<rss version="2.0" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"><channel><title>Hacker News: Theodores</title><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=Theodores</link><description>Hacker News RSS</description><docs>https://hnrss.org/</docs><generator>hnrss v2.1.1</generator><lastBuildDate>Thu, 15 Oct 2026 06:10:34 +0000</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://hnrss.org/user?id=Theodores" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"></atom:link><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Hiking the world in search of rare cheeses"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>"You must be joking.."<p>I can fully understand the love of cheese, however, there is a hidden cost to it, that I have experienced but only recently acknowledged.<p>The places they show on TV and in articles such as this is analogous to showing posh West End made-to-measure tailors and pretending that those SHEIN garments from Bangladesh are made the same way, with no 'slavery' involved.<p>I worked in a cheese factory as a student, taking up the job with an attitude that it must be 'women's work'. How wrong I was. Twelve hour shifts, with 'every object' weighing (or wheying) upwards of 25Kg and every one of your senses brutally assaulted, always with the potential to lose life, limb or another finger in a moment of lapsed focus. Just surviving became the intellectual challenge, with many not making it past two hours before throwing in the towel. Mastery was my goal and I put in the sleepless 'nights' with relentless 'tennis elbow' to get there, achievement unlocked.<p>Because I was a student, this was not a forever job, and there was a higher tax threshold for students, making it financially tough but worth while.<p>On a trip down memory lane I looked the old place up, to discover it had shut down due to numerous health and safety violations, which made me chuckle. That was the culture, and the rule, for example, those chemicals that have huge warning labels, to read such a label after getting nervous ticks after using it, would be moral cowardice. Or, if you needed someone's attention, because the machines were so loud, you would casually throw a 25 Kg object at them (a cheese or a bag of salt) as a 'gentle tap on the shoulder'.<p>On reflection, there is this small matter of the human cost to cheese. PETA might shock people with cheesy animal welfare issues and cardiologists might not be entirely positive about the consumption of 'saturated fat laced with salt', however, few have experienced the harsh reality of working in the industry, to have the strength to write about how extreme and ultra-violent the production of this harmless product can be.<p>I am not saying 'boycott the product', just 'value it more'.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 13 Oct 2026 21:23:42 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50078982</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50078982</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50078982</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "California closed the Montana license plate loophole"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Everyone wants to drive their Lambo on the moon with Montana plates thanks to social media clowns, and it has been this way since the blockchain craze of a few years ago.<p>I wonder if the Montana plates 'loophole' would be as well 'exploited' had it not been for the fictional world of YouTube.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 07 Oct 2026 09:51:49 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49990471</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49990471</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49990471</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "The Legend of the Paper Crane"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>On the day that the war in Afghanistan started in 2001, I visited Trafalgar Square with my sister late at night to place a singular paper crane in each of the two pools below the fountains.<p>I have liked paper cranes ever since, hence I commend your crane-themed fashion 'statements'.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 07 Oct 2026 09:36:09 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49990358</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49990358</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49990358</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "JetBrains reported a net financial loss first time in its tracked history"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>This would make sense for me, as a long time Jetbrains user and not desiring to use AI for anything apart from single line code completion, which the current Jetbrains tools do quite well.<p>I have used their support before, to be extremely impressed. This is an area that they could differentiate themselves in.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 06 Oct 2026 12:39:21 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49977525</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49977525</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49977525</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Enjoy Every Sandwich"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>IMHO this is Beginner Level, basic enjoyment, at the cost of cardiovascular health, due to those saturated fats that the man in the sandwich shop never tells you about.<p>To up your sandwich enjoyment game, what you want is a bread making machine, ideally by Panasonic, with plenty of flour in the cupboards and a well-rehearsed routine of putting the bread on.