skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
If I can really rearrange my life around remote, be sure my couch will not be my first choice :D I've seen social media make enough people miserable and sad, but there might come a time of reckoning that will change that and have people focus more on what happens locally. Hopefully, when the crisis settles, attending offline events will be the new cool for a while and the world will be better off.
Wait, you're saying Amazon SDEs don't have a contract?
Which type are you using? I was on CPD at home (perinatal dialysis), and that worked ok for me I the UK (spent just over 4k days on the list and passed on two calls, I went on eh list before I needed dialysis)

I basically hooked up at 10 pm for a 8 hour cycle and was done by 6 am and out of the door at 7 to commute.

I would have ben ok doing manual bags but I think having to do so exchanges at work sqicked some cowokers out.
If my current MNC turns WFH full time, I plan to shift to Goa, take up a house by the sea, wake up to the breeze and take a dip in the sea once I'm done working.

Currently a Software Engineer in Bangalore, India earning approx $30k per annum
https://github.com/ihebchagra/dotfiles I guess sometimes they are called dotfiles haha.

https://www.google.com/search?q=personal+config+github+nix seem to be a good search

Perhaps I misremembered how many of them make throw shade on dotfiles repos, or perhaps it is just that google isn't good at finding such things ("not dotfiles" won't work).
> I mention on-call duty because it is “peculiar” in that the only other profession requiring this kind of responsiveness is doctors

Uh, not even close. I used to get up at 4am EST to trade European markets for a hedge fund. I was on call 24/7/365. I had my laptop and Bloomberg fingerprint scanner with me on any trip I took.

And this is just my experience. I have had many friends in engineering, management consulting, fin tech, etc who have similar demands made of them.

I’m not saying it’s right, but it is part of the rules of the game that we all sign up to. There’s a reason all of the aforementioned jobs pay so well.
I'm with you, that is how I feel. I have been working full-time remote since ... well, for most of my career.

My wife and I decided to be in a major metropolitan area because of our kids and schools... but back before, we were living in more rural, mountain areas with a lot of access to outdoors.

At some point, we're going to get a small trailer for my use as an office, or an office trailer. It's something I would want anyways.

I think one good compromise with this is having a remote-first company pay for either a home office, or the membership fees for a coworking space. Some people really enjoy the interpersonal interaction. Me? I get enough of it via Slack and Zoom, and the occasional in-person conferences and on-sites.

One of the positives I can see us moving towards is greater interpersonal interaction with the local neighbors, and greater mixed-use spaces like it used to be. You work from home some of the days, and then walk down the street for the coffee and bagals. You talk with the neighborhood grocers. You can hang out at the community gardens. You make your living with things that could be done remote, but there is a much better sense of community where you live. When you spend money, it would be within the local community, so it helps distribute the wealth to people who you live side by side.

And ok, maybe if you don't like to cook, instead of using one of those apps to get some food from across town, you support your neighbors who love to cook.

In other words, instead of bonding primarily with the people you work with, your main community is the one you live in. I think that's generally a good thing.

There's a project called the Urban Farming Guys. They do a lot of hard work for developing food resilency, and transformed one of the worst neighborhoods in Kansas City into something that is great. Imagine living there, because you cared about the work they did. You work the remote job by day, and then walk over to their makerspace to teach the neighborhood kids about coding. When they ask for donations, you could spread some of the wealth from working with a remote tech job. You would have a choice to live with the people who share the same values that you do.

Here's the thing. I think a lot of people feel that they will be disconnected from people if they work remote. But I think if they were able to choose where they live, they might find that they are even _more_ connected with the people they live with, in the neighborhood they live with. I think there is a modern malaise of disconnection and brokenness, and that won't really be solved without reconnecting to your local community. The interpersonal camaderie at work is an imperfect substitute for what I think most people crave without realizing they crave it.
It's because the software industry doesn't respect experience. This issue is the kind of thing an experienced engineer with years of building past systems would notice. And they would know how to talk to management so things are done properly.

But how are experienced engineers treated? Like shit. As soon as we get older and have families to support, we get leetcoded out of positions since we can't keep up with months of studying for basically a mental twitch reflex test. That's what it's become, interviewers will consider you a lesser engineer if you fail to vomit out the rote memorized solution a few minutes slower than another candidate. After all, time to write the solution is an "objective" measure right? So the interview process is now "objective", what a joke.

And if an experienced engineer dares to recommend that hey maybe we shouldn't use the latest fad tech that just got announced on a HN post? They will be ridiculed and laughed as lazy, not "keeping up with technology", called a bunch of COBOL dinosaurs holding everyone back. For simply daring to say, hey maybe this latest new technology has tradeoffs that don't fit for us and we should stick to what we have since it has a better balance of tradeoffs. Nope, nobody cares about that, stupid dumb old engineer, stop getting in our way, need to make our resumes look good.

