Top all-time · #1575
Louis Brandy
Personal blog · lbrandy.comprogramming
Louis Brandy's personal blog at lbrandy.com covers programming. Since 2008, 45 different Hacker News readers have linked it 75 times, most often “Never trust a programmer who says he knows C++”. The last post was in 2023, but the archive is still widely read.
Too few sampled comments (21) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Louis Brandy's posts on using genetic algorithms to find StarCraft build orders, such as the seven-roach rush, plus his writing on C++, compilers and performance. One commenter calls his blog a favourite among developer blogs.
- Recommended for · 2 comments
- Listed among favourite developer blogs; one commenter says an article he linked from his site is 'really eye opening'.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 21 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- Never trust a programmer who says he knows C++6 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2010-03-29
- Using genetic algorithms to find Starcraft 2 build orders6 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2010-11-01
- PNG vs JPEG5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2008-11-13
- Genetic Algorithms: Evolving Human Faces3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2009-04-20
- How We Made Our Face Recognizer 25x Faster2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2008-10-27
- Computational performance — a beginner’s case study2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2009-07-06
What Hacker News says?
When I was playing SC2 frequently a few years ago, someone made a program that used genetic algorithms to construct build orders [1]. It would produce a build that technically worked, but in a lot of cases they weren't very viable. I tried to make a blink stalker rush that'd be the rough equivalent of the build shown in the post liked above, just with the Protoss race in the game. The program would tell me to do thi…
Comment linking /blog/2010/11/using-genetic-algorithms-to-find-starcraft-2-build-orders/
on “DeepMind and Blizzard to release StarCraft II as an AI research environment”Submitted Using genetic algorithms to find Starcraft 2 build orders as a story · 230 points
HN discussionThe first thing I thought of was http://lbrandy.com/blog/2010/03/never-trust-a-programmer-who... The better I get at C++, the less of it I actually use.
Comment linking /blog/2010/03/never-trust-a-programmer-who-says-he-knows-c/
on “Fuchsia is not Linux”Submitted My 8 hour journey to a single character as a story · 176 points
HN discussionYou can apply it on higher level like that guy who bruteforced the 7roach rush for Zerg in SC2. http://lbrandy.com/blog/2010/11/using-genetic-algorithms-to-... Problem is that build orders are just optimizing the opening economy and these unbalanced openings will be just patched out in the future.
Comment linking /blog/2010/11/using-genetic-algorithms-to-find-starcraft-2-build-orders/
on “DeepMind and Blizzard Open StarCraft II as an AI Research Environment”Submitted The 37signals Effect as a story · 171 points
HN discussionI love the story of the Seven Roach Rush. To quote the linked article, "The most interesting part of this build, however, is how counter-intuitive it is. It violates several well-known (and well-adhered-to) heuristics used by Starcraft players when creating builds." I'm fairly certain that this application of machine learning will present some surprising strategies. http://lbrandy.com/blog/2010/11/using-genetic-algo…
Comment linking /blog/2010/11/using-genetic-algorithms-to-find-starcraft-2-build-orders/
on “DeepMind and Blizzard Open StarCraft II as an AI Research Environment”Submitted An almost perfect real-world hack as a story · 129 points
HN discussionYes, even if you send a high quality PNG image to facebook, they will convert it to a low quality JPG. This is especially bad for things with text. See: http://lbrandy.com/blog/2008/10/my-first-and-last-webcomic/
Comment linking /blog/2008/10/my-first-and-last-webcomic/
on “WhatsApp is blocking Telegram links”Submitted This must already exist as a story · 105 points
