skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I am a bit confused by the article - because this is not mentioned at all - I am no history buff so happy to be corrected here:

But haven't there been wars to avoid that Nicaragua gets an own canal (afair even supported by the USA and later by the CIA. Eg their Civil War or before that the US occupation [1])

Back then mainly to avoid having such important routes in the hands of pro-communist states, later to keep their financial interest in Panama in check.

Wasn't the last state the the USA got the exclusive right to build such canal - basically just to allow nobody to do it.

How come that this isn't mentioned at all in the article?

(As said before all cited from vague history memory. Happy to get a correction/update on that.)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_occupation_of_Ni...
Of course, it's here: https://github.com/yaon/lottery

But even if you are familiar with the patterns we used and can guess the architecture, there will be a lot of unexplained code. I don't think you'll be able to extract a lot of knowledge of it.

Anyway, you should look for io_thread.rs (I think it's the most interesting file). Look how the scope are defined (especially the use and abuse of "{}"), the alternation of &self and &mut self and random methods put out of the implementation cause rustc would accept anything when they where inside.

You can also look at the mixed use of String and str which introduce a lot of chaos. And, last but not least, bonus points if you succeed to understand the why and the how of the explicits lifetimes we had to put.
I just did a test using std:: and old-fashioned char[]. The fancy std:: is fifteen times slower than the strcat(). In a loop with intensive string manipulation, this could cause the program to get back to you in 15 seconds instead of 1 second. You don't mind waiting?

Here's the code (Visual Studio 2010):

#include <string>
#include <time.h>

char buf[64], buf2[64];
clock_t start = clock();
for(i = 0; i < 100000; i++)
{ _snprintf(buf, sizeof(buf), "%d", i);
_snprintf(buf2, sizeof(buf2), "%d", i * i);
#if defined FAST
strcat(buf, buf2);
#else
std::string s1 = buf;
std::string s2 = buf2;
std::string s3 = s1 + s2;
#endif
}
_snprintf(buf, sizeof(buf), "%.4f\n", (float)(clock() - start) / (float)CLK_TCK);
OutputDebugString(buf);
John Hempton is pretty sure that Herbalife is not a pyramid, that people are buying that stuff to consume, not sell. Although his analysis depends on them acting at least somewhat rationally, there's certainly room on the market and potential enthusiasts, just look at Soylent.

http://brontecapital.blogspot.com/2014/08/for-kicks-just-how...
Now do one about either.

Given Java 8 and Optional, I recently used Either to replace 80 something lines of crazy interconnected try-catch-bullstuff in a server with 4 straight either-based lines, "do this, in good case try this, in good case try that, ... and finally send a good result to the client, or log a bad result and send the error to the client".

Had to rework and introduce some methods to make this work, of course, but those methods turned into try { foo = doWork(); return Either.goodResult( foo ); } catch ( Exception e ) { return Either.badResult(e); }. It's structured, and neat, and readable. :)
Modems work with T1 lines? Indirectly, sure, but if you can say that, you can say that about almost anything. Modems also work with long-haul microwaves and undersea fiber optics and satellite TWTAs too by that logic.

Try this instead: two modems with a length of flat satin cable plugged between them. ATA on one, ATX1D on the other (X1 to hopefully defeat dialtone detection). It worked with a generic 2400 bps modem and a Commodore 1670 perhaps 25 years ago. It should still work now.
Do you really feel like the Firefox UI is subpar?
There are definitely Amiga 2000s in the photos but most of the monitors have PC-style keyboards in front of them (look above the cursor keys - the Amiga one only has 2 keys (Del and Help) there rather than 6 and only 8 function keys, not 12). It's possible they're attached to Amiga 2000s with adapters but between that and what's on the monitors, I'm pretty sure most desks are primarily running DOS PCs.
""what happens if the diggers dig too deep and disturb the active volcanoes," says Bol"

Is digging disturbing volcanoes really a serious concern?
Mon dieu!

