MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by nindalf | 2025-05-07 11:57:20+00:00
The Pakistani military cares about itself, above all. It wants to maintain its role as the primary protector of the Pakistani people, answerable to no one but themselves. As long as the threat of India looms large, their primacy is guaranteed. As a reward generals are allowed to grow filthy rich.

Support for the Pakistani military was at its nadir during the era of benign neglect because there wasn't an Indian boogeyman to justify their interference in politics and economic exploitation. But now that India has attacked Pakistani targets this will quiet any internal criticism of the Pakistani Army.

In other words, the military absolutely loves it when India engages in so-called deterrence. No Pakistani army soldier died (according to both sides). Pakistani people support the Pakistani Army more strongly than ever. It's absolutely perfect for the Army. I fully expect that they'll fund more terrorists, leading to a constant cycle of violence.
by kevinisherenow | 2025-05-07 11:57:24+00:00
Hey-thanks for your response. I can use all this info in shaping it!

You're absolutely right that the site doesn’t explain much up front- and neither did I in the introduction. That was a conscious choice early on. I’ve been trying to understand what people think it’s for, what they try to do with it, and where it loses them. Kind of like: Here's a ball- what do you think you should do with it? (kick, throw, eat?)- that's a loose analogy. But yeah, if people find a use for it or think a specific part of it's use is very useful- I can shape it that way.

At its core, QuickPoint is a text-first tool for creating structured, shareable content—presentations, walkthroughs, even lightweight docs—using a Markdown-like syntax. But unlike most markdown tools, you can also embed images, audio, logic, and interaction, so it’s more expressive and flexible.

You’re spot on comparing it to something like iAPresenter. That’s probably the closest mental model. I'm just wondering is there something outside of that box. But the main difference is that QuickPoint aims to go beyond slides-it’s designed for anyone who wants to write content once and present it dynamically, especially with branching or reactive elements.

Still very early days, and I appreciate you taking the time to explore and share honest feedback.

Happy to hear any more thoughts!
by nelblu | 2025-05-07 11:57:50+00:00
> can't fathom how huge it is not just geographically

I grew up in India but I don't agree that people in the west can't fathom how huge it is geographically. Geographically speaking India is the 7th largest country, and every country larger than India (Australia, Brazil, US, China, Canada and Russia) is at least 2 times to up to more than 5 times larger than India. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependen...

That said, I do agree a lot of westerners might not be able to relate to the cultural diversity of India.
by fvdessen | 2025-05-07 11:59:22+00:00
I think we should use the airbus model and copy 1 to 1 the AWS platform. Exact same apis, same control panels, same everything, just copy. Start with the most important functions. At least it would be clear what the end goal is and only a matter of funding and execution. It would also make it much easier for existing businesses to migrate away from real aws to euws.
by jeroenhd | 2025-05-07 11:59:27+00:00
std::from_chars will still accept "123abc". You have to manually check if all parts of the string have been consumed. On the other hand, " 123" is not accepted, because it starts with an invalid character, so the behaviour isn't "take the first acceptable number and parse that" either.

To get the equivalent of Rust's

if let Ok(x) = input.parse::<i32>() { println!("You entered {x}"); } else { eprintln!("You did not enter a number"); }

you need something like:

int x{}; auto [ptr, ec] = std::from_chars(input.data(), input.data() + input.size(), x); if (ec == std::errc() && ptr == input.data() + input.size()) { std::cout << "You entered " << x << std::endl; } else { std::cerr << "You did not enter a valid number" << std::endl; }

I find the choice to always require a start and and end position, and not to provide a method that simply passes or fails, to be quite baffling. In C++26, they also added an automatic boolean conversion for from_chars' return type to indicate success, which considers "only consumed half the input from the start" to be a success.

