skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
If his are like mine it can be more like minutes. You get some immediate light and then over the next minute or two it gets to full brightness. This is probably due to cheap bulbs or what not but it can be annoying.

I even have a problem with CFLs in a different room where on occasion I turn the switch on and the light won't come on at all right away unless the other switch that controls a different set of lights is on already. It's pretty bizarre. It's not a big enough deal to spend the money on finding an electrician for something this small but it is strange.
No. The correct move was to install Ubuntu, which had the correct drivers. Point being that all software has issues. More so if the software is as complicated as an OS with two releases per year.
I too have stopped getting angry with agents; there's no payoff in being a jerk. But I have also stopped pretending like they are powerless victims. E.g., "That's a shame that they won't let you really help anybody. Have you thought about finding a job working for better people?"

Propping up a bad system means you are complicit. Especially when part of the way you prop up the system is by keeping people being harmed away from the people ordering the harm.
You "don't think you've thought your position through" despite me predicting the complaint you made and pre-including an acknowledgement of the problem?

The fact is -- contrary to your claims, compatible with mine -- raising prices does both. It slants things towards people who value it more in dollars. People get a higher score for this both by valuing WWDC more and by valuing dollars less. That is better than random.

Next time leave out the meta discussion insults.

Note also that, "if demand exceeds supply, raise prices" is basic economics and standard advice on HN for many other things. e.g. if you're a freelancer with too many people trying to hire you, patio11 would say to raise prices.

you would not then reply saying he didn't think things through because all that is going to accomplish is having price-insensitive clients rather than good clients.

EDIT and how many people go to WWDC as a hobby? how many are really price insensitive? a lot of them, even if they have money, want to get business value exceeding the ticket price, or they will not go. filtering by who can get the most business value by attending would not please certain people with certain egalitarian mindsets, but would still actually be way better than random.

lots of people look price insensitive because the business value for them attending is $25,000 or whatever -- far more than the ticket price. but that isn't actually price insensitivity and it's a good thing to use a system that makes sure those people get to attend.
My theme probably doesn't work super-well on mobile. Sorry in advance for that. I haven't put much effort into theming this blog yet.
Senior backend hacker at 500friends
Is that really the typical CFL number? I ask because I've got one of the new Cree bulbs and I find the quality of light really a lot better than that of the (admittedly cheap) CFLs I've bought at Costco.

So I guess I'm struggling with the significance of CRI.
The whole story smacks of a PR stunt to me.

My guess is he's really looking for a job. Or testing the hack-ability of ycombinator (and non-researched news aggregators in general).
Show HN: Pitching YC on Saturday - What do you think of our about page?
Show HN: Social Crawlytics API
Namecoin isn't ICANN. You install the software and whenever your machine does a lookup for the .bit TLD it uses their lookup system instead of sending it to the DNS resolver.
Combine Coveralls and Codeship to track your code coverage
Huge fan of DiffBot and awesome projects like this. Really cool analysis, thanks for posting.

Would be possible for you to post / send me the original data? I have been very interested in working on more longitudinal analysis using DiffBot data and this seems like a fun and interesting place to start. I'm happy to open-source / clearly attribute DiffBot's contribution to whatever I find / hack together, and would feel a lot more comfortable about integrating DiffBot into larger projects in the future.

Please email me (in my profile) if this is a possibility. Thanks!
While that is a perfectly reasonable solution to the minimal example I provided, there may be reasons to abstract away the concept.

Personally, I like having some sort of structure in memory that allows me to access and query contextual information. It's amazingly useful if you are trying to link a variety of different elements. In fact it's practically unavoidable if you are writing highly dynamic code. Trying to manage this sort of system with a few variables and functions would become a nightmare.

In fact, those dynamic situations are where comments describing layout are absolutely critical. In these situations you may be using your class as a generalization, and tracking the full extent of this sort of interaction could take a ridiculous amount of time.
I thought this was going to be a post about customer development, where the issue is not generally the formatting of the questions, but asking the wrong questions in the first place, or misinterpreting the answers.

Surveys can be a useful tool, but nothing replaces a real conversation. Even asking more open ended questions in an email or survey form can give you so much more information than radio button answers (and unless you're a huge company, it's not too hard to read a few hundred open-ended responses).

Along those lines, I'll share a snippet from patio11's Microconf presentation last year (posted on HN yesterday), regarding interpreting the responses you get to a more open-ended conversation:

"If you’re solving a problem people actually have, they will say at this point, 'Shut up and take my money.' If someone says, 'That’s kind of interesting, tell me when that exists,' you have not successfully identified a problem that people actually have."

