MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by jt2190 | 2025-10-04 15:42:33+00:00
> What I'm curious is why the platforms don't adapt to how the developers have found works best?

Here's my take:

- The web was visualized as a way to publish academic documents in a hyperlinked document system. Librarians and academics live in this world. We hear the word "semantic" from them a lot.

- The visual web was visualized as a way to publish documents that had a precise look. Graphic designers live in this world. They don't care about semantics. They do care about pixel perfect layouts and cool effects.

- The web app was visualized as a way to deliver software to users with lazy, "click link to install"-like behavior. What this crowd cares about is providing server functionality to users, and other concerns like semantics or pixel perfect are often secondary.

- The single page web app is also visualized as as a way to deliver software to users with lazy, "click link to install"-like behavior. They differ from the web app group in that they try to have more server functionality right in the client. Again semantics and pixel perfect are secondary. App complexity is a big problem that this group contends with, and this is what the article discusses.

Given these different ways of visualizing the web (and I'm sure I've left a few out), it's no wonder that we're stuck with the mess that is today's web development. The right solution is a sensible runtime for app development, that doesn't force you to render UI through the DOM and doesn't make it hard for you to get access to basic things like the local file system. We've known this forever (anyone remember Flash?).

WASM feels like it might finally allow app developers to do all of the software things that native platform developers get to do easily, and with the added bonus of strong sandboxing. It's early days yet, I think the "Ruby on Rails"-moment has not yet arrived there yet, i.e. a very popular, easy way for devs to create whatever app-de-jour everyone's excited about.
by onetom | 2025-10-04 15:42:37+00:00
I wonder, how rigidly has the JSON format been baked into the protocol.

It feels like a shortsighted choice, just because it's prevalent in recent decades.

It took years to implement performant parsers for it and it has a lot of quirks, missing features and the tons of double quotes and mandatory commas significantly harm its human readability...

Not sure what would I recommend instead, but personally I would prefer using EDN instead, as a Clojure programmer

https://github.com/edn-format/edn
by jleyank | 2025-10-04 15:42:49+00:00
Unfortunately for the wealthy, they basically have all the money. So if governments want or need more, there’s few alternatives. It’s not that it’s fair or not, but taxing people without money accomplishes little

I guess governments can try mandating that companies must provide and adequately fund defined benefit pension schemes that endure independently of the company’s life. But that favours workers, and I guess we can’t have that.
by mattv8 | 2025-10-04 15:42:58+00:00
This is a great article, and I largely agree but I feel like we're giving ourselves an excuse to be lazy. Because I've absolutely seen this principle swing in the opposite direction, where someone writes slop code, without ever having had a real conversation with the end user(s) and consequently the software goes out the door without having considered top 5 most common edge cases that would have been so obvious if a little more effort had been put in.
by bluerooibos | 2025-10-04 15:43:08+00:00
I'm quite hopeful that anyone under 40 (arbitrary, mostly because I'm in my mid-30s) will get to LEV (longevity escape velocity) - there's a ton of anti-ageing and disease-curing research going on, especially now with the likes of DeepMind and others accelerating said research.

That's assuming you manage to avoid death from microplastics, climate change or AI-related societal collapse, etc.
by Rochus | 2025-10-04 15:44:06+00:00
Lightpanda looks interesting, thanks for the hint. According to public sources, behind the development is a company of 2-10 employees (like Bun). The engine uses parts of the Netsurf browser (written in C) and the V8 engine (written in C++), and - as far a I can tell - is in an early development stage.
by eirikbakke | 2025-10-04 15:44:20+00:00
In Norway, the card terminals usually go into an "accept with signature" mode if they are temporarily offline. So they print a receipt that the customer has to sign. (This is for BankAxept debit cards, which are standard in Norway.)

In a grocery store line once, I remember a distraught customer whose card was declined due to insufficient funds. The store manager came over, yanked the ethernet cable from the payment terminal, and told the customer to try again. "Accepted with signature."
by zahlman | 2025-10-04 15:44:24+00:00
> And let's say numpy didn't expose a version number in a standard (which could be agreed upon in a PEP) field, then it would just throw an import exception. It wouldn't break any old code. And only packages with that explicit field would support the pinned version import.

