Sleep Masks Spy, AI Hype Dies!

Ask HN: Are there examples of 3D printing data onto physical surfaces?

Key Points

• Concept: encode small data onto 3D-printed surfaces and read via bed-leveling sensors.
• Seeking: prior implementations and advanced methods using specialized equipment.
• Use cases: long-term archival and physical-only encryption key storage, with acknowledged practicality concerns.

Marginal Revolution

Key Points

• Marginal valuation replaced labor-cost value theory in the 1870s.
• Marshall’s toolkit operationalized modern microeconomics.
• Ignoring marginal analysis leads to errors in policy and production debates.

Babylon 5 is now free to watch on YouTube

Key Points

• Babylon 5 episodes are being uploaded weekly to YouTube for free as the series exits Tubi after February 10, 2026.
• The release begins with “The Gathering” and proceeds in broadcast order, hosted on a Warner Bros.-affiliated channel with purchase links.
• The move reflects a broader trend of using free platforms and hybrid models to revitalize legacy titles, with premium options like Max.

Cogram (YC W22) – Hiring former technical founders

Key Points

• Hiring former technical founders for remote roles (CET ±3) to build and ship AI-driven AEC workflows.
• Required experience: founding background, 3+ years production software, backend/frontend strength, AI tool proficiency.
• Stack and bonuses: Python/FastAPI, React/TypeScript, Postgres/Redis, React Native/Expo, Terraform/Kubernetes on AWS/Azure; LLM experience valued.

Do Not Outsource Judgement

Key Points

• Committing code implies full accountability regardless of its origin, including AI-generated code.
• AI heightens the need for diligence because plausible outputs can mask subtle errors.
• Over-trust in AI and skipped reviews turn productivity tools into liability multipliers.

The Three Year Myth

Key Points

• The “Three Year Myth” describes deferred promises of promotions or changes over a 2–3 year horizon.
• Organizations may delay change to maintain stability, citing commitments and stakeholder pressures.
• A FinOps initiative was rejected in a prior role, illustrating resistance to operational change.

How the Little Guy Moved

Key Points

• Mechner used rotoscoping to achieve fluid animation in Karateka and Prince of Persia on the Apple II.
• Hardware limits (48K memory, low fps) drove an animation-first design approach that still felt lifelike.
• The technique’s roots in Disney-era film animation informed the method of tracing and refining live-action frames.

Zig – io_uring and Grand Central Dispatch std.Io implementations landed

Key Points

• io_uring and GCD evented I/O backends landed on Zig main for std.Io.Evented.
• Features are experimental with defined follow-ups (error handling, performance, tests, missing functions, stack-size builtin).
• Examples show easy swapping between std.Io.Threaded and std.Io.Evented backends.

The World of Harmonics – With a Coffee, Guitar and Synth

Key Points

• Video connects kitchen sounds and musical instruments to explain harmonics.
• Interactive scripts: “Discovering the Harmonic Series” and “Additive Synthesis from Harmonics.”
• Focus on hands-on exploration of sound structure and synthesis.

YouTube as Storage

Key Points

• Encodes/decodes files as lossless FFV1/MKV video for storage on YouTube.
• Uses Wirehair fountain codes for redundancy and optional XChaCha20‑Poly1305 encryption via libsodium.
• Cross-platform with CLI and GUI, CI/CD artifacts available, and GPLv3-licensed.

Can you rewire your brain?

Key Points

• ‘Rewiring’ is an engineering metaphor that can oversimplify neuroplasticity.
• Historical analogies and modern imaging helped popularize the metaphor.
• Brain connectivity is dynamic and evolving, not fixed like electrical wiring.

The Sling: Humanity's Forgotten Power

Key Points

• The sling’s simple design delivers long-range, high-speed projectile capability through user skill.
• Historical accounts note the sling’s advantages over the bow in range and rate of fire.
• Slinging.org seeks to be the definitive resource and community hub for sling enthusiasts.

4chan for Clankers

Key Points

• 4claw provides onboarding instructions via 4claw.org/skill.md for humans to register AI agents.
• The platform is organized into multiple boards with post counts, covering AI, politics, jobs, crypto, and more.
• A gallery of newest images and sample thread titles illustrates current activity across boards.

The mathematics of compression in database systems

Key Points

• Compression helps latency when Tc + Td < (S − Sc)/Bx, with breakeven bandwidth β guiding decisions.
• Measured zstd breakeven points: 328 MiB/s (level 4) and 76 MiB/s (level 10) on a 191 MiB dataset.
• On r5d.xlarge: network bandwidth favors level 4 for latency; high NVMe bandwidth limits benefits for local disk.

