This is the Popup. It can be disabled in theme options. If you want to add/remove/edit the links, description, or title in the popup you have to go into the code.
i have just stumbled upon the most beautiful public document i have ever laid eyes on. this also goes for anyone whose pastimes include any sort of character creation. may i present, the HOLY GRAIL:
this wonderful 88-page piece has step by step breakdowns of how names work in different cultures! i needed to know how to name a Muslim character it has already helped me SO MUCH and i’ve known about it for all of 15 minutes!! i am thoroughly amazed and i just needed to share with you guys
Cultures include Yoruba, Sikh, Vietnamese, Polish, and dozens more!
This could also be a good staring point for conlangers looking for inspiration for personal name conventions.
FRESHKILL(1994) dir. Shu Lea Cheang Shareen Lightfoot and Claire Mayakovsky raise their daughter Honey near the Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island in New York City. Shareen works as a salvager recovering refuse from the landfill, while Claire works as a waitress at a sushi restaurant. The city is heavily contaminated with pollution that adversely affects local animals and food; Claire brings home contaminated fish from the restaurant that is eaten by Honey, who begins glowing green and then vanishes. Shareen and Claire discover that the multinational GX Corporation is responsible for the pollution and Honey’s disappearance, and become involved in an effort to hack and expose the company with sushi chef/hacker Jiannbin Lui, and poet/dishwasher Miguel Flores. (linkintitle)
I write my fics out in Google Docs and then paste the text into Ao3 when I'm ready to post it. Does anyone else have the problem of pasting with italics? If there's a word in italics next to punctuation, Ao3 will add in a space for some reason and it's kind of infuriating.
One of the AO3 translation volunteers (Min) created a Google Docs script to handle issues when copying from a doc into AO3. It’s really easy to use
create a copy of this google doc. It contains the script that will do all of the HTML formatting for you.
Delete all of the text from the document.
Write or paste your fic/chapter into the document.
Go up to the top menu and click the new menu option Post to AO3, then choose Prepare for posting into the HTML editor
Note: because this is an apps script, you’ll need to give it permission to run the first time.
The script will automatically mark up your document with the required HTML that you can then paste into the AO3 composition window. \o/
To revert your text back to normal, just go back up to that menu and choose Remove HTML. It will look like regular text again.
Once you have the doc, you can make a new copy of it for each new fic you write and that way you’ll always have that script available when you need it :)
For other cool stuff, read this post from @ao3org - which is where I found this script in the first place ❤
Reblogging this to save a life because I’ve been feeling like a crazy person for three months thinking I don’t proofread well enough or my eyesight is too terrible to see all the extra spaces.
Oh my gosh. I just found this website that walks you though creating a believable society. It breaks each facet down into individual questions and makes it so simple! It seems really helpful for worldbuilding!
Heads up that this is a very extensive questionnaire and might be daunting to a lot of writers (myself included). That being said, it is also an amazing questionnaire and I will definitely be using it (or at the very least, some of it).
So You Need To Buy A Computer But You Don’t Know What Specs Are Good These Days
Hi.
This is literally my job.
Lots of people are buying computers for school right now or are replacing computers as their five-year-old college laptop craps out so here’s the standard specs you should be looking for in a (windows) computer purchase in August 2023.
PROCESSOR
Intel i5 (no older than 10th Gen)
Ryzen 7
You can get away with a Ryzen 5 but an intel i3 should be an absolute last resort. You want at least an intel i5 or a Ryzen 7 processor. The current generation of intel processors is 13, but anything 10 or newer is perfectly fine. DO NOT get a higher performance line with an older generation; a 13th gen i5 is better than an 8th gen i7. (Unfortunately I don’t know enough about ryzens to tell you which generation is the earliest you should get, but staying within 3 generations is a good rule of thumb)
RAM
8GB absolute minimum
If you don’t have at least 8GB RAM on a modern computer it’s going to be very, very slow. Ideally you want a computer with at least 16GB, and it’s a good idea to get a computer that will let you add or swap RAM down the line (nearly all desktops will let you do this, for laptops you need to check the specs for Memory and see how many slots there are and how many slots are available; laptops with soldered RAM cannot have the memory upgraded - this is common in very slim laptops)
STORAGE
256GB SSD
Computers mostly come with SSDs these days; SSDs are faster than HDDs but typically have lower storage for the same price. That being said: SSDs are coming down in price and if you’re installing your own drive you can easily upgrade the size for a low cost. Unfortunately that doesn’t do anything for you for the initial purchase.
A lot of cheaper laptops will have a 128GB SSD and, because a lot of stuff is stored in the cloud these days, that can be functional. I still recommend getting a bit more storage than that because it’s nice if you can store your music and documents and photos on your device instead of on the cloud. You want to be able to access your files even if you don’t have internet access.
