Homebrew 1.9.0 - <AUTHOR> https://brew.sh/2019/01/09/homebrew-1.9.0/ <comment><USER2> Automatic cleanup sounds like a major improvement. It's almost scary how much disk space is used by Brew if you don't/didn't run cleanup periodically.

Since I don't install 'mission critical' application through brew, I've always had the following command run daily though a cronjob:

      brew update && brew upgrade && brew cleanup

<comment><USER3> I wanted to comment about this as a LPT because of past experiences, then went to run `brew update` and `brew upgrade` which took more than an hour because it had to build a new version of LLVM from source... Then I ran `brew cleanup` and boom, 4.4GB of free space on a MacBook Air with a small disk.

Overall I hate how slow brew is, especially `update` should be 10x faster, it should maybe warn about source builds that could take forever, and it should maybe give a summary like `apt` whether there are packages to be `autoremove`d.

<comment><USER4> You may know it already but as a PSA: you can usually avoid source builds on `brew install` and `brew upgrade` if you do it without options (such as `--with-lldb`). Unless you customize your installation using options, Homebrew will install your package from bottle, which is infinity times faster than building from source.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I really wish these release notes would explain what is going on for people who don't know the internals of homebrew. Especially since homebrew force- updates itself and there's no way for users to avoid these changes.[1]

There are several updates in here that make me worry that this is somehow going to break my environment or otherwise bite me in the ass when I do something innocent like install Ghostscript and find that Emacs no longer works and to figure out how to fix it's going to be hours of reading github issues. Which is an experience I've had before, repeatedly.

"brew update no longer migrates legacy keg symlinks, tap names, repository locations, cache locations or cache entries."

Is this going to break something I installed years ago? Maybe the homebrew maintainers know, but average tool users don't.

"Homebrew/homebrew-core requires all formulae to be open source by the OSI definition."

Does this mean that something I used homebrew to install in a previous version will no longer be getting updates? Will things that depend on it still be getting updates? Does whether or not updates happen depend on some random committer's legalistic interpretation of an open source definition? Why exactly is this kind of purist decision being imposed on users?

[in 2.0] "brew cleanup will be run periodically and for trigger individual formula cleanup on reinstall, install or upgrade. You can enable this behaviour now on 1.9.0 by setting the HOMEBREW_INSTALL_CLEANUP variable."

So you're going to periodically make maintenance changes to my system without my permission. Goodie.

Someone really needs to write a guide to migrating away from homebrew for people in the unfortunate situation of having used this tool for a long time, and find it taking more and more liberties with one's computer, but also having numerous essential packages now managed by it and not sure how to move to alternatives without weeks of breakage.

[1] [https://paultopia.github.io/posts-output/anti- homebrew/](https://paultopia.github.io/posts-output/anti-homebrew/)

<comment><AUTHOR> > Especially since homebrew force-updates itself and there's no way for users > to avoid these changes.[1]

This is not true. `man brew` documents how to disable auto-updates.

> Why exactly is this kind of purist decision being imposed on users?

Because there's a lot of current debate about whether things being relicensed under the Commons Clause is "open source" or not and we'd rather lean on an established, well-documented authority on what that definition is. Additionally, part of our agreed membership of the Software Freedom Conservancy (who help us with a lot) involves ensuring our core formulae are open source software.

> So you're going to periodically make maintenance changes to my system > without my permission. Goodie.

Again, `brew man` documents how to disable this.

\---

The complaint behind the individual complaints is "why doesn't Homebrew work the way I want it to". That's a reasonable complaint and there may be better tools for you to use rather than Homebrew but we're going to continue to build Homebrew to work in a way that works best for the majority of our users and avoids our (entirely voluntary) maintainers having to deal with the same issues again and again.

<comment><USER6> As someone who _uses_ homebrew religiously, but isn't familiar with the inner- workings, I'll second the sentiment that some _whys_ on the changes would be much appreciated.

Otherwise it just looks like a bunch of scary behavior changes w/o a clear upside.

<comment><USER7> that's a really good suggestion. As someone that writes a lot of changelogs, they would really benefit from including _why_ and not just _what_.

I do think, however, that users greatly underestimate how much time it takes to write up a good changelog. Even one that is as simple as this.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeh, that's it in a nutshell, unfortunately. I wish I had more time to write great changelogs for Homebrew but I don't :(

<comment><USER6> Not for me to tell you how to prioritize your time, of course, but I'll just say in my experience programmers tend to vastly over-index on the importance of stuff like crushing code and under-index on the importance of stuff like communicating w/ the community. Non-tech tasks are still hugely important.

Cheers, and thanks for your work on homebrew. It really is a great tool.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the kind words.

For what it's worth, I really do value this stuff which is why we have release notes at all, a Discourse forum, etc. most of which I've setup and run :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Good job! Homebrew is, at least for me, essential for using macOS as a true *nix, and most of the changes (implemented or proposed) seem good (e.g., the ability to automatically run cleanup)

I am a little bit worried for the removal of all options that is planned for the 2.0.0 version: I have some formulae installed from source (with additional options) and I like the flexibility that they give. Hopefully the migration to an "options-free" Homebrew will be smooth and some alternative when options are needed (not requiring a lot of third-party taps) will emerge.

<comment><USER9> > I have some formulae installed from source

Homebrew has gone out of its way to make this more difficult lately, to the point where 'brew doctor' complains when HOMEBREW_BUILD_FROM_SOURCE is set, and now it's deprecated.

Homebrew's bottle infrastructure is a tempting target if you want to get malware deployed to Macs, and as best I can tell, there is scant documentation out there about what they do to secure it. For all I know, the bottles are built on some random bozo's Mac.

The snarky side of me thinks that if build from source is discouraged then the program should rename itself to Macrobrew (as I'm sure Budwiser would sue their pants off if they used that name).

<comment><AUTHOR> > there is scant documentation out there about what they do to secure it

We have private operations documentation and have had private security reviews of our infrastructure. We are actively moving away from self-hosted infrastructure this year.

<comment><USER9> Do you have published security reviews of your infrastructure? Otherwise you're asking us to just trust you.

Note: I'm not denying that you have a stellar track record, but it would be nice to have more evidence that this is not down to luck or obscurity but is instead due to process, best practice, and understanding of risk.

<comment><AUTHOR> Almost everything we have is open for you to examine (including the code, obviously). If you're not willing or able to do that: yes, you have to trust us (like you do with pretty much all software and infrastructure you don't personally control).

<comment><USER10> Yes, I know that I have to make a judgement call about whether or not to trust infrastructure I don't own, and I have made that judgement, but I'm asking for myself and others if the Homebrew project haa any additional information I and others can use to make that evaluation.

It is frustrating that you are being so opaque and dismissive. You still haven't answered my earlier question if the Homebrew project has published a summary of the results of these security reviews (I understand not posting the entire review publicly). A quick Google search did not turn up anything, which is why I am asking.

For contrast: I can find out the build process for a Debian package from their website[1]. While they do have some private operation documentation, they also publish the process by which packages get pulled into their system, built, and pushed to the mirrors[2][3]. They have documentation for how to replicate their build environment and build packages on my own[4]. This documentation is open, and I can verify packages with it as they move toward reproducible builds[5]. I understand that Debian is a much larger operation with a much longer history. I understand that it takes time to develop these things. This is not an attack on the Homebrew project or the work they do.

[1] [https://www.debian.org/devel/buildd/](https://www.debian.org/devel/buildd/)

[2] [https://www.debian.org/devel/buildd/operation](https://www.debian.org/devel/buildd/operation)

[3] [https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/FTPMaster](https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/FTPMaster)

[4] [https://wiki.debian.org/BuilddSetup](https://wiki.debian.org/BuilddSetup)

[5] [https://wiki.debian.org/ReproducibleBuilds](https://wiki.debian.org/ReproducibleBuilds)

<comment><AUTHOR> It is not my intention to be dismissive. I admire the work Debian has done on the above but they are a project with many more maintainers and a lot more resources. We have some documentation for our process already under [https://docs.brew.sh](https://docs.brew.sh) but ultimately if it's not good enough for you we need people who are willing to step up and do the work to do so.

<comment><USER9> I understand you do not intend to be dismissive, however, not answering a simple yes or no question in your last two responses appears to be dismissive. I could not find any information about the security audits performed and a summary of their results, so I ask again; is there a summary of the security audits published publicly?

I have looked at the Homebrew docs page. There is a document linked that describes how bottles are built[1], but it's not clear who has access to it and what safeguards are in place to prevent a malicious maintainer from spreading malware through it (such as who reviews the commits) and it doesn't list the precautions taken by bintray to prevent and detect tampering with packages (and a user has to trust that they as in place, sufficient, and trust bintray to not tamper with them). Another page says that most formula pull requests need to be reviewer but does not go over what this entails[2].

This alarming text, however, does appear in your maintainer guidelines [3]:

>Verify the formula works if possible. If you can't tell (e.g. if it's a library) trust the original contributor, it worked for them, so chances are it is fine. If you aren't an expert in the tool in question, you can't really gauge if the formula installed the program correctly. _At some point an expert will come along, cry blue murder that it doesn't work, and fix it. This is how open source works._ Ideally, request a test do block to test that functionality is consistently available.

