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Comment How is it best inspected and repaired? (Score 1) 13

The most versatile, repairable, recyclable materials for bridges if one can afford them are steels which can be cut, welded, and easily inspected using proven methods then scrapped and recycled efficiently with many of the standard steel sections easy to cut and resell for less critical reuse.

Cheaper concrete destroys reinforcement bars and mats by corrosion which is a major reason why the US infrastructure repair bills are so expensive. (Small and medium bridges can be replaced by portable metal bridging which can even be rented for use on short-term projects. Some WWII Bailey bridges remain in daily use because there's no reason to install a downgrade that's difficult to remove vs. swapping parts, weld repair or disassembly and replacement with similar.) Portable bridging in military usereliably withstand thousands of heavy wheeled and tracked military vehicles

"Shotcrete" is a handy coating and good for the developers trying this out, but the TCO and averting traffic delays due to repair time also matter.

Automated NDI inspection robots designed for these would be a very good idea to save labor. Bridge inspection robots are not new. Check out these inspection and maintenance robots:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Comment I'd gleefully volunteer. Why not? (Score 1) 53

I'd gleefully volunteer because that would at least make my dying experience useful to others if not myself. I consider that no different than donating my organs and other leftovers to whoever can use them. If we can donate a corpse we can consent to donating ourselves during the normally protracted, miserable decline we call old age and should have the option while we're still compos mentis.

For me an ideal departure path would be a clinical trial followed by body donation to science. Volunteering is an honorable exercise of agency useful to humanity.

I've cared for a demented, bedridden, crippled family member whose mistery I was forbidden to end. My father (WWII combat infantry vet who'd seen plenty of death at Aachen etc) was on board with me assisting his departure but others were too weak to get out of the way so he suffered a couple extra years for nothing. Of course I'd volunteer so others might one day be spared.

Humans treat each other with less respect than they give a beloved hunting dog. Many hunters, farmers and other good stewards understand merciful death is a kindness while clinging to a helpessly suffering animal out of emotional weakness is self-centered sadism.

We're all fucking doomed to feed the worms. Get over it and do something useful or at least don't be a human obstacle to others peaceful departure. Testing therapies on the damned won't make them more damned and if it helps they'll be pleased.

Comment Re: Daz Studio etc & adding vs.switching OS. (Score 1) 148

"Waiting" rather than running more than one OS just postpones the learning curve. Absent unusual constraints you don't need a "next machine" to run Linux which there are many convenient ways to do without disturbing your Windows host. The "I will switch when things get a little bit worse" meme is self-defeating vs exploring Linux (or any OS) in any of many very convenient, educational ways while sacrificing nothing.

Rather than following the "switching" meme I simply add any OS I fancy using the most convenient method.
The idea of "switching" intimidates many prospective users who'd benefit from choice. Use is not contribution, only money and code, so what an individual uses is of nil outside consequence. It's not raging against anyone's machine though that might be one motivator for the Terry Davis crowd.

Your current PC runs 11 so should be quite capable of running a Linux virtual machine you can learn from without disrupting your workflow.

If storage is an issue drive space is cheap and Linux boot drives are normally near effortless to swap between PCs. More RAM is always good so I max out all my PCs old or new that they may serve me better for longer. If money is tight used RAM from reputable Ebay sellers has never failed me (I run memtest after install to be sure). If your drive is soldered in place you can offload storage to external drives (NTFS can be accessed by Linux) with both OS on your boot drive as host or guest.

VMs are a convenient way to sample any or many distros without installing to bare metal. You can download free prebuilts from osboxes and other helpful sites or roll your own (recommended for install training). After running Linux in VMs you can replace your Windows host with Linux. You can make a VM of your current Windows install so you lose nothing and have a readily bootable Windows install to use. You can copy VM as very convenient backups or to run on other computers. If a Windows update breaks something you can revert to a clean snapshot.

I'm a basic VM user still on VirtualBox which is simple and works well for my use but defer to VM aficionados re: the latest optimal choices.

You could run Daz Studio in a light Windows VM with few other programs and if you don't need to connect that VM to the internet you can skip Windows updates to save space. Save work to a shared folder and should anything hose your Windows install reboot into the snapshot you took of whatever Windows state you preferred to save. No need for activation unless the minor inconveniences trigger you, but I've used offline activators since the XP days with clean .iso images. If not sure how that works best the My Digital Life forums are highly educational.

VM aren't just for professionals and in general are a drastic improvement over dual booting and shared boot records. I did that twice in back in 1999ish and found separate hard drives in cheap swap rack trays were the path of least hassle as VM were not an option.

I use Linux because Windows irks me and I greatly prefer my many, many more software options but OS are merely tools so I don't see reason to limit my toolkit. Software doesn't cost a dime unless you feel like paying for it.

You can so I did load Windows To Go drives using leftover small SSD, cheap USB adapters and 3D printed cases. I can boot W10 anywhere or W11 if I cared to use for chores needing bare metal installs like reflashing GM LS V8 firmware. I can swap cheap USB hard drive adapters to use any connector I need. I do similarly with Linux drives which are far more "portable" than Windows. Any sufficiently spacious drive can hold any host and VM and if loaded with Ventoy can boot multiple OS including a wide variety of live .iso images and VM.

