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Bypassing KPTI Using the Speculative Behavior of the Swapgs Instruction - based2
https://businessresources.bitdefender.com/bypassing-kpti-speculative-behavior-swapgs-instruction
======
based2
[https://www.cybersecurity-
help.cz/vdb/SB2019080703?affChecke...](https://www.cybersecurity-
help.cz/vdb/SB2019080703?affChecked=1)
[https://aws.amazon.com/en/security/security-
bulletins/](https://aws.amazon.com/en/security/security-bulletins/)
------
based2
[https://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2019/08/silen...](https://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2019/08/silent-windows-update-patched-side-channel-that-leaked-
data-from-intel-cpus/)
------
based2
[https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/current-
activity/2019/08/06/swa...](https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/current-
activity/2019/08/06/swapgs-spectre-side-channel-vulnerability)
------
based2
[https://www.itnews.com/article/3430322/new-spectre-like-
cpu-...](https://www.itnews.com/article/3430322/new-spectre-like-cpu-
vulnerability-bypasses-existing-defenses.html)
------
based2
[https://wiki.osdev.org/SWAPGS](https://wiki.osdev.org/SWAPGS)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ride-Sharing Congests City Traffic - old-gregg
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2018/02/ride-sharing-actually-congests
======
BurningFrog
At least in San Francisco, the old Taxi system was a deliberately
undersupplied crony capitalist disaster.
It served to enrich a few Taxi medallion owners and left most people without
any reliable way to get a ride from A to B most of the time.
Now that we have functioning ride sharing systems, people actually _can_
reliably get a ride from A to B. So of course we do that more than before, and
there is more traffic. This is a symptom of a better functioning society with
a better life for its residents.
~~~
w-ll
It should still be said that if the availability of taxis matched uber/lyft,
the fact that NO cash is involved. Meaning when you reach the drop off the
riders can just exit the car, most likely saves an unbelievable amount of time
and lane blockage compared to taxis.
~~~
vegashacker
And you don't have to explain the driver where you want to go. Other than
being an extremely nice feature, I could see that decreasing lane blockage
time as well.
~~~
raducu
Also nice for the driver wanting to retire for the day that he can get fares
that get him closer to his home.
~~~
yoz-y
Is that a feature Uber/Lyft drivers have? I always thought they could not see
the destination before picking up the client.
~~~
raducu
I recently talked with a Uber driver, they cannot see the destination of the
client, but he said he can specify the rough area where he wants to
(eventually?) go and fares will take him close enough to that direction.
------
kelnos
I think this is a shame, but for SF at least, it's kinda "well, duh". I would
love to take transit more often, but when I have to go somewhere, and map it,
I see things like:
Car: 12 mins
Transit: 40 mins
Walking: 55 mins
If I have the time, I'll walk. If I don't have the time, I'll take a Lyft
(pre-Uber/Lyft I would usually drive myself, and then have to deal with the
pain of parking). Why would I _ever_ take the bus?
I would love it if SF had a transit system like Tokyo's, or hell, even NYC's.
But we don't, and there's little political will and money available to dig
more subways. The new central subway is a start, but we really need to be
building 5 of those, simultaneously, at all times. So... what's the solution
here?
~~~
dionidium
“Even” NYC? I know New Yorkers love to complain about the MTA, but don’t take
it too seriously. New York’s subway is extraordinary. It has no match in the
U.S. (by a long shot) and is still very, very big by world standards.
The next time a New Yorker feels like complaining that they had to wait 20
whole minutes for a 7 train in far out Queens, they might do well to remember
that most cities in the world wouldn’t have a station there at all.
Lots of fun stuff here: [https://www.citymetric.com/transport/what-largest-
metro-syst...](https://www.citymetric.com/transport/what-largest-metro-system-
world-1361)
~~~
carlmr
>The next time a New Yorker feels like complaining that they had to wait 20
whole minutes for a 7 train in far out Queens, they might do well to remember
that most cities in the world wouldn’t have a station there at all.
Living in Germany, almost all the far out places have train stations. And
30min to 1h wait times between trains.
~~~
dionidium
As part of the primary subway system? Crucially, we're only looking at
"subway" stops here (i.e. places where there is no system transfer to the
primary, inner-city subway).
New York also has the LIRR, Metro-North, and Path, which are commuter rail
systems that reach even further and wider (and with headways more like what
you describe).
I'm just poking fun at New Yorkers. I understand why late trains are
frustrating, but a little perspective never hurts.
~~~
carlmr
Most cities in Germany have 2-3 primary "subway" systems, one operated by the
national railroad company, and the other usually municipal.
Above that the national railroad operates regional trains (RB, RE), express
trains (IC and ICE).
IC and ICE is what you would take from Stuttgart to Frankfurt.
RB, RE is what you would take from Stuttgart to some surrounding town like
Tübingen.
Then there's the S-Bahn, U-Bahn and Strassenbahn (not always), which are the
somewhat local trains.
The S-Bahn usually comes every 30 mins (but often multiple trains on the same
line lead you to have enough selection for a 10 minute wait in the city) and
fans far out (~30-50km in many cities), but often it's the fastest local
train. The stops are about 2-5km apart.
The U-Bahn is more local and doesn't fan out as far, usually goes every 10min
and has stops every km.
The Strassenbahn stops every 500m-1km and is above ground (so not technically
a subway), also this doesn't exist in all the major cities.
I was referring to the S-Bahn. For me it's my city train service, It's the
closest station and takes 10 min to downtown with a train running roughly
every 10min. I can take it far out of town as well.
I'm putting all three in the same pool because you usually buy a single ticket
valid for S-Bahn + municipal transport (U-Bahn, Strassenbahn and Buses).
The S-Bahn is both a primary subway for many people and it goes far out like
some commuter trains in NYC.
------
wils1245
The availability of ridesharing lessens the need for car ownership, which is a
huge win for cities because it reduces the need to devote space for the
storage of automobiles.
The article ignores this benefit entirely, then makes the contradictory points
that a) ridesharing apps actually increase traffic, and b) ridesharing apps
siphon riders from public traffic.
All in all it’s written from the perspective of someone who hasn’t had to
drive much in a high density urban area, where parking is nearly as much of a
headache to figure out as traffic.
~~~
stochastic_monk
It may reduce parking, but it does cause a net increase of miles driven
compared to people driving themselves.
It is also true that as more people rideshare, fewer take public transit,
which is more efficient in fuel and the number of people-miles driven.
These points are not in conflict.
~~~
briandear
Public transportation is not more efficient in terms of my time or usability.
When I have to transport my four kids somewhere or go grocery shopping, public
transport is a nightmare.
Let’s not assume people needing transportation are all single people carrying
a backpack with perfect physical abilities. Ever tried to get a stroller down
the subway steps in New York? In those relatively few stations that have
elevators, they’re all filled with piss and shit. Don’t want my 3 year old
walking around amongst that. Even in “enlightened” European cities, subway
elevators are often disgusting messes, not to mention more unsafe than having
an Uber driver drop you at your front door.
Public transport could be great — but I live in real-ville where it isn’t —
except maybe in Zurich — which is an extremely rich small, and compact city —
you could put twenty Zurichs in the Los Angeles metro at least. On paper,
places like New York have great public transport — but the UX is about 100x
harder than using Uber — especially with kids: walking up and down multiple
stairs, down long corridors, waiting on station platforms literally next to
crazy people, getting on a train, finding a seat — then trying to get back
home doing all that in reverse. Compare that to the literal seconds it takes
to order an Uber, wait outside your door, hop in, ride in quiet, mostly
pathogen-free comfort directly to your destination.
Public transport is “efficient” the same way a prison cafeteria is efficient.
I am not against public transport — it serves a valuable purpose as one facet
of a comprehensive transportation policy. But to claim it is more efficient is
really a matter of opinion — there are a lot of variables that make up what
“efficient” means.
~~~
Al-Khwarizmi
I have used a good number of metro systems in Europe and Asia and practically
never smelled piss or shit, or encountered crazy people.
Madrid, Barcelona, Berlin, Prague, Paris, Stockholm, Beijing, Singapore, Hong
Kong, Seoul... not a single negative experience in these cities, and I have
seen plenty of people with kids in the metro.
Edit: OK, in Madrid they tried to take my old iPod from my coat pocket once,
in a very crowded car. But that was once in a lot of times using that metro
and it's not the kind of bad experience for kids that you are referring to.
In Rome I did find some stations somewhat shabby, as in New York. In Los
Angeles I had a good experience, but I only took the metro once there so it
may have been just luck.
~~~
isostatic
I was in central Paris last week, I saw crazies and people pissing. Reminded
me how bad the shadier parts of London was 20 years ago. That was just one of
the metro lines though, the other 10 trips on bus, 2 or 3 other metros and a
couple of RERs were fine, although metros were always crowded.
I agree with London, Berlin, Beijing, Singapore, Hong Kong etc.
(The reason we took the metro late at night with 2 young kids and a large
suitcase was because uber/taxis is a right pain with kids - trying to get one
with 2 car seats)
------
thebradbain
This is probably anecdotal evidence at best, but:
As a current college student who was just beginning highschool in Dallas when
Uber first starting becoming a real thing rather than a curiosity, I used Uber
all the time to get around even before I had a license (sometimes even taking
it to school in the morning), and continued to use the service once I did.
Almost all of my peers did, too.
I go to college in Los Angeles now and haven't had my car for a few years, so
I mostly rely on a mix of the Metro in addition to Uber for the last mile
problem.
I figured if I can make LA work without a car, I can make it work anywhere. I
have no plans to buy a car after college, instead choosing to rely on public
transit + Uber. Discussions with my friends from home and college reveal this
is not an uncommon plan upon graduation.
Perhaps these studies are looking at the "long-term" effects of Uber too
early? Could it be plausible that there's an "uber-generation" which will
contribute to a sharp decline in car sales?
~~~
JshWright
> I figured if I can make LA work without a car, I can make it work anywhere.
I assume by "anywhere" you mean "any reasonably urban area".
~~~
dannyw
I live in a very suburban, if not 'literally next door to large national
rainforest' area in Australia. Uber is not 100% reliable, but it works well
95% of the time and the rest can be solved via taking the bus.
~~~
JshWright
Fair enough, my comment doesn't apply to countries with functional public
transit system (the US is not one of those countries...)
------
twblalock
This reveals that people who were previously reliant on public transit are
making use of newer, better options.
If cities don't like that, they should improve public transit.
~~~
mikepurvis
Note as well— transit authorities are often balancing conflicting requirements
from their political overlords. In particular, maximizing profit vs. access.
Politicians (especially non users of transit) often want to see as many of
their constituents as possible "covered" by the transit system, which leads to
meandering, infrequently serviced routes of limited usefulness. But then when
this is done, there are complaints that the transit authority hasn't done
enough to "build ridership" and justify its own existence.
In a world where ride sharing is out-competing buses, perhaps there can be
more attention given to straightening out bus routes and increasing service
frequency accordingly.
More on coverage vs. ridership: [http://humantransit.org/2015/07/mega-
explainer-the-ridership...](http://humantransit.org/2015/07/mega-explainer-
the-ridership-recipe.html)
~~~
twblalock
Pretty much every other rich country manages to deliver good public transit,
and I'm sure they face the same combination of incentives.
------
cdoxsey
At least in NYC the congestion has many causes:
\- the continued growth of the population
\- active measures taken to eliminate lanes and slow traffic (the avg speed is
down to 6mph)
\- the continued decline of the transit systems (the subway system is dirty,
full of homeless people and unreliable... on time arrival has declined
significantly)
\- also its not just the subway, nj transit and lirr both have major
reliability and cost problems. I take a train from nj every day and I consider
myself lucky if my train isn't cancelled once every other week, leading to 3
hour commutes. I dread the next major tunnel failure leading to a week or more
of no transit options
\- the inability to add more capacity to aging infrastructure. It took over 50
years to add the 2nd ave subway and it still isn't finished. almost everything
is packed at rush hour leading to a deeply unpleasant commute
\- taxi service was artificially limited which led to the proliferation of
ride sharing services. They're all subsidized by the companies though, so its
hard to know if they're actually viable businesses
\- recently enforcement has been more strict in midtown. You will see traffic
police at most intersections, and drivers are ticketed for blocking lanes. The
blatant disregard for laws is a major issue. Cars and cyclists regularly run
red lights and people walk into traffic ignoring crossing signals, which leads
to cars slamming on their breaks, and then because traffic stops, all the
other people on the sidewalk decide to cross, and the whole thing grinds to a
halt.
------
spikels
Not a very good article. The underlying studies are pretty weak so I would say
the jury is still out on ride-sharing's impact on congestion. I advise anyone
really interested to read the actual research as this has become highly
politicized.
------
headsoup
Well at least parking should become more available for those that still do
drive themselves around I suppose...
As a public transport user I would appreciate less people being on the trains
at least.
I think the other point to consider is that a lot of those driving are
probably from out of town, where catching a ride-sharing service in peak hours
is going to be prohibitively expensive and therefore not viable. Perhaps ride
sharing services could be banned during peak hours, which puts us back to
yesterday.
~~~
mikepurvis
A lot of cities have wised up to the insanity that is on-street parking, and
converted it where possible into protected bike lanes, seating/parkettes,
wider sidewalks, etc. There's something to be said for lessening the demand
for parking in enabling that process.
~~~
jopsen
Indeed, you'll see this a lot of Europe. What's amazing is that American
cities are new, have wide streets, and thus lots of room if they wanted to do
something.
------
scythe
>Nearly 60 percent said they would have used public transportation, walked,
biked or skipped the trip entirely
Skipping the trip entirely is _not_ a desirable economic outcome. The whole
point of all this technology is to enable people to go places. If it doesn't
do that, it's broken.
~~~
chhs
I think you make a good point. The study[0] broke down the numbers further.
> When asked how they would have made their current trip if ride-hailing
> hadn’t been an option, 12% said they would have walked or biked, and over
> two-fifths (42%) of respondents said they would have otherwise taken
> transit. Some of this "transit substitution" takes place during rush hours.
> Indeed, we estimate that 12% of all ride-hailing trips are substituting for
> a transit trip during the morning or afternoon commute periods; an
> additional 3% of riders during these times would have otherwise walked or
> biked. _Overall, 15% of ride-hailing trips are adding cars to the region 's
> roadways during the morning or afternoon rush hours._
[0] Fare Choices - A Survey of Ride-Hailing Passengers in Metro Boston Report
#1 [http://www.mapc.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Fare-
Choices-...](http://www.mapc.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Fare-Choices-
MAPC.pdf)
------
Pelam
Captain obvious here again! There could be a danger of false dichotomy here.
It needs to be kept in mind that generally there are more options than A) lots
of people using ride sharing services or B) lots of people mainly using
personal cars.
Of course many cities in the US of A and the world in general are designed to
support A to B single passenger rides. This means lots of are covered by
parking spaces and assorted infrastructure.
If however cities are already designed or can be transformed in a way that
most people are assumed to not own a car and even ride sharing systems can be
accounted for, then most likely the congestion situation is affected as well.
~~~
cimmanom
That isn't even happening in NYC, where most people in fact don't own a car,
and virtually nobody (who lives in the 5 boroughs) commutes in one.
We're still prioritizing on street parking above transit, cycling, and even
pedestrianism - and the streets are clogged with Ubers and with the vehicles
of suburban commuters, to the point that buses might as well be pedal powered
for how fast they move, and cycling is suicidal.
~~~
vonmoltke
> We're still prioritizing on street parking above transit, cycling, and even
> pedestrianism - and the streets are clogged with Ubers and with the vehicles
> of suburban commuters
I'm not sure what part of the city you are referring to, but this is not what
I see in the lower half of Midtown. I see few personal vehicles, and none are
parked on the street. In fact, most street parking is explicitly commercial-
only during the day on weekdays.
I agree that a large amount of the congestion is caused by hired cars of one
sort or another, but contractors, delivery trucks, and sidewalk vendors are #2
and the primary drivers of street parking availability (in Midtown).
------
tytytytytytytyt
> While outfits like Uber are typically more efficient than traditional taxis,
> they both spend a significant amount of time milling about on the street as
> they wait for a fare.
Instead of just finding a place to park or wait? That doesn't sound right.
~~~
kelnos
Parking is still a reasonably scarce resource; I'd expect there wouldn't be
enough parking available at any given time to accommodate all the drivers not
currently giving someone a ride. In many cities there aren't really places you
can just "stop". And often the parking that _is_ available is metered, which
might cut into a driver's income more than burning gas circling around would.
~~~
tytytytytytytyt
That's why I said "or wait". It should have been obvious I meant sit in a spot
until you get a ride and not actually pay for a spot or leave the vehicle...
You don't need an official parking spot to wait for 15 minutes, as long as you
aren't blocking the bus.
~~~
kelnos
I addressed that: there really aren't that many places you can just "stop" in
many cities, certainly not enough to cover all the ride-share drivers roaming
around.
------
umanwizard
Good! More people are using public infrastructure. Must mean it's worth it to
them, right?
------
pdonis
The problem described in the article is a short term problem. The reason for
the increase in congestion is that the new services, Uber and Lyft, have added
vehicles, not displaced them. The taxis and buses that were there before are
still there, plus now there are ride sharing vehicles.
But that situation won't last. If usage of taxis and buses decreases, fewer of
them will be needed, so the number of them on the city streets will gradually
decrease. That hasn't happened yet because those services are propped up by
fees and taxes, so the fact that they are being out-competed can be hidden--
for a while. Sooner or later that will cease to be feasible.
The real question is whether, after all this has shaken out, congestion on
city streets will be better than it was before ride sharing services came
along. It seems like it ought to be, since ride sharing seems like a more
efficient way to allocate vehicle space. But we won't know for sure until the
experiment is done.
~~~
acabal
Oh I certainly hope usage of buses doesn't decrease. One person hailing an
Uber takes up an entire car's worth of space on the road: 4 seats, an engine,
and a trunk. One person riding a bus takes a single bus seat on a vehicle that
can hold 20+ people in a minimum of space.
If each individual hailed a single Uber for each ride, it's obvious congestion
would greatly _increase_ versus each individual taking a bus, simple because
one person in a private car takes up much more physical space than one person
on a shared bus.
(I hope Uber doesn't continue to increase for many other reasons, congestion
being just one of them.)
~~~
ballenf
The only time public transport is efficient space-wise is during rush/peak
hours. But the same buses/trams are used during off-peak hours. Haven't we all
ridden nearly-empty public transport many times?
Maybe just restricting ridesharing during peak hours and reducing public
transport during off-peak (even subsidize ride shares like has been tried).
~~~
zaroth
Not to mention that the bus’s limited maneuverability and constant stopping,
and pulling over (usually not out of the flow of traffic) to discharge/pickup
passengers, means it contributes to traffic congestion significantly more than
the equivalent number of cars taking the same linear feet.
~~~
ufo
Instead of looking at it as buses using up a lane that could have been used
for cars, look at it as cars using a lane that could have been bus exclusive.
The throughput of a bus is so massively larger than that of cars that it will
outweighs the frequent stopping. And if you give buses a dedicated lane they
become much more efficient as well.
~~~
vkou
I don't understand why you're being downvoted.
Ever since bus-only lanes, as well an HOV has been added to SR-520, my commute
by bus during peak became faster then my commute by car.
That one HOV lane has more throughput then both of the regular, non-HOV lanes
on the highway combined.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Fresh graduates joining big corporation handybook - pacifi30
http://nishant.posthaven.com/how-to-excel-in-big-corporations-part-i
======
anupamk
Good points but I wonder if this applies for all the big corporations.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Questions: History of Ifconfig - MatrixInfo
I'm writing an article on the development history of ifconfig, and some remnants of earlier protocols that remain in the command defaults. Specifically, in BSD and Linux, we've found that there are some defaults in the subnet mask parameters that can bite an admin if they don't know about them.<p>These defaults derive from the old classful network address system of the late 80s-early 90s. I'm trying to understand why those behaviors haven't been removed since classful networks went away. I think I understand in the case of Linux: Classful networks ended in 1993, and support for net-tools in Linux ended in 2001.<p>I've seen hints though that development for net-tools continues to the present in BSD. So my questions are...<p>1) Is net-tools/ifconfig still in development for BSD?
2) If not, then when did it end?
3) If so, then do you have any idea why it's still using defaults based on classful networks?
======
sigjuice
Which BSDs did you try and what is the precise behavior of subnet mask
parameters that you had a problem with? It would be best if you could include
the exact ifconfig command, the output from running the command and what was
the expected outcome.
1) Yes, there is active development. BSDs don't have net-tools as a separately
developed package.
[https://github.com/openbsd/src/commits/master/sbin/ifconfig](https://github.com/openbsd/src/commits/master/sbin/ifconfig)
[https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd/commits/master/sbin/ifcon...](https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd/commits/master/sbin/ifconfig)
------
sigjuice
It turns out the ifconfig command does not provide any default subnet mask
parameters. That is done inside the kernel. Changing the kernel would break
backwards compatibility.
[https://github.com/openbsd/src/blob/0970cb57551e0e8df6688f8a...](https://github.com/openbsd/src/blob/0970cb57551e0e8df6688f8a475400ea57aba548/sys/netinet/in.c#L664)
[https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/cb8e59cc87201af93dfbb...](https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/cb8e59cc87201af93dfbb6c3dccc8fcad72a09c2/net/ipv4/devinet.c#L1173)
------
cpach
There was a thread about ifconfig earlier this year:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22626346](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22626346)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Suggestions for an exemplar Java project to showcase in class - DSpinellis
Turbo Pascal included the source code of a working spreadsheet written in Pascal. Reading it was a revelation for me: I quickly understood how to structure code in small procedures and functions.<p>I see that my students have trouble structuring their code in classes and methods, and I think that going through an exemplar project in classroom would help them a lot. Which projects would you recommend?<p>Ideally, I'd want something:
non-trivial in size (tens of classes) and structure (use of composition, inheritance, dynamic dispatch, containers, enumerations, maybe interfaces, threads, generics, streams);
useful in everyday situations that the students can readily appreciate;
easy to build;
written with impeccable style in terms of structure, naming, commenting, and formatting;
accompanied with unit tests;
not dauntingly complex (this made me rule out the JDK libraries);
of manageable size (< 100k LoC, ideally < 10k LoC).
======
marcuskaufmann
If your stundents have trouble with the most basic part of programmging I
would suggest that they should do more exercice to gain experience. Just by
seeing "good code" doesn't teach them anything.
A couple of years ago I had a lot of fun solving problems (e.g.
[https://projecteuler.net/](https://projecteuler.net/)) with friends and to
compare and discuss the solutions we've chosen.
~~~
DSpinellis
The students can by now program OK in the small, but I feel they will benefit
from some good examples regarding programming in the large.
~~~
marcuskaufmann
Then log4j might be an option since people will probably use it someday
anyway.
~~~
DSpinellis
I'm going through the source code. It looks indeed well-written and
structured. Its function is a bit difficult to catch the students'
imagination, but I think I can make a good case for it.
------
johny_bee
Not strictly adhering to you ideal needs, check out: \- Apache Commons lib \-
OpenJDK \- JabRef
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Recovering from Burnout and Depression - kierantie
https://kierantie.com/a/burnout/
======
55555
I think a big factor in burnout is that most work is ultimately meaningless,
or even morally wrong, and on a deep level, we're aware of that. Why is it so
hard to make yourself work? Probably because you actually should be doing
something else with your life.
If someone paid you money to kick a dog, you'd feel a strong urge to do
something else. That's because you shouldn't kick dogs. But when we feel the
same urge to not work, we read articles (not this one so much) that are
essentially lists of ways to trick ourselves into doing things that don't
matter or which will make the world a worse place.
You may have an idea that you know will make you a millionaire and which you
could build, but you just can't force yourself to because fundamentally money
won't make you happy and the idea is meaningless at best.
At least this is often the case for me.
~~~
jly
I think this is more true than many would like to admit. Maybe 'most work' as
meaningless isn't the way I would phrase it, but I know many including myself
that are often creatively and technically challenged, work an average number
of hours, but feel the mental stress of burnout purely because of the guilt
and resentment of spending so much time on the specific job function, itself.
To put it a little more abstract than 'kicking the dog', much of the work we
do is in service purely of the bottom line - for products no one demands or
needs, that solve no real human needs (of which there are MANY unmet needs),
but generate maximum profit often at the expense of others or our collective
future. Some work that centers purely around controlling capital serves
virtually no real human function and has no actual output except profit (think
banking, real estate, etc). Maybe I'm in the minority but these thoughts weigh
heavily on me and make it much hard to make myself 'work', regardless of
compensation. We keep at it because it's not feasible or enjoyable to be low-
income in the world we live in, but we feel the urge that we should be doing
something else. I call that a form of burnout.
~~~
seanp2k2
This is one of my big problems with the idea of money being so separated from
actual good these days. It also creates huge wealth gaps, and I have no idea
what could be done to re-align it. Basically, I believe that the concept of
money as it exists today is deeply broken and should be aligned with something
which benefits humans vs something which is required in small to moderate
quantities to not suffer yet which people obsess over, collect, and seek to
increase with an unrelenting fervor, despite any damage it does to society or
individuals.
~~~
dnautics
Money is very broken currently.
"By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly
and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens. By this
method, they not only confiscate, but they confiscate arbitrarily; and, while
the process impoverishes many, it actually enriches some. The sight of this
arbitrary rearrangement of riches strikes not only at security, but at
confidence in the equity of the existing distribution of wealth. Those to whom
the system brings windfalls . . . become 'profiteers', who are the object of
the hatred of the bourgeoisie, whom the inflationism has impoverished not less
than the proletariat."
Doesn't that sound familiar? The quote is, ironically, by John Maynard Keynes,
the very person policymakers cite to justify stealing from the poor and giving
to the rich via inflation, in the name of "stability".
~~~
Dylan16807
> stealing from the poor and giving to the rich via inflation
Inflation is a tax on assets. Isn't that the exact opposite of taking from the
poor?
~~~
qb45
Inflation is a tax on money, not on all assets. It costs those who have their
assets located in money. The big fish don't and beggars neither. Lower-middle
would be my guess.
------
rubicon33
I want to highlight something that the article touched on, which for me, was a
big source of burnout.
"Breakdown of community"
This can happen if you work remotely, or work in-office with a team that isn't
collaborating effectively. If the work you do is isolating and you rarely
collaborate with others, you may suffer burnout.
At our core we all want to feel like we're part of something bigger than
ourselves. Being part of a team, even if it's as contrived as an office team
is, can still be surprisingly important for ones mental health.
If you're feeling burned out consider if a lack of engagement with your peers
could be a contributor.
That's my 0.02 at least.
~~~
tannerc
Poor collaboration within a small team is something I'm experiencing now, and
it's devastating.
Would be curious to hear if you found a way out, or a way to improve
collaboration within a currently flawed group.
~~~
rubicon33
That's a tough question to provide a meaningful answer to without
understanding the source of the problem. Conflicts and lack of collaboration
on teams can be the result of a number of factors each requiring a unique
approach.
In general it's the responsibility of the manager to monitor the health of the
team as a unit. If you have a manager it may be worth bringing this issue to
their attention and working with them to find a solution. The manager has the
authority, and should have the respect, to make the necessary changes to your
team dynamics to improve collaboration. What this means for your team, depends
entirely on what the source of the problem is.
For as much as managers get a bad rap in the tech community, they really do
have an important job. Steering the ship and ensuring the wellbeing of the
team is their number one priority. A good manager should be open to your
comments and appreciate the opportunity to work with you to increase valuable
collaboration.
If you don't have a manager then you may need to wear the manager hat. My
recommendation in this case - not knowing you or your team - would be to
identify the source of the collaboration breakdown, and then reach out to your
colleagues to see if they feel the same way. Assuming everyone on your team is
cordial, they should be open to a discussion on how to promote a collaborative
environment. If your teammates are NOT cordial, well, you've got an entirely
different problem on your hands...
------
failrate
My recovery included a regimented sleeping, eating, and exercise plan that I
introduced in stages. If you have to pick just one to start with, it is a toss
up between going to sleep at the same time every night or going for a walk
every day.
I also never work overtime anymore.
Still not totally okay, but not completely burnt out anymore.
~~~
abvdasker
Can you expand on some of the details of your regimen? I'm having trouble
getting myself to go to bed at a reasonable hour and I think it is strongly
contributing to a growing sense of fatigue at work. Would be particularly
interested in how you got started with it.
~~~
failrate
Yes, it is a simple regimen: At least a half hour before bed, turn down all
lights and light-emitting objects. This means no computers or television. Do
not do anything in your bed other than sleeping or sex. If you want to read
until bedtime, move yourself to a different location, like a comfortable
couch. If you are having trouble sleeping at a given time, you may try
melatonin. I don't have to follow all of these rules now that I've developed
the habit, but I find my sleep is significantly improved when I do. Oh, and
don't go to sleep drunk, either.
------
postfacto
For me the cause for burnout was having to deal with a combination of
politics, the fact that those determined my lack of technical input, that I
wasn't allowed to perform at my best because I lacked input, and then getting
beaten with the underperformer stick while the project was going down the
tubes.
~~~
kierantie
I hear that - it sounds VERY similar to what I dealt with. I also had the
additional problem of working to help an audience and a customer base that
deep down, I didn't care about.
So many people seem to believe it's only about overwork - but that's only a
small part of it. It's a myth I tried to dispel as best I could in the
article.
~~~
quantumhobbit
Very true about overwork. I would be less burned out if I worked more, or was
allowed to be more productive. For me burnout is about powerlessness in work,
the feeling that no matter what I do I won't be able to make a positive
impact.
~~~
graphitezepp
"burnout is about powerlessness" I think is a succinct but adequate way to put
it, at least from my perspective.
------
kierantie
Hey everyone - thanks so much for reading! Burnout and depression is a topic
that not enough of us talk about, even though that's often the best solution.
If you know anyone struggling with burnout or depression, or you just enjoyed
my article, I'd be forever grateful if you'd share it with them on Twitter or
Facebook, to help spread the word. Thanks so much!
~~~
moron4hire
> Burnout and depression is a topic that not enough of us talk about
You know, I get what you're saying, but I actually need to stop you here.
Because honestly, we can't go two weeks without a post hitting the front page
about someone's personal come-to-Jesus moment about burnout. We _do_ talk
about burnout and depression, a _lot_. And nobody learns.
Nobody learns and I don't think anyone will learn. In the 20 years I've been
working in the tech industry, I've only seen things get worse. Workers get
treated more like cattle every day. Creatives who become founders self-
flagellate themselves even more. It's a sick, disgusting cycle, all built on a
lie of "just work hard--never mind on what--and you will get your due", and
it's one I think companies like Facebook and funds like Andreeson are
encouraging so that they can have a constant churn of Jr Devs desperate to get
started and Sr Devs desperate to put their lives back together after their own
failed startups.
~~~
elementalest
Maybe its not so much that nobody learns, but that its something that is
generally best learned through experience. Its hard to self assess and self
deception is easy. So society keeps repeating the same mistakes, even though
those who have experienced and learned from it are actually talking about it.
To me it seems much more like a societal/systemic problem - one that will not
be easy to fix, especially with the increasing inequality and rise of
automation. The demand for achievement and lifestyle upheld by society as
something worthwhile to strive for (for happiness, fulfilment, recognition
etc), just perpetuates the cycle and will be become harder to attain.
What are those to think/do who did not reach what society taught them they
should want and have to be happy and fulfilled? These people put the effort
in, but get nothing back. They get burnt out and depressed and even though
they later talk about it, others cant understand as they don't have
perspective and/or don't think it will happen to them. They are too busy
burning themselves out chasing the goal.
I don't think there is a solution that doesn't involve a radical shift in
society and work/life balance.
~~~
darioush
What you're describing is the norm in capitalist Western countries. Other
societies have different "things to chase", basically the values of their
cultures.
------
twfarland
I burned out three times in salaried jobs. Mostly due to chaotic leadership.
Hard work isn't the problem. Chaos and bad leadership is the problem. Moved to
contracting, and have been fine since.
~~~
convolvatron
how is that? i find that chaos and bad leadership still has a huge impact on
my perception of my job and my ability to make progress as a contractor.
its just alot easier to shrug and cash the check. and spend as much of the
rest of your time doing things you think are worthwhile.
ideally as a contractor i could choose to apply myself at places which were
better organized and more engaging, its just they aren't as interested in
contractors and its hard enough keeping yourself in jobs without firing all*
the lousy customers.
~~~
michaeltoth
A bit off topic, but I'm curious - how did you get started in contracting and
how do you go about finding clients? Is it through people you've worked with
in the past, or do you somehow advertise yourself? This is something I've
considered moving toward but I don't know where to begin. Thanks!
~~~
convolvatron
its pretty hard. alot of reaching out. contracts dry up for a wide variety of
reasons. so you have to keep the pipe full.
body shops will reach out to you - thats usually suboptimal for alot of
reasons, but its work
sadly, alot of my contracts come from interviews for full time positions where
the customer is hiring for some special skill, but its clear there isn't a
long term role for me there. that can lead to work
old contacts are the best way, but you have to stay on people's radar.
sofar I've found gig sites to be pretty useless. the site wants to constrain
communication so that you cant have the normal design discussion up front -
they just say 'microcontroller work <$250', bid yes or no
my impression is that the mvp webapp space is still pretty easy to make money
in. not really in systems - decent employers know that its hard to make a
contract work well and would rather have you as a resource ongoing. and
everyone is just doing staple jobs these days, so 'kernel' and 'test' and
'embedded', and all the old specialties dont get you anywhere.
i would try to leverage someone you've worked with before who is now in a
position to influence a contract decision. someone with whom you have a level
of mutual respect. once you have something ongoing, always spend time trying
to open up new opportunities.
the thing that i find hard is that as a hired gun, you can present your
opinion for consideration - once. its not your role to pursue and agenda,
you're there to provide hourly services at the discretion of the customer and
you need to demonstrate concrete value.
to circle around, its this carefully negotiated per-task relationship that
both removes the pain of trying to work around useless colleagues and
eliminates any reward you might feel for shaping a product. this is not your
party, you're just serving canapes.
~~~
michaeltoth
Thanks for the detailed response. You point out some interesting challenges
that I hadn't fully considered. Overall, do you still prefer to contracting
process and role to a traditional position?
~~~
convolvatron
for me personally i dont really have a choice...to continue the analogy, its
nice to have friends and go to parties. but instead of throwing hysterics when
married lisa makes a drunken pass at married brad...i get to chide the
bartender for overserving and wait until midnight.
------
kornakiewicz
One of my favourite quotes from Edward Sapir (known for Sapir-Whorf
hypothesis):
The major activities of the individual must directly satisfy his own creative
and emotional impulses, must always be something more than means to an end.
The great cultural fallacy of industrialism, as developed up to the present
time, is that in harnessing machines to our uses it has not known how to avoid
the harnessing of the majority of mankind to its machines. The telephone girl
who lends her capacities, during the greater part of the living day, to the
manipulation of a technical routine that has an eventually high efficiency
value but that answers to no spiritual needs of her own is an appalling
sacrifice to civilisation. As a solution of the problem of culture she is a
failure — the more dismal the greater her natural endowment. As with the
telephone girl, so, it is to be feared, with the great majority of us, slave-
stokers to fires that burn for demons we would destroy, were it not that they
appear in the guise of our benefactors. The American Indian who solves the
economic problem with salmon-spear and rabbit-snare operates on a relatively
low level of civilisation, but he represents an incomparably higher solution
than our telephone girl of the questions that culture has to ask of economics.
There is here no question of the immediate utility, of the effective
directness, of economic effort, nor of any sentimentalizing regrets as to the
passing of the "natural man." The Indian's salmon-spearing is a culturally
higher type of activity than that of the telephone girl or mill hand simply
because there is normally no sense of spiritual frustration during its
prosecution, no feeling of subservience to tyrannous yet largely inchoate
demands, because it works in naturally with all the rest of the Indian's
activities instead of standing out as a desert patch of merely economic effort
in the whole of life. A genuine culture cannot be defined as a sum of
abstractly desirable ends, as a mechanism. It must be looked upon as a sturdy
plant growth, each remotest leaf and twig of which is organically fed by the
sap at the core. And this growth is not here meant as a metaphor for the group
only; it is meant to apply as well to the individual. A culture that does not
build itself out of the central interests and desires of its bearers, that
works from general ends to the individual, is an external culture. The word
"external," which is so often instinctively chosen to describe such a culture,
is well chosen. The genuine culture is internal, it works from the individual
to ends.
~~~
erikpukinskis
Yet this is one of the central business models of Silicon Valley: build a
software apparatus, hire "interchangeable" women to take care of the human
side of it, pay them "market rates" which for women's work means "the lowest
acceptable wage for at least one woman in the social class your customers
expect" (they're interchangeable, any woman could follow the script. The hard
part is building The Apparatus that tells them what to do. So we pay men big
bucks to build The Apparatus).
It's all built on the fundamental belief that the work these ladies are doing
is interchangeable while the men's work is not.
Is that really true though?
And of course sometimes you find a pool of men who will let you treat them
interchangeably too...
~~~
psyc
What is this SV software company role that is filled exclusively by underpaid
women? I'm trying to think of what you might be referring to, but honestly
have no idea.
~~~
erikpukinskis
Customer support and office manager are the big ones. I wouldn't use the word
exclusively.
------
hn017132
I burned out in 1999 and never really recovered. I miss some of the work, but
not the stress, not the politics nor gamesmanship. Instead of creating capital
value for faceless shareholders I've spent the past nearly 20 years creating
financial and personal value for myself.
~~~
neversorry
If you don't mind me asking, what steps did you take?
~~~
hn017132
I taught myself how to invest for reasonable returns, so a mix of stocks,
bonds, and real companies. I learned how to read and critique financial
statements, business plans, LLC / LP organization documents.
I learned how to say “no” to outrageous demands on my time, to companies which
asked that I give it all in return for some meager equity grant that could be
worth millions but more likely not worth the paper it was written on.
Fairly boring, really, but not covered in my CS or liberal arts studies in
college.
You get so caught up in the moment: get a job, make money, pay your debts, you
don't get a chance to step back and ask what you want out of life.
I've tried working with startups again since I left that world, and I always
end up leaving after a few months to a year. Most startups are managed as
though everything is a crisis, your hair is on fire all the time (and if it's
not, then clearly you're doing something wrong). Firms, capital back companies
are not new. Digital technology and communications remove a lot of the
friction, but a lot of the corporate politics you find in today's hot startup
existed in the 1990s, 1980s, 1970s and so on. It's not just a failure to learn
from the past, it's an outright refusal, the constant "it'll be different this
time" mantra.
Surprise: it's pretty much the same shit, different logos and domain names
(and apps).
------
throwaway8800
I think the most striking thing about burnout is that, in my experience, it
actually takes time to recover from it. Like a wound that requires healing.
It wasn't a situation where you simply remove a stressor and everything
automatically gets better. A problem was created in my brain and it took a
long time before I was functioning properly again.
~~~
atulatul
Good point. And this is the thing I noticed most in the article. Have read a
few other articles here in the past. But here the author stressed this point.
------
suryakrishna
I was working for the software giant based in Seattle. I experienced all the
emotions mentioned in this post. Lucky that you had an option to take a break
for 6 months. I cannot quit my job and take a big break as my visa does not
permit this but I did quit my job and spent a month looking for another job
which was even more stressful. Currently, I am lucky that I work for a company
which truly values employees. I am currently recuperating and it is gonna take
some time. The important learning is never to allow this in the first phase,
when you have a inception of a thought that something is not going right, get
on it and fix it and never ever think about it again.
~~~
praneshp
If you're on H1, and have the money to pull it off, you can take a break with
an approved leave of absence[0]. When it's renewal time, you can add these
dates in as time not spent on H1 if the time was spent outside the US.
I hope you get better soon!
[0]: [http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/how-taking-
approved-l...](http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/how-taking-approved-
leave-affects-your-h-1b-employment.html)
------
spatulon
This struck pretty close to home. I quit my job because of burnout, and I'm
currently on month five of what I expected to be a two or three month break
before finding another job. I still don't feel ready to go back into the real
world.
Like the author, work overload was not the problem - I almost never worked
more than 40 hours per week. Finding support from family/friends has been
difficult; I've been desperately trying to avoid the stigma attached to the
word ｄｅｐｒｅｓｓｉｏｎ, and as a result I don't think many people realise what I've
been going through, and assume I've just decided to bum around for a bit.
------
soulnothing
I've burnt out on several occasions. I'm currently battling with it right now.
Part of it is my career has regressed in pay and challenge year over year. I
can barely accept doing something relatively pointless. But I need to grow or
challenge myself to some extent. In the long run, I work to pay the bills. I
have a million other things I want to do.
But what do you do when both your personal and professional life collapse at
the same time. That's the boat I'm in right now. As soon as I'm done with
work. I practically start working on salvaging what I can of my personal life.
I forcefully have dragged myself to the doctors. But am not getting much help
as of yet from that field.
------
milesf
A nurse once told me "burnout is actually heartache in disguise". While I
don't complete agree with that statement, I think there's some truth in it.
------
spangry
This article really resonates with me. I burned out badly around 2 years ago
and have still not recovered. 2 years. Although it's probably exacerbated by
pre-existing chronic depression in my case.
It's cost me so much. My friends, who I've all alienated. My general physical
health, which is the worst it's ever been in my adult life. Strained family
relationships. Gaining a reputation for being 'unreliable'.
If you notice that feeling of exhaustion/frustration creeping up on you, even
though objectively what you're doing shouldn't be that strenuous, stop. Stop
right there and take a long break. Don't tell yourself "I'll just close out
this project and then take a break". Just stop. The extra couple of months of
work you might be able to force out of yourself are not worth the years of
hell that may follow.
------
mkalygin
Recently I was feeling very frustrated about my work, about what I do in my
life. This was lasting for about 1 month. I've noticed that in such periods I
compare myself to others and intentionally think that I'm worse. Like
literally the most useless person in the world. Usually I find any particular
metric (even meaningless) and compare. This is very self-destructing activity.
What helps me in fight with burnout is realising what my strong sides are. I
just try to do what I'm good at, and I stop comparing myself to others because
of obvious evidence that I'm not. And of course I get more rest, more sleep
and switch to creative hobby activities more often. Like an author, I
reevaluate my goals and priorities and become in sync with my life again.
~~~
Bakary
I've heard about this thought process often and I feel that the root cause is
that tying your self-worth to your "usefulness" to others or to society at
large is ultimately self-defeating.
~~~
ahartman00
see this recent discussion:
"Self-Compassion Works Better Than Self-Esteem"
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14314958](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14314958)
------
thatonecoderguy
This hit spot on for me. I believe I'm currently dealing with and realized not
long ago that Burnout was real and not an arbitrary term that people through
around.
~~~
kierantie
Glad it helped! I've heard from so many people that have been struggling with
the same thing, but didn't even know that's what was going on. It took me
months to realize what was happening, and one of the biggest things that
helped was reading about others' accounts of their experiences - which is what
prompted me to write about it also.
------
xivusr
I can totally relate to this. I experienced this after working steadily 4
years and then having a close friend pass unexpectedly. Suddenly everything I
was spending all my time on felt like a waste of time. Now, almost two years
later I'm doing better and even looking to work in a non-remote scenario. I
think it's great to be on the lookout for signs of burnout, but on the other
hand it's equally important to use our time wisely and do the things we love.
~~~
h_fitzgerald
Your situation is eerily similar to mine. I lost my best friend in 2015. I was
already pretty overworked and stressed out at my job, but after his death my
brain was just broken. I had no drive, ambition, or focus. My shrink has been
instrumental in the recovery process.
Having said that, rebuilding your life post-burnout/depression can be an
overwhelming at times. It's helped me to just focus on making one thing better
each day, no matter how small the task. Forward momentum is the key ingredient
to a come back. Good luck and Godspeed!
------
faragon
TL;DR: Don't try so hard. Like Queen's song. [1]
[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7kUc5RcMqc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7kUc5RcMqc)
------
ggggtez
Are there any studies on how long engineers take to recover from burnout? 6
months sounds about right from what I've heard anecdotally.
~~~
dredmorbius
I suspect there's considerable variance.
~~~
ahartman00
I believe the anecdotes in this thread range from about 1 month to 2 years,
iirc. I've been feeling a little burnt out lately. But reading this thread
reminded me of how much I have to be grateful for, and there were many good
tips. Like focus on the positives. So for me, like 1 hour or so :)
There are many factors at play here.
How bad is it? What is the cause? How long does it take to address the cause?
Ie if the cause is not having meaning, how long does it take to find something
meaningful? If it is a bad community, how long does it take to find people you
like?
~~~
dredmorbius
Not my field, but:
* Suicide is one terminal option.
* There's a fair history of people who've suffered burnout, or equivalent earlier terms (nervous breakdown, nervous exhaustion, possibly also PTSD and its antecedants -- combat fatigue and shell shock), for the rest of their natural lives.
* Others who've taken multi-year / multi-decadal breaks, or transitioned to other careers or professions.
Again: I suspect considerable variance.
------
P4rzival
This is also a huge problem for social workers, especially working with high
risk clients. A lot of times the departments are unfunded so the workers also
do not get the treatment/counseling they really need.
~~~
ythn
Social workers all the way down?
------
bholdr
Very interesting and very nicely written! I was thinking about this myself
lately ([https://medium.com/@yansh/who-do-you-want-to-be-in-life-
ca8f...](https://medium.com/@yansh/who-do-you-want-to-be-in-life-
ca8ffa3d72e7))..
I think the advice to slow down, take a break, refocus is key to figuring
things out, however, not everyone can afford to do so. It's a risk, and there
is always a trade off. So I wouldn't frame the article as a guide, because
it's different for everyone.
~~~
cerberusss
> however, not everyone can afford to do so
So start saving. This was actually my biggest takeaway from the article. The
couple had more than 6 months of living costs stashed away, which I think is a
very good idea.
~~~
bholdr
yes, a great advice but might not be a viable option for everyone.
------
manmal
It has already been said that burnout can stem from a "bad boss", i.e.
abusive, or your work is not appreciated. I think it can also stem from not
having a (perceived) choice. If your worldview forces you to do this exact job
("I'm only good at this particular job", "I would lose my/our home for lack of
money", "My parents would not approve me quitting"), then this can kill your
enthusiasm, and also result in a burnout. And it will spread, and infect other
areas of your life, and you might wonder why you are actually here. Just
building up a choice can help a lot. This could be an alternative career that
earns less, but you realize that you can actually get by on less. Or you make
the decision that your parents' approval is not something you need anymore.
Given a choice, the fun might or might not return. I'm pivoting to design for
this very reason. I love building things, and I'm good (maybe great) at
software, but programming is just not an activity I feel comfortable doing all
day.
------
sethx
Software engineer here. I've been working on meaningless and emotionally
unrewarding project for the last 2 years. Running burnout self-tests this
morning yielded me the second most critical level, but still worthy of "act
immediately" or "seek medical attention". I feel pretty down and my dayjob is
meaningless to me.
I'm considering taking a sick leave till the end of my contract next month,
and am wondering this:
If burnout is caused by lack of emotional reward and lack of giving a f*ck,
should i pick up a sideproject I've committed to that i kind of care about
instead, and think is interesting? Or ditch that as well and just take rest/go
travel? Can i still work while recovering? What's a good workload?
~~~
ahartman00
"I feel pretty down and my dayjob is meaningless to me"
Do you have hobbies? There's many to choose from :) Ask yourself, what does
have meaning to you? There is more to life than a job.
"should i pick up a sideproject I've committed to that i kind of care about
instead, and think is interesting?"
This might be a good idea. If you would find it meaningful and emotionally
rewarding.
"Or ditch that as well and just take rest/go travel?"
Is there someplace you have always wanted to go? Rest is good, but it sounds
like you aren't overworked, as much as just not being stimulated. As far as I
can tell.
"Can i still work while recovering? What's a good workload?"
If you have the savings, I wouldn't.
"I'm considering taking a sick leave till the end of my contract next month"
If you absolutely need to. But it might mean not getting a good reference. Can
you stick it out(assuming you dont already have another lined up)?
------
rjeli
Why do I never read articles targeted at other high-stress jobs (lawyer, med
student, etc etc)? Do software engineers have a unique culture that identifies
this danger? Or are we the only ones that get burned out, maybe because of
some self-selection into the field?
~~~
chatmasta
Probably just confirmation bias given the fact that a) you mostly read
articles/blogs targeted at SWE professionals, and b) software engineers are
far more likely to blog about their career experience than any other
profession.
I'm sure if you read some trade magazines targeted at lawyers, etc you'd find
similar sentiments.
Another, slightly more cynical interpretation is that software engineers are
"special snowflakes" who are much more likely than legal/financial/medical
professionals to complain about long hours and/or burnout. Interestingly those
three professions all have gruelingly long hours and require you to "pay your
dues" early in you career. Yet those professionals seem to complain far less,
perhaps because the long hours are an expected part of their culture. After
all, in finance people typically _brag_ about how long they stayed at the
office. So there is clearly some difference in work culture between the
professions.
~~~
existencebox
I somewhat agree with your cynical interpretation, but I might tweak it a
little bit to be more forgiving: It's a matter of expectations. SWE work, for
the most part over the last 20-30 years, (until very recently, at least to my
eyes) has been perceived as "creative", almost "artistic" work, whereas the
day to day is much much more in line with some weird combination of banking
(often high stress, shifting goals, high impact of externalities, one small
cog in a giant machine) and blue collar production work. This not even
counting the drastic shifts I've seen in the last 5-10 years to commoditize
SWE work. (not a value judgement, just an observation)
Most of my friends and family who went into finance did so knowing what they
were getting into, some even _wanting_ that. It definitely cultivates a
different culture and set of expectations. (There are definitely some CSers I
knew who love the grind, but I don't think I'm making a stretch to assert they
were the minority, and often were within a specific slice of CS that requires
that more similar culture)
------
Karupan
As someone recently diagnosed with depression and anxiety, this stuck a chord.
For me the hardest step was to prioritize my health over my job and force
myself to get help.
Fortunately, have some savings like the author and am taking a break for a
while. Thanks for this timely post!
------
BertPhoo
How timely; last night I typed 'how to recover from burnout' into google.
Thank you.
------
chmike
This is very interesting. The site is nice but I miss the opportunity to
provide feedback to the author. It's frustrating.
To recover from a burnout I have seen that it can be helpful to keep track of
achievements. In depression or burnout very simple things become very
exhausting. Keeping track of the little things we manage to achieve are like
small victories. When we measure and display in a graphic all the things we
achieved, we objectivate things and see progress which give back trust and
power. It's a vertuous circle. Objectivation is important because we tend to
see only the negative side of things, and especially ourselves.
------
abhi152
I feel that this is a over simplified version of a much deeper problem and
cannot be concluded based on the experience of the Author alone. There are
many things that cause burnout and many different reasons that cause
depression. In the case of author the Work did it but there are people in this
world who get burnt out because of sickness of their loved ones or even
because of ambition & their vision. Interestingly the word depression is not
even mentioned in the article.
------
saral
This has certainly been eye-opening read for me. I believe a lot of us can
relate to the traits mentioned in the blog, this will lead us to take
necessary steps at the right time.
>Burnout offers a hidden silver lining.
In the end this is what leads to satisfaction in life.
------
6841iam
the author of the post really grabbed my attention for his slick copy to get
my to sign up for his mailing list. as soon as you get on the list he has a
link to a tweet he wants you to RT. excellent copy, very good marketing and
product skills. I'm going to be following this author because he could be onto
something.
------
noyes
The reason you are suffering is because you aren't living your life based on
an understanding of your predicament.
Fool me once shame on you and fool me twice shame on me. So don't get fooled
again. And don't forget to remind yourself it's all just a stupid game. Just
like musical chairs.
------
draw_down
Everything in that list is happening for me right now, with perhaps the
exception of the mismatch between my values and my company's. I tell my
manager about it and he has been trying to rearrange things to try to help me,
but I feel like there is probably a reason things got to be this shitty, and
that reason will probably keep on happening. I don't know what to do. My last
workplace was bad in many of the same ways, and I don't feel like I have the
energy to enter into yet another employment situation brimming with optimism,
only to have it turn into the suck once again.
