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benjamir

1 karma · joined February 23, 2026

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benjamir··on Germany shelves Nord Stream 2 pipeline
Most major cities on Germany either use district heating or gas (esp. in eastern Germany).

Overall, rounded: 48% natural gas, 25% oil, 14% district heating

https://www.bmwi-energiewende.de/EWD/Redaktion/Newsletter/20...

Electrical heating is rare, because it's inefficient. And considering the former energy mix of Germany: not ecological.

You don't have to like Scholz, but talking about nuclear in this context and calling the head of a state dumb... ?!?!... doesn't make much sense.

benjamir··on Why I will never buy another Samsung device
That cannot be stressed enough: no stock Android is a pain (at least if coming from there)

E.g. more or less bound to their camera app, my automatic sync with Google photos isn't working because they want me to use _their_ gallery. Only when I start Google's photo app does a sync start. Repeating explicitly: that's preventing that pictures are automatically backuped to the cloud! -- too me, that's preventing the main selling point of paying a lot of money for a phone with a decent camera And: why would I switch every service to the crappy Samsung equivalent?

benjamir··on Why I will never buy another Samsung device
Google is becoming incompetent. It's not only their phones.

Currently they fail to fix their speech services for over a month. Doesn't update the language over mobile networks and drowns batteries while waiting/trying -- no matter the settings, restarts, Cache cleans. While other apps on those phones update properly over the same network. Dropped from a 4* rating to 1.5 (s. Play Store)

Major changes were "changed name", "new icon", which were a clear warning sign to me -- now they can add "botched network handling"

benjamir··on A military veteran knows why your employees are leaving
Autos rolling?!? That ugliness is intentional?

That website doesn't work as a business card...

benjamir··on Why I Like Java (2014)
Thanks, I have another "Sedgewick" and wasn't aware of the repo (not in immediate need of it, but nice anyway!)
benjamir··on BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)
Yeah, sadly. But good you say it explicitly and it a fair spin(?) -- I just wanted to point out the IMO damage that license does, not blame the authors/BBC.

In Germany it's the same with the "Mediathek" nonsense. Shows paid with public money can only shown for a ridiculously short time -- no freely accessible archive.

benjamir··on Atlassian founder launches bid for power company AGL to ‘accelerate coal exit’
Well intentioned but close to negligible (globally).

China has contracts with African countries to build coal powerplants, despite transforming their own energy sector.

On a globally scale the billions could be spend with higher impact -- even right now.

benjamir··on Ask HN: Do you find working on large distributed systems exhausting?
Which costs you more than $100k monthly to operate with the same level of manageability and reliability.

We don't use AWS, because our use cases don't require that level of reliability and we simply cannot afford it, but if I needed a company to depend on IT that generates enough revenue... I probably wouldn't argue about the AWS bill. So long, prepaid at hetzner + in-house works good enough, but I know what I cannot offer with the click of a button to my user!

benjamir··on BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)
First thing I notice: the license is horrible.

Even GNU recommends liberal licenses for snippets with less than 300 lines (and allows for commercial use anyway!): https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html " What if the work is not very long? (#WhatIfWorkIsShort)

    If a whole software package contains very little code—less than 300 lines is the benchmark we use—you may as well use a lax permissive license for it, rather than a copyleft license like the GNU GPL. (Unless, that is, the code is specially important.) We recommend the Apache License 2.0 for such cases.
"

While LOCs poorly reflect the effort made, in this case a less anal-retentive approach would have opened up a long-term contribution to societies at large. Considering that the BBC was mainly finances by quasi-public money it's a shame that it was opted for a license with an unnecessary special case (NC).

benjamir··on Mental speed is high until age 60 revealed by analysis of over 10^6 participants
What the ELO ratings of established chess players were already suggesting. Sharp decline seldomly happened before 65. Nice to see that rigorously researched.
benjamir··on Tell HN: Candles can make you feel tired
* I wrote about CO2.

* The boiler's flame is visible (through a slit).

* The system doesn't have a separate supply stream -- it takes oxygen from the flat.

An CO sensor seems obligatory to me: after the chemney sweeper (obligatory in Germany) measured 10,000ppm CO in the exhaust stream (defect, not normal operation), I didn't want to depend on a 25y+ boiler's electronics alone.

CO kills relatively fast. Even if rare, I don't want to die caused by a rare event that could have been avoided by spending ~50€ (here)

benjamir··on KeePassXC – Cross-Platform Password Manager
I like keepassxc.

For everybody trying it: avoid the password sharing feature. It's currently hopelessly broken. The last time I had a look it was a known issue that needs major rework. IMO that can be worked around be keeping a dedicated database for shared scenarios -- albeit not practically fine grained for every secret. (I don't care, yet)

benjamir··on Tell HN: Candles can make you feel tired
I recently bought one of the best CO_2 meters available here (and had a CO alarm since before that): the low temperature boiler (natural gas, 1991) in our kitchen contributes close to nothing to the CO_2 level despite getting its air from inside. Letting it run on automatic a whole workday contributes less than 200ppm in our flat. But an adult and two kids can bring the level from below 500ppm to above 1000ppm in around one hour -- additionally: doesn't really matter if the doors to other rooms are open or not. Ppm fluctuation is (way) less than 100ppm between rooms.

