Ask HN: How was your first performance review? - <AUTHOR> How was it? Did you get what you were expecting?  Did you regret anything? What would you advise to first timers? <comment><USER2> It was a complete and utter waste of time, as has been every other performance review I have ever been a part of.

Performance reviews from bosses are almost always useless and do more harm than good. The only possible exception I've seen might be in research settings where supervisors sometimes work closely with you and may actually be qualified to evaluate your work. But in that case, usually they are already giving you feedback during the process and a formal performance review is just a checkbox item to satisfy their own supervisor or funding organization.

Moreover it is generally impossible to have a fair and honest discussion with someone who can fire you or influence your pay.

Actual feedback on your work from skilled technical people on your team and actual users is generally far more useful than a performance review and can be gathered at any time.

<comment><USER3> Well, I can't say I have ever had a performance review that was inspiring or useful, but it's kind of depressing when you start out having them and then stop. Because one of the subtexts is, why even pretend we might give you a raise? And it means you're unlikely to be fired, but it also means nobody even cares enough to do something about anyone that is causing problems.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Odd that many in this thread blame performance reviews themselves ("complete and utter waste of time", "waste of time and simply busy work", etc) and not the manager giving them.

For your manager to do it right requires some courage (to give negative feedback), maturity (to do it professionally), training (e.g. never deliver feedback in 'the compliment sandwich') and empathy (to relate to the employee's POV). Obviously most managers lack these.

E.g. Some employees are over-eager and blitz colleagues: "Hey did you get the email I just sent 30 seconds ago?" Others like to have Jira ticket comment wars. A good manager would give direct feedback routinely throughout the year.

"Hey Bob, blowing up my inbox with dozens of IMs and emails in a single day is counter-productive."

"Hey Suzy, that 750-word Jira comment about why your dispatch function to the React store is a better approach then Duane's could have been better handled face-to-face."

Then the performance review is hopefully a boring, pedestrian summary of stuff talked about all year.

Instead managers are afraid to give feedback and wait until January to tell you all the things they hate about you. Plus your review is likely tied to your compensation/promotion, often making it unnecessarily a high-stress, do- or-die bombshell.

What's really important these days (IMHO) is not the review itself since nowadays everyone changes jobs like they change pants, what matters is your ability to receive negative feedback like an adult and adapt. It means having a manager who can give negative feedback like an adult (a big if) but that will likely help you more in your career than generic pats on the back.

Happy review season everyone.

<comment><USER5> I hear what you are saying, but... in several places where I have been a manager, it really didn't matter what I said or how I said it. Pay increases (or not) came from HR. Scoring rubrics came from HR. The performance review was performance art, nothing more. I knew it, the employee knew it, and frankly it was more fun to polish our resumes and laugh/cry about it.

What I tried to do instead was offer continuous feedback and career direction, with the understanding that it was just advice. Sure I tried my part to advocate to HR and up the food chain, but in a lot of places they really don't care about retainment or career progression.

<comment><USER4> Ideally a good performance review helps the employee become better, and they can use that feedback to grow in their carer.

E.g. have someone on your team who writes long e-mails? Or insta-replies to things without taking time to think? Helping those people grow is the point.

Compensation is a universe unto itself. Ideally we'd all be paid according to merit but merit is hard to measure. A (well-executed) performance review should have value in helping people grow and not just be a vector for more $$.

Realistically speaking if you want to significantly increase your compensation these days you have to get a new job.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Somehow I ended up getting a perfect score in every category, which in my company is not typical and I was given pretty much no feedback.

I'm confident my manager was scolded for the score he gave me by his boss or hr.

Ever since he's given me the most middle of the road scores . The only take away I've gotten from this experience is that performance reviews in my company are more political then actually reflective of your performance.

<comment><USER7> This really gets me:

      I was given pretty much no feedback

This is exactly what happened to me a few years back. I was so eager for that review since we had all our KPIs recorded and I knew I had a perfect record, and all I heard was something along the lines "I have nothing bad to say". In that review, my manager said my results would warrant at least an A, and a promotion would probably be on the way. Probably.

A few weeks later I received a letter with my C rating, and I left the company a few months later.

<comment><USER8> I once had an interesting review: "Ordinarily if someone had given me this list of accomplishments I would give them I very good review. But I just don't like you". Sometimes reviews serve you well in ways you don't expect ;-) Especially when you are at the start of your career, you don't always twig that the place you are working in is completely dysfunctional.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> My company had just started doing performance reviews, as they had been growing a lot (generic small startup with unlimited vacation and all that) and it was That Time. So this was a quarterly performance review, but was my first after having worked there 1-2 years.

The system had six levels resembling standard deviations in a normal distribution, so ~2% at the extreme high and extreme low. In parallel, you pick one for yourself and describe why in text, and your manager picks one for you and describes why in text. Then some software simultaneously shares them between you, and you have a 1:1 to discuss things you didn't agree on, or that one of you brought up but not the other.

I rated myself as the highest level, because I thought I was the second- highest level and had learned that my opinions about myself are generally lower than others' opinions of me, so I decided to purposefully account for imposter syndrome. My manager rated me as the second-highest level and said that the only thing keeping me from the highest level was the amount of vacation I'd taken that quarter.

I'd taken 5 weeks off that quarter. It's a lot for a quarter, but it was also the only time I'd taken off the whole year, and 5 weeks was the "recommended" yearly amount. So I wasn't sure how to feel, and second-highest level didn't seem like something to complain about.

Still not sure how I feel five years later because I do see both sides and it's a hard problem to fairly solve. But I live a happy life and don't have any complaints, so I don't let it get to me. It's just a performance review, and you will look back in 10 years from a different job, city, and/or life situation wondering why you cared so much.

<comment><USER10> If a company has an "unlimited" vacation policy, it's totally off-limits to bring that up against you in a review. They could say that you didn't get X work done or something, but with that kind of vacation policy — it's what they specifically signed up for.

<comment><USER11> Just another data point to show that when you hear "unlimited vacation" you should think about it the same way as when you hear your cell phone company say "unlimited data"

<comment><USER10> A company policy of unlimited vacation is highly regressive and damaging to the workforce as a whole. It obviously creates a situation where it becomes a competition on who takes less vacation time, as an indicator of one's dedication to the company (whether you think this is a reliable indicator of dedication is irrelevant—all that matters is that many people _do_ think it is, and evaluate others from that perspective).

To avoid this kind of situation, people should be required to take vacation, both to actually get some rest, and to keep a reasonably level playing field for all employees.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> At first confusing, then enlightening. When I was hired, I was told many things about the values of the company, how much they wanted people to think about doing things differently and create innovation even if it was not directly profitable, how much they value diverse contributions and thought, and most importantly, how it's not all about the bottom line here.

I was praised in my 1 year performance review to no end and given great feedback by my manager about new initiatives I had worked on or projects I had done. When I got my official paper copy of the review, it had a score that equaled C- because my estimated revenue contribution was ~5% below my role's average and that was essentially the only thing that mattered for performance evaluation score and bonus/promotion opportunities.

Knowing this, I focused much more on making money the next year and got a much better grade. I left the company shortly after that and I'm still mad they were not just honest with me at the start. I would have taken another job if I knew that was what the deal was, which I suspect is why they lied.

</comment><comment><USER13> My first performance review came 6 months after I started at IBM. I was basically told that I did everything perfectly but I still got what amounted to a middling "satisfactory" rating. My manager told me that I will get a better score next year if I change nothing about my performance, and the "satisfactory" rating was due to company policy and my not having worked there a full year yet. I later learned that managers have a budget of how many good/medium/bad ratings they can hand out, and the choice of who gets what is 100% arbitrary and up to the manager. Big company politics I guess <shrug>. I proceeded to have many much better years after that, fortunately.

</comment><comment><USER14> I seem to be going against the grain here, but I actually find them generally useful. I have a 1-2-1 with my Line Manager every 4 weeks and I find it great to discuss what I have been doing.

My manager asks about what ive been working on, if the pace is good for me and if there is anything holding me back.

I can be frank on how I feel about things (Ive mentioned that I felt I wasnt doing any productive work, because I wasnt comfortable with the experience I had and didnt want to slow down the team) and get honest feedback with them actually trying to help. Its also a great time for me to improve our relationship and ask about the future (Whats happening with this team? How is this project going? When will I be able to do x?).

The main issue here seems to be managers who don't care, not the process itself.

