skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Ask HN: Is there a bias against hackers from 'name-brand' colleges?
Hackers are some of the most meritocratic and egalitarian people I know, but sometimes I sense a sort of backlash against our peers who went to so-called 'name-brand' colleges by those, like the vast majority of us, who went to non-luxury colleges. Do you see this as well in your workplace? If so, please discuss reasons you think this might be happening. How much differently do you treat people based on where they went to college? Thanks!
Right now Google Docs is an invaluable tool for me to collaborate with remote people and teams. It often reduces the need for screensharing software (We all have the same Doc up on our screens, getting editing and updates in realtime).

If your tool could have integration with Google Docs, it'd be awesome. From something as small as "associated Google Docs," or something more complex like XML feeds or Google Doc widgets that spit data from your tool into Google Spreadsheets (Google Spreadsheets can be constantly updated from outside data sources.)
Ah, if only people knew that #2 and #7 happen all the time with Windows.

Anyway, why I wish I liked OSX so I could quit Linux: laptop support. I have a ThinkPad T60, and every now and then I google for ThinkPad T60 Linux and scan through the adventure stories. Occasionally someone declares "success" and claims to be happily using Linux on their ThinkPad (with kernel patches and lots of tweaks and configuration,) but if you read the details, there's always something that doesn't work, usually suspend. Either the feature doesn't work at all, or it requires manual intervention every time you use it, or it causes instability. After being disappointed yet again, I try to wait at least a few months before I google again.

Anyway, that's why I wish I liked OSX: because I still run Windows on all my laptops and don't see any way out except to buy a laptop with commercial Linux support from Dell (Ubuntu) or Lenovo (SUSE, gack -- I use Debian/Ubuntu everywhere else and don't feel like relearning RPM) or Emperor Linux (expensive, woof.) I don't like the idea of being dependent on support, though. Whatever Novell does to get ThinkPads working under SUSE, they must not be releasing it to the community, since people still have trouble. Same thing with Emperor Linux. I don't know if Dell is any better.
Milton Glaser: Ten Things I Have Learned
Don't let the title fool you. This isn't a shitty top 10 list.
"Bootstrap + very profitable".

But that's depending on your definition of "very profitable". I make more money than I did as an employee at my last job.

But it also happens to be a services company. The services company funds the product company. More info:
http://smartfulstudios.com
There's jealousy sometimes, but ultimately if you've got skill commensurate (or better) with the name brand of your degree, it's not a problem at all. Most people are cool. If you're an arrogant ass, you'll get treated like one. If you got hired by management based on your school, but you can't code very well, people will look down on you.

Actually, the broader backlash by far seems to be from some self-taught hackers against people who've gone to school for computer science. There seems to be this idea out there that a computer science program is worthless for becoming a good hacker. For crappy programs, this is true. For great ones, it couldn't be further from the truth.

Anyway, do expect some people to try to test you though and embarrass you if they can. Of course, those people probably would have tried no matter where you went to school.
I think it should be noted that Webkit is a fork of KHTML. I think they still cross-pollinate code though I can't say for sure.
He says new tools make Sarbanes Oaxley cheaper to comply with. This is the first that I have heard. Somehow I dont think it means cheap or easy.
What is TheFunded Founder Institute?
Thanks for the feedback. This is something we have in the roadmap. Especially since we support Google Apps sign in and Contacts integration. Right now a link to a Google Docs or Spreadsheet can be added in a comment, but you are right, deeper integration would be awesome. Thanks again for the tip.
Also worth noting was once we made it through the 'first round' I sent an email asking some questions and got no reply...
To $0.99 or not to $0.99, that is the App Store question
Which is funny because (as I recall) the initial developer of java itself started the project after getting frustrated with how difficult it was to implement macro expansion for c. It seems things have finally come full circle yielding the best of both worlds.
Procedural City Generation - Developer's Log
People are very critical of Jeff because it's very easy to be critical of him. Not that it's necessarily justifiable; it's just that "everyone else is doing it". It's kind of like the old maxim about how nobody every got fired for going with IBM / Microsoft.

He's done some good things, and some stupid things; I think a lot of people have probably gotten started reading up online on their own because of Coding Horror, and anything that gets the 9-to-5 set doing some extracurricular reading can't be all bad.
Follow the "next" link under the title bar to go to the next parts. It's a blog so there isn't (currently) a unified page to submit.
There's about a billion password managers out there, that pick secure passwords and remember them for you.
thanks for the quick reply! i'm curious about your statement about "skill commensurate with the name brand of your degree" ... does that imply that certain people are held to a higher standard due to where they went to college? that seems unfair both to those people (who have unreasonably elevated expectations) and to everyone else (who have lowered expectations since they don't have a name-brand diploma). if 2 people are in the same position at the same company receiving the same pay (working as peers), shouldn't others expect something similar from them regardless of their degrees?
Hopefully I know enough about a co-worker's skills to form a good opinion of them before I find out what college they went to. If you bring it up in our first conversation, I'm going to wonder why.

