Read the latest posts from Infosec Press.
from novaTopFlex
WriteFreely is very similar to and may be a sister project of WordPress. However, after following the Fediverse instances, regardless of potential issues, the truth is that there is no such WordPress.org-based server that supports external accounts thus far.
from novaTopFlex
Welcome to the Fediverse!
from novaTopFlex
Hello! Welcome to the Fediverse!
from Fediverse Transition
WriteFreely is very similar to and may be a sister project of WordPress. However, after following the Fediverse instances, regardless of potential issues, the truth is that there is no such WordPress.org-based server that supports external accounts thus far.
from novaTopFlex
WriteFreely is very similar to and may be a sister project of WordPress. However, after following the Fediverse instances, regardless of potential issues, the truth is that there is no such WordPress.org-based server that supports external accounts thus far.
from novaTopFlex
WriteFreely is very similar to and may be a sister project of WordPress. However, after following the Fediverse instances, regardless of potential issues, the truth is that there is no such WordPress.org-based server that supports external accounts thus far.
from Bruno's ramblings
I've been using Ubuntu daily for a few months. I was a bit afraid of having some major issue and having to try another distro before thinking about returning to Arch, but the balance is positive so far.
I admit there have been a few things that've annoyed me. Then again, I've had that on any OS I've used, so... yeah, computers... At least they're not printers, right?! 👀
I find the default GNOME experience on Ubuntu to be good. Back in the day, I enjoyed the hell out of Unity, and having a similar experience is nice. Of course, we're talking about GNOME here; extensions are necessary, but I didn't install that many, and some were only to improve the interface's bling (I like pretty things 🤷).
It's also nice to have a free tier for the Ubuntu Pro program. If, for whatever reason, I decide to stick with this version, I'll have 10 years of security updates (at the time of writing). The specifics are on the link above, so don't forget to check it out to know more about them.
When it comes to regular home users, Pro's free tier can be a nice thing to have. This way, they can slowly prepare the migration to a newer LTS and still stay reasonably secure. Well, to be honest, also because they don't tend to like changes, and keeping a stable environment for some time reduces the stress of computing for them.
This, of course, is also beneficial for self-hosters, for example. But it might not be for you, and that's fair, too. 🍻
Snaps have also improved quite a lot. You may find the occasional exception, but they have become quite performant compared to just a few years ago. Even the Steam snap has improved; however, it can take a little bit more time to launch than the native package when you have a lot of games installed and/or they take up a lot of disk space.
Another plus for the Steam snap is being able to change Mesa versions. There might be some games that require more recent versions than the included one, so this is a nice feature to have.
There's an issue with the Steam snap, where right-clicking on something to show a menu and then clicking on a menu entry just closes the menu and doesn't perform the action. This one can be annoying as hell sometimes! 💢
I do miss having some utilities I use already packaged or from a trusted enough source on the AUR, but I compiled them from source, and I keep tabs on new updates occasionally.
It's also a shame there is no official gamescope package, and you're left compiling it from source. I do think there are a few issues with that on the 24.04 LTS version, but I'm just remembering this as I type, so I might be misremembering.
I was also having the best KDE experience I've had in ~20 years with Plasma 6.x on Arch, but it's not packaged for Ubuntu 24.04. One time, I tried using a repo from Kubuntu or something, but I ended up borking the package and dependency lists, and couldn't remove the upgraded packages. 💀 I ended up reinstalling, which was faster than spending a day debugging dependency issues and force-installing some packages manually.
I had forgotten how PPAs can be a headache if you just YOLO it. 😅
At least for now, I'm sticking with the latest stable LTS. When I switched, my goal was to have a system that doesn't change much over time and, in doing so, doesn't bother me every day to install a ton of updates. I also wanted something more reliable. While the verdict is yet to be reached on the latter, it has been reached on the former — most days, I only have flatpak updates.
I'll stick with Ubuntu LTS for a few more months, so I can safely say if it is what I'm looking for or if I need to find another distribution. Although I think I'll probably stick to it until the next LTS — unless I have a major issue with it —and then reevaluate it.
