MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by deathanatos | 2025-07-28 04:48:13+00:00
Let's take this as a specific example of the general complaint lodged:

> Let’s take healthcare as an example. The current system forces patients to spread pieces of their medical history across countless proprietary databases controlled by insurance companies, hospital networks, and electronic health record vendors.

If by "system", you mean the available technical standards, they in no way force that. If by "system" you mean capitalism … then perhaps, but an additional technical standard is not going to fix that. People build systems the way they build them because of barriers such as the unwillingness of other players to share data, the lack of technical knowledge of those implementing the systems, and the technical but-non-standards-related barriers of having disparate entities sharing infrastructure (e.g., what if someone sends too much load, if the system housing the data is down, etc.).

> Patients frustratingly become a patchwork rather than a person, because they often can’t access their own complete medical history, let alone correct mistakes.

(IANAL.) This is one of those problems already solved de jure, but not de facto. By law, you have the right to access your own medical history, and with minor caveats, the right to correct mistakes in your data; not being able either of those is a violation of HIPAA.

Enforce the regulation, is what I'd say would be needed in that specific case, but good luck with that, of course. But that's the problem: even if Solid were amazing, did everything you ever wanted, what would cause industry to ever adopt it?

There's also HITECH, but it's vaguer, AIUI.

(HIPAA is about the only federal privacy law we've got; outside of that, I agree more firmly. Esp. the right to correct mistakes in other industries is practically non-existent. The end result of the argument above is still the same, though.)

I agree w/ Schneier, people need better control over their data. But I think that's a regulatory/legal problem, not a technical one. And that is the problem: the Dems are, at best, weak on privacy law and consumer protections, and the GOP is outright against it; worse, rulings like the striking of Chevron Deference are going to make enforcing existing laws hard enough.
by skydhash | 2025-07-28 04:48:15+00:00
I think your perspective is heavily influenced by the imperative paradigm where you actually write the state transition. Compare that to functional programming where you only describe the relation between the initial and final state. Or logic programming where you describe the properties of the final state and where it would find the elements with those properties in the initial state.

Those does not involves writing state transitions. You are merely describing the acceptance criteria. Imperative is the norm because that's how computers works, but there are other abstractions that maps more to how people thinks. Or how the problem is already solved.
by motorest | 2025-07-28 04:48:17+00:00
> The idea that you're going to hand-roll a parser generator and then use that to generate a parser and the result is going to be less buggy than just hand-rolling a recursive descent parser, screams "I've never written code outside of an academic context"

Your comment is quite funny as hand-rolling a recursive descent parser is the kind of thing that is often accused of being a) bug-prone, b) only done in academic environments.
by jongjong | 2025-07-28 04:48:22+00:00
Interesting but I wouldn't call that a gotcha. Trying to read the DOM outside of the component is kind of an anti-pattern and I think this kind of behavior should be expected. You'd generally want the web component to be a black box and it works pretty well once you understand the rendering order and focus only on internal or slotted elements. I think the only real 'gotcha' I came across was the order of when the attribute changed callback gets called versus the connect callback but it's easy to adjust the logic internally to take this into account. I can make do with a custom render() method and sometimes additional methods to perform specific granular updates to the component's own DOM...

With React, the component either gets rendered or it doesn't get rendered; all or nothing and React fully controls this. With web components you can also just nit-pick a single element within the component's DOM and only update that one. It gives you more opportunities in terms of performance optimization and how you split up your components... But you can also achieve a similar result as React by just re-rendering the whole component if necessary.

The one difficulty which is actually an advantage IMO is that you cannot pass JavaScript object or function references to Web Components via HTML attributes; you have to pass primitive values... But IMO this a BENEFIT because it forces separation of concerns and it makes the DOM way easier to debug in the dev console. For advanced use cases you can still pass JS refs to a child component by calling methods on it but I try to avoid this because it makes it harder to understand the state of a component.

