skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I think better type inferencing may bring strong typing back in vogue.

I think what really makes programming in a "dynamic" language significantly more pleasant is not having to type (on the keyboard) type (int, Object, etc.) declarations. A strictly, statically typed language with a good type inferencing engine, like Scala or Haskell, makes a lot of this go away.

I understand (though don't have enough experience to verify) that there are times that the type inferencing occasionally makes things harder when you get a type error and can't identify its source. But certainly a win overall compared to explicit types everywhere.
"Object Orientation failed because it's too hard to understand? I blinked in incredulity"

With great respect, I suggest: If you know what a closure is, you may have trouble understanding how OO is difficult to understand for many other people. The kind of people who have never heard of a closure, and whose eyes glaze over as you try to explain that a closure is an inside-out object and an objct is an inside-out closure.
> But once you get to a certain number of routes, like 20 or so, there's very rapid growth, followed by saturation. This will also happen with chips. To some extent, it already has.

The human brain has billions of routes, and uses them somewhat efficiently...
I would say we've had it for a while now. Ever seen the things that people on a trading desk do with Excel? Or maybe VB, when they get daring.

Generally something that gets the job done that they want it do.

However, it is not going to be very extensible, no one besides the person who wrote it will be able to understand it (and maybe not even him), they will have no idea what to do if they want it to go faster, or if they need to make it work on the web, or integrate some data feed that doesn't have any easy way to import into Excel, or...

In summary, we have programming for non-programmers, it works as well as can be expected, but sometimes you really, really need a programmer.
Implications of the claim "convenience beats quality"
Fred Wilson says "convenience beats quality" for digital videos and photos. This is also true for the consumer web. What are the product management implications?
do you mean that you could rank user importance by the "quality" (highest "worth") of the content they view or vote on w/ a pagerank implementation?
Ask YC: How to Find Problems to Solve?
Recently, on my blog, I have compiled a short list of resources which help startups find problems to solve. The link to the post is: http://tinyurl.com/4n9uw2

The resources include researching Twitter conversations via Summize and Twistori, creating Google alerts for the term 'survey', researching on Yahoo Answers, etc.

I am wondering what resources/methods do you use to find problems to solve?
They are exceptionally boring and uncreative to me at this point. I guess occasionally, one will come around that makes sense but most of the time they are garbage.

Take a descriptive word, drop a vowel - how novel. Try coming up with a unique brand without following the same formula as everyone else - Google, YouTube, Facebook and MySpace all managed to without going the Flickr route.
The Three Kinights of Open Source
This might be apt as well..

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=206296
Why does Azuki need funding when the guys behind it are worth 'hundreds of millions' of dollars? They should be running funds themselves.
The problem may be that our predictors are terrible. There are a lot of Nobel prize winners who later discover their 'dismal' performance on IQ tests. I know grad students at Princeton who've confided sub-100 IQ scores, bad SAT's, horrible performance on one math test or another -- it's like this big, shameful secret for otherwise brilliant people.

Everyone carries around the absurd burdens of judgments and measurements, but they don't always mean what people think they mean.
Did anyone watch the video?

I'm just saying ;)
I use google notebook (notebook.google.com). It has a nice firefox plugin that lets you manage your notes and you can create different categories (for exmple, I have webdevelopment, personal, stuff).
The Future of Mobile Social Networking
Solar-Powered Speedboat Goes on Sale in Netherlands
Via Google:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Do+You+Love+the+Job...
Microsoft to Incorporate Touch Screen Technology Into Upcoming OS
guest@goosh.org:/web> news daum
Error: Operation timed out (1212416829830).

guest@goosh.org:/web> news obama
Error: Operation timed out (1212416850562).

guest@goosh.org:/web> 1 aiml
Error: Operation timed out (1212416867098).
"I don't think I'm the only person to think this up, but I hypothesize that if you remove all the text of Garfield's speech, or thoughts, or whatever that is, that it become an oddly surrealist comic. "

http://www.truthandbeautybombs.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=4997

From January 2006. Thanks for doing your research, New York Times!
"How do you know what I've investigated?"

