Fediverse matcha_addict • 2 weeks ago • 95%

I am sure it was discussed here before, but I can't find a good way to search this community. Are there any arguments against having a user's identity federate, and be compatible across platforms? For example, let us say I sign up with my instance, matcha_addict@lemy.lol But what if I go on mastodon, and I want to have my own micro blog. Or maybe go to write freely and post some blog posts. I'd have to make a different account on each one. What if mastodon or write freely could just let me log in with my lemmy account (or lets call it federated account). This has several benefits: - users don't have to scratch their head on if I am the same person or not across these platforms - theoretically, someone following my feed can get updates on what I do on multiple platforms Now I understand this would be difficult to implement and iron out all the edge cases, but am I missing anything on why it wouldn't be a desirable feature, given it is implemented?

Fediverse matcha_addict • 2 weeks ago • 100%

From a practical sense, ActivityPub may be the obvious choice as it gives easier interop with the largest federated platforms. But what else? There are existing platforms built on these protocols, such as movim for xmpp, and another for matrix I forget. From a technical standpoint, are there any major pros and cons?

Fediverse matcha_addict • 2 weeks ago • 95%

I heard often about activityPub being challenging to implement. Now I know part of this is because, if you are building on activityPub, you want interop with existing platforms such as mastodon, and they do their own thing. But ignoring that aspect, what is so hard about activityPub? What could have been done better? I am a software developer, so feel free to use software dev concepts and terms when explaining. Thanks!

Fediverse matcha_addict • 2 weeks ago • 98%

Lemmy developers have said there are no near plans for allowing users to follow mastodon or other activityPub networks, so I'm considering another platform that can do this. It looks like mbin, Piefed and FediLab have the ability to do this. Has anyone tried them and have a comparison? I also heard it may be possible to do from just mastodon-like platforms. Anyone tried this?

Fediverse matcha_addict • 3 weeks ago • 89%

I know they're quite different technically. But practically, what does ActivityPub unlock that was not previously possible with RSS and basic web tech stack? I think I have an idea of the answer. RSS may provide a way for users to "subscribe" to content from a feed, equivalent of following and putting it in a unified feed. But it does not have a way for users to interact with the poster, like comments or likes. This may be possible with a basic web stack though, but either users will have to make accounts on every person's site, or the site has to accept no user auth. (but this could be resolved with a identity provider standard, like disqus does) I suppose another thing activityPub does is distribute content to multiple servers. Not sure if this is really desirable though? Anyways, did I miss anything?

Linux matcha_addict • 3 weeks ago • 94%

I recently learned about nsjail, a utility to sandbox applications or provide workload isolation. It seems to be lighter weight than firejail and possibly better suited for server applications. Has anyone used this? What's your experience with it? I'm curious about using it for my web server applications as an additional layer of Dr hotty.

Fediverse matcha_addict • 3 weeks ago • 97%

Is there any fediverse client out there (mobile or pc or web) that has support for multiple types of content, rather than just for one? Most apps I find are only mastodon-like (including pleroma etc.), or only lemmy-like, or only peertube-like. One of the main benefits of the fediverse is that I could theoretically access all of those from one platform. But the clients I saw don't seem to support it too well.

Fediverse matcha_addict • 3 weeks ago • 100%

Is there any fediverse client out there (mobile or pc or web) that has support for multiple types of content, rather than just for one? Most apps I find are only mastodon-like (including pleroma etc.), or only lemmy-like, or only peertube-like. One of the main benefits of the fediverse is that I could theoretically access all of those from one platform. But the clients I saw don't seem to support it too well.

Selfhosted matcha_addict • 3 weeks ago • 98%

Hi all, I found a hobby in trying to secure my Linux server, maybe even beyond reasonable means. Currently, my system is heavily locked down with user permissions. Every file has a group owner, and every server application has its own user. Each user will only have access to files it is explicitly added to. My server is only accessible from LAN or VPN (though I've been interested in hosting publicly accessible stuff). I have TLS certs for most everything they can use it (albeit they're self signed certs, which some people don't like), and ssh is only via ssh keys that are passphrase protected. What are some suggestions for things I can do to further improve my security? It doesn't have to be super useful, as this is also fun for me. Some things in mind: - 2 factor auth for SSH (and maybe all shell sessions if I can) - look into firejail, nsjail, etc. - look into access control lists - network namespace and vlan to prevent server applications from accessing the internal network when they don't need to - considering containerization, but so far, I find it not worth foregoing the benefits I get of a single package manager for the entire server Other questions: - Is there a way for me to be "notified" if shell access of any form is gained by someone? Or somehow block all shell access that is not 2FA'd? - my system currently secures files on the device. But all applications can see all process PIDs. Do I need to protect against this? ## threat model - attacker gains shell access - attacker influences server application to perform unauthorized actions - not in my threat model: physical access

