Show HN: TagSpaces – An open source personal data manager - <AUTHOR> https://www.tagspaces.org/ <comment><USER2> Looks nice, but for personal use I don't like the idea of a tool like this changing the file names, and then I see the option in the Pro version to use "sidecar files". Nice! It then brought up another question I have often had with projects like these that start out on Unix like systems and are then available for Windows as well: why do they use dot files on Windows and tell the user to hide them manually, instead of using files with a "hidden" attribute? Part of porting should be adhering to the local conventions, should it not? Since this is not the first time I stumble upon dot files in Windows Explorer I am left wondering there is a real reason for it?

<comment><USER3> Even worse are Unix utilities that leave dotfiles in every single directory they touch. Just because they're hidden doesn't mean that they're not dirty! Pleas keep your crap restricted to ~/.config, which exists for this very reason.

<comment><USER4> > ~/.config, which exists for this very reason.

On GNU/Linux systems maybe, it isn't part of POSIX.

<comment><USER5> It does not conflict with POSIX though. Why not do it on BSD as well?

<comment><USER4> There are more UNIX systems out there.

How will you enforce something like that to all UNIX eco-system?

<comment><USER6> Convention. The concept of configuration in dotfiles is no more posix than the concept of configuration in ~/.config.

<comment><USER4> The point was _enforcing_ UNIX applications to use ~/.config.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Wow! I've been looking for something exactly like this for a long time. I am a motovlogger (which is someone who rides a motorcycle while vlogging) and I generate tons of small videos that I've always struggled to organize. I'll need to use random videos from months and months ago sometimes and it's so easy to lose track of them when you have thousands upon thousands of small short video clips.

One question/request I might have is if it is possible to attach a general note to a specific file. It's helpful to know what a video is about without having to watch the whole thing.

<comment><USER8> FWIW KDE does metadata for files, eg comments/tags/star rating, that you can see in the dolphin information panel and search using their standard toolset.

(You can see the add comment "link" in the images here [https://userbase.kde.org/Dolphin/File_Management#Information](https://userbase.kde.org/Dolphin/File_Management#Information) .)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I like it (even if it is a js app), but I don't like how it renames my files, especially without asking me if that's alright first.

It broke several other scripts and shortcuts I had due to the file name changing without me knowing.

</comment><comment><USER10> Camlistore is another open source project which works well. It's a bit more technical than this one appears to be.

<comment><USER11> I love Camlistore but have been hesitant to use it. They're just doesn't seem to be enough tracking behind it.. if more people were into it, i would be really happy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Instead of renaming the file, TagSpaces could create a symbolic link and preserve the original file name. All such links could be managed in a TagSpaces folder.

> ln -s ../fluffy.jpg "fluffy [cat].jpg"

Tags could be added by linking to the latest one:

> ln -s "fluffy [cat].jpg" "fluffy [cat] [yarn].jpg"

This would allow TagSpaces to have temporal knowledge as to when tags were added or removed.

If the links are cascaded as I have shown, then when the original file is moved, TagSpaces will only need to rebuild the first link. The rest will still work.

The issue of the tags causing the name to be too long can be addressed by a different tag naming strategy.

> ln -s ../fluffy.jpg "fluffy [+cat].jpg"

> ln -s "fluffy [+cat].jpg" "fluffy [+yarn].jpg"

> ln -s "fluffy [+yarn].jpg" "fluffy [-yarn].jpg"

This would require TagSpaces to have some simple logic to determine which tags were relevant at a particular point in time.

<comment><USER13> That system won't work for very many tags. Unix systems have limits on the number of symbolic links you can resolve when trying to access a file. I can't remember the limit on GNU/Linux off the top of my head but I'm fairly sure its something ridiculous like 32 links.

<comment><USER12> Thanks for pointing that out. Instead of the endless cascade, just cascade once off of the first link. That way, there would never be more than two references to resolve and you still get the temporal benefit.

> ln -s ../fluffy.jpg "fluffy [+cat].jpg"

> ln -s "fluffy [+cat].jpg" "fluffy [+yarn].jpg"

> ln -s "fluffy [+cat].jpg" "fluffy [-yarn].jpg"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> The screenshots look nice, but they only contain a couple dozen files and a similarly small number of tags.

I've got a good fraction of a million files on my home partition, and I'm likely to end up with hundreds if not thousands of tags if I were to go about organizing them. I'd like to know whether this tool will work on such a scale without inconvenience. Too many similar tools fall apart once you hit a hundred tags or so, not to mention a few hundred thousand entries. It's a lot of wasted effort to start using a tool like that, only to realize that it doesn't scale.

</comment><comment><USER14> I think git-annex's metadata[1] support and metadata driven views[2] aim to solve a similar problem.

[1] [https://git-annex.branchable.com/metadata/](https://git- annex.branchable.com/metadata/) [2] [https://git- annex.branchable.com/tips/metadata_driven_views/](https://git- annex.branchable.com/tips/metadata_driven_views/)

<comment><USER15> I wish there was a git-annex metadata browser and editor like this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I've always wondered what would happen to an OSS project if someone sat down and implemented all the PRO features and PR to git.

<comment><USER17> You expect to type PRO and have people know what your talking about? I certainly don't, and unless you are talking about the wikipedia entry [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRO_%28category_theory%29](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRO_%28category_theory%29), which it doesn't sound like, I don't think it's reasonable.

<comment><USER18> They mean the Pro version, as in – the paid version of the app. I think only the free features are open sourced.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> As tags end up in file names how can you do backups with this? rsync creates duplicates when tags are added since filename changes

<comment><USER20> The pro version offers saving tag in metadata instead [https://www.tagspaces.org/products/pro/#tagSidecarSaving](https://www.tagspaces.org/products/pro/#tagSidecarSaving)

But it won't recognize if an external tool moves the file

<comment><USER21> I'd much rather it stored it in a central "database" of some sort, but I'd also want automatic detection of renamed files.

<comment><USER22> That is what we do at [http://www.cloudfindhq.com](http://www.cloudfindhq.com), picking up the renamed file issue from the underlying Cloudstores was quite a challenge to implement. A lot of subtleties to get right with not always helpful API endpoints.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I assume only the regular version (non-Pro) is open source? If not, I'm really curious how this works together with Pro version being paid.

<comment><USER23> Looks like the license is AGPL so that nobody can clone them and do a similar 'pro' version.

Now, when you contribute to their OS project you need to sign a CLA which pretty much consists of the usual 'all your base are belong to us'.

      You hereby grant to the Owner and to recipients of software distributed by the  Owner a perpetual, worldwide, non- exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, irrevocable  copyright license to reproduce, prepare derivative works of, publicly display,  publicly perform, sublicense, and distribute Your Contributions and such derivative  works.

<comment><USER24> _Looks like the license is AGPL so that nobody can clone them and do a similar 'pro' version._

Well, they can, they just have to ship the source to the buyers (and no, they don't need to give it to non-buyers).

<comment><USER25> But that source would also be AGPL and a buyer could share it with the rest of the world.

But the odds of someone except the original developer wanting to work on a paid version are low anyway.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Funny how sometimes you think "You know 'x' would be really useful, I would use an application like 'x'." Then the next day its the top link on Hacker News.

<comment><USER27> Or worse: "You know 'x' would be really useful, maybe I should build that." Then you decide to let it rest for a few days (most of my projects have been bouncing around in my head for a while before I have a good idea of what product I want to make) and the next day it's on Hacker News.

Tagging is an old one for me. I settled on using tmsu but never actually got around to use it. The photo organizer sounds like something I should be doing, I start losing more and more photos. Problem is, Tagspaces either renames my files or leaves hidden directories in every directory (what is this, OS X?). Guess I might give tmsu another spin or, if that isn't satisfactory, write my own after all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Sounds like these guys [https://cloudfindhq.com/](https://cloudfindhq.com/) expect they don't modify the file name

<comment><USER22> Yeh, come and check out Cloudfind - we have just launched a new product that integrates nicely into Dropbox and Google Drive - free to use for personal and small team use. Lets you organise the tags into logical groupings to help you organise your stuff.

<comment><USER29> I notice the free version only allows 100 tags. I'd hardly have more than that but it might be a limitation some people should be aware of

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I actually would not mind having a simple database (that is cross platform like SQLite) which would act as a separation layer from the files (and store any tags, and minimal meta data)...only because I'm not crazy about any system changing file names on me. Call me old fashioned ;-) That being said, the UI - especially the editor - looks pretty neat.

I've seen comments for git-annex, but the lack of a neat gui/browser gives me pause. Can anyone recommend an alternative to Tagspaces but which does not alter filenames...and is of course cross platform (because i work with a couple different machines every day), and is open source?

</comment><comment><USER31> Tagging the filesystem and making a personal-cloud manager is very similar to one of the directions I'm headed in with meta64.com, which is built on the Java JCR, Lucene, Solr Cloud, Polymer, and is a sort of tree-structured repository that does lots of these types of shenanigans.

</comment><comment><USER32> I have to say that it would be nice if the sidecar functionality was available in the free edition. I don't want to try the free version because I'm unsure of the effects that renaming will have. I'd be afraid of losing potential customers because they didn't know about the renaming. I will still buy the Pro version because I definitely need somethings like this and this looks like a nice project to support.

p.s. is it possible to upgrade to Pro Unlimited if I like the Pro version?

