Hacker News: swimfar

New comment by swimfar in "Richard Rhodes wrote a classic book about Oppenheimer and the atomic bomb"

swimfar — Fri, 21 Jul 2023 13:30:50 +0000

Can anyone comment on why this was downvoted? Is it not true? Even though sharing secrets with the Soviets would have been different from sharing them with Israel, if it was unsanctioned it still seems like this is a big deal.

New comment by swimfar in "Cities are ending fares on transit. Here’s why"

swimfar — Tue, 18 Jul 2023 14:16:17 +0000

In Salt Lake City, Utah the trams are free in the downtown area. You only have to pay if you ride it outside of there. That seems like a nice way to do it. People who wouldn't normally ride it use it because it's free. And then maybe some of them end up using it more often when they see how nice it is.

New comment by swimfar in "ChatGPT is now a brilliant tool for winding up telemarketers and scammers"

swimfar — Sat, 01 Jul 2023 14:28:00 +0000

Even completely prerecorded scripts can keep them on the phone for over 10 minutes. There's a funny series on YouTube, "Lenny", where they just play a recording of an old man who keeps asking questions and going off track:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSoOrlh5i1k

New comment by swimfar in "Iceland: The emerging tech-ecosystem of the Nordics"

swimfar — Sun, 04 Jun 2023 22:50:34 +0000

For the US the parent said it was 200k migrants in one month. That's 2.4 million/year, or 0.7% of the population.

New comment by swimfar in "Experiments in Making Cocktail Ice"

swimfar — Wed, 17 May 2023 03:12:59 +0000

Unshortened link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B078ZM3F8G

New comment by swimfar in "Early Computer Art in the 50s and 60s"

swimfar — Tue, 16 May 2023 01:43:19 +0000

I immediately did some searches to see if I could find prints, or even high-quality images of some of the pieces. Alternatively, I think it could be fun to try to recreate the works of art myself.

New comment by swimfar in "The art of auto engineering"

swimfar — Thu, 13 Apr 2023 13:51:38 +0000

Somewhat related, there's a series of German videos made for kids that show how a car is manufactured. It's mostly the bodywork and assembly, not engine stuff, but it's still a good overview. If you're interested in this stuff, it could be worth watching, even if you don't understand German.

Autobau Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVNX--ROvtU

Autobau Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=on-PhI5Rlyc

Autobau Part 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XeqY03HUmlU

Autobau Part 4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3cpM6jbqNA

New comment by swimfar in "What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide"

swimfar — Mon, 03 Apr 2023 04:46:41 +0000

$200k is about $1200/month for the mortgage, taxes, and insurance.

New comment by swimfar in "The state of open-source in 3D printing in 2023"

swimfar — Sun, 02 Apr 2023 00:30:39 +0000

Wouldn't you assume that closed-source products would generally have a competitive advantage against open-source products? Especially for products where most of the contributions to the project are from the company selling it. With closed-source you have to worry less about people simply selling copies of your design without having to have invested in any of the design process. Competitors also can't as easily include your design improvements into their products. And, there's definitely a cost associated with sharing internal designs.

New comment by swimfar in "There's something off about LED bulbs"

swimfar — Thu, 30 Mar 2023 16:04:37 +0000

Are you sure those are the same bulbs? The ultra efficient versions sold on Amazon have reviews going back to 2017. Supposedly the Dubai-style bulbs were only available in Dubai even a few years ago.

New comment by swimfar in "Arduino Uno R4"

swimfar — Sun, 26 Mar 2023 23:52:32 +0000

But that Arduino tooling and all the libraries, tutorials, etc. wouldn't exist if nobody had bought Arduinos. If I'm just buying a few boards for personal projects I like to support companies that provide more than just hardware to the maker community.

New comment by swimfar in "People had to be convinced of the usefulness of electricity"

swimfar — Sun, 19 Mar 2023 21:11:39 +0000

Uniscuit would be bread. Biscuit translates to "twice cooked" in French. This is similar to biscotti which translates to the same thing in Italian. Fun fact that many French and Italians don't even realize.

New comment by swimfar in "Learning the ropes: why Germany is building risk into its playgrounds (2021)"

swimfar — Sun, 19 Mar 2023 17:23:03 +0000

I've heard stories from relatives about a funhouse like that on Coney Island. Supposedly there was a dark maze section with clowns that would walk around and shock you. As I got older I assumed some of it had to be made up. But at least part of the story is corroborated in this article about the Steeplechase Park:

https://www.westland.net/coneyisland/articles/steeplechase2....

New comment by swimfar in "Learning the ropes: why Germany is building risk into its playgrounds (2021)"

swimfar — Sun, 19 Mar 2023 17:15:56 +0000

It doesn't look like they are building risk into the playgrounds, as much as they are building the feeling of risk. which isn't necessarily a bad thing. This seems like a compromise that should be seen as better, or at least acceptable to both extremes of parents.

"The maximum fall height in the Triitopia structure’s spiderweb is 1.8 metres." That's not a risky fall, if you're falling onto a rope net.

Also, "The Triitopia tower is encased with boards and netting to ensure no child can take a tumble from a height above three metres." Kids used to climb on the outside and on top of tall playground structures like that. But they're making sure this much more difficult to attempt. This is not a criticism, just my observations.

New comment by swimfar in "Tungsten gold plated bar"

swimfar — Sat, 18 Mar 2023 17:20:51 +0000

Given that companies in China are blatantly selling forgeries of US gold coins[1], it appears that they aren't too worried about the consequences. Though maybe it would start to attract more attention if they began counterfeiting larger value items such as these gold bars.

[1] https://m.alibaba.com/product/60579932545/Gold-Plated-Tungst...

New comment by swimfar in "Tiny Tapeout 3: Create and fab your own chip design"

swimfar — Sun, 05 Mar 2023 16:28:19 +0000

Tiny Tapeout 3 submissions are now active. Design your own chip and it will be added to a large chip containing everyone's submission. Physical chips will be created of the final combined design with access to all of the individual designs.

Tiny Tapeout 3: Create and fab your own chip design

swimfar — Sun, 05 Mar 2023 16:28:19 +0000

Article URL: https://tinytapeout.com/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35031048

Points: 5

# Comments: 1

New comment by swimfar in "Banning words won’t make the world more just"

swimfar — Fri, 03 Mar 2023 04:00:53 +0000

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dqsgxLyl5E

New comment by swimfar in "Paper Models of Vintage Computers"

swimfar — Sat, 25 Feb 2023 01:31:47 +0000

Even an ESP32 is probably more powerful than every single one of those computers, with the exception of the GameCube. You can emulate NES games on that micro-controller.

New comment by swimfar in "Shimano’s three-pulley rear derailleur could revolutionise drivetrain design"

swimfar — Sun, 19 Feb 2023 17:06:55 +0000

Do you mean they just pronounce the "eur" part like in French? Or do they actually say day-rye-eur? It would sound really weird to pronounce the word like in French.