skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
My local McDonalds is experimenting with touch screen menus. I guess automated kitchens won't be far behind.

It will be a shame when such an entry level job is no longer available to teenagers to learn about doing a job and working in a team.
That may be trading one problem for another. The number one complaint I hear about Facebook is how unpredictable the feed is. For power users, Twitter's current approach to their feed is predictable and reliable: strict time order, nothing missing from the people you want to hear from.

At the beginning of the year Twitter started testing out a "while you were away" feature that curates, currently on mobile only: http://techcrunch.com/2015/01/21/twitter-launches-while-you-...

Personally, my initial reaction was instantly negative. I've now come to grudgingly tolerate it; it's not very good, but it's limited to a small number of tweets at a predictable place in my timeline, so I know it's not messing with anything. I've never missed it when at a desktop, though.
Mamabee's+Profile+-+Bonanza
The '#svpol' people showed up and poisoned the thread. They're the people you generally avoid by not having idiots added on Facebook and not following media celebrities on Twitter. Apparently they're inescapable now, even on HN. Fortunately this link is most likely impopular, so the embarrassment is fairly limited.
London’s black-cab drivers use rival app to compete with upstart Uber
Even the people who get replaced get some benefit in that they get access to cheaper food. Not enough to replace their income, but the point is that automation is good for humanity.

Only the Luddites want to smash machines and keep a shirt costing a days wages.
> Here in Silicon Valley, there are now suicide-watch guards at the three railroad crossings near Palo Alto's Paly and Gunn high schools. Infrared cameras are being installed.[3]

Doesn't that seem a bit short-sided to assume that people will only attempt suicide at railroad crossings and nowhere else along the rail line?
Also, one alternative is people not striving to succeed and then being depressed about not having achieved anything, relatively. Or perhaps there is a middle where everyone is happy being average like everyone else.

That said, if there is an uptick in this symptom of society at large, society should try to figure out the cause and then decide if this is a deal we're willing to make.
Twitter need to focus more on developers. The underlying concept behind the site is really solid. Allowing people to build cool things which adds value and brings in new users is good for everyone.
So make it easy for them! Their API is not great, and I cannot for the life of me figure out why they don't release official libraries for the major languages?
How do you manage to travel so much? What is your job, or how do you make money?
Yes. I've often heard people say things like "Oh, divorce rates are rising, how terrible" – but that's got a certain "silent evidence" problem to it.

Divorce rates increasing doesn't NECESSARILY mean marriages are getting worse, it could also mean that people in bad marriages now have more freedom to walk away. It's a lot more complex than what it seems at first glance.
No, it won't. The sooner we shift from labor to education as our source of social dignity the better. Let's pay people to go to school rather than to flip burgers.
Yes it is censored ship but it goes beyond banned interviews, they filter all information. I think the most effective tool is selective teaching in school. Whole blocks of history are being ignored or re-written. The history teaching emphasise on how China has been bullied by the whole world in order to seed patriotism, while numerous TV shows and movies make sure to keep those memories fresh.
This is a pretty advanced language, i like it much!!!
I want to share what i was experimenting with lately...
It´s a very easy language to produce music in the form binaural audio, it helps me to sleep with my insomnia.
Sbagen is the name and you create .sbg files.
http://uazu.net/sbagen/
Idoser is based on the same source
Use this here to create or edit .drg files from or with .sbg files.
http://binaural-spot.blogspot.de/2010/08/drg-author-installe...
There is also an online converter for .drg files to .sbg and the .sbg files actually show you the source, you can create wav files but they are very large..
Use the .sbg files and in case you want this mobile, here is an android version that can handle these kind of files:
http://www.normalesup.org/~george/comp/binaural_player/
Basic income is a bad idea. Idle hands do the devils work. People need to do something or they go crazy. Let's pay people to go to school. Better educated citizens means fewer Donald trumps. Add a consumption tax as well to discourage consumption so our economy can shift away from bullshit jobs.
Show HN: Beginning, a work-in-progress init system
Fences. Now, 8 foot fences with anti-climbing devices on top.
Because it flows naturally between mobile and desktop. Mobile first design is harder than most of us admit, and mobile first that looks good is even harder.
It's probably dictated to some degree by some aspect of culture. When you visit the websites where another culture dominates, one might find things to be different from what we're used to but similar to others where that other culture dominates the design.
America’s national vacation problem
> Facebook

Facebook has a different problem - sold or hacked accounts.

There was an artist I "liked", let's call him Bob. Bob made maybe a post a week, and it was always worth seeing. Bob also had a lot of followers.

A few weeks ago, Bob's account was suddenly renamed to "BobMemes". It then became a spambot spewing clickbait several times an hour, often not SFW.

