skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
>> This is the biggest part of the problem that is left ambiguous, namely because you have to make assumptions about the liar in order to succeed.

I don't understand why the author then proceeds to outline three separate types of liars. This part of the problem seems very simple to me. If you present any question to the lying bird, the lying bird will first evauate the question in the exact same way as the truth-telling bird, to arrive at its answer. Then, instead of telling that answer truthfully, the lying bird will lie.

My answers:

For the first form of the riddle, I thought "Would the other bird say "Yes" if I asked it whether this door goes to paradise?" would work well enough.

For the second form of the riddle, I tried to reduce it to the first answer and side step this 'cannot reference the other bird' problem by referencing that type of bird, maybe something like:

"Given that you are one of two types of birds (Truthful and Liar), if you were the other of the two kinds (the opposite of what you actually are), would you say "Yes" if I asked it whether this door goes to paradise?" (This could be made more concise and clear.)

For the third form of the riddle I had to sketch out logic charts. I arrived at:

Is it true that ( you are a truth telling bird, and that door goes to heaven) or that (you are not a truth telling bird, and that door does not go to heaven)? (Pointing to a particular door throughout).
> "The only effect that can make quadcopter stable is having centre of gravity below centre of lift just like normal helicopter."

This strikes me as incorrect (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pendulum_rocket_fallacy), though I am not totally confident of that.
I've been transparent about the lines between my competencies and what i know more in theory. For me that kind of granularity has kind of helped filter offers.but I'm still relatively new in terms of full time employment programming and don't have any institutional instruction to speak of.
You need to seed the dataset with samples before promoting this site. I just went to the webpage, typed "English" then "Chinese" into the search bar, both times: "There are no samples of this language in our dataset."
It was a hypothetical and tangential case based on the parent comment, so let's get back to the original context where there is a more clear-cut conclusion.

When it comes to security, the accountability dynamic between personal investment in outcomes and the inherent detachment as an employee of a third party is a bit different than kitchen work, and significantly more important.

This arrangement works to the benefit of both Google and those responsible for securing the company.
What about thinking of it in terms of risk / reward. Say in the (unlikely case) you completely fail to deliver... does it matter? Are they paying you? Can you structure the project so that you can do lots of small iterations and continually give them something which is useful?

On the plus side if you pull it off, which is probably more likely if you've been coding for a couple of years and have side projects already, then you'll have a public project to your name, and you'll learn heaps just through the process.

As for how I personally deal with self doubt. Badly ;) have heaps of it and find giving advice far easier than taking my own. I mean you'll never know unless you try right, and the only way to get better is to try & fail & get better a bunch of times. One book you may enjoy (short read) is called mindset: http://www.amazon.com/Mindset-The-New-Psychology-Success/dp/...

Good luck, and I say give it a go.
Very fun, and the gallery is a nice touch. Here's my contribution:

(r *(2*sin((-A*time)/10))^100) * ((r * r ) % 2)

http://maxbittker.github.io/Mojulo/#KHIgKigyKnNpbigoLUEqdGlt...
I had once early on where i got in over my head. Once i realized it I told them about it. Wasn't fun, but I'm glad for the experience, I learned a lot on many levels.
The CDC model http://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/24900 assumes that a sick person in a hospital or containment unit spreads the disease to 0.02 people per day (vs. 0.3 people per day "in the wild") if you have enough Ebola patients in the hospital for a long enough period of time you are going to see a lot of medical personnel infected. For example if this epidemic lasts another 6-12 months in West Africa (which is the CDC's current estimate) some hospitals or containment facilities may operate for 100-300 days with personnel exposed to new sets of Ebola patients every five to ten days.

I am surprised that there has not been more written about recruiting survivors to work in the facilities (on the theory the they are much more likely to be immune to re-infection at least on many basic cleaning and patient care tasks (not inserting IV's or doing complex procedures).

Edit/Update Medscape did a detailed write-up on Ebola at http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/216288-overview and includes this note on recovery time, which may explain why even those who survive may take months to recover:

In those patients who do recover, recovery often requires months, and delays may be expected before full resumption of normal activities. Weight gain and return of strength are slow. Ebola virus continues to be present for many weeks after resolution of the clinical illness.
PDFs render inline wonderfully for me in both browsers I use without plugins.
So people with a different set of beliefs from your own are "trolls and kooks".

Yes, if the beliefs are different enough in ways that the person cannot possibly justify.
Maybe I don't understand the problem, but it seems to me that it would be very simple for apple to prevent the popup messages at their discretion, since they write and control the software that causes the popup to happen in the first place.
How long will it be before right-to-be-forgotten infrastructure becomes abused for something like taking down a competitor's visibility?

