Hacker News: RLN

New comment by RLN in "The magic of through running"

RLN — Tue, 17 Jun 2025 10:43:01 +0000

One problem I've encountered in Munich is they essentially have a single trunk that runs through the centre. In the case of problems on one line you can often find multiple other lines are also affected. London always seems to have a redundancy in the case of a line being unusable.

I suppose this is more a problem of sharing track than through running, but I just found it funny to see Munich public transport described so positively.

New comment by RLN in "Forum with 2.6M posts being deleted due to UK Online Safety Act"

RLN — Tue, 25 Feb 2025 23:26:20 +0000

>I knew when I left (I was the last of my school year to do so) it was going to get bad once Elizabeth died

How small was your school year?! What does Elizabeth (presumably the 2nd) dying have to do with anything?

New comment by RLN in "Set Up a $4/Mo Hetzner VM to Skip the Serverless Tax"

RLN — Sun, 01 Sep 2024 18:25:52 +0000

I've just switched from DigitalOcean to Hetzner purely for cost. I'm getting more resources for less money. Features seem pretty comparable to me but I don't need anything more than a standard VPS. The only thing I've found weird is SELinux being set to permissive by default.

I'm not sure why anyone would be patriotic about a private company.

New comment by RLN in "I spend £8,500 a year to live on a train"

RLN — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 11:07:35 +0000

This is less than half of my rent in London. That's not including gas and electric bills, as well as council tax! I do enjoy having a kitchen though.

"technically has no fixed abode" I think here probably actually means he's registered at his parents house. This would likely be a lot more difficult if you were truly homeless.

New comment by RLN in "See a Satellite Tonight"

RLN — Wed, 02 Nov 2022 14:29:40 +0000

Apart from being incredibly optimisic about clouds and light pollution, this is really cool. Showing where the satellite should pass from a streetview perspective is a really nice addition I've not seen before.

New comment by RLN in "Map showing birthplaces of "notable people" around the world"

RLN — Fri, 29 Jul 2022 15:40:13 +0000

This seems a little inaccurate. I've found John Pearse for my hometown in Hook, Hampshire. However Wikipedia indicates he's from Hook in Yorkshire.

I imagine this could be repeated quite often as there are so many reused place names. Hook in Yorkshire doesn't even get a look in on this map!

New comment by RLN in "Using a catch-all domain is a mistake"

RLN — Wed, 01 Jun 2022 18:14:25 +0000

I have several times. Generally I can just say "you can write anything before the @ and it still comes to me" and people understand it though. It doesn't need to become a big discussion about how email works and they've probably forgotten by the end of the interaction.

Maybe once or twice I've given my address to a new friend as newfriend@domain.com and it's lead to at least a small discussion about it.

New comment by RLN in "In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously"

RLN — Wed, 23 Feb 2022 00:03:34 +0000

In the Netherlands it's not terribly uncommon. It used to be more the other direction in the UK but it has become more common to be card only here as well.

I'm not really sure where class comes into accepted forms of payment? But I'm also not sure what class you're talking about.

New comment by RLN in "Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car"

RLN — Wed, 26 Jan 2022 17:09:28 +0000

It looks like the flat she referred to still exists, Addison Park Mansions in Hammersmith. So we can make quite good comparison presuming one is rented out still. Though I wouldn't be suprised if they've been parted out into smaller flats, or rented as shared.

Funnily enough I'm sat in my flat about 10 minutes walk away. My building appears to have been built sometime in the late 1800s, and is somewhat falling apart. So the value for money might be even less now.

New comment by RLN in "Devon calls victory in 27-year war on termites"

RLN — Wed, 22 Dec 2021 00:05:25 +0000

>“What’s the moral of the story?” he asked. “You can make up your own, but for me, this is public service in its finest form – unseen, largely unknown and rarely heralded – but done with selfless dedication year after year simply because of what would happen to the rest of us if it wasn’t.”

This is my big takeaway, I know a lot of people are against government projects. But in this case especially, where is the profit motive to fix this problem? I can't see any other solution than long term investment in the long term interest of the country. What other entity could ensure long term commitment to such an unprofitable project?

New comment by RLN in "Trader Joe Wrote a Memoir"

RLN — Sun, 24 Oct 2021 22:41:25 +0000

Is it not? Or do you just not feel that's a negative?

New comment by RLN in "Mark Zuckerberg says Facebook will turn into a ‘metaverse’"

RLN — Sun, 25 Jul 2021 00:32:45 +0000

>I think straight black hair often implies non-european ancestry

What? I better tell some friends they aren't European.

New comment by RLN in "Irish webapp to recreate pub atmosphere at home"

RLN — Wed, 17 Mar 2021 15:45:20 +0000

I love the Paddy Losty (45 pints) reference in the old man chat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkcXjholnGk

New comment by RLN in "Europe's night trains are on track for a resurgence"

RLN — Mon, 14 Dec 2020 22:06:48 +0000

I did Amsterdam to London by bus overnight once. From memory via Rotterdam, Antwerp and Lille. It was appalling but really something to be experienced. The next day was a write off but I suppose we didn't help ourselves with pints on the ferry and arriving just in time to wait outside Wetherspoons for it to open.

I can't wait for Europe to reopen and travel in a more civilised manner!

New comment by RLN in "‘God preserve us all’: Samuel Pepys and the Great Plague (2015)"

RLN — Wed, 11 Mar 2020 14:45:54 +0000

It's very well known in some areas of Europe, from Wikipedia:

"Keeping Up Appearances was a great success in the UK, and also captured large audiences in the US, Canada, Australia, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Ireland, Belgium, and the Netherlands. By February 2016, it had been sold nearly 1,000 times to overseas broadcasters, making it BBC Worldwide's most exported television programme."

New comment by RLN in "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (July 2019)"

RLN — Tue, 02 Jul 2019 01:56:58 +0000

  Location: Currently in Sydney Australia, but will move anywhere
  Remote: Willing
  Willing to relocate: Yes
  Technologies: General systems administrator, ready to get to grips with anything that is needed
  Résumé/CV: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dancottam/
  Email: hiring at dancottam.nl

I've worked in a few different industries normally supporting mixed environments with a focus on Linux. Looking to move in a more devops direction and find somewhere I can keep learning.

New comment by RLN in "The heroes of the Thai cave rescue"

RLN — Wed, 30 Jan 2019 02:42:06 +0000

I found it a bit odd that the author differentiated between Britons and Europeans. Britons are Europeans!

I wonder why Europeans were so well represented. I wouldn't have necessarily imagined that would be the case. Is it simply because most European countries are relatively wealthy?

New comment by RLN in "The Squishiest, Sweetest Sleep"

RLN — Fri, 07 Dec 2018 05:45:57 +0000

My girlfriend used to work for a reasonably well known mattress company. Apparently returned mattresses there were given to charity for use in homeless shelters and such.

New comment by RLN in "Transforming Wikipedia into a cultural knowledge quiz"

RLN — Thu, 01 Nov 2018 04:52:11 +0000

I'd go as far to generally say it just means United States culture.

New comment by RLN in "EU to stop changing the clocks in 2019"

RLN — Tue, 18 Sep 2018 03:05:16 +0000

I'd imagine the Benelux countries would stay together as there is so much cooperation between them.