When I started a new job in IT around 2009, I learned that AS400 / iSeries / IBM i was a thing, and it’s still doing pretty well with big retail and the insurance business.

In the same vein, the system used by the aviation industry to book flights is also quite ancient but still very much used to this day.

Yes, green means go!11! Even there’s an old lady that just didn’t finish crossing yet, she just had to do it in the few seconds allowed.

My favorite one is people honking at other drivers for not blocking an intersection because “it’s green!”. I don’t know the term in English but in French it’s a mix of intersection and blocage. Like, if the light is green but there is no space to advance because of gridlock, some apparently like to make it worse by advancing their car in an intersection and sit there while it turns red, and thus blocking the intersection. BuT It WaS GreEn!

Not in Canada and I believe also not in the US. The yellow only comes before red, not before green.

Here it’s red, green, yellow, red, green, yellow…

Just wanted to add that maybe the last thing that we did for the environment and that really worked was for acid rain in 1991. At least where I live.

A few years before that there was the Montreal Protocol that banned CFCs and helped to heal the hole in the ozone layer. I think.

But yeah, I don’t remember anything of the sort recently,

Your optimism can only be admired. However the US has already stated multiple times that it doesn’t care about international law and that Americans cannot be tried for war crimes and crimes against humanity, or they will invade the Netherlands. The ICC cannot even detain an American. This was during W Bush and his “war on terror”.

And then Trump recently reiterated it with a new executive order, imposing penalties and visa restrictions on people even helping the ICC to investigate Americans.

And so all the kids are safe from being crushed by SUVs. No need for bike lanes. No need for traffic reduction. No need to ticket drivers not yielding to pedestrians or passing cyclists dangerously. No need to remove parking. No need to reduce the size or speed of cars. And turning right on red is a god given right.

Helmets are all that is needed to be safe in the streets! That and obeying the law.

I guess I get the intent. It’s better than nothing. But it’s also pretty depressing when you see beyond the attempt at fake security.

Do they have a model with AI?

This reminds me of the death penalty. Killing someone because that person killed is still killing someone.

However society choses to do it, it’s still killing someone. Because killing is bad so if you kill, someone will kill you. Oh no, it’s not a murder. It’s a state employee that works in the correction department. Killers are not okay. The executioner is only applying the lethal will of society towards killers by unaliving them. It’s not murder, it’s justice!

But it was maybe a few months old at best. Maybe it had a defective battery from the start but I contacted Xiaomi and I’ve been told it was “normal” in “winter”. Then when I looked online for this issue with Xiaomi phones, the people on the forums said it was “normal”, and that I expected too much.

In the end it was probably a defective battery. I couldn’t believe that they were selling millions of these and that people always just kept them warm all the time. Like, they have a proper winter too in some parts of China, and I can’t imagine millions of people having their phone dying on them as soon as we get into sweater weather.

But obviously this left a bad taste in my mouth. This and having to ask permission to root my phone.

I decided not to buy another Xiaomi phone when the one I previously had would turn off when it was a bit mildly cool outside.

Like, I would take it out of my pocket to look at bus schedules but it would turn off after a few seconds of being exposed to 5°C, saying the battery was dead. Another time I had it attached to my bike handlebar and it kept turning off because apparently 13°C with the wind was also too chilly. Every time that fucking Xiaomi phone was feeling a bit chill, the battery would just die. And not even in freezing temps!

I looked online and everone of the fanboys on the forums kept saying that this is normal, battery performance degrades in winter, that iPhones do the same, and apparently all other phones do the same. In short, I had unreasonable expectations.

Yet, all my other phones’ batteries didn’t die within seconds of taking them out of my pocket, even in winter.

So, I don’t have to bother with their names anymore.

Por que no los dos?

How many times has he “completely lost it” recently? He’s always been insane. Insanely stupid in fact. Nothing new here.

Yet, when we read the headlines, every few days or weeks, he “completely loses it”.

If he were throwing grass in the air, eat dirt, or speak in tongues, maybe it would be worth the completely lost it title. Otherwise, it gets old after a few times.

It’s a good question but I just read this on Wiktionary and Wikipedia and it’s obviously difficult to be certain.

Both Wiktionary entries in English or French are saying the etymology is from papillon. Then the Wikipedia article for the papillote candy says that the word papillote in cooking is from this, but there’s no citation. And the origin of the word for the candy is also discussed there as being unsure.

However, the French Wiktionary page on papillotte mentions that it’s the feminized form of papillot, which describes a small butterfly using the diminutive “ot”. This is grammatically cromulent. Like chien for dog, then chiot for puppy, or île and îlot.

The papillotes for cooking are not arranged in a butterfly form, but it’s easy to see how it could come from wrapping food like this . So by extension it can also be used to wrap anything using a type of paper, like hair.

As a native speaker, I tend to agree with the proposed etymology, as it kind of makes sense. There’s other words based on papillon so it makes it more likely. Like the verb papilloter to describe fluttering. Or bow ties, that are called nœuds papillon (butterfly knot), also because they look like butterflies.

Still, sometimes the simple deductions are also the ones that are wrong. It could also come from papier, because papillotes can be made of paper. However the spelling is not helping because if it came from papier, it would be spelled papiotte. It could just be a coincidence than ends up working both ways.

You probably could, as papillote is something cooked wrapped in aluminium or parchment paper. The name comes from a candy that was wrapped in shiny paper and looked like a butterfly. So by extension now it’s also for any food that’s cooked wrapped in something. You can have a vegetable papillote, a salmon papillote, or a veal papillote.

In French moths and butterflies are called papillons. There is sometimes a distinction between butterflies and “night butterflies” (moths) but in the end, they are all papillons.

It’s interesting to see how this strategy changes depending on the species.

Some birds will fake being injured to lure predators away from their chicks, and others will attack anything coming too close.

Aside from the sad news, as a Montrealer, the title confused me.

When I hear about the North Shore it’s usually to describe the north of Montreal, as opposed to the south. I thought the title was lacking precision.

Then I read the article, saw Natashquan, and realized ‘North Shore’ in this context is about Côte-Nord (North COAST).

I didn’t know it could be translated to ‘North Shore’.

So far I considered myself lucky that google only added AI results in English but recently they also started doing it in other languages. I googled in French which train stations had elevated platforms in my city and the AI results were confidently wrong. Entirely false information.

It even added that one of the downtown stations was closed for renovations, which is also false as it has been reopened since December 2024.

And you can’t disable it. It’s so fucking bad.

If you speak French you can consider Guadeloupe as a possibility.

Of course there’s cars everywhere but it’s entirely possible to travel there without a car.

There are municipal buses from the airport to multiple cities. There are also ferries to go to the multiple islands. The island of Marie-Galante can be cycled, and is very nice.

I spent a few days in Le Gosier, Pointe-à-Pitre and Grand-Bourg, and I never needed a car.

On the opposite side, avoid SXM.

I was using E16 years ago and liked it but eventually switched to Gnome (2, I think), after waiting for E17 for too long.

What made me quit was the wait. All the other DEs at the time were releasing new versions frequently but Enlightenment took forever.