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Colin Watson

@cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy
5 followers 4 following 107 posts

Irish geek. Happily married, father of four, polyamorous, left-wing, Reform Jew by choice. Debian and Ubuntu developer and freelancer, mainly working for […] [bridged from mastodon.ie/@cjwatson on the fediverse by fed.brid.gy ]

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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 5h
Also today I discovered frescobaldi.org via some older #Lilypond posts, and I'm enjoying it so far. I'd previously been making do with side-by-side vim and PDF viewer windows and occasionally running `:make`, but having automatic engraving and nicer syntax highlighting is enough of a […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 12h
@ryan Honestly the more annoying bit is how the components of the two circular labels have to be read in different orders.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 17/10/2026
This time round I discovered satb.ly. I had a quick look at its implementation and I'm very glad I don't have to maintain it, but it let me uplift a score for my choir from a blurry scan of a 1921 publication into something that we should be able to read comfortably, with only a few points where […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 17/10/2026
#Lilypond really is an unreasonably good piece of software. Every time I typeset a piece of music with it I feel a warm glow of happiness at its gorgeous output.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 09/10/2026
Free software activity in September 2026 Linkage cleanup in OpenSSH, pkg_resources wrangling, and the usual Python packaging work. Blog post: www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~cjwatso…
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laura lemay @lemay.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026
Thinking about how for years teenagers and curious nerds were prosecuted and thrown in jail because poking at a web site was a clear sign of being a ☠️ CR1MIN4L H4CK3R ☠️ Now it's all like oh no! the computer did an oopsie! no one is to blame, nothing can be done! ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
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flere-imsaho 🇺🇦 @mawhrin.fedi.circumstances.run · 20/09/2026
RE: circumstances.run/@mawhrin/11730233… think i'm exaggerating? the money put into the the autoconfabulator investments goes into fucking multiple trillions (order of magnitude: 10¹²). divide that by a million, and you get the order of magnitude of fucking millions. and […]
circumstances.run
Original post on circumstances.run
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 17/09/2026
Well, that's done, I guess. Goodbye, Dad. David Watson 1938-2026 #funeral
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The Man in Seat 61 @seatsixtyone.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
BREAKING: Today, Eurail (established 1959) & Interrail (established 1972) merge into a single European railpass range for EVERYONE regardless of nationality or country of residence, called INTERRAIL. Read why I think this is excellent news here: www.seat61.com/news.htm
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 07/09/2026
Free software activity in August 2026 LLM GR, OpenSSH and PuTTY updates, and the start of Python 3.15 packaging work. Blog post: www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~cjwatso…
chiark.greenend.org.uk
Free software activity in August 2026
LLM GR, OpenSSH and PuTTY updates, and the start of Python 3.15 packaging work.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 25/08/2026
@spacehobo It isn't Debian-supplied. Alpine probably just doesn't build it for some reason (maybe a missing asciidoc build-dependency or something). github.com/GothenburgBitFactory/tim…
github.com
timewarrior/doc/man1/timew.1.adoc at develop · GothenburgBitFactory/timewarrior
Timewarrior - Commandline Time Tracking and Reporting - GothenburgBitFactory/timewarrior
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 25/08/2026
@spacehobo timewarrior.net/reference/timew-cha… and I'm not sure what you mean about the missing man page - at least on Debian I see manpages.debian.org/trixie/timewarr…
timewarrior.net
- Timewarrior
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 25/08/2026
@spacehobo timew week
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highly praised and little read @hannah.posts.rat.pictures.ap.brid.gy · 19/08/2026
The most popular pattern on ravelry right now is simply called The Garment
It’s a hilarious massive floor length circular cape thing
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 23/08/2026
GSS-API support split out from main Debian OpenSSH packages In an option review I did in 2024, shortly after the xz-utils backdoor, I explained that having GSS-API authentication and key exchange support in the main OpenSSH packages is problematic. The key exchange patch is large and intrusive […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 19/08/2026
RIP David Watson, my Dad, on Monday, aged 87. I'll miss you so much.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 19/08/2026
@JessTheUnstill The person I left my previous job partly in order to avoid ever having to work with them again calls themselves an "NP-hard Solver" on LinkedIn
