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bavarianbob about 21 hours ago

Tell HN: Camelgate NPM Outage (Cloudflare)

EDIT: Back online?!

NPM discussion: https://github.com/npm/cli/issues/8203

NPM incident: https://status.npmjs.org/incidents/hdtkrsqp134s

Cloudflare messaging: https://www.cloudflarestatus.com/incidents/gshczn1wxh74

GitHub issue: https://github.com/sindresorhus/camelcase/issues/114

Anyone experiencing npm outage that's more than just the referenced camelcase package?

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devwithanxiety about 2 hours ago

Ask HN: Struggling with Anxiety as a Developer – What Are My Options?

I'm a senior web developer (10 years), but in the past three years, I’ve struggled with anxiety, and my performance has suffered because of it. I started a new job last year but I was let go due to performance and am now wondering how to move forward.

Councilling has made it clear my job and my personal traits are the root cause of my anxiety. Being conscious of what others think of me and fearing making mistakes doesn't mix well with code reviews, sprints and constant deadlines.

The anxiety causes tight muscles, brain fog, adrenaline rushes, and exhaustion, making me 30% slower. It’s a vicious cycle: more anxiety makes me slower, which then fuels more anxiety.

I'm working on this through counselling, journaling, self-reflection, and meditation, but what do I do now? I need to find a new job, but a fast-moving startup environment will just lead to the same outcome.

I do want meaningful work—I don't want to pick my nose all day. But I need a less demanding environment. All I see on LinkedIn are "fast-moving" startup roles. Are there any slower paced web dev jobs? I'm fine taking a pay cut for the right pace and environment. Taking a mid level job is a possibility but they seem scarce and I'm wary of just eventually being given senior work load.

The only other option is to change career within or outside of software. I have no ideas here, and to be honest, this is rather frightening. I'd be curious to hear what others have done.

If you have any tips on the above, have similar programming-related anxiety issues, and/or have overcome them, please share what you can. It will really help me out.

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david927 3 days ago

Ask HN: What are you working on? (March 2025)

What are you working on? Any new ideas that you're thinking about?

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whoishiring about 22 hours ago

Ask HN: Who is hiring? (April 2025)

Please state the location and include REMOTE for remote work, REMOTE (US) or similar if the country is restricted, and ONSITE when remote work is not an option.

Please only post if you personally are part of the hiring company—no recruiting firms or job boards. One post per company. If it isn't a household name, explain what your company does.

Please only post if you are actively filling a position and are committed to responding to applicants.

Commenters: please don't reply to job posts to complain about something. It's off topic here.

Readers: please only email if you are personally interested in the job.

Searchers: try http://nchelluri.github.io/hnjobs/, https://hnresumetojobs.com, https://hnhired.fly.dev, https://kennytilton.github.io/whoishiring/, https://hnjobs.emilburzo.com, or this (unofficial) Chrome extension: https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/hn-hiring-pro/mpfal....

Don't miss these other fine threads:

Who wants to be hired? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43547609

Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43547610

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LouisLazaris about 17 hours ago

Ask HN: Are Squarespace and Wix sites worth it?

I’ve been involved in web dev in different forms for 20 years, but I’ve never done anything with these types of websites.

My questions are:

* When you register a domain with them, is the domain legally yours?

* Are there any SEO penalties for using these apps to build websites? Does anyone own a website or client site hosted on Squarespace or similar that’s ranking high on Google?

I can see the benefit for developers but I’m wondering about the benefits for clients.

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spacebanana7 about 22 hours ago

Ask HN: Why hasn’t AMD made a viable CUDA alternative?

I appreciate developing ROCm into something competitive with CUDA would require a lot of work, both internally within AMD and with external contributions to the relevant open source libraries.

However the amount of resources at stake is incredible. The delta between NVIDIA's value and AMD's is bigger than the annual GDP of Spain. Even if they needed to hire a few thousand engineers at a few million in comp each, it'd still be a good investment.

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mywittyname 1 day ago

Ask HN: What's the best way to get started with LLM-assisted programing?

