Show HN: Solve for All – customizable, private, hackable search engine - <AUTHOR> https://solveforall.com/docs/what_is_solveforall <comment><USER2> The reason to use this is really buried in the text: "if you want to use domain-specific engines, want more control over your search results...". I don't know that I do. I might do but it seems like an intermediate goal. Ultimately I think your value prop is more basic i.e. you believe you give better search results and these are just the mechanisms to achieve that. To sell that, you need to give me examples of bad search results and show your better ones. Even one or two examples would be enough to get your site registered in my "try after google" list.

What would help me is e.g.:

        1. Split the landing page into two side by side gifs
        2. lhs column showing a series of google searches & results
        3. rhs column showing the same searches but with your results
        4. Have a demo search box, above the fold, I can try without setting up social accounts. Its too much of a hurdle without knowing the value.
        5. I'm not watching a 10 minute video without already understanding and being sold on an idea
        6. I would consider dropping the security angle from the hero - it makes the already tricky to see value prop more unfocused.

Is there a niche where your results are particularly strong compared to Google e.g. politics, products, tech support etc.? It might make it easier to position yourself by pushing just that rather than as a head to head google competitor.

Best of luck!

p.s. I really dislike the font used for the logotype - bad fit for the site and makes it feel amateurish.

<comment><AUTHOR> Really helpful feedback, thanks! It is true that the focus is on niches, like programming, deals, and politics. I'll be working to incorporate your feedback.

About the font, I think my taste in fonts is pretty much opposite of everyone else's. I wanted to do something more "stylish", but I guess I'll switch to something more professional. If you happen to have a suggestion, or just general guidelines, I'd love to hear it.

I assume your "try after google" list is figurative, not a real list on the web?

Thanks again!

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hi, I'm the developer of Solve for All. I'm hoping to get feedback on this project, which I promise to consider carefully. I'm also hoping to get in contact with anyone interested in working together, sponsoring the site (which is ad-free), or any other reason.

A few caveats about the site: 1) I've made the settings a little less private for the sake of this Show HN. I don't share your search history with anyone, but with the current defaults, you'll be downloading images directly from the sites in your search results and feeds, possibly over HTTP. When I finally have a 1.0, I plan on securing all downloads for subscribers. 2) Sorry about the captcha when you create an account. Almost always the captcha is impossible when you first load it, so you have to hit the blue refresh button. I couldn't find a good solution that didn't require loading a 3rd party script (Google noCaptcha seems to work beautifully, but I'm wary of including their script). For now I'm using a locally downloaded copy of the reCaptcha script. 3) I'm not wedded to the name, logo, or the theme. Feel free to criticize any aspect of the site, I can take it! 4) I'm specifically looking for feedback on how to make this open source, but still making this a sustainable business. I am thinking of AGPL, or possibly something that would prohibit commercial usage without a license.

Thank you for any input you have!

</comment><comment><USER3> Thanks for the submission. There are few thoughts from me: \- I wonder what does it mean by "customizable", i.e. how is this different from DuckDuckGo with its duck.co? \- I think that the UI can be much better, a good UI does not necessarily to have shiny elements (shadows, gradients, etc). Good UI shall be consistent (in layout, colors, look-and-feel) and intuitive (assume you are a new user, by only looking, one should know what to do next). Maybe read some tips from [http://goodui.org/](http://goodui.org/) \- Why I should register for an account? Reasons are not that clear. \- When I see the signup page, I was amazed that you implemented such many external account linkage. Maybe you can you consistent image sizes or even just text without image. \- When I navigate to the home page, it's not pretty clear what I should do: login? signup? "learn more"? or navigate via the navbar? In summary, I had mostly UI issues, I was once like this, did not care anything about UI, but later I realized that UI, even with a super powerful back-end, is still a very important part of web development since it is what faces the user, and it is what made the user feel. Good luck and have fun :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback and the link! To answer your questions: 1) "I wonder what does it mean by "customizable"" You can add different plugins (that produce answers) and control when to activate them. You can also create mini- search engines that search specific domains. There are also a few settings about security that you can tweak. 2) "how is this different from DuckDuckGo with its duck.co" This search engine also includes a feed reader and get results from your feeds when you search. Also, the plugin system allows you to add data and plugins (written in 100% Javascript) instantly without anyone's approval. 3) "Why I should register for an account?" Since this includes a feed reader, you need to create an account to save your chosen feeds. Also by creating an account you can create your own mini-search engines and add plugins other than the default.

Since you've asked these questions, it's clear to me that I haven't done a good job explaining these things on my site. I'll be working on improving this. Thanks a lot for the feedback!</comment></comment>


Wikileaks publishes 500k new Stratfor emails - <AUTHOR> https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?rl <comment><USER2> Oh, this is so classy: [https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=8402](https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=8402)

Quote:

Oh, they have enough weapons. Now the serious game begins as Reva pointed out. The investigation of the attack is not interesting. I suspect the findings have already been reached before the first investigator got to work. Now the question is how India responds. God willing, the Indian response will make us a lot of money.

This after the devastating terrorist attack in Mumbai which killed 164 people: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Mumbai_attacks](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Mumbai_attacks)

<comment><USER3> Holy damn. Here is one interview of her (Reva Bhalla): [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rc1gJOPCipY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rc1gJOPCipY) And at the end she is linking the attack to Al Qaeda. I think this is why they are giving her kudos, for planting the seed. This is nefarious on so many levels. This means India directly comes under pressure to respond back to Pakistan, and then respond to allegations that Al Qaeda is expanding in India. It is ironic that it was one of the CIA double agent, with links to terrorist organization LeT, who conducted recce of the sites before attacks: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Headley](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Headley)

India was under so much pressure to go to war at that time. Experts were gunning for surgical strikes. Imagine the pressure on bureaucrats, especially when both countries have nuclear arsenal.

Why does education/intelligence/morality not cull the inner devil of some?

<comment><USER4> It could also have meant that investigators have already decided who did this. IIRC, hours after the attacks we were already suggesting Pakistan. In the end it turned out to be close, but jumping into conclusions would not help our credibility.

Reva Bhalla's interview is too insignificant to directly affect our decision to respond. She was speculating, but everyone (including the government!) was speculating too and they were all pretty much saying the same thing. Which is, "someone in Pakistan".

I haven't seen anything seriously damaging yet from the India files. People aren't always very mild in emails, and some of them were just jokes. Some jokes were crude, but we all make such jokes.

