skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Two answers, sorta:

You should play to your strengths/interests.

Staying up to date in the tech world requires a bit of passion, so choose a path that you'll enjoy over one that makes the most sense. If you have a design eye and prefer building interfaces a CS degree might not help you much. If you like hard core problem solving that requires heavy analysis, CS might be more suitable.

Secondly, I don't think that a CS degree will 'pay off' in HTML5 and CSS3 skills as much as it will pay off with language and knowledge around how the nuts and bolts of programming works. My experience as a non CS major is that a CS degree isn't really required for a lot of things in the tech world. There will be some problems that will be terribly difficult and confusing if you don't have the depth of education that a CS degree would provide. I accept that as a weakness and try to work around it and to keep learning.
The no-compromise "fix-the-bug-and-hit-reload-devlopment"-culture that Play enables has changed the way I work. I cannot go back to the old style of developing Java web apps. To hell with unnecessary self-imposed complexity.
Traffic App by MIT and Princeton
I'm a heavy Mac user, but Finder is and has always been one of OS X's pain points and its gotten worse in Lion. Until I changed it when I opened a Finder window it defaults to a list of "All My Files" which is useless (the first 20 or so items are __init__.py)
I don't use use my "pwdff" command that often. It is convenient if I need to read a specific file in a script that's buried in some folder.

I use my "cdff" command much more often, which changes the directory in Terminal to the frontmost Finder window. (And if you already have the folder up in Terminal, "pwd | pbcopy" is essentially the same as "pwdff".)
Is there somewhere that gives a good description of the current state of asset packaging in Rails? Personally, I find the whole thing really confusing.

Right now, I'm just using asset_id (https://github.com/moocode/asset_id) to dump my assets on S3/CloudFront with md5s in the filenames, pretending to myself that that will make everything fast.

It seems like all the gems provide different things, whether it's CSS minification, JS minification, includes to combine many files together, automatic aggregation of multiple JS/CSS files, CSS sprites, easy uploading to CDNs, different strategies for cache busting (md5 of file vs node timestamp)...

I'm presuming that with Rails 3.1, everyone is going to switch over to Sprockets 2.0 from Jammit (which is what it seemed like everyone used before). However, I honestly have no idea what's going on or where the big wins are.

What's up?
Samsung may purchase WebOS from HP
John Mayer on Finishing Projects (even if they are awful)
Could we get a lawyer from one of those countries in here to answer this? I'm curious of the answer, as well.
Astronauts May Evacuate Space Station in November, NASA Says
Awesome! For some types of applications, relying on PAAS for scaling out, logging, etc. is easier than dealing with containers like Java EE 6, etc.

Play! is great. I have used it on my own projects and easily running on Heroku is a nice bonus.

I am not an entrepreneur, instead spending most of my work time consulting (and writing) and I generally go with what customers want but I have been disappointed a few times when I could not convince customers to use a PAAS like Heroku or AppEngine in cases where it probably made the most sense to outsource platform, admin, etc.
> but it will be extremely helpful for beginners

Methinks that kind of summarizes the issue: Microsoft doesn't seem to realize it's not 1995 anymore. "Beginners" are no longer a big market, and people are more comfortable with "discovering" software interfaces, as proven by the success of web apps, Apple, etcetera.
Actually, I'm still pretty sure Apple and XBLA do that because they can make more money, not because they are trying to protect their image.

It's still the first time I've seen anyone say that physical goods based on the game were a problem. I really can't quite believe that.

In-game stuff, yeah, I can see it. Ratings and whatnot. But I don't think Mojang/Notch would have a problem on the ratings end of things, unless the ratings board was out of control. Still, I could see him not taking the chance.
Beautiful!

Many thanks for confirming.
Great post. I face this everyday in my job at an "old media" company. There are policies, rules and constraints in place which served some purpose at some point in time, and haven't been challenged for years. Unlearning the rules of established games is almost as important as evolving them. Everything should be questioned and challenged to find the root of the point of the rule/law/restriction and if it doesn't make sense any longer, throw it out.
South Korean domain registrar Gabia hacked
That was such an entertaining read. I love your writing style. Fast pace, short sentences, and well-framed details.
Samsung May Buy webOS
I generally like ribbon in Office and think MSFT has some great ideas here, like moving the info pan to better fit the wide screen reality.

