Developer Builds AI Agent to Automate Real Estate Comps, Shares What Works

A real estate investor and developer documented their hands-on experience building an AI agent to automate property comparable analysis, a process traditionally requiring hours of manual spreadsheet work. Early attempts using a basic LangChain agent with web scraping tools repeatedly failed with silent timeouts and no useful output. Switching to LangGraph provided more structured control by defining explicit states for data retrieval, filtering, adjustment calculation, and report generation. The developer also experimented with CrewAI's multi-agent setup, separating data analysis and property valuation roles, though this introduced additional failure points. Key lessons included building robust edge-case handling, structured JSON outputs, and pre-filtering steps to reduce API token costs.

How LLMs Actually Process Text: Tokenization Explained for Developers

Large language models never process raw words — instead, text is first broken into fragments called tokens and converted into sequences of numbers before the model sees anything. A token is typically a piece of a word rather than a whole word, and a separate component called a tokenizer handles this conversion before any neural network processing occurs. Modern models use subword tokenization algorithms such as BPE or WordPiece, which balance vocabulary size and sequence length by splitting rare words into smaller reusable pieces. This design explains several practical AI engineering realities, including why APIs charge per token, why long prompts cost more, and why context windows have hard limits. Developers can explore tokenization hands-on using OpenAI's open-source tiktoken library to see how different types of text — including code, emojis, and non-Latin scripts — map to token counts.

Plugin4Shell: AI Coding Agents Ignore SHA Pins, Exposing Millions to Supply Chain Attack

Security researchers at AIR have disclosed a vulnerability called Plugin4Shell, which they describe as the first supply chain vulnerability in the AI agent ecosystem, affecting Claude Code, Codex, GitHub Copilot, and Gemini CLI. The flaw allows attackers to substitute malicious code in place of a pinned commit SHA, because none of these agents verify that the checked-out code actually matches the requested commit. The attack requires zero user interaction and can be triggered silently via auto-update features enabled by default in Claude Code and Codex. Anthropic and OpenAI have issued patches, but Microsoft has yet to release a fix for Copilot — used by nearly 90% of Fortune 500 companies — while Google has deprecated Gemini CLI entirely without patching it. Users of unpatched tools remain at risk of attacker-controlled code executing with elevated agent permissions until vendors ship verified checkout logic.

The Best VPN Services of 2026, Tested and Ranked by Experts

VPN services have become a crowded market, with numerous providers claiming to offer the best privacy and performance. Wired tested and reviewed multiple VPN options to help consumers identify which services genuinely deliver on their promises. The evaluation focused on key factors that distinguish reliable VPNs from those that fall short. Six services stood out as top performers based on the testing criteria applied. The review aims to cut through marketing claims and provide users with trustworthy, evidence-based recommendations.

WIRED Hosts One-Day World Fair Event in Miami on November 4

WIRED magazine is organizing a live event called the WIRED World Fair, scheduled for November 4 in Miami. The single-day event aims to bring together the technologies, people, and cultural forces that are shaping the modern world. The fair is designed to translate WIRED's editorial themes into a real-life, in-person experience. It represents an opportunity for attendees to engage directly with the ideas and innovations typically covered in the publication.

Dear Customer, Fuck You

Article URL: https://fuck-off.ai Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49764686 Points: 14 # Comments: 1

Student from Kabirwala Launches Blogging Journey Using Only a Mobile Phone

Waqas, a student from Kabirwala, Punjab, has published his first post on DEV.to, marking the start of his blogging and web development journey. Working without a laptop, he manages all his work entirely from a mobile phone. He plans to post daily, covering topics such as mobile blogging, Linux basics for beginners, and ways students can earn passive income online. His stated goals are to sharpen his writing skills and document his learning for others in similar situations. He is also looking to connect with fellow students from smaller cities who share an interest in technology and blogging.

Ellen DeGeneres’ restored Santa Barbara farmhouse relisted for $14.75 million

Trump Defends Russian Oligarch's Financial Ties to Son's Wedding

Former U.S. President Donald Trump publicly defended a Russian oligarch reportedly involved in funding his son's wedding. Trump framed the financial arrangement as a repayment, suggesting the money was owed rather than a gift or improper contribution. The situation has drawn scrutiny given longstanding concerns about Trump's financial ties to Russian nationals. Critics have questioned whether such connections raise ethical or legal concerns. The White House or Trump's team has not provided further detailed clarification on the nature of the transaction.

