skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Tell/Ask HN: Why the cloud scares me (including Heroku and GitHub).
Has anyone read through a service agreement with cloud service providers?

First problem: Cloud hosting services are apparently not responsible for "security and privacy" of whatever you upload. This basically means you don't own what you create/upload - they could pass on your uploaded content to anyone (even for money) and you have no remedy against them. This also means no IP for you (since they are considered public domain)!

Second problem: The cost is sky high when you scale. Has anyone done a cost comparison b/w cloud based maintenence, hosting and deployment vs your own servers on maybe rented out racks? Compare backups and multi-nodal solutions.

Finally: You have no control over your stuff - what triggered this in my mind was when I saw how many companies have their sites taken down while they are being investigated for stuff they have very little control over vs. companies who own their infrastructure and thus need to be subpoena-ed or issued a warrant against to but taken down. For example, consider two scenarios of a popular company, say Facebook or Craigslist, let's make it FB. Now if FB is on the cloud and some teenager kills himself from being bullied through it then all the police have to do is ask the hosting company to take down FB while it’s under investigation. The hosting company wants to keep peace so it complies and FB can’t do a thing about it. On the other hand, if FB has its own infrastructure and the cops have an issue, FB can wave the middle finger at them until they get a order from a judge to shut their servers down, which is much, much harder for cops to do and they must make a strong case before getting such order. So basically my point here is you’re at someone’s mercy and could be driven out of business easily by the flick of a switch.

None of this is concrete, and is just a starting point. However, they are serious concerns, and I don’t think there is a better place than HN to ask this question. Please share your thoughts freely.
How difficult is it really to have a green card wedding? The only knowledge I have of it is from TV, but surely in a country where a good chunk of the population doesn't take marriage seriously, finding someone to marry you for citizenship wouldn't be difficult.

You could even build a startup out of it... USMailOrderSpouses.com.
Sounds stupid for the small businesses, because only people who already know about a place will ask for a deal there, so they won't be getting any new eyeballs and probably no new customers either. It will just be people wanting deals at places they already go to.
It's not unusual to see emails go ignored. According to MailChimp, the industry average open rate is 19.1% while the industry average action (click) rate is 4.0% I'm not quite sure where they get these numbers from, but it appears that your figures are normal.
This is nothing like Microsoft dropping Windows. This is like IBM dropping OS/2.
6.7 earthquake near Japan
Does blogging through email produce higher quality content?
Or do the opposite: make it so easy to immigrate legally that few want or need to do it illegally.
Do you have open/click tracking on the emails? If not you should either roll your own or use someone like sendgrid who can automate the process for you (depending on how many emails you send out, even the free tier of sendgrid might be enough). Open tracking isn't perfect but it'll help you narrow down where in the process the drop off happens (sendgrid also does spam report tracking and bounces). They also put a lot of effort into making sure that your email get through (not affiliated, just a happy customer).
There is an open-source Python persistence framework in the works called Bulbs that connects to Neo4j through the Rexster REST server, and there are binary bindings in the works as well.

There is also a Python open-source Web development framework for graph databases called Bulbflow that is based on Bulbs and Flask.

Both frameworks should be released in the next few weeks.
Judge: Apple May Face Hurdles in Amazon Appstore Dispute
This is in the Pricing FAQ, for those who are confused where this came from, like I was.
Do you enforce unique email addresses in your system? What would happen if someone has already added my email to their account? What if I click on "Recover password", would I then be able to take over their account by resetting their password?
There a few companies in this space, specially regarding usability testing. However we are focused on Android, everyone who has develop for android knows the pain of device testing and how easily a perfectly working app on your phone can easily crash on any other device. The people who complain about IE and browser testing have no idea what android developers go through.
Facebook announces version 2.0 Open Compute servers at first community summit
>Frankly the idea of a friend of mine getting that kind of scratch for referring me to a job would put a bad taste in my mouth and poison the friendship.

I guess you need to do some introspection and (re)examine your friendships.
There is also a tsunami warning.

More info: http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/06/22/general-as-japan-e...
You and the idiots who voted me down still don't get it... and your edit changes nothing. You can't act as an agent of employment for someone you know is illegal.

"If anyone is interested in investing in a project to legally provide work opportunities for undocumented immigrants"
In the microsoft world SQL CE 4 is pretty nice for doing the same sort of thing.
Same here. Yesterday my gf bought a Sony Xperia Mini, it came with Android 1.6 :)
Sounds like this...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jericho_%28TV_series%29
As someone who has worked in young, small and medium, old and larger companies: I wouldn't use mongo/couch outside of non-critical webapps even if I was paid to do so and for my own (cynic) understanding, it is as much a "database" as a folder with clear text files is.