And the industry itself? Encourages constant job hopping, so nobody even gets experience maintaining a system for a long time. All those shitty decisions made? Don't care, off to another company.

And within a company? Constant indirect and direct pressure to go to management. Why aren't you a engineering manager? Oh you want to be a principal? Well here's the ridiculous requirements for that, still want it? What's the difference between a principal and senior anyways? Actually why do we even need seniors, let's just get more juniors. Management doesn't know the value of experience, they just want lower costs. And the engineers themselves seem to be saying experience is worthless, so everyone's in agreement right?

We are failing to build good software systems because it requires experience to know how to do it. And this industry does not value experience.
One key metric where Gcc and Clang differ is in their willingness to produce 'cmov', "conditional move", instructions. ('cmov' is an instruction that implements '(a=c?b:a)' without a conditional branch.)

Partition is an essential component of numerous key algorithms; almost half of C++ STL algorithms depend on it. A key primitive to implement partition is the 'swap_if' operation. Performance of this operation thus directly determines the performance of many important algorithms. For best performance with word-sized arguments, 'swap_if' must be implemented with a pair of back-to-back 'cmov' instructions.

Gcc got its fingers burned a few years ago from emitting 'cmov' in loop contexts where the condition was predictable and the result immediately depended upon in the next iteration, creating dependency chains that slowed execution of some benchmarks by a factor of 2. Now, Gcc will never, under any circumstances, emit two 'cmov' instructions in one basic block.

Clang is happy to emit a pair of back-to-back 'cmov' instructions, which enables it to perform partition operations very substantially faster than Gcc. However, it fails to generate 'cmov' instructions in important cases.

The fully general expression of 'swap_if' looks like:

template <typename T>
bool swap_if(
bool c, T& a, T& b)
{
T v[2] = { a, b };
b = v[1-c], a = v[c];
return c;
}

It may be used in the inner loop of quicksort's partition operations as

right += swap_if(
*left < pivot,
*left, *right);

A 'swap_if' implemented with 'cmov' makes quicksort fully twice as fast as, e.g., current 'std::sort'. However, neither Gcc nor Clang recognizes this 'swap_if' as a place to substitute 'cmov' instructions for the pointer/offset accesses. (The latter are slower, probably because they produce more L1 bus traffic.)

Clang will happily emit 'cmov' instructions for a specialization like

template <>
bool swap_if(
bool c, int& a, int& b)
{
int v[2] = { a, b };
a = -c&v[1] | 1-c&v[0];
b = 1-c&v[0] | -c&v[1];
return c;
}

where Gcc emits exactly the 'and' and 'or' instructions.
(Interestingly, Gcc's code for both definitions, despite failing to use 'cmov', runs quicksort quite a lot faster than std::sort; just not 2x as fast.) Clang will also emit 'cmov' instructions for

bool swap_if(
bool c, int& a, int& b)
{
int ta = a, tb = b;
a = c ? tb : ta;
b = c ? ta : tb;
return c;
}

but Gcc will only produce very slow (i.e. badly predicted) branches for this case.

If we had 'std::swap_if' in the C++ Standard Library, probably all implementations would produce good code for it.

(As an aside, I find it odd that changing the second line of the template 'swap_if' above to

a = v[c], b = v[!c];

makes it much, much slower when compiled with Gcc for recent Intel. I would welcome any insight into why this is.)
It's not though? $x=\frac{-b\pm\sqrt{b^2-4ac}}{2a}$. If you have a visualizer hooked up while you're typing, even easier.

And then there's Mathematica.
UBI is meant to be a gambit to distract us from seeing that the playing field is so heavily tilted against everyone but the very rich and fortunate. the rich buy this diversion by periodically sliding some pennies down to the rest of us on the other end, while patting themselves on the back for doing such a magnanimous thing.

what we really need to do is bring transparency and fairness to labor markets, and squeeze rentiers and financiers, so that we can start to tilt that playing field back to where innovators can innovate in all sorts of directions, not just in the ones deigned to make the rich even richer.
First two questions: so far, they haven't removed anything that anyone would feel sorry for. That is not relevant to the point: even Standard Oil or Bell were ordinary, non-predatory businesses for some time.

Last question is more relevant: there are vague suspicions of them planning to monopolize the market, but the bigger question is: whoever gave them $25 billion to piss away is expecting some solid returns on that investment, so they will need to find a way to extract that much, and more, from their users (on top of their current revenue stream). The concern is that it's hard to imagine a positive scenario of extracting that much money from a market that is getting pretty well established by now.
RethinkDB Download Server Change
There will always be people out there saying there is no perfect time to have children. And, thus, their conclusion is that because there's no perfect time then there is no time that makes one time better than another.

