As always, the TIOBE Index is of dubious value. The fact that it ranks Delphi above both Go and Rust should give you an idea of why.

Yeah it's rather odd, also jumps like this in ADA makes you wonder

https://www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/ada/

Ada is being discussed a lot on HN as some sort of 'lost utopia', and AFAIK Tiobe doesn't count actual usage but (more or less) mentions.

C is hardly any path forward

It's not much different from any other high level programming language. Just a different set of compromises to accept.

Yes why would anyone choose to make a fool of themselves when they could choose to build instead?

p.s. in case you don't want to follow the link, number 2 on the list

And yet my licensed Visual Studio 2026 that's supposed to be for serious-face commercial development is rife with Copilot.

> You may stop using Copilot at any time.

But how? Microsoft has shoved it into so many products that I don't see how it's possible, without dropping them alltogether.

The link is pretty clear that it is only about copilot.com, not every product that has copilot in the name:

> These Terms apply to your use of “Copilot,” which includes:

> The standalone Copilot apps on your computer or mobile device

> The Copilot service we offer at copilot.microsoft.com, copilot.com, and copilot.ai

> Conversations you have with Copilot through other Microsoft apps and websites

> Conversations you have with Copilot through third-party apps and platforms

> Other Copilot-branded apps and services that link to these Terms

> These Terms don’t apply to Microsoft 365 Copilot apps or services unless that specific app or service says that these Terms apply.

Some of what I learned from a decade of keeping up with the perfusion of JS libraries and frameworks seems relevant to AI:

- anything with good enough adoption is good enough (unless I'm an SME to judge directly)

- build something with it before considering a switch

- they're similar enough that what I learn in one will transfer to others

- everything sucks compared with 2-3 years from now; switching between "sucks" and "sucks+" will look silly in retrospect

how do you prevent lock-in when choosing?

If you can build, test and run your project entirely from the command line you're never locked in. Every project I've worked on in the past decade has not enforced a choice of editor, and most have been portable to 2-3 OSes.

Try the "Paste as plain text" tool in PowerToys - https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/powertoys/advanced....

Every time I start playing Factorio it's always a matter of time before I'm trying to figure out how to solve factories with VHDL and how to interface Magic VLSI with the game's blueprints. From there it's another day or so before I'm reviewing EE graduate programs and working out how much math I would need to grind.

I had this experience with Eve Online back in the day. The optimization limit horseshoes back into the real world.

Case in point: just reading this thread started me learning about discrete event simulation. Damn you Factorio.

The industrial hubs I'm familar with use optoisolators to separate the host and attached devices, I think. Advantech has a USB-3 version (P/N USB-4630), but I can't speak to these personally.

Absolutley. In a hardware-development context, we use them to stop frying computers with broken devices. I've had good experience with the BB-UHR304 from Advantech. They're expensive and occasionally sacrificial, but cheaper than replacing an average pc / laptop. https://www.advantech.com/en/products/c9300564-0829-46eb-955...

HN has a high concentration of above-average salaries, even within the US. It's tough constantly hearing how many multiples more my southern equivalent at FAANG is earning without it affecting my sense of self worth.

I think this is one of the major downsides of focusing on money as the primary part of a job. It can easily become a constant comparison, which has a natural way of making you miserable.

I've always just used the palm of my hand. You can work a keyboard with more surfaces than just your fingertips.

Most definitely. I've been playing with using ChatGPT to generate proof texts in Isabelle/HOL, since it lets me verify the correctness of the output before code generation.