How to fend off a jerk - <AUTHOR> http://www.davedelaney.me/blog/how-to-fend-off-a-jerk <comment><USER3> There is even a more general technique -- do the unexpected, to break the expected social protocol.

In situations like this, if there is an aggressor (say the customer in this case) they expect a certain outcome. They envision how the interaction will go. "I'll be demanding. Employee will get upset, maybe a bit snippy. I'll yell at them and show them who's boss. Maybe even complain to the manager." But in turn they see a smile, complements ("Oh, what a beautiful Porsche you have!") and willingness to help. They are angry inside but it is hard to manifest it without appearing completely crazy.

I've heard of other stuff like this:

* In a dangerous part of town and see a bunch of shady people eye you up -- act crazy, mutter to yourself and maybe flail your arms. Friend liked to do this in a bad part of Chicago.

* Someone wants to pick an argument and is just contrarian no matter what you say. At first argue a bit, then immediately switch sides and argue against your old position (basically on their side). Also to make it fun, be kind of aggressive and angry at your old position just like they were.

* An aggressive panhandler is verbally harassing you asking for money. "No thanks, I'm good. Talk to you on Wednesday". Say it, as matter of fact as possible. Their mind will stop for a bit trying to process that, and it gives you enough time to walk away far enough.

<comment><USER4> In a "bad" part of town, maybe think of the people there as real people, and don't come across as obviously fearful. This has worked pretty well for me (although there are certainly other factors involved).

<comment><USER3> Maybe, and maybe get mugged. But I don't want to get mugged.

Sure on an intellectual level, everyone is a human being, deserves to be heard, not feared, etc, etc.

At night, in a neighborhood ridden with crime, seeing a bunch of teenagers zoom on your from across the street and starting to cross the street toward you, it is easy to re-assess some priorities.

<comment><USER5> Y'know, people who want to steal for a living usually learn very quickly how to tell if you're gonna fight back. They don't want a fight, they want your money.

If you look like you'll bolt the moment you're threatened, that's a better outcome. Better than being stabbed or shot, at least.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'll probably get flamed for this, but this story reminds me of good ol' Proverbs 25:21,22!

If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat; if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. 22 In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you.

<comment><USER7> Don't worry about the flames:

Matthew 5:10-12

"Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. "Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. "Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Have used this approach years ago when I worked retail and it works really well (as an aside working retail for at least a year will give you a sound grasp of customer service and introduce you to the 10/80/10 split, 10% are lovely to deal with, 80% are somewhere in between but fine and 10% are jerks).

I also learnt not to take it personally, some times people are having a really bad day for reasons you can't see and a little bit of empathy goes a long way.

<comment><USER9> Yes, I do believe everyone growing up should work in retail for at least a year. It's a valuable experience (my experience was working for a year in a Toys R Us).

<comment><USER10> I worked retail in high school, and none of the takeaway lessons were about the customers...

<comment><USER11> What lessons did you learn?

<comment><USER10> I learned that I hated a business where there are cycles without positive feedback. Put away christmas displays, put up valentines, cycle through the holidays, never see the benefits (people might enjoy their purchases, but you'll never know it).

I learned that terrible managers can be quite successful. The chain I was part of had 800+ stores, and MY store had the highest turnover rate of them all (because the manager was angry and mean). But we made our numbers, so upper management didn't care.

I learned there is a lot of risk being taken behind the scenes. When our accountant quit (because of manager), he had no one else to do the job so he stuck our newly hired 16 year old on the job (she came on a month after I did and had no more accounting background than I did, but he had no one else). One day I ended up doing an extra shift because it was a holiday sale and our asst manager was brand new. He relied on me a lot, and at the end of the day my register was somehow a few hundred short (honestly no idea how - <USER2> accumulated errors over the 13 hour day, but I was normally dead on) and I never heard a second word about it even though that'd normally be an immediate firing.

I learned my coworkers (mainly 40-50 year old women) wished their husbands did more in the marriage. I also learned I'm a bit of an elitist snob. My favorite line: "Bill and I never go on dates anymore. But the tractor pull is this weekend so I'm hoping!"

The store bought overstock and sold it, and I learned a bit about what the difference between junk, junk with a brand name, and brand name goods that actually had value.

I learned that if you stocked unheard-of brands of condoms, people would still buy them.

<comment><USER5> Is there a cheat code that lets me give a post infinite upvotes?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I use a version of this when dealing with police.

Instead of trying to act happy or friendly, I remain as level as possible. Think "Mr. Spock with a smile".

I have found that even "huff and puff" types calm down after a minute or so of this.

<comment><USER13> How often are you dealing with police?

<comment><USER14> Maybe he's a paramedic

<comment><USER15> and/or a minority

<comment><USER12> And we have a winner.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> There's a beautiful illustration of this principle from the NFL, of all places. When quarterback Andrew Luck gets sacked, he enthusiastically compliments his tackler for a great play. It completely messes up the opponent's psyche, at least according to this darkly funny Wall Street Journal story:

[http://www.wsj.com/articles/andrew-luck-the-nfls-most- perple...](http://www.wsj.com/articles/andrew-luck-the-nfls-most-perplexing- trash-talker-1418663249)

</comment><comment><USER17> This is unfortunately rewarding poor behavior with extra attention- it's teaching people that they get better service when they are rude.

In a face-to-face position, this might be a good coping strategy where the confrontation is temporary and unavoidable.

On the web, it's best not to engage with rude users at all, since they will continue coming back and learn to expect attention from negative behavior. Try to only engage with polite and positive users.

<comment><USER18> Honestly, when somebody who isn't a subordinate, friend, or direct charge acts like a jerk, I don't think it's worth taking this kind of pedagogical role with regard to etiquette (probably not a good idea in the friends case a lot of time as well). If somebody wants to be a jerk, there are enough providers of goods and services that they'll find one that responds favorably to that. Not to mention that they'll probably rationalize turning them away as the provider being a jerk rather than learning something from it. As DarkTree points out, the provider's response to that behavior is more about managing the provider's quality of life than about shaping customers for the greater good.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> David Burns (in the book "Feeling Good") wrote about the "disarming technique" which is "find some truth in what the other person is saying, even if it seems totally unreasonable or unfair".

</comment><comment><USER20> Playing dumb can be effective disarming others who might otherwise percieve you as a threat.

Shady character asking you for time, cigarette, etc.

"Nah bruh, shit I need one too, you got one? My bad fam."

This has gotten me out of questionable situations during the wrong hours out in Brooklyn/Manhattan inner city areas.

</comment><comment><USER21> I worked at a fast food place back in high school, I often used this approach to a pretty effective degree. The only issue that can arise is when your increasing friendliness causes the person you're dealing with to get irrationally angry and do something rash, such as throw a cup of coffee at you.

It was pretty painful, but the laughter the situation induced was a nice distraction.

<comment><USER22> I'd imagine that increasing friendliness in such a situation could easily be interpreted as mocking or patronizing (no matter how sincere you are) and in that case the hostile reaction isn't to the friendliness it's to the mis- perception of it.

<comment><USER23> in most cases it _is_ patronising; that's the entire point of how you psychologically "win" the encounter by being friendly to someone who is being a jerk to you.

<comment><USER24> ...which is why using social manipulation techniques like these area _great_ for working with strangers or people you will never see again, but mostly a bad idea in more permanent relationships. E.g. with colleagues, repeat customers that you want to see again etc.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I will work customer support at a company sometimes just for fun. I work in completely unrelated field but I love the psychology of customer support, to me its a video game with very well created bots.

Over 1000+ online chats I have never been given a negative review and any customer can leave one through the live chat feedback. I have never had anyone complain about my service on phone either.

A couple things I find key, do not let anyone's words bother you, ever! You are immune to damage from words.

To me its like, do I get mad at a video game because the level is hard ? or do I enjoy it because its a challenge. That is probably the hardest part for most people. To me they are "crabby bots" that you want to defuse and brighten their day.

I never let someone's mood effect me, I consider that giving someone control over my emotions. They are forcing you to act a certain way by their actions and that to me is losing control, Which I find to be a weakness for many reasons. Once you are immune to them having any effect on your emotions you cannot be dragged down or taken off point, so you operate from a position of power.

Then, Empathy, Empathy, Empathy, and personalize your response almost as if you are friends. They are mad because their package is late ? "I am so sorry for that, I cannot stand when my packages are late."

They hate that their package is late ? well you realllly hate it when packages are late. They could not reach tech support, called and couldn't reach anyone so they are mad ? "I really have to apologize for that, it is unacceptable, I completely understand why you feel that way".

You adopt their sentiment that they are expressing and relate to it. It lets them know you are in their corner. They bash your companies customer service ? you reply with "I cannot stand poor customer service, so I will make sure we get this right because I know how frustrating it can be.

It's a game! You take no damage and get to play with someone's mind!! how fun is that!

Another subtle thing, Is don't just use copy paste responses that make you sound like a bot. I actually leave some typos and grammar errors in when I do customer support, and use smiles and lol sometimes (makes you human). Remember its your friend who you are talking to and they are trying to give you money, Help them do it.

</comment><comment><USER26> I don't think the defence is really the happiness, it's the appearance of immunity to their behaviour. Which only helps if they're not actually in a position to puncture your defensive bubble. Are you supposed to keep acting happy when the jerk starts being physically violent or stealing your stuff?

Edit: Please imagine me smiling broadly despite the downvotes.

<comment><USER27> Well, obviously there is a difference between "trying to piss you off" and "doing shit that is actually illegal".

