<rss version="2.0" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"><channel><title>Hacker News: xjay</title><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=xjay</link><description>Hacker News RSS</description><docs>https://hnrss.org/</docs><generator>hnrss v2.1.1</generator><lastBuildDate>Thu, 16 Apr 2026 03:09:48 +0000</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://hnrss.org/user?id=xjay" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"></atom:link><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Google dropping continuous scroll in search results"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Re: Pagination<p>Situation: There are N results shown per page. There are N+1 results remaining.<p>Rigid/simple: The last result is put on a separate page.<p>Flexible/human: If the last results are within some reasonable threshold then include them on the last page.<p>The last page is a different context.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 26 Jun 2024 11:53:20 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40798887</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40798887</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40798887</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Language is primarily a tool for communication rather than thought [pdf]"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Perspectives<p>[2015-09] Anne C. Reboul: "Why language really is not a communication system: a cognitive view of language evolution" - , Laboratory on Language, Brain and Cognition (L2C2), Institute for Cognitive Sciences-Marc Jeannerod, Bron, France [1]<p>> [2013-09] Noam Chomsky: One of the most striking cases of incompatibility, that I know, is the sharp conflict between computational efficiency, and communicative efficiency.  Language is just badly designed for communication, but well-designed to be efficient, it seems. [2]<p>> [2013-09] Noam Chomsky adds: There's a kind of phrase that is sometimes used for this that drives people crazy; "Language is beautiful, but unusable."  It's kind of true, you know.  Even if people don't like it. [2]<p>[2022] Nick Enfield: "Language vs. Reality: Why Language Is Good for Lawyers and Bad for Scientists" [3]<p>> Language cannot create or change physical reality, but it can do the next best thing: reframe and invert our view of the world. In Language vs. Reality, Enfield explains why language is bad for scientists (who are bound by reality) but good for lawyers (who want to win their cases), ... [3]<p>> [2023-01] Ev Fedorenko: "Although language and thought often go together, they are robustly dissociable." [4]<p>> [2023-01] Ev Fedorenko: Fallacy 1: "Good at language = Good at thought". Fallacy 2: "Bad at thought = Bad at language". Fallacy 3: "Bad at language = Bad at thought" (emphasis in being judged on how smart you are based on how you say something). [4]<p>[1] <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01434/full" rel="nofollow">https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10....</a><p>[2] <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-72JNZZBoVw&t=4493s" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-72JNZZBoVw&t=4493s</a><p>[3] <a href="https://direct.mit.edu/books/monograph/5472/Language-vs-RealityWhy-Language-Is-Good-for" rel="nofollow">https://direct.mit.edu/books/monograph/5472/Language-vs-Real...</a><p>[4] <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uE9AiYuCwdE&t=250s" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uE9AiYuCwdE&t=250s</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 22 Jun 2024 11:15:21 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40758124</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40758124</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40758124</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Simple sabotage for software (2023)"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>In a web context, I was thinking this when I checked out the web site of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) [1]; why would they use a thin, small typeface with light gray color on a bright/white background which makes the text less appealing to read?  It must be subtle sabotage from within!<p>(Some may counter this with Hanlon's razor [2]; Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.)<p>[1] <a href="https://www.eff.org/" rel="nofollow">https://www.eff.org/</a><p>[2] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon's_razor" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon's_razor</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 16 Jun 2024 14:03:28 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40697153</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40697153</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40697153</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "The 'Dead Internet Theory'"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Somewhat related: "The Egg" [2009*] is a fictional short story by American writer Andy Weir. [1]<p>> You, a 48-year-old man who dies in a car crash, meet God, the narrator, who says that you have been reincarnated many times before, and that you are next to be reincarnated as a Chinese peasant girl in 540 AD. God then explains that you are, in fact, constantly reincarnated across time, and that all human beings who have ever lived and will ever live are incarnations of you. [1]<p>[1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Egg_(Weir_short_story)" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Egg_(Weir_short_story)</a><p>Kurzgesagt adaptation of the story (31M views):<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6fcK_fRYaI" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6fcK_fRYaI</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 12 Jun 2024 08:41:27 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40655915</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40655915</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40655915</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Högertrafikomläggningen"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Underscore as a separator, YYYY_MM_DD:<p><pre><code>  1970_01_01
  2024_06_09
  2024_12_31
  16383_12_31
</code></pre>
