Software That Perforates the User

somedays i wonder why i dont just write simple software, free of weird issues like "perforating the user" Scalar (on 1D) General Control This refers to commands that take a single value, which is between 0.0-1.0 (usually represented at a 64-bit float, of which we'll normally use a tiny fraction). What that command actually does to make a toy move is ignored, and it is assumed that 0.0 is off/stopped and 1.0 is max power/intensity/etc. Buttplug Client Implementations written by the Buttplug Core Team expose this as scalar actuators. General scalar control is handy if you want to quickly make sure your code works with whatever hardware you have. More importantly, it's perfect if you just want to crank out an application that controls a sex toy so you can go "hey look I made this thing control a sex toy" on social media and then be done with it. THE FUCKING MACHINE PROBLEM The simplicity of ignoring device context comes with a cost, which we refer to as the Fucking Machine Problem. Vibrators, which are what most people use sex toy applications with, take a speed. Most affordable fucking machines also take a speed value, with which they drive a motor to make their thrusting actuator go back and forth. These two motors are wildly different. One might make the user numb, the other might perforate the user. Using general scalar control drops this context, which means the onus of safety is on the user. While there is little to nothing a developer can do to limit a user's choice of hardware and application pairings, keep this problem in mind when communicating about applications that use this type of control.

A Mastodon post jokes about wanting to write simple software without bizarre edge cases, illustrated by technical documentation for controlling sex toys. The punchline is the “Fucking Machine Problem”: treating all devices as a generic scalar actuator can make software send a speed command to a dangerous machine, potentially perforating the user. It is a reaction meme for absurd software-engineering complexity and unexpectedly alarming implementation details. EN: A Mastodon post jokes about wanting to write simple software without bizarre edge cases, illustrated by technical documentation for controlling sex toys. The punchline is the “Fucking Machine Problem”: treating all devices as a generic scalar actuator can make software send a speed command to a dangerous machine, potentially perforating the user. It is a reaction meme for absurd software-engineering complexity and unexpectedly alarming implementation details.

• @rzeczyzabawne / 10153 2023-06-19