skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
This is only possible if there is software installed on the machine that is collecting the MAC address and sending it (browsers don't do this). You are likely confusing a MAC address with a unique (random) identifier assigned to your browser by Amazon.
>>functional requirements for compatibility” between computer programs “are not protected by copyright

This was in regards to Accolade (game company) reverse engineering, and reimplementing the software side of the security procedure of the sega genesis for third-party game cartridges. Following the source leads nowhere to an explanation of the quote. Must be a pretty trivial notion.

Still interesting case, though. First of all, it's puzzling that they just talk about "functional" requirements and concepts. "Well, what isn't functional?", said the Haskeller.

>The TMSS initialization code is a functional feature of a <24 USPQ2d 1577> Genesis-compatible game and Accolade may not be barred from using it.

>Functional features of a product are features ‘which constitute the actual benefit that the consumer wishes to purchase, as distinguished from an assurance that a particular entity made, sponsored, or endorsed a product.’”

I don't, what? Are they basing copyright-eligability on consumers' ability to understand features that interact to form other features? How is the Trademark, that was shown as part of the security check (only on consoles newer than the games), precluded from that desire?

>Accolade did not seek to avoid paying a customarily charged fee for use of those procedures, nor did it simply copy Sega’s code; rather, it wrote its own procedures based on what it had learned through disassembly

Wait, did they pay a fee to use the procedures? What's the case about again? Then, reimplementation is based on the understanding derived from the translation of the object code. Translation is prohibited under copyright, except for fair use. The fair use here is interpretation of an idea and expression of the same idea in different semantics, translation for short. Never mind the irony, surely there wasn't any commercial gain involved, so it's still somewhat fair use. Apparently, a security check that can be broken isn't a commercial advantage, so, its defeat is no benefit. It's defeat is only lawful, because it isn't copyrightable in the first place.

This is so messed up, it just doesn't make sense.
I am still fascinated by the sheer number of RISC CPUs out there. But more amazing than this is their similarity. I think we should develop a new (abstract) RISC CPU which combines all in one architecture :-) .

Joking apart, as a developer of jor1k I am also interested in RISC-V and constantly follow their
progress. I am still not sure, if RISC-V is just OpenRISC 2.0 or a competitor.
The technical keypoints of criticism of the OpenRISC architecture are true, but show me an architecture, which is free of bad design decisions?

The problem is usually not to build a new instruction set. It is in fact the easiest part I would say.
The most time consuming part is to build the toolchain including, emulators, Linux, gcc, binutils, libc
and tons of architecture dependent libraries and programs (gdb, strace, ltrace, libffi, xpcom, ...)
. And here RISC-V begins again from scratch which is a little bit sad.

You forgot to tell, that the RISC-V team build their own Javascript based emulator at

https://github.com/ucb-bar/riscv-angel
Was just reading this interesting article and mentioned it to my girlfriend. She said this was old news and told me about a shampoo with seemingly bogus reviews. So I did some digging... Seems like there were some voting rings on this product too. Or maybe all three of these people just happened to be reviewing both Argan Oil Shampoos and iPhone 5 Battery Replacement's:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A36TZR6GRB6F0Q/r...

and

http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A8YI1C83DWXF5/re...

and

http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/AE5R00L7R0AF5/re...
Related: Novena laptop, desktop and standalone board

https://www.crowdsupply.com/kosagi/novena-open-laptop

http://www.kosagi.com/w/index.php?title=Novena_Main_Page
The above commenter was saying that there is no way to find a user's MAC address by looking at their IP packets alone. MAC addresses are used by link layer protocols (ethernet), but an IP address is used for identification in higher levels. In short, your router knows your MAC address, but Amazon.com only knows your IP. If any website on the internet could get your MAC address that would be very troubling, because a well-behaved MAC address is a quasi-unique identifier for your network hardware.
A common recipe people quote for good software is "a) first make it work, b) then make it fast".

