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b4ux1t3 #1️⃣

@b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

mastodon 4.7.3

"One can believe in a story without believing it happened."
- Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer

Software Developer, dad, animal person. Maybe not in that order? #opensource

You'll mostly see me posting about #TTRPG, #GameDev, #Programming / #SoftwareDevelopment (primarily #DotNet, #FSharp, and #FunctionalProgramming, but also lots of others!), #parenting, and a little bit of #Woodworking.

I used to post about #HamRadio over on @b4ux1t3@mastodon.radio, but now I do that here!

he/him

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37 Posts

Joined November 13, 2022

Blog:

https://write.bauxite.tech/read

GitLab.io:

https://b4ux1t3.gitlab.io/

Demos:

https://bauxite.tech

Watch me make stuff on twitch!:

https://twitch.tv/b4ux1t3

#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 2d ago

Boosted by @trending@homestead.social

So, uh, job search update: About a month ago now, I pleaded on mastodon for help. I didn’t really have a goal in mind. I was just miserable at work, not getting paid enough to do too much work. I posted a big long, rambling post that ended with, effectively, “will someone please help me” A lot of you reached out, actually. It was a truly overwhelming outpouring of help. And I _definitely_ got overwhelmed by it. I’m sure I dropped at least a few opportunities right on the floor. If you’ve been waiting to hear from me and haven’t, I am truly sorry. Today I just filled out the forms to start a new job, and it happened because someone reached out to me after reading my post. My first day is in a little less than a month. On top of it being a welcome escape from my current position, it happens to be _literally_ a dream job of mine. #getFediHired works. If you’re on here, and you’re losing hope, know that it works. There is a way out for you. You’re not in this alone. If you’re not trying to get out of your current job, or you’re not actively looking, I urge you to check out the hashtag anyway. Boost folks. Send them leads. It works.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 3mo ago

Ahhhh, I love finding a nice new fedi handle to follow. The initial “I must scroll through their posts and like every post that stands out” is always a blast. The feeling of “following” on here feels markedly different. I don’t post stuff because I care if other people see what I’m doing; I post stuff on here because it makes people _talk to me_ about stuff I enjoy. And that seems to hold true for most folks on here; most of us did our time in the walled gardens. We want connection, not ads. And a profile full of mushrooms and hiking _on silent Sunday_ is inimitable. I can’t stop gushing about all the amazing people I follow here.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@gamingonlinux speaking as a parent, I’ve decided that no company gets to know who is using my or my kids’ computers or what their age is. What are they going to do? Toss me in jail for ticking the checkbox that says “disable this really very important feature, you naughty user you” that every distribution will put in to get through some vague loophole that will inevitably sneak its way in to whatever chatgpt-generated specification the law ends up requiring? I mean yes, probably.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

I wrote a thing about old video games again. This one is spicy: https://write.bauxite.tech/retro-ramblings/hardly-harder/

Also, to be clear, there are _lots_ of great and well-designed games today. This blog post is discussing a few specific dimensions I have noticed changing, but not _every_ game has these problems, and plenty of games that have these problems are _absolute bangers_. There is no wrong fun here.

(EDIT: I fixed the name of the post, oops)

write.bauxite.tech

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@gnomon see, I keep trying to do that and the CEO keeps foaming at the mouth and screaming “AI” like a pterodactyl.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Like, seriously, we make people get a piece of paper before they can put together a bridge. We do that because the downsides of “a bridge being built by someone who hasn’t gone through at least a minimum of intensive training” are _much_ worse than the downsides of “making people get a piece of paper before making bridges”.

When you write code, you’re…probably (_probably_) not going to kill anyone. This is a thing some juniors need to hear and internalize, but also:

Everything is computers now. All of it. Computers touch every single aspect of modern life.

And that means that when, not if, you screw up, your code is going to hurt someone. It might be something stupid. “God dammit I can’t sign in to neopets because their identity server fell over”.

