skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I'm not sure. I remember learning HTML and CSS through WYSIWYG editors such as Dreamweaver (essentially abstractions, no?), and then getting frustrated by how much excess code it was adding. That then gave me the impetus to delve into the code and then begin learning the HTML, CSS, principles informing the design. Had I started back then trying to tackle HTML head on, I might have been overwhelmed.

Similarly, I'm trying to learn building web apps at the moment. I'd rather have some decisions taken for me by Rails (in the knowledge that they've been based on some kind of best practice / consensus) and try and build backwards from there. It's probably not the purists way of learning, but then I don't have the level of expertise a purist probably does.
Arch, which should be moving to 3.3 soon. Obviously not really a server distro, but still an option if you really want/need bleeding edge.
I'd love one! My email is "bradsimantel@gmail.com".
I am a big fan as well of not bothering to verify emails at the early stage. I figure that if I hit a problem with someone spamming my signup I can deal with that when it comes. Until then though having as little friction as possible is a great thing.
Business Intelligence App for Local Merchants Now in Private Beta
Their offer is specifically for problems that YC itself faces.

Give us a problem, a painpoint, anything that annoys you in day to day life, and we’ll hack it in 72 hours.

Sending a phone to Mars and back isn't one of them, and is missing the entire spirit of the problem.
Just a quick correction, people from our country are called Filipinos. :)
Thank you for your suggestions!

We are trying to avoid reinventing the wheel. :) TinyDNS served me well more than 10 years, I like the design of this piece of software ( although it needs 2 pairs of glasses to read it :) ), so it was a natural choice.

To provide IPv6 and DNSSEC support we'll provide another set of name servers with NSD/PowerDNS as we designed Luadns with flexibility in mind (it's already 100% compatible with PowerDNS).
Minecraft needed to be made of blocks, it's true. But Minecraft could be more beautiful than it is. Which isn't to diss it - what it does well, it does really well. And it can often be beautiful -- the terrain generator can produce some wonderful things.

While it isn't aiming for all the same points, and is obviously inspired in some parts by Minecraft, I think for example Cube World is a much better looking game. http://wollay.blogspot.co.uk/
It is enough to just follow two steps.

(1) carefully review your google/facebook/... privacy settings

(2) make a habit of logging out after you are done, or use NoScript or an equivalent.

If you belong to the 0.00000001% who is really paranoid, then stop using these sites, or better browse the web like Richard Stallman does.
UK teachers union calls for legislation against violent games
> I wish all writing/journalism classes devoted a week to this precept.

Better yet, the entire year. It's the single most valuable concept they teach in high school writing.
You'd be better off building something awesome in 72 hours and using that to show your awesomeness.
The reaction from some iPhone users is rich.
http://www.buzzfeed.com/katienotopoulos/iphone-users-disgust...
I have complained in the thread about that kickstarter project already and I'll repeat myself from a slightly different angle here. I say: Installation is not the problem. It's just a pre-taste of what you're getting into and if the standard procedure is so broken that it needs artificial padding then we have a much bigger problem here.

That bigger and real problem with Rails is wrong abstractions and too much magic, the stuff that you hit right after installation. In terms of discoverability Rails is the poorest of all popular web-frameworks.

I'll say Rails has many things right, but just as many deeply wrong. Which is an amplified problem for absolute beginners - for them it's double hard to unlearn bad patterns after struggling to grasp them in first place.

To name just a few:

It is not right that the default modus-operandi for pretty much everything (e.g. devise) is to inject a bunch of invisible, undiscoverable magic at installation time and leave the user at best with a few hardly discoverable hints about how it actually works (and where to look when it doesn't).

It is not right that rails still makes heavy use of code-generators (related to the previous bullet).

It is not right to still have no automation for schema migration. I do in fact claim the ActiveRecord pattern has proven a poor choice for the Rails use-case.

etc.

