Hacker News Reader

helterskelteron 'The EU runs on Microsoft' – and Uncle Sam could turn it off

It's pretty clear that Linux, or even BSD, is the way forward. My concern at this point is what the picture will look like with embargoes around software development and FOSS -- we saw this with the Russian devs contributing to Linux being cut off a few years back, though it's possible that LLM's will make this point moot very shortly.

helterskelteron Recreating Epstein PDFs from raw encoded attachments

I wonder if this could be intentional. If the datasets are contaminated with CSAM, anybody with a copy is liable to be arrested for possession.

More likely it's just an oversight, but it could also be CYA for dragging their feet, like "you rushed us, and look at these victims you've retraumatized". There are software solutions to find nudity and they're quite effective.

helterskelteron Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

I found the gameplay loop really fun, but the rest of it was definitely not up to the standard of Doom 2016.

helterskelteron Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

I know Doom Eternal had one, I believe she was even credited. But the line between "making a game more fun" and "making a game addictive" is a little blurry.

helterskelteron An interactive version of Byrne's The Elements of Euclid (1847)

Which edition do you have, as in, who published it?

helterskelteron A case study in PDF forensics: The Epstein PDFs

Might be a good fit for uploading a git repo and crowdsourcing

helterskelteron How to carry more than your own bodyweight (2025)

I once carried a log that weighed about double my body weight and carried it 100ft. My back has never been the same, I really don't recommend it unless you know what you're doing.

helterskelteron Noctia: A sleek and minimal desktop shell thoughtfully crafted for Wayland

Out of curiosity, are you using nvidia? Which drivers are you using? I've never experienced this issue with an Intel or AMD graphics, even on a budget laptop.

helterskelteron Noctia: A sleek and minimal desktop shell thoughtfully crafted for Wayland

It's own devs have put it on life support because fixing the problems inherent to its design is not doable without breaking everything that works with it. I don't know what more justification you could want.

Go work on Xorg if you like, but that ship has sailed.

helterskelteron Noctia: A sleek and minimal desktop shell thoughtfully crafted for Wayland

You can minimize tearing with double buffering so it's pretty rare but you can't completely eliminate it. Xorg by design cannot guarantee perfect frames. Tearing is something you'll notice every time it happens, whereas latency is not something that's necessarily an issue, and modern compositors have substantially reduced this latency.

I'm not really sure why Wayland gets all the hate it does, you'd think desktop Linux was perfect before Wayland came along and made everything totally unusable. As for myself, it's been a much better experience than Xorg ever was, pretty much since day one -- I've never had a torn frame, I've never had any issues with input lag, and I've never had to fuss with video settings. Not once. I'm sure some people have, but across a dozen machines I've had exactly zero problems in...a few months shy of a decade.

Let's not forget Xorg's own devs have put it on life support and recommend Wayland, which was created by Xorg devs, going forward. Nobody wants to maintain 35-year old spaghetti code of a fundamentally flawed design.

helterskelteron Noctia: A sleek and minimal desktop shell thoughtfully crafted for Wayland

Wayland got rid of screen tearing, an issue that plagued every machine I had used with X since I started using Linux in 2003/2004. That alone was enough for me to switch to sway in 2016, and I've never looked back. Xorg was nothing but headaches. Let's not even mention its security model.

helterskelteron Godot 4.6 Release: It's all about your flow

Glad it worked! Archwiki is a fantastic resource.

helterskelteron Godot 4.6 Release: It's all about your flow

From Archwiki:

Godot runs on Wayland using Xwayland, which causes a variety of UI issues, when not running in single window mode. [1] To get around this, start Godot with godot --single-window, then open a project, and enable single window mode in the editor settings.

This issue has been resolved in Godot 4.1.1. [2] This issue seems to have recurred in Godot 4.2 [3]

With Godot 4.3, Wayland can be used natively. [4] There are two ways to do this:

    Set the command-line argument --display-driver wayland.
    Enable the editor setting located at run/platforms/linuxbsd/prefer_wayland.

The above only makes Godot's client to run under native Wayland, but games still run under Xwayland. In order for games to run under native Wayland, go to project settings, click on "Display Server" at the sidebar, and at the option "Driver.linuxbsd" select wayland.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Godot_Engine

helterskelteron Microsoft forced me to switch to Linux

> * Support for non-standard DPI monitors sucks, mostly because of the previous point. Wayland has fractional scaling as a sort-of workaround if you can tolerate the entire screen being blurry. Every other major OS can deal with this.

This sounds like you're using some old software. GNOME and sway have clean fractional scaling without blurring, though that hasn't always been the case (it used to be terrible).

helterskelteron Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

I remember reading something around the time these prohibitions against liquids were rolled out that said none of the two-part liquid explosives were powerful enough to take down a plane unless you were carrying an unusual amount of liquid to be traveling with, or storing your liquid in an unusual way. For instance, there should be no reason you couldn't carry an ordinary sized bottle of shampoo in your luggage. No idea how accurate this is, maybe somebody could set this straight?

helterskelteron Blade Runner Costume Design (2020)

Yeah in his case it's his editor he really misses which is probably why he hasn't released anything since she died.

helterskelteron The mountain that weighed the Earth

I remember reading about this in Mason & Dixon. Mason, who worked at the Royal Observatory, was the one who identified this mountain as the best place for the experiment (and was asked to help with it but declined).

