Hacker News: iboisvert

New comment by iboisvert in "When did Google get so weird?"

iboisvert — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 02:37:13 +0000

For myself at least, a couple times Google has promoted in search results scam sites that front run legitimate sites that sell event tickets. I haven't seen this for a while now but trust in Google as a search engine is gone.

New comment by iboisvert in "Microsoft Comic Chat is now open source"

iboisvert — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 02:24:48 +0000

This is awesome. Is there some way we could replace the MS Teams meeting Facilitator with this?

New comment by iboisvert in "FAANG Simulator"

iboisvert — Thu, 09 Jul 2026 02:06:25 +0000

FIRECalc https://firecalc.com/ is another planner with more knobs. It has models for decreasing spending with age.

New comment by iboisvert in "Private equity bought America's essential services"

iboisvert — Wed, 27 May 2026 17:24:21 +0000

> bloated pensions

I find this characterization offensive. Who is to judge if the defined benefit pension if a primary school teacher or fireman, for example, is bloated? It's part of the negotiated pay package, nothing more or less.

New comment by iboisvert in "Invalid SMILES beneficial rather than detrimental to chemical language models"

iboisvert — Tue, 23 Jul 2024 03:09:04 +0000

I originally heard about this many years ago at an informal talk, but I was able to find this paper that sounds like the same problem and should have pretty good references https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00981...

New comment by iboisvert in "Invalid SMILES beneficial rather than detrimental to chemical language models"

iboisvert — Sun, 21 Jul 2024 04:01:33 +0000

I think I may have heard of a similar problem in a different field, computational thermodynamics. Solutions to a set of equations may be real or complex. The nonlinear solvers worked with real numbers exclusively and from time to time would not converge to any solution. Apparently if one used a solver that worked with complex numbers, the solver would reach a solution in real space more often than exclusively real solvers. Of course solving was much more expensive. Your explanation seems to fit here too

New comment by iboisvert in "Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'"

iboisvert — Thu, 08 Feb 2024 04:30:25 +0000

I agree, but I think there are a couple important stages that should be explicit: actively solicit proposals and fund the proposals

New comment by iboisvert in "I looked through attacks in my access logs"

iboisvert — Sun, 28 Jan 2024 17:52:22 +0000

As someone who knows very little about security, this is really interesting, thanks! A question though: how would one know if there has been a breach? These examples look relatively easy to detect, but I guess there would be more complex cases?

New comment by iboisvert in "Is this fraud? And if so, to what extent am I responsible?"

iboisvert — Sat, 16 Sep 2023 18:42:55 +0000

I believe that in Canada, and certainly in Alberta, the titles are very much controlled. The regulatory group APEGA has a Professional Engineer designation for software engineers as well

New comment by iboisvert in "Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?"

iboisvert — Sat, 19 Nov 2022 20:36:54 +0000

YNAB did change my life, thank you!

New comment by iboisvert in "Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said"

iboisvert — Sun, 30 Oct 2022 07:08:22 +0000

That's probably what Martha Stewart was thinking as well

New comment by iboisvert in "I cheated on my Microsoft interview (2019)"

iboisvert — Sun, 05 Jun 2022 16:00:05 +0000

Would you be able to share some tips or sources on managing your manager? It sounds like a really valuable skill

New comment by iboisvert in "Ethereum Has Issues"

iboisvert — Thu, 14 Apr 2022 21:40:33 +0000

> It's a new era of finance

I have no experience with crypto, but this I don't understand.

> DeFi is unlocking the value of an asset, making it liquid...

Like a mortgage or a bond issuance (bonds are secured against assets of the corporation)?

> Credit is loaning you money and providing an interest rate. Usually something insane like 15%.

Average rate for a 30-year fixed mortgage in the US is about 4%[1]. Average Aaa corporate bond yield is 3.43%[2]. I guess that you are talking about interest rate on credit cards? I think that credit card debt is pretty small compared to the size of the mortgage or bond markets.

> One example is on Kaurura...

I'm not sure I follow you here, but it sounds like you get a loan at 19% APR against some collateral. Then you use the loan as capital for some other investment at a higher rate of return.

My question: how is this any different, for example, from a company issuing bonds at 4% coupon rate and using the proceeds to fund operations when the company's profit margin is, say, 50%?

Let's say it's a matter of scale; I, as a person, can't issue bonds to trade on a public market. But I can get a mortgage and invest in other stuff hopefully at a return higher than the rate on the loan.

As I said, I don't understand how this is a "new era of finance".

[1] https://www.valuepenguin.com/mortgages/average-mortgage-rate....

[2] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AAA