Animats

39 ms·

751.
by Animats 6mo ago
Here's a real IBM 3270 keyboard.[1] Note the "Next field" key on the left, and the matching "Previous field" key on the right. The IBM 3270 was a device for filling up forms. The mainframe sent the terminal a form w
752.
by Animats 6mo ago
He briefly mentions microcontrollers, but doesn't go into details. That might make sense, for microcontrollers which implement some kind of protocol talking to something.
753.
by Animats 6mo ago
Agree on title. Too dramatic. The author seems to be obsessing about the overhead for trivial functions. He's bothered by overhead for states for "panicked" and "returned". That's not a big problem. Most useful
754.
by Animats 6mo ago
How well does that long translation prompt work?
755.
by Animats 6mo ago
There are two separate issues: addictive technologies, and mandated technologies. Instagram and TikTok are examples of the first. Google Play Store and Microsoft 360 are examples of the second. The second is more of a concern than the first
756.
by Animats 6mo ago
> they will only get better. Then came the new Claude update, which many people say is worse. Even Anthropic says it got worse.[1] HN discussion back on April 15th: [2] Some of this is a pricing issue. Turning "default reasoning eff
757.
by Animats 6mo ago
That's an idea that predates series elastic actuators. It's been used in tendon robots, where there are two winding drums pulling on two cables, with a spring between the end of each cable and the load. The cables oppose each othe
758.
by Animats 6mo ago
Sure it is. The acquirer is borrowing money for the buyout, and the debt will become a debt of the acquired/merged company. That, by definition, is a leveraged buyout.
759.
by Animats 6mo ago
Right. I'd noticed that the first image, of the harmonic drive, was wrong. The flexible ring gear can't have a disc closely attached; that would kill the flexibility that makes the whole thing go. In some designs, the flexible rin
760.
by Animats 6mo ago
Yes. See [1] for an overview of how this works. When the SEC filing is made, we'll get to see how the deal is structured. The $20 billion from TD Securities becomes a debt obligation of the combined company. There's a tax break in
761.
by Animats 6mo ago
BD used hydraulics for a long time. Works, but inefficient. You have to carry the actuators, the tank, probably a hydraulic accumulator, the pump, valves, and the power source for the pump. That's why BD's machines were so big. So
762.
by Animats 6mo ago
Their approach required pre-computation and simulation before execution. If you watch their videos carefully, you can see the advance planning work on some of the screens.
763.
by Animats 6mo ago
Yes, and yes. Yet most of the world's cheap plastic stuff is made that way. Here's the hobbyist version.[1] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-tZ4l6tXPw
764.
by Animats 6mo ago
500 miles with what load? Pepe's Towing, the heavy towing company in LA with a very popular YouTube channel, has two questions for drivers whose trucks need to be recovered or uprighted - "What's your cargo?", and "
765.
by Animats 6mo ago
The power of money. I spent some time on legged locomotion back in the 1990s. It was clear then that you wanted torque control, and I did some work on the theory for that, trying to solve it from first principles, not machine learning. Got
766.
by Animats 6mo ago
Nice. Tesla claims they will "ramp up" production to 50,000 units per year. When does the 100th unit roll off the line? Let's see some actuals. Tesla's volume and delivery time estimates do not have a good history of rel
767.
by Animats 6mo ago
> They basically should have turned into regulated utilities long ago They used to be. Read up on "Civil Aeronautics Board".
768.
by Animats 6mo ago
But do you have to look at the display to tell what the buttons and knobs are doing. If you have, say, a HVAC fan speed knob with mechanical stops at the low and high end, and a detent, you never have to look at it. If you have an increase&
769.
by Animats 6mo ago
Aw, it's Fiberglas? Not bronze and stone? The Wall Street Bull was a guerilla art piece too. It's a real bronze. Weighs about three metric tons. It's hugely popular, although it's been moved a few times. Banksy's wo
770.
by Animats 6mo ago
(2015) "With recent decreases in the price of natural gas..."
771.
by Animats 6mo ago
Redwood Materials is a major battery recycling company, probably the one mentioned.[1] They have a few moderate sized facilities using old EV batteries for grid storage, but their main business is extracting lithium from old batteries. They
772.
by Animats 6mo ago
> Substack is mid-brow. It is? I thought Substack was just Wordpress with a paywall.
773.
by Animats 6mo ago
Oh, a visa scam. Title is misleading.
774.
by Animats 6mo ago
Good question. We know that Waymo has about one remote operator/customer service rep per 40 vehicles. Waymo also operates vehicle garages for charging, cleaning, and maintenance. Those probably all add up to roughly what it costs a ren
775.
by Animats 6mo ago
How much cellular uplink data does a Tesla vehicle transmit per minute? Anyone know? If they're collecting video it would have to be a lot.
776.
by Animats 6mo ago
> “The bottleneck is data.” This seems to be wishful thinking on the part of Uber, and also Tesla. Google StreetView data is probably sufficient. Waymo's expansion into new cities does not seem to be delayed much by the need for mor
777.
by Animats 6mo ago
Does that make the code uncopyrightable? Non-human authorship?
778.
by Animats 6mo ago
Just a few hours ago, Spirit execs were saying everything is just fine. At noon yesterday, Trump was saying that a bailout was still likely. (The first time I read about Trump saying that "we" were going to buy Spirit, I thought h
779.
by Animats 6mo ago
Wow. Huge crash between 2022 and 2023, from 230 to down around 80. Why? That's the real question. What happened? It's post-COVID. Then stuck in the 60-80 range since 2023. The sample period chosen by Citadel is wildly deceptive.
780.
by Animats 6mo ago
I'm not sure whether it's AI spam, or somebody at an investment company who actually writes like that. It's an exaggerated version of the style in McKinsey reports. They're addressing a very important question, and one f

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