Top all-time · #6582
John Floren
Personal blog · jfloren.net/bhardwareculture
John Floren's personal blog at jfloren.net covers hardware and culture. Since 2012, 12 different Hacker News readers have linked it 43 times, most often “Hellaphone: A Project to Replace the Java Android Stack with Inferno/Plan9”. No feed was found, so read it on the site itself.
Too few sampled comments (7) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN commenters link John Floren's blog as a reference for Inferno OS and the Hellaphone Android project, and for a Proton email-privacy point and a Usenet quip. The comments cite the posts without judging the writing.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 7 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- Hellaphone: A Project to Replace the Java Android Stack with Inferno/Plan94 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2017-12-22
- The Bellwether mouse: A modern Depraz clone2 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2022-03-04
- ProtonMail Rewrites Your Emails2 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2023-07-07
- A USB adapter for a classic Depraz mouse2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2021-08-07
What Hacker News says?
See also Hellaphone -- Inferno OS (successor for Plan 9) running on Android phones: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dF_-jQc53jw http://jfloren.net/b/2015/8/18/2 https://www.defcon.org/images/defcon-20/dc-20-presentations/...
Comment linking /b/2015/8/18/2
on “Dumber phone”Submitted Reverse engineering Solos smart glasses as a story · 166 points
HN discussionI write Go code almost exclusively. I don't have a video demonstrating it, but you can read http://jfloren.net/tools.html for more information about how I use acme, and watch https://research.swtch.com/acme to see it in action. Here's a few key points: * Select text & middle-click it (or just select with the middle button & release) to execute a program. I just keep a file full of common commands open at all times a…
Comment linking /tools.html
on “A new wave of Linux applications”Submitted A USB adapter for a classic Depraz mouse as a story · 84 points
HN discussionhttps://jfloren.net Artisanal hand-crafted CSS on a mix of hand-written HTML and Markdown-to-templated-HTML pages, with a webserver I wrote myself in Go (well, stitched together the standard library HTTP code myself...) It took a bit of fussing to find CSS settings which would scale nicely on mobile and look good on all sorts of devices, but I'm proud that my site degrades relatively gracefully and is readable in ly…
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: Share your personal site”Submitted The Bellwether mouse: A modern Depraz clone as a story · 25 points
HN discussionExpedia is really bad about calling all their promotions "transactional emails". You see, once upon a time in the distant past, I used Expedia, so based on that transaction surely I care deeply about how "A more rewarding travel experience is coming in February": http://jfloren.net/content/expedia.png
Comment linking /content/expedia.png
on “I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones”Submitted ProtonMail Rewrites Your Emails as a story · 6 points
HN discussionReminds me of something I wrote back in 2023: "If you wrote it with an LLM, it wasn't worth writing" https://jfloren.net/b/2023/11/1/0
Comment linking /b/2023/11/1/0
on “Curl: We still have not seen a valid security report done with AI help”Submitted I don’t understand .ly (and other cutesy TLDs) as a story · 6 points
HN discussionThere is/was a Hellaphone[1] project, based on Inferno, a Plan 9 successor. There are also some slides[2] and a video demonstration[3] available. [1]: https://jfloren.net/b/2015/8/18/2 [2]: https://www.defcon.org/images/defcon-20/dc-20-presentations/... [3]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dF_-jQc53jw
Comment linking /b/2015/8/18/2
on “Will Linux phones stay around this time?”Submitted Brilliant Halo smartglasses: limited run FOMO, grotesque Discord "community" as a story · 3 points
HN discussionThey mention the bridge but if they're using pgp under the hood it may well just be entirely broken: https://jfloren.net/b/2023/7/7/0
Comment linking /b/2023/7/7/0
on “Delta Chat is a decentralized and secure messenger app”Submitted I Miss Scrollbars as a story · 3 points
HN discussionOddly, switching to a custom Lisp Machine-inspired keyboard has been better for hand/wrist pain than my Ergodox or the Kinesis Advantage I used before. It's a staggered key, non-split, flat QWERTY keyboard. I think maybe they're just good keyswitches? Here's the keyboard: https://jfloren.net/b/2024/10/23/0
Comment linking /b/2024/10/23/0
on “Thoughts on Mechanical Keyboards and the ZSA Moonlander”Submitted The Bellwether Mouse: A Modern Depraz Clone as a story · 3 points
HN discussionhttp://jfloren.net/b/2022/3/2/0 has pictures and a video
Comment linking /b/2022/3/2/0
on “Monetizing hobbies”Submitted Hellaphone: A Project to Replace the Java Android Stack with Inferno/Plan9 as a story · 3 points
HN discussionThe Hellaphone was an idea in that direction. They substituted all the Java bits in Android with Inferno: http://jfloren.net/b/2015/8/18/2
Comment linking /b/2015/8/18/2
on “Inferno OS for Raspberry Pi”Submitted After 6 months of delays, Brilliant Labs delays smartglasses again as a story · 2 points
HN discussionOr if you have a Mac of that vintage and want to use its mouse on your modern PC, you can use my adapter: https://jfloren.net/b/2022/7/8/0 (I recommend against doing this except as a party trick, because these old mice were never intended to be used on a high-resolution screen)
Comment linking /b/2022/7/8/0
on “Building a USB to Mac ADB keyboard adapter”Submitted Facebook Marketplace Is a Joke as a story · 2 points
HN discussionI documented the 13+ emails I received over the course of trying to buy a wallet: https://jfloren.net/b/2022/12/12/0 Everybody just assumes they're the only thing hitting your inbox, like I don't also have "engagement" messages from 3 other stores I bought shit from two years back, plus PG&E trying to convince me to install a meter that can turn off my A/C remotely, plus Nextdoor trying to update me because somebody…
Comment linking /b/2022/12/12/0
on “One item purchased, Ten emails”Submitted A USB adapter for an old Depraz mouse as a story · 2 points
HN discussionForward Email team here ( https://forwardemail.net ), we have a write-up and comparison @ https://forwardemail.net/en/blog/docs/best-quantum-safe-encr... We've considered adding a E2EE comparison column as well (with the issues such as Proton rewriting your emails @ http://jfloren.net/b/2023/7/7/0 highlighted). Privacy Guides Discussion @ https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t/forward-email-email-prov... Unlike Skiff,…
Comment linking /b/2023/7/7/0
on “Skiff: Various Privacy Failures”Submitted The Mercury Protocol as a story · 2 points
HN discussion"You're not leaving me, I'm leaving you!" https://jfloren.net/b/2023/10/12/0
Comment linking /b/2023/10/12/0
on “Google Groups ending support for Usenet”Submitted How to piss off your customer in 13 emails (and counting) as a story · 2 points
HN discussionI've intentionally never owned a smartphone. I used a Nokia 3310 for 12 years, starting in high school. When it finally broke (and I was a 30-ish young dad), there were always several "old phones" abandoned by family members or close relatives, so I've been using those to their end ever since. The current one is a Nokia 2600, which I genuinely dislike (tiny buttons, overengineered menu system), but the miserable thi…
Comment linking /b/2015/8/18/2
on “People deciding to ditch their smartphones”Submitted 9fans Newbie Syndrome as a story · 2 points
HN discussion