~~~
kevindqc
Same. I guess my only option is to take months off, but can't really afford
to...
~~~
kierantie
Taking months off isn't the only option. It's just one way of buying you
enough headspace to begin to see what the true problem is. Identifying the
cause is the first step - then you can start to take small steps towards
fixing that specific problem/s. Even small things, like turning off your phone
when you leave work for the day, or taking a walk outside on your lunch break,
can help a lot.
------
notadoc
Take a vacation / break, refocus on personal priorities. Learn what makes you
happy, and do that - at least outside of work.
------
backpropaganda
If any of you are suffering from depression, you should seriously try
microdosing LSD.
~~~
lr4444lr
While I'm sure there are a few causes of depression and contextual life events
and personalities for which LSD might be useful, it's downright irresponsible
to suggest that "if _any_ reader" suffers from depression he should turn to
narcotics.
~~~
backpropaganda
I'm not saying I have the study to show that LSD can help with any depression,
but do you have any evidence that it only helps with certain kinds? (I know,
burden of proof is on me)
The reason my advice isn't irresponsible is because microdosing LSD has no
downsides. If it doesn't work, nothing breaks. Try something else then.
Depression is a real life-killer, and if 10 people tried my advice, and this
worked for only 1 of them (although I think at least 5 would), then this
advice has essentially saved 1 life, while not harming the others.
~~~
lr4444lr
Even if it _could_ help them, there are risks[0], and in most jurisdictions,
LSD is a highly restricted drug which doctors cannot prescribe
therapeutically, so there is no guarantee of dose or purity. People with
severe depression who would entertain this seriously are already prone to
impulsive behavior and cognitive difficulties. The suggestion is
irresponsible.
[0]
[https://medlineplus.gov/ency/patientinstructions/000795.htm](https://medlineplus.gov/ency/patientinstructions/000795.htm)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
To Sell a $1,000 Pill for $10 Without Losing Money - jakobsbiz
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-29/his-job-is-to-sell-a-1-000-pill-for-10-without-losing-money
======
erg45g4trh34
I was born with Hepatitis C. The whole situation is frustrating to me. For me
in the US, insurance won't cover the drug unless I am in a category that is
considered to be in great need of it (liver damage, etc.). So at this point I
have to wait until my liver starts being damaged or the price comes down.
I understand the need for rationing given the pricing, but it's still
difficult for me knowing that a cure exists but there's no way for me to
obtain it. Perhaps I should consider medical tourism...
EDIT: After reading the prior authorization guidelines more, looks like I
would be approved if I took up intravenous drug abuse or sex with high-risk
males! Looks like I have other options :)
~~~
joveian
Looking at Pharmacy Checker, Offshore, which I believe ships from India, seems
to have it for $74/pill (in odd quantities that don't seem to evenly divide
what would be needed). Still lots of money and you have to worry about customs
arbitrarily deciding to cause trouble (my impression is that is rare but can
happen).
It looks like round trip airfare to India is available for under $1000, so
that seems like the least expensive option. Wow, so travel to India costs less
than what they sell one pill for in the US, and you can get the full 12 week
supply for less than the second pill (the least expensive version of the full
supply would get you just over half a pill in the US).
Good luck, I hope something works out for you.
~~~
refurb
Beware that Gilead is requiring doctors to check passports before treating
people in India. Not sure how much it's enforced, but that was reported a few
months ago.
------
EwanG
Short version - The fellow responsible for licensing the $1K Hepatitis C
treatment to generic companies in poorer countries talks about the challenges
in getting them out there, and making sure they don't cut into business back
home. IOW, keeping control of a patent by making sure the folks who are likely
to rip you off anyway make more money by working with you.
~~~
refurb
That's actually a really good summary.
Gilead has a lot of experience with differential pricing for developing
countries. They have a large HIV portfolio and started doing this a long time
ago.
------
bahro
"According to Doctors Without Borders, which is critical of drug-pricing
policies, it costs Gilead $100 to manufacture the 90 pills in the 12-week
course."
Sounds more like a $1.11 pill to me. And it seems pretty straightforward to
sell something at (a minimum) 90% margin and make money.
~~~
refurb
That's purely the cost of goods. It completely ignore the cost of R&D.
It's like saying "oh, that CD I just bought only costs $0.30 to press, so $3
is a 90% margin". It's not. You can't ignore the millions that went into
recording the music.
------
auggierose
Very interesting. So, can China not just reverse engineer this pill, and
distribute a generic version of it anyway?
~~~
gravypod
I was wondering the same thing? Why couldn't another company just make a
generic and sell it if there is such a high demand.
~~~
MichalSikora
May be they have good know-how how do this in good level of cost and price. Or
may be this is completely unnecessary for them (the china government).
Normally if you have pharmaceutical generics comapnies they have big portfolio
of many generics drugs ("they do not keep eggs in one basket and
diversification also). Create company which have only one product and sell
only to China market in my opinion is pointless.
~~~
refurb
Well, I assume Gilead is allowing Chinese companies to manufacturer authorized
generics at a price in line with average wages. So people in China already
have access.
The other concern emerging economies like China have is they are already
developing their own brand name/patented drugs. If they don't respect the
US/EU patents, they can't really complain when the US/EU doesn't respect
theirs. The US market makes up almost 2/3 of the western drug market, so it
would be a huge lose for China.
~~~
MichalSikora
Yes, that could be also good explanation. I assume also that China, India etc.
have completely different genetic population than europe populationes. This is
important at clinical trials or bioequivalence study because some drugs
substances could work differently for peoples form Asia and Europe. Pharma
companies run trailes e.g in China and sell drugs only for regional area
(because it work) this drug will be ineffective in Europe or could to do more
damage.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Algorithmic Botany: Publications - dhotson
http://algorithmicbotany.org/papers/
======
lioeters
I love it! From a quick glance down the list, I already found a beauty:
Animating Persian Floral Patterns.
[http://algorithmicbotany.org/papers/persian-
flowers.pdf](http://algorithmicbotany.org/papers/persian-flowers.pdf)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
WoW - rms
http://mattmaroon.com/?p=396
======
rms
Escapism nails it.
Diablo was designed as a series of clicks and rewards. When you clicked on an
item in your inventory, a pleasant sound chimed. When you killed Diablo, you
got a better series of sounds and more things to click in your inventory.
WoW is so successful because it provides such a compelling alternative to
reality. In reality, there is risk, there is emotion, there is change. In WoW,
you just have a steady stream of clicks, a steady stream of rewards, and a
steady group of pseudo-friends (pseudo because they only exist as long as you
play WoW and they won't help you move) that don't judge you. In some ways, it
is better than reality. If nothing else, it is much easier. The only way to
get better is to play more, and the more you play, the more fun you have.
~~~
bprater
If it were just escapism, any MMO could claim that. But none do. Not anywhere
close to what Warcraft has achieved.
I think it's the magic combination of elements that has given WoW the
megacrown. And you've listed several. If you've played Wow, you get it, but
you don't exactly know why.
------
mrtron
#1 Reason easily explained:
Blizzard
Their attention to creating what they consider the 'perfect' game on a
platform they create is mind blowing. They have had Starcraft 2 what any other
company would consider 'finished' for probably 2 years. But they run massive
beta tests, continually tweak and perfect the game.
It shows in every one of their products - look at the
Starcraft/Warcraft/Diablo series - not a single flop or poor game.
I bet you right now that Starcraft 2 becomes even more popular than the
original - and the original is still played in large numbers ten years later!
------
ralph
Submitters, please spare a thought for those of us that read RSS. All I get
is:
Subject: WoW
[Comments][1]
[1]: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=228117
URL: http://mattmaroon.com/?p=396
comments: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=228117
If it's worth bothering all of us with your submission, please take the time
to add a sentance covering the content if it's not obvious.
------
rokhayakebe
Wow lets you create YOU.
Unlike the outside world WoW lets you create YOU as you imagine it in your
wildest dreams. A 360 degree control that cannot be found anywhere in real
life. The game is fair, you are who you want to be as long as you put the
necessary effort into it.
I can guarantee you that a lot of players would respond to their screen name
if you called them out in the street. You think they escape their bills and
work and family by playing, but it is the opposite. They escape their WoW life
by doing mundane things.
------
iamdave
You mean after all this, it has NOTHING to do with the gameplay or the
following of users who migrated from the WC3 universe?
~~~
josefresco
Agreed, article was weak.
~~~
iamdave
Okay, the fact that I got down voted for a completely on topic comment is what
I'm talking about when I say people downvote just to disagree without
commenting themselves. Matt makes no comment on the gameplay factor of WoW and
I think for what it's worth, it's a great technical achievement when you look
at the amount of math and raw computations required for items, enchantments,
leveling, etc. I know this community isn't built around gaming or about
gaming, but I thought it was certainly worth pointing out at least in SOME
degree that WoW's success could have something to do with the gameplay, or at
least since he decided to talk about the social aspect of the game, mention
how many people came to WoW after the success of WC3.
------
alaskamiller
It's not like Blizzard commissioned a set of commercials to explain this.
Shatner <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyUNDbo2KMU>
Mr. T <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqJE5TH5jhc>
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FET09MYis_g>
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNg5ysYd0zc>
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-ZqcW-xu5c>
------
xlnt
Matt,
You really don't play WoW. It doesn't even go up to level 82. Heh.
------
globalrev
ROFL get a life you are missing so much if you think WoW is anything compared
to real life.
~~~
raganwald
"ROFL get a life"
Let me see if I understand what you are saying: You assume the author does not
have a life, and your response is to laugh so hard you fall off your chair?
That is not a very nice sentiment, and if I am correct in understanding your
point of view, it is especially unkind to attempt to publicly shame him for
what you perceive to be an unacceptable lifestyle.
I sincerely hope that the choices you make about relating to people in "real
life" are much more pleasant than the choice you made here.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: What are the forums interesting and meaningful discussion is going on? - aryamaan
I find some of the subreddits interesting and similarly, few people write good answers on Quora. Those are of the kind which makes you think and you feel, you that wasn't feeding junk-food to your brain (even if they weren't on the topics you are not consciously interested in).<p>But most of the threads on these sites are filled with junk (though I will be first to confess, I spend a significant part of my day browsing them).<p>What are the sites where a majority of items and conversations are meaningful and people are not replying just the sake of it?
======
mtmail
[https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/](https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/)
is pretty strict. It's one of the heaviest moderated forums I've seen. At the
same time the question you're asking wouldn't be allowed because it's off-
topic. Can't have both.
------
jerf
Sturgeon's Law.
I've never seen such a thing beyond maybe a mailing list of single-digits of
people on a tightly focused topic. Picking the diamonds out of the rough is a
fundamental operation.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How Many People Are In Space Right Now? - jonmc12
http://www.howmanypeopleareinspacerightnow.com/
======
a3_nm
According to an unsourced claim on Wikipedia
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human>), the largest value ever reached for
this number was 13 (which is surprisingly low).
~~~
sehugg
Here's a citation ([http://www.universetoday.com/27924/soyuz-rockets-to-
space-13...](http://www.universetoday.com/27924/soyuz-rockets-to-
space-13-humans-now-in-orbit/)) it last happened in 2009. Three ISS, seven
shuttle, and three Soyuz. It also happened in 1995 (Mir) and 1997.
~~~
a3_nm
Awesome, thanks! Wikipedia article updated.
------
jackfoxy
This is a testament to how damned expensive it is to get into space. There is
no subverting the laws of physics.
~~~
nazgulnarsil
get out of earth's gravity well and you're halfway to anywhere in the solar
system, energy wise.
------
jamesaguilar
I just got shivers as I pictured the changes that would occur on this site
over the next three or four centuries were it kept up to date for all that
time.
~~~
lmarinho
Hope the real change in that value doesn't disappoints us. If I travelled in
time from 1970 to today and looked at this site I surely would be
disappointed.
------
shii
They make you autofollow once you visit the page and are signed into Tumblr,
not cool.
~~~
sjs
Not for me. (Chrome, OS X)
------
dlokshin
More specifically, this is the number of _live_ people in space. I'd be
curious to know how many dead people are in space as well (the ones who had
their body's launched upon passing).
~~~
tripplesix
The number may be larger than we know because of the undocumented
disappearances of early Soviet cosmonauts. Although Yuri Gagarin is widely
believed to be the first man in space, it is highly probable that he was only
the first man to survive space travel.
~~~
InclinedPlane
This is a conspiracy theory with absolutely no solid evidence behind it.
------
jgroome
This site may actually bankrupt NASA if they keep hotlinking that 1.7mb
background image.
------
savrajsingh
(that civilians know about :))
~~~
zyb09
yea pretty sure there are another couple hundred people on the secret CIA
space ship, conspiring in space about their evil plan to take over the world.
~~~
savrajsingh
The SR71 was a secret for a long time. Now it's in museums. What secret
aircraft/spacecraft do we have now? Beyond the x37? The military budget is
orders of mag greater than NASAs. That's what I meant.
~~~
tesseract
I would guess that the secret aircraft of today, likely as not don't have
people in them.
------
prtk
Too many satellites. Too few people. Seems like space is infested with robots.
Gentlemen machines are winning! And it will be my 1001th(in decimal) birthday
before I go where no man has gone before. :(
------
btilly
On NPR this morning I heard that the total number who have ever been in space
is about 550. That was a lot more than I thought it was.
------
arihant
I think they mean 'Not on Earth'. Being on Earth is same as being in Space.
Earth is in Space.
~~~
ryanklee
No, they mean "in Space". Why attempt to subvert the obviously standard usage
of the word? It's just silly.
------
idlewords
Not enough.
------
jcnnghm
I think it's kind of surprising how low the number is. Almost certainly
because space exploration is underfunded.
Over the last few weeks, there has been a lot of talk about the NASA budget,
and there are a couple of things I think many people don't know. The total
2010 US Space budget was $64.6B. The entire rest of the world combined spent
only $22.5B. NASA's 2010 budget was $18.7B, 83% of the spending for the rest
of the world. It's more than a little ironic when those outside the United
States criticize cuts to US space spending. Europeans, in particular, may want
to consider the paltry $4.6B ESA budget before they criticize the United
States. Space spending does need to increase; the rest of the worlds needs to
start contributing.
~~~
davidhollander
> _Almost certainly because space exploration is underfunded._
Or because there is currently no benefit in conducting exploration using
humans instead of robots.
~~~
jcnnghm
Because we can is almost always a poor reason to do something, but this may be
an edge case.
~~~
davidhollander
I understand the desire for action, but we need to invent another task besides
exploration to engage in. I.e. resource exploitation. Purely observational
exploration of outer space is a task for which we are extremely maladapted
(vacuum, long distances, etc.) that robots will probably always be better at.
~~~
jcnnghm
I definitely agree with what you're saying at the beginning, but I'm not so
sure about the end.
I think there is some value in putting humans in space. It certainly seems
many scientific discoveries are made by a scientist observing or experiencing
something, noticing that it is strange, then investigating. A perfect example
of this is the development of microwaves, which came about because an engineer
working on radar noticed that a candy bar started to melt when near the radar.
Robots are certainly superior by almost every metric once you know what you're
looking for, but I wouldn't be so sure that we actually know what we are
looking for. Boots on the ground, so to speak, can offer insights that a robot
simply cannot.
~~~
davidhollander
Exploring space with humans for the possibility of positive technological side
effects does not seem a reliable, long term way to increase the number of
people in space at any given time, if that is your primary goal. It seems like
a way to temporarily boost the number by around 3.
If the goal is to increase the number of humans in space for the sake of
increasing the number of humans in space, one would probably need to do
research into a colonial business model sustainable enough to get investors
and governments on board.
------
horseshoes
Isn't it closer to 4 billion? Probably more, that we don't know about yet?
Edit: Sorry, 6 billion. Didn't mean to make you think 2 bil. people died.
~~~
mtogo
Why is horseshoes being downvoted? He's exactly right, there are about 6.79
billion[1] people in space[2] right now. There are 10 in _outer_ space, but
the domain isn't howmanypeopleareinouterspacerightnow.com
[1] <http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=population+of+earth>
[2] <https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Space>
~~~
Sacrificiality
And this is why geeks are considered 'retarded'.
Do you really miss the point? No. Pedantic bullshit trolls. Wave to the
camera!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How to grow awareness of your mobile application? - Ryanafish
I was recently brought on to a start-up with an unbelievable mobile product but a small user base and no progress in terms of internet awareness or virality, and I'm in charge of changing that.<p>I know that this community has more collective knowledge about viral growth than most other places online, and if anyone could find a moment or two to give me some advice on how to approach this problem and make the world aware of what we've made I would greatly appreciate it.
======
Ryanafish
Also, our video demo is located at immediatelyapp.com, give it a look!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Do you automate most of your routine tasks? - iworkforthem
Right now, I have a few small tasks I need to complete every other day, it does take up some time. I could also spend around 2 weeks to code and automate whole process. Would you?<p>Also, what other tasks do you currently automate?
======
patio11
I get bored easily with repetitive work. Generally about the third time I find
myself doing something, is on the short-list to get some level of automation
applied to it.
BCC is in maintenance mode, which means that my _only_ interaction with the
site is customer support and moving money around once a week to cover bills
and my paycheck. Everything else is automated or outsourced. Bookkeeping for
sales, for example, is 99.96% automatic. (Chargeback? Bah, you always miss one
case...) Bookkeeping for expenses is about 90 ~ 95% static from month to month
modulo dates and numbers, so I have my VA do it for me. Order fulfillment is
automatic. Routine server administration is automatic. Customer services
problems are, to the extent practical, automatic.
See generally: [http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/03/20/running-a-software-
busin...](http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/03/20/running-a-software-business-
on-5-hours-a-week/)
I should _probably_ find a week or so to give BCC in the near future to make
the ghost ship a wee bit less rudderless. (Like restarting content creation
for it -- that was 99% automatic when I had a freelancer actively working on
it, but she quit and I haven't bothered replacing her for... far too long now,
it seems.)
AR and my consulting work are both less mature and, by nature, require more
hands on attention. Still, you could reasonably expect that as I get more of a
hang on what the business needs and where I add the most value to it, more
work will get pushed off onto systems or processes.
------
jarin
I use Moonshine for automating server configuration and Rails deployment, git
aliases for shortening commonly used git commands, and zsh aliases for
shortening things like "cd ~/wiki; soywiki" to "wiki".
I also spent a few bucks on an 8 GB RAM upgrade so I could just set MySQL,
Postgres, MongoDB, and Redis to run on startup and not have to stop and start
them whenever I am working on different apps, and I still have plenty of RAM
left over for Photoshop, Starcraft II, etc.
I also spend time practicing vim tricks for things that commonly require a
bunch of keystrokes, since practicing shortcuts until they become automatic is
effectively the same thing as automating the task itself.
There are also a lot of things I _don't_ automate, but it basically boils down
to whether or not I use them enough to make it annoying enough to make me want
to automate them. For example, I know that it's possible to set up a Rails
template that creates a new Rails app with all of the gems, plugins, and
configuration that you commonly use, but since I only create new Rails apps
once every two weeks or so it's not enough of a pain that I want to spend the
time creating the template.
------
perlgeek
I can't automate most of my routine tasks, and I'm not sure I would if I
could: eating, sleeping, taking the bike to work, talking to people, ...
I do automate many of my computer related tasks. Since I'm a fan of the
command line, small perl scripts, shell scripts and aliases do a lot of "work"
for me.
------
hoop
How long do you plan on being there? How much time will you spend on these
tasks in the long run?
If the cost of performing these small tasks over some specified period of time
outweighs the cost automating them, and they /are/ in fact easily automated,
then I think the answer here is clear: AUTOMATE.
Tasks I've automated:
* Server/OS/software deployment
* Daily calculation of linear regression of email queues on my mail servers
* Webcam snapshots and automatic uploads - [http://www.charleshooper.net/blog/automating-webcam-snapshot...](http://www.charleshooper.net/blog/automating-webcam-snapshots-and-uploads-to-flickr/)
* Most tasks requiring data entry - <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2359287>
* And lots and lots of other things
------
mopoke
Depends on the definition of "some time" compared to the 2 weeks (solid?) it
would take the automate. And how long you expect to continue doing said tasks.
That said, I would always err on the side of automating - at least some of the
tasks. Take the low hanging fruit and tackle those first.
For example, I send out a weekly report containing a bunch of metrics sourced
from our website monitoring tool. It took me a couple of days to automate
that, but it saves me a good hour every week (and means I don't make mistakes
copying and pasting figures which I used to with alarming regularity). It also
means that my Monday mornings can start immediately without pounding through a
repetitive task.
~~~
itcmcgrath
Exactly. Unless you have what "some time" is, how can you possibly justify
something. It all boils down to ROI and risk (including mental sanity).
------
jwall
practice, practice, practice
The more you automate routine tasks, the faster you'll become. Don't just do a
calculation of:
# of times to do a menial task * amount of time to do menial task <> amount of
time to automate
That oversimplifies and doesn't take into account how much faster you'll be at
scripting etc. in 20 years if you take every opportunity to hone your skills.
Think of it like touch typing; might slow you down at first, but you're going
to more than make up for it by the end of your career.
------
bartl
Yes I do. For example, I have a little script to install Drupal modules, which
is nothing more than downloading the tarball from the Drupal website, and
untarring it in the proper directory.
Likewise, I've got scripts to extract strings to translate (with gettext())
using xgettext from various project directories, and merging it with older,
already existing translations; and for installing edited translations
afterwards (with msgfmt).
I also have a script to upload files that were changed locally to a remote
server.
No, it didn't take me 2 weeks to code them.
Most of the time I just do the task once, and store the commands in a file.
Next I edit that file replacing values with script arguments. Tada! Instant
script. For lists of values that depend on the project, I create presets (one
argument determines what set of values to use).
~~~
zdw
You should check out drush - "drush is a command line shell and scripting
interface for Drupal":
<http://drupal.org/project/drush>
------
HerraBRE
I automate as much as I can. Sometimes I'll even "automate" a one-off task,
simply because writing steps down in a shell script makes it easier to review
what is about to happen and avoid trashing, say, a big chunk of my digital
photo album... :-)
Automation doesn't just save time; it also avoids many mistakes caused by fat-
fingering things or forgetting step 6 of an 8 stage process.
Also, once you have automated something, you've (at least potentially) created
a tool you can share with someone else, which is good for teamwork, delegation
and continuity in a work-place.
------
y0ghur7_xxx
I would, and I do. Coding is much more fun than doing repetitive tasks, and
once it's done you are just so much quicker in completing that particular
task. This is true even for very simple tasks. For example I have to copy some
files to a network share once a month or so. It does not take much time to do
manually, but I had to open a file explorer, search the source folder, ctrl+a,
ctrl+c, search the destination folder and ctrl+v.
Now it's just a doubleclick on a .cmd file on my desktop.
------
einaregilsson
I try to automate as much as I can. I also use these little programs/scripts
as opportunities to learn something new. Examples:
1\. We had a support portal at work which I had to check regularly during the
day. I wrote a small program that monitors the relevant page and pops up a
taskbar notification when something new arrives. Used the opportunity to learn
about taskbar notifications and a little WPF.
2\. I sometimes get database backups from customers and have to restore them
on my machine, which means opening SQL Management studio, clicking and right
clicking a bunch of things. Then I need to add myself as user, change a couple
of settings before I can use the database for anything. I wrote a small
utility so I can right click on any .bak file in explorer, choose Restore
database and update the relevant tables so the database is ready to use right
away with the connection string on the clipboard. Also used it as an
opportunity to learn about windows 7 taskbar progress bars.
Basically I like doing small projects, but I never finish them unless they
really do something. So, automating stuff I do makes much more sense than
learning by following a tutorial that builds something useless.
------
roel_v
I used to, until I spend a whole day on a vim script that, realistically, only
would save me significant amounts of time by the time the work I was
automating would bring in 1000's of dollars a day.
Nowadays I only do it after it's been proven (or I'm 100% certain up front)
that a certain task will come up more often, and that letting someone else do
it is not feasible or cheaper.
------
coolgeek
"We will encourage you to develop the three great virtues of a programmer:
laziness, impatience, and hubris."
\-- Larry Wall
Task automation encompasses all three virtues:
Laziness - "I don't want to do this task every (other) day"
Impatience - "I don't want to spend time doing this task"
Hubris - "Of course this will work on the first try"
------
cmontgomeryb
I have started automating a lot of the smaller, repetetive tasks. It doesn't
save a huge amount of time, just removes small annoyances and friction. One
example is that I'm new to OSX, so I was playing with Automator and have used
it to create a command which brings up my entire development environment. This
saves only 1.5 to 2 minutes each time, but it removes that friction when I get
home from work I can just put my laptop on the sofa and have the dev
environment load while I make a drink.
At work we have to create performance reports monthly for a particular client.
The procedure has always been to do it manually, which takes around 4 to 5
hours. Writing the code to automate this in C# took less than 4 hours and now
the reports take 2 to 3 minutes each month. Time well spent, money definitely
saved.
------
jackkinsella
I'd automate everything if given enough time. To me it's the essence of
running an efficient business (and indeed scaling). Some examples:
1) I automated the creation of Google Adwords CPC keywords for my ecommerce
website. Based on attributes of the product, the algorithm creates 500 unique
keyword combinations. Over the coming days I will automate the creation of
entire campaigns.
2) I automated gathering information about 200 universities by hiring a smart
virtual assistant.
3) I automate my customer support emails by using canned responses.
4) I automate the running of my unit tests so that they run whenever I save
relevant files.
5)I continue to automate my code base by writing new layers of abstraction
which call lower layers intelligently.
~~~
russjhammond
I would love you know how you automate the creation of Adwords keywords.
------
dhimes
I automate all the small, repetitive tasks I can. Even when I'm heavy into
coding (where I'm working with JS/php/db all day long every day), I'll have a
script which opens my terminal and editors and the db etc. so that my day
starts with a ./startEd.sh command.
Right now I'm setting up a staging server for my new webapp (I'm frantically
working towards a private beta). This is new learning for me- and I'm writing
a script for everything I do (that I can). This not only sets up a way for me
to do setup/config tasks automatically, so I don't make typos, etc.), but also
_documents_ what I'm doing. I hadn't considered that aspect of it before I
started writing these scripts.
------
asymptotic
I try to automate tasks in a hierarchical, re-usable fashion, based on log
file output, and always in a pragmatic, least-cost approach. No-one is paying
me to make my life easier.
For example, I'll find myself performing tasks X, Y, and Z quite a lot. I'll
find out that I have 20 minutes free and I'll figure out the most common
denominator of the tasks, let's call it A, and then implement it. I'll quickly
re-write the high level processes X, Y, Z and to use A and then move on with
my life. The up-shot is that future tasks B, C, D, E, F can all use the now-
battle-hardened procedure A, and maybe others in my company will find A
useful.
------
ulrich
Two weeks are quite some time for an automation. But depending on how much
time you spend every day, you might want to go for it. It's not only about
saving time daily, it's even more about scaling things up.
If the process is automated, it should be quite easy to use modified versions
for similar problems. And you can quickly run it again and again without
having to worry about making mistakes.
------
forkrulassail
Yes, server tasks, deployment tasks. My daily routine 'feels' automated to a
large extent and I'm still trying to optimize for output.
When I say my daily routine feels automated I mean, when I have two boring
tasks I usually combine them to make them less inane. So an automata type
scenario comes into play. I don't have to 'think' about the two crappy but
necessary tasks.
------
smarterchild
While I automate some computer related tasks, I can't automate house chores,
working out, etc.
So I wrote an app to remind me: <http://i.imgur.com/exzb0.png>
I find this sort of thing most useful if you have chores that you want to do
regularly, but not on a specific day (i.e. clean every Tuesday).
------
russjhammond
Using Automator on my mac I have created a few simple folder workflows. For
example I have one that everything I drag into it gets printed. This seems
simple but its great when you constantly get a few emails a day with multiple
attachments that need printing. Saves a few seconds every time.
------
jogo3000
I have similar experiences with mopoke.
I've automated a lot of small tasks lately and as a result I have a small
library of stuff which makes it easier and faster to automate yet more small
tasks. It definitely is worth the invested time.
------
johnnytee
Check out <http://sikuli.org/>. It's visual based programming for automating
task. I use it all the time and it's super fast to set up.
------
swah
It is sad though, that we can automate software hassles with such ease, but we
can't automate real world tasks yet.
------
szcukg
I automate a lot of excel and outlook related work
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The centuries-old struggle to play in tune - jonp
http://www.slate.com/id/2250793/pagenum/all
======
nfnaaron
As a non-musician, it's interesting to read about the frustrations and
tensions involved in tuning. So similar to the trade-offs we have to make in
writing software, and equally obscure and surprising to non-participants.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Pono Player – Neil Young and his music store - piqufoh
http://www.ponomusic.com/
======
projct
Here's what Monty (of ogg vorbis fame) has to say about this:
[http://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-
young.html](http://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Research shows that people project their own beliefs onto God. - AndrewDucker
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18216-dear-god-please-confirm-what-i-already-believe.html
======
jhancock
We didn't need a new research report to tell us this.
~~~
mbubb
Right.
It is interesting how (in the European and American context) we have not
developed this idea much from the Enlightenment (Spinoza, Pascal, etc). We
know this idea and yet cannot get past it.
The realization does not shake the belief itself, unless it was very weak to
start with. The German philosopher, Ernst Bloch - I think in his work "Atheism
in Christianity" - insisted the the 'atheist is very close to the true
believer' in the sense that both are responding to the same impulse.
Darwin doesn't wreck my idea of the possibility of a God. And I do not mean in
the sense of "Intelligent Design" or whatever it is called.
It seems hard to accept that if there is 'an allpowerful creator being
thingie' that it would be completely beyond our ken. And any approximation
would be an approximation of something infinite and thus as good as nothing.
Less than the shadows on the cave in Plato's image.
This idea is at least as old as the combined JudeoChristian tradition.
Arguably (and I am not competent to argue this - just was taught it years ago
by a Franciscan so take it for what itis worth), arguably the oldest book of
the Hebrew Scriptures is Job. The oldest text. And to me the answer to this
idea is in that book. (and if you happen to be in NYC check out Wm Blake's Job
prints in the Morgan library exhibit)
That idea of god is incomprehensible, terrifying and at turns mild, beatific.
Like those alternately anthrophagous and beatific buddhas on Tibetan or
Mongolian tapestries.
Over the years a few things I have read have given me the same chill as the
lines of God responding to Job from the whirlwind (Stephen Mitchell's
translation). Like the ending of "King Lear" or Prince Arjuna looking over the
plains at his immense enemy spread before him but then realizing his
charioteer is Krishna. Moments of almost obliterating awe - the realization of
the absolute otherness of creation of which we are a part yet separate through
consciousness trying to get back...
Which gets to why I think Bloch was right. The atheist and the true believer
they are human responses to the same impulse.
I do not get the in between - ie articles like this - is this a new idea?
------
sili
"This research suggests that, unlike an actual compass, inferences about God's
beliefs may instead point people further in whatever direction they are
already facing."
I have long thought that one of the major downside of any religion is that it
radicalizes people. No mater how much peace and tolerance it preaches, dogma
always takes over.
~~~
toadpipe
It can increase people's commitment to compassion too. Like Lisp or Forth, it
is an amplifier. Actually placebos are a better analogy. Both are imaginary
social support that allows a body to commit resources that would otherwise be
held in reserve.
------
nathanb
This isn't surprising...people tend to project their own beliefs onto
everybody, and unlike our fellow humans God doesn't give us any opportunities
to disabuse ourselves of this notion.
------
Goladus
The question this should make people ask is: where are these beliefs coming
from, if not from religious teaching?
Often both sides of a controversial argument are content to blame God for the
position of the religious side. It's easier to simply write off your opponent
as an unreasonable religious nutcase rather than making a legitimate attempt
to look for the real motivation. It's almost as easy to attack religious
fallacies as it is to use them for support.
------
anigbrowl
It is somewhat interesting for noting _why_ this is the case, eg fMRI
observations showing that praying activates the same brain regions as used
when chatting to friends.
Didn't read the original paper yet, but I'd like to see some research on how
these beliefs may shift at different times. For example, someone might say
it's wrong to steal on Monday, but on Friday they might embezzle some money
while murmuring 'god helps those who help themselves', balancing it out with
an hour or two of being a poor sinner on Sunday before deciding they've been
forgiven at the end of it. Stories of large-scale financial fraudsters often
reveal a pattern of 'doubling down' and increasing the fraud in an attempt to
use the money as capital for a superficially legitimate scheme designed to
yield a large profit and allow the return of the money they 'borrowed'.
Julian Jaynes theorized that consciousness as we know it today developed out
of a kind of low-grade schizophrenia in which people internalized social mores
as religious voices prior to the kind of self-reflection we take for granted
today.
------
teeja
Much like how we project our ideas about our ideal love-object onto the people
we fall in love with. Which, of course, no person can ever live up to.
"God" is a very flexible object of contemplation. As a word, its entire
meaning is dependent on context. To a great extent that context is _very_
private. Yet most of humanity naively bandies it about as if we're already
agreed on what it means. As a meme it's certainly one of the most, if not the
most, successful that's ever grabbed hold of us. For whatever purposes.
------
crux
Is this surprising or concerning? This article seems to presume a belief or
decision making process wherein the subject has a belief, but has not thought
about what God would think on the issue, and so decides to address the
question by performing an act of intuition—at which point God's opinion is
intuited to be similar to the subject's own.
I would be awfully surprised if religious people didn't tend to have opinions,
religious and moral, that tend to track with each other and influence each
other.
------
gcheong
This reminded me of something from a Steve Yegge rant:
"Now do a Google search for "perl religion". Looky looky, the first link is a
Slashdot interview with Larry entitled: Larry Wall on Perl, Religion, and...,
in which Larry talks extensively about his conversations with God, in which
God evidently explains to Larry that He only likes Perl programmers. "
<http://steve.yegge.googlepages.com/ancient-languages-perl>
------
presidentender
I tend to think that a lot of religious fanaticism is a result of positive-
feedback loops between sect members. God is defined by the authorities in a
group, per this article; the rest of the group internalizes this God and
projects their own beliefs, again per this article; they share these beliefs
among themselves and with the religious leadership, and the cycle starts over.
(I am a Christian, in case that colors your interpretation of this comment).
------
symesc
Ramen.
------
sketerpot
In other news, the world continues to rotate. It's nice to have a proper study
saying it, though.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
EBay Password Update - frodprefect
http://www.ebay.com/reset
======
nodata
> We take security on eBay very seriously
Very seriously.
No mention of most of my personal information having been stolen. Thanks ebay!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Transforming government through entrepreneurship - hiDenise
http://startupinresidence.org/apply
======
hiDenise
I used to work for the San Francisco Mayor's Office and I wanted to let this
crowd know that they're accepting applications for their Startup in Residence
program, which gives tech startups access to City agencies for 16 weeks to co-
design innovative products that improve public service delivery. From a
startup perspective, participation means:
\- a committed government partner to demonstrate market fit and a user testing
group that's usually hard to access
\- being fast-tracked for a government contract, as participating startups are
pre-approved should department want to buy
\- exposure to other potential government clients (many cities keep an eye on
this program and the success of participants’ products)
\- cross-sectoral mentorship and being part of a learning cohort
\- no requirement to give up any equity
There are 4 cities and 20 challenges that cross a lot of tech spaces. I'd
encourage you to apply!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Wallabag, a self-hostable application for saving web pages - tcit
https://www.wallabag.org/
======
tcit
Hi there,
As written in the title, wallabag is a self-hosted read-it-later web
application (like Pocket or Instapaper, but open-source) that saves content
from webpages. You can organize content and sync it on different devices. We
were kindly invited
([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10904805](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10904805))
by HN to do a Show HN, and hope you'll be interested in our project.
For the last few months, we've been working on a whole new version of our
application (v2), and it sound very promising. We've just launched a new alpha
version for you to test on your server :
[https://www.wallabag.org/blog/2016/01/22/wallabag-
alpha2-v2](https://www.wallabag.org/blog/2016/01/22/wallabag-alpha2-v2). You
can also have a preview at [http://v2.wallabag.org/](http://v2.wallabag.org/)
If you're not willing to play adventurous, you can still give a try to old
version 1.9.1 or choose our hosting service at
[https://framabag.org/](https://framabag.org/)
~~~
mathijs
Hi, and thank you for Wallabag! I've been happily using the self-hosted
version for quite a while now. At some point I forked[1] the Android app but
development stalled when I needed an API to be able to improve the app
further. So this v2 is great news!
Just an FYI: in the blog post you mention that the login for the preview of v2
is wallabag/wallabag, however I get 'bad credentials' when trying that.
This new Material Design version looks awesome! Eagerly looking forward to v2
becoming stable so I can upgrade.
[1]: [https://github.com/monkeyinmysoup/wallabag-
android](https://github.com/monkeyinmysoup/wallabag-android)
~~~
nicosomb
wow nice your fork! Did you see that we released a new android version few
months ago?
~~~
mathijs
Thanks! I didn't know that, but I'll check it out. Thanks!
------
hippich
Btw, sovereign[1] project has wallabag included in the package.
1)
[https://github.com/sovereign/sovereign](https://github.com/sovereign/sovereign)
------
ocdtrekkie
This looks really cool, I'd love to see this on Sandstorm at some point. (I
use TTRSS as a feed reader there, and tend to just star stuff to come back to,
though this would be a better place for storing the stuff I want to read
later.)
~~~
nicosomb
Hello ocdtrekkie, We don't have time to develop a sandstorm application. If
you want to help us with this app, you're welcome ;-) I open a new issue to
not forget your idea. Already here in fact
[https://github.com/wallabag/wallabag/issues/1160](https://github.com/wallabag/wallabag/issues/1160)
~~~
ocdtrekkie
Heh, awesome to see people have already been talking about it!
------
zokier
Have you considered adding an option for saving/archiving the pages without
cleaning them? Maybe utilize WARC somehow.
------
Houshalter
Not the same thing, but kind of relevant and interesting, gwern article on the
dangers of link rot and archiving URLs:
[http://www.gwern.net/Archiving%20URLs](http://www.gwern.net/Archiving%20URLs)
------
abrowne
Just tried the V2 demo, and it looks great, with both themes. I used V1 a year
or so ago, and this is definitely a step up.
However, since Firefox added reader view, I find I don't use services like
this any longer. I was a very longtime Instapaper user and then also used
Readability.com, but now I just bookmark pages I like (and/or save them to
Android Firefox's reading list).
~~~
nicosomb
I understand. It depends on your organization. Firefox reader view (who works
very well) is not a read it later. It's a cleaner tool ;-)
------
emeraldd
So, how does work with DMCA issues? (Or am I missing something?)
~~~
Zikes
In regards to self-hosting, there shouldn't be any copyright infringement as
long as you are not re-serving the contents. Even then, there are exceptions,
e.g. archive.org and Google Cache.
The biggest likely legal concern is possible accidental server DDOS, but as
long as it respects robots.txt and it paces itself, that shouldn't happen.
------
owly
Nice work! I'd like to see someone create an automatically reformat & send to
Kindle app.
~~~
daturkel
Check out tinderizer:
[http://tinderizer.com](http://tinderizer.com)
------
msh
I like it, but the install have quite a lot of dependencies which was kind of
annoying.
------
volaski
OK I think I'll go download that framabag.org thing instead, that sounds cool
------
mynewtb
Warc support would rule
------
g4k
Are there any plans to support video offline sync?
~~~
tcit
Ideas, but no real solutions.
------
lazyant
stable version demo [http://demo.wallabag.org/](http://demo.wallabag.org/) is
404
~~~
nicosomb
Yes, sorry for that. Don't hesitate to create an account on Framabag.org (it's
free!) to test stable version.
------
flormmm
nice!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ubuntu 10.10 – What’s New? [Screenshots] - dkd903
http://digitizor.com/2010/10/10/ubuntu-10-10-whats-new-screenshots/
======
piinbinary
Is it just me, or is this release treading water? There doesn't seem to be
anything beyond minor UI improvements and a few features scattered here and
there.
~~~
tomjen3
Not really - they blog post specifically said they would only look at the
visible changes, so there aren't going to be that many changes.
And the concept of paid apps are pretty damn nice, seeing as this a great way
for canonical to make money and might make money for a few developers too.
~~~
wazoox
> And the concept of paid apps are pretty damn nice...
I've got nothing against paid applications, but I'm rabidly against non libre
applications. So this is definitely not good as is.
~~~
tomjen3
Ubuntu has a lot of stuff that isn't free: unrar, java, flash, etc.
You are free not to use it, but personally it doesn't bother me too much, as
long as the data formats are open.
------
motters
The installation process looks slightly different, and there are some changes
to the software centre, now with a proprietary section. It will be interesting
to see what happens with the proprietary stuff.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Am confused. Please suggest - sunny_s
Hi, I am a long time reader, first time submitting.
I'm a bit confused with my current situation, I would be very grateful if you guys could give me a few pointers. I am not so experienced as most of you here, but i've mostly picked up stuff I'm interested in quite well and easily.<p>My primary interest is network programming. I have done quite a bit of reading and experimenting and am familiar with mechanisms of most protocols. Now I want to start writing code. I read introductory stuff on python and grasped it well too. I had just started playing with the python modules, when I met somebody(with a tall reputation) at the local lug meeting who told me that I could always learn python very easily later but C was the language I must know, specially given my interest on network programming. I did some research and thought maybe the guy is right. So I've been with a k&r for 4 weeks now. It didn't intimidate me but I am progressing very very slowly and maybe that's why also slacking a bit. I am posting this because I'm at the stage where it's even worrying me now.
I'm always thinking that in python i could be building stuff right now. I know python won't teach me low level things like memory management etc, but my progress is pain-stakingly slow in C.<p>Question: Should I continue battling with C like i'm now and write some working code in it or switch to python where i'll be at a bit more ease? Will a high level language spoil me too much to come back to C later?
======
mbrubeck
It's absolutely not true that C is necessary to be a network programmer. There
are some cases where it will absolutely be the best tool (especially for
embedded or proprietary hardware), but just look at all the useful network
software being written in Erlang, Java, Python/Twisted, Ruby/EventMachine, and
now Node.js (just to name a few).
Memcached, for example, was first written in Python, then ported to C. Dustin
Sallings (one of the maintainers of memcached) has also written a Java client,
a server port in Erlang, another server in Google's Go language, and yet
another in Python with Twisted:
<http://dustin.github.com/2009/10/11/ememcached.html>
<http://dustin.github.com/2009/11/12/gomemcached.html>
<http://github.com/dustin/twisted-memcached>
I hope that inspires you to continue to learn new tools based on what you want
to work with, and not think that you "need" to learn one specific tool. On the
other hand, I agree that learning C is a worthwhile goal, will teach you a
lot, and will help you contribute to many existing companies/projects.
------
mahmud
You can get-by with just read-only C skills. Invest your time learning the ins
and outs of python and its performance characteristics.
It's also inevitable that you will have to learn systems programming; POSIX or
Win32 API most likely, for Unix and Windows respectively. But not for another
year or so.
Have fun.
------
gills
You can learn the ins and outs of network programming in pretty much any
language. When you find yourself needing the level of control or speed which C
offers, or compatibility with some platform, then go there.
------
jmonegro
You might find very useful answers over at StackOverflow, or ServerFault, most
likely from people who are already successful network programmers.
~~~
sunny_s
I've just posted it there and got good replies, thanks
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Shaving the Yak (Why Software Development is so Distracting) - ph0rque
http://blog.snootymonkey.com/post/21377807221/shaving-the-yak-why-software-development-is-so
======
nadinengland
I like the idea of adding a time to when I begin a task. I bet if I can see
how long I have been googling "+selection last word phrase editor" I will
realise I am not saving myself any time at all.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Psd.rb - chamza
http://layervault.tumblr.com/post/56891876898/psd-rb
======
artagnon
This programmer has written about the PSD format in colorful detail: "Trying
to get data out of a PSD file is like trying to find something in the attic of
your eccentric old uncle who died in a freak freshwater shark attack on his
58th birthday."
[https://code.google.com/p/xee/source/browse/XeePhotoshopLoad...](https://code.google.com/p/xee/source/browse/XeePhotoshopLoader.m#108)
(ref: first link in the article)
~~~
nja
I think that comment itself was posted on HN or somewhere -- I know I've seen
it before.
~~~
_delirium
It was a front-page story on HN, but four years ago:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=575122](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=575122)
~~~
guiambros
Thanks for the link. I still remember that thread and the original post. It
was indeed awesome.
------
mistercow
>Adobe has never produced an easy way for developers to work with the format.
That's not entirely fair. Adobe has openly released a comprehensive
description of the format which is, as far as I know, accurate. The problem is
that the format itself is a heap of features piled on year after year with
apparently no regard for doing things consistently.
~~~
meltingice
The file spec released by Adobe ([http://www.adobe.com/devnet-
apps/photoshop/fileformatashtml/](http://www.adobe.com/devnet-
apps/photoshop/fileformatashtml/)) is actually outdated, wrong in some places,
and can be incredibly vague at times.
~~~
ejstronge
A bit off-topic, but is there a spec for Illustrator files? It seems the only
one I see on Google is from an old version of AI...
~~~
TheZenPsycho
As noted, newer illustrator files are just PDF's (perhaps with extra data for
editing).
Older illustrator files are in fact, EPS files. This is somewhat tricky since,
an EPS is not actually so much a data format as it is a turing complete
programming language. Sooo... yeah, who knows what black magic they did to
pull off reliably reading and writing it.
~~~
gcr
You can read an EPS file by interpreting it and remembering the shapes it
renders on the page.
You can write an EPS file by emitting your list of shapes without using the
turing-complete features of the language.
Not that hard, at least conceptually.
~~~
TheZenPsycho
That's all fine and good at least up until you have to kern a line of text.
Then what?
------
tommoor
Wow, fantastic work and a lot of respect for open sourcing this lib when it's
clearly an important part of LayerVault.
------
blt
Does anyone else think it's weird that they decided to make this library in
Ruby? It drastically cuts down on the audience. Why not C/C++ with wrappers
for all the dynamic languages?
EDIT: nevermind, it makes sense now that I see their main product is a version
control system for designers. Still, it would be nice to see this ported to
native code some day.
~~~
stormcrowsx
Most of the work is done, get off your ass and start porting.
~~~
blt
I might just accept that challenge!
------
gburt2
I just wrote a script with this that takes a directory of PSDs and outputs
PNGs for each one. It took about 2 minutes. This is great.
~~~
justinator
Wow, everything old, is new again ;)
I think with an actual copy of Photoshop, and a little Applescript, this is
something you could have done > 15 years ago.
~~~
jdboyd
But this way I don't have to keep paying $20/mo to Adobe CC so that I can run
the script again next month.
~~~
jlgreco
I _suspect_ that you could probably also manage it with GIMP/guile, but I
don't suspect it would be particularly pleasant.
~~~
_delirium
If you want to script it, ImageMagick or GraphicsMagick are probably a better
bet than trying to hack up something with GIMP batch processing:
[http://www.imagemagick.com/www/formats.html](http://www.imagemagick.com/www/formats.html)
If you just want to do basic conversion ignoring layers, it's quite easy:
for f in *.psd; do
convert "$f" "${f%%.psd}.png"
done
~~~
picomancer
You can use find/xargs for this. It'll be faster because you can parallelize
it with the -P option, for example, for a 4-core machine:
find . -iname "*.psd" -print0 | xargs -0 -P 4 -n 1 -I I convert I I.png
For best results, change the number "4" in the above command to the number of
cores you have.
~~~
neeee
The same with GNU Parallel, only it picks the right number of cores
automatically and removes .psd from the file name:
find . -iname "*.psd" -print0 | parallel -0 convert '{}' '{.}.png'
------
mhd
Is this more feature complete (esp. regarding to newer PS versions) than e.g.
libpsd?
[http://sourceforge.net/projects/libpsd/](http://sourceforge.net/projects/libpsd/)
~~~
meltingice
libpsd and PSD.rb both have features that the other doesn't have. For example,
PSD.rb parses text/font data, while libpsd can handle images with zip
compression.
libpsd was actually a great reference in building PSD.rb, especially since it
was correct during the times that the actual file spec was wrong and more
explicit in the type of data being read.
------
adamwong246
Idea: Use this to dynamically "compile" photoshop files into png, jpgs, etc on
the rails assets pipeline.
------
tluyben2
Thank you very much for doing this! I wish all people hacking the PSD format
would join forces and help with one project. There are too many partial
implementations which scratch an itch instead of trying to be a full
implementation.
~~~
voltagex_
I get this feeling with many open source projects, but merges happen much less
often than forks.
------
nja
Does anyone know of a similar tool for Python?
Not trying to start a Ruby/Python fight or anything; Python just happens to be
my preferred language.
~~~
kmike84
A shameless plug: you can give [https://github.com/kmike/psd-
tools](https://github.com/kmike/psd-tools) a try.
I've read PSD.rb docs and a bit of its code; the implementation is one of the
best and complete I've seen (I've checked almost all PSD reader
implementations some time ago).
But it seems that psd-tools is mostly on par with PSD.rb. It also have some
features that PSD.rb doesn't have, e.g. full support for 'zip-with-prediction'
compression, including 32bit layers. Such images are very common in practice,
and parsing them is not easy because the compression format is not documented
anywhere, and "zip-with-prediction" for 8 and 16bit layers is totally
different from "zip-with-prediction" for 32bit layers (for 32bits it is really
tricky).
If PSD.rb authors are reading this, I urge them to check the decompression
code in psd-tools ([https://github.com/kmike/psd-
tools/blob/master/src/psd_tools...](https://github.com/kmike/psd-
tools/blob/master/src/psd_tools/compression.py)) or in Paint.NET PSD plugin
([http://psdplugin.codeplex.com/](http://psdplugin.codeplex.com/)) to not
waste the time.
psd-tools also knows how to export individual layers, and there is an
experimental support for exporting layer groups; it seems that this is not
implemented in PSD.rb yet.
PSD.rb has some features that psd-tools doesn't have, e.g. it parses "Font
data" which is really cool and hard because the format is not described
anywhere.
~~~
tluyben2
I checked out psd-tools and it's good. Any chance of you adding their features
to yours or vice versa? I know I know, I should do it myself and do a pull
request, but just asking if you are planning to?
~~~
kmike84
Unfortunately I'm currently very busy with other projects, so I probably won't
implement PSD.rb features myself anytime soon.
I'm trying to provide feedback for psd-tools pull requests, merge them and
release new psd-tools versions in timely manner; the testing suite also helps
here, so you know, pull requests are welcome :) Most improvements over last 6
months came from pull requests submitted by other great people.
I think that the "reader" part of library is feature-complete. psd-tools reads
all the information, but it doesn't decode all Photoshop data structures (some
of them are available only as binary blobs). So I think implementing a PSD.rb
feature will most likely involve checking PSD.rb code and decoding a binary
blob (already loaded to memory) to a Python data structure.
~~~
tluyben2
I didn't check your codebase (I just used the library for a few projects a
while ago), so you don't have to answer. But if you want to enlighten others
as well as me; am I right in thinking that you have a reader while reads the
file and then have a 'decoding module' for every blob. So it would be rather
straight forward to port from Ruby such a decoding part and plug it into your
library?
~~~
kmike84
Yes, that was the idea.
The whole process is divided into 3 stages: reading, decoding and providing
"user-facing API":
\- on "reading" stage PSD file is read and split into binary blobs (I think
this part is done);
\- on "decoding" stage "decoding modules" are called for each binary blob;
decoding modules should produce Python data structures that closely resembles
internal PSD format;
\- on "user API" stage decoded data is converted to more convenient format
that is easier to work with (e.g. this include building layers hierarchy, and
the PSDImage/Layer/etc classes).
I hope that providing new decoders will be rather straightforward, and it
seems to work this way so far: contributors haven't touched "reader" part, and
I haven't touched it for a while as well. But software development is hard, so
we can never be sure :)
------
freerobby
Great work and thanks for building this. There's a lot of room for improvement
in automating manipulative photoshop exports, and I look forward to seeing
what people do with this, especially in terms of building command line tools.