Iff you're unhappy with MSFT their OS are easily contained offline on Linux hosts which let you use your most performant hardware rather than older gear (on which Linux typically runs well, especially on Thinkpads). Installing FOSS firmware like Libreboot on older Thinkpads for secure comms use is an established hobby with strong community support. If you don't feel like flashing it yourself (though the more you do the more capable you become) some Thinkpad enthusiasts will sell you a flashed Thinkpad or flash one you send them. I suggest learning to do that for yourself lest an adversary intercept and backdoor the firmware. You can also boot live security-focused distros like TAILS and remaster their images as desired. Linux offers so many free tools it's hard to beat. https://libreboot.org/

If you prefer control to helplessness why not jump in and enjoy some free (or nearly so) mind-expanding fun?

When seeking tech info I suggest NOT vomiting your emotions all over the internet because:

Nobody else cares. Paranoia is a delusion of personal importance and agency. Everyone sane who reads such
things doesn't pity you, they sneer as you would at your left-wing mirror images.

Cultivating emotional fragility is self-sabotage thus degenerate.

Emotional vomit is a distracting barrier to efficient communication. It's noise, not signal
no matter how much the vomiter fantasizes otherwise. It has the opposite effect of advocacy.

Emotional vomit convinces no one and makes vomiters instant laughingstocks and ridicule targets.
It's the equivalent of the woke airheads you despise puking their lives onto social media
and impresses no one. Nothing you could ever do, be or say can change that.

Go do fun stuff instead. For the rest, I suggest 4chan where /pol/ will suit you just fine.

Submission + - NordVPN embraces open source by releasing its Linux GUI on GitHub (nerds.xyz)

BrianFagioli writes: NordVPN has open sourced its Linux GUI on GitHub, giving the community full access to the code behind its graphical client. The move follows a 70 percent surge in daily active Linux users since the GUIâ(TM)s debut earlier this year, showing clear demand for a user friendly VPN experience on the platform. Alongside the previously open sourced command line tool, the GUI codebase is now available for anyone to audit, modify, and contribute to.

While NordVPNâ(TM)s core backend infrastructure remains proprietary, the company says the open source release reflects its commitment to transparency and collaboration with the Linux community. The GUI can also now be installed with a single command using Snap, simplifying setup and ensuring automatic updates across distributions.

Submission + - ShinyHunters Leak Alleged Data from Qantas, Vietnam Airlines & Other Major F (hackread.com)

schwit1 writes: On October 3, 2025, Hackread.com published an in-depth report in which hackers claimed to have stolen 989 million records from 39 major companies worldwide by exploiting a Salesforce vulnerability. The group demanded that Salesforce and the affected firms enter negotiations before October 10, 2025, warning that if their demands were ignored, they would release the entire dataset.

The hackers, identifying themselves as “ Scattered Lapsus$ Hunters,” a collective said to combine elements of Scattered Spider, Lapsus$, and ShinyHunters, have now published data allegedly belonging to 6 of the 39 targeted companies.

The companies named in the leak are as follows:
  1. Fujifilm
  2. GAP, INC.
  3. Vietnam Airlines
  4. Engie Resources
  5. Qantas Airways Limited
  6. Albertsons Companies, Inc.

Submission + - Britain Issues First Online Safety Fine To US Website 4chan (reuters.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Britain said on Monday it had issued U.S. internet forum site 4chan with a $26,644 fine for failing to provide information about the risk of illegal content on its service, marking the first penalty under the new online safety regime. Media regulator Ofcom said 4chan had not responded to its request for a copy of its illegal harms risk assessment nor a second request relating to its qualifying worldwide. Ofcom said it would take action against any service which "flagrantly fails to engage with Ofcom and their duties under the Online Safety Act" and they should expect to face penalties.

The act, which is designed to protect children and vulnerable users from illegal content online, has caused tension between U.S. tech companies and Britain. Critics of the law have said it threatens free speech and targets U.S. companies. Technology minister Liz Kendall said the government "fully backed" Ofcom in taking action. "This fine is a clear warning to those who fail to remove illegal content or protect children from harmful material," she said.

Submission + - The people rescuing forgotten knowledge trapped on old floppy disks (bbc.com)

smooth wombat writes: At one point in technology history, floppy disks reigned supreme. Files, pictures, games, everything was put on a floppy disk. But technology doesn't stand still and as time went on disks were replaced by CDs, DVDs, thumb drives, and now cloud storage. Despite these changes, floppy disks are still found in long forgotten corners of businesses or stuffed in boxs in the attic. What is on these disks is anyone's guess, but Cambridge University Library is racing against time to preserve the data. However, lack of hardware and software to read the disks, if they're readable at all, poses unique challenges.

Some of the world's most treasured documents can be found deep in the archives of Cambridge University Library. There are letters from Sir Isaac Newton, notebooks belonging to Charles Darwin, rare Islamic texts and the Nash Papyrus – fragments of a sheet from 200BC containing the Ten Commandments written in Hebrew.

These rare, and often unique, manuscripts are safely stored in climate-controlled environments while staff tenderly care for them to prevent the delicate pages from crumbling and ink from flaking away.

But when the library received 113 boxes of papers and mementoes from the office of physicist Stephen Hawking, it found itself with an unusual challenge. Tucked alongside the letters, photographs and thousands of pages relating to Hawking's work on theoretical physics, were items now not commonly seen in modern offices – floppy disks.

They were the result of Hawking's early adoption of the personal computer, which he was able to use despite having a form of motor neurone disease known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, thanks to modifications and software. Locked inside these disks could be all kinds of forgotten information or previously unknown insights into the scientists' life. The archivists' minds boggled.

These disks are now part of a project at Cambridge University Library to rescue hidden knowledge trapped on floppy disks. The Future Nostalgia project reflects a larger trend in the information flooding into archives and libraries around the world.

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