ali's recent activity

  1. Comment on World of Warcraft: Forever | Cinematic trailer in ~games

    ali
    Link
    So now that WoW forever has released - is anyone here playing? I have been enjoying it quite a lot. The servers are so lively, there's tons of people you meet, and the gameplay is fun (if you...

    So now that WoW forever has released - is anyone here playing?

    I have been enjoying it quite a lot. The servers are so lively, there's tons of people you meet, and the gameplay is fun (if you liked WoW classic)

    As always - I can't decide what to play, so I am rolling multiple chars: A hunter that's close to level 20 and then I played a little bit of rogue and mage - the latter to level 7 now or so. But I might also play a paladin/priest/shaman or druid (something where I can fill any role other than DPS) - even though finding dungeons was not too bad so far

    3 votes

  2. Comment on Cold-weather vegan recipes in ~food

  3. Comment on Timasomo 2026: The Showcase in ~creative.timasomo

    ali
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    Thanks for the feedback! I did have a ton of the UI completely reworked recently, and I agree some of the features are definitely just fun experiments - mainly to trial out things. It definitely...

    Thanks for the feedback! I did have a ton of the UI completely reworked recently, and I agree some of the features are definitely just fun experiments - mainly to trial out things. It definitely grew much bigger than I had expected so like this rocket mode was kinda a trial at some point, because I’ve had some people that showed interest in it. There’s other things that came up in discussions which I added but didn’t even make publicly available (a robotics simulation using mujoco)

    The UI was getting so cluttered with all kinds of scenarios, that I basically reworked it all with Claude.

    As for vibe coding - it’s definitely heavily AI assisted development.

    But I do have a background in software engineering and I do look at what I build and the architecture around it - in the end I just need significantly more testing and playing around though. In some things I kinda also just have to rely on the AI, because of stuff like: I get language requests for languages I don’t speak and hiring someone for translations of a tool that is free isn’t really feasible.

    I’ll definitely look over all the texts again though. So I really appreciate the feedback.

    My main focus at the moment is to basically allow for the educational users to have specific classes in there - each of these scenarios can then be verified much more easily and the rest of the tool is basically a sandbox thats stilll fun to play around in.

    Ah and as for the sizes: they are exaggerated, because you always have the issue of: do you make things real size and then people can’t really see much, or do you exaggerate it: initially it was actually even bigger, but I’ll probably go for a super obvious way to communicate that.

    And the galaxy map was also kinda a first UI, which I then added a bit more too, and then I was like: why not just import NASAs exoplanet archive into it as well.

    So yeah: polish what is there and focus on the flows. I don’t think I’ll remove anything because there’s thousands of people visiting different parts now, and whenever something changes too much, I get messages.

    And yeah, having a full game like KSP/Universe sandbox will be impossible as a (self funded) solo dev. There is just too much that has to be polished to make these things good/fun.

    Thanks again!

    3 votes

  4. Comment on Timasomo 2026: Luna Space Simulator updates in ~space

    ali
    Link Parent
    I hope your father likes it! Thanks for the kind words and for sharing it!

    I hope your father likes it! Thanks for the kind words and for sharing it!

    3 votes

  5. Comment on Timasomo 2026: Luna Space Simulator updates in ~space

    ali
    Link
    I have been kind of obsessed, improving the space sim I shared here earlier this year. I've been working on this for a while a lot, and most recently I have been so hyper fixated that I would say...

    I have been kind of obsessed, improving the space sim I shared here earlier this year. I've been working on this for a while a lot, and most recently I have been so hyper fixated that I would say I spent over 70h a week on it in October. Let's just say I am exaggerating so I keep my sanity.

