SoylentNews

Police sources: New evidence suggests Jussie Smollett orchestrated attack

Brothers released in reported attack on 'Empire' actor Jussie Smollett — 12 hours after police called them 'possible suspects'

Jussie Smollett Viewed As “Active Participant” By Cops In Alleged Assault

Jussie Smollett hires Michael Cohen’s criminal defense lawyer

General

This is a post / TFS text pre-processor designed specifically for use with soylent.org

There are three interrelated projects involved.

One is Python(2) CGI that must be installed upon a webserver, and is then used via the web page it generates. This can be used to prepare posts for use on, for example, soylentnews.org.

Another is a Python(2) library that can be used to create your own project of a similar nature. This library is also used in the above project.

The other is a Perl library (module) with the same general functionality as the Python(2) library that is specifically designed to work easily with the soylentnews.org TFS system.

Here is a summary of features and capabilities as of 20190216:

Instance Types:

• Full bore web page for pre-processing your own posts
• Python class suitable for implementing your own handler
• Perl class suitable for implementing your own handler
    (specifically intended for soylentnews.org)

Capabilities:

• Generates tag pairs with terminology expansions for caps / numbers / caps+numbers sequences
  • Over 1000 term expansions (as of Jan 1st, 2019)
  • Can expand electronic components such as R2, VR5 and IC44 (default on)
  • Can ignore specified terms on-the-fly
  • Can list all expandable terms (default off)
  • Flags unknown terms that may be expandable on the web page
  • Handles pre-existing tag pairs when you want to add one-off uses
  • Handles HTML and won't try to expand within HTML tags
  • Includes test code to verify file containing expansions, generate statistics
  • Includes command line tool to check to see if term already present in expansion list
  • Python and Perl stand-alone term expansion classes
  • Ability to add editor's markup either everywhere or within blockquote regions
• Built-in macro language
  • Can list available macros (default on)
  • Multiple random/selected user signature generator (default off)
  • Includes macros to make posting easier (you can add as many as you like):
    • blockquote {bq quoted text}
    • strikeout {strike struck text}
    • bold {b bolded text}
    • italic {i italicized text}
    • bulleted lists {ul item|...|item}
    • numbered lists {ol item|...|item}
    • links, canned and/or on-the-fly {link URL|linked text}
    • temperature display and conversion {f NN}, {c NN}
    • let me google that for you {lmgtfy search term}
    • smile (emoji) {smile}
    • shrug (character art) {shrug}
    • escapes: {vb}=|, {ls}={, {rs}=}, {sqig text}={text}
• Convenient unicode-to-unicodeEntity converter
• Provides optional Soylent-style post preview (default off)
• Handles unicode posting
• Incorporates basic self-test when run from command line
• Can use local configuration file to prevent update from repo resetting your preferences

The project can be found here on Github.

My memory is bad. It's really, really bad. It's famously bad. One of my best friends said it was "an etch-a-sketch on a bumpy road".

The calendar apps I've seen aren't aggressive enough in notifications, and LineageOS's alarm app won't let me set dates sufficiently in the future. There's also a lot of recurring events and events that occur on irregular schedules.

So, I got sick of it, and wrote this. I made an alarm app that can be as aggressive or passive as you want, with crontab syntax.

The code isn't great. I wrote it in python as that's something I've had to use lately and python's proving to be... well, better than I expected. I'm not an expert with Python yet so you'll probably find some eww.

You need pygame for python 3 for alert sounds, python gobject Gtk 3 (pgi), python 3 sqlite, and everything else should be included in the Python 3 standard library.

Let me know what you think.

Vox Media Attempts To Scrub Internet Of The Verge PC Build Video By Going After YouTubers

Many reuploads and analyses can be found.

Ewwwww. Lately in two separate business environments I'm finding large, complicated codebases written entirely in JavaScript....
The worst one uses Electron. You know, basically a Chromium instance rendering your shitty pages as a faux GUI?

Look, JavaScript isn't a bad language for what it was designed for, but pulling in a separate chrome process for every one of your lazily written apps is a horrible idea and wastes a ton of resources.

JavaScript was never meant to be used the way Node.JS is letting it be used! It's not meant as a standalone language, it's meant for some shitty scripting abilities in your web browser.

If you want to make an easy desktop GUI app in a high level language, just use Qt and Python or Perl or something, as those are usually actually easier than JS anyways...

Idk, is anyone else here horrified at how they're developing these apps nowadays?

From time to time, as events wend their merry way through the Courts, I'll submit an SN Story Submission that summarizes the plot that has transpired so far as well as links to my detailed chronicles, each such chronicle packed solid with wall-to-wall Civil Procedures that use all their holes. Our Story So Far:

• Standing to Complain, Or, C-TRAN Kicks a Cripple

tl;dr:

The C-TRAN Clark County Washington Rapid Transit System used a FIFTY-TWO MILLION DOLLAR local sales tax increase to retain a firm of uncommonly sadistic banshees to build these quite cool Avant-Garde Installation pieces that I remain flummoxed are denoted as "Bus Stop Shelters".

Flummoxed because The Vine's alleged "shelters" do not protect either the waiting passengers, nor the benches within in _any_ way.

Redoubling my sorrow, is that as each Vine Avant-Garge Installation piece was... installed... the old, quite pleasant, inclement weather-protective though rather prosaic True Shelters was destroyed.

In this evenings mail, I received a Tort Claims Form from a Mr. Cedric Adams, Claims Manager for the Washington State Transit Insurance Pool. My _polite_, _respectful_ as well as I'ma Gonna Tear Ya A New Asshole reply:

Mr. Adams,

Thank you for sending me C-TRAN's Claim Form.