I wonder.
damn near everybody is intrigued by that guy that's got one foot out the door.

say you're a double-agent. the only thing that matters is if you're working against the common good. if you're totally on another level, you really have nothing to worry about.

the contracts you signed when you were new and stupid are an entirely different beast. get a good lawyer; you should be fine 9 times out of 10 as long as you're not violating a typical no-compete clause... or that no-compete clause over-steps its boundaries.
I am very glad to hear this, google employs (or ahem contracts) some very good security personnel. I do wonder though if the current security personnel will be converted to full employees or if they will be sent back to the contracting company ...
having read through a good majority of the peanut gallery, i'm compelled to say that your contract is your duty.

having said that, ... get a good lawyer. the original contract might be vague enough that the lawyer has had experience with similarly worded crap in the past.

any company that tries to steal your personal development for the entire time you're employed is not some company that you want to work with. a good fight is just a good american spirit. fight that crap that junk corporate throws at you.

tl;dr - fuck 'em. let the lawyers fight it out, but get a good lawyer. dollar-for-dollar, they're worth it. no matter, your education is worth the lawyer dollars regardless.
The big opportunity here is to hire and train people who actually care about "Google security", versus people who care about wearing a uniform and applying for real cop jobs. Sorry if I'm going back to my blue-collar days, but I've never met a security guard who really took his job seriously. They're there mostly for show and they recognize that.
This exactly. It's good to have some doubts but at the end of the day you learn a lot by simply trying, regardless of success or failure.

I think it's very important though, that you learn to accept criticism. Learning from constructive criticism is key to improving.
I actually really like doing text classification using Naive Bayes. I'm still new to it and still learning a lot. But one thing I'm having a hard time answering is explaining Naive Bayes classification in simple terms.

If that was asked to you, how can you explain Naive Bayes classification in simple terms?
I think we will see an infected person make it out of West Africa at a rate of one per month to one per week. We have one case in Dallas and a case earlier this summer in Nigeria. Both were contained but as the number of infected people goes up in West Africa the pressure to leave is going to be greater.

On July 20 Patrick Sawyer entered Nigeria in an infected state and infected at least 20 people, 8 of whom died. See http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2014/09...

On Sept 20 Thomas Duncan arrived in Dallas, and was subsequently diagnosed with Ebola. At least 15 people are at high risk for contracting the disease and another 100 had some risk of exposure.

If you take two cases in two months it's not an unreasonable estimate that at least one person a month will escape the quarantine protocols. The protocols are likely to get better but the number of infected people trying to leave is likely to be substantially higher in each month going forward for at least three to six months. If the numbers hit the upper end the current CDC estimate (1.5 million infected) then it's likely the "escape rate" will be much higher, hence an estimate of one per week.
Yeah it's the median. SV and NYC both. Have you seen what $130k gets you these days? Not much in those areas. You'd be better off at $75k in Texas.
On a side note folding in Vim is very flexible with many helper plugins.
Exactly, that was my experience as well. As employees they should be invested in doing a good job and that will make them better security guards.
Liberia has a government. It receives vast amounts of foreign aid. So when the article says: "West Africa was ill-equipped for an Ebola disaster because civil war and chronic poverty had undermined local health systems and there were few doctors and nurses", this is missing the point.

Corruption undermined the health systems, and much more besides.

Those responsible for this disaster are the Liberian officials who collect a minimum of $449 million annually from overseas donors, but somehow can't seem to manage their nation with it. (But their personal bank accounts are probably very healthy.)

There have been previous outbreaks of Ebola in the region, so no one is unfamiliar with it. With a growing and expanding population, it was not a case of 'if', but 'when'; there is no excuse. When this is all over, a number of individuals - from Liberian government and donor nations - should be prosecuted for corruption, negligence, and possibly even crimes against humanity.
Indeed; I have had the pleasure of having correspondence with Dr. Aldrich in the past. I had interest in implementing a static compiler for CMU's Plaid programming language, but found Go sufficient at the time. He also became involved with development of the Wyvern programming language. Nonetheless, he is well versed in programming language design and theory as that is his area of interest. It would be hard to imagine any related ignorance on his part.
Thanks, I'm aware of it but it doesn't work for me.

Beyond what I described above, I need something that works on Windows and Windows Phone, and I need it to securely sync between the two.
To Find Meteorites, Listen to the Legends of Australian Aborigines
I agree with you, but I would add that: if any power has the key to your phone's backdoor, there is a chance of the key getting into the NSA's hands.
Yeah I registered butt.institute a few months ago and I'm still chuckling over it.
Why would stable ids be a problem? Is it because immutability doesn't give you any stable references to latch on to?
I agree with the idea that the abstractions provided are "inevitable." I disagree with the idea that the way we're using them is optimal.