------
netforay
I have been trying to do this from last 3 months. But I intend to make
modifications to layers (turn on or off, change colors) and export to PNG.
When I saw Psd.rb I thought it is done. But it just exports the channel data
saved by Photoshop. So our modifications wont reflect in it.
~~~
jawngee
Use extendscript or the creative suite extension builder SDK.
~~~
netforay
Unfortunately I want it to run on a Linux server and I don't want any UI as it
needs to be a service.
------
captainbenises
I reckon a good tool (that this psd.rd wouldn't actually help write, but),
would be one that rendered an html/css page - and exported a layered PSD, so
you could prototype an app, render it to .psd and send it to your designer
friend to make it look rad.
------
carlosdp
Thank you! There's quite a ton I can do to this. Will definitely be
contributing soon.
------
smickie
This is a great example of why open source is brilliant. Everybody wins. We
get a PSD parser. LayerVault benefits from the world improving they're core
product too.
------
envex
I feel like this could be used to automatically convert a simple .psd web
layout to non-shitty HTML and CSS.
~~~
gnufied
Look up markupwand.com an YC alumni. The problem is harder than it looks. Now,
I am not an expert in PSD format but a PSD that can be automatically converted
to HTML has to be specifically formatted. For example, if you merge text
layers with image layers, it becomes difficult to extract the information.
~~~
thesunny
We've actually solved this and will be launching in about a week. We've been
working on it for over a year now.
It runs inside Photoshop (there is no upload stage nor do you have to open up
separate software) and it generates HTML and CSS that looks like a designer
wrote it and slices up all your images. It also outputs LESS, SASS, HAML,
Slim, Jade and I think there are some other formats I may be forgetting.
Text is output as text. If you use a Google font, it automatically links the
fonts in for you.
It does not use absolute positioning so if you modify things like text and it
grows taller or shrinks shorter, other items will be positioned properly
(initially we did it with absolute positioning but later I figured out an
algorithm to make it work the way it should, even with overlapping elements).
It's definitely not an easy problem to solve (hence why we've been working on
it for over a year although not full time).
We've done some outputs now and the results are amazing.
I would link you to the website but it looks so bad right now that I don't
want to show it. Anyways, we will launch in about a week so look for an
announcement. If you have any questions about it, please leave a comment.
Sunny
~~~
tluyben2
There are a bunch of those tools which run inside PS, but the point is that I
really don't want to run PS. Ever. My designers do and now I have to pay /
upgrade licenses too because there is no solution. I think PS is overused and
abused for anything 'design' while for programmers it's an annoyance more
often than not.
------
smtm
So, will there be writing .PSD files as well? This would be the über thing.
Imagine: upload a .PSD and get back a clean HTML layout +
bootstrap_overrides.css
~~~
mistercow
>So, will there be writing .PSD files as well?
Writing PSD files is considerably easier than reading them. To write, you need
only support the features you actually use. To read, you must support
everything. For example, Photoshop always saves its layers RLE compressed (or
it did when I last wrote code to write PSD files, which was about five years
ago), but the format supports uncompressed layer data just fine. So if you're
just trying to get basic interoperation with Photoshop, you don't have to
worry about RLE at all.
>Imagine: upload a .PSD and get back a clean HTML layout +
bootstrap_overrides.css
Why would that require writing .PSD files?
~~~
smtm
Well, so you could iterate on your design - and pick up the changes made in
CSS back into the design PSD. And work onwards from there
------
cveigt
These are great news for developers and an easy way to communicate between
designers with developers. Is the beginning of a solution for a big problem.
------
primitur
I'd pay for a Lua port of this. Anyone interested? Drop me a PM.
------
isaacjohnwesley
Truly awesome, cant wait to think of the possibilities with this.
------
jheriko
nice. now if someone can port it to C so that everyone can benefit... :)
------
aftermathvc
awesome!
------
Radle
// PSD is not my favourite file format.
I see bro...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, and Lately, Coding - Libertatea
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/11/us/reading-writing-arithmetic-and-lately-coding.html
======
dasmithii
As essential as computational literacy has become, I feel a bit uneasy here.
Take mathematics for instance. What students learn in school is important,
yes, but it causes a hatred toward math in general. In a typical high school,
90% of kids dread Algebra, Geometry, and PreCalc. These classes are miserable
to them, and consequentially, they associate mathematics with their aversion
from imposed education. Because of this, the wonderful world of numbers is
reduced to mere repetition.
For those who appreciate the beauty in mathematics, this must be depressing.
I'm afraid that CS may have a similar downfall if we mandate programming
curricula. Maybe a more subtle approach is necessary.
~~~
maxerickson
There should be a nonacademic track in math education, starting around 8,9, or
10th grade.
It would focus on things like demystifying probability and balancing check
books and other things that sort of fall under numeracy.
I realize lots of people will like to complain that those aren't topics for
school, but the current program in the U.S. is anyway watering down the
academic track. People that have not yet seen any beauty in math would get
much more value from practical lessons designed to mostly be engaging than
they get from suffering through abstract math that is mostly designed to be
foundational.
~~~
jaredsohn
My high school had such classes; is this not standard?
~~~
derwiki
I can't tell if you're seriously asking. But yes, tons of schools (in the US)
are sub par, especially once you're one hour removed from a major city. From
what I hear from cousins in West Virginia, it's actively getting worse.
~~~
jaredsohn
Whether schools are subpar is a separate question.
I am saying that if you were in my high school and weren't expecting to go to
college, there were courses designed for you across all disciplines to teach
you practical life skills. However, I do think the school still required
students to struggle through at least some of the standard curriculum.
------
lifeisstillgood
We've said it before. We will say it again:
_Programming is the new literacy for the 21st Century._
Charlemagne was the first and only illiterate Holy Roman Emperor. This current
generation of business and political leaders are the only generation that can
remain software illiterate.
No, We wont expect Fortune 500 leaders to do production coding but we don't
expect the Managing Editor of a newspaper to write articles either - but they
must be literate as well as everything else expected.
~~~
dave_sullivan
Agreed. People think of the application of software and automation to every
facet of our lives as an industry (tech) when really it is a new industrial
revolution. We're undergoing a major shift in how people will work in the
future.
"I'm not good with computers" will be the 21st century equivalent of "I can't
read good"
~~~
lostcolony
Or, "I'm not good with computers" will be the 21st equivalent of "I'm not good
at math". Meaning LOADS of employed people will be saying it.
The real benefit of programming for non-programmers is being able to break
large problems into small, solvable ones, and logically assemble those small
solutions into various larger ones (even outside of the original problem; code
reuse, as it were). This is a skill you can learn a myriad of ways, but
computing is perhaps the first time we've had a mechanism by which you can
directly practice it in a non-contrived, endlessly extensible manner.
------
bsaul
As a sidenote, France happend to have exactly this teaching programs in
elementary schools in the 80s. We had a language called "LOGO" running on
thomson mo5. Instructions where "move the tortoise 20 front", then "rotate
tortoise 90°", etc, and we would do pretty graphics on the screen and be
happy.
Or at least that's how i remember it. A friend of mine who's now an history
researcher told me recently how that thing disgusted him from computers for 20
years.
~~~
wallflower
> A friend of mine who's now an history researcher told me how that thing
> digusted him from computers for 20 years.
Can you please elaborate? Was it the infantilism? Or something else? Does your
friend pursue coding now?
Logo and other "beginner" languages are more about introductions to using
computers to create, not about teaching programming.
~~~
xmonkee
Can be a couple of things
1\. It intimidated him. Happened to some friends of mine. 2\. He realized
history is better than writing procedural code . Should have learnt haskell
~~~
quanticle
You do realize that LOGO is a Lisp variant, right? It's not exactly
procedural.
~~~
xmonkee
I had no idea, thanks. It never looked anything like a lisp though.
------
graycat
Easy enough, but the bottlenecks remain:
(1) What real world problem to solve.
(2) For a challenging problem, how the heck to solve it.
(3) How to cut through by far consistently the worst writing anywhere in
civilization -- documentation in computing.
E.g., I'm still mud wrestling trying to figure out why: (A) In program A,
serialize an instance of a class. The result of the serialization is a byte
array. (2) To check, in program A, deserialize the byte array and observe that
do get the original instance back. (C) In program A, printout the byte array
as hex. Transmit the byte array to program B. In program B, print out the byte
array in hex and observe that it is just the same as it was in program A. (D)
Deserialize the byte array in program B and observe that the operation ends
with and exceptional condition. Why? Documentation clear as mud.
Just for my basic work, I have about two cubic feet of books, nearly all badly
written, and 5000+ Web pages of documentation illustrating much of the worst
mistakes in technical writing.
The bad documentation is by far the worst bottleneck.
The whole thing, the industry and the science, needs to take Technical Writing
101. First lesson: A word used with a meaning not in a standard dictionary is
a 'term', and never but never ever, not even once, use a term without a prior
clear definition with motivation and likely examples. And, for such
definitions, sure, use hyperlinks.
(5) Organization and management of computing projects involving teams larger
that, say, half a dozen people.
(6) Computer system construction, installation, configuration, backup and
recovery, monitoring, management, and administration.
(7) Security.
------
imjustsaying
About 10 years ago, I took a Computer Science AB AP class my sophomore year in
high school. It was all in Java.
Man, that was head-slammingly difficult for an intro course. The prereqs said
only a knowledge of Algebra was required. But it took a lot of time to get
used to. The only kids who did well were the ones who had already been
programming for a couple years.
I didn't even know how to do command-line prompts in windows. I remembered a
few things back when I had to use MSDOS to fire up games, but that was about
it.
That all being said, I sincerely believe everyone should learn how to program.
And I furthermore sincerely believe the public school system should stay as
far away as possible from trying to impose a model for a one-size-fits-none
way to do so.
------
johnnygleeson
Agree with the premise but the article lost me at " that might someday lead
to.... instant riches."
------
mantrax5
Ultimately it all comes to cybernetics. Understanding how systems work,
understanding how to change systems, and how to design new systems.
Not about programming itself.
We were designing systems for millennia before computers existed. All the
basic algorithms we use in programming today were invented before computers.
Computers just happen to make systems a lot more reliable, performant and
scalable (if designed right), since computers have evolved to complement us
(i.e. we're bad at what computers are good at and vice versa).
I don't think programming is the new literacy, I think understanding the
common principles that tie system behavior together has always been the
highest form of skill for any human to possess.
As for turning a system design into code, if you know how to design the system
on a higher level, you can always delegate the "boring" act of coding itself.
I'm a programmer, but I understand that the act of programming by itself, even
though I find it enjoyable, isn't that interesting on its own. It's only
interesting in terms of how the program I'm writing connects to a system where
the real world and real people are involved. All programs, with no exception,
either interface directly with people, or interface with other programs that
do interface with people.
Currently we conflate programming with the act of designing systems
(algorithms, design patterns etc.), but I expect sooner or later system design
and programming will split into separate "trades". Would it be a resurgence of
cybernetics, or a brand new branch of science, I don't know.
But it'll happen. And it'll be good, because many programmers use computers as
their golden hammer of system design, and it's hardly the only component of a
good system.
~~~
graycat
You have unusually good insight.
> Not about programming itself.
Basically correct. So, the grades 1-8 or so work in 'computer science' will be
of questionable value.
E.g., my wife had no background in computing at all. I taught her programming
at the level of if-then-else, do-while, allocate-free, call-return, try-catch,
plus quite a lot in about a week. Then I gave her a lecture on 'rule-based',
'expert system', 'artificial intelligence' (AI) programming, and right away
she wrote a nice, first program. I gave her a second lecture, and right away
she wrote the best, early AI program I and my research group ever saw. No
biggie. For 'computer science' in grades 1-8, looks like mostly a waste of
time.
> All the basic algorithms we use in programming today were invented before
> computers.
Not really. E.g., there are books with collections of algorithms by, say,
Knuth, Sedgewick, and others, and more on, say, error correcting codes and how
transactions work in relational database, that really are "basic" but were
invented just for the world of computing and digital communications.
~~~
mantrax5
Error correction codes and transaction models have existed before computers
have, of course the schemes people have settled with before computers were
designed to fit within the limits of what people could work with back then,
with no computers to do the quick math for them.
People have used a simple form of error detection checksum when copying books
manually (like the Bible) thousands of years ago.
Retransmission requests based on error detection like the above have been use
over various pre-electronic communication channels, like telegraphs, which is
a form of error correction scheme.
Of course anything that requires a modern CPU to compute wouldn't be feasible,
but the basics of it, the seed, was.
Transaction protocols can be observed before computers especially in military
protocols where "distributed coordination" and consistency of command are
crucial for carrying out a military mission. Their channels of communications
were slow and unreliable.
I suppose I don't have to also point out same military protocols often
required a log where every formal exchange is written down in order, for later
review if needed. Here are your modern day database transaction logs.
I can also cite famous examples of encryption schemes going back to the Roman
empire, before computers existed, but we all know those.
We assign names to various inventions and we tend to think no one before had
any idea like that, but truth is good ideas keep getting "reinvented" over and
over, and the only difference is the level of sophistication that computers
afford us in combining such concepts and building upon them into more complex
schemes.
By the way in ancient Egypt, every person would be registered and written down
in a set of books, books would be split and sorted by a hash of their name for
easy look up.
Yup. Ancient Egypt had a hash-based index for their database of people (and
books are the hashmap buckets).
~~~
graycat
> Of course anything that requires a modern CPU to compute wouldn't be
> feasible, but the basics of it, the seed, was.
I still believe that what Hamming did in coding theory and the Reed-Solomon
codes, etc., are 'basic' and new since computers.
But, you are correct that transmission error detection and correction were old
needs with old solutions. E.g., there was parity with teletypewriters and old
paper tape for error detection and then retransmission for error correction.
Yes, and the improvements Hamming, etc., made for computers were not feasible
before computers, but I still believe that, while the problem was old and had
old solutions, the work of Hamming, etc. was new and 'basic'.
Yes, heap sort doesn't really work as a sorting technique before computers,
but trying to dream up heap sort is not easy -- just for the heck of it, once
I set aside reading how heap sort worked and tried to dream up such a thing
for about two weeks and couldn't do it. Heap sort's darned clever.
~~~
mantrax5
I don't mean to disregard the work of Hamming & co. as trivial.
Each one of us struggles to add something to the stream of human thought, and
it's hard every time, and it's worth praise every time, but it's interesting
to see it all as a part of a bigger picture, in that computers are just
systems like any. They have certain properties emphasized, and certain other
properties de-emphasized right now, but that's it.
I actually didn't go far enough in my error detection and correction examples,
I only went few thousand years back. There's an even more ancient example,
going back millions of years... the process of DNA replication itself:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proofreading_(Biology)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proofreading_\(Biology\))
One shouldn't be surprised to discover that some cellular process might have
stumbled onto heap sorting, either.
System design is bigger and older than any of us. To think otherwise is just a
sign our culture is just too young yet to appreciate where we fit in the
world. In some ways, it seems we still think we're at the center of the
Universe.
We're not inventing algorithms, just rediscovering them. This doesn't make any
of the achievements of our inventors any lesser, but it's good to keep in mind
the big picture. It helps us, among other things, to look in more places for
inspiration and knowledge, and in turn, create better systems.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Installing NextStep OS (OpenStep) in VirtualBox (2018) - gjvc
http://stuffjasondoes.com/2018/07/25/installing-nextstep-os-openstep-on-virtualbox-in-2018/
======
homarp
You can also emulate a whole NeXT via the Previous emulator:
[http://previous.unixdude.net/about.html](http://previous.unixdude.net/about.html)
"previous"ly on HN:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19084769](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19084769)
and
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8745943](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8745943)
And the Previous Forum (not much activity lately):
[http://www.nextcomputers.org/forums/index.php?topic=2642.121...](http://www.nextcomputers.org/forums/index.php?topic=2642.1215)
~~~
pmarreck
Silly question though, how do I obtain a NeXT Install iso disk?
~~~
gjvc
[https://winworldpc.com/product/nextstep/3x](https://winworldpc.com/product/nextstep/3x)
[https://archive.org/details/Openstep4.2](https://archive.org/details/Openstep4.2)
------
xiaomai
This is really cool. I never got to play with a proper NeXT machine, but
WindowMaker was my window manager of choice for several years in the late
90s/early 2000s. I always wished that GNUStep could have gotten more traction
on the desktop.
I love the NeXT aesthetic, I'm ready for the the next UI design trend to go
retro.
~~~
ken
As someone who used a real NeXT machine, I could never figure out the appeal
of window managers like WindowMaker. It's like those Aqua 'themes' for Windows
XP. It's superficially similar (more or less) but it's missing the guts.
Window managers are an add-on, and consistency isn't something you can get
with an add-on.
~~~
mhd
This is a bit of a nirvana fallacy issue. The Next-like window manager family
wasn't sold on purely visual merits, and thus even just having the window
managers themselves provided some benefit. I don't see that as much in the
Aqua-likes, as the functional changes are pretty minimal (scroll-bar buttons
on the same side, back when that still was a thing) or even counter-productive
(keeping all the window buttons together).
Back when bowman/afterstep/wmaker came out, pretty much no one who used them
was familiar with the NeXt interface, beyond having seen one in a magazine or
knowing its look-and-feel via Win95 copying some of it.
As far as I can remember, the popularity rested on a few pillars: For one,
it's a pretty sleek look compared to twm or mwm. It also had a rather good
resize functionality -- big enough handles to grab at the bottom, while saving
a few valuable pixels at the sides.
A lot of people also like(d) the dock apps that came with it. Even other
window managers adopted them.
Can't say a lot about general dock/shelf usage, as I never got into that.
Window shading was nice and probably introduced into common usage by that
family of WMs.
------
jamesfmilne
I used these instructions to install on VMWare, although it's pretty similar
to the above. It works really well in VMware, including networking. I had to
use a static IP as DHCP wasn't working.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVCxfoG8bv4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVCxfoG8bv4)
You can download the drivers for VMware graphics, mouse, sound and networking
here:
[http://www.nextcomputers.org/NeXTfiles/Software/NEXTSTEP/Dev...](http://www.nextcomputers.org/NeXTfiles/Software/NEXTSTEP/Developer/VMWare_Image_Tools/)
------
TickleSteve
If anybody wants to try the real thing instead of virtualised, I have two
nextstations available for a small fee if you're close to Cambridge, UK.
~~~
TickleSteve
(My email is in my profile) I'm trying to offload them, as they're taking up
far too much room in my garage.
~~~
gjvc
I can't see it. (Is that because I have lower HN karma than you?)
edit: think it might be because one needs to put it in the "about" box as I
have just done.
~~~
TickleSteve
Updated my bio.
------
galonk
Note that the instructions say you can have _either_ the normal install ISO
_or_ the Install-Dev ISO in the optical drive, but this does not seem to be
correct -- using the Install-Dev ISO causes an error trying to read /etc/init.
You need to use the normal install ISO instead.
~~~
gjvc
This is absolutely correct.
~~~
boudewijnrempt
Do you also know how to use the install-dev iso to install the development
tools?
~~~
gjvc
mount the install-dev CD and run as root
/NextAdmin/Installer.app/Installer /OPENSTEP_4.2_DEVELOPER/NextCD/Packages/*.pkg
~~~
boudewijnrempt
Thanks!
------
AdmiralAsshat
I'm surprised we've had several front-page articles in the past few weeks
about getting NextStep installed on a VM or on hardware, but nothing on
GNUStep, which has standard installers.
~~~
mattl
GNUStep is a framework for writing applications not a GUI/desktop environment.
~~~
AdmiralAsshat
This is true. I probably should've clarified that nothing about etoile has
reached the front page, which IS more of a desktop environment written in
GNUStep:
[http://etoileos.com/](http://etoileos.com/)
But to be fair, the project looks like it's stagnated.
~~~
JulianMorrison
Recent headlines, one in 2014, the rest in 2012.
------
forgotmypw
Does anyone know if there is a copy of WorldWideWeb floating around out there
somewhere? Or was it exclusive to TBL's computer?
~~~
adjagu
Is this what you are searching for?
[http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/LineMode/Defaults/Distribu...](http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/LineMode/Defaults/Distribution.html)
There is more available at the following website:
[http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html](http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html)
~~~
1_player
The FTP server at info.cern.ch mentioned in the first link is offline :(
~~~
adjagu
Apologies. I should have tested the ftp server. I did find another source and.
I tested the WWWLineMode_x.xx.tar.Z and they worked for me.
[https://www.w3.org/2016/11/ftp-
shutdown/info.html](https://www.w3.org/2016/11/ftp-shutdown/info.html)
------
Jaruzel
Last time I tried this, the mouse was so laggy it was impossible to use. I
might give it another go at some point tho, maybe even on a mini-iTX
motherboard in a cube case ... for that full NeXT experience. :)
~~~
Narishma
The mouse lag is probably because of the lack of guest-additions for the OS.
Same thing happens for Windows 3.1 or 9x in VirtualBox.
------
Macuyiko
Very cool -- on a semi-unrelated tangent: I really hope SerenityOS takes off
(contributors, supporters), as I've been itching to run some old-looking OS on
newer hardware.
~~~
umanwizard
OpenBSD works fine on a lot of new hardware :)
------
bloopernova
Please, please examine closely the license for VirtualBox before using it.
It's Oracle, after all.
~~~
zymhan
Uh, unless you're building a money-making venture on it, you're fine.
There is also VirtualBox Open Source Edition that would be fine for this.
------
pndy
Looks more promising and easier to deploy than Rhapsody DR2 installation in
VMWare I did once
~~~
scruffyherder
I have a VM running OS X Server 1.0's kernel & userland rebuilt using DR2 for
over 900 days!
[darwin:~] root# uptime 12:34PM up 922 days, 15:02, 2 users, load averages:
2.71, 2.16, 2.03 [darwin:~] root# hostinfo Mach kernel version: Kernel Release
5.5: Sun Apr 30 10:53:53 SGT 2017; root(rcbuilder):kernel-7/BUILD/RELEASE_I386
Copyright (c) 1988-1995,1997-1999 Apple Computer, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Kernel configured for a single processor only. 1 processor is physically
available. Processor type: pentium (Intel Pentium) Processor active: 0 Primary
memory available: 512.00 megabytes. Default processor set: 36 tasks, 61
threads, 1 processors Load average: 2.33, Mach factor: 0.30
It's on VMWare ESXi 5.5 ... It's been surprisingly stable.
------
choiway
That GUI has aged well.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Wufoo introduces integrated payments - pchristensen
http://wufoo.com/2009/10/08/say-hello-to-paypal-payments-pro-and-usa-epay/
======
vaksel
you also got a TC story: [http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/08/wufoo-launches-
integrat...](http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/08/wufoo-launches-integrated-
payments-feature-for-online-form-builder/)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Rock Solid History of Concrete - davesailer
http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/infrastructure/a28502/rock-solid-history-of-concrete/
======
SeanDav
The article hinted at, but did not further explore the unique properties of
Roman concrete.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_concrete](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_concrete)
[https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jul/04/why-roman-
co...](https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jul/04/why-roman-concrete-
still-stands-strong-while-modern-version-decays)
[http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/infrastructure/ne...](http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/infrastructure/news/a27186/ancient-
roman-concrete-mixture-seawall/)
------
theyregreat
Maybe interesting:
_”How to Make Roman Concrete”_
[https://youtu.be/tOhAfaFboNU](https://youtu.be/tOhAfaFboNU)
------
Obi_Juan_Kenobi
It feels like an omission to not mention Roller Compacted Concrete.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roller-
compacted_concrete](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roller-compacted_concrete)
------
TimMurnaghan
This has an anti-adblocker so simply isn't on the internet from my point of
view - and so we shouldn't be linking to it.
There is a certain irony as they'll probably mention one of my favourite
concrete buildings, the Pantheon in Rome, which is also thinking of starting
to have entrance fees.
~~~
LeifCarrotson
Works fine in uBlock Origin, default settings.
It's actually a lovely, very readable article. Pausing the blocker and
refreshing does show some disguisting animated AdChoice ads inserted right in
the middle of the content. Ugh, not getting whitelisted here. On reloading
with uBlock Origin enabled, I can barely see where the extra line breaks are.
What adblocker are you using?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Tell HN: Let's get back to HACKER news - yread
Most of the Trump stories are just speculation/marketing/propaganda/infotainment. Nobody really knows what will happen with him as president. Leave informing about everything he did to the CNN. This is supposed to be Hacker news. Let's upvote technical/startup/SV-echo-chamber/JS-framework-of-the-week/Erlang/INTERESTING stories instead!
======
WheelsAtLarge
Well I personally think Hacker News needs a little bit of real world news
injection. After all technology's and startup's main role in society is to
solve real world problems. Talk about a news bubble, we techies love to live
in a world where, social apps, chat apps, killer new languages get created
without much change from the previous nth iterations. Look around, the word is
bigger than that. And if you want to created the next killer X app you better
expand what you read.
------
0942v8653
There are no Trump stories on the front page, and I remember a total of 3 (the
first two were the same but split to avoid server issues...). This and one
other one is on the Ask page. That's reasonable, I think, for such a major
event.
------
andrewmcwatters
Yeah, JavaScript speculation/marketing/propaganda/infotainment is much more
hilarious.
~~~
sotojuan
People arguing about JavaScript frameworks to make a SPA that doesn't need to
be a SPA feels a lot like people arguing about two bad presidential
candidates.
------
jjnoakes
If Trump stories are making it to the front page (which I haven't seen much of
personally), isn't that because people who read HN find them interesting?
------
pcunite
I'm here for the comments. For such a big event, I expect to talk about it a
little.
------
mancerayder
Disagree, especially given that the truly political stories (if you want to
accept that delineation) are greatly outnumbered by the tech ones.
Also, people here are smart. There's nothing to worry about.
------
greatest-ape
It's not bad to be generally interested in many things, and not only in one
subject.
------
ungzd
Also companies, stocks, oil, ecology, crime, social justice, poor african
children. Sometimes I feel like I'm reading regular newspaper.
And links to all these stinky news websites with adblocker blockers, popups,
autostarting videos with sound just to read story about 0.001% drop of some
stock. These are even worse than TV.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Harvard CS professor David Malan built a distance-learning empire - alienreborn
https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-local-correspondents/how-harvards-star-computer-science-professor-built-a-distance-learning-empire
======
nanna
It should be noted that such a slick class has had the priviledge of being
granted the kind of institutional suport which is extremely rare across higher
education today, at least in the West. Being allocated the same module for 13
years? Having it be the only module you teach? Having an entire _production
team_ at the ready?
It's a mistake to think this is one man's achievement, and a model to
universities everywhere of the kinds of quality that can be achieved if they
give their staff a break from the endless restructurings, precarity, admin,
overwork and burnouts that characterises the vast majority of their
situations.
~~~
bsder
> Having an entire production team at the ready?
THIS. So much.
Having just done an online talk, I can tell you that the audio-visual stuff
was _BY FAR_ the most annoying.
More expensive webcam, add _way_ more lighting to my office, get an expensive
lavalier mic (highly recommended for lectures--earphones with boom mics drive
me nuts as the monitoring has enough delay to be annoying--probably could
remove that with a $500 audio interface that has DSP monitoring), learn OBS,
realize my laptop has nowhere _near_ the power necessary to drive OBS, build a
new Desktop machine outfitted for video (that barely even _notices_ OBS),
relearn OBS now that it works beautifully, realize that I don't know even a
fraction of OBS but have to get things done, record the lecture, and finally
have it presented in potato-cam because the people running the thing have
laptops with less power than mine and can't playback the hi-res video I sent
them.
The lecture maybe took 40 hours to do. Maybe.
The A/V--probably 120+ hours. And probably will take another 120+ the next
round because I'll be more capable with the tools.
~~~
akman
This begs to normalized and sold as a package for both providers and
consumers.
~~~
bsder
The problem is that this effectively requires that you set up all the
equipment in a place and make people come to that.
Not a great thing in the middle of Covid.
However, once Covid passes, perhaps WeWork should try this with all their real
estate to avoid going bankrupt.
~~~
akman
That's an interesting idea with WeWork.
I'd think that despite variations in environments in a home, there are either
1) enough accommodating tools to normalize (e.g., lights that have a variety
of settings) or 2) the majority of the processes required to handle the
variations are figured out (e.g., in consistently poor lighting, you need
package B instead of package A).
I see some hardware packages for home studios going on sale, but nothing to
the level of hardware/software integration necessary for the most effective
online instruction/discussion.
------
cosmodisk
Take aside the crew that does all the filming and editing and the fact that
they can have guests like Zuckerberg or Ballmer,and you have a passionate
tutor,who is willing to go extra mile. When I was at school, I only had 2
teachers like this- won't forget them for my entire life. At uni, most were so
so( as the whole uni itsel) and often more interested in anything but
teaching. However, briefly,we had an ex HSBC guy,who was the finance
professor. The guy was funny, captivating and knew his shit inside out. When
asked why he left banking,he did say he was finding academia more interesting.
And he was a perfect fit. A lot of people are good at doing research but they
may not be very good teachers,or not at least in the setting most of us are
familiar with( large audiences,one guy delivering knowledge). I had a chance
to watch som recorded lectures from MIT, Harvard,and some other famous
institutions and the quality of teaching some( not all though) manage to
deliver is exceptional.
~~~
programmertote
Agree. I have taken classes with over 40+ professors (close to 50, but I have
also taken two or three classes with some profs) in my undergrad and grad
school. Out of them, I can recall ~5 being pretty good instructors. Being a
professor does not guarantee one is a good teacher/instructor.
The thing that sets apart good instructors from mediocre ones is the passion
they have toward teaching (esp. the good ones seem to have empathy as in they
want students to succeed and understand the materials that the instructors
themselves probably took a good amount of time digesting when they were in
students' shoes).
~~~
mettamage
Can confirm this. I taught for a bit (coding bootcamp, 1 year). I was super
excited my first 3 months (it normalized after that) and during the whole year
I had a lot of empathy in the sense that I felt their pain. It’s easy to feel
someone’s pain when you yourself felt it a great deal as well back then.
I was at my best during those first months. Experience and empathy all help
but I could notice how being only slightly enthusiastic was hindering my
performance.
------
cjf4
Taking CS50 feels similar to watching a movie that has an auteur’s
fingerprints all over it. Every word in the lecture, every technology, and
every problem set has been carefully crafted to fit together to create a
cohesive experience.
College instructors everywhere should take the course to see what the zenith
of multimedia online education looks like.
~~~
bachmeier
I've watched some of the lectures of CS50 in the past, and the one question
that has always come into my mind is this: "How do these lectures help you
learn at a deep level?" I already knew most of the material, so I found it to
be an entertaining review, but that's different from a beginner needing to
learn new material at a deep level. I kind of think it'd be a nightmare to
take good notes while watching his lectures. I'm not bashing the lecture
style, but if I were a student, I'd prefer a good textbook to those lectures.
In contrast, I watched all the lectures of Martin Odersky's functional
programming MOOC. I learned a ton from that even when I'd already seen the
material. His presentations were lower tech, with less razzle-dazzle, but my
goal was to learn. His presentations are optimized (intentionally or not) to
facilitate good note taking and later application.
~~~
arcturus17
1\. There’s a companion C book for the course 2. The labs go into much more
detail compared to lectures 3. The psets can be Nintendo-hard; you’ll be doing
devilish pointer stuff by week 3 or 4.
The happy-go-lucky, flashy tone of the course is completely misleading. It is
a challenging course, so much so that it’s been the subject of numerous
cheating scandals from students caving under the pressure over the years.
As for depth, this is a first intro to CS meant not only for CS majors but for
people from other domains (Econ, humanities, hard sciences, what have you).
The style is meant to cater to people who might not be _a priori_ fascinated
by flipping bits. Still quite a bit of people decide to concentrate on CS
after taking the class, so it must be doing something right in that sense...
The course is not mandatory for CS concentrators, so if you already know your
fundamentals you can jump right into CS51 (functional programming) or CS61
(intro to systems), which are outstanding courses but much more terse in
style.
~~~
sukilot
You are conflating the pre-Malan intense weedout "I survived CS50" CS50 with
Malan's kinder gentler easier more superficial CS50.
Malan's innovation was to change "Intro to CS" from "let's see who knew CS
before they got here" to "Intro to CS"
~~~
Arete314159
Word. The 1990's CS50/CS51 course enrolled both students who'd gotten a "5" in
the CS AP and students who didn't know what a for loop was. It felt like
learning to swim while simultaneously drowning.
~~~
jacobolus
The even sillier split-audience course in the mid 2000s was CS121, the intro
CS theory course.
More or less a math course, but required for CS students, the audience
included a mix of advanced math students (including e.g. some IMO winners) and
programmers without any math background.
The result was that half the class felt it was incredibly easy and slow-paced
(at least for the first month; later the problems got tedious and fiddly for
everyone), and the other half was completely overwhelmed.
~~~
jessaustin
As referenced in sibling comment, I took 121 a bit earlier than that, with
Prof. Lewis. Of course he taught from his "Turing's Face" textbook, which is
widely touted as accessible to students with high school math. By the time I
took 121 I had quite a bit more math than that so I can't recall whether that
is true. I agree with your "tedious and fiddly" assessment, but I don't see
any way around it. CS is a tedious and fiddly subject anyway, but the fiddly
tedium in this case is related to foundational truths about computation rather
than trivial details of particular algorithms (...or, at less ambitious
schools, _APIs_ ). Frankly, I hope it's never the case that a student could
graduate Harvard with a degree in CS (or applied math) without mastering the
material that Prof. Lewis taught in CS-121.
------
CydeWeys
> Malan sees it differently: it is wasteful, he said, to have thousands of
> teachers, in computer science or other fields, all doing the work of
> devising similar curricula. Good programmers spend much of their time
> “refactoring” software—editing it to reduce inefficiencies, or “code bloat.”
> Malan’s teaching method pursues a similar objective. “I don’t think we want
> just one introduction to computer science and one introduction to psychology
> or any such field,” he said. “But there’s probably a number around
> dozens—hundreds—that makes more sense?” Rather than threaten the livelihoods
> of professors or the independence of institutions, such consolidation would,
> Malan believes, free teachers to do their best work. And holding online
> courses to the same standards as in-person ones would allow students beyond
> the small, predominantly privileged groups who enroll in places like Harvard
> to access the highest-quality instruction.
100% agreed with this, and this is something I've often thought about. An
unbelievable amount of work is spent replicating the same curricula, lectures,
and course materials over and over and over again. Think of how many calculus
textbooks there are for example: there's thousands in English alone, as math
professors are incentivized to spend years of their lives writing a textbook
they can then have their students buy every semester, and thus create a second
revenue stream for themselves.
There aren't a million encyclopedias anymore; Wikipedia has pretty much
dominated that space. We need something in the education space to fill that
niche as well. Imagine how much better an experience most students will have
if, instead of watching a random teacher out of millions teach a subject, and
using one out of thousands of textbooks, they are instead watching the
absolute _best_ lectures and using the single best _amazing_ compendium
textbook of knowledge for the subject material. There are some projects that
are trying this (e.g. the Wikimedia Foundation has Wikibooks), but none are
that successful yet. I can think of a variety of reasons why, mostly having to
do with inertia, but the reasons why it should succeed are far more
compelling.
~~~
jimhefferon
An awful lot of good teaching is interpersonal. There is a long history of
didn't-work's in educational tech and often it is because the hard part is not
the material, it is having students form the right mental models. That
involves motivating them, adjusting the flow of information, and helping them
as they go through a sequence of successive approximations. Basically, at
least until now, it involves working with people.
Of course, things can change and this course is certainly very admirable. It
will be interesting to see where it goes.
~~~
CydeWeys
Absolutely, and it would be great if teachers were able to fully dedicate
themselves to optimizing the inter-personal aspects of it rather than also
having to do all this other work of lecture/lesson planning, coming up with
curricula, etc. We ask far too much of our teachers/professors, and
realistically, most of them are not going to do remotely as good of a job as
Dr. Malan has here on CS50. So if you're teaching an intro CS class, use his
materials rather than coming up with your own! Same for any other subject; we
just need all these ideal materials to be available for every imaginable class
targeting every possible age level (elementary on up). Admittedly it's a big a
lift, but a seemingly necessary one.
And yes, I know a lot of this already exists to some extent, but where it gets
lost is in its availability, centralization, and being targeted at teachers
only rather than also being available to the students.
~~~
sseagull
In theory, yes. However teachers need to adapt materials to their own style of
teaching and to their audience. It can be very hard in practice to teach
someone else's materials and have it be 'good' and engaging.
Think of it like cover bands. They don't play it exactly the way the original
band does - they adapt it to their own style. So while the original work is
'done', there is still a lot more work to do.
------
bobochan
My son took the AP version of the CS50 course last year in high school and
showed me some of the exercises and videos. I immediately updated a lot of my
own class materials after watching them and relentlessly hyped the edX class
as a great companion to what we were learning.
The entire environment, the culture, that Professor Malan has created is
absolutely fantastic and I am incredibly grateful that Harvard has made this
content available.
~~~
noelwelsh
Can you get into some specifics that you adopted? I'm listening to the
pedagogy video I linked in another comment and so far my takeaway is that
Harvard / Malan has a LOT of money to spend on video production, TAs, and the
like. That's not easily replicable.
~~~
bobochan
Sure. I really thought a lot of the early exercises were things that my
students would enjoy doing, especially ISBN, Cash, and Caesar. I sent them to
the CS50 web site and even showed them my own C solutions so that they could
translate them. I am teaching a lot of students that have never programmed
before, so one of my big takeaways is that they are not just learning Language
X, they are learning lessons in programming that are applicable in many other
languages.
One more thing, with the course needing to be quickly adapted to Zoom last
spring, I really noticed the importance of being able to give students rubrics
and tests so that they could run their code with different inputs and make
sure they were getting the correct outputs. That might seem obvious, but in
the past the class was often in lab mode where I could walk around the class
and work with them interactively.
------
noelwelsh
Kinda fluffy article. This talk on the pedagogy of CS50 has more content:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVjepjUTAk4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVjepjUTAk4)
------
tijuco2
"you don't need to attend Harvard" says the guy who attended Harvard. It
sounds like a guy from a rich family who after failing some business, finally
succeeded and then says: "if you fail, try again, don't give up". They just
forgot that most people can't fail. That's a stupid advice
------
RikNieu
I owe my career to Malan and his CS50 course. That's how I learned to code. I
wish him only the best.
------
melling
“ Malan’s remote-teaching setup involves a host of technology, including a
seven-foot-wide interactive computer screen, called a Microsoft Surface Hub”
Don’t hear much about the Surface Hub these days. It’s alive and well?
~~~
objclxt
> Don’t hear much about the Surface Hub these days. It’s alive and well?
Microsoft released an updated version - the Surface Hub 2S - about a year ago.
The _intention_ was this could be upgraded in-situ using a cartridge to become
the Surface Hub 2X. The 2X was meant to have all the hotness Microsoft were
showing off in demos at the time (it has now been cancelled - [1]).
I procured one for some R&D, it's only sold through OEMs and service
providers, for around $10k (more if you get the steelcase stand and battery
pack).
For what it is it's quite good: it's industrial design and feature-set goes
well beyond a lot of the competition (Google Jamboard, etc), although its
applications are still quite niche.
One nice feature is you can output the touch input to a connected Windows
laptop, making it a (rather expensive) huge multi-touch external monitor.
[1]:[https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/3/21119915/microsoft-
surface...](https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/3/21119915/microsoft-surface-
hub-2x-cancel-major-software-update-features-release-date)
------
simonebrunozzi
I think it might be useful to take a sneak peak at one of the past videos [0].
I did it. I found Prof. Malan to be very, very engaging. I wish one day
everyone in the world will have access to this level of education for free,
and not just for CS50. For everything.
[0]: [https://youtu.be/jjqgP9dpD1k](https://youtu.be/jjqgP9dpD1k)
------
vcsilva
CS50 is a really well-crafted course, and Malan is an amazing educator. Taking
this class online is one of the reasons that got me interested in CS and
programming.
I think that this course in particular really highlights the impact of a good
teacher. In college I've had multiple professors who quickly made my dislike
subjects that otherwise I would have really liked.
------
ru552
Malan is an excellent teacher and I absolutely enjoyed the time I spent with
the CS50 material.
------
paulcarroty
I've ended Harvard CS50 course and should say he's definitely one of the best,
rockstar-like. Also seen tons of MIT, Berkeley and another courses from
Coursera & Edx, so maybe can do the basic comparison.
_Secret_ maybe in very good covering of complex stuff and teaching style:
pressure, fast moving between topics, playing with auditory in tv-show format,
and nearly screaming to get attention while needed.
------
Separo
I took CS50 in 2013. Malan was a phenomenal teacher and presented complex
concepts with a pace and clarity that made them easy.
------
compscistd
I met Professor Malan once and asked him for some advice on overcoming
imposter syndrome. His advice was a matter-of-fact, learn the things you feel
like you don't know and it shouldn't be an issue. I still feel like that
sometimes, but the way MOOCs are today makes it easier to approach anything I
feel like I don't know.
------
neonate
[https://archive.is/1owAX](https://archive.is/1owAX)
------
ralmidani
I agree that Malan is an amazing educator and both energetic and energizing. I
took CS50 via the Extension School, and got a chance to meet him when we
showcased our final project. He is very approachable and down-to-Earth.
But what was the point of contrasting his “glossy black hair” with the white
hair of MIT’s Grimson/Guttag? Very cheap shot, and not even subtly ageist.
~~~
ralmidani
Also, FWIW, I completed MIT’s Intro to Programming with Python on edX before I
took CS50, and recommend that learners get a decent grasp of programming
principles with a higher-level language (spending a week with Scratch doesn’t
really count) before diving into C with its pointers, manual memory
management, etc.
~~~
ghaff
Honestly, although in a self-paced MOOC format you can probably get away with
it, the MIT 6.001 course really isn't the place to learn programming,
programming environments, etc. for the first time either. It doesn't
ostensibly require programming background, but it's at a far different pace
and level than the actual "intro to programming" course I took way back when
in college--and I had even had a programming course in high school which was
fairly unusual at the time.
ADDED: I'm also not sure what to think about C in an intro course in this day
and age. Sure, as a CS major, or even as part of a good programming
curriculum, understanding some of what's going on under the covers is
important. But that feels like a Level 2-ish topic at this point.
~~~
ralmidani
You’re actually right, I had also taken very basic “intro” courses locally
before taking the MIT course, and Grimson was the first person to explain Big
O to me. Having already done some Python and C++ probably helped get more out
of that course, as well.
But some people can’t drop thousands or even hundreds of dollars to have a
prof or TA hold their hand as they learn programming essentials. They might
have to put in more time on their own to do well in a course like 6.001, but
that may be their only option. They could do Udemy courses, but the quality
there seems to vary quite a bit (whereas with edX there’s some built-in
vetting), and a complete beginner may be overwhelmed by the number of choices.
~~~
ghaff
I really liked 6.001 but I already have a fair bit of programming experience
although I don't do it professionally and am not a CS major--so I got a lot
out of it. MIT has a doubtless deserved reputation as being a bit of a
firehose but even so, I can't imagine showing up on campus (during normal
times) and learning the basics of programming including even the basics of
using a command line on the side while taking not only 6.001 but an otherwise
full course load.
Charles Severance's Intro course from U Michigan is a nice Intro to Python
MOOC course that's geared to genuine beginners.
~~~
ralmidani
Thanks for recommending the Michigan course! I have mentored/tutored in the
past but am currently too busy. If people contact me regarding lessons, I can
politely redirect them to that course.
------
Arete314159
Sad to see the article did not mention the OG 1990's CS50 rockstar, Margo
Seltzer.
------
jcq3
Perhaps people appreciate this course because the prestigious Harvard school
is behind it. I would traduce that bias by "a good school involves necessarily
good courses" . Is it true though?
~~~
valuearb
My wife watched his class on the architecture of the internet. She’s not
technical at all but was absorbed by it to the end.
And I never told her it was from Harvard.
~~~
ashtonbaker
Which course is this? I feel like I've seen it but I'm not able to find it
with an internet search.
~~~
valuearb
I would like to find it too. I just related this story to my wife and she
doesn’t remember watching it. I said “you were enraptured, and watched the
whole thing?”!
“Apparently it wasn’t that memorable“, she replied.
Edit: Might be this one?
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_KghQP86Sw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_KghQP86Sw)
If so he’s updated it since we watched.
------
seddin
David Malan is such a nice person, I remember when I was taking CS50 and found
a syntax error and emailed him about it and he was so kind and fixed it.
------
f0rgot
CS50 is THE reason I have a software development career today. Coincidentally,
after CS50, I started watching an MIT Python course. If the MIT course had
been my introduction so programming, I am sure that I would have dismissed
software development as "not for me". I got lucky that my first exposure was
CS50 - I owe a debt of gratitude to Malan.
------
mathattack
I took the class. What didn’t scale were the TAs. It took 2 months to get
anything graded. Malan’s response was “The TA will grade it within a week.”
I suspect they’ve automated since.
~~~
zaphod4prez
Yep, grading is fully automated now!
------
eointierney
The New Yorker needs editors
More of less
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
“It shall be unlawful for any person to manufacture..encryption products” (1997) - declan
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/cpquery/T?&report=hr108p4&dbname=105&
======
cogburnd02
There are some interesting ways around government crypto restrictions.
Ciphersaber [1] is designed so that you can _memorize_ how to write a program
to implement it. Bruce Schneier proposed Solitaire, [2] which is designed to
be carried out with playing cards rather than on a computer. (Later, Paul
Crowley discovered some weaknesses [3] in Solitaire.) Diceware [4] is a method
of generating secure passphrases with (you guessed it) regular dice.
[1] [http://ciphersaber.gurus.org/](http://ciphersaber.gurus.org/)
[2]
[https://www.schneier.com/solitaire.html](https://www.schneier.com/solitaire.html)
[3]
[http://www.ciphergoth.org/crypto/solitaire/](http://www.ciphergoth.org/crypto/solitaire/)
[4]
[http://world.std.com/~reinhold/diceware.html](http://world.std.com/~reinhold/diceware.html)
------
tbrake
Am I reading this GPO link wrong or did that not make it in? Section 2804 here
actually eliminates an enforced key escrow, so I don't know.
[http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-106hr850rh/pdf/BILLS-106h...](http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-106hr850rh/pdf/BILLS-106hr850rh.pdf)
~~~
declan
The history here is non-intuitive; I'll try to explain it. I was living in DC
during the Crypto Wars of the late 1990s and covering them as a reporter (I've
since shifted to working on [http://recent.io/](http://recent.io/), of
course).
The SAFE Act as originally introduced in the House of Representatives was
designed to be generally pro-crypto by relaxing export controls. But as it
made its way through the various committees, the anti-crypto forces got their
hands on it and turned it on its head. It became a ban-non-backdoored-crypto
bill instead.
More precisely, in 1997, a House committee approved a ban on domestic
encryption without backdoors for .gov access. Here's an excerpt from the
amended anti-crypto version of the SAFE Act:
_" After January 31, 2000, it shall be unlawful for any person to manufacture
for distribution, distribute, or import encryption products intended for sale
or use in the United States, unless that product [...] permits immediate
decryption of the encrypted data..."_
Here's how one of the anti-crypto politicos, Rep. Bill McCollum, who went on
to be Florida's attorney general, justified it while debating the House
Judiciary version of that bill:
_" Because this bill will promote greater use of stronger encryption, law
enforcement may not be able to gather evidence that it can use to investigate
and prosecute cases. Imagine a situation where the police with a search
warrant seize the computer of a terrorist but cannot decrypt the list of
people and places that he intends to strike next. Or the situation where the
police seize the computer of a purveyor of child pornography but cannot
decrypt the files to download the images to prosecute him."_
[http://www.techlawjournal.com/cong106/encrypt/19990324mcc.ht...](http://www.techlawjournal.com/cong106/encrypt/19990324mcc.htm#1)
So yes, you're right that sec. 2804 in _one_ version of SAFE eliminates
mandated key escrow. But other versions, including the one approved by that
House committee in 1997, went exactly in the opposite direction.
~~~
ipsin
I agree that this is non-intuitive, and we've arrived at another time in DC
when time has looped back on itself, and wars have to be re-fought.
Your site, [http://politechbot.com/](http://politechbot.com/), was one go-to
source for information during the last crypto war. These days I could consult
the EFF, EPIC or the ACLU, but I wonder if there's a place again for a
cypherpunk-ish focus on DC policy, or if you've found sources covering the
current policy with a politech-like mindset.
In either case, thanks for all those years of good reading.
~~~
declan
<ipsin>: Thanks for your kind words! I've felt the urge to restart/resume the
Politech mailing list a few times in the last few years but haven't been able
to dedicate the time such an effort deserves. Also it works better if
moderated by a practicing journalist, I think.
The short answer is I don't think there is such a source. EFF has good action
alerts and blog posts (even if I may occasionally disagree with some of their
legislative endorsements). EPIC and the ACLU are often more DC-centric, and
Marc (who runs EPIC) is essentially an anti-cypherpunk in his views about the
private sector.
Among advocacy groups, TechFreedom.org is a relatively new entrant with free-
market, liberalize-crypto views. But Berin, who runs it, is a lawyer, not a
technologist, and is spending a lot of time on topics like Net neutrality and
telecom regulation nowadays.
If anyone is thinking of starting such a source of information with a
cypherpunk-ish/politech-like focus on DC policy, I'd be happy to offer some
advice, tips, and introductions.
------
slowmovintarget
The short version: Get it (encryption software) while you can.
~~~
RankingMember
I can't imagine anyone'll be able to keep encryption software out of people's
hands, even if it gets as dire as requiring fallback to sneakernet.
------
known
"Never do anything against conscience even if the state demands it."
\--Einstein
~~~
socceroos
The benefit of hindsight, eh, Einstein?
------
xnull2guest
"(3) Encryption
A telecommunications carrier shall not be responsible for decrypting, or
ensuring the government’s ability to decrypt, any communication encrypted by a
subscriber or customer, unless the encryption was provided by the carrier and
the carrier possesses the information necessary to decrypt the communication."
[http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/1002](http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/1002)
"18 U.S. Code § 2703 - Required disclosure of customer communications or
records
(a) Contents of Wire or Electronic Communications in Electronic Storage.— A
governmental entity may require the disclosure by a provider of electronic
communication service of the contents of a wire or electronic communication,
that is in electronic storage in an electronic communications system for one
hundred and eighty days or less, only pursuant to a warrant issued using the
procedures described in the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure (or, in the
case of a State court, issued using State warrant procedures) by a court of
competent jurisdiction. A governmental entity may require the disclosure by a
provider of electronic communications services of the contents of a wire or
electronic communication that has been in electronic storage in an electronic
communications system for more than one hundred and eighty days by the means
available under subsection (b) of this section.
(b) Contents of Wire or Electronic Communications in a Remote Computing
Service.—
...
(c) Records Concerning Electronic Communication Service or Remote Computing
Service.
..."
[http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2703](http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2703)
~~~
declan
The first statute you're quoting, 47 USC 1002, was part of the 1994 CALEA
legislation. A basic principle of legal interpretation is that newer laws
trump old ones if that is clearly the legislative intent.
So if the 1997 ban-strong-crypto bill had been enacted, it would have
overriden that portion of CALEA -- effectively repealing it -- to the extent
it was in conflict.
Put another way, if Congress has the power to say X one year, they typically
have the power to say not(X) the next year.
~~~
xnull2guest
It would be interesting to see what a crypto ban would do if it were to
override CALEA and the Stored Communications Act. Where a key escrow solution
was previously required, a sudden ban on encryption would do what - force the
companies to change key sizes? Since companies are already required to give
plaintext access to communications and records (if they provide the security
themselves), what difference would a crypto-ban really achieve other than
removing the companies in question from knowing which records law enforcement
sought to access?
