Org-Mode Is One of the Most Reasonable Markup Languages to Use for Text (2018) - <AUTHOR> https://karl-voit.at/2017/09/23/orgmode-as-markup-only/ <comment><USER2> > _Org-Mode Makes Sense Outside of Emacs_

... goes on to name one tool (pandoc) that parses Org-Mode (and also parses Markdown. I would in fact guess pandoc is used much more often for the latter than the former).

> _Org-Mode Has Excellent Tool Support_

> _this is not an article about Emacs_

... goes on to describe the "tool support" in Emacs. Sorry, but the paragraph title here really implies we're going to be talking about a _range_ of tools, not just Emacs.

And then to conclude:

> _With this blog article I wanted to point out the usefulness of Org-mode > even when you are not using Emacs as an writing tool._

Can anyone point me to where exactly in the article the author has done this?

Org-Mode is great if you use Emacs. Try installing the Org-Mode addon in your non-Emacs IDE of choice, and you'll hit the same "partially implemented/not- yet-supported/etc." issues you would using an obscure markdown parser. In this regard, Markdown is much more "standardised" than Org-Mode—a standard exists for both, but the level of adherance to that standard in terms of the total number of parsers out there is undoubtedly higher for Markdown.

<comment><USER3> Org-mode looks very similar to markdown. Almost so that I would call it pointlessly different.

The word standardization gets abused a lot in our industry. Usually it implies something that 1) has a non ambiguous specification, 2) is widely used. 3) is endorsed by some standards body or cross industry organization or simply so widely used that it effectively is a standard 4) has multiple independent implementations (tools, parsers, websiters, etc.)

Org-mode has a specification ([https://orgmode.org/);](https://orgmode.org/\);) is at this point in time not widely used; has not been endorsed or proposed to a standards body like e.g. w3c, ietf, etc.; has a very limited amount of implementations. Declaring it a standard is meaningless until that is fixed.

The Github flavor of markdown has a decent specification ([https://github.github.com/gfm/](https://github.github.com/gfm/)), many implementations of e.g. parsers for different languages, many websites/tools/etc. using it. It's not at this point a formal standard but the previous makes it more or less a de-facto industry standard that is widely used, with a reference OSS implementation and many other parsers aiming to be compatible.

If you are implementing markdown support, you could do worse than pick this flavor. Several other flavors are equally well specified, have similarly good tool support and industry endorsement, and might very well be considered standards in their own right.

Of course, like with Json, there's a long tail of not so great parsers that have implementation specific bugs/quirks/omissions/features, etc.

<comment><USER4> I agree that Org-mode and Markdown are pointlessly different! The latter has no excuse for existing, given that the former both long predates it in time and vastly exceeds it in power.

<comment><USER5> One could say the same about Usenet and Hacker News. Yet here we are.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> >org-mode is standardized

Last I looked into it (mainly with interest for vim), few if any parsers/tooling exist for it outside of emacs; as I recall, people claimed that it apparently has sufficient (undocumented/poorly specified) quirks in the emacs implementation that 100% reproduction is difficult; similar to implementing vim-mode for editor plugins

In which case, its only as standardized as the one implementation; which is exactly how standardized markdown started with (the perl implementation)

<comment><USER7> Came here just to say that. I had a static blog written in org-mode and converted it over to markdown a couple of weeks ago because there's no good way of converting org-mode to html except by running emacs. So for each article, getting a html representation requires firing up emacs. That's insane.

If there were good (and fast!) js, c, python, etc libraries to fully support parsing org-mode to AST and HTML, only then would it be a viable solution for markup.

<comment><USER8> Emacs can run as an elisp interpreter, check out the '\--script' switch. This makes it possible to run org-export without starting an emacs session.

<comment><USER9> I was just about to say. The GP sounds like they're saying

> there's no good way of converting <markup language> to html except by > running <preferred converter>. So for each article, getting a html > representation requires firing up <preferred converter>. That's insane.

<comment><USER7> And how do I use that when I want to interactively convert org-mode to html in javascript? Like countless pure-javascript markdown libraries allow me to do? not to mention the security hazards of running emacs with any user input from a website.

<comment><USER9> That you don't – much like you don't get Pandoc Markdown in JavaScript, because Pandoc is not written in JS.

But if you are content with a less featured variation of the markup language (but still more featureful than Markdown), you can get that for JavaScript too: [https://xiaoxinghu.github.io/orgajs/syntax](https://xiaoxinghu.github.io/orgajs/syntax)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The authors argument that Markdown should be discarded because there are several competing implementations isn't valid.

For many years (even now), we have several competing implementations of HTML, yet the HTML document is the dominant presentational document format (and UI layout language). It hasn't done anything to hurt adoption.

The fact that Markdown does have a common subset of features, and that Markdown is widely interoperable with a vast amount of products is why it wins. As far as I can tell Org-Mode markup is used within Emacs and really nowhere else.

<comment><USER11> The argument isn't that Markdown is bad because there are competing implementations. The argument is that Markdown is bad because there is no standard for those implementations to adhere to, so they end up being wildly incompatible. With HTML, there will be browser differences, but there's a pretty well-defined standard which browsers try to adhere to; there will be bugs, but at least you can know you're writing standards-compliant HTML, and then work around particular browser engines as necessary.

You say Markdown has a common set of features, but what is that common set? There's no standard, and I find myself surprisingly frequently struggle with figuring out what's the correct way in a particular markdown engine to do what I need to do.

An example is that in Reddit's markdown; this text:

        ```
        if (true) {
            console.log("hi");
        }
        ```

will all end up as inline code, with all the newlines and extra whitespace stripped out. The correct way to do it in Reddit's markdown is to hit the space bar (n+1)*4 times before each line, where n is the indentation level. Some (but presumably not all) other markdown engines would render it as a code block.

Markdown engines are also wildly inconsistent about when they treat something as a link, and whether they require a blank line between a paragraph and code blocks or lists.

They seem to mostly agree about how explicit links and bold and emphasis and headings work though, so if that's your consistent common set of features, I suppose you're right.

<comment><USER12> Commonmark ([https://commonmark.org](https://commonmark.org)) exists, has a fairly well defined standard, and the reference implementations are not hard to reason about. They are part of several thousands of larger codebases right now, too.

Org-mode on the other hand is basically an emacs thing that has never been seen in the wild outside maybe as a pandoc input? Which is coincidentally another tool I almost never actually use by itself. And I have literally no idea how ota reference implementation works or on which languages could I embed it and how.

I'm pretty sure my experience isn't that rare too.

<comment><USER13> > _an emacs thing that has never been seen in the wild outside maybe as a > pandoc input_

There are a couple of vim plugins. I don't know whether they're any good.

[https://www.reddit.com/r/vim/comments/4ms4z0/org_mode_which_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/vim/comments/4ms4z0/org_mode_which_plugin_to_use_vimorganizer_or/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> After considering two or three dozens of different "lightweight" markup languages (i.e. not flavors) and designing a few (plus at least three failed attempts to improve Markdown), I'm now almost convinced that Scribble [1] or Perl POD [2] have one of the best possible designs. Not that they are optimal, but they are definitely heading at the correct direction.

They are extremely generic: every Scribble syntax is prefixed `@`, every POD construct is either `letter<...>` or `=word`. And yet they are surprisingly unobstructive and readable enough. Compare with BBCode, which is also pretty generic but too annoying.

They are readily extensible and need no special one-off syntaxes for most things. Yes, using asterisks or underscores for emphasis is handy, but how about strike-throughs? Underlines? Non-emphasis italics (e.g. species name)? Language tags? Abbreviations? Do they nest? Do they work in any context? Why not adding some harmless options to the existing constructs? Syntax extensibility should be one of the foremost concerns of markup language design and they got it right.

Edit: I should stress that these concerns are only valid for writings. For casual comments, less is better (ideally no-follow links and verbatim texts should suffice).

[1] [https://docs.racket-lang.org/scribble/](https://docs.racket- lang.org/scribble/)

[2] [https://perldoc.perl.org/perlpod.html](https://perldoc.perl.org/perlpod.html)

<comment><USER15> Reading the comments here, it feels like people miss the whole point of markdown.

Markdown's _raison d 'être_ is, "if you follow these conventions when doing ASCII art formatting, the my program can transform this to HTML or whatever other format".

The conventions being mostly the ones used in the pre-HTML email era, like underlining headings with a bunch of </comment></comment><comment>.

Orgmode is completely different to that. Orgmode is an "outliner/GTD" at heart, but this aspect has been buried under a ton of features.

Then if you want "prawfishunal qvalitat" advanced formatting, typesetting and layout control what you really want is something like Latex. Yet another whole different thing.

<comment><USER16> The thing about org mode is that it has everything you need to do the full fancy latex typesetting without loosing the ability to export to other formats the way you do if you write raw latex. Of course there are times when you have no choice but to duplicate a block if you are doing something really fancy, but that is a fairly rare occurrence.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> If you haven't seen it yet, check out Markdeep: [http://casual- effects.com/markdeep/](http://casual-effects.com/markdeep/).

Write in any text editor, and a tiny JS boilerplate turns it into nicely- rendered HTML.

<comment><USER18> The flowcharts are gorgeous.

<comment><USER19> Check out [https://mermaidjs.github.io](https://mermaidjs.github.io) which is less visual in plain text but much easier to write.

