skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Are we going to see any prison time for the executives in charge?

The DOJ said they'd start seeking it. (Yes, I know it's a German company...)
http://www.honestjohn.co.uk/realmpg/volkswagen/golf-vii-2013 (A site where people submit their MPGs)

The Golf VII 1.6 TDI can easily achieve 55 MPG for combined. The 2.0 TDI, obviously worse, around 47-52 MPG.

These are obviously UK/Euro models. I'm not sure if/how they differ from any other markets.
All it takes is for a team and their direct managers to collude if oversight and review are lacking. As little as 5 people could have known about this, or possibly it went all the way to the top but given the risks I very much doubt that. It's one thing to have errors or bugs, quite another to deliberately mislead the authorities on a major benchmark for vehicle approval. That's way beyond the gray zone.
I have many fond memories of Print Shop! I remember that program would also print "greeting cards" that you'd fold in quarters. The banners were a pre-birthday task that'd never get overlooked :)

It's interesting that an entire category of features fell by the wayside as a byprodct of the elimination of form-feed/perforated paper.
Finding out what happens to one computer seems like a better start to informed speculation about millions of other computers than not finding out. Sure, it's no guarantee they're all the same, but we can more reasonably discuss whether the observed effects are plausibly widespread after observation...
More than 16B worth of profits?
Visions of Future Physics
I think that's well put.

I'm bothered by the whole idea of putting all my data with any one vendor (with Backblaze or Amazon) and thinking you don't need a backup. I claim "RAID / Reed-Solomon / real time mirrored copies" is NOT "Backup". If your programmer makes a mistake and a line of code deletes some mission critical data from Amazon S3, then all the Reed-Solomon encoding in the world doesn't help you, the data is still gone.

What you need is a copy of all your data from Amazon S3 in another vendor lagging behind for 24 hours that is NOT real time mirrored. Maybe you lose all the customer data generated that day, but your business survives by restoring from backup. (I chose 24 hours arbitrarily, each business needs to choose their upper limit of loss where they can survive.)

A good rule of thumb for a CONSUMER is three copies of your data: 1) primary, 2) onsite backup, and 3) offsite backup. If you are a business that will lose millions of dollars if a programmer makes a mistake or an IT guy is disgruntled, add 4) another offsite backup with a totally different vendor that doesn't share a single line of code with 1-3 and has separate passwords.
> This simultaneously implies that both Bitcoin and cash are not suitable for the mainstream economy.

No, it implies that Bitcoin and cash are both alike in not simultaneously being:

(a) suitable for the mainstream economy, and
(b) not suitable for the black market.

It neither states nor strongly implies which of those two things bitcoin or cash fail on (nor does it state or strongly apply that they each fail on the same one of those two things), though there's a fairly weak implication that Bitcoin and cash both fail on the second (that, whether or not they are suitable for the mainstream economy, they are quite suitable for the black market.)
Meteor is awesome! Really happy to see these latest changes - I'm excited to get started with ES6 and also get away from Blaze and start using React. As soon as they release SQL support, Meteor is really going to take off.

For those of you on the fence about using meteor, I highly highly recommend it. It's silky smooth and really easy to get a basic webapp up and running (check out https://github.com/themeteorchef/base for a great starter repo that I use all the time)
It's not even slightly divorced from the real world. If you don't "pay your taxes" they will eventually send men with guns to confiscate your property and/or arrest you. And if you try to protect yourself, said "men with guns" will fucking shoot you dead. That is reality. And it's absolutely horrifying.
They must have also have some very useful browsing data.
What does it even mean in this context to start doing something? In my circles, the first step usually is to review the respective literature and poke it with a stick to see what works. I can't think of anything right now that this would not work with, thus, I'm ready for anything. Nobody said I had to do a good job off the bat.
Given the prison industrial complex I disagree.
Rectangle Metal Planters
>I was also surprised by how many people live in SF and commute by Caltrain to offices in the south bay.

man, when i came 15 years ago here (after living for years in a real city - St. Petersburg Russia), i was staggered that people choose to live in the "backwater villages" like PA, MV, SV, etc... instead of living in a nice vibrant city SF. Well, today i own in a "backwater village" and SF is too young and vibrant for me, and the once in a year or two ride in CalTrain reminds me about my youth and all the time spent in the public transport back then :)
Little Things: Heredocs
Square Shape Metal Planters
Are those 8TB and 10TB the helium ones with HAMR? Very slow.