<comment><USER3> They did not know who did it immediately, except knowing of Pakistan's involvement. Remember, ISI chief was being flown to India immediately on eve of attacks and Pak PM allowed it, only to be cancelled at last minute? [1] Nobody was speculating Al Qaeda links, it was being said either JeM, Deccan Mujahideen or LeT. Her speculation is significant because she is associated with security agency, is on CNN and will be listened to by in American Policy corridors.

You haven't seen damaging because they are aggregator, and put in their analysis on the news. Yeah crude jokes like selling weapons over the misery of others. "We" do not make these kind of jokes, and even if we do, they should be deplored. Sorry, I am not in sync with you over this.

[1] - [http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/nov/29mumterror-isi-chief- vi...](http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/nov/29mumterror-isi-chief-visit-to- india-cancelled.htm)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It's a weird feeling reading other people's email. I'm sad to see Wikileaks didn't at least do a quick regex pass to remove the credit cards (yup, found some) and the personal love notes. I'm generally a supporter of Wikileaks, but mass dumps like this aren't responsible and only give more ammunition to their detractors.

<comment><USER6> These "people" are looking to profit from misery ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6742844](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6742844)).

Wikileaks is attempting to provide transparency in a world where that doesn't much exist so boo-fucking-hoo if somebody's Mastercard gets leaked in the process.

Mass dumps aren't adding any more "ammunition" for their detractors than some sort of filtered dump would. Detractors don't need much of a reason to dislike what Wikileaks is doing beyond the fact that they've been exposed.

<comment><USER7> You know who else profits from misery? Doctors, and funeral home owners. Pretty much anyone in the media. I certainly hope my doctor isn't making terrible jokes about how much money he's going to make from my disease, but even if he was, it wouldn't be illegal nor would I find it a justifiable reason to leak his personal information (let alone his clients' information!).

You also assume everyone is already split into either the pro-Wikileaks camp or their detractors. As someone who has mixed feelings about Wikileaks, this definitely affected my view of them negatively. (Full disclosure - my card was among those leaked. But even if it hadn't been, if I had just been someone who knew about Stratfor rather than a subscriber, this would have put Wikileaks in a bad light for me).

<comment><USER8> I might suggest that doctors and funeral home owners profit by _alleviating_ the misery of others.

<comment><USER9> Also, it would be different if we did a dump of all the emails from oncologists at the Moffitt Center and found out they were putting doctors on the news to say smoking is good for your health and then highfiving each other via email after.

<comment><USER10> You would be actually shocked how driven by money many oncologists are. Back when I used to consult, I had an oncologist tell me, with no hesitation, that he prefers to prescribe the drugs that give him the best profit margin, even if that means it's not the best choice for the patient.

I'm pretty sure if you checked his email you'd find some pretty shocking stuff as well.

<comment><USER11> In which case, publishing them would be a public good - doctors who put profit over positive outcomes for their patients should be named and shamed and patients would be better off knowing to avoid them.

This is in fact a solid argument for why transparency of this kind is a Good Thing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Is it more, or do these leaks paint StratFor as something along the lines of a "conflict investment firm" on the lines of Richard Morgan's Market Forces [1]?

Jacket cover description excerpt: "A coup in Cambodia. Guns to Guatemala. For the men and women of Shorn Associates, opportunity is calling. In the superheated global village of the near future, big money is made by finding the right little war and supporting one side against the other–in exchange for a share of the spoils."

[1] [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40450.Market_Forces](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40450.Market_Forces)

<comment><USER13> While that book has it's pacing flaws I really enjoyed it. When he calls up "Langley Contracting" for "five extreme prejudice deletions" and is asked "Please indicate level of precision required from the following five options: surgical, accurate, scattershot, blanket, atrocity" I decided it was a winner. Morgan's site has a great quote that the movie option for this book was never exercised because "no-one's going to want to play an action hero this morally compromised".

I guess if StratFor is acquired by an investment bank you would basically have a Shorn Associates type firm.

<comment><USER12> It's a pity that his most popular book (Altered Carbon) hasn't been made into a movie. Now that one's a clear winner (sex, drugs, lots of bullets).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> [https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?relid=402#searchresult](https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?relid=402#searchresult)

Subject: Re: GOOGLE & Iran __internal use only - pls do not forward __

GOOGLE is getting WH and State Dept. support & air cover. In reality, they are doing things the CIA cannot do. But, I agree with you. He's going to get himself kidnapped or killed. Might be the best thing to happen to expose GOOGLE's covert role in foaming up-risings, to be blunt. The US Govt can then disavow knowledge and GOOGLE is left holding the shit bag.

<comment><USER14> That email thread has been public for quite a long time now and the subject of some conspiracy theories. Unfortunately, the rest of that email chain fizzles out, suggesting that it was just an opinionated off-the-cuff remark, not the result of any serious analysis. Maybe there is more in today's drop, but as of yesterday there wasn't anything particularly damning regarding that google employee.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Surprised no one has pointed this out. The headlines for "statfor" today aren't this dump, but rather: [http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/jeremy-hammond- anonymous-strat...](http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/jeremy-hammond-anonymous- stratfor-hacker-10-years/story?id=20904069)

I imagine the two events are connected

</comment><comment><USER16> An absolute gem

"... 2010-12-03 11:54:04 FW: Manning & Wiki Founder Arrest/Prosecution? firstname.lastname@example.com firstname.lastname@example.com

Holy crap, we're passing Fred's rantings to confederation partners?

From: Emre Dogru [mailto:email@example.com] Sent: Friday, December 03, 2010 3:37 AM To: burton Cc: Confederation Subject: Fwd: Manning & Wiki Founder Arrest/Prosecution?

Hey Fred, one of our confed partners (Sabah daily) would like to use this information without any attribution. But he just wonders if your source used "fry" in the sense that Manning should be executed by electrocution, or does it mean something else in intel business lingo?..."

[https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=410181](https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=410181)

</comment><comment><USER17> "RELEASE: over 500k new Stratfor files. Total now released over 5.5M. [http://wikileaks.org/gifiles](http://wikileaks.org/gifiles) #freehammond" \- @wikileaks [https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/401466014111506432](https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/401466014111506432)

</comment><comment><USER18> whaaa? [https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=10828](https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=10828)

<comment><USER9> Jesus christ that looks terrible.