Haskell is very good at a), and not bad at all at b). With the help of the profiler it shouldn't be that hard to determine a program's bottlenecks/leaks and fix them, as with any other language.

BTW, since you mention http, I have this reading on my back burner [1] but from skimming it found that for certain payloads a haskell http server may perform better than nginx (1.4, circa 2013?), which is an impressive feat.

1: http://aosabook.org/en/posa/warp.html
I don't think anyone is surprised when a software piracy site doesn't have careful copyright attributions for all of its piracy tools.
The programming languages you're familiar with don't consider themselves to be similar to natural languages. This one apparently does, and why not? Why do we even use the word "language" to refer to our computer UIs when we balk at mundane language phenomena like context-sensitivity?
Unfortunately, it's a "why X is great, by the vendors of X" article. It's an ad for ParaSail, which is too new (and possibly too weird) to have much traction yet.
Since 2009, I have been a founder of 3 different startups (and 10+ different side projects that I couldn't convert to successful products). All 3 failed. My problem was choosing co-founders that either did not have a passion for the idea or just weren't willing to do what it takes to run a business.

Someone may be a good developer, designer, or co-worker...but that doesn't mean they will make a good co-founder. I learned this the hard way..and it was painful.

I now run a small business with 2 other co-founders..and have been profitable since day one. I quit my job over a year ago and never looked back.
Amazon just needs to sustain a cookie in between times that they do have a chance to collect your MAC address. I wouldn't be surprised if certain plugins could detect it, like flash or amazon streaming plugins. Also, kindle on your home network could grab it.
Posted yesterday:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8572126

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8574278
Sadly, I can't find the link now, but I was reading about this yesterday. According to someone who worked there, there was no insurance.
Fitbit fitness tracking lineup dropped from Apple Online Store
I was thinking of writing the core in C++ (or even Haskell - I just realised that I haven't even considered it!) and using Python as the main scripting language, sorta like it is in Blender.
Sure, you could walk up to a touchscreen and order your espresso. But I want to ask if the scones are fresh. Or how sweet the iced tea is. Or ask for a sample of something. Or ask for extra sugars. And on and on.

And how 'easy' is it? How do you handle changing inventory? Running out of materials? Are you ADA compliant? How many languages do you support? And so on.

Go ahead, try to mock up an ordering app for a coffee shop that gets different pastries in each day, have an ever changing offering of beans, and each customer has a very particular set of desires for how their coffee is made. Make it work for the Spanish woman, the blind child, the teenager in a wheelchair. Get it to answer "which pastries don't have eggs in them?"
@gonzi I think your comments are a bit cynical. I don't think this sort of stuff is common knowledge. If it is true that there is a ring of sellers, this is really highly coordinated, dare I say almost organized ecommerce crime. I for one, certainly would like to know these sellers get away with it. I think it is appropriate to get Hacker News community to weigh in on how it might be achieved.
It enables use (personal and especially corporate) with as little licensing fretting as possible.
Sure, I may produce something just for myself, but that's completely irrelevant to the general claim that consumption "has to" match production.

That's a straightforward claim with straightforward implications: either something compels people to consume everything that's produced, or something compels producers to refrain from production that would go unconsumed. Otherwise the general claim is false.

It is obvious nonsense, no matter how much nonsense you try to wrap around it. As a simple counterpoint to yours, for all you know, I could be on a sacred mission to provide everyone in the world with a shit-sandwich and then I can't be considered the consumer
I didn't even realize they had built their own JS emulator. I'm not sure why they didn't choose to adopt much of the OpenRISC work - was hoping that their FAQ would have had more details, but it only referenced the blog post. However, it seems they're rather committed and have funding, so hopefully they can carry on the open and free RISC torch, whether alongside or via convergence with OpenRISC.
Damn, I'm surprised somebody actually bothered to archive that post. #9 is me - It gets better though, after I wrote that post, his "legal team" sent me a "DMCA" in an attempt to get the post killed off.

