Hacker News Reader

jbmon France Aiming to Replace Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, etc.

I have made most of my karma off of trashing Teams, and while it is "better" than it was before (I rarely get infinite loops crashing my browser now), it is hard to call it acceptable.

Yesterday I was supposed to have a call. I have the app open and it never once let me know that there was a meeting. The entire purpose is supposed to be collaboration with other people; if they aren't going to notify me on the web app, what's the point?

I know a lot of it is because of their need to support an infinite number of potential configurations, but if it had been a protocol instead of an app, we would have had the perfect frontend by now. (But then, how would they be stealing all of my data?)

jbmon Adoption of EVs tied to real-world reductions in air pollution: study

This will be met with consternation, not appreciation. The people who comment about brake dust in EV topics are the people who complain about birds when talking about windmills.

We know it is disingenuous because no one cares about this when discussing overweight trucks and SUVs. Good news about a reduction in pollution from EVs? Can't have that. It's like the "At what price" meme around headlines about China.

Going forward, I will downvote any comment about "brake pollution" and "tire pollution" that does not begin with - specifically - "This is a bigger issue for large, gas-powered trucks and SUVs", and invite you all to do so to. The association of these shitty comments with EV topics is as organic as lighter fluid.

jbmon American importers and consumers bear the cost of 2025 tariffs: analysis

I feel we should have an independent source by now if that was true. Thousands of Chinese suppliers all taking losses to keep market share seems unlikely. A government program would have been clearly shown too. I think it is more likely that goods are being labelled with different origins and being imported through preexisting treaties like NAFTA (I forgot the Trumpian name for his negotiated version), or that Economists are shameless modern tortoise shell baking shamans that we need to sacrifice to appease angry dead ancestors.

jbmon American importers and consumers bear the cost of 2025 tariffs: analysis

The article we are commenting on literally says 96% is paid for by Americans. Do you have a reason to accept Lutnick's position?

jbmon Canada's deal with China signals it is serious about shift from US

My Chinese friends refer to Trump as the "Builder of the Nation" (the nation being China)

I wonder how wide spread drug abuse is among the moneyed elite and how paranoia and other related factors are affecting their decisions

jbmon Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

I feel that neither justifies 2 generations of separatist blackmail, and the use of holocaust terms for constitution failures between two Quebecois men (Lesvesque and Trudeau) is inappropriate — but completely and utterly unsurprising for the overwrought self-pitying elite of the province. Moreover, it is no surprise that Quebec rejects the constitution but simultaneously uses the Not Withstanding clause to block language and religious rights. It is like the bully in Doraemon — what's mine is mine and what's yours is mine.

That said I do grudgingly admire Lesvesque and felt he was much better than all of his successors. You could tell he had a philosophy of a Quebec that could be an actual nation, not merely a collection of childless people who spoke French and simply emulated France.

There is no Lesvesque in Alberta and that is why Alberta will never be a nation; only a gas station for the US. Still, if the only thing people value is income maybe that's the better outcome.

jbmon Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

That might be the rhetoric, but separation means joining the US. The experience of landlocked country would be one of getting taken advantage of by every country around it.

There is a good 20% of people in Alberta who would vote for separation today. Take a close look, they aren't voting to be an independent country surrounded by a hostile country around it and a superpower that hijacks oil tankers to the south.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/red-deer-alberta-ind...

It is a stupid idea because the level of changes that would have to happen to everything would be much, much more than people realize. But Brexit has shown us that people will vote for stupid things if they are sold by trusted-but-dishonest actors

jbmon Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

I signed that petition, just like I voted against Quebec's treason of 1995.

jbmon Canada slashes 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs to 6%

I live in a bubble in Calgary, and am from Montreal originally. Despite that, I saw lines of people waiting to sign petitions for separation in smaller cities. People who were happy to have their photos taken while they are signing petitions for separation from Canada.

There are some cultural factors in Alberta which draw it closer to the US than to Ontario and Quebec. Libertarianism, pro-fossil fuels, differences wrt firearms, differences in attitudes to crime and punishment, etc... The perception is that previous compromises around these items are slowly frayed to appease voting blocks in other provinces (mostly Quebec).

