Anybody want to do a small, paid open source development job? (feel free to boost) I am not offering huge amounts of money (maybe $200 or so?) but it's also a small job. Feel free to tell me this is not reasonable.

The job:

I use HetrixTools to monitor some servers. They offer an open-source shell script that, if you run it, connects to their API and sends detailed information, not just "we can ping your server."

That shell script supports #Linux only and relies on Linuxisms (like reading /proc a lot). It does not support #FreeBSD. My goal is to get detailed server monitoring on FreeBSD via the HetrixTools API.

I've started rewriting it in #Python and there's a code repo where I've already done a bunch of work. I'm looking for someone to pick it up and take it over the line.

Scope

Scope of the job would be to finish the work so that, when run interactively at a command line, it runs in the foreground in an infinite loop, collecting data, reporting it up through the HetrixTools API, and then sleeping.

I'll take on the work of packaging, making it a daemon, a FreeBSD service, and such. I'm just trying to outsource the final bits of python coding, and testing against the HetrixTools API.

Code will be released open source. I'm currently using BSD 3-Clause, but I am willing to adjust to GPL or whatever.

If you're interested, DM me. I can negotiate price a bit, but not a ton.

GitHub - hetrixtools/agent: HetrixTools Server Monitoring Agent (Linux)

HetrixTools Server Monitoring Agent (Linux). Contribute to hetrixtools/agent development by creating an account on GitHub.

^GitHub

The most recent #Django releases, 5.0.5 and 4.2.12 are broken. Most likely they were done on #Windows, and that obviously is sufficient to break stuff.

So far, we've noticed the following issues:
1. The directory is named lowercase `django-X.Y.Z` instead of capital-case `Django-X.Y.Z` (the filename remains capital-case).
2. All files have CRLF line endings instead of LF.
3. All files that should have the executable bit, have lost it.

As a result, the releases don't pass their own tests.

I hope to report this upstream, but their Trac is down now. So you can't even download the releases right now.

#Gentoo #Python

In #Python, this is a useful and common idiom:

if __name__ == "__main__":
...

But it silently fails if __main__ is misspelled and it's extremely non-obvious to new developers. I'd prefer for this common functionality to be baked into the language:

if running_as_script():
...

Now, it's completely transparent what it does and if you misspell the function, it doesn't silently fail. It kinda feels wrong to have a weird special case in the language, but it's so ubiquitous.

#Programming

🧅 #Tor Project Seeks Network Health Engineer 🧑‍💻

The person in this position will work directly with helping us maintain existing systems, and design new systems for gathering and analyzing Tor network data.

The bulk of our code is currently written in #java, smaller portions are written in R, #Python, PostgreSQL, and JavaScript. We are transitioning to a new pipeline mainly in #Rust and Python.

This is a full-time remote position.

#job #FediHire #fossjobs #foss

https://www.torproject.org/about/jobs/network-health/

The Tor Project | Privacy & Freedom Online

Defend yourself against tracking and surveillance. Circumvent censorship.

^{www.torproject.org}

#Fortran #COBOL #PL1 #APL #Snobol #algol60 #lisp #basic #jovial #pascal #python #java #c #cpp #plsql #perl #forth #ada #tcl

I worked with #prolog and could do maintenance on the code, but couldn’t really create from scratch.

I started in the 70’s, IBM 1620 assembler.

#BASIC, 6502 #assembly, #Pascal, #Delphi, #Perl, #Bash, #Javascript, finally #ABAP.

I've looked at #Java and #Python several times but can't get on with Java at all.

My job is 50% ABAP and 50% trying to understand what the client needs and not what they say.

Loved BASIC on my old C64, and have a soft spot for TuboBASIC and TuboPascal. Did a lot of Perl and found it good for what I wanted, but not used it much of late.

I started programming in 1982. Though I'm known as a #Perl developer, I tried to remember every other language I've programmed in.

#BASIC, #C, 6809 Assembler, #Javascript, VBScript (and its many variants), #Java, #Prolog, #RakuLang, #Python, #Kotlin, #COBOL, Easytrieve, and probably a few others.

I wish I had gotten a job in Prolog, primarily because I loved what I could create with it. I don't love programming; I love creating.

What are your languages?

#programming #software #OpenSource

Very thoughtful post.

