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• Post #4206916

  Since Detexify is now #AI slop, I have updated my one-pager of advice for learning mathematics to recommend The Comprehensive LaTeX Symbol List (https://tug.ctan.org/info/symbols/comprehensive/symbols-a4.pdf) for finding symbols. This is kind of a bad solution, since Detexify solved the problem of knowing how to draw the symbol without knowing its name with a very appropriate use of traditional image recognition. It is absurd that there is no #FLOSS tool I can recommend instead. If no one builds...

• Post #4151256

  Sitting at desktop computer: "That's enough Mastodon for now, time to do something else." Opens phone: "Let's check out Mastodon really quick." #Mastodon #internet #humor

• Post #4145883

  Do you find it annoying when socks don't even last a single decade before getting holes in them? I used to sew them back together, but I recently realized that I don't need to. Socks tend to get thinner as they age and develop holes in different places. By wearing two socks on a single foot, the holes in each one are covered by the other and the overall thickness is correct. My partner has listened to me boast about this discovery one too many times, so I thought I should share it with...

• Post #3844077

  I gather that #ImageMagick is including #LLM code now. Is there an alternative which provides similar functionality from the command line? #software #FOSS #noAI #AI #graphics #GraphicsProgramming

• Post #3650704

  @dirtwizard666 What about #Lua ?

• Post #3650703

  @dirtwizard666 I like that JSON-like databases are just valid Lua scripts, so it's a nice replacement for Python + JSON.

• Post #3650702

  Earlier this summer I read the 1926 fantasy novel "Lud-in-the-Mist" by Hope Mirrlees. In addition to being amused with reading the novel exactly 100 years since its publication, I was surprised at how modern its depiction of Faerie felt. I won't spoil it more than that, but you can get a copy at Project Gutenberg if you'd like to check it out: https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/68061 #literature #fantasy #Faerie #fae #fey #fairy #fairies #ProjectGutenberg #1920s

• Post #3650701

  While organizing some files today I came across my copy of Charles H. Bennett's "On Random and Hard-to-Describe Numbers" from 1979 (https://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/9789812770837_0001). It discusses Chaitin's constant (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaitin%27s_constant) for a programming language, which is the probability \(\Omega\) that a randomly-chosen program will compile. This is a real number between 0 and 1 which is definable but not comput...

• Post #3650700

  I've had this succulent for over a decade and recently its pot sprouted mushrooms for the first time. They lasted about one day. All I can figure is that spores got in through the open window. #gardening #nature #succulent #fungi #fungus #mushtodon #mushroom #mushrooms #plants

• Post #3650699

  While teaching a course on algebraic theories last semester I mentioned at some point that the familiar bicomplete categories Top and Poset were not algebraic, but were topological. A student asked about this later on and I found that the #Wikipedia page on «topological category» pointed to categories enriched in Top, not categories with a forgetful functor to Set which is topological. While I have lost a lot of faith in Wikipedia recently, I am pleased to report that https://en.wikipedia.org/wi...

• Post #3029487

  My partner and I have started to settle in to our new living situation, which means that I can start posting more regularly and putting more time into #math research again. Nature is being good to us. Check out this toad I found. #mathematics #nature #solarpunk #toad #toads #toadsofmastodon

• Post #2632854

  Another #Lua observation: I had gotten in the habit of using the #Python #JSON library for storing and reading small amounts of data. I'm quite set on switching over to #LuaLang wherever I used Python before and it's so nice to just write my database files in the same language as the code itself. I'm aware I could write my data as a Python script and import it, but this felt less natural than the analogous construction in Lua. This is probably because Lua is an extension...

• Post #2632853

  Acabo de leer el cuento Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius por Jorge Luis Borges por primera vez. Hace años leí un resumen de este cuento en íngles y aunque no hablo español con mucha fluidez las palabras matemáticas y las ideas lingüísticas familiares me ayudaron entender. Espero que puedo leer y escribir con fluidez finalmente. Leer parece más fácil que mirar las películas para aprender el idioma. #literatura #Borges #JorgeLuisBorges #matemática #matemáticas #math #lingüística #Español

• Post #2632852

  I've posted a one-pager of advice for mathematics students (both undergraduate and graduate) on my website: https://aten.cool/one_pager.html I wrote a draft of this a couple years ago. I now feel a little strange posting it as I leave the university system. I certainly don't approve of many things the AMS has done recently, for instance. Still, I hope that this information is useful for current students and that one day I'll be able to update it with pointers towards pe...

• Post #2632851

  I'm aware that #Wikipedia can be quite quick with articles on current events, and that the results are not always of a high quality initially, but I'm really impressed that the article on last week's warehouse fire in Ontario, California (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Kimberly-Clark_distribution_center_fire) is the only place I've seen reporting on the recent string of similar fires collected in one place. I'll have to remember to check Wikipedia for...

• Post #2632850

  The text of the proposed US federal operating system identity monitoring bill has been posted: https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/8250/text #fascism #OperatingSystem #USpol #Linux #AgeVerification #surveillance #FOSS #law #legal #technology

• Post #2632849

  My experiment with #selfhosting a code forge using #Forgejo has come to an end. Even though it wasn't too expensive to rent a VPS, I still disliked having another form of rent to pay. I'd much rather be hosting something from my own hardware at home. In addition to this, my current use-case doesn't seem to justify the effort it takes to properly maintain the service. I had a couple projects I was sharing on my website via this code forge, both of which used to be on #Git...

• Post #2559771

  I've added a page of software recommendations to my website: https://aten.cool/software.html I often find that I post on Mastodon either asking for recommendations or recommending software myself. This can be helpful, but these conversations are ephemeral. I also sometimes want to post «I'm having fun using Geany!» or something similar, but that doesn't feel worthy of a post on its own. #software #Geany #GeanyIDE #Mastodon #Linux #Android

• Post #1183944

  Does anyone know how to make this patronizing warning go away in #Librewolf? I have to suffer through this every time I want to visit a local address, and I don't want to just start manually adding all the addresses I visit. I'd just like to turn the thing off completely. If I can figure this out, I might try to do the same for the "no HTTPS" warning. #WebBrowser #HTTPS #HTTP #web #internet #Firefox #networking #security #Mozilla

• Post #941053

  I am leaving the university system, possibly forever, at the end of this month. I will be living in the woods, studying mathematics and (hopefully) farming enough to survive. I have posted an essay explaining why I'm doing this on my website: https://aten.cool/leaving_university_2026.html #math #research #academia #USpol #mathematics #trans #transgender #farming #solarpunk #fascism #university

• Post #760594

  After months of procrastination, I've finally eliminated the last two #YouTube links from my web page! All of my seminar talk videos have now been moved to #PeerTube and I can begin moving my math research livestream recordings over. Who knows, I may even have some new, PeerTube-exclusive content in the not-too-distant future. #academia #DeGoogle #seminar #math #mathematics #research #livestream