#yak shaving

[mcb3k]

you're gonna shave that yak.

[techniktagebuch]

Oktober 2022

Yak-Shaving für Astronomen

Als Yak-Shaving bezeichnet man iterative Prozesse, bei denen man, um ein Problem zu lösen, immer erst ein anderes Problem vorher lösen muss, das wiederum die Lösung von noch einem anderen Problem erfordert, und so weiter. Mein Ausgangsproblem: Ich habe ein Bild aus einem Teleskop und will einen Katalog der Sterne in diesem Bild machen. Dafür gibt es eine Reihe von vorgefertigten Programmen, ich muss das nicht selbst programmieren. Eines der gebräuchlichsten heißt “SExtractor”, kurz für “Source Extractor”, und, ja, der Scherz war vermutlich mal für drei Minuten lustig, damals, als SExtractor das Licht der Welt erblickte, also circa im Jahr 2000. Ich habe genau dieses Programm schon damals verwendet, es war mit Abstand am einfachsten und schnellsten für diese Aufgabe. 

Aber damals hatte ich auch noch einen Linux-Computer, der von einem IT-Experten gewartet wurde. Die Software-Installation beschränkte sich für mich darauf, eine Email an diesen Experten zu schicken. So war es auch 2005, als ich meinen ersten richtigen Job antrat, und auch 2007, beim zweiten: Ich bestellte beim Arbeitgeber einen neuen Rechner, und sagte gleich dazu, welche Software ich benötige, fertig. Diese Zeiten sind vorbei, heute sind wir alle System-Administratoren und Software-Yak-Shaver. Astronomie machen wir auch noch.

Mittlerweile ist SExtractor in der Version 2.19.5, und existiert nur als Quellcode, wie so oft bei Spezialsoftware für Astronomen. Man kann es aber einfach auf jedem Rechner kompilieren, der Linux-kompatibel ist, also theoretisch auch auf Macs, solange alle nötigen Libraries schon da sind. Sind sie natürlich bei mir nicht. Diese “Dependencies”, also Software, die andere Software voraussetzt, die wieder andere Software voraussetzt, die Versoftwarung von Yak-Shaving, sind ein generelles Problem unseres Software-Ökosystems, und jeden Tag huldige ich Programmen, die einfach so laufen. Topcat! DS9! Seid umarmt. Zum Glück gibt es zum Management dieser Dependencies wieder andere Software. Ich erfahre von Macports, das nach der Installation auch beinahe sofort läuft, und Macports weiß schon, wie man SExtractor installiert. Eine Weile geht alles gut.

Dann teilt mir Macports mit, das es noch eine vollständige Installation von XCode benötigt. XCode gibt es beim Apple Store, und es dauert auch nur eine Viertelstunde, bis ich dort Zugriff habe – der Account zeigt auf eine uralte Emailaddresse, und die Sicherheitsfragen sind verwirrend. Mein erster Lehrer? Wer sollte das gewesen sein? Dann finde ich heraus, dass die angebotene Version von XCode nur auf einem Betriebssystem läuft, das ein paar Versionen jünger ist als meines. Jetzt gibt es zwei Möglichkeiten: Entweder das Betriebssystem auf den neuesten Stand bringen, was zur Folge haben wird, das diverse andere Software auch neu installiert werden muss, und eventuell nicht mehr geht. Oder einen Developer-Account kaufen, und damit Zugriff auf alte XCode-Versionen zu haben. Beides rote Linien in meiner Yak-Shaving-Philosophie.

Oder aber das ursprüngliche Problem mit einer ganz anderen Software lösen. Oder es überhaupt nicht lösen, ein viel zu selten benutzter Problembewältigungsansatz.

(Aleks Scholz)

[king-of-men]

Finally got Bazel to build me a Go executable on my home desktop today. Just had to upgrade the Bazel version first, so to get my existing C++ projects to compile I needed a new version of protobuf, which required me to change all the places I was logging "status.error_message()" because that method has been renamed to "message()", and also it now returns a StringPiece which Abseil logging doesn't support, so I updated my Abseil install to the latest so I could import Status from there instead of using the protobuf version, so I had to go through all my various tests and update what they imported and logged. But apart from that, no problems with the Go experiment!