~~~
declan
Well, there is no U.S. law requiring key escrow. There are a very few laws
that impose escrow-like requirements on some sectors. If you're a financial
services firm you may be required to monitor employees' email, which makes
some forms of encryption tricky. And even the CALEA excerpt you quoted above
authorizes telecom carriers to provide secure end-to-end crypto (they wouldn't
have "the information necessary to decrypt the communication"). CALEA doesn't
apply to the tech firms HN knows and loves; they're not telecom carriers, a
term of art.
But putting all that aside for the moment, banning crypto without backdoors
would, at a minimum, create real difficulties for U.S. companies and require
many open source/free software projects to move overseas. It would also make
felons of many HN readers. That's no exaggeration; an ex-Mozilla fellow now
building the crypton.io framework wrote to me this evening saying: "That bill
would have made my work criminal."
[https://twitter.com/deezthugs/status/556678844120576000](https://twitter.com/deezthugs/status/556678844120576000)
To be clear, I don't believe the FBI|NSA|DOJ|DEA|DHS|CIA|etc. cadre of TLAs
are pushing for a ban on domestic crypto now. But they tend to take the long
view. Look very carefully at what _is_ eventually proposed. Is it a ban on
whole-disk encryption without backdoors? Would it extend to PCs? What about
open source projects and AOSP? Would mere possession of non-backdoored crypto
be a crime, or distribution, or commercial sale? Etc.
I view a lot of this as the Feds trying to pressure Apple and Google into
adopting an escrowed solution for encrypted devices -- without actually
enacting a law. Laws are public, subject to legal challenge (a federal appeals
court in the Junger case held there are 1A issues involved in a crypto ban),
and tend not to make it through Congress very quickly. But extralegal pressure
can be applied in secret, is not subject to legal challenge, and can happen
much sooner.
HN threads in the past have discussed some of these extralegal pressures that
can be brought to bear. Multi-billion dollar .gov contracts are a big one too.
~~~
xnull2guest
Thank you for the informative post.
By letter of the law, CALEA does not require key escrow. Do you believe that
in practice along with extralegal pressure in the manner described above, that
CALEA and associated laws amount to near ubiquitous key escrow?
~~~
declan
Nope. I think the opposite, in fact. But it's late in the SF area, and it's
time for me to go to sleep. Happy to resume this in the morning.
~~~
xnull2guest
Cheers for good sleep!
Do you believe that the USG can get access to nearly any telecommunication
record in close to real time for emergencies if it needs it, and to nearly any
telecommunication record history up to some amount of time later for
investigations? If you do not, could you defend this belief - it runs counter
to conventional wisdom.
Presuming you do believe that access to telecommunication records can be made
post hoc and/or on demand: do you believe this is because of weak crypto
(KASUMI, A/5, etc) or because there is no encryption for there to be escrowed
for large or critical parts of the infrastructure? Or is it something else?
~~~
declan
There are too many questions here crossing too many areas of the law to answer
in an HN comment; some of the language you're using includes legal terms of
art where the meaning is not necessarily intuitive. A blog post would be more
suitable and I can't take that much time away from my work on
[http://recent.io/](http://recent.io/)
But briefly: You should assume, as I've written in many places in the past,
that your records in the hands of the AT&T/VZ/etc. phone companies can easily
be accessed by TLAs. The NSA itself brags of a surveillance "partnership" with
those companies, as I wrote in this CNET piece:
[http://www.cnet.com/news/surveillance-partnership-between-
ns...](http://www.cnet.com/news/surveillance-partnership-between-nsa-and-
telcos-points-to-at-t-verizon/) In those cases, crypto has little to do with
it.
In this HN comment yesterday, I wrote here about some of the privacy
differences between our favorite Silicon Valley companies and AT&T/VZ/etc.:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8902638](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8902638)
~~~
xnull1guest
Thanks. From what I can tell you agree with:
> there is no encryption for there to be escrowed for large or critical parts
> of the infrastructure
That is to say that TLAs get access to records before encryption is ever
applied to them (I would tend to agree with this) thus obviating the need for
escrow. Laws requiring key escrow, then, become red herrings to the larger
discussion about the legality of access.
I personally would classify 'partnerships' under extralegal pressure. Under
this interpretation you do seem to agree with the GP comment - though I would
understand if one were to argue that for some important semantic reason I
asked the question with the wrong word. I would probably agree that
'partnerships' are only a strict subset and not synonyms for extralegal
pressure.
It does appear that there are partnerships with some digital corporations and
that PRISM is a program for corporations that resist 'partnered' access to
records. Given the history of telecoms and their development of partnerships,
current development of partnerships in our industry and known applications of
extralegal pressure in our industry, we ought to be especially watchful.
~~~
declan
Briefly: There has been plenty of misreporting about PRISM. I tried to correct
some of that in 2013 here: [http://www.cnet.com/news/no-evidence-of-nsas-
direct-access-t...](http://www.cnet.com/news/no-evidence-of-nsas-direct-
access-to-tech-companies/) (Note the Washington Post backed away from their
initial claims and rewrote its original PRISM story.)
~~~
xnull1guest
Thank you again for your reply. I am aware of the confusion regarding PRISM
and its 'vernacular' use to encompass the activities from other disclosed
programs in addition to confusion about its particular details.
In your haste I'm afraid you may have drafted a response that is not on the
topic of its parent, though this is okay since it appears the conversation
found a natural and agreeable conclusion.
------
chernevik
Could someone please post a comment or link on the state of constitutional
protection for strong encryption?
I think I've read that the courts have ruled that dissemination and use of
strong crypto algorithms is protected by the First Amendment, but I'm not sure
of that.
~~~
frostmatthew
_Bernstein v. United States_ [1] maybe?
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernstein_v._United_States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernstein_v._United_States)
~~~
tdaltonc
and Junger v.Daley
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junger_v._Daley](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junger_v._Daley)
[http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/1342657?sid=2110509888...](http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/1342657?sid=21105098883821&uid=4&uid=2)
~~~
declan
This is the big one.
The late Peter Junger, who brought this case, was a principled civil
libertarian and law professor who deserves to be remembered for dealing the
final blow to the federal government's anti-encryption regime. He was the
first person to secure a precedential court decision that said this:
"Because computer source code is an expressive means for the exchange of
information and ideas about computer programming, we hold that it is protected
by the First Amendment." [http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-6th-
circuit/1074126.html](http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-6th-circuit/1074126.html)
(The 9th Circuit in _Bernstein_ didn't go that far, despite valiant efforts by
EFF, as I recall it.)
Peter was a computer tinkerer as well as a lawyer. He once did me the favor of
speaking to a class I taught at Case Western, and, in addition to discussing
his own encryption case, talked about setting up a mail server --I recall the
school let him place a colo'd box in one of their server rooms because he was
an emeritus. He also wrote an article called "You Can't Patent Software:
Patenting Software Is Wrong": [http://samsara-
blog.blogspot.com/](http://samsara-blog.blogspot.com/)
TLDR: One big reason why we haven't seen a proposed US law restricting mobile
device encryption today is because of what Peter Junger did in the 1990s.
~~~
chernevik
Thanks, all
------
rokhayakebe
Many are quick to jump and state that we should all have 100% privacy, and
that governments should not look into our communications. At the same time we
are asking for the government to protect us. Something like 9-11 happens and
we blame our national security officials. Something like the Boston Marathon
happens and we do the same.
At some point we have to choose: Natural Freedom or Societal Freedom, but we
cannot have both.
I for one believe that we should TRULY consider recording every message we
send/receive.
We should have a very high threshold for using these communications against
people, and making sure they can only be used for matters of the people's
security.
~~~
mhuffman
I am baffled as to why you think a criminal or terrorist would follow the
rules set forth by the US Congress and not use unbreakable encryption in their
communications. The only people that would be successfully watched would be
law-abiding engineers of products and law-abiding users of those products.
~~~
rokhayakebe
Certainly having the ability to read all messages is not built with the
intention that we will find a message from the chief of ISIS emailing his top
generals.
As a strategist, to disintegrate/infiltrate any terrorist cell, you will not
begin from the top and work your way down.
Every organization is more fragile at the bottom, hence you can expect someone
will make the mistake of using the system and leaking information, allowing
national security officials to work their way up from there.
~~~
mhuffman
So your theory is that we should all be spied on in the off chance some of the
low-hanging fruit in a hypothetical criminal organization simply makes a
mistake or goofs up enough to put it in the officials lap.
Working off that theory, why not just not spy on millions of innocent
civilians and let the criminal bunglers bungle anyway?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Regular sauna users may have fewer chronic diseases - prostoalex
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-sauna/regular-sauna-users-may-have-fewer-chronic-diseases-idUSKBN1KM5U0
======
carbocation
It's very difficult to contort the causal arrow from the obvious explanation
(that sick people don't use saunas very often) to less obvious ones (that
saunas stimulate something in the heart to improve cardiovascular health). But
boy, do they try.
~~~
bsder
Yeah, I tend to agree.
However, I can certainly imagine that a sauna gets your heart rate up and your
metabolism into overdrive trying to cool you down.
The human body burns roughly a fixed set of calories--it simply shunts those
calories between the systems it considers to be immediately important.
If you are shunting one or two hundred calories a day to cooling yourself off,
that's a bunch of calories your body can't throw at creating chronic
conditions.
~~~
loco5niner
> If you are shunting one or two hundred calories a day to cooling yourself
> off, that's a bunch of calories your body can't throw at creating chronic
> conditions.
... or fighting off chronic conditions either.
~~~
bsder
"Chronic" conditions don't get fought off--they persist. That's what "chronic"
means.
And, yes, doing this _does_ remove calories from the ability to fight off
"acute" conditions.
It's a tradeoff.
~~~
loco5niner
> "Chronic" conditions don't get fought off--they persist. That's what
> "chronic" means.
Well, of course. Fighting off the creation of chronic conditions.
------
m0llusk
Regular saunas are common in Sweden and Finland but rare in Scotland. It is
quite possible that who uses saunas regularly and how they live is what
matters and not the sauna at all.
------
DennisP
This is interesting but I'd like to see a comparison with not using sauna at
all. If 4x/week is better than 1x/week, in theory it could be because 1x/week
is bad for you.
------
6t6t6t6
Or... People with chonic diseases don't tend to use saunas.
------
im3w1l
Once when I had a fever, I set my sauna to 40C and read books there. I have no
idea whether it helped or not but it was very comfortable - much better than
shivering in bed.
------
oh5nxo
Regular bathing forces you to do lots of auxiliary physical activity.
Firewood, ashes, etc. Enough to distort statistics.
~~~
vesak
Most Finns have electric saunas, though. Activity required: turn a dial 30-60
minutes before going in.
------
ahmedalsudani
If I had the free time and the peace of mind to enjoy going to the sauna, I
too would have fewer chronic diseases.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Imposter Syndrome – Desk of van Schneider - jrs235
https://medium.com/desk-of-van-schneider/the-imposter-syndrome-ad397dfb72cb#.cgpdq527d
======
jrs235
I realize that Imposter Syndrome comes up often and perhaps is no longer
interesting. At times though I think reoccurring themes like imposter
syndrome, office layouts (open offices), microservices, etc. appearing on HN
helps. They will always be issues and there will always be differences of
opinions on them but I think they help the community know that A) they are,
were, and always will be issues and B) that there are differences of opinion
within the community about them and C) practice engaging in productive,
respectful debate and sharing of thoughts and ideas.
------
masonic
" _Impostor_ " appears to be as difficult to spell on Medium as "discreet" is
on Craigslist.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Jury: Roundup weed killer major factor in man’s cancer - wine_labs
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/jury-roundup-weed-killer-major-factor-in-mans-cancer/2019/03/19/fcf3d948-4a8f-11e9-8cfc-2c5d0999c21e_story.html
======
cwkoss
Kind of terrifying that we know so little about the chemicals which agrochem
industry (many of which grew from humble roots as chemical weapons
manufacturers) which soak our food supply.
------
todd8
After being on a jury once deciding a DWI case, I wouldn't be surprised with
any outcome involving an understanding of scientific evidence. What's
terrifying is realizing that there are only two of you on the jury that really
understood what happened in the trial.
~~~
staticautomatic
You should see a jury deliberate in an IP lawsuit.
~~~
todd8
I can't even imagine. I remember reading an article by someones experience on
a lawsuit jury and they described the deliberations as "wheel of fortune". (It
was an edition of Medical Economics, not my profession by interesting
nevertheless.)
------
TheMagicHorsey
A jury of your “peers” isn’t a jury of hacker news readers.
I’ve been on one jury, and I wouldn’t say the outcome of their deliberation
was random, but it may as well have been.
------
staticautomatic
FYI the word "substantial" in the legal standard is not synonymous with
"major."
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How Long Your Resume Should Be? - ResRep
http://blog.resumerepublic.com/2014/05/06/how-long-your-resume-should-be/
======
joshsegall
As someone who has read countless resumes for the standard set of tech jobs,
one page should be more than enough space. If you have a portfolio or can
point to online projects you've worked on, then put a link in the resume so
potential employers can review your work if they're interested.
I used to say that if you have more than a page there better be a Nobel prize
on the 2nd page. However, these days if you put more than a page worth of
stuff in your resume then chances are few people will read that far. Maybe
that's okay if you're keyword stuffing for machines to parse your resume, but
I suspect you're applying for the wrong jobs if you do that. Just the
highlights please.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Facebook reveals Russian troll content, shuts down 135 IRA accounts - cctt23
https://techcrunch.com/2018/04/03/facebook-russia/
======
gabept
> Facebook has removed 70 Facebook accounts, 138 Facebook Pages, and 65
> Instagram accounts run by the Russian government-connected troll farm and
> election interference squad the Internet Research Agency
This looks like a fairly small amount of accounts.
~~~
hbosch
Small # of accounts, but massive amounts of followers/viewers. Kylie Jenner
has a "fairly small amount of accounts" (ie _one_ ) on Twitter, but a single
tweet can send a company's stock into the red[0].
0\. [http://money.cnn.com/2018/02/22/technology/snapchat-
update-k...](http://money.cnn.com/2018/02/22/technology/snapchat-update-kylie-
jenner/index.html)
~~~
dmix
Don't these 'troll' accounts mostly have fake followers though? What reach
could 76 accounts with mostly fake followers/likes really have on the world?
They most certainly arent anywhere near Kylie Jenner level so Im not sure what
that has to do with this.
But I guess no one involved (media, FB) wants this story to be any less
newsworthy so I doubt we'll ever have an answer...
------
wohlergehen
IRA = Internet Research Agency for those confused by the title, i.e. the
russian "troll" company.
~~~
petepete
Thanks for this.
Reusing already-prominent acronyms gets really confusing although I know often
it's unintentional.
Many Americans won't know who the IRA were/are, but in the UK (and probably
the rest of Europe) it's common knowledge and burnt in.
~~~
PHGamer
id say middle age and older people would. they were shown in various movies
during the 90s but yea. younger people probably think of the IRA savings
account.
~~~
apotheothesomai
We middle-aged folks also remember some big bombing incidents executed by the
IRA. The IRA is still referenced in the news now and then.
------
jerkstate
Are we ever going to see any of the controversial posts and ads that
supposedly influenced the US election? I don't see anything US politics or
election related in the samples they showed.
~~~
mturmon
This is readily searchable, but here is an example:
[http://money.cnn.com/2017/11/01/media/russian-facebook-
ads-r...](http://money.cnn.com/2017/11/01/media/russian-facebook-ads-release-
house-intelligence-committee/index.html)
------
nym
Is Facebook notifying the affected people that they had viewed fabricated
news, or just releasing press releases?
~~~
jerkstate
Does any of this content qualify as "fabricated news" ? Can you point out what
you mean by that?
------
ProAm
This is too little too late for Facebook. They are just trying to save as much
face as possible now.
~~~
timkpaine
It remains to be seen whether these scandals will have any real effect in the
long run. Facebook grew to be a behemoth, now it seems almost "too big to
fail".
~~~
stephenitis
What would happen if it failed?
------
blitmap
Seems like a fairly small number for removing propaganda/state influence..
[https://media.ccc.de/v/34c3-9233-uncovering_british_spies_we...](https://media.ccc.de/v/34c3-9233-uncovering_british_spies_web_of_sockpuppet_social_media_personas)
~~~
bitumen
People can exert a lot of influence with just one account, and in this case
it’s about 270 _so far_. You’d be surprised at how effective Sybil attacks are
with far fewer than a dozen accounts, never mind hundreds. When those accounts
build reputation, often assisted by more accounts, it’s even more powerful.
Still, the biggest advantage is that you get to probe your audience multiple
ways, then just go with what gains traction. The reputation of any one account
doesn’t matter, it’s a “team” effort.
So while you or I might care about what we say, try to build a reputation, and
in general say things in accordance with what we believe, they don’t have to.
It’s a radically different proposition, and devastating when done well. Even
being discovered can be its own kind of “win” if it creates distrust and
instability within the network itself. You can undermine faith in said network
by exposing it as essentially corrupted, albeit by you.
------
moltar
From the provided sample content it appears to be rather harmless. Reminds me
of buzz feed style posts.
~~~
piracykills
Much of it seems to more be designed to sew discord between the parties than
to directly influence the election.
Mission accomplished I guess.
~~~
supergirl
“sow discord” is an overused meme thrown around by people who choose to not
form their own opinion but, instead, repeat what they read in the tabloids
------
crummy
95% of 135 accounts operated in Russian-speaking countries? So this means
little in the context of alleged US election interference?
------
cyberferret
Hmm, I guess I come from an older generation where mention of the "IRA" was a
whole different genre of terrorism...
~~~
delerio
Yeah, I always thought IRA was the main acronym for the "Irish Republican
Army". Weird that they used IRA in this article to mean something else. Has
the main association changed?
~~~
cyberferret
Currently, the association is for the "Internet Research Agency", which is the
formal company name for a purported Russian based professional trolling firm.
------
tomc1985
I love how we're all falling for this Russian troll BS and not attacking
Facebook's business model of micro-targeting advertising
------
dilyevsky
There were dozens of them! DOZENS!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How Mixpanel Created Demand - craigcannon
http://themacro.com/articles/2016/08/startup-school-mixpanel/
======
akharris
Sadly, this is our last episode of the show for a little while. We learned a
huge amount putting it together - about making good radio, asking good
questions, and how some of our favorite companies got started. We hit a point,
though, where we thought the show needed to evolve to stay great, and while we
figure out what that means, we're going on hiatus.
I want to thank Kat and Colleen for all of their help putting the show
together, for figuring out what guests we should have, and for cohosting. I
also want to thank the good people at Sirius for making the show possible and
for giving us everything we needed to make something of which we are proud.
Stay tuned.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Where To Find Strong Talent - jack7890
http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2012/05/mba-mondays-where-to-find-strong-talent.html
======
wyclif
I'm surprised Wilson didn't mention being aware of evolving projects on github
and subscribing to open source mailing lists. It's easy to look at a project
that way and see who is contributing the quality commits and LOC.
Maybe he was thinking of these things under the heading of #2 and watching the
competition.
I think recruiting talent from other geographies is key. Instead of trying to
poach talent from other companies in SF or NYC, why not look for people in
markets where developer jobs aren't as abundant?
~~~
0ren
He mentioned Github in the context of getting talent from other parts of the
country (#4). Perhaps he edited it based on your comment...
------
asparagui
TLDR version:
1) actual networking, people you know
2) poach from a small company
3) acquihires
4) india
5) naive college students
6) poach from a big company
7) the vc's son
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Saka – A tab search Chrome extension inspired by Spotlight - eejdoowad
https://saka.io
======
voiper1
Very cool!
~~~
eejdoowad
Thanks! I was very surprised a half-decent in-window tab search extension
didn't already exist. They all opened in the popup or a new window. So I made
one myself.
My goal is to make a complete Omnibar/tabs replacement so I can browse in
full-screen mode by default.
This extension complements my other keybinding extension
([https://github.com/lusakasa/saka-key](https://github.com/lusakasa/saka-
key)).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Daily writing prompts with node.js - mirhampt
As an excuse to learn node.js and mongodb, I created a daily writing prompt website in my spare time over a period of two weeks:<p>http://www.telepromptr.com<p>I chose a fairly experimental stack for this application: express, mongodb (via mongoose), jade for the templates, and coffee-script.<p>I was able to extract and release the Recaptcha integration code under the MIT license:<p>http://github.com/mirhampt/node-recaptcha<p>I am not looking to monetize this website, as it was just a side-project for educational purposes. However, I would love to discuss the successes and challenges I faced using this stack, if anyone is interested. Overall, I found the experience quite enjoyable. Feature suggestions are also welcome. I hope someone gets some enjoyment out of it.
======
duck
Nice idea and with some traction this could be a fun site. One suggestion, on
the archive page if there was no submissions remove the link (or let me know
before clicking on it).
~~~
mirhampt
Great suggestion. I'll add a submission count.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Starting a web project in 2015. What stack to use? - iagooar
I know these kinds of questions might sound silly to ask, but I really love the diversity of opinions that HN provides and the discussions<p>To give a bit of context: I am an experienced Ruby on Rails engineer. I really enjoy doing RoR and feel more than comfortable using it.<p>In the next weeks, I'll be starting a web project (mostly a web app, with some public facing pages, imagine a typical SaaS application). There will be some APIs, an on-premise version might also make it into the roadmap.<p>The logical and pragmatic choice would be to go with Ruby on Rails but I don't want to get stuck forever with a stack that might become obsolete in the coming years (or not). Also, I live in an area where getting good engineers is VERY difficult and hiring is a factor to consider when choosing the stack.
======
cweagans
I'm probably going to get downvoted for this, but whatever. This is a very
easy decision.
If you're an experienced Rails developer, use Rails.
If you're an experienced Perl developer, use Perl.
If you're an experienced PHP developer, use PHP.
etc.
The tools don't matter so much. Your experience level with them does. Don't
use something you're unfamiliar with in production just for the sake of using
the new hotness. That's dumb.
That's not to say, of course, that you should never use anything new. Learn
new things, and learn often. Play with new technologies and languages on your
own time and get some proficiency with them before using them for a client in
a production setting.
~~~
raquo
Counterpoint: the stack you choose initially will often follow you for years
because switching costs are rising with every line of code and every developer
on the payroll.
Personally I often go for a less familiar but more appropriate stack.
~~~
cweagans
You can write bad code with a good stack, and you can write good code with a
bad stack.
Put another way, a pro football player will be pretty good with whatever he
uses, but even if I had the exact same gear, I'd never get picked for even a
high school team.
It's about the person, not the tools.
~~~
raquo
Absolutely, but for non-experimental stacks good practices are well understood
and are easy to pick up, especially if you don't focus your career on the one
true stack.
For 99% of the projects you don't need to know any stack at level 80. You're
much better off having a more diverse experience. Most skills beyond
intermediate level – defensive coding, good architecture, managing complexity,
etc. – translate very well to other stacks.
~~~
cweagans
That's a valid way to look at things, but I take a different approach. I try
to avoid easy projects as much as I can with my preferred tech, because it
forces me to grow as a developer. I have a relatively diverse skillset which I
can grow outward or upward if I need to, but I also have deep knowledge of 2-3
technologies that really pay the bills.
------
BjoernKW
The question usually is: Business or leisure? If it's for fun trying out
something that's as different from the stack you're used to as possible (like
Haskell or Lisp, for instance) will allow you to get the most out of the
experience like learning new paradigms and gaining a different perspective on
your favourite stack as well.
As this is for business I'd say stick to what you know. Creating a useful
software product that can be marketed successfully is difficult enough as it
is. There's no need to complicate the process any further.
Regarding hiring: First things first. You won't hire people in the beginning
anyway I suppose. So, that's a problem you should consider later on. Besides,
development lends itself to working remotely so area isn't really an issue
anyway.
~~~
yitchelle
This is a great way to think about the problem. Find the answer to what you
are trying to deliver, and then that will define your constraints on which
stack you can choose.
------
roneesh
I think there can be a few avenues, each worthwhile:
1\. Use Rails as a back-end only and commit to a front-end stack like Angular
or React+Flux. Rails will continue to be viable for a long time, but even
longer as just an easy API server.
2\. If you don't know the Node ecosystem, it might be time to dive in. I
haven't really enjoyed Express.js, the Sinatra-esque framework for Node, but
it can be a good excuse to learn NoSQL db's (though you can use them in Rails
as you know) and just increase JS chops. Also if you hire a front-end dev I
think it's a tad more likely they'll know Node than Rails.
3\. If this is really just to learn, I'd suggest trying other languages,
Clojure seems like a great mix of mind-expanding programming along with web
ready usage.
4\. Meteor.js is a project I'm really interested in. It's 'Rails but for
Javascript'. They have funding to stick around for a while, and they have a
vision of pushing the web away from stateless API's to an always connected
client. This is my answer of what I'd start a new web app in if I had to begin
one today.
~~~
Daishiman
I _thoroughly_ disagree with point 2.
Having tracked the development of the Node ecosystem since its beginning, the
amount of unstable libraries and endless churn continues to amaze me, and the
tooling solutions still seem very immature for what should be a "serious"
development platform.
Honestly, for 99% of things a plain old Rails or Django stack will be fine.
Development will be rapid, the devs behind both frameworks seem to care about
stability while keeping options open to making your own thing, and you have
access to both language's more ample library story, which goes beyond simply
making web pages.
If it's just about the concurrency story, there's async frameworks on Ruby and
Python. If it's about the performance, V8 eventually ends up hitting the same
walls the other languages do, albeit much slower, but with a whole bunch of
language and library deficits that are best avoided altogether.
It's amazing to say it, but nowadays even the current story with some PHP
frameworks is not bad, ever since some people decided to standardize more
parts of their packages and make the language actually suck less.
~~~
throw_for_throw
+1 Currently developing a Node.js / Express application. The choice of
platform was a huge mistake. The brittleness of many of the libraries is
indeed amazing.
------
amarsahinovic
First, I don't think that Rails (and similar) will become obsolete in a few
years. Personally, if it's a serious project, I would go with the stack you
know the best.
Now, if you're willing to learn something new, I would recommend that you try
Phoenix [http://phoenixframework.org/](http://phoenixframework.org/). It
similar to Rails in structure, and Elixir (built on top of Erlang VM) is also
similar to Ruby (syntax-wise).
Some helpful resources:
[https://github.com/h4cc/awesome-elixir](https://github.com/h4cc/awesome-
elixir)
[http://elixirsips.com/](http://elixirsips.com/)
~~~
hhandoko
+1 vote for Elixir.
I am learning it at the moment. Enjoyed the Ruby (syntax) with some functional
programming capability, but the biggest selling point for me was the fact that
it runs on the Erlang VM.
PS. Don't forget:
[http://exercism.io/languages/elixir](http://exercism.io/languages/elixir)
------
codegeek
Think about the following factors when choosing a stack:
\- How mature is it ? Is it a latest new cool thing or does it have a proven
track record?
\- What is the purpose of your project ? Is it just to learn new things or you
actually building a real world busines ? How quickly can you time to market ?
This is critical.
\- What kind of support ecosystem exists for this stack ? Can you easily
debug, ask other people and get answers quickly ?
I don't think RoR will become obsolete in the world of web in the next few
years. If you really love it as you say, then go use it specially if you are
building something important to do as a business. But by all means go try
something new if you want to learn or try as a hobby.
while we are discussing, some of the stuff that I have come across while
building a web project in 2015:
### Front End
Angular, React, Meteor, Knockout and of course Jquery.
### Back End
Laravel/Lumen (for php), Django/Flask (Python), Rails/Sinatra (Ruby), Nodejs
------
liquidcool
Since I started dabbling in recruiting, I've been doing rough tracking of job
data for a number of technologies/stacks, broken down by region (LA, OC, and
SV). When I checked outstanding jobs earlier this month, these were the
rankings (most to least jobs):
SV: PHP, Java EE, Node.js, RoR, Spring/Hibernate, C#/.NET, Python/Django,
Scala/Play, Groovy/Grails
LA: PHP, C#/.NET, Java EE, RoR, Spring/Hibernate, Node.js, Python/Django,
Scala/Play, Groovy/Grails
OC: C#/.NET, PHP, Java EE, Spring/Hibernate, Node.js, RoR, Groovy/Grails,
Python/Django, Scala/Play
And numbers show that SV has 4-5x jobs of LA, which has 2x jobs of OC. This is
all to say that research is critical if you're choosing a technology based on
getting a job locally.
~~~
siquick
Considering all the bad mouthing that goes on, I'm surprised to see PHP at #1
in SV and LA.
Just proves that you need to ignore the haters and go with the language that
works for you/your situation.
*have used PHP for the last 7 years but now switching over to Python/Flask.
~~~
liquidcool
I should probably narrow the query a bit (I'm using a job board aggregator),
but there are a number of startups built on PHP, most notably Facebook. Yahoo
uses it in places, and don't forget all the companies who need a WordPress,
Magento, Drupal, etc. developer. These technologies run multi-million dollar
businesses. And after years of consulting, I can tell you business owners
don't care what's under the hood if it solves their problem with good ROI.
~~~
alasdair_
Where you checked the outstanding jobs matters as well - something like
Monster.com likely has a different group of companies using it that other
sources.
Also, don't FB and Google (and other firms) mostly have their own recruiters?
~~~
liquidcool
I search job board aggregators and do my level best to filter out agency
recruiters. I don't trust the exact job numbers, of course, but I trust the
rankings because the deltas are large enough.
------
barhum
Why don't you try out Meteor? I found it really easy to work with. You could
probably go through the whole book tutorial (discovermeteor.com) in 20 hours.
If you don't end up using it on production; it might help you with faster
prototyping.
------
rnovak
I think it depends on what your goals are. So far I've built simple apps in
Node.JS (Express, Sails, vanilla JS), Spring Boot (Java), Grails, Django,
ASP.NET, PHP, Spring MVC (Java), Perl CGI, C++
The perspective I've come away with is.....MVC is MVC. So far I haven't seen
anything from any of these frameworks that is _completely different when
building a webapp_ (they're of course different when you're building different
types of applications, such as Batch, Three Tier, etc).
I found myself worrying about the same things (Input Validation, internal
state, database management, Object mapping to the database, and Output
serialization) in each case. The optimal choices depended _heavily_ on the
characteristics of the input domain and the problem domain.
Meaning, for a simple CRUD app, I'd probably use Rails (mainly for their
scaffolding), for something that was more event based (like
transactions/financial), I'd probably use Java/Spring, for something that was
more system level or batch, I'd probably use C/C++ or Perl depending on how
numerical/stringy the data is. I'd probably use PHP if I didn't want a bunch
of startup time (i.e. if I just wanted to prototype something really quickly),
ASP.NET if it was going to be Windows.
After picking up a couple of these, I stopped thinking about the solution in
terms of the language, but more in terms of the Paradigm.
Sorry I couldn't be of more help
~~~
Someone1234
Did you mean ASP.net MVC? MVC is great, and I'd recommend it if you want to go
the Windows route, "legacy" ASP.net? Not so much. Razr puts the old rendering
engine to shame, and MVC has received a lot more Microsoft and community love
than ASP.net did.
But I'm pretty sure it was a typo anyway since you talk about MVC (in general)
in the very next paragraph, so I assume you were listing off a lot of MVC
frameworks including ASP.net MVC.
~~~
liquidcool
I don't see a typo, nor do I see mention of ASP.NET MVC anywhere. "Spring MVC"
is an extremely popular web framework on the Java Virtual Machine:
[http://docs.spring.io/spring/docs/current/spring-
framework-r...](http://docs.spring.io/spring/docs/current/spring-framework-
reference/html/mvc.html)
------
getdavidhiggins
> hiring is a factor to consider when choosing the stack
Personally I would not let hiring determine what stack you use. In the end if
it gets the job done, is tested, commented, and can be proudly passed on to
other engineers, then it is suitable.
One more thing I found with 'stacks' is they are not as solid as they seem,
and can be swapped out with other ones, but only as needed. It is common to
switch between multiple stacks throught the day. "Doing everything one step at
a time, in parallel" as they say.
~~~
collyw
Depends what you are doing and where you are going.
A friend of mine had a startup company a couple of years ago. He chose the
language - Python, next choice was Java, and next was C I think (to me the
differences his choice of languages shows a lack of understanding in the trade
offs between each). As he was non technical, I assume he just listened to
other bioinformaticans telling him what was great.
Anyway, he got a product produced (Python and Django / JavaScript front end)
and had the option of a German grant to keep the project going. The amount of
money offered was fine for someone out of University, but wasn't enough for an
experienced dev.
Anyway, despite using a solid choice of language / framework, he couldn't find
a dev to continue the project. My guess is that if he had chosen PHP, he the
project would have continued.
~~~
getdavidhiggins
Yeah but programming languages are an abstraction layer on top of already
existing architectures which are not going away any time soon. X86, ARM, etc.
So as long as code can talk to low level hardware and get executed, it doesn't
really matter what you language you're using.
I can understand the need to have others pick up from where you left off, but
that's introducing politics into programming, and more oft than not, it
confuses what you're trying to achieve (which is converting some form of input
to output I hope)
As a first port of call, it would be preferable to know one low level language
like C, and a scripting / CRUD language like PHP/JS, as a lot of application
development now is web based. Bonus points for learning ASM as that's as low
level as we can get. (Unless you work in an Intel chip facility and are not
allowed tell people what you're working on).
------
johan_larson
Unless there are any unusual requirements, if I were starting a web project
today I would use these technologies:
- Angular/Bootstrap on the front end
- Java/Spring Boot on the server
- PostgreSQL on the data tier
- deploy on AWS
All of these are distinctly conservative choices at this point, but using
tried-and-true technologies has real advantages. They raise no red flags with
bosses or prospective investors. They are well supported and will be for a
long time. And it is easy to find knowledgeable people if you need to scale up
staff.
Since you are a Rails guy, you might want to substitute Rails for Spring Boot.
It's a respected system, and you already know it. Win.
If I had the latitude to take one risk in choosing the tech stack, I would
swap out the Java/Spring Boot for Haskell/Yesod, since I grow increasingly
frustrated with Java's verbosity. But this choice definitely has downsides: I
know Java _much_ better than Haskell, and Haskell is rare enough that if I
needed more than a couple of developers, I'd need to either hire them remotely
or develop them from scratch.
Similarly, you might want to take a chance on one off-beat component if it
catches your eye. But just one.
~~~
Daishiman
I would really hold off on Angular.
The development path of that project seems to indicate a dead end. And as far
as technologies go for a new project that's supposed to start quickly, it has
some tremendously complex abstractions while having issues with debugging.
This is all a pet peeve of mine, but I think the kind of two-way data binding
that Angular proposes will be seen in the long run as a mistake. The fact that
you can't just understand what's going on behind the hood without reading tons
of documentation in the middle is _very_ troublesome.
~~~
johan_larson
Dead end? What makes you say that?
~~~
Daishiman
The fact that the very developers of Angular have stated that Angular 2.0 will
not be backward-compatible with Angular 1.0, and the reason why Angular 2.0 is
being made is because the operating assumptions of browser capabilities when
Ng 1 was made have changed radically.
------
imauld
If I were in your shoes I would be reaching for Django/Flask (depending on how
complex of an app I was making) for the backend and either server rendered
pages or Ember.JS on the front end.
YMMV of course but you get a lot out of the box with Django and if you don't
need everything Django comes with (A user system, A large ORM, authentication
etc) Flask is a more lightweight solution that can be extended pretty easily.
There is a large community for both and any Python dev will know at least one
of them at least fairly well.
That being, the main reason I would go with that stack is because that is what
I know. If you are doing something that entail some "real time"-iness or push
notifications that's not really one of Python's strong points. So ultimately
you should choose the best tool for the job. The "best" tool should be a
workable combination of what you are able to use easily and will get what you
want done without having to write a ton of supporting code.
TL;DR: Choose the best tool. The best tool will be something you can already
use or learn in a fairly easy manner and also lends itself well to the task
you are trying to accomplish.
------
ranty
Use RoR, it's not going anywhere.
------
Firegarden
I am going out on a limb and say for all things backend use C#. Mainly because
in general the language, IDE, community support is by far the best. Yeah said
it - and it's true so if you think Java or PHP or anything else is overall
better your way wrong so fuck you. Oh and it's now open source and runs on
Linux.
Unfortunately its not a as cool as ROR, LAMP etc. It's simply better, more
mature more stable, quicker etc.
There is a major subtle war going on where asp.net mvc and c# are just not
included in the start up tech stack discussions which is ridiculous. asp mvc
has the _best_ Web API infrastructure supporting RESTful / hypermedia API's.
It has amazing WebSockets support. I could go on but who is even reading this
far? Perhaps just me.
~~~
collyw
As a Django user, I have noticed a few comments on here and elsewhere where
people have switched away from ASP and moved to Django, and seemed pleased
with that choice.
[http://kurtgrandis.com/blog/2010/02/24/python-django-vs-c-
as...](http://kurtgrandis.com/blog/2010/02/24/python-django-vs-c-asp-net-
productivity-showdown/)
------
LarryMade2
I would ask myself "what in this project would rails fall short on? or what
language has been known to do a better job, and don't think Ruby/Rails can do
it?"
If there’s nothing compelling you to use something else, its up to you. but if
you see something that Language Y could do over language X for this project,
then that might be the indicator of which way to go.
I do PHP work, currently I don’t feel I'm limited with the tools I've chosen
for what I have in mind. If I did I'd certainly look to see where I've heard
there is more opportunity.
If you have the opportunity, pick the tools that would work for you and learn
how to use them well.
------
CLGrimes
If you're comfortable or want to learn a new stack, there are plenty to choose
from.
If you want to quickly build a web project, hire some engineers, charge for
your service - why not build it in RoR? This will save you time
troubleshooting and learning the ropes of a new web development framework.
Also, you could always hire remote workers if it is difficult to hire locally.
See: [https://weworkremotely.com/](https://weworkremotely.com/)
------
obayesshelton
I had the privilege of meeting the Director of Technology of github the other
week in Newcastle and he kept getting asked a similar question and his
response every time was to use tried and tested tools, languages and
frameworks. Not the latest flashy things.
From my experience use the things that have been around for a while and have a
good community / documentation around them.
------
bbcbasic
Depends on what the project is for.
Is it a personal hobby project? Then maybe it is a chance to try a new stack.
I'd recommend something with a more statically typed language than Ruby so you
can get some experience in that. Java and C# are your mild choices. Haskell
would be more hardcore.
If it is for money or there is a deadline then stick to what you know.
------
ramtatatam
Look at Pylons Pyramid powered by Python, you can serve it with uWsgi and
NginX.
[http://docs.pylonsproject.org/projects/pyramid/en/latest/](http://docs.pylonsproject.org/projects/pyramid/en/latest/)
------
ulisesrmzroche
Use Rails as your API layer and pick a front end framework. That way you get
to expand into a new stack while keeping one foot in Rails. I think in the
rails community, Rails + Ember is a common combo, followed by Angular, though
React has more momentum right now.
------
anubhav_maity
You can try
Bootstrap and Reactjs for the frontend. And for the backend - express and
node. For database try nosql like mongodb.
It will be altogether a different stack from what you are working now. But it
will be a good learning experience.
~~~
Daishiman
There is _no_ reason to use a NoSQL database on a new project (especially one
as hideous as Mongo) unless the problem space is so domain-specific that it
merits it.
------
codinghabit
Look at the job ads in your area. Take that into consideration when choosing
your stack. If you're looking for an enterprise job I think Java would be a
safe bet.
------
aikah
Depends on your requirements. For all the hate RoR gets it's still the fastest
way to write a complex application no question.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
12 great Gfx-demos for CSS, WebGL, JS, etc... - julianpye
http://www.heise.de/ct/Mitmachen/Browserdemo/
The great German computing magazine c't had a Browsercompetition for its 30th birthday.
The 12 finalists are all great and inspiring showcases for CSS transition, WebGL, Javascript, etc...
======
julianpye
The great German computing mag c't has its 30th birthday - Users submitted
great Web showcases and here are the 9 finalists.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Hackers ransack Citrix, make off with 6TB+ of emails, biz docs, secrets - cow9
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/03/08/citrix_hacked_data_stolen/
======
salimmadjd
The evidence that points to Iran comes from a company named, Resecurity. But
there are some odd stuff about this company.
1 - their CEO has no real linkedIn history [1]
2 - they revenue and employment went off the chart just in 2 quarters [2]
3 - very unclear how they came to this assessment. Especially now that US
government is looking for excuses (real or fabricated) to make a case for war
with Iran, I look at these evidence with some skepticism.
Am I being over-cynical here?
1 - [https://www.linkedin.com/in/charles-
yoo-365201165/](https://www.linkedin.com/in/charles-yoo-365201165/)
2 - [https://www.zoominfo.com/c/resecurity-
inc/353866377](https://www.zoominfo.com/c/resecurity-inc/353866377)
edit - formating.
~~~
keyme
I don't have a LinkedIn page, or any other social media for this matter. Does
that make me a non-trusrworthy person now? This is horrible. (I don't disagree
with your other points).
~~~
rakoo
Are you the CEO of a company that works in computer security, where fame is
probably more important than in other fields?
~~~
deathhand
Fame does not equal trust. While there may not be any security through
obsecurity it is a barrier. As for being a trusted CEO at a certain point its
about who you know and who knows you. Do you think the NSA employees all have
social media profiles?
~~~
raesene9
Fame doesn't equal trust, but if someone with no public background starts
claiming to have been in the NSA/MI6/FSB/whatever, why would you believe them?
------
ehnto
Compromise feels almost inevitable. Perhaps the idea that we can keep data
protected and accessible at the same time using complex software is folly?
Systems get more and more complex, security measures layer on top, patching
over holes as they are found. But we are never in front of the cat and mouse
game by necessity, only ever behind. So it must be that compromise is
inevitable.
I wouldn't put personal data I am not willing to lose online or on an intranet
at all anymore. No amount of money and engineering seems to be able to keep
up, and companies prove over and over that they are negligent, naive, or
simply a few steps too far behind.
~~~
appleiigs
> I wouldn't put personal data I am not willing to lose online or on an
> intranet at all anymore
Anymore? Not trusting the internet used to be the default.
~~~
qrbLPHiKpiux
I was at Barnes and Noble yesterday and on an end, I saw an "internet password
log book" for $5.98.
A few years ago, I soughed at it, poking fun at it.
Now, it's not a bad idea.
------
Nasrudith
Brute forcing weak passwords? Someone is doing something horribly wrong here
on several levels. At the very least anything online of any importance should
have rate limits if not locking for repeated password attempts. For servers
themselves allowing password logins is inexcusably bad.
It is considered a bit overzealous by most but I believe that passwords should
have been done away with a long time ago in favor of cryptographic keypair
logins - we have already found the "2FA" in practice like emails and cellphone
text messages not an adequate replacement. I'm aware there are other problems
with storing your keys and loss but I believe that is a better approach for
anything that needs security. I wish I could get my bank accounts to use key
based logins.
~~~
aboutruby
Same tactic as what's used on Twitter accounts.
And same as I said previously: If the bad actors can brute force weak
passwords, the company itself should be able to do it too and force those with
weak passwords to update them.
~~~
citrixshady
Interestingly enough, Citrix ShareFile forced password resets for everyone in
January.
------
jarym
“Resecurity also said it warned Citrix on December 28...” And then: “Citrix,
meanwhile, said it took action – launching an internal probe and securing its
networks – after hearing from the FBI earlier this week.”
Putting aside the fact this security company seems to have never been heard of
before; Citrix’s appears to have buried their heads in the sand until the Feds
came knocking.
If it’s true that the company was tipped off in December then the ‘I know
nothing’ defence is truly shocking.
------
chx
Citrix... mention that to any Hungarian programmer roughly my age and you will
likely receive a long string of swearing because the incredibly buggy central
system necessary to sign up for courses and exams was only accessible via the
Citrix ICA client and back in the second half of the 90s that, in itself, was
a huge source of problems beyond the server app not being particularly high
quality especially on Linux which was rather important because at this time
practically all sane IT students were running Linux to access the Internet
(remember, we are talking pre-Windows 2000).
~~~
acdha
The amazing part to me is that it still sucks: it’s 2019 and random hangs
requiring a full session restart are still a daily occurrence, and I recently
measured keystroke latency at 130+ms over a LAN. That’s much worse than using
X11 over SSH ever was.
~~~
taurath
It’s been pretty much a law of software for me that once an app is primarily
business to business and gets traction in the Fortune 500 expect the
functionality to stay the exact same or become worse over the next 10 years
------
gesman
>> Earlier today, Citrix chief information security officer Stan Black gave
his company's side of the story. He said that, as of right now, Citrix does
not know exactly which documents the hackers obtained nor how they got in...
Ouch. The winner of "The worst position to be in today".
~~~
citrixshady
And, IMO, they've known about it since January when they abruptly forced
password resets on every ShareFile user. I use ShareFile for secure delivery
of documents containig DOB, SSN, AGI, ...
No notice from Citrix ShareFile to its customers about a breach yet, though.
Thanks.
------
sbhn
A country under certain sanctions, especially in regards to encryption, is
easy to middle man. Iran computers are probably the most easy to hack and
plant evidence on if they depend on US operating systems and network
suppliers.
------
drilldrive
At this point, it is (or should be) absolutely clear that password security is
a top priority for everyone nowadays. The only solution that I have heard of
is password managers, but what if such companies are hacked like this one? I
am curious if we will eventually recommend randomly generating passwords per
website and keeping them under lock and key (physically so such as in a safe).
------
w-ll
haveibeenpwned could/should make a browser extension that tell you if the site
your on has been pwned
~~~
ComodoHacker
HIBP isn't about pwned sites. It's about leaked credentials. The source of
leaked data on HIBP isn't verifiable in most cases.
~~~
fastball
Nope.
[https://haveibeenpwned.com/PwnedWebsites](https://haveibeenpwned.com/PwnedWebsites)
~~~
ComodoHacker
OK, so there's a Yahoo! breach from 2012. Should I not visit Yahoo now?
Also please note the '?' marks for unverified sources.
~~~
Dahoon
Do you have a better solution than not using a service? Not using it is like
voting with your wallet. So yes, I would say stay away from yahoo. Where do we
draw a line otherwise? It is the same boat as "I don't like Facebook
collecting data on me but I'll still use their service".
~~~
ComodoHacker
Yes, it's in the same boat, we (almost) all do it with Google.
I don't know where to draw a line, but I don't think a single data breach,
even minor one, should mean a death sentence to business. Maybe some sort of
audit/certification should be mandatory after breach.
~~~
fastball
I think the idea is more about informing users than it is about trying to drum
up a boycott that results in a "death sentence".
For example, with regards to search engines, what if I go on Google and it
tells me "hey, Google has had 3 data breaches that have effected users like
you". And then I go on DuckDuckGo and it says "DDG has never had a data
breach". Not everyone will switch from Google to DDG, but some people will,
and I don't think that's a bad thing.
~~~
ComodoHacker
We can't inform users how a particular breach affected a particular user
(based on the fact of breach alone). Anything else is just FUD. It's like
saying life in California is dangerous because there were deadly hurricanes
there in the past that took lives.
We can't completely control hacker attacks. We should treat them more like
software bugs or service outages. It just happens, we should focus on
minimizing potential damage and proper response.
~~~
fastball
> It's like saying life in California is dangerous because there were deadly
> hurricanes there in the past that took lives.
I'm not sure this is the analogy you are looking for. If you are concerned
with how a hurricane might impact your livelihood, it's generally a much
better idea to live in Colorado than on the coast of California.
Except unlike hurricanes, we absolutely can prevent hacks that leak a lot of
user information.
------
spappal
I would be interested in knowing how cyber warfare and cyber espionage are
viewed from a perspective of diplomacy or power play between nations (or
corporations). Does anyone know of interesting articles?
~~~
joveian
It has been a while since I read it but the first thing that came to mind is
this talk by Dan Geer (who is closely connected to US intelligence agencies):
[http://geer.tinho.net/geer.blackhat.6viii14.txt](http://geer.tinho.net/geer.blackhat.6viii14.txt)
------
citrixshady
Citrix sent all of our clients an email saying their passwords were
invalidated and everyone needed to set a new one (with stricter requirements)
in January....
We use ShareFile as a client portal for secure document delivery.
Shady.
------
komali2
It says they had to find out from the FBI. At least theoretically, how does
the FBI find out? (unless someone knows the actuality and is willing to share?
Didn't see anything in the article)
~~~
citrixshady
Not so sure about that.
I use ShareFile for secure document delivery and they forced a password reset
with stricter requirements in January, the month after the first breach, and
two months before the FBI notification.
No notice of breached documents to its customers yet.
~~~
detaro
Almost as if they didn't force the reset because of the breach, but because of
the reason they gave back then?
------
waterside81
Potentially stupid question but in instances of hacks, how do companies know
for sure what was and wasn't taken?
~~~
ASalazarMX
They don't, they just try their best to reconstruct the attack with whatever
"footprints" the perpetrators left, along with any independent logging they
might have in place. It's a little nightmare because it's rare to give
absolute certainty.
------
cow9
Shares of Citrix is down after report of hack:
[https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/08/citrix-tumbles-on-report-
of-...](https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/08/citrix-tumbles-on-report-of-
unauthorized-access-fbi-investigation.html)
~~~
freehunter
But still higher than they were Dec 24th 2018. Actually higher than they were
at any point prior to April 2018. Because the market knows that major security
breaches that will have long-lasting impact on the victims involved will
ultimately have no impact on the company that was breached.
------
sidcool
I am not very well informed. How serious is this?
~~~
tcd
About as serious as Equifax.
~~~
sidcool
That's quite serious.
------
therealx
Where's the dump?
------
eddywebs
fake news ?
------
hestefisk
“Threat actors”. What’s wrong with the word “perpetrator” or simply
“criminal”?
~~~
xyzzy123
“Threat actor” is super vague but more specific than the words you proposed.
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threat_actor](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threat_actor)
I agree the jargon isn’t great, I’ve seen “attacker” and “malicious user” used
in pentest reports and neither of those seems quite right either.
~~~
doitLP
Also, they aren’t technically criminals if the attackers are state-sponsored
and conducting an act of war. “Threat-actor” seems exactly like the type of
legalese a government relies on when crafting the story around its own
retaliation or justification for future aggression. I think it’s just entered
the lexicon when talking about these types of incidents.
~~~
buttcoinslol
I agree, there are no criminals at the nation-state level, only other actors.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Google launches ad-free net experiment - lentil_soup
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30144073
======
subhro
Or, I can just use Adblock and get the ads blocked.
~~~
ForHackernews
Except if everyone did that, there'd be no way for most sites to make any
money.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Eating for Peace: How cuisine bridges cultures - dnetesn
http://nautil.us/issue/62/systems/eating-for-peace
======
ouid
I guess I'm far more interested in the converse. My grandmother keeps a more
or less kosher house, cooking according to some pretty narrow rules. Over the
years has only assimilated a few other ethnic cuisines into her palate.
The divide that I have noticed most strongly is that she seems to have split
society into barbaric, rice-eating cultures, and the noble wheat/potato
eaters. I'm pretty sure she doesn't even know how rice is cooked. She would
never say it like this, but her aversion to cuisine does happen to correlate
with groups that she will make casually racist comments about. The most
prominent example being the Japanese, with Mexico being a close second.
I've been wondering for a while how closely correlated racism and food-racism
are. Are picky eaters more likely to be xenophobes? Certainly I cannot imagine
myself ever saying anything negative about Thailand or Ethiopia, but I don't
feel anything like that empathy for China, or people who consume ketchup.
~~~
throwaway_98554
As another poster mentioned, "people will find just about any reason to
believe they are better than other people".
Your intuition about racism/xenophobia is probably correct. But that's not the
interesting question, given how widespread it is. What is more thought-
provoking is why did this kind of behavior evolve? What was the advantage? Is
it still advantageous today?
~~~
craftyguy
> why did this kind of behavior evolve?
It's just an extension of the competitive nature of humans/social animals.
Social animals despise animals of the same species that are of different
social groups. They all want their social group to prevail, and will attack
(actively or passively, e.g. by refusing culture) the others. Humans like to
think they are above this 'primitive' instinct, but I think the vast majority
of human behavior can be summed up by this.
------
mturmon
If you're interested in this concept, may I recommend the documentary film
_City of Gold_ , about the LA-based food critic Jonathan Gold, who rather
famously was the first food writer to win a Pulitzer prize.
