skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
To take the article in the right light, consider that in Ruby-land, syntax is important, it matters. For example, optional parentheses. Spaces are mostly disregarded unless they aren't in a few cases. Switches that support almost any type, even though when folks play with entire Hashes as keys things can fail to work even more during the 1.8 to 1.9 transition...

Multiple ways to create literal strings so you can save escaping things inside of them or save some other action.

Closures with one block shortcut per method so you can save a little more characters there.

These things encourage the developer to revisit their implementations and cut the redundancies much more.

The p method coupled with the inspect feature that gives you the description of a certain object so you can debug it or at least see its content very easily.

No use comparing Ruby to LISP and Smalltalk in some "power subjectivity"... Ruby is hackish and used by "hackers" alike. It's not perfect of course...

And I liked this article for it put into better words what I wrote in some comments on the original article.
If you can build the site without a significant investment of money or time then it's OK that it'll take time or tinkering to earn back your money. If it's expensive to build and doesn't have a clear path to earning back that investment, it's at best a gamble.
No. The story is about how Mark Zuckerberg suppresses dissent.
Skills developers will need in the next five years
See Amdahl's law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amdahl%27s_law

Even a tiny amount of work spent sequentially (eg a scheduler or gc) can determine performance as the core count ramps up.

Erlang is essentially ahead of almost everyone on minimalising the sequential portion.
The question you should be asking yourself is will the users buy your product/service? Ads or subscriptions you are still trading your product/service with your customers. Is it something that will be useful enough for them to trade some money or click on your ads? Whether they will depends on how much value they are getting in return.
Woohoo! It's great to see an update to John's book!

[BTW, the Tcl language is well over 20 years old. IIRC, Tk is about 20 years old.]
Actually, if you look at the history, you'll see that many in the Canadian government and the banks themselves felt that they were missing out on all the great action that US banks were able to get in on. It was the prudence of the government of the time that saved them. If it was left up to them, the banks up here would be in the same state as American banks.

To suggest however that the government somehow forced American banks to lend to people that didn't deserve it against the bank's better judgment is garbage. That doesn't explain half of the EU's current problem.

No, the one exception between Canada and the rest of the world right now is that we have tighter regulations on our banking sector.
Ask HN: Is it alright to cycle through inspiration/discouragement?
Well, I have an interesting idea that I haven't had written working prototype on yet.

The problem is that I cycle rapidly between periods when I'm incredibly inspired, - How can something like X not exist yet?!, - and then discouraged, - Meh, there's tons of such software on the web, screw it.

Is that good or bad (for the idea)?

Thanks.
It seems to totally overlook the successful open-source programming 'gods' so to speak, only mentioning open source in relation to amateur programmers. Where's Linus?
Is Twitter Killing RSS?
It depends on your objectives.

If you take angel/institutional money, you should at least have a good idea of what billion-dollar-plus market you're going after.

How specifically you monetize within that market can't always be pre-determined because its a function of a really good product (which takes a lot of morphing/iteration).

It's not a good idea to bank on advertising (unless you're building an ad network) or unless you're product has a great context for capturing purchase intent (from which you can do some pretty killer lead-gen/affiliate).
He explains in the comments that he meant it predictively, in that their work would survive long beyond them. I don't think programming has been around on a large scale long enough for dead masters who've actually died, unless you'd consider Turing, Church, and Shannon to be programmers. Hell, even the inventor/discoverer of Lisp is still around.

edit: I added "Discovered" because that's the way many Lisp fans, including pg, refer to it.
Linode rolling out backup service
Paul Graham once told me something about this...

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=153547
Having a business plan is not "over-analyzing stuff."

If your goal with this project is to make money (i.e., it's not just a hobby), then figuring out how to monetize it is an important step.

The question you need to be asking yourself is: what value are you creating, and for whom? If your idea doesn't provide value to a group of people, it's not going anywhere as a business.

(Note that the users of the product aren't necessarily the same people it provides value for.)
It's a moral panic. They're never rational.

I live near Boston, so our local equivalent of the spooky Google van is: circuit boards. Remember: If you carry your homebrew audio amplifier inside a cheap plastic case, it is not a terrorist threat, but otherwise the cops might threaten you with deadly force and charge you with a felony.

Let's not even get into the topic of carrying liquids onto airplanes.

The only good thing about incidents like this is that they provide anthropologists with teachable moments. It's easy to laugh when some other culture claims that a camera can "steal your soul". Ha ha! Those primitive people! That sort of thinking would never happen in a sophisticated modern culture like ours!
Because his point is that they could spend less and still generate the same income therefore increasing the profit margin.
Normally I'd interpret it like you have, but the license specifically says that only redistributions must keep the licensing in tact. I don't know if that was an intentional thing on their part or just a mis-wording that they didn't mean, but it definitely says that you have to keep the licensing in tact if you redistribute it.

