skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
>> Just no. Some abstractions are light years faster than not having them. To the point that this is a silly statement. Consider the elementary abstraction of an array. The slightly less elementary one of a map.

Abstractions can definitely be an improvident in some cases. They just bring extra complexity at it's cost. In the 'map' case you pointed out, you now need to take into account the performance characteristics of an array, one or more hash functions and linked lists in their specific configuration.

Even though the lookup of a hashmap is supposed to be O(1), you now have to run a hash function for every lookup. That's bound to be slower than the simple integer addition we were doing before on the flat array.

Besides that, if it's a bad hash function (or if the data is bad), performance will easily go down to O(n).

>> So, no, just because there are layers of abstractions does not automatically mean things are going to be slow.

That's not what I'm saying is it? I'm making the point that it'll be slow/er/ because of the overhead of the abstraction. I didn't say "less productive" or "every abstraction is bad", I'm point out that each extra layer comes at a cost and that the extra cost gets buried the more layers you add.

I'm not going to go into the source control argument because I'm talking runtime application performance and mental overhead, not developer performance.
I wish HNers got half as upset about pay walled research papers as they do about movies. If your time has no value you can get any film for free, and that will never be stopped. If you are openly profiting from someone else's IP you will get smacked down, until the apocalypse comes, which some would welcome in exchange for free movies.
I'm a sucker for cryptic T-shirts, sold!
That might be more of an issue with Techstars than being a solo founder (I've been through Techstars as a solo founder. I'm also a YC alum).

Techstars has lots of talks, sessions, and pitch practice. YC has almost none of that - one dinner a week, otherwise, a complete focus on product and customers.
Screw Traffic – Show Me The Money
Kind of weird that no consensus have emerged for multiplication (·, ×, *, or horizontal juxtaposition) or division (÷, /, or vertical juxtaposition with horizontal line between) yet.
Here you go: https://coderwall.com/p/zwftfa
Erlang is big and complicated compared to Go. It's not easy, and besides it is functional (not easy) which already makes it unusable by 90% of people.
TortoiseHg developer here (i.e. I'm probably biased, take my comments with a grain of salt, yada, yada, yada...).

We discussed this a bit on the last mercurial sprint.

In jest, someone said that a lot of git users have what they'd call a "Helsinki syndrome". Probably that is not very far from the mark.

I think that what git brings in functionality is good enough (specially compared to non DVCSs) to make people want to use it and put the effort to understand it. On the other hand it is hard enough to use that when people finally manage to wrap their heads around it they are so proud that they must tell everybody about it.

It is actually quite brilliant if you think about it: Make a SW that does something really well, better than most other similar tools, but wrap it in a horrible UI to keep your users on their toes and make them proud that they are able to use it! This starts an incredible self-congratulatory feedback effect which gives notoriety to your tool.

If you add to that the fact that git was created by one of the most famous hackers of all time, plus the creation of GitHub, and then you get the perfect storm to make git the open-source tool of choice.

Mercurial on the other hand is just as useful (if not more) than git, but it is just not as hard to use. People use it, like it, but they do not need to feel proud about it. It is just easy. There is no need to talk about database details, reflogs, etc. There is no need to blog about it. It just works. This should be great and make mercurial the better tool but it has the perverse effect of not making it cool to talk about it. There is no challenge, there is no achievement in learning how to use mercurial. This makes it hard to get the same sort of buzz that you get from a tool such as git.

In my opinion it is a little surprising that such a knowledgeable bunch such as the Hacker News readers and the open source contributors in general are not able to evaluate both tools just in their technical merits and instead follow the buzz. Understandable, but surprising nonetheless.
You assume the entertainment industry is smart.
I'd love to be able to use this an en embedded or API based thing. (For money, obviously...) It would work really well inside something I've been working on - it's basically a supercharged version of what I'd planned on building in-house. Love it.
"I'm not going to claim that there are no legitimate reasons to hire people who are narrow experts in Blub (and only Blub), but I'm having a hard time thinking of any."

