skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Why is it impossible to use by itself? You can browse the internet, you can buy media off of iTunes, you can edit documents, and you can send email.

The point is that the iPad is sufficient for the average user, but it prevents the graduation to power user by poking around and learning how things work. I very much doubt self-hosted development will ever be made available.
http://www.perthmint.com.au/investment_invest_in_gold_overvi...
Hard to make it past 3 sentences of the arrogant writing style. Such arrogance usually indicates a lack of expertise. The substance of the article confirms that.

Yes, it's like "Don't Hash Unless You Really Understand That I'm the Only One Who Really Understands"
If you ask me this new model of computing is mainly interesting for Apple because they like their 30% earning. In fact there is nothing preventing you from doing simple to use smart computer than when you press Ctrl+L+A+M+E open an terminal where it's also possible to do more interesting stuff.

Or a smart computer where I can save an image from a web page and later email it. Or a smart enjoyable computer that allows me to change ebook reader and still open /My/Ebooks to read all my old stuff with it.

The iPad has usability limits that are a direct consequence of the fact that Apple want to control what you can do whit it, because more control, more $$$.

I don't want a world where most of the computers can't be used to write code. My dad taught me BASIC when I was 7 because we had computer at home, and this computers where build to write programs, attach it to the power line and what you see is a BASIC prompt.

Don't have to be so exasperated today of course, but the iPad has all the potential to make computer users more stupid.

What we really need is a decent competitor, able to do cool computers without the aim to control the world.
Of course. There are some benchmarks where Perl is faster than Java 6.
IPad Support for MonoTouch
Hey, look, another doom and gloom article about the iPad and the end of open development. Let's just try searching it for some keywords.

"web" ... not found

"browser" ... not found

"safari" ... not found

Yes, well.

When did native apps become the new vinyl records? "Sure, the web is great and platform independent, but there's just more soul in compiled code."
Ask HN: Getting started with CNC machinery...
Hello fellow HNers!
I just bought myself a CNC milling machine, something I have been wanting to own for many years, and I am looking forward to extending my programming directly into the physical world.

I have done my research over the last few years and regularly lurk over at CNCZone etc... But that being said I have still never actually used or programmed a CNC machine!

My question to everyone here that has (hopefully) messed about with CNC machinery is: how did you get started? Are there any online/ofline guides you would recommend?
You are right; fixed it. Thanks!
And after randomly mutating variables breaks a few of your programs, you'll switch to "(plan-weekend-time (-1 weekend))".
Quoth the article:

That means that if you know SHA1(secret || message), then you can compute SHA1(secret || message || ANYTHING), which is a valid signature for message || ANYTHING. So to break this system, you just need to see one signature from SuperAnnoyingPoke, and then you can impersonate SuperAnnoyingPoke for lots of other messages.

This is absolutely incorrect. If you know SHA1(secret || message), you can compute SHA1(secret || message || padding || anything), which is quite a different matter. Most useful values of "anything" don't start with such padding.

Should anyone be designing a system which relies on this distinction for its security? Of course not. But things are bad enough already without exaggerating the scope of attacks.
A plane/train/bus/show ticket?

An article you want to go over, marking and adding notes (my wife does this sort of thing..)

A paper due to be submitted to someone who will mark & write notes and don't want to have to print it themselves?

Some reading material for locations where you don't want to take your $500 gadget?
I think Alex's main point is that this device is more for people who consume rather than people who create.
Already posted (on the day of the 0.3 release).

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1050514
> - With a Chrome OS Tablet, ALL your data lives in someone ELSE's cloud (unless you synchronize it with your computer).

Wrong, with HTML5 offline storage you can keep all your data offline on your own machine too.

> - It uses an advanced HTML5 compliant browser called Safari.

I think most people on hacker news know that safari and chrome share the same webkit engine, thanks for the news though :p

> It will even save your web app frontend with its own icon on the main screen, giving it the same user attention privileges as any normal app.