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 11/08/2026
Free software activity in July 2026 More preparations for OpenSSH GSS-API split; the usual round of Python packaging work. Blog post: www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~cjwatso…
chiark.greenend.org.uk
Free software activity in July 2026
More preparations for OpenSSH GSS-API split; the usual round of Python packaging work.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 22/07/2026
Watching (or in my case rewatching) #Buffy with one of my kids. _Becoming_ still holds up remarkably well despite the dodgy 1990s effects. Some lovely comic moments amid the rather obvious tragedy. Spike and Joyce sitting awkwardly in the living room (and TBH any scene containing Spike). Giles […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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elia ayoub @ayoub.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
Listen, I agree there’s loads of good signs re Burnham, but taking a firm pro-immigration stance should be a basic requirement for an ostensibly progressive politician. And sorry for being biased here as an immigrant myself. Mahmood made me want to leave the UK and keeping her is incredibly hurtful.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 20/07/2026
@ryan Shades of _What football will look like in the future_
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 18/07/2026
@adamshostack Conceivably bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?i… / github.com/mozilla-firefox/firefox/…? Would also need to check that there wasn't some other version of the delay after that change though - that's a bit much git […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 16/07/2026
I am really fucking bored of having gallstones. #ow
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Matthew Dockrey @attoparsec.clacks.link.ap.brid.gy · 11/07/2026
I've had this ridiculous idea bouncing around my head for years, and tonight I finally did it. Take that, overhanging greenery! #biketooter
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 03/07/2026
Free software activity in June 2026 OpenSSL 4.0, pytest 9.1, and Python 3.14 as default. Blog post: www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~cjwatso…
chiark.greenend.org.uk
Free software activity in June 2026
OpenSSL 4.0, pytest 9.1, and Python 3.14 as default.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 26/06/2026
Ooh, after leaving windows open for several hours my bedroom might actually be at an inhabitable temperature. Maybe I'll sleep tonight. (It's hard to leave my bedroom windows open overnight because we face onto a main road: only a single carriageway through a village, but all the same the […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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Glyph @glyph.im · 24/06/2026
Sigh. It's go time, folks: github.com/twisted/twisted/issues/1…
github.com
clearly forbid LLM-generated contributions · Issue #12676 · twisted/twisted
Now that we are starting to get LLM-generated contributions (#12665, #12673) we should have a clear policy so that people do not waste their time generating code with LLMs for inclusion in Twisted....
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abadidea @0xabad1dea.infosec.exchange.ap.brid.gy · 12/06/2026
Okay. I FINISHED THE TRANSLATION. Fifty entire pages of modern Chinese philosophy about Western philosophy. It's nominally about "artificial intelligence" but in typical philosophical fashion, it's actually about, uh, colonialism, Catholicism, Van Gogh's […] [Original post on infosec.exchange]
“Western Philosophy from Chinese Perspective: What To Do About Artificial Intelligence?”

An unauthorized, noncommercial translation of 西方思想讲演录:从中国看世界 Lectures on Western Thought: China Looks Out On The World Chapter 2: 如何应对人工只能 “How should one respond to artificial intelligence?,” originally published January 2026; translated June 2026
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 10/06/2026
Free software activity in May 2026 OpenSSH security and IPQoS backports; the usual Python packaging work. Blog post: www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~cjwatso…
chiark.greenend.org.uk
Free software activity in May 2026
OpenSSH security and IPQoS backports; the usual Python packaging work.
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Space Hobo @spacehobo.teh.entar.net.ap.brid.gy · 03/06/2026
Tridge has responded to ThE DiScOuRsE via the medium of...medium. medium.com/@tridge60/rsync-and-outr…
medium.com
rsync and outrage
Comments
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Space Hobo @spacehobo.teh.entar.net.ap.brid.gy · 29/05/2026
I actually worked at the same place as Andrew Tridgell, over a quarter-century ago. I got to know a few of the OzLabs folks during their immediate post-IBM years, and always had the highest respect for them in that way where you feel acute impostor syndrome when they're in the room. Tridge […]
teh.entar.net
Original post on teh.entar.net
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daniel:// stenberg:// @bagder.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy · 27/05/2026
Pasting a huge AI generated explanation to a problem in an issue or pull-request is nothing but RUDE. Don't do it. You look stupid and the receivers of that feel insulted. We are humans. We communicate like humans. Fine, use the tools you like, but don't insult us.
