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>Why not? Why can't faster typing help us understand the problem faster?

do you have a example (even a toy one) where typing faster would help you understand a problem faster?


Has everyone always nailed their implementation of every program on the first try? Of course not. Probably what happens most times is you first complete something that sorta works and then iterate from there by modifying code, executing, observing, and looping back to the beginning. You can wonder about ultimately how much of your time/energy is consumed by the "typing code" part, and there's surely a wide range of variation there by individual and situation, but it's undeniable that it is a part of the core iteration loop for building software.

I don't understand why GP's comment is so controversial. GP is not denying that you should maybe think a little before a key hits the keyboard as many commenters seem to suppose. Both can be true.


That kind of thinking pops up very prominently in the article.

Here's a literal toy one.

Build a toy car with square wheels and one with triangular wheels and one with round wheels and see which one rolls better.

The issue isn't "typing faster" it's "building faster".


No need to build three, you just have to quickly write a proof for which shapes can roll. You'll then spend x+y units of time, where y<<x, instead of 3*x units. We have stories that highlight the importance of thinking instead of blindly doing (sharpening the axe, $1 for pressing a button and $9999 for knowing which button to press).

> quickly write a proof for which shapes can roll.

Writing the 3 are the proofs.


Sometimes articulating the problem is all you need to see what the solution is. Trying many things quickly can prime you to see what the viable path is going to be. Iterating fast can get you to a higher level of understanding than methodical, deliberative construction.

Nevertheless, it's a tool that should be used when it's useful, just like slower consideration can be used. Frontier LLMs can help significantly in either case.


so, what i am gathering is that some people in this comment section read "typing faster" literally, while other people are reading it and translating it to "iterating faster".

"Code writing speed" is just a superficial dismissal of AI without consideration as to whether AI is being used well or poorly for the task at hand. Saying that AI is the same as making people type faster, or that AI only produces slop, etc, is a very self limiting mindset.

> do you have a example (even a toy one)

It's extremely common with video games. Lots of game design is done by seeing what something feels like and changing it or throwing it away, repeatedly.

I think UI can be this way a lot too.


I often understand problems by discussing them with AI (by typing prompts and reading the response). Typing or reading faster would make this faster.

>MIT so yolo let's go mac some monnney and PJ outta Dubai etc etc

>TeamViktor's faces surely? But they're busy diamond handsing all the way to the moon so probably don't even care. XD

would anyone please be so kind to translate these parts of this comment into something a 45+ year old would understand?


40's as well but first line is basically, hey here's some MIT licensed code we can do whatever we want with it, surely we can use it to make some money to the point we can afford private jets in and out of Dubai.

"TeamViktor's faces surely?" = imagine the looks on their faces "diamond handsing to the moon" = hanging onto a situation that looks bad now hoping it gets better, throwing good money after bad, the opposite of cutting your losses.


thanks (and thanks gwking as well).

more or less what i thought, but the "PJ outta Dubai" really made me question myself.


From one “old guy” to another:

PJ = private jet

Diamond hands and to the moon are crypto trader slang

Makes me laugh answering this question, because the meaning is all there if you skip over all the meme words.


I am not that old, but I interpreted that as working in pajamas in Dubai. I guess yours makes more sense.

don't let age phase you out of culture. that's not real.

william shatner is near 100 and the man is locked in with the latest stuff.


Not an age thing, just how terminally online you are.

We just don't subscribe to traditional rest cycles (what Kagi Translate translated from "I should be sleeping right now, but I'm browsing HN" in LinkedIn Speak).

i find this statement is often used as an excuse to not think about security at all. which is probably not what you intended here (i hope, although you did say "pointless"...), but some people parrot it for that purpose.

a) this was a security win. millions and millions of people had physical access to the device for over a decade

b) as others have said, security is not all-or-nothing. the xbox one is extremely secure, despite not being perfectly secure.

c) just because something eventually gets hacked does not mean security was pointless. delaying access is a perfectly reasonable security goal. delaying access until the product is retired and the successor is already out on the market is a huge win.


i wouldnt go as far to say "its horrible".

i would never recommend it to someone who otherwise has a capable computer, of course, but it really isnt that bad. i gave it a pretty thorough test out of curiosity, and when they sponsored a few streamers i watch, it was totally fine. with the caveat that you have a decent internet connection and its probably not good for twitchy games like counter strike.

and, as far as i know, there is limited support for modding and some unsupported workarounds.