I'm guessing that it was intentional. There are some people willing to go through the effort to remove the licensing from the source and compile. Who cares! The real issue (in terms of losing profits) is if one person is able to remove the licensing and redistribute that change.
You are missing the point entirely.

Anti-ship missiles are no joke. No one really believes the US surface fleet can survive against an enemy equipped with a large number of these weapons.

Of course, the Navy has defenses. But it only takes one missile to incapacitate a ship. Would you really feel safe on a carrier off the coast of China during a war?

I read in one Navy report that a supercarrier would not be expected to last the first few hours of a conflict with Iran or the first few minutes of a conflict with China.

Unlike the ground-combatant, who has the advantage of concealment, terrain, and, fundamentally, ground beneath his feet, the naval surface combatant is alone, aboard a warm boat, easily distinguishable from the cold water that surrounds her, said boat being packed to the gills with men, weaponry, and explosives, sailing on a flat, relatively featureless expanse of ocean, which offers concealment and shelter to none, and is (eventually) naturally deadly to human life. As this is the case, threats that would merely slow down the ground combatant--such as guided missiles--are a much greater threat to the naval combatant. Possessing a speed and an agility that naval platforms cannot forseeably match, as well as computerized "smart" guidance systems and a heavy payload of high-explosive, the modern anti-ship missile, once it has acquired its target, is an enemy that the target ship cannot usually run from, hide from, physically avoid, or absorb.

wikipedia.com: anti ship missiles
uh I was using Starlng in production and switched to Kestrel expecting a massive speedup.

It actually slowed down the queue by about a factor of 10.

Maybe the jvm offers GC benefits on massive hardware, but I have not been pleased at all so far.
One way to handle the family groupings can be achieved in Apple's Address Book using Smart Folders.

Smart folders allow you to create auto-updating groups based on rules. Therefore you could create groups based on last name (families). If there are several families (i.e. extended family), you can add other rules to differentiate them, like State, ZIP code, or a custom tag in their 'notes' field.
Skin and Bones - How Startups Use A Boxer From Anchorage Alaska To Gain Exposure
providing value is one thing. Getting users to pay for stuff seems to be a whole different beast.
He built the company. I dont know about who owns majority stake in facebook, but isn't it up to them to decide what Mark should do with facebook? I mean, if Mark has majority stake, doesn't he have every right to run it the way he wants or to even shut down if he feels like it? I dont know what say random reporters have on this.
If you're on a mobile device, you might have a hard time opening the OP. Here's the smaller version: http://www.flickr.com/photos/formforce/3409362834/sizes/m/
Verizon: Fast, wireless Internet coming to rural America
Your comment about 'task rather than pleasure' reminds me of the story about TapBot's new iPhone unit conversion app. [1]

They took an idea that had been done and re-done ad nauseam, but focused on the enjoyment of the process rather than simple efficiency. I like the way the developer describes it:

"Our goal was to make unit conversions fun and enjoyable. I wanted to separate the conversion steps into little tasks that need to be completed. It gives a sense of satisfaction when you’ve completed a unit selection sequence or shock if you press the wrong button, almost like a game. Regardless of whether the feedback is positive or negative, it brings out emotion in the user and that was my goal. Once you get used to it, there’s a sense of satisfaction and rhythm to the process. It’s very subliminal, but it’s there."

[1]http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=543934
It's not about methods with different signatures being being different methods, but about when they are bound. If a class has these methods:

void print(Object obj) {..}
void print(String str) {..}

and we make the following invocation - which one gets called? The static, compile-time type of the invocation is Object and the dynamic, runtime class of the invocation is String. Which one will select the method?

Object a = "hello";
print(a);

In Java, the first method gets called (the one taking an Object argument). Because the compile time type of this invocation is Object, it is bound to the first method, regardless of the runtime class of a. Even if a is a String. It's the compile time type that selects the method, not the runtime class. To select the other method, we need to change the compile time type:

print((String)a);
1. Two of his "dead" programmers are still alive!
Ruby language on the Erlang VM -

http://on-ruby.blogspot.com/2009/03/reia-new-dynamic-languag...
I was considering doing this same type thing with one of my mac applications. My thought was, if they download it, remove the registration, and get it going without a license, at least they have the source on their computer and familiarity with it. The possible will make a good contributor. I was also thinking about creating a "developer license".
Don't repeat your CSS, use Sass modules
"But discussions between the companies are confirmed."

Strictly speaking, there is no prediction in the article. This is a claim about the present. Granted, he has already had to amend the original claim ("late stage" vs. "early stage" talks), so take him to task over that rather than imply a prediction is being made.
The new Jaiku API: Problems and solutions
More Change You Can Believe In.

