Warrantless wiretaps? Congress votes yes - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/12/warrantless-wiretaps-congress-votes-yes/ <comment><USER2> You'd want to know but could not easily learn from this article that the wiretaps in question here pertain to foreign intelligence surveillance (ie, the government's authorization to spy on foreign entities).

You'd probably also want to know that the hotbutton issue actually at play in this authorization is programmatic surveillance, which is what it sounds like: automated collection and analysis of intercepts. The statutory problem with programmatic intercepts is not that they're unlawful, but rather that FISA ss written required individual suspicion for every captured communication, which is logistically intractable for this application.

The law as written limits the application of programmatic surveillance authorizations:

        An acquisition authorized under subsection (a)–

        (1) may not intentionally target any person known at the time of
        acquisition to be located in the United States;

        (2) may not intentionally target a person reasonably believed to be
        located outside the United States if the purpose of such acquisition
        is to target a particular, known person reasonably believed to be in
        the United States;

        (3) may not intentionally target a United States person reasonably
        believed to be located outside the United States;

        (4) may not intentionally acquire any communication as to which the
        sender and all intended recipients are known at the time of the
        acquisition to be located in the United States; and

        (5) shall be conducted in a manner consistent with the fourth
        amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

None of these points are to suggest that Wyden is wrong to be seeking accountability for FISA warrants or that nobody should be concerned about foreign surveillance or that there aren't real concerns that foreign surveillance is capturing lots of domestic communication.

<comment><USER3> And not one of those limits prohibits the NSA from copying all electronic communications that enter or leave the United States and reading through them all. Actually none of them prohibit the NSA from even reading wholly domestic communications.

Nor do the limits themselves have any effect whatsoever, since there is no oversight whatsoever to verify they are being followed and Congress has vowed to immunize from liability everyone who violates them.

Americans: your government is reading your email. There are no qualifications on that statement. Most especially if you are a dissident of any sort.

Just as a reminder, FISA was passed because in the early 1970's, a Senatorial investigation showed that the FBI and NSA were illegally wiretapping the fuck out of law-abiding peace groups and civil rights organizations. It is certain that this is occurring today, again.

<comment><USER4> Just out of curiosity, assume one were to "wiretap" communications of any US government agency, what laws would be used against this? If they can do warrantless wiretaps, what differentiates their actions from anothers?

If they have no legal foundation for their actions, why should another's actions be illegal for the same exact thing?

<comment><USER3> There are plenty of laws. The problem here is that "law" doesn't mean anything if there's no one to enforce it.

Will wiretapping laws be enforced against you? Yes. If you wiretap the government they're going to do a Bradley Manning on you - solitary naked confinement.

Will wiretapping laws be enforced against the President, the NSA, the FBI, the CIA, Verizon executives, Level3 executives, and so on? No.

There's consensus among the Congress and Judiciary and President on those two things.

And that's the problem. The words of the law are meaningless if enforcement depends on who the violator is.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I recommend reading Greenwald's long article on this. I think he explains better than anyone else the _absurdity_ of the situation and the shamelessness of the senators who voted for FISA and against the amendments to it:

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/28/fisa- fei...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/28/fisa-feinstein- obama-democrats-eavesdropping)

<comment><USER2> If you want to have your biases confirmed, Greenwald is a very effective mechanism for doing that.

<comment><USER6> The downmods are undeserved. Knowing a bit about this subject, I find Greenwald's coverage to be some of the worst. People need to remember that he's not a journalist and his goal is not to inform. He's a pundit making an argument, and his arguments are often contrary to the facts.

<comment><USER7> Could you list some of the facts Greenwald has wrong in this article? He is indeed good for confirming my biases, and he litters his posts with so many quotes and links that it seems trustworthy, but I don't want to believe it if it's false.

<comment><USER2> The inaccuracies begin in the very first graf. Greenwald notes Obama's pledge to filibuster any bill that indemnified telcos for participating in unlawful surveillance, then moves the goalposts to suggest Obama abandoned that objective by casting a yea vote that indemnified telcos for (a) lawful surveillance (b) conducted under the color of an entirely new statute in (c) a bill that mostly consisted of new limitations on FISA surveillance powers.

In other words, Greenwald invented an entirely new promise for Obama ("I will filibuster any bill that indemnifies telcos _for any reason_ in concert with surveillance _of any sort_ ") and then cited him for a "blatant, unblinking violation of his own clear promise".

The lede of the cited article is incorrect, misleading, and pointlessly and unproductively political.

Next graf: continuation of same broken argument. Still no details about what the 2008 FISA Amendments Act actually said.

Next graf: invocation of Dick Cheney (the Democrats controlled the US Senate when the FISA Amendments Act passed, and Jay Rockefeller is no political ally of Cheney's; evidence for Cheney's actual input in the act: zero). Still no details about what the 2008 FISA Amendments Act actually said.

Next graf: multiple misrepresentations about the purpose of the FISA court and the conduct the Bush administration conducted that provoked outrage. Still no details about the 2008 FISA Amendments Act, which, contra the actual text of the article so far, specifically forbids the government from intentionally targeting American persons or persons residing in America.

Next graf: dishonestly conflates Wyden's proposals for increased accountability with Paul's showboating attempt to rewrite all existing rules regarding electronic communications to exempt any such communications stored in Google; in other words, foreign powers would be immune from spying so long as they used GMail.

Next graf: begins with "consider how modest these amendments are". Continues with suggestions that all the amendments he's mentioned are reasonable and well-thought-out. Note again here that Wyden himself didn't offer an amendment that required warrants for foreign intelligence or individualized suspicion for programmatic intercepts.

Next graf: still not having directly explained any of the contents of the 2008 FISA Amendments bill, Greenwald predictably fails to mention that the NSA is already forbidden by that bill from surveilling US targets when he mentions Wyden's bill requiring warrants for surveillance of US targets. Here Greenwald again carefully lawyers the words "US Soil" to implicate the idea that the NSA is spying on Americans. Merkley's amendment, "modest" by clear implication, suggests that a court whose purpose is to ensure that spies are spying on foreign targets and not Americans should be compelled to release the details on American spying to the public.

Next graf: no problems, straightforwardly confirms that the Administration opposes amendments that would have the net effect of immediately halting in- process foreign surveillance operations.

Next graf: Dianne Feinstein is now "conservative-Democratic" despite 100% ratings from reproductive rights groups, environmental groups, the Human Rights Campaign, arts groups, and, according to Votesmart, an 87% score from the ACLU. Why? because Feinstein supports something Greenwald opposes, falling into his no-true-Scotsman trap.

Next graf: Obama relied on Republicans (the "root of all evil") for an act that passed overwhelmingly.

Next graf: the 2008 FISA Amendments act, which Greenwald still hasn't discussed in detail, is now a "massive increase" in the government's surveillance powers, when in fact by statute it limits those powers; the "massive increase" comes from statutory authority to conduct programmatic surveillance of foreign nationals without individual findings for each person involved, a detail you can count on Greenwald not to share with you.

Next two grafs are quotes, but check your wallet after reading them.

Next graf: the 2008 FISA bill is flawed (sure), and Obama demands its renewal "without a single change". No: Obama failed to support any of the amendments offered for the bill, which is obviously not the same thing as a refusal to entertain any changes to the act at all.

Next graf: Rand Paul's "modest" amendment to the PATRIOT act, which would have exempted gun dealers (and nobody else) from PATRIOT-motivated subpoenas. Greenwald doesn't take the time to tell you what this amendment was because he would sound stupid explaining that in late December 2012. Also: Harry Reid is Dick Cheney.

Next two grafs are quotes.

Next graf: "if you try to debate the PATRIOT act", for instance by proposing a last-minute amendment exempting gun dealers from subpoenas in terrorism investigations, Reid suggests you support the terrorists. Of course, in neither of the preceding two quoted grafs does Reid say anything like this.

Next graf: plutocratic Dianne Feinstein, instrument of the national security state (with an 87% ACLU scorecard) is similarly demonizing people with concerns about the 2008 FISA Amendments act.

Here I give up. By all means. Cite Greenwald as if he's an objective source.

<comment><USER8> > moves the goalposts to suggest Obama abandoned that objective by casting a > yea vote that indemnified telcos for (a) lawful surveillance (b) conducted > under the color of an entirely new statute in (c) a bill that mostly > consisted of new limitations on FISA surveillance powers.

On (a), how or why can one be indemnified for lawful activity?

The bill to which Greenwald refers does in fact grant retroactive immunity from lawsuits seeking to show that the telco's participation was _unlawful_.[1] Such lawsuits would occur because other parties to the activity are protected by other mechanisms.

On (b), not sure what you mean by 'under the color of'. Hopefully not a reference to retroactive legalisation.

(c) doesn't seem at all relevant to the specific point here.

[1] <http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/intel/RL34600.pdf>

<comment><USER2> I don't know how to respond to this comment, but would like to point out that these CRS memos (I've read a bunch of them today) are so. great. We really need to bump up the budget for the CRS.

<comment><USER8> That's OK. Sneering non-responses are also informative.

<comment><USER2> I hope you're not saying I provided a sneering response. I was trying to express appreciation for the link you offered.

<comment><USER8> Thanks for clarifying. In the context of not addressing the question over Greenwald's credibility it looked sarcastic to me. You see, it's very confusing if you express appreciation for something that seems to contradict your point but then don't address the contradiction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It really scares me that the only issues able to find bipartisan support in congress seem to be the bills that benefit _nobody_. The republicans and democrats can never agree when there is good to be done, but when they get the chance to fuck over the average citizen they're full of cooperation.

