Hacker News Reader

mch82on How good are frontier models at physics?

Are models able to do math now, or do they still rely on “tools” to do the math?

mch82on Build Adafruit projects right from Firefox

Think of it as a collab between two leading open source organizations. Adafruit has contributed a significant amount of open source software and hardware that improves developer experience on microcontrollers, embedded Linux, and Circuit Python.

mch82on After 25 years, Wikipedia has proved that news doesn't need to look like news

This article is talking about Portal:Current Events on Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Current_events). The current events articles are fantastic! Normal newspaper articles are status updates. Current events articles synthesize news to present the current, comprehensive understanding about an event. It’s cool to monitor how current events articles evolve over time.

mch82on After 25 years, Wikipedia has proved that news doesn't need to look like news

I’m continually impressed by Wikipedia’s quality controls. In my experience people underestimate them.

mch82on Helm 4.0

Can you recommend any articles about minimum scale necessary to make Kubernetes worth it?

mch82on Show HN: I wrote a "web OS" based on the Apple Lisa's UI, with 1-bit graphics

The mouse actually works quite well with trackpad mode disabled. I’m using an iPhone Mini. One trick: To select a menu option tap-and-hold a menu title then drag to an option and let go to select.

Really cool!

mch82on Ask HN: What are non-social media ways to share photography/art

Are there any artist groups in your area? You might like participating in critique groups, meet ups, or entering shows.

mch82on Engineered Addictions

Those interested in this branch of the discussion might find Dave Winer’s blog series about building an open social network on top of the RSS standard worth a read. Here’s one of many posts: http://scripting.com/2025/06/28/211301.html

mch82on Ask HN: Share your AI prompt that stumps every model

“Explain your terms of service to me.”

mch82on Are fantasy games like Dungeons and Dragons a cure for US's loneliness epidemic?

Fully Automated is a Solarpunk RPG game manual with fun game systems for exploring optimistic tech futures, https://fullyautomatedrpg.com/

mch82on Troubleshooting: A skill that never goes obsolete

> even seemingly simple systems are infinitely complex. (As Carl Sagan put it: “If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.”)

Wikiquote cites the book “Cosmos” page 218 as the source of this cool quote. https://lccn.loc.gov/80005286

mch82on Webtop – Alpine,Ubuntu,Fedora,and Arch containers containing full desktop envs

Since the website doesn’t have pictures or videos… Is “webtop” a way to package GUI desktop apps in a Docker container so that the only dependencies to run the app are Docker Desktop and a web browser?

mch82on I deleted my social media accounts

By the dictionary definition, yes. However, there are three key differences. (1) People rank the HN feed instead of an algorithm; (2) the incentives of YC, companies, and the HN community seem better aligned; (3) the user experience degrades significantly when posts get too many comments.

mch82on U.S. appeals court strikes down FCC's net neutrality rules

Your point seems spot on to me. We’ve fallen into the trap of differentiating legislation by implementation (technology) instead of job-to-be-done (societal OKRs). Email is just mail is just a way of exchanging letters. Digital packets and analog signals are just ways of sending data over a wire.

mch82on Blogs rot. Wikis wait

Building on your idea, it’s also important to look at how wikis use Mediawiki. Different wikis in the Wikimedia ecosystem apply different sets of patterns appropriate to their size and purpose. Wikivoyage is a useful example of hierarchical information. Wikibooks shows how subpages can be used effectively.

Aside from Mediawiki.org, Ward Cunningham, inventor of the wiki, has written extensively about wiki patterns. He’s also created a reference implementation for a federated wiki that attempts to solve the fork & revision control use cases centralized wikis struggle with. See https://github.com/fedwiki

mch82on Ask HN: What are the best programmable holiday lights?

Adafruit has a couple holiday guides based on their Feather boards and NeoPixel lights. https://learn.adafruit.com/festive-feather-holiday-lights/ov...

mch82on Gitlab names Bill Staples as new CEO

https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/gitlab

The team that runs this Hacker News comment site also invests in startups from time to time. GitLab did pretty well.

:-)

mch82on Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough

Focus on your docs, code, and blog because they’re under your control. Write for yourself. Write for the people who use your work. Publish smaller chunks of work. Add value to your real network.

X, HN, and other socials are far less important. You have no control over whether the algorithm decides to amplify your content. Most work that’s foundational to society isn’t popular on socials today and won’t ever be. There’s a lottery chance you’ll get picked for amplification. Winning that lottery is great, but playing the lottery is not investing in your future.

mch82on Our First Generalist Policy

Your question is great. It’s easy to forget that people are the point, not the tech.

When I was in college, automation was envisioned to reduce injuries to people, increase access to goods, and to create more discretionary time. Somehow we’ve lost the focus on human outcomes.

mch82on Show HN: I built a task manager that separates "do" and "due" dates

Excited to try this out. Will the app edit my iOS calendar, or is it isolated off?

I love that you’re treating tasks as calendar events. Tasks take time, so that’s how it should be.

mch82on Show HN: HTML for People

It’s ridiculous how complicated it’s gotten to answer my parents’ questions about stuff like this. The old desktop metaphors are gone. Screens are difficult for older eyes to read. Every app has a cloud service. Really seems like huge step back in usability.

mch82on Too much efficiency makes everything worse (2022)

Really interesting to learn about the ML perspective of the cost of localized efficiency. Local efficiency can also make things worse from a queueing theory perspective. Optimizing a process step that feeds a system bottleneck can cause queues to pile up, decreasing system-level productivity. Automating production of waste forces downstream processes to deal with added waste.

mch82on Ask HN: Experience with Large K8s Clusters?

Thank you for taking time to comment.

mch82on LLMs can't do probability

Can you recommend any references that explain why LLMs can’t do math?

mch82on Help us invent CSS Grid Level 3, a.k.a. "Masonry" layout

Constraint-based layout using the Cassowary algorithm seemed like a popular alternative for a while (see https://github.com/slightlyoff/cassowary.js/?tab=readme-ov-f...). It’s designed to solve for variance in screen size and shape. Apple switched to Swift UI and may have moved on from this approach.

mch82on [dead]

Thanks

mch82on [dead]

> A radio signal takes about 22.5 hours to reach Voyager 1

> Launched over 46 years ago

mch82on How to fix America's aviation system (2023)

How much of the job relies on visual line of sight from the tower? Could any of the job be done remotely using information displays & high quality video feeds?

mch82on Roll-Invert-Unroll: An easier way to replace a duvet cover

The correct technique is to replace a duvet cover by going to the store and purchasing a comforter. Ideally, purchase two comforters and alternate the one you’re washing with the one you’re using so that the bed is never without one.

:-)

mch82on The race to replace Redis

Universal basic income & bug/feature bounties, for example.