Yes, this part actually is as simple as you imagine. But that means in practical terms that you can't use the feature until at best the next release of Numpy. If you want to say for example that you need at least version 2 (breaking changes, after all), well, there are already 18 published packages that meet that requirement but are unable to communicate that in the new syntax. This can to my understanding be fixed with post releases, but it's a serious burden for maintainers and most projects are just not going to do that sort of thing (it bloats PyPI, too).

And more importantly, that's only one of many problems that need to be solved. And by far the simplest of them.
by pessimizer | 2025-10-04 15:44:42+00:00
It's still forgetting what it's talking about from minute to minute. I'm honestly getting tired of bullying them into following the directions I've already given them three times.

I think the main problem with AGI as a goal (other than I don't think it's possible with current hardware, maybe it's possible with hypothetical optical transistors) is that I'm not sure AGI would be more useful. AGI would argue with you more. People are not tools for you, they are tools for themselves. LLMs are tools for you. They're just very imperfect because they are extremely stupid. They're a method of forcing a body of training material to conform to your description.

But to add to the general topic: I see a lot of user interfaces to creative tools being replaced not too long from now by realtime stream of consciousness babbling by creatives. Give those creatives a clicker with a green button for happy and a red button for sad, and you might be able to train LLMs to be an excellent assistant and crew on any mushy project.

How many people are creative, though, as compared to people who passively consume? It all goes back to the online ratio of forum posters to forum readers. People who post probably think 3/5 people post, when it's probably more like 1/25 or 1/100, and the vast majority of posts are bad, lazy and hated. Poasting is free.

Are there enough posters to soak up all that compute? How many people can really make a movie, even given a no-limit credit card? Have you noticed that there are a lot of Z-grade movies that are horrible, make no money, and have budgets higher than really magnificent films, budgets that in this day and age give them access to technology that stretches those dollars farther than they ever could e.g. 50 years ago? Is there a glut of unsung screenwriters?
by rmunn | 2025-10-04 15:44:49+00:00
Canon also makes a line of printers with refillable ink tanks, no chip involved. I've owned one for a couple years now, and I helped my father set one up about three months ago. Rough back-of-the-envelope math suggests a cost of 1-2 cents per page if you're printing in color, less than that if you only print black & white. (The black ink bottle costs the same as the color bottles but is larger).

Epson also makes ink tank printers, but I don't recommend them because the Epson I used to own refused to work until the "maintenance cartridge" (a special sponge that absorbs the ink used to flush out clogs) was replaced, and it's not user-serviceable. (Technically you could do it but you'd void your warranty). So when my Epson died, I replaced it with a comparable Canon printer. Canon will sell you a maintenance cartridge for about $10 (plus tax and shipping) right on their website, and I'm sure some retailers would carry them too (though I haven't looked). I haven't needed it yet, but it's good to know I won't have to buy a new printer because I couldn't replace a simple sponge buried deep in its guts.
by PaulHoule | 2025-10-04 15:45:10+00:00
I was using React at work and looking at the Vue manual which at first looked good to me because Vue has first-class lists, it fit my model of web applications better. Than I saw three.js and other things were people used React to render things that weren’t ordinary web apps and I realized I could draw anything I could imagine with React but not with Vue.

I like the idea of svelte but for apps that are small enough that svelte has a bundle size advantage the bundle size difference isn’t decisive (users won’t usually notice or care) and if your app is huge enough that the bundle size is a problem you have problems bigger than your choice of framework.
by commandersaki | 2025-10-04 15:45:21+00:00
Was a big fan of the dock about 25 years ago when I used Window Maker. Over that time spotlight and its ilk innovated the launching apps bit, and so, at least for me there is no reason to have it anymore, yet on a mac I cannot make it go away permanently (yes auto hide works - and its become a bit of a pain to set the auto hide delay because the underlying option has changed over the years, but I really just don't want it running at all).
by lxgr | 2025-10-04 15:45:38+00:00
EMV has been using asymmetric cryptography for a long time now, even though it's strictly optional in the specs.