<comment><USER19> Horrible, but this has been online for awhile.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyar- Way5RE](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyar-Way5RE)

<comment><USER20> I'm going to say that the video is almost certainly not real and is in fact a training video.

<comment><USER21> A training video? Showing them how to behave like barbaric cunts?

<comment><USER20> Do you have any context for the video whatsoever?

No?

OK, then maybe don't jump to conclusions. One possibility is that it's a training video for a "watch this then report what happened" sort of thing, which are very common and may not even be affiliated with an actual police department.

Consider the presence of a camera crew (the filmer is way too close to an armed officer to be a bystander). Also notice how there is no blood and no physicality related to a body being hit by bullets.

For all we know this could be a training video to help cops avoid this sort of thing. What sort of twisted world do you live in where you would imagine that any police department in America could explicitly set out to train its police to cold-bloodedly murder people?

Everything related to this video screams of it not depicting an actual event.

Edit: videos of the police committing murder or negligent homicide do exist but there is generally far more context with those videos and they are tied to well known cases.

Edit2: I've watched the video a few more times now and I've noticed some important details which aren't very obvious due to the low resolution of the video. First, the civilian has another gun which he retrieves from behind his back, you can see it in his hands in the last few frames of the film. Second, the "police" are not in uniform nor do they have any police insignia present yet they are wearing bulletproof vests. If they were plain clothes cops they would not have their vests on above their clothes. If they were police on duty they would have badges, insignia, etc.

My guess is that this is a training video or video of training, maybe for police, possibly for private security.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Wiki leaks is embarrassing itself. Stratfor is a silly bunch of blowhards who repackage the Economist for gullible subscribers who think these jokers are some secret intelligence agents.

<comment><USER23> Actually, Stratfor tends to have a unique perspective on the news. I've been signed up for their free email thread for a while, and while I've never been blown away, they do have a better-than-most longform approach to news. It definitely beats CNN.

<comment><USER22> I've had the "privilege" of getting access to the paid product via work some years ago. I found that they did accurately predict 100 of the next 2 crises (ie if you say every day disaster is imminent some days really bad things randomly occur). But beyond the quality of their content, Stratfor intimates they have some proprietary pipeline to govt classified intelligence when they have no more access than any other person with Google and a subscription to the NY times. Wikileaks embarasses itself and does Stratfor a great service by perpetrating the marketing hoax that Stratfor is anything but a bunch of guys in Texas rehashing public news sources for gullible corporate consumers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Would it be a crime if I were to read one of the emails?

<comment><AUTHOR> It may be a crime to _link_ directly to a zip file containing the data in an IRC chat, as we saw with Barrett Brown [1].

That made me reconsider even posting this Wikileaks page to HN (yay chilling effect). But I'm not aware of any criminal law preventing you from reading published content on Wikileaks or submitting a link to them on a social media site.

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

<comment><USER25> That zip file contained 5,000 stolen credit card numbers, along with CVVs and ID info.

<comment><AUTHOR> Correct, he copied and pasted a link (posted by someone else) to a zip file from one chat room to another chat room, that contained 5000 cc's.

And is now facing "12 federal charges relating to identity theft and fraud" for doing so.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I click through the Canadian ones, I'm confused on how much those emails are racists, homophobic, raw and violent...

[https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?relid=707#searchresult](https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?relid=707#searchresult)

</comment><comment><USER27> Question for game theorists: Is here a realistic scenario under which the entire world could disarm and shift from coming up with better ways to kill people to more constructive pursuits.

Please don't say "A visit from Vulcans"

<comment><USER28> > realistic scenario

No. Because humans don't follow game theory. Killing people hasn't come about because of rational application of theories. It comes about from evolution. We, as a race, are aggressive, territorial, greedy, exploiters because that has been, recently, a winning strategy vs the other organisms and environment on this planet. Unfortunately, for us, evolution doesn't care about long term. It's fine with us being wiped out and taking 98.1% of the rest with us. It can always start over with next up and comer organism.

Theory, rationalism, good intentions, nothing is going to override millions of years of genetically programmed behavior.

<comment><USER29> Transhumanism will override all the genetically programmed behaviour :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Are files available via torrent/web somewhere? I'd appreciate if someone has a link to share.

</comment><comment><USER31> It sounds like they need to improve their billing service.

</comment><comment><USER32> " Call me if you want me to get on IM. I'm running around the house and putting things away but would be happy to come back to my computer and chat w/ you. Smoochies Hunny. I love you! XOXOXOXOXO Amy"

Seems a bit too personal to me

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah Amy should know better than to email that to his work email address.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> I wish they published the raw data for this - it would be a lot easier to do analysis and visualization on it.

</comment><comment><USER34> They are talking about the 26/11/2008 Mumbai, India attack and how its going to make them a lot of money. Horrid! [https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=8496](https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=8496)

</comment><comment><USER35> [https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=363678](https://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles/?viewemailid=363678)

Nice.

<comment><USER36> I was shocked to read through those comments, they didn't seem very professional, and that such blatant racism could go unchecked in such a large and powerful organization as Stratfor seeemed very odd. Anyway, turns out those comments were just pasted from vnnforum, and were not written by Stratfor employees. Now, I don't know why they saw any value in that thread at all, just seems like a bunch of nazis trashing McDonalds, but at least Stratfor didn't write that garbage themselves.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> I'm a supporter of the _idea_ of WikiLeaks, if not all of their decisions ... now here's what bugs me: why is it rare (or never) that we see mass dumps of Russian, Chinese, or Pakistani intelligence information? What, there's no corruption, profiteering, or otherwise bad vibes over there? The US has a monopoly on all that? Why does it always have to hurt US intelligence activities (yes: some deserve to be hurt, but just blanket dumping also puts the country at risk).

<comment><USER38> Are you serious? [http://www.wikileaks.org/wiki/Category:China](http://www.wikileaks.org/wiki/Category:China)

<comment><USER37> Open mouth, insert foot I suppose. Though this leads me to a second question, equally interesting ... why haven't I heard of this? Aside from the obvious (I've never looked directly for it), there are two aspects at play - my own filtering, and the editorial decisions of the news organizations.

For the former, I aim for diversity, but it's hard to know you're getting the "full story" as well as what's a "credible source" when all you have is what's already available to you.

For the latter, none of us is immune to this influence, unless we operate our own news / fact-finding outlet, and then our internal biases still provide an umwelt [0] that's hard to escape.

