#reduce development time

[techsagaus-blog]

As we step into 2024, the economic scenario further emphasizes the need for effective strategies to reduce infrastructure costs in IT. In this blog, we’ll explore proven methodologies to achieve a 15 to 20% cost advantage over competitors, focusing on the crucial aspect of reducing IT infrastructure costs.

[showsandstuff]

I am so conflicted about the drama in the arcane fandom regarding Meljayvik because it's all just so messy.

For one, not everyone likes every ship and that is okay. You don't have to like Meljayce or Jayvik, it's okay to only like one of the two or none at all.

But then there is the disposable black gf trope that makes this whole thing tricky. I hate this trope so damn much, it isn't fair. At all.

But then also Mel is SO MUCH more than Jayces lover in the story, like her romantic relationship with Jayce was a tiny part of her character and their relationship with each other as well. So I don't like the idea of reducing her to just that. Mel's arc this season was all about her other qualities, her intelligence, her power and her relationship to her mother, not about her love for Jayce or whatever.

I absolutely love Mel as a character. She went from someone who I thought would be a cunning villain, to this caring and intelligent leader, who will do whatever she thinks is best for her people.

Yet people always reduce her to "the girl that gets in the way of the Yaoi" or "Jayce’s love interest", like no come on?! She never got in the way of anything and she isn't just Jayce’s girlfriend. She doesn't lose her purpose if people don't like her together with Jayce, because that wasn't even what her arc was about! Free my girl!

[prideprejudce]

the more i think about Oppenheimer the more disappointed i get because at its core it’s such an interesting story to tell. like the whole manhattan project catapulted the entire world into a new atomic era that we could never go back from whether we were ready for it or not. and the fallout from the project not only changed and devastated the lives of hundreds of thousands of people (including of course the victims in hiroshima and nagasaki + the people living in new mexico where they tested the bomb) and the continued generational trauma of the bombs. also just the general mass panic and fear that the Cold War instilled into every citizen in the states who were literally waiting to one day be just annihilated by a nuclear attack. the whole creation of the atomic bomb had so much impact on the world. so doing a deep character study of both oppenheimer and his colleagues on the moral ambiguity of their work in the project and the outcome of it is such a great movie concept. but the film didn’t feel like that at all. instead Nolan gave us the watered down story that he’s best at and spent almost three hours forcing us to watch whether oppenheimer had to lose his disneyland government fast-pass due to his communist ties or not (spoiler: he does) and how strauss doesn’t like him because he got his feewlings hurt once. all the other scientists and physicists were given one or two minutes of screen time and were really just names to a face. the actual bombs creation was given a sidelong glance and trivial explanation at best. and of course to tie it all off the main female side characters were either naked/having sex for 80% of their screen time or was given the character depth of a piece of tissue paper

[ladystoneboobs]

this is a few arcs ago now, and a lot of stuff happened since, but i feel the need to clarify a misunderstanding here bc it seems too many people stopped listening after mon said nothing outside that room mattered and missed every word after which belied that statement. as seen in the dialogue capped above, mon mothma was not really offering to call off this arranged marriage to a stranger in a crime family, only suggesting putting off the wedding and making the betrothal last a lit bit longer. this is not her proving herself a Good Parent after all by putting her daughter first so much as an attempted stalling tactic to soothe her own conscience when it came to the brink. the 14yo child bride may have been indoctrinated as a tradwife but she was not actually choosing this wedding bc it was not a true offer of freedom being rejected by her here and the whole marriage was arranged for reasons she could never be told about. mon says only "we can put it off" not "let's call the whole thing off", bc she knows damn well she couldn't afford to piss off davo sculdun, that she was already in debt to this man, and that if even if she stopped her rebellion-funding the tax evasion cover story she'd given him could still get her in trouble with the empire if sculdun turned on her.

just like she knew damn well what luthen meant to do to "protect" her wrt her old friend even as she pretended otherwise. and speaking of tay kolma, while mon was emotional about sacrificing her only child in a tradition she disapproved of, wiping away that single tear and squeezing vel's hand as the newlyweds made their first entrance at the reception, she only started pounding back the shots and dancing like shiv roy after that convo with luthen where she realized her childhood friend was about to be killed in her name. so even though the idea of a mom being drunk at her daughter's wedding was introduced in the scene above, this suggests she could have kept herself firmly in control and sober if leida were the only person she were giving up that day, as had been expected. the drunken dancing was def never about the naive 14yo child bride forcing her hand for the wedding (the wedding mon had planned and agreed to for the sake of The Cause she was committed to) to take place that day by denying a vague offer of delay.

