Hacker News: ottobonn

New comment by ottobonn in "Air France and Airbus found guilty of manslaughter over 2009 plane crash"

ottobonn — Sun, 24 May 2026 06:25:25 +0000

I'm a software engineer and recently got my pilot's license, and the training for the pilot's license increased my (already-high) respect for the aviation profession. All pilots learn to fly basic airplanes and have to do everything by hand (often on paper, but an iPad is allowed) to show they know the basics. The result is that by the time you work up to more advanced planes you have climbed the ladder of abstraction and know what underpins the automation.

The other piece of the picture is that pilots acknowledge that their skills are perishable, and they have to commit to ongoing training. This would be analogous to writing code by hand and getting a licensed engineer to sign off on your currency periodically even if you use LLMs for work.

New comment by ottobonn in "AluminiumOS, by Google: Android Reimagined for the Desktop"

ottobonn — Wed, 13 May 2026 07:48:29 +0000

The marketing copy here is low quality. It spends a lot of words explaining what this isn't instead of what it is. It also just sounds like AI in an off-putting way. What does it mean to have an operating system with "Gemini at every layer"? Based on this page I fear that the entire OS will have a similar level of quality and consideration.

This paragraph in particular shows a confusing lack of understanding:

"The name itself is deliberate. ChromeOS came from Chromium — a metallic element ending in "-ium." Aluminium follows the same pattern, but the British spelling highlights the prefix Al, standing for Android-Linux: an honest acknowledgment of what this platform is built on."

The British spelling does not in fact highlight the fact that the word starts with "Al" any more than the American spelling would. By this point in the page I got angry and stopped reading, because it's a waste of my time.

Edit: if this is a parody, it makes way more sense. I fell for it!

New comment by ottobonn in "Why do voice transcription apps charge monthly when Whisper runs locally?"

ottobonn — Fri, 14 Nov 2025 05:12:39 +0000

I have been looking for this on Linux (Gnome) and would love something like it. I can't find a simple way to get system-level voice input.

New comment by ottobonn in "AI model on a $3 chip (ESP32)"

ottobonn — Thu, 02 Feb 2023 22:00:42 +0000

I signed up for updates! I have been looking for something exactly like this for home automation, to detect occupancy, pets, etc. I am very excited to pair it with HomeAssistant!

New comment by ottobonn in "How to Draw Animals (1930)"

ottobonn — Tue, 07 Jun 2022 19:31:53 +0000

"Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Edwards is a good introduction to drawing. I think in particular it is a good explanation of how much of drawing is learning to look at the world, and exercises to improve your skills of looking at things. One of the big takeaways from this book and other drawing courses I have taken is that once you learn to draw what you see, nothing is particularly easier or harder to draw; in every case you are drawing what you see. The feeling of difficulty in drawing a particular object often comes from trying to parse it into visual symbols, then draw those symbols, rather than seeing the object as a pattern of light and reproducing that on the paper.

New comment by ottobonn in "Ask HN: What do you pay for your internet connection, and where do you live?"

ottobonn — Fri, 27 May 2022 07:37:08 +0000

Oakland CA USA, symmetric 1 Gbps fiber for $35/mo (but actual speed is usually a bit lower than that) from Monkeybrains

New comment by ottobonn in "Show HN: Make your PDF look scanned in browser"

ottobonn — Tue, 19 Apr 2022 19:45:23 +0000

On the topic of PDF tools running in the browser, I made a simple app to split apart large-format pages for printing at home: https://splitpdfs.com/

I use it to print posters and big templates for cutting out e.g. foam board from plans.

New comment by ottobonn in "Ask HN: Share your personal site"

ottobonn — Wed, 06 Apr 2022 22:48:56 +0000

Those previews are great! I like that I can start reading the article before clicking it.

New comment by ottobonn in "Ask HN: Should I move to San Francisco?"

ottobonn — Tue, 27 Jul 2021 06:04:27 +0000

I would say you should try it. If it calls you like it called me, it will feel like you're in the right place. Yes, you can meet amazing people and no, the insane beauty of twin peaks never wears off. I would say it's a bit harder to meet people than in Oakland, which feels more approachable. I also met my partner in SF though :)

New comment by ottobonn in "How I built a keyboard/video/mouse switch for my two 4k monitors"

ottobonn — Thu, 03 Sep 2020 01:57:00 +0000

If you were to for example plug each end into a computer hoping to transfer files between them, both would try to act as the USB host.

New comment by ottobonn in "Show HN: I made an app for large group video calls where people shuffle around"

ottobonn — Tue, 09 Jun 2020 19:20:09 +0000

Wow, this is exactly the project I have been working on for the past few weeks, down to the abstraction of "tables," "starting a new table," and shuffling around at will! I was even building on top of jitsi. Mine was going to be called "lunchbox"...

It's amazing to me how many people had this idea, and that it seemed not to exist before. I am curious how far we can go to make video chat feel as good as in-person socializing.

New comment by ottobonn in "Launch HN: Fly.io (YC W20) – Deploy app servers close to your users"

ottobonn — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 17:06:46 +0000

Great introduction to the technology! I rarely see such a clear explanation of how new products work.

New comment by ottobonn in "Broken"

ottobonn — Thu, 10 Oct 2019 22:41:37 +0000

Do you have any tips for getting the touchpad to work well? Mine picks up palm touches and the only solution I've found is to disable the edges of the touch pad.

New comment by ottobonn in "Micro Frontends"

ottobonn — Mon, 10 Jun 2019 21:58:17 +0000

Do you find that managing versions between the different repos causes overhead? Besides allowing independent main branch management, what are the advantages of having many small repos instead of one that contains all of your apps?

New comment by ottobonn in "Ask HN: Secure automated backup?"

ottobonn — Sat, 13 May 2017 07:30:01 +0000

I also use deja-dup but lately it seems to choke when trying to determine what to back up (I have about 175 GB of files, which doesn't seem outrageous). Have you had any issues with the speed? It could be that I have a long history saved on my backup drive and it's trying to apply too many incremental diffs.

New comment by ottobonn in "Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development"

ottobonn — Mon, 02 Jan 2017 15:42:39 +0000

I just got one with the discrete graphics, and it works great with nvidia-prime. I only had to configure the touchpad a bit to avoid bumping it while I type. I upgraded from my beloved T420, and this is a great laptop.