At some point when looking through Task Manager you may notice the ‘priority’ setting in Task Manager and decide that you want your favorite game (example: Minecraft) to run faster. You right click the process in Task Manager and set the priority to ‘realtime’, the highest setting.
However, upon clicking that option, a scary looking dialogue option pops up informing you that this is probably a bad move.
Changing the priority in this instance causes our laptop mouse to lag across the screen and explorer.exe to stop responding. Fun! Why is this the case? What’s going on here?
Realtime priority is the absolute highest priority you can set a program. This tells Windows you want to dedicate as much CPU time as possible to that process, so basic process like mouse input and Windows UI start competing for CPU cycles.
Realtime is the highest process class
OPTIONAL: Process Table Explanation and Further Information
The “Base priority” column in Task Manager is showing you the process class (called “process priority class” in some docs). Note that Task Manager (at least in Windows 10) labels the “Idle” priority class as “Low” (probably to avoid confusion with the idle process, etc.).
The process class is used only to initialize the priority of threads created within the process. Every thread is created with the “normal” thread priority. If the process is of the “normal” process class, then that means the thread has a base priority of 8.
Programs can change the priorities of their own threads within their process class. In a “normal” process, setting a thread to THREAD_PRIORITY_HIGHEST sets that thread’s base priority to 10. If you change the priority class of a process (say with Task Manager) then every thread’s base priority changes according to the table.
There are a lot of “name anomalies” in this table. “Highest” is not the highest thread priority, “lowest” is not the lowest, “idle” does not mean you are not or will not be doing anything, and “realtime” does not guarantee scheduling behavior suitable for real-time work (it’s just more predictable than the non-realtime classes, partly because it’s above them all, and partly because automatic priority adjustment is turned off in the “realtime” class).
For processes, one is supposed to use the process classes to indicate how important – or not – it is for each process to get CPU time, relative to a “normal” process. And within each process, the developer is supposed to set the thread priorities similarly, relative to a “normal” thread within the process. In practice, very few developers ever bother. (And they should. For example, a compute-bound task like video rendering should be set to a lower-than-normal priority, to avoid interfering with interactive use of the system.)
And the “idle” process class, and the “idle” thread priority within a process, does not mean nothing will be done by that process or that thread. It just means the thread or the process is willing to live with CPU cycles that nobody else wants.
You’ll notice that there is no “0” on the table. Ordinary applications cannot request running at priority 0 through the normal APIs. Only kernel mode threads can run at priority zero. As you’ve found, that is reserved for the zero page thread – or threads; there may be more than one on a NUMA machine.
This doesn’t lead to locking the system entirely because most programs don’t actually use 100% of the CPU regardless of their priority. Most threads do wait for things sometimes, and that could include waiting for a read/write to complete, or some other thread to indicate that they don’t have to wait any more. Additionally, “real-time priority” as a term actually consists of a range of priorities, as indicated by the table above. It’s possible for one “real-time” process to have higher priorities than those of another “real-time” process.
Most of the time, there’s no real reason to change process priority, although a few times it has been personally helpful in situations where two programs are working on a CPU intensive task, and they are slowing each other down. It’s possible to set the program’s process priority to “Above normal” pretty safely, allowing the CPU to dedicate more time to it.
“Is there even an android version of the game out?” No. 🙂
Undertale has been one of the most influential and one of my favorite games of all time. Since the game’s release in 2015 I’ve been entranced by its secrets and storyline. I played it blind when it first came out and have been hooked ever since.
I’ve been a part of a few different Undertale data mining communities over the years and although I admit there probably aren’t any secrets left, I’m still interested in any new theories or fan works/mods.
I came across a method to patch gamemaker files including Undertale to mobile, and then discovered there’s already been some work in the community into this area. I took the existing mobile Undertale modifications online and added full controller and keyboard support (note this build is Android only). YOU CAN HIDE THE ADDED GAMEPAD IN THE GAME’S BUILT IN SETTINGS MENU. SET THE BUTTON OPACITY TO 0. ❤️
A save editor has also been added into the game. If you visit the SETTINGS menu from either the beginning of the game or the Continue menu, you can overwrite your save file with presets. Save file preset names are below, but THEY CONTAIN SPOILERS (if you haven’t somehow heard/played UNDERTALE already)
This along with the added Bluetooth controller support should make it bearable to play Undertale on mobile devices!