I don't. That's why I'm asking.

"More interestingly, what's the response to Dyson's claim that growth in processing power is not matched by growth in people's capacity to use it?"

Dyson seems to be referring to the dumb "extrapolated exponential growth = 'Singularity'" hypothesis. I agree that that idea is completely stupid, I don't see how they can conclude anything from that extrapolation. My argument rests on two postulates: 1. AI is feasible. 2. When AI arrives on the scene, there will be large changes.

See this for more info: http://www.singinst.org/blog/2007/09/30/three-major-singular...
though apparently not with reliable dns yet.
There's a sound argument that goes from "AI is feasible" to "AI can be recursively self-improving". So it's not just a random conclusion as you imply.

I'm not going to go into detail explaining it here because I'd rather spend my energy on doing that in a way that can communicate to more people. (I'm working on that.)
Ask HN: What programming language to use?
Hi.

I create various web applications and am an old-school PHP programmer. Usually I rapid-prototype these myself and then hand them off to other programmers to finish.

It's time to get up-to-speed with the way things are now and I'm looking for advice on what programming language to adopt and get skilled in.

Most of my future applications will be hosted, so I do not need to worry about end-server environments.

They need to be robust languages that they can easily scale as the things I create tend to get a lot of users fast.

I'm open to the end product being flash-based or html/js based. The end answer may remain PHP. Pros and cons are most welcome. I suspect flash may be a greater learning curve, but I could be quite wrong.

It would be a great bonus if there are decent debuggging tools etc, and code libraries for the selected language.

Your suggestions are greatly appreciated, along with the reasoning behind them so that I can make an informed decision.

Thank you very much for your help.
John.
I thought it's supposed to save me time :)
The 5 Biggest Interview Mistakes Startups Make
Your guess is still way high. It's around 200,000 active per week. Probably close to that every day as well since it's a dedicated group.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/04/29/end-of-speculation-the-...
The writer says about everybody's mom: "She will never use Twitter, it’s too complicated for her." Personally I think my mother will never use twitter because it's too narcissistic for her, and she'd probably be insulted by the implication that entering text in a text box is too difficult.

I couldn't get past the stupidity and self-importance of that sentence.
Troops.
"...and left the object oriented stuff to people who really understand it and for problems that can not be solved any other way."

And an example of such a problem would be...?

The single biggest problem with "language war" threads like this is that people actually believe this is the "only way". "Better way"? Maybe. "Only way"? Hardly.

Anything you can do in your language (object oriented or not), I can do in mine. Maybe not as slick, but it can be done.
Are there any other quantifiable variables with such high predictive power? I'd be really interested if there were some other test that could better estimate the odds that someone would get a degree, earn lots of money, stay out of jail, vote often, delay having kids, etc.

It would be interesting to know more details, which I'm sure you can't divulge without violating someone's privacy. But it would be neat to find out if those people had other skills that correlate strongly with IQ, like the various digit-memorization/recitation tests, or reaction time. Were these people autistic? Were they taking a test in a language they didn't know too well?
Congrats! After a marriage things changes a bit. PG and Jessica are involved with YC so, lets hope there is no side effects on YC :)
I've had some not so good experiences with clickatell. Long delays (upwards of hours) on getting messages out, etc.

Would love any info on US based SMS gateways.
Googling for "goosh google" gives me lots of results on Goosh, but Gooshing (...) for the same gives me 0 results on Goosh.

Is this not live data?
>Also, faculty are not administrators, they are former students. They enjoy helping bright motivated students, no matter how much money the student pays in tuition.

That's my approach. But my experience (as both a student and teacher) suggests that I'm a minority, and people like this guy (http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2008/02/11/ferrall) are more common. It varies from place to place, however.