Some of the time you write property management software that doesn’t stop charging an account when that account has a zero balance, and then a property owners association keeps charging the account 400 dollars for three months before the person whose house they’re managing comes to them and asks “hey why did I just pay you 1200 bucks over three months? I literally don’t have that money and need to go to a food bank now”, and then you find out the app has no way to reverse this, except to hire a “consultant” to drive 90 minutes from the nearest major city to UPDATE (balance) IN accounts VALUE (0) WHERE resident.mastodonhandle = b4ux1t3 (that sql is a war crime)

The programmer who writes this code isn’t…a bad person. They didn’t do anything wrong, per se, when they introduced this bug. But they hurt someone. Because of a basic lack of forethought and planning.

Do you know what the bulk of engineering accreditation consists of?

Learning all the ways, obvious and otherwise, that your systems can fail and proactively accounting for them.

So you tell me, reader: do you want the person writing your banking software to have no formal training whatsoever on “building financial systems”?

(I won’t be getting into arguments about the efficacy or otherwise of accreditation programs. Some are bad, some are excellent, but your anecdotal experience dealing with engineers does not change the fact that engineering programs, like regulations, are written on blood.)

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 6mo ago

My few contacts on here who know me at work now know that I’m looking for a job, so, uh, yeah, I’m looking for a new position.

I’m a stereotype. Long-time developer, perpetual polyglot (if pressed, I’m probably strongest in #dotnet, both framework and modern flavors, and favoring f#, but if you look at the list of languages in Rosetta code, you’ll see “my goal”), plenty of experience in different kinds of organizations, have a history that includes dedicated infosec work (pentesting, architecture, help desk, you name it), extensive Linux experience (admin, hacking, even building distros for appliances), and plenty of network engineering. I have mostly been in the fed/mil space and am looking to get out of that space for what I like to think are pretty obvious reasons.

I love learning, I love helping people learn, and I’m a big fan of companies that invest in that. I love giving talks, presentations, workshops, etc, and would love to talk at conferences for your company.

US only, remote greatly preferred but will commute if fairly local and will move for the right position (I have a family so I’d expect assistance with said move, but we’re not opposed to the concept).

Open to leadership roles, but only technical ones.

I’ve actually been looking since last march, though I’ve kept it on the DL since folks at work follow me on here.

I’m not in dire straits, I’m still employed, but

A. I don’t trust the direction the company is going and,
B. I’ve been pulled off of development work to do bog standard systems integration and deployment.

So I’m looking for a change.

And look, I’m not bullish on AI agentic coding (I’m not going to hide my distaste, feel free to scroll my posts), but if your company is using it I’m not going to turn down an offer. I’m nothing if not a team player.

Oh, one last thing: if your company is not lgbtqia+ friendly, it’s not “b4ux1t3 friendly” either. I make it a point to try to change organizations I am in for the better in that regard.

#dotnet #getfedihired #jobsearch #softwaredeveloper

Hachyderm.io

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Less than two hours until my tech interview.

Quick, folks, give me advice.

Bad advice only.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

“Wait, b4ux1t3, are you saying that if we had an accreditation process, companies could save literally billions of dollars a year on hiring practices, and solve the very problems that are on the rise due to wide scale adoption of ai?” Yes, it literally was that easy.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 6mo ago

My few contacts on here who know me at work now know that I’m looking for a job, so, uh, yeah, I’m looking for a new position.

I’m a stereotype. Long-time developer, perpetual polyglot (if pressed, I’m probably strongest in #dotnet, both framework and modern flavors, and favoring f#, but if you look at the list of languages in Rosetta code, you’ll see “my goal”), plenty of experience in different kinds of organizations, have a history that includes dedicated infosec work (pentesting, architecture, help desk, you name it), extensive Linux experience (admin, hacking, even building distros for appliances), and plenty of network engineering. I have mostly been in the fed/mil space and am looking to get out of that space for what I like to think are pretty obvious reasons.