I like it when I can understand the state of a component just by looking at its attributes and I like those values to be as simple and human-readable as possible. I love opening up my dev console and just tweaking the HTML attributes directly and see the change happening. Makes debugging a breeze. Kind of tricky to do with React and you get into all sorts of weird situations where a render may not trigger when you expect when you change properties of an object without changing the reference itself. React adds a lot of unnecessary complexity there.
by larodi | 2025-07-28 04:48:23+00:00
It’s a joke brother. But then not-anecdotally, children aged as young as 12 have taken all kinds of speed on the streets across most of the western world. Happily some of them grow to become reasonable moms and dads, I know few. But tell me it’s not true, and I tell you should maybe get a walk out.

So it was an allegory, but still true. Sad or not. Reality bites.
by cellis | 2025-07-28 04:50:06+00:00
The harder part is “test invalidation”. For instance if a feature no longer makes sense, the human / test validator must painstakingly go through and delete obsolete specs. An idea I’d like to try is to “separate” the concerns; only QA agents can delete specs, engineer agents must conform to the suite, and make a strong case to the qa agent for deletion.
by anhldbk | 2025-07-28 04:50:27+00:00
I'm working on Beam, a web app that lets you transfer files between nearby devices using QR codes - completely offline, with no servers involved, and leaving absolutely no trace.

Beam is perfect for sharing sensitive documents, transferring files when you can't use USB, email, or cloud storage.

Try it here: https://get-beam.vercel.app
by wkat4242 | 2025-07-28 04:51:18+00:00
Really? Were the classified ads that important?

I know some Dutch newspapers that didn't have any. It was mostly the free local papers that did.

Edit: these papers are still around, I just don't know if they still don't have classifieds because I don't read any papers anymore. The whole idea of getting a dead tree delivered is kinda old fashioned to me.
by goku12 | 2025-07-28 04:52:00+00:00
> but the reality is not as it is being portrayed.

This is exactly how anyone would describe your reply. Your claim is so bizzare and its logic so convoluted that the only reason I can imagine for it is political motivation. But I could be wrong and don't want to get into a flamewar. So let's ignore the reasons and reassess the logic instead. Most of the counter I can come up with are variations of what the other commenter replied, so I will leave that to them. Instead, let's look at why your argument never pans out.

Private companies always look for short to medium term profits, since it affects their balance sheets and ultimately their survival. That constraint isn't favorable for scientific research and science missions, because there is a long lead time for the research results to be converted into a commercially viable products. Some companies with a large product portfolio and steady profits still do some research, as long as it isn't too costly or time consuming. An example is the pharma industry.

But science involving the biosphere, atmosphere, astronomy/astrophysics, space, interplanetary missions etc are on the other end of that spectrum - extremely costly and no commercialization for the foreseeable future. The only way private industries are going to do it is if the government funds them with short term profits - in which case, it's the government's program, not the industry's. Even Musk's Mars dream is dependent on government funding in that manner, though his intent isn't science either. What makes you think the private industry will take it upon themselves to fund and conduct research that makes no economic sense?
by rpcope1 | 2025-07-28 04:52:07+00:00
> There's some reason for ethanol in the fuel mix.

Uh, maybe from a "we can grow our own fuel perspective", but I've never seen a car run better on E10 or E85 than E0. Basically everything (including the newest and fanciest engines) runs like ass if you've got ethanol in there (and now you have to contend with your fuel having a component that's hydrophilic, which is a huge problem in and of itself, and brutal on natural rubber). Some things specifically built for ethanol as the primary fuel might be OK, but E10 is kind of a travesty.

