Toronto's Chinese bottle ladies - <AUTHOR> http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/the-secret-lives-of-torontos-chinese-bottleladies/article33425364/ <comment><USER2> I'm sure this is a common phenomena anywhere with bottle deposits, but everywhere I've lived in the GTA has had at least one of these people.

They can be polarizing. Some hate them, some are indifferent, others appreciate them. To the city they're a nuisance, because they take recycling money out of the pocket of the municipality. To some residents they're considered a threat or an annoyance, afraid of theft or annoyed by noise in the middle of the night.

Personally, I appreciate these people. I will collect my bottles and leave them out on a discarded table that sits in an alley on the route of the bottle collecter currently informally serving my neighbourhood. I live in a downtown area known as a party spot, so he does reduce a fair amount of litter by collecting the empties discarded just about everywhere.

It's reassuring that somebody sober is out on the streets and alleys at night. If somebody passes out or is otherwise in trouble, he may be the only person that would discover them.

<comment><USER3> The nuisance factor for me when I lived in Boston (25 years ago; hopefully recycling has improved since then) was that homeless people would tear open the rubbish bags looking for containers that could be turned in for cash. If even a few people were lazy and threw deposit containers in the trash, the rest of us paid the price.

<comment><USER4> Where I've lived in boston none of the bottle collectors would do that for fear of getting the cops called. They did dig through the recycling bins, but everything would be back on the bin by the time they were done

<comment><USER5> And if it's anything like where I am, half the street is wide awake from the noise.

<comment><USER4> No actually, they kept to daylight hours and we're generally friendly and open to conversation. I had more issues from the town's construction. They wouldn't necessarily start construction at 6 am but they would certainly show up to the site and start yelling back and forth while noisily getting their equipment out of their cars

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> There are quite a few of these ladies in San Francisco too. They have enormous bags filled bottles and cans, which can sometimes stink with the remnants of old beer or soda. They ride public transport between locations with their huge bags taking up a seat next to them. Sometimes the bus driver or passengers object but mostly people just leave them alone.

They represent a testament to hard work, even in later life, that few cultures manage to exemplify quite like the Chinese seem to do.

<comment><USER7> "They represent a testament to hard work, even in later life, that few cultures manage to exemplify quite like the Chinese seem to do."

Really? I can't think of a culture/society where people that need to work hard don't do so...even into old age. Even as migrants to America, the first and sometimes second generation bring a strong work ethic with them. I'm sure the Chinese are very hard working...but they're hardly an exception if you look around the world.

<comment><USER8> The Chinese who are in their 50+ probably is the most hard working people, even in China. If you check history, when they are young, china is very poor. A lot of them may have a memory of starvation.

You are right, the Chinese in the young generation are not as hard working now. (Maybe I am geting old)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> > She lives close by, in a house near the big Cadbury chocolate factory.

I used to live right near there; the Cadbury factory is on Gladstone just north of Dundas street. If she owns that house with her husband, it's probably worth just a bit north of a CAD $1 million. Just the rent on a semi-decent house in that neighbourhood would be at least $2,500/month, if not $3,000.

</comment><comment><USER10> We have had some interesting run-ins with scrap collectors. In part because Sunnyvale (or at least their garbage contractor) uses the proceeds from the the sale of recyclables to offset costs of collection. Thus when someone raids the recycle bin for the cans and bottles, it takes money away from the garbage company that was nominally discounting garbage fees based on expected returns. The city council made an ordinance to allow the police to stop people from doing that.

When I hired the janitorial company at the office I included in the contract that they could keep any proceeds they collected from extracting recyclables in the office trash. For me the benefit was that it didn't matter which can you threw out recyclables in, the janitorial staff would sort them out and recycle them. It gave them a bit more money in their pocket, and it made it easier on folks trying to figure out which can to use for what.

<comment><USER11> they would have done that anyways. they also take discarded cardboard boxes and other re-usables.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I live in a microstudio condo building in SoMA, San Francisco. Rent is ~$2000. It's always surreal to see this old lady with an asian "carrying pole" in the elevator. There's no rent control here or government sponsored housing of sorts. Either the lady makes a lot of money doing this (doubtful), or some generous person is letting her live for free (these are ~100 square feet microstudios, barely space to roommate), or she's doing this as a hobby, or I just lack imagination. (For context, we're 10 feet away from a Whole Foods, and Uber's self driving garage).

<comment><USER13> She is probably doing it because she likes the work. She feels good earning a bit of money even if she doesn't really need it. The sense of fulfillment is probably worth a lot more than the actual monetary value. Lots of us derive happiness from work or from feeling useful.

I know at least one old timer (early eighties) that gets really happy when heading over to exchange his bag of aluminum cans. He lives in his daughters home and he doesn't really need money. My thinking is that it makes him happy to earn a bit of money completely on his own, at his age.

<comment><USER14> Indeed they live with family and the can money go to gambling at all those Chinese seniors clubs. A woman who used to clean out the cans here now hires other women to do it and runs a little recycling empire that ends up on the Mahjong table.

There's also a culture of no waste from that generation my friend's grandmother was more than wealthy but refused to eat with plates snacking with newspaper plates she made and grew a large crop of food in their front yard selling it to corner stores every year. She also would dig out clothing out of trash bins, wash and slice up the fabric to sew different clothes she also sold but didn't need to being fairly wealthy.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> In China, we call these people as "the one who pick garbage" or "king of the garbage", the latter one comes from a TV show in 80s. None of these terms are meant to be an insult, just plain description for what they do, but they are. In China, since the low developed well-being system, the elder ones do it since it is the only way they can earn some income to feed themselves. And yes, some of them have lots of deposits, ye, but that comes from saving from low quality life. The Chinese always chase for something pragmatic, which in China, which they can earn some money from. In this news, I do believe some of them may do it since a boring life. But if there is no economy benefit, I don't believe they will do this kind of bottle collecting thing. And ye, it is not because they love money, just a self-protection habit from their motherland.

</comment><comment><USER16> In Ontario (maybe Canada, maybe many countries?) if you recycle a beer bottle, it gets melted down and re purposed. If you return a beer bottle to the beer store, it gets cleaned and refilled, which I expect is considerably more efficient.

Not dismissing the negative issues related to these people, there seems to be potential for them to be doing a considerable service for our communities.

</comment><comment><USER17> In case you are not familiar with China, there are many such old ladies in China. Most of them in big cities are trying to dressed relatively clean and decent. There are some old ladies eat the remained food left on tables in student restaurants in universities.

</comment><comment><USER18> Returning bottles for a deposit in Toronto is incredibly inconvenient.

Yet, the same phenomenon seems to exist in Berlin, where public drinking is tolerated if not encouraged and bottles can be returned to supermarkets.

In general, I wouldn't direct any condemnation upon individuals for scavenging... instead it's worth scrutinizing systems that encourage this waste.

"Keep America Beautiful" was founded by Philip Morris, Anheuser-Busch, PepsiCo, and Coca-Cola...

</comment><comment><USER19> Perhaps "June For" has something to do with 6/4?

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1989)

<comment><USER20> Don't put too much thought in that. "June" could simply be a chinese name "Jun". The lady knows few words of english, I doubt "June" is on that list.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> _" Scrounging through other people's trash for useable stuff is common in many countries, a spontaneous form of recycling that long predates blue bins."_

UK: Birmingham. No deposit on bottles here but some recycling companies will pay very small amounts for aluminium drink cans. We have a bit of a hierarchy going on

Scavengers: people going through wheelie bins and making a mess looking for cans &c. Often homeless.

Collectors: cans and metal objects. I often see a couple out with prams early in the morning collecting stuff. Not obviously homeless.

Rag and bone men: flat lorries going around collecting old fridges and washing machines and other kinds of stuff, usually metal

In Digbeth there is a day centre and residential block for older Chinese people. Always a hot meal at lunchtime, looks popular. Perhaps one of the Churches should start a day centre and organise voluntary activities?

</comment><comment><USER22> Interesting thought- if the province finally raises bottle deposits to match inflation, very few people would leave bottles to be collected.

The fact that bottle ladies exist in Ontario demonstrates that the deposit value is too low to achieve its intended goal- everyone cleaning up their own empties.

<comment><USER23> The intended goal is that the empty bottles be returned, and that goal is being achieved. It doesn't matter whether it gets done by the people who used the bottles or by someone else.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> A friend wrote an article about a NYC millennial who put herself through college collecting cans: [http://bit.ly/2aj0IG7](http://bit.ly/2aj0IG7)

</comment><comment><USER25> Bylaw are nitpicking. i have personally helped fill my truck with cans Many many times!. you could pile them as high as you like tie it down and go to collect at a recycling facility that pays the most in my local area of the GTA and you will be only getting $60-80. I would say it would take one guy a month to collect. They should stop hiring more Bylaw to pick on people. You fire one bylaw officer you would save there 40-50k a year that would more then make up for the difference it makes. Bylaw in my opinion have a job and I think too many people complain rather then go outside and actually (shocker) talk to there neighbor and say hey this bothers me. It creates a war of someone called bylaw on you and it spreads so you call bylaw on all your neighbors it creates bad blood they hire more bylaw eventually there are so many of these lawn police that when everyone is compliant they need to justify there job.

Take my cans and metal and old electronics . My city charges me far to much to pickup trash. Go look at what you receive for your ever rising taxs it will possibly alarm you when you put a cost to it all.

I want less government I want government to fear me not the othere way around.

</comment><comment><USER26> Why doesn't the city hire them to do what they're already doing?

It increases recycling rates and reduces litter providing a public service.

