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phases-of-the-fallen · 5 years ago

Text

Explanation

fandom: alternate timeline of Dreamswap by kai

characters: Waning Crescent, Comet

warnings: cursing, mention of murder and death,

word count: 2,112

Summary: Waning Crescent and Comet talk about what’s upset WC so much.

“So, are you going to tell me what in the fuck happened on your last mission that freaked you out so badly?” Comet asked after he sat down in his boyfriend’s lap, nuzzling into the other’s chest a little bit. “It’s going to bother me until you spill, and you know it helps to tell someone else about whatever is going on, so that we can figure out how to deal with it.”

Waning Crescent swallowed hard for a moment, fidgeting with his hands for a couple of moments, rolling the pen that he’d been using to sign paperwork for a couple of moments before saying “I had gotten a report that Full, Half and New Moon was in Underswap 7651. I went to check out the report alone, as that particular timeline has been under the protection of JR for decades, and New Moon at least should have remembered that, as I’ve captured him there twice. Although the tacos there are some of the best in the multiverse, so perhaps… That’s why they were there.”

“Uh-huh. Having a run-in with those three - even if they did manage to escape you - shouldn’t have scared you that much though. You’re still all wound up by what happened…” Comet pointed out, wrapping his arms around the other’s waist, wishing he could pet the other’s wings, but the other’s wings were currently intangible so that he could sit on the chair without needing to be on the edge of the seat.

“.... How much do you know about Full Moon? Like his past, before you two met?” Waning Crescent responded - he wasn’t deflecting. He was going to explain - he just wanted to know if Comet had known that Angel had been bonded with a determined spirit and hadn’t told him.

“That his timeline was that endless void that you found the both of us in. He was grieving about something, but he never told me what. Apart from that, I know nothing more about his past then you do… Why? Did he do something weird again?” Comet responded, frowning a little and waiting for Crescent to get to his point.

“Ah… I… I accidentally killed Full Moon. He jumped in front of my claymore as I intended to pin down New Moon and I couldn’t get my blade away in time, and… My blade pierced his soul and he died.” Waning Crescent explained. His voice failing him for a couple of moments “And then a determined spirit - one who Full Moon had apparently had absorbed their soul, appeared and offered their soul to New Moon, who… Who took it. A strange, purple button appeared in front of New Moon and he… He resurrected Full Moon in front of me. Full moon had just finished dusting, and he… He’d come back. New Moon started to laugh and I… I fled the battlefield.”

Comet was still for a very long time, or so it felt to Waning Crescent, before he cleared his nonexistent throat, saying quietly, his voice a little shaky “Okay… So New Moon can resurrect people and has a Determined Human’s soul backing his power now. That… That could be bad, but we’ve dealt with monsters who have absorbed multiple human souls, and -”

“New Moon is not a monster. Neither am I. We have the physical appearance of skeleton monsters, but that’s as far as the similarities go. You’ve seen the shape and color of my soul, Comet. One of the constants in this multiverse is the shape and color - or lack thereof - for monster and human souls. New Moon and I… We were created by the previous guardian of emotions, as she… They? Were dying. She summoned the both of us. We are the… We are positive and negative emotions - and the magical power behind them, given form and substance. I… I may be able to show you my true form, if you promise not to freak out on me.” Waning Crescent explains quietly, fidgeting more intensely with the pen in his hands. It was almost impossible to not look at Comet directly, given that the other was still in his lap, but he was just barely managing it.

"Uhh... Okay? Promise me that like... Your body won't... I don't know... Disintegrate or vanish when you do? Or that you can switch back?" Comet responded after a moment's hesitation, trying to process what his beloved was saying. Waning Crescent had said that he was the guardian of positivity, but he hadn't really known what the other meant. None of them did - though they all felt the uplifting effects of his aura.

"No, my body won't disintegrate - but as my true form contains the essence of my soul as well as all of my magic, my physical body will go limp and even grow cold and void of my magic, if I leave it for too long. Though that shouldn't be necessary. You may want to get off of my lap, as my physical form will be unable to hold you close during that time." Waning Crescent explained quietly.

“I… Okay then. Thank you for the warning.” Comet responded, part of him wondering if he should maybe convince the other not to do this. This felt… A little bit strange and like the other was making an impulsive and probably bad decision, and he was processing everything else that Waning Crescent had told him. Comet got up, taking a couple of steps back. “So… You can… You can show me your true form, if you want to.”

Waning Crescent nodded, letting his eye lights fuzz out as he gathered all of his magic into the core of his body, first his soul taking shape, before he pushed himself further from the body. It had been quite some time since he’d done this last, and it was a bit of a struggle at first - but eventually, he was in his original form - a yellow-colored ball of condensed positivity magic and awareness. He floats over to Comet, gently coming to rest on one of the other’s shoulders, letting out a soft trill. He pulses a bit of magic through Comet before returning to his skeletal form “So as you can see… It’s not that a powerful monster is in possession of a determination soul… But…”

“A… A Guardian has absorbed a human soul. And I’m guessing that neither of you have ever done that before - and if the previous guardian did, she or they didn’t ever write down whatever the fuck happened, and if it’s possible to undo it without causing damage, since the two of you still have that weird destiny bond thing that makes it impossible to kill New Moon without it also killing you.” Comet finished, frowning a little bit.

He had known that there was something odd about boss - but he hadn’t realized just how unique Waning Crescent was - were there other Guardians in the multiverse, perhaps hidden in obscure timelines? Protecting… Who knew what? “But… You mentioned New Moon being in possession of a Button - considering the fact that when he used it, that world didn’t Reset, he doesn’t have the ability to Reset a timeline - thank the fucking stars, as that could cause a shit load of trouble. He used it to heal Full Moon - which will be annoying to try to capture them, since with a press of a button, they’ll be back to full health again…”

“I… You’re right, of course. I probably just overreacted. They have a powerful healing ability that could potentially be a great hindrance, depending on if New Moon can resurrect dead criminals and decides to try to do so in order to create chaos… It’s unlikely, though. He mostly just flees and hides with his companions.” Waning Crescent mused “And no, there are no records of a Guardian absorbing a human soul, not to my knowledge. The previous guardian of the… Of the emotive balance was contemptuous and very wary of mortals - chasing away any who attempted to live near them. They were periodically attacked for the power they held, and was eventually struck down in a battle - though they were able to kill their attacker, before they created us.”

“Huh.” Comet remarked - he’s pretty sure that Waning Crescent is leaving out a few key details, but he’s not going to push for more than the other is willing to share. He already knows far more about the true past of the both of them than… Probably anyone else in existence, with the possible exceptions of Full and Half moon, depending on how much, if anything, New Moon had told them of his past. “So, what’s the plan with the three assholes?”

“I’ll update the orders for the undercover operatives. To watch out for any on The List, but for them to not approach New, Full, or Half moon under any circumstances, and if they are in a timeline for more than a couple of hours, to report directly to me, so that I… I can observe them directly.” Waning Crescent decided, nodding a little to himself firmly, before he asked “Does that sound reasonable to you? We can hope that his new powers only extend to that resurrection ability, but until we know for certain…”

“It’s best to limit the potential damage that New Moon could do, if at all possible. It’s going to take time to spread those new orders throughout our network, but I’ll be sure to send it to the regional heads myself.” Comet responded, turning partially, intending to leave.

“Absolutely not - for one thing, I need to make sure to write down and encode those orders… And another thing is, don’t think I haven’t forgotten that your appointment with Healer Ara regarding your pregnancy isn’t today in less than an hour and a half.”

“Oh come oooon! We’ve known that I’ve been pregnant for what? Two weeks now, at most? I’ll be fine.” Comet huffed, pouting a little that he’d been caught out so easily. He was excited to be carrying a soulling… But all of the information about what he could and what he wasn’t going to be able to do as the pregnancy continued was more than a little daunting “Hey… So uh… Since you’re not… Not a monster or a human, do you think that will affect the development of our soulling?”

“I… I don’t know. It’s one of the things that we will need to discuss with Dr. Ara and their Obstetrics team.” Waning Crescent answered honestly. He was worried about how the soulling would continue to grow - and he knew that Comet was as well.

“Yeah… Still not sure how I’m pregnant in the first place… ‘s not as if I have a soul…” Comet muttered, feeling more than a little self-conscious. He’d kind of assumed that he’d be unable to have kids that way, because of his condition.

“But the deep scans showed that you did have one at one point… And again, that’s some of the things that will be gone over in that appointment today. Do you remember that Dr. Ara took a sample of your magic to have it tested?” Waning Crescent prodded gently.

“I… Yeah, you’re right. I’m just… I’m so nervous about all of this - th-though I am excited as well. We… We’re going to have an ankle biter all our own. Look out multiverse, because our kid is going to be one hell of a force of nature. That much I can feel.” Comet answered back, rallying himself after a moment, his eye lights a pair of stars - one yellow, the other blue and purple, a grin appearing on his face.

“Of that, I have no doubt.” Waning Crescent responded with a fond smile appearing on his face, hugging his beloved boyfriend in close, a soft purr rumbling in his chest. “Now… Help me word the updated orders correctly?”

“Eh… You know that sort of thing is not my strong suit. Point me at an AU and tell me who to stab? I’m good. Tell me who to threaten and scare? I’m good. But the whole… Leading a secret service and army with a silver tongue? That’s all you, boss.” Comet grumbled, though he did follow the other back to the desk, claiming Waning Crescent’s lap as soon as the other sat down. It was nice to be close to the other like this, and he hoped that the obstetrics appointment would answer a lot of the questions that both of them had. This new healing ability of New Moon’s could be a pain in the ass… But shouldn’t prove to be too much of a danger... Right?