For teaching I would claim Rails is about the worst possible choice. It's an opaque blob of magic that provides good leverage when massaged in just the right way. But that "right" way is in large parts so undiscoverable and detached from reality that you end up with juniors who may be able to churn out simple rails views - yet are immediately lost when anything diverts from their learned script.

So, back on topic. In my experience teaching web-stuff works best bottom up. Start with HTML/CSS, then give them something like sinatra so they get a grasp on what a request is. Even PHP is a valid choice here.

Rails is for much later, for when they at least have a remote clue what they're doing.
The game looks really awesome, I love space games, and if you combine it with Minecraft... and not only that but programmable CPUs !!!! I would love it.

Sadly "Monthly Fee" is something I don't like... I don't have the money to pay it, nor a credit card to do it, so nope.
I love the creativity, though I have to admit, I'm a little confused.

YC already does a great job of releasing great startup ideas (see links below in the off chance that you haven't read them already). And it seems like everyone I met who got in was accepted because of the awesome things they created. So if you're short on ideas, read the lists, and then get to work and have something to show for it by application time! Whether or not you get in will probably matter less and less once you're cranking away at a company you're really into.

http://paulgraham.com/ambitious.html

http://ycombinator.com/ideas.html
It looks like I need your twitter names as well. My email is in my profile if you don't want to post them.
I have no idea whether their offering is any good or not, but I don't find your argument persuasive. The fact that someone else tried to do something similar does not mean that this can't work well, or that it shouldn't be done.

People once said that Apple shouldn't do a tablet because it had been done before and there wasn't a market for them.
I dunno if the magic is the real problem. I think the real problem with full-stack frameworks is that they require you to drink their entire pitcher of Kool-Aid in order to get up and running. There's no easy "Hello World" to give new users confidence.

Take Django for instance (because I have more experience with it than I have with Rails). Just to get through the introductory tutorial (https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/intro/tutorial01/) you have to wrap your brain around projects, apps, views, models, and Django's command-line tools. Contrast that to getting started in PHP without a framework; you can introduce someone who only knows HTML to PHP extremely gently, by taking an existing HTML document (which they understand) and sprinkling in some PHP to do simple stuff. They won't be a programming god with that knowledge, of course, but that's not important; what's important is that they took the first step and succeeded, which gives them the confidence to take the second. With a full-stack framework, getting that first step right involves a lot of mental work, which increases the chances that people will screw it up or abandon it in frustration.

Frameworks frequently compound this problem by inventing their own terminology for features, or taking words people already use and redefining them, so you can't easily map things you already know from other systems to things inside the framework. Just in the Django intro, for instance, we have to learn the difference between projects and apps, both of which are commonly used terms that Django has overloaded with Django-specific meanings.

All of this means that taking the first step in going from "has never used Django" to "Django newbie" involves a lot of learning, and that guarantees that some people are going to just walk away and others are going to try to follow along but get lost in the complexity.
Then run an emulation of the CPU inside minecraft, and crash the server.
This could quite possibly be the nerdiest game ever made. The amazing level of boffin creativity we've seen in Minecraft could easily be eclipsed by giving everyone their own in-game programmable computers to tinker with.

I can't wait.
Cocky, rash, and likely to be burned by YC is more likely the thing here.

If you want YC to pay attention to what you're doing, why confront it and ask for a challenge? If you're starting your own company why are you asking for a challenge at all? As an entrepreneur it is your job to challenge yourselves and the status quo.