[The film: [https://variety.com/2016/film/production/jonathan-gold-
food-...](https://variety.com/2016/film/production/jonathan-gold-food-
critic-1201724814/) \-- Gold's approach: [https://www.gq.com/story/jonathan-
gold-gutsiest-food-critic](https://www.gq.com/story/jonathan-gold-gutsiest-
food-critic)]
Gold takes a very democratic and open-minded attitude toward reviewing. He has
been one of a handful of writers that were early appreciators and promoters of
various now-common food trends - food trucks and strip-mall food joints, niche
ethnic/regional foods, unusual meats and ingredients.
But, clarified by a pair of quite touching anecdotes that, like parentheses,
open and close the film, Gold's real guiding light is not foodie culture -- it
is the ability of shared food to bring people together, in a metropolis that
is ever more diverse. The first anecdote is about his sorrow after the LA
riots of 1992, which devastated the Koreatown area where he lived at the time.
And the second is a book reading at what looks like Skylight Books in Los
Feliz, where he says that perhaps some of these tensions could be healed at
the micro-level if we "could just invite someone over for dinner."
We all know there are structural problems as well, but the problem of ethnic
tension and misunderstanding operates at many scales and many strategies are
needed. Perhaps this is one.
~~~
CaptainZapp
Reminds me of Tony Bourdain.
May his soul rest in peace.
~~~
mturmon
True, they have some shared motivations. Here’s Jonathan’s appreciation of
Bourdain: [http://www.latimes.com/food/jonathan-gold/la-fo-gold-
anthony...](http://www.latimes.com/food/jonathan-gold/la-fo-gold-anthony-
bourdain-20180608-story.html#)
~~~
CaptainZapp
Thanks!
I'm currently in the Czech Republic, where the LA Times is blocked. I'll
certainly read it when back in Switzerland (where it's accessible just fine).
------
pm90
We often take for granted how lucky we are here in the US that many people
from different cultures come here and sell their food in restaurants, food
trucks, bars etc.
~~~
octorian
Yet, typically, each country/culture is reduced to a single cuisine.
The exception to this is when you're lucky enough to live in an area with a
sufficiently large immigrant population from a particular part of the world.
I've especially noticed this w.r.t. various Asian cuisines in California,
versus anywhere else in the US that I've lived.
------
adfm
Wouldn't it be something if solving world peace were as easy as getting the
Donald to grab a combo plate at the Halal Guys on 6th and 53rd on his way to
see his friends at Fox while at home for the holidays?
Just kidding. You can't solve the world's problems with a coke and a smile...
but it would make a great photo op :^)
~~~
steauengeglase
It's not a panacea, but nothing is. When you have almost nothing to start
with, there is always food.
I'm from the south and the foodie boom has been an enormous benefit for us.
For most of my life there was a hard push to make a distinction between
"southern food" and "soul food". It was a push from both ends of the political
spectrum, as older white critics tried to keep it "white" and black critics in
the 60s and 70s tried to get the taste of repression and feelings of stigma
out of the menu.
It led to a lot of weird scenarios where a critic might call a plate of greens
from Oakland "enlightened" and the same plate in Memphis "limp, servile, and
impotent". That's still a thing. From a purely rational viewpoint this seems
ridiculous, but from the cultural standpoint it makes sense. Still, it's
reification, anthropomorphism, and all that jazz, like Harriet Beecher Stowe
calling loblolly pines lazy and immoral.
The foodie boom offered a lot of mutual pride for a region that has always had
an inferiority complex. As the lines blurred it was less "black" and "white"
food and more "our" food. Everyone grew up eating collards, grits, cornbread,
catfish, and okra. We all ate BBQ and drank sweet tea on the 4th. We all
remembered eating tomato sandwiches with pepper and salt on cheap white bread
as a kid. We all had pimento cheese. It was the one thing we weren't obligated
to feel shame and resentment about in a region that is nothing but shame and
resentment.
Not that it's all peach cobbler. As a retired shrimper friend of mine said
after seeing a $24 bowl of shrimp & grits, "Man, this is what we ate when we
couldn't afford food and now they are pricing us out of it."
Food is important.
------
contingencies
There's an equally fascinating article in the same issue regarding the import
of chilli to Sichuan @ [http://nautil.us/issue/62/systems/why-revolutionaries-
love-s...](http://nautil.us/issue/62/systems/why-revolutionaries-love-spicy-
food-rp)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Fastly's stock opens 34% above its IPO price, then keeps rising - rmoriz
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/fastlys-stock-opens-34-above-its-ipo-price-then-keeps-rising-2019-05-17
======
youngtaff
Such a great company, and run by a lovely group of people
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ray Kurzweil’s ‘singularity’ prediction supported by prominent AI scientists - jonbaer
http://www.kurzweilai.net/ray-kurzweils-singularity-prediction-supported-by-prominent-ai-scientists
======
blacksqr
Meanwhile, just a few submissions down on Hacker News: "About Moore’s Law –
it’s dead"
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Scramble for Africa - zerr
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scramble_for_Africa
======
ganeshkrishnan
"Native Congo Free State laborers who failed to meet rubber collection quotas
were often punished by having their hands cut off."
This is really heartbreaking. The most heartbreaking photo I have ever seen
was a father looking at the chopped up hands of his 4 year old son. The
Belgium army had his son's hand cut off as punishment for failing to fulfill
the daily work quota.
~~~
kentosi
Yes I noticed that too. It made me think that (a) it was somehow ok to do this
to (especially to children), and (b) what other non-photographed atrocities
were committed and never spoken of.
~~~
ganeshkrishnan
It was very common until late 1980's in Australia to shoot and kill aboriginal
children who would wander into your property. The Australian government paid
₤5 to kill an adult and ₤2 to kill a child during the Black War.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/ajzbia/til_t...](https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/ajzbia/til_the_black_war_was_a_period_of_violent/)
The killings were legal till the 60's and then overlooked till the 80's. Last
year a guy was acquitted by the court even after murdering 4 aboriginal
children due to double jeopardy laws. [https://www.theguardian.com/australia-
news/2018/sep/13/bowra...](https://www.theguardian.com/australia-
news/2018/sep/13/bowraville-murders-court-rejects-retrial-bid-over-aboriginal-
childrens-deaths)
~~~
lucozade
> The killings were legal till the 60's
That's an astonishing statement. Could you elaborate? The Aboriginal
population has been treated heinously since European settlement but that's a,
literally, incredible claim.
~~~
ganeshkrishnan
Have close friends who are married to Australians. It was common knowledge
that out in the bush, it was quite frequent to shoot Aboriginals who would
wander into your land. Australia had similar gun laws as US and it only
changed after the Port Arthur massacre in 1996.
Also Aboriginals do not have the concept of land ownership and hence wouldn't
understand the concept of trespassing, especially the kids.
Here is a list of known massacres:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_of_Indigenou...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_of_Indigenous_Australians)
I spent some time in Queensland and the lawyers told me point blank that
courts would hardly rule in favor of "Non Europeans" even for
criminal/personal injury cases and that's why a huge percentage of
civil/injury liabilities are settled out of court.
~~~
lucozade
I see. So you have no basis for the claim.
I genuinely don’t see why you’d make something like that up when the truth is
awful enough. But I’m sure you have your reasons.
~~~
ganeshkrishnan
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Australian_referendum_(...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Australian_referendum_\(Aboriginals\))
They were counted in the population as "humans" only 5 years after this
referendum. Besides the law was such that you could kill Intruders on your
land and this invariably meant murdering the aboriginals
------
novacole
‘Msiri was the most militarily powerful ruler in the area, and traded large
quantities of copper, ivory and slaves – and rumors of gold reached European
ears. The scramble for Katanga was a prime example of the period. Rhodes and
the BSAC sent two expeditions to Msiri in 1890 led by Alfred Sharpe, who was
rebuffed, and Joseph Thomson, who failed to reach Katanga. Leopold sent four
CFS expeditions. First, the Le Marinel Expedition could only extract a vaguely
worded letter. The Delcommune Expedition was rebuffed. The well-armed Stairs
Expedition was given orders to take Katanga with or without Msiri's consent.
Msiri refused, was shot, and the expedition cut off his head and stuck it on a
pole as a "barbaric lesson" to the people. The Bia Expedition finished the job
of establishing an administration of sorts and a "police presence" in
Katanga.’
TLDR:
Can I please have your land? Can I please have your land? Ok, fine I’ll just
shoot you, chop off your head and stick it on a pole. Then I’ll have your
land.
~~~
novacole
There was something seriously seriously wrong with those people.
------
Y_Y
Let's apply modern interpersonal morality to this and see what happens.
~~~
ganeshkrishnan
"modern interpersonal morality" like what's happening in Syria, North Korea,
Venezuela, Afghanistan, Iraq, Turkey, Russia, China?
~~~
Y_Y
Isn't everyone here presumed to be living in the US, or at least the
Anglosphere? North Koreans can't be worrying about the latest JavaScript
hotness.
(I don't live in a rich, English speaking country, but I can pretend so)
| {
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Every Tech Startup Is the Same - NN88
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bp57fPKcoRs
======
brittpart_
I'm on the outside of tech and I did 1 month at health-tech and it was the
epitome of this
| {
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IPhone 4 Tips: Things New Users Should Know - mrboks
http://mrboks.info/2011/01/30/iphone-4-tips-10-things-new-users-should-know/
======
sambeau
That's a pretty good list. I certainly concur with the death grip advice.
| {
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Is Beckstrom's Law the “Quality” to Metcalfe's Law “Quantity”? - chriselles
Is Beckstrom's Law the "Quality" to Metcalfe's Law "Quantity"?<p>Image to help visualise my line of thinking.
https://ibb.co/c1YwLq<p>All thoughts appreciated!
======
quickthrower2
I think I need some explaining! What is the image trying to show? What is
Metcalfe's law? What is Beckstrom's Law?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Ask HN: Will there be a lot of jobs for Django developers in the next 5-7 years? - rayalez
I really like Django and Python, and want to develop Django websites professionally, but I'm worried that web development is going in the direction of realtime single-page apps and full-stack javascript.<p>Do you think there will be a lot of startups using Django in the following years?<p>Can I stick with learning Django, or should I focus on node/ember/etc?
======
scot_hacker
No one has a crystal ball, but one thing I can say for certain is that I've
been wondering this for years, but the number of recruiters hitting on me with
Django job offers is greater than ever - I get several offers per week. There
seems to be a bottomless appetite, and I see lots of startups adopting Django
in some part of the stack.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Life on Earth may have begun 300M years earlier than previously thought - wrongc0ntinent
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/oct/19/life-on-earth-began-300m-years-earlier-than-previously-thought
======
6502nerdface
> If confirmed, the discovery means life emerged a remarkably short time after
> the Earth was formed...
So at what point does the lag time between accretion and first evidence of
life become too short for "native" abiogenesis to be plausible, pointing
toward a transfer scenario instead?
~~~
hawkice
Honestly, that might be a different order of magnitude when it comes to speed
-- maybe if we have evidence of life within the first ~10,000 years instead of
hundreds of millions. We've only been trying to replicate the origin of life
for couple hundred years, tops, at an extremely small percentage of locations
on earth where we'd notice if it happened. It might be extremely likely to
happen when you try everywhere on earth for hundreds of thousands of years,
and that's a rounding error compared to dates we are looking at.
A much better source for what you are talking about would be e.g. finding
tardigrades or similar in the asteroid belt. That would show that life was
part of the mix that went into the forming of the planets.
~~~
sunstone
On the other hand, if life creating was so relatively easy it would be much
more likely to find evidence for multiple independent instances of life
starting on earth. My understanding is that, so far, all life on earth is part
'one web' not multiple webs.
~~~
hawkice
tl;dr It's very likely that first-life creates a lock-out, quickly soaking up
all resources that could be used for independent abiogenesis.
Let's say the probability of new life is roughly constant (and a relatively
low probability). It should roughly follow a Poisson distribution -- in other
words, using current knowledge, and assuming (1) life would be created
noticeably differently given similar circumstances and (2) it didn't (molecule
chirality indicates both of these, for instance) AND (3) the events are
independent, which you need for the distribution -- then it'd be pretty weird
for something following a Poisson distribution where:
Earth Exists: Time 0. We have physical things from the time period: Time 2
Event in the distribution: Life: Time 4 Then absolutely no new instances until
time 45 (unit here is 100MM years)
This is all by means of formalizing your argument, which is largely correct.
But it's important to note that it assumes that the events are independent,
which I strongly, strongly suspect they are not. Life takes resources and uses
them up, and will expand until it meets carrying capacity. So first-past-the-
post-wins seems like a much better guess as to the relationship between
origins-of-life.
------
amelius
It really makes me wonder if life started multiple times independently.
I guess certain molecules essential to life are right or left-handed, and if
life started several times independently, we should (statistically) see both
types of handedness. So then the question is: why didn't life start multiple
times independently?
~~~
warfangle
I guess if certain particles essential to matter as we know it are either
particles or anti-particles, and if matter coalesced several times
independently, we should see both types of matter ;)
The main difference between particles/antiparticles and chirality, though, is
life tends to extinguish other life in its competition for replication.
Antiparticles just tend to annihilate 1:1.
| {
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[hackers Browser] – New Google Chrome, Called SlimJet - iamtrying
http://www.slimjet.com/chrome/google-chrome-old-version.php
======
brudgers
Slimjet page: [http://www.slimjet.com/en/lp/java-silverlight-support-in-
chr...](http://www.slimjet.com/en/lp/java-silverlight-support-in-chrome.php)
It allows NPAPI plugins and is based on Chromium.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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OpenCV 4.0 - conductor
https://opencv.org/opencv-4-0-0.html
======
ChuckMcM
Pretty amazing piece of code, the loss of the C API is sad since a number of
embedded systems started there and are skittish about going to C++11. I used
version 3 to build a simple license plate reader that I had stuck in an
upstairs window for a time. Combine that with the simple IMSI catcher that was
referenced here a while ago and you've got your own little neighborhood watch
station with some pretty grown up capabilities.
~~~
coder543
> the loss of the C API is sad
From the article: "A lot of C API from OpenCV 1.x has been removed."
That doesn't _sound_ like they removed all of the C APIs, unless the only C
API was the one that came with 1.x? I'm not very familiar with OpenCV, but
since they homepage still talks about offering Python and Java APIs, it seems
likely that they're going through a C interop layer somewhere. Did they never
introduce new C APIs in the last three major versions?
If there really is no C API, that's sad and kinda limiting. Everything binds
to C, but almost nothing can bind to C++.
> a number of embedded systems started there and are skittish about going to
> C++11
I'm curious to know what embedded systems are powerful enough to do real-time
computer vision, but don't support a C++11 toolchain? C++11 is pretty old at
this point, and between gcc and clang, almost everything with a 32-bit or
better processor is probably supported, as well as probably many 8-bit and
16-bit architectures, but I'm skeptical about how much CV you can do on the
kind of processors that are built as 16-bit processors.
~~~
ChuckMcM
It isn't a question of power, I use a lot of Cortex M machines (32 bit ARM)
which can compile C++11 just fine, it is that there is a lot of infrastructure
(like you really have to have a working heap system, startup files that know
how to build the necessary infrastructure, Etc.) that is intimidating to
embedded programmers. Not to mention screwing up the symbol names :-).
~~~
coder543
mbed makes it pretty easy to get going with C++ on Cortex-M, last time I tried
it, but that was over a year ago.
Still, I'm skeptical about how much CV you could actually do on a Cortex-M
processor. A few dozen to a few hundred kilobytes of RAM is really limiting
when we're talking about just loading up an image from a camera, let alone
doing computer vision on that image, unless you pay for a Cortex-M7 to get 1MB
of RAM or something really expensive like that... at which point, an entire
Raspberry Pi 0 SBC with 512MB of RAM is actually cheaper than just your
microcontroller alone.
Of course, the microcontroller boots up instantly and supports incredibly
useful sleep modes and a variety of other peripherals... but for raw
performance per dollar, the M7s are just so costly.
~~~
ChuckMcM
> Still, I'm skeptical about how much CV you could actually do on a Cortex-M
> processor.
You have seen OpenMV right? ([https://openmv.io](https://openmv.io)) I've got
one of their early cameras (waiting on my H7's).
~~~
coder543
Ah, a Cortex-M7 with 1MB of RAM... just like I mentioned. haha, the earlier
editions used an M4 with 256KB of RAM it looks like, but yeah.
Do you think you could run the license plate reader you wrote earlier on one
of these? What are the advantages you see for this over a Raspberry Pi 0 with
a Raspberry Camera module? Or the new, powerful Raspberry Pi 3A+ with a camera
module? This is certainly more expensive than either Pi option, with a lower
resolution camera.
~~~
ChuckMcM
I'm reasonably certain it can be run on the H7 but not sure about the H4. It
is one of my test cases :-). Note that these chips also include a DDR memory
controller so you can put 16MB of RAM on them pretty simply, some of ST
Micro's 'Discovery' cards come with this populated, but that is not used on
the H4 or H7 camera.
------
Iv
Oh! G-API seems nice! It looks like something I had to implement imperfectly
at one point (and I suspect many OpenCV developer also did it). The ability to
describe a pipeline and having it run automatically it really a good thing to
have.
~~~
lovelearning
You might also find Halide[1] interesting then. It too is a computation graph
that does a good job of separating core algorithm and optimizations.
OpenCV's neural networks module actually uses Halide as an optional backend. I
found it to be a practical approach to run TF/Torch/Caffe/Darknet models on
CPUs and OpenCL/AMD.
There was an OpenCV proposal to port _all_ algorithms to Halide API [1]. I
think that's still the long term plan, and G-API is a kind of stopgap till
then [2].
[1]: [http://halide-lang.org/](http://halide-lang.org/)
[2]: [https://github.com/opencv/opencv/wiki/OE-23.-Module-
GAPI](https://github.com/opencv/opencv/wiki/OE-23.-Module-GAPI)
~~~
Iv
Interesting, thanks!
------
chunsj
Oh, it seems that OpenCV 4.0 does not support more easy to use/bind C API.
Sad.
~~~
nebgnahz
Yes, it is sad. OpenCV has a code-gen for Java/Python but they are hard to
work with. A number of projects in other programming languages (Rust [1], Go
[2]) has to use custom build wrappers.
[1] [https://github.com/nebgnahz/cv-rs](https://github.com/nebgnahz/cv-rs) [2]
[https://github.com/hybridgroup/gocv](https://github.com/hybridgroup/gocv)
------
kartickv
As an iOS engineer, I remember reading that OpenCV is a few TIMES slower than
alternatives like Core Image.
I wish OpenCV made use of the GPU and vector hardware on phones. Is there an
alternative to OpenCV that does?
~~~
turowicz
It does use gpu, you need to compile it with a flag.
~~~
kartickv
Oh, which one? I was under the impression it uses only Nvidia GPUs (CUDA) on
desktop.
~~~
Benjamin_Dobell
There are a _heap_ of CMake flags that turn on various features e.g. CUDA:
[https://github.com/opencv/opencv/blob/4.0.0/CMakeLists.txt#L...](https://github.com/opencv/opencv/blob/4.0.0/CMakeLists.txt#L227)
but also OpenCL:
[https://github.com/opencv/opencv/blob/4.0.0/CMakeLists.txt#L...](https://github.com/opencv/opencv/blob/4.0.0/CMakeLists.txt#L267)
and Vulkan (which was only merged around a month ago):
[https://github.com/opencv/opencv/blob/4.0.0/CMakeLists.txt#L...](https://github.com/opencv/opencv/blob/4.0.0/CMakeLists.txt#L239)
Perhaps that last one works on mobile, although I wouldn't get your hopes up.
I haven't really used OpenCV since 2.4.x, however assuming the same holds
true, performance enhancements are on a feature by feature basis. Meaning that
if you enable CUDA etc. then it's not going to work for everything. Not GPU,
but a common compile time enhancement (at least it used to be) was to compile
with Intel TBB (thread building blocks) as a lot of the APIs included
optimisations.
~~~
kartickv
Thanks, but iOS supports neither CUDA, OpenCL, Vulkan nor TBB. It's only Metal
and higher-level frameworks like Core Image for GPU, and vImage for SIMD image
manipulation.
~~~
Benjamin_Dobell
You can use MoltenVK to run Vulkan via Metal
([https://github.com/KhronosGroup/MoltenVK](https://github.com/KhronosGroup/MoltenVK)).
Apparently performance is quite good for regular 3D rendering, compute support
is officially listed, but I'm not at all sure what performance is like.
------
barbwire
Anyone who can understand what OpenCV actually is from their front page is
doing better than me.
~~~
cjhanks
OpenCV is ubiquitous in some domains. It's like asking; "What's numpy?"
~~~
virtualized
What's numpy?
~~~
topspin
Portmanteau of Numeric and Python. It's widely used Python library for matrix
math and functions for operating on large arrays and matrices.
| {
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Who's donating to Trump? This bot will tell you - kafkaesq
http://money.cnn.com/2016/06/22/technology/every-trump-donor-bot/
======
ascotan
I understand that there needs to be accountability from the FEC on how
campaign funds are raised, however, this twitter feed gives out PII about
donors including their home address and their employer. The only purpose I can
think of for this information outside of the FEC would be to determine if you
are a democrat or republican by doing an API lookup on your name and home
address. Is there _public value_ in determining your political affiliation?
I'm not sure there is. (at least no positive public value)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Ask HN: How do you preform competitior monitoring and where do you get the data? - leonpanjtar
I am developing a competition monitoring web application and just wanted to ask the community how do you currently stay updated with your competitors activity online and where do you find useful information about them? I am trying to join several information sources under one big roof in order to get the daily competitor activity stream for a nice MVP. What I would like to ask is whether anyone finds this idea worth trying or has any other suggestions about the concept? Also I would really appreciate if you can give some comments about my pre-launch page that I use to collect future clients emails (http://kompetoo.com/signup/).
======
leonpanjtar
I got some replies form the folkes that opted in on my landing page that they
mainly use Flesh&Blood (they hire a company :D) to get the needed results. I
think I see a pain here, because an automated service will make this process
faster, cheaper and accessible from anywhere.
------
123guru
google alerts
| {
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Google's secret about DART - FallFastForFun
http://nadirmuzaffar.blogspot.com/2013/08/future-of-google-dart.html
======
Zigurd
Short answer: No
Longer answer: The Dart VM would need to be adapted to battery powered devices
as thoroughly as Dalvik. Android's runtime is not just for apps. Android's
middleware layer runs mostly in the Dalvik VM. Implementers have multiple
options for performance-critical code, including native code, relying on the
Dalvik JIT compiler, and Renderscript.
Not impossible, but I don't see efforts in that direction. Then there are
lesser details like adapting Dart to Android's security and IPC model, etc.
Until then, WAGs like this have the same credibility as predictions that
Android will go JavaScript.
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Aviation expert Clive Irving: what went right with AA plane crash in Jamaica - pmikal
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-12-23/the-good-plane-crash/
======
RiderOfGiraffes
An old aviation saying:
A good landing is one you can walk away from.
An _excellent_ landing is one where they can use the 'plane again.
------
rlpb
tl;dr: everyone survived; the safety engineering helped
| {
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My Facebook Account is Mine, not Yours - luciantodea
http://www.soft32.com/blog/platforms/web/my-facebook-account-is-mine-not-yours/
======
signalsignal
No, your Facebook account belongs to Facebook. The content you post belongs to
you with distribution rights granted to Facebook. Additionally free speech is
protected from the government's interference, nothing is in the Constitution
about protection from private enterprises.
~~~
readme
I came here just for this comment.
~~~
signalsignal
Thanks for the validation. I don't know if it is the blog-spam that infests
all of these types of forums, or if it that people really think a for-profit
corporation owes them free stuff in perpetuity. PR people, though, call me
"cynical" ;)
------
StavrosK
> The LAST time I checked, this was still America.
As a foreigner, when I read this, I think "so why are you surprised?"
Nationalism really irks me.
~~~
talmand
I don't understand, are you saying he shouldn't be surprised such things
happen in the US? If so, I would agree since things like that happen all the
time.
What's wrong with nationalism exactly? Since, like most things, there are
various degrees of nationalism do you dislike every example of it? If I like
the country I live in but disagree with some of its policies, am I still an
irksome person in your eyes?
~~~
ekianjo
nationalism : (a definition I picked): "a sentiment based on common cultural
characteristics that binds a population and often produces a policy of
national independence or separatism."
In other words, Nationalism is a big myth. There are no common characteristics
(or then, VERY few) that everyone shares in one country, let alone in a single
village. This is an idea created by politicians to turn one country's people
against others. Liking the country you live in does not equal to nationalism,
God forbid.
~~~
talmand
What was I downvoted for? I had a legitimate question.
Anyway.
I see what you're saying now and I would have to tend to agree if that is your
definition.
------
stephengillie
IANAL, but it sounds like Facebook's own TOS require them to close the account
of users who have given away their password, whether to an employer, spouse,
friend, or anyone else. Obviously Facebook would be killing its' advertising
profits with that course of action, given the number of accounts that would
purportedly need to be closed.
Asking for access to a prospective employee's Facebook seems like asking for
access to their car trunk or their home bathroom. Why don't companies try
this?
Is your Facebook account your personal property? What about your information
after you've placed it on Facebook?
~~~
raganwald
Asking for access to a prospective employee's Facebook seems
like asking for access to their car trunk or their home bathroom*
A peripherally related topic, but how is asking for a drug test _unlike_
asking for access to my home bathroom?
~~~
archivator
A drug test is a positive/negative thing where there are well-defined margins
and error bars. The employer can say with reasonable certainty that X is a
drug user and hence pass judgement on that.
A Facebook login is NOT a positive/negative test - it's more of a "does this
person behave well in general" which is a highly subjective measure. What's
worse, it's conflating the private and work spheres and letting the employer
pass judgement on X's personal life, regardless of how well X can
compartmentalize.
The key difference is that drug users usually can't compartmentalize their
addiction. Most people can usually compartmentalize their social behaviour.
"Usually" is the key word here - there are always extreme counter-examples.
------
dutchbrit
Time to start denying you have a Facebook account all together, hook it up to
a specially made email account for Facebook, don't add a profile picture &
don't add friends from work to your network I guess.. Where's the world coming
to?!
I might be mistaken - but doesn't this break the United Nations Agreements on
Human Rights?
------
Tichy
Could employers ask me for my password by default? I mean would it be legal
reason to fire me if I not give it to them? Coming from Germany, I am not
sure, here apparently it is not so easy to fire somebody, but in the US it
might be so easy that it doesn't matter. That is, they don't have to give a
reason, which means not getting a password could be a reason?
Otherwise I wonder if in the future it will be one more thing to watch out for
in contracts.
Another aspect: if an employer would be willing to fire you over such a thing,
your profession is probably not in very high demand and you should consider
switching.
------
CWuestefeld
As far as I can see, this is just a lot of political posturing. Such a law
would have little impact, because the feared scenario is already against the
rule. It violates the Facebook T&C for both the account owner to share the
password, and for the prospective employer to use it. And surely it's already
illegal for an employer to require a candidate employee to violate such an
agreement as a condition of employment.
Just because something needs to be done does not mean that we need to have the
government do it.
------
kstenerud
"Don’t get me wrong. I’m not going to go on some freakin’ tirade here about
first or fourth amendment rights. "
...
"The LAST time I checked, this was still America. The last time I checked, I
was afforded the right to speak my mind (First Amendment). The last time I
checked, I was protected from unlawful search and seizure or demands on my
privacy (Fourth Amendment)."
Umm...
------
xiaomei
Thoughts on this?
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3797771>
| {
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How Killers Bought Guns They Weren't Supposed to Get - jhull
https://www.wsj.com/graphics/how-killers-bought-guns/
======
mdrzn
WSJ has a paywall, the "web" link under the title in this page does not solve
that issue.
How long before we'll add an "Outline" link to use that decluttering service?
------
cobrabyte
How's this related to tech?
~~~
THE_PUN_STOPS
In addition to what other commentators have said, this website is chock full
of people who like to solve meaningful problems.
Gun violence in America is a meaningful problem.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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The Case Against Delaware (2002) - ladon86
https://newrepublic.com/article/61902/rogue-state
======
poultron
Most of you focused on iteration and entrepreneurship should appreciate
Delaware simply for its incorporation status alone. Why does everyone
incorporate in Delaware do you ask? Is it some tax break or something purely
financial, as most people guess? Nope. It's because Delaware put a stake in
the ground a LONG time ago and said that they want to be the experts at
dealing with business law. So much so that they have their own special court
system brought over from England called the Court of Chancery, which iterates
its laws at a much faster pace than typical government to keep up with the
current business environment. This court system is comprised of Chancellors
and Justices who are known to be the best in the world at business law. And
when you take a close look at who elects the Court's officials, its strictly
divided into half Republicans and half Democrats, with mixed representation
from legal and non-legal backgrounds, same with politics. It's about as
unbiased as one can get. and from an experience perspective, the Chancellors
and Justices ONLY focus on business law cases. Would you want your business
case to be dealt with by a judge who just had a divorce case before yours and
a criminal case after yours? I wouldnt either.
And from a development perspective, Delaware made their own Division of
Corporations almost like a lean startup with the goal of making it the EASIEST
and FASTEST way to incorporate your business, with their business hours being
24/7 with international support. You can literally incorporate your business
in 15 minutes or less. Try doing that in your home state. Look into the
history of the Division of Corporations and the Court of Chancery if you're
interested, it's a fascinating story.
So at the end of the day, when you're incorporating a company and inspecting
your fiduciary responsibilities to your future employees, shareholders,
investors and customers... you want to make sure you incorporate wherever the
Business laws are most up to date, with a fast process, a quick judicial
system that plays the game by the books and will be swift and fair with a
proven track record of extensive experience. Delaware has made itself the no-
brainer solution to all of those problems.
And for that, we should thank them (regardless of how shitty their tolls are,
ha).
~~~
joe_the_user
Well,
That's certainly nice for corporations.
However, I would argue that situation runs directly against the broad tenants
of American Democracy. Specifically, that states should regulate their
internal commerce to some extent and the Federal government should regulate
the rest. Here, you have one state that allows an end-run around both
institutions (except for the minute number of people actually living in
Delaware).
~~~
lisper
> tenants
Tenets.
> states should regulate their internal commerce
That idea was invented at a time when the fastest way to travel or communicate
was by horse. In the age of the automobile, the airplane, and the internet,
there is barely any such thing as "internal commerce" any more.
~~~
brownbat
I'd add that there are competing constitutional priorities, one of ensuring
states can regulate their own affairs, and another of ensuring a common
market, and ensuring that the legal frameworks of the various states are
interlocking.
Balancing these two values is not trivial. Article 4 takes a shot, it's how we
got here.
Odd to claim it's antithetical to American democracy. These sorts of
compromises between union and independence, with all their odd imperfect
results, are pretty thoroughly baked in.
------
rayiner
> This is partly true, but it ignores the overriding factor: Incorporating in
> Delaware allows companies to operate under its laws and courts, which are
> the most pro-management in the nation.
This is inaccurate. Being familiar with both, I wouldn’t say Delaware is more
pro management than New York. Which makes me wonder what else in the article
is outright fabrication.
(The idea of “pro-management” corporate law is itself a bit misleading.
Delaware law governs the internal operations of the corporation and the
relationship to shareholders. Shareholders are the ones who decide what rules
will apply because they choose where to incorporate.)
~~~
chris_mc
>This is inaccurate
How so? I'm curious, as I don't know much about corporate law.
~~~
mirashii
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12320377](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12320377)
An old thread, but the discussion covers a bit on how Delaware actually has
extremely pro-shareholder laws relative to other states, including requiring
disclosure of the cap table.
If we want to also talk about misleading, I think choosing a subset of the
reasons that businesses choose to incorporate in Delaware and selling them as
the sole or even primary reasons is pretty misleading. If you even do a short
Google search on why companies incorporate in Delaware, you'll find that one
of the top cited reasons boils down to predictability. Because Delaware has
been the place companies incorporated for so long, it has a long and
established set of case law and precedent, which brings of stability that
states with fewer corporations will need to build over time. Add in feedback
loop contributions, such as the amount of lawyers who have studied and are
experienced in the state's corporate law, and the choice continues to make
more sense even without the factors the author listed.
~~~
chris_mc
Thanks
------
froindt
If you're not from the northeast, the fact that Delaware is the state of
incorporation for so many companies is a huge pain point when bankruptcy is
involved.
For example, why should a company who exclusively does business within 200
miles of their headquarters be able to file bankruptcy thousands of miles
away? Is that the justice intended by our court system? Any parties involved
(suppliers, employees who are still owed money, and customers) must hire an
attorney to represent their interests, and furthermore must hire local council
in Delaware to be able to submit documents to the court.
~~~
nine_k
Would you suggest that a company must operate close to where it's registered?
How is it going to work with companies that operate across several states, and
gradually focus on more on other states than the place of the original
incorporation? Can they even close a branch in the state of the incorporation?
How important the convenience of the bankruptcy process is compared to other
processes related to a company?
~~~
SllX
Expensively.
This came to mind while I was reading your comment and this is not a position
I am actually advocating, but the law is malleable and reflects human will, it
doesn't confine it. If you wanted to make such a scheme work, you could
require a corporation incorporate in _each_ and _every_ State/Nation that they
conduct their business in. You could slice this down to what it means exactly
to do business in a State so every charge on a corporate credit card across
State lines doesn't have to mean you suddenly do business in that State.
If you wanted to close all the branches in the state of incorporation, you (as
in the many legislatures, not you specifically) could setup a process of
disincorporation and transfer of control to one of the subsidiaries.
The law is not a stone tablet handed down from on high, it is, in a literal
sense, whatever humans wish to make of it, and there are always processes for
changing the laws to fit whatever position you're advocating.
Now effective enforcement is another matter entirely, and without care and
consideration, there will always be knock on effects. In this case, requiring
incorporation in multiple jurisdictions would make the cost of doing business
more expensive, and liable to expose corporations to increased liability.
------
tomphoolery
It's not unprecedented. Only a few miles north, New Jersey basically ruined
I-95 for everyone who lives above Philly.
[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-20/after-60-...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-20/after-60-years-i-95-is-
complete)
DE and NJ aren't really suitable states, they bring zero benefit as a separate
entity from their neighbors.
Disclaimer: I live in Philadelphia. Also, fuck Dallas.
~~~
Camillo
What a frustrating article! It doesn't explain anything about why the highway
was opposed, how the battle played out, etc.
The "old" map shows I-95 just ending, and doesn't show where it resumes. The
most obvious thing the map should do given the story is show what the old path
was and what the new one is, and it doesn't do that! The second most obvious
would be showing Mercer County, which is blamed in the article for blocking
the highway, but guess what, it doesn't show that either.
It sounds like there is an interesting story here, but that article utterly
fails at telling it.
~~~
pdonis
There are some good maps showing the changes here:
[http://www.raymondcmartinjr.com/njfreeways/Interstate_95_Gap...](http://www.raymondcmartinjr.com/njfreeways/Interstate_95_Gap_Map0.html)
------
jessaustin
It seems strange that the falsehood about the gas tax wasn't corrected in the
text but rather in an endnote.
------
ur-whale
The article makes a case against states competing with one another.
I'd argue that competition is a very good thing in this case.
~~~
stretchwithme
Yes. When governments compete, you win. When you're stuck with only one
option, you're more likely to overpay.
Especially in a large popular state that is difficult to get away from in more
ways than one.
~~~
ur-whale
>Especially in a large popular state that is difficult
I agree, and states in the US being too big is the root cause of the headache.
~~~
stretchwithme
I think this is also a reason why business prospers so much in places like
Singapore and Hong Kong. Yes, not exactly democracies, but very easy to leave,
so rule of law was the way to go. People can vote with their feet. Whereas
tyranny on continents can really be entrenched for centuries.
------
will_brown
>making my way down I-95 in a rental truck...I screeched to a halt in front of
what turned out to be a two-hour backup in Delaware. Never having driven down
the East Coast, I at first assumed the traffic jam...But as my truck crept
forward I saw it was no accident at all but a deliberate
obstruction—specifically, a tollboth on the Delaware Turnpike.
Um...I-95 and the Delaware turnpike are not the same roadway. Somehow while
applying the brakes on I-95 the driver and truck magically transported from
I-95 to a 2hour traffic jam for a toll on the Turnpike?
~~~
rayiner
Also, when was this? I drove that stretch every other week when I lived in
Wilmington, and never hit a jam. Was this pre-Speedpass?
~~~
pdonis
_> Was this pre-Speedpass?_
It was before Delaware added fast through lanes for EZPass, so that only
people paying cash for the toll have to go through the booths.
------
jessaustin
If only the good people could be in charge of _everything_...
------
HaHa31
I was born and raised in Delaware, so I will give my quick take on it.
> The State of Delaware had turned the East Coast’s main traffic artery into a
> sweltering parking lot merely so it could exact a tribute from each driver
> crossing its miserable little stretch of concrete.
Wow, the author has a lot of emotion for a supposedly one-time problem.
Delaware pays for a little over 69% of its state and local road maintenance;
the tolls help pay for it.
> The practice of charging road tolls is an archaic holdover blighting much of
> the Northeast.
Roads cost money to maintain, and eventually, replace. Tolls are supposed to
help pay for this stuff.
> The whole paragraph on Gunning Bedford Jr.
Pointing fingers at anyone in the colonial era is objectively dumb. For
example, Roger Sherman, a representative for Connecticut, helped write the 3/5
compromise, where slaves were counted as 3/5 of a human for voting purposes.
Quick, Connecticut is evil incarnate, you should hate it.
> When the nation mobilized for the War of 1812, Delaware manufacturers, led
> by the du Ponts, demanded that their laborers be exempt from military
> service.
If the author did any research into the Du Pont company, they would know that
the mills were gunpowder mills. Now, why would everyone want gunpowder mills
to be run by their skilled employees in a war?
> Delaware voted against the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments
> to the Constitution, which freed the slaves and gave them the vote and equal
> protection.
Yes, Delaware was racist, and some parts still are. However, as the author
makes clear, this is not specific problem for Delaware, but a systemic problem
throughout the US.
> Delaware also set itself apart through its fondness for medieval forms of
> punishment.
Okay, I honestly didn't know this stuff, and I did double check that it is
generally accurate. It is shitty, but still it was 60 years ago.
>If a state wants to charge drivers for the cost of maintaining roads, tolls
are a dubious way to do it—the traffic congestion they produce can be more
costly than the toll itself.
Outdated; easy-pass barely has any effect on traffic.
> The rant about tolls
Blah, blah, Delaware is malevolent; Delaware is an abstract entity that
doesn't have intent. It is a collection of any number of individuals who may
fit or not fit with the author's view of Delaware.
> To nonresidents, of course, it makes not a whit of difference that our tolls
> finance Delaware’s airports rather than its schools.
Ironic, Delaware has no commercial airports; as I have already said, Delaware
pays for a majority of its local and state road maintenance, which otherwise
would come from the federal government. Guess, where that federal tax money
comes from?
> Seizing the opportunity to exploit unwary consumers across the country,
> eight of the ten largest credit-card firms in the country now operate within
> Delaware. In the meantime, personal bankruptcy nationwide has risen
> sevenfold over the last two decades, and tens of millions of Americans send
> checks to Delaware every month.
There is no direct line of causation that the author even pretends to offer.
This is textbook misdirection. Of course, people send checks to Delaware
because that is where their banks are.
> But just after the Pennsylvania bank ceased its payday lending, a bank based
> out of Delaware opened up shop in its place.
I mean that could be related, but the author does not give enough evidence.
> The revenue stream is so large (relative to Delaware’s budget) that the
> state needs no sales tax.
Delaware also has quite high property tax; taxes are distributed differently
in every state. Some states have high income tax, some have high sales tax; it
doesn't matter which.
Okay, this is as far as a can stand to go. The author hates Delaware, I don't
know why.
~~~
wyclif
_Delaware also has quite high property tax_
Which is relative. Most Delawareans, as you no doubt know, regard DE state
property tax as low when compared to PA or NJ.
------
joelesler
It’s also highly inaccurate and exaggerates.
~~~
froindt
Do you have any more specific criticisms? This didn't add much to get
discussion started.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Your Hacker Workspace - dryicerx
Every hacker has a workspace and coding/working environment that has been personalized, optimized, improved, tweaked and hacked for countless hours and days. This is one of the, if not the most, sacred things each hacker posses.<p>Share it with the community so we can learn from each other while improving our own.<p>Share yours.
======
dryicerx
I will start.
My two primary work horses include a desktop computer and Thinkpad with Fedora
core 10.
_Desktop server:_
\- Gnome -> 8 workspaces on two monitors { Web (regular), Web (work), Emacs,
Emacs, Emacs/Compile, Emacs/Debug (GDB/DDD), 4 shells,
Thunderbird/IM/IRC/Music }
\- Fluxbox on VNC with 4 virtual { 4 Shells, ServerStats, Void, Void }
\- Screen session just in case I want to drop in
_Laptop:_
\- Gnome -> 5 Virtual { Web, Emacs, Emacs/Compile/Debug, Void,
Thunderbird/IM/Music }
_Both:_
\- Emacs (all instances are new-frame so shared buffers, heavily use gdb-mode,
and for compiling)
\- Synergy desktop sharing Keyboard/Mouse with Laptop
\- Zsh + scripts for common tasks (backups, syncs)
\- NFS shares mounted both ways
_Other_
\- Pencil Sketch pad (no rules) as my idea pad, doodling, I keep several of
these everywhere
\- Post-it's for quick notes
\- Emacs/C/C++/Python cheat/reference sheets printed and posted
_This is modest if not simple by hacker standards, but it makes me feel
comfortable for my usual tasks and most at home_
~~~
abstractbill
_This is modest if not simple by hacker standards_
I'm not so sure about that ;-) My setup is simpler than yours:
I do all my development on one machine - a macbook pro (Tiger, haven't got
around to upgrading yet).
I run only three applications pretty much all the time, and they're all full-
screen - Firefox, Emacs and iTunes, and alt-tab between them. Occasionally I
also start a Terminal, if I want to ssh into a server somewhere.
Usually my Firefox tabs are gmail, yammer, ganglia, <http://irc.justin.tv>,
and often some documentation to help with whatever I'm working on.
Typically I have a dozen or so Emacs buffers open - mostly python, javascript
and haxe source code.
I never write notes by hand. I either write them in an Emacs buffer, or I send
myself an email.
This is where I work (at justin.tv):
<http://abstractnonsense.com/workspace.jpg>
~~~
mrduncan
Do you actually work from that couch all day? I can't imagine that being
comfortable for more than a few hours.
~~~
Silentio
I have the smaller version of that couch (Ikea) and I can attest to the fact
that it is a uncomfortable piece of shit. But it was cheap.
------
pg
(Fairly) soundproof room; lots of lamps, none too bright; Aeron chair; new
desk designed by Kate Courteau (the architect who designed the YC offices),
with a steel frame and butcher-block top; Macbook Air; bluetooth mouse; 23"
Apple monitor; a bunch of terminal windows running either vi or the Arc
toplevel or tail -f of some server log; Firefox windows with Gmail, HN, and
localhost; cup of tea; UHU tac earplugs (disengaged); postcard of smiling
Wodehouse, age 92, with dachshund.
<http://wodehouse.ru/photo/phdach.jpg>
~~~
prakash
Why Wodehouse? BTW: If Stephen Fry invited you as a guest on QI, would you go?
<http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0380136/>
------
scumola
It's dirty, crappy, no dual-screens, no mac prettiness, no butcher-block
table, no glass, no stainless steel, but it's awesome and it's very
productive. :)
<http://www.flickr.com/photos/scumola/3508980363/>
~~~
Tichy
I don't understand why you wouldn't switch to a place with sunlight eventually
(after 9 startups)?
~~~
icey
You must not be very superstitious.
------
swombat
_Every hacker has a workspace and coding/working environment that has been
personalized, optimized, improved, tweaked and hacked for countless hours and
days. This is one of the, if not the most, sacred things each hacker posses._
Sorry, don't buy that. Many hackers just work from anywhere, and many who do
work from a regular spot don't care about it as much as you do.
This is a valid question, mind you, I just disagree with your first point.
~~~
phugoid
Between work and home I interact directly with more than one hundred machines,
from IBM Risc 6000 running AIX to Ubuntu laptops to WinXP drones under
corporate lock-down. These machines are not even speaking to each other. My
most important piece of kit is my thumb drive, which I keep chained to my car
keys.
I'm not big on aliases or scripts to do simple things. Better to make a one-
liner or throw-away script to do exactly what I need now, something that will
work on many machines. Automation is only useful if it can significantly
reduce repetitive effort.
I'm no master or hacker, I just get on with my projects without much frosting.
I'm partial to a cheap (dropable?) Ubuntu laptop with emacs, gdb, wireshark,
k3b, and lots of medium-length cables and adapters.
------
mahmud
Two thinkpads, one running XP and the other running slackware. LispWorks and
emacs/slime/sbcl on the win32 box, tested there first, and when I need to
implement Unix FFIs I have two putty terminals to the linux box. I have been
using linux since 1996, and I don't think I ever ran a full Unix desktop for
more than a year (FreeBSD and xfce then)
Stuff get passed around between the XP and the linux box until I am happy with
them, then they're sent to 2 slackware VPSes and a Solaris box elsewhere.
More important than code is my Skype phone. Half my work is done walking
around with a phone glued to my ear.
Essentials include, a yahoo currency converter bookmarklet, a timezone time
calculator, various inhouse tools for lead management and tracking (I have a
mailer I wrote in Lisp that I paste email text to and rewrites all URLs as
mysite.com/redir?url=FOOBAR; I use this to track who read my emails, when and
how. Couldn't live without it.)
OpenOffice and Unipad for funny Arabic text handling. Copernic Desktop Search
for the massive library of documents that I have and need to share.
2-3 notepad windows open at all times. An emacs org-mode buffer that contains
my life's work.
A separate Firefox installation that has the annoying but very essential SEO-
Quake plugin for doing _stuff_.
GNU GPG integrated with Thunderbird. 20+ email accounts in thunderbird,
Pidgin, Chatzilla and a twitter window open at all times.
Paint.NET for the necessary graphics editing. MS Paint for quickly resizing
images. Mingw and MSYS to make Windows habitable.
Various Lisp implementations to check my sanity when something doesn't work
with SBCL.
Opera, left running at all times with the home page set to the Common Lisp
hyperspec, the hunchentoot manual in another tab.
Skype running at all times, but goes to my cellphone when I have a call.
Various powershell and bash scripts to make life easier.
Firefux plugin to remember passwords for 100+ social networking websites that
I submit press releases and other stuff to.
Mozart/Oz, Ocateve and R for prototyping "stuff"
[Edit: I wouldn't use a laptop other than a Thinkpad if it was given to me for
free. I am a proud owner of 4 Thinkpads at the moment, about 10 of them in the
last 10 years.]
~~~
Herring
which password plugin?
~~~
mahmud
lastpass. more security addons here:
[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-
US/firefox/search?q=&cat=1...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-
US/firefox/search?q=&cat=1%2C12)
------
llimllib
Nope, I hack most of the time with a macbook on my dining room table.
Sometimes on the coffee table.
At work I have a 30-inch screen for Vim next to the macbook, but it's
optional.
~~~
TJensen
Upvoted since I just got done with six hours of tweaking my iPhone app on my
macbook on my dining room table. :) More often, I'm reclined on the couch,
though.
I used to be a cave-type, but now I find that I'm more productive when I'm
around people (as long as they aren't actively engaging me). So I'll work from
home with the kids playing around me and get more done than I do in my
isolated cube at the office.
------
thomanil
Physical whiteboard in the same room.
Big screen.
A command line (Terminal on mac, cmd.exe on windows).
A launcher app (Quicksilver on mac, Colibri on windows)
An editor (TextMate in mac os, NetBeans in windows).
A mindmap editor for planning, design and notes. (Freemind, cross platform)
(I purposefully stay cross-browser, cross-OS, going back and forth between my
MacBook and my Wintel desktop pc. This forces me to keep using and testing
both my product and dev environment in several different OS'es and browsers -
plus it provides redundancy; if one env blows up in some way, I can just fall
back on the other.)
~~~
Raphomet
Physical whiteboard is a very good idea. I think I'll be taking that from you.
~~~
durin42
I've been able to make do without a whiteboard at my current job by keeping
tons of scratch paper around. I'm given lots of 1-sided printouts I never
need, so I just throw them in a drawer for when I need to sketch something.
------
davidalln
If you're interested in that, check out:
<http://www.deskography.org/>
There are some pretty crazy and inspiring setups on there, and you can share
your own.
------
pookleblinky
On the screen: Gentoo running Xmonad in simpleTabbed layout. Opera, emacs,
terminal with Screen multiplexing 5 zsh terminals (emacs -nw, irssi, ghci,
irb, guile at the moment), Xchat, Pidgin, Skype, and Quodlibet; all running
mostly in separate full-screen tabbed workspaces.
Meatspace: a battered wooden desk I found in the trash years ago, and a
similarly battered armchair missing most of its upholstery. The desk surface
is hidden beneath ashtrays, coasters, coffee mugs. My cat peers over the
monitor, half asleep.
~~~
jimmyjim
Screenshot, please?
~~~
pookleblinky
Screenshots of Xmonad aren't that interesting. They don't show you how easy it
is to do stuff without ever using the mouse.
------
jimmyjim
Just a request to all those who'll be responding: Please add screenshots!
I'll be setting up xmonad and working on my layout for the next few days, if
this post is alive until then, I'll post my screenshot.
------
asnyder
I couldn't live without my 5 screens:
[http://www.deskography.org/people/yjg1097qMx/desks/786/photo...](http://www.deskography.org/people/yjg1097qMx/desks/786/photos/1254/)
~~~
quizbiz
[http://www.deskography.org/people/FgR504TfT/desks/359/photos...](http://www.deskography.org/people/FgR504TfT/desks/359/photos/517/)
has you beat :P
~~~
gurraman
And:
[http://www.deskography.org/people/oPi254rbd/desks/197/photos...](http://www.deskography.org/people/oPi254rbd/desks/197/photos/405/)
:)
~~~
siculars
this guy wins... but ill throw mine in for good measure...
<http://www.flickr.com/photos/9864615@N06/756229467/>
------
Herring
The problem with these threads is that skill is largely in how you use these
tools. It's very hard to communicate techniques with just a list of tools. I
have no solution.
~~~
silentbicycle
Furthermore, there are very diminishing returns in obsessing about your tools
themselves. Sometimes, tinkering with your emacs config (or whatever) is just
procrastinating.
~~~
pookleblinky
Sometimes, though, this procrastination does wonders. Like bonzai tree
gardening, or a Zen gravel garden.
As someone who uses Gentoo, Xmonad, Zshell, and Emacs, there's more than
enough config code to tweak than there are hours in the day. The happy result
is that if I'm stumped, I always know I can pop open a buffer and hack
something a bit.
Hell, the alternative to wasting your time in a fully hackable environment is
wasting your time on the interwebs.
If you're going to procrastinate, you could do worse than by hacking .emacs.
Like Runescape.
~~~
silentbicycle
I don't think the problem is so much that it's procrastination, but it's
procrastination that _seems_ like work. Like people noodling around with their
"productivity systems". Having the option to customize things is worthwhile (I
use Emacs, dwm, and screen, and have accumulated a lot of settings for each),
but it's a means to an end.
When I'm hitting a dead end, I usually find it more helpful to get away from
the computer entirely and go for a bike ride, work out, talk to someone, have
some fruit, etc., and see the problem with a fresh mind later.
------
mstefff
2 desktops connected with synergy..a laptop..huge speakers..bottle of
scotch..and a coffee pot.
------
neuromanta
Here is mine... both :P
<http://tobal.extra.hu/karik/PICT4672.JPG>
<http://tobal.extra.hu/karik/PICT4673.JPG>
<http://tobal.extra.hu/karik/PICT5571.JPG>
------
njoubert
<http://njoubert.com/images/workspace1.jpg>
Dual 22" monitors hackintosh running OSX 10.5.6 6 spaces, normally 2 spaces
per project and one for random stuff. (I like to arrange all my code in one
space and all the docs and the like in another and switch between the two as
necessary).
