Ask HN: What "impossible" things have you done?

4 points by mikewarot ↗ HN
I once spent a lot of time getting Unix and MS-DOS to dual boot because I was told it couldn't be done, it was "impossible". What have you folks done with that same motive?

2 comments

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Used regex to parse XML - including properly handling namespaces!

TBF, the XML was part of our integration platform, so I knew it was well-formed. Using regex to parse what I needed from the incoming payload was several times faster than using a traditional XML parser. This was on the Java platform. People were amazed at how fast that system could process incoming messages!

I once came up with a not so easy mathematical proof for a homework exercise while taking a nap.