</comment><comment><USER15> My first performance review was at my third job. I was promoted to lead dev in my first six months at my first job and by the time my review came up we had been acquired. In my second job I was made redundant a few days before my review.

My first review was a total waste of time, but I only learned this after my second review. In my first review I was given an "average" rating, because my technical knowledge was high, but some of my projects were late. Most of this was out of my control, and was down to the fact that I refused to work in my free time to make up for shoddy project management. I was also told that I could apply for a mid-level promotion, despite already being mid-level. I played ball regardless, and got my "promotion" and pay rise.

My second review was "outstanding", and I learned that my job title, at least internally, was now senior-level. While I was a better developer after 12 months, the only thing that had changed was that the manager that did my last review had left and my new manager liked me. The only constant was the managing director, and when I questioned what made the company decide I had gone from junior to senior within the space of a year they couldn't give an answer. Despite being given a nicer job title, more responsibility, and more money, I was annoyed at how stupid the process was.

A day earlier, one of our best developers was given a poor review. The manager didn't like him because his project was grossly behind schedule. This was no fault of his own, and he was being punished because he took on a very hard project and was ignored when he requested that we start from scratch due to the issues with the initial build. His review wasn't a reflection of his skill, because skill-wise he was way above everyone else there. His review was down to how liked he was, and whether he played "the game".

I've been a developer for a decade now, and I can't name a single review that was worth my time, because ultimately the outcome has always been obvious. I always try to be positive and to show empathy where possible, and for around 6+ years that approach has always given me solid reviews. The technical side has always been largely irrelevant, even when working with languages/tools that are new to me.

</comment><comment><USER16> Right out of college, I got hired into a team that maintained trading software for a big bank. I was thoroughly disinterested in trading, which made it quite difficult for me to understand the needs of the people for whom I was maintaining software. Looking back, I realize that because of my disinterest in trading, I was a terrible fit for that job, and I was quite unhappy and non-performant as a result.

The mediocre performance review I got helped me realize that I was a poor fit for my team, and it motivated me to transfer to a different team which was a better fit.

My next few performance reviews were much better, but I eventually left the big bank for a startup, and now I am as happy as a clam!

I advise first-timers to make friendships with managers other than the one they report to, and ask their help to interpret the results of the review. It's difficult to interpret the results of a performance review without the benefit of mental separation (the ability to look at it in an impartial way, without being blinded by ego) and experience, both of which an experienced manager should have. If nothing else, having a sympathetic and interested human you trust interpret these results is bound to help a great deal.

For bonus points, identify and cultivate a few older mentors, and keep in touch with them even after you move to new teams and new jobs. For even more bonus points, pick up a mentee or two when you gain a few years of experience.

</comment><comment><USER17> Consider doing your own review first. Then do a review based on what you consider as your manager's point of view. If you can get some other opinions about how you seem at various points of time, eg your partner's perspective, this might be useful as well. Your general vibe of not being grouchy after various events throughout should be applicable. Feed this all into your own review of yourself. Was the year doing this work actually successful and good for you? Were you a good fit? What worked? What didn't?

Two perspectives:-

One of my early reviews: Complete and utter waste of time. Nothing said by the manager was useful for the future. No actionable items. Useless evaluation criteria and meaningless bland comments. I read the notes afterwards three times and got advice from others to verify. Their advice: get out fast.

My review at my next job was great and set the stage for much better results. I actually saw the gaps I needed to fill and multiple possibilities for improvement and alternative pathways to access them. Helped with a training plan and what I needed to cover as a educational framework for the next 10 years.

The difference was night and day. If the review is merely a checklist item then its unlikely to be useful.

</comment><comment><USER18> Performance reviews are a waste of time and simply busy work. When you're a star performer but not getting a raise then you leave.

</comment><comment><USER19> My first performance review was around 2013 or so on my first job, after not doing any significant work for the first few months I was worried I was asking my manager too many questions. I was told I was doing great. I then got a 25% raise next month without anyone communicating anything else to me (not a lot of money but the percentage is still significant at that point).

Since then, and despite not being the best worker in any group I've been in, I've have had good to stellar reviews that resulted in no actionable items and no salary adjustments.

This whole experience does lead me to believe that performance reviews are very hard to get right (ie. to make them actually useful).

</comment><comment><USER20> As a general rule it should be transparent to you what is evaluated how. Is it subjective feedback (" _I_ have the feeling you could benefit from looking through your code before submitting to review."), is it some kind of arbitrary metric ("Your change requests take way more iterations than the average before being merged.") or is it some kind of pre-arranged evaluation scheme ("You scored only 3 out of 10 on the code quality.").

With that knowledge you can prepare a defense or proactive suggestions for improvement if you feel the need. It could also give you something to use as an argument for a raise.

</comment><comment><USER21> _Performance reviews. If you didn 't demotivate your employees till now, now it's the time._

I've read somewhere that as a manager you don't have to motivate the people, you just have to be careful not to demotivate them.

</comment><comment><USER22> My first performance review as an employee was good. I had a manager that cared about his employees and understood their strengths and weaknesses. I was challenged on some key shortcomings but got enough positive feedback and reward to keep me motivated. He had good visibility into what I was doing and what its impact (or lack thereof) was.

My first performance review that I gave as a manager was terrible. My employee was twice my age, and I'd managed him for 2 months. He came into the room and his first words were "Yeah. I think in my entire career, this kind of thing has only been useful once."

<comment><USER21> _My first performance review that I gave as a manager was terrible._

I understood that you took it personally?

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> It was very positive. This was back when we had 'ratings' like On Target, Above Target, Significantly Above Target, etc. I only joined a couple of months before the review period so it was not really a full review. I got positive feedback which told me that if I continue on the same track I'll be performing well above target in the next review. I got a nice raise and bonus. Eventually we got rid of the rating system, but the reviews have come with useful feedback and a decent compensation bump in the form of bonuses, salary, and RSUs each year.

</comment><comment><USER24> It takes me about 3 years of working closely with someone before I can give them useful feedback. And when I want to give someone feedback, I take them out for a walk or go get coffee with them and ask them if they're willing to take some feedback from me.

Don't expect too much from your official performance reviews, especially in terms of actionable feedback. However, sometimes reviews can teach you that the way others perceive your value to the team/company might be very different from your own beliefs of what you think you're good at.

</comment><comment><USER25> Most people are too nice in reviews. You probably won't get better as a result.

Respect people who give it to you straight, even if it costs you the ego stroke of a promotion. Your career is a marathon, so your first performance review is like the first half mile - focus on your process, and getting better, rather than being ahead of the competition.

The only good performance reviews I've gotten are when I evaluated myself. But of course, those are laden with bias.

</comment><comment><USER26> They didn't inform me that it was a performance review. I did not notice that it was a performance review. It wasn't made clear what or weather i was doing well or should change behavior. I didn't interpret the meeting as intended to have any effect on my employment. It was months later, after I had started hearing friends talk about their performance reviews, that I realized that I had one as well.

</comment><comment><USER27> My manager set no goals. I received an email in Feb (appraisal was April-March following year) that I did Ok but have to do better to get more money or be promoted. No goals again next year. Same feedback. Forced my manager to set goals for the following year. Managers changed. Had to start over. Left my jobs. If a company says that there are no fixed goals or no fixed vacation days, run. Run and dont look back.

</comment><comment><USER28> Boss said I was too slow. It's a confusing bit of feedback because colleagues were telling me to slow down. I graduated from a pretty elite university where we had a weekend to write a client+server in C... and my first job was PHP. So the work felt trivial.

I feel that it was just a negotiation tactic. I quit after a year there. He proposed a counter-offer later, but I decided to try elsewhere.

</comment><comment><USER29> Don't fear it.

If you have a good boss/coach it will be constructive and you'll identify areas to improve on and maybe get some training if you want.

If you have a bad one you will get rated on some scales, make some goals nobody will give you room to work on. Just get through it quickly and try to keep the goals remotely realistic so you can still convince them to a raise later..

</comment><comment><USER30> I think these reviews depend on your manager. If you have a good manager, they will make it important, meaningful, and worthwhile. Plus dependant on how well the reviewee prepares for the review and how serious they take it. That being said, these type of managers are rare. I'm generally unimpressed with performance reviews.

</comment><comment><USER31> 1995/6? Went to the pub. Founder told me I was getting a pay rise from £13,600 to £15,600. He then made a pantomime of patting his pockets before saying he'd left his wallet in the office...

Simpler times back then.

</comment><comment><USER32> My overall grade was 'Outstanding', but I joined in Feb, so had a good -5 months before I was reviewed. Apparently it's difficult to get this where I work.

