Author: davidg

Dear Mozilla, please stop copying Google Chrome UI changes into Firefox

I don’t know why Firefox dislikes Bookmarks. Perhaps they are a pain in the ass, and the Mozilla people hope they will go away? I understand why Google would dislike them; if you use a bookmark, you are not using the Google Search Engine. Google’s primary source of revenue is advertising, ergo, search is good and bookmarks are bad. But Firefox? What excuse do you have for making your user’s lives worse?

UPDATE: there is a fix; add in about:config an item “browser.toolbars.bookmarks.2h2020” set as boolean False.

The beef I have at the moment is that I wrote a script to take screenshots. It’s the old adage “A picture is worth a thousand words”.

But the bookmarks toolbar is noise/clutter in this situation. So the simple solution is a keystroke that toggles the bookmarks toolbar on and off. Trivially easy to do, and doesn’t distract the tech support person I’m going to sending the screenshots to. Doesn’t leak information to their tech support about which web sites I log in to often.

This keystroke to toggle the Bookmarks Toolbar used to work. Now, the keystroke is still mapped, but not to the toggle function.

Firefox has now copied Google Chrome to turn the bookmarks toolbar off with that keystroke, and you have to use the freaking right-click mouse menu to turn it back on. Or there is a three menu deep regular mouse click path to get there.

What was wrong with having a toggle?

Mozilla Firefox Team: you did not make my life better by copying Google Chrome; you made it worse. I’m using Firefox because I think it is better than Chrome. Please stop downgrading it into being a clone of Chrome.

I can’t imaging anyone in the Firefox world thinking to themselves You know what I need? I need the Toggle Bookmark function to stop working, because being able to get to my bookmarks toolbar should become a pain in the ass.

The Bookmarks Toolbar was always about ease of use. It doesn’t get easier than having a button on the top of the page to click on, to instantly transfer to that site. But apparently ease of use is bad now?

Sigh.

Factorio notes, several hours in

I recently found a new mall blueprint that I like reasonably well. illHam’s Starter Base. It was in the Factorio School’s most recent list instead of the most popular list; but there were things I liked about it. Mostly, I liked that it did all three: red, green, and black science, and, it includes solar panels.

The only thing I don’t really like about illHam’s Starter Base is that the chests are limited by inventory slots and not by inserters controlled by circuits. In other words, each chest has a maximum number of slots enabled, so what limits the count of items produced is the inventory capacity getting full. The problem with this is that sometimes I have too many items in my personal inventory, and stuffing them back into the production chest is denied when the maximum-number-of-slots scheme is in place. So now there are 58 chests that need to be retrofited with red wire to the inserter, and the condition set on the inserter to stop when the count of items in the chest hits the limit. If I have too many items in personal inventory, I can shove them all into the chest with a trivial ctrl-click.

For me, solar panels are too much work / take too long to be done without robots. The quest for robots lead me to Nilaus’ YouTube video Robo Rush; because Robot abuse should not be delayed. Here’s the blueprint string:

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

Next, have the robots build red circuits, so I can build roboports. 😉

Lastly, I fight biters really poorly. I’m old, so my brain does not go as fast as young people’s brains. I’m sure doing combat with biters and eliminating their nests is much easier for brains that think quickly. For me, I just die a lot. It is frustrating. But with illHam’s Starter Base and the production of piercing rounds magazines, I can put a perimeter of turrets up and not have to worry so much about biters.

0eNqVkltugzAQRfcy3yYqDgbKVqKqCjBCIxmD/KiKkPdeOyg0Stym/fJDc++5Hs8KrXQ4a1IWmhWom5SB5rSCoUGdZbyzy4zQAFkcgYE6j/E0OJVZpzVa8AxI9fgJTe7ZU6GZJVmL+kbG/RsDVJYs4Qa/HJZ35cY2VDb5rnZBoQc9hTVrUdrgO08mCCcVicEs42V+EAyWsK2PBxEwPWnstpKSXVNNzs4uhn+g8dQjU5yXK8UnXI67y4g9uTFDGUJo6rJ5kvgkNw+5E57Fv/og6r/0gdQPbRA7jJRBHb/sdwi/h/CEa/k4CCnX6jv6XfA4K5eJam4ml8EHarNB67yoXnklRFGIqvT+C5hh72E=

The problem with this one is that it uses underground belts, which are very expensive.