My understanding of HAMR is that it is probably perfectly fine for Backblaze's backup products, which are (more or less) write-once, read-rarely. Shingled magnetic recording should also be OK for that use case.

But clearly not good for cloud storage.
"The ones who appear stuck could be the reasonably clever ones"

I used to be terrible at interviews because I couldn't help over-thinking every question to minutia levels even if I was aware that I shouldn't be doing that in an interview context.

I just couldn't turn my brain off from thinking about all the what-ifs and corner cases which in some cases I'm absolutely sure made me come off as someone who was "lost" on the question but was really actually thinking multiple levels beyond what the interviewer was expecting and still branching down. And this, when combined with the stereotypical programmer trait of not wanting to say something wrong in public makes it really difficult for some people (eg. younger me) to 'think through the problem verbally' with a stranger.

It may be self-serving to think this, but IMO this sort of thinking is actually really useful to have as a programmer but it really fucks you on traditional interviews.

I eventually learned to compartmentalize it and just short circuit myself when interviewing, but it took a really long time to do this, even after I was well aware it was a problem.
Following up: if anyone wants to poke around at the file, the download URL is http://ctldl.windowsupdate.com/msdownload/update/v3/static/t... , a CAB archive that contains a single file disallowedcert.stl. That file itself is DER-formatted ASN.1, evidently a PKCS7-signed "Certificate Trust List" (1.3.6.1.4.1.311.10.1). `openssl asn1parse -inform der -in disallowedcert.stl` reads it just fine.

There's a reference to the date 150923203626Z (2015-09-23 20:36:26 UTC) somewhere in there, but I'm having trouble figuring out what it applies to.
Ah, so it's one of those moments when there are contradicting studies and without getting a PhD on the subject one can't have a meaningful opinion. I just wish there was a good way of settling such situations.
I didn't see this - are data centres available in different regions? Or is this a US-centric offering?

I ask because I tried Backblaze a while back, and uploads from the UK were very slow.
As far as I understand it, Taler seems to be great for privacy and society (ensuring income is taxable). Governments can't see how you spend your money, but they can see who receives payments.

Bitcoin and others will never succeed because they are too friendly towards illicit behaviour. Taler seems to strike a genuinely interesting and ethical balance here.
Really really doubt it. I would lean much more towards the Russian government wanting to be able to demask Tor users.
And as soon as they're off schedule because of any hiccup, they're never getting back on it.
French Constitutional Council Rejects Uber Appeal of Law Banning Uberpop
The project on Github is simply traefik without the æ, so it should be ok :)
On Go, Portability, and System Interfaces
Tell HN: In Waterloo from 29/09-02/10. Fellow HNers around?
Hi,

As $title says. It would be nice to meet any fellow HNers - from UWaterloo or otherwise.

Email is in my profile. :)
As for #1, students and instructors can simply create a new github account specifically for any given course and not connect it to any of their personal information or other github accounts/repositories if they are security-conscious.
What stock is going to perform the best over the next year?
Thanks! Let us know how we can improve it!

partyline@quickleft.com
Well, getting caught is never part of the corporate strategy. You could always make the revolving door turn a liitle bit faster.

VW and BP spill are outliers.
I apologize in advance, but this feels rather un-German...
What was the motivating factor in this? This blowout is going to affect so many of VW's lines, and their reputation.
In that he's more into religion than science/tech/making things.

The latest news is that his father his giving him a break from school and taking him on a pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia. Cos you know, that's where every 14yo wants to be right?

