Hacker News: kogus

New comment by kogus in "Inception-style curved map for turn-by-turn directions"

kogus — Fri, 28 Aug 2026 15:51:48 +0000

I don't really know why, but the thought of my (elderly) mother using this made me laugh almost as hard as the El Risitas guy[1]. I adore it, and it also should never ever be used in any car GPS scenario. It's far too distracting, and puts far too much emphasis on the places you are not going.

I could see it being useful for a more exploratory style of map, however. Games like Pokemon Go come to mind as a place where this would be pretty cool.

[1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fkk9DI-8el4

New comment by kogus in "Delphi 13 Community Edition Is Now Available"

kogus — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 14:13:59 +0000

Nuh-uh. http://www.isdelphidead.com/

New comment by kogus in "Delphi 13 Community Edition Is Now Available"

kogus — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 14:13:08 +0000

I have used Beyond Compare for 20 years, and as far as I know, it has always been and still is written in Delphi. Quest Software, maker of TOAD for Oracle was also a big Delphi shop for many years. Not sure if they still are.

New comment by kogus in "How many of the 170k English words do you know?"

kogus — Fri, 19 Jun 2026 20:43:15 +0000

Suggestion: Add an "I don't know" button. If I don't know a word, I can admit it - but if I have to guess, then I have a 1/4 chance of getting incorrect credit.

New comment by kogus in "AI is just unauthorised plagiarism at a bigger scale"

kogus — Thu, 21 May 2026 16:41:32 +0000

  quantitative changes in an activity produce qualitative changes

Well said!

New comment by kogus in "U.S. to Withdraw 5k Troops from Germany, Pentagon Says"

kogus — Sat, 02 May 2026 00:44:49 +0000

If this is the Trump Administration's "punishment" for "disloyalty", then we are in for a treat. Hopefully US forces can also be withdrawn from Japan, Iraq, Italy, Guam, and the other 180 locations where they are currently unnecessarily stationed.

New comment by kogus in "72% of the dollar's purchasing power was destroyed in just four episodes"

kogus — Mon, 30 Mar 2026 15:57:39 +0000

I'm pretty sure you are right. Or to emphasize the devaluation, "$100 today would be worth only $3.05 in 1914."

I think it is astonishing that we accept that in a best case scenario of sustained 2% inflation, we are literally planning for the value of the dollar to be cut in half every 36 years.

New comment by kogus in "Fast-Servers"

kogus — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 15:50:01 +0000

Ah, that makes sense.

New comment by kogus in "Fast-Servers"

kogus — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 15:14:17 +0000

Slightly tangential, but why is the first diagram duplicated at .1 opacity?

New comment by kogus in "Delphi is 31 years old – innovation timeline"

kogus — Wed, 18 Feb 2026 21:24:50 +0000

I have very fond memories of working with Delphi 5 and 2005 in the early 2000s. Both the language and IDE were a real pleasure to work with, and they were head and shoulders better than anything from Microsoft at that time. The community was small but enthusiastic and supportive as well.

It would be hard to justify Delphi in a new project today - not because of the tooling or language, but because of the prohibitive license costs.

New comment by kogus in "STFU"

kogus — Fri, 16 Jan 2026 19:37:04 +0000

I love the ingredients for this project:

    made with spite and web audio api. do whatever you want with it.

New comment by kogus in "Claude Cowork exfiltrates files"

kogus — Wed, 14 Jan 2026 21:00:18 +0000

I don't think I understand what you are trying to say.

Are you suggesting that if a technological advance is sufficiently important, that we should ignore or accept security threats that it poses?

That is how I read your comment, but it seems so ludicrous an assertion that I question whether I have understood you correctly.

New comment by kogus in "Shipmap.org"

kogus — Wed, 07 Jan 2026 17:53:02 +0000

I posted this as a top-level comment, but for up to date info you might try this:

https://www.vesselfinder.com/

I have no affiliation with that site, I just enjoy it.

New comment by kogus in "Shipmap.org"

kogus — Wed, 07 Jan 2026 17:51:29 +0000

This is beautiful and well done. For realtime shipping information, may I suggest this:

https://www.vesselfinder.com/

New comment by kogus in "European Nations Decide Against Acquiring Boeing E-7 Awacs Aircraft"

kogus — Thu, 13 Nov 2025 16:05:23 +0000

As an American, I am also gratified to see the EU take steps toward independence from US foreign policy. Independence doesn't mean enmity; it just means that the EU and US should both be adults in the room, reaching decisions on equal terms.

If one takes a longer view of things, the period from WW2 to now is very much an anomaly reflecting relative European weakness in the aftermath of that war's physical and moral destruction. There is no intrinsic reason that the US should take the lead on, say, policy toward Russia. Quite the opposite.

New comment by kogus in "Trump admin reportedly plans to link autism to Tylenol use while pregnant"

kogus — Mon, 22 Sep 2025 19:12:59 +0000

Assuming that these claims are unsubstantiated, as the article indicates[1], what is the motivation for the Trump administration to put forward this bogus assertion?

[1]From the article:

A Kenvue spokesperson told CNBC in a statement that "over a decade of rigorous research, endorsed by leading medical professionals and global health regulators," shows there’s no credible evidence linking acetaminophen to autism.

New comment by kogus in "Wake Forest University goes tuition free for families making less than 200k/year"

kogus — Mon, 22 Sep 2025 19:10:29 +0000

Wake Forest University is a fairly prestigious private research university in Winston-Salem, NC. The costs of attendance (without financial aid) are normally almost 100k / year.

Wake Forest University goes tuition free for families making less than 200k/year

kogus — Mon, 22 Sep 2025 19:10:29 +0000

Article URL: https://news.wfu.edu/2025/09/17/wake-forest-university-will-be-tuition-free-for-admitted-students-from-north-carolina-families-earning-less-than-200000/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45338061

Points: 3

# Comments: 2

New comment by kogus in "William Gibson Reads Neuromancer (2004)"

kogus — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 04:58:00 +0000

I had to read Neuromancer twice; once to learn the world, then once to actually enjoy the story.

New comment by kogus in "SQL Injection as a Feature"

kogus — Thu, 24 Jul 2025 17:19:13 +0000

I am not an expert on SQL/PSM, but I have worked in an Oracle shop before, and used PL/SQL extensively. In SQL Server, the equivalent is T-SQL. T-SQL procedures can do pretty much anything (assuming it is executed by a user with sufficient privileges), including creating and altering tables, creating and executing other procedures, running dynamic sql, as well as ordinary CRUD style operations. The "no side effect" limitation applies specifically to SQL functions.