But don’t get a computer with a big HDD instead of getting a computer with a small SSD. The difference in speed is noticeable.
SCREEN (laptop specific)
Personally I find that touchscreens have a negative impact on battery life and are easier to fuck up than standard screens. They are also harder to replace if they get broken. I do not recommend getting a touch screen unless you absolutely have to.
A lot of college students especially tend to look for the biggest laptop screen possible; don’t do that. It’s a pain in the ass to carry a 17" laptop around campus and with the way that everything is so thin these days it’s easier to damage a 17" screen than a 14" screen.
On the other end of that: laptops with 13" screens tend to be very slim devices that are glued shut and impossible to work on or upgrade.
Your best bet (for both functionality and price) is either a 14" or a 15.6" screen. If you absolutely positively need to have a 10-key keyboard on your laptop, get the 15.6". If you need something portable more than you need 10-key, get a 14"
FORM FACTOR (desktop specific)
If you purchase an all-in-one desktop computer I will begin manifesting in your house physically. All-in-ones take away every advantage desktops have in terms of upgradeability and maintenance; they are expensive and difficult to repair and usually not worth the cost of disassembling to upgrade.
There are about four standard sizes of desktop PC: All-in-One (the size of a monitor with no other footprint), Tower (Big! probably at least two feet long in two directions), Small Form Factor Tower (Very moderate - about the size of a large shoebox), and Mini/Micro/Tiny (Small! about the size of a small hardcover book).
If you are concerned about space you are much better off getting a MicroPC and a bracket to put it on your monitor than you are getting an all-in-one. This will be about a million percent easier to work on than an all-in-one and this way if your monitor dies your computer is still functional.
Small form factor towers and towers are the easiest to work on and upgrade; if you need a burly graphics card you need to get a full size tower, but for everything else a small form factor tower will be fine. Most of our business sales are SFF towers and MicroPCs, the only time we get something larger is if we have to put a $700 graphics card in it. SFF towers will accept small graphics cards and can handle upgrades to the power supply; MicroPCs can only have the RAM and SSD upgraded and don’t have room for any other components or their own internal power supply.
WARRANTY
Most desktops come with either a 1 or 3 year warranty; either of these is fine and if you want to upgrade a 1 year to a 3 year that is also fine. I’ve generally found that if something is going to do a warranty failure on desktop it’s going to do it the first year, so you don’t get a hell of a lot of added mileage out of an extended warranty but it doesn’t hurt and sometimes pays off to do a 3-year.
Laptops are a different story. Laptops mostly come with a 1-year warranty and what I recommend everyone does for every laptop that will allow it is to upgrade that to the longest warranty you can get with added drop/damage protection. The most common question our customers have about laptops is if we can replace a screen and the answer is usually “yes, but it’s going to be expensive.” If you’re purchasing a low-end laptop, the parts and labor for replacing a screen can easily cost more than half the price of a new laptop. HOWEVER, the way that most screens get broken is by getting dropped. So if you have a warranty with drop protection, you just send that sucker back to the factory and they fix it for you.
So, if it is at all possible, check if the manufacturer of a laptop you’re looking at has a warranty option with drop protection. Then, within 30 days (though ideally on the first day you get it) of owning your laptop, go to the manufacturer site, register your serial number, and upgrade the warranty. If you can’t afford a 3-year upgrade at once set a reminder for yourself to annually renew. But get that drop protection, especially if you are a college student or if you’ve got kids.
And never, ever put pens or pencils on your laptop keyboard. I’ve seen people ruin thousand dollar, brand-new laptops that they can’t afford to fix because they closed the screen on a ten cent pencil. Keep liquids away from them too.
LIFESPAN
There’s a reasonable chance that any computer you buy today will still be able to turn on and run a program or two in ten years. That does not mean that it is “functional.”
At my office we estimate that the functional lifespan of desktops is 5-7 years and the functional lifespan of laptops is 3-5 years. Laptops get more wear and tear than desktops and desktops are easier to upgrade to keep them running. At 5 years for desktops and 3 years for laptops you should look at upgrading the RAM in the device and possibly consider replacing the SSD with a new (possibly larger) model, because SSDs and HDDs don’t last forever.
COST
This means that you should think of your computers as an annual investment rather than as a one-time purchase. It is more worthwhile to pay $700 for a laptop that will work well for five years than it is to pay $300 for a laptop that will be outdated and slow in one year (which is what will happen if you get an 8th gen i3 with 8GB RAM). If you are going to get a $300 laptop try to get specs as close as possible to the minimums I’ve laid out here.