This is like going to an NFL referee and asking them for a football game. Why not start the football game and make the referees take notice at how great you are? Being hungry gives you the ambition to improve. Being good is remembering and executing on what you've learned.
Coming to Rails frustrated with the slog that you have to deal with otherwise is exactly the path that Rails was designed to accomodate. You know and appreciate the fact that Rails is making decisions for you to help you get going while a beginner would probably be overwhelmed by all the complexity.
I think you're correct a long-term push is different from a 72 hour scramble but they're only looking to "win" an interview, not a place in a starting class. I think it's reasonable a team could be unsuccessful at filling out an application (which previously required an idea) but still be extremely strong candidates. I hope YC accepts, they don't stand to lose anything (save time) and there's no obligation to accept similar copycat offers in the future. They might also get a problem solved.
Getting a prototype out in 72 hours is a pretty good start, from there you can validate whether the approach is good, and if it is go into greater resolution about specific parts of the pain point and solve those too in the next iterations

And if the basic business premise is just plain wrong you've you've only lost a few days of dev time rather than months
Yeah, true. The whole incentive and informational system for academic reviewing is pretty broken.
Apple holds the master decryption key when it comes to iCloud security, privacy
This is so great, thank you so much! :)
True that, build something amazing in 72 hours. You are not just idea implementation and realization machines.
I can't understand what is this exactly for.
It's a collection of scripts that let you easily develop you'r web applications in the cloud ?

Like, it helps you set up a Heroku or Google App Engine Application ?

Also, can I use it in another distro/Ubuntu desktop ?
Oh I didn't mean it in that way. I'm just wondering what happened in previous attempts.
I'm a Filipino Developer, this is actually an alternative for us developers in the Philippines, instead of going abroad working overseas which will be very far from our families, we got a lot of opportunities from foreigners who wants for outsource their development projects, it earns us quite substantial income, though its not as high as when your really working abroad, being with your family and seeing your children grow up mostly makes up for it. Staying up late is not that hard as me myself is most productive at night when kids are asleep. I know most programmers share this work time.
Say goodbye to your 30 pins
Ask HN: Bootstrapping into first freelance gig?
I recently left work so I would have more time to do startup projects. To keep this sustainable I'd like to start freelancing part of time (starting with mobile app work).

I'm networking (founder/startup scene mostly) and working on apps for the portfolio, with a web presence to follow.

Can anyone share some tips on getting those first paying gigs?
I feel like this will be a game where those of us that know assembly will end up writing our weird assembly programs for playing text based adventures or spinning our ships in spirals or whatever, whereas everything that is actually necessary will (hopefully) be able to be bought/created in game.

Also, there's probably going to be a lot of community sharing of ideas and programs (just like there is with Minecraft) so non-programmers will be able to steal code from other people if they really want something.

Obviously I have no idea, but he says "_can_ be used to control your entire ship" not "must be programmed to do anything."
But don't you think that YC is a business school, by any definition of the word? And wouldn't it be interesting to do a comparative ranking alongside traditional business schools?

There was a time I wished I had gone to HBS or Stanford GSB. While those remain fine institutions, wouldn't any young nerd today prefer YC?
Perhaps if the colours in photos that phones took weren't ugly as sin it wouldn't be a thing.
The fundamental types of Python – a diagram
(http://www.news.com.au/technology/accc-wins-appeal-against-g...)

(http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/04/03/oukin-uk-google-aus...)

> "It is Google's technology which creates that which is displayed," said the judges, who examined four cases of misleading search results.

(http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/ACCC-wins...)

> “Google's conduct cannot fairly be described as merely passing on the statements of the advertiser for what they are worth,” Chief Justice Patrick Keane and Justices Peter Jacobson and Bruce Lander said, according to the AFR. “That it happens to headline a keyword chosen by the advertiser does not make it any the less Google's response.”

(http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-04-03/accc-wins-case-against...)

> "Although the key words are selected by the advertiser, perhaps with input by Google, what is critical to the process is the triggering of the link by Google using its algorithms."
Database connection error... Cached:

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?ix=acb&sour...
I don't know about you, but for me not being able to explore space by myself is a daily painpoint ;)
> Our dream has, for a while, to get our startup off the ground

English..
They should solve their hosting issues first. Google's cached version for those looking for a copy http://bit.ly/HM9HHg
100 Tools to Develop the Next Killer iOS or Android App
We'd be in for that too. We have tons of ideas waiting on deck so to speak.
that indeed would make it misleading.

this article speaks to that a bit more:
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/accc-wins-appeal-against-google-...

