skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I understand the point you're making - but let me propose another way of thinking about it: Amazon pays a referral fee regardless of what item is purchased. Whether you buy that book or Goodnight Moon or the Kardashian Family Coloring book, a referral link will pay.

So I actually don't think this creates a conflict of interest regarding this book at all. Why would a "conflicted reviewer" point you toward this book vs any other book that he could be equally compensated for?

The conflict arises in two cases -- if the OP insists you should buy this book that's only available on Amazon vs another book that's widely available. Or if this book happens to be significantly more expensive (and hence pays the OP better) than other books.

I don't think either of those is the case here, so I think your dismissal is perhaps unfounded.
This algorithm is useless without quantifying constants or numerically demonstrating that the constants are practical for some test problems. Although they cite CMG in passing, they do not compare performance. They also (negligently) do not cite LAMG. MG algorithms are also highly parallelizable, which is not clearly the case for this algorithm.

To get an idea of how essential it is to quantify constants, recall that in 1964, Fedorenko rigorously proved that the number of iterations of multigrid required to reduce the residual of Poisson on a rectangular grid with n points by a factor of epsilon is O(n * |log epsilon|). He quantified the associated constant as

W(n, 0.01) <= 210000*n + W(10^6, 0.01)

Groundbreaking optimal asymptotics, but utterly useless (the proposed algorithm had the wrong idea about good coarse spaces) and nobody cared until Achi Brandt came along it 1973 and revolutionized implicit solvers by demonstrated that if you get the details right

W(n, discretization error) <= 40 * n

(using only addition and shift operations).
It seems to me like almost nobody in the comments on HN believes his story to be genuine. And yet, this guy updated his blog to add :

"Wow, I really didn't expect this story to blow up the way it has. I've never had anything voted up on Hacker News before, much less gain the top spot. I'm still not convinced it hasn't all been a fever-dream."

which just supports the hypothesis that he's just bullshitting everybody.
How would you shoot a stealth drone? And how are lasers an improvement over conventional anti aircraft missiles?
A lot of that market has already defected to Windows for the price/performance improvements, except for Final Cut users. If you're running Adobe CS, you don't need a Mac, and Mac OS X has relatively few advantages over Windows 7 for pro work.

The line I hear is "I'd rather be using a Mac, but...."

It's true that Apple tends to fit high-end Core chips in notebooks, but last year's Core i7-3770K still gives you step up in performance over this year's Retina MBP. And for pro users, time is money.
Forgot Aaron Swartz already?

Indeed, 99% of the time these edge cases won't affect you. But there's still that 1%...
Get into digital signal processing / digital communications. They are awesome fields that are challenging and rewarding.
Valve was giving away a promotional item in Team Fortress 2 for users who logged into the game from a Linux machine. The last time they did this, for users who logged in from a Mac, the promotional item became a kind of in-game de facto currency.

There were lots of users logging in once from an Ubuntu VM instance for the item; it'll be interesting to see if this growth continues now that the item giveaway is over.

For reference: http://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Tux
In colloquial terminology, x^2 is an exponential. This isn't actually an important part of the article. I don't feel that a paragraph explaining why "Polynomial time" is bad (but not too bad) would improve the article.
>I'd estimate that PBS is paying around $0.05 per show to stream. I'm basing this on CDN costs in the range $0.10/GB - $0.20/GB, the size of 30 minute shows weighing in between 125MB and 250MB, plus storage and admin overheads.

If they actually own the rights to the show they want to distribute to the public for free and the primary thing stopping them is the cost of a CDN, why aren't they using BitTorrent? At least as an option that says "no CDN in your country, international users use this"?
I thought that the soviets already solved that one in the 80s.

First, you figure out how long it takes a laser installation to lock onto and destroy a drone. Let's say it take five minutes. You then build a bunch of cheap, $100 decoy drones that have no payload or remote control capability. You send decoys through at a rate of ten per minute, overwhelming the laser system. Amongst the decoys, you send a real drone or two. You adjust the decoy rate and number of drones until you've calculated that you have a 99% chance that a real drone gets through.