As for #Perl, it hardly “stopped at version 5.” (See @shiar’s summary of changes from Y2K’s 5.6 to last year’s 5.38: https://sheet.shiar.nl/perl.) There simply hasn’t been major breaking changes, unlike, say, #Python.

The community also lacks consensus on the marketing value of a new major version. Some software releases just merrily keep incrementing that number to draw attention and create FOMO, semantic meaning be damned.

A few thoughts on Programming languages

Just a few thoughts on programming languages that have been rattling around in my head this week, but which don’t each merit a full blog post. The main theme is that the culture behind each programming language leads to some interesting choices, as is the case with spoken languages.

This week I started learning how to program in Rust. Even though I’m using the project-based Command-Line Rust to learn, the author still went with the traditional “Hello, world!” project for the first intro to the language. I was also working on a Go project last week and so it immediately stood out to me that (at least as taught by this author) Rust has the print! macro that allows you to succinctly print to the command line. By contrast, Go requires importing fmt before you can print. This was the first topic that was swirling around in my head this week. What makes language designers choose whether printing output (one of the most basic things a program can do) is built-in or requires an import. I even remember back when I was learning Java in undergrad (I think it was Java 1.8, but I don’t remember) we had to use the savitch library just to get program input (another very basic computer program concept). As I thought about it, I wondered if it has to do with thoughts around compilation and whether the language designers think you’re mostly making user-interactive programs or libraries? It makes sense to me that scripting languages like Python, Ruby, and Perl would have print built-in since you always have to have the interpreter along with you, so all the basics should be there. (The original Batteries Included Python promise, for example) But perhaps the Go developers thought you wouldn’t always be printing to the command line so a more efficient binary could be compiled by forcing you to import the functionality? I’m not entirely sure.

The next thing I started thinking about, again due to learning Rust, was the mutability of variables. In most languages I’ve come across (I think all, except Haskell) all variables are mutable by default. It almost seems pointless to have a non-mutable variable. I understand why many languages have the concept of a “contanst” modifier/keyword. Unlike normal variables, THIS ONE does not change. But the opposite seems so weird since most of what we often do in programming involves changing the value in a variable. Perhaps as I learn more about Rust, I’ll understand their reasoning, but this seems completely backwards to me.

Both Rust and Golang use structs to organize variables where Ruby, Python, and Java use objects. But when both Go and Rust allow you to “attach” methods/functions to structs – is there a true distinction between object-oriented programming and struct-based programming? It seems like it’s just semantics (in the generic sense of the word) – at least at the level at which I program. The only difference I can see is that structs don’t have inheritance, although Go’s “types” solve some of the same problems.

Today’s (the day I’m writing this, not the day it’s going to be posted) shower thought was about programming language versions. On one end you have Java (I think now on version 22) and C# (now at version 12). On the other you have Python and Ruby (both at version 3). Perl essentially stopped at 5 with Perl 6 evolving into Raku. I don’t know what Java is up to. But I think C# is actually using the versions correctly – I’ve heard that each version introduces completely different ways of doing things and that the way you program C# depends strongly on when you jumped in. This is why Python is probably never moving to v4 unless they need to make some kind of huge change. Rust is an outlier with year-based versions. I guess that’s fine, but doesn’t tell you anything like a proper semantic versioning could.

Finally, I know that Rust is the newest of all the programming languages I’ve learned, but I really love how new projects are started. Python isn’t horrible, but it’s currently suffering from a lots of ideas, none of which has complete market share. You could do a simple virtual environment or you could do a more complex virtual environment/lock file situation with Poetry. (And there are about another half dozen variations on these two themes) But Rust….Rust deserves a chef’s kiss. When you start a new project with “cargo new project-name”, not only does it set up your directory structure, but it does a whole bunch of great setup tasks. It creates your Cargo.toml file (with Python, which only really started supporting toml files at the project level a few years ago, you need to look at documentation to figure out what goes in there) so that you have all the basics in there already. But it doesn’t stop there! It also, in a nod to modern programming, creates a git repository AND a gitignore file. It’s a thing of beauty. I would absolutely love for Python to move in this direction officially (not through a random user choice) for their defaults. Even “go mod init” could benefit from setting up a git repo and a git ignore (since the toml is not how Go works – I think they would probably best set up a README.md since Go’s default packaging is through git repos).

