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New ask Hacker News story: Ask HN: 3rd Week at FAANG and feeling imposter syndrome

Ask HN: 3rd Week at FAANG and feeling imposter syndrome 8 by HowDoesSound | 7 comments on Hacker News. A bit about my, I'm early 30s frontend engineer w/ no degree who started working at FAANG. Before that I spent about 12 years working at agencies doing web dev, Drupal, wordpress, etc. By week 2 at FAANG I'd gotten through the onboarding, figured out how to get my app running behind all the business security and policies, and started trying to work on a simple frontend React bugfix. I'm struggling to make heads and tails of everything going up. I understand what processes exist and why at a theoretical level, but all the outdated documentation, random commands to input and feature flags to setup, etc. is literally driving me in circles. Also my team is VERY busy, so I've had to figure out everything on my own. I have the app working, but I cannot understand beginning to end how the frontend app works. Also I'm feeling a strong sense of imposter syndrome. I'm...

New ask Hacker News story: Ask HN: What benchmarks are you using to judge AI models?

Ask HN: What benchmarks are you using to judge AI models? 3 by cowpig | 0 comments on Hacker News. There are so many models, and so many new ones being released all the time, that I have a hard time knowing which ones to prioritize testing anecdotally. What benchmarks have you found to be especially indicative of real-world performance? I use: * Aider's Polyglot benchmark seems to be a decent indicator of which models are going to be good at coding: https://ift.tt/94NfTEb * I generally assume OpenRouter usage to be an indicator of a model's popularity, and by proxy, utility: https://ift.tt/h3QIHEt * LLM-Stats has a lot of charts of benchmarks that I look at: https://llm-stats.com/

New ask Hacker News story: Ask HN: What Makes a Good Datasheet?

Ask HN: What Makes a Good Datasheet? 4 by RetroTechie | 0 comments on Hacker News. I've been browsing a few (RISC-V related) System-on-Chip datasheets. Have seen 1000s of datasheets (ROM/RAM/discrete logic/peripherals, opamps, voltage regulators, etc etc) in my life. Some lacking essential info like Thermal Design Power (TDP), # of balls on the BGA package, etc. One (JH7100) including mention of the standards that were referenced. Nice! Another: lots of spelling errors (Chinese pulled through Google Translate?). Yet another: some value declared, but missing the unit. Yet another: upper/lower case all over the place, CamelCase looking tame in comparison (this seems commonplace though). Also: a simple dictionary of abreviations used. Not all readers are experts! To be honest: nice looking tables, block diagrams etc do matter. They make a datasheet more readable, and yes "1 picture says more than 1000 words" is true to some degree. In short: in your opinion, what makes a ...

New ask Hacker News story: Ask HS: Career Advice for Someone Struggling

Ask HS: Career Advice for Someone Struggling 4 by aireo | 1 comments on Hacker News. Hi, all. I'm in a tough spot career-wise right now and would love some perspective from those who've worked in tech, have undergone a career change, or have some general life lessons they've found helpful. About a year ago, I graduated with a software engineering diploma from a well-regarded Canadian technical institute. To be a competitive applicant, I re-took all my high school math, did well, and was accepted into the program, where I also achieved excellent grades. I was a mature student with a goal. Some years before, I earned a Masters degree in the humanities and worked in the post-secondary and non-profit sectors. I decided to switch careers for a few reasons: I've always loved technology, I wanted to use it to contribute a positive difference in the world, and I thought it would increase my earning potential. Unfortunately, I graduated at what seems to have been an all-time ...

New ask Hacker News story: Ask HN: Are there any apps to track grocery prices in local stores?

Ask HN: Are there any apps to track grocery prices in local stores? 4 by cantrobot | 1 comments on Hacker News. With tariffs kicking in and imports slowing, I want to track the local impact at my grocery stores. Does anyone have any suggestions? Would scraping websites of local grocers be sufficient? Any prior art?

New ask Hacker News story: Ask HN: I don't want to work in software anymore. Where do I go?

Ask HN: I don't want to work in software anymore. Where do I go? 6 by needtoquitmyjob | 4 comments on Hacker News. I live in NYC and I have about 6 years of experience. Out of the 4 jobs I've had, I loved one of them, but I just couldn't bear the rest. I love building software, and I've worked with a lot of great people, but the overall culture just isn't for me. I have been abused too many times. I don't know what to do now. And, I am worried that if I do enter another industry, it won't actually be different than where I am now. I don't have a degree, so I'm assuming I have to start from scratch. Some options I've been considering: 1. New career. Maybe a trade? Aviation maintenance? Nothing specific sticks out to me. 2. Move to another country. This was prev recommended to me after I mentioned my job didn't treat me like I was human - apparently European countries (Denmark, Sweden) are much better? 3. Find a new job. But, I don't kno...

New ask Hacker News story: What are the key bottlenecks for AI Agent development in the next 1–2 years?

What are the key bottlenecks for AI Agent development in the next 1–2 years? 2 by jasonwangwcy | 1 comments on Hacker News. I've been following the progress of AI Agent systems like Devin (by Cognition), AutoGen, and OpenAI's GPTs. I’m curious: what do you think will be the key bottlenecks for AI Agents over the next 1–2 years? Will it be reasoning capabilities, long-term task planning, toolchain integration, or something else? If someone were to build in this space today, which technical challenges or application areas would be the most worthwhile to tackle? (For context: I’m an engineer exploring how to apply AI Agents to SaaS product development, with a particular interest in reasoning, multi-step tasks, and tool usage.) Would love to hear your thoughts, and any resources you'd recommend digging into. Thanks!