Currently, I use Perplexity or ChatGPT via the web prompt for small coding tasks, but sometimes I'll use Ollama. Stuff like writing a shell script perform some task, or maybe a small Python function. I'd like to get to the next level, but I don't know where to start.

What are some good places to get started? What are the tools you use to get work done?

Some background: I mainly do data engineering using Python and Snowflake + MySQL. I use Pycharm as my dev environment, but I'd be open to changing that if there's a better option.

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frabia 1 day ago

When so much knowledge is produced every day, how do you keep up?

Between newsletters, podcasts, Youtube videos, (tech) news, articles, and (of course) books, how does one keep up with it?

I currently try to read long-form content that requires deep focus in the morning before work (30-45 mins depending on my day). Then during the day I have some breaks and read newsletters and other posts. Videos and podcasts are difficult for me to consume, as they are often a bit too padded with small talk and non-essential conversational information, but I sometimes listen to them when I work out or while I cook. I recently started taking notes when I read, I would like to extend this system into rewriting my synthesis in Obsidian or Notion.

However, despite all, I feel my reading list keeps growing and I'm always catching up with what happens in our field, but as if I'm always a few steps behind. There are many more articles and books that would make me better as a professional, but I simply don't have time to go through them. (Not to mention other topics I'd like to learn aside from my work, or simply read for pleasure.)

So my question is: how do you keep up? How do you stay up-to-date in your own profession?

And I mean it both in terms of your approach/methodology (e.g. when do you read and what, how do you retain information, what aids to reading/bookmarking do you use) but also in terms of the mental aspect/wellbeing (how much is "good enough" for you? How do you keep yourself from being overwhelmed? Do you feel energized by reading?).

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wiraashm about 20 hours ago

A Virtual Whiteboard That Has a Thinking Assistant Baked In

What do you guys think about a virtual whiteboard that has a LLM baked in as a thinking assistant providing insights and suggestions based on what your writing and helps you brainstorm? Is able to also modify your writings and add also add more ideas. Is also able to retrieve information and provide insights in combination with what you've already written on the whiteboard.

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billconan about 21 hours ago

Ask HN: Could you help me find an old post?

I remember there was an old but popular post on HN front page about a failed startup project. The project is about distilling biology science. The conclusion was that there is no money in science distillation.

I can't recall any search key word to find it. If you remember its title, please help me.

Thank you!

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vectify_AI about 21 hours ago

RAG Without Vectors – PageIndex: Reasoning-Based Document Indexing

We were frustrated by vector-based RAG systems that rely on semantic similarity and often fail on long, domain-specific documents. In these contexts, domain-specific terminology tends to be semantically similar, making it hard to retrieve the exact content users need. It’s also difficult to incorporate expert knowledge or user preferences effectively. So we started exploring a more reasoning-driven approach to RAG. Inspired by the tree search algorithm in AlphaGo, we came up with a reasoning-based RAG system that uses tree search to guide retrieval.

We open-sourced one of the key components: PageIndex, a hierarchical indexing system that transforms large documents (like financial reports, regulatory documents, or textbooks) into semantic trees optimized for reasoning-based RAG.

Some highlights:

- Hierarchical Structure: Organizes lengthy PDFs into LLM-friendly trees — like a smart table of contents.

- Precise Referencing: Each node includes a summary and exact physical page numbers.

- Natural Segmentation: Nodes align with document sections, preserving context — no arbitrary chunking.

We've used PageIndex for financial document analysis with reasoning-based RAG and saw significant improvements in retrieval accuracy compared to vector-based systems.

Would love any feedback — especially thoughts on reasoning-based RAG, or ideas for where PageIndex could be applied!