Treated as base-10 number literal in some programming languages.<p>5 bits for DD [0, 31] + 4 bits for MM [0, 15] + 14 or more bits for year [0, 16_383] = 23 bits.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 09 Jun 2024 10:02:39 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40623287</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40623287</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40623287</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "The Distinctiveness of Human Aggression (2022)"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Related: 2016: Facts and statistics on domestic violence at-a-glance<p>> The Partner Abuse State of Knowledge Project: The world's largest domestic violence research data base, 2,657 pages, with summaries of 1700 peer-reviewed studies.<p>> Overall, 25.3% of individuals have perpetrated IPV.<p>> Overall, 22% of individuals assaulted by a partner at least once in their lifetime (23% for females and 19.3% for males).<p>> Rates of female-perpetrated violence higher than male-perpetrated (28.3% vs. 21.6%).<p>> Higher rates of intimate partner violence (IPV) among younger, dating populations “highlights the need for school-based IPV prevention and intervention efforts”.<p>> Among large population samples, 57.9% of IPV reported was bi-directional, 42% unidirectional; 13.8% of the unidirectional violence was male to female (MFPV), 28.3% was female to male (FMPV).<p>> Among school and college samples, percentage of bidirectional violence was 51.9%; 16.2% was MFPV and 31.9% was FMPV.<p>> Within military and male treatment samples, only 39% of IPV was bi-directional; 43.4% was MFPV and 17.3% FMPV.<p>> According to national samples, 0.2% of men and 4.5% of women have been forced to have sexual intercourse by a partner.<p><a href="https://domesticviolenceresearch.org/domestic-violence-facts-and-statistics-at-a-glance/" rel="nofollow">https://domesticviolenceresearch.org/domestic-violence-facts...</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 06 Jun 2024 12:02:26 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40596396</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40596396</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40596396</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Microsoft blocks Windows 11 workaround that enabled local accounts"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Windows should be broken up.<p>"Windows 11 Platform" for applications, drivers, security updates, and gaming.  No (forced) Microsoft account.  Only security updates.<p>"Windows 11 Plus" is a subscription model for enhanced features.<p>What their system requirements tell consumers:<p>> Windows 11 Pro <i>for personal use</i> and Windows 11 <i>Home</i> require internet connectivity and a Microsoft account during initial device setup. [1]<p>[1] <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/windows-11-specifications" rel="nofollow">https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/windows-11-specifica...</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 04 Jun 2024 11:32:31 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40573262</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40573262</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40573262</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Let yourself be monitored: EU governments to agree on Chat Control"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>EU: In the name of the EU government, you are all under arrest.<p>Democracy: It's treason, then.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 29 May 2024 19:59:26 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40516297</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40516297</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40516297</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Why is x & -x equal to the largest power of 2 that divides x?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>See also: Bit Twiddling Hacks<p><a href="https://graphics.stanford.edu/~seander/bithacks.html" rel="nofollow">https://graphics.stanford.edu/~seander/bithacks.html</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 26 May 2024 02:19:54 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40479340</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40479340</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40479340</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Microsoft's AI chatbot will 'recall' everything you do on its new PCs"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Cloud 1: Cloud does all the compute, logic, storage, and transfer.<p>Cloud 2 = Cloud 1, but delegate more compute/logic to edge/local computers to reduce cost. [1]<p>Cloud 3 = Cloud 2, but edge/local computer has hardware specifically made to do the compute, store intermediate data, and send the results to someone else who might give you something in return for free, and possibly make you pay for it later.<p>Marketing can call it Cloud <3 (heart).  Some might say </3 (broken heart). [2]<p>> [~10 years ago] Smartphones began incorporating AI accelerators starting with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 in 2015. [3]<p>> An AI accelerator, deep learning processor, or neural processing unit (NPU) is a class of specialized hardware accelerator or computer system designed to accelerate artificial intelligence and machine learning applications, including artificial neural networks and machine vision. [3]<p>[1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volunteer_computing" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volunteer_computing</a><p>[2] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_emoticons#Western" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_emoticons#Western</a><p>[3] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AI_accelerator" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AI_accelerator</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2024 12:55:46 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40427867</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40427867</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40427867</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "North Yorkshire Council to phase out apostrophe use on street signs"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Replace it with a QR, but it contains a UUID which has to be used to look up the current street name.<p>(If all you have is a phone, everything can be solved with an app.)<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR_code" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR_code</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 05 May 2024 10:47:07 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40263813</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40263813</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40263813</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Key Consciousness Connections Uncovered"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>See also: The Elephant in the Brain [1]<p>> The main thesis of the book is that we are very often not aware of our real reasons for most of our behaviours. Our behaviors are optimised for living in a social group and very often, from the point of view of natural selection, it is useful if we are not consciously aware of our real motivations. [1]<p>[1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elephant_in_the_Brain" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elephant_in_the_Brain</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 02 May 2024 14:40:14 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40236846</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40236846</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40236846</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "The IMEI Code: Your phone’s other number"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Android defaults to sending the IMSI (SIM ID) to Google.