Hacker News: otterpro

New comment by otterpro in "OpenBSD 7.9 Released"

otterpro — Tue, 19 May 2026 15:21:40 +0000

That's too bad. I might need bluetooth on keyboard, mice, headphone/earbuds, etc. OpenBSD seems so nice, but right now it is limited to running as a server, and not a desktop, which could be considered a good thing, as it focuses on simplicity. However, I do wish it had more hardware support.

EDIT: Running openBSD in a VM might get me the best of both world, with hardware support on host OS (linux/win) and the benefit of running OpenBSD.

New comment by otterpro in "Website streamed live directly from a model"

otterpro — Wed, 22 Apr 2026 21:29:14 +0000

It's pretty cool. I created a beautiful isometric illustration of home garden, which is worthy of being featured in a real book or magazine. I really like the isometric view to explain things, and the color palette is consistent and pleasant.

New comment by otterpro in "3.4M Solar Panels"

otterpro — Wed, 22 Apr 2026 14:08:09 +0000

In Florida, the irony is that hurricane is the reason for not having too many solar panels. For example, Miami-Dade county requires commercial solar panel installation to have hurricane-approved solar mounts, which can withstand up to 160mph+ winds. This means installation is very costly. Even for homes, many insurance company will not insure homes with roof solar panel because of hurricane.

New comment by otterpro in "Show HN: Mini-Diarium - An encrypted, local, cross-platform journaling app"

otterpro — Thu, 19 Feb 2026 17:25:20 +0000

I like the idea, as a niche project for users that don't have control over their hardware/OS, or run on USB flash for portability.

Speaking of which, I have notes / journal entries dating back several decades, all in plain text files. I'm worried about these new projects and their longevity and whether it'll be actively supported 30 years from now. For simplicity, I'd use gocryptfs, Veracrypt, or other general file-based encryption which suits your risk tolerance, and use whatever editor (ie Obsidian, vscode, OneNote, etc) I want to use.

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

otterpro — Wed, 18 Feb 2026 22:49:44 +0000

My memory is fuzzy, but as for me, Delphi died the day it suddenly became too expensive for hobbyists and students, and I couldn't justify spending more on Delphi than on a brand new PC at that time. Borland sold it away and we saw price up in the thousands of dollars for a single license. When the free community edition came out, it was a decade too late. I also miss dBase, as it was far superior to MS foxpro or Access.

New comment by otterpro in "Reliable 25 Gigabit Ethernet via Thunderbolt"

otterpro — Sun, 01 Feb 2026 13:11:53 +0000

> reduces temperatures by at least 15 Kelvin, bringing the ambient enclosure temperature below 40 °C,

I had to do a double-take when it mentioned Kelvin since That is physically impossible.

New comment by otterpro in "Show HN: Baby's first international landline"

otterpro — Mon, 13 Oct 2025 18:17:43 +0000

I love this idea as I grew up with ancient dial up phones, and I miss actually holding a handset and dialing a number to make calls. However, gen alpha has grown up in completely digital era, and most interaction occurs on FaceTime (or other video chat), and I don't think we can ever go back even if we wanted to. My kids' grandparents WANT to see their precious little grandkids so we always use video calls, if it involves kids and grandparents.

I, on the other hand, want this to communicate with friends who want to do the same.

New comment by otterpro in "Show HN: Baby's first international landline"

otterpro — Mon, 13 Oct 2025 18:08:37 +0000

see TinCan phone mentioned in the comments, which does this. However, it means that all their friends need to buy the phone as well.

New comment by otterpro in "Why Exercise Is a Miracle Drug"

otterpro — Sat, 02 Aug 2025 17:10:58 +0000

Exercise "simulate the arduous tasks that were once necessary to make it through a life" makes sense, as most of our ancestors were blue-collar workers and farmers. I try to integrate more physical activity in my life, which seemed like labor before, but now feels like life-saving activity. For example, I am intentionally trying to fix/diy things with my house like painting my garage, mowing my lawn instead of hiring someone else to do it, and even learning woodworking and gardening. Even in the heat of the summer, I feel more invigorated working outdoor whenever I can, and helps offset the sluggishness I feel after a day of sitting, coding, and staring at the monitors at work.

