skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
A serious amount of Redis crash reports are due to memory errors (we ask to test memory after crashes, since real segfaults are very rare, not everybody tests, tests may lead to false negative, so the problem is bigger than the one we observe).

This experiment also seems to show that there is a lot of corrupted memory out there.

There is a simple fix, I wonder why it is not used:

1) Add a feature at operating system level that one time every second tests N memory pages, at random. No observable performance degradation.

2) Report the problem to the user when it is found.

3) Mark the page as faked up and don't use it, ever.

So you have memory tested basically for free, users aware of their hardware errors, and a lot less consequences for those errors.
He was also the founder of Be, which was trampled by Microsoft's anti-competitive monopolistic practices.
These two posts from actual successes building more gender balanced tech conferences will give a better perspective on the core issue (gender and ethnic diversity):

"Beating the Odds — How We got 25% Women Speakers for JSConf EU 2012"
http://2012.jsconf.eu/2012/09/17/beating-the-odds-how-we-got...

They were themselves inspired by:

"How I Got 50% Women Speakers at My Tech Conference"
http://geekfeminism.org/2012/05/21/how-i-got-50-women-speake...

To summarize, it takes lot of effort and thought. But it's totally doable with outreach + anonymization.
Awesome, thanks. I just added that comment string def to init.lua and it works great.

Edit: why is this not there by default? I'm not sure any developer would not want a block commenting function...
And I assume that you would want to be speaking at a conference because you have a great talk to give, not for anything else.

The conference could be all white, the conference could be all female, the conference could be all black. These details do not matter. It should be the best speakers.
Honestly I don't think they were in the wrong for stopping the guy. Arrest was probably too much, but when you are wearing a watch that looks like a bomb detonator, you should definitely be stopped and questioned.

Unfortunately every member of the TSA cannot be an expert in this man's artwork to understand what he actually had in his posession. Suspicious watches (and protruding wires!) are one of the things they are trained to look for as all of the 9/11 hijackers had digital casio wrist watches. So yeah, honestly I think confiscating the watch and stopping him was a good move. Maybe even denying him his flight would be sane.

What does it take for you guys to agree that someone shouldn't get on a plane, a backpack full of c4!? The idea is to stop the disaster before it happens, and at this point all we have are vague clues. Not to mention the fact that for economic reasons, each TSA officer is going to be a layman who probably isn't well versed in electronics.

Combine this with the fact that it looked like he "hid" it under his coat... This guy needs to use some discretion when flying, I'm sorry!

As much as I disagree with the erosion of our civil liberties, wearing a watch that looks like a bomb detonator onto a plane is not a smart move. Sure, us HNers would know the difference between art and a real device. The general public does not, and we cannot expect them all to gain our same level of competence with electronics.

Finally, the TSA stopped someone that was actually suspicious.
> surpassed Android in web traffic in just 10 days

The fact of the matter is, there's a huge number of people who aren't aware you can browse the web on a smartphone (Android or iOS), or just don't use the feature very often. I know a lot of people who spend pretty much all their time on their phone inside the Facebook app, some games, and the SMS app. Many of them were very surprised to learn that there was a full-featured browser available on their phones.
Then why are we speculating about counter-factuals?

There are women in the Ruby community, and they are interesting speakers who have done interesting work. There's no need to ask folks to prevaricate about whether diversity or quality are at odds.
That can certainly be their goal, but finding sponsors for a conference that is seen as exclusionary is going to be tougher. Another insiders club meeting isn't something I'd want to sponsor, with or without the bad press.
AKA the blog post currently on the front page:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4800776
Why does that seem contradictory? Gaza can be the aggressor, but Israel is much better armed. (Don't confuse shipping with getting by truck; they don't receive supplies by ship, but they do get plenty of supplies.)
Like I said to another commenter, actual prevention and the appearance of prevention are different problems. They are not mutually exclusive.

Reducing the public perception of risk is not the same as reducing the actual number of casualties (otherwise people would stop driving). Most people do not behave as Bayesian rationalists, and policy must take this into account.

By the way, the HN feature of delaying the option to respond as a thread grows (presumably to prevent flame wars) is not a good idea. It stifles interesting and civilized exchanges like this one, and flame wars happen regardless; people just start new comments or edit their existing ones.