</comment><comment><USER27> I have seen the same in Berlin, especially, on Friday evenings. Plenty of old or unemployed people in the city trains, UBahn. The deposits for a glass bottle is 10 euro cent and for PET is about 25 cent, IIRC.

</comment><comment><USER28> so many people like her live in China

<comment><USER29> I am not sure there are 'so many' especially in big cities, but quite a few comparing to the developed world.</comment></comment>


Vert.x 3 released - <AUTHOR> http://vertx.io/

<comment><USER2> From [https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/vertx/xgGgQcDeX04/0q8C...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/vertx/xgGgQcDeX04/0q8C1pylFaAJ)

Here are some of the highlights of Vert.x 3:

      * A new and improved core API providing HTTP, SSL, TCP, UDP, DNS, WebSockets, File System, Event Bus, distributed maps, clustered locks, clustered counters and many more features
      * Introducing Vert.x-Web http://vertx.io/docs/#web - a new toolkit for creating any type of web application from traditional server rendered apps, to modern client rendered apps, real-time apps, REST apps and HTTP micro services.
      * Pluggable authentication/authorisation with out of the box implementations using JDBC, MongoDB, JWT and Shiro
      * Pluggable metrics with an out of the box implementation using DropWizard metrics
      * Database connectivity for MongoDB, Redis and JDBC
      * Integration with SMTP mail and a JCA adaptor for interop with JavaEE app servers (e.g. WildFly)
      * RxJava style APIs if you don't like callbacks
      * Reactive Streams implementation http://www.reactive-streams.org/ for interop with other reactive systems (e.g. Akka)
      * Introducing Vertx-Unit - a test toolkit for writing async tests
      * Codegen of Java APIs into idiomatic APIs in other languages - including JavaScript, Ruby and Groovy
      * Completely embeddable
      * Simpler classloading model
      * Docker images and support for Red Hat OpenShift
      * Faster than ever

</comment><comment><USER3> Errrr. Does python support still exist?

</comment><comment><USER4> Examples look great with Java 8. Very excited to try version 3.

</comment><comment><USER5> Java please, no more.</comment>


An Introduction to Model-Based Machine Learning - <AUTHOR> https://blog.dominodatalab.com/an-introduction-to-model-based-machine-learning/ <comment><USER2> Author calls it "Model-Based" in place for Bayesian.

I transitioned from using Bayesian models in academia to using machine learning models in industry. One of the core differences in the two paradigms is the "feel" when constructing models. For a Bayesian model, you feel like you're constructing the model from first principles. You set your conditional probabilities and priors and see if it fits the data. I'm sure probabilistic programming languages facilitated that feeling. For machine learning models, it feels like you're starting from the loss function and working back to get the best configuration.

Much of the underlying machinery behind Bayesian vs. machine learning models is the same. Hidden Markov Models are Hidden Markov Models whether they have a prior or not. But this difference in feel influences how you build models and hence, the results.

Now that optimization algos for Bayesian models are catching up, Bayesian ML might become a thing.

Cool stuff.

<comment> dj-wonk The blog post author (Daniel Emaasit) wasn't the first to use the "model-based machine learning" phrase. He cites "Model-based machine learning" by Christopher M. Bishop.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> The authors initial feelings around ML are similar to how I feel. It's such a broad subject, it feels like you could read/study for years and not cover everything. Worse still it's ever changing.

<comment><USER4> I'd like to see a high-level overview of the kind of problems that can be solved by the different kinds of ML, and their applications.

<comment><USER5> The only material I have seen which does this or comes to this is the Andrew Ng Machine Learning class on Coursera and Academic Earth.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> What is a good textbook that will take me from 0 to practical proficiency with Bayesian Nets, if I have experience with regression models, hand built and machine learned?

<comment><USER7> Do what the author did: take Koller's course and follow the research that interests you. In this case, the propagation through factor graphs is also a good analogy for when you start looking at back propagation in NNs and the autoencoder.

<comment><USER6> This is a very fragmented approach and is very frustrating to go down that road. Every field is filled with hype and people pushing their own agenda and publicity to further their careers. Speaking from experience with self learning discriminatve modeling, the overwhelming majority of the books is either superficial or needlessly complicated. In both of those situations the books are badly written as well.

Finding a book that hit the sweet spot for regressions wasn't easy but was doable. I was hoping there would be something similar with Bayesian Nets/Generative Models.

<comment><USER8> > _Finding a book that hit the sweet spot for regressions wasn 't easy but was > doable._

Could you provide an example?

<comment><USER6> Regression Modeling Strategies. You need at least some notion of what regressions and probability are all about, but if you have the basics covered, this book will take you through 80% of the journey and the rest is some googling to figure out some concepts that might be murky.

This is a book that emphasizes practical applications without getting bent on the math details too much. If on the other hand you are a math whiz, Elements of Statistical Learning is THE book but it expects you to be very proficient in math.

Both books are seriously underrated, which is kind of funny to say because you will find only praises about them, but they deserve even more.

<comment><USER7> I disagree re: ESL and RMS, but Harrell's book is superb. It's really more aimed at biostatisticians and clinicians, though.

If the math in ESL gives you trouble, you might prefer [http://www- bcf.usc.edu/~gareth/ISL/ISLR%20First%20Printing.p...](http://www- bcf.usc.edu/~gareth/ISL/ISLR%20First%20Printing.pdf) (and I'm not just saying this because the first author was one of my advisers, although I do think that he and Daniela are particularly gifted teachers).

If the math in ESL is too trivial for you, there's always [https://web.stanford.edu/~hastie/StatLearnSparsity_files/SLS...](https://web.stanford.edu/~hastie/StatLearnSparsity_files/SLS_corrected_1.4.16.pdf) , which covers some graphical modeling strategies in later chapters and even kicks the tires of the autoencoder (imho perhaps the greatest recent advance in neural networks for practitioners) along the way.

Koller's course and Ng's course are also good.

Ultimately I feel like you have to get the math right or you'll never acquire the intuition that helps you design your own approaches. But you also have to put in the work.

That reminds me, tibshirani's Stanford course (accompanies ISL and ESL) is terrific. Better than those other two, actually. I wish Harrell would offer one.

<comment><USER6> You disagree wit what regarding ESL and RMS?

>Ultimately I feel like you have to get the math right or you'll never acquire the intuition that helps you design your own approaches.

But what do you mean by that? Do I really need it if my applications are not as demanding as Netflix? I feel like many people consider anything less than phd-level understanding lol worthy, which is simply not true. Majority of analysts out there are doing just fine with canned procedures. Are there something like canned procedures for Bayesian Nets?

<comment><USER7> I disagree that RMS is necessarily better than ESL in some meaningful way. The two are complementary. It's like saying a gravel truck is better than a motorcycle: it all depends on what you want to do with it.

Re: "do I really need it?": hell if I know, I'm not you. But my assertion was specifically that if you want to design your own methods (i.e. do research) you need to understand what they are doing. This doesn't seem like a controversial position; an expert is simply a master of the fundamentals.

<comment><USER6> But I thought I made it clear that I am not looking to do research. I'm not even looking for state of the art performance. I am looking for that 30% of the skills which allow me to do 70% of the tasks. Like RMS. Because outside of Google/Microsoft/Amazon et al, domain knowledge beats superior math skills 10 out of 10 times.

<comment><USER7> You should do whatever you like, but remember that domain knowledge and math skills are not mutually exclusive. If the problem you need to solve for a major customer or project happens to be in that 30%, it may come in handy.

Linear algebra and calculus (to a lesser degree) are foundational for a great many things. Got missing data? K-NN or nuclear norm matrix completion (or marginalizing over the rest) can help. Systems of differential equations? Use a matrix exponential.

You are free to do whatever you like. A bus driver doesn't need to know how to rebuild an engine. But if you want to race cars you'll get a lot further if you do know how.

<comment><USER6> If I have missing values, I can use multiple imputation or even simple averaging and the hit I will take will be negligible. I simply do not work in the remaining 30%. I can tell if the work is going to be above my head and refuse the project in those cases.

So after all this back and forth, I still don't know if there is a book similar to RMS in scope, for Bayesian Nets.

<comment><USER7> Try [http://www.r-bayesian-networks.org](http://www.r-bayesian-networks.org)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It seems this is a rebranding of probabilistic graphical methods.

</comment><comment><USER10> So what did he actually do with this model? Why is it better to do it this way? What is the point? There's no evidence or output here.

<comment> dj-wonk Just to touch on one part of your question -- did you see the case study section? There are five conclusions:

> 1\. This approach provides a systematic process of developing bespoke models > tailored to our specific problem.

> 2\. It provides transparency to our model as we explicitly defined our model > assumptions by leveraging prior knowledge about traffic congestion.

> 3\. The approach allows handling of uncertainty in a principled manner using > probability theory.

> 4\. It does not suffer from overfitting as the model parameters are learned > using Bayesian inference and not optimization.

> 5\. Finally, MBML separates the model development from inference which > allows us to build several models and use the same inference algorithm to > learn the model parameters. This in turn helps to quickly compare several > alternative models and select the best model that is explained by the > observed data.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Non office hours chats and email - <AUTHOR> When you have a culture originating from top about posting messages and emails late at night and on weekend how do you view this? In my case I spend time working evenings and weekend but I take extra care to not push(commits) or post, email during non working hours. Now in my company there is growing culture of unabashedly posting non-urgent stuff middle of night which I find insensitive and ostentatious.<p>My question is am I thinking too much or its a symptom of a deeper problem which is going to get worse and I must do something. <comment><USER2> Unless there's a policy establishing otherwise, it's going to get worse, especially if it's coming from the top. If it's something that bothers you then try to ride it out, but have a foot out the door in case you hit your breaking point.

