MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by quantadev | 2025-05-14 02:52:10+00:00
Developers over 50ish (like me) grew up at a time when CPU performance and memory constraints affected every application. So you had to always be smart about doing things efficiently with both CPU and memory.

Younger developers have machines that are so fast they can be lazy with all algorithms and do everything 'brute force'. Like searching thru an array every time when a hashmap would've been 10x faster. Or using all kinds of "list.find().filter().any().every()" chaining nonsense, when it's often smarter to do ONE loop, and inside that loop do a bunch of different things.

So younger devs only optimize once they NOTICE the code running slow. That means they're ALWAYS right on the edge of overloading the CPU, just thru bad coding. In other words, their inefficiencies will always expand to fit available memory, and available clock cycles.
by alganet | 2025-05-14 02:53:01+00:00
Non-AI therapy is already the product of mind experimentation ultra-idealists. "Head shape measuring madmen".

It has been neutered and reformed into some kind of counseling, but not completely, and it can become feral and discriminating/horrible/disgusting at any time.

Just search the history of it.

So, we should go against any kind of therapy and mind probing. Not just AI.
by mmooss | 2025-05-14 02:53:19+00:00
> Apple

Apple's incredible innovation and attention to detail is what made them legendary and successful. Steve Jobs was legendary for both.

> Meta and Alphabet had zero cost products (to consumers) that they leveraged to become near monopolies.

What does zero cost have to do with it? The comment I responded to spoke of cutting the business's costs - quality inputs, labor, etc. - not their customers' costs. Google made a much better search engine than competitors and then better advertising engine; Facebook made the best social media network.

> Aren’t all the AI companies believed to be providing their products below cost for now to grab market share?

Again, what does that have to do with cutting costs rather than innovating to increase profit?
by theamk | 2025-05-14 02:54:31+00:00
When we get an alternative that can:

(1) be stored in a single file

(2) Allow tables, images and anything else that can be shown on a piece paper

(3) Won't have animation, fold-out text, or anything that cannot be be shown on a piece of paper

(4) won't require Javascript or access to external sites

that means never.. We've got lucky we at least got PDF before "web designers" made (3) impossible, and marketers made (4) impossible
by kube-system | 2025-05-14 02:54:32+00:00
Since we're on the topic of authentication, how about the fact that they are not recoverable? You cannot reset a password on the blockchain, nor can you call the blockchain and prove you are the rightful owner of any inaccessible/stolen funds, nor can you take the blockchain to court to return your funds. You are SOL.

Just about any service that banks do are great examples of other things that math itself cannot do for you. These are all reasons that people still overwhelmingly use banks.

Banks do work to integrate with other societal systems in meatspace, build infrastructure, manage exceptions, comply with legal expectations, provide service, build and maintain partnerships, etc. Cryptographic ledgers don't do any of this, they are inanimate.
by spinarrets | 2025-05-14 02:54:33+00:00
Why couldn't you deploy all those solar panels on earth. Then you could supply the grid when you weren't training models, you could recycle your components when they got old, you wouldn't need launches, you could maintain things if they break, and sure, spend a bunch of money to figure out large radiators that could radiate heat out of the atmosphere.

Be the start of a geoengineering project that is actively collecting energy and radiating it out into space while performing useful work along the way. Infrared radiation between 8 and 13 micrometers isn't absorbed by the atmosphere and exits the planet.

So, why not build big infra here and if you can build powerful radiators, aim them up and away from the earth, which needs to be cooled a bit anyways!
by jandrewrogers | 2025-05-14 02:54:50+00:00
It makes it a lot less performant and there is no avoiding or mitigating that downside. C++ is often selected as a language instead of safer options for its unusual performance characteristics even among systems languages in practice.

Fil-C is not a replacement for C++ generally, that oversells it. It might be a replacement for some C++ software without stringent performance requirements or a rigorously performance-engineered architecture. There is a lot of this software, often legacy.
by eru | 2025-05-14 02:54:55+00:00
Well, the MacBook Air is pretty much an iPad that swapped its touchscreen for a keyboard (and trackpad).

