ElCheapo (u/ElCheapo)

ElCheapo commented on A 'screenless smartphone' vice.com/en/article/k7bxp... · Posted by u/watchdogtimer

ElCheapo · 3 years ago

Screenless smartphones could totally be viable as a product, especially for visually impaired folks.

The problem is only one: PROPRIETARY APPLICATIONS

Could you write a custom and simplified Facebook Messenger client that would allow clear and complete navigation through hardware buttons or vocal commands? Abso-fucking-lutely!

Can you do it without Facebook's approval which will never come? Abso-fucking-lutely not!

ElCheapo commented on Libcamera v0.0.1 git.libcamera.org/libcame... · Posted by u/hasheddan

marcodiego · 3 years ago

> is obvious when you compare the image quality from a no-name chinese brand with Samsung or Apple even though they are using the same exact sensors.

This is an area where FLOSS has an opportunity to shine. I think many of these algorithms are described in scientific papers and considering FLOSS is much more collaboration-prone, I'd really expect the best algorithms (except for the ones that require much training data) to soon be implemented. An example of a success case: AV1.

ElCheapo · 3 years ago

and who's designing and manufacturing and programming the accelerators needed for those algorithms to perform close to real time?

ElCheapo commented on Libcamera v0.0.1 git.libcamera.org/libcame... · Posted by u/hasheddan

xrd · 3 years ago

It's interesting seeing how camera support is the biggest gaping hole in the open source smart phone world.

For example, almost everything in this graph is green, except for the camera column:

https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices

It's a complicated problem:

https://blog.brixit.nl/pinephone-camera-part-2/

But, in a world where open source almost always exceeds the commercial offerings, I'm surprised this is the case. It seems like the parent article and the LWN article posted (https://lwn.net/Articles/904776/) are suggesting that the trend is to just dump raw data and let software process it. I'm doubly surprised there aren't good libraries in the open source world that do this so much better than the commercial ones.

This is the main reason I feel stuck inside the duopoly of Android (barely tolerable and hostile) and iOS (completely unusable and unhackable). I need a good camera on my phone and there aren't good options for that at all.

Maybe extracting this code outside of gstreamer is a good idea if this takes us closer to that goal.

ElCheapo · 3 years ago

Your post is only partially correct. Even with completely open firmware, or at least a documented interface, the biggest roadblock would become be abysmal state of OSS digital image processing. Engineers at major smartphone and camera companies are paid top dollar to improve how the images are processed, this is no laughing matter and is obvious when you compare the image quality from a no-name chinese brand with Samsung or Apple even though they are using the same exact sensors.

FOSS smartphones such as the Pinephone would then need a whole bunch of accelerators to perform such computations because the general purpose CPU would be too slow for that, and image could take seconds to finish processing and get saved in the gallery. But at that point Pinephone itself would not have enough expertise for such a design and everything would crumble.

ElCheapo commented on Jessica Wade made more than 1k Wikipedia bios for unknown women scientists today.com/parents/jessica... · Posted by u/Brajeshwar

berkes · 3 years ago

> Which I honestly find pretty reasonable. If you were to make a Wikipedia article for every college professor, we'd have a pretty bloated Wikipedia

Why would that be a problem? What is such a Long Tail costing us? It's not like there is scarcity like a libraries' bookshelves or pages in a journal.

And what would be the line of bloatedness? Maybe it already is way too bloated, and a wikipedia 10% the current size is better?

ElCheapo · 3 years ago

Why not have 8 billion entries for each and every one of us? If you remove any popularity boundary then this is the only logical conclusion

ElCheapo commented on Kodak Is Hiring Film Technicians: ‘We Cannot Keep Up with Demand’ petapixel.com/2022/10/12/... · Posted by u/Stratoscope

supernova87a · 3 years ago

Can someone convince me / correct my logic here?

I used to be a huge film photographer as well, back to high school days in the darkroom and getting my hands smelly and watching images appear in developer bath. I too have nostalgia. I was entertained by the online meme/question where someone asked "what is the 'red room' in Stranger Things?", ah these youngsters nowadays.

But objectively, digital sensors can have their color profiles / output remapped to most film "looks", even adding grain, and of course you're not spending $ on film with every shot and waiting days to get the film back. Aside from if you need the medium/large format resolution, (and the nostalgia / anticipation / excitement of the image) there is no objectively better thing about film, is there?

I really get puzzled by people on r/analogcommunity sharing their "finds" of old expired film and wanting to go out and shoot on it. Boggles the mind. You take images hopefully to keep, and wanting to do that with unknown film to save $5 and see what comes out, is... exciting?

(I'm sure this is a religious-level debate, I'm not imagining that this will be resolved here, but at least some enjoyment in discussing it.)

ElCheapo · 3 years ago

It boggles your mind that people find surprise and adventure exciting? Do you also think digital painting has superseded actual brushes?

ElCheapo commented on Is the World Ready for Effective Weight-Loss Drugs? gq.com/story/weight-loss-... · Posted by u/aksss

ElCheapo · 3 years ago

The world is ready, perhaps too ready, to solve their problems with a pill.

The real question is, is the world ready for fixing our lifestyles instead of searching for a panacea of pills?

ElCheapo commented on Infosys asked HR not to hire 'Indian-origin candidates', 'women with children' timesnownews.com/business... · Posted by u/webmobdev

aliqot · 3 years ago

Im not a bot.

ElCheapo · 3 years ago

I already told you this is not what I asked. Your replies are all over the place and I sincerely am not understanding them.

[EDIT]

wow, you edited your whole long form reply and just replaced it with "I'm not a bot"? That's such a misleading and dishonest thing to do for everyone reading these posts from now onwards

ElCheapo commented on Infosys asked HR not to hire 'Indian-origin candidates', 'women with children' timesnownews.com/business... · Posted by u/webmobdev

aliqot · 3 years ago

> please specify which kind of diversity fosters innovation

To keep an open mind I did a thought experiment and found a few: entertainment, fusion food, music, those things I'd imagine benefit greatly from diversity.

ElCheapo · 3 years ago

You told me human endeavors in which "diversity" (which again, means nothing) fosters innovation. But that wasn't my question. I asked what kind of diversity fosters innovation, not what kind of innovation is fostered by diversity

ElCheapo commented on Infosys asked HR not to hire 'Indian-origin candidates', 'women with children' timesnownews.com/business... · Posted by u/webmobdev

k__ · 3 years ago

Diversity can foster innovation.

ElCheapo · 3 years ago

Didn't know skin pigment contributed to innovation.

"Diversity" is empty HR speak, please specify which kind of diversity fosters innovation.