You'll notice the Macbook peeking out from underneath the desk on the left -
if I need more screen space I pop that one open. Or if I'm not at home!
M-Audio speakers are crucial - good music is a help! And lots of paper /
binders / books to refer to all the time.
At least 3 lights sdjustable to whatever conditions I prefer, and black shades
in front of the blinds to block out sunlight and heat.
~~~
alnayyir
I've struggled with hackintosh for freakin' ages. Please share info.
Big problemo was usually the 9800GT 512mb.
~~~
njoubert
Funny, I'm running a 9800 GTS 512mb, with no issues.
My secret was using the iDeneb 10.5.5 distro, that thing works wonders on my
system. I'm running an Asus P5E-Delux motherboard, with is also a well-
supported system. Everything I did is textbook from insanelymac.com
------
wehriam
The office: White enamel, 92" Oval Ikea table 24" Dell monitor on articulating
arm Macbook Pro Speakers on Airport express
The rest of the house: Old Macbook Pro connected to 42" LCD TV, mounted on the
wall running Bittorrent with RSS subscriptions / iTunes Logitech 5500
connected to MBP + speakers built into the wall About 700GB NAS
[http://www.flickr.com/photos/wehriam/369719626/in/set-181528...](http://www.flickr.com/photos/wehriam/369719626/in/set-1815288/)
(Slightly old photo)
~~~
DTrejo
I hope you don't buy cable :)
------
jdoliner
Well here you guys go, pretty simple small desk, although it is all glass
which is kinda nice looking. Nice big monitor, but only one. And then my
computer which is really the reason I'm posting it has an acrylic case and uv
lighting over reactive tubing, neato huh?
<http://tinypic.com/r/2eewug5/5>
here's one of the computer all alone: <http://tinypic.com/r/15qufc2/5>
------
timtrueman
MacBook + 24" Dell
[http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3130/3219406843_af228d3a04.jp...](http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3130/3219406843_af228d3a04.jpg)
(Not pictured: Airport Extreme with a USB drive for Time Machine--critical
stuff I backup to Github if it's source code and Drop Box if it's not source
code)
Software-wise I work with IntelliJ, TextMate, vi or Xcode depending on the
task at hand.
------
Raphomet
I've got a Hackintosh tower - the first PC I've ever built (and I learned a
LOT doing it!). I threw a Core 2 Quad, a Velociraptor drive, and 4GB memory in
there. This is attached to a 30-inch monitor and a split, ergonomic keyboard,
upon which I type in Dvorak.
Considering how much time I spend in front of this machine (e. g., most of
it), I don't mind investing a little more in my setup to make the experience
as comfortable as possible.
I've got a refurbished Rev. A MacBook Air to carry around with me when I'm out
and about. I'm thinking of buying a wireless card or a MiFi to have Internet
access everywhere.
I synchronize all important files over Dropbox and use The Cloud for
everything else. My brain goes into Evernote. Bookmarks are synchronized
across my browsers with Xmarks.
I use Spaces heavily and Expose a little. I use Launchbar and mouse gestures
through xGestures to get around the computer.
My code is synced up using git.
------
abyssknight
At work, I have a standard issue cubicle with L-shaped desk. We all have
docking stations and one monitor, but I have _acquired_ a second one from the
cubicle's previous inhabitant. So, I run dual 19" 4:3 monitors from the
docking station.
At home, I've tried to match the environment as best as possible. I bought a
simple Ikea table that I use as a desk and a thrift store bargain task chair
that really needs to be replaced. I run dual 19" 16:10 monitors on an
identical docking station, acquired from my father. When I work from home I
just plug in my USB keyboard and mouse, dock the laptop, and the monitors
auto-detect and switch over. If I'm not working, my i7 gaming rig powers the
dual displays.
For general computing. email and web development unrelated to my day job I use
a MacBook Pro from 2007. I wouldn't trade it for anything; except maybe a new
unibody MBP.
------
dbul
Mac Air with Philadelphia Brewing Co. sticker over the Apple logo for iPhone
dev; cheap Toshiba laptop for web hacking; Chromium for browsing;
Firefox/Firebug for dev; Gimp; Postgres; whatever aesthetically pleasing
environment the coffee shops around me offer; sometimes getting pumped up
listening to good musak on the iPhone; from time to time use one of the many
white boards at Wean Hall at Carnegie Mellon.
MacAir (lil guy next to it will soon drown):
[http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_QdVzmQAz0JQ/ShEHWvpIW1I/AAAAAAAAAE...](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_QdVzmQAz0JQ/ShEHWvpIW1I/AAAAAAAAAEg/X3uQWoazUTM/s1600-h/IMG_0133.JPG)
White boards (my friend is in the pic):
[http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_QdVzmQAz0JQ/ShEHIm3Q9vI/AAAAAAAAAE...](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_QdVzmQAz0JQ/ShEHIm3Q9vI/AAAAAAAAAEY/fTcBW777660/s1600-h/IMG_0851.JPG)
------
yason
I have a MacBookPro running Ubuntu 9.04. It boots to Gnome with StumpWM which
has three groups (virtual desktops):
\- emacs and terminal (fullscreen, I'll just swap between those two) \- mail,
irc, and cplay (screen split between alpine / ssh+irssi, with a horizontal
pane for terminal running cplay) \- browser (split vertically about 1:4, with
nautilus on the left in the smaller pane and Shiretoko in the larger pane,
usually in one window). I also watch movies, view pictures, PDFs etc. in this
larger browsing pane.
I've settled for three virtual desktops that wrap around: this way I can
always move to any of the desktops with just one move command, either left or
right.
------
wheagy
Here are a few pics of my workspace. It's essentially an unfinished room in
the basement. I keep my computers, power tools, collections...everything in
this room. It's not fancy, but I can get things done. The main computer is an
imac with VMWare and VirtualBox for Linux and Win XP. There are also a few PCs
scattered around for robotics work. I use the Netbook for microcontroller
interfacing...in case I fry something. The Netbook is cheap enough that I
won't be too upset if it get ruined.
<http://www.flickr.com/photos/wheagy/sets/72157618418142512/>
------
iuguy
I travel _a lot_ so I keep everyhthing I need for hackery on my Dell XPS m1530
with a lot of VMWare images.
Currently this gets synchronised with a Debian server, due to be replaced with
a Mac Mini in a week or two.
------
uggedal
Couch, laptop in lap, and Norwegian soap operas in the background.
------
chewbranca
My current desk. Macbook for dev work, server under the desk. Fairly simple
setup but I've got a lot of space to work and room for my betta fish.
[http://www.deskography.org/people/TME1103EMJ/desks/789/photo...](http://www.deskography.org/people/TME1103EMJ/desks/789/photos/1258/)
[Edit: running macvim, terminal and safari with either vlc or itunes for
music]
[Edit 2: forgot to mention quicksilver. Kind of funny, but quicksilver is the
only osx application I absolutely cannot live without.]
------
dfox
Large self-designed and self-built U-shaped desk. workstation on one edge,
permanently cluttered workbench on other, clean empty space in middle segment.
Three displays + old character-cell terminal (useful for looking on logs and
such things) for workstation (with one monitor going thru KVM switch to few
other computer for testing on obscure architectures). Sun Type 7 keyboard and
mouse.
Old NCD thin client on edge of workbench part (incredibly useful).
------
gtani
2 apple laptops, previous gen(late 2007 / early 08), same software everybody
runs: leopard, WinXP, FreeBSD, openBSd, ubuntu 8.04, openSUSE 10.3, vim,
textmate, komodo;
\- current-gen apple, matias keyboards
\- whiteboard (me too)
\- moleskine notebooks, postit notes, Bic 4-color pen
\- cheap Ibanez-clone guitar; Duncan , diMarzio pickups;
\- m-audio MIDI controller, garage band, ProTools, digidesign mBox
\- looking to get piccolo, flute or alto sax
\- yoga mat and props from Iyengar studio
------
modoc
My MacBookPro is the heart of everything. Usually running are: Eclipse, Mail,
Adium, Safari, iTunes, OmniFocus.
When I'm at my desk, that's usually hooked up to a 30" display, wireless
keyboard and mouse, and SoundSticks.
I'm actually about to build a custom desk and shelving in my home office to
make things _perfect_. I use an Aeron chair which has saved my back.
~~~
modoc
On that note, does anyone have any good experience with building a good desk?
Any tips or tricks? Grommet plugs you love, great cable management techniques,
etc..?
My current plan is to use pre-finished maple plywood as the surface, and I
haven't figured out exactly how I'm going to handle cables, power, etc...
------
jfd
My desks: <http://www.deskography.org/people/jfd/>
------
csomar
i found this site too : <http://www.deskography.org/>
------
gurraman
A few different desks:
<http://www.deskography.org/people/gs/>
Current setup includes:
\- Aluminum MacBook
\- Apple Cinema Display (24")
\- Apple Wireless Mighty Mouse
\- Apple Wired Aluminum Keyboard (recently switched from wireless)
\- A functional IKEA desk.
\- A not-so-great IKEA chair (we're getting new chairs!)
\- vim (and MacVim)
\- mutt
\- Python (automate tedious tasks)
\- CS4 Suite
Total revamp as soon as we've found the office of our dreams.
~~~
gurraman
Forgot to mention one of the most important parts of our work environment: the
whiteboard! We make pretty good use of that.
------
dot
macbook air, a mouse and a rtw ticket.
~~~
rjurney
Seconded. I buy a new loaded Apple notebook every 3-4 years, and each cycle I
debate on getting a Mac Pro that will wipe the floor with the notebook for
even money. I never do, because I can't stand to be chained to a desk.
~~~
bjelkeman-again
A MBA for working in the sofa and in the garden. A Mac Pro for when you are
chained to the desk. Happiness.
~~~
rjurney
I can't disagree. I just haven't had the budget :)
------
nickfox
Here is my workspace. I really like the 3 Acer 22" monitors. They were cheap
and work well. I also have a laptop with Mac OS X for my iPhone work.
<http://www.websmithing.com/my_workspace.jpg>
Nick
------
andrewljohnson
Here's our space. We recently added a third desk to the room.
[http://www.flickr.com/photos/33766454@N02/3146045372/in/set-...](http://www.flickr.com/photos/33766454@N02/3146045372/in/set-72157611757081379/)
------
alanthonyc
To facilitate traveling to client sites for my day job: MacBook Pro, vim,
firefox and a (paper) notebook. When I work out of town, the one thing I miss
the most about my home workspace is my 3x4 foot whiteboard.
------
travisjeffery
Here's a picture: <http://is.gd/AU6T>
Typically I have Emacs, Safari, Terminal.app, and iTunes open all the time.
Once in a while I open up MacVim and do some editing.
------
Jem
<http://www.flickr.com/photos/jemjabella/3296058718/>
Really need to get off my butt and get some shelves up.
~~~
abyssknight
Wow, that's tiny! I vaguely remember working on counter tops bolted to a wall,
and our space was about that size per developer.
~~~
Jem
This is only my space at home, thankfully (not that my work desk is much
bigger). I actually quite like my little cupboard because it's dead space in
the house. I can shut myself in if I need privacy or time to myself and not
have to worry about anything :)
------
csomar
I have a PC with 17" screen, also a HP laptop, Microsoft Mouse and Genuis
Keyboard, Wifi Router, External Disks, lot of CDs and MP3 Player.
------
vaksel
the only "tweaking" I did to my workspace, was build a cover for the desk's
surge protector Power button. I always kept hitting it and its pretty
inconvenient having your computer die in the middle of working on things.
------
etherael
I used to have a pretty normal desktop setup, the one thing that was the
constant catalyst which finally pushed me over the edge to "fix stuff" was my
uncomfy series of chairs (read: all of them, any chair under 500$ I've ever
tried, for extended periods of seating is absolutely not something I am
capable of effortlessly maintaining concentration during).
At first I thought, it's been over ten years you've been at this game clearly
you're going to be at it for a long time more, why don't you just spring for a
very expensive chair and get it over and done with? Well, I wasn't entirely
certain that an Aeron or Leap or Freedom would actually fix my issues. Sure,
people talk about them, but I wanted to _know_ for sure that it would be the
end of my problems once I had gone and fixed everything up, and the only way I
could know that would be to actually buy one. Seemed like too much of a gamble
so I skipped that.
It seemed strange to me that all these chairs at the high end were more than
I'd spend on a new midrange system altogether, so I started to think about the
entire problem rather than just the chair aspect and came to the conclusion
that a nice recliner is probably about the most comfortable chair I've ever
had, so why not work a system around that? I ran into several examples in the
DIY sphere of people doing exactly this and being rave review happy with the
results, as well as examples of high end full solution workstation setups like
the Zero-Gee one and a few others based around the same idea that I based my
initial plans on.
Interestingly enough, a good recliner will run you less than half the cost of
an aeron, but seeing as I just wanted to prototype a setup I thought well what
can I use that I have just lying around the house to make it happen? I had a
broken chair (high backed / gas lift / 5 roller castors setup) and an old flat
bottomed entertainment unit, so I ripped apart the chair and took the gas lift
part of it and drilled and bolted it to the bottom of the flat bottomed
entertainment unit, this resulted in kind of a mobile trolley with enough desk
space for my display items (24" widescreen, 15" acer aspire 5630 notebook, 17"
4:3 1280x1024 for the mini) with stowage space underneath the main desk for
all the necessary driving hardware (mac mini + powerboards + cables + USB 3.5
SATA docking stations, speakers).
Having the entire setup on an easily movable / swivelling caddy means that it
actually ended up serving as an entertainment unit for the household too, XBMC
+ 1080p 24" = happy housemates when it's time to kickback and relax, I just
swivel the caddy 180 degrees and then it faces 2 large sofas in the living
room. Or I can move the caddy in front of a larger couch for collaborative
sessions with clients and colleagues. Synergy links all the systems together,
the mortals can use OS X on the mini and I have my heavily customised multi
workspace ubuntu compiz system on the laptop, and I can take over their
session w / synergy.
When working solo I face the caddy toward my single seat comfy old sofa and
pull it in and equation complete, extremely comfortable working environment,
enormously productive and adaptable, all in all extremely happy with it, and
I'll be even happier when I invest a little more for an ergonomic recliner
which will just be a dropin replacement for my current sofa. That said, this
current one is so many more times comfortable than my old office chair + desk
setup that I'm in absolutely no rush to do so.
Other potential ideas for upgrading are perhaps a kinesis evolution split
keyboard setup mounted on the seat arms instead of the current lap mounted
keyboard + right arm mounted mousepad setup, frictionless matting for the
frequent different positions of the caddy, and an intuos to replace my
sketchpad habit.
------
c00p3r
Browser, pdf and chm viewers, IM.
Nokia E90
Dell D830 (1920x1200), last Ubuntu x86_64/Fedora-development i586 (for Wine).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Facebook Distances Itself from Marc Andreessen - confiscate
http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/10/facebook-distances-itself-from-marc-andreessens-statements-on-free-basics/#.6qjorz:UTqk
======
SixSigma
> I made an ill-informed and ill-advised comment about Indian politics and
> economics.
Before entering a market with a radically different strategy, perhaps it is
better to not be ill-informed or ill-advised. Business 101 tbh.
And when your board members say in public that they are ill-informed and ill-
advised regarding one of your major strategies, what does that say ?!
If @pmarca was an employee he would likely be presented with a resignation
letter to sign.
------
pjg
Net neutrality is paramount. Regardless of country/region of the world. To
offer limited Internet to people who are going to get it anyway within an year
or two with control over what they could surf and what they couldn't is wrong.
Period.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Lawmakers Demand Investigation into FCC Chairman Ajit Pai - joeyespo
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/11/lawmakers-demand-investigation-into-fcc-chairman-ajit-pai/
======
binaryblitz
I really hope that something comes from this. However, we've been burned SO
many times before...
------
fosco
I find it odd the amount of points this has in a few hours but this is not in
the front page?
If anything happens I hope the result is to encourage more competition in
everything under the purview of the FCC.
------
thebiglebrewski
Ajit Pai is a spineless shill for the cable industry. I'm glad he's being
investigated. He doesn't care what the public thinks and just pushes the
industry agenda over and over again.
~~~
sctb
The guidelines ask us to post civilly and substantively, and comments that are
more provocative than informative don't lead us to the kind of thoughtful
discussion we're here for. Please try to move things in the informative
direction, especially on controversial topics.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)
------
kapauldo
Flagged! Quick before someone opines!
~~~
sctb
Could you please stop violating the guidelines and post civilly and
substantively instead? We've asked you several times and we'll ban the account
if you won't.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)
------
Karunamon
> _We contacted Chairman Pai 's office today, and a spokesperson provided this
> response:_
> _Unfortunately, this request appears to be part of many Democrats ' attempt
> to target one particular company because of its perceived political
> views_...
Politics as usual, then. The stated reason for doing something is usually not
the actual reason. I'm glad to see someone is standing up to this industry
crony nonetheless, doing the right thing for the wrong reason is still doing
the right thing.
~~~
uabstraction
Meh. This is the same administration which politicized the NFL, and continues
to politicize climate science and basic reality itself. Anything you say or do
that comes remotely close to holding them accountable will be decried as a
political attack. Any evidence of corruption is fake news.
I'm not buying it. Pai is as slimy as they come, and everyone knows it. We are
going to figure out who was responsible for stuffing the FCC public comment
forum with dead people's comments no matter how much Pai screams about it. We
are going to find where this blatantly corrupt man's kickbacks are coming
from. That isn't politics. That's justice.
~~~
Fjolsvith
Methinks the NFL politicized itself, without realizing what potential
consequences their actions would bring about.
~~~
h_r
I'm pretty sure the parent is referring to the POTUS stepping in and demanding
certain behavior of both the players and owners. You'd think he had bigger
problems to demand his rather limited attention.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Dead simple hourly forecast - davidjhamp
I got tired of bookmarking weather sites wherever I went so I created this. It generates a forecast based on your current location.<p>I'd really appreciate any criticism and feedback even more so.
======
r1ku
You should probably show the location that is being used. I would feel more
comfortable with relying on it then.
Great project, I'll use it.
~~~
davidjhamp
That makes sense. I'll look into adding that.
------
polyfractal
Nice app, I like the clean interface. The header takes up a lot of space
though, at first glance I only see two-three rows of the table.
Others may be interested in <http://www.weatherspark.com> as well. Really
slick weather app for a slightly more data-filled UI.
~~~
davidjhamp
I like their graph, very detailed. I've had some other people tell me how they
like to read the forecast graphs as well so maybe I'll add that in the next
iteration but still try to keep it super simple... if possible.
------
cfontes
Nice design... I am in Brazil and it couldn't find my locations using Chrome
for some reason. But congrats anyway !
~~~
davidjhamp
Thank you, this was one of my first tries at some real design and I tried
really hard :)
------
davidjhamp
url: <http://www.hourweather.com/>
~~~
ubojan
Simple and useful service, but please add client location somewhere in the
page header (in my case: Belgrade, Serbia). How can I be sure that your web
application figured out right location (because of proxy servers and other
factors)? EDIT: oh, someone already made this remark.
~~~
davidjhamp
Will do, thanks for commenting anyway, helps gauge how important this is to
add.
------
gujk
Bravo.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
N26 will be leaving the UK - vinnyglennon
https://n26.com/en-de/blog/leaving-uk-does-not-change-our-global-vision-to-transform-retail-banking-for-the-better
======
danpalmer
Businesses pulling out of the UK based on the Brexit process is bad for the
UK, and I'm sure this was indeed mainly motivated by N26's need for a UK
banking licence, which is a costly and difficult process to go through.
However, it's worth noting that they are pretty small in the UK (~200k users).
They're very successful in Germany where banking is a very slow, difficult,
manually run industry (from what I've heard), but in the UK we have generally
very good banking infrastructure – payments are normally instant and free, and
there's a lot of consumer protection with things like the current account
switching service guarantee.
Startups such as Monzo and Starling started in this great infrastructure and
now offer relatively compelling products, while the incumbents are getting to
grips with modern tech and doing better than many people realise.
N26 on the other hand just didn't have a compelling offering. They charged for
most/all of their accounts (explicit charges for accounts in the UK are
uncommon), they lacked features, and their marketing was unremarkable compared
to the competition.
~~~
alibarber
I've recently moved from the UK to another European country, and whilst I
despise the way the politics is going back home - I'm amazed at how much
better banking is back in the UK. It's free to have an account and debit card,
often with a modest free overdraft. And transfers are really instant. As in I
can transfer from Barclays to Santander and by the time I've double-tapped
between bank apps the money will be there cleared, at any time of day.
Here it's 'transfer before 2pm and we'll send it the same _working_ day!!' And
that's once you've made your appointment a week out to open an account, and
maybe received everything after a few weeks (if they like you that is)...
I got the impression that N26 was mainly to challenge the latter way of
working. I didn't understand what their offer was even for a free account that
was better than even a 'legacy' bank in the UK (and I'm not sure they even
support direct debit - which would have made it useless for any super-cheap
energy/phone etc deals).
In all - yes Brexit sucks, yes they may have stayed in the UK without it
(although I wouldn't have expected them to introduce anything new), but I
don't think they can blame any lack of success in the UK on it.
~~~
satysin
Oh. My. God. YES!
I moved from the UK to France in 2018 (in part due to Brexit but that is a
longer story) and dear god the banking systems here are utter shit.
I am with HSBC and I can't even change the PIN on my debit card! Hell I
couldn't even get my card and cheque book (yes they still use cheques here!)
delivered to my address as it was a temporary one so I had to collect it from
my branch in person.
If I buy something on my card it takes at least _three_ days before it is
listed in the HSBC mobile app or web site.
I generally use cash so it isn't a huge issue for me (check my post history
for some explanation on why I mostly use cash) but god is banking frustrating
here.
The only positive is that I do have an actual account manager (as in the same
person) who I always deal with and he is _excellent_ at sorting my problem. I
have to say I do like that consistent human content. Obviously if it is an
emergency I use their emergency line (lost card, etc) but for general
inquiries that don't require instant action my account manager is my go to.
_(thank you for bringing this up I feel I needed this quick rant!)_
~~~
_-___________-_
> If I buy something on my card it takes at least three days before it is
> listed in the HSBC mobile app or web site.
That's actually the case for my HSBC UK account too. It's impossible to know
accurately what the balance of it really is at any time too; both the real
balance and the available balance fluctuate wildly with no obvious relation to
the transactions, which are delayed by a variable 1-3 days (presumably
depending on the type of transaction). They seem to be about ten years behind
all the startup banks.
~~~
philpem
It seems to be a thing for all the incumbent UK banks I've tried. CYBG/B (now
the second incarnation of Virgin), Lloyds, Halifax, NatWest -- all have that
3-day delay.
Instant update was the killer feature that swung me to Starling. Well, that
and Natwest calling some random guy (who later found me to tell me what
happened) for a sales call, only to give him the transaction data for my last
five transactions....!
(obFD: no pecuniary interest, just a happy customer)
------
tablloyd
I'm skeptical of Brexit being the reason that N26 is withdrawing from the UK.
They started operation in the uk in October 2018, over 2 years after the
referendum result and 6 months before the UK was meant to leave until the date
got pushed back.
~~~
threeseed
Not sure if you actually follow Brexit but the situation now is completely
different to the last 2 years.
Michael Gove this week formerly advised businesses that the UK is going down
the hard Brexit path i.e. leaving the customs union, single market and with
full regulatory divergence from the EU.
Under these circumstances it is impossible to run a business like N26 in the
UK serving the EU.
~~~
blibble
> Under these circumstances it is impossible to run a business like N26 in the
> UK serving the EU.
you have this the wrong way round: they are a bank based in the EU that was
passporting their German (EU) license into the UK
in the near future they will not be permitted to operate in the UK as the UK
will no longer accept their EU banking license
~~~
thu2111
That's not actually certain. The UK has no fundamental reason not to recognise
EU banking licenses, although it may choose not to, or to recognise it but
require additional compliance.
The UK may end up being 'forced' to not recognise such licenses in retaliation
if the EU refuses to recognise British licenses. This is quite likely to
happen because the EU has a track record of revoking financial licensing as
part of trade wars with European countries. For instance they revoked
acceptance of Switzerland's financial licenses as part of trying to pressure
the Swiss government to cede significant powers to Brussels.
~~~
blibble
> That's not actually certain.
well, you can argue but it's a matter of UK law:
[http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2018/1149/regulation/2/ma...](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2018/1149/regulation/2/made)
the PRA has stated that EEA firms will require a license (with some temporary
transition arrangements:
> Passporting rights will now cease at the end of the transition period. Once
> passporting rights cease, EEA firms currently operating through a passport
> in the UK under the existing European passport framework will require a Part
> 4A permission under the Financial Services and Markets Act (FSMA) to be able
> to continue carrying out regulated activities in the UK.
see [https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/eu-withdrawal/temporary-
perm...](https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/eu-withdrawal/temporary-permissions-
regime)
> This is quite likely to happen because the EU has a track record of revoking
> financial licensing as part of trade wars with European countries. For
> instance they revoked acceptance of Switzerland's financial licenses as part
> of trying to pressure the Swiss government to cede significant powers to
> Brussels.
this is the worst example possible you could have given, the result of the
loss of equivalence was that the Swiss gained business, while EU firms lost
business
------
Zenst
As somebody who lives in the UK (London area), I've never even heard of this
company N26, let alone aware that they had UK operations.
I do frequent the web, youtube, bus stops, tubes, trains and utterly exposed
to all forms of marketing.
So from my perspective, this does seem like marketing failure from the start -
at least from my perspective.
Though the only real new Bank in the UK to do well, traction wise would be
Metro Bank and that's only due to them having a solid high street offering and
more so niche in that they are open near on all hours. Also associated app and
online works well.
But sorry, never even heard of N26 and is it initialy appears to tweak my
interest that it may be something N64 related, would of at least had me
read/look into it beyond that. Not even that happened, until now and only
reinforces the lack of marketing carried out as testified by the aspect that
I've never heard of them until now.
That's a shame as marketing is usually an area in which startups/companies
tend to overdo more than not do at all.
~~~
jen20
> Though the only real new Bank in the UK to do well, traction wise would be
> Metro Bank
This probably indicates that you are not in fact as well exposed to bank
marketing as you suspect - it's hard to argue that Monzo and Revolut have not
done well.
~~~
twic
Let's look at various banks' total assets, as listed on this random website i
found [1], in millions of pounds:
Monzo 139.82
Starling 206.64
Marks & Spencer 5569.90
Ulster 11641.00
Metro 21647.00
Co-operative 23102.80
Coutts 34280.00
Clydesdale 43583.00
HSBC (retail) 238939.00
Barclays (retail) 251305.00
On that measure, at least, Metro Bank is a hundred times bigger than either
Monzo or Starling. Assets are not the whole story, of course; i'd be
interested to see numbers for customers, revenues, and some sort of
measurement of payment flow.
But i think the lesson here is that if you live in the London tech bubble,
it's easy to think that Monzo are huge. Many of my friends bank with Monzo,
and i see plenty of Monzo cards being tapped on the readers at the tube
station. But we are not representative of the country at large.
[1] [https://thebanks.eu/banks-by-country/United-
Kingdom](https://thebanks.eu/banks-by-country/United-Kingdom)
~~~
p10jkle
According to the website, that Monzo stat is two years old. monzo.com shows
the current customer count - 3.8 million ie 10% of the adult population of the
UK.
According to
[https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/saving/article-7647253/M...](https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/saving/article-7647253/Monzo-
accounts-half-UK-digital-challenger-bank-market-data-finds.html) Monzo has
over half the challenger bank market share
------
butler14
Out-competed by Monzo/Starling/Revolut and co. and blaming Brexit.
Not the first to use that excuse, and certainly not the last.
~~~
buboard
do you know if these offer services to EU customers? and specifically business
accounts?
~~~
benhurmarcel
Only Revolut offer services in the EU.
------
eugenijusr
This is not the first market this bank has pulled out from. A couple of years
ago they stopped signing up people from two EU markets they previously served
(Latvia and Lithuania) without any reason. Granted all existing accounts
remained untouched, still these accounts get somewhat crippled functionality
and their future is unclear. Although their app is great and I didn't have any
big issues with the service itself, I'm somewhat wary of keeping any larger
sums of money in my N26 account.
~~~
s_dev
>I'm somewhat wary of keeping any larger sums of money in my N26 account.
It's German. All savings are guaranteed by German gov up to €100k. This is not
the case with Monzo or Revolut.
~~~
acta_non_verba
True. They’re protected up to £85,000 by the British Government instead.
~~~
zeku
They claim 250k USD in the US, via their partner Axios Bank.
"All deposits are FDIC-insured through our partner bank, Axos Bank®, Member
FDIC."
------
thawaway1837
Our company has opened several new Amsterdam offices thanks to Brexit already.
Currently they have probably added low double digit jobs in Amsterdam, and cut
single digit jobs in the UK (explicitly related to Brexit...net jobs in the UK
are probably even).
This may not sound like a lot, but for a company that operated in every EU
country, but only had a single office, in London, that employs 1000s of really
well paid employees, and had no plans at all to change anything, it’s a huge
step.
At the very least, London now has competition from Amsterdam in terms of
European work, and EU employees will likely prefer moving to Amsterdam with
free movement than to London with the hassles involved.
And this is right at the beginning of Brexit at a time where nothing has
actually changed thanks to the 1 year continuity period. If the deal that the
UK strikes a year from now (which is only likely to make things worse) is
substantially bad, then things may change very rapidly.
Brexit was a decision by a generation that did not fight the wars, but always
wished they did and that greatly benefited from the EU, but their desire to
believe that they were being oppressed and they had to throw off the shackles
from the oppressors, like their ancestors did, led them to screw the newer
generations while they themselves are at the end of their lives and will
barely suffer from the consequences.
~~~
imtringued
The initial step is always the hardest. Choosing a suitable location for your
EU presence can be a difficult task and if you can do everything from your HQ
there is no reason to even find one. But once you have paid that cost upfront
then you can arbitrarily choose to expand in either UK or EU (whichever makes
the most sense).
------
SpeakMouthWords
Worth noting that N26 was touted for a while as a grim reaper that would come
to the UK with its vast capitalisation (at the time about 2-3x as a much as
any UK mobile bank) and blow Monzo and Revolut away.
A good lesson that a well-funded incumbent in another market can't always make
the hop to a different geography with assured success.
~~~
andy_ppp
I mean giving up so easily when they have the capital to become a bank in the
UK is really the issue here. Sure, it would have been harder than inside the
EU, the real story is about them having no customers :-)
------
seemslegit
Well, unlike some N26 users who get their accounts locked without warning
explanation or anyone to turn to - at least the UK gets a notice.
~~~
btzll
Could you expand? People get their accounts locked for no reason?
~~~
seemslegit
Well there was probably a reason but they weren't told it and with N26 being
online-only had noone to turn to, you can do a google/twitter search for
someone getting police called on them for showing up at their Berlin
HQ/Backoffice trying to get some answers.
~~~
bpfrh
To be fair, that is nothing unique to N26.
In fact in austria easybank is also a bank that afaik only exists "online" and
easybank is much older than n26.
Edit:
Forgot something
~~~
seemslegit
To be even fairer, this isn't even unique to online banks - regular banks in
the US can "fire" customers without a reason and even if only because their
heuristics find their profitability to be too low, but at least they get a
notice and a chance to move their money.
------
ArmandGrillet
> we’ve already fully redesigned our mobile experience to simplify the actions
> that matter most to customers
I couldn't contain my laugh reading that, sending money using the N26 app is a
12 steps process (no exaggeration) since the app update and the "AI" behind
the categorization of spendings is an amazing garbage, e.g. I have a once a
month recurring payment of the same amount from my landlord, I have
categorized it a dozen of times manually but it still gets registered as...
grocery shopping.
~~~
Cenk
> sending money using the N26 app is a 12 steps process
Not sure if we’re in different A/B test buckets or you’re in a different
country and are using a different version but it’s four to five taps for me?
Unless you’re counting the log in button and typing the amount as separate
steps?
~~~
ArmandGrillet
Connect, Manage, Money Transfer, Choosing one, Naming it, Verification, Send,
Identity Verification, Confirmation of Identity Verification. So 9
views/steps.
~~~
Cenk
Okay, we must have different versions of the app. On mine: Actions -> Bank
Transfer -> Choose Recipient -> Enter amount -> Message -> Send -> Confirm
The real question is, which one of these do you think is unnecessary?
------
axaxs
N26 just launched in the US, also. If their UK launch was anything like their
US launch, I can see why. They made a lot of promises about how much better
they'd be, but their offering is terrible compared to the competition here.
------
Symbiote
> With the UK now having left the European Union, we will in due course be
> unable to operate in the UK with our European banking license.
Isn't this still up for discussion?
Since they're only giving two months notice, they could wait until much later
in the year before shutting up shop in the UK.
~~~
threeseed
Not really. Gove is warning businesses that there will be trade impacts:
[https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/feb/10/checks-
on-e...](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/feb/10/checks-on-eu-bound-
goods-inevitable-gove-tells-business-leaders)
And if you don't have a deal on goods you absolutely won't have a deal on
services.
~~~
nailer
Sure but trade is two way. The EU won't have a deal either. They want to
continue selling cars, food, and everything else. The only thing with no deal
being on the table is the UK being able to walk away, as a type of mutually
assured destruction, rather than having to accept any deal offered by the EU.
------
scarejunba
The comments here are odd. N26 isn't making any political statements. They're
just saying they don't want to apply for a UK banking licence now that they
can't use an EU one.
The response "they're only doing this because they can't make enough money in
the UK" seems kind of vacuous. Of course that's why they're doing it. The cost
of requiring a UK licence outweighs the benefit of being there.
There seems to be some sort of desire to say "Brexit didn't cause this". It's
pretty clear it did because they could previously operate without a UK licence
and now they can't and it doesn't cost low enough to be worth it for them. I
don't think it matters in the big scale since there's Monzo and Starling, but
having the EU fracture will be annoying since markets will fracture.
As for the criticisms of starting in the UK post the Brexit vote, I don't
understand if you guys have run businesses before, but you have to take risks.
Things can change, and for the right growth opportunity you go for it.
As an example, post-GDPR I set up the European arm of our data business, and
even though Brexit was on the horizon, we set up in London. Why? Because the
opportunity was big enough and we could work our way to a solution in time
that would meet what we needed and because (being entirely Anglophone)
establishing a bridgehead in the UK made sense. It's a successful business now
and we have teams in mainland Europe now. It's like running towards one of
those closing doors so that you can slide under it like a hero. You don't want
to be trapped under the door, but sometimes what's on the other side of the
door is worth the risk.
~~~
barnabee
It’s not so much “Brexit didn’t cause this” as it is hard to believe that’s
the main reason their business failed in the UK (make no mistake, that is what
they are admitting, whatever the reason). The comments are quite reasonably
identifying that their statement is conveniently burying the real news with an
excuse that will surely be easy to swallow in their home country.
Brexit is bad but that isn’t the news here. I’m sure we’ll see plenty more of
this.
~~~
scarejunba
It certainly doesn't look like they're burying anything to me. The official
media statement squarely accepts the inability to serve as an N26 problem:
> _While we fully respect the decision that has been taken, it means that N26
> will in due course be unable to serve our customers in the UK and will have
> to leave the market_
And having some part of the business fail is not some sort of moral failing
you have to hide or which they're even attempting to. The rest of their
statement makes it clear that considering their growth and number of users it
doesn't make sense for them to get a UK licence, i.e. this isn't feasible for
them.
I think people are interpreting "We can't do this because Brexit has made this
infeasible for us" as "We'd have succeeded if it weren't for Brexit" when it
seems quite obvious to me that the trivial interpretation is "Brexit moved us
from feasible to infeasible" which just means they were envisioning less in
the future than the Brexit-costs would impose and makes no implication really
about the width of that Brexit cost boundary. After all, they're still in the
US and you need a local licence.
------
jxramos
Guess the value and quantity of their UK customers didn't warrant obtaining an
equivalent "UK banking license"?
> ... we will in due course be unable to operate in the UK with our European
> banking license.
------
treebornfrog
Sad news, I've been using them for over a year, their card design is the most
beautiful I've seen yet in the UK (1).
(1)
[https://miro.medium.com/max/4000/1*XScUHKRVuzfiRKttAfJ64w.pn...](https://miro.medium.com/max/4000/1*XScUHKRVuzfiRKttAfJ64w.png)
~~~
detritus
Mmm, not sure I'd agree with your estimation, but "beauty is in the eye of the
beholder" and all that. Seems a little form over function to me - I'm not sure
how wonderful an idea it is being able to read the three security digits on
the reverse.
Not sure if I'm just paranoid, but I scrape those off every time I get a new
card.
~~~
Hamuko
The CVC is behind the MasterCard logo on my N26 card.
~~~
detritus
That would work!
------
gadjo95
Rumor is that they are also going to cancel their launch in Brazil. I think
they are just re-focusing and trying to make money instead of burning it.
Launching in a new market is always expensive.
~~~
zorked
TBH the neobank market in Brazil is kind of crowded and N26 doesn't have
anything over those that started sooner.
~~~
bloodm
Would you be so kind to give an overview over it (Brazil, both banks and
brokers), incl. a recommendation? Thx
------
greatgib
I understand their reasons, but I think that it is an abuse from them to close
UK customers so fast. Imagine loosing your bank account suddenly in just 1
month. From what I see, nothing prevents N26 to continue operating until the
end of the year in UK. So, they could have given a 3 or 6 months notice at
least to their user. I'm not in UK, but because of actions like this, I'm more
than encouraged to not be confident with them and not use this as a "primary
account".
------
Causality1
"A 100% digital banking experience"
I know this isn't the exact focus of the post, but I find that a little
terrifying. I wouldn't be willing to trust all my holdings to a computer
system with no ability to walk into a building with my birth certificate,
photo ID, and social security card and have someone give me back my accounts
should my identity be stolen.
~~~
barnabee
I moved to Monzo as soon as they got a banking license and wouldn’t want to go
back to an old bank with branches. Not only is their tech terrible but
someone’s got to pay for all those buildings and people.
------
LockAndLol
Compared to Revolut, they're pretty expensive. Additionally, their app doesn't
work without google services like Revolut does, so you're completely crippled.
And finally, their app doesn't look as good, nor does it have a view of your
expenses.
This isn't a big hit to England.
------
nottorp
We are today a team of more than 1,500 unique talents of 80 nationalities,
based across our offices in Berlin, Barcelona, Vienna, New York and São Paolo.
Looks easy for them to leave the UK. No offices there.
Anyone shutting down UK offices yet?
------
monkeydust
Think they just found the UK more competitive and advanced than what they
expected. They could have got a UK licence but perhaps better ROI elsewhere.
Don't think the UK loses much here.
------
symboltoproc
Can anyone explain why they can not get a UK bank license and migrate their
customer to the UK bank?
I suspect that the main motivation is not Brexit but fiercer competition in
the UK (e.g. Monzo).
~~~
ztratar
Migrating banks puts your users through a migration themselves (new terms,
transfers, new issued cards, etc). It's very difficult.
On top of that, their UK business wasn't doing very well.
So why double down on a losing bet and go through a ton of pain for it?
------
nilanp
TransferWise.com/borderless is a pretty neat solution to a few of the problems
N26 was solving. Anyone here - tried it out ?
Disclosure: Been building this for 6 years :-)
------
xvilka
Despite thinking Brexit was a mistake, this is indeed a chance for the UK to
modernize and improve its financial and banking industry, to make it even more
attractive for non-EU capital, and to make London an even more international
city. Assuming there is a will for that. After all gov.uk initiative was a
success and still continues to improve.
------
frostyj
probably just a company not big enough to deal with too many financial
regulations.
~~~
Benjammer
Uhm, they raised 300m on a 2.7b valuation somewhat recently...
[https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/09/n26-raises-300-million-
at-...](https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/09/n26-raises-300-million-
at-2-7-billion-valuation/)
Not exactly small.
------
iamspoilt
I am wondering if Revolut would follow the course as well?
~~~
buboard
revolut is based in britain
------
wdb
I didn't even knew N26 was active in the UK.
------
kalium_xyz
N26 has little on bunq though
------
carlsborg
This is bad for innovation.
------
B008L355
who?
------
ghastmaster
The font on that page does not scale well.
------
3fe9a03ccd14ca5
Brexit makes for a convenient scapegoat when your business isn’t compelling to
U.K. customers.
~~~
jamil7
You might be right, here in Germany the banks are extremely archaic and make
things difficult if you're a foreigner and just moved here. N26 onboarding is
streamlined (video call on your phone) and can be done in at least English and
German, maybe other languages now they're expanding. They also invested
heavily in native mobile experience first while the other banks where
struggling to offer decent online banking.
~~~
dividuum
Not sure how that's today, but a few years ago their "mobile experience first"
stuff resulted in quite some security issues:
[https://media.ccc.de/v/33c3-7969-shut_up_and_take_my_money](https://media.ccc.de/v/33c3-7969-shut_up_and_take_my_money).
That alone would be enough for me to not trust them with any of my money.
~~~
jamil7
Yeah I've seen the presentation thanks. I'm also not sure how their security
stands today but theres no reason "mobile first" has to mean "bad security".
------
Rhardward
Seem like another way of saying "We failed in the UK so lets blame it on
Brexit"
Haven't heard of anyone being a customer of N26.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How To Fly Without ID - jmonegro
http://www.lookingglassnews.org/printerfriendly.php?storyid=7040
======
ryanwaggoner
According to this article from Wired last year, TSA changed the rules so that
now you can only fly without an ID if you _claim_ that you lost it. So
essentially they're giving up any increased security advantage (real or
imagined) that comes from a mandatory ID requirement, for the purpose of
sending the message that challenging authority will not be allowed.
<http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2008/06/tsa-nixes-flyin/>
------
mildavw
Hmm. The article is not coming up for me at the moment. But that won't stop me
from commenting!
I accidentally traveled without ID last year. My drivers license is the only
picture ID I carry. I'd given it over to test drive a baby seat at a store,
and forgot to get it back. Left for vacation the next day.
My stops were Portland, San Jose, and Austin. At all three airports I
explained my situation, showed them my YMCA card (or library or credit card or
something) and they marked my boarding pass for special security. The
processes were not draconian, just a pat down, and actually faster than the
regular security line. I skipped the line and went to some designated place on
the side, zipped through the pat down, and then had to wait for my properly
ID'd wife every time.
YMMV, but based on my experience, I highly recommend traveling without an ID!
~~~
zackattack
Speaking of highly recommending traveling without an ID, on my way back from
school last year, I got really stoned in my friend's car on the way to the
airport. Me being stoned, I left my wallet in the car, and ended up at the
airport with no ID.
I also got to go through the much-faster special screening, but I had to step
into a chamber where they puffed you with air. Not for weed scent, for bombs,
though I was mildly concerned at the time.
All in all a fun experience. Next time there's a big line at security, I'm
going to tell them that I forgot my id. w00t
~~~
torpor
Weed often sets off the bomb sensors, since the high concentration of
fertilizers produce similar signatures ..
~~~
zackattack
I don't believe you. Prove it.
~~~
torpor
Bomb detectors are designed to pick up traces of nitrates, the theory being
that if you are making a DIY bomb, you're going to go the ammonia-nitrate
route.
Nitrates exist in fertilizer - and thats what folks make bombs out of.
Weed is often fertilized with nitrates, and trace amounts of these elements
are present in your sweat, in your pee, and so on. When you go through a bomb
detector after a heavy weed weekend or so, you're going to be flagged for
closer inspection.
This was explained to me by a security agent at an airport I was travelling
through after a heavy week in Amsterdam.
------
zepolen
"...could not bar an American citizen from boarding a plane, even if a
passenger refused to produce any identification at all!"
How exactly can you know if someone is an American citizen if they don't show
any government approved ID saying so?
~~~
jrockway
People like to use the word "citizen" for some reason, even when it is not
accurate. The protections of the US Constitution apply to all "people", not
all "citizens". The word "citizen" mostly occurs when referring to voting and
running for office (both which do require citizenship).
Everyone gets a jury trial, free speech, etc.
~~~
ionfish
People like to use the word "citizen" because it's a way of broadcasting their
tribal identity. These little war dances are generally done by people with
citizenship of high-status nations; one doesn't tend to see people going
around bragging about how they are Togolese citizens, for example. However,
it's certainly not a behaviour limited to Americans: I've seen plenty of Brits
and Canadians do it too.
------
devin
Did anyone else notice this is from 2006? Anyone know if this is still
possible? Was it _ever_ possible?
The reason I ask is: <http://www.lookingglassnews.org/> does not look like the
pinnacle of journalistic integrity. The author of this story certainly sounds
intelligent, but all of the conspiracy theory crap on this site makes me
wonder.
~~~
jgfoot
It is true that if you simply don't have proper ID -- your wallet was stolen,
for example -- it's still possible to fly; I think this involves going through
the "heightened" pat-down screening. But you are correct that rant-ish reports
posted on sketchy web sites that make broad assertions of constitutional law
are generally good sources of entertainment, but not legal advice.
John Perry Barlow (of EFF fame) litigated this issue in late 2006. He lost at
every step. What came out of that is that the TSA does indeed have a written
regulation requiring you show government ID, but that regulation is secret.
Info on his litigation is at <http://papersplease.org/gilmore/>
~~~
jrockway
_But you are correct that rant-ish reports posted on sketchy web sites that
make broad assertions of constitutional law are generally good sources of
entertainment, but not legal advice._
Honestly, I think these folks have a better idea of what the intent of the
Constitution was than many of the justices on the Supreme Court. Like
anything, the Supreme Court is mostly about politics these days, rather than
protecting anyone's rights. (Sometimes both interests are aligned, of course,
but many times they are not; especially with respect to ID.)
~~~
praptak
_Honestly, I think these folks have a better idea of what the intent of the
Constitution was than many of the justices on the Supreme Court._
Sorry to say that, but "good source of legal advice" is by definition one that
works in court, not one with high moral ground.
~~~
jrockway
Yes, definitely.
Incidentally, I have some recent US coins that say, "Live free or die," but it
doesn't seem socially acceptable to have that attitude anymore.
"Live in constant fear of the government and live" doesn't have the same
ring...
------
weisthefunk
Thank you for returning my faith in civil rights and the US Constitution. The
home of the free and the land of the brave is at grave risk of becoming
extinct as long as good men and women sit and watch their basic freedoms
eroded continuously in the name of fighting illusionary 'terrorists'
~~~
gluejar
the article is a bit stale. This page is up to date:
<http://epic.org/privacy/airtravel/>
------
jrockway
Something I want to try; get on the "no fly" list, legally change my name to
something completely different (in a very small town, of course), legally get
updated ID, and see how long it takes before I am on the "no fly" again.
(My guess is never.)
Incidentally, my credit report thinks my name is "Johnathan Rockway", which is
a name I've never used on any credit card, nor one that appears on any ID I
have ever possessed. Accurate!
~~~
mdasen
On the last part, I'd caution you to look into that. I had a name that wasn't
mine on my credit report and soon other things started appearing on my report
that weren't my accounts. A lot of companies that report to the credit
agencies just report the last four of your SSN and name. I started getting
calls for someone that wasn't me from collections agencies.
~~~
jrockway
Well, it is just one letter added to my real name. So probably someone fucking
up data entry, not someone misusing my identity.
------
jvdh
The last of the regulations seems to imply that it is possible to fly
internationally without an ID. I have no idea what you would accomplish by
boarding an internation airplane without an ID, because you will get sent back
once you get there. There is no way the other country will accept you without
a passport.
~~~
ryanwaggoner
I'm sure there is some procedure for handling citizens who have lost their
passports.
~~~
arjunnarayan
Yes, but it involves contacting your nearest consulate/embassy before boarding
the plane. They normally verify some stuff internally (which is why it helps
immensely to have photocopies that speed up the process as that contains the
relevant numbers/barcodes that allow them to look you up quickly) and then
they give you an "emergency travel document" or a new passport, depending on
the situation. The ETD lets you travel back to your home country and then
handle things from there.
~~~
miracle
If you have lost your passport, you have to go to a police station and make a
claim. You can only board the plane with that claim (and there is normaly a
police station on every major airport)
And PS: I hope that they wouldn't let in the ignorant author of the article in
without a valid passport.
------
adatta02
Extremely interesting. Last March I actually tried to switch the name on an
American Airlines ticket and the agent on the phone informed that it was
impossible to switch the name on a ticket. She went so far as to claim the
computer system didn't even support name changes. I called her out on that and
then she told me that federal law prohibits name changes on tickets.
Assuming this article is valid - how would an airline even know that the name
on the ticket doesn't match if I refuse to produce ID? (it was a domestic
flight so no passport)
------
robk
The rules in the US seem to have changed this summer to require ID in almost
every case. See Flyertalk's security forum here:
[http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/travel-safety-
security/984568...](http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/travel-safety-
security/984568-oh-oh-rules-seem-have-changed-pv.html)
Very disappointing and arguably unconstitutional.
------
wkdown
The downside of this was not pointed out unless one read the whole snippet:
_EMPTY THE LUGGAGE OR ITEM AND PHYSICALLY SEARCH ITS CONTENTS BY A QUALIFIED
SCREENER_
Yeah, you got on the plane without showing ID. But if they really wanted to,
they could determine who you are in other ways (DNA from hair on clothing,
etc)
------
yread
Very interesting article. I wonder how does it work in the EU. Have to get
some legal friend to have a look at it! Perhaps I could have exchanged air
tickets with people couple of times already...
~~~
salvadors
Flying within a country is different from crossing international borders. Even
within Schengen many (most?) countries still require visitors to be holding a
valid travel document (passport or ID card). Random spot-checks are often
carried out close to borders (although by local police, rather than
immigration or border guards).
I'd certainly be interested in discovering whether airlines are _required_ to
confirm that passengers have these.
Many airlines now also require 'official' ID for flights even within a
country, but AIUI that's purely airline policy rather than a legal
requirement.
~~~
jvdh
I've actually been checked in Holland by customs when coming home from a
Schengen country.
He asked me to show an ID, I asked "why?", and he just responded "Because I
say so". I was a bit too flabbergasted and not prepared for that answer and
just showed him. He then proceeded to someone else who was even requested to
come to the counter and let his bags get checked.
I'm curious whether I was actually required to do so.
~~~
miracle
Yeah, play hard ball and you hopefully will go to jail. What's the problem of
showing your id?
~~~
jvdh
The problem is that in the Netherlands there now is a law requiring you to
show an ID if the cops ask for it. However, this was allowed with the
provision that the cops had a sensible reason for doing so, i.e. you broke the
law, or you were doing something suspicious.
I see no reason why it is any of the cops business to know who I am when I'm
just walking down the street.
Same situation applies at the border, there is a seperate section for Schengen
countries in the Amsterdam airport and you normally get in and out without
showing an ID. I see no reason why it suddenly is any business to the customs
officer to see who I am.
~~~
jrockway
I agree with you, but couldn't someone from a non-Schengen country claim that
they are from Schengen?
~~~
salvadors
I think he's talking about the gates that handle flights to/from Schengen
countries being in a different part of the airport, before passport control.
The assumption is that once you're in Schengen the border guards at the first
entry point should have ensured you're allowed to be there.
However, in every airport where I've seen that, I've certainly been able to
get as far as the gate without ID (particularly if I've a pre-printed boarding
pass), but I've always needed either a passport or EU member state ID card to
actually get on the plane.
If you can get on without your ID, however, there are generally no checks at
all at the far end.
~~~
jrockway
Ah, OK, this makes sense. I admit that I don't think much about immigration or
customs when I am arriving in Europe because it is all so simple. It's only
when arriving in the US that I dread the experience. (And I am a natural-born
US citizen.)
------
edw519
I fly often and can't imagine going through any of this just to prove a point.
I always print my boarding pass at home, never check bags, go directly to
security, and use my frequent flyer card to go through the express line. I
show my driver's license for inspection, but no data from it is ever recorded.