I love learning, I love helping people learn, and I’m a big fan of companies that invest in that. I love giving talks, presentations, workshops, etc, and would love to talk at conferences for your company.

US only, remote greatly preferred but will commute if fairly local and will move for the right position (I have a family so I’d expect assistance with said move, but we’re not opposed to the concept).

Open to leadership roles, but only technical ones.

I’ve actually been looking since last march, though I’ve kept it on the DL since folks at work follow me on here.

I’m not in dire straits, I’m still employed, but

A. I don’t trust the direction the company is going and,
B. I’ve been pulled off of development work to do bog standard systems integration and deployment.

So I’m looking for a change.

And look, I’m not bullish on AI agentic coding (I’m not going to hide my distaste, feel free to scroll my posts), but if your company is using it I’m not going to turn down an offer. I’m nothing if not a team player.

Oh, one last thing: if your company is not lgbtqia+ friendly, it’s not “b4ux1t3 friendly” either. I make it a point to try to change organizations I am in for the better in that regard.

#dotnet #getfedihired #jobsearch #softwaredeveloper

b4ux1t3 :trek_ds9_sisko:#1️⃣: "My few contacts on here who know me at work now k…" - Hachyderm.io

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@whitequark@social.treehouse.systems (apologies for the long reply from a stranger, just…I’m so with you here) Their argument is also…just straight up false. Like, it’s been demonstrated time and time again that _linguistic_ ability is tied much more closely to “programming” ability than mathematic ability is. This is _why_ it’s interesting that LLMs can write any code _at all_. Their ability to write code is an _emergent property_ of the model, likely stemming from the fact that computer languages are, at their core, fundamentally the same as human language. ….but as we all keep saying, writing code isn’t the hard part. Just like writing the sentences of a novel isn’t the hard part. Neither code nor prose changes people’s lives because of the mechanisms we lay on the page or in the editor, and it’s here that your OP is sort of right. Sort of. The magic of software comes from the unique and interesting ways those mechanisms interact. LLMs do not exhibit this kind of thinking or creativity because they _don’t think_. The day we get a deterministic compiler from natural language to machine code will be a _huge_ win for society. It’s just also no where close to being here in any sort of sustainable way.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@gnomon hehehehh. Oh it’s resolving itself alright. Right into the ground. But that’s okay, I figure I have a year or so of runway before I need to bounce, company is in a niche that’s hard to lose once you’re in it, but that won’t save it forever. Already looking for new things. ;)

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

This is what I’m doing rather than practicing for my technical interview later. Posting on mastodon. Just fyi.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@GamesMissed it’s madness, because that’s still just happening. Our CEO hired an “AI Czar” and…well, same story different decade I guess.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@jpm@aus.social “hey you proved that this is a problem, and have no more actual information to give because you _already gave everything we needed_, but because you didn’t talk for two weeks we’re going to close this even though it’s an easy win.” Sigh. And it’s always the big companies who actually have the resources to watch their open source stuff, you know?

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Listen…

The tool is “speak English and get code”

I do not need seventeen thousand different tutorials that all have someone typing some text and getting code out of it.

I do not need to be reminded to “look at it myself” as if that advice is meaningful when the fucking thing spits out ten thousand lines of subtly (and not-so-subtly) broken code in an hour.

You’re not going to get big on YouTube telling AI to make software. Stop trying. Even if I believed this stuff was as revolutionary as folks claim it is, _it kills specialization and experience_ so folks posting about it _necessarily_ don’t have enough experience to actually help anyone; this is the equivalent of 15 year old b4ux1t3 thinking he had deep emotional wisdom to share with the world when what he really had was overly dramatic, technically very good writing.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@Two9A@hachyderm.io I love it. We have a similar failure mode ;)