#Ubuntu #Linux #Arch #KDE #GNOME #Steam #Gaming #LinuxGaming #DesktopLinux
from Tom Tildavaan
I bought one so you don't have to. (Edit: at least until Eaton supports Matter over WiFi)
These devices connect to Azure IOT Platform. While I am sure Eaton has a great deal for that, it means that every time I turn the lights on or off, Azure gets paid a small amount of money.
The switch, while not multi-touch capable, will wait 0.5s before turning the load on or off.
In an event of a network connection disruption, when you are back online the switch will take ~5 minutes to become available in the app. There is no local control even though the ESP32-C3-MINI1 (datasheet) module can do this. The unit is provisioned with WiFi credentials over Bluetooth but other than that Bluetooth is not used.
And when you use schedules, the status LED does not correspond to the actual state of the switch.
I am still debating whether to give Schneider Electric Matter-over-WiFi a try, but the more I read the specs the more I become convinced that Z-Wave network I already have is the best.
Edit: https://www.eaton.com/us/en-us/products/wiring-devices-connectivity/Matter.html suggests that at some point these WiFi devices will gain Matter support. If/when that happens, these switches, dimmers, and receptacles will become much more useful.
from Tom Tildavaan
In case you want more #IOT in your life, Eaton ships remotely actuated circuit breakers.
The breakers are provisioned using a “BlinkUp” system through your phone. You start the provisioning on your device, then put your screen to the sensor on the circuit breaker, your screen blinks a number of times sending WiFi credentials to the device, and then the latter connects to the Electric Imp servers. Eaton is using impOs as the basis of their offering, and Electric Imp is adamant they are secure.
Now, Eaton provides API to these circuit breakers – https://api.em.eaton.com/docs, but there is no true local access – there is apparently a way to get local control, but your device must phone home weekly to receive configuration that would allow you to talk to your device locally.
from Tom Tildavaan
As I was writing this I decided to scan GitHub for the URLs I found so far, and, well, people smarter than me have already written a home_assistant integration against #SEW, but it is a bit different from what I saw in the field:
I'd still like to describe how to locate the endpoints and the login process, so here we go...
This is the second post about #SEW SCM API – Smart Customer Mobile API by Smart Energy Water, this time we will learn about different APIs using real world utility websites.
It appears that there are at least two different API “flavors”. The one that uses ModuleName.svc/MethodNameMob naming convention and usually resides under PortalService endpoint, and the newer one, which lives under /API/.
So e.g. Nebraska Public Power District has endpoints at https://onlineaccount.nppd.com/PortalService/, e.g. https://onlineaccount.nppd.com/PortalService/UserLogin.svc/help. Rochester Public Utilities runs a different set of endpoints, with the root at https://connectwith.rpu.com/api.
The endpoints for the latter API can also be browsed at https://scmcx.smartcmobile.com/API/Help/.
Different utilities pay for different set of modules, and here's some of the modules I have discovered so far:
For /PortalService/ endpoints you can visit BASE_URL + /PortalService/ + ModuleName + .svc + /help to get the list of RPC calls you can issue. In order to find out what to send in the requests, you need to look into the calls within the apps for your utility. Note that some utilities opted out of the AES/CBC/PKCS5Padding PasswordPassword encryption, so let's hope this will be a trend forward. Currently SEW web portals talk to a completely different set of APIs to populate the interface, even though they are querying the same thing.
So to start, here's how to login to your favorite utility:
from typing import Mapping, Any
import base64
import json
import hashlib
import requests
import urllib.parse
from Crypto.Cipher import AES
BASE_URL = "https://example.com/PortalService"
def _encrypt_query(
params: Mapping[str, str], encryption_key: str = "PasswordPassword"
) -> str:
"""Encrypt with AES/CBC/PKCS5Padding."""
cipher = AES.new(encryption_key, AES.MODE_CBC, IV=encryption_key)
cleartext = urllib.parse.urlencode(params).encode()
# PKCS5 Padding - https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8018#appendix-B.2.5
padding_length = 16 - len(cleartext) % 16
cleartext += padding_length * chr(padding_length).encode()
return base64.b64encode(cipher.encrypt(cleartext)).decode("ascii")
def request(module: str, method: str, data: Mapping[str, Any]) -> Mapping[str, str]:
enc_query = _encrypt_query(data)
# Or module + '.svc/'
url = BASE_URL + "/" + module + "/" + method
resp = requests.post(url, json={"EncType": "A", "EncQuery": enc_query})
if not resp.ok:
raise Exception(resp.status_code)
return resp.json()
password_digest = hashlib.sha256("PASSWORD".encode()).hexdigest()
# Or ValidateUserLoginMob
response = request(
"UserLogin",
"ValidateUserLogin",
{"UserId": "USERNAME", "Password": password_digest},
)
print(response)
response will contain some object, you will need LoginToken and AccountNumber to proceed with most of the other calls.
