Hackers, Robots, and Apple Cash Grab Shock!

I dropped my Google Pixel 9 XL Pro from 6th floor balcony to the street

Key Points

• A Google Pixel 9 XL Pro survived a drop from a sixth-floor balcony, remaining powered and connected via Bluetooth.
• The author plans to repair the externally damaged phone using 38 EUR worth of parts ordered from AliExpress, changing its color in the process.
• The story underscores that smartphones, though complex, can often be repaired instead of discarded, extending their usable life.

The history of C# and TypeScript with Anders Hejlsberg | GitHub

Key Points

• Interview covers Hejlsberg’s role in creating Turbo Pascal, Delphi, C#, and TypeScript.
• TypeScript’s move to GitHub is discussed as part of Microsoft’s open-source evolution.
• The team plans to port the TypeScript compiler to Go targeting a “10x perfor…” improvement.

Show HN: OpenJuris – AI legal research with citations from primary sources

Key Points

• Answers are citation-backed with direct links to primary sources, including U.S. case law.
• Case-centric chat and AI headnotes help users analyze individual opinions efficiently.
• Text selection enables targeted follow-up questions and contextual quote retrieval.

Drawings of the elements of CMS detector, in the style of Leonardo da Vinci

Key Points

• Record includes 40 images of CMS detector elements styled after Leonardo da Vinci.
• Photographer credited is Sergio Cittolin; item dated 01/10/2014.
• Images are available in multiple sizes and via a slideshow, under CC-BY-4.0.

The Book of PF, 4th edition

Key Points

• Covers modern PF features including IPv6, dual stack, and advanced traffic shaping.
• Provides practical configurations for rulesets, wireless security (authpf), and NAT/redirection.
• Addresses redundancy (CARP, relayd) and monitoring/analysis with logging and NetFlow across BSDs.

Sometimes Your Job Is to Stay the Hell Out of the Way

Key Points

• Cultivate conditions for focused engineering work rather than celebrating 10x labels.
• Formalizing a “Wolf” role backfired, alienating real Wolves and prompting counterproductive behavior.
• Light-touch support enabled an engineer’s impactful, self-directed quality initiative.

Coffee as a staining agent substitute in electron microscopy

Key Points

• Espresso delivered contrast comparable to or better than uranyl acetate in EM tests.
• Controlled comparisons used ultra-thin mitochondrial sections and image analysis software.
• Further tissue-type studies are needed to validate broad applicability.

What I learned building an opinionated and minimal coding agent

Key Points

• Context engineering and transparency are prioritized over feature-rich harnesses.
• Self-hosting is hampered by SDK/tool-calling issues in common libraries.
• The author built a modular, minimal coding agent stack (“pi”) with multi-provider support.

Netbird a German Tailscale alternative (P2P WireGuard-based overlay network)

Key Points

• WireGuard-based P2P overlay powers NetBird’s modern VPN alternative.
• Features include least‑privilege access, posture checks, MFA, SSO, and OpenID integration.
• Customer testimonials (Select Tech Group, Axiros, netgo) report simplified, Zero Trust–aligned deployments.

Reliable 25 Gigabit Ethernet via Thunderbolt

Key Points

• Bus‑powered, silent Thunderbolt‑to‑25GbE adapter achieves ~20–25 Gbit/s but runs extremely hot.
• Stability issues observed on macOS; Apple says crashes were not security‑related.
• Teardown shows Mellanox OCP 2.0 NIC plus Thunderbolt 3 bridge with suboptimal thermal design.

Pre-Steal This Book

Key Points

• Harry Harrison abandoned a novel with a premise similar to Michael Crichton’s The Andromeda Strain.
• The author once led a computer adventure game line with major authors’ participation.
• The post advocates anticipating and executing on emerging ideas faster and bolder rather than seeking extreme novelty.

VisualJJ – Jujutsu in Visual Studio Code

Key Points

• Provides an interactive change tree inside Visual Studio Code.
• Builds on top of both Jujutsu (jj) and Git for version control.
• Emphasizes safe history editing and developer flow.

How to Scale a System from 0 to 10M+ Users

Key Points

• Start simple and scale as bottlenecks appear.
• Stage 1: single-server architecture with common frameworks, a relational DB, and background jobs.
• Watch for clear thresholds (resource usage, performance, downtime) to decide when to evolve.

