skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
While I appreciate Heroku's quick and decisive response, I don't quite follow why they felt the need to muddle the message by explicating that their sponsorship is handled by women. That really shouldn't have any barring on anything.
Here's a screenshot of it.

https://img.skitch.com/20120320-fmsc5mciy8e7n3nxhakmegxxg9.p...
> Although this backwards incompatible policy causes short term pain for developers on their platform, Apple made this conscious decision because in the long-term it leads to an overall healthier ecosystem.

From all evidence I've seen it's more likely they 1) don't care because people are willing to put up with it and 2) don't have the proper type of process/system/codebase/culture to allow such a move (and would rather spend that effort on something else).

One of Microsoft's top 3 selling points in the enterprise is backwards compatibility... They go as far as implementing run-time patches for 20 year old 3rd party DOS binaries that they don't have the source code to when they get crash reports in and it crosses a certain threshold.

> We only have to look at Microsoft's third-party ecosystem to see the alternative.

A developer that targets Windows breaks compatibility with a previous version of his software, then...? What does that have to do with Windows/Microsoft?
I'm surprised to this day that this hasn't made it onto film.
In responding to something that further alienated women from the tech field, I'm assuming they felt it would make sense to reassure them that there are in fact women working in some of the best regarded companies in that field.
> Then like any sane company they took the safe route.

Some of the other sponsors haven't, and I believe they're all fairly sane.

I don't really see how Heroku could be expected to have been any quicker than they already were in responding to this.
Then shouldn't you be angry at the Boston API Jam people, not people 300 miles away who have nothing to do with this?
Sorry about that, not sure if it's a problem on my end or on Quixly's (http://quixly.com). If anybody else encounters that situation, drop me a line (http://sachagreif.com/contact) and I'll send you the eBook directly.
God. This stuff is beyond tacky. It's not just insulting for females but it reminds other LGBT geeks that they're outliers. Who cares whether a man or woman is delivering my drink? Like seriously, I'm gay and I don't think I've ever thought "Damn, a woman delivered my drink instead of a dude".
I don't really understand the order. Why is Alaska "A", Alabama "B", and Washington D.C. "y"?
I am sure Heroku cared, they're really classy company. As someone who sponsored 70+ events in Q1 at Twilio, I can tell you that we don't review every Eventbrite page and email that goes out. The backchannel of people who organize hackathons is small and well connected, word about this got around to everyone very fast.
I got the 1215b E450 and I'm very happy with it. It came with 4GB RAM.

I didn't notice any touchpad problems. I disabled the two-finger multitouch scrolling in favour of the one-finger vertical scrolling region because I just couldn't get used to it after a few weeks of trying. It requires me to hold my hand at an odd angle which feels uncomfortable. Then I re-enabled it because I found myself trying the two-finger gesture (in vain) in certain situations, so now I'm using both depending on how I sit and I'm happy. Except that sometimes it doesn't seem to detect the scrolling (for either method) but it's not like the touchpad-issue as I saw it on the YouTube videos.

One thing you really should consider is that IMO the display quality is not all too great:

One, I got a bit of LED-bleeding on the left side of the screen, nothing too serious, just a bit brighter than the rest, but enough to at one time trick me into wondering "huh I don't remember jEdit's line number margin had a gradient in it?".

Two, sometimes the white appears blown out, like over-exposed. At first this was way worse and I almost took it back until I found out it wasn't happening always and it turned out to be some sort of power-saving setting. However after disabling that, it's still not very good. For instance I need to turn my display at an angle in order to be able to read the lightest "dead" comments on HN, which I did not have to do on my last netbook.

Third, if the sun's shining outside, even with the (semi-translucent) shades drawn, watching a dark scene in a movie is difficult. Of course it's no optimal condition and my last netbook had trouble with it as well, but not as bad. Maybe it helped that the netbook's screen surface was diffuse and this one's got a reflective surface. I don't know why they make reflective screen surfaces anyway??

