skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
JavaScript is object oriented but it gets the inheritance from prototypes instead of classes. Prototypes are very powerful, you can implement a class system in JavaScript if you want to but the reverse is not true.
OpenSSL isn't the best example to use. Cryptographic code is quite challenging to write because it needs to factor in timing analysis attacks (via cache misses, branching with different execution times, etc). For this reason, use of normal programming approaches may be incorrect from a security standpoint.
> That implies that you can specify all requirements in a mathematical form, which is not the case.

I concede that requirement themselves can't be completely reduced to math. But most of them can. Also, the system itself (excluding human operators) can definitely be reduced to pure math.

What I was proposing was to check the pure math specification against the mostly math requirements. If such math are simple enough, it should be easy enough to make sure the specs match the needs.
You know? This is not a bad idea.

I've been wondering for months what kind of thing one could do to 'awaken' people about all these corrupts running stuff. It's not that they hide what they do. Oh, no! In general they are quite blatant about it. The problem is that most journalists (with the exceptions of people like Matt Taibbi and Greg Palast) can't be bothered to do their job and actually do some... well, journalism.

So, I wonder if creating a compendium of these facts won't make it an easier job for the journalists in the mainstream media to pick them up and maybe expose them to the public a bit more. I'm making a big, big, assumption here that mainstream media actually gives a crap about this at all.
There are plenty of people who'd happily stand in line for $10. I'd do it; give me a usable queue computing device and I can do other stuff at the same time.
I spent about a year in 2003 trying to launch a similar start-up. Restaurant owners told me that they would gladly trade a normal distribution of customer satisfaction for consistent-but-average experiences. Why? If you have a great experience, you might tell a few people. However, when you have an awful experience, you'll tell a hundred.
HellBound Hackers
I don't go to a restaurant just to eat. It's a social event. I go to hang out with friends, people watch, and just be around people. You can order in if you really hate human interaction that much.
I use Runkeeper for my iPhone. There's this great belt you can buy that holsters it (Spibelt), can't even feel it there. Coaching on how fast you're going every half mile. You can calibrate pretty quickly.
The amount of money provided by YC seems like it would naturally limit the type of problems that could be solved by a YC startup.
I think this analysis is a little unfair. It may be true that pg wasn't really saying anything new. That doesn't mean that it wasn't worth writing about, however, because it is one of those lessons that seems to continually go unlearned.

I don't believe his allusion to the inverse correlation between the age of founders and the likelihood of big successes is entirely unfair, either. Of course there are exceptions, but in general I've noticed that as my friends grow older, they have become more risk averse. They seems to be much more likely to talk themselves out of pursuing big ideas by enumerating all of the ways in which they might fail.

Having said that, I think there's a lot of value in older founders who can use their experience and judgement, but are still willing to adopt a "damn the torpedos, full speed ahead" attitude when they realize that a lot of hard, boring work lies between them and their goal.
He should contact an employment/labor attorney. Under no circumstances should he sign the agreement without consulting an attorney.

30-60-90 days of non-compete is one thing. Two years is insane, almost criminal.
How to get Front-End Developers
Full Examples + Demos. I hate when a video tutorial or written documentation talks about something and shows a few lines of sample code but doesn't actually let you download the full working code.
Moving java scala appengine to dotcloud
We hosted our scala/lift application on appengine, but recently we faced few difficulties to utilize several scala/lift features on it. Is there anyone out there who has experience moving application code to dotcloud from appengine?
I think that's a little harsh, and misjudging what he is saying.

I can handle lots of saving, planning and sacrifice, as well as logistics. I cannot handle moving to the valley, without destroying a happy family life. That doesn't mean I shouldn't start a company, it means I shouldn't apply to YC or other things that require a move to the valley.

There's nothing WRONG with requiring that move, and I agree, it probably does considerably raise your chances of success. It is just not necessarily possible for everyone who would/could/should start a company.
Thanks, you bring up an excellent ancillary point in the discussion. The momentum of tradition is quite powerful. As a point of comparison, I use a Dvorak keyboard layout which allows me to touch type faster and has reduced my carpal tunnel syndrome effects considerably. I personally know several others that use Dvorak. However, I also realize that most of the world will not be switching from QWERTY because that is just how it is.
The value in high-end processing is the multimedia upsell. Replacing a paper menu doesn't require much processing power, but it's worth a lot to increase the check average and/or improve margins by promoting higher margin items.
Wikipedia is probably blacking out, so long as someone makes a decision somewhere :)
Rupert Murdoch Calls Google a "Piracy Leader"
My 2 cents on the "too specialized" arguments...

1 - In high school, the people who take multiple CS subjects tend to be intellectually curious, and good at many other things. The same folks who took AP CS with me also took AP European history. I suspect it will be similar here.