<comment><USER20> PlantUML is a good alternative too and has a good jetbrains plug-in

<comment><USER21> I came cross PlantUML recently, it's so much more than a classic diagram tool. I was particularly intrigued by their wireframe system: [http://plantuml.com/salt](http://plantuml.com/salt)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> As much as it pains me, org-mode is no better than Markdown when it comes to standards or implementations. There's basically just one de facto implementation of it, and it has no specification or standard. There are parsers out there, but all of them are lacking one or more of the parts that make org-mode so great. Markdown shines with its simplicity, org-mode shines with its extensibility. Want to use it like a Jupyter Notebook? No problem. Want to use it as a spreadsheet? No problem. Want to write academic papers and export it to LaTeX? No problem. Want to use it outside of Emacs? Well...

I've been looking for and at solutions for using org-mode as the markup language for a static site generator, and none of the ones I find do what I want. org-mode has a builtin exporter that can build whole websites, but it is very barebones. The only real solution I know of is Hakyll with Pandoc, which is what I'm playing with right now.

I wish we had something like CommonMark for org-mode, but the overlap of people who use org-mode and don't use Emacs is probably extremely small, so it's not like there will be competing implementations outside of Emacs.

<comment><USER9> Sorry, probably missing something obvious: what prevents you from using Emacs instead of pandoc to convert Org to HTML in whatever pipeline you have going already?

<comment><USER22> Mostly that Emacs only exports to HTML without any context of the content, in a blog you'd like to extract the metadata which org-mode doesn't, it just exports the whole buffer as HTML. I've been thinking about writing a blogging engine in pure Emacs Lisp, but I'm not sure if I'm that crazy yet :)

<comment><USER9> If at some point you want to feel what it's like to be that crazy, there's a chance you'll find that it's actually not that crazy at all!

When I created the current iteration of my website[1], I started out just adding some custom export formatting advice to the default ox functions. I couldn't resist add some additional functionality, though, and it takes refreshingly little work: There's one function that iterates through the Org source files and uses the built-in Org functions to query the files for tags, title, date, and so on. The result is memoised in a list, and then various other functions iterate through that list to generate index page, tag listing, and so on.

[1]: [https://two-wrongs.com/](https://two-wrongs.com/)

<comment><USER22> Now this is intriguing to me, do you have any pointers for a setup like this?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> The day org-mode will reach the masses is when the tutorials about it do not even mention the word _emacs_. Until then, it will inevitably be seen as a thing useful only for emacs users.

<comment> mickael-kerjean There's an ecosystem around org-mode that's developing. I made a client: [https://demo.filestash.app/view/docs/tasks- projects.org?shar...](https://demo.filestash.app/view/docs/tasks- projects.org?share=hnorg) the project is also open source [https://github.com/mickael-kerjean/filestash](https://github.com/mickael- kerjean/filestash)

<comment> non-nil There is indeed, and it's making me very hopeful for the future of org-mode. Beyond Filestash (great work!) there's the somewhat similar org-web [0], Beorg for iOS [1] and Orgzly for Android [2], all of which them leveraging the power of org-mode without requiring anyone hitting M-x or C-c even once.

What Markdown has going for it is a much wider acceptance as a simple, straightforward way to work with text. Especially on modern devices, users with little or no coding background are successfully being lured into (superior!) plaintext workflows by apps with a great UI, and appear to take to it. iA Writer [A] and Bear [B] are two prominent examples of such apps, and I can't see why they would be any worse (or less popular) apps had they instead opted for org-mode behind the scenes.

This is what org-mode needs to gain widespread adoption, and I'm hoping we're on our way there.

[0] [https://github.com/DanielDe/org-web](https://github.com/DanielDe/org-web) [1] [https://beorgapp.com/](https://beorgapp.com/) [2] [http://www.orgzly.com/](http://www.orgzly.com/) [A] [https://ia.net/writer](https://ia.net/writer) [B] [https://bear.app/](https://bear.app/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Last I checked, and admittedly it's been a while, parsing full org-mode syntax outside Emacs itself is a nightmare. It's essentially cloning whatever version of org-mode you have in mind.

Not that org-mode's any less for it. I'm no longer a daily user, but I was, for quite some time, to organization a particularly chaotic episode of my work life.

</comment><comment><USER25> I really, really, really like org-mode. I've used it for more than a decade. I've written self-published books with it. I use it for capturing ideas. For writing Reveal presentation slides. My database of links. I use it as a lightweight kanban board for personal projects. I use it for generating technical documentation mixing graphs, code, and prose.

But most of that isn't possible without Emacs.

As a markup format I wish it was more widely used. The promise of org-mode is that _text_ is the best format for storing your data in. However to properly read more than the surface markup language of org-mode requires a significant amount of software. And very few editors or software packages exist outside of emacs work with it.

And so lacking any other features of org-mode it's markup language isn't any more impressive or useful than any other and is more of a matter of preference. It would be nice if more software packages supported the org-mode markup syntax but I wouldn't say it's the most "reasonable," even given the arguments in this article.

</comment><comment><USER26> Org mode is simply awesome and the only reason I open emacs these days. I still haven't managed to find a software, free or paid, which has the same amount of flexibility.

<comment> black-tea Org-mode and magit were the reasons that I had to use emacs. Ended up falling in love with emacs itself, though.

<comment><USER27> Magit does make pretty good bait.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Might be time to plug my very orgmode-esque Vim plugin: [https://github.com/nfd/disorganiser](https://github.com/nfd/disorganiser)

I recently came to the same conclusion as the article but was dismayed by the performance of the popular Vim plugin (and wasn't ready to switch to emacs), so I wrote a very, very minimal implementation which is enough to get me headings, folding, tables (including formula solving, the syntax for which is currently left as an exercise for the reader), unordered lists, dates, and various other things.

It's very much a work in progress (in particular, the syntax files expect a graphical Vim) but it's definitely improved my note-taking. Requires Python 3 support.

</comment><comment><USER19> While reading the thing I could not help but feel like what I'd call "sensible markdown" is both very close and bijective to org syntax. The trouble comes when I need to define what is "sensible markdown" which is a thing I never attempted to do, but pragmatically works very well. It seems like it's CommonMark + GFM (for tables, checklists, and syntax-aware fenced code blocks mostly) + MarkdownLint[0], the latter enforcing stringent rules that makes Markdown very consistent and portable as well as prune the nonsensical stuff (like double space before newline or underline headings). It's fantastic to use with VScode[1] or vim-ale.

Some pet peeves:

I really don't ever get the argument about Markdown URLS. Being able to do both [](url) vs [][ref] is awesome (the latter I liberally use when writing long form docs). If one finds it so annoying one would make the mistake like three times and then it'd be burned into one's brain due to selective pressure. Or just use [][ref] style (which is more readable anyway since you don't have the URL right in the middle of a sentence).

Also, very personal thing but my brain seems to hate /italics/ as it branch predicts into parsing that as a regex.

What drives me nuts though is all the variants and ad hoc syntaxes like JIRA's or this very board's, which sit right in the uncanny valley of nonsense.

[0]: [https://github.com/DavidAnson/markdownlint](https://github.com/DavidAnson/markdownlint)

[1]: [https://github.com/DavidAnson/vscode- markdownlint](https://github.com/DavidAnson/vscode-markdownlint)

<comment> mickael-kerjean > bijective to org syntax

To date, I haven't seen a flavor of Markdown that has a comment feature. I use it extensively to hide all my notes that don't have a place in the final exported document people will read.

<comment><USER29> Some versions support HTML-style comments

<comment><USER19> They may very well exist but I've yet to encounter one that does not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> AsciiDoc! As nice as org-mode syntax, but with "=" instead of "*". Also, has code blocks so copy&paste is nicer. Also, has one giant document explaining everything.

<comment><USER31> My first love was AsciiDoc and it still is. I never got into markdown as much as AsciiDoc because it did what I wanted which was to generate documentation for software. However, when keeping track of stuff I am working on, snippets of possible code and completion status, etc. then Org-Mode has my attention. I have tried doing the same in markdown but most themes don't handle TODO as gracefully as ones targeting org-mode.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> I use org-mode often. It's a very intuitive way of structuring notes because most things are hierarchical in nature and lend themselves well to infinitely nested lists. It really pairs well with The LISP Way™.

I use it to make flashcards (csv format for Anki) out of my notes. The front side is the hierarchy of a headline to its parents, and the back is the text below the headline.

e.g.,

      * Python3

      ** I/O

      *** modes

      - 'r' open for reading (default)

      - 'w' open for writing, truncating the file first

      - 'x' open for exclusive creation, failing if the file already exists

      - 'a' open for writing, appending to the end of the file if it exists

      - 'b' binary mode

      - 't' text mode (default)

      - '+' open a disk file for updating (reading and writing)

...makes a flashcard like:

       </comment><comment></comment><comment>-- </comment><comment></comment><comment>--
      | Python3      | - 'r' ...    |
      | :: IO        |   .          |
      | :: modes     |   .          |
      |              |   .          |
       </comment><comment></comment><comment>-- </comment><comment></comment><comment>--

source for undocumented spaghetti code: [https://github.com/hackharmony/org- to-anki-csv/blob/master/o...](https://github.com/hackharmony/org-to-anki- csv/blob/master/org-to-anki.el)

However I would say that there are much better markup languages out there. (Or better yet, don't use a markup language at all and use richer formats. We're not in the PDP11 era anymore.) It's good if you need version control though.