Blub is a very useful tool but has a bunch of quite esoteric gotcha's that an expert will be able to avoid due to long experience.

Expert has used almost all of the Blub framework over the years, including the more popular third-party addons and already knows what's best and fastest in a variety of situations without having to think about it much.

"A truly good programmer will pick up your language/framework in days, and be at full productivity in months, even from scratch. It's hard to do better than that."

Yeah, but then HR won't be able to tick off the 'Blub expert' box and, well, nobody would ever get hired! Or something...
Thanks for the comment - we just fixed this. We're a Finnish company and for some reason this page refused to read the proper language file for those two parts (the text was Finnish).

Mt = megatavu = megabyte in English. Finnish 101 :)
just as you could hook up a pen to a plotting machine ( http://www.niklasroy.com/project/149/cardboard_plotter ) and use it as a printer, you could hook this up to (e.g. lego mindstorms, arduino, whatever) and implement a 3D printer.

Arguably, humans are also (rather overspec'd) plotting machines.
Metal implants are routine, and usually the "best of the alternatives" in implant design. The body generally tries to isolate metal implants, making them mostly inert, although this does depend a bit on which metal.

The main problems with metal implants are that the can shed ions that accumulate in some people, and that wear particles can cause psuedo-tumors. This is mainly a problem with metal-on-metal joint surfaces (ie in knee or hip replacements). Some more info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hip_replacement#Risks_and_compl...

And 3D printed, titanium implants have already been made over a year ago http://news.cnet.com/8301-11386_3-57372095-76/3d-printer-pro... http://www.designnews.com/document.asp?doc_id=230500&dfp...

I actually would have thought that titanium would be the go-to for orthopeadic plates in the skull. I would have thought plastics aren't stiff enough and ceramics too brittle.
The / is actually the - from the other symbol and the .'s are placeholders for the numbers to the left and the right of the / so those are in fact pretty close.
The first video glimpse of a Google-Motorola collaboration
« During the trial period, you cannot change firewall configuration. »

Please allow us to add in/out rules !
Strength Training 101
"Sometimes I felt that knowing Pointer arithmetic and tricks are some sort of chess-thumping that old programmers tend to do. (My background is system programming so I know how pointer works)."

Or the best, easiest and clearest way to do things... Sure you can write confusing crap with pointers, but they are very useful.
Site's down for me too, but on the Google cached version I found the donation link and the download info got quickly emailed back to me automatically despite the error message after checkout: http://100yss.fetchapp.com/sell/eireeghu
There's an article over on slashdot to do with the security model.

http://news.slashdot.org/story/13/03/09/0757245/how-the-firs...

Basically, this is a very big move for Bitcoin. Once investment banks have access to Bitcoins they can decide whether they see it as a potential revenue stream both for FX and prop trading.

It would take just one announcement from a large investment organisation to see the Bitcoin price rally.
Here is a more realistic attempt at improving the airplane experience for economy class passengers: http://www.jamesdysonaward.org/Projects/Project.aspx?ID=2634...

This is a design concept submitted to for the 2012 James Dyson Awards. Unfortunately this design takes up more floorspace than the existing cabin layout, so they would need to iterate on the design before an airline will consider it.
Top 100 Video-on-Demand (VOD) Services
That is true, but isn't it only revealing the problem that correct interpretation is not conveyed, not causing it? If it wasn't possible to reply, the same people would still hold the misinterpretation, but then the author wouldn't see it.

Communication is hard.
Announcing AMI Copy for Amazon EC2
No deal, I clicked the link excited wanting to finally show off my love of HN to my co-workers and was faced with a strange orange bar with a gray bottom. What? What are you trying to say with this? Watsi suffers for your decision. I would have bought two of them if it had actually said HN or Hacker News or anything more identifying than a bar with two colors.
Shigeru Miyamoto On Nintendo's Innovative Past And Optimistic Future
To enable the firewall - we ask users to deposit the 10 euro minimum to the account. This releases the limitations as a free server with no pre-configured firewall rules could increase abuse on the network substantially.