Is there a set of maintainers who handle security sensitive formula, like openssl, gnupg, and tor?

[1] [https://docs.brew.sh/Brew-Test-Bot](https://docs.brew.sh/Brew-Test-Bot)

[2] [https://docs.brew.sh/How-To-Open-a-Homebrew-Pull- Request](https://docs.brew.sh/How-To-Open-a-Homebrew-Pull-Request)

[3] [https://docs.brew.sh/Maintainer- Guidelines](https://docs.brew.sh/Maintainer-Guidelines)

<comment><USER11> I had exactly the same security concern. It seems it would be quite easy to slip in an attack via brew.

I had an experience years ago where I discovered the lack of quality control: a typo (presumably) caused a package to regress back a couple of years. My issue used wording like "Are you serious?" which was taken as offensive and I was banned, unable to even apologize or defend myself from resulting attacks.

brew is convenient and I still use it, but I have a much higher degree of trust in packages shipping with OS distributions.

<comment><AUTHOR> > It seems it would be quite easy to slip in an attack via brew.

You can put your money where your mouth is and consider submitting one to our HackerOne. Otherwise: perhaps it's not "quite easy" after all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I wonder why Linux users would want to use Homebrew? Are the packages not available via the normal Linux package managers?

<comment><USER13> For many distributions (redhat, ubuntu lts, debian) packages can grow rather old. If you want something more up-to-date, linuxbrew can help. I suppose that's less useful on rolling distros like gentoo or arch.

<comment><USER14> I think that's a good example of how the whole paradigm of package management as an application distribution mechanism (at least as implemented) is really terrible. What good is all this management if I have to bypass it and everything it supposedly provides just to get up to date software, or two versions of the same software?

<comment><USER15> I totally agree with you. I think it's pretty pointless to have terabytes of repos for software that then grows stale.

But distributions often say that it's the only way to keep the whole "ecosystem" of a distribution stable.

So? What I think is that Linux "distributions" are growing less and less useful nowadays. On the desktop, no Linux was able to gain significant traction, and many developers are just using Macs and Windows with WSL.

On the server side, ways to "build your own distro" for creating a tuned stack for your purposes ( read: docker images ) exist and seem more useful than standard distro components. Nixos is another take.

Yes, "just apt install foo" is nice, until it isn't. I think we're at a tipping point between the old and new approach.

<comment><USER16> > But distributions often say that it's the only way to keep the whole > "ecosystem" of a distribution stable.

In practice, it doesn't work. I did a Debian Stretch `apt-get upgrade` and it pulled in a new version of firefox-esr that _did not run_ on my Rockchip Chromebook. Debian was forced to do it because it was end-of-life for the older firefox-esr, and Debian's security backports policy doesn't scale for projects like Chromium and Firefox.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Really not a fan of the removal of options, imo it is one of the greatest perks of homebrew. Can I manually build my own software? Yes. Do I want to have to maintain a tap for every single thing I want to use options on? No, I do not.

This move along with the python2 vs python3 change that was made previously has left a seriously sour taste in my mouth about Homebrew. I'm actively looking at other options.

<comment><USER4> It's less than 12 months until Python 2 will no longer be maintained. [https://pythonclock.org/](https://pythonclock.org/)

I really encourage you to create a tap for the formulas you like to customize. Taps are a powerful, much overlooked feature baked into Homebrew.

<comment><USER17> My objection is more about how it was handled on a communication and technical level than any of the specifics of switching to Python 3 over 2.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> > Homebrew 1.9.0 no longer runs on 32-bit Intel CPUs.

Where does this constraint come from? Homebrew is written in Ruby.

To cut down on compilation from source issues? Or Homebrew uses language features from Ruby versions greater than what Apple shipped in their latest 32-bit supported OSX versions (as homebrew insists on using the system default binaries)?

<comment><USER4> Homebrew builds individual binary bottles per package and per macOS version, but not per target architecture.

In other words: at bottle creation time (server-side), Homebrew tells the compiler to output code that runs on older CPUs. The downside of this is that end users who install bottles never get to enjoy the benefits of latest CPU instruction sets, such as SSE 4.1/4.2.

From time to time, Homebrew raises the bar to keep the balance between performance and compatibility. From Homebrew 1.9.0, bottles are built to use the features of the Penryn/Core 2 microarchitecture or higher, or in other words: Homebrew no longer supports CPU microarchitectures older than Penryn/Core 2.

<comment><USER18> Your explanation makes sense for bottles, not for Homebrew itself. Homebrew is still at its core "build from source".

This is exactly what the bottle bot does, building the same formulas you have on your machine. Why should this no longer work?

<comment><USER4> Unless the user sets specific build options, or runs `brew install --build- from-source`, Homebrew installs core packages from a bottle hosted on Bintray by default.

While I agree in that building from source is somewhat at Homebrew's core (as that's what happens at bottle creation time), the intention is to deliver core packages to end users via bottle as often as possible.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Windows support! That's a surprise.

Chocolatey is... ok. It works, mostly, but it's a common occurrence for upgrades to fail because the package maintainer forgot to update the hash, or the program's built-in autoupdater already ran and moved things around, or a phantom .install dependency is missing, or some other inscrutable problem. Competition will be good for it (and the developer sells a premium version, so I do expect proper competition). All the other package management tools on windows have fairly tiny repositories and are, as far as I can tell, optimized for the workflow of sysadmins building images.

I wonder if Brew has any plans to support that package management framework Microsoft is apparently still working on? ([https://github.com/OneGet/oneget](https://github.com/OneGet/oneget))

<comment><USER20> Did you take a look at scoop.sh? I find it very useful commpared to chocolatey. It only installs portable versions, requires no admin and has everything my dev heart needs. Even installing stuff like miniconda and fluttr is a blaze.

<comment><USER21> Seconded. Scoop.sh is spectacularly simple and to the point for all the areas where chocolatey feels needlessly complex.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> > brew link --force will not link software already provided by macOS.

An explanation for this change would be useful.

<comment><USER23> If I had to guess. Probably to prevent tainting the base system.

<comment><USER24> It depends on the defintion of _taint_. Homebrew cannot touch the base system, since it lives in /usr/local in macOS. Also macOS SIP prevents modification of most system files.

One major problem is that system and Homebrew versions of library may have incompatible ABIs.

<comment><USER25> That's the exact reason why I consider MacPorts much more elegant.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Remember that Homebrew by default records some of your usage data via Google Analytics. Disable that if you are not comfortable, or switch to MacPorts.

</comment><comment><USER27> Technically speaking, why would anyone wants to use brew on linux over snap or nix?

<comment><USER28> To have a common dev environment setup with their mac using colleagues.

<comment><USER29> Nix actually does run on OSX, at the company I work at we have about 25 engineers, 20 using macs, 5 using Linux and we use nix to keep the dev environment across all of our computers (and CI)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> My saviour when forced to use a Mac recently has been Nix. Homebrew has only ever caused me pain.

</comment><comment><USER31> It's a bit weird how they're announcing a new mission statement about how this is a small focused project for macOS at the same time they're announcing Windows and Linux compatibility.

<comment><USER32> Hi. I am one of the Linuxbrew maintainers. I understand that this may seem contradictory.

Linuxbrew has existed since a few years now ([https://github.com/Linuxbrew](https://github.com/Linuxbrew)). We just merged the linux part of the code into the main brew repo.

[https://github.com/Linuxbrew/homebrew- core](https://github.com/Linuxbrew/homebrew-core), where the formula reside, is still a separate project. But we all work closely together. The 4-5 linuxbrew maintainers joined the homebrew team and we are now a single team.

This does not add too much work for the initial homebrew maintainers.

The scope has grown a little bit, but nothing to be worried about. And the windows part is "just" Linux running on Windows, so actually there is not much difference there. That part is not so well tested though, because we do not have so many users on Windows, but we hope to be able to improve this part if needed.

On the other side some decisions have been made lately: less from source builds, less options ... this will reduce our workload too.

<comment><USER31> If the scope has grown and you're all a single team, shouldn't that be reflected in the mission statement?

<comment><USER4> While I'm as excited about the Linux part as my fellow maintainers are, I feel it's important to set reasonable expectations.

Currently, about 25 % of Homebrew's active maintainers work on the Linux/WSL part. I don't believe that ratio is going to change much during 2019.

If Linux and Windows were to become part of Homebrew's mission statement, it'd be all too easy for Linux/WSL users to interpret that as Homebrew committing to the same level of support to which macOS users are accustomed at this time.

I feel there's no way we'd be able to deliver on that commitment and not disappoint users. We want happy users.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Is it me or homebrew became slower recently?

I recall that some commands where much faster. It takes on average 2.5 seconds to do brew search.

$ time brew search mpv ==> Formulae mpv

==> Casks mpv brew search mpv 2.34s user 0.59s system 67% cpu 4.348 total

This is not autoupdate — this is with set HOMEBREW_AUTO_UPDATE_SECS to 14400.

