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ximeng

3,470 karma · joined November 18, 2009

ximeng888 at gmail

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ximeng··on Divorce does funny things
It could equally be seen as evidence that staying in a bad marriage is worse for women than for men, so women will risk more to escape that scenario.

(Presumably people file because they expect a better life outcome for themselves from divorce than from not divorcing. This could be because they expect a better outcome due to divorce, as you say; or that they expect a worse outcome if they don't divorce, which is my alternative possible interpretation. I'm neutral on which is actually the case.)

ximeng··on China's wealth surges by over $100T since 2000, overtaking the US
https://archive.md/drAbX
ximeng··on If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter
It was a recent software addition.

https://www.apple.com/hk/en/ios/ios-15/features/

Another neat new feature is screen sharing in FaceTime. But there’s a huge list of improvements, it’s clear they’re investing heavily in software.

ximeng··on If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter
I have a few issues with Apple software, but with AirPods Pro they recently added an AI-driven voice isolation mode which was an incredible change. Went from the other side barely being able to hear you when you were speaking in a noisy environment to feeling like you were in a quiet room together. Massive quality of life improvement and increased competitive moat from better software.
ximeng··on Corded headphones are making an unexpected return
Summary of thread - you can't keep everyone happy, and for some people there's no such thing as non-replaceable battery or broken cables if they have a soldering iron. The variety of things to complain about is greater with wireless.

Wires (+)

- Connection more reliable

- Sound quality consistent and stable (this is non-negotiable for some who won't buy a phone without an analog jack)

- Buttons on wire are convenient

- No battery worries

- Better audio "resolution", can hear more details (but theoretically wireless should be able to match "Harman target"), no compression

- Can replace cable, earpads if it fails (modular, good value Sennheiser HD25 has easy to replace parts - cable, earpad - and lasts >10 years; some manufacturers do not add 3.5mm TRRS jack)

- Clear which device is connected

- Simple and easy to understand

- Harder to lose

- Can use amp or USB DAC for sound quality

- Supported by decades worth of devices

- Better for environment as less disposable and repairable

- 1/8" RCA stereo jack is "best interface ever" (but ground connects last, plugging in may cause jumbled connections and shorts, and noises - bad with amps and speakers - partial plugging in possible, unbalanced signals; pros prefer XLR or heavy-duty cables such as Speakon, and TS/TRS cables only for patch cables such as guitar to amp; newer equipment uses audio over ethernet / Dante)

- Can convert to bluetooth with an adapter (e.g. fiio ubtr, although has less battery life) or 3d print a converter for flexibility

- Cheaper

Wires (-)

- Default headphone wires are short (but fixable)

- Headphone wire must be removed before taking off a shoulder-strap bag or shirt (can route under shirt or bag, but takes more time to put on or off and may yank wire if looking at phone so need slack in pocket)

- Tethered to source

- Taking off a face mask / shoulder-strap bag or passing a doorknob or exercising may tear headphones out of ears and damage them (need to treat wired headphones as consumable)

- Might tangle e.g. with keys in pocket, or if walking or running and putting things in and out of pocket (folding wire may help although some people thinks it damages wire; better wire materials may help)

- Some wired headphones are earbuds, so might be affected by issues people note for wireless earbuds

- Wires and ports may be fragile (may be able to solder to fix)

- Wires may crackle if not held in the right angle (although most headphones now come with replaceable cables, 2.5mm jack in headphone end)

- Annoying carrying cables

- May have cord noise

Wireless (+)

- Can change shoulder-strap bag or top without taking off headphones

- Portability: listen away from source (e.g. bathroom, up to ~40ft at home)

- Audio is fine in general (Airpods 2nd gen)

- For some (e.g. AirPods 2nd gen) no connection issues and good switching between phone and iPad (but auto-switching is not always wanted such as with an interval timer; sometimes connects to the wrong device)

- Bluetooth problems mostly solved in AirPods and Beats lines)

- Can help with hearing protection (e.g. reducing wind noise, especially on a motorcycle)