> I still think the future is either 360-fold laptops with a good tablet mode (indeed that's the present for me, my main machine is a HP Envy) or something like the MS Surface line with their detachable "keyboard cover".

I think people still want to use different form factors in the future. There's different uses for a phone, a tablet, a laptop and a desktop.

I do agree that laptops might get better tablet modes, but if you want to have a full-sized comfortable-ish keyboard, the laptop is gonna be more unwieldy than a dedicated tablet.

The only thing you save from running your desktop (or even laptop) form factor off your phone is the processor (CPU, GPU, RAM). You still have to pay for everything else. But even today the cost of desktop processing components that can reach phone-like performance is almost a rounding error; just because they have so much more space, cooling and power to play with.

(Destop CPUs can be quite pricey if you buy higher end ones, but they'll outclass phones by comical amounts. Phone performance is really, really cheap in a desktop.)
by awesome_dude | 2025-05-14 02:55:03+00:00
> You could see similar behavioural issues with C++ back in the days

I think that it's happened to some degree for almost every computer programming language for a whiles now - first was the C guys enamoured with their NOT Pascal/Fortran/ASM, then came the C++ guys, then Java, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, Javascript/Node, Go, and now Rust.

The vibe coding people seem to be the ones that are usurping Rust's fan boi noise at the moment - every other blog is telling people how great the tool is, or how terrible it is.
by throwanem | 2025-05-14 02:55:31+00:00
Sure. "Torture porn?" That's considerably excessive.

Desjardins' character isn't written for the reader to get off on. But I see exactly why a reader who didn't expect to do so would rather blame the author than recognize the mirror into which he's been surprised to find himself looking. The projection is trivially obvious and the lack of insight that allows it to be aired this way in public should be embarrassing.
by Adambuilds | 2025-05-14 02:55:35+00:00
It’s amazing how coffee has evolved. From the traditional bitter brew to light roasts, fruity blends, and decaf options, the range of choices today is endless. What started as a simple drink has transformed into something that caters to almost every taste and health need.

Personally, I’ve always struggled with the bitterness of coffee, but when I discovered lighter roasts and fruity flavors, it completely changed my experience. Some with whiskey flavour is one that surprised me the most. It’s fascinating to see how human innovation can take something so basic and make it fit our ever-changing desires.
by SV_BubbleTime | 2025-05-14 02:56:18+00:00
I talked with a Chinese friend at Meta about this. We agreed that no one would have been interested in Deepseek as a Chinese run service (loose “no one”) but as a tool to undercut the value of US AI, it’s seemingly effective.

I see no downside here. Force US to innovate beyond “it costs a lot of money and we conveniently had that upfront” while also undercutting the law makers and people trying to enforce regulatory capture on a new thing like they’ve done on all the old things.

As a person interested in tech and tools and America, I have no issues with Deepseek and Hunyuan and Wan being effectively CCP funded. Keep it up. Accelerate. Push.
by 0xDEAFBEAD | 2025-05-14 02:58:08+00:00
One way to think about it is: If we were coding all our games in C with no engine, they would run faster, but we would have far fewer games. Fewer games means fewer hits. Odds are Balatro wouldn't have been made, because those developer hours would've been allocated to some other game which wasn't as good.
by rat87 | 2025-05-14 02:59:54+00:00
its not design by committee its design by Pull request It doesn't have a central https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benevolent_dictator_for_life like python used to so people suggest and implement features as a group, with code counting for a lot (although theoretical issues with safety/design also matter) as opposed to companies arguing for their pet features endlessly without much difference. Look at how long it takes C++ to get any new features.
by tomhow | 2025-05-14 02:59:58+00:00
Please avoid personal swipes like this. This is covered in the HN guidelines:

Be kind. Don't be snarky. Converse curiously; don't cross-examine. Edit out swipes.

Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.

Please don't fulminate. Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community.

Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
by danpalmer | 2025-05-14 03:00:30+00:00
Take home assessments can be a valuable part of an interview process but they absolutely need a time limit. I think 2-3 hours is going to give you all the information you need, unless what you're selecting for is new grads with no dependents, hobbies, or responsibilities.