<comment><USER34> It loads all "casks" when doing search. I don't know if it did it in earlier version, but now `brew search` takes more than minute on my system (mostly because of apfs on hdd)

[https://discourse.brew.sh/t/solved-brew-search-is-too- slow-s...](https://discourse.brew.sh/t/solved-brew-search-is-too-slow-search- casks-takes-most-time/3291)

<comment><USER33> That explains everything... Thanks.</comment></comment></comment>


The full story of Thailand's extraordinary cave rescue - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-44791998 <comment><USER2> FWIW, the NYT also had an excellent feature focused on the technicalities of the rescue. Lots of great graphics too: [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/12/world/asia/thailand- cave-...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/12/world/asia/thailand-cave-rescue- seals.html)

<comment><USER3> From the diagrams on nyt, it looks like they never went underwater.

I was under the impression they had to navigate through a small passage that was 3 feet across under water.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This was definitely great news for Thailand. Especially after the capsized boat last week where 60+ people died.

[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-thailand-accident- boat/th...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-thailand-accident-boat/thais- fear-no-chance-of-more-survivors-from-tourist-boat-nearly-60-may-be-dead- idUSKBN1JW0CK)

</comment><comment><USER5> I cannot believe that Elon Musk has accused Vern Unsworth, one of the British rescue divers, of being a pedophile on Twitter, all because his idea of using a mini-submarine to rescue the boys was rejected[1].

It's absolutely disgusting behaviour on his part and completely uncalled for. It's one thing to professionally disagree with the best method for rescue (although Elon is not a cave rescue expert by any measure), but it's another to libel a man and accuse him of being a pedophile.

He's lost any goodwill he gained from offering to help. In my mind, he's lost all good will. You can't just go around accusing people of being pedophiles because they live in Thailand. He's as bad as Donald Trump accusing Joe Scarborough of murdering his constituent-services director.

[1] [https://techcrunch.com/2018/07/15/elon-musk-tweets-hell- bet-...](https://techcrunch.com/2018/07/15/elon-musk-tweets-hell-bet-ya-a- signed-dollar-that-thai-cave-rescuer-is-a-pedo/)

<comment><USER6> Edit- NM. Have at it.

<comment><USER7> While unseemly, Elon is as much a part of the tapestry of the story, as the side show is a part of the circus.

<comment><USER8> Has Elon Musk lost his marbles, or has his broad public platform just magnified his, to be frank, strange personality? I remember that footage of him getting delivery of some million dollar car and thinking that this guy is kinda off center:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eb3pmifEZ44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eb3pmifEZ44)

I get the heebie-jeebies watching this. And knowing he then crashed this car. Without insurance. Showing off.

Maybe he's not, Savior of the World material?

<comment><USER7> I'm no fan of Musk, but its not unusual among the super rich to not have insurance. They frequently post a bond with the state in lieu of insurance. Perfectly legal in fact in California.

<comment><USER8> So is this another example how the super rich can sideline laws that need to be followed by the not super rich? Like for example, anything that's not allowed, but the only repercussion is a fine? (let's say, littering, just as a concrete example) If I'm super rich, that basically means I can do it, but a poor person would think twice.

Also see companies dealing in business malpractices that only receive a pittance of a fine as the outcome of losing the legal trial. ie: "cost of doing business"

<comment><USER7> In California for example, You post the bond in the amount required by the state (35k), that acts as your certificate of insurance. Purchase a surety bond from a company licensed in California, or file a certificate of self insurance (only for motor carriers, and requires a 300-750k deposit), or you can purchase traditional liability insurance.

[https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/dmv/detail/pubs/brochures/fast...](https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/dmv/detail/pubs/brochures/fast_facts/ffvr18)

<comment><USER8> But why would one do that, rather than pay insurance? What's the benefit to the driver?

<comment><USER7> In the long run, its cheaper - if you have the initial capital.

<comment><USER8> So it's an example of, "being poor is more expensive than being rich"

Any other pluses to doing it this way?

<comment><USER7> One less thing to worry about, you file the bond once, and its good forever</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Motion to Abolish Domain Base Names - <AUTHOR>

The Motion:
All base domain names (.com .org .net .info, etc.) to be abandoned and abolished forthwith.
The Reasons:
1) They are not fulfilling clear enough purpose and not being distinctive enough. Most websites provide some information (.info), allow some communication (.net), are associated with some organisation (.org), and maybe collect money in some way (.com). Thus these base names are mere noise words, creating confusion for users trying to guess the most appropriate one.
2) The base names lead to unwanted duplications, overlaps and mis-directions of the real domain names and the unnecessary disputes arising from this. Simply stated, the base names destroy the uniqueness of the real domain names. This is sheer folly.
3) Lest someone objects that there will not be enough domain names to go round, most main domain names can be differentiated more effectively and appropriately by addition of three or more letters of the domain buyer's own choice.
The Implementation
It is suggested that all existing domain names are converted to the new format protocol.uniquename by simple deletion of the dot before the base name. Example: www.somedomain.eu -> www.somedomaineu
This means that legacy compatibility of networks and browsers can be ensured with a minor parsing change and those who have grown attached to their base name (perhaps a geographical one which does carry some information) will get to keep it in this form.
No re-registration or change of any kind of the existing domains is necessary.
Summary of The Benefits:
1) Neat resolution of the major non-uniqueness problems plaguing unnecessarily the existing domain name addressing.
2) The changeover can be accomplished simply and with a minimal disruption, ensuring legacy compatibility.
3) New domain name creators become empowered to create many new unique and relevant names for themselves. <comment><USER2> 1\. This would break links all over the web. e.g. all links to <http://news.ycombinator.com> must be changed to link to <http://news.ycombinatorcom>. Many of the people who will be responsible for updating links will not know how to use sed or perl on their html files.

2.a. .om is used by websites in Oman. cccc.om and ccc.com would both become ccccom --- conflict.

2.b. .et is used by websites in Ethiopia. nnnn.et and nnn.net would both become nnnnet --- conflict.

3.a. .er is used by websites in Eritrea. Quick, register twitt.er and you can own Twitter!

3.b. I hope no-one in Peru registered sky.pe, because Skype will take it off them for trademark infringement.

4\. Users already don't need to remember whether a website is a .com or an .org or whatever. They need to be able to find it on Google.

<comment><AUTHOR> Fair point. Conflicts clearly need to be prevented. Perhaps by conversion . -> 'dot' only in those specific cases

<comment><AUTHOR> Regards breaking the links, again, fair point. This is, in fact, possibly the only substantial problem. However, as I hinted in the proposal, this could be dealt with by the browser. Browsers are already full of hacks for legacy reasons, they could as well have one more which repairs the failed broken links by removing the superfluous dot.

<comment><USER2> Windows XP is going to be around for a long time, and Internet Explorer on Windows XP is a legacy browser only. You can only get this hack into new browsers.

So you'll need to wait at least a decade to flip the switch even after all the browser makers have included the hack in the browsers (good luck with that, btw).

I know someone who still uses Windows ME.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> mark-r The current system works well enough and is unlikely to be replaced, ever.

1) Append .com and see where it takes you.

2) Let a search engine figure it out.

And tell me again why this belongs on HackerNews?

<comment><AUTHOR> 1) has on numerous occasions taken me to wrong places 2) has likewise wasted a lot of my time

Why have to put us with this? Who benefits, apart from Google?

"And tell me again why this belongs on HackerNews?"

Perhaps because one of the most important decisions for anyone initiating a net presence is to choose the right domain name? Perhaps because many young enterpreneurs here don't really want to waste their precious time and resources on lawsuits arising from domain name duplications?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> > No re-registration or change of any kind of the existing domains is > necessary.

So who gets to own www.foobar, the owner of www.foobar.com, www.foobar.net, or www.foobar.org?

<comment><AUTHOR> See the first paragraph of The Implementation section and the example of the proposed conversion.

foobar.com -> foobarcom

foobar.net -> foobarnet

foobar.org -> foobarorg

foobar goes to whoever registers it first

</comment></comment><comment><USER2> Wen yoov pushd this froo, kan yoo improov Inglish speling az wel pleez?

</comment><comment><USER4> but then they become unreadablecom ? uggh

<comment><AUTHOR> People will naturally want to drop these noise words for new registrations. I contend, on the contrary, that 'readable' is more readable/typeable than 'readable.com'</comment></comment>


Here Come the Zoom Startups - <AUTHOR> https://www.protocol.com/Newsletters/SourceCode/here-come-the-zoom-startups <comment><USER2> > Why Zoom? Simple: Zoom is winning.

For now. But it isn't really a compelling reason to build a startup on top on someone else's 'winning' ecosystem. The assumption here is that these 'startups' believe that they could get acquired by Zoom someday which is at best a 50/50 risk of allowing Zoom to compete with or copy you, if you're on their platform. So what do you do? Add support for Zoom's competitors.