- Note that wireless headphones aren't necessarily earbuds (may have wrap-around design, although over-the-ear may hurt for glasses wearers), so some earbud issues are not necessarily linked to wireless; so longer battery life and can plug in if needed (so some people just use earbuds for sport)

- AirPods noise cancellation increases apparent loudness (also have transparency, normal mode; this is not necessarily just for wireless though)

- Not reliant on an analog jack (more device choice, one less part to fail)

- May be "cool" (but too popular so maybe "uncool")

- Convenient when moving around e.g. working out

Wireless (-)

- Don't connect, or only one connects, or randomly disconnect (possibly interference especially in crowded areas but not issue for everyone)

- Connection speed can be slow (varied experiences)

- Might connect to wrong device

- Sounds sometimes glitches out randomly (e.g. by large diesel generator), may have internal noise/audible hiss

- Bluetooth protocol - just drops stale packets, and enough dropped packets disconnects

- Earbuds fall out of some people's ears, so only use in "safe" places such as at home not outside (some people find OK for 5k run, may need better fit, and not necessarily a wireless only problem; more a problem if moving head a lot)

- Gestures and voice inconvenient without buttons as tapping just pushes into ear without registering (but AirPods Pro have buttons on stems and some use Siri/watch/phone instead of gestures; can also use device with wire between earbuds with controls and bluetooth transmitter)

- Batteries are inconvenient as need to be charged and get worse over time (can use one and swap to charge while using; maybe could have replaceable batteries - this is a HN obsession, can just resolder as cheap wholesale; wireless charging and case helps, USB-C headphones help too if used with USB-C computer)

- Latency (~200ms) means not good for pro audio or games or music or video (although some software may compensate e.g. YouTube)

- Bluetooth is not as quick to connect as DECT (e.g. Jabra DECT wireless headset suitable for all-day in call centre)

- Bluetooth is a complicated protocol with error correction and lots of failure points (software, hardware, bluetooth controller, protocol, medium, codecs) and not everything support bluetooth

- Easy to lose (would be good if had a way to wirelessly locate)

- Sometimes computer doesn't connect on bluetooth, especially on Linux and when using with mic or not

- Some models don't connect while charging (but wireless headphones can be temporarily wired)

- Other people may talk to you without realising you are wearing them if you have long hair, or think you're talking to yourself

- Bluetooth has lossy, pyschoacoustic compression (may cut out at low volumes to save battery), codec may be worse when using microphone as well (but not for all models)

- Worse for environment as finite lifetime with Li-ion battery

- Annoying carrying case (but needed for battery life)

- Expensive (but cheap clones may be OK, some say replacing every 3 years is good value for how much they use)

- Microphone can be bad

- May be security/privacy issue

- May be uncomfortable on your side

- Possible ear infections (as prevents ears from naturally clearing)

- Some complain volume not high enough

- May be heavier and bulkier

Speaker (+)

- If you're in the military and headphones will fall off, so just share music with a boombox

Individual models

- Sennheiser PX100 for good quality sound outside not driving as doesn't isolate from surroundings

- Sennheiser HD220s for radio and TV on tablet or phone late at night

- Sennheiser HD485s for music

- Bose QuietComforts (case is annoyingly big, but charges quickly)

- Bose SoundSports have wire between earbuds which clip to collar so hard to lose; also charge fast

- Galaxy Buds+ had bad battery after a year

- AirPods 150 Eur with 90min listening time after 1 year of use, 40 minutes in cold

- AirPod Pros (need to replace if has "crackling"), falls out for some not others, may be better with Apple devices, AirPods Pro take 5 hours to charge

- Nokia BH-503 on-ear bluetooth headphones lasted 10 years (minimal problems except slight pitch changes, OK sound quality but not as good as over-ears, one of first A2DP headsets)

- DT770 have bad non-replaceable cables (although can modify with a miniXLR socket), but may not be updated

- DT 700 Pro X (Beyerdynamics successor to DT770) has replaceable cords

- Shure SE215 in-ear headphones have detachable MMCX cables for 100 Euros

- Wireless Sennheiser (over-ear headphones) great audio (vs. old wired HD25), last 20 hours, plug into USB, headphone jack, bluetooth - mitigates battery issues