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vitalmixofntrnt about 22 hours ago

A free and open source software, hardware and firmware PC with a eFPGA

Basically, a QuickLogic Qomu Dev Board plugged into a hub with six USB Type A ports:

        * A USB Type A keyboard

        * A USB Type A mouse

        * A DisplayPort over USB Type C Monitor connected with a USB Type C to USB Type A adapter

        * A MicroSD to USB Type C Adapter connected to a USB Type C to USB Type A adapter

        * A free and open source wifi or ethernet or lora adapter.
A free and open source SPI Firmware for the Arm Cortex M4F can be developed. The eFPGA's tooling is officially supported with a free and open source Verilog to Bistream toolchain, as opposed to the legal gray area that is FPGA vendors tolerating reverse engineered toolchains, a stance that they might change in the future.

I don't know if the Qomu's EOS S3 chip has the proprietary flexible fusion engine, I'll edit this post once QuickLogic tells me whether it does or doesn't, but the documentation says that if it does have it, the Flexible Fusion Engine is powered off by default, so as long as I don't turn it on, it's free and open source hardware.

I'll make a gplv3 or later OS for it where the Arm core powers up the eFPGA and reconfigures it when necessary for performance. The eFPGA would run a soft core cpu whose instruction set is my programming language source code. My OS will run entirely in Ring 0 and I'll make it programmable with my programming language via voice commands since that chip has a microphone inside. My OS will be for recreational programming. I'll call it eFPGAos-Libre.

Now I know that the Arm Cortex M4F and QuickLogic eFPGA's Architecture are both closed source, so one can't put QuickLogic's eFPGA architecture or derivatives of it or the Arm Cortex M4F or derivatives of it into a chip of theirs without either's permission, but the tooling for both is entirely free and open source.

It comes with 512KB of Sram in the chip, enough for me.

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mecHacker 2 days ago

Ask HN: Finding Remote Enterprise SW Consulting Leads: Non-US Resident Edition

Been wrestling with this for a while, figured some of you might have seen similar. The Situation: * 15+ years Enterprise Software - PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) experience, including a stint at Google. * Now based in India. * Strong US network (NY, OH, OK, CA). * Targeting direct client engagements, potentially building a small remote team. * Problem: Most remote PLM roles explicitly state US/UK/EU residency.

The Question: How do you effectively find remote PLM consulting/contracting gigs in the US when you're physically outside those regions? Freelance platforms seem to be a dead end due to the residency requirements.

Initial Thoughts (and Maybe Where I'm Going Wrong): * Leveraging existing network is a given, but feels like I'm hitting a wall. * Direct outreach to companies? Feels like a long shot, especially with the location hurdle. * Is there some niche platform or strategy I'm missing? Something beyond the usual Upwork/LinkedIn grind.

Looking For: * Specific strategies that have worked for others in similar situations. * Experiences with companies that are open to remote PLM consultants outside the typical zones. * Insights on how to navigate the legal/contractual aspects of this arrangement. Anyone cracked this nut? Any and all advice appreciated.

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raj7desai 1 day ago

Ask HN: How many jobs will AI eliminate? Which ones are safe?

Over the past few weeks, I’ve spoken with several VCs who confidently claim that companies won’t need to hire anyone in the next year or two because AI will handle everything.

Even Bill Gates recently said we might all be out of work soon and won’t need to do anything in an "age of abundance."

How much of this is hype vs. reality?

Which jobs are likely to be completely eliminated by AI and which ones are likely to survive or even thrive?

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tempcal 2 days ago

Ask HN: How to make money in the new age of AI?

Employed. Unfairly compensated. Old. Love AI. How to capitalize on the new tech wave?

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kinnth 2 days ago

Ask HN: An Android build/skin specifically created for Almost Blind People?

I have an 82 year old friend who I help and care for. She has about 10% of her sight left and she uses and needs her phone on a daily basis.

She particularly needs Whatsapp.

I am having a lot of difficulty finding and installing apps with very large clear fonts, in a way where the operating system doesn't keep having overlays or changing things and keeps getting stuck using her phone?

What are the best options?

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concerned_citi 8 days ago

Ask HN: can Wireless-CarPlay dongles steal your data?

So I recently ordered one of the many wireless Carplay dongles from Aliexpress that work via USB in your car connecting your iPhone to the car's Carplay via Bluetooth (and/or Wifi) to the USB dongle.