It's a bit awkward that different utilities have different endpoints, which makes creating a universal client challenging, so for now I am researching the ways to get info from the Usage module. The parameters are weird (“type”: “MI”, or “HourlyType”: “H”), but we will get there.
from Tom Tildavaan
Once upon a time I learned about Opower HomeAssistant integration. But my utility does not use Opower, it was using something called “Smart Energy Water”.
Smart Energy Water, or #SEW is a SaaS provider, and they ship the whole thing – the backend, frontend, and the phone apps, the latter under the name SCM, which means Smart Customer Mobile.
So I embarked on a journey to figure out how these phone apps worked and, if successful, get my data out and into homeassistant.
I pulled an APK of my utility from Google Play Store and found that something secret is hidden in a libnative-lib.so binary, under com.sew.scm.gcm.SecureConstant, under a few methods returning String, and some methods that decrypt these strings using a heavily obfuscated set of routines, which essentially XOR'd (in case of Android APK) the values of gcm_default_sender_id + google_app_id + Android_App_RatingConstant_File, all the values from the strings.xml within the app resources.
One of the decoded tokens contains a key for request encryption. It was ...
PasswordPasswordSCM apps use private APIs. In order to remain private and hard to use the requests are encrypted.
You urlencode the parameters into key=value&key1=value1... form, then encrypt the resulting string using AES-CBC with PKCS5 Padding (16 bytes variant) using PasswordPassword as both the key and IV.
Then you send {"EncType": "A", "EncQuery": "base64-encoded-encrypted-string"}, and receive response from one of the .../API/Module/MethodName endpoints. The response will be JSON with no extra encryption, so it is definitely a deterrent against making requests, not a security feature.
Armed with that knowledge, and some help from exposed API listing on one of the utility websites I found that I need to use ValidateUserLoginMob call expecting userid and password.
However, password had to be base64-encoded result of applying a secret scheme from that SecurityConstant module above. It is always SHA256.
So my first https://utility.example.net/API/UserLogin/ValidateUserLogin was a success, I got LoginToken and AccountNumber, which was all we needed to start poking APIs.
If your utility uses SEW SCM, i.e. one of these at https://play.google.com/store/apps/developer?id=Smart+Energy+Water, you should be able to get API listing by visiting the web interface, and appending /API/Help. Or, if your utility runs an older version of SCM, replace /portal/ with /portalservice/UserLogin.svc/help or /portalservice/Usage.svc/help. You may get the .NET API definitions.
from Grimoire
רָז
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from Бележник | Notеs
Като вехтошар на спомени, аз искрено вярвам в идеята за енергията, таяща се във всяко нещо – от човека, с който разговаряш – до пръстена на баба ти, който носиш.
Но
Вещите помнят ли завинаги? Има ли давност приетата енергия? Забравят ли те имената на собствениците си, както ние забравяме имената на познати?
Или просто не можеш да усетиш енергията на някои предмети, както някои хора не те допускат до себе си веднага?
“I like this car,” Yuki spoke up after a while. “What is it?” “A Subaru,” I said. “I got it used from a friend. Not many people look twice at it.” “I don’t know much about cars, but I like the way it feels.” “It’s probably because I shower it with warmth and affection.” “So that makes it nice and friendly?” “Harmonics,” I explained. “What?” “The car and I are pals. We help each other out. I enter its space, and I give off good vibes. Which creates a nice atomsphere. The car picks up on that. Which makes me feel good, and it makes the car feel good too.” “A machine can feel good?” “You didn’t know that? Don’t ask me how, though. Machines can get happy, but they can get angry too. I have no logical explanation for it. I just know from experience.” “You mean, machines are like humans?” I shook my head. “No, not like humans. With machines, the feeling is, well, more finite. It doesn’t go any further. With humans, it’s different. The feeling is always changing. Like if you love somebody, the love is always shifting or wavering. It’s always questioning or inflating or disappearing or denying or hurting. And the thing is, you can’t do anything about it, you can’t control it. With my Subaru, it’s not so complicated.”