There IS a PINBALL.EX_ on the XP x64 cd, and it expands to a 64-bit executable.
You should be using `+=` to build strings incrementally in C++, not using `+` repeatedly.
It's amazing that Flytenow seems to think the FAA's position doesn't "answer ... questions" or is arbitrary.

The FAA's position seems quite clear and based on reasonable ideas, even from the letters Flytenow links to and then seems to wilfully misinterpret. Private pilots can't be compensated for flights. The exception is that, if the pilot and passengers have a common purpose, which doesn't seem to be "oh, we happen to want to go to the same city," then they can share expenses. Thus, if a pilot and some of her friends are sitting around and say "hey, it would be great to go see X," they can pool their money to do so. Nothing the FAA seems to say officially suggests that advertising for random strangers to go on a flight is acceptable, and quite a few articles Flytenow links to seem directly contradicted by the FAA's letters. It's not clear that posting on airport bulletin boards was ever really acceptable, but may have been disregarded in that it only really advertised to other pilots, with a clearer understanding of the risks.

These rules are based on far more vital safety issues than taxis, and, as you point out, the rules around carrying paying passengers are reasonable, unlike taxis. Uber and Lyft can at least argue that they are fighting an unfair system. Flytenow can't.

For that matter, their response, keeping the platform up but removing expense-sharing, seems blatantly in contempt of the letter, and it seems certain that they'll be punished, harshly. What possible reason would there be for a site where pilots can find "non-paying" passengers to tag along with them on flights, significantly increasing their own costs, unless the expectation is that pilots will use the site to find passengers who will pay under the table?
Wow, recruiting pitch at the top of the README. Someone make Adblock for Github.
Ask HN: Did anyone regret the move from engineer to manager?
I've read a lot about the "lowly status" of an engineer, and it's easy to imagine the grass is greener on the other side: management.

I'm looking for perspectives from engineers who have switched into management. Is life better now? Are there unanticipated cons of being in management? Should all engineers try to move towards management?

Thanks!
Sounds good, and I agree with the change. That said, something to convey "spying on you to keep you safe" has a nice Orwellian ring to it, which I feel this topic deserves. Just my two cents, that's all.
I guess it was just a matter of time. I would have really liked if Bezos actually wanted to have a nice, respectable newspaper without using it as a marketing platform for Amazon.
It's one thing to hyperlink words to affiliate links in their text, but it's completely different to force all their readers to read over "Buy it now" while they're trying to read the article. Talk about interrupting the flow of the article!

Also, how would you feel as a journalist if the investigative piece you'd spent the last three weeks on was ultimately riddled with "buy it now"s?
This is a great project because a lot of work has been put into finding solutions to many different edge cases, and it "just works".
They hint at US opposition in the article but they don't come out with all the history behind it...

"Some opponents of the canal worry that the financing will actually come from the Chinese government itself, which Richard Feinberg, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, describes as "the Chinese planting their flag right in the heart of the Western Hemisphere.""

NPR is a news outlet funded in part by the US government it isn't particularly surprising that they aren't going to delve into history that makes the US look bad.
(in case it changes, the current title given on HN for this is "Confirmation that the UK is a police state")

From wikipedia: "A police state is a state in which the government exercises rigid and repressive controls over the social, economic, and political life of the population."

This story in no way establishes that the UK is a police state. It does, I think, show that the police's pursuit of justice was more than a little contaminated by their bumbling idea of PR.

From the HN title, I'd have expected something more along the lines of:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/peteroborne/100279865/if-c...

or:

http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/07/deep-state-data...

or maybe:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/royal-family-...

or perhaps:

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/police-destroyed-lorry-...

or even:

http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2014/04/28/g4s-ride-to-the-d...

not to even mention:

http://www.amnesty.org.uk/press-releases/government-accused-...

just to pick some recent random examples, any of which might suggest to some that the UK is veering towards quasi-police-statehood.