IMO, a small price to pay to move quickly through the airport.
~~~
kingandcountry
I can't imagine going through this whole revolution just to start my own
country. All I have to do is give a toast to King George and pay a tax on tea,
a small price to pay to stay part of Britain.
~~~
ramchip
Canada did get out of it without a revolution. I get your point, though.
------
californiaguy
If you're in the US just tell them your wallet was stolen.
They'll put you in another line and often times it'll actually be faster than
the main security line.
I've done this multiple times, the first time after I actually did lose my
wallet in Vegas and had to fly back home. Apparently it happens all the time.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Seattle School Board votes to keep 'Brave New World' on curriculum - aaronbrethorst
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2013631328_bravenewworld09.html
======
forgotAgain
_The Seattle School Board voted Wednesday to keep Brave New World on the
district’s list of approved books for high-school language-arts classes._
_Nathan Hale administrators dropped the book as a regular part of its
sophomore Language Arts curriculum after Sense-Wilson’s initial complaint,
however students can still read it as part of class “literature circles” in
which students reading the same book discuss it in a small group._
Reading the above it appears that the book hasn't been returned to the high
school's curriculum. The school board merely said it could be. Judging from
the school administration's initial actions I would say return to the core
curriculim is still in question.
~~~
Locke1689
School curricula aren't completely constant in a state. It sounds like the
book is no longer required reading in that specific high school in Seattle,
not all high schools in Seattle.
------
hartror
I hate PC revisionists. This is a book from the 1930s and as such there are
aspects of the book that don't reflect the mores of today's society. However
this will be obvious to its high school student readers and don't need to be
"protected" from this sort of material as they're old enough to place it in
context.
An example of where the line I think gets blurry is the Golliwoggs from Enid
Blyton's Noddy which were removed in the 1980s. I don't know if there is any
evidence for or against negative racial stereotypes affecting children's long
term views but I won't be exposing my kids to such material.
I would hate to have my small child point to a dark skinned person on the
street and say "Golliwogg!" for a start.
------
pinchyfingers
Every American should be reading this book. Huxley is very accurately
describing modern America. A stoned populace to caught up in the distractions
of commercialism and instant gratification to be aware of their complete lack
of self-determination and complete dependence on the state.
I don't want to go off of some crazy libertarian rant, but really, take a
couple hours to reread this book, and then take a fresh look at the world of
distraction all around you.
~~~
TheBlack_knight
I resist the comparisons between accent Rome and our current culture, but
sometimes the insights are intuitive.
… Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have
abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military
command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and
anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses
Once a society becomes advanced many comforts become available, it seems to
happen that we forgot just how it is we got there. There is an economic theory
that goes something like, every generation or two needs a great war so that
those who survive come back home with a sense of purpose. And those
individuals work to advance society. The next generation perhaps becomes more
immersed in the culture and uninterested in advancing knowledge or economic
gains. Stagnation sets in again.
------
anigbrowl
Well, that is a ray of sunshine on a gloomy day. Thanks for keeping an eye on
the story.
------
VladRussian
what is wrong with exposing school students to the fact that a great author in
his great book used stereotypes which are prohibited today? What is next?
Removal of mentioning of racism from the history curriculum ? Looks like
building of BNW step by step.
------
nhangen
A book like this has never been more important. Would love to see schools wake
up and embrace something like this, and perhaps Atlas Shrugged or the
Fountainhead, among other philosophical masterpieces.
~~~
avdempsey
Agreed about Huxley. Neil Postman covers many of the same themes in his non-
fiction work. Technopoly in particular is a good read.
Atlas Shrugged is _not_ a message I think our age is lacking however. I
enjoyed it as a kid, but it's pretty clear capitalism and selfishness are
enjoying the commanding heights. It's status as a philosophical
masterpiece...that's the easiest way to troll a philosophy major.
~~~
xenophanes
As a Rand fan, let me tell you: the world is not Randian. The overwhelming
majority of the "capitalists" of today are not the kind I or Rand would
approve it. We'd be more inclined to call them socialists than to say they are
in accord with Rand's message.
If you think Rand's message is widespread then you simply have not understood
it. For example Rand is sometimes accused of supporting big business. Maybe
you have that misconception and think all the big businesses and their
supporters are Randians. This is extremely false. Rand was very clear about
how she hated many types of businessmen, and a lot of the bad guys in her
books were big businessmen.
~~~
jmillikin
Of all currently existing nations, which do you think best represents Randian
ideals?
~~~
xenophanes
USA I suppose. But I haven't really researched Hong Kong or a few other
smaller countries I've heard are good in terms of free market.
It's easy to complain about the US, and plenty of the complaints are true, but
that doesn't mean the US isn't the greatest country of all time. And the US is
getting better not worse -- for example if you read about the history of the
railroads the amount of Government corruption and unethical business practices
100 years ago is really quite amazing and shows how far we've come. And if you
go back another 100 years, then the UK was the best country, but it was really
really really bad compared to the modern world -- it's hard to express how bad
it was in any short statement. Gay sex was punished by hanging, there was
slavery, women were property of their husbands (not 100% property, but ugh),
racism was the norm, and being rich and powerful was usually about political
power and achieved by methods like land grants from the Government as favors
for military service; there may be quite a few bad businesses today and people
rich due to crime or Government favors, but we have cut down on that stuff,
and also we have far more people who earned their money as entrepreneurs, far
more middle class, etc
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
NY Times: Entrepreneur Troubleshoots AdWords Campaign to Save Business - URSpider94
http://boss.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/26/my-adwords-debacle-a-wake-up-and-a-fix
======
URSpider94
I have never run a large-scale AdWords campaign, so this is back-seat driving,
but I wonder if Google's Pay Per Conversion pricing
([http://support.google.com/adwords/bin/answer.py?hl=en&an...](http://support.google.com/adwords/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=2472713))
would be a way to attack this problem.
For example, send incoming customers to a survey. Pay $1 for customers who
self-identify as non-profit or academic, $10 for customers who identify as
Fortune 500. Google will go off and determine if it's more efficient to
deliver you 10x non-profit customers, or 1x corporate ones.
Folks who have tried something like this, does it work?
~~~
ccbean
The problem with using pay-per-conversion is that it works best (and only?)
when you can get a direct response from the site when a sale is made. For
example, send someone to your landing page, they buy a product online, and
then call the conversion code on the 'thank you' page, e.g. /order/complete --
this can be tracked as a conversion easily.
For sites with big ticket items where the transaction doesn't take place
online, it can be trickier to try and attribute the sale to a certain ad
campaign.
~~~
kanzure
> For sites with big ticket items where the transaction doesn't take place
> online, it can be trickier to try and attribute the sale to a certain ad
> campaign.
How do they do it? One method I can think of is to show different phone
numbers for users that have been cookied as coming in from different ads.
~~~
thecosas
The company I currently work for does exactly this for car dealer websites. We
have separate tracking numbers which display on car dealership websites
depending on the source.
We actually found another vendor that does this on a per visitor basis (ie.
each visitor gets their own tracking number). While I think THAT is overkill,
the technology is there to do this kind of thing without too much overhead.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
API showcase - developer garden - szimpl
http://www.developergarden.com/en/blog/articles/article/api-showcase-be-inspired-test-and-upload/
======
polyvisual
They seriously need to change the colouring of the links and text in the API
table on this page: <http://www.developergarden.com/apis/applications/>
------
szimpl
Has anyone here used their API's?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Picasa Arrives on the Mac - rscott
http://picasa.google.com/mac/
It's about time.
======
sc
Unfortunately it's not very Mac-like.
Petition to Google and other cross-platform app-makers: please take the time
to integrate with OS X; Mac users can already run PC apps with the help of
VirtualBox, VMWare Fusion, or Parallels.
~~~
old-gregg
I can't even begin to describe how happy I am that it's not Mac-like, i.e. not
dumbed-down to idiotic Apple UI idoms. I have an IQ above 50 so I don't need
"OSX-style" UI for retarded Oklahoma children, thank you very much google for
not ruining it. It works _exactly_ as it did on Windows which is... like a
hundred years ahead of iPhoto. I'm sorry kids, but Apple should be learning
from Picasa how to make usable UIs, not the other way around. I hope this
trend of ignoring OSX's idiotic idioms will continue.
I don't have to go back to Windows
anymore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What a day... Christmas came late for me this year. :-) I'm sitting here,
typing this smiling like a baby.
If google wanted to charge $1K for it, I would have paid it.
~~~
whalesalad
For someone so happy to "[not] have to go back to Windows anymore!!!^69"
you're clearly a Mac user. I find it puzzling that you've got such distaste
then, for "OSX-style UI for retarded Oklahoma children". If you're so clearly
against windows and use OS X and all of the applications it has to offer,
aren't you really just saying a bit about yourself here? That or this is
purely hypocrisy. For having such hate for "OSX's idiotic idioms", I find it
pretty surprising that you use the platform at all.
At least you could have made your frustrations clear in a less vicious manner,
and without making yourself look like such a tool.
~~~
old-gregg
That's what happens when you post a message 15 minutes after watching a
football game, still drunk and excited. Should have known better. Answering
your question, I'm on a Mac against my will [a number of reasons] and I rarely
use anything else than Safari, Photoshop, vim and bash console.
------
Timothee
It will probably be difficult to get a big market share from iPhoto, even
though Picasa has a couple of features that iPhoto lacks:
\- (free and) easy sync with online albums (there's a plugin to push photos
from iPhoto to PicasaWeb but probably not as complete as Picasa from what the
video demo shows. I do hope Google keeps providing this plugin though)
\- face recognition. I tried it on PicasaWeb and it was pretty impressive.
Where it could make a difference is on speed. The rest looks very similar.
I also wonder if it gives the same system-wide access to photos through the
Media library that many applications use.
~~~
halo
On the other hand, Picasa is free.
~~~
Timothee
The thing is that iPhoto comes with every Mac. So, in a way, it's free too.
------
timcederman
At last, although I can only hope it doesn't emulate the bloated crap that is
Picasa 3 on PC.
It is disappointing that one of the fastest and most stable photo applications
out there (probably its biggest two differentiators) has followed the path of
all previous photo applications.
It's not just me either.
[http://groups.google.com/groups/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8...](http://groups.google.com/groups/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=%22back+to+picasa+2%22&btnG=Search&sitesearch=)
------
old-gregg
Oh my god!!!!!!!!!!! I was just in process of configuring yet another Windows
box just because I failed (after a year of trying) to find a way to deal with
my ~5K of photos on a Mac. I tried everything imaginable and nothing came
close to Picasa, so finally, finally google has come to rescue us!
Ugh... I can't remember when was the last time I was so happy about a piece of
software... I only wish Apple could find more talent in Silicon Valley,
apparently all their serviceable engineers are busy on Safari and OSX without
anyone adequate available to work on iPhoto and Finder.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Earn $500 by hacking some Python - _stryngs_
https://configitnow.com/challenge
======
masonic
Soliciting black hat activity on HN? Classy.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The battle over new nerve cells in adult brains intensifies - laurex
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/neurogenesis-brain-neurons-2018-yir
======
dcx
The fact that we still don't know whether or not adult brains produce new
neurons is incredible to me. It feels like we know so much as a species. But
at the same time we're all just wandering around in these poorly-understood
meat suits.
~~~
Teknoman117
and the question is, are we meat suits or are we driving meat suits...
------
andrewflnr
For a given phenomenon that's at least logically consistent, the egg tends to
end up on the faces of people who said it was impossible.
~~~
Retric
You rarely hear about the 99% of the rime when the experts where correct.
~~~
andrewflnr
Fair point in general. However, in most cases where the debate hits the public
because there are experts on both sides, I'd say it still holds.
------
StanislavPetrov
Evidence for neurogenesis is more convincing than the arguments against it.
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4543605/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4543605/)
------
softwaredoug
Props to Sciencenews.org. The articles are interesting. The pages load fast.
And lots of meaty references to backup the claims. Will subscribe
------
starbeast
Can someone tell me a mechanism that would fundamentally halt the production
of new neurons in adult brains? If you can't define that edge well, then it
would seem very likely that new neurons do form in adult brains, given the
scale of neuron to brain, even if many fewer of them do in comparison.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Tell us how you successfully hacked some (non-computer) system to your advantage - peter_d_sherman
======
peter_d_sherman
There's a question on YCombinator's application, "Please tell us about the
time you most successfully hacked some (non-computer) system to your
advantage."
Idea: I think it would be a great idea to take all of the past answers of this
question, audit them to make sure they are legally and publicly acceptable,
then get permission from the people or person making the submission to make
their answer to this question public, then publish all of those answers on a
web page where users could see them/compare them/vote on them, much like HN...
I think this could become a great resource for
a) Systems Theory Generalists
b) People who want to understand systems better
c) People who want to understand how some systems can be and are gamed;
d) (Non Computer) Systems Engineers/Systems Security Experts
e) Generally creative people who are interested in observing how other
generally creatively people think and approach problems.
Comments?
------
PaulHoule
Advantage play in gambling situations where the odds are not clearly defined.
For instance, at my son's school they regularly have raffles where you can put
a ticket in a bag to enter a raffle for one of various items. You can see how
many tickets are in the bag and know what the odds of winning are.
I always walk away from that with at least one if not two prizes by picking
things that are desirable (to me) that have few tickets in them.
I used to think my sister-in-law was impervious to the laws of probability
because she plays video slots at the casino. Then she noticed there was a
promotion where you could put losing scratch tickets into a pot at the casino
and she saw how many entries there were, realized it was a winning bet, and
she and my mother in law bought $200 of scratch tickets, of which they won
about $100.
They won a trip to Las Vegas which was worth upwards of $1200 so it was a good
deal.
I win at the racetrack by using the "odds to win" to find mispriced place and
show bets. Basically you sometimes find that the payout for a horse to show is
more than 1/3 of the payout to win but you have three chances to win, so
sometimes it is a "can't lose" situation.
------
100100010001
You can steal gas from a car by putting a hose in the gas tank. I’m pretty
sure everyone knows this “hack” so maybe you should clarify your question.
~~~
peter_d_sherman
Clarification: The hack or hacks must be ethically acceptable...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: What are the best books you've read this year? - adamnemecek
======
mindcrime
_It 's Not the Big That Eat the Small...It's the Fast That Eat the Slow: How
to Use Speed as a Competitive Tool in Business_ by Jason Jennings & Laurence
Haughton
_Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software_ by Charles
Petzold
_What Is Relativity?: An Intuitive Introduction to Einstein 's Ideas, and Why
They Matter_ by Jeffrey O. Bennett
_Spooky Action at a Distance: The Phenomenon That Reimagines Space and
Time—and What It Means for Black Holes, the Big Bang, and Theories of
Everything_ by George Musser
_Towers of Midnight (Wheel of Time, #13)_ by Robert Jordan & Brandon
Sanderson
_Second Foundation_ by Isaac Asimov
Just started reading _The Penguin History Of The World_ by J.M. Roberts & Odd
Arne Westad. I'd always found history interesting in a general sense, but
other than a couple of specific periods that I found interesting (the American
Revolution, WWI, WWII), I had not studied the subject in much depth. So I
figured I'd start with a good single-volume overview of World History as a
whole, then go back and dig deeper into additional areas that pique my
interest.
So far it's pretty fascinating. It's especially interesting when you see how
elements of our modern world have roots that can be traced back for millennia.
It's also fun to note the extent to which geography and climate have impacted
the evolution of human civilization(s). It gives you a lot to think about in
terms of dealing with anthropogenic climate change. Even if human civilization
isn't wiped out completely, we could certainly see massive changes in the
nature of our civilizations as a result. At least history seems to suggest so.
------
douche
_The Black Company_ by Glen Cook[1]. Gritty low-fantasy story about a more-or-
less lovable band of misfit mercenaries.
_The Path Between the Seas_ by David McCullough[2]. Account of the history of
the building of the Panama Canal, from the first French attempts, their
collapse, the political and business machinations to transfer ownership to the
US.
_A Mad Catastrophe: The Outbreak of World War I and the Collapse of the
Habsburg Empire_ by Geoffrey Wawro[3]. History of Austro-Hungary in the years
leading up to the outbreak of the Great War and the disastrous first year of
the war on the Austrian fronts.
_Old Man 's War_ by John Scalzi[4]. Military Sci-fi. Elderly earthers are
recruited, have their consciousness implanted in young, superhuman, and extra-
human, clones, and are sent out to the stars to wage questionable war to
expand the human race.
_The Forever War_ by Joe Haldeman[5]. Starship Troopers, except with
relativity, and so the poor SOBs on the front-lines watch the rest of the
world move ahead millenias around them.
_Avogadro Corp: The Singularity Is Closer Than It Appears_ by William
Hertling[6]. A team at a suspiciously Google-like corporation inadvertently
creates an AI system integrated with their email system, which develops beyond
its creators wildest dreams.
[1] [http://amzn.to/2gEdbns](http://amzn.to/2gEdbns)
[2] [http://amzn.to/2h5nIZg](http://amzn.to/2h5nIZg)
[3] [http://amzn.to/2gda4lm](http://amzn.to/2gda4lm)
[4] [http://amzn.to/2h85fvW](http://amzn.to/2h85fvW)
[5] [http://amzn.to/2h5seaw](http://amzn.to/2h5seaw)
[6] [http://amzn.to/2gddDN6](http://amzn.to/2gddDN6)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Nokia share price after the Microsoft partnership news - some1else
http://www.google.com/finance?client=ob&q=NYSE:NOK
======
Tichy
But why did Microsoft fall, too? It sounds like the best possible deal for
them?
~~~
ralx
Maybe for something like this: [http://www.asymco.com/2011/02/11/in-memoriam-
microsofts-prev...](http://www.asymco.com/2011/02/11/in-memoriam-microsofts-
previous-strategic-mobile-partners/)
~~~
Tichy
LOL, poor Nokia...
------
egze
Good time to buy. I'm sure it will recover
~~~
kevinykchan
I agree, having this deal is much better than no deal for Nokia.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Apple Q1 2012: $13.06 Billion Profit on $46.33 Billion in Revenue - georgekv
http://www.macrumors.com/2012/01/24/apple-reports-best-quarter-ever-in-q1-2012-13-06-billion-profit-on-46-33-billion-in-revenue/
======
yequalsx
The truly astounding statistic to me is that Apple sold 26% more Macs than the
same quarter a year ago. This while PC sales for other manufacturers declines
or remained stagnant. We expect to see increases in the tablet and smartphone
markets since those markets overall are increasing. But to increase 26% in a
stagnant sector is remarkable.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A super nerdy post about Hardware in Shenzhen (with loads of pictures) - sensors
http://www.txzero.com/hardware-in-shenzhen-part-3/
======
pink_dinner
"I discovered this when the company told me they couldn’t show off a lot of
things they wanted to."
Many of these factories will tell you anything to get you to buy, so I
wouldn't exactly believe this.
The problem is that not only can they share your secrets, there is pretty much
no legal recourse.
~~~
sensors
Always got to remain cautious of course!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Can I put something in space? - hazz99
Hello,<p>Is it possible for a technically-minded person to put their own cubesat/related technology into space? Are there major legal hurdles, or is it mainly financial?<p>Cheers.
======
giaour
Yes, you can do so. The cheapest option at the moment is to use a TubeSat kit
from InterOrbital Systems (
[http://www.interorbital.com/Tubesat%20Kits](http://www.interorbital.com/Tubesat%20Kits)).
The kit is $8,000 and includes a launch into low Earth orbit.
You will need approval if you want to take images of the Earth. Take a look at
DIY Satellite Platforms by Sandy Antunes for a detailed overview and guide.
~~~
arwineap
Hrm, approval from who? Seems like public "space"
~~~
giaour
The 1967 Outer Space Treaty makes individual nations responsible for the
extra-terrestrial activities of persons and entities under their jurisdiction.
US persons and entities need authorization from NOAA. (cf
[https://space.stackexchange.com/a/26373](https://space.stackexchange.com/a/26373)
)
------
sigmaprimus
Not sure where you live but in Canada there are laws regarding doing this, not
saying you can't but you might get in trouble, that being said it's almost
always easier asking for forgiveness than permission. Here is a link to the
Canadian law that covers this
[https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://w...](https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.canadianrocketry.org/files/tc_hpr_reqs_jan00.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiVh4nLyZHdAhUDFXwKHcooAdoQFjAMegQIAxAB&usg=AOvVaw1gAWpOC-
rMM8y-Bvqhg3GD)
If your interested in satellite tech I suggest looking into amsat, and if you
want a cheap way to communicate with satellites, I suggest getting your HAM
license and go that route.
Good luck
------
flingo
More to this question, are there any limits on what you can put in orbit?
e.g. could I put a satellite in orbit that broadcasts an SSTV signal that's
goatse, or a handgun? For the sake of the question, assume I can launch/reside
in any country.
------
danielvf
Three or four man college teams do cubesats all the time, so I’m guessing it’s
entirely doable by an individual. In the US I know you have to get FCC
approval, and do so you’ll probably need to plan on an orbit with a short
lifetime.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Opinionated Rundown of JS Frameworks for Single Page Apps - HenrikJoreteg
http://blog.andyet.com/2014/08/13/opinionated-rundown-of-js-frameworks
======
t0nyh0
Despite the potential developer productivity costs associated with custom
frameworks, I've decided not to use some of the bigger frameworks for the
following reasons:
\- Performance is a feature. I like less magic, more clarity on how data flows
through my system. $digest cycles, ng-repeat will keep me up at night. I sleep
better when I know what code is doing exactly what. \- Hiring becomes easier,
i.e. do not have to screen for certain framework experience. Know JS? Good,
that's all you need!
Of course, writing your own custom application framework is no walk in the
park, but like the article said, you'll have ultimate flexibility. In my
experience, writing your own custom app framework, you have to ensure:
\- Proper dependency management, use AMD or CommonJS. The alternative:
Spaghetti jquery code.
\- Enforcing class responsiblities, e.g. ViewModels are for data
transformation and validation only. Views are for DOM management. HTML is for
layout only. CSS for styles.
\- Proper risk/reward evaluation of third party libraries. Usually, the leaner
the library the better imo.
~~~
WettowelReactor
_Hiring becomes easier, i.e. do not have to screen for certain framework
experience. Know JS? Good, that 's all you need!_
How is training someone on your custom framework any less arduous than
training them on an existing framework?
~~~
t0nyh0
It is true that your own custom framework will need to be taught as well, but
the difference between a custom framework and using a pre-existing mammoth one
is that of clarity.
I will have a better idea of how data flows through my system so that if the
new developer creates a bug, I have a better idea of where the problem may be
and be able to isolate it better. Whereas, if you use a heavy pre-existing
framework, you run the risk of not knowing. The subtle bugs can be pretty
dangerous.
In the case of hiring, if I have a good JS developer, I can show him easily
how data flows through the system because it is more clear (if architected
properly). If I used a heavy framework, I may have to expect him to know the
subtleties of these external frameworks, and may even have to act in the role
of an "architect" to dissect it.
It's a balance to achieve between speed and productivity. My personal style is
to err on clarity and not magic.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Is React Native enough to justify using React over alternatives? - brightball
The discussion on Gitlab's choice of Vue.js got me wondering about everyone's thoughts on this. I hear a lot about front end frameworks but based on everything that I've read about React Native it seems that it gives me the impression that even if Vue or something else might be preferable - the potential cost/work/time savings of React Native would win the decision every time. Is there more to it?
======
jamon51
At Infinite Red we chose React.js over our previous choice of Ember not
because it was objectively better at web, but because it lowered the context
switching when our devs would switch between mobile and web projects. We have
many devs who only handle web or only handle mobile, but for the ones who can
do both, it's well worth it.
React.js being superior/inferior to Vue.js or others isn't very relevant
unless the gap is huge, which it's not.
------
thelambentonion
Having just started a project in Swift due to some limitations with 'native'
JS frameworks, I can honestly say I have _no_ idea why someone would use
anything else unless they had a burning need for code reuse with Android.[0]
The quality of the language and documentation has been superb, and I feel more
confident in my code than I did with another project written with JS bindings.
[0] I suppose the argument can be made that web-view components could be
recycled with minimal effort, but that sounds like it'd be a worse story for
end-users more often than not.
~~~
diegoperini
I'd like to respond with a real example if you don't mind.
We developped a native app that looks pretty much Instagram. It is written in
Swift and Java due to reasons you can probably imagine.
React Native became handy when we wanted to add a payment flow that can have
native like ux, remote updates (adding new offers, disabling some options due
to sudden legal changes etc) and a shared codebase. React Native with Codepush
was the perfect choice. It had native like performance, updates without
involving app stores and most importantly ability to be maintained by our
backend Node.js developers.
Was it worth the add the huge dependancy just for it? Arguably yes. Tooling is
good, integrating it took only a day. App size didn't increase a lot. Our
backend developers had the chance to use already established in-house utility
libraries.
Our design was to implement a React hosting Activity, a Fragmentand and a
UIViewController. No issues have yet be faced and it works like a charm (users
have no idea those screen are backed a few lines of Coffeescript.
~~~
diegoperini
Sorry for the typos. That comment was written with my mobile in a hurry. :(
------
jadengore
Honestly depends on your use case.
Do you absolutely need a native-feeling mobile app? React Native (and
ultimately React) are worth your time and investment.
In Gitlab's case, Vue.js works well for them because their product is web-
first and allows them to iterate quickly.
For the most part, I consider React Native separate from React entirely. I
consider most startups to either be completely web or completely mobile, and
to let questions in the former case be answered by validating and iterating on
the product quickly with a web app.
------
tones411
I put together an article a while back comparing a few different frameworks.
They all have their pros and cons. I should probably update it to add React
Native and NativeScript, but here you go for what it's worth:
[http://anthonytietjen.blogspot.com/2016/07/choosing-a-
mobile...](http://anthonytietjen.blogspot.com/2016/07/choosing-a-mobile-
development-framework.html)
------
WorldMaker
There are certainly still alternatives to React Native such as Cordova and
NativeScript, among others.
Some other frameworks have bindings to React Native using it as a just the
final "renderer". CycleJS has a React Native binding, though I'm not currently
aware of how well it works yet. I'm not aware of Vue.JS bindings for React
Native, but it may be possible.
There's certainly a question of whether or not you need "native" to begin
with. Cordova doesn't always feel "native", but it is reliable and reliable
can be all some apps/dev-teams need.
------
miguelrochefort
Xamarin is a great alternative.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Bricklayers Think They’re Safe from Robots - walterbell
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/07/upshot/bricklayers-think-theyre-safe-from-automation-robots.html
======
Spooky23
Bricklayers are already a dying breed... workers compensation makes it way too
difficult to build many structures out of brick. Most "brick" or "stone" you
see in new construction is some prefab panel glued to something.
IMO you'd employ more bricklayers doing trim work and operating the robot than
you do now. And we should move away from shitty manufactured wood, glue and
toxic treatments.
~~~
NullPrefix
>Most "brick" or "stone" you see in new construction is some prefab panel
glued to something
Prefix that with "In the States".
~~~
seanmcdirmid
What countries is brick still popular for primary construction? Japan is wood,
China and much of Asia is majorly concrete. Europe?
~~~
vincnetas
Yep. My house, and all neighbors around live in brick houses. In my country
people have this strange notion from Hollywood movies that if house isn't made
from bricks, you can punch though the walls with a fist :) And we also know
kid stories about tree piggies.
~~~
atonse
Even now folks in India (my home country) are always amused when they see an
American house being built. They say "it looks like it was built from
toothpicks" – and my answer is always "have you actually held a 2x4? Hardly a
toothpick."
I'm not sure about the structural pros and cons of wood vs brick, but from
what I've seen here in the mid-atlantic, brick is nowadays used more as a
decorative outside layer, rather than a superior structure (for homes at
least).
------
olivermarks
Bricks are expensive these days, and laying them is an artisan art and skill.
Where I live in California houses are currently erected in days out of cheap
wood and cladding. As soon as it is feasible this process will be automated
and ways found to construct them more quickly using the cheapest materials.
We recently had some terrible fires where entire subdivisions burnt. Dozens of
houses burnt simultaneously yet the trees and cars didn't catch fire. This was
due to embers landing on roofs and getting into attics - the houses went up
like paper bags.
Making sure the next generation of cheap building materials are fire retardant
and robust is a worry given the rush for maximum profit for minimum investment
and wealth sharing automation brings.
~~~
corpMaverick
Does any one know why are bricks expensive ? It is just dirt. right ?
~~~
ytwySXpMbS
It's clay, and wood is much more abundant in the US. However, in other places
such as the UK, wood isn't abundant, so most houses are made of brick.
~~~
kps
The UK has a particular problem with a fungus that attacks lumber, _serpula
lacrymans_ aka ‘dry rot’.
------
monocasa
Reminds me of the folklore of John Henry.
He beat the steam engine in a steel driving competition and was treated as a
hero, but died from over exertion. The steam engine continued to work the next
day.
------
dawnerd
Whats the setup time for a robot that lays bricks? If you've ever seen a team
of skilled masons/bricklayers build a wall, they're pretty freaking fast at
it. I imagine the time to transport/setup/calibrate/etc a robot would eat up
whatever performance gains it would have over humans - unless perhaps its a
really big job, but how many of those are being built these days?
~~~
Bartweiss
Fairly significant, apparently - you have to put up a scaffold alongside the
wall for SAM to work. (And presumably, you need firm, open ground to put the
thing on.) And they can't do corners or complex features, so when you hit
those you need to either stop the machine or move it to a different part of
the project. Headlines say they're 6x faster than normal masons, but that's
during a given span of operation; over the course of a day, with overhead,
it's apparently more like 3x.
That said, the machines are in field use, since masons are scarce and
expensive. You're right about the big jobs, too; they're apparently pretty
much limited to sites like universities and hospitals which have lots of big,
featureless walls. The Tech Review article about it is much more informative
than the NYT one here. [1]
I think this sort of automation worry seriously over-generalizes from factory
robots. Robots are spectacular at doing repetitive tasks with nicely-arranged
inputs and fixed workspaces. Hence, Amazon warehouses and Ford factory floors.
But (as the SAM people admit) outdoor, new-worksite tasks are going to involve
way more mixed human/robot tasks.
[1] [https://www.technologyreview.com/s/540916/robots-lay-
three-t...](https://www.technologyreview.com/s/540916/robots-lay-three-times-
as-many-bricks-as-construction-workers/)
~~~
OrganicMSG
Ideally you want a small robot that climbs the wall it builds with a crane
follower being fed by brick fetching robots on the ground. If it was done
properly you could fit it all on a flatbed and have it cheap enough to be
bought by standard building crews.
~~~
Bartweiss
It did cross my mind that the one guaranteed "work surface" present when
building a wall is the wall itself. I'm curious how the weight situation would
work out, though.
On one hand, fresh mortar can clearly support several new layers of brick as a
wall is laid. On the other, common estimates suggest a 24 hour wait to reach
60% of final strength. How light would an on-wall robot have to be to work at
a steady pace without disrupting the still-drying brick?
The other question, I suppose, is whether the brick-supplying robot makes that
redundant. It's either going to need a scaffolding or a cart/flatbed that
moves frequently to keep feeding target that moves back and forth, and if you
need a ground-supported robot arm right near the wall it might just be easier
to do everything that way?
~~~
OrganicMSG
I was thinking that the crane robot would run along the wall behind the laying
robot and fetch bricks from robot hovercraft that move pallets of bricks.
------
bkmrkr
The replacement will not be laying bricks but new technologies.
Computers didn't replace human "calculators" by using abacus.
~~~
ballenf
3D "printing" walls and entire buildings onsite from epoxy, resins or other
raw materials seems the most plausible.
~~~
robotrout
I'm not an environmentalist, but even I would prefer we don't graduate to
epoxy or resin for home construction. These things are all petroleum based and
I have to imagine they outgas for a long period of time after construction. If
they do burn, they will also doubtless emit lots of toxic gasses.
I would prefer 3d printing type automation, but applied to compacted dirt or
clay. I love adobe and wish it was more popular. Big thick walls that keep out
the heat and the cold seem like a no-brainer, if you can reinforce them to not
crush you during earthquakes.
~~~
ballenf
Agreed, although we already have a significant amount of petroleum based
products in modern (US, anyway) homes: insulation (more and more styrofoam),
sealing wraps, glues over fasteners, flooring, and plumbing. Your basic
plywood by weight is a large part resins already, although no idea the makeup.
Maybe automation will make more "organic" building materials more affordable
or feasible.
------
Y_Y
Just makes me think there's a market for a better brickie robot. The one they
show is lethargic and built like a train. Even two robotic arms, working like
a human does would be tons more efficient.
(I'd also like to complain about the stupid title, but it's what NYT picked)
~~~
fastball
Why emulate a human at all? I think that's the main issue. There has to be a
better way to lay brick once you get robots involved.
~~~
bluthru
It's probably anticipating corners and arches, but for the majority of bricks
this seems quite inefficient. Bricks could be rolling off a conveyor belt in
to place.
~~~
tintor
Conveyor belt doesn't help, as you would still need an arm to take bricks from
the pallet and place them on conveyor.
~~~
bluthru
True. You could also have an unskilled laborer grab two bricks at once and
place it on the machine at a rate of 1 brick every 2 seconds or so.
------
ohf
Clearly, SAM is a shitty robot. It looks as if it were designed by someone who
had no intention of using it to lay bricks.
~~~
Bartweiss
They're already in field use, and are apparently fine at it. They just do big,
straight wall stretches for things like hospitals. The "would lose to master
masons who have to put up corners in a speed contest" metric is a bit silly -
on non-corner work they're operating 3x as fast as the masons they're
alongside. No real risk they're replacing humans, but they do work.
[https://www.technologyreview.com/s/540916/robots-lay-
three-t...](https://www.technologyreview.com/s/540916/robots-lay-three-times-
as-many-bricks-as-construction-workers/)
~~~
dwighttk
Since they replaced journeyman masons there will be no new master masons and
once all the master masons are dead they'll have to do that corner work too.
~~~
Bartweiss
Fortunately, they don't seem to have replaced journeyman masons either.
Journeymen still do corners and other complex features, they just do it with
oversight. Rather, there's a shortage of masons at all skill levels, and so
far SAM is only cost-effective as a way to help fill that gap on very large
projects.
I'm sure that will change with time regardless, but I don't think it'll be
because SAM drove out human expertise.
------
thriftwy
When you see at brick buildings built 100 years ago, it's works of art. It's
apparent that amount of attention to detail is just not within range of most
brick layers today. Especially when you consider price point.
I'm talking stuff like this:
[http://www.etovidel.net/appended_files/big/4ea52a818bc08.jpg](http://www.etovidel.net/appended_files/big/4ea52a818bc08.jpg)
BUT, robots can change all that. You can render a wall on PC, with all mosaics
and tiles and all kind of super precise stuff, it will produce a complete
program for a brick-laying robot, which will then be executed up to a
millimetre. And it will also account for ventilation shafts, drainage,
internal structures within the wall to decrease weight, increase toughness,
heat- and soundproof.
~~~
UncleEntity
I'd blame Bauhaus (the movement, not the band) for the lack of fancy features
on modern-era buildings before I'd blame the bricklayers -- they just do what
they're paid to do and modern architecture doesn't call for that level of
detail in the brickwork.
~~~
usrusr
And it's such a shame that the radicalism of Gropius got all the attention and
imitation when he was surrounded by equally modernist architects who pushed
the subtle decorative qualities of brick to new heights. Even Gropius himself
is best when he puts brick into the mix.
------
jaclaz
An article with some more (past and present) "state of the art":
[https://www.theb1m.com/video/a-short-history-of-
bricklaying-...](https://www.theb1m.com/video/a-short-history-of-bricklaying-
robots)
using adhesive (for thermal blocks) removes a lot of the variables, to have
thermal efficient structure the smallest (thinner) the junction layer is, the
better, and as a matter of fact various kind of adhesives are already
replacing mortar in construction sites, with precision ultimately depending
only on dimensions of the bricks used.
------
oflannabhra
I think they are right, at least for a long time.
I'm not a luddite, but every time I hear people talk about how everything from
laying bricks to flipping burgers to landscaping will quickly become automated
I have the following thought:
Humans are amazingly versatile, and amazingly cheap.
If I'm making, say, peanut butter, automation makes sense. I'll put up
millions of dollars to leverage large-scale automation technologies (mixers,
conveyors, etc) because of volume and consistency.
The smaller the scale, the better advantage humans have, and will for a long
time.
Even if a burger-flipping robot existed today, it wouldn't have a great ROI
compared to the ongoing cost of labor. A restaurant just doesn't make enough
burgers for automation to be cost-effective yet. That is why most automation
has occurred at centralized points of supply chains, and why a patty that
enters a McDonalds is already the product of automation.
Someday, small scale automation technologies will have reached a low enough
price point, and an effective versatility that we won't need humans to lay
bricks or flip burgers. My bet is that occurs when the components (including
software) of such a robot become commoditized and modularized far beyond what
they are today.
~~~
goodcanadian
_Even if a burger-flipping robot existed today . . ._
Sorry, I had to point it out; the burger flipping robot does exist (though, I
don't think this really takes anything away from your point):
[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-43343956](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-43343956)
------
sandworm101
It is a new tool, not any sort of replacement. There is much more to brickwork
than laying bricks. Show me a robot that can crawl under a house to fix a
cracked brick, or one than can shovel a trench without breaking something.
------
peterwwillis
Why aren't they using shims and jigs? If you want to line it up right, make
sure you have the right amount of mortar in the right place, etc, put a jig
around it with some shims. It's the easiest way to build anything precisely
that has to be done over and over again.
~~~
jpindar
That might be the easiest way for a novice to do it, but would it be the
fastest for someone who has experience?
~~~
peterwwillis
Oh sure, someone who's an expert may do it faster without a jig. But we don't
need more expert bricklayers to lay 9 bricks a minute, we just need more
bricklayers. By using jigs you simplify the process and make it easier to
perform by less experienced people, and make the process more reliable, which
reduces waste, which increases efficiency, which brings down cost, and
improves quality.
------
bmcusick
Bricklayers are probably safe from a robot that can perfectly replicate human
bricklaying skill. What they're not safe from is whatever machine-built module
that can be easily assembled by unskilled labor on site replaces brick walls.
------
s73v3r_
So what are we going to do with the people who get displaced by robots? They
still need money to buy food and house their families.
------
0xdeadbeefbabe
Those brick layers (the human ones) look happy and healthy.
~~~
ghostbrainalpha
You are correct. We should commission a study on brick layers.
Maybe the secret to long term health and happiness lies in mortar work.
~~~
titanomachy
Next up: voluntary labour camps where unhappy desk workers can go lay bricks
to gain better life satisfaction. Learn the same techniques used by real blue-
collar workers! $20,000 per team for a weekend retreat. For an extra $2,000 an
ornery foreman will come out of his trailer every two hours and yell at you to
get off your ass.
~~~
cr0sh
Considering there are already places where one can learn hands-on the
operation of large heavy equipment - your idea doesn't sound all that far-
fetched, and might actually be profitable.
~~~
ghostbrainalpha
I did this in Las Vegas. [https://digthisvegas.com](https://digthisvegas.com)
I think $500 is too much if you have to pay for it personally, and I also feel
gross about paying to do other people's "job", but goddamn it was fun.
------
ricardobeat
Robots and humans alike are due for unemployment with our move towards pre-fab
and additive manufacturing.
~~~
dugditches
So the prefab parts are just going to put themselves together in the
factories? Then walk themselves to the job site? And erect and inspect
themselves?
~~~
fastball
Maybe stuff more like this[1]?
1:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUdnrtnjT5Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUdnrtnjT5Q)
~~~
monkeynotes
But a 'robot' built that house... Didn't you say prefab would put robots out
of business?
~~~
jsonderulio
Prefab robots with delivery infrastructure put local robots out of business.
~~~
pbhjpbhj
"Off-shore robots are stealing our jerbs; maintain me, puny human. EOL" /robot
------
jMyles
What a bizarre turn of phrase that bricklayers are "safe" only if they
continue to engage in their profession, which comes with a substantial risk of
injury.
Of course bricklayers will be _safer_ when robots are able to build houses.
Then bricklayers will be able to stay home and do as they please.
How have we come to think of the challenge of automating the matter of the
universe as within our reach, but the challenge of seeing each other as viable
individuals defined by something other than a "job" as unattainable?
~~~
ben509
Oh come on, commuting comes with a substantial risk of injury. People doing
work aren't victims, they are moral agents making informed decisions to pursue
larger goals.
~~~
jMyles
Of course - I love work. But I also don't think that it makes sense, in a
world of automation, to continue to define people by their work. There is no
risk of being "unsafe" just because our species has figured out a way to train
robots to do what was once your job. That's really ill thinking; the future is
much brighter than that.
~~~
s73v3r_
"There is no risk of being "unsafe""
I would say the risk of being homeless because a robot means I can no longer
afford my home means there's a risk of being "unsafe".
~~~
jMyles
I'm not sure how to make my point more clearly - that's exactly the part to
which I'm objecting.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
$100 in Google Adwords Credits - bks
I work at a Google Adwords approved agency and we were sent 20 coupons for $100 in Google adwords credits if you deposit $25.<p>I don't have 20 businesses to hand them out to before the Feb 28th expiration date. If anyone is interested - the terms are http://www.google.ca/adwords/coupons/terms.html<p>But just message me and I'll send one to you. It's a great way to validate a new landing page, or SaaS product if you are bootstrapping.
======
bks
These are expiring today Feb 28th. I have emailed to everyone who requested
one...
But here is a link to a list of the remaining codes that I have. If you use
one, please mark down that you used it. If not allow the rest of the community
to share.
There are going to be almost 30 codes in the list.
[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AkJ0d72ZbljkdFh...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AkJ0d72ZbljkdFhRc2pXUmtyVHFCZUZiYUZVYTV0N1E&usp=sharing)
Enjoy.
------
rex_gsd
I'd be very greatful if you could send one my way. Thanks !
~~~
bks
What is your email address. You dont have one in your HN profile.
~~~
rex_gsd
that's odd, I'd thought I put it in there. I've updated it now in the profile.
Thanks very much!
~~~
bks
Sent
------
sebkomianos
I'd love one and I upvoted. What else should I do?
~~~
bks
Sent to your email account defined in your HN profile.
~~~
bks
Also, for future people - no need to upvote - just ask for one and I'll email
it to you.
You need to activate by Feb 28th.
~~~
sebkomianos
Thanks a lot!
I assume more votes means more people get to see this?
------
xedeon
I could use one, if you still have them :)
~~~
bks
I just need your email address.
~~~
xedeon
joseph.bolus AT gmail.com
~~~
bks
done
~~~
xedeon
Thanks a lot!
------
steventruong
Could you send one my way, thanks
~~~
bks
sent
------
johnrgrace
I could use one
~~~
bks
I could use your email address.
~~~
johnrgrace
It's john at johnrgrace.com
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Hacking web forms to support iOS8 card scan feature - jesseangell
https://www.paymentspring.com/blog/hacking-form-cardscan
======
chaloobe
I wish Safari on iOS came with more documentation...
------
jrochkind1
Seriously?
> Setting the label text to “Name on card” was the magic trick.
I18n, who needs it, everyone prefers English!
~~~
pc86
I see no indication from the article that having the text in a different
language would change this. It's probably based on browser locale.
~~~
jrochkind1
The article said the text attribute had to be set to a specific string "Name
on card" for the autofill to work.
You really think that if the browser locale were set to, say, Spanish, then it
would work with only some particular spanish translation of 'name on card'?
That's awfully... optimistic of you. I suppose it's possible. And someone
could try to reverse engineer all the exact string literals expected for each
possible browser locale and hope they don't change. It's definitely not a very
i18n-friendly solution.
I'd actually be pretty surprised if it really did work like this, and was
hard-coded to different `text` attribute strings for different locales. But
it's hard to say what exactly Apple's motivation was for the odd details of
the undocumented implementation, so hard to predict what they may have done. I
guess more reverse engineering could be done. Which is pretty silly. Some
`data-*` attributes would probably be the 'right' way to implement this
feature, and not any harder to implement than hard-coded id's and `text`
attributes; heck, maybe it does support specific data- attributes, they just
haven't told anyone about it. Who knows, with no docs.
I honestly have no idea why my comment got downvoted, but that's cool.
~~~
jesseangell
Agree with you completely. It's pretty frustrating how it works, and I really
wish Apple would release some documentation on this.
I'm sure there is more to be found reverse engineering but once I had enough
figured out for our uses I stopped.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Attribute.pro – A cross-domain traffic attribution solution - acoyfellow
https://Attribute.pro
======
acoyfellow
I had someone ask: "Can you give more examples of (link:
[https://attribute.pro/](https://attribute.pro/)) attribute.pro and why
someone would use it?"
My answer:
Client X is a SaaS. They have all marketing pages on "root.com"
Their signup flow is on "accounts.root.com"
Their actual SaaS app (which has Mixpanel installed) is on: "app.root.com"
Outline of Problem:
\- You want to drive traffic to their homepage (root.com, root.com/case-
studies...)
\- You want to use UTM variables to track ad performance from Google Ads.
\- You have to get those UTM variables down into "app.root.com" (and inside
mixpanel)- so we know which people are attributed to which campaigns/sets/ads.
This tool is allowing me to do what I need: Attribute.pro - it allows me to
drop a tag on "root.com", use UTM links, then re-call those UTM links from
"app.root.com" (or any other domain)
How would you solve this problem?
------
acoyfellow
Hi HN; Just sharing a thing I built.
[https://Attribute.pro](https://Attribute.pro)
Why? I needed a solution for a client, and I wanted to make it re-usable.
Built with 1 single Cloudflare worker. No server, no database.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Supreme Court rules cell phones cannot be searched without a warrant - randomname2
http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/supreme-court-cell-phone-privacy-searches
======
belovedeagle
The current title of this HN post does not indicate this is from 2014.
------
tradersam
> absent special circumstances
Key phrase here.
------
trendia
> a unanimous Supreme Court ruled Wednesday.
Very good sign, in my opinion.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Study investigates if Covid-19 came to Calif. in fall 2019 - incomplete
https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Study-investigates-if-COVID-19-came-to-Calif-in-15187085.php
======
incomplete
OP here: i live in the bay area, and got a nasty 'cold' at the beginning of
november. was able to correlate my 'staying home sick' emails, work calendar
and texts to my (traveling) partner against covid-19's timeline and symptoms,
and they match up perfectly.
and i mean perfectly. crazy dry cough, exhaustion, timeline, fever, etc.
two days before the symptoms started, and four before i was suddenly _VERY_
sick, i attended a warriors game at chase arena in SF... probably the best
place to catch it.
i'm really curious about this study and will try and reach out to them and see
if it's not too late to get tested.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
So Much for the Death of Sprawl: America’s Exurbs Are Booming - acheron
http://opportunityurbanism.org/2015/11/so-much-for-the-death-of-sprawl-americas-exurbs-are-booming/
======
rhapsodic
Yep, I'll take a 3/4 acre lot and an attached 2-car garage in a low-crime area
over city living any day of the week. And I know there are a lot of people who
are really bothered by the fact that there are a lot of people like me. It's
fun to watch city dwellers brood and obsess over the existence of suburbs.
~~~
grapes4me
I pay $100/mo (tax free) for unlimited public transit, which allows easy
access to the airport. Most cars cost something like 8-9k just to own per
year. You also make higher salaries in the city, and if you have a % 401k
match, which doesn't cost you anything, well, that is money in the bank
regardless if your expenses are higher.
Not to mention, my commute is 30 minutes or less. One of my jobs my commute
was 15 minutes via public transit.
Have fun driving everywhere in the burbs and polluting the earth with tons of
green house gasses.
~~~
rhapsodic
Actually, I work remotely. I don't commute at all.
The tone of your reply is what I was referring to. You sound angry and bitter
because of the personal preferences I expressed.
You obviously prefer public transit to driving your own car. I don't happen to
share your view, but I'm not going to judge you or berate you because of it.
~~~
grapes4me
Its not just commuting to work, its everything that comes with living close to
things. Socializing is easier, there is more to do, more variety of
restaurants and small businesses, better access to services (medical,
government, library, etc), and world class entertainment. I'm within walking
distance to most things I need even.
I just don't understand why people would want to live in the suburbs over
living in the country or the city. To me, the burbs are isolating and
depressing; they are cultural waste lands. I don't have to to drive
everywhere, or maintain a car and thus I am saving another few thousand
dollars every year, its fiscally a no brainer to live in the city.
if you are going to be a hermit, better off doing it in the country.
~~~
rhapsodic
> I just don't understand why people would want to live in the suburbs over
> living in the country or the city. To me, the burbs are isolating and
> depressing; they are cultural waste lands. I don't have to to drive
> everywhere, or maintain a car and thus I am saving another few thousand
> dollars every year, its fiscally a no brainer to live in the city.
Dude, do you realize you're proving my point in spades?
Why are you trying to convince me that living in a city is better than in the
suburbs? I'm sure for a lot of people it is. But not for me.
_I don 't care_ if you prefer living in the city over the suburbs. But you've
amply demonstrated that you _do care_ about the fact that I don't. And that's
my original point. And I find it amusing that so many city dwellers care so
much that there are people who don't share their preferences.
~~~
grapes4me
I never implied i cared really, don't be so defensive.
My point, is that city living is objectively better than the suburbs, which is
why i don't understand why people prefer to live in the burbs aisde from
irrational and unfounded fears of crime.
~~~
rhapsodic
> I never implied i cared really, don't be so defensive.
The fact that you expended so many keystrokes explaining why you think city
living is better implies that you do care. And you were the one being
defensive. I never said one word trying to convince you my preference is
better.
> My point, is that city living is objectively better, which is why i don't
> understand why people prefer to live in the burbs.
No offense, but I don't think you're using the word "objectively" correctly.
You seem to put a lot of stock in your perception that it's less expensive to
live in the city. But money is a very subjective value. I make enough money
that I don't have to ride on smelly buses, so I choose not to. You may view it
differently, and that's cool. Perhaps you see it as a personal virtue, or find
it gratifying for other reasons. Whatever. And I like being able to start my
car in my heated garage in the winter, rather than dig it out of a snow bank
parked on the street a block from my house, like some of my urban friends do.
It's all very subjective.
~~~
grapes4me
No i used it correctly
not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice; based on
facts; unbiased.
The only reason I can think of to live in the burbs, is that there can be
better public schools, but if you are not raising a family, any argument you
can give, I can give you a logical reason why living in a city is better.
Regardless of what you spend your money on, or chose to budget, living in a
central location without needing a car, close to all amenities and services,
is better, plain and simple. I don't see how that is not objective, unless you
prefer living far removed from everything and wasting time out of your day
traveling in a car, which statically the more time you spend driving the more
likely you will die or be injured in a accident.
~~~
rhapsodic
OK, you're right. Riding smelly buses that run behind schedule and only stop
within walking distance of an infinitesimal portion of the places I might want
to visit is "objectively better" than getting in a late-model luxury car and
going wherever I want whenever I want...
Dude, do you still not see it? I made a point, not about city living, but
about city dwellers, and you appeared out of the blue, to illustrate my point
in one post after another. If anyone is reading this thread, they probably
think you're a sock puppet created by me. You illustrate my point _perfectly_.
And you also remind me that the city dwellers I've encountered, who obsess
about convincing others that their lifestyle is superior, seem to really be
trying to convince _themselves_ of that more than anyone else.
So, if you makes you feel better, I'll admit that I'm jealous that I don't get
to ride smelly buses or crowded trains every day, while being on guard against
pickpockets, and live without a car because I "don't need" one. It's soul-
crushing that my kids can play in any backyard in the neighborhood without me
worrying about junkies or mentally ill homeless people lurking nearby.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Google+ API released - taxonomyman
http://developers.google.com/+/api/
======
mirrorskin
Hmm, to be honest, I did expect a little bit more after waiting for three(!)
months now …
The hype seems to have settled. Now I hope that Google can come up with some
more details to their API soon, so developers can start building interesting
tools for this new ecosystem. If they wait another three months, I guess it
will be too late.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: What do top engineers you know do that others don't? - aledalgrande
Just wanted to get into the top 0.01% axons. :>
======
stickfigure
I boil it down to two things:
#1 Rapidly Climb Learning Curves
The ability to quickly learn enough about new subjects to be useful. New
technologies or APIs; new algorithms; mathematical or statistical subjects;
and most importantly, your problem domain. Some of this ability is a skill,
"knowing how to learn", which covers google-fu, reading comprehension,
prioritization, time management, etc. Some of this ability comes from having
enough aggregate experience that new information just clicks into place like
jigsaw puzzle pieces. Some of this ability comes from the confidence of having
climbed enough seemingly insurmountable learning curves that this next one is
"just another day at the office".