Edit: to the commenter below, you argue a false dichotomy that has nothing to do with my comment. Besides, that would be similar to asking the public about the next chess move for Kasparov; most people are not qualified to answer. There are reasons not every public policy decision is a votable proposition.
The thing I wonder about is how the knowledgeable and experienced can write articles like this, explicitly recognizing that an adrenaline/stress high is a necessary component, and not think that we need to find a better way to encourage entrepreneurship than the current "ten set out and nine don't make it" method.
It is not ´careless words´ that caused this. After all, everyone is entitled to express their opinion.

What really caused this is the climate where it is ok for women to meet without the least danger of being accused of sexism. It is the climate where it is ok for blacks to meet without any danger of being accused of racism. It is the climate where it is VERBOTEN for white guys to meet, even if the topic is something totally neutral like Ruby and the attendance is self-selected.
I don't think the post was deleted by the author, I think it was flagged to death for being political and not relevant.
in other words this life sometimes sucks but it way better than working for somebody else.
I'd rather have some deep lows, some very steep highs and a constant background noise saying "you're going to fail", than sitting there, watching out of the window and knowing I am not testing my full potential.
Because when you try to reach your limits you always fall, that's when you know them.
Then you stand up again and go for the next limit.
Once you tasted that, there's no way back.
Yours views about Startups: Sillion Valley?
How a Homeless Guy Inspired My Startup
Check out the inspiration behind my new startup MealTics.com. We allow restaurant customers to purchase meals that get donated to local soup kitchens and homeless shelters. Every month we give out cool prizes to random MealTic customers in our raffle.
Lack of vision, direction, and innovation doesn't bring you to the brink of bankruptcy. There are plenty of boring, staid, profitable companies out there. To fail so badly at that size requires mismanagement.
As the tests get more specific, the code gets more generic
20.000 dollar! Does anyone here know if there is something like a kickstarter for people that make the news? I always feel so bad for these guys.
Hey Influx.

Every community has its dramas. Ruby just likes to make ours really really public :P

Ruby folks like to talk about passion for coding, so unsurprisingly controversies in Ruby are equally passionate.

One thing that is very much worth noting about the Ruby community is that when controversies happen, things change. Sometimes they're things like Zed Shaw flaming out of the community (which i'm still kinda bummed about), sometimes it means organizations like Railsbridge (http://workshops.railsbridge.org/ ) are formed.

But these are not needless controversies with no results. This stuff matters.
opened an issue https://github.com/ffissore/presentz.org/issues/36
I have so far successfully avoided Perl, but I have programmed a little in Python. I completely understand those statements, and I can make guesses about difference in some corner cases. I think it's relatively common to know what those statements mean. I agree that a programmer that doesn't know how variables are passed probably doesn't understand the language.

I don't agree with the conclusion though. I think that a programmer "knows" a language if he/she understands the idiomatic way of representing an idea. For example, if a functional language programmer comes to C, perhaps he/she might write a summing function this way:

int sum(int* arr, int count) {
if (count == 0) {
return 0;
}
return *arr + res(arr++, count--);
}

And an assembly programmer might do it this way:

int sum(int* arr, int count) {
int sum = 0;
int i = 0;
loop:
if (i == count)
return sum;

sum += arr[i];
i++;
goto loop;
}

Neither are writing idiomatic C code, but both show they know different corners of the syntax. I would argue that one does not "know" a language until their first reflex in solving a problem is to write it the most idiomatic way for that language.

When I write code in a language, I try to follow the idioms of that language:

* Go: multiple return values and interfaces

* Java: small, polymorphic classes with tons of getters and setters

* Javascript: prototypes, callbacks and array methods

* Python: list comprehensions, generators, and tuples

* D: templates, "auto" and parameter storage classes (in, out, ref, inout)

A programmer doesn't have to know the nitty gritty details of a language to "know" the language. I think the programmer can omit omit learning crazy #define macro foo, the "comma" operator, type coercion rules, bit alignment in structs (for cheap struct serialization) and the like and still "know" the language. Conversely, the more of these details you know, the more likely it is that you won't write idiomatic code. If you know, for example, that x << 0 is faster than parseInt(i, 10) is faster in Javascript, you'll tend to use that more often than the more idiomatic way. This is an implementation detail and shows that you don't understand the idiomatic way of writing Javascript code.

