HackerTrans
TopNewTrendsCommentsPastAskShowJobs

pbronez

2,046 karmajoined 7 yıl önce
[ my public key: https://keybase.io/peterbronez; my proof: https://keybase.io/peterbronez/sigs/aK3o2l59iuXf4ZE61-arwlc3CsPE1jYuB6pu_vjfi0c ]

<a rel="me" href="https://hachyderm.io/@PeterBronez">Mastodon</a>

comments

pbronez
·3 gün önce·discuss
Yes it’s an add for a book but it does provide a sample chapter:

https://nostarch.com/download/samples/automate-excel-with-py...
pbronez
·3 gün önce·discuss
What are best practices for using Excel as a front end for python tooling? I’ve got a use case where the business users are maintaining a complex spreadsheet and we need to hook some genuine optimization into it. It’s all fine and good if you assume the people will use the template perfectly, but hahahahahaha

There’s probably some ideal blend of locking regions, in-excel validation, in-python validation, and clean separation of human inputs and machine outputs. Has anyone figured out what that is already?
pbronez
·6 gün önce·discuss
I don’t see why HP would want to do that. They have huge margins on ink, right? I’m sure the increase in cartridge sales would offset lost subscription revenue from useless cloud services, if only because the people who are gonna use an open source printer would never pay for that anyway.
pbronez
·10 gün önce·discuss
Thought-provoking closing paragraph from the linked Cornel Chronicle article about the transition:

“It’s now difficult to prepare for the world three months from now if the median LLM-produced computer science paper is better than that produced by the median grad student.”

https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2026/06/digital-research-re...
pbronez
·10 gün önce·discuss
1000% this. I write to force myself to think deeply and crystallize my opinion on things.
pbronez
·11 gün önce·discuss
Interesting, I was wondering why Snowflake was investing in PostgreSQL. Looks like Snowflake bought Crunchy Data and Databricks bought NEON… so the two leading DWaaS companies have managed PostgreSQL offerings now.
pbronez
·11 gün önce·discuss
I am currently fighting my way off SQL Server towards PostgreSQL.

Windows Server is a real pain to operate and the SQL Server ecosystem expects you to run a lot of add-ons on the server alongside your database. Those don’t translate to managed database services, so you lose a lot of functionality if you jump to RDS or similar.

The first party tools are also aging poorly. SSIS and SSRS are not fun. SSMS is ok for what it is but can’t compete with the ecosystem around PostgreSQL.

Maybe I’m missing something but I can’t wait to ditch it.
pbronez
·12 gün önce·discuss
Same, although I prefer Endel. It’s a paid subscription, but their objective-focused playlists work really well for me. Relax, Focus, Deep Focus… very effective.
pbronez
·17 gün önce·discuss
“As with all bunny.net services, accounts using the platform are subject to our standard $1/month minimum spend, but DNS itself no longer incurs any usage-based charges.”

This is smart. Ensures you have valid payment information, which implies a financial institution is running KYC on your customer. That reduces fraud and abuse while also reducing friction for real users to increase their spend within your ecosystem when a new product catches their eye.
pbronez
·18 gün önce·discuss
Maybe? Would be nice for it to be optional. The site says the camera saves the original images, so they should be able to provide multiple stitching approaches.

If it’s a lighting flicker issue, you can probably address with frame stacking… multiple exposures from each lens taken in rapid succession, then combined.
pbronez
·18 gün önce·discuss
OP’s wigglegrams are fun but a bit jarring; your “at the concert” is much smoother. I wonder how we could bridge that gap. My first thought was to use video stabilization algorithms. I suspect they would either fail do to insufficient frames or remove the interesting movement entirely.
pbronez
·24 gün önce·discuss
In that scenario, maybe SSD prices drop enough that spinning disk loses relevance.
pbronez
·26 gün önce·discuss
Yeah this is a better link https://squeezlabs.github.io/handcrank/
pbronez
·26 gün önce·discuss
That’s really cool! I’ve been thinking about how LLMs could help me with long running series. I read lots of stuff that’s thousands of pages long with a huge cast of characters and locations. Amazons X-Ray is okay ish but (1) not supported everywhere and (2) amazon.

It would be really fun to have a progress-aware AI that can give me a quick definition of entities like people and places. The other thing that would help is details about fictional mechanics. How exactly does FTL work in this universe? What were all the cultivation stages? I don’t need help with reading comprehension, I need a better way to flip back through everything and surface the key detail that was mentioned one time 500 pages ago.

Also, unfortunately my library lives in Kindle. Help me get it out, at least the DRM free stuff. I also use Royal Road extensively and pay for that. Would be great to have those live serials supported somehow.
pbronez
·26 gün önce·discuss
That’s really cool! I’ve been thinking about how LLMs could help me with long running series. I read lots of stuff that’s thousands of pages long with a huge cast of characters and locations. Amazons X-Ray is okay ish but (1) not supported everywhere and (2) amazon.

It would be really fun to have a progress-aware AI that can give me a quick definition of entities like people and places. The other thing that would help is details about fictional mechanics. How exactly does FTL work in this universe? What were all the cultivation stages? I don’t need help with reading comprehension, I need a better way to flip back through everything and surface the key detail that was mentioned one time 500 pages ago.

Also, unfortunately my library lives in Kindle. Help me get it out, at least the DRM free stuff. I also use Royal Road extensively and pay for that. Would be great to have those live serials supported somehow.
pbronez
·29 gün önce·discuss
It's weird how hard it is to get programmatic access to a mobile-first messaging service. Telegram is the only one that makes it easy. WhatsApp and iMessage have first party solutions that assume you're a business with 1:M comms. Signal doesn't want bot users at all.

Maybe I need to start looking at SMS/MMS proper, but that's putting a lot of information in the clear and giving up a lot of features.
pbronez
·geçen ay·discuss
Interesting, Project Sunrise aims to run non-stop flights between Sydney and London + New York. They needed to design a new airplane to do it. Targeting service starting late 2027.
pbronez
·geçen ay·discuss
Isn’t the solution high-quality identity verification? There are piles of digital identity companies out there. They make money selling to banks for KYC compliance. Heck, there are background check as a service companies designed to add trust to gig economy platforms.

I used to think that a small payment could accomplish the same thing, but X selling blue check marks proved that doesn’t help much. Well, at least it’s a much weaker signal than the previous curated version.

The challenge is any barrier to entry high enough to discourage motivated spammers is also high enough to discourage casual users. That disrupts the network effects you’ve traditionally needed to bootstrap a social website.

If I was trying to get a new social site off the ground right now, I would try:

1) secure a good brand from the pre-AI era. Twitter, Digg, Friendster, MySpace. Something that motivates a first look.

2) Require third party identity verification on sign up, configured so the social site is never the custodian of PII, though require enough demographics to support high-value advertising later. Verification is free to the user, ideally provide multiple verification options- one US and one EU at minimum.

3) Target a few core communities and invest. Find the people who moderate historically great subreddits, were active in twitter communities during the good years, etc. get them in your platform. Maybe even pay them.

That should be enough to tell you if it’s going to work or not.
pbronez
·geçen ay·discuss
Loads super fast and scrolls easy. On mobile, my one complaint is that the menu items (top bar, footer) are quite small.
pbronez
·geçen ay·discuss
Does that change with the growing market share of 5 over 1 wooden mixed used buildings?