I don't know if the account was sold or hacked, but this isn't the way Bob behaves, and several weeks on there's been no change (as I'd expect if there was a hack).

So it's not just about followers, it's about choosing who you "like".
Times of stress throughout my life have led me to turn, or return, to the physical sciences, a world where there is no life, but also no death --- Oliver Sacks

Each one of here today will at one time in our lives look upon a loved one who is in need and ask the same question: We are willing help, Lord, but what, if anything, is needed? For it is true we can seldom help those closest to us. Either we don't know what part of ourselves to give or, more often than not, the part we have to give is not wanted. And so it those we live with and should know who elude us. But we can still love them - we can love completely without complete understanding --- A River Runs Through It

Even though you can't expect to defeat the absurdity of the world, you must make that attempt. That's morality, that's religion. That's art. That's life --- (read somewhere)

On education ---

"And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual. This is what I am and what I am about."

"Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity or it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world"
> Love marraiges are a more natural, a more realistic option over the arranged marriages setup

Just for fun, it's worth pointing out that marriage itself is a human-created institution and not exactly "natural". But if we explore this rabbithole we then have to start asking what natural even means, and if man-made things are natural, and so on.

But it's an interesting point to include when thinking about such things, because it's a good reminder that most of these things are constructed and actually very context-sensitive (eg- arranged marriages were probably once more realistic in older configurations where family ties played a more important role in an individual's survival).
Hi HN, I've been working on this for a while and I was looking for some feedback on it. I've been using it on my laptop, servers, etc. without issues for a few months.
Using the project is essentially the same as copy pasting code though, and having a line like that in there makes me think that there is code in the project that is hostile by intent. Saves me the trouble of having to look through the code as I can ignore the project right there.
Bootstrap didn't invent such websdesign, it was experimented with, learned and improved collectively. If anything, the library implemented these (almost) standards that were wildly used.
A very good point I think, the web in your language is not always the same as the web in other languages, for example sites like nicovideo.js do tend to be different and carry a lot more information per page than American or European sites.
ZTE Axon Elite with 5.5-inch 1080p display announced
What is the sense in teaching SICP in a language that has no tail optimization? McEval would run straight into the wall.
Yes, now read-only.
This is already happening in the form of welfare, food stamps, tax credits, etc. lots of different programs.
I found this on Intercoms blog post entitled "Some Things can't be Wireframed". This picture reflects the meta design of many websites. https://blog.intercom.io/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/SquareSp...

We've arrived with this design from years of design evolution and no one person is responsible. All products seem to ultimately converge on some optimal universal archetype. Websites, books and radio towers are no different in this sense. The same will be true of mobile Apps someday but I don't think its the case at the moment.

https://blog.intercom.io/things-cant-wireframed/
We need to talk about suicide but articles like this possibly raise risk. The detailed description of a person and her reasons; mention of methods; mention of locations; etc all are possibly harmful.

That leading photo is of an exhibition that IMO would significantly increase risk.

The author makes no mention of gender differences in rates of completed suicide (far more common in males). (And it's not just a difference in methods).

Most of the article is speculation - sometimes by people working in suicide prevention but still speculation. It would be nice to see more rigorous research being used.

There are some good bits about the article: there's a message of hope.

But not including the contact details of suicide prevention services in an article like this is dangerous and irresponsible.
Fewer Roads Can Lead to Less Traffic Congestion
They seem to be saying that it's possible to do the same experiments as real labs, on a budget. Which might be true.

The reason garage labs produce less than real labs, is more likely due to selection effects. The majority of people passionate about biology probably try to become professional biologists. The people doing experiments in their garages are those who didn't make it, or people totally outside the field. And there's also fewer of them.

That's not to say if you took all the actual biologists and make them work in a garage, they wouldn't produce interesting things.
I worked as a laborer in my eary twenties in Scotland and they have an apprenticeship system as well for trades like plumbing, masonry, and joinery (carpentry). 6 months in the classroom and 6 months apprenticed to a master.

Software Engineering seems to be moving in this direction but I think this is applicable to almost all fields of study.
I share your concern for the people effected but the notion that these people have little to offer and can not, or will not move up the labor chain does far more harm then good. Most westerners great grand parents were either farm laborers or did some form of back breaking manual labour. The literacy rate was horrible and so forth. I doubt very much these farm workers could not transition into some from of service jobs with very little training. Or some lateral move into other manual labor positions in other parts of the economy.

