skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
To his shareholders. If a CEO I have shares into does not increase it's value, I don't think he is doing a good job.

I'm not investing into company to make the world a better place, I vote and lobby government for this.

Also, as long a drug companies customers are mostly health insurances and not the final users, you will never get real competition.
Show HN: NextDNS now supported by Merlin (encrypted DNS for all your devices)
Hehe. The comparison is both amusing and apt. I’m often in the “executive” position in this scenario and this barrier between the angry team/customer/partner and the people doing engineering work really pays in spades. The people doing the “real” work on both sides usually avoid animosity and the management teams slugging it out in conference rooms usually understand that the dance they’re doing is just business as usual and not personal. When the separation is violated you can have engineers doing shoddy work because they’re stressed or emotionally overloaded. Early in my career I was in that situation and made some very pointed comments that the company’s CEO had to smooth over.

If you do a really good job at handling the communication separation the business relationship is stronger after and each side better understands one another’s needs and motivations. My foot in mouth moment ended up turning into a larger business arrangement because the CEO turned it into a positive experience.

While not a universally perfect negotiating book, I’ve found “Never Split the Difference” to be an interesting tome on making the best of adversarial business situations.
Focusing on workers rights would endanger their corporate campaign donations, and they can't have that.
I think the number one after-school activity for me and my friends was at some point HOMM 3 (and 2).
Coal miners should learn to code?
Cheques are being phased out in New Zealand this year. Almost no one uses them here anymore. It's all electronic, online. Zero fees for bank transfers.
You could use an Amiga while formatting a floppy, back in 1985, a couple years before OS/2 was released.
No because a few years ago it was shown to be emotional ideology.

Personally, I loath graphical UIs I am expected to interact with.

And it isn’t just because of bad designers. It’s the melding of data and functionality like Oop enables. It’s a straight up dumb paradigm.

There’s been so many cases, before we were building modern intelligent helpful UI, where GUI widgets functionality changes as the data changes. I have to undo and separate out an idea or rework something because the GUI wasn’t able to consider the nuance I had in mind.

Desktop computing software design influences of old need to die. Trying to make people productive by giving them buttons that are just wrappers to functions is a crap way to make office life more productive.

Programmers spend all day editing text. Just make nicely formatted text record standards for our users and show them how to combine those ideas, feed it into a machine that presents a nice result.

I did this once at a job years ago. Everyone loved it. Now I get to copy paste yaml and tell people there is fuck all I can do about Gmail bring shit

GUIs make people waste time trying to deal with problems the developer was never tasked with solving.
Don't know if this was linked, but the relevant podcast episode if anyone's interested https://www.akimbo.link/blog/s-2-e-13-ignore-sunk-costs
I am not but it seems like an intuitive solution to the problem where the path is blocked by other units so one of stragglers routes alllllllllll the way around the map and straight through the enemy base.
I must live in Star Trek because I can assure you I do all of that electronically and with no fees. If you give someone here a cheque chances are they won't even know what it is. I'd say literally nobody under 30 here has seen a cheque in their entire life. (Spain)
That reminds me of the time Papa John said he wouldn't give his employees health insurance because it would cost an extra 14 cents a large pizza. Heaven forbid.
When SpaceX breaks stuff it is simply because not all the variables are known, not because they cut corners and harm their customers in favor of their bottom line or speed of execution.
Nor is machine learning likely to produce a reliable method of inferring intention: it’s a bedrock of anthropology that intention is unknowable without dialogue. As Cliff Geertz points out in his seminal 1973 essay, “Thick Description,” you cannot distinguish a “wink” (which means something) from a “twitch” (a meaningless reflex) without asking the person you’re observing which one it was.

I see this and other examples of "explainability" from time to time as proof why humans are not a "Black Box."

However it rests on two faulty assumptions.

1. The explanation will be truthful

2. The explainer can always reliably describe the actual cause of their own actions

For the purposes of theory, you could explain away #1. However a minute of introspection will make you realize that you would fail at #2 the vast majority of the time - using story telling and retroactive explanations to explain your behavior.
Ofc not. I was trying out different tech.
Setup the tech using Surge for frontend, node + mongo on ec2 as backend while sendgrid to send out mail. Looking for suggestions to improve tech stack.
“Please select the images that show US military bases to proceed”
> I understand that Microsoft has a similar crew they can dispatch to any customer to get their business software working again.