But this kind of device is not for me (see the link), it's for people who don't know much about computers or don't want to deal with one.

The problem with the iPad is that you still need to own a computer and know how to use iTunes to sync/update your device. So my friends will still need me to help them with itunes (I know my mom would). With the chrome os tablet, I can just get one for my mom because it syncs and updates itself automatically so she'll never need to call me to ask "how that thing plugs into the computer again" and why itunes is asking her to "sync or delete my whole photos collection" or "why itunes doesn't work anymore? it says I need to download 200MB of update, is that a virus or can I go ahead?" etc.
He has a point. If I had a Commodore 64 as a kid, instead of the $100 Dick Smith VZ-300 with 5 games for it, I would probably not have been a programmer either. I would have playe the same games as my friends, rather than learning Basic, then Z80 assembly language.
"The thing that bothers me most about the iPad is this: if I had an iPad rather than a real computer as a kid, I’d never be a programmer today."

You could say the same about most PC's, actually. Time was, when you got a computer it had a few programs and some sort of interpreter or compiler to build your own program. Kids back then who got computers became programmers. Kids today get computers and go on the internet, and there's enough there to distract you that you don't get bored enough to install a compiler or something.

Somehow, kids still get into programming anyway.
By posting about the "problem" of iPad stories you're generating yet another meta story about the iPad.

I'm all for hearing other news. Please submit some. If it's awesome, we'll hear it through the noise.
While there are certainly many factors that go into determining the number of users who know how to use a device, orthogonal is a poor word for describing the relationship between people who know how to use the device and ease of learning. The two are definitely correlated, IMO.

Consider the extremes. Something that was impossible to learn would have zero users that know how to use it. Everyone would know how to use a device that required no learning.

It's this latter hypothetical to which the iPod/iPhone/iPad aspire. So why should Apple care to make the point that so many people already know how to use it?

After some thought (and I may be slow to the conclusion that everyone else has come to already), I think it is because they knew that "It's just a big iPod Touch" would be one of the main objections. This particular point about the 75MM users was an attempt to turn an aspect of the device that could be perceived as a big negative into a postive.

For me - the relatively uninitiated into the world of pitchmen - it's an interesting piece of marketing.
Obama's call for capital gains cut could supercharge startups
Louis Auchinschloss, Novelist, Dies at 92
OK, then someone needs to make a Squeak-like Javascript programming environment, using only the built-in JS machinery.

Can't see how they could complain about that.
Master/servant? I prefer the pusher/user metaphor myself.
But Whoa on that 'Whoa'. There's a huge difference: the PC came with vendor and third-party technical reference and programming manuals, BIOS references, etc. It was a world that encouraged that kind of curiosity and creativity.

Now, a kid who does that is a "jailbreaker", and can be sued by Apple for DMCA violations, etc.

My own personal Apple experience: Age 17, Apple II. Open the covers, look at the circuitry, look at sample programs....a career began. New technologists need as many legal reference books as they do technical reference books. (Listen to the old guy refer to 'books') :-)
It already has with some music. The only legal distribution channel for the digital version is through iTunes.
Good call. Or at least let's wait till some of us have used the device for more than a few moments.
While a netbook may do all of those tasks, it doesn't do them particularly well. The iPad will turn on instantaneously, will be easy to use, and apps will be optimised for the screen size. The biggest problem with netbooks is that they run OSs and apps that have been optimised for much larger displays.
Apple and Mcgraw Hill need each other. Mcgraw needs the distribution platform and hardware and Apple needs the content. They will forgive and forget what happened.
Quite true, and usually in the UX department. (for both most developers and Apple)
Either you see the simple computer as some harbinger of the death of the PC, or you are an Apple fanboy who thinks the thing is a magic wand. Guess what everybody. It's neither.

Your blanket statement is foolish and naive. The range of opinions is far and wide. For example I appreciate Apple's innovation and marketing skills, but I'm no love-blind Apple fanboy and yet I think their mobile strategy is completely game changing.