Amiga Unix (Amix)

Key Points

• Authentic but obsolete AT&T SVR4 port by Commodore
• Unmaintained, difficult to install, and insecure if networked
• Best suited for historical learning; use emulation like WinUAE

FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

Key Points

• FOSDEM 2026 spotlighted digital sovereignty and self-hosted, community-led systems.
• Highlighted talks included Rust-VMM, DN42/FlipFlap, SmolBSD, and Garage S3 Best Practices.
• BoxyBSD boosted accessibility by offering free invite codes for hands-on BSD learning.

MicroPythonOS graphical operating system delivers Android-like user experience

Key Points

• MicroPythonOS delivers an Android-like GUI for microcontrollers, built in MicroPython with LVGL.
• Runs on ESP32 and other MicroPython-supported platforms; cross-platform on Windows, Linux, macOS.
• Includes pre-installed apps and an AppStore; supports OTA updates and common hardware interfaces.

Adventure Game Studio: OSS software for creating adventure games

Key Points

• AGS is a free, open-source, standalone tool for point-and-click adventure game development.
• The Windows-based IDE integrates graphics import, scripting, and testing in one environment.
• AGS games run on Linux, iOS, and Android, with community support and a website for showcasing.

Show HN: Zuckerman – minimalist personal AI agent that self-edits its own code

Key Points

• Self-editing, hot-reloading AI agent focused on minimalism and approachability.
• Collaborative ecosystem for sharing capabilities and feature versioning.
• Three-layer architecture (World, Agents, Interfaces) with plain-text configuration and quick start via GitHub and pnpm.

Anciente map of Fairyland. Places from nursery rhymes, fairy tales etc.

Key Points

• 1917 map by Bernard Sleigh published by Sidgwick & Jackson; decorative literary map with 16-page guide.
• Adapted into fabric by Rosebank Fabrics after 1937; led to further commissioned designs.
• Held at Boston Public Library’s Norman B. Leventhal Map & Education Center; exhibited in 2015 and 2016–2017.

US, UK, EU, Australia and more to meet to discuss critical minerals alliance

Key Points

• ~20-country summit in Washington to build a critical minerals alliance and de-risk from China.
• Australia launches A$1.2bn mineral reserve; debate over US minimum price guarantees.
• EU to push the US to drop steel derivative tariffs amid ongoing trade tensions.

English professors double down on requiring printed copies of readings

Key Points

• Yale English professors are mandating more printed readings and restricting devices due to AI and distraction concerns.
• TYCO Print course packet offerings have increased, with costs ranging from about $20 to over $150.
• Accessibility exceptions and Yale printing support programs accompany stricter no-tech policies.

Pancreatic cancer researchers' latest breakthrough could help tumors disappear

Key Points

• Spanish researchers propose a new therapy protocol that could help pancreatic tumors disappear, per the article.
• Over 60% of pancreatic cancer cases are diagnosed at Stage 4, and tumors often resist chemotherapy.
• Current mutation-targeting drugs show initial effects but typically lose efficacy within months due to resistance.

Real engineering failures instead of success stories

Key Points

• Silent scope growth undermined project focus and outcomes.
• An explicit, measurable Definition of Done prevents misalignment and rework.
• Frequent demos and incremental delivery enable early feedback and course correction.

Common Lisp Extension for Zed

Key Points

• Integrated LSP and Jupyter kernel support with a shared Master REPL
• Type-aware, package-aware completion and hover documentation
• Simple installation with SBCL/Quicklisp prerequisites and optional Jupyter/ZeroMQ

Show HN: Voiden – an offline, Git-native API tool built around Markdown

Key Points

• Offline-first, Git-native API client with Markdown-centric workflows; Version 1.1.0 available.
• Supports Windows, macOS (Intel/Apple Silicon), and Linux; beta builds provided.
• Open source with docs, clear project structure (Electron/React), and Apache 2.0 license.

Aging muscle stem cells shift from rapid repair to long-term survival

Key Points

• NDRG1 rises with age in muscle stem cells, suppressing mTOR and slowing repair.
• Blocking NDRG1 in old mice restores youthful activation but reduces long-term stem cell survival.
• Results indicate aging involves trade-offs between immediate regenerative capacity and durability.

NCR Tower 1632 – Computer Ads from the Past

Key Points

• Tower 1632: 1982 Motorola 68000-based, UNIX III-derived, multiuser system priced under $12,500.
• Designed for OEMs; 29-inch under-desk cabinet; supported up to 16 users with Winchester disks.
• NCR reorganized in 1983 to target large enterprises, decentralizing decisions to plant managers.