Yes, Oracle is big, bad and "ebil" and I cannot stand their sales drones.. but if you ever had an "oh CRAP" moment, chances are very good that the db has got your back. Of course it also has its downsides like any other huge software product...
Except the N9 doesn't use MeeGo, it uses Maemo. Harmattan is just the release that begins the transition to MeeGo.
But it's the same for non-mobile platforms. I only use 10 applications on my computer, too, and I try to avoid platforms that don't have these. Of course, one might argue that everyone needs the same apps on a smartphone (telephony, messaging, notes...) but why not use a regular phone, then?
I'm glad to see that, out of all the top-level comments, the ones about Flask and Jinja2 were not highly criticized, but I will never understand the rather massive butthurt that this community seems to feel over Twisted. Is it because people love Tornado, or because people hate Twisted?

Also, as always, since somebody said "Twisted is big," I'd just like to counter: Django is twice as big as Twisted and nobody seems to mind.
Bug trackers are often pretty terrible at promoting passive aggressive behavior as well, if you don't have good communication with the person on the other end. Reasons to close often look like: INVALID, DUPLICATE, WONTFIX, WORKSFORME.
It's pretty handy, and an easy upgrade to a 'real' database if the need ever arises - especially mongo/couch.
You are quote wrong about this. That happens in some circumstances, but it is not the rule. Indeed, a major part of the problem is that the immigration system is wastefully arbitrary and unpredictable.
Hulu with no content licenses is still valuable. The brand is established, they have significant traffic, the technology seems to be pretty well put together.

Maybe even valuable enough to recoup their $100 million investment.
IBM DB2 on Big Iron
I only have experience with SQL Server Express (my employer was still using their licensed copy of SQL Server 2000 when I got there in 2009). There are a lot of features I'd love to have that are missing from the free version such as replication and automation tools.
I love Riak. It's become my go to for "this just has to work" (and I actually work on problems that need to scale, not ones I hope will have to scale).

The only improvement you could make to it would be adding some of the fancier bits that make Redis really nice, like sets and lists.
> You seem to be assuming that something is right because it is the law.

No, I'm assuming that regulating immigration is right because not regulating it has demonstrably bad consequences, for example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariel_boatlift

If regulating immigration is right, sidestepping that regulation is wrong, just like driving without a license, running a bank that doesn't keep enough reserves, or building a house that doesn't have safe wiring.
What's wrong with those compiled loops?

The only difference from a "hand-written" loop is that you would use `i` and `ln` instead of `_i` and `_len`, and something in context like `numbers` instead of `_results`.
As far as I can tell, it doesn't work with SQL Server Express. It's there on the configuration tool, but it's disabled completely.
There are two answers as far as I know.

1. The sending bank can reverse an ACH (electronic transfer) within a certain period of time due to fraud, death of the recipient, etc. (Up to 90 days in some cases.) By holding up the money, a bank protects itself from losing money on a reversal. If anything seems fishy, the receiving bank might hold the money for a few days.

2. The bank can get a little more float. Back when WAMU was going down, they started taking a week or more to clear large ACH's and deposits.

Most banks don't hold innocent-seeming transfers for more than a day. The larger than usual transfers are the ones that often are delayed.
Better Business Bureau Admits: Mistakes Were Made on Pay-For-Ratings Issue
If the size of each block was reduced to a few pixels square you could fit an entire year in a single image (4 pixels * 12 * 24 = 1152 wide, 365 * 4 = 1460 high) - which might be nice way of visualizing what the weather is like in a location.
I had similar problems with previous installs, but those are fairly infrequent. I'm sure I'll go in tomorrow and figure it out. This was one of the few things I didn't document how I did it, probably because I was so relieved at getting it to finally work. A student I went to school with just got a new job and one of the tests they had him perform was to log into a local instance of SQL Server using the Management Studio. The catch was the service wasn't started. Too easy... they should have made him do this!
Why in any country is listening to lobbyists not a "death penalty" for any politician that kills reelections?

I guess the problem is since all the candidates do it, they cannot run against the other advertising that the other does it.

Even Obama who promised to remove their influenced has actually increased their influence and they now meet across from the whitehouse so they stay off the recorded visits.
If law is unjust, you change the law. It has happened in American plenty of times. Hell, America was founded in part because an unjust law was imposed on us.
Why do you use pgsql over mysql?

I've used mysql a lot, and pgsql a little. I can't tell the difference, other than pgsql being slower and having less support. Some people swear by it, so I'm curious what I am missing.
I think it's bigger than that - the idea that a GPU can execute syscalls is pretty crazy if you really buy into it (i.e. the entire OS is running using this heterogenous environment)
Andorid's biggest failing to me is the lack of a coherent killer e-mail, calendar and integrated IM experience. Out of the box you have a carrier crippled experience or the google locked in experience. Even Win7 get's that right. Conversely you will pry my Incredible 2 from my cold dead hands.
Well, that's true. But it's hard to see how that would not be very disruptive.
Equity Structure for technical lead?
I am looking for some help here and am just wondering what the opinions of others are who have been in my situation before.