#[creator sleepy]#waning crescent #comet #cursing tw #death ment #murder ment #outcome: lunar eclipse

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yonderu-bell · 6 years ago

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Navigating and Ordering from Suruga-ya with Tenso

Welcome to my updated guide to ordering through Suruga-ya using the forwarding service Tenso. I hope people don’t mind me taking the images out, but I thought that a text-based approach would be more helpful to people reading it over a range of devices.

If this sounds like a pain, you’ll probably be happier just using a proxy service, although this tutorial should still be of use for searching the site. However, once you get the hang of it, it’s not hard. Ordering yourself also eliminates the possibility that a sale will end before the proxy service is able to process your order, and at least reduces the possibility that an item will be sold out before you get it (Suruga-ya's items are available online and in-store, so there are no guarantees).

A couple of things before we start:

•Buy at your own risk. I’ve ordered from Suruga-ya numerous times without any problems, so it’s not exactly brain surgery. That said, I can’t stand over your shoulder and check your work, which means that any mistakes you make are your own and you’ll have to fix them yourself. So basically...

•...use common sense. Read all of Tenso’s rules, double-check your information when signing up for your account, think twice about buying something if you’re confused by the product description (you can’t return it after you receive it), and, overall, use a proxy service instead if you don’t feel confident buying things from a website in a language that you’re not proficient in.

•There may be mistakes because I am *not* fluent in Japanese (not even close).

•Suruga-ya takes PayPal from international customers, but I’ve read that they no longer accept international credit cards. I’ve also read that “adult” products cannot be purchased without a credit card, but you’ll need to do your own research on that topic (Tenso, for its part, prohibits buying “obscene articles” through its service).

•You should be able to use most of this guide if you’re using a different forwarding service, but you may have to do a little extra work

•This is accurate as of July, 2018. If you’re reading this several years from now, things may have changed (they’ve made several updates to their website just recently and will likely continue to).

Still here? Then continue under the cut to get started.

First, sign up for an account with Tenso, a Japanese mail-forwarding company. Make sure you read all the information about their fees, shipping options, prohibited items, etc., before you sign-up (I’ve seen people who were turned off by the identity verification part, in particular).

After you’ve done that, go to the ‘My Page’ section. There will be a box at the top that says ‘[Your Name]’s Tenso address,’ with a link at the bottom that says ‘How to enter your Tenso address.’ Click on that; there are several helpful examples, but all you need is the top one labeled ‘General Guide.’

Next, go to Suruga-ya. At the top of the page, to the right of the search bar, you’ll see a blue icon next to the word ‘サインイン (sign in).’ Click on it. [If you’re trying to do this on Suruga-ya’s mobile site, click on ‘マイページへ/to My Page’ under the logo.]

✸Creating an account/signing in:

On the right, you’ll see two boxes for signing in. The top says “e-mail address (メールアドレス)” and the bottom says “password (パスワード ).” Once you’ve entered those, you can click on the orange button and you’re in. If you’ve forgotten your password, click on the link below the password box (パスワードをお忘れの方はこちら) to reset it.

On the left, you’ll see two buttons allowing you to sign-in/create an account with either your facebook or Google account. If you’d like to do that, go ahead, but I can’t guide you. To create a wholly new account, click on the white button below those two (新規アカウントの作成) and follow the steps below. [mobile users: the white ‘new account’ button is right below the orange ‘sign-in (サインイン)’ button]

✸ Account creation: fill in these steps one-by-one. If an error occurs when you try to submit, copy the warning text and paste it into Google translate to troubleshoot.

Note: several of the text boxes specify that you must use half-width characters (半角英数). If you don’t know what that means, you probably don’t need to worry about it. If you do know what it means, you should use half-width characters when entering your e-mail and password (copy and pasting your Tenso address takes care of the rest).

✸メールアドレス (アカウント)=“E-mail address (account)”=your e-mail address

✸メールアドレス (確認)=“E-mail address (confirmation)”=re-enter your e-mail

✸パスワード=“Password”=must be between 6-12 characters (No mention of whether symbols or spaces may be used in addition to letters and numbers, so keep that in mind when creating your password)

✸パスワードの確認=“Confirm Password”

This next part is where things get a little more difficult.

✸お名前=“Name”=this line has two input boxes. Japanese users would enter their name in kanji, but international users can use the Latin alphabet here (or whatever alphabet you use, although I can’t guarantee the site supports all of them).

—姓=“Surname/last name”

—名=“First name”

✸フリガナ=“Furigana (i.e, not kanji)”=here, you’ll need to write your name in katakana. You can use this page to get the katakana spellings.

—セイ=“Surname/last name”

—メイ=“First name”

For the next several lines, you’ll want to refer back to your Tenso address. Tenso’s general guide and Suruga-ya use the same order and kanji labels, which is really handy in filling this out. I’ll also include the label translations, just in case.

✸郵便番号=“Postal code/zipcode”

✸都道府県=“Prefecture”=this one should auto-update after you input the zipcode

✸市区町村=“Municipality”

✸番地=“Address/unit number“

✸ビル・マンション名=“Building/Apartment name”

✸電話番号=“Phone number”

Hard part’s done! The next section is optional: it lets you sign-up for e-mails about product categories, which I never do, so I’m going to skip it.

Scroll down, and you’ll see a box containing the site’s terms of service. Copy and paste them into Google translate and give them a read; they’re pretty straightforward and it only takes a minute to go over them. Below that, it will ask you if you agree to the site’s terms and want to continue your registration (規約に同意してアカウント登録を行いますか？), followed by two buttons.

✸はい=“Yes”=click this button to finish your registration

✸いいえ=“No”=click this button to cancel your registration

That should do it, although you’ll still need to confirm your account by clicking on a link in an e-mail they’ll send you. After that, it’s time to shop.

✸Searching/categories: In most cases, you’ll need to search using Japanese characters (i.e., kanji, hiragana, katakana) to find what you want. Try checking wikipedia/fan wikis/Anime News Network, etc. if you want to find the Japanese title for a manga/anime. Searching for stuff is pretty easy; just enter what you’re looking for in the purple search box at the top of the page. The default is to search all categories (全商品), but you can refine that with the category menu to the left. The categories are games (ゲーム), DVD/video (映像ソフト), music (音楽ソフト), toys/hobbies (おもちゃ・ホビー), PC software (PCソフト), books (本), electronics (電気製品), food/food premiums (食品・食玩), miscellaneous goods/accessories (雑貨・小物), and doujin (同人).

Update: I’ve found that you can use romaji to search for many titles. For example, if you type ‘Naruto’ into the search bar, then ‘ナルト’ will indeed be the first suggestion that comes up. Convenient, no?

✸Advanced search (詳細検索): this link is to the right of the search box. I honestly don’t use it, and it would be a hassle to go over all the options, so I’m skipping it for the most part. It does, however, allow you to search by ISBN, JAN, control number (管理番号), or standard code (規格コ-ド), which is useful.

The next three setting are found right above the product listings.

✸R-18 products: you have three options for displaying adult (アダルト) goods---show (表示), hide (非表示), and show only (の��). Please be aware that some forwarding and proxy services have rules against buying or shipping adult goods for international customers.

✸Show sold-out goods (品切れ): ON or OFF

✸Sorting (並べ替え): default is “開連順,” which is basically sorting by relevance. The rest are cheapest first (値段が安い順), most expensive first (値段が高い順), newly added/updated first (更新の新しい順), newest release date first (発売日の新しい順), and oldest release date first (発売日の古い順).

✸Item status: these appear in green next to the item’s category/right below the product image.

—“Newly arrived goods (新入荷)”

—“Price-cut (値下げ)”=; after an item has been at the store for long enough, they may lower the price

—“Increasingly popular (人気上昇中)”=this accompanies a price increase

✸Release date (発売日): self-explanatory

✸Sold out (品切れ): If you have “show sold-out goods” set to “ON,” this will appear in red below the release date. Sold-out goods will also be shown if they can be purchased through one of the new “other shops” that Suruga-ya is listing on their site,

✸Condition: these markers now appear before the price—”new (新品)”, “used (中古)“, and “pre-order (予約)”. The kanji directly after the price means “including tax (税込).” Sometimes, both a new and used version of a product may be for sale at the same time, so you’ll see two prices; be careful to add the version you want to your cart. Suruga-ya also includes the “list price (定価)” below the store price. If you see “Rank B (ランクB)” in a product title, that means that it has more serious condition issues, so pay attention to the description.

✸NEW “Other shops (他のショップ)”: Suruga-ya seems to be trying an Amazon Marketplace-type scheme where they also give you prices for items that are available through affiliated shops. This is below the “list price,” and it’s a link that takes you to a page to compare prices/see vendor ratings/etc. Even if you have “show sold-out goods” turned to “OFF,” you will still see items listed if they are only available through a third-part seller. I haven’t used this option yet, so I can’t tell you exactly how things work out,

✸Adding items to your cart/wishlist: On product pages, there’s a big orange button with a cart that’s for...adding the item to your cart. The button below it with a star is for adding it to your favorite list. If the item is sold out, you’ll see a green button that allows you to add it to your backordered items watchlist.

After you add an item to your cart, you’ll get a pop-up with two boxes. The blue one basically says “keep shopping,” while the orange one says “continue to check-out.”