<comment><USER33> Just as an FYI, Org mode has a flashcard software (org-drill).

(Broken on Org 9.x - not sure if they fixed it - you may need to use 8.x).

<comment><USER32> I tried that but it didn't have all the features I wanted. Specifically, I wanted to be able to make a list of subheadings as a flashcard (the front side being the headlines above). There's a lot of information you can encode in just the hierarchy for free.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> It does look nice, and I'd be more than happy to put some effort and use Org- Mode, instead of Markdown, if only \- There was a standardized release outside emacs which would consistently provide the same results. \- There was an easy way to render documents (like the Perl script markdown has) \- There was serious support for plugins for my editor for easy rendering to pdf/html/whatever.

</comment><comment><USER35> The author claims, several times, that "many" people use org-mode outside of emacs.

I am skeptical of that.

The whole point of an abbreviated mark-up is to RENDER that mark-up into something else. The "many" people who use org-mode outside of emacs are just a subset of pandoc commandline users (and perhaps some other tool which I am not even aware of). I guess it depends on what one considers to be "many"?

</comment><comment><USER36> I can't help but think this is a bit more of an apples-to-oranges comparison than it's being treated as in this post. Org's introduction (chapter 1.1 of its manual) begins,

* Org is a mode for keeping notes, maintaining TODO lists, and project planning with a fast and effective plain-text markup language. It also is an authoring system with unique support for literate programming and reproducible research.*

Whereas the introduction to Markdown from its original author begins simply,

 _Markdown is a text-to-HTML conversion tool for web writers._

These are both lightweight markup languages, sure, but they're designed for different domains. What makes Org-mode interesting isn't ultimately its markup language; look at all the comments here talking about tasks and tags and such. What makes it interesting is its _implementation._ Markdown, conversely, was explicitly intended as an HTML preprocessor. You can do anything in Markdown that you can do in HTML for the simple reason that if you can't do it in Markdown, you can literally use HTML. That's not what Org-mode is for.

I think the thesis of this article is basically "Org-mode's specific choices with respect to markup syntax are better than Markdown's." And, well, fine; I'm not entirely sure I agree, but I'm not sure it really matters. What does matter to me is that Markdown (a) works very well for what I want in practice and (b) works everywhere I want it to. If I was one of the folks who lived in Emacs, the chances are Org-mode would handily hit both of those points for me. But I'm not. And as lucideer noted in his comment, just because it's possible to use (a subset of) Org-mode's markup outside Emacs doesn't mean it offers any particular advantage over, well, Markdown.

</comment><comment><USER37> Once I played with tables in org-mode, I never turned back to markdown. I am not sure if there is another markup tool which looks at tables as good org- mode does.

<comment><USER38> Agreed. Sadly ox export for markdown doesn't render markdown tables. Of course, as the OP argues, that's a little like exporting PDF to EPS.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Actually, looks very reasonable :)

But adopting trumps perfection, hence, GFM is probably the most reasonable choice for new applications today.

</comment><comment><USER40> > Org-Mode Is Standardized

Let's be totally clear about this: If Org-Mode were actually popular, it too would have twelve variants. It is not popular.

</comment><comment><USER41> > consistent, intuitive, standard

about that, just found some random online editor and entered this:

[https://i.imgur.com/Mcyi3kS.png](https://i.imgur.com/Mcyi3kS.png)

not what I'd call intuitive. maybe is that particular editor implementation? but then I'd have an issue with the other half of the post, where he talks down markdown dialects.

</comment><comment><USER42> The article title is missing a footnote:

"Only if you use EMacs, as Org-Mode is impossible to implement outside of EMacs".

Source: tried once as someone who never used org-mode or emacs. Did not go well.

<comment> mickael-kerjean I built a complete web app for org-mode: [https://demo.filestash.app/s/hnorg](https://demo.filestash.app/s/hnorg) ho and it's open source [https://github.com/mickael- kerjean/filestash](https://github.com/mickael-kerjean/filestash)

<comment><USER43> Hey, this looks pretty nice! Could you elaborate a bit here on what this is?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> I like Wikitext[1] which is Mediawiki's markup. Mediawiki is the software that runs Wikipedia. I have a personal Mediawiki that I use for taking notes and it works a lot better than org-mode in that it is easy to make tables, nicely formatted outlines , hypertext, etc. Chrome has a plugin that lets you edit textboxes in emacs too so you can use a real text editor instead of just chrome textboxes.

[1] [https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Wikitext_examples](https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Wikitext_examples)

</comment><comment><USER45> Org-mode syntax is no better than that of AsciiDoc, or arguably Markdown.

But I can assign keywords and unique id to sections, include sections from another file, generate indexes and sitemaps in fully customizable manners, incorporate other programming environments. What markup languages can do that?

Org-Mode syntax is an interface to a powerful writing/authoring environment. To dismiss it as a `markup language' is not a good way to advocate its adoption. Something similar can be said to ways people appreciate the power of Emacs.

</comment><comment><USER46> What we need is more time machines so we can go back in the past and make even more future choices. Because just splitting amongst the choices we have is so .. limiting.

I do kind of wish we only had one markdown flavour. Maybe why we only have one org mode is because of its lack of ubiquitousness? If it had an electron windows version would it be the same?

The commensurate note is, everything here (Bar one) says it's a stalking horse for Emacs

</comment><comment><USER47> Maybe I'm just old but I miss the old MoinMoin syntax. A lot of markups are so complicated (mediawiki) I'd rather just write HTML.

For my personal notes I now just use vim and a custom syntax file to give color to special names and headings. I've used markdown before but it seemed like different tools treated the language slightly different.

<comment><USER14> I do the same for my personal notes. Something like (the actual contents differ because I take notes in my native tongue):

        if exists("b:current_syntax")
          finish
        endif

        syn match diaryHashtag "\w\@<!#[A-Za-z]\+"
        syn match diaryInlineCode "`[^`]\+`"
        syn match diaryLineMarker "^[ \t]*\%([0-9]\+\.\|[*-]\)\S\@!"
        syn match diaryInlineMarker "=>\|\S\@<!(\?\%(i\{1,3}\|iv\|vi\{0,3}\|ix\|x\))\S\@!"
        syn match diaryInlineDate "\<\%(today\|yesterday\|tomorrow\|\%(\%(next\|last\)\s\)\=\%(mon\|tue\|wed\|thu\|fri\|sat\|sun\)\|20\d\d-\d\d\%(-\d\d\)\=\)"
        syn match diaryInlineTime "\<\%(\d\d\=:\d\d\|morning\|afternoon\|night\)"

        hi default link diaryHashtag String
        hi default link diaryInlineCode Delimiter
        hi default link diaryLineMarker Statement
        hi default link diaryInlineMarker Statement
        hi default link diaryInlineDate Comment
        hi default link diaryInlineTime Comment

        let b:current_syntax = 'diary'

But this system is entirely unusable for longer and potentially public writings.

<comment><USER48> I used something similar, along with a few additions to add timestamp as a column on the left etc.

I've since switched over to org-mode though, I find that the agenda integration and a couple of org-journal plugins make for easy task management. I'd really like an alternative that lets me handle this on mobile, so far I've tried termux and the github edit file interface, and neither are as satisfactory.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Unconvincing. Markdown surely has way better tool support.

The lack of standardisation is probably the best argument, but I suspect that is mostly not a problem for Org mode simply because barely anyone uses it. If it were as popular as Markdown you'd find plenty of non-standard extensions and slightly different implementations.

</comment><comment><USER50> Having written my dissertation in markdown, and having not tried org-mode, I'm intrigued. The thing about multiple markdown implementations is a bit of a red herring. The subtly different problem with markdown is not multiple implementations, but a syntax with too many alternative ways of doing the same thing. Section headers, tables, raw HTML, raw LaTeX -- it's kind of a mess. Multiple flavors make this worse by supporting subtly different variants of the alternative syntaxes, but the core of the problem is that the original specification was "whatever this perl script does," and that leads to weird corner cases.

The appealing case for org-mode is consistent syntax. At least that's what it looks like from a distance. Like I said, I haven't tried it.

<comment><USER51> what do you think about Org2Blog [1] (it supports math notation as well as integrated publishing from orgmode to wordpress) ?

I would like to minimize my learning curves, so wanted to get a performant blogging service installed on a 2.50$ Vultr instance, and keep using Emacs for blogging with something that includes math typesetting.

org2blog seems to be fit closest to what I am looking for (but I would prefer something other than wordpress if I have a choice).

[1] [https://github.com/org2blog/org2blog](https://github.com/org2blog/org2blog)

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> Makes me think of a comment I posted not too long ago (and it's responses) : [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19474623](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19474623)

Reasonable for text...for most text that's skeuomorphic with regards to the printed word (in most senses). But... what is there for that which is beyond? A response to the linked comment mentions TEI (Text Encoding Initiative). Anything else? Is it too vast a problem in that we should make due with solutions that cover 90% of use-cases? Ah, but does that limit potential future development as people mold themselves to the constraints placed on them by the tools and what those tools allow?

Just thinking out loud, per usual.

</comment><comment><USER53> I refuse to use a plain text editor for my personal notes. Bold, italic, underline, text highlighting... these are all things that help me organize text and draw my attention to certain areas. Asterisks simply don't do the same job, visually.

<comment><USER54> Luckily for you Emacs lets you set the faces (emacs's name for syntax highlighting) however you want it. You get the best of both worlds: convenient keyboard interface and marked up text in the editor.

