aka gkaklas@{lemmy.{zip,world},programming.dev,piefed.zip}

https://gkak.la/

aspe:keyoxide.org:CZQI42SE5HXWZCFPARIGCNK32A

  • 0 Posts
  • 50 Comments
Joined 2 years ago
Cake day: January 2nd, 2025
  • gkak.laₛ@lemmy.ziptoGames@lemmy.world•Poll: Will you buy GTA 6 when it launches on your platform? (Update: VPNs unblocked now!)English
    2·
    2 months ago

    “Value for money”!

    You’re right! E.g. some story-heavy games with great mechanics and immersion might be worth spending more on; it’s just a general rule of thumb I have!

    (maybe it takes a bit more time for me to familiarize myself with the characters, controls, mechanics etc, so I don’t prefer a game to be too expensive or too short; and in general I consider it a bonus if a game has huge replayability, support for mods, and procedural generation for example)

    But in any case, I still find the ratio to be a useful tool!:

    • A game that seems pretty fun, at €1/hour it’s a no-brainer to buy!
    • A game that seems kind of interesting but I’m not quite sure I’m going to like, at €3/hour I’m going to wishlish it and maybe check it out in the future
    • A very short game that I’m not quite sure I’m going to like but it’s from a small developer, €2/hour I’m going to be a little hesitant but may think “hmm it’s not too expensive, why not try it out and worst case I just supported a small developer who might make something I like even more in the future”
    • A game that seems beautiful with excellent gameplay, new and interesting mechanics, not released from a AAA company, at €4/hour it might be worth it

    So the per-hour ratio is more about putting the prices of the games in some context between eachother, in order to be able to decide if <feature you value> is worth paying <X%> more than other games you buy; Every player and the genre of games they choose are different, so it makes sense for anyone to set a different amount as a baseline! 😊

  • gkak.laₛ@lemmy.ziptoGames@lemmy.world•Poll: Will you buy GTA 6 when it launches on your platform? (Update: VPNs unblocked now!)English
    6·
    2 months ago
    • I’m playing on PC (Linux PC + a Steam Deck) because it’s a more open platform.
      • I avoid buying games that first came out as exclusives: if they didn’t want my money when the game first came out, I’m not going to give it to them later either 🤷
    • I generally prefer buying from smaller companies and indie studios
      • There are millions of other games from developers who do want my money, are cheaper, the money goes to developers and artists who need it instead of a huge corporation that lay off people all the time etc
      • Games are a form of art, and there are so many developers and artists that take the leap to try new things instead of pouring the same type of content in the same safe thing that appeals to more people and just sell more copies
      • Smaller games usually have way better VfM (I tend to prefer ~€0.5-€1 per hour of gameplay, but if it’s a small studio I’m okay with paying a little bit more, given that steam+taxes take a little over 50% 🫠)
  • gkak.laₛ@lemmy.ziptoLemmy Shitpost@lemmy.world•YouTube nowEnglish
    6·
    4 months ago

    Depends on the system! Even for anonymous polls, you still need to have unique links to ensure that people don’t take it multiple times and bias the results. Even if it can track who has (not) answered the poll, it doesn’t mean that the answers are traced back to you!

    If they want they still can track you though, so this is why we need tools that we can verify how they work, e.g. open source services, maybe hosted on a external trusted provider etc

  • gkak.laₛ@lemmy.ziptoProgrammer Humor@programming.dev•< :-( >English
    72·
    4 months ago

    Greek-Latin question marks

    Actually the Greek question mark (;) looks like the Latin semi-colon (;)!

    Last time I looked it up I think I found they are the same characters, and I tried compiling C with a Greek question mark instead of a semi-colon and it compiled fine! But I’m curious if it was because of something else, like my computer’s keyboard layout, or the compiler simply being able to handle them 🤔

  • gkak.laₛ@lemmy.ziptoMeshtastic@mander.xyz•Cross State CommunicationEnglish
    1·
    7 months ago

    What is “too far away”?

    Hmm, you’re right, I guess I don’t mean the distance of the link by itself, but rather the fact that the number of hops and the dependence on central (?) high-power long-range nodes limits how far a message can go

    While technically a mesh network, I’m not sure that with 3-7 hops it provides the benefits of one; in theory, just by being mesh it should be able to have a much larger (unlimited?) reach, just like the Internet.

    Instead, from what I understand, user nodes are recommended to not participate in the routing, = they are just clients, but by being “mesh” they would be expected to actively participate in the network.

