Gentoo was the first distro I got working with internet access because it supported the little phone line based network my family had, so I could share dial-up via the parents windows computer. And, yes, I also printed off the install guide.
Makes me wonder what it would take for governments to actually hit Microsoft hard enough for it to hurt. I remember when they were hit with anti-trust fines here in the USA due to how they were bundling Internet Explorer as the default browser. I mean, did they ever stop? I can't recall ever turning on a new Windows install in the past couple decades and not having IE or Edge as the default.
It also makes me wonder what it would take for IT people to finally stop gritting their teeth about having to use, or having to let others use, Windows and start just dealing with the learning curve of switching to some Linux distro. I mean, Windows Recall is spyware. If it didn't come from Microsoft, Windows Defender would be sure to mark it as malicious... What's the name for a screenshot based keylogger I wonder...
I used to just figure that Windows was just all some people could use. And if that was the best tool for them, then ok. But now? I can't say that anymore. It's out and out malware at this point.
In all seriousness, if you are sticking with Windows at this point, why? Is it just the fact your other software doesn't work on another OS? Or is there something good about Windows that you like?
Things seem more complicated due to Visual Studio Code being cross-platform, and the fact that there's some extremely rudimentary support for consoles in Jetbrains tools, but there's no debugging support at all.
> In all seriousness, if you are sticking with Windows at this point, why? Is it just the fact your other software doesn't work on another OS?
That’s not really a minor point. It’s a big deal for people who do things other than use a browser, text editor, and terminal.
Even for certain CAD software I use that has Mac and Windows versions, the Windows version feels so much more performant and responsive. I’ll switch to Windows for anything serious.
Also, YMMV, but in the past 5 or so years my Windows workstation has felt less buggy and more stable than my Macs. I’ve dealt with a lot of annoying quirks on the Mac over the years where the only solution is to wait for the next update and hope it’s fixed. Even today, accessing network file shares is incredibly buggy on Mac in certain cases.
I daily drive Linux for everything except games, and gaming on Linux has come far enough that I'll be switching over soon. My 60+ father also uses Linux for most of what he does.
And, yes, software working on your OS is not a minor point. That's the whole reason I used to go with the "best tool for the job" approach. Windows Recall is what changed that for me. I can't see using an OS with spyware built in as a "feature".
In my opinion, Apple is no more trustworthy than Microsoft, so...
> It’s a big deal for people who do things other than use a browser, text editor, and terminal.
So, the number of video editing, photo editing, CAD, gaming, and so on tools that work on Linux has grown a LOT. It's not just for basic stuff. You can do almost anything you need to on Desktop Linux. Yes, a lot of things are rough around the edges, but they're that way because people haven't invested in them, not because they're bad tools.
So, I feel like "Docs-as-Code" has some context I'm missing, so I'm going to comment on docs in general.
I think there multiple kinds of docs for software.
* Comments explaining a specific section of code.
* API docs describing functions/classes/etc.
* Docs on how to use a library/class/etc. Usually including simple, isolated, examples.
* Tutorials on how to create simplified applications using the developed tools.
* Docs on how to deploy, configure, and maintain an application.
* Docs on how to use an application.
* Docs on how to troubleshoot an application.
* Docs on how to integrate applications.
* And likely others I'm missing.
Personally, I've been seriously frustrated by how bad most of the open source (haven't done much with proprietary code) documentation is. Case in point is Drupal and Symfony. Trying to use api.drupal.org is not fun, and Symfony's docs always cover the basics, and then there's nothing on pulling everything together into something complicated. So you try to dig into the actual code, and end up finding multiple layers of uncommented abstractions. Yes, I can eventually figure out what is going on if I put the effort in, but that's a lot of time that could be save by a few lines of comments.
I usually end up asking JetBrains AI about what I need, then use what it says after I fix the errors it makes... It's also very good at summarizing everything I'd find if I used a normal search. But that all only works if others have already asked and answered my questions.
Some things I've been trying to do to improve my own code's documentation:
* Unless the line is super obvious, even if I think it is obvious, I try to leave a comment. Yes, it seems pointless, but I have gone back to old code I remember being obvious without said comment enough times that I think it is worth it.