</comment><comment><USER33> Most people aren't very diligent with naming their tags and organizing their data. I am definitely guilty of this.

Are there any data management services out there that can use some kind of semantic understanding to let you search through your own data? In essence, "google" my own personal collection of data? For example, I might make quick notes throughout the day and tag them with vague or maybe even incorrectly spelled tags. Can I type something like "note I wrote yesterday about dogs" and get correct results?

<comment><USER34> Cortana / Siri / Google Assistant?

Seems to be a place all of them are trying to head, with varying degrees of success thus far.

</comment></comment><comment> dj-wonk I'd be more interested if this integrated with macOS tags.

<comment><USER35> TagSpaces aims to be a cross-platform tool, implementing such a feature will be very restrictive for the use cases supported by the application.

<comment> dj-wonk When I hear "X is impossible", I like to reframe the issue. Instead of making a statement, why not ask a question such as "What would make X possible?" I write more about this at [https://medium.com/@xpe/reframing-the- impossible-42c588abcba...](https://medium.com/@xpe/reframing-the- impossible-42c588abcba7)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Is there a trial for the pro-version. In case somebody wants to test the sidecar functionality, full text search capabilities...

</comment><comment><USER37> I've been using TagSpaces for a while (mostly ass desktop note taking app). Nice project, but went back to Tomboy for two main UX reasons:

* no ctrl+n for new file

* no auto-saving of the file itself (I have to say last version I've been using was 2.1.1. I've downloaded / updated the software on my computer and will check this soon (apparently is missing)

</comment><comment><USER38> I have been looking for something similar to this that would allow me to also share the files with other people using a group permission structure per file. Has anyone seen something like that?

</comment><comment><USER39> Am I the only one who read this as TabsvsSpaces?

</comment><comment><USER40> So, for someone using only macOS/Mac OS X, how is this an improvement over the built-in file tagging?

<comment><USER35> Other operating systems don't posses the easiness of the tagging system build in OS X. The issue we see in the OS X tags is that they are locked to a particular operating system. Ones you copy/move your files on some other other platforms or the cloud you are mostly loosing the tagging information. BTW, TagSpaces is not only for tagging, we use it for example as a Evernote alternative.

<comment><USER40> So, given that my question was:

> for someone using only macOS/Mac OS X, how is this an improvement over the > built-in file tagging?

The answer is "it doesn't"?

I'm not saying it doesn't have a market, I'm trying to understand if it offers anything above the OS included functionality for someone purely in the Apple ecosystem.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> The title I got in my RSS reader was "File manager supports over 100 file extensions(Open source)." I was expecting a recent discovery of something from like the 60's being the earliest known document using the term "Open source." Shining example of the over-overloading of terms in tech.

</comment><comment><USER42> Why organize files by massive manual tagging if you can organize them with a simple system based on conventions [1]?

You can predict where something is most of times.

[1] [https://github.com/galfarragem/hamster- gtd](https://github.com/galfarragem/hamster-gtd)

<comment><USER35> In order to organize files with tagspaces you could use tags, but is not mandatory. You can still relay your local file and folder structure, which is displayed in the application. In a way you can use any conventions with TagSpaces, without a bounding to any file sync cloud service or Evernote.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I've been wanting to build something like this for about a decade but never bothered, and this looks so much better than anything I could have built. Thanks Ilian!

</comment><comment><USER43> That must be the slowest webpage I've ever used.

From the comments it sounds like I'd prefer the way git annex handles tagging.

<comment><USER44> Really fast for me, here in the UK.

<comment><USER43> It's still loading...

<comment><USER43> Hah, it's sitting there waiting for several fonts to load from fonts.googleapis.com, but I have my browser set to ignore any font choices set by webpages. Apparently it's just going to leave the dom empty forever.

<comment><USER27> I have fonts.googleapis blocked in my hosts file, loads fine for me in Firefox. Maybe it's your browser? Or the method of blocking?

<comment><USER43> I checked that last night, actually. A traceroute showed packets winding their way through comcast's network, hitting google's, and then vanishing. Whatever the problem was, it's been fixed. The moral of the story is to never rely on third-party assets, especially for synchronous stylesheets that block the browser from even parsing the rest of the page.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: I'm a PhD in logic trying to become a Data Scientist. What should I do? - <AUTHOR>

Dear HN,
I'm just about to finish a PhD in formal logic for multi-agent systems. I don't want to stay in academia and I'd like to try a Data Scientist career. My background is in philosophy, and even though I taught some computer science and maths courses, my programming skills are those of a mediocre undergraduate computer science student's (at best). I know Haskell, Scala and Python a little bit, and I'm learning R. I have never taken part in any serious programming project, though. The biggest program I ever wrote had less than 300 lines of code.
So here's my question to you as a community of experts. What is the best path for me? Should I simply learn Java and do exercises from some textbook one by one, and then study machine learning, hadoop and the like? Should I rather start with SICP and a good algorithms book? Or should I perhaps take a Data Science specialization on Coursera (I'm trying it, but my coding skills are too poor even for their elementary R course)? Something else?
Any advice is much appreciated. <comment><USER2> Disclosure: affiliated with the program[1]:

We offer both a 12 week immersive in data science (with structured curriculum augmenting a focus on practical data science) and a 6 week project focused curriculum leading up to a job fair. This is a python focused curriculum focusing on scikit learn.

Outside of that, I ended up becoming a data scientist and engineer via taking on consulting projects and working my way up on difficulty. There's a mix of online materials out there you've already mentioned that work more than well enough. My only other piece of advice is picking a concentration and becoming as good as it as you can.

1\. [http://www.zipfianacademy.com/](http://www.zipfianacademy.com/)

</comment><comment><USER3> I would join this program. [http://insightdatascience.com/](http://insightdatascience.com/)

Note, I am not affiliated with the program, I just know that they do exactly what you're asking, and have produced amazing results.

</comment><comment><USER4> I highly recommend the intro to data science course on coursera: [https://class.coursera.org/datasci-002](https://class.coursera.org/datasci-002)

Even if you have only a little programming experience if you spend a fairly reasonable amount of time on this you'll come out with a lot of practical knowledge which will allow you to jump into more advanced courses. (It has a bit of python, SQL and R).

</comment><comment><USER5> If you want some simple (maybe!) real world projects to test yourself on then get in touch using the email in my profile.

I do some work for a charity trying to improve things using data. I have several smallish, self contained data science projects that fit in the important but not urgent quadrant.</comment>


Lululemon sacks employee over China T-shirt uproar - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52380951 <comment><USER2> Heres a link to a similar stoy with images of the shirt for context. I think the shirt is sort if racist but I still feel it is important to see it. This is especially important for news media to provide the images so people get the full story. Otherwise people will imagine the worst possible case, when that is not nessisarily the case.

[https://www.vladtv.com/article/261998/lululemon-art- director...](https://www.vladtv.com/article/261998/lululemon-art-director- fired-after-sharing-racist-bat-fried-rice-shirt)

<comment><USER3> It is racist. It's on the same level as associating watermelon with African- Americans.

It's right that the employee was fired.

<comment><USER2> >>> It's on the same level as associating watermelon with African-Americans.

Or haggis with Scottish? How about sauerkraut with Germans? Maybe apple pie with Americans? Sushi with Japanese? It's kind of racism but not extremely racist. Maybe it was the bat wings that made it racist? The font used on the sleves could be considered racist I suppose. All important information that was not provided by the reporter BTW.

Would I have fired the employee? Possibly, but I think I would have at the very least demanded a public apology from them and had a frank discussion with them. Considering the comments Chip Wilson made that Fat Women shouldn't wear their yoga pants I'm not surprised this happened at lulu.

My comment was more to the point that certain media outlets provide incomplete information in their stories to fit the narrative of their choice. I hate to call it fake news because of the stigma attached to that turn of phrase but I think it approaches the realm of half truths when critical information is ommited.

Personally I think the artist thought that they were being funny, racist or not they didn't follow the rule of:

"Tradgedy+TIME=Comedy"

<comment><USER3> Associating sushi with Japan is not a racist stereotype. Sushi is a cultural part of Japan. Although this can obviously be used in a racist way.

Associating watermelon with African-Americans, or greed with Jews, is a racist stereotype.

Chinese are no more fond of bats than blacks are fond of grape juice (in fact it's worse than that as Chinese do not generally eat bats at all). This is fake news that feeds racism.

This cartoon is idiotic and racist. Publishing it on social media added another layer of stupidity. The guy rightly got immediately fired.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Computer program can reconstruct long-extinct languages from modern ones - <AUTHOR> http://www.nature.com/news/computer-program-roots-out-ancestors-of-modern-tongues-1.12407

<comment><USER2> What, like COBOL?

<comment><USER3> You laugh. A guy two doors down is wondering why a COBOL program that used to run just fine is now segfaulting.</comment></comment>


Racist Comments Cost Conservative Parkland Student a Place at Harvard - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/17/us/parkland-kyle-kashuv-harvard.html <comment><USER2> They got him some two years later.

Beyond that, it really goes to show how much the university system is now simply a credentialing system for certain individuals, so long as they maintain the correct group affiliation it have individuals that can make the necessary donations (and make sure it stays discreet, unlike the recent Hollywood elites). Is there a place where individuals can study, and question, and learn? Unfortunately not at the university.