Clearspace (YC W23) Is Hiring an Applied Researcher (ML)

Key Points

• Hiring for an ML role to build a production network traffic classification model.
• Emphasis on data-centric ML, from data volume to featurization and inference constraints.
• Onsite role in San Francisco with close collaboration with founders.

Show HN: ÆTHRA – Writing Music as Code

Key Points

• ÆTHRA composes music via a text-based DSL that encodes musical intent.
• It outputs WAV audio using a C# (.NET) interpreter and supports core musical constructs.
• The project is open-source (v0.8), not a DAW or MIDI-focused, and seeks community feedback.

Light exposure and aspects of cognitive function in everyday life

Key Points

• Brighter, less fragmented daytime light correlates with improved vigilance, working memory, and visual search.
• Recent light exposure is linked to subjective sleepiness and reaction times in daily tasks.
• Earlier bedtimes and higher daytime light strengthen light–sleepiness relationships.

I taught my neighbor to keep the volume down

Key Points

• RF remote convenience can lead to interference when neighboring devices share frequencies.
• Disabling RF control on the set-top box resolved unsolicited channel and volume changes.
• IR remotes, though requiring line-of-sight, avoided the interference issues experienced.

Towards a science of scaling agent systems: When and why agent systems work

Key Points

• Multi-agent helps parallelizable tasks but can hinder sequential workflows.
• A predictive model selects optimal architectures for 87% of unseen tasks.
• Five agent architectures were tested across four benchmarks and three model families.

The philosophy behind ODF: openness, freedom and control – TDF Community Blog

Key Points

• ODF is an open, transparently governed standard ensuring long-term document accessibility.
• Multiple applications support ODF, enabling user choice and interoperability.
• Open governance prevents unilateral vendor changes, enhancing user control over data.

Efficient String Compression for Modern Database Systems

Key Points

• Compression in databases primarily targets performance, not just storage savings.
• CedarDB supports Uncompressed, Single Value, and Dictionary schemes for strings.
• Dictionary compression with stored offsets enables fast random access to string values.

TIL: Apple Broke Time Machine Again on Tahoe

Key Points

• macOS Tahoe’s stricter SMB defaults caused Time Machine to stop backing up silently to a Synology NAS.
• Editing /etc/nsmb.conf and adjusting Synology DSM SMB settings restored backup functionality.
• An alternative setup using mbentley/timemachine on Docker (Proxmox + ZFS) is being tested for robustness.

A Crisis comes to Wordle: Reusing old words

Key Points

• NYT will reintroduce previously used Wordle answers starting February 2.
• Filtered analysis identifies 5,437 common five-letter words suitable for Wordle.
• This pool could support nearly 15 years of unique daily puzzles.

'Right-to-Compute' Laws May Be Coming to Your State This Year

Key Points

• Montana enacted the first right-to-compute law in April 2025.
• Bills are statutory, aiming for heightened judicial scrutiny of AI regulation.
• ALEC model legislation is backing similar efforts in other states.

Typechecking is undecidable when 'type' is a type (1989) [pdf]

Key Points

• Dependent types (Π-types) are formalized and contrasted with ordinary function types.
• Including ‘Type’ as a type of all types leads, via Girard’s paradox, to undecidable typechecking.
• The report uses concrete examples to motivate value-dependent type specifications and type constructors.

Oregon gave homeless youth $1k/month with no strings. Here's what happened

Key Points

• 94% of participants reported being housed by program end.
• $1,000/month plus a $3,000 enrichment fund supported housing and stability.
• Second cohort expanded to Jackson County with added public and philanthropic funding.

1-Click RCE to steal your Moltbot data and keys

Key Points

• A crafted URL can force OpenClaw to connect to an attacker gateway and leak the auth token.
• The initial exploit allows account takeover and data access; limitations include no localhost reach and no RCE.
• The author claims a chained method achieves 1-click RCE, starting with bypassing localhost restrictions.

Apple's Q4 2025 margin on Services was 76.5%

Key Points

• Q1 gross margin: 48.2%, above guidance and up sequentially.
• Services margin: 76.5%; Product margin: 40.7%, both up sequentially.
• Next quarter gross margin guidance: 48–49%, with supply constraints on advanced SoC nodes accounted for.

Good if make prior after data instead of before

Key Points

• Demonstrates Bayesian updating with a concrete example yielding a 1/3 posterior probability.
• Shows both odds-based reasoning and Bayes’ equation for the same result.
• Argues that adjusting priors post-data can be appropriate when the hypothesis space emerges from the data.