Screenshots
This build is for educational purposes and Undertale research only.
Download
v0.1.0 – Updated internal Undertale version to v1.08 – Fixed name selection screen crash – Add more name easter eggs – Fix save editor crash DOWNLOAD: [APK FILE FOR ANDROID ONLY]
Task Manager may display a startup entry with a blank program icon and the name ‘Program’. What is this?
While this can look malicious or suspicious, typically it’s the result of a mistake. When a program registers itself as a startup program, it may not enclose one or more values in double quotes correctly. Thus, if a program path is supposed to be ‘C:\Program Files\Starcheat\starcheat.exe‘, the developer may have mistakenly not enclosed the path correctly. Windows will read a space as the end of the value, therefore it becomes C:\Program.
View Offending File Path
If you want to view the path causing this, simply right click on the header of the task manager startup entries and show the ‘Command line’ option. ‘Startup type’ is useful to show as well.
From here, you will now be able to see the broken path and navigate there yourself.
As you can see, in this instance the value is not enclosed correctly, leading to this error.
You can then potentially remove the startup entry entirely or laugh at the developer’s incompetence.
It’s 2022, and cryptocurrencies have hit something of an impasse. While assets like Bitcoin and Ethereum are firmly established in the public consciousness, many questions still remain about crypto security and long-term viability. Even now, in the age of wild NFT hype and rampant digitalization (of seemingly everything), there’s as much discussion about the safety of the various exchanges and wallets you’d use for digital dealings as there is about the actual marketplaces.
Amidst this uncertainty, cryptocurrencies are still being used primarily as investment assets, and haven’t made much of an impact on how we physically (or virtually) spend our money. Volatility in particular remains a big issue; vendors are reluctant to accept currencies with such wild value swings as some cryptos –– and by the same token, those with crypto assets may be loathe to spend them and risk potentially missing out on value gains.
All of this begs the question though: What opportunities remain for crypto to make the jump from being something to have into something to use? A few options with legitimate potential come to mind
Travel Money
El Salvador caused a storm in September of 2021 when the country itself started to accept Bitcoin as legal tender. With 1.4 million Salvadorans living and working in the U.S. and foreign remittance accounting for some $6 billion (or about 23% of El Salvador’s GDP), crypto’s speed and potentially lower cost compared to traditional money transfer methods make it an attractive proposition. Accused of pandering to rich currency speculators, President Nayib Bukele went to pains to show how crypto would benefit the average family with the launch of payment app Chivo, which Salvadorans can use to pay directly with Bitcoin at both local vendors and global chains such as McDonald’s and Starbucks in San Salvador.
This is, of course only one country’s journey with crypto. But we know that Panama, Paraguay, Brazil, and Argentina at minimum are among the nations monitoring how El Salvador’s integration of crypto into daily life progresses. It appears possible that in the near future there may be countries and regions for which cryptocurrency will become a favored if not necessary option among travelers (not to mention entire local populations).
Online Shopping
When Elon Musk announced in January that Tesla would accept Dogecoin for certain company-branded merchandise, the headlines were focused on the acceptance of what was once seen as a “joke” crypto. However, even when we look beyond Musk’s high profile, many retailers have been quietly accepting many cryptos for some years now.
Unsurprisingly, tech vendors were among the first to get on board, with Newegg having welcomed Bitcoin transactions since 2014, and added Dogecoin, Shiba Inu, and Litecoin to its payment methods in 2021. Meanwhile, Chinese vendor FastTech ships worldwide and accepts 22 different cryptocurrencies as of this writing. And Home Depot has gone one step further; the biggest hardware chain in the U.S. has accepted Bitcoin for both website and in-store purchases since 2019.
Gaming
Given that the internet is where cryptos are stored and traded, gaming seems like a natural outlet for spending. Accordingly, Microsoft accepts Bitcoin payments for both hardware and software, through users’ Microsoft accounts. The game streaming platform Twitch allows users to tip their favorite accounts using multiple cryptocurrencies. And in the emerging Decentraland metaverse, poker salons where players wager the in-house crypto MANA have become some of the most popular locations in the platform’s digital world.