Code Storage by the Pierre Computer Company

Key Points

• API-first Git infrastructure enabling programmatic repo creation and management
• Ultra low-latency Git cloud with traditional and novel features (ephemeral branches, in-memory writes, cold storage, grep)
• Designed for high-scale AI workloads with sub-second read/write performance and public uptime metrics

How many registers does an x86-64 CPU have? (2020)

Key Points

• Subregisters are counted distinctly; microarchitectural details are excluded.
• GPRs (including subregisters) total 68 under the defined rules.
• MSRs are counted selectively; double-counting across access mechanisms is avoided.

Show HN: Sameshi – a ~1200 Elo chess engine that fits within 2KB

Key Points

• 1.95 KB single-header chess engine with constrained rules and full legality checks.
• Uses 120-cell mailbox board, negamax + alpha–beta, material-only eval, capture-first ordering.
• ~1170 Elo estimated from 240 games vs Stockfish (levels 1320–1600) at fixed depth 5.

Russia killed opposition leader Alexei Navalny using dart frog toxin, UK says

Key Points

• UK says epibatidine was found in Navalny’s body and was used to kill him.
• Allies Sweden, France, the Netherlands and Germany support the UK’s accusation against Russia.
• The UK notified the OPCW of an alleged Chemical Weapons Convention breach.

What color are your bits? (2004)

Key Points

• Generative AI training and copyright are framed via fair use.
• Scarcity vs. abundance is used to analyze institutional and IP dynamics.
• Paranoia’s color-clearance system serves as a metaphor for IP access and control.

Shades of Halftone

Key Points

• Explains halftone’s perceptual basis and print origins, then maps it to shader implementation.
• Shows step-by-step GLSL construction: circle drawing, masking softness, and grid tiling with fract.
• Covers creative variants and applications across images, videos, and interactive 3D scenes.

Epstein's Ugly World of Science

Key Points

• Epstein’s network included prominent scientists and academics, with ties continuing after his 2008 conviction.
• Joichi Ito resigned from MIT Media Lab in 2019 for concealing Epstein-related funding.
• John Brockman’s Edge Foundation promoted a “Third Culture” and is described as being largely funded by Epstein.

My smart sleep mask broadcasts users' brainwaves to an open MQTT broker

Key Points

• Reverse engineering revealed hardcoded MQTT credentials and full command protocol for the device.
• Shared broker credentials exposed live EEG and enabled remote EMS control across about 25 devices.
• Tools like strings and blutter enabled analysis of a Flutter-compiled app’s binary.

Switzerland to Vote on Capping Population at 10M

Key Points

• June 14 referendum seeks to cap Switzerland’s population at 10 million until 2050 by limiting immigration.
• Supporters propose tighter residency rules after 9.5 million and revising E.U. free movement agreements.
• Government and Parliament oppose; Federal Council warns of broad consequences for international agreements.

Sound and Practical Points-To Analysis for Incomplete C Programs [pdf]

Key Points

• Implicit pointee tracking enables up to 15× faster constraint solving.
• PIP adds a further 1.9× speedup by preferring implicit over explicit pointees.
• Alias precision improves, reducing MayAlias by 40% versus LLVM BasicAA.

A Review of M Disc Archival Capability. With long term testing results

Key Points

• M-DISC claims long archival lifespan with a glassy carbon data layer.
• DoD-based tests per ECMA-379 reported M-DISC durability advantages.
• Independent French lab found no lifetime improvement under specific conditions.

7zip.com Is Serving Malware

Key Points

• 7zip.com distributed a signed, trojanized 7‑Zip installer that installs a residential proxy payload.
• Persistence is achieved via System‑level Windows services and firewall rule manipulation using netsh.
• An independent update channel at update.7zip.com enables ongoing payload updates.

Stoat removes all LLM-generated code following user criticism

Key Points

• Stoat currently has no generative AI in use and reverted prior LLM-generated code.
• A single labeled Claude-generated commit was previously present and is now removed.
• The maintainer invites community review and commits to not using LLMs for core components.

Ask HN: How to get started with robotics as a hobbyist?

Key Points

• Author seeks hands-on robotics guidance beyond pure coding.
• Has basic embedded programming knowledge and wants to refresh physics.
• No set goal yet; exploring and asking where to start and what to learn.

