diffuse_l (u/diffuse_l)

diffuse_l commented on Ask HN: Why hasn't x86 caught up with Apple M series? · Posted by u/stephenheron

Apple took the ARM base design (they licensed it), and then they modified and tweaked it.

You get the ARM ISA, and compilers that work for ARM will compile to Apple Silicon. It's just that the actual hardware you get, is better than the base design, and therefore beats other ARM processors in benchmarks.

diffuse_l · 4 days ago

It's more than that. They have an unlimited license to arm designs, and can change them as they see fit, since they were an early investors (or something along those lines). Other manufacturers can't get these terms, or if they can, it will be prohibtly expensive

diffuse_l commented on Unity reintroduces the Runtime Fee through its Industry license unity.com/products/unity-... · Posted by u/finnsquared

estimator7292 · 9 days ago

That sounds well and good, but Unity forced my last company into the more expensive license unilaterally and with no discussion. They doubled our costs just because they can.

At this point, we should all treat Unity like we do Broadcom. Utterly toxic and should be avoided at all costs because they will shake you down and leave you with a lesser product for no reason other than blind greed.

Nothing Unity does will ever recover the goodwill they nuked for money

diffuse_l · 9 days ago

I would expect no less from a company that acquired/merged with IronSource...

diffuse_l commented on Website is served from nine Neovim buffers on my old ThinkPad vim.gabornyeki.com/... · Posted by u/todsacerdoti

NoahZuniga · 12 days ago

I'm no expert, but could it be that one contributing factor to the speed is that neovim stores the files in ram while Nginx has to go to disk for every request?

diffuse_l · 12 days ago

I'm pretty sure that the website will reside in cache in any case.

diffuse_l commented on I tried to replace myself with ChatGPT in my English class lithub.com/what-happened-... · Posted by u/lapcat

epatjas · 25 days ago

I think the most interesting detail was that students started recognizing AI by its tics (obsessive em-dashes, always exactly three examples) and turned detection into a game. Accidentally became better readers.

diffuse_l · 25 days ago

I'm wondering if the usage of an em-dash in the article (somewhere towards the middle) is self-aware trolling, or just the result of excessive ai use...

> includes both a human and a computer—and “surprisingly,

diffuse_l commented on When Is WebAssembly Going to Get DOM Support? queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?... · Posted by u/jazzypants

thaumasiotes · a month ago

I asked a number of times on HN why wasm was good when java applets, exactly the same thing, were bad. There was a vague feeling that java applets were insecure and that this would somehow not be an issue for wasm.

It's not just applets; we also had Flash, which was a huge success until it was suddenly killed.

As far as I can tell, the difference between java applets and Flash is that you, the user, have to install java onto your system to use applets, whereas to use Flash you have to install Flash into your browser. I guess that might explain why one became more popular than the other.

diffuse_l · a month ago

Flash was a security nightmare, with multiple vulnerabilities discovered regularly.

It was eventually killed because Apple decided it won't support it on the iPhone.

diffuse_l commented on Xbox Hacks: The A20 (2021) connortumbleson.com/2021/... · Posted by u/mattweinberg

mjg59 · a month ago

A20 bugs were still with us until at least 2009, when I tripped over one: https://mjg59.livejournal.com/118098.html . I love the visualisations in this post, it makes it much clearer what's actually going on.

diffuse_l · a month ago

Indeed, more than you ever wanted to know about the A20 line: https://aeb.win.tue.nl/linux/kbd/A20.html (from your article)

This is one hell of a rabbit hole...

diffuse_l commented on Repasting a MacBook christianselig.com/2025/0... · Posted by u/speckx

axoltl · 2 months ago

I'm actually very surprised this happened. I've dis- and reassembled dozens of iPhones (from the iPhone 4 all the way up to the iPhone 16) and I've never torn a single flex cable.

You just have to be careful not to pull on the flex, but the connector instead. This logic applies as much to pulling a plug out of a wall socket as it does a thin flex with a board-to-board connector.

That said, would I characterize disassembling any Apple product as "quite friendly"? No. Do not attempt unless you're either familiar with how things go together or you're willing to spend the money to replace the parts you broke. If those aren't options, find a local repair shop.

diffuse_l · 2 months ago

I tried to repair a macbook air, and did manage to tear the microphone cable, because I didn't notice the connector :|

Like you said, you need to be careful, but you better be prepared to pay dearly (or manage without) for your mistakes...

diffuse_l commented on US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf] storage.courtlistener.com... · Posted by u/dave1629

thaumasiotes · 4 months ago

> I strongly disagree. If Google was broken up 20 years ago, nearly ALL the services listed above would not have happened. They are all FREE too, mind you. Everyone would still be paying for email.

People weren't paying for email before gmail. It was predated by hotmail, Yahoo mail, and innumerable free online email offerings by small players. Being free wasn't even a selling point for gmail; the selling point was that they gave you a lot of storage.

Speaking of things that happened before Google, Yahoo Maps and Firefox are older than Google Maps and Chrome. And... Google Flights is a Google acquisition, not a product that they developed.

And then...

> Can you imagine how the world will be affected when these go away?

> Google Fi

> Google Fiber

> Google Pay

Yes, no one will notice.

> Google Groups

It already has gone away. Also, Usenet is something else older than Google.

> Google OAuth

Eliminating "sign in with [popular site]" would be a hugely positive change.

diffuse_l · 4 months ago

Nitpick - Maps and Chrome were also acquisition. Also Android, for that matter

diffuse_l commented on Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with €530M fine over data transfers to China apnews.com/article/tiktok... · Posted by u/Alifatisk

noirscape · 4 months ago

My guess is just physical/lazy reasons. Before this, they were homed in the UK, whose special arrangements meant that they could avoid a lot of EU regulations that way.

Then Brexit happened and they just moved to the nearest available option.

diffuse_l · 4 months ago

I'm pretty sure Ireland was home to a lot of global corporations EU headquarters way before brexit...

diffuse_l commented on GPT o3 frequently fabricates actions, then elaborately justifies these actions xcancel.com/TransluceAI/s... · Posted by u/occamschainsaw

simianwords · 4 months ago

The only scientific way to prove intelligence is using statistics. If you can prove that a certain LLM is accurate enough in generalised benchmarks it is sufficient to call it intelligent.

I don't need to know how it works internally, why it works internally.

What you (and parent post) are suggesting is that it is not intelligent based on its working. This is not a scientific take on the subject.

This is in fact how it works for medicine. A drug works because it has been shown to work based on statistical evidence. Even if we don't know how it works internally.

diffuse_l · 4 months ago

Assuming the statistical analysis was sound. It is not always so. See the replication crisis for example