<comment><USER3> Huh? The university system (for rich people) has nearly always been that way.

Don't you remember that blacks and women - incorrect group affiliations! - used to have a really hard time going to university?

Or the schools that generally didn't accept Jews? As I recall, the 'well- rounded student' euphemism was because Jewish people tended to do better on entrance tests, so there needed to be some justification for discounting that.

Or, recall how the universities (for rich people) used to have entrance examinations which were biased towards the material taught at prep schools? Funny how poorer people didn't learn so much Latin at their schools.

There's certainly places where 'individuals can study, and question, and learn' \- try smaller universities where people aren't fighting for the name cachet.

And ... stop the bad habit of thinking "person X went to Name Cachet university therefore is more likely to be a good job candidate than person Y who went to Less Well Known university."</comment></comment>


David Bowie, an Internet pioneer - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-35279234 <comment><USER2> _Bowie: I don 't think we've even seen the tip of the iceberg. I think the potential of what the Internet is going to do to society—both good and bad—is unimaginable. I think we're on the cusp of something exhilarating and terrifying.

Interviewer: It's just a tool, though, isn't it?

Bowie: No, it's not... no, it's an alien life form [laughs]. It's just arrived from Mars. _

1998?

<comment><USER3> I very much doubt that he thought the Internet was invented by Gore in 1997. Expand your time scale to the level of the point he's making, and yes it did just arrive.

<comment><USER2> I was not faulting him for possibly not knowing the full history of the internet.

Pre-1997, the internet and the web were both very confidential. It started to become a thing in the public mind around that time, and seeing it, in 2000 (apparently the proper date of the interview) as an alien life form is very insightful.

<comment><USER4> I don't disagree that characterizing it as an "alien" would not have been out of place at the time.

However, it was not "confidential" in 1996. That is simply a ridiculous statement.

<comment><USER5> It's only ridiculous if you willfully overlooking the context of the interview... which is not history of arpanet 101.

From the perspective of the Time magazine reading consumer middle class, yes, the internet just arrived fully formed, with only Compuserve and its ilk as hobbyist forerunners with hardly more uptake than CB or ham radio.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The interview is gold. (I shared it earlier but it didn't garner enough attention [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10883028](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10883028))

He perfectly summarized the relationship between the art and the internet: "That gray space in the middle (between the artist and the audience) is what the 21st century is about"

Also it is fascinating how certain he was that new mediums will emerge and how different they will be from what we knew back then. When we were pioneering current style of social media with Jaiku back in 2006, many smart people failed to understood how powerful social broadcast media could be. But Bowie was already in 2000 understanding the power of it.

<comment><USER7> Did he bank on it in any way? I've never noticed Bowie doing anything particular social media, youtube exclusive, pay what you want or other similar new media age kind of things.

As far as I know, he did news paper and TV intervews, released albums, played live shows and acted in movies. Doesn't seem very "social broadcast media" to me.

<comment><USER8> Bank on it... in a way, yes. He sold the rights to his albums. People gave him ready money in exchange for the future income from his albums.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celebrity_bond](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celebrity_bond)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It's scary to think about how ephemeral some of these early internet experiments are. Wayback Machine is great for static sites, but I'm amazed that enough of this interactive media/software was captured to even report on. I hope that the Bowie camp has some smart archivists who will preserve this unique material.

<comment><USER10> I worked on BowieNet in around 2000. He was really very involved in the site and content. The biggest draw was the members-only concert.

Regarding the content. There was another company that did the design work, a bunch of it in flash; but also in HTML for the message boards and stuff that we integrated into our PHP forum that had all the actual messages stored in MySQL. I'm not sure what would have happened to any of that when VillageWorld (the company that did the backend at least initially) went bust in 2004; or if it was migrated away or shut down before that.

The live chats were either IRC with a Java web client or we also had an NPH script that we could of used, but I don't remember which ended up being "real" at this point. There were definitely some that were organized and others that were not.

<comment><USER11> Live chats with Bowie?

Care to give more details, stories, etc? BowieNet sounds fascinating to me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Omikron (1999) was a great game. It was one of the first open world games with real 3D graphics. You could ride a taxi around the city, enter buildings, etc. Of course GTA3 (2001) took it to the next level, but in 1999 GTA still was 2D: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Theft_Auto_2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Theft_Auto_2) .

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omikron:_The_Nomad_Soul](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omikron:_The_Nomad_Soul)

<comment><USER13> $10 DRM Free on GOG: [http://www.gog.com/game/omikron_the_nomad_soul](http://www.gog.com/game/omikron_the_nomad_soul)

$10 on Steam as well: [http://store.steampowered.com/app/243000/](http://store.steampowered.com/app/243000/)

One of my favorite games, however I recommend playing it on Dreamcast if that's an option, as the PC controls are a little painful to work with.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> A non-Flash version of the interview: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiK7s_0tGsg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiK7s_0tGsg)

</comment><comment><USER15> Some very ignorant remarks and assumptions of people who did not watch the full live BBC video interview relating to him, music & the internet and are taking snippets - of course the internet was estsblished before 1998!!! Some folks do not have a command of the english language and think they are computer boffins. He was not talking "Microsoft" for example - relative to music , him and people (audience) ... Very smart man - also get the interviewer's question to comprehend his response ... People who were born in the middle 70s & after, unless savy and forward thinking do not get: "David Bowie, an internet pioneer" YES, most definitely I concur; he was & is ... You're programmed already & not an individual (thinking tech facts blah) nor creative as he was & he was the 1st "Personality" to offer himself as an ISP - #Fact RIP Mr. JONES

</comment><comment><USER16> The interviewer's perspective was no less prophetic about the current reality. The internet is mostly a tool to spread the same old media type of content, just more and faster. A lot more America's Favorite Home videos and niche channels than were possible before. A lot more spam, gossip and passing notes, which is not very alien.

Engelbart also thought we would get somewhere alien. He underestimated the power of the mainstream.

</comment><comment><USER17> For anyone trying to find the website on the WaybackMachine:

The BowieNet domain was davidbowie.com, not bowie.net (as noted under the screenshot in the article).

</comment><comment><USER18> I don't remember BowieNet at all, and I was definitely cheerfully using dialup in the UK, with Demon Internet, in the late nineties ('97 onwards I'd say). Was it really a big deal? I can't find out much information about it other than a bunch of news sites this week all regurgitating variants of the same material.

</comment><comment><USER19> At 98 those predictions were already old hat.

</comment><comment> V-2 _" For a monthly fee, members got an @davidbowie.com-ending email address"_

Isn't it the same thing Trump gets ridiculed for? ;)

<comment><USER20> No, it isn't the same thing, and you took it out of context to make it seem it is:

 _" BowieNet also operated as a full internet service provider (ISP) in the US and UK, competing with AOL, Claranet and others. For a monthly fee, members got an @davidbowie.com-ending email address and exclusive access to audio recordings, music videos and chat rooms, which the singer participated in himself."_

<comment><USER21> I found these, which give a better idea what the service actually promised:

BowieNet VPN Account: For $19.95/month subscribers can obtain full Internet Service Access via a Virtual Private Network (VPN) arrangement with Concentric Networks. Instead of dialing into AOL or your local ISP, you dial a Concentric Networks number and gain full Internet access (web browsing, email, chat, news, FTP) on the back of Concentric's worldwide network. $19.95/month accounts also get an exclusive BowieNet CD-ROM which includes all the software necessary to get you on the Internet together with two video tracks and a newly recorded audio track called Fun.

Premium Content: For $5.95/month subscribers who want to retain their current Internet provider can sign up to obtain a username and password to access the premium content of BowieNet. That includes everything on the web as in the BowieNet VPN account, but doesn't include the CD-ROM with the exclusive tracks.

From a contemporary review: [http://www.teenagewildlife.com/Othermedia/BowieNet/review.ht...](http://www.teenagewildlife.com/Othermedia/BowieNet/review.html)</comment></comment></comment>


The Outliner for the Rest of us - <AUTHOR> http://outlineedit.com <comment><USER2> It's a nice simple tool for editing lists. Much better than Notes for this.</comment>


Ruby Enterprise Edition 1.8.7-2011.01 released - <AUTHOR> http://blog.phusion.nl/2011/02/12/ruby-enterprise-edition-1-8-7-2011-01-released/

<comment><USER2> I'm really hoping that we'll see some REE love for 1.9, but right now they're focused on other things (rightly so). Forking unicorn workers is so expensive without a COW-friendly GC that I've reverted back to thin.

Very happy to see development continuing, and I'll be upgrading all my 1.8.7 apps to run on this later today.

So, thanks phusion team!

<comment><USER3> Can you elaborate on unicorn being expensive with 1.9.2 in comparison to thin?

IIRC they're both using the prefork model, so shouldn't they have roughly the same COW/GC issues?

<comment><USER2> I don't believe thin uses a pre-fork model, though I could be wrong on that account. I went through some pretty intense memory comparisons between the two over the past month, I'll have to write it up tomorrow.

<comment><USER3> I looked at the Thin code again and it uses Open3 to spawn multiple instances of itself as subprocesses.

Intuitively I'd expect that method to consume _more_ Ram than forking because there's no opportunity for COW at all. However it'd be interesting to see what you measured, looking forward to your write-up if you get around to it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I just forked Moonshine and added a patch for this: <https://github.com/jarinudom/moonshine>

If you're already running ree187 with Moonshine, just install that fork and run 'cap ruby:upgrade' to update to the latest version (or wait until it gets merged into <https://github.com/railsmachine/moonshine>).