Tonymac is not a great guy. Between the bans for innocuous questions, the hypocrisy, the fact that him and his staff reportedly read user's private messages, and the fact that he tries to intimidate people into not talking about his stolen code.. ick.
x ∈ (A ∩ B) = (x ∈ A) * (x ∈ B) if "x ∈ A" equals 1 when x is in the
set A, 0 when x is not in the set A. Using "indicator functions" like
this also gives you a nice formulation for probability and
integration, etc. that falls apart if you use 1 to represent x ∉ A.

edit: I should add that I'm not claiming "you can't build measure theoretic probability from this formulation of booleans" is a strike against the project. Just addressing the math question.
Dude, it is the mac address they grab.

I ran ifconfig en1 | grep ether and the mac address showed up on my URL omnibar when I firebugged it.

I've even noticed this happening at Starbucks whenever you use their WiFi - they will sniff your MAC address and it shows up in the URL omnibar when you agree to the WiFi terms.

Will the real hackers please chime in on how this (grabbing MAC address) can be achieved...
That may be true but I find it curious. Without knowing too much about Rust, it looks like a lower level language than Haskell.

I'd have thought that someone would pick the higher level language first, and go to the lower lever when in need of more control.
Failed startup http://www.quadmsolutions.co.nz/ after painful 1.5 year. Failed because of co-founder issues.

Then, I and my friend started working on new startup (https://www.atatus.com/) and got 100 customers in 2 months.
I read less negativity into the comment than that.
API is more like the table of content of a book, not titles. Titles would be like the website name.
Ask HN: Programming languages for music
I am learning CSound. It is really nice, but too low level. What are other languages for writing music?
Getting started with predictive modelling in python
It just sounded as if being public domain somehow makes project more ambitious (that is, means to be more difficult to complete than if it wasn't public domain), so I probably just misunderstood.
I think it still probably depends on whether it lowers the cost of car insurance, which probably varies state by state.
Sure, I entirely agree that there's a large spectrum of user types (or people) out there.

You used the phrase 'most people' three times there to describe a quite likely common user type for off-the-shelf consumables. I am quietly confident the guys working on this are not targeting 'most people'. Or if they are, they are quite candid about it not being ready for them yet.
There is no perfect language but from what you write seems like you may enjoy Crystal [1]. It is probably not ready for prime time yet but it is making good progress!

1: http://crystal-lang.org/
I'm surprised at the severity of the fire; it doesn't look like bitcoin mining equipment would be comprised of much flammable material - it's mostly metal and silicon and PCBs. The former two are essentially nonflammable, while the latter usually being made of FR-4 is flame-retardant (UL94V0).
Yes, this happens at Starbucks because your MAC address is captured when you connect to their wifi network (this happens on virtually any captive portal, not hard). I, for one, cannot find my MAC address in a long list of history because it is simply not passed via web requests.

You can get the MAC address of anyone who is connected to the same network - but that's it.
It's somewhat bizarre to obfuscate the URL thinking it will stop CSRF, if there's no anti-forgery token embedded within.

As Fabian says, just do the CSRF with the encrypted URL if it's not stateful. When Apache Wicket does add state, apparently it's just a small incrementing integer. Like an 8 bit anti-forgery token.

But all of this seems like so much over-engineering when one line of Javascript to add a non-standard request header, and one line on the server to fail if it's not present -- that's all you need?!

What I'm wondering, if you add an X- header with no actual token, do we agree that's enough these days? I remember an old Flash version which allowed adding X-headers outside the SOP, is that the only reason it's not considered fully safe? I think if you're running outdated Flash your machine is completely owned anyway and Anti-CSRF won't make a difference.

[1] - http://security.stackexchange.com/questions/23371/csrf-prote...
I don't think Flash has that ability, but Java can if you accept the numerous prompts you'll get...
"The real mystery is...how does something like this wind up on the front page of HN?"

Why are you dismissing this as HN-unworthy news?