✸ Cart/checking out: when you’re ready to check-out, click the big orange button (注文画面に進む/proceed to order page) on the right side of the page. You can also delete (削除) items or move them to your favorites list (お気に入りリスト). The shipping prices are in a gray box on the right. You usually get free shipping for orders over 1500 yen, but the threshold may be lower during sales.

The next page is a list of more of their site policies. Open up Google translate again and look them over. Most of it isn’t really important, but some of it you may find useful, such as how they package items for shipping or when they process orders. At the bottom, click “はい(yes)” to continue if you accept these policies.

On the next page, you’ll see your personal and shipping information displayed, followed by several payment options. Make sure PayPal is selected. Click on the orange button at the bottom (ご注文内容なにの確認へ /confirm the contents of your order) to continue. You’ll see another page with all the details of your order; if everything looks right, click the orange button (決済情報の入力へ /enter payment information) again to proceed to PayPal to authorize Suruga-ya to charge your account (they don’t actually charge you until your order is shipped). That should be it.

After your order is placed, you’ll get a confirmation e-mail as well as a notification on your My Page staying that your order was received. If any of your items are sold-out (their items are for sale in their physical stores as well as online) they’ll apparently send an e-mail asking you to contact them and confirm that you still want them to mail the rest of your order. This hasn’t happened to me yet, so I can’t say how that works, although I’ve seen people write that they just used Google translate to create a reply and it worked fine (probably best to write something short and simple). The e-mails that I’ve received have all been basic ‘here’s what you ordered, don’t respond to this’ messages that you always get when shopping online.

Now you get to play the waiting game. Orders can take more than a week to ship, so be patient.

Below are some additional bits of information that you may find helpful while shopping.

✸Time Sales

Suruga-ya often has "time sales (タイムセール)” that usually last 1-2 days and only apply to certain categories/items; the amount of money that you have to spend to get free shipping may also be lowered. If there’s a time sale on, there should be a banner at the top of the site with the date(s) and time range (usually 12:00-23:59 JST) for the sale. Items that are part of the sale will have ‘タイムセール’ written in green above their price on search pages.

✸My Page/account page (マイページ)

—お知らせ一覧=notice list (the most recent ones appear on your my page by default). The 3 types of notices you usually get are that your order was received, that your order is being prepared, and that your order was shipped.

—ご購入履歴=purchase history

—売却履歴=sales history. This applies to people who have sold items to Suruga-ya. Not applicable to people outside Japan.

—見積履歴=estimate history. This applies to people who have sold items to Suruga-ya. Not applicable to people outside Japan.

—閲覧履歴=browsing history

—入荷リスト=(backordered) goods received list. If you’ve added items to your backorder list, they’ll appear here if they’re now in stock.

—入荷待ちリスト=backorder list. You can add sold-out goods to this list so you’ll be notified if they’re restocked.

—お気に入りリスト=favorites list, which includes the following options:

••新しいお気に入りリストを追加する=add a new favorites list (click 新規登録する button to confirm)

••商品を追加するお気に入りリスト=add items to favorite list (use the drop-down list to select which list you want items to be added to by default)

••カートに入れる=add item to cart

••入荷待ちリストに追加する=add item to backorder list

••リスト名を集編する=change list name (click ‘変更’ to confirm change)

—速報メール確認·変更=confirm/change mail notifications

—登録クレジットカード確認·削除=confirm/delete credit card information. Not applicable to people outside Japan. I think.

—身分証画像を更新=update ID card image. Not applicable to people outside Japan.

—本人確認番号の登録·削除=register/delete personal identification number. Not applicable to people outside Japan.

—登録情報確認·変更=confirm/change registration information (name, address, e-mail, etc.)

—お知らせ機能設定確認·変更=confirm/change notification settings

—アカウント変更=change account. You can change your account ID (e-mail address) here.

—パスワード変更=change password

—お届け先確認·変更=confirm/change adress

—お振込先銀行口座=bank transfer bank account. Not applicable to people outside Japan.

—セキュリティ=security. Set up 2-factor authentication and check login history.

—アカウント削除=delete account

—ヘルプ=help

✸ Related Tutorials

—Buying from Sanyodo with Tenso by marry-me-ishida-sui

—Buying from Toranoana with Tenso by Memory’s Aria

—My tips for buying stuff from Japan, including Japanese stores that ship internationally, and proxy/forwarding service reviews

#surugaya #suruga-ya #buying from japan

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screechinginternetcloud · 4 years ago

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Reget For Mac

Many authors have written eloquently at great length on the horrors of war. Ulsterman writes equally eloquently, but much more succinctly, on the same subject in 'Mac Walker's Regret,' a story that will stay with readers long after they finish it.

After you've chosen a name for the disk after it's erased, choose Mac OS Extended (Journaled) from the dropdown menu and click Erase. (If you want to encrypt your disc for extra security.

Regrets

ReGet Junior is a download manager created especially for novices. You don't need to configure anything, the program will automatically detect settings for. Enter to Search.

By Bernadeen

A/N: Thanks for your reviews. Here's the last chapter.

Chapter 7

Harm continued to recover at an amazing rate. When Mac went to see him the next day, he was out of ICU. The following day he was sitting in a chair when she entered his room. They joked and flirted, almost like old times, but both knew a time would come to talk about this new closeness.

Two weeks later, the doctors told Harm he could be go home if someone was there to look after him. When the news was conveyed to Mattie, she immediately said she would stay out of school to take care of him. Harm made it clear that Mattie was not to miss school on his behalf. In the end, Mac was able to clear her schedule and persuade the admiral that she should be with Harm during the day. The doctors expected that Harm wouldn't need help for more than a week.

A routine was established wherein Mac arrived at Harm's just after breakfast. Coates would take Mattie to school while Mac took over 'Harm watch' for the day. Harm didn't really need physical help – it was mostly to ensure that he didn't overdo things, to pick up groceries or prescriptions since Harm wasn't allowed to drive yet, and to keep him from going stir crazy in his apartment.

At first, they were slightly awkward with each other, but Mac was determined that nothing would slow up Harm's recovery. Therefore, she was persistently cheerful and ready to help Harm in anything he needed, almost before he knew he needed it. In fact, it was Mac who sometimes felt a bit stir crazy since Harm's recovery included long naps during the day. She brought files with her so that she was able to feel productive both as a friend and as a lawyer.

Near the end of the week, Mac drove Harm to Bethesda for a follow up doctor's appointment. The doctor was pleased with Harm's progress. He no longer needed someone with him in his apartment. The doctor scheduled another appointment in a week, but expected that if Harm's recovery continued at the current pace, it was likely that Harm would be cleared for limited duty after that.

When Mac and Harm arrived back at Harm's apartment, both were in a thoughtful mood. Mac tried to sound cheerful as she said, 'Well, I guess my temporary assignment is finished. You'll be glad to have you privacy back, I expect.'

Reget For Mac Os

Harm gazed at her with sadness and longing. 'I was getting used to having you around… I liked it.'

Mac's almost made some flippant remark, but stopped herself in time. Instead, she thoughtfully returned his look. 'So did I,' she said honestly.

Harm stepped closer to Mac and raised his hand to touch her cheek. 'Mac, I don't want to go back to where we were before I got shot. I know we've both hurt each other a lot lately, but … can we just go on from here? … I don't want to lose your friendship again.'

At Harm's first words, Mac's heart began to race. Finally, they could be honest in their feelings. Then his last words dealt her a discouraging blow. He only wanted friendship. She hesitated a few seconds before responding, needing to control her disappointment. She wasn't quite successful as her voice trembled slightly. 'I don't want to lose your friendship either,' she agreed but didn't quite meet his eyes.

Instantly Harm knew he had made yet another mistake, but wasn't sure what it was. This time, though, he wasn't about to back down. 'Mac, talk to me. I know I just said something wrong, but I don't know what. I don't understand.'

'No, you didn't,' Mac tried to speak convincingly. Harm didn't need the added stress of knowing how she felt and feeling guilty for not being able to return her love. Besides, her self-preservation was beginning to kick in. She continued with more confidence, 'I value your friendship more than you'll ever know, Harm.' Then she grinned. 'And I'm looking forward to kicking your butt in court again.'

'Oh, no, you don't. You're not getting away with that diversionary tactic this time. Tell me why you looked so sad just then. Please?' Harm's instincts told him they needed to be honest with each other now or it might never happen.

Mac sighed and turned away from him. She paced across the room, turned back and stopped a few feet away, as she gathered her strength around her. Drawing a deep breath, she took the plunge, 'I was sad because you only want my friendship while I … I want your … love.'

Harm could hardly believe Mac's words. His heart began to beat harder and faster, causing a dull pain in his still healing chest. When, by reflex, he brought his arm up to cover his chest and went slightly pale, Mac felt a stab of terror and instantly regretted her words.

'Harm .. Harm, are you all right?' She moved quickly to take his arm and lead him the couch. 'God, I knew this wasn't the right time to get into that discussion. I am so sorry.' She sank down beside him, slipping an arm around his waist.

Harm was slightly short of breath, more from excitement than from any pain. 'Mac, I'm fine. You just caught me off guard.' He turned to her and again lifted his fingers to her face. His voice was like a soft caress, 'you have my love, Sarah, don't you know that? You've had it for very long time.'

Mac could only stare. No words would form in her brain so she simply leaned forward, sliding both arms around Harm and holding him tight. His strong arms answered her embrace. They just held each other as both of them soaked up the new feeling of knowing each was loved. After a few minutes they drew back far enough to confirm the knowledge as they saw the love and longing in their gaze. Almost reverently they shared their first kiss as lovers, a kiss that quickly became urgent with need. Mac's lips parted as she invited Harm's tongue to explore, then she took her turn tasting and caressing. As their embrace escalated and threatened to become out of control, Mac finally drew back. 'Harm, slow down. I don't want you to overdo things. You're still recovering.'