Now even if you support Google Meet, Skype, etc there is nothing stopping them from also copying you. Once that happens you're finished. The moral of this story is control. Zoom, Google and Skype win by default and all the startups building upon them risk being at their mercy.</comment>


Will Trump kill the Obama tech surge? - <AUTHOR> https://backchannel.com/the-final-days-of-obamas-tech-surge-864b9bf60d34#.mzglaug9q <comment><USER2> > _The White House imported Silicon Valley's best to transform government._

Did he though? I'm of the opinion that tech has been marching forward _despite_ our federal government, not because of it.

Also the surge in funding for dubious startups couldn't also be from the upward pressure of essentially free money from the fed and artificially low rates... right?

<comment><USER3> _HIC SVNT IDEOLOGUS_</comment></comment>


12Society Sends Out Plain, White Plate in Subscription, Chaos on Twitter Ensues - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/12Society <comment><AUTHOR> Or Here: <https://twitter.com/jcmorgan/status/292305277208895488>

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> My favorite reaction: <http://i.imgur.com/2z0Li.png></comment>


Ask HN: How can I volunteer my tech skills to help fight Covid-19? - <AUTHOR> I'm a full-stack web developer, but curious to hear ideas for other technical skill sets, as well. <comment><USER2> [https://coronavirustechhandbook.com/](https://coronavirustechhandbook.com/) seems to collect ideas and there's a newsletter and chat group.</comment>


Man Accused of Masterminding the Hacks That Shook Wall Street - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-11-10/digital-don-accused-of-hacks-at-jpmorgan-dow-jones-over-8-years <comment><USER2> This reads like a real-life SPECTRE organization. Huge, brazen, with tentacles in many countries.

I'm astonished. I (seriously) thought stuff like this happens in novels and in movies, not in real life.

</comment><comment><USER3> That's quite the story. Fragments were already out there but to see all the pieces laid out end-to-end makes it a lot more serious than what I'd figured out so far.

Makes you wonder why they did not stop when they were ahead.

<comment><USER4> How else do you get to 'too big to fail'?

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> As always Matt Levine as some interesting takes on this.

[http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-11-10/bank- hacker...](http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-11-10/bank-hackers- thought-some-insider-trading-might-be-cool)

</comment><comment><USER6> I love how 100 million in fraud shakes wallstreet, while we all more or less quietly ignore much more severe in monetary scope and prevalence fraud in the business and larger banking sector. Such as the LIBOR scandal.

<comment><USER7> What? The LIBOR scandal was Wall St banks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> When reach for comment he responded "mess with the best, die like the rest"</comment>


Apple Edge Cache - <AUTHOR> https://cache.edge.apple <comment><USER2> Those traffic requirements are fairly steep - perhaps it will come down as the program matures.

If you're interested in similar edge cache programs:

[https://openconnect.netflix.com/en/](https://openconnect.netflix.com/en/)

[https://www.facebook.com/peering/](https://www.facebook.com/peering/) (though I don't see FNA specifically mentioned there)

[https://peering.google.com/#/options/google-global- cache](https://peering.google.com/#/options/google-global-cache)

[https://www.akamai.com/us/en/products/network- operator/akama...](https://www.akamai.com/us/en/products/network- operator/akamai-network-partnerships.jsp)

[https://peering.azurewebsites.net/peering/Caching](https://peering.azurewebsites.net/peering/Caching)

[https://www.cloudflare.com/partners/peering- portal/](https://www.cloudflare.com/partners/peering-portal/)

<comment><USER3> A neat secret about these cache devices is ISPs that charge for usage. The data the customers use comes straight from the ISP's Central Office, not from "The internet" at all.

<comment><USER4> My parents have a (crappy) wireless internet provider. During most evenings and weekend, they're lucky to get even 0.5Mbps. At the same time, Netflix works fine, and the speed on fast.com (Netflix-run) will be a few Mbps (I don't remember exactly). In the daytime on weekdays, they usually get a few Mbps from any speed test and generally everything feels fast.

This lets me deduce the ISP is way over-subscribed on their upstream internet connection, but also has a Netflix appliance.

What's frustrating is if they complain enough, the company will send a tech out who will "adjust" their antenna, or suggest it's a line-of-sight problem and they need a bigger tower, should cut down some trees, etc.

<comment><USER5> > _" My parents have a (crappy) wireless internet provider. During most > evenings and weekend, they're lucky to get even 0.5Mbps."_

Sounds like my experience on Three UK here in London. Just awful! Vodafone and O2 are at least 20X faster at peak times despite Three actually having a significantly stronger 4G signal at my flat. Absolute joke of a network. I'm so angry that I was basically tricked into a 12 month contract with them.

<comment><USER6> The problem with Three is they don't have enough spectrum especially in densely populated areas, they definitely have invested a lot in backhaul capacity. 99% of cellular data problems are nothing to do with backhaul or peering, it's spectrum usage.

Some good news: they are aggressively rolling out SDL (supplementary downlink) which will really improve things. They also announced today their 5G network (which has by far the most spectrum of all UK carriers) has went live. I would expect insanely good speeds on that network.

But yeah, turns out selling unlimited data/tethering/roaming/text/minutes for as low as £11/month isn't a good business strategy.

Generally though: EE is good everywhere. Vodafone is good in North London, O2 better in South London. Three generally awful everywhere.

<comment><USER7> Three's 5G has actually been running since last summer : I should know, I was in one of the pilot areas in London and signed up for their home broadband offering on day one.

No complaints, 100-300Mbps on average. They seem to have done great at the 5G spectrum auctions, they're the only UK carrier with 100+ Mhz.

I'm also using them for mobile 4G and yes that's often awful, as others are reporting. I should probably switch to giffgaff (safer to use different providers anyway in case Three has a catastrophic outage), but Three's "Feel at home" free roaming in many countries beyond the EU (including the US) is super handy and has no equivalent that I know of.

<comment><USER5> > _" Three's 5G has actually been running since last summer : I should know, I > was in one of the pilot areas in London and signed up for their home > broadband offering on day one."_

But this is not really the Three network. It's a separate network with a different network ID and cannot be accessed with ordinary Three devices/SIM cards.

It's based on the network formerly known as "Relish", which was bought by Three in 2017. The areas covered by Three Broadband's 5G are basically exactly the same areas which were always covered by Relish. They just upgraded the equipment to use 5G radio.

Relish held a lot of spectrum in the 3.5 Ghz (n78) band. Three, by arrangement with OfCom, added Relish's holding to their own 3.5 Ghz spectrum won at auction to give them the contiguous 100 Mhz.

There is an additional 200 Mhz of 5G spectrum being auctioned this year, which should bring the other operator's 5G holdings up to comparable levels with Three's:

[https://www.techradar.com/uk/news/ofcom-to-hold- next-5g-spec...](https://www.techradar.com/uk/news/ofcom-to-hold- next-5g-spectrum-auction-in-spring-2020)

<comment><USER8> > _But this is not really the Three network. It 's a separate network with a > different network ID and cannot be accessed with ordinary Three devices/SIM > cards._

I'm not in the UK and ask purely out of curiosity, but what SIM/configuration do you use then?

<comment><USER5> They provide a 5G home router (Huawei 5G CPE Pro), with a SIM card specific to the Three Broadband (formerly Relish) network.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The home/small business version of this is included with every installation of OS X: [https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/what-is-content- cac...](https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/what-is-content-caching-on- mac-mchl9388ba1b/mac)

Popular app and OS updates can be cached on a local Mac, with the recommended machine being on the network using a wired connection and always connected (desktop/Mac mini)

<comment><USER10> If you're a sysadmin you need to take an old mac mini and put this on your wifi or guest wifi network. It alleviates so many support tickets on iOS update release days.

<comment><USER11> This! Instead of being a dick and blocking updates just cache 'em!

<comment><USER12> Do people notice if you block updates on say a work wi-fi?

I'm thinking more generally userbase wise and not quite the tech centric crowd we have here on HN.

I would expect most people wouldn't notice.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This seems smart. Presumably it initially gives everyone a better experience with App Store apps, and over time becomes critical infrastructure for Apple TV+ in the same way Netflix use caches in ISPs.

<comment><USER14> Definitely critical for Apple TV+ if they want to compete with Netflix and Youtube. Though both of those together account for a quarter of the total bandwidth on internet, I'm not sure if Apple TV+ is anywhere close to that yet, but long term planning here.

<comment><USER15> Unless there is some kind of limitation for the 1 year free AppleTV+ offer (when buying a new device) it is a terrible service and not even a competitor to Netflix. The prices for movies are abnormal - Predator (a 23 year old movie) is 4.99EUR for rent. For comparison a small market (<2mil people) local streaming service offers the same movie for rent for 1.90EUR.

<comment><USER16> You are complaining about iTunes prices, that's unrelated to Apple TV+.

Apple TV+ costs a flat fee for unlimited access to (for now very limited) collection of original content. Surely they plan to launch more shows.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Dumb question -- how does this work with SSL? Is Apple putting their private keys on these boxes and assuming the ISPs can't/won't extract them?

