mylastattempt (u/mylastattempt)

mylastattempt commented on Show HN: I spent 4 years building a UI design tool with only the features I use vecti.com... · Posted by u/vecti

AlienRobot · a month ago

One common case I notice this is with FFMPEG. Everything that saves a video needs its own dialog with different settings. It would make a lot more sense if you had 1 single polished FFMPEG frontend that everyone just streamed data to.

On the other hand, I'm afraid that if this did happen that FFMPEG frontend would look like a GNOME app and I would hate using it.

mylastattempt · a month ago

Me, on the other hand, love ffmpeg, because I notice my ytdlp using it and my vlc player sometimes using it and I have two homemade powrshell scripts using it to convert flac to mp3 and whatever. I don't want to open a program and figure out it's UI for those things. It has a job, it does it well, you can sort of pipe things to it and I'm very happy.

mylastattempt commented on Calling All Hackers: How money works (2024) phrack.org/issues/71/17... · Posted by u/krrishd

LeanOnSheena · 2 months ago

I am a CPA by training originally, but have spent most of my time in operational finance roles for PE-backed technology companies. While my work is all finance and accounting related, I mostly work with SQL and Python day to day creating internal applications for things like ARR etc.

I agree completely on your "thorough grounding" comment. I spend a lot of time explaining to finance people how tools like python, SQL, AWS stuff can be leveraged in simple ways for analytical purposes, and I spend a lot of time explaining to technology people what all the finance and accounting stuff is really about. In both cases my experience is it always comes back to explaining fundamental ideas or concepts over and over, but applying them to different situations and contexts (I do so much more confidently when explaining accounting and finance stuff since I have deeper education & experience there).

A lot of times these fundamental ideas and concepts can be explained very simply and intuitively using toy examples. the problem is it can take years and years to build up enough experience to really separate the signal from the noise and see clearly what is truly fundamental (yes that's where formal education is helpful but it can be hard to really grok absent experience imo... In the same way learning a programming language can be easier if you just try to build something).

A deep understanding of fundamental concepts is what allows you to pick apart very complex and novel problems into it's component parts. A deep understanding of fundamental concepts is one of the things that separates professionals from non-professionals in my opinion.

mylastattempt · 2 months ago

Going in without understanding the underlying basic concepts is, just... well let's just say I completely agree with your comment!

mylastattempt commented on Mid-pregnancy pollution exposure linked to postpartum depression bps.org.uk/research-diges... · Posted by u/wjb3

HPsquared · a year ago

Yes.. I'd expect places that are poor and miserable would also tend to have more pollution.

mylastattempt · a year ago

And surely the other way around as well, if not more so. Places with more pollution will generally be in poorer areas, where life happiness/satisfaction are already lower, most likely worsened by negative effects of pollution. Indirectly or otherwise.

mylastattempt commented on I genuinely don't understand why some people are still bullish about LLMs twitter.com/skdh/status/1... · Posted by u/ksec

GolDDranks · a year ago

I guess that Sabine's beef with LLM's that they are hyped as a legit "human level assistant" -kind of thing by the business people, which they clearly aren't yet. Maybe I've just managed to... manage my expectations?

mylastattempt · a year ago

That's on her then for fully believing what marketing and business execs are 'telling her' about LLMs. Does she get upset when she buys a coke around Christmas and her life doesn't become all warm and fuzzy with friendliness and cheer all around?

Seems like she's given a drill with a flathead, and just complains for months on end that it often fails (she didnt charge the drill) or gives her useless results (she uses philipheads). How about figuring out what works and what doesn't, and adjusting your use of the tool accordingly? If she is a painter, don't blame the drill for messing up her painting.

mylastattempt commented on Stem cell therapy trial reverses "irreversible" damage to cornea newatlas.com/biology/stem... · Posted by u/01-_-

cced · a year ago

How do we know if something is truly irreversible?

mylastattempt · a year ago

Irreversible might not be the thing to wonder about. Can it be changed to a more desired state or result? That has a much more definitive answer: pretty much always 'yes'.

mylastattempt commented on Cowboys and Drones: two modes of operation for small business emeaentrepreneurs.com/ant... · Posted by u/sixhobbits

PeterStuer · a year ago

Using the artcles nomenclature, in my experience (only primarily knowledge worker businesses) ever company grows from 'cowboys' into layers of 'drone management' where actual production is still relying on 'cowboys' to get the actual work done and keep the company running despite the 'processes'.