Selfhosted matcha_addict • 1 month ago • 86%

The telegram app has a very nice interface, but I want to use a self hosted xmpp chat server. Is there maybe a fork of telegram that makes it work with a self hosted xmpp server? I would imagine that this is possible. If not, is there anything that at least gets close to how nice telegram UI is?

Programming matcha_addict • 1 month ago • 92%

Sorry, the question in title sounds naive. I have no doubt that math is essential in programming, but I am thinking about philosophy of programming and want to summarize when they're needed in programming. My attempt is below: Most applications of programming are making electronics do things through their interfaces. Whether that's telling a screen to display something, a network wire to transport data, a hard disk to persist data. But we often need math because we often transform data, or we might make said electronics do things based on user input, or an event. Transforming an event to data is a mathematical construction. Some applications are almost purely mathematical, like banking, crypto currency, or encryption. In your opinion, does this fully explain why we need math in programming? Is there a better way to sum it up?

Linux matcha_addict • 2 months ago • 97%

Hi all, I am looking for a local database that is easily accessible via the command line. It can be SQL or non-SQL Whats my use case? I want to use it kinda like a second brain. A place to save ~~my notes~~, my todo lists, my book reading lists, links / articles to read later, etc. I want it to be a good CLI citizen so that I can script its commands to create simpler abstractions, rather than writing out the full queries every time. Maybe sqlite is what I need, but is that ideal for my use case? Edit: removed notes, as evidently they aren't suitable for this and aren't like the rest.

Linux matcha_addict • 3 months ago • 92%

I am thinking to make the following tool, but wanted to get opinions before I embark on this journey. The tool builds container images. The images are optionally distroless: meaning, they do not include an entire distro. They only include the application(s) you specify and its dependencies. What else does the tool give you? - the build tool uses a package manager to do dependency resolution, so you don't have to manually resolve them like many docker files do. (NOTE: The package manager is not installed on the container image. It is only used by the build tool) - uses gentoo's portage to build the software from source (if not previously cached). This is helpful when you're using versions of software that aren't built against each other in the repos you download from - allows specifying compile flag customizations per package. - makes use of gentoo's existing library of package build or install recipes, so that you only have to write them for uncommon apps rather than in every docker file. I find it crazy that so many dockerfiles are doing their own dependency resolution when we already have package managers. What do you think? Is this tool useful or am I missing a reason why it wouldn't be?

Lemy Meta matcha_addict • 3 months ago • 96%

This instance performs spectacularly. Admin is always on top of everything. No drama, and I have high confidence that this instance won't disappear without notice. Our admin does not get enough appreciation, so big shoutout and thanks for your hard work ❤

Linux matcha_addict • 4 months ago • 95%

I understand that nvidia support for wayland is lacking, but I know it's possible. For context, I was using sway 1.8 for a while (no official support for nvidia). It was working almost perfectly, only minor issues. After the update to 1.9, I get constant flickering. I can downgrade to 1.8, but the fact that 1.8 was working tells me that it is possible for a window manager to work well for nvidia. The problem is the sway team does not want that headache (understandably so). Are there any alternatives that work well with nvidia?

Linux matcha_addict • 4 months ago • 94%

Bspwm has many appeals, and I do not want to focus on those. I want to focus on binary-tree separation of windows and its benefits vs alternatives. What's the appeal? For comparison, Sway and i3 allow for the v-split and h-split layout, so you can have 2 or more windows split side by side. You can nest them, so it is sort of an n-ary tree. It feels a lot more powerful. So why the binary tree? The others seem richer and more capable. Bspwm is marketed as more powerful than i3 but it seems the other way around?

