skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Puppet and Chef are yet another thing to learn and maintain, if the guy is a part-time admin with a lot of other responsibilities and a small number of servers it may not be worth it.

Speaking from experience as a part time admin, it is definitely worth it to automate the process, even with one or two servers. Any build system will repay in spades the first time you have to set up a new server or rebuild an old one, esp. if you're in a hurry after a server failure.

That said Linode offers other easier options (Linode specific of course). You can take the commands usually executed, and put them in a shell script in the language of your choice which is uploaded and executed on first run (they call this StackScripts - there are lots of examples and helper scripts on their site, but the scripts are really very basic). It's perhaps easier than learning a DSL as it's just codifying the same commands you would run via ssh by hand. You can also clone nodes so you could set one up in a known good state and clone that each time.

This does tie you to linode, so long term one of the other options available would be worth looking in to.
Education is for pussies
Weekly Digest 3 - The most interesting links from .NET community
Software engineers earn a multiple of the median wage, but not an order of magnitude more. The jobs our work displaces are order of magnitude material. If anything, compared to the value we create, we're grossly underpaid. I think this is due to the inability of employers to see us as fundamentally different from the workers our automation displaces. The perception remains (and i've seen this first hand) that developers are replaceable, and this means that there are limits to how much you're considered entitled to.
Why is weev getting relatively no support?

EFF circa 2013 is a large institution. It does good, but it isn't at all focused on defending people in "boring" cases, which was kind of its original mission (Steve Jackson Games).

There isn't an organization in the tech community which defends people from computer related crimes on bogus but boring grounds the way the ACLU does for pure, conventional free speech.

I think that would be a useful organization; even if a defendant is a racist troll, he deserves a competent defense, and computer crimes are still complex and novel enough that normal legal defense is probably not ideal. Unfortunately I'm not (yet) in a position to fund something like that.
This article is terrible. There is no "rape", no "rapist", and no "survivor" until a trial has been conducted. Until then, there is only an "accuser" and an "accused". The article also links to a report that only 54% of rapes are reported to the police. Until there has been a trial, there is no way to know if there has been a rape. What they mean is that 54% of people who claim rape do not report it to the police. I don't know they know that even.
Someone close to me has paranoid schizophrenia, undiagnosed.
Your response is a bit disingenuous in that you ignore the further modifications of the Militia Act that I obliquely referred to and which updated it to reflect the evolution of the country. If the purpose was to divert the discussion into the minutiae of the US Code and Common Law of 1792 I am capable of having that conversation but it is not relevant.

You did not invalidate my point -- all able males of a certain age are definitionally members of the militia in 2013 -- which was my purpose because it answered a specific question of the parent. That definition has a long history. The evolution of the Militia Act is both irrelevant and uninteresting in this context.
Deja vu - this was just on HN 48 hours ago.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5301688

7zip does it in a fraction of the time within 100 bytes

92629 bytes jquery-1.9.1.min.js
31783 bytes 7z.exe -mx9 -tgzip a "jquery-1.9.1.min.js.gz" "jquery-1.9.1.min.js"
31688 bytes zopfli.exe -v --i1000 "jquery-1.9.1.min.js"

BTW if you need a windows binary, mingw compiles it without any trouble.
On linode, which he is using, there is one built in - they allow shell scripts to run on first boot which could replay his commands as they are without many changes:

http://www.linode.com/stackscripts/
Web Intents, the Web equivalent of Android intents. It would certainly help to solve this issue.
2222 is a dumb choice as an alternative port, it's both obvious and quite commonly used. I'm using a port on 4XXXX-range that's normally not used for anything and therefore not scanned by the bots unless all the 65536 ports are. The automated login attempts disappeared almost immediately, except for a few that were quickly blocked.

Now the logs are clean from automated login bots, the only thing left are real dedicated hacking attempts that is worth pursuing further.
You know what else people confuse? That Go interfaces are just like abstract base classes! :P

I think you are confused by abstract base classes in Java. In C++, which has multiple inheritance, a class can inherit from multiple classes. An abstract without implemented methods behave like an interface, it specifies what deriving classes should implement. The largest difference is in implementation: in C++ a base class pointer is just that and methods will be looked up via the vtable, in Go the interface-typed 'pointer' is actually a type pointer - instance pointer tuple (which is ugly, because it clouds nils). And in Go you do not have to specify the interfaces being implemented explicitly. Some see that as an advantage, others as a disadvantage (since a struct + functions can accidentally implement an interface, while not implementing the intended semantics).

I am utterly baffled. Go's approach to packaging is literally the best tool of its class that I've ever used.

No version management. Fun for hobby projects, a nightmare for large mission critical programs.

This is a vast understatement. Just green threads? And please, tell me, what other mainstream language supports green threads? I know Haskell and Erlang do.