<comment><USER26> There's only a difference in practice if you have a chance of getting whatever law they're breaking enforced. Also there are bad things people can do that are legal.

The technique may work well with people whose only ambition is to be slightly irritating and who aren't particularly committed to that goal.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> This works really well for software support too.

I have some technology related courses out and I sometimes get people who ask questions in extremely passive-aggressive ways or just have a terrible attitude.

I just bombard them with optimism and treat them in the best way I can. Most of the time they will do a full 180 and become very reasonable, sometimes even apologize.

</comment><comment><USER29> Very interesting! My question is, does it work in email? At least, it might be worth trying.

<comment><USER30> I find trying to be "overly nice" in email can often come off as a little condescending.

<comment><USER31> If someone's being rude to me I don't mind being a little condescending.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> This approach only works if the other person realizes they're being rude/obnoxious. If they're not self-aware enough to know that, they're just going to interpret your friendliness as a sign that you enjoy being around them...

<comment><USER33> This can be a good thing too. I worked at a gas station for a few years, and I had a share of regulars who seemed to have no regard for me as a person by the way they interacted with me. Some things that I would encounter from them included ignoring formalities, getting impatient over mild inconveniences, and generally acting haughty in conversation. I wasn't really in a position to act offended, so I would just follow my routine of acting friendly and saying hello and good-bye to them.

Almost every time, after enough repeated interactions like this, it's as though these regulars forgot that they didn't like me. They would see me and light up, or they would eventually thaw out and start putting more consideration into the way they interacted with me.

Whatever their inclinations for acting unpleasant may have been, I rarely, if ever, had anyone not come around and act more personable after enough friendly encounters with me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I would have gone insane years ago if I didn't pick this up. If you remain happy & friendly while being able to explain the reason for any question you ask, no reasonable person can bring you down.

</comment><comment><USER35> This is surprisingly easy to pull off, especially if you have good senses of absurdity and perspective.

As noir_lord mentions, just don't take it personally.

</comment><comment><USER36> "A soft answer turneth away wrath." \- not sure who said it, but I agree.

On the other side of the fence, I find that a sympathetic word to a cranky/grumpy cashier or salesperson can really help cheer them up. For example, "Wow, looks like you're having a super-busy day. How's it going?"

<comment><USER37> I try to do this every time they look harried. Because you know they're angry that the manager hasn't opened up more lines, or worried the people waiting are mad, or some sort of anxiety. So being friendly and acknowledging their predicament costs you nothing, but can make their day a bit easier.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> People just ignore me and I'll eventually just wander off.

<comment><USER39> Sometimes I wander off anyway.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> > _I sighed and grabbed the squeegee to do his entire window again._

You wouldn't last long in Japan if you sighed at customer requests. Hai, sumimasen, and wipe it again.

A jerk is what that customer is _being_ today; it's not necessarily what he _is_.

</comment><comment><USER41> Now a days I could see that being a nice service while I used my phone but what did people do while their car was being filled up back then? I'd rather be doing something rather than sitting in my car doing nothing...

<comment><USER42> I have a pet theory that people had longer attention spans back then and didn't need constant entertainment to distract them from the present moment. Also they listened to the radio and enjoyed not being out in the cold.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> Not everyone who acts like a jerk (as described) is seeking confrontation. Some people who act like this are simply a rare combination of finicky and totally self-absorbed. If you act happy and bend over backwards to meet their demands, they'll see you as a rare individual worth coming back to again and again and again. Sometimes you really do have to stop smiling and let such people know they're being unreasonable, because they're totally clueless.

</comment><comment><USER44> This will be added to my toolbox after some excersicing... If I'm able to do it correctly would be nice.

Buuuuut, I have a question: imagine this is a call, and you go by the rule with extreme optimism to an angry customer on the phone, don't you risk in the case of a recording to sound kind of crazy? it should be incredibly natural and well thought and executed... if not you risk being exposed.

With that said... isn't this a way of making your employees being nice no mater what?

</comment><comment><USER45> Based on the comments here, I'd better practice up on being rude. Seems like I'll get better results.

</comment><comment><USER46> I've often used a similar technique driving, but it has backfired. When someone gets angry, flips me off, etc. I will usually wave exuberantly, with a huge smile. Unfortunately making an angry driver angrier gets scary quick.

<comment><USER47> _I 've often used a similar technique driving, but it has backfired. When someone gets angry, flips me off, etc. I will usually wave exuberantly, with a huge smile. Unfortunately making an angry driver angrier gets scary quick._

Once in a while, I catch myself making some kind of mistake on the road that angers another driver.

I really wish there was some kind of international, "Sorry, my bad!" gesture. If there is one, I'm unaware of what it is.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> And when you find yourself hanging on a cross or inhaling a liter or two of water in Gitmo, just remember this - [https://youtu.be/WlBiLNN1NhQ](https://youtu.be/WlBiLNN1NhQ)

</comment><comment><USER49> This is my usual route to any sort of confrontation. Act happy while stating my disagreements. Nothing pisses my wife off more.

</comment><comment><USER50> Great read and I've seen this work directly in my life for the 20 years after I heard this advice for the first time. There's no avoiding it. Someone is going to treat you terribly for reasons you don't deserve and most of the time and you can't "patch" the other guy/gal.

I was the youngest member of the team by 6 years at the company I started my career[1]. I was treated like a kid (often called a whiz-kid, but not in a flattering way). I worked with sysadmins, several of which had terrible attitudes and all of which were at least 5 years my senior. Three were outright bullies and made me hate a job I would otherwise love. A coworker told me "treat them with undeserved kindness" and quoted a bible verse about it being like "heaping hot coals over them". I wasn't a Christian so the bible didn't have the authority that it held for him, but after a long talk, I understood the usefulness and decided to run with it. It came down to "whether or not the abuse is deserved, you can't _make_ the other guy do something different, you can only control _yourself_ ".

I became the guy who was kind to "the 3 jerks". I'd find things to do for them -- volunteering to swap tapes, noticing how coffee was taken and bringing an extra back when I refilled[2], twisting received backhanded compliments into compliments (with inappropriate thanks), and apologizing about things they complained to me (and about me others) seeking advice on how to do better[3]. My behavior toward "the jerks" spilled over to everyone else. One of the 3 bullies became my defender and friend (I got the impression he was a jerk to fit in at the time but such is not the case today).

I really liked the description of what happens to you when you decide to put this attitude in action. The more you do it the more comical grumpy, angry people become. The phrase "it must suck to be you" sarcastically rang through my head occasionally. The two remaining bullies, however, behaved how I've found _most_ bully-types behave when I'd ceased to be a reliable target. "Heap hot coals" was a perfect description. They became _bigger_ jerks and their behavior spread out to everyone. I was picked for projects over them because I was seen as kind/friendly while they were stereotyped as BOFH. Coworkers saw the undeserved abuse given me by "the jerks". On the same day I received a promotion, they were laid off (and I was told directly that it was due to their terrible attitude and the way myself and my advice giving coworker were treated). I became a much happier person in general. Thinking about it now, it's strange to think that happened because I chose to accept abuse and be kind, but it was.

[1] I was 19 doing sysadmin/infrastructure support for a telecom - most of my coworkers were over 25, many over 35.

[2] I remember grabbing myself a cup of coffee and filling up another cup for my coworker, prepared the way he always took it, and having him say "sucking up to me, now, are ya?" and then complaining that it had too much sugar. My boss was in the cube next to his at the time and overheard the conversation. He stopped by to apologize for this employee's abuse and asked me why I was being so nice to him. I don't remember my response.

[3] This was the only hard part - swallowing my ego. Experience has taught me that Sysadmins/Devs have _strong_ opinions about things that are as important as the color of the bikeshed. I'd be denigrated for not following rules that were unwritten (and not followed by these individuals) and trivial (i.e. tabs vs spaces where "wall of pink" doesn't apply) and having to _ask_ how I could do it "better" while swallowing the screaming in my mind that said "Seriously?! This is what's _so_ important?!!"

<comment><USER51> Thank you for sharing your awesome story. I've learned a lot, and I agree that swallowing one's ego is probably the toughest part, especially in an environment where I tend to be the youngest/least experienced.

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> Yes, upon being insulted the best response is to avoid being insulted. The idea goes back a long way.

[http://boingboing.net/2010/10/29/twenty-first- century-3.html](http://boingboing.net/2010/10/29/twenty-first-century-3.html)

</comment><comment><USER53> I use this approach and call it "killing with kindness".

</comment><comment><USER54> Well I read that wrong at first glance.

</comment><comment><USER55> Well the most important thing to remember is the Golden Rule. You should treat others as you would wish to be treated in their situation.

<comment><USER26> How do you want to be treated when you're being a dick to service workers for no reason?

<comment><USER55> Probably with respect?

<comment><USER26> Should I treat gratuitously unpleasant people with more respect than other people?

<comment><USER55> No, the same amount, but also try to spend less time interacting with them if possible.

<comment><USER56> I wouldn't want other people trying to spend less time with me.

<comment><USER55> Well the way the universe works is people can't spend time with everyone else concurrently.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Newton Storage History (2007) - <AUTHOR> http://www.dadhacker.com/blog/?p=948 <comment><USER2> Another one, more technical, on the patching technology we used in the Newton: [http://www.dadhacker.com/blog/?p=2233](http://www.dadhacker.com/blog/?p=2233)

</comment><comment><USER3> I loved the whole Newton Soup system. It's a real shame that something like it didn't get further developed. I always wondered what it would look like scaled up into a cluster arrangement.

