MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by Dylan16807 | 2025-11-20 08:35:28+00:00
So you can't name a single software patent where the system worked as intended, but you DON'T think that's a valid argument against software patents?

Your standards for a valid argument make no sense.

> An example of a software patent that I think is fundamentally "solid" is public key encryption. Some people thought of it, they developed it, it is at least as novel and clever and non-obvious as the cotton gin, so if the cotton gin should be patentable, public key encryption should also be.

It's cool that they got paid for having those clever thoughts.

But the goal of the US patent system isn't just to enable that payment, it's to encourage more innovation and disclosure via that payment.

And also, those core inventions happened almost 50 years ago with that field getting more collaborative and less patent-using every decade.

If that's the best example multiple people can come up with, then software patents are an extremely failed experiment.
by rmunn | 2025-11-20 08:35:40+00:00
Not the ones I've used. Haskell compiles to executables, F# compiles to the same bytecode that C# does and can be shipped the same way (including compiling to executables if you need to deploy to environments where you don't expect the .NET runtime to be already set up), Clojure compiles to .jar files and deploys just like other Java code, and so on.

I'll grant that there are plenty of languages that seemed designed for research and playing around with cool concepts rather than for shipping code, but the FP languages that I see getting the most buzz are all ones that can ship working code to users, so the end users can just run a standard .exe without needing to know how to set up a runtime.
by wkat4242 | 2025-11-20 08:35:45+00:00
The current Dutch government is a bunch of egotistical fascists made up of a coalition of parties that try to get one over on the other by any means necessary.

They fell after a year because of that but are still in power until a next one can be formed. They've been like this for 6 months due to our excruciatingly slow election system that requires months to prepare an election. When that finally happened the results weren't much better.
by Gareth321 | 2025-11-20 08:35:54+00:00
I agree in theory but in practise, this just results in even more regulations. There are very few or no real world examples of stricter regulations being written in clearer terms. The reasons are numerous, but a big one is that people often have a financial incentive to circumvent these regulations. They attack the edge cases and the ambiguity between each word. If the regulations are not written sufficiently prescriptively, courts are swamped with cases and eventually a precedent is set which nullifies much or most of the intended purpose of the regulations. So regulators go to painstaking lengths to write clear and verbose regulations, but ensuring compliance with tens of thousands of pages of regulations are expensive, and this results in an economies of scale barrier for small businesses.

There are workarounds like exemptions for small businesses, but this creates all kinds of new issues like a regulatory ceiling, which results in enormous new costs on some arbitrary day for a business once it crosses some kind of user or revenue threshold. Ramp-ups are difficult or impossible to legislate in this context. Further, two or multi-tiered regulatory systems are highly inefficient and arguably unfair. They're very difficult for everyone to navigate. Generally speaking, from countless examples around the world, rules should apply to everyone.

Ultimately this means fewer regulations generally are good for startups - and larger businesses. But there are also social and consumer costs for this. There is no perfect balance to be found. Just competing ideological beliefs and positions.
by JuniperMesos | 2025-11-20 08:36:07+00:00
I have started using Signal for large group chats in the past year or so, after spending many years using it as an encrypted replacement for SMS texting. Signal has gotten noticeably better at the UX of group chats during that time, although I am still annoyed that they basically require you to use their client to access the network in the name of security. I can't easily run a legitimate 3rd party Signal client on my server, and when I've tried I've accidentally broken my access to my account on my phone, which is quite annoying since I use Signal pretty frequently.