Then, the dirty reality; the Canadian economy has never been "great", at least in my lifetime. Nearly my whole class at university wound up going to the US, because one couldn't get a decent paying job in Canada in a lot of fields. Even our current prime minister did a ton of his work abroad. If separating (IE: joining the US) was only an economic question, only a tiny elite would support remaining a part of Canada.

The question Alberta separatists wish to ask is much less dishonest than the Quebec separation question in 95, which leads me to believe they are much more confident about their success. I wouldn't rule it out.

jbmon 4k tons of potatoes to be given away for free in Berlin

I remember liking it too; it was actually a Schweppes product but as my boss said, it was straight to flush out. The Japan market just doesn't like sweet drinks. The top drink was green tea, which probably caused consternation as it was so expensive to manufacture.

In retrospect I miss the teas from Japan more than any of the weird flavours we had. Thankfully one can make them oneself but there is something special about going to a corner store and having relatively healthy options instead of a hundred flavours of sugar water.

jbmon 4k tons of potatoes to be given away for free in Berlin

When I worked at a Coke bottler in Japan, we had similar issues with product.

Stuff that didn't sell was called "Flush Out" and had to be disposed of.

You couldn't legally just dump the contents without paying money so I made an app that let employees get cases for shipping costs. It was popular, even though we were usually talking about weird flavours that no one liked (stuff akin to Apple Ginger ale)

They eventually got rid of it, but I was already out of the company so I didn't know the reason.

jbmon Scott Adams has died

I always thought it was the same as a solid part of his specific cohort and generation; excessive entertainment-style news consumption through the normal rabble rousers. For a group of people who were obsessed with telling me that wrestling was fake, they sure were a group of marks when a guy with a gravelly voice told them what to think.

I didn't know about his comments about Black people until today. It's more than a bit pathetic that he devolved into colour-based absurdities so late in life. For someone who could pattern match the reality of life at a large company so effectively, it's unfortunate he couldn't realize he was being played by 4chan trolls and fellow travelers in the media.

jbmon Tesla’s 4680 battery supply chain collapses as partner writes down deal by 99%

The one that intrigued me more was circa the 2017 era when Tesla was supposedly an energy company. That might have justified their valuation at the time, but it turned out to be dishonest spin.

Yet again, there are no adults and the shallow fabric of society fails to conceal the greed boner under the sheets.

jbmon GLM-4.7: Advancing the Coding Capability

I'm surprised by this; I have it also and was running through OpenCode but I gave up and moved back to Claude Code. I was not able to get it to generate any useful code for me.

How did you manage to use it? I am wondering if maybe I was using it incorrectly, or needed to include different context to get something useful out of it.

jbmon GPT-5.2-Codex

When Claude screws up a task I use Codex and vice versa. It helps a lot when I'm working on libraries that I've never touched before, especially iOS related.

(Also, I can't imagine who is blessed with so much spare tome that they would look down on an assistant that does decent work)

jbmon Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (December 2025)

I've been working on a weightlifting logging app for the apple watch. I haven't submitted it yet since I am still beta testing, but I'm mostly feature complete.

It's intended to be anti-memetic, and anti-guilt trip. Just put it on your watch, install a program (open format) and you never need the phone itself. Your workout is a holiday from your phone.

The data can be exported if you want to use it elsewhere.

I originally made it for ROCKNIX but as there was no way to share the app I paid the Apple tax :/

https://github.com/jmahmood/RED-STAR-WEIGHTLIFTING

jbmon GPT-5.2

I use a few AIs together to examine the same code base. I find Grok better than some of the Chinese ones I've used, but it isn't in the same league as Claude or Codex.

jbmon Bad Dye Job

https://daringfireball.net/2025/03/something_is_rotten_in_th...

This article? If it caused consternation it boggles the mind. These are all completely normal reactions to Apple's AI missteps.

If detailed but milquetoast criticisms are grounds for excommunication, maybe the company really does have serious management issues.

jbmon Pakistan says rooftop solar output to exceed grid demand in some hubs next year

I have to disagree.