#LetFictionalWomenBeSuckyMoms #YesEvenHeroicCharacters

[thevelaryons]

Prince Jacaerys x Baela don’t call my attention as much as other pairings for them. Baela’s personality is totally unique and takes a blow from not being allowed to be more than a wife for him. I want to know your thoughts on Baela’s best ship and Jacaerys’s best ships. I don’t see that love being shown as strongly as the other examples we have for couples. I haven’t finished F&B yet but I do know how this ends.

I think it depends on which canon you are looking at for Baela. In the show version, Baela is the love interest and in the book version, Baela is a character who has love interests.

Showverse Jacaela made the dynamic a lot more equal than it was in the book. Baela is treated as Jace’s partner in everything. They are meant to be perceived as a romance. Though it does come at the expense of Baela’s own personality. She’s not the rough, flirtatious tomboy of Fire & Blood but more of a softspoken lady always ready to support Jace (just as he is there to support her). Though the writers clearly favour building up Jace more, hence scenes of Baela expressing her frustrations about her father are used to prop up Jace’s characterization and his own daddy issues. I’d say majority of show!Jacaela scenes are about Jace wanting to prove himself/Jace’s troubles about bastards/Jace’s position as heir, with Baela always being the love interest at his side.

Bookverse Jacaela is quite different. In fact, Jacaela didn’t even really exist as a ship until HOTD because the dynamic comes off less romantic in the book. If it’s a romance, then it’s a rather lacklustre one:

Lady Rhaena’s twin, Baela, remained on Dragonstone. Long betrothed to Prince Jacaerys, she refused to leave him, insisting that she would fight beside him on her own dragon…though Moondancer was too small to bear her weight. Though Baela also announced her intent to marry Jace at once, no wedding was ever held. Munkun says the prince did not wish to wed until the war was over, whilst Mushroom claims Jacaerys was already married to Sara Snow, the mysterious bastard girl from Winterfell.

Once Jace returned from the North, and took up control of the castle as Prince of Dragonstone, Baela expressed her wish to marry him. I’ve said before that I see this as Baela asserting herself as Jace’s consort and future queen (as Daemon’s mini me, she is acting as her father would to assert himself in the family through marriage). But the fact that Jace didn’t fulfill Baela’s wish speaks volumes. Even Jaehaerys married Alysanne when she asked it of him. They had a private ceremony then in the future they had a grander one when they made their relationship public (they also waited years to consummate until they were ready). Jace’s own brother, Aegon, doesn’t consummate his marriage with Daenaera until many years later. So Jace could’ve married Baela and then in the future once the war is over, they would have a larger wedding + consummation. There being no wedding at all seems like a significant detail, otherwise GRRM wouldn’t have bothered including that in the text.

I do think that the cheating rumours are likely false since it doesn’t really fit Jace’s character. Also, at that point in the story, Jace was trying to appease Corlys. He had to name Corlys as Hand, but a more certain way to retain Corlys’ loyalty would’ve been to marry his granddaughter. It would be a promise that Corlys’ bloodline would sit the Iron Throne one day. Again, I believe it’s a very significant detail that the marriage between Jace and Baela never happened in the book. While I do think Jace would’ve married Baela eventually, in the future, it was not something high on his list of priorities at the time. That is to say, Baela was not really a priority to Jace in the book canon. This is obviously different on the show, where we are shown Jace actually prioritizing Baela a lot more. In the book, I think he may have cared for her, because she is family, but it was not any deeper than that.

Leaving Sara out of the equation since there’s no confirmation if she actually exists, I personally think the most significant relationships Jace has in the book, outside of his parents, are with his sworn brother, Cregan, and his milk brother, Daeron. In the show canon, there isn’t anything special to say about Jace’s trip North (he interacts with Cregan for a minute at best) and Jaceron doesn’t exist because Daeron was temporarily erased. However, we are given substantial details about these dynamics in the book. Jacegan appears to be a very popular relationship for Jace. I personally prefer these two as only friends though I don’t necessarily have any issue with them as a romantic couple. That being said, Jace is 14 years old in the book when he meets the 21 year old Cregan so the age gap is a bit questionable. Though by ASOIAF standards, I guess it’s normal. Jacegan is personally not my favourite ship for Jace because that would be Jaceron.

