@fastfinge

Admin

completely blind computer geek, lover of science fiction and fantasy (especially LitRPG). I work in accessibility, but my opinions are my own, not that of my employer. Fandoms: Harry Potter, Discworld, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Buffy, Dead Like Me, Glee, and I'll read fanfic of pretty much anything that crosses over with one of those.
keyoxide: aspe:keyoxide.org:PFAQDLXSBNO7MZRNPUMWWKQ7TQ

Location Ottawa

Birthday 1987-12-20

Pronouns he/him (EN)

xmpp fastfinge@im.interfree.ca

keyoxide aspe:keyoxide.org:PFAQDLXSBNO7MZRNPUMWWKQ7TQ

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@nick I’ll keep eloquence64 going. Once the new engine is fully feature to feature compatible, I’ll rip out the 32 bit bridge and replace the DLL files. My guess is they’ve got a year of work to get there.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@dhamlinmusic @jscholes That’s just mastodon with some extra code.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jscholes It’s also possible iceshrimp and mastodon are different. I refuse to use mastodon because monocultures are bad, and I want to do my tiny part to keep the fediverse open.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jscholes To be fair, Mona misuses it in exactly that way, to my endless frustration. I keep forgetting I’m allowed to boost posts from protected accounts when I’m using Mona.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jscholes Huh. On my server “approve follow requests” is a different setting. Protected means the server won’t even tell non followers any info about the account like bio etc, and all posts are hidden and boosts and quotes are disallowed. I assumed mastodon was the same.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jscholes I’m confused. Protected means only followers can see your posts. A public post on a protected account can’t be a thing can it?

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@MLE_online @BorrisInABox I mean translations are AI. Not using an LLM doesn’t mean it’s not machine learning, or not AI. If you don’t want any AI, spell checking, translation, ocr, dictation, grammar checking, smooth scrolling, text to speech, phishing protection, autofill, and autocomplete also have to go.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@feld Not using the MAC address is to avoid hostile dhcp servers tracking your device. It’s the same reason all modern devices rotate MAC addressing. If you need stable addresses, dhcp is the wrong tool.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@clv1 @jscholes @jcsteh Just as soon as someone invents an ipa keyboard that doesn’t require three hands with seven fingers each.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@clv1 @jscholes @jcsteh Why? It uses the Latin alphabet, a silly and flawed writing system. If we are forcing everyone to change why keep it? And why keep a language designed by white Europeans to privilege themselves? It’s no easier or neutral to learn than English for Chinese or Japanese speakers. Leave it to die with the other outmoded 19th century ideas that inspired it.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@clv1 @jscholes @jcsteh The perfect solution would be for everyone to just learn a language that already does, like Korean. The world only needs a single language, and then we can get rid of AI translation services, and save the environment! I mean, as long as we’re all dreaming impossible dreams…

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jason @jcsteh I think social media should be handled the same way we handle TV in Canada: no ads or sponsored content for children. If your website shows ads, it either needs to be adults only, or it needs to show zero advertisements to children. Then all of the incentives for the social media networks to capture children’s attention the way they have are gone, because they can’t make money at it. And places like Mastodon can just keep doing what we’re doing.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@mcourcel Nah. He's spent the entire negotiation rolling over and shaking a paw like a good little puppy. I expect after they force the provinces to put American alcohol back on the shelves and nobody buys it, we'll all be given legally enforced quotas for how much of it we're required to buy in order to show support to our American friends.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jcsteh I wonder how all of the social media bans and age verification requirements and things are going to affect that? As they remove computers from the schools, and kids aren't allowed to use Gmail or Google Docs until they're 16, will Braille make a comeback? Or will the kids just be left to wrotte because "Well, they can just use a screen reader when they're old enough". As I understand it, Australia decided that github qualifies as a social network. So technicly a 13 year old student is legally not allowed to download NVDA there.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jscholes @jcsteh Right, but everyone in the room would notice...something...was different about it, even if they couldn't articulate what. The same way even though I can't play a single instrument, I can tell if someone else is playing an instrument poorly. Even if I can't explain what they're doing wrong.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jcsteh Also, remember that billions of dollars and years of manpower have been spent helping people who struggle to read print do a better job of it, so they can read signs and billboards, even if they would never willingly pick up and read a novel. In comparison, almost zero resources have been spent on helping people who struggle to read Braille. They're just told to give up on it.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jcsteh I think it's more about removing the stigma around being illiterate, honestly. I know some sighted folks who, for one reason or another, are functionally illiterate. But they would never, ever come out and say it, even if reading a menu is a fifteen minute struggle. Some people's brains just aren't set up for reading fluintly, either in Braille or print. It's not a problem unique to Braille.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jcsteh Yes, but most style guides are major enough that they're easy for sighted readers to learn. If you grew up in Canada, almost every newspaper article you read probably follows the Canadian Press Book of Style. Same for US news and AP Style. So for sighted writers, it's just "do the natural thing". For blind folks who don't read Braille daily, it's just a giant pile of a few thousand rules to memorize.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jcsteh And that's not to mention things that even Braille readers can't learn, but authors/writers are absolutely required to know. For example, are you aware of drop caps and why/how they're used? That was another thing I constantly got marks taken off for forgetting when I submitted certain documents.

🇨🇦Samuel Proulx🇨🇦 @fastfinge@interfree.ca

@jcsteh I used to agree with you a lot stronger until I went into journalism at university. They had a required "spelling and punctuation" exam that every other student past on the first try. It took me three. Without reading Braille, you just don't notice things like God needs a capital g, LORD is in all caps in some cases (and YHWH always is), titles that go after a name (esq, phd, OBE, etc) are capitalized differently from titles that go before the name (mr. mrs. and so on), not to mention all of the non-obvious homophones; everyone gets there/they're/their, but what about pail vs. pale? When should you write the number 5, and when should you spell it out? When should a word be a compound, and when should it be hyphenated? How and when should words be split across lines? What types of subheads can go in the middle of a page, and what should always go at the top of the next page? When is it okay to skip an accented letter at the end of a word, and when is it not? What is the difference between dashes, Hyphens, and em-dashes, and when should each be used? When does punctuation go inside the quotes, and when does it go outside? There are three types of quotation marks; when is it appropriate to use each one? These are things any sighted person picks up naturally, just by reading, well enough to pass this sort of exam. Whereas I mostly used speech for everything but math and science, so I had to study for several months to squeak a pass. Because none of that is stuff you'd think to pause your text to speech reading and check, or even realize was a thing unless someone directly told you.

❮ Previous page Next page ❯