We'd have been better served just working more towards synthetic gasoline and biodiesel (and I'll make a strong wager that there's still going to be a lot of gas/diesel powered stuff 20-30 years out, and we're going to be going back to trying to get good at synthesizing fuel).
by ravila4 | 2025-07-28 04:52:55+00:00
I think one key reason HUDs haven’t taken off more broadly is the fundamental limitation of our current display medium - computer screens and mobile devices are terrible at providing ambient, peripheral information without being intrusive. When I launch an AI agent to fix a bug or handle a complex task, there’s this awkward wait time where it takes too long for me to sit there staring at the screen waiting for output, but it’s too short for me to disengage and do something else meaningful. A HUD approach would give me a much shorter feedback loop. I could see what the AI is doing in my peripheral vision and decide moment-to-moment whether to jump in and take over the coding myself, or let the agent continue while I work on something else. Instead of being locked into either “full attention on the agent” or “completely disengaged,” I’d have that ambient awareness that lets me dynamically choose my level of involvement. This makes me think VR/AR could be the killer application for AI HUDs. Spatial computing gives us the display paradigm where AI assistance can be truly ambient rather than demanding your full visual attention on a 2D screen. I picture that this would be especially helpful for help on more physical tasks, such as cooking, or fixing a bike.
by yorwba | 2025-07-28 04:53:01+00:00
There's not a trend against freedom of speech so much as existing laws outlawing certain categories of speech being applied to the internet. If you lie in a commercial context, that's fraud; if you lie in court, that's perjury; if you tell your buddies to go do crimes together, that's conspiracy to commit; if you tell someone to give you money or else, that's blackmail...

If you come from the perspective that there used to be freedom of speech and now there's all those pesky laws restricting what you can say, it looks like a slippery slope. If you realize that people have been required to check ID when selling material unsuitable for minors in physical stores since before the internet existed, it seems a bit more unlikely that ID requirements will expand to cover everything else.
by nunez | 2025-07-28 04:55:09+00:00
This exactly is the terminal state of big AI: models that only four companies can train (on datasets only they can obtain) who also happen to own all of the ancillary services for accessing those models (because most businesses are really chatgpt in a trenchcoat). Yet the world is begging and kicking down the doors for this, just like they did for social media.
by dotancohen | 2025-07-28 04:56:01+00:00
Unfortunately, the expert in debugging Arduino electrical errors, or in numpy, or in evaluating what the burn pattern on your spark plugs means, or in identifying that strange object in your telescope, won't be on IRC. He'll be on Reddit, where you'll need a government-provided ID _and sanctioned device_ to participate. Or on Facebook, where you'll need a government-provided ID _and sanctioned device_ to participate. Or on whatever large, popular platform replaces them, where you'll need a government-provided ID _and sanctioned device_ to participate.

But rest assured, so long as you want to discuss privacy and nostalgia of the pre-invasionary internet, you'll find a knowledgeable expert on IRC.
by acyou | 2025-07-28 04:58:22+00:00
Surface level thinking, ecological disaster in the making. Birds and bats and other bugs eat mosquitoes to live. Killing all the mosquitoes is like the Chinese killing all the sparrows. We do not understand, and we do not want to understand, the deep consequences of our actions.

People who think we can reengineer and shape ecology by eliminating key species are here on the dunning Kruger curve.

Better option, if you really want to fight malaria go fight that directly, leave mosquitoes out of it.
by mrtksn | 2025-07-28 04:59:12+00:00
EU isn't at all capable of doing that because it's not a hegemonic state, it's just bunch of a countries coming together to coordinate on doing stuff.

My guess on what happened this time is, people were tasked to implement a way to verify age anonymously and this was the only feasible way to do it because of their constraints that don't allow them to do bigger stuff that China or USA will able to do through having the budget and enforcement power.
by nemo1618 | 2025-07-28 05:00:49+00:00
I'm dipping my toes into decompilation -- specifically, decompiling Super Smash Bros. Melee. Once you get into the groove, it's kinda addicting! Now that I've done a few functions by hand, I'm wondering how to best leverage AI to speed up the process.