Online Poker
Traditional poker sites have also been quick to capitalize on cryptocurrency being held by growing numbers of people. Indeed, with more than 100 million individuals now holding some form of crypto asset, the market has diversified well beyond “tech bros” and fund managers and now more closely mirrors the general public –– much of which plays poker online.
As this mainstream transition has occurred, it has also become clear that crypto in poker has numerous potential benefits. First and foremost, the security the blockchain offers means a safer (and more anonymous) way of depositing funds. Additionally, payouts can be actioned almost instantaneously. And as a sort of added bonus –– depending on how you look at it –– the volatility of cryptos adds potential perks to gambling, in that winnings can appreciate in value, and lost cryptocurrency might eventually become less valuable (though of course both of these perceived perks can also work the other way around). Because of these factors, we have already seen some adoption of crypto by poker sites, and it’s likely the trend will continue.
Dining and Entertainment
On the dining front, it sometimes goes overlooked that some major restaurants now accept crypto payments. Food at the countrywide Mastro’s steakhouse chain can be paid for with Bitcoin or Bitcoin Cash, for instance. The delivery app Menufy also accepts Bitcoin, as can the Takeaway app in Europe.
As for entertainment, there seem to be more examples with each passing month. Crypto advocate Mark Cuban has ensured fans can use Bitcoin and Dogecoin to buy tickets and merchandise connected to his NBA franchise (the Dallas Mavericks). AMC Theaters now accept various cryptos as payment methods for movie tickets as well. And these are just a few highlights in the entertainment sector.
It’s true that cryptocurrencies haven’t become as much a part of our daily lives as some acolytes have predicted over the years. Chances are they won’t until federal government regulations lay out formal structures for a safer ecosystem that more traditional companies can get on board with. At this point though, there are still plenty of ways to use crypto in day-to-day spending, and the use cases are only growing.
Cryptocurrency is often touted as the next monetary replacement, but we have a ways to go until the technology is fully ready or stable. Here’s the bitcoin bug that could have upset the entire market.
A few weeks ago, Coinbase.com awarded their largest ever bug bounty to “Tree of Alpha” (Twitter) for finding a huge exploit that would have allowed a malicious user to sell BTC or ANY other coin without even owning the asset.
At first, our friend ‘Tree’ was poking around the advanced order platform to see how the order API worked. He sent a normal request from the web ui, then captured the data that was sent. Notice the parameters “product_id”, “source_account_id”, and “target_account_id” near the bottom half of the image below.
‘baseSize’ also shows the designated order price
This is the information sent to the server informing it which cryptocurrencies it should place an order for, and for tracking accounts. In the image above he had sent a test order of selling 0.02433012 Ethereum for a limit price of $3,000.
In the first step of testing, you want to break an application. Seeing where an application’s limits and boundaries are is a great way to see how to expand them.
Tree decided to change the ‘product_id’ to ‘BTC-USD’, a pair he did not own. However, he left the ‘source_account_id’ and ‘target_account_id’ the same.
He sends the modified the payload, and… it went through?
Tree was able to sell 0.02433012 Bitcoin with the same amount of ethereum without even owning any Bitcoin. Checking the live order fills and hoping it was a visual bug, his tests were confirmed. The fills corresponded with live, open orders.
Time for the last test. He listed 50 BTC in exchange for 9M SHIBA and asked if other users online saw it as well. They confirmed, and he contacted coinbase.
If this exploit had been abused in the wild, there’s no telling the damage it could have caused to the market. Coinbase is so influential, even prices off the site would have been affected. Additionally, many other public facing APIs use crypto prices from Coinbase. It could have caused a chain reaction sell off, but there’s no telling for sure as it was fixed before any harm was caused.
What does this tell us? Well, that crypto is nowhere near as stable as some make it out to be. Blockchain is an amazing technology (how the heck does it work exactly though?), but it’s not being utilized to the fullest yet.
I’m not saying don’t invest in Bitcoin, I’m saying don’t throw your life savings in there when someone with Firefox 97 is all that’s standing between total market collapse.
Text tone indicators are a proposed solution and a step along the path to better online communication. It’s sometimes difficult to tell others’ use of tone on the internet, even with additional context such as emojis. 🙂
Generations already have their own slang, and texting without punctuation has quickly become a way to imitate ‘casual’ conversation. This has then evolved over time to include adding periods as a way to express anger, or sending a singular ‘k’ to express dismissal.