You don't get that kind of insight from radio buttons.
The article says that probability of a restaurant being sold out at peak hours changes by 20 percent, not number of people.
In my opinion, when a company does this to you, you should leave. Immediately.

This is a problem and we need to look for solutions. Why should I continue to support a company that doesn't care? Wouldn't you rather pay a little more and have decent customer service? Usually this means you support local merchants.

Recently I purchased a plasma TV locally, and paid tax! Crazy, I know! But when it's time for service, I know the company will stand behind it. We need to stand behind these companies.

EDIT: Free plug to the retailer: Abt Electronics :)
I personally like semicolons. It's similar in spirit to the period of English. Even languages which didn't traditionally have the period have adopted it in the last couple of centuries.

More practically, it seems to remove a class of errors. Semicolons are optional in Javascript and I've seen posts here about subtle errors that can creep in when you change code a little carelessly.

And even more practically, it allows you to type "one liners" into things like REPLs even if they aren't one liners.

Just my two cents.
So you know, the API was designed to be simple and easy to get started with. We try to accommodate the most used methods, though if there's something you feel should be added, please let us know!

Our API is stateless, meaning there's no sessions or cookies to manage, you just need to supply your account token and key with each API request you make.

Happy hacking!
FinCEN's raison d'être is to choke out entrepeneurialsm in all financial areas: banking, money transfer, etc. But they're like the mentally ill nephew of the OECD's Financial Action Task Force...
> The first bits of bad code set a precedent and make subsequent developers feel less bad about using poor code themselves.

This is really just another manifestation of the "Broken windows theory"[1], which I've witnessed in code many times over. I think it's just a fact of human nature, also similar to the "When in Rome..." adage; it doesn't make you feel nearly as dirty to do something awful (whether it's in code or in a run-down urban environment) when there's already lots of problems to begin with.

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory
Its a mixed bag here. People wanted faster/cheaper product they got it in terms of cost cutting measures to the bottom line. Customer Service isn't something a profit driven company wants to do, its something they have to do to retain users. The idea of talking to a person seems enough for some people as they can vent their frustration at a CSR but I never felt that was good enough; when I did it it felt criminal.

But then you have companies that go out of their way to help you. They have the power to bend the rules and when its in your favor it can be an extremely rewarding experience as a customer. I'll always toot Valve's horn because of this. I placed an order and paid extra not to have DHL shipping to Canada (I've had too many bad experiences to count). Valve shipped it DHL anyway so I emailed customer service explaining my displeasure. They asked that I refuse the package when it arrives and they'll have the order correctly shipped with UPS as I instructed.

Not only did they ship my UPS order before the DHL had arrived and been subsequently rejected, they refunded my entire purchase. I'm a sworn customer now and more likely to overlook problems with Steam or busy season mishaps because they do things that keep their customers. Pleasant side effects for them? I'm on HN shooting free advertising (as if they need it here).

I'm always willing to pay more or deal with longer delays for local product now. My friends still scour the web to try and find the cheapest deal on the car stereo equipment or PC part but I keep it local. Sure I spent $40 more but I didn't deal with a kicked in box and the returns department. I didn't deal with foreign timezones and odd business hours to get a return receipt. Sure it was cheaper cash wise but my secure sound of mind is worth more than a few pennies. Always go with the underdog if they're capable of the services you are after. They need to please the customer to stay afloat unlike big box chains who don't have any obligation to you because there's someone standing behind you to buy the item you'll pass up if you don't follow their rules.
The CEO gave an interview this February

http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/report/loosecubes-pioneer-ri...

> A large part of that reported $7.8 million never actually came through. McKellar says that the investor syndicate, led by New Enterprise Associates, stopped funding the company. Faced with the decision of whether to operate on a severely amputated budget or to close down, she opted for the latter
Have they gotten rid of Unity yet? No?

Pass.
So you spam favorite twitter too? You know you are breaking twitters tos just like the op and degrading the value of twitter the same way an email spammer degrades email?
They do this in Central America and I've always found it comforting, except when it's been a long flight and I can't find my ticket.
Even if I want more light, one single high-output bulb is a bad way to do it. Spreading the light out over more sources gives a much more even, ambient-like illumination.
Announcing underscore-contrib
SHARED: A New Shared Work-Space in SoMa
The modern UK is essentially a police state.
There's a lot of cultural disagreement within the first world. Check out UK libel law, the official secrets act, etc.
The Real Danger of Copying Music (It’s Not What You Think)
There is tons of research like this. There are multiple conferences dedicated to research like this (e.g.: http://www.program-comprehension.org/ ). You just need to go out and find it instead of waiting for it to appear on Hacker News.
OP here. Well, first off I should say that there are many sides to a platform. The blog post was meant to give an overview of what today's social apps have in common, and how things could and should be done better. You'll hear a lot more about it in the coming weeks.