It always starts with little subtleties, harmless emails like "check this out". Soon you find yourself on a Monday morning getting accosted by your boss or overly-ambitious co-worker before you even had the change to get coffee with "did you get a chance to take a look at that thing I sent?" Eventually these micro-telegraphs take their toll and you find yourself feeling guilty about not participating in the Slack chat at 2am. Now the precedent of being available whenever the boss has the whims to work is set, whether you like it or not.

Disclaimer: I'm all for working after hours as it merits, I just prefer to do it on my schedule or on an as-critically-needed basis.

<comment><AUTHOR> >> "you find yourself feeling guilty about not participating in the Slack chat at 2am." Thats me at times, though feeling more helpless than guilty

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> What kind of communication is it? Are they posting something that requires reaction / is some response expected? Or is it just posted because that's when they happened to think of it / do the work?

I think the first one is pretty bad and I wouldn't hesitate to publically respond "I'll deal with this in business hours". (If I even saw it - I won't configure work chat or email on a personal device) On the other hand, I don't see anything wrong with people working when they want to. As long as others are not expected to match that, why is that anyone else's concern? Are you worried those messages imply some expectations?

It's Saturday evening and I actually just pushed some doc with team notification on GitHub because it was on my mind and I was really curious if some way of linking documents would work. I don't expect anyone to either see or react to it before Monday though.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sometimes it is non-urgent non-important communication about something which makes the poster excited, Sometimes its status of the work they were doing Mostly stuff which if required at all, could easily wait till business hours. I understand that they might not explicitly expect any responses. But the timing of the posts makes me nervy - ungodly hours - and esp coming from higher ups. Is all that innocuous?</comment></comment>


NoSQL with Postgres - Using Hstore in Rails - <AUTHOR> http://schneems.com/post/19298469372/you-got-nosql-in-my-postgres-using-hstore-in-rails

<comment><USER2> Hstore as part of a larger search index is really handy. We're using it at DocumentCloud to allow reporters to tag and search through their primary source documents by adding their own arbitrary metadata.

[http://blog.documentcloud.org/blog/2011/05/arbitrary- metadat...](http://blog.documentcloud.org/blog/2011/05/arbitrary-metadata/)

... when I search for "company:XTO" (or "company:*" for that matter), it can be serialized into an hstore query like so:

[https://github.com/documentcloud/documentcloud/blob/master/l...](https://github.com/documentcloud/documentcloud/blob/master/lib/dc/search/query.rb#L311-330)

... and then be used to build apps with hstore queries on top of the API, like this:

[http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/12/02/us/oil-and- gas...](http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/12/02/us/oil-and-gas- leases.html)

... all without ever having to change the database schema, or indexes.

</comment><comment><USER3> I wrote a similar article here sometime ago:

[http://travisjeffery.com/b/2012/02/using-postgress-hstore- wi...](http://travisjeffery.com/b/2012/02/using-postgress-hstore-with-rails/)

I go over how to use the keys as fields, and some other common problems.

<comment><USER4> Thats useful, it's got some things I didn't run into yet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Wow, didn't realize how easy it was.

<comment><USER4> I know! Never tried before because it sounded scary.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> "Using Hstore allows us to easily store all these values without having to make a bunch mostly blank columns."

Or they could have used a small Product table with common fields and made fanout tables for Books and Laptops. For some reason it appears impossible for some to create new tables, or have joins and foreign keys.

<comment><USER4> The idea though, is that we can allow every user to create any product of any type without giving them access to make new tables. I doubt amazon has a books table, a toilet-paper table, etc. ... This is just another tool in your Postgres toolbelt, use it when appropriate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Does anyone know how fast it is compared to Relational Postgres? mongodb?

<comment><USER8> Just as fast (and that means pretty fast). Comparing to MongoDB might not make sense, if you're running it with no fsyncs (I don't know much about MongoDB, so maybe it is possible to make it fsync data).

There was a good talk about using Postgres as a key-value store at PGcon 2010, see <http://www.pgcon.org/2010/schedule/events/219.en.html> and [http://www.scribd.com/gavinmroy/d/31669670-PostgreSQL-and- No...](http://www.scribd.com/gavinmroy/d/31669670-PostgreSQL-and-NoSQL) (especially the classic photo of DBAs running with scissors)

<comment><USER9> MongoDB makes a full flush by default every 30 seconds, it can be forced with the fsync command [http://www.mongodb.org/display/DOCS/fsync+Command#fsyncComma...](http://www.mongodb.org/display/DOCS/fsync+Command#fsyncCommand- fsyncCommand)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Thanks to the OP for this</comment>


Misleading absentee ballot application forms sent by McCain - <AUTHOR> http://thepoliticalcarnival.blogspot.com/2008/09/misleading-absentee-ballot-forms-being.html

<comment><USER2> If this was intentionally done it's all a bit disgusting. Why can't candidates try to win on merit any more? I'm tired of all the negative attacks and lies they pedal these days. I don't need someone to tell me why I shouldn't vote for the other guy, I need them to tell me why I should vote for them and then I'll make up my own mind.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Here's an image I turned up: <http://www.flickr.com/photos/jarretmichael/2846819173/></comment>


MNT Reform: The Campaign Is Live - <AUTHOR> https://www.crowdsupply.com/mnt/reform/updates/the-campaign-is-live <comment><USER2> Great work mntmn! I love the no-compromises design - blob-free, mechanical keyboard, user-replacable batteries, open hardware... it's great. Nice work.

And a quick question: have you considered selling more parts separately? It would be nice to pick up the trackpad+controller, and maybe the keyboard too, for other projects.

<comment><USER3> Thanks, I'm honored to get your feedback. And yes, we'll offer all parts separately and I hope they'll be cloned, too!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Main link incl. video: [https://www.crowdsupply.com/mnt/reform](https://www.crowdsupply.com/mnt/reform)

Also, AMA!

<comment><USER4> 1\. Roughly how heavy is it? It looks big but not too dense.

2\. How easy is it to remap keys on the keyboard and trackball? For example, I'd probably want to swap the Alt and Space keys, the Shift and Up/Del keys, and the Primary/Secondary Click and macro buttons. Are we talking config file change or manually patching firmware?

3\. How generic is the SoM connector? Are there any existing alternative SoMs I might be able to stick in there?

4\. How many times can I open the body without running into issues? For example, if I swap out the batteries every day for a year, am I going to run into problems?

5\. It looks like you opted for a barrel jack instead of USB-PD for charging. Why'd you choose to go that route?

6\. Why the lack of USB Type-C ports?

7\. "The keyboard not only works as a USB HID device, but it also has a direct UART cable connection to the system controller on the motherboard. By pressing the Circle key, you can interact directly with the system controller, bypassing the main SoC." That sounds really cool. Do you have more info about that? How hackable is it?

Edit: I like where you're going with the project, and I think I could easily turn this into my daily driver. Keep up the great work!

<comment><USER3> Thanks for your questions and encouragement.

Answers:

1\. ~1.9kg fully loaded with batteries, WiFi card and SSD.

2\. Currently you need to rebuild the firmware, which is "make" and then "flash.sh", but it's absolutely feasible to make a nice keymap editor.

3\. The connector itself is generic and cheap (SO-DIMM), you stick a bare PCB in it (card edge). There's currently no other SoM with this pinout, though. We'll work to change that.

4\. Haven't run into issues yet, and opened and closed mine many many times.

5\. Simplicity.

6\. Type-A is still much more common. The next version could have Type-C or a mix possibly.

7\. Totally hackable. The sources are already in our Git / on GitHub but I'll post an article about this during the campaign.

<comment><USER4> 1\. That's pretty damn good, especially given the size.

2\. Since it's all in git, I'd consider `make && ./flash.sh` fine; that's not really any more difficult than a config file.

3\. I particularly like the potential for switching architectures without needing a whole new device.

4\. Awesome

5 & 6\. I've been refusing to buy new portable electronics unless they have Type-C ports and support USB-PD, since it's simplified my life a lot--one charger for everything. That being said, I'm normally making that decision under the assumption that I won't be able to upgrade what I buy today, and I don't want it to hold me back tomorrow. That's not an issue with your device, but I'd definitely love to see USB-PD down the road, even if it's an external accessory or a DIY guide.

7\. That's definitely something I'd love to learn more about. From my perspective, the integrated-yet-fully-hackable HIDs are key selling points.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I very much like the keyboard layout that gives more action to thumbs and some rest to pinkies.

</comment><comment><USER6> I absolutely love the trackball and approach to replaceable batteries. Currently this device is a bit outside my price range, but I'll keep an eye on the project in the future and spread the word to friends who might be interested.

</comment><comment><USER7> Unless it has a RYF certification, it doesn't stand out from all the alternatives.

<comment><USER4> What alternatives are you thinking of? I don't know much about this niche, although I've come across System76 a few times over the years.

<comment><USER7> Off the top of my head, there are also the Librem laptops from Purism and the Vikings X200 laptop, the latter of which _does_ have an RYF certification.

<comment><USER4> Are those actually comparable? Neither of those options appeal to me, but the MNT Reform does. I would say the biggest advantage of the MNT Reform is that it appears to be fully hackable, both hardware and software. I don't really get that impression from most of Purism's products or the Vikings X200

<comment><USER7> If that's your priority, there was also the Novena, I think?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have constantly be impressed by the progress of this project. I really like some of the design decisions, like the mechanical keyboard or the trackball.