I use a language depending on the problem domain. Some languages lend themselves to certain problems better than others. I don't, however, know the implementation details that only a compiler designer should know, but I don't feel that precludes me from "knowing" a language.
The author of the article alludes to, but doesn't pursue, another possible concern: the rise of Kickstarter-funded arts projects will lead to reduced interest in NEA and other government-endowed sponsorship, which will in turn lead to further budget cuts for these organizations. I'm in favor of the individual patronage model, but there should remain some funding for arts in the public interest.
Show HN: Cohort Visualizer - A handy tool for browsing cohort datasets
Please tell me more about how awful it is to be a white guy in Western society.
That is a lot of words to say nothing. Interesting you agree that Israel is practicing apartheid (since you didn't try to refute it)

Israel needs to make peace with the Palestinians. Not occupy them for thirty years.

Israel is a democracy. The citizens are responsible for what their government does.
Ask HN: Unsolicited redesign of Facebook ads?
I recall a while back someone creating an 'unsolicited redesign' of Facebook advertising that was full of interesting ideas. For the life of me I can't dig it up. Ring a bell?
This is an important problem. It's fundamentally a problem with the way patents are granted, and the way they are used, and the way they are understood. let's address these in turn:

First, you shouldn't be able to patent round corners. That's silly.

Second, you should be able to patent things and then sue people for using your patent if you are not using your patent in any way shape or form. An unused idea should be free for the taking.

Third, there's a great deal of ignorance about what patents are, how to get them, and how to use them. Behind this veil of ignorance, bad things happen.

Unfortunately, this state of affairs means that companies like Apple can and indeed must violate the spirit of the law symmetrically with it's competitors, to protect themselves until the system is fixed.

There is no doubt it's a bad scene, but it's not entirely Apple's fault. If they exercise restraint with these patents, using them purely defensively and then with great perspicuity, then I don't see how they could do any different.

Let us all direct our feelings toward reforming the patent system perhaps by joining an organization like "Defend Innovation"[1], the EFF's group pushing for patent reform.

[1] https://defendinnovation.org/
From you own point of view it is much better to be the only boss - share nothing, nothing special.

From the point of view of any investor, investing in a single-founder is a much higher risk. In case of any accident the second founder could be of some use, where in a single-hero case it would be a guaranteed lose.

Another issue is that smart investor would try everything in his power to engage all co-founders in a competition, a standard manipulation about position and respect. Very useful technique.

So, it seems possible to do things alone, and a lot of people do, but investing in a single-founder startup is too risky - there is a single point of failure.)
Perhaps, but a core premise of the post-PC world is that people will be increasingly using tablets and smartphones to surf. I doubt that many Windows RT/8(which is supposed to be not selling) tablets have been sold, so it must be PCs(which are supposedly dying off) a few of which were upgraded overtaking the biggest mobile OS in a matter of days. And it must be consumer PCs too, since enterprises aren't deploying Windows 8 in any large number.
Well, either way you look at it, it's hard to imagine that Gassée is unbiased and objective. That doesn't mean he's wrong, but it does mean that you need to read it differently. Rather than accept the text as objective reality, you should view it as a perspective on reality that a former Apple executive who was forced to resign is willing to say publicly about Apple's relationship to the firing of Steven Sinofsky at Microsoft (while conveniently not mentioning Apple's firing of Scott Forstall). That is an incredibly shaky foundation to build an opinion on, is it not?
Ars Technica has a source who is supposedly close to the RSC who also says that lobbyist pressure helped to kill the report: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/11/influential-gop-g....

They also make some good points about different groups within the GOP arguing over this.
I don't think this guy understands the debate. A quick summary:

If you think statistics is a big toolbox, some of the tools give different answers that are better or worse in various ways, and you can just take out whatever tool you like, you're a frequentist.

If you think that there's such a thing as a correct probability estimate, and all coherent reasoning is required to come up with consistent answers regardless of which different path was taken to arrive at the same destination, you're a Bayesian. From this perspective, a "confidence interval" isn't a tool that's useful on some occasions, it's just plain crazy and wrong, like a weather forecaster who only tells you the probability that it's raining here xor in Narnia. Sure, the forecast is generated by a process that's sorta related to the correct answer, but by manipulating the imaginary land of Narnia you can make the forecast be basically anything. With Bayesianism there are no degrees of freedom in the likelihood ratio you report. See http://xkcd.com/1132/.

It doesn't do any good to appeal to the idea that Bayesian methods are just one tool in the toolbox. Only frequentists think in terms of toolboxes in the first place.