Come decompile with us! https://github.com/doldecomp/melee
by sema4hacker | 2025-07-28 05:03:37+00:00
Our community has three large fire trucks, and one is sent out for every 911 call, even though the vast majority of calls are for medical emergencies, not something requiring a fire truck (which always arrives quickly, but a subsequent ambulance on call is what inevitably hauls a patient to the hospital). I've never understood why the fire department doesn't acquire and dispatch small vehicles for all those medical calls instead of a giant fire truck. Seems like that would help hold down costs.
by nulld3v | 2025-07-28 05:03:41+00:00
I've tried that but it isn't very effective because usually if they are not a git wizard, they are already using some sort of git interface or GUI that prevents them from making catastrophic mistakes. So they don't see the appeal in relearning all their git knowledge and terminology.

Hence why I initially try to sell it as an addition to their toolbox, instead of as a replacement for their entire workflow.
by bigyabai | 2025-07-28 05:05:28+00:00
The Wacom kernel drivers are so nice, especially with the neat little interface GNOME has in the settings. I got a secondhand Wacom tablet from 2002 at a garage sale that serves it's duty signing PDFs and sculpting in Blender on those rare occasions where it's needed.

Makes me wonder if anyone's playing osu! on their Steam Decks...
by aurareturn | 2025-07-28 05:05:44+00:00
My AMD Framework 13 running Fedora (an officially supported option: https://frame.work/linux ) also gets around that amount of battery life. And can run games surprisingly well.

Macs don't throttle when you unplug it. All AMD laptops do.

Even when plugged in, AMD laptops are quite a bit slower than Macs. When unplugged, it's not even close.
by cadamsdotcom | 2025-07-28 05:06:11+00:00
All these new tools are so exciting, but running untrusted code which auto-updates itself is blocking me from trying these tools.

I wish for a vetting tool. Have an LLM examine the code then write a spec of what it reads and writes, & you can examine that before running it. If something in the list is suspect.. you’ll know before you’re hosed not after :)
by ashwinsundar | 2025-07-28 05:06:47+00:00
Here's the thing - the other frameworks I work in don't encourage me to require secrets on the client-side, so you're exactly right. The client-server split that is enforced by Next.js's App Router paradigm is not an abstraction, but more like a rift through the center of the web development universe. I don't want to send env variables to the client, but sometimes they have to be shipped with the bundle to cross this great chasm. It's like that scene in Interstellar when Coop and his team gets sucked into the black hole. Him returning to see Murph is like a client issuing a fetch request to the server, as far as Next.js is concerned

And I already know what the answer is, it's "anticipate every possible future scenario that your web program might encounter, and design your server/client structure perfectly the first time! What's so hard about that?"

This experience with Next.js has made me quit the Javascript/Typescript communities of web frameworks entirely. Burned by Gatsby and GraphQL once, shame on them. Burned by Next.js though...
by fluidcruft | 2025-07-28 05:07:00+00:00
You can enroll keys on trusted hardware and then use them on untrusted hardware. That's how smartcards work. Enrollment is secure (say performed by your employer) and (in theory) extracting the private key is impossible.

Smartcards also seem to have the ability to issue certificate requests. I think the keys inside the cards are signed by a manufacturer trust chain (I got a gemalto card to play with for signatures and places like IdenTrust were able to verify authentic cards, but I wasn't trying to fool anything so it may be possible... but they would only issue certain levels of keys for specific cards)

I'm not saying you are wrong (I don't know enough about the details) but it all was much more sophisticated than I had thought and the chips seem to be running some sort of attestation of the chip in the card. Basically, you can't MITM things if doing so requires getting a private key that only exists in the factory. That sort of thing.
by AIPedant | 2025-07-28 05:08:29+00:00
That is not true:

https://archive.is/A23eV

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1155/2024/6355613

Simply running a gas burner generates about twice as much PM2.5 emissions as pan-frying a chicken breast on an induction stove. And of course gas generates pollution when you're boiling or steaming things, quickly reheating, or anything that doesn't involve burning / Malliard reactions / etc. Using gas means you are at the very least doubling the amount of pollution, and in most cases it's much worse than that.