    As for things that I have added to it:

    • a freeflight mode, where you can explore the Solar system in it's massive scale (it's still quite boring, but I am sure eventually this will be more fun
    • You're now able to sign up (a prerequisite for all the stuff that's to come)
    • A preparation for a teacher mode, in which a teacher can teach a class, see students join, their progress, and have interactive physics lectures
    • a mode where you can film your scene (which I think helped the tool grow tremendously from 500-1000 daily users to 2-3k daily users)
    • bodies at the Roche limit get torn apart
    • preparations for auditory experiences, kind of making music and experiencing everything without having to look at it
    • and the thing I consider the magnum opus: An agentic “copilot” of sorts. It allows users to interact with the tool without having to go and hunt for buttons and menus. Many users just wanna see: how can I do this, and the copilot either helps you do it - which I think is super cool for people with disabilities and potentially blind users interacting with their voice. I’ll do a full technical writeup on this eventually.
      Everything (except for the website) is served on my own VPS, connected via tailscale to my home network where my 2 DGX sparks sit, but later I realized that thanks to the Claude for Startups program, I have quite a lot of API credits to spend - so I allowed users to use Claude Haiku (which for the price has an absurd performance in the right harness) and now since my credits are about to reset, I have upgraded everyone to Sonnet for a few hours (as long as the spending stays under the limit)

    As for the account reuirement: Since these API calls cost real money, I have to limit people somehow and the only reliable way in my opinion is having people sign up - it's free.

    I have been working on this a lot, and I am pursuing potential collaborations to turn this into a fully fledged fun physics education game. 
How many other educational games have thousands of daily users?

    3 votes

  7. Comment on Timasomo 2026: The Showcase in ~creative.timasomo

    ali
    (edited )
    Link
    Luna I have not posted updates. I have been kind of obsessed, improving the space sim I shared here earlier this year. I've been working on this for a while a lot, and most recently I have been so...

    Luna

    I have not posted updates. I have been kind of obsessed, improving the space sim I shared here earlier this year. I've been working on this for a while a lot, and most recently I have been so hyperfixated that I would say I spent over 70h a week on it in October. Let's just say I am exagerrating so I keep my sanity.

    As for things that I have added to it:

    • a freeflight mode, where you can explore the Solar system in it's massive scale (it's still quite boring, but I am sure eventually this will be more fun
    • You're now able to sign up (a prerequisite for all the stuff that's to come)
    • A preparation for a teacher mode, in which a teacher can teach a class, see students join, their progress, and have interactive phyiscs lectures
    • a mode where you can film your scene (which I think helped the tool grow tremendously from 500-1000 daily users to 2-3k daily users)
    • bodies at the roche limit get torn apart
    • preparations for auditory experiences, kind of making music and experiencing everything without having to look at it
    • and the thing I consider the magnum opus: An agentic “copilot” of sorts. It allows users to interact with the tool without having to go and hunt for buttons and menus. Many users just wanna see: how can I do this, and the copilot either helps you do it - which I think is super cool for people with disabilities and potentially blind users interacting with their voice. I’ll do a full technical writeup on this eventually.
      Everything (except for the website) is served on my own VPS, connected via tailscale to my home network where my 2 DGX sparks sit, but later I realized that thanks to the Claude for Startups program, I have quite a lot of API credits to spend - so I allowed users to use Claude Haiku (which for the price has an absurd performance in the right harness) and now since my credits are about to reset, I have upgraded everyone to Sonnet for a few hours (as long as the spending stays under the limit)

    I have been working on this a lot, and I am pursuing potential collaborations to turn this into a fully fledged fun physics education game. 
How many other educational games have thousands of daily users?

    try it here: Luna Space Simulator

    10 votes

  8. Comment on They released a new patch for Deadlock, Valve's MOBA game. It's a Halloween patch. in ~games

    ali
    Link Parent
    thanks for the input! I'm curious. I havent played a moba in a while. I'll try it. You were right. I got invited in the discord within a few minutes

    thanks for the input! I'm curious. I havent played a moba in a while. I'll try it. You were right. I got invited in the discord within a few minutes

    3 votes

  9. Comment on They released a new patch for Deadlock, Valve's MOBA game. It's a Halloween patch. in ~games

    ali
    Link
    Has anyone here played it? I was about to download it, but I just saw that it's not even available generally

    Has anyone here played it? I was about to download it, but I just saw that it's not even available generally

    1 vote

  10. Comment on TEMPdle: Is your next city hotter or colder in ~games

    ali
    Link
    Got a streak of 28, 3. Best apparently. The first few were easy but then I wasn’t sure - china has so many potential climates

    Got a streak of 28, 3. Best apparently. The first few were easy but then I wasn’t sure - china has so many potential climates

  11. Comment on 2026 United States midterm elections distractions topic in ~talk

    ali
    Link Parent
    Wishing you the best of health!