<comment><USER2> One of the guys who designed soups (Walter Smith) went to Microsoft and worked on the database-based storage system for Longhorn. It didn't go that well; my take is that the project got really big and politicized -- classic Microsoft -- and he wound up leaving after a while.

I think that systems like ReThinkDB are really close, if not superior. One thing the Newt never had to worry about was concurrency; the scripting environment was single-threaded, and the storage system only ever had one transaction at a time (with some advanced cheating going on for background storage operations and garbage collection). Modern systems solve harder problems, albeit with many orders of magnitude more resources and way better tools.

<comment><USER4> It should have had, but never got, "contexts" so when your code is changing an object in one place, your other code doesn't see the changes unless you want it to. Ah well, people seem to have made it work anyway. :)

CouchDB is _pretty_ close in principle but does a lot more stuff. For something closer to the original, I think you could do it PostgreSQL quite easily. But then you need a language layer...I think ECMAScript proxies might work. Hmm, I guess somebody should make an npm module!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is slightly off-topic but has anyone blogged about Palm history as wonderfully as kabdib/Dadhacker/Landon has about Newton and other topics?

<comment><USER6> Seems like Steve Yegge worked on palm, I haven't read anything from him at this level though, I am not an authority though!

<comment><USER5> A good enough excuse to troll through his blog posts again at least. ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The great thing about Soups/Stores was the sharing: applications could augment the frames with their own data, and everything worked together cooperatively with ubiquitous access to the information.

In the modern era of sandboxing, this is impossible, and services don't compose nearly so well.

</comment><comment><USER8> The Soup was cool and really ahead of its time. But then I also think that the Newton was slow and a battery hog compared to say a PalmPilot, partly because one had a fancy innovative OS and the other was relatively simple.</comment>


VR has a perception problem for its wide adoption - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@benitopagotto/vr-barrier-to-adoption-perception-b2006d25de9f#.o3b1qtga7 <comment><USER2> What's stopping mass adoption? too expensive and 99% high end gaming.</comment>


IBM Design Language - <AUTHOR> http://www.ibm.com/design/language/ <comment><USER2> I like their replacement for Lorem Ipsum:

 _Be authentically thoughtful

Authenticity is based on real, shared experiences and is sensed rather than rationalized. Thoughtfulness is a quality that comes from the heart with the best of intentions in mind. It is the deliberate consideration for the needs of others and an empathic understanding of what is most important.

Unity, not uniformity

By giving people a common starting place—and the freedom to innovate and experiment—we allow them to recombine ideas and build specifically relevant solutions, while staying connected to that common center point._

<comment><USER3> IBsuM...

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Instead of leaving a simple comment I would like to share my authentic and thoughtful comment brand which communicates my living perspective and collection of crafted experiences working together as a cohesive language of positive reflection in the inverse context.

<comment><USER4> IBM has great products and the design of this website is nice but the content does the design a disservice. The design expresses "clarity and simplicity" while the text expresses "vagueness and complexity".

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> As a design language/guide/framework etc, I've spent 5 minutes on that link clicking around and I still don't really know what I'm looking at.

<comment><USER6> I'd say it's IBM's response to Google material design. IBM blog announcement: [http://www.ibm.com/design/blog-page.shtml?ibm-design- languag...](http://www.ibm.com/design/blog-page.shtml?ibm-design-language)

<comment><USER7> That's the only thing their webpage said to me 'we too!'. I used to enjoy improving the visual qualities of data (Brett Victor and previous inspirations as extrapolation) but nowadays it's more of a fad of form over content.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> There are actually some interesting bits about why things are the way they are, which is useful for someone like me who is not a designer:

[http://www.ibm.com/design/language/framework/visual/layout.s...](http://www.ibm.com/design/language/framework/visual/layout.shtml)

</comment><comment><USER9> Sometimes I wonder how much of Apple and IBM starting to work together was due to the shared love of Helvetica Neue.

</comment><comment><USER10> There was a good talk from IBM's head of design about what they are doing earlier this year [1]

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

</comment><comment><USER11> Leading with the Paul Rand "Eye Bee M" rebus is always cool:

[http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/ibm100/us/en/icons/gooddes...](http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/ibm100/us/en/icons/gooddesign/)

</comment><comment><USER12> At the very least, a beautiful presentation. And it collects some interesting hints for anyone remotely interested in graphical design. But then it reminds me how this is a field in and of itself, that deserves more professional attention than my own amateurish efforts. When I play around with design, I will do so in my spare time :)

</comment><comment><USER13> Why the hell the height of navbar is so huge? It just has 6 words in it, but the level of distraction is like from a modal.

</comment><comment><USER14> Serious question: does anyone have anything resembling an idea as to what the hell the linked page is talking about?

</comment><comment><USER15> I find it interesting that even going to the main homepage at [http://ibm.com](http://ibm.com) shows that these guidelines haven't made it very far internally. I'd have thought they would have established their own brand at home before releasing guidelines.

<comment><USER16> You could have said roughly the same about most of Google's products when they released Material Design.

<comment><USER17> That's probably not comparable at all.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I actually quite like mockups on their inspiration pages:

[http://www.ibm.com/design/language/inspiration.shtml](http://www.ibm.com/design/language/inspiration.shtml)

</comment><comment><USER19> looks pretty good for a summer internship project, but nothing more. Why are all these guides uglier than bootstrap?

<comment><USER20> uglier? to me bootstrap's visual patterns are overused and frankly unoriginal.

<comment><USER21> Well, the unoriginality is an advantage to me. Trying to discover yet which of the things is an active button gets tedious.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This doesn't feel at all like IBM.

It feels like a modern design team trying to fit in, not realizing they work at IBM.

</comment><comment><USER23> Am I missing something here?

Why (and how) does IBM have anything to say about _design_?

<comment><USER10> You mean the company that hired Paul Rand decades before Apple did? [1]

[1] [http://www.paul-rand.com/foundation/ibm/](http://www.paul- rand.com/foundation/ibm/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Now they just need to hire a celebrity to back up all this bullshit.

Who's next at coming up with a 'design language'? Blackberry?

<comment><USER25> Clearly, you know nothing about design. This design language looks pretty solid to me, and is much nicer (IMO) than Google's gee-whiz Material language.

<comment><USER24> Not saying it's doesn't look nice, but certainly waaay behind Google's Material Design in terms of solidness and clarity IMHO. IBM is just trying to stay 'trendy' IMHO.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> From the folder icons in resource zips you can see that they are using Google Drive.

Interesting, considering the size of the corporation.

<comment><USER17> What's the issue with Google Drive? Do you suggest they should come up with their own whole backup solution? Why reinvent the wheel anyways. Not to mention it's possible that only certain teams use it, not all the teams, nor the teams who have truly sensitive information in the spirit they don't want Google to see.

<comment><USER26> No issue, just interesting.

I would assume that such a big corporation would have very strict data sharing policies. Apparently, that's not the case. Interesting!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> This is like the complete opposite of creativity. I actually feel a bit sick..

<comment><USER28> Why? This is pretty standard design guidelines. Create a typography hierarchy, design mobile interfaces with enough space for fingers... etc.

If anything, I'd say these guidelines are too generic. Not specific.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Ut enim ad minima veniam, quis nostrum exercitationem ullam corporis suscipit laboriosam, nisi ut aliquid ex ea commodi consequatur?

</comment><comment><USER30> Dear IBM... you suck at communication! Take a look at their Watson LP ([http://www.ibm.com/smarterplanet/us/en/ibmwatson/](http://www.ibm.com/smarterplanet/us/en/ibmwatson/)) If you don't continue reading blog articles comments and do some tryouts you actually have no idea what they want to sell you and EVEN LESS how exactly you can use it.

<comment><USER31> Sadly even when they customer research, we have been on a few of these with regards to improving their support sites, they seem to take all the suggestions and go the opposite direction.

At least the linked sites look good, try navigating their support sites, it gets worse when they cross license products and some support is here, some there, and all bound up behind horrid search engines.</comment></comment>


What should I do with 100 powerful servers? - <AUTHOR> Hey! I have a big infrastructure of about 100 servers. I can't spend more than a few hours to deploy some cool stuff and it's just for fun. My ideas are adding all of them to the TOR network or running a bitcoin miner (only CPU so extreme unprofitable)<p>Any other ideas? <comment><USER2> What you and others said, you could also create multiple domains,trusts, set up GPOs for users and user accounts and have fun.

Of course you can always put them on eBay!

</comment><comment><USER3> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_distributed_computing_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_distributed_computing_projects)

</comment><comment><USER4> Folding@Home</comment>


Meet Terminal inside sublime text 2 - Alpha - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/wuub/SublimePTY

<comment><USER2> I have been waiting for this... :)

<comment><AUTHOR> It was fascinating to use terminal inside sublime. I am rails developer I have to frequently switch terminal but now no more.</comment></comment>


Odd Lots Podcast: Signs That a Civilization Is About to Collapse [audio] - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-11-21/odd-lots-here-are-the-signs-that-a-civilization-is-about-to-collapse?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_content=business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social <comment><USER2> Further reading:

Tainter -- "The Collapse of Complex Societies"

Diamond -- "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed"

Meadows et al -- "Limits to Growth"

edit: after listening to the podcast there is much in common with Tainter's general argument. I'll paraphrase poorly: as civilisations become more complex and interconnected, this makes them more efficient (e.g. economic specialisation and trade). But the increased complexity also increases the fragility of the system, and also adds ongoing maintenance costs. At some point there is no marginal return for adding complexity, or the return on maintaining the complexity becomes negative, so the complexity is no longer worth maintaining. Collapse.

