Hacker News Reader

DrAwdeOccarimon 23andMe files for bankruptcy to sell itself

My favorite thriller story idea comes from knowing a character’s SNPs that are also covered by the standard forensic DNA panel. Then the antagonist in the story buys a bunch of oligos that flank the panel targets and spreads them around the crime scene to “frame” the character for murder!

So once the ‘’’bad guys’’’ purchase the 23andme database, the story is complete! They can then frame our protagonist…

DrAwdeOccarimon Do viruses trigger Alzheimer's?

Are you a drug developer by trade? You certainly think like someone who’s seen some SARs…

DrAwdeOccarimon QRP Labs QMX SSB beta firmware relased

Only the ham bands, and there are three different models that hit different harmonics of the bands: 80/60/40/30/20m; 60/40/30/20/17/15m; and 20/17/15/12/11/10m.

DrAwdeOccarimon QRP Labs QMX SSB beta firmware relased

I was wondering how Hans got it to work. All the groups.io threads and I couldn't find a simple explanation.

DrAwdeOccarimon My Experience Getting Licensed in Ham Radio (2020)

I have fallen in love with ham radio the past few years. I got my technician license about 15 years ago and didn't really do much. I went to a local ham meetup and honestly, they were all kind of abrasive and lame. Most were old and came off as gatekeeping. I putzed around local repeaters and took my 2m/70cm handheld around with me when I went on vacation and hit local repeaters on my trips. Met some nicer people, but it was all very different to me. I grew up with online chatrooms and AIM and so the idea of speaking with strangers, like with my voice, made me feel kind of uncomfortable (and still does!).

Anyway, fast forward to the pandemic and I found myself thinking about radios again. I decided to study for my General because I started learning about over-horizon radio and how you could use HF to bounce off the ionosphere. I had some extra time so I studied the pool with an app and in a few weeks took the test. Once I passed, I took to the internet and read about HF and what I needed to get started. Purchased an Icom IC-7300, an Alinco 330MVT power supply, and an hfkits EFHW build-your-own 80/40/20/(15)/10 wire antenna with 49:1 unun. I also eventually purchased an LDG Z-100A-DXE antenna tuner, a RigExpert AA-230-ZOOM, and a Moonraker AV-600 inline meter. Building my own unun and antenna made me feel like a Jedi building their own light-saber as part of the experience! lol

This is when I got hooked. Tuning into 40m at night and hearing from Boston all across the eastern seaboard, into Europe, the Caribbean, and Latin/South America was wild. Then I tuned into 20m and made SSB contacts in Europe. What an electric feeling to call out to someone and having them respond from thousands of miles away! Then I re-purposed a raspberry pi 4 and imaged DragonOS to a card and, omg, digital modes through my radio is where I spend 90% of my ham time now.

FT-8 is so much fun. I've made contacts all over. I've hit Japan, Nepal, Asiatic Russia, Brazil, Suriname, Ghana, basically every European country, basically every US state, Canada, the list goes on. I've started building new antennas basically monthly. Copper pipe J-pole was the most fun for 2m. Testing the new antennas with WSPR is a really easy way to see how it performs. There are listening stations in Antarctica and Australia and New Zealand that I can regularly hit at 1 Watt (wtf!?). So cool.

DragonOS also does ADS-B tracking and monitoring, which I'm just getting into having purchased a Tram 1410 and stuck it in my attic.

Anyway, the world of radio is just incredible. I highly recommend it for any technologist as the fun and crazy shit you can build now for cheap is remarkable. We are truly in the golden age of wireless tinkering!

DrAwdeOccarimon The Grateful Dead's Wall of Sound (2019)

On it!

DrAwdeOccarimon The Grateful Dead's Wall of Sound (2019)

Duuuude yes! I adore your app. Do you have a tip jar or something?

DrAwdeOccarimon Ask HN: What are your thoughts on ChatGPT as a professional?

I emphatically disagree, but I appreciate that you may feel there is a requirement for a certain amount of time to pass before becoming reliant on any new technology.