I've just spent time in my code reducing polymorphic classes into simpler type identifier + record combinations. The rationale I am going by is that every class I introduce proliferates new symbols: the class definition, the instances, the methods, the values, the references to yet further symbols. Each time I introduce new symbols I bulk up the code and diffuse its meaning; the meaning of these symbols exists in the class, not at the call site. Thus, everything in a class definition is doing its job correctly as long as you want the class to be a true "black box" that hides behind the symbols it provides.

But in many situations, the algorithm is basically "business logic" and conveys the most meaning when inlined at the call site: "Given this type of data, do this. Otherwise, do that." This type of algorithm assumes a schema onto the data, which is usually our true intention; having determined the schema, we can cease further indirection and begin our actual computation. And in this code, ADTs become less important, because we've already used those to query for the data; when we have the queries abstracted, we can stop. We don't need to abstract the meaning any further. Relational database modelling is analogous; when the data is normalized, it's very indirect, yet also very simple. And this pattern can be followed from within a program as well.

Consider the "composable component-entity" model that has become somewhat of a cargo cult fad. These systems generally understand the entity as a record of "which components are used/where to find them/how they fit together". The implication is that a definite schema of "types of components and their properties" exists at or near the top level, and entities do not hide arbitrary blobs of data and functionality in deep recesses, as results when trying to build from class inheritance. Since the concept is poorly defined, actual implementations are all over the place, of course, but the general direction of it is towards flat/primitive/normalized.

The result I got from killing off some classes and inlining their functionality was that I found some lurking unused variables, clarified the top-level, improved the code's flexibility, and reduced total lines of code. So at least in this instance I seem to be on the right track.
>> Apple says they don't have a specific backdoor anymore (!), and they won't let you audit anything.

Yes. Its amazing to me how eager some people are to take a corporation's spokepeople at their word.
There are many things that are now wrong with Nginx, but none of them are addressed by sthttpd, unfortunately.
Yeah I'll get them up there at some point. The code is less than presentable right now though - I'm slightly embarrassed by it ;)
My developer has cut off all contact (update)
Hi,

About a week ago I posted about my developer not getting in touch for a month or so. It's now been longer than that (obviously) and still nothing. I know he's alive because he's active on here, but won't answer a simple email (and I've sent plenty) I seriously have no clue what to do, and the last email he sent stated that he was going to send an update... but he never did. What the heck should I do?
I guess that its more beyond POSIX only
> more than once I was approached by people who wanted me to help implement their projects. But I have always refused just because I think I'm not good enough. [...] have you ever done that?

Absolutely. I'd say that 90% of the time that I've been offered consulting work, I've turned it down because I know it would require some skills -- web design, graphics, SQL, linux, ruby, C++, etc. -- which I know I don't have.

I have a reputation for being very good at what I do, and it is certainly true that there are some things I am very good at... but a large part of that is that I don't do the things which I'm not very good at.

> how do you deal with self-doubt?

If you're a generalist, there's almost certainly going to be someone else who is a better generalist than you. If you specialize, it's not hard to find a niche in which you are one of the leading experts in the world -- because the group you're being compared against is losing the 99.9999% of people who never looked at that particular niche. So I'd recommend looking for a niche; because once you're the world's leading expert on something, it's pretty hard to doubt your competence in that area.
Coincidentially, I'm working on something which is very relevant to this topic: http://i.imgur.com/dGZk26W.jpg
If the title said that this is from Couchbase (Labs), it would definitely be a more active discussion with tons more upvotes, too!
Attorney general: “technological advances” allow criminals to “avoid detection.”
It might burn itself out, which is as bad as it sounds - it will kill so many people there will be no one left to infect.

There will probably be mandatory quarantine as well, and everyone inside the zone will either die or become immune.

Or we might figure out how to manufacture the 2 or 3 known cures in great enough quantity.

Or a vaccine - seems to me this should not be a huge challenge to develop a vaccine for because (unlike HIV) people become immune after exposure, which is half the battle already.
Just to be nitpicking, I said "functional society", not "civilized society". Although the distinction make no effect on your argument.

>Are you suggesting that morality has no purpose other than to provide a civilized society? That's one view on morality, but it's not that common nowadays.