    Wishing you the best of health!

    4 votes

  12. Comment on Any tips for improving personal cybersecurity in 2026? (I'm concerned about rogue AI agents) in ~tech

    ali
    Link Parent
    Well… unless the supply chain has been compromised (see ledger)

    like a hardware security key

    Well… unless the supply chain has been compromised (see ledger)

    3 votes

  13. Comment on Not Solitaire in ~games

    ali
    Link
    this is incredibly fun. I've been going back to this over and over

    this is incredibly fun. I've been going back to this over and over

    4 votes

  14. Comment on What programming/technical projects have you been working on? in ~comp

    ali
    Link Parent
    Thank you! At some point it becomes so normal, if you take a step back and see what these agentic systems can do nowadays it is kind of magic compared to what we’d have imagined a few years ago....

    Thank you! At some point it becomes so normal, if you take a step back and see what these agentic systems can do nowadays it is kind of magic compared to what we’d have imagined a few years ago.

    Life is a rollercoaster I guess haha.

    I especially like building systems that help me organize since my adhd sometimes paralyzes me and keeps me from starting a task, but once I’m into it, I can be working obsessively for a while.

    I’ve now been developing both an AI integration for Luna and I’m looking into building it fully accessible so that you can use it even as a blind person. I don’t know where it will go, but I’ve had some ideas.

    That’s another thing why these agents are amazing. Instead of making everyone click around in menus, you could allow someone to interact with your tool just by voice

    1 vote

  15. Comment on ChatGPT keeps telling people 404 Media can solve their tech support problems in ~tech

    ali
    Link
    This is really funny, and I am going to make a prediction: In a while we'll see the same in Germany about people reporting any of their banks errors to the BaFin (Federal Financial Supervisory...

    This is really funny, and I am going to make a prediction:

    In a while we'll see the same in Germany about people reporting any of their banks errors to the BaFin (Federal Financial Supervisory Authority) - I keep reading this in the german personalfinance subreddit, where people keep referring to that authority as Trade Republics Premium support. And whenever there's the slightest issue that might take a few hours to resolve, people immediately tell you to contact the BaFin

    6 votes

  16. Comment on What programming/technical projects have you been working on? in ~comp

    ali
    Link Parent
    Yes! I’ve been thinking about that a lot. I just worry about oversaturation but then again, I’ve literally been working in tech for 10 years and especially doing AI/ML engineering for 5+ years. I...

    Yes! I’ve been thinking about that a lot. I just worry about oversaturation but then again, I’ve literally been working in tech for 10 years and especially doing AI/ML engineering for 5+ years.

    I just used to like to talk myself out of things. I’ve gotten much better at it. It I think about what I hear from people, and seeing how Luna has developed - it literally almost ended up in my pile of cool stuff I built and that stays on my PC, but I just decided to share it and e see what people think of it, and it’s literally giving 50k people a month access to a fun educational game.

    I drifted off, but my main point is, that I am a big proponent of local AI. I don’t think either side is right (AI isn’t useless and AI isn’t going to be completely eradicating all labor).

    But the local model by now are so powerful, that with good engineering around it, you can have really cool upgrades to your workflow (that don’t involve replacing your labor force)

    Reading your article now!

    1 vote

  17. Comment on What programming/technical projects have you been working on? in ~comp

    ali
    Link
    I have been fine tuning some LLMs, trained my robot arm to play chess, and I have been developing on my space simulator like a madman. I've shipped so much in the last few weeks. I have applied...