Anyway, I'm not saying you can't push through fast. I did it myself, and it was well worth it (2 years = half price). But I had to fight the system every semester, and use various paperwork/administrative hacks to do it. It wasn't easy, and if I were a chem major (department chair: Jones, mentioned earlier), it would have been impossible.
This seems reasonable. However I seem to remember that the actual listings in the UK are 'owned' by some central authority (I forget who but it's got something to do with the Radio Times) and you license the right to publish them.

While it's a fact that a show is on it's also content owned by some authority. This is where lawyers make their money.
Maglev and the naiivety of the Rails community
Skydeck Goes Social And Releases APIs
The implementation kind of sucks but good idea. I'm in Canada but tossed my commute up there to see if anyone wants a ride.
I have a love-hate relationship with my job. I love what I do, and essentially go home every evening to develop myself further so that the next day, I can do even a better job. I love it to a point where everything else is secondary to being better at what I do

On the flip side, there are moments when given certain tasks I absolutely hate it. I think it has to do with my vision of what a perfect environment ought to be, and anything that does not fit that mold is something I despise. I truly believe software development is an art, and it ought to be treated as such. Add to that, I am somewhat of a purist, and like things done in a particular manner, and the fact that resource constraints don't help in that regard frustrate me.

At the end of the day, I (think) would be doing what I do, as long as I feel I am being adequately compensated for it, both personally (in terms of my own growth) and professionally (yeah, pay check size does matter :D)
yeah that's a good start... but the keys need to be virtual so they can move around.
This one from ikea is pretty ideal. Flat surface but some shelving on top for storage of books and whatever else: http://www.ikea.com/ca/en/catalog/products/60111123
should that not be i.com?
I recommend Python, once you try it, you will never look back, and it has decent web frameworks, libraries etc for whatever you want to do.
I agree. Twitter is simple, but to the average person, it's not useful IMHO
what about ununbium (112) through ununoctium (118)?
Geophysicist Builds Baby Earth to Test Its Magnetic Field
Sensational title. Check.

Misleading title. Check.

Wild speculation. Check.

Lack of references. Check.

Ignoring all the data right in front of us. Check.

Activist call to action. Check.

Reddit, Digg, or National Enquirier. No Check.

Hacker News. Check.

Just "checking".
solve your own problems, you will be surprised at the number of people that have the same problem that you do.
Google has many datacenters. You probably used a different one then Goosh. Not everybody sees the same results on google.
or thumb.st (just checked, available)
Key to Optical Illusions Discovered - We "see" into the future
Get a job.

They'll give you plenty of problems to solve.

Many of which you can build a business around.
mosoc
6 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Be a Web Worker
Microsoft's Robbie Bach 'thought about killing' Surface
Adobe launches Acrobat community
Intel to re-enter mobile market
New iPhone could be for sale at £100 by July
This is really cool, but you can set search shortcuts in Opera (and the other browsers too). Eg. I type 's xyz' to google search xyz. I have tons of other search shortcuts, like e for ebay, a for amazon, i for imdb, m for mininova, y for youtube, etc.
I like my job, at the end of the day its really chill and pays fairly well, however its really just something i'm doing while in school, so I really don't see a long term career happening.
named_scope is pretty awesome.
I think it might be good for both, if Google targets better. It may depend on the industry -- what kind of products do your clients advertise?
I registered textzero.com as a domain for an idea I had years ago.

I've never used it and TBH am unlikely to ever get around to doing anything on it. I'd rather it got used than sat there.

If you'd like it, you can have it at cost.
Just buy me a beer one day if you make millions ;-)
Anyone know how how to make an "extension"? Help says:

load	<extension_url>	load an extension
Agreed.

The project I'm working on right now is to build online tools to make contract nurses lives easier. It comes from my working as a contract nurse for 10 years, and knowing what problems that niche market has.

I have a bunch of other ideas/problems in need of solving on the back burner if this one doesn't work out. Most of them are issues that I've come across and said, "I'd love it if I had something that would help me do X, Y or Z..."
Problems find me. And, unless you're a very lucky person, I bet they find you as well, so just pick the one that annoys you the most.
Can it be neither?
Twitter thrives on the modern "Cult of Celebrity" idea. The reason Arrington and Scoble have so many followers and love Twitter so much is evidence of this fact.