A sign you're doing this wrong: "I need training!"
#2 Understand The Customer
IMHO, the best engineers are half product managers. You can easily get a 10X
improvement in productivity by building the right features and not building
the wrong ones. Yes, professional product managers are great, but technical
limitations often impact product design. A great engineer knows when to push
back or suggest alternatives. This requires empathy not only for the customer,
but for the product management team. This ability is also tightly coupled with
#1 - you need to quickly come up to speed on the problem domain, whatever that
may be. If you wan't to be a great engineer, don't study algorithms (until you
need an algorithm, of course), study the particular business that you're in.
A sign you're doing this wrong: "Whatever, just tell me how you want it and
I'll make it that way!"
~~~
pmiller2
That’s a rather poor attitude you have toward your colleagues if any of them
dare suggest they need a little training.
~~~
stickfigure
"I need training!" says that _you_ need to figure out how to make _me_ good at
this role. It shifts responsibility onto the organization; if I suck at the
job, it's someone else's fault. A great engineer figures out what to do no
matter how dysfunctional the organization.
It's not that it makes you a _bad_ engineer if you can't thrive in an
imperfect organization. All organizations are varying levels of imperfect.
_Great_ engineers figure out how to be great anyway.
~~~
Scarblac
What if training is simply the most efficient way to get the required
knowledge and it has nothing to do with the level of perfection of the
organisation?
~~~
brianwawok
Maybe, but it means the guy who can teach himself via google is going to get
his similar project done a lot faster.
~~~
Scarblac
I don't think Googling is the fastest way to learn things in general.
But I was mostly thinking of stuff that can't be found on Google, e.g. the
last time I said I needed training was when I was going to do maintenance at
some company, on some internal application that I had never seen. I didn't
know the domain either. But I had heard that a two-day training course for
users existed (also given by internal people). So I said I wanted that
training (developers before me hadn't), people thought that was a good idea
and it turned out to be very helpful.
------
ericb
* Better googling. Time-restricted, url restricted, site restricted searches. Search with the variant parts of error messages removed.
* Read the source of upstream dependencies. Fix or fork them if needed.
* They're better at finding forks with solutions and gleaning hints from semi-related issues.
* Formulate more creative hypothesis when obvious lines of investigation run out. The best don't give up.
* Dig in to problems with more angles of investigation.
* Have more tools in their toolbelt for debugging like adding logging, monkey-patching, swapping parts out, crippling areas to rule things out, binary search of affected code areas.
* Consider the business.
* Consider user-behavior.
* Assume hostile users (security-wise).
* Understand that the UI is not a security layer. Anything you can do with PostMan your backend should handle.
* Whitelist style-security over blacklist style.
* See eventual problems implied by various solutions.
* "The Math."
~~~
huffmsa
> _Assume hostile users (security-wise)._
Ah, a personal favorite of mine which often makes other people uncomfortable.
1\. Users are like Marines, if it can be broken, it will be broken. If it's
use is not clearly marked, it will be used incorrectly. If it can be fucked
(literally or figuratively), it will be fucked.
2\. Users are malicious and are actively trying to backdoor everything you do.
Why? Because it's the first thing I do with a new product / what I do with the
competitions products.
3\. It is the developers responsibility to mitigate the above cases.
~~~
kingbirdy
> If it's use is not clearly marked, it will be used incorrectly.
In my experience clear markings aren't enough to stop it being used
incorrectly.
~~~
huffmsa
Ah yes. Should be revised to "unless it is clearly marked, it will rarely be
used as intended. Even when clearly marked, users will misuse in ways you
couldn't imagine"
------
giancarlostoro
One thing I havent seen posted which I mention in threads like this one
anywhere I am online: humility
I don't care how good you are, if your personality is hostile and toxic,
you're not making the team productive. If you can't take honest feedback
during peer review, or QA or even from the client, then you need to evaluate
why.
The best engineers I know are humble. They don't freak out when you point out
a bug, they look into it and figure it out, then they share with you what they
found vs what you found in order to determine if it is indeed a bug. Then
there's developers that think all their code is perfect and sacred. Nobody
likes working with those kind of developers.
~~~
bob33212
There is a grey area where a non-technical manager wants to make a decision
without understanding the long term impacts of that decision. Is the good
engineer submissive here and go with the flow or does the good engineer put
their foot down and suggest that that is not a good idea?
~~~
giancarlostoro
No, of course not. Humility doesn't mean you become completely submissive.
There's a fine difference between a great engineer blurting out "THAT WILL
NEVER WORK, WHAT ARE YOU EVEN SAYING!?" and... "Hey, Jim, I think that's a
reasonable proposal, however, I have some concerns ..." which do you think
sounds like the professional / good engineer, and which one sounds like a
Junior whose ahead of themselves?
I've met people who literally believe humility to be a weakness, I think a lot
of people misunderstand what it means to be humble these days.
~~~
bob33212
It is one thing to understand that you are not perfect and you could learn
something from everyone and to respect your co-workers.
It is another thing to be a legitimate expert and to not voice your opinion to
avoid conflict. I have seen smart people who avoid direct conflict at all
costs. Even if that means working on something you know is a bad idea.
~~~
giancarlostoro
They do it out of fear of conflict probably, or in other cases you're so
burned out you don't want to argue anymore. I've been burned out enough to
where I didn't care anymore I just wanted it to be over with.
------
tetek
1\. Don't bitch about legacy software
2\. Are willing to help with getting proper requirements
3\. Don't need a JIRA task for everything
4\. Don't say they are done if something is untestable
5\. Are willing to do stuff other than their skill (eg. one of the graphics
required for the project is too big, top engineer opens up gimp, resizes and
continue. Bad engineer will report to manager that design team did shitty job,
reassign JIRA ticket, write two emails and wait for new a graphic)
6\. Top programmers deliver well packed, documented software, keep repository
clean with easy setup steps accessible for everyone.
7\. Top engineers enjoy what they do, and are making the project enjoyable for
everyone, keep high morales and claim responsibility
~~~
AllegedAlec
> 3\. Don't need a JIRA task for everything
Genuinely asking: how so? Tickets are not just some bit of bureaucracy, they
are also a living log of what has been done and why that thing was done.
~~~
bpodgursky
My personal heuristic: if it is worth doing, and it takes less than an hour --
just do it now. Organize your team so engineers feel free to knock off quick
tasks at their discretion.
If you try for an hour and it's still not done -- make a ticket.
There's nothing more annoying than seeing the same trivial task get shuffled
around 4 sprint planning meetings, taking mental overhead from 8 people.
And nothing comes out of sprint planning with less than a quarter day
allocated. You've turned a 20-minute task into a whole day of wasted effort.
~~~
AllegedAlec
> My personal heuristic: if it is worth doing, and it takes less than an hour
> -- just do it now.
Sure, but that doesn't mean you can't create a ticket for it. It just means
that you have tickets which fall outside your sprint planning flow.
~~~
bpodgursky
My point is that the overhead of writing up a ticket description becomes a
significant fraction of the total work involved. Write a commit message if you
want it documented.
There's no need for a ticket for small tasks, unless you are being evaluated
on number of tickets closed (which is a separate problem)
~~~
ropman76
Like all things in life it depends on the team and workflow. I have my PM’s
make tickets because many times I am in the middle of a different feature or
bug and don’t want to have to have the mental load of remembering what the
issue was. Secondly I work with very solid PM’s who document the ticket very
well and it saves me time having to reproducing the issue. My team does have a
lot of tickets but we make it work for us and our process flow.
------
kthejoker2
I can't recommend Gary Klein's Sources of Power enough, it is stuffed with
awesome mental models, real life parables, research findings, and one quotable
passage after another on expert decisionmaking.
From the book, things experts do more/better/faster/etc than novices.
* Identify patterns faster and successfully predict future events more often.
* Recognize anomalies - especially negative anomalies i.e. something didn't happen that should - quickly and take appropriate actions.
* Identify leverage points within their architecture to solve new problems and deliver new features faster and with less effort.
* Make finer discriminations of events and data, at a level of detail novices don't consider.
* Understand the tradeoffs and consequences of an option.
* (I like this one) Recognize expertise in others and defer as many decisions as possible to that expertise.
* Their ability to "context switch" when describing a situation to other experts vs novices vs non-particpants.
And one that's not explicitly from the book but is contained in its wisdom:
* Skate where the puck is going, not where it is.
~~~
BoiledCabbage
All great advice - will have to check out the book
------
honkycat
1\. NEVER practice Coincidence driven development.
If you get lost, and no longer know why something is not working, do not just
keep fiddling and changing things.
Simplify the problem. Disable all confounding variables and observe your
changes. Open up a repl and try to reproduce the issue in your repl.
Read the source code of your dependencies. I have seen this a lot: People
fiddle with dependencies trying to get them to work. Crack the code open and
read it.
2\. Choose your battles. Not every hill can be the one you die on. You cannot
control every part of a code-base when you are working on a team. People are
going to move your cheese and you need to learn to not let that affect you.
3\. Learn to lose. Similar to the last one. Treat technical discussions as
discussions, not a competition. Use neutral language that frames your ideas as
NOT your ideas, but just other options. Keep an open mind and let the best
idea win.
4\. Write tests. There are outliers here, but the majority of talented
engineers I have worked with are all on the same page: If you don't have
tests, you cannot safely refactor your code[0]. If you cannot safely refactor
your code, you cannot improve your codebase. If you cannot improve your
codebase, it turns to mush.
5\. Simplicity is golden. Keep your projects simple, doing the bare minimum of
what you need, and do not refer to your crystal ball for what you might need
later. Single responsibility principle. Keep your Modules and your functions
simple and small, and combine them to create more complicated behaviour.
6\. Quit shitty jobs. If you are not learning at a job, or they are abusing
you, you need to get the hell out of there. Burn-out is real. Burn out on
something cool that helps YOU, not pointless toil for some corporate overlord.
0: Martin Fowler's Refactoring 2nd edition
------
analog31
I call myself a scientist, not an engineer, so I conveniently rule myself out
of contention. But I think the best engineers...
* Multidisciplinary
* Quantitative
* Scientific
* Curious, skeptical
* Thorough
* Willing to abandon a bad idea
* Willing to advocate a junior colleague's good idea
As an add-on question: Which of the properties mentioned in this thread do
your organization actively drive out of people?
------
celim307
Know when the juice is worth the squeeze, whether it be a refactor, a
political fight, or even the job itself. There are not a lot of hills I'll die
on anymore, while when I was younger everything seemed life or death. Now I
got other things to worry about.
------
api
A few I don't see mentioned:
They are strategically lazy, putting a lot of thought into how to simplify at
all levels. Great engineers loathe complexity and indulge in it reluctantly.
Solutions should never be more complex than what the problem domain demands.
A corollary to above: they use language features and constructs to solve
problems, not to show off how smart they are by constructing the most "clever"
bit of language gymnastics with which to waste the time of those who have to
maintain the code later (including the author!).
They know assembly language and the basics of CPU architecture regardless of
what language they use so they understand what is actually happening. They
also have a grasp of other aspects of the system like networking and storage
even if they do not do much with those directly.
They know the history of computers and computing and how things have been done
at various points in the past. This helps them spot fads and rediscoveries of
old things that have been tried already as well as generally deepening
understanding.
They are skeptical of fads and don't instantly adopt whatever thing is trendy
unless it's a genuine improvement.
------
xwowsersx
The best engineers I've worked with always ask the question "what are we
trying to solve here" whenever working on something that involves more than a
trivial time investment. Nine times out of ten, answering that question
clarifies critical issues and avoids going down to a high cost path.
------
b0sk
They have a great mental model of the inner workings on the product. Even for
a part of a code they haven't seen in a long time. When you debug code with
such a person, you notice that they seamlessly translate the piece of code on
the screen to the mental model and back (it probably takes hours for Jr
engineers to piece those together). Neo deciphering the matrix is a good
analogy.
------
FunnyLookinHat
* More interested in working methodically than frantically. (If the alarms are firing but they still follow method over shotgun approach.)
* Reads the docs of dependencies rather than blindly googling.
------
sunasra
1\. Research & Finalize architecture design before jumping to code
2\. Take code as documentation. This helps to debug things faster
3\. Focus more on problem solving than language/tool priorities
4\. Listens more and always towards exploring and experimenting new things.
This improves breadth knowledge
~~~
ahartmetz
1.5. Be willing to rethink the architecture when it turns out problematic. I
have seen systems that probably looked good as a diagram before a line of code
was written, but had to work around their own architecture with gross hacks.
Architecture is important, but organizations employing "software architects"
tend to be bad at software.
~~~
ahartmetz
The second part may read as a non-sequitur. The connection is that in
organizations that have separate architect roles, architects are shielded from
their mistakes because they don't work on implementation, and their work
usually isn't questioned.
The worst thing I remember is a web API where some call could fail but didn't
tell you, it just gave you some kind of plausible looking inert data. The call
to query system status was separate, so there was always a time of check /
time of use problem. Also there was a transition period when the original call
did return an error but the system status API didn't yet. Nobody (I hope)
comes up with such a disaster while implementing and testing it.
------
jdsully
The #1 trait is they will dig until they fully understand the problem. When
writing code if the first draft Is not good they will rearchitect until it
makes cohesive sense.
Time spent getting it right the first time saves significantly more time than
dealing with the fallout of not doing the right thing.
~~~
jasonpeacock
So many people stop when it works, without understanding why it works. Or not
caring how ugly it is.
They have no long-term perspective about the future cost of support - fixing
bugs, adding features, or just understanding what was done.
When something changes and their snowflake solution breaks, their first
reaction is to blame the external change for causing their poor solution to
fail.
Top engineers don't do this. They understand why their solution works, they
know its limitations, and their solutions are understandable and supportable.
This significantly lowers the total cost over time and is what helps projects
deliver on time with quality.
~~~
ScottFree
> So many people stop when it works, without understanding why it works.
Most work environments train programmers to act that way. I find this is
especially the case at workplaces that (sort of) follow scrum and agile. In
most of these places, junior to mid-level programmers are given a task to work
on that already has an hours estimate on it. Managers like to optimize
efficiency and programmer time, so that estimate is always tight. Asking why
we're doing this task is rarely received well and the tight time estimate
means there's barely time to make the change work in the first place, let
alone understand why it works.
We're literally training our devs not to be top devs.
~~~
aledalgrande
The reverse side of the coin is an engineer who has complete leeway on what
they do and they spend time "redecorating" their code ad nauseam. I think
there is a golden mean to be found.
------
acd
Key to good app performance starts at the data structures used in the app. If
those algorithms have good run / insert time the app will run good. Cache
layers is another key to good app performance.
It is important to test the code base.
The central bank system is making every day people poorer as they print new
debt. They got wage inflation imported from cheap globalized goods wrong. This
part is annoying to know since most do not understand this flow fully. It’s
engineering but financial such. New printed money is flowing to automation and
are deflationary. Understanding other engineering areas other than your own
field and seeing strength/weaknesses in those.
------
franzwong
# Prefer simple or replaceable solution. Avoid unnecessary layer of
abstraction. If you can't explain to others within a few words, you will
forget how it works and it will be unmanageable few months later.
# Prefer un-opinionated framework. This comment is opinionated. From my own
experience, opinionated framework only looks good in the first 5 minutes. You
always need to implement a more difficult solution to solve problems
afterwards.
# Offload your task to your subordinates People can only gain experience by
failure. It won't become a serious problem if you can give guidance and
review. The major benefit is you can spend more time on anything else.
------
huffmsa
1\. Knowing when it's okay to implement a "good enough" solution versus taking
the time to implement the "academically correct" solution.
Or otherwise put, knowing when to do things by the book, and when it's okay
not to.
~~~
tgsovlerkhgsel
I'd go further:
\- knowing how to make the solution "the right level of good", as opposed to
"academically perfect" or "unmaintainable hack".
\- being able to design and implement a "good enough" solution that is still
reasonably maintainable (if needed) much better and/or faster than others
~~~
huffmsa
"Correct enough" is the phrase I usually use here.
Knowing where on the scale to set that mark requires being able to bridge
speed of implementation, execution, maintainable, upgradability and the
overarching business goals you're building for.
So really a broad range of understanding that only "excellent" senior
developers will possess
------
m_ke
The most impressive engineers that I've worked with were great at focusing on
the task at hand and finishing them without getting distracted by other issues
that they came across in the process. They didn't optimize things prematurely
or try to come up with new abstractions for things that might come up in the
future. They didn't get into stupid arguments over minor details and were
focused on completing and shipping features.
------
vidanay
Have the ability to distinguish causes from symptoms.
------
ScottFree
They're interested in things other than their primary domain. Some of the best
web developers I know spent some time making video games, programming
microcontrollers, designing telecommunications systems, etc. They take the
experience and knowledge they've gained from those other areas and use them to
make better web applications.
------
AndrewKemendo
Being able to type/write accurately and quickly. Seriously overlooked skill.
Huge in the terminal, huge on the business/product side.
------
harel
A lot of good points were made. I'll add one I think was missed (and I'll
avoid the title "engineer"): A top developer knows that the stack does not
matter to the user. The stack provides interest or a familiar or economical
grounds to said developer but the user - they couldn't care less.
------
l3db3tt3r
Tact: They have a broad and inclusive means of understanding/managing
perceptions, and motivations that starts from humility.
Their ability in troubleshooting, problem solving, risk-assessment, is detail
oriented, and seeing the forest for the trees. Being keen-sighted, and
maintaining a field of view, and depth of field.
Informing, teaching, educating: They have a pervasive means of being able to
explain, walk through a problem and/or solution to a verity of audience types.
Some of the best at ELI5.
Understands the Intent, over just the labeled end goal. (As basically what the
US Military defines Intent as.)
Ability to give and take critique (also sharing with Tact above). This always
seems to infer just the negative, criticize/criticism, and the opposite is
often overlooked.
------
chrisbennet
If you’re working at the edge (or beyond) of your competency _that’s normal_.
------
karmakaze
They understand the difference between essential and accidental (I prefer the
term incidental) complexity. This isn't a simple categorization as something
that may seem extraneous, may have a near-term benefit making it somewhat
essential. What's absolutely undesired is that which is added by complex
designs that serve no pragmatic purpose for the user or developer, other than
the satisfaction of an executed grand design. This can sometimes be summed up
as that uncommon form of common sense.
------
logandavis
Great thread, great answers!
Follow-on question: OK, so how does your company's interview process test for
these traits?
It's mind-boggling to me how many organizations understand that the most
important traits of a great engineer are "soft skills" (how many answers here
are about really understanding big-O complexity or pointer math?)... and yet
are content to interview candidates with whiteboard algorithms problems.
Interview for greatness, not for having-brushed-up-on-Djikstra's-ness!
------
hprotagonist
* Consider ethics first.
* Happy to ask the uncomfortable questions early.
* Will ask technical questions proactively without caring about maintaining face.
* Has good discipline and communicates well.
------
Rocafella888
The best engineers I worked with were very respectful of my work (UI Design)
and were always happy to share their knowledge. They also ask me questions and
ask me about how we can do things better. They are constantly looking for ways
to improve our products for the customers, in contrast to the developers who
have an attitude of "this'll do".
------
srikz
There are many qualities, which have also been listed by others but I found to
be extremely common is this:
Be very organized / systematic..
\- in their thoughts and how they articulate their points during discussions
\- in building their personal knowledge base
\- in how they approach problems, be it during solving a customer problem
(adding a new feature) or debugging code
------
heurist
Trust your intuition, but don't be a dick. Pick your fights. Software is more
art than science. Learn from those who have gone before you. Also:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E86phiV8w2M](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E86phiV8w2M)
------
zaphar
One thing I haven't seen mentioned yet that I think to engineers do is read
the side code of the third party libraries and frameworks that they use.
Usually when they are trying to figure why something is broken, but sometimes
just when they are learning how to use it.
------
diehunde
Then don't hesitate when choosing a simple and maybe old-fashioned solution if
it's the right one for the problem. This could go from simple algorithms,
database engines, languages, to architectures and system design.
------
okareaman
If you believe Uncle Bob Martin it's the ability to pair. He recently tweeted
"If you don’t like pairing, don’t pair. But be prepared for the folks who have
developed the pairing skill to fly past you."
------
chance-name
The best engineers I know do their best to discover the core problem. They ask
why a problem should be solved. They also challenge “known” assumptions and do
their best to discover the real constraints to a problem.
------
pomnia
Top engineers understand. The hardware, the OS, the protocols.They use that
understanding to solve problems. The comprehension is the differentiator
between top and anyone else.
------
haidrali
listen this talk by DHH you might get an idea
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LfmrkyP81M&app=desktop](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LfmrkyP81M&app=desktop)
~~~
aledalgrande
I had missed that video, it's great!
------
backspaces
From 50,000 feet: \- Top engineers are able to solve a problem, and are hired
to do so. \- Others are able to solve tasks, and are hired to do so.
------
gargarplex
Are there any books you know that have been recommended to you by top
engineers? Preferring recommendations for books with exercises.
------
awill
They're better owners. They ship, and follow up on bugs until they're proud of
what they shipped.
------
fpalmans
Whenever someone talks about senior engineers, two close friends spring to
mind immediately, one of which is my brother (software development).
Even Though I am convinced that experience (and thus age) contributes to the
segregation between engineers and _senior_ engineers, I also think that it is
a special frame of mind which enables some people to truly become the top of
the crop. Despite my inflated self image and overly optimistic assessment of
my own intelligence, and despite the fact that I am convinced I would have
little trouble convincing an f500 company to give me the title of senior
engineer, I know that I can never attain the 'seniority' my brother and friend
already possess.
Having scanned through the responses, I didn't immediately see the specific
behaviors I have found in top engineers. First of all, I disagree with the
humility trait. I would not call top engineers humble. I would not call them
arrogant either. Top engineers have strong opinions, yet are flexible. They
have their ideas about best practices, yet are 100% comfortable adopting
something else.
Using a stupid example in software development, tabs or spaces. Number of
spaces. Top engineers will have their preference, whichever it is. And they
have thought about it, deeply. Not just from their perspective, but from the
perspective of all engineers, future, present, and past. You may probe as
deeply as you want, they will have looked at it from every possible angle and
will be able to explain to you in every detail why they prefer the one over
the other. And! This is so, so important... And! They will put their
preferences immediately to the side if that's just not how things are done on
this particular project, in this particular team. I wish I had better words to
convey this thought...
Top engineers will work with what they have to get to where they want to go.
And, that's not just the technology, it's also the team. Senior engineers in
your team will automatically make everything better. Sometimes their value is
educating the entire team on best practices, sometimes it is just driving
towards success despite the all of the feces.
Sometimes they might come over as arrogant, because they can speak with
confidence on certain topics. That's another thing that sets top engineers
apart from junior and regular engineers, whenever they speak with confidence,
it is because they are in fact confident. And they are only confident when
they have analyzed an issue sufficiently deeply and from everyone's
perspective that they are comfortable being probed deeply.
When they do not speak with overzealous confidence, it is because they are
still learning about the subject. And they will learn and analyze it deeply if
that is necessary.
A single inconsistency, or a single counter example, or even a single
ambiguity is sufficient for them to reconsider their position completely.
Also, senior engineers will never assume they know anything. They tend to
listen attentively whenever anyone is talking. When someone says something
'stupid' they won't assume that the person is stupid, or said something
stupid, they will assume they did not understand something and ask for
clarification. They tend to not jump to conclusions... If something is
ambiguous, they will identify it and ask for clarification. As a result, they
will often ask for follow-ups in the future... such as: "Thanks for the
information, can I get back to you if I have more questions?" Now that I think
of it, I don't think I have ever seen someone whom I consider to be a top
engineer not keep that door open....
I hope this helps.
------
ilaksh
Maybe some don't subscribe to narcissistic worldviews.
------
hadiz
Play video games. I am actually serious.
~~~
aretaic
I'm curious, could you please elaborate?
~~~
hadiz
Much like a codebase, some of the brilliant engineers I've met relish the
video games that lets them scour around the universe, think about strategy,
and get into action. It's like watching someone attempting an Olympic weight-
lift move.
~~~
someisaac
What games do you recommend?
~~~
hadiz
Unfortunately I don't play games myself. But Anno 1800 is something my very
good colleague plays these days.
------
EsssM7QVMehFPAs
Care about their responsibilities
------
notyourday
De-risk. De-risk. De-risk.
------
sys_64738
They say No.
------
BerislavLopac
Abstraction.
------
rasengan
Code all day and all night.
~~~
AnimalMuppet
For the most part, no. That's what wannabes do, trying to prove they're top
engineers. Most top engineers quit when they're tired, because they know that
if they keep going when mentally tired, they create more problems than they
solve.
There are a _few_ top engineers that get bored when they're not coding, rather
than getting tired after doing it too long. But that's kind of orthogonal to
whether they're a top engineer or not. In over 30 years, I've known _one_
person who was both a top engineer and a "code all day and all night" (or at
least all evening) person.
~~~
rasengan
You just said I was right lol
~~~
AnimalMuppet
Wrong. Doubly wrong, in fact. Wrong in your first post, and wrong now. I did
not say you were right, no matter how you try to spin it.
------
rado
UX don't matter
------
rv-de
overengineer and prematurely optimize everything because a pragmatic approach
to software development is too boring and you couldn't use a lot of fancy
tools and features otherwise.
tongue in cheek, yes, but with a grain of truth, I'd argue.
~~~
AnimalMuppet
I'd argue that those who do so are "top engineers", but not actually top
engineers. They have the reputation (especially in their own minds), but
they're not the real deal.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How great programmers learned their craft (interview) - comatose_kid
http://usmanahmad.wordpress.com/2006/08/02/great-programmers-answersinterview-with-steve-yegge-linus-torvalds-dave-thomas-david-heinemeier-peter-norvig-james-gosling-guido-van-tim-bray/
======
ntoshev
[http://www.stifflog.com/2006/10/16/stiff-asks-great-
programm...](http://www.stifflog.com/2006/10/16/stiff-asks-great-programmers-
answer/)
I think this is the original article, no broken text and Bjarne Stroustrup's
answers as a bonus.
news.YC has editors, right?
~~~
henning
Very odd, indeed. If you're going to engage in shameless wholesale scraping as
appears to have occurred here (and the site does appear to be a scraper site),
why not pick content on a topic that you can monetize
(porn/gambling/pharmaceuticals/mortgages/etc) easily?
------
tx
Guido is awesome. He clearly does not take himself too seriously. :) Linus'es
answers were the ones I most agreed with.
------
altay
David Heinemeier Hansson listens to _Jewel_?!
~~~
tyler
This might get a rise out of some people, but I believe that DHH is completely
out of place in that list of hackers, and his response to the question about
mathematics makes it painfully obvious.
So many things he says make me ashamed to admit I use Rails for most of my
coding these days.
~~~
ntoshev
He is different, sure. But no "true hacker" made a better web framework.
Perhaps there is something in his mentality we can all learn from.
~~~
altay
i agree with both of you, but i agree with tyler more.
------
jrcapa
That is very old, why are you posting it again?
~~~
comatose_kid
Simple. I didn't know it had been submitted. I did a search before I
submitted, but the article didn't come up in the first page or two.
One solution would be for news.yc to improve its matching algorithm (perhaps
looking at the body of html text, not just the title/url) - most people won't
even search for previous articles before submitting.
~~~
g00dn3ss
They actually have search? I was trying to find an article the other day and
looked all over for a search box. I finally had to resort to a Google site
search.
~~~
comatose_kid
I should have been more clear - I meant I used Google to do a site: search.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
BiteScript: Ruby DSL for generating JVM bytecode - zcrar70
http://blog.headius.com/2009/05/bitescript-002-scripting-examples.html
======
dschoon
I love how simple and practical this is. This is exactly the sort of tool I
never know I need until I desperately need it, and by that point, I typically
don't have the time to build it. Wonderful.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Trump wants federal hiring to focus on skills over degrees - SQL2219
https://apnews.com/da3c08790765a57a4dc6a258d252acef
======
CincinnatiMan
Small step to reduce credentialism, I'm a fan.
------
dkdk8283
This is refreshing - as someone without a degree I’m happy to see this become
normalized.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Google Creates Alphabet, but Runs into BMW - denzil_correa
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/12/technology/google-creates-alphabet-but-runs-into-bmw.html?_r=0
======
rco8786
Seems like a non-issue. They did no research ahead of time regarding
alphabet.com/@alphabet handles... this would indicate that they are not that
concerned about the visibility/branding of the holding company, which stands
to reason.
It's not like they didn't think about these things when they were naming, they
just don't care.
~~~
DarkTree
Yeah, to imply that the leaders of a massively successful company didn't think
to look into naming issues is extremely naive or grasping for news straws at
best.
~~~
kraig
In a way they may have not or they would have confirmed that BMW wouldn't have
an issue with it.
~~~
tobyjsullivan
It's not up to BMW. It's up to trademark law. And trademark law is quite well
established in this context that there's no issue.
------
dragonwriter
Runs into in what way?
Sure, BMW owns alphabet.com -- Alphabet, Inc., uses abc.xyz, and probably
doesn't care about alphabet.com. They aren't a consumer-facing entity, all the
consumer facing entities are presumably going to be subsidiaries with their
own names and identities.
And, sure, BMW has a trademark on Alphabet in particular domains. Again,
Alphabet, Inc., is a parent entity, its quite likely the subsidiaries will all
be doing business under their own names, not using "Alphabet" as a trademark
in a way that would conflict with BMW's trademark.
~~~
andrepd
Runs into in the sense that the first website people will type when trying to
access the website of Google's Alphabet is surely alphabet.com.
~~~
deelowe
Why would people be accessing the proposed alphabet.com? There's not going to
be any consumer related stuff there. In fact, I'd be surprised if abc.xyz will
change much.
~~~
andrepd
Yes, I know that. But I can see where the "problem" resides, even if it's not
actually a problem at all :)
~~~
deelowe
I think the point of the name is to be as common and forgettable as possible.
Alphabet isn't going to be some huge brand or anything. It's literally just a
holding company for the major bands (former) Google wants to see flourish on
their own.
------
fecak
Timely considering PG's post earlier in the week
[http://paulgraham.com/name.html](http://paulgraham.com/name.html)
~~~
molecule
_> Unless you're so big that your reputation precedes you..._
~~~
fecak
Agreed that nobody is going to think Google is a marginal company. IANAL, but
I'd think it's a bit odd that nobody from Google would contact BMW (as BMW
spokesperson said in article). An announcement this big concerning two large
companies doesn't seem a situation where you'd ask forgiveness rather than
permission.
~~~
icebraining
Permission/forgiveness for what?
~~~
fecak
There's a fairly common saying about it being preferable to "beg forgiveness"
than to "ask permission". In this case, I was referring to Google possibly
mentioning to BMW their intent to use the Alphabet name.
------
stephengillie
Engadget article:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10043212](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10043212)
\---
_...the Internet domain alphabet.com, as well as the trademark Alphabet,
already belonged to someone else — namely, the German automaker BMW. And if
they had dialed BMW headquarters in Munich, they would have discovered
something else: BMW does not want to sell._
Well that's embarrassing. Good thing they launched with abc.xyz.
But wait...
_Just because one company uses a name does not mean another company cannot
use it. Trademark infringement occurs if another company’s use could create
confusion with consumers, according to the United States Patent and Trademark
Office._
~~~
Zigurd
Good thing one of them is a car company...
~~~
nemo
BMW noticed Google's pushing into the (self-driving) car business. That's what
their trademark complaint's based on.
~~~
dragonwriter
> BMW noticed Google's pushing into the (self-driving) car business.
Kind of hard not to.
> That's what their trademark complaint's based on.
BMW hasn't filed a trademark complaint. They haven't even indicated that they
think that there is a violation. They have said they are looking into whether
any infringement has taken place, which is many miles short of having a
complaint.
------
mxfh
Journalist needs to create Article, types Alphabet into Google.com.
------
quadrature
Is it actually important for the holding company to be well branded ?
------
bitmapbrother
This is an article looking for a problem. Google doesn't care about
Alphabet.com nor did Google ever approach BMW at any time to make an offer for
it. It's a holding company, not a brand and in keeping with Google's playful
nature abc.xyz fits them just fine.
------
h1fra
They couldn't care less. The name does not actually mater for an holding and
the website will not likely be used for anything. I think no one will actually
search for this.
alphabet.com does not even reach the page 1 nor will abc.xyz (unless they are
faking results)
------
wanghq
Google -> abc.xyz -> alphabet -> a to z -> a2z.com -> Amazon
~~~
melvinmt
-> abc.wtf
~~~
stephengillie
a16z
------
WalterBright
I don't think single common English words should be trademark-able. Remember
when Zilog tried to trademark the letter Z? Didn't Intel try to trademark a
number?
~~~
sp332
Yes, and UPS has trademarked brown (and T-mobile has purple). Remember that
trademarks are limited to certain categories. If you're not competing with
UPS, you can use brown etc.
~~~
WalterBright
I know how trademark works (I have a registered tm myself), but am suggesting
that it change. To my mind trademarking 'brown' is so thoroughly uncreative. A
trademark should be more than a common English word.
~~~
dragonwriter
Trademark isn't intended to be about creativity (that's copyright), trademark
is intended to be about preventing commercial confusion.
~~~
WalterBright
The "Pixels" thing clearly shows that trademarking common English words is
ripe for confusion. A little creativity would go a long way towards reducing
confusion.
~~~
sp332
You can't make DMCA request for trademarks. That was a copyright complaint
that looked for a common English word. The complaint would have been overly
broad whether or not it was trademarked.
------
tobyjsullivan
TL;DR: Alphabet can't buy alphabet.com but clearly didn't intend to because it
is already using abc.xyz.
Just a click-bait headline.
------
massysett
Reminds me of Qwikster. The Twitter handle was already taken, and wasn't the
avatar Elmo with a cigarette in his mouth?
Knowing Google the decision was probably about as hasty as Qwikster was.
It's not that holding company names aren't important. Kraft realized
otherwise. They certainly thought about it before they picked Mondelez.
------
coldcode
Still seems stupid to not at least try to buy the facebook+domain name and the
twitter handle @alphabet. I bet the twitter owner would love to part with it
for a few million. Even BMW might be amenable to enough scratch.
~~~
dragonwriter
> Still seems stupid to not at least try to buy the facebook+domain name and
> the twitter handle @alphabet.
Why? AFAICT, the whole point of Alphabet, Inc. is to maintain common ownership
while reducing the visible ties between the various components. I don't see
Alphabet _qua_ Alphabet being the focal point of PR efforts, so why do they
need those kind of public-facing identities?
> I bet the twitter owner would love to part with it for a few million. Even
> BMW might be amenable to enough scratch.
And I bet Alphabet, Inc., is happy keeping the money and letting the current
owners keep the Facebook and Twitter identities, the Alphabet.com domain name,
etc.
Sure, they could spend money buying everything in existence that has the word
"Alphabet" associated with it -- but why?
------
ljk
> _BMW is examining whether any trademark infringement has taken place, Ms.
> Sandstede said._
how likely are they gonna get trademark infringement notice?
------
antaviana
This is a non-issue that will be cured when Alphabet's car subsidiari sells
self-driving BMW. Juzt like the non-issue between Apple, the device maker, and
Apple, the owner of Beatles songs, was finally cured when Beatles songs
started to be sold on iTunes.
------
o0-0o
I have been looking all over, but can't find where Alphabet is incorporated.
Anybody have the answer?
~~~
ianhawes
Delaware. "Alphabet, Inc" was created on July 23rd, 2015.
------
return0
Maybe google plans to buy BMW ...
~~~
kuschku
After BMW just bought the last remains of Nokia (including the smart-driving
subsidy of Nokia that produced 3D scans of all european streets), I don’t
think so.
Also Google is, for a carmaker, tiny. VW, for example, is over twice as large
as Google.
~~~
dragonwriter
> Also Google is, for a carmaker, tiny. VW, for example, is over twice as
> large as Google.
By what measure? Market cap, Google is one of the biggest companies in the
world, (#2 behind Apple, last I heard) in the neighborhood of $450 billion. VW
Group is around $100 billion. Google's _cash on hand_ is on the rough order of
magnitude of VW's _market cap_.
~~~
kuschku
Google has less assets, half of the profit and half of the revenue of VW.
Google has a higher valuation due to an investment bubble, not due to actual
economics.
~~~
dragonwriter
> Google has less assets, half of the profit and half of the revenue of VW.
Most recent quarterly numbers are more like Google has 1/3 of the _revenue_ of
VW but 85% of the _profits_.
> Google has a higher valuation due to an investment bubble, not due to actual
> economics.
Even if it was due to an investment bubble rather than, say, rational
expectations of stronger long-term growth based on market characteristics,
well, investment bubbles are as much "actual economics" as anything else.
~~~
kuschku
Advertising in general is a grossly overvalued business.
VW will still build cars, engines and small-scale power plants in a century.
Web advertising is already becoming an issue now, with more and more people
moving to mobile, vendors pre-installing adblockers and even ad agencies
starting to doubt the effectiveness of easily overlooked Google ads.
And still, VW, a single carmaker in a single company, is larger than the
overvalued internet giant of Google that controls advertising in all but a
handful of countries.
Google is a tiny player in the rest of the world economy.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Lesson: Oracle's driving MySQL to open core; don't sign contributor agreement - chaostheory
http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2011/09/open-core-mysql/index.htm
======
justin_vanw
Good news! Postgresql scales really well, and will always be open source.
Plus, it has more features and great compliance with the SQL standard.
~~~
socratic
You're certainly not alone in hoping that MySQL loses market share to
PostgreSQL under Oracle's stewardship. I've always assumed that MySQL has been
more prevalent due to some combination of historically earlier user
friendliness, an incompatible SQL implementation, and feedback effects related
to the previous two factors.
That said, is there something that would be lost if everyone just switched
from MySQL to PostgreSQL tomorrow? What benefits does MySQL have over
PostgreSQL these days?
~~~
fauigerzigerk
a) Clustered and covering indexes.
b) Non-transactional tables
Both allow you optimize the memory usage of some particularly problematic
cases, specifically very large, simple tables. Postgres cannot return data
directly from indexes (covering indexes). It always has to go back to the
table itself to fetch the actual data. If the table is large, that can be
inefficient for some types of queries.
Non-transactional tables use a lot less memory as well. For instance, if you
have a large table that represents a N:M relationship (id1 int, id2 int), the
two ints use 8 bytes of memory. A postgres table adds about 24 bytes per
record, three times the actual data, plus some overhead per page.
Don't take this to mean that MySQL is faster than Postgres. That's not
generally the case. The Postgres query optimizer is vastly better than
MySQL's. So for complex queries and data models, Postgres is way superior. The
big differences are always related to very specific data model and query
combinations, so general benchmarks are utterly useless.
~~~
caf
Unlogged tables are now in Postgres as of release 9.1:
<http://www.postgresql.org/docs/9.1/static/release-9-1>
~~~
fauigerzigerk
That's very good news! I have to look at the physical data structures and what
it means for memory usage though. "Unlogged" as such only means they don't use
WAL.
------
Udo
Any MySQL hackers can always just leave this Oracle nightmare behind and join
MariaDB, it's a promising fork of the MySQL core and they're working hard on a
new storage engine for it.
~~~
piotrSikora
...or Drizzle.
------
goombastic
Oracle has typically been a licensing centric company. The "named user plus"
licensing thing can be unwieldy for most small firms. The past few years have
been bad for it as a result. SAAS based innovation, unconventional databases,
database scaling bottlenecks, parallelization, in-memory computing, mobility
and a lot of the low cost innovations around these have emerged as a threat to
Oracle. The options it has had are acquiring OpenSource and aggressively
defending patents. All the while its marketing teams continue to whitewash
offerings like exalogic as "cloud" offerings.
I feel that Oracle tends to explore options to corral innovation. Its
OpenSource portfolio is the classic trojan horse. Expect all sorts of lock-in.
~~~
toyg
I'm sorry, you're sorely mistaken. I've worked at Oracle (been acquired) and
i've seen numbers. Licensing is not the main source of profits, support is;
they might sell it differently, but that's where they make the real dough. The
margins are astonishing. And look at the numbers they just posted about
Europe: +50%. At these levels, that's huge.
~~~
goombastic
I agree. All I wanted to point out was the difficulty in using their stack if
you are a small firm or an innovator.
------
jacques_chester
I guess Oracle just don't see MySQL as enough of a threat, or enough of a
profit opportunity, to shackle to the mothership with contributor agreements.
Indeed it might even speed up MySQL development, potentially undercutting
Oracle's serious open source rivals.
~~~
Roboprog
Oracle has a problem in that PostgreSQL is somewhat of a threat, in terms of
features and similarity. OK, the default stored procedure language is not
exactly the same, but it's fairly close to PL/SQL.
Nobody is going to mistake MySQL for Oracle, and I suspect Oracle wants to
keep it that way, while dragging MySQL along just enough to prevent an exodus
of FOSS developers to PostgreSQL.
I should probably re-evaluate MySQL again, but they scared the Hell out of me
back in 2001 when I found it did not support rollback, nor foreign key
constraints, nor transaction isolation at the time. I KNOW THEY HAVE FIXED
THIS STUFF SINCE THEN, but the mentality that thought it was OK to leave that
stuff out??? I did enough xBASE stuff in the 80s to know I did not want to
back to that confusion. I would rather use an ISAM interface than debug query
planning in SQL, but having to use SQL, and getting none of the data integrity
benefits?!? Screw that!
Y'all enjoy your MySQL, and I hope the whole source code license issue works
out well for you :-)
~~~
jacques_chester
I use Oracle at work, Postgres at home and MySQL only when I have to.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
SMT-COP: Defeating Side-Channel Attacks on Execution Units in SMT Processors - matt_d
http://www.cs.binghamton.edu/~dima/pact19.pdf
======
justincormack
The original idea for SMT was that a single application would use both threads
to do part of the same computation, using resources better. But we just used
it as "more CPUs", which has a different security profile.
~~~
ryacko
It would be interesting if logic units were uncoupled from cores, then
multiple cores could share multiple logic units, reducing contention pressure.
As it is, all designs treat CPUs as a series of chiplets.
~~~
zamadatix
The AMD bulldozer was a "Clustered MultiThreading" chip somewhat as you
describe in that certain units were shared between what would normally have
been a core. It was a bit of a disaster though as it was more "cut down and
share what's left" than "keep and share".
I have a feeling it'd be hard to find something that is easier to route and
schedule over multiple cores than it is to just add that extra unit to a
single core. AMDs latest CPUs are a good example of this, the L3 cache isn't
even contiguous across all cores in the same core complex anymore (same access
pattern as if you went to a completely different chiplet).
~~~
ryacko
According to Intel’s manual (although I don’t think it still applies):
“Under heavy load, with multiple cores executing RDRAND in parallel, it is
possible, though unlikely, for the demand of random numbers by software
processes/threads to exceed the rate at which the random number generator
hardware can supply them.”
I don’t think it would be that hard to find something to route over multiple
cores. If certain operations were unrolled and buffered, it would be overall
more efficient.
~~~
zamadatix
Depends on the elements you're talking about. RDRAND takes no input other than
"I need a number" and produces output by feeding the constant output of a
hardware RNG to the AES components of a particular core.
Pretty much every other piece of the CPU needs to consume inputs and produce
outputs without race conditions or cache coherency. This is where it becomes
difficult to connect and schedule and is the reason AMD ends up with 16*16 MB
of L3 cache instead of 1x256MB, trying to pump coherency instead of just
output over an interconnect comes with an ENORMOUS penalty.
~~~
ryacko
I wasn’t aware that RDRAND was implemented in microcode on the same core, I
thought it was implemented as a coprocessor with some microcode checks for
quality.
Avoiding speculation on the output of high latency instructions seems prudent.
------
SketchySeaBeast
This is largely a cloud/server issue, is it not? Any desktop machine that's
running malicious code is already compromised, isn't it? Or is this a concern
with drive by JavaScript? I never know if these issues are likely to impact
the home user or not.
~~~
dijit
These issues can be triggered via javascript, yes.
[https://github.com/terjanq/meltdown-spectre-
javascript](https://github.com/terjanq/meltdown-spectre-javascript)
------
verdverm
Awesome, love to see great work from my alma mater!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Infectious Dose May Explain High Mortality of 1918–1919 Pandemic (2010) - Nuzzerino
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2909907
======
redis_mlc
> Conclusion
> The increase on the proportion of infectious persons as a proxy for the
> increase of the infectious dose a susceptible person is exposed, as the
> epidemic develops, can explain the shift in case-fatality rate between waves
> during the 1918 influenza pandemic.
I don't have the tuits to read and analyze the entire paper, but I pasted the
conclusion above.
My interpretation is that a longer period of "social distancing" would have
helped in 1918, though it was so infectious that it went global before
airliners.
As apparently people were still infectious after they felt better and left
their house, causing healthy people to become even sicker than expected with
the increased viral load from both pre-symptom and still recovering patients.
Can somebody study the entire paper and see if my interpretation is what the
paper is implying?
Also, for those not familiar with that pandemic, it was a subtype of H1N1 and
the highest in fatalities, killing 50-100 million people, and occurred near
the end of WW1, which also meant famine in parts of Europe. Like corona, it
affected the lungs.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influenza_pandemic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influenza_pandemic)
A lot of nobility died in WW1 (machine guns killed soldiers and their
commanders alike), which ended the influence of European royalty outside
Britain.
~~~
Nuzzerino
> As apparently people were still infectious after they felt better and left
> their house, causing healthy people to become even sicker than expected with
> the increased viral load from both pre-symptom and still recovering
> patients.
That is not how I interpreted it. If you are out of the house, you are more
likely to get a smaller dose of the infection (such as from a handrail or
something), and therefore your immune system is going to have a head start on
fighting it.
If everyone is home on the other hand, and one person in the house gets sick,
then everyone else in the house is more likely to get a higher dose of the
infection due to the repeated proximity to others in the house. And therefore
the infection is gaining a foothold and head start against the immune system.
------
meowface
Could this partly explain why healthcare workers are being hit particularly
hard by COVID-19, including young ones?
~~~
Nuzzerino
Yes.
| {
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PeopleAhead takes on Monster.com with qualitative job-matching algorithms - waderoush
http://www.xconomy.com/2008/06/11/peopleahead-has-forward-looking-take-on-the-online-job-board/
======
tom
An interesting take on the age old "person can do this" and "company wants to
pay someone to do that" how do we unite the two parties problem. It'll be fun
to see how the "fuzzy" criteria can help improve matches with some real, more
random (ie: not just Biz school folks) user profiles.
Finally, I'm sure they worked hard to get the LinkedIn stuff to work, but
there it is again - another site asking for my user and pw ... though I do
like that they have a nice note about their privacy policy and how they'll use
your credentials. Still, what happens when I update my LinkedIn account? Are
they storing user/pw and syncing? Somehow I doubt it. Will they prompt me
regularly to update/sync?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Illustion of a Balanced Schedule - redcapeman
http://www.alexparker.me/the-illusion-of-a-balanced-schedule/
======
mijustin
This really resonated with me:
_There is no achievable perfect balance point of schedule. Many things that
appear to be "balanced" are actually in constant motion in order to maintain
the illusion of balance._
I've found this becomes even more true as you have a family. There are so many
unplanned events with kids; they key, it seems, is to be flexible.
| {
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Stanisław Leśniewski: rethinking the philosophy of mathematics [pdf] - danielam
https://biblio.ugent.be/publication/4443772/file/4443780.pdf
======
Kednicma
It's always worth recalling _why_ we bother with set theory. Philosophical
objections like Leśneivski's are extremely valuable and good insights which we
cannot discard trivially. Maybe sets are not good things to study. The main
reason that we study sets today is because they are a place where we could
study ordinals and the rest of number theory. We know about two bananas, two
apples, two trees, etc. but what is two itself? Set theory provides a capable
if unsatisfying answer: Two is anything which is uniquely isomorphic to the
second ordinal number, which happens to be a particular finite set, and since
sets formally contain nothing but other sets, we can manipulate two as a set
without having to know about bananas, apples, trees, etc.
The modern way to talk about this stuff is via categorification; [0] is a good
high-level introduction.
[0]
[https://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/quantization_and_categorifica...](https://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/quantization_and_categorification.html)
~~~
spekcular
Set theory does not answer the question, "what is two itself?" This is a
common misconception. It just provides a way to translate statements about the
natural numbers into statements about sets, which then you can use for proofs
and formal constructions. It's an encoding, _not_ a definition. In particular,
the definition you give of two is not correct and I'd be interested to learn
who told you it.
Further, the "modern" way to discuss this is not categorification, despite
what Baez says; people who work and publish on the foundations of mathematics
almost universally do so in the language of set theory.
~~~
Kednicma
Since sets are 0-categories, we can't escape set theory when talking about
structures like the natural numbers. A natural numbers object is a feature of
a topos, preserved by topos functors (geometric morphisms). Nobody told me
this definition; it's something I had to absorb for myself when learning topos
theory.
Formally, let N be the natural numbers object (in some topos), let z : 1 -> N
be the zero arrow, and s : N -> N be the successor arrow. Then z;s;s : 1 -> N
is the arrow which chooses 2 as an element of the NNO. Since z and s are
unique up to unique isomorphism, so is 2. Moreover, since geometric morphisms
between topoi preserve finite limits, the NNO should also be preserved, and
that includes 2.
When the topos we choose/define is (equivalent to) Set, then we get the
standard ordinal-number definition of 2.
To use a pun, this lets us upgrade from Dedekind-categoricity to a more modern
and natural sort of categorical categoricity.
~~~
spekcular
Of course we can escape set theory (and categories) when talking about the
natural numbers. The concept of "two" predates the concept of a set by at
least a thousand years. People were happily manipulating and investigating the
natural numbers before set theory ever came along.
As I said previously, it is true that set theory provides a way to _encode_
the natural numbers as sets (or features of a topos, etc.), so that questions
about natural numbers can be stated as questions about sets. It is further
true that this endeavor can be incredibly fruitful, for instance for studying
the foundations of mathematics. But it does not mean that natural numbers
"are" sets (or objects in a topos), any more than Quicksort "is" a piece of
C++ code.
------
sanxiyn
See
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Foundations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Foundations)
for another alternative foundation of mathematics.
~~~
dr_dshiv
The original philosophical foundation of mathematics would be Pythagoreanism
[1].
For instance, that there is a special, transcendent meaning to "oneness" or
"twoness" — or more generally, that there is a basic harmony within
mathematics that manifests in the harmonies of the cosmos.
Here is a nice article on the sources of his mathematical contributions.
[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0315086089...](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0315086089900207/pdf?md5=f82cfebc9d937472cb2b6a4af44ae195&pid=1-s2.0-0315086089900207-main.pdf)
[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pythagoras](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pythagoras)
~~~
bawolff
Trying to find an axiomization of mathamatics and trying to find the
metaphysics of mathamatics seem like two very different projects to me.
~~~
dr_dshiv
Hmm, getting to the bottom of axioms feels a lot like metaphysics, but open to
why they'd be a different ballpark.
~~~
bawolff
In my mind, metaphysics is asking "why", axioms are asking "how"/"what"
~~~
dr_dshiv
That's fine. It's just that when you get to the very bottom of axioms, it can
get a little weird. Like, is the underlying basis the one, the nothing or the
all? Is it being or not being? That is metaphysical -- and has implications
for the foundation of any axiom, no?
~~~
bawolff
I'm not sure what it even means for the underlying basis to be one or nothing
or everything (basis of what specificly?). That doesn't sound like an axiom
thing to me.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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