</comment><comment><USER33> I don't remember...it was in early 1998.

</comment><comment><USER34> My favorite part was that the only negative marks I got was on leadership. My manager admit that I was not given any power or opportunity to demonstrate my leadership skills.

I got a raise, but ended up leaving 6 months later.</comment>


Chiptune - <AUTHOR> http://chiptune.com/ <comment><USER2> I remember 10 years ago Malcolm McLaren thought Swiss chip music would be the next punk rock.

[http://archive.wired.com/wired/archive/11.11/mclaren.html](http://archive.wired.com/wired/archive/11.11/mclaren.html)

<comment><USER3> It still might. Chip music and Demoscene/Trackerscene music is an unusually vibrant and prolific music scene that has almost no commercial ties to the music industry. It's sort of the most "indie" kind of music you can find, with people doing whatever they feel like for the most part, yet still has some recognizable cultural threads.

<comment><USER4> That was a beautiful response.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Is there a way to actually play chiptunes within the shell, or can you only download them? Seems like it's sort of missing its core competency if there's no WebAudio implementation of a tracker.

<comment><USER6> I'm currently working on a web tracker, and it turns out that it is /much/ easier said than done. You have all the problems of making a web app, coupled with all the problems of making a tracker (of which there are many). Plus, you seem to be suggesting a one-stop allgear tracker, which makes it ten times worse, since one doesn't seem to exist even for desktop yet.

And, a shoutout to, IMO, one of the coolest quasi-demoscene places on the internet, [http://battleofthebits.org](http://battleofthebits.org). Without them, I would never have gotten my feet off the ground with coding.

And, if anyone's curious (it's still in its incredibly early stages), [https://github.com/ianremsen/lunartracker](https://github.com/ianremsen/lunartracker)

<comment><USER5> Admittedly, it'd be easier to just render all the audio to MP3, stick it on S3 (6000 chips = ~70GB of music?), and create a tracker _interface_ that actually just streams those MP3s. Costly on bandwidth, though.

<comment><USER7> As a showcase for the MP3 approach, for C64 music there's this [1] that has more than 50000 tracks recorded from actual SID chips (because the emulators are still not perfect, apparently...). That includes a lot of pointless stuff, though (they've played back every track available, which includes game over jingles and sound effects in many cases).

[1 [http://www.6581-8580.com/](http://www.6581-8580.com/)

<comment><USER8> > (because the emulators are still not perfect, apparently...)

The SID chips contain analog synthesizers that have a very distinct tone which is difficult to emulate in digital signal processing. There was also a lot of variance in the semiconductor manufacturing process, so no two SID chips sound exactly the same.

The SID emulators are actually very different from your typical audio synths, they don't run at the "native" output sample rate (ie. 44.1 or 48kHz) but do their processing at a much higher (closer to MHz) sample rate to better emulate some of the analog phenomena going on in the chip.

So, no, SID chips are still not "perfect" and will probably never be :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> One thing to note if you've never used an Amiga is that you can pick up the white bar at the top and drag it up and down to reveal a screen behind it. This was what passed for entertainment in those days.

<comment><USER10> I'm not sure what you mean by the last sentence. That wasn't entertainment. That was an ultra handy feature which I miss to this day. You could have several fullscreen applications, switch between them easily or just have a peek onto what's going on by dragging the screen down a little bit. It's like a tiled desktop on steroids. Amiga's Multitasking was great (considering the resources).

<comment><USER9> Oh, just an admission that when you pull the workbench down, what you find might not be very exciting :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I'm not sure what I'm looking at. Hints?

<comment><USER12> A pretty good emulation of AmigaOS ~1.3 from the late 1980s.

This site has been around for a long time and is related to the oldskool demoscene ([http://pouet.net](http://pouet.net)) and chiptune music scene ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GH7eUlri4yM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GH7eUlri4yM)).

Unfortunately, apart from the neat OS emulation, it does a rather poor job at communicating what it is about or linking to interesting samples of the art.

<comment><USER13> Awesome compilation! Thanks for the link. I randomly went on a chiptune binge on YouTube a week ago to see what I could find. I made a submission [1] of a video (Black Light Machine [2]) I found because I thought the visualization was really interesting, and the music was really well composed. It's a fascinating genre of music. One of the original sources where I discovered it was on Linus Akesson's website [3].

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8873614](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8873614)

[2] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ik8Bv8KMk7E](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ik8Bv8KMk7E)

[3] [http://www.linusakesson.net/](http://www.linusakesson.net/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I just noticed the Shadow of the Beast demo (SOTB), this is one of the quintessential Amiga games. Wonderful art and music (also rock-hard difficulty).

Not long ago the game was ported to popular modern formats, for anyone interested: [http://www.indieretronews.com/2014/10/shadow-of-beast- legacy...](http://www.indieretronews.com/2014/10/shadow-of-beast-legacy- popular-remake.html)

<comment><USER15> unfortunately, since that article was written, the guy doing the porting has slowed right down. The most up to date info can be found in the EAB forum thread

[http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=74013&page=11](http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=74013&page=11)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> This website brings back so many memories, both of first discovering it, and before that my time on the Amiga.

</comment><comment><USER17> F11 your browser, open 'Starfield' from Demos, resize window to fullscreen, travel through space: [http://i.imgur.com/twSrcy0.png](http://i.imgur.com/twSrcy0.png)

<comment><USER18> Mousewheel appears to control speed. Wouldn't've thought the Amiga had a mousewheel...

</comment></comment><comment> j-b So much nostalgia, just spent the rest of the morning listening to various chiptune's on Spotify.

</comment><comment><USER19> Check out radio Nectarine if you like this kind of music!

<comment><USER20> or Slay Radio -> [http://www.slayradio.org](http://www.slayradio.org) or the Bitjam Podcast -> [http://www.bitfellas.org/page.php?100](http://www.bitfellas.org/page.php?100)

<comment><USER19> awesome, thx!</comment></comment></comment>


Astronomers discover planet made of diamond - <AUTHOR> http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/25/us-planet-diamond-idUSTRE77O69A20110825

<comment><USER2> Amazingly timely given that I'm about half way through A Deepness in the Sky.

(A diamond asteroid figures into the plot.)

<comment><USER3> Not _that_ amazing. Considering that Vinge is of high interest to a number of HN readers, that there are a fair number of HN users, and that Deepness in the Sky is of sufficient length and density that a readthrough (especially a first) can take a pretty decent length of time, I wouldn't find it at all surprising is there was always at least one HN commenter who either was currently in middle of or had just finished Deepness in the Sky.

<comment><USER4> Am I the only one imagining the Dwight Schrute meme while reading this? <http://memegenerator.net/Dwight-Schrute>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> If we could make a few discoveries like that a little closer and in slightly more hospitable environments, maybe we could get some enterprising capitalists to try to cash in, and thereby make our way through and beyond the solar system.

Well, I can dream, can't I?

<comment><USER6> Diamonds are just a special form of carbon which is, itself, not very rare. Granted, it's fairly hard to coax carbon into that form, at least if you want something that looks like a gem, but we already have CVD processes which can make diamond.

The main reason they're valuable is due to marketing.

<comment><USER7> Yup. Producing several megatons of diamond in labs would be many orders of magnitude easier than harvesting it from another planet.

Even if it were the moon that were made of diamond, I strongly suspect that the energy requirements to harvest it would _still_ exceed the normally- extreme energy requirements of growing it in a lab.

<comment><USER8> _harvesting it from another planet_

You raise an interesting idea here. I wonder how difficult it would be to harvest diamond from a diamond planet. Diamond can be cleaved if you hit it at the correct angle [1] but if the entire planet is made of diamond then what would happen? Would a wrong cleave or heavy force shatter the planet into nothingness?

Rather, I think the planet is made of many small (relative to an entire planet) sized diamonds embedded in dirt.

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamond_cutting#Cleaving_or_saw...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamond_cutting#Cleaving_or_sawing)

<comment><USER9> You can cut diamond with diamond saws or lasers, if you wanted to pull out diamond bricks from a big mass or whatever.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Curiouser and curiouser...

"Not only is the universe stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine." \- Sir Arthur Eddington

</comment><comment><USER10> I can imagine a colony being set there by the year 4000 run by the "Company"...

</comment><comment><USER11> The sky is made of diamonds.

<comment><USER12> Not all of it -- this is obviously a custom job from Magrathea.