But I have to say, while I really liked some of the early design sketches, the final design I find quite ugly.

I wish them success with this project and hope this can lead to more and potentially cheaper open source computing options in the future, but for now, I will have to pass.

<comment><USER3> That's OK. Tastes differ wildly.

<comment><USER8> Yeah, of course.

And I do feel bad for being so harsh, because I really like the concept. It is just so chunky and looks no fun to lug around.

I do look forward though to maybe getting a copy of the trackball/keyboard to use with other devices.

<comment><USER4> Chunky isn't necessarily bad if it's light. It looks like there's a lot of empty space inside compared to modern non-repairable laptops.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Was i the only one who clicked through expecting to read about new monetary policy in Mongolia?

Oh, i was.

Still, this is a cool project, and i'm happy to have learned about it!

</comment><comment><USER10> The hardware heroes we need. Amazing and the best laptop design in years.

</comment><comment><USER11> Is there an option for clicky keyboard switches?

<comment><USER3> You can write me an email after backing and I'll see what we can do! (Clicky switches do exist)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> is it possibile to replace the display with an e-ink one?</comment>


Elon Musk says Apple is the 'graveyard' for fired Tesla staff - <AUTHOR> http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/oct/09/elon-musk-apple-graveyard-fired-tesla-staff <comment><USER2> This is especially interesting in light of Ashley Vance's biography of Musk, since Musk is apparently notorious for firing people over minor oversights, and for driving otherwise excellent people to quit because of his harsh criticism. One could probably assemble a dream team of Tesla and SpaceX staff who've been fired for superficial reasons or who've quit because of the tone, culture, and attitude in those companies.

<comment><USER3> >Musk is apparently notorious for firing people over minor oversights, and for driving otherwise excellent people to quit because of his harsh criticism.

Sounds exactly like Steve Jobs really

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I don't know if all stuff Elon says makes him sound unbalanced, but all off the stuff he gets quoted on makes him sound unbalanced.

<comment><USER5> It is known that Elon Musk has characteristics of Aspergers Syndrome. [https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2015/04/0...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2015/04/03/why- shades-of-aspergers-syndrome-are-the-secret-to-building-a-great-tech-company/)

<comment><USER6> By whom? The Post link you provided didn't mention Musk, and it's an odd, poorly-organized article that conflates drivenness and social awkwardness with Aspergers, when they're not necessarily the same. People with Aspergers are more likely to be socially awkward, but not everyone who is socially awkward has Aspergers. This Post article even includes a story from the Isaacson bio about a young Steve Jobs (who didn't have Aspergers) disrupting a meeting for Seva, while omitting Jobs' emotional reaction and subsequent apology as soon as he left that meeting.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Exactly what Jobs would say of Musk too. They would have been two peas in a pod.

</comment><comment><USER8> Screenshot of the interview from the source.

[http://i.imgur.com/r3nBUEe.png](http://i.imgur.com/r3nBUEe.png)

</comment><comment><USER9> Jobs is rolling in his grave for a chance to get back at Musk. Jobs would make him eat his words if he were still around... and vindictively at that.

<comment><USER10> I am sure Musk is really worried.</comment></comment>


FOAM: The Importance of Time Synchronization - <AUTHOR> https://blog.foam.space/foam-the-importance-of-time-synchronization-3934755ccc4e <comment> _-richard The margin of error on this system, running on mobile devices with inconsistent and unpredictable OS and network latency/overhead must limit its usefulness.

It's cool though, and nice to see another .space in the wild.

<comment><USER2> It's also very easy to fake/attack. Sybils in this system would not be difficult to spin up.

<comment><USER3> How? nodes validate each other in the mesh.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Just browsed it real quick. They claim you can locate something in 3D with 4 sensors, but as configured they can't differentiate between any positive Z distance and any negative Z distance.

<comment><USER5> You actually can even if all the sources / transmitters are on the same plane. It's pretty easy to conceptualize as well.

With one measuring point and it's distance to a fixed target, you know that the target lies somewhere on the surface of a sphere with a radius equal to the distance.

With a second measuring point and it's distance to the same fixed target you can overlap those two spheres. Two spheres that overlap do so as a circle. You now know the target lies somewhere on the circumference of the circle.

With a third measuring point and it's distance, it's sphere will intersect the circle at precisely two points. This is the minimum required for GPS as it can usually discard one of the points using other knowledge (your receiver is not in space).

With a fourth measuring location the ambiguity is removed and you're left with a single location.

The orientation and location of the spheres don't matter as long as you know the precise locations of the measuring points, all measurements are taken while the target is fixed (which is why time synchronization matters here), and all the spheres overlap (in the real world noise, and mulitpath reflections make this quite difficult).

Source: I worked on wireless trilateration for several years for a commercial project.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> This video clearly explains the root of the problem:

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

</comment><comment><USER7> More on FOAM's use of Time Synchronization for dynamic proof of location here: [https://github.com/f-o-a-m/public-research](https://github.com/f-o- a-m/public-research)

Product white paper: [https://foam.space/publicAssets/FOAM_Whitepaper.pdf](https://foam.space/publicAssets/FOAM_Whitepaper.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER8> I learned a lot from this, including that the Eiffel tower was scheduled for destruction. Nowadays, you can't legally take a picture of it!

<comment><USER9> You can take a picture of the tower but not its lights. [http://c4sif.org/2010/12/copyright-and-the-eiffel- tower/](http://c4sif.org/2010/12/copyright-and-the-eiffel-tower/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is very cool. I have been thinking a lot about ideas in this space for a few years.</comment>


Walmart's Vudu Converts Your DVDs & Blu-Rays To Digital From Your Home - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2013/01/07/walmart-vudu-disc-to-digital/ <comment><USER2>
      But once all that's done, there's the promise of being able to own your movie forevermore without ever having to buy it again.

Forever, aka until Walmart decides the program is unprofitable and shuts down the DRM servers.

<comment><USER3> The UltraViolet registry is actually operated by Neustar and one would hope the multi-platform aspect would keep it around longer. But yeah, DRM is still DRM.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> So theoretically, one could rent movies from Redbox, convert them to digital on Vudu, and for $3 ($1 from Redbox, $2 to Vudu) you could have a new release at a significant discount?

<comment><USER5> hmm, they might tweak the code to not let something like that happen. Basically you may get a "sorry we cannot convert this video" . which won't be a surprise since nobody said that Vudu works with all sites.

It might take a bit hit on both side, people still have KeepVid for youtube/daily/meta and co, while you won't be able to sustain downloading from redbox and others.</comment></comment>


Noah Kagan shares stories from Facebook, Mint, AppSumo (live, 8pm PT) - <AUTHOR> http://chill.com/event/leanla

<comment><USER2> He launched fb? I only knew that he got fired from there.

<comment><USER3> He was employee #40 i think. possibly earlier. I think the title is misrepresentative.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> For those that are concerned with such matters, it is pretty filled with profanity so far.

</comment><comment><USER5> Will this be available for playback later also? Timezone differences mean it will be hard to tune in live.

<comment><USER6> Same here. Anyone know if there's a transcript for this or later playback?

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Is it really a secret? Sorry, a skeptic here. Not every well worded piece of advice is a secret.

</comment><comment><USER8> How do I full screen this? I find the chat completely pointless and the people beneath moving very distracting. I want to see him & the presentation, not this crap moving?

<comment><USER9> It's just syndicated <http://www.livestream.com/leanla>

<comment><USER8> Very much appreciated - thank you!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> what on earth is this text styling? <http://screensnapr.com/e/CKomIo.png>

<comment><USER10> What browser are you in? Shows fine for me: <http://i.minus.com/iO2g26qadZ3eb.png>

<comment><USER9> Seems they fixed it.

<comment><USER11> Still looks the same for Chrome 16 on Windows 7 / FF8

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Noah will be coming on live at 8 and dropping knowledge on how he launched Facebook, Mint.com, and now AppSumo.

<comment><USER12> Noah is one of the coolest, most awesome dudes you'll ever meet. I did an interview with him about email marketing and SEM, and his insights are crazy smart. Don't miss this.

<comment><USER13> Did you publish/share that interview?

<comment><USER12> It's available for students of my Online Marketing Master Class, which relaunches tomorrow: <http://maneeshsethi.com/online-marketing>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> LIVE FEED IS HERE: <http://chill.com/room/leanla>

</comment><comment><USER14> Sounds awesome. I'll definitely be tuning in.

\- Chase

<comment><USER15> Please don't sign your comments.

<comment><USER14> No prob. Won't do that in the future. Just used to it from BBS and emails over the years.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask YC: best (multi-user) startup email support/helpdesk system? - <AUTHOR> Howdy all,
What's the best email support/helpdesk system to use for our startup that lets more than one person process incoming email?
Currently we have an email alias support@ which simply sends to two of us (web feedback form submissions come this way too). When one of us replies then we BCC the other so they know not to reply too, but this is obviously a pain. Additionally if we reply from our personal address then the other person no longer receives future messages in the thread.
As well as solving these two problems, it'd be useful to bring some more of the team into the process so they at least can read the incoming support requests to get an idea of user feedback - this would quickly get out of hand with our current simple setup.
Any recommendations? Cheers! <comment><USER2> HelpSpot is exactly what you're after - <http://www.userscape.com/products/helpspot/>

We've been using it for about 3 years and love it.

</comment><comment><USER3> Although I haven't used it myself (though I'm planning to once I need to deal with such issues) I hear Fogbugz is pretty good at this kind of stuff.