#Go #Golang #perl #python #Ruby #rust

https://wp.me/p5cs3g-4HT

An experiment with creating files with invalid UTF-8 names & trying to read in #Python ...

Invalid-UTF8 vs the #fileSystem, 20230914,
by Kristian K,
https://blog.koehntopp.info/2023/09/14/invalid-utf8-vs-the-filesystem.html

#XFS #ZFS #APFS

Invalid-UTF8 vs the filesystem

^{Die wunderbare Welt von Isotopp}

How is it ridiculous? Out of these three languages, #Perl has several decades of backwards compatibility, and a huge stable ecosystem.

Despite #Python's claims to having one way to do any one thing, it is very inconsistent and has how many ways to format a string now? Last I checked, the performance was also several leagues behind Perl, despite getting a lot more funding these days, and a lot more attention publicly.

#Javascript is a massive issue with accessibility wherever its introduced, and having it enabled is a sure-fire way to support the online malware industry. And there's NPM of course, the least consistent, reliable package ecosystem known to the field of programmer's. They can just yank a package which is required for comparing if a value is even or odd, because something like that is a very difficult concept in programming languages apparently, and break half the projects in the world.

Perl too has it flaws, of course, but it is still actively developed, and having used all these three languages professionally, I can say with confidence its the least "annoying" out of all of them. Any package I pull from CPAN is small and focuses on doing its one job well, and I don't even need to create a special environment for every single project that has dependencies. The language writes in a natural fashion which is a very enjoyable experience, one which most developers skip because it is simply not popular, and people like you laughing in the face of anyone who even dares suggest it is not as bad a language as is advertised by the masses.

I wonder, have you ever written Perl in a professional capacity, or at all, even?

One would assume you’re trying to be “edgy” by making such silly comments…

One who is inexperienced and unwilling to learn, maybe. Anyone else would be interested in why I recommend an increasingly unpopular language.

Essentially, distro developers are firefighters, putting out fires made by careless upstreams.

What I've wasted time on, today:

- making the non-standalone test suite of #Hatchling (sigh) work without #UV again, so that a critical build dependency of a growing number of #Python packages could be tested everywhere

https://gitweb.gentoo.org/repo/gentoo.git/commit/?id=cc6e54e1df5e0802198c793f39107a9028b8698f
https://bugs.gentoo.org/930662

- fixing effectively dead (but with a promise of revival) #PassLib not to break random stuff via printing warnings when using newer #BCrypt versions

https://gitweb.gentoo.org/repo/gentoo.git/commit/?id=c1e015b65b74283a51893672739c5e4784b95273
https://bugs.gentoo.org/925289

- hacking the test suite of #ImageIO work using an offline copy of test data, rather than cloning its git repository at the beginning of tests

https://gitweb.gentoo.org/repo/gentoo.git/commit/?id=77ff4bc09d68067f2c635d43d446f308990e0873

I really wish people would consider donating to distro developers more often, rather than to projects that create this thankless work for us.

#Gentoo

Someone on Reddit was asking if there is any way of detecting something in an exoplanet atmosphere which would have no other explanation than life. I'm pretty happy with my answer.

You might be surprised that it even includes #Python code.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Astrobiology/comments/1caudbn/can_telescopes_actually_find_biosignatures/l0vzq3e/

#AstroBiology #Science #Astronomy #Life #Software #NASA #SpaceX

Whatever happened to Perl? Back in the day it was wildly popular and was used all over the place. Then there was supposed to be a big rewrite for Perl 6 and that's the last I've ever heard of it. No news, no releases, nothing. For me Python came in and ate Perl's lunch, so I don't miss it at all. Python is better in every way for me. Honestly Perl was a horrible language, but still interesting to see it die so suddenly.

#perl #python #ate #lunch

I really despise that Python’s timezone aware times are the same type as its timezone naive times.

#python

You can follow @theweeklychallenge.org, which I just set up to post the #RSS feed from https://TheWeeklyChallenge.org

It’s a successful site run for the last five years by #Perl and #RakuLang developer @manwar that’s also had thousands of entries with other #programming languages like #Python, #Ruby, #Haskell, #RustLang, #Lua, #Clang, #CPlusPlus, #JavaScript, and #GoLang

#WeeklyChallenge #PerlWeeklyChallenge

The Weekly Challenge - Perl & Raku

You do not have to be an expert.