All of you who are writing these windy pieces about the ramifications of the iPad have just been swept up in a mighty PR storm. Even those decrying the device are just helping Apple.

Largely ignored by the blogs and "PR storm" is this simple underlying fact: with the iPhone, iPod Touch and now iPad what Apple has done for the "computing philosophy" of the world is successfully present an entirely new UI metaphor. They slipped it under our noses, in a 30+ year old world of the windows metaphor, they've marketed and popularized it and now we simply take this drastically different UI as common and expected. To be so cynical about Apple's impact with its mobile line of devices is to have your back to the future of innovation itself.

[Updated based on andrewljohnson's response]
True -- most people weren't interested in cooking as an exercise, they just wanted to eat. However, interest in cooking as an art form, not just as consumption, is at an all time high (or so it seems to me from the countless media around food). So, did the microwave kill the culinary arts? No, it liberated the people who didn't care cooking from having to deal with it.

As someone who avoids processed food, I get where you're coming from, but our values are not necessarily other peoples values.
The $23 billion in short-term assets on their balance sheet—or rather, a small portion—could help, if they really care.
You mean useful values of "anything" not including URLs, HTTP cookies, unicode comma-seperated lists, and unicode key=value ASCII pairs, where a small amount of padding isn't going to break anything.
Not with the current App Store policies they won't be.
http://www.techcrunch.com/2010/01/24/steve-jobs-tablet-most-...
I wasn't talking about UI innovation when I said "Computing Philosophy." I was talking about open vs. closed platforms, proprietary vs. open source.

Apple is no more open or closed than before (still totally closed).

EDIT: Since I can't respond to the commenter, I'll edit a response here. The comment is silly... the iPad just came out, the iPhone has been out for years. Maybe Apple got more closed with the release of the iPhone, but the iPad is more of the same.

And actually, iPods are locked down too, so iPhones were just more of the same. Oh wait, Macs were locked down too until Apple switched to Intel processors... so even iPods were nothing new.
I believe that this is precisely the fear. I don't think anyone is enamored with the beleaguered process in becoming a doctor, and would not like "hacking" to turn into some long process requiring official education or a lot of personal determination. Today you can "fall into" becoming a programmer. In fact, many of the best programmers I know started in completely different professions, they didn't make a decision early on that writing software is what they wanted to do.

I am simply explaining the OPs fears. There exists an argument that the iPad could theoretically inspire more people to learn because its more "fun".
Knuth: The Complexity of Songs
> The iPad will have zero effect on the computing philosophy of the world.

I've seen many strong arguments made against this, including the in this article. Since you don't want to read any more opinions about it I won't re-iterate, but I will point out that you're handwaving.
Uhmm... we have a voting system here at Hacker News. If you don't like stories you can vote them down, just like everyone else.
No one gave a crap about applications on iphone before the app store.
I have yet to hear one story written about the mad rush to develop web applications for the iphone.

The native app/app store combination is incontrovertibly the best way to deliver applications and have your product found.

To pretend otherwise is disingenuous or simply naive.
You can't develop on the device though; you also need a mac, so it's not the same.
I thought yesterdays obituary for Howard Zinn was a bigger news story than this... because, well, most people thought Salinger was already dead.
Plane: e-ticket. I can't remember when last I had a paper ticket. I fly a lot.

Train: subway card; on-demand ticket dispenser at station. Even when I use the Acela I don't need to print anything.

Show: uhm, they should accept electronic display (then I'll use my iPhone - last concert was Kylie Minogue, and I got a paper ticket on the 2nd hand market)

Article: physical magazine or online reading. I never make notes on the physical article (then I'd have to have a filing system to keep it)

Paper: send it to me in PDF or some other open format; I'll send review notes back electronically.

Other reading material: books?

