<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: colmmacc</title><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=colmmacc</link><description>Hacker News RSS</description><docs>https://hnrss.org/</docs><generator>hnrss v2.1.1</generator><lastBuildDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 09:12:21 +0000</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://hnrss.org/user?id=colmmacc" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"></atom:link><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Is legal the same as legitimate: AI reimplementation and the erosion of copyleft"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The four essential freedoms of the Free Software movement are ...<p>1. The freedom to run the program as you wish
2. The freedom to study how it works and modify it (which requires access to source code)
3. The freedom to redistribute copies to help others
4. The freedom to distribute modified versions, so the whole community benefits from your improvements<p>To my mind ... GenAI coding make all of these far more realizable, especially for "normal people", than CopyLeft ever has.  Let's go through them ...<p>Want to run a program as you wish? Great! It's easier than ever to build a replacement. Proprietary or non-free software is just as vulnerable to reimplementation as Copyleft is.<p>Want to study a how a program works and to modify it? This is now much more achievable.<p>Want the freedom to redistribute copies to help others? Build your own version! It may not even be copyrightable if it's 100% generated (IANAL).<p>Want to distribute modified versions? yes! see previous.<p>I dunno; seems like generative coding can be as much a liberator as any kind of problem.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 10 Mar 2026 03:33:38 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47318819</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47318819</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47318819</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "How Big Diaper absorbs billions of extra dollars from American parents"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>EC only works if parents are the sole carers, and every success story I've heard had one main parent doing 90% of the care-taking. No daycare would do it, and if you can find a nanny, au-pair, grand-parent or other carer who is up for it ... small kids still just behave differently around different people. If they have a different level of comfort, anxiety, or reluctance with a person it breaks down.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 08 Mar 2026 14:26:26 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47297607</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47297607</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47297607</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "How Big Diaper absorbs billions of extra dollars from American parents"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Our two year old is potty training right now, and this was definitely a factor for us. We had to wait until it could be explained. Another factor is that diapers are now so absorbent that the kid feels no real discomfort from a pee or a poop. His main motivation is peer pressure and to be a bigger kid; concepts he's only recently caught.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 08 Mar 2026 14:09:13 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47297456</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47297456</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47297456</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "1940s Irish sci-fi novel features early mecha and gravity assists"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>That's almost certainly right. I couldn't see that as anything other than "Teal" but Éalú makes perfect sense especially thematically.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 15 Feb 2026 19:32:56 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47026680</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47026680</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47026680</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "1940s Irish sci-fi novel features early mecha and gravity assists"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>That does make more sense.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 15 Feb 2026 19:22:20 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47026568</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47026568</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47026568</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "1940s Irish sci-fi novel features early mecha and gravity assists"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Native Irish Speaker and Sci-Fi fan here. What an unexpected delight. For those who might not pick it up , the author name "Máiréad Ní Ghráda" is that of an unmarried (that's the "Ní") woman ("Máiréad" which is like a variation of Mary).<p>Here's my Translations of the Chapter titles. I'm pretty sure many of these have old-Irish style séimhiú (a dot above a consonant denotes what would now be a h after the consonant) in the originals that have not been translated by the OCR, so there are several missing h letters. If I weren't on a plane over Afghanistan, I'd download the PDF to check. Will update the repo when I can!<p><pre><code>   Pláinéid na feaca Súil Duine riamh = A planet no person's eyes have ever seen
   An Radarc, tríd an gCiandracán = the view throughout the [Ciandracan] (this is a compound proper noun, "Cian" is "head" or "brain" and "racán" could be visor or rocket)
   An Turas go Manannán = the Trip to Manannán
   Manannán = Manannán (it's a noun, which is very similar to the Irish term for the Manx and the Isle of Mann). 
