HNHacker News
TopNewBestAskShowJobs

martinrue

737 karma · joined May 29, 2009

submissionscomments
martinrue··on Halt and Catch Fire Syllabus (2021)
Easily one of my favourite "tech" TV shows. But now I'm curious, has anyone recently found something similar to HCF that they similarly enjoyed? I've never found anything I've enjoyed quite as much as HCF.
martinrue··on Show HN: Draw a fish and watch it swim with the others
My initial fish likelihood score was 7% and I couldn't get it past 12% without looking up what a fish looks like. I learned a lot about myself via this app, so thank you.
martinrue··on Six Years of Gemini
No, it's as simple as it sounds. I should think about that at some point.
martinrue··on Six Years of Gemini
Gemini for me has been such a breath of fresh air in contrast to 2025 Internet, with so many ads, grift and now AI slop.

Back when I first discovered Gemini, I wanted to create a space for people to have a voice without needing to run their own server, so I built Station (https://martinrue.com/station). I've been running it ever since.

Gemini in general, and specifically folk who use Station regularly, make it a friendly, throwback-to-the-90s vibe, and I still value it a lot.

martinrue··on Six Years of Gemini
I made the first (and still popular) "social network" 4 years ago. Still going strong. More info: https://martinrue.com/station
martinrue··on Canal Boat Simulator
Reading this I totally feel the hacker vibes that carried me through my teens. Just sitting down and building something cool for the fun of it. Nice work! I once did something similar in C to create a 2d isometric training campus where I could teach others C on a whiteboard. I made the walls in Paint, just like you mentioned! One of the most fun things I ever made.
martinrue··on Ask HN: What are you working on? (May 2025)
I'm working on a language learning tool. An early version, that I'm quickly improving is live here: https://langsesh.com
martinrue··on LibreLingo – FOSS Alternative to Duolingo
Not FOSS, but for anyone who may find it useful, I launched a language learning project I've been hacking away on for a few months. Any feedback most welcome! https://langsesh.com
martinrue··on A Map of British Dialects
Why are there so few on this map? Seems wrong to me :)
martinrue··on Language and Personality
There's some interesting effects on decision making. I wrote about it here, for anyone curious:

Do we act differently in a foreign language? https://lingoh.news/do-we-act-differently-in-a-foreign-langu...

Does language influence how we think? https://lingoh.news/does-language-influence-how-we-think

martinrue··on What If You Hadn't?
Well said and could not agree more! Thanks for sharing.
martinrue··on What If You Hadn't?
Indeed. I don't know where my joy would come from if I wasn't doing something for the pure fun of it and to see where it'll take me.
martinrue··on Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (October 2024)
Awesome! Drop me a message when you're here, let's get coffee! All my info is at https://martinrue.com. Safe travels!
martinrue··on Ask HN: What are you working on? (October 2024)
I've been living in SE Asia for the past 9 months (mostly Vietnam) in order to make my runway last longer. In terms of Thailand, I have the 5-year DTV visa, which is probably SEA's best nomad visa option right now.
martinrue··on Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (October 2024)
I'm building a language learning app: https://yakk.app. Way to go, but made a good start and even a little bit of money so far. I quit my job and moved to Asia on savings to keep building. LMK if any of you guys are in Bangkok, let's hang out.
martinrue··on Ask HN: What's the most creative 'useless' program you've ever written?
I have a funny story about this. I wrote a tool to create a situation that allowed me to kill VNC server when the college admin used to spy on me years back: https://martinrue.com/coding-stories-me-vs-vnc/
martinrue··on Ask HN: What are you working on (September 2024)?
I'm working on a language learning web app (very cool to see several others here too) which gasp does not use AI! It mixes the form of a book and experience of an app, and provides small guides to the basics of languages. Currently only Vietnamese and Esperanto: https://yakk.app
martinrue··on Does language influence how we think?
Some of the info in this post is taken from the awesome Lera Boroditsky and her work. Highly recommended if you found this article interesting: https://www.edge.org/conversation/lera_boroditsky-how-does-o...
martinrue··on ULID: Like UUID but Sortable (2019)
Agreed. If the thing hasn't seen a commit in say 3 years, it'd be useful for idiots like me to know before they assume it's new because it's being shared now. Still, my bad :)
martinrue··on ULID: Like UUID but Sortable (2019)
You know, I didn't even look at the last commit! I assumed it was a new thing, and hence why it was being shared now. Here's an idea for HN: when processing a repo link, auto add (<time since last commit>) to the end of the title.
martinrue··on ULID: Like UUID but Sortable (2019)
There's no mention of the UUID v7 in the README. Based on my basic understanding, v7 uses the first 48 bits to encode the Unix epoch, which makes them more useful for sort/indexing scenarios. Might be useful to compare ULID and v7 in the README to make it clearer the benefits one has over the other.
martinrue··on Creative Writing Systems for Esperanto
MDR, d̠nk̥n!
martinrue··on Duolingo Sucks, Now What?
I've been building https://yakk.app for the past 2 years. It's only good for anyone curious to learn Esperanto right now, but Spanish + German books coming next.
martinrue··on How to run a small social network (2019)
Another shameless plug: I created the first social network for Gemini and have been running that for a couple of years now: https://martinrue.com/station
martinrue··on Ask HN: Could you share your personal blog here?
https://martinrue.com – my best HN post was my post about Esperanto, which reached #1 here for a few hours, but my favourite to write was the story of how I learned to code on the C64: https://martinrue.com/give-yourself-more-playtime
martinrue··on Ask HN: Most interesting tech you built for just yourself?
I made a text-only social network for the Gemini network and it recently surpassed 1k users: https://martinrue.com/station
martinrue··on Esperanto is not my favourite artificial language (2002)
The article is well-written and makes some good arguments about things that could be better, but like all languages (including conlangs), they're never going to be perfect and they're always going to have biases and rough bits.

I started studying Esperanto 4 years ago and it has become a fluent second language for me at this point. I now almost have more friends who speak the language than don't. While the language could be improved (by fixing word order and dropping the accusative, among other things mentioned here), it's still clear to me that Esperanto is a very easy language to learn. My comparative experience with Spanish has been much harder going.

Thanks to Esperanto I've spent time living abroad with Esperanto-speaking friends from different countries, travelled to local and international hangouts, and met some of the most open-minded and lovely people.

Outside of the hobbyist and academic contexts, there are a surprising number of people who actively use Esperanto (as well as create things: books, music, poetry, apps) and a cool international community to explore.

Just wanted to add a positive take.

P.S. There are a few articles on my blog about my own personal experience with the language and some projects I've worked on, in case anyone's curious: https://martinrue.com/articles

martinrue··on What is this Gemini thing, and why am I excited about it? (2020)
For anyone reading this and jumping into Gemini for the first time, I made a micro social network which already has a nice little community – come hang out on Station: gemini://station.martinrue.com
martinrue··on Minus
> I wonder what sorts of social media we'd see if it wasn't dependent on selling ads.

This is why I got interested in Gemini. It's a modern take on Gopher and the network already has a lot of folks posting content and sharing ideas completely free of the normal commercial goals you see on most http sites. I even made a small Twitter clone, Station, which has about 260 users right now. If you're a Gemini user, come hang out: gemini://station.martinrue.com

martinrue··on English is relatively easy to learn, but not to master (2018)
If anyone’s curious, I wrote more about it here: https://martinrue.com/zamenhofa-tago-18/
Page 1 of 3Next →