For some people it may be more convenient to print stuff, but not for me. Paper => physical clutter.
Well, you can just not vote on them. But that's just as good.
Actually you can't vote stories down just flag them.
I don't know about you, but I generally don't allow NUL bytes in my URLs, HTTP cookies, unicode comma-separated lists, or unicode key=value ASCII pairs.
"noise from complete beginners offering each other tidbits of programming wisdom"

This is a problem that plagues any language with both age and an active online community.

ActionScript has been around for a decade and massive communities have been built around it with the users dominated by people who are inexperienced, learning, and overly-confident about their abilities. The same can be found for HTML, CSS, JS, PHP, Java, C#, etc.

If RoR remains relevant and used for long enough by enough people, it too will enjoy the same fate.
This is what you really want if you care a lot about avoiding the small domain problem (brute forcing H(myguess) so that I finally find H(myguess) == password_hash):

Just use an algorithm that is acceptably slow when used to authenticate users, but unacceptably slow when using for brute forcing.

For instance

HMAC(1,HMAC(2,HMAC(3,MAC(4,HMAC(..N,HMAC("yourPublicZZaaalt","yourpassword"))))))

Use N big enough so that you need a few milliseconds to run this code as optimized C.

If you are smart, design it so that CUDA wont help.

Now you are done. Brute forcing will take just too much if the password is not too obvious. It will be still possible to test 10000 hashes in a reasonable time maybe, but forget to run John The Ripper against it.
Hey There.

First of all, congratulations, now get yourself a pair of safety glasses and wear them, all the time. I'm seriously not kidding about this, it is one of the most important things that you could overlook and when you are just starting out with this the chances of an 'incident' are very large, bordering on certainty.

Then, to give you some pointers I need to know a bit more about your machine, what size machine do you have, what is the working volume, stroke, power of the spindle motor and the kind of drive you've got (servos ? steppers ?).

Is it a production machine or a rebuild ?

What kind of materials do you intend to work ?

What kind of workpieces do you intend to make ?

Are you going to program the machine directly or are you going to set up a whole chain ? (cad package, translator, machine controller)

-- do you know cnczone.com ? --

Strike that, missed you mentioning cnczone in your comment.

I think cnczone is by far the better forum for these kinds of questions, the people there have spent collectively multiple 100's of lifetimes programming, building and debugging cnc gear, this is a very interesting field to play around in.

--

In the few leftover hours that I've got I'm converting this rig:

http://pics.ww.com/d/93690-2/dscf1225.jpg

To a modern simultaneous 4 axis controller. It's been lots of fun so far but rather a whole lot more work than anticipated.
I think the iPad does its best to _not_ inspire creators of any type. It's a device focused almost entirely on content consumption.

For a few years there Apple put much of their effort into creating tools that gave more people access to the means of content production.

Now that they own major channels of media distribution (more all the time with the introduction of "xyz store"), their effort is focused on promoting content consumption much more than content production.
"The thing that bothers me most about the iPad is this: if I had an iPad rather than a real computer as a kid, I’d never be a programmer today."

Laptops and desktops aren't going away. Everyone is blogging like the end of the hacker world is coming. Apple isn't forcing anyone to buy their products. Worse comes to worse you can just build a PC if you don't like the convenience of a great looking prison.
That's interesting - my experience has been the opposite (that is, AMQP has been quite easy to work with), but I wonder if it's because I primarily use the Ruby clients (http://github.com/tmm1/amqp for asynchronous, http://github.com/celldee/bunny for synchronous)? I've also used the Erlang client a bit, which was somewhat trickier. Maybe this should inspire me to start a blog and write up a tutorial.
CJK adaptation has been slow, not only because I suspect those countries tend to have a more insular Web, but because of the Han unification issues: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_unification
The interesting character ranges are:

U+0000 to U+007F: 1 byte for UTF-8, 2 for UTF-16
U+0080 to U+07FF: 2 bytes for UTF-8 and UTF-16
U+0800 to U+FFFF: 3 bytes for UTF-8, 2 for UTF-16
U+10000 and up: 4 bytes for UTF-8 and UTF-16

