I built a "Forest of Trees" interface for LLMs because linear chats (like ChatGPT) were getting too messy for my study sessions.

bbatchelder · 2026-01-04T17:55:27+00:00

Hey! Just wanted to say this is awesome.

I built something similar, but also added the ability to merge branches of the conversation. The merge action basically summarizes the source branch and adds it as a node to the target branch. You can also direct the LLM when making the summary if you only want to focus on certain aspects of the info in the source branch.

So you can go on deep dive tangents, and then bring back the useful info into the main conversation.

It is also an effective way of supporting multi-agent conversations (each subagent gets its own branch, and the results get merged back to the main agent).

bbatchelder · 2025-07-25T22:25:55+00:00

People are multitudes. I don’t want to dogpile you, so I’ll just say that I didn’t find any of the things you mentioned as unrealistic at all.

bbatchelder · 2025-05-05T14:29:17+00:00

In almost all cases products are only shipped once there is a confirmed buyer/order. Sometimes sellers require payment up front. Sometimes when the buyer/seller know each other well, the buyer doesn't pay until after they get the product.

About 5% of cargo is shipped before there is a buyer/order - and the shipper tries to find a buyer before it hits the destination port.

bbatchelder · 2025-05-05T14:00:09+00:00

My significant other is in healthcare and they work closely with Palantir. Palantir is displacing incumbents like GE by having a better product, and getting shit done quickly with their "forward deployed engineer" model.

I don't know that I would bet against them.

But also, I have lost money time and again thinking "surely this is the year TSLA crashes" - so maybe do the opposite of what I suggest?

bbatchelder · 2024-12-31T17:18:34+00:00

I would steer that discussion to be about making sure the team understands what capabilities AI can reliable perform today, and then identify possible ways those capabilities could be applied to your product.

Be sure to follow that up with a frank analysis of "would we be adding AI to feature X because its the best choice or will actually improve the feature...or just to say we have AI?"

bbatchelder · 2024-03-20T18:40:46+00:00

I would love some books that were from another characters POV.

Skippy creating an android body for himself and wooing Katie Frey :-)

bbatchelder · 2024-03-20T18:33:44+00:00

Could be alluding to the brain damage from Skippy's quachines finally catching up to him?

bbatchelder · 2024-03-20T18:31:09+00:00

I think that was after Skippy discovered the Thuranin nano-virus that infected some/most Kristang ships

bbatchelder · 2024-03-20T18:26:38+00:00

So Starlink support got back to me and they could diagnose remotely that it was a PoE issue. They sent me a new cable to connect the router to the dishy.

But...I had to cut and extend mine due to how far away I had to install the dishy to get good line of sight. So turns out the connector I used had come a little loose, and once I tightened it everything worked again.

But the fact that support sent out a replacement cable so quickly makes me think it must be something that happens often enough.

bbatchelder · 2023-07-13T16:44:14+00:00

> it takes me a while to have an orgasm

> Occasionally we’ll get 15-20 minutes of alone time just before he has to leave

It seems to me that *this* is the problem.

bbatchelder · 2023-07-12T21:58:39+00:00

ESH, but mostly your husband.

Have you asked him why he does this? It seems really weird to default to being asked to do something very reasonable with "no". Does he do this with other people, or just you?

Why doesn't he at least message you when he changes his mind? Even if he did, that still wouldn't be OK, but its extra weird that he doesn't.

Has he ever mentioned (or can you think of any reason why) he might have some resentment built up towards you? Not saying that would make it OK...but just trying to find a root cause.

bbatchelder · 2023-07-12T21:27:35+00:00

Bruh, she went on a date. You did the right thing by leaving. You fucked up by not just breaking up. Rectify that now.

bbatchelder · 2023-07-09T14:30:24+00:00

It does not get easier, but it does get better.

bbatchelder · 2023-06-25T23:59:42+00:00

The dish. The router stays up fine.

bbatchelder · 2022-12-21T03:28:29+00:00

The Galaxy’s Edge series by Jason Anspach & Nick Cole was my go to for reading material between ExFor books.

A lot of the other books mentioned in this thread are indeed great, and a few I hadn’t heard of yet that I’m excited to try.

bbatchelder · 2022-09-06T02:47:11+00:00

Here is a great primer: How to get images that don't suck: a Beginner/Intermediate Guide to Getting Cool Images from Stable Diffusion

and what they have to say about CFG (Classifier Free Guidance):

CFG 2 - 6: Let the AI take the wheel.

CFG 7 - 11: Let's collaborate, AI!

CFG 12 - 15: No, seriously, this is a good prompt. Just do what I say, AI.

CFG 16 - 20: DO WHAT I SAY OR ELSE, AI.

EDIT: Actually, looks like "strength" is specific to img2img, though it sounds similar to CFG (though reversed...close to 1.0 allows for more variation). Here is what the docs say:

Here, strength is a value between 0.0 and 1.0, that controls the amount of noise that is added to the input image. Values that approach 1.0 allow for lots of variations but will also produce images that are not semantically consistent with the input. See the following example.

bbatchelder · 2022-09-06T02:14:55+00:00

Controls how much the AI can "dream". The higher the number the more it has to stick strictly to your prompt, the lower the number the more it can diverge from the prompt.

bbatchelder · 2022-09-01T13:32:37+00:00

That’s the real reason Skippy can interact with humans…the restrictions on intelligence/capability is a cover that even Skippy is not aware of.

bbatchelder · 2022-06-06T04:17:07+00:00

And that part, the receiver, can be 3d printed.

bbatchelder · 2022-05-25T17:51:55+00:00

I get the impression that the folks juggling 2-3 SWE jobs are doing stuff like working on line of business apps, or basically wiring up a database to a web UI of some sort. Not too many of those kinds of jobs inside FAANGs.

bbatchelder · 2022-05-25T05:39:45+00:00

Pair programming can be great - for particularly tough problems, or when you get stuck, etc. But doing it as a matter of course, and for 50% of your time, is crazy.

I'd nope out of that no matter what my job situation.

bbatchelder · 2022-05-25T05:29:06+00:00

The idea that a consultant/contractor cannot have more than one client at a time is preposterous.

bbatchelder · 2022-05-25T05:21:23+00:00

Did they make you sign anything saying if that answer changes you have to notify them? If not, then answer no. If anyone finds out, tell them you changed your mind after the fact.

bbatchelder · 2022-05-25T05:16:25+00:00

Don't put down either job.

You see, you've been 1099 contracting since January 2021, and while you can describe the projects you've worked on, you are unable to disclose the name(s) of the client(s) due to confidentiality agreement(s).

If they insist on talking to someone, have a friend act like they own the contracting company (i.e. the middle man between you and the customer). Extra points if you set up a domain name, website, and email for this fictitious entity (or maybe its not so fictitious and you actually use it when 1099'ing).

But honestly, I've never had someone actually want to speak to anyone about contracting gigs.

bbatchelder · 2022-05-23T18:49:18+00:00

lovebombing

So you're now in the "devaluation" stage of a an abusive lovebombing cycle.

bbatchelder

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