Many languages have green thread implementations (Ruby 1.8, Python, etc.). But there is a varying amount of multiplexing to native threads and some implementations are hampered by global interpreter locks, etc. In fact, even old Java versions implemented green threads, but they were replaced by native threads.
Anyone starting to use S.E.C. XBRL data feeds in FinTech environment?
What I think is scarier though is thinking about
what happens if the unemployment rate hits say 20%
and starts moving towards 30%.

That is already the case in some countries (even some western ones, like Spain: 26.1% as of December 2012).
Likewise, if you make it to the Bay Area, beers are on me. I'll even make you some homemade borscht - one web security Russian to another. :)
Don't talk to police, either, according to this law school professor: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wXkI4t7nuc
Note also that there's the possibility of community treatment orders.

We don't have that option. And I'm really torn on this one.

And let's not forget that people with mental illness are far more likely to be the victims of violent crime, not the perpetrator.

Absolutely.
Python threads are only useful if you use C modules that handle the GIL correctly and I/O bound stuff from the standard library, it gives no speed boost for python code
I use "adduser" instead of "useradd". Its more convinient as it does the remainings steps automatically for your. It comes with ubuntu by default. Any downsides?
This stems back to parallelism vs. concurrency. Yes, it is true that your Python threads will not run in parallel but they will run concurrently. If you're curious about parallelism vs. concurrency, here is a great talk by Rob Pike on the subject: http://vimeo.com/49718712
Is there a benefit of using ufw instead of iptables?
I am new to this. I don't allow ssh logins password based.

The hackers fail according to sshd but logwatch lists a list of chinese and russian attempts.

I was hoping my firewall would block them. I tried entering a block of ips but some of the same ones are connecting.

I don't know what this means:

Illegal users from:
undef: 20 times
183.60.177.246: 7 times
217.14.134.68: 7 times
219.149.30.170: 6 times
I worked / am working on something that Tyler discusses in his follow-up article.

It's called http://trackpile.com and it allows easy sharing from Spotify to Rdio, and vice versa.

Would love if you guys could check it out!
Try 7zip's gzip output in "ultra" profile (mx9) - it's within 1% of zopfli and a fraction of the time to compress.
The first two things I prefer to do after I log in for the first time (on ubuntu):

> ufw enable
> ufw default deny

This way, after I log in, I will not allow anyone else to connect to my machine (I've had instances when by the time I changed my root password "bad guys" had already tried to connect to my machine).

Of course after I do the server setup (which is usually a script that will change ssh ports, install packages, etc) I will allow other services in ufw.
I feel sorry for Quinn Norton an innocent bystander in all this. It seems everything she did including talking to the prosecutors she did what she honestly thought was the best thing to do. She did need to protect herself and her daughter. Her life was thrown upside-down during those months she was involved in this case, unfairly.
Nobody says it now. Nobody has said it at any point in the past, either. But here we are, all as busy as ever.

I look forward to seeing your data, but looking at historical workforce participation rates and average wealth suggests that the singularity has not quite happened yet.
"Space Jam" Website Still Online
Last I heard they were getting sued for like $15 billion by one of the Big 5, guess the cat's out of the bag.
Many languages explicitly allow you to use Unicode even in variable names. Your issue was a limitation of the language, though I can see the issue with using the name in a compression algorithm that has the potential to be used in many languages that might not deal with the non-ASCII characters all that well.
I work at NASA / JPL (but I'm not part of the MSL team, or any flight software team). We learn a good bit about good flight practices though. Here's what probably happened:

Someone found the problem as a behavioral anomaly or weird status bits. It gets reviewed and escalated a few times until the important people know. For class-A missions (I think lower classes too), we have performed fault analysis on each component (and the system as a whole), so that we can match an observed behavior to the actual underlying issue through something like a flowchart. I don't know for sure, but it was probably a bit harder for a bit-flip, but I wouldn't be surprised if they had provisions for that too. However, these high-profile projects are extremely risk-adverse, so they'll review any non-standard commands heavily before transmitting them. teams (plural) probably reviewed this failure before confirming the initial conclusion.

The week was accounting for this through analysis and review process.

(my opinion is my own, and doesn't represent NASA or JPL)
Wealth Distribution Fallacy
What the OP doesn't get is that there are tons of other industries that have distorted and glamorous brands attached to them. Many smart, ambitious people set out to become doctors, bankers and lawyers because they can make good money, work on interesting challenges and be respected at cocktail parities. Sure they have lots of downsides too, but the benefits are more emphasized.

If some of those smart ambitious people became programmers because they got to see the benefits (financial or otherwise) of being a developer, that would not be a bad thing.
http://sloblog.io/~ujovlado/MIJExiD2mfE/php-hasn-t-reached-i...
I was wondering about this the other day, is

PasswordAuthentication no

really that necessary if a strong password is used?