But not a story showing that the police here try and play a story which is bound to attract huge publicity with some dubious image management in mind (though heaven knows what, exactly.)

(For anyone not following the recent UK news on child abuse allegations, it's certainly true that the police are in need of a bit of image management in regard to that issue, having apparently unreasonably curtailed several investigations into prominent alleged abusers; see, for example: http://ethicalalliance.org/united-kingdom-corruption-probe-i... which story now seems to have (ahem) disappeared from mirror.co.uk.)
So simple and yet fun to play. I was pleasantly surprised that arrow keys can be used instead of clicking.
Good to know. I always assumed that the NPR is one of the reputable media in the states.
function action(){
if($('#color-1').css('opacity') > $('#color-2').css('opacity')){
$('#color-1').trigger('click');
}else{
$('#color-2').trigger('click');
}
};

setInterval('action()',0);
Ironic that by then fax machines moved serial data faster across phone networks than the 1541 did over a 3' cable.
The blog post goes beyond discussing the ruling and explicitly discusses why they think their service falls outside the regulations for commercial operations.

You're right that I misunderstood the requirements for a commercial operation, but looking it over it still doesn't look particularly onerous.
if you extend probabilities into the domain of complex numbers, you basically get quantum mechanics

To me, the most fundamental question of quantum physics is this: Why not quaternions? As a mathematician, the distinguishing characteristic of C is that it is the algebraic closure of R; but I see no physical relevance to that.
Show HN: Put “GIF” in front of any YouTube URL and hit enter
The argument basically boil down to if you can't judge the individual (since everyone gets an A) then you have to judge the institution. This means the institution has an incentive to improve their reputation. The authors then make the leap in logic that institutions will try to raise their reputation by improving their education quality. Given that improving teaching quality is a hard problem, the much more likely approach that they would take is to improve the apparent teaching quality by investing in flashy things like new buildings and rock star academics. At least we now have a rational explanation for the recent activities of university management.
Seconded. I was really surprised to see that his proposed Cython talk didn't make it into PyCon. Maybe SciPy would be more receptive?
You seem to have reworded "Monsanto will sue you for your neighbor's pollen blowing into your field" into "Monsanto will sue you for accidents". We know they didn't sue him for using Roundup, because Roundup isn't controlled (rather, it's controlled in the normal way, by charging money for it). We know they didn't sue him for harvesting and replanting his own wheat, because, again, that's legal.
Nicaragua still has active and erupting volcanos and a lot of earthquakes.
This seems fairly straightforward, but I am not a lawyer.

The common carriage rule says a private pilot can't offer to fly people around for money. The exception to this rule is if the money is only defraying the cost of the flight.

The fact that Flytenow charges a fee for connecting pilot and passenger appears to put the system outside of the exception to the rule. The fee does not defray the cost of the flight.
Living in a world where the IRS will secretly leak your tax details to your political enemies* means I'd rather the centralized database not exist in the first place ... at least, not without massive effort to remove personally identifying information.

This is harder than it sounds. I believe Schneier had an article up showing how a person's lat-lon tracks alone makes them very easy to identify, if you already know things like where they live, where they work, etc.

* well, they did promise they really didn't do it, so I guess it's okay then, because they wouldn't lie about it ... and I also believe 7 hard drives or whatever can simultaneously accidentally break, when they just happen to be the ones containing evidence under Congressional subpoena.
Hey, why are you cheating? That's so rude for people playing normal.
This is really cool. And I hate to be that guy, especially so early. But wouldn't it be easier on both networking and cpu to convert it to a webm?
I think the least we can give in return to companies that open-source useful stuff like this is look the other way when they self-promote a little bit.
That was fantastic, thanks for sharing. Those susceptible to siezures should not try this.
Ask HN: Switched back to programming at age 35 after 7 years of management
I did 5 years enterprise java then 7 years project management. Now I'm a python/django developer at a hipster/startup company and feeling like I'm home.