<comment><USER2> It's hard to support a rational argument that FISA mechanisms benefit "nobody". FISA's supporters in DHS and DOJ and DOD will point lawmakers to a litany of cases where FISA-backed surveillance saved lives. The issue is whether the cost of that surveillance is worth the increased safety.

<comment><USER9> FISA isn't even about increased surveillance. If the DHS thinks they need more surveillance to do their job, i trust them on that. FISA is about a lack of oversight and due process on the surveillance. In the litany of cases where FISA-backed surveillance saves lives, that same surveillance could have been performed with proper oversight and regulation, rather than what basically amounts to the whim of an investigator. The absence of regulation in this instance benefits nobody (except those who would abuse it).

<comment><USER2> I don't understand how FISA doesn't constitute oversight over foreign surveillance, unless you're of the opinion that spies should be required to get warrants to spy on foreigners.

These arguments always seem to point out how FISA is nothing like a criminal court, as if that was a dispositive argument. FISA isn't supposed to be like a criminal court. The purpose of FISA is to ensure that our foreign intelligence services don't spy on our own citizens, and not much else.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> For those in here defending no oversight of FISA, note that the 2008 FISA revision included retroactive immunity for telecoms that had already been caught illegally monitoring Americans. Since then the program has been operating in complete secrecy, though there have been hints by Senators privy to classified information that alarming levels of spying on ordinary Americans is taking place. There have also been periodic leaks and whistle blowers hinting at massive data gathering operations. I think there is a big likelihood that ALL of our private electronic communications are being illegally monitored. The complete opposition to congressional oversight is another big hint that illegal activity is going on.

<comment><USER2> No, it immunized telcos for assistance in surveillance under the color of the 2008 FISA Amendments act.

<comment><USER11> Retroactively for what was illegal before the act was passed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Sen. Feinstein, who I've voted for since I was 18, just lost a huge chunk of the respect I had for her.

<comment><USER2> Huh? Didn't Feinstein speak on the floor of the Senate 4 years ago in favor of the exact bill they just renewed?

<comment><USER12> It's either Feinstein or the GOP nominee (third parties need not apply to Congress.) If the GOP were to nominate someone I agreed with more than her, I'd vote for them. They haven't, so I haven't. The lesser of two evils, while still evil, is at least less so.

<comment><USER2> I'd vote for her too if I had to, but this wasn't a surprising move on her part.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Sigh. Some things will never change. Surveillance will only increase, slowly. And like frogs in water that is slowly warmed we'll just all go along with it, until we're nicely cooked.

* There is no terrorist lurking under every rock and behind every corner.

* 9-11 will repeat itself, because the context is changed now. Passengers can no longer assume that they will get away alive by complying, so they will fight back.

* These things do not have to be carried out in secrecy.

* These measures are ineffective anyway. Anybody who is able to pull of planting an impactful bomb somewhere in the US can most definitely also figure out how to securely communicate or how to hide a communication.

Edit: Formatting

</comment><comment><USER14> I'm confused by the title of this article. Do FISA warrants not count as warrants?

<comment><USER5> Ron Wyden explained the "general warrants" in FISA:

[http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/12/27/sen-wyden-fisas- genera...](http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/12/27/sen-wyden-fisas-general- warrants-are-like-the-writs-of-assistance-the-founding-fathers-despised/)

It's not like normal warrants. It's warrant that is in effect for a year and allows them to spy on everyone for that whole year. But of course they will get it renewed every year. The idea of a "FISA Court" is a joke. The only reason they even have that extra step is to say they "go through Court". But it's just like not having it at all, because everything they are doing gets approved. If FISA was a proper law, the warrant should be asked from any regular Court.

<comment><USER2> This comparison is flatly hyperbolic. The general warrants the framers prohibited were a tool of harassment that essentially allowed agents of the British government to tear apart the homes and belongings of anyone they saw fit. You could be stopped, detained, intrusively searched, have soldiers enter your house and dump the contents of your drawers and cabinets on the floor.

The similarity he's trying to invoke is between the probable cause requirement of a criminal warrant and the lack of any targeting whatsoever in a general warrant. It's obviously true that a FISA warrant is less targeted than a domestic criminal warrant. But FISA warrants also also much less intrusive than a criminal warrant, and, like airport searches (which are entirely warrantless and nonetheless constitutional under administrative search), serve a safety goal instead of a criminal evidence collection purpose.

FISA warrants also are targeted, unlike general warrants. The FISA court exists to verify that actual investigations are being served by the warrants. It's not hard to see why FISA warrants are rarely rejected: the government is not actually in the habit of randomly surveilling people outside of actual investigations.

Heading a series of unproductive responses off at the pass: seeing the logic of the "yea" votes in the Senate on this issue _does not mean_ that I agree with them.

<comment><USER6> I'll go one farther. I think the current FISA law is better than the previous one. Yes, I do find the oversight provisions a bit weak, but it's better than the absence of any legal framework for targeting non US persons communicating via US systems.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> _Jacob Appelbaum 29C3 Keynote: Not My Department_

<http://youtu.be/QNsePZj_Yks>

<comment><USER16> I sure hope this video gets more views, as this is one of the most important privacy talks this year.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Here is a more complete (but still short) article on the same topic [1], and here are the records of the votes for the passage of this bill, and the rejection of the three proposed ammendments (search for "00236" in the table) [2]. The second link is useful if you want to see how your representative voted.

[1] [http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/29/us/politics/senate- votes-t...](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/29/us/politics/senate-votes-to- extend-electronic-surveillance-authority-under-fisa.html)

[2] [http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/vote_m...](http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/vote_menu_112_2.htm)

</comment><comment><USER18> Has FISA-authorized surveillance been found constitutional?

<comment><USER2> It's never come before SCOTUS directly (a technical question about whether lawyers can speculatively sue for information about specific cases was heard in October and will be decided next year) but has survived in lower courts.

I'm obviously not an expert but the odds seem very high that warrantless electronic surveillance of specific foreign targets will be found constitutional; warrantless searches of Americans are constitutional in many circumstances.

It's important to remember that "constitutional" is not a synonym for "correct". There's a lot of things we could do that are constitutional but ridiculous.

 _Late edit:_

Note that while it's hard to find FISA case law, it's not as hard to find case law on the principles animating it. Here's SCOTUS, US v US District Court 1972:

        Moreover, we do not hold that the same type of standards and
        procedures prescribed by Title III are necessarily applicable to this
        case. We recognize that domestic security surveillance may involve
        different policy and practical considerations from the surveillance of
        "ordinary crime." The gathering of security intelligence is often long
        range and involves the interrelation of various sources and types of
        information. The exact targets of such surveillance may be more
        difficult to identify than in surveillance operations against many
        types of crime specified in Title III. Often, too, the emphasis of
        domestic intelligence gathering is on the prevention of unlawful
        activity or the enhancement of the Government's preparedness for some
        possible future crisis or emergency. Thus, the focus of domestic
        surveillance may be less precise than that directed against more
        conventional types of crime.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> This will sound silly, but after watching The Wire, I am tempted to support

<comment><USER2> FISA warrants would not help McNulty at all; they cannot be used to target people who reside in America.

<comment><USER20> This is not true, FISA warrants certainly target people who reside in America. That is the whole point of them. If Bob in afghanistan is talking to Sue in pakistan, no warrant is needed. The USA can spy on that all day. They only need to go through the FISA warrant process when the communication is in America.

Here is a good write up with details: [http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/publication/19156/electr...](http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/publication/19156/electronic_surveillance_and_fisa.html)

<comment><USER2> That's a great article, and thanks for it, but what I meant was that none of the criminals in The Wire were FISA-eligible targets; even "The Greek" (who was not Greek) was a lawful US resident.

<comment><USER21> Everyone is FISA-eligible: "which may include American citizens and permanent residents suspected of being engaged in espionage and violating U.S. law on territory under United States control" - [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillan...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Act), paraphrasing <http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/50/1801> (b)(2)(C).

Certainly it makes sense for the NSA to store all communications by FISA- eligible persons, if they can. With the Bluffdale datacenter, storing connection information becomes feasible. I worry about the interpretation of the FISA law where potentially anyone is FISA-eligible. Do you have reason to believe that the NSA would reject that interpretation?

More fundamentally, is it acceptable for lawmakers to pass FISA in its current form if it allows that interpretation? If so, what would make the law unacceptable?

<comment><USER2> That person must "knowingly engages in sabotage or international terrorism, or activities that are in preparation therefor, for or on behalf of a foreign power". I think Avon Barksdale can rest easy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> America is going to be destroyed by these ticks in government, these are the hyopthermia pains before the coming realization that we will not recover and be frozen to suffer death by slow freezing, this will take 20 years, but our great nation will fall.

As hackers we must prepare to plant the seed for a superior nation when we are overrun by communists, socialists, corruption in every layer of government and business, and bleed from so many ticks and parasites that the collective dies from an unexpected shock to our system.

this is our writing on the wall. you have been measured and found wanting.

<comment><USER23> One could dryly observe that it would appear to be the capitalists, lenders, investors, and bankers that've caused this nation the most upset, one could.

<comment><USER24> The capitalists wouldn't be able to do much to dent the economy, much less the supporting fabric of the nation without their collusion with the government.

If you don't realize the government's more than sizable role in the most recent catastrophe, you haven't been paying attention.