<p>Here you get delayed gratification since it takes three minutes to load the machine and four hours for it to bake a loaf. You get proper bakery smells, which is a bonus, and the freshest bread in town (the second you unload the machine).<p>Freshness is a hack with any bread you buy. It is usually harmless additives that keep it 'fresh', but there is no need for the 'harmless additives' when you have a Panasonic machine. You won't find yourself adding weird chemicals, but you could find yourself adding, nuts, seeds, berries and other fruit to your bakes, to suit your whims or preferences of your guests.<p>Sometimes some people notice your fresh bread and insist on telling you how much better their sourdough is (that they made once in lockdown) or how that their local bakery makes far nicer bread than your pathetic little Panasonic machine. So you get an extra 'last laugh' from having to endure these ad-hoc lectures on sourdough that is just not in the same league as your favourite bread made effortless by your lovely machine.<p>You might miss out on interactions with that sandwich store (they rob you slowly, hence the staff will know your name and preferences, if a regular), however, people outside the sourdough cult are always impressed by home made bread, even if you insist it was effortlessly made.<p>Making your own bread connects you to our history of making bread, plus you get a much healthier product, arguably real bread, unlike that nonsense that is commercially sold as 'bread'.<p>Eating a sandwich now, haven't bought one for maybe five years.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 24 Sep 2026 16:42:28 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49833272</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49833272</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49833272</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "MUNI Heritage Weekend in San Francisco"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Looks like a realm of 'I bit off more than I can chew' when it comes to results. Good to see OpenSeadragon in the wild on Flaming Spork's site (for prsenting images). It is a rarely ploughed furrow of artistic endeavour, and I suspect that is for good reason (of difficulty).<p>My plan was to experiment on the canal towpath with bicycle and basic android phone. I think I need a proper camera and the train.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 24 Sep 2026 16:09:00 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49832722</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49832722</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49832722</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "MUNI Heritage Weekend in San Francisco"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Many thanks! Those trains are beauties. Looks like I had best get out there, giving it a go. It is canalside that I want.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 24 Sep 2026 15:57:30 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49832539</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49832539</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49832539</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Americans' Drinking Remains at Record Low: Gallup Poll"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I suspect there is more to this story. Post pandemic, I wonder if there are more people drinking on their lonesome as a coping strategy with fewer people drinking socially because it is too expensive to do so.<p>My father was in the former category, and ultimately it was alcohol that killed him. He thought he was a moderate drinker, not an alcoholic, and I doubt he would have self-reported drinking 'heavily' with his beer-goggles on. As far as he was concerned, he had always enjoyed a glass of wine with a meal, to have spirits as a 'night cap' and beer on sunny afternoons.<p>I saw the progression, and I went the other way, from 'enjoying' a drink on special occasions, always socially, never home alone, to complete abstinence. I decided that I no longer wanted to enable the alcohol dependent person by drinking, or have the health complications.<p>Looking back on the drinking I have done over the years, it was always people that brought me pleasure, not that vile alcohol stuff that brought us together. Motivation for going to the pub was meeting certain people, not drinking particular beverages.<p>As you can imagine, I am going to gleefully report 'I never touch that poison' to a pollster, whereas my father would never report drinking more than he used to, because he didn't see what was going on with his liver (and wallet).</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 22 Sep 2026 17:25:15 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49804908</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49804908</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49804908</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "MUNI Heritage Weekend in San Francisco"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I have a long-standing dream to use a line scan camera from a moving train, assuming everything would be easy, if I had the camera. Little did I realise how much work is needed to tidy up the imagery!<p>Your work is extremely beautiful, and I am truly envious of your work, the aesthetic is awesome. I want to do it on the cheap though, with a regular phone as camera.<p>I think you have given me the directions needed to make some bold steps towards getting what I want out of the 'medium'.