Nelson refused to be interviewed and by refused, I mean, even refused to tell me no - I had to have intermediaries tell me.
I remember you telling me that. Was quite hurt frankly since he is one of of my programming heroes.
Readit Newsnoufalibrahim commented on Lists and Lists: Basics of Lisp through interactive fiction (1996) eblong.com/zarf/zweb/list... · Posted by u/prathyvsh
noufalibrahim commented on Ted Chiang: The Secret Third Thing linch.substack.com/p/ted-... · Posted by u/pseudolus
Calling Hell is the Absence of God a critique of religion misses the point. Chiang isn’t saying “religion is false.” He imagines a world where God’s existence and Heaven and Hell are undeniable, and shows that even certainty doesn’t solve the problem of suffering or the struggle for meaning. The story critiques the idea that proof would make faith easier, not religion itself.
I've not read the book but beating this whole thing left and right in my head, I've come to a similar conclusion. It's pleasantly jarring to hear that Chiang (whose other works i like very much) had a similar position.
noufalibrahim commented on AOL to discontinue dial-up internet nytimes.com/2025/08/11/bu... · Posted by u/situationista
So many pieces of the internet being discontinued. A little nostalgic but I don't really see the point in keeping dial up alive anymore.
When I was first exposed to the net, I used an email to http proxy. It was called https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agora_(web_browser) and you sent a certain email address emails with requests for pages, posting to forms etc. Then walked away and came back and checked your inbox for responses. It was quirky but I did get some documentation and largish poster of Steve Vai back in the day using this which was kind of cool I guess.
I sent so many emails (first from pine and then from mutt) that I remember the email address by heart. agora@dna.affrc.go.jp
noufalibrahim commented on I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file al3rez.com/todo-txt-journ... · Posted by u/al3rez
I've cycled between a few low tech. solutions and have finally settled on Emacs org-mode. I don't use my phone to track TODOs and this works fine for me.
I think Aaron Reed's 50 Years of Text Adventures is an even better intro. Starts earlier, ends later, covers each era in greater depth, and comes in a more manageable format: tables, transcripts, and quality prose rather than cut tracks of talking heads.
(Don't get me wrong: Get Lamp is good. 50 Years is even better.)
Thank you. Added to my list.
Ah. The world of interactive fiction. Brings back so many memories.
For "newer" folk, who are interested, you should try to get your hands on a copy of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Get_Lamp and watch it. It covers the history of the games and everything else. Everyone relevant is interviewed with the notable exception of Graham Nelson (author of the Inform language). The tag line sums it up pretty well - "before the first person shooter, there was the second person thinker."
Plotkin himself is a bit of a heavyweight in the IF world. I'm not surprised that this was by him.
I tinkered with the language and environment a little. Inform 7, with it's natural language style of writing, is a fascinating environment.
noufalibrahim commented on Ask HN: What trick of the trade took you too long to learn? · Posted by u/unsupp0rted
> Sometimes* the same code copy/pasted or repeated is much easier to understand than pulling it all into a subroutine.
The Write Everything Twice principle is a much needed sanity check for absurd DRY practices. There are too many naive people arguing with a straight face that writing a base class and two specialization classes saves you the work of writing two classes.
That's one situation where it makes sense.
I had another recently where I need to implement an integration for a specific protocol. It's got a standard but most providers are not completely compliant and it's not mature enough to be exact. An expert consultant asked us to implement a pristine version and then subclass, add rules to change fields, behaviour etc. etc.
I suggested that it would make more sense to just copy/paste the implementation and make tweaks with comments that would accommodate the other providers. Worked like a charm and `diff`ing the files more or less gave us what's different. Got us from 0 to 60% without any problems.
noufalibrahim commented on Rotring 600 Ballpoint Pen shellshore.com/review-rot... · Posted by u/Alupis
They're also horrible to use if you're left-handed and writing English or any other left-to-right language.
Ah yes. I'm right handed and I've suffered from this when trying RTL scripts (Arabic) for calligraphy. It's a challenge to keep your hand from blotting what you've written.
noufalibrahim commented on Rotring 600 Ballpoint Pen shellshore.com/review-rot... · Posted by u/Alupis
> One lasts generations
Multiple Parker Vectors I had typically lasted a few years of use each before the plastic windings between the pen head and the holder wore out or broke.
My Pilot Metropolitan did the same just a few months back.
I still have the high-end pens my grandfather used that, while mechanically still sound, I am unable to get the ink flowing through them.
I love writing with fountain pens, but long lasting they are not in my experience.
I disagree. I used a Waterman Expert for a long time. It conked out when someone I loaned it to dropped it. I switched to a Noodlers Ahab (which has a flexible nib) so you can do a little bit of flourishing for headings etc. I've used it for a long time and still do. Recently, I switched to a broad tipped Lamy Safari (which was a birthday gift).
My main problem is that most papers can't really handle the inkflow from fountain pens anymore and since the place I come from is somewhat humid, the papers quickly start to bleed ink. So, my more common instrument is a Pentel graphgear mechanical pencil.
I do calligraphy as a hobby so I have separate arsenal of dip pens and nibs but those are not for daily use.
We recently had two gaming machines built by different vendors. The second hada higher spec than the first.
The engineer from my company who interacted with the vendors and I were chatting about the machines and we kept coming back to the point about nicely the first guy had routed the cables and put them in the cabinet. It would be covered by a metal sheet and hence invisible but the work he put into it was obvious when we opened it up to install a RAM stick.
I don't know how to quantify the practical benefits of this but it does indicate a different mindset. I think that will spill over to other work which has more tangible benefits and that's a good thing.