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pervocracy:

dysgraphicprogrammer:

pervocracy:

How to hack any hospital computer

-Use the password taped to the monitor

How to hack any hospital computer (L337 version for advanced security systems)

-Use the password taped to the back of the monitor

As a computer guy: This is what happens when you have too much security. It reaches a tipping point and then suddenly you have none.

Security at the cost of convenience comes at the cost of security.  

This is true of so many things in healthcare.  Example: our software is designed to automatically alert the doctor if a patient’s vital signs are critically out of range.  If someone has a blood pressure of 200/130, the doc gets a pop-up box that they have to acknowledge before doing anything else.  It makes sense, in our setting.

But then some mega-genius upstairs realized something: the system was only alerting for critical vital signs, but not for all vital signs that could possibly be bad.  Like, yeah, 200/130 is potentially life-threatening, but 130/90 is above ideal and can have negative effects on health.  Should the doctors be allowed to just ignore something that could negatively affect a patient’s health?  Heavens no!

So now the system generates a pop-up for any vital signs that are even slightly abnormal.  A pressure of 120/80 (once considered textbook normal, now considered slightly high) will create the pop-up.  We have increased our vigilance!

Well, no, what we’ve actually done is train doctors to click through a constant bombardment of pop-ups without looking.  We’ve destroyed their vigilance and made it much easier for them to accidentally skim past life-threatening vital signs.

But you can’t tell that to management, because you’d have to confess that you are a flawed human with limited attention resources.  They’d tell you “well, all the other doctors take every abnormal vital sign seriously, it sounds like you’re being negligent.”  And if you’re smart, you back down before you start telling the big boss all about your habit of ignoring critical safety alerts.

The end result is exactly the same as if we had no alerts at all, except with more annoying clicking.

This is called Alert Fatigue.

This is a major issue in the IT industry, especially in Medical IT. For that matter, it is a problem outside of IT as well, but this specifically is something that software companies actively try and avoid doing. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean management listens and tends to bypass those default settings…

The Dining Campaign, Adventure 14

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Last time on the Dining Campaign:

The party plans via speaking with each of the council members who will be deciding the fate of the Homestead Project with some… mixed results.

Sorry for the backlog of updates; been a bit busy.

Present in this adventure:

  • Elena, Elven Rogue-like-Bard
  • Nocturne, Tiefling Cleric-like-Sorceress (only Adventure 15, so not the Orb things)
  • Galwyn, Gnome Paladin-like-Cleric
  • Karma, Orcish Drunk-like-Monk
  • Dharma, Human Saijin-like-Monk

NPCs mentioned in this adventure:

  • Horin, Halfling Arcane Trickster and representative of the South Cormick Tax Association (read: Thieves’ Guild)
  • Myra Cormick, Succubus Mayor of South Cormick.
  • The Master, Elven Monk of the Shrine of the Clouds (also the master of both Karma and Dharma).
  • Brenda, Legendary Gnomish Cleric of Thrin. Galwyn’s personal hero… and the player’s previous character.
  • Thrin, gnomish deity of Good and Protection.

The sun rose and someone got up on the wrong side of the bed – namely, pretty much everyone. The Monks received word that their Master was in town to pick back up a loaned artifact – the Orb of Prophesy. Karma in particular was quite familiar with the orb, as she couldn’t leave things alone and constantly wanted to touch it, hence the rules of the orb mostly consisting of the phrase “Don’t touch the orb, Karma”.

As per the letter, Karma and Dharma were to recover the orb for their master from the person who borrowed it… and it turns out, the person who borrowed it is none other than Myra, the mayor of South Cormick. After much discussion (and finding out that Nocturne was away shopping), they went off to the Mayor’s office / chamber…

… only to find it completely ransacked and the Mayor utterly pissed off. Overnight, the South Cormick Tax Association (read: Sanctioned Thieves’ Guild) effectively went on strike… and also robbed the Mayor’s office blind. She was in there at the time (she sleeps and… does other things in there) and they basically went in with a distraction and ransacked the place in mere moments – signs that they had some magical help as well.

Naturally, the Orb was one of the things taken. The Orb case was there, they just took the orb out of it. Luckily, it was pretty easy to follow the thieves, as there is something a bit… wonky about that orb.