Edit: Oops, I forgot it's in a branch on my fork, so you'll have to do something like

      $ rails plugin install firstname.lastname@example.com:jarinudom/moonshine.git -r ree187-2011.01

</comment><comment><USER5> That article and corresponding REE marketing pages do a great job of telling me why I should use REE.

Can anyone tell me why I _shouldn't_ use REE? (Currently using MRI 1.8.7)

<comment><USER6> If you don't need the memory savings, you probably want to start migrating to ruby 1.9 for the speed improvements. JRuby is also a good alternative. (faster than 1.8, OS-level threads)

So no reason to _not_ use REE, but there are other alternatives that have their own strengths.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do they write test coverage for driverless cars? - <AUTHOR> How they write test suites for driverless cars? For example, it seems that you'd need to run through the same tests multiple times in different weather conditions, with broken signage, with signage and traffic rules for different countries, and so forth. <comment><USER2> They use all the data they collect from the real world to run endless simulations. There was something about this in the January 2016 status report from Google.

"All together, we drive more than 3 million miles in simulation every day."

[https://www.google.com/selfdrivingcar/reports/](https://www.google.com/selfdrivingcar/reports/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Lots of good stuff there, thanks. But not finding anything addressing formal, repeatable test suites.

<comment><USER3> I don't think they can do formal checking in such cases. The best they can do is to run a number of tests on a number of scenarios.

However, this is a scenario with large input sets and infinite test cases, I don't think they can ever formally check every possibility.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I would guess that there are three major components to the cars - the data collection (sensors, cameras, GPS, etc), the driving mechanism (throttle, brakes, wheel), and the logic unit ("should I accelerate into this minivan?")

I would assume they run the logic unit through simulations independently of the other systems in many instances.

<comment><AUTHOR> One _can_ assume those things, but should one? So many problems come to mind. For example, you can overtrain neural nets. How do they avoid that problem? Do they have tests that do so? Or driving on the other side of the road, as in Britain vs. United States.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Hire someone with lots of experience writing drivers!

</comment><comment><USER6> probably some sort of simulation?

<comment><AUTHOR> We all know simulations are by definition not the real thing. I think that would be a great way to get 95% of your testing done. It's the other 5% that haunts me.</comment></comment>


Comodo not really getting the concept of HTTPS - <AUTHOR> http://servertastic.tumblr.com/post/49923726926/comodo-not-really-getting-the-concept-of-https

<comment><USER2> Related: [http://www.troyhunt.com/2013/05/why-i-am-worlds-greatest- lov...](http://www.troyhunt.com/2013/05/why-i-am-worlds-greatest-lover- and.html) (hn discussion: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5661806>)

Looks like Troy picked up the Comodo story and demonstrates a MiTM attack here: [http://www.troyhunt.com/2013/05/heres-why-you-cant-trust- ssl...](http://www.troyhunt.com/2013/05/heres-why-you-cant-trust-ssl-logos- on.html)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> So while loading the seal over standard http is not a security issue in itself there is the problem of mixed content when loaded over https.

This could leave the site open to a MiTM style attack since security fatigue means the user just loads insecure content. The http request could then potentially be redirected to load an alternative content.

<comment><USER3> Note: Firefox 23 (currently active in Nightly) will block insecure content by default

<comment><AUTHOR> images are classed as passive content by Firefox 23 so by default they will load just the padlock will not show. More info: [https://blog.servertastic.com/firefox-23-to-block-mixed- cont...](https://blog.servertastic.com/firefox-23-to-block-mixed-content/)

<comment><USER3> Hm, good to know

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Even though the embed code has HTTP for the image url, it's still possible to load the images over SSL.

[https://www.positivessl.com/images- new/PossitiveSSL_tl_trans...](https://www.positivessl.com/images- new/PossitiveSSL_tl_trans.gif)

<comment><AUTHOR> Which makes it even more stupid that they haven't put this as the source code.</comment></comment>


We don't hire designers who can't code - <AUTHOR> http://www.followtheuxleader.com/user-experience-design/we-dont-hire-designers-who-cant-code

<comment><USER2> Yeah, I mean seriously. I'm sure most fashion designers can sew, and I'm sure most industrial designers know basics of electronic boards.

The hardest part about web-design isn't even coding/sketching. It's finding a compromise between your own taste, the clients, the back-end developers, and a bunch of varying ideas in your mind.

Web-design is about explaining to your wasted colleagues why you can't just 'draw it up' in five minutes and send an invoice. Web-design is about hastily aligning sections and changing fonts at some girl's house with a bottle of wine and cheese instead of having sex with her. Web-design is about wanting to kill yourself because your mockup got trashed on r/design_critiques. Web- design is about walking through art lofts with giant sculptures of penises and girls with green hair while you're trying to figure out where the hell you are and where the hell is the exit. Web-design is about cutting yourself with an x-acto knife, partly because you missed the 4B graphite pencil and partly because you're suicidal. Web-design is about being covered in white gouache because you're trying to clean up a sketch and the fucking pencil marks just won't come out when you erase them. Web-design is about sitting at a coffeeshop and drinking coffee while trying to fix that one part that just won't fucking work on Internet Explorer.

Web-design is fun! :|</comment>


Ask HN: What's a good practical web language to learn? - <AUTHOR>

Hello fellow hackers. I have 12 years experience with PHP and MySQL, what I am wondering is, what is a good practical web language to learn?
I have thought about learning Node.js and MongoDB. Also even thought about Python.
Please give me practical reasons, not "X is better than Y because I said so".
Thanks! <comment><USER3> My vote goes toward Node.js.

My reasoning for this is because of the versatility of JavaScript across the stack (both front-end and back-end) - you only need to learn one language!

As per database, call me old-fashioned, but I'm still with the MySQL camp. NoSQL databases like MongoDB have their uses, but MySQL is king for me - <USER2> now, anyway. :P

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback. Sticking with MySQL would be best for me too as I know it, but it would be nice to learn a NoSQL database too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'd go with Javascript / Node.... 1 JS is universally deployed (1 language to learn) 2 JS works pretty well as a functional language, which is becoming much more important of late 3 Node(still a work in progress) covers the server side too, and the result is a scalable, single language solution.</comment>


Edward Snowden's Advice for an Unhackable Password - <AUTHOR> http://time.com/3815620/edward-snowden-password-john-oliver/ <comment><USER2> The way I do it is going to be insecure the moment I lose one password, but it is easier for me to remember than these things. I have a phrase that is at least 8 characters long and then I add something specific for the service. The initial phrase includes a number and capital, for example "ExampleP1ss" and I really should have a symbol somewhere in it except I haven't signed up for anything that requires a symbol. Examples of things specific to this would be "hacknews", "hackernews", "hackerNews", "ycominator", "hackercombinator", ... How (in)secure is this?

I also have it written down because I figure if someone has access to my personal computer physically, and they want my passwords they can probably install some keylogger or something else I don't understand, and this way I'll never forget my password. I also have a list of services that I am signed up for so I don't forget to change my reddit password because I haven't used reddit in the last three weeks after something like heartbleed happens. What I will not do is store my passwords in my browser, that seems like an awful idea. Especially because some things automatically sync across browsers.

<comment><USER3> >What I will not do is store my passwords in my browser, that seems like an awful idea. Especially because some things automatically sync across browsers.

The serious browser extensions that do this use encryption for syncing, you are correct that centralizing them all in a browser extension is a negative for security, but the upside of having random and different passwords for each site or service _far_ outweighs the risks posed by centralization or browser storage.

The odds that one or more sites you use end up leaking your plaintext passwords is far more likely than Lastpass being hacked, even the odds of someone identifying your self described insecure pattern from a series of these leaks is far more likely than getting burned by an extension.

I had my apprehensions before starting to use a password manager, but after six months I consider it absolutely essential and urge everyone else to use LastPass or a similar addon. The benefits massively outweigh the risks.

<comment><USER4> Any idea why browsers haven't implemented their own native password generation functionality yet?

If nothing else, having this functionality built into popular browsers would increase public awareness of better password practices by at least an order of magnitude.

<comment><USER5> There's an option you can enable in chrome://flags to enable a password generator. I don't believe the user gets any control over the password's complexity right now, but it looks like it's something that the Chrome team is at least considering.

I'm not aware of anything similar being built into Firefox.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Unfortunately, many sites enforce arbitrary restrictions on admissible passwords (e.g. between 8-13 characters, at least one digit, one lower case, and one uppercase). This makes the whole proposition much harder. I wonder if there is some purpose behind this (make things a little harder for the small- timers, but open the doors for the big guys).

<comment><USER7> Banking sites seem to be notorious for this. The worst offenders will simply truncate the password, too, leaving you to believe you're using a much more secure password than you actually are.

<comment><USER8> This is absolutely the case with USAA. No warning whatsoever was given that they truncated my password which led to me being locked out when it autofilled from LastPass. I contacted them but all they've offered to do is "forward it to our security team".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I still think the best possible practice is to use a password manager. I've been using one for a couple years I haven't ran into any issues so far. My passwords are long, complex,with symbols and unique. I use the phrase trick for the master password.