   Muintear Manannáin = the people of Manannán
   na 'Cráidmí' = the Craidmi (I think it's just a plural noun)
   An tÁrd-Máigistir = the high Magistrate, or possibly the supreme magistry
   An Priorún = the Priory
   Oidce sa Coill = The class/lesson/teaching in the woods/forest
   An tinneall = the fire
   Oidce tar Oidceanta = Lesson upon lesson
   Lug Lám-fada = the long-armed lug
   An Tróid leis na 'Cráidmí' = The war with the Craidmi
   Diogaltas = Revenge
   An téalod = not sure about this one</code></pre></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 15 Feb 2026 19:05:23 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47026404</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47026404</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47026404</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Ireland rolls out basic income scheme for artists"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Grafton St buskers at their best are really really good, but there are also some very average buskers there every day too. New Orleans is a stand-out in the US where you can find world-class jazz bands playing on the streets.<p>Nashville has plenty in the evenings, and then you can find hot spots in some cities. I've seen regular buskers in Boston, Seattle, Sarasota, and Boulder - usually in pedestrianized touristy quarters.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 11 Feb 2026 17:20:45 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46977794</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46977794</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46977794</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "The Feynman Lectures on Physics (1961-1964)"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Lesser known but possibly more relevant to most HN readers are Feynman's lectures on computation - <a href="https://theswissbay.ch/pdf/Gentoomen%20Library/Extra/Richard_P._Feynman-Feynman_Lectures_on_Computation__-Addison-Wesley%281996%29.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://theswissbay.ch/pdf/Gentoomen%20Library/Extra/Richard...</a> . There's some really great explanations in there of computability, information theory, entropy, thermodynamics, and more. Very little of it is now out-dated.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 10 Feb 2026 23:22:11 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46968486</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46968486</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46968486</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Irish man with valid US work permit held in ICE detention for five months"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I don't support this kind of detention, but the case reads like he overstayed his original conditions of entry.<p>According to the court order, he entered the US on the Visa Waiver Program in 2009. He may have a work permit now because anyone can file for an Employment Authorization Document (EAD) through an I-765 while they are applying for a green card through marriage, but there's no indication that he had work permits before that. I've encountered Irish people throughout the US in similar situations.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 09 Feb 2026 19:07:34 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46949457</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46949457</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46949457</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "What came first: the CNAME or the A record?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I am very petty about this one bug and have a very old axe to grind that this reminded me of! Way back in 2011 CloudFlare launched an incredibly poorly researched feature to just return CNAME records at a domain apex ... RFCs be damned.<p><a href="https://blog.cloudflare.com/zone-apex-naked-domain-root-domain-cname-supp/" rel="nofollow">https://blog.cloudflare.com/zone-apex-naked-domain-root-doma...</a> , and I quote directly ... "Never one to let a RFC stand in the way of a solution to a real problem, we're happy to announce that CloudFlare allows you to set your zone apex to a CNAME."<p>The problem? CNAMEs are name level aliases, not record level, so this "feature" would break the caching of NS, MX, and SOA records that exist at domain apexes. Many of us warned them at the time that this would result in a non-deterministic issue. At EC2 and Route 53 we weren't supporting this just to be mean! If a user's DNS resolver got an MX query before an A query, things might work ... but the other way around, they might not. An absolute nightmare to deal with. But move fast and break things, so hey :)<p>In earnest though ... it's great to see how now CloudFare are handling CNAME chains and A record ordering issues in this kind of detail. I never would have thought of this implicit contract they've discovered, and it makes sense!</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 20 Jan 2026 01:12:36 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46686693</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46686693</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46686693</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "What an unprocessed photo looks like"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I've always considered that Tim Jennison quote to be a reference to C.P. Snow's "The Two Cultures" lecture. Steve Jobs' ambition for Apple to be "where the Liberal Arts and Technology meet" also seemed similarly influenced. If you haven't read Snow's lecture, it's well worth the quick read.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 29 Dec 2025 03:25:27 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46417161</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46417161</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46417161</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Maybe the default settings are too high"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>There is a great meditation in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance about the differences between riding and driving. Being open to the elements, in and a part of nature, is visceral. Bubbled in a car, our surroundings are observed more than experienced. That's always resonated for me.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 26 Dec 2025 01:24:20 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46388336</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46388336</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46388336</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "The IPv4 address swamp: The new normal"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The transition to 7200 VXRs as core routers really hit a tipping point around 2000. They could handle millions of entries in the FiBs and really led to a relief in pressure. Subsequent devices had to match that.