skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
There's quite more to this than just simply replacing gethostbyname() with getaddrinfo().
That may be true most of the time for TCP/UDP client-side, but even there you'll run into OS-specific
quirks the moment you try to support more than one OS (or even more than one version of the same OS).
I've done my share of porting and here's some of the things I've ran into:

- OSs don't support all (major) RFCs, so e.g. you don't get inet_pton() or even some getaddrinfo() flags

- OSs support some draft RFC version (socklen_t mess)

- getaddrinfo() return values are system-specific (EAI_NODATA, EAI_PROTOCOL)

- getaddrinfo() with AI_ADDRCONFIG doesn't work or works differently on each system

- IPv6-mapped IPv4 addresses (don't get me started)

- server-side: IPv6 sockets cannot handle IPv4 traffic on all systems, so you end up having two separate sockets listening to the same port

- retrieving a list of local IP addresses from NICs - all ioctl()s changed, no proper documentation (except for BSDs fantastic getifaddrs(), also ported to newer Linuxes)

- if you're dealing with non-standard ports, you now have to fiddle with two sockaddr structures (_in and _in6)

- comparing two network addresses for equality is a pain in the ass - for example, one is an IPv6 address and the other is an IPv6-mapped IPv4 address

- huge piles of OS bugs (AIX being the winner here)

- xinetd/inetd configuration changes (IPv6-only, dual stack) are different for each system

- nslookup output (AAAA addresses) is different for each system

- accessing Windows network shares via IP addresses

- using IPv6 addresses with existing tools (e.g. ping -6 vs. ping6, ssh [addr]:port?)

Then there are differences in multicasting, raw sockets, addressing schemes (link-local, no broadcasting),
transition mechanisms (6to4, Teredo etc.) and so on and so forth.

IMO, porting to IPv6 is light years from being transparent.
I wouldn't worry about it at all.

So what if it is 'taken', it's not like someone has a monopoly on ideas that have already been used before.

Even stronger you can assume that your idea has been taken.

When google launched their search engine, 'search' as an idea had been taken. They redefined it to 'really good search' and the rest if history. Facebook wasn't the first social network and I suspect they won't be the last (though they may still be the biggest).

Do the very best you can when you execute your idea and then keep doing that, ever refining it. As time goes by the headstart - if you're the first mover - will increase, if you're not the first mover the distance to the leader should decrease. Relentlessly focus on making your site the best and you'll be able to take on even an established competitor. It won't be easy, but it is doable.

As for that search example, google now has competition. DuckDuckGo is very very tiny, but they're doing some small things better than google.

Search done 'a little bit better' apparently is still a valid idea, even so many years after 'search' was supposedly taken as an idea.

Competition is good for you, it keeps you sharp.
That's true; we've already got special cases like WITH-OPEN-FILE.
>advertise that they make serious errors and steal from you

Might look a bit like a truism .. Paypal bank is a bank?

Seriously though even knowing that Paypal mess up and take money and have terrible customer service doesn't mean that they are necessarily worse than a highstreet bank. Banks mess up and have poor customer service too - admittedly knowing the occurrence rate of monies taken on both sides would allow the price to be weighed against the negative factors (of both Paypal and regular banks) in a more transparent way.
That's all 'taboo' means. It identifies things we don't talk about openly, regardless of why.

Personally, I think the social disinclination to talk about salary is as manufactured for private gain as the whole diamond engagement ring 'tradition'.

The practical effect of secrecy in compensation is that employers have a massive advantage in negotiations and end up paying far, far less for labor. Perhaps I'm just cynical, but in my personal experience, effects like that are never accidental.
I think there's definitely a wider audience for this technology.

What audiences do you see for this technology?

Also, how would you expand the audience for this technology?

Possible options:

* Auto-crawl content and automagically organize it, without involving the content owner. (The Google approach).

* Build a turn-key solution that people can upload their content and get the index returned to them. (An API approach.)

* Talking to businesses directly, and make one on one deals. (An enterprise/B2B approach.)
I applied about 4 hours before the deadline, if I remember correctly.

I found out about YC that day while reading a Slashdot article that said the deadline was coming up. I put together the application in about 2 hours and sent it off, and marked that Dan would not be able to come out, and Chris would (a total guess).

I called them both the next day and was pretty surprised that after telling them about YC, they both instantly agreed to drop out of our last semester at Penn State and move to San Francisco.
http://www.RackspaceCloud.com
We have an awesome tool we call Haystack that we use to collect, categorize, and search exceptions and other notices. It uses MongoDB capped collections to keep the number of stored entries to a manageable level. "Needles" are simple JSON hashes and the views are customizable with Mustache. Exceptions can be rolled up based on a custom value provided by the producer. For instance, we roll up exceptions by filename and line number of origin. We use the hell out of it.