The father: "I ask Allah to bless this time. After that, we'll see" [referring to what school to put the kid in since so many have offered him places].

When they return, that's when they'll meet Obama.

It's really worked out for them hasn't it? The whole putting a clock in a case thing has opened so many doors.
Determine the average sales price of vehicles with the power your car now has after correcting its ECU fuel maps, subtract that from the average sales price of vehicles with the power you advertised. That number you arrive at is the compensation you owe each person who purchased your vehicle.
I have never heard of a concierge physician service. where can I learn more about the issues surrounding medical insurance and its impact on patient care? as someone who lives in the US and relies on the healthcare system, I'm very interested.
In the UK VW claim up to 88 MPG on one model, yet real-world MPG is more like 66% of that figure at best. [1] All they have to do is caveat it with:

"*MPG figures are obtained from laboratory testing and intended for comparisons between vehicles and may not reflect real driving results."

=/

[1] http://www.honestjohn.co.uk/realmpg/volkswagen/golf-vii-2013...
German woman aged 91 charged over Nazi death camp allegations
Hooli, I Mean Google, Gives Away Compression Code for Free
Am I the only one that reads a head line like this and thinks.... "Thats complete and utter BS" Titles like this are not helpful. Something like "One method we used at xyz to help eliminate bad tech hires" is much better. Also makes it sound less click baity
BonoU2: Solar Fields, Sexist Poverty and a Modern Marshall Plan
Advertisers and content providers are always free to negotiate the price of an ad impression. Because of Adblock, many "impressions" now go (measurably!) unseen. So ad prices will drop - and in response, ad volume will go up.

But advertising budgets haven't changed! The world's marketing departments still have $X to spend on web ads, and the world's content providers get $X. The only thing that's changed is that they're now exclusively targeting the segment of people who don't use Adblock: customers who view web ads as useful/relevant and convert via that method more often.

There's nothing unethical about blocking ads. Nor will it be unethical when content providers introduce subscription models, or when advertisers buy up half the page. It's simply a big structural change in the market: ads are no longer deliverable to all users.

Eventually we'll all realize that web content is excludable (e.g. Netflix), and I suspect a lot more sites will move towards a hybrid model to capture revenue from ad-haters as well.
This is damn fun.
Except medical knowledge is not like pushing up a code commit. A new break through comes out, but it takes time for it to filter its way through the medical community, get doctors educated, convince them to change their ways, etc. Doctors are often required to get a certain number of CME credits every year, but there's no guarantee they'll be 100% current on the cutting edge of your issue.

So if a doctor can lag behind from an education standpoint, is that an opportunity for a patient to help fill in gaps if they are willing to invest time?

Please make no mistake, I largely agree that doctors are much better at considering the options and diagnosing accordingly. My point is that they are not omniscient, and new developments in medicine happen all the time. While a specialist might be expected to be more current in their specialty, a general practitioner might not be.
No! The reasons are absolutely valid. It's just interesting to see that the lean and cool startup is very similar to an established enterprise in that regard.

The trust is in quotes because I'm not sure what to think about it. Every month I see a post here about some AWS service outage but it looks like nobody is getting nervous because of this. People just wait until it is fixed. On the other hand, I have experienced that people begin to trust companies because the company advertises on TV. But AWS has earned its trust legitimately I think.

The whole concept of "confidence/trust in companies" is so important but I know so little about it.
Fatal? Please, you're exaggerating greatly. If the pinto couldn't kill Ford, VW will be just fine.
True, but at least Taler allows for the consumer to chose merchants who specify they don't sell data. Right now I can't buy anything online and not be tracked by the payment provider unless I use bitcoin. The prepaid credit cards here all require online registration and in store identification, Visa/Mc/Amex then track my purchases. If I show ID to buy $200 worth of Taler in a 7-11, there's no way for my Taler provider to see what I used it for.
> Why can't I have my cake and eat it?