Maybe I'm weird for mostly writing code that does straightforward input-to-number conversions and not partial string parsers, but I have yet to see a good alternative for Rust's parse().
by AStonesThrow | 2025-05-07 12:00:38+00:00
Beginning when I was only 14 in 1986, I used to attend a lot of concerts. A lot of them. And they were not particularly popular concerts, though most were in larger venues such as sports arenas and amphitheaters. So I was usually able to score decent tickets without too much cutthroat camping-in-line or anything. Even in those days, most all of the tickets were sold through TicketMaster. Our main outlet was on the second floor of a Montgomery Ward store in the mall, right there among all the clothing in the department store, for no obvious reason.

Now in those days there were a couple of fees tacked on to ticket prices, but of course they were typically opaque already because even the base would depend on where we wanted to sit in the venue. So we didn't squirm too much when there were "facility fees" and "convenience fees" added and so forth. If possible, I would directly approach the venue's box office for the best deal, though.

It was interesting, because as the years wore on, I became interested in more obscure music, and that translated to ever-smaller venues, and more informal ticket purchases.

By 1999 I had acquired my "dream job" of clerk at Tower Records, and I was able to get up-close and personal with a real TicketMaster terminal (which was accessed in exactly the same way, with arcane text commands) and by that time my concert-being activities were being strictly curtailed. But I understood how terrible the market had become, the layers of fees that got tacked on, and the financial pain of wanting to see our favorite bands was increasing. I mean, in the "good old days" each seat was $40, maximum. These $250 packages with parking fees extra, that's abominable.

As for short-term rentals, while I've embraced the new food delivery services and ride-sharing over taxis, I never felt like adopting short-term rentals over hotels. For reasons of insurance, safety, and billing, among other things. So I'm thankful that the FTC is doing stuff about both of these industries. I hope that this regulation will bring about some lasting change and consumer confidence.
by fatbobman | 2025-05-07 12:00:52+00:00
In everyday life we constantly convert values between different units of measurement. For developers this seems easy—write a few formulas, sprinkle in a couple of switch statements and you’re done. But the moment you try to support dozens of units, seamless internationalisation, formatting, precision and rounding, the workload sky-rockets and the drudgery can make you question your life choices. The good news: starting with iOS 10 Apple added a comprehensive Measurement API to Foundation, taking all that “donkey work” off our hands. This article walks you through its usage and best practices.
by gosub100 | 2025-05-07 12:00:55+00:00
I think you're arguing against yourself in the last paragraph. Decades of ordering pizza proves the market for food delivery. And the app makes it even easier than calling and talking to a person for both sides.

I haven't used DD or ordered pizza since 2022 at the latest, but I usually got enough food that it didn't get cold. Since it was so expensive I'd load up on appetizers and extras so I could get at least 2 meals out of it.

I don't get it today because I heard how expensive it got, and my apartment complex is huge and I don't trust them to find my unit.
by lgiordano_notte | 2025-05-07 12:01:56+00:00
Value isn’t just the editor, it’s the workflow. Letting LLMs plan and act across multi-step flows is a hard problem, and Windsurf figured out a dev-focused version of that. Gains to be made in browser automation once you add structure, retries, and context. Feels like a bet on that pattern becoming default. But yeah as others said, highly doubt that's $3B in hard cash, more likely a roll-up of shares etc.
by concats | 2025-05-07 12:02:18+00:00
I won't deny that in a context with perfect information, a future LLM will most likely produce flawless code. I too believe that is inevitable.

However, in real life work situations, that 'perfect information' prerequisite will be a big hurdle I think. Design can depend on any number of vague agreements and lots of domain specific knowledge, things a senior software architect has only learnt because they've been at the company for a long time. It will be very hard for a LLM to take all the correct decisions without that knowledge.

Sure, if you write down a summary of each and every meeting you've attended for the past 12 months, as well as attach your entire company confluence, into the prompt, perhaps then the LLM can design the right architecture. But is that realistic?

More likely I think the human will do the initial design and specification documents, with the aforementioned things in mind, and then the LLM can do the rest of the coding.