Drawing a deep, calming breath, Harm loosened his embrace. 'The way I feel now, I'd chance it, but you're probably right. I love you and I've waited a long time for you. I don't want to wait a second longer than necessary, so the sooner I'm healed, the sooner we can continue this, right?'

Mac smiled shyly, 'I love you, too.' Her smile became more sly. 'And we can practice a little more each day, just to build your strength.' As she gazed into his eyes, her smile faded and she became more pensive. 'When I thought I was going to lose you, I didn't know how I would live without you. You've been in danger so many times, and each time I've been terrified. But afterward I could never bring myself to tell you how I felt. I thought you only wanted to be friends. And I wanted so much more. That night as I waited to learn whether you would live, I had so many regrets – regrets for a lost friendship, regrets for not trying again to tell you how I felt, regrets for the promise of a baby that might never be conceived, regrets for so many lost opportunities. We've waited so long and we still have some things to work out, but this is it, isn't it, Harm? .. what we've both always wanted? '

Harm drew Mac back into a strong embrace as he answered, 'Yes, my love. This is it.' And he proceeded to show Mac a glimpse of their future.

End

Post #1,000 on this blog. Fitting that it’s Python nerd shit, huh?

I needed a way to search for MAC addresses, which are unique identifiers for networking hardware. For example, if your computer has a built-in Ethernet port, as well as wireless capability, then it has 2 MAC addresses. These are always 6 groups of 2 hexadecimal characters (0 through 9, and A through F). E.g., a valid MAC address would be: 01:98:DF:9E:10:37. Theoretically, every MAC address on every computer in the world will be unique, as the naming scheme provides over 281 trillion possible combinations (281,474,976,710,656).

Canonically these groups of 2 hex digits are separated by a colon, but many people record them with hyphens instead. So I needed to search for this particular pattern of characters amid a potentially-vast amount of text. Enter regular expressions (which I totally suck at using).

The regex I came up with is:

Going through it, piece by piece: [a-fA-F0-9] = find any character A-F, upper and lower case, as well as any number [a-fA-F0-9]{2} = find that twice in a row [a-fA-F0-9]{2}[:|-] = followed by either a “:” or a “-” character (the backslash escapes the hyphen, since the hyphen itself is a valid metacharacter for that type of expression; this tells the regex to look for the hyphen character, and ignore its role as an operator in this piece of the expression) [a-fA-F0-9]{2}[:|-]? = make that final “:” or “-” character optional; since the last pair of characters won’t be followed by anything, and we want them to be included, too; that’s a chunk of 2 or 3 characters, so far ([a-fA-F0-9]{2}[:|-]?){6} = find this type of chunk 6 times in a row

Let’s give it a shot.

First, a list of strings… e.g., a row from a comma-delimited file (returned via the csv module):

Run it:

Reset For Macbook

Next, a string:

Run it:

Reget For Macbook

Fuckin’ bickety-bam, the whole stage comes crashing down.

0 notes

abovethesmokestacks · 7 years ago

Text

Run, Run, Run

Title: Run, Run, Run Character: Bucky Barnes, mentions of Steve Rogers Rating: General Audiences Word count: 2.4k Spoilers: general spoilers for CA: CW

I signed up for Annie’s (@hellomissmabel) 1k followers celebration, opting to do her shuffle challenge. I got assigned “Living In the City” by Rhys Lewis, and this is what came out of it. Tag list at the end.

Brooklyn, New York, US

The Asset doesn’t really know how he ends up here. The borough calls to him, lights the way back like a beacon that he can’t help but follow. His desperate exit from D.C has him shedding his tac suit like old skin, rifling for whatever clothing he can find that fits him, resorting to petty pickpocketing for cash to make it through his days.

Brooklyn makes something jar inside him, a vertigo creeping in to grab hold of him when he walks down streets, looks at buildings too long, lingers at intersections. The eyes tell him this is not the same, but the mind disagrees. The mind says ‘home’. The mind says ‘belong’. The mind says ‘Steve’.

The mind should have no memories of either. The mind should be blank, a canvas for handlers to paint missions onto. Simple instructions. Defrost protocols, briefing, supply, exit protocols. A different kind of beacon mercilessly pulling him back. Fulfillment of mission, extraction, debrief, cryo.

The Asset stays only long enough to get on his feet, gather funds, recon his own exit protocols. His body shudders. It says ‘Brooklyn is not the same’. It says ‘I’ve been gone for too long’. It says ‘I’ve been living in the city too long’.

He leaves at first light, a month after D.C.

London, UK

He takes the name offered to him back in D.C. It carries meaning, the mind painting vivid memories of the disbelief and pain in the other man’s eyes. Bucky. He keeps it to himself, a closely guarded treasure that won’t be ripped from him again. The mind is oddly cluttered, a strange cesspool of fragments he tries to put into order, overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of it. It makes his head ache, his body shiver, pulls him out of disjointed nightmares.

There is no more cryo, no more resets. He can’t forget, and shouldn’t want to, right? Do normal people wish they could wipe their consciousness clean of all the emotions brought upon them? Measures need to be taken. Self-discipline not encouraged. He is not an asset anymore. Integration critical.

London is bustling, a pulse underneath his skin that refuses to settle. Maybe it’s because Bucky keeps looking over his shoulder, keeps expecting extraction and forcible reset. Like any other metropolitan area, HYDRA has strongholds here. The mind supplies the locations of two (2) storage areas and fifteen (15) resupply caches. These have everything needed for extended missions, but it’s too soon. They will no doubt be crawling with operatives. He cannot risk detection.

Bucky walks around London with that syncopathic pulse beating inside him, takes a job where the bare minimum of questions are asked and his pay comes in a nice stack of bills twice a month. He moves around, tries to stay nondescript. London is great for flying below the radar. It’s cold enough that no one looks twice at the jacket he wears, the gloves covering his hands. He switches between different kinds of caps and hats, lets his scruff grow out. The language adapts in his mouth, bends to the environment, takes on a different cadence. He eats, eagerly tasting anything that strikes him. It’s a wonderful start, he thinks. He can do this, he thinks. It’s okay. Nondescript. Incognito.

Except for when he wakes from his dreams. He screams in an accent his heart refuses to forget, refuses to relinquish until he talks himself back into the one he has adopted for his cover. It happens too often for him to bear it. Something needs to be done. Measures-

No.

He is not an asset. Maybe he can’t go to a shrink like normal people do, but he is not a thing for which measures are taken to fix glitches in the programming. Bucky will… deal with himself. Somehow.

Months crawl by. A notebook finds its way into his belongings, his hands rifling for it in the darkness when he wakes up from another horror playing out in his head. Pages are filled, his writing in the beginning so shaky he can hardly read it. It evens out over time. Memories supply more memories.

London has been good to him. He packs up after six months, the whispers of a HYDRA ops sending him running. It won’t do to be recaptured. It won’t do to be discovered. If HYDRA is here, the man on the br- Steve might come. Bucky is not ready.

London has been good. He’s been here too long.

Vienna, Austria

He picks his cities with delicate balance. Large so he can blend in, be just another person milling about. His mind readily supplies him with intel on HYDRA presence, number of cryo storages, resupply caches. It is intel he doesn’t want to know how he acquired it, but it undoubtedly proves useful.

Vienna straddles the balance. Bucky can hide, but the number of resupply caches worry him. The city is a hub, a focal point in a network quietly seeping into the continent. But there are no cryo storages, no active ops near as far as he can tell. It will do. It will have to.

It is easier to settle, to find work that will pay in cash, to find shelter, to find a rhythm. For all the niggling worry in the back of his mind, Bucky takes to Vienna a lot better than London. The language is softer, wrapping pleasantly around his tongue as he makes small talk with the men stuck on the same work detail. Bucky tries to think of it as practice. This is normal. Talking, interacting. Staying quiet would be anomalous. He chooses a different name than in London, something universal that speaks both of here and anywhere. Bucky is for his own time.

It’s for the apfelstrudel he eats in a corner of Stephansplatz, watching people milling about while the spire of the Stephansdom reaches towards the sky. It’s for the quiet moments when he wakes one morning because the sun’s rays are filtering through the dirty windows after a night without nightmares. It’s for the moment his detail has been directed to the Wiener Musikverein and the floating notes of a classical piece his mind knows but can’t put a name on stops him dead in his tracks. He wants to break off, sneak closer. Hell, he wants to find a damn air vent so he can crawl unseen into the hall and listen to the piece, the crescendo slowly rising to grip tightly at his heart.

“You have not lived until you have experienced Beethoven in that room.” It’s one of the men he works with, peering at Bucky with a curious smile.

“Then I guess I’ll never live,” Bucky replies, knowing that although he might scrape together the cash needed for a ticket, he could never truly go to a performance.

It doesn’t stop him from buying a burner phone, just so he can waste the preset data limit on listening to the Beethoven piece throughout the nights when he’s ripped awake. The screen gets wrecked on the third night, and he forces his body to learn to only grab the phone with his right hand. The melody soothes him, his tears hitting just as the crescendo starts building. This person he is, the consciousness aching inside his body… It doesn’t quite belong.

Bucky plans his exit meticulously. Vienna has been good, but it’s time to move on. His final paycheck has been tucked away into his backpack, all goodbyes have been said, a convincing lie that will lead any pursuers in the wrong direction should they come looking. The numerous caches in the city are too good to give up. He could hit one of them. Raid it and get out. Five show signs of recent activity. Out. Another five are too old to have updated supplies. Probability of old currency high. Avoid. Three more are nixed because they stray too far from his exit strategy.