<comment><USER4> Yea, this is one of the main reasons I use FogBugz. It checks email via POP and then imports emails as cases. You can handle the case just like another case/ticket/bug. You can reply right from the website, or assign it to a project, user, etc...

They have a free startup plan for two users, and free unlimited users for yc funded startups.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> <http://tenderapp.com/>

</comment><comment><USER6> <http://www.redmine.org> is Ruby on Rails -based project management app. You can configure it to run your code development projects (it basically an improvement on <http://trac.edgewall.org>, features wiki/tickets/milestones/integration with git/svn... etc ) and set up a separate customer support section.

They have email gateway and a very flexible user rights management features. You could set up customers to email you issues which will automatically become tickets in your development project (which is accessible only for developers). You can also set up a wiki available only for customers.

Since you are (hopefully) already running issue tracker/version control environment for developers, you can thus avoid creating a redundant extra layer of 'support ticket' database and 'customer knowledge base' altogether.

</comment><comment><USER7> Check out Roundup (<http://roundup.sourceforge.net/>). Written in Python, easy to extend, has a web interface and email gateway. The UI is pretty ugly, sadly, so if you want something easier on the eyes, you need to hack up some custom CSS.

<comment><USER8> Yes, I'd recommend Roundup. It has a good, easy, clean design.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Pretty sweet and easy to get this working in a Rails app [http://wiki.rubyonrails.org/rails/pages/HowToReceiveEmailsWi...](http://wiki.rubyonrails.org/rails/pages/HowToReceiveEmailsWithActionMailer) Then users in the rails app can claim feedback, and reply through the system, so everything gets nice and logged. I'm not sure what your development platform looks like but you should be able to wire this type of thing up somehow.

</comment><comment><USER10> I haven't used any but check out these recommendations: [http://ask.metafilter.com/44577/FreewareOpen-Source-Help- Des...](http://ask.metafilter.com/44577/FreewareOpen-Source-Help-Desk- Software)

There's also a whole list here: <http://www.opensourcehelpdesklist.com/>

Are you hosting this yourself or do you want someone else to host it?

</comment><comment><USER11> Zendesk: <http://www.zendesk.com>

Not sure if it's the right fit for you, but it's run by some friends of mine.

</comment><comment><USER12> <http://www.fogcreek.com/FogBugz/StudentAndStartup.html>

</comment><comment><USER13> What about something like GetSatisfaction? It's all web based and comunity driven. You don't have private areas (I think) but it does look nice and I think you can even tie your FAQ page to it.

<comment><USER14> I tried it and I didn't like it. I appreciate what they are trying to do, but I am not looking to redesign my workflow around getsatisfaction but rather optimize my exisitng worflow (currently around gmail).

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> OTRS: <http://otrs.org/> or RT: <http://bestpractical.com/rt/>

</comment><comment><USER16> Zendesk is nice, but maybe a bit expensive for what you need (it was for me).

I use Cerberus myself. Once you figure out its quirks, it's pretty handy.

</comment><comment><USER17> Recommend Kayako - <http://www.kayako.com>

Very robust and full of features.

</comment><comment><USER18> anyone use <http://sproutit.com/> ?

</comment><comment><USER19> Cerberus. It kicks ass. I used it at two of my internships...quality software.

<http://www.cerberusweb.com/>

It's super-easy to use, too.</comment>


Using Go as a scripting language in Linux - <AUTHOR> https://blog.cloudflare.com/using-go-as-a-scripting-language-in-linux/ <comment><USER2> The second bullet point in favor of using Go is "easy non-privileged package management out of the box", which "is especially useful in large corporate environments."

But because `go run` won't elide the shebang line, half the article is a howto for adding a new binfmt to your kernel. Which requires privileges and in a large corporate environment pretty much the last thing you'd ever be allowed or even want to do.

TL;DR: Go actually doesn't work well as a scripting language. Someone should just ask the Go authors to add support for the shebang line. Lua doesn't use '#' as a comment delimiter, either, but _does_ recognize and ignore the shebang line as a special case.</comment>


The effect of IQ on task performance: Smart people don't do as well under press - <AUTHOR> https://www.behaviorist.biz/oh-behave-a-blog/goal-setting-and-iq <comment><USER2> Anecdotal, and not claiming to be smart. With that said, I found myself working in two call centers during college (more evidence for not that smart!). I did much worse during training than most of the class in both jobs and outperformed the entire class after a month or two. I liked to comfort myself by thinking that they really didn't know what they were doing whereas I was actually thinking about it.

Of course, there is also that whole thing about people with good mental schemas / organization (KNOWING how to think logically) not using working memory nearly as much and becoming LESS competent in novel situations until they have time to optimize, and then they don't win out on IQ but structure.

Again, anecdotally, I know people irl who wing "general intelligence" tests often given at IT/finance companies. When they get the right answer on these problems, they can't explain it - they either get it intuitively or they don't, but when they get it intuitively, they get it much faster than I do with logic.</comment>


Show HN: IsTempMail – Detect and block disposable email addresses - <AUTHOR> https://www.istempmail.com/ <comment><USER3> This is completely ignoring the useful use cases of "disposable" emails like privacy. I have a domain that I specifically use as a catch all, so anytime I sign up for a website I use the domain as the username, like email@example.com

This helps protect me in many ways. If my email is sold or leaked, not a big issue, I can just add that specific email to a blacklist and I never need to get spam from it again. Or if I cancel and keep getting spam about rejoining, blacklisted. It makes it easy to keep my spam and newsletters to a minimal.

It has the built in advantage that I can always sign up for new trials if I want, just do thatdomain.com1@ thatdomain.com2@ and so on. Although I don't do this often, I have had to do it for various reasons.

I've hit on occasion websites that block their domain from being in the email address, likely a poorly implemented security check because their software might say anyone with a "@service.com" email is an admin or something. In that case, I enter some random crap. I never have to remember the emails, since I can just search my email history for the address the service sent the registration confirmation to.

However, the downside is privacy. I use my own domain, which contains my full name, so when I sign up to some services and want to do so without giving my name, I still rely on a disposable email service such as hidemyass.com; and I do this for many online services. I am not a believer that everything I sign up for needs to know my full name, address, and email - often services ask for this information for no reason.

So attempting to block these types of services, that have valid and useful benefits to users, simply harms your users. You can avoid spam users with a captcha, and for trail abusers you already can't do much because @gmail.com already allows for a lot of aliases to work like @googlemail.com, or user.@gmail.com or firstname.lastname@example.com etc, or firstname.lastname@example.com

Don't harm your users with useless validations.

<comment><USER4> I disagree. I run a SaaS product and disposable emails are a bane to my existence. I get thousands of signups a day from people all around the world using disposable email addresses trying to milk the free tier of the product.

You have no idea the lengths people will go to.

If all you wanted to do was test a product out, create a real email address even if it's full of bogus details.

If you won't try my product without a real address then you're a customer I don't want and don't need.

<comment><USER5> Your "free" tier isn't really free, then. As payment, you're asking for the sacrifice of your users' privacy.

Some users may value your service so much or their privacy so little that they may pay up, but for the rest of us it's back to the disposable email arms race.

PS: Kudos for being open and considerate enough to defend an unpopular position on here, though it's ironic that you did so using a disposable HN account.

<comment><USER6> > Your "free" tier isn't really free, then. As payment, you're asking for the > sacrifice of your users' privacy.

Is that what asking for an email to sign in to create an account to use a service that probably doesn't work well without having an account is now, invasion of privacy?

Where do we put our foots down and stop saying that everything a SaaS does is sacrificing the user's privacy... Soon we're gonna start seeing "Whoa, asking them to pay and input their credit card? You're asking for the sacrifice of your user's privacy."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Not to be an asshole but I absolutely loathe this... these sort of things are why I'm forced to give my email address to organizations I don't trust. This is offensive to my sense of privacy and I wish people would stop doing it.

Too often now sites/app want a login for no benefit other than to SPAM me with newsletters and crap I never wanted. That's why I use disposable email addresses, you're providing me no real value, at least sight unseen, but I must give you something I know is valuable-- my contact information.

<comment><USER8> I add the name of whomever I'm mailing whenever I enter my address, like "firstname.lastname@example.com".

If they remove the "+microsoft" portion mailing me, that email is sent to my spambox and reported to spamcop, because I did not sign up with that address; the address I signed up with has the +etc infix.

Eventually I figure companies will get wise to this and I'll have to set up my own server which does the same trick with an underscore instead of the "+" sign.

<comment><USER9> Not all email validators respect the + symbol.

<comment><USER10> With gmail you can use periods in the email address and gmail will ignore them. i.e. email@example.com is the same as firstname.lastname@example.com or even email@example.com.

<comment><USER11> I did that for a bit, but there's only so many variations and remembering which email belongs to which service is not nearly as straight forward.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I created it as a side project to stop fake registrations with disposable email addresses, like emails from mailinator, email-fake.com, temp-mail.org, etc.

It has a public API, no registration required, accepts up to 10 checks per minute. A WordPress plugin and a simple PHP library are also included.

Check it out :-)

<comment><USER12> No offense, but why block those addresses?

<comment><USER6> Because some services have sensitive information and need a reliable way to contact you. If you use my service and attach your credit card to pay for it, and used a disposable email to sign up with and your account gets breached, who's fault is it that I couldn't email you and let you know?

Sure if it's some throw away service that doesn't have such sensitive information, that's fine, but there's many reasons to use such a service.

<comment><USER13> > who's fault is it that I couldn't email you and let you know?

The user's fault; they are knowingly trading that risk for protection of their privacy. That says a lot for how they regard the service in question.