\</comment></comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>----

[0] [http://xkcd.com/1037/](http://xkcd.com/1037/)

</comment><comment><USER39> Why the hell don't they just dump everything?

they're politicizing the very leaking they're doing.

</comment><comment><USER40> Are you actually going to read 500k emails?

Especially when most of them look like water cooler chitchat.

</comment><comment><USER41> 404 on all those links. am i doing it wrong?

<comment><USER42> or may be Great Firewall does it right :) Btw, can NSA splitters function as such as well? Or [selectively] replace real traffic with artificially generated one? (I mean pure splitter wouldn't, yet why it would be just a pure splitter? why limit themselves to read-only capabilities only? May sound like a new tin foil hat frontier for some ... yet i think we do need one at least as a guide post into the future as the reality has already moved well past the previous one)

<comment><USER43> [http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/11/this-is-how-the- interne...](http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/11/this-is-how-the-internet- backbone-has-been-turned-into-a-weapon/)

Apparently there are malicious servers that do active attacks against Internet users (with forged injected traffic). I've seen no indication that the servers that carry out these attacks are directly related to the splitters.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> This submission is off-topic (not "Hacker News") and should be deleted.</comment>


Why Tesla's autopilot can't see a stopped firetruck - <AUTHOR> https://www.wired.com/story/tesla-autopilot-why-crash-radar <comment><USER3> > And it's not much of a problem if every human in a semi-autonomous vehicle > followed the automakers' explicit, insistent instructions to pay attention > at all times, and take back control if they see a stationary vehicle up > ahead.

While their technical reasoning is fine... this statement shows a complete failure of reasoning about human beings and UX. In essence they are asking people to stay alert without being active, this is actually really fucking hard to do as a human being. Noticing an object that needs to be avoided while you are already actively engaged in driving is easy, you are naturally alert and there is no "intervention time" because there is nothing to intervene with. Trying to achieve the same level of response while letting a machine drive kind of defeats the purpose of letting the machine drive.

Yes I'm basically making the argument that semi-autonomous driving is not safe. Make it fully autonomous or not at all. Two modes, keep it simple, because human concentration is complex.

<comment><USER4> There are mountains of evidence to back this up, quite a bit of it stems from the problem of keeping airline pilots engaged and alert while the autopilot functions as it should.

<comment><USER5> And people deskill when they don't get enough practice as well. I know I got better over time as a driver and it wasn't just because I wasn't a teenager any longer. It's easy to imagine we'll end up with a lot of people on the roads with not-quite autonomous systems who actually haven't actively driven all that much.

<comment><USER6> It's not even about deskilling. I raced road bikes for years and in large part drive like I rode: highly defensive (bordering on aggressive as I've been lectured by LEOs). I commuted for years in my roadster with a manual transmission & power steering set for the track where I'm highly engaged as I can feel every crack in the road and the car can accelerate to unholy speeds in seconds. When I drive our sedan, it's boring and I find my mind drifting. If I turn on assisted cruise control, it's mind numbingly boring and on any long drive I'm guaranteed to fall asleep so I don't use it anymore because it's too dangerous.

Without being engaged in the act of driving, without the adrenaline, I switch off. This is the key problem I suspect everyone at some level suffers from wether they want to admit it or not. Even awake, on full autopilot I suspect most people are in full-on daydream mode.

<comment><USER3> I don't race but I have noticed this with my "normal" car, i've always driven a hatchback though which are quite common in this country. If I force myself to drive very steady I can almost feel the alertness drifting away, I become less aware of vehicles around me and their bearing. If I speed up to a threshold just between the bored comfortable zone and racing it's enough to give heightened alertness, I can easily preempt drivers making careless moves that would otherwise endanger me and I notice pedestrians and other things around the road more, it's a strange balance, but i've no doubt that sticking dead to the limit on a large road will decrease alertness in any study.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > Tesla didn't confirm the car was running Autopilot at the time of the crash"

That essentially means that it was. If it wasn't they would have denied it and released data.

> but its manual does warn that the system is ill-equipped to handle this > exact sort of situation: "Traffic-Aware Cruise Control cannot detect all > objects and may not brake/decelerate for stationary vehicles, especially in > situations when you are driving over 50 mph (80 km/h) and a vehicle you are > following moves out of your driving path and a stationary vehicle or object > is in front of you instead.

Just for those unaware of Teslas previous handling of other crashes, this is them waving a huge flag saying "We fucked up and we know it".

I wonder how that call went "Hi Tesla, my self-driving car just drove head-on into a stationary firetruck" "Ohh... did you read the manual? It's supposed to do that, so it's basically your fault!"

<comment><USER8> > That essentially means that it was. If it wasn't they would have denied it > and released data.

What kind of ridiculous, half-assed logic is that? There could be any number of reasons they can't confirm this yet.

I haven't officially confirmed I'm not an alien being from a far away planet -- so that must mean I am one!

<comment><USER9> Based on past experience, Tesla PR tends to respond within 24 hours to push the blame on their customer. In the court of public opinion, a change in behavior like this is a pretty good indication.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Apparently the driver of the Tesla didn't have time to react to the firetruck as their field of view was obscured by a large pick-up truck that changed lanes seconds beforehand.

If Tesla's autopilot can't detect upcoming stationary objects, it should in the very least keep enough distance between itself and the vehicle ahead in order to allow the human at the wheel to have an unobscured view of the road ahead.

<comment><USER11> Why can't it detect a static object on the same path? I thought Subaru has a system that can do that.. At least according to the commercials it detects when a car in front of the car in front of you has stopped or slowed.

<comment><USER12> > the car in front of you has stopped or slowed.

This is different from what happened in the tesla case. What happened here is that the vehicle in front of the car was moving and in view of the tesla's radar sensor obstructing the view of the firetruck. That car then moved and now a stationary object was suddenly in front of the car. From the Tesl's view point, an object just magically appeared somewhere in front of the car.

I'm not familiar with radar systems, but I imagine in this scenario the system isn't precise enough to know that this stationary object that suddenly appeared isn't an overhead sign or some other similar object that pops into the field of view of the radar system. It probably has something to do with radar not being extremely directional, constantly having stationary things pop up due to reflections and various objects in the periphery, having a limited sampling rate, and needing to do a filtering or other sorts of magic to make sure there aren't constant false alarms etc. I can see how cruising along at 50mph, the system doesn't have enough time to figure all this out and stop (e.g. not enough samples or there being a noise floor on stationary object data). It appears the correct way to solve this is with 3d lidar systems combined with sort of of mapping technology, but those are still too expensive/difficult to put into every day vehicles.