Yes, that's what I meant (roughly). And while your example (don't harm other so you won't be harmed) sounds selfish, how about "help others in needs so you will be helped in time of need" sounds? To quote Wikipedia: "Morality can be a body of standards or principles derived from a code of conduct from a particular philosophy, religion, culture, etc., or it can derive from a standard that a person believes should be universal.". It does not necessary have to be because people are selfish, but because there are many many possible behaviors, and a universal standard (morals) allow us to know what to expect. The complexity of dealing with a large group of people (society) can get really messy real quick, just because of the sheer number of possible possibilities . That's also why many people believes that when it comes to two adult with sounded mind dealing directly with each other, any thing goes.

I'm well aware of utilitarianism, and that's actually (partly) where I got the idea of moral standard as a basis for a functional society, but I digress. It seems like the difference between your and my argument was how we tallied up the happiness sum. I draw the line at "being human", and you have a bigger one that encompasses "sentient being".

> Ok, then what happens if you decide a certain person or certain group no longer reasonably belongs in the category of "one another"? For example, how some Sunnis view Shiites, and how Hutus view Tutsis. That group is no longer seen as a vital part of civilization and can be treated in any way at all, because behavior cannot be intrinsically good or bad.

I was about to say that that there is no difference between, let's say Sunnies and Shiites, except their belief, in the sense that except for historical accident, an eternal war between the two won't end. But I just realized where that argument would lead to (and I don't like that). I guess I will have to think a bit more on vegan-ism :-)
How to Become a Twitter Data Analyst Using Xplenty
Jonathan aldrich does come from the UW side of PL, which leans toward objects (a bias I share as well). But he knows his FP. Still, I'm not much for arguments by authority; either you see a proper comparison in the paper or not (I haven't looked closely enough). What both William and Jonathan both seem to miss, however, is more a discussion on object thinking, which I think would make the difference between OOP and fp more clear from a design perspective.
Thanks both for taking the time to check this out and offer these insights and links - I was so blown away by the UI on the Star Wars demo I was sure they'd probably developed it themselves. Looks like I didn't need to build these at all! (Although I will be rebuilding these using SVG and doing tutorials on them as I go along).
I think there is huge opportunity in decentralising existing business models that are well suitable for p2p.

Think of Uber / AirBNB / etc with no fees and no government power over them.

Another huge opportunity in distributing revenue of these services to peers running the network. This may cause rapid growth & unparalleled fault tolerance.

Third thing that might be disrupting is ability of such services to issue their own coins/stocks, which price is linked to service's revenue. Revenue is then distributed among stock owners, and service can issue such stocks at will without government's approval.
self doubt will destroy you.
In most of your examples, the answer is no because of economies of scale; hardware fabrication only makes sense because of economies of scale (and to a lesser extent pipe or packaging production - although you could ask the same question about vertical integration all the way up the petrochemical supply chain to operating oil rigs and refineries).

Most game dev companies just aren't big enough to need enough hardware for vertical integration to make sense. Most water companies aren't big enough for a pipe factory to be economically viable, let alone building their own minerals division, oil rigs, oil refinery and chemical plants.

I suspect that security and running cafeterias do have economies of scale (e.g. a business might only need a drive-by check a few times a night, and so it is more efficient to have one guard drive around different businesses than for each business to hire their own guard), but Google's demands for security and cafeteria services are probably high enough that they gain many of the same benefits of the economy of scale.

Allowing management to focus on core competencies is also important for smaller businesses, but eventually most decision-making is delegated to middle managers or even subsidiary companies, so the top tier of management doesn't have to worry about it. For big companies like Google, it is likely that they have modelled it, and worked out it will cost them less to vertically integrate this function.

Businesses generally have far more efficient control over employees than contractors, so if they are unhappy with something, they can just change it rather than needing to renegotiate a contract.
A Couple Gaining Independence, and Finding a Bond
Impostor syndrome? Most people I know are affected from it.
It must be the costs... Multirotors have enjoyed open source development by enthusiasts so far, and they built heavily on the experience of the RC enthusiasts, and they repurposed tons of hardware that is suitable for small applications. A few thousand dollars is within the budget of many developers, so the small UAV improvements could proceed very much like software-based innovation curve does. But, any size/budget/project bigger than that is bound by a different progress curve. I bet it can be done, and if it is practical, it will be done too. Aerospace engineers were always a very innovative bunch; check out autogyro (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autogyro).
Critical USB hack goes public; how bad is the risk?
https://github.com/adamcaudill/Psychson
Getting someone in the door by lying to them doesn't seem like good round on which to start a relationship. Unless you're desperate, it's stupid to accept an offer where one party started the negotiation by misleading you.
And now I am too. I'm 35 years old.
The obligatory xkcd reference had to be posted here. :)

http://xkcd.com/538/

"Drug him and hit him with this $5 wrench until he tells us the password."