from J. R. DePriest
I was sent to a psychiatric hospital experiencing a “haunting”. It was one of those old school places that looks like a mansion out of a horror movie, a place that people spend a great deal of money to get access to. As usual, I was handed a folder and USB drive full of research the investigative team had already completed. This building had a series of unused sub-levels from the bad old days and an honest to god death tunnel. The dead don't bother me so I snuck in through the external hatch, where they used to occasionally remove the bodies. I'll skip the gory details if you don't mind and get right to setting up camp in the unused administrative office in the abandoned sub-level. Ears aching, neck hairs standing up, gooseflesh, like a cold spark pulsing through the whole place. I disguised myself as maintenance before grabbing my toolkit and heading up the stairs. The drywall dust only served to make my appearance more convincing. I did odd jobs around the place, listening, gathering intel. Patients escaping their rooms was too common to narrow down, but talk of a frozen swimming pool pointed me in the right direction. I had to be close. Walking down a wide, empty hallway, I heard something plink and stopped. “You dropped a button,” a husky voice said. I looked down and saw, sure enough, a button on the linoleum behind me. As I bent to pick it up, I got a look at the feet of the being who'd spoken to me. It was about an inch off the ground, barefooted, skin dry as stone and cragged, spotted with brown and gray. My heart rate was steady, my breathing normal, I chuckled to myself. “Thank you,” I said as I stood up and saw the whole thing. It was morbidly obese, pale and dry as a porcelain doll, and stark naked. Fat hid any discernible sex. Long white hair floated around its head like a bleached anemone. Eyes were yellow surrounded by black and the mouth was little more than a horizontal slash. No smell other than ozone. “I haven't seen you around,” I said. “Oh?” it said. “I'm new here.” I held up the button. “Thanks again, uh…Miss…ter?” I said, gazing expectantly. “It's Doctor, actually,” it said, without moving its mouth, “Doctor Sharpe.” “Thank you, Doctor Sharpe, then.” I turned and started to walk away. When you encounter an entity during a haunting, they typically want to be seen. The theory is that they literally feed on your strong emotions, your reactions. “Wait a moment,” it said in a softer tone. “Yeah?” I didn't turn around. “Would you—like to play a game with me?” I grinned and I'm sure it felt my elation. “I thought you'd never ask,” I said and turned back to face it. There was a table in between us that hadn't been there. “Nice,” I said, running my hand over its obsidian smooth surface. The entity was standing on the other side, no longer a floating ball. White hair hung down its oval face, wearing the same yellow eyes but with a delicate nose and pink lips around the mouth. Broad shoulders were draped with a white gown more appropriate for a gothic sleepover. She was smiling, shaking her cupped hands as something jingled inside. “What's your name?” she asked, showing her yellow teeth this time. “Anderson,” I said, giving her an alias. “I don't think so,” she said, tilting her head, her hair fluttering briefly to life. My ears tingled, and my hair ruffled just a little under my hat. A breeze ran down my sides to my feet, up my calves and thighs, met in my crotch, ran up my torso, by my chest, then split and went down both arms. She knew me now. Whether she'd be intrigued, confused, or angry remained to be seen. “Ooh,” she said and that was all. Coins clanged on the table as she opened her hands. They were colored, shaped, and sized like American quarters but without the ridges. “Take some,” she said. “And keep your button out.” I counted out four and slid them over in front of me. Picking one up, I glanced over, “May I?” Her yellow teeth smiled back as she nodded. Dense, heavy in my fingers, like real metal. Looked like cuneiform writing and instead of George Washington and an eagle, it was something like a lamprey's mouth on one side and a burning bush on the other. “You can see?” she asked, squinting. “Yeah,” I said. “A real beauty.” And it's true. I've seen lots of manifestations and this one was extremely detailed and surprisingly solid. In other words, this place was very, very tangled with the other. I stacked the coins in front of me and put the button beside. “So, Doctor Sharpe,” I asked. “What are the rules?” Her hair twitched. “Please call me Amelia,” she replied. “Okay, Amelia,” I said. “Then you can call me Alex.” She leaned in, asking, “Is that short for something.” While her hair started to writhe. “Maybe,” I told her, visibly grinning. I can play games, too. Sometimes, they like that. She leaned back and I felt nothing but anticipation from her. “You've already stacked the coins, I see. “Put your button on top of