On the other hand, if you went to grad school, research is such a small world that this kind of thing comes up more often - I might ask who your advisor was, etc, to find out whether we have friends in common. It's less about skills.
I actually attended the talk on YQL at Barcamp Portland and it seems really powerful.

You are basically able to use Yahoo's cloud servers and huge internet pipe for free with this service.
does that imply that certain people are held to a higher standard [with unreasonably elevated expectations] due to where they went to college?

In my experience it's true. Do I think it's unfair? Probably exactly as unfair as giving preference to someone during the hiring process because of where they went to school. Equal and opposite "unfairness." :)
1. Entertaining but often wrong in subtle ways that could confuse a novice programmer. As an example see his opinion the need to know C.

2. Yes, much better then experts exchange.

3. He does that often, make mistakes and then boldly admit to them. The last one I remember was his article on password salting. Yes, that's good but then again what choice does he have, you can't erase your past from the internet.

That being said, this particular entry is a tease to the NEXT entry where we might learn something valuable about security.

I'd prefer if we saw many, many fewer coding horror articles here because I do believe the interests of his fans and those of elite hackers are mutually exclusive.
Prolog in Haskell
A long, poorly written article that says a lot of contractors use a 2080 hour year as the basis for rates, instead of a 2087 hour year, which would account for leap years. It's just not a realistic statement anymore, given that most people I work with aren't paid on an hourly basis. Not to mention that the cost of the changes to the accounting systems would likely be greater than the cost reduction, which would then be put back into the rates as overhead.
Given you've already fixed it with max-width I can't test this, but CSS 3 can also help out. The benefit of this approach is that the container can remain liquid:

white-space: pre-wrap; /* css-3 */
white-space: -moz-pre-wrap !important; /* Mozilla, since 1999 */
white-space: -pre-wrap; /* Opera 4-6 */
white-space: -o-pre-wrap; /* Opera 7 */
word-wrap: break-word; /* Internet Explorer 5.5+ */

You can read about this approach here: http://users.tkk.fi/tkarvine/pre-wrap-css3-mozilla-opera-ie....
"But Google failed to judge how its offering would be received, as it has often done in Japan."

That bit isn't expanded on. How else has Google "mis-stepped" in Japan?
Do you prefer your iPhone to be thicker?
PHP libmemcached via memcached and igbinary
Researchers work on website credibility tests
"Mass account creation - Ok, they got me on this one."

Yes, they did have you on that one. Thanks for playing.
I like: 6. style is not to be trusted
"Hackers are some of the most meritocratic and egalitarian people I know..."

Maybe you need to meet some new hackers.

I have never seen this. Ever.

30 years. 90 companies. 1,000,000 lines of code.

Maybe it's just because people who know me know better than to bother with details instead of issues.

Your "pedigree" is a detail. Your work is an issue. Don't waste your time with those who don't know the difference.
CRM for tracking web customers?
Any one have suggestions for a very light weight CRM system for tracking your web customers, e.g. logging e-mail conversations, sending mass e-mails, etc.
Sigh, yes I am of course aware of the speed limitations. I agree, Moore's law will probably work well for mobile phone-sized devices.

The point is still that "traditional" computer UIs don't work on a phone sized screen; the XP applications (you talked about originally) just needs to be rewritten. Which would take away much of the advantage of getting XP on them.

I read enough reviews of the early Win mobiles that I won't even want to try. But maybe a head mounted display/EyeTap could work for full-sized apps?

(I guess I should run this through a spelling checker, but I won't bother, since you say you don't want to pick at typos...)
There is a difference between those early dependence and Twitter. Twitter is still young, it's uncertain, and worst it's future is really unpredictable because it doesn't even have a business model to generate revenue yet.

Building on top of a business is sensible when you are depending on something that's been there for a while, know it's dependable and have a reputation. This twitter does not have.

If the same service as Twitter was provided by Google, Amazon or even Microsoft, you know it's backed by something solid.
Unix To PowerShell - Basename
So, now he's pimping his stocks, just like everyone else. Sad.
There is a difference between depending on Google and depending on Twitter.

Google is a multi faceted business, they have a good revenue model, have money, and are a proven company. Depending on them isn't crazy.

What's crazy is depending on Twitter, it's new, still have no solid revenue model to make money and sustain, in simple it's a single egg in the basket.
His premise that the further down the list the closer you are to a problem doesn't apply to all problems. I'm not closer to the problem of Global Warming that the President - probably the opposite.
Find the Date When a Web Page was First Published on the Internet
There are discussions on the same topic going on in many governments right now, examining the rules to make sure that open source software can compete on equal footing. That's fair. Let the best solution win.