There are other projects, but nothing else that I'm able to talk about at the moment.
<cite>2. iPython was fun to use, helped out a lot, but it's not SLIME.</cite>

what exactly were you thinking about?
The app is well executed, looks create and has a good UI (well, except for the alert box when you update your profile).

However, I agree it is a little to MVP. To be useful I need more control over what is displayed in the bar ... and I probably want to host all the scripts on my own server too.

I want to be able to set the content in the Javascript code that instantiates the bar so the message is relevant to a user action.
My guess is that the bigger BH gets, the bigger that lost opportunity gets.
Ask HN: How do you feel about what it is that you do?
Specifically, the mental projection of your digital self? What do you think you accomplish by doing the thing that is the most enjoyable to you?
For those who missed , Andy Brice interviewed some startup/projects founders who failed :

http://successfulsoftware.net/2010/05/27/learning-lessons-fr...
Not only is competition good for you - but it is something you should expect. Whether there is already competition in your market, or it is completely niche, you will need to strive to do things better and make sure you meet your target user base needs.

This still holds true if those competitors are better funded; just build a better product.
Wow, you seriously have a lot of side-projects (http://techbio.org/). Drop me an email, and we'll talk.
Three R’s for living to 100: Resolution, Resourcefulness and Resilience
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/19/business/19entre.html
Very nicely done. Would love to see some stats about how long this took, in terms of crawling, indexing, etc. time.

Also, would love to hear more about the tools behind it.
Fair enough. But isn't it possible for a company to be profiting enough that they could pay off the debt before an acquisition? Especially in the case of a company being able to sell so quickly at a value 10x higher than the super angels valuation.

Is it wrong to go into an angel investment with the hope of paying off the debt before it converts and keeping your equity?
4 Ways To Avoid Going Stir Crazy Working At Home
We (WePay) applied at the last minute on a whim, and it was honestly one of the best decisions we have made as founders.
Less than 25 minutes you should feel refreshed, more than that you may feel groggy. Even if you only go into "standby" mode and don't actually sleep, the downtime typically leaves you feeling refreshed.

I worked a show with 70+ hour weeks for several months & those 17 minute (best length for me for some reason) power naps were the only thing that kept me sane.
got the first real contact to vim via these screencasts a few weeks ago (except for the standard i,:wq commands to get around). Amazing editor: powerful and available on any platform; my main problem before was that the later is not true for textmate; now: learn once, use anywhere!
Have you tried Craigslist?

Perhaps there are expat Americans or Brits who work in Lithuania, who could obtain a copy for you.
Oh, I'm not worried that competition exists; I'm worried about competition I'm not aware exists. I want to be able to find out who all is trying to do something similar to my idea, and how well they are doing it so that I can pivot where necessary.
I've worked for quite a few companies over the years who had made it a firing-offense to discuss salaries at all in the workplace. This made negotiation your top skill in the company - not the quality of your work, nor the quantity of your work.

While this didn't stop employees from finding out who made what, it slowed it down, and it did little to reduce the sense of unfairness.

Folks who tend to go into managerial tracks tend to think that everything is negotiable. While techies tend to be poor negotiators. This results in an arms race where one side is unarmed.
It really seems like you have two options:

Classic corporate style: all salaries are private, and management has total flexibility in how salaries and raises are calculated.

Fog Creek style: there's a grade system, salaries are near-public (or easy to figure out), and management is locked into pay brackets; a trade of flexibility for transparency.

What doesn't seem to work is anything in between. If everyone knows everyone else's salary and management does flexible incentive/retention/recruiting salary calculation, the situation devolves to "Incentive Pay Considered Harmful"-style teamicide as people snipe at each other and invest cycles in cultivating resentment about perceived pay injustices.

An employee might reasonably prefer one style or the other. It's probably nice not to stew all day wondering if the guy slacking off next to you is making more than you, but it's also nice to know that if you talk to your manager, make an arrangement, and then just completely rock out for a couple months, you can achieve an arbitrary pay bump. "Classic style" is more entrepreneurial.
Mark Suster's post.
http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2009/06/06/the-first-vc-m...

referenced:
http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2010/10/06/the-four-main-...
Are you guys hiring? Also, what other startups do you think are on the same level of awesome as GitHub?
Initially Buffett started out as pretty much an arbitrageur, he focused on companies selling below their liquidation value. This was all from learning under Benjamin Graham. So if you look at his partnership years, he would often invest in companies where they had hidden assets.

