Look at it from the perspective of 1977 or just before, when the scripts were written. I wasn’t alive back then, but from what you read, it was a time when (real-world) devices came with manuals, schematics, block diagrams, and if they were missing you could probably find them or get them from the manufacturer.

Apple I and II are just hitting the market, with a strong background in DIY culture, and in the unlikely case you had access to one of these (or something like an Altair 8800 etc), you’d probably know how to fix a blown cap with a soldering iron.

Maybe I’m glorifying the past here but, Star Wars was written at a time when things, including computers, were expected to be repairable. So what you’re writing really only makes sense from a contemporary 2020-ies perspective, nobody would have raised an eyebrow at that detail in 1977 … probably.

Potentially, yes, but the official apps available are all using Google Maps … so I’m not sure how much of an improvement that would be over just using GMaps to begin with

Neat … the public transport issue is unfortunately a big one, and the hardest to solve :(

Not just the live updates and departure/arrival times, but starting with the sheer existence. In the (reasonably big) city where I live the only thing to be found in OSM/CoMaps/OrganicMaps is the subway.

No buses (including nightbuses for when the subway doesn’t run), no commuter rail for the surrounding cities and suburbs, no tram …

Not sure where this data could be accessed …

EDIT: Now that I’m looking at it again, it seems that at least some bus lines are available in OrganicMaps, but you have to look for a stop, click on the line, and it will show you the route. It’s not integrated with the route lookup feature though :(

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngogo_chimpanzee_war https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gombe_Chimpanzee_War

Könnte man die als “Krieg” bezeichnen? Vielleicht nicht unbedingt ideologisch motiviert, aber das liest sich schon nach recht systematischer Gewaltanwendung …

I think many people are imagining it wrong, though … it’s not like every house in Barcelona has a parking garage, especially in the old town, but also in newer dense neighborhoods. It’s just my estimate based on observation but I would say apartment buildings WITH a parking garage are the exception rather than the norm. If they have a garage, you still have to pay extra for the spot usually.

As a resident you can apply for resident street parking, which gives you preferential parking in the parking zones associated with your neighborhood. That’s not free, either, but you can park at a discount.

But typically renting an apartment doesn’t come with any guarantee that you’ll have guaranteed immediate access to parking close to your place … heck, if you’re living in the old town you might have trouble finding a place to put your bicycle …

EDIT: the article only mentions selling, not renting, so, not sure how that compares really …

I still view the Japanese model as ideal …

Parking on the roadside (outside the official parking spots, which you have to pay for) will usually get you a ticket or towed … free public roadside parking is mostly a thing of the past in most densely-populated places, really …

Since when is a parking spot a right? At least where I have lived so far, no apartment ever came with a guarantee for a parking spot, either you had to pay for a resident permit in your respective zone, or find a public spot, with free public parking (thankfully) becoming a rare occurrence these days … very few buildings I ever lived in had a garage …

I think this is one of the key quotes:

“It used to make sense to require parking in homes to avoid public spaces being filled. But this generates traffic because it encourages people to drive. Young people are also less likely to own a car. They may either opt for car sharing or renting.”

There’s practically no free public parking in Barcelona. It’s either for-pay or you have a resident permit.

I hope this frees up space, not just for sustainable transportation but also for more affordable housing, something Barcelona really needs …

Use case is putting accents on certain elements of the stage, specifically loudspeakers (in a multichannel setup with loudspeakers placed around the audience). So they don’t have to be particularly bright.

That one took me a moment as well … why is there a difference between 2/2 and 4/4, or 6/8 and 3/4 …

It started to make sense once I saw it as an abstraction. It denotes a certain emphasis on certain notes that would look really awkward and hard to read if it was repetitively written out for every note (not that I can really read music anyway).