Jace and Daeron’s relationship is quite important to the narrative of the Dance. They were born close together and became milk brothers from the beginning. They were supposed to be representative of a positive future for the Targaryen dynasty, yet they become divided because of the increasing conflict between their families. Jace and Daeron were expected to be each other’s equals, they were made to train and study together, and attend the same feasts and balls. Daeron is said to be in his older brother’s shadows yet he should at least be on the same level as Jace. Except he isn’t because Jace is openly favoured by the King himself while Daeron gets no great show of affection from his own father. Daeron is the only one in his family who is also sent away from the capital while everyone else gets to stay together in King’s Landing. The boys’ appearances are directly compared to each other from the moment of their birth. The favoured heir who looks like a bastard and the trueborn Valyrian prince who is sidelined. They could have been friends in a different time, but in this story, they can only become enemies. Over the years, their actions still affect each other. It is Jace’s dragonseed plan that causes trouble for Daeron and eventually leads to his death. Even in separation, the milk brothers are connected. One detail that I’ve always liked is the parallel between the scenes of Jace and Daeron making plans for how to proceed with the war, but these plans are foiled by the supposed interference of the gods: “Yet the plans of men are but playthings to the gods. For even as Jace laid his plans, a new threat was closing from the east.”/“Men may plot and plan and scheme, but they had best pray as well, for no plan made by man has ever withstood the whims of the gods above.” These are the descriptions given before the beginning of the battles that would kill Jace and Daeron, the Gullet and Second Tumbleton. Though there isn’t any great show of love in this dynamic, it has always been one of my favourites because of what it represents for the Dance as a whole. Even HOTD erasing them doesn’t lessen my enjoyment of the relationship, since I primarily focus on book canon anyways.

For Baela, her most significant relationships, outside of her parents, in the book are with her twin, Rhaena, and her eventual husband, Alyn. Those are the ones GRRM wrote about extensively. Since all three characters are well fleshed out in the book, so is Baela’s role here. She is not just a supporting role to either Rhaena or Alyn, but a power player in her own right (with many of her actions being enabled by one or the other two). Incest is not a dealbreaker for Targaryens and Baela/Rhaena make an excellent match because of how seamlessly they operate together. I don’t know why the show created a bit of disconnect between the Dragon Twins, with Rhaena feeling bitter about Baela not understanding her concerns and the two of them growing up separately. In the book canon, they grew up together on Dragonstone and were said to be very close. It’s not until the war that they are separated. Though the more baffling decision is HOTD aging up Alyn. Book!Baela rejected the idea of being married to someone much older than her and instead chose Alyn, who is the same age. The characters’ ages in the show are kinda all over the place, but apparently the actor playing Alyn is in his 30s and even older than the actors playing Rhaenyra/Alicent/Criston, whereas the actress playing Baela is in her 20s. So show!Alyn is clearly older than show!Baela who is either 16 or 15. It defeats the whole purpose of the Baela/Alyn relationship which is supposed to be one of equals. Although it seems like the show is setting up some kind of dynamic for Baela and Alyn already, since season 2 had the scene of Baela calling herself “blood and fire” in her conversation with Corlys as a parallel to Alyn saying he is of “salt and sea”.

Baelyn’s relationship in the book is a marriage of convenience. Baela actually took a big risk when she decided to run away to Driftmark. The last time Baela had asked a boy to marry her, she would’ve been left disappointed when he didn’t fulfill her wish. Unlike Jace, who was Baela’s stepbrother and betrothed, Alyn may be her cousin but he is also a stranger for all intents and purposes. Ultimately, Alyn did agree to Baela’s proposal to help her escape her forced marriage. Since Baelyn have very similar personalities, they do work well together as partners, but at the same time, they are also known to quarrel with each other. The book does mention that they always end up reconciling whenever they clash:

Yet in the end they reconciled, as they always did.

Their dynamic is written to be complicated but it’s also one of the most interesting ones in the book. On the one hand, Alyn is willing to wage war to protect Baela, and later was willing to oppose the small council in order to protect her from a forced marriage, he defers to Baela and treats her as a higher authority than he does the king & queen, he names his flagship in honour of her, he makes her part of his political plans, he seems to have no issue with the idea of Baela expressing her sexuality through relationships with other people, etc. But on the opposite end, Alyn does seem to chafe against the notion of domestic marriage that Baela seems more favourable of. He craves freedom and adventure. That being said, Baela is often shown to be doing her own thing in the book too; she’s not confined to the role of wife. So while they may act as a couple at times, in other instances, they are their own individual.