<comment><USER11> That, or the Spiders. But I didn't see an erupting binary with a disturbingly regular 250-year period.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Twinkle twinkle little star ... Like a diamond in the sky</comment>


Why I don't usually meet startups in person (2019) - <AUTHOR> https://elizabethyin.com/2019/03/08/why-i-dont-usually-meet-startups-in-person/ <comment><USER2> I feel about this the same way I feel about interviewing eng, PM, and particularly sales candidates.

Before you pull the trigger on investing, hiring, whatever, you should meet with candidates at least once __in the way they 'll be performing the job __. If you 're hiring a cold calling salesperson, you should not interview them in person — ever. Their performance is going to be determined – on the job — over the phone, so you should interview them over the phone.

If you're hiring a remote developer, you should interview them remotely. The inverse is true as well: if you're hiring someone to be in the office every day, interview them in the office.

Same goes for investing. How are are you going to be primarily interacting with this team? If you're interacting primarily remotely (e.g., _not_ in the context of a shared-workspace startup incubator), you should feel comfortable interviewing remotely as well. It'll give you a better sense of how your interactions will go in the day-to-day running of the business.

The author's view on using in-person meetings as a way to get a 'feel' for a person resonates with me: it sounds appealing, but it introduces an additional opportunity for bias relative to talking on the phone or even over VC.

<comment><USER3> Where is the evidence for your approach outperforming the alternatives? Hiring is highly subject to confirmation bias. And the false negative results are never quantified.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> _In the venture community today, we reward "visionaries" much more than executors. And a big reason for this is that we make investment decisions based on pitches rather than on execution (aka working) in our decision- making._

Another reason is everyone wants to back the next Steve Jobs, and if you don't have those Jobsian traits, you fail the investor pattern-matching test.

Some startup CEOs know this, and have really perfected the VC signaling down to choices of clothing, speaking styles, and shitty treatment of (some) employees.

I heard something similar from an older advisor at the MIT Venture Mentoring Service. He said something to the effect of, "if you're not raring to go" and "your board has to practically hold you back" then investors wouldn't fund you. He was probably right.

<comment><USER5> _> "have really perfected the VC signaling down to choices of clothing, speaking styles, and shitty treatment of (some) employees"_

Elizabeth Holmes of Theranos comes to mind...

<comment><USER6> One of the more funny aspects of human psychology is that when someone perfectly matched their signals to a very specific audience, it looks _ridiculous_ to anyone not a member of the target audience.

Holmes is possibly one of the most perfect example of this. To any non-VC it's obvious that wearing a black turtleneck is not a necessary precondition to being the next Steve Jobs, but the VC and media commentators fell for it hook line and sinker.

<comment><USER7> It has little to do with the turtle neck. Read the book or watch the documentary.

Elizabeth Holmes was born into money. Her family had connections. One of her first investors was a well known VC and neighbor. All you need is a couple of connections like that to get credibility.

<comment><USER8> The point about it looking ridiculous to outside observers still stands. Connections buy you credibility within the connected groups.

<comment><USER7> You are right: her turtle neck (and fake voice) were both ridiculous.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> _" In the venture community today, we reward "visionaries" much more than executors."_

The former CEO of Better Place comes to mind. Blew through most of a billion dollars, accomplished very little, went bankrupt. But he's tall, very good looking, and a great speaker.

<comment><USER10> >But he's tall, very good looking, and a great speaker.

Never heard of the guy before.Googled to see how well he does public speaking and landed on some TED talk. If I'd talk like him,I would have became a millionaire quite some years ago. However, some of the stuff he says,may have sounded smart in 2010 but today it sounds like complete tosh.

<comment><USER9> That's him, all right.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I like the idea of taking notes and then making your decision based on the notes. That's how the Google interviewing process worked, and I think it emphasizes the things that matter and lets you filter through the things that don't. People have a laundry list of things to do in an interview to hack the system: what you wear, what kinds of follow-up questions you ask, etc. None of those things ever make it into the notes. Only your thought process as it applies to software engineering ends up in there.

To some extent, this really mirrors how we buy consumer products. We read a bunch of experiences and data collected by other people, then make a decision based only on those written notes. Meanwhile, enterprise products are sold by who buys you the best golf outing or who sends you the nicest holiday present. If you remove that source of bias, only the facts stand out. Could be a good technique to apply more widely. Do you want the product that has the best experience from other users, or do you want the one that buys you stuff every few months? As the purchasing manager, of course you want the kickbacks. But the company itself probably wants the one with the best user experience. Something to think about.

<comment><USER12> > making your decision based on the notes

And can wait some days in between too, to better forget the in person impression

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Yep, it doesn't matter in the slightest how charismatic the founder is if their product isn't going to get traction.

I mean, rate founder charisma versus these things:

* Chaos in product - whenever consumers try the product, it bites them

* Packaging misfit - founder drove an IOS app out when market really needs a web experience

* Product lacks rarity - Founder is driving a new iKnockoff when there are scaled competitors already penetrating the market

The list of things that are more important than the founder's charisma goes on and on.

Frankly the charisma at the helm is really more applicable when the company is fully established and has a fan base. For a startup, if the product needs someone charismatic to get traction, hire someone charismatic to sell it.

<comment><USER7> If you think it doesn't matter, you've never been around someone with real charisma. They can BS their way into anything, especially investor wallets. This charisma is actually most useful _before_ the startup has a product. Once the rubber meets the road, those lofty forecasts and powerpoints full of fiction are less useful.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Visionaries get other people to act, and that's important.

WeWork is not a real company, built on Koolaid. This is the paradox. Without the founder's BS it likely would not have happened. Though his forecasts were rubbish, there was (and is) a material, underlying business.

It doesn't take an extrovert to pump the Koolaid a lot of awkward people have kind of a stubborn/lack-of-self-awareness kind of focus, and their own self- belief gives confidence to others.

I think it's rare that successful companies are built without a little bit of 'stupid confidence'. Which at first glance is a paradox, but not once you think about it.

<comment><USER15> > Visionaries get other people to act, and that's important.

Good visionaries can certainly get people to act in good ways.

It appears that there are other kinds of visionaries who get (good?) people to act in bad ways.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> >This top female VC, however, realized that, although she was more excited about the male founder's pitch, when she objectively thought about what he had accomplished, she realized it wasn't much. And that the female founder had knocked it out of the park although her storytelling wasn't as amazing. This story is a true story and this happens all the time in venture.

Aren't VCs also investing in companies that they are betting can raise more money down the road? If you invest in someone who persuades you at a "gut" level, you're taking into account that they will also persuade others at a gut level.

<comment><USER17> But if their product is mediocre then it doesn't matter how many investors they pull in. In the long term, would they actually make a significant amount of money when customers aren't that attracted or satisfied?

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> We met with Elizabeth virtually (didn't like the idea but wanted to invest if we pivoted.) Very fair process & a sharp person to boot- I don't think we lost anything over an in-person meeting.

</comment><comment><USER19> If I had the money I'd secretly get employed at startups I was interested in to see if they were just a bunch of jokers or not.

I'd do this is because if I were that rich then I probably won the lottery and stupidly quit my job without thinking and would probably be very bored.

<comment><USER20> i know a person who did this. he wanted to acquire a company and asked to be hired on for 3 months before it was announced. This way he had time to figure out who was good, who was awesome and who was toxic.

<comment><USER21> Sounds a great way to make employees to perceive you as dishonest from the start.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Unpopular opinion: it really doesn't matter what VCs do or don't do. Most VCs dreadfully under-perform the market. The rate of VC success is mostly related to chance or some unfair advantage in getting into early winners. Most VCs are awful. Meet with them in person, not in person, it doesn't matter. I treat advice from VCs pretty much the same as a random money manager. Maybe what they're saying makes sense, maybe not, but it doesn't deserve any heavy weight.

The 80/20 rule applies heavily to VCs. A very small number of VCs are responsible for the majority of returns. The rest are just chasing deals around. Chase in person. Chase not in person. It really doesn't matter.

<comment><USER23> This page has a chart comparing S&P 500 to other modes. Looks like VC tracks it rather closely.

[https://www.toptal.com/finance/venture-capital- consultants/s...](https://www.toptal.com/finance/venture-capital- consultants/state-of-venture-capital-industry-2019)

Sorry, couldn't find a chart giving just the bottom 80% of VCs :-)

<comment><USER22> This chart shows that only 5% of the VCs are generating most of the returns, and 50% of VC firms can't even return the capital that's invested in them: [https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/01/the-meeting-that-showed- me...](https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/01/the-meeting-that-showed-me-the-truth- about-vcs/)

From the article: ""Ninety-five percent of VCs aren't profitable," he said. It took me a while to understand what this really means."

