MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by molticrystal | 2025-04-30 05:27:15+00:00
Maybe someone else can summarize more accurately or do a better job but I'll take a shot:

The Jacobian often appears in the final segment of a three part calculus series when exploring chain rules and variable transformations. Look up the Jacobian used in converting between x,y,z and spherical coordinates ρ,φ,θ and note its matrix structure. Skimming your Medium Lobosi article it seems it emphasizes this aspect.

The Jacobian also serves another purpose. As stated in the OP's article "The Jacobian operator Df:x⟼Df(x) is a linear map which provides the best linear approximation of f around a given point x."

We like approximations, we can make a speed vs accuracy/memory trade off, you only have so much space in a register or memory cell, and trying to get more accuracy past a certain point takes more memory/computations/time.

The article then notes that many computations involve Jacobians with sparse matrices meaning some matrix elements can be ignored so we don't have to waste our time on them if handled cleverly.

Subsequent sections cover methods to identify and label sparsity patterns. The article explains how applying their proposed coloring techniques to large matrices common in machine learning yields significant efficiency gains.

As far as the mathematical heritage, I don't know the family tree, but I suspect it stems from courses blending matrix theory linear algebra and algorithms so you'd want the computer science version of such math. Functional approximation ties to numerical methods though I am uncertain if introductory texts cover Jacobians. Check out Newton's method to grasp its mechanics and understand how that works then explore its Jacobian extension. For the coloring aspect graph theory is where to turn. You can learn its basics with minimal prerequisites by studying the seven bridges problem or the map coloring problem, do the five color version. Many of these concepts can be simplified into small programming projects. They will not rival Matlab but they will solidify your understanding.
by wahern | 2025-04-30 05:27:34+00:00
> vDSO layer that intercepts some system call wrappers for more efficient access.

Technically the vDSO library doesn't intercept. libc chooses to use either the vDSO or the syscall. This can happen either in the wrapper itself, or through a special PLT helper where the linker asks libc to resolve the symbol to populate the GOT entry. vDSO symbols have the prefix __kernel_ or __vdso_.
by hsala8 | 2025-04-30 05:28:56+00:00
All good advice, and I also did this. I was able to go from high school to M.S. in Computer Science in 3.5 years. I did this by starting community college in H.S., maxing out credit hours every semester (after the a certain amount of credit hours it was free at my school; so basically beyond the 5th class was free) and taking summer sessions.

However, as I've been out of school for almost 10 years now and looking back I regret "speed running" through college. I sacrificed my love of learning, being able to learn things deeply, internships, and more importantly making friends and enjoying the college experience.
by FlyingSnake | 2025-04-30 05:29:10+00:00
> wake the Kindle up, get an image, and then sleep it again

This is basically what I'm doing with this project. I tested the client by getting a dummy image initially. This line in the code puts it to sleep for x-duration. The kindle runs for ~2-3 weeks on a single charge.

[1^]: https://github.com/samkhawase/kindle-dash-client/blob/master...
by jwe | 2025-04-30 05:29:16+00:00
As somebody who is also not a Kagi customer because of this the statement of Vlad is exactly "throwing his hands up".

Two quotes from his response: "Any good search engine remains unimpressed by world politics." "We set out to fix search, not the world."

All the technical explanations between these two quotes could have also been used to justify why they are not contributing to Russias economy. But he didn't do that. That is a conscious choice while clearly being aware of the issue.
by delifue | 2025-04-30 05:29:28+00:00
The "if I then go and code in Python, Java or C#, pretty much all objects have the overhead of an Arc" is not accurate. Rust Arc involves atomic operation and its preformance can greatly degrade when the reference count is being mutated by many threads. See https://pkolaczk.github.io/server-slower-than-a-laptop/

Java, C# and Go don't use atomic reference counting and don't have such overhead.
by tyre | 2025-04-30 05:30:19+00:00
I took this closer to how engagement farming works. They’re leaning towards positive feedback even if fulfilling that (like not pushing back on ideas because of cultural norms) is net-negative for individuals or society.

