skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
You're assuming you would have hired him anyway. If he was such a sap, and you'd done a half-decent job of interviewing him, that shouldn't happen...
There are definitely some in the Java community who would view public properties as incorrect code. For example, it was not accepted at the large corporation where I used to work, nor is it allowed in my wife's Intro to Java class. There are some cultural language specifications as well as the technical ones.
yup, that's exactly it
Do developers really need a second monitor?
Chromium beta, Ubuntu 11.04
I can think of at least two pragmatic, immediate reasons the patent system needs to be addressed:
-The HTML5 video codec wars and the rise of patent pool companies like the MPEG-LA (which, besides licensing H.264, is reportedly forming a patent license pool for VP8 entirely independently from Google)
-Relatedly, the patent pools forming around next-gen communication protocols like LTE, a 3G successor

The communications pools in particular are worrisome -- the licensors in the pools used to be manufacturers who happened to hold patents and used these pools to encourage widespread adoption but the increasing involvement of holding companies and pool packagers is turning licensing into a primary business, which is overall bad news.
Annoying, the author doesn't seem to answer his own (@#*&$ question with anything substantial. I'm hoping by posting here that something other than the Atwood Developer BoR can be cited as something valuable...one study is hardly enough to convince most managers. :(
that rule was reversed months ago
I would vehemently disagree with the statement that it's "Facebook for gym rats" or that it doesn't provide value outside of updating your FB profile with your workout logs, but thanks for the opinion.
I think it's just a question of the bar being too low (though being so much so as to make patents that are found acceptable qualitatively unlike patents that I consider acceptable).

For example, I think the LZW patent was deservedly admissible (though it rightfully did not prevent equally-good and patent-unencumbered algorithms from being developed).
That's perfect, thank you!
New Zealand banned software patents a couple of years ago I believe, and from what I see from friends there they have have a thriving software industry.
Schema.js v0.2 released
Location Dampens Virality
A couple of problems with that:

- Filing a frivolous lawsuit makes the plaintiff liable for the defendant's legal expenses.

- Repeatedly filing frivolous lawsuits can get you labeled as a vexatious litigant, and if labeled as such you need a judge's permission to file even a valid lawsuit.

- Lawyers knowingly participating in frivolous lawsuits or vexatious litigation can be disbarred.

For these reasons, I don't think you will see corporations filing a lot of meritless nuisance lawsuits.
You could still lose that fight, even if your work came first, if you never published it or filed a patent for it. First to invent only holds if you reduced it to practice (either by actually inventing the thing, or boiling it down so someone reasonably skilled in the art could then invent it) within that year. You lose rights to it after that if someone else wants to patent it. There's also first to conceive stipulations. The intellectual property class I took last semester would have been a lot easier if the U.S. just went first to file (like basically everywhere else).
In principle, it sounds like a good idea to prevent those bad people from voting. But now you can see that this can actually be used as a political weapon, to keep those you disagree with from having a voice.
> c'mon, these reactors of the basic design dating back to the Manhattan project need to give way.

Absolutely. There's been a ton of research, but too little actually being built. This would be a good time for Japan (and elsewhere) to replace any vulnerable reactors to designs that can work with passive cooling.
On what do you base the assumption that it is possible for us, or anyone, to run a competent democracy? There's no historical precedent for it; in fact quite the opposite.

Theoretically, it's possible, but in theory communism would work if everyone just did their best to make it work. Reality is different.
I don't think I can up-vote this enough. #1 is key. I personally find it to be an iterative process but just keep removing things until it feels clean. Not drab and useless but clean and as though things aren't competing for your attention anymore.
We ran into what we believe to be this very problem at SimpleGeo and spent a long time figuring out what the cause of the JVM locking up for tens of minutes at a time were; we believe this bug (or general class of bugs) to be responsible. Upgrading to 10.10 has caused the majority of the symptoms to disappear.

