holalouisliu

holalouisliu website

A single point of origin, recorded into the future.

I’ve finally sorted out that input method bug that’s been doing my head in for ages. Whenever I was typing in the terminal or a browser, if I clicked away before hitting Enter, whatever I’d just typed would vanish into thin air. It turned out to be a bit of a miscommunication between the input software and the system. The developers patched it back in June, but the version in the Ubuntu repositories hadn't caught up yet, leaving me typing on eggshells every single day. I’d assumed it was just the terminal acting up, but when I realised the browser was doing it too, the penny dropped—they were both using the same system communication channel. I wasn't about to install dozens of bloated development tools just to recompile the whole suite for the sake of one minor glitch; that would be daft. In the end, I decided to just patch the specific component that was causing the trouble. I got blocked by permission errors a few times, but I managed to swap it out manually, and now my typing doesn't get 'eaten' anymore. I’ve jotted the whole process down in my dev notes, because I know that when Ubuntu pushes an update, it’ll likely overwrite my fix with the old version and the problem will rear its head again. Once the system’s built-in input method hits version 5.1.20 or higher, I can bin my manual patch, but until then, those notes are my insurance policy against the bug.

I’d never heard of hyperthyroidism before, so it hadn’t even crossed my mind to look into what it actually was. It wasn’t until I was working out with some friends that I realised just how much it can mess with your exercise. If you’re not careful, you could end up in a spot of bother. My friend’s wife was just having a gentle stroll on a treadmill set to an incline. It was only 40 minutes—hardly a marathon—but her heart rate hit 160-plus, and she felt properly dizzy afterwards. I had to suggest she knock the exercise on the head for now and go back to the doctor to see if they could get her heart rate under control with some medication before she tries to get back into a routine. The irony is that hyperthyroidism speeds up your metabolism, so losing weight is usually the only silver lining. It’s a shame, really; my friend started exercising because she wanted to slim down, and while she’s managed to experience every other symptom of the condition, the weight loss hasn't bothered to show up yet.