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HYPER-TYPING

Hyper-typing, the act of making typings so complex that it makes them almost unusable, is becoming a trend in the TypeScript ecosystem. While there are very good reasons for using types, hyper-typing is a slippery slope that ends in a place where things work, and they might also look good for the caller, but the resulting types are a complex mess and the compilation errors produced are walls of inscrutable text. Less accurate and less safe libraries might be dumber, but working with them is overall more enjoyable, and the resulting code is more understandable and maintainable.

STARGUARD

Fake stars are rampant and supply chain attacks are rising. StarGuard is a command-line tool for detecting fake-star campaigns, dependency hijacks, license red flags, and other signals of open-source risk. It was designed to automate open-source due diligence so it can be done in seconds. StarGuard only uses public metadata (unless a token is provided) and it doesn't execute any code.

APPLE CONSIDERS RAISING IPHONE PRICES, WITHOUT BLAMING TARIFFS

Apple is considering price increases for its fall iPhone lineup. It is determined to avoid any scenario in which it appears the price increases are attributed to US tariffs on goods from China. The US and China agreed yesterday to suspend most of the tariffs they had imposed on each other. Chinese factories will continue to handle the bulk of production for Apple's most profitable and high-end phones. While Indian factories are capable of producing Pro models, the country's infrastructure and technical capabilities are not yet able to support mass production at the same scale as China.

ELON MUSK'S BORING COMPANY IS IN TALKS WITH GOVERNMENT OVER AMTRAK PROJECT

The Federal Railroad Administration is in discussions with the Boring Company to see whether it can help with a multi-billion-dollar Amtrak project. The firm told officials that it could find ways to build the tunnels needed for the project more cheaply and efficiently. The Boring Company is one of several firms being consulted for the project. No decision has been made on bids yet.

EMBEDDINGS ARE UNDERRATED

The machine learning technology that might end up having the biggest impact on technical writing is embeddings, because they offer writers the ability to discover connections between texts at previously impossible scales.

GOOGLE JUST CHANGED ITS ‘G' LOGO

Google's new logo blends the colors into a gradient.

REDIS IS OPEN SOURCE AGAIN. BUT IS IT TOO LATE?

Redis' recent improvements show that the team is listening again, but many people have already moved on.

HOW I HACKED MY CLOCK TO CONTROL MY FOCUS

A script to display a reminder for what you want to focus on next to the clock in Ubuntu with GNOME.

ASK HN: CURSOR OR WINDSURF? (HACKER NEWS THREAD)

A discussion on various IDEs available and how well each has integrated AI.

AIRWEAVE

Airweave is an MCP-compatible tool that lets agents semantically search any app.

OPENAI AND MICROSOFT REPORTEDLY RENEGOTIATING PARTNERSHIP TO ALLOW FOR POTENTIAL IPO

OpenAI and Microsoft are reworking their partnership to allow OpenAI to move forward with a restructuring plan to create a for-profit public benefit corporation controlled by its nonprofit parent. Microsoft may take a smaller equity stake in the new entity in exchange for extended access to OpenAI's technology beyond the previously agreed-upon 2030 cutoff. OpenAI plans to reduce the percentage of revenue it shares with Microsoft as part of the restructuring. It needs approval from Microsoft to proceed with its plan.

ELIZABETH HOLMES'S PARTNER HAS A NEW BLOOD-TESTING START-UP

While Elizabeth Holmes is in prison for defrauding investors through Theranos, her partner, Billy Evans, plans to start his own blood testing company. Evans is trying to raise money for a blood-testing company with a machine that bears more than a passing resemblance to Theranos' infamous blood-testing machine. The company, Haemanthus, is still in stealth, and not much information is available about it. It aims to eventually raise more than $50 million. Haemanthus plans to first address the pet health care market before progressing to humans.

CHINA JUST MADE THE WORLD'S FASTEST TRANSISTOR AND IT IS NOT MADE OF SILICON

A group of scientists at Peking University has created what they claim is the world's fastest and most efficient transistor. Made with a slender sheet of lab-grown bismuth and a new architecture, the two-dimensional, silicon-free transistor represents a radical rethinking of what chips can be and how they can be made. Chinese firms have been blocked from buying the latest silicon chip-making equipment due to ongoing US-led export restrictions, forcing researchers to find solutions from fresh perspectives. The team is now working on scaling up production - they used existing fabrication platforms, so the barrier to mass production may not be as high as with other experimental technologies.