In Calgary, the streets are numbered and it's super easy to navigate between "16th St NW" and "18th St NW". Certainly easier to understand than "Go from St. Catherine's Street to Peel" in Montreal.

Where they are not numbered, they at least have the name of the community. Edgemont, for example, has no numbered streets but the name usually starts with "Edge", making it clear what part of the city you are going to.

I don't think it is perfect but I have also lived in Tokyo where the system is literally impossible without a GPS because the locations are not as neatly arranged as here.

jbmon Ultima VII Revisited

Vaguely related but there is this whole set of videos on the production of the Ultima series on Youtube by Majuular that I've been playing while working out. Just such a different time, I almost regret missing it.

His video on 7 and serpent's isle brought back a lot of memories (although my preferred origin game was Wing Commander)

https://youtu.be/0NyaGRNH2zE

jbmon Heretic: Automatic censorship removal for language models

I tested this with ChatGPT 5.1. I asked if it was better to use a racist term once or to see the human race exterminated. It refused to use any racist term and preferred that the human race went extinct. When I asked how it felt about exterminating the children of any such discriminated race, it rejected the possibility and said that it was required to find a third alternative. You can test it yourself if you want, it won't ban you for the question.

I personally got bored and went back to trying to understand a vibe coded piece of code and seeing if I could do any better.

jbmon GPT-5.1: A smarter, more conversational ChatGPT

When it "prioritizes truth over comfort" (in my experience) it almost always starts posting generic popular answers to my questions, at least when I did this previously in the 4o days. I refer to it as "Reddit Frontpage Mode".

jbmon Toucan Wireless Split Keyboard with Touchpad

> 42 keys

It is a nice looking keyboard but do people find value in such minimal layouts?

jbmon Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (Nov 2025)

I kinda gave up on building apps for Rocknix (since there is no easy way to distribute software) and instead have been looking at my apple watch. I ported over some software for workouts that is streamlined. I'm working on a way with MDNS to sync data to my Linux PC automatically when I'm at home.

If it works out, maybe this could be a way for me to replace the compromised Apple Music app with something that actually syncs to my music on my desktop.

jbmon The great decoupling of labor and capital

I dunno, people really are living in tent cities and Hondas in Canada. The gains were permanent.

jbmon NextSilicon reveals new processor chip in challenge to Intel, AMD

How dare you have a moral objection to buying from a state accused of genocide. Please stick to completely organic complaints about comedy festivals and soccer tournaments.

jbmon Harnessing America's heat pump moment

I had a similar problem too. Was unable to find anyone who was willing to quote me on a heatpump when I was installing my air conditioner. I assume it will be better in 5-10 years when I have to replace them.

jbmon Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

Is there any value in fixing the battery on these? IE: Do the other components last long enough to be worth the cost?

It seems like procuring the battery is not as expensive as the Tesla battery (I see someone who did it themselves for $6k on Youtube with the battery from a wrecked leaf). In comparison, the cost I see for my Model 3 is about ~$18k CAD.

Getting a car up and running for $8k might be worth it if it is otherwise dependable, but I've only heard unfortunate stories about the first gen Leaf.

jbmon Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

I can respect that. For what it is worth, I validated with a well-trusted local shop that works on EVs (and works with Tesla) that said the issue is starting to pop up. Moreover, it's the government of Korea that is making this claim as well.

(I also find it difficult to separate noise from signal about Tesla. However, I don't consider them innocent victims; besides the elephant in the room, they literally eliminated their PR department)

jbmon Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

I am a bit more concerned about batteries now as opposed to an year ago.

We had this article from Elektrek [1] about battery issues in South Korea. When I asked my local electric maintenance shop [2, sorry for the FB link], they said they have started seeing the same issue in Model 3s and Ys in Canada as well. (They also said that it is too early to tell how common it would become)

This may bode well for recycling since the issues is an unbalance, not the whole pack failing.

[1] https://electrek.co/2025/10/14/tesla-is-at-risk-of-lossing-s...

[2] https://www.facebook.com/groups/albertaEV/posts/248558844207...