Older cards indeed didn't have it for cost reasons, and online-only cards theoretically have no strict need for it even today, but practically, a symmetric-only card is a non-starter these days for several reasons. You won't be able to ride the Tube in London or Subway in NYC with a card that does not support it, for example.
by finaard | 2025-10-04 15:45:52+00:00
I can recommend Kyocera - my current one has been going strong for 15 years now. I had problems with paper transport about two years ago - but that's expected after that many prints, and was solved with a reasonably priced field maintenance kit.

As far as I know they're still not doing any nonsense to force you to use their toner - but even if they did I probably wouldn't care as the original toner is cheap enough that I just can't be arsed to figure out good compatible ones.
by dsr_ | 2025-10-04 15:46:22+00:00
Everyone with a Mac had an ImageWriter printer; the scanner attachment was, by far, the cheapest way to add scanning capability. Many people bought them to add the capability, not because they needed them already.

A little later, the LaserWriter printer became the first generally affordable laser printer. But it was affordable only if you were rich or had a business case for it. The sub-thousand dollar laser printer took quite a few more years.
by reactordev | 2025-10-04 15:46:25+00:00
There is no economics that involves enslaving other humans. Not slavery. Not ever. However, in debt in perpetuity is a thing. So you have to work to pay, so you can live, so you can work, so you can pay…

Debt crisis is a real problem. We have borrowed more than we can ever repay, all nations, for the last 30 years. Both sides. Just drove right off the cliff.
by DavidWoof | 2025-10-04 15:47:04+00:00
It's hard to talk in the abstract because obviously people can abuse any type of code feature, but I generally find chaining array methods, and equivalents like c# linq, much easier to read and understand than their looping equivalents.

The fact that you single out .reduce() here is really telling to me. .reduce() definitely has a learning curve to it, but once you're used to it the resulting code is generally much simpler and the immutability of it is much less error-prone. I personally expect JS devs to be on the far side of that learning curve, but there's always a debate about what it's reasonable to expect.
by olooney | 2025-10-04 15:47:29+00:00
Then you may enjoy Elements of Statistical Learning[1] or Kevin Murphy's books[2][3][4], which this chapter is heavily indebted to; it is mostly a short gloss of the topics covered in those books.

[1]: https://hastie.su.domains/ElemStatLearn/

[2]: https://probml.github.io/pml-book/book0.html

[3]: https://probml.github.io/pml-book/book1.html

[4]: https://probml.github.io/pml-book/book2.html
by gloosx | 2025-10-04 15:47:36+00:00
I don’t want to spoil anything for you, but ethanol is actually a very reactive molecule — and in some ways, it acts similarly to opioids like heroin. It, among other things, stimulates endogenous opioid pathways, leading to the release of β-endorphins and activation of mu-opioid receptors. So, alcohol works indirectly, heroin directly – but both enhance opioid signalling. If you’re curious, this study explains it really well:

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3728478/
by a022311 | 2025-10-04 15:47:55+00:00
As a daily GNOME user, this is inaccurate. OP is comparing each DE's out-of-the-box experience which is obviously not meant to be left untouched. Both GNOME and KDE have hundreds of extensions that augment functionality in various ways. For a macOS-like experience on GNOME not much is needed: - A dock like the one provided by the excellent Dash-to-dock extension - Toolbar buttons like fullscreen and minimize can be easily enabled from GNOME Tweaks or with the `gsettings` CLI. They can even be moved to the left side of the title bar. - Desktop icons are available by default, I know because I explicitly disable them. - The "system tray" is supported with the AppIndicator extension - Lots of customization options are available in GNOME too in the Control Center, through GNOME Tweaks and the `gsettings` CLI. - Extensions like Blur My Shell and Rounded Window Corners can bring the experience even closer to the recent macOS one (I'm not aware of any Liquid Glass extensions at the moment). Shell themes are a thing too, you can change anything.

