News Nug
I bought a £16 smartwatch just because it used USB-C

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: Hacker News

The review discusses the author's quest to standardize all their portable electronics to use USB-C charging, including smartwatches, which typically struggle with battery life and often use proprietary charging methods. The author bought the Colmi P80 smartwatch, claimed to be the world's first with a USB-C port, for £16, expecting it to be of low quality. Surprisingly, the review found that the USB-C charging worked well and the watch performed decently. Key features included accurate timekeeping, easy Bluetooth pairing

Don't “let it crash”, let it heal

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: Hacker News

The content begins a series addressing misconceptions about Elixir, specifically critiquing the phrase "let it crash." The author believes this phrase can mislead newcomers, suggesting a lack of concern for code quality, as it implies that crashes are acceptable. In Elixir, built on the BEAM VM, processes are lightweight and can recover from crashes through a supervisor system, which can lead to a more resilient application. However, "let it crash" may give the impression of sloppy coding practices, akin to

In the Future All Food Will Be Cooked in a Microwave, and if You Can’t Deal With That Then You Need to Get Out of the Kitchen

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: /r/programming

The author, a restaurant owner, discusses the rapid advancements in microwave technology and predicts that kitchens will eventually be reduced to merely having a microwave, eliminating traditional cooking equipment like stoves and ovens by 1955. They advocate for chefs to embrace microwaves, arguing that those who do not will be left behind in the industry. The author offers a course on using microwaves and highlights their experience of being banned from a subreddit for sharing microwaved food, claiming it reflects resistance to the future of cooking.

Workflow Engine design proposal, tell me your thoughts

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: /r/programming

The content emphasizes the importance of user feedback and invites users to engage with the project on GitHub, including signing up for an account to ask questions or report issues. It mentions the development of a new workflow processing engine for Emmett, designed for coordinating multi-step business processes with durable execution and observability. Users are encouraged to provide feedback, view documentation for qualifiers, check an example API, and join a Discord channel for more interactive discussions. There are also repeated notices about loading errors on the page.

Show HN: Kitten TTS – 25MB CPU-Only, Open-Source TTS Model

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: Hacker News

The content emphasizes the importance of user feedback, stating that it is carefully considered. It introduces Kitten TTS, an open-source text-to-speech model that is lightweight (under 25MB) and features 15 million parameters for high-quality voice synthesis. The model is currently in developer preview and is available for use across various platforms. The message also encourages users to refer to the documentation for available qualifiers and to join their Discord community.

The Amaranth hardware description language

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: Hacker News

The Amaranth project offers an open-source toolchain for hardware development based on synchronous digital logic using Python. It focuses on ease of learning, minimizing coding errors, and simplifying complex designs with reusable components. The toolchain includes the Amaranth language, a standard library, a simulator, and a build system, which together facilitate the FPGA development process. It allows integration with existing Verilog or VHDL code, enabling a flexible design flow. The Amaranth language is a Python library for

I'm Archiving Picocrypt

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: Hacker News

The message emphasizes the importance of user feedback and reassures users that their input is taken seriously. It also mentions the availability of qualifiers in the documentation and prompts the user to reload the page due to an error. Additionally, there's a request for assistance in analyzing a final message from a developer regarding their archived open-source file encryption software.

Marines now have an official drone-fighting handbook

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: Hacker News

The U.S. Marine Corps has released a 90-page handbook focused on the use of small unmanned aerial systems (sUAS) in combat situations, enhancing their drone operation capabilities. The "Small UAS/Counter-small UAS Integration Handbook," published in June, supports a new 10-day training course at Camp Pendleton, aimed at instructing around 400 students by year-end. The handbook, overseen by Lt. Col. Nick Freeman and his team, consolidates lessons learned

Software Rot

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: Hacker News

Software rot refers to the degradation of software functionality due to changes in the environment it operates in, such as updates to libraries that lack backward compatibility. This phenomenon fosters a mindset where software is deemed obsolete without ongoing maintenance. Instead of focusing solely on the software's lifespan, it's beneficial to consider the stability of its underlying environment, likening it to constructing a house on solid ground rather than a bog. While developing on dynamic platforms is often necessary, compatibility with stable, unchanging systems can mitigate issues associated with

Engineer restores pay phones for free public use

Published: 2025-08-06 | Origin: Hacker News

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Create personal illustrated storybooks in the Gemini app

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: Hacker News

The Gemini app now offers a feature for creating personalized, illustrated storybooks with read-aloud narration. Users can describe any story, and Gemini will generate a unique 10-page book with custom illustrations and audio. The app can also incorporate inspiration from users' own photos and files, allowing for various artistic styles such as pixel art, comics, and more, available in over 45 languages. The feature is accessible globally on both desktop and mobile. For more updates, users can subscribe to Google news.