Granted, your costs have gone up an order of magnitude, since you need to spend so much money on decoys. On the other hand, drones are just going to keep getting cheaper and the decoys even more. Besides, if you use your first couple of drones to destroy the laser, you don't even have to worry about decoys after that point.
Top 10 most expensive car crashes
I would add the qualifier "not all" to your assertions.
The [Apple] Lightning Digital AV Adapter Surprise
The 30 pin dock had 30 pins so it could put video out directly and things like that.

Lightening is a SERIAL FORMAT with 9pins. So it streams audio and video out in an encoded form.

The AV adapter, need to take that audio and video and turn it into a standardized AV format for the AV plugs.

Now, rather than a lot of odd incompatibilities because Apple added new features to new devices that older docks don't support, we have a common communication format in lightening that should be much more robust going forward.

Apple can add whatever protocols it needs over the serial connection to support future tech, rather than the old way of redefining what some of those 30 pins meant from period to period-- remember the 30 pin connecter started out in a time when there was firewire taking up some of those pins!

People like to ascribe nefarious purposes to Apple or claim apple is "rippng them off" because a small computer that does digital AV conversion costs $30... and they dont' realize that the 30 pin connector didnt' do any conversion of formats was just bringing the signals out to a standard connector. This one actually has to do work, which is why it has a SoC on it.
Leaving aside the eggs-in-a-single-basket aspect, I think being too close could be a liability. You may read a lot of bearish press about Apple that emphasizes market share over profit share completely missing the point of Apple's culture and the fact that foregoing the standard protectionism is what allows them to pursue the next great product so much better than anyone else. You might be totally right in this thinking and yet still be screwed by the market because it's full of speculators subscribing the conventional wisdom. And it's tech, so totally plausible for them to hold the stock down until consumer tastes move on and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I see so much dubious analysis of Apple (eg. suggesting Apple could go the Dell route) that I'm getting tempted to go long, but it's a tremendous risk because it's so damn frothy.
I did the original WebGL Globe (texture, atmosphere shader, interaction, ...). Just sounded like you were taking credit for the overall aesthetics. As far as I can see, aesthetic-wise the difference is that you didn't pass the height for the cubes.

I don't really mind though, the whole point was to get people to use the platform. Just found it funny :)
Well, if you look it from the perspective, that a Bipolar (2 sections) world against a Uni-Polar(US), its kinda good for the world as proven by history. 2 WW were enough to teach us the cost of worldwide war, the time has changed, the no of war-mongers have decreased considerably.

Consider, how USSR and US were before 90's, yes, things were more delicate than today, at a time when communication was not that rampant, but it occasionally did put in check each one of them.

Like USSR interfered towards the end of Veitnam War, no offence against US, but when you have power, the road becomes tough, and you need the occasional wake up call to see what is wrong and what is right.

Russia holds that baton even today, but somehow people are only seeing the world being Bipolar between US-China, even though the current balance is something like Russia + China = US in terms of power.

Power does not mean, any of them have to flaunt it, I will say it again, don't look at who is building which weapon, because all you gonna do is get anxious and build a better one.

We as PEOPLE, must not give power to these war symbols, we should be anxious about ground realities. The growing unemployment in US, the need of reform of education in US, the need for liberty and freedom of speech in China, and much more.

going into Space age, we the people should be concerned, and should push to make space free of boundaries, so the problem of today, stay on the earth only.
Thanks for the advice. This was definitely in my mind, in order to continue the business as long as I can, I have to reduce the burn rate as efficiently as possible. I have talked to my crew about the matter and they are disappointed but understand the magnitude of the situation. I already apologized to them that their hours are more likely to be cut due to the lack of business. I am blessed to have people be understanding and are making the sacrifice in order to keep this business afloat. However, this can only last so long and I still need to hustle. Burn rate is high due to a commercial kitchen that I am on a lease in. At the moment I have renewed a Craigslist ad of renting the kitchen space out, for extra income. Could use to push that a little more.