</comment></comment><comment><USER55> It fills most of the same niches as a tool which is currently extremely widely used (Markdown) without having any major benefits over it. Probably the single biggest improvement I see is the link syntax which I find bothersome in Markdown for the reasons the author suggests (parens first or brackets first). Aside from that, tooling for Markdown is massively better with dozens of tools supporting Markdown parsing and authoring. Yes there are a lot of sub-versions of Markdown, but if you know the basic markdown features you can use any of them.

<comment><USER56> > ... without having any major benefits over it.

How about tables?

<comment><USER55> Fair point.

Though I would suggest that one of the strengths of Markdown is the fact that the basics are simple and easy to understand and it leaves more advanced concepts to specific implementations. So there are implementations for everything from code comments ([https://www.hackingwithswift.com/example- code/language/how-t...](https://www.hackingwithswift.com/example- code/language/how-to-add-markdown-comments-to-your-code)) to Script Writing ([https://fountain.io](https://fountain.io)) which have features specific to their respective domains. Markdown itself doesn't have a huge featureset but the sub-markup languages which inherit from it do.

Edit: What I find more confusing about Markdown is actually incomplete implementations like what's used by HN.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER57> Such free-style formats are easy and addictive, but you eventually hit some well-hidden sharp corners. For example I missed some deadlines without any warning from emacs nor any indication with syntax higlighting when I had:

        * TODO stuff
        text <- no text should be here!!
        DEADLINE: <date>

Not to mention I am vim user and ANY vim compatibility layer for emacs eventually goes infuriatingly against my muscle memory.

</comment><comment><USER58> I sometimes think that Org-mode suffers in the same way that SGML lost to HTML, SOAP lost to XML-RPC, Atom lost to RSS, XML lost to JSON, and so on. What some people see as the over-simplicity of Markdown is exactly what leads to it being implemented "everywhere." The simpler format often ends up being more widely used precisely _because_ of its simplicity, not despite it.

<comment><USER59> The analogy breaks down because the complexity in org-mode is completely optional.

You don't have to use or even know of all of org-mode's features in order to use it. You could use a tiny subset of features and still have a valid org- mode file which is as simple as any other markdown format.

In fact, that's exactly how most people use it. But if they want more power, it's there.

What's more likely to be the reason for org-mode's lack of adoption is that most people don't use emacs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> Another one that doesn't respect line breaks

What is the reason why all those lightweight markup languages don't preserve plain text line breaks by default without special formatting?

It would be much easier to use if they did, if I hit enter in plain text it's for a reason

I like BBCode, and that one preserves your line breaks too

</comment><comment><USER61> Org mode is great, at work I use it since half a year to keep myself organized. For instance when I'm debugging something, I can keep notes and clues or the sometimes not avoidable request that just won't fit into the issue tracker.

</comment><comment><USER62> Previously in [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15321850](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15321850)

</comment><comment><USER63> This looks very similar to markdown. I wonder how org-mode distinguishes itself.

> Org-Mode is Standardized

> the very widely used markup language named Markdown has many flavors to > choose from

I believe the XKCD about standards applies here.[0]

The problem with Markdown is only real if you treat Markdown as a single language instead of a family of languages. You don't need to support multiple Markdown compilers. Just pick a particular flavor of Markdown to support for your project. I usually go with GitHub's.

Besides, having a standard doesn't stop others from adding unofficial features on top of that standard. If this happens to take off, maybe I'll be using GitHub Flavored Org-Mode in the future.

[0] [https://xkcd.com/927/](https://xkcd.com/927/)

</comment><comment><USER64> I'm surprised how many people use org-mode.

At least on Hacker News... a Lot of the Polar users mention org-mode as one of the other tools they're using.

</comment><comment><USER65> I've always wanted to learn org-mode and emacs.

Can anybody recommend a good tutorial?

Also, should I learn pure emacs or go the spacemacs route? My background is in vim.

<comment><USER66> Another, long-time Vim user here. I recommend Emacs Doom [1]. It was built especially with Vim users in mind.

[1]: [https://github.com/hlissner/doom- emacs](https://github.com/hlissner/doom-emacs)

</comment></comment><comment><USER67> So markdown. But standardized. Again.

<comment><USER33> Org mode predates markdown.

</comment></comment><comment><USER68> > Org-Mode Is Standardized

(until it isn't)

I'm assuming all of the variations of Markdown that were created were created without knowledge of the original Markdown creator.

Is the OP going to monitor all open source projects and block people from creating an improvement of Org-Mode

<comment><USER69> >(until it isn't)

There is only one version of Org-Mode, with its own reference implementation, and it's been that way for years.

>I'm assuming all of the variations of Markdown that were created were created without knowledge of the original Markdown creator.

Not so. Daring Fireball was repeatedly asked to participate in advancing, changing, standardizing MD, but chose not to. He was well aware of the variants emerging.

>Is the OP going to monitor all open source projects and block people from creating an improvement of Org-Mode

That's not how reference implementations work. The only thing that matters are variants that get enough traction.

</comment></comment><comment><USER70> This is just markdown..

</comment><comment><USER71>
        : Simple pre-formatted text such as for source code.
        : This also respects the line breaks. *bold* is not bold here.

The trouble with that is you cannot easily copy/paste code to/from it, because you'll need to manually add/subtract the : prefix. Delineating the section with:

        ```
        Simple pre-formatted text such as for source code.
        This also respects the line breaks. *bold* is not bold here.
        ```

is much more practical.

<comment><USER72> They're not mentioned in the article, but org-mode does have syntax for source blocks (a little uglier than Commonmark/Github-flavor markdown's blocks in my opinion, but it does the same thing and works well).

<comment><USER73> It may seem uglier if you use it first time:

      #+BEGIN_SRC lisp
        (format t "Hello world!~&")
      #+END_SRC

but it has two things going for it.

One, it's consistent with other blocks, like BEGIN_QUOTE, BEGIN_EXAMPLE, BEGIN_VERSE, etc. (n.b. all four have a default shorthand that gets tab- expanded; <s. <q, <e and <v, respectively) , and with arbitrary user-defined blocks like BEGIN_whatever.

Two, while #+BEGIN_SRC may seem only an unnecessarily verbose way of writing ```, things change when the block starts to look like this:

      #+NAME: advanced-block
      #+BEGIN_SRC lisp :package my-package :var foo=123 :var bar=asdf :noweb yes :exports both :eval never-export
        <<preamble>>
        (format t "Hello ~A!~&" <<some-other-block(param=3.14)>> )
      #+END_SRC

AKA. a named source block (so I can reference it elsewhere) of Lisp executing in selected Lisp package, with org mode variables injected into it, using noweb syntax (literate programming) for injecting other code blocks[0], which when exporting the document to a different format (say, PDF) will export both code and results of its evaluation, but will not automatically evaluate the code.

This feature makes Org Mode essentially a kind of better Jupyter, with automatic support for any and all possible language that you can plug into Emacs, simultaneously.

\--

[0] -- here, it'll paste the literal contents of #+BEGIN_SRC block with #+NAME: preamble at the beginning, and then paste the _results_ of executing a block with #+NAME: some-other-block, with value 3.14 for its :var param, at the end

<comment><USER9> I have a slight preference for

          #+NAME: advanced-block
          #+HEADER: :noweb yes :exports both :eval never-export
          #+HEADER: :package my-package :var foo=123 :var bar=asdf
          #+BEGIN_SRC lisp
            <<preamble>>
            (format t "Hello ~A!~&" <<some-other-block(param=3.14)>> )
          #+END_SRC

(Just wanted to point out that the header format has even more flexibility than what you've shown!)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER74> org-mode with latex yasnippet expansions is the best note taking method I've ever used. Inline images, tables, ans latex. So seemless.</comment>


Employee engagement is up by 470% as Shell energizes internal comms with O365 - <AUTHOR> https://customers.microsoft.com/en-us/story/royal-dutch-shell-mining-oil-gas-office365 <comment><USER2> Must have been off a low base!</comment>


Ask HN: How to patent stuff in China? Is it a scam? - <AUTHOR> If I patent software in the US & EU, I know that those patents wont be patented in China. I also know that US&EU patents are usually treated like 5 min cookbook recipes for Chinese companies that are stealing tech. How do I prevent my tech getting stolen by Chinese companies? If I register a patent there would it actually work? <comment><USER2> If you don't patent it, then how will anyone know what exactly it is that you're doing and how? So then how can they copy?

<comment><AUTHOR> I like your answer, however, its better to patent it because sooner or later someone else is going to come up with the same thing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Alice and the EPC should be enough to make software patents invalid in the US and in the EU.

<comment><AUTHOR> Alice and the EPC?</comment></comment>


Digitally cloning a 1914 Delage Type S engine block - King-Aaron https://www.csiro.au/en/Research/MF/Areas/Metals/Lab22/Delage <comment><AUTHOR> Why is CSIRO, a well-regarded Australian Government research organization, doing this? For some rich collector?

Making duplicates of broken or worn out parts is a standard industrial operation. Here's a laser scanning service that measures out parts.[1] Here's a mechanical coordinate measuring machine measuring out an engine block.[2]

Here's a Kuka industrial robot machining a sand mold for a one-off job.[3] That's somewhat unusual, because you only get one part per sand mold.