Also Bayes's Rule is tautologically equivalent to Bayes's Theorem. There's more wrong, but meanwhile, color me unimpressed.
Focus Daily Standups on Value, Not Activity or Individuals
I’m very sad that Hypercritical ends. Siracusa was a podcast making machine, always great at picking out interesting topics, always great at explaining and finding the right analogies. Sure, not all episodes were always genius (as is bound to happen with a weekly podcast), but it’s not like that has happened more often recently.

I’m not really at all in tune with American pop culture, so his appearances on The Incomparable are sadly not as interesting to me.

I’m guessing doing an interesting podcast week after week is just hard and he wants a break?
Having only white male speakers is a sign that something _might_ be wrong, but it seems that a number of people took it as a sign that something _is_ wrong. If there was evidence that action was taken to avoid having minority speakers, then sure, throw a tantrum. But saying there might have been bias, so it needs to get shut down - that's not fair to anyone.
we don't want to go out of our way to find a non white male just to tick a box

See, they should have gone out of their way to do this. Not just to tick a box, but because ticking that box is a kind of due diligence towards building a more inclusive community. Unless they're ready to claim that there's no interesting non-white, non-male speakers able or willing to speak at their conference, then the failure is theirs to make any effort at all. But if they did make the effort and failed to attract someone, then they can say "we actually tried, and couldn't do it." The effort need be no more than to send a bunch of emails, and if that fails, it demonstrates a deeper problem in their community than they can fix.
presentz.org is powered by presentz.js https://github.com/ffissore/presentz.js, so yes, you can have everything on your web site
Leadership doesn't happen overnight - it comes from trying, failing and learning.

This was a few Rubyists trying to do something for their community - not interviewing for McKinsey.
I don't know what to make of this. I tend to feel that if you want to accuse someone of racism or sexism then you have to be sure it was deliberate. The accusations can be so damaging that it's irresponsible to sling them about freely without due care or thought.

I don't think that playing the discrimination card before getting your facts straight is the best way to encourage improvement. In the case of the accusations made, the people making them have contributed nothing. What they have done is deny the minorities they were supposedly defending an opportunity to speak at a large conference, because the whole damn thing has been cancelled as a result.
Yes, for residential plans they abolished the National / International pricing for a fixed rate across both, but for servers in data centers they still have National vs International pricing. For example: http://www.net24.co.nz/dedicated-servers/

I don't know where you got the idea that all traffic goes out of the country and back in again. That is just false.
Yea, in 1997 Apple was going to add CHRP support to Mac OS to allow cloners more flexiblity, but they killed the clones before that work was released.
I know you Linux guys are used to every app having a completely different look and feel, but on the mac this app just doesn't feel native.

But your story was cool too...
life←{ ↑1 ⍵∨.^3 4=+/,¯1 0 1∘.⊖¯1 0 1∘.⌽⊂⍵ }

↑ Game of life
Unfortunately it is hard to impossible to organise a conference on that basis. You need to have money down to pay for venues, etc. well in advance.
Why not address my argument directly rather than sidestepping it with a cute list?
Diversity is a problem in society. You're blaming the victim by implying that it is "computings" fault for the lack of diversity.

Even in my 7th grade programming course(back in the late 90s), there were 22 males and 1 female.
So, from the outside looking in knowing this is a tough subject to "sum up" in a few paragraphs ...

What's the end goal? I find it incredibly more insulting, demeaning, and counter productive to include someone JUST because they are white, black, female, asian, etc. It's just as discriminatory as excluding them.

In fact, in my opinion, it's far worse. It's discrimination masquerading as equality.

You want everyone treated equal? Awesome. The best speakers get in, period. You vary from that in either direction, and you are embracing inequality.
luigi is not talking about filling some gender/race quota, but infers from the tone of the OP that representation of race and gender wasn't something remotely important to the organizers.

It makes them indifferent to the question, not hostile.

I think languages like Ruby and Python have reached a point where they are so popular and accessible that it's time to get as many people engaged in using them as possible.
Gene Helps Predict Time of Death
I don't think many people complained that this guy received extra scrutiny. If something looks/seems suspicious it's acceptable to apply a higher level of scrutiny in determining the actual risk. The article acknowledges this, and says it's pretty reasonable that they stopped him, talked to him, and would have been reasonable if they had asked him to mail the device to himself.

What's totally unreasonable in any context is the fact that this guy was CHARGED WITH A CRIME, and is now sitting in jail on $150,000 bail. He will have to go through a lengthy trial process and potentially serve jail-time. Unless the facts are contrary to what the article presents (which is possible), this is totally unreasonable.