Hacker News: jblakey

New comment by jblakey in "Teaching my kid to code with a modern MUD"

jblakey — Tue, 18 Aug 2026 13:36:40 +0000

It's nice to see my old MUD is still online, and my account is still there, 30 years later!:)

New comment by jblakey in "Most people can't juggle one ball"

jblakey — Mon, 13 Apr 2026 13:54:41 +0000

I picked up a copy of the Klutz book back in the 1980s. I think it was their first publication, and it got me started. Their YoYo book was also a fun time.

New comment by jblakey in "The contagious visual blandness of Netflix"

jblakey — Sun, 22 Jan 2023 16:02:31 +0000

On a related note, why is Netflix's interface so locked down? Why would it be bad for me to turn off autoplay for trailers? Why can't I say "never show me this show again, I'm never going to watch it"? And why, in this age of AI, and they still putting white text over a white background? That last one, especially, made me say "do people at Netflix eat their own dogfood"?

New comment by jblakey in "Microsoft employee accidentally announces Notepad is getting tabs in Windows 11"

jblakey — Sun, 25 Dec 2022 15:53:27 +0000

Second that, it's the right mix of paint and gimp for me most of the time.

New comment by jblakey in "Linux Developer Laptops: Dell's Precision 5500 series reigns supreme (2019)"

jblakey — Sat, 12 Mar 2022 02:12:56 +0000

Got a Dell latitude 7420, wiped Windows 11 off it, installed Ubuntu, and I was happily surprised that everything just worked.

New comment by jblakey in "Automated departure messages at Symbolics"

jblakey — Sun, 23 Jan 2022 12:19:26 +0000

I was waiting to see the output of the macro:)

New comment by jblakey in "iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro"

jblakey — Tue, 13 Oct 2020 17:08:57 +0000

I really wish the Apple presenters would stop waving their arms... since I noticed they were doing it, I can't stop seeing it:)

New comment by jblakey in "Ask HN: Essential skill needed to be a programmer?"

jblakey — Tue, 06 Oct 2020 19:41:15 +0000

Second this - I think part of being a programmer is having a really hard head that stands up to being banged against that wall, over and over, until the thing you're trying to make work works:)

New comment by jblakey in "Autodesk Fusion 360 becomes almost useless for hobbyists"

jblakey — Thu, 17 Sep 2020 15:58:52 +0000

Man, I was just getting started in Fusion 360! Bummer!

New comment by jblakey in "How to Be Helpful Online"

jblakey — Mon, 14 Sep 2020 20:26:29 +0000

I really liked the "answer yes" point. It keeps the person needing help going in the right direction instead of stopping them cold.

New comment by jblakey in "Why programming is difficult (2014)"

jblakey — Thu, 13 Feb 2020 13:29:01 +0000

Love this article! I don't think the guy is playing a 'persona' at all in this piece. These are the kinds of things he thinks about on a daily basis. Heck, these are the kinds of things I think about on a daily basis too, and I'm sure most devs who have been writing code for a few years do.

In my daily work, I don't have time to understand everything. There, i've said it. I'm not lazy. I'm not stupid. I just don't have time when I'm trying to get a task/job/chore done. I appreciate good abstraction/encapsulation. A good tool does this. A bad tool fails to do this. Same with documentation, really.

Don't get me started!:)

New comment by jblakey in "Ask HN: How does your company keep track of lessons learned?"

jblakey — Tue, 11 Feb 2020 17:59:45 +0000

I set up Confluence and used it a lot for "how to do this" and "how to do that" notes for myself. It was helpful to me, and I figure that it MIGHT be helpful to other people. It doesn't HURT to have the information searchable, and with a GUI on it for the less-UNIXy folk. Some people use it, most don't.

New comment by jblakey in "The missing semester of CS education"

jblakey — Tue, 04 Feb 2020 14:04:03 +0000

Three great programmer virtues, according to Larry Wall: 1. Laziness (figure a smart way to do it that is less work) 2. Impatience (figure how to do it faster) 3. Hubris (figure that what you're doing is important)

New comment by jblakey in "Lessons from the Cuckoo's Egg"

jblakey — Mon, 13 Jan 2020 14:06:15 +0000

Ah, Trumpet Winsock - and then Windows 95 spoiled that party!:)

New comment by jblakey in "My Experience as a Remote Worker"

jblakey — Mon, 02 Dec 2019 18:05:38 +0000

Kuhn or bust!:)

New comment by jblakey in "Ultrafast laser pulses produce a previously unseen phase of matter"

jblakey — Tue, 12 Nov 2019 19:07:28 +0000

Laugh-a while you can, monkey-boy.

New comment by jblakey in "Making My Own Glasses"

jblakey — Fri, 04 Oct 2019 18:31:14 +0000

I'm in Ontario, too, and couldn't get my PD from Laurier Optical. So I left, went on Amazon, and bought a PD Distance Measurer for a couple of hundred bucks. Did my whole family, and now my wife feels better about ordering from Zeni. Saved enough on a single pair of glasses to pay for the meter.

New comment by jblakey in "The one who kept VLC free"

jblakey — Wed, 25 Sep 2019 13:47:49 +0000

Just wanted to say thanks for all the hard work over the years!

New comment by jblakey in "Twitter locked my account for a nine year old tweet"

jblakey — Fri, 16 Aug 2019 14:03:32 +0000

I realize I may be out of touch (pushing 50) with the current state of things, but I keep asking myself "What right do I have to expect a Company (that I pay no money to) to provide me with access to their service?"