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Top stories from https://news.ycombinator.com (with 100+ score) Contribute to the development here: https://github.com/phil-r/hackernewsbot Also check https://t.me/designer_news Contacts: @philr
Donald Bitzer has died (Score: 150+ in 19 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6junQ
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6junQ
OpenAI whistleblower found dead in San Francisco apartment (🔥 Score: 158+ in 1 hour)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jwtY
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jwtY
Making my first robot as a software engineer (❄️ Score: 154+ in 2 days)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jkMP
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jkMP
Scrabble star wins Spanish world title despite not speaking Spanish (❄️ Score: 150+ in 3 days)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jjhR
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jjhR
What every systems programmer should know about concurrency (2020) [pdf] (Score: 150+ in 22 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jtBJ
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jtBJ
Mathematicians uncover a new way to count prime numbers (Score: 151+ in 14 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6juff
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6juff
Taming LLMs – A Practical Guide to LLM Pitfalls with Open Source Software (Score: 151+ in 17 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jtKU
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jtKU
The FDA Hasn't Inspected This Drug Factory After 7 Recalls for the Same Flaw (Score: 150+ in 23 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jsgu
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jsgu
The age of average (2023) (Score: 153+ in 8 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jujZ
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jujZ
Storing Times for Human Events (❄️ Score: 150+ in 4 days)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jf4E
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jf4E
Show HN: I designed an espresso machine and coffee grinder (Score: 154+ in 8 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6ju2Y
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6ju2Y
It was a lot of work as a solo project but I hope you guys think it’s cool. When I say “we” in the website it’s only in the most royal sense possible. I also did all the photo/videography. I started out designing a single machine for personal use, but like many things it sort of spiraled out of control from there.
I felt like espresso machines were getting very large, plasticky, and app-integrated without actually improving the underlying technologies that make them work. The noisy vibratory pumps in particular are from 1977 and haven’t really changed since then. So I wanted to focus on making the most advanced internals I could and leaving everything else as minimalist as possible. The pump is, as far as I know, completely unique in terms of power density and price. Without spending several thousand dollars, it was difficult to find a machine with a gear pump, and adjustable pressure was also similarly expensive but this machine has those things and costs a normal amount to buy. You can also turn the pressure way down and make filter coffee.
I also saw so many people (including myself) using a scale while making espresso, and even putting a cup below the group head to catch drips, entirely negating the drip tray, so I basically designed for that! The profile of the machine is much lighter on the eyes and doesn’t loom in the corner like my old espresso machine did.
And for the grinder, basically everything on the market uses conical and flat burrs that have descended from spice grinders, and the same couple of standard sizes. Sometimes larger companies design their own burrs, but only within those existing shapes. There is sort of a rush to put larger and larger burrs into coffee grinders, which makes sense, but with cylindrical burrs, you can increase the cutting surface way more relative to the size of the grinder. When grinders get too big, maintaining alignment becomes mechanically cumbersome, but the cylindrical burr can be very well supported from the inside, and there is the added benefit of hiding the entire motor within the burr itself. The resulting grounds are just outright better than all the other grinders I have used, but obviously this is a matter of taste and my own personal bias.
The biggest downside for the grinder is that it doesn’t work with starbucks style oily roasts, because the coffee expands so much while traveling down through the burrs and can sometimes clog up the teeth. It doesn’t hurt the grinder but it does require cleaning (which is tool-free!). Another downside for both machines is the fact that they run on DC power so it’s best if you have a spot in your kitchen to tuck away the power brick.
I also made a kit that makes the gear pump a drop-in upgrade for other espresso machines, to reduce noise and add adjustable pressure.
https://velofuso.com/store/p/gear-pump-upgrade-kit
The roughest part of this process were the moments midway through development where they weren’t working at all. When the grinder is just jamming itself instantly or the fourth factory in a row tells you the part you’re making is impossible or the pump is alternating between spraying water out the side and into your face and not pumping at all. And the default thought is “Of course it’s not working, if this was going to work someone else would have already made it like this”. The route you’ve taken is fundamentally different enough that there are no existing solutions to draw on. You’re basically feeling around in the dark for months on end, burning money, and then one day, every little cumulative change suddenly adds up to a tasty espresso. And it’s not perfect yet, but you at least can see the road ahead.
Anyways, this is way more than I expected to write, thank you for reading! Tell me if you have any questions
A new video captures a 1968 demo of IBM’s Executive Terminal (Score: 153+ in 5 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6juaq
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6juaq
Unexpected Keyboard (❄️ Score: 152+ in 2 days)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jiZe
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jiZe
Show HN: Kubernetes Spec Explorer (Score: 150+ in 10 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jsjx
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jsjx
I built an interactive explorer for Kubernetes resources spec
A few things included:
- Tree view with schema, type and description of all native resources
- History changes since version X (properties added/removed/modified)
- Examples of some resources that you can easily copy as a starting point
- Supports all versions since X, including the newly released 1.32
- I also want to add support for popular CRD, but I’m not sure how I’ll do that yet, I’m open to suggestions!
Everything is auto generated based on the OpenAPI spec, with some manual inputs for examples and external links.
Hope you like it and if there’s anything else you think it could be useful just let me know.
"Rules" that terminal programs follow (Score: 151+ in 7 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jsJV
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jsJV
Colour in the Middle Ages (❄️ Score: 150+ in 3 days)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jjhE
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jjhE
Web Origami, for making websites where you can understand how they’re made (Score: 153+ in 8 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jvem
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jvem
Elon Musk wanted an OpenAI for-profit (🔥 Score: 154+ in 2 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jw8a
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jw8a
MarkItDown: Python tool for converting files and office documents to Markdown (🔥 Score: 151+ in 3 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jvRM
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jvRM
Librebooting the ThinkPad T480 (❄️ Score: 151+ in 5 days)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jcCA
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jcCA
Amid cuts to basic research, New Zealand scraps all support for social sciences (Score: 152+ in 12 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6juje
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6juje
Test (🔥 Score: 152+ in 36 minutes)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jv3k
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jv3k
Fixing the Loading in Myst IV: Revelation (❄️ Score: 150+ in 3 days)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jhEX
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jhEX
Devin is now generally available (❄️ Score: 150+ in 2 days)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jjHL
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jjHL
Elixir/Erlang Hot Swapping Code (2016) (Score: 151+ in 10 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jtPD
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jtPD
Understanding the Odin Programming Language (❄️ Score: 150+ in 5 days)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6ja3Z
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6ja3Z
Carta is making it too difficult to cancel subscriptions, some founders say (Score: 152+ in 5 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jtJS
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jtJS
Parkinson's Law: It’s real, so use it (Score: 150+ in 16 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jrHf
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jrHf
Microsoft Recall still storing credit card, social security numbers (Score: 150+ in 7 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jsHz
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jsHz
Canada euthanasia now accounts for nearly one in 20 deaths (Score: 152+ in 13 hours)
Link: https://readhacker.news/s/6jrnx
Comments: https://readhacker.news/c/6jrnx