Wow OpenSuSE is terrible at iPhone photos

At first, it didn’t work. So I did some searching, and found that I needed to add ifuse musmuxd libplist and libimobiledevice. Okay, did that. It still doesn’t work.

I should mention that when I connected the iPhone, Gwenview would recognize a device had been plugged in, but would spit at me that protocol capture:/ was not recognized – both before and after the addition of these packages. This appears to have been a problem seven years ago.

Eventually I find that perhaps digiKam will do what Gwenview will not. Okay, add that.

DigiKam does see the photographs on the iPhone. Great! I should be able to download them now, right?

😝

All attempts to download (backup) the photos result in the question of “to where?” This is very reasonable.

Since this is a new installation of digiKam, there is no Album defined. The download dialog box has a button “New Album” but it does nothing. Probably in a log file somewhere, some programmer wrote out LOL, dumbass.

In the main digiKam window, the Album menu has all items greyed out (including the “New” album choice with Ctrl-N for the shortcut). LOL, dumbass.

Eventually, I learn to do Settings+Configure digiKam, Collections menu and choose Add Collection. Apparently a collection is the same as an album, or not, but it appears I now have a backup copy of one of the iPhone groups of photos. I’m just kind of amazed it was this hard, and by the way, KDE isn’t telling me anything about the progress of files copies (which in the olden days, it would).

Up in the upper right corner, though, is this really cool looking text, digiKam.org which has each letter in the domain name highlighted, from left to right. That’s cool – it’s like a throbber, but for the help button. Other than the Cancel button being lit up on the Apple Inc. iPhone window, I cannot tell if file transfers are happening or not.

And of course, hooray for random crashes while stuff is doing work.

“Free” apps for your smartphone

There has been a long standing piece of knowledge in the computer industry that if you are not the customer, you are the product being sold. That is to say that advertisers are the customer, and the data that the “free” services harvest from you is what is being sold to them.

There’s a reason why you get offers for a free hamburger if you order is from their app (and the like). If you use the app, you collect reward points and get discounts and such.

Oh By The Way

TANSTAAFL

Do be very selective in what apps you install. They are all pretty much data harvesting machines.

Another favorite Factorio blueprint – Automated Artillery Expansion

I did edit it and create a smaller version of my own:

0eNqVnE1v2zgQhv9KoLNdUPxmbnvY2x73tigK21ESYV3LK8ltg8L/ff0RJ2rDV5z3FKSVHr0jDmdGHDI/q/X20Oz7djdW9z+rh2bY9O1+bLtddV/90Y/tdtv0L3d//tivdsPpX++Wd3+thqa/+/vQ98043HW77Uu1qIbdar8cu+VT3z6cQT+q+1qpRfVy+XlcVKv10G0PY7M8X7lvd0/V/dgfmkXVbrrdUN3/87Ma2qfdanu+e3zZN6fnt2Pz9cTerb6ef9uen7scL8+tTsR299CcH3NcFG8dxm7XLL+vttvJjVpw4+r2Bj4+1whu77t1t+/66W32+HlRNbuxHdvmavbll5cvu8PXddOf7MmpXlT7bmivw3J5uaH+5C5v16pP7niW8htGk5g6jzEyjC6osSQGqHEyjCmo8SQGqAkyjC2oiSQGqEkyjCuoqRXJAXJqoR/7kh5NcpAeoSeHkh5LcpAeoS/Hkh5PcpAeoTenkp5IcpAemT9HVYqDiuQAPVrmz7EYlzXJQXpk/hxLkVlbkoP0yPw5lmKz9iQH6ZH5cyxFZx1JDtIj9OdSXDVCfy7FQ8PWGRpw2ELDAA5baSA9bKmB9Lh84ZlJzK+cLMVLKX6OEqSUOEeJQkpUc5QkpegZilXkLAejbWupmtdRslmKJuc4UmPIOY44luQAH7aOjBWI40kOsksYk0OJE0kOsksYk2NBj1MkB+hxwhojlTgyf06qxDHC2aVfZ5fPUmTerN/mugVqZN6s3yK7AxxPcpAeaVTWfu7tyHxZu5IamS9rW+B4JbUqzljlZZ6sQ0mNzJO1L3GknmzUnFVCT04lNUJPjiWOzJNNXZgRPpAcpEfmy0aVOImsKYFdQZEcoCfUZE2JOJrkILvevblfPaz6udUihLBkGZenOLL8yk6rIC2So5/TwhYXaJDEZfJcAAxsaQHUREWWBIjDlhbAbyJbWiA9huQgPbKQnEpTPDqSg/TIQnIqhYoYSA7SEz82IzLFxZWRsoRElksBrE8rkuMBpyaTFdKjSQ7SY8gkgziW5CC7HJlkkB5PcpCeIPDAMOeBKZJZJmYpk4WL7qkdxnaz3Dw3w7hcbcb2W7Pc99239qHp5xY/A2qaKARfHx4f55nn97+o+ua/w+n6L4/tdmz6a2fw1uF8Y2/6w0Oz7Nrtcr06vYLzcGy6w7l1q9Xxc1ZYTebWkLdPk0kx5jHSMjypWTVs0Pdo2NioD8efDftQERv3oaJJLX5YD+PqcvcH0LK+TbzT5U379LzuDhfvq1XKO1QScc/tJMCNi7rWWXbNpoiEeo81CYoIpEXW3r4ac2/xZK3LW2vIBASttSQIWutE1tqIrD29rrr2eWu9iO09ZLtFrYHfBDJ1whcQSRAckkQmT6RI2L4MxSkx6V9+2NSCu7NOXZLTQ9s3m+v/6yxcNk1u35KZwc07jTZc5ncqb7slk2DKYxyXBJEaTyZBoCaQuQu6WCRB0MUSmbuQImGPMxWd3tTcArbTeYzm0omDe1AMCUKbLIzl1p6RYY5b7EUYz62uIkxgi2j9W5wSFdGTr5Bb8XxWc9sV+GFp7fWienLRdBhXm3+X7e5k9dj0eaQtmpV5hEM3vdqI7gNp9vVKM7ny/W2v26dlsz1F+P70lH23bfJ2wM+w92+Q94tBLLgpVtNrJ3Xf4/b0c3zuu++ZB0ztnJR4+3Y/UezyH0ImckUSnsOJBMGNZOTqNAaRWzmgaZZcn8aKyM0cWBG5TO3qPIZcpwYBypIL1UhNIOsIoCZydQRSk7j0Dwdd2AVPRTcUtsFT0Q2lffCiGzrDtbCdQSBLFgAQRDbDnUYgz/WfsaLANaAxKHK9YwxKXPMYgrzi+r4YVHONXwwiF68xiFyEgH4k7I2/9X6xIkdmM6jIkyCoKJDZDCqKJAgqStzmRGfyW74VtzsRYWoySQOMptfQf3EmYfn/vvoxPDe/1qT5yjHMVPtQkP593cRm0ZasS2z+zTmyLgED4LkOOnRPaSu+GOZC5LrWcOZJ2/HFCC7sxydVUiRsyKdivJR25IvxUtqSL8ZLaU++GC+lTflivIxsKrAIRK40O4dAbCqAIHKlGZqWFJlTAKYmcwrAaG7LO8IYbs87wrCfoQBDnpGBgy7szb9tWMegwO00x94TSRBUlLi95gikFXlQBpmmVU2mRQjSJAiaZsj8ChVZEgQVOTK/QkWeTIsQxEbqgEBkT9B5BGIjNVJUkz1BqEh6RtcUQZoEQdMMdxgaK7IkCCpy3HlorMiTIKgocCeisaJIgqCixJ2JhiBptzuUTBOe1n07FY1BmgRB0wx3LhorsiQIKnLcyWisyJMgqChwZ6OxokiCoKLEnY6GiqTHdovBX3huNxZjtrCpHYsxW9jUjsWYLTy6G4sx2ziyGIWKyIOPV9DnxfXPwNxP/rbOovrW9MN1B02sbUg6BG/roOPx+D+JRu9y=

The original is here: Automated Artillery Expansion – Factorio Master Class by Nilaus

It does have the snap-to-grid option enabled, which means it would have been nice to have done those on the first city blocks. But still, it works fine.