Since Baela grew up watching couples in her family like Corlys/Rhaenys, Daemon/Laena, Daemon/Rhaenyra (regardless of whatever private issues those couples might’ve had), she would have certain expectations for how she wants her marriage to end up. While Jace may be a disappointment because he denied Baela the marriage she wanted, Alyn disappoints in other ways. Though he does at least try to prioritize Baela in the book. But whether that’s Alyn simply doing his duty to Baela since she is his wife, or out of genuine affection, is left ambiguous. I would say that Alyn grew to love Baela but he’s not in love with her. As for Baela, she probably felt the same way about Alyn. There is a part at the end of Fire & Blood where Baela expresses her jealousy over Alyn’s fond regard for another woman, so that does suggest Baela’s possible romantic interest in Alyn. But that’s the last mention of them. Fire & Blood 2 will have more details on the development of their relationship, and if Alyn reciprocates Baela’s growing interest in him. My impression of book!Baela’s romantic prospects is that Jace was just meant to be a placeholder for Alyn. GRRM clearly intended to depict Baela and Alyn as each other’s main love interest, considering how much he wrote about them. I find it fascinating how Alyn shares many similarities with both Laena and Daemon. Leave it to GRRM to create a love interest for Baela who is just a combination of her parents. Even the fact that Alyn and Baela have matching burn scars, complimentary sea & moon symbolism, grand displays of defiance for each other, all suggest a deep connection between the two, despite the stormy nature of their marriage.

The only other noteworthy relationships Baela had were with some of the other boys at Dragonstone. After the Battle of the Gullet, the rest of Team Black moves to King’s Landing and Baela remained behind at Dragonstone. I don’t think these relationships are of any particular consequence because we don’t even know the names of the boys Baela hooks up with but it’s still relevant for Baela’s own characterization. Tbh I do find it odd that GRRM didn’t write anything about Baela expressing grief over Jace’s death but the idea of her Dragonstone boy getting hurt moved Baela to tears:

As a younger girl she had oft been chastised for wrestling with squires in the yard, but of late she had taken to playing kissing games with them instead. Not long after the queen’s court removed to King’s Landing (whilst leaving Lady Baela on Dragonstone), Baela had been caught allowing a kitchen scullion to slip his hand inside her jerkin. Ser Robert, outraged, had sent the boy to the block to have the offending hand removed. Only the girl’s tearful intercession had saved him.

Though it’s possible that at that point, Baela has already moved on since her relationship with Jace was only an arrangement made by their parents, and now Baela is learning to express herself as more than just a consort. In which case, her relationship with the Dragonstone boys is a necessary starting point for Baela’s development.

Baela became a more prominent character near the end of the Dance, in the book. Despite this, she actually had more depth as a character than Jace (died in the first 1/3 of the Dance) and Alyn (he did even less than Baela during the war and only came to the forefront in the Regency). While the show did increase Baela’s presence, it fails to capture the complexity of her character that was present in Fire & Blood. Her primary purpose in show canon so far has just been about developing Jace’s character.

[buddies4life]

I get that some people are upset Eddie isn’t a part of the big emergency BUT he did have an episode that he was almost in every scene except for Maddie scenes, AND this means Eddie and Buck are now both due for an NDE! This opens the door to some exciting possibilities. Possibilities that could include mentions of a certain will. AND given that almost every single character but them has had a recent NDE now, one of them will most likely get hurt on their own OR with each other. Which means the other will have their whole entire attention on the one that is hurt.

[thenotoriousscuttlecliff]

Magneto had a really great character arc in the 80s which just got completely chucked in the bin because the new editor taking over the title thought that he should always be a one-note maniacal villain, and I'm disappointed to see X-Men '97 doing the same because the ex-showrunner wanted to recreate his favourite issue.

[swallowtail-ageha]

"Actually it is realistic for berserk female characters to all crush on guts and get sexually assaulted every two pages and not have much depth because its set in the middle ages"<- what are you even ON

[mabaris]

also. tbh. a little disappointed it seems like taash is Also going to be from the qun, or at least a very recent defect. i was hoping we’d get to see more vashoth characters

[princessproductivity]

7 ways to reduce your screen time...

