Semiofftopic but somehow I took offense at the Vista comparison. Aero Glass was peak UI design to me, and I'd certainly prefer it to modern paradigms like flat controls, or to stretch it even further, Corporate Memphis etc.
Curse you, Apple and Jony Ive. You only needed to tone skeuomorphism down not kill it.
I’m genuinely delighted that this reaction to that little phrase came up! It was definitely something of a half-joke on my part: the Mercedes infotainment system is very well-regarded, but it does not look “modern” compared to something like a Tesla, Rivian, or Xiaomi.
The hyperscreen from a physical hardware perspective looks strangely dated to me as well, depending on the specific car model.
Never thought of the fake variant as gasoline-like but it sure has that strange, very heavy 'chemical' aftertaste that lingers in your palate. Also never tried the real thing, I wonder if i'd like it or not.
+1 - it tastes so obviously of petrochemicals that I throw the food out - truffle fries, truffle pasta - might as well pour mineral spirits on it for the same experience.
> Every time a manufacturer says vague descriptions like "security" or "performance" fixes, be wary - they probably removing perfectly working functionality for "reasons"
I have a pair of WF-1000XM3s and this is painfully true. ANC was brilliant on these until I naively updated, and whoosh - instantly and grossly degraded ANC, to the point I previously almost didn't hear people talking at distance, keyboard chatter, city traffic etc. and now I do, no matter the app settings.
I wanted to upgrade to the in-ear XM4s, but after this? NEVER again Sony. At least for portable audio. I got instead a pair of cheap QCY HT07s (then $28, now ~$20) and got quite surprised with ANC performance on these: easily beats the crap of the XM3s-on-latest-firmware, and gets close to the previous one in audio quality. Which is a lot to say about Sony "updates".
Not to defend Google, but they end up saying much the same:
> The next challenge for the field is to demonstrate a first "useful, beyond-classical" computation on today's quantum chips that is relevant to a real-world application. We’re optimistic that the Willow generation of chips can help us achieve this goal. So far, there have been two separate types of experiments. On the one hand, we’ve run the RCS benchmark, which measures performance against classical computers but has no known real-world applications. On the other hand, we’ve done scientifically interesting simulations of quantum systems, which have led to new scientific discoveries but are still within the reach of classical computers. Our goal is to do both at the same time — to step into the realm of algorithms that are beyond the reach of classical computers and that are useful for real-world, commercially relevant problems.
Up to that point, most Windows iterations didn't require (for the time) big upgrades to run fine. Many PCs designed for a given version could run the next, maybe with a little elbow grease, but the bottom line is: the out-of-the-box experience on new AND upgraded PCs was mostly okay.
Then it came Vista. An OS designed for at least 1Gb RAM, preinstalled on machines who stubbornly refused to sell with more than 512Mb (even 384Mb, the horror!) for a looong time. I remember that, at least where I live, RAM prices sky rocketed just months afther Vista came out, because almost all people irremediably needed the upgrade.
It also didn't help that vendors were happy to fill new systems with their auto-installing crapware. While this wasn't Microsoft fault, it certainly helped to cement Vista's reputation as a very heavy-weight OS.
Having said that. I concede the point that Vista was pretty alright, provided your PC had the grunt to run it.
Oh wow. Count me in on the I didn't know I had that! camp.
When younger I struggled horribly with ALL things math, and to this day still do. OTOH I've always had a knack for DIY involving measurements: lenghts, rythms, quantities, sizes, you name it. I just invoke my own "dynamic mind ruler" for the task at hand and usually get it right 1st try. Cooking something new? I intuitively know the proper amount of ingredients and spices. Doing work in a friend's car? That nut looks like a 3/4 and that one a 11/16, and who the heck put a 11mm in place of a 7/16??
Incidentally, the whole concept of Time always flows from right-to-left to me. 1000BC is waaay to the right, and 2030AC is just a stone throw away to the left. Now I wonder if it's something only I perceive that way, or everyone does.
My course of action was to run Memmaker, and let it take care of (almost) everything. It usually worked fine. Sometimes I had to fine-tune config.sys/autoexec.bat to make a bit more room or disable EMS, but those were edge cases.
Now that I think about it, it'd be fun to know how Memmaker works internally, but I can't seem to find info on that. Maybe no one has done such analysis... yet.
> Now that I think about it, it'd be fun to know how Memmaker works internally, but I can't seem to find info on that. Maybe no one has done such analysis... yet.
It has been a long time...doesn't it just go through and LOADHIGH all the obvious possibilities? I feel like it maybe had some library of candidates it would check.
I never had this program, I think I did it all manually after analyzing config.sys and autoexec.bat on systems with more free ram than I had. It makes me realize how much knowledge I just mined from school computers.
Out of curiosity, did you needed some particular feature in such an app? I've found that Google Lens is pretty darn good at identifying plants, insects, fungi and whatnot (assuming your camera has a decent macro mode).
The only problem with Lens is that it is "magic" and doesn't have a failure state beyond giving junk results should it fail. I don't think I would ever trust it for a "can I eat this" indicator on a mushroom with how many visual lookalikes there are out there. What if the contrast isn't good enough to catch colorations and the gills are not in sight?
Merlin Bird ID is so good in comparison, probably the best in the "ID this thing" category of apps I have ever tried. Photos do a lot, but if you don't get a good ID it will ask some questions about the bird's behavior and your circumstances to narrow down your search.
Even if you identified the mushroom species, sometimes that is not enough to know whether it is safe to eat. The same species can be edible (perhaps after some soaking) or dangerously poisonous depending on the geographic area where it grew.
Mushrooms are literally one for the categories of things that are "DO NOT EAT UNLESS YOU'RE 100% CONFIDENT AND KNOW THROUGH YOUR OWN KNOWLEDGE" types. (Caps used because it is a yelling thing)
Seriously, just don't eat any mushroom that you can't personally identify with 100% confidence from your own knowledge and references, with some app saving its xyz not being considered a reference.
Even experienced mycologists have sometimes made mistaken identifications so anyone else should be so cautious as to presume poison in all cases except the most certain.
You cannot market nature, but you CAN market everything around it: Tourism, clothing/footwear, camping gear, even technology (cameras, GPS etc). All of them to give you the "upper hand" over your peers - And of course, you can buy that from us!
Curse you, Apple and Jony Ive. You only needed to tone skeuomorphism down not kill it.
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