Tech Enthusiasts [Rule]

can confirm
edit: actually, i cannot confirm, i don't even have a printer in my house/apartment
- Printers are banned in my house. I need to print maybe twice a year. I pay for someone else to manage a printer that will work when I need it instead of discovering that my ink is dry or the drivers don't work despite nothing having changed since the last time I used it.
  
  I just got one from e-waste and its worked for 4 years, somehow.
  Don't try replacing a USB port as your first ever soldering attempt. Or at least don't be an idiot like me, you need flux, not fucking 520°C.
  I mean, it holds. It's tilted, burnt, but works...
  Drivers, Linux works fine, but not Windows. HP support page for that specific printer says the installation is automatic. Windows says it can't find drivers. As usual, archive.org is my friend (Linux doesn't support high-DPI feature).
  But, uuuh, the high DPI takes 20 minutes per A4 page. Yeah, 20 minutes. And it is the only acceptable option for pictures or small details.
  Ink, I managed to get half a liter from AliExpress on sale for 71 cents. At least black one, I don't use color too often. And even then, I only managed to use half of the 2 bottles when I decided to print 180 pages of text in dark mode (white on black).

And that printer is a B&W Brother Laser Printer with no wifi or bluetooth
- This printer does rock. Unfortunately mine has WiFi.
  
  Mine also has wifi. It's plugged into the switch via Ethernet.

VLANs and least privilege access. Everytime I see this is the same thing, everyone hates on automation. Just do it right. If you need to sign up for something use a alias and different domain. Username+4@throwawaydomain.com for that annoying Philips hue login.
Have different wireless SSIDs setup for each purpose on different vlans.
Personal/home SSID
Guest SSID
Work SSID
Automation SSID
Use port security to stop automation and Guest SSID/VLAN from accessing places it shouldn't.
- Hubs decided he wants some automation now we own . Consequently I am building a proxmox with pfsense and Home Assistant. What fun.

a printer is the last piece of tech you should ever let into your home network

Six years, and it's still a sign of a bad techie.
First the printer is the last thing you should have or trust.
Second, smart homes are not inherently insecure but idiots can EASILY make them that way. Many of the most talented, security minded, techs I've ever worked with are home assistant users.
Maintain local control only, avoid using cloud enabled devices and it's fine.
Stop pushing ignorant positions like this post.
- Yeah. The people who spread this memes probably have some cheap WiFi router from a foreign manufacturer with default config that phones home to its mothership.
- It a big wider than what you're looking at.
  Most peple chase the flash of convenience. People who work in the industry know how gardenwalled a lot of that shit is, the huge privacy concerns and the fact it will be abandoned as soon as the company feels like it. We see the pitfalls and avoid.
  It's like that other one about "how come you always see a tech using some ancient giant server to do something a $50 media player can do". Because our equipment predates the availability of that shit, and also our server will still work after your media hub stops supporting netflix.
- Yeah I was gonna say. Loads of the guys I work with have pretty filled out home assistant setups with smart blinds, lighting, temp sensors, garage door controls etc. Theres a difference between having a smart house and getting random "smart" appliances like cloud activatable dishwashers etc
- Yeah this meme is only true until you start using Home Assistant. It makes smart home stuff so easy.
  
  Which most people for sure aren't.

You can have a lot of smart functionality and remain local-only (e.g., Home Assistant). All my smart devices are on their own VLAN with no Internet access --- if something breaks it's not the cloud's fault, it's mine.

Smart houses are a deathtrap 💀 imagine having to ask your overlord Alexa to open the door... any emergencies would like to have a word.
- Thats just bad design. I get that you're joking about it BTW, this is more of a general info comment on the reality.
  A door lock should always have a mechanical locking method in addition to the electronic, or the electronic would need to default to open (mostly a security door thing for default open BTW, for fire emergency scenarios).
  The same applies to anything else. I mentioned just yesterday that I have (aside from some wled managed lights, which are not critical use and dont need it) a physical button which can control my regular lights. Its a momentary switch and a relay, so I can control it automatically, or physically by pressing the button. If I press it, the state changes and its reflected in my home automation (home assistant, as others mentioned).
  Next problem - Alexa/Google Home/etc. I personally would never use a commercial solution like theirs, but let's say I did - it should only ever be an augment to the system not the sole means of control. So a spoken command should trigger an action, the same action that could be run by a local device (whether its a zigbee button, a wall mounted wired momentary, or even a trigger based on a PIR sensor - whatever).
  I'd say a good design for a smart home includes local operation, withno internet connectivity requirement, and a physical method of managing any critical endpoint (door locks as the example above). Anything critical should also have a battery backup for continued operation, and in the case of something like a door lock, needs to default to a safe selection in case of both wired + battery failure.
  Plenty of tech folks have a smart home. Most of the non enthusiast-style techs I know use home assistant, but all of them use a local system.
- "I'm sorry Dave, I cannot do that."
- Emergency exit? Solve this captcha, motherfucker!
  
  "Click every square that includes a lethal object."

Shit... I've been a tech worker all this time? Because except for the gun part, that's me. But I prefer heavy solid objects to deliver destruction onto appliances.

I only have a broken laser printer that runs off a parallel port and I'm scared to fix it.

In my experience, the more senior IT experts eventually come full circle and embrace the smart home lifestyle.
- Know what divides a mid level engineer from a senior software engineer? The ability to reduce anything into a theoretically solvable problem and justified superstition
  My exchanges often go "this should work, maybe rebuild?" And my response is always "let's give it a try"... Because we're two people who have seen a lot, have been burnt a lot... And 2/5 of the time, especially when we're both scratching our heads and insisting this should work, it just does after our rituals
  Junior software engineers understand the computer does exactly what you tell it. Software engineers understand computers do what you tell them... Except when they don't for no comprehensible reason. Senior software engineers understand the computer requires the sacrifice of an unbloodied goat on Tuesdays with an odd date
  
  Goddamn right.
  The hardware is run on magic smoke. The software runs on that hardware. By extension, software is magic.
  
  First user end tech job. Not gonna act like I understand software beyond it's magic that anything works.
  Amount of odd shit I've seen in 2 years with 200 users to assist is absurd. There was literally a signal in an emergency call system on the same frequency of the tv channels. Tech took his coax tester out, waved it in the air, and it picked up signal. WTF. only 1 of hundreds lol
- Once you have enough guns, the you it’s worth it to automate the guns. But then you need a gun for the gun controller in case it acts up. This gun, too, may be automated.