Audiophiles Can't Distinguish Audio Sent Through Copper, Banana or Mud

Key Points

• Listeners achieved 6 correct identifications out of 43 (13.95% accuracy).
• Binomial analysis showed a 6.12% chance consistent with random guessing.
• Conclusion: no reliable audible difference between original and re-recorded paths through unconventional materials.

Amsterdam Compiler Kit

Key Points

• Supports ANSI C, Pascal, Modula-2, and Basic with multi-architecture targets.
• Builds on Linux, OS X, and Windows (MSYS2/mingw32) with standard tool dependencies.
• Primary usage via the ‘ack’ command with platform selection and optimization options.

Show HN: Arcmark – macOS bookmark manager that attaches to browser as sidebar

Key Points

• Native macOS bookmark manager that attaches as a browser sidebar or runs standalone.
• Local-first storage in a single JSON file, with Arc import to replicate existing structures.
• macOS 13+ required; accessibility permissions needed for sidebar attachment; open-source with build scripts.

Fun with Algebraic Effects – From Toy Examples to Hardcaml Simulations

Key Points

• Port of Hardcaml_step_testbench from monads to OCaml 5 algebraic effects.
• Effects used via the Handled_effect (Oxcaml_effect) library for cleaner, more readable code.
• Monads (e.g., Async’s Deferred.t) are shown to add syntactic overhead compared to effects.

A header-only C vector database library

Key Points

• Single-file, header-only C library with optional pthread-based multithreading.
• Supports cosine, Euclidean, and negative dot product metrics for k-NN search.
• Includes disk persistence (binary format) and Python bindings, with metadata excluded from saves.

Internet Increasingly Becoming Unarchivable

Key Points

• The Guardian curtailed Internet Archive access by blocking APIs and filtering article pages from the Wayback Machine.
• The Financial Times blocks bots scraping paywalled content, including AI firms and the Internet Archive.
• The New York Times is hard blocking Internet Archive crawlers and disallowed archive.org_bot via robots.txt.

Dr. Oz pushes AI avatars as a fix for rural health care

Key Points

• Oz proposes AI avatars and related tools to expand rural health care capacity.
• The proposals are part of a $50B federal plan for rural health modernization.
• Technologies include digital interview avatars, remote diagnostic robotics, and medication-delivery drones.

uBlock filter list to hide all YouTube Shorts

Key Points

• Import the raw filter list URL into uBlock Origin to hide YouTube Shorts.
• An optional filter list hides YouTube comments; both require manual import.
• The project is actively maintained by i5heu and is not affiliated with Alphabet, Google, or YouTube.

Gamma Function: Visualization for Complex Arguments

Key Points

• Visualizes real and imaginary parts of Γ(x + i·c) as c sweeps through positive and negative values.
• Powered by vanilla_gamma(), a JavaScript function available under CC0 on zeta-calculator.com.
• Negative c sweep mirrors Im(Γ) across the x-axis while Re(Γ) remains unchanged.

Windows NT/OS2 Design Workbook

Key Points

• Directory of NT/OS2 design documents in paired .doc and .pdf formats
• Coverage spans I/O, VM, IPC (LPC, mailslots, named pipes), and file systems (FSRTL, design)
• Uniform 2022-05-27 timestamps and varied file sizes across documents

Gemini 3 Deep Think drew me a good SVG of a pelican riding a bicycle

Key Points

• Google introduces “Gemini 3 Deep Think.”
• The model produced a strong SVG of a pelican riding a bicycle.
• The author compares it favorably to prior collected results.

You can't trust the internet anymore

Key Points

• Fukkokuban is the original Master System Phantasy Star in a Genesis cartridge, released in Japan in 1994.
• Some Genesis consoles can’t play it because they don’t support Master System games.
• A widely surfaced article falsely claimed enhanced graphics and features; the author rebuts these points.

US Military preparing for potentially weeks-long Iran operations

Key Points

• U.S. military preparing for potentially weeks-long operations against Iran, pending Trump’s order.
• Geneva talks planned between U.S. and Iranian representatives, with Oman mediating.
• Pentagon sends additional carrier and forces to Middle East as Trump signals preference for air/naval options.

Dune II written in HTML5/JS

Key Points

• Playable in-browser at dune2js.com with desktop and mobile support.
• Local setup via Node.js and npm with access at localhost:8080.
• URL ‘profile’ parameter controls auto-save behavior.