But seriously...don't they get it? It's too late. We can get around any centralized controls with ad-hoc and mesh wireless networks. Freedom will win in the end, and watching these tards struggle against that reality is so sad (yet strangely amusing).
Is it alright to cycle through day/night? It is inevitable. It is neither good, nor bad.

The human brain is like a committee, with millions of warring factions. Sometimes the positive bunch are running the show, and sometimes the negative bunch are shouting louder.

And, of course, taking an honest assessment of your idea is important. You've gotta listen to both sides and try to ascertain which one is correct. But, the "there's tons of X" is a nonsensical argument. There are niches within any large software market that are being served poorly. There are opportunities to change the game in any large market, and those opportunities come around every few years...you just position yourself to take advantage of them and be the company that changes the landscape.

Google changed the landscape rather than accept that search was an also-ran idea. It took the Japanese until the late 70's to figure out how to change the auto industry landscape, but they did, and now the big three Japanese auto makers rule the market, with Toyota (the most forward thinking and efficient mover among them) the leader.
Neither, for that matter, is Knuth. I'm sure there are, however, piles of dead COBOL programmers whose code is still in active use. Perhaps Jeff should rethink the category names.
The idea is sort of rational: privacy isn't solely about your information being recorded, it is about your information being accessed and accessible. Honestly, if my entire life were put on photographs and stored on a computer at the NSA (no doubt sandwitched between the Ark and a microfilm showing what really happened to JFK), I really wouldn't care that much.

Now, if it were searchable by Google Images, I'd pretty much die.
Twitter + Amazon Mechanical Turk = TwitTurk or Frankenstwit
CodingHorror strikes again.

Knuth is apparently dead. And it sounds like he didn't go down quietly, he took Alan Kay with him.
These things might be related. The authorities in the UK seem to be fully committed to the notion that filming something on a digital camera gives you power over it. A lot of infrastructure has been built, and a lot of PR money spent, in the service of this magical principle. There are CCTV cameras everywhere, and everyone knows that they're a symbol of authority.

Studies show, I believe, that the cameras don't accomplish much, especially when you calculate the marginal cost/benefit of adding still more cameras. The cops lobby for more cameras anyway, justifying them with professions of faith. If we all believe that a cop is watching, then it will be just like having a real cop standing there!

That kind of environment takes its toll, psychologically. If you tell people over and over that a fuzzy digital image of their street is a powerful tool in the hands of a cop, you're also subtly suggesting that a fuzzy digital image of their street might be a powerful tool in the hands of the nameless criminals lurking on the scary Internet.

Another, completely different theory: People take the opportunity to protest against Google's cameras because, when you protest against a government camera, it doesn't go away. Instead, you might get investigated or arrested. The Google van is a convenient scapegoat for people's general fear of centralized surveillance and loss of privacy.

And both of these theories could be true at the same time! The subconscious is a mysterious thing.
How are you planning to pay for your hosting costs, advertising, marketing, branding, design, coding, food, rent, a car, and all the other luxuries in life?

That money has to come from somewhere.

How much money do you want and or need to survive? How many jobs do you want to create for others? How long do you want to retire? What are your plans over the next 1 year, 5 years, 10 years...?

What do people want to pay for? Well, people don't like waiting. Once they decide they want something, they want it now now now.

People pay for food. You have to eat. People pay for management of life's necessities. People pay for more life. They pay for less fear. They pay for convenience. They pay for more time.

They pay for more money.

They pay for less cost.
They pay for more entertainment.
They pay for more control over their environment.
They pay for vision.
They Pay for stability, accessibility, consistency...

What do you want them to pay you for?
Why wasn't Linus Torvalds added to his Successful Programmers list considering the first line of that category is - Programmers who are both well known and have created entire businesses -- perhaps even whole industries -- around their code.

Maybe he will get added once he dies, considering Linux will surely outlive him.

Another thing .. can Knuth and Dijkstra be said to be programmers ?! Just an open question for discussion !
Yep. I'm wondering where most people who read this article place themselves. I would say I'm probably a mix between the Working Programmer, the Average Programmer, and the Amateur Programmer. Working because I would say I have a successful career so far; Average because I wouldn't say I'm a naturally talented programmer (although I question whether they exist at all); and Amateur because I love programming and messing around with new technologies.
Discoverer? I mean, I think Lisp is great, but I wouldn't call it a fundamental part of the universe.
Maybe next he will grace us with the '7 Levels of Programming Hell'...
Seems the distinction between Average and Bad programmers is that, while both lack talent, the Average programmer understands that he lacks talent and the Bad programmer does not.
"Persistence" Hunt
I see some of his points. However, buying keywords on searches that you rank highly in is often not a negative. We buy brand terms for our clients all the time and it only helps them. They do very well in the organic listings for these same terms, but they often make more money through the PPC terms. The reason I feel that it often works that way, is that people clicking on PPC terms, are often more in a buying mode.