I want there to be something like Matrix that is designed first and foremost as a large-group realtime chat program (really, as a meaningful FOSS alternative to Discord), and it should make different tradeoffs than Signal. I'm actually willing to entirely forego encryption, at least at first, to make this happen - IRC wasn't encrypted and Discord isn't either, and these are things I want to replace with something better. Matrix's UX is still noticeably worse than Discord's, and I'm skeptical that the ostensible security gains from the encryption are worth it, especially given the problems with device verification UX, metadata leakage, and the fact that as the number of people in a group chat grows the possibility that they will take a screenshot of the encrypted message sent to them and leak it to the press grows higher and higher.
by vinhnx | 2025-11-20 08:36:49+00:00
> Codex is extremely, painfully, doggedly persistent in following every last character of them

I think this is because gpt-5 (or gpt-5.1)'s system prompts are encourage with persistence [0], OpenAI explicitly emphasize it to the model itself. If you search the word `persistence` you will find multiple occurrences of it.

``` <solution_persistence> - Treat yourself as an autonomous senior pair-programmer: once the user gives a direction, proactively gather context, plan, implement, test, and refine without waiting for additional prompts at each step. - Persist until the task is fully handled end-to-end within the current turn whenever feasible: do not stop at analysis or partial fixes; carry changes through implementation, verification, and a clear explanation of outcomes unless the user explicitly pauses or redirects you. - Be extremely biased for action. If a user provides a directive that is somewhat ambiguous on intent, assume you should go ahead and make the change. If the user asks a question like "should we do x?" and your answer is "yes", you should also go ahead and perform the action. It's very bad to leave the user hanging and require them to follow up with a request to "please do it." </solution_persistence> ```

[0] https://cookbook.openai.com/examples/gpt-5/gpt-5-1_prompting...
by mschuster91 | 2025-11-20 08:37:03+00:00
> Patents are a pest. They're just another mechanism to pump money from below to above.

Patents are a way to make sure inventors are getting compensated for their R&D work and risk.

I do agree with your observation though - IMHO, the "exclusivity" period of a patent should last five years, and for the 15 years after that, patent holders should be mandated to license out their patent at reasonable pricing.
by baxtr | 2025-11-20 08:37:37+00:00
The problems are in the details: why are news organizations exempt from this rule in Europe? You can’t read news websites unless you accept all cookies or pay to read.

Who decides these things? How is such a rule in favor of privacy? Why is my site where I regularly post news not eligible? Who decides which sites are eligible?

It’s these kind of moral double standards and cognitive dissonances that people have to endure. I wish it was black and white. But reality simply isn’t.
by stackghost | 2025-11-20 08:37:37+00:00
>It seems like it has been moralized and the people who are “right” don’t have to actually rebut arguments against their position because they are so right? I don’t get it.

It's the opposite.

Conspiracy theorists cannot be reasoned with. Recently some people took a flat-earther to one of the poles and showed him the 24 hours of daylight to prove the earth is a spheroid, and he went into all sorts of mental gymnastics to cope with the cognitive dissonance rather than face the fact that he's stupid and got had. Something about how there must be some other way to reconcile it with the midnight sun. Anyways.

In other words, people who are right don't have to rebut the arguments of conspiracy theorists because it doesn't matter. The conspiracy theorists will simply invent a new reason why their beliefs, upon which their entire self identity is built, are able to persist.
by jolmg | 2025-11-20 08:38:33+00:00
Sorry, I should probably think more widely, but I was just considering Linux distros.

> /bin is the "standard" location for bash on a subset of Linux distributions

Considering "location" such that it includes /bin symlinks, that would be nearly all distros, I would think...

> What's more, bash isn't a standard shell.

De facto and specifically among Linux distros, it is. It's probably an underestimate that 95% of all Linux distro installations have it preinstalled.
by toastal | 2025-11-20 08:39:04+00:00