We hope this isn't too much of an inconvenience.

Thanks!
Thank you! I’ve tried it and it looks very good! Simple and lightweight. Can help to get things done
Nicholas Felton's 2012 Annual Report is out
Much appreciated - and if you like to reach me personally, you can e-mail me at antti.vilpponen@upcloud.com. :)
> Btw. Google App Engine is currently "giving away" 1000$ for startups if you register through some affiliate.

What's this now? I'd like some details, did they start a BizSpark like program?
http://research.google.com/pubs/papers.html
Mac / Windows downloads only, but here's some tips from WINEHQ about running your favorite visual hallucinogens on Linux: http://wiki.winehq.org/ScreenSavers

(*Note: I could not get this one to work in wine, crashes right away..)
Remote root exec on TP Link
While I wasn't cured after a 'short course of treatment' I started to get better from near-suicidal point when I started getting treatment. I had anxiety problems after that, but kept on at it.

It took me a good 5 years to deal with all of my emotional baggage, and from that I now have the skills to deal with shit, and to better perceive and handle my emotional state. I am now 100% depression free for almost 4 years now, and I have been able to completely cope with much worse situations than initially caused me to get depressed.

This stuff just takes time.
Lego Paper Plane Folding Machine
The CAN[1] bus used in OBD is a broadcast protocol. So the dongle can just stop sending messages to appear inert to engine control unit.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controller_Area_Network
yes, totally agree, from my basic knowledge of understanding.
Physics masterclass: available free online for six months.
The agent-based simulation is probably much more CPU expensive than the statistical model in older SimCitys, which might also have informed the size limit.
thanks for the info, in Brazil you don't hear a lot about bitcoins so I didn't know about this "Limited amount" thing and that is a REALLY important info.
United States Transitions To A 'First-Inventor-To-File' Patent System
I had a problem with registration. My last name was treated as invalid value, so I went with ASCII version (without diactric). Same letter seems to work fine in first name, but to be consistent I used there only ASCII letters too in the end.
Live on Forever...
True, though language design can have implications on how fast things can be implemented.
The word "plastic" in plastic surgery refers to plasticity - the ability of an object to be reshaped or reformed.
If this would available localized for Germany, I would buy it.
Available Jobs (mostly Netherlands/from jacquesm)
Interesting. Good luck with the service!
Where can we read more about it? What technology are you using? Are you using any of the popular cloud platforms (openstack, cloudstack, opennebula etc)?
For many people, the bus/train is the better experience. It takes less time during rush hour, and you can read/nap/work during the ride. I imagine that private plane slots at an airport have a fairly limited availability, so if they become popular you'll have congestion issues too.
Which is addition. Without the carry.
From UpCloud's AUP: Intentional or careless use of the Services in excess of a typically expected server load, such as continuosly high CPU or I/O use rate.

Does this mean that uses cases like ZenCoder (video encoding "in the cloud") would not be allowed on UpCloud, since they would max out the CPU?
So: turn up early, be nice, ask?

Gotcha.
Thanks for the feedback!

Even though our control panel describes the backups as server dependant, backups are in their technical sense separate storage entities.

The downside is that our control panel doesn't currently allow the creation of new instances from backups (but you can naturally clone running or stopped instances - which many of our customers do). You can circumvent this through our API for the time being, which allows backups to be cloned to regular disks through the clone storage -function. We're adding this functionality to our control panel soon though.
I Second that. Be good to meet up with some like minded souls.
Thanks Nux! We're really excited :) Our technology is home grown, there's a lot of information on our site regarding the decisions we have made.

You can find the information here: http://en.upcloud.com/features
You don't hear a lot about Bitcoins anywhere except the Internet, as far as I know ;)

One of the best sources is the Bitcoin wiki, particularly the FAQ[1] and Myths[2] pages.