HN discussionBerlin based design studio OnFormative did a similar project using Google Maps as source material: http://www.onformative.com/lab/googlefaces/ Very nice to see more projects where algorithms and art come together. This post also reminded me a bit of this project where a face detection algorithm and a psuedo-genetic algorithm are combined to create faces out of noise: http://lbrandy.com/blog/2009/04/genetic-algorithm…
Comment linking /blog/2009/04/genetic-algorithms-evolving-human-faces/
on “Cloud images that are recognized as human faces by a face-detection algorithm”Submitted Demotivating a (Good) Programmer as a story · 105 points
HN discussionSee also: http://lbrandy.com/blog/2008/10/my-first-and-last-webcomic/
Comment linking /blog/2008/10/my-first-and-last-webcomic/
on “A guide to rhythm in web typography”Submitted You can’t beat a good compiler…. right? as a story · 104 points
HN discussionYes, but even well designed games (from a gameplay pov) can have unexpectedly powerfull builds, like what happened with Starcraft 2 and the genetic-algorithm build order[0]. So simulating builds/gameplays can give you another edge at detecting strange/powerful scenarios. I also think you should rely on player feedback and community to spot this kind of things, but that could become time consuming if you're a lone de…
Comment linking /blog/2010/11/using-genetic-algorithms-to-find-starcraft-2-build-orders/
on “No Man’s Sky – Procedural Content”Submitted The programmer's wife as a story · 100 points
HN discussionAlthough there's no need to venture into unportable extensions here - as I pointed out at http://lbrandy.com/blog/2010/06/you-cant-beat-a-good-compile... , C99 has the "restrict" keyword.
Comment linking /blog/2010/06/you-cant-beat-a-good-compile/comment-page-1/
on “You can’t beat a good compiler…. right?”Submitted Never trust a programmer who says he knows C++ as a story · 87 points
HN discussionThis has some caveats that I pointed out at http://lbrandy.com/blog/2010/06/you-cant-beat-a-good-compile... ; still, a nice enough article. EDIT: note that the off-by-one error is MY mistake - it simply isn't there. My point about "restrict" is valid, though.
Comment linking /blog/2010/06/you-cant-beat-a-good-compile/comment-page-1/
on “You can’t beat a good compiler…. right?”Submitted Me vs Backspace: my war against a rogue character as a story · 81 points
HN discussionThere is nothing good in there! Run away! :P There are reasons companies like Google et al. strictly enforce their developers to use only a subset of C++, or to use it as an "augmented C". There's also this fun problem as you learn and use it: http://lbrandy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/c++.png http://yosefk.com/c++fqa/index.html isn't a book, but the author shares your disgust for C++ and it's fairly detaile…
Comment linking /blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/c++.png
on “C++ Grandmaster Certification”Submitted The 75% answer as a story · 75 points
HN discussionThis approach does work, but be mindful that each patch changes things a lot, and there's a lot of maintenance required to keep it working. In StarCraft II, the 7 roach rush was developed using genetic algorithms. http://lbrandy.com/blog/2010/11/using-genetic-algorithms-to-...
Comment linking /blog/2010/11/using-genetic-algorithms-to-find-starcraft-2-build-orders/
on “Show HN: League of Legends Build Orders by Genetic Algorithm”Submitted How did we geeks become experts on macroeconomics? as a story · 70 points
HN discussionI don't understand why he has the source as [unknown]. 5 seconds and google brought me to: http://lbrandy.com/blog/page/10/ -- the original post I believe.
Comment linking /blog/page/10/
on “The Dumbest Interview Question”Submitted Parallel programming is hard. Right? as a story · 59 points
HN discussionI fixed it. Here's the original link: http://lbrandy.com/blog/2008/10/my-first-and-last-webcomic/
Comment linking /blog/2008/10/my-first-and-last-webcomic/
on “SVG vs PNG”Submitted How We Made Our Face Recognizer 25x Faster as a story · 57 points
HN discussionA few of my favorites that I didn't see people list; note that many of these are sort of combined personal blogs and programming-related (like mine - http://joeganley.com ): - http://wilshipley.com - http://lbrandy.com - http://nedbatchelder.com - http://www.teamten.com/lawrence/writings/
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: What are the best developer/hacker focused blogs?”Submitted How I grew to hate every computer language as a story · 44 points
HN discussion