"An ad headlined with "Honda.com.au" that redirected to car trading website CarSales"
Ask HN: Book about startups?
I'm currently reading The Lean Startup by Eric Ries. I'm enjoying it so far however, whilst a great book about how to run a startup, it isn't teaching me much about startups themselves.

I need to know about seed capital and the differences between 1st stage funding and 2nd stage and what angel investors are and what mezzanine means, etc, etc. That kind of thing. (By the way, I know what some of those are, but they're just examples).

So, is there a book that anyone can recommend about startup finance and how to actually found a startup and obtain funding? I'm based in the UK which would be relevant to any books targeted at the legal side of things, however I'm looking more for an overview of the various terms and stages of setting up a company.
> "My product has a 5-star average, but this competitor's product only has a 4.5-star average. Why the hell is my product shown further down in the list?"

'Because you have fewer votes than your competitor'

I don't think it's that hard to understand.
Full article: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/GLAST/news/dark-matter-ins...
I'd like to see this on the iPad vs. Java.
I admire the hustle, but in this case, you are asking the people of YC to do extra work to come up with something for you to solve. I think they are very busy and unlikely to do that.
I think about how great text-based protocols are every day, and every time I use them (multiple times per day.)

This is my biggest turn-off to Microsoft products and the Windows world. I actually like XML sometimes over undocumented JSON because it's so easy to figure out what everything does (in the case of succinct XML, which is admittedly rare.)
I was going to point this out for them. It's particularly harmful because it's in the second sentence...
Ubuntu's HUD: Light-years beyond any menu system
Out of curiosity what is classified as "Quake in Space" and "WoW in Space" ?
Congrats! This kinda post is what keeps HN alive for me :)
"Hello, I'm Gabe Newell,

I would like to introduce you to our new game, titled "Fill in The Blank". You run around, maybe as part of a group of some sort. Maybe rescue some hostages, scout and snipe terrorists every now and then and maybe stab a chicken or two. Physic, shaders and purple monkey dishwasher; I'm surprised you got this far before signing up for our email notification subscription."

Yes, some personalities have plenty of currency to spend amongst their fan base.
Um. Just opening your eyes and looking around also shows you all the females in the area. There's nothing creepy about it. And what exactly is it that these supposedly not-smart-enough women need to be defended from? You sound like a raving, paranoid sexist.
Thanks for the link, didn't expect to see an error
If you think most comments are bad, and you have an explicit prior that reflects this, then your ranking will update to "Hey, the comment was actually good!" at the optimal speed - no more, no less - given the rate of incoming ratings. Why would any other rate of updating be better?
Suskunlar dizisi izle
Quake in Space is maybe Shattered Horizon? "WoW in Space" is either Star Trek Online or Star Wars the Old Republic.
Facebook counters Yahoo's legal action with a lawsuit
Who Uses Ubuntu Linux, and Why? Survey Offers New Insight
YEARS? The game is not even a year old!
Your phone is Android 2.1? Here is where it stands in the world:

http://developer.android.com/resources/dashboard/platform-ve...

Most Android developers starting new projects are not going to make any serious attempt to support your phone because it is out of date, even by the standards of the Android ecosystem.
Absolutely - and in fact, one of the virtues of the better Rails tutorials is that they do expose you to some of the complexity.

You learn to understand that things are passing between the model and controller, and the rough sequence of things. I've come to appreciate the basics of a RESTful approach, and why things are as they are. I'll of course need to take away the abstraction over time, but without having the abstraction in the first place, I probably wouldnt have started.

That said, I second the point about getting it installed. I shouldn't have to be on StackOverflow for that.
Oops I accidentally a word there. Fixed :)
sudo pacman -S ruby && sudo gem install rails

I installed it that way, wasn't difficult at all.
You know what works better?