them.” I did as I was instructed. When I looked over at hers, the table had a mock temple made of old cardboard tubes from toilet paper and paper towels. I blinked a few times and it was still there. Another thing about hauntings. Even though we are tangled with another reality, there are still some things we aren't able to see. Our brains can't interpret it. As a safety mechanism, it'll hide things from us until they can happen when we aren't looking. When you look away, when you turn your back, when you blink your eyes, then your brain lets you see the change. You couldn’t see it happen. That's not possible. So I blinked to make sure she was done modifying the table. “You can go first, Alex,” she said. “You have to use your finger to flick the button at the temple. “The goal is to be the first person to knock it down.” The button on her stack of coins glinted when I tilted my head. “That hardly seems fair,” I said. “What would you prefer?” she asked. I looked down and saw my coins and button were replaced with food. I looked up and the temple and everything was now desserts. “First one to finish eating the temple?” I picked up one of the pastries and took a bite. Flaky, honey sweet, hint of pecan, powdered sugar on top. “Extremely good job on these,” I said. “They taste freshly baked.” “I'm glad you like them,” she replied, the table now covered in sweets of all kinds. Instead of eating more, I put it down. When they give you food, you have no idea what you are actually eating. You really don't want to know some of the things I've put in my mouth. She frowned, bunching up her bottom lip. Frustration. “I thought you wanted to play?” she said. “Actually, I'm down here because I heard about a frozen swimming pool. “Was that you?” Her hair danced. “They really seem to like it,” she said. “I'd like to see it, too, if that's okay.” She pointed beside us. “It's right there.” And it was. An Olympic sized swimming pool, frozen solid. I could see people at the far end. There was a faint impression of ice skaters, of Christmas trees, of carolers singing. “Christmas,” I said. I felt myself slipping into it, could smell hot cocoa and cookies, could feel a fireplace nearby. “It is lovely,” I said before shaking myself out of the reverie. “I cannot image how much effort that must have been to create for them.” Her face was stoic, stern, but her yellow eyes were moist, red tears welled. “They deserve it,” is all she said before she and her entire table slid into the floor and vanished. I hadn't felt malice or mischief, only remorse and pity. I headed toward the crowd, the illusion playing at the edges of my senses, eager to pull me back in coming in waves with a dull thump each time. As I got closer, I saw them pointing out on the ice, laughing and hugging, pretending to drink mugs of coffee or cocoa that were real to them. And the thumps got louder and louder. In fact, the thumps were so loud they had to be real. I looked over the ice, underneath the illusion of kids ice skating and throwing snowballs, underneath the sleds and snowmen. I saw something under the ice. A black mass moving and pushing up and failing to find a way out. It was desperate, I could feel that now that I knew it was there. I went out on the ice to the shouts of the others telling me to get off because I wasn't dressed for it, to stay out of the way, to be careful, to be nice to the kids. I knelt down and felt the ice. It wasn't cold. I still had my toolkit. No axe, but a hammer and a flat-head screwdriver might do. I started tapping, chiseling, then banging. The others were angry now, yelling that I was putting their kids in danger, that if I wanted to fish I'd have to wait until after the kids were done playing. The “ice” chipped like old concrete until I had a hole big enough to stick a hand through, an arm. It was only an inch thick. I had no idea how it was even holding my weight. The water was a syrupy but I waved my hand as much as I could until the black mass saw me and swam toward me. The “ice” bulged up under its pressure but wouldn't break. I pulled my arm out of the hole and pressed my ear to it instead. “Free me, please,” whispered. “Free me, please,” again and again. Hope and fear in equal measure came from whatever it was. At this point, I had an idea of what was down there and I hoped my hormones would keep me safe. I hammered and hammered, hearing her voice from the water the whole time, hearing the people screaming, begging me to stop, but unwilling to come out on the ice. Until it was a hole big enough for a person to climb out of, or be pulled into. I put both arms in the slushy water and told her to come to me. The black mass was already underneath and I felt its weight. I felt its urgency and its hesitancy. I felt it taste me, a tingle running through both arms all the way to my core. It pulled slightly before reversing and allowing me to pull it up. It resembled a horse, a bundle