My personal hunch is that there are probably startups and developers that dumped Cassandra due to "stability issues," which were in reality symptoms of this bug. There's obviously no way of confirming or denying this, so I'll reiterate that it's just a hunch.
I can't imagine that Apple would willfully put its entire app ecosystem at risk like that.
....and I would say that if Riverbed didn't provide the equivalent support (lol) as Cisco or didn't have the complete integration solutions that Cisco offers, then Cisco SHOULD win out. If you innovate and you're actually better, then you should win. If not, you should go out of business.

Isn't this what "free market" is all about? You can't have both.
I wonder how much of their capital they've run through.
TV (real TV, not the set top box).
Real User Monitoring by New Relic
AT&T plans consumer security service for 2012
Memristors' Current Carves Protected Channels
Im pretty upset with their performance in general. When I develop, I release quickly and iterate like my life depended on it. I would have loved to see them start standing up real servers to get people joining and over time they overcame bugs, new features etc.... They haven't even done that. Its quite a shame they have taken the Microsoft approach to releasing code and NOT taken the Facebook Approach to releasing code. If they ever wish to take over the social environment, they MUST release then build instead of build then release.

Its driving me crazy that I can't even start using their service all the while Facebook over takes all social networks.
Good point. The other things that stood out for me:

- They talked about technical stuff that they were doing (which is fine if you are a HN-type) but for ordinary people who use Facebook there is no reason to care or even figure out who Diaspora are. Network effects are really strong as others have noted. Facebook offered exclusivity to Ivy League colleges when they launched, Diaspora need to really figure out their angle. Perhaps appeal to the Quora/HN/TED Conference/SXSW type crowd first, and create the illusion of scarcity and exclusivity that way?

- They seem to have no compelling reason to switch to Diaspora that users really care about. If they offered, I don't know, an integrated Skype interface (unlikely perhaps now), proper privacy, and a way to migrate your Facebook data to their service (highly unlikely), perhaps people would sit up and take notice. (Just throwing random silly ideas out there.)

- I think they need to become really aggressive and 'pick a fight' with Facebook. Meekly churning out features on a project on Github isn't going to get you several hundred million users. They need to get serious media coverage, and one would think that they will need to have a significant marketing budget for this.

EDIT: Their approach seems to be the opposite of the 'release early and pump out features' approach that allows YC companies to take off quickly. Not good.

http://www.paulgraham.com/startuplessons.html
Great article on Accel's Jim Breyer and its dark days
Ten Predictions For The Future From An Intel Anthropologist
>"I see no reason why an invention should be unpatentable simply because it involves software."

Are you a software developer? Do you understand that often times, there is only a few logical ways of doing something?
Nuance voices found in OS X Lion. New iPhone speech / text capabilities?
YellowAPI.com and the Future of API Monetization
StackMob provides a hosted platform for creating server-side data stores, logic, API's for mobile apps.

They were nice enough to send me a beta invite, but I've only had time to take a cursory glance. At present, the functionality looks equivalent to what you can do yourself using Ruby on Rails scaffolding to generate data models with a XML/JSON REST API--with the addition of an easy-to-use UI to manage that, rather than the raw command line interface of Rails.
Two Factor SSH Authentication with Duo Security
If you have no training and want to create a great experience, the best advice is to get some training.

Can you imagine somebody walking into a symphony hall and saying, "OK, guys, I don't really know much about music, but I want to create a masterpiece. How do I do it?" What do you think the answer would be?

It's nice to imagine that areas outside your expertise can be conquered with just a few helpful tips and some elbow grease, but it's unlikely to yield anything above "mediocre." Whether a poor or uninspiring experience is good enough for you is a personal choice. But don't fool yourself about what you're creating. If you want to create something great, you need to get really good.
The comment upstream about "buying dairy cows for the beef" pretty much nailed the Ballmer strategy. I'm definitely stealing that one.
I just use SpiderOak. It includes my dot files during its normal backup routine, it has file revisioning included, and all my files are available immediately upon installing SpiderOak to a new computer.
Compact Navigation is Coming to Chrome - How to Enable it Right Now
I figured out the proof on my drive in to work. It is simple.