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 22 Sep 2026 15:56:17 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49803376</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49803376</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49803376</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "I don't want to read what you didn't write"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>"Chinese whispers" - a Chinese colleague teased me about using that phrase in a meeting, which made me question whether I needed to use that phrase in other contexts (e.g. conversation with family, in my home town, or with close friends).<p>I am not ready to use the Americanism, 'teh telephone game', since nobody knows what that means, yet everyone over a certain age knows what 'Chinese whispers' means.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 22 Sep 2026 15:36:32 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49803055</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49803055</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49803055</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Grok 4.7"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Congratulations on going down the SVG 'rabbit hole'!<p>There are also interesting inheritance rules with SVG, so you could define the basic shape of a key, well, several shapes, just as rects in the defs, with no stroke or fill specified.<p>Then, at the group level, you can then specify stroke and fill, so there could be a group of normal keys, another group for modifiers, function keys and so on.<p>Then there are the keys themselves, how do you clone a shape and put different text inside each clone? There are many ways to do this but I think you are on the right track using the clip path approach, albeit using the rects in the defs.<p>What is interesting about SVG is that artists don't care for the file format, they just see text as shapes on a page. Then programmers don't care for SVG as that is a graphic designer/artworker thing. So SVG sits in this witch-space, with only a few brave enough to wade in and do cool stuff.<p>Given your application, and given the fun that could be had with SMIL/JS, you could make your SVG files interactive, so you press a key and a popover tells you more about what that key does. You can even get audio working in SVG, as well as HTML popovers (in foreignobjects, as buttons, but working, nonetheless).<p>'Views' is another interesting SVG feature. I have a sprite sheet that uses a lot of views, where you are projecting your SVG into some type of virtual canvas, taking a 'picture' of it, and then incorporating that in something else, maybe a CSS variable.<p>One 'deadly addiction' is animation. Filters are another 'deadly addiction'. Why have a static and actually useful diagram, when you can animate it, move the 'camera' and add the equivalent of 27 Photoshop layers as filters to everything?<p>For example, supposing you wanted to show what keys to press, with there being modifiers and a sequence, e.g. 'Hello World!'. The animation for one letter could be what triggers the animation for the next 'key press' and so it goes.<p>My top tip of all: reposition the origin (0,0) to where it makes sense. Many objects have symmetry, so you can define one side, clone it, scale it (-1,1) and do it all around 0,0 to then translate the results to somewhere sensible.<p>I have found the JetBrains IDEs to be extremely useful for SVG, the preview feature is very helpful, as are the code hints.<p>AI sort of knows SVG, so I have had some suggestions from Google on how to build filters. These never work, but they do get you thinking. Say you wanted to use filters to add specular highlights and animated shadows to the keys, that would be fair game for AI hints on how to do it.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 22 Sep 2026 15:09:13 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49802613</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49802613</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49802613</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Apple Mac mini review"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>50% of consumer spending is by the top 10% of consumers, with that 10% generally being Apple ecosystem people. Anyone with ecommmerce stats can confirm this, Apple consumers just shop and consume more, particularly at the high end.<p>This gives the impression that Apple are even bigger than they are.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 21 Sep 2026 19:34:26 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49792222</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49792222</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49792222</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Grok 4.7"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Impressive! I had to peek at the SVG file and it superficially looks good, however, as is the case with everything AI, the more you look, the more it doesn't make any sense.<p>By now AI should know of the DRY concept. But no. Hence the keys have a rounded rectangle for the key shape and another rounded rectangle for a clip path, to prevent text overflow. There are 72 * 2 = 144 identical rectangles, when just one would suffice (in the defs), with this being cloned once for the clip path, and 72 times for the keys.<p>I would not expect SVGO levels of optimisation (rounding numbers, that sort of thing), however, the human, if writing out the same thing for the 72nd time, might think 'is there a better way', to get the manual out. A graphics program such as Illustrator would not do that, but AI 'should' because AI.