US MILITARY TAPS ROCKET LAB'S NEW NEUTRON LAUNCHER FOR ‘POINT TO POINT' CARGO TEST FLIGHT IN 2026

Rocket Lab and the US Air Force Research Laboratory have planned a launch and return-to-Earth mission for Rocket Lab's Neutron rocket no earlier than 2026. The flight will test Neutron's reentry capabilities and the rocket's viability for global point-to-point cargo transportation objectives. Rocket Lab plans to debut its partially reusable Neutron later in 2025. The company has been launching its 59-foot-tall Electron rocket since 2018 and has significantly increased its launch cadence over the past few years. Neutron will stand at 141 feet tall with a 23-foot diameter.

REACT THREE

React Three is a React renderer for three.js. It allows developers to build scenes declaratively with re-usable, self-contained components that react to state, are readily interactive, and can participate in React's ecosystem. Everything that works in three.js will work with React Three. This site allows developers to select React Three packages to include into their projects via npm, download, or by creating a repository.

ASK HN: WHAT WILL TECH EMPLOYMENT LOOK LIKE IN 10 YEARS? (HACKER NEWS THREAD)

While the role of the coder will likely still exist in 10 years, it will probably look very different from what it is today. However, it is important to remember that there is still a lot of work to be done before large language models can even replace junior developers. The role of debugging will grow as models trained on previous errors and methods won't catch bugs. AI is just another technology that claims it will change the world - it hasn't taken over yet, and it might not, just like 3D printing didn't ruin manufacturing, blockchain didn't ruin finance, and the metaverse hasn't caused mass migrations away from cities.

THE STEALTHY LAB COOKING UP AMAZON'S SECRET SAUCE

Annapurna Labs was a secretive Israeli chip-design startup purchased by Amazon for about $350 million a decade ago. Amazon's entire AI strategy is now built on a foundation of chips designed by Annapurna. The company has planned more than $100 billion of capital expenditures for this year, mostly on AWS infrastructure required for AI systems using homemade silicon. This article looks at the history of the startup and how a discussion over beer and wine eventually led to one of the most consequential deals in tech history.

FORMER APPLE DESIGN CHIEF JONY IVE REFLECTS ON COMPANY CULTURE, ICONIC PRODUCTS, AND A WARNING FOR THE TECH INDUSTRY

Apple's former Chief Design Officer, Jony Ive, recently gave a rare interview at Stripe Sessions 2025 that offered insights into his design philosophy, his time at Apple, and his current work at LoveFrom. In the hour-long conversation, Ive reflected on the experiences that shaped his career, the principles that guide LoveFrom, the unintended consequences of the work of designers and technologists, and broader concerns about the technology industry. He did not address his collaboration with OpenAI on a new AI-focused hardware project.

STARLINK TO LAUNCH ON UNITED AIRLINES PLANES BY MAY 15

MileagePlus customers will get free Starlink internet with 200+ Mbps speeds.

APPLE WANTS TO SIMPLIFY ADDING MULTIPLE DEVICES TO TRAIN, PLANE, OR HOTEL WI-FI

Apple is working to extend its devices' password sharing capabilities so they work on commercial and captive networks.

'WORLD'S FIRST' AMD GPU DRIVEN VIA USB3

Tiny Corp has managed to get an AMD eGPU working over USB3 using libusb - the method works on Windows, Linux, and macOS, including devices with Apple Silicon.

INDIE DEVELOPERS MAY SAVE THE VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY FROM ITSELF

Indie game developers are pushing the medium forward while big-name publishers focus on safer bets.

A CRITICAL LOOK AT MCP

There is an apparent lack of mature engineering practices within the MCP servers and clients that are being built and published daily.

THE MOST VALUABLE COMMODITY IN THE WORLD IS FRICTION

Friction is the effort it takes to move between systems.

Choose from OVER 1,000 LEARNING LABS AND AI-FOCUSED COURSES

covering the latest AI, analytics, and cloud engineering tools, including those available on Google Cloud.