:-) We definitely plan to add an API to append to an existing file. The current largest file size is 5 GBytes, and we want to support much larger (imagine a 1 TByte encrypted disk image). That will be by appending chunks to files followed by a "commit" declaring the file as complete.

I think the reason most of us cloud providers don't like replacing parts of files is it helps our caching layer be much simpler, and it would change the SHA-1 checksum on the file which just means "more complexity". But it isn't out of the question, it might just come with a "cost" (like you can replace the span but it might take a while and then we provide you the final checksum of the whole file in the response).
I don't think I've heard the BSA mentioned since I was in college arguing with a teacher about how the BSA's piracy numbers were completely over inflated and made up.

The teacher used those number in her argument that piracy was literally the same as stealing a car, while admitting that even she did it.

It makes me depressed that major companies still support such an idiotic organization.
Who takes their car to a dealer to have it serviced? Certainly not everyone.
Telling an aggregator "I'm going to be selling this room for $180, why don't you guys sell it for $200" is a good way to end the talks right there. The middle ground is arranging some kind of "lowest published price" agreement, where neither party can go below the price, but can lure the customer via some other non-monetary methods (points, loyalty rewards, etc.)
That seems like more of a pricing issue if the business can't break even.
I have a good friend that uses Groupons for his business. What he has shared, is that customers that come in with a Groupon, often come with a sense of entitlement. I know this isn't the rule, and maybe it a defense mechanism from the customer who thinks the business is giving them a "second rate" experience. However, this ultimately led him to ending his Groupon deals.
In the UK cars are taxed according to their emissions - will VW have to foot the bill for the problems this will cause their customers?
Way to risk too much for a measly 250k.
> In that case we could have aftermarket parts and/or interoperability. These are bad things that could cut into corporate profits.

Evidence?
> One more reason for publishing the source code to drive-line software in cars.

How does this prevent VW from publishing inaccurate source code?

Let's say we manage to force them to not only disclose full source code but also how to make binary reproducible builds and we also (somehow) can verify the integrity of every single microcontroller in the car, how do we prevent underhanded programming tactics?

We're always going to need to trust auto makers so why put massive burdens on them that don't remove our need to trust them?
Given the cars that are affected are on the lowest end of VW's and Audi's lineups, you can safely assume these owners don't have/won't spend significant amounts of personal wealth to sue VW. They'll likely accept a voucher for $500-1000 and a "sorry" and be on their way. They really don't have much legal pull even in a class action lawsuit which will likely be less $ than VW made in profits on the overestimated power and mileage numbers.

Furthermore, the owner of the 2009 Jetta TDI will have less bargaining room than the owner of the 2014 Audi A3 taking into consideration the price, age, mileage and status of the vehicle. I wouldn't be surprised if VW argue the older vehicles (say 2009-2012) benefited from the software more than the 2013+ vehicles and thus are entitled to even LESS compensation.

"That's a bold strategy. Let's see how it plays out."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ru8DMW-grY
If you're going to make the space available, expect it to be filled to capacity during peak times. 500 sf is tiny and probably too small (your support staff onsite will take up a huge chunk of that, unless you're planning on having support staff offsite).

Unless I'm mistaken, most of Mountain View (and certainly Castro St) has free wifi internet through Google's agreement with the city. So that's neither a cost you need to worry about nor a service you can charge much of a premium for.

I'd expect at least an occupancy permit/business license. Probably not more than that if you're not doing things with food.

Instead of coworking, I'd consider using such a space to provide short-term rentals to startups, who will either go under or need more space weeks after they start using your space. The premium services you'd offer are having everything turnkey from internet to utilities to desks and chairs (and the ability for them to move out without it costing them an arm and a leg). I'd especially encourage you to consider taking stock options as part of (or instead of) the rent.
> If your programmer makes a mistake and a line of code deletes some mission critical data from Amazon S3, then all the Reed-Solomon encoding in the world doesn't help you, the data is still gone.

