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First item published on 2025-09-15T11:34:42.000Z
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<title type="text">Terence Eden’s Blog</title>
<subtitle type="text">Regular nonsense about tech and its effects 🙃</subtitle>
<updated>2025-09-15T21:07:11Z</updated>
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<title type="html"><![CDATA[How big a solar battery do I need to store *all* my home's electricity?]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62959</id>
<updated>2025-09-15T21:07:11Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-15T11:34:42Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="solar"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I have a modest set of solar panels on an entirely ordinary house in suburban London. On average they generate about 3,800kWh per year. We also use about 3,800kWh of electricity each year. Obviously, we can't use all the power produced over summer and we need to buy power in winter. So here's my question: How big a battery would we need in order to be completely self-sufficient? Background …]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/"><![CDATA[<p>I have a <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/solar-faq/">modest set of solar panels</a> on an entirely ordinary house in suburban London.</p>
<p>On average they generate about 3,800kWh per year. We also use about 3,800kWh of electricity each year. Obviously, we can't use all the power produced over summer and we need to buy power in winter. So here's my question:</p>
<p>How big a battery would we need in order to be <em>completely</em> self-sufficient?</p>
<h2 id="background"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#background" class="heading-link">Background</a></h2>
<p>Let's take a look at a typical summer's day. The graph is a little complex, so I'll explain it.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Power-Flow.webp" alt="Graph of power flow." width="1788" height="988" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62974">
<p>The yellow line shows solar production. It starts shortly after sunrise, peaks at midday, and gradually drops until sunset.</p>
<p>The red line shows how much electricity our home is using. As you can see, there's a large peak about 19:00 when we cook dinner.</p>
<p>The blue line shows how much electricity we draw or export from the grid. From midnight until sunrise we import because the sun isn't shining. Once the sun has risen we're able to power our house <em>and</em> export to our neighbours. When we cook, we draw from the grid <em>and</em> our battery - which is why the evening grid peak is lower than the household use dip.</p>
<p>The CSV of the data looks something like this:</p>
<table>
<thead>
<tr>
<th align="right">Local_time</th>
<th align="right">Household_(W)</th>
<th align="right">Solar_(W)</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:25:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-187.76</td>
<td align="right">1166.77</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:30:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-227.04</td>
<td align="right">1193.25</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:35:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-253.06</td>
<td align="right">1222.84</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:40:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-266.87</td>
<td align="right">1245.18</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:45:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-450.8</td>
<td align="right">1268.66</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:50:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-251.84</td>
<td align="right">1281.79</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:55:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-1426.26</td>
<td align="right">1306.93</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T09:00:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-206.78</td>
<td align="right">1341.37</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T09:05:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-215.52</td>
<td align="right">1390.9</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T09:10:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-242.6</td>
<td align="right">1426.19</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T09:15:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-246.84</td>
<td align="right">1473</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>It's fairly trivial to sum both columns and subtract one from the other. That shows either the excess or deficit in solar power for the household.</p>
<p>On that day, the house used 9.7kWh and generated 19.6kWh. I'd need a 9.9kWh battery to store the excess right? Wrong!</p>
<p>Because my usage doesn't track the sun, I'd actually need a 13kWh battery. That's the peak amount of excess electricity I've generated in that one day.</p>
<p>What I want to do is find out what the <em>maximum</em> size battery I would need in order to store all of summer's electricity for use in winter.</p>
<p>Luckily, I have several years of real data to go off! Let's get started!</p>
<h2 id="disclaimer"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#disclaimer" class="heading-link">Disclaimer</a></h2>
<p>This is based on data generated by my home battery. It has probes to measure solar output and grid flow. It is not 100% clock-accurate compared to my solar-panels' internal reporting nor what my smart-meter reports. I estimate a 1-2% deviation, which is good enough for these purposes.</p>
<p>My energy usage isn't representative of anything other than my usage. Your household is probably different. I already have a 4.8kWh battery which changes how and when I use energy.</p>
<p>This doesn't account for gas heating or hot water. We have some electric heaters and taps which increases our electricity usage.</p>
<p>My maths is <em>probably</em> right - but the code is open source, so feel free to check for yourself.</p>
<p>Remember, this is just a bit of fun. There's no practical way to build domestic batteries with this capacity using the technology of 2025.</p>
<h2 id="code"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#code" class="heading-link">Code</a></h2>
<p>We tend to start generating more electricity than we use starting in Spring. So I've picked the end of March 2024 to the end of March 2025.</p>
<p>Let's see how big a battery we'd need to store our summer excess for winter. This finds the cumulative difference between each day's energy production and usage:</p>
<pre><code class="language-python">import os
import pandas as pd
# Load all the CSVs
filepaths = [f for f in os.listdir(".") if f.endswith('.csv')]
df = pd.concat(map(pd.read_csv, filepaths))
# Make sure they're in order
df = df.sort_values("Timestamp")
df = df.reset_index(drop=True)
# Resolution is every 5 minutes, so divide by 12 to get hourly
df["Cumulative_Difference"] = ( (df["Household_(W)"] + df["Solar_(W)"] ).cumsum() ) / 12
# kWh of battery needed
int(df["Cumulative_Difference"].max() / 1000)
## Draw a pretty graph
df.plot(kind="line", x="Local_time", y="Cumulative_Difference", xlabel="Date", ylabel="MWh", xticks=["2024-04-01", "2024-05-01", "2024-05-01", "2024-06-01", "2024-07-01", "2024-08-01", "2024-09-01", "2024-10-01", "2024-11-01", "2024-12-01", "2025-01-01", "2025-02-01", "2025-03-01", "2025-04-01"], legend=False, grid=True, fontsize=15)
plt.show()
</code></pre>
<p>The total is <strong>1,068KWh</strong> - basically, a MegaWatt-hour of storage.</p>
<p>Here's a quick graph to show how the storage would be used over the year.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Cumulative-Graph.webp" alt="Graph showing a steady climb to 1 MegaWatt-hour and then down again." width="1300" height="700" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62980">
<p>As you can see, even in this scenario there are a few days where we'd need to import energy from the grid.</p>
<h2 id="is-this-sensible"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#is-this-sensible" class="heading-link">Is this sensible?</a></h2>
<p>Probably not, no. It doesn't account for increased energy use from having an electric car or moving away from gas heating / cooking. As <a href="https://www.nrel.gov/pv/interactive-cell-efficiency">solar panels increase in efficiency</a>, it might be more sensible to replace the panels on my roof, or add some onto a shed.</p>
<p>The environmental impact of creating and storing such huge batteries could also be factored in.</p>
<p>A battery which is only 100% full for a few days probably isn't an efficient design. Using wind, hydro, and other green sources from the grid might be preferable.</p>
<p>But, remember, this is an exercise in wishful thinking.</p>
<h2 id="is-this-possible"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#is-this-possible" class="heading-link">Is this possible?</a></h2>
<p><a href="https://mathstodon.xyz/@johncarlosbaez/115190527741497635">Grid-scale batteries exist</a> and they work brilliantly.</p>
<p>But if I wanted my own MegaWatt-hour of battery storage, it would probably cost me between <a href="https://www.fogstar.co.uk/collections/solar-battery-storage/products/fogstar-energy-32kwh-battery?variant=55157091205497">£100k</a> and <a href="https://modoenergy.com/research/battery-energy-storage-capex-containerised-bess-development-costs-oem-balance-plant-bop-grid-connections-survey-2024">half-a-million quid</a>.</p>
<p>That doesn't include maintenance, the land, planning permission, and a hundred other things.</p>
<p>But battery prices are falling fast. In the last decade <a href="https://www.energy.gov/eere/vehicles/articles/fotw-1354-august-5-2024-electric-vehicle-battery-pack-costs-light-duty">lithium ion battery prices have fallen 90%</a>. With new <a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11913365/">sodium ion batteries</a> promising an even bigger drop - down to <a href="https://www.geeky-gadgets.com/catl-sodium-ion-battery-packs/">US$10/kWh</a>.</p>
<p>If - and it is a <strong>big</strong> if - those numbers came to pass, it would probably cost around £8,000 for a domestic battery. Basically the same cost as adding solar panels in the first place.</p>
<p>Domestic solar <em>works</em> - yes, even in the rainy UK! It is relatively cheap, moves energy production as close as possible to energy consumption, reduces bill-shock, and means we don't have endless planning arguments about whether fields should be turned into solar farms.</p>
<p>It is possible that, not too long in the future, every home could also have a 1 MegaWatt-hour battery. They would be able to capture all the excess solar power generated in a year.</p>
<p>There's a bright and sunny future where every home can be solar-self-sufficient.</p>
<hr>
<p>If you've enjoyed this blog post, please consider <a href="https://share.octopus.energy/metal-dove-988">switching to Octopus Energy</a> - we both get £50 when you join.</p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Book Review: All That We See or Seem by Ken Liu ★★★★★]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-all-that-we-see-or-seem-by-ken-liu/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63299</id>
<updated>2025-09-13T15:00:47Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-13T11:34:34Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Book Review"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="NetGalley"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Sci Fi"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[This book is ridiculously zeitgeisty. It's all brain-rotting AI, social-media meltdowns, mixed with some cracking technobabble. She thinks about erasing more: all the practice session recordings; her own encrypted cephaloscripts; the dream-guide neuromesh of her personal AI; the interviews, fan messages, reviews—food for her vanity, training data for her egolets. Fab! But, for all that, it's p…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-all-that-we-see-or-seem-by-ken-liu/"><![CDATA[<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/9781035915934_l.webp" alt="Book cover with a fractured city in the background." width="200" height="310" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-63301">
<p>This book is <em>ridiculously</em> zeitgeisty. It's all brain-rotting AI, social-media meltdowns, mixed with some cracking technobabble.</p>
<blockquote><p>She thinks about erasing more: all the practice session recordings; her own encrypted cephaloscripts; the dream-guide neuromesh of her personal AI; the interviews, fan messages, reviews—food for her vanity, training data for her egolets.</p></blockquote>
<p>Fab! But, for all that, it's pretty realistic. Sure, it's set five-minutes into the future, but all the tech is plausible and all the hacks somewhere in the ballpark of reality. It is <em>much</em> better than <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2021/09/book-review-the-ministry-for-the-future-by-kim-stanley-robinson/">The Ministry for the Future</a> simply because all the technowizardry passes the smell test.</p>
<p>The plot is, charitably, basic. A woman has been kidnapped and her husband (who is a suspect) enlists a <del>Private Eye</del> hacker to solve the mystery. But you're not reading to discover whodunnit; you're there to revel in the pitch-perfect future-gazing and cower before the (hopefully not too accurate) predictions around how technology will be subverted to protect the powerful while leaving everyone else helpless.</p>
<p>The neologisms are off the chart - "Darcybots" to help you date, a "Fiscjinn" to interrogate your finances, and an "Oneirofex" to… well, I'll let you discover that! You'll need to have a good grasp of what's going on with modern technology in order to get more than half the references. I've no idea if the book will be intelligible half-a-decade from now. Perhaps we'll have our self-hosted AIs translate it for us?</p>
<p>At times, it feels less like a book and more like a series of parables woven into one story. The ending feels a little rushed - but it fits in with the fast-paced nature of the plot. A great slab of sci-fi to chew on.</p>
<p>Thanks to Netgalley for the review copy. The book is released in October 2025 - and will probably remain relevant for at least half-a-dozen weeks.</p>
]]></content>
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<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Reasonably accurate, privacy conscious, cookieless, visitor tracking for WordPress]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63158</id>
<updated>2025-09-11T14:05:19Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-11T11:34:39Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="HTML"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="javascript"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="seo"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="WordPress"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I am vain. I like to know which of my blog posts have "done numbers". I get a little thrill knowing that an old post I wrote has been read by someone in a land I've never visited. I'm curious and want to know if a newsletter has linked to me. At the same time, I don't want to know too much about people. I don't want to stalk them around the web. I refuse to care how long they spend with me. I…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/"><![CDATA[<p>I am vain. I like to know which of my blog posts have "done numbers". I get a little thrill knowing that an old post I wrote has been read by someone in a land I've never visited. I'm curious and want to know if a newsletter has linked to me.</p>
<p>At the same time, I don't want to know <em>too</em> much about people. I don't want to stalk them around the web. I refuse to care how long they spend with me. I can't be bothered setting up a foolproof system that captures 100% accurate information.</p>
<p>After trying several analytics plugins for WordPress, I've decided to have a go at writing my own<sup id="fnref:learn"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fn:learn" class="footnote-ref" title="I enjoy learning. If you're about to say "Why not just install…" then you've missed the point. I like understanding how things work, I get joy from discovering some new function, my brain feels happy…" role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup>.</p>
<p>Before embarking on this, please do read "<a href="https://blog.yossarian.net/2023/12/24/You-dont-need-analytics-on-your-blog">You Don't Need Analytics on Your Blog</a>" and the slightly more provocative "<a href="https://www.thisdaysportion.com/posts/contra-analytics/">You do not need “analytics” for your blog because you are neither a military surveillance unit nor a commodity trading company</a>". Both give excellent examples of why this is at best foolish and at worse injurious. Proceed with caution in your heart.</p>
<h2 id="background"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#background" class="heading-link">Background</a></h2>
<p>As a consequence of the way the web works, every time you click on a link the website's owner gets the following pieces of information.</p>
<ul>
<li>The time you clicked,</li>
<li>The page you visited,</li>
<li>The name of the web browser you use,</li>
<li>The URl of the page which you clicked to get here,</li>
<li>The IP address your computer has.</li>
</ul>
<p>There are a few other things sent along but they're not interesting to me.</p>
<p>Using that information, I can construct a reasonably accurate view of how many times a post has been viewed and how many people viewed it.</p>
<h2 id="defining-a-page-view"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#defining-a-page-view" class="heading-link">Defining a page view</a></h2>
<p>If a web page is loaded, that counts as a view. I'm not going to track whether the user stayed for more than 30 seconds or closed their browser in disgust after reading the headline. If the page is loaded, that's a view.</p>
<p>But what if one person repeatedly hits refresh on the same post? To deal with that, I'll need a concept of a visitor.</p>
<h2 id="defining-a-visitor"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#defining-a-visitor" class="heading-link">Defining a visitor</a></h2>
<p>The "normal" way of doing things is to stick a cookie in the user's browser and track them that way. I can't be bothered with that. And, besides, it doesn't account for a person reading on their laptop and then moving to their phone.</p>
<p>So I'm going to use a proxy by creating a cryptographic hash of the visitor's IP address and the browser's User Agent string.</p>
<p>Of course, a household might have one IP address and multiple people with the same phone. But, equally, one person might rove over several WiFi networks in the course of one browsing session, getting a different IP each time.</p>
<p>The aim is to be <em>reasonably</em> accurate.</p>
<p>Hashing the contents means I don't need to store the user's IP address. Once hashed, the information becomes a string like <code>db050e7b853e5856</code> which is functionally impossible to <a href="https://www.techsolvency.com/passwords/dehashing-reversing-decrypting/">crack</a> back to an IP address & UA string<sup id="fnref:orisit"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fn:orisit" class="footnote-ref" title="Or is it? There are 4 billion IPv4 addresses - although slightly fewer in actual use. Creating a rainbow table with 4 billion rows is possible if I was just using IP addresses. But there are an…" role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup>.</p>
<p>This also means that I can redefine the concept of a page view. If the same visitor refreshed the page multiple times, it will only count as a single visit.</p>
<p>I'll reset the counter at midnight in my local timezone. If someone visits just before midnight and then just after, it'll count as two visits. Oh well.</p>
<h2 id="where-did-they-come-from"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#where-did-they-come-from" class="heading-link">Where did they come from?</a></h2>
<p>Generally speaking, there are two ways that visitors share their referrer. One is the "referer" header (yes, it is misspelled). It contains a URl of the referring site or application. For example, if someone clicked from a search result it might say <code>https://yahoo.com</code>.</p>
<p>The other way is using "Urchin Tracking Module" query strings. At the end of the URl they visit, they might append something like <code>?utm_source=alices-newsletter</code>.</p>
<p>Some sites, like Reddit, might use multiple subdomains - <code>old.reddit.com</code> or <code>out.reddit.com</code> - so some deduplication may be necessary.</p>
<h2 id="where-in-the-world-are-they"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#where-in-the-world-are-they" class="heading-link">Where in the world are they?</a></h2>
<p>A user's IP address is <em>somewhat</em> accurate method of detecting their location. Yes, users could be proxying through a VPN or using a SIM card from a foreign country. But this isn't an exercise in precise tracking. Rough and ready is fine.</p>
<p>There are a variety of <a href="https://mailfud.org/geoip-legacy/">GeoIP Databases</a> which are updated semi-regularly. I'm only interested in the country of origin, I don't care about finer resolution than that.</p>
<p>Again, the aim isn't precise targetting. I'd just like to know that people in Sudan ever read my blog posts.</p>
<h2 id="what-else-could-we-use"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#what-else-could-we-use" class="heading-link">What else could we use?</a></h2>
<p>It <em>might</em> be nice to know if someone is using a small-screen or large device. But my CSS is responsive, so I don't care.</p>
<p>Similarly, their Internet connection speed might be available. But, again, I try to optimise things so that isn't necessary to know.</p>
<p>Do I need to know if someone speaks Hungarian? No. There's nothing useful I can do with that information.</p>
<p>Could I extract their operating system, device, and browser from their User-Agent? I guess. Would I use the information that X% of my readers use Firefox on Linux? Doubtful!</p>
<h2 id="collect-the-information"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#collect-the-information" class="heading-link">Collect the information</a></h2>
<p>There are two main methods of collecting these data.</p>
<p>First is a "no JavaScript" solution. This tells the browser to request an image which has a query string to send along the details of the page requested.</p>
<pre><code class="language-php"><noscript>
<img src="/tracking.php?ID=<?php echo $postID ?>" alt="" width=1 height=1 class=hidden>
</noscript>
</code></pre>
<p>The downside is that there's no way to capture referer information. If each page were dynamically generated, I could grab it from PHP's <code>$_SERVER</code> superglobal. But my website is heavily cached, so that isn't possible.</p>
<p>It <em>is</em> possible to use JavaScript to dynamically send the information for collection:</p>
<pre><code class="language-js">let formData = new FormData();
formData.append("HTTP_REFERER", document.referrer);
formData.append("ID", <?php echo $postID ?>);
fetch("/tracking.php", {
method: "POST",
body: formData,
});
</code></pre>
<p>This approach has three distinct advantages.</p>
<ol>
<li>It works whether the user has JS enabled or not.</li>
<li>Repeated requests for the same page will usually reload the image from cache, so won't double-count.</li>
<li>It doesn't count hits from bots. They typically don't execute JavaScript or don't request images.</li>
</ol>
<h2 id="bot-detection"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#bot-detection" class="heading-link">Bot Detection</a></h2>
<p>Not all traffic originates from humans. There are lots of bots which crawl the web. Some are useful - like search engines building up a map. Others are harmful - like AI agents aggressively scraping content to plagiarise.</p>
<p>There are <a href="https://www.humansecurity.com/learn/blog/crawlers-list-known-bots-guide/">lots of identifiable bots</a> out there - and more which obfuscate themselves. There are some, like <a href="https://github.com/GoogleChrome/lighthouse/pull/14384">Lighthouse</a> which cloak themselves.</p>
<p>I'm not trying to eliminate everything which <em>could</em> be a bot. I am trying for <em>reasonably</em> accurate. So I eliminate any User-Agent which contains:</p>
<p><code>"/bot|crawl|spider|seo|lighthouse|facebookexternalhit|preview|HeadlessChrome/i"</code></p>
<p>There are some <a href="https://github.com/fabiomb/is_bot">big lists of bots</a> you can use - but they don't seem to trigger my analytics because they aren't requesting the images or executing the JS.</p>
<h2 id="what-bits-of-the-site-to-measure"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#what-bits-of-the-site-to-measure" class="heading-link">What bits of the site to measure?</a></h2>
<p>I only care about how many visitors my posts and pages get. I don't need to know if someone visited a tag page, or scrolled back to page 100 of posts from 2019. Those sorts of deep pages are usually only accessed by bots anyway.</p>
<p>I also don't want to count visits from me, myself, and I.</p>
<p>So the tracking is only inserted on single pages which are viewed by non-admins:</p>
<pre><code class="language-php">if ( is_singular() && !current_user_can( "edit_posts" ) ) {
…
}
</code></pre>
<h2 id="oddities"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#oddities" class="heading-link">Oddities</a></h2>
<p>Sometimes, the URl requested will look something like: <code>https://shkspr-mobi.translate.goog</code> - that just means Google has translated it.</p>
<p>Sometimes, the referer will look something like: <code>android-app://com.google.android.gm/</code> - that just means they clicked from an Android app.</p>
<p>Sometimes, the URl requested will include a fragment or a query string - they can be ignored.</p>
<p>Sometimes, the <code>utm_</code> will contain all sorts of weird stuff. It isn't always possible to pull out exactly where it has come from.</p>
<p>Sometimes, the referer and <code>utm_</code> will disagree. Ah well, never mind.</p>
<p>Sometimes, RSS views are counted and sometimes not. Perhaps I should fix that?</p>
<p>Sometimes, users block trackers or use a text-only browser. That's fine, they can keep their secrets.</p>
<h2 id="saving-the-data"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#saving-the-data" class="heading-link">Saving the data</a></h2>
<p>I started this by just shoving what I collected into a CSV.</p>
<pre><code class="language-php">// Write the CSV.
$line = [date("c"), $ID, $UA, $referer, $domain, $country, $user];
// Date-based filename.
$filename = "log-" . date("Y-m-d") . ".csv";
// Append mode.
$handle = fopen( $filename, "a" );
fputcsv( $handle, $line );
fclose( $handle );
</code></pre>
<p>Nothing fancy. Something easily grepable with the ability to query it in more detail if I need. At the number of hits that my site gets, it is less than 1MB per day.</p>
<p>I've since moved it into a single MySQL table. That might not be sustainable with hundreds of thousands of rows. But that's tomorrow's problem.</p>
<h2 id="accuracy"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#accuracy" class="heading-link">Accuracy</a></h2>
<p>I've been running this for a couple of days - simultaneously with my other, more professional, stats plugin. It is within 5% accuracy. It appears to <em>slightly</em> exaggerate the number of visitors and undercount my page-views. That's good enough for my purposes and probably good for my ego!</p>
<h2 id="putting-it-all-together"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#putting-it-all-together" class="heading-link">Putting it all together</a></h2>
<p>You can take a look at all the code <a href="https://gitlab.com/edent/blog-theme/">on my GitLab repo</a>.</p>
<h2 id="what-does-it-look-like"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#what-does-it-look-like" class="heading-link">What does it look like?</a></h2>
<p>If you've made it this far, you can have a little pictorial treat! Aren't you lucky?</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/stats-view.webp" alt="Three tables. One showing referers with colourful favicons. Another countries with colourful emoji flags. One a list of pages and views." width="2450" height="1400" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-63260">
<h2 id="whats-next"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#whats-next" class="heading-link">What's next?</a></h2>
<p>For now, a simple table structure is fine. I've shoved it in a basic database. Sure, I don't have any indexes or fancy stuff like that. But modern computers are pretty fast.</p>
<p>Eventually I'll need to create some new tables which will consolidate the data. Perhaps a table for individual posts, using date and country? Or maybe referer? I'll have to see.</p>
<p>I also need a way to get historic data into it. I've blog stats going back to 2009 which I am anxious not to lose.</p>
<p>And, yeah, I'll need a better front-end than manually running SQL queries.</p>
<p>Above all, I want to keep it simple enough that my puny mortal brain can understand it after several years of not touching anything. I want to build something which can run without constant maintenance.</p>
<p>Remember, this is only an exercise in self-learning, self-hosting, and self-respect.</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:learn" role="doc-endnote">
<p>I enjoy learning. If you're about to say "Why not just install…" then you've missed the point. I like understanding how things work, I get joy from discovering some new function, my brain feels happy when it is working on a problem. I don't want to just click install, hit next a few times, and fiddle with a few options. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2020/12/build-dont-buy/">I've written more about my philosophy here</a>. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fnref:learn" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:orisit" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Or is it? There are 4 billion IPv4 addresses - although slightly fewer in actual use. Creating a rainbow table with 4 billion rows is possible if I was <em>just</em> using IP addresses. But there are an almost infinite variety of User Agent strings. It is probably possible to create a rainbow table of, for example, the 10 most popular UAs, concatenate them with every possible IP address, and then see which hashes to <code>65fef01fef257963</code>. But even then, what would that get an attacker? Knowing that the most popular model of iPhone is on a mobile network's IP range isn't exactly private information. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fnref:orisit" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>4</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Event Review: Doin' the Lambeth Walk (Oi!) ★★★⯪☆]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/event-review-doin-the-lambeth-walk-oi/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63196</id>
<updated>2025-09-14T10:18:40Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-09T11:34:19Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="london"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="review"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Historical entities have been sighted in the old village of Lambeth. Are they ghosts? Visions? Or intruders through a crack in time? Join your guides and explore the backwaters and byways that slowly spread over the mysterious marshes of Lambeth. Most walking tours have a guide drag you around the well-known tourist hot-spots while they read out a bit from Wikipedia. Minimum Labyrinth’s tour i…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/event-review-doin-the-lambeth-walk-oi/"><![CDATA[<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/lambeth-walk.webp" alt="Poster" width="250" height="250" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-63199">
<blockquote><p>Historical entities have been sighted in the old village of Lambeth. Are they ghosts? Visions? Or intruders through a crack in time? Join your guides and explore the backwaters and byways that slowly spread over the mysterious marshes of Lambeth.</p></blockquote>
<p>Most walking tours have a guide drag you around the well-known tourist hot-spots while they read out a bit from Wikipedia. Minimum Labyrinth’s tour is <em>different</em>. We were told to find the meeting spot by looking for a mysterious message chalked somewhere on Westminster Bridge.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/chalk.webp" alt="Chalked onto the bridge, the message "Why did you come here?"" width="1020" height="768" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-63203">
<p>As the bells from Big Ben faded - ghosts appeared!</p>
<p>We were whisked away onto a tour which was part history lesson, part ghost story, and part science-fiction extravaganza. As we wandered through the streets, various "baddies" appeared out of nowhere. Ghosts came to chat with us and then promptly vanished. Music played causing onlookers to pause their hurried strolling. It was somewhere between immersive theatre and <em>immersed</em> theatre.</p>
<p>The walk was well paced. The three acts each consisted of 50 minutes of strolling then 30 minutes in a pub. Perfect for a loo-break and refreshments. The cast didn't stay in character during the pub - which was a relief for them, and meant we could chat about what we thought of the event.</p>
<p>It took us through some parts of London I was vaguely familiar with - and some which were completely new. It is brilliant having someone explain exactly <em>why</em> that piece of art is where it is, or <em>who</em> commissioned that church, and point out that <em>exquisite</em> detail you might have missed.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/art.webp" alt="Stencil art on a wall. A photorealistic figure holds some pixelated video game items." width="512" height="683" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-63204">
<p>Without wishing to spoil anyone's fun, the sci-fi element was the weakest part of the adventure. It paid "loving homage" to an abandoned and somewhat forgotten TV series. I felt that the story would have been much stronger without tying it in to a larger universe. No one under 50 recognised the characters so I think that aspect fell a little flat.</p>
<p>I also felt that there wasn't <em>quite</em> enough to do during the walk. There were some neat snippets of information but there were long stretches of walking down streets without much going on. Given the slightly spooky and sci-fi nature of the story, I would have expected the audience to have been given little tasks or asked to keep a lookout for ghosts.</p>
<p>That said, the tour took us round some stunning and unexpected spots. The ghostly goings-on were suitably mysterious and the cast kept us all safe and entertained. We had fun exploring little alleyways and art displays which were completely unknown to us.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/doing.webp" alt="Terry and Liz smiling in front of a mural depicting the Lambeth Walk." width="1024" height="729" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-63202">
<p>The team at <a href="http://minimumlabyrinth.org/">Minimum Labyrinth</a> do a variety of weird tours and events. Worth checking out if you want something entertaining and unusual.</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>0</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Some thoughts on personal git hosting]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62821</id>
<updated>2025-09-07T16:31:44Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-07T11:34:46Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="developers"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="git"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="ReDeCentralize"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[As part of my ongoing (and somewhat futile) efforts to ReDeCentralise, I'm looking at moving my personal projects away from GitHub. I already have accounts with GitLab and CodeBerg - but both of those sites are run by someone else. While they're lovely now, there's nothing stopping them becoming as slow or AI-infested as GitHub. So I want to host my own Git instance for my personal projects. …]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/"><![CDATA[<p>As part of my ongoing (and somewhat futile) efforts to ReDeCentralise, I'm looking at moving my personal projects away from GitHub. I already have accounts with <a href="https://gitlab.com/edent/">GitLab</a> and <a href="https://codeberg.org/edent">CodeBerg</a> - but both of those sites are run by someone else. While they're lovely now, there's nothing stopping them becoming as slow or AI-infested as GitHub.</p>
<p>So I want to host my own Git instance for my personal projects. I'm experimenting with <a href="https://git.edent.tel/">https://git.edent.tel/</a></p>
<p>It isn't <em>quite</em> self-hosted; I'm paying <a href="http://pikapod.net/">PikaPod</a> €2/month to deal with the hassle of hosting and updating the software. I get to point my domain name at it which means I can always change the underlying service if I want. For example, it uses Gitea and I might want to switch to Forgejo later.</p>
<p>So far, it works. But there are a few significant drawbacks.</p>
<h2 id="network-effects"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#network-effects" class="heading-link">Network Effects</a></h2>
<p>A large service like GitHub has network effects which are incredible. It feels like 90%+ of all developers have an account there. That means if someone wants to leave a comment or send a PR there is no barrier to entry. That's huge! There are a bunch of popular FOSS projects which make me sign up for <em>yet another</em> service when all I want to do is send a simple bug report which I find deeply annoying.</p>
<p>Luckily, Gitea has built in support for various OAuth providers. So I've set up single-sign-on with Gits Hub and Lab.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/sign-in.webp" alt="An SSO screen with buttons for GitHub and GitLab." width="588" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62822">
<p>I <a href="https://mastodon.social/@Edent/115066706121512523">asked people how easy it was to use</a> - most people were able to use it, although a few people wanted a local-only account.</p>
<p>But is is still a bit of a faff. Even a little bit of hassle turns people away.</p>
<h2 id="forking-isnt-federated"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#forking-isnt-federated" class="heading-link">Forking isn't Federated</a></h2>
<p>Suppose you want to make a Pull Request or just take a copy of the code. At the moment, you have to create a fork on <em>my</em> server. There's no way to easily fork something to your GitHub or personal server.</p>
<p>You can <code>git clone</code> the repo to your local machine, and you can manually move it elsewhere, but there's no way to send a PR from your repo to mine.</p>
<p>There's also no way for users to find other forks. Perhaps the <a href="https://forgefed.org/">upcoming ForgeFed proposals</a> will fix things - but it doesn't exist yet.</p>
<p>As pointed out in "<a href="https://blog.edwardloveall.com/lets-make-sure-github-doesnt-become-the-only-option">Let's Make Sure Github Doesn't Become the only Option</a>" - most of the tooling of git hosting platforms isn't adequate for modern needs.</p>
<h2 id="discoverability"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#discoverability" class="heading-link">Discoverability</a></h2>
<p>The easiest way to find code at the moment is to search GitHub. Moving my stuff to a different site means it will only be discovered by a general search engine.</p>
<p>I want people to find and use my code. If that's hard, they won't. I can point existing users to the repo - but it still cuts down on discovery.</p>
<h2 id="admin-hassles"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#admin-hassles" class="heading-link">Admin Hassles</a></h2>
<p>Although PikaPods takes care of all the hosting administration, there's still the faff of setting up all of Gitea's options.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/gitea-config.webp" alt="Long list of config options." width="801" height="800" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62823">
<p>If I get hit by <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/07/grinding-down-open-source-maintainers-with-ai/">an automated spam attack</a>, it'll be up to me to clean it up.</p>
<p>I'm not sure if I have the time, patience, or expertise to correctly and safely configure everything. Time spent administrating is time not spent coding.</p>
<h2 id="sponsorship"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#sponsorship" class="heading-link">Sponsorship</a></h2>
<p>I get a little bit of money when people <a href="https://github.com/sponsors/edent">sponsor me on GitHub</a>. There's no "sponsor" option on Gitea and, even if there was, the network effects of GitHub are substantial. Getting people to enter their credit card info into a random site isn't as convenient as clicking a button in GitHub.</p>
<h2 id="now-what"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#now-what" class="heading-link">Now What?</a></h2>
<p>My <a href="https://github.com/edent/SuperTinyIcons">most popular Github repo</a> has around 140 contributors. I genuinely don't think I could attract that many people to OAuth onto my personal git hosting service.</p>
<p>Gitea seems to have a mixed reputation. But it's the only one offered by PikaPods.</p>
<p>There are <a href="https://github.workshops.petrichor.me/">interesting discussions about how to replace GitHub</a> but they're only in the early stages.</p>
<p>Although €2/mo isn't a huge amount, I've gotten used to having free services on GitHub / GitLab / CodeBerg.</p>
<p>So this, I think, is my plan:</p>
<ol>
<li>Leave my popular / sponsored repos on GitHub</li>
<li>Move my smaller repos to <a href="https://git.edent.tel/">https://git.edent.tel/</a></li>
<li>Create new repos in there as well</li>
</ol>
<p>I'm also going to look for a hosted Forgejo instance which lets me use my own subdomain - hopefully at a cheaper or comparable price. If you have any recommendations - please let me know!</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>15</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Book Review: Star Trek: Lower Decks, Vol. 1: Second Contact by Ryan North ★★★★★]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-star-trek-lower-decks-vol-1-second-contact-by-ryan-north/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63010</id>
<updated>2025-09-05T11:51:18Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-05T11:34:52Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Book Review"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="NetGalley"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Sci Fi"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I can confidently declare that Lower Decks is the second best Star Trek series after The Orville. Lower Decks has always been bags of fun with a good emotional core. Now your favourite sci-fi capers are available in handy comic book form! Second Contact is a compilation of Lower Decks issues #1–6. You get a bunch of stories spread out over 145 pages. The great thing about a comic of a cartoon i…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-star-trek-lower-decks-vol-1-second-contact-by-ryan-north/"><![CDATA[<p><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/second.jpg" alt="Comic book cover." width="340" height="522" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-63030">
I can confidently declare that Lower Decks is the second best Star Trek series after The Orville. Lower Decks has always been bags of fun with a good emotional core. Now your favourite sci-fi capers are available in handy comic book form!</p>
<p>Second Contact is a compilation of Lower Decks issues #1–6. You get a bunch of stories spread out over 145 pages. The great thing about a comic of a cartoon is that all the characters look <em>identical</em> to their TV counterparts. There's no pesky rights issues to get in the way.</p>
<p>The stories are exactly what you'd expect from Lower Decks. The gang have to deal with aliens, not-too-strange new worlds, and some heavy meta-textual crises. And, yes, it is <em>delightfully</em> meta. There are plenty of call-backs to the show, TNG, and the <em>original</em> animated series. Perfect for nerds like me.</p>
<p>It also introduces some new lore:</p>
<blockquote><p>Kirk sometimes liked to unwind in his quarters by making a fanvid of his own day. This is canon.</p></blockquote>
<p>There's also the first(?) appearance of the "Starfleet Corps of Rhetoric Engineers" who, as their name suggests, help provide some much needed exposition for the technobabble.</p>
<p>Oh, and we find out that the noise the transporters make is "SVRRRRRMMMMMM". Which seems about right.</p>
<p>The episodic pacing is nice and there is a genuine laugh-out-loud moment every few pages. It doesn't try to do anything new or innovative with the comic book format - it's pretty much small panels, the occasional bigger art piece, and one double-pager.</p>
<p>On a technical note, the speech bubbles are in text, rather than raster, format - so your TTS should be able to read them aloud.</p>
<p>Second Contact is the sort of comic book which will keep you giggling with glee at the misadventures of lovable misfits.</p>
<p>Thanks to <a href="https://www.netgalley.co.uk/">Netgalley</a> for the review copy. The book is available to pre-order now - with delivery mid-September 2025.</p>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[40 years later, are Bentley's "Programming Pearls" still relevant?]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=44218</id>
<updated>2025-09-08T13:00:34Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-03T11:34:14Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="programming"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[In September 1985, Jon Bentley published Programming Pearls. A collection of aphorisms designed to reveal truths about the field of programming. It's 40 years later - long enough to see several revolutions in the field - so surely these are obsolete, right? They belong in the same category as "always carry a bundle of hay for the horses" or "you won't always have a pocket calculator with you" or …]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/"><![CDATA[<p>In September 1985, Jon Bentley published <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/4284.315122">Programming Pearls</a>. A collection of aphorisms designed to reveal truths about the field of programming.</p>
<p>It's 40 years later - long enough to see several revolutions in the field - so surely these are obsolete, right? They belong in the same category as "always carry a bundle of hay for the horses" or "you won't always have a pocket calculator with you" or "tie an onion on your belt to stay stylish".</p>
<p>Ah, my sweet summer child! <i lang="fr">Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.</i> You'll find nearly everything in here depressingly relevant.</p>
<p>Before we dive in, a word for Bentley on the provenance of this collection:</p>
<p><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/4284.315122.pdf">Programming Pearls.</a></p>
<blockquote><p>Although there is some truth in each saying in this column, all should be taken with a grain of salt. A word about credit. The name associated with a rule is usually the person who sent me the rule, even if they in fact attributed it to their Cousin Ralph (sorry, Ralph). In a few cases I have listed an earlier reference, together with the author’s current affiliation (to the best of my knowledge). I’m sure that I have slighted many people by denying them proper attribution, and to them I offer the condolence that Plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery.</p></blockquote>
<p>Here we go!</p>
<p><a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/4284.315122"><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/pp-fs8.png" alt="Gnarly monochrome scan of Programming Pearls." width="800" height="243" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-49144"></a></p>
<h2 id="coding"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#coding" class="heading-link">Coding</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>When in doubt, use brute force.
Ken Thompson - Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Straight off the bat, a winner! Almost all problems are solvable through brute force. It may take time - but throw more resources at it! Once you know it <em>can</em> be done, then it is time to see <em>how</em> it can be done better.</p>
<blockquote><p>Avoid arc-sine and arc-cosine functions - you can usually do better by applying a trig identity or computing a vector dot-product.
Jim Conyngham - Arvin/Calspan Advanced Technology Center</p></blockquote>
<p>And then, just like that, something broadly irrelevant today. These sorts of mathematical functions have been optimised so far that it probably doesn't matter which way you calculate them.</p>
<blockquote><p>Allocate four digits for the year part of a date: a new millenium is coming.
David Martin - Norristown, Pennsylvania</p></blockquote>
<p><em>*weeps*</em> Why didn't they listen to you, David? While I would hope any code written this side of Y2K uses ISO8601, it is amusing that you still occasionally encounter people who want to save two bytes <em>somewhere</em>. Handy in some small systems, but mostly just a recipe for disaster. Looking at you, <a href="https://www.gps.gov/support/user/rollover/">GPS</a>!</p>
<blockquote><p>Avoid asymmetry.
Andy Huber - Data General Corporation</p></blockquote>
<p>I'll be honest, I'm not sure what Andy is going on about here. I <em>assume</em> that he's talking about having the ability to go A->B without being able to go B->A. Equally, it could be about accepting data in one format and outputting it in a different format. <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33739184">Some more discussion on the topic</a>.</p>
<blockquote><p>The sooner you start to code, the longer the program will take.
Roy Carlson - University of Wisconsin</p></blockquote>
<p><em>Bam!</em> Right in the truth. Much like <a href="https://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/03/29/sharp-axe/">the woodsman who spends his time sharpening his axe</a>, we know that diving into code is probably the least efficient way to create something.</p>
<blockquote><p>If you can’t write it down in English, you can’t code it.
Peter Halpern - Brooklyn, New York</p></blockquote>
<p>So many bugs come from us not understanding the requirements of the user / customer.</p>
<blockquote><p>Details count.
Peter Weinberger - Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Hard agree, Pete! It's very easy to go for the "big picture" view of the software. But unless all those sharp edges are filed down, the code isn't going to have a happy life.</p>
<blockquote><p>If the code and the comments disagree, then both are probably wrong.
Norm Schyer - Belt Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Ah, the dream of self-documenting code will never be realised. Again, this goes back to our (in)ability to properly describe our requirements and our (in)adequacies at turning those comments into code.</p>
<blockquote><p>A procedure should fit on a page.
David Tribble - Arlington, Texas</p></blockquote>
<p>Famously, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/24/the-two-pizza-rule-and-the-secret-of-amazons-success">Amazon has a "Two Pizza" rule</a> which defines the maximum size of a team. The larger and more complex something is, the more likely it is to go wrong. Yes, there are limits to <abbr title="Don't repeat yourself">DRY</abbr> and <abbr title="You ain't gonna need it">YAGNI</abbr> - but we seem firmly in the paradigm that large procedures / functions are ruinous to one's health.</p>
<blockquote><p>If you have too many special cases, you are doing it wrong.
Craig Zerouni - Computer FX Ltd. London, England</p></blockquote>
<p><code>IF/ELSE</code> and <code>CASE/SWITCH</code> still really test our patience. Beautifully clean code which is ruined by special subroutines for rarely occurring situations. But it is hard to call them "wrong". Sometimes the world is complex and it is the job of computers to do the hard work for us.</p>
<blockquote><p>Get your data structures correct first, and the rest of the program will write itself.
David Jones. Assen, The Netherlands</p></blockquote>
<p>Dave is right. A well-defined data structure is <em>still</em> the essence of most <abbr title="Create, read, update and delete">CRUD</abbr> systems.</p>
<h2 id="user-interfaces"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#user-interfaces" class="heading-link">User Interfaces</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>[The Principle of Least Astonishment] Make a user interface as consistent and as predictable as possible.
Contributed by several readers</p></blockquote>
<p><em>*weeps*</em> Why isn't this hammered into every programmer? Today's tools are filled with hidden UI gestures, random menus, and a complete disregard for the user's time.</p>
<blockquote><p>A program designed for inputs from people is usually stressed beyond the breaking point by computer-generated inputs.
Dennis Ritchie. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>I think this one is mostly irrelevant now. Humans can only type at a limited speed, but computers can generate massive amounts of data instantly. But our machines' abilities to ingest that data has also grown. I suppose the nearest thing is the DDoS - where a webserver designed for a few visitors is overwhelmed by a flood of automated and malicious requests.</p>
<blockquote><p>Twenty percent of all input forms filled out by people contain bad data.
Vic Vyssotsky. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Ha! Vic didn't know that we'd have <code><input type...</code> validation in the 21st century! But, yeah, people write all sorts of crap into forms.</p>
<blockquote><p>Eighty percent of all input forms ask questions they have no business asking.
Mike Garey. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Mike was sent from the future to warn the people of the past - but they paid him no heed.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don't make the user provide information that the system already knows.
Rick Lemons. Cardinal Data Systems</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm going to slightly disagree with Rick here. Asking for repeated information is a reasonable way to double-check you've got that information correct. It also helps to validate that the user is who they say they are.</p>
<blockquote><p>For 80 percent of all data sets, 95 percent of the information can be seen in a good graph.
William S. Cleveland. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Those of us who have seen <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anscombe's_quartet">Anscombe's quartet</a> know how true this is.</p>
<h2 id="debugging"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#debugging" class="heading-link">Debugging</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>Of all my programming bugs, 80 percent are syntax errors. Of the remaining 20 percent, 80 percent are trivial logical errors. Of the remaining 4 percent, 80 percent are pointer errors. And the remaining 0.8 percent are hard.
Marc Donner. IBM T. J. Watson Research Center</p></blockquote>
<p>Syntax errors are rarer now that we have IDEs. And I hope visual programming languages will further reduce them. Logic errors still plague us. Pointer errors have been eradicated unless you're working at the very lowest levels. And I'd say the number of "hard" bugs is probably higher now due to the complex interaction of multiple libraries and systems.</p>
<blockquote><p>It takes three times the effort to find and fix bugs in system test than when done by the developer. It takes ten times the effort to find and fix bugs in the field than when done in system test. Therefore, insist on unit tests by the developer.
Larry Bernstein. Bell Communications Research</p></blockquote>
<p>We can quibble about the numbers and the ratios - but it is generally harder to fix in prod. That said, getting crash logs from the field has considerable shortened those ratio.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t debug standing up. It cuts your patience in half, and you need all you can muster.
Dave Storer. Cedar Rapids, Iowa</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm with Team-Standing-Desk! So I think Dave is wrong.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t get suckered in by the comments - they can be terribly misleading. Debug only the code.
Dave Storer. Cedar Rapids, Iowa</p></blockquote>
<p>Hmmm. Yes, this is probably correct. I'm not going to say code is self-documenting these days; but it certainly is a lot easier to read.</p>
<blockquote><p>Testing can show the presence of bugs, but not their absence.
Edsger W. Dijkstra. University of Texas</p></blockquote>
<p>Dare we disagree with Dijkstra?! Well, perhaps a little. With modern fuzzing tools we can show the absence of certain kinds of bugs.</p>
<blockquote><p>Each new user of a new system uncovers a new class of bugs.
Brian Kernighan. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Yup! Our code would be bug-free if it weren't for those pesky users!</p>
<blockquote><p>If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
Ronald Reagan. Santa Barbara, California</p></blockquote>
<p>Amongst the many things about which to disagree with the former President, this is up there! Code needs maintenance. Some things aren't broke until all of a sudden they are. Sure, maybe don't change your app's layout because a manager wants a bonus; but things constantly need fixing.</p>
<blockquote><p>[The Maintainer’s Motto] If we can’t fix it, it ain’t broke.
Lieutenant Colonel Walt Weir. United States Army</p></blockquote>
<p>I believe in you. Self deprecation is fine, but self confidence is better.</p>
<blockquote><p>The first step in fixing a broken program is getting it to fail repeatably.
Tom Duff. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Yes! Transient errors are the worst! And a huge source of the "it works for me" antipattern.</p>
<h2 id="performance"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#performance" class="heading-link">Performance</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>[The First Rule of Program Optimization] Don’t do it.
