Monthly Archives: November 2021

Article note: Dang, nice. The BeOS/Haiku family is always one of my favorites, its so cool to see the tiny team that does most of the work on Haiku manage to do so much while still basically following the design the BeOS folks were right about in the 90s.

Article note: As usual when this comes up, because fixing shitty indoor ventilation costs _institutions_ money, and implies they are culpable, and we (as a society) like solutions where the cost and blame are are borne by _individuals_.

Article note: Arcan really is one of the very few truly interesting things happening in OS stacks right now. I don't think it's going to take over the world, but I think it is going to inform and falsify a bunch of ideas instead of simply re-making cyclical mistakes.

Article note: A McSweeneys' that gets both absurd, intrusive authentication schemes and absurd academic administrative behavior in one? That's delightful.

Article note: This is a fun watch. Most of the original Mac team on stage, talking in public. There's a link to a longer and slightly higher quality copy in the comments. Especially interesting to watch in layered historical context, since you have the modern stuff that makes what they're showing mundane and thus influential, you can look at the NLS and Xerox demos from the preceding decade-and-change that do all the tricks and more but not in financial reach of consumers, and we can look retrospectively at the career arcs of all the people involved.

Article note: When you design your language ecosystem, you either end up with libbehemoth, or left-pad.

Article note: Interesting, looks like an expansion of Dialog (who they acquired)'s line, in the same vein as their GreenPAK offerings.

Article note: This looks like a surprisingly friendly reversal, but I feel like there is a catch. Setting up a limited program to stall regulatory action? Obscenely overpriced parts?

Enlarge / The back of the iPhone 13. (credit: Samuel Axon)

Apple will begin selling repair kits to consumers who want to perform some essential repairs on their iPhones themselves. Titled Self Service Repair, the program will first be available in the United States starting early next year, with more regions gaining access throughout 2022.

At first, the program will apply exclusively to iPhone 12 and iPhone 13 devices, but it will "soon" apply to Macs with M1 chips as well. A news release from Apple about the program says that it's intended to allow "customers who are comfortable with completing their own repairs" access to the parts and support they need, but that it believes going to an Apple Authorized Service Provider (AASP), independent repair provider, or Apple Store will still be the best choice for most users.

But for those who do want to repair their phones or laptops themselves, Apple describes the process thusly:

Article note: I'd like to see some more bands put under a regulatory situation similar to the SRD rules some of the ISM Bands allow unlicensed use under (that's the familiar 902-928Mhz, 2.4-2.5Ghz, and 5.725-5.875 GHz bands and rules that basically all useful modern consumer RF devices work in). Especially some VHF/UHF bands (like the 13cm allocation just below the 2.4Ghz range used for WiFi/Bluetooth/Etc.) that would be give existing applications more legroom, but also some longer and shorter stuff to see what kind of fun things consumer devices can do with modern radios and encodings in those. I can hear Elmers and commercial operators (see:C-Band politicking during the 5G rollout over the last few years) and such shrieking in the distance already. Europe is trying some slightly-tighter-reg unlicensed use of 863-870 MHz band for LPWAN applications for the last several years that seem like a good model.

Article note: Oh please oh Please oh Please. Please don't be unenforced "illegal" like so many scams, but actually come after fuckers with meaningful fines for their roach-motel subscription systems.