Will there be an iPad App gold rush? - <AUTHOR> http://www.gaborcselle.com/blog/2010/01/will-there-be-ipad-app-gold-rush.html

<comment><USER2> The author frames the question as to whether iPad native apps or web apps will win, but obviously the much bigger question is: how many people will buy iPads?

The iPhone app rush is predicated on the enormous popularity of the iPhone itself, which was already a given when the App Store was introduced. With the iPad, it's a very open question whether a gap in the market exists for a form factor between a phone and a laptop -- and whether it is better than the current contender for that space, Netbooks.

<comment><USER3> Right, especially since it's looking like a large part of the iPad's market will be technophobes who don't want to deal with the "complex" features of normal computers. How many apps are those users actually going to buy, as opposed to just using it for web browsing and email?

<comment><USER4> Games, games, and more games. Take advantage of the multitouch features.

As a side note, I'm developing a pretty awesome concept for a game in time for the iPad release, and could sure use some artists to partner with... Give me a shout if you are interested.

<comment><USER5> I also think there's an opportunity for 'board' games: the iPad can be positioned on a table for viewing and operation by multiple players simultaneously, moreso than previous devices.

<comment><USER4> Yep I definitely have considered that as well. Especially the possibility of RTS board games of some sort, as opposed to turn-based. I'm sure the Parker Bros would be well advised to make a Monopoly app.

<comment><USER6> I've got to admit, the board game idea for the ipad is pretty cool. In general, though, I'm not convinced I see the game market for the ipad being as large as it is on the iphone. A phone is in your pocket when you're on the bus, in the waiting room, or in the bathroom (you know you do it). These are perfect opportunities to pull out the device and play a game for a few minutes. I don't see people having as quick of access to the ipad or planning to bring it somewhere just to game on.

That being said, I'm guessing we can assume that the next flash sdk's ability to build for iPhone will extend to the iPad, in which case the games floodgates are going to open regardless.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> _1\. Web apps are an order of magnitude easier to develop than iPad apps._

I'm not sure I agree with that. Applications with limited UI are easier as webapps if you forget all the other browsers you might want to be compatible with. Native apps live in a wonderfully deterministic world, albeit with a target market of one to three-ish devices.

Personally I'm looking forward to counting how many "flashlight" applications there are on release day! Currently there 240 apps that return for "flashlight", almost all of which are competing for the ever lucrative _I want more light than my wallpaper lets through_ market.

<comment><USER8> Yeah i think I agree with you. Web apps require knowledge of a ton of software layers, not least of which is the web server/client architecture and protocols. To the extent that native apps are also communicating with remote services there is probably not much difference, but many native apps are built to stand alone which, in my opinion, makes them an order of magnitude easier to develop.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think the opportunity of the iPad for developers is to offer feature rich desktop quality applications. Judging from the iWork demo, and the other built-in applications, the iPad hardware & SDK is advanced enough to create some serious applications. As a result I think there won't be the same race to the bottom we saw with iPhone apps. There will be a bigger market for $20-$50 _applications_ here.

<comment><USER10> As a lone developer, I'm very hesitant to invest a significant amount of time on a project knowing that Apple can, in one strike, kill my project.

<comment><USER11> As a lone developer, you should be in the best position to take that kind of risk. No?

<comment><USER12> Just because you're the best one to take a bad risk, doesn't mean the risk's worth taking.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I was ready to buy one for my girlfriend - I kind of promised her one already before it was presented. She wasn't all that keen on a new "computer" for her, and my selling pitch for iPad to her was "you can run your farm on farmville on it" ... do I need to continue?

<comment><USER14> You can? I thought Farmville needed Flash.

EDIT -- Didn't realise I was just completing your thought for you. Sorry.

<comment><USER13> and as I understood iPad doesn't have Flash support, right? So when I told her that, she said (was watching screens over my shoulder) "but he showed facebook" - referring to the facebook app. And this, my friends, is your typical user.

At least she got an "ugly duckling" farmville mug. I'd tell you I bought myself one too, but then I'd lose my street cred - so I wont tell you.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've just thought of the first app I'll make for the iPad. It will be a version of _top_. Seeing as the thing only runs one process at a time, it should practically be a one-liner.

<comment><USER16> Seeing as you've apparently not bothered to learn anything about how the existing iPhone OS works, you might be surprised at the results you'd see from such an application.

<comment><USER15> Relax, buddy. It's a joke.

<comment><USER16> So it's OK to make jokes which aren't even tenuously based in fact?

<comment><USER15> Yes. Yes, it is.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I'm sure there will be money in it... but a tablet is in no way anywhere close to the 'necessity' that a phone is.

Everyone has a phone, and most people use their phone for a good majority of the day. It's easy for anyone from a teen to a grandparent justify buying an iPhone. I don't see this tablet having nearly as much of a market share... phones are simply much more a part of our lives (and central to even our style and personality) than a tablet.

</comment><comment><USER18> I'd say it may pay to develop a game which works really well with the iPad size. May cash in on the initial rush when everyone gets one and wants a good app to see the advantages of the bigger screen.

</comment><comment><USER19> I want to see educational, multitouch, applications. Like, learning how to trace letters, simple math games, etc.

</comment><comment><USER20> it's not just the development environment app writers care about, but also the app store infrastructure: an easy way to charge for your application and in- app content, availability of user reviews and ratings and possibly free advertising are all things that a bigger screen won't offer for webapps.

</comment><comment><USER21> iPhone is a bigger market than iPad, and iPhone apps will work on iPads.

I'm sure that most of the #100 iPhone apps will make a special iPad-enhanced version, but that's not going to be a killer feature.

I guess some apps can only ever work on an iPad (due to size / CPU / RAM) constraints, but those will be a niche.

I'd just say that the iPad is a larger incentive to target the iPhone. Some apps will be a big deal on the tablet, but mostly they will be better targeting the iPhone first.

</comment><comment><USER22> Yes I have an app idea in mind that will help the newspaper industry out.

</comment><comment><USER23> This all comes down to where the developer can make the most money, a native app or a web app.

Someone also mentioned the infrastructure and resources needed to support a web app to support thousands/millions of users. as opposed to basically nothing for a native app.

</comment><comment><USER24> Once again the main problem with iPhone OS web apps is that they can't take advantage of many of the truly unique features of Apple products: multi touch, motion sensors, etc.

If you want to make something truly interesting you have to actually write an native app.

<comment><USER25> There are multi touch events in mobile safari.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: What helps you produce code faster? - <AUTHOR>

For me it is completely shutting out every around me. Headphones on, music loud, and food and drinks on my desk so I don't need to get up which normally ends up with me getting distracted. <comment><USER2> Having a suite of unit tests I can rely on. It helps me avoid the paralysis that occurs when I wonder "what else might have been touched by this code I changed?" I can give that ? a couple minutes thought, write whatever changes I need, and then run the suite to see whether I missed anything. That factor more than almost anything else helps me write code quickly.

</comment><comment><USER3> \- Chrome alarm extension to alert me when 1 hour of work has passed after which I get away from the computer for a few minutes.

\- StayFocusd Chrome extension to prevent me from going into social networking sites while I'm working

\- "...knowing that all the \"other stuff\" I have to do is done. Inbox clear, no meetings about to happen, etc."

\- Knowing when I'm too tired to keep working efficiently

\- Being away on IM/IRC except for work

\- Keeping work conversations to IM/IRC as much as possible

\- "...shutting out every around me. Headphones on, music loud." I prefer music without vocals, e.g., electro

\- Using <http://www.gunnars.com/> to minimize eye fatigue

\- Knowing Emacs well to improve code editing speed

\- Having unittests to validate my changes quickly

\- Using screen or tmux to quickly switch between shells while maintaining a full screen for each...code, shell, unittests, Python shell, database shell

\- Using Xmonad to quickly switch between Desktop workspaces while maintaining a full screen for each

\- Avoiding the mouse as much as possible, even on the browser (Vimium extension)

\- Using the ThinkPad nipple when I do have to use the mouse

\- I don't use an external monitor at all. I find the constant neck motion to switch between them tiring and distracting. The combination of screen, Xmonad and Gnome notifications allows me the same application throughput with less distraction and without sacrificing screen space.

That's just off the top of my head. There's probably a lot more. Maybe I should write a blog post about it.

<comment><USER4> Have you set up custom notifications?

<comment><USER3> Only for my USB sound card when it is connected and disconnected. But, that's more of a nice-to-have. Everything else is built into the programs I use and into Gnome.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Motivation. If I'm motivated to get the work done, I will have razor focus. If the task is something someone else wants me to do (but I don't particularly want to do), then I won't be as motivated and it won't get done as fast.

Additionally, I don't like doing tedious things, so I always try to make whatever I'm doing as less tedious as possible. For instance, I'm supposed to get some feature working. The underlying code is very complex. Getting the feature working wil be very painful and tedious. If I can refactor the underlying codebase first, implementing the feature will be less tedious and more enjoyable. The problem is that sometimes my team mates don't want me refactoring code, so I'm forced to trudge through the complex code and it takes me a lot longer to do it that way.

</comment><comment><USER6> 1) Focus and concentration, without distractions.

2) Think a little bit before writing on what you will write. Thus I have better program with less need to rewrite.

3) Using a 13inch laptop. The small screen estate forces me to concentrate on what I am doing right now. No place for other editor windows or browsers or anything else, just my code and my work.

What does NOT make you faster:

1) Having a special mechanical/ergonomic/whatever keyboard.

2) Having multiple large screens with tons of windows open. This is most of the time distraction and not helpful. Avoid it.