[bstormhands]

Yak Shaving

Okay today was a classic yak shaving incident

You know how it is, you want to put up the Christmas tree, so you get the tree and ornament boxes from the storage unit. 

But no ones bought the old desk your child out grew and the which you put in the living room to make room for the new desk. 

Call Brother in Law for help taking it to the thrift store with the chair and some old clothes. 

Driving over there his car throws a low tire pressure warning, and he had just had it serviced yesterday.

Finally, back home. Oh the bookshelves are a mess and we won’t be able to reach the cookbooks with the tree in the way. 

Hours later, most of the cookbooks are on the side nearest the kitchen, many books are not in the right place but some what together, some shelves aren’t the right size. sigh

Librarying is hard.

And we still don’t have the tree up, but out of spoons.

[tototavros]

feels good to shit out 200 loc on a whim

[hello-delicious-tea]

I decided I absolutely had to pot up the Genuwine tomatoes, so I went to look for pots. There were not enough, so I needed to plant the bok Choi in the cold frame. I planted the bok choi and then noticed that the spinach and kale were thinking about bolting and needed to be pinched back and harvested. Then I had to clean the sink so I could rinse the spinach so I could finish harvesting it, since there was too much for one colander. I wonder if I’ll get to potting up the little tomatoes today…

[eggman-is-fat-mkay]

copilot (n.)

a method of rapid editing for programmers who flatly refuse to learn any method of rapid editing (vim keybindings, snippet engines, Emmet for HTML...) besides tab completion

[mourning-again-in-america]

me: i should learn elixir! me: guess i should choose a version manager for the language me: `bats` is now giving me a failure? why?

[balioc]

Is this a concept-formulation that's already kicking around out there somewhere? It might well be. It feels like the sort of thing that someone would already have developed. But it's new to me, at least, so I'll muddle around with it as best as I can.

On one end of the spectrum, you've got the musical hook. A hook is maybe two seconds of music, if that. And when you hear it, if it's good, you get a concentrated spike of -- oh, yeah, that's the shit right there, this exact experience in this exact moment is fucking awesome. And then, as soon as it's come, it's gone. All you can do is wait for it to come back later in the track, or rewind a few seconds, or maybe just replay that tiny little scrap of music in your head.

The pleasure of a good hook is incredibly condensed. It doesn't even really extend into the rest of the song, let alone into the rest of your life. To experience it, you have to be listening to those exact few bars (if only in your mind). It has no penumbra, no shades-of-experience that color other aspects of your existence. On the other hand, well...when you're listening to those exact few bars, you know it, and it's great. If it's a good enough hook, you kinda just want to listen to it over and over again, like you're popping Pringles or something.

All the way on the other end of the spectrum, you've got something like a traditional-style TTRPG campaign.

Even when it's being run masterfully, a game like D&D has a very low proportion of that's the shit right there moments, and a very high proportion of tedious yak-shaving stuff. Every so often you get your critical success in a high-stakes moment, every so often you get your awesome monologue or your big-drama scene or whatever...but for every moment like that, there's a hundred moments or more of the other stuff. The commonplace D&D play experience is famous for its vast amounts of OOC joking-around, which is not how things look when people are deeply engaged with the art on a moment-by-moment basis. And, of course, not every campaign is run masterfully. Sometimes boredom, or eye-rolling, is what you get in almost every moment.

And yet people love their D&D campaigns, like really incredibly a lot, and are deeply affected by them, and not-uncommonly have their whole lives changed by them.

The correct model here, I think, is that the pleasure generated by that kind of TTRPG experience is super diffuse. It's almost all penumbra. The awesomeness doesn't inhere in any one moment, or even any one scene or any one story arc. It inheres in the broad strokes of the campaign, in the ongoing knowledge that YOU ARE YOUR COOL CHARACTER and you go on a million cool adventures, in the mythos and the running jokes that add up invisibly over time into magic. And it pervades the entirety of your existence. You can think about it when you're lying in your bed, you can chat about it with your friends over lunch, and the awesomeness is just as much there as it is when you're actually playing. Maybe more so.