<comment><USER11> I said "the car in front of the car in front of you". That car is not visible either since the car in front of you is blocking it. Subaru has commercials indicating this scenario is addressed as far as I can tell.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> For a 65mph crash into a stationary object, that looks like fairly light damage considering!

Isn't this _precisely_ the scenario that automatic emergency braking systems are designed to prevent?

The article suggests that no system can handle this, but the EuroNCAP system specifically tests cars driving at up to 80kph (~50mph) into a stationary vehicle ([https://youtu.be/AJ4WXgWaNgs?t=2m40s](https://youtu.be/AJ4WXgWaNgs?t=2m40s) protocol: [https://cdn.euroncap.com/media/32278/euro-ncap- aeb-c2c-test-...](https://cdn.euroncap.com/media/32278/euro-ncap-aeb-c2c-test- protocol-v201.pdf)) Is this sort of safety equipment not a "thing" in the US?

It looks like AEB is not fitted to the model S in the EU as standard. [https://www.euroncap.com/en/results/tesla/model-s/7897](https://www.euroncap.com/en/results/tesla/model-s/7897) (expand safety assist section - no AEB listed, c.f. XC90 [https://www.euroncap.com/en/results/volvo/xc90/20976](https://www.euroncap.com/en/results/volvo/xc90/20976))

I wonder if AEB was installed and activated in this crash, despite what the cruise control was doing? Surely it must have done otherwise I'd have expected _significantly_ more damage, particularly to the fire truck getting a 2t lump slamming into it @ 65mph?!

<comment><USER14> Presumably when the car got within a certain distance of the firetruck the cone of the radar was narrow enough that the radar could tell that the truck was definitely in the road and triggered braking - too late to avoid a collision but early enough to slow down some.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> > _Radar knows the speed of any object it sees, and is also simple, cheap, > robust, and easy to build into a front bumper. But it also detects lots of > things a car rolling down the highway needn 't worry about, like overhead > highway signs, loose hubcaps, or speed limit signs. So engineers make a > choice, telling the car to ignore these things and keep its eyes on the > other cars on the road: They program the system to focus on the stuff that's > moving._

So these car-mounted radar systems can't detect how large an object is or where it is in relation to the road? I don't get how they can be used at all then. That can't be true, right? Because if you can tell how large something is, then the hubcap is out. And if you can tell where something is in relation to the vehicle and/or road, then the signs are out. I mean, hell, the most maniacal situation of climbing a steep hill with clearance under a sign that you just can't see because the sign happens to be mounted just after the rise, which probably doesn't exist anywhere in the world, would be out by other factors, like knowing that you're going up a steep hill.

So it really sounds like the only thing left is just not being able to tell how large something is, which sounds wild.

> _This unsettling compromise may be better than nothing_

People frequently find disappointment to be worse than nothing.

<comment><USER16> There are physical limits to how good a radar's resolution can be, set by the properties of the radio waves used. Those make it really difficult to detect small size differences -- relative to the radar's wavelength -- though, not quite impossible.

It's why everyone else uses lidar instead, or in addition. Really, it has the same limits, but the wavelength of visible light is small enough that they're only an issue for microscopes.

<comment><USER17> That's why many (most?) other vehicle manufacturers use cameras instead of radar. You physically see what the driver would physically see and react how the driver would react with the same information (just faster).

See Subaru, Toyota, Honda, etc.

I'm not sure why this article and this discussion seemingly act like the predominant technology used in automatic braking systems doesn't exist?

<comment><USER18> Tesla's use cameras as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> So I read this and cannot help but wonder if we really are 5 years away from a massive sea change. People think truck drivers could be obsolete in 5 years time, the bullish ones anyway.

The tech is still developing. We may be in a bit of a hype bubble, but it is as real and clear as it has ever been. I think even as the tech advances rapidly, public acceptance will be way further out than 5, 10 or 15 years. I would venture to say self-driving cars and truck fleets being normalized is 30 years away and in no way because of the tech, but due to all the red tape and public debate that will encase the issue.

If you think all truck drivers are going to be displaced in 5 or even 10 years, you may be living in an HN bubble. Sure jobs will be automated away, but this is going to take more time than lots of people think. For instance, one article like this could delay acceptance for months or years, in my opinion.

<comment><USER20> > People think truck drivers could be obsolete in 5 years time, the bullish > ones anyway.

I'm not sure how many people _really_ think that; it's pure fantasy. To be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if they're not obsolete in 20 years. AI stuff has a tendency to get nearly good enough quite quickly, and then improve very little more for decades afterwards.

<comment><USER5> >AI stuff has a tendency to get nearly good enough quite quickly, and then improve very little more for decades afterwards.

What tends to happen is that some approach, deep learning in the current case, turns out to be very effective for a class of problems. But it turns out that it only gets you, say, 90 percent of the way there to being truly useful in the real world. And there isn't an obvious way to get you the other 10 percent.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> The fact that this flaw is known and in production gives credence to some of the AI experts who are saying level 5 is waaaaay further away than we are being led to believe.

<comment><USER22> No, it just requires the sea change of having every vehicle on the road talk with each other. That would fix this particular problem quite nicely.

It's not a panacea of course.

<comment><USER23> What about cars breaking down that stop communicating?

<comment><USER24> The cars around that car are still communicating. So the car next to it sees a drastic speed drop and tells everyone else.

Also say the cars regularly ping each other for updates, then one car that was in sight and is still in sight disappears doesn't respond, then it gets flagged as a possible hazard.

<comment><USER25> What if 2 cars fail to communicate and can't flag each other?

<comment><USER26> You'll have an accident. But we have accidents already. The question is, what failure rate will we tolerate from autonomous vehicles?

<comment><USER27> It should be Zero. Computers don't make mistakes is the entire reason anyone would even consider letting an automated car pickup their kids.

<comment><USER18> I disagree and I have a kid. I'd be happy to let an automated car pick up my kid if it was demonstrated to be safer than I'd likely be.

Car related deaths are fairly common, I can't see any rational reason to not switch to autonomous driving as soon as they are statistically likely to save lives.

Do you really want a large (35,000 a year or so in the USA) people to die every year until autonomous cars are perfect? Not to mention nothing is ever perfect.