Not because it would have been technically impossible for the LLM to do the code design, but because it would have been practically impossible to craft the correct prompt that would have given the desired result from a blank sheet.
Ask HN: Theory to industry: where do academics fit in?
by doubledamio | 2025-05-07 12:02:29+00:00
I'm a young researcher with a background in abstract physics and mathematics, specializing in areas like probability theory, spectral analysis, network theory, and statistical/quantum mechanics.

I'm considering transitioning to industry, but my coding experience is limited to basic Python. I’m concerned that, with a strong theoretical background but limited engineering skills, I might struggle to find a good fit. Additionally, with the tightening job market, the abundance of remote talent, and the rise of tools like Copilot, I’m wondering how these factors might impact my prospects.

For those who’ve made a similar transition—or who have hired people with this kind of background—how did it go? What roles or paths have worked best for you?
by magospietato | 2025-05-07 12:02:31+00:00
I had a beautifully presented octopus tentacle tapas on Menorca about a decade ago. I can't describe how exquisite the meat is when cooked well.

But boy, all those short YouTube docs about smart octos just came flooding back at the first bite.

Felt a lot like eating someone's dog, and I've steered clear since.
by matheusmoreira | 2025-05-07 12:02:57+00:00
I thought he invaded because of historical and not at all unfounded fears of western encirclement. Ukraine was getting pretty close to NATO, after all. I don't doubt that there were imperialist intentions, I'm just saying there is also a certain strategy and logic to the invasion.

Hopefully this will finally teach the nations of the world they can't rely on the likes of the US for their protection. If they want to survive and keep their sovereignity, they should really start developing missile technology and stockpiling nukes. If they don't, they will simply get steamrolled by nuclear armed opponents while the US does pretty much nothing about it despite promising to because they're not actually willing to risk global thermonuclear war with Russia over some eastern european country.
by vetleen | 2025-05-07 12:02:57+00:00
You did get me to click the 'upgrade' button, but the pricing is too high for me.

I did one search with 4 criteria, then added the two free columns, and at this point i had spent 750 of my 1000 free credits. The next tier being $49 with only 8000 credits, which means only 10 searches a month.

The search I did was super useful, and I would love to use the product, and reccomend it to my coworkers. But the pricing is what stops me.

Best of luck. I'll probably use it once a month if I can remember :)
Ask HN: How do you manage client retainers? Built a tool, curious if useful
by neil5paul | 2025-05-07 12:03:32+00:00
I run an app agency, and over time we ran into a lot of pain managing client retainers.

We have 15+ clients on different setups (some hourly, some fixed monthly) and were juggling Slack, ClickUp, Toggl, Stripe, and email. It became a mess to track hours, assign tasks, and keep clients updated without spending way too much time on manual updates.

We ended up building an internal tool to handle retainer tracking, team assignments, and automated client updates. It saved us a lot of time and improved communication and built trust.

Now I’m wondering if this is just our problem or something others struggle with too.

Would love to hear: • How do you manage retainers or ongoing client work? • What’s been your biggest headache? • Have you found tools that work well, or are you hacking it together with multiple tools?

For context, I set up a public version at retainkit.io

Would love to hear your mind even if you are a freelancer!

Not trying to pitch, just curious if it’s useful beyond our agency.

Thanks!
by kccqzy | 2025-05-07 12:04:14+00:00
There are food courts elsewhere too. The main difference is government subsidized rent, and an older generation of people who are willing to work very hard for low overall income. The former can be solved by politics but the latter cannot. It is simply not sustainable. Look at the people who are working in these hawker centers: they are almost always old, and they are willing to work hard so that their children can work less hard in a nice air conditioned office. When these people retire, there will be no one to occupy these hawker centers at this price of food.
by bArray | 2025-05-07 12:04:34+00:00
> It isn't reasonable to have different default behaviour - otherwise the majority of users would be vulnerable from a security perspective.

A better default behaviour would be to alert the user and allow them to choose to indefinitely defer by "accepting the risk". Some setups, rightfully or wrongfully, have a very long running time and cannot be restarted.

> If you want different behaviour, just configure it as you wish.