The instruction manual mentioned a firmware upgrade which had an interesting way of connecting to the internet. So when the dongle is connected to a power source you can connect to it via Wifi and an IP address in your browser. Now in the dongle's web UI, there is a button to upgrade your firmware. But how does this work when the dongle is not connected to the internet at all?

Well as I learned, the dongle simply uses the iPhone's mobile connection to send/receive data from the internet. I wasn't aware this is even possible and there doesn't appear to be a way to stop this or be notified of an active connection (aside from the wifi connection obv).

Now my concern is: when the dongle is connected to the iPhone in the car, is there a way for the dongle to use the same mechanism and send Carplay data (messages, contacts, etc) to a remote server using the iPhone's mobile connection?

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Eager 1 day ago

AxiomGPT: Programming with LLMs by defining Oracles in natural language

AxiomGPT is an experimental programming model that treats large language models as latent semantic engines.

Instead of writing traditional functions, you define Oracles, which are embedded entities described in natural language that behave like callable, composable functions.

For example:

(defn fibber (Oracle "Return the nth Fibonacci number"))

(fibber 123) ; => 22698374052006863956975682

LISP isn't required at all, but it helps for composition :-)

The model doesn't "execute" logic, it remembers, manifests and resolves the structure behind the intent as oracles.

Oracles can represent:

Algorithms (sorting, TSP, prime factors, map/reduce)

Concepts (e.g. "the government", "my refrigerator")

Personas (e.g. Arthur C. Clarke, a Victorian engineer)

Higher-order or recursive behavior collapsed into linewr time execution.

You can pass them, compose them, gate them, even reflect on them using meta-Oracles.

The full write-up includes usage, theory (embedding vectors as symbolic computation), and a comparison to quantum-like behavior: latent oracles act like entangled functions, invoked by attention.

It's strange, fun, and surprisingly powerful.

You can try it out yourself in minutes with handy provided prompts.

Full Codex and examples: [https://x.com/chrisbe1968/status/1906875616290365941]

Happy to discuss or answer questions!

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vvvnnnnvvv 3 days ago

Best Linux distro in 2025 for non-experts

This is about finding a good linux distro for my parents to use. Apparently, Windows now requires an outlook account in order to log into your computer. Well - his outlook account has been hacked. (In fact, it's the second time he's had a Microsoft account be hacked. He's pretty savvy about scams and phishing, but we can't figure how how this keeps happening.) Anyway, understandably, he's pretty freaked out about what they might have access to on his computer and will probably end up just reformatting it.

He's open to switching to linux, but I've been out of the game for a while and not sure what to recommend. In olden times, Ubuntu was my go to - is that still a reasonable default or is there a new game in town?

They primarily use the internet and I guess they might need to print sometimes (which I'm assuming is going to be a hassle no matter which distro we pick).

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krrishd 1 day ago

Ask HN: Do you still self-host a blog? What's your publishing stack?

Question says it all - I'm curious what the state of the art is for a community like HN (that, intuitively, wouldn't just start an eg. Substack).

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vibe_coding 2 days ago

Ask HN: Are You Vibe Coding?

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tejmac 1 day ago

WhatsApp web overrides basic text box functionality

While typing a message, pressing Ctrl + Delete opens a "Clear this chat?" dialog instead of deleting the word to the right of the cursor.

Who on the WhatsApp team thought it was a good idea to override basic text box functionality with an option to clear the entire chat?

I’d love to meet the people who need to clear their chat more often than they need to delete a single word.

If anyone has any contact at WhatsApp, please tell them to reverse this insanity.

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beneadie97 about 9 hours ago

Ask HN: What is the benefit of using MCP over a dictionary of functions?

I'm really confused with the MCP hype. I looked through their docs for quick start and it looks like more work and code than doing it simply with a dictionary. I feel I must be missing something here. Could someone please elaborate on why it is useful?

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tosh 3 days ago

Ask HN: Fanless Laptops

I fondly remember my student days of running Ubuntu on a tiny Thinkpad X61 w/ a 12" 1024×768 screen.

