Hacker News with Generative AI

What is the origin of the lake tank image that has become a meme? (2021) (stackexchange.com)
This image, the template for the "Panzer of the Lake" meme, depicts a soldier from an unknown nation looking at what appears to me to definitely be a Panzer. However, no-one seems to know the origins of the image. So, where and when was this image taken, and where was the image originally published?
Memes, History, Images, Military
422 points by napolux 9 hours ago | 88 comments
AlphaQubit: AI to identify errors in Quantum Computers (google)
Our new AI system accurately identifies errors inside quantum computers, helping to make this new technology more reliable.
Quantum Computing, Artificial Intelligence, Software, Error Detection
72 points by roboboffin 4 hours ago | 19 comments
Niantic announces "Large Geospatial Model" trained on Pokémon Go player data (nianticlabs.com)
At Niantic, we are pioneering the concept of a Large Geospatial Model that will use large-scale machine learning to understand a scene and connect it to millions of other scenes globally.
Machine Learning, Augmented Reality, Location Data, Gaming, Niantic
44 points by bookstore-romeo 1 day ago | 19 comments
AAA – Analytical Anti-Aliasing (frost.kiwi)
Today’s journey is Anti-Aliasing and the destination is Analytical Anti-Aliasing. Getting rid of rasterization jaggies is an art-form with decades upon decades of maths, creative techniques and non-stop innovation. With so many years of research and development, there are many flavors.
Graphics, Computer Graphics, Anti-Aliasing, Algorithms
408 points by todsacerdoti 15 hours ago | 54 comments
SQL, Homomorphisms and Constraint Satisfaction Problems (philipzucker.com)
Database queries are a pretty surprisingly powerful tool that can solve seemingly intractable problems.
Databases, Programming, Computer Science
93 points by xlinux 5 hours ago | 9 comments
La Basilica Di San Pietro (microsoft.com)
Photogrammetry, AI, and digital preservation combine to create a digital twin of St. Peter’s Basilica with thousands of images, allowing visitors to explore it in detail from anywhere in the world.
Photogrammetry, AI, Digital Preservation, Virtual Reality, History
105 points by geox 7 hours ago | 44 comments
How good are American roads? (construction-physics.com)
We’re in an era where US infrastructure is getting a lot of attention. We need a lot of energy infrastructure for decarbonization, and to enable the AI data center buildout. There’s lots of interest in building high-speed rail, mass transit infrastructure, desalination plants in arid regions, and better ports.
Infrastructure, Transportation, Energy, AI
143 points by chmaynard 8 hours ago | 307 comments
Undergraduates with family income below $200k will be tuition-free at MIT (news.mit.edu)
Undergraduates with family income below $200,000 can expect to attend MIT tuition-free starting next fall, thanks to newly expanded financial aid. Eighty percent of American households meet this income threshold.
Education, Financial Aid, MIT, College Tuition
144 points by gnabgib 6 hours ago | 95 comments
Bit-twiddling optimizations in Zed's Rope (zed.dev)
A couple of weeks ago I came across one of Antonio's PRs, titled "Speed up point translation in the Rope" — now who doesn't stop to take a closer look at a PR with that title?
Optimization, Programming, Software, Algorithms
37 points by misternugget 2 days ago | 12 comments
Show HN: Autotab – Programmable AI browser for turning web tasks into APIs (ycombinator.com)
Hey HN, we're Alexi and Jonas the co-founders of Autotab (https://autotab.com). Autotab is a chrome-based browser you can teach to do complex tasks, with a simple API for running them from your app or backend.
Web Development, Chrome Extensions, Artificial Intelligence, API
20 points by jonasnelle 2 hours ago | 10 comments
Between the Booms: AI in Winter – Communications of the ACM (cacm.acm.org)
Observing the tsunami of artificial intelligence (AI) hype that has swept over the world in the past few years, science fiction writer Ted Chiang staked out a contrarian position. “Artificial intelligence,” he insisted, was just a “poor choice of words … back in the ’50s” that had caused “a lot of confusion.”
Artificial Intelligence, Technology, Science, Communications
40 points by rbanffy 5 hours ago | 29 comments
Show HN: Rebuild of Blossom, an open-source social robot (msgtn.xyz)
This post presents updates to Blossom, the robot that I developed in grad school.
Robotics, Open Source, Social Robots
38 points by psychomugs 5 hours ago | 2 comments
Europe's Internet resilience mitigates impact of submarine cable cuts (cloudflare.com)
When cable cuts occur, whether submarine or terrestrial, they often result in observable disruptions to Internet connectivity, knocking a network, city, or country offline.