^{theweeklychallenge.org}

Anyone know if a (space) indent width could be specified for #Python code formatters like Black (or Blue or anything similar not in Rust|Go)?

If nothing would come up, then might just hack up Black.

I have tried #YAPF but it has ... some other issues.

@dch On a related note: I can't tell you how many times I've typed the following:

pythong path/to/program

I have NO idea why I do that. It's not like I ever type "thong," but my fingers are hallucinating programming languages.

#Python

Computer Science professor Bob Fulkerson joins the show to discuss his BBS days including his stewardship of the Endless Forest BBS in Omaha. Bob also discusses facets of teaching Computer Science and his love for the Perl programming language.
#bbsing #perl #python

https://sites.libsyn.com/481983/bob-fulkerson-discusses-the-endless-forest-bbs-and-computer-science-academia

Stray Pointers: Bob Fulkerson discusses the Endless Forest BBS and Computer Science Academia

^{sites.libsyn.com}

@homeassistant

If you're managing HA Core in a FreeBSD jail, I've made some notes about a way to manage the Python virtual environments and upgrade to new releases of HA.

https://blog.brendans-bits.com/posts/2024/upgradable-home-assistant-in-a-freebsd-jail/

#homeassistant #bastillebsd #freebsd #python

It's a small patch to Apple's #OpenSource MLX machine learning framework to fix a minor nit that annoyed me, but I was happy to have my first PR accepted against a Python project. (https://github.com/ml-explore/mlx-examples/pull/458#event-11856417623).

Still happily doing #Perl, but #AI is #Python all the way.

Make it easier to know in which file we have bad JSON data by Ovid · Pull Request #458 · ml-explore/mlx-examples

I was using lora.py to train Mistral and accidentally used corrupted JSONL files. My traceback looked like this: Traceback (most recent call last): File "/Users/ovid/projects/llms/mlx-examples/l...

^GitHub

That's certainly true.

The flip side is, how easy is it to write good code, especially for less experienced devs?

For example #perl programmers seem more likely to misuse regexes than #python programmers. Should we blame the language for that? Probably not. But the culture around it (tutorials, popular libraries, etc.)? I'd say so.

But invalid json files may execute arbitrary python code.

😛

#python

Tritium on #python IRC channel ...

『json files are valid python that wont raise an exception if you execute it as python』

About half a year ago I wrote myself a little #python script to automate #wikipedia #translation via #deepl.

Tried to use it on my second 💻 today, to no avail and much grinding of teeth.

I'm not setting up any more #venv . I'm fed up. I'm bloody rewriting everything, even libraries in #perl so it works proper on #unix damn it. And maybe throw a look at some #zig porting while at it.

The Kookaburra is out of the bag.

Checkout Toolong, a terminal app for viewing / tailing / searching log files (and .JSONL).

#Textual #Python

https://github.com/textualize/toolong

GitHub - Textualize/toolong: A terminal application to view, tail, merge, and search log files (plus JSONL).

A terminal application to view, tail, merge, and search log files (plus JSONL). - GitHub - Textualize/toolong: A terminal application to view, tail, merge, and search log files (plus JSONL).

^GitHub

#Python : Batteries included

#Perl : Flint and tinder included

#Java : PHB included

#PHP : Notepad included

#C : Screw you

#Rust : Arcane eldritch data guardian forbidding memory blasphemy included.

@AFresh1 Yes, because you care about distributing code that others *don’t* need a separate virtual #Perl environment to run.

Nearly every set of end-user installation instructions for #Python-based applications begins with steps to give the app its own virtual environment with separate interpreter and dependencies.

/cc @ology @profoundlynerdy @bololacertus @overeducatedredneck @fuzzix

Direct (non-LinkedIn-shortened) link: https://catonmat.net/ftp/perl1line.txt

I’m also pleased that its author ranked Perl as one of his top 5 best #programming languages: https://catonmat.net/5-best-programming-languages
1. #C / #Clang
2. #PHP
3. #Perl
4. #GoLang
5. #JavaScript (but only version 1 circa 1995 plus #jQuery)

His 5 worst? https://catonmat.net/5-worst-programming-languages
1. #Haskell
2. #Rust / #RustLang
3. #CPlusPlus
4. #Python
5. modern #JavaScript

“My only metric... is time to get things done and ship to customers.”