What about rejecting ISP-issued e-mail addresses? Those are also ephemeral, for those who use them.

What about Yahoo! / Outlook.com / Gmail addresses? in the vast majority of cases people using those have no 'hold' on them and their accounts can be suspended at whim.

Domain-related addresses can be lost if the registry decides to hike the domain prices beyond affordability, such as with the 1000% increase in Uniregistry gTLDs later this year.

Where to draw the line? All e-mail addresses are temporary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Cool. I know Microsoft has an email address classifier they use for things like product beta signups. See these examples:

[https://flow.microsoft.com/providers/Internal.User/users/joe...](https://firstname.lastname@example.com/getType)

[https://flow.microsoft.com/providers/Internal.User/users/joe...](https://email@example.com/getType)

It classifies things like gmail, yahoo mail, hotmail as "Consumer" addresses.

So, there might be some additional markets for you if you can identify "consumer" emails vs "business". Also, some niche areas like isEduEmail(), for things like student discounts (fyi, not as simple as it seems at first glance).

<comment><USER15> Interestingly, if you try an @yandex.com address you get back a true "isViral" property. Wonder what that means?

<comment><USER14> Don't know, but you get "isViral" for zoho.com, amazon.com, google.com, tencent.com, pinterest.com, and others as well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> If you consider using this, please for the privacy of your users make sure to only check the domain, not the full mail address (so not like the first two API request examples).

<comment><AUTHOR> It's an API function, so it should accept any reasonable input. The WordPress plugin checks only the domain name part, and the bulk checker does too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> This is such a bad idea. 99 out of a 100 times the use case for such a service is because the developer wants to make sure it can spam a real email address.

</comment><comment><USER18> In the past I've used this: [https://github.com/martenson/disposable-email- domains](https://github.com/martenson/disposable-email-domains)

Gets the job done.

<comment><AUTHOR> I used it too, but several new domain names are added every day. It's ineffective to manage/update your local block list.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Kudos to the founder for trying something new.

But, I hope this doesn't take off because there are valid reasons for using fake email addresses. E.g. I don't trust the site not to sell my email, or leak it inadvertently through a security exposure.

</comment><comment><USER20> I really don't like this service at all. It destroys value, like the ability to be anonymous, and enables abuse by companies - the 90% use case is by companies who use it for sending marketing junk as we all know perfectly.

</comment><comment><USER21> I guess you don't show the domain name blacklist because that's the entire business?

</comment><comment><USER22> Maybe instead of blocking disposable emails, give user a gentle notification and explain why you would not like him to use such email address.

<comment><USER6> While the service mentions blocking them, this API can be used just for that. All it does is take an email and tell you if it's a temp email. What you do with that info after is up to you.

<comment><AUTHOR> +1. The WordPress plugin gives a nice warning message with a promise that the website owner won't spam or sell the email address. After all, it's all up to the website owner.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I really hope this doesn't see adoption in many cases. I can see it being okay in places where abuse is an issue, but I use different disposable email services specifically because I don't want spam or my actual email exposed in the endless stream of breaches.

I don't want Best Buy Rewards, etc. having my email to sell.

</comment><comment><USER24> Can someone provide examples of temp mail abuse that makes this necessary? I sometimes use these service to avoid being subscribed to ceaseless email marketing rings or get at information (in my opinion) needlessly siloed in things like forums.

Seems also like a user-hostile escalation in this kind of arms race that will eventually be overcome anyway.

<comment><USER20> The only example I can think of is when using temp-mail for serious stuff.

E.g. you register an actual account with temp-mail, this makes anybody able to reset the password.

I totally agree though that this service is user-hostile.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> If you ask somebody their phone number and they give you a fake one - <USER2> don't trust you and think you are an asshole. Same with e-mail. When you feel you need to protect yourself from "disposable emails" then your problem is elsewhere.

</comment><comment><USER26> I don't quite understand why this service is attempting to charge for what is basically an email list, when email lists with more domains have been public for quite some time.

<comment><USER27> New ones pop up

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Why is thrott.com (ThrottleHQ) on your block list?

I'd argue that those emails aren't disposable. I use ThrottleHQ to track when service providers resell my email to other lists.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ones can create multiple email addresses, and disposable them in an instant. It's just another disposable email service that is easily abused by spammers.

<comment><USER29> You should block GMX too, it lets you create/delete multiple addresses per account

[https://support.gmx.com/email/settings/aliasaddresses.html](https://support.gmx.com/email/settings/aliasaddresses.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> > Disposable Email Address (DEA) services

Is that acronym even a thing?

<comment><AUTHOR> I store and track "disposable email address service provider", so I want to abbreviate that name. Anyway, I removed the "DEA provider" counter and the acronym :-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> If you implement this on your site, it won't get me to give my real email address; I'll just leave and not give your product a chance.

</comment><comment><USER31> > Disposable Email Address (DEA) services are tools for spamming, fake > registration, free trial abusing, etc. And we hate them!

Gloves are a tool for criminals! Knives are a tool for murderers! Cameras are a tool for terrorists and pedophiles!

Like these other tools, email addresses have legitimate uses. If you find yourself getting a lot of disposable addresses, there are other ways to ensure you get a valid email address, like only asking for one when your users are actually going to want to receive your emails.

</comment><comment><USER8> Why block disposable email addresses?

</comment><comment><USER32> This got me thinking of a tangential business idea: a user-hostile site blocker.

You take a quick quiz of stuff you personally consider unacceptable from a site (such as blocking disposable emails), and then it comes up with an autoupdated blocklist.

Does this exist?

</comment><comment><USER33> If I have no incentive login again, you should probably not ask my email. This service is a nuisance just like all those sites that require an email for no good reason.

</comment><comment><USER34> This sucks. I hate it. VERY few "services" are worth the exposure of my real email address. I made this mistake with yahoo, bigfoot.com and amazon.

It would not hurt my feelings if the developer of this "service" became allergic to pizza. And if the service were to close... The allergy is reversed, gradually.</comment>


Agile is Dead - <AUTHOR> https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/agile-dead-matthew-kern <comment><USER3> This guy is decrying a bunch of hucksters selling buzzwords to corporate managers with more money than sense. What's his solution?

> If I were king, I would prefer to see a methodology using the (ISC)2 > recommended practices in the SDLC, and the emerging OWASP practices, with > more certifications like the CSSLP.

The author apparently calls himself an "Enterprise Architecture Evangelist MSEA BSEE CEA³ CISSP-ISSAP PMP ITIL"

I've got to chuckle. What does any of this even mean? And what does it have to do with writing good software?

<comment><USER4> Perhaps: MSEA (Master in Science of Engineering Awesome) BSEE (Binomial System Enterprise Engineer) CEA³ (Crack Enterprise Architect -to the 3rd!) CISSP- ISSAP (Calisthenic Infrastructure with Solipsistic System Paradigms - Isomorphic and Soporific System Accreditation Practices) PMP ITIL Pusillanimous Management Practices for Information Technology Inline Languages (or Pmpster IT for short)

<comment><USER5> Titles by first result on Google

MSEA - Maryland State Education Association BSEE - Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement CEA3 - Clean energy associates CISSP-ISSAP - CISSP- Information Systems Security Architecture Professional PMP - <USER2> Management Professional ITIL -Information Technology Infrastructure Library

Those got less interesting as I went on. :/

His title reads like a shitty craigslist posting

For sale - 92 Toyota Corolla $100000

TOYOTA COROLLA ACURA HONDA FORD CORVETTE CHEVROLET DATSUN...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Agile will be dead as long as it's the dominant management methodology and there are page-views to be had. It'll be replaced with essentially the same process but with different terminology. Long before the Agile Manifesto, when I was working at NASA, we talked about the reality that the state of knowledge about a project is at its lowest at the beginning, and that any realistic project planning and management process must acknowledge and accommodate that fact. Subsequent research has confirmed that human beings consistently underestimate complex tasks, and that this bias persists even with experience, so no matter what methodology you adopt, you will always be under unrealistic deadlines. This results in distortions to whatever process you use, and flaws in whatever product you produce, and these distortions and flaws will be blamed on your development process, since no one will accept that it's simply an unfixable feature of human nature.

<comment><USER7> I've always felt the problem is that we're trying to estimate something unestimatable. My thought's always been that if the management needs of the company are that developer time should be quantifiable and that projects should have a direct ROI, then the most sense would be to only chase ROI in small projects of little risk, and leave business growth to big projects with lots of ambiguity and lots of risk. This is the same for any kind of business venture; why should writing software be any different?

In other words, if your process involves predicting time needed to complete a project, you've already failed.

<comment><USER8> My father-in-law is a project manager for a gigantic construction company, so it was interesting talking about estimation for him. Estimates are much more predicatble in his field, even when working on multi-million dollar projects with timelines that span several years.

The difference was that in construction, the same subprojects have to be done over and over again, so subcontractors can easily be given and held to realistic deadlines, and your only bloat comes from the usual hiccups. On the other hand software engineers _by definition_ estimate things they've never built before. If they've already built it, they can just port it over and start working on something new.

Combine that with everyone's tendency to underestimate, inability to determine unknown unknowns, and the usual hiccups, and we're left with the usual refrain: accurate software estimation is basically impossible.

<comment><USER9> The interesting thing is that in software engineering the cost of additional sub components is zero. Copying bytes is effectively free, so we gain no useful information on how much it costs to build a widget.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> "Agile is Dead" is like saying: Life sucks.