In this scenario I was approached to be a technical lead on a project. I am in a unique position in that I do not need the cash and I think the concept could be very good though obviously I will not work for strictly equity.

I have owned and been part of the sale of my own company previously but have never been brought into a project where I was not the person structuring the deal before, so my question is what should I definitely ask for in the deal and what should I avoid?

Restricted stock is obviously high on my list and I was thinking of an upfront payment for server equipment costs that I may incur in the upcoming weeks as well.

I am just wondering what sort of structure I should be expecting and what I should be looking for both good and bad

Thanks!
Brilliant idea! The site is a little slow, so in case it didn't work for you first time, mouse over each panel to see the actual photo that was used for the avg color calculation.

I'm often looking for color inspiration, so will use this. Would be amazing to have this for Colorado skies, especially as the sun sets over the Rockies.
I remember when he came out as gay I thought he was brave. Apparently I didn't know the half of it. (I was a year ahead at MVHS)
You should really learn Javascript first. Coffeescript is not (yet) a replacement for it, more like a tool.
We actually have our own extensions to use Perl filehandles to write directly to Oracle LOBs. I don't know if that is Oracle-specific or if it can be used elsewhere. I've never cracked open the implementation.
Beware of what? It does look quite straightforward and readable to me. The JS actually helps me understand the CoffeeScript (note, I have never seen real CoffeeScript code before.) Even the class definitions and destructuring assignment further along are quite comprehensible. I don't even have to qualify that with "for what they do."
yes, I enforce unique email addresses. You cannot take over an account. i do not allow for email address change.
XFS Zeroes the block instead of keeping the random/sensitive data that was already on the disk if the metadata necessary for that write was not commited before the failure. Ext leaves the data as is.

If you want full protection against those situations instead of praying that it's still the right data or that it doesn't happen at all, you need a copy-on-write FS, or enable data=journal on ext3, at a massive performance cost.
You do know the LA riots were not caused by lack of internet service, right?

Rodney King was beaten by LAPD officers and it was videotaped and the officers were acquitted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodney_King

If anything, riots would be caused by people reading and understanding this article:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-real-housewive...
Oh on a philosophical level it is quite unfair. It's not fair at all that all humans are not regarded as equals. It's really unfair that I should be withheld from visiting or living on a piece of the planet because there happens the be a group of people on it that made a "nation" and the "nation" has invisible "borders" and the "borders" are by "law" not penetrable by people from my "nation".

But such is the case. If Jose or anyone else wants to change this inherent unfairness they can do that.

Meanwhile, though, I have no sympathy for people who are trying to shortcut the established processes. The "hope for a better life" just doesn't justify bypassing all the other people that wait in line. It is extremely unfair to the people who are also trying to immigrate to the US, but do so by entering lotteries, applying for GCs and all.
This isn't something I would do; I know that every tool has its use. I basically own the website and wanted to do a PHP/MySQL site, but we are under contract to use .Net and my supervisor wants to not do anything that could be considered a breach of contract. However, now that I'm using Linux as my main operating system I am constantly being reminded of how the different philosophies between the operating systems affect me. Ninite is a great tool, but installing everything I want from packages is simply awesome. And of course, Linux systems don't need to be restarted in order to apply updates, but on Windows you always need to. This is why I have to possibly go to our data center tomorrow morning if the Server 2008 box our database is on doesn't come back up for remote access when I update it tonight.
The US does have a high rate of immigration, but on the other hand it's underpopulated compared to other developed countries. The biggest reason to loosen restrictions on immigration IMO is that without doing so the US is going to have difficulty with the payouts for social security and so forth as more baby boomers retire and there are fewer new entrants to the workforce. This is a medium-term problem (~20 years), left undone then it will be much more expensive to handle by the time it becomes acute, as countries in central and south America are more like to exhibit a labor shortage than surplus and will be competing with the US for the same labor pool.

http://www.ssab.gov/documents/IMMIG_Issue_Brief_Final_Versio...
I just hope whoever buys them lets them continue working the way they do. I admire their product process so much.
I know you were being facetious, but they actually do a considerable background check when you marry a foreigner to ensure it's not a green card wedding. I think it's a felony if you stage it.
Too broad or too narrow? Apple multitouch patent sparks debate
Right, which is why some companies (such as MySQL AB) charge for support and custom tools instead of the software itself (which is always free to use). The senior programmer I spoke of called them and their marketing staff was of course desperate at the chance to make some money, so she came off thinking that we would have to pay for MySQL. And of course, there's the whole "you have to release all of your source code if you use MySQL anywhere our system!" fallacy.
Some webcams have manual settings, I know mine does. Just enabling those should get you 90% of the way of a tethered digital camera, "all that remains" is getting sufficient dynamic range and fixing the curves/compensating for human perception.
To expand on the point: skilled immigrants in Canada gain permanent residency (aka the equivalent of the green card) immediately upon entry. You can work for anyone, in any field, without restriction. You have health care, education, and all of the benefits of anyone else except the vote.