of wet grass, a pile of stones, a hag, a maiden, until it was simply a woman with green skin and seaweed for hair. I'd been so fascinated that I was able to see the transformations, the shifting, the refocusing of reality with my own eyes that I didn't hear the crowd's crying until it was over. The water sprit pierced my soul with a glance, looking me up and down. “Hmmph!” the green woman said, shaking her head. “Oh,” I said, putting my right hand over my heart and raising my left hand in a symbol involving the first and second fingers as well as the pinky and thumb. “By the secret name inscribed on my soul, I release you from any and all obligations borne of this transaction.” That got her attention. “Thank you,” she said reaching a trembling hand toward my face. I did not pull away as she touched my cheek. She had tropical lagoons for eyes, like a warm bath, like a mother's embrace. It was another glamour, of course, but I allowed it, almost against my will. Almost. I was on a beach. The ocean's roar behind me like an out of tune radio. She was in front of me, wearing a Tahitian pāreu, fragrant flowers in her thick, black hair, brown skin instead of green. “I'm so tired of the snow and ice, so tired of Christmas,” she said, looking up at the sky and squinting. I heard music, singing, like a choir but it was just her laughing as she spun in place. “I'm free!” she sang. “You freed me.” She stopped spinning and faced me again. She was getting closer but not walking. “Why did you reject your prize?” She was circling me but also still standing in front of me. I felt her eyes all over me, I felt her probing me. The sky turned to storm clouds. I looked down, closed my eyes, to avoid her million eyes. I answered, “You tell me. “By now, you know me at least as well as I know myself.” The sun returned. “You aren't like the men and women I normally meet,” she sang. I felt the urge to lift my head, a gentle breeze stroking my chin. “Please look at me,” she pleaded. I took a deep breath, faced her, opened my eyes, and saw her. She was beautiful, of course, like a live action Nani Pelekai? My heart fluttered as if she was my first true love and heat flooded out to my hands and feet. I wobbled, nauseated, like I might stumble or fall to my knees. “You do have a heart, after all,” she sang, “and I see how it beats.” I felt the warm breeze circling around my ankles, looked down, saw myself clearly for the first time. I, too, was dressed in a bright pāreu, barefoot, dark skin. Not my body. I tested my muscles to see how real I was: toes, feet, calves, knees, thighs, pelvis, stomach. Wait. Something was different. I went numb. Something was different. Impossible, but as real as my own flesh. My hands trembled, stomach racked with nausea, my legs buckled, I was on the ground, sand in my mouth and eyes. Tears, great torrents and I couldn’t stop crying. I couldn’t stop. I heard her fluttering toward me. “You refused my gift before I even offered.” She paused. “And it was because you thought you were doing me a favor.” She put a steadying hand on my naked shoulder. “That thing trapped me,” she said. “It told me to give them their children back. “I didn't even take their children.” I heard her kneel down beside me. I felt pity from her, pity but also longing. I shivered at her breath in my ear. “But you rescued me.” I couldn't see her through my sobs. I could barely hear her as I forced myself to remember this, to remember it. The ocean was coming in. Not sure how I could tell, but it was coming in fast. “Thank you,” she whispered, voice like an ice pick. It was a phrase that carried power, when a fae speaks it is wise to consider that any words can be full of power and magic and gratitude, genuine gratitude, is powerful indeed. Then I was lying on the false ice, lying in my own snot and tears, surrounded by grieving parents. The sorrow, the emptiness, drove away whatever had been haunting the place. I could feel that almost immediately. I carved some carefully designed sigils around at precise locations to help anchor against future resonance. I went back out the same way I came in, hiked to my concealed vehicle, climbed inside, and cried for an hour. I drove home in mute resignation of what I'd been allowed to experience. I left the personal details out of my full report, but they've never left me. And. Sometimes. When I dream. Instead, I'm back on that beach. I look out at the ocean, at the eternal cycle of waves in and out; at the horizon in the unreachable distance. I hear singing. But. This time. It's just the birds. I feel the sand between my toes, I smell the brine, the seaweed, fruit trees in the distance. I feel the warmth of the sun that never sets, the breeze that meanders along the water line. I sit in the surf, rubbing my belly, savoring every sensation, marveling at what I should not have. Waiting for her to come back. So I can tell her, “thank you.” But she never will.
