Hacker News: sherr

New comment by sherr in "I was recently diagnosed with anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis"

sherr — Wed, 03 Jun 2026 16:40:59 +0000

Thanks for writing this. Perhaps a part of your therapy at the end. Also, a way to understand and recover. I hope all goes well for you!

New comment by sherr in "Bttf is a command line datetime Swiss army knife"

sherr — Thu, 28 May 2026 17:59:01 +0000

Yes, I agree. It was magic to me really. I still love Perl.

New comment by sherr in "Bttf is a command line datetime Swiss army knife"

sherr — Thu, 28 May 2026 14:55:45 +0000

Respect for programming this. I did some date/time calculations a few years ago using Perl and it was full of corner cases and trouble. Did I enjoy it? I enjoyed seeing it work. Hopefully with the right answers! This tool looks great.

New comment by sherr in "HP Now Sponsoring the Linux Vendor Firmware Service / Fwupd"

sherr — Wed, 20 May 2026 18:59:59 +0000

That's great news. Fwupdmgr has made a huge positive difference to me over the past few years. A BIOS update used to be painful, perhaps even impossible, but not now. Thanks to all who worked hard on this, particularly Richard Hughes, who set it all going. My Debian Thinkpads also thank you.

New comment by sherr in "Too dangerous or just too expensive? The real reason Anthropic is hiding Mythos"

sherr — Fri, 15 May 2026 14:23:07 +0000

Whatever the reason for "hiding" Mythos, it seems clear that these systems are getting very good at finding software security exploits. Mythos has made more people, even the US government, sit up and pay more attention. Regarding who should control the release of powerful systems like this, as Bruce Schneier and David Lie write in "Mythos and Cybersecurity" :

"Until that changes, each Mythos-class release will put the world at the edge of another precipice, without any visibility into whether there is a landing out of view just below, or whether this time the drop will be fatal. That is not a choice a for-profit corporation should be allowed to make in a democratic society. Nor should such a company be able to restrict the ability of society to make choices about its own security."

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2026/04/mythos-and-cy...

It is reasonable to be concerned.

New comment by sherr in "You gave me a u32. I gave you root. (io_uring ZCRX freelist LPE)"

sherr — Sat, 09 May 2026 06:01:43 +0000

Desktop and server vulnerabilities are one thing. At least many are actively maintained and will get patched. I have a concern about all the common and cheap internet firewalls and routers that are around, running old software and kernels. Many or most will not get patched. I have some Ubiquiti boxes that are long out of support and run old kernels for instance. The hope is only that there's nothing they expose that gets hit.

New comment by sherr in "The Joy of Folding Bikes"

sherr — Sun, 26 Apr 2026 05:48:19 +0000

"Theft-resistant"

I have two Bromptons (a 3 and a 6 speed). Unfortunately, I've also had TWO stolen .. painful. This was years ago now and both were locked up in central London. The second time, locked via a "Kryptonite New York Fahgettaboudit", a good U-lock. An angle-grinder gets through these easily and they're battery powered. I don't believe ANY bike lock is safe now and never lock the Brompton up outside. Great bikes!

New comment by sherr in "Help Keep Thunderbird Alive"

sherr — Thu, 09 Apr 2026 13:53:03 +0000

I've just donated. I use Thunderbird every day and have used it for years now. Mozilla, Firefox and Thunderbird are very important to me and my internet usage. For all the complaints (many just unwarranted in my opinion) I'm a happy user.

New comment by sherr in "Philips to drop Google TV for European-based Titan OS"

sherr — Mon, 23 Mar 2026 17:20:55 +0000

From : https://docs.titanos.tv/introduction

"Titan OS is the European, independent Linux-based smart TV operating system from Titan OS S.L, the technology, entertainment, and advertising company based in Barcelona."

Also :

"Titan OS operates on a Chromium browser, offering support for standard audio and video codecs, streaming protocols, and DRM options"

I don't watch TV, but have a non-smart Samsung hooked up to a laptop running Linux. I wonder how locked down or hackable this OS would be? Would an EU based system be better for privacy? I'd love to have a better option for when I update the "TV" I have in my living room.

New comment by sherr in "Parallel Perl – autoparallelizing interpreter with JIT"

sherr — Fri, 20 Mar 2026 17:00:41 +0000

Going to the link and just hitting the spacebar worked for me. Next slide, and so on. Firefox/Linux.

