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Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

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Re: Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

#41
post #39

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> IMHO it'd be nice if you donated some of your earnings to a human rights focused NGO operating in the area. Is there somehow a difference in impact depending on who does this? Maybe if you chipped in, the Qatar slave workers would be even better off. Or is this just about guilt-tripping strangers for their past? :-)

My free funds are currently 100% dedicated to helping Ukraine and will be until Russia falls back to 1991 borders.

Re: Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

#42

I wrote the GNC firmware for a loitering munition and it's... complicated. I am both very proud of and saddened by it. I'm also realizing that it could be said to be the most "impactful" thing I've built.

beats fuzing bus for a plain ol gbu

Re: Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

#43

I won't say much more here but this second question caught my eye, because the answer is the same as for your earlier question. Some impactful work I am intensely proud of also became a thing that haunts me (or at least challenged my idea of "doing good"). Think about dual-use. You may never really know quite how your creations pan out. Not quite in the league of Mikhail Kalashnikov, but it piqued my now intense inte…

Do you mean the missile would lock on to what the pilot is looking at when it's fired, or it would change target inflight if the pilot looks elsewhere? I'm intrigued by how missiles work. I bought this [0] book to learn about them but I've forgotten math. [0] https://www.amazon.co.uk/Tactical-Strategic-Missile-Guidance...

The former. The clue is in the "fire and forget" bit. Not that I know much about it. These things are well compartmentalised - as I found out. :)

Re: Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

#45
Not anything too big, but... I wrote a program to merge Jupyter notebooks properly. The backend was mostly done, and I had a start on the GUI.

Then I found out about nbdime, which did nearly everything I wanted. I ended up just making a simple Python script to make using nbdime more convenient, and soon I'm planning to make a vs code extension to make it 1-click.

Re: Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

#46
post #2

I have wasted a lot of time building a two sided marketplace for gigs, that was the biggest thing i regret, that i kept trying for much too long of a time

Why sis you regret it?

Sounds like he regrets spending so much time working on something that didn't result in anything useful. That's been most of my career, so I empathize.

Re: Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

#47
post #44

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condescending : having or showing an attitude of patronizing superiority.

I don't see anything patronizing or showing superiority in what I wrote. I am saying this as a peer, not as a superior.

It's kinda weird to expect people not to make mistakes such as this if nobody tells them it's wrong. And it's normal for people to tell other people they do bad stuff if they do.

Re: Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

#48
post #25

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That’s quite condescending.

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>Now they should try to make it right - donating money to people trying to fix the situation is a good way to do that.

You're assuming that this individual hasn't already done something to atone (which goes against HN's rule to assume best intentions). That, coupled with a tone that comes off as though you know better than this person, basically round out the definition of "condescending".

Re: Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

#49
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s quite condescending.

Quoted post unavailable.

Donating money rarely fixes problems. What it does is create organizations that draw their lifeblood from the continued existence of the problem, and continued donations of money.

Re: Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

#50
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

>Now they should try to make it right - donating money to people trying to fix the situation is a good way to do that. You're assuming that this individual hasn't already done something to atone (which goes against HN's rule to assume best intentions). That, coupled with a tone that comes off as though you know better than this person, basically round out the definition of "condescending".

I am not assuming anything. I made a suggestion, nothing else. They're free to do nothing if they feel like they already did enough. You're assuming I'm assuming , which goes against the HN rule to assume best intentions.
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