I did like the observation/claim that as civilisations encounter trouble, and things start to go badly, they respond by continuing to do whatever they are familiar with doing, but with increasing intensity.

<comment><USER3> Why don't societies fluctuate around an equilibrium of maximum complexity maintainable?

Going overboard shouldn't mean collapse but readjustment by simplification. Unless the entire system instantly rely on any newly introduced complexity at a structural level?

<comment><USER4> Simplification seems very difficult because entrenched interests benefit from the complexity. Look at health care: it's not hard to imagine a vastly better and cheaper system than the US has (indeed many other countries have it), but even minor changes to health care will involve battling politically powerful groups, and the political risk is extremely high. Same thing can be said about the complexity of the tax code. There have even been HN articles recently about how it's not hard to simplify the tax filing process, but Intuit and other tax preparers lobbied against it and killed it.

<comment><USER5> Re: tax code - there was a good planet money episode a few weeks ago [0] about this. It argues that Intuit aren't nearly as big a player as conservative groups who bizarrely view simplifying the tax code as akin to raising to taxes.

[0] [http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/03/22/521132960/episo...](http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/03/22/521132960/episode-760-tax- hero)

<comment><USER6> Is that essentially why the Freedom Caucus torpedoed the ACA replacement? "We don't believe this should even exist, therefore we will vote against measures to move it closer but still short of our vision."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you want to hear a classic take on this (granted from someone who will DL this episode of the podcast but has not listened), the famous North African philosopher Ibn Khaldoun went on at length about this in his ironically named Introduction (al-Muqaddima) re weakening of metals used in coin based currency (the US did this with nickel in nickels in the last 5 years IIRC) and other heuristics he gathered as a vizier for many Arab kings of weak and sickly states. He watched this pattern often in his day job as royal adviser.

It's not a light read but a solid look from one guy who believed in the cyclical nature of order and society.

<comment><USER8> > _the US did this with nickel in nickels in the last 5 years IIRC_

Using expensive precious metals in what are essentially symbolic tokens seems like a waste, but that's just me.

<comment><USER9> I'm personally deeply amused by the tinfoil-hat goldbug ecommerce sites.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I disagree when it comes to this. I think the US government is the first government in history that has a "Globalistic" tendency. Islam did actually something similar (by conquering countries and integrating them into the religion instead of putting them as Slave countries). If you think about it, Islam is a Globalistic religion that wants (and assumes) everybody in the planet earth must be under its radar and rules.

The march toward a globalized world is still in its infancy. The US just began the operation; and I don't think a Trump presidency is going to change that direction. In this case, the US is not collapsing but rather its era is just beginning. Though the end result will be a US without an A.

<comment><USER6> [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Empire](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Empire)

Also, Islam went through various phases during its expansion. In its most lenient (and progressive) Abbasid era it was highly tolerant of other religions coexisting in areas it controlled. You pay the tax, you can be a Christian or whatever you want.

<comment><USER10> I might be wrong but if I remember accurately, Jew were tolerated (and protected) in the prophet era when they pay the Tax.

This article might have more information: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_under_Musl...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_under_Muslim_rule)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Save yourself the time and read one of the summaries here in the comments. The interview meanders unclearly.

It's arguments are ones that could be applied to any time past the industrial revolution. The whole thing is click bait.

I guess I shouldn't feel disappointed that the podcast doesn't make a good argument for the imminent collapse of civilization, but I did feel kinda let down for the lack of insight.

<comment><USER12> I often wonder what the comments on various sites looked like the day before the 2008 crash. Or the dot com bust. It seems for every highly voted analysis of how vulnerable we are there's a highly voted comment pooh-poohing it.

<comment><USER13> Yes, but the various sites were warning of the same thing in [beg of time... 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006,... present]

It would be more impressive to find a source that did not predict doom during the other years, and then did before '08, and then ceased to do so after '08.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I wish this had a transcript.

<comment><USER15> It's a podcast with anthropologist from Vanderbilt, specializing in the downfall of civilizations I would have also loved a summary, but my curiosity was piqued enough to give it a listen.

Here are some hastily taken notes for anybody who wants a better gauge if the time is worth it to them:

\- The strengths of a civilization are often the cause of the downfall

\- Western economies focus on over production of a small number of things, then exchange for other goods

\- Counter movements aren't necessarily indicative of impending collapse

\- In the face of counter movements, leaders don't usually adjust strategy, rather they intensify their existing strategies

\- This intensifications are usually always counterproductive

\- The terms of Presidents or CEO's (4-8 years) are not long enough to meaningfully restructure things; this re-enforces the intensification approach, leading to bubbles, leading to collapses

\- Common patterns of this intensification include shorter and shorter term thinking

\- Hypercoherent societies are closely interconnected, working as a unit for shared prosperity

\- A challenge of hypercoherent societies is that if there's a problem in one area, it creates a huge impact on the whole (ie. computer network outages)

\- Competition/profits drive hypercohesion and the associated fragility of the system

\- Observations of 'this is the greatest period in <<something>>' are warning signs of status wars that could be construed as ominous

\- Dependence on unsustainable systems (ie. transportation infrastructure) creates an entanglement theory that prevents leaders from taking corrective action (ie. closing an sink hole of a subway line)

\- This entanglement theory compounds and can lead to speedy collapses

<comment><USER16> Ha! So Royalty was a good idea after all.

<comment><USER17> Royalty tends to be a lot more stable than democracy's. However, while critically important it's also just one type of success. Interestingly, in less stable countries having a strong leader becomes preferred because of just how damaging chaos is.

<comment><USER18> > Royalty tends to be a lot more stable than democracy's.

Is it? I've thought that _the_ big advantage of democracies is that when people get fed up with their leaders, they can change them without a bloody revolution or civil war (which, as you say, is incredibly damaging).

I mean, our dear democratically(?) elected politicians say or do dumb things just like any inbred royalty, but at least we can switch them peacefully.

Of course, democracies aren't immune and can fail too. E.g. Germany in the 1930's, or for that matter Turkey 2017.

<comment><USER17> US had a massive civil war, further only a fraction of democracy's evem last 100 years. Germany, France, Turkey, Russia, Iran, etc are all well known. But, look at South America or Africa and you see many countries hold elections, but not consistently over time.

PS: The US scores relatively low on several measures of democracy. Relatively few house seats are competitive with many candidates unposed. D.C. has zero power in congress yet can't even run it's own budget. The president frequently loses the popular vote by huge margins. Is so something of a nominal democracy where without massive backlash the people have little say.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Summary?</comment>


Ubuntu 10.04: First Thoughts - <AUTHOR> http://quandyfactory.com/blog/59/ubuntu_1004_first_thoughts

<comment><USER2> I agree that the best new feature for most people is faster bootup time. I have a dual boot (Widows 7, Ubuntu) Toshiba U505 and the difference in bootup used to be huge (Widows 7 being a lot slower), now the difference is humongus!

Wifi support now supports my new laptop.

I have been using Linux since I downloaded Slackware over a 2400 baud modem (1991?) and have used most of the major distros over the years. For me, Ubuntu is the "get stuff done with minimal hassles" distro - love it.

<comment><USER3> "I have been using Linux since I downloaded Slackware over a 2400 baud modem (1991?) and have used most of the major distros over the years. For me, Ubuntu is the "get stuff done with minimal hassles" distro - love it."

Same here.

<comment><USER4> Same here. I love that philosophy, because as much as I like to tweak my distro, some times I just want it to work.

<comment><USER2> Using Ubuntu is much like the OS X experience: things just work, little wasted time. OS X wins a bit with apps like TexShop and OmniGraffle while Linux wins a bit with easier package maintenance.

I hate to admit this but I will: it took me about 20 hours to get Windows 7 set up with everything that I need for development and writing. Not bad once it is set up, but what a time-killing overhead expense. Now, I want to _not_ drop my Windows/Ubuntu laptop: nice having a Windows machine available, but I hope to not have to spend the setup time again for many years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Upgrading my eeePC 1001P right now. Hopefully my funky wireless card will continue to work fine with the nidswrapper.

Something I appreciate is that I don't have to go to a "store" somewhere and get a "disk" to install and do an "upgrade". Update Manager is pretty nice at being no-hassle.

Overall my opinion is that Ubuntu is roughly equal to OS X for the little to no-hassle OS department.

I used to run Gentoo years ago, and then I got a real job and didn't want to spend time configuring and compiling and wanted Photoshop, so I switched to OS X. My PS needs are much less now days and I'm quickly drifting back to Linux and liking Ubuntu.

<comment><USER6> I took this same path (except for the Photoshop bit; I ended up using OS X because support for the shiny new PB17 I'd just bought was terrible in Gentoo -- or any Linux -- at the time), and after fighting with Ubuntu for a coupla months, installed Arch, and things are better, now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I upgraded to 10.04 (server) on my Wind PC last night, which I use as a print server and torrentflux box. Everything seemed to handle the upgrade fine (samba needed an additional service restart, but I digress)

For those of you not happy with your upgrade/download speeds, just use a local mirror in your sources.list. An impartial list is available here:

<http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/releasenotes/1004overview>

Or you can just google for "ubuntu mirror <name of nearby educational institution>" For example, I picked MIT

</comment><comment><USER8> > Yet I just don't see a benefit to moving them to the left side that > justifies the aggravation of having to unlearn a habit that goes back nearly > 20 years.

