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Show HN: I built a tiny LLM to demystify how language models work

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Re: Show HN: I built a tiny LLM to demystify how language models work

#151
post #64

How does this compare to Andrej Karpathy's microgpt ( https://karpathy.github.io/2026/02/12/microgpt/ ) or minGPT ( https://github.com/karpathy/minGPT )?

Who cares how it compares, it's not a product it's a cool project

> Who cares how it compares

Well, the person who asked the question, for one. I'm sure they're not the only one. Best not to assume why people are asking though, so you can save time by not writing irrelevant comments.

Re: Show HN: I built a tiny LLM to demystify how language models work

#154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There isn't enough training data though, is there? The "secret sauce" of LLMs is the vast amount of training data available + the compute to process it all.

I think you could probably feed a copy of a toki pona grammar book to a big model, and have it produce ‘infinite’ training data

There are not enough samples in that book to generate new "infinite" data.

Re: Show HN: I built a tiny LLM to demystify how language models work

#155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LLMs can tell you what the code does but not why the developer chose to do it that way. Also, large codebases are harder to understand. But projects like these are simple to discuss with an LLM.

> LLMs can tell you what the code does but not why the developer chose to do it that way. Do LLMs not take comments into consideration? (Serious question - I'm just getting into this stuff)

They do (it's just text), if they are there...

Re: Show HN: I built a tiny LLM to demystify how language models work

#156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> does this work? Absolutely. If you loaded this into an agentic coding harness with a decent model, I can practically guarantee it would be able to help you figure out what's going on. > there is no more need for writing high level docs? Absolutely not. That would be like exploring a cave without a flashlight, knowing that you could just feel your way around in the dark instead. Code is not always self-documenting,…

> If you loaded this into an agentic coding harness with a decent model, I can practically guarantee it would be able to help you figure out what's going on. My non-coder but technically savvy boss has been doing this lately to great success. It's nice because I spend less time on it since the model has taken my place for the most part.

> since the model has taken my place for the most part

Hah, you realize the same thing is going on in your boss's head right? The pie chart of Things-I-Need-stronglikedan-For just shrank tiny bit...

Re: Show HN: I built a tiny LLM to demystify how language models work

#157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There isn't enough training data though, is there? The "secret sauce" of LLMs is the vast amount of training data available + the compute to process it all.

I think you could probably feed a copy of a toki pona grammar book to a big model, and have it produce ‘infinite’ training data

This is essentially a distillation on the bigger model; you'd wind up surfacing a lot of artifacts from the host model, amplifying them in the same way repeated photocopying introduces errors.

https://dailyai.com/2025/05/create-a-replica-of-this-image-d...

Re: Show HN: I built a tiny LLM to demystify how language models work

#160
post #92
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meaning/goal of life is to reproduce. Food (and everything else) is only a means to it. Reproduction is the only root goal given by nature to any life form. All resources and qualities are provided are only to help mating.

Then why are reproductive rates so low in western countries? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fer...

not just western countries
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