Arabic, Cyrillic (Russian), Tamil, Thai, Hebrew, and many other non-European scripts take an equal amount of space in either UTF-8 and UTF-16. Japanese and Korean have some cases where UTF-16 is more efficient, but only by a byte, and most Chinese characters take 4 bytes either way.
Microsoft enjoyed 60% profit growth in 2009
Encouraging More Chromium Security Research
Apple now allowing iPhone apps to make VoIP calls over 3G networks
and that's convertible into a fast attack on the MAC key, even through network delay and jitter? (I wouldn't be surprised, now that you've pointed it out.)
Don't use HMAC, but, sure: iterate SHA1 a couple thousand times. This is the approach taken by PBKDF.

A better approach is to use bcrypt or scrypt. It's not a security objective of SHA1 or HMAC-SHA1 to take a long time to run --- in fact, they have the opposite design goal. Bcrypt and scrypt have both been designed to be "cryptographically slow": speeding them up in the general case would (forgive an oversimplification) require a new result in cryptography that would be more significant than "optimizing brute force cracking".
Congress did not envision the DMCA exemption process as a forum for economic restructuring of business models...

I double dog dare you to claim that the EFF was not attempting to abuse the DMCA exemption process to this end.

I figure next up is the suggestion that Apple strongly lobbied against the DMCA.

I have no idea what you're talking about.
I can run whatever I want on my Mac. Can't on my iPhone. I think the latter is more closed.
That's because you're a C programmer. Tarnsap may not have this problem, but Flickr definitely did. I don't know why you think it's a good idea to talk this problem down; it has already been catastrophically bad for some applications.
What you want is a language that is also an IDE. Smalltalk did this 30 years ago.
I'd love to show this to some narcissists I know. But then again, they might think it is revolving around them rather than humbling.
In November, recovery was a mere hope; now, it is a growing reality.

I'm glad to hear it. Welcome back.
Well I generally don't disallow NUL bytes.
No one gave a crap about web apps for the iPhone because they all wanted to develop apps that took advantage of phone features. (Which Apple has been making more and more accessible to web apps anyway.)

The entire scare here is that the iPad will make personal computing a closed ecosystem. But the web is already where most people spend most of their computer time, and Safari is an excellent and standards-complient browser.

No, you won't develop web apps for the iPad. You'll develop web apps, period. For the web. Which people will use on iPads and any other computer they please.

The battle that matters is keeping web standards open. Consumer operating systems can be as closed as they like, as long as they come with a compatible browser.
C# on the iPad
"The thing that bothers me most about the iPad is this: if I had an iPad rather than a real computer as a kid, I’d never be a programmer today."

Programming should be moving to the cloud anyway - heroku,appengine,aws is where the hacker should be innovating - do programming through the web browser

you can have kids do simple programming in the webbrowser in javascript
So, you're going to lug and iPad AND your laptop when you travel? Seems like fail to me. (Don't forget the chargers and cables you'll need, too).
I proposed HMAC just in order to avoid that there is some strange property about H(H(H(H(H(...))) probably not true for SHA1 and many other believed secure hash functions and block cyphers.

Btw another slow thing that can be used is Blowfish, as it has a slow key scheduling stage, but don't know if it's slow enough.

Another approach can be to take any Feistel Network based block cypher and turn it from M rounds to M*N rounds.

There are many ways to turn a secure cryptographic primitive into a monkey asses slow cryptographic primitive that seriously limits the effectiveness of brute force.
"...or are you really aiming to become a glorified consumer gimmicks firm?"

priceless
I don't think that's what he's getting at. Much of the developer support built into IDEs are there because it's too much for the programmer to handle. His assertion is that it's because it's a weakness of the programming language that we need to do that.

Have IDEs that generates boiler plate code? Then perhaps the language is too verbose, or not powerful enough to express templates of code. Have IDEs that auto complete variable names for you? Perhaps there are too many and your program is too big to fit into your head.