[1]: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/FAQ

[2]: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Myths
I really like that one - was considering purchasing it for a project. Granted, you guys modified it quite a bit. I'm also looking into close.io for my sales. : )
It would be very unwise to make flying more attractive as long as the planes are injecting fossil CO2 straight into the upper atmosphere. This makes the emissions 2-4x more potent greenhouse gases than CO2 emitted from the ground.

We should be in a hurry to implement disincentives for air travel.
I don't really understand who benefits from this change? Doesn't everyone lose?
Beat the Best: An Anecdote
John C. Dvorak is a professional troll.
I'm pretty sure the USPTO and Patent Attorneys win, given that it'll encourage more people to file patents, and sooner rather than later.

Not sure of the impact on innovation, but my gut instinct isn't good.
You guys spoke, we listened - A brand new Bitspend website is live
Thanks to you guys we received tons of positive and constructive criticism. We're proud to say we listened, and acted!

We hope our new site is more up to all of your standards :)

Thank You,
The Bitspend Team
How does this compare to lisp, where you can break straight into editing code, inspecting variables, etc, and then continue?
This seems to be something Clojure really lacks, but I never see it explicitly stated in 'why you should use Clojure' articles, nor in Clojure books. What I want to read is a sober 'pros and cons of using Clojure' article, so I can properly judge whether I should switch.
Absolutely. Even if you're a blub grandmaster, you really ought to know a dozen other things fairly well.
Snap, me too. It's a great course run by Dan Grossman (who pops up on HN occasionally).

I signed up to learn functional programming and have learnt a lot.
After reading the article, I got fixated on why you were dividing time by space... finishing the sentence, I realized that wasn't what you were trying to say at all. :-)
Out of curiosity, what kind of protection does the system offer against companies in certain markets patenting against potential innovations in these markets by inventors?
Flip.io - An open HTML5 word puzzle game
Is that an antonov?
I've put together a few very quick tests I carried out after the last story on here about Upcloud, you can see them here if you don't want to go through the hassle to just run some perf tests:

http://www.ewanleith.com/blog/1228/upcloud-cloud-iaas-perfor...

I think it's an interesting approach that they're taking, but they'll need to build out more services like load balancing, DNS, hosted databases and so on, before they can make a significant impact as a cloud service provider.
Thanks for the question! ZenCoder and other resource intensive cases are what our service was built for.

The item in the UAP is there by our lawyers to make sure we can take steps to prevent abuse on the infrastructure by others (and thus possibly hurting others' performance).

So please run ZenCoder on our platform and do let us know how it compares to others :)
So, using their extremely scientific method, did anyone else experience increased site traffic, or sales? I'm sure we can link other industries who deliver digital goods(software) so the closing of a digital locker site. Correlation === Causation; the pinnacle of statistical research!
Those startups should move to Milwaukee where there are great clean coworking spaces like The Hudson (http://hudson-business-lounge.com/), and fun startup communities like Startup Milwaukee (http://startupmke.org/)
There can be if a secret is on the same page as text under the attacker's control. The attacker can run a hidden JavaScript reload attack on the page, the fiddle with the text under their control until compression is maximized.
What looks confusing has a lot of science and math backing it up. The procedure is known as yield management (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yield_management#Airlines) and the idea behind it is selling as many seats on a plane as expensively as possible. Since nothing is going stale quicker then unsold airline seat when the doors close they rather sell you a seat for 200$ instead of asking 2K and having an unsold seat.

In a nutshell: An airplane cabin is segmented into a number of classes. There can be a dozen, or even more classes, even though you only see economy, business and maybe first.

Each class gets allocated a number of seats and the actual booking class can have more, or less restrictions attached to it (for example: refunding, or changing the ticket, mandatory Saturday night stay, minimum duration of stay, etc).

The more flexibility you require the more expensive the ticket becomes.