Anyone else?
What will I do at 40?:)
> Also, how would you feel as a journalist if the investigative piece you'd spent the last three weeks on was ultimately riddled with "buy it now"s?

Note that this is in the Style section, and they may draw a line between "serious" reporting and entertainment reporting for the purposes of in-line ads.
A much better solution than 'sponsored' articles. Gives journalists the freedom to write freely without upsetting each individual sponsor. Change the buy it now links accordingly, amazon sells nearly everything.
I don't believe that's accurate:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NPR#Funding

Perhaps you were thinking of Voice of America, or the way it used to be funded 30-40 years ago?
Cant email a webm
Because this is "hacker"news and people here like to reverse engineer things! Also, great work with the game. It's really fun and quite an interesting mind game once it starts getting faster and faster. I agree with the mobile app sentiment... it would be a fun game to play on a commute. Great job!
No. NPR derives about 5% of their funding from US, federal, state, and local governments. Source:

http://www.npr.org/about-npr/178660742/public-radio-finances

NPR certainly has its own biases in reporting, but it is not solely funded by the US government and it is not a US government mouthpiece.
Don't do it! You'll be bored.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8187802
providing remote management of vehicles from state traffic management centers

This was the land of the free. I'd rather control my own steering wheel, acceleration and brakes, thank you very much.

Welcome to the future.
Barely any of NPR's funding is from the US government:

"While NPR does not receive any direct federal funding, it does receive a small number of competitive grants from CPB and federal agencies like the Department of Education and the Department of Commerce. This funding amounts to approximately 2% of NPR’s overall revenues."

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NPR
I always had this doubt. What to do with interesting original content that is not in English and don't have an official translation? Submit the original (not English) site? Submit an autotranslation?

The advantage of the first option is it preserves the original site name, and prevents dupes. The advantage of the second option is that most of the user here can read English and perhaps other language, but the common denominator is English.
> they may draw a line between "serious" reporting and entertainment reporting for the purposes of in-line ads

For now...
I'd like to believe that buy-it-now links are added independently from the editorial process. It's an easy rationalization to start editing articles to make them more commerce-friendly, and it's a great way to wreck quality journalism.
Absolutely! We actually made a webm version (that's the smallest size to date and the fastest to create), but just wanted to perfect GIF creation and get some captions on the system early before introducing webm.

Maybe we should reverse that?
Got to 938 points on my first go. Discovered you can also use left and right arrow keys, which is much more efficient and got me to 1566 on my second go. Thanks for the game
No, I just don't think it's unreasonable for it to be tracked what cars are using a road.
Delivery driver making $80k. Totally negates the value of a college degree. Embarrassing.
Might be, but in Python it is much easier to use and better integrated in the language basics.

Operator overloading is something, that belongs to the 'pro' skill-set of C++ developers and done wrong, can lead to many problems.

In Python it is much easier to overwrite the behavior of such standard methods and the language core can be learned in about 1/4 of the time you need to learn in C++ to just know the basics (C core, C++ object basics, Operator overloading, standard library basics like the string class, ...) -- in Python you get the power with much less learning effort and without the technical troubles.
Yes, VOA is even worse. But I think the point stands that NPR has a history of close links to the US government.
Really good job for 4 hours.
So why have grades at all if everyone gets an A. Of course that would suppose that students and institutions are capable of being completely idealistic and self motivated which I doubt.
I don't doubt it but could human scale construction trigger an eruption that would destroy the country?
The entire ruling was about compensation. Additionally, neither the Federal Aviation Regulations nor the FAA has ever recognized any distinction between friends or strangers, i.e., a prior existing relationship has no bearing on common purpose. Otherwise, how could you decide if common purpose exists? Is there a secret handshake? One conversation, two conversations? Maybe, just asking: can we be friends so we can fly together? That's a slippery slope.
Just to put some numbers on this, in 2010 (the last year I could find stats on with lazy Googling) there were 267 fatal GA crashes with 453 fatalities in the US. There were no airliner fatalities in the US, just like most years in the past decade.