Agile is a phenomenon with lots of different manifestations that try to do their best at embracing the Agile Manifesto. Yes there is hype and people who make money of it. But that hype is justified by many examples of successful Agile manifestations.

Most important to Agile is to get it. To get into the mindset of feedback loops and collaboration. For larger companies with "non-Agile" habits, that is hard by default.

<comment><USER11> I hope 'Agile', as a product, with the capital A, that sells lots of worthless pulp fiction "how to" books, with dogmatic consultants propagating useless practices they neither understand nor can follow, well I hope that is dead. It was and is a cancer on the industry as a whole.

I however hope 'agile' as a spirit of talking to your users, breaking down tasks into bite size deliverables, testing, and making sure things move in a generally agreeable direction, well, I hope that persists and flourishes.

<comment><USER12> Those who say "agile is dead" are those that think agile was something you had to buy in the first place. To me agile has always just been a way of thinking about solutions to problems. It can't 'die' because it ideas have already been absorbed into our collective consciousness and affects the way we create solutions. Even if no one calls it agile anymore, the mark has been made.

<comment><USER13> Let's just call that Quality and make things in good ways.

Go back to W. Edwards Deming—understand your customers, understand your company and your people, manage with respect and based on science and psychology, and base decisions on the reality of your systems and customers, rather than fantasy goals or objectives.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Just to illustrate an example of how people are using the term "agile" wrong:

If you ask around, you'll notice that (many|most) people equate "agile" with "two week sprints". But if you actually read the Agile Manifesto you find this:

 _Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter timescale._

Agile does not dictate that you use two week sprints. In fact, th term "sprint" itself is not even part of agile! The term "sprint" comes from Scrum, which is simply one specific methodology which claims adherence to the agile philosophy. But Scrum != Agile. Agile can also be XP, Crystal Clear, or AUP, etc.

<comment><USER15> Scrum is the easiest for management to grasp at a surface level so out of all the methodologies under the Agile banner Scrum is most readily and widely adopted.

The problem is that Scrum "sprints" are like treating a marathon as 422 contiguous 100m dashes.

<comment><USER14> _The problem is that Scrum "sprints" are like treating a marathon as 422 contiguous 100m dashes._

Yep. Or to put it another way, too many shops seem to think that you can "sprint" ALL THE TIME. And while it's "only a metaphor", it's a meaningful one in this case. You can't:

        sprint -> sprint -> sprint -> sprint -> sprint -> sprint -> ∞

You have to:

        sprint -> sprint -> breather -> sprint -> breather -> sprint -> sprint -> breather -> ∞

or something like that.

<comment> UK-AL Sprints aren't sprints.

Replace sprint with time segment. And you get more accurate picture.

<comment><USER14> _Sprints aren 't sprints._

Except when they are. And just using that term encourages people to treat them like actual sprints, instead of just metaphorical sprints. This is why I advocate for use of the term "iteration" instead. But even then, I think it's important to include "slack" iterations that are for random bug fixes, miscellaneous refactoring, etc., that is developer driven, not business user driven.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> > Agile is Dead.

Ok. I listen. What is it wrong with it ? Then there is an endless list of links. I don't even know where to start. Impossible to argue against that. But I still don't understand what the author meant.

So. If we just stick to the agile manifesto. Is there something wrong with it ?

The worst part is that there is no proposed alternative. I kind of get the idea that the author still thinks big upfront design is the way to go. If he believes agile is no better than Waterfall. I can't agree with that. I would hate to go back to that.

<comment><USER17> One answer is by Simon Bennet. See [https://vimeo.com/138060217](https://vimeo.com/138060217) , in particular 13:10-16:00

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Agile and was indeed the OOP Design Patterns of the late 2000s. Sure, there's many smart things in it, and many of those will survive, but when consultants started selling cargocultish dance moves you have to do to succeed, and where all failures happened because you were just not pure enough, it became as awkward as AbstractsSingletonFactories.

</comment><comment><USER19> Oh, look. Another PMP proponent who didn't _WANT_ any agile practice success rushing to quote everyone who has reflected on the fact that it isn't perfect. This guy kills his credibility with the "let's hold a rave on the grave of Agile, I'll bring the Molly" attitude.

Also, he clearly never learned the secret sauce of "agile" that Scrum and modern proponents only pay lip service to because it doesn't "sell well": Fucking. Technical. Practices. I've spent over a dozen years now on teams that focused on a.) pair programming b.) test coverage and testability c.) CI (actual CI on one branch - not GitFlow B.S.) and d.) Close customer involvement. We shipped high quality, low bug software that made money for the businesses. Teams that fail to learn technical excellence leave 75% of the value of "agile" on the table, and 9 times out of 10 it's the fools in suits that won't 'let' them do it.

As far as I'm concerned, big organizations can go to hell & keep failing over and over. As software becomes more powerful, 'we' don't need them: [http://allankelly.blogspot.com/2015/10/software-has- disecono...](http://allankelly.blogspot.com/2015/10/software-has-diseconomies- of-scale-not.html)

</comment><comment><USER20> Good Riddance. While applying for jobs last year, I have seen huge difference between companies that demonstrate great pride in using Scrum and Agile and (insert any other buzzword here) and others that really understand how software gets developed.

Software is and ever was product of art and skill. There are great ways to improve productivity, for instance I really like how kanban fits software development. On the other hand, using Scrum and sprints and what not is how non-tech HR person explains to the non-tech management how software should be developed.

<comment><USER21> Seems to me that if you are a decently talented developer one would be able to adjust to whatever work methodology a company uses. It's a pointless thing to involve whether a candidate knows anything of the system currently in place. Every job I've worked has been different, some have even changed, and it's worked out fine enough.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> One of my last clients used scrum (I was a contractor). The boss ran a fortune 500 company during the day and decided to take everything she learned to run her own small 20-person company.

Our standups lasted minimum 1 hour every day. Every Thursday we had a show- and-tell meeting, which meant going through everything we worked on and fixed (some of these meetings lasted 3 hours) and we also had a pre-planning and post-planning scrum meeting, each lasting 3 hours.

At one point I was charging the company more for meetings than actual work (it was 70/30 meetings to work).

I finally left when we added another 1-hour meeting on Fridays where we would just tell a joke, funny story, or something about our life. Since the majority of other contractors/developers on the team were from other countries (and didn't speak English very well), it was one of the most awkward situations I've ever encountered at work.

<comment><USER23> Sad. It looks like the someone going through the motions without understanding the intent.

In contrast, I've been part of agile teams where we were from three different timezones, had short standups (sometimes multiple times a day depending upon the need), and focused on delivering value.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> > DevOps is the next wave replacing Agile

DevOps is about eliminating the decades-old division between development staff who control the programs and operations staff who control the data. By having "DevOps" staff who control both programs _and_ data, businesses open themselves up to large-scale employee theft and fraud.

</comment><comment><USER23> Being "Agile" means being able to respond to change.

For software, that means delivering high value, high quality working software quickly and frequently. One needs the fundamentals of short feedback loops, the ability and willingness to inspect and adapt, and collaboration and teamwork. Everything else - training, release planning, standups, story card walls, iterations - is all just the ceremonies and techniques that support these fundamentals.

</comment><comment><USER25> You can't kill Agile because _Agile doesn 't mean anything_.

It's a marketing term. It's the place in the bookstore you go to buy books about cool stuff technology teams are doing nowadays.

If I want science fiction, I go to the science fiction aisle. If all the science fiction sucks this week, I either buy something else or wait until next week. I've already established that I like reading science fiction.

If I'm consuming material titled "Agile" that doesn't seem to work, or seems like a scam? I stop consuming that material. More will be along later.

And just like in books, many times you have to take the book home and try it out to see if it works for you.

I think there are some people who really, really, really want a magic bullet. They want an answer to life, the universe, and everything. And in so many fields, that just doesn't exist. These are some of the same people, by the way, who make Agile so terrible for everybody else. You gotta dial back the feverish adopter thing, whether you're for or against Agile, to make any progress in your career.

</comment><comment><USER26> As with any tool there is a place for it. Daily stand ups sucked but on the big project I was on, it did help with people needing to bring up roadblocks. open floor plans suck but you get used to them and start feel isolated when you go back to a cube. Code quality suffered because of the constant pressure to get things done now.

<comment><USER27> Stand ups didn't suck at my last company. (My current one doesn't do scrum at all.) But they were okay because I refused to let people screw them up. If anyone got off-topic, I simply asked a pointed question and got them back on track. Everyone appreciated it, and it kept the stand-ups short, like they were supposed to be.

When others ran the stand-ups, they tended to let people ramble more, and they were more painful. I did my best not to step in and corral the situation, but I still often ended up asking the appropriate question.

My meetings went the same way, with a focus on getting things done so we could all go back to our desks. We socialized plenty from our desks and other times, and there was no need to drag out meetings.

I was thanked for my efforts numerous times, and I tried to be aware of any discord that was created, so I'm fairly sure I wasn't making enemies by doing it.

My point is that standups don't have to suck, but someone has to keep them on track. That's what the standup leader is supposed to be doing anyhow.

<comment><USER28> Heh, on one of the projects I once worked on, we had a problem with the stand- ups getting too longwinded, and so we instituted a 1-minute time limit for each persons' update. And then we were like "Hey, this is working pretty well, let's see if we can shrink the time limit!" We ended up getting it down to 10 seconds/person, with the entire standup over in one minute.

The essential purpose of a standup is to make sure everyone knows what everyone else is working on, to identify any potential blockers early, and to get the right people collaborating _offline_ to work out details. It really doesn't take very long to say this: "ComponentX, componentY; Blocked on componentZ; need to talk to Bob and Sue afterwards" is fine.