And it works on the Vision Pro via the next update.

finally!!!

Can’t wait to try that and for the f1 stuff to come out.


>Pointing out that a man who has achieved financial freedom decades ago may have different priorities than present and future wage slaves isn't attacking the man.

saying he has no empathy, and has never had empathy, on the other hand...


>How is this different than any company that uses the open source software?

recognition for the authors, which can lead to all sorts of opportunities. "netflix uses my X for their Y, worldwide" opens doors.


Can you cite an actual example of a FAANG company using X for Y that is also primarily attributable to a single developer? That is, someone who can say "uses my X"?

Not a community-developed project with a lot of contributors, but a software that would realistically qualify as being mostly attributable to one person?

Redis is an easy example, but the author of that doesn't need to say "Netflix uses my X" because the software is popular by itself. AI being trained on Redis code hasn't done anything to diminish that, as far as I can tell.


>Can you cite an actual example of a FAANG company using [...]

FAANG specifically? no, i am not familiar with their entire tech stacks.

but i have leaned on my single-developer projects (being used in other, not owned by me, software) to help land consulting gigs.


it has never been my explicit goal. but i have certainly enjoyed the rewards of recognition (e.g. i was able to lean on a successful project of mine to help land a nice consulting gig) and it would be silly to ignore that.

(edit: the comment i replied to was edited to be more a statement about themselves rather than a question about other developers, so my comment probably makes less sense now)


>What makes this more objectionable than profiting off open source projects by using it directly?

i can brag if netflix is using my X or facebook runs all their stuff with my Y. that can help me land consulting gigs, solicit donations, etc.


This is an edge case in OSS. Even among software packages used by Netflix and Amazon, few of them were attributable to a single maintainer or small group of individuals. They've long since become community developed projects.

Netflix and Amazon use many packages of all sizes. And contributions to projects with many contributors helped people get jobs.

How would you even know that Netflix or Amazon uses your package?

Their open source software depended on or derived from your package. They included your copyright notice with software they distributed. Someone contributed code. Someone reported a bug. Someone requested a feature. Someone mentioned it at a conference. I could continue.

arguments are stronger without insults

Anyone who knows anything about Carmack knows that he has trouble empathizing. I don't even think it's his fault per se. I'm fairly sure he would actually agree with the assessment. His raw intelligence is sky-high.

And that is a big reason why he's making this post, is what I'm saying. It doesn't excuse him, but it's not surprising in the least.


> Anyone who knows anything about Carmack knows that he has trouble empathizing.

Can you give some examples, outside of this post? I only know about Carmack by the things he'd worked on, but not anything personal like this. This would help me get a more complete picture of him.


I'd read Masters of Doom (the psych eval/juvie story and the cat story stand out). You might think "oh he was so young back then", and it's true, but keep in mind that book details id Software up to and including Doom 3 development, and he was in his early 30s there. I'm sure you can find excerpts if you don't want to read the whole thing. It's an interesting book though; great glimpse into trenches of 90s game development.

I've (unoriginally) always been impressed by his technical ability and work ethic, and while I used to religiously read his .plan updates (you might not know what that is, because I'm an old, OK? It's the precursor to blogs) and also follow the old Armadillo Aerospace development blogs, and watch the very long QuakeCon talks, I haven't kept up much as I got older, just come across things here and there (like this Twitter post), and I have not picked up a big change in demeanor or humility in regards to labor, political and societal issues from back then, and those are things he's written about. It's very much objectivism, the criticism of which is beyond this topic, but suffice it to say it's not a philosophy conducive to empathy. I seem to recall he made a bunch of libertarian rants on Facebook when he worked there too, but I'm not going to give Zuck the traffic. I'm sure you can find some.


true/false and insult/not insult are two different axes.

>Gotta give it to Zuck.

if "it" is the middle finger, for sure. "terrifying" is a great choice of word for it.


I was equally impressed/terrified by Apple's marketing blitz around client-side-scanning. So many people got paid to advocate for that, and the community barely convinced them it was a bad idea. There's not much hope left for any of FAANG deliberately resisting surveillance.

Why would they resist surveillance? They're making massive profits from it.

Well they can profit from that so why resist if ordinary user usually cares only about colors being pretty and Instagram/tiktok/x/your slop generator of choice working properly.

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