The list there is just an overview of what sets our platform apart from everything else out there, and what makes our team excited to work on it for the past 2 years. We believe we're making a difference. And the size of our user base lets us really test if we're right, and iterate until we hit our goals.

If you want to learn more about our business strategy and what our long term roadmap looks like, get in touch with us, or follow us. We are not yet at the stage where we are inviting other developers to build on our platform. We are building it out for ourselves and our users.

That said, you're correct. These are valid concerns and you can only learn about these kinds of things as the platform gets opened up and policies get put in place. Pay attention to the incentive structure of the platforms you are building on, and you will have answers as valid as ones the platform developers themselves can tell you. The short and simplistic answer to your question is that, IF everything goes as we plan, in a few years this will be a completely decentralized social network (think Wordpress of social networks), that does right by its users and developers.
Proof-of-work systems have nothing to do with the "meaningfullness" of the actual work being done. The work just has to be difficult. Hashcash existed long before bitcoin, so your last sentence is incorrect. In fact, Bitcoin is itself based on Hashcash, and the idea of using POW as a means of exchange also predates bitcoin. See this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof-of-work_system#Reusable_p...
So if my tube of ping-pong balls is infinitely long, am I sending my signal infinitely fast?
Getting back to the topic at hand, we should also acknowledge the most self-evident drawback of using modular art: the fact that resused art can become repetitive. This leads to what we commonly refer to as “art fatigue”. The median play time of Skyrim on Steam has peaked at well over 100 hours, which is a huge compliment . With that kind of time spent, however, players are bound to notice the same rock or farmhouse or tapestry used again and again. And another two dozen times after. Art fatigue sets in where this repetition becomes obvious and erodes the authenticity of the world.

It wasn't art fatigue that annoyed me. I don't care about seeing the same tapestry or window over and over.

What annoyed me was that after playing for ~10 hours, I started to recognize the entirety of sections (chunks) of levels that were reused. When you're in a cave, and the cave takes a turn to the right and immediately descends down to a rock bridge over a stream - just like the ten caves before it - it kills replayability. For a game that is supposed to reward exploration, designing levels in that manner seems like an odd design choice. It's probably why I played for ~40 hours and then gave up before even finishing the game.

I understand the challenges of scope and the need to find an efficient system to design the world and its levels. But they should have gone with a level randomization similar to Diablo 2. That game also reused art assets, but levels never became repetitive because, except for very specific parts, they were truly random all the time.
SpotOn.it: the anti-productive “predictive intelligence” service
> I dislike the consistent color across dimming. The whole point of dimming lights is to lower the color temperature.

To each his own, but it's funny, I _love_ this about the LED lights. It has been a pet peeve of mine pretty much forever that I cannot get the low level of light I want out of dimmed incandescents because the light becomes unbearably orange when turned down that low.
This is too bad... I remember seeing this article some time ago, and now I actually clicked thinking that now would be a good time for me to read it in full. Too late!
The fast inverse square root trick is clever, but this is right on. It's bypassing the provided interface for FP operations and mucking around with implementation details. That's not to say that that's a bad thing, or that floating point numbers aren't a leaky abstraction, or that the real world doesn't demand this sort of optimization from time to time. But it's still true.
I don't have any citations. It's not a hard rule and doesn't apply everywhere, but I feel like it would be somewhat applicable in this situation. It's just a thing that I've concluded as a result of my own experiences with selling digital media (games and music). Piracy did indeed spread awareness of my music and game, although it's hard to say if caused any lost revenue.

I supposed some fraction of pirates would have instead paid for the media had they not been able to pirate it, but there would also be a fraction of paying customers who would not have heard about the media had their peers not pirated it. It's hard to tell if these two populations are roughly equal in size, but I have a hunch that the second group is larger. This is based on our sales data following our involvement in the Humble Bundle: http://hitboxteam.com/dustforce-sales-figures