<comment><USER29> There's no reason you need to get everybody in the same physical place at the same time for this. If you are just giving status updates, team chat is a perfectly viable option.

I know I personally can't get started on things right away in the morning because of the psychic weight standups carry. I can't get focused because in the back of my mind I know I'm going to get interrupted soon for a meeting that mostly has little relevance to me.

<comment><USER28> I had another project (two, actually) where we had a "remote standup", where a couple of the team members were on the opposite coast and dialed in via videochat. You do lose something. It works, but it never felt like those teams "gelled" as well as the ones where everyone was in the same office, and the remote workers were often off doing something tangential rather than something core to the project. One of the points of the standup is to build trust and unity within the team; it's harder to do that when you're not face-to-face.

Also, there's nothing that says that standups have to be in the morning. Most of the teams I've worked on actually had theirs either right after lunch or mid-afternoon. That accommodated those of us who were late-risers, it let the early-risers get some work in in the morning, and it meant that it'd often fall during food coma or when energy levels hit a mid-afternoon nadir.

<comment><USER29> That's fair, but for groups who are in fact all in the same office, there's plenty of face to face time every day. In every environment I've worked, I've never met a developer who's been gung-ho for standups. They are always attended begrudgingly. And if you need standups to build team camaraderie and trust, there's probably other larger issues that a standup isn't going to solve.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Does Agile really not work with large enterprises? Or is it more that "fake agile" doesn't work?

<comment><USER31> > Does Agile really not work with large enterprises?

It works well when you can control or bound the expectations of your users. Delivering a gradually-expanding customer self-service portal, for example, is a perfect candidate for agile processes.

However, it _doesn 't_ work when the requirements are legal or financial compliance. There is seldom an opportunity to iterate and improve, it needs to be done once and fully by the go-live date. You can't release a small part of a compliance project ahead of schedule because, well, it wouldn't be compliant... Date-bounding makes-up a large proportion of enterprise business logic for this reason.

Counter-intuitively a large enterprise actually needs to be more flexible in its project management and methodology than a small, "agile" start-up. Deploy whichever technique is appropriate for the task, which means you have to have adaptable staff.

Source: having worked for a Fortune 100 that was agile-ising.

<comment><USER30> That makes sense, I think. Though in the spirit of the original authors, it sounds like it's more about collaborating and getting things working bit-by- bit rather than releasing publicly.

In the legal/financial compliance zone, it's probably about "here are the things we need to get done for this aspect of compliance," and then just doing them.

We're saying the same things, yeah?

<comment><USER21> Yes. Compliance things can be broken down into smaller deliverables just like anything else. You just have to make sure what the feature being delivered is compliant if it is being released to production. Just because something is being "delivered" doesn't mean it's going directly into the hands of clients.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> His account is a troll right?

Anyone that lists under certifications...

       'Winter Survival, Civil Air Patrol, Starting 1974'

...is impressed with certifications more than they should be. Or anyone that lists...

        '22% raise in one year, CDC'

...under Honors & Awards is surely making a joke?

</comment><comment><USER33> It is irrelevant if agile is dead until we have something to replace it with.

</comment><comment><USER34> We ended up implementing Scrumban [1]

[1] [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrumban](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrumban)

</comment><comment> UK-AL The guy advocates CMMI in other posts which is a bureaucratic nightmare to work under.

I think this guy isn't a developer, and fetishes over planning and really process driven development.

</comment><comment><USER35> But we're alive. Let's move on.

</comment><comment><USER36> hurray!

</comment><comment><USER37> LinkedIn's really on a roll here.

72 hours ago there was "The Lie That Has Beguiled A Generation Of Developers" ([https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/lie-has-beguiled- generation-d...](https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/lie-has-beguiled-generation- developers-richard-eng)), and now there's this.

I can't wait to see what's next. Maybe "The End of Programming".

<comment><USER38> It's not really LinkedIn, it's more their built-in blogging platform, pulse.

<comment><USER39> Is their Pulse related to, or the same as, that startup called Pulse that was acquired a few years ago, and in the news?

<comment><USER40> They are one in the same.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Microsoft announces major commitment to Apache Spark - <AUTHOR> https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/dataplatforminsider/2016/06/06/microsoft-announces-major-commitment-to-apache-spark/ <comment><USER2> Usually when I hear about Apache Sparc, there is Scala being mentioned too. Does Scala have the best support for it and what's the situation on .NET side? (F#?)

<comment><USER3> First class language support in Apache Spark:

      * Scala
      * Python
      * Java
      * R

All these languages are equal, but Scala tends to be more equal than others in some areas of the API. I also believe R is mostly restricted to the DataFrame API.

Third-party language support:

      * Clojure [0]

To develop on Spark in a new, non-JVM language, you'd need a bridge to Java. That's how PySpark works [1], and I believe R follows a similar pattern.

[0] [https://github.com/yieldbot/flambo](https://github.com/yieldbot/flambo)

[1] [https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/SPARK/PySpark+In...](https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/SPARK/PySpark+Internals)

<comment><USER4> More like 3 tiers of support:

Scala -- native API

Java -- java wrappers for Scala API, slightly clunky but same implementation

Python+R -- janky process involving forking a process and feeding strings back and forth between JVM and python/R via pipes

<comment><USER3> You're right about Python and R having to pass data back and forth to the JVM for certain operations, but also keep in mind that native code still runs in the native interpreter. That means you have access to the full ecosystem of the native language.

For example, if I want to convert an RDD of JSON strings into Python dictionaries:

        import json
        rdd_dict = rdd.map(lambda x: json.loads(x))

Same goes for any external Python libraries I install on the cluster and want to use in my Spark job. You can even run your Python code on PyPy [4]!

For me, working in Python generally feels like a first class experience on Spark. There are areas -- like GraphX [0], certain niche features [1] -- where Scala is definitely easier to work with, but with time that is becoming less [2] and less [3] true thanks to the DataFrame API.

[0] [https://spark.apache.org/graphx/](https://spark.apache.org/graphx/)

[1] [http://stackoverflow.com/q/23995040/877069](http://stackoverflow.com/q/23995040/877069)

[2] [https://github.com/graphframes/graphframes](https://github.com/graphframes/graphframes)

[3] [http://stackoverflow.com/a/37150604/877069](http://stackoverflow.com/a/37150604/877069)

[4] [https://github.com/apache/spark/pull/2144](https://github.com/apache/spark/pull/2144)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Can't wait until they install it on my computer!

<comment><USER6> I assume that Microsoft considers the Windows EULA to let them use your computer as an Azure compute node.

<comment><USER7> This is actually a rather interesting idea.....allowing users to voluntarily participate as a compute node would be extremely cool.

<comment><USER8> Users can contribute idle CPU cycles to a variety of projects [http://www.hyper.net/dc-howto.html](http://www.hyper.net/dc-howto.html) . AFAIK, lot of folks have been doing this for decades.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Is it just me, or does any technology that Microsoft supports late in the game give you sort of a queasy feeling?

<comment><USER10> No, but I view MS as a collection of employees desperate to learn what they need for the next job now.

Hence, the total apparent lack of desire to do anything new and innovative ("Let's copy AWS! Genius!").

<comment><USER11> Funny story from my time at Microsoft (this wasn't representative of the entire population, just a few folks). This was circa 2013:

We were in a meeting talking about infrastructure and testing. I said that we used EC2 for some of our infrastructure, and we were thinking of moving some of our local dev infra to AWS. Someone in the room asked me what that was. I responded with "Amazon web services" and they countered "you mean the company that sells books and stuff?" \-- they had never heard of AWS, nor EC2

This comes from someone who had been with the organization for some time. He was very well respected by a lot of folks. He had more awards in his office than I could count. I still think he's a great guy.

The Microsoft monoculture hurt quite a bit.

<comment><USER12> Cheap shot, but this is the company that created TFS in 2005(?). Which as near as I can tell is an answer to the question "How do we reimplement SVN in an MS environment?" Which seems like something no one should have been asking for by that time.

<comment><USER11> Microsoft's dev tools were straight up amazing. As someone who didn't get to take advantage of many of them, I was always envious of engineers using Visual Studio and being able to debug code like it was magic.

Although TFS may seem terrible, it works for super large organizations, and big code bases in a way that SVN and Git just didn't.

<comment><USER12> I wouldn't say I worked with a super large codebase at the customer who used it, but the only compelling feature seemed to be "it played nice with MS infrastructure."

Teams that had issues grasping the fundamentals of VCS in general still had issues. And in return you got the lesser compatibility and greater number of code warts that came with proprietary enterprise software over open source.

But I'm curious, what worked specifically for you in TFS that wasn't in the SVN ecosystem? It's probably the client was unaware of a lot of features.

<comment><USER11> I never got to use TFS, but I'd sum up the benefits with /integration/. The MS dev ecosystem is amazing. I write software now for Linux on Mac OS X. I use IntelliJ, Netbeans, virtual box, and a whole bunch of bash to tie it all together.

If I want to do a deploy of my lambda software, I edit some Python in IntelliJ, I then run a build and upload it to lambda using some bash scripts, and test it using the GUI in Chrome.

If I'm editing C code, I edit some code in Netbeans, and edit it over Netbeans SSH integration in VB. I then go compile it using make on the remote machine, and load it. I have a bunch of bash scripts to do testing on that remote machine that are executed via SSH.

\----- I have several more duct taped integrations. With VS, this is all in one system.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Not a surprise, since [https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/47107.wss](https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/47107.wss)</comment>