this post was submitted on 24 Feb 2024
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Vending machine error reveals secret face image database of college students (arstechnica.com)
submitted 9 months ago by stopthatgirl7@kbin.social to c/technology@lemmy.world
89 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Facial-recognition data is typically used to prompt more vending machine sales.

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[–] grandma@sh.itjust.works 34 points 9 months ago (2 children)

I love how vending machines run windows now

[–] pete_the_cat@lemmy.world 20 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Tons of Point of Sale terminals run Windows instead of Linux for some reason, probably because the software they run is only written for Windows.

[–] grandma@sh.itjust.works 16 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Makes sense, but a vending machine shouldn't need a fully fledged OS in the first place imo

[–] Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 9 months ago (2 children)

As if Linux based vending machines aint a full fledged OS even with a minimal installation?
This aint embedded.

[–] msage@programming.dev 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

No, Linux is a kernel.

OS is a specific distribution, so like a Debian is the full fledged OS.

So just write your inventory inside the file, and bind the vending machine keys to it, and ignore 99% of the OS. The coin slot I would expect runs its own validations.

[–] uis@lemm.ee 1 points 9 months ago

Linux Standard Base is full fledges OS then

[–] grandma@sh.itjust.works 0 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Yes of course Linux is a fully fledged OS, my point was a vending machine should not need any OS, my bad if I didnt make that clear

[–] herrvogel@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Why not? A full windows environment (though not really, because these things run what's called the kiosk mode) can run on cheap SBCs and gives you a ton of hardware and software flexibility, and is also pretty convenient. It's very commonly used for very good reasons.

[–] grandma@sh.itjust.works 1 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

TIL about windows kiosk mode!

I can understand it from the perspective of the developers who need to implement all this crazy tracking/advertising/graphics functionality, but imo a vending machine should only do three things:

  1. Let me see what is available (preferably using glass)
  2. Accept payment
  3. Give me what I paid for

Vending machines have done this for decades without requiring an operating system. Keep it simple!

[–] herrvogel@lemmy.world 3 points 9 months ago

Simple in what way?

You could make logistics simpler by giving these things networking capacity so you can remotely track their stock and cash levels.

If your software needs to run on multiple different device configurations, you can simplify development and deployment by letting the OS handle a lot of the low level stuff.

In other words, a simpler machine is not necessarily going to be simpler to operate for the company.

[–] Miaou@jlai.lu 1 points 9 months ago

Let's stop kidding ourselves, the "good reason" is the cto's yearly Microsoft financed holidays and/or too much legacy code to restart from scratch. But from a purely technical aspect, there's no reason to touch windows

[–] Tbird83ii@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 9 months ago

It isn't. It would most likely be windows IoT. it's an embedded windows OS that allows for a single app instance to be running.

You'd be surprised how many things run windows IoT right now...

[–] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

A low end Windows PC can be had very cheap these days. Why bother doing something proprietary, if you can just cobble together something from off the shelf parts?

[–] BreakDecks@lemmy.ml 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

This isn't even remotely true. Everyone knows that if you're trying to do a cheap embedded product, you use SBCs and Linux. Using Windows for these kinds of applications is almost always the result of a company having a contract with Microsoft that leads their development strategy towards Microsoft's offerings rather than the best offerings.

Also, in what universe is a Linux platform more proprietary than Windows?

[–] Miaou@jlai.lu 2 points 9 months ago

People here are delusional, booting windows eats more ram than your typical embedded product needs to run. Same goes the hard drive.

And this people also think maintaining a yocto/build root image is proprietary 🤷‍♂️

[–] robber@lemmy.ml 9 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Just imagine the license fees.

[–] jabathekek@sopuli.xyz 7 points 9 months ago

That's why the need facial recognition, to sell the data to pay for licensing fees.

[–] blazeknave@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

They must have like an enterprise master agreement IOT-specific thingy right?

[–] Miaou@jlai.lu 4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Still expensive as fuck. And a nightmare to work with, but you knew that, it's windows