</comment><comment><USER7> \- no email \- no im \- no texting or phone calls

\- knowing _exactly_ what I want to achieve, no exceptions (this doesn't include the how part but only the what part) \- repeatedly playing the same music for hours, closing out every noise that makes me think about anything else but the task \- not engaging in any other activities on the computer I'm working on before I start working because I find myself going back to those activities from time to time which is a huge distraction \- last but not least a bottle of water or a cup of tea

<comment><USER8> One hack that has really, really helped me is putting what I'm doing next into my git commit logs.

For example: git commit -a -m "Finished writing tests for Car model. Now implementing car.drive, car.park, and car.accelerate."

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I use 5 monitors. I can't overstate the productivity edge this gives me, particularly for web and web/backend dev.

<comment><USER10> How big are said monitors. I think 2, maybe 3 is my limit (although the screens are pretty big). Can't imagine being productive on 5.

<comment><USER11> I have 6 24" FHD monitors. Although not all are in constant use, I find it useful to not have to drag windows around to check different thing (mail, skype, IDEs, etc..).

<comment><USER12> What's your configuration on that? 3x2, 2x2 with 1 to either side of that, or 6 in a row?

<comment><USER11> 3x2

Like:

[] [] []

[] [] []

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> On the contrary, for me complete silence, dead-minimal desk and a piece of paper and a pen seem to work much better. I take programming as a serious task, I need to be 100% focused.

</comment><comment><USER14> Old repeats of stuff like Friends or Scrubs on the TV and quiet everywhere else in the house helps me most.

If I have Spotify playing I end up always searching for the next song.

<comment><USER15> its old Simpsons episodes for me. Ones I have seen so many times I could quote every scene, if I have something on in the background that I don't know as well I'll be very distracted

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> For me, it's knowing that all the "other stuff" I have to do is done. Inbox clear, no meetings about to happen, etc.

</comment><comment><USER17> focusing on what needs to be get done! And breaking the things in small bits that can be achieved easily.

And well I mostly code in nights, so there arent much disturbances.

</comment><comment><USER18> Uninterrupted time. Good luck coding if you have a girlfriend.</comment>


Ask HN: Get into PLT with no CS degree - <AUTHOR> Hi,
Here is the situation: I've received a letter from my uni saying I cannot continue my studies there. I love the theory of programming languages and I've been studying on the side books about type theory, compilers, programming languages, category theory, topos and proofs (TAPL and Software foundations form B. Pierce, Introduction to category theory by Harold Simmons, papers on DOT/scala)
I would like to pursue this route into PLT but I lack the formalism that a university can teach me. On the other hand, I don't want to start again in a new university as I would see it as a huge waste of time and would like to focus in what I enjoy.
My plan is to find a job as a compiler engineer while studying on the side and contributing to open source programming languages. But I have a hard time finding job offers in compiler engineering. Offers in my area are sparse and job offers I find rarely accept remote (I live in Switzerland)
In conclusion my questions are: - how do you get a job in compiler engineering? who is hiring? and if it's unjustifiable to hire a junior like me, how do I get the necessary experience to be employable? - Is there a better way to do it? Am I missing something? If you were to get in the field completely differently, how would you do it? <comment><USER2> That sounds tough. To be honest, I don't know how a plan of taking the job you want while studying to be competent at it on the side would be possible for anyone.

I'm also confused why you don't just transfer to another school with the credits you have. You wouldn't be starting from zero, right? Given that compilers are a very academic niche (people get PhDs in this), I don't at all see why university would be a waste of time.

The good news is that there are lots of open source languages out there that could use help (most?). Nothing stopping you from getting there on your own, it just seems that guidance from professors on such a deep subject would help a lot.

</comment><comment><USER3> If you can invent a new programming language...

Perl's father Larry Wall do not have a degree in CS.

If you like research, do not have to go to university. you can publish in your blog. compiler research do not cost that much as biological science.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good point. Thank you!</comment></comment>


Get Started with Rkt Containers in Three Minutes - <AUTHOR> https://coreos.com/blog/getting-started-with-rkt-1.0.html <comment><USER2> You know, the CoreOS development team seems from the outside to be this rockstar group really hauling ass to make their container stuff phenomenal. Kudos to them for that kind of attitude in the face of the mountainous popularity of Docker. I personally feel like it's kind of a lost cause, but I have mad respect for their dev team for trying.

<comment><USER3> Isn't it essential an alternate implementation of the same underlying spec? (appc).

I don't think they need to "beat" docker to have a viable product.

<comment><USER2> No, you're totally right. But Billy the Programmer who first looks at containerizing his application (or dev environment or whatever) is going to choose Docker, because that's what everyone else is doing. Not to sound trite, but most people defer technical decisions to other people. This is the reason so many Windows machines exist, and why it has such a huge market share: End users don't know and don't care, they just pick what the manufacturer installs on the device. They are outsourcing their technical decisions (exactly like most distros did with systemd and the Debian TC). It's the classic appeal to popularity, which is totally how most people (even technical people) make the decision of which software to use.

<comment><USER4> There's another reason too, if more people are using X then I'm far more likely to be able to find help getting over whatever problem I hit.

<comment><USER2> Yes totally this! I spend a huge amount of time in #docker on Freenode pointing people at resources to solve their problems. I am fairly regular in my "there is no right answer, just the best answer for your environment" attitude, but I always point exactly at what you've said: "But if you do it this way, there's a huge amount of prior work done solving this problem versus the way you want to go"...</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


A metric for measuring the growing entropy on social news sites. - <AUTHOR> http://tinypaste.com/afdfb Had this idea right now; in lieu of a formal blog to post this, I'm posting this here.  Would love some feedback (or anyone interested in implementing). <comment><AUTHOR> Had this idea just now. pg's reason for hackernews, from what I understood, was the decreasing quality of conversation on reddit. It may be interesting to see if this can be measured and qualified, and what applications this may have.

The approach should also work on blogs (measure comment quality, etc) and news sites (cnn.com vs economist.com).

Would love any feedback and anyone interested in implementing.</comment>


US Presidents age slower than their peers - <AUTHOR> http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/12/06/us-usa-presidents-aging-idUSTRE7B52EY20111206

<comment><AUTHOR> I submitted this because there is a giant statistical error in the article that is worth noting:

 _For example, the average age of the first eight presidents at their time of death was 79.8 years - during a time when life expectancy at birth for men was less than 40._

<comment><USER2> A _really_ common error. Also pops up in debates over pensions. While it _is_ true that people tend to live longer post-retirement now than they used to, and that this impacts pension-fund economics, many people quote life expectancy at birth to illustrate the difference, which isn't really relevant, since infant mortality rates are not closely related to pension-fund solvency. (Conditional life expectancy at typical retirement age would be the right statistic.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Olshansky admits that "All of these presidents benefited from the trifecta of exceptional wealth, almost all were highly educated and all of them had access to medical care," and yet he decided to compare them to a 'cohort' consisting of the general population.</comment>


I'm OK, the bull is dead: Communication skills for engineers - <AUTHOR> http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/print/93903/I_m_OK_The_Bull_Is_Dead <comment><USER2> Sorry, but this is contrived. One can speak clearly without resorting to a formula.

The story contradicts itself. The author describes at length the process he had to go through to decode this supposedly clear communication. The one person without a vested interest in the formula (his wife) just found it puzzling and annoying. Besides, it's obvious how to communicate the information "I've been in an accident, but I'm ok" straightforwardly.

I kept hoping that the story would turn out to be a clever parody of the father's pet theory by an impudent son. That, as anyone who has been mercilessly imitated by offspring knows, is what children are made for. But no such luck.

It reminds me of a book I read years ago by a psychologist who used to insist that people (including his children) speak in active tenses so as to take responsibility for things. Instead of saying, "The milk got spilled," one should say, "I spilled the milk," and so on. He knew he had gone too far when his 8-year-old came in soaking wet one day and said "Sorry Dad. I guess I rained all over myself."

This kind of thing appeals to technical people who like algorithms for things and want algorithms for human interaction. But that's a category error. Engineers who really want to get better at communication would get further by paying more attention to their audience (and themselves).

<comment><USER3> _"Sorry Dad. I rained all over myself."_

That's a breakdown in the kid's/family's communication. It is simple to say, "I walked in the rain." It conveys the exact same piece of information--I'm wet because it was raining outside, and I was outside without something to keep the rain off of me. There are numerous other ways to say the same thing without sounding backwards.

<comment><USER2> Sure. But I think the point was that the father realized that he had overemphasized a linguistic device at the expense of a general principle. He'd got his 8-year-old into a state of clueless, if not malicious, compliance, which didn't serve the real goal. (In fact, it often backfires, because people will instinctively resist anything that inhibits their freedom.)

By the way, using active instead of passive language really does change one's thinking and foster responsibility. I've found it to yield pretty rich rewards, and the whole subject is fascinating. Similarly, beginning a status meeting with a one-sentence summary, then proceeding to details, can be quite effective. But when people focus on the trick rather than the substance, it doesn't work anymore. And the OP is an example of that. A car accident is not a status meeting.

<comment><USER4> The phone call reporting it is. I imagine his son put in the "bull is dead" bit to be funny - which it was. But when I've had to make similar phone calls, I always start with "I'm okay, but..." It tells the person on the other end the most important thing first: I'm okay.

<comment><USER5> I never start a conversation with my mother like "I've been in an accident ...", if you're cut off then she'd go psycho and be needing tranqs. As the parent said "We're all OK but ...".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Best presentation advice I've heard: put your conclusions first. People zone out after five minutes if they're not interested. Tell people up front what you want them to take away from the talk. Then, even if they fall asleep, they'll know what you did - just not how you did it.

This _is_ in an academic setting, by the way, and that advice was given from the chair of my department to someone in my research group who was prepping for an interview talk at a government lab.

</comment><comment><USER6> I feel like I was tricked into reading an Oprah magazine article.