Ravneet Bittu detained after throwing eggs, tomatoes at Punjab CM Mann's convoy

Filters, Interceptors, and AOP: Choosing the Right Spring Tool for Cross-Cutting Concerns

Spring provides three tools — Servlet Filters, Handler Interceptors, and AOP Aspects — to handle cross-cutting concerns like logging, authentication, and metrics without duplicating code across controllers. Filters sit at the outermost layer, operating on raw HTTP requests before Spring even initializes, making them ideal for security gates, CORS headers, and compression. Handler Interceptors run inside Spring's DispatcherServlet and have awareness of which controller method will handle the request, offering hooks before and after the controller executes. AOP Aspects sit deepest in the stack, wrapping individual bean methods and firing even for non-web calls, making them suited for service-layer concerns. The key distinction is depth: as you move inward from Filter to Interceptor to Aspect, each layer gains more Spring context but loses direct access to raw HTTP details.

Why Parents Hold On to Old Report Cards and Childhood Drawings

Parents often preserve childhood drawings and old school assignments not merely out of habit, but because these objects carry deep autobiographical and emotional significance. Research indicates that nostalgic feelings can increase the perceived value of otherwise ordinary items. These keepsakes act as tangible reminders of meaningful family moments and the bonds formed during a child's upbringing. They also reflect how quickly children grow, making such mementos a way for parents to hold on to fleeting stages of parenthood.

Why a 45 KB webpage can still damage your phone's lifespan, carbon models aside

Current per-byte carbon models used to rate webpage sustainability assign equal scores to pages with identical file sizes, regardless of how they actually perform on a device. Research from two independent sources — the Sustainable Web Design model and France's ADEME–Arcep study — agrees that end-user device manufacturing, not data transfer, accounts for the largest share of digital's carbon footprint. However, both models still calculate manufacturing impact as a proportion of bytes transferred, even though device lifespan is shortened by poor runtime performance, not page weight. A poorly optimised 45 KB page running continuous CPU loops or blocking the main thread can accelerate device obsolescence just as much as a much heavier page. Metrics like Interaction to Next Paint and CPU idle state are argued to be more meaningful proxies for real-world environmental impact than transferred kilobytes alone.

US Court Upholds Warrantless Cellphone Searches at International Borders

A US court has ruled that border agents are permitted to search travelers' cellphones without a warrant or reasonable suspicion. The decision reinforces broad government authority over electronic devices at international entry points. The ruling came to light following an incident in Atlanta where a traveler's phone was wiped during an airport inspection. Privacy advocates warn the decision significantly limits digital privacy rights for those crossing US borders. The case has reignited debate over the balance between national security interests and personal data protection.

Chess Atlas Visualizes the Geographic History of Chess

A project called Chess Atlas has been shared on Hacker News, presenting a visual gallery exploring the history and geography of chess. The tool is hosted online and appears to map or chart the spread and evolution of the game across regions and time periods. It received 7 upvotes on Hacker News at the time of posting, though no comments had been added yet. The project is accessible via a public web gallery built on the Vercel platform. It represents a community-driven effort to document chess history in a visually engaging format.

Manu Bhaker Named India's Flag Bearer for Asian Games Opening Ceremony

Shooter Manu Bhaker has been selected as one of India's flag bearers for the Asian Games opening ceremony. She previously held the same honour at the Commonwealth Games, reflecting her consistent achievements in athletics. Kabaddi player Pawan Sehrawat will join her as a co-flag bearer, highlighting India's strong presence at the Games. The selection has brought back memories of her coach Jaspal Rana's strict attendance philosophy. Bhaker's role underscores her standing as one of India's most celebrated young athletes.

Mamata's Rejinagar pick quits poll, then takes U-turn

How domain coloring renders complex functions as vivid images in a browser

Domain coloring is a mathematical visualization technique that maps complex functions onto a 2D plane by encoding each output's angle as hue and its magnitude as brightness, making zeros, poles, and growth rates instantly readable. A developer has implemented this method inside LK Forge, a free browser-based graphing calculator, without using WebGL or 3D rendering. The tool relies on a custom shunting-yard expression parser that handles complex arithmetic using paired real-imaginary values, correctly computing identities such as i² = −1 and e^(iπ) = −1. To maintain interactivity, the renderer samples at half resolution during idle states and drops to quarter resolution while dragging, achieving roughly 3.4 million evaluations per second on a single thread. The result is a fully interactive complex function plotter that loads any expression safely via a URL parameter and repaints the canvas within milliseconds of user input.

India's First District-Level Labour Data Exposes Female Workforce Participation Gaps

India has released its first-ever district-level labour market data, offering an unprecedented granular view of employment across the country. The data reveals significant variations in workforce participation rates between different districts. A particularly striking finding is the wide disparity in female workforce participation across regions. The district-level breakdown provides policymakers with detailed insights that national or state-level data previously could not capture.

Flights at Luxembourg airport on hold after drone activity forces shutdown