Honestly, being a private key screw-up away from never being able to log in again scares me a little.
Yellow Cab's brandname has survived.

In any case, I thought Uber's 'difference' was the professional black car/limo drivers. Judging by this page, they're now signing up randoms who are behind on the payments on their 09 Hyundai. As a former driver, that's a huge leap in my mind.
Microsoft owes Denmark $1B in taxes
"Player Piano, author Kurt Vonnegut's first novel, was published in 1952. It is a dystopia of automation, describing the dereliction it causes in the quality of life. The story takes place in a near-future society that is almost totally mechanized, eliminating the need for human laborers. This widespread mechanization creates conflict between the wealthy upper class -- the engineers and managers who keep society running -- and the lower class, whose skills and purpose in society have been replaced by machines."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Player_Piano_(novel)

I read the book as a young person and was convinced. Now, I'm not so convinced.

Technology automates and thereby destroys jobs, but there is always value-producing work to be done beyond the reach of technology. Unless disincentivized to do so, the displaced will seek out those jobs. That may mean a new economy where 45% of people are technology creators or maintainers, 45% of people are in the service or entertainment industries, and 10% are transitional.

But we are not going to see 95% unemployment (the Player Piano scenario IIRC) or anything near that, ever. If there's anything certain in life, it's that there's always more work to do.
Google translation: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=da&tl...
This is a tricky subject but I feel compelled to point out that it's not so simple. If I hadn't talked to the USAO when I received a proffer letter in 2006, I might have been in Aaron's position trying to defend myself at trial for doing nothing wrong. Instead, the U.S. Attorney (a different one) decided to drop the issue (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/13/technology/13secure.html).

I don't know if there's really a lesson to be learned from the story other than to be very careful when it comes to doing anything that might be even remotely perceived as "hacking" because the justice system is incredibly broken. You don't get to choose your prosecutor.
BlackBerry infrastructure in India set for takeover by govt
What would be nice is a library that you can load with LD_Preload and replaces zlib compression. That way I could easily use e.g. Optipng with this new algorithm.
We'll never get to 95% of the population not working so long as more profits can be extracted by having more people than 5% working.

You don't work now because you /must/ for humanity to survive. You work now because someone wants to get richer and you're helping them.
Service and entertainment?

We need, what, a 1000 musicians, about the same number of actors and supporters to produce all the tv and music we have time to hear or watch.

They are already starting to make robots that can make burgers, call centers have robots, etc.

So 45% of the population have to be employed as dog walkers, massage terapists and nurses?

Seems unlikely to me.
It's easier to get started with UFW, and you don't need to learn much about networking to be able to setup your firewall. I haven't checked this out (I prefer iptables and never actually UFW), but it's said UFW is a front-end to configure iptables.
The singularity isn't profitable. The end-game for humans (distributed consciousness without death) is too equal all around to ever become a reality so long as greed rules us.
there are many free sites with music, i try to use them as long as their around , http://cloud-vibe.com
Silicon Valley is high on innovation. And pot
If not for performance, why would anybody use it? Scalability?
And its Celeron chip.
so, an alternate example
1. speaking english will give people advantages
2. learning a new language may quite well introduce you to new ways of thinking
3. so you'd prefer that not everyone had the opportunity to learn english, regardless of the individual benefit to them, in order to maintain the kind of society you want to be in.
Demonstrating tidal: programming breaks with Haskell
As an Irish person I find the widespread use of the Irish tax code for the purpose of tax avoidance by multinationals deeply embarrassing. This has made the country something of a pariah among EU tax authorities without conferring any discernible benefit to the Irish economy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Irish_arrangement
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdism
I would agree that some software engineers are underpaid. However, it is not legally enforced in the US unlike many countries, it is more of a statistical phenomenon. Many software engineers grossly underestimate the other costs associated with their efforts, which I state as a software engineer by trade with P&L responsibility. Most software engineers find pay that is at the level of their value to a first approximation.

The reality is that "developers" are replaceable, it is not just a perception. And by "developer" I mean developers that have a few years of experience under their belt but no real differentiating skills. This is an important distinction; I've met developers in their 40s with no differentiating skills despite decades of work history and developers fresh out of school that could materially differentiate themselves from ordinary developers. It is an important distinction. Developers with interesting skills are a lot less replaceable.

To be honest, I don't need any "developers" in the generic sense. My company does not hire them. We hire people with material skills that (1) we need and (2) are not widely available in the pool of people that call themselves "developers". I literally can't use the rest no matter how the conversation is framed. We pay well above the median wage for the developers we do hire because we know we are hiring them for their unique and valuable skill set. We absolutely pay for talent but have no interest in average talent.
I would argue that we're mostly there already.
We can be picky, but with good reason as security is an exact science and a costly one to get wrong. There's so much conflicting and out right bad advice posted online these days that sometimes it takes a picky community to help clarify the best practices.