DrAwdeOccarimon Ask HN: What are your thoughts on ChatGPT as a professional?

I thought this at first, but the open source models are no joke: https://venturebeat.com/ai/mistral-ceo-confirms-leak-of-new-...

DrAwdeOccarimon Ask HN: What are your thoughts on ChatGPT as a professional?

Good analogy. It’s a tool. Sure, you could wash your clothes by hand, but a washing machine frees your time to do things that technology can’t scale (yet!).

DrAwdeOccarimon Ask HN: What are your thoughts on ChatGPT as a professional?

I work in biotech and at my company, specifically our CEO, for over a decade has constantly asked all of us, "How are you leveraging AI in your job?". So much so that we used to joke about it. Well, when ChatGPT arrived, something happened. Everyone at the company (now about 5000 people) were already primed, looking for how they could finally answer "Yes" to our obsessive CEO. We have a deep roster of professional software engineers, and one dev in particular hacked out an internal site that leveraged the OpenAI API and deployed it company wide. Last count, a majority of the company uses it daily. What my team specifically has found is that building custom GPTs and working out detailed, two-way prompts, has allowed us (and specifically my part-time employee) to deliver detailed technical reports commensurate to an FTE. The key is to force the output to "show it's work" and to expect to review similar to how you would work with a first year graduate student. If you do the math, this puts the company above it's FTE cost in terms of per employee output. That's the real ticket right now. It's not inventing the next drug, but it sure as hell is making me more productive without causing burn-out. It works really well also at meeting minutes, a huge source of time-waste for project managers who should be doing high-thought work instead of menial tasks.

So to answer your question: become reliant on it. This is the future of white-collar work. Local instances are catching up to the big ones. It's only going to get better!

DrAwdeOccarimon UniFi U7 Pro

This one works great: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B078211KBB

DrAwdeOccarimon UniFi U7 Pro

Funny thing, I complained and complained and complained and they quietly rolled out full-offline zero cloud required UniFi and Protect IOS direct connection support starting about three months ago. I doubt my complaining helped specifically, but there were many people on the same threads so maybe they got the hint?

DrAwdeOccarimon UniFi U7 Pro

I’ve had two die and then I read using an SSD helps a lot with the heat issue. Replaced the HDD with an SSD and temp is a cool 45C now down from high 50’s with HDD. YMMV but figured I’d add my anecdotal experience.

DrAwdeOccarimon Moderna's mRNA cancer vaccine works better than thought

It’s been tested for decades. The issue is protein-based platforms deliver the protein outside the cell. This means most do not get processed and presented by MHC-1 and 2 the way a genetically encoded therapeutic does. The issue with DNA is it separates the innate immune activation signal (eg cGAS and TLRs) from the presentation so you don’t get co-signaling. This may be the ticket why mRNA could work…

DrAwdeOccarimon How Stone Walls Became a Signature Landform of New England

My favorite is the Measurer of Wood and Bark. We elect one every year still as a lark, but it used to be important as wood was the central way people generated energy in their homes so standardizing wood lots was of central importance in New England.

https://www.wickedlocal.com/story/brookline-tab/2014/07/17/w...

DrAwdeOccarimon Paste without formatting on macOS

I turn that off when I first setup my browser.

DrAwdeOccarimon Cancer expert given experimental treatments for incurable brain tumour

I can’t seem to find exactly what kind of treatment he received. Does anyone know the actual scientific description of it?

DrAwdeOccarimon As I get older, I just don't care about new technology

If you're talking salary banding, no companies in biopharma pay as broadly high, but the big ones like Pfizer, GSK, Merck, Sanofi, etc. certainly compensate high.

DrAwdeOccarimon As I get older, I just don't care about new technology

Yes! We switched from electronic technology to bio technology.

DrAwdeOccarimon Flipping the model presents a new way to treat sleep apnoea

Omg, I purchased one of the Caldera neck rest collars and slept with it on last night instead of my chin strap. Wow is all I can say. Normally my AHI is around 2, it was 0.2 last night. What is this black magic!? Thanks so much internet stranger!