I'm surprised that a member of the European Union could write such a non-competitive policy.
Grove Says Patent System May Have Same Flaws as Derivatives
Reggy: Interactive regular expression matching for OS X
Loopholes. You can win by finding loopholes. Children's stories are full of it - it's a basic part of being human. But no one likes a cheater.

But it might be worth it, for what you win - if the end justifies the means. It can also introduce a new, and better, concept of what the rules should be. I'm a big fan of winning through superior understanding, instead of superior resources. Brains not brawn.

Fantastic article. I didn't pick up that military strategy from watching "Laurence of Arabia".
If people are automatically going to organize themselves into small groups, you don't have a disambiguation problem. Make the email address unique, not the username.
I guess you didn't see much of the GoGaRuCo sewage flow last week, eh?
The title is misleading, what Watkins is alluding to is that they want to shrink the hard drive so they can increase screen and battery size.

My problem with the iPods has always been that their hard drive size is so large that you can't listen to all the music you have. This wasn't so much a problem with the classic, however with the shuffle (which is aimed at playlists) it's appalling.

I'm consistently impressed by Sony's Walkman line of mp3 players, due to their huge battery life (45 hours on their current line). The thing that tops all is the fast recharge speed of their mp3 players, simply put 3 minutes of charge equals 3 hours of use. I still have one of their walkman's (from the previous line) and it still works perfectly. The devices are simply amazing for anyone who travels, I rarely see a power adapter for 30-40 hours when I'm traveling and an iPod never cuts it (I have a classic). The thing is relegated to a couple hours of video before being dunked into a bag and switched up for a Sony that lets me listen to music for the entire trip.
If no browsers tried to compete, we'd all still be using IE6.
Report: Apple building a Kindle competitor
Customers are not always right, but they’re never wrong
RIM managed to grab the smartphone market where it counts. it grabbed up the enterprise share and is consistently developing and nurturing that market and retaining that share.

iPhone has cut into this market with its support for exchange etc, but all of its marketing has been geared towards the consumer market.

Android is the odd man out, providing ZERO enterprise support and development AND not bothering to market at all.
Like I said: risk and reward. From the article it's clear that Twitter was a big benefit to his company. It became the #2 referrer after Google. Given the network effect inherent in Twitter, I bet it would become #1 over time.

That's why he's so upset that Twitter cut him off.

So, yes, building on Twitter is riskier. Building on Facebook is riskier. But as distribution channels they have huge upside.

If the risk is too high don't build and wait for the channels to become more mature.
A brand name helps in getting job interviews and it helps open doors. Backlash is very uncommon, unless you are a jerk.
I think it's a good start, and I like the layout.

The easiest thing for you to blog about will be your current problems and interests as they're related to software.

If you post things like that, without worrying too much about whether the posts are "interesting," at the very least your blog will stand as a personal journal of your progress that you can refer back to it yourself.

I have a blog, and I refer back to it all the time. Do I have a large readership? No.

In your other post an HNer suggested you blog in your native language, which I take it is Arabic. If you're interested in increasing readership, this isn't a bad idea - there are many fewer Arabic language development blogs than there are English. By choosing English, you're "competing" with the thousands of English blogs out there.

So maybe, blog in both languages? It can't hurt. Good luck!
An S-Corp is actually worse from the VC standpoint than an LLC, b/c S-Corps don't require incorporation (DBA's can apply for and receive S-Corp status). This means it's easier to take the money and run.

Some VCs prefer LLCs because it gives them the risk-minimizing benefits of a corporation, while at the same time giving them a hand in managing the business (a la partnership form).
HOWEVER, many VCs, especially the smaller ones, are unfamiliar with LLC law, and avoid it b/c they don't know about it. Some VCs prefer S-Corp because it ideally gives them access to the founders' personal assets, but in practice, a bankruptcy court will try very hard to deny this benefit.
Yes, I contacted their bizdev email alias back in November. I got no response.
In the Q&A after his Harvard presentation last month Stephen said he would not crowdsource Wolfram Alpha. In short the reason he gave is that crowdsourcing is unreliable. Stephen used as an example the problems of Wikipedia where rogue interests and non-experts manipulate results. He only wants great curators of knowledge to sign off on the inputs. That way when you search for something on Wolfram Alpha you can expect near certainty in the results.

The ontology of Wolfram Alpha is involved. Those professional researchers in Champaign who understand how to talk to Wolfram Alpha are not getting their data from simple Google searches and then citing their sources. This is a complex process even for simple data points. If Wolfram Alpha has a need for Mechanical Turk it would be to catch mistakes or maybe do information triage - but Stephen made clear he doesn't want quasi experts going anywhere near the research department.
I think he even had a post about how passphrase is better than a password. But I may be mistaken and I am just to lazy at the moment to search for it :(
First a GUI Desktop, then Network, then Open Source Software. What is the next big thing in popular computing?

