skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
My company came up with this data for the Wall Street Journal, so I should explain that the title here is a bit of an over-simplification.

The main point is that if you sort in ascending order on e.g. the "Average number of degrees temperature deviates from 60-80 range in last five years" column you should have a good indication of how the cities compare in terms of the time and extent to which their air temperature deviates from a comfortable range.

But if you're interested in more detail, the figures in that column are actually derived from:

- The heating degree days (HDD) with a base temperature of 60 F summed for each day over the last 5 years (measuring the time and extent to which the temperature dropped below 60 F in that 5-year period).

- The cooling degree days (CDD) with a base temperature of 80 F summed for each day over the last 5 years (measuring the time and extent to which the temperature rose above 80 F in that 5-year period).

We summed the HDD and CDD together to get a relative measure of how much and for how long the temperature was outside the optimal range over the 5-year period. Then we divided by the number of days in that 5-year period to get the total degree days per day. The day bits cancelled out, effectively giving the average number of degrees that the temperature deviated from the optimal range. (I think the WSJ sensibly thought that expressing the data in terms of average temperature deviation would make it more accessible than if it were expressed in terms of degree days, which most people probably aren't familiar with.)

We did that calculation for each of the 66 "global cities" listed in the 2012 list that you can find on Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_city

Anyway, irrespective of whether the meaning of the figures themselves is intuitive, I think they're ideal for ranking the cities in terms of how favourable their climates are in terms of temperature.

The main body article also has some interesting discussion of the ins and outs of using temperature as a measure of a given location's comfort levels.

Probably of more interest to me than most as I'm quite chuffed that my company's data was used in the WSJ :) But putting my shallow ego aside I do think the numbers are cool as I've long been intrigued by the idea of finding the locations on earth with the perfect climates.
How Two Rogue Projects Are Making The Internet Fun Again
I dont like the first quote. If you have only thought about but not acted on anything for ten years then it's an out of date idea and youre incapable of enacting anything anyway.
imagine if Dell had a tool that let you put in a macbook model number, and it displayed its offering that is as close as it can get with the components it uses (maybe add to the thought experiment that this was back when dell was all built-to-order).

would this be a legal a problem? Doubt it. What do you guys think?

edit: as for what it's like for 'apple' in the analogy - remember that the 'dell' offer in the actual current story this is an analogy for is then delivered instantly and absolutely free and gratis! :)
They have to make only $100M/year to be valued at 5 times yearly revenue. It is very likely Instagram can double its user base over the next 12 months now that it supports android. At that point reaching $100M in revenue will be quite easy due to the fact that mobile consumers are very likely to make sub $2.99 purchases/upgrades.
Open Letter to XSLT Fans
That's completely dependent on what you submit fr reimbursement. There's absolutely zero rules stating you can't outsource $40k worth of work to a company in your home country that you just happen to own. As long as the work has been 'completed' in they will reimburse it. Start-Up Chile will not pay for things that will happen, only what has happened, so you can't get advances.
As a programmer who is generally unfamiliar with business lingo, can someone explain what this valuation round means? Are they saying that Instagram is worth $500,000,000? How realistic is that number?
The Case For Windows 8
I'll just mention that the MIT license is not the GPL and leave it at that. (yes, that's proof enough for me.)
I wrote that the link should send you back to HN and then after testing it in Hacksandthoughts I realized it actually does. This is a good step forward.
I don't see why they insist it is locked if you are already into a contract. What if I want to use my iphone overseas for a few months. I am still paying them what I owe them, there is no way I can get out of it.
I am interested. I am a beginner in several languages (Ruby, Python, JavaScript, C) but I've never written serious software in any of these.
Instaprint - The location based photo booth for Instagram [200k/500k]
My problem with this is that I think degrees over are much worse, and humidity is also such a major factor in temperatures over 80. 85 and dry is perfect; 85 and humid is miserable. Also, with typical NYC humidity, 90 is a lot worse than 50 (assuming you have access to appropriate clothing). You don't want to do anything outdoors in NYC 90 unless you know what you're doing, whereas biking or running in 50 is pretty easy. NYC 90 is equivalent to 35, and 100 is equivalent to 10.
It bewilders me when private corporations peddle on consumer fear like this, it really does.
Thanks Nik. I agree that it makes much more sense to join forces and merge efforts.

1) This extension looks at all wpsocialreader links, so unless they change the URL paths, it should still function.

2) Is your extension still in the webstore? I tried the link in the github repo, but it's 404'ing.
I share your astonishment. The headline "...from the UK Gov" lead me to expect a comic disaster worthy of The Daily WTF, but this is really good stuff.
No surprise here - the 3 companies (Pearson, Cengage, and Macmillan) are the furthest behind the tech adoption curve of their big competitors & parent companies.