Programming matcha_addict • 4 months ago • 100%

I am looking to program something similar to a simulation game, but free-form in its customization and scripting to the point where no strategy game will get me close enough. I initially thought to start from scratch, simulating all the basics. Simulating money, people, resources, maps, etc. Obviously this is very ambitious. Are there any libraries or frameworks that could help me with this? I don't want something opinionated that decides the model for how to simulate, for example, money or a person. I want to preserve the ability to simulate those with the models and math of my choosing. But maybe a library that has the foundations of simulation in general, so that I don't have to build everything completely from scratch? I understand what I said sounds very vague. This will be something I will discover as I do more of it, so forgive the vagueness.

Programming matcha_addict • 4 months ago • 96%

I am building an application that is using JSON / XML files to persist data. This is why I indicated "outside of SQL" in the title. I understand one benefit of join tables is it makes querying easier with SQL syntax. Since I am using JSON as my storage, I do not have that benefit. But are there any other benefits when using a separate join table when expressing a many-to-many relationship? The exact expression I want to express is one entity's dependency on another. I could do this by just having a "dependencies" field, which would be an array of the IDs of the dependencies. This approach seems simpler to me than a separate table / entity to track the relation. Am I missing something? Feel free to ask for more context.

Android matcha_addict • 5 months ago • 93%

I like tasks.org but unfortunately it doesn't look like this will come any time soon. Plus points: - if the task can be assigned to multiple sub-lists (or projects, buckets, etc).

Android matcha_addict • 5 months ago • 94%

I want a to-do list app that syncs from a json file (or other human-readable data format), so that I can view and modify the file (via a CLI like `jq`) from my computer too, and it would still reflect on my phone when it syncs. Does this exist? Preferably it uses a format simple enough that makes it possible / easy to modify it via jq.

Android matcha_addict • 5 months ago • 81%

In the desktop world, we have the option to use the command line: a uniform interface for a multitude of apps that would otherwise be very different when implemented as GUIs. Using the same interface, I can move or edit files, cross out tasks on my to-do list, retrieve my password for my email account (using Bitwarden or pass), etc. All in the command line. The GUI for each of those are wildly different. The other benefit is it is very easy to create a new command line app, as opposed to a GUI. Is anything like this possible for the smartphone world (even if it doesn't or will never exist)? What would it look like? Since smartphone typing is much slower, we can't simply reuse the command line. We'd need something different. An interface that can still support a various spectrum of different operations, yet ergonomic for a smartphone. What are your thoughts?

Programming matcha_addict • 6 months ago • 100%

While reading Sipser's book on theory of computation, it relies heavily on the concept of formal language, and machines that merely accept or reject an input. But most useful programs we deal with do more than merely verify an input. They compute something. We may compute a solution for an equation instead of merely verify it. We may sum a list of numbers, or calculate some function on it. Maybe "most" is an exaggeration since I can't prove it. But still, it begs the question. Why not deal with machines than do more than merely verify?

Programming matcha_addict • 6 months ago • 88%

Apologies if the title is confusing, but I couldn't think of better phrasing in short text. Whenever we define / specify a certain automaton (such as a finite state machine or a turing machine) by defining all of its States, transition function, etc., this feels awfully similar to defining an algorithm. For example, I can define a machine that can tell if a number is divisible by 3. It is very similar to writing an algorithm and the steps to solving the problem. Now I understand that the two aren't exactly equivalent. But would it be incorrect to say that the specification of a machine is a type of algorithm, since we're defining the steps it takes to solve a problem (how to respond to a specific state or input to solve a specific problem)?

Asklemmy matcha_addict • 6 months ago • 93%

I've been looking at best buy. Are there any other sites to look on? Budget: targeting $900, can go up to $1000 Specs: - 3060 or 4060 and up - decent build and ergonomics - good battery - 16 GB RAM - 6 core / 12 thread CPU - good screen

Selfhosted matcha_addict • 6 months ago • 89%

I want to self host a suite of services and make them public. What kind of services? Well, all kinds. Matrix, lemmy, bookwyrm, and I may think of others in the future. The problem? I don't even know where to begin from a legal stand point. Not only that, I am a barely legal immigrant (vulnerable to deportation) from a country that is not very liked by the gov. I am afraid to put myself in a vulnerable position and get more trouble than the typical US citizen. Is there a reasonable way to be able to self host public services without legal trouble? Is there a resource I can follow for best practices to avoid issues?