Because it may high time start learning the next big thing, now that OSS became mainstream.
I got yer privacy right here, pal
"I'm surprised that a member of the European Union could write such a non-competitive policy."

You're shitting me right? Over two years ago an EU commission actually stated that switching to open source could offer considerable savings to organizations with little effect on their business. They mentioned there might be a short-term cost increase, but the savings would easily account for it in the long run.

So you're surprised that two years after that announcement, the Hungarian government is following the EU's backing of open source. Are you truly that uninformed about Europe? Because that was huge news a couple years ago.
You are right that that is a big difference, but I wasn't trying to compare these technologies based on their runtimes - I was attempting to compare them based on the type of application they attempt to produce. I wanted to make this a very simplistic list without going down the slippery slope of explaining too much about each technology (as there is a LOT about each technology to explain). The way I see it, these are two different approaches to creating a desktop-like RIA, but the end goal is the same.
Lithium-ion battery makers anticipate billions in clean-energy subsidies
He did interview a college coach: Rick Pitino. From what is said in the article, the press worked there, too.
Fair point - I changed the name in the article (though can't edit it here). I wasn't really sure what to call the post, but I'd say it's a bit more than a list =).
what can i say, it wasn't working quite right for me without it.
It's a good question, but tough to answer because its impossible to generalize the behavior of "hackers".

That said, I have heard of backlash against 'name-brand' colleges at a startup, but it was, interestingly, not by hackers but by business dev. people.

I think at the end of the day, you're a jerk if you judge a person by their college. And you're a jerk if you think going to a good college actually means you're inherently more capable than other folks.
In truth, it is far better to tell yourself that you are succeeding because of your effort than because of your talent: http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/

You can get skill from effort, but not the other way around.
Actual title: Looking to Big-Screen E-Readers to Help Save the Daily Press.

I found interesting the suggestion that a subscription model may work better on the Kindle, because of the expectation to pay for content vs laptops and the web where the expectation is free.
For any given form of an AI test, you can wrap another layer of indirection. The beauty of the Turing test is in it's simplicity and almost zen-like clarity.

In comparison, this "test" feels like an over-architected clunky mess.
Colored Rubber Mulch
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Social networking for terrorists
Rubberecycle
Rubberecyle manufactures a unique granule rubber product that consumers love. Produced from 100% recycled tires, Rubberecycle's rubber mulch is safe, economical, and environment friendly.
The context in which normal users need to use the command line, is roughly equivalent to when Windows users would need to edit the registry or do something equally abstruse.

On my (admittedly fairly limited) experience of getting others to sue Linux, completely naive users are fine provided initial installation and configuration are done for them, but users who have learnt a lot about Windows (i.e. a lot that is specific to Windows) find the transition harder.
I'd imagine the more technically inclined students already know ways around this.. My first thought would be to install vmware or similar.. run the schools OS with monitoring software in one VM, run your OS with internet access in the other. Problem solved, and no need to hack at the software they use.

Assuming it was anything like my school, the walls are solid enough that you would end up needing an access point in each room.. don't want students to have internet access? Just shut the AP off.
Blackberry Curve outsells iPhone in Q1
I predicted it!

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=264246
The point is still that "traditional" computer UIs don't work on a phone sized screen; the XP applications (you talked about originally) just needs to be rewritten. Which would take away much of the advantage of getting XP on them.

Ah, now I understand what you're saying. Yes, some apps need 17" screens; but most don't. Many older apps were designed with small screens in mind (an extreme example is VGA). And some don't use a UI at all such as compilers, TCP/IP implementations, databases - you might say they're pointless to have in an iPhone, but I think partly that's because an iPhone can't yet do them well. Having access to all that is part of the value of a platform. I think the few apps that would need to be rewritten are apps that you wouldn't want to use on a iPhone display anyway (or, you would plug the iPhone into a HD display when you wanted to use them - I do this with my eee PC).

But my counter to this still holds true: netbooks with tiny screens have been wildly successful with Windows XP. One solution the eee PC uses is to scroll across a larger area (iPhone does this too). It's awkward, but it works. However, it's very uncommon to have to do it (in my experience). It's still a minus, and you wouldn't want to run photoshop on it.

Another solution is finer resolution - so that the device size remains small. Of course, you need good eye-sight.

But the obvious solution is projectors. There's already a couple of handheld ones (I think maybe one's in a phone?). Resolution and battery life are issues; I don't know how long they'll take to improve enough (batteries don't follow Moore's Law). Arguably, this would be a different category of device from a "phone" in terms of uses, so maybe it's not reasonable to compare.

Head-mounted display could work too, but it seems one of those very cool ideas known for a very long time but which don't seem to be popular even when we have the tech (like video conferencing).

BTW: A spellchecker wouldn't catch not vs. nut.