@stuartmarks@mastodon.social

Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jul 31, 2026

Replying to @mattblaze@federate.social

@mattblaze@federate.social I guess this would be like the Full Ginsburg for computer security?

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jul 19, 2026

Replying to @datarama@hachyderm.io

@datarama@hachyderm.io @Guillotine_Jones@beige.party Well done, sir.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jul 18, 2026

Replying to @emilymbender@dair-community.social

@emilymbender@dair-community.social The one-way nature of this process reminds me of “Schopenhauer’s Law of Entropy”: If you add a teaspoon of wine to a barrel of sewage, you get a barrel of sewage. If you add a teaspoon of sewage to a barrel of wine, you get a barrel of sewage. (Probably not actually from Schopenhauer)

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jul 17, 2026

Replying to @stuartmarks@mastodon.social

@Jam123@mstdn.ca @controlc@mstdn.ca @jef@mastodon.social @effinbirds@mastodon.social Also: https://giphy.com/Swear_Trek

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jul 17, 2026

Replying to @Jam123@mstdn.ca

@Jam123@mstdn.ca @controlc@mstdn.ca @jef@mastodon.social @effinbirds@mastodon.social In case @effinbirds@mastodon.social doesn’t reply to this… At a con I asked Aaron about swear_trek and he was quite doubtful it would return. Star Trek owned by Paramount so nobody can make any money without a license. And since swear_trek is decidedly family unfriendly it’s unlikely a license could be negotiated. So, it had a good run, but it was time to move on. Looks like many are still there at https://xcancel.com/swear_trek “You stuck your dick in the warp core?”

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jul 10, 2026

Replying to @lazarus7@infosec.exchange

@lazarus7@infosec.exchange @SeanCasten@mastodon.social Right, not enough people know that an account logged into X is required to read threads and replies. Posting on an open platform like Mastodon (Fediverse) is preferable. Meanwhile, a workaround to read X posts is to go through the “xcancel” service: https://xcancel.com/SeanCasten/status/2075293839359680777

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jun 24, 2026

Replying to @stuartmarks@mastodon.social

With the room example, the "floor" member indicates the floor of the building. But does «"floor": 1» indicate the ground floor (US style) or the first floor above ground level (EU style)? A new version might add «"groundFloor": 0» to indicate which convention is used. A strict implementation would give an error if "groundFloor" isn’t expected. This certainly can be inconvenient but it might be better than silently processing the record incorrectly. (2/2) @john@social.ahlroos.me @mehmandarov@mastodon.social

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jun 24, 2026

Replying to @john@social.ahlroos.me

@john@social.ahlroos.me Hi, I’m not sure if you saw @mehmandarov@mastodon.social’s article posted just a little while before your question: https://mastodon.social/@mehmandarov/116792525382514461# He describes Jackson as “strict” and other JSON libraries as “lenient”. Why is Jackson strict? I don’t know the actual reason but I have a plausible guess: an “extra” but unknown property might change the interpretation of one of the known properties. #Java #Jackson (1/2)

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · May 18, 2026

Replying to @mattblaze@federate.social

@mattblaze@federate.social I did a small bit of digging on PGN’s contribution to the naming of Unix. https://mastodon.social/@stuartmarks/116596803964572033

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · May 10, 2026

Replying to @norootcause@hachyderm.io

@norootcause@hachyderm.io Ah yes, the good old “You should have known”.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · May 10, 2026

Replying to @ben@werd.social

@ben@werd.social @igb@mastodon.hccp.org If you need access to Palo Alto then one angle might be to find a place near a Caltrain station in a more affordable town. Since Caltrain was electrified last year the service has improved considerably. caltrain.org

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · May 05, 2026

Replying to @TheDonRaab@mastodon.social

@TheDonRaab Those $ names are all intended to be non-public, but the fact that they’re visible in the class file represents a “leakage” of information. These names also leak into concrete forms such as serialized data, which I hear that some people 😇 depend upon. There are probably other things that depend these names too, inadvertently or not. If javac were to change its naming policy, I bet a bunch of stuff would break.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · May 05, 2026

A shirt from the good old days, when corporate swag had high quality fabric with an embroidered logo. This one is a long-sleeved shirt with the Solaris logo.