Build something nice and polished (anything) and show them that.

Big claims work better when you're not coming empty handed.
Being able to ship a proof of concept (a precursor to an MVP) is a pretty core skill that will happen many times in that thousands of hours.

Other fun questions in the perpetual proof of concept game:

Will it work this way? Will it work that way?

I don't know. How long will it take? Can we quickly try it out somehow to see if it gets us what we need? Who can jump on this?
This screenshot is from way before his comment above, so it was indeed 6502 at that time. See also:

https://twitter.com/#!/notch/status/183222415428554754
This does more than just package installation, it operates at a higher level. A service may require several packages that need to be installed, configured, then configured to work with each other. All of that is captured in a charm giving you a way to easily deploy a service. So capture your start to finish setup for any service you use in a charm and you can no deploy, and scale that service, using Juju.
The biggest problem with XML is that people don't understand how to implement it properly and end up with stuff like you talk about above. Namespaces in particular can help with the problem, but I see tons of APIs failing to implement them in ways that actually alleviate the bloat, and they instead opt for insanely verbose Java-style naming conventions that do implement namespaces and attributes that ultimately just make concise XPath a nightmare.
I'm Sure It Will Only Take You A Few Days To Code
So as someone who has programmed before in C# and Python, and has a knowledge of OOP, what would you suggest to start in Web Development (Apart from HTML, CSS and JS) ?
I tried PHP, but I found the syntax extremely awfull and verbose, any alternatives ?
http://railsinstaller.org/ ?

in general, windows support in the ruby world is sort of a third class citizen, but I had thought rails installation was a solved problem
Be Specific (especially during PG's office hours)
Thanks, I went through the Code Academy courses and they were fun and helpful, but the biggest strides I've had in programming have been thinking of an idea and then trying to build it from what I know. This way, I am applying what I already know, further cementing it and it forces me to run into problems that I cannot yet solve. I spend up to a week trying to figure out a solution to that problem on my own. If I can't, I'll head to Stackoverflow and ask there. That's been the best way for me so far.
I'm not looking forward to setting up my first Linux mail server next week. Any tips for a fellow noob? There's so much information and so many guides out there I don't know where to begin.

Debain/Ubuntu have a tasksel for a mail server but I haven't tried it yet. (https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Tasksel)
> sudo tasksel install mail-server

I plan on trying some other semi-automated installers like iRedMail (http://www.iredmail.org/) in a VM first.
It was, indeed, auto-generated:

https://twitter.com/#!/notch/status/181791985164746753
It would be misleading if the ad attempted to fool users that they were about to click through to the site they were looking for using the trademarked name of the intended site. Searching for "Honda" and clicking on a link to Honda.com that redirected to another site is very shady. However, all ad units in Google search results are marked as such and I would say at this point 99% of the population knows the difference between an ad and a genuine result. Buying a competitor's name as a keyword gets you exposure to people looking for options and i dont see anything wrong with it assuming you are not impersonating someone else's brand. I can think of a certain billboard right here in LA that advertises an organic market and is placed directly above the Whole Foods on Santa Monica and Fairfax. Whole Foods might not be happy about it, but it is clever ad placement.
Ya, I'd tend to think it's at least worth pg sending them a challenge.

That being said, I don't think that what successful YC applicants are doing should be characterized as "filling out an application." The application just captures their past work in a form. It's the actual past work that matters, not the simple transcription.

I think my larger point is that an awesome 72 hour hack session probably isn't as good of an indicator of future success as a track record of successful medium to long term work in the past.
Depends on the levels of dedication and aptitude !

That's like asking "How long does it take to learn to play the guitar?" What like a monkey? or like Eric Clapton?

I've worked in many corporate IT departments with veterans with 10+ years "experience" who couldn't hold a match to a motivated 15 yo hacker.