Stones' Rants

 Every year, some butthole ruins christmas for me. Sometimes it's an overenthusiastic douchebag deciding everyone needs some "christmas cheer" a bit early. I think October is a bit early, but nobody ever asks me what I think. Sometimes it's a TV commercial for cars or something where a popular christmas song has been usurped and the lyrics changed to promote this years models. This year, it was a frigging ice cream truck playing christmas carols in frigging September! There are only a couple dozen or so traditional christmas songs, and everyone and his brother has recorded a christmas album featuring these same songs. "Classsics," they call them. Fine. I would like to listen to my favorite christmas classics on frigging christmas eve, however, by the time christmas eve rolls around, I am so goddam sick to death of them I don't want to ever hear another carol as long as i live. People don't reaize that I've been forced to listen to these same goddam songs, year after year, for over six decades. And some of them I don't even like, such as "Frosty the goddam snow man," I have come to hate that song. Maybe it's because of endless repetition, or the fact that it's pretty trite, I don't know. It's not that great a song to begin with. Oh, and "Here comes santa claus," screw you, Gene Autrey. Horrible, horrible song. I never liked that one. Yet, every year, for months, I am literally assaulted by christmas, starting in September or October, and it doesn't let up until frigging January. I'm so sick of it, I could puke.
I'm not a believer. I don't begrudge you your holiday celebration.  Celebrate away! Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa, Winter Solstice, whatever! Enjoy your time with your family or your other believers or whatever the hell. Just leave me out of it!  I don't give a rat's testicles about your imaginary friend's imaginary son's imaginary birthday. Give me a freaking break. And I certainly don't appreciate being bludgeoned with it for freaking months!
Another thing, what the hell is wrong with your Business Plan if it's contingent upon every man, woman, and child going into serious debt to "celebrate" the "holidays?" Doesn't sound like good business to me. But what the hell do I know? I don't really participate in big way. Hardly even a small way. Hardly at all, really. As little as possible, to be honest.

 I Received an Amazon gift card as a gift (imagine that!) and tried to use it today. The whole point of it is convenience, right? Take my laptop, find a thing I want to buy, go to checkout, try to enter in the number on the gift card. I get an error, something like "not a valid number" or something. Maybe I typed it in wrong? Try again, same error. Maybe it's not this number, but the other number? Tried that one (it's fucking thirty digits long!) Nope, same error. I try examining the physical card. Am I missing something?  It's in an envelope, with a window. The window shows a bar code and some numbers. I notice, just below the edge of the "window" is another number. I tear the envelope just enough to enter this number. Nope, same error. The "card" is in the envelope, but there is no way to open the envelope. The envelope is glued shut! The fucking card is glued inside it. I carefully tear away the envelope, trying not to damage the card. This reveals another goddam number; but, it's under a "scratch and sniff" thing, like a lottery scratch card. For fucksakes. I peel away the scratchy bit, and try this number. SUCCESS!!! I spent the better part of an hour fucking around with this shit. What kind of a drunken monkey would engineer the card to be impossible to remove from the fucking envelope??? I can't be the only one that finds this ridiculously complex. WHY? What is the point of it?  The Amazon Gift Card is supposed to make my life easier, not harder. That's an hour of my goddam life wasted that I will never get back. Kind of takes the joy out of giving, doesn't it? Or receiving, for that matter.
I wouldn't use Amazon at all, except that, no retailer, not Walmart, not Target, not Home Depot, not Lowe's, not anyone has any kind of variety, anything other than stuff they think they can sell quickly. It's been bad for awhile, and it's only getting worse.

Got a new phone a couple weeks ago. It's a Samsung Galaxy Prime J3. Still figuring it out. It's not quite as frustrating as the goddam Iphone, but it's not easy to use, either. The design still has the same kind of flaws the Iphone has, a lack of visual cues as to how, when, and which way to swipe.
Case in point today, my wife shows me " all you have to do is swipe down to see what's open and running,"
Swipe down? How the fuck would I even know that. There is no arrow, icon, flashy thing or other indication that there is anything to swipe down. So frustrating.

