skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Seems like Elgan is saying Google is like a cable company and their goal of organizing the world's information is analogous to a cable company's marriage of content & carriage and bundling services to follow the "dumb pipe" metaphor all the way through.

It's implied that Google is doing this organization for us not because there's room for innovation and improvement, but because they simply want to insert themselves into our lives anyway they can.

I think it's more likely that Google doesn't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, they want make a better bath tub. If that reinforces their role as middle man, fine, but it isn't like Inbox is a superfluous solution in search of a problem! And it isn't like Gmail doesn't already have a lot of intelligence and monetization built in to it on top of the basic protocol that make it a business winner for Google anyway.
I like the idea. But...

Is faster typing really the solution to the problem of wanting to professionalize computer programming? And is that even a problem?

I play the double bass. The problem that faster "entry" solves for musical instruments is wanting to express complex ideas in real time.
thanks! it looks like a good guide to getting started with Opsworks and Chef
that's a good suggestion.. will look into it. am just worried that it won't give me a deep enough understanding/customisation compared to Opsworks..
Apparently CVS and Rite-Aid are participating in this competitor retailer-run card program called CurrentC, run by something called Merchant Customer Exchange

http://www.mcx.com/ <-- their website is ultra-broken, but seems like they're getting a lot of partners.
It seems tough to have a class that can shovel the information into you and have you actually practice it right then and there, but in the classes I've had where we've done that... holy crap, what a difference it makes. If every class was like that, I'd absolutely love it.

I think a system with short lectures followed by quality labs/recitations would be a huge improvement. In my experience, labs are often rushed and confusing, and recitations are taught by crappy TAs and are truly horrendous. Improve that part of the course and you'll make a big difference.
I hope fundamental pieces of GNU/Linux system can start migrating to Rust without the FSF objecting to rutsc using LLVM.
This is really only essential in languages which provide recursion as a primitive and not iteration. Scheme is the prototypical example and was, I believe, the first to require tail call elimination in its standard for this very reason. In C it really doesn't matter that much because you can just write the iteration explicitly and then you know you won't blow out the stack since there is no recursive call in the first place. As a bonus, many programmers find it easier to understand.
Wow - just realized how slow most drones are.

Could something that small break the sound barrier?
@kentonv - you misunderstand. I do know that all of this can be implemented in dynamic languages. The question is whether the benchmarks there will be significantly different than benchmarks on languages with direct unsafe memory access.

I dont know the answer, ergo the question.
I always hated that. Sitting in a warm room, a lecturer drones on in a pleasant monotone, I fight to keep my eyelids open but they just feel so heavy, I need to sleep... Then, class is over, step outside, BAM. Fresh and awake. WTF, body, why couldn't you be this alert when it mattered?
Although I am looking forward to the Angular 2.x mainly to see what it has in store in terms of performance.. i had had faced performance issues with Angular regularly
> From my perspective client-side applications are a solved problem thanks to React.

React is very cool, no doubt, and I use it in my own app, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. React is far from perfect:

- the Virtual DOM is a leaky abstraction: you sometimes need to get your hands on a real DOM node: http://facebook.github.io/react/docs/working-with-the-browse...

- if you're updating the virtual DOM from anywhere other than React's event loop (for example from a setTimeout() or XHR callback), batching doesn't happen properly which can lead to inefficiency. Needing to be aware of what runs inside a React event loop vs. what doesn't can add application complexity. More info: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/reactjs/LkTihnf6Ey8

- writing manual event handlers is a somewhat more manual and less expressive than some of the two-way data binding approaches like Knockout.js or Angular.js.
This story has gotten a lot of play over the past year, but one aspect I haven't really seen covered are what, if any, longer-term plans are being proposed to mitigate future water supply issues for the state as a whole. This article mentions efforts by a couple small municipalities to fill reservoirs and provide incentives to conserve, and while this is the right spirit, is orders of magnitude less than what the state needs.

The prevailing thought seems to be that the issue is eventually going to take care of itself because (1) at some point this drought will end - which is technically true, and (2) even if it continues on for a while longer market forces will moderate consumption - also true; but both of these come at a very high long-term expense for everybody in California via higher water bills, taxes, and most importantly the permanent loss of agricultural production. These efforts also do nothing to address the next time a drought hits California. The state expects to grow 40% in population by 2060 (not a unique trend worldwide).