For what it's worth, some of the advice given in that article was worth mentioning (eg fail2ban, it's a great tool). But the shared account suggestion was the complete opposite of how you should be managing user accounts as you lose audit trails. And for that comment alone, I'd recommend people read that article with a degree of scepticism before rushing onto any boxes they might administrate.

That article has generated a lot of good discussion though. So even if just indirectly, it's been a valuable contribution to HN.
Their goal should be 10h of battery life for this year's model, which would be easily achieved by increasing its tiny battery. Unfortunately, I think they will have other priorities with it, which means they'll have to keep the battery tiny again to cut costs and be able to use the other stuff they plan for it.

If I were to build the next Chromebook, I'd put 802.11ac Wi-fi in it, increase battery life to 10h, use a quad core 2 Ghz Cortex A15 chip, and probably leave the resolution the same for this year (so it doesn't nullify the 50% bigger battery I'd use), but use a higher quality IPS panel. And probably try to increase the quality of the build, too, a bit, as long as it costs me as much as they did last year. I think all of those are doable for this year's $250 Chromebook.
A friend of mine sent me a link to Copy and told me to sign up for it and that "it's like Dropbox." I just clicked his link to check it out and the first thing your website did was ask for permission to use desktop notifications (Safari/OS X). Of course, not even knowing what the website is I promptly rejected the prompt and then closed the tab.

My complaint with this is that why in the world would I blindly let a random website have extended permissions, before I even know what the website is?

Afte I got over it some hours later, I went back to copy.com to check it out and I found nothing in your website that would make me want to switch from Dropbox (for ease of use) or Spideroak (for encryption and security). One of the comments here said exactly what I'm thinking: I have no idea who you guys are, why I should trust you with my data, and that you'll even be around after a year.

From reading some comments here, apparently you're part of Barracuda Networks (no idea who this is, so it doesn't help) and some other snarky comments like "check out humans.txt" or "look at the html code and you'll see Facebook IDs…" No, no I'm not going to waste my time doing this.
...45% of people are in the service or entertainment industries...

70% of the US economy is service industry already.
I wish I could retweet that, but no such thing here. :)

I'm not affiliated with the asker but I'd like to thank everyone too, this is encouraging--I'm 23. I've been regretting my youth lately because I don't feel that I'm a good programmer at my age. I learned HTML, CSS, and JavaScript when I was 12 or 13 by tinkering with my Friendster profile layout. But there's not really a hacker culture where I come from, so while the passion has always been there, it wasn't cultivated as I grew older.
It's a trade-off to some extent. You can have more automation and less customization, less automation and more customization, or somewhere in between. A lot of existing tools for dealing with CRUD apps address a particular set of needs somewhere along that line.
We learned something pretty useful at the bird sanctuary: "Quiet birds have ears".
Automation makes human labor more efficient. Efficiency of a resource doesn't reduce its consumption; it increases it. That's the Jevons paradox: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox

And yes, it does apply to labor. That's why the cotton gin made slavery worse, not better.
This is a repost.
here's one more usecase which is probably very common: When you use python as glue to call other programs which can run asynchronously. As an example I've used python once to implement a parallelized genetic algorithm where the evaluation function was a matlab program. It was quite a breeze to spawn hundreds of such threads over ssh using one PC as the controller - if only I hadn't shocked the local sysadmins ;-).
I've to agree with title. however it is the same with science. everybody had had it but not everybody will find a job in it. So what' s wrong with introducing coding to a wider public?
I/O bound stuff from the standard library

still for performance
That's never the case. Any decent colo facility has some way for you to reboot in single user mode and remote in to that, IP KVM is one such tool.
Thanks for the clarification. I think I get the theory a bit better now.

I'm still struggling with seeing some practical examples of those differences.

for example, `apt-get` is pretty much idempotent already, no? if I run `apt-get install -y <package>` x 1000 times in a loop it won't install it 1000 times...

Fabric does give you the building blocks for those kind of checks elsewhere, such as `exists`, `contains`, `append` (which is supposed to also be idempotent) etc... I've designed my deployment / bootstrap scripts with fabric to take this into account. It does add a little overhead, but nothing that makes me feel I need a better tool... Maybe my deployment base is still relatively small and homogeneous.

So it's true that I have to put in those checks myself, and that I don't have a very easy way to discover what state a server is at.

I'll try to take another stab at one of those tools. Maybe things will sink in when I actually use them. Thanks again for explaining.
It's not as silly when you have stuff like this already happening http://money.cnn.com/2012/12/03/news/economy/record-corporat...

Companies, and in turn, powerful individuals are getting richer and richer while unemployment rises and wages grow less quickly than inflation.