2 - Similar to what folks say about Stuyvesant, I don't think there will be a crowding out effect of other subjects.

3 - If done right, the teachers can connect many other subjects to computer science: Philosophy, Mathematics, the Scientific Method... This can make those topics more interesting, not less.

4 - The rigor of learning to program is applicable in many other fields. Computer Science grads frequently go into other fields precisely because of this. This diminishes the "Let's fix the software engineering deficit" argument, but it's true that CS as a major signals ability above and beyond programming.

If I had grown up in NYC, I would have done anything to go to this school. I am glad that my children might have the opportunity to go to a place like this if they so desire.
The obvious question is, how many of your older friends are founders? The fact that someone is an older founder means he/she is less risk averse than other people.
The most dangerous thing about our dislike of schleps is that much of it is unconscious. Your unconscious won't even let you see ideas that involve painful schleps.

"Unconscious" should probably be "subconscious" in these two sentences...
A social event with the waitstaff? No one is saying that you can't talk to the restaurant staff, even when using a tablet -- you just aren't beholden to them for service.
I remember reading an article a few years ago by (I think) a novelist who envisioned that in the future we'd store our entire computing system online and just switch between devices, always having access to our environment and files. Whether you're on a smart phone, your home computer, or at a terminal in the library, etc.

I don't believe dropbox is going to do that, but it is an interesting idea.
I think Paul over simplified this one. The average hacker is attracted to things like recipe sites because these are solutions which can be accomplished entirely by code and execution. They are driven away by problem spaces which require foreign skills or unknown social networks, namely startups involving payment processing and banks.

So really a schlep is just a hard problem, one that the person considering it doesn't have the skills or know-how to solve.

It's easy to say that there is hidden value in these "schlep niches" but not if you don't have the slightest inkling of how to approach it. It'd be like me telling the average hacker to go start a farm.
The amount of money more-or-less promised to all YC companies is deceptively larger than the amount YC itself publishes. Also, until you get to Webvan sizes, there are existence proofs to pretty much all the possible company sizes at YC.
Why did Tumblr generate a thumbnail 9.4 times larger than the original image?
Sure, I was just pointing out that life is full of layers of schleps to overcome before you get to the fun and business related schleps which you actually have a choice to overcome. For some, they are more of obstacles.

Before incubators far fewer people had the opportunity to attempt to solve life's problems by starting a company. Hopefully things continue to evolve and new ways are created to expose as many minds as possible to the various business schleps in the world.
Facebook CEO – Mark Zuckerberg is Giving Away Free iPad and iPhone
If "climate engineering" fails and the planet gets warm enough to melt the polar ice and heat the sea beds to release the trapped methane, its probably inevitable!

("Methane is one of the most potent and influential greenhouse gases on Earth. The 100-year global warming potential of methane is 25, i.e. over a 100-year period, it traps 25 times more heat per mass unit than carbon dioxide." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_methane)
One possible argument for proprietary tablets is that the value to a potential thief is much less than a commodity tablet which could be repurposed. Perhaps the maker of a "standard" Android tablet could be convinced produce a version slightly modified so that their standard distro would not work without modification? While thieves clearly could hack the standard distro to make it work, would they really achieve high enough theft numbers to justify the effort?
I like this story, but imagine for a second the water hose replaced with a flamethrower giving the apes severe burns, and it remains always hooked up. Suddenly it becomes a sensible way for the apes to act.

I say this becuase, sometimes, even blindly keeping status-quo is the best course of action.

The real lesson for the apes is that they need to communicate better with each other about what the basis of their processes are.
Actually, yes. Does that sound crazy? I'm not talking about bad servers, I'm talking about good servers. Also, servers let me ask questions and help me discover new food I would probably not try. That's just me though, maybe I'm special.
I don't think it's disingenuous; I think it's pretty on-the-nose. Also, I think "early exits" are still win conditions at YC; that's one of the (salubrious) benefits of being organized like YC and not DFJ; there's a lot of reasons why a "YC" would want to tune outreach to young people, and none of them need to be "avoid build-to-flip companies".
I disagree that the point of the article was to make the obvious point that hard work is unpleasant. Rather, I thought he was trying to illustrate that there are components of many tasks that are easy to discount the importance of. Instead of attending to certain details that seem pointless on the margin, or may have less obvious benefit, the focus may be placed on more mission-critical tasks. It's not that those other tasks don't require hard work; it's that it may be easier to place the focus on them because it's more apparent why they need to be done.

