Hacker News: linker3000

New comment by linker3000 in "Running a law firm on Free software"

linker3000 — Sat, 07 Nov 2026 15:11:15 +0000

I like the idea, but for 'normal' users - oh, yaml.

I see there's third party GUI tools but that adds more hassle for the non-technical.

Would be great if there was an inbuilt interface in espanso.

New comment by linker3000 in "Running a law firm on Free software"

linker3000 — Sat, 07 Nov 2026 15:07:12 +0000

Neil is very active in the Fediverse on a variety of tech and non tech topics (Airsoft) and appalling jokes.

New comment by linker3000 in "The Commodore 64 hardware simulator: break chips and pins, see the results"

linker3000 — Sat, 17 Oct 2026 19:10:33 +0000

This is really cool, and a fantastic piece of work. It may come in handy when diagnosing / fixing C64 boards.

Stretch goals:

* Allow the simulation to run diagnostics carts.

* On the 250407 board I have had timing edge cases with PLA replacements - the fix is often to fit a small (~100pF) capacitor on the /CASRAM line to slow it down a bit. The cap is fitted from the left leg of an existing 82 Ohm resistor and a nearby ground point close to 'RAM6'. Some boards actually have official space for the capacitor - designated C204. With some original PLA variants on real boards the capacitor may already be fitted. It would be good to be able to enable and disable this capacitor and set its value to see the effects.

Write-up: https://linker3000.com/index.php/blog/poor64

New comment by linker3000 in "Man discovers his parents' coffee machine used 1TB of data in 10 days"

linker3000 — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 22:05:13 +0000

Yeah, but the people running the Webcam probably didn't make notes about the watch / rings / shirt / dress / shoes worn by the people using the coffee maker, nor take down whether they were wearing glasses and if they added milk - and sell this information to the local jewelers, clothes shop, shoe shop, opticians and dairy.

Probably.

Ixys / Littelfuse announce EOL for remaining Z80 parts

linker3000 — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 12:40:28 +0000

Article URL: https://mastodonapp.uk/@quazarsamcoupe/117398911337931780

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49991941

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

New comment by linker3000 in "Three sites made 215,128 “best software” pages for AI. Perplexity cites them"

linker3000 — Wed, 02 Sep 2026 16:09:30 +0000

I'm just about getting by with DDG and a curated 'AI slop' list subscription in uBlock origin.

The state of search has been dire for quite some time.

- in 2026.

New comment by linker3000 in "Z80 – The 1970s Microprocessor Still Alive (2021)"

linker3000 — Sun, 23 Aug 2026 12:19:23 +0000

Yay, wirewrap...

https://codeberg.org/linker3000/Z80-Board

New comment by linker3000 in "Mars Bar from 1991 found – and it's 20g bigger than today's"

linker3000 — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 16:37:40 +0000

I find it apparent when I very occasionally take a break from making my own stuff from scratch and get a takeout.

Fastest way to run ghidrasql: point an AI coding agent at the installer prompt

linker3000 — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 20:35:22 +0000

Article URL: https://github.com/0xeb/ghidrasql

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49174716

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

New comment by linker3000 in "Prevent cognitive debt by manually retyping LLM-generated code"

linker3000 — Mon, 03 Aug 2026 11:45:36 +0000

One thing it taught me was that sometimes the corrections would be in next month's edition, so I had that long to figure out for myself why the program didn't work as stated.

New comment by linker3000 in "Show HN: I'm a 15 Year Old Wannabe Engineer, This Is a Cycloidal Gearbox I Built"

linker3000 — Sun, 02 Aug 2026 15:16:22 +0000

The main qualification of one of the best electronics engineers I knew (UK) was Bachelor of Music.

New comment by linker3000 in "How to survive boiling water"

linker3000 — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 20:51:29 +0000

So if, say, you were completely irradiated - every atom of your being - and fully repaired, would you still be 'you'?

/Is that a transporter energizing I hear?

New comment by linker3000 in "Minecraft Java raises recommended memory to 16GB ahead of Vulkan transition"

linker3000 — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 15:35:42 +0000

Is this the evolution of something that used to run moderately well on a mid-range Raspberry pi?

Don Priestley (Mazogs), stares down with a withering look.

An open letter to office suite users, just before the Euro-Office announcement

linker3000 — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 07:21:39 +0000

Article URL: https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/06/08/an-open-letter/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48442247

Points: 8

# Comments: 0

New comment by linker3000 in "32GB of DDR5 now costs $375 – AI shortage continues to squeeze PC building"

linker3000 — Wed, 03 Jun 2026 17:50:12 +0000

A few weeks ago I needed a computer to be a Debian server for some at-home simple Web dev / learning stuff. I bought an HP Prodesk 400 G3 SFF PC with i5-6500, 8GB RAM and a 256GB off a popular auction site for £44. It'll do. I might upgrade to 16GB. An additional 8GB stick costs £19.

New comment by linker3000 in "Canonical/Ubuntu have been under DDoS"

linker3000 — Fri, 01 May 2026 12:40:23 +0000

> leads to real outages.

Um, no.

I daresay you could find the odd example, as for any grid in a stressed situation, but it's not like we turn to each other every week in the dark and say "Oh, it must be half time at the Manchester United match".

New comment by linker3000 in "Bring Your Agent to Teams"

linker3000 — Thu, 23 Apr 2026 11:38:41 +0000

I would just like to bring my Bluetooth headset into teams reliably.

New comment by linker3000 in "Paul Brainerd, founder of Aldus PageMaker, has died"

linker3000 — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 20:54:27 +0000

I used to support DTP, and graphics for the systems house at which I worked. I travelled round the UK installing PageMaker and A4 paper-white CRT displays - boy were they heavy!

My endearing memory is calling the company in Edinburgh for technical support, to be greeted on the phone by a lady with a lovely, cheery Scottish accent announcing "Aldus UK".

Fun fact: I was first person in the UK to print in colour on an HP ink jet printer at the trade show where they were first demonstrated. The HP folks hadn't got the official colour driver ready for the show, so the HP guys were printing in mono, but I'd had an advanced model to try and hacked some other print driver to work with it.

New comment by linker3000 in "Motorola announces a partnership with GrapheneOS"

linker3000 — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 08:27:44 +0000

The Motorola phones are generally good performers and value for money. My only gripe is that they cannot have their batteries replaced easily - even by phone repair shops.

I understand that this is because you have to disassemble / un-glue the phones through the front and remove the display. For this reason, the repair shops I have asked have said they don't 'do' Motorola phones because there's too much risk in breaking the display.

This effectively means that the life of the phone is determined by the ageing of the battery.

New comment by linker3000 in "The largest zip tie is nearly 4 feet long and $75"

linker3000 — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 08:24:11 +0000

I learned how to do lacing during an electronics engineering apprenticeship in the 1980s.

After the fact, when I moved more in to systems and networking, I found that flat, nylon, waxed lacing cord, with a small nut tied to the end, was lightweight and perfect for throwing through ducting and ceiling spaces very long distances, so you could backhaul cables through the void. It was a real time saver.