</comment><comment><USER7> I liked the story. I remembered my grandfather (a very successful engineer) once told me I should take acting classes or something that would force me to address an audience and communicate something in a way the audience would understand. He then explained to me that engineers are usually not taught how to communicate things effectively, and how this can make a big difference in trying to accomplish your objectives in life.

<comment><USER8> I've oft thought that was the failing of most college programs. You're asked to show all your work, but rarely is the explanation for your decisions given nearly as much weighting as the actual outcome and how you got there. In reality is what you actually learned.

Switch over to the real world where 'cheating' becomes 'teamwork' and problems are discovered rather than verbosely outlined. Communication becomes the face of your reputation. While the ability to deliver may be the heart, no one can see it without closer inspection.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Surely it should be: 'I'm OK, but I've been in a car accident'? Then maybe mention the bull.

<comment><USER10> That doesn't fit the "conclusion first" advice that makes sense to clarify a situation. Problem is, an irrelevant conclusion was chosen. A better alternative following the advice would be something like "I'm OK but the car is wrecked."

<comment><USER9> I agree that's a better phrase based on the rules, but stating what happened ('car crash') rather than the result ('car is wrecked') conveys more information (ie. why 'I' am not already home). Either works though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I know Gopal (and Raj). This is an old, old story, but I get a kick out of it every time I hear it.

<comment><USER12> Do you know what the story behind the bull is?

<comment><USER11> I don't know much more than the story as it's told, just that Raj was driving past a farm late at night and hit a bull that had somehow escaped. It wasn't a head-on collision, but it was enough to kill the bull and wreck his car.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This was shared by a co-worker due to a problem i had at work, the business and engineers speak a very different language...anyway, the article has proven useful many, many times for me, hope you guys like it.

</comment><comment><USER13> Maybe he should follow the style himself when writing the article about it. The punchline should almost stand alone by itself. It shouldn't say, "Hey, audience, now you have to listen to the rest of this to understand what I meant." "The bull is dead," is a very provocative clause that leaves the audience scrambling for (irrelevant) context.

</comment><comment><USER3> This reminds me of a business case study done during my undergrad days. I don't remember the finer details of the study, but I remember the lesson. The case study was basically a company that had screwed up royally. We were not given much of any hints as to what needed to be done. Most people, including myself, went about creating huge forecasts for trying to solve a problem that really couldn't be solved. We were all wrong. The lesson of the case study was this: Sometimes the only answer is to admit that something has gone wrong, stay calm, severe ties to the project, understand what went wrong, and go about things with what you have left. This is one of the most important things I learned in business school.

</comment><comment><USER14> As a project manager managing multiple projects, I often need status updates from my team. I find that without a standard structure, people often fail to convey the most important information. I ask my team to report status in the following manner: 1\. Of the things that were expected to be done at this point, what is not done? 2\. What other deliverables are in danger of not being done in time? 3\. What is being done about items in #1 and #2 4\. Of the things that were expected to be done at this point, what is done?

I'd love to receive feedback about this process. What has worked for you?

</comment><comment><USER15> All the academic writing I produce and read begins with a conclusion, in the abstract.</comment>


Tell HN: I'd like to sponsor your passion project - <AUTHOR> As part of a New Year's resolution to provide more value to the universe, I'd like to sponsor you to work on your passion project full-time.<p>- $700 USD/week<p>- Expectation is to work on your project full-time, without any other employment or work-for-hire obligations<p>- Anywhere in the world is OK<p>- You retain all IP, ownership, etc.<p>- Can be open source or closed<p>Interested? Tell me a bit about yourself, your project, and your long-term goals. Email in profile, or post here. <comment><USER2> A few thoughts:

1\. This sounds and smells like 'bait'. The reason it isn't being upvoted is because people question the motive of the OP who hasn't explained why he wants to toss out $2500/month to someone else who retains all IP. Thus, naturally, people think the OP is just trying to get ideas for his own project(s). Or that he's just insane.

2\. There are marketplaces for this kind of stuff already. Kickstarter, IndieGogo, etc. Leave us alone, quit trying to get HN points (why anyone cares about these, I'll never know) and go spend your own time hunting in those marketplaces and throw your money there.

<comment><AUTHOR> Lorenzo, thanks for bringing up these points. I'm not 100% sure what my motivations are either, but I want to do _something_. This amount of money is very little to me, so I'm not actually expecting anything in return.

In fact, I feel like this desire for tit-for-tat returns and legal frameworks for ownership and remuneration are some of the problem -- they destroy our innate generosity and humanity.

I'm fascinated by the gap between smart people who can execute and traditional systems of funding and employment. Some people get lost in that transition, and half the time it's because they have to tweak their project to meet these expectations of return. This makes the project "not theirs" in a way, and kills some intrinsic motivation.

And motivation is everything.

<comment><USER3> Can you imagine yourself ever wanting anything more?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> While this is a generous offer, a $36k salary equivalent for _full-time programming work_ , with no other job for external income, isn't feasible.

<comment><USER5> Not in the United States, and especially not in the SF Bay Area...

But it's more than acceptable in many parts of the world.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's actually above US individual (not household) median income, so it's perfectly possible to live on this amount.

And yes, I wouldn't expect someone with a family in the Bay Area to be interested.

<comment><USER6> _" And yes, I wouldn't expect someone with a family in the Bay Area to be interested."_

At least, a family to support. A family supporting them, maybe...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> What do you mean by this?

        - Expectation is to work on your project full-time, without any other employment
          or work-for-hire obligations

Anyway, I'd like to nominate [https://twitter.com/joepie91](https://twitter.com/joepie91) for this.

His previous attempt: [https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-year-long-open- source...](https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-year-long-open-source- sabbatical#/)

<comment><AUTHOR> What it says -- you shouldn't be getting paid to work on other projects. This is mostly to keep your head clear and focused. I and a lot of my friends are so burnt out after a day at work that side projects basically never happen. I want to remove this burn-out for someone.

<comment><USER7> Okay, that makes sense :)

I stand by my recommendation. Few people do more for open source than Sven. (Bonus: I don't think he's usually employed.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Hi trevyn, I'm a 37 year old sysadm/developer from Brazil and I have lived in the US before for a few years (when I was 12). Me and my wife we own a music school here in Sao Paulo (she manages it), and we have lots of students and teachers studying and working with us. We've a model that is working well and the teachers that works with us are very happy. I have an idea for a project that could also help other freelancer teachers here in Brazil, but also from other parts of the world too. Basically it's a website/app that teachers (mostly freelance teachers such as language teachers, yoga, dancing, voice, musical instruments, personal trainers, crafts, etc) can use to help them manage their classes and students' schedule, payments, etc and also to list all their classes available on a ebay-kinda site, plus a possibility to offer live or recorded video content, etc. Teachers usually have a hard time keeping track of all this info, and most of them don't like to charge their students personally, so I think they would like a tool such as this. Kind of a myspace for teachers + youtube + ebay + airbnb.. ;-) I have lots of other ideas and I'm in the process of building a tool to help me build all these ideas... Let me know if I qualify! :-) BTW, happy new year!!!! email@example.com

</comment><comment><USER9> This is a cool idea. You have my respect.

Are you offering any guarantees? Can anybody be worried about relying on this income only to be dropped like many NY resolutions in March?

Is your "value to the universe" linked to your own generosity, or the projects available?

</comment><comment><USER10> Hello! I appreciate your desire to help people work on their projects! Well i'm a 20 year old freelance web developer. I have This idea i'm passionate about but can't afford to stop work for it. Its inspired from my desire to do good. I want to build first a work news aggregator website, then slowely add features to it like "resume builder", "Tax calculator" and all work relevant tools to help people build a career. Going to be free and open source. Anyways This Is me telling You about my passion more than a sales pitch. If You invest in me i'd be more than greatful. But even a feedback would be more than welcomed

</comment><comment><USER11> It's really cool to get compensation for work on your own project. And $700/week is a lot in the country I'm living in, it's enough for hiring 2-4 good software developers (I know a few groups of people who do work for YC companies).

But I would feel very uncomfortable knowing that the person who pays me doesn't get something valuable back and doesn't really need what I'm working on (but rather "provides more value to the universe"). That is probably just me, though.

</comment><comment><USER12> > \- Expectation is to work on your project full-time, without any other > employment or work-for-hire obligations

That's not for me, but I like the idea.

$700/week is a lot in some countries, so I wish you to make our universe a better place :)

</comment><comment><USER13> It's an awesome idea, if only you'd let the person keep a part-time job and make this opportunity a part-time job as well, maybe that'd be more realistic?

</comment><comment><USER14> This would be an awesome break for me, but I'm dealing with a bunch of health issues right now so I'll have to pass.

I'm wondering what would happen if this got posted to /r/technology though. My initial thought was the epic vote count for something like this, but then I realized it might be outright banned.

The reason I thought it would be interesting was the variety of responses it would attract.

IMO this isn't something someone should take any initiative with; if OP wants to do this, it would be for him to do himself. I was just wondering.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for this pointer -- I'm pretty sure I did get soft-banned on HN; this post doesn't appear on the front page even though it briefly did and is well under the points/time threshold for doing so. Since HN is a recruiting tool for YC, I can see how something even vaguely resembling a job post would be stepping on their toes.

<comment><USER4> Self-posts have an inherent penalty.

<comment><USER14> Huh, TIL.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> If you are serious and not just fishing for leads can I suggest a lottery to allocate the money. Just put all the applicants into a pool and have someone else publically choose the winner.

<comment><USER16> hm, he could use the blockchain to add transparency ... and turn the whole damn thing into a kind of open-initiative for other financially stable (or millionaires) to do the same thing.

On the other hand at least some sort of technical screening must take place in order to make sure that a candidate is at least _technically_ able to deliver a sort of MVP.

<comment><USER15> Good suggestion on the transparency.