New comment by sherr in "OpenSUSE Kalpa"

sherr — Tue, 17 Mar 2026 16:49:30 +0000

This appears to be a "pre-beta" site, so this will be why it is not polished yet. From the documentation page :

"note: These installation instructions will be changing, with the Beta release of Kalpa"

A bit rough around the edges - so probably unfair to publicise too prominently yet.

New comment by sherr in "Allegations of insider trading over prediction-market bets tied to Iran conflict"

sherr — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 06:52:55 +0000

According to the Economist recently [1], Israel recently caught a couple of men who bet on the timing of the Iran attacks last year :

"Last summer one “ricosuave666” won more than $150,000 on Polymarket, a betting platform. Their true identity was not clear, but the source of the winnings was: ricosuave666 had bet, with suspicious accuracy, on the precise timing of Israel’s attacks on Iran."

So, these people can be found. Overall however, the magazine does not think that these markets should have a blanket ban.

[1] https://archive.is/W8Ga8 (Prediction markets are rife with insider betting)

New comment by sherr in "Ubuntu 26.04 ends a 40-year old sudo tradition"

sherr — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 06:58:47 +0000

There are alternatives to sudo other than the new Rust version here.

"doas" [1] comes from OpenBSD and is a smaller (LOC) tool, easier to audit and keep secure (supposedly). Also available for Linux.

Also "run0" [2], another alternative that comes from the Linux/Systemd camp, using "polkit" and is similar to "systemd-run".

[1] https://man.openbsd.org/doas.1

[2] https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/257/run0.ht...

New comment by sherr in "William Latham – Art and the Computer (1990) [video]"

sherr — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 14:53:42 +0000

Latham worked at the IBM UK Scientific Centre in Winchester, the computer artist working with the software engineers to create an "organic" type of art. This was not realtime or interactive, at least not at the start and for a few years, but might have got there eventually. IBM had just started producing their Unix workstation (the RS6000) that could have some 3D capability. They were overshadowed by the SGI's they also brought in at the time. I worked there very briefly in the 80's (Occam/transputers).

New comment by sherr in "UK PM: "No platform gets a free pass""

sherr — Tue, 17 Feb 2026 10:10:57 +0000

I think the possible age restriction on VPN use will be problematic in many ways. The direction of travel here is a worry even though I agree that children need some protections from social media use. The site ISP Preview [0] has an article about this as well :

'The UK Prime Minister, Kier Starmer, has today proposed last minute amendments to two Bills that will enable the Government to set a minimum age limit for social media (i.e. greater use of Age Verification), as well as options to age restrict or limit children’s use of Virtual Private Networks (VPN), where it “undermines safety protections and changing the age of digital consent".'

[0] https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2026/02/government-set...

New comment by sherr in "The full history of Windows widgets, from 1997 to today"

sherr — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 15:35:58 +0000

On my Pixel 8a, a swipe right on the home screen shows the "google app", I don't like that so I disabled it (home settings).

New comment by sherr in "Anthropic's plan to scan and dispose of books"

sherr — Mon, 02 Feb 2026 20:36:27 +0000

I have visions of the book scanner in Vernor Vinge's SF novel "Rainbows End" (a book I love). A machine rips the books up into small pieces, photographs are taken and "AI" software then reads and assembles the pictures to digital files. Vinge didn't write an instruction manual for this process.

New comment by sherr in "Rare Iron Age war trumpet and boar standard found"

sherr — Mon, 12 Jan 2026 10:03:56 +0000

The History Blog has more :

https://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/75071

I look forward to the "musicologists" getting to grips with this carnyx and figuring out improvements to the reproductions they make.

New comment by sherr in "Rare Iron Age war trumpet and boar standard found"

sherr — Mon, 12 Jan 2026 09:59:43 +0000

Sounds like rubbish to me. What "political reasons" do you mean? Don't be shy.

New comment by sherr in "Firefox to create AI Window: Built for choice and control"

sherr — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 09:27:32 +0000

Get what?

The page says this thing will be opt-in. As it also says, they can't ignore the effect AI is having in the world. I'm not much of a fan of a lot of this effect, but see some benefits in places.