There's a slight possibility that some of these problems are software, since I run Ubuntu on the netbook and this one's still got Win7. I will see.

Otherwise, it's a great device!
Am I missing the part where they actually no longer intend to have female-only event staff/beer-servers? The apology makes it sound like they just changed the ad copy.
Since the mobile optimized version is taking quite some time(!!!!), and I had some spare time for fun, I decided to try if I could get the current version to work in touch enabled browsers.

I scanned the files and did some usability tests on a galaxy tab and identified the main problem: The extended use of the 'dblclick' event to open files.

A very natural thing in a desktop ofcourse, but not so on a tablet.

I decided to see if things would start working if I caught doubletap touch events and fired them as doubleclick, and voila the whole thing started working, within 2 minutes. That hád to be to easy!

It was: I wasn't able to scroll the overflowing containers.

After some research in code, experiments with converting touch to drag events, and a stroke of genious later, i decided to convert 2 finger swipe events into mousewheel events, fired on the same object.

Problem solved! It's not pretty, but at least workable! I can edit my code using Cloud9, on the go, TODAY!

Made a gist so that people can do with it whatever they want, enjoy :)
Where might this hackathon take place?
Ask HN: A High Profile Startup Guy Ripped us Off. What's the best move?
(throwaway account)

I submitted my startup for inclusion in a large Silicon Valley event. I knew the guy running the event had a semi-competing portfolio investment. I did worry he he might like our approach and push them down that route after seeing our thing, but figured it was worth the risk since we're launching this new product very soon anyway.

We made it multiple steps into the process and they expressed interest but then we were rejected without any explanation. No problem though, we weren't all that excited about the event and it's their thing, their call.

I am upset though that his portfolio company did a pretty significant pivot exactly in the direction we are going less than a month later. They rushed out a shitty hack of our concept.

Ultimately we're not really worried about them. They've been around for something like 4 years and don't seem to have much of a clue. We're confident that we'll kick their ass. What does it say about a company that they pivot the company around their investor's stolen concept in a month (after about 5 other pivots prior)

Anyway. A part of me really wants to rip this guy a new one. This is clearly a pattern for him. All of his own startups are ripoff ideas of other peoples and I could easily detail that and tear him a new one. It's very tempting and would be extremely cathartic I think.

On other hand: I'm not actually worried about the copycat or the investor affecting my startup in any practical sense. Users don't care about the inside baseball or the drama of copycats.

I guess I know what the logical answer is: let it slide. But there is a part of me that really wants to do what feels right: expose the scoundrels.
What a crappy thing to write.

https://img.skitch.com/20120320-fmsc5mciy8e7n3nxhakmegxxg9.p...

It says under 'Great Perks':
Women: Need another beer? Let one of our friendly (female) event staff get that for you.
Good for Heroku. Clear, zero tolerance for avoidable stupidity with a group (developers) that prides itself on details, but is just lazy.

The more events that are run, and organized by over-brained and under-hearted geeks (by/for developers), the more bias towards women seems to come out.. maybe from their inexperience with women to begin with.

Reminds me of a penny arcade comic on the insecurity that often fuels this type of behaviour; there's a reason you're single.

http://www.neoanathema.com/gallery/albums/ClipArt/PA_LinuxXb...
It's listed in a comment right above yours, but was posted after your comment. Here are his reasons: http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2010/04/common-m...
Depression is bigger than work. Watch out for changes in diet or sleeping patterns. Half days off are a possible indicator. What's the cost of seeing your dr. and having a conversation? Not much.

Don't think it can happen to you? Read about Ben Huh at Cheezeburger.
http://www.geekwire.com/2011/cheezburger-ceo-ben-huh-details...
We mostly used Lua as a scene/level description language and for stuff like UI as you can tweak the code and see the updates live without having to rebuild anything.
Plus it's really easy to implement the Lua - C++ interface and Lua is generally a nice, easy language to write in.
Whenever people get outraged about things like this, it interests me. I like looking at attractive women. I like programming. Would it be possible to have an event where I could program and look at attractive women at the same time? Or does enjoying seeing attractive women in public make me a bad person? As a man, is this my original sin?