He ends up outside an inconspicuous building in Josefstadt. No one has come or gone in the three days he has surveilled it. It underwent a remodel no more than five years ago, meaning supplies needed to be shifted and upgraded. It’s a simple enough mission. Infiltrate, retrieve, exit. Bucky’s heart is beating a mile a minute, his body covered in cold sweat when he walks out no more than ten minutes later with his backpack and duffel filled. Cash, intel, equipment. Everything he needs.

If HYDRA comes looking, they will find their cache raided. They will find their surveillance cameras mangled, showing the face of their ghost just before they flicker out. They will show his picture to the people at the nearby train station, find out a man bought a one way ticket to Bern. CCTV will show the man boarding the train and disappear from Vienna. The ghost knows when to disappear.

Naples, Italy

It’s not the best choice Bucky’s made, but he figures HYDRA would assume he wouldn’t hide out in a city off the coast of the Mediterranean in the middle of summer. Naples is hot as hell, the language takes days to adapt to, he has to wait until a rainy day makes his attire less likely to be held to scrutiny, and even that requires a shopping trip he most definitely did not ask for.

It’s another round of night shifts, another set of envelopes with wads of bills, jumping between safehouses. He sleeps naked under thin sheets that cling to his body when he wakes in the late afternoon. There’s not much to do, he can’t go outside, not while the sun is still blazing down on the city. He fills his notebook - notebooks, now - with memories, rough drawings, newspaper clippings when he can find them and they spark something in his addled mind.

It’s a whirlwind spilling onto the pages, and in the eye of the storm is the man on the- Steve. He knows his name is Steve, every bone in his body, every fiber, every muscle aches in recognition. It’s a feeling of same-but-different, echoes of Steve’s voice in the dark calling for him. His memories supply contradicting images, conversations indicating worry about health and financial situation, vivid memories of the force behind the shield and pulling a heavy body to shore.

Managing the chaos becomes… not exactly easier, but he tries. Out of nothing came everything, and his thoughts beg for order, for synchronicity, for logic. A timeline helps with the nightmares, helps him identify when, why, where.

Being confined like this, it eats away at him. Even after the sun sets, the temperatures remain sweltering, and by the time Bucky sneaks out of the shoddy apartment to go to his shift at the docks, it has cooled down just enough to make his attire of well-worn jeans and a long-sleeved shirt seem inconspicuous enough. Naples, for all its beauty remains largely unexplored.

When it’s time to move on again, Bucky scouts out another cache to loot. He wants to stock up enough that he could survive without having to do another loot in the next city. His manager at the docks didn’t say much. Same as always. Final paycheck, a simple goodbye. Hiding in an alley outside the cache he decided to hit, Bucky realizes that for all that he has tried to fit in in order to remain forgettable, he has not gained a single friend, not a single acquaintance.

His only friend is a man he can’t fully remember.

He leaves Naples a fairly wealthy man, his soul as restless as his legs. Nothing to leave behind, everything to run towards. He should have left long ago.

Bucharest, Romania

Bucky doesn’t intend to make it a home, but Bucharest takes him in and sweeps him up in a bubble where he can relax for the first time in over a year. The city has minimal HYDRA presence, only a few caches that are all a little outdated. The city tells him he is okay. The city tells him it will keep him safe. It provides for him; a small apartment that he pays for with stolen cash, a language that sits comfortably, flows easily from his lips. It’s a far cry from the toughness of Brooklyn, the rough edges of London. It is kinder than the Austrian German, softer than the Naples variation of Italian.

Bucky finds companionships in the old ladies down the hall who keep fawning over “the handsome young man”. They inundate him in food until he can find his bearings in preparing meals for himself, they provide him with a few necessities, call him little bear in a way that has him smiling instead of telling them he is far more dangerous than any bear could ever be. He tentatively makes a home, something that is his. Maybe it’s a little dark, but it’s all his making, his choices, his preferences. Some part of him settles in that apartment, sinks its roots into the dingy sofa he picked up at a yard sale, takes great pleasure in preparing oatmeal with fresh fruit sliced on top, hums in contentment at the sound of the radio that is perpetually set just a little out of alignment so the voices rasp in a way that his mind says is good and familiar.

Of course he makes plans, works out contingencies. The backpack with his notebooks, his memories, gets stashed under a floorboard he pries loose one night. He walks through ten different kinds of exit strategies, considers distances, destinations, calculates for minimal collateral damage. That is also familiar. If he has to keep one thing of his old life, it might as well be this, because he can use it to keep people safe. He can keep Adela, Ileana and Vera safe. He can make his new life without a fuss. He can be a little bear.

None of this helps the day it all comes crashing down. Bucky knows the second he sees his old moniker in the newspapers, knows the moment he sees an all too familiar silhouette browsing the notebook he’d written in the night before, knows when the tell-tale sound of heavy boots close in, knows when the first bullets start zinging through the air. He should have run away already. But with each bullet blocked, each projectile hurled in defense, flying through the air with his gaze fixed on the roof he’s aiming for, surrounded by law enforcement and a goddamn man in a flying suit, his mind quietly tells him:

This is where we stayed. This is where we stop.

@ursulaismymiddlename, @loup-malin, @bakexprayxlove, @callamint, @mrshopkirk, @tatortot2701, @ceebeetumbles, @thetalesofmooseandsquirrel, @lenia1d, @andhiseyesweregreen, @basicallybucky, @thatgirlsar, @bubblebathsandsarcasm, @amrita31199, @netflixa, @erisjade, @rockintensse, @marvelrevival, @jurassicbarnes, @writemarvelousthings, @gallifreyansass, @allyallyally-oh, @shy2shot, @angryschnauzer, @engineeringgirlcve, @hellstempermentalangel, @whyisbuckyso, @melconnor2007, @brookebarnes, @snuggleducky, @avengerofyourheart, @booksandshowsandmovies-ohmy, @themcuhasruinedme, @creideamhgradochas, @feepsmoothie, @nuvoleincielo, @wellfuckbuck, @mellifluous-melodramas, @sarahsassafras13, @romanosgirl1978, @bovaria, @sebbytrash, @rosyskies, @cyanide-candyx, @thelastjedl, @4theluvofall, @just-another-fangirl777, @avengingnights, @softwhispers, @therealgingermermaid, @c-maximoffs, @ipaintmelodies, @reniescarlett, @mizzzpink, @winter-in-wakanda, @viollettes, @lenavonschweetz, @stephanie11220

#bucky barnes #bucky barnes imagine #marvel imagine #my fics #fic: run run run

162 notes · View notes

hydrus · 8 years ago

Text

Version 255

youtube

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tar.gz

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tar.gz

I had a great week, getting a lot done. There are many improvements to the duplicate system and some important notes for anyone who downloads from gelbooru.

you can now move tabs!

Right-click on a page tab on the main gui and hit 'move left/right' to move it left and right!

I can't believe I didn't think of this before, but it was a hell of a lot easier than writing custom drag and drop code!

the gelbooru downloader is not healthy

Like several other downloaders in the program, now the gelbooru parser is now also having trouble. I fixed some gelbooru ssl and redirect problems this week, but the gelbooru guys themselves have also changed how their gallery thumbnail URLs work in a way that is not helpful to hydrus, particularly for subscriptions.

The gelbooru downloader page seems to fetch files and tags fine, although the urls associated with the files are not great.

For subscriptions, I have attempted to mitigate the url problem in the update code--you will receive a popup on update if you are affected--but if you had a gelbooru subscription fire in the past week (it then likely had an error due to the above redirect problem), you should check it in the manage subscriptions dialog. If the sub has twice as many urls as it should, you should go into the subscription, click the icon button that launches the list of urls and then either 'skip' or just delete the new ones.

If you have too many subs to fix or are just not confident playing around with this stuff, just pause all your gelbooru subscriptions. I will put more work into this next week, which I suspect will include a retroactive purge of these new ugly redirect urls.

This is another reason to overhaul the downloader engine, which will then be more flexible and easier to fix when these things happen. I will start it in a few weeks, as soon as I am done with the current duplicate stuff.

duplicate stuff

I've polished the duplicate filter substantially. Several miscellaneous buttons and unusual workflow cases now work properly, and shift-click should drag media around. Also, the background will brighten and darken as you flick between the pair to give better feedback, and the pairs it presents you will be selected faster and more intelligently.