To me, it's a reflection of how fractured the state is: northern vs Bay area vs southern, blue vs red counties, farmers vs everybody else, etc... And while I will argue for distributed over centralized authority any day, the current path the state is on seems insane. For example, San Diego is building its own multi-billion dollar desalination plant:
http://www.mercurynews.com/science/ci_25859513/nations-large...

certain other communities within California continue to expend 2-4x more water than average - mostly to fill swimming pools and water golf courses - because there is no incentive for either consumers or the water district to conserve at all:
http://www.mercurynews.com/science/ci_25090363/california-dr...

and just a couple years ago the state voted to approve construction of an obvious 11-digit pork barrel project, which ironic to my original point, would connect northern and southern California (and Las Vegas, really...)

But the point remains, for the supposed "8th largest economy in the world" there is very little in my mind that holds the state together other than tradition. As an anecdote, I used to live in Michigan where our monthly water bill was ~$100/month, and now where I live in the California high desert, I pay only $20 per month more. That's only 20% more coming from a state that is literally surrounded by fresh water, to an arid/desert land which primarily gets its water from mountain runoff and other states. This just doesn't seem right to me.

I guess the potential glimmer in all this, is at some point, it will become economically feasible to ferry icebergs from Antarctica into Long Beach harbor. I've always thought that would be an awesome sight to see.
Once you get over what a mess the system is, once you lower expectations, instead of being depressing it can actually be interesting. Try to see it from a detached observer status, even though it affects you and people you love, because you cannot do anything about it anyway. A great teaching tool about our powerlessness is the StarPower game, play it with people someday:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StarPower_(game)

I'm of the opinion this sort of thing cannot be changed, it's just a mechanism of humanity. Cynical, selfish people rise to the top, those who optimize for power get it. They self-select. Ambition for power, for control over others is not something people with empathy would want to work hard for.

Revolutions just change who is in power, they never change the dynamics, and often make it much worse. Think Animal Farm.

Western Democracies have a shit load of problems, but I actually think they're the least worst option. At least we mostly get free internet and free press.

I actually think one of the worst problems we have is that so many people are actually ok with violence against black people. Trayvon Martin, police shootings, rampant prison violence. That's probably the thing I am least OK with in our society, well that and violence against women, but these are actually a problem with the attitudes of the general population and local governments, not a big bad corrupt federal government.

I also think the FBI is a pretty good organization when it comes to fighting political corruption. FBI agents are seriously committed to rooting out corrupt politician, and if anything the FBI's capabilities to go after politicians was actually a threat to our democracy when Hoover was running that organization. So even if you mistrust the FBI, that's something to be thankful for.
Two undercover officers wore black ski masks.

Since when do undercover officers wear ski masks. Furthermore, what are taxi authority officers undercover?
Only if roads exist.
"the common man never had a real chance to invest in your idea."

You may not realize that VCs are investing on behalf of the common man. Most of the LP's in VC funds are entities like pension funds who represent the common man's money.
Does this prove that bodyfat is from carbs, not fat?
Exactly. Upgrading the keyboard in this case is more like improving your composing sheet or getting a better pen for composing -- not the limiting factor at all.

I guess the real 'instrument upgrade' analogy in this case would be upgrading the human mind, or perhaps a well tuned programming language.
No but the problem with the schools isn't that kids don't get to play basketball a minute before class.
My history teacher sent me to the office for saying columbus was a slaver, my computer teacher wrote me up for proving he wrote insecure code (sql injection), my science teacher chewed me out for stating that every legitimate scientific body acknowledges evolution is a fact. The problem is the education system isn't about education it's about control.
Analyze what you've been doing in git
I was reading about Romans and lead poisoning on HN a couple weeks ago. I think this is just one case where it didn't happen to work out disastrously, but in many other cases the remedy was much worse than the disease.
Segmented sleep – Wikipedia
Typing has never been the road block.

It's the inability to blend typing with other kinds of media I generate - easy references to diagrams, notes, reference papers, etc - that is my limiting factor, that is stopping my work for moving closer to my ideal of what a professional solution in software should look like.

I want some web-esque way to blend the several kinds of artifacts I make as a programmer in an easy to generate manner from a system that understands I'll be generating all these kinds of things, and that they're all fundamentally different expressions of the same idea.

That way I can blend drawing and doodling doing what they're they're good at with text entry with what it's good at, and create the deeper and more meaningful references that underscore the idea (or composition of ideas) I'm attempting, and not have several stand-alone pieces that don't express their relationships and interdependencies correctly.

Telling me how to play the violin faster doesn't help me conduct a symphony of ideas, and shows that the people proffering answers don't even understand what my problem actually is. (Hint: I'm rarely the one playing any particular instrument; rather, I'm trying to explain how I'll bring all the instruments to bear together on a single piece.)
The people, if you can get a representative number of signatures the individual is incarcerated and a measure is put on the ballot.
Check out the South Korean/Western co-production 'Snowpiercer' - a real gem.
"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual." -Thomas Jefferson
Hey, I've seen this article maybe 5 times on HN in the last couple days.