<comment><USER25> It's a trust issue.

Doing your best and working towards safety is one thing. Putting 100% trust to autonomous thing is a different thing. If you know it's 100% safe, than it's rather easy to do. But if it's 98% safe.. It's pretty much gambling. You know it may fail and you have no chance to influence it. Sit back and hope you're not the (un)lucky one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> The problem with Autopilot is the name and the marketing. Tesla markets it as more advanced than other systems, which is not true, and the name suggests to people that it is a more or less self-driving vehicle, which they are encouraged to believe with the Summon feature as well. The responsible thing for Tesla (and other adaptive CC makers) to do is to do studies on how many people feel safe browsing the web when they enable their cruise mode. If it is significant at all, it is a sign that they should perhaps disable these modes of operation or make them require more activity from the user.

</comment><comment><USER29> This is... as the article says... unsettling.

I think it's safe to say Autopilot was enabled. Tesla has never waited to rush out and state that the car's driver was lying and that their system didn't screw up. Presumably they will still blame the driver for not paying enough attention, but as the article says, not being able to detect a stopped emergency vehicle is a pretty giant gaping flaw.

<comment><USER5> They're all just assistive driving systems and anyone who thinks that robo- Uber is going to pick them up at a bar and deliver them to their driveway in less than a number of decades is delusional. The issue is that these systems will get good enough to work enough of the time that people think reading a book or watching a movie with the occasional glance at the road is OK when it isn't. (Of course, plenty of people don't really pay full attention today.)

<comment><USER30> > anyone who thinks that robo-Uber is going to pick them up at a bar and > deliver them to their driveway in less than a number of decades is > delusional

You are aware that this is literally how Waymo's _existing_ taxi service in Phoenix works?

I am aware of the limitations, but the parts with "decades" and "delusional" are obviously overstated.

<comment><USER5> We'll see. I honestly (and regrettably) do not believe we'll see a taxi service without a human driver in 20 years if not significantly longer.

<comment><USER30> Honestly, what makes you think that, given that _multiple_ corps are saying that they will have autonomous cars on the road _this year_?

I can see how "this year" could slip into next year under unforeseen circumstances, but when your own prediction is so far away from the collective wisdom of an entire industry sector, it sure looks like a massive case of Dunning-Krueger, so you should have a very solid argument to support your prediction.

<comment><USER5> No they're not or if they are it's with lots of caveats and limitations. In fact, Volvo, which has been one of the more aggressive companies in this space, has apparently moved back their plans. [1] I'm actually willing to believe that this space will develop faster than it looked a few years back. I note that one of the more skeptical AI researchers working on this, John Leonard, is taking a sabbatical from MIT to work on Toyota's self-driving initiative. But quicker to market is still probably at least 10-20 years. Perhaps just not "not in my lifetime" as Leonard said a few years back.

[1] [https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/14/16776466/volvo-drive- me-...](https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/14/16776466/volvo-drive-me-self- driving-car-sweden-delay)

<comment><USER31> I think it will go much faster than people realise, because the big blocker to infrastructure changes that make self driving easier is the fact that there are no self driving cars. Once they have a foothold somewhere, with caveats and limitations, it's much easier to convince the neighboring city that with "only a few updates to these intersections" or "just a couple of beacons" or whatever, they can have self driving taxis too.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> I guess the output of the radar is basically a list of relative velocities for nearby large objects, paired with distance and rough direction to those objects. There is _always_ a large object essentially all around you moving with the same relative velocity as your speed : the ground. And there are often other large fixed objects (overhead signs, overpasses, etc) which appear roughly dead ahead.

Radar is just a very limited sensor!

</comment><comment><USER33> Yes, my 2017 Subaru with EyeSight behaves this way.

A couple of other scenarios when adaptive cruise is on: cars changing lanes into the lane ahead of me at short distances do not cause it to react quickly enough. It seems there's too much lag in the time to capture the interloper; and, if I'm approaching a car quickly that is moving much slower than I and I _signal a lane change but don 't execute it_, I'll collide with the slower car. (or so it seems to me, the system did not slow down and I had to apply the brake to avoid colliding).

Another related problem with vision-based systems, these random type of road artifacts that fool the system. This image shows a false left-side lane marker (formed by a partial re-paving and the shadow cast by the center barrier). It sounded a lane departure alert. If the car were autonomous, it likely would have swerved right trying to center: [https://imgur.com/a/KnsXU](https://imgur.com/a/KnsXU)

<comment><USER34> That last situation gives _me_ problems - my least favorite is that combined with jersey barriers so the old marking goes straight into the jersey barriers versus the new marking.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> I have Adaptive Cruise Control on my VW Golf, and I must say that I preferred my old Honda Accord vanilla cruise control. I found with the old system that I could relax if the road ahead was fairly clear. If car changed lanes in front of me, I immediately touched the brake, which disabled cruise control. I could relax and yet know I could regain control immediately.

Even before reading this article, I have not been able to relax with my new automatic cruise control. The problem is that I don't have a solid intuition for it - so instead of relaxing, I remain nervous and alert while it is on. In reality, I use it way less than I used the vanilla system.

</comment><comment><USER36> This has been debated for years.

[https://insideevs.com/elon-musk-tesla-doesnt-need-lidar- will...](https://insideevs.com/elon-musk-tesla-doesnt-need-lidar-will-tweak- radar-to-be-lidar-like/)

[https://9to5google.com/2015/10/16/elon-musk-says-that-the- li...](https://9to5google.com/2015/10/16/elon-musk-says-that-the-lidar-google- uses-in-its-self-driving-car-doesnt-make-sense-in-a-car-context/)

</comment><comment><USER37> > "a stationary vehicle or object is in front of you instead"

So it isn't that Tesla and volvo don't see a stationaty vehicle: they might not see objects as well.

Evil plan: you, in the front car, drive against a wall, and turn in the last second to avoid the collision. The autopilot behind you will accelerate against the wall.

Evil plan 2: you, in the front car, see a car/truck stopped in the lane. You waint until the last second to turn and avoid collision, the autopilot behind you will accelerate against it and crash.

<comment><USER38> Isn't "blinding" self-driving cars with radio waves much more dangerous? Not sure how today's systems work in that case. But for a fully self-driving car, losing radars would probably cause emergency breaking.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> I'm driving a '97 Miata now. No cruise, no ABS, basically no safety features other than questionable 90's airbags. It does have an LSD which is great. I find that being in touch with the road contributes to better control and safe driving on my part than when driving bigger vehicles with automatic trans, cruise, etc. Also driving with the top down feels pretty scary at first, and being that exposed really makes me think about how I'm driving.