<comment><USER25> It's clearly at the request of said capitalists, what with rent seeking behavior, quest for monopoly power and whatnot.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: From self taught developer to self taught sysadmin - <AUTHOR>

Hi,
I've recently accepted a position as a sysadmin. I've been working as a software developer for the last decade or so, however the market where I live (far, far outside of SV) is somewhat thin for people with my skill set. Relocating is not an option, and I am not interested in telecommuting. Hence the switch (plus higher pay, and a more reputable company).
Others who have moved from development to administration: what, in hindsight, would you recommend to someone making the switch? Books/non-obvious strategies/etc.
Thanks! <comment><USER2> It's hard to say without knowing what type of organization that you're joining. Either you're going to a well run IT shop (good, but boring), or entering a land of chaos and dysfunction (bad, but not boring).

If you're going to a place of chaos and dysfunction, your mindset should really be about triage. To get things under control you need to be able to quickly mitigate any kind of problem, which usually means trying to make everything as homogenous as possible. Try to limit the number of permutations of systems and the software which runs on them. Use imaging and devops tools to stamp this homogeneity out across the organization. When I was a sysadmin, I would generally have a centralized, backed up file server, and any desktop/laptop that someone used would be nuked (using Ghost) if someone went wrong with it. You don't really have time to do detailed analysis of failure causes, so just get everything back up and running as quickly as possible. This will probably annoy many people, but it lets you get a grip on things relatively quickly.

On the other hand, if you're going to a good, but boring shop, you should be doing more detailed fault analysis and theorizing how things could potentially break. You then spend most of your time trying to implement things to stop breakages from happening. This is where you probably want to be as an organization, however a lot of managers probably aren't going to want to pay for it. IT is a cost center, after all, so if you get it beyond the point where you're out of dysfunction mode, many managers are content to deal with the occasional catastrophic failure.</comment>


Darpa to re-invent GPS navigation without the use of satellites - <AUTHOR> http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/202111-darpa-to-re-invent-gps-navigation-without-satellites <comment><USER2> Inertial and GPS-based navigation systems have always been complementary components of a complete navigation solution. The problem with inertial navigation is, it because you are reckoning position by taking the second integral of acceleration, error is introduced and what's worse, it accumulates. No matter how accurate the gyros and accelerometers, if you run the system long enough the drift accumulated will have you off from your actual position. So GPS is used to correct the inertial solution with actual position data.

So yeah, it's great that we're getting much better solutions from inertial gear to supplement a faulty or missing GPS solution. But this isn't GPS without satellites.

Now... navigation on or over land by performing SLAM on ground features... that would be interesting.

<comment><USER3> > Now... navigation on or over land by performing SLAM on ground features... > that would be interesting.

I'd more be interested in guidance using x-ray emissions from pulsars and neutron stars. Constant reference points that are almost impossible to jam.

<comment><USER4> True, but you could just use stars. The SR-71's celestial navigation unit could get a fix during the day while it's sitting on the ground: [https://books.google.com/books?id=xwPFC3GtcL8C&pg=PA132&lpg=...](https://books.google.com/books?id=xwPFC3GtcL8C&pg=PA132&lpg=PA132&dq=Nortronics+NAS-14V2&source=bl&ots=gjLGqSECed&sig=etODqzN_hNYyNRwhSXpQRbvovmg&hl=en&sa=X&ei=ZMQYVaDpIojroASzxIJg&ved=0CEoQ6AEwCTgK#v=onepage&q=Nortronics%20NAS-14V2&f=false)

The Nortronics NAS-14V2 was designed in the early 60s. I would _love_ to see the insides of one of those things.

<comment><USER5> Clouds, fog and smoke are the obvious issues. Dense tree canopies too.

<comment><USER6> Sure, those are all obstacles. But the way I see it, they can all complement each other. I.e. One of the posters mentioned drift of accuracy for some alternate positioning methods. You could then periodically, when possible, use this more-accurate but obstacle-susceptible system to "correct" the drift.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm sure there's a lot of novel stuff they're trying to do here, but the article seems to seriously skirt that inertial navigation systems are all around us and in fact predate GPS by _a lot_.

Doesn't seem to me they're re-inventing GPS, just making better INS.

<comment><USER8> yeah, that was the impression that I got to. Shame the article was 80% waffle.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Halfway through the 7th paragraph (of 8) and finally a vague answer to what the title promised.

</comment><comment><USER10> Geographic location could fall out as a side-effect of increased use of passive radar. Whilst it hasn't happened yet, the UK is testing whether it can use passive radar for air-traffic control [1]. If a radar receiver can figure out the position of a target, it would be even easier (no losses due to reflection) for the target to receive the same signals and figure out its own position. With a wide-band receiver, using all available incidental sources, it would also be hard to jam, since an adversary would have to have control over the entire electromagnetic environment. It would be even harder to jam if the receiver was using a phased array to figure out directions to sources, allowing it to null interference.

[1] [http://www.atc-network.com/atc-news/airbus-defence-and- space...](http://www.atc-network.com/atc-news/airbus-defence-and-space- awarded-caa-study-for-passive-radar-use)

<comment><USER11> Sounds a lot like "VHF omnidirectional range" (VOR) which dates back to 1946.

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

<comment><USER10> In so far as VOR is the locational analogue of traditional "rotating beam" radar, but there the similarity stops. VOR has a known structure to its intended transmissions. Passive radar relies on incidental transmissions, and the system learns about any structure in the received transmissions. Passive radar has potential for much greater accuracy (better than GPS??), as it can potentially use a huge bandwidth.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The interesting section:

> including novel inertial measurement devices that use cold-atom > interferometry; chip-scale self-calibrating gyroscopes, accelerometers and > clocks; and pulsed-laser-enabled atomic clocks and microwave sources

</comment><comment><USER13> Would it be possible to depend on the earth's magnetic field for positioning ? Migratory birds use it but I don't know how precise it is.

<comment><USER14> So called 9 axis inertia guidance units exist (3 linear accelerometers, 3 axis gyroscope, and 3 axis magnetometer). The magnetometers are particularly useful for dealing with gyroscope drift. Once you reject stuff like mains hum, in most typical situations, human scale magnetic fields tend to be pretty constant for many timescales in most human situations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Could they be inclined to, sometime in the _very far_ future, shut down GPS completely? Many other countries have realised that GPS is entirely US-owned, and launched their own GNSS services already.</comment>


Show HN: An Ansible playbook that creates and provision a DigitalOcean droplet - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/jasonheecs/ansible-digitalocean-sample-playbook <comment><USER2> Sounds pretty useful. Ansible is like Dockercompose right? Can you add other packages you want to install?</comment>


After 50 Years, Moore's Law Has Only Started to Disrupt Everything - <AUTHOR> http://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthof/2015/04/17/at-50-moores-law-has-only-started-to-disrupt-everything-we-do/

<comment><USER2> I'm sorry, the page rendering (even on Chrome) with it's jumpiness and then the click to see another 1/6 of the article is more than I could tolerate to read the actual content.

<comment><AUTHOR> [http://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthof/2015/04/17/at-50-moore...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthof/2015/04/17/at-50-moores- law-has-only-started-to-disrupt-everything-we-do/print/)</comment></comment>


Advanced Linux Programming – book with free PDF (2001) - <AUTHOR> http://advancedlinuxprogramming.com/ <comment><USER2> Two alternative, and better, choices, if you're willing to spend a few dollars (and hopefully expense it to your manager):

The Linux Programming Interface: [http://www.amazon.com/Linux-Programming- Interface-System-Han...](http://www.amazon.com/Linux-Programming-Interface- System-Handbook/dp/1593272200/)

Advanced Programming in the UNIX Environment: [http://www.amazon.com/Advanced- Programming-UNIX-Environment-...](http://www.amazon.com/Advanced-Programming- UNIX-Environment-3rd/dp/0321637739/)

A not-too-distant third choice, Linux System Programming: [http://www.amazon.com/Linux-System-Programming-Talking- Direc...](http://www.amazon.com/Linux-System-Programming-Talking- Directly/dp/1449339530/)

<comment><USER3> In my opinion these are best two books on the subject. Stevens' book is classic and have been updated quite recently (3rd edition came out 3 years ago), LPI is very extensive and have some specific Linux info not present in Stevens' book and is clearly influenced by Stevens book.

<comment><USER4> Stevens is dead many years ago. The second and the third editions were written by Rago. He is a good author but he is not Stevens.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'd recommend this book instead 'The Linux Programming Interface' [http://man7.org/tlpi/](http://man7.org/tlpi/) it's a lot more recent and the content is excellent, though it's not a free download. The author is also the maintainer of the linux man pages.

<comment><USER6> Well I don't think it is so much better, I is very usefull but it seems to my more like a manual than a book

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> >> [http://advancedlinuxprogramming.com/about.html](http://advancedlinuxprogramming.com/about.html)

This appears to be the first edition of the book, published in 2001. Is this book still useful, considering it's 15 years old?

<comment><USER8> Some of the subjects it treats are low-level enough (and of Unix-ish heritage) that their treatment is probably not irrelevant today. The performance considerations of threads and processes are probably out of date, but their API (sections 3 and 4) is largely still the same. Same for shared memory and other IPC mechanisms described in section 5. The API re. section 7 still applies -- /proc has expanded considerably since 2001, but it's still used in the same manner. Chapter 8 is probably more out of date than others, but you can still follow it. Stuff in 9 is probably not used much anymore, an #10, while adequate, would probably be considered incomplete today.

