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Pandas 3.0.0 Released

https://github.com/pandas-dev/pandas/releases/tag/v3.0.0
1•todsacerdoti•1m ago•0 comments

How to use AI in Meta's AI-assisted coding interview (with prompts and examples)

https://interviewing.io/blog/how-to-use-ai-in-meta-s-ai-assisted-coding-interview-with-real-promp...
1•leeny•2m ago•0 comments

The 2030 Race for a Moon Reactor

https://www.universetoday.com/articles/the-2030-race-for-a-moon-reactor
1•rbanffy•2m ago•0 comments

Show HN: QRY – Natural Language to SQL Using Claude Code/Codex CLI

1•amansingh-afk•3m ago•0 comments

What does Software Engineering mean when machine writes the code

https://www.shayon.dev/post/2026/19/software-engineering-when-the-machine-writes-code/
1•shayonj•5m ago•0 comments

Black Horror on the Rhine (Wikipedia)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Horror_on_the_Rhine
1•subjektivation•5m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Rowboat – Open-Source Claude Cowork with an Obsidian Vault

https://www.rowboatlabs.com/
2•segmenta•6m ago•0 comments

We ran high-level US civil war simulations. Minnesota is how they start

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jan/21/ice-minnesota-trump
1•Teever•6m ago•0 comments

AdGuard VPN protocol goes open-source – meet TrustTunnel

https://adguard-vpn.com/en/blog/adguard-vpn-protocol-goes-open-source-meet-trusttunnel.html
2•kumrayu•6m ago•0 comments

Open source server code for the BitCraft MMORPG

https://github.com/clockworklabs/BitCraftPublic
1•sfkgtbor•7m ago•0 comments

A Malicious Push Network: What 57M Logs Taught Us

https://www.infoblox.com/blog/threat-intelligence/inside-a-malicious-push-network-what-57m-logs-t...
1•aa_is_op•8m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Aiwaf now supports local Geo-blocking and country-level rules

https://github.com/aayushgauba/aiwaf
1•aayushgauba•9m ago•0 comments

TidesDB v7.3.1 vs. RocksDB v10.9.1 Performance Benchmark

https://tidesdb.com/articles/tidesdb-7-3-1-vs-rocksdb-10-9-1-benchmark/
1•alexpadula•10m ago•0 comments

CEOs Say AI Is Making Work More Efficient. Employees Tell a Different Story

https://www.wsj.com/lifestyle/workplace/ceos-say-ai-is-making-work-more-efficient-employees-tell-...
1•_tk_•11m ago•0 comments

Please Please Please Let Me Code How I Want

https://csmeyer.substack.com/p/please-please-please-let-me-code
1•csmeyer•15m ago•0 comments

Clean Energy in Data Centers Could Avoid Trillions in Climate and Health Costs

https://blog.ucs.org/steve-clemmer/powering-data-centers-with-clean-energy-could-avoid-trillions-...
1•giuliomagnifico•15m ago•0 comments

Incremental AI Adoption for E-Commerce – Arcturus Labs

http://arcturus-labs.com/blog/2026/01/18/incremental-ai-adoption-for-e-commerce/
1•dep4b•15m ago•0 comments

I Turned This Handheld into My 90s Childhood – Part 1 (Amiga, MS-DOS and Win98) [video]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AUlKefFXVk
1•doener•16m ago•0 comments

How North Carolina erased medical debt for 2.5M people

https://www.npr.org/2026/01/21/nx-s1-5678541/north-carolina-undue-medical-debt-erased
1•rbanffy•17m ago•0 comments

Get Good at Agents

https://www.interconnects.ai/p/get-good-at-agents
1•Philpax•17m ago•0 comments

Show HN: I studied gender bias by creating a fake AI girlfriend on Twitter

https://github.com/jaylenhester/aiasuka-data-project
2•jaylenhester•18m ago•0 comments

Show HN: Burnt out and failing, I built an AI that gives a shit

https://zropi.com
1•silentorbit•18m ago•2 comments

Do Cows Use Tools? This One Does

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/19/science/animals-cows-intelligence-tools.html
2•elsewhen•19m ago•0 comments

Ukraine offers allies combat data to train AI

https://www.ft.com/content/ab121d67-c823-40d4-808f-861f42145404
2•marojejian•19m ago•1 comments

Memory semiconductor supercycle set to run through 2028

https://blocksandfiles.com/2026/01/21/the-memory-supercycle/
1•rbanffy•21m ago•0 comments

My Neighbor Pays $1k in Taxes on a $2M Home

https://datastream.substack.com/p/my-neighbor-pays-1000-in-taxes-on
2•racketracer•22m ago•1 comments

10GbE in 2026 Is Finally Hitting the Tipping Point

https://www.servethehome.com/10gbe-in-2026-is-finally-hitting-the-tipping-point/
1•speckx•22m ago•0 comments

Databases Are Magic Until

https://silvestreperret.com/posts/databases-are-magic-until-they-are-not/
1•silverret•23m ago•0 comments