I can tell you quite confidently that having children now would ruin us financially and emotionally. In 2 years after my partner graduates college, in all likelihood, it'd do the same. My wife would never be able to get a job because she'd be a college grad that went right into childbearing without ever having a professional job. Some five to seven years later when she is forced to go back into the workforce - she'd never be able to get anything that would substantially contribute to our income.

So - really - when is a good time for me? I don't know - I don't think it ever existed for me. I'm left with not good and terrible times. All I've learned from my friends who did have kids was to have kids earlier than 37. So far, it's lookin' like 37 is what will be the age for me because I won't have my career, my wife's career, or my financial situation worked out until then. Fortunately, for one of us, my significant other (if we're still together) will only be 30.

Such is life. Full of ruined plans because I tried to break into the upper class while being born into a much much lower one.
> Density + mass transit in cities

That is no reason to require not-remote work , and also not entirely true

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aac9d2
>Those same Ron Paul fans are all in r/conservative or r/The_donald, or other conservative subs now. There are way more now than there ever were.

Is this true? I hold quite a few libertarian beliefs and those conservative subs don't seem any more inviting than their left wing counterparts. It's so much about partisanship that it's off-putting to me.
Kinda unrelated to topic at hand but I always wanted to ask this to other programmers:

Author mentions that he traded sleep for code, and I hear this from so many people but I really cannot understand how well they manage to pull this off. I simply cannot code productively if I get less than 7 hours of sleep or code for more than 8 hours straight, and caffeine doesn’t help me. So how do you people manage to pull this off? I’m really envious that people can code all day long but does it really provide good code? Doesn’t that increase the bug count of the code?
Its no secret to anyone who has paid attention (which the Taiwanese certainly have) that China has been constantly undermining Hong Kong's guaranteed independence with both political pressure and government cronies.

The fact they haven't outright invaded and smashed Hong Kong is hardly high praise.

There is zero chance that the CCP will hold up their end of any bargain Taiwan makes to join it, and the situation in Hong Kong proves it.
I dunno. I worked on a team of 3 with one in SF, one in Europe and one in Singapore. If you're OK with repeating meetings and work mostly async it's doable.

You'll never get everyone together (unless someone takes a midnight meeting, but that's just cruel) except on special occasions, which sucks but it can be done.
You know that anyone can edit a wikipedia page right? I think it's telling that this man is an ex director at the WHO with over 50 years experience as an Oncologist and rather than listen to what he is saying, people are continually trying to discredit him.
First architecture. (lot of AI, VR, visualization, geometry, algebra)

Then telecommunications (creating an internet provider, lot of stupid HW)

Then automotive (optimizing race cars. much better HW, much better clients)
My own workplace is remaining remote for the time being. We moved out of our office prior to eventually maybe moving into one. We might not all be asked to move back in permanently.

I had looked in the past for remote work for precisely the reasons you mentioned. On top of that my partner would love to move back to Vancouver Island for a spell. Also Toronto is bloody expensive.

We've discussed all kinds of different options... but one of the core motivators would be affording a house, with some land. Being closer to family—mine or hers—and spending more time outdoors.

Also not having to commute 1+ hour each way—yes, please.
My faith is based on both evidence(as in accounts of the resurrection, among, many many others) as also based on personal experience (both tangible and otherwise)

C.S Lewis is a great writer from the turn of the century, whose books you might consider.

Do you know that there is a lot more proof in the biblical accounts than in many other historical events - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/14/what-is-the-hi...

--

My personal take?

There is enough evidence in the physical world - that if you look, can make you a believer at best, or a doubting agnostic at worst.

It is however the personal experiences that solidify the faith.

--

Depending on where you are in life, some events (current) might hit a nerve. For me, it was a persecution that made question the social fabric, and yet in the midst of it, were some crazy guys - who were willing to martyr themselves? Why? - that search led me to rediscover Christ, though a Christian myself.

It took a while, but I would also say, it is not we who seek God, in our case, it is God who relentlessly pursues us.
My understanding from the article was that both types of problems happened.
Moderation is akin to public service. Taking on the duty means putting yourself in a place of visibility and accountability. It is no surprise that the pressure is too much for some.
This is a site for curiosity, and repetition and curiosity don't go together.

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

Multiply that 10x when the repetition is indignant or inflammatory.

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

I doubt that you would want other commenters to drill you like a schoolchild, but even if I'm wrong about that, please don't do it to others on this site. We're trying for entirely the opposite sort of discussion. Basically, if it's predictable, it is off topic here.
I fear OP may have misunderstood how the signing bonus works and it seems to have caused him undue stress.

