skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I found this article's descriptions of performance reviews was simply nothing like what I've experienced. Maybe it's a combination of being in the Bay Area and having gotten used to getting feedback, and enjoying improving my performance based on it, as a TA.
I've deployed ubuntu server edition for my website. It is stable indeed and the update process is convenience. But, still, it lack of hardware support. The RAID board I use do not provide .deb packaged driver and I have to patch it myself. When I was trying to connect the disk array to server, ubuntu can not recognize that. Well, as far as I use, ubuntu release is stable. But the driver problem is painful, too.
I tought this would be another anti-management bandwagon rant but this was surprisingly insightful. Having endured 10 years of this I can clearly recognize what is being discussed.
Thanks a lot for posting link!
Quite an interesting analysis...
The explaination on revenue differences squaring off after a couple of years reflects the legacy that Oktoberfest has created...Incredible phenomenon that brings millions of people from diverse nationalities and cultures together year after year…
(attended Oktoberfest in Hong Kong yesterday... but,the spirit of Munich is unparallel!!)
Apple ads about Microsoft ads about Apple ads about Microsoft
Eleventh Hour Agro
Coach Taylor and Smash say goodbye. Tyra begins dating Cash while Julie comforts Matt during hard family times.
The (neuro)Science behind creativity
All diamonds / p&#305;rlanta are GIA certificated.
Thanks Roberto Bene. You answer all my questions about GIA grading diamonds / p&#305;rlanta.
I am in grad school and need to live frugally so tomorrow I am buying a $4,000 espresso machine.
I think in this particular case they are not even generally true, just occasionally.
Now that client side frameworks like Cappucino and SproutCore exist, I don't really see the point in using Rails or Seaside.

Why would a javascript client framework remove the need for a backend?
You're talking about a marketing problem. If the RIAA can sell britney spears, I'm quite sure they'll find a way to sell AI music.
> Jeff is being denied access to his data by the host and he says that since he had a crash on his local hard drive, he no longer has copies of any of the content that was on the Quote Unquote Records server.

I'm assuming they want the site up just long enough to move it.
Converting pictures to canvas
Do you have a special photo that means the world to you and you are interested in putting it on your wall in the form of canvas? Today it is possible to have your photos converted to canvas, which was not a possibility quite some time ago. The latest technologies and developments in the printing industry have made this impossible feat a possibility. t.
Me too.

Just to test it out, I entered in my name (zain). It suggested http://za.in/ and said it was available. I was ecstatic!

But, sadly, no, it was wrong. "whois za.in" says NOT FOUND, but I can't find a single .in registrar who says it is available. Bummer.
Enter Pressflip...
The Neuroscience Behind Hope
I fully agree with what's written here.

It's still quite disappointing to see him referring to managers as "bosses" and non-managers as "subordinates". The next logical step is to state that managers are not there to exert power, but to make it possible for non-managers to do work. Fewer power plays means a better working environment.
Even in 1991, Steve Jobs was wearing jeans and a black turtleneck.
Don’t buy a phone system. Savings? At least $500 a year per person..

Uh, maybe if you've never heard of VOIP. $39.95/mo for an entire company plus $0.03/minute.
Snake Xenzia Cheats, Codes Tips and Tricks
games cheats, mobile games, nokia games, nokia mobile games cheats, nokia mobiles.nokia games cheats., snake, snake xenzia cheats, xenzia
Japan's 10 Most Visited Tourist Destinations
Funny I did a similar thing recently, specifically for domain names. The code to train a Markov chain (without using any libraries outside standard Python) is this:

import re, collections
from itertools import *

def words(text):
return (w.group() for w in re.finditer(r"\w+", text.lower()) if w.group().isalpha())

F=collections.defaultdict(lambda:collections.defaultdict(lambda:1))

M = 5

def add_spaces(word):
return ' ' * M + word.strip() + ' ' * M

N = 0

from operator import add
def train(words):
for word in words:
w = add_spaces(word)
for i in range(len(w)-M):
F[w[i:i+M]][w[i+M]] += 1
global N
N = reduce(add,(n for d in F.itervalues() for n in d.itervalues()))

train(words(file('big.txt').read()))

