nogridbag (u/nogridbag)

nogridbag commented on How well do coding agents use your library? stackbench.ai/... · Posted by u/richardblythman

metadat · 15 days ago

The skip-to-the-end answer: Context7 MCP is so good it seems like magic, even to many well-informed, highly capable hackers. Simply wildly good for libraries and SDKs. All it takes to start using it is to add the MCP provider to your agent config and save your arms, "Use Context7 for this".

https://context7.com/

nogridbag · 15 days ago

I'm confused a bit by this. For instance, Gemini was struggling to write proper Java code for using Firebase Admin SDK. It would write Java code using methods that only exist in the JavaScript SDK. And when I would correct it, it would give other options that also were only in the JavaScript SDK or were invalid.

So I thought this is where context7 would be useful, but I'm confused what I'm looking at in the detail page: https://context7.com/firebase/firebase-admin-java

I was expecting some sort of dump of all the admin methods, but it gives a single example of one library function and info on how to build javadoc.

nogridbag commented on Marines being mobilized in response to LA protests cnn.com/2025/06/09/politi... · Posted by u/sapphicsnail

komali2 · 3 months ago

> And both cases would have been avoided if they were Waymos.

This is speculative. Waymos hit people too.

I agree that pedestrian infrastructure in the USA is sorely lacking. The proven solution that worked in other countries is to take measures to reduce the number of cars on the road, not try to replace every driver with a computer that can only be trained by putting stupider computers on the road first to experiment on the population.

Public transit. A subway moves literally millions more people than car infrastructure can with significantly fewer injuries - basically 0 if the platforms are built with doors or gates. Busses and cable cars, driven by professional drivers, have far lower incidence per capita of injury as well.

nogridbag · 3 months ago

What I was hoping to see from your post was some stats showing Waymo incidents where Waymo is at fault. I'm not actively following this stuff, but after some googling it's hard to find anything. There's tons of links with click-bait titles and then once you click into them you see things like:

    - "Waymo drove through a red light (while being driven by a human)"
    - "Waymo involved in a hit and run (it recorded a hit and run by a human using it's cameras)"
    - "Waymo was involved in a multi-car accident (while it was stopped with other stopped cars)".

I'm not saying they don't happen. I'm sure they definitely do. As a father of two little girls, I would feel much safer with them getting into a Waymo for a short trip than an Uber. With that said, I'm strictly talking about Waymo. I would never get into a Tesla Robotaxi.

nogridbag commented on Android 16 is here blog.google/products/andr... · Posted by u/nsriv

NiekvdMaas · 3 months ago

It's not part of the stable release yet, but the beta version that was released today has an option to enable this: https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2025/06/developer-...

I tried it and it works great - Dex-like experience with mouse and keyboard, on a stock Pixel phone.

nogridbag · 3 months ago

That looks pretty amazing. I hope this means Google is committed to releasing a Pixel Tablet 2.

nogridbag commented on Marines being mobilized in response to LA protests cnn.com/2025/06/09/politi... · Posted by u/sapphicsnail

komali2 · 3 months ago

Excellent, so it's working. Waymo has been nonconsensually testing their unready "autonomous" cars on people for far too long.

As recently as last year a Waymo stopped at a stop sign and then accelerated directly towards me in a crosswalk.

These vehicles aren't ready and have already injured people. Lighting them on fire seems a valid defense strategy since the government's unwilling to intervene to protect its citizens.

nogridbag · 3 months ago

Personally I can't wait until Waymo reaches the east coast. Within the past year, my neighbor was hit in a crosswalk pushing a baby stroller (minor injuries to mom and baby, but could have been much worse). And while walking my daughter our of an kids art school, an impatient car sped past the cars stopped at the crosswalk and were a foot or two from hitting my kids. These were both human drivers. And both cases would have been avoided if they were Waymos. In the first situation, the driver was only looking forward instead of the direction they were turning.