Even though it looks very confusing from a passenger perspective and prices can fluctuate on an hourly basis, depending on the number of seats available for a specific sub class, the concept makes a lot of sense from an airline's perspective.
Yeah it is a fundamental part of the model. The limit is something like 21 million BTC ever. The reward from mining diminishes over time, halving every so often so that it will take quite a while to get to the 21 million.

To BTC enthusiasts, this fixed supply is a major positive point as 'nobody can dilute my money!', but to others (like me) the idea of a currency with a fixed supply seems wrong.
The more of the global economy BTC comes to represent the higher the value of each BTC, assuring that so long as it is used it will rise in value. This creates a big disincentive to spend and pretty much kills any idea of lending. What's more it concentrates wealth in the hands of people who put in a comparatively small effort a long time ago and now hold BTC, compared to those producing economic output now, meaning that if it became common currency we'd end up with even more extreme division of wealth than we see now.

Note that I don't necessarily agree with the 'assumption' that BTC will collapse, that some people use to justify calling it a Ponzi or Pump'n'Dump scheme, but I do think it would be a terrible choice of primary currency for the reasons I've given.
The number of applications consisting of just ideas, that haven't been implemented, tested, or tried, is going to sky rocket. And who can afford to file so many patents? The "big" established guys. Things just got worse.
Well, there are a lot of people who love Make: magazine. I've seen other comments that it's the best part of O'Reilly, which we lost when we spun it out in December :-) So tastes may differ.

I don't know about your Railsconf issue. Please send more details.
Everybody uses juxtaposition for multiplication (or dot when some separation is required) and horizontal line for division.

* and / are poor man's substitutes when all you have is ASCII.

× is used for vector products, Cartesian products and products of algebraic structures in general.

The only place I've ever seen × or ÷ being used in arithmetics was primary school. No idea why they use them.
Japan to drill for controversial 'fire ice'
Why Backend as a Service – BaaS cannot be ignored for developing Apps
An interesting dilemma. You're targeting a market that either isn't very sophisticated (uses Google Docs for text editing) or can't afford/won't pay for the tools for the job.

If people could send Microsoft Word documents for suggestions, possibly from Office 365 and/or SkyDrive, that might appeal to the pro/business audience that would pay for the service. However, they probably wouldn't use it because of the problems with privacy, confidentiality and copyright protection.
I don't see anything in the HN guidelines against advertising. Why flag instead of ignore?
Not being the biggest fan of Google anymore, I got somehow saddened when I first read the news.

But after a second thought, I can understand why he did it and if I were in his shoes I would do the same.

I don't think it has to do anything with money. For a connectionist, it is a dream to have access to the massive amount of CPUs that Google has. Take that and add all the incredible and smart people that Google has in its team and then you would see his decision was a no-brainer. I feel very happy for him.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the Haskell concurrency model is a very efficient one which is also based on lightweight threads. Moreover, is CSP is all you care about, you might want to have a look at CHP.
I'd rather transition to a system where if two people try to file for the same thing within a few months or a year of each other, neither one gets it because it's probably pretty obvious.
Amuse - ZSH Theme
Just to clarify, since some people (not necessarily you) confuse this: first-to-file does not mean prior art doesn't count. If you publish something, it can stil be used to invalidate a patent or application.

First-to-file just means that if two people apply for a patent, there's no possibility for the second to challenge the first with an interference proceeding[1] to attempt to prove using non-published evidence that you actually invented first.

[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interference_proceedings
A previous thread answers this question:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5211221
Doing Business On A Handshake
Nice. From a technical point of view, I wonder, is this written using the same HTML/CSS/JavaScript code used in the browser, say using something like PhoneGap? Or did they they rewrite the entire app all-over again for iOS, Android and Windows Phone?

Seems like a pretty daunting task to keep their site, their iOS, their Android and their Windows Phone app all in sync with functionality and UI.

Any Trello developers care to share the secret?
Thanks for letting us know - if you can't sign-in or activate your account for this reason, please contact our support to solve the issue. You can e-mail them here: support@upcloud.com.