I've interviewed at Amazon and had a lot of conversations about compensation. I don't know about the terms of the relocation bonus, but for the signing bonus, you don't pay it back if you are fired and even if you leave voluntarily, you only pay back a pro-rated amount. For example if your signing bonus is $20k, and you leave at the 6 months mark, you owe $10k back but you get to keep the other $10k.
A 5 year old gist from 1 employee (out of the current ~70k SWE's employed at the company + all that have come and gone in the last 5 years) just to shit on the quality of Amazon engineering? And folks wonder why I have depression -it's not because i'm burnt out, it's because the HN crowd thinks I'm some sort of cognitive defective
for working at Amazon.
The problem part we got down: We all need a living income and the current system cannot employ all with a living income. There are many people who are fully employed and cannot make ends meet. Many others still cannot leave their employer to improve or change their skills without losing their housing, healthcare, or food security -- short of being crucified on higher education debt. This hurts everyone.
I don't think that is a fair way up putting it when they are very upfront about it and don't call it salary.

On the other hand at the end of year 2 when you have gotten used to the monthly payments I guess the we told you so is it bit harder to agree with.
So weird seeing you post that, as I literally have this book on my desk right now.

Thanks Gavin, I learned a lot from reading it!
The numbers were listed in the next sentence.
> But probably less "meaningful" work, in however society defines meaningful.

Typically in these experiments the people start small businesses. When the risk of failure has a floor it makes you more likely to take on the risk.

> At some point, if enough income is withheld at that level, what's the point?

Most UBI proposals are VAT taxes. The more you consume the more you pay. So if you're a wealthy person, you will still see the return on your effort.
> The divide between AWS employees and everyone else employed at Amazon seems to be "2007 Google employee" against "sweatshop"; they're run mostly-separately, from what I've read.

This is not true. Amazon and AWS are exactly the same organizationally speaking. You could hardly tell who works in an Amazon team and who works in an AWS team. Maybe if they tell you their building.

The cultural drift happens in the teams and orgs, not the parent "company". Everyone at Amazon knows this and that’s why many people know changing teams is a gamble and prefer staying at the same team doing the same menial tasks, than venturing into finding another team.

Amazon and AWS have both great teams and shitty teams. There’s just not an easy way to tell, except for one internal tool that allows you to see how people are rating their managers but this is all bs because some teams don’t have enough data or any data at all. Also the data itself is probably skewed, since people are afraid of giving poor rates to their managers (this is a general problem in the modern workplace dynamics, not at an Amazon problem)

The other way is asking a friend but I don’t know how people do that since I only knew people from my team and teams that sat nearby. Maybe I’m too socially incompetent.
You are missing the point: I still need a lot of care, and the quality of it allows me not only to work, but to stay alive. I have at least 1 appointment per week for my medical care, if not a minimum of 2. Sometimes I can have 4 appointments per week. It is not just a matter of having to commute, however long that may be. In an emergency, where I am located matters, and living 2-3 hours outside a major metro area can easily hasten my death, with my medical issues. Rare diseases tend to be systematic, with limited treatments. They are also not easy to treat either. In my case in particular, I am technically more susceptible to having other rare conditions too. My rare diseases are immune-mediated.

But, where I live absolutely matters. I also require a lot of healthcare contact, where living 2-3 hours outside of a city just does not work.
What was stated seems pretty typical on small teams who manage critical systems. How are critical systems managed otherwise without having to 3x your team (assuming you want 24hr coverage with a 8hr workday)?
I thought Druid lost the battle against ClickHouse long ago. Am I wrong?
It isn't a binary option between work and not work. Most people on HN make much more money than they need to subsist. If the goal is to only subsist, there is an option to reduce hours worked in exchange for reduced pay. The exact form that could take varies as not everyone works at a company that would support either a shorter workday or workweek. However other options exists that don't rely on your employer such as taking regular sabbaticals or a very early retirement.

There are also numerous financial options available to you such as annuities or insurance if you are worried about protecting yourself from unforeseen financial hardships.
What are your credentials to say that his statements aren't the truth?
At my last position they tried to offer me a "promotion". More responsibility, more accountability, mentoring juniors AND on call, all for the grand pay raise of $0.

"on call" was super, super vague and I pushed back hard on it. If they require me to work outside something reasonable like 6am-6pm, they will pay me at least double for it. No exceptions.

I wish everyone would push back that hard, and that on-call was an official opt-in "extra pay" scenario.

Needless to say I turned down their "promotion" even after months of them trying to make me take it.

Note: I am NOT saying I'll work 12 hour days. I'm just saying if I have to come in early for a meeting for 6am, or stay until 6pm sometimes, that's fine. If I'm expected to come in or be on call at 2am, that's a different story.
> The iPhone is the best selling model in the United States.

To clarify: It has the best selling model, but it is not the most used mobile OS among US mobile phone users.