Basically, the default mode for VCs is to either lose the money investors put in them or modest returns, which isn't particularly good given the risk of the investment class. 80%+ of the VCs you'll talk to underperform the S&P. Those general returns you see? They come from a handful of VCs, who will be much more selective. Basically you can't approach them, they'll approach you since they know they are the kingmakers in the industry.

* Also, check Slide 14 in this deck: [https://www.slideshare.net/gilbenartzy/money-talks-things-yo...](https://www.slideshare.net/gilbenartzy/money-talks-things-you-learn-after-77-investment-rounds)

\- The Top 20 VC funds, which represent 2% of all VC Funds, generate 95% of all VC returns \- 50% of VC firms return less than 1x of invested capital \- An additional 35% of VC firms return less than 2x of invested capital

So yeah, it's even worse than 80/20 rule. 9 out of every 10 VC firms you talk to will most likely be loser funds that don't generate substantial returns. Focus on the top 20 VC funds if you want to be in with the real winners. For everyone else, they're just money managers, mostly losing their investor's money, but pretending like they're kingmakers.

<comment><USER24> Do you feel it's the VC's responsibility to carry you and make your startup successful? Or is their role to provide funds, and possibly some introductions and guidance, and let the chips fall where they may?

<comment><USER25> I think he meant "don't give money to VCs, not "don't take money from VCs".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I would think that an in-person meeting could be substituted by videos calls in the current circumstances, but that phones calls/emails are inferior given the information bandwidth is a lot narrower.

There are lots of different kinds of charisma and they interact differently with a company's potential depending on the business models. For example, a highly technically competent founder may in itself be very charismatic to engineers.

</comment><comment><USER27> I was curious, after seeing this in the article:

> "Contrarian perspective here – it's ok to _not_ meet a founder in person > before deciding to invest."

> This set off a tweet firestorm — mostly with people telling me in some form > or fashion that I was wrong.

I decided to look on Twitter to see more about the controversy, and while I couldn't find as many VC's discussing it as I remembered (maybe some are shy, maybe some use different words than I used in my search), you can see the varied responses below.

It seems like Andreesen's investment in Clubhouse may have been a watershed moment also - legitimizing remote investing for everyone else.

[https://www.mediazed.com/vc-not-meet-in- person.html](https://www.mediazed.com/vc-not-meet-in-person.html)

</comment><comment><USER28> When you create a corporation, you're essentially creating a society (remember: culture is the foundation of society and society is the foundation of civilization)

You can model your society in any way you wish but the intention ought to be to make your society more competitive and capable than the default (i.e. society at large)

The socialist system is something along the lines of 'from each according to his abilities to each according to his needs' but that has never worked out in practice.

There are other systems but the capitalist system ('to each according to his investment, from the collective pot') is close but we mistake what investment is and we drastically misunderstand how to maximize the collective pot.

The whole VC system as it currently stands is a symptom of our distorted view of what investment is and the breakdown of trust required for people to truly maximize their returns, nothing more.

VC's bring money to the table and it seems that this buys them enhanced privilege compared to people who bring other sorts of investment. The minute you begin the VC conversation you begin devaluing the investments of people who bring other sorts of investment (i.e. faith, effort, opportunity costs) and create a sort of toxic feedback bubble whereby the entire system goes off the rails because apart from the money the VC's are hardly invested in your vision, innit

hence the term 'vulture capitalists' \-- how are VC's any different from tech recruiters anyway?.

The only way to make any money is to sell something somebody else makes.

<comment><USER29> > culture is the foundation of society and society is the foundation of > civilization

That's a terrible analogy because it's trivial for the culture to change without civilization being put at risk. Foundations can't be substantially changed without risking everything on top.

<comment><USER28> What are you saying? the minute culture shifts so does civilization. Look at where we are now compared to where we were in the industrial age.

This whole techbro culture has destroyed corporate society and brought about drastic shifts in the entire world civilization and not for the better.

What is this wishful thinking?

Edit: and by the way the word 'culture' comes from the latin for 'core' it's by definition the foundation. I can't believe we're arguing the semantics of well-known words look up culture and society for yourself.

Edit 2: think of your culture like a potluck dinner. Everyone brings their carefully prepared dishes. Some latecomer shows up to the door with a wad of cash and says I didn't prepare anything but suddenly the money they brought entitles them to be first in line. What kind of civilization can exist under these cultural manners?

<comment><USER29> A culture can be destroyed without taking out civilization though. It happens all of the time. Comparing it to a foundation is absolutely terrible.

<comment><USER28> I think I can understand what you're saying but you obviously can't understand what I'm saying.

You're objecting to my use of the word foundation for some reason and all I'm getting out of it is why even bother.

But here goes anyway as you may have heard words have multiple meanings and not everyone uses them the same way.

I'm referring to the second meaning of foundation: an underlying basis or principle.

Culture -> society -> civilization

These three things are built on each other.

When one changes all the others are affected without necessarily being destroyed but yes if one is destroyed the others will suffer too.

You're also probably referring to an alternate definition of civilization as in all of humanity whereas if you ask Siri the definition of civilization is literally what I've written so like why all the hate bub?

"The society, culture and way of life in a particular area" i.e inside a corporation.

Mess with the culture and it has outward ripples to the entire way of life duh

<comment><USER29> I understand what you're saying and I'm suggesting it's a bad model.

You can't have culture without a society and culture is heavily impacted by civilization as well.

"Culture -> society -> civilization" is too rudimentary to be useful and it's just plain wrong in many cases. Changes in technology (e.g. smartphones) or massive events (e.g. pandemics) flow backwards through the chain eventually forcing the culture to change to adapt (social distancing, etiquette for texting at the table, etc).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Along these same lines, I've heard from clients that during the pandemic they started to magically hit their diversity hiring numbers now that they judge applicants on their performance rather than how much they "like" them.

Remote interviews have leveled the playing field and forced them to make more objective decisions about who to hire. Suddenly there is no "pipeline problem"...

<comment><USER31> Any company that has diversity hiring numbers that they are supposed to hit is discriminating based on factors outside of performance if it influences their hiring process at all.

<comment><USER32> The hypothetical you're clearly referring to here is a high-performing white or Asian applicant who regrettably has to be rejected to make room for a mediocre black applicant. This concern is 1% based in reality and 99% based in racist resentment.

Companies make hiring decisions based on all sorts of factors that have nothing to do with performance. Two extremely problematic ones are:

1) soft "skills" like charisma, rapport, etc, which are much more about social identity than social ability, and in particular discriminate against nonwhites, women, and many LGBT people

2) Unvarnished and criminal Klan-style racism, such as turning down a well- qualified job applicant because his name is Jamal, or assuming a black woman must have lied about her 3.9 GPA, which is still rampant in all 50 United States, and an enormous reason for the black-white wealth and income disparity. This sort of blatant discrimination has been repeatedly observed in the 21st century and is a plain fact.

These two practices are not only widespread and illegal, they also deprive companies of good talent. The reason for diversity quotas isn't to distort a (nonexistent) meritocratic hiring process, but instead to correct grotesque violations in actually existing hiring practices.

<comment><USER33> Do you have any sources to back this up? I figured that may have been the case a few decades ago but I imagined nowadays the affirmative action outweighs those factors on a macro scale.

<comment><USER32> I am sorry to keep being uncharitable about this but I am angry and frustrated: the reason you "figured" it may have been the case a long time ago but you "imagine" that nowadays we have the reverse problem is because you are an ignorant racist who is filling your gaps in knowledge with white resentment. I will try to alleviate some of the ignorant side of this:

March 2020, results from a field experiment demonstrating persistent unambiguous racist discrimination: [https://www.nber.org/papers/w26861](https://www.nber.org/papers/w26861)

This is a recent example of a famous series of experiments, where otherwise identical fictitious resumes are given "black-sounding" or "white-sounding" names (or addresses, alma maters, etc), and the researchers count how many callbacks the resumes get. If the black resumes get significantly less callbacks there is no alternative explanation than illegal racism. The classic experiment is "Are Emily and Greg More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal?" from 2003: [https://www.nber.org/papers/w9873](https://www.nber.org/papers/w9873)

A 2016 retrospective of similar labor discrimination field experiments: [https://www.nber.org/papers/w22022](https://www.nber.org/papers/w22022)

Evidence of improving but ongoing racist discrimination against black business owners seeking credit: [https://www.nber.org/papers/w13972](https://www.nber.org/papers/w13972)

2011 paper estimating that 1/3rd of the black-white wage gap is due solely to employment discrimination: [https://www.nber.org/papers/w17462](https://www.nber.org/papers/w17462) (it has been established elsewhere that about ~1/2 the wage gap is due to the education/credentials gap)

An interesting 2019 paper finding virtually no discrimination against Native Americans and Hawaiians: [https://www.nber.org/papers/w25849](https://www.nber.org/papers/w25849) (this is relevant to the sociological view that American racial stratification is anti-black more than pro-white, or rather that "white" really means "not black")

This is just from one google search of the NBER archives on my phone. This evidence exists in spades.

