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thorvaldsson

20 karma · joined January 21, 2023

Hrafn Thorvaldsson

https://hth.is

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thorvaldsson··on Ask HN: Share your personal website
https://hth.is
thorvaldsson··on .localhost Domains
In my case I just setup a subdomain 'local.<domain>' to my personal domain and had Let's Encrypt create valid certificates for it via Traefik.

Each service is then exposed via '<service>.local.<domain>'.

This has been working flawlessly for me for some time.

thorvaldsson··on What scripts have you built to stand up a new server?
Didn't know about that, will need to look into it. Thanks!
thorvaldsson··on What scripts have you built to stand up a new server?
I use Ansible to setup my servers, and also all my workstations.

The first step is to run a bootstrap script, then run a tailor made playbook for each situation.

Those specific playbooks haven't been made public, but I wrote something[0] last year about how to setup an Android development environment using Ansible, and as part of that shared my bootstrap script.

[0]: https://hth.is/2023/01/02/android-ansible/

thorvaldsson··on Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (October 2024)
Not exactly what I'm currently working on, as it got released last week, but...

I gathered many of my bash scripts and aliases, focused on making use of Android Debug Bridge (ADB) easier, together into a single collection[0]. The wiki page has visuals and more information on functionality[1].

Then starting a new project this week around gathering and displaying information on air quality in Iceland.

[0]: https://github.com/hrafnthor/adb_helper

[1]: https://github.com/hrafnthor/adb_helper/wiki/ADB-Helper-wiki

thorvaldsson··on Mozilla's new Firefox Linux package for Ubuntu and Debian derivatives
This behaviour can be disabled by blacklisting Firefox from APT's unnattended upgrades. I wrote[0] something up on this last year if anyone is interested.

[0]: https://hth.is/2023/01/10/blacklist-firefox/

thorvaldsson··on Ask HN: Could you share your personal blog here?
Certainly!

https://hth.is

It mostly acts as a central hub, tying together a blog (not many posts but still some), portfolio, cv, pictures and social links.

thorvaldsson··on My First Impressions of Nix
I got into Ansible around 8 months ago and wrote up a blog post with detailed steps, and a companion repository, about how to get started with using it. The blog post goes into how to setup everything needed for Android development via Ansible.

Perhaps, if you decide to take a look at Ansible, it might help with getting started https://hth.is/2023/01/02/android-ansible/

thorvaldsson··on Ask HN: Something you’ve done your whole life that you realized is wrong?
As someone who sits at a desk for long hours it was not doing stretching exercises, such as yoga, every day.

I thank my partner for introducing that habit into my life.

thorvaldsson··on Ask HN: How do I know that I am autistic?
My understanding of the DSM (which I have not read) spectrums was that it included all peoples, with one end containing most individuals who have little to no symptoms indicative of a disorder and as we move further down the other end of the spectrum the number and intensity of symptoms increase.

Is my understanding incorrect here (genuine good faith question)?

thorvaldsson··on Ask HN: Why do you find your job satisfying?
In the past, what has made me love a job have been the people I got to interact with on a daily bases.

In some areas I was the expert, but in so many others they had the expertise, and so I got to learn a lot from them. And not just in terms of technology and software.

We built up a comradery strong enough that to this day I still regularly meet with old team mates from previous positions to catch up and stay in touch.

Second to that were the problems that needed solving. Still important but not as much as the team.

thorvaldsson··on Ask HN: Why do you find your job satisfying?
I concur.

It sounds like the coworkers are perhaps more knowledgeable in some areas, rather than necessarily having higher IQ's.

And getting to work with people who are more knowledgeable than you is exactly where you want to be.

Never be the smartest person in the room (unless I guess if you are trying to sell or buy something).

thorvaldsson··on The Disappearance of the Ashtray
I believe around 20% of respondents in the Netherlands said they smoked in 2020.

For the same period, Iceland though was close to the US, with a reported rate of 12% of respondents saying they smoked.

thorvaldsson··on Magnetic method to clean PFAS contaminated water
Not to sound too cynical, but humanity has rarely (or ever) been able to react in a coordinated timely fashion to any event threating it in any way.

That is until we reach the brink.

Think of the Montreal Protocol from the 80's, a treaty for phasing out and eventually banning CFC/HCFC's in an effort to protect and hopefully restore the ozone layer. The protocol was in response to a dramatic seasonal depletion of the ozone layer over Antarctica in the 80's.

To me, from everything I read and hear about PFAS pollution, it would seem we are at the brink again in terms of those chemicals.

thorvaldsson··on Brief structured respiration enhances mood and reduces physiological arousal
As it was explained to me (and from reading I have done), the mammalian diving response (which all mammals have but to varying degrees) works to preserve oxygen and energy expenditure when underwater.

For seals and other water dwelling mammals this is a controlled sophisticated mechanism that is deliberately used when underwater.

In humans it is a survival mechanism, triggered when the trigeminal nerve on our face gets submerged in water. And the colder it is the stronger the response seems to be.

Submerging one self in cold water up to your head seems to affect many parts of the human body, and in my case I am not sure which part it is that I am feeling the effects of. But it leaves me feeling more alert, awake and with less mindfog after doing an extended cold water dip (going to the pool without one in comparison leaves me sluggish).

Wikipedia has a good section on the response: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diving_reflex

thorvaldsson··on Brief structured respiration enhances mood and reduces physiological arousal
The swimming pools in my area of the world all have a 'cold tub' with water ranging in temperature from 6-10°C. On average I visit the pools roughly 2-3x per week and always spend around ~12 minutes (in 4 minute chunks) in the 'cold tub' doing controlled breathing.

That, and plunging and holding my face in the cold water to try to trigger the mammalian diving response, has really had a positive effect on me (ofcourse only n=1).

Think I'll add 5 minutes of these breathing practices to my routine as well.