Matrix matcha_addict • 6 months ago • 100%

I am interested in trying out matrix, but my first impression seems to reveal that by default, there may be some privacy or anonymity pitfalls if I use matrix. Examples: - using an instance I don't host means the host is trusted with my data - self hosting might reveal a lot of information about me. Most likely, it is registered to a domain that has my info and could potentially be traced back to me. - When self-hosting, being one of few users, basic analysis of my activity could reveal a lot about me, since all that activity could be easily identified as belonging to a single person Now I understand not all threats could be mitigated, but my worry is that both self hosting or not have significant gaps. What's the most privacy and anonymity conscious way to use Matrix?

Fediverse matcha_addict • 6 months ago • 100%

An alternative to reviewing games on steam Preferably the platform would be community driven rather than profit driven (which may make the data less trust worthy for me)

Programming matcha_addict • 6 months ago • 87%

While learning Automata and computation theory independently, I made a realization I want to confirm. Regular languages can all be created by taking elementary languages (languages made up of a single member of its alphabet) and performing closed operations in them, such as union, concat, and kleene star. This was clear to me from regular expressions. Is this true? Is there any significance to this fact? What about Context-free languages and other formal languages? Are there operations that can be performed on elementary languages to create all of them? Or is this a special property of regular languages only?

Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ matcha_addict • 6 months ago • 97%

I know Calibre can remove DRM, but it seems that Calibre does not remove things like watermarks, references to the buyer by name, etc. Now maybe I can try to find those manually, but that is an error prone process. Plus, what if they embed a unique digital signature that ties back to me? I understand that this is a very uncommon practice, but I do not want to find myself in a bad place. I suppose the only way to remove a digital signature of any sort is to buy two of the same e-book by different people, diff them, and remove anything that differentiates them. Is there any tool that does this or automates the process? am I being too paranoid, and this is not a real threat?

Programming matcha_addict • 7 months ago • 95%

I want something that is: - SSG (static site output) - looks nice - is a template I can use out of the box by just dropping in my content and configurations, rather than designing or building myself - is not feature-poor. I want it to have features like footnotes, jump-to-section links, citations, on-hover pop-ups for citations or footnotes, syntax highlighting for code blocks, etc. - nice to have: ability to draw basic graphs or diagrams (helps in technical explanations) - is not too difficult to customize by editing the code directly, Customizing the looks, structure, or adding functionality if I needed Programming language doesn't matter much. I can use whatever. I do have a preference for functional languages. Eleventy seems like a great framework to do this, but as I said I want a template that's ready out of the box not just a framework. The blogging template I found for eleventy does not look as nice as I hope.

Programming matcha_addict • 7 months ago • 90%

Suppose we have a large to-do task manager app with many features. Say we have an entity, which is the task, and it has certain fields like: title, description, deadline, sub-tasks, dependencies, etc. This entity is used in many parts of our codebase. Suppose we decided to modify this entity, either by modifying, removing, or adding a field. We may have to change most if not all of the code that deals with this entity. How can we do this in a way that protects us from errors and makes maintenance easy? Bear in mind, this is just an example. The entity may be something more low-key, such as a logged user event in analytics, or a backend API endpoint being used in the frontend, etc. ## Potential Solutions ### Searching One way people do this already is by just searching the entity across the codebase. This is not scalable, and not always accurate. You may get a lot of false positives, and some parts of the code may use the entity without using it by name directly. ### Importing Defining the entity in one central place, and importing it everywhere it is used. This will create an error if a deleted field remains in use, but it will not help us when, say, adding a new field and making sure it is used properly everywhere the entity is being used so what can be done to solve this? plus points if the approach is compatible with Functional Programming ### Automated Tests and CICD Tests can discover these types of issues with high accuracy and precision. The downside is... Well tests have to be written. This requires developers to be proactive, and writing and maintaining tests is non-trivial and needs expensive developer time. It is also quite easy and common to write bad tests that give false positives.