<comment><USER34> Hey, I agree with everything that is being said here but I think it might be unnecessary here to be making personal attacks such as calling somebody racist or implying white resentment because somebody is mis-informed. Especially because -- growing up in a racist society -- we _all_ have internalized racism in some way, which we're just slowly trying to unlearn.

Just based on current events, even many dense non-Whites (myself included) have just started to realize how deep the problem goes when it goes to both conscious and unconscious bias.

We can definitely do better, and I hope the trends do indeed show that we're heading that way.

<comment><USER32> In my view a huge part of the problem is that we keep giving bad people a benefit of the doubt they don't deserve, and keep treating bad faith nonsense as arguments worthy of consideration. In my view I am not making a "personal attack" so much as calling a spade a spade.

To be clear: I believe OP is not just ignorant, but is being a bad person. OP's point was not simply that anti-black discrimination is no big deal - which would be reprehensible enough - but that _the opposite is happening,_ to the detriment of whites. It doesn't matter if OP is parroting racist propaganda or creating it themselves: it is highly potent racist propaganda, designed to convert whites into overt racists by playing on their resentment.

OP isn't "less racist" if they sincerely believe the propaganda due to misinformation: racism is racism and OP is perpetuating it. "Just because he's repeating a racist lie does NOT mean he is a racist" is unfortunately a common line of thought in the US. But this only assuages the feelings of whites, and does not accurately describe racism in America.

<comment><USER31> When you say 'OP', who are you talking about?

<comment><USER17> > Any company that has diversity hiring numbers that they are supposed to hit > is discriminating based on factors outside of performance if it influences > their hiring process at all.

> OP's point was not simply that anti-black discrimination is no big deal - > which would be reprehensible enough - but that the opposite is happening, to > the detriment of whites.

You.

<comment><USER31> You do realize I didn't say any of that and this person hallucinated a giant rant right?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Git-remote-AWS: AWS accounts as Git remotes - <AUTHOR> https://git-remote-aws.autofitcloud.com?src=hn <comment><AUTHOR> Hi guys. The idea of AWS from Git is a new concept that I brought to life just last month to solve a problem of mine. I'm looking for validation if it's a good idea or not, and ideas on what would be good next steps for the project. Links to the same discussions on reddit are available in the tool's homepage (link of this post).</comment>


The winning PC 64k intro from Revision 2016: "fermi paradox" by mercury - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZ6ZzJeWgpY <comment><AUTHOR> Also worth a watch is Conspiracy's close runner-up, "Darkness Lay Your Eyes Upon Me"[0].

[0] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Py1PdrLORQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Py1PdrLORQ)

<comment><USER2> 2 points close, which is absolutely nothing (since every voter could distribute up to 5 points to every demo.)</comment></comment>


Logging Off: The Internet Generation Prefers the Real World - <AUTHOR> http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,710139,00.html <comment><USER2> Does this surprise anybody here? I don't understand the mainstream ignorance about the content provided online. There is a massive divide between internet lurkers and the minority that create content. Most people never reach that level.

And surprise, surprise. Most people that use the internet use it merely to entertain themselves and supersede other one-to-one devices such as the phone at communicating with people.

</comment><comment><USER3> The fact that the internet functions as an extension of offline social space (see here: danah boyd's work on the subject) doesn't mean that the internet isn't hugely important in shaping a lot of how young people are growing up. There can be overlap in things mediated online and offline, but the fact that the web offers new avenues for interaction is still important.</comment>


What It's Like to Be a Woman in Venture Capital - <AUTHOR> http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/09/venture-capitalist-women/501677/?single_page=true <comment><USER2> I hate it when women say being a "parent and wife" is a job.

Are men incapable of also being a parent and married?

I worked at a startup recently where 3 of the founders used this logic on a daily basis and it was very patronizing.

If you want people to start taking women in VC/Tech seriously, stop throwing the fact that you have kids in our face and expecting us to have sympathy for you.</comment>


Should you resend emails to subscribers when they don't open? - <AUTHOR> https://www.gethighlights.co/blog/resend-emails-unopens/ <comment><USER2> This seems to be the summary

"Resending emails to subscribers that didn't open isn't a sustainable strategy. Maybe it will work once or twice, but the more you do it, the less likely it will be to work, and the more likely your emails will get marked as spam or blacklisted."</comment>


Advantages of Using R Notebooks for Data Analysis Instead of Jupyter Notebooks - <AUTHOR> http://minimaxir.com/2017/06/r-notebooks/ <comment><USER2> Once I got serious about this stuff, I started using Emacs with Org Mode and ESS. It has most of the features listed here. It's just a text file, magit is incredible, you can export to HTML and there are lots other formats available as ox plugins (e.g. MediaWiki), excellent LaTeX support, Org Mode is incredible for organizing large analyses and managing todos, you can glue together anything from anywhere (R, Python, shell scripts, Spark clusters, SQL, remote processes, etc.), and so on. Considering I code in addition to doing data analysis, I can reuse all my coding stuff to do data analysis too. I can take notes in Org Mode during a meeting, and then afterwards do some analysis directly on those meeting notes, export to HTML/PDF, and send it to a colleague.

It is missing the quick backtick interpolation that you get with R-Markdown, and some of the nice UI stuff like inline Shiny graphs and clickable tables (but it is easy to output Org-format tables that can be piped into other languages).

<comment><USER3> IMHO R notebooks, jupyter and their ilk are essentially emacs for the masses.. which is neither good nor bad, but is.

<comment><USER4> Yup. Lots of people who rave about the benefits of notebooks are describing the benefits of a REPL.

<comment><USER5> Disagree. A REPL does not make for a log of what you did - which is a big deal if you're revisiting/-running data analysis workflows you haven't touched in a long time.

<comment><USER6> Using a terminal is enough to do that for any REPL: run "script".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I switched from Python to R about 3 years ago. I missed iPython (Now Jupyter) for a long time. Then I just got attached to RStudio.

I have tried R in Jupyter a few times and it was nice but the advantages in R Notebooks is just awesome. Git playing nice is the best advantage.

I still am clueless to the religious Python vs R and the smack that is read that "serious" work is done on in Python? R works best for me.

<comment><USER8> Out of curiosity, what was the motivation for switching from Python to R for analysis, was there a particular R package that you were looking to use?

<comment><USER9> I can't speak for top comment but I started learning R and realized that a lot of the primitives which are exposed in python as libraries are just primitives in R and are thus are more natural to use in subtle ways. Once you start thinking in R you think in data and statistics rather than how you deal with data and statistics within a language. This doesn't mean one is actually better than the other unless you want to do generic programing things along your math oriented code then probably python is better but I find this change of mental state to be useful when focusing on problems R is suppose to solve.

<comment><USER10> R has some really crazy metaprogramming facilities. This might sound strange coming from Python, which is already very dynamic - but R adds arbitrary infix operators, code-as-data, and environments (as in, collections of bindings, as used by variables and closures) as first class objects.

On top of that, in R, argument passing in function calls is call-by-name-and- lazy-value - meaning that for every argument, the function can either just treat it as a simple value (same semantics as normal pass-by-value, except evaluation is deferred until the first use), or it can obtain the entire expression used at the point of the call, and try to creatively interpret it.

This all makes it possible to do really impressive things with syntax that are implemented as pure libraries, with no changes to the main language.

<comment><USER11> Quite true. R was originally build on top of Lisp and it shows in many places, such as in the metaprogramming stuff that you mention.

Overall R seems a little weird at first but the more you get to know the language the more you realise it's actually pretty well thought out.

<comment><USER12> It's true, the more I do in R, the more I wish that it had remained scheme compatible (originally, R was built on a scheme if I remember correctly).