And the real threat is from iBooks, but they won't dare go after Apple.

If you can't innovate, litigate and legislate.

EDIT: here's a link to book mentioned in article - http://www.amazon.com/Campbell-Biology-MasteringBiology-9th-...
I can imagine Apple would commit some legal resources to research the validity of a complaint, though it seems like a reasonable feature to me.
Really Cool. What did you build it with?
Show HN: taxKilla helps us turn the game around
during the ows protests it dawned on me that citizens shouldn't camp outside of buildings hoping to influence those inside; they actually hold the money/power and just don't see it.

so as a side project we made taxKilla to counteract the root of government power and systemic corruption: taxes. it's a simple, line by line guide to using an independent entity to control your taxes.

it's legal, free, and is a particularly good fit for hackers that perform independent contract work; i hope some of you can enjoy it this year.
Bringing every child a free laptop should be considered an essential starting point to reduce social inequality and poverty. Giving the opportunity to the poor child that has born in the countryside to be connected and teach him about technology since is a 5 years old bring an amazing democratizing tool of opportunities to them. And perhaps the only one.

I'm from Uruguay and starting in 2006, this is exactly what the government has been done. This has become a national cause. And as far as I know, this has been the most successful implementation to date of this.

Uruguay is a relatively small country (similar to Greece but with a lot rural areas) and with a modest population of 3M people.

In less than two years (by 2009) the government implemented free wifi connectivity for OLPC kids across the country. The country is very close to 100% wifi connectivity for OLPC kids (run on a separate network) and we're near to 100% 3G costless as-well across the country which works at least at 5Mb / second.

In addition to that, the government declared internet as a right that anyone should get, for free. Any uruguayan can claim at least 256k in their houses for free on any part of the country. There's no barrier anymore to be connected. And truth is, people is getting interested in the opportunities of it. The little kid who goes to school in a horse because is 20km far from his house in rural areas now he's aware of a new previously unseen potential and see the opportunities of becoming a designer or a programmer. And this is really happening.

However, is naive to think computers alone will do the trick. Bringing computers is just the starting point of something bigger which is not only the connectivity, but mostly the educational foundations that should be instrumented afterwards and carefully followed up based on all the feedback. Real iterations based on data and adjusted as the project goes. It may resonate like the same principle of a startup.

Here's a summary I found of a pilot OLPC experience in Uruguay.
http://www.divms.uiowa.edu/~hourcade/ceibal-workshop.pdf

I heard the people who contribute to this in UY is now beginning to help the Peruvian and other countries with the experience and all we have learned of this to re-create the same kind of educational environments.
When doing simple graphics work at university, I would name files that contained nothing but pixel data foo.raw and IIRC some image editors would offer the options you mention when opening the files, then display them fine. Maybe that was before .raw got associated with cameras (and presumably more complex).
Want to apologize for that last sentence since I wrote it after feeling sick in the middle of the night. After I reread it when I woke up it sounded pretty rude.

Not that he should or shouldn't deserve credit for editing but in the end Wikipedia should be the one cited. I would suggest that Wikipedia acknowledge some editors for their work but that to me would probably result in more bureaucracy and infighting than any good it would do acknowledging contributing editors.

But I agree, very sad when a big site doesn't cite their sources even if it was, "an email from a friend"
When those things become essential to civic discourse, the line between need and choose gets blurry. How many people choose to go without cell phones without being branded as RMS-type weirdos? And the recent thread on RMS's rejection of facebook had lots of complaints about the resistance people face for staying off facebook, and the price they pay in terms of disconnection from the discourses of their social circles. Yes, these are choices, but the price paid for rejecting these choices is getting higher and higher.
Ask HN:External Harddrive or NAS for mac/win home
Hi,
I want to backup data both from my macbook and windows desktop. Is it possible using a NAS like
LaCie Network Space 2 to backup data from both the machines on the server. I 'm guessing I will have to partition the drive and then store the data separately on the respective drives. Can someone also share their experience with Lacie NAS?<p>Secondly would an external harddrive attached to wifi router be a good option as compared to using NAS?<p>Thanks
J
I know the guys over at Boundless but haven't had a change to ask them if the litigation was known in advance of closing the Series A. It appears the complaint came out a few weeks before the announcement (3/16).

Fighting this to the end could eat up a substantial amount of Venrock's $8M.
a lot more people live off-grid, generating all their own power, than do computering like RMS.
Whether it is or not, chrome extensions are just ZIP files with a .CRX extension - with a quick rename, it should be trivial to unpack and peruse it yourself.
Learn HTML & CSS in One Easy to Use Guide
Flagged - duplicate submission. BY THE SAME PERSON!!
Is Dell assembling them in the same way as the macbook in a case that was a clone of the macbook ... aka a counterfeit macbook? That's what Boundless sound like they're doing.
I really like this project. One of the few things that the government seems to be getting right at the moment.