It is the Orb of Prophesies – basically, it starts spouting out prophesies to anyone that has the case open (OOC, think Bajoran Orb from ST:DS9). They’re not even necessarily good ones, but it does cause you to feel like you’re in said prophesy. Now imagine a completely uncovered orb going through the densest part of town and, well, you have a few thousand people tripping balls. Finding the trail was easy. Getting to the orb, now that’s a bit harder. The box was to keep the orb’s power at bay. Karma, at this point, decides to wear the box on her head. No, I’m not making that up.

Turns out, the thieves ended up going into the City-State aqueduct system to presumably some underground lair. Only they didn’t make it that far, as they started tripping more and more then longer they held on to that orb. The party, after basically hallucinating for an hour trying to get closer, eventually reaches a large viaduct access area. Inside is the Orb, the thieves (who are currently attacking a wall), and an Otyugh (currently attacking a different wall).

None of them could see the party (they’re too busy hallucinating), so Karma decides to go over and swim to the orb, picking it up. From here, Karma gets a vision of the future. After bringing the orb back to the party, everyone else does as well… then Karma remembers to take the orb container off of her head and put the orb in it.

The visions, however, were quite disturbing, with each PC getting a very different look on things. Karma saw a battle in which Dharma was just killed, Elena unconscious, one of the deities of the campaign setting killed next to her, and another figure she wasn’t familiar with trying to talk to her. Oh, and some nasty looking elf having just killed Dharma and about to go after Karma. The deity and the unknown person both looked out of place, Karma figuring out that the other figure is some other deity (The Young Goddess, as she found out later). Karma could only hold on to the vision for a few moments before it faded, but she did notice that she was WAY more powerful in the vision than she is in reality.

Note: Galwyn was not in her vision.

Dharma saw a city under attack. Focusing for a bit, he figured out that this is his future city – the one the party is trying to build – as the entire city was up on stilts like one of their plans. A gigantic gold dragon was breathing fire upon the settlement. Then Dharma turned and saw a figure off in a distance, wearing a very fancy and peculiar white dress with a very long train that just floated behind her, as though she was walking in slow motion. Then Dharma lost hold of the vision.

Elena had a vision of a dismal landscape, a partially destroyed South Cormick. There was an execution going on and, after a bit, she discovered that the person being executed is Myra, the mayor. A mighty axe was raised and fell to her neck, having the executioner’s hood blown off from the blow. Elena then saw that the executioner was none other than Galwyn, their party member. She then lost the vision.

Galwyn, however, had the most unusual vision of all. It started out as a typical prophecy, until someone literally pulled her out of it. She was shaken to wake up by a similarly sized person – a gnome. Galwyn focused for a bit and noticed a sword across her back – Thrin’s personal greatsword. The person in front of Galwyn is none other than Brenda, and not talking to her in a mystical way. According to this vision (and there was discussion back and forth), Brenda is actually the creator of the Orb of Prophecy, having put it there to replace the Water Orb that was once held by the shrine in the clouds (that’s part of the previous campaign). More importantly though, Brenda is currently acting as Thrin – answering prayers, granting powers, the whole nine yards – while Thrin is missing. She says that she knows Thrin is safe, but something terrible may happen in a year’s time – and Galwyn is apparently one of the keys to things happening.

Eventually, the party makes it back to the temple.

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First real meal I've booked for myself in months.

First real meal I’ve booked for myself in months. by Shivers

Via Flickr:

As a lot of people know, I was diagnosed with severe depression years ago. The past several months have been really rough on me, to the point where I stopped cooking entirely a few months ago. I’ve slowly been working my way back up – first going back to making sandwiches, then cooking pre-prepared meals..

Today I cooked my first meal from might-as-well-be-scratch in over three (might even be four) months. Sure, it is a meal I’ve cooked many times before (although with some minor changes – quesadilla instead of cheddar cheese – A+, will do again), but still – I cooked a meal for over an hour and it is relatively healthy (other than the egg noodle base, but it is more broccoli than noodle). I didn’t have to do this, nothing was about to go bad, but… I did it.

I’m proud of myself. Allow me to show you my dinner.