Amazon is well known for their sophisticated internal monitoring systems. They often will take down reviews if they are fake and generated from the same IP or MAC addresses. The point of this article is that a band of sellers have managed to hack the Amazon iron curtain and how they did it is the $64000 question. It is not about saying "this is nothing new" -- it is about being curious about "how is this being exploited (i.e. hacked) and taken advantage of and why is this being allowed to persist given the almighty Amazon resources and their goal to make it a safe marketplace".
128-bit submarine vs 32-bit destroyer reminded me of IPv6 vs IPv4.
I think this is 20% genius and 80% confused. However, that 20% may completely outweigh the 80. (as always)

I have worked in all these environments and yes, there are aspects of process ... and principles, techniques, and mindset which can be taken from engineering and applied to creative pursuits. Good point.
Curtis Yarvin is a grand fool, and everything with which he is involved in entirely bullshit. If you find bullshit amusing, some of his writing is worth a few hours of your time. Just don't expect any of this to amount to anything.
Agreed. Taking out insurance on expensive facilities requires a degree of intelligence and forethought that one doesn't really expect in the kind of person who builds said facilities with flammable tiles and doesn't include a fire-suppression system.
An auditable random noise generator [video]
I have successfully done so. One huge question: why would it be advantageous to scale groups of composers? Many people can do more than enough with no collaborators at all.
The analogy that kicked this all off:

"An ordinary user can no more drive a Linux box in the cloud than fly an A320."

Maybe they aren't targeting most people, but if not, why are they talking about the ordinary user?
>or something compels producers to refrain from production that would go unconsumed

Yeah, they run out of money. The rest is a rounding error.

>I could be on a sacred mission to provide everyone in the world with a shit-sandwich

You're not a producer in the market sense then. Consumption is a market term, it doesn't mean anyone has to eat the sandwich.

To put it simply: The original statement was "consumption has to match production with very few exceptions". Zealotry outside of markets is one of those few exceptions; it's very rare. Otherwise market forces compel them to match.
The Social Network for recipes
Show HN: Swift Optionals in 3.5 minutes
Religion and philosophy have tried for millennium to change human character. They have been unsuccessful for the most part, and this failure will likely continue.

Because.... we are bound by biology. Change that and everything changes. And this is the threshold where we stand right now. I don't know where it leads. But I'm pretty sure it is the future.

Never bet against technology in favor of philosophy.
TLDR: Technology ("human achievement") is useless because "it doesn't give us greatness (of character)" (note that they believe that any worldly possession or anything that makes life easier is fleeting and thus worthless)

I can understand that a 5 year old believes this, or someone who is homeless with no possible way out. It strikes me as a viewpoint that is designed to keep the homeless/the extreme poor "in their place". Convince them that it's not even worth it to try to improve their situation, that God himself would oppose that (maybe gods would be the more appropriate word ?). I bet any smart tax-collecting ruler would be a huge fan of this faith. For anyone else I think their everyday experiences will contradict this way of thinking enough to convince them otherwise.

I think that it is in fact possible, desirable and worth it to try to improve myself and my situation (economical, technological, literary, knowledge, familial, ...). Improving my character is only a component of that, necessary but far from sufficient, and technology helps a LOT, though admittedly probably not with the character part.
Understanding the Swift Languages concept of Optionals (or nil protocol). It's under four minutes and I hope gives a good overview. Let me know if I can improve it while still keeping it short.
I somewhat doubt it was anything to do with me mentioning a version number, and all to do with having the audacity to suggest I'd like a comprehensive keybinding alternative (it's the weakest element in Emacs, in my personal opinion).
Except that some jurisdictions in the world don't have the concept of public domain, so, in those places, this code is legally in a very weird place. It's much better (IMO) to assert copyright, and then release under the most permissive license possible.
Sketchtips:  Clever tips, thoughts and insights for your favorite design app
Don't really get what this is technically, but conceptually I do understand it and would love to back a company like this. Technologies like this could kill Microsoft (Windows) and many others.
I predict #1 on reddit and $1b investment within a few days.
Indeed, it's a good general principle: Defensiveness never works. What does work? Counterattack.

