skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
A lot of the ROI is speculative and aggregate, though, isn't it? You're not mainly buying the potential profitability of the specific new customer, but attempting to buy a network with enough critical mass to get off the ground as a viable payment mechanism. I'm not sure how you measure the ROI on that, since it's got huge uncertainty.
Most of the problems people have installing software from CPAN are related to the fact that the module's entire test suite is run on your machine before it is installed. If a test fails, it means the module doesn't work on your machine, and it shouldn't be installed until it's fixed. If you just install the Debian package or whatever, then you are simply installing software that doesn't work on your machine.

If you just want to copy files from lib/ to your system @INC, then sure, go ahead. But then you are throwing away any stability guarantees in favor of "BUT I WANT IT NOW!!!"
Perhaps (and I think this agrees with TomOfTTB's point in his comment) the problem is assuming that if all people receive the same education, then they have all received a good education. This seems to be the assumption built into current state laws about compulsory schooling.

If people have power to shop, they don't all eat the same foods or wear the same wardrobes. Neither should we expect learners with the power to shop to all choose the same educations. As you correctly say, "One person's waste of time is another person's education." (By the way, that mention of drawing exercises is an especially apt example.)
My favorite paragraph: http://www.scripting.com/stories/2010/04/03/verdictAfterOneD...
http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/bm1u8/safe_robu...

Ironic, considering the title, if you ask me.
Everyone realizes it. I think the contention is (right or wrong) that a pure-consumption device isn't what people want or need (given the other things that they have in their lives). It's redundant. It doesn't replace anything.

I think if they had multi-tasking it'd go a long way to shutting up this criticism.
You want to write code and compile it ON the iPad?

Why not? I just visited with an old friend of mine from high school, and the only computer her 7 year old son has access to is her iPhone, and I'm absolutely certain that there will be hundreds of thousands of kids who only have access to an iPad; it's just that kind of device. The iPhone, let alone the iPad, are dramatically more powerful than the Commodore 64 I learned to program on.

Assuming that a kid is like you or me, and will just pony up the thousand bucks for a development machine in order to get to the SDK, and the 99 bucks to participate in the app store, is wishful thinking.

If Apple allowed scripting engines to run on the iPhone and iPad I wouldn't be quite so intense on this...but they don't, so a kid with an iPhone or iPad also can't get access to a BASIC-equivalent, like I had to tinker with. All he gets is whatever games and toys Apple decides he can have. This is a chilling thought, to me, and I'm depressed that many hackers don't feel the same way.

You need a mac to run XCode and your mac will have it for free, and you can download updates for free. Not sure what else you'd want Apple to do.

I expect them to let people tinker and learn and explore, rather than merely consume! Exactly what I've been saying all along. I'm not being secretive about what I'm talking about here. I want Apple to let kids have an environment where they can learn technology, if they want to, even if they don't have wealthy parents who can afford to buy them a Macintosh. Most of these kids parents will never buy a Macintosh, even if they buy an iPhone or an iPad. They can't or won't afford one. If they have a computer at all, it's a super cheapo box from Walmart or something, that was on sale because it was the previous model or similar.

That's the thing about the iPhone and iPad: It reaches people who don't use computers. That's a great thing. The digital divide is already pretty deep and wide, we don't need it getting deeper by cutting everyone off from the Internet. But their kids have the opportunity to cross that divide completely...and Apple doesn't want them to.

I guess only time will tell what the Apple/Andriod/?? future looks like.

It doesn't really matter to the point of my argument, in this particular string of angry rants. I don't think that just because an open option does exist, Apple should get off the hook for the harm they're doing. But, I did want to mention that there is light on the horizon, and I think the good guys will win this round, which is refreshing, after so long under another oppressive regime (though not as problematic as Apple's iPhone/iPad bright and shiny and clean world).
Is Heroku free or just cheap?
Not really, or rather, which one?