My favorite analogy for these types of personalities would be if one of your friends in high school got a really hot, older girlfriend. Instead of living the high life (we all imagine) and going to older more sophisticated parties he brings his hot GF to your buddies basement to hang with you and your buddies instead. The point being he adores the attention lavished upon him in your basement more than the actual lifestyle that the hotty GF brings. Calacanis is another perfect example of this.
Use products/services that you think are solving a problem and observe what their doing right and what their doing wrong, come up with your own twist on the problem you want to solve and apply good design in your effort to solve that problem.
bugmenot.com
In retrospect, I topped out in my upper division coursework for the math major. I still got B's and even some A's in those courses (Real Analysis, Abstract Algebra), but I was reduced to studying solution sets rather than mastering the material creatively. This was when I got more interested in applications (optimization, scientific programming, etc).

I figured I'd pick a grad program in Industrial Engineering so that I could get away from math and more into applications. Unfortunately, I picked Berkeley. A graduate intro to optimization was pretty much a series of proofs about convex sets. Same deal for stochastic processes (it might be different with different professors, though). BTW, this isn't meant as a knock on Berkeley - this theory focus is a big part of why it's such a powerhouse program. But it probably wasn't the right choice for me. I've heard Stanford is more flexible (I've also heard the grass is greener, so who really knows).

At this point, I topped out in grades as well as understanding, because I didn't have the motivation to continue. I tanked, and squeaked by with a MS. I actually missed problems that I would have gotten right as an undergraduate. I was thinking "I've had enough of proofs, I just don't want to do this anymore."

In a way, I got a lot out of the experience. My interest in academics waned, and I pretty much just started hacking with like-minded students. In other words, I finally, belatedly arrived at the process of becoming self-educated, which is really the only kind that sticks, right?
Why Your Car May Soon Be Driving Digital Advertising
December 22nd, 2012 is the day the day the Aliens come and the whole world ends - I think the internet is the least of our worries. Hopefully Mulder has a plan.
How is it good for my client to spend 30% more to acquire a customer? Google champions the fact that their ads produce more $ for them (than comparable products from Y!/MS), which is good only for them and their shareholders. I don't see how the product matters in this regard. It's all about ROI and unless these Goog customers are more apt to buy again and again it's not worth it.
Sleep Medicine is actually a sub-specialty of Pulmonary Medicine. So, to become a Pulmonologist/Sleep specialist, you need to have 4 years Pre-Med, 4 years Med school, 3-4 years of Internal Medicine Residency. After that, you have to apply to become a Pulmonologist, which is rather competitive. Regardless, it's a two year fellowship in pulmonary medicine, which means that you're the defacto king of the ICU for 2 years. Sometimes, pulmonologists take an extra one year to study sleep medicine.

So, on average, your sleep specialists have about 13-15 years of schooling. It's about the same ammount of time that it would take to become a Plastic surgeon, or Interventional Cardiologist, Cardiothoracic Surgeon of Invasive Radiologist.

It's not a light weight course of study. Certainly not 4 hours worth.
languages don't scale, your architecture does.
Praise and anger over The Planet data center fire and outage
All-fours study links gene to upright gait
A sixth path towards the singularity? (response to Vernor Vinge)
They are so worth every penny. I love mine.

I actually cut a hole in the middle of my desk, so I can recline in my office chair, and swivel my monitor out over the edge of the desk and face it down at me. It really helps with neck and back strain.
You should be able to marshal out everything in just about any VM. The reason why Ruby and the JVM dont' do this is because it just hasn't been done yet. The whole point of VMs is that they are virtual machines. That virtual model is just data. The VM is just another program. So saving state, then restarting later from that state is quite doable.

Image-based development is a very different style, however. Lots of people are in love with their command lines and text editors.
Dan Gilbert: Why are we happy? [video]
Python and Ruby are pretty much the players when it comes to web apps these days.