**********

Once you start looking at art through this variable-diffusion-of-appreciation lens, you can see many different points on the spectrum.

It's obvious that a short story is more concentrated than a novel, which is more concentrated than a series; it's obvious that a movie is more concentrated than a TV show. But it's not just the choice of medium that pushes in one direction or the other. It's a million different choices concerning content and style. Lushly descriptive language, in prose fiction, serves to concentrate the reader's appreciation into the moment of reading -- it forces the expenditure of extra attention for the sake of creating a beautiful mental moment, which in the vast majority of cases will be gone and forgotten almost instantly. Abstracted and philosophical language does the exact opposite, pulling the reader out of the narrative for a little bit for the sake of giving him something to roll around in his head. Suspense, and surprising plot developments, are concentration techniques that can have their full effect only during the transition from unspoiled-to-spoiled (and they serve to emphasize and heighten the moments of that transition). Archetypical, iconic plots are diffusion techniques that trade predictability-in-the-now for satisfaction-in-contemplating-the-story-later.

Sitcoms strike me as being vehicles for diffuse appreciation, to a huge extent, even more than other TV shows of comparable length etc. Much of what makes them good is just the presence of the characters and their distinctive shticks in your mindscape, in a way that builds from episode to episode without any particular grounding in specifics. When I think about a sitcom that I like, I find myself concluding that I like the show overall more than I like any single given episode. Which is weird, right? You'd expect some sort of bell-curve thing where the best episodes, or even the best individual moments, rise up above the averaged-out mass of the whole. But no.

**********

Fannishness is, overall, a very diffuse form of appreciation. This is true in the very-obvious sense that you're enjoying the work during a time when you're not actually consuming the work, by dint of consuming/producing fanworks and talking with other fans etc. But it's also true in the somewhat-less-obvious sense that the enjoyment-of-the-thing usually ends up very unrooted in the specifics of the thing, the plot beats and characterization details and so forth. You have a big beloved vibe, with lots of bits and bobs attached, and you can take the bits and bobs you like best and rearrange them however you like best when you're engaging in fandom.

**********

I believe it is overall true that concentrated appreciation is much more legible than diffuse appreciation. More legible to artists and art theorists, more legible to marketers and consumers. When you talk about art being good or bad or successful or unsuccessful, it's very easy to think in terms of "what is it like to consume this moment-by-moment?", and much harder to think in terms of "how does each piece of the work pervade the whole of the work, and also the general thoughtscape of the consumer?" For this reason, concentration techniques are associated with prestige, and high-prestige analysis tends to focus on a work's ability to generate concentrated appreciation.

...I also believe that different people want to be appreciating art, in the ideal case, at different levels of diffusion. There are people for whom a good artistic experience means lots of crack-hit awesome moments, and others for whom a good artistic experience means getting to live in an infinite penumbra, and others who fall at every point in between.

**********

For reasons I may discuss later, I think this concept-suite is extremely valent to the construction of theater LARPs, and the tension between people who expect more-concentrated enjoyment and people who expect more-diffuse enjoyment is responsible for a lot of the Wars Over What's Good within that sphere.

[smirked-with-triumph]

shaving yak deniers when their lather erodes overnight (april-june megalog)

[brumeraven]

🍂: Interview with a Boundless Candidate || dolls, boundless, creativity, transformations, saints, cute?, sorry to the confused

"Please state your name for the record."

"..."

"Nothing?"

"names are...well, they can't be self-assigned."

"Good catch. Sorry about the trick question, but you understand why we have to make you jump through all these hoops."

"it's fine."

"How long have you lived as a doll?"

"my whole life. or, well, maybe that's just how i've been treated."

"How you've been treated?"

"sorry, how this one has been treated."

"So the whole world treats you like a doll?"

"more or less, this one supposes."

"But how long has it been since you decided to just accept it? To stop fighting back and just give up your personhood?"

"it did not make the decision; this is...it's just the way it is. the way it's always been."

"Mm, fair. Dolls don't choose."

"dolls don't choose."

"And you believe that you'll be happier as a doll?"

"i...it has never really...understood the concept of happiness."