I sure hope the stuff he deliberately created is not anyone's religion...
I'm trying out iAnnotate right now. So far it has worked pretty well. I tried loading one into pages and it didn't recognize it. I'll see if iBooks can do it as well.

*edit: it doesn't look like you can load PDF files into iBooks
How to Create a Best Profile Picture
I don't think the general public is interested in a reverse-chronological view of the entire news stream to begin with.
Hey Tony - Pity that seemingly everyone in Seattle is staying in tonight. Crappy weather... Two things:

1. You've probably forgotten more about this sort of data than I'll ever know, but I look around at folks on laptops in cafes and see nothing but Facebook or Gmail on Netbooks. I think we, as a class of users, are the exception: most people on computers spend the bulk of their time consuming information instead of producing it.

2. Rumor has it that iPhone OS 4 will be announced at WWDC 2010 (big shock) and will feature multi-tasking.
He's not the first to make this claim and I question whether it is so clear cut. For instance, it seems very likely that some of those 40 million jobs created by start-ups had an effect on established business. Either through competition for growth or even competition for existing market space.
"... I have yet to find someone at Microsoft that views Open Source as 'the enemy'. ..."

Maybe all the players have left MS now? But I remember Bill didn't like open source ~ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Letter_to_Hobbyists James Allchin wasn't that keen ~ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Allchin#Controversies neither was Paul Maritz ~ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Maritz and Vinod Valloppillil wrote the book ~ http://www.vinod.com/blog/NavLinks/FAQ.html You can get a better view of these MS players reading through the Halloween documents at http://www.catb.org/~esr/halloween/ None of that matters much as it once did. MS is spent as a force, at least in the eyes of developers.

There are bigger problems. [0]

[0] Eben Moglen, "Interview: Eben Moglen - Freedom vs. The Cloud Log"

http://www.h-online.com/open/features/Interview-Eben-Moglen-...
It's free given the base configuration: http://heroku.com/pricing#blossom-1-0

That config is basically only for development/prototypes, though (it has a 5MB database cap); their default tiny-ish plan is $15/month, which is quite decent for anything that runs Ruby, let alone on a grid.

Turning on all the knobs and levers on that page gave me "$5089/month", which is a slight bit terrorizing—but I can't imagine the kind of business that would grow to need that scale without becoming a multinational with its own IT.
The FED believed that if AIG was not saved then the whole system would have collapsed and the flow of money would have seized up. e.g Small companies that call to banks for short term loans (to pay payroll for example) would not have any more left and would close up shop.
Another great one: StayFocusd https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/laankejkbhbdhmip...

It restricts the time you can spend on time-wasting websites.
Mr. Friedman adds to his lengthy list of stories in which he lobbies (it has gotten to be numbingly repetitive, Tom) for increased immigration from India and China.
Maven and Ant are unnecessarily verbose. I find Makefiles and CMake far simpler. Maybe it's just the XML I'm sick of.
Rethinking how we build and invest in partnerships
Ask HN: Searching HN
Hello HN,

I was wondering if anyone had made a search engine which searched through submissions, comments, ect.

I mean really (akin to google) search through them, so if I wanted to find an article from months back, and if I could only remember a phrase from within the article, I could search it in quotes and find the article.
Interview: Eben Moglen - Freedom vs. the Cloud Log
people keep saying this, and i keep thinking it'll be shot from a truly horrible angle and will be really unflattering.
HN: Help this young photographer get his camera
Would you buy a laptop locked down like the iPad?
An estimated 700,000 iPads bought on day one
"... I was wondering if anyone had made a search engine which searched through submissions, comments, ect. ..."

This is a good question & wonder why it isn't on the menubar at the top. Try http://www.searchyc.com/ excellent in every way.
He doesn't say his mother's going to love it. He says: ...although her Mac is terribly inadequate and confusing, with so many layers of contradictions.... Too bad this product is so far from being able to replace it for her.
I have a hard time using those other languages, because they just aren't as mature and featureful as Perl 5/CPAN. I like to organize my applications as composable parts ("roles"), and the only other language that has a sane role implementation is Scala. And sadly, Scala had a little too much Java for breakfast and got them mostly wrong.

