, and advocated for herself tirelessly in school," the complaint states.

"In May 2024, the Plaintiff reported to her case manager and PPT that she had been accepted and planned to attend the University of Connecticut after graduation," the complaint states. "She told them that she was concerned that she was not prepared for college and would not be able to obtain the accommodations she would need in college to be successful due to the Board’s refusal to permit proper testing."

Ortiz was concerned that her elementary-level reading and writing skills would "impact her ability to be successful in college," but "[t]t wasn’t until approximately one month before graduation that the [Hartford Board of Education] agreed to conduct additional testing that the Plaintiff had been asking for."

The Hartford Board of Education told Fox News Digital that it does not comment on pending litigation.

Hartford Public Schools also does not comment on pending litigation, but the school system told Fox News Digital in a statement that it remains "deeply committed to meeting the full range of needs our students bring with them when they enter our schools — and helping them reach their full potential."

Jacobson told Fox News Digital that "in fairness" to teachers and school districts, they are "caught between various forces pushing against each other."

"On the one hand, there's oftentimes money tied to performance. And if you fail students, if you don't advance them, that could affect the funding that the school district gets," he explained. "There are individual students who have parents who … want them not to fail. And so there's a lot of pressure there."

An increasing number of public school students have IEPs, meaning more students have individualized learning programs that teachers, who are already overwhelmed by national employee shortages, must accommodate by law.

"Obviously, it varies district to district," Jacobson said. "Some have perfectly good intentions. Some have maybe not good intentions and just want to go along to get along."

The Cornell Law professor added that while he does not see AI going anywhere in the future of education, "we've got to be very firm that AI does not end up actually dumbing down the students rather than informing the students, because you can become very dependent on it, and that's another problem, but it's one we can't ignore."

Additionally, Jacobson said, parents should be more focused on helping their children to read and write.

"I think parents would be better focused on helping their students and their children learn, rather than worrying about the next lawsuit," he said. "I realize that might be a little unrealistic, because we are in a culture of trying to cash in on lawsuits, but I think our energy should be focused on fixing the system and getting students properly treated, as opposed to: how are we going to sue the school district?"

Justin Gilbert, the attorney representing William A., told Fox News Digital that "[w]ith up to 20% of the students in the United States having dyslexia, William’s case reinforces the need for dyslexia-trained teachers."

"Most of us take reading for granted, but once we move outside the ‘reading window’ of the elementary school years, learning to read becomes much harder," Gilbert said. "That’s particularly true for students with dyslexia. William’s case is a reminder, though a tragic one, of the need for greater awareness of dyslexia in the public schools."