Yikes well I work for a large corporation that uses tons of Microsoft software, and we use their dispatch team constantly. Granted, we are probably one of their largest customers. It's great to have such a resource. But the fact that we need it doesn't speak well for Microsoft -- I would prefer if we didn't need such a dispatch team on a constant basis.
It depends on my goals.If I just want to learn something,I do a little bit research on the subject and what could be good books on it and tgen head to Amazon or local book store for it. If haven't got a concrete goal and just want to explore some random topics,I again hit Amazon and browse random categories,read some literature reviews by critics in newspapers and etc. Also,reading feeds reading. For instance,I was reading some comments on Financial Times and saw someone making a fairly reasonable argument about queuing theory.Not being familiar with it,I googled it, found some very interesting courses and books. Will do a bit of exploration of this topic in near future.
The article's author is not Girard himself.
3) will stop them from buying an off the shelf commercially-ready product. Yes, they can develop one from scratch, but only at enormous cost and difficulty relative to simple dollars.
I thought that the problem with air travel is not (just) the amount of CO2 emitted, but also the altitude, which makes the green house effect bigger per ton of CO2.
> I'm sure plenty of states would be happy to let you transact in crypto as long as you're willing to pay taxes.

What is the point of cryptocurrency if your freedom can be impinged upon by being compelled to pay taxes? What's the point of it isn't the primary medium of exchange? If it's not that, then it's just a deflationary store of value, functioning like gold, which nobody uses for daily transactions, therefore of limited value.

Why would that state accommodate your ability to convert crypto into local currency that they ultimately control? The only rationale would be to hurt their presumptive rival: the state you fled.

And more importantly, even if that works at the individual level for you and a few others who work that kind of deal with a state, how does that model scale to populations of multiple 10s of millions?

Another state may allow a few people to make that personal optimization in their territory, but they won't negotiate such agreements with millions of people. If you are a rare wealthy person able to strike such a deal with a state, you are then effectively an oligarch, and part of the state power structure.

States are made of people, and people only trust other people who they believe have skin in the game.
The problems that MBAs are trying to solve are not those at which your average engineer is particularly good. Also, these problems are usually ill defined and not easily testable. On top of that, to "deploy" your solution you need to show a schizophrenic amount of confidence for the amount of ambiguity and risk you plan to take, and you have to do it all in the form of a PowerPoint slide deck for people who are most likely have no clue what you are talking about and have an attention span of a 5 year old child. All this leads to a relatively high error rate.

So, it's easy for engineers to ridicule them, while still keeping well within their own comfort zone. It doesn't add credibility though, I agree.
Communication Patterns for Leadership
The How I Built This podcast on Southwest [0] with Kelleher (since deceased) is an amazing episode. Both for trivia and giving context to what it takes to be successful behind the scenes.

Kelleher (a lawyer by training) ran a private practice while litigating a 3-year lawsuit against airline incumbents at the time... before Southwest flew its first flight in Texas.

And when asked "Why?" As in, why didn't you stop, return to law, or do something easier, he basically said "Because it didn't seem fair. Or right. That they could keep us from flying."

I'm sure he had his fair share of sharp business decisions, but he came across as a truly great human being.

[0] https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/national-public-radio/how-i...
One particular source for me has been the reading lists of great writers and thinkers (Eg: Tolstoy[0], Gandhi[1] and many more kept extensive reading lists). Generally I think it is a good idea to delve into classics because time is a good judge.

[0] https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/09/30/leo-tolstoy-reading...

[1] http://www.gandhi-manibhavan.org/eduresources/bks_read_by_g....
Yes - but generally only of information that contradicts their pre-existing views. This whole thing is, after all, basically a way of helping to reassure Guardian readers who've seen their political side lose with the help of those they expected to support them that their views were right all along, and that it's all the fault of global manipulation by big tech brainwashing the other people into voting against their own interests. I've never seen any of the people bemoaning this consider that maybe their side suffers from a systematic disinformation problem, not even after being caught out time and time again by false information spread on social media, often by journalists.
Most mutexes implementations spin before truly acquiring the lock.

Also, there are better spinlock implementations, such as speculative spinlocks, and queued locks.
Sounds interesting. Would be interested in a post detailing the tech stack.
The researcher has much of both. But yes, if the monkey only compares itself with the other primate in a cage...
Sorry for doubting you. I saw some pictures posted on Reddit if the Burbank store, it’s a lot more barren than I remember it being, so I don’t doubt that they’re cutting costs by not turning all the lights on.
> The most important decision-making rule you learn in business school is still largely misunderstood.

I wonder what he thinks is misunderstood. My experience is that people get it if taught it, and don't if they weren't.

> But Bruce is sick and Manfred Mann is substituting for him. You don’t like him so much. But you paid $500 for the seats! Should you stay?

I get the message but this illustrates the trickiness of sunk costs, they're not always so perfectly sunk. In this case most people would probably correctly stay - they're there, dressed, ready to have a good time, a lot of the costs are only partially sunk with lots of residual value.
I'm not OP, but here's what I do.

I keep a list of books I want to read on Goodreads. When a friend mentions a book they liked, I add it on the mobile app. When someone mentions something here or on Reddit, I do the same. I keep adding books without any commitment to actually reading them, and then I review the list whenever I need another book.