The next step in online communication then would be some way to communicate the intent or tone behind the words.
Enter: tone indicators.
Tone Indicators
Tone indicators are shorthand for words used to convey tone, which the Cambridge Dictionary defines as “a quality in the voice that expresses the speaker’s feelings or thoughts”.
The same message can be joking, or serious. It could be teasing, or threatening. We don’t consciously acknowledge it, but you can also immediately tell if the speaker’s delivery was negative, positive, or neutral face to face. It can be sexually suggestive, or entirely friendly. Tone and delivery influences the meaning and implications of a sentence in every way.
Tone indicators are intended for use through text, as miscommunication is frequent in social media. Posts are often misinterpreted, and this looks to fill in some of the missing gaps of information that may otherwise supplement that interpretation.
In fact, in a study, UCLA professor of psychology Albert Mehrabian found that 93% of liking is from non-verbal cues. 38% is due to tone of voice, while an additional 55% is attributed to body language.
Of course, these cues are absent from text-based social medias.
Master List
INDICATOR
MEANING
/j
joking
/hj
half-joking
/s
sarcastic
/gen or /g
genuine
/srs
serious
/nsrs
non-serious
/pos or /pc
positive connotation
/neu
neutral connotation
/neg or /nc
negative connotation
/p
platonic
/r
romantic
/c
copypasta
/l or /ly
lyrics
/lh
light-hearted
/nm
not mad
/lu
a little upset
/nbh
for when you’re vagueposting or venting, but it’s directed at nobody here (none of your followers)
/nsb
not subtweeting
/sx or /x
sexual intent
/nsx or /nx
non-sexual intent
/rh or /rt
rhetorical question
/t
teasing
/ij
inside joke
/m
metaphorically
/li
literally
/hyp
hyperbole
/f
fake
/th
threat
/cb
clickbait
Remember the ones you wish to use, Google if you see one you don’t know later. Simple.
Usage
When should you use these? When something you’re saying could be ambiguous online. The purpose of the creation of these is to better communicate and exchange ideals.
An example tone indicator, /j, means joking. To use, simply place at the beginning or end of a sentence.
Beginning
“(/gen) Wow, you’re such a great friend.” Genuinely and earnestly saying you have a great friend.
“(/s) Wow, you’re such a great friend.” Sarcastically saying someone is a great friend.
END
“I hate you. /j“ Joking with a friend, don’t actually dislike.
“I hate you. /ly“ A song lyric you relate to, not aimed at someone.
“I hate you. /srs“ You’re being serious, and actually hate someone.
I don’t want to use these / Using /j ruins the joke
You don’t have to use them. This is an informational post on the existence of them and their usage.
Think about how you can go into a sitcom, knowing full well that its genre is comedy and its intent is to make you laugh, and still find it funny. If putting two characters at the end of your joke ruins the entire thing, maybe it wasn’t all that funny to begin with.
How many times have you misunderstood a post someone sent to you online, or thought your friend was mad at you through text? If adoption of text tones becomes more commonplace, this could be one such solution to those problems.
(/srs) You also don’t have to use them on every line. Text tones are meant for an easy way to quickly convey the intended attached non verbal data that would otherwise be exchanged in a face to face interaction.
With this script, you can automate the removal of a massive quantity of discord messages (everything back to a channel’s origin, if wanted), including in personal channels. I used it personally to delete a conversation with over a year of messages. There were no problems after the proper modifications.
You will need Tampermonkey. This is an extension for your favorite browser that will allow you to run custom JavaScript.
Next, visit the delete discord messages repository. You will need to click the ‘userscript.js‘ file listed upon visiting the url. Copy everything (CTRL + A / CTRL + C) and install it. The script obviously does nothing malicious but you can also take this opportunity to verify for yourself.
To use, click the trash can icon in the channel or DM you want to delete and press “START”.
You can also add a ‘before message id’ or ‘after message id’ to control how much you delete.
The script will try to respect Discord’s limits as much as possible, backing off as necessary when Discord errors. I cannot promise you will not be banned for selfbotting or something, but I have used it many times and my account is fine. Just to be safe you shouldn’t be doing anything else on your account while the script is deleting (it will also slow down and cause problems anyway). AFAIK this doesn’t violate anything in terms of service but use at your own risk, as always.