Perhaps, it would do everyone some good to focus on the things we suck at doing or can't see the obvious benefit to doing.
A McDonald's outside of Orlando was experimenting with self-ordering in 2003. I saw it in action when I was working on a tablets-at-the-table start-up. It worked well. In the Midwest, Sheetz "gas station" (quotes because it's so much more) has done self-ordering for years using a system from Radiant Systems.
Those owners probably aren't great at training their staff and/or don't understand the intangibles that make for a good service experience. You might be able to sell the owners on your product. That doesn't mean the owners can sell their customers on your product.
These are generally good tips. I swear by

set -e # same as set -o errexit

and I like using list constructs (&& ||) in lieu of simple `if` test blocks but it's really important to remember that list constructs aren't exactly the same. This always catches me out:

if [ -e "missingfile" ]
then
echo "you'll never see this"
fi

(above runs fine with set -e)

[ -e "missingfile" ] && echo "you'll never see this"

(while that one correctly fails and thus `set -e` fails the script)

I generally stick an `|| true` on the end of those list constructs.

fwiw.
> Isn't copyright violation a civil and not criminal matter?

Not always. This case was for criminal infringement (and conspiracy). The definition of criminal infringement was expanded by the NET Act a long time ago, but only recently have there been many cases of it making the news.

Here's an article on how the whole criminal infringement thing works if you want to know more:

http://www.ericgoldman.org/Articles/warezcriminalcopyright.p...
Generally speaking, the more shlep you're willing to deal with, the less perfect your marketing can be. Find a cure for cancer, and you won't have to market it. Work on a recipe site OTOH and your marketing better be tight.

And you definitely have less competition. More shlep acts as barriers to entry. So does unique insight/expertise in a field outside of technology. Anyone can build the next Del.icio.us, or Pinterest, but not anyone can build the next software system that can help currency traders make money, or software to monitor diabetes patients. But most people just go after the low hanging fruit.
Well, most first-time parents confess surprise at how difficult it being a parent turns out to be. Among them are parents who did their research, knew lots of other first-time parents, and didn't believe they would be surprised.

It turns out that believing you are prepared for something and actually being prepared are often not the same thing, hence the "blindness" pg refers to.

You say "Don't be fooled, what pg is doing here is thinking like the VC that he is." I say, don't be fooled by analyzing the source, "schlep blindness" really does exist.

He's also writing about fear and perfectionism. And I find his admonition to

"...ask 'what problem do I wish someone else would solve for me?' ... there's plenty still broken in the world, if you know how to see it."

to be useful.

It's fine to point out his (VC) bias, but I think you're doing a disservice in not pointing out that he's also giving useful advice.
We use One World Direct at Everlane. Photojojo also uses OWD.

http://www.owd.com/
http://www.everlane.com
http://http://photojojo.com/
I've been relatively happy with using wuala to sync directories. My only gripe so far has been the android client seems to keep everything as temporary.
It depends if your app is using a lot of proprietary AppEngine APIs / features. If yes, then you will have to rewrite at least some portions of the app.

Due to the recent AppEngine pricing changes, I moved my app - Review19.com - away from GAE. I had to rewrite it entirely because I used a lot of AppEngine specific APIs.

There are other open source options that "replicate" some of the GAE APIs, but none of them claim to production ready.
Casual dining chains are very scared of change. Deciding to feature a different sandwich in the most prominent sections of their menus is what they consider a huge decision. All execs believe that their customer service experience is much better than in reality. So, they compare their "ideal selves" to the experience of using a tablet and cringe in horror. Also, most folks managing in the restaurant industry came up through the ranks, so they've all self-selected into an extroverted, interaction-intensive occupation. Their views don't mirror those of Americans as a whole.
It doesn't bother me to read other people's code that does this, but I never decrement or increment within an assignment statement. I've just made too many off by one, index out of bounds errors over the years.
Why strong IP law is so attractive (2007)
Being able to download code is huge, and I think that should be a standard for code-related tutorials.

However, what about tutorials for setting an app? Wouldn't you rather watch a setup video than read through a pdf?
Wow, this is both very touching but also very intriguing. In my mind I have romanticized it into a tale of an online version of a mad, solitary genious.

A couple of years ago i stumbled upon this guy who was acting as the entire community of a pokémon forum all by himself. He was mentally ill, and often posted threads about his and Nurse Joys marriage. It was very sad, but he seemed happy in his own little world. It's interesting to see how technology/internet and mental issues interact. We get a small peek into their world. It's touching.
Plugging a hole in Microsoft's hiring pipe: IE Frame
He seemed to be focused on the idea that people would want to play games on the tablet -- nevermind that handheld game machines existed before he even opened.
No, that is just wrong. In double-brackets, bash will handle expansion and testing of unset variables and variables with spaces just fine, because word splitting and pathname expansion are not performed in double braces -- they are shell syntax, as opposed to single brackets, which are commands. Your syntax error happened because you don't have a fi matching that if.