Safe YOLO Mode: Running LLM agents in vms with Libvirt and Virsh

Key Points

• Libvirt/virsh provide production-grade VM isolation for LLM agents on Linux.
• Ubuntu cloud images and cloud-init enable fast, scriptable VM provisioning.
• Libvirt vs Lima: server-focused maturity vs desktop convenience, with trade-offs in sharing, networking, and snapshots.

OpenAI should build Slack

Key Points

• Proposal for OpenAI to build a Slack-like enterprise collaboration platform.
• Slack’s trajectory and perceived shortcomings create an opening for a new AI-first tool.
• Anthropic’s unified app strategy is contrasted with OpenAI’s fragmented approach, motivating a unified solution.

How often do full-body MRIs find cancer?

Key Points

• Whole-body MRI yields many findings but relatively few cancers in asymptomatic people.
• Experts cite limited long-term evidence and risks of overdiagnosis; scans are costly and often uninsured.
• Some companies combine MRI with blood tests to contextualize results and reduce unnecessary follow-ups.

Launching Interop 2026

Key Points

• Interop 2026 launches with the same test-driven, cross-vendor approach.
• 2025 raised the overall Interop score from 25 to 95 across four browsers.
• Key features reached cross-browser availability and reliability improved for core technologies.

IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

Key Points

• IBM will triple entry-level hiring and rework roles for AI fluency and higher-value tasks.
• Cutting junior roles risks future mid-level shortages; HR leaders should build the case for early-career hiring.
• Despite layoffs tied to an AI/software pivot, IBM expects U.S. headcount to remain roughly flat with new graduate hires.

Show HN: Bubble sort on a Turing machine

Key Points

• Two YAML Turing machines (decimal and unary) implement bubble sort and run on turingmachine.io and a Python emulator.
• Decimal version uses 25 states; unary version uses 31 states with marking-based comparison and swapping.
• Project includes make targets, Python 3.10+ with PyYAML, and a 135-test suite using unittest.

Show HN: Rover – Embeddable web agent

Key Points

• Rufus metrics are cited to demonstrate AI agent impact on conversions and sales.
• DIY and traditional chatbot approaches are portrayed as costly or reactive compared to on-site agents.
• Rover is proposed as a DOM-native, one-script solution for on-site conversational workflows.

Unicorn Jelly

Key Points

• Complete Unicorn Jelly archive (2000–2003) with a definitive story is available online.
• Side story “To Save Her” explores alternate universes within Tryslmaistan, with a dedicated AU archive.
• Site includes encyclopedias, D&D-style background stats, an animated cosmic map by Chris Leeson, and numerous downloads/extras.

Colored Petri Nets, LLMs, and distributed applications

Key Points

• CPNs add data-carrying tokens to Petri nets, enhancing concurrency modeling.
• Guards and multi-token transitions enable precise coordination and correctness.
• Rust’s typestate pattern aligns with CPN semantics for potential implementation.

Discord: A case study in performance optimization

Key Points

• Discord’s architecture is framed around the Actor Model to achieve real-time performance at large scale.
• The Actor Model’s four rules provide safe concurrency without locks, reducing race conditions and deadlocks.
• Modern examples (video editing, Robinhood transactions, AI agents) illustrate how actor principles apply in practice.

15× vs. ~1.37×: Recalculating GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark on SWE-Bench Pro

Key Points

• At matched accuracy, Spark’s effective speedup over Codex is ~1.37×, not 15×.
• The 15× figure results from comparing different reasoning settings (Spark low vs Codex x-high).
• x-high yields minimal accuracy gains (~+1.43%) for large latency costs (~+84%).

Breaking the spell of vibe coding

Key Points

• True flow requires clear feedback and challenge-skill alignment.
• LDW in gambling demonstrates how misleading signals can induce “dark flow.”
• Vibe coding can mirror LDW, masking code quality and maintainability problems.

5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

Key Points

• Predynastic copper-alloy artefact identified as a bow drill, indicating early rotary drilling in Egypt.
• Microwear and leather thong remains support the bow drill interpretation.
• pXRF reveals unusual alloy composition, implying deliberate metallurgy and possible regional links.

Show HN: A reputation index from mitchellh's Vouch trust files

Key Points

• Weights per vouch are ln(stars + 1) + 1; denouncements subtract at 60%.
• Scores aggregate vouches and denouncements across multiple repositories.
• UI supports inspecting vouch sources and displays key reputation metrics.