"You're unhappy being treated this way?"

"this one has never seen happiness as attainable."

"But you need this to feel comfortable?"

"no, not really."

"Then what exactly do you expect to get out of this?"

"congruence. alignment of expectations and reality."

"My point is, what do YOU want out of this? You, not the people around you."

"...this one does not want anything."

"Rather not say?"

"no."

"Well, let me take a stab at it. You just want to feel wanted. Want to be given worth, want to be a valued pet, a cherished possession, because you can't find any self-worth, so you need extrinsic reassurance your life has purpose and meaning."

"..."

"You're afraid of responsibility. Afraid of agency. Afraid of fucking up your own life any more than you already have. You'd rather a Witch, or even a human, fuck it up for you. At least it wouldn't be your fault, then; at least you could pretend you're worth shit."

"..."

"Well let me tell you something, kiddo; those are bad fucking reasons to throw away your humanity. Because, hate to break it to you, but you aren't worth shit just because someone likes you."

"it's not like that. not for this one."

"No? Then why don't you tell me what it is, hm?"

"it's just...well, efficient."

"Efficient?"

"i can't stand it. this one cannot stand it. it wastes so much time worrying about what to do, what not to do, prioritizing and tracking and deciding."

"You're looking for...what exactly?"

"this one has value; it is certain of it. it is capable of great things and has several useful skills. time management is not one of them. it's greatest fear is that it will waste its entire existence shaving yaks."

"Shaving...yaks?"

"it simply wishes to be able to work without the cruft of life getting in the way. without wasting its time worrying about what it should be doing at any given time."

"...So you want a manager, not a master."

"this one wants a scrum master."

"..."

Interviewer Comments: NOT THE WORST REASON I'VE HEARD

Verdict: ACCEPTED

~🍂

[mirqmarq428]

Motherboard is here! Before opening it and installing i wanna get my streaming setup working tho. Which means getting the spare phone up and running as a droidcam. Which means re-flashing it because the current OS doesn't have networking. Which means copying the android files on my old home drive onto the NAS.

Gotta love yak shaving!

[kiunlo]

i don't have one of my own yak mounts on WoW with the transmogrifyer as the passenger, i only have the travelling mammoth mount so i can like sell stuff and fix my gear, so whenever i get new armour and want to change it's appearance back to the cool appearance that i came up with, i'm always on the lookout for somebody with their yak out. i take any opportunity to use someones transmogrifyer that they've got on their yak, because i'm too poor to afford my own yak mount and i despise having to go back and forth from my current place to a major city just to change a few pieces of armour. sometimes i've really shaved it close, the person dismounting their yak, and me changing my armour appearance within a few seconds before the transmogrifyer npc despawns. i'm sure i could probably save up for a yak mount of my own but the hunt for other players with yak mounts is always more entertaining.

[recentadultburnout]

My School President (2022)

"Tinn" Tinnaphob Jirawatthanakul-ติณ ติณณ์ภพ จิราวัฒนากุล

Tinn-grass

Tinnaphob-One who can cross worlds (one who has attained enlightenment)

Jira-stability,sustainability

Watthana-flourish, grow, prosper

kul-clan, family

"Gun" Guntaphon Wongwitthaya-กันต์ กันตพล วงศ์วิทยา

Gun-pleased, satisfied, attractive, satisfying, gorgeous, cut, shaved

Guntaphon-have good energy,energetic

Wong-family, dynasty, lineage, clan, race, tribe

Witthaya-knowledge, philosophy, science, learning

Por-ปอ

jute, kenaf, fibre crops, dragonfly

"Phat" Phatchara-พัด ?พัชร?

Phat-blow, fan, wind, waft, drive, whiffle

Phatchara-If it's พัชร, it means diamond

Yo-โย

Yo does have a meaning, but I don't think it's the intended meaning for his name. It's "to provoke" or "to be provocative" ((very)rarely used). Because this story is about music, I think of the "Yothawathit Band," which mean a marching band. It does get short to Yo Band a lot, but I'm not so sure.

