Top all-time · #5533
David Gerrells
Personal blog · dgerrells.com/blogprogramminggames
David Gerrells's personal blog at dgerrells.com covers programming and games. Since 2024, 13 different Hacker News readers have linked it 20 times, most often “How fast is Go? Simulating particles on a smart TV”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-09-21, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (2) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link David Gerrells' posts on JavaScript and WebGPU performance, including a post on simulating 20M particles in JavaScript and a demo of the same. Comments cite them as examples of particle simulation speed.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 2 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
just another try hard
Most-linked posts?
- How fast is Go? Simulating particles on a smart TV2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2025-09-14
- Video to CSS2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2024-08-21
- How to Make a Game Engine2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2025-12-19
- /sabby2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2024-07-08
- How fast is Java? Teaching an old dog new tricks2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2025-10-23
- Show HN: Simulating 20M Particles in JavaScript2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2024-07-08
What Hacker News says?
the journey. I humbly share my thoughts from around ~4 years ago on the same subject. It is all too easy to focus on outcome/results rather than the joy of the process. https://dgerrells.com/blog/journey-before-destination
Comment linking /blog/journey-before-destination
on “Why blog if nobody reads it?”Submitted So you think you know box shadows? as a story · 774 points
HN discussionYou have to open the previews in a dedicated tab as codesandbox's inline editor blocks the header from being set. It also may get blocked if you are using a privacy focused browser. I'll try to include embedded examples in the future. You can try out the final version here https://dgerrells.com/sabby
Comment linking /sabby
on “Show HN: Simulating 20M Particles in JavaScript”Submitted Show HN: Simulating 20M Particles in JavaScript as a story · 561 points
HN discussionDemo on mobile [0], pretty incredible to play with. [0] https://dgerrells.com/sabby
Comment linking /sabby
on “Show HN: Simulating 20M Particles in JavaScript”Submitted How to save $13.27 on your SaaS bill as a story · 179 points
HN discussionIf you use shaders and are smart about GPU data structures you can do it, I have got 5-6 million particles running smoothly (60fps) in my own testing which is just a hacky weekend mash with no optimization, here's a blog post of someone who went into detail on something similar here: https://dgerrells.com/blog/how-fast-is-javascript-simulating... From the blog post: > This version can hit 20m particles on on M1 mac…
Comment linking /blog/how-fast-is-javascript-simulating-20-000-000-particles
on “Show HN: Unreal Engine 5 in WebGPU”Submitted How fast is Go? Simulating particles on a smart TV as a story · 110 points
HN discussionI started out writing my own engine. Never finished a game. Switch to unity and finished two then hit industry. Both games were mediocre if I am generous. The janky demos i made with the custom engine felt and looked so much better. I even had folks on forums asking if they could join the project. The issue is if everyone uses the same unity standard shader, lighting, posteffcts, etc, it ends up with a certain smell…
Comment linking /blog/how-to-make-a-game-engine
on “What to Learn to Be a Graphics Programmer”Submitted Can you convert a video to pure CSS? as a story · 92 points
HN discussionSubmitted How fast is Java? Teaching an old dog new tricks as a story · 10 points
HN discussionSubmitted How fast is Java? Teaching an old dog new tricks as a story · 5 points
HN discussionSubmitted How Fast Is Swift? as a story · 5 points
HN discussionSubmitted How to Make a Game Engine as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted How fast is go? simulating particles on a smart TV as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Video to CSS as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Video to CSS as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted How not to run a SaaS company as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Why Everyone Hates Levels as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted So you think you know box shadows? as a story · 1 points
HN discussion