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@GamesMissed I tried to do the freelance consulting route directly out of high school. Turns out it’s…both very difficult and also not very lucrative to do when you’re 20 years old, even if you do literally have more experience building software than most developers of the time. In the end, I went and sold out, because I needed things like “food and shelter” more than freedom.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@GamesMissed uh, to be clear, i did not make more money _in that sector_ and the work I did was _information security_ related. But still, like, it’d be nice if the folks securing our nations’ nuclear infrastructure against cyber attacks…you know, had a meaningful education and background in cybersecurity, and wasn’t “some rando developer that a security company hired and dressed up like a security engineer. Computers are computers, right?”.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

@Tealfuleyes@mastodon.art it always felt that way, but now it’s like they’re weaponizing it.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 26mo ago

Replying to

@hellenicsun@toot.community side note: of _course_ fdroid is on the fediverse. Thank you for pointing out they exist so I could follow them!

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 30mo ago

Replying to

@the_wiggler@mastodon.social @rail_@bark.lgbt I (straight) was surprised when a queer friend grumbled about the lgbtqia+ community not being inclusive...Of straights. One: it's not even in the name, and not the point of the community, Two: I've never met a person in the community who despised straights by default and _literally attacked them_, while the inverse can't be said. No one is at pride marches stopping straights from attending. I don't know what's more inclusive than letting everyone participate.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 6mo ago

Replying to

@foxyloon yeah I was trying to find seams that would indicate it was screwed together, and then I found them and was reallly impressed by the tolerances. Peel and screw is the first step after step zero: information gathering!

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 6mo ago

Replying to

Seriously though, this is not shade on gamesir’s engineering here. Top tier, great product. This is entirely user error.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 10mo ago

Replying to

@rk this is one of those situations where my first instinct was _not _ to blame corporate greed. As much shit as we all give eg Boeing, this sector of technology is easily one of the safest and has some of the highest standards in any industry. This is probably a _very _ interesting bug, and not likely one that would have been easy to test for.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 32mo ago

Replying to

@b0rk@social.jvns.ca I'll have you know you just cost me, like, one and a half cents, because I _immediately_ printed this out.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 25mo ago

My company is hiring #DataEngineer s!

Stack is #DotNet and #postgresql #postgres

Team is fully remote, and I've been very happy with them.

DM me for a link to the posting. #GetFediHired #DataEngineering

EDIT: To be clear, I am not the hiring manager, I'm just a guy who works here.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 30mo ago

Replying to

@Sarahw@mastodon.green @the_wiggler@mastodon.social @rail_@bark.lgbt Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of folks (especially trans folks these days!) who have every reason to hate and fear cis het people. The fact that the community is _still_ accepting of cis het allies speaks _volumes_ to the character of the community.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

I think that K-pop is currently the most deserving of the term “rock and roll” in today’s music scene.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Replying to

What I’ve actually been doing the past few days is trying to design “AI-proof” senior-level technical interview scenarios. Things like designing problems where a naive user will turn to their LLM and ask it the wrong question. Code samples with bugs that a senior will either flag directly as unrelated or just fix them, but which will seem like a real fix to an AI. The fact that technical interviews went from “annoying thing that exists because we refuse to build an accreditation system for software development” to “absolutely necessary and fraught with tricky thinking and AI traps” is really annoying to me.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

LinkedIn is trash and terrible. But hey, you should be using every avenue to improve your odds at getting a job, and quickly glancing through the profile of someone who is going to be interviewing you is _really really_ helpful.

Problem is when you’re interviewing with someone who is as cautious and careful about personal privacy as you are. OSINT only goes so far with folks who know what “OSINT” is.

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 5mo ago

Alright #TTRPG #parents who are looking for ways to get their kids into the hobby, go have your kids watch S4E5 of Ada Twist on Netflix.

Just do it.

Hachyderm.io

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#1️⃣ @b4ux1t3@hachyderm.io

· 3mo ago

Replying to

@inthehands@hachyderm.io this number 3 is the Crux. I think. It’s hard to wrap your head around, even for me, even this late into the game.

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