So a few weeks ago I started to wonder what the best ultraportable laptop for running Linux is nowadays.

I know these are somewhat arbitrary, personal constraints of mine (that the X61 also did not meet) but is it possible that there are (almost) no options for a laptop w/

- no fan

- 190+ dpi

?

I think I'd even be willing to accept battery life that's just "ok" if the screen is sharp for rendering text and passively cooled.

With 100s of vendors I thought there surely must be dozens of options.

But I have trouble finding any options from within the last 10 years.

And I mean not only no options specifically for running Linux "ok" but any options at all (e.g. compromising on Windows + WSL 2).

Except from Apple.

The 12" Macbook and current Macbook Air M1-M4.

Is that really it?

A close miss I found is the Thinkpad X13s that comes with a Qualcomm Snapdragon (!).

It is fanless but it has a 160 dpi screen which unfortunately places it in the "almost good but still blurry" uncanny valley when it comes to text rendering.

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Buildstarted about 19 hours ago

Ask HN: Why do text posts have such low contrast?

I'm curious why this color was chosen.

They look like they're flagged comments. I know my eyesight is getting worse as I get older but I can't be the only one who needs a custom css just to be able to comfortably read the posts.

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kieloo 7 days ago

Ask HN: What's the ideal stack for a solo dev in 2025

I’m a marketer turned dev. When I built my first SaaS 3 years ago, I went with ROR because it seemed like the ideal stack for a solo dev.

But with all the development in AI, I wonder, is it still the best choice? Most AI tools have JS or Python integration but the Rails ecosystem seems a bit behind.

But at the same time, a lot of the JS ecosystem feels all over the place.

So what tech stack should a solo dev use in 2025?

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iam-TJ 5 days ago

Debian Testing/Trixie removes systemd-resolved

Debian's systemd maintainer today removed both systemd-resolved and systemd-nspawn packages [0] from Testing/Trixie/Debian 13 - soon to be in feature freeze - due to disagreements with the Technical Committee [1].

For operators already using Testing/Trixie/Debian 13 this will lead to dependency version conflicts and/or loss of existing service; for upgrades from Stable/Bookworm/Debian 12 likewise.

systemd-resolved package depends on the exact same version of other systemd packages. When they try to upgrade to newer versions the installed-but-orphaned systemd-resolved package will prevent it unless it is removed.

New installs can use resolvconf.

[0] https://tracker.debian.org/news/1632477/accepted-systemd-2574-4-source-into-unstable/

[1] https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1098914

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gtirloni 6 days ago

Ask HN: How are you dealing with AI-assisted interview cheaters?

Ethical questions aside, if you interview engineers remotely, how are you dealing with the proliferation of AI-assisted interview cheater software?

Have you had someone pass an interview and then later they can barely perform?

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tinchox6 8 days ago

Ask HN: Building a Non-AI tool feels surprisingly refreshing for me

Lately, I’ve been working on a small side project: a web tool for creating radial and circular layouts using CSS only. What I’ve enjoyed the most is that it’s completely non-AI—just code, logic, and design decisions made by hand.

I have nothing against AI, but I found that building something without it has been almost therapeutic. Of course I know it is just a side project. I mean I'm not depend on its success for living.

It also made me wonder: in a world where AI is taking over so many creative and technical tasks, is there still a place for the joy of purely handcrafted software? Have others here felt something similar when working on non-AI projects?

Side project url https://github.com/zumerlab/orbit/

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CGMthrowaway 3 days ago

Ask HN: Any decent open-source CGM software?

I have some experience with Nutrisense Continuous Glucose Monitors (CGM) , and the experience is very user-friendly through the app. The problem is it costs $225/mo, and most of that cost is in the software.

I think you can get Libre CGMs for $40/mo but they don't come with any software or insights.

There has to be an open source solution, right? On google I saw a few people built their own projects, but I'm wondering if anyone here is familiar with the range of open source in this area and what the best app is.

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