 So, earlier, I got my bluetooth headset working and listened to a podcast. Tried to do the same with Pandora, couldn't figure it out. It kept telling me I needed to log in, which I did. I even created a new Pandora account, still not working. The problem here is a lack of meaningful error messages. That is to say, the error messages, if any, are completely usless in determining what the actual error might be.
Finally my wife says "you need to download the Pandora App," Again, how would I know that? It worked fine on the podcast website, no app needed. Pandora has a website, but apparently, that particular thing doesn't work like that. Again, how the fuck would I even know this? The 200 page manual is pretty good, I got the bluetooth working, but it's a little vague on some things. So, I finally got Pandora working, and I couldn't get my frigging bluetooth headset to work. Again, my wife intervenes, something in the settings was turned off. How would I know this? It was working fine, earlier. I'm ready to bring this back and get a flip phone again. So frustrating....

I've been getting a lot of stupid calls lately. Multiple texts from wrong numbers, when I send a string of obscenities via text (to get their attention) I get the; "I'm sorry, I don't know why you are so upset, this was our first text.  We'll take you off the list," I'm upset because it wasn't the 'first text,' this shit had been going on for months.
Then there's the "You've won a cruise!" phone call. Not even from a real person, but a clever recording, pretending to be a real person. I didn't realize it at first, until I tried interrupting it, "it" kept on talking. "Hello? Hello? Oh, hi, I was having trouble with my headset. The reason I'm calling is....."
And then there are the surveys. The first thing they say is, "I'm not selling anything," so why did you call. I ask what the survey is about, and who is funding it. Usually, they are not allowed to reveal this. This is when I hang up. Sometimes, depending on my mood, I may actually take a survey (depending on the subject) and halfway through realize that I've been conned, the survey questions are slanted to get the desired outcome regardless of your actual opinion. So I hang up. I know what you're thinking, "block the number," you think. It doesn't work, they have multiple numbers. I get the same call from different numbers, over a period of weeks. Don't put your personal info on a "Do Not Call" list, where do you think they get your number to begin with?
Then there was today. A live person, a Real Estate Agent called me and asked if I was thinking about selling my house. I was stunned. Stunned by the fact that it was a live person, stunned that this person actually thought I would be willing to transact business with SOME GUY I didn't know, quite possibly the largest transaction I would ever make in my entire life.
Then I was thinking, 'hey, waitaminute, my number is unlisted, HOW DID YOU GET MY NUMBER?'
He mumbled something like, "why, does it matter? I HAVE it," like that was an answer. I guess I should have gotten his name and number, and the company he worked for, and stuff. But, as I said, I was stunned.
So then I said:"I don't understand. You're cold calling random people to see if they want to sell their houses? That has to be a colossal waste of your time. Not to mention, a waste of MY time." Then I started screaming obscenities at him, and hung up.
Like I said, I should have gotten his name and number, so I could post it all over social media. Maybe I could have had a face to face and taken his picture, and put that all over the net. You can't undo something like that. But like I said, I was stunned...

I've been hearing about Linux for over twenty years. The first time I looked into it, it was more of a "roll your own" operating system, you had to build and compile the kernel from scratch. I decided it was too much work at the time.  Periodically, over the years, I looked at it again, even tried "test driving" a few different versions. Ultimately, the lack of documentation, and the steep learning curve, dissuaded me from taking it too seriously.

I have an aging computer, the last of a series of older machines with Windows XP installed, and for one reason or another, the last remaining working computer is also one of the slowest that I've had. So in addition to the hardware being years out of date, the Operating System is showing signs of age. Newer web browsers don't work right, forcing me to use older versions that many websites declare "are no longer supported." A new computer is in the works, but not in the immediate future.

Part of my motivation for investigating Linux again, is Microsoft's total abandonment of loyal users like me. I have been using Windows for over twenty years, since Windows 3.1. Windows 10 isn't Windows anymore, looks more like the Apple desktop, which I hate, since it's counter-intuitive to what I am already accustomed to. I've already put in enough time on the Windows learning curve for over twenty years, I don't want to have to learn it all over again. I just want it to work. I don't want to fight with "versions" or drivers, or any other goddam thing. I just want to use it. I got things to do, and learning a new Operating System isn't one of them.