I do agree that going to meetups and connecting with people using these leads generation tactics with a sense of fear and panic will not be good for anyone. As a dire situation this might be, staying calm in the storm is going to be a key to my success. The analogy of the dish being simmered slowly is spot on. Initially though of simmering of any dish requires hot fire to get it going and going out there talking to people is that fire, but my business name with goodwill will make it come together.

Deep discounts wasn't what I was going to rely on for bidding customers. I plan to give discounts reasonably so that they have a chance to taste what we have to offer and that I have decent amount of profit margin to make it work. I do appreciate the great advice and everything you mentioned is definitely something to think about.
It's likely a side effect of some inner conflict which we can't see.
From the article: "But Mozilla isn’t interested in locking down users with Firefox OS and the Firefox Marketplace. In fact, Android owners can download the mobile version of Firefox right now, head to marketplace.firefox.com, and start downloading the same games that are available on handsets running the new operating system."

Firefox OS continually sounds more and more self-defeating.

Why would anyone bother with Firefox OS when they can get the same benefits while using Android or some other platform, while also getting the additional benefits those platforms offer?

Everything about Firefox OS is repulsive to users and developers. Users get a limited amount of software. Developers don't really even have a choice about what programming language to use (choosing between JavaScript and CoffeeScript, TypeScript or Dart isn't what I consider a real "choice"). This encourages the typical no-win situation where there are no developers, no users, and nothing to encourage growth in either area.

The worst thing may be that it siphons off effort that could be going toward improving Mozilla's products that are actually useful and widely used, like Firefox on the desktop and Thunderbird.

It's just not encouraging that Firefox OS looks worse and worse the more we learn about it.
Whaaaaaat? This is the oldest news ever. I'm going back to sleep, and when I wake up, this site better not be a throwback to 2002, OK?
My guess is that the 640x480 monitors are standard-definition TVs.
Evernote hacked
If Apple wanted to boost stock price they would have a 20:1 stock split. Price per share would then be in the $20's and would quickly shoot up because of how "cheap" the stock is.
Not so sure about your last sentence. Can a replacement browser be any good without using JIT compilation somewhere? Is the sandbox going to allow it to jump into dynamically generated data? Are there any valid technical reasons for having sand-boxing in the first place?

(I'm guessing "probably not", "no", and "yes".)
I don't see that. If you need to kill the line of sight laser, swarm it with cruise missiles flying nap of the earth.

The gun won't see incoming until they pop over horizon which is .. what five miles away?

Now I am armchair warrior-ing - but I at least spent a few years as an enlisted guy, a long time ago.
If I had money and free time, then I'd love to do research on my own. Thing is, I need a job to pay the bills :( I'm thinking of getting into freelancing and using that to float me as I get to do more and more research.
The answer is that lightening is a general purpose next generation serial format.

This allows them to support different formats in the future, for instance, say when HDMI isn't popular.

The 30 pin connector didn't have HDMI on it at the time it was created and they have repurposed pins over the years regularly.

Here they can have a much less complicated solution-- a standardised serial bus over which they can stream any future protocol they want to support.

It's a lot more future proof.
Programming is not a Glamorous Job
I am pretty sure US govt killing civilians in an attempt to ensure a supply of terrorists to keep them employed in the future is a fairly robust definition of insanity :-)
How Pepsi India Saved Itself From A Social Media Blunder
Startup accelerators aren't for everyone
"CRUD" is hard. That's why there are so many bad CRUD applications out there. Write a good "CRUD" application and I take my hat off to you.
... Only the ones that are less obviously right. For people and companies that can afford to pursue frivolous lawsuits as a business model, those frivolous litigants will bear the real costs of their frivolity: their own expenses, and the expenses of the one in the right. Of course, it makes "getting it wrong" even more reprehensible than ever... The law still needs to be just.