I made a partition for Nix on mine so I have all the tools I need while not relying on Jolla to package things (the installable package list is quite barren). My audio works from the speakers, but the patches to make the headphone jack (something you Fairphone users no longer know of :P) work won’t come til the next release. For banks, I just use cash or log into the website on my laptop if required—while I will refuse goods/services that require an apps to the fullest extent possible (couldn’t get around TicketMaster which was a real blood-boiler beyond just the “phone required” aspect).
by sdoering | 2025-11-20 08:39:10+00:00
Fingerprinting is actually covered by the regulations and needs to be "consented" to.

There are different regulations, but basically they are technology agnostic (a good thing). If you as a compnay want to use data that could theoretically be used as an identifyer for me, you need my consent. For any type of use. Except if it is absolutely necessary to provide the basic service. Or if we have a contractual relationship, but there are also protective rules in place to protect the customer.

Different regulations handle storing data (like cookies, but also local/session storage and similar things on the devices of your users. But those are separate from GDPR.

GDPR is - as said - only concerned with data that could be theoretically linked to me as an individual. Regardless what this data is. Could be an id in a cookie, could be a fingerprint, could be smoke signals. It could even be the combination of different data points, that taken together allow for an identification.

Theoretical example: Imagine I live in a village with 500 people. The company tracks the location and that I am male (so roughtly 50% of the population), that I am between 45 - 50 (say about 10% of the population), have multiple cats (say maybe only three people now in that village, use a Linux based machine - bingo: You found me. And now you have a set of data that falls under the GDPR. Welcome in having to ensure you only use this data in a way that I gave consent to.

See: The law doesn't even just look at marketing or tracking data. Or what happens in an app or a browser. It covers all data that is either pointing ti me as an "ID" - like a cookie ID, or at personal identifiable data - like bei combination in my example.
by cess11 | 2025-11-20 08:40:02+00:00
I'm sure the Lisp machines were very impressive compared to a DOS or Unix prompt, but today I can run like ten Amber or Newspeak environments on a constantly networked many-core system I carry around in my pocket. I'm not sure whether the CL folks have created similar web interfaces to the running image but I wouldn't be surprised if they have.

I feel it would be cool to sometime run code on a radiation hardened Forth chip, or some obscure Lisp hardware, but would it be life changing? I doubt it.
by kleiba | 2025-11-20 08:41:19+00:00
Related: JOP: A Java Optimized Processor for Embedded Real-Time Systems (2005) [0]

It's an implementation of the Java virtual machine in hardware, also FPGA-based, see chapter 7.1 Hardware Platforms.

[0] https://backend.orbit.dtu.dk/ws/files/4127855/thesis.pdf
by JuniperMesos | 2025-11-20 08:41:37+00:00
Not everyone views the ACLU's word as sacred and authoritative. I certainly don't, even though I think they're correct on this particular issue - it is in fact bad that Apple can arbitrarily cut off apps from iOS device users by removing them from the app store because the US federal government tells them to. It's also bad if they can do this because the Chinese federal government tells me to, or because Apple decides internally that some app is bad. This is a huge reason why I have never used iOS devices. Nonetheless, people were willing to work at Apple, on iOS devices, going back to the dawn of the system in 2007. If they didn't care about end-user compute sovereignty then, they probably don't care now either.
by barchar | 2025-11-20 08:42:08+00:00
It's often overlooked that bubbles like this actually validate themselves. It's not like the demand, revenue, or profits are fake or made up.

Investment mechanically _causes_ profits, and if you're as big as big tech is then some of that profit will be yours. In the end stupid investment will end badly, but until it actually plays out it can very much be rational for _everyone_ involved; Even if none of them are lying about anything.

Bubbles probably don't even have to hurt after the fact if the government is willing to support demand when things go south. The real cost is in the things we could have done instead. At least GPUs are genuinely useful (especially with the end of Moore's law), Energy investment is never a bad thing in the end, and those assets have very long useful lives.
F1TV issue on Firefox after latest Google Announcement – Coincidence?
by iKasu | 2025-11-20 08:42:16+00:00
The timing is starting to feel a bit too coincidental. Today — right after Google’s McLaren announcement — Firefox is, again, no longer supported on the F1TV Website.