    I have been fine tuning some LLMs, trained my robot arm to play chess, and I have been developing on my space simulator like a madman. I've shipped so much in the last few weeks. I have applied for some funding, but if that doesn't work, I'd love to figure out how to monetize it somehow, so I've just been working on it a lot, also making some reels again, so I can share info about it. So the usernumbers have been looking quite good recently!

    5 votes

  18. Comment on AI models may be capable of self-replicating without access to a datacenter in ~tech

    ali
    Link Parent
    I think everyone should read about that. Because in the end, yes it’s kinda the fault of not putting in guardrails, and it’s just numbers and tokens, but in the end, the impact it has is still...

    The point is not that it's somebody explicitly saying "self replicate on android TVs", but that it happens inadvertently while executing some other tasks. Which the huggingface hack has already demonstrated can happen.

    I think everyone should read about that. Because in the end, yes it’s kinda the fault of not putting in guardrails, and it’s just numbers and tokens, but in the end, the impact it has is still very real, and whether it’s conscious (it’s not imo) or not, doesn’t really matter, since the behavior is fascinating and I mean it’s kinda like: if it behaves like humans do, even if it’s not human, what are the implications?

    I mean I don’t think any of the AI wellness or torture or whatever complaints are valid, because in its simplest form the model is just a thing that predicts the next token. But what about the whole harness around it? In my opinion it’s still just software and just very convincingly mimics human behaviors. But it’s still fascinating.

    Weird times we live in. With people turning off their brains and just letting AI handle all their work and thinking, an AI agent might just be borderline indistinguishable from a human, at least from a work perspective lol.

    Either way, hold the AI companies executives accountable for their agents committing felonies and see how quickly they stop

    11 votes

  19. Comment on Anyone using a DGX Spark? in ~comp

    ali
    Link Parent
    Thanks for the insightful answer. I also think that the Apple Studio might be a good purchase for pure LLM work. I just like having access to NVIDIAs ecosystem, and even though the Tokens per...

    Thanks for the insightful answer.

    I also think that the Apple Studio might be a good purchase for pure LLM work. I just like having access to NVIDIAs ecosystem, and even though the Tokens per second aren't the fastest, they're good enough for me to prototype and I might try putting it into a CoLocation to see how well it performs with good networking. I just really also cared about the portability + robotics aspect, which is why I went with the spark.

    I am currently running different projects for robotics (using a LLM harness) and LoRa with my sparks.

    FWIW both devices have just increased in price since I bought them, so I am not that worried about the cost - writing them off makes it not THAT big of an investment, and having the option to resell them for potentially more than I bought them for, is even a plus. I guess in a way it's both compute and a diversified portfolio (is that how watch people justify their expenses?)

  20. Comment on Anyone using a DGX Spark? in ~comp

    ali
    Link Parent
    I realized I never answered you, and I've been since thinking about the sparks often. A small update from my side: I agree that checking the models on openrouter first is a great approach to see...

    I realized I never answered you, and I've been since thinking about the sparks often. A small update from my side:

    1. I agree that checking the models on openrouter first is a great approach to see what you can use.
    2. I did end up purchasing a GX10 after waiting a bit and watching the price rise to 4250 - since then, they have gone up to 5.5 - I have also decided to buy a DGX Spark at 5800 Euro- 2 days later the price went up to 6400 (and 6700 at most other sellers) - I kinda saw that coming, so I did actually place an order for 2 more sparks, but sadly the seller had a technical error, so I couldn't check them out- the next day they were at 6k so I was hesitant... Now, less than a week later, the price increase of all 4 would've kinda paid for one by itself. Pretty absurd times we live in.

    I'm pretty happy with having these local machines, since I want to also work in this field, and having some compute for local developments takes off the coordination task for renting cloud GPUs (even if they would've been cheaper)

    In the end, it seems more like the investment of this hardware is less of a business cost, and more of an investment, unless the prices come down eventually (which would be a great thing anyways) - so I guess it's either great that I have secured some computing power, or it's great because prices have normalized.

    1 vote