Because, people clicking on PPC ads want to be marketed and sold to. Is this always the case, no. You have to run the analysis on it to determine if it is worth it to buy keywords you do well with in the organic searches.
Can't disagree with that
I love E. In a way, with the split screen editing, it's even better than Textmate. For windows users, E is one of the best editors out there. Releasing E's source is an awesome move!
> That kind of environment takes its toll, psychologically.

This is very true. I am starting to seriously contemplate leaving the country, because it's becoming such an oppressive environment.
Well, I'm not sure, but I think too much emphasis got put on TPB in my message. I mean, based on my own understanding I don't think Rand would approve of people getting the full benefit of her work without people paying. But I also think she would have tremendous respect and appreciation for Amazon.
smalltalk is generaly (sic) slow

In what context? I've seen implementations of block encryption in Smalltalk that ran 3% faster than a DLL written in C! You wouldn't want to do heavy numerical integration utilizing lots of double precision floating point in Smalltalk, but for a lot of the sort of programming I do, several of the available Smalltalks are very snappy and responsive.
Ruby has an advantage over Lisp: syntax

Many programmers like syntax, since coding AST-style can be tedious sometimes. Sure, you can create your own reader macro with Lisp, but that is harder than overriding some methods in Ruby. Rails is an example that opinionated software has an edge sometimes and Ruby compared to Lisp is opinionated in terms of syntax.
Where's Linus, RMS, K&R and Guido? They're not only successful, they're also "dead" (which is a stupid label to use). I'm sure people will be studying the Linux kernel and using GNU/Linux (or derivatives thereof) and hacking in Python and C long after those people are dead. Why does Gates get to be on that list and not the Woz?

I wonder where Jeff Atwood places himself on that list.
This article misses the much bigger picture on two points:

1) Geico is forgoing efficiency in favor of growth. In the past 20 years it has roughly quadrupled its market share. It can do so safely as it is owned by Berkshire Hathaway. As many other auto insurance companies have failed, Geico has climbed to a top 4 insurer.

2) Geico is owned by Berkshire Hathaway. Unlike some of the other companies, it does not have profitability as an exclusive motivation. Even at break-even, it generates significant float for Bershire to invest. This is why growth is favored to high margins.
Dice.com Shows 45% Drop In Tech Jobs
You seem to be implying that one needs e.g., "green threads" to support huge numbers of "actors". That implication is false.

Also, the only way that Erlang can support running on multiple actual hardware cores is, just as in Java "actor" implementations, to do an MxN mapping of actors to cores.

Now, at one end of the spectrum there's the basic rule of thumb for each system to have O(number of cores) hardware threads and map all of the actors down to that, there are good arguments (by people like Paul Tyma) that promote using 10s or even 100s of thousands of hardware threads in Java on real, shipping OSs (late model Linux is his focus).

Of course, Erlang as both a language and its VM, are matched to each other and their specific problem domain (lots of little actors focused on coordination rather than computational or data transformation intensive jobs) whereas Java is more general. So, things like the management of multiple run queues in Erlang certainly make sense.
It's Berkshire Hathaway with a k.
I was thinking about this on the way to work earlier regarding calendars, and how I don't want to choose a particular service to grace with my data, and then try to hack 'sync' to other services and devices.

I came up with...

Make the data the important part. Carry the data structure around with me on my device(s) of choice.

Have the data accessible in a standard format - i.e. I can keep it in vCal/vCard format - or, in any format I choose as long as it has an included vCal/vCard interpretive layer.

Anywhere I want to use it, it would be up to the program to read/write the appropriate format. That is, instead of a proprietary data store with export/import as afterthoughts, it would be fundamental - or so key that it would cease to exist in its own right. You don't import wood into a chisel in order to shape the wood, why must we import all of our calendar into a program in order to add an appointment?

The model I was thinking of would be more like the wood carving example - you'd present a slice of your calendar to a program, which would carve it and give it back.

Still plenty of details that would need working out, though.
This person obviously does not understand the value in capturing BOTH organic search visitors and paid search visitors.

Let us say 30% of the searchers for "auto insurance" click on Geico's organic search listing. What about the other 70%? Some of them click on other organic search listings, some of them will click only on other paid search listings, some of them will click on a combination of listings (comparing).

It would only make sense for Geico to buy paid search listings as well - to capture SOME of that other 70% that do not click on their organic listing.

Simply, ranking organically and buying keywords will only increase the chance for a potential customer to find your site. And with an industry as competitive as car insurance, if Geico doesn't spend that $90MM to acquire new visitors someone else will.

Also I highly doubt the accuracy of the $90MM figure as Spyfu's database is only an estimate.

Finally let's not forget this article also doubles as a marketing material for Tipping Point Labs, I'm sure they agree they are "expert story-tellers" who completely "understand online content marketing".