Internet, Cybersecurity, Infrastructure, Europe
14 points by hampus 26 minutes ago | 0 comments
With Core One, Prusa's Open Source Hardware Dream Dies (hackaday.com)
Yesterday, Prusa Research officially unveiled their next printer, the Core ONE. Going over the features and capabilities of this new machine, it’s clear that Prusa has kept a close eye on the rapidly changing desktop 3D printer market and designed a machine to better position themselves within a field of increasingly capable machines from other manufacturers.
3D Printing, Prusa Research
54 points by iancmceachern 2 hours ago | 28 comments
Yi Peng 3 crossed both cables C-Lion 1 and BSC at times matching when they broke (bsky.app)
Yi Peng, Cables, Breaking
414 points by perihelions 16 hours ago | 520 comments
How Google spent 15 years creating a culture of concealment (nytimes.com)
Trying to avoid antitrust suits, Google systematically told employees to destroy messages, avoid certain words and copy the lawyers as often as possible.
Google, Antitrust, Culture, Corporate Culture, Legal Practices
33 points by tysone 11 hours ago | 12 comments
New Calculation Finds we are close to the Kessler Syndrome [video] (youtube.com)
Space Debris, Kessler Syndrome, Science, Video
40 points by cratermoon 2 hours ago | 15 comments
Show HN: Unbug – Rust macros for programmatically invoking breakpoints (github.com/greymattergames)
A crate to programmatically invoke debugging breakpoints with helping macros.
Rust, Debugging, Programming, Tools
78 points by BrainBacon 9 hours ago | 33 comments
FireDucks: Pandas but Faster (bearblog.dev)
My main background is a hedge fund professional, so I deal with finance data all the time and so far the Pandas library has been an indispensable tool in my workflow and my most used Python library.
Data Analysis, Python, Pandas, Performance Optimization
341 points by sebg 6 days ago | 155 comments
Understanding the BM25 full text search algorithm (emschwartz.me)
BM25, or Best Match 25, is a widely used algorithm for full text search. It is the default in Lucene/Elasticsearch and SQLite, among others. Recently, it has become common to combine full text search and vector similarity search into "hybrid search". I wanted to understand how full text search works, and specifically BM25, so here is my attempt at understanding by re-explaining.
Search Engines, Algorithms, Text Search, Computer Science
266 points by rrampage 19 hours ago | 51 comments
Does the Internet Route Around Damage? – Baltic Sea Cable Cuts (ripe.net)
This week's Internet cable cuts in the Baltic sea have been widely reported, even as attempts to understand their cause and impact are ongoing. We turn to RIPE Atlas to provide a preliminary analysis of these events and examine to what extent the Internet in the region is resilient to these events.
Internet Infrastructure, Network Resilience, Cybersecurity, Data Analysis
7 points by voytec 4 hours ago | 0 comments
Ensō: design constraints of a focussed writing tool (sonnet.io)
This note is #fleeting and very much a work-in-progress!
Writing Tools, Design, Software
48 points by rpastuszak 9 hours ago | 23 comments
Discarded delights: The joy of ex-library books (2021) (abebooks.com)
Let's start with the definition. An ex-library book is a book that once belonged to a public library or institution and has been 'discarded' after being deemed no longer useful.
Books, Libraries, Secondhand Goods
79 points by MrVandemar 13 hours ago | 57 comments
Exploring the Cost and Feasibility of Battery-Electric Ships (newscenter.lbl.gov)
Retrofitting a portion of the US shipping fleet from internal combustion engines to battery-electric systems could significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and be largely cost effective by 2035, according to a new study from Berkeley Lab researchers recently published in Nature Energy.
Environment, Shipping, Energy, Sustainability, Cost Analysis
16 points by gnabgib 6 hours ago | 38 comments
Pipe Viewer – A Unix Utility You Should Know About (catonmat.net)
Hi all! I'm starting a new article series here. This one is going to be about Unix utilities that you should know about. The articles will discuss one Unix program at a time. I'll try to write a good introduction to the tool and give as many examples as I can think of.
Unix, Programming, Tutorials
47 points by lnyan 7 hours ago | 11 comments
Show HN: Retry a command with exponential backoff and jitter (+ Starlark exprs) (github.com/dbohdan)
recur is a command-line tool that runs a single command repeatedly until it succeeds or no more attempts are left. It implements optional exponential backoff with configurable jitter. It lets you write the success condition in Starlark.
Retry Mechanisms, Exponential Backoff, Starlark
63 points by networked 6 days ago | 30 comments
The Political Afterlife of Paradise Lost (newstatesman.com)
In 1790, 126 years after John Milton was buried beneath the floor of St Giles’s, Cripplegate, his coffin was broken open by builders renovating the church.
Politics, History, Literature
45 points by drdee 1 day ago | 14 comments