As a counterexample:

(echo $BASH_VERSION;
foo=foo; [[ $foo = foo ]] && echo $foo;
foo="1 2 3"; [[ $foo = "1 2 3" ]] && echo $foo;
foo=''; echo ${foo?"No foo for you"};
unset foo; echo ${foo?"No foo for you"})
4.2.10(1)-release
foo
1 2 3

bash: foo: No foo for you

That last one is one of the few ways you can tell whether a variable is unset or merely set to an empty string.

lrn2bash.
Great feedback, I appreciate the input. My app is going to target noobs, so I think the video component will be super helpful. But for experienced people, yeah I know what you mean. It can be a roadbump at best sometimes.
I don't mind doing tedious things. I discovered in college that I was an excellent bureaucrat when I became student treasurer.

I just wish I could come up with ideas, though. A lot of them are hard for me to relate to. I don't go out and do normal consumer-type things ( not that there's anything wrong if you do) or have any real friends, so social things are out.

I just can't relate.
Designing "Mute"
Very well said, thanks man. I agree and think relying solely on videos is a mistake. I'll still use it for my new project because for noobs I think a video is good.
The average user doesn't buy an Apple computer either, or own an iPhone. Heck, even the average smartphone user doesn't have an iPhone. Yet Apple does quite well for itself.
I can't think of anything in C or C++ that uses length off the top of my head. Size and Len, sure, but nothing that's length.

I would guess that most of the spelling errors get propagated through autocomplete. That's how most of the spelling errors in my code get there anyway.
I'm not convinced. He says:

"There are great startup ideas lying around unexploited right under our noses. One reason we don't see them is a phenomenon I call schlep blindness. Schlep was originally a Yiddish word but has passed into general use in the US. It means a tedious, unpleasant task."

I wouldn't say we don't see them. The problem is we don't want to take on them. Founders know that the odds of getting rich are slim, so they (we) want to have fun during the journey. Investors on the other hand, want to make money. They don't care if founders have fun. They need to convince founders to do unpleasant things that have a chance of doing spectacularly well.
Indeed. From the end of the third paragraph:

And don't think that you need more than one instrument
or more than one voice to make real music. Pretty much
every musical instrument and every person's voice is a
source of polytonic sound.
Not exactly true. In exchange for their support in the War on Terror, China managed to get a number of vaguely-defined domestic opposition groups (particularly ethnic separatist ones) listed as international terrorist organizations.

I'm not sure the point at which anti-China activities would fall under the purview of anti-terrorism laws, but I'm not sure the issue is as clean-cut as you think. A Chinese individual who sent money back home or canvassed for support might get nailed on quite a few grounds assuming the United States was willing to be consistent in applying its policies regarding Islamic terrorism to anti-China groups.
The extradition treaty between the US and the UK would seem to be bizarre as hell. On the one hand, a person who hacks into US government computer systems isn't extradited, and on the other hand a minor and specious copyright violation does merit extradition.
"A new broom sweeps clean but an old broom knows the corners." Irish aphorism
I think buying general purpose tablet would definitely cost much more. Also, pushing restaurants to first buy an ipad/android tab, and then using your app on it is just too many hoops to jump through for any restaurant.
One of the key reasons why I think the US university system is useful is it demonstrates who can do the schlepp.

And boy howdy, is enterprisey full of schlepping. Talking with my dad, who has run his own small construction business for the last 20? years, this is just the nature with work in general.

+1, pg. +1.
I also have news for you. Surprise! I'm an American who dislikes socialism and loves to make money. So please stop assuming that anyone who isn't an extreme free market ass kisser is some socialist European who's against capitalism and competition. Please don't bring emotional baggage like that into conversations.

Unless you've been living under a rock for the past 10 years, Bankers, oil, auto, healthcare, insurance, airline, and countless other industries have consistently shown the public that they are willing to go to dangerous lengths to make cuts where ever they can to save money. Many times at the cost of HUMAN lives on a massive scale. The airline industry is ALREADY guilty of that with the way they treat, train, deploy pilots, and the way they've bribed the FAA to give them passing grades on safety inspections.

> The free market is about the only hope you've got in a fight against corruption

Freedom, opportunity, and the rule of law combined accomplish this. With only a free market you end up with anarchy, chaos, and disorder. Full and total free market capitalism sounds great in theory but doesn't work out in reality, the same way communism sounded like paradise in theory but never lived up to its promises when actually implemented. I think the problem is most people with this 'total free market all the way' attitude have NEVER lived anywhere but America, they don't know what totally free markets without rule of law or regulations are like (ie: Bulgaria after the fall of communism, Russia, etc...). They don't realize how bad things can get.
Microsoft Bans Sex Games Based on Kinect