- Sony over-ear headphones have few isues

- Sennheiser wireless earbuds don't suck

- Sony WF-1000XM4 can pair multiple devices so don't need to disconnct then reconect e.g. phone and laptop

- Sony WF-1000XM3 "good" wireless headphones but connect to wrong device, low battery life, OK sound quality, bad voice quality on calls, one will turn on but not the other, buttons too sensitive e.g. if wearing hood or rainy/windy days, poor pairing; some people have good experience with this vs. AirPod Pros, but plug in XM3 for lossless music

- Sony WF-1000XM2s similar issues to XM3 but worse

- Sony WF-1000XM (first gen) very reliable with android but nothing else, very bad pairing

- Sony WH-1000X (headphones, not earbuds) - good audio, battery charge once a week, pairing perfect, comfortable all afternoon, but microphone low quality codec

- Bose QC45 has good quality codec even with microphone

- Apple Beats Fit Pro similar to AirPods Pro but has wingtip to keep in ear

- Bose QC15 had replaceable batteries (2009-2015)

- Beyerdynamics studio headphones last 16 years with replaced cords

- Apply corded EarPod microhpone sounds very good

ximeng··on Paradox of the perfect code editor
Zig is working on hot reloading, needs compiler and linker level support.

https://github.com/ziglang/zig/issues/68

That issue has some links to people doing it in C/C++.

ximeng··on Rows.com – Spreadsheet that supports external API integration and collaboration
I hit processing time limits when I tried to use it with no easy way to get around them.
ximeng··on Telegram Ad Platform
Without limited options for backup and cross-device migration, I don't use Signal for anything too important, so search is less important.

Whatsapp UI and search are OK but if you have a very long chat history then simple things like jumping to a specific date are difficult. I end up guessing a medium-to-rare search term and using the search history to jump back.

I'd much prefer having control of the data with simple export to my own device for my own search/analysis, but none of these apps do it.

ximeng··on Ask HN: How many laws are there in each country?
https://www.elegislation.gov.hk/index/chapternumber?p0=1&TYP...

This is a list of Hong Kong ordinances, going up to around 622 (select "All" to see them all).

But some of those are much more complicated than others, so it will depend how you slice them up how many you would count. This will be similar in other jurisdictions.

ximeng··on Designing better file organization around tags, not hierarchies (2017)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinFS WinFS - was cancelled
ximeng··on Energy, and How to Get It
Normally the question is vim and emacs not vim and vigor.
ximeng··on Over 30k Gitlab servers still unpatched against critical bug
https://twitter.com/menscher/status/1456057918562861059

Suggests DDoS attacks in excess of 1 Tbps, one of largest ever.

ximeng··on Waymo will start testing self-driving cars in New York City
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=68n4RjGhvRw Has Tesla handling some construction. Not quite there but in theory these cars should handle these situations much like people do - have an expectation of the road layout and adjust based on what they see in reality.
ximeng··on Waymo will start testing self-driving cars in New York City
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TFEvkmvIjVo Clearly not perfect in how it handles this as it doesn’t really back up or go onto the sidewalk but these Chinese self-driving cars are handling quite difficult scenarios.

It’s like there’s a phase transition from theoretical ideal driving to ignoring street markings and navigating based on how much space there is around you and intentions of surrounding vehicles. Looks difficult but not impossible.

There are similar videos showing Teslas handling double parked vehicles and oncoming traffic too.

ximeng··on Using Zig's translate-C to understand weird C code
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/34519318/c-address-of-fu... suggests it's guaranteed by the standard to be OK.

In the standard at https://web.archive.org/web/20181230041359if_/http://www.ope...