I also object to Microsoft's "business model," where you "rent" software on a yearly contract, instead of buying it outright, and possibly paying for upgrades. I've bought MS Office a few times, now they want me to pay for it every year, in perpetuity? No. Not going to happen.

So, Apple is out, Microsoft is out, what's left? Linux.

Started looking for a version that was easy to use, and would run on my aging and obsolete computer. One of the things I found was "Puppy Linux," which will run from a thumb drive. Which is a good thing, because my goddam CD player doesn't work anymore. Fortunately, whoever designed this machine, made the BIOS in such a way that it's possible to boot from a USB thumb drive.
Linux comes in many versions, and Puppy Linux comes in several versions, as well. The first one I tried was version 4.30, because it was easy. It worked fine, was lightweight, seemed to run fast, installed in a few minutes, and then i tried to access the internet. That actually worked, too, except the browser was so outdated, I was unable to login to my email, Google+, Facebook, or any other site that required a secure login. In order to update the browser, I had to update the version of Linux. (sound familiar?)

Tried a Debian install first, and after 3 hours gave up, I don't think there was enough room on the thumb drive, I have no idea. The first attempt took about ten minutes, this was taking hours, and I don't know why.

The next attempt was with "Slacko Linux 6.3.2" based on the famous slackware. Well, they said it was famous. I never heard of it.
Ok, did this, now try booting it up. OK, it installed in less than ten minutes, BUT, there seems to be some kind of video driver problem? click on something, it opens a window, but the window is missing stuff, there are buttons, but the buttons don't have any labels, can't figure out what I'm looking at or how to fix it. Very fucking frustrating. The good news is, it's on a fucking thumb drive, and I can just reformat and move on to:

Installed Tahr 6.0.5 PAE
everything installed OK. Tahrpup is based on Ubuntu. Help file is completely useless. Internet installed seamlessly.
The built in browser was a firefox clone called "Palemoon." the problem with it is that websites like Google and duckduckgo didn't recognize it. Kept getting weird errors. The forum had some "solutions" to fix this issue, mostly blaming the unfairness of life, etc... the actual "fix" was convoluted and you had to do it separately for each site, and ultimately, didn't fucking work.
Installed Firefox. imported bookmarks via a second thumb drive. This worked ok. Started using the browser, logged into yahoo mail, Facebook, Google Plus. I noticed it runs a lot slower than previous attempts and previous browsers. Sometimes it freezes up for half an hour!!!! this shitting thing makes windows look good!!!!

From the "Puppy Linux" official website

Puppy Linux advantage

    Ready to use → all tools for common daily computing usage already included.
    Ease of use → grandpa-friendly certified ™
    Relatively small size → 200 MB or less.
    Fast and versatile.
    Customizable within minutes → remasters.
    Different flavors → optimized to support older computers, newer computers.
    Variety → hundreds of derivatives (“puplets”), one of which will surely meet your needs.

1. Let's take them one at a time. Yes, it's ready to use, and Yes, there is some version of a word processor, a web browser, and a bunch of other commonly used stuff. But, it's all stuff you never heard of, and it doesn't work quite the same as whatever you were using before. Again with the learning curve. And it's a learning curve for each and every program, and even things like Firefox, which I am intimately familiar with, is different under Linux.

2. Ease of Use. No, it's not easy to use. Easy to install, yes, it's done in about ten minutes, unlike windows, that used to take hours just to get back to where you were before it crashed. They jokingly say "grandpa friendly certified." I'm a grandpa, and it's not friendly, its not easy to use, the help files are useless, and documentation, if you can find it, may not even apply to whatever version you are using.

3. Relatively Small Size. Yes and no. The initial installation is small, yes. Then you install a browser that actually works, and this inflates the installation quite a bit. There is a swap file on the thumb drive that takes the place of the swap file on the Hard Drive. So you are restricted to the speed of your USB card, internal memory, mother board, etc., etc.

4. Fast and Versatile. Meh. Not that fast, in some cases, much slower. "versatile" is a relative term. Compared to other versions of Linux? Maybe, I have no idea. Compared to Windows? There's the fucking learning curve again. It took me a week to set the clock in Linux. Again, finding relevant documentation is nearly impossible, again, the internal help files are not very helpful. Followed one of the many procedures I found for setting the clock, nothing worked! Then, maybe a week later, I had at it again. I'm not even sure what I did, something to do with the "time zone?" Now it works! What a fucking pain in the ass!