Then, I tried to measure how "good" a particular word is (experimenting with different measures):

from math import log
def goodness(word):
w = add_spaces(word)
res = 0
for i in range(len(w)-M):
res += F[w[i:i+M]][w[i+M]]
# res += log(F[w[i:i+M]][w[i+M]])
global N
return float(res) / ((len(w)-M)*N)

print 'test score:', reduce(add, (goodness(w) for w in words(file('test.txt').read())))

Then, tried to find the top N words at less than 2 edits distance:

alphabet = 'abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz'

import types
def edits1(word):
if type(word)==types.StringType:
n = len(word)
return set(chain((word[0:i]+word[i+1:] for i in range(n)), # deletion
(word[0:i]+word[i+1]+word[i]+word[i+2:] for i in range(n-1)), # transposition
(word[0:i]+c+word[i+1:] for i in range(n) for c in alphabet), # alteration
(word[0:i]+c+word[i:] for i in range(n+1) for c in alphabet))) # insertion
else: #Assume word is actualy an iterable of words
return set(reduce(chain,(edits1(e) for e in word)))

def edits2(word):
return edits1(edits1(word))

def topn(n, word):
words = [(x, goodness(x)) for x in edits2(word)]
words.sort(cmp = lambda x,y: -cmp(x[1],y[1]))
return words[:n]

I have borrowed some code from Peter Norvig's spelling checker, and the style is very much influenced by it.
(Really sorry if this post sounds like a job search, I have a good job and am not looking for one). 10 months ago someone posted a story on programming.reddit on how to write your CV using LaTeX; I put a link to mine and released the source. I got praise for it, so I'd like to share it here as well.

This is the “neat LATEX Résumé” on http://linux.dsplabs.com.au/resume-writing-example-latex-tem...

Direct link to the PDF (French résumé): http://n.favrefelix.free.fr/cv.pdf
Apple responds to "I'm a PC"
CEO Jobs, Executive CEO Job Search Video
You can subscribe to receive daily a list of all registered .com/.net/.org domains, from the registrar.
20 tips for MySQL db architects
Connecting to Facebook
There are a bunch of startups trailing twitter. Recently I came across messmo. It has a cute approach where anyone can create a messmo channel, and publish at no cost from web to mobile. Like twitter but on a 1:1 basis. Worth keeping an eye on.
Awesome, easy to setup, hosting provider
I agree with your point but I would like to point out that not all countries use high fructose corn syrup. Coca-Cola in South Africa uses regular sugar.
Tim Bray: On Tough Times
No worries, glad you like. I thought it'd be a useful one for others when I stumbled across it - I've bookmarked it for my own future Linux reference.
> Just goes to show that you can be smart and know exactly how to achieve a goal, but luck and timing are just as important.

Yeah, it's fascinating to watch this and think that as this video was being made, the Internet (well, WWW) was just about to change everything (directly or indirectly anyway).
No. It's not the same thing.

Eg. Usually I loan out $1 billion. But now, my risk appetite is smaller because of my desire for a smaller leveraged balance sheet, hence i will loan out only $100 million.

So even if I trust that you are able to pay back the loan, I will no longer lend to you because I have no desire to lend so much anymore. The overall credit supply decreases.

Maybe my initial post was not clear, I believe the main reason for the tight market is this: Constriction of desired leverage -> Decreased credit supply

Eg. Assuming the precrisis loan-to-cash mean leverage is 500%, USD 100 billion of cash can yield USD 500 billion of loan supply in the credit market. Now, the loan-to-cash mean leverage is about 200%, so the same USD 100 billion of cash will yield only USD 200 billion of loan supply. Thus, the Fed has to print a lot more cash to restore the precrisis credit supply. The announced capital injection is not enough. They have to inject a lot more. If they don't wish to print that much cash, the Fed can be the direct lender and assume the precrisis leverage themselves.

Here's a good article that explains it all:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/robertpeston/2008/10...
I think that empirical evidence supports my view.