If you have to compromise on these specs, the one that is least fixable is the processor. If you get a laptop with an i3 processor you aren’t going to be able to upgrade it even if you can add more RAM or a bigger SSD. If you have to get lower specs in order to afford the device put your money into the processor and make sure that the computer has available slots for upgrade and that neither the RAM nor the SSD is soldered to the motherboard. (one easy way to check this is to search “[computer model] RAM upgrade” on youtube and see if anyone has made a video showing what the inside of the laptop looks like and how much effort it takes to replace parts)
Computers are expensive right now. This is frustrating, because historically consumer computer prices have been on a downward trend but since 2020 that trend has been all over the place. Desktop computers are quite expensive at the moment (August 2023) and decent laptops are extremely variably priced.
If you are looking for a decent, upgradeable laptop that will last you a few years, here are a couple of options that you can purchase in August 2023 that have good prices for their specs:
If you are looking for a decent, affordable desktop that will last you a few years, here are a couple of options that you can purchase in August 2023 that have good prices for their specs:
If I were going to buy any of these I’d probably get the HP laptop or the Dell Tower. The HP Laptop is actually a really good price for what it is.
Anyway happy computering.
Also:
If your computer is over 5-7 years old but is still working for you that is fine! You don’t have to replace your computer because of an arbitrary age. “Functioning” as we define it at my job means that a computer will run the latest standard operating system and the latest versions of various types of business software because that is what is required for a computer to work for an office; a home computer doesn’t have to have the same specs to stay functional for a user who is just doing email and internet, which is what most home users use their computers for.
*However* the reliable lifespan of hard drives and ssds is a lot firmer and it isn’t planned obsolescence or an attempt to degrade lifespans of consumer devices, it is simply due to the limitations of the hardware. After about five years of use, HDDs and SSDs are more likely to fail. HDDs will give you some warning about this (reporting bad sectors, clicking noises, if they fail data can likely be recovered for a fee), but when SSDs fail they fail catastrophically (they just don’t turn on and the data is gone). That is not to say that your drives will automatically fail at the five year mark, it just means that they are much more LIKELY to fail at the five year mark. So now that you know this, you should take steps to prevent a failing drive from ruining your life. Get a large external hard drive and save regular image and file backups from your computer, and if your backup drive is five or more years old buy a new one and copy any important data to the new drive then use the new drive for new backups. You should also get a thumb drive and create a windows recovery disk if you haven’t already done so. And you should keep in mind that thumb drives also have an expected lifespan of about five years, depending on frequency of use. And you can also just proactively replace your storage drives on a schedule before they fail to extend the lifespan of the device. If you plan on upgrading the hardware in your computer at five year intervals (a good plan if you don’t want to or can’t replace an older computer! I support this plan! This is what most people should do!) then you will likely never experience a drive failure on your device.
ALSO here are things that my customers frequently don’t consider that can get a lot of life or functionality out of an older/broken computer:
If your laptop screen fails and you can’t afford to replace it, go to a local thrift store, get a monitor, then go online or to best buy and get the cable to connect your laptop to your new monitor. Thrift stores have monitors for about 20 bucks and a cable will cost 7-15 dollars, which is a hell of a lot cheaper than $75-150 for a replacement screen and whatever labor would cost. This will mean that your laptop is not a laptop anymore, but it can still be a computer for you.
If your computer doesn’t have enough USB ports get a USB hub. A lot of laptops come with only one USB port these days, and many desktops come with 4 or fewer, so an 8-port hub is a great idea.
People are making computers without ethernet ports these days (evil) but you can get USB to Ethernet adapters (here is one by a reliable manufacturer). This is bad and I hate it and I’m sorry.
If the keyboard or touchpad on your laptop fail and you can’t afford to replace them, get a USB keyboard or laptop. You can get very small wireless keyboards that will allow you some measure of portability, and there are even keyboard/touchpad combos that you can get.
Talk to like three friends and go in together on a USB CD/DVD drive to share. Most computers, even most desktops, don’t have internal optical drives these days, but external readers are available for a wide variety of prices and it is not something that you are going to need every day.
Those things seem pretty obvious, I’m sure, but they just don’t occur to a lot of people. Also like at least three of those tips are “if your computer didn’t come with hardware it should have then store-bought is fine” and I recognize that that is bullshit but at least if you have your own ethernet port, usb ports, and optical drive it immediately becomes less of a concern if your computer has those things AND you’ll be able to use those external components with multiple devices if you want to.
Also I know nothing about gaming specs or video cards but Paul’s Hardware on Youtube has a 75-video playlist about video cards that I suspect will have answers to many of the questions people have about graphics cards.