<comment><USER10> Importantly, your password manager file can stay on your device, not in a network-connected database that can be hacked, downloaded, and brute forced. Having millions of targets in one place is tempting, your personal files aren't.

<comment><USER11> I use Keepass, I store the databases on Dropbox, I memorize the passphrases, and I store their private keys on a thumbdrive.

I do worry about someone analyzing each and every change to the database for some kind of information leak, but I also change the compound key every 6 months which should help.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> One of my university professors used lyrics from folk songs to create passwords. Usually he took first characters of each word and created a long password out of them. He changed the song every week - I saw him often singing without a sound when he was about to login ;-)

<comment><USER13> One of my professors recommended passphrases of the same type. I still remember the example he used 15 years later.

"ILikeToPluckStringerdInstrumentsWithAPlectrum"

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Not sure I understand the advantages of passphrases that string together common words and names. Presumably a password cracker could look for long strings of common words, too.

Snowden emphasizes using words that aren't in the dictionary, but proper names of historical figures are in certain e-dictionaries (my android keyboard's auto-complete dictionary for instance includes Margaret and Thatcher).

</comment><comment><USER15> That protects against people guessing your password, (or cracking after a DB dump), but that assumes they have to guess. Demand that sites encrypt your passwords. [http://plaintextoffenders.com/](http://plaintextoffenders.com/)

<comment><USER16> They don't have a search feature!

I always >sigh< when I have to resort to external web search and limit the search to that domain which usually gives in poor results.

( Just noticed they have added a note about that. )

<comment><USER17> Given they know about it, they should just add a custom Google search widget to the sidebar.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Write your passwords down on a piece of paper and put that piece of paper in your wallet. If you lose your wallet, well you just lost your credit card and maybe social security card too, so changing passwords ain't so bad.

Use incorrect answers for secret questions (wallet too).

<comment><USER19> I think for most moderately-technically-inclined people, a decent password manager is going to be much more secure (and in many cases, more convenient).

If you steal my credit card, I'll just call my bank and cancel it (and I'm not liable for any charges you made, anyway). But if you break into my email (or even something like my Facebook, which might have weaker security), it might be really hard to recover from that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I think an important point Snowden makes is that the words used in the passphrase should be unlikely to be in a dictionary. In other words, the phrase should be one to which a language model[1] would assign low probability, as there are hugely many of such phrases, whereas higher probability phrases are less numerous.

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_model](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_model)

</comment><comment><USER21> For good master passwords: Randomly select 12 words from a book (be honest with the randoms, don't be choosy), and then doodle a picture where each word has a memorable element. Draw it a few times. Put one copy away for safe keeping. Work through the image whenever recalling your password, and once it becomes muscle memory, make a point of imagining it as typing it every once in awhile, to make sure you don't turn it completely instinctual :)

</comment><comment><USER22> I've tried to use non ascii characters in passwords. Specifically, I've tried using japanese phrases as passwords/passphrases. Most software reject them. Or when they accept to register them, they would fail to recognize it on login. Sigh.

</comment><comment><USER23> My rule of thumb is to go for 128 bits of entropy:

        * If they allow all printable ASCII chars, that means
          128 / lg(94) = about 20 characters
        * If they only allow alphanumeric,
          128 / lg(62) = about 22 characters

If the site doesn't let me use a password > 20 characters, I don't sign up.

I also use a password manager, so all my passwords are randomly generated.

My master password? 64 characters of line noise I memorized years ago. ;)

Also:

[https://defuse.ca/password-policy-hall-of- shame.htm](https://defuse.ca/password-policy-hall-of-shame.htm)

<comment><USER24> >I also use a password manager, so all my passwords are randomly generated.

Any recommendations?

Key points being security and cross platform accessibility.

<comment><USER15> I've been using LastPass, it's been pretty solid. It's not the most polished thing in the world but it works well.

<comment><USER15> And InfoSec Taylor Swift uses it. [https://twitter.com/SwiftOnSecurity/status/58655626893814169...](https://twitter.com/SwiftOnSecurity/status/586556268938141697)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> [http://correcthorsebatterystaple.net/](http://correcthorsebatterystaple.net/)

</comment><comment><USER26> [https://xkcd.com/936/](https://xkcd.com/936/)

<comment><USER27> Note that bruce schneirer said not to do it, so people don't.

nobody's proved it wrong, but BS said not to, so people avoid it.

<comment><USER28> People are really bad at estimating password security, which is why he advised against it as a trick. You're right that he shouldn't have advised against it on a basic entropy level... except that 44 bits is not enough.

Using words is okay, but you have to impress on people two critical things.

1\. random words. not sentences. use a program or dice.

2\. Each word is only as good as two random characters. 8 words is as good as 16 characters, no more.

People try to get 'clever' and it never works out well.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: I'm resigning soon, any suggestions what to build on my own? - <AUTHOR>

This summer I decided to take some time off - the last two weeks of August - and spend them at home doing nothing. The experience of freedom from office work was so wonderful that I want more of it!
This Monday, immediately upon returning, I told my boss I'll be resigning in about three months. (That's a reasonable grace period because the job happens to be my all-time favorite - http://kosmosnimki.ru - plus I happen to be the lead client-side dev, and the boss happens to be my schoolmate.) Same day I told my landlord I'll be moving away in a month to find a cheaper apartment. There's some money stashed from previous odd jobs that will last me several months at least.
So freedom is ahead, now what? Starting a startup would be the logical course of action... except I've never had a burning desire to make a lot of money, and business ideas don't pop into my head by themselves. So I'm turning to you for suggestions.
(Personal background: the HN community may remember me from my project http://openphotovr.org that was discussed on HN a year ago or so. I know my math and can program passably well in most languages used in the industry and some exotic ones.) <comment><USER3> I know exactly how you feel. I was recently laid off for 5 weeks and worked full-time on my startup. Working from home was so awesome... <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=641400>

With that said, here are my thoughts.

First of all, you're lucky if you enjoy your job and work with friends. I would strongly suggest that you see if you can work part-time while you "do your own thing", with a possibility of coming back full-time, should you ever "come to your senses".

With no plan, no idea, no help and no anything, I don't see how you can support yourself past "several months at least". One remedy is to find a fledgling startup to join. It's risky without knowing the other founders well, but it could be good experience.

My #1 recommendation for you is to read the following links:

[http://www.slideshare.net/venturehacks/customer- development-...](http://www.slideshare.net/venturehacks/customer-development- methodology-presentation)

[http://steveblank.com/2009/08/27/the-leading-cause-of- startu...](http://steveblank.com/2009/08/27/the-leading-cause-of-startup- death-the-product-development-diagram/)

[http://steveblank.com/2009/08/31/the-customer-development- ma...](http://steveblank.com/2009/08/31/the-customer-development-manifesto- reasons-for-the-revolution-part-1/)

Basically, the idea is to verify that your idea can actually make money before you write one line of code. Since you're probably heavy on tech and light on customer development, use this time to learn and experiment. I'm not telling you this as a know-it-all, I'm telling you this as someone who wishes they would have done it years ago.

Good luck with whatever you choose to do.

EDIT: spelling

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks a lot! This is precisely the kind of answer I wanted. Don't want to stay for part-time, though; I'm terrible at switching from project to project, this takes days.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Here's a serious idea.

An SMS-based/ mobile app that will help me and my family encourage each other to work out.

For example, when I come back for a run, I would text in "just ran 5 miles" and my parents and sister would get the text /email/ twitter update and perhaps be encouraged to exercise as well!

Some other functionality could be showing me trends of my workouts (think Nike+ on iPhones) vis a vis my other family members, or SMS updates ("your son said you should go for a run!").

The problem is that people in this country are getting fatter every day, and could use motivation to work out. Support and ecouragement from family and friends might be the most effective source of motivation.

Thoughts?

<comment><AUTHOR> That may be a good idea, but I live in Russia and practically no one around me is fat, so it'll be hard for me to muster the startup enthusiasm. :-) Anyway, thanks!

<comment><USER5> Here's some useful marketing intelligence:

[http://www.food.gov.uk/healthiereating/advertisingtochildren...](http://www.food.gov.uk/healthiereating/advertisingtochildren/promotion/issues/obesityratesworldwide/)

Probably best to target the merely overweight than the hopelessly obese. In which case Russia (or perhaps more urgently my native England) actually looks like a fair bet!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Here's 30 ideas: <http://ycombinator.com/ideas.html>

<comment><AUTHOR> Good list. Three years ago I made a working demo of #22 but then got distracted by personal problems. Thanks for reminding me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Having never done this myself, I have to ask: Shouldn't the normal order of process be: 1) have an idea, 2) quit job to work on it full time, 3) profit! It seems to me like your #1 and #2 are swapped. That doesn't mean it won't work out for you, though. :)

<comment><USER8> Isn't a more common order 1) unsettled in job, have an idea 2) quit to work on it full time 3) realize the original idea sucks and zero in on a new one through trial and error 4) profit!

In which case, skipping step 1 doesn't seem too harmful to the process.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Like others, I'm not really going to answer the question you asked, but instead offer unsolicited advice on the decision you've made.

Being at home doing nothing is fun, but realize that you'll be at home working your ass off. If it was the "doing nothing" part that was most interesting to you then a startup may not be as much fun as you're currently anticipating.

Also, I don't know what your financial situation is, but "several months" of savings doesn't sound like a whole lot if you're just starting from scratch now. It could likely take longer than that to get ramen profitable.