[The Second Rule of Program Optimization - for experts only] Don't do it yet.
Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson Systems Ltd.</p></blockquote>
<p>As true now as it ever was.</p>
<blockquote><p>The fastest algorithm can frequently be replaced by one that is almost as fast and much easier to understand.
Douglas W. Jones. University of Iowa</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm only <em>mostly</em> in agreement here. Many of the security bugs we see in modern code are due to "clever" tricks which turn out to have nasty strings attached. But, at the microcode level, performance is still everything. And a well-tested fast algorithm may be necessary. As part of the climate crisis we should all be thinking about the efficiency of our code.</p>
<blockquote><p>On some machines indirection is slower with displacement, so the most-used member of a structure or a record should be first.
Mike Morton. Boston, Massachusetts</p></blockquote>
<p>We live in an age of ridiculously fast SSD and RAM access times. Sequential reads are still slightly faster than random jumps, and structures like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-tree">B-Tree</a> give us a good mix of the two. We don't need to align data to the physical tracks of a spinning disk any more.</p>
<blockquote><p>In non-I/O-bound programs, a few percent of the source code typically accounts for over half the run time.
Don Knuth. Stanford University</p></blockquote>
<p>I wonder how true this now is? Perhaps we could replace "I/O" with "Internet requests" and still be accurate?</p>
<blockquote><p>Before optimizing, use a profiler to locate the “hot spots” of the program.
Mike Morton. Boston, Massachusetts</p></blockquote>
<p>Mostly true. But you don't lose much by doing some manual optimisations that you know (from bitter experience) will make a difference.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Conservation of Code Size] When you turn an ordinary page of code into just a handful of instructions for speed, expand the comments to keep the number of source lines, constant.
Mike Morton. Boston, Massachusetts</p></blockquote>
<p>I don't think this is relevant these days. Perhaps it is useful to spend time explaining exactly what trickery you're pulling off with weird syntax. But our tools are now line-count agnostic. Mostly.</p>
<blockquote><p>If the programmer can simulate a construct faster than the compiler can implement the construct itself, then the compiler writer has blown it badly.
Guy L. Steele, Jr. Tartan Laboratories</p></blockquote>
<p>I think this is rather self-evident. But compilers are so ridiculously optimised that this scenario is increasingly rare.</p>
<blockquote><p>To speed up an I/O-bound program, begin by accounting for all I/O. Eliminate that which is unnecessary or redundant, and make the remaining as fast as possible.
David Martin. Norristown, Pennsylvania</p></blockquote>
<p>I think this can be generalised even further. I'm reminded of <a href="https://github.com/npm/npm/issues/11283">NPM's progress bar slowdown issue</a>. There's a lot of redundancy which can be removed in many programs.</p>
<blockquote><p>The fastest I/O is no I/O.
Nils-Peter Nelson. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Man! They were <em>obsessed</em> with I/O back in the day! At large volumes, it is still an issue. But perhaps now we can relax just a little?</p>
<blockquote><p>The cheapest, fastest, and most reliable components of a computer system are those that aren’t there.
Gordon Bell. Encore Computer Corporation</p></blockquote>
<p>A little unfair, I think. It's cheaper to have less RAM, but that doesn't make my laptop faster.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Compiler Writer’s Motto-Optimization Pass] Making a wrong program worse is no sin.
Bill McKeeman. Wang Znstitute</p></blockquote>
<p>Personally, I don't think it is the compiler's job to tell me I'm doing it wrong.</p>
<blockquote><p>Electricity travels a foot in a nanosecond.
Commodore Grace Murray Hopper. United States Navy</p></blockquote>
<p>And a nano-Century is Pi seconds! One of those pub-trivia facts which are irrelevant to modern computing.</p>
<blockquote><p>LISP programmers know the value of everything but the cost of nothing.
Alan Perlis. Yale University</p></blockquote>
<p>Nowadays LISP programmers are a protected species and shouldn't be subject to such harsh treatment.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Little’s Formula] The average number of objects in a queue is the product of the entry rate and the average holding time.
Richard E. Fairley. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>
<p>Another of those truisms which kinda don't matter in a world with infinite disk space. Speed is our greatest worry.</p>
<h2 id="documentation"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#documentation" class="heading-link">Documentation</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>[The Test of Negation] Don’t include a sentence in documentation if its negation is obviously false.
Bob Martin. AT&T Technologies</p></blockquote>
<p>I don't know if that's the same guy as <a href="https://blog.wesleyac.com/posts/robert-martin">Uncle Bob</a> - but it sounds like the sort of claptrap he'd come up with. What's obvious to you might not be obvious to others. Test your writing with your audience to see if they understand your meaning.</p>
<blockquote><p>When explaining a command, or language feature, or hardware widget, first describe the problem it is designed to solve.
David Martin. Norristown, Pennsylvania</p></blockquote>
<p>Agreed. It doesn't need to be an essay, but documentation needs context.</p>
<blockquote><p>[One Page Principle] A (specification, design, procedure, test plan) that will not fit on one page of 8.5-by-11 inch paper cannot be understood.
Mark Ardis. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>
<p>I do have some sympathy with this - see the Two-Pizza rule above - but I think this ignores the reality of modern systems. Yes, we should keep things simple, but we also have to recognise that complexity is unavoidable.</p>
<blockquote><p>The job’s not over until the paperwork’s done.
Anon</p></blockquote>
<p>Amen!</p>
<h2 id="managing-software"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#managing-software" class="heading-link">Managing Software</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>The structure of a system reflects the structure of the organization that built it.
Richard E. Fairley. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>
<p>This is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_law">Conway's Law</a> and it is still fairly true. <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1109/RESER.2013.14">Some studies show it is possible to break out of the paradigm</a> but it holds remarkable power.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t keep doing what doesn’t work.
Anon</p></blockquote>
<p>If only we could tattoo this on the inside of our eyelids, eh?</p>
<blockquote><p>[Rule of Credibility] The first 90 percent of the code accounts for the first 90 percent of the development time. The remaining 10 percent of the code accounts for the other 90 percent of the development time.
Tom Cargill. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Agile methodology has <em>somewhat</em> dimmed the potency of this prediction. I think people are <em>generally</em> better at estimating now. But it is hard to escape <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2022/12/zenos-paradox-and-why-modern-technology-is-rubbish/">Zeno's Paradox</a>.</p>
<blockquote><p>Less than 10 percent of the code has to do with the ostensible purpose of the system; the rest deals with input-output, data validation, data structure maintenance, and other housekeeping.
May Shaw. Carnegie-Mellon University</p></blockquote>
<p>How many times have you installed a simple program only to see it pull in every dependency under the sun? We need an awful lot of scaffolding to keep our houses standing.</p>
<blockquote><p>Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment.
Fred Brooks. University of North Carolina</p></blockquote>
<p>I lean <em>slightly</em> towards this. I also strongly believe that you can pick up a lot of good judgement by listening to your users.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t write a new program if one already does more or less what you want. And if you must write a program, use existing code to do as much of the work as possible.
Richard Hill. Hewlett-Packard S.A. Geneva, Switzerland</p></blockquote>
<p>This is the open source way. Much easier to fork than start again. But at some point you'll run up against an unwanted design decision which will be load-bearing. Think carefully before you re-use.</p>
<blockquote><p>Whenever possible, steal code.
Tom Duff. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>ITYM "Respect the terms of an OSI approved Open Source licence" - don't you, Tom?</p>
<blockquote><p>Good customer relations double productivity.
Larry Bernstein. Bell Communications Research</p></blockquote>
<p>A lesson learned by Apple and ignored by Google.</p>
<blockquote><p>Translating a working program to a new language or system takes 10 percent of the original development time or manpower or cost.
Douglas W. Jones University of Iowa</p></blockquote>
<p>I honestly don't know how true that is any more. Automated tools must surely have improved that somewhat?</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t use the computer to do things that can be done efficiently by hand.
Richard Hill. Hewlett-Packard S.A. Geneva, Switzerland</p></blockquote>
<p>A rare disagreement! Things can be efficiently done by hand <em>once or twice</em> but after that, go nuts! Even if it's something as simple as renaming a dozen files in a directory, you'll learn something interesting from automating it.</p>
<blockquote><p>I’d rather write programs to write programs than write programs.
Dick Sites. Digital Equipment Corporation</p></blockquote>
<p>There will always be people who love working on the meta-task. They're not wrong for doing so, but it can be an unhelpful distraction sometimes.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Brooks’s Law of Prototypes] Plan to throw one away, you will anyhow.
Fred Brooks. University of North Carolina</p></blockquote>
<p>I'd go further an suggest throwing out even more. It can be hard to sell that to management - but it is necessary.</p>
<blockquote><p>If you plan to throw one away, you will throw away two.
Craig Zerouni. Computer FX Ltd. London, England</p></blockquote>
<p>Craig with the double-tap!</p>
<blockquote><p>Prototyping cuts the work to produce a system by 40 percent.
Larry Bernstein. Bell Communications Research</p></blockquote>
<p>Minor disagreement. Prototyping <em>is</em> part of the work. And it should probably take a considerable amount of time.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Thompson’s rule for first-time telescope makers] It is faster to make a four-inch mirror then a six-inch mirror than to make a six-inch mirror.
Bill McKeeman. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>
<p>Yes. It is always tempting to go for the big win. But baby-steps!</p>
<blockquote><p>Furious activity is no substitute for understanding.
H. H. Williams. Oakland, California</p></blockquote>
<p>Goodness me, yes! It's always tempting to rush in pell-mell. But that's a poor use of time.</p>
<blockquote><p>Always do the hard part first. If the hard part is impossible, why waste time on the easy part? Once the hard part is done, you’re home free.
Always do the easy part first. What you think at first is the easy part often turns out to be the hard part. Once the easy part is done, you can concentrate all your efforts on the hard part.
Al Schapira. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Oh, Al! You card! Luckily, there are very few "basic" problems to be solved in modern computing. We know what most of the hard problems are. Perhaps Agile teaches us to always leave software in a working state, so we start with the easy parts?</p>
<blockquote><p>If you lie to the computer, it will get you.
Perry Farrar. Germantown, Maryland</p></blockquote>
<p>We shouldn't anthropomorphise computers; they don't like it. Actually, nowadays it's is quite common to "lie" to computers with dummy data and virtualised environments. It's fine.</p>
<blockquote><p>If a system doesn’t have to be reliable, it can do anything else.
H. H. Williams. Oakland, California</p></blockquote>
<p>Perhaps it is my imagination, but we seem less concerned with reliability these days. A Tesla car is a wonderful example of that.</p>
<blockquote><p>One person’s constant is another person’s variable.
Susan Gerhart. Microelectronics and Computer Technology Corp.</p></blockquote>
<p>I wonder about this one a lot. Scoped access to variables possibly makes this less of an issue in the 21st century?</p>
<blockquote><p>One person’s data is another person’s program.
Guy L. Steele, Jr. Tartan Laboratories</p></blockquote>
<p>I don't quite get this. Anyone care to explain?</p>
<blockquote><p>Eschew clever rules.
Joe Condon. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>The pearls end with this gem.</p>
<h2 id="what-have-we-learned-today"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#what-have-we-learned-today" class="heading-link">What have we learned today?</a></h2>
<p>The majority of my disagreements are minor quibbles. And while disk-bound I/O is rarely a problem, network latency has replaced it as the main cause of delays. We've managed to fix some things, but many seem irrevocably tied to the human condition.</p>
<p>Which one was your favourite?</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>28</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[A little oddity in the way curl deals with old dates]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63068</id>
<updated>2025-09-01T10:45:21Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-01T11:34:48Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="bug"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="curl"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="linux"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="time"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[For boring technical reasons, computers think the world began on 1st of January 1970. To keep track of the future, they count the number of seconds since that momentous date. So zero seconds represents midnight on that day. So how do computers deal with dates before The Beatles' Abbey Road was top of the UK album charts? Negative numbers! Most modern computers can deal with dates far in the…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/"><![CDATA[<p>For boring technical reasons, computers think the world began on 1st of January 1970<sup id="fnref:who"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:who" class="footnote-ref" title="Although, who is to say it didn't? Were you there? Do you have proof? Maybe the Young Earth Creationists aren't ambitious enough?!" role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup>. To keep track of the future, they count the number of seconds since that momentous date. So zero seconds represents midnight on that day<sup id="fnref:midnight"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:midnight" class="footnote-ref" title="Except! Psych! It doesn't! The UK was experimenting with year-round BST so there's actually an hour's difference. Time is hard™." role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup>.</p>
<p>So how do computers deal with dates <em>before</em> The Beatles' Abbey Road was top of the UK album<sup id="fnref:album"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:album" class="footnote-ref" title="Do not search for the number 1 single on that date. You'll give yourself a sad." role="doc-noteref">2</a></sup> charts?</p>
<p>Negative numbers! Most modern computers can deal with dates far in the past and, hopefully, far into the future. Again, for <a href="https://righteousit.com/2024/09/04/more-on-ext4-timestamps-and-timestomping/">boring technical reasons</a>, lots of computers can only save files with a date no earlier than 13th December 1901<sup id="fnref:book"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:book" class="footnote-ref" title="The music charts were less well-developed in 1901. But you could have read "The Purple Cloud" which is a brilliant early sci-fi novel." role="doc-noteref">3</a></sup>.</p>
<p>When you download a file from the Internet, the sending server can tell you when that file was last modified. That's useful if you only want to download the file if it has changed since you last got it.</p>
<p>It presents the date using <a href="https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc1123">RFC 1123</a> format for reasons which are lost to the ages.</p>
<p><code>< Last-Modified: Wed, 09 Oct 1940 16:45:49 +0100</code></p>
<p>Great!</p>
<p>If you use the venerable <code>wget</code> utility, it will happily save the file on your disk and tell you that is when it was created.</p>
<p>But what if you use <code>curl -OR</code> to download the file? The <code>-R</code> option says:</p>
<blockquote><p><a href="https://curl.se/docs/manpage.html#-R">Make curl attempt to figure out the timestamp of the remote file that is getting downloaded, and if that is available make the local file get that same timestamp. </a></p></blockquote>
<p>THIS IS A LIE!<sup id="fnref:lie"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:lie" class="footnote-ref" title="Everything you know is false! How deep does this conspiracy go!?!?" role="doc-noteref">4</a></sup></p>
<p>If curl sees a date with a negative time, it pretends that the past doesn't exist and that what you <em>really</em> wanted was to save the file with today's date and time.</p>
<p>Why does it do this?</p>
<p>I <em>think</em> it is because <a href="https://github.com/curl/curl/blob/f08ecdc586203026d1a81bd401486261f28848d3/src/tool_filetime.c#L89-L91">this code only checks for times ≥ 0</a>. Which, I guess, is pretty reasonable. There weren't <em>many</em> computers around before the 1970s<sup id="fnref:zero"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:zero" class="footnote-ref" title="Although, there were some. Not just the secret ones used to control the weather - but actual proper computers you could use to do maths!" role="doc-noteref">5</a></sup> so the chances of finding a file which predates disco are slim.</p>
<p>Should we storm the barricades and demand this temporal anomaly be rectified?<sup id="fnref:photon"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:photon" class="footnote-ref" title="Preferably by firing photon torpedoes. Or maybe ejecting the warp core. I'm not an engineer." role="doc-noteref">6</a></sup> Nah. I've <a href="https://github.com/curl/curl/discussions/18424">raised it as a discussion item on curl's GitHub</a>.</p>
<p>If you have strong opinions about this - please join in the discussion<sup id="fnref:help"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:help" class="footnote-ref" title="Or seek help from a mental health professional." role="doc-noteref">7</a></sup>.</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:who" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Although, who is to say it didn't? Were you there? Do you have proof? Maybe the Young Earth Creationists aren't ambitious enough?! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:who" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:midnight" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Except! Psych! It doesn't! <a href="https://www.shellscript.sh/examples/1970/">The UK was experimenting with year-round BST</a> so there's actually an hour's difference. Time is hard™. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:midnight" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:album" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Do not search for the number 1 <em>single</em> on that date. You'll give yourself a sad. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:album" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:book" role="doc-endnote">
<p>The music charts were less well-developed in 1901. But you could have read "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Purple_Cloud">The Purple Cloud</a>" which is a brilliant early sci-fi novel. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:book" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:lie" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Everything you know is false! How deep does this conspiracy go!?!? <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:lie" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:zero" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Although, there were <em>some</em>. Not just the secret ones used to control the weather - but actual proper computers you could use to do maths! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:zero" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:photon" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Preferably by firing photon torpedoes. Or maybe ejecting the warp core. I'm not an engineer. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:photon" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:help" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Or seek help from a mental health professional. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:help" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Some minor bugs in Proton's new Authenticator app]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62350</id>
<updated>2025-08-01T09:31:17Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-31T11:34:55Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="2fa"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="CyberSecurity"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="MFA"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Proton"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="totp"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I maintain a a test-suite for TOTP codes. It contains a bunch of codes which adhere to the specification, some of which stretch it to breaking point, and some that are completely invalid. These codes are a good starting point for checking whether a 2FA / MFA app works correctly. Proton have release a swish new authenticator app for Android, iOS, Mac, Linux and Windows. Sadly, their open source…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/"><![CDATA[<p>I maintain a <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/03/towards-a-test-suite-for-totp-codes/">a test-suite for TOTP codes</a>. It contains a bunch of codes which adhere to the specification, some of which stretch it to breaking point, and some that are completely invalid. These codes are a good starting point for checking whether a 2FA / MFA app works correctly.</p>
<p>Proton have release a swish <a href="https://proton.me/authenticator">new authenticator app</a> for Android, iOS, Mac, Linux and Windows. Sadly, their <a href="https://github.com/protonpass/android-pass">open source repository</a> doesn't allow for bug reports so I'm blogging in public instead.</p>
<p>The good news is, the majority of tests pass. It accepts a wide range of acceptable codes and refuses to store most broken ones. There are a few niggles though. None of these are severe security issues, but they probably ought to be fixed.</p>
<h2 id="very-long-codes"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#very-long-codes" class="heading-link">Very long codes</a></h2>
<p>The maximum number of digits which can be generated by the standard TOTP algorithm is 10. Proton happily scans codes containing 1 - 9 digits, but complains about 10 digit codes. So this fails:</p>
<p><code>otpauth://totp/issuer%3Aaccount%20name?secret=QWERTYUIOP&digits=10&issuer=issuer&algorithm=SHA1&period=30</code></p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/10digit.webp" alt="QR code for a 10 digit TOTP." width="360" height="360" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62370">
<p>The TOTP RFC says:</p>
<blockquote><p>Basically, the output of the HMAC-SHA-1 calculation is truncated to obtain user-friendly values</p>
<p><a href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc6238#section-1.2">1.2. Background</a></p></blockquote>
<p>But doesn't say how far to truncate.</p>
<p>There's nothing I can see in the spec that <em>prevents</em> an implementer using all 10.</p>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The user may not be able to store a valid code.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Allow 10 digit codes.</p>
<h2 id="invalid-secrets"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#invalid-secrets" class="heading-link">Invalid Secrets</a></h2>
<p>Here we get to yet another <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/02/the-least-secure-totp-code-possible/">deficiency in the TOTP specification</a>. How is a secret defined?</p>
<p>Google says the secret is:</p>
<blockquote><p>an arbitrary key value encoded in Base32 according to RFC 3548. The padding specified in RFC 3548 section 2.2 is not required and should be omitted.</p></blockquote>
<p>Whereas Apple says it is:</p>
<blockquote><p>An arbitrary key value encoded in Base32. Secrets should be at least 160 bits.</p></blockquote>
<p>Either way, <a href="https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc3548#section-5">the Base32 alphabet</a> contains only uppercase letters and a few numbers. What happens if we give it a secret like <code>QWERT!£$%^)*(YUIOP</code>?</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/invaid-secret.webp" alt="QR code for an invalid secret." width="360" height="360" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62371">
<p>Proton Authenticator just accepts it. It stores the full secret but I'm not sure how it generates the code based on it.</p>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The code may be generated incorrectly.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Warn the user that the secret may be invalid and that a correct 2FA code cannot be guaranteed.</p>
<h2 id="issuer-mismatch"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#issuer-mismatch" class="heading-link">Issuer Mismatch</a></h2>
<p>In this example, the first issuer is example.com but the second issuer is microsoft.com</p>
<p><code>otpauth://totp/example.com%3Aaccount%20name?secret=QWERTYUIOP&digits=6&issuer=microsoft.com&algorithm=SHA1&period=30</code></p>
<p>What should the TOTP reader do with this? Proton chooses microsoft.com.</p>
<p>This is something which, again, is inconsistent between major providers.</p>
<p>Google says this parameter is:</p>
<blockquote><p><strong>Strongly Recommended</strong> The issuer parameter is a string value indicating the provider or service this account is associated with, URL-encoded according to RFC 3986. If the issuer parameter is absent, issuer information may be taken from the issuer prefix of the label. If both issuer parameter and issuer label prefix are present, they should be equal.</p></blockquote>
<p>Apple merely says:</p>
<blockquote><p>The domain of the site or app. The password manager uses this field to suggest credentials when setting up a new code generator.</p></blockquote>
<p>Yubico equivocates with</p>
<blockquote><p>The issuer parameter is recommended, but it can be absent. Also, the issuer parameter and issuer string in label should be equal.</p></blockquote>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The code may be displayed with the wrong issuer.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Warn the user that there are multiple issuers. Let them choose which one is correct.</p>
<h2 id="dealing-with-defaults"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#dealing-with-defaults" class="heading-link">Dealing With Defaults</a></h2>
<p>What should a TOTP app do if there is missing information? Proton does the following:</p>
<ul>
<li>If the code has no number set for digits, it defaults to 6</li>
<li>If the code has no time set for period, it defaults to 30</li>
<li>If the code has no algorithm, it defaults to SHA1</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> Low. The user normally has to confirm with the issuer that the the TOTP code has been correctly stored.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Let the user know that the code has missing data and may not be correct.</p>
<h2 id="odd-labels"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#odd-labels" class="heading-link">Odd Labels</a></h2>
<p>The label allows you to have multiple codes for the same service. For example <code>Big Bank:Personal Account</code> and <code>Big Bank:Family Savings</code>. The Google spec is slightly confusing:</p>
<blockquote><p>The issuer prefix and account name should be separated by a literal or url-encoded colon, and optional spaces may precede the account name. Neither issuer nor account name may themselves contain a colon.</p></blockquote>
<p>What happens if there are spaces before the account name?</p>
<p><code>otpauth://totp/Spaces:%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20test%40example.com?secret=QWERTYUIOP&digits=6&issuer=&algorithm=SHA1&period=30</code>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/spaces.webp" alt="QR code for a TOTP." width="400" height="400" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62374"></p>
<p>Proton strips the spaces (probably wise) but also removes the issuer.</p>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The user will not know which account the code is for.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Keep the issuer.</p>
<h2 id="timeline"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#timeline" class="heading-link">Timeline</a></h2>
<p>These aren't particularly high severity bugs, nevertheless I like to give organisations a bit of time to respond.</p>
<ul>
<li>2025-07-31 - Discovered.</li>
<li>2025-08-01 - Disclosed <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/proton.me/post/3lvbnajumh22e">via a web form</a>.</li>
<li>2025-08-31 - Automatically published.</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="next-steps"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#next-steps" class="heading-link">Next Steps</a></h2>
<ul>
<li>If you're a user, <a href="https://codeberg.org/edent/TOTP_Test_Suite">please contribute tests</a> or give feedback.</li>
<li>If you're a developer, please check your app conforms to the specification.</li>
<li>If you're from a security company - wanna help me write up a proper RFC so this doesn't cause issues in the future?</li>
</ul>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>1</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Is it possible to allow sideloading *and* keep users safe?]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63058</id>
<updated>2025-08-28T15:16:23Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-30T11:34:55Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="android"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="google"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="rant"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="scam"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[In which I attempt to be pragmatic. Are you allowed to run whatever computer program you want on the hardware you own? This is a question where freedom, practicality, and reality all collide into a mess. Google has recently announced that Android users will only be able to install apps which have been digitally signed by developers who have registered their name and other legal details with…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/"><![CDATA[<p>In which I <em>attempt</em> to be pragmatic.</p>
<p>Are you allowed to run whatever computer program you want on the hardware you own? This is a question where freedom, practicality, and reality all collide into a mess.</p>
<p>Google has recently announced that Android users will only be able to install apps which have been digitally signed by developers who have registered their name and other legal details with Google. To many people, this signals the death of "sideloading" - the ability to install apps which don't originate on the official store<sup id="fnref:sideload"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#fn:sideload" class="footnote-ref" title="Post by @[email protected] View on Mastodon" role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup>.</p>
<script data-allowed-prefixes="https://mastodon.social/" async="" src="https://mastodon.social/embed.js"></script>
<p>I'm a fully paid-up member of the Cory Doctorow fanclub. Back in 2011, he gave a speech called "<a href="https://boingboing.net/2012/08/23/civilwar.html">The Coming War on General Computation</a>". In it, he rails against the idea that our computers could become traitorous; serving the needs of someone other than their owner. Do we want to live in a future where our computers refuse to obey our commands? No! Neither law nor technology should conspire to reduce our freedom to compute.</p>
<p>There are, I think, two small cracks in that argument.</p>
<p>The first is that a user has no right to run anyone else's code, if the code owner doesn't want to make it available to them. Consider a bank which has an app. When customers are scammed, the bank is often liable. The bank wants to reduce its liability so it says "<a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2023/05/the-limits-of-general-purpose-computation/">you can't run our app on a rooted phone</a>".</p>
<p>Is that fair? Probably not. Rooting allows a user to fully control and customise their device. But rooting also allows malware to intercept communications, send commands, and perform unwanted actions. I think the bank has the right to say "your machine is too risky - we don't want our code to run on it."</p>
<p>The same is true of video games with strong "anti-cheat" protection. It is disruptive to other players - and to the business model - if untrustworthy clients can disrupt the game. Again, it probably isn't <em>fair</em> to ban users who run on permissive software, but it is a <em>rational</em> choice by the manufacturer. And, yet again, I think software authors probably should be able to restrict things which cause them harm.</p>
<p>So, from their point of view it is pragmatic to insist that their software can only be loaded from a trustworthy location.</p>
<p>But that's not the only thing Google is proposing. Let's look at <a href="https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2025/08/elevating-android-security.html">their announcement</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p>We’ve seen how malicious actors hide behind anonymity to harm users by impersonating developers and using their brand image to create convincing fake apps. The scale of this threat is significant: our recent analysis found <strong>over 50 times more malware</strong> from internet-sideloaded sources than on apps available through Google Play.</p></blockquote>
<p>Back in the early days of Android, you could just install any app and it would run, no questions asked. That was a touchingly naïve approach to security - extremely easy to use but left users vulnerable.</p>
<p>A few years later, Android changed to show user the permissions an app was requesting. Here's a genuine screenshot from <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2013/04/what-can-android-learn-from-symbians-security-model/">an app which I tried to sideload in 2013</a>:</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Legit-App-Permissions.png" alt="A terrifying list of permissions." width="480" height="800" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-28202">
<p>No rational user would install a purported battery app with that scary list of permissions, right? Wrong!</p>
<p>We know that <a href="https://www.nngroup.com/articles/how-little-do-users-read/">users don't read</a> and they especially <a href="https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1389027/1/KrolWarnings-CameraReady.pdf">don't read security warnings</a>.</p>
<p>There is no UI tweak you can do to prevent users bypassing these scary warnings. There is no amount of education you can provide to reliably make people stop and think.</p>
<p>Here's the story of <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-64981507">a bank literally telling a man he was being scammed</a> and he <em>still</em> proceeded to transfer funds to a fraudster.</p>
<blockquote><p>It emerged that, in this case, Lloyds had done a really good job of not only spotting the potential fraud but alerting James to it. The bank blocked a number of transactions, it spoke to James on the phone to warn him and even called him into a branch to speak to him face-to-face.</p></blockquote>
<p>Here's another one where <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-67208755">a victim deliberately lied to their bank</a> even after acknowledging that they had been told it was a scam.</p>
<p>Android now requires you to deliberately turn on the ability to side-load. It will give you prompts and warnings, force you to take specific actions, give you pop-ups and all sorts of confirmation steps.</p>
<p>And people still click on.</p>
<p>Let's go back to Google announcement. This change isn't being rolled out worldwide immediately. They say:</p>
<blockquote><p>This change will start in a few select countries specifically impacted by these forms of fraudulent app scams, often from repeat perpetrators.</p>
<p>…</p>
<p>September 2026: These requirements go into effect in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand. At this point, any app installed on a certified Android device in these regions must be registered by a verified developer.</p></blockquote>
<p>The police in Singapore have a page <a href="https://www.police.gov.sg/Media-Room/News/20241106_advisory_on_the_prevalence_of_malware_scams_affecting_android_users">warning about the prevalence of these scams</a>. They describe how victims are tricked or coerced into turning off all their phone's security features.</p>
<p>Similarly, there are estimates that <a href="https://www.gasa.org/post/1-in-3-brazilians-targeted-by-scammers-in-2024-state-of-scam-report">Brazil lost US$54 <strong>billion</strong> to scams in 2024</a> (albeit not all through apps).</p>
<p>There are <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/indonesia/comments/1mjpnlo/optimisasi_apk_pemerintah_yg_kyk_kontol_enables/?tl=en">anecdotal reports from Indonesia</a> which show how easily people fall for these fake apps.</p>
<p>Thailand is also <a href="https://www.bangkokpost.com/tech/2487659/phone-users-warned-over-malicious-apps">under an ongoing onslaught of malicious apps</a> with some apps raking in <a href="https://thethaiger.com/hot-news/crime/thai-police-crackdown-on-app-scam-seizing-nearly-1-million-baht">huge amounts of money</a>.</p>
<p>It is absolutely rational that government, police, and civic society groups want to find ways to stop these scams.</p>
<p>Google is afraid that if Android's reputation is tarnished as the "Scam OS" then users will move to more secure devices.</p>
<p>Financial institutions might stop providing functionality to Android devices as a way to protect their customers. Which would lead to those users seeking alternate phones.</p>
<p>Society as a whole wants to protect vulnerable people. We all bear the cost of dealing with criminal activity like this.</p>
<p>Given that sideloaded Android apps are clearly a <em>massive</em> vector for fraud, it obviously behoves Google to find a way to secure their platform as much as possible.</p>
<h2 id="and-yet"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#and-yet" class="heading-link">And Yet…</a></h2>
<p>This is quite obviously a bullshit powerplay by Google to ensnare the commons. Not content with closing down parts of the Android Open Source Project, stuffing more and more vital software behind its proprietary services, and freezing out small manufacturers - now it wants the name and shoe-size of every developer!</p>
<p>Fuck that!</p>
<p>I want to use my phone to run the code that I write. I want to run my friends' code. I want to play with cool open source projects by people in far-away lands.</p>
<p>I remember <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2015/11/the-day-google-deleted-me/">The Day Google Deleted Me</a> - we cannot have these lumbering monsters gatekeeping what we do on our machines.</p>
<p>Back in the days when I was a BlackBerry developer, <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2012/06/how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-blackberry/#what-specific-things-could-the-research-in-motion-developer-relations-team-do-or-communicate-that-would-make-you-more-likely-to-develop-applications-for-the-blackberry-10-platform">we had to wait ages for RIM's code-signing server to become available</a>. I'm pretty sure the same problem affected Symbian - if Nokia was down that day, you couldn't release any code.</p>
<p>Going back to their statement:</p>
<blockquote><p>To be clear, developers will have the same freedom to distribute their apps directly to users through sideloading or to use any app store they prefer.</p></blockquote>
<p>This is a lie. I can only distribute a sideloaded app <strong>if Google doesn't nuke my account</strong>. If I piss off someone there, or they click the wrong button, or they change the requirements so I'm no longer eligible - my content disappears.</p>
<p>They promise that <a href="https://developer.android.com/developer-verification">Android will still be open to student and hobbyist developers</a> - but would you believe anything those monkey-punchers say? Oh, and what a fricking insult to call a legion of Open Source developers "hobbyists"!</p>
<p>I hate it.</p>
<p>I also don't see how this is going to help. I guess if scammers all use the same ID, then it'll be easy for Android to super-nuke all the scam apps.</p>
<p>Perhaps when you install a sideloaded app you'll see "This app was made by John Smith - not a company. Here's his photo. Got any complaints? Call his number."</p>
<p>But what's going to happen is that people will get their IDs stolen, or be induced to register as a developer and then sign some malware. They'll also be victims.</p>
<h2 id="so-whats-the-solution"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#so-whats-the-solution" class="heading-link">So What's The Solution?</a></h2>
<p>I've tried to be pragmatic, but there's something of a dilemma here.</p>
<ol start="0">
<li>Users should be free to run whatever code they like.</li>
<li>Vulnerable members of society should be protected from scams.</li>
</ol>
<p>Do we accept that a megacorporation should keep everyone safe at the expense of a few pesky nerds wanting to run some janky code?</p>
<p>Do we say that the right to run free software is more important than granny being protected from scammers?</p>
<p>Do we pour billions into educating users not to click "yes" to every prompt they see?</p>
<p>Do we try and build a super-secure Operating System which, somehow, gives users complete freedom without exposing them to risk?</p>
<p>Do we hope that Google won't suddenly start extorting developers, users, and society as a whole?</p>
<p>Do we chase down and punish everyone who releases a scam app?</p>
<p>Do we stick an AI on every phone to detect scam apps and refuse to run them if they're dodgy?</p>
<p>I don't know the answers to any of these questions and - if I'm honest - I don't like asking them.</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:sideload" role="doc-endnote">
<blockquote class="mastodon-embed" data-embed-url="https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/115093185284473606/embed" style="background: #FCF8FF; border-radius: 8px; border: 1px solid #C9C4DA; margin: 0; max-width: 540px; min-width: 270px; overflow: hidden; padding: 0;"> <a href="https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/115093185284473606" target="_blank" style="align-items: center; color: #1C1A25; display: flex; flex-direction: column; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'Segoe UI', Oxygen, Ubuntu, Cantarell, 'Fira Sans', 'Droid Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; justify-content: center; letter-spacing: 0.25px; line-height: 20px; padding: 24px; text-decoration: none;"> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" width="32" height="32" viewBox="0 0 79 75"><path d="M63 45.3v-20c0-4.1-1-7.3-3.2-9.7-2.1-2.4-5-3.7-8.5-3.7-4.1 0-7.2 1.6-9.3 4.7l-2 3.3-2-3.3c-2-3.1-5.1-4.7-9.2-4.7-3.5 0-6.4 1.3-8.6 3.7-2.1 2.4-3.1 5.6-3.1 9.7v20h8V25.9c0-4.1 1.7-6.2 5.2-6.2 3.8 0 5.8 2.5 5.8 7.4V37.7H44V27.1c0-4.9 1.9-7.4 5.8-7.4 3.5 0 5.2 2.1 5.2 6.2V45.3h8ZM74.7 16.6c.6 6 .1 15.7.1 17.3 0 .5-.1 4.8-.1 5.3-.7 11.5-8 16-15.6 17.5-.1 0-.2 0-.3 0-4.9 1-10 1.2-14.9 1.4-1.2 0-2.4 0-3.6 0-4.8 0-9.7-.6-14.4-1.7-.1 0-.1 0-.1 0s-.1 0-.1 0 0 .1 0 .1 0 0 0 0c.1 1.6.4 3.1 1 4.5.6 1.7 2.9 5.7 11.4 5.7 5 0 9.9-.6 14.8-1.7 0 0 0 0 0 0 .1 0 .1 0 .1 0 0 .1 0 .1 0 .1.1 0 .1 0 .1.1v5.6s0 .1-.1.1c0 0 0 0 0 .1-1.6 1.1-3.7 1.7-5.6 2.3-.8.3-1.6.5-2.4.7-7.5 1.7-15.4 1.3-22.7-1.2-6.8-2.4-13.8-8.2-15.5-15.2-.9-3.8-1.6-7.6-1.9-11.5-.6-5.8-.6-11.7-.8-17.5C3.9 24.5 4 20 4.9 16 6.7 7.9 14.1 2.2 22.3 1c1.4-.2 4.1-1 16.5-1h.1C51.4 0 56.7.8 58.1 1c8.4 1.2 15.5 7.5 16.6 15.6Z" fill="currentColor"></path></svg> <div style="color: #787588; margin-top: 16px;">Post by @[email protected]</div> <div style="font-weight: 500;">View on Mastodon</div> </a> </blockquote>
<p><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#fnref:sideload" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
<link rel="replies" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#comments" thr:count="33"/>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Book Review: What Sheep Think about the Weather - Amelia Thomas ★★★☆☆]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-what-sheep-think-about-the-weather-amelia-thomas/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62701</id>
<updated>2025-08-27T20:15:20Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-28T11:34:38Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Book Review"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="NetGalley"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[It started with a hummingbird dive-bombing Amelia Thomas over her morning coffee, and a pair of piglets who just wouldn’t stay put. Soon Amelia, journalist and new farmer, begins to question the communications of the creatures all around her: her pigs, her dogs, the pheasant family inhabiting her wood, her ‘difficult’ big red horse: even the earwigs in the farm’s dark, damp corners. Are they all…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-what-sheep-think-about-the-weather-amelia-thomas/"><![CDATA[<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/sheep.webp" alt="Book cover featuring a sheep." width="200" height="300" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62702">
<blockquote><p>It started with a hummingbird dive-bombing Amelia Thomas over her morning coffee, and a pair of piglets who just wouldn’t stay put. Soon Amelia, journalist and new farmer, begins to question the communications of the creatures all around her: her pigs, her dogs, the pheasant family inhabiting her wood, her ‘difficult’ big red horse: even the earwigs in the farm’s dark, damp corners. Are they all just animals reacting instinctually to the world around them—or are they trying to communicate something deeper?</p></blockquote>
<p>This is a curious - and mostly satisfying - look at the practicalities of interspecies communication. Unlike <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2024/09/book-review-how-to-speak-whale-a-voyage-into-the-future-of-animal-communication-by-tom-mustill/">How to Speak Whale</a>, this doesn't assume that animals have a rich and complex grammar, nor does it make the case for animals having "higher-order" cognition. Instead, this is a fairly practical look at the limits of understanding animals.</p>
<p>Anyone with a pet cat or dog knows that they are experts at <em>some</em> forms of communication. "Feed me" being the primary one!</p>
<blockquote><p>In some ways, animals are simpler than humans. Hamsters don’t deliberately confound or obfuscate. Donkeys don’t gossip. An iguana will not gaslight you. Animals say what they mean. Yet that’s not to say this content is clear, or that we’re always aware it even exists at all.</p></blockquote>
<p>The author is open about her limitations and her goals. At times, it rather feels like reading a series of blog posts as she finds a new paper, chats to a new expert, and accidentally acquires yet another animal. Because she's primarily working with her own animals, there's a fair bit of anthropomorphising going on. Similarly, any "do your own research" project is going to be unaware of how to critically assess evidence. That makes it slightly scattershot and homespun. Nevertheless - it is fascinating what she uncovers.</p>
<p>There are some excellent practical tips for understanding the animal experience (I particularly like the idea of going on all fours and trying to understand a pet's-eye-view of the world). There's also an interesting bunch of interviews with scientists who are seeking to understand how and why animals communicate - and whether we can meaningfully exchange ideas with them, or just condition their behaviour.</p>
<p>But, as the book wears on, the author becomes more and more credulous. She goes on a series of courses which - with the best will in the world - seem to have rather dubious outcomes.</p>
<blockquote><p>Most of what I hear and see over these seven soaking days I need no scientific study to verify. I just sort of know it, the way the chicken guessers and dog listeners in the experiments just sort of knew what the calls signified. I wonder if this has to do with something called the motivational structure hypothesis,</p></blockquote>
<p>With no external interrogation of what she is doing, the book descends into the pseudo-scientific. The author recounts receiving mystic visions, engages with people who believe they can communicate with animals using telepathy, wanders into the realm of quantum physics, and claims that their horse has a psychic bond with her which causes psychosomatic injuries. Oh, and that her raspberry plants are laughing at her.</p>
<p>It is unfortunate that the last few chapters undermine all the interesting and useful information in the rest of the book.</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>1</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Security Flaws in the WebMonetization Site]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62468</id>
<updated>2025-09-11T12:26:13Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-26T11:34:33Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Bug Bounty"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="CyberSecurity"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Responsible Disclosure"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="WebMonetization"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="xss"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I've written before about the nascent WebMonetization Standard. It is a proposal which allows websites to ask users for passive payments when they visit. A visitor to this site could, if this standard is widely adopted, opt to send me cash for my very fine blog posts. All I need to do is add something like this into my site's source code: <link rel="monetization"…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/"><![CDATA[<p>I've written before about <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/03/how-to-prevent-payment-pointer-fraud/">the nascent WebMonetization Standard</a>. It is a proposal which allows websites to ask users for passive payments when they visit. A visitor to this site could, if this standard is widely adopted, opt to send me cash for my very fine blog posts.</p>
<p>All I need to do is add something like this into my site's source code:</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="monetization" href="https://wallet.example.com/edent">
</code></pre>
<p>A user who has a WebMonetization plugin can then easily pay me for my content.</p>
<p>But not every website is created by an individual or a single entity. Hence, the creation of the "<a href="https://webmonetization.org/tools/prob-revshare/">Probabilistic Revenue Share Generator</a>".</p>
<blockquote><p>Probabilistic revenue sharing is a way to share a portion of a web monetized page's earnings between multiple wallet addresses. Each time a web monetized user visits the page, a recipient will be chosen at random. Payments will go to the chosen recipient until the page is closed or reloaded.</p></blockquote>
<p>Nifty! But how does it work?</p>
<p>Let's say a website is created by Alice and Bob. Alice does most of the work and is to receive 70% of the revenue. Bob is to get the remaining 30%. Within the web page's head, the following meta element is inserted:</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link
rel="monetization"
href="https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siaHR0cHM6Ly9leGFtcGxlLmNvbS8iLDcwLCJBbGljZSJdLFsiaHR0cHM6Ly93aGF0ZXZlci50ZXN0LyIsMzAsIkJvYiJdXQ"
/>
</code></pre>
<p>The visitor's WebMonetization plugin will visit that URl and be redirected to Alice's site 70% of time and Bob's 30%.</p>
<p>If we Base64 decode that weird looking URl, we get:</p>
<pre><code class="language-json">[
[
"https://example.com/",
70,
"Alice"
],
[
"https://whatever.test/",
30,
"Bob"
]
]
</code></pre>
<p>Rather than adding multiple URls in the head, the site points to one resource and lets that pick who receives the funds.</p>
<p>There are two small problems with this.</p>
<p>The first is that you have to trust the WebMonetization.org website. If it gets hijacked or goes rogue then all your visitors will be paying someone else. But let's assume they're secure and trustworthy. There's a slightly more insidious threat.</p>
<p>Effectively, this allows an untrusted 3rd party to use the WebMonetization.org domain as an open redirect. That's useful for phishing and other abuses.</p>
<p>For example, an attacker could send messages encouraging people to visit:</p>
<p><a href="https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siaHR0cHM6Ly9leGFtcGxlLmNvbS8iLDk5LCJpbWciXV0">https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siaHR0cHM6Ly9leGFtcGxlLmNvbS8iLDk5LCJpbWciXV0</a></p>
<p>Click that and you'll instantly be redirected to a domain under the attacker's control. This could be particularly bad if the domain encouraged users to share passwords or other sensitive information.</p>
<p>If the Base64 data cannot be decoded to valid JSON, the API will echo back any Base64 encoded text sent to it. This means an attacker could use it to send obfuscated messages. Consider, tor example:</p>
<p><a href="https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siUGxlYXNlIHZpc2l0IFJlYWxfZ29vZF9DYXNpbm9zLmJpeiBmb3IgbG90cyBvZiBDcnlwdG8gZnVuISEhIiwxMjM0NTYsImltZyJdXQ==">https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siUGxlYXNlIHZpc2l0IFJlYWxfZ29vZF9DYXNpbm9zLmJpeiBmb3IgbG90cyBvZiBDcnlwdG8gZnVuISEhIiwxMjM0NTYsImltZyJdXQ==</a></p>
<p>Visit that and you'll see a message. With a bit of effort, it could be crafted to say something to encourage a visitor to enter their credentials elsewhere.</p>
<p>When I originally reported this, the site could be used to to smuggle binary payloads. For example, <a href="https://webmonetization.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">this URl would display an image</a> - however, it seems to have been fixed.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, it is important to recognise that the WebMonetization.org domain contains an <a href="https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/Unvalidated_Redirects_and_Forwards_Cheat_Sheet.html">unvalidated redirect and forwarding</a> vulnerability.</p>
<p>I recommended that they ensured that the only URls which contain legitimate payment pointers should be returned. I also suggested setting a maximum limit for URl size.</p>
<h2 id="timeline"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/#timeline" class="heading-link">Timeline</a></h2>
<ul>
<li>2025-03-27 - Discovered and disclosed.</li>
<li>2025-08-05 - Remembered I'd submitted it and sent a follow up.</li>
<li>2025-08-26 - Automatically published.</li>
<li><ins datetime="2025-08-27T15:37:49+00:00">2025-08-27</ins> - A day after this post was published, <a href="https://github.com/interledger/publisher-tools/issues/85">the issue was made public on their repo</a>.</li>
<li><ins datetime="2025-09-11T12:25:32+00:00">2025-09-10</ins> - <a href="https://github.com/interledger/publisher-tools/issues/85#issuecomment-3274623144">Confirmed fixed</a>.</li>
</ul>
]]></content>
<link rel="replies" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/#comments" thr:count="4"/>
<link rel="replies" type="application/atom+xml" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/feed/atom/" thr:count="4"/>
<thr:total>4</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Book Review: The Shattering Peace by John Scalzi (Old Man's War Book 7) ★★★⯪☆]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-the-shattering-peace-by-john-scalzi-old-mans-war-book-7/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62754</id>
<updated>2025-08-23T20:21:32Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-24T11:34:46Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Book Review"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="scalzi"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Sci Fi"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I'm reasonably sure I've read all the "Old Man's War" books. As the last one was published a decade ago, you'll forgive me if I don't remember all the intricacies of galactic politics and interpersonal intrigue. Thankfully, Scalzi has carved off a side character from a previous book and given them a brand-new adventure. There's enough exposition to tickle the parts of your brain that go "Ah,…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-the-shattering-peace-by-john-scalzi-old-mans-war-book-7/"><![CDATA[<p><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/9781509835409.webp" alt="Book cover showing spaceships and alien worlds." width="270" height="411" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62756">
I'm <em>reasonably</em> sure I've read all the "Old Man's War" books. As the last one was published a decade ago, you'll forgive me if I don't remember all the intricacies of galactic politics and interpersonal intrigue. Thankfully, Scalzi has carved off a side character from a previous book and given them a brand-new adventure. There's enough exposition to tickle the parts of your brain that go "Ah, yes, that sounds familiar" but the story is just about separate enough that a new (or lapsed) reader can dive straight in.</p>
<p>An off-the-books colony has <strong>vanished</strong>. Only <strong>one woman</strong> has the martial and intellectual skills to save the day. With her <strong>trusty alien companion</strong> she's in a race against time to <strong>save the galaxy</strong>!</p>
<p>The plot is a little thin, and has a slightly annoying habit of jumping forward and then giving retroexposition in "flashback". Some of the prose is gorgeous - "All you need for an avalanche of chaos is one inebriated snowball." - but it is used sparingly. That gives it a rather cold and utilitarian feel - which matches the alien surroundings our protagonist finds herself in.</p>
<p>I also found the humour to be a bit repetitive - the alien doesn't quite get that you shouldn't talk aloud about human's sexual habits - but the story is well-paced and keeps the intrigue high without delving too deeply into convoluted political machinations.</p>
<p>It doesn't really add much to the science fiction pantheon in terms of Big Ideas, but it is rather good fun.</p>
<p>Thanks to Pan Macmillan for the advance copy, the book is out in September this year and can be pre-ordered now.</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>1</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Gig Review: Rainbow Girls at LVLS London ★★★★★]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/gig-review-rainbow-girls-at-lvls-london/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62814</id>
<updated>2025-08-23T08:43:21Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-23T11:34:12Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="gig"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="music"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="review"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[At some point around the start of the pandemic, The Algorithm instructed me to listen to music by Rainbow Girls. Who am I to question the ineffable will of the machine? I don't know what it was about their harmonies, slide guitar, and double-bass which tickled my brain, but I was hooked. A few days ago, a different algorithm alerted me to the fact that they were touring the UK - so I snapped up…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/gig-review-rainbow-girls-at-lvls-london/"><![CDATA[<p>At some point around the start of the pandemic, The Algorithm instructed me to listen to music by <a href="https://www.youtube.com/@RainbowGirlsMusic">Rainbow Girls</a>. Who am I to question the ineffable will of the machine? I don't know what it was about their harmonies, slide guitar, and double-bass which tickled my brain, but I was hooked.</p>
