Hacker News: skunkworker

New comment by skunkworker in "The Neo cannot scale with macOS behind on the basics"

skunkworker — Wed, 18 Mar 2026 06:28:02 +0000

When Apple still had intel chips, I remember how long it used to take for external displays to be properly detected and to start working. The first time I used a M series chip, suddenly the displays were detected and started working in a second or two. I had assumed that that’s how long it always had to take, when in reality it could an order of magnitude quicker, and on a thunderbolt dock.

New comment by skunkworker in "I’m leaving Redis for SolidQueue"

skunkworker — Thu, 15 Jan 2026 08:27:41 +0000

Rails shops running on normal CRuby, have difficult in effectively scaling out multithreading due to the GVL lock. It's much easier to "scale" ruby using forking with sidekiq or multi process, and to have it consume data from a Redis list. It is possible to get around the GVL using JRuby, but that poses a different set of constraints and issues.

There is some definite blending of async messaging in the Ruby world though. I've seen connectors which take protobufs on a kafka topic and use sidekiq to fan out the work. With Redis (looking at sidekiq specifically) it becomes trivial to maintain the "current" working set with items popped out of the queue, with atomic commands like BLMOVE (formerly BRPOPLPUSH).

Kafka is taking an interesting turn however with the KIP-932 "Queues for Kafka" initiative. I personally believe it could eat RabbitMQ's lunch if done effectively. Allowing for multiple consumers, a "working set" of unack'ed data, without having to worry as much about the topic partition count.

New comment by skunkworker in "Honey Targeted Minors and Exploited Small Businesses [video]"

skunkworker — Mon, 22 Dec 2025 05:39:19 +0000

PayPal Honey extension has again "featured" flag in Chrome web store - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43298054 - March 2025

LegalEagle is suing Honey [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42581108 - Jan 2025

uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42576443 - Jan 2025

Show HN: Open-source and transparent alternative to Honey - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42535274 - Dec 2024

Exposing the Honey Influencer Scam [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42483500 - Dec 2024

Amazon says browser extension Honey is a security risk, now that PayPal owns it - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22016031 - Jan 2020

copied from this comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43538687

Honey Targeted Minors and Exploited Small Businesses [video]

skunkworker — Mon, 22 Dec 2025 05:37:26 +0000

Article URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwB3FmbcC88

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46351661

Points: 19

# Comments: 1

New comment by skunkworker in "Fix HDMI-CEC weirdness with a Raspberry Pi and a $7 cable"

skunkworker — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 06:18:17 +0000

I've got a Apple TV -> Denon -> LG C3. CEC on the appleTV remote will turn all 3 on, and long pressing (power button on appletv remote) will turn all 3 off, not just screen saver with input.

New comment by skunkworker in "Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10"

skunkworker — Thu, 20 Nov 2025 18:02:46 +0000

I've used it multiple times while hiking and outside normal cell phone tower range. Need to transfer 500mb of images and videos? easy.

New comment by skunkworker in "Listen to Database Changes Through the Postgres WAL"

skunkworker — Mon, 17 Nov 2025 22:11:04 +0000

After working with the Postgres WAL through logical replication in the last few months on a work project. My largest gripe is that some specific behaviors (like how a WAL receiver process should respond to a fast-shutdown on the database backend), aren't well documented outside of asking questions on the postgres discord.

Specifically: If the server requests a reply on a heartbeat, the status update should include the heartbeat's LSN on the next loop. But a standby status update includes the LSN values + 1.

I was able to get it working and properly disconnecting to a fast shutdown, but when you get into the internals of the logical WAL receiver loop, it can get nuanced.

And my largest compliment is that the Postgres discord is filled with some extremely knowledgeable and helpful people. I was able to figure out some really specific and nuanced behavior around the different status messages being sent to the primary server, thanks to the in-depth responses there.

New comment by skunkworker in "Kafka is Fast – I'll use Postgres"

skunkworker — Wed, 29 Oct 2025 23:31:29 +0000

I wish postgres would add a durable queue like data structure. But trying to make a durable queue that can scale beyond what a simple redis instance can do starts to run into problems quickly.