At all points we're going to have an infinite set of integers to process, a clique of integers whose connections to each other and all of the integers left to process is red, and a clique of integers whose connections to each other and all of the integers left to process is blue. (red clique, blue clique)

We start with all of N as our set, and our cliques are empty sets.

At each point we take the first thing in our set, and remove it from the set. If there are an infinite number of things left in our set that it has a red connection to, then put it into the red clique and remove all things from the set that its connection is blue to. Else put it into the blue clique and remove all things from the set that its connection is red to. This step can always be done and leaves us with 2 cliques (one of which grew by one) and an infinite set of integers to process.

After we do this an infinite number of times at least one of the red and blue cliques must now be infinite in size. And we're done.
With Apple rumors are pretty much all you have until a specific product launches.
I think the actual test is if the intended audience would get confused between the original and the imposter (see the H. R. Pufnstuf v. McDonald's case, although that's copyright, not trademark).
1. You can probably make that sales page much better, and install some a/b testing software and then increase conversions over the course of a year or so.

2. You can probably help her with tips around driving traffic (starting with her existing fans).

3. Set her up with a mailing list and a newsletter.

That's plenty to start with.
IOS 5 speech recognition concept showcased in video
Anyone here in berlin? would like to meet up twitter.com/taigeair
or disagreed with it!
Unlikely. Consumers just don't care about processor architectures.
I'm addicted to Vim's modes & shortcuts. If use an IDE, I end up installing Vim emulators in VS2010, Eclipse, or NetBeans.
They invested everything in building a few quantum computers in iPhone form factor. Each store gets one. Now they build an obstacle course that will eradicate half of mankind trying to buy it first.
Microsoft, on the other hand, developed a great mobile OS in WP7, have been screwed (as I think everyone expected) by their network/manufacturer partners

That's rich.
I'm not sure how this meshes with some of the claims of Tyler Cowen's The Great Stagnation [1]. He says that, although the web is an innovation that makes us greatly happier, it does it so efficiently that far, far fewer people need to be employed for the benefits to be reaped.

So here we are with Google's work force of 20,000 delivering $64Bn of value. That's great, but on the other hand, that's a lot of traditional jobs that don't need to exist (for those that think "full employment" is the most important thing)

On the other hand, anything that can pump so much value into the economy has to be a good thing. That value would, I assume, multiply into much greater benefits in ripples through the economy.

[1] http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2011/01/growth_2
Unity (http://unity3d.com) is a 3D game engine that embeds Mono for scripting purposes.

Platform-wise, Unity has their own web player, pending NaCL support, pending Flash/Molehill support, shipped standalone Windows/Mac, pending Linux support, iPhone, Android, Wii, PS3, Xbox 360. They use AOT compilation on more restrictive platforms (iPhone, Xbox 360, etc).

I couldn't find an official comprehensive list, but this forum post attempts to cover iOS successes. 7 Unity-made games have hit #1 in the app store: http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/65053-iPhone-games-chart-be...
I checked out the achievements, and they are mostly strength-focused and pretty daunting for a beginner but possibly too simple for an experienced lifter. The list of achievements should be categorized and fleshed out, with barbell lifts in one category, bodyweight exercises in another category, running in another, swimming in another, kettlebells in another, etc. More levels should be added, too. Video game achievements typically start really easy (10 kills with a particular weapon, for example) and then ramp up quickly. Level one of barbell squatting should be a single barbell squat with any weight! Remember, you're trying to suck people in! For most folks who are entirely new to weightlifting, just walking over to the equipment and starting to use it is an achievement. Your system should validate that feeling and help pull people gradually over the psychological barriers as well as the physical ones.