#WhenIDream #Dreams #Dreaming #Dreamlands #Writer #Writing #Writers #WritingCommunity #WritersOfMastodon #ShortFiction #Fiction #Paranormal
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License
It is definitely not okay to feed this into a dataset to be used to train an genAI or LLM. Nobody is authorized to used it for genAI or LLM.
from YAIL
Hello world!
I write this as a test to see what’s possible on infosec.press.
Can I use markdown? Yes I can!
Did the use of my browsers ‘back’ button spawn a new post instead of an edit? I think it did.
from Bruno's ramblings
A few days ago, I saw a post on r/fibromyalgia with a list of symptoms related to fibromyalgia, both common and uncommon. As I was looking at them, I couldn't tell what was scaring me the most: the size of the list or the fact that I have a lot of them. Today, after trying to cope with this for a few days, I copied the full post and applied bold to the ones I've had since this shit started, just to get a more precise grasp of how many of these I've had. Oh boy! I shouldn't have, because now I'm stressing out, and I'm trying to vent with this blog post.
I already had a few of them, due to other comorbidities, like allergies, asthma or IBS (this one is common in people with fibromyalgia), but they got worse after this fucking syndrome ruined my life. I also always had a sensitive nose, but not to the point of detecting a gas leak from a bottle with a hair-thin hole in it (the hole was barely visible with the naked eye, and no one around me noticed the leak except my now way too sensitive nose!).
Some sources suggest there are up to 200 symptoms associated with fibromyalgia. Below is a comprehensive list categorized by system:
Musculoskeletal Symptoms
• Widespread muscle pain • Muscle stiffness • Joint pain • Muscle spasms • Muscle weakness • Chronic fatigue • Tender points (sensitive areas on the body) • Reduced exercise tolerance • Restless legs syndrome • Feeling unrefreshed after sleep
Neurological Symptoms
• Chronic headaches or migraines • Numbness and tingling in extremities • Burning or prickling sensations • Sensory overload (hypersensitivity to light, sound, and touch) • Poor coordination • Dizziness or vertigo • Brain fog (cognitive dysfunction) • Memory problems • Difficulty concentrating (“fibro fog”) • Slowed processing speed • Speech difficulties (word-finding issues) • Increased pain sensitivity (hyperalgesia) • Phantom pain (pain with no clear cause) • Sensory processing disorder-like symptoms
Sleep Disturbances
• Insomnia • Frequent awakenings at night • Light, unrefreshing sleep • Delayed sleep phase disorder • Sleep apnea • Hypersomnia (excessive sleepiness) • Difficulty maintaining sleep • Increased pain sensitivity at night
Psychological Symptoms
• Anxiety • Depression • Panic attacks • Mood swings • Irritability • Emotional sensitivity • Feeling overwhelmed easily • Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) • Increased stress response • Low stress tolerance
Gastrointestinal Symptoms
• Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) • Constipation • Diarrhea • Abdominal cramping • Bloating • Nausea • Acid reflux (GERD) • Food intolerances • Sensitivity to gluten or dairy
Cardiovascular Symptoms
• Palpitations • Irregular heartbeat • Orthostatic intolerance (dizziness when standing) • Low blood pressure • Raynaud’s phenomenon (cold, discolored fingers/toes) • Poor circulation
Immune System Symptoms
• Frequent infections • Swollen lymph nodes • Flu-like symptoms • Allergies or worsening allergies • Sensitivity to mold or chemicals
Hormonal & Endocrine Symptoms
• Menstrual irregularities • Painful periods (dysmenorrhea) • Premenstrual syndrome (PMS) • Low libido • Thyroid dysfunction symptoms (even with normal labs) • Adrenal fatigue-like symptoms • Weight fluctuations • Hot flashes or night sweats
Sensory & Skin Symptoms
• Skin sensitivity • Rashes or hives • Itching (pruritus) • Temperature sensitivity (hot or cold intolerance) • Excessive sweating • Bruising easily • Dry eyes or mouth (similar to Sjögren’s syndrome) • Tinnitus (ringing in the ears) • Blurred vision • Heightened sense of smell
Urinary & Reproductive Symptoms
• Bladder pain (interstitial cystitis) • Frequent urination • Urinary urgency • Painful intercourse • Pelvic pain • Erectile dysfunction (in men)
Metabolic & Energy Symptoms
• Chronic fatigue • Hypoglycemia symptoms (without diabetes) • Sugar cravings • Difficulty maintaining energy levels • Feeling drained after minor exertion • Non-restorative rest
Temperature Regulation Issues
• Feeling excessively hot or cold • Sweating abnormalities • Poor heat tolerance • Cold hands and feet
This list captures many of the most commonly reported symptoms, but fibromyalgia is highly variable, meaning people experience different combinations of symptoms.