I am a big fan of Ubuntu. Been using it exclusively for quite a few years now. But I really don't get the point of moving the window buttons. First thing I did after upgrade was shift the theme back to Clearlooks[1].

Apart from that the upgrade was smooth, boot time is good and I plan to stick to Ubuntu :)

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ubuntu_Clearlooks.png>

<comment><USER9> I didn't like the buttons at first, but decided to stick with them anyway. Took me all of 10 minutes to get used to them. Most of the time I Alt-F4 anyway, so it's really not a big deal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Just upgraded from 9.04, took about 2 hrs. Finding the the left side windows icons a little unnatural, but going to stick with it for a couple of days. Otherwise it looks great, and no issues at all.

Great work Canonical, also I see linode have 10.4 vm's available already, fast work guys...

</comment><comment><USER11> i was looking to install this on my old laptop yesterday (Fujitsu P5020D, the precursor of netbooks!), wiping my old install of crunchbang linux. however, i got hit by this bug: [https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg- video...](https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video- intel/+bug/568779) , and the liveCD booted to a blank screen even with nomodeset.

i just put arch on it, but i really wanted to see the UI changes that were made in this release.

</comment><comment><USER12> Has the font rendering improved on 10.04? I had to do quite a bit of tweaking on 9.04 to get Firefox fonts to looks close Windows/Mac. Regardless, this upgrade looks great!

<comment><USER13> From a rough glance at the screenshots, they do seem to have improved. But if they haven't, all you really have to do is copy the fonts from Windows 7 to the newly installed Ubuntu distro, really just a minute-long task.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Um, I can't get ubuntu one to work. Maybe because I use swiftfox... Seriously you can't even enter your username/password into the tool directly.

I guess dropbox is the way :P

</comment><comment><USER15> Best feature for me:

The "Windows XP got pissed and shit on" theme is gone.

</comment><comment><USER16> I have the feeling that ubuntu is trying to hard to look like Windows (for new users) but in the same time doesn't want to copy the UI. I think there is a decision to be made: Copy or not copy. If they really want to get new users from the Windows world, I think they should simply include a Windows theme with the same icons, the same X_[], etc.

Anyway, advanced users doesn't really use ubuntu.. and for some that use it, it's really a modified version.

Last thing, I find also that if their goals is to attract new users, they should stop with the mentality of over-configuring everything, every icons, every possible smallest thing you can think changing and instead, provide a clean and simple interface. Configuration files and script already exist for those special configuration, no need to pollute every window configuration with that.

That's my 0.02$ from someone who's been using Linux for 10 years. (I use arch, btw)

<comment><USER17> Look like...Windows? Really? Have you even _looked at a screenshot_?

Ubuntu looks nothing like Windows. If they're mimicking anything, it's OS X.

<comment><USER18> Agreed. They're competing at a whole new level now, having surpassed Windows in usability, functionality, and aesthetics a long time ago, they have their sites set on competing with Apple. If they're going to copy anything, it's going to be from the higher benchmark OS X has set than from Windows.</comment></comment></comment>


The one graph TWTR stock traders should see - <AUTHOR> https://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=Twitter&cmpt=q&tz=Etc%2FGMT%2B8 <comment><USER2> The graph for facebook looks almost identical.</comment>


Alpaca - Easy Forms for jQuery - <AUTHOR> http://www.alpacajs.org/

<comment><USER2> Why does the form have to be generated dynamically by JS?

A much better solution would be to generate the markup on the server-side. It should be easy enough to port this to Node, and a bit more of work for other major backend languages like Ruby, Python and PHP.

It could even be implemented as a webapp that takes the input JSON on the left side, and spits out HTML on the right, which I could paste into my site markup directly.

Right now, the trade-off is too big for the developer-time convenience of generating forms dynamically.

<comment><USER3> It's more to do with separation of concerns. The presentation of data should be the responsibility of the front-end (in this case, the data is a form description and the front-end is in your web browser).

This is very useful for when you have a single API that drives your web, Android, and iOS apps. Your back-end just describes the form in JSON and each front-end is responsible for how that form renders. Alpaca is just a shortcut for your web front-end.

<comment><USER4> You get the irony though that this was the original purpose of SGML (which admittedly HTML 1.0 thoroughly screwed up). It seems perfectly reasonable to render the page using HTML and have the render logic for browsers or what have you be in the form of style sheets and Javascript.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> At a first glance: very cool plugin, I think the core idea of representing forms as JSON is a good one. Two gentle criticisms:

1\. From a 'prospective developer' standpoint, I'm worried about the dependencies and general heft of the thing. Does it require jQuery UI? Is there a stripped-down version I can use? As far as I can tell, the landing page doesn't answer these questions.

2\. More broadly, I'd argue that there are two types of <form> implementations: barebones forms that use 'value' and 'type' and very little else, and hyper-customized ones that are generated bespoke. This plugin seems to address the middle of that spectrum: people who need a little -- but not too much -- customization. It's hard to tell exactly what options I'm given just from poking through the first few pages.

</comment><comment><USER6> Cool idea, but please fix the radio button labels. Having to click on a radio button directly makes for a really bad UX

</comment><comment><USER7> I'm worried this does not put usability first. In the example Edit form, I noticed two problems: 1) the radio button labels have not been linked using 'for' to the buttons, so clicking on them does nothing. 2) Hovering my mouse over the first address line text box causes it to move down away from my mouse! Errors like these will cause a lot of entry mistakes.

</comment><comment><USER8> The radio buttons label not being linked is a deal breaker for me

</comment><comment><USER9> This is really just an awful idea. Every few weeks/months I see some kind of "wouldn't it be great to have users write pseudo-html in json and we can then write loads of javascript to write the html for them!" kind of library and the answer to that is always "why would that have ever seemed like a good idea?".

Good libraries decorate html to provide functionality because, well html is pretty good at the html bit.

</comment><comment><USER10> Two things:

1\. Too heavy.

2\. Doesn't degrade nicely.

</comment><comment><USER11> Before having a big complain about the radio buttons, why not see:

[https://github.com/1337/alpaca/commit/d15032dd14214786f69525...](https://github.com/1337/alpaca/commit/d15032dd14214786f695252dddf4ddee499faadf)

It literally would have taken a similar amount of time to fix vs complain :/, and much less to just open the issues list.

</comment><comment><USER12> The first example renders a form with radio button labels not tied to the appropriate controls, so I can't just click them to select the radio button. Same for the other labels. This is _totally unforgivable_ and such a well known annoyance that I refuse to read anything else. RIP Alpaca.

</comment><comment><USER13> Love it! The complaints here are usually from people who assume this is good for all situations. If you have a fixed amount of static forms, this wouldn't make sense. BUT, if you had to do dynamic forms that can change drastically with user input, this is wonderful.

</comment><comment><USER14> During my University coursework this year I had the same idea during one of my assignments, I wrote something similar without using jQuery as a hack for a entry level web development paper.

</comment><comment><USER15> Why is the maximum age for a field set at 50?

</comment><comment><USER16> Why you can only click on the bullet to select something on the example form? They seem pretty bad... at forms.

<comment><USER17> Probably creating "input" element instead of "label(input)" or "input + label for=".

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> The delay is a concern. There would need to be some significant benefit for me to enforce that on users.

</comment><comment><USER19> After working with Angular, it pretty much became my only choice for javascript + form combination

</comment><comment><USER20> No labels at all just on the demo form. This isn't 1996 where one can make shitty HTML forms for shits and giggles. People expect high quality forms with labels nowadays.

As others have said: dealbreaker. Not going to use it.</comment>


Strange Loop 2010 Panel: The Future of Programming Languages - <AUTHOR> http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Future-of-Programming-Languages <comment><USER2> There is certainly a rise in the complexity of languages plus most software applications now require multiple languages/technologies to accomplish given functionality. In order for programming to be easier, this needs to be simplified, but (if anything) the trend is for technologies to become more complex.

Brett Miller <http://www.customsoftwarebypreston.com/technologies>

</comment><comment><USER3> It was nice to see the panel advocate FORTH and x86 assembly, if only for educational value.

</comment><comment><USER4> For an awesome panel like that, it was a pretty mediocre Q&A discussion.

<comment><USER3> Well, everybody was pretty civil and evenhanded- for example, prematurely heading off any static/dynamic debate. If you want passion and drama, you also need more people butting heads.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I liked it overall, but the moderator was really obnoxious. He kept interrupting the panelists to tell lame jokes...</comment>


Show HN: Keypirinha, a new semantic launcher for keyboard ninjas - <AUTHOR> http://keypirinha.com <comment><USER2> What advantages does this have over the well-known Launchy [0] which accomplishes the same tasks but multi-platform? You may want to touch upon any improvements if you want to win anyone (namely: me) over.

I tried to read through the Configuration section and found nothing about limiting the scope of the search. For example, if I put .shortcut files into a certain directory, let's say `K:\Programs` and only want to use Keypirinha to quickly run those shortcuts. I find Launchy is finicky with updating its library for this purpose and often requires a bit of adding/removing/restarting/telling it to rescan before it finally picks up on additions/removals. I see nothing about limiting Keypirinha's searching scope.