I'd say it's still useful to someone who comes to Linux from other platforms, or to people who are already using Linux but aren't familiar with systems programming under it.

Edit: although, as someone else pointed out, APUE is probably a better choice (and was a better choice back in 2001, too).

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I am getting interested in Unix programming, but essentially starting from scratch. I've read through the first two chapters of the _The Linux Programming Interface,_ and while I think it is a great book, so far it has not been easy for me to find points of entry. I think it might not be the best book for me to start with.

I've just started _How Linux Works,_ but I thought I might take this opportunity to ask for suggestions for someone trying to get started (doesn't have to be a book).

<comment><USER10> Raymond's _The Art of Unix Programming_ is a good resource for understanding the design philosophy of Unix...and by extension Linux. It explains much of the context and history behind why things are done the way they are done and what good _nix programs do to be good_ nix programs.

[http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/taoup/html/](http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/taoup/html/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Stevens APUE is a much better choice.

</comment><comment><USER12> Is this a good read after finishing Beginning Linux Programming (big red book by WROX) by Neil Matthew and Richard Stones?

</comment><comment><USER13> This is a good write up for IPC related stuff - [http://beej.us/guide/bgipc/output/html/singlepage/bgipc.html](http://beej.us/guide/bgipc/output/html/singlepage/bgipc.html)

<comment><USER14> It is somewhat helpful, but the examples for shared memory and mmap ignore concurrency issues and refer you to a generic, non-language specific WikiPedia page for guidance.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> It seems many people dont like this book. Why's that?

</comment><comment><USER16> [http://www.kohala.com/start/](http://www.kohala.com/start/)

</comment><comment><USER17> why are all the chapters in separate pdf's? Is that unintentional or an enticement to buy the book when it comes out? If it's the former, anybody got a full pdf download link?

<comment><USER18> The first line in the table on [http://advancedlinuxprogramming.com/alp- folder/](http://advancedlinuxprogramming.com/alp-folder/) is a link to the PDF of the full book.

[http://advancedlinuxprogramming.com/alp-folder/advanced- linu...](http://advancedlinuxprogramming.com/alp-folder/advanced-linux- programming.pdf)

(The size in the table is incorrect. It's 3866012 bytes, not 1273361. The md5sum is correct.)

<comment><USER18> The size has now been corrected.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> pretty good book

</comment><comment><USER20> If you are doing "Linux programming" instead of UNIX programming, you are most likely doing something wrong.

<comment><USER21> Where can I find a "UNIX" distribution to try? :-)

Linux are in every android cell phones, PI, pc, etc.

<comment><USER22> z/OS is legally UNIX.

So's HP-UX and Solaris (probably not any of the Open Source variants, however).

None of the Open Source BSDs qualify as UNIX, however.</comment></comment></comment>


ThereOrSquare – Everything you need to plan an epic party with your friends - <AUTHOR> https://thereorsquare.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> ThereOrSquare is a free party/event planning tool much like Facebook event, but with collaborative tools, such as time/location poll, shared task list, and potluck list etc., to lessen the burden on hosts. We are also thinking of features such as surveys and expense tracking down the road.

Feel free to give us any feedback on problems you find, viability issues, and feature recommendations. We want to hear what you have to say. Thanks!</comment>


Oops Now You Can Track the Tweets Politicians Tried to Delete - <AUTHOR> http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/05/oops-now-you-can-track-the-tweets-politicians-tried-to-delete/257853/?google_editors_picks=true

<comment><USER2> Was Stephen Fincher really the best example of politicians deleting tweets that they could find? If only there were examples more significant than Stephen Fincher's ruminations on bad TV. Maybe something like a politician named Anthony Dong who tweeted a photo of his dong and resigned from the senate as a result?

If there were examples like that, maybe we'd really be able to see what this service is useful for. Oh well, too bad nothing like that ever happened.

[edit: just noticed all their examples of bad tweets come from one party. Strange. Is the other party immune to bad tweets?]

</comment><comment><USER3> This looks like it breaches Twitters rules of the road. Specifically items 1.D and 2.4.B.

<https://dev.twitter.com/terms/api-terms>

<comment><USER4> _4\. Be a good partner to Twitter

B. Respect the features and functionality embedded with or included in Twitter Content or the Twitter API. Do not attempt to interfere with, intercept, disrupt, filter, or disable any features of the Twitter API or Twitter service, and you should only surface actions that are organically displayed on Twitter.

For example, your Service should execute the unfavorite and delete actions by removing all relevant messaging and Twitter Content, not by publicly displaying to other end users that the Tweet was unfavorited or deleted._

Edit: I know there are some exceptions. For example, the Library of Congress (in the US) is building a permanent archive of all tweets older than 6 months. They have said that if you wait longer than that to delete your tweet, they won't remove it from the archive. I wonder if Twitter would consider a 24-hour rule for official political accounts? If the tweet is left up for 24 hours, then even if it's deleted from the twitter stream, you don't have to delete it from your archive.

<comment><USER3> Thanks, I should have indeed just copy and pasted the terms. Here is 1.D

 _Respect the privacy and sharing settings of Twitter Content. Do not share, or encourage or facilitate the sharing of protected Twitter Content. Promptly change your treatment of Twitter Content (for example, deletions, modifications, and sharing options) as changes are reported through the Twitter API._

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The most important thing in politics is transparency, which many politicians vehemently oppose for their own selfish reasons. But, as the representatives of the people, they have to be held accountable for everything they do. Little steps such as this wonderful project go a long way towards this goal.

<comment><USER6> Or you can look at it the other way that they're people who make mistakes but we somehow want them to magically be perfect human beings.

And then you can look on something like this as a bit weird and creepy, the digital equivalent to the ultra nerd you come across at gaming night who just has to correct you about constantly because he hasn't learnt basic social skills.

<comment><USER5> Interestingly, I pretty much expected this answer. Yes, politicians are, in the end, humans, too. They make errors and we need to acknowledge that. However, being held accountable for what you do does not exclude that. The point is not to punish for every little error, it's to be able to differentiate the small errors from major fuck-ups, deliberate deception and corruption - which is of course, as I said, not in the interest of a lot of politicians.

I don't think this is creepy, either. If you decide to become a politician, this should just be part of what you sign up for - either accept that you will be held fully accountable for everything you do and say, or don't become a politician.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Is there a human filter on this stuff?

I ask because, say a politician posts and then deletes something embarrassing on a personal level but which isn't particularly relevant to their political stance.

They are human beings too and I don't feel there's much to gain by being a dick and re-posting this sort of thing on an automated basis. It will just get their backs up and make them a lot more wary about what they post in future. Net loss for transparency on political issues.

This is something traditional journalists are good at -- knowing when to break a story and when to show a bit of discretion in order to earn people's trust and avoid unnecessarily putting people on the defensive.

<comment><USER8> > This is something traditional journalists are good at -- knowing when to > break a story and when to show a bit of discretion in order to earn people's > trust and avoid unnecessarily putting people on the defensive.

I disagree. This is precisely where traditional journalists go bad. It's also where their biases show. (See Obama's Chicago church vs Romney's Mormonism for an example.)

Trading (non) coverage for access is PR.

<comment><USER7> What's the answer though? every politician should be hounded in every aspect of their private life just so we can avoid accusations of bias?

That's going to drive good people out of politics. (Cue jokes about 'they already left a while ago').

Perhaps in part it's an american thing. The political culture there seems particularly personal and nasty. It's not something I'd like to see spread unnecessarily.

(And by the way I was referring specifically to discretion on non-politically- relevant aspects of people's personal life, not selective coverage of political topics. Although I realise it's a blurry line, one has to draw it somewhere.)

<comment><USER8> > every politician should be hounded in every aspect of their private life > just so we can avoid accusations of bias?

Actually, certain politicians are "hounded in every aspect" today. If you think that's wrong....

> (And by the way I was referring specifically to discretion on non- > politically-relevant aspects of people's personal life, not selective > coverage of political topics. Although I realise it's a blurry line, one has > to draw it somewhere.)

You forget, the personal is political.

Disagree? You'll have to take that up with the folks who are currently hounding.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> John Boehner is on the ball.

 _Speaker John Boehner ( R )

You know what else has been deleted? Jobs in the Obama economy. Where are the jobs? #politwoops

Speaker John BoehnerDeleted 13 minutes ago after 36 seconds, originally posted via web_

<comment><USER10> At least one member of his social media staff is pretty smart. Posting a tweet (with a #politwoops hashtag, no less!) deleting it, knowing it would appear on the politwoops site in a perfect context for his message.

see: <http://politwoops.sunlightfoundation.com/user/SpeakerBoehner>

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> It would be much more interesting to see what they try to reverse in speeches. I know that various news and media outlets (including the Daily Show) highlight this from time-to-time, but unless you've watched all of their speeches, I don't know of any way to easily see what politicians have said over time and how their views have changed, evolved, or reversed.

</comment><comment><USER12> How exactly can they get to tweets that have only been posted for a few seconds (and then deleted)? Does the API still return deleted tweets for some time?

<comment><USER13> the streaming API publishes the tweets as they come in. Afterwards, if the tweet has been deleted, the streaming API sends out a delete message. That's... the only way to do real time. Otherwise it... wouldn't be real time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Maybe they need a time delay - <http://bleep.ly/></comment>


As a developer, setting expectations is the most important part of your job. - <AUTHOR> http://blog.buildbettersoftware.com/post/35091174820/as-a-developer-setting-expectations-is-the-single-most

<comment><USER2> All you need to know about setting expectations: underpromise and overdeliver.