There’s a balance between affirming and rigor. We don’t need something that affirms everything you think and say, even if users feel good about that long-term.
by cycomanic | 2025-04-30 05:32:47+00:00
> It's not a question of anyone asking.

> Lets imagine that there is a job with parameters (including wages) where only high schoolers would take the job. Should that job be required to pay above the market wage to make it also attractive to independent adults? Then what job will the highshoolers have? If I've got to pay a full adult wage anyways, I'm probably not going to employ a highschooler.

> It creates a deadweight loss. In this example are kids that would benefit from working, at low wages, from both the experience and income and they're left out. There would be useful work done that probably just doesn't get done, creating harms in the form of missing products and services.

Why would kids benefit from working? Shouldn't the benefit be from going to school? If they need to supplement their parents income doesn't that just mean that their parents salary is not high enough? It seems the only benefit of allowing kids to work is to the employers, enabling them to depress salaries, because somebody trying to support a family would not take the job. I find it interesting that often the same people (not saying you are) arguing against immigration because the immigrants take away jobs, argue for children to work because it's a "great experience".

> Now sure, non-existence of a minimum wage would create other harms and losses so there is a balancing act-- but in the special case of students being discussed here those other costs don't apply. (and that's also why in practice there are minimum wage exceptions like the 'youth minimum wage program').
by rkagerer | 2025-04-30 05:35:06+00:00
The "not a fan of passkeys" link toward the bottom is a great read [1].

It mentions: As far as Apple is concerned, I would be satisfied if passkeys could be saved in a local, non-iCloud keychain, as normal keychain items with support for export and import. Ideally, the export format would be cross-platform, and I don't see why it couldn't be cross-platform, given that passkeys are just public-private key pairs tied to a domain. In that case, I would be happy to eliminate web passwords, since I already use randomly-generated, keychain-managed web passwords that can't be memorized (by me). Unless and until Apple provides such a solution, though, I remain extremely skeptical of passkeys and feel inclined to fight back against the notion of replacing and eliminating passwords.

[1]: https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2023/5/1.html

Would it be possible/viable for a third party to release such a piece of software? Does one already exist?
by snowwrestler | 2025-04-30 05:36:02+00:00
One of the subtle ways in which this movie is so great is that it starts off as the story of a whip-smart junior person who discovers a shocking surprise... but as the movie goes on, it becomes clear that this was actually a risk that senior folks had already suspected and argued about, possibly for years.

By the second or third time watching it, I realized how much of the boardroom scene is kabuki theater. The CEO makes people get up and say their parts not necessarily to learn new information, but to milk the moment and bring everyone through a thought process. I think he knew what he wanted to do before he walked through the door. But he needed everyone else to understand the problem and believe in the drastic solution.
by TFYS | 2025-04-30 05:37:35+00:00
Relying too much on free-market competition is what is causing the west to stagnate. Left on their own, markets will produce monopolies and won't invest in expensive and risky basic research, or really anything of value where that value can't be captured by a single profit seeking entity. China is using free markets more as a tool when it makes sense and not treating it as an intrinsic value like the west has been. China has used subsidies and carefully controls that no businesses get to a monopoly position, which allows markets to function more efficiently and directs their power to things that make sense for the nation as a whole instead of just a single company or industry.
by theartfuldodger | 2025-04-30 05:37:50+00:00
The head of most healthcare systems are administrators. An Environmental Lawyer with decades of experience suing corporations using science as evidence is one of the best matches we've had. Is he good? I dont know, but it is misperception and I think fairly illogical to expect an admin/leadership role to be done by a MD or research scientist. Not seeing many tech firms run by a lead developer either.
by userbinator | 2025-04-30 05:38:03+00:00
There has been maybe two dozen different barrel plugs widely used over the last two decades, and "12V" and "20V" were already a de-facto standard for laptops with 2S and 3S batteries respectively (there was some artificial segmentation like 18.5V, 19V, 19.5V, 20V, etc. but they are all within tolerance range). I have not seen a male laptop; they are always female, being the "receiver" of the power.