Selfhosted matcha_addict • 7 months ago • 96%

Hello friends, Just about every guide that comes up on my Google search for "How to create certificate authority with OpenSSL" seems to be out-of-date. Particularly, they all guide me towards creating a certificate that gets rejected by the browser due to the "Common Name" field deprecation, and the requirement of "Subject Alternative Name" field. Does someone know a tool that creates a Certificate Authority and signs certificates with that CA? A tool that follows modern standards, gets accepted by browsers and other common web tools. Preferably something based on OpenSSL. If you know a guide that does this using OpenSSL, even better! But I have low hopes for this after going through dozens of guides all having the same issue I mentioned above. ### Replies to Some Questions you Might Ask Me #### Why not just correct those two fields you mention? I want to make sure I am doing this right. I don't want to keep running into errors in the future. For example, I actually did try that, and npm CLI rejected my certs without a good explanation (through browser accepts it). #### Why not Let's Encrypt? This is for private services that are only accessible on a private network or VPN #### If this is for LAN and VPN only services, why do you need TLS? TLS still has benefits. Any device on the same network could still compromise the security of the communication without TLS. Examples: random webcam or accessory at your house, a Meta Quest VR headset, or even a compromised smartphone or computer. #### Use small step CA (or other ACME tools) I am not sure I want the added complexity of this. I only have 2 services requiring TLS now, and I don't believe I will need to scale that much. I will have setup a way to consume the ACME server. I am happier with just a tool that spits out the certificates and I manage them that way, instead of a whole service for managing certs. If I am over estimating the difficulty for this, please correct me.

Functional Programming matcha_addict • 7 months ago • 100%

I've been enjoying learning ocaml, but I found it very easy to write code riddled with side effects and imperative-ness. Take this example: ``` let some_func arg = let input = format_input_from_stdin () let read_content = read_file "some/file/path.txt" let to_write = get_write_file_content input read_content let () = write_file "some/other/path.txt" to_write let output = run_external_command_with_output (output, read_content) ``` As you can see, many side effects and imperative steps in the code. Is there a better practice for coding this in a functional manner?

Linux matcha_addict • 7 months ago • 94%

I read a lot of answers online that its a bad idea, but the arguments did not make a lot of sense. "it's a heavily ingrained part of the eco system". Well if I can change it, what's the deal? It makes more sense to make an interrupt signal be the harder shortcut, and copy to be ctrl+C, matching other programs and platforms.

Programming matcha_addict • 7 months ago • 100%

I constantly hear about research into functional programming, and even real things coming out of them, like certain programming languages (idris). Is there anything like this for frontend UI dev? It doesn't have to be FP related.

Programming matcha_addict • 8 months ago • 100%

Hello friends, Unfortunately none of my friends (or even my coworkers, surprisingly) share my passion for programming. I am looking for a tightly knit online community where I can make friends with other nerds who are enthusiastic about programming (i.e. It's not just a job for them). Matrix, discord, or honestly any online platform is good. I do highly prefer that the community is welcoming and not toxic. Topics I'm interested in: programming theory, comp sci, devops, self hosting, system design, Linux, functional programming, OOP, etc.

Programming matcha_addict • 8 months ago • 96%

cross-posted from: https://lemy.lol/post/19181146 > I just started to learn Ocaml to learn functional programming. I will use it to build a CLI that's mostly orchestrating other programs. > > My experience is mostly in JS / TS, but I've also coded a good bit in Python and Lua. > > Below, I provided a list of things I learned or focused on while using OCaml. But I feel like I must be missing something. This is only moderately different from what I'm used to in JS. I expected something more radical. Moreover, I constantly hear a lot of FP jargon (like "highly kinded types", monads, etc) that I feel am still missing. > > So far, here's what I studied: > > - immutability > - avoid side affects > - static typing > - recursion instead of loops > - option / maybe > - higher order functions > - conditionals and other constructs as expressions, when they're statements in other languages > - pipelines and functions as input —> output > - currying > - scoping with let > > What am I missing? > > > >

Functional Programming matcha_addict • 8 months ago • 100%

I just started to learn Ocaml to learn functional programming. I will use it to build a CLI that's mostly orchestrating other programs. My experience is mostly in JS / TS, but I've also coded a good bit in Python and Lua. Below, I provided a list of things I learned or focused on while using OCaml. But I feel like I must be missing something. This is only moderately different from what I'm used to in JS. I expected something more radical. Moreover, I constantly hear a lot of FP jargon (like "highly kinded types", monads, etc) that I feel am still missing. So far, here's what I studied: - immutability - avoid side affects - static typing - recursion instead of loops - option / maybe - higher order functions - conditionals and other constructs as expressions, when they're statements in other languages - pipelines and functions as input —> output - currying - scoping with let What am I missing?

Programming matcha_addict • 8 months ago • 90%

There are so many definitions of OOP out there, varying between different books, documentation and articles. What really defines OOP?