I'm not sure if it changed, but they made it extremely difficult on purpose. You can stop snap from updating, but then lots of other things also break.

> This just isn't a reasonable description of reality.

It's my experience with packages I use.
by wkat4242 | 2025-05-07 12:04:44+00:00
That's also something that's the fault of US lawmakers. In the EU cancelling a service must be as easy and through the same channels as signing up. Hence it's illegal to require that customers mail a hand-posted registered letter only on the second Tuesday of the month. Unless that's also the only way to sign up.

Transferring you to a "customer loyalty specialist" when cancelling is also illegal if you refuse.

Don't worship Apple because they're a bit more "consumer friendly" (while cashing in 30% for the privilege!!) when you could have everything be customer friendly for free just by electing honest politicians.
by throwaway642012 | 2025-05-07 12:05:26+00:00
India, where minorities become Bollywood superstars, beloved musicians, richest men in Asia, and even presidents, has been notoriously hostile to minorities? I don’t think any other country in Asia has a track record like India when it comes to minorities. Let’s not get rhetoric and false propaganda into our way of critical thinking. India has flaws but it is steadily proving to be a responsible power in that geography.

If you look at the facts: The only exodus happened in India was in Kashmir.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-35923237
by whstl | 2025-05-07 12:05:32+00:00
Thanks!!! :D

I ended up leaving the big enterprise I was and joined a YC startup, now I'm back in my element a bit more. I'm still afraid of it growing too much, but maybe it will be the push I need to try my luck being a founder.

I agree with what you said about builders, I really wish there was a path that goes from engineering to engineering+product+business that isn't "founding CTO"! :(
by somenameforme | 2025-05-07 12:06:35+00:00
The problem is that posturing can turn into reality (which is perhaps what you're trying to say). I do think Russia was posturing. They began seeking negotiations 4 days after they invaded, and outside of an absurd longshot decapitation strike all of their early maneuvering was much more performative than military in nature.

With Ukraine's entry into NATO appearing increasingly imminent, they likely felt they could force matters with a semi-bluff thinking they could catch Ukraine by surprise. Then the West jumped in thinking they could catch Russia by surprise. In the end nobody was really "surprised" and so we got a war that I expect nobody, especially in hindsight, really expected, let alone wanted.
by gruez | 2025-05-07 12:06:39+00:00
>I was never satisfied with the Israeli explanation. Their sustained attack to disable and sink Liberty precluded an assault by accident or some trigger-happy local commander.

If the attack was due to mistaken identity, wouldn't you expect the Israelis to go all out? I also skimmed the section and there's not much in the way of arguments besides that and "Israel pressured US to admit it was an accident".
by AStonesThrow | 2025-05-07 12:07:06+00:00
> work canteen

I had a job through a temp agency back in 2019, and we were occupying a rather spacious and well-equipped office building belonging to our client. One of the perks was free sodas and well-appointed break rooms, with fridge, microwave oven and all. However, there was no cafeteria nor canteen. Worse yet, there was no restaurant or deli within any reasonable walking distance to the site. It was a vast and dedicated office park with very large corporations as tenants, and evidently most of them did typically have cafeterias, or their actual employees had other arrangements.

Therefore I found myself preparing something at home to bring as "lunch" every day, and it was difficult because I am not good at preparing food at all. We were only alotted 30 minutes total to eat, and I found that barely enough time to put it together, heat something, and wolf it down. It was the most distasteful aspect of working there, having no other choice for breaks. We were working "swing shift" into the night (off at 10pm or so) and so the choices for meals after work were quite slim, and I was riding the bus anyway.