Iran summons families of exiled journalists to halt their activities

Key Points

• Iranian intelligence bodies summoned and threatened families of exiled journalists and activists, per Dadban.
• Araghchi said Iran is ready for either a US deal ensuring no nuclear weapons or for conflict.
• IRIB removed Ofogh TV’s director after a controversial segment mocking protest victims.

MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

Key Points

• Year-long aerobic exercise (~150 minutes/week) reduced MRI-estimated brain age by ~0.6 years.
• Control group showed a slight, non-significant increase in brain-PAD (~0.35 years).
• Measured mediators (fitness, blood pressure, body composition, BDNF) did not explain the brain age change.

Defeating a 40-year-old copy protection dongle

Key Points

• The system’s RPG toolchain requires a parallel-port hardware dongle to run and compile.
• Disk imaging and emulation exposed the RPG II compiler, source code, and protection behavior.
• Compiler-injected runtime checks propagate dongle enforcement to all generated executables.

Kiki – The accountability monster for people who are easily distracted

Key Points

• Users select only essential apps and websites for a task.
• Kiki blocks all non-essential apps and sites to reduce distractions.
• The service claims users can reclaim up to two hours per day.

My thousand dollar iPhone can't do math

Key Points

• Apple Intelligence failed to enable/download, returning “unknown” classifications.
• MLX local LLMs produced gibberish on iPhone 16 Pro Max but worked on iPhone 15 Pro and MacBook Pro.
• Tensor outputs on the iPhone 16 Pro Max were numerically incorrect by about an order of magnitude.

Founding Is a Snowball

Key Points

• Momentum transforms small beginnings into compounding progress.
• Alignment and coordination determine whether added hands accelerate or hinder growth.
• External conditions and uncertainty require ongoing judgment about when to persist or change course.

Show HN: NanoClaw – "Clawdbot" in 500 lines of TS with Apple container isolation

Key Points

• Runs agents in Apple-managed Linux containers for OS-level isolation.
• Claude Code handles setup, dependencies, auth, and configuration.
• Provides WhatsApp I/O, per-group isolation, scheduled tasks, and web access; integrations via skills like /add-gmail.

A Collection of Awesome Nostr Projects

Key Points

• Nostr is an open, relay-based protocol for censorship-resistant communication, with both self-hosted and public relays available.
• The ecosystem includes multiple user clients on iOS, Android, and web, alongside tools like Zapstore, Hivetalk, NostrHub, and NosTracker.
• There is a large variety of Nostr relay implementations and frameworks, built in many programming languages and targeting different performance and use-case needs.

Building Your Own Efficient uint128 in C++

Key Points

• u128 is built from two 64-bit limbs with arithmetic via x64 intrinsics mapping to adc/sbb.
• Codegen matches builtin __uint128_t for add/sub/mul/compare on Clang/GCC (MSVC noted).
• Fixed-width arithmetic is favored for known bounds; patterns scale to wider widths.

Troublemaker: The fierce, unruly life of Jessica Mitford

Key Points

• Troublemaker is billed as the first scholarly biography of Jessica Mitford.
• Kaplan’s research included interviews and a 2008 meeting with Deborah Cavendish.
• The article contrasts public perceptions of Jessica and highlights her empathy.

We (As a Society) Peaked in the 90s

Key Points

• The author claims the late 1990s offered a healthier balance between tech and daily life.
• Digital tools augmented creative work, with slower cultural cycles adding weight to releases.
• Privacy and simpler device ownership are highlighted as core advantages of that era.

Treasures found on HS2 route stored in secret warehouse

Key Points

• About 450,000 artifacts from HS2 excavations are stored in a secure Yorkshire warehouse.
• Finds span over 10,000 years, including notable Roman and Palaeolithic items.
• HS2 leadership acknowledges delivery issues amid ongoing debate over the project.

From its name, to its hazy origins, to its drug interactions, there's a lot goin

Key Points

• Grapefruit can markedly affect drug bioavailability, as shown in 1989 research confirmed by follow-up tests.
• Grapefruit is a hybrid of pomelo and sweet orange, rooted in citrus ancestry from Asia.
• Grapefruit likely originated in Barbados via natural hybridization amid casual citrus planting in the West Indies.

Time Machine-style Backups with rsync (2018)

Key Points

• rsync with --link-dest creates storage-efficient incremental snapshots.
• A 'current' symlink tracks the latest successful backup.
• Backups are automated via a daily cron job with logging and failure handling.

