Hacker News: ngokevin

New comment by ngokevin in "Localsend: An open-source cross-platform alternative to AirDrop"

ngokevin — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 05:26:08 +0000

Airdrop has not felt reliable to me all the time, and completely fails on anything larger than a picture or short video. Especially if you are storing your files on iCloud and the pictures and videos don't live on your phone.

Been using Localsend to transfer bigger files between phone / laptops, never fails or has trouble finding a device, or stalling.

New comment by ngokevin in "Ask HN: Any interesting niche hobbies?"

ngokevin — Wed, 08 Apr 2026 17:09:14 +0000

I use Blood on the Clocktower to do this, it's a social deduction game (that's just not randomly accusing each other) so it gets everyone talking easily

New comment by ngokevin in "In Japan, the robot isn't coming for your job; it's filling the one nobody wants"

ngokevin — Mon, 06 Apr 2026 01:21:56 +0000

This short-term thinking makes me pessimistic about UBI. Everyone's addicted to work despite automation and AI creating less need for work. And thinking we live in a zero-sum game where if someone else is benefiting, it must be hurting them somehow so they must block it. If someone's getting a "handout", they're a lazy bum.

New comment by ngokevin in "AI Didn't Break the Senior Engineer Pipeline. It Showed That One Never Existed"

ngokevin — Mon, 30 Mar 2026 21:53:48 +0000

—

You dropped your emdash. This comment actually sounds more human than the original post!

New comment by ngokevin in "AI Didn't Break the Senior Engineer Pipeline. It Showed That One Never Existed"

ngokevin — Mon, 30 Mar 2026 20:15:53 +0000

The most AI headline I've ever read

New comment by ngokevin in "Show HN: Open-Source Animal Crossing–Style UI for Claude Code Agents"

ngokevin — Fri, 27 Mar 2026 23:21:07 +0000

I guess the AI didn't know what Animal Crossing looks like. Cool visualization though.

New comment by ngokevin in "Return of the Obra Dinn: spherical mapped dithering for a 1bpp first-person game"

ngokevin — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 18:54:09 +0000

Mostly enjoyed it but the art style gave me motion sickness during and after each session where I had to stop (playing on a TV).

New comment by ngokevin in "Show HN: Channel Surfer – Watch YouTube like it’s cable TV"

ngokevin — Fri, 13 Mar 2026 20:31:51 +0000

I'd love an Inter-dimensional Cable channel, just weird surreal stuff

New comment by ngokevin in "Digg is gone again"

ngokevin — Fri, 13 Mar 2026 20:29:42 +0000

"This is not...this is" is a tell

New comment by ngokevin in "Lessons from 14 years at Google"

ngokevin — Sun, 04 Jan 2026 23:00:44 +0000

I've repeatedly told ChatGPT to stop talking like this (it isn't X, it's Y) every other sentence

New comment by ngokevin in "Ask HN: Is building a calm, non-gamified learning app a mistake?"

ngokevin — Wed, 17 Dec 2025 19:28:38 +0000

Thanks for trying and following it. Spent the morning wondering if that's a chance for it and I'm not sure. Just requires Herculean habit building which necessitates dopamine. Anki works because it has 100% of the coverage of people who don't need dopamine.

New comment by ngokevin in "Ask HN: Is building a calm, non-gamified learning app a mistake?"

ngokevin — Wed, 17 Dec 2025 19:26:40 +0000

Thanks for the feedback, I'm trying to sort of post-mortem and I think that's always been a major point I thought I could overcome.

New comment by ngokevin in "Ask HN: Is building a calm, non-gamified learning app a mistake?"

ngokevin — Mon, 15 Dec 2025 19:37:32 +0000

As someone who spent 2+ years building one, I would turn away now if you're looking for traction or sustainability (https://couplingcafe.com). Though I don't regret it and learned enough to speak to my in-laws. My retention numbers are decent, but I just haven't done the marketing bit yet, and am currently taking a break.

Language learning apps are the ultimate sand-pit for solo developers thinking they can offer some random unique feature that Duolingo (or "Anki but better") doesn't offer. Without realizing, they don't do it for a reason. Language learning has extremely low activation and retention. And it's super easy to find one or two early adopters that like your app for some reason to keep going.

And solo developers that get into language learning often are only strong in software development and lack in UX, design, product, or marketing.

You may start with a calm, "not Duolingo gamification" style app, but every language learning app starts with pure intentions until you're many months or years in, your numbers are low, you need to make money, and you need to move the needle.

My two cents, you don't have to heed it obviously.

New comment by ngokevin in "I Test Drove a Flying Car. Get Ready, They're Here"

ngokevin — Fri, 17 Oct 2025 16:37:18 +0000

Not sure about the autopilot part (even planes autopilots follow a flight path). I'm not an expert either, but with roads, there are clear lanes and markings. And ability to generally see around you, and judge distance.

Is what sets the lanes in the air are traffic controllers and flight plans? We're already short on traffic controllers. And there are already lots of near-misses (and not near-misses) even with the heavy regulation and control. Can't imagine having it as mass personal transit driven manually. There'd need to be a mass central system that controls everything, and in that case, might as well just keep it commercial

The energy efficiency isn't great either on personal aircraft

not an expert, just shooting the crap

New comment by ngokevin in "Apple Debuts iPhone 17"

ngokevin — Tue, 09 Sep 2025 18:46:52 +0000

Even an iPhone X was running great in 2025, until it finally gave up to age and the network module stopped working. iPhone 13s are lightning quick for me still.

New comment by ngokevin in "Let's get real about the one-person billion dollar company"

ngokevin — Tue, 12 Aug 2025 19:11:19 +0000

Stardew Valley?

New comment by ngokevin in "Intel's retreat is unlike anything it's done before in Oregon"

ngokevin — Thu, 17 Jul 2025 16:36:00 +0000

Ah, I meant tech startups. Starting a brewery and machine shop is exactly what I expect from the PDX crowd. I think you echo what I said, people working in PDX tech are there for the salary and coast so they can focus on their own lives outside of work, which is perfectly fine. But not conducive to a tech startup environment

New comment by ngokevin in "Intel's retreat is unlike anything it's done before in Oregon"

ngokevin — Wed, 16 Jul 2025 22:18:29 +0000

It helps there to be a strong community of founders, employees willing to take a risk to work at startup for less money, investors, capital, and general energy in the air. PNW tech scene is relatively low-key and apathetic to startups. Anyone with that type of ambition should have already migrated

New comment by ngokevin in "Intel's retreat is unlike anything it's done before in Oregon"

ngokevin — Wed, 16 Jul 2025 21:26:03 +0000

As a PDX native that went to Oregon State and saw a lot of people go towards Intel, I don't feel the Oregon Intel crowd has strong aptitude for starting something up. They're at Intel in the first place because it was a secure job in their hometown they could coast at. I'm sure there are many of them that can do it, but I don't feel Portland has strong startup energy.

New comment by ngokevin in "Show HN: I built this to talk Danish to my girlfriend – works with any language"

ngokevin — Tue, 15 Jul 2025 16:37:21 +0000

Wow, we're on the same page. I'm making a language app specifically for couples https://couplingcafe.com ... about to release a version focused on chat that has translator support as well

How has it been since you been using your tool?