If you're making more than one, you first make a pattern, usually from wood, that's then packed with sand. Then you remove the pattern and pour in hot metal. The pattern has to be adjusted in size a bit to compensate for shrinkage as the metal cools. Standard foundry practice, centuries old. After casting, you do some finish machining on the surfaces that matter, and leave the rest as cast.

There's commercial software for all this. Autodesk Moldflow, for example. This is not an R&D project. It's the sort of thing someone would do in a good manufacturing technology 2-year degree program. I've seen people do this kind of thing at TechShop, although in a smaller scale than an engine block.

[1] [http://www.dirdim.com/serv_replication.htm](http://www.dirdim.com/serv_replication.htm) [2] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oiDK864Agk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oiDK864Agk) [3] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjMNKYAYdFE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjMNKYAYdFE)

<comment> King-Aaron This is one of many projects that Lab22 is working on to further develop 3d scanning and manufacturing processes. Amongst other things, there's:

\- 3D printed medical implants: [https://www.csiro.au/en/Research/MF/Areas/Metals/Lab22/Titan...](https://www.csiro.au/en/Research/MF/Areas/Metals/Lab22/Titanium- Heel)

\- 3D printed jet turbines: [https://www.csiro.au/en/Research/MF/Areas/Metals/Lab22/3D-pr...](https://www.csiro.au/en/Research/MF/Areas/Metals/Lab22/3D-printed- jet-engine)

\- Oventus's new sleep apnea device: [https://www.csiro.au/en/Research/MF/Areas/Metals/Lab22/Mouth...](https://www.csiro.au/en/Research/MF/Areas/Metals/Lab22/Mouthguard)

And lots of other stuff. I'm working on a branding project for one of Lab22's projects, and thought I'd share this because it was semi-interesting.

<comment><USER2> Do you have anything that you can share that goes beyond the surface-level detail of the links, and gets a bit more in to the meat of things?

<comment> King-Aaron Not on the Delage, sorry. I'm just doing some web work for other stuff.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER2> This isn't an article. It's barely a company fluff piece. It has no more detail on what sounds like an interesting project than the title of the link.

</comment><comment><USER3> Jay Leno (serious car buff) has been doing this for years. I think he and many other car collectors realized the potential of 3D printing of obsolete parts when the cost came down enough to be affordable.

</comment><comment><USER4> cool story, but

> using traditional manufacturing methods was not an option.

...why?

</comment><comment><USER5> The article indirectly suggests that the sand mould isn't one-time use. Is this indeed the case?

<comment><USER6> I think they will have been re-printing new sand molds for each casting.</comment></comment>


AdoptOpenJDK 8u265 Available - <AUTHOR> https://blog.adoptopenjdk.net/2020/07/adoptopenjdk-8u265-available/ <comment><USER2> Save someone some googling if they don't know what AdoptOpenJDK is --> [https://developer.ibm.com/technologies/java/blogs/adoptopenj...](https://developer.ibm.com/technologies/java/blogs/adoptopenjdk- an-open-java-distribution-and-community-you-can-count-on/)

<comment> jagged-chisel I think this still leaves out some important details. Oracle's OpenJDK is source code only - you have to build it yourself. AdoptOpenJDK provides pre- built binaries ready for use.

<comment><USER3> I was a little confused about this for a long time especially when AdoptOpenJDK was first created, but I believe this is wrong. Here is an OpenJDK build from Oracle: [https://jdk.java.net/14/](https://jdk.java.net/14/)

<comment><USER4> AIUI, Oracle provides:

1\. "Oracle OpenJDK": free, open source builds of the current version of OpenJDK, at [https://jdk.java.net/](https://jdk.java.net/)

2\. "Oracle JDK": expensive, licensed builds of several versions of OpenJDK (plus their special patches?), at [https://www.oracle.com/java/technologies/javase- downloads.ht...](https://www.oracle.com/java/technologies/javase- downloads.html)

See:

[https://developer.okta.com/blog/2019/01/16/which-java- sdk](https://developer.okta.com/blog/2019/01/16/which-java-sdk)

You can't get a maintained build of 11, the current LTS, from Oracle for free. Hence, AdoptOpenJDK and some other players provide that.

I keep meaning to look into Corretto, Amazon's patched build of JDK 8 and 11:

[https://aws.amazon.com/corretto/](https://aws.amazon.com/corretto/)

Amazon use it internally, so it is battle tested, and their 8 version has loads of good patches:

[https://docs.aws.amazon.com/corretto/latest/corretto-8-ug/pa...](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/corretto/latest/corretto-8-ug/patches.html)

11 is pretty vanilla right now, but could get better with age.

<comment><USER3> I think you have it slightly wrong. LTS is not a thing inherent to the language or to OpenJDK, it is a thing that a vendor provides. It is separate from from "update" releases that Corretto and AdoptOpenJDK provide.

pron98 (pron on HN I believe) who works on the JDK at Oracle explains it better here: [https://www.reddit.com/r/java/comments/i5zyyk/wtf_does_lts_e...](https://www.reddit.com/r/java/comments/i5zyyk/wtf_does_lts_even_mean_ffs/g0so60h/?context=3)

<comment><USER4> It's true that I'm using "LTS" very sloppily. Last time I looked into this in depth, it wasn't at all clear how community/third-party maintenance of old versions was going to be handled. It still isn't entirely clear.

It's certainly true that "LTS" is not an official thing for OpenJDK or Oracle. But if Red Hat is doing LTS for 11, and are upstreaming their patches to the OpenJDK updates repo, then LTS is a thing in practice. Even if AdoptOpenJDK aren't doing any backporting, just building OpenJDK, that's functionally an LTS.

The comment you link to is astoundingly bad, given who it's from. In particular:

> The safest, easiest approach is to use the current JDK. You get a well- > maintained JDK and never have to do another major upgrade.

No, you may have to do a major upgrade every six months.

<comment><USER3> > No, you may have to do a major upgrade every six months.

I think the point is that it's not a major upgrade. There hasn't been a major upgrade since 9, and there won't be going forward. It's similar to Go in that sense, where it's very easy to upgrade to the latest version, and older versions are only supported for a year.

<comment><USER4> The 9 -> 10 -> 11 upgrades are allowed to make breaking changes. I have apps running on 11 that i can't upgrade further without significant work, because there are things that were retired in 12.

To me, that means those changes are major upgrades.

pron's article says that there are no major releases, only feature releases, and that may well be the terminology the project uses, but that terminology is pure mendacity.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It's great to see even incremental performance fixes are still getting backported (eg: [https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8229022](https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8229022)). I am curious how long that will be maintained as it must surely be quite a bit of effort.

<comment><USER6> The backporting work is being done by Oracle, right?

I imagine there could be some risk-averse Java-powered companies out there willing to pay good money to keep their old JVMs patched, to avoid the risks of upgrading.

<comment><USER5> > some risk-averse Java-powered companies out there

There millions of them. But if anything I would expect that risk aversion to translate into _not_ back porting discretionary performance fixes. For example, the fix I linked to improves BufferedReader performance by swapping a thread-safe underlying class for a non-thread-safe version. That could introduce race conditions and other synchronization issues into its behavior. Thread safety was never specified in the API so that's fine for prospective versions, but having this land unexpectedly in a minor version update bundled with security patches .... is almost the opposite of what I would want.

<comment><USER7> It is a method-scoped variable that is operated on under the reader's lock. Therefore the additional locking by StringBuffer is unnecessary and there is no negative impact by switching to StringBuilder.

<comment><USER5> You're right - it makes me feel a bit better. But the underlying point ... that I'm surprised this sort of thing is getting backported, I think is still the same.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Careful with these patch releases as they often introduce breaking changes. Java update 11.0.6 recently broke all self-signed certs because they introduced new behavior, and required a config change to enable the old behavior. Test before you roll them out!

> A new system property named jdk.security.allowNonCaAnchor has been > introduced to restore the previous behavior, if necessary.

<comment><USER9> Hmmm Java is normally super backwards compatible, even leaving in deprecated API's for several major versions. I wonder what the reasoning behind this change was.

<comment><USER10> Probably security concerns took priority over compatibility.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Odd that they would patch out of schedule. Usually would expect this on the third week of January, April, July, and September with the normal TLS schedule.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> i did not found the release note for this version.

Here the previous greatly detailled one: [https://adoptopenjdk.net/release_notes.html](https://adoptopenjdk.net/release_notes.html)

8u265b10 and brew now provides 8u265b01?

[https://github.com/AdoptOpenJDK/homebrew- openjdk](https://github.com/AdoptOpenJDK/homebrew-openjdk)

<comment><USER12> Yeah my bad - that ticket is assigned to me, should get it done this weekend

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Couldn't find any 8u265 binaries to download. Am I missing something? In what sense is it "available"?

</comment><comment><USER14> I love how they always push OpenJ9. Guess that's just IBM.

<comment><USER15> I think I heard somewhere (please correct me if this is merely a malicious rumor) that the reason AdoptOpenJDK were denied a license to the official test suite (TCK) was that Oracle were not happy that OpenJ9 was offered as an option. Guess everyone else fell in line.

<comment><USER15> ... "somewhere" perhaps being here[1][2], where it's speculated that the issue is the technicality that OpenJ9 is Apache/Eclipse licensed and not GPL.