<comment><USER18> Lots of people answering the technical question, but I have to wonder: why do you think ISPs would break into Apple's equipment just to extract private keys securing media files and software downloads? Do you think ISPs are typically in the business of violating the contracts and security of their partners? What would they gain by doing so?

Note that I understand the importance of securing private keys in general. I'm just asking about ISPs because you specifically mentioned them.

<comment><USER19> It's not the ISPs themselves, necessarily. You have a box that you own and that sits in someone else's network, where their security policies and practices apply. Those policies and practices are not going to be the same as yours. Perhaps more importantly, other people have physical access to the hardware. That includes employees of the ISP, but perhaps also 3rd parties (think multi-tenant datacenter, for example). That's why you should treat that box as being in a hostile environment.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I hope this isn't the same CDN they use for the App Store.

I've never seen a download from the store faster than about 50 megabits per sec even on a gigabit line.

<comment><USER21> This appears to be additional to CDNs. Apple is saying they will put their own servers directly into ISPs data centers as a cache for content requests that would normally go to a CDN. So the path for downloading data would go from your computer to your ISP and if the data you requested is cached on your ISPs Apple Edge Cache server then it wouldn't even go to a CDN. This is an attempt to address your complaint which may well be caused by slowness of traffic between the CDN and your ISP.

<comment><USER20> CDNs already use servers in your local ISP. That's how they speed things up. This is no different than how Akamai or Netflix or Cloudflare builds their CDN. Most likely these Apple edge servers sit in cabinets and network segments adjacent to those other CDNs.

<comment><USER21> Sure, that is the best case scenario. Apple using it's own servers would have several advantages including they would presumably be able to tune/seed the cached content based on superior knowledge of consumption. They also wouldn't be competing for the same limited CDN space as others.

Not to be flippant, but I recognized your name and when I visited your bio I see you now work at Netflix. You could probably find an excellent answer as to why Apple would choose to start its own program rather than rely on existing CDN colocation by asking your internal team why Netflix does the same. My guess, without inside knowledge, is it is a combination of price and performance.

<comment><USER20> I know why Netflix does what it does, I helped build it. :)

What I'm saying is that Apple is probably already doing the same thing (using their own servers in colocations). They're just opening it up to the public now.

<comment><USER21> Well, edge cache doesn't appear to be brand new (I found [https://www.c8k3.com/blog/caching-in-apples-new-cache- progra...](https://www.c8k3.com/blog/caching-in-apples-new-cache-program) which dates from Dec 2019) but it does appear to be an analogue to programs like the one you helped build at Netflix. So while they probably have been doing this in some limited fashion (e.g. through direct outreach), it is entirely possible your own ISP wasn't included. Hopefully your download speeds will increase if/when your ISP signs up for the program.

I'm not sure what you mean that this is being "opened up to the public now". This seems to be limited to ISPs as far as I can tell. I'm not sure who, other than an ISP, would be doing 25Gb/s of Apple-content related traffic.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> And the question is... Do this "Apple certified server-side network appliances" run on Mac or Linux?

<comment><USER23> Obviously Linux since no one uses mac server side, Even Apple doesn't use mac for their online services.

<comment><USER24> What are they using to run WebObjects then? AFAIK, iTunes and the App Store still run on WO.

<comment><USER25> The Java implementation of WebObjects runs on Linux.

[https://wiki.wocommunity.org/display/documentation/Deploying...](https://wiki.wocommunity.org/display/documentation/Deploying+on+Linux)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> With 25Gbps minimum peak, it seems like this is targeted at game apps (which load heavy assets) or short videos apps (which load 10-20MB video assets). If they have streaming capability, then probably more apps can take advantage of it.

For all other apps (which load static image assets and much smaller dynamic response payloads), meeting 25Gbps minimum peak is going to be a challenge.

Let's do some rough math. Let's say your app needs to load 10MB of assets in every user session. Let's say your user's network speed is not a constraint. Then least number of concurrent users needed to drive 25Gbps of traffic is 25Gbps/10MB = 313 new user sessions per second. If you want to sustain this for 5 minutes or so to register as peak 313 users/second * 5 minutes = 93900 concurrent apple user sessions. Let's say your users realistically have 10Mbps of speed, we will have to multiply 93900 with 8 (because it takes 8 seconds to load 10MB with 10Mbps speed)!

<comment><USER27> I think you got the use case of such edge caches wrong. You don't get one of those for a single app. Most companies who participate in such edge cache programs don't even have apps. These are boxes that internet service providers plug into their networks, usually close to their customers, hence the name "edge cache". The edge cache owner then routes user requests for big and static content (video streams, large apps, OS updates, stuff like that) coming from networks equipped with edge caches to the caches located within their networks instead of a third-party CDN or the cache owners own server farms, effectively reducing the traffic that particular ISP has to route through to the edge cache owner. It is this aggregate traffic that has to meet a 25Gbps peak minimum to qualify for getting an Apple edge cache.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Off topic... but there are .apple domains now?

<comment><USER29> Google does too: [https://domains.google](https://domains.google) (registrar), [https://dns.google](https://dns.google) (public-dns, supports DoH and DoT), and [https://ai.google](https://ai.google).

I wish there was something up at [https://google.google](https://google.google) or [https://apple.apple](https://apple.apple)

<comment> jon-wood Google also own .new which seems like the sort of ridiculously expensive experiment only one of the big startups with cash to burn would do. It allows you to type docs.new or sheets.new (etc) into your address bar and instantly get an empty document.

Sadly it always defaults to the first logged in user, which makes it almost entirely useless to me.

<comment><USER30> You can also type design.new to get a Canva design.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> This launched around December of 2019. It is the same service that companies like Google[1] and Akamai[2] have provided for a while.

[1]: [https://peering.google.com/#/options/google-global- cache](https://peering.google.com/#/options/google-global-cache)

[2]: [https://www.akamai.com/us/en/products/network- operator/akama...](https://www.akamai.com/us/en/products/network- operator/akamai-network-partnerships.jsp)

</comment><comment><USER32> > The program is by invitation only.

> If your business meets these requirements, request an invitation.

Doesn't that defeat the purpose of being "invitation only" which, to me at least, implies the other party knows who they want to invite? That is, invitation only implies hand picked, or pre-chosen by some prior criteria to me. If it's exclusive to select ISPs that meet the criteria and they have to apply, why not just say that instead of the using wording that requires additional explanation to get past people's likely initial interpretation?

<comment><USER33> It's a "Hey can I come to your party?" and "I'll think about it and get back to you if you can" versus a "I'm coming to your party despite not being asked"

<comment><USER32> I know what they're trying to do, it just feels amateurish and jarring because cause it's jamming two concepts that are somewhat opposed together.

The whole point of saying the party is invitation only _is so random people don 't ask you to come_.

I think the normal way this is normally done is to say "we're being very selective with who we partner with at this point. Please apply if you think you qualify and we'll get back to you."

That they've chosen not to do the obvious seems purposeful, and that it was done so jarringly on purpose is odd.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Questions.

Why now? Apple has had hundred of Millions iOS users for years and fast approaching a billion. Why didn't they do this earlier? Or they did but it wasn't public ?

What are the chances this is a Mac Pro rack, even though it is highly unlikely to be running on macOS ?

Do they Cache iCloud Backup, Photos and upload with these Edge Appliance? Same as macOS Server?

</comment><comment><USER35> This is for large consumer ISPs, obviously, but Mac OS X Server used to have an optional cache feature for iOS apps and OS X software updates that was relevant for enterprise and campus networks (or even a home network like mine with a 3:1 iDevice to human ratio...)

</comment><comment><USER36> I am absolutely not informed on the dynamics of these technologies and business agreements so pardon my ignorance.

Q: are you getting paid for allocating such a cache? Or should you feel honoured that Apple thinks you are eligible to freely distribute their content?

</comment><comment><USER37> Are Apple credible to offer this? The AppStore loads slowly if at all a lot of the time on my Mac. And isn't exactly spritely on my phone either.

</comment><comment><USER38> It would be cool if they used the Xserve chassis.

</comment><comment><USER39> Doesn't it break net neutrality ?

<comment><USER40> This is not related to net neutrality. Typically the way things work is that your end-user ISP is connected to a "Tier 1" or "Tier 2" ISP. Then the website you want to visit is also connected to an ISP in a similar manner. To get packets from the end user to the website, the traffic has to transit over the Tier 1 and Tier 2 ISPs. Those ISPs do not offer this service for free. To lower costs and potentially improve latency, many websites are happy to connect directly to the end-user's ISPs.

Imagine that your Internet service is just an Ethernet cable that goes to a router in a datacenter. This is Apple offering to plug their servers into that router. Now you can get to their servers without going out to "the Internet" via a Tier 2 or Tier 1 ISP. That is where the word "internet" comes from -- interconnected networks. More connections is more internetting.

This is all super common. Many big companies are happy to peer with small ISPs if they're already in the same building.

Edit to add: The edge cache thing that this article is about is similar, but not quite the same as what I'm describing. Instead of connecting you to their network, they just put some of their servers in the same datacenter as your network. Even less latency!