</comment><comment><USER40> I understand that these systems must ignore stationary objects or they'd break all of a sudden at every road sign you encounter, but is there no way to tell a road sign (albeit a big one) from a fire truck that is 20 times bigger than a road sign, and 2-3 times bigger than your car?

No one is going to pay that much attention if your car is on auto-pilot. That's just how people are, no matter what's written on the manual (which no one reads).

<comment><USER41> Road signs are huge.

Also the problem is a road sign or overpass over a crest of a hill. It's stationary directly in front of you, the road simply curves away.

EX: Here is a car in-front of a road sign. [http://iowahighwayends.net/ends/June06/16/34exit263_99_halfm...](http://iowahighwayends.net/ends/June06/16/34exit263_99_halfmi.jpg) We assume the sign is not on the actual road, and the software makes the same assumption. It's just not always true.

EX2: [https://i.pinimg.com/736x/f7/11/eb/f711ebb462449a422151daab6...](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/f7/11/eb/f711ebb462449a422151daab63f3fa1c --chesapeake-bay-bridge-west-virginia.jpg) again perfectly safe but it looks like a static object blocking the road up ahead.

<comment><USER40> > Road signs are huge.

As big as a fire truck, and in the middle of the street, at the same level as your car!?

> Also the problem is a road sign or overpass over a crest of a hill. It's > stationary directly in front of you, the road simply curves away.

Isn't the autopilot aware of where the street is, and knows that you are not going to hit it?

I'm not convinced.

Of course, I know there are a lot of much-smarter-than-me people working on this for years, but I still don't get it.

<comment><USER41> Size varies, but it's not unusual for them to be 10 feet tall and 20 feet wide. They can also be stack on top of each other or be placed side to side.

To give an idea individual letters can be 16" tall. [http://onlinemanuals.txdot.gov/txdotmanuals/fsh/images/Figur...](http://onlinemanuals.txdot.gov/txdotmanuals/fsh/images/Figure%204-10.gif) And sizes are rounded to nearest 1/2 foot.

<comment><USER40> You ignored my other indication: they are not in the middle of the street, at the same level as your car...

<comment><USER41> I linked to two pictures with large static objects at the same height as parts of the road.

<comment><USER40> I don't see them. I've yet to see a road sign in the middle of the street, where cars drive.

<comment><USER41> The first image has a road sign being blocked by a car heading directly at it.

You are making assumptions about the placement of objects in the image, but the actual image in no way demonstrates the sign is not at street level.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> The amazing thing here is the "no injuries" part in a frontal crash at 65 mph.

</comment><comment><USER43> What is the safety record for semi-autonomous cars per mile driven? I worry that even if it's better than human piloted vehicles, progress could be short- circuited by the fact that since this is a novel technology, it makes the news every time an accident occurs.

On the other hand, while it seems that we're on the cusp of an autonomous vehicle revolution, and we'll see commercial use adopting early, consumers are going to be wary. The failure modes are very different than what drivers are used to. The systems appear "dumb" and make mistakes that humans rarely do. I see more promise in the short term for collision avoidance systems, or other systems which augment the driver's ability. For example anti-lock brakes have been an almost complete win, almost to the point of invisible ubiquity. I'd love to have something on-board my car that can help me safely avoid hitting a deer at 75mph.

<comment><USER5> >I'd love to have something on-board my car that can help me safely avoid hitting a deer at 75mph.

I wouldn't hold my breath for that. Faster reflexes notwithstanding, automated systems don't change the laws of physics. If anything, I'd expect a human--at least during daylight hours--would be more likely to notice a deer at the side of the road and react accordingly before they ran in front of the car.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> This article is fluff/FUD when it comes to the implications about autonomous driving. "Autopilot" is a marketing term for a kind of cruise control. The article repeatedly tries to make the point that if "the best system available" doesn't stop for stationary vehicles, how will self-driving cars ever work? However, Tesla's Autopilot is not a self-driving system, it's a cruise control system. Emergency braking systems are also not self-driving systems. The comparison is meaningless.

I say the same thing to the comments about the irresponsible "UX" of Autopilot for not handling this case. It's more about irresponsible marketing, capitalizing on the enthusiasm for self-driving cars, potentially lulling overzealous customers to trust a cruise control system or emergency braking system with their lives.

</comment><comment><USER45> I don't know the tech well, but the article doesn't explain why it can't differentiate between say, a sign post on the side of the road and a large object in the direct path of the vehicle, and slow down in the latter case.

<comment><USER46> One reason might be a lack of datasets.

There are a ton of datasets out there for things like traffic sign identification, and vehicle/pedestrian/etc identification - but most of those vehicles in those datasets are:

1\. From the rear (or oblique rear angles)

2\. Of mostly automobiles and small trucks

There likely aren't many real-world datasets of vehicles facing the vehicle and stopped in the road, and/or of larger vehicles (buses, semi- trucks/lorries, emergency vehicles, bulldozers/tractors, etc).

Without having such datasets, the AI you have trained won't have any way of knowing about those objects, and they may be odd enough that they can't be easily extrapolated from the datasets you do have to train on.

And by "dataset" \- I mean you need massive amounts of data; 50,000 images would be a "small" dataset. Ideally you want many times that, plus you want to "generate" synthetic views for more training data (by skewing/warping the existing images, it helps the system generalize on the data).

That's a possible explanation, but I don't know if that's the reason, part of the reason, or no reason at all. Plus, it's not to say they are "at fault" \- or to absolve the driver of any responsibility.

I'm just throwing it out there, based on my knowledge and experience - <USER2> isn't much, I admit (I completed the Udacity Self-Driving Car Engineer Nanodegree last year, plus Udacity's CS373 course, and what is now the Coursera Machine Learning course - but I took it as ML Class in 2011 before Coursera existed).

<comment><USER45> Hmm, would have expected something "more simple" like a sensor every 15? degrees. When a medium+ object is headed at high speed towards 0 degrees the car should slow, if on a different vector it ignores. The type of object is somewhat irrelevant, e.g. don't want to run into a road sign either.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Why not just have a system that produces a full 3D model of the surroundings and their velocity (using something like doppler radar) and then just do a geometric computation in 4D spacetime to find out a path that doesn't intersect with the trajectory of anything? (assuming their speed is unchanged)

That should prevent all such trivial accidents and allows to actually mathematically prove that the software works, as it should be required for such a critical system.