I remember a few years ago when I wrote Perl OO and said, "I wish this was more like Common Lisp". Now I can barely get past "(defclass" without wishing I was using Perl instead. (And then I usually switch the project to Perl; the 8-billion-x or whatever speed hit is well worth Moose's design sugar.)

Anyway, I spend a lot of time thinking about programming and application design, and I just can't get Clojure or Ruby or Python or Java to a point where they could be usable for the kinds of things I do. And Perl already has everything I would need to add to those languages.

The only other language I really like is Haskell. It is much better than Perl. But Perl has so many good libraries (and great library authors), that I don't see myself switching completely to Haskell for a long time. I can stand a little bit of computer science imperfection if it means I have an application that works. With Perl, I always end up with an application that works.

Honestly, hating Perl and then saying to use Ruby or Python or Clojure instead is kind of silly. All languages in this category have the same fundamental weaknesses... they just all spell the weaknesses differently.
I was using it, and it inspired the question. It's a great search, and I use it all the time, but I have to remember a title name or something of the sort to use it vs. part of the article.
FTA: "I expect to wow her with the map application."

Consider it to be an example of paraphrasing.
Are Facebook or Twitter irrelevant?
No everything would NOT have been fine. There was a real fear in the market.

By 100% backing any bank that failed, the FEDs allowed the flow of money to continue through the economy and it said a very clear message that everyones money is safe.

Imagine if everyone thought their money was not safe in their bank accounts. That everyone started taking out all their money. The system would have collapsed.
I agree. It's your responsibility to let her know, probably a few months into the relationship, and she can choose to stay or leave you. It's her choice. She might ask you why you didn't tell her earlier so that she wouldn't have been with you from the beginning... Just answer it honestly, you were being selfish and wanted the intimacy of a relationship; She might be angry, but that's okay. (IMO)
The argument du jour is that every software patent is dangerous and useless, and every patent holder a potential troll. Surely it cannot be "safer" to infringe on Oracle's patents than on Microsoft's, yet at least Microsoft has gone to the trouble of specifying what exactly is exempt from patent claims and what isn't with that Community Promise of theirs - which by the way is legally binding under estoppel. I don't remember ever seeing anything like that from Oracle, Sun or IBM vis-a-vis Java, and it was interesting that Java was released under the GPLv2 and not v3, which would actually eliminate the threat of a patent claim on it.

/This/ argument that Java and PostgreSQL and MQ implementations (check out the patents in that niche) and everything else is "more safe" than Mono is unpersuasive at best to me - in fact I'd buy it only in the case of Samba, which does have an official get out of jail free card from Microsoft.
Are you saying single life is dark?
My own take on C#/.NET, and I bet a lot of others had this take as well, came down to 2 elements:

1. when it appeared, it looked a lot like somebody within Microsoft said to some other guys, "Hey, go make us a Java. Like Java, but our baby." And they basically approached it by cloning it and then making several superficial tweaks and changes -- JUST enough, especially at a superficial level, so they could say with a straight face to people who were none to observant that this indeed was the product of internal R&D -- true innovation -- rather than being what it actually was. In short, it looked awfully like a student who turned in a paper which was a pretty blatant copy of another student's paper, except with some superficial textual changes made to make it look different and original. I know that both languages have drifted and evolved since C#'s debut, but I remember looking at programs written in the current dialects of Java and C# at C#'s debut and it was hilarious just how much it looked like the C# version was just a functional/semantic clone of Java, only with arbitrary syntax differences (keywords, case, etc.) Life is complex and they've both evolved since then, but there's no doubt in mind that C# started life with a "clone Java, change it's name/keywords" design strategy.