<comment><USER41> Fantastic explanation. I actually have an exam on this next Friday.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Step X of competing with aws, gcp, azure. Arm cpus Serverside swift Foundationdb They're spending way too much on aws for iCloud, and probably i* distribution

</comment><comment><USER43> Do they get paid to host this? How much?

<comment><USER44> I doubt it, they get "paid" by not having to pay for upstream data charges while still charging their downstream consumers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> Nice to see them use the .apple TLD.

</comment><comment> david-cako EdgeCompute coming soon I suppose.

</comment><comment><USER46> I'm confused why ISPs would do this for free. Why doesn't Apple just colo like other CDNs do?

<comment><USER2> Because it saves them money on transit costs. The Internet Peering Playbook is a good resource if you want to learn about some of the economics behind programs like this one ([http://drpeering.net/core/bookOutline.html](http://drpeering.net/core/bookOutline.html)).

Edit: the flip side of this relationship is also interesting - if Apple or whoever doesn't offload enough of their traffic to the rack, then it isn't cost effective and can really annoy the ISP. I've known some ISPs to boot these caches out of their network when the related company wasn't utilizing it effectively.

<comment><USER47> The question here is why you would host such a device for free instead of just having SFI peering with apple (which is apparently required in this program). I suspect that the incentive there has mostly nothing to do with transit costs and is mainly about capacity planing inside the ISP's network and thus with fixed hardware and infrastructure costs. (ie. SFI is free, but the 100Gbps port on your router is not)

<comment><USER48> It may be possible to place caches deeper inside an ISP's network than the peering points. For example, it looks like Apple peers in Dallas but not Austin or Houston so putting a cache in Austin would save bandwidth up to Dallas.

<comment><USER47> In my experience it will invariably be placed deeper into the network, that is at least into network core of the ISP, which typically isn't anywhere near the edge router placed in some wonderfully expensive colo space associated with some IXP.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> is this the tiered internet we were warned about?

</comment><comment><USER50> _Apple Edge Cache (AEC) is Apple supplied and managed hardware_

Do they have something against using dashes?

<comment><USER51> Where would dashes be placed here?

<comment><USER50> "Apple-supplied."

That's what they do elsewhere:

[https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202471](https://support.apple.com/en- us/HT202471)

[https://support.apple.com/guide/terminal/script- management-w...](https://support.apple.com/guide/terminal/script-management- with-launchd-apdc6c1077b-5d5d-4d35-9c19-60f2397b2369/mac)

[https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201954](https://support.apple.com/en- us/HT201954)

For less ambiguity, I should have used the term "hyphen," but imagined it would be clear.

<comment><USER52> Fascinating. A hyphen and a dash are two completely different things. A dash isn't ambiguous at all, it's literally the wrong word. Those who live in glass houses..

[https://www.grammarly.com/blog/hyphens-and- dashes/](https://www.grammarly.com/blog/hyphens-and-dashes/)

<comment><USER50> Digitally, they're _the exact same thing,_ represented by the exact same code point:*

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyphen- minus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyphen-minus)

The figure dash _literally_ serves the same purpose as the hyphen:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dash#Figure_dash](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dash#Figure_dash)

ASCII was limited, compromises were made, and "dash" and "hyphen" became interchangeable.

Most style guides accept both under the term "dash":

[https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/qanda/data/faq/topics/H...](https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/qanda/data/faq/topics/HyphensEnDashesEmDashes/faq0002.html)

* Unicode has changed this somewhat, though not perfectly.

Bonus:

[https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/grammar/british- grammar/...](https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/grammar/british- grammar/hyphens)

 _Hyphens are a form of dash (-) which we use between words or parts of words._

<comment><USER53> Feels very disingenuous to critique grammar, while using bad grammar yourself, and then rebuke the person who calls it out politely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> And they use AWS for that, at least in Europe. Had a huge orders from them in last few months

<comment><USER55> It says its Apple-managed hardware though? Can you elaborate?

</comment></comment><comment><USER56> Copyright © 2019 Apple Inc.

</comment><comment><USER57> "Apple Edge Cache (AEC) is Apple supplied and managed hardware for deployment within our ISP partners networks to deliver certain Apple content directly to our shared customers."

This sounds horrifying.

<comment><USER51> In what way?</comment></comment>


Can a Wandering Mind Make You Neurotic? - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/blog/can-a-wandering-mind-make-you-neurotic <comment><USER2> I can think of like 5 different ways that you could define "a wandering mind," yet the author just takes it for granted and acts like we all "get it," even though the definition you choose might change the conclusions she reaches and the nature of the discussion.

It's just that vagueness that characterizes discussions about consciousness or subjectivity. It makes me think we have an incredibly long way to go before we accurately model the human subject, which is a prerequisite to any meaningful AI.

<comment><USER3> You may be interested in this paper by Hubert Dreyfus, "Why Heideggerian AI failed and how fixing it would require making it even more Heideggerian."

[http://leidlmair.at/doc/WhyHeideggerianAIFailed.pdf](http://leidlmair.at/doc/WhyHeideggerianAIFailed.pdf)

<comment><USER4> Thank you! A very interesting and insightful criticism of various approaches to AI, especially what we can learn from GOFAI. Do you have any other papers to recommend?

<comment><USER5> You might check out stuff from John Haugeland, who coined "GOFAI" back in the 80s. Here's a nice essay I quickly found online (that's sort of indirectly about AI) for example: [http://philosophy.uchicago.edu/faculty/files/haugeland/Mind+...](http://philosophy.uchicago.edu/faculty/files/haugeland/Mind+Embodied+and+Embedded.pdf)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm EXACTLY like the daughter mentioned in the article. My ruminations make me more creative and poetic while making me careless and depressed.

Does anyone here have any ways I can tackle the downsides of being this way ?

<comment><USER3> What's the one thing you actually enjoy doing that does take your out of your recursive depressive thinking for a minute?

Do more of that thing every day. Do less web surfing and less rumination.

It's all about mental habituation.

Allow me to randomly speculate that in your mental world, reading some Intellectually Fascinating Article has an extremely high priority, whereas eating dinner is just some stupid thing your body demands, and so because of this configuration of like/dislike or attraction/aversion you tend to chow down whatever is easiest so you can get back to the Fascinating Article.

That habit becomes deeply learned by your neural networks, reinforced by daily training. Fortunately your species has evolved the mysterious capacity of thinking and willing, so you can in fact make decisions that are counterintuitive to your own neural training.

You may find that you need some violent tactics such as temporarily cutting off your internet supply. That snaps you back to reality (oh, there goes gravity). Makes it way easier to focus on prepping veggies.

Isn't part of the problem that electronic or thought-based stuff moves too fast, is infinitely elastic and offers too little real friction-based resistance? Which leads to a stagnation of patience with actual passing time and physical reality. So I suggest doing whatever requires and encourages patience. Cooking is a great example because if you try to do it as fast as possible you will burn your garlic and that can very effectively train your neurons to chill out and do one thing at a time.

<comment><USER7> Depressive thinking existed before the Internet.

<comment><USER3> Agreed. I don't know much about those times though and I can only really speak to what I'm familiar with.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I think the answer is yes. There's an old saying, idle hands are the devil's workshop or something like that. The mind needs to be nurtured and guided just like muscles or it will fall into disarray. Creative pursuits help keep the mind focused. That and some good FPS games.

</comment><comment><USER9> Books and video games have really helped me not to think when that's needed.

"Worrying about misfortunes that will never happen" is also called "risk analysis" in securityspeak. Sure, a neurotic mind can find you those bizarre edge cases but it can also become a burden when you're needed to reset and tackle a new problem.

<comment><USER10> "I'm not perseverating, I'm threat modeling!"

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I've definitely noticed this, and the cause was never really a mystery to me. Seems like the brain and nervous system would have evolved to benefit from an optimal balance of intro vs extroverted time spent. During externally oriented times the brain is occupied on a task so it would make sense for any anxiety or fear centers to be engaged. While the brain could best utilize downtime by analyze past mistakes or ruminating on things. The fear mechanisms of the brain i would guess use discomfort and aggitation to help spurr on adaption and problem solving. like a neural network stuck in the training phase, too much time spent worrying inward would distort the system and cause problems

</comment><comment><USER3> David Abrams wrote a book called _The Spell of the Sensuous_ (1996) that's related.

The subtitle is "Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World."

TL;DR: modern life is rubbish; go hiking.

Humans grew up in "nature," whatever that means. Basically they were inside systems they didn't make. They had to understand rivers, trees, birds, stars, plants, all kinds of stuff. At first they didn't even have language, and before symbols, life was vivid and dynamic; there was no alienation.

Some people were (some people still are) shamans. Their job was to commune even more interestingly with the non-human world. For example they would study birds so much that they could imitate them and kind of live among them. They would develop complex ways of interacting with plants.

> It is this, we might say, that defines a shaman: the ability to readily slip > out of the perceptual boundaries that demarcate his or her particular > culture—boundaries reinforced by social customs, taboos, and most > importantly, the common speech or language—in order to make contact with, > and learn from, the other powers in the land.