[1] [https://twitter.com/volker_simonis/status/105261065466907443...](https://twitter.com/volker_simonis/status/1052610654669074432?lang=en)

[2] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19826967](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19826967)</comment></comment></comment>


Pev: Postgres 'Explain' Visualizer (2016) - <AUTHOR> http://tatiyants.com/postgres-query-plan-visualization/ <comment><USER2> I needed a version that ran on the command line so I made one here: [https://github.com/simon-engledew/gocmdpev](https://github.com/simon- engledew/gocmdpev)

<comment><USER3> That's awesome! Does something like this exist for MySql?

<comment><USER4> IIRC, it's already present in mysql workbench.

[https://dev.mysql.com/doc/workbench/en/images/wb-new- visual-...](https://dev.mysql.com/doc/workbench/en/images/wb-new-visual- explain-52.png)

<comment><USER3> I mean something that runs on the command line. Preferable a small open source script like the one hotdogknight wrote.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> creator of pev here, thanks for all the kind words!

<comment><USER6> This is beautiful.

Can I ask, do you use a library to handle laying out the visual network, or is that using custom JS?

<comment><USER5> I don't use JS for layout, it's pretty much all custom CSS.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Does this store the plans? I like these things, but I'm always a little leery that this will expose my database schema in Google search results.

<comment><USER8> I've used this before; data is only stored locally. Alternatively, you could run your own copy of the service using the NPM package.

<comment><USER7> Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This is really great and I think I might start using this. I would also love a standalone version of this that runs outside the browser. Something that can maybe connect directly to my DB.

</comment><comment><USER10> I use this tool often, and it's great. It's a lot easier to wrap your head around plans when the way it displays them.

The one thing I wish it had is either the ability to not save plans automatically, or at least a button to clear the history. As it is, I just pull up a console from time to time and do localStorage.clear()

</comment><comment><USER11> Looks good, but why not dump is as a flame graph?

<comment><USER12> I'm not sure why you're being downvoted without comment: that sucks. I think the fact this project _can_ show per-node costs of the plan is interesting--- and certainly a killer feature---but I think it's only part of the story. I think the structure is just as important.

Unfortunately, flame graphs don't show (much) structure.

Now, as a second note, I do a _lot_ of performance work (systems programming in stacks starting at hand-assembled machine code, working all the way up to scripting languages). Personally, I find flame graphs not as useful as a traditional (inverted-)back-trace. I think the _structure_ encoded in a traditional (inverted-)back-trace tells you a lot about poorly designed algorithms and bad systems interactions in a way that flame graphs (mostly) erase.

<comment><USER11> I'm not sure how you mean flame graphs don't show much structure. They appear to show a lot of structure so I'm surprised by the criticism. I haven't used them as much as I would have hoped; but found them useful. Otherwise I normally see @brandangregg banging on about how good they are so could you elaborate more on your criticisms?

Thanks

<comment><USER13> Flame graphs are based on high frequency linear sampling of a (at least conceptually) single thread of execution, where each sample records the stack.

SQL query execution does not follow this structure. Query plans are executed in whatever order or degree of parallelism is appropriate. And linearising an SQL query plan is actually wrong. If you've ever watched SQL Server's Live Query Statistics play out, you'll know that the engine does whatever work it can when possible. It would be incorrect to think of the query execution as a stack the CPU can get stuck deep down in, and a flame graph would create an incorrect model.

As an exercise, where would you put self-time in a flame graph representation of an execution plan for a filtering node, or a sorting node? The engine doesn't report that, because filters happen inline (at least in batches) and sorts are optimised to happen progressively and can be scheduled in between IO handlers. Ask an expert about this, I'm not your guy.

Also, the data you want to see isn't represented by one dimension on the flame graph (how wide is this function call?), it is represented by many more: cost, CPU time, number of rows, IO operations, and estimations of all the above. The execution plan needs to be roomier, and include all this information, not merely wall clock time.

<comment><USER13> I should add, in my experience optimising queries, a time breakdown is generally the first step of many. Flamegraphs are great at telling you where in 1,000 invocations your time is spent, but your execution plan only has ~20 nodes max, and the percentages do that job well enough. At that point, you want to know why it's slow, and a flamegraph representation of those percentages won't help you with that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Looks awesome! How about adding a direction to your graph for people just starting with SQL.

</comment><comment><USER15> Cool project. Not a DBA but was interested in playing around with this. Be great to maybe add some example plans here: [http://tatiyants.com/pev/#/plans](http://tatiyants.com/pev/#/plans)

So if you just want to checkout the interface you can click to load up an example or two.

<comment><USER16> It already has that feature!

Hit "New Plan", and then in the top right there's a link that says "Create Sample Plan"

<comment><USER15> Ahh, nice! Missed that. Maybe make it more prominent ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I can completely see myself using this on my Postgres projects, but something like this would be most useful for me at work.

How feasible would it be to port this over to MySQL / MariaDB? I know EXPLAIN output on MySQL is much simpler than what you get out of Postgres so my gut feeling would be that it wouldn't be possible.

<comment><USER18> Not exactly the same, but if you run MySQL Workbench as GUI there's a visual explain feature built around MySQL's JSON explain: [https://dev.mysql.com/doc/workbench/en/wb-performance- explai...](https://dev.mysql.com/doc/workbench/en/wb-performance-explain.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Something I've wanted from an explain viewer for a long time is simply using the "start time" "end time" information on the nodes to put things in a basic timeline. Most visualisers seem determined to keep the layout as a pimped up version of the tree given to them.

</comment><comment><USER20> Why, in the example, does the constituent `customerid` join take longer than the forming `orderid` one?

<comment><USER21> You'd probably have to expand each step to see the specifics, but a simple possibility is that many customers don't have orders, and hence the first join filters out a bunch of them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Very cool! Now I want to figure out the Postgres EXPLAIN JSON format and start parsing other DBs to fit, just so I can use this tool on them.

</comment><comment><USER23> This is great, should really be a part of pgadmin4.

<comment><USER24> pgadmin4's Query Tool [0] has a similar analyzer.

[0] [https://www.pgadmin.org/docs/pgadmin4/1.x/query_tool.html](https://www.pgadmin.org/docs/pgadmin4/1.x/query_tool.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Very nice! I wonder if it would be possible to embed that into pgAdmin? Possibly with Electron?

</comment><comment><USER26> Absolutely fantastic! Thank You!

</comment><comment><USER27> Thank you, this is very useful!

</comment><comment><USER28> The PostgreSQL parser is available as a C library.

C - [https://github.com/lfittl/libpg_query](https://github.com/lfittl/libpg_query)

Ruby - [https://github.com/lfittl/pg_query](https://github.com/lfittl/pg_query)

Go - [https://github.com/lfittl/pg_query_go](https://github.com/lfittl/pg_query_go)

Node - [https://github.com/zhm/pg-query-parser](https://github.com/zhm/pg- query-parser)

Python - [https://github.com/alculquicondor/psqlparse](https://github.com/alculquicondor/psqlparse)

<comment><USER29> The output of explain is not "parse this SQL statement and show me what it means" but "given this SQL statement, how will it be executed on this database (which is affected by the table's stored statistics and takes into account any indexes)". I am thereby not sure how these query parsing libraries are relevant.

<comment><USER28> Thanks for taking the time to comment (?).

Never-before-on-the-HN-front-page tools for working with PostgreSQL queries seemed relevant to me; this info may help a few others.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Rad</comment>


Dr. Elon and Mr. Musk: Life Inside Tesla's Production Hell - <AUTHOR> https://www.wired.com/story/elon-musk-tesla-life-inside-gigafactory/ <comment><USER3> Yay for at-will employment laws... :-(

> Over the previous year, he had been living out of a suitcase, putting in > 13-hour days, seven days a week.

This story is a good reminder not to do this. The company will usually not return the favour, you rarely get properly rewarded for crazy hours, yet it has a major impact on your health (both mental and physical) in the long run. Not worth it.

> It was not a 9 to 5 company. People were already working hard; now Musk was > implying they needed to do more.

No wonder things were going to shit. Nobody can do good work if they don't get enough rest and have too much stress.

> Three months after that, it would report profits of $312 million, well > beyond Wall Street's expectations.

How much of this money did the employees get for all the overtime they were forced to work?

> Tesla, ... that some aspects were "overly dramatized," "abbreviated," and > "ultimately misleading anecdotes that completely lack essential context." > ... "Elon cares very deeply about the people who work at his companies. ...

For the sake of everybody working for him, I really really hope this is true and not just PR firefighting and that the story misrepresented what actually happened. I'm not convinced, based on Musk's twitter outbursts and such, but I still hope this story is mostly false.

<comment><USER4> > at-will employment laws

I just don't get how we just can't over turn them politically state by state in State Elections. How is this not a thing? I live in an At Will State (PA) and it pretty much sucks to have the knowledge I can be fired for any reason and sure I still can sue but I can still lose even though I am 100% in the right.

<comment><USER5> > I just don't get how we just can't over turn them politically state by state > in State Elections. How is this not a thing?

Do most people want to overturn them? I think you're assuming that start state and it's perhaps not the case.

> I can be fired for any reason

And you can also leave for any reason. It's symmetrical. You don't have this right in some countries - I'd be careful about volunteering to give it up.

<comment><USER6> >And you can also leave for any reason. It's symmetrical. You don't have this right in some countries - I'd be careful about volunteering to give it up.

That's not symmetrical, or if it is, it's symmetrical in the same way as "heads I win, tails you lose." Being fired and quitting both place the entirety of the risk of unemployment on the employee, there is no counterbalance of power or risk on the part of the employer.