There are many office parks and corporate centers around here that feature at least one little deli or sandwich shop on the corner, that is walking distance for employees. I really don't think I'd accept work on-site at a place that lacked a cafeteria or a nearby restaurant.
by affalytics | 2025-05-07 12:07:12+00:00
Probably a needed move (and timely with the recent upsurge in Reform UK wins). Deliveroo has been running on a regulatory arbitrage -- it got to decent size in the UK due to lax laws on low quality/illegal immigration. If that has an expiry date approaching (it looks like it does), to maintain its scale it has to plan for a technological shift in the way it operates -- it is too small to do that by itself. DoorDash isn't.
by monsieurbanana | 2025-05-07 12:07:17+00:00
It was a mistake from my part to write a quick comment, there's much more than having a low pay that makes it impossible to have a similar hawker culture in other countries.

Singapore is effectively a big city, just the difference in geometry between it and pretty much any country you're thinking of makes it impossible to have a "hawker center 10 minutes of walk away from anybody".
by LeafItAlone | 2025-05-07 12:08:02+00:00
>First: Those numbers are all BS and have been for decades. If you want damp clothes, dirty dishes and refrigerated to within a blond one of the legal minimum food then you can trust the numbers. If you want your appliances to do their jobs in a satisfactory manner you're going to find yourself turning them up (whatever that means will vary by appliance) and consequently using a lot more energy.

I have had zero of these issues. Can you be more specific about when you have encountered them yourself?
by Applejinx | 2025-05-07 12:08:22+00:00
It doesn't matter whether they do or not.

They're saying things like 'Claude does not hallucinate. When it doesn't know something, it always thinks harder about it and only says things that are like totally real man'.

It doesn't KNOW. It's a really complicated network of associations, like WE ARE, and so it cannot know whether it is hallucinating, nor can it have direct experience in any way, so all they've done is make it hallucinate that it cares a lot about reality, but it doesn't 'know' what reality is either. What it 'knows' is what kind of talk is associated with 'speakers who are considered by somebody to be associated with reality' and that's it. It's gaslighting everybody including itself.

I guess one interesting inference is that when LLMs work with things like code, that's text-based and can deliver falsifiable results which is the closest an LLM can get to experience. Our existence is more tangible and linked to things like the physical world, where in most cases the LLM's existence is very online and can be linked to things like the output of, say, xterms and logging into systems.

Hallucinating that this can generalize to all things seems a mistake.
by explodes | 2025-05-07 12:08:34+00:00
For something like these kinds of reflexes, my understanding is that the response comes from the central nervous system, even before the brain has had the chance to fully process the input. This shortcut makes one avoid, say, burns or snakes, quicker than if it required the brain. Still, I agree with you that seeing what a cat sees (here or anywhere) would be awesome.
by bArray | 2025-05-07 12:08:39+00:00
Their answer will be "just make your server robust to restarts bro", not really understanding the fact that some stuff simply cannot be restarted. We have Ubuntu desktop running a robot arm (not our choice of OS, but the manufacturer). Mid-operation snap decides to kill the robot that would otherwise be happy operating away and sending stats to the cloud.

I'm personally moving to Debian. It's 99% how Ubuntu used to be and most Ubuntu stuff is just a .deb that is relatively compatible.
Show HN: Check how many trees you need to offset your carbon footprint
by karl_rikhardych | 2025-05-07 12:08:49+00:00
Hi everyone!

Last year I posted about my environmental project, but then it didn’t get much attention here. Now, as we’ve made some progress and improved our website a bit using users’ feedback, there is an occasion to give it another chance!

This time I’d like to focus on the feature that allows you to check how many trees are really needed to be planted to offset one’s carbon footprint, based on emissions per capita. It includes trees’ survivability rate, as not every seedling will get a chance to mature. It is often an overlooked factor.

You can also start gradually planting a whole forest and track your impact by choosing your planting plan. As for planting, we restore broadleaf forests with environmental purposes and not industrial plantations.

Since last year, several municipalities have expressed interest in partnering with us, pledging enough land for over 10 million trees for our project, and there is a potential for much more! We’ve also got some subscribers from across the US and the EU. Now we are looking to bring in more people to plant with us, to make it happen in a reasonable timeframe, so I’d immensely appreciate if you decide to join and spread the word!

We’ll be also further developing our app and website.

Here is the link to my previous post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40284156