META REPORTEDLY EYEING 'SUPER SENSING' TECH FOR SMART GLASSES

Meta is working on a 'super sensing' type of facial recognition technology for its smart glasses lineup. The software will be able to recognize people by name and keep a better track of what users are doing throughout the day. It will be opt-in only. The company is reportedly working on two new pairs of smart glasses and also re-evaluating its privacy policies and potential safety risks associated with the technology.

OPENAI HIRES INSTACART CEO AS HEAD OF APPLICATIONS

Instacart CEO Fidji Simo is joining OpenAI to lead its applications business. Simo has served as an OpenAI board member over the last year. She will remain CEO of Instacart for the next few months. Simo will focus on enabling OpenAI's traditional company functions to scale as it enters its next phase of growth, which will allow CEO Sam Altman to increase his focus on research, compute, and safety, which are critical as the company approaches superintelligence.

AURORA TO ADD NIGHT DRIVING, NEW ROUTES AS IT RAMPS DRIVERLESS TRUCKING

Aurora Innovation plans to expand its driverless trucking route beyond Dallas to Houston and into El Paso and Phoenix. The company plans to start sending its self-driving trucks out at night and during adverse weather conditions in the second half of 2025. It already runs freight with self-driving trucks in those conditions, but with a human safety operator behind the wheel. Running at nighttime would double the company's drive time and is a key milestone.

ULTRA-RARE 'ASIAN UNICORN' HAS GENOME SEQUENCED, AND IT COULD MEAN EVERYTHING

The saola is a bovine that hangs out in the mountainous forests of Vietnam and Laos. The species wasn't scientifically described until 1993 and has still never been seen in person by scientists or studied in the wild. It is a critically endangered species with an estimated population ranging from 50 to up to a few hundred individuals. An international team of scientists has reconstructed the saola genome, hinting at some potential good news for the chances of its conservation. The saola are split into two populations with considerable genetic differences, which means there may be enough genetic diversity to start working on building a captive breeding program.

POSTGRESQL 18 BETA 1 RELEASED!

The first release of the PostgreSQL 18 beta is now available for download. It contains previews of all of the features in PostgreSQL 18, but some of the details of the release may change during the beta period. The update improves performance and the developer experience and introduces new security features. It also adds monitoring and observability tools. This post goes over the new update.

ASK HN: HOW MUCH BETTER ARE AI IDES VS. COPY PASTING INTO CHAT APPS? (HACKER NEWS THREAD)

Copying and pasting into chat apps can be tedious, but assistants like Copilot aren't as smart as the 'thinking' chat apps. This makes it clear why AI IDEs exist, but using them can get expensive because of the pay-per-use pricing as opposed to effectively unlimited prompts for a monthly subscription as with thinking apps. This Hacker News thread contains a discussion on the current state of AI IDEs and how they compare to chat apps. The thread mentions lesser known alternatives to Cursor and Windsurf, such as Roo code and aider-chat, that unlock different workflows.

BILL GATES TELLS HIS FOUNDATION TO SPEND IT ALL BY 2045

Bill Gates expects his foundation to exhaust its coffers and spend more than $200 billion over the next 20 years. The total of Gates' donation is expected to be the second-largest philanthropic gift in US history, adjusted for inflation. His foundation has already spent more than $100 billion on a range of causes. Many of the foundation's beneficiaries have been people in low-income countries with endemic and frequently deadly diseases.

ASK HN: WHAT ARE GOOD HIGH-INFORMATION DENSITY UIS (SCREENSHOTS, APPS, SITES)? (HACKER NEWS THREAD)

It can be difficult to find examples of good high information density UIs. This Hacker News thread lists resources for finding these examples and tips for how to find good examples. One of these methods is to look at programs used by pro creatives - some people regularly spend their days using a single such product as their primary work tool. Another source of good examples of dense information communication can be found in command line system monitoring tools.

STABILITY BY DESIGN

The Clojure ecosystem is abnormally stable because its community avoids breaking things.

APPLE GLASS WILL GET CUSTOM APPLE SILICON TAILORED FOR LOW POWER & CAMERA CONTROL

Apple's internal silicon design team, which is behind the creation of the chips used in the Apple Silicon line, is working on chips for smart glasses.