If you want to stick with a Microsoft Stack, you could try ASP.NET (shudder).
As a web worker one of the biggest obstacles is the fact that most people who work 9-5 mon through fri work .. much ... slower ... than ... you do. I will often work in the morning, send a client an email in the afternoon, and then wait, and wait and wait not realizing that the typical 9-5er will wait sometimes 1-2 days to act on a new email because they deal with "office stuff". Often I'm disappointed because I'll close my laptop at 12:00 AM and then get up the next morning at 7:00 and not have any new emails (same problems Steve Pavlina had with sleeping)
That's why I wanted more details. It's implausible to me that so many people would choose Google over Yahoo if Google delivered worse results for more money. I'd also be confounded at Google's ability to do so while hiring so many smart people. Perhaps Google delivers more purchases per click, or more repeat customers (they are worth something, aren't they?). Perhaps Yahoo is particularly good at certain kinds of clients (that's why I asked).
RailsConf 2008 Liveblogging - Final day highlights / summary
Not at the same time.

Edit: The brain uses most links but you use a tiny fraction of your overall memories at any one time.
"Imagine a service from Apple that was free and allowed you to sync multiple Apple products via the Internet"

Amazing, now I can snc my iPod with my ... iPod.

Which shines the light on the major problem of services like this. I don't want to be tied to 1 vendor for all my services and devices. All-in-one solutions only work when one sacrifices the advantages of mixing and matching the very best service and hardware from other manufactures.
A lot of this has already appeared in the popular press, but this is a lecture by a Harvard psychologist responsible for much of the research. He's funny & punchy, and generally quite enjoyable to watch.

Aside from the experiments, I thought the bit about how freedom was the enemy of happiness was pretty interesting. Among other things, it explains the reaction to PG's essays: in order to maintain their happiness, they have to believe that they're stuck in a boring corporate job and have no other options. Otherwise, they have a choice, and with that choice comes regret, and with regret comes unhappiness. So PG is really spreading unhappiness the world over. ;-) His essays only resonate with those who already know they have a choice, because we're not going to become more unhappy about it, and it might inspire us to actually try it.

Also explains why the 20s can be such an emotional wasteland - coming out of college, we have so many possible choices, and nearly all of them are reversible.
'too complicated' could easily be understood to mean 'you are not smart enough to understand'. It could also mean 'Why bother, too complicated'. The act of entering text isn't too difficult for any of our mothers. But 'getting' twitter is way to complicated for them.
Why is Google Code Search missing from the list?
Being a startup focused web geek I'm constantly bouncing ideas off of my hacker friends. One of which always responds with statements like "It would be cheaper and a better investment to just buy a Quiznos franchise" or something along those lines.

Now he contends mostly that he's looking for free lunch more than anything (oh he's a funny one), but often buying a traditional boring old business makes much more sense than tying to hit the VC tech lottery.

Screw logic though, onward towards beta 2!
"Please not a job!!!... anything but that"
For some people, just the act of thinking about getting a job is simply life threatening. Start a Startup instead, it pays in the long run, if not financially, just think about the experience you will gain.
No interest in going with Microsoft. :-)

What are the pros and cons between Python and Ruby and how does Ruby on Rails fit into it?

Thank you!
They check with Arrington first, and then based on his expert recommendations implement the best technology/strategy.

/lame joke
Experience, open-mindedness, open eyes, serendipity.

Using Twitter, Google Alerts & co. is just another way of having your eyes open (really wide, in this case), but they are hardly enough.

Do your thing, follow your bliss, and problems will find you - specifically searching for one is like searching for a girlfriend at a party.
There are still limits on what an infinitely intelligent creature can do in the real world. AI is not going to result in magic levels of technology. For example you might build an IC engine that is 40, 50, or 60+% efficient but it's never going to be 100.00001%. And as we can already build 40+% efficient power plants so it's not possible to build something that extracts 3x as much energy from burning fuel.
Performance. I mean, price is definitely a factor.