I have a much harder time with harmony theory … like, I get that some successions have a “resolving” feel but other than that I never got why I shouldn’t just jumble up pitches any way that sounds ok to me. Ultimately I decided that I’ll spend my life composing music, deliberately ignoring harmony theory as material …

Other things that elude me a mostly social nature … like, some people are just amazing at striking up some or another deal or barter their way through life at a discount, simple because they connect well to people. I never got how they do that … not sure whether it’s something you can learn

I mean … it’s mostly functional but in times when I’m in decent shape (which fluctuates) in a way I like the look of a well-fitted jersey 🫣 😅 … bibs and helmets always look kinda awkward though …

They don’t have to though … mine looks moderately fancy but is really just a collection of used or discounted parts I scraped together over the last 20 years … I have two jerseys, both bought when they were on sale, one is probably 15 years old …

New shorts every once in a while because they wear out, the cheap ones work fine for me …

So I still look like a MAMIL but in reality it’s a fairly low-budget hobby …

I summer 2026, at least in Europe, a lot of people try to stay away from heat sources as much as they can though 🥵

Unless you live in a densely populated area and the trains are packed to the max during commute hours … not too uncommon having to stand, unfortunately :(

I use locking axles for the wheels and have the saddle attached with a chain. That reduces the effort quite a bit :) Admittedly I don’t use a saddle bag on the city bike.

With the big trade-off that it eats up space and money when it’s not a weekend or a holiday … I sometimes think it’d be nice to own a car to go out on the weekends, but then I remember that I’d have to pay insurance and taxes independent on how much I use it (which would amout to “any other weekend”, maybe), and couldn’t use my garage as a workshop anymore because it’d be occupied by a car. Plus, short-term rentals and car sharing are a thing … so, yeah … in the end it always feels more like a liability than “freedom”

Theoretically, in many places, bikes are allowed in the same places as cars most of the time. But, if a biker shares the space with cars, it’s just a matter of time before that biker collides with a car. When that happens, the person in the car won’t be injured. The biker may be dead.

Assuming every cyclist who shares the road will eventually have an accident involving a car is kinda fatalist IMHO, but I guess it depends on where you are … where I live, bicycles on the road are very common, both in the city and outside.

My typical ways in the city involve a multilane road that doesn’t have a bike path yet, and while it can be stressful I don’t consider it overly dangerous.

Road cycling is a common pastime here so having bicycles on the country roads is expected, and motorists are required to maintain a certain distance (1.5m), as indicated by many roadsigns along popular roads. They typically comply.

So, yeah, I don’t think it’s a given and very much the results of cultural attitudes more than anything …

Heh I was about to post the exact opposite … now, it’s true that if you want to use certain DAWs and plugins, they’re not available on Linux … but with Ardour, Reaper or Bitwig you still have some very amazing DAWs at your disposal and there are many great plugins available.

Other than that I frequently perform as a laptop musician on stage (with my own software) and I wouldn’t want to use anything but Linux anymore. Pipewire + a class-compliant Interface, esp. on Arch (btw), seems to be the most rock-solid combination I know of …

Drivers on Windows seem to be so consumer-oriented that they try to do all kinds of stuff for you and I wouldn’t trust it at all in a live situation … everything seems to be way to fragile. MacOS is stable but I find the configurability is lacking behind.

When it comes to multichannel audio, I don’t think anything can beat Pipewire or JACK … free system-level anywhere-to-anywhere routing is so much better than the whole aggregate device + blackhole dance you have to do on MacOS … it’s super inconvenient if you ask me (and I’ve been developing multichannel audio software for a living for some time).

So, yeah … It all depends on your needs but for me, as someone who develops audio software both professionally and for their own music practice, and performs frequently, I’d say it’s the other way 'round … Linux, in 2026, blows everything out of the water audio-wise …

Ja daran erinnere ich mich auch noch, da kam’ man nach Hause und stank wie ein Aschenbecher … und auch auf den Unifluren noch gequalmt wurde … im Hörsaal nicht unbedingt, so alt bin ich dann auch nicht 😅

Wobei die Übergangsphase mit den “Raucherzimmern” auch nicht optimal war … das war’s dann die gleiche Anzahl Raucher auf der Hälfte des Raumes … da ist das kpl. Verbot doch besser …