Just some background, I was in a somewhat similar situation last year. The new startup/project I quit my job for was something that I had been working on part-time for 3 years before that. Even with that head start, my initial revenue was only about 10% of what I had projected/hoped for. It's still steadily growing and could be ramen profitable in the next year or two, but I just wanted to share my experience to let you know that financially it could be harder and longer than you think. It was for me.

<comment><AUTHOR> So ramen profitability will take you five years? That's pretty depressing - <USER2> don't want to think about that scenario :-)

<comment><USER9> Yeah, it was very depressing when it first hit me. Great learning experience though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> _the job happens to be my all-time favorite_

What are you crazy?!?

I've had many jobs and I've liked few of them. If you have a job you love working for a schoolmate, why would you want to leave? You don't even have any plans. I'd understand this a little better if you had a project you're dying to work on full time, but that's not the case.

Why don't you just keep your job and find a side project. If that side project gets big, go part time. If it gets so big, you're _burning_ to work on it full-time, then quit, but not before.

Good jobs are hard to come by and jobs you love are almost impossible to come by. Also, don't discount all the data you get from your job to feed your startup plans. Lots of people would love to do a startup, but don't know what to work on. People with jobs don't have that problem as much. The job can be the source of lots of great ideas for things people actually need right now.

I'm the last person to discourage anyone from doing their thing, but job vs. startup is not a binary decision. You _can_ do both, at least for a while.

Keep that all-time favorite job for now. You can always leave later once something else has wings.

<comment><USER11> No matter how much I've liked any job I've had, I always knew I was working for someone else.

<comment><USER12> you say that like working for someone else is bad - do you think your startup will have no customers? (for whom you'll be working_for harder than your boss)

<comment><USER11> You're overparsing my intention. When you work for another company, there is always someone else who ultimately has to sign off on your decisions; I'd far rather be the person with whom the buck always stops.

<comment><USER13> That's not necessarily true. I can code basically whatever I want. I just can't _launch_ it without Marissa's approval. But there are more potential internal users at Google than most startups ever get anyway, and anything with significant internal traction will likely get launched regardless of the decision-makers' opinions.

<comment><USER11> With my day job right now, I determine our release schedule, what features go into the product, how things get implemented, what tools we use, what languages we use, what hardware we purchase, what development methodologies we use, how we build, how we test, how we handle user training, how we deal with bug reports, what candidates we hire, which people we fire, and I don't have to ask for permission to do any of these things.

But, it's not my company; and what I can and can't do could change instantly if the guy at the top of the org chart decides on a whim that things are going to be done differently. While I don't think it's likely to happen, it's still a possibility; and you have a lot less of that when it's you at top of the chart.

[Edit: I just want to preempt some other angles if I can; I know that things get muddy when you deal with investors and and boards of directors, and when you deal with partners and staff and all of those things. There's a bit of nuance here that I'm somehow not conveying. I guess at this point you either get what I'm saying or you don't.]

<comment><USER13> If the guy at the top decides on a whim that things are going to be done differently, you can just keep doing what you're doing. If he doesn't like it, he can fire you, and then you're in exactly the same position as if you'd quit to pursue a startup. Except that you probably have a bit more savings, a bit more experience, and a bit more of a desire to prove him wrong.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Make an app in your favorite language with just a red button on it. Then just figure out what the button should do when pressed, and you'll be fine.

<comment><USER15> A modern day version of:

1.Quit job

2.Ask HN

3\. ???

4.Profit!

Love it :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Seriously, do not quit your job UNTIL AFTER YOU HAVE YOUR KILLER IDEA!! Apologies for those who can't stand the all-caps. If you have a good job now, what you should do is move to a cheaper place to live and get your bills down to as low as possible. In the meantime, do some market research and really think about what kind of business you want to build or what kind of service you can provide. For this to be good, it needs to accommodate both your needs for doing something you enjoy and the needs of being a realistic profitable business. To do this well, you will want one to two years worth of savings in the bank, not a couple of months! Best of luck to you in this endeavor.

</comment><comment><USER17> Are you bored with <http://openphotovr.org> and its time to find a new project?

You did a really good job on it. Maybe you can create a business around it?

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm not bored with it and will definitely continue doing what its users ask me to do, but it was started explicitly as a non-profit: all photos are Creative Commons licensed and the code is GPL.

<comment><USER18> <http://openphotovr.org/> is really cool, good work! I uploaded a small set, and it was very easy to make a 3d scene.

I'm sure people would be willing to pay to be able to host a viewer on their own site. For example, companies may put a 3d scene of their office on their jobs listing page. Or restaurants, museums, universities, and so forth would do well to have one on their site.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! Actually you can already host a viewer on your own site for free, see the help page for how.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Just start building something and let it evolve - sort of like _stream of consciousness writing_ when you have writers block.

Just start building something simple and your mind will begin moving.

I've done the same thing you have with my life, congrats on taking the leap :) You might find it worth your while to pick up a weekend part time job too so you can have some fun money (having fun is necessary when you are cooped up all by yourself working in an intellectual space).

GL!

</comment><comment><USER20> I would love an app that could keep an inventory of the food i have on hand in my aparment (based on what I've ordered in the past and my own inventory revisions), allow me to order more when I run out (from freshdirect.com or whatever the local equivalent is), and provide me with recipes that I can make with what I have on hand. Kind of complicated to orchestrate the whole thing, but would be obscenely valuable.

<comment><USER21> . Build a grocery list for a mobile app.

. Finds coupons

. Integrates with bar code scanner to inventory all items

. Integrates with weight scales to measure consumption to predict future usage.

. Integrates with grocery stores and online vendors for call ahead packaging and delivery.

I could go on and on on this one. If someone get funding for something like this let me know, I would be in.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> build something to alleviate annoyance in your everyday life. even if someone else already has a product in that space, do it better.

</comment><comment><USER23> I think you should have already built something else - at least a prototype - in your free time while staying gainfully employed and then quit later when you can at least guarantee yourself and any dependents a lifestyle full of roofs and ramen.

</comment><comment><USER24> Contact me, alexander dot macgregor at gmail dot com, if you like. I am working on a project that might interest you.

I'd also be happy to discuss any ideas you might have. :)

</comment><comment><USER25> Scratch your own itch: build something you either need and doesn't exist or it does exist but sucks.

</comment><comment><USER26> Ouch! You seem to have fallen in love with laziness.

>You are leaving a job you like, with no idea of what to do next.

>You are leaving a job you like, _inspired_ by vacation.

Thats you being lazy.</comment>


Does a Multiverse Fermi Paradox Disprove the Multiverse? - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/life-unbounded/does-a-multiverse-fermi-paradox-disprove-the-multiverse/

<comment> anti-shill or maybe there are very advanced civilizations in the multiverse, but they consider earth to be a version of the andaman islands, and so they leave us alone to develop in peace.</comment>


On apps that get acquired - <AUTHOR> http://inessential.com/2015/12/07/on_apps_that_get_acquired <comment><USER2> > You also can't go by whether or not it's open source, because open source > apps get abandoned.

But if it's open source, you can (FSVO "can", depending on your skillset) fix critical problems yourself.

Let's say I get Mailborg for $10 and move my mail over to it. Mailborg gets acquired. Dropborg eventually closes Mailborg. Next month, Apple releases OS X 10.12 and something breaks. I'm SOL.

Or I get open-source Thunderborg. Borgzilla stops development of Thunderborg. Next month, Apple releases OS X 10.12, and something breaks.

No matter. I'm still not SOL. Either I have a chance of fixing it, or more likely, someone smarter than me will find a fix and post it, maybe even with a new binary.

I'm no Stallmanite, but this is the whole origin myth of free software, for goodness' sake.

<comment><USER3> Chances are still pretty low, however. I used to be a long-time open source maintainer, and I definitely found (based on my own experience, and the experience of others trying to get started on projects I've worked on) that the barrier to entry to almost any non-trivial code base is fairly high. And debugging is usually more difficult than adding a new feature.

Open source communities also don't "just happen". It's pretty rare for someone to throw some code in a GitHub responsibility, wander off, and later find that it's suddenly become actively (or even passively) maintained.

Unless it's an app that's mission-critical to my life and there aren't any alternatives (even if they're not as good), I can't see myself digging in to fix bugs. And even then, it still feels like a hard sell.

I also feel like most apps that people might love enough to even consider diving into also have server components. If the company running the service shuts down, that's another barrier to setting up your own (assuming the backend pieces were even open sourced too!).

Sure, it happens, but those tend to be very very exceptional cases.

<comment><USER4> One of those great exception is Erherpad. The open source base helped launch a community then a full rewrite. Hopefully the hackpad fork will now be merged or at least some features will be back ported.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The advantage of an open-source app is that there will almost always be a way to get your data _out_ of the application/service if it does shut down.

With closed-source/proprietary apps, you're at the mercy of the provider for getting out any data.

</comment><comment><USER6> It would be great if any/all of these developers/companies can guarantee the app will be around for X days / years after the user _buys_ it. Then it's a contract and you wont feel bad/betrayed once the app is gone (acquisition/bankrupt etc)

They can always end of life it after their last sale.

This guarantees the user that it's worth the time/investment, and the company can always decide to prolong the contract / expiration date.