New comment by otterpro in "Show HN: Tattoy – a text-based terminal compositor"

otterpro — Fri, 13 Jun 2025 15:57:37 +0000

I'd probably run cmatrix for looks or maybe htop on the background. Also, Rick-rolled in the screenshot.

New comment by otterpro in "Eleven v3"

otterpro — Fri, 06 Jun 2025 01:34:45 +0000

This is straight out of the movie "Her", when OS1 said something like this. And the voice and the intonation is eerily similar to Scarlett Johansson. As soon as I heard this clip, I knew it was meant to mimic that.

New comment by otterpro in "Show HN: F2 – Cross-Platform CLI Batch Renaming Tool"

otterpro — Sat, 24 May 2025 16:32:38 +0000

Wow, it can integrate with exiftool. I use exiftool to rename photo files, but I think f2 offers more flexible renaming features.

New comment by otterpro in ""Is This Tech Dead?" A snarky autopsy engine for your dead frameworks"

otterpro — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 03:11:51 +0000

I don't know what's going on with this website, but it just slowed my browser to a complete halt, and I've never seen any website that did this. I had to restart Chrome but still have some serious performance issue.

New comment by otterpro in "How Nintendo bled Atari games to death"

otterpro — Wed, 16 Apr 2025 20:33:04 +0000

I got Atari 5200 when I was a kid, and the disappointment was immense, considering the marketing and hype that went into it. The controller made playing games very difficult. And the games were pretty bad as well. Later, I got a Commodore 64 and then also NES, which just revolutionized home gaming in general.

New comment by otterpro in "I bought a Mac"

otterpro — Mon, 14 Apr 2025 01:54:12 +0000

I bought a PowerMac G3 (from ebay, about 15 years ago) and while it was not very powerful, the thing was just fun to work with. I ran Linux and had added all kinds of PCI cards like old analog TV tuner card and SATA RAID card to run it as NAS. And the case was very beautiful. I'm not sure how they did it, but Apple and Steve Jobs made plastic look very pleasing to the eyes. Afterward, I also saw someone's PowerMac G4 in person and that thing looked incredibly nice, especially the mirror finish. These macs looked better in real life than in photos. I never got the G4, and I wish I still had that G3.

New comment by otterpro in "FOSS infrastructure is under attack by AI companies"

otterpro — Thu, 20 Mar 2025 14:51:34 +0000

Yes, this might be the best solution. and put read-only repo on github or some public facing host.

New comment by otterpro in "Computers and Mice – Mister Rogers Neighborhood"

otterpro — Sun, 16 Mar 2025 01:35:26 +0000

Me, too. I got anxious when Mr. Rogers began to do the unthinkable. Surely he is not going to plug a ps/2 mice into a live PC, is he? And he did. Oh, so many memory of me crashing my PC whenever I did that, forgetting that the PC was powered on.

New comment by otterpro in "Obsidian is now free for work"

otterpro — Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:06:43 +0000

Aww man, I just paid for one out of my pocket just few weeks ago, after procrastinating for months. I use Obsidian for taking notes on my work laptop. I think I'm the only one at work who uses Obsidian, and everyone else at work use OneNote or just plain text or something else. Anyway, I hope Obsidian continues to thrive, as it was the only note app that was good enough to make me switch from vim (and onenote and nvalt). I feel it is the only note app that really understands its users, and it shames all other commercial note apps.

New comment by otterpro in "File Pilot: A file explorer built for speed with a modern, robust interface"

otterpro — Wed, 19 Feb 2025 18:03:55 +0000

I've been using a free file explorer called Q-Dir (http://www.q-dir.com) by a guy who writes a lot of these types of utilities for windows. It has a quirky UI and it has 4 quadrants by default, but once I got used to using it, it was almost life-changing. It is compatible with every windows, even windows 98. It's updated fairly frequently, even till now.

New comment by otterpro in "Home Loss File System"

otterpro — Wed, 15 Jan 2025 15:49:09 +0000

This is great, I can just fill it out, and save a copy somewhere in google drive. Also I'd keep a printed hard copy of it and then save it in (fireproof) safe or a bug-out bag for escaping from disaster.