Ubuntu bundles most of this much friendlier GNOME experience as the default. I wonder what distro OP chose.

Personally, I think KDE doesn't have that much to offer over GNOME, except maybe stability and KDE connect for phone integration.
by ben_w | 2025-10-04 15:48:07+00:00
> Did you think it got out of hand? I thought it ended on a nice note.

It did indeed end on a nice note, but I think "got out of hand" is looking at the wrong end of the thread.

I didn't flag that comment, I seldom flag any, but I would guess the problem was likely the start of that other thread, because your opening there was more than a little abrasive.
by jfengel | 2025-10-04 15:48:14+00:00
I find that strong typing often obviates the need for unit tests.

Software breaks when data transforms in a way that typing can't solve. When data goes across a wire, or into a database, it leaves your space. Anything you do to your code risks breaking it. Integration tests solve that, but at a very high cost.

I don't have a great solution for that. It just comes down to experience: how do things change over time? You take guesses. You try to be flexible, but not so flexible that you aren't solving the problem at hand. (It doesn't do you any good to hand the user a C compiler and say "this is flexible enough to handle all of your future needs.")

Experience is, unfortunately, the worst teacher. It gives the lesson after it gives the test.
by tguvot | 2025-10-04 15:49:33+00:00
ain't it comfortable that there are 2 sets of videos.

given that there is "statistics" (comfortable provided by hamas) of people getting shot during every single distribution, do you find it strange that there is not even 1 video of people actually getting shot en masse ? surely someone would have thought that it will be amazing video evidence that will be easy to make, as it happens daily, and a way to make israel look real bad, yet - nothing. the only video that comes close to it is when bullets very precisely hitting absolutely nothing few meters away from people.

with regards to " IDF whistleblowers", in case you missed the memo, the famous haaretz article with whistleblowers was mistranslated from hebrew. in hebew was used expression with meaning of "shooting at air/ground to prevent advancement". it was translated to english as "shooting at people". haaretz got it's 13 pieces for this
by meatgrinder | 2025-10-04 15:49:41+00:00
I've recently started playing with graphDBs mostly for the purpose of using entities within parsed documents for my own ideas on a modified RAG approach (not graphRAG). However I'm not sure I would choose this for serious production type work compared to object stores like Mongo where your entity could easily have additional metadata sections of information in it's object store which could have anything you want. Right now as I brainstorm, I find that the graphDB just fits better with my mental thought meanderings.
by p_l | 2025-10-04 15:49:45+00:00
Historical, but also there was a bunch of physical ram drives - RAMsan, for example, sold DRAM-based (with battery backup) appliances connected by fiber channel - they were used for all kinds of tasks but often as very fast scratch space for databases. Some VAXen had a "RAM disk" card that was IIRC used as NFS cache on some unix variants. etc. etc.
Updated Space Docking Systems
by Xorakios | 2025-10-04 15:49:58+00:00
OK to downvote me, but really would respect responses. I am developing a space exploration game and exploring options for docking. I tried this on perplexity. Is the response reasonable? If SpaceX designed a new docking system from scratch, to be the next generation of wonderfulness, with your help, describe what would be improved to maximize utility
by mtlynch | 2025-10-04 15:50:37+00:00
Manning doesn't pay that much to first time authors, and it looks like it's the first book for the author, Garrison Hinson-Hasty.

My guess is it's about $2k upfront and the author owes it back if they don't deliver.

Teiva Harsanyi did a good writeup recently about working with Manning as a first-time author. He got $2k upfront and $2k after delivering the first 1/3rd.[0]

[0] https://www.thecoder.cafe/p/100-go-mistakes
by stmw | 2025-10-04 15:51:28+00:00
Exactly right - the data-first (or contract-first for APIs) is a better abstraction barrier than object-first (or data + code mixed together). Most query languages respect this, and when they do not, it usually ends up being a dead end. That includes ideas like embedded a JVM in an Oracle SQL database or various NoSQL systems that have tried embedding Javascript or other general purpose programming languages.
by zug_zug | 2025-10-04 15:51:37+00:00
I think this is largely practical advice if you want to influence a tech company at all costs. That is -- to have multiple projects lined for each executive goal that you can singlehandedly deliver on to thunderous applause.

