Hacker News: vsskanth

How F1 cars collect data in real time [video]

vsskanth — Fri, 09 Oct 2026 23:04:04 +0000

Article URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tosJ0j8K31c

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50027671

Points: 6

# Comments: 0

New comment by vsskanth in "Powerless F1 drivers frustrated by Bahrain F1 software glitch"

vsskanth — Tue, 06 Oct 2026 00:15:43 +0000

You're technically right. I was just speaking industry parlance because everyone still just say McLaren. You'll get blank stares if you say "Motion Applied".

New comment by vsskanth in "Powerless F1 drivers frustrated by Bahrain F1 software glitch"

vsskanth — Mon, 05 Oct 2026 03:13:20 +0000

F1 vehicles have a lot of actively controlled systems - Engine, MGU, Diff, Brake Bias, Aero etc. Their way of allowing active control but preventing "driver aids" like traction control, torque vectoring is to tightly regulate and give them a box where they can place their controls and what inputs they are allowed to use.

New comment by vsskanth in "Powerless F1 drivers frustrated by Bahrain F1 software glitch"

vsskanth — Mon, 05 Oct 2026 02:26:57 +0000

The firmware situation is mixed. The ECU hardware is a standard TAG700 from McLaren. Basically these are software-defined ECUs where you can do whatever. However, FIA has some rules on what you're allowed to modify and has some "compulsory" software in there for monitoring and competition regulatory reasons. It appears there was very limited testing of this module in wet conditions which seems to have affected a lot of vehicles. (I work in Motorsports)

New comment by vsskanth in "Show HN: Copy-and-patch compiler for hard real-time Python"

vsskanth — Mon, 16 Feb 2026 00:44:51 +0000

How is this different to casadi ?

New comment by vsskanth in "New US curb on high-skill immigrant workers ignores evidence of its likely harms"

vsskanth — Thu, 25 Sep 2025 02:04:41 +0000

Citizens are always favored. It costs way more money, lawyers, time and paperwork to hire someone on a visa. HR hates it.

New comment by vsskanth in "New H-1B visa fee will not apply to existing holders, official says"

vsskanth — Sat, 20 Sep 2025 20:46:31 +0000

Still doesn't clarify what happens to people adjusting their status from F1 to H1B inside the US. Is that a new visa ?

New comment by vsskanth in "NASA loses another senior official as tension about the agency's future grows"

vsskanth — Wed, 23 Jul 2025 03:36:32 +0000

What is the actual intent behind decimating NASA ? It's tiny compared to the defense budget and fairly high ROI in terms of maintaining US scientific leadership.

New comment by vsskanth in "I'm Wirecutter's water-quality expert. I don't filter my water"

vsskanth — Sat, 07 Jun 2025 17:58:33 +0000

It's mostly for taste at this point, rather than safety. For a long time I used to drink right from the tap, now use a filter pitcher simply because it tastes better.

New comment by vsskanth in "A 'Trump Card Visa' Is Already Showing Up in Immigration Forms"

vsskanth — Wed, 07 May 2025 23:25:54 +0000

No law required ? Is Executive order sufficient to create new visa categories ?

New comment by vsskanth in ""I need to rethink my future": Tech workers on coping with shifting immigration"

vsskanth — Thu, 20 Mar 2025 20:04:33 +0000

Not disputing long term damage to the talent pool in the US, just making an observation that it won't be solved until the issue affects certain groups.

New comment by vsskanth in ""I need to rethink my future": Tech workers on coping with shifting immigration"

vsskanth — Thu, 20 Mar 2025 18:33:53 +0000

Issues with immigration will be fixed once Europeans start reporting difficulties obtaining visas and green cards. Until then it's business as usual.

New comment by vsskanth in "Nearly half Dell's US workforce has rejected RTO. Rather WFH than get promoted (2024)"

vsskanth — Sun, 05 Jan 2025 00:39:07 +0000

Smart move. One typically needs to move jobs to get promoted anyways.

New comment by vsskanth in "Updates to H-1B"

vsskanth — Wed, 18 Dec 2024 19:36:45 +0000

Spouses on H4 cannot work unless the primary H1B has an approved I-140 immigrant petition. It's not automatic.

New comment by vsskanth in "Updates to H-1B"

vsskanth — Wed, 18 Dec 2024 16:49:23 +0000

they mean "bonafide job offer". What is happening right now is staffing agencies (mainly in India) mass file H1B applications for all their staff, and then once they get picked in the lottery, they find assignments in the US and file the entire petition after. This heavily disadvantages non-staffing companies who file H1Bs for their staff outside the country or those in the US on F1 visas for actual jobs.

This change is meant to close that loophole. This used to not be a problem, because you had to file the entire petition BEFORE you enter the lottery, but now you just pay some nominal fee and get your name in, leading to a highly profitable situation for staffing companies.

New comment by vsskanth in "Modelica"

vsskanth — Mon, 16 Dec 2024 16:35:43 +0000

This is a pretty niche acausal language, and is used extensively in Motorsports (F1, NASCAR) for real-time simulation on the driver simulator.

The language spec is open source but there many commercial compilers, Dymola is the most popular.

I code in this language extensively and its acausal nature is extremely powerful. It makes your models highly composable, you can basically assemble a mechanical system like a bunch of lego blocks and the equations fall out automatically. You can also easily invert your models.

The closest analogy in the programming world is Haskell.

New comment by vsskanth in "Demystifying Git Submodules"

vsskanth — Mon, 02 Dec 2024 01:04:40 +0000

speaking of submodules, anyone here have experience with git subrepo ?

New comment by vsskanth in "An unusual Google Keyboard bug"

vsskanth — Wed, 13 Nov 2024 02:21:50 +0000

Not surprised. For an AI first company, Google keyboard swipe behavior is atrociously bad.

New comment by vsskanth in "Kernel optimization with BOLT (binary optimization and layout tool)"

vsskanth — Wed, 06 Nov 2024 17:08:21 +0000

Anyone know of a windows equivalent to BOLT ?

New comment by vsskanth in "The American Dream Without a House? Believe It"

vsskanth — Tue, 10 Sep 2024 02:59:12 +0000

Seems light on data, mostly anecdotes