Hunters also had intimate connections with nature. Spend enough time in the forest and you and your culture will develop sensual intuitions based on subtle bird sounds, so that you can tell without thinking that there is a large mammal thataway, from the way the birds are moving and chirping.

> Today we participate almost exclusively with other humans and with our own > human-made technologies. It is a precarious situation, given our age-old > reciprocity with the many-voiced landscape. We still _need_ that which is > other than ourselves and our creations. The simple premise of this book is > that we are human only in contact, and conviviality, with what is not human.

> Caught up in a mass of abstractions, our attention hypnotized by a host of > human-made technologies that only reflect us back to ourselves, it is all > too easy for us to forget our carnal inherence in a more-than-human matrix > of sensations and sensibilities.

The crucial event Abrams goes back to in order to explain the current detachment is the invention and spread of the alphabet, that is, the way of writing that is abstracted from natural symbols. Alphabetic literacy initiates a profound shift; McLuhan agreed. We begin to build an abstract world of ideas that is enormously powerful, and we also kind of lose touch with "reality."

> Plato, or rather the association between the literate Plato and his mostly > nonliterate teacher Socrates, may be recognized as the hinge on which the > sensuous, mimetic, profoundly embodied style of consciousness proper to > orality gave way to the more detached, abstract mode of thinking engendered > by alphabetic literacy. [...]

> By continually asking his interlocutors to repeat and explain what they had > said in other words, by getting them thus to listen to and ponder their own > speaking, Socrates stunned his listeners out of the mnemonic trance demanded > by orality, and hence out of the sensuous, storied realm to which they were > accustomed. Small wonder that some Athenians complained that Socrates' > conversation had the numbing effect of a stingray's electric shock.

The climbers I know love it almost like religious people love their faith. It does become a "lifestyle." They start saving up money for vacations in Spain and France and anywhere with big serious boulders. Some also get into spelunking. Most of these people that I know are otherwise academics and IT professionals, and climbing is a way for them to restore something ancient and combat alienation and burnout.

> Transfixed by our technologies, we short-circuit the sensorial reciprocity > between our breathing bodies and the bodily terrain. Human awareness folds > in upon itself, and the senses—once the crucial site of our engagement with > the wild and animate earth—become mere adjuncts of an isolate and abstract > mind bent on overcoming an organic reality that now seems disturbingly aloof > and arbitrary. [...]

> We may think of the sensing body as a kind of open circuit that completes > itself only in things, and in the world. [...]

> The human mind is not some otherworldly essence that comes to house itself > inside our physiology. Rather, it is instilled and provoked by the sensorial > field itself, induced by the tensions and participations between the human > body and the animate earth.

Exercise for the reader: come up with a way to coexist with technologies and thoughts as if those things were landscapes, mountains, animals.

<comment><USER12> Go hiking. I do this a few times a week to get away from the desk. I still end up thinking the entire time, but my thoughts are much more positive. I end the hike feeling refreshed and happy every time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I often think that everything is going to end. Especially when I'm up at night and playing video games, after a long day of work. Something about game worlds ending probably makes it more likely for me to have an existential angst, but the biggest reason is how much Judaeo-Christian RELIGION I have been exposed to and trying to find the truth among contradictory worldviews.

I am NOT depressed (at least in the colloquial sense of the term) since I definitely feel intrinsically happy most of the time when nothing special is happening. I don't really need anything except good health in order to be happy. However, I tend to take things to their logical conclusion way more than other people, and as a result I see both upsides and downsides most avoid talking about. My mind naturally tries to find the main factors to explain a phenomenon, rather than accepting what's told to me.

The thought that all this will come to an end is scary to me. It leads to a conclusion which I guess also comes out of depression: what is the point of it all? I can accomplish so much in this world and then if I die and everyone who experiences it will die, what's the point ultimately? If you knew the entire world was ending in 3 days due to a meteor, say, would you labor every day on a giant novel, no matter how good it is? If not, then isn't it all just a matter of scale?

Perhaps I have to learn to love the journey instead of the destination.

Perhaps I have to liken not being around in 700 years to not having been around 700 years ago. But life moves forward and now that I'm here, my self preservation instinct makes me dread someday not being around. Because while the world will continue, for me it may as well be a fantasy world.

Also I look around at the cultures of the earth engaging with computers and cellphones and promiscuous sex and all the other stuff. A lot of it is addictive and exciting, but once you wean yourself off of it you realize how non essential it is. So what is the point of any worldly things?

I must say, the fact that religions have existed stably for thousands of years, as well as various philosophies (Buddhism, Stoicism) seem to teach similar things. A detachment from the cares of this world, and a focus on something "greater".

But what if this is all there is?

And what if there is an afterlife and we spent our lives believing the wrong religion, and must face some consequences?

These are thoughts I find scary.

Especially the last one.

</comment><comment><USER14> From reading the title, you would think that the article was going to speculate about cause, but it seems to completely ignore it and just beg the question. Does being neurotic give you a wandering mind?

There's little or no experimental evidence that "thought" causes anything: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiphenomenalism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiphenomenalism)

edit: Wikipedia is scary specific [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_mental_causation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_mental_causation) :)

</comment><comment><USER15> The writer seems to express the worry that one type of mind is more efficient when the going gets tough (i.e. initial description of the two characters). This is an entirely different question. The assumption that so-called "neurotic" minds, wondering or whatever, will have less adaptive reactions to the circumstances is false. It is regularly contradicted by reality (e.g. history). There is just no reliable prediction to be made about how someone is going to behave based on the criterion presented.

</comment><comment><USER16> +1 for the first two paragraphs. Though I am not a psychologist I have seen your observation to be true in many cases. I would classify this line as gold "while my son's mental life is closely connected to the outside world, my daughter spends much of her life inside her own head". I have never met a person who has many outward connections and is depressed the assumption is that those connections are real.

</comment><comment><USER17> Is it possible to have both? Quiet your mind and be in the moment for physical stuff but call on its rumination powers to think when needed?

</comment><comment><USER18> Wandering not Wondering, title is a typo.

Read the title thought it was silly, double check the link's title and yeah, typo.

<comment><USER19> Agreed, please fix the title who can, it's confusing. Thanks :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> My mind wonders whether you actually meant "wandering"?</comment>


Terminal pixel art - <AUTHOR> https://gist.github.com/1308580

<comment><AUTHOR> I made it for <http://drawbang.com> upcoming API, just put before this script a simple GET request to any Draw! image and show it in your terminal.

<comment><USER2> why are you using tput ? why not print the ANSI codes directly with a library like this: <http://flori.github.com/term-ansicolor/>

<comment><AUTHOR> Because I don't want to introduce dependencies, but I think I should try it! Thanks for the feedback

<comment><USER2> Even so, take a look at how the library is implemented. It is better than calling tput which is kinda dirty.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Is there no way to call the terminfo API from Ruby? No way to call ncurses?</comment>


The Guys Who Trade Your Blood For Profit - <AUTHOR> http://www.forbes.com/sites/erincarlyle/2012/06/27/blood-money-the-guys-who-trade-your-blood-for-profit/ <comment><USER2> Article is over a year old... At one point it mentions that the company isn't profitable but expects to be by mid-2013. I wonder how the company is doing now?

Edit: Looked up their website, found them at [http://generalblood.com](http://generalblood.com). Looks like they are now working with Delta to deliver their blood, and Delta had an internal news article about General Blood: [http://www.generalblood.com/img/0912_5min_28.pdf](http://www.generalblood.com/img/0912_5min_28.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER3> Worst Title Ever. Should have been something like "Guys who are trying to make the blood distribution more cost efficient"</comment>


We object to the Newspaper Licensing Agency's terms - <AUTHOR> http://www.cutbot.net/legal-copyright/we-object-to-the-newspaper-licensing-agencys-terms/ <comment><USER2> First comment: "Interesting. These would be the same newspapers that once quoted my blog, without warning. This caused a traffic spike, and a hit to my hosting bill. I look forward to my forthcoming claim against The Times."

Because of course, it's not that the newspapers think any view of a webpage or usage of a headline is infringing, oh no. They just want this rule to apply to Their Stuff, which is Worth Protecting. Not to Your Stuff.

<comment><USER3> My favorite such case was when the Belgian newspapers sued Google for linking to their sites, and then when Google stopped doing it because they actually won that lawsuit, they came back begging to Google to include them again, once their traffic dropped significantly.

[http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110718/16394915157/belgia...](http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110718/16394915157/belgian- newspapers-give-permission-to-google-to-return-them-to-search-results.shtml)

<comment><USER4> It really disappoints me that Google would relist those sites. I would have demanded the money spent in court fees as payment for relisting, and if they didn't want to pay it... Google's under no obligation to list any site.

<comment><USER5> While it's fun to be vindictive, google surely made money by listing ads for those sites, and was probably happy to put them back and get the ad revenue again.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The article and the headline do not mention it, but FYI, this takes place in the United Kingdom.