Edit: I think it can help reduce the power divide that allows one litigant to abuse their wealth simply to intimidate. If they are not litigating justly, they will only harm themselves. I feel like it should be more broadly applicable for preventing abuse than the one parasitic example of patent trolls.
Many distributions have made huge steps in being usable for non-technical people. My mom and GF both use Trisquel without problems (well, fewer problems than most Windows users I know).

Of course, it does take a technical person to install it for them.
Have you been in a "CRUD" job for at least a year? I can assure you, what often seems like a "CRUD" will teach you a lot about architecture, design, requirements analysis, etc. It's actually a good way to teach yourself skills that cannot be obtain via university schooling.
Spend a year mastering a framework or two (in a paid project), face some support issues, etc. When the job is boring and you complete your tasks very well, ask for a raise and/or start looking for a new job.
Here are a couple of CS-y but not too math-y suggestions.

Consumer-facing interactive native apps are typically low on CRUD and some of them require non-obvious solutions. You could try to get a job (or just create a product on your own) on mobile or in games.

Another option is working on tools instead of apps. If you manage to get some non-trivial gcc/clang/kernel patches accepted you can try to find a company that works on those.

(I've worked on Google Maps for Mobile and am now building a robotic waste recycler - no CRUD for me since 2002 unless I've decided to build some for my own needs).
whew, i was shocked when my evernote client asked me to enter my password because i did not recieve the e-mail. It seems like this was a precautious step as nothing was 'really' hacked, or was it?
Just enough money to keep it under control
Minor quibble with the article. Handbrake is not illegal. It does not break encryption, it merely transcodes. It, by design, does not come with a copy of libdvdcss, and you have to download it through other means. It will also, on a mac, go find VLC's copy and use it.

The people behind Handbrake are somewhat touchy about this, for good reason.
Certainly I'm biased, but I think working at a place like http://istrategylabs.com is a place to do this.

We have to invent new things everyday, and due to our focus on hacking the digital and physical worlds there's so many possibilities.
I've learned that ruby/rails is not the place to go for tough challenges. Agreed. My question now is where do I go from here?
MHL is an option but it only fixes the number of pins issue. It has the same problem as HDMI out: you need a transceiver capable of multi-Gbit data rates. You also have to get the video output to the transceiver. Its not the easiest thing to do inside a phone, its really not the easiest thing to do when your next phone release is focused on 'thinner and lighter'.

Apple already made a strong commitment to AirPlay, so they already had a focus on building a fast, smooth, low power encoder that could encode the entire screen. Once encoded, the stream is probably only a few Mbit/s, a data rate that can easily be transmitted with single ended protocols like SPI. Almost all SoCs already have multiple SPI buses so no need to change any hardware.

Their solution may seem inelegant to some, but I think it is great. They managed to support a feature with almost zero hardware costs on the core device (depending on how you assign the lightning connector). A feature that I'm willing to bet only a very small % of all users will ever use. That is a big win, not having to dump extra hardware into a device that only 5% of all users will ever activate does great things for your margin and design flexibility.
I think what you're debating is similar to how someone could tell me "gay" means happy. Yes, we all know that's the origin of the word - but in 2013, if you hear someone describe someone else(or something else) as "gay" you can probably assume they don't mean "happy".
Or just "Bitcoin is at a new high"
My experience using Steam on linux has been pretty good. The only thing is that the trailers/videos do not work because I run on 64-bit (there is a workaround for this).

As for the games, a lot of hit and miss. Team Fortress works great! However, a lot of other games require workarounds even though they have official linux support. Luckily, the Steam Linux community is quite strong and these workarounds were pretty easy to find.