Here are some of the less common (but still reported) symptoms:
Neurological & Sensory Symptoms
• Olfactory hallucinations (smelling things that aren’t there) • Tingling or buzzing sensations in the skin (paresthesia) • Feeling like your skin is sunburned without an actual burn • Electric shock sensations in the brain or body • Difficulty distinguishing temperatures (e.g., not realizing something is too hot or too cold) • Changes in depth perception (difficulty judging distances) • Spatial disorientation (walking into door frames, tripping) • Sudden “jelly legs” or leg weakness
Psychological & Cognitive Symptoms
• Derealization or depersonalization (feeling detached from reality) • Hypersensitivity to emotions (excessive empathy or feeling drained around people) • Intrusive thoughts or mental overstimulation • Extreme irritability before storms or weather changes • Lack of motivation despite wanting to do things
Skin & Hair Symptoms
• Hair loss or thinning (often linked to stress or inflammation) • Skin mottling or marbling (livedo reticularis) • Sudden bruising with no clear cause • Extreme skin dryness despite moisturizing • Bumps or lumps under the skin (lipomas or fibrous nodules)
Cardiovascular & Circulatory Symptoms
• Feeling faint after standing too long (due to blood pooling) • Heart palpitations with no clear cardiac issue • Frequent cold hands and feet, even in warm weather • Random hot or cold flushes without fever
Gastrointestinal & Metabolic Symptoms
• Metallic taste in the mouth • Burning tongue syndrome • Random aversions to foods once tolerated • Episodes of extreme hunger or complete lack of appetite • Unexplained weight gain or loss despite no change in diet • Swelling in the hands, feet, or face (fluid retention)
Respiratory & ENT (Ear, Nose, Throat) Symptoms
• Feeling like you can’t take a full breath (air hunger) • Chronic post-nasal drip or unexplained nasal congestion • Recurring sore throat with no infection present • Hoarseness or voice changes without a clear reason • Increased sensitivity to strong smells causing nausea or headaches
Urinary & Reproductive Symptoms
• Pain during ovulation (not just during menstruation) • Sudden onset of interstitial cystitis (bladder pain syndrome) • Feeling like you need to urinate immediately after going • Lower abdominal bloating that mimics pregnancy
Sleep & Fatigue Symptoms
• Waking up gasping for air (not sleep apnea related) • Extreme difficulty waking up despite a full night’s sleep • Sudden episodes of body exhaustion with no warning • Vivid or disturbing dreams that feel real
Immune System & Autoimmune-Like Symptoms
• Frequent canker sores or mouth ulcers • Random fevers or flu-like symptoms with no infection • Easily getting sick but recovering slowly • Reactions to vaccines or medications that others tolerate well
Rare Pain Symptoms
• Pain that migrates randomly from one part of the body to another • Tingling scalp or burning sensation on the head • Feeling like your limbs are “too heavy” to move • Painful swelling in one finger or toe with no arthritis diagnosis
Many of these symptoms overlap with other chronic illnesses, which is why fibromyalgia is often misdiagnosed.
#Fibromyalgia