Hacker News Reader

pieter1976on Resurrecting Apple ][ code from a 1980 B movie

Some people have way too much time on their hand. But thanks goodness for emulators.

pieter1976on Fixing a bug in “Airwolf” code from 1984 [video]

The whole channel seems interesting https://www.youtube.com/c/BehindtheScreens Based on This Tumblr: https://moviecode.tumblr.com/

pieter1976on Network Performance Issues in multiple locations

For CDN, yes. For DDoS mitigation, no. Before they removed the figure from their website they claimed about 1/5th the DDoS mitigation capacity as Cloudflare.

pieter1976on The TSA's Selective Laptop Ban

Where does this end? After the liquid ban everything was banned from aircraft accept passport and boarding pass for a while. Imagine that becomes the norm.

Then terrorists realise that the rectum has a capacity of 500 to 800ml and decide to stuff a bomb large enough to puncture an aircraft wall in the anus and then remove it in flight.

pieter1976on The TSA's Selective Laptop Ban

At some point we are going to have to realise that terrorists are always going to want to target aircraft and just live with it. This ban makes no sense because $BAD_GUY can just via some intermediate airport with their iPad Bomb.

It's interesting that El Al has not decided to ban laptops (despite undoubtedly being a target) and, in fact, advises people not to put valuables in the hold: https://www.elal.com/en/PassengersInfo/Baggage/Pages/Policy....

"EL AL reminds all passengers not to pack valuable items in baggage send to the hold of the plane. These items should be carried in the hand luggage"

pieter1976on Aaron Swartz’s Theory on How to Save the World

Dutch not so different from British then.

pieter1976on Aaron Swartz’s Theory on How to Save the World

And there is the problem. He is being treated as a symbol, rather than a fellow human being who walked the planet with the rest of us and had his own demons.

pieter1976on Aaron Swartz’s Theory on How to Save the World

I have never understood the raising up of Aaron Swartz to demi-god status by this community. It is tragic that he took his own life and I fully expect to be downvoted here for expressing this opinion as it is a thing you can't say here (http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html).

pieter1976on Oracle buys Dyn

I assume that was sarcasm, right?

pieter1976on Britain’s vote to exit the EU sends Europe’s space sector scrambling for answers

Wouldn't be any surprise if Tim Peake turns out to be Britain's first and last official astronaut.

pieter1976on Is Hyperloop the future of travel?

Haven't really fast trains (sometimes maglev) inside evacuated tubes been proposed over and over again. Trying to work out what is new here.

For example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vactrain

pieter1976on Konrad Zuse and the digital revolution he started 75 years ago

Good to see Zuse on HN. It's possible to go and see his machines in Germany and I highly recommend it. This is a "forgotten" part of computing history because of WWII and deserves the light of day.

pieter1976on Peter Thiel to serve as Trump delegate

I guess this is on HN because people are surprised that not all programmers are atheist members of the Democratic party.

pieter1976on A conference for polyglot programmers – Regular tickets on sale

The whole polyglot programmer thing is totally weird to me. Why would you not be a polyglot programmer? And why are we celebrating it as if it was something special?

pieter1976on Richard Stallman's 22-Page Rider (2011)

I do not eat breakfast. Please do not ask me any questions about what I will do breakfast. Please just do not bring it up.

It's one thing not to want to eat breakfast, but making it a taboo subject seems extreme.

pieter1976on Chernobyl's legacy 30 years on

Two years ago I was lucky enough to visit Chernobyl with an organized tour out of Kyev. Strange to think of part of this planet as a forbidden zone, even stranger that it's a tourist attraction.

pieter1976on How the CIA writes history

In the film Spotlight there's a similar worry about disappearance of public records and a race to get them when they are released before a sort of Boston/Catholic Omerta makes them disappear.

pieter1976on Spy Chief Complains That Edward Snowden Sped Up Spread of Encryption by 7 Years

Sounds right. I work for a major Internet company and we locked down everything tight post-Snowden.

pieter1976on Bangladesh Bank hackers compromised SWIFT software, warning issued

The malware looks for processes with with a specific DLL loaded in it and then will replace two specific bytes with other instructions, which essentially trick the process into thinking an important check has been done.

It replaced a JNZ with NOP NOP. The BAE Systems blog post has lots of techincal detail: http://baesystemsai.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/two-bytes-to-951m...

pieter1976on Open-source cloud with LibreOffice online

Every time I try to use LibreOffice (and OpenOffice before that), I end up terribly disappointed by the software quality compared to 'equivalent' Microsoft or Apple products. Have things improved lately?

pieter1976on Google wins copyright battle over books

Good. Google Books is an incredible resource and this was a mistake. The Authors Guild are wrong to stop this scanning as it Google Books makes IMHO books more desirable not less.

pieter1976on How a Diode Changed My Life

Lovely story. Don't forgot that diodes also have a voltage drop across them which means that they can be used to change voltages from batteries or other sources if needed.

pieter1976on Many railway lines in Britain that were closed in the 1960s are re-opening

Now, if only the tram lines would be rebuilt things would be a lot smoother (at least from a public transport perspective).

pieter1976on Amazon Echo Is Magical. It’s Also Turning My Kid into an Asshole

Sorry, no, it's the parents' responsibility to teach children how to interact in all sorts of situations.

Amazon Echo is no different. This person needs to deal with their child and not blame technology.

pieter1976on Welcome to 'the worst job in the world' – my life as a Guardian moderator

Seems vastly overblown to call this "the worst job in the world". There are far, far worse things people do to get paid.

Sure jumping out of your tree-hugging everybody-love-everybody mindset is probably a shock, but there's plenty of hatred in the real world.

pieter1976on The Basics of Web Application Security, Part 4: Protect Data in Transit

There are plenty of countries that will do this. It is not a subtle hint about the NSA.

pieter1976on The Restart Page: rebooting experience from vintage operating systems

Wow. The Amiga one brings back some memories.

pieter1976on Merkel Grants Turkish Request to Prosecute German Satirist

Yes. This is a big problem here in the Netherlands. Traditionally we have been a very open society but more recently people have become unable to speak their minds about religious matters that affect society.