In regards the technical screening this can occur post the lottery draw. If the winner is not technically capable of being able to deliver a product then just draw again. This will avoid a lot of work for the OP.

My only other suggestion here is that entrants have to answer some sort of technical quiz or some other human only hurdle so that you don't get a million entries from someone with a script.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> How many applicants and for how long you are going to support?

</comment><comment><USER18> This is a fantastic idea @trevyn, love it! Reminds me a bit of the Awesome Foundation [0], a community of independent chapters around the world that give $1k to interesting people and projects with absolutely no strings attached. No tax breaks, no catches, some people just want to sponsor cool stuff. Good on you!

[0] [http://www.awesomefoundation.org/](http://www.awesomefoundation.org/)

</comment><comment><USER19> I'll do it for 280 dollars a week but I'll only work weekends and 2 evenings a week. The reason is that I don't want to quit my job. If you're interested then I will send you my ideas.

</comment><comment><USER6> I might be interested if I weren't already being paid quite a bit more to work on something I'm deeply interested in.

I've been spending a part of that "quite a bit more" paying people to work on Snowdrift.coop, if you'd like to join me in that.

Regardless, props on your decision! :)

</comment><comment><USER20> Hi Trevyn, I sent you an e-mail under email@example.com about what we do and our situation. I'm looking for support from someone who believes in what we do.

</comment><comment><USER21> Hi trevyn, great initiative from you. I have email you about myself and my project. cheers

</comment><comment><USER22> What an awesome gesture, thank you for your generosity and best of luck. Happy New Year!</comment>


Working with Objective-C and Swift on the Same Project - <AUTHOR> https://spin.atomicobject.com/2015/09/24/swift-to-objective-c/?utm_source=hacker_news-ao&utm_campaign=swift-to-objective-c&utm_medium=referral <comment><USER2> Also, once you start creating Swift code, the resulting bundle grows considerably (presumably due to lack of standard ABI so far); in my experience it was about 10 MB of additional libraries.</comment>


What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote? - <AUTHOR> https://www.quora.com/What-did-Alan-Kay-and-Steve-Jobs-talk-about-at-the-2007-iPhone-keynote/answer/Alan-Kay-11?share=1 <comment><USER2> > _(the Mac was done in 1984, 11 years after the more powerful and capable > Parc Alto, which started working in 1973)._

I find this comment mildly irritating. The Alto apparently cost $40k [1] in (or around) 1973, which was equivalent to $95k in 1984 (or $232k today). Compare with the Mac which cost $2.5k in 1984.

Sure, the Alto may have been more powerful, but if it was financially out of reach of almost everybody, it's no wonder it had a limited direct impact.

I wonder if it's a trend that Alan underestimates the importance of economics for technology to actually have an impact.

[1] [http://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/input- output/14/34...](http://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/input- output/14/347)

<comment><USER3> We understood Moore's Law, so it made sense in the early 70s to make a personal computer in 1973 that would have the power of much less expensive personal computers 10 or more years later. Why? Because the new SW and UI takes a lot of work to invent -- this allowed us to show Steve "the 80s" in 1979.

(Worth pondering this way of going about things.)

What was disappointing is that the market couldn't value personal computing, especially the general market. For example, the Lisa with its hard disk was really the better machine to be the flagship for Apple. In the early 80s it was priced at less than an average car -- ~$10K -- a mass market price if you could see that this would be your "information and speculation vehicle".

Instead, PCs could only be sold at consumer price levels, more or less as novelties and in business as spreadsheet machines -- and this forced the Mac to be much smaller (both in RAM and disk) so that it was more like a toy than a vehicle.

So, no, _we_ (not I - I was part of a research community) did not underestimate the importance of economics. Note that my original Dynabook paper in 1972 said these would eventually be sold for the same price as color TV sets. But we did underestimate the ability of the early market to value computing.

<comment><USER4> There were machines like the Commodore C64 - and later to some extent the Amiga as well - that more fully embraced and valued computing in that they booted into an environment which allowed you to create programs right away.

With the C64 in particular there was no real distinction between the operating system and the programming language, the programming language actually WAS the operating system. The machine booted into an empty canvas for you to create something with.

I still find that idea fascinating. Absurdly enough, the closest we've come to this again afterwards is Microsoft Excel. A spreadsheet application today is the closest general purpose computing equivalent to 'an empty canvas everyone can use to create something with right away'.

<comment><USER5> My memory on this is super vague because this was way back in the mists of time, but I _think_ some old versions of DOS used to have a BASIC interpreter built in, where you could just start writing BASIC code at the DOS prompt.

<comment><USER6> QBasic was included in some of the later DOS versions.

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Steve revealed at D10 that the iPad actually did get prototyped first. IIRC, he tasked a team with creating a keyless keyboard tablet thing (forgive my terrible paraphrasing). They came back with a tablet. When Steve scrolled up and saw the rubber band effect, he said "oh my god we can make a phone with this" and they went the phone first.

Edit: Below is the interview. He "had an idea of being able to type on a multi touch glass display"

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5f8bqYYwps](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5f8bqYYwps) @ 37:00

<comment><USER8> He called the iPad at the time a glass keyboard. Because he didn't want to give it away.

And let's not forget that a Microsoft guy provoked him into creating a tablet called the iPad.

<comment><USER9> _" This guy badgered me about how Microsoft was going to completely change the world with this tablet PC software and eliminate all notebook computers, and Apple ought to license his Microsoft software. But he was doing the device all wrong. It had a stylus. As soon as your have a stylus, you're dead. This dinner was like the tenth time he talked to me about it, and I was so sick of it that I came home and said, "Fuck it, let's show him what a tablet can really be."_

 _Jobs went into the office the next day, gathered his team, and said, "I want to make a tablet, and it can't have a keyboard or a stylus."_

[https://www.cultofmac.com/126116/steve-jobs-created-the- ipad...](https://www.cultofmac.com/126116/steve-jobs-created-the-ipad-to-show- one-microsoft-employee-what-a-tablet-really-can-be/)

<comment><USER10> Who really won though? Does anyone buy tablets anymore? I feel like I haven't seen one since 2015.

<comment><USER11> Apple publishes how many iPads they sell every quarter.

This is another example of the old internet trope "Do people still watch Tv? I haven't had a TV in 10 years".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I always find the "make it this size and you'll rule the world" quote interesting. The users I know who really love their iPads/tablets are closer to @alankay1's generation. Younger generations don't have much use for device that can't fit in a pocket. I wonder how much the interest in iPad-sized devices came from years of using paper about that size.

<comment><USER13> Fitting in a pocket is a great advantage for a portable device, to everyone.

The market seems to be saying: if I need something that I have to lug around, I might as well have a keyboard. i.e. a laptop.

Another effect is people are doing everything they can on a phone, because of the convenience. This leads to slightly larger phones every year, and now a 5.5" phone is no longer considered a "phablet", and apple is rumoured to having a 6.5" phone next (their smallest tablet is 7").

So... tablets _will_ rule the world, but they'll be "phones". The barrier to adaption was changing consumer behaviour... as always.

<comment><USER14> iOS and Android turn tablets into oversized phones, so no surprise they lose against phones - they have the same (or usually worse, at a given price point) capabilities while being larger, thus less convenient to carry and more fragile.

These days I'm not using much Windows for desktop (HN took over the time I had for games), but I do sincerely hope this OS will live on for at least couple more years, because _Microsoft is the only company that knows how to do tablets_. Seriously. A proper operating system, with real capabilities and proper user interface that can make use of the tablet form, makes a world of a difference. And I say that as someone who owned a decent Android tablet in the past. As someone who's friends and family with people owning currently decent Android tablets. My little Windows 10 el-cheapo tablet/netbook I picked up second-hand for ~$130 is much more useful than the top-of-the-line Samsung tablet offering. Hell, it already earned me many times more than its own value back, as it's good enough to do some meaningful dev work on the bus/train.

<comment><USER15> Windows did try the same as Android and iOS with Windows RT, thankfully that was a disaster. Netbooks are ridiculously useful, I used to have a 15 minute bus ride to work with an Asus EEE and would manage to fill that 15 minutes with active moonlighting development time every day. The work I did on that bus became the frontend for what now 10 years later is a $50m company.

I realise I'm making a slightly different point as I'm purely talking about netbooks/laptops. But having the full power of an OS on a tablet is definitely the way to go.

Certainly that's one of the bad points about iOS and Android they are so locked down that you have to jump through hoops if you wanted to use them as a work machine.

For my current job I bought myself a $350 refurbished Thinkpad (T430 8GB SSD core i5), this brings me in all my income. You can compare this to my nephew that is paying $1000 for an iPhone X because he got bored of his iPhone 8.

Further to that I bought exactly the same spec Thinkpad for my 5 year old daughter. The Thinkpad T-series are great because you can pour a litre of liquid over them without problem [0] plus they're built like a brick, so basically perfect for kids. My daughter immediately covered the grey brick with shiny stickers and gave it a name (she has an iPad, but that's always just called 'iPad'). It has the full capability to do everything she'll ever need in theory for the rest of her life/career. Further to that it's got Ubuntu installed and I can then install Sugar [1] for her to use (the same used for One Laptop Per Child).

The possible drawback is that it doesn't have a touchscreen. But with my experiment of buying a laptop with a touch screen I found I pretty much never wanted to use the touch screen, it's a slower interface than keyboard and mouse. You want the screen in front of you at arms length but then you have to reach with your arm to touch the screen.

I can now teach her over the years what it means to have real freedom with your software and hardware.

[0]: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0U5n2WaMMHo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0U5n2WaMMHo)

[1]: [https://sugarlabs.org/](https://sugarlabs.org/)

<comment><USER13> Sadly, netbooks seem to be gone. Even chromebooks are full-size, full-weight.