The exact same kind of issue happened earlier this year with Mozilla trying to work on a fix (https://techissuestoday.com/firefox-users-locked-out-of-f1tv-mozilla-engineer-confirms-a-fix-is-coming/). Their fix was working until today.

When something breaks twice in such a short window, it’s hard to believe in coincidences. I’m not claiming anything deliberate, but the pattern makes me question whether Google’s involvement in F1 might be affecting which browsers get proper support, even indirectly.
by Y_Y | 2025-11-20 08:42:25+00:00
That depends, are the people who are negatively impacted aware, and able to do anything about it?

There are some "mosquito" businesses that imho provide no net value and we'd be better off if they didn't exist (c.f. Bastiat's window breaker⁰). For example; payday loans, gadget insurance, MLMs, f2p games. The trouble is that there is an apparent need they're meeting, and nobody wants to "destroy jobs" or even worry too hard about exploiting the vulnerable.

Even if I were emperor and believed hese businesses were unjustifiably bad, I'd be worried about the authoritarian consequences of shutting down the less egregious ones. I'd also hope to have the humility to entertain the idea that I don't understand their full benefits.

In conclusion I think it's bad to have unethical businesses, and that even if they make the indicator go up, they are probably a net negative on the economy and society. However, I don't know what's to be done about it.

⁰ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window
by sdoering | 2025-11-20 08:42:36+00:00
If you want to do business in the EU, just follow the law.

You are not allowed to sell Heroin to anyone in Germany. I don't see you making the argument, that we should - in the same fashion as with digital spyware using companies - not target drug dealers. Becase hey, people can just decide to not buy drugs.

[Edit]: Typo
by nandomrumber | 2025-11-20 08:44:19+00:00
Thanks for helping clarify what was being asked.

I find it baffling when a misunderstanding occurs and the person being misunderstood just repeats their words.

You also motivated me to open a tab and enters some text.

This study indicates at least some benefits for transdermal nicotine for ADHD.

https://scholars.duke.edu/publication/659499
by miramba | 2025-11-20 08:44:21+00:00
> if you haven't noticed, the people concerned are computer programmers, UI designers, and PMs.

Those are the people who should know best what is meant by "ask visitors for consent before you track them.".

Lawyers and more work is needed if you want to track anyway and look for ways to make people accidentally consent. "Let's ask the question, but hide the unwanted answer as deeply as possibly without breaking the law."

You may blame EU bureaucrats, I blame the unwillingness of the companies to fulfill the spirit of the law and putting all the work into pretending.
by raverbashing | 2025-11-20 08:44:34+00:00
True but some still wants me to understand what a monofunctor is or something that sounds like a disease to do things like print to screen or get a random number

I feel that is the biggest barrier to their adoption nowadays (and also silly things like requiring ;; at the end of the line)

Pure functions are a good theoretical exercise but they can't exist in practice.
by 0xCE0 | 2025-11-20 08:44:38+00:00
Booting up startup (even the startup needs to be started, it doesn't start by itself) is a constant struggle. Almost every simple and basic sounding action/operation/step causes heavy reaction/resistance by the reality. The reality just doesn't want you to succeed.

I am lucky to run my startup with my own funding, and it causes me to be very responsible with spending.

Finding PMF is the most mysterious thing I have ever encountered. How is it possible to sell anything in this world? People who can sell are the most valuable people in this world.

I guess I have had "burnout" so long, that I cannot anymore feel it. It has now become the feeling of accepting and observing the reality as realistically as it is. "It's just life.", says my friend when reality slaps/hits on face.

Technical problems for technical startups and for everyone else, normal life.

Customer acquistion, individual case of PMF? Mysterious.

Co-founder issues. Hopefully you can resolve things out, because it is the only good way out for the co-founders and therefore for the company. You need to have a real talk.

Runway stress? Time is money (because of expenses), so do things now that leads to making deals (= your product/service + marketing/selling). Do them now. Now. Do it.

Yeah, the struggle and pain is hard. So hard. Let us wish power to for the survival of each other. Good luck, and don't fuck it up (message directed also to myself).
by gf000 | 2025-11-20 08:44:55+00:00
Well, one aspect is how dynamic the platform is.