And as an experiment, I've made it so pairs that have the same resolution will stay at the same zoom and pan when you flick between them. I'm really pleased with how this works, so I may extend it to more classes of pair, like those with the same aspect ratio.

full list

the duplicate filter now supports shift+left-click to drag, like the archive/delete filter (this remains hardcoded for now)

if a pair in the dupe filter has the same resolution, they will now maintain zoom and pan when switching back and forth (I might increase this to work for same ratio as well, let me know how it works in the real world)

the duplicate filter will show a lighter/darker background colour as you scroll the current pair

the way lighter/darker and alternate lighter/darker colours are calculated is now centralised and should be more reliable in edge cases

improved the dupe filter pair selection algorithm--it now chooses pairs more reliably under edge case conditions and prioritises decision-groups that have high potential decision value. it should also run a little faster

increased the dupe filter batch size to 250, let's see if it causes any problems

the close button on the dupe filter's top hover window now works

fixed the duplicate filter disappearing pairs that were skipped (meaning you could not go back to revisit them)

fixed a frequent deadobject error when the dupe filter closes

the shutdown 'maintenance due' test is less sensitive to dupe search tree rebalancing, which typically only takes half a second

the archive/delete filter now uses the new shortcuts system for both keyboard and mouse input

the archive/delete filter now intercepts archive or delete commands from different sources ('media' shortcuts, top hover frame button presses) more reliably and converts them into filter actions (hence moving on to the next file)

you can now move pages one to the left or right from their menu!

on the top-right hover window (and the background underneath), ratings are now on the top, and hence will always be in the same location as you scroll through your media regardless of known urls, remote location, or inbox status

autocomplete searches for tags with apostrophes, quote marks, braces, brackets and paretheses should be more reliable

urls are now associated with files through the same 'content' pipeline as tags and ratings and so on

gui-level media is now aware of the 'new url content update' event and will update and redraw itself appropriately

fixed deviant art nsfw parsing, but it might not hold for long. proper fix here is to wait for the downloader overhaul

networking engine now uses the 'requests' module's CA .pem (which the overhaul will be moving to anyway), which should reduce the frequency of ssl verify failures (gelbooru on the relatively new 'Let's Encrypt' CA had this problem for many users)

fixed the networking engine redirect parsing for gelbooru's unusual location header. unfortunately, gelbooru is still giving mickey-mouse garbage redirect urls from its main thumbnail pages, for which in this engine there is no immediate fix

neighbouring .txt tags will now be properly cleaned and sibling-collapsed in the path tagging dialog

neighbouring .txt tags will now be properly sibling-collapsed in the import folder workflow

making a media viewer borderless fullscreen and back will now recenter the media (previously, the current drag delta was not reset, so this frequently put media off-screen)

fixed a serious issue where the media viewer could lock the client up on opening with a video if its gui options set 'remember size' to false

tag import options objects will cleanse themselves of missing services on options save/client shutdown

manage tags now defaults to cross-referencing 'my files' on the 'local tags' domain, where 'remote' (i.e. deleted) files' tags are not useful

reduced memory use when importing large pngs with transparency

improved adminside petition processing gui reporting

servers will now cap the size of their mapping petitions so as not to ovewhelm the admin processing them (they now won't be both >20 tags and >1000 total row weight)

the media viewer's manage tags frame now listens for content updates from outside, so if you alter an in-view file's tags (such as with a shortcut key), the manage tags dialog will update as it happens

moved a number of the buttons on the top hover windows to the new unified internal command engine (which the new shortcut system also uses)

disk cache maintenance uses fewer resources but now occurs in the foreground (and should hence more reliably maintain the cache)

critical repository service id lookup errors will now automatically reset the repository's processing cache and better inform the user of what has happened. if you see this, please let me know the details and how this error fired in the real world

updated and reinstated the ipfs service panel in review services

updated some ipfs service code for the new service system

misc refactoring and cleanup

more cleanup and deletion of redundant old pubsub command code

updated ubuntu build machine to 17.04 and opencv 3.2

next week

I have 41 things left to do for the duplicate work, and I want to get that to 0 as soon as possible. Beyond some more gelbooru triage, I want to focus on duplicate stuff and a few bugs that I didn't have time to get to this week.

I'm behind on messages, so I'll make some time to catch up as well.

#release

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colorguardian10 · 8 years ago

Text

Response to Mike Rose’s “Blue-Collar Brilliance”

I said I wouldn’t share this if another post didn’t show enough interest, but @yoursinfulsister asked to see it and I didn’t really need a strong excuse anyway.

For my Writing Seminar course, we were supposed to write a five-page response to this article. He wrote about how a lot of workers in low-class jobs are considered to not have intelligence, and about how it’s a gross misconception. I recommend reading it for the full context of this paper. Here was my response to his article:

Mike Rose speaks on the concept of most jobs fitting into one of two categories: the intellectual or “white-collar”, and the physical or “blue-collar”. Hearing these groups, examples come to mind: accountants, lawyers, teachers propped up against steelworkers, construction workers, or plumbers. We immediately categorize work differently in order to treat it differently. I’m not sure my first job could have been a more fitting example of this divide.

While I was in high school, my school district decided to try something new. Every student is given a laptop assigned to them to help with schoolwork and develop technology literacy skills, and every summer, they hire a few professionals to deal with the hundreds and hundreds of computers needing maintenance over the break. This year, they planned to hire a handful of mildly tech-savvy, and cheap, students instead. They also knew that they were short on janitors for cleaning each building while the students were out.

So, in the main library, applications were put out: you simply checked which of the two positions you were applying for, why you wanted to work there, and how many hours you would be available.

This turned out to be a grave mistake on their part. For starters, through some form of miscommunication, 12 “technology interns” were hired for the five open slots. For another, not a single person applied to be a janitor. Having relied on a boost of students to fill out their gaps, they were now even more short-staffed than before.

A solution was reached: the interns would rotate between the job they had applied for, and being janitors, to help even out the balance in each. Anyone unwilling to accept this could leave. (One quit, one threatened to sue for the position, and an additional two were later fired for committing crimes at work.) As much as I wasn’t happy with the arrangement, I knew that the administration was doing its best in an unusual situation, and certainly preferred it to not having a job at all. I stayed.

Working as an intern was repetitive, but concerningly easy. Our first task was to update the software on every laptop in the school and set up the school’s network (a process called “imaging”), which required first wiping them of personal data as a matter of policy. We simply had to memorize a series of hotkeys and administrator passwords and wash, rinse, repeat. All the interns of the day did for weeks was sit at a desk with two or three laptops in front of them:

ctrl + alt + D / ctrl + alt + D / ctrl + alt + D

Are you sure you want to reset to factory defaults? If so, provide credentials and press enter:

qu@k3r / qu@k3r / qu@k3r

Do you wish to download the latest software?

yes / yes / yes

You are using a private network. Please log in as a network administrator to continue:

qu@k3r# / qu@k3r# / qu@k3r#

Put them back in the computer carts, pick up three more from the “unimaged” cart. Repeat.

Certainly, it required basic computer skills, but it was pretty obvious why they didn’t bother to ask for previous experience on the form. Later, we were tasked with fixing broken hardware, which at least required the ability to unscrew the casing, identify and replace sensitive parts, and put the casing back on in one piece.

On the other hand, being a janitor was exhausting. Every summer, the entirety of every single building is cleaned from top to bottom: every desk, every chair, ceilings, walls, and cabinets alike. Furniture has to be removed so that all floors can get a new layer of wax. Outside maintenance is done, too. I was spared by only having to fill cracks in the tennis court with wet asphalt in the summer sun for just a few days. I was “accidentally” placed in the rotation for twice as much time as any other intern, though, so maybe not. I became very familiar with Laura, my immediate supervisor in this department.

I said it was exhausting. This was in part due to the fact that they were still short-staffed, and a quarter filled with unwilling teenagers to boot. I never got to stop. We had our 30-minute lunch break and two exactly-fifteen-minute breaks. The other eight hours were nonstop, moving, scrubbing, mixing solutions, lifting desks and slate tables, carefully picking up lamps, and putting everything back exactly how the teachers left it - they might complain about having to shift the desks again, I was told. Third floor to bottom floor, stripping the wax floors and re-waxing every room and hallway as we went. I could barely even interact with my family when I got back home from how mind-numbing it was on top of barely being able to move. I was given the “easy” jobs because I was young, and a student, and the other workers didn’t want me to “break something”. Laura had been working at my school longer than either of my parents have been alive. Despite this, I had never even heard of her.

My personal experience would support the notion that jobs come either physically taxing or mentally taxing (or perhaps physically or not at all). I might even have argued against Rose’s claims that they’re not so divided, but I have the sense to see that my examples are pretty far on either end of the spectrum, and that one came with very different pressures than the other. I know that the majority of “physical” jobs, such as a waitress like Rose’s mother, do require mental effort as well as physical.

Mike Rose mentions the complexities of something as externally simple as taking orders, one of many basic skills of a waitress - “Waiting on seven to nine tables, each with two to six customers, Rosie devised memory strategies so that she could remember who ordered what. And because she knew the average time it took to prepare different dishes, she could monitor an order that was taking too long at the service station.” (47) He goes on at length about the massive cleverness needed to keep your head on straight in the restaurant business.

Even being a janitor, which I’ve already stressed the physical effort of, came with its tips and tricks: solution #20 for the desks and the walls, #8 for the windows, but dab some #16 on first for stickers. Zizz-O® gets off permanent marker and mop in that white gunk to strip the floors – but if you actually touch it head straight for the chemical shower. And by the way, pour in some extra #20 in your bucket, here’s a bottle we popped with a screwdriver - the mixing machine dilutes it too much.

You might take Rose’s statements and counter that, obviously, waitressing must be a strange exception that really requires knowledge rather than endurance. He prefaces these remarks by describing her additional efforts simply navigating the restaurant, describing her as walking “full tilt through the room with plates stretching up her left arm and two cups of coffee somehow cradled in her right hand” and “weaving in and out around the room” when not holding dishes as a constant part of her work, “flopping” into a booth to take a break with him (Rose 46).

However, while I do solidly agree with Rose’s argument that the perceived division of jobs is untrue, I do not agree with the way he makes it. He states that physical jobs include a mental aspect as a way of giving them value. I believe they should deserve it regardless. Certainly my experience would suggest giving even more respect to physical work.