2. Microsoft's whole business model appears, to me anyway, and to other folks, as being basically about just copying what other folks are doing, putting their logo on it, offering it up for sale, and then once people are using it, to design features and systems in such a way as to create lock-in. Lure them in, then close the door. Or least, slowly start closing that door, so slowly and with enough distraction that the unwitting victim is not smart enough or quick enough to see it.
True, but "people" you talk about are like you and I who wish we could poke around with this device a lot more. Most people just consume and hardly produce anything-- other than, perhaps, emails, todo lists, & recipe notes.

I think the relevant verdict would be delivered not by the Pogues or Mossbergs but by mom, dads, and the 4-5 year-olds who see this device for what it is. Because, for the first time we (as in majority of the general public) can look at a computer as a consumer device as oppose to a general purpose device that needs training or learning. I think most reviews I read missed this aspect.
They are barriers because if Apple added an "advanced" button somewhere that gives you root, then tons of ordinary users would press it (perhaps after being instructed to by an online tutorial, or by a scam), break things, and find that their iPod does not "just work" and be unhappy. Apple would be adding a button that you can press to enable your device to get malware, and that will confuse and harm lots of people.

It's not obvious how to add an advanced button that the right people will press, and others won't. You can hide it, but it will get reported on websites that newbies see, with simple instructions. But that said, I'm sure there's a solution, and I hope Apple finds it.

I think the development effort from Apple to enable stuff which would only be used by a fraction of the audience -- even done to Apple's high standards of polish -- is a secondary and more minor issue. Apple can afford it, and Apple knows that developers are worth the expense. However, in terms of development time rather than money (which aren't equivalent because finding, hiring, and training good programmers is hard), this has to be lower priority than enabling multiple programs to run at once and some other stuff, so maybe it'll be a while.
If you're talking to a close friend or family member (that's the use case), it doesn't matter.
I also want to defend Programming in Lua, which is probably the best single book devoted to a programming language that I've ever read (only K&R comes close). I'm not alone in thinking highly of it--on Amazon, of the 30 reviews, 25 give it 5 stars and 4 give it 4 stars. The book is not really for beginners, as you can tell by the fact 30 percent or so is devoted to the C-Lua API, but since when should every book on programming be targeted to beginners? The book covers many interesting programming methodologies while giving a complete and thorough tour of the language.

In fact, though, Lua is a sufficiently simple language that programming novices generally have no problem learning it, and the first third or so of PIL should get the beginner on his way very nicely.
I'm not quite sure why all these iPad articles are framed with the assumption you're going to use the iPad instead of something else. I've been working on a project in Logic most of the night on my Mac with the iPad sitting on my desk for browsing, music, and video. It's a fantastic setup. Nice break from keyboard & mousing. The display is stunning and multi-touch web browsing on this size screen is such a natural experience. Something about the portrait view is very compelling to me. I popped it over to landscape for a bit and some of the magic disappeared. I wonder if part of the appeal of the iPad is simply that it's the first mainstream computing device to use portrait orientation so effectively.
He mentions that as the only thing his mother would like about the device. The paragraph above the one you quote says this:

I also work with people who are not very deeply skilled in computer technology, exactly the kind of people this product is supposedly for. It won't work for them, because they need to multi-task too. We learned a long time ago that inexpert users don't use less resources, they just use them differently. The argument that the Mac wasn't a serious computer was nonsense. I was there when all these arguments were fresh. This is not a replay. Keep dreaming if you want, but if you give the iPad to your mother expect the light to go on for you. At that exact moment you will realize how poorly prepared it is for that.
Why is the type on this site unreadable on Firefox?
At the bottom of your page in the middle in color is HNSearch.
"Goldman vigorously disputes that it could not have survived if the government hadn't paid it in full"

Maybe you missed the part in the article where they said they could have survived without the money.

