Hacker News: postdoc74

New comment by postdoc74 in "Python 3.14 garbage collection rigamarole"

postdoc74 — Sun, 14 Jun 2026 10:30:01 +0000

Not anywhere near Mathematica, but a good replacement for Matlab. From a daily user of all those.

New comment by postdoc74 in "Ask HN: What are tools you have made for yourself since the advent of AI?"

postdoc74 — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 07:05:45 +0000

A terminal and keyboard based email user agent with support for markdown, all written in Python with Textual https://github.com/juanjosegarciaripoll/pony

New comment by postdoc74 in "Notes about reading messages with the Python email packages"

postdoc74 — Mon, 25 May 2026 17:29:28 +0000

I've had a lot of fun vibe coding my own text-based email client and reader using mostly Python's stdlib. It is my daily driver and found no problem with parsing so far. It also leads to a very efficient and simple HTML reader submodule.

https://juanjosegarciaripoll.github.io/pony/

New comment by postdoc74 in "Jolla phone – a full-stack European alternative"

postdoc74 — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 07:34:01 +0000

Many banks restrict the number and capabilities of secondary users. In the end I had to get a power of attorney, but for me observing these changes is just a warning. I see a pervasive use of a phone as means of authentication and the compulsory nature of hardware-bound digital IDs is penetrating our society. That is a barrier for elderly people but also for other groups, specially when those requirements are not accompanied by standards (i.e. why does a French person need to get a new ID to work with Spanish bureaucracy) and also because the phone itself is an unsubsidized cost. Not to mention when one is travelling to countries with locked networks, losing the phone or, closer to the topic here,the lack of trust on generic phone platforms, which enforces a duopoly (Google Android + iOS) preventing new technologies to enter the market.

New comment by postdoc74 in "Jolla phone – a full-stack European alternative"

postdoc74 — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 18:46:19 +0000

Maybe you don't live in any European country. 2FA with cell phone has become compulsory for most banking procedures in Spain, to the point that I can even no longer assist my parents without being present there with them. Even when there is a web app, this randomly forces the user to confirm identity via phone. Every day this extends to more and more official proceduress these days (e.g. loging to EU pages, regional government paperwork, access to hospital records and prescriptions...), and unfortunately it seems to me that the phone as official ID might be the future. In this scenario, projects like this one cannot be really useful without some standardization or layer that makes it acceptable by the government.

New comment by postdoc74 in "Word documents will be saved to the cloud automatically on Windows going forward"

postdoc74 — Wed, 27 Aug 2025 11:54:55 +0000

I don't know what's new on this. For the last two years all Office apps I own have insisted on saving to OneDrive first. I have always had to explicitly click on the path and select another folder. Every. Single. Time.

New comment by postdoc74 in "Show HN: A Tiling Window Manager for Windows, Written in Janet"

postdoc74 — Wed, 21 May 2025 06:33:24 +0000

I am not familiar with Janet but have been a long time lisp developer. Could you perhaps add a few lines to the readme explaining how the build process for jwno works? Would love to give it a try, understand how it works and hack around :)

New comment by postdoc74 in "More than 40% of postdocs leave academia, study reveals"

postdoc74 — Tue, 21 Jan 2025 07:33:21 +0000

Not necessarily. A three or four year PhD in Europe is a short time to acquire a solid network (a lot of time is spent in training, unless the student is very proactive) and not all PhDs broaden their horizon to have a well differentiated topic to pursue after the degree. I would argue that true independence is actually acquired in the early postdoc years, but it requires a lot of work and a lot of luck.

TBH, 40% attrition rate is less I expected. Since each academic can train more than one PhD and postdoc every few years, which is the case, some attrition is required because the system cannot grow exponentially. The desired outcome in this context is that this talent incorporates to industry or other sectors where this expertise or problem solving skills are not wasted.

New comment by postdoc74 in "Let's Quit X"

postdoc74 — Mon, 13 Jan 2025 18:26:58 +0000

It's not hate but unwillingness to support a guy promoting extreme right wing Nazi parties in Europe. That's a no go in my agenda. The only reason I don't delete my profile is I don't want anyone to use my name.

New comment by postdoc74 in "Amazon is trying to trick me into signing up for Prime services"

postdoc74 — Tue, 03 Sep 2024 09:33:05 +0000

I believe they are so aggressive that they have broken their shopping cart code. For instance, as Prime subscriber I usually get at checkout preselected options that would be aimed at getting people subscribed. Like two separate boxes stating "Free delivery". Weird.

New comment by postdoc74 in "An implementation of Common Lisp targeting Lua"

postdoc74 — Fri, 10 Nov 2023 12:30:52 +0000

As former maintainer of ECL, another open software Common-Lisp, I can attest that both CMUCL's and SBCL's are extremely useful as reference implementation for much of ANSI CL. I learned a lot regarding LOOP, or how to implement the floating point printer, which has a lot of complexity (and reproducibility) as compared to ANSI C and other standards.

New comment by postdoc74 in "Barcelona Supercomputing Center"

postdoc74 — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 07:17:50 +0000

You obviously do not understand tenders and also have a bad faith in addressing this message towards me (García-Ripoll) and Artur.

First of all, this tender only received one application. There could have been other applicants as it happened in Galicia's quantum computer tender, but there were none.

Second, this application was done by a collective of companies of which Qilimanjaro is only one more participant, responsible for calibration and integration.

Third, my role as scientist in this evaluation was only to certify that the specifications of the tender proposal follow the scientific requirements of the call, and whether any parameter is below or above the requested standards. That is tickboxing essentially and with only one applicant this does not influence the outcome.

So I am asking you to retract these accusations as I am concerned, or follow suit if you have so much evidence of wrongdoing.

New comment by postdoc74 in "GnuCash Tutorial and Concepts Guide"

postdoc74 — Fri, 20 Oct 2023 20:31:27 +0000

I love Gnucash, have been using it for my personal accounting for 20 years, but the stock and funds part is horribly complicated. Yet I have not found anything better.

New comment by postdoc74 in "Ask HN: What's a good program for calisthenics for beginners that you have tried"

postdoc74 — Sun, 01 Jan 2023 19:13:55 +0000

I can second this program. I am usually into kettlebells, but for several months I was travelling and required an alternative. This program is an open version of the "Convict Conditioning" program which works just as well. I've been using several months and now that I have returned to KB and clubbells I have retained the pushup and pull-up progressions.

Show HN: A template-based static site generator using pure Emacs

postdoc74 — Sat, 23 May 2020 16:28:48 +0000

Article URL: http://github.com/juanjosegarciaripoll/org-thtml

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23284253

Points: 1

# Comments: 0

New comment by postdoc74 in "Ask HN: Recommendations for Working from Home?"

postdoc74 — Wed, 11 Mar 2020 20:27:27 +0000

Having a dedicated space makes a huge difference in concentration. However, it also helps you feel relaxed in other parts of the house.

I lived long in a single space studio and worked everywhere in the flat. After a few months I ended up hating just being at home and had to work at coffee places (noisy, productivity killer).

Now I have a slightly larger flat with a designated office corner. Not only it is more convenient, but when I saturate I go to the reading corner and switch off more effectively.

I also found buying a cheap monitor and an external keyboard to plug the laptop a huge productivity improvement.