In fact, I've even been known to flirt with attractive women in public--perhaps even servers at restaurants and events. I've dated many women I've met this way. Is it ok, when I'm eating and drinking, but not when I'm programming?

Sorry, but I don't think this is as cut-and-dried as the pitchfork brigades here make it seem. In my world, there isn't a bright line between "professional and sexless" and "fun", with programming strictly under "professional and sexless". Obviously there's a conflict here. I don't know what the right balance is, but I cringe every time men are screamed at for not hiding carefully enough that they like sex, as if it's mens' faults that women are powerfully interesting to them in a biologically mandated and different way than vice versa.

While I'm at it, I might as well mention that I very much doubt the dearth of women in technology is because men are sexual predators. Medical doctors have been mostly men, and, in my experience, exhibit pretty much the same desire for women as tech people, but that never stopped women from flocking to become nurses. As you well know, doctor/nurse fraternization is a time-honored pursuit. There is one big difference between the two groups, though, in that doctors are considered by women to be higher status than technical men. I've noticed that behavior which is welcome from high status men is often labeled "creepy" when exhibited by low status men.

Edit: I notice that people have latched onto the doctors thing which is bizarre inasmuch as it strengthens my point. I worded it the way I did on purpose, "have been", with an idle thought to making a point about the inroads made by women, but was too lazy to look up the percentages. The fact that the male/female ratio of doctors has improved so much is a tribute to the fact that women have no problem succeeding in a previously male dominated industry if it caters to their interests. And if you don't think the medical profession was a good 'ol boys club, or think that systematic "awareness raising" was the cause for the improvement, I'm afraid you're not too familiar with the history and dynamics of that industry.
Actually, the plan for this arctic cable is mostly driven by the needs of the financial-services industry in London and Tokyo (i.e. high frequency trading, ultra low latency direct market access, etc).
Low pay low stress jobs/lifestyle
This is something I've been wondering about for a while. How many of you have tried a low pay/low stress job or lifestyle and liked it? I'm talking about pretty low pay, like working as a waiter at a restaurant.

My parents have always pushed me toward the impressive jobs, so I'm curious about how "bad" (or not bad) these lower-salary jobs are. I like intellectually stimulating things, but I can see myself enjoying a relaxed 9 to 5 drudgery job for a few years. I don't plan to do it forever, just while I work things out and maybe develop a client base as a freelancer.

I feel like my parents have conditioned my thinking in a restricted way, and would like you guys to possibly provide me with a different perspective. Thanks for any advice and experience.
The original sqoot post was comically riddled with spelling and grammar errors too. Who are these people?
You embed the scripting language VM in to the game application and expose some API to it - which is then used to build the game content - things that require customization but aren't performance critical or technical, like triggers/events, ie. what happens when character X enters area Y, when user presses X, where it would be ridiculous to recompile the code just to modify it and you want non programmers to be able to do the customization in a "safe" language - sort of like javascript/DOM allows designers to do some programming while the grunt work and low level details/performance critical parts to the C++/native implementation.
Disagree, emacswiki is a great resource.
Could you please give some more details about your system and what exactly happens when you try to launch the tour?

We just checked again and it seems to be working on our IE9.
JSON 3: A modern JSON polyfill compatible with nearly all JavaScript platforms.
Following that math, the 9 day Apollo trip got 0.0114 sieverts. We'll round that to 11 mSv.

So in 9 days, they got 11x more than the EPA's yearly limit to the public, or 1/5th of the EPA's yearly limit to radiation workers.

The 520mSv warpspeed listed as a trip's radiation exposure comes out to 5x the lowest yearly radiation exposure 'clearly linked' to increased cancer risk.

So yeah. A problem, barring adequate shielding, if that number is correct.
That would really annoy me!
"Someone should build a (subscription) service where you can embed a bunch of fields (and labels) onto a form with a single line of Javascript.[...] The performance of the fields (their effect on conversion rates) could be measured continuously."

