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Comment by wojciii | Hacker News Reader

I hate everything that uses ".. from first principles" with a passion. Almost as much as "technically true".

To me it just suggests that the blog is going to explore the topic at a low level, ie, discuss the transmission of bits of data via cables or radio waves, rather than discussing HTTP or TLS or whatever. Which in general is something I find quite interesting. (I haven't read this article yet so don't know if it's actually good, and the other comments don't give me much hope.)

Hi, author here. I did explain all the fundamentals without leaving any gaps. Please do give it a read and I hope you like it.

+1 usually a sign of midwit and mediocrity. not once I seen "first principles" blogs have any value.

I skimmed the article after I realized that I was being negative. It has some nice explanations so my comment wasn't about the content but just about the wording of the title. :D

Which is really sad, because actually working from first principles is a valid methodology to build efficient products that bypass layers of unnecessary abstraction.

The term itself seems to have lost its real meaning however.

on the other hand, you start distinguishing the pipe from the image of a "the pipe".

My own personal "pet peeve" cliche phrase is anything that is "literally" (except it's really figurative) something. So many people for so very long have used "literally" to mean the literal opposite of it's actual meaning. Even when they don't use it to mean it's actual opposite meaning, they'll still often use "literal" to describe a thing that is in no way actually literal. It just "grinds my gears" to hear it.

blooalien says "My own personal "pet peeve" cliche phrase is anything that is "literally" (except it's really figurative) something. So many people for so very long have used "literally" to mean the literal opposite of it's actual meaning. "

That is called "illiteracy". Unfortunately it can be eliminated only by the tedious but necessary process of someone literate (you) politely instructing the illiterate about the proper use of each misused word, e.g., "literally". Takes time, human speed, worthwhile.

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