<comment><USER3> Yes, and one more thing: make commitments. Don't be afraid to make some of these modest promises. And then over deliver.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Raising your kids bilingual - <AUTHOR> Good day HN! I'm about to become a father pretty soon (first time!) and was wondering whether it would make any sense to try and raise my kid bilingually (Russian + English). The thing is that I am not a native English speaker myself, however I believe that I have a pretty strong speaking level (and good accent), as I communicate in English daily due to work. Also, we do not live in an English speaking country (but we do travel a lot). I've read about most common bilingual upbringing techniques (OPOL, etc.), however I found very few first-hand articles where people were actually raised bilingually by non-bilingual parents. I also have a slight fear that I will be missing out on sharing my native culture with my child, but on the other hand the situational upbringing method takes care of that. I would appreciate any advice on the subject, especially from parents and bilingually raised folks! <comment><USER2> I was billingually raised. I spoke in an Indian language called Punjabi with my parents and I spoke English outside of the house. My English is much better due to the lack of people besides family I could speak Punjabi with growing up in then west. Now I have my own children and although my wife also happens to have a similar background to me, having spoken Punjabi with her parents she too grew up in the west like I did and we speak English with each other. I've realized now that our own children will not grow up billingual because of my wife and I speaking English with each other. This does make me sad but unless I were to migrate to India (where I've never lived) this is the practical reality.

The lessons are, kids will definitely learn the language their parents speak with each other and also the language of the local city/state they live in. Other than those it will take an enormous effort to teach anyone another language. If you can afford an English speaking nanny or tutor or a program at a school that might make things easier. Good luck.</comment>


A Euro Tragedy - <AUTHOR> https://mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2018/06/a-euro-tragedy.html <comment><USER2> >> The reality, as the author describes, is that Syriza's call for debt relief should have been granted.

But that is 100% the failure of Syriza, not the Europeans. Syriza took this perfectly sensible, perfectly legitimate demand and turned it into a circus act, backed by a farcical Referendum [1] and fronted by the clownish antics of Yanis Varoufakis.

A unique opportunity to reason with our European partners was squandered, just so that Varoufakis could burnish his personna of the maverick economics professor. And because Tsipras, who was in way over his head, an inexperienced young prime minister trying to negotiate with the heavy-weights of European politics, did not have the courage or the honesty to accept reality for what it was: that no, we didn't hold all the aces, no, the EU would not shed a tear if we jumped off the Grexit cliff no matter how loudly Varoufakis proclaimed it to be the divine truth; that, no, you cannot play chicken with frau Merkel, you silly little boy.

And that the Europeans were not even out to get us. They needed something they could present to their own citizens as a viable option. We gave them an Aristophanean comedy instead, a shadow play of Karagiozis with all the bells and whistles. And we paid the price, for the populism of our leaders, their lack of seriousness and their incompetence.

And we still do.

_________

[1] The referendum question regarded an offer by the EU that had already been withdrawn before the referendum was called. The text of the question itself was so vague and complex that on the one hand it immediately became a running joke with various memes, and on the other, allowed all sides in the debate to claim victory and only served to muddle the waters even further on what "The Will of the People" really was.

<comment><USER3> I got a different reading of the whole situation in 2015 from the book by Mr. Varoufakis himself, "Adults in the Room". TL;DR: the EU was never going to budge. They knew what he wanted was right, but they couldn't give Greece any political wins. And the Eurocrats were expert in shaping the story in the media, that you (yes you) got the impression the Greeks were stupid clowns.

Look at Brexit, I now get the impression the Brits are clowns, but if someone wrote an inside story book, it's probably deliberate run-around and media manipulation. Not that I'm saying the Brits aren't clowns...

<comment><USER4> > media manipulation

This is intruiging to me. From where I am sitting in the beautiful English sunshine, the media seems very bullish and pro-brexit!

The Daily Mail, Express and Telegrapgh are openly pro-brexit, branding those trying to stop it as 'traitors'.

The Murdoch press (Times and Sun) is less overt, but Murdoch is well known to be pro-brexit.

This leaves The Guardian, which is well read on the internet because it is free but less so on paper. Also the Mirror is apparently more balanced, but lightweight. The BBC seem very sheepish after open threats from Ian Duncan Smith.

I think the domestic press have been very, very easy on the government and the official opposition who are not opposing Brexit. I wonder if the international press are behaving differently? Disclosure: I do believe the Brexit team are clowns. I believe that most people in Britain had no interest in the EU either way until the popular press handed them an opinion. Remember the Google.co.uk trending searches for the day after the referendum included 'what is the EU'

<comment><USER5> You aren't reading much press in the UK then.

Openly anti-Brexit: the Guardian, the Financial Times, the Economist, Sky News, BBC News (e.g. their famous "despite brexit" spin on every good news story).

The UK is really the only country in Europe that has a press that's willing to attack the EU and (uselessly) try to hold it to account. I've always been surprised when reading German news how flimsy so much of their broadsheet press really is. Die Zeit's "interview" with Farage being a good example of the low quality that passes for highbrow media there.

 _Remember the Google.co.uk trending searches for the day after the referendum included 'what is the EU'_

You're doing what so many EU fans do, you're repeating myths whilst believing you're above believing myths.

The Google graphs that people cited at that time didn't show any volume, but volume data was available via their ad planner tool. What that showed is that volume for that query is absolutely minimal, even a huge spike would still amount to virtually nobody typing in such a query. Almost certainly, given the wordy phrasing, those queries were coming from children via speech recognition.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/eliseackerman/2016/06/28/brexit...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/eliseackerman/2016/06/28/brexit- and-the-two-faces-of-google-adwords-data/#49ac14d82ef6)

But sure, you go on and tell yourself that most people were simply repeating things they read in the press.

<comment> cirrus-clouds > You aren't reading much press in the UK then.

Neither are you.

Researchers at Loughborough University analysed Brexit coverage on TV and in the press in the lead up to the referendum. They found that coverage, _when weighted by circulation_ , was 80% in favour of Brexit and 20% against.

Source: [https://blog.lboro.ac.uk/crcc/eu-referendum/uk-news- coverage...](https://blog.lboro.ac.uk/crcc/eu-referendum/uk-news- coverage-2016-eu-referendum-report-5-6-may-22-june-2016/)

<comment><USER5> I wasn't making any claims about weighting by circulation, only refuting the point that the media is very pro Brexit. In reality it's split about 50/50.

But again, trying to go from "what the media supports" to "what people voted for" is a correlation/causation fallacy. There are plenty of anti-Brexit papers to read. If people largely choose not to, that probably implies they don't think those papers are very good.

<comment><USER4> > If people largely choose not to, that probably implies they don't think > those papers are very good

Another way to interpret that is that people read the Sun and the Mail for reasons entirely unrelated to Brexit, such as celebrity gossip (The Economist and FT are pretty lacking in those areas). However, perhaps the constant drip feed of anti-EU/Anti-immigration stories in there have given them a certain impression of the EU, alongside their daily non-political entertainment.

Perhaps people would care to Google why the current UK foreign secretary was sacked by The Times, or the 'Bendy Bannanas' debacle?

<comment><USER5> But that cuts both ways. The pro-EU press gives a misleading impression as well, usually by refusing to report on any story that makes the EU look bad, or by putting a spin on events that blames member states instead of the institutions.

After all, by your argument influential people go read the Financial Times because they think it suits their station in life, or because they want financial news, and end up being exposed to a constant litany of pro-EU stories, resulting in them voting that way in the referendum (and not only voting but being quoted by other campaigners and news outlets as 'experts', a perk accorded to the sorts of people who read the Economist but not the Daily Mail).

After all, the FT literally flies the EU flag above its headquarters. Not exactly a neutral source, is it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Australia has about 25 million people and about five economic centres of more than a million people. The reserve bank has to set one rate. At times, it gives compromise rates that are a tradeoff between a mining boom on one side of the country, and a downturn on the other.

The European central bank has a much larger version of the same problem. Iceland was able to use rates to help it out of its economic collapse. Greece can't do this.

The quality of consumer FX has steadily improved over the decades. Access to technology has given tighter spreads and convenience. If the Euro goes, I hope there is some consideration given to running regional currencies rather than national. Imagine if a "Bank of Italy" maintained independent northern, central, and southern notes.

<comment><USER7> There are similar issues in every large currency area with different economies. However, US and Australia are countries where people are mostly fine with the idea that having a single currency and interest rate also means big transfers have to take place within the country. This isn't the case in the EU. Although Greece (And others) receive EU support, there just isn't popular support for the kind of transfers required to keep a single (German) interest rate. Taxing people in one country to transfer to another isn't possible on that scale in the EU.

What needs to happen for the Euro to survive is that Germans have to accept a pretty substantial and long term inflation in order to keep growth elsewhere. But they had some bad luck with inflation in the past when it led to "economic anxiety" so it's a bit of a red flag for them...

The other solution is to kill (or split) the Euro to save the EU. It seems more and more sensible.

<comment><USER8> I always read German attitudes to the Eurozone with some disbelief. They always seem to insist the burden of changing policy to make the Euro work fall on other countries and not there own.

<comment><USER9> I think that's in large part because Germany had the Agenda 2010 which heavily cut welfare and hit many people super hard. The common narrative is that it's because of those sacrifices the German economy is in a better position than most other European countries. On top of that in the very least the perception is that the lower classes didn't benefit from that at all. So I understand that there is a lot of "I did my part and sucked it up while others didn't and now I am supposed to suffer again to help people who failed to do the right thing in the first place."