Not quite the same, but sounds a bit like inForm[1]. These guys presented at a recent HN London meetup[2] and this was the meetup.com description which summarizes it better than I could:

"Ever wondered how users engage with your site, where they get stuck or how long they spend making choices? Forward Technology's upcoming form analytics service inForm can help you answer all these questions and more. Without any configuration Inform allows you to quickly build up a strong picture of what happens when real visitors interact with your forms."

Beta sign-up for HNers here[3]

[1]http://inform.forwardtechnology.co.uk
[2]http://vimeo.com/32617520
[3]http://inform.forwardtechnology.co.uk/users/sign_up
Oh, absolutely. It’s just a dealbreaker for me personally that fonts are monochromatic, single-layer, and difficult to position in web pages with precision and consistency. If those aren’t concerns, then icon fonts are a perfectly useful tool.
Thanks for your detailed feedback!

1. I thought about using a 3D mockup of the eBook, but I figured it was a little cheesy. After all, it's a book, people know what it looks like. I know, I know, that's not how you sell stuff…

2. I made the title look like a button on purpose since the book is about user interfaces. Probably not the greatest idea I've had…

3. That's actually not a close icon, but an "expand" icon. You can just click anywhere to close the lightbox

4. This is an easter egg, so I didn't want to make it too easy. Seems like you found out anyway :)

I'm definitely open to criticism. For my defense, I should say that I design my own stuff differently than I would design for a client. So I'm willing to give up a couple sales if I can inject some more personality in the design.
Replace "Rails 2.3" with "IE 6" or "Windows XP" and you have enterprise software.

Yes, you have the code for Rails and can fix/make changes, but the further you deviate from what other people are fixing bugs in, the less you benefit from using open source.
> Medical doctors have been mostly men, and, in my experience, exhibit pretty much the same desire for women as tech people, but that never stopped women from flocking to become nurses.

Oh, honestly. Institutionalized sexism sure as hell made it quite difficult for decades (if not centuries) for women to become doctors.
The room should be the size of a conference room so everyone has a normal sized desk and room to personalize their space.

Team fit and cohesiveness become pretty critical in this setup. Ideally the team lead should sit with the team or close enough to run interference and provide air cover as needed.
You mean the "Quick Website Tour" button, right?

While creating a tour, after clicking the save button, you can customize it to remove that button and launch it by calling a JS function(Drawer.start_tutorial()).

Or you can also customize it to automatically launch on page load.
So. Much. Brogramming.

Anyways, in addition to the annoying beer plug, let us observe their other typos:

"Massages: take a brake [sic] from hacking to unwind."

"NO Idea Guys: security is on strick [sic] instructions to bounce anyone who can't code."

"NO Slow Internet: Let's make buffering a thing of the paste [sic]."

Fucking clowns.
I just read it ("Order now! Only 12.7 million copies remaining!") and found it amusing. Not sure what the other version was.
just correct TLDs separately, and i don't think it's a problem if you have false positives in there, after all a user will recognize an incorrect suggestion and move on, should it happen at all. using something like this is definitely better than using nothing at all.
After finding Codiqa as the top post earlier and it blowing me away, this app to create an app seems to be subpar.
best badge: "made with notepad, the right way!"
Personally, my problem with open plans isn't my team members, it's everyone else in the building who isn't on my team.

This is the point that the "team office" plan tries to address. Everyone you want to talk to is in the same room, everyone from other departments, people on manager schedule, etc, is behind a closed door.
I don't think there is anything wrong with appreciating and looking at attractive women, that isn't sexism. The problem here is marketing the event with "perks" that put women in a submissive position to men by default. Its not going to create an environment when female developers want to come hang out and hack, because it leads to those awkward "Are you a beer girl, are a coder?" conversations.

FWIW you can totally look at attractive women while programming, without objectifying them at a hackathon -- that's what the Internet was made for.
How we could size business sign up forms down to one field
Although that line has a bit stupid to put on there, the entire flyer stinks of meatheadedness in general.