Also the TARP money was pretty much forced on them http://goo.gl/N7SP (businessinsider.com)
Git-sh(1) -- a git shell
I always thought about Ant as `make + native Java plugins`. Is there anything else it can do that doesn't fit in that description?
They shred bulk class mail. If it's anything important, I'm sure it is not being sent bulk class. And if someone wants me to get something enough to pay full price, then I guess I'll look at the cover, and maybe have the service scan the contents (the way it works with non-spam is they scan the cover of the mail, and then I can choose to receive the actual item in the next forwarded batch of mail, scan it so I can look at the contents online, or shred it and recycle it). The most egregious and annoying stuff is bulk mail.

Though I did, apparently end up on a Nationalist organizations mailing list, somehow (maybe through one of the various libertarian causes I've supported over the years; somehow there are ultra-right-wingers who think libertarians are sympathetic to their BS), so that's an annoying letter I've gotten recently that made it into the "look at the covers" phase. Since the word "Nationalist" was in the from address, I knew I could shred it immediately without opening it.

Oh, I just realized you might be theorizing that they might censor my mail. What they do is regulated by the federal government, and it takes roughly the equivalent of a power of attorney to let them open my mail. If they were ever caught tampering rather than acting as an honest agent, they'd be facing federal mail tampering charges. I don't have any reason to believe they would do that; they've been extremely polite, responsive, and they have excellent reviews. I can recommend them.
You may be unpersuaded, but, as Miguel acknowledged in a recent article linked here, most OSS developers have (wisely, IMO) kept their distance and relegated Mono to a sideshow. While MS was constantly making veiled threats about patent issues with free software in general and Linux in particular Sun and Oracle were making important contributions and treating Linux as a first-class deployment platform. Maybe you can't see a difference here but it couldn't be plainer to many of us.
There is, if previous threads are to believed, a very little bit of drama about searchyc.
It's interesting how "idealist" sounds like a good thing and yet "ideological extremist" sounds like a bad thing. And yet, they are both probably the same thing. :)

The abolishing of slavery was led by ideological extremists.

Voting rights for women and blacks were led by ideological extremists. Child labor laws, environmental protection, social security, health reform, religious freedom, heck, arguably the founding of our country, etc. were all disproportionately brought about due to ideological extremists.

I think having ideals and principles is a good thing. People who are anti-Microsoft "extremists" tend to be that way because they have ideals and principles, and they think they see Microsoft as having a certain track record against those ideals and principles, and therefore that's bad.
There may or may not be good ideas in C# and .NET. But if we can have those good elements without having Microsoft, I bet that's what those folks would like. I'm definitely one of those folks. I had no issue writing software in Java in part because I had no expectation of Sun trying to say lock me into Solaris or a suite of Sun products -- something which Microsoft had a track record of doing in the past. Whether they would still do that with C#/.NET I could not know for sure at the time, but it was the smart bet to make.
My mistake. There are USB hubs that are classified as "powered" or "unpowered", but I guess in the unpowered case it's relying on the computer's supply.
Huh? you lost me. Care to explain how you got from mortgage slicing to treason?
This, it seems to me, is what ideologues always do: redefine the term so that an existing real-world thing doesn't count as an example of it. Communists did this with the Soviet Union (sure they're bad but a real communist society would never be like that). Ideological proponents of capitalism do it today: the US system isn't really capitalism because the government is too much involved. And extreme-programming software projects that fail weren't really following the process. To me this is an unhelpful line of argument that is preoccupied more with labels and beliefs than with what is actually going on.
You make a good point, which proves that neither of us actually knows which phrasing Dave Winer meant. Don't be a jerk. We live in the same city and might actually meet at some point. I don't like being on bad terms with people I've never met.
This review explicitly notes that aspect. It notes it in order to make the contention that such a belief is incorrect, but it does note it.
Sure, if I had a kid and it was one of those toy ones with learning activities.
If you are going to spend tens of millions of dollars on a referral bonus promotion, it better not be speculative!