How we built the worlds fastest VIN decoder

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: /r/programming

At Cardog, the company processes millions of vehicle listings daily, which require VIN decoding for details like make, model, and engine specifications. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) provides an official API for this data, but its average response time of over three seconds is a hindrance due to the massive volume of requests. The NHTSA's Vehicle Product Information Catalog (VPIC), which has been compiled since 1981, is comprehensive but poorly optimized for speed, featuring legacy

Spotting base64 encoded JSON, certificates, and private keys

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: Hacker News

The author was examining a file meant to contain encrypted content for a GitHub repository and noticed something odd about its structure. After consulting a colleague, they discovered the file was base64 encoded JSON, which could be decoded using visual cues—specifically, that it starts with "ey" indicating the presence of {" and often includes a trailing equal sign for padding. The colleague also pointed out that base64 encoded certificates and private keys can be identified by beginning with "LS," similar to "TLS certificate."

Tech jobs were supposed to be the safe career route. What changed?

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: /r/programming

Viet Vu, a manager at The Dais think tank at Toronto Metropolitan University, highlights the challenges faced by recent computer science graduates in the technology sector. One such graduate, Steven Bubonja, has struggled to find a job in tech despite applying to hundreds of positions over the past five years, forcing him to continue working in the heating and ventilation industry. This reflects a broader trend where, following a hiring boom during the pandemic, the tech sector is experiencing a decline in employment and job postings,

Ollama Turbo

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: Hacker News

Ollama Turbo is a new service that allows users to run large, open models on datacenter-grade hardware, significantly improving response times compared to traditional models. By upgrading to the latest hardware, users can execute larger models without taxing their personal devices running on Mac, Windows, or Linux. Importantly, Ollama ensures user privacy by not retaining data or logging queries made through Turbo mode. Currently, during its preview phase, users can access the gpt-oss-20b and gpt-

GitHub - isene/GiTerm: Git(hub) TUI application

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: /r/ruby

The content outlines a Git and GitHub Terminal User Interface (TUI) application called GiTerm, created by Geir Isene. Built in Ruby using rcurses, GiTerm allows users to browse repositories, manage issues and pull requests, and perform Git operations directly from the terminal. Users can run GiTerm from any Git repository or manually if installed. The application's interface features four panes and requires a personal access token to enable GitHub functionalities. It operates in two modes: Command Mode and Shell Mode

Open models by OpenAI

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: Hacker News

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Software architecture is about spending abstractions

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: /r/programming

The blog post discussed highlights the pitfalls of overly complex software architecture, particularly the tendency to create "perfect abstractions" that may not add real value. It points out that while senior engineers often advocate for these abstractions as a means of future-proofing and good practice, they can lead to significant development slowdowns. The author argues that problem domains are constantly evolving, and rigid abstractions can hinder adaptability. An example provided is the locale/content abstraction, where content is centralized in an interface (like

Slack-GitHub Threads – An open source Sinatra app to send Slack threads to GitHub issues

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: /r/ruby

The content describes a Slack integration tool that allows users to export Slack thread conversations as formatted comments on GitHub issues, facilitating better documentation of discussions about features, bugs, and decisions. This integration utilizes a Ruby Sinatra application and can be activated via a Slack slash command by providing a GitHub issue URL. The tool is particularly beneficial for development teams that communicate in Slack but want to maintain clear records of discussions in GitHub. A live demo is available to showcase its functionality. The text also offers a

What constitutes debugging? Empirical findings from live-coding streams

Published: 2025-08-05 | Origin: /r/programming

Debugging is a crucial yet often underappreciated aspect of software development, leading to misunderstandings among managers that can diminish team productivity and product quality. One primary challenge in understanding debugging is its measurement; typically, developers work alone to fix bugs, making their process invisible to others. A recent study overcame this by analyzing live-coding streams on platforms like YouTube and Twitch, where developers debug open-source projects. The study defined debugging as the localization, understanding, and fixing of program defects.