The big problem with a 52% / 24% / 24% split is that nobody wants to be a 24% partner. Particularly since they've left the de facto running of the company to the 52% partner. I've seen people try this, and it never seems to work out.
low&lame
No performance reviews. If you do good, you get generous raises, stock options to get your own piece of the pie, and a bigger role in making the company succeed. If you do bad, mediocre, or merely slightly above average, you get a generous severance package and the gentlest kick out the door.

I do not understand why adult human beings, who get a few short years to do something creative and useful, want so bad to be treated so similarly to grade school children. Line up to pee in the cup and have your bodily fluid tested just like the cattle you fat fucks gorge yourselves on. Come into the principa...manager's office and get reduced to some meaningless numbers it a social ritual that directly links to mankinds worse tendencies to form hierarchies that exist to mantain power. Piss away the potentially creative years of your lives living the same day over and over again and get a few measly biosurvival tickets in return, until you drop dead. If you are going to go through life processing your relationships to power structure like a grade school kid, what's the point of being an adult?

I do not want to hire the kind of person who needs or wants to be validated like a second grader. I would prefer to hire the kind of person who demands the dignity and responsibility due to adult human beings, and would blow me off if I tried to sit down and hand out gold stars based on what's already happened. I would prefer to address real problems when they come up, as appropriate, and ignore nitpicks rather then saving nitpicks to be unleashed in a minefield of potential miscommunications and ignoring problems with employees until the review. There is no need to have this stupid ritual every six months.

I do like his "preview" idea. The idea of replacing review with long range planning seems exactly right. Companies exist to invent the future, attention should be focused on the future.
Agreed. Just look at the success of Gorillaz.
Because most of the work for Seaside (and to a similar extent Rails) is in managing user interface state. That goes away with client side frameworks. At least most of the messy complex stuff - obviously persistence things are still kinda handy ;)

Its back to the future.

When you have worked with both you find that the back end stuff just gets in the way for the rich client frameworks. Its not to say that "classic" action/restful style web apps don't have a place (they have a BIG place, especially for content heavy sites) but its not a one size fits all.
Brilliant. I love the look on Macs face when he swoops the ad money towards fixing vista and PC swoops it toward advertising.

This is like boxing. Mac ads have had pc's reputation on the ropes in the collective unconscious. All the sudden, after getting beat on barely throwing a punch, PC comes out swinging. Even lands a blow on macs chin, shakes him up a bit. But before PC can land another punch, this uppercut takes out 3 of his teeth and drives the cartilage in his nose into his brain.

Now, everyone who sees both ads will think "Why is microsoft spending $$$ on this without fixing vista?" This ad, and it's partner on censoring vista, just short circuited Microsofts 300 million dollar campaign. This is microsoft being completely outclassed by people who just get it.
>Now that client side frameworks like Cappucino and SproutCore exist, I don't really see the point in using Rails or Seaside.

Couldn't agree more. Impressed daily with Cappuccino.
ydnar appears to be "randy" backwards.
FBI Ran a Forum for Phishers, Spammers and Hackers.
I wonder why this one did not get many more upvotes. Are we in cat-picture country still?
Aliens in America
A Wisconsin mom arranges to host a foreign exchange student, believing the visitor will help her shy son become more popular. When the student turns out to be a Muslim teenager from Pakistan, her plans go awry - and everyone is likely to learn a little lesson about life.
Backpacking in Thailand | Thailand Travel Online
I did an excellent work for months so my project manager wrote a review that should have granted a raise. But I got sent to a new customer that didn't like my face and asked for a replacement after a week.