I appreciate that you anticipate users may move the .exe outside of the install directory. Too many people expect APP_EXE to be within APP_DIR, thank you for not making that assumption. :)

Also the most important question: can the keybind be left alt + space? Or are there any keybind limitations that so many programs have that don't allow key modifiers to be bound with space? (E: Answer is `yes`, mentioned in Config file)

[0] [http://www.launchy.net/](http://www.launchy.net/)

<comment><AUTHOR> I've been a long time and happy user of Launchy. It's a great tool and you might have noticed the small tribute to it in Keypirinha by using the term "Catalog" to name its internal database :)

Keypirinha is more modern than Launchy in many ways and integrates better in recent Windows platforms (for example I've had troubles due to 64-bit platforms with Launchy; items not found or not launchable, ...). The search accuracy is very much improved as well. You can have machine and/or user- specific configuration in a __portable __way. In addition to that, Keypirinha is more easily extensible, it embeds a Python interpreter to load its plugins (whereas you had to compile a C++ plugin to do the same job with Launchy; I wasn 't happy with the unofficial Launchy-Python plugin). That gives the user the power to modify the existing official plugins (they are open-source), or to create new plugins that fit her needs (that slowly leads us towards your "searching scope" question).

Keypirinha is also very young compared to venerable Launchy so its plugins catalog has yet to be "flourished".

Hope that answers your question regarding Keypirinha vs. Launchy.

Regarding the "searching scope" question, please follow the discussion on GitHub at: [https://github.com/Keypirinha/Keypirinha/issues/3](https://github.com/Keypirinha/Keypirinha/issues/3)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Check out Wox - an open source launcher like Alfred for Windows with plugin support. [http://www.getwox.com](http://www.getwox.com)

<comment><AUTHOR> Wox offers more exotic features, but to be fair is also way less efficient when it comes to search accuracy, speed, memory footprint and battery friendliness.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Website looks clean, loads fast and is very informative, so props for that. Are you using a static generator (Pelican perhaps)?

<comment><USER5> Looking at the source I think he's using Sphinx (Python static generator) with the RTD theme, or some variation.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's right, with the vanilla ReadTheDocs theme (no variation).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Kind of pointless since these days, Win + "typing" does exactly the same thing.

<comment><USER7> You can write plugins for the start menu as well?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for pinning one of the points of Keypirinha :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Nothing beats Everything.

<comment><AUTHOR> Different purpose. Everything rocks at finding files and is complementary to Keypirinha, which rocks at adapting to your needs. As explained in an other comment, Keypirinha is way more than about launching apps and documents.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> ...on Windows.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry I forgot to mention that. More precisely: Windows 64-bit (Vista, 7, 8, 8.1 or 10)</comment></comment>


Reg Braithwaite on Optimism - <AUTHOR> http://github.com/raganwald/homoiconic/blob/master/2009-05-01/optimism.md#readme <comment><USER2> It's fairly amusing to me that this essay can explain away the vast majority of my existential angst. As much as I hate to admit it, I had an 'aha' moment while reading this.

What I really enjoyed about this post was that it talked about using research to come to an explicit algorithm to learn optimism. I could never swallow the advice of many optimistic people in my life since they [through no fault of their own, mind you ;)] were not usually hackers. As such, they would explain in broad and nebulous terms how they achieved said happiness, which makes sense, since--according to the essay--they see positives as general and permanent. I would always focus on their seemingly obvious contradictions, without really noticing my own. I guess I'm just glad someone finally pointed that out to me.

<comment><USER3> _As much as I hate to admit it, I had an 'aha' moment while reading this._

I know that feeling, but I wonder if that might be another tendency worth training away. "Aha" moments are one of the greatest pleasures in life and should be actively sought out.

Trying to always know everything is a tyranny from which I would like to escape.

<comment><AUTHOR> At the risk of trying for the HN-discouraged "witty reply:"

 _I'm not young enough to know everything_ \--Oscar Wilde

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have mixed feelings about Seligman. Those three concepts are indeed useful. On the other hand, the experiments that made his name, though presumably within the standards of the time, involved treatment of dogs so cruel that it's hard to read about them without wondering what kind of person would do such things. Basically they showed that, when randomly tortured, most dogs become depressed (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learned_helplessness>). Bizarrely, or perhaps naturally, these experiments turn out to have been one of the inspirations for the CIA torture program. Seligman says he had nothing to do with it, but he did have contact with the people who designed it and has declined to publicly disagree with their application of his work ([http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/07...](http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/07/mayer- on-seligm.html)). This is admittedly a weak link, but a notable one.

<comment><USER5> I noted the conceptual connection between "learned optimism" and "learned helplessness", but didn't realize it was the same guy.

I want to expand on "randomly tortured" dogs. The electric shocks given weren't damaging (though they were painful), it was the lack of power over them was damaging, leaving the dogs hopelessly cowering in a corner. It wasn't the torture that harmed them, but its arbitrariness. That is, the cruelest part was not the torture itself. Knowledge can be used to harm people; but it can also be used to help them, as Dr. Seligman has subsequently done with "learned optimism".

I agree that giving electric shocks to dogs is a disturbing thing to do.

<comment><USER4> _The electric shocks given weren't damaging_

According to whom?

<comment><USER5> Electric shocks that were damaging would defeat the purpose of the experiment. It required a comparison between dogs that had some control over the shocks and those that didn't (though both received exactly the same shocks). If both dogs were harmed, it would be harder to differentiate the harm due to the randomness.

Of course you may doubt their reporting of their own experiments. We only have their word for it that they conducted the experiments at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Thanks, Reg, outstanding article.

One great satisfaction in working with a group of people is getting to the point where they know you pretty well and have solid estimation of your skills. It frees you up to ask stupid questions without (or with less) concern of being labeled a stupid person.

I think it was Marvin Minsky who said that children should be encouraged to make mistakes, because that is how you learn. The dominated culture in the USA, though, seems to tie individual instances of failure with an essential, long-term, character deficiency.

</comment><comment><USER7> This is a great article.

With regard to the 'call to action', I wouldn't under estimate the difficulty in changing the context (duration, specificity or 'me'-centricity) of our judgments because:

a) our need to judge is not causeless. It arises for our self-concept and

b) changing our thoughts is nigh impossible if they conflict with what we fundamentally believe is true.

So this whole things comes back really to what we believe is true about ourselves.. Is our self-concept true or is it a figment of our imagination?. Our judgments, and therefore how we 'see' anything, arises from that. Like the Paul Simon said, '...we see what we want to see and disregard the rest'

So how do we see what is true?

This is tricky because the mind that asks the question is the same mind that has created the self-concept.... and so it can never reason it's way beyond itself. We invest a lifetime justifying, aggrandising and clinging to the thing we call 'me' and so seeing ourselves as we really are in not going to happen using the old familiar tools.

It seems to me that to know the simplest of truths requires an openness that few of us are used to -- no thinking, no talking, no reasoning, no calculation, no busyness, no effort of any kind. Simply holding in mind what it is we needs to know and leaving an open and welcome space to be able to hear.

Anne Morrow Lindbergh nails this for me: "The sea does not reward those who are too anxious, too greedy, or too impatient..... Patience and faith. One should lie empty, open, choiceless as a beach – waiting for a gift from the sea."

Can you see now why approach is particularly troublesome for hackers? We have brought up to be value knowledge, reasoning skills and discourse... and ashamed of ignorance. Yet it is ignorance that is called for!

So what to do?

Not the place to attempt that one here (perhaps a blog post) but it seems that our own path through life is itself this process of becoming willing to let go of our clinging to our pre-conceptions -- of answering the fundamental question 'Who am I without my judgements'. Life will always find some way to pry our hands away from clinging, even if our clinging is to the need to no longer cling.

</comment><comment><USER8> A thoughtful essay as usual, but I did chuckle a bit at the self-referential 3rd person in this particular headline. :P

<comment><AUTHOR> I wanted to distinguish between _raganwald_ the blogger and _Reg Braithwaite_ the person. This essay really was a Reg Braithwaite thing. But it is a temporary measure ;-)

<comment><USER8> Ah, fair enough. I was hoping that the general, personal, and permanent nature of my praise along with the temporary and specific nature of my criticism would not be lost on you. :P

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think it goes very well with this article about how to get big projects done: [http://www.spring.org.uk/2008/11/getting-big-projects- done-b...](http://www.spring.org.uk/2008/11/getting-big-projects-done- balancing.php)

</comment><comment><USER10> For twittering, it might help to note that that "personal" and "permanent" can be thought of as different forms of "general"; and "impersonal" and "temporary" can be thought of as different forms of "specific".

<comment><AUTHOR> I made that connection as well, but I wanted to present Dr. Seligman's work as directly as I could without editorializing it and then move on to discuss my own opinion of how it relates to hacking and programmer culture.

He may have had extremely good reasons for maintaining the subdivision between the three axes that are too subtle for me to grasp. For example, it could be that when writing tests to identify optimism, he found that he could only get a strong correlation between score and behaviour if he included questions from all three groups.

I don't know :-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> This point of view looks a bit like taking the "blue pill" to me. It might make you happier (in the "ignorance is bliss" sense) but I doubt it will make you more succesful. If you attribute all your faults to bad luck and all your success to being smart, great etc., you are not going to improve yourself much, after all we learn a lot from our mistakes. I have to say, though, that I haven't read the book, i just checked in internet to see what it is about.