Software (Best if used by X/XX/XXXX)

</comment><comment><USER7> Good points here, but let's have a quick look at the examples provided here:

> There are some companies you can rely on: Bare Bones, Panic, and Omni (my > employer), for instance.

Hmm. Panic killed its early MP3 player Audion not long after Apple started shipping iTunes in their OS for free [1]. And Omni has allowed their once mind-blowingly great web browser OmniWeb [2] to wither; though theoretically still in development, only "test builds" of the latest version have been available for years, and it doesn't even have its own page on Omni's site anymore.

The author's point - that software companies discontinuing software sometimes is a thing that happens regardless of other factors - still stands, but the companies the author cites as counter-examples are not themselves flawless.

[1]: [https://www.panic.com/extras/audionstory/](https://www.panic.com/extras/audionstory/)

[2]: [https://www.omnigroup.com/more](https://www.omnigroup.com/more)

<comment><USER8> Those are two cherry picked extreme examples in the sense that both Audion and OmniWeb were fighting for markets that Apple moved into in a big way. However, I think Brent picking any companies at all as "examples of the good guys" undermines his larger point.</comment></comment>


The China Conundrum – are we headed for a supply chain meltdown? - <AUTHOR> https://diginomica.com/2019/01/25/the-china-conundrum-are-we-headed-for-a-supply-chain-meltdown/ <comment><USER2> We are in process moving a product line from China to Canada as result of the 25% tariff. Fact is, the product was migrating to North America anyway as prices from China increased, and product innovation has not kept pace. It difficult to fully state how the lack of foreign competition, protection, and subsidy has created inefficiencies and other problems across large sections of Chinese goods. Youtube bloggers ADVChina and serpentza are good places to start in understanding the scope of difficulty.

I have one former Chinese partner in China, now far too successful to care anymore, who described it to me this way... You have farmers and one generation down from farmers managing the largest and arguably most complex political-economic situation in the world. The expertise is simply not there at the highest provincial and central levels, where its desperately needed. The political will isn't there to rebalance.

The meltdown won't just be the supply chain. China's military will impact the nature and breadth of the decline.

<comment><USER3> My previous employer tried the same in 2015 with both BC and Washington with Oregon. We scrapped the plan after 6 month of the pilot plant keeping failing.

Finding cadres was really tough even for the simplest things. Finding a guy who can program a particular brand of chipshooters took 2.5 months. We found a single guy in all BC/Washington/Oregon area, and he demanded 100k+ for something that I can teach a highschooler to do. In Shenzhen, I'm 100% sure that I will get few solid applicants on day one for just any machinery brand.

Simple assembly line workers. 50k+ undergrad students were horrid workers, with terrible discipline. 70k+ masters students, just a bit better. People with years of work experience and 80k+ expectations finally did that, but they were still spending more time wiring simple electric bikes than Chinese highschoolers do. At that stage, we decided to stop.

<comment><USER4> >Finding a guy who can program a particular brand of chipshooters took 2.5 months. We found a single guy in all BC/Washington/Oregon area, and he demanded 100k+ for something that I can teach a highschooler to do.

So why did you waste 10 weeks searching for a candidate, when you could have so easily trained an entry-level employee?

It seems like your firm either failed to engage suffiently talented recruiters, or possibly failed to set the compensation offered appropriately.

<comment><USER3> We did not hire him, and I kept doing it myself.

Before, in my whole life, I only touched high end chipshooters less than 10 times.

<comment><USER5> Most people who need that sort of work done can't do it themselves, and people who can do it are rare in the US. It sounds like the one guy you found knows his value and charges accordingly. I admire him for that. What you charge for your time should be based on the value you return, not how hard your work is.

<comment><USER6> Good luck paying cleaners then. They provide a lot of value (keep the office 1+ month without cleaning)

<comment><USER7> And if you've got an office full of sensitive material, you will and do pay a significant premium over what you'd pay to clean an office full of of help- desk employees.

<comment><USER6> Damn cleaners with security clearance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > That's why global CEOs and business leaders need to deal with the China > Conundrum now.

They are. They are:

\- 37 percent have moved production out of China in the past 12 months, while 33 percent plan to move in the next 6-12 months.

[https://money.usnews.com/investing/news/articles/2019-01-17/...](https://money.usnews.com/investing/news/articles/2019-01-17/job- jitters-mount-as-chinas-factories-sputter-ahead-of-lunar-new-year)

\- Apple Is Moving Some High-End iPhone Production to India

[https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/12/27/apple-is-moving- so...](https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/12/27/apple-is-moving-some-high- end-iphone-production-to.aspx)

\- China's Xi Jinping 'most dangerous' to free societies, says George Soros

[https://www.bbc.com/news/business-46996116](https://www.bbc.com/news/business-46996116)

<comment><USER9> They moved production to India (and Brazil likewise) because THOSE countries have huge import duties, not because of a rebalancing away from China.

<comment><USER10> i don't see why one precludes the other

<comment><USER9> They aren't producing for export outside of those countries.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I believe the article is wrong. It uses Foxconn as an example despite the fact that Foxconn is a Taiwanese company that suffers all the conditions that the author mentions: Chinese spying, Chinese sanctions against Taiwan and vice versa, etc. for years. China and Taiwan are even still technically at war. However, Foxconn has been in China since 1988 and is very big in China.

In my mind the real killer has been increasing costs, China's manufacturing decline has been showing signs since 2016, and is more related to increased labour costs and increased pollution regulations. The trade war is just another final nail in the coffin. The "China conundrum" or manufacturing moving out of China has been happening for a while, its just people haven't paid much attention to it until now. The decline would have happened even without the trade war.

<comment><USER12> I'm also very sceptical that Foxconn would be setting up that factory for any reason other than avoiding Indian tariffs on mobile phones. India is not really the first place one would think of to build a supply chain.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> > _In the late 1970s and 1980s, Americans fretted a lot about something called > "The China Syndrome." The idea was that in the case of a nuclear reactor > meltdown, the fiery radioactive core would burn a hole through the earth and > come out somewhere north of Peking_

Good grief, no. It was a colorful metaphor in the industry for explaining the self-sustaining problem with meltdowns: the fuel was very dense and would naturally flow and pool together, remaining a cohesive blob even as it escaped its containiment. Other runaway reactions naturally disperse and explode, meltdowns don't. So the failure mode analysis needs to worry about what happens long after it leaves the building and hits bedrock.

It was also the title of a pretty good movie, FWIW.

</comment><comment><USER14> By 2015, Samsung already moved more than half of smartphone manufacturing from China to Vietnam. All others are late to the party.

<comment><USER15> What's after Vietnam?--is my question.

<comment><USER16> Cambodia... I was just in Sihanouk last week and the entire city is under _massive_ development by the Chinese. You have 4-5 star hotels built with potholed dirt roads out front. Giant apartment buildings are going up in marshland. There is also a massive port built there where China can now move goods through. There is zero care for the environment and the entire city is a mess. Tons of gambling, prostitution and drugs... it is literally like the wild wild west there. All in the last couple of years. [1] [2]

Vietnam doesn't work so well with the Chinese because of their history and because the US has already been giving Vietnam a bunch of free boats [3] [4] and money.

[1] [https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/jul/31/no- cambodia-l...](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/jul/31/no-cambodia- left-chinese-money-changing-sihanoukville)

[2] [https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/this- cambo...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/this-cambodian- city-is-turning-into-a-chinese-enclave-and-not-everyone-is- happy/2018/03/28/6c8963b0-2d8e-11e8-911f-ca7f68bff0fc_story.html)

[3] [https://thedefensepost.com/2018/03/29/us-gives- vietnam-6-pat...](https://thedefensepost.com/2018/03/29/us-gives- vietnam-6-patrol-boats/)

[4] [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-vietnam-usa/u-s- delivers-...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-vietnam-usa/u-s-delivers- patrol-boats-to-vietnam-to-deepen-security-ties-idUSKBN18J0FU)

<comment><USER5> Won't the collapse of China's economy take their investments in Cambodia with it? The point of moving your supply chain away from China is to avoid that.

<comment><USER16> Maybe, but if anything I'd think this investment would help protect them since it allows the occupation of a major shipping hub.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Lets dispel those claims

> 1\. China has attracted many billions of dollars in investment and outright > purchases from Western companies

Not Western, the West and US in particular never were the no.1 investors in China. China was at all times bad at soliciting foreign money. Claiming foreign capital as a reason for China's past growth is like claiming that electric trains are running on gasoline. Most of that growth was from internal sources. That's beyond any dispute.

> 2\. Tariffs and Trade Wars – President Trump and President Xi Jinping have > pushed their trade war to the brink of disaster.

China and USA can mutually embargo each other tomorrow, and it will be a just a needle prick for both. USA and China have really little economic interdependence, completely contrary to the popular opinion. Though China will fare a little bit better, as it trades in more elastic goods, and will find markets to replace the US faster.

> 3\. In terms of psychological advantage, US has the upper hand (my > rephrasing)

And that, the only thing that's true. Despite all of above being relatively insignificant, the US side managed to make it sound like the end of the world was coming, and even convince many people in _China_ of that. In fact, the prime majority of recent deflationary wave in China was due to people who were closing down and panic selling businesses that were perfectly fine.

> 4\. "These China-U.S. tensions are real, and it's a long-term problem I > don't want to deal with. I want to find other suppliers in other countries > and even completely move to another country for manufacturing. It's just not > worth the long-term risk anymore."