I do not agree with the notion of intelligence garnering respect, and the corresponding notion that roles not requiring it are not worth respect. To again apply it to Rose’s thinking, I agree that jobs are often divided into mental and physical, but I believe that this is an applied devaluing of jobs in the latter rather than a quirky misconception with side effects. Work not requiring a formal education is frequently devalued based on not requiring “intelligence”. Rose applies this to waitresses and argues that they deserve respect by showing that they need smarts to do their job well. I believe that he is trying to rise something up with an idea used to bring it down, and accepting his argument completely, to me, simply leads to the same problem he is addressing - just for other people.

The superintendent told us we might be getting paid less while janitors - for the same qualifications, for the same hours, technically even for the same job title! Why? Because it was “unskilled work”. So what kind of “skills” are we really talking about when considering pay scales? Rarity of required skills, and compensation of effort in gaining said skills, may be one factor, but who decided that removing an LCD screen was harder than removing an entire classroom? While certainly some work is worth more than others, efforts to funnel money out of working people’s hands has only been hitting those least able to get it back, resulting in a drastically unfair imbalance. Instead of trying to help each other, our society climbs over each other to get at the precious “fair” work left, and people who can’t compete with one-dimensional standards get work that’s even less valued. It’s not about “skills” or “effort” at all. It’s about your rung on the ladder.

Rose does make good points. He clearly shows through his examples that stereotyped categories of work (he also includes “pink-collar” or creative/empathetic work in his comparisons) are defective and out of touch. He gives examples of foremen and waitresses having aspects that obviously contradict the social divide. He even admits that intelligence doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with formal education – and then says that many jobs require intelligence even if they don’t require formal education. Even Rose can’t seem to separate himself from the root problem enough to denounce it. Most likely he is not conscious of this – few people knowingly perpetuate issues – but that doesn’t mean that I can suddenly agree with the underlying notion.

I believe that we should hold ourselves accountable when we notice ourselves keeping harmful ideas alive, at the most basic levels we can. That means, yes, don’t belittle work based on the perceived intelligence needed, but it also means don’t belittle work based on the actual intelligence needed. The original purpose of jobs and specialized work is so that everyone can provide for the needs of the populace. Roles are needed because no one can be their own doctor, and banker, and cook, and technician, and janitor. People simply can’t independently fulfill their own needs in modern society. We work to help each other. If someone is working in a position socially lower than you, then they are doing you a service. Respect them.

“Respect them.” What does that even mean? I know what I think that looks like, but I grew up in a rich neighborhood. I have more concrete examples of what respect for workers doesn’t mean. Do you remember Laura? I never even knew she existed until I had met her. When people are giving their time and effort for the sole purpose of making your life easier, we should appreciate that. Instead, we say these roles are “insignificant” or “low-level” and push them under the rug.

Have you ever had to wait in line at a fast-food restaurant because the service is slow? Think about this instead: the people behind that wall are working even harder than normal. Service isn’t being slow, demand is simply too high to keep up with. You have to stand still for a few minutes. They can’t stand still until everyone in there is gone, and probably haven’t for a while. I know far too many people who take a situation like this and complain, or leave pitiful tips. After all, you had to wait a long time to receive food you normally don’t have to wait for. To me, it always seemed that it meant the people serving you are doing an even better job working to fulfill your needs.

Part of recognizing that all roles aren’t divided into definite categories, as Rose and I argue against, is recognizing that work also can’t be categorized into quantifiable worth. The person making your Starbucks, the person making your sandwich, and the person wiping your floors are all working at least as hard as you are, and to your direct benefit. Treat them as such.

You may disagree with my earlier ideas, that work exists to help others. Isn’t everyone just working to provide for themselves? That’s how American society at least frames it. Rose shows his mother acting very differently. He says that many customers came in with a desire for human contact, and describes how she changed her behavior to suit that. Though he also says it was all to get a higher tip, this is an outlook we disagreed on from the beginning. One of the founding principles of a capitalistic society is that everyone has to compete to “earn” their right to live freely. And so, payment is phrased as points in some great unwinnable game and not as acknowledgement for doing your part. This is where the faults lie. We can’t ever be compensated properly when our compensation doesn’t treat our work as work. Beyond that fact, not everyone can “compete”. Certainly not everyone can compete in a system where your worth is measured by a singular quality. Waitresses have intelligence? Great. Why weren’t they respectable without it?

Again, I wish to state that Rose made a valid argument. I saw his article as halfway to getting at the true problem, but for many his view may be the first time they’ve seen it that way. I can think of a couple people back in my rich neighborhood who could have used the worker’s perspective. Maybe the girl who rented a stadium for her birthday, or my mother, who thinks that most of the janitors made minimum wage because they’re too lazy to get a degree. She can carry the accursed solid slate chem room tables for decades - then she can tell me what “lazy” is.

My experiences may be extreme, and my views radical. But I said above that it is necessary to prevent ourselves from perpetuating harmful ideals. That includes calling these ideas out when we see them. I know that the teenagers typing in passwords were placed at a higher worth than the full-grown adults working themselves to death. I saw Mike Rose’s criticism of a system that put those two forms of work on different pedestals, and I wanted to express what I meant by saying that this divide is unfair. Seeing so-called “white-collar” and “blue-collar” workers in different lenses is something we should recognize, and we should also recognize why we made that divide. Rose argued how inaccurate this difference is, and I argue that the difference shouldn’t even exist.

#this is phrased kind of like it was a learning experience but I was already aware of this kind of shit I just hadn't strongly experienced it #it was hard to keep myself from going on a full communist rant for a while there #also I tried to avoid pointing out the fact that I had my first job at 18 lol #mine #paper #I highkey suspect that the administration was taking advantage of me being the only one being nice about it #'my views may be radical' I can't believe I let myself write that sentence lol #yoursinfulsister

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dropswisdom · 5 years ago

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HiMedia is a Chinese brand name located in Shenzhen,China and has been operating since 2005. They have a large range of TV Boxes and that’s their sole product range. As a result, they are quite experienced in the field.

Today, I look at one of their latest and greatest TV Boxes, the H8 Core (not to be confused with the older, previous Allwinner A31 based variant). The H8 Core is based on Rockchip’s RK3368 Octa core CPU.

This review unit was sent to me courtesy of the good people at HiMedia, so thank you all, and especially Nicole, for the great communication and help.

What’s in the Box?

The box contains the basic items: H8 TV Box, DC power adapter, HDMI 2.0 cable, IR Remote control, and a user manual.

Looks

[easy-image-collage id=1137]

The H8 Core is encased in a brushed aluminium box, with passive cooling only. That means it is completely silent. Most of the connections are on the back of the unit, aside from the SD/MMC reader which is on the left side, and the USB ports on the right side.

The H8 Core does not have any buttons on it, and can only be turned on and off (no suspend/sleep option) from the included remote. There is no recovery pin hole either, and any and all upgrades are done either online or locally via the upgrade option in settings.

Specifications

Chipset Rockchip RK3368 28nm Octa-core CPU, up to 1.5GHz GPU PowerVR G6110 GPU Memory / Storage 2GB DDR3 RAM / 16GB Flash Memory LAN 10/100M RJ45 Wireless IEEE 802.11 b/g/n @ 2.4G OS Android OS 5.1.1 Video Output HDMI 2.0 @ 60Hz, Composite Audio Output HDMI out, SPDIF (optical) Power DC 5V/2A Peripheral Interface 2 x USB 2.0 Host, SD/MMC 2-in-1 Card Reader, SPDIF Optical Audio Input, 1 x HDMI 2.0 cable, 1 x RJ45 LAN Port Packing Included 1 x H8 Core, 1 x Power Adapter (DC 5V/2A), 1 x HDMI 2.0 Cable ,1 x Learning IR Remote Controller,1 x Manual

Benchmarks and Testing

All benchmarks have been repeated 3 times and results have been averaged to give a more accurate reading:

Antutu Benchmark

The Antutu benchmark tests single core performance over multi-core as it is a better indication of the performance of one device over others in most situations.

GPU Mark Benchmark

GPU Mark tests 3d gaming performance and also provides a normalized score according to the used screen resolution (for a more accurate result). The test is quite short and should be taken as a supporting result to that of the more serious 3D Mark benchmark.

*A1 SD Benchmark

A1 SD Benchmark tests RAM and flash memory speeds. As can be seen in the provided graphs, RAM is much faster (by a factor of about 40) than flash memory – that is why it’s in smaller amount and is also volatile (does not keep its contents after a reboot). * The results showing in the tests may be skewed due to caching (as can be seen, a similar effect was observed in the other RK3368 based box tested). The results being skewed is re-enforced when you look at the other benchmarks and see that their results do not correspond to a RAM that’s twice as fast. The internal storage and SD card testing also show a higher than expected result that don’t necessarily correspond to real world results. The A1SD benchmark did notice it and alerted in that regard. I also used the (much) longer “accurate” measuring to get a better picture of the box’s results.

PC Mark Benchmark

4 Tests-in-one: Work Performance, Photo Editing, Writing & Web Browing

The PC Mark benchmark tests shows an apparent lead for the new HiMedia H8 Core. Also, only the Minix X8-H and the H8 Core were able to complete the video test portion of the test. It seems that both the EX+ and the Gecko require the use of specialized codecs in order to play some encoded video files.

3D Mark Benchmark

3D Mark benchmark is considered as one of the best ways to test 3d performance on Android (and other platforms).

On the H8, even though it identified it as OpenGL ES 3.1 capable, it could not run the 3.1 or the 3.0 tests correctly, so I was forced to run the OpenGL ES 2.1 tests instead. This happened before in another RK3368 I’ve tested (the ENY EKB368), so it might be a known issue.