* Avoiding "elegance" in favor of "explicitness". For example, I use full `if` statements instead of ternary operators even when ternary operators would look better. For whatever reason the syntax of ternary operators has never sunk in for me, and the explicitness of `if` is much easier to parse. I also use very descriptive function and variable names. Basically, if I have to think about what something means, I try to change it so I don't have to.
* Split out functions into smaller functions as much as I can't. This means I can use descriptive function names. And I'm pretty sure it's just good practice.
I also have been trying to figure out ways to keep higher level docs closer to my code. I have some ideas, but haven't tried them yet. Has anyone ever written something that detects changes to a method/function, and then when you save your file it pops up asking if related docs need updating? Maybe add comments to the method pointing to where related docs live, and then your IDE/tool uses that to know what docs need updating?
"Has anyone ever written something that detects changes to a method/function, and then when you save your file it pops up asking if related docs need updating?"
I've got a partial solution to that: I have automated tests that introspect my code for things that need documentation and then fail if those items aren't at least mentioned in the docs. Works really well.
That's a good way to do it. I was actually thinking of a Git hook or something in the ci pipeline as a place to start. So reading about how you implemented it was helpful. Thanks for sharing!
Drupal still has a very high learning curve. I'll use Drupal over WP any day, but I can acknowledge it has some rather rough edges.
I haven't dug into it yet, but I think that "starshot" initiative that's been Drupal.org's front page since the last DrupalCon might be aimed at giving people an option without the rough edges.
Personally, if Wordpress handled security alerts with plugins the way Drupal does, and if they did a better job of keeping bad code out of plugins (why can a theme implement a form?? At least that was the case years ago. Has it changed?) I'd give WP a serious look again.
I use it in most of my containers. Very handy if you need to run some kind of pre-script before you main program, or need to run multiple programs in the same container.
The article itself is rather, hmm... Melodramatic? Not sure that's the right word, but it is close. That said, the overall idea that "open source" projects that are controlled by a single vendor have problems is true.
I think that having a for-profit company controlling an open source project is a major conflict of interest. Open source does not always result in profit. Often the opposite. And I think we've seen the results of that with all the different open source projects that have re-licensed into pretend open source licenses.
There are ways to run open source projects that support both the open source culture, and allow for for-profit companies to make a profit. But most of those ways mean allowing competition. Which is where the single vendor project conflict of interest becomes apparent. Yeah, big tech will leech off any successful project. Yes, that means less money for the "single vendor". Yes, that is not fair. But I'd say re-licensing is worse than leeching, so...
The other side effect of "single vendor" I've run into a lot, is simply that their paid options are always priced for organizations with very deep pockets. So the smaller orgs (and individual developers) that jumped on the bandwagon early because the project was open source (and they actually could jump on the bandwagon), have no chance at supporting the project. And end up have to find something else because the project stops supporting open source.
I don't see how it's a conflict of interest. The primary benefit of open source is that you can run and modify it yourself if you need to. This benefit is still there if there is a single vendor behind the project.
The risk of a single vendor project is that it's less likely to be supported in the long run. This isn't a conflict of interest though.
I would love to see a regulation put in place requiring companies to notify their users every time they transfer data about their users to another organization. If the data is "anonymized", the company should have to notify all their users.
If the company has contact info for the user, it should send the user a notification via that contact info. Even if that means having to send a physical letter.
The company should also keep a public record of transfers, something like a page on their website listing when they've transferred data, why it was transferred, and what kind of data was transferred. That would cover anonymous users.
There would need to be something in there covering data transfer as part of what the company's business is. Maybe a list of businesses that access your data as part of the provided services and are covered by the company's terms?
Even better would be to force companies that make money selling your data to share the profits with every person they just sold data on.
Why would anyone worry about anonymized data? That bit sounds strange. If it’s truly anonymous then how can there be harm in it? E.g would a site telling its owner they had 400 unique users (an anonymous piece of data since it’s an aggregate) have to notify its 400 users they were counted?
I guess company wouldn't care, but I'd like to know if statistics that I'm part of is now also owned by someone else. I don't know why but it'll be nice to know.
Man, I should find time to dig into Gentoo again.