That said, it's often easier said than done. We've all worked at places where projects were canceled 3 months in due to all sorts of reasons (e.g. security breach changes all priorities, nobody cares about your database change now).

So I do think there comes a point where an engineer asks themselves -- "How many projects do I have to prepare, how many stakeholders do I have to convince, how many wins do I need before I see tangible benefits commensurate with my investment?" What if I just let the executives set the course and provide my insight if asked, and still get 90% of the pay.

Ultimately this is a guide to work successfully within a dysfunctional system, but nonetheless great advice for that.
by reactordev | 2025-10-04 15:52:01+00:00
I agree with you there. It’s a program that open for at least 8 hours a day if you’re using it.

I’ve been trying to work on a simplified UI for blender for level editing (blender is completely extendable) but you still have the blenderisms present. Rendering to anything is buried to the right. Along with most of the things you care about. Its lack of UX is still apparent. Almost all of those things should be menu items with windows in a normal workflow. Blender isn’t that though and everything happens “on canvas”. I’m happy it exists. I’m happy to work with it. It’s not Maya or 3ds Max, but it combines a lot of tools into one open source package. Which is fantastic.
by zero-sharp | 2025-10-04 15:52:03+00:00
I've had the experience of working at a small business with extremely bad onboarding/organization:

1. documentation is nonexistent

2. broken processes that nobody can explain.

3. no clear direction to establish workflows. This is rationalized with "every situation is different"

4. a constantly changing system (which would partially explain 2)

5. an acknowledgement from the higher ups that training "takes years"

At a certain point, it's just about job security for the people who already work there since it creates such a high barrier to entry.
by aetherson | 2025-10-04 15:52:06+00:00
Money spent on startups isn't charity, you do it in the expectation of (in aggregate) profit -- so it's not rivalrous with charities. People who might support museums earn money on investments that they can then use for charities.

If you believe that you are better at picking winners (slop startups vs non-slop startups) than the rest of the investment world, then that's a valuable skill that you could use to earn a lot of money that you could then use to support museums if you choose.
by SeanAnderson | 2025-10-04 15:52:17+00:00
Man, I must not have worked at dysfunctional enough companies. I can't relate to the opening remarks in this article at all. I'm used to really open communication from the top down and, even when we build in a direction I disagree with, we've discussed things enough that I'm at least interested in seeing why someone else I consider intelligent sees the world so differently. Perhaps it has to do with only working for companies founded by engineers rather than product/marketing? I'm not really sure.
by Molitor5901 | 2025-10-04 15:53:09+00:00
Perhaps I just feel old.. but I really, really wish they'd go back to making Bond films like Moonraker, Diamonds are Forever, and the Man with the Golden Gun. No big explosions, just nice cars, suave hero, good stories, and all the spy gadgets and things many of us love.

Albert Broccoli had the formula right and IMHO we should go back.
by getnormality | 2025-10-04 15:54:24+00:00
It seems like this post can be summarized as follows:

1. If your manager has something in particular they want you to do, you should do it.

2. If your manager doesn't have something in particular they want you to do, you should figure out what they will want you to do in the future, and make any necessary preparations so that it will be doable when they want it.

I'd say it's good advice. The only thing I would add is that managers and leadership are sometimes happy to be given something different than what they asked for, so long as it's still what they wanted at a higher level. This is risky, but success can be a fast track to respect and autonomy.
by FollowingTheDao | 2025-10-04 15:55:08+00:00
What????

We knew that LolCDE was a vulnerability to e coli since well before 2016 and knew inhibitors of the complex, globomycin being one of them, which they knew about since 1978

https://journals.asm.org/doi/full/10.1128/jb.00502-16

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/353012/

Is enterololin just another from of globomycin?

Is AI smart or are scientists just getting dumber?