Not saying that that's the correct attitude, just offering a explanation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> An often overlooked point is that euro is not just an economic tool but also a social one, as being able to travel and pay freely in the whole continent is an important unifying point.

<comment><USER6> I don't think this is a strong argument. Physical cash is on the way out. You can do payments through mastercard/visa lines, and wired transfers are straightforward. FX conversions are straightforward when everyone has a phone. In 2007 I had a situation where I was being paid in Australia, but living in London. I used the lines on my cards for that year, and don't remember it being inconvenient.

<comment><USER11> My bank makes me use a terrible rate and then adds a £1.50 charge on top, every time I use my card in the rest of Europe. So I'm still looking for good deals on Euros and carrying large amounts of cash when I go.

<comment><USER12> the EU could simply force banks to let you withdraw at market rates at any ATM

<comment><USER13> There was a huge pushback from banks a few years ago when transaction fees at German ATMs were capped to (AFAIK) € 1,90.

The argument from banks is that there are a lot of online-only banks that rely on the ATMs of banks with physical branches in a parasitic manner.

<comment><USER14> And online banks like N26 complain in turn that Germany has the most expensive ATM fees in Europe. It sounds like a bullshit argument given that operational costs for an ATM are mostly fixed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is a really, really valuable post (and book).

The topic of the euro's effects on Greece, and the influence of Germany, appears to be at a wide consensus amongst academic economists. Stiglitz, Krugman, and even people like Navarro agree. [https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/02/01/germany-the- eur...](https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/02/01/germany-the-euro-and- currency-manipulation/) [https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/09/11/the- euro...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/09/11/the-euro-is-a- disaster-stiglitz-krugman-milton-friedman-and-james-tobin-agree/#2e67a756063d)

I remember back 20 years ago that macroeconomists were talking about how the lack of fiscal coordination was going to break the euro. And so it has come to pass, it seems.

Edit: or what PaulHoule says with more detail in another reply.

</comment><comment><USER16> I hope that we will see a different and more rational handling in italy's case. In fact we should allow countries to leave the EU if their economy is not strong enough. It just doesn't make sense for anyone to have the same currency. Right now, everyone treats the "dropping out of the EU zone" as a failure and a stepping stone into a complete EU collapse, but the EU shouldn't be a prison. Having the same currency and no option to devalue for a country leaves you strangled and tied to the big guys (Germany, France,...). Let italy, portugal, spain and finnland drop out if they want, let them devalue their currency and let them get back on their feet, otherwise we stumble deeper and deeper into uncharted dark territory.

Ofc it's not as easy as I'm stating it here, if they drop out of the EU, Germany and others would be in deep trouble due to the massive credits they gave everyone to make them stay and dependent

<comment><USER15> Drop out of the EU, or drop out of the euro? Half of the macro arguments are about the problems of currency union without fiscal policy union. Perhaps the pre-2015 UK position is a good intermediate drop-back step: no currency union, still many ties to EU and Brussels.

(that said, the German wage deflation discussed in the post is an EU issue, not a euro issue.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> It has been pointed out (I forget where) that part of the reason the US works as a monetary union is that people are not very attached to where they live. When one area of the country becomes much more successful than another, many people are often willing to move, which acts as a countervailing force to regional productivity differences.

One of the problems with the EU is that Germans like to live in Germany and Greeks like to live in Greece.

<comment><USER18> The US is a single country with a single language, a single culture and a single currency. It's not comparable to the many countries within Europe.

<comment><USER5> Sort of but not really, right?

America has a large population of Spanish speakers and go to many cities and you'll find official signage and documents written in Chinese and other languages.

Single culture, well, compare people living in the deep south and Manhattan, what they value and enjoy. Beyond sports do they have a lot in common?

That said I agree Europe is much _less_ homogenous.

<comment><USER18> >>> Beyond sports do they have a lot in common?

They speak the same language, they go to the same shops, they watch the same tv shows and tv channels, they have a common healthcare and education system, they are governed by the same president, they share a similar history that they learn in the same schools.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Is USD a tragedy, given California vs Appalachia?

<comment><USER20> The different monetary needs of different parts of the U.S. are a real issue but they can be papered over by taxing wealth in California and giving aid to Appalachia. That is, one country can coordinate its own monetary and fiscal policy, but countries in the E.U. can't, particularly because of the "Growth and Stability" pact.

<comment><USER4> > but countries in the E.U. can't

Do you mean countries in the euro?

<comment><USER20> You are right. The euro currency zone is not the same as the E.U.

I'm not sure that voters know the difference, but they do know there is a "democratic deficit".

<comment><USER4> > "democratic deficit".

Sorry could you elaborate? I voted for an MEP. I voted for my national government, whose leader sits on the Council. Commissioners are appointed by the same people, much like the UK civil service

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I don't see it as a tragedy for Germany. You would have to feel the euro has a lower value than the duetchmark would have today? That rather helps Germany in their position as one of the worlds top exporters. Germany ous growing and has a budget surplus.

I think as others have noted the idea of a single currency is always going to be partly political. What kind of state makes all of its decisions based on economic theory?

The euro zone as a whole right now is out-growing the UK, and according to my fx dealer are deliberately playing down their growth to keep the euro weak.

I think criticising the idea of the euro as 'political' is a bit rich from someone whose opposition to it seems too also be ideological.

Personally I like the easy trade it facilitates. FX risk is dreary to manage. Only having to hedge GBPEUR makes it much simpler than the old days. Maybe the mistake, if there was one, was letting Greece et al join before they were ready

</comment><comment><USER20> What I find strange about it there was almost a universal consensus among economists that the Euro couldn't work. The UK was fortunate enough to drop out of the Euro as the Pound/Euro was mispriced in the transition phase.

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

Unlike many ideas in economics, the "impossible trinity" has proven itself again and again. It's not one of the usual right wing tropes like "raising the minimum wage will tank the economy".

Different monetary zones allow price levels to adjust. For instance I was in Montreal and looking at the price of package tours to different parts of Europe and Greece turned out to be the most expensive place to go. If it wasn't for the Euro, price levels would drop in Greece as denominated in USD, it would be more attractive to go on vacation there, manufacturing would become more profitable there, and the Greek economy will recover.

It is true that the Eurozone and the E.U. are different but I am not sure that Brexit voters really know that. What they have seen is Eurocracy has a "democratic deficit" and and inability to handle problems (for better or worse government legitimacy is more impacted by effectiveness than by process or ideology.)

<comment><USER2> I can't find any earlier information online (well, not with a quick look anyway) but the following shows an upward trend, year-on-year, in tourist and revenue from 2000 to 2018, and arrivals from 2008.

[https://tradingeconomics.com/greece/tourism- revenues](https://tradingeconomics.com/greece/tourism-revenues) [https://tradingeconomics.com/greece/tourist- arrivals](https://tradingeconomics.com/greece/tourist-arrivals)

Intuitively also, I don't get the feeling that tourism has been hurt by the Euro and by higher prices. And, anecdotally, business owners are supposed to prefer higher-earners as visitors, to backpackers and students etc (regardless of whether that makes business sense or not).

(hi Paul :)

<comment><USER2> And I just hit on this article:

[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/03/greece- tourism...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/03/greece-tourism-at- record-high-amid-alarm-over-environmental-cost)

According to which 2018 is an exceptionally good year, so good in fact we might have trouble accommodating all the extra people:

 _Greece is braced for another bumper year. The tourists will not stop coming. For every one of its citizens, three foreign visitors – 32 million in total – will arrive in 2018, more than at any other time since records began.

Tourist numbers have increased by an additional 2 million every year for the past three years. Arrivals from China alone have doubled since 2017. But with forecasts predicting record numbers over the next decade, a growing number of Greeks are asking: can Greece really cope?_

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Seems to me its doesn't make sense to have a gov sell bonds in a currency that it doesn't have control of. This includes countries outside of the EU that use the Euro. When buying bonds of a country, there should mean the investor believes in the direction of the country / the governance there / believes it is low risk that the bonds would lose value or the strength of the economy would collapse. That's the risk that gets taken by the investor. It doesn't make sense to peg it to an external countries' performance. Of course it sweetens the deal but makes things confusing too.

</comment><comment><USER22> It's scary and terrible how people think of this. That this was somehow Greece's fault, or even Greece's doing. Or worse yet: Syriza's fault.

Politicians are experts at this. This morning there was a discussion on ozzie radio with the secretary of the treasury on radio. There, the government decried the lack of innovation in the Australian business community. Specifically why there aren't any Australian businesses that operate online 2-sided marketplaces like Amazon or Ebay. Similar discussions have been happening in Europe.

Now of course, when you analyze the argument (and I assure you these government people at that level aren't morons, they know this) it turns out these government people are psychopaths.

You see, the reason there is no Australian 2-sided online marketplace is ... tax. The Australian government has chosen not to impose either import tax, rules or GST/VAT on imported goods with a value < $1000.

So after years of imposing a ~18% cost disadvantage on Australian businesses compared to international businesses, a senior government representative comes on public radio, and eloquently decries the fact that it must be Australian's inadequacy that has prevented them from competing with international companies WHILE IMPOSING AN 18% PRICE HANDICAP ON THEM. Therefore, it is only fair that customers punish them. They called up a few of them that were clearly preselected for their utter lack of rhetorical abilities to make them completely ridiculous (they were cut off halfway through the argument too).