<p>A few days ago, a different algorithm alerted me to the fact that they were touring the UK - so I snapped up tickets.</p>
<p>It was, of course, an <em>amazing</em> gig. Thanks Algorithms!</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Rainbow-Girls.webp" alt="Rainbow Girls on stage at LVLS." width="2048" height="1152" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62815">
<p>I don't know when I've enjoyed myself more at a gig. The LVLS venue in Stratford is charmingly intimate (and their drinks prices aren't too outrageous for London). The Girls filled the space with their sonic perfection. A brilliant mix of their original songs and crowd-pleasing covers. Their act is obviously well-rehearsed with very little time between songs spent faffing with equipment.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Bart-and-Rainbow-Girls.webp" alt="Bart on stage with the Rainbow Girls." width="2048" height="1152" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62816">
<p>The multi-instrumental nature of the show gives it a wonderful variety - not that you can really tire of their singing - and they are generous with their chat between numbers.</p>
<p>The support act, <a href="https://www.bartbudwig.com/">Bart Budwig</a> was delightful. A sweet selection of homespun songs and a magnificent stage presence. His crowd-work was excellent, bringing in the audience to join in with his songs. A particular favourite was <a href="https://www.instagram.com/reel/DKcu54Zvq5N/">Idaho Sober</a> which the London crowd greatly enjoyed.</p>
<p>The Rainbow Girls are currently on tour throughout the UK, Ireland, and Europe. Catch them if you can.</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>0</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[What about using rel="share-url" to expose sharing intents?]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/what-about-using-relshare-url-to-expose-sharing-intents/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62488</id>
<updated>2025-08-06T19:32:20Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-22T11:34:06Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="HTML"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="standards"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="webdev"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Let's say that you've visited a website and want to share it with your friends. At the bottom of the article is a list of popular sharing destinations - Facebook, BlueSky, LinkedIn, Telegram, Reddit, HackerNews etc. You click the relevant icon and get taken to the site with the sharing details pre-filled. The problem is, every different site has a different intent for sharing links and…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/what-about-using-relshare-url-to-expose-sharing-intents/"><![CDATA[<p>Let's say that you've visited a website and want to share it with your friends. At the bottom of the article is a list of popular sharing destinations - Facebook, BlueSky, LinkedIn, Telegram, Reddit, HackerNews etc.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/share-on.webp" alt="Screenshot. "Share this page on" followed by colourful icons for popular social networks." width="824" height="452" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62491">
<p>You click the relevant icon and get taken to the site with the sharing details pre-filled.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/telegram.webp" alt="Screenshot of the Telegram sharing page." width="600" height="561" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62492">
<p>The problem is, every different site has a different intent for sharing links and text. For example:</p>
<ul>
<li><code>https://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u=…&t=…</code></li>
<li><code>https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url=…</code></li>
<li><code>https://bsky.app/intent/compose?text=…</code></li>
<li><code>https://www.threads.net/intent/post?url=…&text=…</code></li>
<li><code>https://www.reddit.com/submit?url=…&title=…</code></li>
</ul>
<p>As you can see, some only allow a URL, some text and a URL, and some just a plain text which could contain the URl. A bit of a mess! It's probably impossible to get every site to agree on a standard for their sharing intent. But there <em>could</em> be a standard for exposing their existing sharing mechanism.</p>
<p>That's the proposal from <a href="https://about.werd.io/">Ben Werdmuller</a> with "<a href="https://shareopenly.org/integrate/">Share Openly</a>".</p>
<blockquote><p>ShareOpenly knows about most major social networks, as well as decentralized platforms like Mastodon, Bluesky, and Known.</p>
<p>However, if ShareOpenly is having trouble sharing to your platform, and if your platform supports a share intent, you can add the following metatag to your page headers:</p>
<p><code><link rel="share-url" href="https://your-site/share/intent?text={text}"></code></p>
<p>Where <code>https://your-site/share/intent?text=</code> is the URL of your share intent.</p>
<p>The special keyword <code>{text}</code> will be replaced with the URL and share text.</p></blockquote>
<p>I think that's a pretty nifty solution.</p>
<p>For sites which take a URl and an (optional) title, the meta element looks like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="share-url" href="https://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u={url}&t={text}">
<link rel="share-url" href="https://lemmy.world/create_post?url={url}&title={text}">
</code></pre>
<p>For those which only take URl, it looks like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="share-url" href="https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url={url}">
</code></pre>
<p>It's slightly trickier for sites like Mastodon and BlueSky which only have a text sharing field and no separate URl. The current proposal is just to use the text. For example</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="share-url" href="https://bsky.app/intent/compose?text={text}">
</code></pre>
<p>But it could be something like</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="share-url" href="https://mastodon.social/share?text={text}%0A{url}">
</code></pre>
<h2 id="what-next"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/what-about-using-relshare-url-to-expose-sharing-intents/#what-next" class="heading-link">What Next?</a></h2>
<p>The HTML specification has this to say <a href="https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/links.html#other-link-types">about adding new link types</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p>Extensions to the predefined set of link types may be registered on the <a href="https://microformats.org/wiki/existing-rel-values#HTML5_link_type_extensions">microformats page for existing rel values</a>.</p></blockquote>
<p>Adding to that page merely requires a formal specification to be written up. After that, some light lobbying might be needed to get social networks to adopt it.</p>
<p>So, I have three questions for you:</p>
<ol>
<li>Do you think <code><link rel="share-url"</code> is a good idea for a new standard?</li>
<li>What changes, if any, would you make to the above proposal?</li>
<li>Would you be interested in using it - either as a sharer or sharing destination?</li>
</ol>
<p>Please leave a comment in the box - and remember to hit those sharing buttons!</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>13</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Theatre Review - Show:Girls ★★★★☆]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62714</id>
<updated>2025-08-19T22:06:47Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-21T11:34:59Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Theatre Review"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Is it offensive to call a burlesque show "charming"? Sure, it is a funny and mildly titillating evening, but Show:Girls is suffused with such good natured charm that it is hard to describe it as anything else. Unlike Gallifrey Cabaret which puts on a plethora of variety acts, this is a rather stripped down production. The central conceit is that two acts have been accidentally double booked.…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/"><![CDATA[<p><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/ShowGirls-Phoenix-Listing.webp" alt="Two burlesque performers. One in a Viking helmet and one in a red hat." width="400" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62716"> Is it offensive to call a burlesque show "charming"? Sure, it is a funny and mildly titillating evening, but Show:Girls is suffused with such good natured charm that it is hard to describe it as anything else.</p>
<p>Unlike <a href="https://mastodon.social/@Edent/114156815734664216">Gallifrey Cabaret</a> which puts on a plethora of variety acts, this is a rather stripped down<sup id="fnref:sorry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorry" class="footnote-ref" title="Sorry!" role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup> production.</p>
<p>The central conceit is that two acts have been accidentally double booked. One, a high-class opera singer, the other a low-down burlesque performer. HI-JINKS ENSUE!</p>
<p><a href="http://www.belindawilliams.co.uk/">Bellinda Williams</a> has the voice of an angel and <a href="https://www.elsiediamond.com/about">Elsie Diamond</a> has the body of a devil<sup id="fnref:sorrry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrry" class="footnote-ref" title="Look, there's no way to write about these things without sounding like a bit of a seedy old man, OK!" role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup>. They teach each other the secrets of their art form which leads to the most unlikely mash-up I've seen in some time; Opera Burlesque.</p>
<p>It is exactly as batty as it sounds. Each of them attempting to Eliza Doolittle the other to the great merriment of the audience.</p>
<p>I'm sure there's something profound to say about the origins of opera and its intersection with courtesan couture, or how empowering it is to play dress up with your friends, but I was too busy laughing to think of anything that intellectual.</p>
<p>As befits a fringe show, it is rather short and I could have easily enjoyed more. There seem to be a few revivals of <i lang="fr">cabaret de l'érotique</i><sup id="fnref:fr"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:fr" class="footnote-ref" title="That's yer actual French, y'know!" role="doc-noteref">2</a></sup> within London's now-sanitised Soho. Most, like this, are fairly tourist friendly and unlikely to draw the wrath of The Lord Chamberlain. Perhaps we'll see them on the Royal Variety Show next?</p>
<p>There's only one thing which bothers me, and that's the origin of one of the marquee quotes. One of the performers is mentioned thusly:</p>
<blockquote><p>famously described by Danny Dyer as having “a good old fashioned pair of Lils”.</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm reasonably familiar with Cockney Rhyming Slang and its step-sibling <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/04/book-review-fabulosa-the-story-of-polari-britains-secret-gay-language-by-paul-baker/">Polari</a>, and I can't find anything even close to that.</p>
<ul>
<li>Cockney:
<ul>
<li>Lilian Gish - fish. A somewhat unlikely comparison.</li>
<li>Lilly The Pink - drink. Although I suppose a pair of "pinks" might make sense?</li>
<li>Little And Large - margarine. I guess "Little" might be heard as "Lil"? And Ms Diamond's are not exactly on the smaller side.<sup id="fnref:sorrrrry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrrrry" class="footnote-ref" title="Look, you try writing about this without sounding like Sid James!" role="doc-noteref">3</a></sup></li>
</ul></li>
<li>Polari:
<ul>
<li>Lills - hands. I have no evidence that her hands <em>aren't</em> old fashioned.</li>
<li>Lilly Law - police. Perhaps Mr Dyer was comparing the shape of a bobby's helmet to the size and shape of…?<sup id="fnref:sorrrry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrrry" class="footnote-ref" title="Probably best to stop there, eh?" role="doc-noteref">4</a></sup></li>
</ul></li>
</ul>
<p>Either way, Show:Girls is performed sporadically - keep an eye on their websites for the next performance. The entrance fee isn't too expensive, but in exchange you'll receive your fair share of thruppeny bits<sup id="fnref:sorrrrrrry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrrrrrry" class="footnote-ref" title="At this juncture, please imagine a giant shepherd's crook protruding from the wings and dragging me off stage." role="doc-noteref">5</a></sup>.</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:sorry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Sorry! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:sorrry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Look, there's no way to write about these things without sounding like a bit of a seedy old man, OK! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:fr" role="doc-endnote">
<p>That's yer <em>actual</em> French, y'know! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:fr" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:sorrrrry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Look, <em>you</em> try writing about this without sounding like Sid James! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrrrry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:sorrrry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Probably best to stop there, eh? <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrrry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:sorrrrrrry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>At this juncture, please imagine a giant shepherd's crook protruding from the wings and dragging me off stage. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrrrrrry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>0</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Theatre Review: Sluts With Consoles ★★★★⯪]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-sluts-with-consoles/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62726</id>
<updated>2025-08-19T22:39:57Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-20T11:34:03Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="gaming"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Theatre Review"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Let's see if this post makes it through the spam filters! Sluts With Consoles is a brilliant two-hander. Girly-twirly pick-me Player One and Gothy just-one-of-the-boys Player Two are locked in mortal - and emotional - combat. They represent the duality of the female gaming experience. Is it better to be feminine or feminist? Is gaming an escape from the cliques of teenage oppression, or just…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-sluts-with-consoles/"><![CDATA[<p><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Sluts-with-Consoles.webp" alt="Promotional Poster for Sluts With Consoles." width="350" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62727"> Let's see if this post makes it through the spam filters!</p>
<p>Sluts With Consoles is a brilliant two-hander. Girly-twirly pick-me Player One and Gothy just-one-of-the-boys Player Two are locked in mortal - and emotional - combat. They represent the duality of the female gaming experience. Is it better to be feminine or feminist? Is gaming an escape from the cliques of teenage oppression, or just another form of self-deception?</p>
<p>That all sounds a bit heavy-handed, but it is a hilarious show. It perfectly observes modern gaming tropes and how we all evolve our gamer styles.</p>
<p>Throughout, it asks a very specific question; "does a single stuck pixel spoil the entire view?" That is, what are we prepared to tolerate in order to live in our fantasy world? Older brothers swiping our power-ups transmogrify into incel-gamers shouting slurs. Who cares if we're having fun, right…?</p>
<p>As with any powerful piece of theatre, it's unlikely to be seen by those who have the most need of its message.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, it is an entertaining and amusing show with a +20 battle-damage buff.</p>
<p>The show is touring throughout the year and it is absolutely worth seeing if you have any interest in gaming.</p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Preventing NAPTR Spam]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=61707</id>
<updated>2025-08-03T20:49:37Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-18T11:34:47Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="dns"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="internet"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="privacy"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[You're the sort of cool nerd who knows all the weird esoterica which makes up DNS, right? In amongst your A, AAAA, SOA, and MX records, there's a little used NAPTR. Yes, you can use DNS to store Name Authority Pointers! What?! It is yet another of those baroque standards which spits out things like: cid.uri.arpa. ;; order pref flags service regexp replacement IN NAPTR…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/"><![CDATA[<p>You're the sort of cool nerd who knows all the weird esoterica which makes up DNS, right? In amongst your A, AAAA, SOA, and MX records, there's a little used <a href="https://dn.org/understanding-naptr-records-and-their-role-in-dns/">NAPTR</a>. Yes, you can use DNS to store Name Authority Pointers!</p>
<p>What?!</p>
<p>It is yet another of those <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2015/11/a-polite-way-to-say-ridiculously-complicated/">baroque</a> standards which spits out things like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-_">cid.uri.arpa.
;; order pref flags service regexp replacement
IN NAPTR 100 10 "" "" "!^cid:.+@([^\.]+\.)(.*)$!\2!i" .
</code></pre>
<p>Essentially, it is a way to store contact details within a DNS record (rather than in a WHOIS record).</p>
<p>Back in the early 2000s, the dotTel company opened the .tel TLD with a promise that it could be used to store your contact details in DNS<sup id="fnref:history"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:history" class="footnote-ref" title="Even back in 2009 I didn't think it was terribly compelling. By 2013, it was almost dead. And in 2017 it became just another generic TLD." role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup>. The idea was simple, rather than storing my phone number in your address book, you'd store my domain name - <a href="https://edent.tel/">https://edent.tel/</a></p>
<p>If I updated my phone number, changed my avatar, or deleted an old email address - your address book would automatically update via DNS. Nifty!</p>
<p>If you didn't know a company's phone number, you'd dial <code>example.com</code> on your phone and it would grab the phone numbers from DNS. Wowsers trousers!</p>
<p>You can see an example by running:</p>
<pre><code class="language-_">dig justin.tel NAPTR
</code></pre>
<p>You'll get back something like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-_">NAPTR 100 101 "u" "E2U+web:http" "!^.*$!http://justinkhayward.com!"
</code></pre>
<p>A phone number stored in a NAPTR would look something like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-_">NAPTR 100 100 "u" "E2U+voice:tel" "!^.*$!tel:+442074676450!" .
</code></pre>
<p>Brilliant! But there's a problem - aside from the somewhat obtuse syntax! - and that problem is spam.</p>
<p>Those of you old enough to remember putting your unexpurgated contact details into WHOIS know that the minute it went live you were bombarded with sales calls and scammy emails. So putting your details directly into DNS is a bad idea, right?</p>
<p>.tel thought they'd come up with a clever hack to prevent that. As they explain in <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20120504070307/https://dev.telnic.org/docs/privacy.pdf">the .tel privacy paper</a>, records can be individually encrypted.</p>
<ul>
<li>Alice has her contact details on <code>alice.tel</code></li>
<li>Bob has his contact details on <code>bob.tel</code></li>
<li>Alice agrees to share her phone number with Bob.</li>
<li>Alice looks up Bob's public key from <code>bob.tel</code>.</li>
<li>Alice encrypts her phone number.</li>
<li>Alice generates a new DNS record specifically for Bob - <code>bob123456.alice.tel</code></li>
<li>Alice shares the name of the new record with Bob.</li>
<li>Bob downloads the NAPTR from <code>bob123456.alice.tel</code> and decrypts it with his private key.</li>
<li>Bob periodically checks for updates.</li>
<li>Alice can decide to revoke Bob's access by removing the data or subdomain.</li>
</ul>
<p>Clever! If convoluted. You can <a href="https://rikkles.blogspot.com/2008/05/privacy-in-tel.html">read more about the way friendships and public keys were managed</a> and <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20120504073313/https://dev.telnic.org/docs/naptr.pdf">some more technical details</a>.</p>
<p>Are there better ways?</p>
<h2 id="multi-recipient-encryption"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#multi-recipient-encryption" class="heading-link">Multi Recipient Encryption</a></h2>
<p>When people say "you can't give Government a secret key to your private messages" they are technically incorrect<sup id="fnref:worst"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:worst" class="footnote-ref" title="The worst type of incorrect." role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup>. Multi Recipient Encryption is a thing.</p>
<p>Here's a very simplified and subtly wrong explanation:</p>
<ul>
<li>Alice creates a <em>temporary</em> public/private keypair.</li>
<li>Alice encrypts some text with her temporary public key - resulting in <code>e</code>.</li>
<li>Alice encrypts the temporary private key with Bob's public key - resulting in <code>k1</code>.</li>
<li>Alice encrypts the temporary private key with Charlie's public key - resulting in <code>k2</code>.</li>
<li>Alice publishes the concatenation of <code>e+k1+k2</code></li>
<li>Bob downloads the file, decrypts <em>his</em> version of the key, and uses that to decrypt the message.</li>
<li>Charlie does the same.</li>
</ul>
<p>In this way, both recipients are able to decipher the text but no one else can. So can we just shove an encrypted record in the NAPTR? Not quite.</p>
<p>There are two main problems with this for DNS purposes.</p>
<ol>
<li>The encrypted size grows with every recipient.</li>
<li>Every time a new recipient is added, everyone needs to download the data again even if it is unchanged.</li>
</ol>
<p>Generally speaking, DNS records are a maximum of 255 characters - <a href="https://kb.isc.org/docs/aa-00356">although they can be concatenated</a>.</p>
<p>An extra record could be used to say when the plaintext was last updated - which would let existing recipients know not to download it again.</p>
<p>Monitoring for changes would allow a user to know roughly how many recipients had been added or removed.</p>
<p>What other ways could there be?</p>
<h2 id="what-else-could-be-done"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#what-else-could-be-done" class="heading-link">What else could be done?</a></h2>
<p>Here's the user story.</p>
<ul>
<li>I want a friend to subscribe to my [phone|email|street|social media] address(es).</li>
<li>I must be able to pre-approve access.</li>
<li>When I change my address, my friend should get my new details.</li>
<li>I need to be able to revoke people's access.</li>
<li>This should be done via DNS<sup id="fnref:dns"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:dns" class="footnote-ref" title="Why DNS? Because I like making life difficult." role="doc-noteref">2</a></sup>.</li>
</ul>
<p>Using an API this would be playing on easy mode. A friend (or rather, their app) would request an API key from my service. I would approve it, and then ✨magic✨.</p>
<p>DNS isn't <em>technically</em> an API although, with enough effort, you could make it behave like one<sup id="fnref:marquis"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:marquis" class="footnote-ref" title="If you were a sadist!" role="doc-noteref">3</a></sup>.</p>
<p>So - how would <em>you</em> do it?</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:history" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Even back in 2009 <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2009/03/some-thoughts-on-tel/">I didn't think it was terribly compelling</a>. By 2013, <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2013/03/should-i-renew-my-tel-domain/">it was almost dead</a>. And in 2017 <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2017/02/whats-the-future-for-the-tel-domain-name/">it became just another generic TLD</a>. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:history" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:worst" role="doc-endnote">
<p>The <em>worst</em> type of incorrect. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:worst" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:dns" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Why DNS? Because I like making life difficult. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:dns" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:marquis" role="doc-endnote">
<p>If you were a sadist! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:marquis" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Books will soon be obsolete in school]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/books-will-soon-be-obsolete-in-school/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62422</id>
<updated>2025-08-04T17:24:56Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-16T11:34:30Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="AI"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="education"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="history"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="schools"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I recently had a chance to ask a question to one of the top AI people. At a Q&A session, I raised my hand and asked simply "What is your estimation of the future educational value of AI?" The response was swift and utterly devastating for those laggards who want to hold back progress. The AI guy said: Books will soon be obsolete in schools. Scholars will be instructed through AI. It is possible …]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/books-will-soon-be-obsolete-in-school/"><![CDATA[<p>I recently had a chance to ask a question to one of the <strong>top</strong> AI people. At a Q&A session, I raised my hand and asked simply "What is your estimation of the future educational value of AI?"</p>
<p>The response was swift and utterly devastating for those laggards who want to hold back progress. The AI guy said:</p>
<blockquote><p>Books will soon be obsolete in schools. Scholars will be instructed through AI. It is possible to teach every branch of human knowledge with AI. Our school system will be completely changed inside of ten years.</p>
<p>We have been working for some time on educational AI. It proves conclusively the worth of AI in chemistry, physics and other branches of study, making the scientific truths, difficult to understand from text books, plain and clear to children.</p></blockquote>
<p>That's it. We can throw away all those outdated paper books. Children will learn directly from an AI which, coincidentally, is sold by the company. We can trust their studies on such matters and be assured that they have no ulterior motive.</p>
<p>But, ah my friends, I have told a <em>slight</em> untruth. I didn't ask that question. Frederick James Smith asked the question to Thomas Edison in <strong>1913</strong>. The question was about the new and exciting world of motion pictures.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/moving-pictures.webp" alt="Scan of old newsprint. "What is your estimation of the future educational
value of pictures?" I asked.
" Books." declared the inventor with decision, " will soon be obsolete in the public schools. Scholars will be instructed through the eye. It is possible to teach every branch of human knowledge with the motion picture. Our school system will be completely changed inside of ten years. " We have been working for some time on the school pictures. We have been studying and reproducing the life of the fly. mosquito, silk weaving moth, brown moth, gypsy moth, butterflies, scale and various other insects, as well as chemical cbrystallization. It proves conclusively the worth of motion pictures in chemistry, physics and other branches of study, making the scientific truths, difficult to understand from text books, plain and clear to children" width="766" height="492" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62423">
<p>You can <a href="https://www.laviemoderne.net/images/forum_pics/2017/20171116%20New%20York%20NY%20Dramatic%20Mirror%201913%20Mar-Apr%201914%20Grayscale%20-%200690.pdf">read the full exchange from The New York Dramatic Mirror</a>.</p>
<p>A hundred-plus years since the great and humble Edison made his prediction and… books are still used in schools! Those of us of a certain age remember a TV occasionally being wheeled in for one lesson or another. Today's kids watch more video content than ever - of mixed quality - but still rely on books and teachers.</p>
<p>Videos are good for some aspects of learning, but woefully inadequate for others.</p>
<p>I'm not trying to say that just because one technology failed, so will all others. But it is <em>amazing</em> how AI-proponents are recycling the same arguments with basically the same timescale. Will AI be part of education? Sure! Just like videos, pocket computers, the Metaverse, and performance enhancing drugs.</p>
<p>Will it be the <em>only</em> tool ever needed for education? I doubt it. Will vested interests and uncritical journalists continue to boost it? You don't need to have read many history books to work out the answer.</p>
<p>Further reading: <a href="https://www.colincornaby.me/2025/08/in-the-future-all-food-will-be-cooked-in-a-microwave-and-if-you-cant-deal-with-that-then-you-need-to-get-out-of-the-kitchen/">In the Future All Food Will Be Cooked in a Microwave, and if You Can’t Deal With That Then You Need to Get Out of the Kitchen</a></p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Theatre Review: Being Mr Wickham ★★★★★]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-being-mr-wickham/"/>
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62605</id>
<updated>2025-08-13T21:16:42Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-14T11:34:06Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/"/>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Theatre Review"/>
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Mr Wickham is ready to set the record straight. Celebrating the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth, Adrian Lukis, who starred in the renowned BBC TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, returns to the role of Mr Wickham. Join Pride and Prejudice’s most roguish gentleman, George Wickham, on the eve of his sixtieth birthday, to lift the sheets on what exactly happened thirty years on from whe…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-being-mr-wickham/"><![CDATA[<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/wickham.webp" alt="Promotional poster for Being Mr Wickham." width="384" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62606">
<blockquote><p>Mr Wickham is ready to set the record straight. Celebrating the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth, Adrian Lukis, who starred in the renowned BBC TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, returns to the role of Mr Wickham.</p>
<p>Join Pride and Prejudice’s most roguish gentleman, George Wickham, on the eve of his sixtieth birthday, to lift the sheets on what exactly happened thirty years on from where we left him… And discover his own version of some very famous literary events.</p></blockquote>
<p>You remember "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead", right? Take two minor characters from a famous play and weave a tale around their misadventures. This is in much the same vein. A one-man show where we get to spend time with Pride & Prejudice's most clubbable old rake in order to better understand <em>why</em> he was such a scoundrel.</p>
<p>There's a lovely bit of intertextuality in having Adrian Lukis both write and perform as Wickham. For people of my age, he <em>is</em> Wickam. Sure, he's no Darcy in a dripping wet shirt, but played the perfect bounder and cad.</p>
<p>The Jermyn Street Theatre is the perfect venue for these tall tales. An intimate room where we're slowly drawn in to the confidences of a master manipulator. Behind the twinkling smile there is, be in no doubt, a predator.</p>
<p>Wickham lives off his charms and it is no wonder that the audience is eating out of the palm of his hand within minutes. His outrageous name dropping is all part of the seduction.</p>
<p>Of course he has been viciously abused in literature; done dirty by those envious of his success. Yes, he is a bit of a rascal but - and his eyes flirt with us at this point - isn't that what makes a man <em>interesting</em>?</p>
<p>Adrian Lukis doesn't redeem the villain; he indulges him. It is a delight to spend an hour in his company, hearing the old sot reminisce about old conquests, and catching up with the Bennet gossip. But you'll walk away wondering if you're any closer to the truth or have just been beguiled like some many others.</p>
<p>There's an interesting bit of media rights discussion to be here as well. Famously, the actors who play James Bond <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/new/Why-Pierce-Brosnan-Wears-Ugliest-Suit-Ever-Thomas-Crown-Affair-68301.html">aren't allowed to wear a tuxedo in other movies</a> lest they be confused with 007. All of Jane Austen's works have long since passed out of copyright - but is the character of Wickam based on the book version of the 1990's screen version? There's no portrait of Julia Sawalha on the wall, so you'll have to make your own mind up on that count.</p>
<p>I do wonder how many other other actors will take the opportunity to revisit their star turns? The nostalgia roadshow rumbles on.</p>
<p>Mr Wickham is in residence until the 30th of August and I have no doubt that you will find his company most agreeable.</p>
]]></content>
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<title type="text">Terence Eden’s Blog</title>
<subtitle type="text">Regular nonsense about tech and its effects 🙃</subtitle>
<updated>2025-09-15T21:07:11Z</updated>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" />
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<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[How big a solar battery do I need to store *all* my home's electricity?]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62959</id>
<updated>2025-09-15T21:07:11Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-15T11:34:42Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="solar" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I have a modest set of solar panels on an entirely ordinary house in suburban London. On average they generate about 3,800kWh per year. We also use about 3,800kWh of electricity each year. Obviously, we can't use all the power produced over summer and we need to buy power in winter. So here's my question: How big a battery would we need in order to be completely self-sufficient? Background …]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/"><![CDATA[<p>I have a <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/solar-faq/">modest set of solar panels</a> on an entirely ordinary house in suburban London.</p>
<p>On average they generate about 3,800kWh per year. We also use about 3,800kWh of electricity each year. Obviously, we can't use all the power produced over summer and we need to buy power in winter. So here's my question:</p>
<p>How big a battery would we need in order to be <em>completely</em> self-sufficient?</p>
<h2 id="background"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#background" class="heading-link">Background</a></h2>
<p>Let's take a look at a typical summer's day. The graph is a little complex, so I'll explain it.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Power-Flow.webp" alt="Graph of power flow." width="1788" height="988" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62974">
<p>The yellow line shows solar production. It starts shortly after sunrise, peaks at midday, and gradually drops until sunset.</p>
<p>The red line shows how much electricity our home is using. As you can see, there's a large peak about 19:00 when we cook dinner.</p>
<p>The blue line shows how much electricity we draw or export from the grid. From midnight until sunrise we import because the sun isn't shining. Once the sun has risen we're able to power our house <em>and</em> export to our neighbours. When we cook, we draw from the grid <em>and</em> our battery - which is why the evening grid peak is lower than the household use dip.</p>
<p>The CSV of the data looks something like this:</p>
<table>
<thead>
<tr>
<th align="right">Local_time</th>
<th align="right">Household_(W)</th>
<th align="right">Solar_(W)</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:25:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-187.76</td>
<td align="right">1166.77</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:30:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-227.04</td>
<td align="right">1193.25</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:35:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-253.06</td>
<td align="right">1222.84</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:40:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-266.87</td>
<td align="right">1245.18</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:45:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-450.8</td>
<td align="right">1268.66</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:50:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-251.84</td>
<td align="right">1281.79</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T08:55:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-1426.26</td>
<td align="right">1306.93</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T09:00:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-206.78</td>
<td align="right">1341.37</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T09:05:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-215.52</td>
<td align="right">1390.9</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T09:10:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-242.6</td>
<td align="right">1426.19</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="right">2025-08-25T09:15:00.000+01:00</td>
<td align="right">-246.84</td>
<td align="right">1473</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>It's fairly trivial to sum both columns and subtract one from the other. That shows either the excess or deficit in solar power for the household.</p>
<p>On that day, the house used 9.7kWh and generated 19.6kWh. I'd need a 9.9kWh battery to store the excess right? Wrong!</p>
<p>Because my usage doesn't track the sun, I'd actually need a 13kWh battery. That's the peak amount of excess electricity I've generated in that one day.</p>
<p>What I want to do is find out what the <em>maximum</em> size battery I would need in order to store all of summer's electricity for use in winter.</p>
<p>Luckily, I have several years of real data to go off! Let's get started!</p>
<h2 id="disclaimer"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#disclaimer" class="heading-link">Disclaimer</a></h2>
<p>This is based on data generated by my home battery. It has probes to measure solar output and grid flow. It is not 100% clock-accurate compared to my solar-panels' internal reporting nor what my smart-meter reports. I estimate a 1-2% deviation, which is good enough for these purposes.</p>
<p>My energy usage isn't representative of anything other than my usage. Your household is probably different. I already have a 4.8kWh battery which changes how and when I use energy.</p>
<p>This doesn't account for gas heating or hot water. We have some electric heaters and taps which increases our electricity usage.</p>
<p>My maths is <em>probably</em> right - but the code is open source, so feel free to check for yourself.</p>
<p>Remember, this is just a bit of fun. There's no practical way to build domestic batteries with this capacity using the technology of 2025.</p>
<h2 id="code"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#code" class="heading-link">Code</a></h2>
<p>We tend to start generating more electricity than we use starting in Spring. So I've picked the end of March 2024 to the end of March 2025.</p>
<p>Let's see how big a battery we'd need to store our summer excess for winter. This finds the cumulative difference between each day's energy production and usage:</p>
<pre><code class="language-python">import os
import pandas as pd
# Load all the CSVs
filepaths = [f for f in os.listdir(".") if f.endswith('.csv')]
df = pd.concat(map(pd.read_csv, filepaths))
# Make sure they're in order
df = df.sort_values("Timestamp")
df = df.reset_index(drop=True)
# Resolution is every 5 minutes, so divide by 12 to get hourly
df["Cumulative_Difference"] = ( (df["Household_(W)"] + df["Solar_(W)"] ).cumsum() ) / 12
# kWh of battery needed
int(df["Cumulative_Difference"].max() / 1000)
## Draw a pretty graph
df.plot(kind="line", x="Local_time", y="Cumulative_Difference", xlabel="Date", ylabel="MWh", xticks=["2024-04-01", "2024-05-01", "2024-05-01", "2024-06-01", "2024-07-01", "2024-08-01", "2024-09-01", "2024-10-01", "2024-11-01", "2024-12-01", "2025-01-01", "2025-02-01", "2025-03-01", "2025-04-01"], legend=False, grid=True, fontsize=15)
plt.show()
</code></pre>
<p>The total is <strong>1,068KWh</strong> - basically, a MegaWatt-hour of storage.</p>
<p>Here's a quick graph to show how the storage would be used over the year.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Cumulative-Graph.webp" alt="Graph showing a steady climb to 1 MegaWatt-hour and then down again." width="1300" height="700" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62980">
<p>As you can see, even in this scenario there are a few days where we'd need to import energy from the grid.</p>
<h2 id="is-this-sensible"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#is-this-sensible" class="heading-link">Is this sensible?</a></h2>
<p>Probably not, no. It doesn't account for increased energy use from having an electric car or moving away from gas heating / cooking. As <a href="https://www.nrel.gov/pv/interactive-cell-efficiency">solar panels increase in efficiency</a>, it might be more sensible to replace the panels on my roof, or add some onto a shed.</p>
<p>The environmental impact of creating and storing such huge batteries could also be factored in.</p>
<p>A battery which is only 100% full for a few days probably isn't an efficient design. Using wind, hydro, and other green sources from the grid might be preferable.</p>
<p>But, remember, this is an exercise in wishful thinking.</p>
<h2 id="is-this-possible"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#is-this-possible" class="heading-link">Is this possible?</a></h2>
<p><a href="https://mathstodon.xyz/@johncarlosbaez/115190527741497635">Grid-scale batteries exist</a> and they work brilliantly.</p>
<p>But if I wanted my own MegaWatt-hour of battery storage, it would probably cost me between <a href="https://www.fogstar.co.uk/collections/solar-battery-storage/products/fogstar-energy-32kwh-battery?variant=55157091205497">£100k</a> and <a href="https://modoenergy.com/research/battery-energy-storage-capex-containerised-bess-development-costs-oem-balance-plant-bop-grid-connections-survey-2024">half-a-million quid</a>.</p>
<p>That doesn't include maintenance, the land, planning permission, and a hundred other things.</p>
<p>But battery prices are falling fast. In the last decade <a href="https://www.energy.gov/eere/vehicles/articles/fotw-1354-august-5-2024-electric-vehicle-battery-pack-costs-light-duty">lithium ion battery prices have fallen 90%</a>. With new <a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11913365/">sodium ion batteries</a> promising an even bigger drop - down to <a href="https://www.geeky-gadgets.com/catl-sodium-ion-battery-packs/">US$10/kWh</a>.</p>
<p>If - and it is a <strong>big</strong> if - those numbers came to pass, it would probably cost around £8,000 for a domestic battery. Basically the same cost as adding solar panels in the first place.</p>
<p>Domestic solar <em>works</em> - yes, even in the rainy UK! It is relatively cheap, moves energy production as close as possible to energy consumption, reduces bill-shock, and means we don't have endless planning arguments about whether fields should be turned into solar farms.</p>
<p>It is possible that, not too long in the future, every home could also have a 1 MegaWatt-hour battery. They would be able to capture all the excess solar power generated in a year.</p>
<p>There's a bright and sunny future where every home can be solar-self-sufficient.</p>
<hr>
<p>If you've enjoyed this blog post, please consider <a href="https://share.octopus.energy/metal-dove-988">switching to Octopus Energy</a> - we both get £50 when you join.</p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Book Review: All That We See or Seem by Ken Liu ★★★★★]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-all-that-we-see-or-seem-by-ken-liu/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63299</id>
<updated>2025-09-13T15:00:47Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-13T11:34:34Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Book Review" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="NetGalley" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Sci Fi" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[This book is ridiculously zeitgeisty. It's all brain-rotting AI, social-media meltdowns, mixed with some cracking technobabble. She thinks about erasing more: all the practice session recordings; her own encrypted cephaloscripts; the dream-guide neuromesh of her personal AI; the interviews, fan messages, reviews—food for her vanity, training data for her egolets. Fab! But, for all that, it's p…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-all-that-we-see-or-seem-by-ken-liu/"><![CDATA[<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/9781035915934_l.webp" alt="Book cover with a fractured city in the background." width="200" height="310" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-63301">
<p>This book is <em>ridiculously</em> zeitgeisty. It's all brain-rotting AI, social-media meltdowns, mixed with some cracking technobabble.</p>
<blockquote><p>She thinks about erasing more: all the practice session recordings; her own encrypted cephaloscripts; the dream-guide neuromesh of her personal AI; the interviews, fan messages, reviews—food for her vanity, training data for her egolets.</p></blockquote>
<p>Fab! But, for all that, it's pretty realistic. Sure, it's set five-minutes into the future, but all the tech is plausible and all the hacks somewhere in the ballpark of reality. It is <em>much</em> better than <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2021/09/book-review-the-ministry-for-the-future-by-kim-stanley-robinson/">The Ministry for the Future</a> simply because all the technowizardry passes the smell test.</p>
<p>The plot is, charitably, basic. A woman has been kidnapped and her husband (who is a suspect) enlists a <del>Private Eye</del> hacker to solve the mystery. But you're not reading to discover whodunnit; you're there to revel in the pitch-perfect future-gazing and cower before the (hopefully not too accurate) predictions around how technology will be subverted to protect the powerful while leaving everyone else helpless.</p>
<p>The neologisms are off the chart - "Darcybots" to help you date, a "Fiscjinn" to interrogate your finances, and an "Oneirofex" to… well, I'll let you discover that! You'll need to have a good grasp of what's going on with modern technology in order to get more than half the references. I've no idea if the book will be intelligible half-a-decade from now. Perhaps we'll have our self-hosted AIs translate it for us?</p>
<p>At times, it feels less like a book and more like a series of parables woven into one story. The ending feels a little rushed - but it fits in with the fast-paced nature of the plot. A great slab of sci-fi to chew on.</p>
<p>Thanks to Netgalley for the review copy. The book is released in October 2025 - and will probably remain relevant for at least half-a-dozen weeks.</p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Reasonably accurate, privacy conscious, cookieless, visitor tracking for WordPress]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63158</id>
<updated>2025-09-11T14:05:19Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-11T11:34:39Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="HTML" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="javascript" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="seo" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="WordPress" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I am vain. I like to know which of my blog posts have "done numbers". I get a little thrill knowing that an old post I wrote has been read by someone in a land I've never visited. I'm curious and want to know if a newsletter has linked to me. At the same time, I don't want to know too much about people. I don't want to stalk them around the web. I refuse to care how long they spend with me. I…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/"><![CDATA[<p>I am vain. I like to know which of my blog posts have "done numbers". I get a little thrill knowing that an old post I wrote has been read by someone in a land I've never visited. I'm curious and want to know if a newsletter has linked to me.</p>
<p>At the same time, I don't want to know <em>too</em> much about people. I don't want to stalk them around the web. I refuse to care how long they spend with me. I can't be bothered setting up a foolproof system that captures 100% accurate information.</p>
<p>After trying several analytics plugins for WordPress, I've decided to have a go at writing my own<sup id="fnref:learn"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fn:learn" class="footnote-ref" title="I enjoy learning. If you're about to say "Why not just install…" then you've missed the point. I like understanding how things work, I get joy from discovering some new function, my brain feels happy…" role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup>.</p>
<p>Before embarking on this, please do read "<a href="https://blog.yossarian.net/2023/12/24/You-dont-need-analytics-on-your-blog">You Don't Need Analytics on Your Blog</a>" and the slightly more provocative "<a href="https://www.thisdaysportion.com/posts/contra-analytics/">You do not need “analytics” for your blog because you are neither a military surveillance unit nor a commodity trading company</a>". Both give excellent examples of why this is at best foolish and at worse injurious. Proceed with caution in your heart.</p>
<h2 id="background"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#background" class="heading-link">Background</a></h2>
<p>As a consequence of the way the web works, every time you click on a link the website's owner gets the following pieces of information.</p>
<ul>
<li>The time you clicked,</li>
<li>The page you visited,</li>
<li>The name of the web browser you use,</li>
<li>The URl of the page which you clicked to get here,</li>
<li>The IP address your computer has.</li>
</ul>
<p>There are a few other things sent along but they're not interesting to me.</p>
<p>Using that information, I can construct a reasonably accurate view of how many times a post has been viewed and how many people viewed it.</p>
<h2 id="defining-a-page-view"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#defining-a-page-view" class="heading-link">Defining a page view</a></h2>
<p>If a web page is loaded, that counts as a view. I'm not going to track whether the user stayed for more than 30 seconds or closed their browser in disgust after reading the headline. If the page is loaded, that's a view.</p>
<p>But what if one person repeatedly hits refresh on the same post? To deal with that, I'll need a concept of a visitor.</p>
<h2 id="defining-a-visitor"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#defining-a-visitor" class="heading-link">Defining a visitor</a></h2>
<p>The "normal" way of doing things is to stick a cookie in the user's browser and track them that way. I can't be bothered with that. And, besides, it doesn't account for a person reading on their laptop and then moving to their phone.</p>
<p>So I'm going to use a proxy by creating a cryptographic hash of the visitor's IP address and the browser's User Agent string.</p>
<p>Of course, a household might have one IP address and multiple people with the same phone. But, equally, one person might rove over several WiFi networks in the course of one browsing session, getting a different IP each time.</p>
<p>The aim is to be <em>reasonably</em> accurate.</p>
<p>Hashing the contents means I don't need to store the user's IP address. Once hashed, the information becomes a string like <code>db050e7b853e5856</code> which is functionally impossible to <a href="https://www.techsolvency.com/passwords/dehashing-reversing-decrypting/">crack</a> back to an IP address & UA string<sup id="fnref:orisit"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fn:orisit" class="footnote-ref" title="Or is it? There are 4 billion IPv4 addresses - although slightly fewer in actual use. Creating a rainbow table with 4 billion rows is possible if I was just using IP addresses. But there are an…" role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup>.</p>
<p>This also means that I can redefine the concept of a page view. If the same visitor refreshed the page multiple times, it will only count as a single visit.</p>
<p>I'll reset the counter at midnight in my local timezone. If someone visits just before midnight and then just after, it'll count as two visits. Oh well.</p>
<h2 id="where-did-they-come-from"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#where-did-they-come-from" class="heading-link">Where did they come from?</a></h2>
<p>Generally speaking, there are two ways that visitors share their referrer. One is the "referer" header (yes, it is misspelled). It contains a URl of the referring site or application. For example, if someone clicked from a search result it might say <code>https://yahoo.com</code>.</p>
<p>The other way is using "Urchin Tracking Module" query strings. At the end of the URl they visit, they might append something like <code>?utm_source=alices-newsletter</code>.</p>
<p>Some sites, like Reddit, might use multiple subdomains - <code>old.reddit.com</code> or <code>out.reddit.com</code> - so some deduplication may be necessary.</p>
<h2 id="where-in-the-world-are-they"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#where-in-the-world-are-they" class="heading-link">Where in the world are they?</a></h2>
<p>A user's IP address is <em>somewhat</em> accurate method of detecting their location. Yes, users could be proxying through a VPN or using a SIM card from a foreign country. But this isn't an exercise in precise tracking. Rough and ready is fine.</p>
<p>There are a variety of <a href="https://mailfud.org/geoip-legacy/">GeoIP Databases</a> which are updated semi-regularly. I'm only interested in the country of origin, I don't care about finer resolution than that.</p>
<p>Again, the aim isn't precise targetting. I'd just like to know that people in Sudan ever read my blog posts.</p>
<h2 id="what-else-could-we-use"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#what-else-could-we-use" class="heading-link">What else could we use?</a></h2>
<p>It <em>might</em> be nice to know if someone is using a small-screen or large device. But my CSS is responsive, so I don't care.</p>
<p>Similarly, their Internet connection speed might be available. But, again, I try to optimise things so that isn't necessary to know.</p>
<p>Do I need to know if someone speaks Hungarian? No. There's nothing useful I can do with that information.</p>
<p>Could I extract their operating system, device, and browser from their User-Agent? I guess. Would I use the information that X% of my readers use Firefox on Linux? Doubtful!</p>
<h2 id="collect-the-information"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#collect-the-information" class="heading-link">Collect the information</a></h2>
<p>There are two main methods of collecting these data.</p>
<p>First is a "no JavaScript" solution. This tells the browser to request an image which has a query string to send along the details of the page requested.</p>
<pre><code class="language-php"><noscript>
<img src="/tracking.php?ID=<?php echo $postID ?>" alt="" width=1 height=1 class=hidden>
</noscript>
</code></pre>
<p>The downside is that there's no way to capture referer information. If each page were dynamically generated, I could grab it from PHP's <code>$_SERVER</code> superglobal. But my website is heavily cached, so that isn't possible.</p>
<p>It <em>is</em> possible to use JavaScript to dynamically send the information for collection:</p>
<pre><code class="language-js">let formData = new FormData();
formData.append("HTTP_REFERER", document.referrer);
formData.append("ID", <?php echo $postID ?>);
fetch("/tracking.php", {
method: "POST",
body: formData,
});
</code></pre>
<p>This approach has three distinct advantages.</p>
<ol>
<li>It works whether the user has JS enabled or not.</li>
<li>Repeated requests for the same page will usually reload the image from cache, so won't double-count.</li>
<li>It doesn't count hits from bots. They typically don't execute JavaScript or don't request images.</li>
</ol>
<h2 id="bot-detection"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#bot-detection" class="heading-link">Bot Detection</a></h2>
<p>Not all traffic originates from humans. There are lots of bots which crawl the web. Some are useful - like search engines building up a map. Others are harmful - like AI agents aggressively scraping content to plagiarise.</p>
<p>There are <a href="https://www.humansecurity.com/learn/blog/crawlers-list-known-bots-guide/">lots of identifiable bots</a> out there - and more which obfuscate themselves. There are some, like <a href="https://github.com/GoogleChrome/lighthouse/pull/14384">Lighthouse</a> which cloak themselves.</p>
<p>I'm not trying to eliminate everything which <em>could</em> be a bot. I am trying for <em>reasonably</em> accurate. So I eliminate any User-Agent which contains:</p>
<p><code>"/bot|crawl|spider|seo|lighthouse|facebookexternalhit|preview|HeadlessChrome/i"</code></p>
<p>There are some <a href="https://github.com/fabiomb/is_bot">big lists of bots</a> you can use - but they don't seem to trigger my analytics because they aren't requesting the images or executing the JS.</p>
<h2 id="what-bits-of-the-site-to-measure"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#what-bits-of-the-site-to-measure" class="heading-link">What bits of the site to measure?</a></h2>
<p>I only care about how many visitors my posts and pages get. I don't need to know if someone visited a tag page, or scrolled back to page 100 of posts from 2019. Those sorts of deep pages are usually only accessed by bots anyway.</p>
<p>I also don't want to count visits from me, myself, and I.</p>
<p>So the tracking is only inserted on single pages which are viewed by non-admins:</p>
<pre><code class="language-php">if ( is_singular() && !current_user_can( "edit_posts" ) ) {
…
}
</code></pre>
<h2 id="oddities"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#oddities" class="heading-link">Oddities</a></h2>
<p>Sometimes, the URl requested will look something like: <code>https://shkspr-mobi.translate.goog</code> - that just means Google has translated it.</p>
<p>Sometimes, the referer will look something like: <code>android-app://com.google.android.gm/</code> - that just means they clicked from an Android app.</p>
<p>Sometimes, the URl requested will include a fragment or a query string - they can be ignored.</p>
<p>Sometimes, the <code>utm_</code> will contain all sorts of weird stuff. It isn't always possible to pull out exactly where it has come from.</p>
<p>Sometimes, the referer and <code>utm_</code> will disagree. Ah well, never mind.</p>
<p>Sometimes, RSS views are counted and sometimes not. Perhaps I should fix that?</p>
<p>Sometimes, users block trackers or use a text-only browser. That's fine, they can keep their secrets.</p>
<h2 id="saving-the-data"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#saving-the-data" class="heading-link">Saving the data</a></h2>
<p>I started this by just shoving what I collected into a CSV.</p>
<pre><code class="language-php">// Write the CSV.