IIRC, it was partly the Mason Dixon line that inspired this experiment. They noticed syatematic errors in the line because their plumb bobs were deflected by gravitational pull from local terrain. At the time they speculated it was because of the Alleghenies, though it was probably more localized variations in gravity.

helterskelteron ICE using Palantir tool that feeds on Medicaid data

I didn't downmod, but it's probably because they are represented by population in the House, a coequal chamber which approves the budget (and the Speaker of which is next in line for POTUS after the VP). States have equal representation in Senate so one high-population state can't write laws that only benefit them, or are disadvantageous to smaller states.

helterskelteron ICE using Palantir tool that feeds on Medicaid data

> Republicans represent half the country

This statement isn't necessarily wrong because about half of elected government officials are Republican, but I want to point out that less than 60% of eligible Americans voted in 2024, so we're talking about <30% of Americans who vote Republican.

helterskelteron Downtown Denver's office vacancy rate grows to 38.2%

This is an issue that got brought up in Portland, OR during Covid IIRC. The city was looking at buying up vacant offices and converting them to living space but it just didn't make any sense financially and the city concluded it was cheaper to demolish and rebuild than convert.

helterskelteron Has Anyone Used Phreeli?

Verizon is pissing me off for selling customer data and now requiring a full year of service to unlock a device you own, so I want to know if this is a worthy alternative.

helterskelteron The Dilbert Afterlife

Shit rolls downhill...and most people just try to keep an eye on where the next turd comes from without bothering to watch where it goes after it's past them.

helterskelteron Plunging US Birth Rate Leaves Too Many Colleges with Too Few Kids

Honestly I would love to go back to college for studying $THING. And then I think about the kids there and decide I'd rather stay away. That and the stupid shit schools do to make sure you aren't using AI.

No thanks, I'd rather watch lectures on YouTube and go to the library. I don't need any diploma, I only want enrichment.

helterskelteron ‘ELITE’: The Palantir app ICE uses to find neighborhoods to raid

    I'm so free, I'm so free

    I'm so free, I'm so free

    Feel so good, now, I'm so free

    Oh oh oh, I'm so free

helterskelteron Why some clothes shrink in the wash and how to unshrink them

Good to know, I might give them a shot again. For Wild Ass, I'd go up probably two-four sizes from your Carhartts. If you're a 32 in Carhartt you'll want at least a 34 in WA. Go for 36 if the Carhartts are snug. WA will shrink slightly too.

helterskelteron Why some clothes shrink in the wash and how to unshrink them

I used to swear by them but I ordered like half a dozen pairs of their standard double fronted work dungs and they fell apart in the washer after 2-3 cycles. This was 2022-2023. It was weird, seams weren't stitched properly, the fabric was lighter, etc. I saw comments on their site which shared my experience.

I think this around the time they shifted production outside the USA (memory is hazy). If you see a "helmets to hardhats" decal on the inside of your pants on the pocket lining, they're US production.

I've switched to Bailey's "Wild Ass" brand of denim work pants for my physical laboring needs, but you have to wear them with logging suspenders.

helterskelteron GitHub should charge everyone $1 more per month to fund open source

The trick will be getting around the regulations that are being set up to protect interests of government and big business at the expense of everybody else. This will only become more difficult as time goes on.

helterskelteron Why some clothes shrink in the wash and how to unshrink them

$.02:

- American Giant is pretty good for their pullover hoodies. They'll wear out at the cuffs first, but I've kept a single hoody in use for like five years with some repair stitching.

- Standard Issue makes good waffle knit shirts. They'll last a few years depending on how often you wash them.

- Duluth Trading makes some good cotton shirts and boxers. Quality has declined slightly, but they're the best plain cotton shirts and boxers I've found so far.

- Big John makes denim jeans on old Levi looms. They even use cotton stitching.

- Carhartt makes some okay dressy dungarees. Their work pants are worthless these days though (in my experience). They've been pivoting to lifestyle for a few years now.

- Filson in my opinion has declined, but they're still pretty good. The socks are great, but they're overpriced.

(Only posting this because I've struggled finding decent clothes myself and it's hard to tell what's good when you're shopping online)

helterskelteron FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

My understanding is that the GPL doesn't have fucktons of precedent behind it in court. You bet the house on a big case and lose, the precedent will stick with GPL and may even weaken all copyleft licenses.

Also, it's better to gently apply pressure and set a track record of violators taking corrective measures so when you end up in court one day you've got a list of people and corporate entities which do comply because they believed that the terms were clear enough, which would lend weight to your argument.

Saying this as a GPL hardliner myself.

helterskelteron Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

People protect their secrets from stenographers with steganography.