February 8, 2026
Terminal beats, existential feats
Ask HN: What are you working on? (February 2026)
HN’s talent show: Terminal beats, AI time cops, and a crisis of focus
TLDR: A free terminal-based sampler for making beats stole the spotlight, while the thread erupted over AI tools: one dev pushed for real code review of AI-generated work, and an AI time tracker using screenshots sparked privacy jokes. It’s creative chaos with real debates on how we build and live.
Ask HN just turned into a mixtape of side‑hustles and existential vibes. One dev dropped a free, mouse‑less beat machine in the terminal — a sampler that mashes vintage hardware magic with modern software swagger — and the crowd cheered the “hardware feel, software power” vibe. The sampler sparked jokes about a “terminal rave” and a “DJ who pipes beats with grep,” with fans loving the tactile, no‑mouse workflow and others playfully asking if the next collab is with CTRL+C.
Then the mood swung hard to code therapy: ebhn argued that tools for AI‑written code shouldn’t auto‑rubber‑stamp reviews, they should help humans inspect and track tech debt. That hot take lit up the room — half nodding “finally, adult supervision for our bots,” half sighing “we invented AI so we could do less work, not more.”
Privacy alarm bells rang when christoph123 pitched an AI time tracker that “reconstructs your day” via screenshots but “never stores them.” Commenters turned that line into a meme, dunking on the idea of productivity surveillance with a “trust me, bro” energy. Meanwhile, junaid_97 won wholesome points with a free immigration form‑filling app that dodges cursed PDFs, and zahlman’s bare‑honest “Myself, mostly” became the thread’s therapy hashtag. It’s chaos, it’s creative, it’s peak HN.
Key Points
- •A free terminal-based sampler consolidates features from classic samplers, DAWs, plugins, outboard FX, and DJ gear.
- •The project began in Costa Rica as a tool for organizing samples and quickly evolved into a beatmaking environment.
- •It is live for macOS and Linux, with Windows support planned.
- •A v1.0 release is imminent, with community collaboration on Factory Kits for new users.
- •The no-mouse terminal interface aims to combine hardware feel with software flexibility; outreach plans include collaborations, contests, and events.