Transactions, Timezone, Claude, Gemini, Mammouth

1. Encountered very strange database consistency issue, where I did read headers for one table but items were missing. I did use READ COMMITTED isolation level and join to read the data. And if data is inserted in a single transaction updating headers and items, I still don't understand how this could happen. And it shouldn't. Unfortunately this is complex business environment, where the InnoDB is probably linked via SQL Server connector etc, or it might be even Oracle database in the background. I changed the isolation level to SERIALIZABLE but at the same time I modified the code, to skip over headers that lack items completely. - Nobody has returned to the issue since that, so the practical production issue got solved, but why? I want to know! This bothers me deeply. I did add very clear logging to the cases, but I don't have direct access to the system(s). Gotta ask their IT. I want always to get to the bottom of the problems. I can't accept we did number of random things and now it seems to be working. So what did change, how and how did it solve the problem? (Case is resumed much later)

2. Date / Timezone - Yes, simple date. Had fun argument (because I'm factually correct and they're wrong, they just won't admit that). Using DATE without timezone information allows, in the worst case, a 50-hour interpretation window. One party whom writes the filed converts their local time to UTC and then the other party assumes that the date is based on their local timezone. This double conversion failure can lead up to 50 hours error. Even if the DATE is factually correct and based on accurate time. Just timezone information is missing. Without the double conversion error it still allows about 28 hours (with DST)... But to sum it up, with date it would be also nice to use timezone, to limit the ambiguity and make it "24 hours" accurate, instead of slipping from both ends and leaving it open to double misinterpretation in very worst case. - For fun, I checked the DST regions, if any of those is on the "edges". But nope, so that won't extend the window from 50 to 51 hours by one hour in the worst case possible.

3. Claude Skills (@ Anthropic.com ) - More practical alternative to MCP (AI Agent access interfaces) - I think I like Skills workflow and implementation more than I did like MCP. I wrote full MCP service for my local AI test environment running on my own dedicated hardware. MCP worked fine, but it was initially quite hard got get started with. I do have of course experience with web-dev, microservices, json, stdio streams, so it wasn't impossibly hard. But still took quite a while to write Python MCP server (from scratch, to learn) and connect it to OpenWeb UI / Ollama & local models. - Of course this is also control flow related. My scripts call AI, but with in reverse cases the model can call tool. I locally mostly use tool calling AI with provided data and maintaining full control on what's happening. - The classic trade-off: control versus versatility. - Like my root shell MCP. - From IRC chat bots to this, smile...

4. Gemini Live - Somethings strange happened, I noticed that they're probably testing different audio models. Even if I've specifically selected tone for my Gemini, it seems to change from response to response. Some sound just bored, some enthusiastic and so on. TBH, I like that enthusiastic voice. The bored one was quite lame. It was like a public tired city worker whom just won't care about anything at all. When I asked about this, the active voice model seemed to change from response to response. -> Clear testing pattern, even if the active AI model itself denied or was clearly unaware about that. Especially the Finnish female option sounded often like drunk old bar bat. - Nice!

5. I've been using Mammouth.ai for a good while now, and it's quite nice. I especially like the fact, that it's properly designed site. It's light, and everything comes from a single domain. No piles of poop to load from random destinations... Like it's with so many bleeping crappy web bloat services have nowadays.

6. Element - Matrix did it again, they release so bad versions that I had to rollback the version and mark updates on hold. - Thanks guys!

2026-04-12