#Sun #SunMicrosystems #Solaris

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · May 05, 2026

Replying to @iFixit@mastodon.social

@iFixit 👏

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · May 04, 2026

Replying to @stuartmarks@mastodon.social

javap -v ‘Collections$2’ Amidst the voluminous output there will be some lines of the form: LineNumberTable: line 5169: 0 line 5170: 9 line 5169: 14 These map from certain locations in a method’s bytecodes back to the source lines. Each method should have a line number table. The relevant line number in the source code is here: https://github.com/openjdk/jdk/blob/jdk-25-ga/src/java.base/share/classes/java/util/Collections.java#L5169 which points directly at the anonymous inner class within singleSpliterator(). (2/3) @TheDonRaab

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · May 04, 2026

Replying to @stuartmarks@mastodon.social

Finally, the Collections$2 name is just the convention chosen by javac when it generates the class. It could put more information about the location of the anonymous class, say, including the method name in the class name, something like: Collections$singletonSpliterator$2 That might provide more meaningful names without burdening programmers with the need to name things that don’t need names. (3/3) @TheDonRaab

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · May 04, 2026

Replying to @TheDonRaab@mastodon.social

@TheDonRaab An anonymous class is a feature from the code author’s standpoint; they’re relieved of the burden of choosing a name if it’s not necessary to choose a name. Forcing things to be named (by language rule or by coding style) will result in authors making up meaningless names. This does make things harder to debug, though. There is more direct way to see the source of an anonymous class, at least in the JDK. For example, run this command on JDK 25… (1/3)

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 28, 2026

Replying to @bondolo@mastodon.social

@bondolo Nice! I’ll have to try this.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 21, 2026

Replying to @aka_pugs@mastodon.social

@aka_pugs@mastodon.social Sun was circling the drain in 2008 and was looking for a buyer. If Oracle hadn’t bought Sun, who knows what would have happened — but nothing good was likely. Maybe it would have been bought up and parted out by private equity.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 16, 2026

Replying to @briankrebs@infosec.exchange

@briankrebs@infosec.exchange https://mastodon.social/@adhd_coffee/115043327681155140

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 15, 2026

Replying to @igb@mastodon.hccp.org

@igb Yeah the Eastern Sierras are fabulous. In winter when all the passes are closed — I guess most are still closed now — it’s really isolated too. Bridgeport has the feel of the town in the “It’s A Good Life” episode of The Twilight Zone. Well not really, but that’s the feeling I had when we passed through there. 😅

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 14, 2026

Replying to @rl_dane@polymaths.social

@rl_dane @claudius @synec GrossBSD implies the existence of DozenBSD

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 11, 2026

Replying to @mwichary@mastodon.online

@mwichary 😮

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 10, 2026

Replying to @stuartmarks@mastodon.social

The other operations were much faster than multiplication and division, so it was probably deemed unnecessary to speed them up when shorter precisions were selected. Multiplication and division, being much slower than the other operations, probably stood to benefit the most from the variable precision. Using 8 digits could be 2.7-3.8x faster than 14 digits. (4/4)

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 10, 2026

Replying to @stuartmarks@mastodon.social

Page 13 describes how this works. The value always occupied 64 bits, but digits beyond the selected precision were zeroed. It says “Model 44 always performs long-precision arithmetic with 56 bits.” So how were the lower-precision formats faster? The timing table on p. 15 reveals that only multiplication and division operations changed speed depending on the selected precision. Other operations’ timings were unchanged. (3/4)