On top of all that, ventilation does nothing for the environmental impact: https://concernedhealthny.org/2022/10/burning-fossil-fuel-in...
by dasickis | 2025-07-28 05:09:58+00:00
Working on a dog collar that understands dog vocalizations: https://sarama.ai

The current app is being rebuilt as it sucks and the device is under active development.

We've gotten the following to work:

1. Emotion detection with barks

2. Cough detection (Kennel Cough specifically)

3. Identifying a dog from their bark

4. Video analysis of dog behavior

5. Identifying key parts in dog vocalizations (similar to phonemes in people)

6. Some basic intent detection (or what people call translation)

If anyone is good at μpython + TFLite and can help us transferring our models on device that'd be awesome. Currently our set up is super hacky.
by derbOac | 2025-07-28 05:10:20+00:00
Not OP, but my impression from reading the literature is that the problem with rip currents is that people either exhaust themselves fighting the current, and/or get pulled out beyond their ability to swim back.

The typical distance a rip current will pull people out is about 100m. Given that about 50% of the US population can't swim functionally at all, this can be very dangerous. However, it depends — 100m is not very much for an experienced open water swimmer, who might be used to swimming 1500-3000m routinely.

Most updated recommendations suggest people should ride the current until it stops and then signal for help and/or swim away from the current. This is to avoid exhaustion and because research indicates rip currents can go in different patterns.

If you know what you're doing and can swim that distance, it's not that dangerous. Experienced surfers would fall in this category, as they're used to navigating shore currents.
by mytailorisrich | 2025-07-28 05:10:22+00:00
There is no "freedom of speech" in the US sense in the EU/UK. That's often a cause for misunderstanding between the two sides of the Pond.

There are many things that you are not allowed to write or say by law in EU countries simply because the legislator has decided that they are wrong opinions, and it is generally accepted that the State can and should implement such controls.

Note that lying is not a crime in general. Your examples are for very specific contexts.
by dagmx | 2025-07-28 05:10:42+00:00
The other advantage to procreate+ipad is that it’s easy to take with you. It’s effectively the new sketchbook.

It’s just nice to be able to draw on the go or not be tied to a Cintiq.

You can connect the iPad to a larger screen and use it like a Cintiq though.

It’s definitely not fully featured enough for more complex art but the appeal is more than just the accessibility.

Almost all my professional concept artist friends have switched over, but I agree it’s not a great fit for matte paintings.
by atleastoptimal | 2025-07-28 05:10:55+00:00
Depends on what your goal is.

Every few months LLM's get markedly better. In days GPT-5 will come out which by early reports (and anecdotal evidence on LMarena) is substantively better than the best current coding models. Will it surpass humans? It is a possibility, unless there is some yet unforeseen impassable intelligence gap below human intelligence and above SOTA AI intelligence.

Coding as a hobby seems to be more fun for people without AI tools. You get the experience of more completely holding the system in your head, your interaction with the codebase is more intuitive and connected deeply to your natural reasoning faculties. However, I believe the purism of eschewing AI tools is a trap that had few consequences in 2023, or even 2024, but by the end of 2025, the standard for what a "productive software developer" can accomplish in a week will be set by the boon AI tools give to mid and senior developers.

That's it, there's no getting around the reality of technological progress. Soon after that, there will be few if any humans in the loop at all for all except the highest level executive decisions. Coding will be an artisan task done for personal enjoyment, like knitting or cooking.
Ask HN: What are your reverse engineering skills?
by alganet | 2025-07-28 05:10:56+00:00
Hi!

I was wondering what the reverse engineering skills of people here in HN are.

From simple things like trying to mess with systems you assume to be based on regular expression, to more elaborate ones, down to more increasingly advanced techniques.

I'm not particularly interested in bit shaving stuff like hex editors or things like that, but if you're proud of something in that regard feel free to share.

Prompt engineering is quite outside this question (it seems that AI folk see themselves apart from other areas, so it's really not relevant to more principled reverse engineering techniques).