This came from a Youtube series Factorio Master Class by Nilaus.

Putting an image on a Raspberry Pi

  1. Download a .raw.xz file
    1. In this case, it was https://download.opensuse.org/distribution/leap/15.4/appliances/openSUSE-Leap-15.4-ARM-KDE-raspberrypi.aarch64.raw.xz
    2. Yes, I also downloaded the .sha256 file and ran sha256sum against the downloaded image to make sure the image file was not damaged during transfer.
  2. Open a terminal session and become root
  3. Determine which device the SD card is
    1. In this case, it was /dev/sdc
  4. Copy the image file to the SD card
 xzcat /home/david/Downloads/openSUSE-Leap-15.4-ARM-KDE-raspberrypi.aarch64.raw.xz | dd bs=4M of=/dev/sdc iflag=fullblock oflag=direct status=progress; sync

Amazon Transcribe gotcha

I needed to transcribe some minutes from a meeting, and only one person was speaking during a particular three minute piece. So I copied that segement out to it’s own MP3 file.

I uploaded the file to s3:// and ran a default transcription job. Whoops.

By default, I mean that, mostly I clicked Next, Next, Next. I supplied a job name, an input file, and an output file. (That I used an output file location other than default means it wasn’t exactly default settings).

After the transcription job was done, because I had not specified the quantity of speakers, it left out the 'speaker_labels' data from the JSON file.

I have been using https://github.com/trhr/aws-transcribe-transcript/transcript.py to simplify the JSON into text, but it does not handle files with missing speaker labels.

Sigh. Now I have to re-do the transcription, which will incur another charge. Those speaker_labels are all over the file when present.

For what it is worth, the tasks were essentially:

  1. Upload the file to S3
    1. aws s3 cp /home/david/Documents/some_path/review_of_previous_board_meeting.mp3 s3://some_s3_bucket/
  2. Log in to Amazon Transcribe and create a job
    1. Job name was review_of_previous_board_meeting
    2. Input file was s3://some_s3_bucket/review_of_previous_board_meeting.mp3
    3. Output file was s3://some_s3_bucket/review_of_previous_board_meeting.json
      1. This did require clicking the button “Customer specified S3 bucket”
      2. I used the AWS CLI commands to copy between my local machine and the S3 bucket, so it is easier if I name the bucket I want the files in.
    4. Click Next
    5. THE IMPORTANT PIECE: Audio Identification = On, and audio identification type = speaker identification
      1. Stupidly, you have to define the count of speakers, and 1 single speaker is an invalid minimum. So I have to tell it there were two speakers, when I had clipped the MP3 file to only contain one.
  3. Download the file from S3
    1. aws s3 cp s3://some-s3-bucket/review_of_previous_board_meeting.json /home/david/Documents/some_path/
  4. Clean up the transcription
    1. transcript.py /home/david/Documents/some_path/review_of_previous_board_meeting.json
    2. And then transcript.py runs without errors. The result is file review_of_previous_board_meeting.json.text

Amazon Echo as an alarm clock with playlists

Don’t bother.

It can be done, but man, what a pain in the ass.

First, create your play lists in the Amazon Music App. I prefer to have the Amazon Music App in offline mode, but for this step it must be in online mode. This makes sense, because the Echo devices are online devices.