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 10, 2026

Replying to @stuartmarks@mastodon.social

There’s a picture of this on Ken Shirriff’s @kenshirriff@oldbytes.space site, along with the consoles of the other 360 models. In the 360/44 pic, the knob is the bottom one of the trio of knobs at the center left. https://www.righto.com/2019/04/iconic-consoles-of-ibm-system360.html There is a general description of this feature on the Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_System/360_Model_44 and fortunately it has a link to original source material on bitsavers: https://bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/360/functional_characteristics/A22-6875-5_360-44_funcChar.pdf (2/4)

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 10, 2026

Replying to @JohnMashey@mstdn.social

@JohnMashey@mstdn.social @SteveBellovin@infosec.exchange @markd@hachyderm.io @aka_pugs@mastodon.social Speaking of the 360/44 and (previously) of IBM’s hex floating point, I went down a little rabbit hole I thought I’d share here. The 360/44 had variable-precision FP. Using a knob on the front panel, you could select long precision to have 8, 10, 12, or 14 hex digits, allowing you to trade precision for speed. (1/4)

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 09, 2026

Replying to @JohnMashey@mstdn.social

@JohnMashey@mstdn.social @SteveBellovin@infosec.exchange @aka_pugs@mastodon.social @markd@hachyderm.io Ah, the “Motivation” section on that page covers it. Thank you.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 09, 2026

Replying to @SteveBellovin@infosec.exchange

@SteveBellovin@infosec.exchange @aka_pugs@mastodon.social @JohnMashey@mstdn.social @markd@hachyderm.io Very interesting. I’ve always suspected (or maybe I heard somewhere long ago) that the hex floating point was done for speed. I’m trying to understand why it would be faster. I’m guessing that most FP ops require a lot of shifting, and shifting by 4 bit places at a time would require fewer cycles than shifting 1 bit place at a time, but perhaps the folks here would know more.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 09, 2026

Replying to @mwichary@mastodon.online

@mwichary Arrrgh! The tractor-fed paper is misaligned!! 😄 On another note, the Data General stuff is *very* blue.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 08, 2026

Replying to @aka_pugs@mastodon.social

@aka_pugs@mastodon.social @JohnMashey@mstdn.social @markd@hachyderm.io @SteveBellovin@infosec.exchange Huh, interesting comment on hex floating point. I’ve long thought that a controversial choice. I remember hearing an IBM numerical analyst claim that the hex floating point was “cleaner” than competing formats (this predated IEEE 754) but much literature today echoes the criticism given here that the hex format effectively shortens the significand.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 07, 2026

Replying to @davidgerard@circumstances.run

@davidgerard@circumstances.run Yes in fact Rega is a U.K. company so I’m sure you can do much better than going through a U.S. retailer! There is certainly decent quality analog equipment available to you, Rega or equivalent, at affordable (or “affordable”) prices.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 07, 2026

Replying to @stuartmarks@mastodon.social

@davidgerard@circumstances.run A good source, at least of ideas, is Music Direct. I just looked and they have a LP digitization bundle on sale for US$725. I don’t know much about this specific equipment but the brands are well regarded and the price seems to be above the “cheap crap” range but below the “excessive” range (which I consider to be US$5,000 on up). 2/X https://www.musicdirect.com/turntables/rega-planar-1-fono-mini-a2d-mk2-mm-phono-preamplifier-usb-a-d-converter/

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 07, 2026

Replying to @davidgerard@circumstances.run

@davidgerard@circumstances.run I’ll echo other respondents and say that you should get a decent analog turntable and external A2D converter. I don’t know what your budget is or what U.K. pricing is, but it’s possible to get a decent turntable in the US$500-1000 range. I’m a belt drive advocate as they typically have lower noise than direct. Well regarded brands in this price range are Rega, Music Hall, and Pro-ject. I have a Pro-ject Debut III which is 33, 45, and 78 capable, and an NAD PP-4 A2D processor. 1/

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Apr 03, 2026

Replying to @Daojoan@mastodon.social

@Daojoan@mastodon.social I guess the void is no longer asking you to join its professional network on LinkedIn.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Mar 25, 2026