Rigetti to Supply 108-Qubit Quantum Computer as India Expands Capabilities

https://www.hpcwire.com/2026/01/20/rigetti-to-supply-108-qubit-quantum-computer-as-india-expands-...
2•rbanffy•24m ago•0 comments

LG Energy Solution to Sell Ohio Battery Facility to Honda for $2.85B

https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/LG-Energy-Solution-To-Sell-Ohio-Battery-Facili...
1•PaulHoule•24m ago•0 comments
Open in hackernews

Millihertz 5 Mechanical Computer (2022)

https://www.srimech.com/MHZ5.html
95•gene-h•8mo ago

Comments

thechao•8mo ago
I've always wanted to build (distinct) mechanical computers out of the following kinds of elements:

1. Spur-gear differential; and,

2. Shishi-odoshi.

Both of these are saturating mechanical devices that can be used to build NAND gates; the latter, I think, would be very pleasing, if exceedingly slow.

For the spur-gear differential, you'd need to up-scale the output by a factor of 2 (since the output is half-speed), and use a locking wedge to build a one-way gear out of one of the spur-gear differentials. However, it has the nice property that the logic is made entirely out of a single element: the spur-gear differential.

Similarly, for the shishi-odoshi: you're going to have to do a bit of analysis (drilling a hole in the bottom part of the bamboo ladle), to figure out the in-flow and out-flow to build the basic AND gate, and then balancing out the NOT gate, to build your basic NAND. This is, obviously, very finicky; but, I supposed, that'd be quite a bit of the charm of a Zen computer garden?

hnlmorg•8mo ago
A shishi-odoshi ALU would be amazing to see…and hear too.

I love that idea.

blackhaz•8mo ago
I wanna run my neural net on shishi-odoshi.
rightbyte•8mo ago
Has any computer been built out of spur-gear differentials? Like maybe some sort of adder circuit, not necessarily a full instruction executing computer. The only uses I could find was what seems to me like the differentials being part of some sort of analogue computer.
thechao•8mo ago
Spur gear differentials are naturally adders (with carry!); so, traditionally they've only ever been used for analogue logic. They're overly complicated for digital logic: you need two spur gears to build a single gate (NAND) to perform a single binary operation. If you want any sort of reasonable lash characteristics you're going to need ~60 teeth. At that point, two 60 teeth spur gears give you a 3600-valued adder. That'd take something like 300+ spur gears in binary: it just doesn't make any damn sense.

I think the last time I looked at this, if I used the cast spur gears available I needed a staged approach to "start" the computer and a 1100 hp motor to run it.

rightbyte•8mo ago
> a 1100 hp motor to run it

Oh, ye that sounds impractical. A really big truck engine more or less.

thechao•8mo ago
Convincing Mrs. thechao that we needed to drop 80000$ on a blown V8 to build a 4b 3 function calculator didn't workout, BTW.
rightbyte•8mo ago
Well I want to be on your side but I think one need to keep the dreams not within grasp but at least in sight.
jcgrillo•8mo ago
A huge steam engine might be the ticket, that'll solve your starting torque problem
byronknoll•8mo ago
I built some logic gates using water and a 3D printed "seesaw" that tilts to the left or right: https://byronknoll.blogspot.com/2022/06/water-computer.html
thechao•8mo ago
Beautiful! Thank you!
QuadmasterXLII•8mo ago
the shishi-odoshu seems like the more promising avenue. The key question in mechanical computing is never designing gates, its designing power amplifiers.
eccentricwind•8mo ago
What a gem of a site Thank you for sharing
mrandish•8mo ago
I just smile hearing the term "Millihertz Computer". I'd love it if building and designing mechanical and analog computers grew as a hobby/educational activity as I find them both fascinating and somehow satisfying.

Also, this 1950s Naval Training film explaining the fundamentals of how mechanical fire control computers work to solve complex problems is excellent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1i-dnAH9Y4

256_•8mo ago
I was incredibly surprised to find that this actually is a computer. Normally when you hear about a "computer" constructed in an unusual medium, it turns out to just be a binary adder or an analogue computer. I've learned to expect disappointment.
ryukoposting•8mo ago
About 8 years ago I visited TU Chemnitz and they had a lab making similar things to this. It wasn't clear to me what the goal was, but it was very cool nonetheless.
ogogmad•8mo ago
Is anyone going to produce a proof-of-concept Analytical Engine?

Will robots (which will hopefully soon be available) be able to do it?

tenthirtyam•8mo ago
This brings to mind two stories: Exhalation by Ted Chiang (short story), and the Three Body Problem (specifically the human computer) by Cixin Liu (novel length).

Exhalation really gets me thinking about what it means to be sentient & self-aware. If the neurons in our brains could, even in theory, be simulated by logic gates then, equally in theory, a Turing machine could be sentient. I can even imagine a bunch of rocks being sentient: https://xkcd.com/505/