My someday project is `#lang arcket` for Racket, which would allow people to use existing R code, and mix with Racket, with appropriate data.frame data structures and whatnot.

<comment><USER10> The problem will likely be similar to that with alternative Python implementations - because so many existing libraries in the ecosystem are written in C, an implementation that is not ABI-compatible with them is not attractive to most existing users.

<comment><USER12> No fundamental reason I know of that the C libraries for R could be used with Racket as well. After all, both R and Racket are able to do the FFI dance. Could the hypothetical R-in-Racket implementation sufficiently mimic the R FFI as to allow all R code to run without modification? Probably, maybe?

<comment><USER10> That's exactly the problem. R has a very specific API for its extensions - it's not just vanilla C, it's stuff like SEXP.

Although now that I think more about it, it's not quite as bad as Python, because the data structures are mostly opaque pointers (at least until someone uses USE_RINTERNALS - which people do sometimes, even though they're not supposed to), so all operations have to be done via functions, where you can map them accordingly.

You'd also need to emulate R's object litetime management scheme with Rf_protect etc; but that shouldn't be too difficult, either.

Some more reading on all this:

[https://cran.r-project.org/doc/manuals/r-release/R-exts.html...](https://cran.r-project.org/doc/manuals/r-release/R-exts.html#System- and-foreign-language-interfaces)

[http://adv-r.had.co.nz/C-interface.html](http://adv-r.had.co.nz/C-interface.html)

<comment><USER12> Oh, yeah, now that you mention it I have seen the SEXP and protect / unprotect stuff before. Maybe a hybrid approach of porting some of the core stuff / popular libraries to Racket's FFI would be more ideal if one were to do this for real.

Maybe aiming for "mostly compatible, with some porting work for a handful of the more popular non-R (C, Rcpp) packages would yield a better result in the end.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> "No cell block output is ever truncated. Accidentally printing an entire 100,000+ row table to a Jupyter Notebook is a mistake you only make once." Hah, sadly this is not the case for me.

<comment><USER14> Jupyter now has output rate limitations (I pushed for them to add them), though I think they may be off by default. I also implemented something better (I think), which is an output buffer, for CoCalc's version of collaborative Jupyter notebooks. Instead of rate limiting, CoCalc saves only the last part of the output, discarding earlier output, and provides a link to get it.

<comment><USER15> Wow, CoCalc is really cool.

I've often found myself wishing for a collaborative environment like that... and there it is.

Thank you!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Sage deserves a mention: [http://www.sagemath.org/](http://www.sagemath.org/)

</comment><comment><USER17> The big question in data science is: should I spend more time learning Python or R?

The answer is always: math

<comment><USER18> One of the best things for R is the mailing list. At leasr when I was learning stats and R rhe knowledge both of how to do stuff in R and what math to use when was phenomenal. If gentle people didnt answer in time Prof Brian Ripley from Oxford would answer early morning British time and explain why your question was wrong and what the math meant and what you really meant to do and why and then 3 lines of R to do it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Can I say how damn _good_ notebooks (any notebooks) are for data exposition compared to traditional coding environments?

I'm more familiar with Jupyter than R Notebooks. I'd second the point about version control in Jupyter being.. hard. There isn't really a good pattern for it yet.

I would note that I believe the latest version of Jupyter has prettier tables though!

Edit: Also, matplotlib makes me sad. Surely there could be something better which abandons it completely?

<comment><USER20> Re: matplotlib

You have other options like bokeh and plotly

<comment><USER21> And for options utilizing grammar of graphics (really worth knowing, even if you're not coming from the R world) you have ggplot and plotnine, which are both sort of ports of ggplot2 from R.

<comment><USER22> > "grammar of graphics (really worth knowing, even if you're not coming from > the R world)"

Can you explain why? I've never gotten the appeal. Besides the concept, the classic implementation (ggplot) does not make nice graphs in my opinion. To me these look wrong... I guess I'm not quite sure why. There is something about it too cookie cutter, cartoonish and information-light: [http://r4stats.com/examples/graphics- ggplot2/](http://r4stats.com/examples/graphics-ggplot2/)

<comment><AUTHOR> ggplot has many built-in themes if you dislike the defaults. theme_minimal() is a newer one which is close to the FiveThirtyEight style and it works great.

<comment><USER22> It looks better, but still I don't really get what is so great about ggplot. With base R I can pretty much make a chart look however I want based on the context, if it is just something quick and easy for me to check something (where axis labels dont really matter etc) it is like one line of code too.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Can someone here recommend good practical statistics book? Something with modern methods, but explained sufficiently in depth?

<comment><AUTHOR> For statistical programming, since we're talking about R, I strongly recommend R for Data Science ([http://r4ds.had.co.nz](http://r4ds.had.co.nz)) by Hadley Wickham (who created a large amount of the R packages that are very commonly used [tidyverse] and incidentally also now works for RStudio)

A good book on statistical _theory_ is harder to come by, though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Call someone explain in what sense these notebooks are "reproducible" to a greater extent than just a .py or R file? I'm not that familiar with them. Do they have key metadata or something?

<comment><USER25> Writing a bunch of scripts can quickly become a mess. I was working on some twitter analysis for a project, and not really worrying about the code because I didn't intend for it to be used again, and it quickly became a mess of "run this script, then run that script on the generated file, then use this shell command to process the file, then run the final analysis step on that file, then clean up all the intermediates". Not to mention, say, "one-time" data cleanup through the shell / REPL that runs into problems months down the line when you want to update the data set. And, of course, invariably none of this is documented. Notebooks don't _force_ you to organize your code and write documentation, but they strongly encourage it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Relevant discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14035092](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14035092)

</comment><comment><USER27> Really cool article. It still seems like jupyter is the better longterm option because it offers so many different kernels.

</comment><comment><USER28> The team working on Spyder (the Python closest alternative to RStudio) have something like R Notebooks in their roadmap for a while now, but it keeps being pushed into the future.

I wish they could use RStudio for a while and understand just how important is the feature for someone using Python for research.

<comment><USER29> Closest alternative to RStudio (on principle, if not in practice): [http://rodeo.yhat.com](http://rodeo.yhat.com)

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I don't see this replacing Jupyter notebooks any time soon, as they simply are better.</comment>


Ask HN: Which US Visa is needed for this? - <AUTHOR> I'm a french consultant (self-employed). I'm receiving requests from American companies for Ruby ETL work (especially after launching http://www.kiba-etl.org).
Althought I almost exclusively work remote, I wonder: what is the recommended Visa to allow me to work on-site for an american client?
Some friends have recommended the Visa Waiver program [1], but this case does not appear in the allowed travel purposes.
Thanks for your guidance :-)
[1] http://travel.state.gov/content/visas/english/visit/visa-waiver-program.html <comment><USER2> > Some friends have recommended the Visa Waiver program, but this case does > not appear in the allowed travel purposes.

You're right - the Visa Waiver program is not right for working in the US.

If you can get an American company to sponsor an H1-B visa, that is one option. You will be restricted to working for that firm alone.

If you have exceptional ability in your field, and you can convince an agent to sponsor you on this basis, you could qualify for the O Visa.

If you become a college student in America via the F-1 visa, you can work part-time (up to 20 hours per week). No restriction on companies you can work for.

If you get a Green Card via the annual Diversity Visa Lottery or through marriage to an American citizen, you can set up as a consultant (self- employed) and work for multiple companies.

In short, there is no quick and dirty way for you to work onsite for an American client.

<comment><AUTHOR> To clarify "work", I wouldn't be employed by the american company. My company would emit invoices for payments (not salary). Just in case!

Thanks for your detailed response otherwise.

<comment><USER2> If you are enter the United States on the visa waiver program, you cannot work, irrespective of how the compensation is received.

<comment><USER3> While you're not exactly wrong (especially in the case presented), there are a variety of exceptions, for a loose definition of 'work' \- which some future readers/searchers here might find useful. For example, if you're manning a booth at an exhibition for your foreign employer, that's work but allowed. Selling, being a service engineering, training, and some other things are also allowed with very careful restrictions. More information at [http://travel.state.gov/content/dam/visas/BusinessVisa%20Pur...](http://travel.state.gov/content/dam/visas/BusinessVisa%20Purpose%20Listings%20March%202014%20flier.pdf)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> B2 Business visa [1] might be your ticket. You might have to tweak your payments to go via international borders. :-)

Better consult an attorney.