If you create content for a living, schedule your posts in one sitting so you don't have to spend as much time putting them out throughout the day.

Turn on your phone's grayscale setting — this overrides our natural inclination to click on the brightly colored app icons of addictive socials like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and more.

Use a minimalist phone app. This removes icons altogether, and forces you to intentionally look for what you need from a list of apps as opposed to mindlessly clicking. I'm currently using an app called Oasis Launcher from the Google Play Store.

Turn off notifications from social media, so you are only prompted to spend time on those apps through your own natural inclination.

Oftentimes we reach for our phones because our hands are idle, not because we actually want to spend the time on them — find something to keep your hands busy. For me this is crochet, but it could be a book, a painting, or some other kind of project.

If you find that you spend a lot of time on certain social media apps, try uninstalling the app itself, and only using that form of media through your phone browser. I used to spend a lot of time window shopping on Amazon, and the added inconvenience of not having it available in one click has really helped deter me from spending so much time on it — now I only jump on and use it when I truly need to order something for the household.

Reevaluate your screen time at the end of every week. Many phones have a "digital well-being" feature now that allows you to set time limits on apps, and see how your screen time compares to previous weeks. This can be a great way to evaluate where you need to trim down your usage.

A bit about @princessproductivity! What is the 12 week year? 7 ways to organize your life...

[imjustexistingtbh]

i’m actually so sad i wanted 15 to be the doctor longer. he was done DIRTY by that ending.

[thebraxiatelcollection]

I watched the new Doctor Who episode because of the spoilers coming online.

I have thoughts...

[sillyandquiteawkward]

Do you think Father would be openly gay in the institute or be in the closet?

in the little fallout universe i like to play around in, i like to think that shauns always been a gay man, but as an adult has tamped down and ignored his feelings for focusing on science and working, maybe even viewing himself as better than his peers for not falling prey to childish desires. its the case anyway that in 60 years, shaun has no romantic partner, nor children. i think much later on, once he becomes director and starts having more power and access to knowledge, that his denial of his wants starts to falter now that he satisfies his need for control and superiority in other ways. this also compounds once he learns he has a terminal illness. now hes acting a bit irrationally to his own standards, and hes pleasure seeking, yolo and such. this includes in my little crackship universe, that he and bayley end up in the same vicinity as each other and eventually develop into a thing. openly they arent exactly "together" but on lookers could easily notice something is up between them.

i think when it comes to being open or in the closet, if you asked him his preference hed initially say hes asexual. in mostly a way that i think he genuinely wants to believe that he is that ("wouldnt that be so much easier if true, i could focus on more on scientific progress rather than feel the burden of ideas on relationships and sex"). if pressed further on the topic hed admit in his youth he was fond of boys, but would go on to dismiss the idea like "im not so childish now." like his biggest in the closet issue isnt being gay its about Wanting a relationship or sex or a lover. like to him Thats what hes ashamed about. i think theres a lot of intersection between denial of himself in particular with his relationship to his gayness tho, he just doesnt consider that as the main contender.

[ruhrohherewego]

‘tehehehehe tim drake hasn’t slept in 45 hours and is living off of coffee and vibes’ FUCK YOU these are olympic-level athletes they need SOME base of self-care to function. tim drake, or ANY vigilante cannot fight bad guys severely dehydrated and hallucinating from sleep deprivation. stop romanticizing terrible health habits with the characters who are the least likely to have them!!!!

[dakrapatops]

one of the problems with supernatural (the writing, but also the fandom) is that most if not all characters are seen as accessories to the main three guys. not even the main three sometimes! sometimes its literally just 'dean and cas are the only characters with depth in the show and everyone else is there to compliment them in some shape or form'. i dont mean that in a 'ohh why was the brothers show only about the brothers' way, i mean it in a 'the fandom doesnt really view any characters other than sam, dean, or cas, as capable of existing for themselves in a way that is not them being cardboard cutouts that stand near the main three guys'. i have seen some absolutely godawful takes on this webbed site and the main theme between them all is that no-one views anyone except tfw as a person with autonomy, and that anyone other than tfw is one-dimensional and disposable.

[fnaffersblog]

I'm going to see a movie here soon.

But when I come back, I would really like to sit down and write something cohesive about Eclipse and today's episode.

Namely, I'm glad they've touched on this finally, this more "human" side of him (I only use "" quotations because they're robots) and I hope they continue to do so.