If health insurance wasn't tied to employment in the US, or if there were something like UBI, then the dynamics of at-will employment might be at least _more_ symmetrical.

<comment><USER5> > there is no counterbalance of power or risk on the part of the employer

If there is no power or risk on the part of the employer then why do some countries have a law requiring that you give the employer a notice period? It's to reduce their risk.

In my country can sued for their damages if you leave without a notice period - real damages such as having to hire more expensive temporary staff to do your job until they can find someone else permanent. That's their risk.

<comment><USER6> Fair enough, some risk exists, and how much probably depends on the position ... although in my country as far as I'm aware, there is no requirement to give notice (it's just a courtesy) and, of course, no such requirement exists on the part of employers.

In the linked article, it's mentioned that Elon felt a constant need to fire people that he sometimes had to be talked down from, so if the employer risk exists, it doesn't seem to be particularly high in most cases. If the risk for employers was significant, then at-will employment laws wouldn't even exist, because the entire purpose of such laws is to make it arbitrarily easy to fire employees.

The only way at-will employment could truly be symmetrical is if I could walk into work and literally fire any of my managers or the CEO with the same ease with which they could fire me.

But of course, _actually_ applying the power dynamic of at-will employment both ways would just be _insane_ wouldn't it?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> One day he will catch an employee stealing, fly into a rage and fire the entire workforce. He'll lock the iron gates to the factory and sequester himself from the public eye for several decades sparking all kinds of rumours about his fate. Then one day he'll announce a competition for children to win golden tickets to visit his once grand factory and we'll finally discover the real story of Elon Musk and his Gigafactory.

<comment><USER8> > _Then one day he 'll announce a competition for children to win golden > tickets to visit his grand factory_

I feel like this is exactly the kind of quirky thing he'd do anyway, without all that negative stuff.

<comment><USER9> "Every car has a chance of having a winning ticket in the glove compartment"

The only problem is that then they actually have to manufacture enough cars to drive a competition like that.

<comment><USER10> They're producing 7000 Model 3 a week. That's more than any other electric car currently, as far as I know.

<comment><USER11> Do You have a source for that number, that sounds way too high.

<comment><USER10> My bad, they were pushing for it [0]. Actual number according to Bloomberg is 4k [1].

[0] [https://electrek.co/2018/11/15/tesla- model-3-production-7000...](https://electrek.co/2018/11/15/tesla- model-3-production-7000-per-week/) [1] [https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla- tracker/](https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> > Musk "would say 'I've got to fire someone today,' and I'd say, 'No you > don't,' and he'd say, 'No, no, I just do. I've got to fire somebody,' "

Musk really is the asshole abusive boss who gets a pass because of his media fame.

I urge anyone in a situation similar to the employees mentioned in the article to simply quit. Giving up your life and dignity for "the cause" isn't worth it. You aren't changing the world, just killing yourself to make some rich people richer.

<comment><USER13> Speaking of abusive bosses, let me recommend a favorite book:

[https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000Q9J0RO](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000Q9J0RO)

It's Lundy Bancroft's, "Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men". It's the single most astute thing I've ever read. The guy spent more than a decade as a counselor for abusive men, most of them ordered to him by the courts. It's clear he heard an ocean of bullshit and became very good at seeing through it.

It's targeted at domestic abuse, but his insights are so clear and well- explained that it's easy to apply the lessons elsewhere. E.g., a couple of years back my boss got pushed out, so suddenly I was being managed by his boss. I walked out of my first meeting with him wondering what the fuck had just happened; everything I said he jumped on aggressively. But the pattern rang a bell, so I thumbed through the book. He lists a variety of abuser styles, and the one called "Mr. Right" fit him perfectly. In one meeting he hit something like 2/3rds of the items in the checklist.

Had I not read that, I would have probably walked away thinking that the problem was me, even though my original boss had been happy with me and my work. Instead, I was prepared for what came next: a couple more abusive meetings and then a surprise, no-notice "layoff" where I and the other manager my boss hired were pushed out. (And where we were asked to sign a no- disparagement clause if we wanted any severance. Seeing it a further abuser- style manipulation, I passed.)

Over the years I've given away maybe 15 copies of the book, often to people who were in abusive relationships without recognizing it. If you ever even begin to wonder, I strongly recommend reading the book.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I posted this article because I'm really afraid that many young entrepreneurs take Elon Musk (and Steve Jobs, etc.) as role models and get the impression that in order to be successful you have to be an abusive brick.

I've recently read Walter Isaacson's "The Innovators" and there seem to be at least a couple of counterexamples (Robert Noyce for instance). Any other examples of tech leaders who lead their companies in a friendly and open manner and are successful despite (or probably because) of that?

<comment><USER14> You see the same debates about military leadership - some very famous military leaders were apparently pretty unpleasant at a personal level - then at the other end of the spectrum you have people like Leonard Cheshire who was tough but thoroughly decent and treated everyone at all levels with respect:

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

Edit:

Worth reading the list of missions he was on then the description of how he led:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Cheshire#Cheshire_as_o...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Cheshire#Cheshire_as_officer)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I used to be neutral or slightly positive about Musk but this year really changed my view on him. He's a pathological liar, attention-seeker, vengeful narcissist, obsessed about his public image who's unable to handle criticism.

<comment><USER16> I guess we all have these things in side of us and given the wrong circumstances people let them out. I am definitely compassionate towards Musk, as I for myself have made the experience that stress can bring out very negative sides within you, if you don't stay aware and relaxed to not get carried away of such feelings. It cannot be an apology and hopefully Musk recognizes that it is not his true self acting but stress and anxiety projected on others.

<comment><USER17> I'd find that argument more compelling if Musk hadn't done this of his own volition and for great personal benefit at the expense of others.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> It strikes me that many very successful people are incredibly smart and driven but seem to have the emotional maturity, or personal introspection, of a 10 year old. Maybe it's just a necessary combination for this kind of success, but it's also a bit paradoxical. Case in point: buying 5 mansions in Bel Air when you spend all your time at work, literally sleeping under your desk. Another is insisting on burning the candle at both ends by sleeping 4 hours a night, when it has been proven beyond doubt that it's extremely counter- productive to do so, both in terms of mental ability and overall health.

<comment><USER19> He doesn't actually spend all his time at the factory. He's mostly in LA. There are people on Twitter who track the flights of his private jet. He's mostly in LA, he'll go to the bay area maybe for a day a week. More rarely to Reno. If he's spending all his time working, it's at SpaceX of anything. But more likely he spends his time at home searching his own name on Twitter.

The insane work hours stories are just part of the mythology.

<comment><USER20> I find it interesting you can read this negative article about him and choose to believe the bad things, but dismiss the parts you think some might consider a positive

<comment><USER21> Probably shorting TSLA...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Why do you guys say this is a negative article about Musk? Did you read the whole of it? It's quite a fair story about the downs and ups of Tesla in the past couple of years, and some of Musk's weird behaviors.

In the end, as the article mentioned, Tesla got through the 'production hell', October's financial reports were positive and Musk's emotions went back to (more) normal levels.

</comment><comment><USER23> Even after reading this, I do think Musk genuinely, truly wants to change humanity for the better and believes that that's what he's doing. And I think he actually is to a large extent. But stuff like the examples in this article and his social media behavior show he has no problem regularly being an abusive, cruel, immature, rageful, narcissistic, despotic asshole to individual people to get there - even to the people who've sacrificed and contributed so much to help him get there.

I don't think he should be written off entirely, but he has a lot of learning and growing to do.

</comment><comment><USER24> People like Musk are necessary. You can't create great things without a mind outside of the norm, and a mind outside of the norm is often unstable. Most people wouldn't manage (psychologically) to be in Musk's position, much less get to the point where he is now.

It isn't fair (what happened to this engineer), but hardly anything in life is fair. What's important is to realize this and be able to move on. As an engineer in the US, he is already one of the luckiest people on Earth.

<comment><USER25> There are several billion people on this planet. If we push out the asshole savants, then there will be room for the respectful savants who have been there all along.

There are too many well-educated, compassionate, clever people out there for "nobody else can do it but this specific abusive asshole" to stand up as an argument.

<comment><USER26> What is stopping the non-asshole savants from succeeding now? Would a lack of competition improve things further? And of course who decides who is an asshole and making sure they aren't the biggest one of all.

Also one is dealing with far ends of the bell curve by definition - there may not be a replacement with every desired trait. Overfiltering on the irrelevant is the action of literal historical losers like trying "German Physics" or Lysenkoism instead of Bourgeoisie genetics.

Not to mention there are plenty of non-savant assholes in charge - if we want to get rid off assholes wouldn't it make sense to oust the savants last as they have actual utility above the norm?

<comment><USER27> Why do you think the non-asshole savants aren't succeeding?

<comment><USER26> I think they are but they are also rarer although certainly not impossible.

Part of it might be the "unreasonable man" effect based upon the Shaw quote paraphrased as "A reasonable man adapts to the world while the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself - therefore all hope of progress rests upon the unreasonable man.

Essentially making advances ahead of everyone else requires disregarding what everybody else thinks and not being deterred. So not caring what the naysayers think kind of becomes a prerequisite. One can dissent and not be an asshole but patience is limited.

That can be a hazard for assholishness which combined with some level of obsessiveness means many probably fall into the category of being considered assholes rightfully or not.