Note that I've CCed my Legal Advisor Rod Schmidt; when you mail me yourself, please CC Rod as well.

While I will fill it out and submit it tomorrow (Wednesday), I really don't see a way for C-TRAN to remediate the ultimate cause of the cruelty C-TRAN's Vine Bus Operator other than to either redesign, or perhaps to replace _each_ of the bus stop shelters for The Vine route.

This because those "shelters" do not, in _any_ way, shelter the benches from the wind, rain and snow. Nor do the protect either those sitting on the bench or those standing from the cold, wet winds which are so common in Vancouver during the Fall, Winter or Spring.

What led me to be so profoundly overcome with grief was the great pain I experienced due to having been forced to stand during most of the forty-five minutes I awaited The Vine's arrival on this last Saturday morning, February 9th. That grief was compounded by the knowledge that I _voted_ for the local sales tax increase that at the time of the election was intended to raise fifty-two million dollars for the construction of the Fourth Plain Rapid Transit Corridor.

Despite C-TRAN quite admirably sparing no expense nor effort to provide - in the parlance of the Americans With Disabilities Act - "Reasonable Accommodation" for those who cannot walk and so require wheelchairs, no such Accommodation was provided for those who do not use wheelchairs, but for whom walking or standing are excruciatingly painful and difficult.

For that reason, my monetary claim on our form will be a largely arbitrary, quite large amount, with the expectation that my claim will be denied. I will then proceed with my Civil Complaint through the Clark County Superior Court.

I shall do so with the expectation that C-TRAN's attorney and I - with the assistance and advice of Mr. Rod Schmidt - will negotiate a settlement which stipulates that _each_ Vine Stop Shelter be protected from the elements.

Enclosed please find a photo of one of the two snow-covered benches at the 12th and Broadway Vine Stop. I shot that with my phone upon my arrival on the C-TRAN #60 Delta Park Regional Bus.

Warmest Regards,

Michael D. Crawford

Indeed I did request my 9-1-1 call's audio file, but it's going to take CRESA (not "CRESPA"), the Clark Regional Emergency Services Agency, ten to fourteen days to get it to me.

I await my Emergency Call's arrival with bated breath, as I _begged_ CRESA's Dispatcher to deliver unto me a VPD Officer who would not arrest my Evil and Cruel Bus Driver, but _reason_ with him so that he would stop insisting I get off his bus. That would have condemned me to another forty-five minutes of standing, with _great_ pain, in the snow for the next bus.

The Mind Simply Reels

There Is a Taboo Against Criticizing AIPAC — and Ilhan Omar Just Destroyed It

American Israel Public Affairs Committee

But AYYPAC doesn't donate to candidates!

Unattended-upgrade in progress during shutdown:
A start job is running for unattended upgrades shutdown

Been having problems with the Linux box. I don't shut it down very often, but recently, the machine has become pretty unresponsive. Generally, when I'm killing a little time by playing a game. The game becomes unresponsive, so I shut down other applications. That doesn't help, the game gets more and more unresponsive, until I decide to do a reboot. Except - the reboot never takes place.

So, I unmask the shutdown dialog, to find the above jewel delaying shutdown, or reboot. Dang, I was beginning to think it was a hardware issue!

So, I search for that message on the internet, and find an exact hit at https://catinsunshine.blogspot.com/2017/02/debian-cant-shutdownreboot-immediately.html

I checked the Debian WIKI for unattended upgrades services and found there are 2 packages involved: unattended-upgrades and apt-listchanges. Check the log file under /var/log/unattended-upgrades/, no record for upgrades, but reboot for test, still stuck on the service for 15 mins. So I make decision to remove it to save my time:

sudo apt remove unattended-upgrades

Then solved. Power-off/Reboot quickly, perfect.

Like the guy said, SOLVED!

So, now, the next question: Where in HELL did this unattended-upgrades come from? I presume it would have come from a dist-upgrade, but I don't know that. I am quite sure that I didn't intentionally install it myself! Obviously, nothing depends on it, so I didn't approve of it while installing some other program.

Is this a systemd thing? Soylentils have discussed abandoning systemd, and I have agreed, but haven't made the move yet. If THIS nonsense is something introduced by systemd, my priorities will change real soon! (need a hard drive to install to, and haven't bought one yet)

Ideas?

Also - it has been quite some time since I did a distro-upgrade. I'm wondering if it's been there for months, and only recently started acting up. Maybe it got corrupted or something, and only then started hanging up the system.

After removing it, I played my game again, on hard. Got all the way through Endgame: Singularity without a glitch. I've got my computer back! Now that I think about it, some other things have balked a little now and then. None of them as badly as Singularity, but odd little momentary hangs. Weird, isn't it? When I run any updates/upgrades manually, apt-get never interferes with other running applications.

I’d have a mischevious grin and a sadistic chuckle?

“Mike, this is getting _really_ old. Don’t tell us you have The Good Guy’s Gal tied to the railroad tracks again?”

Not, not today any, but have Your People call My People that we may come together as a team to do that before End Of Business on Monday.

The Long Blinks just hit! I’ll continue in the comments after I chills to one or more torrents.

Dark matter is a sinking ship or a physics oddity?
Can it be both spread out AND clumpy?
Will Dark matter ever die?

Go to the same Bat time, same Bat channel!

https://physicsfromtheedge.blogspot.com/2019/02/wide-binaries-30.html