If this had been limited to 3 hours then the worst case is that the candidate would have lost 3 hours, but far more likely is that they would have come up with an entirely different proposal and/or solution that was appropriate for that timeline, and that extra information would have made it clearer what the company was looking for.

The other point I'd always encourage applicants to confirm is: are you looking for any answer, or are you looking for a good answer. Some take-home tests are purely about passing a test suite and how you manage it doesn't matter, some would prefer that you meet 80% of the requirements but write better code. I've seen applicants do the wrong thing on both sides of this.
by eru | 2025-05-14 03:00:39+00:00
> We're still largely doing on our phones and laptops the same things we were doing in 2005. I'm surprised it took this long

Approximately no-one was watching 4k feature-length videos on their phones in 2005, or playing ray traced 3d games on their laptops.

Sending plain text messages is pretty much the same as back then, yes. But these days I'm also taking high resolution photos and videos and share those with others via my phone.

> I hope they'll also allow the phone's screen to be used like a trackpad.

Samsung's DeX already does that.

> I'm fully agreed with you on the wasted processing power-- I think we'll eventually head toward a model of having one computing device with a number of thin clients which are locally connected.

Your own 'good enough' logic already suggests otherwise? Processors are still getting cheap and better, so why not just duplicate them? Instead of having a dumb large screen (and keyboard) that you plug your phone into, it's not much extra cost to add some processing power to that screen, and make it a full desktop pc.

If we are getting to 'thin client' world, it'll be because of 'cloud', not because of connecting to our phones. Even today, most of what people do on their desktops can be done in the browser. So we likely see more of that.
by Aziell | 2025-05-14 03:00:44+00:00
There was a time I worked from the corner of our living room.My partner would often walk in during meetings, sometimes asking loudly where the charger was. One day, I left a sticky note on the table:“In a meeting – please check back in 30 minutes.”Surprisingly, it worked. What really changed things wasn’t the note itself, but the quiet agreement it created.
by Ar-Curunir | 2025-05-14 03:00:45+00:00
> However, for high-performance systems software specifically, objects often have intrinsically ambiguous ownership

What is the evidence for this? Plenty of high-performance systems software (browsers, kernels, web servers, you name it) has been written in Rust. Also Rust does support runtime borrow-checking with Rc<RefCell<_>>. It's just less ergonomic than references, but it works just fine.
by parpfish | 2025-05-14 03:01:09+00:00
Man, I hate take-homes.

When I see instructions that say “This project tests your ability not only to code, but to deal with ambiguity and open-endedness”, it actually means either a) this exercise has been so poorly conceived that we didn’t bother with a rubric or b) the work environment is so chaotic, we never clearly define specs or requirements for anything.

That, and the instruction to simultaneously “show off your skills” and deliver a pragmatic functional solution are completely at odds. Good simple solutions aren’t flashy.
by tbihl | 2025-05-14 03:01:14+00:00
I used to think that was the worst, but then my org introduced me to pegging HDD write at 100% for half an hour at a time. My dad likes to talk about how he used to turn on the computer, then go get coffee; in my case it was more like turn on machine, go for a run, shower, check back, coffee, and finally... maybe.
by ada1981 | 2025-05-14 03:01:29+00:00
Vegan 25 years. If you "crave" animal products, it's simply that you have a nutrient you need that your body only associates with an animal product. But you can just figure out what it actually is you need and then add that in other ways.

I don't think anyone needs to eat animal products to be at optimum health, I've just never seen it.

Also, the idea veganism is extreme is wild. Eating plants and fruit vs. paying someone to essentially torture animals that you'd keep as pets and love in a different context... that is extreme.
by rester324 | 2025-05-14 03:01:35+00:00
I don't think this is true. The proportion of short term rental places in some districts in European cities are as high as 8-10% and it's growing.