<comment><AUTHOR> Have you read the book? As the essay says, I don't recommend you judge Dr. Seligman's _research_ from my anecdotal summary of a book he wrote summarizing his research for laypersons. I simply recommend you read the book and, if you are so inclined, pursue his original research.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I like the idea of cognitive therapy (mind hacking), and this interpretation of optimism/pessimism, but I get tripped up on the categories. It seems to me that "permanent/temporary" is an instance of "general/specific". Even the illustration of _permanent_ , "gems are always a pain", seems to be a generalization from one gem to all gems. Although it uses the word "always", the focus seems to be on the gems, not on time. I'd prefer not to be tripped up by issues of categorization that don't really matter, so I welcome clarification of this confusion. :-)

Fred Brooks claimed that programmers are optimists; but I've heard many people claim that engineers are pessimists - and need to be. What can go wrong will go wrong, so anticipate it. It seems that Dr Seligman has data showing that his tests really do predict the success of salespeople - but do they predict the success of engineers? Or... predict engineering success inversely? (Even if true, programming is not exactly engineering; and of course a startup has _at least_ as much sales as engineering, e.g. Jobs/Woz).

<comment><AUTHOR> _It seems to me that "permanent/temporary" is an instance of "general/specific"._

As explained in another reply here, that occurred to me but I resist summarizing it so. Although it seems to be trivially true, it may turn out that if you collapse the categories in your mind you lose the benefits of hacking your mind when you do that.

Also, collapsing things to the most "general" observation may be a psychological turing tar pit, a place where "everything is possible but nothing of interest is easy." If you only think of the most general aphorism, it may require a lot of work to apply it to various situations. The "specific" rules (personal/impersonal, permanent/temporary, general/specific) may require three times the storage but be very easy and fast to apply.

I don't know, which is why I resist trying to editorialize. If I were a psychologist, I would take a conjecture like that and test it. Which is often the difference between pundits and scientists. A pundit wonders if such-and- such is the case and writes an essay. A scientist wonders if such-and-such is the case and then sets about trying to devise a means of testing the conjecture.

I don't know if being pessimistic abut my code would make it better. I do know that tending towards pessimism of the sort described by Dr. Seligman has made me unhappy.

<comment><USER5> Thanks for your reply. I agree with you that speaking abstracting _"permanent/temporary" is an instance of "general/specific"_. To be precise: _temporary_ is an instance of _specific_ , over time. Categorizing an explanation as _temporary_ means that it is contained within a _specific_ (and short) period of time. (I also agree that concrete categories can often be helpful in practice even if they aren't strictly necessary in theory.) That's what I think you meant in your comment above.

But that isn't what I meant. My confusion is how to apply it - how to actually categorize concrete explanations in practice? The example again "gems are always a pain" seems to be generalizing over gems, and not over time. Therefore, it would be a better example of _general_ rather than _permanent_. A better example might be "this gem/Windows/linux/PC never works! It _always_ messes up, every single time I use it." My difficulty is that (it seems to me) that every example can be recast in either form, because different events in a person's life occur at different times - to generalize over events is to generalize over time; and to generalize over time is to generalize over different events.

It occurs to me that an explanation might be neutral along some of these dimensions - an explanation might not be explicitly permanent, nor explicitly temporary. Or one might have a default, and say "if it isn't explicitly temporary, then it's permanent". eg, "they're just jealous because I'm smart" doesn't mention time, so by default it is permanent. Or, there could be a continuum along a dimension, corresponding to the size of the set generalized over: only this one instance---similar events---absolutely everything (and similar for the permanence/temporary dimension).

It might seem that I'm picking on your example, as not an ideal one to illustrate permanent/temporary (which was its purpose). I am. But I make the same kind of error (assuming it is one). And it seems to me that categorizing something as more strongly along the general/specific dimension, or more strongly along the permanent/temporary dimension seems arbitrary, and one can do it just as one feels - there's no principle behind it. Perhaps it is still useful, even without a principle behind it, but I'm uncomfortable with this.

 _Summary_ : I don't know how to classify an explanation as "permanent/temporary" or "general/specific" in practice. [answered in replies]

Or maybe I just too much :-). But it was important to me to lay this out clearly. [I haven't yet read your other reply that you mention - now read]

<comment><AUTHOR> _gems are always a pain_

"Gems" is general about gems, it suggests that all gems have this problem. And "always" is permanent about time. The statement also implies impersonal: It suggests this is true for everyone, as opposed to "I'm always flocking gems up on my projects."

I chose that to illustrate just one of the three axes, but to my ear it sounds like it is saying impersonal, general, permanent.

So I agree with what appears to be the general thrust of your argument which is that an explanation might be neutral on one axes, or imply something about one axis, or make statements about two or more axes.

I suppose this is why Dr. Seligman makes tests with many, many questions. You need to aggregate a lot of explanations from one person to get a picture of their underlying attitude toward positive and negative events.

<comment><USER5> I have been troubled by cognitive therapy techniques, because they are implicitly intended to be used in the way that Seligman does. But they purport to be truthful, when they are intended to be used in a biased way. If you use them in a non-biased way (for example, to undermine good feelings, not just undermine bad feeling), they'll make you feel bad.

That's what I like about the two levels of this definition of optimism: it comes right out and says that it is biased, as a way of containing bad things, and expanding good things. The categories at the second level (personal, specific, temporary etc) appear to be just the same as cognitive therapy techniques.

So... thanks for that. :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I really like his suggestion on differentiating praise and criticism.

I have already been depersonalizing criticism though. I basically started to believe that I am much more than the sum of my problems or difficulties. But while criticism isn't personal, nobody owes me help and I'm the only one who has the responsibility of dealing with it. Of course I can still take criticism personally, but I'm at least forcing myself to focus on finding things that I can do to solve the problem.

</comment><comment><USER13> "plural of anecdote is not data"

Yes it is. It's just not (or probably not) statistically significant.

<comment><USER14> That's what the saying means. "The plural of anecdote is (probably) not statistically significant data" is not very catchy. Imagine if you had to say "a rolling stone (most of the time) gathers no (or at least very little) moss."

<comment><USER13> Yeah, I understand the intent of the phrase, I just think it's a bad way of putting it.

By the way, I did enjoy the Optimism presentation. I didn't mean to take away from it with my nitpick.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> "Learned Optimism," by Dr. Martin Seligman is going on my to-read list!

</comment><comment><USER16> Why is everything written by a Ruby programmer so damn long-winded?

<comment><USER17> Funny. So what's the optimistic version of that comment?

How about:

I'm always interested in the thoughts of other programmers. This article is a bit longer than I have time for at the moment. Would anyone care to summarise?

<comment><USER4> Maybe you're not serious, but the thought of people communicating that smarmily makes my skin crawl.

<comment><USER17> Well its a serious question. There's definitely value in the ideas of Seligman. But it requires skill to apply them in conversation the way Reg suggests without sounding overly deferential and false. Depersonalising criticism where appropriate seems a reasonable approach. Often the personalisation is just a habit that doesn't actually express your intention. Prefacing every criticism with praise could get very old very quickly.

<comment><USER5> As with a lot of mind hacking (aka self-help), the key is to apply it to oneself, not to others. Turns out people don't like being hacked (get out of my mind!) And to apply it to ones operational thinking, not to how one expresses oneself.

But a discussion of _how_ to apply it to ones own thinking can be a helpful preparatory exercise. In that spirit, and with apologies to the parties involved (the OP is obviously having a joke anyway):

Definition of "optimism": good things are explained as personal, general and permanent; and bad things are explained as impersonal, specific and temporary.

(1) _Why is everything written by a Ruby programmer so damn long-winded?_

This is describing a bad thing (long-windedness). "Everything" is _general_. "Ruby programmer" is _impersonal_ wrt to the speaker (it's personal wrt those programmers as a class, but impersonal wrt Reg - but I don't think these are relevant)."Everything" is also _permanent_ , as it includes every time an essay is written, and there is no explicit limit to when such essays will cease being written (not the interminableness of any individual essay). An _optimistic_ explanation for a bad would be impersonal, specific and temporary - this one is impersonal, but it's general and permanent. So it's mostly, but not completely pessimistic. A more pessimistic version is:

\- _Why am I always so slow at reading everything?"_

(2) _I'm always interested in the thoughts of other programmers. This article is a bit longer than I have time for at the moment. Would anyone care to summarise?_

This is also about something bad ("longer than I have time for"). "I" is _personal_ wrt to the speaker ("I don't have time"; in contrast, the article is only "a bit longer" - the problem is mine, not the articles). "At the moment" is _temporary_. "This article" is _specific_. An _optimistic_ explanation for a bad would be impersonal, specific and temporary - this one is personal, specific and temporary, so it is mostly, but not completely optimistic. This definition of optimistic isn't the same as "nice", "kind" or "positive". A more optimistic version is:

\- _This article is too long to read right now_

( The other sentences aren't part of the explanation (and maybe aren't explanations at all?), but anyway, the preface is about a good thing and is personal, general, permanent; the epilogue is an action step about a good thing, and is impersonal, permanent, specific. )</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Miary – a beautiful and minimal diary with mood and activity tracking - <AUTHOR> https://apps.apple.com/us/app/miary-diary-mood-tracker/id1485099713 <comment><AUTHOR> Hi developer here,

I wanted to build a journaling app that had its first focus on writing so I built Miary, I would love if you could check out the app and provide me some feedback. :)

Some features of the app are:

\- Clean, beautiful and distraction-free interface.

\- 100+ beautiful color themes / gradients and 50+ fonts.

\- Soothing sounds to help you focus while you write your diary.