[1][http://immigration.laws.com/visa/b2-business- visa](http://immigration.laws.com/visa/b2-business-visa)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks - I'm indeed going to contact an attorney and the embassy.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Self hosted RSS "cache" server/application? - <AUTHOR> I see that self hosted RSS aggregators usually provide a web browser interface for all the subscribed feeds. What I'm looking for is a self hosted option where I can use my feed reader application with it...so I have the flexibility to look at all sources or specific sources and individually handle read status, starring, etc., the flexibility to read things when offline after syncing with the server.
I want the feed reader interface to be as if it's subscribed directly to the respective feeds (though it would be subscribed to feeds on this self hosted service).
Is there anything like this? It sounds more like an RSS Caching service than a feed aggregator. <comment><USER2> You're looking for [https://indieweb.org/microsub](https://indieweb.org/microsub) which is a developing standard for this, along with an open source server like Aperture (see: [https://indieweb.org/microsub#Servers](https://indieweb.org/microsub#Servers))

<comment><USER3> > > [https://indieweb.org/microsub#Servers](https://indieweb.org/microsub#Servers)

Thanks going to check this out

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Something like Miniflux? [https://miniflux.app](https://miniflux.app)

<comment><USER3> thanks for the recommendation</comment></comment>


Ask HN: What is the state-of-the-art environment for developing Erlang code? - <AUTHOR> I was big into Erlang in 2014, but haven't touched it since. I used to write code in Emacs and compile it there as well.<p>If I want to get started again (on either Windows or Ubuntu) what would be the base I'd need to get developing again? <comment><USER2> Contrary to others here, I would still suggest to stick with Erlang, but use Elixir's toolkit.

You can use `mix`, `exunit`, release, etc... from Elixir, and they can handle your Erlang codes fine. You also have better integration with editors like VSCode.

The reason for sticking with Erlang is that your project can be used in both Erlang and Elixir community. But if you write pure Elixir, it's pretty hard to use it in Erlang.

You can also write Elixir macro to wrap your Erlang code in an API. Not the other way around.

Project structure between Erlang and Elixir is similar anyway, so it should not be too difficult to have one single project for both Erlang and Elixir code.

<comment><USER3> Interesting. Can you suggest an example repo built this way?

<comment><USER2> Not a very good example in term of usefulness and completeness, but I did one: [https://github.com/sntran/gen_spider](https://github.com/sntran/gen_spider)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> An aside, after you've learned a few langugages- the biggest friction to learning a new one is learning the tooling and dev environment for that language.

If someone is looking for an side-project idea, something like "Show me your dev workflow / environment" could make for a valuable resource.

<comment><USER5> Sounds like HowIStart: [https://howistart.org/](https://howistart.org/)

Github repo here: [https://github.com/howistart/howistart.org](https://github.com/howistart/howistart.org)

<comment><USER6> The Go example is getting pretty dated... I wonder if Peter would do a rewrite?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm afraid there are no big changes, there's an IntelliJ plugin but it's not as slick as Emacs. If you are already comfortable with Emacs it's all good.

VSCode is also another popular choice.

You probably want to check out Elixir as they can cross-compile, the Elixir build tool and language server are slightly better.

I haven't tried on Windows but I guess Ubuntu would be a safe bet since it's a POSIX system.

</comment><comment><USER8> We use Elixir/Phoenix for our entire backend here at AgentRisk and we're all on vscode (works great). Previously the team was a big erlang shop (BugSense) but we'll go with Elixir any given day.

<comment><USER9> What plugins do you recommend for vscode?

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I've been writing a lot of Elixir recently, and I'm very impressed with the Emacs' language server support:

[https://github.com/emacs-lsp/lsp-mode](https://github.com/emacs-lsp/lsp-mode)

Looks like Erlang is one of the supported languages, so I'd give that a whirl.

</comment><comment><USER11> I'm currently on a project which uses Elixir and the Phoenix framework. Both are pretty good.

It uses "hex" for package management, which has a tool called `mix` to call build related commands.

Last I was in erlang was 2008; and I'm quite impressed with where it's at now in terms of the above.

I've found the vscode elixir/erlang defaults to also be quite helpful.

<comment><USER12> mix is a part of Elixir, not a part of hex.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Emacs, erlang.el (comes with Erlang) and distel.

</comment><comment><USER14> I just use ViM and it's fine for me. I've got autocomplete, syntax highlighting, and ripgrep for file searching. I think I can jump from a function to it's definition but I'd have to double check.

With Tmux I just keep another window open with a few terminals running my server and front end watchers.

Erlang is neat because with Cowboy and rusty/sync (I _think_ that's the library) I get hot code reloading for server side issues. Then webpack and a simple bash script handle updates to front end assets and transferring the files to the directory Nginx is pointed to.

I try to keep my dev and production environments as close as possible to avoid unexpected surprises so I've used DnsMasq to set up local ssl certs.

All in all it's one of the more pleasurable dev environments I've worked in. Not having to restart the server every time I make a change is a huge boon, and having my supervisors restart their children automatically on crashes is tremendous.

I'd go with whatever you're most comfortable with for best results. Learning new environments often sucks and you may end up discouraged and spending more time learning new shortcuts and how to do X, Y, and Z unrelated to actual Erlang development which can be both discouraging and a time sink.

</comment><comment><USER15> Elixir, seriously: [https://elixir-lang.org/install.html](https://elixir- lang.org/install.html)

<comment><AUTHOR> What would be the reasons I'd want to use Elixir over Erlang?

<comment><USER16> The greatest feature of Elixir in my opinion (and it's a beautiful language with a lot of great features in the first place, including the advantages of the Erlang VM and Library) is the care it got in being approachable and easy to use. It has some of the best documentation I've seen extended to pretty much all environment surrounding the base language (including the integration with OTP for parallel processing), Phoenix and Ecto, plus great books and a very friendly community. The design of all those components is also very well done to avoid surprises for people coming from "modern" languages and to avoid unnecessary complexity. And it also has a nice plugin and formatter for vscode.

<comment><USER17> Yes, documentation and just the syntax (to me at least) seems a hell of a lot simpler than erlang. You can always use erlang libraries in Elixir as well.

<comment><USER18> Erlang's syntax is not difficult or complex; it's just 'different' from what people are used to.

I will add though, that Elixir does add some nice things besides just a more familiar syntax. Things like their string implementation stand out as a real improvement.

<comment><USER19> > Erlang's syntax is not difficult or complex

I will say a lot of it does feel dated & crusty though, especially when digging thru the documentation. And the different forms of iodata, list, binaries, bitstrings, and other string-y things is super confusing in the beginning.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> For someone who has been learning Elixir off and on the past year or so, it can work on Windows but it's a lot easier to use the command line tooling with WSL. Given all the Remote tooling VS Code just released, these days I just use that to SSH into an EC2 box and use that as my dev environment.

</comment><comment><USER20> If you're looking for something new from the same foundation, checkout the elixir ecosystem.

<comment><USER21> What's the deployment story on Elixir as of now? I recall that some previous threads had not-so-nice things to say about deploying Elixir apps. Any progress on this front?

<comment><USER22> It got pretty good literally 4 or so months ago with 1.9 I wrote a module that deploys to an (existing aws) instance in about 15 minutes. If I wanted to have it provision an instance too that probably would have taken me only a bit more time (using the exaws module). Containers are easy too (but I only did a one- off in singularity, don't know about docker). Releases are "in language" so I'm basically writing a dynamic elixir script that calls system (Unix) tools as if it were an elixir script, no shell script at all.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> If actual erlang then VSCode. There is a nice language server plugin (pgourlain.erlang) for it.

cowboy if you need a web server.

rebar3 for package management and build.

</comment><comment><USER24> IntelliJ IDEA has plugins for Erlang support and as a beginner with the language it's been more than enough. Not sure if there are any issues that would be blockers for more advanced users though.

</comment><comment><USER25> I recently started working with Erlang and Elixir at my current company and I'm doing everything with VSCode.

We have Erlang/rebar3, Erlang/mix and Elixir/mix projects, and no issues whatsoever with VSCode.

</comment><comment><USER26> I've never used Erlang professionally, I'm a Clojure person, but I know that Emacs has a superb support for Erlang. Late Joe Armstrong himself was a well- known Emacsen.

</comment><comment> rooam-dev As a long time Eclipse user, Erlide has been working fine for me (1 week into learning Erlang). Autocompletion (both editor and shell) is helpful.

</comment><comment><USER27> Don't develop on Windows but I hear their new WSL2 lets you have a pretty well-working Linux environment.</comment>