Also, LISTEN/NOTIFY do not scale, and they introduce locks in areas you aren't expecting - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44490510

New comment by skunkworker in "Kafka is Fast – I'll use Postgres"

skunkworker — Wed, 29 Oct 2025 23:28:53 +0000

Millions of events per day is still in the small queue category in my book. Postgres LISTEN doesn't scale, and polling on hot databases can suddenly become more difficult, as you're having to throw away tuples regularly.

10 message/s is only 860k/day. But in my testing (with postgres 16) this doesn't scale that well when you are needing tens to hundreds of millions per day. Redis is much better than postgres for that (for a simple queue), and beyond that kafka is what I would choose in you're in the low few hundred million.

New comment by skunkworker in "How Hyper built a 1M-accurate indoor GPS"

skunkworker — Fri, 01 Aug 2025 19:56:38 +0000

I've personally used one of these before in a performance where you needed individual based tracking, the chips were active UWB radios and sensors were placed and calibrated around the stage, I believe it was < 10cm accuracy and quite an interesting sensation to walk with lights following you perfectly and quickly.

https://kinexon.com/products/kinexon-rtls was what was used.

New comment by skunkworker in "The Hollow Men of Hims"

skunkworker — Thu, 26 Jun 2025 09:39:53 +0000

You can get generic finasteride 1mg/180 (6 month) for as low as ~$17 if you go to a Kroger pharmacy and use their preferred savings program (I forget the name off hand) and no insurance coverage. Kroger discontinued their Kroger savings and now have a preferred card, which ended up being half the cost of the best deal on GoodRX.

Source: I picked up a 6 month supply last week.

New comment by skunkworker in "Milwaukee M18 Battery Reverse Engineering"

skunkworker — Fri, 18 Apr 2025 09:46:12 +0000

I recently purchased a M18 trimmer after not using one for years, it still surprises me that when not on the throttle - "off" is truly off, and not the persistent hum of a 2 stroke that is too loud in your left ear. No fumes and no fuel/oil mix to worry about.

New comment by skunkworker in "Tech workers are leaving notes in robot taxis seeking workers and lovers"

skunkworker — Thu, 17 Apr 2025 05:57:20 +0000

Anecdotal, but around college campuses (ASU in particular), many people like Waymo because there isn't a creepy driver in the front seat.

New comment by skunkworker in "Making Postgres scale"

skunkworker — Fri, 14 Mar 2025 18:25:16 +0000

Unless their pricing has changed, it’s quite exorbitant when you need a lot of data. To the point that one year of cockroachdb would cost 5x the cost of the server it was running on.

New comment by skunkworker in "Swiss Tables"

skunkworker — Fri, 21 Feb 2025 08:52:00 +0000

For those reading, Go officially adopted swisstable into Map for 1.24 last week.

New comment by skunkworker in "Apple squandered the Holy Grail"

skunkworker — Mon, 06 Jan 2025 23:47:44 +0000

Vox is also pretty great for FLAC

https://vox.rocks/mac-music-player

New comment by skunkworker in "Uncut Currency"

skunkworker — Mon, 06 Jan 2025 07:07:31 +0000

Some banks also do this. I’ve gotten a wad of $2 bills from a local branch of a major bank before.

New comment by skunkworker in "Go Upgrade Checklist"

skunkworker — Thu, 02 Jan 2025 22:53:27 +0000

The internal tools I've used regenerate the code as part of the CI process, and will fail the pipeline if the regenerated code has dirtied the git tree.

New comment by skunkworker in "Is Iceland getting ready to join the EU?"

skunkworker — Sun, 29 Dec 2024 16:34:23 +0000

While in Iceland I learned from local fisherman who have conflicting thoughts on joining the EU. On one hand it could strengthen relations, but on the other they would not be able to preserve their fisheries from being over fished.

New comment by skunkworker in "Will that hub or dock slow your SSDs, or even make them faster?"

skunkworker — Thu, 26 Dec 2024 05:50:25 +0000

I have been using a TS3+ daily for more than 4 years now without any major issues, there was a firmware update a few years ago but since then it's been very reliable ever since.