Hacker News Reader

4pkjaion Cisco gives engineer unlimited AI tokens to rewrite legacy code

That’s funny I offered to do this for my tailor. He has a FoxPro app that was originally made in 1990.

4pkjaion Removing Next.js Got My Blog to 100 on Every Lighthouse Category

I wrote not so basic CRUD application that uses HTML and vanilla javascript. I don't even minify the javascript. That website loads significantly faster than all the other websites I have made.

4pkjaion Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died

Sad to hear this, I watched "Triumph of the Nerds" multiple times when I was at University.

4pkjaion Fuck Android Developer Verification Program

I got banned from Google Admob (or whatever it is called now) and they still send me promotional emails.

4pkjaion How my boss made InternalServerErrors disappear

I think we did do that.

4pkjaion My Business Is Dying

I disagree, I think if you slop out your content it will be disregarded. It seems to be pretty easy to identify now with tools like Pangram.

4pkjaion Why are all the amounts values negative?

I don’t really understand how OCRing a PDF could be more accurate than reading the text nodes.

Another thing to consider is OCR works well for English but not so well for other languages.

4pkjaion Why are all the amounts values negative?

Yes it’s not a safe general rule. I can do it because I first classify the statement into a document_type and then run special code for specific document_types.

4pkjaion Why are all the amounts values negative?

I agree with you, it's not safe to have a rule saying "non-black means invisible".

I should have made it clear in the blog post, but the first thing I do when processing a PDF is I identify the document_type. Then I run special rules for that document_type.

So the "non-black means invisible" rule only applies when processing this document_type.

4pkjaion Why are all the amounts values negative?

I did try method number two, and it worked. I should update this post.

4pkjaion The 2-Year Apartment Rule

Damn I was hoping for some sort of explanation. This rule doesn't apply to me, my apartments are pretty good even after two years.

I do end up changing apartments after the two year lease period because I get bored of the area or the landlord raises the rent.

4pkjaion Ask HN: What are tools you have made for yourself since the advent of AI?

Something to help me remember the order of my jokes when doing stand up.

4pkjaion It's OK to compare floating-points for equality

I do this to see if text in a PDF is exactly where it is in some other PDF. For my use case it works pretty well.

4pkjaion MonoGame: A .NET framework for making cross-platform games

I used MonoGame to port my XNA games to other platforms.

It’s really good, also it was very cool as a junior developer to see the code for the methods I used.

4pkjaion Trunk Based Development

I worked in a team of four between 2017 and 2020 this way. I really enjoyed it. After that I joined a company that worked with PRs. Felt like such a waste of time.

4pkjaion Adventure Game Studio: OSS software for creating adventure games

I started off using this back in 2009 when I wanted to make an adventure game.

Really enjoyed it back then, great to see it’s still around

4pkjaion Paul Hegarty's updated CS193p SwiftUI course released by Stanford

I did the 2014 version of this to learn Swift to port an Android app I made.

He’s an excellent teacher!

I think he worked at Apple so he shared a lot of the history behind the APIs in iOS going back to the NextStep days.

4pkjaion Advent of Code 2025

Kotlin, because it’s a language I like

4pkjaion Implications of AI to schools

When I was a university student in 2009 a lecturer accused me of plagiarising a c++ win32 project I submitted.

It turned out he ran it through a plagiarism detector and multiple lines of code where identical to lines in their database.

It was very silly because there’s a lot of boiler plate code in win32 projects

4pkjaion Starship's eleventh flight test

Is this something you think they can or should fix?

4pkjaion How I, a non-developer, read the tutorial you, a developer, wrote for me

We do this in game development .

Watch someone play the game for the first time. Don’t interfere. See if they can figure out how to play.

4pkjaion Should we drain the Everglades?

Normally I don't, but liked the humour.

4pkjaion I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

Regarding your last sentence, it seems like he did buy a used EV.

4pkjaion Twenty Eighth International Obfuscated C Code Contest

As a noob, this is confusing me.

4pkjaion No Hello

When people give me a hello back I raise them a “how are you?”

4pkjaion Show HN: Meet.hn – Meet the Hacker News community in your city

Hey I know you!

4pkjaion Show HN: Meet.hn – Meet the Hacker News community in your city

Doesn't seem to work for Hong Kong

4pkjaion The Myth of the Product-Market Fit (2013)

Another PMF-inspired practice in vogue is using Google Adwords to channel keyword searches to a dummy product site listing various features. The idea is to establish PMF before even beginning work on the product. A certain click-through rate establishes a clear need and a ready market to consume the product.

I've always disliked this strategy. It doesn't feel good to start off your relationship with a customer with deception.

4pkjaion A cafe worker: the question customers ask showing disrespect

"Of all the jobs I’ve had – creative agencies in London, content creator for a produce supplier in San Francisco, a digital marketer in Melbourne – nobody has ever breathed a word of interest in where I went to university."