This one was from three days ago with 84 comments. You should search for this comment thread and add your thoughts to it!

Bay Area tech company caught paying imported workers $1.21 per hour (engadget.com)
101 points by akerl_ 2 days ago | flag | 84 comments
They aren't the ones who block it. Instead it's the infrastructure providers who do it.
Cloudfare started supporting it only a few months ago.
Many ISP's use proxies that disallows websockets connections.

Again, the point is: You can't claim you won't need cookies if you want to consider scaling up.
Sadly, I think only one branch is needed these days.
Fascinating! I never would have guessed that the Where We Live intro is an Apex Twin song.
My understanding is they don't want more idiots editing, it's a 'feature' that it's tricky to edit.

I also considered the decline is that it's kinda 'complete' it's not like the old days where it was easy to contribute something important and meaningful.
I even think that slow input systems have benefits. I remember feeling awkward when using an HP48 (GUI was sluggish compared to other simpler calc) but it was so consistent, you didn't really care about it, you could think in advance, fill the buffer and think while the computer was processing the input. In the end, you'd enjoyed the slowness. It was a non-thing.

Also, back when people had to book computer time 1h per week, they had to think the thing through before asking the compiler to check and run the code. I'm pretty sure they didn't want to waste their time slot on a misplaced comma.
Yes the title is total click/link bait garbage.

However the article is kind of correct.

Positive thinking without action is almost a waste of energy, however positivety leads to optimism which leads to action.

Context: I'm the CEO and developer of positivethinking.net (mobile app)
> what then is the difference between our system and that of authoritarian regimes if both systems are not ruled by laws but by the greed of police and government agencies?

That is not fair. There is a huge difference between the systems, I have lived in both a communist totalitarian country and in US.

And the difference is this:

US government and the culture as a whole has much better handle on PR and brainswashing. In the communist regime I know, very few privately believed or respected any of the ideals about the "party". All those slogans and so on.

In contrast in US many believe in fantasies and have a very distorted view of reality. Either that government is totally useless and evil or that one should obey, listen, be proud of it, and sign up to go fight wars on its behalf when it asks you, because it is the "best country in the world".

In rest, effectively, how much power the "lower classes" have is about the same as in the other regime. With some trade-offs. For example. Here they have the "freedom of speech". So anyone can grab a megaphone and go stand at the corner downtown, and yell about space lizards. That is nice. In the communist country they would be in an mental institution or maybe a work camp. Also here they can buy an iPhone, say, if they save enough and maybe sell enough food stamps. But on the other hand, they don't get free housing and healthcare. Which is what the communist regime had.
You can replace $800 chair with $200 chair, maybe a cubicle vs. an open office and no windows as a typical medium case insurance company / call center office worker. And if your at a place where the rent is cheap, your cubicle is probably bigger than his desk too.

Still much better than a lot of student classrooms.
This description sounds very idealized.

* I do believe Ives is very aware of the bottom line impact of his designs, and that it affects what he does. He'd be a (starving) artist and not a designer otherwise. Even artists -- great ones -- consider the bottom line.

* If someone cares only about giving users great solutions, then they must concern themselves with the bottom line impact. Costs to the vendor and to the consumer determine, to a large extent, how many people will use the solution.

* Google and Apple are for-profit businesses not digital art colonies. Returning to my above point, that's how they afford to staff so many designers and develop such advanced designs.

* For example, I suspect Ives' ideal iPhone would cost Apple orders of magnitude more than the iPhone 6. I suspect the ideal Inbox would cost Google far more per user than the deployed design. What constraint determines how much the iPhone 6 and Inbox cost their companies? Maximizing profit.
>Why can't we have movies with the joy of discovery? The thrill of exploration and invention? The future doesn't have to be bleak.

Because they try to base them in the actual future, which WILL be bleak?
So as an individual who wants to conduct transactions involving more than $10,000, in increments of less than $10,000, what do you do?

You can't file a Currency Transaction Report on amounts less than $10,000. You could demand that the bank file a "Suspicious Activity Report" on you, to make it very clear that you're not trying to evade limits, but ... they're under no obligation to do so, are they? And my understanding is that there's a Gag Order attached as well, and the recipients of the report probably won't get the nuance that "you asked for it" at all.

I think the "structuring" rules are kept vague because well-defined rules would be used by people who wanted to avoid attention, for various reasons.
I recall one of my best math class grades was pre-cal my Junior year. I would normally fall into the trap you did, and completely failed Algebra 2 but somehow didn't swing back on it..

