Molly Guard

(bookofjoe2.blogspot.com)

32 points | by surprisetalk 14 hours ago

6 comments

  • evanjrowley 43 minutes ago
    I'm reminded of this legendary HN comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16530398
    • cortesoft 11 minutes ago
      I am confused by the second guy who was curious and punched the plastic lid… it says you have to hold the button down for 30 seconds, how did that happen?
      • charles_f 5 minutes ago
        The guard itself ends up pushing the button
  • jiehong 1 hour ago
    Oh! Then perhaps the long press required for the iPhone’s action button to trigger is a Molly guard!

    Also, perhaps `rm` should be molly guarded to move things to the trash on all systems by default, and delete only if forced to by a flag.

    Note: I’d have expected Molly to be a cat, because they tend to be pretty good at disrupting things in my experience.

    • Modified3019 40 minutes ago
      Seeing long presses implemented for those intermittent and irreversible actions in games is something I‘ve always appreciated. I often end up making errant inputs, especially on keyboards.

      A guard I often make for myself is removing/disabling the delete key on my keyboard, and setting FN+Backspace to Delete with whatever control software is involved. I often then repurpose the delete key location to F2, which is typically used to “Edit” a spreadsheet cell or file name.

    • denkmoon 1 hour ago
      rm has mollyguarding, that's why every invocation of rm you see on the internet is followed by -f
  • yolosollo 36 minutes ago
    The digital equivalent of this for AI agents is something I've been working on. operate.txt has an `irreversible_actions` section: sites declare which actions can't be undone so agents pause and verify with the user first. Same concept as the molly guard. The system flags dangerous operations rather than relying on the operator to remember. github.com/serdem1/operate.txt
    • spongebobstoes 7 minutes ago
      this isn't like a Molly guard. this is like asking the toddler to be careful
  • Shadowmist 58 minutes ago
    I've been looking for this!
  • hyperhello 1 hour ago
    “Mollyguarding” sounds like a great derogation of unnecessary safety measures. Stop mollyguarding me!
  • jiehong 1 hour ago
    I do wish those were a thing on flat touch sensitive induction cooktops! (For all those pesky water droplets causing the cooktop to error out and turning itself off)
    • gib444 3 minutes ago
      I get annoyed even at the thought of those things! Had to use a few while travelling. Ugh!