$line = [date("c"), $ID, $UA, $referer, $domain, $country, $user];
// Date-based filename.
$filename = "log-" . date("Y-m-d") . ".csv";
// Append mode.
$handle = fopen( $filename, "a" );
fputcsv( $handle, $line );
fclose( $handle );
</code></pre>
<p>Nothing fancy. Something easily grepable with the ability to query it in more detail if I need. At the number of hits that my site gets, it is less than 1MB per day.</p>
<p>I've since moved it into a single MySQL table. That might not be sustainable with hundreds of thousands of rows. But that's tomorrow's problem.</p>
<h2 id="accuracy"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#accuracy" class="heading-link">Accuracy</a></h2>
<p>I've been running this for a couple of days - simultaneously with my other, more professional, stats plugin. It is within 5% accuracy. It appears to <em>slightly</em> exaggerate the number of visitors and undercount my page-views. That's good enough for my purposes and probably good for my ego!</p>
<h2 id="putting-it-all-together"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#putting-it-all-together" class="heading-link">Putting it all together</a></h2>
<p>You can take a look at all the code <a href="https://gitlab.com/edent/blog-theme/">on my GitLab repo</a>.</p>
<h2 id="what-does-it-look-like"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#what-does-it-look-like" class="heading-link">What does it look like?</a></h2>
<p>If you've made it this far, you can have a little pictorial treat! Aren't you lucky?</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/stats-view.webp" alt="Three tables. One showing referers with colourful favicons. Another countries with colourful emoji flags. One a list of pages and views." width="2450" height="1400" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-63260">
<h2 id="whats-next"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#whats-next" class="heading-link">What's next?</a></h2>
<p>For now, a simple table structure is fine. I've shoved it in a basic database. Sure, I don't have any indexes or fancy stuff like that. But modern computers are pretty fast.</p>
<p>Eventually I'll need to create some new tables which will consolidate the data. Perhaps a table for individual posts, using date and country? Or maybe referer? I'll have to see.</p>
<p>I also need a way to get historic data into it. I've blog stats going back to 2009 which I am anxious not to lose.</p>
<p>And, yeah, I'll need a better front-end than manually running SQL queries.</p>
<p>Above all, I want to keep it simple enough that my puny mortal brain can understand it after several years of not touching anything. I want to build something which can run without constant maintenance.</p>
<p>Remember, this is only an exercise in self-learning, self-hosting, and self-respect.</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:learn" role="doc-endnote">
<p>I enjoy learning. If you're about to say "Why not just install…" then you've missed the point. I like understanding how things work, I get joy from discovering some new function, my brain feels happy when it is working on a problem. I don't want to just click install, hit next a few times, and fiddle with a few options. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2020/12/build-dont-buy/">I've written more about my philosophy here</a>. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fnref:learn" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:orisit" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Or is it? There are 4 billion IPv4 addresses - although slightly fewer in actual use. Creating a rainbow table with 4 billion rows is possible if I was <em>just</em> using IP addresses. But there are an almost infinite variety of User Agent strings. It is probably possible to create a rainbow table of, for example, the 10 most popular UAs, concatenate them with every possible IP address, and then see which hashes to <code>65fef01fef257963</code>. But even then, what would that get an attacker? Knowing that the most popular model of iPhone is on a mobile network's IP range isn't exactly private information. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fnref:orisit" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>4</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Event Review: Doin' the Lambeth Walk (Oi!) ★★★⯪☆]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/event-review-doin-the-lambeth-walk-oi/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63196</id>
<updated>2025-09-14T10:18:40Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-09T11:34:19Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="london" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="review" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Historical entities have been sighted in the old village of Lambeth. Are they ghosts? Visions? Or intruders through a crack in time? Join your guides and explore the backwaters and byways that slowly spread over the mysterious marshes of Lambeth. Most walking tours have a guide drag you around the well-known tourist hot-spots while they read out a bit from Wikipedia. Minimum Labyrinth’s tour i…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/event-review-doin-the-lambeth-walk-oi/"><![CDATA[<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/lambeth-walk.webp" alt="Poster" width="250" height="250" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-63199">
<blockquote><p>Historical entities have been sighted in the old village of Lambeth. Are they ghosts? Visions? Or intruders through a crack in time? Join your guides and explore the backwaters and byways that slowly spread over the mysterious marshes of Lambeth.</p></blockquote>
<p>Most walking tours have a guide drag you around the well-known tourist hot-spots while they read out a bit from Wikipedia. Minimum Labyrinth’s tour is <em>different</em>. We were told to find the meeting spot by looking for a mysterious message chalked somewhere on Westminster Bridge.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/chalk.webp" alt="Chalked onto the bridge, the message "Why did you come here?"" width="1020" height="768" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-63203">
<p>As the bells from Big Ben faded - ghosts appeared!</p>
<p>We were whisked away onto a tour which was part history lesson, part ghost story, and part science-fiction extravaganza. As we wandered through the streets, various "baddies" appeared out of nowhere. Ghosts came to chat with us and then promptly vanished. Music played causing onlookers to pause their hurried strolling. It was somewhere between immersive theatre and <em>immersed</em> theatre.</p>
<p>The walk was well paced. The three acts each consisted of 50 minutes of strolling then 30 minutes in a pub. Perfect for a loo-break and refreshments. The cast didn't stay in character during the pub - which was a relief for them, and meant we could chat about what we thought of the event.</p>
<p>It took us through some parts of London I was vaguely familiar with - and some which were completely new. It is brilliant having someone explain exactly <em>why</em> that piece of art is where it is, or <em>who</em> commissioned that church, and point out that <em>exquisite</em> detail you might have missed.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/art.webp" alt="Stencil art on a wall. A photorealistic figure holds some pixelated video game items." width="512" height="683" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-63204">
<p>Without wishing to spoil anyone's fun, the sci-fi element was the weakest part of the adventure. It paid "loving homage" to an abandoned and somewhat forgotten TV series. I felt that the story would have been much stronger without tying it in to a larger universe. No one under 50 recognised the characters so I think that aspect fell a little flat.</p>
<p>I also felt that there wasn't <em>quite</em> enough to do during the walk. There were some neat snippets of information but there were long stretches of walking down streets without much going on. Given the slightly spooky and sci-fi nature of the story, I would have expected the audience to have been given little tasks or asked to keep a lookout for ghosts.</p>
<p>That said, the tour took us round some stunning and unexpected spots. The ghostly goings-on were suitably mysterious and the cast kept us all safe and entertained. We had fun exploring little alleyways and art displays which were completely unknown to us.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/doing.webp" alt="Terry and Liz smiling in front of a mural depicting the Lambeth Walk." width="1024" height="729" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-63202">
<p>The team at <a href="http://minimumlabyrinth.org/">Minimum Labyrinth</a> do a variety of weird tours and events. Worth checking out if you want something entertaining and unusual.</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>0</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Some thoughts on personal git hosting]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62821</id>
<updated>2025-09-07T16:31:44Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-07T11:34:46Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="developers" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="git" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="ReDeCentralize" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[As part of my ongoing (and somewhat futile) efforts to ReDeCentralise, I'm looking at moving my personal projects away from GitHub. I already have accounts with GitLab and CodeBerg - but both of those sites are run by someone else. While they're lovely now, there's nothing stopping them becoming as slow or AI-infested as GitHub. So I want to host my own Git instance for my personal projects. …]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/"><![CDATA[<p>As part of my ongoing (and somewhat futile) efforts to ReDeCentralise, I'm looking at moving my personal projects away from GitHub. I already have accounts with <a href="https://gitlab.com/edent/">GitLab</a> and <a href="https://codeberg.org/edent">CodeBerg</a> - but both of those sites are run by someone else. While they're lovely now, there's nothing stopping them becoming as slow or AI-infested as GitHub.</p>
<p>So I want to host my own Git instance for my personal projects. I'm experimenting with <a href="https://git.edent.tel/">https://git.edent.tel/</a></p>
<p>It isn't <em>quite</em> self-hosted; I'm paying <a href="http://pikapod.net/">PikaPod</a> €2/month to deal with the hassle of hosting and updating the software. I get to point my domain name at it which means I can always change the underlying service if I want. For example, it uses Gitea and I might want to switch to Forgejo later.</p>
<p>So far, it works. But there are a few significant drawbacks.</p>
<h2 id="network-effects"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#network-effects" class="heading-link">Network Effects</a></h2>
<p>A large service like GitHub has network effects which are incredible. It feels like 90%+ of all developers have an account there. That means if someone wants to leave a comment or send a PR there is no barrier to entry. That's huge! There are a bunch of popular FOSS projects which make me sign up for <em>yet another</em> service when all I want to do is send a simple bug report which I find deeply annoying.</p>
<p>Luckily, Gitea has built in support for various OAuth providers. So I've set up single-sign-on with Gits Hub and Lab.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/sign-in.webp" alt="An SSO screen with buttons for GitHub and GitLab." width="588" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62822">
<p>I <a href="https://mastodon.social/@Edent/115066706121512523">asked people how easy it was to use</a> - most people were able to use it, although a few people wanted a local-only account.</p>
<p>But is is still a bit of a faff. Even a little bit of hassle turns people away.</p>
<h2 id="forking-isnt-federated"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#forking-isnt-federated" class="heading-link">Forking isn't Federated</a></h2>
<p>Suppose you want to make a Pull Request or just take a copy of the code. At the moment, you have to create a fork on <em>my</em> server. There's no way to easily fork something to your GitHub or personal server.</p>
<p>You can <code>git clone</code> the repo to your local machine, and you can manually move it elsewhere, but there's no way to send a PR from your repo to mine.</p>
<p>There's also no way for users to find other forks. Perhaps the <a href="https://forgefed.org/">upcoming ForgeFed proposals</a> will fix things - but it doesn't exist yet.</p>
<p>As pointed out in "<a href="https://blog.edwardloveall.com/lets-make-sure-github-doesnt-become-the-only-option">Let's Make Sure Github Doesn't Become the only Option</a>" - most of the tooling of git hosting platforms isn't adequate for modern needs.</p>
<h2 id="discoverability"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#discoverability" class="heading-link">Discoverability</a></h2>
<p>The easiest way to find code at the moment is to search GitHub. Moving my stuff to a different site means it will only be discovered by a general search engine.</p>
<p>I want people to find and use my code. If that's hard, they won't. I can point existing users to the repo - but it still cuts down on discovery.</p>
<h2 id="admin-hassles"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#admin-hassles" class="heading-link">Admin Hassles</a></h2>
<p>Although PikaPods takes care of all the hosting administration, there's still the faff of setting up all of Gitea's options.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/gitea-config.webp" alt="Long list of config options." width="801" height="800" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62823">
<p>If I get hit by <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/07/grinding-down-open-source-maintainers-with-ai/">an automated spam attack</a>, it'll be up to me to clean it up.</p>
<p>I'm not sure if I have the time, patience, or expertise to correctly and safely configure everything. Time spent administrating is time not spent coding.</p>
<h2 id="sponsorship"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#sponsorship" class="heading-link">Sponsorship</a></h2>
<p>I get a little bit of money when people <a href="https://github.com/sponsors/edent">sponsor me on GitHub</a>. There's no "sponsor" option on Gitea and, even if there was, the network effects of GitHub are substantial. Getting people to enter their credit card info into a random site isn't as convenient as clicking a button in GitHub.</p>
<h2 id="now-what"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#now-what" class="heading-link">Now What?</a></h2>
<p>My <a href="https://github.com/edent/SuperTinyIcons">most popular Github repo</a> has around 140 contributors. I genuinely don't think I could attract that many people to OAuth onto my personal git hosting service.</p>
<p>Gitea seems to have a mixed reputation. But it's the only one offered by PikaPods.</p>
<p>There are <a href="https://github.workshops.petrichor.me/">interesting discussions about how to replace GitHub</a> but they're only in the early stages.</p>
<p>Although €2/mo isn't a huge amount, I've gotten used to having free services on GitHub / GitLab / CodeBerg.</p>
<p>So this, I think, is my plan:</p>
<ol>
<li>Leave my popular / sponsored repos on GitHub</li>
<li>Move my smaller repos to <a href="https://git.edent.tel/">https://git.edent.tel/</a></li>
<li>Create new repos in there as well</li>
</ol>
<p>I'm also going to look for a hosted Forgejo instance which lets me use my own subdomain - hopefully at a cheaper or comparable price. If you have any recommendations - please let me know!</p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Book Review: Star Trek: Lower Decks, Vol. 1: Second Contact by Ryan North ★★★★★]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-star-trek-lower-decks-vol-1-second-contact-by-ryan-north/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63010</id>
<updated>2025-09-05T11:51:18Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-05T11:34:52Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Book Review" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="NetGalley" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Sci Fi" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I can confidently declare that Lower Decks is the second best Star Trek series after The Orville. Lower Decks has always been bags of fun with a good emotional core. Now your favourite sci-fi capers are available in handy comic book form! Second Contact is a compilation of Lower Decks issues #1–6. You get a bunch of stories spread out over 145 pages. The great thing about a comic of a cartoon i…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-star-trek-lower-decks-vol-1-second-contact-by-ryan-north/"><![CDATA[<p><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/second.jpg" alt="Comic book cover." width="340" height="522" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-63030">
I can confidently declare that Lower Decks is the second best Star Trek series after The Orville. Lower Decks has always been bags of fun with a good emotional core. Now your favourite sci-fi capers are available in handy comic book form!</p>
<p>Second Contact is a compilation of Lower Decks issues #1–6. You get a bunch of stories spread out over 145 pages. The great thing about a comic of a cartoon is that all the characters look <em>identical</em> to their TV counterparts. There's no pesky rights issues to get in the way.</p>
<p>The stories are exactly what you'd expect from Lower Decks. The gang have to deal with aliens, not-too-strange new worlds, and some heavy meta-textual crises. And, yes, it is <em>delightfully</em> meta. There are plenty of call-backs to the show, TNG, and the <em>original</em> animated series. Perfect for nerds like me.</p>
<p>It also introduces some new lore:</p>
<blockquote><p>Kirk sometimes liked to unwind in his quarters by making a fanvid of his own day. This is canon.</p></blockquote>
<p>There's also the first(?) appearance of the "Starfleet Corps of Rhetoric Engineers" who, as their name suggests, help provide some much needed exposition for the technobabble.</p>
<p>Oh, and we find out that the noise the transporters make is "SVRRRRRMMMMMM". Which seems about right.</p>
<p>The episodic pacing is nice and there is a genuine laugh-out-loud moment every few pages. It doesn't try to do anything new or innovative with the comic book format - it's pretty much small panels, the occasional bigger art piece, and one double-pager.</p>
<p>On a technical note, the speech bubbles are in text, rather than raster, format - so your TTS should be able to read them aloud.</p>
<p>Second Contact is the sort of comic book which will keep you giggling with glee at the misadventures of lovable misfits.</p>
<p>Thanks to <a href="https://www.netgalley.co.uk/">Netgalley</a> for the review copy. The book is available to pre-order now - with delivery mid-September 2025.</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>4</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[40 years later, are Bentley's "Programming Pearls" still relevant?]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=44218</id>
<updated>2025-09-08T13:00:34Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-03T11:34:14Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="programming" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[In September 1985, Jon Bentley published Programming Pearls. A collection of aphorisms designed to reveal truths about the field of programming. It's 40 years later - long enough to see several revolutions in the field - so surely these are obsolete, right? They belong in the same category as "always carry a bundle of hay for the horses" or "you won't always have a pocket calculator with you" or …]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/"><![CDATA[<p>In September 1985, Jon Bentley published <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/4284.315122">Programming Pearls</a>. A collection of aphorisms designed to reveal truths about the field of programming.</p>
<p>It's 40 years later - long enough to see several revolutions in the field - so surely these are obsolete, right? They belong in the same category as "always carry a bundle of hay for the horses" or "you won't always have a pocket calculator with you" or "tie an onion on your belt to stay stylish".</p>
<p>Ah, my sweet summer child! <i lang="fr">Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.</i> You'll find nearly everything in here depressingly relevant.</p>
<p>Before we dive in, a word for Bentley on the provenance of this collection:</p>
<p><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/4284.315122.pdf">Programming Pearls.</a></p>
<blockquote><p>Although there is some truth in each saying in this column, all should be taken with a grain of salt. A word about credit. The name associated with a rule is usually the person who sent me the rule, even if they in fact attributed it to their Cousin Ralph (sorry, Ralph). In a few cases I have listed an earlier reference, together with the author’s current affiliation (to the best of my knowledge). I’m sure that I have slighted many people by denying them proper attribution, and to them I offer the condolence that Plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery.</p></blockquote>
<p>Here we go!</p>
<p><a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/4284.315122"><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/pp-fs8.png" alt="Gnarly monochrome scan of Programming Pearls." width="800" height="243" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-49144"></a></p>
<h2 id="coding"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#coding" class="heading-link">Coding</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>When in doubt, use brute force.
Ken Thompson - Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Straight off the bat, a winner! Almost all problems are solvable through brute force. It may take time - but throw more resources at it! Once you know it <em>can</em> be done, then it is time to see <em>how</em> it can be done better.</p>
<blockquote><p>Avoid arc-sine and arc-cosine functions - you can usually do better by applying a trig identity or computing a vector dot-product.
Jim Conyngham - Arvin/Calspan Advanced Technology Center</p></blockquote>
<p>And then, just like that, something broadly irrelevant today. These sorts of mathematical functions have been optimised so far that it probably doesn't matter which way you calculate them.</p>
<blockquote><p>Allocate four digits for the year part of a date: a new millenium is coming.
David Martin - Norristown, Pennsylvania</p></blockquote>
<p><em>*weeps*</em> Why didn't they listen to you, David? While I would hope any code written this side of Y2K uses ISO8601, it is amusing that you still occasionally encounter people who want to save two bytes <em>somewhere</em>. Handy in some small systems, but mostly just a recipe for disaster. Looking at you, <a href="https://www.gps.gov/support/user/rollover/">GPS</a>!</p>
<blockquote><p>Avoid asymmetry.
Andy Huber - Data General Corporation</p></blockquote>
<p>I'll be honest, I'm not sure what Andy is going on about here. I <em>assume</em> that he's talking about having the ability to go A->B without being able to go B->A. Equally, it could be about accepting data in one format and outputting it in a different format. <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33739184">Some more discussion on the topic</a>.</p>
<blockquote><p>The sooner you start to code, the longer the program will take.
Roy Carlson - University of Wisconsin</p></blockquote>
<p><em>Bam!</em> Right in the truth. Much like <a href="https://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/03/29/sharp-axe/">the woodsman who spends his time sharpening his axe</a>, we know that diving into code is probably the least efficient way to create something.</p>
<blockquote><p>If you can’t write it down in English, you can’t code it.
Peter Halpern - Brooklyn, New York</p></blockquote>
<p>So many bugs come from us not understanding the requirements of the user / customer.</p>
<blockquote><p>Details count.
Peter Weinberger - Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Hard agree, Pete! It's very easy to go for the "big picture" view of the software. But unless all those sharp edges are filed down, the code isn't going to have a happy life.</p>
<blockquote><p>If the code and the comments disagree, then both are probably wrong.
Norm Schyer - Belt Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Ah, the dream of self-documenting code will never be realised. Again, this goes back to our (in)ability to properly describe our requirements and our (in)adequacies at turning those comments into code.</p>
<blockquote><p>A procedure should fit on a page.
David Tribble - Arlington, Texas</p></blockquote>
<p>Famously, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/24/the-two-pizza-rule-and-the-secret-of-amazons-success">Amazon has a "Two Pizza" rule</a> which defines the maximum size of a team. The larger and more complex something is, the more likely it is to go wrong. Yes, there are limits to <abbr title="Don't repeat yourself">DRY</abbr> and <abbr title="You ain't gonna need it">YAGNI</abbr> - but we seem firmly in the paradigm that large procedures / functions are ruinous to one's health.</p>
<blockquote><p>If you have too many special cases, you are doing it wrong.
Craig Zerouni - Computer FX Ltd. London, England</p></blockquote>
<p><code>IF/ELSE</code> and <code>CASE/SWITCH</code> still really test our patience. Beautifully clean code which is ruined by special subroutines for rarely occurring situations. But it is hard to call them "wrong". Sometimes the world is complex and it is the job of computers to do the hard work for us.</p>
<blockquote><p>Get your data structures correct first, and the rest of the program will write itself.
David Jones. Assen, The Netherlands</p></blockquote>
<p>Dave is right. A well-defined data structure is <em>still</em> the essence of most <abbr title="Create, read, update and delete">CRUD</abbr> systems.</p>
<h2 id="user-interfaces"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#user-interfaces" class="heading-link">User Interfaces</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>[The Principle of Least Astonishment] Make a user interface as consistent and as predictable as possible.
Contributed by several readers</p></blockquote>
<p><em>*weeps*</em> Why isn't this hammered into every programmer? Today's tools are filled with hidden UI gestures, random menus, and a complete disregard for the user's time.</p>
<blockquote><p>A program designed for inputs from people is usually stressed beyond the breaking point by computer-generated inputs.
Dennis Ritchie. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>I think this one is mostly irrelevant now. Humans can only type at a limited speed, but computers can generate massive amounts of data instantly. But our machines' abilities to ingest that data has also grown. I suppose the nearest thing is the DDoS - where a webserver designed for a few visitors is overwhelmed by a flood of automated and malicious requests.</p>
<blockquote><p>Twenty percent of all input forms filled out by people contain bad data.
Vic Vyssotsky. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Ha! Vic didn't know that we'd have <code><input type...</code> validation in the 21st century! But, yeah, people write all sorts of crap into forms.</p>
<blockquote><p>Eighty percent of all input forms ask questions they have no business asking.
Mike Garey. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Mike was sent from the future to warn the people of the past - but they paid him no heed.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don't make the user provide information that the system already knows.
Rick Lemons. Cardinal Data Systems</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm going to slightly disagree with Rick here. Asking for repeated information is a reasonable way to double-check you've got that information correct. It also helps to validate that the user is who they say they are.</p>
<blockquote><p>For 80 percent of all data sets, 95 percent of the information can be seen in a good graph.
William S. Cleveland. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Those of us who have seen <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anscombe's_quartet">Anscombe's quartet</a> know how true this is.</p>
<h2 id="debugging"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#debugging" class="heading-link">Debugging</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>Of all my programming bugs, 80 percent are syntax errors. Of the remaining 20 percent, 80 percent are trivial logical errors. Of the remaining 4 percent, 80 percent are pointer errors. And the remaining 0.8 percent are hard.
Marc Donner. IBM T. J. Watson Research Center</p></blockquote>
<p>Syntax errors are rarer now that we have IDEs. And I hope visual programming languages will further reduce them. Logic errors still plague us. Pointer errors have been eradicated unless you're working at the very lowest levels. And I'd say the number of "hard" bugs is probably higher now due to the complex interaction of multiple libraries and systems.</p>
<blockquote><p>It takes three times the effort to find and fix bugs in system test than when done by the developer. It takes ten times the effort to find and fix bugs in the field than when done in system test. Therefore, insist on unit tests by the developer.
Larry Bernstein. Bell Communications Research</p></blockquote>
<p>We can quibble about the numbers and the ratios - but it is generally harder to fix in prod. That said, getting crash logs from the field has considerable shortened those ratio.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t debug standing up. It cuts your patience in half, and you need all you can muster.
Dave Storer. Cedar Rapids, Iowa</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm with Team-Standing-Desk! So I think Dave is wrong.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t get suckered in by the comments - they can be terribly misleading. Debug only the code.
Dave Storer. Cedar Rapids, Iowa</p></blockquote>
<p>Hmmm. Yes, this is probably correct. I'm not going to say code is self-documenting these days; but it certainly is a lot easier to read.</p>
<blockquote><p>Testing can show the presence of bugs, but not their absence.
Edsger W. Dijkstra. University of Texas</p></blockquote>
<p>Dare we disagree with Dijkstra?! Well, perhaps a little. With modern fuzzing tools we can show the absence of certain kinds of bugs.</p>
<blockquote><p>Each new user of a new system uncovers a new class of bugs.
Brian Kernighan. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Yup! Our code would be bug-free if it weren't for those pesky users!</p>
<blockquote><p>If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
Ronald Reagan. Santa Barbara, California</p></blockquote>
<p>Amongst the many things about which to disagree with the former President, this is up there! Code needs maintenance. Some things aren't broke until all of a sudden they are. Sure, maybe don't change your app's layout because a manager wants a bonus; but things constantly need fixing.</p>
<blockquote><p>[The Maintainer’s Motto] If we can’t fix it, it ain’t broke.
Lieutenant Colonel Walt Weir. United States Army</p></blockquote>
<p>I believe in you. Self deprecation is fine, but self confidence is better.</p>
<blockquote><p>The first step in fixing a broken program is getting it to fail repeatably.
Tom Duff. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Yes! Transient errors are the worst! And a huge source of the "it works for me" antipattern.</p>
<h2 id="performance"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#performance" class="heading-link">Performance</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>[The First Rule of Program Optimization] Don’t do it.
[The Second Rule of Program Optimization - for experts only] Don't do it yet.
Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson Systems Ltd.</p></blockquote>
<p>As true now as it ever was.</p>
<blockquote><p>The fastest algorithm can frequently be replaced by one that is almost as fast and much easier to understand.
Douglas W. Jones. University of Iowa</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm only <em>mostly</em> in agreement here. Many of the security bugs we see in modern code are due to "clever" tricks which turn out to have nasty strings attached. But, at the microcode level, performance is still everything. And a well-tested fast algorithm may be necessary. As part of the climate crisis we should all be thinking about the efficiency of our code.</p>
<blockquote><p>On some machines indirection is slower with displacement, so the most-used member of a structure or a record should be first.
Mike Morton. Boston, Massachusetts</p></blockquote>
<p>We live in an age of ridiculously fast SSD and RAM access times. Sequential reads are still slightly faster than random jumps, and structures like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-tree">B-Tree</a> give us a good mix of the two. We don't need to align data to the physical tracks of a spinning disk any more.</p>
<blockquote><p>In non-I/O-bound programs, a few percent of the source code typically accounts for over half the run time.
Don Knuth. Stanford University</p></blockquote>
<p>I wonder how true this now is? Perhaps we could replace "I/O" with "Internet requests" and still be accurate?</p>
<blockquote><p>Before optimizing, use a profiler to locate the “hot spots” of the program.
Mike Morton. Boston, Massachusetts</p></blockquote>
<p>Mostly true. But you don't lose much by doing some manual optimisations that you know (from bitter experience) will make a difference.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Conservation of Code Size] When you turn an ordinary page of code into just a handful of instructions for speed, expand the comments to keep the number of source lines, constant.
Mike Morton. Boston, Massachusetts</p></blockquote>
<p>I don't think this is relevant these days. Perhaps it is useful to spend time explaining exactly what trickery you're pulling off with weird syntax. But our tools are now line-count agnostic. Mostly.</p>
<blockquote><p>If the programmer can simulate a construct faster than the compiler can implement the construct itself, then the compiler writer has blown it badly.
Guy L. Steele, Jr. Tartan Laboratories</p></blockquote>
<p>I think this is rather self-evident. But compilers are so ridiculously optimised that this scenario is increasingly rare.</p>
<blockquote><p>To speed up an I/O-bound program, begin by accounting for all I/O. Eliminate that which is unnecessary or redundant, and make the remaining as fast as possible.
David Martin. Norristown, Pennsylvania</p></blockquote>
<p>I think this can be generalised even further. I'm reminded of <a href="https://github.com/npm/npm/issues/11283">NPM's progress bar slowdown issue</a>. There's a lot of redundancy which can be removed in many programs.</p>
<blockquote><p>The fastest I/O is no I/O.
Nils-Peter Nelson. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Man! They were <em>obsessed</em> with I/O back in the day! At large volumes, it is still an issue. But perhaps now we can relax just a little?</p>
<blockquote><p>The cheapest, fastest, and most reliable components of a computer system are those that aren’t there.
Gordon Bell. Encore Computer Corporation</p></blockquote>
<p>A little unfair, I think. It's cheaper to have less RAM, but that doesn't make my laptop faster.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Compiler Writer’s Motto-Optimization Pass] Making a wrong program worse is no sin.
Bill McKeeman. Wang Znstitute</p></blockquote>
<p>Personally, I don't think it is the compiler's job to tell me I'm doing it wrong.</p>
<blockquote><p>Electricity travels a foot in a nanosecond.
Commodore Grace Murray Hopper. United States Navy</p></blockquote>
<p>And a nano-Century is Pi seconds! One of those pub-trivia facts which are irrelevant to modern computing.</p>
<blockquote><p>LISP programmers know the value of everything but the cost of nothing.
Alan Perlis. Yale University</p></blockquote>
<p>Nowadays LISP programmers are a protected species and shouldn't be subject to such harsh treatment.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Little’s Formula] The average number of objects in a queue is the product of the entry rate and the average holding time.
Richard E. Fairley. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>
<p>Another of those truisms which kinda don't matter in a world with infinite disk space. Speed is our greatest worry.</p>
<h2 id="documentation"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#documentation" class="heading-link">Documentation</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>[The Test of Negation] Don’t include a sentence in documentation if its negation is obviously false.
Bob Martin. AT&T Technologies</p></blockquote>
<p>I don't know if that's the same guy as <a href="https://blog.wesleyac.com/posts/robert-martin">Uncle Bob</a> - but it sounds like the sort of claptrap he'd come up with. What's obvious to you might not be obvious to others. Test your writing with your audience to see if they understand your meaning.</p>
<blockquote><p>When explaining a command, or language feature, or hardware widget, first describe the problem it is designed to solve.
David Martin. Norristown, Pennsylvania</p></blockquote>
<p>Agreed. It doesn't need to be an essay, but documentation needs context.</p>
<blockquote><p>[One Page Principle] A (specification, design, procedure, test plan) that will not fit on one page of 8.5-by-11 inch paper cannot be understood.
Mark Ardis. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>
<p>I do have some sympathy with this - see the Two-Pizza rule above - but I think this ignores the reality of modern systems. Yes, we should keep things simple, but we also have to recognise that complexity is unavoidable.</p>
<blockquote><p>The job’s not over until the paperwork’s done.
Anon</p></blockquote>
<p>Amen!</p>
<h2 id="managing-software"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#managing-software" class="heading-link">Managing Software</a></h2>
<blockquote><p>The structure of a system reflects the structure of the organization that built it.
Richard E. Fairley. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>
<p>This is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_law">Conway's Law</a> and it is still fairly true. <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1109/RESER.2013.14">Some studies show it is possible to break out of the paradigm</a> but it holds remarkable power.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t keep doing what doesn’t work.
Anon</p></blockquote>
<p>If only we could tattoo this on the inside of our eyelids, eh?</p>
<blockquote><p>[Rule of Credibility] The first 90 percent of the code accounts for the first 90 percent of the development time. The remaining 10 percent of the code accounts for the other 90 percent of the development time.
Tom Cargill. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Agile methodology has <em>somewhat</em> dimmed the potency of this prediction. I think people are <em>generally</em> better at estimating now. But it is hard to escape <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2022/12/zenos-paradox-and-why-modern-technology-is-rubbish/">Zeno's Paradox</a>.</p>
<blockquote><p>Less than 10 percent of the code has to do with the ostensible purpose of the system; the rest deals with input-output, data validation, data structure maintenance, and other housekeeping.
May Shaw. Carnegie-Mellon University</p></blockquote>
<p>How many times have you installed a simple program only to see it pull in every dependency under the sun? We need an awful lot of scaffolding to keep our houses standing.</p>
<blockquote><p>Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment.
Fred Brooks. University of North Carolina</p></blockquote>
<p>I lean <em>slightly</em> towards this. I also strongly believe that you can pick up a lot of good judgement by listening to your users.</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t write a new program if one already does more or less what you want. And if you must write a program, use existing code to do as much of the work as possible.
Richard Hill. Hewlett-Packard S.A. Geneva, Switzerland</p></blockquote>
<p>This is the open source way. Much easier to fork than start again. But at some point you'll run up against an unwanted design decision which will be load-bearing. Think carefully before you re-use.</p>
<blockquote><p>Whenever possible, steal code.
Tom Duff. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>ITYM "Respect the terms of an OSI approved Open Source licence" - don't you, Tom?</p>
<blockquote><p>Good customer relations double productivity.
Larry Bernstein. Bell Communications Research</p></blockquote>
<p>A lesson learned by Apple and ignored by Google.</p>
<blockquote><p>Translating a working program to a new language or system takes 10 percent of the original development time or manpower or cost.
Douglas W. Jones University of Iowa</p></blockquote>
<p>I honestly don't know how true that is any more. Automated tools must surely have improved that somewhat?</p>
<blockquote><p>Don’t use the computer to do things that can be done efficiently by hand.
Richard Hill. Hewlett-Packard S.A. Geneva, Switzerland</p></blockquote>
<p>A rare disagreement! Things can be efficiently done by hand <em>once or twice</em> but after that, go nuts! Even if it's something as simple as renaming a dozen files in a directory, you'll learn something interesting from automating it.</p>
<blockquote><p>I’d rather write programs to write programs than write programs.
Dick Sites. Digital Equipment Corporation</p></blockquote>
<p>There will always be people who love working on the meta-task. They're not wrong for doing so, but it can be an unhelpful distraction sometimes.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Brooks’s Law of Prototypes] Plan to throw one away, you will anyhow.
Fred Brooks. University of North Carolina</p></blockquote>
<p>I'd go further an suggest throwing out even more. It can be hard to sell that to management - but it is necessary.</p>
<blockquote><p>If you plan to throw one away, you will throw away two.
Craig Zerouni. Computer FX Ltd. London, England</p></blockquote>
<p>Craig with the double-tap!</p>
<blockquote><p>Prototyping cuts the work to produce a system by 40 percent.
Larry Bernstein. Bell Communications Research</p></blockquote>
<p>Minor disagreement. Prototyping <em>is</em> part of the work. And it should probably take a considerable amount of time.</p>
<blockquote><p>[Thompson’s rule for first-time telescope makers] It is faster to make a four-inch mirror then a six-inch mirror than to make a six-inch mirror.
Bill McKeeman. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>
<p>Yes. It is always tempting to go for the big win. But baby-steps!</p>
<blockquote><p>Furious activity is no substitute for understanding.
H. H. Williams. Oakland, California</p></blockquote>
<p>Goodness me, yes! It's always tempting to rush in pell-mell. But that's a poor use of time.</p>
<blockquote><p>Always do the hard part first. If the hard part is impossible, why waste time on the easy part? Once the hard part is done, you’re home free.
Always do the easy part first. What you think at first is the easy part often turns out to be the hard part. Once the easy part is done, you can concentrate all your efforts on the hard part.
Al Schapira. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>Oh, Al! You card! Luckily, there are very few "basic" problems to be solved in modern computing. We know what most of the hard problems are. Perhaps Agile teaches us to always leave software in a working state, so we start with the easy parts?</p>
<blockquote><p>If you lie to the computer, it will get you.
Perry Farrar. Germantown, Maryland</p></blockquote>
<p>We shouldn't anthropomorphise computers; they don't like it. Actually, nowadays it's is quite common to "lie" to computers with dummy data and virtualised environments. It's fine.</p>
<blockquote><p>If a system doesn’t have to be reliable, it can do anything else.
H. H. Williams. Oakland, California</p></blockquote>
<p>Perhaps it is my imagination, but we seem less concerned with reliability these days. A Tesla car is a wonderful example of that.</p>
<blockquote><p>One person’s constant is another person’s variable.
Susan Gerhart. Microelectronics and Computer Technology Corp.</p></blockquote>
<p>I wonder about this one a lot. Scoped access to variables possibly makes this less of an issue in the 21st century?</p>
<blockquote><p>One person’s data is another person’s program.
Guy L. Steele, Jr. Tartan Laboratories</p></blockquote>
<p>I don't quite get this. Anyone care to explain?</p>
<blockquote><p>Eschew clever rules.
