XScreenSaver 5.19

XScreenSaver 5.19 is out now. This version works on MacOS 10.8.

I really didn't want to upgrade yet (only suckers pay for .0 releases) but the new version broke XScreenSaver so I needed to test it. ("Screen savers must not use garbage collection! No wait, screen savers must use garbage collection! No wait, screen savers must not use garbage collection!")

The iOS version is still "awaiting review", but if those of you who are able could build and try that version yourselves, I'd appreciate it. I think I've fixed the performance problem on Retina iPads.

A decade later, and still nobody at Apple knows how to estimate completion times:

(And that was after the "about 20 minutes" timer starting over from scratch once. Total actual time, about an hour and a half.)

Also, isn't it about time that upgrading MacPorts after having upgraded the OS wasn't a colossal pain in the ass that takes fully half a day of fucking around? Jesus.

Anyone know how to delete all the slideshow screensavers from the list in preferences ("Floating" and "Flip-up" and whatnot)? The others you can just delete from /System/Library/Screen Savers/ but I can't tell where these live.

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Today in Torture Phallus news:

Phallostethus cuulong

The backwards-facing priapium has both reproductive and digestive functions, with the opening of the anus set in one end and a genital pore set in the other. It has two conspicuous externalised bones -- the curved toxactinium, which juts out from under the mouth, runs down the throat and connects under the skin to the rest of the priapium structure, and the short, serrated ctenactinium, which looks like a tiny, toothy lower jaw bone. Scientists have suggested that the reason this bone is lined with seven hook-like serrae is for the purpose of grasping onto a female's head during copulation. Because her oviduct is convenienrly located at her throat.

Besides the clasping component of this organ, there is also what's known as the papillary component, which is responsible for transferring sperm bundles into the female. Once the female's oviduct is filled with sperm, she is able to lay eggs that were internally fertilised. [...] No one knows exactly why P. cuulong and priapiumfish evolved to have their genitals on their heads, but one thing's for sure, she said, "There's not much going on at the back of these fish".

Previously, previously, previously, previously.

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Shitscalators.

Human waste shuts down BART escalators

When work crews pulled open a broken BART escalator at San Francisco's Civic Center Station last month, they found so much human excrement in its works they had to call a hazardous-materials team.

While the sheer volume of human waste was surprising, its presence was not. Once the stations close, the bottom of BART station stairwells in downtown San Francisco are often a prime location for homeless people to camp for the night or find a private place to relieve themselves.

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Femto-Photography

Visualizing Photons in Motion at a Trillion Frames Per Second

Volumetric Propagation: The pulse of light is less than a millimeter long. Between each frame, the pulse travels less than half a millimeter. Light travels a foot in a nanosecond and the duration of travel through a one foot long bottle is barely one nanosecond (one billionth of a second).

TED talk.

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