<comment><USER7> More specifically, it takes place in _Scotland_.

Which has a very different legal system from England and Wales (or anywhere else, for that matter). Primary legislation from 1707 through 2000 was enacted in Parliament in London, but the judicial system itself is based on Roman law rather than Common Law or the Napoleonic Continental System.

This affects me (I'm in Edinburgh and so is my colo server). _You_ , whoever you are, are probably safe.

<comment><USER8> > the judicial system itself is based on Roman law rather than Common Law or > the Napoleonic Continental System

Says on Wikipedia[0] that it's a hybrid of Roman and English law. Why did they even use Roman law at all? The Roman Empire had been gone for several centuries, and England was in control after the 1707 Acts of Union, so it's surprising they didn't reform the system to follow English procedures.

0: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_law>

<comment><USER9> _Why did they even use Roman law at all_

One of the difference between Roman (aka civil) law and English (aka common) law is the that precent matters differently.

Lots of countries in Europe are based on civil aka Roman law.

The Act of Union in 1707 Scottish law was guaranteed to continue after the union, that was a demand. Why didn't they change it? Probably for the same reason the USA adopt Mexican law? Why should they? It's a different country with different legal systems.

<comment><USER10> _Probably for the same reason the USA adopt Mexican law?_

Bad analogy. The US and Mexico are not connected by an Act of Union.

And actually - parts of Mexican law were incorporated by states in the Southwest, where they made sense: primarily land-use and water rights.

 _It's a different country with different legal systems._

Act of Union - as I read it - united Scotland and England into the same Kingdom. You guys shared a flag, your armies are the same, the currency is the same.

A difference with no distinction.

Now, a prickly Scot could want to keep his oddball legal system and more power to him. But don't get all irate if the rest of the world looks at that choice and wonders that two countries that share currency, an army, a monarch, and etc should not also share the same legal system.

<comment><USER11> Another distinction is that Scotland has its own devolved parliament. Some issues, including copyright, are reserved to the UK government, but Scotland can (and does) pass its own laws on devolved issues.

<comment><USER12> And of cause that Scotland likes to emphasize its independence, as probably best illustrated by Scotland's current push to leave the United Kingdom.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Attempting to figure out the country of origin for every lawsuit, law, and court case referenced on this site is ridiculous. It's difficult to parse it all even if it's clearly denoted, and it rarely is. Please, please add the country of origin to headlines like this.

</comment><comment><USER14> The NLA contributed to the death of a startup I worked for last year (in Edinburgh, although this is a UK-wide issue, Meltwater being an English company).

At that time, they wanted £5,000 to not sue us, at least that much again, per quarter, for access to a horrific and incomplete API, plus 12p per link per imprint.

Let me repeat that one again: they wanted 12p for every time someone saw a link to their website published by us.

And even THEN, the NLA don't actually speak for all newspapers in the UK - News International publications are not licensed, which means that there's no legal path to accessing their content.

It's complete nonsense. One friend suggested using bit.ly to shorten the URLs, paying the NLA their 12p once and letting them go after bit.ly (in America) for the rest.

<comment><USER15> News Intl. aren't covered? How ironic, News Intl. publications were some of the first to put up pay walls.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> It seems like the content provider has little downside to doing this. News aggregator sends traffic to their page + news site seeks 'licensing' fees for that traffic = profit. I suppose there is the potential for the newspaper to lose money in legal fees as well as look like a jerk to people on the internet, but hey, gotta fight the inevitable demise of print media somehow.

<comment><USER17> Sometimes I just wish they would go out of business already. I think google should stop infringing their copyright too. You know, indexing Their Stuff and making links to it. That could do the trick. I wonder what they'd say then.

We see first hand what happens when disrupting incumbents who happen to also control politicians and have some good friends in the legal system. Hopefully the current people movement against copyright mafia will see further victories...

<comment><USER18> What does it mean to go out of business? Don't most newspapers make a loss? [1] (Excluding The Sun, obviously.) I don't think the motivation for funding them is profit, but influence, and so they'll continue to be produced for quite a while.

Regarding Google, didn't Murdoch complain about just that? [2]

[1] Well, at least The Times and The Guardian. [http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jul/20/times-paywall- re...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jul/20/times-paywall-readership) mentions a daily loss of £240,000 for The Times, and [http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jun/10/guardian- media-g...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jun/10/guardian-media-group- results) suggests similar (if not as great) losses by The Guardian. [http://moreintelligentlife.com/content/ideas/tim-de- lisle/ca...](http://moreintelligentlife.com/content/ideas/tim-de-lisle/can- guardian-survive) suggests a calculation of £100,000 a day. However, The Telegraph appears to make a profit, as suggested here because of merging their digital and print media: [http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/mar/18/telegraph- group-...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/mar/18/telegraph-group- profits-increase) — though I get the feeling that it would still be funded somewhat past the point of profitability too…

[2] [http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/apr/07/rupert- murdoch-g...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/apr/07/rupert-murdoch- google-paywalls-ipad)

<comment><USER17> Good point.

However, I think even Mr Murdoch's personal wealth could not sustain the losses of digital news outlets should Google comply and stop indexing them. By any means, they just have to put a little piece of text in their robots file to do just that - so this is yet more talk in favor of strong copyrights, and no action to renew anything.

<comment><USER18> <http://www.thetimes.co.uk/robots.txt> would suggest that they are already doing that for their paywalled sites, wouldn't it?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


How does the Kubernetes scheduler work? - <AUTHOR> https://jvns.ca/blog/2017/07/27/how-does-the-kubernetes-scheduler-work/ <comment><USER2> Generally the order of operations for someone writing a controller in Kube is:

1\. Do the basic loop with resync

2\. Fix a bunch of bugs

3\. Realize the controller is too slow (for all pods {} etc)

4\. Optimize for performance

5\. Soak for a few months

6\. Remove the resync interval

A correct controller will not need a resync interval. But it takes a while for sufficient tests and soak time to prove the controller is correct, and the resync is a great way to at least guarantee that state eventually converges.

For instance, 1.8 will remove the endpoint sync (after almost 2 years). Endpoints were one of the first controllers, and kept on chugging along without a problem. It's only now, with people running tens of thousands of services, that the inefficiency of the controller is indicating a need to optimize.

Controller loops are a great pattern because

1\. They embody the single-writer principle (you can get a lot of work done single threaded at low scale and still reason about correctness)

2\. An inefficient loop that that continually makes sure everything is correct is better in production than an efficient loop that breaks.

3\. Most of the efficient tooling is in place to adopt as we go.</comment>


10 Richest People of All Time and How They Made Their Fortunes - <AUTHOR> http://www.neatorama.com/2008/07/09/10-richest-people-of-all-time-and-how-they-made-their-fortunes/ <comment><USER2> The part about Carnegie doesn't mention how he basically went to England and took a new process for making steel 10x more efficiently from some other guys, came back and invested $100000 in a factory using the new process, and then had congress pass laws enacting tariffs on British steel. He wouldn't have gotten nearly so rich without those tariffs.

<comment><USER3> Probably because that's a myth. Read Joseph Frazier Wall's biography of Carnegie -- he went to Britain and saw the new steel-making process, but so did many other Americans. Like Carnegie, they were unimpressed, because it made small batches of steel for which there wasn't a ready market.

He got into the steel business about a decade later.

 _But_ that story isn't as fun as the legend of the rapacious rapscallion, who only got rich stealing an idea nobody wanted and everyone knew about, ten years later.

The tariff point is correct, though. He would not have been so rich. But he was the low-cost producer, anyway, so he wouldn't exactly have been hurting.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> A cool quote: "Gentlemen: you have undertaken to cheat me. I won't sue you, for the law is too slow. I'll ruin you. Yours truly, Cornelius Vanderbilt."

Reminds me of the advice to not rely too much on patents but on the business.

<comment><USER5> You can copy IP in 6 minutes IT in 6 months But to re-create a culture takes years.

When the owner drives a culture of ruthless business excellence (or otherwise), replacing the owner is not a wise business decision.

<comment><USER6> Well said.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> It could really use some more details on how they're coming up with these numbers. I can imagine how they might infer the wealth in current dollars of, say, Carnegie or Ford. But Crassus?

</comment><comment><USER8> There is a lot more to John D. Rockefeller than the article can ever summarize. I would suggest to anyone who wants to find out about the entire history, politics, discovery and wealth surrounding Oil and oilmen to read Daniel Yergin's The Prize.

<comment><USER9> To read about Rockefeller try "The Titan". Ever since this book came out in 1997, it has been my favorite business biography followed by Icon "Jobs".

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> One of Rockefeller's greatest achievements which is not mentioned is the creation of the modern corporation. Rockefeller and his partners were the first ones to pioneer the management of a huge enterprise much of what is taken for granted in today's S&P 500 companies.

Standard Oil came up with the idea of owning a wide variety of companies through trusts.

Also, the idea of management by being first among equals, running the company by consensus (in most cases) by a group of executives without exerting authoritarian control was new.

Finally, Rockefeller help write much of anti trust law. I will leave it at that.</comment>