If you've not already seen them, the BBC's design guidelines are also very good (though obviously somewhat different in scope): http://www.bbc.co.uk/gel
From a U.S. perspective, those servers on the balcony cause me qualms for multiple reasons.
Note the relative energy/op for the Pentiums in figures 10 and 11.
Google Cofounder Sergey Brin Spotted Wearing The “Google Glasses”
Software originally was free as in beer, and mostly free as in liberty because most money was made from selling expensive hardware. Software was included as a convenience, an afterthought, and represented such a small proportion of the total (astronomical) costs that no one thought there was money to be made commercializing it. In other words if you were willing to pay the millions of 1960's dollars for the hardware, you could do whatever you wanted with the software. It wasn't until hardware prices came down to more affordable levels that companies started applying their copyrights in liberty infringing ways.
It's still within your control to block/not use FB connect even when you have an account.
Sorry. "Nonsense" is too strong a word. I removed it. I also agree that for some companies pitching and networking is important, for raising money, building partnerships, or getting advisors.

But when hundreds of applicants are being forced to spend lots of effort playing a game of schmoozing, and the criteria for acceptance depends more on how much someone likes you rather than what you're building, that screams "flawed system" to me.

Disclaimer: We applied to TechStars and Y Combinator and didn't get in.
When I accessed the site and saw the notice about using a carrot rather than stick approach I was turned off since I believed that stating that this was their approach just showed that this isn't the standard culture, however, that said, this is an excellent list of principles. I'm going to take notes. :)
Hmm? Expected running time is a valid and important concept. In Quicksort, for example, picking the pivot element randomly results in O(n^2) runtime in the worst case, but has an expected runtime of O(n log(n)). The O(n log(n)) limit can be enforced using the median-of-medians method for pivot selection, but that's a pain to program and has a much higher constant factor than generating a random number; the only benefit being theoretical computer scientists sleep well at night.
I don't if I get this, but I'm having a hard time picturing just who are you able to get for less than USD 1000 /month, since most developers here would scoff at less than ~USD 1500 (CLP 700000) a month as a starting salary, maybe less if you really like the company.
I think Instagram is a great company but I personally see too many IFs and moving pieces to support a $500m valuation.
Robert Sedgewick: "What am I reading? I'm usually just writing"
The submitter has a long habit of duplicate posting to the same stupid math tricks site. Flag as I might, it doesn't go away. Apparently the content is borderline close enough to what HN readers like that it hasn't reached some rejection threshold. To my annoyance.
Cool, thanks man. Can't really pick classes now but heading into college I can.
This is a key distinction. Attempting to integrate laptops into existing curriculum with teacher training is a sisyphean task for deployments in countries where teachers haven't used (let alone taught with or seen someone teach with) any computer or smartphone before. OLPC made its classroom-transformative ideals clear, but, and this is purely speculation, the popular and misguided notion of what "ICT for Education" should be wins out nearly everywhere. Purchased laptops ended up being seen as something they can plug-and-play insert into the existing educational curriculum instead of complementing or supplanting any part of it.

OLPC's recipe, followed to a T, would probably work quite well. But the economics and politics of the situation mean these ideals are mutated to the point of inefficacy before the laptops reach the kids.

Technology can be plug-and-play and transformative for kids without adult supervision. Watch kids play games. The kids in OLPC deployments pick up the difficult-to-use laptop UI quickly, clicking around and finding ways to have fun with the cameras and make silly videos of their friends singing in the schoolyard when the teachers aren't looking.

But in the newly-laptopped classroom the teachers just can't help but revert back to the comfortable pattern of stepping kids through pointing and clicking all the while juggling laptops running out of battery, touchpads on the fritz, and the realities of a classroom full of children. And the teachers are not comfortable with this technology. It's another chapter in their teacher's manual they have to spend their free time to learn, however exciting and novel it is.

Get the kids anything with a thriving App Store and give them an internet connection. Set up computer clubs outside of school for structured growth and let them play.
These are fair concerns. The journalist just wrote a related blog post at http://blogs.wsj.com/numbersguy/modern-thermometers-1132/ that discusses the "experience" of temperature more.

An improvement on the analysis might be to adjust all the temperatures for humidity and wind speed etc. before calculating the deviations below 60 F and above 80 F. My company's system doesn't do that because those other factors are much less important for energy consumption calculations (which is what degree days are traditionally used for). But I think they probably would be good factors to include for a more thorough analysis of human comfort. (I say "probably" because the complexity would increase considerably and also the figures would become less clearly defined in a sense as well. So it wouldn't be 100% positive.)
> Don't you think that decades of isolationist Maoism had more influence on the rural poverty in China than US and British protectionism?