I really wish Ubuntu and other linux distros can make an app store (or software center) of similar quality. It's really a joy to use.
(())()()(()) Parentheses in FP makes me dizzy, is there an IDE based solution to that ? FP almost feels like speaking a very long statement while running out of breath!
"but to be completely fair, if Squeak is the way forward, I think I'm happy where I am."

Well, it's still the language from the year 1980. The very fact that you judge a 1980-vintage system as "not bad" compared to existing alternatives is telling in itself. Alan is working on a 2010 version even as we speak. :-)
Try systems companies (e.g. storage, networking) - you get to build products that leverage core CS concepts - algorithms, distributed systems etc. You also get a chance to use your investigative skills to debug problems like race conditions, memory leaks etc.
> The last time they did this, for users who logged in from a Mac, the promotional item became a kind of in-game de facto currency.

FWIW, this won't happen again, as the Tux items are not tradable.
Beautiful PHP
I think it is a brilliant way to make some money. Find a really good book and write a really good book review about it and then make money on referral links. Nothing wrong at all with getting paid to do a good thing like this.
Things unique to Chrome that don't come from the OS: V8 Javascript engine, process isolation model, networking including new protocols like SPDY and possibly QUIC [1], auto-update (for browser and all apps and extensions) Chrome sync (for bookmarks, open tabs, apps, extensions). Don't forget that the Chrome team is now a major contributor to WebKit.

[1] https://plus.google.com/u/0/100132233764003563318/posts/b36w...
Different places have different expectations, and there's no reliable way to know in advance what those expectations are going to be -- other than asking. I think most employers understand that.

If you can afford to say you wouldn't want to work at a place that expects a suit and tie for an interview, that's great -- but not everyone has that luxury.

Asking what to wear has generally worked just fine for me.
I'm not so sure that public percepiton is different. Loads of people I know still think that because I'm a programmer I must be an expert in fixing printers, or formatting spreadsheets.
I don't know how you feel about working for the military-industrial-tech-surveillance-state but companies or universities that get DARPA or IARPA money work on stuff like flying and/or self driving cars, autonomous systems etc (Lockheed, Honeywell, Carnegie-Mellon, Raytheon, for examples). Of course these things will ultimately be used to crush humanity's soul, but they're interesting software and technical challenges.
Don't be panic if the cable get kernel panic.
Hard problems are everywhere. Every company, every app, every product has unique and difficult problems to solve.

Sometimes those problems are with product design and UX. Sometimes those problems are mathematical. If you are successful, often they have to do with scalability and reliability. If you work with great people there are always hard problems in enabling productivity and building great tools. Many companies have serious and significant challenges around security and may not even know it. If most companies are solving simple problems, then why aren't most companies automatically successful?

If you broaden your definitions of "hard" you might find that there are many things that qualify. If what you mean is "hard mathematical problems" then yes, you will have to learn some math.
I'm slightly hijacking the thread here, but does HN have any recommendations on CS-heavy bioinformatics grad programs (not just US based)?
In the PBS case, I cannot possibly (legally) access the content my tax dollars pay for, because they block it on their site, and I don't live in the US now.

According to http://www.pbs.org/funding, tax dollars pay for about 15% of the budget across all PBS stations. And a large part of that money goes to ensuring that local stations can exist in places that they otherwise couldn't. While tax dollars are helpful, in no way are they paying for that content in the same way that the BBC is funded by people in England.

In any case the reason for that geographical restriction is that PBS makes money from selling access to popular shows like Sesame Street worldwide. They could not make that money if organizations in that area had no incentive to pay for it.

...it's more like I'm paying for something but getting nothing.

My taxes help to pay for the system of embassies and consulates that provide a support network for people like you. Since I live in the USA and have no plans to travel, I'm getting nothing from that tax money.

Welcome to a fundamental fact of taxation, most of what our taxes pay for does not directly benefit us. Nor do we individually have any say about how that is spent. Once it has been taken by the government it is in no real sense "ours". Get over it.