Thiuson-ทิวสน

array of pine trees

Khajorn-ขจร

Emanate, pervade, Telosma minor Craib(flower)

Yak [Music club senior]-ยักษ์

Gian

Index

[therealrattlehead]

Atom and Evil: A Ramattra/Zenyatta Fanfiction

Summary: "I'm talkin' 'bout Atom, and Evil

Atom and Evil

If you don't break up that romance soon

We'll all fall down and go boom, boom, boom!"

WC: 6000+, first 1263 here, rest is found on Ao3

Rating: Explicit

A/N: One of my personal fav ideas for these two, hope you guys enjoy :]

Keep reading

Zenyatta, upon entering Shambali and joining Ramattra and the other monks in the temple, was quiet and timid. Unlike the others, he hadn’t joined close to the monastery’s opening, but rather a few years after it had been established. It made him feel late, late to join the others in worshiping in the greatness that was the Iris. Of course, it was never too late to join a faith, especially one as abstract and fascinating as Shambali. He knows the trope is overdone, to be lost and hopeless in the world only for the great force of spirituality to save you and set you on a path of great self discovery, but that was the only way to describe Zenyatta’s life. It felt as though it didn’t even start until he joined the monastery. He felt good. He felt at peace, especially with Ramattra.

Ramattra was a bit of a black sheep compared to the other members of Shambali. He was huge, towering over the others in both height and mass. He was built like a tank, decorated in a large chest and muscular arms. Whatever he had done before, it was definitely something that required great amounts of strength, and based on the old scars that criss-crossed his skin, was anything but gentle to him. However, Ramattra now used his strength for the protection of his fellow brothers, often guarding the gates and guiding wild animals away from the building and breaking up disagreements between particularly rowdy members. He began talking to Zenyatta not when he had brought him to the monastery, but in between his shifts of guarding the doors, when he would walk the long, large halls on his way to the daily prayer circles. Their conversations usually stayed small, Ramattra giving Zenyatta his reports on the day’s animal visitors, telling Zenyatta stories of yaks and musk deers and vultures. In return, Zenyatta would give his knowledge on the animals, entertaining Ramattra with the facts of all the animals they came across. Light would enter Ramattra’s eyes with every conversation, his usual stern look melting into soft smiles and chuckles. Soon, their conversations had evolved into much deeper, more personal ones. They talked of the Shambali and their previous lives, of their hobbies and skills. Ramattra had shared a passion for poetry, which Zenyatta had the privilege of reading every morning as they ate their breakfast, preferring to eat in the privacy and secrecy of Ramattra’s room than with the rest of the monks. Sometimes Ramattra would allow Zenyatta to sleep beside him at night, the two holding each other in complete comfort as they dreamed side by side. By and by, their lives began to integrate and melt completely with each other, the two of them doing every task they wished together.

Ramattra had been the one to shave his head during his initiation, rough hands gently gliding a straight razor through scruffy, black hair and letting it fall to the floor like the leaves of autumn. He would be able to grow his hair back, seeing as Ramattra was complete with mid-length dreadlocks and a neatly shaped beard, but Zen was content with his new clean look and small soul patch he kept because he wanted to match with Ramattra.

Ramattra was the one to sit with Zenyatta in front of the audience that was the monastery, holding his hand as Mondatta carefully carved small, circular scars into his forehead. He can still vividly remember Ramattra’s large, warm hand pawing at his, the thumb lightly stroking the top of Zen’s as Zen grimaced and whimpered in pain. The air around them was filled with small, quiet praises, each one giving a dosage of calm to Zen’s nerves.

“You’re doing so well.”

“Almost done, you’re so brave.”

“You’ll look beautiful when they’re healed.”

Ramattra had been the one to dress Zenyatta in his robes. They were in Zenyatta’s new room, a small, quiet space where the two were in private. Zenyatta would stand still as Ramattra’s hands ran across his body, peeling away the old clothes Zenyatta had arrived in. Rough fingertips ran across scarred, freshly washed skin, over the small hills of breasts and the dip of hips as Ramattra measured out the size of Zenyatta's new clothes. Ramattra would gently grab at the small of Zenyatta’s back as he turned him around, fitting a neat sash around Zen’s waist and tying it around him like a pretty present. Zenyatta remembered lightly pawing at his new, baggy, gray pants as he felt Ramattra’s lips softly land on his head, kissing it. Ramattra’s beard was soft, making Zenyatta lean into it. Ramattra would pull away before letting his lips return to Zen’s skin, this time landing on the man’s bare shoulder.

