Hacker News: ljnelson

New comment by ljnelson in "Matrix URIs, a URL syntax from Tim Berners-Lee that never shipped (1996)"

ljnelson — Tue, 30 Jun 2026 20:31:23 +0000

Many comments so far seem to imply (perhaps not intentionally) that this syntax was intended only on the "right side" of the URI, but you can think of it more as adding qualifier-like information to (potentially) each path segment. So in /com/foo/bar you could further qualify foo (perhaps as /com/foo;color=yellow/bar). This can be combined with a (definitionally trailing) query string as well. Someone noted that Spring implements some support for this; the Eclipse Foundation's Jersey (Java REST toolkit) does as well if I remember right.

New comment by ljnelson in "Tested: 1981 Datsun 280ZX Turbo (1981)"

ljnelson — Tue, 02 Dec 2025 03:17:12 +0000

This was the absolute golden age of Car and Driver. David E. Davis Jr. was the editor; he later departed to found Automobile magazine.

New comment by ljnelson in "Hash Ordering and Hyrum's Law"

ljnelson — Wed, 02 Oct 2024 18:41:24 +0000

Interesting note: the JDK deliberately randomizes iteration order of certain immutable sets and maps (https://github.com/openjdk/jdk/blob/jdk-23%2B37/src/java.bas...).

New comment by ljnelson in "Ronda Rousey: "I never wanted to talk about concussion""

ljnelson — Wed, 10 Apr 2024 19:25:10 +0000

One thing many don't talk about is the social aspect of getting a concussion. An acquaintance has decided to try to do something about that: https://concussionbox.org/ (Disclaimer: no involvement/attachment with the site, just thought it was relevant here.)

New comment by ljnelson in "Plastics Contain Thousands More Chemicals Than Thought, and Most Are Unregulated"

ljnelson — Fri, 29 Mar 2024 17:52:32 +0000

The actual report: https://zenodo.org/records/10701706/files/PlastChem_State_of...

New comment by ljnelson in "KoBold Metals says Zambia copper find largest in a century"

ljnelson — Mon, 05 Feb 2024 20:38:43 +0000

Does this make Gates and Bezos the Lords of KoBold (hear our prayer)?

New comment by ljnelson in "Ask HN: What would you do if you could start over?"

ljnelson — Wed, 17 Jan 2024 01:42:04 +0000

Put everything I possibly could into a Roth IRA starting at 21.

New comment by ljnelson in "Generation Junk"

ljnelson — Thu, 28 Dec 2023 03:35:01 +0000

You want to make sure you're using PYREX, not pyrex. They're different![1]

[1]: https://www.allrecipes.com/article/what-is-the-difference-be...

New comment by ljnelson in "Ask HN: What outdated tech are you still using and are perfectly happy with?"

ljnelson — Wed, 18 Oct 2023 16:43:15 +0000

Tivo.

New comment by ljnelson in "Ask HN: What software did you purchase that positively impacted your family life"

ljnelson — Wed, 04 Oct 2023 01:52:14 +0000

AnyList (https://www.anylist.com/). Streamlines grocery shopping and the paid version is absolutely worth the money. ~$15/year for a family.

New comment by ljnelson in "Install a server in your house, get free hot water!"

ljnelson — Wed, 15 Feb 2023 22:48:49 +0000

Interestingly, this is often by design: https://www.npr.org/2020/12/10/945136599/how-spanish-flu-pan....

New comment by ljnelson in "U.S. to announce fusion energy ‘breakthrough’"

ljnelson — Mon, 12 Dec 2022 04:12:49 +0000

See also the Financial Times, which originally reported the story: https://www.ft.com/content/4b6f0fab-66ef-4e33-adec-cfc345589...

New comment by ljnelson in "Why wasn’t the steam engine invented earlier? Part III"

ljnelson — Fri, 14 Oct 2022 14:13:26 +0000

I also like https://technicshistory.com/2021/02/18/the-age-of-steam-intr..., which points in part to metal purity and engineering tolerances.

New comment by ljnelson in "Ask HN: What are you doing this weekend?"

ljnelson — Sat, 24 Sep 2022 16:35:41 +0000

Playing jump blues at the North Bend Blues Walk (https://www.northbendblueswalk.com/).

New comment by ljnelson in "Canada taps into strategic reserves to deal with shortage of maple syrup"

ljnelson — Sat, 27 Nov 2021 04:30:23 +0000

What a masterful headline.

New comment by ljnelson in "Java Virtual Threads Preview"

ljnelson — Tue, 16 Nov 2021 06:59:30 +0000

Indeed. “of” infected Java with the awful naming conventions imposed by java.time (and to a lesser degree java.nio) because “new” is a keyword and doing “newThing” instead was not in vogue. Now it smacks of the worst kind of hipster disease and is going to enter java.lang for no good reason at all. What’s wrong with “newPlatformThread” or something similar? This shouldn’t have survived the initial sniff test.

New comment by ljnelson in "I write code 100 hours/week, here's why I probably won't stop"

ljnelson — Mon, 18 Oct 2021 04:23:31 +0000

How do I put this? We are all going to be forgotten, utterly, along with every last thing we do, within no more than three generations (one for most of us). That makes everything we do both utterly insignificant and unfathomably important at the same time. Please make sure whoever is reading this, particularly if you're in your 20s, that you do what makes sense for you, and those around you who are important to you, for your very, very short now.

New comment by ljnelson in "Email a Dumpster Fire"

ljnelson — Tue, 24 Nov 2020 19:37:52 +0000

Part of what I love about this is that periodically it doesn't work and a dude comes in from off camera and manually makes sure your email is torched. Very 2020.

New comment by ljnelson in "Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?"

ljnelson — Sat, 19 Sep 2020 18:17:02 +0000

This seems like it isn't physically related, but it is: as the years accumulate, it becomes more and more clear that the person staring back at you in the mirror is the one you have to live with most intimately. Do the best you can with what you have, in all things, always. The person in the mirror will know whether it was the best you could, and he or she or they will also know whether you can be forgiven for any given action given what you had at the time. The biggest part of this is unkindness: If you are unkind, that person in the mirror will never let you forget it. You may not spend much time on this when you are young but you will spend a lot of time on it when you are older.

New comment by ljnelson in "Brain-Gut Circuit Lets Microbiota Directly Affect the Sympathetic Nervous System"

ljnelson — Sun, 02 Aug 2020 22:50:50 +0000

Looks like the original story is here: https://www.rockefeller.edu/news/28643-bacteria-in-the-gut-h...