I use a couple of browser extensions that tell me what's available at my library on Goodreads:

- Available Reads - checks which books are available as eBooks or Audiobooks on OverDrive (online service through the library)
- Library Extension - checks specific books if they're available at a set of libraries (physical books or eBooks/audiobooks)

I like the first because it creates a sortable list on my "to read" shelf, whereas the second is useful if I'm looking at a specific book.
Ask HN: Are there any projects that attempt to simulate the human body?
It doesn't need to have anything close to cellular precision. I know how hard it is to simulate even just a few million neurons and synapse. I'm looking for something that simulates high-level processes that can be found in medical research papers. Even a crude weight loss simulator given calories, physiological traits and exercise level buckets would qualify.

Non-human simulations, like mice, worms, flies, yeast, might also qualify if they can be adapted to humans.
I'm not sure I'm following. In the example, there's a sunk cost of dressing up and setting aside time. Then, other than sunk cost, there's the probable future cost of reduced cooperation as well as cost in rapport and morale. I don't see those things as sunk cost because the decision to go or not go can influence those costs.
Adverts are not free speech. Public service announcements on billboards might be, like the band trying to promote their underground concert in town, or an association promoting a cultural event. But you can't put those in the same basket as big corporations paying multiple k$ for premium attention-grabbing spots with fancy graphics to make you dream of things you don't need.
I love these keyboards (and mechanical keyboards in general; the tactility and sensitivity is so satisfying). I just wish there was a silent option that wasn't still loud as fuck.

The main problem is that noise isolating/cancelling cans won't protect you from the clackety-clack, which for a lot of people can be as infuriating as listening to someone eating loudly.
> I wouldn't rely on it because it's committing to an ongoing arms race against the browsers. One that I expect them to win.

Don't be so sure about this. The world's most popular browser is developed by the world's largest advertising company. I'm not saying Google is intentionally sabotaging Chrome, but I doubt they're putting significant resources into anti-ad technologies.
Finding Domain Experts with Slack
As far as I know, that's it.
It reads like he thinks college is an anime set in a competitive Tokyo high school. It doesn't at all reflect my experience at a t20 undergrad school. Most people were just busy having fun, getting laid, and maybe doing a little studying from time to time. Except the pre-med folks. They were doing a lot more of the latter and a lot less of the former.
Location: San Luis Obispo, CA
Remote: Preferred
Willing to relocate: Yes
Technologies: Mostly Python, 20 years
Résumé/CV: On request
Email: feepish at gmail

Looking for automated testing/QA position.
Language/framework/toolkit not important. If the testing tools are fun, I'll give it a shot.

Contact me, I'll send a cover letter and resume.

thanks, rusty
The Metagame: Notes on Paul Graham's “How to Get Startup Ideas”
Ah, thanks for the info.

I would imagine the unlocking call would wake up the sleeping thread so it won't keep waking up periodically.

The user-mode only implementation sounds interesting. The only downside is it won't work with inter-process locking.
Are you VPNed or using TOR? I'm blocking JS and am not having this problem.
Thanks for the link. For people thinking about reading it, try! It’s clear and engaging, even funny.
Yes, rather than making decisions due to past waste you need to make decisions that maximize expected value.
Of course you should ignore "sunk costs" - the problem is deciding what's a "sunk cost" and what's "an investment" with an associated probability on its return.

To riff on the example say you were prepared to pay $300, you paid $55 and you're being offered $500 on the door.
Yes. You probably would sell the tickets, for $445 profit. However maybe you flew into the city for $200 and booked a hotel for $100. You've now sunk $55+$200+$100 and if you sell your ticket, that's all list. You walk away with $145 profit - but you'd originally been prepared to see Bruce for twice that.

Maybe if you wait 30 mins the tout will put his price up? Or maybe somebody else will sell, he can deliver on his commitment to a third party, and resale price will collapse.

Now if the price collapses, you can still see Bruce. If they price offered remains/rises you can re-consider selling.

Now maybe you do take the money and exit the market.... Except article mentions Bruce is playing the next day. You could sink $100 into another night in the hotel and $50 to change your flight (which roughly halves your return). This would let you see if you can get another cheap ticket on stub-hub, and the next day sell them to touts, go to the show, stand outside trying to tout them yourself. When you spend that $150 then of-course the cost has been sunk and you should ignore it from then on. Problem is deciding whether or not to make the sunk-cost/investment.
i was hoping for a roast of AI similar to when he beat the semantic web into a pulp last time... now I wonder if the semantic web messed him up too much in revenge.
Why was Stripe sharing something as critical as [SSN+Name] with a third party? If Atlas is simply a white labeled service of another service, then I hope it was prominent in Stripe's communication with customers/potential-customers. I say this because the market has many competitive offerings in the space, and among the primary reasons to pick Stripe is the assumption of better security, given it's multi billion dollar venture funding and valuation
Is the company backed by Bill Gross or Bill Gates or both?
I said recently to a founder who wasn’t sure if they loved their startup idea: your work doesn’t need to be sacred for it to matter. The sport of building something and beating competitors and working with great people is sufficient reward. Anything more, and your cup runneth over.
Similar to the Concorde fallacy: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/conco....
Ask HN: Can or should I learn to code on a Windows computer?
I have done a few online courses in HTML, CSS and Javascript and created my first website. My next step is do a Python course and then create a small web app as a project.