Creating a playlist

  • Click on Library, then Playlists, then +NewPlaylist
  • Give your playlist a name. I’ll use Friday Morning Playlist
  • Hit Save
  • Hit Done
    • This is because, immediately after creating a new playlist, the only songs available to me are Recently Played with no option to pick a different list. From my point of view, this is a UI failure.
    • I was doing this on my smartphone. The process may suck less on a desktop.
  • You will be on the name of the playlist with a message that you have not added any songs yet. Click the three vertical dots button for more options.
  • Click the +AddMoreSongs button
  • Now you have your choice of Artists, Albums, or Songs
    • What songs do you want to wake up to, in what order? You decide. 😍
    • I should probably point out that I had previously gone into the Amazon Music App and fully populated “My Songs” in my library. If you haven’t done this, well it is one more step to do. The only good thing about this is that you can get the Amazon Music App on your desktop computer, and (while in online mode) it syncs up to AWS.
  • Click Done

At this point, you want to exit the Amazon Music App on your smartphone. It wouldn’t hurt to give it a few seconds to sync up to AWS before exiting. The reason you need to exit the app on your smartphone is because it is listening, and you are about to give a voice command to your Amazon Echo. If you don’t exit the app on your smartphone, it will respond instead of your Echo.

Implementing an alarm with playlist

  • Speak at your Amazon Echo “Alexa, set alarm for every Friday to play Friday Morning Playlist”
  • Your Echo will respond with “Alarm set for what time?” Say your alarm time.
  • Your Echo will respond that it has set an alarm.

Checking your work

  • Open the Amazon Alexa App
  • Find your way to Alarms & Reminders
  • The things I have had to look for was if the alarm was set for every week versus do-not-repeat, and if it was actually set for the playlist I want. It seems to me that the programmers at Amazon don’t want to play me what I want, they want to play me what their algorithm comes up with. I suspect that they think that by forcing new songs down my throat, they will entice me into signing up for their monthly service for even more variety.

Follow up commentary

I am happy sad that I can now no longer wake up to exactly the songs I want to, in order. All is not perfect, however. My life is happiest when I have a particular routine, and that routine starts with waking up. What I would like to do is:

  1. Alarm clock plays Song Number 1. I wake up and (mentally) sing along with the song.
  2. I hit the snooze, climb out of bed, and start the shower on hot water, at a trickle.
  3. Climb back into bed, and start praying. Thanks first, grattitude list second, and people on my prayer list third.
  4. Snooze timer expires, and more music plays. Maybe I sing along, maybe I hit snooze again and go back to praying.
  5. Repeat step 4 until it is time to climb out of bed and hit the shower. I also have some Alexa routines which turn on the lights and brighten them as time passes.

So the problem is the “snooze” function. If I speak at the Echo device “Alexa, snooze” then it does so; but, when the snooze timer expires, the Echo starts back on Song Number 1 of the playlist.

Kind of makes the playlist work pointless.

Not entirely, however. “Friday Morning Playlist” is not likely to be mistaken by Alexa for some random song, and, is short and sweet and understandible. If I were to say “Alexa, set alarm for every Friday to play Timbuk3 The Future’s So Bright, I Gotta Wear Shades” I can almost guarantee you that Alexa would not get it. Yes, I have tried. Wow did it take a lot of tries to get Alexa to finally figure out which song I was referring to. In retrospect, it would have been a lot easier to create a playlist of one song with a short sweet name and use that.

I did try “Alexa, pause playlist for six minutes” That was interpreted as “Alexa, stop” 😒

So a good snooze function still eludes me.

Also, I would like an Echo device with a snooze button, and the LCD display like the Echo Dot with Clock except with the good speaker of the six inch Echo with premium sound.

Saturday Night Live should just give up

In today’s climate, and with the concessions Lorne Michaels has had to make over the years, it will never be as funny as this: U.S. Ministry of Truth Interrogates Man Who Shared Misinformation

I remember watching SNL as a kid, back in the 1970’s. It was truly hilarious. 1970’s SNL would have done this skit, exactly, this coming Saturday.

Today’s SNL is likely getting pressured to let Nina Jankowicz host the show instead of (correctly) being mocked on it.

Lorne Michaeals probably sees that SNL is in hospice care. His beloved baby has grown ill, and it’s terminal.

He should do the right thing and pull the plug. Let it die with at least a little dignity left.

I doubt that his corporate owners will let him do that, however.