When the gp’s book says that C is a third generation language: I would guess the first generation is Fortran and the second generation contains ALGOL and BCPL. C was heavily influenced by BCPL. (get it? C comes after B)

Especially talk to FSF if this “well known debugging tool” is a part of the GNU project, as FSF has the power and standing to enforce the copyrights on GNU software.

I think my mother played that star trek game on a time shared minicomputer.

Let us all remember that, at least back when it started, the establishment alternative to systemd was a product named after its original operating system, System V UNIX, which is a direct descendent of the original UNIX from AT&T. This sysvinit software used complicated shell scripts to manage daemons. Contrary to some opinions, these shell scripts were not “just working”; they were in fact a constant and major maintenance burden for Linux distributions. When I started on Linux at least, Debian had a suspiciously large fraction of bugs on init script breakages.

All this is to say that the new system, systemd, doesn’t have to be anywhere near perfect to be worth replacing sysvinit.

People argue that systemd is rejecting the “UNIX philosophy” of small tools that do one thing well. I argue that this UNIX philosophy is not some kind of universal good with no tradeoffs. It’s an engineering rule of thumb. There are always tradeoffs.

People argue that systemd is too much like Windows NT. I argue that Windows NT has at least a few good ideas in it. And if one of those ideas solves a problem that Linux has, Linux should use that idea.

Yea ya can’t get any pancakes at the dang Waffle House.

Here’s my recollection from civics class:

1. Each state makes their own laws about whether and when a dead candidate can be replaced on the ballot. It’s entirely possible that citizens in some states would vote for dead candidates, while citizens in other states are voting for different candidates.

2. Remember you’re actually voting for the electors that are listed underneath each (now presumed dead) presidential candidate. States make their own laws on how strictly the electors actually have to vote for the guy they pledged to. In many states, there’s no penalty for being a “faithless” elector, and so in this scenario I would imagine that many electors in this situation would exercise their prerogative to vote for a living person who is eligible to hold the office. Perhaps even a re-nominee from their party.

3. Electors meet in their state capitols to sign and transmit the real ballots to Congress. However they decide to vote based on the above, I think it’s important to the constitution that this happens by a deadline (December 18?), and if that is missed, we may be in real constitutional crisis territory.

4. After meeting, swearing in new members, and electing a house speaker (I really hope they can elect a speaker), Congress meets in a joint session to count the real ballots from step 3. This process is in the constitution. This is the process that was interrupted by a mob on Jan. 6, 2021. Under the constitution, Congress can only go against what the ballots say if there’s a tie, in which case the house votes for president on a one state, one vote basis.

4a. As seen in 2021, Congress could conceivably engage in a deliberative process to determine whether ballots that are presented are real, legitimate ballots or not. The constitution doesn’t actually allow them to do this. This is a real weakness in the system. If Congress isn’t allowed to adjudicate ballot legitimacy, then who is? Apparently no one.

4b. There’s also no alternate process if the majority of elector ballots have elected a dead person. Presumably Congress is required to declare that person President.

5. Constitution also says the next president’s term starts on Jan. 20, 2025, at noon eastern, period. No ifs, ands, or buts. If Biden dies in office, his VP Kamala Harris will assume the duties. But that term ends on this date, and the fact that she ascended would have no direct bearing on whether she appears on any presidential ballot.

5a. This turnover deadline literally has no exceptions. If it is missed for any reason, we’re probably in real serious constitutional crisis territory.

5b. If, per 4b, Congress declared that a dead person was elected president, I imagine that person would have a hard time showing up to inauguration on Jan 20. In this case I think that once the turnover has occurred, the normal line succession, which is 17 people deep*, can be used to swear in the next president.

5b1. In this scenario, next up would be the vice president-elect from the elector ballots, probably sworn into the vice presidency first. Third in line is the speaker of the house (I really, really hope they can elect a speaker). Then President Pro Tempore of the senate (the longest serving senator), then cabinet secretaries.

*Most of the 17 are cabinet secretaries. These do not expire automatically when the presidential term expires on Jan. 20. This means that all of the old president’s secretaries are still in the line of succession (unless they foolishly submitted resignation letters) until a president is sworn in and either fires them or makes them resign.

**The presidential term starts at a precise date and time, but a president must swear the oath of office. Both things are in the constitution, so what happens when the time arrives, but the new president isn’t sworn in?

These are all general opinion statements. There aren’t any verifiable facts like, “on this date at a meeting with x we discussed how AI project y is myopic and non-user-centered.”

To be fair it might actually be possible to find smut there.

Or Fortran variables that collide with Fortran built-in functions.

Keep in mind that array subscript and function call are both () in Fortran.

And you can write more than six characters, but only the first six are recognized. So APFLWSAC and APFLWSAF are really the same variable.

And without namespaces, company policy reserves the first two characters for module prefix and Hungarian notation.

Some of those dialog boxes have not changed a bit since Windows 3.0.

Here’s another semi obscure tidbit.

Do you know what happened to the puritan religion? As in, the actual church that was famous for burning witches and forcing women to wear letters.

It morphed into the United Church of Christ and, I kid you not, the Unitarian Universalists. (Among other splinters)

Seems like this will become a legal bludgeon when one parent supports gender affirming care, but the other does not.

Stellaris on Steam has a fully-native Linux executable.

Except even Gentoo does binaries now (more than they used to).

Even if they’re currently shipping some LGPL components, they may want to prevent new LGPL components from being added if they eventually want to be LGPL-free in the future.

Once you’re far enough up to reach terminal velocity, it doesn’t matter how far you fall any more. (mostly)

You don’t want people to be able to ditch judges they don’t like through means of violence.

Reminder: the 22k number is inclusive of Hamas combatants. They refuse to break out military casualties from civilians.

So people ask priests to bless stuff rather often. Stuff like babies, boats, cars, fields, tractors, running shoes, and whatever else. This is the kind of religious tradition that goes back a long way before Christianity, but nevertheless, the Roman Catholic church has policies, procedures, and liturgical texts for how to do it.

These types of blessings are not usually a major part of spiritual life for most people.

Previously, it was explicitly forbidden for a priest to offer this kind of blessing to a sane-sex couple. That is now permitted, but the priest must take steps to ensure that no one is confused that this might be a marriage, which it is definitely not (in the eyes of the church).