Is it possible to learn on a Windows computer? Git and Python programs exist for Windows and there is a cmd line.

General wisdom seems to point towards installing a version of Linux like Ubuntu. I'd like to know your reasons why I should or shouldn't do this.

Thanks.
If you only need to read the emails from S3, take a look at this project https://github.com/mewa/s3abird
Author here. I'm interested to hear from anyone with an opinion on this idea. Is this something you'd find useful?
the whole comment section was insisting that per-project billing is the only viable way to make money in consulting.

Generally, when someone gives you advice that's supposed to be 100% right in all cases, they either stand to gain from it personally or have no idea what they're talking about.

In this case, the difference between the two approaches is mostly a question of who ends up with what risks. My wife and I run a two-person development contracting business, and we've done projects with both approaches. Both have worked well for us, but for the type of work we tend to do, most projects would not be suitable for fixed price billing.

The reason is that most of our work consists of "deep dives" for figuring out if something is possible at all. (Or more precisely, possible within a reasonable amount of effort.) So what usually ends up happening is we'll agree on a capped research budget, and dig into the problem up to that number of days. If we find a solution before that time, great; if we find a fatal blocker before that time, well, not great but it's a result. Otherwise, we'll hopefully have found some leads to pursue in that time and can give a better estimate for how much more effort it'll take.

Maybe it's possible to do this sort of project on a value-based basis, but I certainly haven't found one that seems fair, or that a client is likely to accept. The author of the original article likes to claim that with value based pricing, interests are aligned. Well, for this sort of project, one of the parties is likely to lose out massively if you agree a fixed price up front.

And as for the author's assertion that your income is capped: you have one variable you can tweak: your rate. Charge more! We charge more than his "optimistic estimate". Sure, we're still not rolling in it, but we also don't work anywhere near 40 hours a week. And the implication that our incentive is to drag out projects to get more billable hours - well, I have a stronger incentive to make all my clients super happy so that they keep coming back for repeat business. This way, we have more requests coming in than we can feasibly accept.

Of course, only touch open ended projects for savvy clients. The nature of our particular specialty means we work with tech companies who understand the nature of big unknowns in projects.
This comment is strange, what does him not knowing about this blog say about him?
This just in: people re-discover the emboss/bump map plugin in photoshop...
> There was a time when a software engineer didn't get basic stuff. A time when languages like C were developed where there wasn't an associative data structure baked in for example. It wasn't because associative data structures are a secret tech that requires great insight to uncover. It is because the field was new and people hadn't cottoned on to how basic and important having access to hash-maps is. Times moved on. Now basically all modern languages have hash-maps as a basic data type.

That is a really weird historical fantasy. If you pull out your copy of volume 3 of Knuth and look at chapter 6, it is obvious that associative data structures were some of the first ones to be developed in the field.

The reason why hash tables became so popular is the explosion in main memory size starting in the late 1990s. The trade-offs between the possible associative data structures became less important for a lot of applications, especially when you consider how much needed to be done on secondary storage and specifically on tapes in the 1960s through the 1980s.
Here is one of R.A. Lafferty's short stories (many of his works are available online, a handful are in print in the UK), http://ralafferty.com/2017/05/22/through-other-eyes/

"The Cerebral Scanner, newly completed by Charles Cogsworth, was not an intricate machine. It was a small but ingenious amplifying device, or battery of amplifiers, designed for the synchronous—perhaps “sympathetic” would be a better word—coupling of two very intricate machines: two human brains. It was an amplifier only. A subliminal coupling, or the possibility of it, was already assumed by the inventor. Less than a score of key aspects needed emphasizing for the whole thing to come to life ... It had been a long-held opinion of Cogsworth that, by the proper amplification of a near score of these impulses in one brain, a transmission could be effected to another so completely that one man might for an instant see with the eyes of another—also see inwardly with that man’s eyes, have the same imaginings and daydreams, perceive the same universe as the other perceived. And it would not be the same universe as the seeking man knew ... This idea of his—to enter into the mind of another, to peer from behind another’s eyes into a world that could not be the same—this idea had been with him all his life. He recalled how it had first come down on him in all its strength when he was quite small.