DrAwdeOccarimon Flipping the model presents a new way to treat sleep apnoea

Just to add this, my ENT prescribed a nasal probiotic prior to my surgery due to staph risk. I used it for 6 months prior to the surgery and now I continue to use it because, either it's a placebo or something special, it seems to improve the airflow in my nose beyond what I'd expect from just squirting some buffered water up my nose. Additionally, I seem to have fewer head-colds that also seem to resolve more rapidly (I have two small children, so my house is literally an incubator for infections). This is the product: https://liviaone.com/collections/probiotics/products/probiot... in case you were curious.

DrAwdeOccarimon Flipping the model presents a new way to treat sleep apnoea

Yea, this is why I just pay for the sterile sensimist nasal saline spray: https://www.amazon.com/Simply-Saline-Adult-Nasal-Original/dp...

DrAwdeOccarimon Flipping the model presents a new way to treat sleep apnoea

Totally agree! I went through tons of them. The one that finally worked for me was this one: https://www.amazon.com/PRIMADA-Premium-White-Support-Industr...

It's basically a 4 inch wide soft elastic band with velcro on the ends.

DrAwdeOccarimon Flipping the model presents a new way to treat sleep apnoea

https://apnimed.com/

https://journals.lww.com/neurotodayonline/Fulltext/2022/0407...

DrAwdeOccarimon Flipping the model presents a new way to treat sleep apnoea

Totally agree. My journey started with TMJ disorder. Turns out bruxism (teeth grinding) is common in sleep apnea patients; I assume because it forces the lower jaw forward. I started with a mandibular advancement device and it was amazing. It completely relived my debilitating TMJ jaw pain and fixed my sleep apnea. I couldn’t believe how amazing I fet every morning. Unfortunately, and which was clearly communicated to me by my sleep dentist, after about 8 years my lower jaw stopped resetting back to a normal bite during the day. So I switched to CPAP. I love my nasal pillows plus chin strap CPAP, the sleep quality is unbeatable and my light-sleeping partner would have left to sleep in another room permanently if not for it. Along the way I have tried many other ideas—a tongue suction pull forward thing, a rear tongue electro stimulation device, prone sleeping, wedge sleeping, just the chin strap, and I looked into the pace maker thing and participating in an oral small molecule trial but didn’t follow through with it (also, I’m already thin, just a weak jaw line). Nothing compares to CPAP at high humidity and medium temperature. What has made a major impact was seeing an ENT, and the discovery of sinus blockages, so I recently had major sinus surgery and it’s improved my sleep apnea about 75%! Turns out “negative pressure” is a major cause of airway collapse. So I’m going to try some of the non-CPAP stuff again to see if my partner is able to deal with at most some loud breathing.

Sorry for the long post, but my advice to all is see an ENT if you need a CPAP and are already thin.

DrAwdeOccarimon Unexpected link between pure mathematics and genetics

I assumed it's because plants can't run, so they need a larger chemical arsenal to convince predators not to eat them and mates to coit with them, all with line of sight to the sun.

DrAwdeOccarimon Temperature-dependent RNA editing in octopus recodes the neural proteome

We've known for a few years that cephalopods edit most of their mRNA (like 60% or so) to change the protein that's made. So this result isn't super surprising to the field. This is very much an example of epitranscriptomics, along with it's eponymous relative epigenetics, shows sophisticated additional layers by which life can respond to environmental queues.

DrAwdeOccarimon Secret ChatGPT plugins can be revealed by removing a parameter from an API call

This is a great reply because it shows just how much things are about to change. OP is likely a smart, digitally inclined individual and they missed this use case. This will sweep through the general population eventually so lean in and learn how to interface with a young AGI.

DrAwdeOccarimon Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

I have one, it works, but I really want to connect it to a pi for data logging and visualization but I don’t have the time to code it up. If you go down this road, please let me know if you wind up finding a good open source project for managing the data! You can purchase rocks off ebay that have some radioactivity, which I use to show my kids how radiation works much to the chagrin of my spouse : )