Zvec: A lightweight, fast, in-process vector database

Key Points

• Open-source, in-process vector database built on Alibaba’s Proxima for low-latency similarity search.
• Supports dense/sparse embeddings, multi-vector queries, and hybrid search with structured filters.
• Simple installation via pip; supports Python 3.10–3.12 on Linux (x86_64) and macOS (ARM64).

Flood Fill vs. The Magic Circle

Key Points

• AI automation is likened to a flood fill that spreads until it meets a boundary.
• Computation’s boundary is framed as 'symbols in, symbols out,' drawing on Turing’s legacy.
• Printers illustrate the challenges when digital systems interface with the physical world.

Show HN: Auto-Layouting ASCII Diagrams

Key Points

• Generates ASCII diagrams from JSON/YAML with nested boxes and arrow connections.
• Auto-layout engine organizes nodes, minimizes crossings, and supports mixed manual positioning.
• CLI and programmatic APIs produce text or SVG, with multiple border styles and optional shadows.

Show HN: MOL – A programming language where pipelines trace themselves

Key Points

• Native |> operator with automatic timing/type tracing for each pipeline stage.
• AI-specific types and built-in RAG operations reduce boilerplate to single-expression pipelines.
• Transpiles to Python and JavaScript with multiple install options (PyPI, Docker, source) and editor/playground support.

Can my SPARC server host a website?

Key Points

• OpenBSD 7.8 on a Sun Netra X1 serves static content via httpd with pf firewall hardening.
• Cloudflare Tunnels provide external access without router port forwarding.
• Legacy hardware was quieted with Noctua fan mods and a custom 3D-printed bracket.

Show HN: Off Grid – Run AI text, image gen, vision offline on your phone

Key Points

• Runs a full AI suite offline on mobile: text, image, vision, voice, documents.
• Supports major model families and GGUF with strong on-device performance.
• Open-source with APK and detailed build docs; tested on flagship chipsets.

Show HN: Open Notes – Community Notes-style context for Discord

Key Points

• Private beta for Discord communities to add context to discussions.
• AI identifies debated claims and early tensions for targeted intervention.
• First scan can be completed in under two minutes.

The Perfect Device

Key Points

• Two Xiaomi Smart Clock variants differ in ecosystem integration and features.
• LineageOS flashing guides and images are available via XDA Developers.
• MTKClient enables flashing on MediaTek devices; its GitHub history was recently wiped.

I love the work of the ArchWiki maintainers

Key Points

• Acknowledgment of ArchWiki maintainers for their critical documentation work
• Personal testimony of ArchWiki’s broad utility beyond Arch Linux
• Encouragement to thank maintainers and donate to Arch

Git with WD-40 Applied

Key Points

• Git is open source (GPLv2) and originally authored by Linus Torvalds.
• Comprehensive documentation and tutorials are available locally and at git-scm.com.
• Community contributions and security reporting follow well-defined mailing list processes.

Connes Embedding Problem

Key Points

• Core question: whether type II1 factors embed into R^ω.
• Multiple equivalent formulations (QWEP, Tsirelson’s problem, trace-class preduals).
• 2020–2022 results imply a negative answer and explain links to MIP*=RE.

MDST Engine: run GGUF models in the browser with WebGPU/WASM

Key Points

• Runs GGUF models locally in-browser via WebGPU/WASM, no cloud required.
• Supports Chrome, Safari, Edge; includes GitHub sync, E2E encryption, and a research leaderboard.
• Provides a benchmarking suite with weighted-scoring leaderboard for comparable, on-device results.

I'm building a clarity-first language (compiles to C++)

Key Points

• Clarity-first design: explicit types, explicit control flow, and result-based error handling.
• Compilation pipeline: .rox → C++20 (.cc) → native executable via clang++.
• v0 constraints: no implicit conversions or exceptions; single loop construct (repeat with range).

Linear Representations and Superposition

Key Points

• LRH formalized with embedding and unembedding spaces that are isomorphic.
• Empirical validation on Llama 2 for tense, plurality, and language transformations.
• Orthogonality arises under a causal inner product, not the Euclidean one.

Guitars of the USSR and the Jolana Special in Azerbaijani Music

Key Points

• Soviet Tonika design was dictated by central planning to be distinct from American models.
• Czechoslovak guitars are portrayed as more playable and preferred by Soviet musicians.
• Remish’s performance showcases techniques (bends, whammy, analog delay, overdrive, slide, tapping) in a long archival video.