But at this stage it looks so very very bad, and remind me the open office mouse with 30 buttons.
do what you can't be happy if you will not do it.
But how often do you really need to do that? For me, it's once every few months. It's okay for rarely-needed features to be less accessible or a bit harder to use. I understand that getting at the textual path of an object is generally a bit easier in Windows Explorer than in the Finder, but I don't know of any common workflow in OS X that requires it, so I don't understand why it's getting decried as a notable problem with the Finder.
it could also mean "less", which translates pretty well to a minimalistic UX and feature set.
Have you noticed, that this point, which I have not meant to make, is very common, and situation you described - such complicated mess of layers and layers of useless abstractions, bugs and poor design decisions, is the description of a common Java project? And that description cannot be applied for most of other common languages, except PHP, which is much worse nightmare and a triumph of incompetence in itself.)))
Or, direct plug-in to PCI-E like the revodrive.
The 3 months of YC will be some of the hardest you work and you'll be working in extreme close proximity to your co-founders. If you don't go the solo route, just keep in mind that when looking for a co-founder you want someone who will happily go through that with you.
How did you find it? Honest question, had no idea about it until now...
Matternet, A Network of Drones For Deliveries In Remote Locations
Perhaps he has data that he doesn't want people looking at if it's lost or stolen.
What Kills Startups? A study.
I wasn't trying to express skepticism - the whole thing smells pretty bad. I was just looking forward to seeing the nail in that coffin :)
Don't forget productivity. If you can concentrate/focus for 10 hours a day, you can work 50hours a week and have free weekends and still 10hours ahead of the average developer. If you are more productive, your output will be even higher.

Increase your productivity by improving your environment, sleep, food...I think 48hours are good to have fun/make a short travel.
+10, best article on memory ever. If a similar treatment showed up on branch prediction we would have an excellent pair.
According to Microsoft's data, more than 85% of the command usage in Explorer is through keyboard shortcuts or context menus. Clearly, it isn't that hard to get used to using context menus and keyboard shortcuts.

It seems to me that a lot of people here on HN are simply using this issue to talk about how much better they are at using a computer than the ordinary person, who is apparently quite inept. Unless there is convincing evidence that people that incompetent are still a significant fraction of the userbase, we should stop designing desktop software to accommodate people who are not able to master the use of an iPad.
SGCompass a web app to test if your startup is heading the right direction
I'd love to see some stats on this. I wonder just what percentage of users never changes a default UI.
My co-founder and I both couldn't make it to interview. He flew out and I interviewed over a video chat via Skype. It's not a problem at all.
You haven't found anything? Really? Where exactly have you looked? Off the top of my head, here are 4 examples:

http://tigerbeatdown.com/2011/01/06/why-i-didnt-delete-tiger...

http://kateharding.net/2007/04/14/on-being-a-no-name-blogger...

http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2011/02/my-point-here...

http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2007/02/my-life-as-ri...

(Edit: if you want more, but lack the google-foo, email me and I can provide you with more. There's quite a bit of this available for reading from the people who haven't taken their content offline completely.)
That's not entirely correct. The MMU generally handles virtual to physical memory address translation and the OS is only ever involved if there is a page fault. Outside of OS architecture and very specific and intended application, virtual/physical memory is completely transparent. When I hear "virtual memory" I assume reference to swap space unless otherwise noted because the technical meaning has such a specific domain.
Thanks for this info. I wasn't aware of potential carrier-specific issues so I'll make sure we take this in to account while testing. Have you raised this with the networks? I guess there's a chance that it could also affect non-jqm powered code.
Can someone please move those arrows farther apart?
You could try this Stylebot style I made: http://stylebot.me/styles/248
I have to say I'm really digging the Touchpad for web browsing, which is primarily would I would want a tablet for. I can see some people needing more applications, but this is fine for me.

That said, is there a way to get Gmail working through the web browser? Because I'll be sharing the Touchpad with someone else I don't want my credentials in the email app.
Boiler Hire from All Seasons Hire
What makes people feel pleasure? [video]
That's certainly one way to paint the picture. Most of investing, though, is trying to grow the pie, not necessarily focusing on your specific piece.

I've been on the founder side (trying to convince investors to spin off a new company) and the pitch goes like this: Before, you had an ownership stake in 1 company with two products. After, you have an ownership stake in 2 companies. Both of these companies are out to grow, raise money and exit in their own right, and have teams solely devoted to hitting a home run. From that perspective, you could argue that you now own more than you did before, essentially by growing the pie.
If all you want to do is program, then you don't need a Computer Science degree; in fact, you don't need a degree at all. A reasonably intelligent person can read all the free tutorials on the web and develop a decent sense for programming.

If what you want to do is think critically, write better programs, and possibly even tackle problems that have never before been solved or even addressed, then you need a Computer Science education.
This looks like a professional tool for doing stuff with files. The same way Word is a professional tool for text and documents, and the same way that Photoshop is a professional tool for editing images.