Search for "laptop" here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coaxial_power_connector#Listin...
by neom | 2025-04-30 05:40:37+00:00
There has been this weird trend going around to use ChatGPT to "red team" or "find critical life flaws" or "understand what is holding me back" going around - I've read a few of them and on one hand I really like it encouraging people to "be their best them", on the other... king of spain is just genuinely out of reach of some.
by cornholio | 2025-04-30 05:41:20+00:00
Well, Windows computers have a prominent button that evolved from the ATX shutdown button that actually used to turn off energy completely, but the button has been long since hijacked to do all sort of fancy sleep gymnastics; there is no other "shutdown" button that the user can operate.

So I can definitely see why a driver installer is very nervous about people "shutting down" their devices to reload the system. Why would a full restart be required in the 3rd millennium to load a driver for an USB input device is of course another Microsoft philosophical moment.
by satisfice | 2025-04-30 05:42:00+00:00
When I say consciousness is self-evident, I get there by asking myself what it is like to be me.

Whatever consciousness is, it seems vanishingly unlikely that the philosophers talking about it for thousands of years are not talking about this experience I have of being “here now” looking out of my eyes with a constant shower of sensations and interpretations coursing over and by me.

I am not my fingers or hair or forehead in the same vital way that I am this nexus of awareness situated right behind my eyes. But when I am asleep some parts of that awareness are gone. When I am knocked out (by head injury or anesthesia) I so little awareness that I seem to have time traveled when I wake up. (my heart operation seemed to take about one second, and then I teleported to the recovery room).

Sometimes I am very alert, sometimes I am drifting and blinking out. Of course there a gradations of consciousness. Try listening to a book while you are going to sleep.
by amatecha | 2025-04-30 05:42:48+00:00
Yeah, the sourdough my wife and I bake now is so fine-tuned that we haven't had better sourdough from anywhere. Indeed the sourdough pizza is insanely good! We make crackers, pancakes and waffles with the discard. Oh and chocolate chip cookies... freakin' glorious.

We did the Tour du Mont Blanc hike (170km/105mi) last summer over 8 days, and we took one of our sourdough starters to let it take in the different particulates in the air all over the alps. Whether it makes a big difference or not is hard to say, but it was a fun way to hopefully bolster the "diversity" of the starter's makeup. It is indeed a very strong starter that we get great results from. I would have been really curious to submit it to this study, had I the chance, because we've taken it all over the place now!
by StopDisinfo910 | 2025-04-30 05:44:14+00:00
I don’t really know.

I stopped using ChatGPT at some point because I disliked how cagey it became about a lot of topics. I used to enjoy making write improbable movies mashup when GPT3 was released and at some point it became very touchy about IP rights and violence which was annoying.

I generally use Deepseek nowadays which is not sycophantic and surprisingly doesn’t seem as censored to me especially if you use a version not hosted by Deepseek themselves.
by theartfuldodger | 2025-04-30 05:44:15+00:00
I know I have created a few dozen "registries" for research and stat analysis with my team. All data is depersonalized and HIPAA compliant. I dont understand how a generic statement made to the public becomes a recipe for the next reich. I get how the FB crowd would just go hyperbolic, would not have expected it here. Ive worked with medical, insurance, legal, banking and finance data for a decade. It would be easy to scare a normie by describing nearly any of those projects, but its the exact opposite, everything is done with a preponderance of caution to ensure privacy compliance.
by somenameforme | 2025-04-30 05:44:25+00:00
Your assessment of computer chess could use a bit of elaboration. A strong human can easily play an entire game blindfolded - even in blitz/high speed time controls. So seeing a line 30 moves out is not especially remarkable. What makes computers so unbelievably strong in chess is much like in other domains, and it's pretty boring - they will literally never make a simple oversight or blunder. Even the best human players regularly make "simple" mistakes even on the current move, let alone in one's distant analyses.