And that only takes three years of continuous residency.

Compare with the US: must make the H-1B quota, wait years, apply for Green card, wait even more years (EB-3 is what, 6-7 years at this point?), then get your green card. The entire time you're an indentured slave to your employer who can take advantage of you every which way knowing you're locked in. Barbaric.
Having been a professional editor for a number of years, I can say that many people in the industry were looking for ANY solution better than Avid. After a number of iterations, it finally looked like FCP could actually be that product.

Many of the smaller shops forming around that time jumped on board. Our (larger) shop decided that FCP wasn't quite ready for our workflow, so we did the sensible thing and installed dual-boot systems running Avid and FCP so editors could choose to experiment with FCP on smaller projects. All in all, FCP was open enough that you could easily design a workflow to suit your own needs.

The backlash in this case is somewhat warranted, in the sense that there are many shops that rely on FCP as the focal point in their workflow, and FCP X basically leaves them with no options to upgrade their systems any time soon.

I think what many of these editors fail to recall is that PRIOR to adopting FCP we basically fed ourselves using Avid systems that hadn't seen a major upgrade in years. With all the investment in proprietary equipment, it wasn't as if you could just upgrade whenever you felt like it. Nor would you necessarily want to. After all, large scale upgrades run the risk of bringing your business to a screeching halt if anything happens to be incompatible. In some ways, that was Avid's whole selling point- hardware & software compatibility(insert laughs here).

FCP X will likely be looked at in the future as yet another game changer in the world of NLEs. In the mean time, that means all the FCP shops out there are going to have to do the same thing they did before FCP, use what they have. As we used to say, somewhat tongue in cheek, "If it ain't broke, don't upgrade it."
Might wanna have a look at the list of questions asked during a marriage fraud interview here:

http://www.immihelp.com/greencard/familybasedimmigration/mar...
I like the apple wireless usb keyboard without the numeric keypad. It's got a small width while still being comfortable meaning there's more room on my desk, I can slide it easily but it stays in place while I'm typing, the chicklet keys are easy and fast to press and don't make too loud or quiet of a clicking sound.
According to the docs, this is a blocking operation -- so it's inplace, but I wouldn't consider it to be online, as I would PostgreSQL's vacuum or Cassandra's major compactions:
http://www.mongodb.org/display/DOCS/compact+Command
After Seven Years, The Winklevosses Give Up On Battle With Facebook
Idd, sad, it looks like Yahoo is working like a bureaucratic internet company from xx years ago. They could do so much amazing things.
I currently work at an all student run credit union that has the same rules as any other bank in regards to ACH transactions so I think I can clarify some points here. Institutions are allowed up to 5 business days to accept or reject an ACH based debit or credit if it is between non-local banks. However, business days are really the days in which the Fed are open. So there are days when you could potentially have to wait up to 8 days for a transfer to be completed (ie 5 business days + weekend + holiday). If it is between local banks which is defined as being in the same Fed region, the rule is 3 business days.

These rules are very outdated and need to be updated. I think this is one of the most hindering rules in the current financial system. Back in the day, I could see the need for there to be different time allotments between local and non-local transactions, but today it is pretty much instantaneous. However, I don't see these regulations being changed in the near future and the reason is very simple. Big banks have more time to use this "float" money to make money, as well as to secure the money via overnight loans if they are short.
Thankfully, most banks process ACH twice daily (morning and night), but not all. And some even delay transactions on purpose.
Also if anyone is curious how much money it really costs a bank or credit union to do a ACH transfer, it is $0.000133 per transaction. So when your institution charges you $5 or $15 or even $25 to do a incoming or outgoing transfer, they are literally making bank.
There are a total of 9 references to the `_vars`. I think line noise in the compiled javascript is a legitimate counter argument to the claim that its strait forward and readable.
Thanks for the suggestions. The free tier would not be enough for me, but I don't mind spending $9.95 per month.

Does anyone have experience integrating SendGrid with a Google AppEngine Java application ?
I am sorry for your friend's psychosomatic illness. Cell towers, wifi, microwaves, wireless phones, etc. all operate at frequencies below infrared, not above ultraviolet. There are "regulation and health risks" for parts of the spectrum above ultraviolet because that contains X-rays, gamma rays, and other forms of nasty ionizing radiation. Things below ultraviolet are non-ionizing and will do no more than heat you up... very very slightly too, unless you're standing in front of a microwave transmitter, thanks to the inverse square law.