Anyway, the teacher, the girls soccer couch, actually gave us a good amount of time after the lecturing to work on our homework. And often he would start the class about 10-15 minutes late and I knew it was to give us a chance to polish off the homework. I recall being in a class of mostly Seniors, and a group of us always ended up working together.. The baseball teams pitcher, who was actually quite sharp, his friend, and a girl I don't quite remember that well. The teacher encouraged us to move our desks together as needed. This arrangement worked out fantastically. We would often divide and conquer the homework, or race through the problems individually. Both had advantages; somebody(me or the pitcher) would almost always have a particular problem figured out if the rest were stuck. It created this interaction that was part competitive and part cooperative/supportive. I suspect we all had fun, learned a lot, and did great on the tests and grades(I did).

I had three main takeaways from this:

1.)The lectures were focused, dense, and did not take up the entire 90 minutes.

2.)We had plenty of time to practice the problems and help each other/get help during the period

3.)I now just recall that this was our lunch period as well, which we took the 2nd to last slot, so we had a break before the last bit of the period. This was quite nice.

As an aside, three of the coaches I had for academic classes are probably in my top 5 list. Their classes were very engaging.. I find this interesting.
Here is the comment - I see it as an opinion not an attack:

"...Maybe this is cynical but I dislike stories like this. I’m glad he got back safely, but it sounds a bit Everest-y. Felix Baumgartner was an experienced jumper. Every time a corporate executive pulls the “throw money at something hard for mere mortals” card I cringe. Again, Everest. The number of rich businessmen who die because Mother Nature does not give a fuck about job titles is immense. ..."
In my experiments conditional moves have been actually slower than predicted branches.
Corporate services provider.
Oh, no, I'm being an optimist - I don't think the US and/or world is moving from a fair and just culture to a terribly unfair one. I actually think the world is, by and large, somewhat better than before. Depressing would be to think that we lost a fair and just culture, no?
Commenting is universal. :)
I could just as easily say that you are building a narrative wherein people should become dependent on modern material goods (many of which did not exist decades ago and most of which would be considered frivolous luxuries 100 years ago), and therefore always forced to work on someone else's idea.

It might be more clear if you would describe utopia for us. If someone wants to try a zillion ideas without answering to anyone, who should pay them in the meantime? And would that money be enough to live comfortably in one of the most sought-after areas in the world?
I understand they would like to capture some of the value, but seriously? They are building a technology that, when built, will be worse than already implemented technology backed by the two largest tech companies google and apple. They have to think, does getting the customer information (which they could just freely share with each other without this system) provide enough value to actually spend money to compete with large tech companies? They obviously won't succeed.
so this one finally made it to the front page.

very curious as to what happened to these stories here on HN. twitter lit up (devs ands business people), gruber wrote a story, etc - HN could not get it on front page.
Interesting! How'd you know that about the developer's situation? Digging around kapeli.com, it doesn't talk much about it.
Well, as a happy Google Wallet user, I'm more than happy to take my business to Walgreens, instead.

Apple's marketing engine is one of the best in the world. It seems borderline suicidal to go up against them by intentionally hamstringing a new iPhone feature in order to promote an inferior alternative when people have an easy alternative. Google Wallet I could understand - it's been woefully underpromoted, and carrier shenanigans have really stood in the way of adoption, but Apple drives adoption like nobody else - I was excited for Apple Pay specifically because I expected it to drive the adoption of NFC at more retailers (which means more Google Wallet support for me!)

I wonder who greenlit this thing.
Yeah, society sucks for that - I think it may be getting a bit better, with a lot more media attention addressing mental illness and the stigma associated with it (granted, much of this overemphasizes depression and ignores other forms of mental illness). I'm sorry to hear about your experiences, and while I don't know what I can personally do to help, I hope you know that there are certainly people out there who care about you. Mental illness sucks, and society's ingrained stigmas suck, but often individual people (friends, family, random strangers you meet at a coffee shop) can help. I wish you the best.
Yep I was wondering this but more about whether this state also slows other processes like bacterial and viral infection spread.
Can you give some instances of what you call "idea websites"?
Kalid Azad (Author of BetterExplained website) has a nice teaching ideology that I find really makes things click (for math at least). Link here: http://betterexplained.com/articles/adept-method/
Samsung has a response at https://www.samsungknox.com/en/blog/response-blog-post-samsu....

I was surprised that so many people didn't have patience to think through the logic in that original post. Since there is a function used to derive the key from password, this must be the way Samsung handles the password. This logic doesn't fly.
Goodbye CVS, goodbye RiteAid. Hello, Walgreens.
I'll vote with my money (or rather, iPhone 6).
And I bet that they'll reverse that moronic decision eventually once ApplePay gets sufficient traction and cuts into their bottom line, and/or their own home-baked store-specific solution doesn't take off.