Difference is that doing stuff with files is not a profession.
You are (not) a Visionary: The end of the startup world as we know it
You can download minecraft from any computer here:

http://www.minecraft.net/download.jsp

The client is self-updating.
Shameless plug: I want to do this 100%. I have exhausted every single person I know who codes for the passed 4 years. It pretty much comes down to "They don't want to do the work and are completely happy in their current job".

If anyone is interested, I would love to be your co-founder.

I have built several websites. I am experienced in both C# and Java. Ive built several Android Apps. I know DBs like the back of my hand and I have DRIVE.

I have an amazing idea. Ya of course everyone says that, but I really do. Its a total niche idea and it has the ability to make money from both users and sponsors alike through subscriptions and sales from the application. I am currently iterating the idea my self through the night, but would love for someone to jump on board. This niche is supported by well over 1000 groups willing to pay good money. There is no competition to the point I want to bring the idea.

I want to apply, but I am totally a Solo here. Anyone want to co-found an idea? I want someone who is 100% ready to jump in.

Contact me.

spoiledtechie with gmail
Well, I'm still glad this got submitted; I wouldn't have gone searching for it. Pretty interesting read.
If you're writing C++ code, learning x64 assembly is extremely helpful, as it will tell you exactly what is happening in a function - all of the implicit calls (destructors, operators, copy ctors, etc) are in plain sight when you read the assembly.
Absolutely yes, for many different reasons:

1. If you program in any compiled language, being able to read assembly is critical to figuring out what the compiler is doing with your code. A quick glance over the assembly can often reveal why the code is slower than expected, often including suboptimalities in your higher-level code such as unexpected aliasing.

2. If you program in a C-like language, parsing the output of gdb is impossible (beyond the bare basics) without knowing assembly.

3. SIMD assembly can give performance improvements of 10-20x or even higher for many types of real-world code. Skill at using SIMD is in incredibly high demand at the moment, especially on ARM (with NEON). If you are writing code where performance is critical, you should always consider how to optimize with SIMD. If you don't, you're effectively throwing away >90% of the capabilities of your CPU.

4. If you understand the capabilities of the machine you're optimizing for, you can better write code (in a low-level language like C) to take advantage of it. Examples of this include the ability on ARM to do conditional instructions effectively for free, or the ability on x86 to do reg3 = (reg1+(reg2<<{0,1,2,3})+<const>) in one instruction.

Learning assembly is quite easy; for example, last Google Code-In we had a student (age 17) who started knowing not a single iota of anything about assembly and, within a week, was writing literally thousands of lines of SIMD code and passing stringent code reviews.
Have you met people not in the tech world?

Tons of people struggle with things as simple as sending emails, or adding music.
Lessons for developers: why you should dog food your software
agree, in fact UI like this encourages a user to develop bad usage habits, which will remain with them for an indefinite amount of time until these behaviors are (if ever) unlearned.
True, and shortcut key functionality (the commonly used good UI) is simultaneously expanded.
I'm getting off-point here, but did anyone else get annoyed that the MS blog post used bar charts when they should use pie charts to compare relative percentages?
The article points out that context menus are not very discoverable, and yet despite this they are used a lot. Getting past a simplistic reading of the data, MS are focussed on improving the UI for the majority that probably don't even know about the context menu.

Arguably, to look at the data and resolve to tune the context menu would be similar to getting data that most people are climbing up a drainpipe to get into their apartment, instead of using the lift, so to improve their experience we should signpost the drainpipe and build a nice ladder up the side of it. (BTW I use the drainpipe - it's quicker)
...this entire redesign was saved in my eyes by the quick access bar and the fact that you can add any function to it and collapse the ribbon out of sight.

I'll like that too, but I have faith that MS will screw this up somehow. Some of the ways you wind up interacting with Explorer (the Open dialog, say) won't use your customizations, or Explorer will forget them every few weeks. Or something else. That's always been their way.
Gmail.com being MITM'd by Iran using this certificate
Most "normals" I interact with are beginners every time they use the computer. They are not comfortable discovering anything. I can teach them something and be confident in them forgetting it by the next time I talk to them.

Things like moving files around directories is black magic to them. Directories are black magic to them. The problem I see with this solution is two-fold:

1. The people who understand this stuff will be comfortable using context menus.

2. The people who don't understand this stuff will be just a stymied by the "move to" being in the ribbon versus being in a never-seen context menu.

However, what I would imagine MS is hoping with this is that the people in category two will gradually slide up to category one (well, more like 1a) because these things are in their face all the time.
Anybody that puts themselves in the public eye will sooner or later have to deal with the downsides of that.