<p>On the IPv6 side; by 2002, nobody was really experimenting with A6 records any more, and EUI64 was needless. Both were parts of IPv6 designed to facilitate "easy" renumbering, so that single prefixes could be replaced with larger ones. But the ISPs weren't complaining any more about table size.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Dec 2025 23:06:21 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46380262</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46380262</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46380262</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Ireland’s Diarmuid Early wins world Microsoft Excel title"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The Oscars, The Golden Globes, the Emmys, just a few!</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 20 Dec 2025 20:30:52 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46339363</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46339363</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46339363</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Constant-time support coming to LLVM: Protecting cryptographic code"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I don't think it's nefarious but it is sabotage. There's long been an implicit assumption that optimization should be more important than safety.<p>Yes, languages do lack good mechanisms to mark variables or sections as needing constant-time operation ... but compiler maintainers could have taken the view that that means all code should be compiled that way. Now instead we're marking data and section as "secret" so that they can be left unoptimized. But why not the other way around?<p>I understand how we get here; speed and size are trivial to measure and they each result in real-world cost savings. I don't think any maintainer could withstand this pressure. But it's still deliberate.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 26 Nov 2025 13:51:48 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46057387</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46057387</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46057387</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "The Pen and the Spade: The Poems of Seamus Heaney"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I bought this latest Heaney book while I was in Ireland recently and it lives in my nightstand, along with the other Heaney books in the series (his letters, and his translations). They are an endless marvel and constantly make me ponder. Part of the attraction for me is that Heaney is simultaneously a peerless transcendent writer, but also is very everyday. He came from a working class, or maybe lower middle class, background and stuck to Belfast and Dublin and lived a relatively humble life. When I think of Yeats I can only see him in Tweed suits, visiting country estates with servants, and making posturing speeches in the Irish Senate. Yeats was an expert commentator, but removed from many of the experiences and lives he documented. Heaney really lived them. It's so much more relatable.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 15 Nov 2025 15:59:14 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45938263</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45938263</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45938263</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Public trust demands open-source voting systems"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>So they open the source ... how do I know that's what's running on the voting machine? There's really no good practical solution to this problem. What matters more is that there is a voter-verified paper audit trail and that this record is actually counted. At least by spot check risk-limiting audits, but ideally just count every vote manually to verify.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 21 Oct 2025 16:49:10 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45658040</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45658040</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45658040</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Secret diplomatic message deciphered after 350 years"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>No, this absolutely is not how forward secrecy works in TLS. Forward secrecy protects against a break in the signature algorithm, but not in the key agreement algorithms.<p>Both the FFDH and ECDH key agreement algorithms are vulnerable to quantum crypt-analysis; someone capturing traffic today could later break that agreement and then decrypt the data. An attacker would have to capture the entire session up to the "point of interest" though.<p>This is why FFDH/ECDH are being augmented with Post-Quantum secure KEMs.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 19 Oct 2025 21:08:44 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45638003</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45638003</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45638003</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Ultrasound is ushering a new era of surgery-free cancer treatment"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p><a href="https://www.statnews.com/2024/06/22/hank-green-pissing-out-cancer-comedy-special/" rel="nofollow">https://www.statnews.com/2024/06/22/hank-green-pissing-out-c...</a><p>Watching Hank Green's YouTube video where he found out that his cloudy pee was cancer leaving his body, he was surprised that doctors don't tell you to expect it. It can be such a morale boost.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 14 Oct 2025 11:02:23 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45578544</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45578544</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45578544</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by colmmacc in "Corporations are trying to hide job openings from US citizens"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Completely open borders migration between all countries would be the biggest such market correction. If every development job was open to every qualified developer in the world, I suspect software salaries in the US would be much lower.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 13 Sep 2025 07:11:47 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45229997</link><dc:creator>colmmacc</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45229997</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45229997</guid></item></channel></rss>