Joe Condon. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>
<p>The pearls end with this gem.</p>
<h2 id="what-have-we-learned-today"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#what-have-we-learned-today" class="heading-link">What have we learned today?</a></h2>
<p>The majority of my disagreements are minor quibbles. And while disk-bound I/O is rarely a problem, network latency has replaced it as the main cause of delays. We've managed to fix some things, but many seem irrevocably tied to the human condition.</p>
<p>Which one was your favourite?</p>
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<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[A little oddity in the way curl deals with old dates]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63068</id>
<updated>2025-09-01T10:45:21Z</updated>
<published>2025-09-01T11:34:48Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="bug" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="curl" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="linux" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="time" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[For boring technical reasons, computers think the world began on 1st of January 1970. To keep track of the future, they count the number of seconds since that momentous date. So zero seconds represents midnight on that day. So how do computers deal with dates before The Beatles' Abbey Road was top of the UK album charts? Negative numbers! Most modern computers can deal with dates far in the…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/"><![CDATA[<p>For boring technical reasons, computers think the world began on 1st of January 1970<sup id="fnref:who"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:who" class="footnote-ref" title="Although, who is to say it didn't? Were you there? Do you have proof? Maybe the Young Earth Creationists aren't ambitious enough?!" role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup>. To keep track of the future, they count the number of seconds since that momentous date. So zero seconds represents midnight on that day<sup id="fnref:midnight"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:midnight" class="footnote-ref" title="Except! Psych! It doesn't! The UK was experimenting with year-round BST so there's actually an hour's difference. Time is hard™." role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup>.</p>
<p>So how do computers deal with dates <em>before</em> The Beatles' Abbey Road was top of the UK album<sup id="fnref:album"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:album" class="footnote-ref" title="Do not search for the number 1 single on that date. You'll give yourself a sad." role="doc-noteref">2</a></sup> charts?</p>
<p>Negative numbers! Most modern computers can deal with dates far in the past and, hopefully, far into the future. Again, for <a href="https://righteousit.com/2024/09/04/more-on-ext4-timestamps-and-timestomping/">boring technical reasons</a>, lots of computers can only save files with a date no earlier than 13th December 1901<sup id="fnref:book"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:book" class="footnote-ref" title="The music charts were less well-developed in 1901. But you could have read "The Purple Cloud" which is a brilliant early sci-fi novel." role="doc-noteref">3</a></sup>.</p>
<p>When you download a file from the Internet, the sending server can tell you when that file was last modified. That's useful if you only want to download the file if it has changed since you last got it.</p>
<p>It presents the date using <a href="https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc1123">RFC 1123</a> format for reasons which are lost to the ages.</p>
<p><code>< Last-Modified: Wed, 09 Oct 1940 16:45:49 +0100</code></p>
<p>Great!</p>
<p>If you use the venerable <code>wget</code> utility, it will happily save the file on your disk and tell you that is when it was created.</p>
<p>But what if you use <code>curl -OR</code> to download the file? The <code>-R</code> option says:</p>
<blockquote><p><a href="https://curl.se/docs/manpage.html#-R">Make curl attempt to figure out the timestamp of the remote file that is getting downloaded, and if that is available make the local file get that same timestamp. </a></p></blockquote>
<p>THIS IS A LIE!<sup id="fnref:lie"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:lie" class="footnote-ref" title="Everything you know is false! How deep does this conspiracy go!?!?" role="doc-noteref">4</a></sup></p>
<p>If curl sees a date with a negative time, it pretends that the past doesn't exist and that what you <em>really</em> wanted was to save the file with today's date and time.</p>
<p>Why does it do this?</p>
<p>I <em>think</em> it is because <a href="https://github.com/curl/curl/blob/f08ecdc586203026d1a81bd401486261f28848d3/src/tool_filetime.c#L89-L91">this code only checks for times ≥ 0</a>. Which, I guess, is pretty reasonable. There weren't <em>many</em> computers around before the 1970s<sup id="fnref:zero"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:zero" class="footnote-ref" title="Although, there were some. Not just the secret ones used to control the weather - but actual proper computers you could use to do maths!" role="doc-noteref">5</a></sup> so the chances of finding a file which predates disco are slim.</p>
<p>Should we storm the barricades and demand this temporal anomaly be rectified?<sup id="fnref:photon"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:photon" class="footnote-ref" title="Preferably by firing photon torpedoes. Or maybe ejecting the warp core. I'm not an engineer." role="doc-noteref">6</a></sup> Nah. I've <a href="https://github.com/curl/curl/discussions/18424">raised it as a discussion item on curl's GitHub</a>.</p>
<p>If you have strong opinions about this - please join in the discussion<sup id="fnref:help"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:help" class="footnote-ref" title="Or seek help from a mental health professional." role="doc-noteref">7</a></sup>.</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:who" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Although, who is to say it didn't? Were you there? Do you have proof? Maybe the Young Earth Creationists aren't ambitious enough?! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:who" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:midnight" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Except! Psych! It doesn't! <a href="https://www.shellscript.sh/examples/1970/">The UK was experimenting with year-round BST</a> so there's actually an hour's difference. Time is hard™. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:midnight" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:album" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Do not search for the number 1 <em>single</em> on that date. You'll give yourself a sad. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:album" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:book" role="doc-endnote">
<p>The music charts were less well-developed in 1901. But you could have read "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Purple_Cloud">The Purple Cloud</a>" which is a brilliant early sci-fi novel. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:book" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:lie" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Everything you know is false! How deep does this conspiracy go!?!? <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:lie" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:zero" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Although, there were <em>some</em>. Not just the secret ones used to control the weather - but actual proper computers you could use to do maths! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:zero" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:photon" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Preferably by firing photon torpedoes. Or maybe ejecting the warp core. I'm not an engineer. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:photon" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:help" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Or seek help from a mental health professional. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:help" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Some minor bugs in Proton's new Authenticator app]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62350</id>
<updated>2025-08-01T09:31:17Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-31T11:34:55Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="2fa" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="CyberSecurity" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="MFA" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Proton" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="totp" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I maintain a a test-suite for TOTP codes. It contains a bunch of codes which adhere to the specification, some of which stretch it to breaking point, and some that are completely invalid. These codes are a good starting point for checking whether a 2FA / MFA app works correctly. Proton have release a swish new authenticator app for Android, iOS, Mac, Linux and Windows. Sadly, their open source…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/"><![CDATA[<p>I maintain a <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/03/towards-a-test-suite-for-totp-codes/">a test-suite for TOTP codes</a>. It contains a bunch of codes which adhere to the specification, some of which stretch it to breaking point, and some that are completely invalid. These codes are a good starting point for checking whether a 2FA / MFA app works correctly.</p>
<p>Proton have release a swish <a href="https://proton.me/authenticator">new authenticator app</a> for Android, iOS, Mac, Linux and Windows. Sadly, their <a href="https://github.com/protonpass/android-pass">open source repository</a> doesn't allow for bug reports so I'm blogging in public instead.</p>
<p>The good news is, the majority of tests pass. It accepts a wide range of acceptable codes and refuses to store most broken ones. There are a few niggles though. None of these are severe security issues, but they probably ought to be fixed.</p>
<h2 id="very-long-codes"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#very-long-codes" class="heading-link">Very long codes</a></h2>
<p>The maximum number of digits which can be generated by the standard TOTP algorithm is 10. Proton happily scans codes containing 1 - 9 digits, but complains about 10 digit codes. So this fails:</p>
<p><code>otpauth://totp/issuer%3Aaccount%20name?secret=QWERTYUIOP&digits=10&issuer=issuer&algorithm=SHA1&period=30</code></p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/10digit.webp" alt="QR code for a 10 digit TOTP." width="360" height="360" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62370">
<p>The TOTP RFC says:</p>
<blockquote><p>Basically, the output of the HMAC-SHA-1 calculation is truncated to obtain user-friendly values</p>
<p><a href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc6238#section-1.2">1.2. Background</a></p></blockquote>
<p>But doesn't say how far to truncate.</p>
<p>There's nothing I can see in the spec that <em>prevents</em> an implementer using all 10.</p>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The user may not be able to store a valid code.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Allow 10 digit codes.</p>
<h2 id="invalid-secrets"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#invalid-secrets" class="heading-link">Invalid Secrets</a></h2>
<p>Here we get to yet another <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/02/the-least-secure-totp-code-possible/">deficiency in the TOTP specification</a>. How is a secret defined?</p>
<p>Google says the secret is:</p>
<blockquote><p>an arbitrary key value encoded in Base32 according to RFC 3548. The padding specified in RFC 3548 section 2.2 is not required and should be omitted.</p></blockquote>
<p>Whereas Apple says it is:</p>
<blockquote><p>An arbitrary key value encoded in Base32. Secrets should be at least 160 bits.</p></blockquote>
<p>Either way, <a href="https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc3548#section-5">the Base32 alphabet</a> contains only uppercase letters and a few numbers. What happens if we give it a secret like <code>QWERT!£$%^)*(YUIOP</code>?</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/invaid-secret.webp" alt="QR code for an invalid secret." width="360" height="360" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62371">
<p>Proton Authenticator just accepts it. It stores the full secret but I'm not sure how it generates the code based on it.</p>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The code may be generated incorrectly.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Warn the user that the secret may be invalid and that a correct 2FA code cannot be guaranteed.</p>
<h2 id="issuer-mismatch"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#issuer-mismatch" class="heading-link">Issuer Mismatch</a></h2>
<p>In this example, the first issuer is example.com but the second issuer is microsoft.com</p>
<p><code>otpauth://totp/example.com%3Aaccount%20name?secret=QWERTYUIOP&digits=6&issuer=microsoft.com&algorithm=SHA1&period=30</code></p>
<p>What should the TOTP reader do with this? Proton chooses microsoft.com.</p>
<p>This is something which, again, is inconsistent between major providers.</p>
<p>Google says this parameter is:</p>
<blockquote><p><strong>Strongly Recommended</strong> The issuer parameter is a string value indicating the provider or service this account is associated with, URL-encoded according to RFC 3986. If the issuer parameter is absent, issuer information may be taken from the issuer prefix of the label. If both issuer parameter and issuer label prefix are present, they should be equal.</p></blockquote>
<p>Apple merely says:</p>
<blockquote><p>The domain of the site or app. The password manager uses this field to suggest credentials when setting up a new code generator.</p></blockquote>
<p>Yubico equivocates with</p>
<blockquote><p>The issuer parameter is recommended, but it can be absent. Also, the issuer parameter and issuer string in label should be equal.</p></blockquote>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The code may be displayed with the wrong issuer.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Warn the user that there are multiple issuers. Let them choose which one is correct.</p>
<h2 id="dealing-with-defaults"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#dealing-with-defaults" class="heading-link">Dealing With Defaults</a></h2>
<p>What should a TOTP app do if there is missing information? Proton does the following:</p>
<ul>
<li>If the code has no number set for digits, it defaults to 6</li>
<li>If the code has no time set for period, it defaults to 30</li>
<li>If the code has no algorithm, it defaults to SHA1</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> Low. The user normally has to confirm with the issuer that the the TOTP code has been correctly stored.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Let the user know that the code has missing data and may not be correct.</p>
<h2 id="odd-labels"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#odd-labels" class="heading-link">Odd Labels</a></h2>
<p>The label allows you to have multiple codes for the same service. For example <code>Big Bank:Personal Account</code> and <code>Big Bank:Family Savings</code>. The Google spec is slightly confusing:</p>
<blockquote><p>The issuer prefix and account name should be separated by a literal or url-encoded colon, and optional spaces may precede the account name. Neither issuer nor account name may themselves contain a colon.</p></blockquote>
<p>What happens if there are spaces before the account name?</p>
<p><code>otpauth://totp/Spaces:%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20test%40example.com?secret=QWERTYUIOP&digits=6&issuer=&algorithm=SHA1&period=30</code>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/spaces.webp" alt="QR code for a TOTP." width="400" height="400" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62374"></p>
<p>Proton strips the spaces (probably wise) but also removes the issuer.</p>
<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The user will not know which account the code is for.</p>
<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Keep the issuer.</p>
<h2 id="timeline"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#timeline" class="heading-link">Timeline</a></h2>
<p>These aren't particularly high severity bugs, nevertheless I like to give organisations a bit of time to respond.</p>
<ul>
<li>2025-07-31 - Discovered.</li>
<li>2025-08-01 - Disclosed <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/proton.me/post/3lvbnajumh22e">via a web form</a>.</li>
<li>2025-08-31 - Automatically published.</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="next-steps"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#next-steps" class="heading-link">Next Steps</a></h2>
<ul>
<li>If you're a user, <a href="https://codeberg.org/edent/TOTP_Test_Suite">please contribute tests</a> or give feedback.</li>
<li>If you're a developer, please check your app conforms to the specification.</li>
<li>If you're from a security company - wanna help me write up a proper RFC so this doesn't cause issues in the future?</li>
</ul>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Is it possible to allow sideloading *and* keep users safe?]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63058</id>
<updated>2025-08-28T15:16:23Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-30T11:34:55Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="android" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="google" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="rant" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="scam" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[In which I attempt to be pragmatic. Are you allowed to run whatever computer program you want on the hardware you own? This is a question where freedom, practicality, and reality all collide into a mess. Google has recently announced that Android users will only be able to install apps which have been digitally signed by developers who have registered their name and other legal details with…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/"><![CDATA[<p>In which I <em>attempt</em> to be pragmatic.</p>
<p>Are you allowed to run whatever computer program you want on the hardware you own? This is a question where freedom, practicality, and reality all collide into a mess.</p>
<p>Google has recently announced that Android users will only be able to install apps which have been digitally signed by developers who have registered their name and other legal details with Google. To many people, this signals the death of "sideloading" - the ability to install apps which don't originate on the official store<sup id="fnref:sideload"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#fn:sideload" class="footnote-ref" title="Post by @[email protected] View on Mastodon" role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup>.</p>
<script data-allowed-prefixes="https://mastodon.social/" async="" src="https://mastodon.social/embed.js"></script>
<p>I'm a fully paid-up member of the Cory Doctorow fanclub. Back in 2011, he gave a speech called "<a href="https://boingboing.net/2012/08/23/civilwar.html">The Coming War on General Computation</a>". In it, he rails against the idea that our computers could become traitorous; serving the needs of someone other than their owner. Do we want to live in a future where our computers refuse to obey our commands? No! Neither law nor technology should conspire to reduce our freedom to compute.</p>
<p>There are, I think, two small cracks in that argument.</p>
<p>The first is that a user has no right to run anyone else's code, if the code owner doesn't want to make it available to them. Consider a bank which has an app. When customers are scammed, the bank is often liable. The bank wants to reduce its liability so it says "<a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2023/05/the-limits-of-general-purpose-computation/">you can't run our app on a rooted phone</a>".</p>
<p>Is that fair? Probably not. Rooting allows a user to fully control and customise their device. But rooting also allows malware to intercept communications, send commands, and perform unwanted actions. I think the bank has the right to say "your machine is too risky - we don't want our code to run on it."</p>
<p>The same is true of video games with strong "anti-cheat" protection. It is disruptive to other players - and to the business model - if untrustworthy clients can disrupt the game. Again, it probably isn't <em>fair</em> to ban users who run on permissive software, but it is a <em>rational</em> choice by the manufacturer. And, yet again, I think software authors probably should be able to restrict things which cause them harm.</p>
<p>So, from their point of view it is pragmatic to insist that their software can only be loaded from a trustworthy location.</p>
<p>But that's not the only thing Google is proposing. Let's look at <a href="https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2025/08/elevating-android-security.html">their announcement</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p>We’ve seen how malicious actors hide behind anonymity to harm users by impersonating developers and using their brand image to create convincing fake apps. The scale of this threat is significant: our recent analysis found <strong>over 50 times more malware</strong> from internet-sideloaded sources than on apps available through Google Play.</p></blockquote>
<p>Back in the early days of Android, you could just install any app and it would run, no questions asked. That was a touchingly naïve approach to security - extremely easy to use but left users vulnerable.</p>
<p>A few years later, Android changed to show user the permissions an app was requesting. Here's a genuine screenshot from <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2013/04/what-can-android-learn-from-symbians-security-model/">an app which I tried to sideload in 2013</a>:</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Legit-App-Permissions.png" alt="A terrifying list of permissions." width="480" height="800" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-28202">
<p>No rational user would install a purported battery app with that scary list of permissions, right? Wrong!</p>
<p>We know that <a href="https://www.nngroup.com/articles/how-little-do-users-read/">users don't read</a> and they especially <a href="https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1389027/1/KrolWarnings-CameraReady.pdf">don't read security warnings</a>.</p>
<p>There is no UI tweak you can do to prevent users bypassing these scary warnings. There is no amount of education you can provide to reliably make people stop and think.</p>
<p>Here's the story of <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-64981507">a bank literally telling a man he was being scammed</a> and he <em>still</em> proceeded to transfer funds to a fraudster.</p>
<blockquote><p>It emerged that, in this case, Lloyds had done a really good job of not only spotting the potential fraud but alerting James to it. The bank blocked a number of transactions, it spoke to James on the phone to warn him and even called him into a branch to speak to him face-to-face.</p></blockquote>
<p>Here's another one where <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-67208755">a victim deliberately lied to their bank</a> even after acknowledging that they had been told it was a scam.</p>
<p>Android now requires you to deliberately turn on the ability to side-load. It will give you prompts and warnings, force you to take specific actions, give you pop-ups and all sorts of confirmation steps.</p>
<p>And people still click on.</p>
<p>Let's go back to Google announcement. This change isn't being rolled out worldwide immediately. They say:</p>
<blockquote><p>This change will start in a few select countries specifically impacted by these forms of fraudulent app scams, often from repeat perpetrators.</p>
<p>…</p>
<p>September 2026: These requirements go into effect in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand. At this point, any app installed on a certified Android device in these regions must be registered by a verified developer.</p></blockquote>
<p>The police in Singapore have a page <a href="https://www.police.gov.sg/Media-Room/News/20241106_advisory_on_the_prevalence_of_malware_scams_affecting_android_users">warning about the prevalence of these scams</a>. They describe how victims are tricked or coerced into turning off all their phone's security features.</p>
<p>Similarly, there are estimates that <a href="https://www.gasa.org/post/1-in-3-brazilians-targeted-by-scammers-in-2024-state-of-scam-report">Brazil lost US$54 <strong>billion</strong> to scams in 2024</a> (albeit not all through apps).</p>
<p>There are <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/indonesia/comments/1mjpnlo/optimisasi_apk_pemerintah_yg_kyk_kontol_enables/?tl=en">anecdotal reports from Indonesia</a> which show how easily people fall for these fake apps.</p>
<p>Thailand is also <a href="https://www.bangkokpost.com/tech/2487659/phone-users-warned-over-malicious-apps">under an ongoing onslaught of malicious apps</a> with some apps raking in <a href="https://thethaiger.com/hot-news/crime/thai-police-crackdown-on-app-scam-seizing-nearly-1-million-baht">huge amounts of money</a>.</p>
<p>It is absolutely rational that government, police, and civic society groups want to find ways to stop these scams.</p>
<p>Google is afraid that if Android's reputation is tarnished as the "Scam OS" then users will move to more secure devices.</p>
<p>Financial institutions might stop providing functionality to Android devices as a way to protect their customers. Which would lead to those users seeking alternate phones.</p>
<p>Society as a whole wants to protect vulnerable people. We all bear the cost of dealing with criminal activity like this.</p>
<p>Given that sideloaded Android apps are clearly a <em>massive</em> vector for fraud, it obviously behoves Google to find a way to secure their platform as much as possible.</p>
<h2 id="and-yet"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#and-yet" class="heading-link">And Yet…</a></h2>
<p>This is quite obviously a bullshit powerplay by Google to ensnare the commons. Not content with closing down parts of the Android Open Source Project, stuffing more and more vital software behind its proprietary services, and freezing out small manufacturers - now it wants the name and shoe-size of every developer!</p>
<p>Fuck that!</p>
<p>I want to use my phone to run the code that I write. I want to run my friends' code. I want to play with cool open source projects by people in far-away lands.</p>
<p>I remember <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2015/11/the-day-google-deleted-me/">The Day Google Deleted Me</a> - we cannot have these lumbering monsters gatekeeping what we do on our machines.</p>
<p>Back in the days when I was a BlackBerry developer, <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2012/06/how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-blackberry/#what-specific-things-could-the-research-in-motion-developer-relations-team-do-or-communicate-that-would-make-you-more-likely-to-develop-applications-for-the-blackberry-10-platform">we had to wait ages for RIM's code-signing server to become available</a>. I'm pretty sure the same problem affected Symbian - if Nokia was down that day, you couldn't release any code.</p>
<p>Going back to their statement:</p>
<blockquote><p>To be clear, developers will have the same freedom to distribute their apps directly to users through sideloading or to use any app store they prefer.</p></blockquote>
<p>This is a lie. I can only distribute a sideloaded app <strong>if Google doesn't nuke my account</strong>. If I piss off someone there, or they click the wrong button, or they change the requirements so I'm no longer eligible - my content disappears.</p>
<p>They promise that <a href="https://developer.android.com/developer-verification">Android will still be open to student and hobbyist developers</a> - but would you believe anything those monkey-punchers say? Oh, and what a fricking insult to call a legion of Open Source developers "hobbyists"!</p>
<p>I hate it.</p>
<p>I also don't see how this is going to help. I guess if scammers all use the same ID, then it'll be easy for Android to super-nuke all the scam apps.</p>
<p>Perhaps when you install a sideloaded app you'll see "This app was made by John Smith - not a company. Here's his photo. Got any complaints? Call his number."</p>
<p>But what's going to happen is that people will get their IDs stolen, or be induced to register as a developer and then sign some malware. They'll also be victims.</p>
<h2 id="so-whats-the-solution"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#so-whats-the-solution" class="heading-link">So What's The Solution?</a></h2>
<p>I've tried to be pragmatic, but there's something of a dilemma here.</p>
<ol start="0">
<li>Users should be free to run whatever code they like.</li>
<li>Vulnerable members of society should be protected from scams.</li>
</ol>
<p>Do we accept that a megacorporation should keep everyone safe at the expense of a few pesky nerds wanting to run some janky code?</p>
<p>Do we say that the right to run free software is more important than granny being protected from scammers?</p>
<p>Do we pour billions into educating users not to click "yes" to every prompt they see?</p>
<p>Do we try and build a super-secure Operating System which, somehow, gives users complete freedom without exposing them to risk?</p>
<p>Do we hope that Google won't suddenly start extorting developers, users, and society as a whole?</p>
<p>Do we chase down and punish everyone who releases a scam app?</p>
<p>Do we stick an AI on every phone to detect scam apps and refuse to run them if they're dodgy?</p>
<p>I don't know the answers to any of these questions and - if I'm honest - I don't like asking them.</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:sideload" role="doc-endnote">
<blockquote class="mastodon-embed" data-embed-url="https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/115093185284473606/embed" style="background: #FCF8FF; border-radius: 8px; border: 1px solid #C9C4DA; margin: 0; max-width: 540px; min-width: 270px; overflow: hidden; padding: 0;"> <a href="https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/115093185284473606" target="_blank" style="align-items: center; color: #1C1A25; display: flex; flex-direction: column; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'Segoe UI', Oxygen, Ubuntu, Cantarell, 'Fira Sans', 'Droid Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; justify-content: center; letter-spacing: 0.25px; line-height: 20px; padding: 24px; text-decoration: none;"> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" width="32" height="32" viewBox="0 0 79 75"><path d="M63 45.3v-20c0-4.1-1-7.3-3.2-9.7-2.1-2.4-5-3.7-8.5-3.7-4.1 0-7.2 1.6-9.3 4.7l-2 3.3-2-3.3c-2-3.1-5.1-4.7-9.2-4.7-3.5 0-6.4 1.3-8.6 3.7-2.1 2.4-3.1 5.6-3.1 9.7v20h8V25.9c0-4.1 1.7-6.2 5.2-6.2 3.8 0 5.8 2.5 5.8 7.4V37.7H44V27.1c0-4.9 1.9-7.4 5.8-7.4 3.5 0 5.2 2.1 5.2 6.2V45.3h8ZM74.7 16.6c.6 6 .1 15.7.1 17.3 0 .5-.1 4.8-.1 5.3-.7 11.5-8 16-15.6 17.5-.1 0-.2 0-.3 0-4.9 1-10 1.2-14.9 1.4-1.2 0-2.4 0-3.6 0-4.8 0-9.7-.6-14.4-1.7-.1 0-.1 0-.1 0s-.1 0-.1 0 0 .1 0 .1 0 0 0 0c.1 1.6.4 3.1 1 4.5.6 1.7 2.9 5.7 11.4 5.7 5 0 9.9-.6 14.8-1.7 0 0 0 0 0 0 .1 0 .1 0 .1 0 0 .1 0 .1 0 .1.1 0 .1 0 .1.1v5.6s0 .1-.1.1c0 0 0 0 0 .1-1.6 1.1-3.7 1.7-5.6 2.3-.8.3-1.6.5-2.4.7-7.5 1.7-15.4 1.3-22.7-1.2-6.8-2.4-13.8-8.2-15.5-15.2-.9-3.8-1.6-7.6-1.9-11.5-.6-5.8-.6-11.7-.8-17.5C3.9 24.5 4 20 4.9 16 6.7 7.9 14.1 2.2 22.3 1c1.4-.2 4.1-1 16.5-1h.1C51.4 0 56.7.8 58.1 1c8.4 1.2 15.5 7.5 16.6 15.6Z" fill="currentColor"></path></svg> <div style="color: #787588; margin-top: 16px;">Post by @[email protected]</div> <div style="font-weight: 500;">View on Mastodon</div> </a> </blockquote>
<p><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#fnref:sideload" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Book Review: What Sheep Think about the Weather - Amelia Thomas ★★★☆☆]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-what-sheep-think-about-the-weather-amelia-thomas/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62701</id>
<updated>2025-08-27T20:15:20Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-28T11:34:38Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Book Review" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="NetGalley" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[It started with a hummingbird dive-bombing Amelia Thomas over her morning coffee, and a pair of piglets who just wouldn’t stay put. Soon Amelia, journalist and new farmer, begins to question the communications of the creatures all around her: her pigs, her dogs, the pheasant family inhabiting her wood, her ‘difficult’ big red horse: even the earwigs in the farm’s dark, damp corners. Are they all…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-what-sheep-think-about-the-weather-amelia-thomas/"><![CDATA[<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/sheep.webp" alt="Book cover featuring a sheep." width="200" height="300" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62702">
<blockquote><p>It started with a hummingbird dive-bombing Amelia Thomas over her morning coffee, and a pair of piglets who just wouldn’t stay put. Soon Amelia, journalist and new farmer, begins to question the communications of the creatures all around her: her pigs, her dogs, the pheasant family inhabiting her wood, her ‘difficult’ big red horse: even the earwigs in the farm’s dark, damp corners. Are they all just animals reacting instinctually to the world around them—or are they trying to communicate something deeper?</p></blockquote>
<p>This is a curious - and mostly satisfying - look at the practicalities of interspecies communication. Unlike <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2024/09/book-review-how-to-speak-whale-a-voyage-into-the-future-of-animal-communication-by-tom-mustill/">How to Speak Whale</a>, this doesn't assume that animals have a rich and complex grammar, nor does it make the case for animals having "higher-order" cognition. Instead, this is a fairly practical look at the limits of understanding animals.</p>
<p>Anyone with a pet cat or dog knows that they are experts at <em>some</em> forms of communication. "Feed me" being the primary one!</p>
<blockquote><p>In some ways, animals are simpler than humans. Hamsters don’t deliberately confound or obfuscate. Donkeys don’t gossip. An iguana will not gaslight you. Animals say what they mean. Yet that’s not to say this content is clear, or that we’re always aware it even exists at all.</p></blockquote>
<p>The author is open about her limitations and her goals. At times, it rather feels like reading a series of blog posts as she finds a new paper, chats to a new expert, and accidentally acquires yet another animal. Because she's primarily working with her own animals, there's a fair bit of anthropomorphising going on. Similarly, any "do your own research" project is going to be unaware of how to critically assess evidence. That makes it slightly scattershot and homespun. Nevertheless - it is fascinating what she uncovers.</p>
<p>There are some excellent practical tips for understanding the animal experience (I particularly like the idea of going on all fours and trying to understand a pet's-eye-view of the world). There's also an interesting bunch of interviews with scientists who are seeking to understand how and why animals communicate - and whether we can meaningfully exchange ideas with them, or just condition their behaviour.</p>
<p>But, as the book wears on, the author becomes more and more credulous. She goes on a series of courses which - with the best will in the world - seem to have rather dubious outcomes.</p>
<blockquote><p>Most of what I hear and see over these seven soaking days I need no scientific study to verify. I just sort of know it, the way the chicken guessers and dog listeners in the experiments just sort of knew what the calls signified. I wonder if this has to do with something called the motivational structure hypothesis,</p></blockquote>
<p>With no external interrogation of what she is doing, the book descends into the pseudo-scientific. The author recounts receiving mystic visions, engages with people who believe they can communicate with animals using telepathy, wanders into the realm of quantum physics, and claims that their horse has a psychic bond with her which causes psychosomatic injuries. Oh, and that her raspberry plants are laughing at her.</p>
<p>It is unfortunate that the last few chapters undermine all the interesting and useful information in the rest of the book.</p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Security Flaws in the WebMonetization Site]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62468</id>
<updated>2025-09-11T12:26:13Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-26T11:34:33Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Bug Bounty" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="CyberSecurity" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Responsible Disclosure" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="WebMonetization" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="xss" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I've written before about the nascent WebMonetization Standard. It is a proposal which allows websites to ask users for passive payments when they visit. A visitor to this site could, if this standard is widely adopted, opt to send me cash for my very fine blog posts. All I need to do is add something like this into my site's source code: <link rel="monetization"…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/"><![CDATA[<p>I've written before about <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/03/how-to-prevent-payment-pointer-fraud/">the nascent WebMonetization Standard</a>. It is a proposal which allows websites to ask users for passive payments when they visit. A visitor to this site could, if this standard is widely adopted, opt to send me cash for my very fine blog posts.</p>
<p>All I need to do is add something like this into my site's source code:</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="monetization" href="https://wallet.example.com/edent">
</code></pre>
<p>A user who has a WebMonetization plugin can then easily pay me for my content.</p>
<p>But not every website is created by an individual or a single entity. Hence, the creation of the "<a href="https://webmonetization.org/tools/prob-revshare/">Probabilistic Revenue Share Generator</a>".</p>
<blockquote><p>Probabilistic revenue sharing is a way to share a portion of a web monetized page's earnings between multiple wallet addresses. Each time a web monetized user visits the page, a recipient will be chosen at random. Payments will go to the chosen recipient until the page is closed or reloaded.</p></blockquote>
<p>Nifty! But how does it work?</p>
<p>Let's say a website is created by Alice and Bob. Alice does most of the work and is to receive 70% of the revenue. Bob is to get the remaining 30%. Within the web page's head, the following meta element is inserted:</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link
rel="monetization"
href="https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siaHR0cHM6Ly9leGFtcGxlLmNvbS8iLDcwLCJBbGljZSJdLFsiaHR0cHM6Ly93aGF0ZXZlci50ZXN0LyIsMzAsIkJvYiJdXQ"
/>
</code></pre>
<p>The visitor's WebMonetization plugin will visit that URl and be redirected to Alice's site 70% of time and Bob's 30%.</p>
<p>If we Base64 decode that weird looking URl, we get:</p>
<pre><code class="language-json">[
[
"https://example.com/",
70,
"Alice"
],
[
"https://whatever.test/",
30,
"Bob"
]
]
</code></pre>
<p>Rather than adding multiple URls in the head, the site points to one resource and lets that pick who receives the funds.</p>
<p>There are two small problems with this.</p>
<p>The first is that you have to trust the WebMonetization.org website. If it gets hijacked or goes rogue then all your visitors will be paying someone else. But let's assume they're secure and trustworthy. There's a slightly more insidious threat.</p>
<p>Effectively, this allows an untrusted 3rd party to use the WebMonetization.org domain as an open redirect. That's useful for phishing and other abuses.</p>
<p>For example, an attacker could send messages encouraging people to visit:</p>
<p><a href="https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siaHR0cHM6Ly9leGFtcGxlLmNvbS8iLDk5LCJpbWciXV0">https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siaHR0cHM6Ly9leGFtcGxlLmNvbS8iLDk5LCJpbWciXV0</a></p>
<p>Click that and you'll instantly be redirected to a domain under the attacker's control. This could be particularly bad if the domain encouraged users to share passwords or other sensitive information.</p>
<p>If the Base64 data cannot be decoded to valid JSON, the API will echo back any Base64 encoded text sent to it. This means an attacker could use it to send obfuscated messages. Consider, tor example:</p>
<p><a href="https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siUGxlYXNlIHZpc2l0IFJlYWxfZ29vZF9DYXNpbm9zLmJpeiBmb3IgbG90cyBvZiBDcnlwdG8gZnVuISEhIiwxMjM0NTYsImltZyJdXQ==">https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siUGxlYXNlIHZpc2l0IFJlYWxfZ29vZF9DYXNpbm9zLmJpeiBmb3IgbG90cyBvZiBDcnlwdG8gZnVuISEhIiwxMjM0NTYsImltZyJdXQ==</a></p>
<p>Visit that and you'll see a message. With a bit of effort, it could be crafted to say something to encourage a visitor to enter their credentials elsewhere.</p>
<p>When I originally reported this, the site could be used to to smuggle binary payloads. For example, <a href="https://webmonetization.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">this URl would display an image</a> - however, it seems to have been fixed.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, it is important to recognise that the WebMonetization.org domain contains an <a href="https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/Unvalidated_Redirects_and_Forwards_Cheat_Sheet.html">unvalidated redirect and forwarding</a> vulnerability.</p>
<p>I recommended that they ensured that the only URls which contain legitimate payment pointers should be returned. I also suggested setting a maximum limit for URl size.</p>
<h2 id="timeline"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/#timeline" class="heading-link">Timeline</a></h2>
<ul>
<li>2025-03-27 - Discovered and disclosed.</li>
<li>2025-08-05 - Remembered I'd submitted it and sent a follow up.</li>
<li>2025-08-26 - Automatically published.</li>
<li><ins datetime="2025-08-27T15:37:49+00:00">2025-08-27</ins> - A day after this post was published, <a href="https://github.com/interledger/publisher-tools/issues/85">the issue was made public on their repo</a>.</li>
<li><ins datetime="2025-09-11T12:25:32+00:00">2025-09-10</ins> - <a href="https://github.com/interledger/publisher-tools/issues/85#issuecomment-3274623144">Confirmed fixed</a>.</li>
</ul>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>4</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Book Review: The Shattering Peace by John Scalzi (Old Man's War Book 7) ★★★⯪☆]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-the-shattering-peace-by-john-scalzi-old-mans-war-book-7/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62754</id>
<updated>2025-08-23T20:21:32Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-24T11:34:46Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Book Review" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="scalzi" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Sci Fi" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I'm reasonably sure I've read all the "Old Man's War" books. As the last one was published a decade ago, you'll forgive me if I don't remember all the intricacies of galactic politics and interpersonal intrigue. Thankfully, Scalzi has carved off a side character from a previous book and given them a brand-new adventure. There's enough exposition to tickle the parts of your brain that go "Ah,…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-the-shattering-peace-by-john-scalzi-old-mans-war-book-7/"><![CDATA[<p><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/9781509835409.webp" alt="Book cover showing spaceships and alien worlds." width="270" height="411" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62756">
I'm <em>reasonably</em> sure I've read all the "Old Man's War" books. As the last one was published a decade ago, you'll forgive me if I don't remember all the intricacies of galactic politics and interpersonal intrigue. Thankfully, Scalzi has carved off a side character from a previous book and given them a brand-new adventure. There's enough exposition to tickle the parts of your brain that go "Ah, yes, that sounds familiar" but the story is just about separate enough that a new (or lapsed) reader can dive straight in.</p>
<p>An off-the-books colony has <strong>vanished</strong>. Only <strong>one woman</strong> has the martial and intellectual skills to save the day. With her <strong>trusty alien companion</strong> she's in a race against time to <strong>save the galaxy</strong>!</p>
<p>The plot is a little thin, and has a slightly annoying habit of jumping forward and then giving retroexposition in "flashback". Some of the prose is gorgeous - "All you need for an avalanche of chaos is one inebriated snowball." - but it is used sparingly. That gives it a rather cold and utilitarian feel - which matches the alien surroundings our protagonist finds herself in.</p>
<p>I also found the humour to be a bit repetitive - the alien doesn't quite get that you shouldn't talk aloud about human's sexual habits - but the story is well-paced and keeps the intrigue high without delving too deeply into convoluted political machinations.</p>
<p>It doesn't really add much to the science fiction pantheon in terms of Big Ideas, but it is rather good fun.</p>
<p>Thanks to Pan Macmillan for the advance copy, the book is out in September this year and can be pre-ordered now.</p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Gig Review: Rainbow Girls at LVLS London ★★★★★]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/gig-review-rainbow-girls-at-lvls-london/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62814</id>
<updated>2025-08-23T08:43:21Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-23T11:34:12Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="gig" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="music" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="review" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[At some point around the start of the pandemic, The Algorithm instructed me to listen to music by Rainbow Girls. Who am I to question the ineffable will of the machine? I don't know what it was about their harmonies, slide guitar, and double-bass which tickled my brain, but I was hooked. A few days ago, a different algorithm alerted me to the fact that they were touring the UK - so I snapped up…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/gig-review-rainbow-girls-at-lvls-london/"><![CDATA[<p>At some point around the start of the pandemic, The Algorithm instructed me to listen to music by <a href="https://www.youtube.com/@RainbowGirlsMusic">Rainbow Girls</a>. Who am I to question the ineffable will of the machine? I don't know what it was about their harmonies, slide guitar, and double-bass which tickled my brain, but I was hooked.</p>
<p>A few days ago, a different algorithm alerted me to the fact that they were touring the UK - so I snapped up tickets.</p>
<p>It was, of course, an <em>amazing</em> gig. Thanks Algorithms!</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Rainbow-Girls.webp" alt="Rainbow Girls on stage at LVLS." width="2048" height="1152" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62815">
<p>I don't know when I've enjoyed myself more at a gig. The LVLS venue in Stratford is charmingly intimate (and their drinks prices aren't too outrageous for London). The Girls filled the space with their sonic perfection. A brilliant mix of their original songs and crowd-pleasing covers. Their act is obviously well-rehearsed with very little time between songs spent faffing with equipment.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Bart-and-Rainbow-Girls.webp" alt="Bart on stage with the Rainbow Girls." width="2048" height="1152" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62816">
<p>The multi-instrumental nature of the show gives it a wonderful variety - not that you can really tire of their singing - and they are generous with their chat between numbers.</p>
<p>The support act, <a href="https://www.bartbudwig.com/">Bart Budwig</a> was delightful. A sweet selection of homespun songs and a magnificent stage presence. His crowd-work was excellent, bringing in the audience to join in with his songs. A particular favourite was <a href="https://www.instagram.com/reel/DKcu54Zvq5N/">Idaho Sober</a> which the London crowd greatly enjoyed.</p>
<p>The Rainbow Girls are currently on tour throughout the UK, Ireland, and Europe. Catch them if you can.</p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[What about using rel="share-url" to expose sharing intents?]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/what-about-using-relshare-url-to-expose-sharing-intents/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62488</id>
<updated>2025-08-06T19:32:20Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-22T11:34:06Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="HTML" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="standards" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="webdev" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Let's say that you've visited a website and want to share it with your friends. At the bottom of the article is a list of popular sharing destinations - Facebook, BlueSky, LinkedIn, Telegram, Reddit, HackerNews etc. You click the relevant icon and get taken to the site with the sharing details pre-filled. The problem is, every different site has a different intent for sharing links and…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/what-about-using-relshare-url-to-expose-sharing-intents/"><![CDATA[<p>Let's say that you've visited a website and want to share it with your friends. At the bottom of the article is a list of popular sharing destinations - Facebook, BlueSky, LinkedIn, Telegram, Reddit, HackerNews etc.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/share-on.webp" alt="Screenshot. "Share this page on" followed by colourful icons for popular social networks." width="824" height="452" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62491">
<p>You click the relevant icon and get taken to the site with the sharing details pre-filled.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/telegram.webp" alt="Screenshot of the Telegram sharing page." width="600" height="561" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62492">
<p>The problem is, every different site has a different intent for sharing links and text. For example:</p>
<ul>
<li><code>https://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u=…&t=…</code></li>
<li><code>https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url=…</code></li>
<li><code>https://bsky.app/intent/compose?text=…</code></li>
<li><code>https://www.threads.net/intent/post?url=…&text=…</code></li>
<li><code>https://www.reddit.com/submit?url=…&title=…</code></li>
</ul>
<p>As you can see, some only allow a URL, some text and a URL, and some just a plain text which could contain the URl. A bit of a mess! It's probably impossible to get every site to agree on a standard for their sharing intent. But there <em>could</em> be a standard for exposing their existing sharing mechanism.</p>
<p>That's the proposal from <a href="https://about.werd.io/">Ben Werdmuller</a> with "<a href="https://shareopenly.org/integrate/">Share Openly</a>".</p>
<blockquote><p>ShareOpenly knows about most major social networks, as well as decentralized platforms like Mastodon, Bluesky, and Known.</p>
<p>However, if ShareOpenly is having trouble sharing to your platform, and if your platform supports a share intent, you can add the following metatag to your page headers:</p>
<p><code><link rel="share-url" href="https://your-site/share/intent?text={text}"></code></p>
<p>Where <code>https://your-site/share/intent?text=</code> is the URL of your share intent.</p>
<p>The special keyword <code>{text}</code> will be replaced with the URL and share text.</p></blockquote>
<p>I think that's a pretty nifty solution.</p>
<p>For sites which take a URl and an (optional) title, the meta element looks like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="share-url" href="https://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u={url}&t={text}">
<link rel="share-url" href="https://lemmy.world/create_post?url={url}&title={text}">
</code></pre>
<p>For those which only take URl, it looks like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="share-url" href="https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url={url}">
</code></pre>
<p>It's slightly trickier for sites like Mastodon and BlueSky which only have a text sharing field and no separate URl. The current proposal is just to use the text. For example</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="share-url" href="https://bsky.app/intent/compose?text={text}">
</code></pre>
<p>But it could be something like</p>
<pre><code class="language-html"><link rel="share-url" href="https://mastodon.social/share?text={text}%0A{url}">
</code></pre>
<h2 id="what-next"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/what-about-using-relshare-url-to-expose-sharing-intents/#what-next" class="heading-link">What Next?</a></h2>
<p>The HTML specification has this to say <a href="https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/links.html#other-link-types">about adding new link types</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p>Extensions to the predefined set of link types may be registered on the <a href="https://microformats.org/wiki/existing-rel-values#HTML5_link_type_extensions">microformats page for existing rel values</a>.</p></blockquote>
<p>Adding to that page merely requires a formal specification to be written up. After that, some light lobbying might be needed to get social networks to adopt it.</p>
<p>So, I have three questions for you:</p>
<ol>
<li>Do you think <code><link rel="share-url"</code> is a good idea for a new standard?</li>
<li>What changes, if any, would you make to the above proposal?</li>
<li>Would you be interested in using it - either as a sharer or sharing destination?</li>
</ol>
<p>Please leave a comment in the box - and remember to hit those sharing buttons!</p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Theatre Review - Show:Girls ★★★★☆]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62714</id>
<updated>2025-08-19T22:06:47Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-21T11:34:59Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Theatre Review" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Is it offensive to call a burlesque show "charming"? Sure, it is a funny and mildly titillating evening, but Show:Girls is suffused with such good natured charm that it is hard to describe it as anything else. Unlike Gallifrey Cabaret which puts on a plethora of variety acts, this is a rather stripped down production. The central conceit is that two acts have been accidentally double booked.…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/"><![CDATA[<p><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/ShowGirls-Phoenix-Listing.webp" alt="Two burlesque performers. One in a Viking helmet and one in a red hat." width="400" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62716"> Is it offensive to call a burlesque show "charming"? Sure, it is a funny and mildly titillating evening, but Show:Girls is suffused with such good natured charm that it is hard to describe it as anything else.</p>
<p>Unlike <a href="https://mastodon.social/@Edent/114156815734664216">Gallifrey Cabaret</a> which puts on a plethora of variety acts, this is a rather stripped down<sup id="fnref:sorry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorry" class="footnote-ref" title="Sorry!" role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup> production.</p>
<p>The central conceit is that two acts have been accidentally double booked. One, a high-class opera singer, the other a low-down burlesque performer. HI-JINKS ENSUE!</p>
<p><a href="http://www.belindawilliams.co.uk/">Bellinda Williams</a> has the voice of an angel and <a href="https://www.elsiediamond.com/about">Elsie Diamond</a> has the body of a devil<sup id="fnref:sorrry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrry" class="footnote-ref" title="Look, there's no way to write about these things without sounding like a bit of a seedy old man, OK!" role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup>. They teach each other the secrets of their art form which leads to the most unlikely mash-up I've seen in some time; Opera Burlesque.</p>
<p>It is exactly as batty as it sounds. Each of them attempting to Eliza Doolittle the other to the great merriment of the audience.</p>
<p>I'm sure there's something profound to say about the origins of opera and its intersection with courtesan couture, or how empowering it is to play dress up with your friends, but I was too busy laughing to think of anything that intellectual.</p>
<p>As befits a fringe show, it is rather short and I could have easily enjoyed more. There seem to be a few revivals of <i lang="fr">cabaret de l'érotique</i><sup id="fnref:fr"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:fr" class="footnote-ref" title="That's yer actual French, y'know!" role="doc-noteref">2</a></sup> within London's now-sanitised Soho. Most, like this, are fairly tourist friendly and unlikely to draw the wrath of The Lord Chamberlain. Perhaps we'll see them on the Royal Variety Show next?</p>
<p>There's only one thing which bothers me, and that's the origin of one of the marquee quotes. One of the performers is mentioned thusly:</p>
<blockquote><p>famously described by Danny Dyer as having “a good old fashioned pair of Lils”.</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm reasonably familiar with Cockney Rhyming Slang and its step-sibling <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/04/book-review-fabulosa-the-story-of-polari-britains-secret-gay-language-by-paul-baker/">Polari</a>, and I can't find anything even close to that.</p>
<ul>
<li>Cockney:
<ul>
<li>Lilian Gish - fish. A somewhat unlikely comparison.</li>
<li>Lilly The Pink - drink. Although I suppose a pair of "pinks" might make sense?</li>
<li>Little And Large - margarine. I guess "Little" might be heard as "Lil"? And Ms Diamond's are not exactly on the smaller side.<sup id="fnref:sorrrrry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrrrry" class="footnote-ref" title="Look, you try writing about this without sounding like Sid James!" role="doc-noteref">3</a></sup></li>
</ul></li>
<li>Polari:
<ul>
<li>Lills - hands. I have no evidence that her hands <em>aren't</em> old fashioned.</li>
<li>Lilly Law - police. Perhaps Mr Dyer was comparing the shape of a bobby's helmet to the size and shape of…?<sup id="fnref:sorrrry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrrry" class="footnote-ref" title="Probably best to stop there, eh?" role="doc-noteref">4</a></sup></li>
</ul></li>
</ul>
<p>Either way, Show:Girls is performed sporadically - keep an eye on their websites for the next performance. The entrance fee isn't too expensive, but in exchange you'll receive your fair share of thruppeny bits<sup id="fnref:sorrrrrrry"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrrrrrry" class="footnote-ref" title="At this juncture, please imagine a giant shepherd's crook protruding from the wings and dragging me off stage." role="doc-noteref">5</a></sup>.</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:sorry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Sorry! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:sorrry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Look, there's no way to write about these things without sounding like a bit of a seedy old man, OK! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:fr" role="doc-endnote">
<p>That's yer <em>actual</em> French, y'know! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:fr" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:sorrrrry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Look, <em>you</em> try writing about this without sounding like Sid James! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrrrry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:sorrrry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Probably best to stop there, eh? <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrrry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:sorrrrrrry" role="doc-endnote">
<p>At this juncture, please imagine a giant shepherd's crook protruding from the wings and dragging me off stage. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrrrrrry" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>0</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Theatre Review: Sluts With Consoles ★★★★⯪]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-sluts-with-consoles/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62726</id>
<updated>2025-08-19T22:39:57Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-20T11:34:03Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="gaming" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Theatre Review" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Let's see if this post makes it through the spam filters! Sluts With Consoles is a brilliant two-hander. Girly-twirly pick-me Player One and Gothy just-one-of-the-boys Player Two are locked in mortal - and emotional - combat. They represent the duality of the female gaming experience. Is it better to be feminine or feminist? Is gaming an escape from the cliques of teenage oppression, or just…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-sluts-with-consoles/"><![CDATA[<p><img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Sluts-with-Consoles.webp" alt="Promotional Poster for Sluts With Consoles." width="350" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62727"> Let's see if this post makes it through the spam filters!</p>
<p>Sluts With Consoles is a brilliant two-hander. Girly-twirly pick-me Player One and Gothy just-one-of-the-boys Player Two are locked in mortal - and emotional - combat. They represent the duality of the female gaming experience. Is it better to be feminine or feminist? Is gaming an escape from the cliques of teenage oppression, or just another form of self-deception?</p>
<p>That all sounds a bit heavy-handed, but it is a hilarious show. It perfectly observes modern gaming tropes and how we all evolve our gamer styles.</p>
<p>Throughout, it asks a very specific question; "does a single stuck pixel spoil the entire view?" That is, what are we prepared to tolerate in order to live in our fantasy world? Older brothers swiping our power-ups transmogrify into incel-gamers shouting slurs. Who cares if we're having fun, right…?</p>
<p>As with any powerful piece of theatre, it's unlikely to be seen by those who have the most need of its message.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, it is an entertaining and amusing show with a +20 battle-damage buff.</p>
<p>The show is touring throughout the year and it is absolutely worth seeing if you have any interest in gaming.</p>
]]></content>
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<thr:total>1</thr:total>
</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Preventing NAPTR Spam]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=61707</id>
<updated>2025-08-03T20:49:37Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-18T11:34:47Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="dns" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="internet" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="privacy" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[You're the sort of cool nerd who knows all the weird esoterica which makes up DNS, right? In amongst your A, AAAA, SOA, and MX records, there's a little used NAPTR. Yes, you can use DNS to store Name Authority Pointers! What?! It is yet another of those baroque standards which spits out things like: cid.uri.arpa. ;; order pref flags service regexp replacement IN NAPTR…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/"><![CDATA[<p>You're the sort of cool nerd who knows all the weird esoterica which makes up DNS, right? In amongst your A, AAAA, SOA, and MX records, there's a little used <a href="https://dn.org/understanding-naptr-records-and-their-role-in-dns/">NAPTR</a>. Yes, you can use DNS to store Name Authority Pointers!</p>
<p>What?!</p>
<p>It is yet another of those <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2015/11/a-polite-way-to-say-ridiculously-complicated/">baroque</a> standards which spits out things like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-_">cid.uri.arpa.
;; order pref flags service regexp replacement
IN NAPTR 100 10 "" "" "!^cid:.+@([^\.]+\.)(.*)$!\2!i" .
</code></pre>
<p>Essentially, it is a way to store contact details within a DNS record (rather than in a WHOIS record).</p>
<p>Back in the early 2000s, the dotTel company opened the .tel TLD with a promise that it could be used to store your contact details in DNS<sup id="fnref:history"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:history" class="footnote-ref" title="Even back in 2009 I didn't think it was terribly compelling. By 2013, it was almost dead. And in 2017 it became just another generic TLD." role="doc-noteref">0</a></sup>. The idea was simple, rather than storing my phone number in your address book, you'd store my domain name - <a href="https://edent.tel/">https://edent.tel/</a></p>
<p>If I updated my phone number, changed my avatar, or deleted an old email address - your address book would automatically update via DNS. Nifty!</p>
<p>If you didn't know a company's phone number, you'd dial <code>example.com</code> on your phone and it would grab the phone numbers from DNS. Wowsers trousers!</p>
<p>You can see an example by running:</p>
<pre><code class="language-_">dig justin.tel NAPTR
</code></pre>
<p>You'll get back something like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-_">NAPTR 100 101 "u" "E2U+web:http" "!^.*$!http://justinkhayward.com!"
