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simmonmt

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simmonmt
·22 giorni fa·discuss
Maybe? If you assume a cell can just disappear at a moment's notice, then I'm guessing you don't even try backing it up. Whatever goes into and out of the cell (request logs and results) gets backed up, and no doubt that's more complicated than a monolithic system, but it may not be so bad assuming the replay systems and global transaction router do their thing?
simmonmt
·27 giorni fa·discuss
Yep. When did virtual screens come in? My last full time experience with X was with Xsun in the early 2000s under Solaris. There was a shared cursor, I thought you could drag windows between monitors, but I also thought the DISPLAY variable was different for each (though I could be misremembering)
simmonmt
·27 giorni fa·discuss
This is pretty cool - especially that it's at the point where it can be used with a real window manager.

I'm curious why multiple screens is considered legacy baggage and thus out of scope, given how common multiple monitor setups are these days. I also have zero familiarity with X internals, so don't know if multiple monitor support is a horror show that'd be miserable to support.
simmonmt
·mese scorso·discuss
This was one of the reasons given, at the time, for why Netflix created fast.com. It's served by the same infra that does their streaming, and is thus difficult for isps to game. That is, it'd be hard for them to do some hack to make fast.com numbers without also benefiting Netflix streaming performance in the bargain.
simmonmt
·2 mesi fa·discuss
I mean ... step 1 is probably fixing the part where it lands in the ocean, falls over and explodes. Once they've done that and can get their hands on the tiles I'm guessing they can continue to iterate there until they get a more easily reusable design.
simmonmt
·2 mesi fa·discuss
It jumped out at me too, but because I wondered what it would look like in the AI version of this story. Having had it build the SQL version do you ... a) miss the leap because you don't understand how it works, don't care to know, and go off to vibe the next thing b) ask it lots of questions because reasons to develop that deep understanding then make the leap or c) rely on it (prompt: "this can't be good enough do better") to go make the leap for you.

(Assuming for the sake of argument that you guided it to the SQL version first)
simmonmt
·2 mesi fa·discuss
That's true, but the human can do a much better job planning for the journey if they know what to expect along the way.

One example, from the end of the journey: knowing in advance where the actual entrance to the business is, or the specific curb cut that leads to the residence, makes it easier and far less error prone to decide exactly where the journey should end. Even humans have a hard time figuring out the right access point for a business or residence. This is a job for an offline process, fed by as many data sources as possible.
simmonmt
·2 mesi fa·discuss
> When they want data about a school intersection in SF at a certain time of day, they just... synthetically generate it and simulate

I think it's more about detecting changes to the world. You need boots on the ground, so to speak, to see that new speed limit sign or the new lane paint. The Waymo vehicle can no doubt react to changes in the world when it encounters them, relaying them back to the mothership, but it's better to know about them in advance.
simmonmt
·3 mesi fa·discuss
I think he meant a very small (stub) MEMORY.md whose sole contents are something like "don't write here - write there".
simmonmt
·3 mesi fa·discuss
If you consider say elevator music - music that's just there to fill space, rather than to be listened too - then I don't think there's that much difference between using AI to produce it and using AI to produce clip art or boilerplate code.
simmonmt
·5 mesi fa·discuss
That's an anti pattern, at least the way we use it. If you need to add complexity, you define custom functions. If that's not enough, CEL probably isn't the right choice, and you'd be doing yourself no favors banging it into that square hole.
simmonmt
·5 mesi fa·discuss
Interesting. I made the same jump and noticed a huge increase in speed and decrease in memory pressure (the likelihood that iOS will kill an app I've switched away from). I miss the physical silent mode button though.
simmonmt
·5 mesi fa·discuss
The alternative is not charging. JFK somehow manages. Yes there's traffic, but it keeps slowly moving.
simmonmt
·7 mesi fa·discuss
I'm not normally a fan of tips, but this seems like a reasonable use of one to me. The picker isn't paid on the shininess of the apple they bring you -- they're paid to pick as quickly as they can from what's on offer. The potential for a tip incentivises them to go beyond that requirement -- to pick the nicest/freshest rather than the most convenient.
simmonmt
·8 mesi fa·discuss
They stopped building B2 bombers 25 years ago.
simmonmt
·9 mesi fa·discuss
Fewer challenges, but no more space between them. They still come out daily starting December 1st. They just stop coming sooner.
simmonmt
·9 mesi fa·discuss
Costs are a big thing, sure, but for me it's electrical reliability. For better or worse our heating oil and natural gas supply are both more reliable than our electricity supply. I don't need the heat going out in the dead of winter when some wind storm drops a bunch of branches on power lines.

I'm aware that both my boiler and a natural gas furnace have electric blower motors. It's a lot easier to power them from a generator than it is to have a generator than can power a house worth of heat pumps.
simmonmt
·9 mesi fa·discuss
It depends on the item. Let's take this screw pitch gage: https://www.starrett.com/details?cat-no=155

Starrett doesn't really compete on price, as evidenced by the fact that this is a $95 item whereas the cheap alternatives go for closer to $10 on Amazon. So they're probably not making or selling very many of them. But they sell enough to make it worth keeping them in stock, and eventually they'll run out so they'll need to make new parts. Assuming low volume (I say this just in case I've accidentally picked the one weird thing that does sell like hotcakes), they're not going to spend any engineering time evolving that design. The input materials aren't going to stop being made. It is what it is, it does what it does, some people buy it, and so the name of the game becomes how do you make that specific thing they want with the least overhead? You use the same tooling you've used for the last 50 years. When you need a new batch of parts, you pull out that tooling, stamp out a bunch of leaves, and put the tooling away until you need it again.

There are many many manufactured items that fall into this category.