Sanborn Map company sold maps, but they also had an investment portfolio that dwarfed their market cap. So he had them sell it off. He did a lot of cigar butts like that. Back then, Buffett was pretty pushy. He would do whatever it took to acquire all the stock of companies and would sack the management teams and replace them with others. At one point an entire town in Dempster protested against him.

Then he met Charlie Munger and Munger got him to start focusing on acquiring good businesses that had franchise values. See's Candy is the best example. So he looked for companies with sustainable competitive advantages and high returns on invested capital. So he started to buy your good businesses run by great entrepreneurs with little actual control. The only thing he would ask is if they could not meet an internal hurdle for ROIC (return on invested capital) that they give excess capital for him to redeploy.

Now, if you look at what Buffett has been doing, he's continued to evolve a bit. He seems much more focused on buying utility-like businesses. MidAmerican and Burlington Northern exemplify this. They don't throw off cash that can be redeployed elsewhere like the previous Berkshire deals. At the same time though, they potentially can be around for the next 50 years and increase prices to make up for inflation.

These deals are probably going to continue. Buffett must realize that his 3 replacements wont be as good at allocating capital, so he will need to find businesses that are great but also utilize a lot of cash. That would reduce the burden on his CIO replacements.
The Stuxnet worm was likely created by a government.
How do you decide what features to add or not add to Github? How much thinking, discussion, planning, design, research, etc go into each feature before coding begins?
I don't think that you're accurately representing the state of affairs.

At the time I'm reading it, your second comment (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1799442) is neutral at 1 point. That is not a symptom of people acting "toxic" and trying to "discourage" you. It was a good question, but nobody seemed to know much about it, so it just sort of sat there.

Your first comment (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1787833) is at -3 points. Unfortunately, as it's five days old, I can no longer put it at -4. You stepped into an admittedly poor discussion about specific reasons why SO might need less servers than Digg, and posted a flamebaity generalization with absolutely no support; you didn't suggest a reason that .NET might be faster than LAMP, nor any evidence that it might be faster, or what it might be faster at. You just dropped a one-line load of an opinion and left. I absolutely am on board with being maximally toxic and discouraging toward the comment you made there.
We learned of the application about 1 week before the deadline. We threw it together in an afternoon, spent a couple days editing, and turned it in just before the deadline. We basically thought "What the hell?" the worst thing that can happen is we don't get accepted, and then we will have only wasted the time we spent preparing the application. We had no demo and barely a coherent idea, so we focused our application on how awesome the founders were. We basically wanted to show that we were smart and we could build things, we figured that would get us to the interview round (and buy us some time to formulate our idea.)

You should apply even if you have to put the application together today. Just for the experience. At worst, you'll waste an afternoon. At best you'll get in, like we did (Cloudant YCS08 - Boston)
Confrontations happen with every political change. The real question is whether it's feasible to repeal laws that limit citizens rights; the US presents numerous examples that suggest it is.

In 1972 the draft ended. In 1996 export of strong cryptography from the US was legalized. Since the 1990's, 18 states have either decriminalized marijuana or legalized medicinal marijuana. A couple states during that time span legalized assisted suicide. Judicial rulings in the past ten years alone have overturned laws banning firearms and sodomy, and in five states, same sex marriage was legalized.
Nice, very nice. There are a lot of good critiques in the comments and I might agree with some... But my initial gut reaction was 'yes - I get what this is and like the basic design...'

I would imagine in time links to the actual HN discussions of the book might be nice (though it would not be too hard to google that oneself).

I open links in tabs too - so I would agree with that comment.

More 'click to sort' options, maybe by language.

For a Beta example site I liked it. Good start.
I too rolled my eyes until I saw that it was about vim.
"The first stage is implemented by the 'reader' and can be reprogrammed by an ancient API to the reader via read tables."

Readtables aren't any more ancient than the rest of ANSI INCITS 226-1994 (R2004) (the language standard formerly known as X3.226-1994 (R1999)), but the interface to them is very low-level and non-modular.

The current readtable is specified by a dynamic variable, so the readtable facility can be made modular with a nicer interface, in a portable manner. This is exactly what the library Named-Readtables does: http://common-lisp.net/project/named-readtables/

Now realize the significance of this: Common Lisp is the only language allowing total unrestricted syntactic extension and <i>modification</i> in a modular and (somewhat) composable way.

I've been using named-readtables for the past month, and between it and Quicklisp, I haven't been this excited about programming in CL since I started (which is 8 years ago, not that long, but I'm not a total noob either).
There is not really alot of documentation yet so you want find any even if you tree more words.
There is no free lunch. It seems logical to me that there is a downside to artificially screwing with the density of available (in both senses of the word) mating partners. The brain is wired to a value here greater zero and less then unlimited.
no idea - but the idea of supporting overweight rabbits sounds good.
I sorely regret that your contribution has not received more attention!