Recommendation & personalization technologies are acquired as fast as they are launched. You could be next!

^that made me laugh harder than the women statement.
New Apple iPad hits 116 degrees, Consumer Reports says
Depending on the programming language, I can't help but feel that this article is out of date.

Today you don't really need to be a pure starter or architect anymore. There are so many frameworks that mimic Rails and its philosophy of convention over configuration, that there's not really a lot of effort needed to start and its easy to delegate most of the architectural duties to the framework developers themselves.

As for the debugger and finisher, that is also a lot easier as well. With all the automated integration and behavior driven test frameworks, it's relatively easy to both cross your t's and dot your i's. Today you can have something yelling at you everything second your tests break (assuming that you wrote them, which is key to any project).
Just added a line to say I don't cover HTML/CSS, thanks!
who uses OpenID? I honestly don't know anyone that does, not even hackers
Ask HN: Mental block - where is "email for hipsters"?
I saw a beautiful, in-all-likelyhood-html5 webmail client that is stuck in my mind as "email for hipsters" but I can't remember its name?
What the hell are you talking about? Medical doctors are not "mostly men". Roughly 50% of all medical students are women, and current trends have women overtaking men in the profession long term.

"I very much doubt the dearth of women in technology is because men are sexual predators". Sheesh. I agree. Comments like this do the job just fine, too.
The site never promised to be an in-depth analysis of the systemic issues that produce "dumbass government", those being the principles of power metastasis, authority-liability mismatch, and the absence of anti-dynastic measures (or more accurately, the presence of pro-dynastic mechanisms).

I can't tell if you're being disingenuous or what, but the site makes no claim to be a forum of deep debate. It's a search of government screwups. It's an invaluable tool if you're an activist. Imagine if Americans were motivated enough to use DumbassGovernment to find out who is screwing up and lobby to have them fired.

What if every corrupt cop that got exposed on DAG couldn't go to a restaurant without someone urinating in their food? What if the politically correct bureaucratic morons that gave $4.5 million to an illegal immigrant pedophile were totally ostracized from their community? THAT is the end purpose of DumbassGovernment: to make incompetence as corrosive to the bureaucrat as to the nation.
> you're not entitled to everything everyone else has

That is inane and witless. It throws away any kind of intelligent informed view and reduces it all to a cheap emotive sloganeering.

Rightsholders are not entitled to control what people do with information -- they are granted special commercial rights, and not for their own benefit but because such an arrangement is intented to encourage production for people to use/enjoy overall. The purpose is not to deny people or restrict people -- exactly the opposite. The aim is to have no more restriction than needed.

This is just the standard rational understanding. It is not difficult to find.

And it follows that if people do feel inordinately restricted or inconvenienced, the system is not functioning well and needs adjustment or fixing.
The main problem was the noise level went up as all the teams ended up in the same room, along with the IT ops guys. It went from 3 guys that worked well in a team room to 25 people in one open office plan.

Our own team's cohesiveness deteriorated as we all went into headphone mode and communication was slower among ourselves.
I think he may be referring to the fact that Sqoot, the event organizer, is based out of NYC (and Chicago) but:

> Sqoot was founded in 2010 at DreamIt Ventures, a startup incubator based in Philadelphia & NYC. We're a scrappy team in beautiful Chicago & NYC.

From: http://www.sqoot.com/about
>- startups that are rejected and fail, but would have thrived had they been accepted

PG has specifically stated that this is not a bug (it's a feature). The goal of YC is not to take mediocre or bad startup teams and turn them into wins, but to take the winners and turn them into Super-Winners(Dropbox).

As far as maximizing YC's impact, I think Dropbox maximizes it more than small wins from teams that would have lost had they not been in YC.
The Boston API Jam was being put on principally by Sqoot, who are a NYC-based deals API company. Presumably they were trying to drum up interest in their platform.

Now, see? Even you thought Boston had something to do with this!
Uhm, did you read the post? That is exactly what they say the reason was.