Do you know of termux.com, for linux without rooting? It's basically a linux distribution, adjusted for android's slightly odd filesystem. The app itself is tiny, and you install from its repository. e.g. there's latex, youtube-dl, curl, vim, clang, ecj, python, ruby, perl, lua, erlang etc.

A bluetooth keyboard completes the DIY linux netbook... sadly, bluetooth keyboards are also almost gone, presumably as people adjust themselves to "touch" typing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Didn't really knew that Kay was so active on Quora. Now I'm about to read everything.

</comment><comment><USER17> It always amazes me how many questions or Quora solicit an answer from someone so close to the subject at hand.

<comment><USER18> I feel the same way about HN. It's both platforms major point of difference to other platforms I think.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> What is it about Quora that draws so many prestigious people to answer?

<comment><USER20> The same reason Facebook took off like it did.

In Facebook's case, it was famously harvard.edu. A lot of people want to belong to or participate in exclusive clubs. Something other people are widely excluded from. The commons is Answers.com or Yahoo Answers. The people writing junk and spam questions & answers on Yahoo Answers, are not participating on Quora.

In Quora's case, it was that it originated / spread out of prestigious tech circles. A small group of connected, rather elite, techies out of Silicon Valley seeded the site in its early days. Those people were connected to other prestigious tech people, and so it went.

Adam D'Angelo is one of Quora's two founders, the former CTO of Facebook, and is a near-billionaire that went to Exeter with Zuckerberg and then CIT. Elite + connected.

Then last but not least, Quora enforces fairly high standards on quality, similar to why Stack Overflow isn't overflowing with trash despite its immense scale.

<comment><USER21> > similar to why Stack Overflow isn't overflowing with trash despite its > immense scale

Oh boy. You haven't checked out the newest questions page on SO, have you? There are oh so many new low-quality questions. That said, they're mostly so badly written, that they rarely show up on Google. _But_ if you're actually trying to answer questions, then good luck finding any worth answering.

I simply gave up answering questions unless I stumble upon them while googling.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> The entire Fast Company interview is gold, but a few quotes on the iPhone:

" _Think about this. How stupid is this? It's about as stupid as you can get. But how successful is the iPhone? It's about as successful as you can get, so that matches you up with something that is the logical equivalent of television in our time._ "

...

" _Yeah. We can eliminate the learning curve for reading by getting rid of reading and going to recordings. That's basically what they're doing: Basically, let's revert back to a pre-tool time._ "

[https://www.fastcompany.com/40435064/what-alan-kay-thinks- ab...](https://www.fastcompany.com/40435064/what-alan-kay-thinks-about-the- iphone-and-technology-now)

</comment><comment><USER23> >""Have I got a deal for you: a Honda with a one-quart gas tank!". Steve did not like this memo, but what could he do given the history, and that it was quite true?"

Can someone explain the joke?

Also does anyone know how long Alan was with Apple?

<comment><USER12> I believe he left in 1997 when Jobs returned and Advanced Technology Group was shut down.

<comment><USER3> 1996 before the return of Steve

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Faster computer has increased everyone's free time, which in turn are being used to eat other persons free time. Does that means computer will never increase our free time ? ( Or increase and eat up in point less video games and ad watching ? ). The ultimate benefit I think is, because millions use computer for point less thing, but ultimately investing their time and money in to it, are kind of crowd sourcing the technology advances that are other wise was not possible. So on that look out, kudos to cat video and ads. It that is what it takes to make human kind forward so be it.

</comment><comment><USER25> iPhone first helped them get the mobile OS right. Because MicroSoft had a tablet for a decade and its OS was horrible- a cluttered version of shrunk windows. If Apple had shrunk MacOS as an interface, that would have been awful too.</comment>


A system for growth = our MRR is up 800% - <AUTHOR> https://doopoll.co/blog/how-we-grew-mrr-800-percent-six-months <comment><USER2> If I'm reading this right the growth grew by 800%, not the revenue?

"Overall, we increased SME revenue by 17% in this period."

"While the new MRR added is a small portion of the segment of customers who predate the growth work we did, there are two really key things to note."

"Firstly, the velocity of this growth is impressive. This equates to an 800% growth from September to March."

<comment><AUTHOR> Nuance is that the SME revenue overall grew by 17% but that the revenue directly attributable to the work we did during those 6 months grew by 800% from month 1 to month 6.</comment></comment>


Here's what you can do to protect yourself from the KRACK WiFi vulnerability - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/16/heres-what-you-can-do-to-protect-yourself-from-the-krack-wifi-vulnerability/ <comment><USER2> > But first, let's clarify what an attacker can and cannot do using the KRACK > vulnerability. The attacker can intercept some of the traffic between your > device and your router. Attackers can't obtain your Wi-Fi password using > this vulnerability. They can just look at your traffic. It's like sharing > the same WiFi network in a coffee shop or airport.

From reading the articles:

[https://www.krackattacks.com/](https://www.krackattacks.com/)

( [https://github.com/vanhoefm/krackattacks](https://github.com/vanhoefm/krackattacks) ; which is watch-able )

> Against these encryption protocols, nonce reuse enables an adversary to not > only decrypt, but also to forge and inject packets.

[https://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/228519](https://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/228519)

> Key reuse facilitates arbitrary packet decryption and injection, TCP > connection hijacking, HTTP content injection, or the replay of unicast, > broadcast, and multicast frames.</comment>


Startups for Remote Nomads handle Corona (Learn from a leading founder) - <AUTHOR> https://www.blog.openstartuplist.com/pieter-levels-corona-virus-nomadlist-remoteok <comment><AUTHOR> Pieter Levels of Nomad List and Remote OK share how it's like running two businesses in the midst of the Corona. He handles it pretty well I must say.</comment>


It ships when it ships - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/on-startups/e3adac92576b

<comment><USER2> Deadline actually translates to total effort put in a task, which translates to total cost of the task, and Managers really need to know this to control the budget. whether to develop a feature is based on cost vs benefit analysis, so if as a Manager I can't rely at all on the cost estimates then how can you be sure you are building the right thing in first place.</comment>


Oracle Wins Bid for TikTok in U.S. - <AUTHOR> https://www.wsj.com/articles/microsoft-drops-out-of-bidding-for-tiktoks-u-s-operations-11600039821 <comment><USER3> Here's what I am guessing it is:

\- Bytedance retains some ownership and control of the app and the algorithms

\- Oracle runs the entire back end on their infrastructure

\- Oracle guarantees to the US government that no data is going back to China (because they control the release of the app and control the back end)

\- This satisfies the USA's (supposed) national security concerns and also satisfies China because TikTok is not actually being "sold" to a US company.

<comment><USER4> This is a fantastic idea - the only thing missing (that I see) is that Oracle would need to see the source code and verify that the checksum of the apps built from that code matches the downloads from the Google Play Store and App Store.

Otherwise the guarantee that no data is being sent to China is not airtight. Oracle could audit the app every time it gets an update and watch network traffic, but this would miss anything sent by code activated remotely after the fact. It wouldn't work for long, but the US government will look for any reason to deny this deal. I don't think Oracle will audit the app constantly anyway. Come to think of it, that could apply to the source code too, if the malicious code was extremely well hidden.

<comment><USER5> How would they shuttle out that much traffic undetected?

<comment><USER6> It is a video app. Couldn't you embed the embargoed data into the media content using steganography. All the receiver of the data would need to do is download a modified version of the client, then collect the data. From the server side it would just look like a normal TikTok app watching videos.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> My prediction: Oracle couldn't care less about TikTok as an entity, but wants their IP so they can sue everyone else who has a recommendation engine. No, it won't make any sense, but much of that organization's moves are inscrutable to me.

<comment><USER8> Oracle has a "Data Management Platform" (perhaps a bit better known as BlueKai), which they might consider augmenting with stuff coming out of TikTok.

<comment><USER9> And that product was just pulled out of Europe last week for privacy violations. There is also a pending class action lawsuit against Oracle (and Salesforce) for this type of product violating GDPR.

So I don't think this is a great step forward for US consumers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> ByteDance has said publicly that they won't be selling their algorithm ([https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-09-13/bytedance...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-09-13/bytedance- tells-u-s-it-won-t-sell-tiktok-s-algorithm-scmp)) -- so there's no IP angle here. What is Oracle really getting out of the deal?

<comment><USER11> They're doing the deal as part of a consortium, Oracle is getting TikTok's cloud hosting in the US market (at least). Assuming TikTok doesn't fade in the next few years, it'll substantially increase the size of Oracle's cloud business and they can use it as a marketing point.

It suggests that Oracle's cloud business has such dire traction that they can't acquire prominent customers for it any other way than to directly buy part of them. It also speaks to that Ellison & Co. view the cloud shift as a terminal threat for Oracle, one that is getting worse by the day, and that if they don't succeed at building up their cloud business, they will erode and die (and they're right).

Oracle stayed in the game in the last round through massive consolidation, buying up the competition one after another (eg Siebel, PeopleSoft, etc). They'll try the same thing this time around as their organic efforts have largely failed; we'll see how much success they have given they're far outgunned this time around (and running from much further behind).

<comment><USER12> Has anyone actually ever used their cloud offering? I assume it's awful, but I've never even looked at it.

<comment><USER13> They have the most generous free tier. 2 free VM's each with 50 GB of storage and 2 free autonomous Oracle databases with 20 GB of storage.

<comment><USER14> What is the catch here? That seems good enough to run most things on.

<comment><USER15> They offer 2 free Oracle databases. The catch is they're Oracle databases.

In other words it's the same as every cloud provider: They hope you'll build a business system that uses enough of their proprietary tech that you can't easily move to another provider.

<comment><USER13> You can run mysql on any other free database on the 2 free compute instances. It is totally up to you.

The autonomous database is Oracle's offering of their Oracle database - <USER2> requires no DBA or tuning and runs on Exadata infrastructure. They are offering it for free - because they want enterprises using existing on-premise Oracle databases, to move their existing DB applications to the cloud.