IMO it's meaningless to cite this 0.1% non-sense, because nobody will rent an AirBnB on the outskirts of huge cities far from tourist hotspots, so whoever comes up with these numbers, they probably try smearing the data by selecting an unreasonably wide area for comparison
by SAI_Peregrinus | 2025-05-14 03:02:10+00:00
I don't like the taste of coffee. I don't like coffee in chocolate (though I don't like chocolate much to begin with), I don't like Tiramisu, I loathe coffee-flavored jelly beans, I've tried light roasts & didn't like them, medium roasts & didn't like them, dark roasts & definitely didn't like them, and several varieties of bean and liked none. I just don't like coffee flavor.
by ethbr1 | 2025-05-14 03:02:16+00:00
The affiliations of employees and students (if liberal) isn't what creates a monoculture -- it's the double standard and resulting self-censorship.

Too few liberals in academia were willing to say "I disagree with what you say, but support your right to say it" when it was inconvenient.

Which isn't in any way to justify the excessive clusterfuck of a reprise by populist conservatives these days. Two wrongs do not make a right, and what's being done today is much worse than the liberal bent of early 21st century US universities.
by hn_throwaway_99 | 2025-05-14 03:02:23+00:00
Your entire comment is just made up with no evidence.

As a simple example, in Austin TX, Inside AirBnB tracks over 15000 short term rentals, which would be closer to 5% of housing stock.

And the "only a small percentage of housing is AirBNBs" is a poor argument anyway, because home prices are set at the margins, and a relatively small reduction in housing supply in a constrained market can have a significant effect on price. Plus, for people that rent out a room, in can essentially have the effect of increasing the amount they are willing to pay ("I could normally not afford this apartment, but I could if I rent out a room on AirBnB"), which also increases prices.

More importantly, though, people have actually done studies on the effect of AirBnBs on prices, and found they have a positive (i.e. housing gets more expensive) effect on rents and home prices. One example: https://marketing.wharton.upenn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/...
by natrys | 2025-05-14 03:02:31+00:00
You could maybe make that accusation about V3 (to the extent that it's a bad thing and not fair use, specially considering amoral origin of OpenAI's models in first place), but don't think the claim makes sense for R1 since OpenAI's o1 did not expose its CoT traces even in API.

They published about GRPO (key algorithm behind R1) a full year before[1] they scaled it for R1. Given the research they do in open, it's not far-fetched to think they had the talent and technical know-how to achieve R1 on their own.

[1] https://arxiv.org/abs/2402.03300
by Adambuilds | 2025-05-14 03:02:47+00:00
Our taste preferences evolve over time. Just like we’ve adapted our food to suit our personal tastes, why not do the same with drinks?

I used to be a big fan of water too, but after trying different coffees, teas, and even flavored waters, I realized how much variety and experience they can bring. Coffee gives me that kick I need to get through the day, tea offers relaxation, and flavored water just feels refreshing.

Isn’t it part of human nature to seek variety and pleasure in our experiences? If we were all content with just plain water, would we ever have discovered the joy of our favorite drinks?
by CuriousRose | 2025-05-14 03:03:04+00:00
I understand your point, nobody is claiming that separating the bread and milk is a particularly good experience either and while it probably makes more money in a physical store where you want to buy multiple options at once, this doesn't apply to AirBnB with a single item checkout. The search at Amazon almost always gets me what I want on the first page, which is the desired behaviour almost everywhere to reduce friction to checkout. Why would I want to increase user frustration and bounce rate on a single product checkout?

I imagine significantly reducing database calls and blob downloads due to short-sighted pagination behaviour would result in significant cost saving, reduce bounce rate and increase conversions.
by massysett | 2025-05-14 03:03:27+00:00
Hotels have been disgusting for years. They weren’t great before Covid. After Covid hotel owners stopped cleaning during your stay. Trash piles up in my room, with guests leaving trash in the halls. Carpets quickly get nasty. Nobody cleaning up the common hallways.

An Airbnb isn’t cleaned during my stay either, but at least the trash can can hold a day’s worth of trash, and there’s a proper kitchen and more space.