I hired someone from Mexico on a visa into a 6 figure a year job who's father was literally a farm laborer. He was quite capable to do his job. Expecting nothing from people is a self fulfilling prophecy.
That's in the article:

> While the appellation is unique to Penn, the behavior is not. In 2003, Duke jolted academe with a report describing how its female students felt pressure to be “effortlessly perfect”: smart, accomplished, fit, beautiful and popular, all without visible effort. At Stanford, it’s called the Duck Syndrome. A duck appears to glide calmly across the water, while beneath the surface it frantically, relentlessly paddles.
Most organizations pick designs based on competitor research.
Sometimes there's a project manager in the middle to preach ux.
Either way the site comes out like the rest, and at times its usable
Many thanks, I'll remove that line.
That's why I said "almost" any. Though many of my friends have actually been to Iran and had great things to say.
They're two sides of the same coin. If you have bucket loads of traffic, you can use basically any monetization strategy (including classic banner ads) and make money.
I just assumed those questions were so that they could charge you for lying later if you did turn out to be a spy/terrorist/etc.

Not sure why that would matter when you're also getting arrested for spying / committing a terrorist act, but whatever.
Yes absolutely. Chennai used to be called a city of lakes, and now even Pallikaranai[1] is seeing disastrous development.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pallikaranai_wetland
The decline of bees
A friend of mine suffering from Huntington's disease died last year of complications. I always think of Alzheimer's similarly to Huntington's, although I think the prognosis for Alzheimer's has a shorter average life span from diagnosis.

It's unspeakably distressing seeing people you know degenerate in seemingly random ways, knowing full well there's literally no chance of improvement, just temporary pauses in the inevitable.

My friend was quite open when speaking privately in the early days and said things like "It's OK my mind is still there" when you saw him shaking or unable to walk properly.

Later though his mental capacity deteriorated and one time when I asked whether he was aware of his diminishing function he said "No". He understood the question and for me it was a minor consolation, as heartbreaking as it seems, for him to be unaware of that. To think that you are aware of your situation when your body an mind are basically failing would be that much more horrific. Still it's small consolation. His wife also suffered tremendously, as strong and stoic as she is. Living with these diseases takes a toll on everyone around you too.
Gotcha. In defense of their government, which I will almost never ever do, I don't know whether China historically got a fair shake or not. The Japanese, for example, never did say sorry for WW II and Nanjing. At least China didn't lose !

I imagine things haven't been completely fair for China, but that's life and everyone's pretty much in the same boat. I'm sure you will agree that teaching your citizens to distrust the rest of the world doesn't seem practical in today's global society. China, 中國, is no longer "the middle", it is one of many.
I'm gonna guess that OCR'ing the card's data will take off far, far, before QR codes take off.
Whatever It Would Cost to Eliminate Mobile Ads, Consumers Don't Want to Pay It
Sports Startup HeiaHeia and Hintsa Performance to Merge
The patent office of India tries (again) to make software patentable in India
There are examples in the UK of a shed laboratory mis-identifying MRSA in everything and causing a national scare, costing many thousands of pounds in needless extra cleaning. This is detailed quite well in Ben Goldacre's Bad Science book.

There are a few blog posts about this: http://www.badscience.net/category/mrsa/
I would be curious to know as well. Also if Google Apps have a higher or same limit. I've come across this limit with things that were only mildly popular and I've wondered if there are any large companies who use this that could possibly run into the limit internally and if so if there is a way to raise the limit.
neat! I may try that...
twitter's default landing page is more interesting than the default page that you see after login
Amazing Facts about Abu Dhabi and Dubai
Don't want to nit-pick but,

>gray text on web pages (even despite it violates W3C accessibility recommendations),

the W3C don't recommend against grey text at all, they recommend that designers consider the contrast of text colour versus background colour, and to not use light grey on white. It's a matter of contrast and not a blanket rule.

I do think it is important that we don't start making new silly rules about dos and don'ts in web-design.
Preventing STP forwarding loops
Oh, heh if they have a fence covering all the rail that seems more realistic.

I live in the Ohio and never saw anything like that, so was a bit puzzled how they thought guarding the crossing alone would help.
Its ridiculous that people think the destruction of menial labour will be destructive given all the evidence to the contrary. Jobs have been render obsolete for centuries and the outcome has been an increase in education and skilled labour to do more rewarding jobs.
Teaching taste
I would say, this is good part, common elements, creativity is in the content or other solutions.
It seems most of the people afraid of commenting, thanks for the silent ack!
I mostly opted out. I became much happier when I stopped looking at other people's feeds & instead only email/text to keep in contact.
Yes but IIRC only for the same school and not the entire fucking country.
I can believe that the growth was significantly helped by third-party clients, but I wouldn't believe that the more creative twitter integrations had a major effect. That would be a dev/techy-centric view of the world, similar to those that truly believe that the real-name policy was a mainstream issue that killed G+.
Unless the book is a manga, in which case you will find chapter 1 at the back, and how many of us tried to read our first manga in the early 90s only to be really confused?