This sentence implies that your opponent's position is: "US and British protectionism didn't have more influence on the rural poverty in China than decades of isolationist Maoism." Perhaps you are not a native English speaker and didn't know the implications of using a negative form question. Regardless, you were attempting to use this misrepresented position to win an argument as you later demonstrated in the thread.

All conditions are met to qualify your comment as a straw man fallacy.
If We Go One Attempt Every Ten Seconds, We're Under The Radar
Common Lisp/Haskell syntactic comparison
Why performance reviews hurt?
Yes. The article didn't mention whether the identity of the seller would be sold as well. Knowing that a person exists in the world whose corporate password is "FuzzieBunn1" isn't a terribly useful piece of information. Furthermore, did survey participants perceive that there might be some risk of being caught selling access to one's company? In most countries, doing so must be a crime of some sort. In general, I'm skeptical of the survey.
> I really wish people would stop citing the Paradox of Choice.

Even if it were true, it's not as though there is no choice in other language communities.

What python web framework should I use? I can choose among several well-documented, supported, maintained systems; and if I need an extra library for a specialized task, there's a packaging system to install it (and it's probably well-maintained and documented, as well).

The times I've looked at lisp I just don't see that at all. Look here:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/540953/best-web-framework...

Those frameworks are all either dead or pre-production-quality.

I'd like to like lisp, but I find that I'm a software engineer before a computer scientist. Things like a good extension mechanism, good documentation, a complete standard library, and a robust community matter more to me than a powerful macro system.

Clojure and racket may be exceptions. I'll probably try one of those out.
When the cops subpoena your Facebook information, here's what FB sends the cops
This comment with all its hand-waving reads like it comes straight from 1990.
You pay for everything out of pocket and get reimbursed later. So when you put flights, rent, rent deposit, food, external monitors, etc. together for three people over two months it adds up.
I think it's fair to assume that any site, anywhere, might wind up giving information that you have input into the site, to advertisers.

In the case of Facebook, it's annoying because people have the expectation that they're giving information to their friends, and Facebook seems to work hard to make sure it feels that way. Thus, people who are unaware of the privacy implications might share something with their friends, something those friends already know, without realizing how much it reveals about them to Facebook, advertisers, future employers, etc.
Ask HN: Are users like this a problem?
Season might absolutely play a role for me too. I live in Sweden, where the winter can get very dark. I hated the darkness when I went to school before sunrise, and came home after sunset. When I worked in manfacturing I optimized my light hourss by taking the night shift, so I would go to work just before dark.
I just highlight the title, right click and select "Search Google" usually... takes me to the same place without giving FB any info. Interesting app, but I'm weary of using Chrome because of the data it gives to Google. (Can't win these days - I just want to browse in peace! D: )
That does not work for me.
The way to fix the American educational system is to teach teachers better ways to teach. Teaching is a learnable and teachable art, even though like all arts, some people will be better (sometimes much better) than others. See "Building a Better Teacher": http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/07/magazine/07Teachers-t.html...
Custom Shop Fireglo 4003 Left Hand Bass 
Price: $435.05. Save $20 off 2012 Sale. Free Shipping Worldwide. Wholesale Guitars From China. No minimum
Ben Nanonote: Copyleft Palmtop
Well lots of people still do, or this wouldn't be an issue in the first place. The Washington Post is the same way.
Notch live coding 0x10c
I work on building distributed fault tolerant high performance server systems. Compiling all of the code for the project on a Core 2 Duo with 4 GB of ram takes about 2 minutes and uses about 2.5 Gb of ram while linking.

I don't care about power consumption or UX with what I am currently working on, it is going to be running on 64 core beasts with 128 GB's of ram...

That being said, as a developer I still want a generous amount of screen real estate to get more work done faster, the more code I can display on my screen the better I can and faster I can develop without having to get my tasks back on track, without having to context switch.

I understand where you are coming from, and I understand the idea behind it, but at the end of the day I want to spend less time waiting for my compiler.
Stop the fight between iOS and Android and why Android might be the future
Is there research on whether paying teachers in a given country more makes them more effective?
XSLT is miserable, but isn't this old news? My issue is that most real-world transformations require look-up tables, calls to other systems for derived data, etc. The XSLT extension format is no fun at all. Sadly, I have yet to have seen a good, general-purpose framework-y library for sort-of declarative transformations. I suspect that, because most transformation code exists to achieve interoperability between systems, the problems at hand involve impedance mis-matches which are inherently yucky problems.

Anyone seen any good schemes?
I emailed the author. He said that all their sponsored posts are clearly labelled.
Almost every problem you mention is a problem of the underlying runtime. Are you sure you bash the right thing?
Rules are made to be bent. And this is why I am a working on a startup.