My boss was asked to burn the review. Someone else from above would write a new one. I guessed what was going on (later my boss confirmed my guesses), so I didn't waste a second. A week later I gave the two weeks notice to go to a place with 20% more pay. I wouldn't if not for the review system.
As far as I know he's been wearing it for much longer:

http://folklore.org/projects/Macintosh/gallery/popsci.jpg

"The following collage is from an article by Steven Levy that appeared in the February 1994 issue of Popular Science, commemerating the Macintosh's tenth birthday. It's based on pictures taken by Norman Seiff for Rolling Stone Magazine in January 1984."
Actually, I'm thinking: wow, I voluntarily watched an advertisement for a geek sports rivalry. Go gray! No, go blue! Let's talk about this at the watercooler and pretend we share something to care about in our vapid, disposable lives!
Funny thing... I've been using him as well for at least the same time! He must be a very popular guy!
Before I went self-employed, I was involved in hiring for the company I worked for. 99% of CVs were MS Word documents. Also, most of them were pretty bad, especially the ones coming in through agencies. (no clear structure, terrible formatting, butchered English)

Personally, I've always maintained mine in (very plain) HTML and LaTeX versions.
I love reading commentaries. As a result of that love, I've come to spot populist messages. To me, a populist message is one in which most all of the listeners are going to feel like "heck yes!" while they are reading it.

Populist messages have a tendency, however, to fall apart upon further inspection. There is no doubt that people hate performance reviews -- managers and employees alike. There's no doubt that in most cases they cause and create behavior that nobody wants.

I think he misses the boat right off the bat with the purpose of the review. The purpose of the review is to make sure the manager is doing his job with the employee, knowing what's going on in the employee's work, having an interest, offering to help, seeing where the employee and the company's interests can be aligned. Some of these conversations are tough, and if you didn't require them, a lot of employees would never have the chance to say no, I don't want to be a tech lead, I'd rather get into teaching (or something similar). To view the review process as primarily raise and checklist based is to see how it's done instead of seeing what it's supposed to do. A common argument in populist writing is to say "since X is commonly done very poorly, X is therefore a bad idea altogether"

He gets even further into the cool-aid with this comment "I'm sick and tired of hearing about subordinates who fail and get fired, while bosses, whose job it was to ensure subordinate effectiveness, get promoted and receive raises in pay."

Sounds good -- as long as you think bosses should always be able to make/help subordinates be happy and productive. But while managers are definitely super people, they're not superman. Things happen in life. People get accepted at jobs they will never like. Companies take directions employees simply can't agree with. There are lots of reasons why somebody can get fired while management is not responsible. I'm not even sure that most times management is responsible, but I know that it's not all of the time. Generalizations are always false: including this one.

</Rant>
Shy and socially awkward in the "real world", fine. Shy and socially awkward in a crowd of hardcore geeks is cause for concern IMHO.
Job losses spread in Silicon Valley
Some even straighter talk from Pierre Francois of 74s
One things that helps too is that in recession time large companies have no available resource to stomp you out of existence. They're fighting to survive, cutting jobs and getting completely disorganized, and no one realizes there's a little guy out there who's stealing markets and clients.
He is a smart guy. That's a very rational non BS marketing brief for a CEO. (at least my stereotype of one. I don't know many). This a gist from the 2nd tape:

They are interested in consumers being pushed form the PC to the workstation market. These are the reasons:

1* - Custom Apps - * The key is having the best development environment. (he thinks they do0

2* - productivity Apps - * The key is productivity apps using the networking capabilities so they can tie people together'*

3* - Interpersonal Computing - * This he says, is the long term strategy.
Nike shoes, air jordans, sneakers, air force ones
news and information for the sneaker collector, nikes, jordans, puma, vans, bape and more.
I'm reminded of what Charlton Heston said to Bill Maher. Charlton had taken out full page personal attack ads blasting Barbara Streisand for her anti-gun activism, and Bill Maher asked him if this was really appropriate.

Charlton considered for a moment, and then responded. I was unkind, he admitted, Not unfair, but unkind.

Now as to lame, is it there some factual error? Is Microsoft actually spending more on fixing Vista than advertising it? My feeling is that if the ad is correctly representing Microsoft's strategy, there is nothing lame about depicting it. The un-lame thing about the ad is that it never says Microsoft is wrong, it shows you the facts through a skit and lets you decide what to do.

I wonder if people would react differently if these ads were SNL skits. I have a feeling that some people are so emotional about one company or the other--which is odd, these are companies, after all, not religious edifices--that they simply cannot sit back and enjoy a good laugh.
Is OpenID too open?
MS and apple... It's kind of cute, like watching kids fight :)
Now if apple would only realise that quicktime on the net has lost out to flash I would be able to wacth this. Quicktime reminds me of realplayer: buggy on PC's, runs lots of processes in the background I didn't ask for and requires me to install itunes which I don't want.
Video Tutorial To Start Developing Web Applications on Erlang
>Do Ruby on Rails Developers Need Merb?