Oracle Autonomous databases comes with free Oracle APEX - which is a low code / no code toolchain.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> No one thinks this has to do with the relationship between the US President and Oracle? Amazon is throwing a fit because they weren't chosen to be the Pentagons cloud provider. Now this. It's favoritism.

<comment><USER17> At leas the pentagon deal was government related. Why the hell is the government putting it's nose up private deals like this and also asking for a cut?

<comment><USER18> Because in this case the executive branch effectively forced the sale to happen by threatening to ban the platform. TikTok on its own wasn't looking to sell. Now, they _have_ to sell to an American company in order to make Trump happy. So what else do they have to do to make Trump happy?

<comment><USER17> Well it's borderline acceptable to indirectly forcing them to sell by threatening a ban, but to actively oversee the sale and micromanage it is far beyond the line.

<comment><USER18> > it's borderline acceptable to indirectly forcing them to sell

It really is not. One of the biggest horrors of the Trump years is the extent to which this kind of capricious executive action has been normalized. A ban is a ban. If you genuinely think an app poses a security risk, then you use one of the executive tools available to shut it down.

There was no "ban" enacted here. It was a bargaining chip used to muck with the markets in an outrageously explicit way. We don't do that in this country. Or we never did before.

The closest equivalent to this in terms of effect would have been the trust busting of the early 20th century. And that involved all three branches of government working over years. This happened because One Guy decided he didn't like TikTok.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> This is such a huge clusterfuck, I don't know why anyone would buy it. Microsoft is lucky to have gotten away from it. What does acquiring the US operations even mean? Do they get code and if so who is going to take it forward? The engineers are all byte dance employees. They have a few engineers outside of China but the bulk of the talent is in China, that is where the innovation is coming from. Without them it doesn't make sense to get the operations. The user base is going to drastically fall and it will be a write- off in 2yrs time. All of the money is wasted.

<comment><USER5> You think oracle is paying for this without it being rewarded some nice matching government contracts or other investments/deals to match the expense?

<comment><USER20> Yep, exactly like how Microsoft was compensated for buying Skype. This stuff is not without precedent.

Skype was not sponsored by a foreign power but by liberal minded founders using P2P technology. Still a "national security" threat (actually a hegemony threat) so it had to be addressed somehow. Microsoft was happy to help.

It also helps explain a little the hapless treatment of the Skype brand under Microsoft. Not that Microsoft hasn't bought companies and mismanaged the assets before, but they really didn't know what to do with Skype.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> This is likely explanation why Oracle was able to acquire TikTok's operation, despite the fact it does not seem to be a good fit at all: [https://www.businessinsider.com/look-inside-president- trump-...](https://www.businessinsider.com/look-inside-president-trump-and- larry-ellisons-relationship-2020-8)

<comment><USER22> That's just speculation. Recall that Microsoft was rejected by TikTok leaving Oracle as the sole contender.

See: [https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/13/technology/tiktok- microso...](https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/13/technology/tiktok-microsoft- oracle-bytedance.html)

<comment><USER23> > Weeks later, China issued new regulations that would essentially bar TikTok > from transferring its technology to a foreign buyer without explicit > permission from the Chinese government.

> The Chinese regulations helped scuttle the effort by Microsoft, which said > the only way it could both protect the privacy of TikTok users in the United > States and prevent Beijing from using the app as a venue for disinformation > was to take over the computer source code underlying the app, and the > algorithms that determine what videos are seen by the 100 million Americans > who use it each month.

This makes it clear that China has ties to Oracle management in some form or another, or Oracle wouldn't be the last man standing. This is going to be a shitshow.

<comment><USER24> > This makes it clear that China has ties to Oracle management in some form or > another

Oracle also has ties to Trump. This stinks.

<comment><USER25> Every company at this level has ties to the executive branch, and much more. Remember last year when the DoD wrote Microsoft a $10 billion check?

<comment><USER24> There's a difference with having a contract with a department and being best buddies with an autocrat wannabe. Who then signs an executive order and invokes national security on very shaky grounds to force a sale.

Still, I'm not saying that the $10B DoD contract and the way they tortured the process to avoid giving it to Amazon did not stink as well. Or that Amazon as a company is fine. There can be more than one festering carcass in a swamp.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> It needs to be said that US admin interfering/forcing this deal citing "national security" concerns in a situation where US companies already dominate social platforms sends a very, very strong signal for other countries to demand social data to be stored on their respective soil as well. It's the end of the illusion of a competitive market in the "internet" and will have far-reaching consequences. In which world would EU, India, South/Mid America give a free pass to US oligopolies capturing almost all advertising revenue?

<comment><USER27> The US threatened to impose tariffs on India for trying to do this. US is all free markets as long as they can win when they cannot they bully.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> It appears Oracle is a "tech partner" in this acquisition.

Isn't this virtually identical to the Chinese model? For example, NetEase is the tech partner for Blizzard, GCBD for Apple's iCloud, Sinnet for AWS, who does Microsoft partner with?

This appears to be a working model that the Chinese government will support. I wonder if other nations will start to adopt it.

<comment><USER29> Yes.

My Chinese friends are joking on this "California on Cloud" scenario. (GCBD is called "Guizhou on Cloud" in Chinese)

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Global Times (China's CCP-run English Language News Portal) claims that ByteDance will NOT sell TikTok-US operations to Oracle or Microsoft.

Edit: They're probably being technically correct about "sell", but not so much about "operations".

[https://twitter.com/globaltimesnews/status/13054102792833884...](https://twitter.com/globaltimesnews/status/1305410279283388417)

</comment><comment><USER31> Well Facebook has to be happy at least. Oracle has to be the company least likely to run TikTok well.

<comment><USER32> probably not because it's basically a Pyrrhic victory long-term. It'll drastically increase the chances of Facebook facing those issues in other countries, which would be devastating to the global business model of US software firms, and Facebook might get regulators attention again if the only significant competitor dies. I think Zuckerberg even said as much.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> (Written for another post regarding the same topic, copied here)

Oracle purchasing a stake in ByteDance, and maybe handling US operations? It sounds like one of those deals which will end up as a loss in a few years and a write-down. The first comparison that comes to mind is the Tumblr sale, when Yahoo wrote-down $712 million, although the companies are quite different. However, the similarity is the culture difference between the parent and subsidiary companies - Yahoo couldn't figure out how to turn Tumblr profitable as they had no successful examples prior, as far as I remember. Oracle and TikTok could not be more different: Oracle is a cold cloud technology supplier with no business advertising to teens.

If Oracle wishes to only be the cloud partner holding US data (a possibility mentioned in the article) it's possible that it could work out, but whether it is possible is dependent on politics and potentially who is elected as the next President.

</comment><comment><USER33> That's hilarious, really. In my experience if you want to kill a company have Oracle acquire it. (that may be a bit too cynical)

<comment><USER34> As far back as 15 years ago, Oracle had the reputation of being the company where people would come to work, close their office door, and then work on a second job or side project in peace and quiet. Oracle was/is powered by zero innovation and all enterprise sales.

I thought the idea of Microsoft buying TikTok was funny, but I couldn't think of a company more effective to dismantle TikTok than Oracle.

<comment><USER35> > Oracle was/is powered by zero innovation and all enterprise sales.

Oracle has one of the last couple of proper industrial research labs left in the industry.

It regularly publishes at the top venues in multiple fields and funds a lot of academics.

<comment><USER36> Examples?

<comment><USER37> Usually they have a paper at Sigmod

2018: [https://sigmod2018.org/sigmod_industrial_list.shtml](https://sigmod2018.org/sigmod_industrial_list.shtml)

RAPID: In-Memory Analytical Query Processing Engine with Extreme Performance per Watt

2020: [https://sigmod2020.org/sigmod_industrial_list.shtml](https://sigmod2020.org/sigmod_industrial_list.shtml)

Database Workload Capacity Planning using Time Series Analysis and Machine Learning

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Depending on what part of TikTok Oracle runs this may actually be a good arrangement that works well for both companies.

If Oracle has anything to do with the app itself or its functionality then TikTok will not do well. But if Oracle just manages the data and cloud operations then this may indeed work out well for both companies. Oracle is competent when it comes to data and cloud. That's their core business after all.

</comment><comment><USER39> I wonder how the deal is structured with respect to employee stock compensation. I was negotiating with them late last year and most of the comp was going to be in funny-money of the bytedance variety, which is both highly illiquid and hilariously valued. If US tiktok employees get converted to shares of Oracle, that's a substantial upgrade. Of course, they work for Oracle now, but still.

</comment><comment><USER40> That was unexpected. What Larry will do with it? Sell Oracle to teenagers?

What an irony given Oracle's own roots in USA's espionage agencies.

<comment><USER41> "Irony" or "makes complete sense?"

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This feels like such a strange acquisition for Oracle. Does anyone have insight on how Oracle envisions the TikTok brand and userbase adding value to the rest of the company?

<comment><USER42> I think this makes sense. Oracle isn't really acquiring TikTok, just its "US Operations". They presumably won't be responsible for developing algorithms, the app, or the backend, and will instead be running the service and hosting all of the data generated in the United States. Looked at this way, it's more like an unusually deep relationship with a cloud services provider than a buyout, and a huge win of business and reputation for Oracle Cloud.

<comment><USER43> But is it really a huge reputational win? Us geeks know that Tiktok's scale is huge, but your average bank is not going to be terribly impressed that Oracle is now hosting an app still widely viewed as some random frivolous teen twerk thing.

<comment><USER44> > but your average bank is not going to be terribly impressed that Oracle is > now hosting an app still widely viewed as some random frivolous teen twerk > thing.

Absolutely not. If anything, the young user base makes TikTok more valuable. It will be viewed as an analogue to Facebook before it exploded.