</code></pre>
<p>A phone number stored in a NAPTR would look something like:</p>
<pre><code class="language-_">NAPTR 100 100 "u" "E2U+voice:tel" "!^.*$!tel:+442074676450!" .
</code></pre>
<p>Brilliant! But there's a problem - aside from the somewhat obtuse syntax! - and that problem is spam.</p>
<p>Those of you old enough to remember putting your unexpurgated contact details into WHOIS know that the minute it went live you were bombarded with sales calls and scammy emails. So putting your details directly into DNS is a bad idea, right?</p>
<p>.tel thought they'd come up with a clever hack to prevent that. As they explain in <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20120504070307/https://dev.telnic.org/docs/privacy.pdf">the .tel privacy paper</a>, records can be individually encrypted.</p>
<ul>
<li>Alice has her contact details on <code>alice.tel</code></li>
<li>Bob has his contact details on <code>bob.tel</code></li>
<li>Alice agrees to share her phone number with Bob.</li>
<li>Alice looks up Bob's public key from <code>bob.tel</code>.</li>
<li>Alice encrypts her phone number.</li>
<li>Alice generates a new DNS record specifically for Bob - <code>bob123456.alice.tel</code></li>
<li>Alice shares the name of the new record with Bob.</li>
<li>Bob downloads the NAPTR from <code>bob123456.alice.tel</code> and decrypts it with his private key.</li>
<li>Bob periodically checks for updates.</li>
<li>Alice can decide to revoke Bob's access by removing the data or subdomain.</li>
</ul>
<p>Clever! If convoluted. You can <a href="https://rikkles.blogspot.com/2008/05/privacy-in-tel.html">read more about the way friendships and public keys were managed</a> and <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20120504073313/https://dev.telnic.org/docs/naptr.pdf">some more technical details</a>.</p>
<p>Are there better ways?</p>
<h2 id="multi-recipient-encryption"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#multi-recipient-encryption" class="heading-link">Multi Recipient Encryption</a></h2>
<p>When people say "you can't give Government a secret key to your private messages" they are technically incorrect<sup id="fnref:worst"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:worst" class="footnote-ref" title="The worst type of incorrect." role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup>. Multi Recipient Encryption is a thing.</p>
<p>Here's a very simplified and subtly wrong explanation:</p>
<ul>
<li>Alice creates a <em>temporary</em> public/private keypair.</li>
<li>Alice encrypts some text with her temporary public key - resulting in <code>e</code>.</li>
<li>Alice encrypts the temporary private key with Bob's public key - resulting in <code>k1</code>.</li>
<li>Alice encrypts the temporary private key with Charlie's public key - resulting in <code>k2</code>.</li>
<li>Alice publishes the concatenation of <code>e+k1+k2</code></li>
<li>Bob downloads the file, decrypts <em>his</em> version of the key, and uses that to decrypt the message.</li>
<li>Charlie does the same.</li>
</ul>
<p>In this way, both recipients are able to decipher the text but no one else can. So can we just shove an encrypted record in the NAPTR? Not quite.</p>
<p>There are two main problems with this for DNS purposes.</p>
<ol>
<li>The encrypted size grows with every recipient.</li>
<li>Every time a new recipient is added, everyone needs to download the data again even if it is unchanged.</li>
</ol>
<p>Generally speaking, DNS records are a maximum of 255 characters - <a href="https://kb.isc.org/docs/aa-00356">although they can be concatenated</a>.</p>
<p>An extra record could be used to say when the plaintext was last updated - which would let existing recipients know not to download it again.</p>
<p>Monitoring for changes would allow a user to know roughly how many recipients had been added or removed.</p>
<p>What other ways could there be?</p>
<h2 id="what-else-could-be-done"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#what-else-could-be-done" class="heading-link">What else could be done?</a></h2>
<p>Here's the user story.</p>
<ul>
<li>I want a friend to subscribe to my [phone|email|street|social media] address(es).</li>
<li>I must be able to pre-approve access.</li>
<li>When I change my address, my friend should get my new details.</li>
<li>I need to be able to revoke people's access.</li>
<li>This should be done via DNS<sup id="fnref:dns"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:dns" class="footnote-ref" title="Why DNS? Because I like making life difficult." role="doc-noteref">2</a></sup>.</li>
</ul>
<p>Using an API this would be playing on easy mode. A friend (or rather, their app) would request an API key from my service. I would approve it, and then ✨magic✨.</p>
<p>DNS isn't <em>technically</em> an API although, with enough effort, you could make it behave like one<sup id="fnref:marquis"><a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:marquis" class="footnote-ref" title="If you were a sadist!" role="doc-noteref">3</a></sup>.</p>
<p>So - how would <em>you</em> do it?</p>
<div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes">
<hr>
<ol start="0">
<li id="fn:history" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Even back in 2009 <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2009/03/some-thoughts-on-tel/">I didn't think it was terribly compelling</a>. By 2013, <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2013/03/should-i-renew-my-tel-domain/">it was almost dead</a>. And in 2017 <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2017/02/whats-the-future-for-the-tel-domain-name/">it became just another generic TLD</a>. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:history" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:worst" role="doc-endnote">
<p>The <em>worst</em> type of incorrect. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:worst" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:dns" role="doc-endnote">
<p>Why DNS? Because I like making life difficult. <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:dns" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:marquis" role="doc-endnote">
<p>If you were a sadist! <a href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:marquis" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">↩︎</a></p>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Books will soon be obsolete in school]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/books-will-soon-be-obsolete-in-school/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62422</id>
<updated>2025-08-04T17:24:56Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-16T11:34:30Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="AI" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="education" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="history" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="schools" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[I recently had a chance to ask a question to one of the top AI people. At a Q&A session, I raised my hand and asked simply "What is your estimation of the future educational value of AI?" The response was swift and utterly devastating for those laggards who want to hold back progress. The AI guy said: Books will soon be obsolete in schools. Scholars will be instructed through AI. It is possible …]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/books-will-soon-be-obsolete-in-school/"><![CDATA[<p>I recently had a chance to ask a question to one of the <strong>top</strong> AI people. At a Q&A session, I raised my hand and asked simply "What is your estimation of the future educational value of AI?"</p>
<p>The response was swift and utterly devastating for those laggards who want to hold back progress. The AI guy said:</p>
<blockquote><p>Books will soon be obsolete in schools. Scholars will be instructed through AI. It is possible to teach every branch of human knowledge with AI. Our school system will be completely changed inside of ten years.</p>
<p>We have been working for some time on educational AI. It proves conclusively the worth of AI in chemistry, physics and other branches of study, making the scientific truths, difficult to understand from text books, plain and clear to children.</p></blockquote>
<p>That's it. We can throw away all those outdated paper books. Children will learn directly from an AI which, coincidentally, is sold by the company. We can trust their studies on such matters and be assured that they have no ulterior motive.</p>
<p>But, ah my friends, I have told a <em>slight</em> untruth. I didn't ask that question. Frederick James Smith asked the question to Thomas Edison in <strong>1913</strong>. The question was about the new and exciting world of motion pictures.</p>
<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/moving-pictures.webp" alt="Scan of old newsprint. "What is your estimation of the future educational
value of pictures?" I asked.
" Books." declared the inventor with decision, " will soon be obsolete in the public schools. Scholars will be instructed through the eye. It is possible to teach every branch of human knowledge with the motion picture. Our school system will be completely changed inside of ten years. " We have been working for some time on the school pictures. We have been studying and reproducing the life of the fly. mosquito, silk weaving moth, brown moth, gypsy moth, butterflies, scale and various other insects, as well as chemical cbrystallization. It proves conclusively the worth of motion pictures in chemistry, physics and other branches of study, making the scientific truths, difficult to understand from text books, plain and clear to children" width="766" height="492" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-62423">
<p>You can <a href="https://www.laviemoderne.net/images/forum_pics/2017/20171116%20New%20York%20NY%20Dramatic%20Mirror%201913%20Mar-Apr%201914%20Grayscale%20-%200690.pdf">read the full exchange from The New York Dramatic Mirror</a>.</p>
<p>A hundred-plus years since the great and humble Edison made his prediction and… books are still used in schools! Those of us of a certain age remember a TV occasionally being wheeled in for one lesson or another. Today's kids watch more video content than ever - of mixed quality - but still rely on books and teachers.</p>
<p>Videos are good for some aspects of learning, but woefully inadequate for others.</p>
<p>I'm not trying to say that just because one technology failed, so will all others. But it is <em>amazing</em> how AI-proponents are recycling the same arguments with basically the same timescale. Will AI be part of education? Sure! Just like videos, pocket computers, the Metaverse, and performance enhancing drugs.</p>
<p>Will it be the <em>only</em> tool ever needed for education? I doubt it. Will vested interests and uncritical journalists continue to boost it? You don't need to have read many history books to work out the answer.</p>
<p>Further reading: <a href="https://www.colincornaby.me/2025/08/in-the-future-all-food-will-be-cooked-in-a-microwave-and-if-you-cant-deal-with-that-then-you-need-to-get-out-of-the-kitchen/">In the Future All Food Will Be Cooked in a Microwave, and if You Can’t Deal With That Then You Need to Get Out of the Kitchen</a></p>
]]></content>
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</entry>
<entry>
<author>
<name>@edent</name>
<uri>https://edent.tel/</uri>
</author>
<title type="html"><![CDATA[Theatre Review: Being Mr Wickham ★★★★★]]></title>
<link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-being-mr-wickham/" />
<id>https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62605</id>
<updated>2025-08-13T21:16:42Z</updated>
<published>2025-08-14T11:34:06Z</published>
<category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="/etc/" /><category scheme="https://shkspr.mobi/blog" term="Theatre Review" />
<summary type="html"><![CDATA[Mr Wickham is ready to set the record straight. Celebrating the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth, Adrian Lukis, who starred in the renowned BBC TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, returns to the role of Mr Wickham. Join Pride and Prejudice’s most roguish gentleman, George Wickham, on the eve of his sixtieth birthday, to lift the sheets on what exactly happened thirty years on from whe…]]></summary>
<content type="html" xml:base="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-being-mr-wickham/"><![CDATA[<img src="https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/wickham.webp" alt="Promotional poster for Being Mr Wickham." width="384" class="alignleft size-full wp-image-62606">
<blockquote><p>Mr Wickham is ready to set the record straight. Celebrating the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth, Adrian Lukis, who starred in the renowned BBC TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, returns to the role of Mr Wickham.</p>
<p>Join Pride and Prejudice’s most roguish gentleman, George Wickham, on the eve of his sixtieth birthday, to lift the sheets on what exactly happened thirty years on from where we left him… And discover his own version of some very famous literary events.</p></blockquote>
<p>You remember "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead", right? Take two minor characters from a famous play and weave a tale around their misadventures. This is in much the same vein. A one-man show where we get to spend time with Pride & Prejudice's most clubbable old rake in order to better understand <em>why</em> he was such a scoundrel.</p>
<p>There's a lovely bit of intertextuality in having Adrian Lukis both write and perform as Wickham. For people of my age, he <em>is</em> Wickam. Sure, he's no Darcy in a dripping wet shirt, but played the perfect bounder and cad.</p>
<p>The Jermyn Street Theatre is the perfect venue for these tall tales. An intimate room where we're slowly drawn in to the confidences of a master manipulator. Behind the twinkling smile there is, be in no doubt, a predator.</p>
<p>Wickham lives off his charms and it is no wonder that the audience is eating out of the palm of his hand within minutes. His outrageous name dropping is all part of the seduction.</p>
<p>Of course he has been viciously abused in literature; done dirty by those envious of his success. Yes, he is a bit of a rascal but - and his eyes flirt with us at this point - isn't that what makes a man <em>interesting</em>?</p>
<p>Adrian Lukis doesn't redeem the villain; he indulges him. It is a delight to spend an hour in his company, hearing the old sot reminisce about old conquests, and catching up with the Bennet gossip. But you'll walk away wondering if you're any closer to the truth or have just been beguiled like some many others.</p>
<p>There's an interesting bit of media rights discussion to be here as well. Famously, the actors who play James Bond <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/new/Why-Pierce-Brosnan-Wears-Ugliest-Suit-Ever-Thomas-Crown-Affair-68301.html">aren't allowed to wear a tuxedo in other movies</a> lest they be confused with 007. All of Jane Austen's works have long since passed out of copyright - but is the character of Wickam based on the book version of the 1990's screen version? There's no portrait of Julia Sawalha on the wall, so you'll have to make your own mind up on that count.</p>
<p>I do wonder how many other other actors will take the opportunity to revisit their star turns? The nostalgia roadshow rumbles on.</p>
<p>Mr Wickham is in residence until the 30th of August and I have no doubt that you will find his company most agreeable.</p>
]]></content>
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"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62959",
"title": "How big a solar battery do I need to store *all* my home's electricity?",
"description": "I have a modest set of solar panels on an entirely ordinary house in suburban London. On average they generate about 3,800kWh per year. We also use about 3,800kWh of electricity each year. Obviously, we can't use all the power produced over summer and we need to buy power in winter. So here's my question: How big a battery would we need in order to be completely self-sufficient? Background …",
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"content": "<p>I have a <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/solar-faq/\">modest set of solar panels</a> on an entirely ordinary house in suburban London.</p>\n\n<p>On average they generate about 3,800kWh per year. We also use about 3,800kWh of electricity each year. Obviously, we can't use all the power produced over summer and we need to buy power in winter. So here's my question:</p>\n\n<p>How big a battery would we need in order to be <em>completely</em> self-sufficient?</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"background\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#background\" class=\"heading-link\">Background</a></h2>\n\n<p>Let's take a look at a typical summer's day. The graph is a little complex, so I'll explain it.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Power-Flow.webp\" alt=\"Graph of power flow.\" width=\"1788\" height=\"988\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62974\">\n\n<p>The yellow line shows solar production. It starts shortly after sunrise, peaks at midday, and gradually drops until sunset.</p>\n\n<p>The red line shows how much electricity our home is using. As you can see, there's a large peak about 19:00 when we cook dinner.</p>\n\n<p>The blue line shows how much electricity we draw or export from the grid. From midnight until sunrise we import because the sun isn't shining. Once the sun has risen we're able to power our house <em>and</em> export to our neighbours. When we cook, we draw from the grid <em>and</em> our battery - which is why the evening grid peak is lower than the household use dip.</p>\n\n<p>The CSV of the data looks something like this:</p>\n\n<table>\n<thead>\n<tr>\n <th align=\"right\">Local_time</th>\n <th align=\"right\">Household_(W)</th>\n <th align=\"right\">Solar_(W)</th>\n</tr>\n</thead>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T08:25:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-187.76</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1166.77</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T08:30:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-227.04</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1193.25</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T08:35:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-253.06</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1222.84</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T08:40:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-266.87</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1245.18</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T08:45:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-450.8</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1268.66</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T08:50:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-251.84</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1281.79</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T08:55:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-1426.26</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1306.93</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T09:00:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-206.78</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1341.37</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T09:05:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-215.52</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1390.9</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T09:10:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-242.6</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1426.19</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n <td align=\"right\">2025-08-25T09:15:00.000+01:00</td>\n <td align=\"right\">-246.84</td>\n <td align=\"right\">1473</td>\n</tr>\n</tbody>\n</table>\n\n<p>It's fairly trivial to sum both columns and subtract one from the other. That shows either the excess or deficit in solar power for the household.</p>\n\n<p>On that day, the house used 9.7kWh and generated 19.6kWh. I'd need a 9.9kWh battery to store the excess right? Wrong!</p>\n\n<p>Because my usage doesn't track the sun, I'd actually need a 13kWh battery. That's the peak amount of excess electricity I've generated in that one day.</p>\n\n<p>What I want to do is find out what the <em>maximum</em> size battery I would need in order to store all of summer's electricity for use in winter.</p>\n\n<p>Luckily, I have several years of real data to go off! Let's get started!</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"disclaimer\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#disclaimer\" class=\"heading-link\">Disclaimer</a></h2>\n\n<p>This is based on data generated by my home battery. It has probes to measure solar output and grid flow. It is not 100% clock-accurate compared to my solar-panels' internal reporting nor what my smart-meter reports. I estimate a 1-2% deviation, which is good enough for these purposes.</p>\n\n<p>My energy usage isn't representative of anything other than my usage. Your household is probably different. I already have a 4.8kWh battery which changes how and when I use energy.</p>\n\n<p>This doesn't account for gas heating or hot water. We have some electric heaters and taps which increases our electricity usage.</p>\n\n<p>My maths is <em>probably</em> right - but the code is open source, so feel free to check for yourself.</p>\n\n<p>Remember, this is just a bit of fun. There's no practical way to build domestic batteries with this capacity using the technology of 2025.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"code\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#code\" class=\"heading-link\">Code</a></h2>\n\n<p>We tend to start generating more electricity than we use starting in Spring. So I've picked the end of March 2024 to the end of March 2025.</p>\n\n<p>Let's see how big a battery we'd need to store our summer excess for winter. This finds the cumulative difference between each day's energy production and usage:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-python\">import os\nimport pandas as pd\n\n# Load all the CSVs\nfilepaths = [f for f in os.listdir(\".\") if f.endswith('.csv')]\ndf = pd.concat(map(pd.read_csv, filepaths))\n\n# Make sure they're in order\ndf = df.sort_values(\"Timestamp\")\ndf = df.reset_index(drop=True)\n\n# Resolution is every 5 minutes, so divide by 12 to get hourly\ndf[\"Cumulative_Difference\"] = ( (df[\"Household_(W)\"] + df[\"Solar_(W)\"] ).cumsum() ) / 12\n\n# kWh of battery needed\nint(df[\"Cumulative_Difference\"].max() / 1000)\n\n## Draw a pretty graph\ndf.plot(kind=\"line\", x=\"Local_time\", y=\"Cumulative_Difference\", xlabel=\"Date\", ylabel=\"MWh\", xticks=[\"2024-04-01\", \"2024-05-01\", \"2024-05-01\", \"2024-06-01\", \"2024-07-01\", \"2024-08-01\", \"2024-09-01\", \"2024-10-01\", \"2024-11-01\", \"2024-12-01\", \"2025-01-01\", \"2025-02-01\", \"2025-03-01\", \"2025-04-01\"], legend=False, grid=True, fontsize=15)\nplt.show()\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>The total is <strong>1,068KWh</strong> - basically, a MegaWatt-hour of storage.</p>\n\n<p>Here's a quick graph to show how the storage would be used over the year.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Cumulative-Graph.webp\" alt=\"Graph showing a steady climb to 1 MegaWatt-hour and then down again.\" width=\"1300\" height=\"700\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62980\">\n\n<p>As you can see, even in this scenario there are a few days where we'd need to import energy from the grid.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"is-this-sensible\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#is-this-sensible\" class=\"heading-link\">Is this sensible?</a></h2>\n\n<p>Probably not, no. It doesn't account for increased energy use from having an electric car or moving away from gas heating / cooking. As <a href=\"https://www.nrel.gov/pv/interactive-cell-efficiency\">solar panels increase in efficiency</a>, it might be more sensible to replace the panels on my roof, or add some onto a shed.</p>\n\n<p>The environmental impact of creating and storing such huge batteries could also be factored in.</p>\n\n<p>A battery which is only 100% full for a few days probably isn't an efficient design. Using wind, hydro, and other green sources from the grid might be preferable.</p>\n\n<p>But, remember, this is an exercise in wishful thinking.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"is-this-possible\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/how-big-a-solar-battery-do-i-need-to-store-all-my-homes-electricity/#is-this-possible\" class=\"heading-link\">Is this possible?</a></h2>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://mathstodon.xyz/@johncarlosbaez/115190527741497635\">Grid-scale batteries exist</a> and they work brilliantly.</p>\n\n<p>But if I wanted my own MegaWatt-hour of battery storage, it would probably cost me between <a href=\"https://www.fogstar.co.uk/collections/solar-battery-storage/products/fogstar-energy-32kwh-battery?variant=55157091205497\">£100k</a> and <a href=\"https://modoenergy.com/research/battery-energy-storage-capex-containerised-bess-development-costs-oem-balance-plant-bop-grid-connections-survey-2024\">half-a-million quid</a>.</p>\n\n<p>That doesn't include maintenance, the land, planning permission, and a hundred other things.</p>\n\n<p>But battery prices are falling fast. In the last decade <a href=\"https://www.energy.gov/eere/vehicles/articles/fotw-1354-august-5-2024-electric-vehicle-battery-pack-costs-light-duty\">lithium ion battery prices have fallen 90%</a>. With new <a href=\"https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11913365/\">sodium ion batteries</a> promising an even bigger drop - down to <a href=\"https://www.geeky-gadgets.com/catl-sodium-ion-battery-packs/\">US$10/kWh</a>.</p>\n\n<p>If - and it is a <strong>big</strong> if - those numbers came to pass, it would probably cost around £8,000 for a domestic battery. Basically the same cost as adding solar panels in the first place.</p>\n\n<p>Domestic solar <em>works</em> - yes, even in the rainy UK! It is relatively cheap, moves energy production as close as possible to energy consumption, reduces bill-shock, and means we don't have endless planning arguments about whether fields should be turned into solar farms.</p>\n\n<p>It is possible that, not too long in the future, every home could also have a 1 MegaWatt-hour battery. They would be able to capture all the excess solar power generated in a year.</p>\n\n<p>There's a bright and sunny future where every home can be solar-self-sufficient.</p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>If you've enjoyed this blog post, please consider <a href=\"https://share.octopus.energy/metal-dove-988\">switching to Octopus Energy</a> - we both get £50 when you join.</p>",
"image": null,
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{
"name": "@edent",
"email": null,
"url": "https://edent.tel/"
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"categories": [
{
"label": "/etc/",
"term": "/etc/",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63299",
"title": "Book Review: All That We See or Seem by Ken Liu ★★★★★",
"description": "This book is ridiculously zeitgeisty. It's all brain-rotting AI, social-media meltdowns, mixed with some cracking technobabble. She thinks about erasing more: all the practice session recordings; her own encrypted cephaloscripts; the dream-guide neuromesh of her personal AI; the interviews, fan messages, reviews—food for her vanity, training data for her egolets. Fab! But, for all that, it's p…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-all-that-we-see-or-seem-by-ken-liu/",
"published": "2025-09-13T11:34:34.000Z",
"updated": "2025-09-13T15:00:47.000Z",
"content": "<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/9781035915934_l.webp\" alt=\"Book cover with a fractured city in the background.\" width=\"200\" height=\"310\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-63301\">\n\n<p>This book is <em>ridiculously</em> zeitgeisty. It's all brain-rotting AI, social-media meltdowns, mixed with some cracking technobabble.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>She thinks about erasing more: all the practice session recordings; her own encrypted cephaloscripts; the dream-guide neuromesh of her personal AI; the interviews, fan messages, reviews—food for her vanity, training data for her egolets.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Fab! But, for all that, it's pretty realistic. Sure, it's set five-minutes into the future, but all the tech is plausible and all the hacks somewhere in the ballpark of reality. It is <em>much</em> better than <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2021/09/book-review-the-ministry-for-the-future-by-kim-stanley-robinson/\">The Ministry for the Future</a> simply because all the technowizardry passes the smell test.</p>\n\n<p>The plot is, charitably, basic. A woman has been kidnapped and her husband (who is a suspect) enlists a <del>Private Eye</del> hacker to solve the mystery. But you're not reading to discover whodunnit; you're there to revel in the pitch-perfect future-gazing and cower before the (hopefully not too accurate) predictions around how technology will be subverted to protect the powerful while leaving everyone else helpless.</p>\n\n<p>The neologisms are off the chart - \"Darcybots\" to help you date, a \"Fiscjinn\" to interrogate your finances, and an \"Oneirofex\" to… well, I'll let you discover that! You'll need to have a good grasp of what's going on with modern technology in order to get more than half the references. I've no idea if the book will be intelligible half-a-decade from now. Perhaps we'll have our self-hosted AIs translate it for us?</p>\n\n<p>At times, it feels less like a book and more like a series of parables woven into one story. The ending feels a little rushed - but it fits in with the fast-paced nature of the plot. A great slab of sci-fi to chew on.</p>\n\n<p>Thanks to Netgalley for the review copy. The book is released in October 2025 - and will probably remain relevant for at least half-a-dozen weeks.</p>",
"image": null,
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{
"name": "@edent",
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"url": "https://edent.tel/"
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"label": "/etc/",
"term": "/etc/",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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"label": "Book Review",
"term": "Book Review",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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"label": "NetGalley",
"term": "NetGalley",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63158",
"title": "Reasonably accurate, privacy conscious, cookieless, visitor tracking for WordPress",
"description": "I am vain. I like to know which of my blog posts have \"done numbers\". I get a little thrill knowing that an old post I wrote has been read by someone in a land I've never visited. I'm curious and want to know if a newsletter has linked to me. At the same time, I don't want to know too much about people. I don't want to stalk them around the web. I refuse to care how long they spend with me. I…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/",
"published": "2025-09-11T11:34:39.000Z",
"updated": "2025-09-11T14:05:19.000Z",
"content": "<p>I am vain. I like to know which of my blog posts have \"done numbers\". I get a little thrill knowing that an old post I wrote has been read by someone in a land I've never visited. I'm curious and want to know if a newsletter has linked to me.</p>\n\n<p>At the same time, I don't want to know <em>too</em> much about people. I don't want to stalk them around the web. I refuse to care how long they spend with me. I can't be bothered setting up a foolproof system that captures 100% accurate information.</p>\n\n<p>After trying several analytics plugins for WordPress, I've decided to have a go at writing my own<sup id=\"fnref:learn\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fn:learn\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"I enjoy learning. If you're about to say \"Why not just install…\" then you've missed the point. I like understanding how things work, I get joy from discovering some new function, my brain feels happy…\" role=\"doc-noteref\">0</a></sup>.</p>\n\n<p>Before embarking on this, please do read \"<a href=\"https://blog.yossarian.net/2023/12/24/You-dont-need-analytics-on-your-blog\">You Don't Need Analytics on Your Blog</a>\" and the slightly more provocative \"<a href=\"https://www.thisdaysportion.com/posts/contra-analytics/\">You do not need “analytics” for your blog because you are neither a military surveillance unit nor a commodity trading company</a>\". Both give excellent examples of why this is at best foolish and at worse injurious. Proceed with caution in your heart.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"background\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#background\" class=\"heading-link\">Background</a></h2>\n\n<p>As a consequence of the way the web works, every time you click on a link the website's owner gets the following pieces of information.</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>The time you clicked,</li>\n<li>The page you visited,</li>\n<li>The name of the web browser you use,</li>\n<li>The URl of the page which you clicked to get here,</li>\n<li>The IP address your computer has.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>There are a few other things sent along but they're not interesting to me.</p>\n\n<p>Using that information, I can construct a reasonably accurate view of how many times a post has been viewed and how many people viewed it.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"defining-a-page-view\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#defining-a-page-view\" class=\"heading-link\">Defining a page view</a></h2>\n\n<p>If a web page is loaded, that counts as a view. I'm not going to track whether the user stayed for more than 30 seconds or closed their browser in disgust after reading the headline. If the page is loaded, that's a view.</p>\n\n<p>But what if one person repeatedly hits refresh on the same post? To deal with that, I'll need a concept of a visitor.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"defining-a-visitor\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#defining-a-visitor\" class=\"heading-link\">Defining a visitor</a></h2>\n\n<p>The \"normal\" way of doing things is to stick a cookie in the user's browser and track them that way. I can't be bothered with that. And, besides, it doesn't account for a person reading on their laptop and then moving to their phone.</p>\n\n<p>So I'm going to use a proxy by creating a cryptographic hash of the visitor's IP address and the browser's User Agent string.</p>\n\n<p>Of course, a household might have one IP address and multiple people with the same phone. But, equally, one person might rove over several WiFi networks in the course of one browsing session, getting a different IP each time.</p>\n\n<p>The aim is to be <em>reasonably</em> accurate.</p>\n\n<p>Hashing the contents means I don't need to store the user's IP address. Once hashed, the information becomes a string like <code>db050e7b853e5856</code> which is functionally impossible to <a href=\"https://www.techsolvency.com/passwords/dehashing-reversing-decrypting/\">crack</a> back to an IP address & UA string<sup id=\"fnref:orisit\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fn:orisit\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Or is it? There are 4 billion IPv4 addresses - although slightly fewer in actual use. Creating a rainbow table with 4 billion rows is possible if I was just using IP addresses. But there are an…\" role=\"doc-noteref\">1</a></sup>.</p>\n\n<p>This also means that I can redefine the concept of a page view. If the same visitor refreshed the page multiple times, it will only count as a single visit.</p>\n\n<p>I'll reset the counter at midnight in my local timezone. If someone visits just before midnight and then just after, it'll count as two visits. Oh well.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"where-did-they-come-from\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#where-did-they-come-from\" class=\"heading-link\">Where did they come from?</a></h2>\n\n<p>Generally speaking, there are two ways that visitors share their referrer. One is the \"referer\" header (yes, it is misspelled). It contains a URl of the referring site or application. For example, if someone clicked from a search result it might say <code>https://yahoo.com</code>.</p>\n\n<p>The other way is using \"Urchin Tracking Module\" query strings. At the end of the URl they visit, they might append something like <code>?utm_source=alices-newsletter</code>.</p>\n\n<p>Some sites, like Reddit, might use multiple subdomains - <code>old.reddit.com</code> or <code>out.reddit.com</code> - so some deduplication may be necessary.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"where-in-the-world-are-they\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#where-in-the-world-are-they\" class=\"heading-link\">Where in the world are they?</a></h2>\n\n<p>A user's IP address is <em>somewhat</em> accurate method of detecting their location. Yes, users could be proxying through a VPN or using a SIM card from a foreign country. But this isn't an exercise in precise tracking. Rough and ready is fine.</p>\n\n<p>There are a variety of <a href=\"https://mailfud.org/geoip-legacy/\">GeoIP Databases</a> which are updated semi-regularly. I'm only interested in the country of origin, I don't care about finer resolution than that.</p>\n\n<p>Again, the aim isn't precise targetting. I'd just like to know that people in Sudan ever read my blog posts.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"what-else-could-we-use\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#what-else-could-we-use\" class=\"heading-link\">What else could we use?</a></h2>\n\n<p>It <em>might</em> be nice to know if someone is using a small-screen or large device. But my CSS is responsive, so I don't care.</p>\n\n<p>Similarly, their Internet connection speed might be available. But, again, I try to optimise things so that isn't necessary to know.</p>\n\n<p>Do I need to know if someone speaks Hungarian? No. There's nothing useful I can do with that information.</p>\n\n<p>Could I extract their operating system, device, and browser from their User-Agent? I guess. Would I use the information that X% of my readers use Firefox on Linux? Doubtful!</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"collect-the-information\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#collect-the-information\" class=\"heading-link\">Collect the information</a></h2>\n\n<p>There are two main methods of collecting these data.</p>\n\n<p>First is a \"no JavaScript\" solution. This tells the browser to request an image which has a query string to send along the details of the page requested.</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-php\"><noscript>\n <img src=\"/tracking.php?ID=<?php echo $postID ?>\" alt=\"\" width=1 height=1 class=hidden>\n</noscript>\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>The downside is that there's no way to capture referer information. If each page were dynamically generated, I could grab it from PHP's <code>$_SERVER</code> superglobal. But my website is heavily cached, so that isn't possible.</p>\n\n<p>It <em>is</em> possible to use JavaScript to dynamically send the information for collection:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-js\">let formData = new FormData();\nformData.append(\"HTTP_REFERER\", document.referrer);\nformData.append(\"ID\", <?php echo $postID ?>);\n\nfetch(\"/tracking.php\", {\n method: \"POST\",\n body: formData,\n});\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>This approach has three distinct advantages.</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>It works whether the user has JS enabled or not.</li>\n<li>Repeated requests for the same page will usually reload the image from cache, so won't double-count.</li>\n<li>It doesn't count hits from bots. They typically don't execute JavaScript or don't request images.</li>\n</ol>\n\n<h2 id=\"bot-detection\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#bot-detection\" class=\"heading-link\">Bot Detection</a></h2>\n\n<p>Not all traffic originates from humans. There are lots of bots which crawl the web. Some are useful - like search engines building up a map. Others are harmful - like AI agents aggressively scraping content to plagiarise.</p>\n\n<p>There are <a href=\"https://www.humansecurity.com/learn/blog/crawlers-list-known-bots-guide/\">lots of identifiable bots</a> out there - and more which obfuscate themselves. There are some, like <a href=\"https://github.com/GoogleChrome/lighthouse/pull/14384\">Lighthouse</a> which cloak themselves.</p>\n\n<p>I'm not trying to eliminate everything which <em>could</em> be a bot. I am trying for <em>reasonably</em> accurate. So I eliminate any User-Agent which contains:</p>\n\n<p><code>\"/bot|crawl|spider|seo|lighthouse|facebookexternalhit|preview|HeadlessChrome/i\"</code></p>\n\n<p>There are some <a href=\"https://github.com/fabiomb/is_bot\">big lists of bots</a> you can use - but they don't seem to trigger my analytics because they aren't requesting the images or executing the JS.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"what-bits-of-the-site-to-measure\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#what-bits-of-the-site-to-measure\" class=\"heading-link\">What bits of the site to measure?</a></h2>\n\n<p>I only care about how many visitors my posts and pages get. I don't need to know if someone visited a tag page, or scrolled back to page 100 of posts from 2019. Those sorts of deep pages are usually only accessed by bots anyway.</p>\n\n<p>I also don't want to count visits from me, myself, and I.</p>\n\n<p>So the tracking is only inserted on single pages which are viewed by non-admins:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-php\">if ( is_singular() && !current_user_can( \"edit_posts\" ) ) {\n …\n}\n</code></pre>\n\n<h2 id=\"oddities\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#oddities\" class=\"heading-link\">Oddities</a></h2>\n\n<p>Sometimes, the URl requested will look something like: <code>https://shkspr-mobi.translate.goog</code> - that just means Google has translated it.</p>\n\n<p>Sometimes, the referer will look something like: <code>android-app://com.google.android.gm/</code> - that just means they clicked from an Android app.</p>\n\n<p>Sometimes, the URl requested will include a fragment or a query string - they can be ignored.</p>\n\n<p>Sometimes, the <code>utm_</code> will contain all sorts of weird stuff. It isn't always possible to pull out exactly where it has come from.</p>\n\n<p>Sometimes, the referer and <code>utm_</code> will disagree. Ah well, never mind.</p>\n\n<p>Sometimes, RSS views are counted and sometimes not. Perhaps I should fix that?</p>\n\n<p>Sometimes, users block trackers or use a text-only browser. That's fine, they can keep their secrets.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"saving-the-data\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#saving-the-data\" class=\"heading-link\">Saving the data</a></h2>\n\n<p>I started this by just shoving what I collected into a CSV.</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-php\">// Write the CSV.\n$line = [date(\"c\"), $ID, $UA, $referer, $domain, $country, $user];\n// Date-based filename.\n$filename = \"log-\" . date(\"Y-m-d\") . \".csv\";\n// Append mode.\n$handle = fopen( $filename, \"a\" );\nfputcsv( $handle, $line );\nfclose( $handle );\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>Nothing fancy. Something easily grepable with the ability to query it in more detail if I need. At the number of hits that my site gets, it is less than 1MB per day.</p>\n\n<p>I've since moved it into a single MySQL table. That might not be sustainable with hundreds of thousands of rows. But that's tomorrow's problem.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"accuracy\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#accuracy\" class=\"heading-link\">Accuracy</a></h2>\n\n<p>I've been running this for a couple of days - simultaneously with my other, more professional, stats plugin. It is within 5% accuracy. It appears to <em>slightly</em> exaggerate the number of visitors and undercount my page-views. That's good enough for my purposes and probably good for my ego!</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"putting-it-all-together\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#putting-it-all-together\" class=\"heading-link\">Putting it all together</a></h2>\n\n<p>You can take a look at all the code <a href=\"https://gitlab.com/edent/blog-theme/\">on my GitLab repo</a>.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"what-does-it-look-like\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#what-does-it-look-like\" class=\"heading-link\">What does it look like?</a></h2>\n\n<p>If you've made it this far, you can have a little pictorial treat! Aren't you lucky?</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/stats-view.webp\" alt=\"Three tables. One showing referers with colourful favicons. Another countries with colourful emoji flags. One a list of pages and views.\" width=\"2450\" height=\"1400\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-63260\">\n\n<h2 id=\"whats-next\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#whats-next\" class=\"heading-link\">What's next?</a></h2>\n\n<p>For now, a simple table structure is fine. I've shoved it in a basic database. Sure, I don't have any indexes or fancy stuff like that. But modern computers are pretty fast.</p>\n\n<p>Eventually I'll need to create some new tables which will consolidate the data. Perhaps a table for individual posts, using date and country? Or maybe referer? I'll have to see.</p>\n\n<p>I also need a way to get historic data into it. I've blog stats going back to 2009 which I am anxious not to lose.</p>\n\n<p>And, yeah, I'll need a better front-end than manually running SQL queries.</p>\n\n<p>Above all, I want to keep it simple enough that my puny mortal brain can understand it after several years of not touching anything. I want to build something which can run without constant maintenance.</p>\n\n<p>Remember, this is only an exercise in self-learning, self-hosting, and self-respect.</p>\n\n<div class=\"footnotes\" role=\"doc-endnotes\">\n<hr>\n<ol start=\"0\">\n\n<li id=\"fn:learn\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>I enjoy learning. If you're about to say \"Why not just install…\" then you've missed the point. I like understanding how things work, I get joy from discovering some new function, my brain feels happy when it is working on a problem. I don't want to just click install, hit next a few times, and fiddle with a few options. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2020/12/build-dont-buy/\">I've written more about my philosophy here</a>. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fnref:learn\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:orisit\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Or is it? There are 4 billion IPv4 addresses - although slightly fewer in actual use. Creating a rainbow table with 4 billion rows is possible if I was <em>just</em> using IP addresses. But there are an almost infinite variety of User Agent strings. It is probably possible to create a rainbow table of, for example, the 10 most popular UAs, concatenate them with every possible IP address, and then see which hashes to <code>65fef01fef257963</code>. But even then, what would that get an attacker? Knowing that the most popular model of iPhone is on a mobile network's IP range isn't exactly private information. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/reasonably-accurate-privacy-conscious-cookieless-visitor-tracking-for-wordpress/#fnref:orisit\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n</ol>\n</div>",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63196",
"title": "Event Review: Doin' the Lambeth Walk (Oi!) ★★★⯪☆",
"description": "Historical entities have been sighted in the old village of Lambeth. Are they ghosts? Visions? Or intruders through a crack in time? Join your guides and explore the backwaters and byways that slowly spread over the mysterious marshes of Lambeth. Most walking tours have a guide drag you around the well-known tourist hot-spots while they read out a bit from Wikipedia. Minimum Labyrinth’s tour i…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/event-review-doin-the-lambeth-walk-oi/",
"published": "2025-09-09T11:34:19.000Z",
"updated": "2025-09-14T10:18:40.000Z",
"content": "<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/lambeth-walk.webp\" alt=\"Poster\" width=\"250\" height=\"250\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-63199\">\n\n<blockquote><p>Historical entities have been sighted in the old village of Lambeth. Are they ghosts? Visions? Or intruders through a crack in time? Join your guides and explore the backwaters and byways that slowly spread over the mysterious marshes of Lambeth.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Most walking tours have a guide drag you around the well-known tourist hot-spots while they read out a bit from Wikipedia. Minimum Labyrinth’s tour is <em>different</em>. We were told to find the meeting spot by looking for a mysterious message chalked somewhere on Westminster Bridge.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/chalk.webp\" alt=\"Chalked onto the bridge, the message \"Why did you come here?\"\" width=\"1020\" height=\"768\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-63203\">\n\n<p>As the bells from Big Ben faded - ghosts appeared!</p>\n\n<p>We were whisked away onto a tour which was part history lesson, part ghost story, and part science-fiction extravaganza. As we wandered through the streets, various \"baddies\" appeared out of nowhere. Ghosts came to chat with us and then promptly vanished. Music played causing onlookers to pause their hurried strolling. It was somewhere between immersive theatre and <em>immersed</em> theatre.</p>\n\n<p>The walk was well paced. The three acts each consisted of 50 minutes of strolling then 30 minutes in a pub. Perfect for a loo-break and refreshments. The cast didn't stay in character during the pub - which was a relief for them, and meant we could chat about what we thought of the event.</p>\n\n<p>It took us through some parts of London I was vaguely familiar with - and some which were completely new. It is brilliant having someone explain exactly <em>why</em> that piece of art is where it is, or <em>who</em> commissioned that church, and point out that <em>exquisite</em> detail you might have missed.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/art.webp\" alt=\"Stencil art on a wall. A photorealistic figure holds some pixelated video game items.\" width=\"512\" height=\"683\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-63204\">\n\n<p>Without wishing to spoil anyone's fun, the sci-fi element was the weakest part of the adventure. It paid \"loving homage\" to an abandoned and somewhat forgotten TV series. I felt that the story would have been much stronger without tying it in to a larger universe. No one under 50 recognised the characters so I think that aspect fell a little flat.</p>\n\n<p>I also felt that there wasn't <em>quite</em> enough to do during the walk. There were some neat snippets of information but there were long stretches of walking down streets without much going on. Given the slightly spooky and sci-fi nature of the story, I would have expected the audience to have been given little tasks or asked to keep a lookout for ghosts.</p>\n\n<p>That said, the tour took us round some stunning and unexpected spots. The ghostly goings-on were suitably mysterious and the cast kept us all safe and entertained. We had fun exploring little alleyways and art displays which were completely unknown to us.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/doing.webp\" alt=\"Terry and Liz smiling in front of a mural depicting the Lambeth Walk.\" width=\"1024\" height=\"729\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-63202\">\n\n<p>The team at <a href=\"http://minimumlabyrinth.org/\">Minimum Labyrinth</a> do a variety of weird tours and events. Worth checking out if you want something entertaining and unusual.</p>",
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"authors": [
{
"name": "@edent",
"email": null,
"url": "https://edent.tel/"
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"categories": [
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"label": "/etc/",
"term": "/etc/",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"label": "london",
"term": "london",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"label": "review",
"term": "review",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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},
{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62821",
"title": "Some thoughts on personal git hosting",
"description": "As part of my ongoing (and somewhat futile) efforts to ReDeCentralise, I'm looking at moving my personal projects away from GitHub. I already have accounts with GitLab and CodeBerg - but both of those sites are run by someone else. While they're lovely now, there's nothing stopping them becoming as slow or AI-infested as GitHub. So I want to host my own Git instance for my personal projects. …",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/",
"published": "2025-09-07T11:34:46.000Z",
"updated": "2025-09-07T16:31:44.000Z",
"content": "<p>As part of my ongoing (and somewhat futile) efforts to ReDeCentralise, I'm looking at moving my personal projects away from GitHub. I already have accounts with <a href=\"https://gitlab.com/edent/\">GitLab</a> and <a href=\"https://codeberg.org/edent\">CodeBerg</a> - but both of those sites are run by someone else. While they're lovely now, there's nothing stopping them becoming as slow or AI-infested as GitHub.</p>\n\n<p>So I want to host my own Git instance for my personal projects. I'm experimenting with <a href=\"https://git.edent.tel/\">https://git.edent.tel/</a></p>\n\n<p>It isn't <em>quite</em> self-hosted; I'm paying <a href=\"http://pikapod.net/\">PikaPod</a> €2/month to deal with the hassle of hosting and updating the software. I get to point my domain name at it which means I can always change the underlying service if I want. For example, it uses Gitea and I might want to switch to Forgejo later.</p>\n\n<p>So far, it works. But there are a few significant drawbacks.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"network-effects\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#network-effects\" class=\"heading-link\">Network Effects</a></h2>\n\n<p>A large service like GitHub has network effects which are incredible. It feels like 90%+ of all developers have an account there. That means if someone wants to leave a comment or send a PR there is no barrier to entry. That's huge! There are a bunch of popular FOSS projects which make me sign up for <em>yet another</em> service when all I want to do is send a simple bug report which I find deeply annoying.</p>\n\n<p>Luckily, Gitea has built in support for various OAuth providers. So I've set up single-sign-on with Gits Hub and Lab.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/sign-in.webp\" alt=\"An SSO screen with buttons for GitHub and GitLab.\" width=\"588\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62822\">\n\n<p>I <a href=\"https://mastodon.social/@Edent/115066706121512523\">asked people how easy it was to use</a> - most people were able to use it, although a few people wanted a local-only account.</p>\n\n<p>But is is still a bit of a faff. Even a little bit of hassle turns people away.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"forking-isnt-federated\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#forking-isnt-federated\" class=\"heading-link\">Forking isn't Federated</a></h2>\n\n<p>Suppose you want to make a Pull Request or just take a copy of the code. At the moment, you have to create a fork on <em>my</em> server. There's no way to easily fork something to your GitHub or personal server.</p>\n\n<p>You can <code>git clone</code> the repo to your local machine, and you can manually move it elsewhere, but there's no way to send a PR from your repo to mine.</p>\n\n<p>There's also no way for users to find other forks. Perhaps the <a href=\"https://forgefed.org/\">upcoming ForgeFed proposals</a> will fix things - but it doesn't exist yet.</p>\n\n<p>As pointed out in \"<a href=\"https://blog.edwardloveall.com/lets-make-sure-github-doesnt-become-the-only-option\">Let's Make Sure Github Doesn't Become the only Option</a>\" - most of the tooling of git hosting platforms isn't adequate for modern needs.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"discoverability\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#discoverability\" class=\"heading-link\">Discoverability</a></h2>\n\n<p>The easiest way to find code at the moment is to search GitHub. Moving my stuff to a different site means it will only be discovered by a general search engine.</p>\n\n<p>I want people to find and use my code. If that's hard, they won't. I can point existing users to the repo - but it still cuts down on discovery.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"admin-hassles\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#admin-hassles\" class=\"heading-link\">Admin Hassles</a></h2>\n\n<p>Although PikaPods takes care of all the hosting administration, there's still the faff of setting up all of Gitea's options.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/gitea-config.webp\" alt=\"Long list of config options.\" width=\"801\" height=\"800\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62823\">\n\n<p>If I get hit by <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/07/grinding-down-open-source-maintainers-with-ai/\">an automated spam attack</a>, it'll be up to me to clean it up.</p>\n\n<p>I'm not sure if I have the time, patience, or expertise to correctly and safely configure everything. Time spent administrating is time not spent coding.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"sponsorship\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#sponsorship\" class=\"heading-link\">Sponsorship</a></h2>\n\n<p>I get a little bit of money when people <a href=\"https://github.com/sponsors/edent\">sponsor me on GitHub</a>. There's no \"sponsor\" option on Gitea and, even if there was, the network effects of GitHub are substantial. Getting people to enter their credit card info into a random site isn't as convenient as clicking a button in GitHub.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"now-what\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/some-thoughts-on-personal-git-hosting/#now-what\" class=\"heading-link\">Now What?</a></h2>\n\n<p>My <a href=\"https://github.com/edent/SuperTinyIcons\">most popular Github repo</a> has around 140 contributors. I genuinely don't think I could attract that many people to OAuth onto my personal git hosting service.</p>\n\n<p>Gitea seems to have a mixed reputation. But it's the only one offered by PikaPods.</p>\n\n<p>There are <a href=\"https://github.workshops.petrichor.me/\">interesting discussions about how to replace GitHub</a> but they're only in the early stages.</p>\n\n<p>Although €2/mo isn't a huge amount, I've gotten used to having free services on GitHub / GitLab / CodeBerg.</p>\n\n<p>So this, I think, is my plan:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>Leave my popular / sponsored repos on GitHub</li>\n<li>Move my smaller repos to <a href=\"https://git.edent.tel/\">https://git.edent.tel/</a></li>\n<li>Create new repos in there as well</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>I'm also going to look for a hosted Forgejo instance which lets me use my own subdomain - hopefully at a cheaper or comparable price. If you have any recommendations - please let me know!</p>",
