Hacker News: alexb_

New comment by alexb_ in "Canada's first sovereign wealth fund"

alexb_ — Mon, 27 Apr 2026 20:23:57 +0000

Wow! This guy knew a lot about working in an environmental/social/governance framework, AND he knows enough about money to have been an international central banker?

I knew Carney was great, but I didn't know he was so well-qualified too.

New comment by alexb_ in "U.S. banks may soon collect citizenship data from customers"

alexb_ — Mon, 20 Apr 2026 16:54:25 +0000

Yes. "Other people do it" does not make it any less anti-foreigner.

New comment by alexb_ in "Where the Heck Did My Taxes Go?"

alexb_ — Wed, 15 Apr 2026 17:32:49 +0000

https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/agency

Click down into a federal account and then change the drop down over the chart to "Recipient".

New comment by alexb_ in "Where the Heck Did My Taxes Go?"

alexb_ — Wed, 15 Apr 2026 17:29:26 +0000

https://www.usaspending.gov/ is another great website for this stuff. I suggest using the Budget explorer. Here's the map by function (e.g. national defense, healthcare): https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/budget_function

New comment by alexb_ in "Microsoft's "Fix" for Windows 11: Flowers After the Beating"

alexb_ — Tue, 24 Mar 2026 12:24:26 +0000

Yeah, it's kind of annoying. But middle click scroll is something I use literally every single second of every single day on my web browser. It's a deal-breaker.

New comment by alexb_ in "Microsoft's "fix" for Windows 11"

alexb_ — Tue, 24 Mar 2026 12:22:13 +0000

Even skipping the first step (which requires a second readme) the next step involves opening a terminal. Instant fail. The entire point of an operating system is to make computers usable without knowing how they work, what a file is, what a command is, or having to look up anything. If something needs to be done, it needs a GUI.

Linux is an important operating system, but anyone under the delusion that it is desktop ready right now needs to actually watch someone use it. I say this not because I hate linux, but because I love it. I want someone to make it usable for a desktop, and people claiming that it is usable right now are not helping that.

New comment by alexb_ in "Microsoft's "Fix" for Windows 11: Flowers After the Beating"

alexb_ — Tue, 24 Mar 2026 12:19:45 +0000

Company? Most of the time this stuff is years (sometimes DECADES) old. That's why it doesn't work on Linux in the first place.

New comment by alexb_ in "Microsoft's "fix" for Windows 11"

alexb_ — Tue, 24 Mar 2026 11:28:25 +0000

The last time I tried to use Linux, I said "fuck this" when I had to open up a text editor for something so basic as making a shortcut with command line arguments. This is the easiest menu in the world on Windows, but it took me looking up a bunch of things to get it to not work on Linux.

The real crime, by a lot, it middle click. I did not realize how often I use middle click scroll until I switched to Linux and it didn't work anymore.

New comment by alexb_ in "Microsoft's "fix" for Windows 11"

alexb_ — Tue, 24 Mar 2026 11:27:01 +0000

Most people want a computer that works with their software. No, "learn the FOSS version" is not a solution. Especially because nearly everyone has some niche thing they like, some 5% that isn't covered by the FOSS solutions, that only a niche Windows program can actually do correctly.

And that doesn't even get into gaming.

New comment by alexb_ in "Chuck Norris dies at age 86"

alexb_ — Fri, 20 Mar 2026 17:07:26 +0000

He actually died years ago. It just took until today for the Grim Reaper to work up the nerve.

New comment by alexb_ in "Conway's Game of Life, in real life"

alexb_ — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 13:26:49 +0000

This isn't what this is about, but I wonder if anyone has created a fully mechanized version of Conway's Game of Life. The fact that you only have to follow 4 rules, and each cell only needs to observe its neighbors to follow those rules, makes me wonder if it's possible to track these things mechanically. I unfortunately don't know enough about mechanical engineering to do such a thing.

New comment by alexb_ in "MacBook Neo"

alexb_ — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 14:29:36 +0000

Are you serious? This is Apple, the same company that purposefully made their messaging service less compatible so that children would get bullied into buying their products. You really think they would allow anything that isn't MacOS to be run on their hardware?

New comment by alexb_ in "Show HN: 3D Mahjong, Built in CSS"

alexb_ — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 14:24:31 +0000

Disappointed to see that this is solitaire and not Riichi :( would love to see more implementations of actual mahjong

New comment by alexb_ in "Show HN: 3D Mahjong, Built in CSS"

alexb_ — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 14:23:17 +0000

Riichi is the most fun one, in my opinion, but I would not go so far as to say "skill weights over luck". The absolute best Riichi players win less than 25% of hands.

New comment by alexb_ in "H-1B Exposed: Banking sector visa sponsorship investigation"

alexb_ — Tue, 17 Feb 2026 12:46:40 +0000

The H-1B system is obviously flawed. For some reason, we've decided to tie the ability to live where you want and take advantage of your pursuit of happiness to having an employer. This creates massive power imbalances that are avoided by not engaging in national segregation policies. We don't demand that anyone born on this side of the border do anything like what people born somewhere else have to - how can a law applied differently based on how you were born be just?

New comment by alexb_ in "Dell admits consumers don't care about AI PCs"

alexb_ — Wed, 07 Jan 2026 16:28:55 +0000

Unfortunately, their common sense has been rewarded by the stock tanking 15% in the past month including 4% just today alone. Dell shows why companies don't dare talk poorly of AI, or even talk about AI in a negative way at all. It doesn't matter that it's correct, investors hate this and that's what a ton of companies are mainly focusing on.

New comment by alexb_ in "What happens when even college students can't do math anymore?"

alexb_ — Wed, 19 Nov 2025 17:56:59 +0000

To clarify, these are percentages for the sample of students taking the remedial Math 2 class, not generally. Two percent is still crazy low though, that's practically nothing.

New comment by alexb_ in "This map is not upside down"

alexb_ — Fri, 19 Sep 2025 15:36:50 +0000

By this logic, should we put east Asia on the top and have the less populated western hemisphere on the bottom? Why not have East be up?

New comment by alexb_ in "Learn Your Way: Reimagining Textbooks with Generative AI"

alexb_ — Thu, 18 Sep 2025 19:22:22 +0000

The point of the rigidity and uniformity of school is not that it is the best way to get everyone to understand everything if they try. The point is that it forces all the kids to try. School is not just for the most interested, it is for everyone.

No AI you ever create will get a kid to choose learning how math works over doing basically anything else with their time. The point of school is not to teach, it is to discipline children to participate in education. Otherwise, why have it at all? Kids can find extensive information and guides for basically any topic they want on the internet right now.

The entire "AI education" thing misses this.

New comment by alexb_ in "US national debt reaches a record $37T, the Treasury Department reports"

alexb_ — Thu, 14 Aug 2025 13:07:55 +0000

Land tax fixes this