(All time low 380ppm -- 10% above the world average during my birth :-( , highest 1620ppm)

benjamir··on Ask HN: Should we accept the “floppy disk icon” as the default save symbol?
Piggy bank -- as long as there are coins.

Safe -- regarding obsoletion: probably a safe bet compared to a piggy bank (pun intended)

benjamir··on Facebook staff now to be known as “Metamates”
One of FAANG out of ideas?

* Change the name of it

* Change (brand) color(s)

* Modify icon (slightly) and have it as the major news of a release

* Do something seemingly stupid to get press coverage

benjamir··on All baptisms performed by Phoenix priest invalid because he changed one word
Yeah, otherwise HRH will be very disappointed in heaven. Look, Petrus is standing there and only ever to let you in if the rituals were done in order. Otherwise... no luck for you... straight to hell.

Says an intuition full of child groppers.

benjamir··on All baptisms performed by Phoenix priest invalid because he changed one word
<sarcasm>Thank god that they "decided" in 2007 that there isn't a limbus for unbaptised babies anymore.</sarcasm>
benjamir··on Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?
Ff on mobile with uBlock origin is IMO awesome.

I switched angrily to Chrome on mobile ca. 4y ago, but came back ca. 2y to give it a 2nd chance and I'm not missing Chrome.

benjamir··on Ask HN: Why is Firefox losing marketshare and how would you save it?
headscratch I used profiles with Ff for ages... what is the difference to Chrome's?
benjamir··on Tesla Issues Recall for Faulty Heat Pumps, Loss of Heating in Cold Weather
14°F, a worst-case scenario? WTF?

I had to keep shelter in a telephone booth just to survive waiting for a train at -14,8F (-26°C) in Weimar, Germany -- called a taxi. That's a worst-case, not the "every decent winter in Europe" 14°F

benjamir··on DHS ‘Misinformation’ Greatest Terrorism Threat to U.S.
Uh... my mind read: DHS' misinformation greatest terrorism threat to U.S.
benjamir··on Spinal implants allow paralysed people to walk, swim and cycle again
I think I would cry tears of joy even seeing _anyone_ even just wiggle their toes after not being able to do so. How awesome that most be to witness somebody who could only recently dream of doing this, really accomplish this?

_This_ is infinitely more amazing than any crypto shit, saving-the-world with Lomi blah blah blah and senseless techno-garbage some wanna-be-rich-thanks-to-an-exit-strategy creeps propagate on HN.

benjamir··on Spinal implants allow paralysed people to walk, swim and cycle again
I waited for this.

I agree with you and always have to think about "Everything is amazing and nobody is happy": https://youtu.be/nUBtKNzoKZ4

-- and I don't care it's Louis C.K. saying it. Like I don't care if a songs from Michael Jackson is playing. Still true.

benjamir··on Alfa Romeo thinks attaching NFTs to cars can improve resale value
"...most beautiful.... wheels inspired by analog telephone dial..."

I suggest: "mental".

benjamir··on Removing trucks could be almost 'impossible,' say heavy towing experts
Tank, or something like this: https://youtu.be/cD5dIyI7AoY

Done. Who says the tires have to be treated nicely?

benjamir··on Meta may be forced to shutter Facebook, Instagram in EU
The current Samsung Update to Android 12 installs Facebook without question -- despite my removal beforehand.

Thus I would welcome the EU kicking as much Meta corporations into the nuts as possible.

After that, pick either Google or Samsung. Not any better.

benjamir··on PHP – The Right Way
A language that changes the semantics of functions between minor versions has no "right way". "count()"less examples of crap. I have currently two weeks of code migration behind me because code running correctly on 7.0 fails on 7.3 -- while I see the reason for change was necessary I also see the hopelessness of rebuilding a flawed house with a fundament build on a pile of manure.

And the good news given to me by a colleague is that they pulled the same stunt going from 7.3 to 7.4. It's like depending on stumbling alcoholics instead of language designers.

Not much has changed since core devs tried to mitigate an overflow by testing for "$variable < MAXINT".

benjamir··on Ask HN: What is one book you would recommend everyone to read?
+1 for the problem of the translations.

Considering the room of interpretation it is outragous that some claim to take their (often random) translation at hand literally.

Nobody should take the collected stories of a far away tribe (time and space) and take it word by word.

Enjoy it as it is: a mixture of early philosophy, politics and mysticism.

benjamir··on Europe: The end of the privacy of digital correspondence
Meanwhile the former pope and his bishop protected known child abusers who continued to abuse children.

Aiding a criminal is itself a crime in Germany -- I would go for "Täterschaft durch Unterlassen"; without their enablement, no further abuse could have happened.

But the prosecutors seem to be to involved with the church shrug

Instead of going for the known abusers the general population gets the STASI 3.x treatment.

Some days I wish the EU dissolves into irrelevancy. Barely more than a fishbowl full off awkward, self righteous bureaucrats. Then again, the scavengers and populists are already waiting and are the guaranteed ticket to hell during lifetime.

benjamir··on Facebook/Instagram consider shutting down in EU if they can't move data to US
Yes, please do shut down here!

What a quack.

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