In other words, this guy has been pursuing a policy of openly sabotaging Australian businesses for at least half a decade, blames them, wide open in public for not performing well, and then picks the worst of them to "say a few words".

Now this sort of thing happens a LOT in discussions. For instance, when it comes to immigrants, ... I must say it makes it VERY clear why these people want to censor (sorry, I mean "eliminate fake news for the good of the people").

For the record, I am a socialist and I hate the business practices of these businessmen, but hearing that radio discussion I must say, I got a newfound respect for them and a deep hatred of the Australian treasury/government. I mean I would respect someone who just stood there and said "I'm screwing you and there's nothing you can do" more than this lying asshole.

Thing is, I'm absolutely sure 90% of people listening (at least) fell for it.

You should learn to look at European governments actions as very similar to this. You will understand far more about the situation by assuming any government spokesman/woman (including of course such papers as Der Spiegel) are at best leaving out viewpoints, usually outright lying, and sometimes directly falsifying their argument.</comment>


A Crash Course on ML Modules (2015) - <AUTHOR> https://jozefg.bitbucket.io/posts/2015-01-08-modules.html <comment><USER2> This is a good rundown of the basics of ML modules, the syntactic aspects, if you will. But it doesn't really give you the important insight:

      Abstraction. is. powerful.

if you consider the IntMap module provided in the article, you notice that the type `t` is not defined. It is kept "abstract". One defining property of ML modules is that you can indeed keep the definition of types hidden and _nothing can break abstraction_. The rest of the program can only manipulate the type `t` through the functions provided by the module.

This allows, in practice, to encode pretty much any property you would like. In the case of maps, you can use BST and never have to worry about users breaking the invariants: the user can't even see it's a BST! You can provide any form of validation and be sure that the data you manipulate will stay validated (as long as the module is correct, of course).

Functors allows you to rely on this by giving you a way to abstract away a whole module. This gives you excellent guarantees: if two modules behaves exactly the same, swapping them is semantic-preserving. Said in another way: if I can prove that sets-as-lists and sets-as-bst are functionally equivalents, then I can swap one for the other, and the rest of the program will behave the same!

Refactoring becomes a breeze. Functors (and modules) makes all the Javaesque reflections and dependency injections completely redundant: modules are (in OCaml) first class objects that you can manipulate and apply as you wish.

It also gives you separate compilation! A lot of people say that the OCaml compiler is blazing fast: this is precisely because OCaml's module system ensure that each module can be typechecked and compiled incrementally.

It pains me that modules get so little appreciation. Many ML programmers get a sort of selective blindness: just like fish in the sea, they don't realize the power of what they're swimming in. Proper modules with actual abstraction are, in my opinion, the single most essential feature for "large scale" programming.

<comment><USER3> It seems to me that you can get the same thing in C++ with classes <> modules ; templated classes <> functors. What am I missing?

<comment><USER2> There is no abstraction in C++, you can always poke around the memory layout of what you are given, and change your behavior depending on that.

For example, let us say you have a module satisfying this signature:

      module M : sig
        type sorted
        val import : int array -> sorted
      end = struct
        type sorted = int array
        let import = Array.sort
      end

In OCaml, if you have a value of type `sorted`, you _know_ it's indeed sorted. In C++, as soon any code external to the module had an handle on it, you don't know! It could have modified the array behind your back, since it can look directly at the definition, or worse, poke in the memory layout.

<comment><USER4> Yes, you can access raw memory and flip bits to modify a private member of an object (and it migth even be defined, not too sure about that thou). But I don't find that an valid argument for the statement that you can't do abstractions in c++. That's just not something people do.

The c++ version of your example would be, if I understood your code correctly, to take an std::vector as an constructor parameter, copy it to an private field and sort it.

<comment><USER2> I don't know all that much about C++'s object system, so I can't give you a concrete example on how it breaks down.

However, you say that it is "not something people do" ... well maybe not in C++ (I highly doubt that), but it's very common in many languages. In C, it's common to look inside structs directly and change things. Javascript libraries do it all the time: They inspect their arguments, look at the types and change their behavior depending on it. It's a common programming practice to poke deep into the data-structures and do things. In Java, they made it an art with reflection and monstrosity such as Spring.

Abstraction is a bit like immutability: Sure, you can try to fake it in languages that don't have it, but then you are just praying that everyone plays by your rules. :)

<comment><USER4> My comment "not something people do" was about directly accessing memory to circumvent the private data abstraction in c++ and I stand by that.

I admit that I kinda pushed you into it, but you are moving the goal post. People indeed use public fields in languages like C and Javascript.

In C it's often done for the sake of performance. Hiding data behind a pointer has a cost.

In Javascript I would say it's lazyness above all. Front end programs often aren't that big nor pinacles of code quality.

But it is possible to define abstract data types in both languages. ML makes it a bit easier and some times even more performant, but it doesn't "own" the idea.

Abstractions are quite like immutability. You can enforce both in many languages, some just give you better tools for it.

<comment><USER2> The goal post, right from the start, is that by having proper abstraction (the kind that doesn't break when you blow lightly on it), you get many benefits.

You say that, even when the language doesn't enforce it, people don't break it ..... except when they do. It doesn't really matter why, it simply makes every thing else more brittle as a consequence and limits how you can reason about your code.

You seem to trust that programmers will play by the rules, even if the compiler doesn't enforce them. We will simply have to agree to disagree. :)

<comment><USER4> > You seem to trust that programmers will play by the rules, even if the > compiler doesn't enforce them.

I've been trying to say the exact oppisite. C, C++, Javascript, all those languages provide ways to define abstract datatypes that cannot be circumvented (by "normal" code. Even Haskell has unsafePerformeIO). My latest argument was that people decide not to use those abstractions not because they are unavailable, but because it is more ergonomical or performant not to. The same happens even in ML, not all data is abstracted as an abstract data type.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> ML should get more love. If PolyML or MLton had received even a fraction of the support behind golang, we'd have a language with all the upsides of go (simple, concurrent, typed, etc) and none of the horrible downsides (not functional, almost zero abstraction, empty interface, no generics, pointers, etc).

<comment><USER6> The bucklescript and ReasonML ecosystem is quite interesting right now, seems to attract at least a bit of attention.

<comment><USER5> ReasonML syntax just isn't as good as the ML style syntax. If I understand correctly, they started with SML then switched to Ocaml because there were more libs. I suppose it was a pragmatic decision, but I believe SML Successor would have been a much better long-term target not to mention that going with PolyML would have given them a concurrent back-end (PolyML has had years of refinement while Ocaml's implementation is still not finished yet).

<comment><USER6> Can you explain what the problem with that syntax is, is there something you couldn't express in ReasonML? It is meant to bridge the gap for existing js developers, if I understand it correctly.

Regarding the ecosystem, I think the main goal is compilation towards js and js interop, so other backends don't really matter that much, from my understanding. Maybe Ocaml just fit the bill best as a base language equivalent, regarding the features they wanted to map to and from js.

<comment><USER5> I love JS (which ReasonML tries to emulate), but the traditional ML syntax (elm, haskell, SML, etc) is simply better for me. The extra parens and curly braces everywhere don't really add anything useful to the language while complicating the syntax (well, they help solve some edge cases in Ocaml, but those cases also don't exist in most other MLs). Another result of using Ocaml is that operators aren't overloaded (not bad if you have only a couple types, but quite problematic as the number of primitive types grows). A personal annoyance is the use of JS promises (non-monadic with auto-flatmap).

Most of this applies to reason as well. [http://adam.chlipala.net/mlcomp/](http://adam.chlipala.net/mlcomp/) (I'd note that the goal of Successor ML is to add the most useful Ocaml features into SML).

As to why they chose Ocaml. More libraries makes it easier to write tooling. Ocaml has builtin tools to make writing the language much easier. Most importantly, other Facebook teams were already doing a ton of stuff in Ocaml. There are probably a bunch of other reasons, but the ReasonML guys know way more about that than I do.

<comment><USER6> Ok, yeah, I guess that's personal preference then. I have only superficial experience with traditional MLs and am currently experimenting with ReasonML, and it just feels more intuitive and productive right from the start, and context switching is easier.

With regard to operator overloading, that's the number one issue I had anytime I looked for example at haskell, it's just incredibly hard to figure out what some <=$=> operator or whatever means, and also very hard to google, so for newcomers it's really bad language UI.

<comment><USER5> Operator overloading has pros and cons. In truth, I'm inclined to agree with you that operator overload should be limited in userland, but I'm a bit incredulous at the choice with primitive data types. There are 12 or so common primitive numeric types baked into hardware. If Ocaml ever expanded to include these all, the effect without overloading would be horrendous.

<comment><USER6> Ok yes, agreed, the separate operators for different numeric types are not exactly very user-friendly either. In the de-facto use case of Reason they shouldn't be such a big deal though (building webapps).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I know he said "All the code here should be translatable to OCaml if that's more your taste" but I have read multiple examples about the power of ML modules and the code always seems to be in SML and not OCaml. Why is that?

<comment><USER5> Because Ocaml is easily the ugliest of all the ML languages. I will never understand why Ocaml became the popular one. SML is much more elegant in my opinion (and even adding all the good Ocaml stuff to SML still leaves a much more elegant language).

The further reason is that SML is very popular in Academia (perhaps that is its downfall). The same holds true for things like lisp where Common Lisp is undoubtedly the most used, but scheme is usually an example language because it is more elegant (and with fewer warts).

<comment><USER8> Can you define what you mean by "the ugliest"?