If you look at the third chart, you can see that after the Humble Bundle spikes, the blue line starts to have an upward slope, whereas it was almost flat before. This indicates that sales on Steam increased after the Bundle finished, due to the huge influx of new players (many who only paid a penny). It seems that the more people playing the game, the more copies you will sell, because more awareness is raised. There are a lot of factors involved in that that don't let me conclusively say that this effect extends to pirates too, but it seems reasonable. Since I can't do anything about piracy, I don't let it bother me too much and just focus on making things worth buying. It's just a part of the business, so it's factored into it all.
Regexp engine with parsing, Thompson NFA (polynomial time) in 76 lines of Python
Is C# better than Java or are they just different?
I've heard C# described as what Java was meant to be. But Java is the single most dominant programming language according to things like the Tiobe index. Is it fair to compare them or are they apple and oranges?
Was under the impression that if a changing magnetic field induces a current in a wire then running current through a wire will produce a changing magnetic field around it, but apparently is not the case, it produces a static magnetic field.
Power existing where capital pools is exactly what capitalism is. What did you expect?
Yep, and it has the same cable news echo-chamber effect of creating self-fulfilling prophecies off weak fundamentals.
Reminds me of my experiences with JetBlue. After every successful flight, they would send me a survey. After every bad flight (and there have been a few very bad ones), no survey.
Doesn't Ubuntu insert amazon affiliate links into your search results while Mint doesn't, or was that removed? Or does Mint just do it as well?
Function Space received lots of love and feedback on HN. Here are some updates
First of all, thanks for the overwhelming response. There were lots of suggestions and nearly all of them have been implemented.

1. Responsive design - Enjoy FS on your mobile and tablets!
2. No Sign-up required
3. Pretty, Google-friendly URL's
4. Social Sharing
5. Option to edit and delete opinions
6. Live Preview

Coming weeks will see lots of new features! Stay tuned! - http://functionspace.org :)
Agreed. You can be penny-wise but dollar-stupid.

Many times, these "bargains" you scour the internet for usually cost more in the end. For the few times it doesn't, oh well.
That depends -- the energy wasted by illumination needs to be cooled away (if you live in a climate where cooling is necessary, obviously), which not only uses energy but also increases the necessary size of the HVAC unit needed. This can be significant in places with a lot of lights so more applies to offices than residences.

OTOH, if you live in a climate where heating is necessary, and even more if you heat with electric heat, there's obviously little gain to be had by switching to LEDs.
Title needs an Oxford comma. (I first read "Strikingly" as a comment on how surprising it was that Buildzoom and Bitnami were leading.)
Because you're still working, you get 8-9 hours a day off from being responsible for the immediate care of the baby. Your wife probably feels like she gets zero hours off. Is she eager to get back to work or just to get out of the house and get a few hours off? Could you work from home a few days a week or drop down to 30 hours a week so she could have some time to feel like a professional more than a mom? You're both really stressed and your lives have changed a lot, but hers has changed more than yours, at least for now. Can you leave the baby with her grandparents and go away for a weekend?

I agree that a bit of formula is going to be fine for the baby. The more important thing is a happy, loving set of parents who aren't resentful of the awesome thing they made. If the crying and not sleeping doesn't stop soon, it could be attributable to an allergy or food sensitivity. Your wife can either go on a super bland and shitty elimination diet, or you could talk to your doctor and see if formula exists for super allergic kids and just try him on that for a few weeks and see if it gets better. Food allergies are really common nowadays, and it's an easy thing to fix.
Like amazon on Facebook to reach 10.000 likes
Single Page Applications for Dummies
Top 5 Cloud Myths of 2013 (Infographic)
I would be interested to see how you hooked up Ember Data to Parse.
Is it correct to assume that CRI stands for color rendering index? New term to me. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_rendering_index
Another one is putting someone on hold when you already know the answer as if you need to check with someone else to get approval. That tends to put some friction that prevents to much time from being wasted. Another use is if someone wants a discount. If you agree to quickly they can think it was to easy and might wonder if there is money on the table.

Do this many times in negotiation as well typically. Even if you know you will sell (or buy) at a certain price you can't agree to quickly.

(Once again all this depends on your product, who you are selling to and what you are trying to achieve.)
This was asked on HN more than a year ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3177815
1: You are just like me!
For anyone interested in the art and science of surveys/customer interviews, I found this book to be quite helpful: http://www.amazon.com/Asking-Questions-Definitive-Questionna... It's written for sociology/anthropology students, but the principles are equally applicable in product conversations. It's filled with lots of best practices for designing questions, interview flows, surveys, and other customer tools. There's actually a lot of mistakes that can be made without realizing and this book helps prevent many of them. e.g. switching up types of questions from yes/no, to scales, to free response to prevent answers based on momentum.
Twitter actually has an entire team dedicated to killing spam.

Their actually doing a pretty good job for the amount of spam they actually have to deal with. Once they figure out that people have started to use favorites to spam, they'll start killing those kind of spammers too.
I like the topic, but I have no idea where to start on these books. Can anyone recommend one or two sources that would be good entry points for learning this kind of stuff?
It's probably a big difference in quality depending on what you get. Most of our CFLs have lasted so long we've physically broken more of them while moving to a new house than have given up in use.
You don't have to be a jerk, but you can certainly voice your issues in the calls - they're recorded for 'quality control purposes'.
From Poverty To CEO Of A World-Class Startup: A Hero's Journey