With this post, the foundation has been laid for a counterattack. One way to do it would be to publicly name and shame any credentialed journalist who uses the quote out of context. Don't just be "curious how fixable this sort of bogus meme is"—use your formidable influence and numerous supporters to attack those who attack you.
Google CodeJam APAC Round D
By re-writing CSS to use a different syntax?
You could call it Noom....
Bit confused on one point -- so SoundCloud revised their ToS to deny downloads, but they kept the download URL in the API response? Amazing that after two different illegal take-downs it just kept getting back on top of the listings.

Random Android question: When the app was taken down, I guess you lose app storing listing and IAP. But existing users would still be able to run it, and the developer would still get ad impressions and ad revenue?

I don't quite understand SoundCloud's rationale... Why is it OK for me to do an HTTP GET from one user agent but not another? How is that something they have legal standing to dictate?

Hartig seems perfectly happy to let his obviously well liked software be stomped into oblivion? SoundCloud could perfectly well provide the equivalent functionality, but instead they snuff out an honest developer?

It's not even like he was deep-linking the content (oh no, don't actually use hypertext markup how it designed to be used, shiver), this was just an added intent in the existing 'Share' dialog.

So serious question: 3rd party apps insert themselves into the Share dialog. It's purposefully designed that way. In that dialog, the user gets to choose how to handle the data being shared. Basically, it's in a clipboard and the user is choosing where to paste it. How does SoundCloud get Google to nuke an app for properly using this interface?

(Sorry, that's like a dozen different questions that this post has raised in my mind)
I left my comfortable job in Dubai, moved the family (with 2 small kids) to Toronto to build an enterprise database product, launched it at the niche's world conference, pivoted once, and spent all the money I had. That took nine months.

When it came time to look for work I got a decent job offer in the Toronto startup scene as a django dev, but I called up my old employer in Dubai and found out they had not managed to replace me. So I replaced myself! Moved the whole family back out to the Middle East.

You'd think the whole experience has turned me off startups forever, but....
That's one heck of a writing prompt.
My startup that failed aimed to provide more detailed student reviews of colleges. People wouldn't answer questions, and I couldn't get traction.

It failed the summer after college (after starting it a year before). Now I'm at a coding bootcamp. I'll work for a year or two, and then give it another go.
I am a little weary of the hype around a language whose unique selling point is speed. Where else in Julia is there significant innovation versus Python? The latter seriously has it all when it comes to scientific computing, and if anybody is not already running vectorized numpy code, or trivially compiling critical for loops to c-like speed using Numba/Cython, then they're missing out on performance which has nothing to be ashamed of versus any of the newer kids on the block.

I have been weary of the Julia pitch which was basically "lets brew R, Python, and Matlab (all >20 years old with massive and unrivalled ecosystems and all serving their purposes very well, thank you) into one "new" language and put a nice logo on it". How is this language seriously the leap forward that one needs to abandon the current awesome toolsets, with all their battle tested libraries, other than a nebulous "speed" argument which in many cases, judging by the comments and my own experience in financial data matrix operations, is not even fully accurate? Ready to be persuaded otherwise if I can be shown that other than "speed" there are hefty reasons to move from Python and abandon the almost endless choice of richly varied tools that I have at my disposal already.
Your karma check for today:
There once was was a user that whined
his existing OS was so blind,
he'd do better to pirate an OS that ran great
but found his hardware declined.
Please don't steal Mac OS!
Really, that's way uncool.
(C) Apple Computer, Inc.

(from a low page written in memory when Don't Steal Mac OS X.kext is loaded)
Bringg – saas delivery api
Because lawyers don't get what you just explained.
Here is a video of a talk the author, Tucker Taft, gave about the ParaSail language at Mozilla last year:

https://air.mozilla.org/region-based-storage-management-para...