“You are very affectionate,” Zenyatta giggled, his eyes glancing back and catching on to Ramattra’s. Ramattra’s skin flushed as he looked away, quickly pulling himself from Zenyatta and taking a step back.

“How could I not be with someone as charming as you?,” Ramattra cooed, his lips dragging across the warm, exposed skin of Zenyatta’s shoulder, kissing and nibbling at it. Zenyatta hummed in content.

“You make it sound like I’m the only charming man here,” Zenyatta chuckled, reaching over and putting a hand on Ramattra’s shoulder and rubbing it in exchange. Ramattra smiled and extended an arm forward, returning the gesture as he pulled his lips off of Zen’s shoulder. Their arms folded back to their respective sides, but the two stood, looking at each other, for quite some time. Scented candles filled the air with the sweetness of vanilla and honey, a scent so strong Zen could taste it in the back of his throat. Even in the coldness of winter mountains, where the skies were pale blue with frost and the ground was pearl with snow, the heat of the room was much closer to that of hellfire than the icy heaven that surrounded them.

Ramattra was first to make a move. He licked his lips, which had been dried out for quite some time now, and took a hearty step forward toward Zenyatta. His hand reached out again, this time placing itself underneath Zenyatta’s chin with such tenderness that he might as well have not touched him at all. Zenyatta’s smile widened, his eyes darting up to Ramattra’s. Ramattra leaned down, his lips landing softly on Zenyatta’s, which faintly parted to welcome him. The kiss was feather light, soft lips on soft lips as they pulled each other close. Zenyatta hated to admit how eagerly he licked up the sweet, subtle taste of Ramattra’s lips. They tasted like mint chapstick and sage tea and warmth and love and comfort. Zenyatta’s lips parted to say something, but Ramattra took it as something different, pulling Zenyatta even closer and indulging himself even more in the luxury that was Zenyatta’s mouth. Zenyatta didn’t protest. His mouth tasted like the apricots he ate for breakfast, a tantalizing taste that only drew Ramattra closer.

In a couple of blurry moments, Zenyatta was slowly backed into the wall. Hungry hands traced over his skin, massaging his shoulders and lightly grabbing at his breasts, tugging at his nipple, sending shocks of pleasure through Zenyatta’s body. Zenyatta moaned into his lips, his hands beginning to palm at the new, hard surface in Ramattra’s pants. Zenyatta gasped as he pressed against the wall with a newfound firmness.

“I love you. I love you more than any man here. You’re my person, the only one meant for me” Ramattra confessed between small, hurried kisses.

[invisibleraven]

For the 5 sentence prompt. I'm going with Carrie and Reggie if that works for you. Feel free to change it if not.

"These heels were wearing a blister on the side of her foot but she'd be damned if she was going to take them off she looked too good in them."

These heels were wearing a blister on the side of her foot but she'd be damned if she was going to take them off she looked too good in them.

So Carrie smiled, turned, and waved at each photographer that shouted her name. Posed until she was given the blessed signal she could move on.

"Hold on Carrie, can we get one of you and your date?" a man shouted.

She saw Reggie off to the side, dutifully holding her purse, and asked the question with her eyes. He wasn't used to all this hullabaloo; the people asking a million questions, the flashbulbs non-stop. But he said he wanted to come to this awards ceremony with her.

"I wanna support you in everything doll," he had vowed to her the night before when she asked him for the millionth time if he was really sure. "Whether that be making music or doing car commercials, or hell, shaving your head and raising a herd of yaks, I'm there."

"You're ridiculous," she said, but pulled him in, resting their foreheads together. "Thank you."

So now, when she held out her hand to him, he came running. Wearing that goofy smile of his, looking oh so besotted. Sure they were all clamouring for a picture of them, but Reggie's eyes never left hers.

And when she saw the final shot? It quickly became her favourite picture of them.