<p>The above is not criticism of your work, just an observation regarding AI SVG capabilities.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 21 Sep 2026 19:22:56 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49792063</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49792063</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49792063</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "What Sun got wrong"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I was spoilt by SGI and their wonderful interface, where every detail was awesomely cool. The Sun machines were just old-fashioned at this superficial but important level of how it all looked, but only if you knew better, and that meant experience of SGI. In the world of IRIX, we had CPU-eater desktop wallpaper, meanwhile, on Sun, you had some badly drawn window decorations.<p>I imagine this to be the awful GUI that you speak of.<p>I say look and feel is superficial, however, when you have to learn a variant of UNIX with slightly different command line switches to the UNIX you know, with an interface worse than even Windows (3.11), for it to run dog slow, a lot of copium is needed. A poor interface gets in the way of what you are trying to do, a cool interface just lets you get on with it.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 21 Sep 2026 18:49:00 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49791591</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49791591</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49791591</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Most people prefer traditional architecture"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>In Europe we had this minor disagreement in 1914, which we would prefer not to talk about.<p>One consequence of this was the decimation of skilled craftsmen. Millions of them were sent off to become machine-gun fodder, to never return to their respective trades.<p>Along with them was their craft. The next generation of apprentices never had the mentors they needed, hence that was that, the end of what you might call traditional architecture.<p>There was another minor disagreement that began at various times depending on one's nationality. In the UK this meant 1939, and with it a second 'double tap' on the skilled craftsmen that the building trade used to rely on.<p>Many of the survivors did get to work on war memorials, and every village has one, carved in stone, and often kept in immaculate condition to this day.<p>In my local station there are two memorials, and I struggle to hold it in as I walk past. Needless to say, we lost a lot of good railway workers too. Sad.<p>There wasn't a lot of money after each of these minor disagreements and heavily blitzed cities still bear the scars. There can be a wonderful parade of shops with flats above, with wonderful craftsmenship, which is truly wonderful considering they didn't have motorised vehicles as we know them, or cherry pickers, or any machine that is big and yellow (JCB in the UK).<p>Nowadays there can be a huge 1870s building, with four storeys, all with big rooms and high ceilings, next to some 'rubbish' that was built in the post-disagreement years.<p>Some places were physically removed from the map. A 500 bomber raid on the special crane used to hoist big guns onto the ships of the Royal Navy happened one night. They completely missed the crane to destroy the entirety of Clydebank, a district of Glasgow. People are sore about that to this day.<p>The crane still stands, albeit idle, since shipbuilding went to Asia in the post-disagreement years. That crane, once the largest and most capable in the world, has a soul. It speaks of sorrow to me.<p>So yes, you are correct, but there is more to the story than just a Modernist story of cheap mass production. The limit was not resources as you can see the quarries that were abandoned after the first minor disagreement, and there is enough stone in any given mountain to make millions of homes. The limit was the loss of men as well as the loss of European colonies, on which the wealth of European cities came from.<p>Moving swiftly on, I am no Ferrari fan under normal circumstances, however, Lewis Hamilton currently drives for their Formula One team and he is a hero of mine. Hence I am willing to defend the loathed Luce!<p>The Luce does have Mr Ive's design input and I don't think anyone is critical of the interior. It is well understood that serious tax avoidance vehicles need to stay away from having big screens on the dashboard since they are not going to age well (and F1 cars don't have such things). Having four seats rather than just the two makes sense to me, since the car needs to have some length to it for high speed stability and there is no need for a massive red V12 engine in the middle of the car.<p>The Luce brings much from the world of F1, including high performance cooling systems that cost 100x the price of the radiators in your car. People like older cars because they can tune them, the Luce is the first EV that is what you might call tune-able, with the owner able to set the car up for a given track or just the road, with them also able to do what they want with it.<p>The aerodynamic package is ahead of its time, and, as such, it will draw criticism. We have been here before, notably in the UK with the Ford Sierra. This was a 'jelly mould' shaped version of the three-box saloon that had gone before, the Cortina. Initially the press hated on the Sierra and people did have genuine misgivings. However, it did not take long before the Sierra rose to the top of the sales charts to set the trend for the 'jelly mould' look, these being the 'peak car' maintainable vehicles that people wish they had today.