<p>> SUPL is used as part of the A-GPS (Assisted GPS) system to get a faster Time to First Fix. The problem is that Android's implementation automatically sends the IMSI (ID of the SIM card) to the SUPL provider for no apparent reason. And because Google is the default provider it's a big breach of privacy.<p><a href="https://github.com/Magisk-Modules-Alt-Repo/supl-replacer">https://github.com/Magisk-Modules-Alt-Repo/supl-replacer</a><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assisted_GNSS" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assisted_GNSS</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 30 Apr 2024 19:16:10 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40215042</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40215042</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40215042</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "The man who killed Google Search?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I can imagine this happening in many places: 1) Idealist phase. 2) Hype phase. 3) Novelty wears off = Leave. 4) Bean counter phase. 5) ???</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 23 Apr 2024 18:32:04 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40135439</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40135439</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40135439</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "David Lynch presents 'A Thinking Room'"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Random stuff: David Lynch on what lead him to cast the set decorator, Frank Silva, as "Bob" in Twin Peaks:<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37P0ukg4io0&t=40s" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37P0ukg4io0&t=40s</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 16 Apr 2024 19:39:11 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40056267</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40056267</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40056267</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Fastest way to get IPv4 address from string (2015)"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>This is what happens when you over-iterate on a specification.<p>Keep it simple.  Be kind to your fellow automaton.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 14 Apr 2024 19:55:16 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40033905</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40033905</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40033905</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "How might software development have unfolded if CPU speeds were 20x slower?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Sidenote: MSVC had an optimization option for Windows 98, I think it was /OPT:98 (/FILEALIGN:4096).  It sets the "file alignment" of sections in the portable executable (PE) file to 4096 bytes (0x1000) = 1 memory page -> noticeably more efficient because it's a direct copy operation.  It's sacrificing space (padding empty space with thousands of zeros) for time (one copy operation instead of many to shuffle data into memory pages).<p>(The file alignment still defaults to a 512-byte (0x200) sector size which means the inefficiency is there today even though you may not notice it in isolation, but the "sector"/buffer size has been at least 4096 bytes since 2011. [2])<p>> The /FILEALIGN option can be used to make disk utilization more efficient, or to make page loads from disk faster. [Assuming it matches the page size = 4096 bytes.] [1]<p>> All hard drive manufacturers committed to shipping new hard drive platforms for desktop and notebook products with the Advanced Format sector formatting [4096-byte or greater] by January 2011. [2]<p>[1] <a href="https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/cpp/build/reference/filealign" rel="nofollow">https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/cpp/build/reference/fileal...</a><p>[2] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Format" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Format</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 09 Apr 2024 10:13:12 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39977910</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39977910</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39977910</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Llm.c – LLM training in simple, pure C/CUDA"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>> They haven't open sourced anything. They posted a tweet. [1]<p>[1@2024-04-06] <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7MRj4N2Cyk&t=429s" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7MRj4N2Cyk&t=429s</a><p>[Twitch] <a href="https://twitch.tv/georgehotz" rel="nofollow">https://twitch.tv/georgehotz</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 09 Apr 2024 02:35:40 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39975798</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39975798</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39975798</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Science fiction and the death of the sun"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>In some 1990s sci-fi series, an alien race played the long game by directing some (invisible) energy beam at the sun, accelerating its transition into becoming a red giant, a process which would have otherwise taken billions of years.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 03 Apr 2024 01:07:23 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39912596</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39912596</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39912596</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by xjay in "Traffic jams, AirTags and GPS darts are ways NY, NJ are trying to stop car theft"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Star Trek: TNG, season 1, episode 8, "Justice".<p>> One punishment for any crime.  Execution. [1]<p>[1] <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7XqGiwfUyI" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7XqGiwfUyI</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 29 Mar 2024 05:43:43 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39861050</link><dc:creator>xjay</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39861050</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39861050</guid></item></channel></rss>