So 98% of the moves a computer will play are not especially surprising at all. A strong human will just about always have at least considered the move and even if not - they'll immediately understand the point. And in the 2% there's a relatively simple explanation. Computer's inability to make short-term mistakes lets them consider ideas humans never would. For instance humans tend to like material, yet there are a shockingly large number of positions where a modern computer will sac a piece and then just continue on playing a piece down in what "feels" like a fairly normal position. It simply turns out that your opponent simply has no way to convert their material advantage, and so your positional advantage will tell in the longrun, even being a piece down! At least if you're a computer...

This has led to some interesting outcomes. For instance Fabiano Caruana, a top 10 player in the world, is extremely well known for his exceptional level of deep and creative opening preparation, all computer approved. But in more than a few instances he's ended up in positions that look bad but where a computer will say he's practically winning, and ultimately go on to lose the game. It's simply because these sort of positions might indeed be objectively winning, but it may require 10 or 20 practically perfect moves - whereas a single subtle mistake means you lose. And it's extremely hard for even the best players in the world to play like this.
by jenadine | 2025-04-30 05:44:48+00:00
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_development_aid_agenci...

US is clearly not the only country.

I guess other aid agencies are already busy with their existing programs and can't easily step in when the country with the biggest GDP stop suddenly.

Edit: See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_development_aid_sovere...
by slau | 2025-04-30 05:45:49+00:00
There are barcode scanning libraries that specialise in scanning dozens or hundreds of barcodes in a single frame.

These are typically used to mass-import your competitors prices just by walking through the shop with a camera mounted on your shoulder. Or phone in a shirt pocket with the camera facing forward.

There’s a few white-label companies that offer these apps. Many of the barcode companies offer their own version of this app. They’re not usually available on the AppStores.

The reason for this is that each competitor requires slight customisation (font, price location relative to each barcode, etc) to get the best results.
by mrandish | 2025-04-30 05:47:16+00:00
Very nice.

AI music researchers: this is an example of one kind of interaction model creative people would love from AI music tools. Personally, I have zero interest in typing a text prompt and getting a complete song as an output. However, I will gladly pay serious money for a tool that interactively collaborates with me in a highly granular, sequential process where we iterate, adjust and combine discrete elements toward a finished result.
by RainyDayTmrw | 2025-04-30 05:47:19+00:00
What should be the solution here? There's a thing that, despite how much it may mimic humans, isn't human, and doesn't operate on the same axes. The current AI neither is nor isn't [any particular personality trait]. We're applying human moral and value judgments to something that doesn't, can't, hold any morals or values.

There's an argument to be made for, don't use the thing for which it wasn't intended. There's another argument to be made for, the creators of the thing should be held to some baseline of harm prevention; if a thing can't be done safely, then it shouldn't be done at all.
by vlovich123 | 2025-04-30 05:48:56+00:00
> GM, Ford, and other companies have chimed in positively.

Given how Amazon tried to start showing the cost of the tariffs on their site, Trump publicly threatened them, and they backed down with hours, I’m not so sure I read too much into anyone praising the policies of this government as it’s clear that companies are erring on the side of staying on this governments good graces publicly regardless of personal opinions.
by downboots | 2025-04-30 05:49:47+00:00
Would it be useful to have classes for unsolved problem analogous to the complexity classes for algorithms?

The class of problems...

... informally posed but lack definition

... formally posed but lack framework

... framework exists but there's no solution method

... solutions exist with modifications

... sidely accepted as true, yet unproven

Of course this would no longer be rigorous mathematics but an epistemic heuristic. One could for example study the most common transitions from unsolved to solved.
by tritipsocial | 2025-04-30 05:50:12+00:00
This headline is misleading because it makes it seem like tariffs are a step function that activate below 85%, which isn't true.