This by the way is why most big ERP, BPM,RPA projects fail. Once the pretence is codified it turns out the emperor never had any clothes.

mylastattempt · a year ago

Is that a reference to something (emporer..clothes)?

mylastattempt commented on The Generative AI Con wheresyoured.at/longcon/... · Posted by u/nimbleplum40

danroblew · a year ago

Trillions of dollars, dude. They need to make trillions of dollars to satisfy their investors.

mylastattempt · a year ago

If you are correcting my use of millions to trillions: I was refering to the author himself, who writes like this giant AI bubble is pushing him forward to the edge of the cliff as people keep believing in it, and he is desperately trying to get the bubble to shrink or he'll fall off and die. Methaphorically.

But why does he act or feel that way? Let the trillions be lost, it's just how hypes, bubbles and the stock market in general work.

mylastattempt commented on My washing machine refreshed my thinking on software estimation cosive.com/blog/my-washin... · Posted by u/tashicorp

emilfihlman · a year ago

This was just painful to read.

>For my washing machine, they were unknown unknowns - I didn’t even expect there’d be a hole to drill, new hoses to buy, a cold water tap cap to remove, and a spigot PVC wall to drill out.

No, most of this was something that could have easily been known if checked after the first trip to the store but before going there again, or at minimum before the third trip. It was just so painful to read how there was absolutely zero planning and checking before execution.

While you can also do many checks and plans in software development and deployment (like calculating if the thing you want to calculate given your resources is even remotely possible, back of the envelope calculations, you know), there's still many more things that are much harder to know about and check in advance, and there's not usually a huge cost (going to the store) associated with problem solving each time.

mylastattempt · a year ago

Agreed on this being a painful read. Starting with this being a 10 minute job. Based on what? Assumptions are the.. etc. You assumed everthing was plug&play ready. Who told you that?

Anyway, after the second trip, before going on a third, he still didn't think to actually check the complete 'requirements' for his trip to the hardware store. You buy a part for your drill, but don't check if it will fit your drill? Why not bring the drill and then take a picture of the job site, if you are going to ask the people at the store for help anyway.

It's like downloading a compiler, write lot's of code in Python and then being annoyed it's a C++ compiler or whatever. Same for the "not actually extendable hose". Maybe call the wife, or just buy the hose and return it if you don't need it on another trip to the hardware store later that day or week when you pass there. Just painful, no planning or thinking.

The only thing I can imagine just being domain knowledge, is that the spigot needed a hole to be drilled eventhough it has an inlet which I would also assume was open.

mylastattempt commented on The Generative AI Con wheresyoured.at/longcon/... · Posted by u/nimbleplum40

mylastattempt · a year ago

On LLM/ML itself: it seems a lot of cynical people start with some unreasonable idea that "AI" should be able to do what it will perhaps be able to in 10 or 100 years, and are subsequently upset that it is not capable of that yet. It may get there, it may not. But that's on you for starting with a wrong assumption.

Is the AI "business" or "market" overvalued for it's current capabilities? Yeah, I do believe so. Welcome to the financial world, which is completely separated from reality. It's like that in all sectors where something new and exciting is happening, not just IT or AI. People poor money in hoping to be early enough to make a profit. Nothing more, nothing less. The rest is marketing. Some Sam Altman guy promoting the hell out of his own product? That is literally his job, regardless of wether or not he believes it all.

But articles like these are so bizarre to me. The author acts like he has millions at stake and his money manager just won't listen and pull all investments out of AI. Hurry up, the bubble is about to burst, I will lose all my money!

Except that... they don't. They are just "old man yelling at cloud". If you believe AI is the next Metaverse or WeWork, then it will just die off by itself once the bubble pops. Why are you having so many conversations about it, where you seem to be desperately trying to convince people of the bubble/con that is AI. To the point that you're so sick of it, that you write down your arguments so you can point the blinded there instead of having those tiresome arguments.

Genuinely baffled. Spend your energy on something productive rather than destructive, perhaps?

mylastattempt commented on I am (not) a failure: Lessons learned from six failed startup attempts blog.rongarret.info/2025/... · Posted by u/lisper

a1j9o94 · a year ago

I was part of a group that did something like this. We used a crypto token system where if you joined the group you got X number of tokens and you could use that to get other people in the network to help with various tasks.

Then the network would take a small percentage of equity in the companies of all the members.

mylastattempt · a year ago

You left out the most interesting part: why _were_ you a part of it. Did it not work out, why not, or did you leave because of reasons not related to the (un)succes of this system?