The mediocre results may indicate a need for some improvements in the firmware that will elevate this box to it’s proper high placement. (closer to or even higher than the EKB368)

Usage and Performance

First impressions and testing shows a fast boot time of 27.21 seconds from “On” to desktop.

I was pleasantly surprised by the remote control. It has universal functions which I may test later, but the buttons are soft, it has a “mouse” function (not air mouse, just the kind you use the arrows to move the cursor around the screen), and it’s quite responsive. It does have a bit of sharp edges, but that can be corrected easily.

Rooting is not built into the default firmware, but can be achieved with a manual local file upgrade (Be aware that it will factory reset your box and also revert the language to Chinese, as well as possibly negating your warranty).

The default Himedia H8 Core launcher

One of the built-in tools in Android (4.x and 5.x) is the screenshot. It is not accessible in this box, but thanks to the root I was able to install a third party free tool so I can take screenshots in good quality.

Kodi performance was a less encouraging affair. There are bugs in this custom version of Kodi (15.1 Beta) which includes the RK codec to allow for hardware video acceleration. Those bugs manifested in small video stutters (the video stops for periods of less than a second and than continues while the audio continues without pausing), video completely stopped while audio continued in another occasion, and all videos took a few seconds to start, while fast forwarding resulted in long delays (up to 20 seconds!) while the audio comes back first and then the video syncs in.

Most of these issues were resolved when I switched to SPMC 15.0.0 (another Kodi fork which includes many codecs built-in and is more stable than custom kodi versions). Also, the pre-installed media manager (accessible from the H8’s desktop) was able to play most content without an issue, aside from the heavier 4K content which still lagged and stuttered. SPMC solved most of the issues, but not all. I experienced a few mid-playback crashes (from SPMC to the desktop), and browsing SMB shares from both Kodi and SPMC was very slow.

Note: All of these and other issues I encountered have been reported to HiMedia to be rectified and dealt with in future updates.

Video Playback testing (Using SPMC)

Resolution Video Format Local Playback Network (Wi-Fi/LAN) Playback 720p (1280*720) AVC ([email protected]) Playing correctly Playing correctly 1080P (1920*1080) AVC (High@L4) Playing correctly Playing correctly 2160P (3840*2160) HEVC (H.265) Playing correctly Playing correctly 4K (4096*2304) AVC ([email protected]) Playing correctly Buffering and stutter 4K / HD / FullHD HEVC (H.265) 10Bit Does not play Does not play

Antutu Video Tester

Gaming performance

I have tested the H8 with three games, but could not measure frame rate or resource usage accurately due to performance measuring issues. (both GameBench could not grab statistics correctly, and FPS meter was unable to maintain correct frame count at all times)

Asphalt 8 Airborne – a 3d graphic intensive racing game – run well in normal settings. But, I could not measure FPS consistently. I did see it kept at 45-60 fps at most times. It did think that I am using a phone or tablet and would not let me control it via the remote control arrows.

Angry Birds 2 – a popular 2d action game – worked great, with a frame rate between 35-55 fps at most times. (measuring was unreliable)

Walking War Robots – an online robot warfare game that requires a game-pad – seemed to load and play fine, with a frame rate of 35-45 and no issues, other than the need for a game pad.

Conclusions

Did I like it? Yes, But it will take a few rounds of firmware updates to get this box to its full potential. It’s not there yet.

Would I recommend it? Yes, but keep in mind that it is a new model with some growing pains. It also shows good format support including HD audio via its Media Manager app. (also BD-ISO playback)

For purchase, you can find it at Aliexpress, Niking Store, iAndroidTVbox, Geekbuying or even Amazon for prices ranging between 95.99 USD to 109.99 USD before coupons and/or discounts.

I hope you enjoyed the review, as you can expect quite a few more, and soon!

Review | HiMedia H8 Core RK3368 TV Box HiMedia is a Chinese brand name located in Shenzhen,China and has been operating since 2005. They have a large range of TV Boxes and that's their sole product range.

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infotainmentplus-blog · 6 years ago

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Worst smartphone experiences: Our team members share their tales We’ve been through many smartphones here at Android Authority — it comes with the territory. Some have been great, some have been bad. But how bad can it get? We asked our AA staff to recall their worst smartphone experiences of all time, highlighting the best ones below. We tried to stay clear of low-end smartphones because, let’s face it, most ultra-cheap Android devices were awful for the longest time. HTC leads the pack One of the more interesting tidbits from the poll was how HTC surfaced three times. This could be due the sheer bad luck of our staff, HTC’s fault, or its early popularity magnifying bad smartphone experiences. It’s still rather interesting. More specifically, Oliver Cragg‘s worst experience was the HTC One M9. “Imagine following the HTC One M8 (one of the most beautiful and best smartphones ever made) with a buggy, derivative phone that had an unforgivably bad camera,” Oliver explains. “I had it for six months before it stopped accepting any kind of network — a blessing in disguise. I’ve used HTC phones since (the 10 and U11 were both solid), but the M9 was a disaster.” Editor's Pick Daily drivers: 30 AA team members reveal the phones they use Mobile tech is what we do here at Android Authority. We have a huge team of people from all over the world. With that comes a broad range of needs and wants when it comes … Sticking with HTC, our SoundGuys colleague Lily Katz particularly disliked with 2012’s Droid DNA. “There was constant screen flickering and sporadic reboots that weren’t remedied by multiple factory resets. Not cute,” Lily said. Going back even further, Jimmy Westenberg pointed to 2010’s HTC Desire, but his experience wasn’t as bad as you might expect. His only major complaint was the storage space — a common issue during this era. “I could pretty much only use the stock HTC apps — the 4GB of storage didn’t allow for much wiggle room. I got used to living my life with a ‘low storage’ notification, which was annoying,” Jimmy recalled. “Other than that, the phone was great! No iPhone killer, but I still have good memories with it.” Huawei makes two appearances Chinese brand Huawei surfaced twice. The manufacturer is massive in Europe, China, and emerging markets, so it shouldn’t be surprising someone had a bad experience. Scott Adam Gordon generally had a good experience with his phones, but says the Huawei P10 sits atop the pile for worst smartphone experiences. It’s a stark contrast to the Huawei P20, which has been praised by us and other outlets. “They’ve all been great, but my worst experience has been with my current daily driver, the Huawei P10. The rear cameras have an autofocus problem that will cost money to fix (I don’t have a warranty),” said Scott. “The shots are blurry unless I take them in black and white. Google Photos will forever remember this as the film noir period of my life.” Read more: Best smartphones of 2018 — Here are our current picks Meanwhile, AA and DroneRush‘s Jonathan Feist mentions the Huawei Nexus 6P as his worst smartphone experience to date. It’s no surprise —the phone’s various issues have been well publicized. “It was a perfectly good phone for the first while, but then the issues started. First the battery would die anywhere below 50 percent, giving me less than two hours of screen-on-time per charge,” Jonathan says. “Then the dreaded boot loop killed it. To date, this is the only phone I have ever had that is no longer operational.” Did your old phone make the list? Robert Triggs recalled his experience with the Xperia X10, back when Sony Mobile was Sony Ericsson. “The Timescape UI was an overly complex, stuttering mess that got in the way more than it helped. Worse still, the Snapdragon S1 CPU developed an overheating problem after a year or so that kept rebooting the phone. I haven’t let a rubbish Android Donut experience put me off Sony, although I haven’t owned an Xperia since.” Meanwhile, the Oppo R11 (pictured above) was the source of Tristan Rayner‘s frustration. “The hardware wasn’t awful, but it came without an oleophobic coating, copied iPhone-style anti-Android notifications and had a poor skin,” said Tristan. “Add to that very little third-party support from the likes of LineageOS because it didn’t sell well enough, plus Oppo moved across to the R11s, meaning it’s a phone no one wants and it can’t be re-sold easily either.” Samsung only showed up once in our poll, with C. Scott Brown‘s worst experience being his Galaxy S6 (above). The device saw Samsung attempt to take on Apple for design prowess, but that’s not why it landed on our list. “I hate TouchWiz/Samsung Experience with a fiery passion. I bought the S6 planning to flash CyanogenMod, but Sammy/AT&T locked the bootloader, leaving me with only module options. I returned it after only a few weeks and got the Nexus 6P instead. CyanogenMod was up and running in a few minutes.” Xiaomi‘s Mi Mix 2 gave Adam Doud his worst experience, partly because of the expectations tied to a high-end device. “This is a flagship-level phone but the camera was below average in almost every way — very disappointing. It also had a weird bug where it wouldn’t accept group SMS messages, which, for a suburban dad, is an automatic deal breaker.” If I had to pick my own worst experience, I’d choose 2009’s Nokia N900 (though it’s probably a toss up between it and the Lumia 950). On the plus side, it had a slideout QWERTY keyboard, 32GB of storage, powerful Maemo OS, FM transmitter, video-out, and could run the Debian distribution of Linux. But it lacked WhatsApp, used a Linux-style app repository system, offered a resistive touchscreen, and wasn’t meant to be used in portrait orientation. Did the experience deter them from the brand? One rather interesting figure was that just over 30 percent of our staff said their terrible smartphone experience soured them on the brand. It’s a tiny sample size of course — we only had roughly a dozen responses in total. Nevertheless, this is potentially good news for companies that produced recent stinkers — maybe people are as willing to overlook a misstep as most of our staff. Most of these brands are more recognizable though, so who knows whether users would be kind to unknown manufacturers. What was your worst smartphone experience? Did you jump ship to a different brand afterwards? Let us know in the comments section! , via Android Authority http://bit.ly/2yNw84D

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