It simply defaults to an open world where you could just load a class from any source at any time to subclass something, or straight up apply some transformation to classes as they load via instrumentation. And defaults matter, so AOT compilation is not completely trivial (though it's not too bad either with GraalVM's native image, given that the framework you use (if any) supports it).

Meanwhile most "AOT-first" languages assume a closed-world where everything "that could ever exist" is already known fully.
by nickpp | 2025-11-20 08:46:08+00:00
> Gig economy businesses are exploiting workers

Actually, around here they are giving a second chance to people whom over-regulation of the work market made too expensive to hire.

> insane monopolistic pricing and practices in the US in eg the telecom industry

It's actually regulations deterring competition in telecom who are responsible to those practices.

It goes like this: (well intended) regulation => raise price of doing business => fewer startups => less competition => incumbents enjoying practically monopoly => incumbents behaving like monopolistic a-holes.

> too little environmental regulation

In China. You forgot "in China". That is where most of that planet dooming is happening. Good luck promoting environmental regulation there.
by bmacho | 2025-11-20 08:46:27+00:00
> It's not that people are unimpressed with AI - they're just tired of constantly being bombarded with it, and it sneaking its way into where it's not wanted. "Generate any image you want!" "Analyse this thing with AI!" gets pretty tiring.

Isn't it just the second person? If there were just a Generate button/tab without explicitly addressing me and asking/begging I wouldn't mind it.
by AnthonyMouse | 2025-11-20 08:46:37+00:00
> But one row before it mentions "such as accessing secure areas of the site."

Which could be read as allowing session cookies but not ones that allow you to save your login if you come back later. But it's also kind of confusing/ambiguous, which is another problem -- if people don't know what to do then what are they going to do? Cookie banners everywhere, because it's safer.

> Ok, I agree that for sites without username / password that will not work.

How would it work differently for sites with a username and password? The login cookie would still identify the user and would still be used to remember the language preference.
by gadders | 2025-11-20 08:47:51+00:00
>>the BBC coverage of the Scottish independence referendum, Corbyn, and Brexit was embarrassing.

Yes, they were clearly pro-Remain and anti-Corbyn and anti-Scottish independence.

>> The Prescott memo is just the latest observation of how the BBC has been used as a tool to propagate elite opinions and accomplish intelligence objectives.

Yes, it demonstrated examples of bias in favour of those elite opinions.
by pjmlp | 2025-11-20 08:47:57+00:00
Because developers don't like to pay for tools.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excelsior_JET

https://www.ptc.com/en/products/developer-tools/perc

https://www.aicas.com/products-services/jamaicavm/

It is now getting adopted because GraalVM and OpenJ9 are available for free.

Also while not being proper Java, Android does AOT since version 5, mixed JIT/AOT since version 7.

EDIT: Fixed the sentence regarding Android versions.
by rmunn | 2025-11-20 08:48:19+00:00
Not mentioned there, because it's discussing history that nearly all happened before Unicode was ever conceived, is the fact that the kernel expects the first two bytes to be #! and therefore a UTF-8 BOM will mess up this logic. If the first two bytes are 0xEF 0xBB (because the first five bytes where 0xEF 0xBB 0xBF hash bang), you'll get errors like "./doit.sh: line 1: #!/bin/bash: No such file or directory" and be left scratching your head. /bin/bash is right there, I can see it with ls, why can't my script see it?

Do you see the invisible BOMb in the error message? Neither did I the first time. (And, in fact, Ghostty apparently stripped it out when I copied and pasted, so it's not actually there in this comment). But if I were to load that doit.sh script I created for this example into VS Code, I'd see the telltale "UTF-8 with BOM" file format.

Most people already know this, but maybe this will help someone out there. If you see a "No such file or directory" error and the program being executed apparently starts with #!, it probably actually starts with U+FFEF#! and you need to re-save the script in UTF-8 without a BOM(b) at the start.
by mg | 2025-11-20 08:48:32+00:00
When I look at the new pipe syntax ...

$output = $input |> trim(...) |> (fn (string $string) => str_replace(' ', '-', $string)) |> (fn (string $string) => str_replace(['.', '/', '…'], '', $string)) |> strtolower(...);

... I think why not just something like the following?

$output = $input |> trim($) |> str_replace(' ', '-', $) |> str_replace(['.', '/', '…'], '', $) |> strtolower($);