    In this sense of “peer-to-peer”, we could say that my ISP is also a peer, and if it lost the connection to all other ISPs it could still continue working within the reach of its infrastructure, = my ISP is off-grid as well, and my connection to the ISP is independent since they own the fiber

    Instead, I think the focus should be on building a distributed mesh network that is resilient and can’t be taken down by the failure of a couple of nodes. Similarly, with the dependence on LoRa radios: if e.g. the import or usage specifically of LoRa™®© chips is banned, the nodes who chose to use alternative technologies would not be affected and the network could continue to operate normally

  • gkak.laₛ@lemmy.ziptoMeshtastic@mander.xyz•Cross State CommunicationEnglish
    3·
    7 months ago

    Hello, sorry for the random question, but I’m new and still trying to understand the benefits of joining the network and how it works

    What is the point of a network that:

    • Is off-the-grid but can’t connect nodes that are too far away
    • Is independent, but forces people to use LoRa which creates a dependence on LoRa-licensed radios
    • Is decentralized, but obviously needs few centralized higher power backbone nodes in order to function (e.g. in this case)
    • Is peer-to-peer, but from what I read it’s recommended to not have your node accessible at all times (or have it read-only?) in order to not have the TTL expire
    • Cannot connect remote networks together, but also can’t bridge them in some other way

    Is the main use case just connecting e.g. a couple of sensors on a remote farm a few kilometers away from your house, and have 2 neighbours relaying the messages to you along the way? 🤔 Why does that need a decentralized peer-to-peer network if it can just be done by simple repeaters?

  • gkak.laₛ@lemmy.ziptoAsklemmy@lemmy.ml•Are there any widely used mesh networking projects being used by people in apartments in cities?English
    3·
    7 months ago

    That’s not what my objection is about 😅 Of course low power consumption is important

    My point is about depending an independent peer-to-peer off-grid network on one specific technology

    E.g. imagine if TCP/IP, BGP, or HTTP were proprietary (instead of owned by standards organizations), and in order to connect to the Internet you would need to buy a network card that is licensed from the TCP/IP company! But since that’s not the case, people can connect to the Internet using any technology they want (Wi-Fi, Ethernet), but as long as their device uses TCP/IP, anyone can connect with anyone

    (PS maybe there is a better physical layer or routing example than the above 🤔 But I think the principle still stands)

  • gkak.laₛ@lemmy.ziptoAsklemmy@lemmy.ml•Are there any widely used mesh networking projects being used by people in apartments in cities?English
    1·
    7 months ago

    You don’t have to pay meshtastic any money

    They can still profit indirectly from providing services etc (which is fine)

    But even just the fact that in order to use the word “Meshtastic” ™®© I have to read https://meshtastic.org/docs/legal/licensing-and-trademark/ shows that it does not have “community” vibes but “Meshtastic™®© is ours and we’re just letting you use the source code etc for now” vibes

    Again, the fact that it is owned by someone means that the community (probably) does not have control over it, and one day we might need to fork the whole network and migrate every node

    there’s nothing they can do to stop you using it as you see fit

    If a specific radio is illegal, it’s easy to just find where it’s transmitting from and fine you; they already do this with pirate radio stations

    There is no way to be completely free of dependence on others

    But why be dependent on 2 companies instead of having the option to buy a radio from any company? Why is competition and diversity bad for an independent and off-grid network that we don’t want it to have a single point of failure? 🤔

    Not only it can make the network more resilient (which is supposed to be one of the goals), but it allows for experimentation and innovation in new technologies, which you can’t do if you’re locked into using LoRa™®©

    Why lock every user into a single technology just because some users want to have a long-lasting battery? (Which btw is probably important for very remote nodes and not the home and portable nodes that I think are more common).

  • gkak.laₛ@lemmy.ziptoAsklemmy@lemmy.ml•Are there any widely used mesh networking projects being used by people in apartments in cities?English
    5·
    7 months ago

    you’re going to want to buy some LoRa devices anyway

    Yes, but you’re not forced to; you can have nodes in your city that use any radio they want to communicate to each other, and e.g. your local hackerspace can have a node with multiple radios that bridges them to other nodes on the global network

    With Meshtastic™®©, if your country bans LoRa™®© radios you simply don’t have any other option, so the whole network is just done. With Reticulum or any other agnostic network they can’t ban all radio modules that can be used

    Reticulum is pretty much developed by a single person.

    Hmm that’s unfortunate, I didn’t know that 😕 But that’s a chicken-and-egg and network effect problem; we shouldn’t be “forced” (network effect) to use something that is not ideal just because more people use/develop it, otherwise we will never have a better alternative, because no one wants to develop it because no one is using it because no one wants to develop it

    At least for me, dedicating energy to build a Meshtastic™®© node would feel like I’m making something that profits LoRa™®© and Meshtastic LLC without trusting the “independence” of its every aspect. It transfers the dependence from the ISP that brings the wire to the home, to the companies that make Meshtastic™®© and LoRa™®©, but it’s still a dependence on one or two external companies instead of an independent community like I’ve seen with other local WMNs over the years

    (I don’t have the experience to say that Reticulum is the best option, but it’s the main agnostic network I’ve seen with the little search I’ve done; people reading this feel free to make suggestions! 💚)