1RM (one-rep maxes) achievements are not friendly for beginners, by the way, because beginners find it less daunting to push themselves for reps than for one massive lift. It feels safer, and conventional wisdom seems to be that it actually is safer. Also, keep in mind that female users will have a very different perception of, say, a 0.9x bodyweight bench press. Revamp your achievements, and they will become a lot more addictive, and therefore a lot more useful for keeping people working out and keeping people on your site.
Thanks for the vote - it was indeed an attempt to make a serious point.

I didn't actually forget 'first mover advantage' I simply didn't list it there because it isn't considered a form of IP protection. The problem I think with your position is that there is a historical record of innovative software companies being seriously or fatally damaged by unfair competition form big companies, some of whom are quite happy to copy your work despite the patent then challenge you to sue them with their vast legal resources. I think it is very hard to justify a general statement to justify your confidence that 'innovators would come up with clever ways of capitalizing...' And when you say it wouldn't be a perfect system but it would be a better one, the question arises - better for who? Not better for the small innovators who would be left with nothing, surely?

I am not suggesting this is easy, but I don't think a one sided abolition frenzy is the answer. IMHO this position is often motivated by (a) an ideology of freedom on the internet which whilst generally a good thing runs into problems in some cases in this context (b) a real ignorance about how the patent system actually works as opposed to caricatures and edge cases.
>"the odds of such a thing occurring would be as remote as the odds of doing the same thing in your backyard workshop with a lathe."

No. The difference is that PHYSICAL TANGIBLE things exist in the "analog" realm have infinite possibilities. Things that exist in the digital realm have a finite number of possibilities, and if you limit yourself to a particular subset of things you can even possibly do (such as those things which are implemented in computer programming languages), the odds go up greatly. If I tell someone to build a table leg on a lathe, there would probably be many variations between skilled builders. If I tell someone to make an efficient file store (or in patent speak "digital storage"), lots of people would probably come up with something similar...but that's patented: http://www.google.com/patents?q=digital+storage&btnG=Sea...
Finding good hosting is a challenge :) Any recommendations on an affordable hosting (PHP/MySQL) that can easily scale with traffic and takes care of server maintenance/patching?

Thnx!

P.S. The situation is resolved for now.

P.P.S. We've got so much great feedback here and via our site that it'll take some time to go through it all and get back to folks. Thank you!
Show HN: Android accessories with only Arduino code & the Handbag App
IANAL but as far as I can see this strategy is not without risk.

After all, they are already being paid on those vacation days, are they not technically working for their existing company?

What happens when your new employee's old company turns round and says 'Hey, we just found out about your wonderful scheme about testing out our employees when they're still under our contract. That means our intellectual property is in your code base. That employee has no negotiation power and you clearly knew that, our price for this bespoke job is $100,000. You've already got the goods, payment terms 1 day. Thanks.'.
Yes - sorry - r of 0.54, not p.
> pilots who were shot down ended up landing in the UK (able to go back into battle if British, but destined for a PoW camp if German)

Hence the German pilots (against their better instincts) started shooting pilots who had bailed out. This was seen as "bad form" by both sides but the Germans knew that a British pilot who survived could be back in the air causing more problems for them later the same day.
I'm sorry but I truly don't understand the relevance to my argument.
That's an elegant way to express it - thank you. My method has more of the "TA DA!" about it, and tends to generate a sense of "Gosh!", but I like the quiet elegance of yours.

Nice one.
This is presently true, but shouldn't it be possible to define a legalese that can be parsed as English as well?
I agree, that is great advice. #2 is good advice as well
But the many experts and analysts who went on record early saying this wasn't going to be a major disaster

It's only a "major disaster" by nuclear standards. Compared to the loss of life that we routinely accept in coal mining and the air pollution from burning it, it's barely a blip. (http://spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/energy/renewables/coal-p...)
Fair trade revealed as feel good hoax
Fighting for market share and making infinitesimal margins across a large market share is the relatively easy and obvious way to do things, and it involves relatively easy and obvious processes of copying/iteration.