The prime majority of China's problems are fully internal, and completely orthogonal to the trade disputes. If something will sink China, it will be its own baggage of troubles.

</comment><comment><USER17> I think what we're seeing is the culmination of a breakdown in the decades old neoliberal political consensus that Chinese nationalism could be gradually dispelled through a policy of opening up Western economies to integration with China's. In practice, at the highest level, the Chinese government has kept the market subservient to nationalist goals, and remains stubbornly autocratic, repressive and hegemonistic.

The populist leanings of the Trump administration perhaps may make them more receptive to this argument, because they understand these kind of nationalist and hegemonistic instincts better than neoliberal technocrats, but I think this has been a dawning realisation throughout Western policymakers over the past decade. Even the Obama administration, which was strongly neoliberal, worked hard to isolate China economically through the TPP. Trump's disdain for trade deals killed that, but his confrontation of China is really just a noisier continuation of a pre-existing US foreign policy.

Big business might have put a restraint on Western policymakers' wishes to oppose China if they'd had more success in penetrating the Chinese market. But here the Chinese government has been too defensive, and Western business leaders have realised that they simply won't be allowed to be dominate in China in any meaningful way. Meanwhile, they have watched their infrastructure get attacked and their IP stolen, and have decided enough is enough.

</comment><comment><USER18> > China's goal, simply put, is to replace the U.S. as the world's leading > superpower, and they're using illegal methods to get there. China's state- > sponsored actors are the most active perpetrators of state-sponsored > espionage against us.

The goal is absolutely true, thanks for pointing out, as China has to raise its huge population.

But ... illegal? WTF ... China has been ranked as the 2nd country after US by Nature Index [1] for years, which presents research outputs by institution and country. Is it illegal??

I believe there're tons of engineers in HN. I do think that if a private enterprise in China can inject a spy program on the chip without being discovered by the most developed countries in the world for years, that should be the concern.

But the question is, why do a country with such ability still want to spy United States? That ability should be more advanced than the current US technology for decades ...

[1] [https://www.natureindex.com/annual- tables/2018/country/all](https://www.natureindex.com/annual- tables/2018/country/all)

<comment><USER19> >But the question is, why do a country with such ability still want to spy United States? That ability should be more advanced than the current US technology for decades ...

Mainly because it's cheaper to let somebody else do the research and find the problems.

If you were interested in stealth aircraft technology, you might be glad to read about another country's research into Schiff base salts for paint. Or somebody else's modeling for multistatic radar aircraft detection.

It costs tons to do these sorts of things. If by spying, you could just eliminate half of the tech dev blind alleys, you've saved a lot of money and maybe time as well.

<comment><USER18> My point is, developing such spy tech, cost tons tons more, which is almost impossible. This is not some kind of movie, it's about software and chip!

<comment><USER20> Spying is cheap: software and hardware cadets in a military academy learning to exploit specific systems. The main cost is wages, which are lower in China. For military tech, you need materials and engineering specialists. Often multimillion dollar prototypes just to find out where the problems with the techniques are. Specialized facilities for testing prototypes. De novo techniques for testing those facilities. Compare spywork, where it might be enough to bribe a single person in a chip fab to add a backdoor circuit.

<comment><USER18> Spying is not cheap, and the main cost is technology & science, not wages. Even in WWII the technology spies are definitely top tier geniuses with brilliant minds, not to mention now it's 2019 already.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> My TAke on this all is that, yes, Mister Xi is bad...

But Hackernews is probably being spread with "Guided-Stampede" , you know, It is like a stampede when all the bison run following the one before him without knowing where is heading...........

Happened in the old wester movies with the cows. If you shoot a rifle at the bovines, for example.

Or if you let a napkin fall in the ground, sometimes, and this is true.

But this Stampede is "guided" , is not spontaneous, It must be whatsapp or facebook Religious groups "Reinforced Opinion Formation" Spammed messages, if you know what I mean, Reinforced , yes.

The kinds of The Brexit, Hungary, Yellow Jacket, Brazil, you know whoever......

This is to make people believe Chinas economy is collapsing????????? !!!!!!!!!!!

Did I miss Any headline here, really???????

<comment><USER22> The goal is not to convince people "China's economy is collapsing 25 question marks". The goal varies from article to article. This article is only trying to convince people that some companies are moving away from China for various reasons and trying to explain the reasons why. Whether you think it's correct is a different story.

<comment><USER21> This article is perfectly OK, and this headline "Conundrum" is perfectly OK. I was talking generally about some of the comments made , really, they sound like people has fever and are in Delirium state.

So it cannot be a coincidence when many people have the same coincidental completely mistaken perception, "It" All Has a Commom Source. Humans are smarter then this...

They are being lead into that......

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> > In fact, the U.S. and other countries are barring the use of Chinese-built > 5G equipment from Huawei and ZTE thanks to allegations...

This doesn't seem like it should be legal either but the article has no issue with it, rather touts it as being good. I'm sure if the US lost economically due to allegations it would be a different story altogether.

<comment><USER24> > I'm sure if the US lost economically due to allegations it would be a > different story altogether.

Are you joking? China has many more restrictions on foreign competition in far less sensitive areas than their communications networks.

Setting that aside, it seems reasonable for any country to decide for any reason what they allow to be used in such core infrastructure. Any country that can afford not to depend on someone they might not completely trust now or decades in the future is foolish to do so.

<comment><USER25> I don't really follow your thinking. When you said "Any country that can afford not to depend on someone they might not completely trust now or decades in the future is foolish to do so." I believe by "any country" you were referring to the U.S. But when you said "China has many more restrictions on foreign competition in far less sensitive areas than their communications networks.", you seemed to completely ignore your rhetoric that "any country" (say China?) would be foolish to not put restrictions on foreign competition if they don't trust them. I guess you like to have your cake and eat it too.</comment></comment></comment>


Geometric Madness: Implementation of computational geometry algorithms [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fu-uW7CQkVo <comment><USER2> Jason Davies, who works in D3.js. The audio is quite quiet, though.

<comment><USER3> It's also only coming out of the left channel (unless I've suddenly gone deaf in my right ear.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Here's an MIT OCW lecture series on computational geometry, with an emphasis on folding things.

[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUl4u3cNGP62xuxL4CQpy...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUl4u3cNGP62xuxL4CQpy8uo2MeM4a3YD)</comment>


Diversity Friendly – showcasing upcoming diversity friendly conferences - <AUTHOR> http://diversityfriendly.co

<comment><USER2> I'm all for diversity. I just hope the term does not get permanently hijacked to mean "more women". There are many other demographics out there that would benefit from diversity aid, financial or otherwise.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey,

Founder here, great point and I completely agree.

We are featuring conferences that promote the attendance of persons that are traditionally under-represented in technology, including but not limited to women, African Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans and persons with disabilities.

More info - [http://diversityfriendly.co/about](http://diversityfriendly.co/about)</comment></comment>


Rm -r * - <AUTHOR> http://www.veen.com/jeff/archives/000899.html

<comment><USER2> One virtue of recent version of Windows is that system files have ACLs tied to "TrustedInstaller" and/or "System" so that even a user that's an Administrator cannot delete the files. You literally have to hack a login as SYSTEM or take ownership of the files. It's a big pain.

Also, don't most Linux distros have protections in place so that "*" skips over ".", thus only deleting the contents of the current folder and not the entire system?

</comment><comment><USER3> Rm: command not found</comment>


Objective NPR goes there; compares Trump to Mussolini - <AUTHOR> https://www.npr.org/2020/09/06/910320018/fascism-scholar-says-u-s-is-losing-its-democratic-status <comment><USER2> It is trivially easy to find noted "academics" to compare Republicans politicians and policies to fascism.

They all forget that if their comparisons were correct, they would be in gulags, against the walls, or simply disappeared.

NPR might as well just ask the nearest antifa what they think. But, NPR is trying to promote a narrative, and enough people still have a high enough opinion of "intellectuals" that their gambit might pay off, at the cost of a massive hit to their already plummeting credibility if it doesn't.

</comment><comment><USER3> As the article points out it was a comparison that existed before he even entered into the presidential race in 2016. I was always reminded of a Hitchens interview in the early 90s, and the close connection between a sort of "putting the country back on it's track and run it like a business" rhetoric and fascism[1]

A somewhat more obscure version of this archetype is Armstrong in the Metal Gear series, Kojima really was oddly prophetic with some of his games.

[1][https://youtu.be/j1MynYJDyE0](https://youtu.be/j1MynYJDyE0)

</comment><comment><USER4> It's a good comparison.

The article is based on book and interview by historians studying fascism.</comment>


Mysterious alien cigar 'asteroid' is interstellar lump of ice, not a spaceship - <AUTHOR> https://phys.org/news/2017-12-mysterious-alien-cigar-asteroid-interstellar.html <comment><USER2> If there are organisms in the ice, its a spaceship.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's a good point, I mean what if they're ice-based life forms? Perhaps we shouldn't be so presumptive.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Exciting in any case as an extra-solar/interstellar object. My mind jumped to the movie Lifeforce. Frozen vampires inside!</comment>


The Tanenbaum-Torvalds Debate   - <AUTHOR> http://oreilly.com/catalog/opensources/book/appa.html

<comment><USER2> a 1999 reporting of a 1992 event. Over, much?</comment>