The perception itself of being an asshole is itself biased towards the status quo - just look at Eartha Kitt's blackballing over answering the question of the why juvenile delinquency and disaffection was on the rise by pointing out the dissatisfaction over the Vietnam war and being called to give their lives for it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> > "Did you fucking do this?"

That sounds like Kim in a factory posing as important. You have to wonder if he even knew what "this" was.

</comment><comment><USER29> Watching inside spacex there seemed to me to be a very tense and cautious relationship between Musk and people who had to interact with him. Apart from any nerves about launching. This article clarifies what I saw.

</comment><comment><USER30> For the last year or so, the mass of Tesla negativity around here at least used to pretend to be around their product or market or finances. Now that they're doing really well, all thats left is a torrent of increasingly comical over-the-top denunciations of Musk.

</comment><comment><USER31> Perhaps unsurprisingly, there are a lot of parallels to Jobs' Macintosh factory. He was similarly overeager with automation, and even coerced the executives to have the machines painted.

Excerpts from Walter Isaacson's biography: [https://imgur.com/a/WlJ7wsD](https://imgur.com/a/WlJ7wsD)

Some videos: [http://strategosinc.com/articles/strategy/apple-foxconn- stra...](http://strategosinc.com/articles/strategy/apple-foxconn- strategy-1.htm)

<comment><USER32> Jobs kind of had a point. Americans appear to have a tolerance for filth and grime in the workplace that people from other developed countries do not. I'm to understand that German auto mechanics, for instance, keep their workplaces spotlessly clean in contrast to the "grease monkeys" that prevail in the USA. And Jobs had always wanted to bring the same style and refinement from the best European product design studios to his own products...

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Musk reminds me of the North Korean man-child, touring the factories to dole out his expertise. The only difference is Musk can't put you in a concentration camp.

</comment><comment><USER34> And to think that some people think of him like he is/was some sort of demi- god, saviour, genious, mankind's last hope. In fact guys like Musk or Steve Jobs are just arrogant assholes with big egos, happy to take credit for the hard work of all the fruits of their engineers doing bulk of the work.

</comment><comment><USER35> None of us should aspire to emulate this _way to greatness_. You'll lose everything and for your reward, people will say, _he was successful_. If you can ever find someone who does not know you, maybe you could pretend to be different and they might like you, but you won't like yourself.

</comment><comment><USER36> Why would anyone work there if this is the case? I agree that Tesla cars are very futuristic, but glory all goes to the company and Elon. Do employee get like a huge bonus or something if they survived long enough? There's got be a reason this article is not mentioning.

<comment><USER28> The entire Mars, gonna save the world shtick? It's a recruitment ploy. Most of his claims don't hold up to closer scrutiny, but it's aimed at young tech professionals who _really want_ for their job to make sense, so much, that they're willing to overlook both the evidence it might not _and_ the bad quality of a job offer, just to hook themselves to someone who has a "bright vision."

Truth is, much of tech nowadays doesn't even pretend to care about any benefit to society. And spotting a scam, when a part of the scam is literally offering you a sense of self-worth? That requires some rather painful introspection.

<comment><USER37> Doesn't hold up? What other company is there is making a bigger impact pushing us to electrify?

And the "Mars is a conspiracy" is just not true. Musk can be sincere in his motivations while still not being pleasant to work with.

<comment><USER28> > Doesn't hold up? What other company is there is making a bigger impact > pushing us to electrify?

Zurich public transport, every single train company. Claiming electric personal cars are a solution to anything is a joke.

> And the "Mars is a conspiracy" is just not true. Musk can be sincere in his > motivations while still not being pleasant to work with.

I'm sure he's sincere about colonising Mars. It's just that it's a terrible idea and making it appear as a benefit to society requires some significant mental exercises. But ever since at least Lenin it's pretty much common knowledge that just increases commitment amongst the converted.

<comment><USER38> If I were the dictator and could force everybody to do as I say tge world would be so much better.

You live in an utter delusional fantasy world if you believe that public transport and trains can replace cars.

And you can believe about mars whatever you want. Even if collonisation doesnt happen, getting to mars alone is already a huge achievment. Just the tech the have done so far has been a huge achievment.

<comment><USER28> > You live in an utter delusional fantasy world if you believe that public > transport and trains can replace cars.

You live in an utter delusional fantasy world if you believe that's what I wrote, but we both know that you're consciously strawmanning.

<comment><USER38> There will be millions of cars sold for many, many years to come. Far, far more then we can now produce EV. Large parts of the world are not gone be served by trains.

Cars right now are a huge part of total oil consumption replacing that is hugely important. Trains are established technology and no train company in the world is gone reduce total oil consumption at the rate that Tesla is producing cars now DIRECTLY competing against an oil driven resource that is gone be around for 20+ years.

So tell me what other company right now is doing more to reduce oil consumption in transportation and even more important, is growing at the rate Tesla is growing. And that is even without the impact of Tesla on the vehicle market.

<comment><USER28> > So tell me what other company right now is doing more to reduce oil > consumption in transportation and even more important, is growing at the > rate Tesla is growing. And that is even without the impact of Tesla on the > vehicle market.

Regardless of your non-sequiturs and strawmanning, the Zurich public transport authority [http://photo.tramscape.com/trolleybus/2013_mini_trolleybus.j...](http://photo.tramscape.com/trolleybus/2013_mini_trolleybus.jpg)

Edit: also, a true devotee like you should be aware that Musks main motivation is his hate for traveling with other people, not "reducing the oil consumption."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> I find it very strange that I've never seen a single article like this about SpaceX. Doesn't it stand to reason that if musk runs both companies, there would also be a juicy scoop about SpaceX employees and their hardship? I suppose it has nothing to do with the fact that Tesla is publicly traded and SpaceX is not.

Elon musk was totally rational during the Thai submarine thing. He posted a series of very logical and straightforward suggestions, was then asked by the divers to implement the submarine, and was consequently called a fraud by some random person who had associated himself with the rescue. It was quite rude. Elon responses in kind and in my opinion he was very measured in his reply considering he had just received a very unfair and mean molestation of his character. But all this wired article says is that he called someone a pedo, as if he had lost his mind. A lack of essential context is conspicuously absent.

</comment><comment><USER40> Seems pretty damning, but I do wonder without his efforts would as much progress have been made in batteries/electric cars?

It is just sad that Tesla could be a much healthier and successful company if all those first string people where still there.

</comment><comment><USER41> I wish more people realised the truth behind the PR construction that is Elon Musk and stop calling him an 'inventor' and 'engineer'. He is neither. He got lucky a few times and has somehow managed to persuade people that he 'invented' Paypal (he didn't - and was in fact sacked when X.com was bought), that he 'invented' the electric car (nope, the Victorians did that), that he 'invented' the Hyperloop (again, the Victorians) and that he 'invented' reusable rockets (again, not him). He is a massive fraud and a paper tiger.

<comment><USER38> Most of the things you claim that he says he never did say. The idea that he claims that he invented the electric car or reusable rockets is utter nonsense and you will not find one quote that makes that statment.

Claiming that he is not an engineer is just more nonsense. He is the chief engineer of the falcon rocket and many people inside and outside of SpaceX have said to be highly impressed with what he does.

If you don't like Elon that is fine, but this post is just nonsense.

<comment><USER41> Sorry I should have said 'they' rather than 'he' in referring to those prosletysing his mythos. Also, he is not a qualified engineer, whatever he calls himself. I imagine many of those depending on his good favour are 'impressed with what he has done at SpaceX', including his employees - <USER2> designing rockets is not one of those things. I have no personal beef with him, I just object to him being elevated beyond his true abilities.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> I remember reading his biography and the author admits they intended it to be a hit piece in the first chapter.

</comment><comment><USER43> Modern day Howard Hughes?

</comment><comment><USER44> I've not read a positive article about Elon Musk for a while now.

Why would anyone want to work in places like this?

<comment><USER45> > I find it interesting how many smear pieces against Musk have suddenly > surfaced ever since he announced he wanted to take Telsa private again.

<comment><USER46> Wait, again? Did I miss another million dollar weed joke?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Wow, capitalism (& employement obviously) is shit. What a surprise! Thank you HN to sharing this and reminding us that our great leaders are geniuses but bad to us in the same time and we should get on with it.

</comment><comment> who-knows95 i'm honestly stunned, i know he's so passionate and a genius, but this is truly mind boggling.

<comment><USER48> I'm honestly amazed to still see people call him a genius in 2018.

<comment><USER49> I'm honestly amazed people don't think he's a genius after all he has accomplished.

<comment><USER50> What's genius about him? He's a great manager, in the sense that he get people to get shit done.

Would you call Wayne Gretzky a genius?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> His passion, geniuses, quirkiness, and yes that include his "abusive" behavior is exactly the reason why I continue buying tesla stock. I hold no other individual company stock except tsla, everything else is index fund.</comment>


Quadcopter drone deliberately flown at passenger airliner - <AUTHOR> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2808246/Quadcopter-drone-deliberately-flown-passenger-airliner-Essex.html

<comment><USER2> Not sure the dailymail should even be showing up here. They are notorious for being an unreliable source of information, generally with very plebeian taste for _news_ stories. I would go even as far as advising _not_ to take any news report from this tabloid as serious or news worthy. Sorry for the harsh comment, but unless corroborated by other news outfit, this is to be taken with a coarse grain salt.

</comment><comment><USER3> Not sure why they show a DJI Phantom when it clearly wasn't one.</comment>