Being a woman or a blogger has very little to do with it, attacks as a result of internet interaction are increasing, period. And as more and more of our communications and expressions are moving to the internet this trend will accelerate rather than slow down.

A friend of mine is an author that sometimes goes on TV, after every appearance there are at least several weirdos that feel the need to describe how and where she's going to die.

That's nothing to do with TV, it has everything to do with your visibility. The more idiots that figure out who you are and where you live the more you'll get this sort of thing aimed at you.

It is interesting how the author is actually asking for even more visibility which may very well result in more of such nonsense. That either means that she doesn't think it is all that serious after all or that she hasn't thought over the consequences of this action.

Trolls love attention, if you want them to go away ignore them. And that's just what these people are, real life trolls and griefers. My guess is that as a result of this posting there will be a lot more attention from the jerks & idiots.

Also, if you really are ever concerned about your health to the point that you would write something like this the first place to stop is your local police station to file a complaint, without that it is very easy to be told that you 'made it all up'.

The short version: If you plan on being visible, grow a very thick skin regardless of your gender or occupation.
This reminds me of this famous quote:

The only problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste. They have absolutely no taste. And I don't mean that in a small way, I mean that in a big way, in the sense that they don't think of original ideas, and they don't bring much culture into their products.
BTW, is "officially" the new "literally"?
Well, in general I agree with the comments saying that the review missed the point about reworking the Tool/Menu bar so that people start to use it more

I still think, it's too crowded, and will benefit from a mode selection (i.e. Advanced with all these button, Basic with only the most used ones and Custom )
Yes. Learning assembly and how compiler translates high level languages into assembly really helps you master the full stack up and down.

It would also help you understand how some of the VM works.
Wonderful - thank you for the information!
> It sounds like he's not evaluating the Finder, or any other window manager on its own merits. He's comparing it to what he's used before (command line) and assuming that any new way of doing things won't need relearning, or at least that relearning should be easy because he's a "poweruser."

- Assessing a window manager in isolation from the rest of your workflow makes no sense.

- Based on my experience with ribbons in Office, I think they are much less user-friendly than any other existing system of accessing commands. Primarily, I think this is because of the visual noise: there are lots of icons and words in an arbitrary layout (not rows or a grid) you have to parse through to find what you want. I think the same principle applies as with web forms (http://www.cxpartners.co.uk/cxinsights/web_forms_design_guid...) -- the ribbon makes you jump around between a whole bunch of icons before you find what you want.

- Spending more time with ribbons don't make them easier to use in practice. For example, I use conditional formatting, autofiltering, and sheet/worksheet protection all the time in Excel. I still am not able to remember which tab they are in on the ribbon (how does putting sheet protection on "Review" tab make any sense?).

> Someone might have a better feel for temps in degrees Fahrenheit over degrees Celsius. That doesn't mean Fahrenheit is inherently better than Celsius.

I'd say a better analogy would be between the US system of measuring volume (gallons, etc.) and the metric system. I've refused to learn the US system because the relationship between the different units is totally arbitrary. The arbitrary feel of the design of the Win 8 Explorer ribbon strikes me the same way.
I know plenty of people like that. For the most part, they know how to right-click (unless they're using an Apple mouse).
Here we go again, or should I say here I go again. ;)
Microsoft UIs current state is, in general, cluttered and broken.
I agree with this blogger, and my reaction was similar when I red the original post on msdn.

Having been absent from microsoft office (or any office like application for that mater) for many years, I recently got to use recent versions of microsoft products such as Word, Outlook, etc. The ribbons were a big facepalm, I didn't know such bad things exist, a few co-workers of mine said that they find them practical. I spent an average of 20-40 seconds each time I needed to click one of those buttons, even after many months of usage.

The buttons are jammed together in a rectangular area in ridiculous amounts. Some ribbons have close to 20 buttons, this will never be intuitive, it's just not visually easy to identify the buttons. Also, often a button is on the other site, all the away across the window in a far far away ribbon.

I never managed to use any microsoft OS after XP. Did the users really need other MS OS after XP? Quite frankly, I cannot find sinigle advantage of using vista or seven.

PS: The screenshots have something of a 1998 charm, I think it's that overlayed info. mspaint?
Firefox 6 Launched with 2,600 Long-Known Bugs
What about Minecraft's distribution method makes you not want to use it? You buy the game and are given an account, then you can use that account anywhere and everywhere on any operating system. You just log in when you start the game.
This is so awesome, congratulations guys, keep up the great job, you are definitely discovering the fundamentals behind great entrepreneurs.
Package signing comes to Archlinux