Two kinds of AI users are emerging. The gap between them is astonishing

Key Points

• Two AI user cohorts are emerging: power users with coding/agent tools and chat-only users.
• Microsoft Copilot dominates in enterprises but is portrayed as underperforming versus CLI agents; the article claims Microsoft is testing Claude Code internally.
• Enterprise IT constraints (locked-down systems, no APIs, siloed engineering) hinder safe and effective AI agent adoption.

Show HN: Wikipedia as a doomscrollable social media feed

Key Points

• Local, non-ML algorithm personalizes a feed from Simple Wikipedia content.
• No external data collection; interaction data is ephemeral and cleared on refresh/close.
• Open-source project with code on GitHub and discussion links on major social platforms.

History and Timeline of the Proco Rat Pedal (2021)

Key Points

• ProCo Sound formed in 1974 after the Sound Factory’s closure, initially partnering with JBL on speaker cabinets.
• The RAT was designed by Scott Burnham; earliest “Bud Box” units date to 1977–78 using Bud Industries enclosures.
• Only twelve circuits were built into eleven early pedals, including one double-RAT, making them highly rare.

Actors: A Model of Concurrent Computation [pdf]

Key Points

• Actors enable scalable concurrency via asynchronous messaging, pipelining, and dynamic creation.
• The report defines an abstract actor machine, a minimal language, and higher-level evaluation constructs.
• Formal semantics use possibility and subsequent transitions to model nondeterminism and fairness.

Notepad++ hijacked by state-sponsored actors

Key Points

• Hosting provider infrastructure was compromised, enabling selective redirection of Notepad++ update traffic.
• Attackers lost direct server access on September 2, 2025, but used retained credentials until December 2, 2025.
• Provider fixed vulnerabilities, rotated credentials, and reported no ongoing malicious patterns after December 2, 2025.

In the Lab – Soldering Prototypes with Enamel Magnet Wire

Key Points

• Six-step method to strip and solder enamel magnet wire to PCB pads.
• Switch to 0603 SMD resistors for prototypes due to compact fit and handling.
• Tool setup includes 26 AWG magnet wire and an inexpensive hot-air station.

Ian's Shoelace Site

Key Points

• Human-authored shoelace resource with 100+ tutorials, 2,700+ photos, and 25 knots including the Ian Knot.
• Interactive tools and search: Create-a-Lace and Google Custom Search across 300+ pages.
• Recent updates: PUMA “Equality Knot” video, interview addition, Lug Woven Lacing; last updated 01-Feb-2026.

Show HN: Sandbox Agent SDK – unified API for automating coding agents

Key Points

• Unified API supports multiple coding agents with a universal session schema.
• Operates as a Rust server or TypeScript SDK with HTTP + SSE and Inspector UI.
• Compatibility and feature matrix outlines stable vs. experimental agents and capabilities.

ICE protester says her Global Entry was revoked after agent scanned her face

Key Points

• Agent reportedly identified Cleland via facial recognition and issued a verbal warning.
• Cleland’s Global Entry and TSA PreCheck were revoked three days after the incident.
• Her declaration supports a lawsuit against DHS and ICE officials in federal court.

Contracts in Nix

Key Points

• Runtime “contracts” add type-like validation to Nix code.
• Contracts integrate with nixpkgs options via mkOptionType.
• Now compatible with yants for broader ecosystem support.

Building a Telegram Bot with Cloudflare Workers, Durable Objects and Grammy

Key Points

• Deploy on Cloudflare Workers and use Durable Objects for per-user storage.
• Set the Telegram webhook and call bot.handleUpdate(update) to process updates in serverless.
• Register commands dynamically via bot.api.setMyCommands before handling updates.

Apple's MacBook Pro DFU port documentation is wrong

Key Points

• Observed DFU port behavior on a 16-inch M4 Pro MacBook Pro conflicts with Apple’s documentation.
• External macOS updates failed until both security policy (LocalPolicy) was fixed and a different USB-C port was used.
• Standard update tools (Software Update and softwareupdate) provided no actionable errors during failures.

Stop Using Pseudo-Types

Key Points

• Callable is a runtime-validated union of Closure, string, and array (introduced in PHP 5.4).
• Certain constructs are not callable; exit()/die() are callable from PHP 8.4.
• Iterable is a union type Traversable|array from PHP 8.2, no longer a pseudo-type.