I'm surprised at the implication here, that you'd use Glacier on a non-versioned bucket. Making destructive updates impossible doesn't cost much extra in archive fees.
When Your Former Boss Sues You for Starting a Startup
I don't think VW has hurt their customers in any way. They gave their customers fuel economy and power that was not possible under EPA regulations. I think if anything the current VW Diesels will be more valuable in future as subsequent model years will be crippled by default to satisfy the EPA, and the government has no way to determine if a vehicle has firmware that lies to their equipment without drastically altering their testing procedures.
Only let them claim the hypothetical $1000 payout if they come in to flash the ECU.
A fair bit harder unfortunately. You only have the core here.

A regular microcontroller has a lot of necessary extras in there. You generally want modules to handle power and clock generation. Flash memory is usually in there to hold firmware. Then you need a way to load that memory via an interface. You have internal RAM for running stuff.

Debugging module like JTAG is usually in there but maybe you skip that if you use an FPGA.

Microcontrollers have various I/O like GPIO, Analog to digital, Pulse Width Modulation module, Serial Peripheral Interface.

You have to figure out your pins. The design has currently 300+ IO ports at first glance. That's not realistic.

Other posters seem to be jumping the gun and talking about loading this on a FPGA board like all the work is done. There's a lot more design still needed to get it doing anything useful (Unless your hobby is executing instructions on a CPU).
Actually it's the expiration timestamp of signing certificate "Microsoft Certificate Trust List Publisher". I intended to add this info in the blog post but can't do it right now.
The rules from the article. That should've been read before posting.
SOPA and PIPA are not previous incarnations of CISA. CISA has nothing to do with SOPA and PIPA.
It might be an interesting thought experiment to build a country entirely using private roads, but I find it pretty confusing that one could rail against the government "taking money at gunpoint" and at the same time hold up private roads as an alternative example. How do you think private roads make money? Asking people nicely if they could donate money if they are so inclined?

Yeah, maybe you could say "If you don't want to pay for a private road, don't drive on it. Simple as that." And exactly how do you plan to enforce the "don't drive on it" part?

And mind you, in an alternative universe where every road is private, a poor Joe who has to drive ten miles to work to feed his family will take the road, whether he can pay the toll or not. And if he finds using a gun is cheaper than paying tolls he will absolutely do so, because (in a society where the government can't point guns at employers' head and demand to pay minimum wage) if he doesn't he will be priced out by his neighbors who are willing to use the gun and drive cheaply.
Yup. That's why this "final thought" doesn't add up:

> You want to put a stop to this? Stop playing free games. Buy a game for 4.99 or 9.99.

No. The only solution is to stop playing games that exploit people's privacy in such a way. No matter what you pay for them.

What about people who can't tell how bad they're being exploited? Well, for starters, paying 4.99 is not going to suddenly make them able to tell. Surely paying may make them believe the game is more honourable, but that's really the same spiel all over again, is it not?

No it's much simpler. Just get your games from a company in a jurisdiction where this shit is illegal. Like in the EU.

Just like people are sometimes wary of certain foreign brand electronics having cheaper chips or whatnot in them, now you know what US-based game companies are legally allowed to do to their users. And the lengths they will go to do it.

> We don’t want to be making games like this, and we don’t want another meeting about retention, cohorts or churn.

And please. "Look at what you made us do!", have some personal responsibility.
Well, it's not just one model, it's all the small TDI's. According to what I've read, that's a pretty big segment of their American market. How important is America to an auto manufacturer?
After China became practically the sole supplier of rare earth elements to the entire world, they restricted exports in 2011, creating shortages everywhere outside of China.

It caused a lot of companies to reexamine their supply chains, this time considering factors other than just price per ton. Several nations started subsidizing domestic production from mothballed facilities for strategic economic reasons. China went from 95% share of that market to less than 80%.

Essentially, they were expecting to get higher prices by restricting output as a monopoly supplier, but it blew up in their faces.
TU Munich too!