\- Insights that help you know how different activities affect your mood.

\- Daily gratitude prompts and inspirational thoughts.

\- Complete private and secure multi device sync with iCloud.

I have also tried to make Miary accessible for everyone with support for accessibility features like VoiceOver, Dynamic Type, Reduce Motion, etc.</comment>


Ask HN: How to create animated iPhone UI demos? - <AUTHOR>

Some teams go straight from design to development.
With my app, I'd like to go from design to 'animated demo' and THEN to development.
In other words, I'd like to take my single frame UI screens and animate them.  To create a realistic 'animated demo video' showing what the final product will look like; complete with iOS style effects (moving screens, button states, etc).
My plan is to get the UI setup in Flash CS5 and then use the timeline, motion tweens, and actionscript to animate a user case study example.
That said, this is my first time tackling an interface animation project like this - so I'm curious - is there a better, easier methodology?  Perhaps using other tools?
Any tips or suggestions are appreciated. <comment><AUTHOR> A note for reference: I learned that the best way to create a 'sexy animated demo' is to forget the Flash idea and simply create it in Xcode and Inteface Builder.

For example, create a new Xcode project, ignore all business logic and data access programming, and simply code / build an working interface that can visualize a basic user case study example.

Then run the Iphone Simulator, take a screen capture video (using Snapz Pro or Camtasia) and run your makeshift CheckOut build. Save it and voila - you have an animated demo video that looks like the real thing.

In addition, I'd recommend SimFinger to beef up the Iphone Simulator with the iPhone4 shell. It also adds a 'finger' and some other tricks to make the demo video look better:

<http://github.com/atebits/SimFinger></comment>


Poking a sleeping giant - <AUTHOR> http://swizec.com/blog/poking-a-sleeping-giant/swizec/2825

<comment><USER2> So, how much is given back to the original creator of the photo, which postme.me is using to generate profit?

</comment><comment><USER3> I thought this was going to be about how a small postcard startup poked Apple, which decided to make its own Cards.app

That said, I have a DSLR and thus have way more sendable pictures on my computer than I do on my phone. Also, writing a postcard is something I want to sit and be deliberate about, not just impulsively do on the phone. Hopefully postme.me finds its niche there (the cheaper price is nice too)

</comment><comment><USER4> Interesting article.

Some thoughts:

\- how many people don't access the internet where they are travelling.

\- A written postcard means a lot to people. I don't get many but someone stood in a physical place in the world to send something to me is something to keep. Maybe as our culture moves forward receiving a typed postcard will be okay.

If someone could get the postcard handwritten and sent out.. maybe we have something.

</comment><comment><USER5> API?

</comment><comment><USER6> C'mon e-cards aren't new at all. There have been hundreds of e-card websites pop-up, and die off over the years. They all eventually had to turn to spam and splatter their websites with ads just to stay afloat.</comment>


WaTunes 2.0 in Beta - <AUTHOR> http://beta.watunes.com

<comment><USER2> My first reaction was - ok looking site...what is it, so you hit it right with the wwwaaa????

I took the time to find out what you are doing as I am in this space as well (launching a new version today too).

I think you should put on your main page somewhere what you are doing, who it's for, etc.

Even after being to your site and reading your 'about' page, as a consumer, I'm not sure why I would go. That needs to be made clear I think.</comment>


Automatic image moderation, removing adult photos using WebPurify and Cloudinary - <AUTHOR> http://cloudinary.com/blog/automatic_image_moderation_removing_adult_or_inappropriate_photos_using_webpurify_and_cloudinary

<comment><AUTHOR> This article explains how you can have user uploaded images automatically moderated by human expert moderators to make sure that only appropriate content is shown to your users. Integration code samples are available for Node.js, PHP, Java, Ruby on Rails and Django.</comment>


List of vim plugins I use - with mini tutorials - <AUTHOR> http://mirnazim.org/writings/vim-plugins-i-use/

<comment><USER2>
        […] I do all(not counting using the textarea inside the
        web browser) of my editing inside vim.

You can edit even textareas with the "It's All Text!" Firefox addon (<https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/its-all-text/>). I've never used it, but I've read it's the standard for Vim editing of browser text for Firefox users.

<comment><USER3> If you're using Pentadactyl (or Vimperator), then you get this with Ctrl-i. Vimperator (and now Pentadactyl) is the reason my main browser has been Firefox for a _long_ time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nice list. The "Github repository" link for CloseTag points to Command-T.

Also the SuperTab repo you linked is a mirror of an obsolete vimscript. It has a new maintainer and that maintainer's repo is at <https://github.com/ervandew/supertab>.

<comment><USER5> Continuing with errata: "git submodule add git://github.com/majutsushi/tagbar.git bundle/fugitive" should be "git submodule add git://github.com/majutsushi/tagbar.git bundle/tagbar"

<comment><USER6> Thanks for pointing out the errors guys. Updated the post with corrections.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I use FuzzyFinder (<http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=1984>) instead of Command-T, and I would also add:

Endwise: <https://github.com/tpope/vim-endwise>, Matchit: <https://github.com/tsaleh/vim-matchit>, NerdTree: <https://github.com/scrooloose/nerdtree>, Surround: <https://github.com/tpope/vim-surround>, Snipmate: <https://github.com/msanders/snipmate.vim> (compulsory)

<comment><USER8> I'd recommend trying Ultisnips instead (of the now abandoned) snipmate: <http://fueledbylemons.com/blog/2011/07/27/why-ultisnips/>

I realise there is a fork going, but Ultisnips is providing a ton more features and seems a _lot_ nicer in many aspects.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Please look at Steve Losh's blog post. This contains great plugins ... was posted almost a year back.

<http://stevelosh.com/blog/2010/09/coming-home-to-vim/>

</comment><comment><USER10> I'd say testing a page to be sure it appears is a good idea.

      .wf-loading {
          visibility: hidden;
      }

Whatever is setting <html class="wf-loading"> is not your friend, Mr. Nazim.

<comment><USER6> Yeah. Agree. I need to get around that and change that to a font stack instead of simply "hidden".

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> IMO this is the best overall Vim add-on repo (for Python and Ruby devs alike): <https://github.com/carlhuda/janus> [1]

[1] [http://yehudakatz.com/2010/07/29/everyone-who-tried-to- convi...](http://yehudakatz.com/2010/07/29/everyone-who-tried-to-convince-me- to-use-vim-was-wrong/)

<comment><USER12> Janus is amazing. I replaced all of the hassle of maintaining a bunch of plugins and vimrc with Janus and a few lines in ~/.vimrc.local and ~/.janus.rake

With Janus, you can easily remove things you dont want and add plugins you need.

<comment><USER13> I use pathogen with a bundle.available dir with git submodules and a bundle dir with symlinks to active ones. Makes it damn easy to enable/disable.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14>
      I do all(not counting using the textarea inside the web
      browser) of my editing inside vim. Even when I need to
      use a word processor, I first type my content inside vim
      and then open the word processor to format it.

If he were an Emacs user, he could format his text using Emacs' Org mode rather than copying the text to a word processor. Text formatted using Org mode can be exported to numerous formats, including HTML, LaTeX, and PDF. Also, if he were an Emacs user, he could use Org mode to create and edit spreadsheets, limiting his use of an office suite to an even greater degree.

<comment><USER15> Why is this being voted down? Is the poster offending someone? Why, when having these fun editor discussions are we not allowed to bring up, and compare the competition?

<comment><USER16> Sure, and the next thing you know, Hitler is invited to the party and everyone has to go home ..

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> This is extremely close to my vim setup. Two additional plugins I'd recommend are ack.vim (<https://github.com/mileszs/ack.vim>) to provide search across multiple files and ropevim (<http://rope.sourceforge.net/ropevim.html>) for better python completion and some refactorings. Check out rope-omni (<https://github.com/rygwdn/rope-omni>) for ropevim and supertab integration.

<comment><USER13> Close for me too. Since he mentioned TagClose and DelimitMate to close various stuff magically I find it notable to mention vim-surround [1], which allows for both tag and various stuff to be changed at will.

For the ~/.vim layout I actually have a bundle dir but also a bundle.available dir. In the latter land all vim plugin git submodules I might need while the former contains links to those I actually want active.

[1] <https://github.com/tpope/vim-surround>

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> If installing the pyflakes fails, as in [0], do:

git clone --recursive

or

git submodule update --init --recursive

/via sethwoodworth

[0] <https://github.com/kevinw/pyflakes-vim/issues/27>

</comment><comment><USER19> I think TagBar is the standout of this list, I've been needing something like that for a while now.

</comment><comment><USER20> Pyflakes is awesome, I think you just changed the way I edit python files.

<comment><USER21> It's also pretty great as a pre-commit hook (invoked on the CLI). I've only had 2-3 false positives in about a year of using it as such.</comment></comment>


EU report recommending new Civil Law Rules on Robotics - <AUTHOR> http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2fEP%2f%2fTEXT%2bREPORT%2bA8-2017-0005%2b0%2bDOC%2bXML%2bV0%2f%2fEN&language=EN <comment><AUTHOR> IMO this document pushes for some seriously misguided legislation due to sensationalist characterization of the technology by the media. Consider for example:

> 59\. f) creating a specific legal status for robots in the long run, so that > at least the most sophisticated autonomous robots could be established as > having the status of electronic persons responsible for making good any > damage they may cause, and possibly applying electronic personality to cases > where robots make autonomous decisions or otherwise interact with third > parties independently;</comment>