<comment><USER43> I'm not doubting TikTok's own value, I'm questioning the assertion that owning TikTok will have reputational benefits for Oracle as a cloud hosting provider.

<comment><USER44> It's an application with about a billion users. The benefits are tremendous. Banks are not dumb, they do their research before valuing corps

<comment><USER43> Again, not a question of Tiktok's valuation, but whether this is relevant to bank considering Oracle Cloud for their _own_ infra.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> In a way this is brilliant from ByteDance. Sell for the most money to a company that will never grow or operate tiktok in a way that can threaten you outside the US.

<comment><USER46> If you read the latest statement from Microsoft of how they'd have made sure to implement all the latest "privacy" features for TikTok, it's actually a really great news that ByteDance knows better.

What was the most visible outcome of Microsoft's takeover of GitHub? Some software engineers who happen to live in a wrong peninsula in Europe had their GitHub accounts shutdown with no advance notice and no recourse. So much for the rule of law and for social coding!

I think it's great that people from all over the world have a choice of who to give their data to. If there'd be a worldwide antitrust body, US would already be in trouble! Remember when China blocked Twitter and whatever else? Yeah, aren't we the China now?!

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> And all that because of a bunch of kids disrupting a rally. It's disgraceful that US companies would agree to participate in this forced sale. What's next? Volkwagen? After all, if this is now a legal way to do business I see absolutely no reason why it would stop at TikTok.

</comment><comment><USER48> First thing they're going to do is install their slow and really difficult to use BI tools and the db that takes hours to download.

It's insane when I tried installing oracle db and BI tools on my laptop. It was the worst software installation process in my life.

</comment><comment><USER49> so what? oracle acquires a flavor of the month platform.. it'll be a "remember when" type of story, in 2-3 years, when everyone is just starting to forget tiktok

</comment><comment><USER50> It's very bizarre. What could Oracle possibly gain from TikTok from a business perspective? It seems so far away from their core business. MySQL, SUN, I kind of understand, but TikTok? Why didn't say Google or Amazon make a bid?

<comment><USER44> > What could Oracle possibly gain from TikTok from a business perspective?

Further credibility with the US government as they deepen their ties with the NSA and US intelligence. Leads to winning more massive government contracts and more favor from future administrations.

Oracle is ahead of the game. It has realized that ingratiating itself with the government is a recipe for long-term success.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> It would be interesting to know why Oracle won. Did they offer more money ? Or is TikTok convinced that Oracle won't be able to do something decent with the acquisition ? Other than start fights with facebook etc over tiktok lookalikes ? Oracle will be great at that.

"If we can't have it, then we want to make sure NOONE will profit from it, and we burn that space to the ground in the US" ?

The cynic in me suspects that this is so, Oracle looked like a weird pick from the start. It would have been super interesting to be part of that negotiation.

<comment><USER52> Mark Ellison is the only leader in tech who openly runs fundraisers for Trump. The cynic in me suspects that's the entirety of the reasoning.

<comment><USER52> This is of course supposed to say Larry Ellison but I can't edit.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> [https://archive.is/55ZvG](https://archive.is/55ZvG)

<comment><USER46> [https://archive.is/55ZvG](https://archive.is/55ZvG)

> Microsoft earlier Sunday said it was notified earlier in the day of the > decision by TikTok parent ByteDance Ltd.

> "We are confident our proposal would have been good for TikTok's users, > while protecting national security interests," the company said in a > statement. "To do this, we would have made significant changes to ensure the > service met the highest standards for security, privacy, online safety, and > combatting disinformation, and we made these principles clear in our August > statement. We look forward to seeing how the service evolves in these > important areas."

Yeah, as a self-appointed member of the worldwide trade commission, enforcing the antitrust rules and regulations, I'm really happy that the Microsoft's bid has been declined!

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> Oracle, really? M&A needs strategic fit to make real sense (for buyers other than financial sponsors), and I don't see any

You don't just pick the highest paying bid, necessarily

<comment><USER55> It needs strategic fit FOR THE BUYER, not the seller. Besides, M&A is more driveen ny management hubris than business value anyway.

<comment><USER54> It also matters for the seller, to some extent, because the employees will now work at Oracle. If you're the CEO of TikTok, and now you're "Chief Social Media Officer" or whatever title the buyer will think up, would you rather hold that job at Oracle, Microsoft or somewhere else?

Sure, if you're the shareholder, you may not care what happens to your former employees, but the buyer _should_ care that the value of the asset they just paid for is inclusive of human capital, and that value depends on the opinion of the people working on the seller's side

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Not sure if everyone knows this, but Oracle owns and rents the largest personal information database in the world. They have more than Facebook or so it's rumored.

<comment><USER57> Can you share more on this?

<comment><USER58> > Oracle Corp. has spent five years and billions of dollars getting really > good at following people around the internet. Six acquisitions reportedly > totaling at least $3 billion since 2014

[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-06/oracle- di...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-06/oracle-didn-t-see- the-data-reckoning-coming)

<comment><USER59> More importantly, they own Datalogix, which aggregates loyalty card details for retail.

This means that Oracle are legitimately the best people to answer the question of which half of your advertising was wasted for offline sales.

Weird, right?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER60> Here's the arstechnica take on this:

[https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/09/oracle-one-of- do...](https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/09/oracle-one-of-donald- trumps-favorite-companies-wins-tiktok-deal/)

</comment><comment><USER61> Well rumor circulating in China's VC / startup circle is that this ISN'T true either.

</comment><comment><USER62> That's a very smart move, they sell it to the least competent bidder possible. If microsoft buys it, you might have a global competitor with big number of Hollywood stars as influencers. With oracle it will be a slow death but with enough money not die anytime soon.

</comment><comment><USER58> On The Guardian: [https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/sep/14/tiktok- by...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/sep/14/tiktok-bytedance-to- partner-with-oracle-in-us-after-rejecting-microsoft-bid)

On Reuters: [https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-autos/europe- br...](https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-autos/europe-britains- carmakers-warn-of-110-billion-euro-hard-brexit-bill-idUKKBN2640YV)

</comment><comment><USER63> Oracle must have made the most concessions of control to ByteDance. Oracle gets a popular brand, data, and a strong entry into social networks.

</comment><comment><USER64> That's very smart of Oracle. They will introduce ERPs to kids from early age. I heard it's a dream of 10years old to get into the enterprise.

</comment><comment><USER65> One thing about Oracle, either it prints money for Ellison or it ceases to exist. I suspect tiktok will be no more in about 2 years.

</comment><comment><USER66> Plain text of the article for those behind paywall:

[https://gist.githubusercontent.com/llacb47/2beb750b56bc98a5d...](https://gist.githubusercontent.com/llacb47/2beb750b56bc98a5daa8a1257f27a2c3/raw/ec9ea9a9d73dea8017c6e165ac5bb45b202f4550/wsj- tiktok.txt)

<comment><USER67> For the WSJ you can just append this to the URL to bypass the paywall:

?mod=djemalertNEWS

<comment><USER68> any idea why that is the case?

<comment><USER67> None, sorry.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER69> Chinese law requires that algorithms are not exported out of china. So how would their recommendation algo work which requires processing all this data. Will that run on Oracle cloud in US or in China ?

And how does it stop any bytedance engineer from logging into the cloud machine or looking into the data directly

</comment><comment><USER70> "Hello Fellow Students!"

</comment><comment><USER71> The hate around Oracle seems very emotional without reason and reminds me of the hate around Microsoft back in the day.

Oracle's latest acquisition [0] by is a consumer video creation company called sauce.video [1]

It could be that Oracle is looking for a new challenge in video technology to demonstrate the capabilities of their cloud services, even Zoom chosen them for their infrastructure [2].

[0] [https://www.oracle.com/corporate/acquisitions/](https://www.oracle.com/corporate/acquisitions/)

[1] [https://www.oracle.com/corporate/acquisitions/sauce- video/](https://www.oracle.com/corporate/acquisitions/sauce-video/)

[2] [https://www.oracle.com/customers/zoom.html](https://www.oracle.com/customers/zoom.html)

<comment><USER72> > The hate around Oracle seems very emotional without reason and reminds me of > the hate around Microsoft back in the day.

Seriously? There were plenty of legitimate reasons to hate Microsoft "back in the day". Less of them now, but hating Microsoft in the 90s and 00s was not "without reason".

<comment><USER71> > Less of them now, but hating Microsoft in the 90s and 00s was not "without > reason".

Never said that, read what I said again.

<comment> yjftsjthsd-h > The hate around Oracle seems very emotional _without reason_ and _reminds me > of the hate around Microsoft back in the day_.

(emphasis mine) Okay, what am I missing? That looks like exactly the same statement.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER73> Oracle Enterprise TikTok. Licensing experts from Oracle will visit kids and check if they are properly licensed. Multi-core phone owners will pay extra unless their family is on Oracle Premier Support.

</comment><comment><USER74> If I were Facebook I'd offer to pay for Oracle to buy it. What better way to kill off an upstart social media app popular with young people than to have Oracle run it! Zuck must be thrilled.

</comment><comment><USER75> This should not be a surprise. If you want to monkey around with the codebase and the algorithm, which company is easier to dupe? Microsoft or Oracle?

</comment><comment><USER76> Crony capitalism, anyone?

"Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison earlier this year threw a fundraiser at his house for the president. Chief Executive Safra Catz also worked on the executive committee for the Trump transition team in 2016."

</comment><comment><USER77> This reminds me of when Yahoo! bought Tumblr.

</comment><comment><USER78> "how do you do, fellow kids?"

</comment><comment><USER79> Hahaha! Has Oracle ever run a B2C product in their existence? Or anything ad supported? Or anything at all that you don't buy with a contract?