I mention it not be a pedantic fool, but because the web also has global regional variations and the linked blog post deals solely with the western web and its layout. There is a marked difference in design and quantity of information (and quality, both positive and negative) of the web we use and the web in other regions.
earlier discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10124078
The Real Difference Between Machine Learning and Statistics
Can someone tell what is wrong with this observation and why the downvotes ?
The Physics of How That Star Wars BB-8 Toy Works
While it's true immigrants in the 19 and early 20th centuries were uneducated, they had a generation or two available to catch up. In today's day and age, they have a few years to adjust to this new reality.

It's true that a good many could transition to other higher level jobs, but at that cost of labor, jobs will go to the domestic labor force. I.e. If I have a job where the going rate is 25/hr, why would I go thru the hoops of sponsorship in one case and on the other hand running afoul of immigration law by hiring a worker who can't legally work? Foreign migrant laborers are on special visas and don't transfer to other sectors.
Finding out what they do is a fairly unusual need though, right? When I look up a company website (rarely) I'm not looking to find out what they do, typically. My use cases are something like: I want to order something, I want info on a specific product they sell, I want support for something that has gone wrong, or rarely I may be looking for info on working there. I typically know what they do before going to their site, otherwise I wouldn't be there in the first place.
Is that a joke or do you have any examples? Links would be great.
I almost did a Ph.D.

Luckily, my prof and I didn't get along too well, and I escaped with just a Master's degree.

To this day, my prof doesn't list me in his page (all other students before and after me are listed, and the lone publication I have with him is listed too).
It's there about 10 comments down or so
Just like we didn't need to fix the infinite-scrolling-homepage before it, or the top-navigation-with-drop-downs design before that , or the left-side-navigation-fixed-width design before that, or the fluid-width-with-header-and-two-sidebars before that. The current design trend is exactly that - a trend. Something else will replace it in a year or two.

The current state-of-the-art full screen background image site is no more a standard than any other design in any other field. Design is a living, breathing thing that evolves as our technology evolves - it moves with the times.

However...

I believe that after years of designing websites, we found something that works, and works well.

You don't need to 'believe'. If you aren't testing your designs and gathering actionable metrics you're really missing out.
This should not be taken as a judgement on Guava. Guava is a popular library, and for good reasons. But the rationale here is rather simple:

A lot of the benefits of Guava have been supplanted by additions to the JDK in JDK 7 and JDK 8 (e.g., the diamond operator, lambdas, and streams).
We are no longer shading dependencies in the Elasticsearch jar (see #13252).
We do not have a proper Java client today; this means that developers that depend on the Elasticsearch jar are likely going to have to deal with Guava version conflicts (which are likely since Guava is popular).
Developers do embed Elasticsearch inside web containers which creates conflicts with the provided versions of Guava.
Plugin developers encounter issues with Guava version conflicts (again, because Guava is popular).
All else equal, fewer dependencies is a positive.
In short, the internal benefits have been reduced, and there are external benefits to developers to removing Guava.
The internet is a giant A/B test. If something works, people adopt it. Once it stops working, people move on to what works then. Wash, Rinse, Repeat.

I'm starting to think that the tech community at large doesn't understand that it's also part of humanity, and thus falls to the same cognitive traps as the rest of society.
isnt there already a consumption tax? ie sales tax.
Case in point: "The Complete Manual of Suicide" (Kanzen Jisatsu Manual -- 完全自殺マニュアル) which many people in Japan have used to great effect.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Complete_Manual_of_Suicide

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2059673.Kanzen_Jisatsu_Ma...
That would be true if every website had the same job. They don't. Some are there to inform the user, some to persuade the user, some to gather information, some to work as a shopfront and others to work as a product in themselves. It would be a very odd design quirk if one design worked best for all those things.
Birthdays are not uniformly distributed. http://www.panix.com/~murphy/bday.html
Yep. This is like someone saying "all pop songs sound the same". Yup, they do, and because they're meant to be accessible.

The consumer doesn't always want to be challenged. See "Don't Make Me Think". A familiar design allows us to focus on the content, not the delivery.

There are exceptions, of course. Iron Maiden's website is dark and epic, as it should be. They're a metal band. But if I'm going to be buying software from you, c'mon. Make my life easier. Don't make me think.
Looking at their score example at the bottom of the page, the right-hand score is defined as a separate entity from the left-hand score. As a result, to the OMN notation reader, it's hard to see the inherent synchrony between the two hands. This would be a bitch to debug and compose (i.e., code) without its display on a standard staff, which would show the time-ordered parallelism directly.