While I'm at it, there were 32,788 automobile traffic fatalities in 2010 in the US, although of course there's vastly more car activity than GA activity.
> I definitely asked for a Rust review from the C POV, but I feel like they do a good job marketing the idea that it's not supposed to express 100% of what other languages do.

You can express everything that other languages can do—we've written a compiler and a Web browser in it, remember. Of course there is a learning curve, but once you've learned the rules I've found that, by and large, people don't have too many problems, and the time saved by not having to track down segfaults in a debugger is a huge productivity booster.
Thanks for this link.

Many investigators have been dissatisfied with the strong assumptions that conventional measure theoretic probability requires you to make. The community that I'm most familiar with that is stretching these bounds is the imprecise probability people, http://www.sipta.org/index.php?id=cs

They have a conference every other year. The simplest generalization is to interval valued probabilities, but there are several other interesting theories.

There are some phenomena, such as a failure of long term averages of some actual physical-world stochastic processes to converge, that seem to indicate that conventional mathematical probability does not predict their behavior correctly. I.e., it is a theorem that long term averages of stationary processes should converge, and these don't.
We are far, far from 100%.

You can only take mutability lifetimes if you are alone. That mean for example that you can't insert in a tree without going mad. Yeah, you have to search (non-mut operation), insert (mut operation), and balance your tree (mut operation). Not possible.

How do you do it in the official B-Tree implementation ? You clone all the branch at each insertion[1] so that the insertion don't compete with the search. Oh well.
Hopefully it's a B-Tree so it won't be too deep. But for a performance oriented language, it's make me cry a little.

[1]: a) https://github.com/rust-lang/rust/blob/master/src/libcollect...
b) https://github.com/rust-lang/rust/blob/master/src/libcollect...
what counts are accident statistics going down

Kind of. What counts to the insurance companies is having to pay out as little as possible, while still taking as much of people's money as they'll give. So they do want fewer accidents, but they also want more paying customers that won't file claims (uninsured/undocumented driver's fault) or have claims filed on them (when it's their own fault). Using incentives to manipulate (manage) customers' behavior achieves this, with the PR goal of "lowering accident statistics."
Speaking as an engineer who made the transition to management in a big way (from primary web engineer and DBA to CEO with no time to code at all), I have mixed feelings.

I love programming. It's a zen activity for me, turn me loose on a problem and I'll literally lose track of time because I'm so absorbed in the problems. It's one of the purest, most joyous singular activities I've ever had the pleasure of practicing.

After 5 years of doing it 8-10 hours per day, I was getting stale. I was putting in the hours and I think I was productive, but I wasn't encountering new problems very often anymore.

I moved into management shortly thereafter, and being a CEO has been fascinating in its own right. So far (3 years in) I have feel like I'm nowhere near the top of the learning curve. It's a constant challenge, in a way that programming wasn't for me 3 years in. I don't think I've ever been more fully intellectually engaged.

That said, I miss programming. A lot. I find excuses to pick up bug fixes. I wrote an internal tool that manages the distribution of status updates, and at least half the reason was just to be able to code something. I don't regret the career change, but I hope some day I can make programming my main gig again.

As an alternative, I think I could have switched from web programming & DBA work to a new problem domain like graphics or even mobile apps and probably gotten a new lease on learning-curve.

Taking that step back, when I look at where other engineers have gone in their careers within the Twitch organization, the success of a switch into management seems highly idiosyncratic. Some engineers really take to it and enjoy the new challenges; some of them hate it and want to switch back. We've had a number of people try it, decide it wasn't for them, and move back onto the IC (individual contributor) track. We pay top ICs about the same as top managers, so I suppose that might make it easier.

My bottom line advice would be: you don't really know if you'll like management unless you try it. If you're in a workplace where you have the option of switching into a management position, give it a shot. Just know that it's not for everyone.
If you have a startup idea that hasn't launched yet, what is the main reason?