"image": null,
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"name": "@edent",
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"label": "/etc/",
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"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63010",
"title": "Book Review: Star Trek: Lower Decks, Vol. 1: Second Contact by Ryan North ★★★★★",
"description": "I can confidently declare that Lower Decks is the second best Star Trek series after The Orville. Lower Decks has always been bags of fun with a good emotional core. Now your favourite sci-fi capers are available in handy comic book form! Second Contact is a compilation of Lower Decks issues #1–6. You get a bunch of stories spread out over 145 pages. The great thing about a comic of a cartoon i…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/book-review-star-trek-lower-decks-vol-1-second-contact-by-ryan-north/",
"published": "2025-09-05T11:34:52.000Z",
"updated": "2025-09-05T11:51:18.000Z",
"content": "<p><img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/second.jpg\" alt=\"Comic book cover.\" width=\"340\" height=\"522\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-63030\">\nI can confidently declare that Lower Decks is the second best Star Trek series after The Orville. Lower Decks has always been bags of fun with a good emotional core. Now your favourite sci-fi capers are available in handy comic book form!</p>\n\n<p>Second Contact is a compilation of Lower Decks issues #1–6. You get a bunch of stories spread out over 145 pages. The great thing about a comic of a cartoon is that all the characters look <em>identical</em> to their TV counterparts. There's no pesky rights issues to get in the way.</p>\n\n<p>The stories are exactly what you'd expect from Lower Decks. The gang have to deal with aliens, not-too-strange new worlds, and some heavy meta-textual crises. And, yes, it is <em>delightfully</em> meta. There are plenty of call-backs to the show, TNG, and the <em>original</em> animated series. Perfect for nerds like me.</p>\n\n<p>It also introduces some new lore:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Kirk sometimes liked to unwind in his quarters by making a fanvid of his own day. This is canon.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>There's also the first(?) appearance of the \"Starfleet Corps of Rhetoric Engineers\" who, as their name suggests, help provide some much needed exposition for the technobabble.</p>\n\n<p>Oh, and we find out that the noise the transporters make is \"SVRRRRRMMMMMM\". Which seems about right.</p>\n\n<p>The episodic pacing is nice and there is a genuine laugh-out-loud moment every few pages. It doesn't try to do anything new or innovative with the comic book format - it's pretty much small panels, the occasional bigger art piece, and one double-pager.</p>\n\n<p>On a technical note, the speech bubbles are in text, rather than raster, format - so your TTS should be able to read them aloud.</p>\n\n<p>Second Contact is the sort of comic book which will keep you giggling with glee at the misadventures of lovable misfits.</p>\n\n<p>Thanks to <a href=\"https://www.netgalley.co.uk/\">Netgalley</a> for the review copy. The book is available to pre-order now - with delivery mid-September 2025.</p>",
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"label": "/etc/",
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"label": "Book Review",
"term": "Book Review",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"label": "NetGalley",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=44218",
"title": "40 years later, are Bentley's \"Programming Pearls\" still relevant?",
"description": "In September 1985, Jon Bentley published Programming Pearls. A collection of aphorisms designed to reveal truths about the field of programming. It's 40 years later - long enough to see several revolutions in the field - so surely these are obsolete, right? They belong in the same category as \"always carry a bundle of hay for the horses\" or \"you won't always have a pocket calculator with you\" or …",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/",
"published": "2025-09-03T11:34:14.000Z",
"updated": "2025-09-08T13:00:34.000Z",
"content": "<p>In September 1985, Jon Bentley published <a href=\"https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/4284.315122\">Programming Pearls</a>. A collection of aphorisms designed to reveal truths about the field of programming.</p>\n\n<p>It's 40 years later - long enough to see several revolutions in the field - so surely these are obsolete, right? They belong in the same category as \"always carry a bundle of hay for the horses\" or \"you won't always have a pocket calculator with you\" or \"tie an onion on your belt to stay stylish\".</p>\n\n<p>Ah, my sweet summer child! <i lang=\"fr\">Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.</i> You'll find nearly everything in here depressingly relevant.</p>\n\n<p>Before we dive in, a word for Bentley on the provenance of this collection:</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/4284.315122.pdf\">Programming Pearls.</a></p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Although there is some truth in each saying in this column, all should be taken with a grain of salt. A word about credit. The name associated with a rule is usually the person who sent me the rule, even if they in fact attributed it to their Cousin Ralph (sorry, Ralph). In a few cases I have listed an earlier reference, together with the author’s current affiliation (to the best of my knowledge). I’m sure that I have slighted many people by denying them proper attribution, and to them I offer the condolence that Plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Here we go!</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/4284.315122\"><img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/pp-fs8.png\" alt=\"Gnarly monochrome scan of Programming Pearls.\" width=\"800\" height=\"243\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-49144\"></a></p>\n\n<h2 id=\"coding\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#coding\" class=\"heading-link\">Coding</a></h2>\n\n<blockquote><p>When in doubt, use brute force.\nKen Thompson - Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Straight off the bat, a winner! Almost all problems are solvable through brute force. It may take time - but throw more resources at it! Once you know it <em>can</em> be done, then it is time to see <em>how</em> it can be done better.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Avoid arc-sine and arc-cosine functions - you can usually do better by applying a trig identity or computing a vector dot-product.\nJim Conyngham - Arvin/Calspan Advanced Technology Center</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>And then, just like that, something broadly irrelevant today. These sorts of mathematical functions have been optimised so far that it probably doesn't matter which way you calculate them.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Allocate four digits for the year part of a date: a new millenium is coming.\nDavid Martin - Norristown, Pennsylvania</p></blockquote>\n\n<p><em>*weeps*</em> Why didn't they listen to you, David? While I would hope any code written this side of Y2K uses ISO8601, it is amusing that you still occasionally encounter people who want to save two bytes <em>somewhere</em>. Handy in some small systems, but mostly just a recipe for disaster. Looking at you, <a href=\"https://www.gps.gov/support/user/rollover/\">GPS</a>!</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Avoid asymmetry.\nAndy Huber - Data General Corporation</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I'll be honest, I'm not sure what Andy is going on about here. I <em>assume</em> that he's talking about having the ability to go A->B without being able to go B->A. Equally, it could be about accepting data in one format and outputting it in a different format. <a href=\"https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33739184\">Some more discussion on the topic</a>.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>The sooner you start to code, the longer the program will take.\nRoy Carlson - University of Wisconsin</p></blockquote>\n\n<p><em>Bam!</em> Right in the truth. Much like <a href=\"https://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/03/29/sharp-axe/\">the woodsman who spends his time sharpening his axe</a>, we know that diving into code is probably the least efficient way to create something.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>If you can’t write it down in English, you can’t code it.\nPeter Halpern - Brooklyn, New York</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>So many bugs come from us not understanding the requirements of the user / customer.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Details count.\nPeter Weinberger - Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Hard agree, Pete! It's very easy to go for the \"big picture\" view of the software. But unless all those sharp edges are filed down, the code isn't going to have a happy life.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>If the code and the comments disagree, then both are probably wrong.\nNorm Schyer - Belt Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Ah, the dream of self-documenting code will never be realised. Again, this goes back to our (in)ability to properly describe our requirements and our (in)adequacies at turning those comments into code.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>A procedure should fit on a page.\nDavid Tribble - Arlington, Texas</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Famously, <a href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/24/the-two-pizza-rule-and-the-secret-of-amazons-success\">Amazon has a \"Two Pizza\" rule</a> which defines the maximum size of a team. The larger and more complex something is, the more likely it is to go wrong. Yes, there are limits to <abbr title=\"Don't repeat yourself\">DRY</abbr> and <abbr title=\"You ain't gonna need it\">YAGNI</abbr> - but we seem firmly in the paradigm that large procedures / functions are ruinous to one's health.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>If you have too many special cases, you are doing it wrong.\nCraig Zerouni - Computer FX Ltd. London, England</p></blockquote>\n\n<p><code>IF/ELSE</code> and <code>CASE/SWITCH</code> still really test our patience. Beautifully clean code which is ruined by special subroutines for rarely occurring situations. But it is hard to call them \"wrong\". Sometimes the world is complex and it is the job of computers to do the hard work for us.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Get your data structures correct first, and the rest of the program will write itself.\nDavid Jones. Assen, The Netherlands</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Dave is right. A well-defined data structure is <em>still</em> the essence of most <abbr title=\"Create, read, update and delete\">CRUD</abbr> systems.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"user-interfaces\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#user-interfaces\" class=\"heading-link\">User Interfaces</a></h2>\n\n<blockquote><p>[The Principle of Least Astonishment] Make a user interface as consistent and as predictable as possible.\nContributed by several readers</p></blockquote>\n\n<p><em>*weeps*</em> Why isn't this hammered into every programmer? Today's tools are filled with hidden UI gestures, random menus, and a complete disregard for the user's time.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>A program designed for inputs from people is usually stressed beyond the breaking point by computer-generated inputs.\nDennis Ritchie. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I think this one is mostly irrelevant now. Humans can only type at a limited speed, but computers can generate massive amounts of data instantly. But our machines' abilities to ingest that data has also grown. I suppose the nearest thing is the DDoS - where a webserver designed for a few visitors is overwhelmed by a flood of automated and malicious requests.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Twenty percent of all input forms filled out by people contain bad data.\nVic Vyssotsky. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Ha! Vic didn't know that we'd have <code><input type...</code> validation in the 21st century! But, yeah, people write all sorts of crap into forms.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Eighty percent of all input forms ask questions they have no business asking.\nMike Garey. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Mike was sent from the future to warn the people of the past - but they paid him no heed.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Don't make the user provide information that the system already knows.\nRick Lemons. Cardinal Data Systems</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I'm going to slightly disagree with Rick here. Asking for repeated information is a reasonable way to double-check you've got that information correct. It also helps to validate that the user is who they say they are.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>For 80 percent of all data sets, 95 percent of the information can be seen in a good graph.\nWilliam S. Cleveland. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Those of us who have seen <a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anscombe's_quartet\">Anscombe's quartet</a> know how true this is.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"debugging\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#debugging\" class=\"heading-link\">Debugging</a></h2>\n\n<blockquote><p>Of all my programming bugs, 80 percent are syntax errors. Of the remaining 20 percent, 80 percent are trivial logical errors. Of the remaining 4 percent, 80 percent are pointer errors. And the remaining 0.8 percent are hard.\nMarc Donner. IBM T. J. Watson Research Center</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Syntax errors are rarer now that we have IDEs. And I hope visual programming languages will further reduce them. Logic errors still plague us. Pointer errors have been eradicated unless you're working at the very lowest levels. And I'd say the number of \"hard\" bugs is probably higher now due to the complex interaction of multiple libraries and systems.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>It takes three times the effort to find and fix bugs in system test than when done by the developer. It takes ten times the effort to find and fix bugs in the field than when done in system test. Therefore, insist on unit tests by the developer.\nLarry Bernstein. Bell Communications Research</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>We can quibble about the numbers and the ratios - but it is generally harder to fix in prod. That said, getting crash logs from the field has considerable shortened those ratio.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Don’t debug standing up. It cuts your patience in half, and you need all you can muster.\nDave Storer. Cedar Rapids, Iowa</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I'm with Team-Standing-Desk! So I think Dave is wrong.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Don’t get suckered in by the comments - they can be terribly misleading. Debug only the code. \nDave Storer. Cedar Rapids, Iowa</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Hmmm. Yes, this is probably correct. I'm not going to say code is self-documenting these days; but it certainly is a lot easier to read.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Testing can show the presence of bugs, but not their absence.\nEdsger W. Dijkstra. University of Texas</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Dare we disagree with Dijkstra?! Well, perhaps a little. With modern fuzzing tools we can show the absence of certain kinds of bugs.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Each new user of a new system uncovers a new class of bugs.\nBrian Kernighan. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Yup! Our code would be bug-free if it weren't for those pesky users!</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.\nRonald Reagan. Santa Barbara, California</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Amongst the many things about which to disagree with the former President, this is up there! Code needs maintenance. Some things aren't broke until all of a sudden they are. Sure, maybe don't change your app's layout because a manager wants a bonus; but things constantly need fixing.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>[The Maintainer’s Motto] If we can’t fix it, it ain’t broke.\nLieutenant Colonel Walt Weir. United States Army</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I believe in you. Self deprecation is fine, but self confidence is better.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>The first step in fixing a broken program is getting it to fail repeatably.\nTom Duff. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Yes! Transient errors are the worst! And a huge source of the \"it works for me\" antipattern.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"performance\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#performance\" class=\"heading-link\">Performance</a></h2>\n\n<blockquote><p>[The First Rule of Program Optimization] Don’t do it.\n[The Second Rule of Program Optimization - for experts only] Don't do it yet.\nMichael Jackson. Michael Jackson Systems Ltd.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>As true now as it ever was.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>The fastest algorithm can frequently be replaced by one that is almost as fast and much easier to understand.\nDouglas W. Jones. University of Iowa</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I'm only <em>mostly</em> in agreement here. Many of the security bugs we see in modern code are due to \"clever\" tricks which turn out to have nasty strings attached. But, at the microcode level, performance is still everything. And a well-tested fast algorithm may be necessary. As part of the climate crisis we should all be thinking about the efficiency of our code.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>On some machines indirection is slower with displacement, so the most-used member of a structure or a record should be first. \nMike Morton. Boston, Massachusetts</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>We live in an age of ridiculously fast SSD and RAM access times. Sequential reads are still slightly faster than random jumps, and structures like <a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-tree\">B-Tree</a> give us a good mix of the two. We don't need to align data to the physical tracks of a spinning disk any more.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>In non-I/O-bound programs, a few percent of the source code typically accounts for over half the run time.\nDon Knuth. Stanford University</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I wonder how true this now is? Perhaps we could replace \"I/O\" with \"Internet requests\" and still be accurate?</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Before optimizing, use a profiler to locate the “hot spots” of the program.\nMike Morton. Boston, Massachusetts</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Mostly true. But you don't lose much by doing some manual optimisations that you know (from bitter experience) will make a difference.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>[Conservation of Code Size] When you turn an ordinary page of code into just a handful of instructions for speed, expand the comments to keep the number of source lines, constant.\nMike Morton. Boston, Massachusetts</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I don't think this is relevant these days. Perhaps it is useful to spend time explaining exactly what trickery you're pulling off with weird syntax. But our tools are now line-count agnostic. Mostly.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>If the programmer can simulate a construct faster than the compiler can implement the construct itself, then the compiler writer has blown it badly.\nGuy L. Steele, Jr. Tartan Laboratories</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I think this is rather self-evident. But compilers are so ridiculously optimised that this scenario is increasingly rare.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>To speed up an I/O-bound program, begin by accounting for all I/O. Eliminate that which is unnecessary or redundant, and make the remaining as fast as possible.\nDavid Martin. Norristown, Pennsylvania</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I think this can be generalised even further. I'm reminded of <a href=\"https://github.com/npm/npm/issues/11283\">NPM's progress bar slowdown issue</a>. There's a lot of redundancy which can be removed in many programs.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>The fastest I/O is no I/O.\nNils-Peter Nelson. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Man! They were <em>obsessed</em> with I/O back in the day! At large volumes, it is still an issue. But perhaps now we can relax just a little?</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>The cheapest, fastest, and most reliable components of a computer system are those that aren’t there.\nGordon Bell. Encore Computer Corporation</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>A little unfair, I think. It's cheaper to have less RAM, but that doesn't make my laptop faster.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>[Compiler Writer’s Motto-Optimization Pass] Making a wrong program worse is no sin.\nBill McKeeman. Wang Znstitute</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Personally, I don't think it is the compiler's job to tell me I'm doing it wrong.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Electricity travels a foot in a nanosecond.\nCommodore Grace Murray Hopper. United States Navy</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>And a nano-Century is Pi seconds! One of those pub-trivia facts which are irrelevant to modern computing.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>LISP programmers know the value of everything but the cost of nothing.\nAlan Perlis. Yale University</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Nowadays LISP programmers are a protected species and shouldn't be subject to such harsh treatment.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>[Little’s Formula] The average number of objects in a queue is the product of the entry rate and the average holding time.\nRichard E. Fairley. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Another of those truisms which kinda don't matter in a world with infinite disk space. Speed is our greatest worry.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"documentation\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#documentation\" class=\"heading-link\">Documentation</a></h2>\n\n<blockquote><p>[The Test of Negation] Don’t include a sentence in documentation if its negation is obviously false.\nBob Martin. AT&T Technologies</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I don't know if that's the same guy as <a href=\"https://blog.wesleyac.com/posts/robert-martin\">Uncle Bob</a> - but it sounds like the sort of claptrap he'd come up with. What's obvious to you might not be obvious to others. Test your writing with your audience to see if they understand your meaning.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>When explaining a command, or language feature, or hardware widget, first describe the problem it is designed to solve.\nDavid Martin. Norristown, Pennsylvania</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Agreed. It doesn't need to be an essay, but documentation needs context.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>[One Page Principle] A (specification, design, procedure, test plan) that will not fit on one page of 8.5-by-11 inch paper cannot be understood.\nMark Ardis. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I do have some sympathy with this - see the Two-Pizza rule above - but I think this ignores the reality of modern systems. Yes, we should keep things simple, but we also have to recognise that complexity is unavoidable.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>The job’s not over until the paperwork’s done.\nAnon</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Amen!</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"managing-software\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#managing-software\" class=\"heading-link\">Managing Software</a></h2>\n\n<blockquote><p>The structure of a system reflects the structure of the organization that built it.\nRichard E. Fairley. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>This is <a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_law\">Conway's Law</a> and it is still fairly true. <a href=\"https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1109/RESER.2013.14\">Some studies show it is possible to break out of the paradigm</a> but it holds remarkable power.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Don’t keep doing what doesn’t work.\nAnon</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>If only we could tattoo this on the inside of our eyelids, eh?</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>[Rule of Credibility] The first 90 percent of the code accounts for the first 90 percent of the development time. The remaining 10 percent of the code accounts for the other 90 percent of the development time.\nTom Cargill. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Agile methodology has <em>somewhat</em> dimmed the potency of this prediction. I think people are <em>generally</em> better at estimating now. But it is hard to escape <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2022/12/zenos-paradox-and-why-modern-technology-is-rubbish/\">Zeno's Paradox</a>.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Less than 10 percent of the code has to do with the ostensible purpose of the system; the rest deals with input-output, data validation, data structure maintenance, and other housekeeping.\nMay Shaw. Carnegie-Mellon University</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>How many times have you installed a simple program only to see it pull in every dependency under the sun? We need an awful lot of scaffolding to keep our houses standing.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment.\nFred Brooks. University of North Carolina</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I lean <em>slightly</em> towards this. I also strongly believe that you can pick up a lot of good judgement by listening to your users.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Don’t write a new program if one already does more or less what you want. And if you must write a program, use existing code to do as much of the work as possible.\nRichard Hill. Hewlett-Packard S.A. Geneva, Switzerland</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>This is the open source way. Much easier to fork than start again. But at some point you'll run up against an unwanted design decision which will be load-bearing. Think carefully before you re-use.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Whenever possible, steal code.\nTom Duff. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>ITYM \"Respect the terms of an OSI approved Open Source licence\" - don't you, Tom?</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Good customer relations double productivity.\nLarry Bernstein. Bell Communications Research</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>A lesson learned by Apple and ignored by Google.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Translating a working program to a new language or system takes 10 percent of the original development time or manpower or cost.\nDouglas W. Jones University of Iowa</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I honestly don't know how true that is any more. Automated tools must surely have improved that somewhat?</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Don’t use the computer to do things that can be done efficiently by hand.\nRichard Hill. Hewlett-Packard S.A. Geneva, Switzerland</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>A rare disagreement! Things can be efficiently done by hand <em>once or twice</em> but after that, go nuts! Even if it's something as simple as renaming a dozen files in a directory, you'll learn something interesting from automating it.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>I’d rather write programs to write programs than write programs.\nDick Sites. Digital Equipment Corporation</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>There will always be people who love working on the meta-task. They're not wrong for doing so, but it can be an unhelpful distraction sometimes.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>[Brooks’s Law of Prototypes] Plan to throw one away, you will anyhow.\nFred Brooks. University of North Carolina</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I'd go further an suggest throwing out even more. It can be hard to sell that to management - but it is necessary.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>If you plan to throw one away, you will throw away two.\nCraig Zerouni. Computer FX Ltd. London, England</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Craig with the double-tap!</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Prototyping cuts the work to produce a system by 40 percent.\nLarry Bernstein. Bell Communications Research</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Minor disagreement. Prototyping <em>is</em> part of the work. And it should probably take a considerable amount of time.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>[Thompson’s rule for first-time telescope makers] It is faster to make a four-inch mirror then a six-inch mirror than to make a six-inch mirror.\nBill McKeeman. Wang Institute</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Yes. It is always tempting to go for the big win. But baby-steps!</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Furious activity is no substitute for understanding.\nH. H. Williams. Oakland, California</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Goodness me, yes! It's always tempting to rush in pell-mell. But that's a poor use of time.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Always do the hard part first. If the hard part is impossible, why waste time on the easy part? Once the hard part is done, you’re home free.\nAlways do the easy part first. What you think at first is the easy part often turns out to be the hard part. Once the easy part is done, you can concentrate all your efforts on the hard part.\nAl Schapira. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Oh, Al! You card! Luckily, there are very few \"basic\" problems to be solved in modern computing. We know what most of the hard problems are. Perhaps Agile teaches us to always leave software in a working state, so we start with the easy parts?</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>If you lie to the computer, it will get you.\nPerry Farrar. Germantown, Maryland</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>We shouldn't anthropomorphise computers; they don't like it. Actually, nowadays it's is quite common to \"lie\" to computers with dummy data and virtualised environments. It's fine.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>If a system doesn’t have to be reliable, it can do anything else.\nH. H. Williams. Oakland, California</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Perhaps it is my imagination, but we seem less concerned with reliability these days. A Tesla car is a wonderful example of that.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>One person’s constant is another person’s variable.\nSusan Gerhart. Microelectronics and Computer Technology Corp.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I wonder about this one a lot. Scoped access to variables possibly makes this less of an issue in the 21st century?</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>One person’s data is another person’s program.\nGuy L. Steele, Jr. Tartan Laboratories</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I don't quite get this. Anyone care to explain?</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Eschew clever rules.\nJoe Condon. Bell Labs</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>The pearls end with this gem.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"what-have-we-learned-today\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/40-years-later-are-bentleys-programming-pearls-still-relevant/#what-have-we-learned-today\" class=\"heading-link\">What have we learned today?</a></h2>\n\n<p>The majority of my disagreements are minor quibbles. And while disk-bound I/O is rarely a problem, network latency has replaced it as the main cause of delays. We've managed to fix some things, but many seem irrevocably tied to the human condition.</p>\n\n<p>Which one was your favourite?</p>",
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"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63068",
"title": "A little oddity in the way curl deals with old dates",
"description": "For boring technical reasons, computers think the world began on 1st of January 1970. To keep track of the future, they count the number of seconds since that momentous date. So zero seconds represents midnight on that day. So how do computers deal with dates before The Beatles' Abbey Road was top of the UK album charts? Negative numbers! Most modern computers can deal with dates far in the…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/",
"published": "2025-09-01T11:34:48.000Z",
"updated": "2025-09-01T10:45:21.000Z",
"content": "<p>For boring technical reasons, computers think the world began on 1st of January 1970<sup id=\"fnref:who\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:who\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Although, who is to say it didn't? Were you there? Do you have proof? Maybe the Young Earth Creationists aren't ambitious enough?!\" role=\"doc-noteref\">0</a></sup>. To keep track of the future, they count the number of seconds since that momentous date. So zero seconds represents midnight on that day<sup id=\"fnref:midnight\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:midnight\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Except! Psych! It doesn't! The UK was experimenting with year-round BST so there's actually an hour's difference. Time is hard™.\" role=\"doc-noteref\">1</a></sup>.</p>\n\n<p>So how do computers deal with dates <em>before</em> The Beatles' Abbey Road was top of the UK album<sup id=\"fnref:album\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:album\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Do not search for the number 1 single on that date. You'll give yourself a sad.\" role=\"doc-noteref\">2</a></sup> charts?</p>\n\n<p>Negative numbers! Most modern computers can deal with dates far in the past and, hopefully, far into the future. Again, for <a href=\"https://righteousit.com/2024/09/04/more-on-ext4-timestamps-and-timestomping/\">boring technical reasons</a>, lots of computers can only save files with a date no earlier than 13th December 1901<sup id=\"fnref:book\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:book\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"The music charts were less well-developed in 1901. But you could have read \"The Purple Cloud\" which is a brilliant early sci-fi novel.\" role=\"doc-noteref\">3</a></sup>.</p>\n\n<p>When you download a file from the Internet, the sending server can tell you when that file was last modified. That's useful if you only want to download the file if it has changed since you last got it.</p>\n\n<p>It presents the date using <a href=\"https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc1123\">RFC 1123</a> format for reasons which are lost to the ages.</p>\n\n<p><code>< Last-Modified: Wed, 09 Oct 1940 16:45:49 +0100</code></p>\n\n<p>Great!</p>\n\n<p>If you use the venerable <code>wget</code> utility, it will happily save the file on your disk and tell you that is when it was created.</p>\n\n<p>But what if you use <code>curl -OR</code> to download the file? The <code>-R</code> option says:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"https://curl.se/docs/manpage.html#-R\">Make curl attempt to figure out the timestamp of the remote file that is getting downloaded, and if that is available make the local file get that same timestamp. </a></p></blockquote>\n\n<p>THIS IS A LIE!<sup id=\"fnref:lie\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:lie\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Everything you know is false! How deep does this conspiracy go!?!?\" role=\"doc-noteref\">4</a></sup></p>\n\n<p>If curl sees a date with a negative time, it pretends that the past doesn't exist and that what you <em>really</em> wanted was to save the file with today's date and time.</p>\n\n<p>Why does it do this?</p>\n\n<p>I <em>think</em> it is because <a href=\"https://github.com/curl/curl/blob/f08ecdc586203026d1a81bd401486261f28848d3/src/tool_filetime.c#L89-L91\">this code only checks for times ≥ 0</a>. Which, I guess, is pretty reasonable. There weren't <em>many</em> computers around before the 1970s<sup id=\"fnref:zero\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:zero\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Although, there were some. Not just the secret ones used to control the weather - but actual proper computers you could use to do maths!\" role=\"doc-noteref\">5</a></sup> so the chances of finding a file which predates disco are slim.</p>\n\n<p>Should we storm the barricades and demand this temporal anomaly be rectified?<sup id=\"fnref:photon\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:photon\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Preferably by firing photon torpedoes. Or maybe ejecting the warp core. I'm not an engineer.\" role=\"doc-noteref\">6</a></sup> Nah. I've <a href=\"https://github.com/curl/curl/discussions/18424\">raised it as a discussion item on curl's GitHub</a>.</p>\n\n<p>If you have strong opinions about this - please join in the discussion<sup id=\"fnref:help\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fn:help\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Or seek help from a mental health professional.\" role=\"doc-noteref\">7</a></sup>.</p>\n\n<div class=\"footnotes\" role=\"doc-endnotes\">\n<hr>\n<ol start=\"0\">\n\n<li id=\"fn:who\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Although, who is to say it didn't? Were you there? Do you have proof? Maybe the Young Earth Creationists aren't ambitious enough?! <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:who\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:midnight\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Except! Psych! It doesn't! <a href=\"https://www.shellscript.sh/examples/1970/\">The UK was experimenting with year-round BST</a> so there's actually an hour's difference. Time is hard™. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:midnight\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:album\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Do not search for the number 1 <em>single</em> on that date. You'll give yourself a sad. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:album\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:book\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>The music charts were less well-developed in 1901. But you could have read \"<a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Purple_Cloud\">The Purple Cloud</a>\" which is a brilliant early sci-fi novel. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:book\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:lie\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Everything you know is false! How deep does this conspiracy go!?!? <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:lie\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:zero\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Although, there were <em>some</em>. Not just the secret ones used to control the weather - but actual proper computers you could use to do maths! <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:zero\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:photon\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Preferably by firing photon torpedoes. Or maybe ejecting the warp core. I'm not an engineer. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:photon\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:help\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Or seek help from a mental health professional. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/09/a-little-oddity-in-the-way-curl-deals-with-old-dates/#fnref:help\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n</ol>\n</div>",
"image": null,
"media": [],
"authors": [
{
"name": "@edent",
"email": null,
"url": "https://edent.tel/"
}
],
"categories": [
{
"label": "/etc/",
"term": "/etc/",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
},
{
"label": "bug",
"term": "bug",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"label": "curl",
"term": "curl",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
},
{
"label": "linux",
"term": "linux",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"label": "time",
"term": "time",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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},
{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62350",
"title": "Some minor bugs in Proton's new Authenticator app",
"description": "I maintain a a test-suite for TOTP codes. It contains a bunch of codes which adhere to the specification, some of which stretch it to breaking point, and some that are completely invalid. These codes are a good starting point for checking whether a 2FA / MFA app works correctly. Proton have release a swish new authenticator app for Android, iOS, Mac, Linux and Windows. Sadly, their open source…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/",
"published": "2025-08-31T11:34:55.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-01T09:31:17.000Z",
"content": "<p>I maintain a <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/03/towards-a-test-suite-for-totp-codes/\">a test-suite for TOTP codes</a>. It contains a bunch of codes which adhere to the specification, some of which stretch it to breaking point, and some that are completely invalid. These codes are a good starting point for checking whether a 2FA / MFA app works correctly.</p>\n\n<p>Proton have release a swish <a href=\"https://proton.me/authenticator\">new authenticator app</a> for Android, iOS, Mac, Linux and Windows. Sadly, their <a href=\"https://github.com/protonpass/android-pass\">open source repository</a> doesn't allow for bug reports so I'm blogging in public instead.</p>\n\n<p>The good news is, the majority of tests pass. It accepts a wide range of acceptable codes and refuses to store most broken ones. There are a few niggles though. None of these are severe security issues, but they probably ought to be fixed.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"very-long-codes\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#very-long-codes\" class=\"heading-link\">Very long codes</a></h2>\n\n<p>The maximum number of digits which can be generated by the standard TOTP algorithm is 10. Proton happily scans codes containing 1 - 9 digits, but complains about 10 digit codes. So this fails:</p>\n\n<p><code>otpauth://totp/issuer%3Aaccount%20name?secret=QWERTYUIOP&digits=10&issuer=issuer&algorithm=SHA1&period=30</code></p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/10digit.webp\" alt=\"QR code for a 10 digit TOTP.\" width=\"360\" height=\"360\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62370\">\n\n<p>The TOTP RFC says:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Basically, the output of the HMAC-SHA-1 calculation is truncated to obtain user-friendly values</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc6238#section-1.2\">1.2. Background</a></p></blockquote>\n\n<p>But doesn't say how far to truncate.</p>\n\n<p>There's nothing I can see in the spec that <em>prevents</em> an implementer using all 10.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The user may not be able to store a valid code.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Allow 10 digit codes.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"invalid-secrets\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#invalid-secrets\" class=\"heading-link\">Invalid Secrets</a></h2>\n\n<p>Here we get to yet another <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/02/the-least-secure-totp-code-possible/\">deficiency in the TOTP specification</a>. How is a secret defined?</p>\n\n<p>Google says the secret is:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>an arbitrary key value encoded in Base32 according to RFC 3548. The padding specified in RFC 3548 section 2.2 is not required and should be omitted.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Whereas Apple says it is:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>An arbitrary key value encoded in Base32. Secrets should be at least 160 bits.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Either way, <a href=\"https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc3548#section-5\">the Base32 alphabet</a> contains only uppercase letters and a few numbers. What happens if we give it a secret like <code>QWERT!£$%^)*(YUIOP</code>?</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/invaid-secret.webp\" alt=\"QR code for an invalid secret.\" width=\"360\" height=\"360\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62371\">\n\n<p>Proton Authenticator just accepts it. It stores the full secret but I'm not sure how it generates the code based on it.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The code may be generated incorrectly.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Warn the user that the secret may be invalid and that a correct 2FA code cannot be guaranteed.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"issuer-mismatch\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#issuer-mismatch\" class=\"heading-link\">Issuer Mismatch</a></h2>\n\n<p>In this example, the first issuer is example.com but the second issuer is microsoft.com</p>\n\n<p><code>otpauth://totp/example.com%3Aaccount%20name?secret=QWERTYUIOP&digits=6&issuer=microsoft.com&algorithm=SHA1&period=30</code></p>\n\n<p>What should the TOTP reader do with this? Proton chooses microsoft.com.</p>\n\n<p>This is something which, again, is inconsistent between major providers.</p>\n\n<p>Google says this parameter is:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p><strong>Strongly Recommended</strong> The issuer parameter is a string value indicating the provider or service this account is associated with, URL-encoded according to RFC 3986. If the issuer parameter is absent, issuer information may be taken from the issuer prefix of the label. If both issuer parameter and issuer label prefix are present, they should be equal.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Apple merely says:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>The domain of the site or app. The password manager uses this field to suggest credentials when setting up a new code generator.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Yubico equivocates with</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>The issuer parameter is recommended, but it can be absent. Also, the issuer parameter and issuer string in label should be equal.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The code may be displayed with the wrong issuer.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Warn the user that there are multiple issuers. Let them choose which one is correct.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"dealing-with-defaults\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#dealing-with-defaults\" class=\"heading-link\">Dealing With Defaults</a></h2>\n\n<p>What should a TOTP app do if there is missing information? Proton does the following:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>If the code has no number set for digits, it defaults to 6</li>\n<li>If the code has no time set for period, it defaults to 30</li>\n<li>If the code has no algorithm, it defaults to SHA1</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p><strong>Risk:</strong> Low. The user normally has to confirm with the issuer that the the TOTP code has been correctly stored.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Let the user know that the code has missing data and may not be correct.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"odd-labels\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#odd-labels\" class=\"heading-link\">Odd Labels</a></h2>\n\n<p>The label allows you to have multiple codes for the same service. For example <code>Big Bank:Personal Account</code> and <code>Big Bank:Family Savings</code>. The Google spec is slightly confusing:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>The issuer prefix and account name should be separated by a literal or url-encoded colon, and optional spaces may precede the account name. Neither issuer nor account name may themselves contain a colon.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>What happens if there are spaces before the account name?</p>\n\n<p><code>otpauth://totp/Spaces:%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20test%40example.com?secret=QWERTYUIOP&digits=6&issuer=&algorithm=SHA1&period=30</code>\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/spaces.webp\" alt=\"QR code for a TOTP.\" width=\"400\" height=\"400\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62374\"></p>\n\n<p>Proton strips the spaces (probably wise) but also removes the issuer.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Risk:</strong> The user will not know which account the code is for.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Recommendation:</strong> Keep the issuer.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"timeline\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#timeline\" class=\"heading-link\">Timeline</a></h2>\n\n<p>These aren't particularly high severity bugs, nevertheless I like to give organisations a bit of time to respond.</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>2025-07-31 - Discovered.</li>\n<li>2025-08-01 - Disclosed <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/proton.me/post/3lvbnajumh22e\">via a web form</a>.</li>\n<li>2025-08-31 - Automatically published.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<h2 id=\"next-steps\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/some-minor-bugs-in-protons-new-authenticator-app/#next-steps\" class=\"heading-link\">Next Steps</a></h2>\n\n<ul>\n<li>If you're a user, <a href=\"https://codeberg.org/edent/TOTP_Test_Suite\">please contribute tests</a> or give feedback.</li>\n<li>If you're a developer, please check your app conforms to the specification.</li>\n<li>If you're from a security company - wanna help me write up a proper RFC so this doesn't cause issues in the future?</li>\n</ul>",
"image": null,
"media": [],
"authors": [
{
"name": "@edent",
"email": null,
"url": "https://edent.tel/"
}
],
"categories": [
{
"label": "/etc/",
"term": "/etc/",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
},
{
"label": "2fa",
"term": "2fa",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
},
{
"label": "CyberSecurity",
"term": "CyberSecurity",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
},
{
"label": "MFA",
"term": "MFA",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
},
{
"label": "Proton",
"term": "Proton",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
},
{
"label": "totp",
"term": "totp",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
}
]
},
{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=63058",
"title": "Is it possible to allow sideloading *and* keep users safe?",
"description": "In which I attempt to be pragmatic. Are you allowed to run whatever computer program you want on the hardware you own? This is a question where freedom, practicality, and reality all collide into a mess. Google has recently announced that Android users will only be able to install apps which have been digitally signed by developers who have registered their name and other legal details with…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/",
"published": "2025-08-30T11:34:55.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-28T15:16:23.000Z",
