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sylvainr65

0 karma · joined April 25, 2020

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sylvainr65··on 'The French people want to save us': help pours in for glassmaker Duralex
French Canadian here - I remember my mom loving these glasses, back in the 70s-80s. We still use some of them 50 years later. They last for decades.
sylvainr65··on Samsung makes ads on smart fridges official with upcoming software update
Apparently, you can turn off ads quite simply.

* How to turn off ads on your Family Hub The widget will appear by default on the fridges as part of the software update. However, Samsung is giving users the option to turn off ads. To do this, go to the Settings page on the fridge, scroll to Advertisements, select it, and you’ll be taken to a screen where you can toggle off ads.

This will remove the widget entirely. If you think you might actually like the widget’s other features (calendar, weather, and news), you can “X” out a particular ad, and it won’t pop up again. But then you’ll get another ad.

sylvainr65··on Big Tech Killed the Golden Age of Programming
Still hiring every other months in my company. Hard to find real talented developers. My guest : most of them are already employed. This article does not reflect my reality at all.
sylvainr65··on Grand Theft Auto VI Is Now Coming May 26, 2026
Still playing GTA IV. Hope they'll take more time for GTA VI.
sylvainr65··on 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think
This is a cultural thing, I think. I'm proud to work more hours than my boss expects. My relative never brag about the number of days off they have, but will quickly tell you that they only took one week off last year. The expected reaction is: wow, you're a great worker.
sylvainr65··on Why I hate your Single Page App (2016)
Looking at your login, you probably gone through a lot more before cgi-bin. Nice.
sylvainr65··on 3x new books added to the Pirate Library Mirror
I really like the Amazon Prime model: author are payed depending on the number of pages read. They get something like $4 to $5 per 1000 pages read.
sylvainr65··on Ask HN: Why do people write comments?
I often take a lot of time to write a comment. I think, I research, I change a word, remove a paragraph, move phrases around. And then, often, I just don't post it.

The reason I do this: It makes me think.

sylvainr65··on Counterfeits, fraud, and theft: Why Silca changed its return policy
I think I'm the average Amazon customer. If I buy something cheap and it breaks or doesn't work as expected, I just throw it away. If it's expensive, then I ask for a return, but I really take care to return it as new. If I command something and change my mind afterward, I just keep it and take it as a lesson.
sylvainr65··on Why Ruby Is More Readable Than Python
Not on topic but a little rant about dark themes. After years of reading code displayed in dark mode on a white page (high contrast), I still wonder why. It's really hard to see, at least for me. Most of the time, I end up selecting the whole piece of code to have white text on a black background - it's not as good as black text on a white background, but it's much better than dark blue or dark red on a black background.

This interesting article uses dark red for operators (".", "=", "<", etc.). This is one of the worst choices. On a dark background, please do not use dark color.

sylvainr65··on Euro Truck Simulator 2: ZX Spectrum Edition
Would love this !
sylvainr65··on In Moscow, McDonald's packs up, radio falls silent and the brain drain begins
CNN, command.
sylvainr65··on Principles of Green Software Engineering
I don't follow. We wrote fax softwares that eliminated the need to buy a fax. We wrote accounting softwares that eliminated the need to have hundred of accountants to get to the office every day, using cars! We wrote softwares that eliminated the need to sell and buy physical encyclopedias, dictionaries, watches, photo albums, typewriters, books, compasses, maps, calculators, tickets, cameras, VHS, calendars, answering machines, telephones, flashlights, radios, newspapers, agendas, snail mail, sound systems, physical money. We wrote softwares that get anything delivered to your door without having you getting in your car and spending hours in 3 physical stores. We wrote softwares that make it possible to share your neighbor car for a little fee. We wrote softwares that can assess climate changes effects.

To me, softwares are the greenest inventions ever.

sylvainr65··on World on 'catastrophic' path to 2.7C warming, warns UN chief
> are skeptics even making predictions?

I think that this is their point: predictions cannot be made with our current understanding of climate.

sylvainr65··on World on 'catastrophic' path to 2.7C warming, warns UN chief
> and give it away

But who would pay for this? At the end, the States can only take the money in the pocket of its citizens, present or future.

sylvainr65··on World on 'catastrophic' path to 2.7C warming, warns UN chief
> A&W tried introducing a 1/3 lb burger, and it failed horribly because the average consumer couldn't understand that 1/3 is greater than 1/4.

Why then they didn't come up with a 1/5 lb burger?

sylvainr65··on How to Be Clear
Excellent post. I should add that text formating is almost as important as what you want to say.

11 short sentences addressing 4 points packed in a single paragraph is really painfull to read.

Use paragraphs, new lines and bullet points as much as you can.

Let the reader breath.

sylvainr65··on Thank You, Apple for Standing Strong for Privacy
Mozilla tries to find a niche to survive. But I really think that personalized adverts are a better thing that random adverts.
sylvainr65··on The strange economics of open-source software (2015)
Your premise is false: Open source software has nothing to do with communism, Marxism or socialism.

How many successful open source software created in communist countries do you know? Isn't it surprising that most successful open source software have been developed in capitalist countries ?

In fact, only capitalist countries give you enough wealth to spend a lot of time on hobbies, like developing open source software. If you were living in a communist country, you would probably spend most of your time searching for food.

sylvainr65··on How Microsoft crushed Slack
No. I was using Netscape in the 90s. Somewhere, Netscape published a new version that was very buggy. I switched to IE because it was way more stable. And never come back.

Same thing for MS Word vs Wordperfect and Excel vs Lotus 123.

sylvainr65··on My dad got scammed for $3k worth of gift cards
Greet post, thanks!
sylvainr65··on Why can't programmers design software?
Cannot be anything but a joke. The problem is simple, the solution requires 10 lines. There is no reason, absolutly none, to create an interface for a such simple problem.
sylvainr65··on Why can't programmers design software?
It is parody.