You would think so, but while WalMart has proven that WalMart can do it in retailing, many other businesses have proven that they can't.

So in the end I agree that simply proving such-and-such is possible is not a recipe for any old company doing it.
Yeah I can see how this could be overkill. I initially started by writing my own script but I made that script more complicated than necessary (trying to handle removing files and such). So the end result was that I didn't trust the script with my files.

Perhaps there's room for a simple puppet-style configuration manager that lives in just a single script, in some ways similar to sqllite.
Thanks for the feedback, dkarl.

We've had a largely positive response to our achievements system thus far but I agree that they aren't necessarily beginner friendly. We do intend on fleshing out the system more to support achievements for a greater variety of exercises (cardio, bodyweight exercises, etc).
Groklaw - The Blog That Made a Difference
I've been playing with Arduino-based Android accessories for the past few days and thought more people could play with them if they didn't have to write Android code.

So, I created the Handbag App which enables you to both define the Android application user interface and implement the behaviour in your Arduino sketch.

If you've got an Android 2.3.4 device, an Arduino Uno or similar and a USB Host Shield you can try it out.
All you linked to is your picture...?
I don't know..

While I'd love to see some funding for these awesome guys, I don't think that Microsoft's money would be that great. Moving Mono development from a big corporation to a small startup might even help settle some of the FUD problems. Receiving money from MS probably wouldn't...
There is at least one person selling gift cards for bitcoins, including Walmart and Amazon giftcards. Also there is at least one site selling food directly (http://www.bitmunchies.com).

So you wouldn't strictly starve...
I'd Rather Shoot Myself In the Head Than Ever Own a Home Again
tl;dr skinny jeans mean you can write software.
Does the embedded vim use the users' config files? I've gotten quite used to assorted macros and helpers.
The Speech Obama Could Give: 'The Constitution Forbids Default'
You can't create a high end when there's a thriving low-end and its all commodity. Apple does this by prohibiting clones. There's no competition to pull down prices.

In the PC market Dell would love to go high-end, but they can't because Acer will ship the same machine, with plastic rather than carbon fibre, and sell it at 1/3 the price. Apple doesn't have that worry.
Yahoo and Alibaba Try to Mend Fences in China
Fat Pointers
Anyone who's interested in Bloom filters check a great blog post by Adam Langley about its variants with links to papers: http://www.imperialviolet.org/2011/04/29/filters.html
Instead of 10.10, I would suggest switching to Debian Or CentOS.

Due its short support cycle, Maverick isn't suited for servers.
For me I see the seminal (forgive the pun) flashpoint being when pay-per-use pornographic web sites take BitCoins for services rendered.

The value proposition of anonymity is highly valued there I suspect.

Prior to that occuring, I expect there would need to be a service that pornographers would 'buy' as enabling this as a valued currency.

So once we see the emergence of a referral system or advertising system in which you can 'pay' for ads with Bitcoins I don't doubt we'll see sites that accept Bitcoins as payment.
They also got around 250k in funding.
101 Things I Learned in Architecture School - Sits on my desk at work (I'm a designer) and always inspirational
http://www.amazon.com/101-Things-Learned-Architecture-School...
They used to fly a Lancaster Bomber, Spitfire and Hurricane past the annual summer show where I grew up.

(And there's a Lancaster Bomber Flyby in the English Midlands this Sunday, incidentally).
"If anything, Fukushima is an example of how little attention we should pay to the anti-nuclear movement"

I think the opposite. I recall many many people on this site asserting with absolute certainty that nothing bad could happen at Fukushima immediately after the earthquake. Anyone that suggested otherwise was demonized as an uninformed faermonger.

I'm not anti nuclear, I think it's a better option than coal, but the pro nuke people have done the cause a great disservice with their wrongness and refusal to cop to it.

Reread this for one example, and tell me which side sounds as if it doesn't deserve attention.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2326726