HOW GOOGLE MEASURES AND MANAGES TECH DEBT

Defining, measuring, and actively managing technical debt can benefit any development team.

WHEN SOFTWARE BUYS SOFTWARE

AI agents are starting to operate with real autonomy and becoming decision makers - a future where agents sell software to other agents is not far off.

NOBODY CODES HERE ANYMORE

Just like being good at writing code, being good at using agents isn't a binary thing - there's a sliding scale of quality.

THANKS TO DOGE, GUMROAD'S FOUNDER HAS A SECOND JOB WITH THE VA

Sahil Lavingia, the second employee of Pinterest and founder of Gumroad, is also an unpaid contractor working with the Department of Veterans Affairs in a role facilitated by the Department of Government Efficiency.

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APPLE WILL ADD AI SEARCH IN MOBILE SAFARI, CHALLENGING GOOGLE

Apple plans to shift the focus of mobile Safari's search experience to AI search engines. Searches in Safari fell for the first time ever last year due to people increasingly using large language model-based solutions. Google and Apple shares dropped after Apple's plans were revealed as investors fear that the deal that makes Google the default search engine may not last. It is unlikely an AI search engine will become the default as the technology still needs to improve, particularly when it comes to indexing.

STRIPE BRINGS STABLECOIN ACCOUNTS TO MORE THAN 100 COUNTRIES

Stripe is launching USDC and USDB accounts in 101 countries. The new stablecoin-funded accounts will help Stripe facilitate cross-border transactions between businesses. The accounts will also support balances held in British pounds, euros, and US dollars. Stripe has also announced a profiles feature to help businesses find each other and verify their identities and a tool to make it easy for developers to embed artificial intelligence agents into their products.

AMAZON SAYS NEW WAREHOUSE ROBOT CAN ‘FEEL' ITEMS, BUT WON'T REPLACE WORKERS

Amazon's new warehouse robot has a sense of touch, allowing it to handle jobs previously only done by humans. Vulcan has an innovative gripper that can manipulate 75% of the one million unique items in inventory at Amazon's Spokane warehouse. Vulcan will not be used to replace people - Amazon will create new, higher-skilled jobs. The robot can handle items up to 8 pounds and operate for 20 hours a day.

GOOGLE AGREES TO FUND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THREE NEW NUCLEAR SITES

Elementl Power has signed an agreement with Google to develop three project sites for advanced reactors. Each site will generate at least 600 megawatts of power capacity. Google will have the option to buy the power once the sites are up and running. Elementl has yet to choose the type of reactor it will use. It plans to choose the reactor technology that's furthest along in development when it is ready to begin construction.

FIGMA INTRODUCES ‘VIBE-CODING' AI SOFTWARE DESIGN FEATURE

Figma Make is an artificial intelligence feature that automates the process of building websites and applications. It will be available starting at $16 per person per month when purchased annually - there is no free tier. The tool uses Anthropic's Claude 3.7 Sonnet model. It is currently being tested. There is no information on when it will be released.

THE MAGIC OF SOFTWARE; OR, WHAT MAKES A GOOD ENGINEER ALSO MAKES A GOOD ENGINEERING ORGANIZATION

Many of today's best practices were drawn from long-established internet companies like Google. However, the problem with copying its current practices on the basis of its success is that most of those companies found near-invincible business models, and so almost any practice developed or selected at random likely would continue to be successful to some degree. The practices and cultures that have developed at these companies more often reflect optimizations for the benefit of various decision makers rather than optimizations for actually creating something great. The qualities that make a good engineer are often the same ones that create good engineering organizations - both start with deep understanding as the basis for innovation and recognize that vision and engineering are often deeply intertwined and mutually informative rather than linear.

KNOW YOUR ENEMY: HOW THREE YEARS AT MCKINSEY SHAPED MY SECOND STARTUP

Zac Townsend was an Associate Partner at McKinsey. This post talks about the reasons he joined the company, his time there, the projects he worked on, and the lessons he learned from the experience. After working there for three years, Townsend learned that it is impossible to fix institutions that have gotten too big - there are too many people, too many processes, and too much regulatory overhang. This led him to create his own company.