<p>Fortunately I will never be a customer for Ferrari, however, if I was a tax-dodging benevolent dictator with the wealth to put together a motor museum, I would not hesitate to buy a Luxe for the collection, to go alongside an OG Tesla Model S, with the faux grille, and a Xiaomi SU7. I would like to add a Ford Cortina and a Ford Sierra too, however, millions were made and millions rusted away, leaving none for my fantasy museum, particularly in the desired Saluki Bronze colour.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 15 Sep 2026 21:32:40 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49719159</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49719159</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49719159</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Suspected sabotage causes major Netherlands rail disruption"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Groups such as Extinction Rebellion are easy to steer off course by the state into taking meaningless actions such as gluing themselves to London Underground trains.<p>Perhaps this is just as well. If Extinction Rebellion really wanted to take down the entire transport network, they could do so by 'accidentally' touring the big stations with a leaky rucksack filled with lead paint fragments or ground up asbestos tiles, to then tip off the press. This would probably reveal an unfortunate truth, that there was plenty of aforementioned toxins already on the network, from brake pads and paint of yesteryear. Nonetheless, some closure for the guys in hazmat suits would be needed.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 15 Sep 2026 12:22:02 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49711463</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49711463</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49711463</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "CSS-Tricks in Limbo"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Almost all magazines go though an arc of success, plateau and decline. Audiences and writers move on or retire.<p>I very much like and use CSS-Tricks, however, in itself it reflects a somewhat dated frontend design process and rarely uses any CSS tricks to clothe the Wordpress core that enforces dated design processes.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 15 Sep 2026 12:01:48 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49711243</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49711243</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49711243</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Compressing a flag to 11 bits"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Here is the Union Jack from the article. Concise and surprisingly human readable (I could draw this with felt tip pens on graph paper).<p>One problem though. The Union Jack is not symmetrical. This is tantamount to spelling someone's name incorrectly, and could be taken the wrong way, much like how some Americans would be offended if there weren't all the stars or stripes depicted.<p><pre><code>            <g xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" clip-path="url(#cxr741hpqpxhvpg0uu2qvnr_0)">
                <rect x="0" y="0" width="1" height="0.5" fill="#012169"/>
                <line x1="0" y1="0.5" x2="1" y2="0" stroke="#fff" stroke-width="0.09"/>
                <line x1="0" y1="0" x2="1" y2="0.5" stroke="#fff" stroke-width="0.09"/>
                <line x1="0" y1="0.5" x2="1" y2="0" stroke="#c8102e" stroke-width="0.0375"/>
                <line x1="0" y1="0" x2="1" y2="0.5" stroke="#c8102e" stroke-width="0.0375"/>
                <rect x="0" y="0.2" width="1" height="0.1" fill="#fff"/>
                <rect x="0.45" y="0" width="0.1" height="0.5" fill="#fff"/>
                <rect x="0" y="0.22" width="1" height="0.06" fill="#c8102e"/>
                <rect x="0.47" y="0" width="0.06" height="0.5" fill="#c8102e"/>
            </g>
</code></pre>
There are some optimisations to be made, if concision rather than human readable is the ultimate goal. For example, x1="0" y1="0" is not needed, the use of a 1 x 1 viewBox means not using integers, even a 2 x 1 viewBox remedies that.<p>For 'human readable', if something is mirrored, the code should reflect that, with 'use' and transform 'scale(-1, 1)'. More groups could be used to contain elements that share the same colour or stroke.<p>In my 'hand coded' GB flag the weird offset-symmetry of the Northern Ireland 'red diagonals' is explained in SVG.<p>I am not that keen on CSS in SVG, however, for colours, I could be using CSS variables.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 15 Sep 2026 11:31:11 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49710932</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49710932</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49710932</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "Compressing a flag to 11 bits"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>My Union Jack (in SVG) is coded to reflect the union of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland. I live in Scotland where it is commonly known that the English flag is plastered over the Scottish Saltire, and they don't even get the same colour blue in each.<p>There are different aspect ratios too, plus there is the 'jack'. I don't care for AI but I do like SVG to be human readable to some extent, although I do like oklch colours, which are not something I consider 'human readable'.<p>Here I have the Scottish flag, the English one, a 'GB' flag which slaps one on top of the other with those Irish extras, to make a UK 'Jack' that waves badly because SVG filters are not something I am good at.<p>Excuse the SVG code:<p><pre><code>        <defs id="flags">