Yes.

For small sites, Rails is the ultimate in readable and simple frameworks.

However. For very small sites where the whole application is placed in one source file. For bigger sites where not all the controllers is placed in one directory. For sites which uses jQuery instead of prototype. For sites where thread-safety is important, the answer is Merb.
This is our first attempt to make a video. It shows the path we took in order to create web applications using Erlang and Mochiweb. Your feedback is more than welcome.
I wonder what proportion of Vista users think it needs fixing?

I don't understand the new Microsoft PC adverts either. What does having glasses have to do with anything?
5 Oil Myths and the "Great American Oil Boom"
Alternatives to Google App Engine
"Slimming down the bloated iTunes 8 installer": http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=554
When did advertisments become about putting your competitor down? Heck even the Coke v/s Pepsi wars didn't stoop this low.

If Apple can't market it's products on their own features and has to rely on this kind of negative adverts I'd say it's really hitting a low-point. The ad kind of pisses me off actually.
Jewelry Directory, Gemstones, Fashion Jewelry
JewelerLocal.com is a jewelry directory offering jewelry information such as beads, diamonds, gemstones, manufacturers, pearls, precious metals, retailer & wholesaler.
You know, I'm starting to agree with you.

I've had Vista since it came out and am completely happy with it. I thought the Apple commercials were cute, but off-base. They were funny, and they emphasized Mac good points, so I liked them.

But now it just seems mean. Hell, computer commercials are getting like political commercials, and we've all had enough of that lately.
"Mac ads have had pc's reputation on the ropes in the collective unconscious."

Do you mean Microsoft? If so, it sure as hell hasn't scratched the business world. It's only knicked the consumer world a couple percentage points. I'd reconsider your position.

Further, this is kind of old and becoming a nonissue in today's world. With the migration towards non-platform-specific consumer usage of systems (ie. internet) I don't see as heavy of a need for some bloated consumer operating system.

I'm no huge Windows fan. I've used countless operating systems; C64, Cisco IOS, HP-UX, AS/400, Solaris, Mac OS, Windows 3.x-Vista, Server NT-Server 2k8, Linux derivatives galore, BSD. While developing/working on them and I can say I'm not really impressed with what Apple offers.

Apple is just a gimmick in the world of computing systems. You can claim that consumers aren't nerds that love command lines, but what do you think drives the media infrastructure that panders to all the fun-filled music and video that Apple users love to waste time on? It sure as hell isn't Mac OS.

Computers primarily run the world's business. Steve Jobs' goal is not to get Apple tangled up with "boring" business stuff. Hell, look at the stupid hipster getup the "Mac Guy" wears in the comercials. Jobs put the noose around Apple's neck when he set the goal of being consumer-orientated instead of business-orientated if his plan is digital world domination.
If you make it yourself, coffee is really cheap, and I say this despite buying good-quality, Fair Trade beans. Paying coffee shop rates, however, is a rip off (Starbucks, I'm looking at you).

Also figure that if drinking it improves your productivity at all, it's money well spent.
Perhaps it's because Apple offers nothing worth switching for over a Microsoft solution that is generally cheaper and more supported by not only oem manufacturers and colleagues, but software and hardware manufacturers?
If you look at Win7 as "Fixing Vista" --> which in some/lots of ways it is - then I'd guess that MS are spending more on "fixing" than on advertising.. Certainly nothing near that ratio though..

The reasonably insightful comment on reddit was that this isn't just a pissing contest between MS and Apple - it's a pissing contest between Crispin Porter and TBWA (the ad agencies)...
You obviously never used a Mac. ;-)
Ouch. Behold the dangers of keeping your data "in the cloud".
Yeah, at some point I'd like to see Linus walk through one of those ads and just slap them both on the back of head and call them morons...
They should sue the host into the stone age.