Top 5 Best Programming Languages

This is the reverse post of my highly popular Top 5 Worst Programming Languages post. My only metric for a good programming language is time to get things done and ship to customers. I don't care about anything else.

^catonmat.net

For any #Python devs working with Qt who've stumbled on the "Megasolid Idiom" text editor example (https://www.pythonguis.com/examples/python-rich-text-editor/), you might be disappointed that it's written in PyQt5, when PyQt6 is available.

I've ported it to #PyQt 6 for you: https://github.com/Ovid/pyqt6-rich-text-editor

It's still a bit of a hack since I just did a straight port with some minor cleanup. It needs tests. It also needs bars for adjust margins, but despite my searching, I can't figure out how to do that.

Writing a Rich Text Editor in PyQt5

Simple WYSIWYG editor in Python. Megasolid Idiom is a rich text word processor implemented in Python and Qt.

^{Martin Fitzpatrick (Python GUIs)}

For anyone working with generative #AI to write software, you might find this bug and subsequent comments on the VS Code Copilot integration interesting.

https://github.com/microsoft/vscode-copilot-release/issues/800

After writing small programs with AI, I decided to see if I could write a large, professional application. It's in a problem domain I know very well, using technologies I don't know (the #python PyQt6 library).

The short verdict: not ready for prime time, but the technology is getting there.

#LLM #Copilot #ChatGPT

workspace suddenly stopped working · Issue #800 · microsoft/vscode-copilot-release

I've been using @workspace heavily for a Python project. Suddenly, it now longer works and cannot figure out what workspace information to collect. I have tried restarting VS Code a few times, but ...

^GitHub

How Programming Languages Got Their Names

#haskell #java #kotlin #python #ruby #rust

https://kylehigginson.medium.com/how-programming-languages-got-their-names-df85277de4c3?utm_medium=erik.in&utm_source=mastodon

How Programming Languages Got Their Names - Kyle Higginson - Medium

Have you ever wondered how the likes of Python or Java got their names? Let’s take a look at some programming languages and the story behind how they were named. Before we start — If you’re curious…

^{Kyle Higginson (Medium)}

@bololacertus @overeducatedredneck @profoundlynerdy Put another way, `checkbashisms` exists because the only way to get #shell scripters to stick to strict #POSIX syntax and userland programs is to automatically reject deviations with extreme prejudice.

And please don’t get me started on #Python portability. Y’all can’t even settle on how to manage the virtual environments that every individual Python-based tool requires.

@KC1PYT “Recent” is in the eye of the beholder. I haven’t personally used #WebPerl, but it appears to be based on a slight fork of #Perl v5.30 from 2019: https://github.com/Perl/perl5/compare/maint-5.30...haukex:emperl5:emperl_v5.30.0

As with anything, it needs someone with an itch to scratch and enough skills and tuits. The primary author is employed doing #Python now, so it's a fine time to pick it up unimpeded.

Any #Python fans familiar with #PyQt6 ?

I'm stumped. I'm sure I missed something obvious, but I can't tell what it is.

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/77885605/toggling-character-format-with-pyqt6

Hey, #python devs. I want to be able to enforce that methods overriding existing methods raise an error if they don't have an @override decorator. Likewise, if they have that decorator and don't override a method, it should also throw an exception.

Didn't see anything which does this, so I threw this together. https://gist.github.com/Ovid/1a1d7869b29816cc4c82d00ad42aa2fc

Am I missing something obvious?

Force validation of overridden methods in Python

Force validation of overridden methods in Python. GitHub Gist: instantly share code, notes, and snippets.

^Gist

@MonkeyPanic I haven't had a chance to try it yet. I've been busy writing an immutable ORM for #Python to better learn the language.

Probably not the easiest project I could try, but I've done it in #Perl 😀

I’m stuck trying to install the #Python `torch` module with #CUDA support on an old iMac with #Debian https://www.reddit.com/r/LocalLLaMA/comments/197zg0v/cuda_support_on_an_imac_with_debian_installed/

Anyone have experience here?

#AI #Llama