            <symbol id="england" fill="white" clip-path="url(#flag-clip-two-by-one)">
                <title>England</title>
                <use href="#bounding-square"/>
                <g id="st-george-cross" stroke="oklch(0.5472 0.242 22.16)" stroke-width="12">
                    <g id="england-flag-cross" transform="translate(60 60)">
                        <line id="england-flag-line" x1="-60" x2="60"/>
                        <use href="#england-flag-line" transform="rotate(90)"/>
                    </g>
                </g>
            </symbol>
            <symbol id="gb" clip-path="url(#flag-clip-two-by-one)">
                <title>United Kingdom</title>
                <use fill="oklch(0.2873 0.139 259.18)" href="#saltire"/>
                <g id="st-patrick-lhs" stroke-linecap="square">
                    <line id="st-patrick-red-line" x2="60" y1="32" y2="62" stroke="oklch(0.5472 0.242 22.16)"
                          stroke-width="4"/>
                    <use href="#st-patrick-red-line" transform="translate(0 124) scale(1 -1)"/>
                </g>
                <use href="#st-patrick-lhs" transform="translate(120 -4) scale(-1 1)"/>
                <use stroke="white" stroke-width="20" href="#england-flag-cross"/>
                <use href="#st-george-cross"/>
            </symbol>
            <symbol id="scotland">
                <title>Scotland</title>
                <g fill="oklch(0.5079 0.1766 247.88)" clip-path="url(#flag-clip-two-by-one)">
                    <g id="saltire">
                        <use href="#bounding-square"/>
                        <g transform="translate(60 60)">
                            <line id="saltire-white" x1="-60" x2="60" y1="-30" y2="30" stroke="white"
                                  stroke-width="12"/>
                            <use href="#saltire-white" transform="scale(-1 1)"/>
                        </g>
                    </g>
                </g>
            </symbol>
            <symbol id="union-jack">
                <title>Union Jack</title>
                <defs>
                    <filter id="flag-wave">
                        <feTurbulence type="fractalNoise" baseFrequency="0.0025" numOctaves="3"
                                      result="flag-wave-fractal-noise" seed="42">
                            <animate attributeName="baseFrequency" values="0.0025;0.01;0.002;0.005;0.004;0.0025"
                                     dur="12s" repeatCount="indefinite"/>
                        </feTurbulence>
                        <feDisplacementMap xChannelSelector="R" yChannelSelector="B" in="SourceGraphic"
                                           in2="flag-wave-fractal-noise" result="flag-wave-fractal-source" scale="50"/>
                        <feGaussianBlur in="flag-wave-fractal-source" stdDeviation="0.4"/>
                        <feMorphology operator="dilate" radius="0.5"/>
                    </filter>
                    <radialGradient id="radial-glow">
                        <stop offset="0%" stop-color="white"/>
                        <stop offset="100%" stop-color="grey"/>
                    </radialGradient>
                    <linearGradient id="flagpole-gradient">
                        <stop offset="0%" stop-color="grey"/>
                        <stop offset="55%" stop-color="white"/>
                        <stop offset="90%" stop-color="darkgrey"/>
                    </linearGradient>
                </defs>
                <g transform="rotate(10)translate(25,10)">
                    <use href="#gb" transform="translate(7, -10)scale(0.75)" filter="url(#flag-wave)"/>
                    <circle r="3.5" fill="url(#radial-glow)" stroke="none"/>
                    <rect y="2.5" x="-2.5" width="5" height="120" stroke="none" fill="url(#flagpole-gradient)"/>
                </g>
            </symbol>
        </defs></code></pre></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 15 Sep 2026 10:54:16 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49710511</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49710511</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49710511</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by Theodores in "US confirms for first time it has deployed space weapons"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Technically the US has had 'space weapons' for many decades, due to how an intercontinental ballistic missile works.<p>Incidentally, the Shuttle raised concerns in the USSR because they saw those large cargo bay doors and rocket thrusters out back, to think that this was a 'delivery system'.<p>In the modern battlefield, 'hypersonic' missiles are the new shiny. However, any ICBM is 'hypersonic', at least during the space phase. The new meaning of hypersonic means going at 'hypersonic' speeds through the atmosphere and in the final approach. Force equals mass times acceleration, more speed means more deceleration, which means packing a bigger kinetic punch.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 15 Sep 2026 10:38:22 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49710386</link><dc:creator>Theodores</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49710386</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49710386</guid></item></channel></rss>