Any mode of transportation will cause injuries, especially since other humans are on the road. So just saying "Waymos have already injured people" is kind of a meaningless comment. I do think the type of accidents matter as much as the number of incidents. For example, the video that went viral recently of a self-driving Tesla randomly making a dramatic left turn into a tree on a rural road (possibly because it misinterpreted a shadow in the road) is not a mistake a human would have made.

nogridbag commented on My AI skeptic friends are all nuts fly.io/blog/youre-all-nut... · Posted by u/tabletcorry

Amezarak · 3 months ago

It isn’t clear at all that there’s any infringement going on at all, except in cases where AI output reproduces copyrighted content or content that is sufficiently close to copyrighted content to constitute a derivative work. For example, if you told an LLM to write a Harry Potter fanfic, that would be infringement - fanfics are actually infringing derivative works that usually get a pass because nobody wants to sue their fanbase.

It’s very unlikely simply training an LLM on “unlicensed” work constitutes infringement. It could possibly be that the model itself, when published, would represent a derivative work, but it’s unlikely that most output would be unless specifically prompted to be.

nogridbag · 3 months ago

I'm interpreting what you described as a derivative work to be something like:

"Create a video of a girl running through a field in the style of Studio Ghibli."

There, someone has specifically prompted the AI to create something visually similar to X.

But would you still consider it a derivative work if you replaced the words "Studio Ghibli" with a few sentences describing their style that ultimately produces the same output?

nogridbag commented on Ask HN: How do I learn robotics in 2025? · Posted by u/srijansriv

nogridbag · 3 months ago

I've just started this journey. I always wanted to get into electronics and robotics, but instead went the software route. I've picked up an Arduino and microbit over the years, but they sit collecting dust.

It may sound silly, but I asked Gemini to recommend a learning plan and it came up with a detailed plan along with time estimates in months. The first step is reading and going through all the exercises in Make Electronics (third edition) which is very hands on.

nogridbag commented on Understanding Java's Asynchronous Journey amritpandey.io/understand... · Posted by u/hardasspunk

Neywiny · 4 months ago

I don't get it. The first example in JS vs Java looks very similar. Now all those other code blocks, they certainly have more going on but idk how that compares to JS. And to answer the questions:

A completable future is something that in the future may complete. I think that's self explanatory. A promise seems equally vague.

Boilerplate looks the same. JS is just a function, Java they put a class around it. Java requires exception handling which is annoying but having fought errors in async JS, I'll take all I can get.

API is eh. Sure. But that's not even shown in this example so I have no idea.

So JS saves like 3 lines? Is that really so much better?

nogridbag · 3 months ago

Yeah that first example is rather poor. And it uses the word boilerpate to seemingly refer to the stuff unrelated to the async code (class declaration, exception handling, main method).

I don't use Java async much, but I guess if you have a utility method named "setTimeout" than the example can simply be:

    public CompletableFuture<String> fetchData() {
        return setTimeout(() -> "Data Fetched", 10000);
    }

    public void loadData() {
        fetchData().thenAccept(System.out::println);
    }

Which is simpler or equivalent to the JS example.

nogridbag commented on You wouldn't steal a font fedi.rib.gay/notes/a6xqit... · Posted by u/todsacerdoti

gkoberger · 4 months ago

They updated it for the sequel, and one example doesn't nullify thousands of years of design.

But to go down that path from a logical standpoint... Papyrus isn't on my computer (OSX) for whatever reason, and it doesn't come on Linux. Papyrus isn't a free, public font... it's licensed by its owner (ITC), so the only reason you can use it on your computer is because someone is paying a license for you to see it.

nogridbag · 4 months ago

I don't have a strong opinion here. I was only making a silly reference to the SNL skit :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVhlJNJopOQ

nogridbag commented on You wouldn't steal a font fedi.rib.gay/notes/a6xqit... · Posted by u/todsacerdoti

gkoberger · 4 months ago

That's not true at all. You think games would feel as immersive if everything was Calibri? Magazine-style articles would feel as tactile if they all used the same system fonts? Etc.

You may not care about fonts, but to say they don't matter is a misunderstanding. For example, I could glibly say we only need one programming language (the user doesn't care what syntax you used before it was compiled down to 1s and 0s!), but any engineer would make the case why that's not true at all.

nogridbag · 4 months ago

Avatar was pretty immersive! And they just did Select-All and chose Papyrus!

nogridbag commented on Bored of It paulrobertlloyd.com/2025/... · Posted by u/NotInOurNames

GeoAtreides · 5 months ago

> What is the greatest tool in human history in your opinion?

Language, fire, writing; in that order.

nogridbag · 5 months ago

Even AI mostly agrees with you! ChatGPT suggests:

Language, Writing, and the Scientific Method.