    6.5.3.2 Address and indirection operators
    Constraints
    1 The operand of the unary & operator shall be either a 
    function designator, the result of a [] or unary
    \* operator, or an lvalue that designates an object that
    is not a bit-field and is not declared with the
    register storage-class specifier.
So as the parameter is an lvalue it is guaranteed to work with the & operator.
ximeng··on Dutch forensic lab says it has decoded Tesla's driving data
You can see the same route being driven better as new betas come out. There's just not the same openness from Waymo and Cruze as Tesla which has vehicles out there in varied conditions able to be recorded by members of the public.
ximeng··on Ask HN: Cofounder in startup about to get funding but not feeling it
What do you want to work on? It doesn’t sound like this is it.

Don’t worry about the funding - negotiate an exit that’s fair to everyone if necessary, taking into account the work you’ve done to get to this point.

Better to cut your losses and work on the underlying issues that you hint at in your post.

If you’re not sure yet, then take your time and be as upfront with your colleagues as you can.

ximeng··on ‘Trojan Source’ Bug Threatens the Security of All Code
https://github.com/rust-lang/rust/issues/28979 plenty of discussion here on Unicode including homoglyph attacks. This is for Rust but has links to Go and Zig. The Unicode standard also has extensive discussion, for example https://unicode.org/reports/tr31/ and http://unicode.org/reports/tr39/ on identifiers and security.

In general a multilayer solution is needed: compilers, linters, Unicode standard, merge tools, editors, and so on.

ximeng··on Ask HN: Can you please add transcription to vocal messages in messaging apps?
They've just added automatic OCR of photos as well to allow copy and paste from pictures of text.
ximeng··on Ask HN: Can you please add transcription to vocal messages in messaging apps?
Wechat has this feature
ximeng··on Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]
4) if you don’t want amp it’s an extra click (once you’ve found the non-amp link) and going back then requires two clicks
ximeng··on Dutch forensic lab says it has decoded Tesla's driving data
There are plenty of videos on Youtube showing the state and rate of progress of self-driving. It's clear it's got a long way to go but is improving quickly.

Everyone knows that Elon Musk's twitter is not a reliable indicator of feature release dates.

ximeng··on Half a million South Korean workers walk off jobs in general strike
https://hongkongfp.com/2017/02/16/1-killed-2-injured-blaze-s... The subdivided flats are not perfectly safe.
ximeng··on Predicting spreadsheet formulas from semi-structured contexts
The current suggestions in Google sheets disappear very quickly if you press a key and then don’t reappear, so in practise are useless to me as I tend to be typing quickly.
ximeng··on The booming business of knitting together the world’s electricity grids
I think the problem is this is already on the edge of what is technically possible.

To provide power to the US it would presumably be easier to take advantage of US deserts and lay cables over land rather than cross-Atlantic. This avoids security and engineering problems as well as reducing transmission loss.

Also batteries mitigate the timing delay problem. Also these are not exclusive projects can do both if there is demand.

ximeng··on The booming business of knitting together the world’s electricity grids
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJunxkln578 more on the UK to Morocco solar / wind farm plan. 3,800km times four HVDC cables for redundancy. Global capacity around 4,000km of cable per year. So to make this project happen, need to open a new cable manufacturing facility.

This video also suggests that this sort of renewable project will have an average cost of 48 GBP/MWh versus 92.50 GBP/MWh for new nuclear.

ximeng··on Thank you everybody [Google account of Armoured Archives unlocked]
Following up from this highly upvoted story:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28621412

"Dave" a Google Community Manager unlocked the account. This was in the same thread previously linked to:

https://support.google.com/drive/thread/127021326/google-has...

This is a video thanks from the account manager for community support in getting the visibility needed for Google to rescue the account.

ximeng··on It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news
Unscientific and outdated but there were a couple of polls on locations.

In US: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6583918

Which US state: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5222370

Worldwide: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6582647

https://imgur.com/a/xOAvftj for charts https://pastebin.com/77KGTfwe for data

ximeng··on Singapore population sees biggest percentage drop since 1950
1.2% drop in Hong Kong

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/society/article/3144845/...

ximeng··on China unable to update to Windows 11 due to foreign TPM chip ban
There is (was?) a Chinese chip that has a similar purpose: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hengzhi_chip

I suppose this is to promote self-reliance in security technologies.

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