I can't see any scenario where this ends well. Reminds me of Dyson's electric car ambitions. Or the time I considered living in a van, I was quite drunk that day.

</comment><comment><USER80> They probably didn't want the app to survive and be competitive in the US. They didn't want a company capable of nurturing it and expanding it to buy it (Microsoft). They were contemplating just killing, at least this way they get a pay out.

</comment><comment><USER81> serious question: does anyone think this is a good idea? is there an argument that this could be a good thing?

</comment><comment><USER82> What cloud provider does TikTok use now?

<comment><USER83> They signed $800 million with google cloud a couple of years ago. So probably that with a mix of others

</comment></comment><comment><USER84> This probably means that the CPP will still continue to gather the data, despite this "ownership" change.

</comment><comment><USER85> Ellison is a big time donor for Donny.

It never was about 'best fit' or "national security'.

It's corruption, clear as day.

[https://www.businessinsider.com/oracle-billionaire-larry- ell...](https://www.businessinsider.com/oracle-billionaire-larry-ellison-is- fundraising-for-donald-trump-2020-2?op=1)

<comment><USER86> Also very similar to Zoom which also partnered with Oracle and immediately the zoom-is-in-bed-with-the-chinese-communist campaign ended.

<comment><USER87> Ellison said that Zoom chose Oracle because "we were faster—much faster—and we were much less expensive and we were more secure." ([https://www.barrons.com/articles/oracle-and-tiktok-why- ceo-l...](https://www.barrons.com/articles/oracle-and-tiktok-why-ceo-larry- ellison-should-just-say-no-51598055844))

I wonder where I heard this speech-pattern before?

<comment><USER88> It strains credulity to claim with a straight face that Oracle is much less expensive than its competitors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER89> Safra Catz is relatively close to the Trump administration.

</comment><comment><USER90> not strange

\- TikTok ruined Trumps rally

\- Facebook is threatened by TikTok growth in US

\- Zuck testifies before congress, pointing fingers at China and companies like TikTok

\- Zuck met Trump, shaked hands under the table

\- Trump asks TikTok to sell

\- to Oracle.... best US company to curb TikTok growth

\- Facebook does nothing about Trump posts

\- Profit for Trump, less competitor for Zuck

\- Things probably staged. What is one reason TikTok "chooses" Oracle over Microsoft?

edit: formatting

</comment><comment><USER91> I'm sure Trump is thrilled about this since Larry Ellison is a Trump supporter who fund raises for him.

<comment><USER92> Trump probably okayed the deal, or made it happen.

Now Tiktok has to please not one but two authoritarian governments.

</comment></comment><comment><USER93> A win for all the conservatives on TikTok. Larry is a big Trump supporter.

</comment><comment> non-entity TikTok Enterprise (tm)

<comment><USER94> Oracle Funny-Clock-Sound Personal Video Suite for Youth Management (Single- Core License)

<comment><USER7> (Single-Thread License. They don't want people ripping them off with multithreaded CPUs.)

<comment><USER95> They saw an article about Heterogeneous ARM cores in smartphones and just couldn't help themselves.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER96> Did China just get access to Oracle and Oracle Cloud?

<comment><USER97> good for American company, better that data stays in US than in China</comment></comment>


How Not to Write an API - <AUTHOR> http://getpostdelete.com/how-not-to-write-an-api.html

<comment><USER2> Damn those free, MIT-style licensed, open-source, decently maintained, libraries designed for usecase A!

They don't work for my Usecase D! These people are ass holes. How dare they?!?!?!?

/s

Have you actually submitted issues for the problems you're facing? That repo has 94 open issues and 833 closed ones..

Have you tried contributing by submitting pull requests?

Seriously this community was not built on entitlement, and it won't support yours here now.

</comment><comment><USER3> Nobody is preventing you from forking and trying to get your improvements(?) merged upstream...</comment>


'Inhuman Microphone' [iPhone] App Circumvents Occupy Wall Street's Megaphone Ban - wh-uws http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/12/inhuman-microphone/all/1

<comment><AUTHOR> "you don't need to understand how the Inhuman Microphone works in order to use it. Just like democracy."

It's shit like this...</comment>


A Few Notes On The Culture, by Iain M. Banks - <AUTHOR> http://nuwen.net/culture.html

<comment><USER2> From the notes:

 _Of course, the materials used in the construction of something ten million kilometers in circumference spinning once every 24 hours are far beyond anything we can realistically imagine now, and it is quite possible that the physical constraints imposed by the strength of atomic bonds ensure that such structures will prove impossible to construct, but if it is possible to build on a such a scale and subject such structures to forces of these magnitudes, then I'd submit that there is an elegance in using the same rotation to produce both an acceptable day-night cycle and an apparent gravity which makes the idea intrinsically attractive._

I've been thinking off and on about materials needed to construct an orbital. [1]

To construct an entire ring (as opposed to just two opposing plates held in place by tractor beams), I believe that nothing more exotic than regular steel would be required. Solid mountains of stone might be a challenge, but making them hollow is feasible. And having oceans with an average depth of 4km should be readily achievable too.

If, for example, a 100m thick steel ring is not sufficient to construct an orbital, I'd like to hear otherwise.

[1] [http://www.reddit.com/r/TheCulture/comments/11mt3m/speculati...](http://www.reddit.com/r/TheCulture/comments/11mt3m/speculation_about_the_construction_of_a_culture/)</comment>


Security Tips Every Signal User Should Know - <AUTHOR> https://theintercept.com/2016/07/02/security-tips-every-signal-user-should-know/ <comment><USER2> Odd that the article mentions password locking your phone, but doesn't mention Signal's optional feature of locking all of Signal's conversations behind a password phrase.</comment>


Learn to Code in 2017, Get Hired, and Have Fun Along the Way - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@andreineagoie/learn-to-code-in-2017-get-hired-and-have-fun-along-the-way-5ff4c1b1a790#.inrtxavet <comment><USER2> I learned to "code" and have fun doing it. I don't have a job doing do it, probably never will.

It's simply not that simple.</comment>


Ask HN: Learn transcendental meditation? - <AUTHOR> What resource, thought process, mindset, etc would you recommend for truly making breakthroughs in meditation? Anything from a particularly helpful book, school of thought, or realization that took things to the next level for you would be helpful. <comment><USER2> I first learnt meditation at age 11. Lucky that my parents thought it valuable. Have discovered several different types over the years, some more useful than others.

TM, transcendental meditation involves being given a specific mantra by a TM master. This is usually a word that you focus on during the meditation for 20mins twice a day. It works if you work it as with most things. You can choose a word, like 'focus' or 'love' to meditate on even if you haven't been given an official mantra. Or you can simply visualise the flicker of a candle flame in your minds eye.

Mindfulness is the most useful meditation form I've found to help me. It is not a dedicated time that you 'do' meditation, but a greater awareness of yourself and all around you as you go through life. It is becoming the observer. Simply by noticing your thoughts and noticing yourself noticing your thoughts it can bring about a much higher level of clarity.

The great thing with this is you can set up certain triggers to remind you to do it. There are several apps that can ding at a random interval and remind you to become aware. Or you can use walking through a doorway as your trigger.

For me personally, I want to improve my levels of patience. So now any time I feel impatient, I use that as my trigger to become present to where I am, what I'm feeling and how I'm being.

Being impatient is essentially rejecting the reality of 'now' for some preferred future. So by coming back to experiencing the present moment as if I had chosen it myself, it's quite a powerful way to then move forward.

Best book I've read that can help with this is Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle.

There are many kinds of visualisations, breathing techniques, silence and stillness exercises, but the most useful to actually making a difference in life is mindfulness from my experience. And the great thing is it doesn't take any extra time out of your day!

<comment><AUTHOR> Beautiful response, I appreciate your insight. The "walking through a doorway" trigger is something that I will definitely try to implement. Are tips like that what I am going to find in Power of Now? Are there specific gurus who you feel make these difficult concepts and their implementations more accessible to someone who was born and raised in Western society?

<comment><USER2> Thank you. Yes, Power of Now breaks the concepts down into chunks that are much more tangible and easier to understand than the oft quoted "focus on nothing" that is so unachievable for most people.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> For transcendental meditation, try meditating on π.

I prefer algebraic meditation, so I meditate on √2 instead.

EDIT: This was downvoted within two minutes. Get a sense of humor, HN.</comment>


The Next CSS Frontier – Classless - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@ubershmekel/the-next-css-frontier-classless-5e66f3f25fdd <comment><USER2> this one has been around for years - [https://github.com/yegor256/tacit](https://github.com/yegor256/tacit)</comment>


Show HN: Quick Cursor – use big Android phones with one hand - <AUTHOR> Free app without ads that makes it easy to use big Android phones with one hand.
The app can be found in Play Store with the name Quick Cursor: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.quickcursor
It is an alternative to the already known Reachability Cursor app which, unfortunately, it is not maintained anymore (from 2018) and does not work on new Android versions.
I need help to collect any feedback on this early version. I'm interested in opinions about the idea, feedback on how it works on other devices, bugs, interesting features that might be helpful, etc. Anything you have to say about it!
Thanks HN! <comment><AUTHOR> Play Store link to install the app: [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.quickcurso...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.quickcursor)

</comment><comment><USER2> It never showed up for me. I followed the instructions. I'm on a samsung galaxy note 9. Any way I can send you debug logs?

<comment><AUTHOR> can you try to go in Settings -> Swipe zones and change the trigger size? And then try to grab it from those triggers?

Thanks!</comment></comment>


Show HN: Bowerbird, a Chrome extension that lets you see and edit webpage colors - <AUTHOR> https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ijhcklddpbfbnnabmlhpjdlmokhfiljd?hl=en-US

<comment><AUTHOR> We hope you find it useful! The source is available at: <https://github.com/nthloop/bowerbird></comment>