If hotels brought back proper service I would prefer them.
by mastazi | 2025-05-14 03:03:48+00:00
> Here in Sweden, it is customary to roast and brew coffee the same color as your soul: dark and ragged

Strange, I thought it was the opposite given that very light roasts are sometimes called "Nordic roasts" - my understanding was that the name came about because light roasts are common in Northern Europe. Maybe that applies only to some but not all Nordic countries?
by cobertos | 2025-05-14 03:06:10+00:00
I had this experience too. Booked on AirBnb with someone who was about the same price as the hotels. Turns out the hosts were just employees of some letting company. They wanted photo ID, a deposit, and sign a second contract in a _separate website_, which I declined. Contacting AirBnb support they said this was fully allowed and I should have read the description harder. I did get a full refund but was told it was only because it was "my first time" and I've never had other issues.

I'm glad I turned around and booked with a hotel. It was very personable, good value, and better than what I would've gotten for the same price on AirBnb for that city.
by ednite | 2025-05-14 03:06:17+00:00
Please take no offense—I genuinely want to understand. I agree that my blog needs work, especially with less fluff and more value—i'm working on that.

I guess where I’m coming from is this: why is it assumed that using tools like AI or Grammarly takes away from the creative process? For me, they speed up the mechanical side of things—grammar, flow, even structure—so I can spend more time on ideas, storytelling, informing, or just getting unblocked.

I do get frustrated when ChatGPT changes my wording or shifts the meaning of what I’m trying to say. It can definitely throw a wrench into the overall story. But in those cases, I rephrase my prompt, asking it not to touch the narrative or my word choices, just to act like a word processor on steroids or an expert editor.

I’m not saying these tools replace a good human editor—far from it. If I ever get to the point where I can work with a real editor or proof reader and so on, I’d choose the human every time. But until then, these tools help me keep the momentum going—and I don’t see that as a lack of care.

On the contrary, it often takes me more time to get the output right—because I’m trying to make sure it still reflects exactly what I want to say and express.

Maybe it’s just a different kind of process?
by Const-me | 2025-05-14 03:06:42+00:00
> I've been using it in C#

One reason why async-await is trivial in .NET is garbage collector. C# rewrites async functions into a state machine, typically heap allocated. Garbage collector automagically manages lifetimes of method arguments and local variables. When awaiting async functions from other async functions, the runtime does that for multiple async frames at once but it’s fine with that, just a normal object graph. Another reason, the runtime support for all that stuff is integrated into the language, standard library, and most other parts of the ecosystem.

Rust is very different. Concurrency runtime is not part of the language, the standard library defined bare minimum, essentially just the APIs. The concurrency runtime is implemented by “Tokio” external library. Rust doesn’t have a GC; instead, it has a borrow checker who insists on exactly one owner of every object at all times, makes all memory allocations explicit, and exposed all these details to programmer in the type system.

These factors make async Rust even harder to use than normal Rust.
by hortonhearsafoo | 2025-05-14 03:06:46+00:00
Look I don't want to pile on, but I sent the latest version of your resume through ChatGPT with o3 and it pointed out several things to fix or improve about the current version of your resume, which as a human who has interviewed 100s of candidates I mostly agree with. Hopefully this is helpful.

https://chatgpt.com/share/68240746-14ec-8006-bc64-44c7a04d71...
by memco | 2025-05-14 03:06:55+00:00
Iced coffee or cold brew might work for you.

I used to do aeropress or pour over coffee every morning but now I brew a large batch of hot coffee in a jar and then leave it on the counter overnight. The next day I remove the grinds and put the coffee in the fridge. Then on weekdays I just pour some over ice. It’s barely more work than making one pour over and I get 7 days of coffee with no prep work in the morning: delayed instant gratification all in one.
by digianarchist | 2025-05-14 03:07:37+00:00
I lived next to an AirBnB in Toronto, guests partying until 4am on a Wednesday.

Owner of the unit did nothing and as did AirBnB.

Luckily it was only a few nights a year - there's no mechanism to eject a guest like this. They create new accounts if they are banned from the platform.