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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 18th, 2023

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  • I was writing my first game in XNA .NET framework, and I’m really glad I had that experience. It forced me to understand (and figure out) the insides of a game engine, such as collisions, GameObject model or game loop really well, and since by that time I had no idea something like game engines exist, I learned to not take those features for granted and actually had to research and write them.

    When Unity went free, I appreciated the features so much more, and now I also see that some of the newer developers have no idea what’s actually happening in the background, which is a shame.

    I’d recommend that anyone interested in gamedev starts more low-level, and only after that gets to more heavyweight engines. Sure, you probably won’t make a 3D game, but making a simple platformer from scratch is an amazing learning experience.



  • Its what literally changed my life. I was really socialy awkward, spend most of my lide behind a computer, and when I managed to go out to parties in a subculture scene parties I loved, I couldnt talk to anyone, had a few beers awkwardly in a corner and went home.

    Then I met someone who introduced me to MDMA. That happened almost 8 years ago, and now I am an organizer of 2/3 of the same scene regular parties in our city, Im helping and DJing on a festival that happens here, and am living my best life in that regard. All thanks to that one best friend who got me something that made me talk to, and get to actually know people in the scene in the extent that I always wanted, and get comfortable enough that I no longer need to be high to interact with anyone. Since now they are friends and regulars, and not random people I wanted to talk to, but was afraid of approaching.

    But, it wasn’t as easy as it sounds. I was always trying to be responsible and cautious, and In did get bordeline to addiction in the process, which I was fortunately able to recognize early and put a stop to it by getting help in a adictiology nonprofit. It was never bad, more like a precaution. And I caught it in the best possible moment. I’ll never forget my first group session, where literally everyone else said “I’m 35+, I used to take stuff at parties for fun when I was 25, and then I ended for 10 years in meth…”.

    Everyone had similar story. And I went “Well, I’m 25, and I take stuff on parties for fun…”. And that was a really strong lesson, where I realized I’m stopping a really huge problem at exactly the right time.

    So, it might help. It is definitely fun, but it is so hard to not end up badly. You will need a lot of luck, especially if you are exploring it on your own. I still take things on parties, but with personal experience about the dangers it has. And getting that, is something that no one can give you, unless you see it for yourself. And for most of the people, that comes too late. I was lucky, you probably won’t be. But in conclusion - drugs are amazing, and have changed my life. Its a shame that personal experience will probably vary.



  • It has been a while since I have to deal with problem complexities in college, is there even class of problems that would require something like this, or is there a proven upper limit/can this be simplified? I don’t think I’ve ever seen O(n!^k) class of problems.

    Hmm, iirc non-deterministic turing machines should be able to solve most problems, but I’m not sure we ever talked about problems that are not NP. Are there such problems? And how is the problem class even called?

    Oh, right, you also have EXP and NEXP. But that’s the highest class on wiki, and I can’t find if it’s proven that it’s enough for all problems. Is there a FACT and NFACT class?


  • Here is a picture, that may help a little bit. The n is input size, and f(n) is how long does the algorithm runs (i.e how many instructions) it takes to calculate it for input for size n, i.e for finding smallest element in an array, n would be the number of elements in the array. g(n) is then the function you have in O, so if you have O(n^2) algorithm, the g(n) = n^2

    Basically, you are looking for how quickly it grows for extreme values of N, while also disregarding constants. The graph representation probably isn’t too useful for figuring the O value, but it can help a little bit with understanding it - you want to find a O function where from one point onward (n0), the f(n) is under the O function all the way into infinity.




  • Exactly this. I only have pretty vague experience with machine learning, since it was one of the other specializations for my Masters than the one I choose, which however means we still shared some basic courses on the topic, and I definitely share his point of view. I’ve been saying basically the same things when talking about AI, albeit not as expressively, but even with basic insight into ML, the whole craze that is happening around it is such bullshit. But, I’m by no means an expert in the field, so I may be wrong, but it’s nice to finally read an article from an “expert” in the field I can agree with. Because so far, the whole “experts talking AI” felt exactly like the COVID situation, with “doctors” talking against vaccines. Their doomsaying opinion simply contradicts even the little knowledge I have in the ML field.




  • I self-hosted it few months ago, and it’s actually surprisingly easy! Someone has made an Ansible script for Matrix with Element and some bridges, that (at least a month ago, IaaC tends to be pretty fragile) worked out of the box on a first try. I just set up some config values (mostly about enabling bridges I want) based on their amazing documentation, and then ran it once and everything is working so far. I even updated it several times already, and every time it was smooth, and it was basically just running a single ansible command. Their documentation is pretty well written, and with my basic cloud, IT and Linux knowledge I had no issues with following it. All you need to know is how to set up cloud VM, get a domain and set DNS, and set up SSH keys to access the server.

    In total it took me about two hours in total, from when I decided “I’m setting up Matrix tonight” without any prior knowledge, looking up my options and finding the ansible script, setting up cloud and getting Matrix up and running.

    I’m renting a VM on Hetzner for like 6$ per month, and it worked without issues so far. I use it for Discord and Messenger, although the Meta bridge does have some problems, for example I didn’t figure out how to message someone with whom I haven’t had a conversation since I set up the bridge, since only then it creates the room for it. But that can be solved by keeping the Messenger app or usign the browser to send a first message, and it immediately shows in your Matrix bridge (and stays there forever).






  • My favorite windows update was when I was attending an onsite coding competition hosted my Microsoft. We were all in this large meeting hall that looked like a theater, and we spent first 10 minutes or so at the start of the competition just looking at Windows update, with the Microsoft rep apologizing to us, because his pc decided to do the “Forced update restart you cant postpone any more” literally two minutes into the presentation




  • I suppose it’s written in a way to sound way worse and alarming than it actually is, due to the upcoming elections. It sounds almost unreal, i mean “EU secret plan to ban any kind of encryption or privacy” can’t be reallistically happening, right?

    I know about Chatcontrol, so I wouldn’t be surprised, but this article sounds pretty overblown, to the point of sounding more like a wild conspiracy theory. Does anyone have more resources or info about this, that don’t read like an election ad?

    I’m not trying to dismiss or disrespect the author, and I trust that it was written with best intentions, but it’s a really worrying topic about which I’d like to get more information about.

    However, thanks for bringing it up, I contacted our local Pirate party about the topic, because they don’t have anything related to crime prevention vs. privacy in their programe. I suppose that I know what the answer would be, but getting a confirmation before I vote for them would definitely be nice.