The formula is a simple, linear equation: tariffs = 0.25 * MSRP * (percent foreign content - 15)

Companies with 84% domestic content will pay a 25% tariff on 1% of the MSRP, companies with 70% domestic content will pay a 25% tariff on 15% of the MSRP, etc.

This is a common sense way to incentivize companies to make parts here without requiring perfection.

Here is the proclamation:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/04/amen...
by opello | 2025-04-30 05:51:30+00:00
That's fair, sorry for my casual language in a technically nuanced discussion. I hadn't looked at this in quite a while, but it was good to review. Thanks for the prompting.

https://github.com/bminor/glibc/blob/glibc-2.41/sysdeps/unix...

https://github.com/bminor/glibc/blob/glibc-2.41/sysdeps/unix...
by epicureanideal | 2025-04-30 05:52:15+00:00
> American labor is low quality and high cost.

That is the opposite of my experience with software engineers, and my observation of the work ethic of most Americans in a variety of professions makes me think the opposite is true in pretty much every industry.

I think "American labor is low quality and high cost" is one of those things people think must be true about some other industry besides the ones they've seen, kind of like they think the news is inaccurate when it reports things they know to be false, but accurate when it reports on other subjects.
by swyx | 2025-04-30 05:52:49+00:00
its for the better, and i'm actually serious about this. it's just that Subbarao is ALSO right and it is not perfect nor human level. but it -DOES- improve results measurably and consistently.

so what i'm saying is don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. LLM as judge doesnt replace human judgement but its a pretty darn good first pass for how cheap it is. and you can imagine that it will get better over time.
by vlovich123 | 2025-04-30 05:53:56+00:00
Right and

> If someone I know committed murder, like almost everyone - organized crime members are very few in the population - I would absolutely not overlook it. What an absurd argument.

Fails to define murder and focused on organized crime vs what if it was your best friend, wife, close relative etc. it’s easy to claim how you’ll react in an abstract scenario but revealed preferences often show something happening very different in reality than what people claim about theoretical situations publicly. Oh and as if it wouldn’t matter who the victim was. What if it was someone bullying your child viciously for months on end? What if they claim it was an accident and now you have to pick which story sounds more plausible?

And does “not overlook it” mean they cut ties with that person, turn them in, visit vengeance upon them?
by 6510 | 2025-04-30 05:56:19+00:00
> We can do a lot for individuals, but even with cooperation, maybe can’t immediately give food and shelter to everyone

It oddly isn't all that desirable. You don't want to depend entirely on the generosity of others. What you want is a fighting chance to take care of yourself. Helping there, even a little bit is both very effective and very easy.
by matsemann | 2025-04-30 05:56:43+00:00
One thing I'm curious about, but I guess not visible in any way, is random stats about my own user/usage of the site. What's my upvote/downvote ratio? Are there users I constantly upvote/downvote? Who is liking/hating my comments the most? And some I guessed could be scrapable: Which days/times are I the most active (like the github green grid thingy)? How's my activity changed over the years?
by dokyun | 2025-04-30 05:57:23+00:00
I was aware of the story beforehand. The context you've pasted here hasn't changed the intent of my statement, but I'm glad you took the time to type it.

> Third, emails weren't handed over

That they weren't, however the information that was handed over was enough to identify the target.

> Why parrot half of a story disparaging one of the only large email providers that fights in court to protect the privacy of its users?

Because despite their apparent and commendable work in trying to preserve the privacy of their users, they have regretfully failed to do so in the past, and it will more than likely proceed that way in the future.

It's not that I want to badmouth their efforts, but it has tainted them so I think it would be wrong not to bring it up. An email provider that has never divulged info (of which several exist) isn't tainted the same way as one that has. It may only be a difference of time and scale, but it's your freedom of choice, and I think freedom of choice is a very important thing. Email is decentralized, and the more email providers that exist and hold themselves to high standards the better. If more people moved between or started smaller email providers, it would help relieve these kinds of issues.

So that is why I would recommend against it.