5. Customizable withing minutes. Seriously? I'm afraid to "customize" anything, because it might stop working altogether. If it took a week to figure out setting the goddam clock, why would I even attempt to customize it? You've got to be kidding me.

So, let me sum it up here:

Pros & Cons:

Puppy Linux
Pros:
It's not Windows!
It's not Apple!
Will run on a thumb drive!
Has a FREE native program for just about everything

Cons:
It's not as fast as the claims
Some shit is hard to get working
Some of the browsers just don't work right
It's always "behind the curve"
The learning curve is brutal
The documentation sucks

A six year old girl in Dallas asked the Amazon Artificial Intelligence Alexa to buy her a dollhouse and some cookies. Apparently, there was no fail-safe set to prevent such things, even though the settings exist in the device. Yes, because of a parental oversight, one of the most popular AI's on the market today was confounded by a six year old girl. Not high marks for AI in the 21st century. The parents were puzzled when an expensive doll house and 4 pounds of cookies showed up a couple days later. Eventually they questioned the girl, and she confessed to sharing her desires with Alexa. It is unknown if the girl is grounded or what at this time. (read the story here:)

http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/05/health/amazon-alexa-dollhouse-trnd/index.html

Then, to add insult to injury, a news reader in San Diego apparently set off an avalanche of doll house and cookie orders by merely reading the story on the air. It is unknown at this time exactly how many Alexa-equipped households were ordering dollhouses and cookies. Maybe Amazon should have better setup instructions? Way to boost the economy, eh? So the six year old's parents weren't the only stupid people in the world, apparently, there's a whole pile of them in San Diego! (read the story here:)

http://www.cw6sandiego.com/news-anchor-sets-off-alexa-devices-around-san-diego-ordering-unwanted-dollhouses/

Not an auspicious beginning for AI. The problem appears to be, the designers keep trying to make it more user-friendly, and easy to use, and wind up making it unusable. Now some sort of security codes or passwords or something have to be implemented to prevent the thing from just randomly picking up words off the TV or the Radio and acting on them. The problem in past was in the voice recognition, it had to be "trained" to identify a users voice, vocabulary was limited, and complex commands like "Alexa, buy cookies," were a little beyond it's capabilities. With the technological obstacles removed, it now becomes a problem of common sense. Was no one on the design staff able to foresee this might become an issue? If I tell Alexa that I really want a Rolls Royce, will it actually attempt to have one delivered? How do you draw a line that it cannot cross without human intervention, without rendering it so inconvenient that you're better off just using your computer or smart phone? I don't believe these challenges to be insurmountable, but we're going to have to do a lot better than this moving forward. AI is here to stay, how do we integrate into our already tech-heavy lives without letting it take over? Perhaps "AI" is too strong a term, the thing isn't really intelligent, it's basically a voice-activated personal assistant. Strangely, the hardest part has been getting the voice activated interface to work reliably. Now that we seem to have that obstacle removed, maybe we should be trying to make the thing more intelligent.

https://www.yahoo.com/style/tranny-granny-halloween-costume-recalled-by-164654452.html

you've got to be joking. Are we so ultra-sensitive that the slightest deviation from the

mainstream is considered offensive? Are we so easily offended that this fairly innocuous

costume is the source of such controversy, yet police in other states continue to gun

down unarmed civilians. We're one election away from an Orwellian Dystopia and THIS is

what you're upset about? This is the most important thing in the news to report on?

The article further states; "Fortunately, college student Mahala Herron has some pretty

sound advice for avoiding controversy, specifically in regards to cultural appropriation.

“Halloween is coming up, so everyone please remember that my culture isn’t a costume,”

she tweeted. She shared this alongside an illustration of three figures symbolizing

different cultures: One head is adorned in a hijab, another is wearing cornrows, and the

third is in a headdress." Since when is 'Mahal Herron' the goddam costume police?
I see things that are offensive to me ALL THE TIME and nobody gives a shit that I'm

offended. Seriously, this PC nonsense has gone too far. If you find this offensive, DON'T

BUY IT!!! seriously, WTF?