I'll always remember a lab we had in university where we hand-wrote machine code to do blinkenlights, and used an array of toggle switches to enter each byte into memory by hand.

You could totally do that with the mirror on the moon. (Retroreflector + optical data transmission).

The moon is approximately (it varies) 1.3 light seconds away, i.e. a 2.6 second round trip, and optical links can have very high data rates. You could fit quite a lot of data on there! (Edit: although maybe the data rate won't be so high at these distances)

Some amateur radio folks do something along similar lines: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%E2%80%93Moon%E2%80%93Ear...

Tooltips are struggling on mobile.

And, importantly, there already is an official diff tool: the "Compare" button.

Correct. Solely relying on the built in Word Compare tool results in a whole host of version control issues, however, which I outline in detail in my post "On Building Git for Lawyers."

https://theredline.versionstory.com/p/on-building-git-for-la...

Git supports registering custom diff tools for specific file types [1]

Wouldn't the obvious solution then be to take the tool they already use for redlining (e.g. Word's compare function) and integrate it into a git workflow?

[1] https://stackoverflow.com/questions/12356917/how-to-set-diff...

Better to use something like `cloc` which excludes blank and comment lines.

Could there be a limited format that disables scripting? Like in Excel: xlsx files have no macros, but xlsm (and the old xls) can contain macros.

Is it verifiable now?

Fair question. The technocrats are less than trustworthy.

If you're doing original work, the plan might change at every step.

Sometimes I'll catch myself absentmindedly reopening the browser and checking two or three front pages, seconds after having just checked them and closed the browser.

That's a sign of addiction and I highly recommend changing your behaviour towards those pages!

I feel like I need to avoid channelling Bob Saget from Half Baked when I say that is not addiction. That's a habit.

There is a noprocrast feature in your settings to specify how long you can stay on for a single session and the frequency at which you can view HN. Super helpful!

oh interesting (honestly!), how is that it distinguished?

Don’t let me distract from this learning opportunity with my armchair expertise. There are a lot of articles out there for this exact topic, but here’s one that’s pretty good.

https://relevancerecovery.com/habit-vs-addiction/

Interacting with the material is how you learn.