Replying to @cpurdy@mastodon.social

@cpurdy@mastodon.social @zeldman@front-end.social Really?? Not sure there’s any “I” here at all, whether or not it’s artificial.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Mar 25, 2026

Replying to @zeldman@front-end.social

@zeldman@front-end.social @cpurdy@mastodon.social I am shocked — SHOCKED — to discover that people are advocating avoidance of em-dashes.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Mar 12, 2026

Replying to @alfiekohn@sciences.social

@alfiekohn They missed the title. The “easy” version should be called The Good Gatsby.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Mar 04, 2026

Replying to @dr2chase@ohai.social

@dr2chase@ohai.social Hooray! She’s still afflicted though, tiring after 15 min. But much improved! Glad for her progress.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Feb 12, 2026

Replying to @tagir_valeev@mastodon.online

@tagir_valeev As 90% of fire alarms are drills, it makes perfect sense to respond with the most likely scenario. ( /s in case it wasn’t obvious. Rather startling that people are arguing with you.)

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Dec 30, 2025

Replying to @mattblaze@federate.social

@mattblaze@federate.social The amount of surveillance video, cell tracking, and license plate scanning detailed in the document is startling. And he made all the purchases on credit cards. Remind me to pay cash next time I buy wire strippers, safety goggles, gloves, a file, and sandpaper. In the future, paying cash and not carrying a powered-on cellphone will be viewed as suspicious activity.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Dec 15, 2025

Replying to @kittylyst@mastodon.social

@kittylyst @mattblaze Thanks. I follow Wil a little bit. I was wondering what he’d say about it. Certainly a refreshing contrast from Trump, though not on the most pleasant topic.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Dec 15, 2025

Replying to @mattblaze@federate.social

@mattblaze@federate.social Didn’t take me too long to run into it. I took a deep breath before reading. Yes, awful and delusional, and 100 other terrible things that are typical of Trump posts. Thanks again for the warning, it helped.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Dec 15, 2025

Replying to @mattblaze@federate.social

@mattblaze@federate.social Thanks for the advance warning about Trump’s response. The Reiner murders hit hard. I now have some time to prepare myself for the Trump response when I inevitably run across it.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Sep 18, 2025

Replying to @mattblaze@federate.social

@mattblaze@federate.social Kind of funny that Gilligan’s Island was trying to thumb their nose at Minow. I watched that show as a kid, but in retrospect it was one of the “formula comedies about totally unbelievable families” (well, sort of) that Minow said was part of the vast wasteland. I mean c’mon, the premise was completely ridiculous. On the other hand I recommend reading or listening to Minow’s speech. It holds up well, and it shows Carr to be nothing more than a petty tyrant. https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/newtonminow.htm

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jul 31, 2025

Replying to @regehr@mastodon.social

@regehr@mastodon.social Agassiz was great in the abstract but not in the concrete. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Agassiz#/media/File:Agassiz_in_the_Concrete.jpg

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Mar 26, 2025

Replying to @holly_cummins@hachyderm.io

@holly_cummins Mundus sine caesaribus?

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Mar 23, 2025

Replying to @kenshirriff@oldbytes.space

@kenshirriff Interesting, thanks, I had heard of a keyset but I never knew how it worked. I can see how five chorded keys would be difficult to learn. Seems like it would be more useful as function keys (as you noted) or as modifier keys, rather like buttons on a Wacom tablet or Emacs control/shift/meta/super/hyper modifiers.

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Jan 24, 2025

Replying to @aka_pugs@mastodon.social

@aka_pugs@mastodon.social TECO expert quiz. Quick: what happens when you type your name to TECO?

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Stuart Marks @stuartmarks@mastodon.social · Oct 16, 2023

Replying to @dgar@aus.social

@dgar@aus.social 12. Proofread carefully to ensure you haven’t any words out.

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