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nosfe @nosfe.kamu.social.ap.brid.gy · 18/05/2026
so, umm, this is a 16 bytes intro 16 bytes !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvycyU-kLjg #demoscene #intro
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Larvitz :fedora: @larvitz.burningboard.net.ap.brid.gy · 13/05/2026
Several years of Deutsche Bahn business travel taught me something unexpected: eventually you stop fighting the system and start learning its moods, failure domains, and hidden virtues. I wrote down the practical folklore that actually helps: apps, routing habits, delay survival, seat choices […]
burningboard.net
Original post on burningboard.net
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 12/05/2026
@dalias This was one of the major differences between bzr's data model and git's: bzr explicitly tracked file renames (although without the per-file independent DAGs you go on to suggest). I think it was one of the reasons bzr ended up losing to git: having to explicitly track file identity […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 11/05/2026
Free software activity in April 2026 groff, OpenSSH, and parted updates; helped with dput-ng data loss fix. Blog post: www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~cjwatso…
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 11/05/2026
@spacehobo I know it's business-speak and all and I don't necessarily like it, but I'm not sure English is necessarily better for refusing regular productions from simple verbs in favour of irregular semi-learned borrowings from different verbs entirely that have morphed into the meaning we want
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 07/05/2026
But the results obviously won't be stable across PostgreSQL versions. I don't mind needing to make the odd tweak, but I'd like to understand the scale of changes that we'd be signing up for over time. Are there any good-quality Django applications (it's fine if they're PostgreSQL-specific) that […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 07/05/2026
While you can get big improvements here with relatively small changes, it's also easy to introduce problems like this, so ideally I'd have regression tests. Django has QuerySet.explain, so if I set things up right I could assert things about its output, like "no seq scans" or "no nested loops" […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 07/05/2026
I might have some #Django friends who have experience with this sort of thing. I spent a good chunk of today doing #PostgreSQL query optimization: not indexes, but rather "if this query had a different but semantically-equivalent structure, the planner would understand how to make it an order […]
mastodon.ie
Original post on mastodon.ie
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abadidea @0xabad1dea.infosec.exchange.ap.brid.gy · 29/04/2026
the ghost of Beethoven: tell me, how fares the future? do people still enjoy my music? me: oh yes, quite often actually. and sometimes creative young composers intentionally mislabel their work as yours, so that the robots which patrol our libraries day and night don't burn the manuscripts […]
infosec.exchange
Original post on infosec.exchange
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 19/04/2026
This is, like, 4000x more petrolhead than my usual scene. But it's quite a fun weekend out #DoningtonPark
The Porsche Sprint Challenge at Donington Park.  It's a nice day, and we're on top of a hill with a view of a pretty decent section of the track.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 19/04/2026
I have rarely seen a more striking example of Betteridge's law.
A card for a BBC Health article with the headline "Should you really trust health advice from an AI chatbot?".
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 12/04/2026
@ryan I definitely write argparse stuff from scratch in quick-and-dirty scripts, but only because I never do anything complicated with it in those contexts so it isn't much to remember. parser = ArgumentParser(); parser.add_argument(...); args = parser.parse_args(), job done.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 12/04/2026
Free software activity in March 2026 A few security updates, but otherwise mostly routine Python work. Blog post: www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~cjwatso…
chiark.greenend.org.uk
Free software activity in March 2026
A few security updates, but otherwise mostly routine Python work.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 08/04/2026
@askamanager.org While I'd be happy to, I really cannot figure out how to fill this out coherently as a freelancer where I don't have the same rate across the board - not to mention of course that comparing freelancing pay with salaries is tricky for other reasons. What would be most helpful here?
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 08/04/2026
Loconundrum #24 ⬜🟩⬜ 🚂🚂 🟩🟩🟩 Quite pleased with that! Getting it in one (as was the case a few days ago) is obviously just luck; this is more satisfying.
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Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg @theradr.bsky.social · 23/03/2026
This was a fucking masterclass in interviewing. Crucial for any of us whose work has become fodder for AI churn in this dystopian hellscape but also just a hell of an interview for ANYONE on capitalism and exploitation, and what CEOs really think of you:
theverge.com
Confronting the CEO of the AI company that impersonated me
Superhuman CEO Shishir Mehrotra responds to the Grammarly “expert review” controversy, and whether AI is extracting more value than it creates.
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Colin Watson @cjwatson.mastodon.ie.ap.brid.gy · 23/03/2026
@theradr.bsky.social Wooow I could _feel_ the slime oozing off that CEO dude just from the transcript. And the gall of trying to sell the interviewer on training a robot to replace themselves. Ick ick ick.
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defnull @defnull.chaos.social.ap.brid.gy · 14/03/2026
The 'multipart' #python library got an independent #security audit and I only know about that because they found something -> CVE-2026-28356 This is great, actually! Someone looked into it so thoroughly that they found an obscure single-character issue in a regular expression ... and didn't […]
chaos.social
Original post on chaos.social
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