Slim's underlying assumption is that only those people that are suitable to held a job are worth caring about, for as long they remain suitable to held such job.

I agree that social entrepreneuring and accessible seed capital investment is part of the solution, as well as employment stimulus programs. However, we cannot ignore that fact that the global tendency in the dominant incarnation of capitalism is to replace labor and expertise with capital, automation and standard processes. Pure capital generating abstract machines cannot be a solution to our labor problems.

Even more so, we need to address the fact that there is people in this world who will never be able to have a job again: the elderly, the disabled, the dispossesed. No matter how much economic growth there is in the world, they will never have direct access to that.
The only reason you'll fail is because your product sucks, not lack of marketing or money.

You are trying to do too much too soon, making everything mediocre crap.

1) Simplify everything; figure out what the one thing your site does well is (whatever is doing most successful, which looks like contests/predictions). Get rid of everything that people aren't using, like yaNotes.

2) Don't do international, focus on building where you live and work. Nobody cares that theres international traders. I'd rather have 500 US traders then 25 traders from 20 countries. This is called the network effect.

3) Clean up your homepage after you've done accordingly. Users probably only need to see 3 sentences out of what you've written.

4) Make something viral a core part of your product (getting users to announce predictions on twitter to be part of a giveaway?).

I hate to say it, but you did it wrong (I did this too while trying to build a social network). You poured money into it thinking you could design the perfect community and features and just launch it. I see nothing that requires hiring graphics artists, mathematicians, or two outsourced dev firms.

You can still make this a success, just expect to lose a majority of what you have now. All the work you've put in will essentially be deleted and you'll have to let it go. Good luck.
At least for me- I have not forgotten- it is just a matter of priority.

On such a small team working on such a large product, accessibility takes the back seat to other implementations. This is not my decision, and I do have issues with it, but I understand it as well.

Something I have always wondered though was why visitors would be frustrated on [insert your little site here] on a [insert your accessible device here], when such an important majority of the internet doesn't even work? Based on the link, I would think expectations are not very high.
Well give the guy back his money less the re-adjusted transaction fees. They just robbed this man of $2500.
but you have to use annotation and they suck. :)
Again with the downvotes, did I detract from the conversation? If you disagree say so (and preferably why) or upvote such a disagreement.

>I can't tell which email you sent me has that very important attachment

If it's from me then the subject will say "$important-attachment-subject" and the priority will he set to high (but not highest unless you're going to lose money or there is a risk of injury to persons or properties by a delayed response).

Seriously I'd have thought that people would like a vcard that can save them 10 mins inputting data and instead be imported into an address-book with a simple click.

Admittedly I hadn't realised that it got labelled as an attachment (but it seems obvious it should now). But then ...

Oi, I just tested with Thunderbird and vcards (and signature images) are not labelled as attachments. So, are you sure it does in your MUA?
FTA: FP says that you don't have to have 20 thousand libraries. Or rather, you're welcome to have as many libraries as you want, but you develop those 30-70 functions that you use most often in your job and re-use them Instead of learning a new problem domain for each project and then working inside of it little piece by little piece, you're creating you own minimal set of symbols that work on all of your projects, thereby making each new project more and more trivial.

Would anybody mind making a non-comprehensive list of these 30-70 functions?

I know the article says they're specific for each job, but I'm sure there's an overlap among most of them.
It being a library, refactoring often means that the interfaces are now different. Refactoring should mean your functionality doesn't change, but having interfaces change is normal (and expected). Given that the author isn't modifying the code calling theirs, stuff will inevitably break. You can presumably make an adapter to make it compatible, though in this case I doubt all that's been modified is refactoring.
Any decisions in these past 3 years you regret?
Who else other than the user would the benefits go to? Web developer maybe, but their interests are aligned, unless you like being stuck using a IE6-only site during the day, and weeping when you compare it to the modern internet that you use in the evenings.
Charging for Digital Content in the Land of Free Rides
wow, thanks john. and may i say, good choice on that implementation of data. :p

thank you kindly for such a wonderful tool (referring to the framework itself, of course).
Fear And Loathing At The Wall Street Journal
We (HireHive) applied 4 days after the deadline. This was the first time that YC had officially accepted late applications. We weren't planning on applying until the winter (if at all). We were just filling out the application as a way to firm up our understanding of the business and then we said "what the heck".

In retrospect this was clearly a great decision.