SML is used in academics because the language is very well-defined(both semantically and typing rules) and all the fundamentals of typed functional programming, so it is preferred for teaching. Ocaml is a moving goalpost, and the language has no formal specification, afaik.

<comment><USER5> The fact that the implementation is the spec is a large part of the issue. Someone feels like adding a feature, so they just tack it on somewhere until the language has a million syntactic features littered everywhere. The experimentation aspect is nice, but to me, the final product is an unwieldy Frankenstein (though still better than many more popular languages).

[http://adam.chlipala.net/mlcomp/](http://adam.chlipala.net/mlcomp/)

SML is nice enough as is, but the progress with Successor ML to gradually add the best of Ocaml on top is a very appealing option. As a personal gripe, both languages need better Unicode support.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Prerequisite is existing knowledge of ML syntax I guess. Cause I couldn't fully follow.

And can someone tell me how its different to Java Interfaces or Classes?

<comment><USER10> One big difference is that java interfaces can't contain member types. They describe the methods of one particular type. Imagine you could define an interface for an entire java package.

Another big one is that module types are structural: you don't have to declare all the module types implemented by a module when you define the module.</comment></comment>


An In-Depth Look at Clojure Collections - <AUTHOR> http://www.infoq.com/articles/in-depth-look-clojure-collections

<comment><USER2> Joy of Clojure MEAP (draft book from Manning) is coming along really well. 7 of 12 chapters, thru Macro's.

(Google for a discount code)

<http://manning.com/fogus/>

<comment><USER3> I haven't read the Macro Chapter yet, but I can say the rest has really helped me understand Clojure a bit better, been reading it since the first MEAP hit. And both authors are very open to feedback so if something doesn't make sense or the like don't be afraid to tell them. They seem very dedicated to helping people better understand and use the language with this book.

<comment><USER4> The content of the macros section is mostly complete, although there are some tweaks to be done here and there. Of course, if you want to know more about macros we will cover them throughout chapters 8-12 also. However, if you can't wait that long then check out "On Lisp" by pg and "Let over Lambda" by Doug Hoyte. Not only are they the best books on macrology -- they are likely the best _possible_ books on macrology.

<comment><USER3> Yeah I figured the Macro chapter would be at least fairly complete before you guys published it. Just been too tired to dig into such a dense topic, since even with my limited dabbling in scheme and CL before Clojure I never gained any real skill with macros.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> >If an object cannot change it follows that it can be shared freely between different threads of execution without fear of concurrent modification.

Ok, but then is there a reason to have immutability with collections that aren't shared by multiple threads? I _love_ that Clojure is trying to address these big problems, but I'm not convinced they're on the right track.

<comment><USER6> Of course there is. You can freely modify values received from other functions without fear of screwing things up further up the chain This is a fairly common idea - (C++ has const, Python tuples, Objective-C immutable collections, etc.)

The difference is that in Clojure they're really, really fast since they share structure, giving you ridiculously close to mutable performance in some cases. And you don't have to worry about expensive copy operations or things blowing up because you accidentally casted away from const, etc.

It's one of those features that once you're used to, you get a sad face when you look at everything else.

<comment><USER5> > You can freely modify values received from other functions without fear of > screwing things up further up the chain

Thats a neat way of putting it, that it sort of makes the collection 'const'. I'll have to ponder how many bugs/problems are due to that type of error, and if its worth the small performance hit of not using arrays.

I'm not sure I'm _quite_ convinced the trade offs are worth it, but considering it further now.

<comment><USER6> This also means that you can operate on these data structures with multiple threads. Depending on the number of CPUs you have and the problem domain, you could very well operate more quickly (and safely!) on your data then with mutable data structures.

<comment><USER5> Are you sure? I mean, from what I understand, a linked-list is an 'immutable structure' (in the sense that once a pointer is set, it can never be changed, but it CAN go from empty to something).

But, I don't think any old linked list can be safely read and modified from a multithreaded environment without threading issues...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> In firefox the headings of the sections are very hard to read, the letters run together.</comment>


Ask HN: Anyone have process for creating good internal application names? - <AUTHOR> I work at a large financial institution, and we are really bad at naming our internal applications. They usually end up as some four or five letter acronym of the process or problem.  I'm sure others people have worked with application names like CAPS, MAPPS, TRAXS CRIMS and thought they suck.<p>So does anyone have a nice process for coming up with internal application names? <comment><USER2> I was a 'corporate giant' a number of years ago and developing internal applications, and I always made a point of naming my applications with absolutely ridiculous names.

A script for calculating the rate of employee attrition (voluntary departure) in Human Resources was named the "Quantitative Attrition Calculator" or "QuAC" for short. The icon was a duck.

I always had a laugh when they said the name - some got the joke and loved it, which was great... but, even better was the one who "refused to be made a fool of" and would always make a point of saying the letters. (Bless her :) )

Just last year, I had to write some Customer Relationship Management Software - which brought back memories of Quac and I went with the name "Customer Relationship Management Interface" or "CRMI" the logo was a frog and the interface was green. It's not easy being green.

:)

My suggestion: make it as fun as you can.

<comment><USER3> I once named a deployment system "Parachute".

Because, as with a parachute... we were f*cked if it didn't deploy properly.

A tenuous link, but we still laugh about it now. And because of that, you would never forget what it actually does.

I can't believe no body has made this quote yet either...

"There are only two hard things in Computer Science: cache invalidation and naming things" - Phil Karlton

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> With internal applications you likely won't have concerns about domain name availability, trademarks, etc., so how about a simple, plain English naming scheme, e.g., "Timesheet," "Expenses," "Inventory"?

<comment><USER5> There are often several systems being used concurrently that do the same thing: either due to different departments reinventing the wheel, or by somebody rewriting an application without retiring the previous one.

<comment><USER4> True, but that sounds like "security through obscurity" with regard to naming conflicts--two departments could both invent the same acronym as easily as a plain English equivalent (there must be a ton of "CMS" systems out there, considering "case" and "content" management).

As always it's a people problem that requires communication and coordination (and until that happens we're stuck with CLOTS, BUGR, and NIPL).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Sets of animal names are always popular - I've worked with many Cobras and Eagles. Fierce animals such as snakes and birds of prey seem to come up often, particularly with business-facing applications.

My preferred technique is to come up with a catchy name, then derive a backronym for it that has some kind of connection to the process or problem. For instance, MACRAL could be the market and credit risk analysis library.

</comment><comment><USER6> We once used the Latin names for constellations.

For example:

Pyxis -> "Compass"

Orion -> "Hunter"

There's usually a good mapping from the constellation name to a meta-feature of the app, for example, a large bloated app might be called Cetus (the whale).

<http://stars.astro.illinois.edu/sow/const.html>

</comment><comment><USER7> I've used Star Wars planet names for quite a while, they sound good and most of them are pretty easy to remember.

You should check Wikipedia's list: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Wars_planets_(C%E2...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Star_Wars_planets_\(C%E2%80%93D\))

<comment><USER8> So did Mozilla when they came out with "Bespin" as in the "Cloud" city. Ah... so witty... immediately every Star Wars geek knew what they were doing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Wikipedia has a rather extensive list of greek mythological deities and mortals. Surely there is something appropriate in there ... [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Greek_mythological_figu...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Greek_mythological_figures)

</comment><comment><USER10> I asked a similar question here ([http://answers.onstartups.com/questions/5887/how-do-you- choo...](http://answers.onstartups.com/questions/5887/how-do-you-choose- codenames-for-projects)). Hope it can help.

</comment><comment><USER11> What about Culture Ship Names?

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ships_%28The_Culture%29>

Perhaps with acronyms for the longer ones e.g.

Sense Amid Madness, Wit Amidst Folly (SAMWAF)

</comment><comment><USER12> It's an old one, but I still think of it every time someone is trying to come up with an acronym: <http://dilbert.com/fast/1993-06-23/>

</comment><comment><USER13> One syllable, funny-sounding abbreviations. When an entire org is saying, writing, dreaming about the same thing -- make it memorable, efficient and as fun as it can be.

</comment><comment><USER14> Pick whatever naming scheme comes to mind, but something that vaguely relates to the program's functionality + a degree of silliness makes the name easier to remember.

</comment><comment><USER15> Moons of Saturn:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moons_of_Saturn#Table_of_moons>

</comment><comment><USER16> Pick from the Top Ten Deadliest Animals: Dart Frog, Cape Buffalo, etc. Had a buddy who used names of Fender Guitars, boss wasn't as amused as us ;)

</comment><comment><USER17> Muppets. Current major app being worked on is called "Statler". There's probably a "Waldorf" coming up as well in the future.

</comment><comment><USER18> I found <http://wordoid.com> funny and useful for finding names.

</comment><comment><USER19> Our company is a Greek word so we tend to use Greek names/words.

</comment><comment><USER20> Sure. We usually come up with job titles describing the "human" equivalent of what function the application performs; e.g:

The Warden - an set of scripts to manage chroot jailed workers

The Middleman - a heavily customized MQ/ESB

The Coxswain - an app that monitors/controls system components

</comment><comment><USER21> I name them after herbs</comment>


We Don't Know Whether Obamacare Was a Net Gain - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-03-28/we-don-t-know-whether-obamacare-was-a-net-gain <comment><USER2> I remember when they signed the law, they had a picture of the bill and it was a couple feet tall worth of paper.

That does not include the regulations that will be written after.

The more complex they make these things, the harder it is to figure out what the outcome is.</comment>