CallMeAl (like Alan)
Free Software Enthusiast
- 1 Post
- 16 Comments
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.ziptoHacker News@lemmy.bestiver.se•Why Zip drives dominated the 90s, then vanished almost overnightEnglish
94·12 days agoIt’s always funny to me to read a history of something I lived through written by someone who didn’t. I don’t think anyone who was in the industry at the time would say the Zip drive dominated the 1990s.
To set the scene, most people in the 90s didn’t own a computer at all and the majority of people who did own a computer never owned a zip drive. While Zip was the most successful of the Superfloppies, it was never ubiquitous. By the sales numbers, 10-15% of computer owners bought zip drives. Compare to a floppy or CDROM which is close to 100%.
The reason it vanished quickly was simple: Zip was never that good and CDRW was much better. As soon as the prices dropped for CDRW, Zip was a goner.
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Opensource@programming.dev•What does Open Source mean?English
5·26 days agoIn 1998, the Open Source Definition was created for clarity. A lot of people were confused between Free Software/GPL, and other types of open source software. People would make a lot of assumptions that it meant many things it didn’t so a formal definition was written down.
It doesn’t seem like it worked to clarify much as people still have wildly differing views on what Open Source means or what they think it should mean.
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Programmer Humor@programming.dev•*Permanently Deleted*English
3·2 months agoI heard Postgres was originally created in 1966 by Doug Englebart to store vectors for early mouse designs.
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Science Memes@mander.xyz•Finally we do not need to count it on fingersEnglish
10·2 months agoTushay!
I’ll see myself out.
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Science Memes@mander.xyz•Finally we do not need to count it on fingersEnglish
27·2 months agoDo I smell an ignobel in the wind?
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Privacy@lemmy.dbzer0.com•Whats the flaw of the "Nothing to Hide" argument?English
11·2 months agoIt’s irrelevant to whether other people need privacy. Saying, “I don’t care about privacy because I have nothing to hide” is like saying, I don’t have cancer so why should I support the search for a cure?
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Linux@programming.dev•How do you pronounce daemon?English
2·2 months agoYes the CTSS crew were reportedly thinking of Maxewell’s demon but also chose to change it to the “daemon” spelling to make it sound more like a “friendly garden spirit than a monster” and the pronounced it “deemon”.
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Linux@programming.dev•How do you pronounce daemon?English
8·2 months agoIn case you ever wondered where it came from in computing.
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Linux@programming.dev•Does anyone have any info about this strange repeating broadcast in my Fedora server?English
6·2 months agoare you running anything that would cause a large number of files to be open?
was it always like this? if not when did it start?
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Privacy@lemmy.dbzer0.com•Best privacy-respecting IDE for REACT-style web development?English
6·3 months agoI really like Kate and I set it up similar to this guide.
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ@lemmy.dbzer0.com•Is there a 100% free way to pirate as a newcomer?English
82·3 months agoMulvad is 5 euro per month for up to 5 devices. You could split it with 4 other people…
the only book i own on text editing
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Steam Hardware@sopuli.xyz•[Help] ext4 or btrfs or xfs for Proton and Wine prefixes on Lutris or Steam with an external SSD ?English
3·3 months agoI’ve been using EXT4 and XFS on external drives for a long time with no issues. Both are rock solid under linux and steam.
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.zipto
Linux@programming.dev•cool-retro-term 2.0.0-beta1 releasedEnglish
11·3 months agoPerfect for those late night Zork sessions!
CallMeAl (like Alan)@piefed.ziptoHacker News@lemmy.bestiver.se•Pipe Dreams – The life and times of Yahoo Pipes (2023)English
1·4 months agoYahoo Pipes was great. I used to use it to track nzb releases back in the day.

Nearly all are run by companies making money by recording as much of your data as possible.
A commercial cloud app could be entirely private but then the company would not be able to take your data.