"content": "<p>In which I <em>attempt</em> to be pragmatic.</p>\n\n<p>Are you allowed to run whatever computer program you want on the hardware you own? This is a question where freedom, practicality, and reality all collide into a mess.</p>\n\n<p>Google has recently announced that Android users will only be able to install apps which have been digitally signed by developers who have registered their name and other legal details with Google. To many people, this signals the death of \"sideloading\" - the ability to install apps which don't originate on the official store<sup id=\"fnref:sideload\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#fn:sideload\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Post by @[email protected] View on Mastodon\" role=\"doc-noteref\">0</a></sup>.</p>\n\n<script data-allowed-prefixes=\"https://mastodon.social/\" async=\"\" src=\"https://mastodon.social/embed.js\"></script>\n\n<p>I'm a fully paid-up member of the Cory Doctorow fanclub. Back in 2011, he gave a speech called \"<a href=\"https://boingboing.net/2012/08/23/civilwar.html\">The Coming War on General Computation</a>\". In it, he rails against the idea that our computers could become traitorous; serving the needs of someone other than their owner. Do we want to live in a future where our computers refuse to obey our commands? No! Neither law nor technology should conspire to reduce our freedom to compute.</p>\n\n<p>There are, I think, two small cracks in that argument.</p>\n\n<p>The first is that a user has no right to run anyone else's code, if the code owner doesn't want to make it available to them. Consider a bank which has an app. When customers are scammed, the bank is often liable. The bank wants to reduce its liability so it says \"<a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2023/05/the-limits-of-general-purpose-computation/\">you can't run our app on a rooted phone</a>\".</p>\n\n<p>Is that fair? Probably not. Rooting allows a user to fully control and customise their device. But rooting also allows malware to intercept communications, send commands, and perform unwanted actions. I think the bank has the right to say \"your machine is too risky - we don't want our code to run on it.\"</p>\n\n<p>The same is true of video games with strong \"anti-cheat\" protection. It is disruptive to other players - and to the business model - if untrustworthy clients can disrupt the game. Again, it probably isn't <em>fair</em> to ban users who run on permissive software, but it is a <em>rational</em> choice by the manufacturer. And, yet again, I think software authors probably should be able to restrict things which cause them harm.</p>\n\n<p>So, from their point of view it is pragmatic to insist that their software can only be loaded from a trustworthy location.</p>\n\n<p>But that's not the only thing Google is proposing. Let's look at <a href=\"https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2025/08/elevating-android-security.html\">their announcement</a>:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>We’ve seen how malicious actors hide behind anonymity to harm users by impersonating developers and using their brand image to create convincing fake apps. The scale of this threat is significant: our recent analysis found <strong>over 50 times more malware</strong> from internet-sideloaded sources than on apps available through Google Play.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Back in the early days of Android, you could just install any app and it would run, no questions asked. That was a touchingly naïve approach to security - extremely easy to use but left users vulnerable.</p>\n\n<p>A few years later, Android changed to show user the permissions an app was requesting. Here's a genuine screenshot from <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2013/04/what-can-android-learn-from-symbians-security-model/\">an app which I tried to sideload in 2013</a>:</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Legit-App-Permissions.png\" alt=\"A terrifying list of permissions.\" width=\"480\" height=\"800\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-28202\">\n\n<p>No rational user would install a purported battery app with that scary list of permissions, right? Wrong!</p>\n\n<p>We know that <a href=\"https://www.nngroup.com/articles/how-little-do-users-read/\">users don't read</a> and they especially <a href=\"https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1389027/1/KrolWarnings-CameraReady.pdf\">don't read security warnings</a>.</p>\n\n<p>There is no UI tweak you can do to prevent users bypassing these scary warnings. There is no amount of education you can provide to reliably make people stop and think.</p>\n\n<p>Here's the story of <a href=\"https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-64981507\">a bank literally telling a man he was being scammed</a> and he <em>still</em> proceeded to transfer funds to a fraudster.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>It emerged that, in this case, Lloyds had done a really good job of not only spotting the potential fraud but alerting James to it. The bank blocked a number of transactions, it spoke to James on the phone to warn him and even called him into a branch to speak to him face-to-face.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Here's another one where <a href=\"https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-67208755\">a victim deliberately lied to their bank</a> even after acknowledging that they had been told it was a scam.</p>\n\n<p>Android now requires you to deliberately turn on the ability to side-load. It will give you prompts and warnings, force you to take specific actions, give you pop-ups and all sorts of confirmation steps.</p>\n\n<p>And people still click on.</p>\n\n<p>Let's go back to Google announcement. This change isn't being rolled out worldwide immediately. They say:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>This change will start in a few select countries specifically impacted by these forms of fraudulent app scams, often from repeat perpetrators.</p>\n\n<p>…</p>\n\n<p>September 2026: These requirements go into effect in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand. At this point, any app installed on a certified Android device in these regions must be registered by a verified developer.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>The police in Singapore have a page <a href=\"https://www.police.gov.sg/Media-Room/News/20241106_advisory_on_the_prevalence_of_malware_scams_affecting_android_users\">warning about the prevalence of these scams</a>. They describe how victims are tricked or coerced into turning off all their phone's security features.</p>\n\n<p>Similarly, there are estimates that <a href=\"https://www.gasa.org/post/1-in-3-brazilians-targeted-by-scammers-in-2024-state-of-scam-report\">Brazil lost US$54 <strong>billion</strong> to scams in 2024</a> (albeit not all through apps).</p>\n\n<p>There are <a href=\"https://www.reddit.com/r/indonesia/comments/1mjpnlo/optimisasi_apk_pemerintah_yg_kyk_kontol_enables/?tl=en\">anecdotal reports from Indonesia</a> which show how easily people fall for these fake apps.</p>\n\n<p>Thailand is also <a href=\"https://www.bangkokpost.com/tech/2487659/phone-users-warned-over-malicious-apps\">under an ongoing onslaught of malicious apps</a> with some apps raking in <a href=\"https://thethaiger.com/hot-news/crime/thai-police-crackdown-on-app-scam-seizing-nearly-1-million-baht\">huge amounts of money</a>.</p>\n\n<p>It is absolutely rational that government, police, and civic society groups want to find ways to stop these scams.</p>\n\n<p>Google is afraid that if Android's reputation is tarnished as the \"Scam OS\" then users will move to more secure devices.</p>\n\n<p>Financial institutions might stop providing functionality to Android devices as a way to protect their customers. Which would lead to those users seeking alternate phones.</p>\n\n<p>Society as a whole wants to protect vulnerable people. We all bear the cost of dealing with criminal activity like this.</p>\n\n<p>Given that sideloaded Android apps are clearly a <em>massive</em> vector for fraud, it obviously behoves Google to find a way to secure their platform as much as possible.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"and-yet\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#and-yet\" class=\"heading-link\">And Yet…</a></h2>\n\n<p>This is quite obviously a bullshit powerplay by Google to ensnare the commons. Not content with closing down parts of the Android Open Source Project, stuffing more and more vital software behind its proprietary services, and freezing out small manufacturers - now it wants the name and shoe-size of every developer!</p>\n\n<p>Fuck that!</p>\n\n<p>I want to use my phone to run the code that I write. I want to run my friends' code. I want to play with cool open source projects by people in far-away lands.</p>\n\n<p>I remember <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2015/11/the-day-google-deleted-me/\">The Day Google Deleted Me</a> - we cannot have these lumbering monsters gatekeeping what we do on our machines.</p>\n\n<p>Back in the days when I was a BlackBerry developer, <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2012/06/how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-blackberry/#what-specific-things-could-the-research-in-motion-developer-relations-team-do-or-communicate-that-would-make-you-more-likely-to-develop-applications-for-the-blackberry-10-platform\">we had to wait ages for RIM's code-signing server to become available</a>. I'm pretty sure the same problem affected Symbian - if Nokia was down that day, you couldn't release any code.</p>\n\n<p>Going back to their statement:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>To be clear, developers will have the same freedom to distribute their apps directly to users through sideloading or to use any app store they prefer.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>This is a lie. I can only distribute a sideloaded app <strong>if Google doesn't nuke my account</strong>. If I piss off someone there, or they click the wrong button, or they change the requirements so I'm no longer eligible - my content disappears.</p>\n\n<p>They promise that <a href=\"https://developer.android.com/developer-verification\">Android will still be open to student and hobbyist developers</a> - but would you believe anything those monkey-punchers say? Oh, and what a fricking insult to call a legion of Open Source developers \"hobbyists\"!</p>\n\n<p>I hate it.</p>\n\n<p>I also don't see how this is going to help. I guess if scammers all use the same ID, then it'll be easy for Android to super-nuke all the scam apps.</p>\n\n<p>Perhaps when you install a sideloaded app you'll see \"This app was made by John Smith - not a company. Here's his photo. Got any complaints? Call his number.\"</p>\n\n<p>But what's going to happen is that people will get their IDs stolen, or be induced to register as a developer and then sign some malware. They'll also be victims.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"so-whats-the-solution\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#so-whats-the-solution\" class=\"heading-link\">So What's The Solution?</a></h2>\n\n<p>I've tried to be pragmatic, but there's something of a dilemma here.</p>\n\n<ol start=\"0\">\n<li>Users should be free to run whatever code they like.</li>\n<li>Vulnerable members of society should be protected from scams.</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>Do we accept that a megacorporation should keep everyone safe at the expense of a few pesky nerds wanting to run some janky code?</p>\n\n<p>Do we say that the right to run free software is more important than granny being protected from scammers?</p>\n\n<p>Do we pour billions into educating users not to click \"yes\" to every prompt they see?</p>\n\n<p>Do we try and build a super-secure Operating System which, somehow, gives users complete freedom without exposing them to risk?</p>\n\n<p>Do we hope that Google won't suddenly start extorting developers, users, and society as a whole?</p>\n\n<p>Do we chase down and punish everyone who releases a scam app?</p>\n\n<p>Do we stick an AI on every phone to detect scam apps and refuse to run them if they're dodgy?</p>\n\n<p>I don't know the answers to any of these questions and - if I'm honest - I don't like asking them.</p>\n\n<div class=\"footnotes\" role=\"doc-endnotes\">\n<hr>\n<ol start=\"0\">\n\n<li id=\"fn:sideload\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<blockquote class=\"mastodon-embed\" data-embed-url=\"https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/115093185284473606/embed\" style=\"background: #FCF8FF; border-radius: 8px; border: 1px solid #C9C4DA; margin: 0; max-width: 540px; min-width: 270px; overflow: hidden; padding: 0;\"> <a href=\"https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/115093185284473606\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"align-items: center; color: #1C1A25; display: flex; flex-direction: column; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'Segoe UI', Oxygen, Ubuntu, Cantarell, 'Fira Sans', 'Droid Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; justify-content: center; letter-spacing: 0.25px; line-height: 20px; padding: 24px; text-decoration: none;\"> <svg xmlns=\"http://www.w3.org/2000/svg\" xmlns:xlink=\"http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink\" width=\"32\" height=\"32\" viewBox=\"0 0 79 75\"><path d=\"M63 45.3v-20c0-4.1-1-7.3-3.2-9.7-2.1-2.4-5-3.7-8.5-3.7-4.1 0-7.2 1.6-9.3 4.7l-2 3.3-2-3.3c-2-3.1-5.1-4.7-9.2-4.7-3.5 0-6.4 1.3-8.6 3.7-2.1 2.4-3.1 5.6-3.1 9.7v20h8V25.9c0-4.1 1.7-6.2 5.2-6.2 3.8 0 5.8 2.5 5.8 7.4V37.7H44V27.1c0-4.9 1.9-7.4 5.8-7.4 3.5 0 5.2 2.1 5.2 6.2V45.3h8ZM74.7 16.6c.6 6 .1 15.7.1 17.3 0 .5-.1 4.8-.1 5.3-.7 11.5-8 16-15.6 17.5-.1 0-.2 0-.3 0-4.9 1-10 1.2-14.9 1.4-1.2 0-2.4 0-3.6 0-4.8 0-9.7-.6-14.4-1.7-.1 0-.1 0-.1 0s-.1 0-.1 0 0 .1 0 .1 0 0 0 0c.1 1.6.4 3.1 1 4.5.6 1.7 2.9 5.7 11.4 5.7 5 0 9.9-.6 14.8-1.7 0 0 0 0 0 0 .1 0 .1 0 .1 0 0 .1 0 .1 0 .1.1 0 .1 0 .1.1v5.6s0 .1-.1.1c0 0 0 0 0 .1-1.6 1.1-3.7 1.7-5.6 2.3-.8.3-1.6.5-2.4.7-7.5 1.7-15.4 1.3-22.7-1.2-6.8-2.4-13.8-8.2-15.5-15.2-.9-3.8-1.6-7.6-1.9-11.5-.6-5.8-.6-11.7-.8-17.5C3.9 24.5 4 20 4.9 16 6.7 7.9 14.1 2.2 22.3 1c1.4-.2 4.1-1 16.5-1h.1C51.4 0 56.7.8 58.1 1c8.4 1.2 15.5 7.5 16.6 15.6Z\" fill=\"currentColor\"></path></svg> <div style=\"color: #787588; margin-top: 16px;\">Post by @[email protected]</div> <div style=\"font-weight: 500;\">View on Mastodon</div> </a> </blockquote>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/is-it-possible-to-allow-sideloading-and-keep-users-safe/#fnref:sideload\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n</ol>\n</div>",
"image": null,
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{
"name": "@edent",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62701",
"title": "Book Review: What Sheep Think about the Weather - Amelia Thomas ★★★☆☆",
"description": "It started with a hummingbird dive-bombing Amelia Thomas over her morning coffee, and a pair of piglets who just wouldn’t stay put. Soon Amelia, journalist and new farmer, begins to question the communications of the creatures all around her: her pigs, her dogs, the pheasant family inhabiting her wood, her ‘difficult’ big red horse: even the earwigs in the farm’s dark, damp corners. Are they all…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-what-sheep-think-about-the-weather-amelia-thomas/",
"published": "2025-08-28T11:34:38.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-27T20:15:20.000Z",
"content": "<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/sheep.webp\" alt=\"Book cover featuring a sheep.\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-62702\">\n\n<blockquote><p>It started with a hummingbird dive-bombing Amelia Thomas over her morning coffee, and a pair of piglets who just wouldn’t stay put. Soon Amelia, journalist and new farmer, begins to question the communications of the creatures all around her: her pigs, her dogs, the pheasant family inhabiting her wood, her ‘difficult’ big red horse: even the earwigs in the farm’s dark, damp corners. Are they all just animals reacting instinctually to the world around them—or are they trying to communicate something deeper?</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>This is a curious - and mostly satisfying - look at the practicalities of interspecies communication. Unlike <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2024/09/book-review-how-to-speak-whale-a-voyage-into-the-future-of-animal-communication-by-tom-mustill/\">How to Speak Whale</a>, this doesn't assume that animals have a rich and complex grammar, nor does it make the case for animals having \"higher-order\" cognition. Instead, this is a fairly practical look at the limits of understanding animals.</p>\n\n<p>Anyone with a pet cat or dog knows that they are experts at <em>some</em> forms of communication. \"Feed me\" being the primary one!</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>In some ways, animals are simpler than humans. Hamsters don’t deliberately confound or obfuscate. Donkeys don’t gossip. An iguana will not gaslight you. Animals say what they mean. Yet that’s not to say this content is clear, or that we’re always aware it even exists at all.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>The author is open about her limitations and her goals. At times, it rather feels like reading a series of blog posts as she finds a new paper, chats to a new expert, and accidentally acquires yet another animal. Because she's primarily working with her own animals, there's a fair bit of anthropomorphising going on. Similarly, any \"do your own research\" project is going to be unaware of how to critically assess evidence. That makes it slightly scattershot and homespun. Nevertheless - it is fascinating what she uncovers.</p>\n\n<p>There are some excellent practical tips for understanding the animal experience (I particularly like the idea of going on all fours and trying to understand a pet's-eye-view of the world). There's also an interesting bunch of interviews with scientists who are seeking to understand how and why animals communicate - and whether we can meaningfully exchange ideas with them, or just condition their behaviour.</p>\n\n<p>But, as the book wears on, the author becomes more and more credulous. She goes on a series of courses which - with the best will in the world - seem to have rather dubious outcomes.</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Most of what I hear and see over these seven soaking days I need no scientific study to verify. I just sort of know it, the way the chicken guessers and dog listeners in the experiments just sort of knew what the calls signified. I wonder if this has to do with something called the motivational structure hypothesis,</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>With no external interrogation of what she is doing, the book descends into the pseudo-scientific. The author recounts receiving mystic visions, engages with people who believe they can communicate with animals using telepathy, wanders into the realm of quantum physics, and claims that their horse has a psychic bond with her which causes psychosomatic injuries. Oh, and that her raspberry plants are laughing at her.</p>\n\n<p>It is unfortunate that the last few chapters undermine all the interesting and useful information in the rest of the book.</p>",
"image": null,
"media": [],
"authors": [
{
"name": "@edent",
"email": null,
"url": "https://edent.tel/"
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"categories": [
{
"label": "/etc/",
"term": "/etc/",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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"label": "Book Review",
"term": "Book Review",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"label": "NetGalley",
"term": "NetGalley",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62468",
"title": "Security Flaws in the WebMonetization Site",
"description": "I've written before about the nascent WebMonetization Standard. It is a proposal which allows websites to ask users for passive payments when they visit. A visitor to this site could, if this standard is widely adopted, opt to send me cash for my very fine blog posts. All I need to do is add something like this into my site's source code: <link rel=\"monetization\"…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/",
"published": "2025-08-26T11:34:33.000Z",
"updated": "2025-09-11T12:26:13.000Z",
"content": "<p>I've written before about <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/03/how-to-prevent-payment-pointer-fraud/\">the nascent WebMonetization Standard</a>. It is a proposal which allows websites to ask users for passive payments when they visit. A visitor to this site could, if this standard is widely adopted, opt to send me cash for my very fine blog posts.</p>\n\n<p>All I need to do is add something like this into my site's source code:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-html\"><link rel=\"monetization\" href=\"https://wallet.example.com/edent\">\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>A user who has a WebMonetization plugin can then easily pay me for my content.</p>\n\n<p>But not every website is created by an individual or a single entity. Hence, the creation of the \"<a href=\"https://webmonetization.org/tools/prob-revshare/\">Probabilistic Revenue Share Generator</a>\".</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Probabilistic revenue sharing is a way to share a portion of a web monetized page's earnings between multiple wallet addresses. Each time a web monetized user visits the page, a recipient will be chosen at random. Payments will go to the chosen recipient until the page is closed or reloaded.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Nifty! But how does it work?</p>\n\n<p>Let's say a website is created by Alice and Bob. Alice does most of the work and is to receive 70% of the revenue. Bob is to get the remaining 30%. Within the web page's head, the following meta element is inserted:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-html\"><link\n rel=\"monetization\"\n href=\"https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siaHR0cHM6Ly9leGFtcGxlLmNvbS8iLDcwLCJBbGljZSJdLFsiaHR0cHM6Ly93aGF0ZXZlci50ZXN0LyIsMzAsIkJvYiJdXQ\"\n/>\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>The visitor's WebMonetization plugin will visit that URl and be redirected to Alice's site 70% of time and Bob's 30%.</p>\n\n<p>If we Base64 decode that weird looking URl, we get:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-json\">[\n [\n \"https://example.com/\",\n 70,\n \"Alice\"\n ],\n [\n \"https://whatever.test/\",\n 30,\n \"Bob\"\n ]\n]\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>Rather than adding multiple URls in the head, the site points to one resource and lets that pick who receives the funds.</p>\n\n<p>There are two small problems with this.</p>\n\n<p>The first is that you have to trust the WebMonetization.org website. If it gets hijacked or goes rogue then all your visitors will be paying someone else. But let's assume they're secure and trustworthy. There's a slightly more insidious threat.</p>\n\n<p>Effectively, this allows an untrusted 3rd party to use the WebMonetization.org domain as an open redirect. That's useful for phishing and other abuses.</p>\n\n<p>For example, an attacker could send messages encouraging people to visit:</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siaHR0cHM6Ly9leGFtcGxlLmNvbS8iLDk5LCJpbWciXV0\">https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siaHR0cHM6Ly9leGFtcGxlLmNvbS8iLDk5LCJpbWciXV0</a></p>\n\n<p>Click that and you'll instantly be redirected to a domain under the attacker's control. This could be particularly bad if the domain encouraged users to share passwords or other sensitive information.</p>\n\n<p>If the Base64 data cannot be decoded to valid JSON, the API will echo back any Base64 encoded text sent to it. This means an attacker could use it to send obfuscated messages. Consider, tor example:</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siUGxlYXNlIHZpc2l0IFJlYWxfZ29vZF9DYXNpbm9zLmJpeiBmb3IgbG90cyBvZiBDcnlwdG8gZnVuISEhIiwxMjM0NTYsImltZyJdXQ==\">https://webmonetization.org/api/revshare/pay/W1siUGxlYXNlIHZpc2l0IFJlYWxfZ29vZF9DYXNpbm9zLmJpeiBmb3IgbG90cyBvZiBDcnlwdG8gZnVuISEhIiwxMjM0NTYsImltZyJdXQ==</a></p>\n\n<p>Visit that and you'll see a message. With a bit of effort, it could be crafted to say something to encourage a visitor to enter their credentials elsewhere.</p>\n\n<p>When I originally reported this, the site could be used to to smuggle binary payloads. For example, <a href=\"https://webmonetization.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\">this URl would display an image</a> - however, it seems to have been fixed.</p>\n\n<p>Nevertheless, it is important to recognise that the WebMonetization.org domain contains an <a href=\"https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/Unvalidated_Redirects_and_Forwards_Cheat_Sheet.html\">unvalidated redirect and forwarding</a> vulnerability.</p>\n\n<p>I recommended that they ensured that the only URls which contain legitimate payment pointers should be returned. I also suggested setting a maximum limit for URl size.</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"timeline\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/security-flaws-in-the-webmonetization-site/#timeline\" class=\"heading-link\">Timeline</a></h2>\n\n<ul>\n<li>2025-03-27 - Discovered and disclosed.</li>\n<li>2025-08-05 - Remembered I'd submitted it and sent a follow up.</li>\n<li>2025-08-26 - Automatically published.</li>\n<li><ins datetime=\"2025-08-27T15:37:49+00:00\">2025-08-27</ins> - A day after this post was published, <a href=\"https://github.com/interledger/publisher-tools/issues/85\">the issue was made public on their repo</a>.</li>\n<li><ins datetime=\"2025-09-11T12:25:32+00:00\">2025-09-10</ins> - <a href=\"https://github.com/interledger/publisher-tools/issues/85#issuecomment-3274623144\">Confirmed fixed</a>.</li>\n</ul>",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62754",
"title": "Book Review: The Shattering Peace by John Scalzi (Old Man's War Book 7) ★★★⯪☆",
"description": "I'm reasonably sure I've read all the \"Old Man's War\" books. As the last one was published a decade ago, you'll forgive me if I don't remember all the intricacies of galactic politics and interpersonal intrigue. Thankfully, Scalzi has carved off a side character from a previous book and given them a brand-new adventure. There's enough exposition to tickle the parts of your brain that go \"Ah,…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/book-review-the-shattering-peace-by-john-scalzi-old-mans-war-book-7/",
"published": "2025-08-24T11:34:46.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-23T20:21:32.000Z",
"content": "<p><img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/9781509835409.webp\" alt=\"Book cover showing spaceships and alien worlds.\" width=\"270\" height=\"411\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-62756\">\nI'm <em>reasonably</em> sure I've read all the \"Old Man's War\" books. As the last one was published a decade ago, you'll forgive me if I don't remember all the intricacies of galactic politics and interpersonal intrigue. Thankfully, Scalzi has carved off a side character from a previous book and given them a brand-new adventure. There's enough exposition to tickle the parts of your brain that go \"Ah, yes, that sounds familiar\" but the story is just about separate enough that a new (or lapsed) reader can dive straight in.</p>\n\n<p>An off-the-books colony has <strong>vanished</strong>. Only <strong>one woman</strong> has the martial and intellectual skills to save the day. With her <strong>trusty alien companion</strong> she's in a race against time to <strong>save the galaxy</strong>!</p>\n\n<p>The plot is a little thin, and has a slightly annoying habit of jumping forward and then giving retroexposition in \"flashback\". Some of the prose is gorgeous - \"All you need for an avalanche of chaos is one inebriated snowball.\" - but it is used sparingly. That gives it a rather cold and utilitarian feel - which matches the alien surroundings our protagonist finds herself in.</p>\n\n<p>I also found the humour to be a bit repetitive - the alien doesn't quite get that you shouldn't talk aloud about human's sexual habits - but the story is well-paced and keeps the intrigue high without delving too deeply into convoluted political machinations.</p>\n\n<p>It doesn't really add much to the science fiction pantheon in terms of Big Ideas, but it is rather good fun.</p>\n\n<p>Thanks to Pan Macmillan for the advance copy, the book is out in September this year and can be pre-ordered now.</p>",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62814",
"title": "Gig Review: Rainbow Girls at LVLS London ★★★★★",
"description": "At some point around the start of the pandemic, The Algorithm instructed me to listen to music by Rainbow Girls. Who am I to question the ineffable will of the machine? I don't know what it was about their harmonies, slide guitar, and double-bass which tickled my brain, but I was hooked. A few days ago, a different algorithm alerted me to the fact that they were touring the UK - so I snapped up…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/gig-review-rainbow-girls-at-lvls-london/",
"published": "2025-08-23T11:34:12.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-23T08:43:21.000Z",
"content": "<p>At some point around the start of the pandemic, The Algorithm instructed me to listen to music by <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/@RainbowGirlsMusic\">Rainbow Girls</a>. Who am I to question the ineffable will of the machine? I don't know what it was about their harmonies, slide guitar, and double-bass which tickled my brain, but I was hooked.</p>\n\n<p>A few days ago, a different algorithm alerted me to the fact that they were touring the UK - so I snapped up tickets.</p>\n\n<p>It was, of course, an <em>amazing</em> gig. Thanks Algorithms!</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Rainbow-Girls.webp\" alt=\"Rainbow Girls on stage at LVLS.\" width=\"2048\" height=\"1152\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62815\">\n\n<p>I don't know when I've enjoyed myself more at a gig. The LVLS venue in Stratford is charmingly intimate (and their drinks prices aren't too outrageous for London). The Girls filled the space with their sonic perfection. A brilliant mix of their original songs and crowd-pleasing covers. Their act is obviously well-rehearsed with very little time between songs spent faffing with equipment.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Bart-and-Rainbow-Girls.webp\" alt=\"Bart on stage with the Rainbow Girls.\" width=\"2048\" height=\"1152\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62816\">\n\n<p>The multi-instrumental nature of the show gives it a wonderful variety - not that you can really tire of their singing - and they are generous with their chat between numbers.</p>\n\n<p>The support act, <a href=\"https://www.bartbudwig.com/\">Bart Budwig</a> was delightful. A sweet selection of homespun songs and a magnificent stage presence. His crowd-work was excellent, bringing in the audience to join in with his songs. A particular favourite was <a href=\"https://www.instagram.com/reel/DKcu54Zvq5N/\">Idaho Sober</a> which the London crowd greatly enjoyed.</p>\n\n<p>The Rainbow Girls are currently on tour throughout the UK, Ireland, and Europe. Catch them if you can.</p>",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62488",
"title": "What about using rel=\"share-url\" to expose sharing intents?",
"description": "Let's say that you've visited a website and want to share it with your friends. At the bottom of the article is a list of popular sharing destinations - Facebook, BlueSky, LinkedIn, Telegram, Reddit, HackerNews etc. You click the relevant icon and get taken to the site with the sharing details pre-filled. The problem is, every different site has a different intent for sharing links and…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/what-about-using-relshare-url-to-expose-sharing-intents/",
"published": "2025-08-22T11:34:06.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-06T19:32:20.000Z",
"content": "<p>Let's say that you've visited a website and want to share it with your friends. At the bottom of the article is a list of popular sharing destinations - Facebook, BlueSky, LinkedIn, Telegram, Reddit, HackerNews etc.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/share-on.webp\" alt=\"Screenshot. \"Share this page on\" followed by colourful icons for popular social networks.\" width=\"824\" height=\"452\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62491\">\n\n<p>You click the relevant icon and get taken to the site with the sharing details pre-filled.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/telegram.webp\" alt=\"Screenshot of the Telegram sharing page.\" width=\"600\" height=\"561\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62492\">\n\n<p>The problem is, every different site has a different intent for sharing links and text. For example:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><code>https://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u=…&t=…</code></li>\n<li><code>https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url=…</code></li>\n<li><code>https://bsky.app/intent/compose?text=…</code></li>\n<li><code>https://www.threads.net/intent/post?url=…&text=…</code></li>\n<li><code>https://www.reddit.com/submit?url=…&title=…</code></li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>As you can see, some only allow a URL, some text and a URL, and some just a plain text which could contain the URl. A bit of a mess! It's probably impossible to get every site to agree on a standard for their sharing intent. But there <em>could</em> be a standard for exposing their existing sharing mechanism.</p>\n\n<p>That's the proposal from <a href=\"https://about.werd.io/\">Ben Werdmuller</a> with \"<a href=\"https://shareopenly.org/integrate/\">Share Openly</a>\".</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>ShareOpenly knows about most major social networks, as well as decentralized platforms like Mastodon, Bluesky, and Known.</p>\n\n<p>However, if ShareOpenly is having trouble sharing to your platform, and if your platform supports a share intent, you can add the following metatag to your page headers:</p>\n\n<p><code><link rel=\"share-url\" href=\"https://your-site/share/intent?text={text}\"></code></p>\n\n<p>Where <code>https://your-site/share/intent?text=</code> is the URL of your share intent.</p>\n\n<p>The special keyword <code>{text}</code> will be replaced with the URL and share text.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I think that's a pretty nifty solution.</p>\n\n<p>For sites which take a URl and an (optional) title, the meta element looks like:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-html\"><link rel=\"share-url\" href=\"https://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u={url}&t={text}\">\n<link rel=\"share-url\" href=\"https://lemmy.world/create_post?url={url}&title={text}\">\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>For those which only take URl, it looks like:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-html\"><link rel=\"share-url\" href=\"https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url={url}\">\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>It's slightly trickier for sites like Mastodon and BlueSky which only have a text sharing field and no separate URl. The current proposal is just to use the text. For example</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-html\"><link rel=\"share-url\" href=\"https://bsky.app/intent/compose?text={text}\">\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>But it could be something like</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-html\"><link rel=\"share-url\" href=\"https://mastodon.social/share?text={text}%0A{url}\">\n</code></pre>\n\n<h2 id=\"what-next\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/what-about-using-relshare-url-to-expose-sharing-intents/#what-next\" class=\"heading-link\">What Next?</a></h2>\n\n<p>The HTML specification has this to say <a href=\"https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/links.html#other-link-types\">about adding new link types</a>:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Extensions to the predefined set of link types may be registered on the <a href=\"https://microformats.org/wiki/existing-rel-values#HTML5_link_type_extensions\">microformats page for existing rel values</a>.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>Adding to that page merely requires a formal specification to be written up. After that, some light lobbying might be needed to get social networks to adopt it.</p>\n\n<p>So, I have three questions for you:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>Do you think <code><link rel=\"share-url\"</code> is a good idea for a new standard?</li>\n<li>What changes, if any, would you make to the above proposal?</li>\n<li>Would you be interested in using it - either as a sharer or sharing destination?</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>Please leave a comment in the box - and remember to hit those sharing buttons!</p>",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62714",
"title": "Theatre Review - Show:Girls ★★★★☆",
"description": "Is it offensive to call a burlesque show \"charming\"? Sure, it is a funny and mildly titillating evening, but Show:Girls is suffused with such good natured charm that it is hard to describe it as anything else. Unlike Gallifrey Cabaret which puts on a plethora of variety acts, this is a rather stripped down production. The central conceit is that two acts have been accidentally double booked.…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/",
"published": "2025-08-21T11:34:59.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-19T22:06:47.000Z",
"content": "<p><img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/ShowGirls-Phoenix-Listing.webp\" alt=\"Two burlesque performers. One in a Viking helmet and one in a red hat.\" width=\"400\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-62716\"> Is it offensive to call a burlesque show \"charming\"? Sure, it is a funny and mildly titillating evening, but Show:Girls is suffused with such good natured charm that it is hard to describe it as anything else.</p>\n\n<p>Unlike <a href=\"https://mastodon.social/@Edent/114156815734664216\">Gallifrey Cabaret</a> which puts on a plethora of variety acts, this is a rather stripped down<sup id=\"fnref:sorry\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorry\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Sorry!\" role=\"doc-noteref\">0</a></sup> production.</p>\n\n<p>The central conceit is that two acts have been accidentally double booked. One, a high-class opera singer, the other a low-down burlesque performer. HI-JINKS ENSUE!</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"http://www.belindawilliams.co.uk/\">Bellinda Williams</a> has the voice of an angel and <a href=\"https://www.elsiediamond.com/about\">Elsie Diamond</a> has the body of a devil<sup id=\"fnref:sorrry\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrry\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Look, there's no way to write about these things without sounding like a bit of a seedy old man, OK!\" role=\"doc-noteref\">1</a></sup>. They teach each other the secrets of their art form which leads to the most unlikely mash-up I've seen in some time; Opera Burlesque.</p>\n\n<p>It is exactly as batty as it sounds. Each of them attempting to Eliza Doolittle the other to the great merriment of the audience.</p>\n\n<p>I'm sure there's something profound to say about the origins of opera and its intersection with courtesan couture, or how empowering it is to play dress up with your friends, but I was too busy laughing to think of anything that intellectual.</p>\n\n<p>As befits a fringe show, it is rather short and I could have easily enjoyed more. There seem to be a few revivals of <i lang=\"fr\">cabaret de l'érotique</i><sup id=\"fnref:fr\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:fr\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"That's yer actual French, y'know!\" role=\"doc-noteref\">2</a></sup> within London's now-sanitised Soho. Most, like this, are fairly tourist friendly and unlikely to draw the wrath of The Lord Chamberlain. Perhaps we'll see them on the Royal Variety Show next?</p>\n\n<p>There's only one thing which bothers me, and that's the origin of one of the marquee quotes. One of the performers is mentioned thusly:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>famously described by Danny Dyer as having “a good old fashioned pair of Lils”.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>I'm reasonably familiar with Cockney Rhyming Slang and its step-sibling <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/04/book-review-fabulosa-the-story-of-polari-britains-secret-gay-language-by-paul-baker/\">Polari</a>, and I can't find anything even close to that.</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Cockney:\n\n<ul>\n<li>Lilian Gish - fish. A somewhat unlikely comparison.</li>\n<li>Lilly The Pink - drink. Although I suppose a pair of \"pinks\" might make sense?</li>\n<li>Little And Large - margarine. I guess \"Little\" might be heard as \"Lil\"? And Ms Diamond's are not exactly on the smaller side.<sup id=\"fnref:sorrrrry\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrrrry\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Look, you try writing about this without sounding like Sid James!\" role=\"doc-noteref\">3</a></sup></li>\n</ul></li>\n<li>Polari:\n\n<ul>\n<li>Lills - hands. I have no evidence that her hands <em>aren't</em> old fashioned.</li>\n<li>Lilly Law - police. Perhaps Mr Dyer was comparing the shape of a bobby's helmet to the size and shape of…?<sup id=\"fnref:sorrrry\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrrry\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Probably best to stop there, eh?\" role=\"doc-noteref\">4</a></sup></li>\n</ul></li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Either way, Show:Girls is performed sporadically - keep an eye on their websites for the next performance. The entrance fee isn't too expensive, but in exchange you'll receive your fair share of thruppeny bits<sup id=\"fnref:sorrrrrrry\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fn:sorrrrrrry\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"At this juncture, please imagine a giant shepherd's crook protruding from the wings and dragging me off stage.\" role=\"doc-noteref\">5</a></sup>.</p>\n\n<div class=\"footnotes\" role=\"doc-endnotes\">\n<hr>\n<ol start=\"0\">\n\n<li id=\"fn:sorry\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Sorry! <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorry\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:sorrry\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Look, there's no way to write about these things without sounding like a bit of a seedy old man, OK! <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrry\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:fr\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>That's yer <em>actual</em> French, y'know! <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:fr\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:sorrrrry\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Look, <em>you</em> try writing about this without sounding like Sid James! <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrrrry\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:sorrrry\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Probably best to stop there, eh? <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrrry\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:sorrrrrrry\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>At this juncture, please imagine a giant shepherd's crook protruding from the wings and dragging me off stage. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-showgirls/#fnref:sorrrrrrry\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n</ol>\n</div>",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62726",
"title": "Theatre Review: Sluts With Consoles ★★★★⯪",
"description": "Let's see if this post makes it through the spam filters! Sluts With Consoles is a brilliant two-hander. Girly-twirly pick-me Player One and Gothy just-one-of-the-boys Player Two are locked in mortal - and emotional - combat. They represent the duality of the female gaming experience. Is it better to be feminine or feminist? Is gaming an escape from the cliques of teenage oppression, or just…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-sluts-with-consoles/",
"published": "2025-08-20T11:34:03.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-19T22:39:57.000Z",
"content": "<p><img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Sluts-with-Consoles.webp\" alt=\"Promotional Poster for Sluts With Consoles.\" width=\"350\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-62727\"> Let's see if this post makes it through the spam filters!</p>\n\n<p>Sluts With Consoles is a brilliant two-hander. Girly-twirly pick-me Player One and Gothy just-one-of-the-boys Player Two are locked in mortal - and emotional - combat. They represent the duality of the female gaming experience. Is it better to be feminine or feminist? Is gaming an escape from the cliques of teenage oppression, or just another form of self-deception?</p>\n\n<p>That all sounds a bit heavy-handed, but it is a hilarious show. It perfectly observes modern gaming tropes and how we all evolve our gamer styles.</p>\n\n<p>Throughout, it asks a very specific question; \"does a single stuck pixel spoil the entire view?\" That is, what are we prepared to tolerate in order to live in our fantasy world? Older brothers swiping our power-ups transmogrify into incel-gamers shouting slurs. Who cares if we're having fun, right…?</p>\n\n<p>As with any powerful piece of theatre, it's unlikely to be seen by those who have the most need of its message.</p>\n\n<p>Nevertheless, it is an entertaining and amusing show with a +20 battle-damage buff.</p>\n\n<p>The show is touring throughout the year and it is absolutely worth seeing if you have any interest in gaming.</p>",
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=61707",
"title": "Preventing NAPTR Spam",
"description": "You're the sort of cool nerd who knows all the weird esoterica which makes up DNS, right? In amongst your A, AAAA, SOA, and MX records, there's a little used NAPTR. Yes, you can use DNS to store Name Authority Pointers! What?! It is yet another of those baroque standards which spits out things like: cid.uri.arpa. ;; order pref flags service regexp replacement IN NAPTR…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/",
"published": "2025-08-18T11:34:47.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-03T20:49:37.000Z",
"content": "<p>You're the sort of cool nerd who knows all the weird esoterica which makes up DNS, right? In amongst your A, AAAA, SOA, and MX records, there's a little used <a href=\"https://dn.org/understanding-naptr-records-and-their-role-in-dns/\">NAPTR</a>. Yes, you can use DNS to store Name Authority Pointers!</p>\n\n<p>What?!</p>\n\n<p>It is yet another of those <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2015/11/a-polite-way-to-say-ridiculously-complicated/\">baroque</a> standards which spits out things like:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-_\">cid.uri.arpa.\n;; order pref flags service regexp replacement\nIN NAPTR 100 10 \"\" \"\" \"!^cid:.+@([^\\.]+\\.)(.*)$!\\2!i\" .\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>Essentially, it is a way to store contact details within a DNS record (rather than in a WHOIS record).</p>\n\n<p>Back in the early 2000s, the dotTel company opened the .tel TLD with a promise that it could be used to store your contact details in DNS<sup id=\"fnref:history\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:history\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Even back in 2009 I didn't think it was terribly compelling. By 2013, it was almost dead. And in 2017 it became just another generic TLD.\" role=\"doc-noteref\">0</a></sup>. The idea was simple, rather than storing my phone number in your address book, you'd store my domain name - <a href=\"https://edent.tel/\">https://edent.tel/</a></p>\n\n<p>If I updated my phone number, changed my avatar, or deleted an old email address - your address book would automatically update via DNS. Nifty!</p>\n\n<p>If you didn't know a company's phone number, you'd dial <code>example.com</code> on your phone and it would grab the phone numbers from DNS. Wowsers trousers!</p>\n\n<p>You can see an example by running:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-_\">dig justin.tel NAPTR\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>You'll get back something like:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-_\">NAPTR 100 101 \"u\" \"E2U+web:http\" \"!^.*$!http://justinkhayward.com!\" \n</code></pre>\n\n<p>A phone number stored in a NAPTR would look something like:</p>\n\n<pre><code class=\"language-_\">NAPTR 100 100 \"u\" \"E2U+voice:tel\" \"!^.*$!tel:+442074676450!\" .\n</code></pre>\n\n<p>Brilliant! But there's a problem - aside from the somewhat obtuse syntax! - and that problem is spam.</p>\n\n<p>Those of you old enough to remember putting your unexpurgated contact details into WHOIS know that the minute it went live you were bombarded with sales calls and scammy emails. So putting your details directly into DNS is a bad idea, right?</p>\n\n<p>.tel thought they'd come up with a clever hack to prevent that. As they explain in <a href=\"https://web.archive.org/web/20120504070307/https://dev.telnic.org/docs/privacy.pdf\">the .tel privacy paper</a>, records can be individually encrypted.</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Alice has her contact details on <code>alice.tel</code></li>\n<li>Bob has his contact details on <code>bob.tel</code></li>\n<li>Alice agrees to share her phone number with Bob.</li>\n<li>Alice looks up Bob's public key from <code>bob.tel</code>.</li>\n<li>Alice encrypts her phone number.</li>\n<li>Alice generates a new DNS record specifically for Bob - <code>bob123456.alice.tel</code></li>\n<li>Alice shares the name of the new record with Bob.</li>\n<li>Bob downloads the NAPTR from <code>bob123456.alice.tel</code> and decrypts it with his private key.</li>\n<li>Bob periodically checks for updates.</li>\n<li>Alice can decide to revoke Bob's access by removing the data or subdomain.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Clever! If convoluted. You can <a href=\"https://rikkles.blogspot.com/2008/05/privacy-in-tel.html\">read more about the way friendships and public keys were managed</a> and <a href=\"https://web.archive.org/web/20120504073313/https://dev.telnic.org/docs/naptr.pdf\">some more technical details</a>.</p>\n\n<p>Are there better ways?</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"multi-recipient-encryption\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#multi-recipient-encryption\" class=\"heading-link\">Multi Recipient Encryption</a></h2>\n\n<p>When people say \"you can't give Government a secret key to your private messages\" they are technically incorrect<sup id=\"fnref:worst\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:worst\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"The worst type of incorrect.\" role=\"doc-noteref\">1</a></sup>. Multi Recipient Encryption is a thing.</p>\n\n<p>Here's a very simplified and subtly wrong explanation:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Alice creates a <em>temporary</em> public/private keypair.</li>\n<li>Alice encrypts some text with her temporary public key - resulting in <code>e</code>.</li>\n<li>Alice encrypts the temporary private key with Bob's public key - resulting in <code>k1</code>.</li>\n<li>Alice encrypts the temporary private key with Charlie's public key - resulting in <code>k2</code>.</li>\n<li>Alice publishes the concatenation of <code>e+k1+k2</code></li>\n<li>Bob downloads the file, decrypts <em>his</em> version of the key, and uses that to decrypt the message.</li>\n<li>Charlie does the same.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>In this way, both recipients are able to decipher the text but no one else can. So can we just shove an encrypted record in the NAPTR? Not quite.</p>\n\n<p>There are two main problems with this for DNS purposes.</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>The encrypted size grows with every recipient.</li>\n<li>Every time a new recipient is added, everyone needs to download the data again even if it is unchanged.</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>Generally speaking, DNS records are a maximum of 255 characters - <a href=\"https://kb.isc.org/docs/aa-00356\">although they can be concatenated</a>.</p>\n\n<p>An extra record could be used to say when the plaintext was last updated - which would let existing recipients know not to download it again.</p>\n\n<p>Monitoring for changes would allow a user to know roughly how many recipients had been added or removed.</p>\n\n<p>What other ways could there be?</p>\n\n<h2 id=\"what-else-could-be-done\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#what-else-could-be-done\" class=\"heading-link\">What else could be done?</a></h2>\n\n<p>Here's the user story.</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>I want a friend to subscribe to my [phone|email|street|social media] address(es).</li>\n<li>I must be able to pre-approve access.</li>\n<li>When I change my address, my friend should get my new details.</li>\n<li>I need to be able to revoke people's access.</li>\n<li>This should be done via DNS<sup id=\"fnref:dns\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:dns\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"Why DNS? Because I like making life difficult.\" role=\"doc-noteref\">2</a></sup>.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Using an API this would be playing on easy mode. A friend (or rather, their app) would request an API key from my service. I would approve it, and then ✨magic✨.</p>\n\n<p>DNS isn't <em>technically</em> an API although, with enough effort, you could make it behave like one<sup id=\"fnref:marquis\"><a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fn:marquis\" class=\"footnote-ref\" title=\"If you were a sadist!\" role=\"doc-noteref\">3</a></sup>.</p>\n\n<p>So - how would <em>you</em> do it?</p>\n\n<div class=\"footnotes\" role=\"doc-endnotes\">\n<hr>\n<ol start=\"0\">\n\n<li id=\"fn:history\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Even back in 2009 <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2009/03/some-thoughts-on-tel/\">I didn't think it was terribly compelling</a>. By 2013, <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2013/03/should-i-renew-my-tel-domain/\">it was almost dead</a>. And in 2017 <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2017/02/whats-the-future-for-the-tel-domain-name/\">it became just another generic TLD</a>. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:history\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:worst\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>The <em>worst</em> type of incorrect. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:worst\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:dns\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>Why DNS? Because I like making life difficult. <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:dns\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n<li id=\"fn:marquis\" role=\"doc-endnote\">\n<p>If you were a sadist! <a href=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/preventing-naptr-spam/#fnref:marquis\" class=\"footnote-backref\" role=\"doc-backlink\">↩︎</a></p>\n</li>\n\n</ol>\n</div>",
"image": null,
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{
"name": "@edent",
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"url": "https://edent.tel/"
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62422",
"title": "Books will soon be obsolete in school",
"description": "I recently had a chance to ask a question to one of the top AI people. At a Q&A session, I raised my hand and asked simply \"What is your estimation of the future educational value of AI?\" The response was swift and utterly devastating for those laggards who want to hold back progress. The AI guy said: Books will soon be obsolete in schools. Scholars will be instructed through AI. It is possible …",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/books-will-soon-be-obsolete-in-school/",
"published": "2025-08-16T11:34:30.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-04T17:24:56.000Z",
"content": "<p>I recently had a chance to ask a question to one of the <strong>top</strong> AI people. At a Q&A session, I raised my hand and asked simply \"What is your estimation of the future educational value of AI?\"</p>\n\n<p>The response was swift and utterly devastating for those laggards who want to hold back progress. The AI guy said:</p>\n\n<blockquote><p>Books will soon be obsolete in schools. Scholars will be instructed through AI. It is possible to teach every branch of human knowledge with AI. Our school system will be completely changed inside of ten years.</p>\n\n<p>We have been working for some time on educational AI. It proves conclusively the worth of AI in chemistry, physics and other branches of study, making the scientific truths, difficult to understand from text books, plain and clear to children.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>That's it. We can throw away all those outdated paper books. Children will learn directly from an AI which, coincidentally, is sold by the company. We can trust their studies on such matters and be assured that they have no ulterior motive.</p>\n\n<p>But, ah my friends, I have told a <em>slight</em> untruth. I didn't ask that question. Frederick James Smith asked the question to Thomas Edison in <strong>1913</strong>. The question was about the new and exciting world of motion pictures.</p>\n\n<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/moving-pictures.webp\" alt=\"Scan of old newsprint. \"What is your estimation of the future educational\nvalue of pictures?\" I asked.\n\" Books.\" declared the inventor with decision, \" will soon be obsolete in the public schools. Scholars will be instructed through the eye. It is possible to teach every branch of human knowledge with the motion picture. Our school system will be completely changed inside of ten years. \" We have been working for some time on the school pictures. We have been studying and reproducing the life of the fly. mosquito, silk weaving moth, brown moth, gypsy moth, butterflies, scale and various other insects, as well as chemical cbrystallization. It proves conclusively the worth of motion pictures in chemistry, physics and other branches of study, making the scientific truths, difficult to understand from text books, plain and clear to children\" width=\"766\" height=\"492\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-62423\">\n\n<p>You can <a href=\"https://www.laviemoderne.net/images/forum_pics/2017/20171116%20New%20York%20NY%20Dramatic%20Mirror%201913%20Mar-Apr%201914%20Grayscale%20-%200690.pdf\">read the full exchange from The New York Dramatic Mirror</a>.</p>\n\n<p>A hundred-plus years since the great and humble Edison made his prediction and… books are still used in schools! Those of us of a certain age remember a TV occasionally being wheeled in for one lesson or another. Today's kids watch more video content than ever - of mixed quality - but still rely on books and teachers.</p>\n\n<p>Videos are good for some aspects of learning, but woefully inadequate for others.</p>\n\n<p>I'm not trying to say that just because one technology failed, so will all others. But it is <em>amazing</em> how AI-proponents are recycling the same arguments with basically the same timescale. Will AI be part of education? Sure! Just like videos, pocket computers, the Metaverse, and performance enhancing drugs.</p>\n\n<p>Will it be the <em>only</em> tool ever needed for education? I doubt it. Will vested interests and uncritical journalists continue to boost it? You don't need to have read many history books to work out the answer.</p>\n\n<p>Further reading: <a href=\"https://www.colincornaby.me/2025/08/in-the-future-all-food-will-be-cooked-in-a-microwave-and-if-you-cant-deal-with-that-then-you-need-to-get-out-of-the-kitchen/\">In the Future All Food Will Be Cooked in a Microwave, and if You Can’t Deal With That Then You Need to Get Out of the Kitchen</a></p>",
"image": null,
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"authors": [
{
"name": "@edent",
"email": null,
"url": "https://edent.tel/"
}
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"label": "AI",
"term": "AI",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"label": "education",
"term": "education",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"label": "history",
"term": "history",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"label": "schools",
"term": "schools",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog"
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{
"id": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=62605",
"title": "Theatre Review: Being Mr Wickham ★★★★★",
"description": "Mr Wickham is ready to set the record straight. Celebrating the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth, Adrian Lukis, who starred in the renowned BBC TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, returns to the role of Mr Wickham. Join Pride and Prejudice’s most roguish gentleman, George Wickham, on the eve of his sixtieth birthday, to lift the sheets on what exactly happened thirty years on from whe…",
"url": "https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/08/theatre-review-being-mr-wickham/",
"published": "2025-08-14T11:34:06.000Z",
"updated": "2025-08-13T21:16:42.000Z",
"content": "<img src=\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/wickham.webp\" alt=\"Promotional poster for Being Mr Wickham.\" width=\"384\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-62606\">\n\n<blockquote><p>Mr Wickham is ready to set the record straight. Celebrating the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth, Adrian Lukis, who starred in the renowned BBC TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, returns to the role of Mr Wickham.</p>\n\n<p>Join Pride and Prejudice’s most roguish gentleman, George Wickham, on the eve of his sixtieth birthday, to lift the sheets on what exactly happened thirty years on from where we left him… And discover his own version of some very famous literary events.</p></blockquote>\n\n<p>You remember \"Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead\", right? Take two minor characters from a famous play and weave a tale around their misadventures. This is in much the same vein. A one-man show where we get to spend time with Pride & Prejudice's most clubbable old rake in order to better understand <em>why</em> he was such a scoundrel.</p>\n\n<p>There's a lovely bit of intertextuality in having Adrian Lukis both write and perform as Wickham. For people of my age, he <em>is</em> Wickam. Sure, he's no Darcy in a dripping wet shirt, but played the perfect bounder and cad.</p>\n\n<p>The Jermyn Street Theatre is the perfect venue for these tall tales. An intimate room where we're slowly drawn in to the confidences of a master manipulator. Behind the twinkling smile there is, be in no doubt, a predator.</p>\n\n<p>Wickham lives off his charms and it is no wonder that the audience is eating out of the palm of his hand within minutes. His outrageous name dropping is all part of the seduction.</p>\n\n<p>Of course he has been viciously abused in literature; done dirty by those envious of his success. Yes, he is a bit of a rascal but - and his eyes flirt with us at this point - isn't that what makes a man <em>interesting</em>?</p>\n\n<p>Adrian Lukis doesn't redeem the villain; he indulges him. It is a delight to spend an hour in his company, hearing the old sot reminisce about old conquests, and catching up with the Bennet gossip. But you'll walk away wondering if you're any closer to the truth or have just been beguiled like some many others.</p>\n\n<p>There's an interesting bit of media rights discussion to be here as well. Famously, the actors who play James Bond <a href=\"https://www.cinemablend.com/new/Why-Pierce-Brosnan-Wears-Ugliest-Suit-Ever-Thomas-Crown-Affair-68301.html\">aren't allowed to wear a tuxedo in other movies</a> lest they be confused with 007. All of Jane Austen's works have long since passed out of copyright - but is the character of Wickam based on the book version of the 1990's screen version? There's no portrait of Julia Sawalha on the wall, so you'll have to make your own mind up on that count.</p>\n\n<p>I do wonder how many other other actors will take the opportunity to revisit their star turns? The nostalgia roadshow rumbles on.</p>\n\n<p>Mr Wickham is in residence until the 30th of August and I have no doubt that you will find his company most agreeable.</p>",
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"name": "@edent",
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