Machine learning can be added for object detection to allow more sophisticated trajectory prediction.

<comment><USER48> Indeed, "why not just"; I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not.

I'll assume the latter: Even if you were able to perfectly maintain an accurate 3D model of the surrounding geometry (and associated trajectory of all moving objects), it doesn't mean you have enough information to make 100% accurate predictions. For example, a frozen over road often has very nearly exactly the same physical geometry and color, but extremely different behavior to cars trying to drive on it. Other weather effects like fog or snow bring their own challenges.

You're right though, that precise and accurate 3D models _do_ do a lot to make driving easier and more correct, the problem is that the hardware necessary to produce those models is still very expensive (LIDAR). Most (all?) of the advanced self-driving prototype cars use LIDAR, while Tesla has decided that they can do without for their consumer models, sticking with just the simpler and less expensive RADAR and cameras.

In theory, Tesla's right, since humans get by just fine with only two "cameras", but we're clearly a long way from automating that level of performance.

<comment><USER47> Using multiple separate emitters and detectors it should be possible to determine how every point reflects light (i.e. sample its BRDF for a limited angular range and set of wavelengths), which should allow to distinguish at least between a limited set of materials such as snow, solid ice, liquid water and asphalt.

Cameras alone seems unsuitable, since it doesn't seem possible to make a camera-based system that works correctly all the time, ideally provably so, as required for a life-critical system.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Last year or so there was a article about what sounds like exactly the same problem with radar. Overhead traffic signs and very reflective small objects confusing it. The argument was that Tesla is in a great position to deal with it because they have so much human driver data. If humans keep driving through the giant obstacle it's probably not a problem. Apparently Tesla instead decided to ignore the problem...

</comment><comment><USER50> _> These systems are designed to ignore static obstacles because otherwise, they couldn't work at all._

 _> But it also detects lots of things a car rolling down the highway needn't worry about, like overhead highway signs, loose hubcaps, or speed limit signs. So engineers make a choice, telling the car to ignore these things and keep its eyes on the other cars on the road: They program the system to focus on the stuff that's moving._

I don't know about the sensors on today's semi-autonomous cars but it seems like there's already enough data there to prioritize _collision avoidance_ over forward motion.

It seems like the Wired story is very incomplete about the details. It needs a more "Ars Technica" in depth treatment or more ideally, an actual Tesla engineer to explain the self-driving computer's decision tree.

How do today's sensors that advertise their ability to "maintain distance" between cars work?

What's the difference between the following to scenarios to the front-mounted sensor?

      - 60mph Tesla slamming into a slow-moving road cleaning vehicle at 20mph

      - 40mph Tesla slamming into a stopped vehicle at 0 mph.

Isn't the ongoing computation of dy/dx to determine a "safe" gap between cars the same?

EDIT to summarize replies with a possible technical explanation...

The resolution of the radar sensor treats overhead signs (like highway signs[1]) as being on the "same 2-dimensional plane" as cars directly in front of you. This would generate false positives. It's not 3D radar which would yield spherical data inputs of impending collisions. Without 3D data, you can't write a rule that ignores objects not 0 degrees in front of the car.

The resolution of radar treats surface level signs (such as the double- arrow[2] at T intersections) as being the same harmless mass as a stationary car. The low resolution cannot distinguish between the shape/footprint of _small_ signs that are supposed to be there vs (large) stationary cars that are not. This object categorization requires LIDAR instead of radar.

Therefore, programming an unambiguous algorithm to prioritize "collision avoidance" is not possible with the current radar sensors. Is that an accurate summary of the technical limitations?

[1] [https://www.google.com/search?q=overhead+green+highway+signs...](https://www.google.com/search?q=overhead+green+highway+signs&source=lnms&tbm=isch)

[2] [https://www.google.com/search?q=2+direction+traffic+sign+dou...](https://www.google.com/search?q=2+direction+traffic+sign+double+arrow&source=lnms&tbm=isch)

<comment><USER14> The difference is that if all you have is a radar telling you that something is moving at 20mph then you can guess that it's probably a vehicle in the road and you should brake. But if there's something that's stationary at 0 mph it might very well be an overhead sign or otherwise something that you don't have to avoid. A radar can be very precise in detecting distance and relative velocity but very bad at detecting which direction something is in. For the sort of non-dish radars used in cars I'm not even sure they can detect direction at all.

Ignoring things that aren't moving is a standard technique in radar to prevent your returns from being swamped by, e.g., the ground instead of fast moving planes you're looking for.

<comment><USER51> To add even more detail, as there still appears to be a lot of confusion:

The radar systems in these vehicles send out a radio pulse in a broad approximate-cone forward. They get bounces back from everything that reflects radio in front of them. Distance from the object is calculated by time between pulse and response. Speed towards/away from the object is calculated from Doppler shift of the radio frequency.

There are two main things that these systems can't detect.

1\. Speed of the object perpendicular to the direction of radio wave travel.

2\. Location of the object within the approximate-cone the radio pulse travels in.

Note that thanks to the second, you can't calculate the first with higher- level object tracking, either.

So the data you get back is a list of (same-direction velocity component, distance) pairs. There's no way to distinguish between stationary objects in the road and stationary objects above the road, to the side of the road, or even the surface of the road itself.

Radar just doesn't provide the directional information necessary to handle obstacle detection safely.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> Isn't the solution some sort of collision avoidance system that is used in airplanes? Or perhaps as a stop gap, some sort of add-on (passive?) device for operators of vehicles that are frequently stopped can use to signal to autopilot vehicles that they are an obstruction to be avoided? It's a hack, but perhaps a necessary one?

</comment><comment><USER53> Why doesn't the camera system take over from the radar sensor to spot the stopped vehicle?

</comment><comment><USER54> I think this shows that autopilot won't truly be a thing until the cars start talking to each other. If the firetruck was broadcasting a stationary signal, the autopilot would not have to relay of cameras and radar to figure out what is where.

</comment><comment><USER55> IIRC Model S only has cameras while Model 3 also has radars (maybe in response to the first death with autopilot, which didn't see a white truck against white sky).

</comment><comment><USER14> I'm sort of surprised that the camera wasn't able to identify an object based on visual flow, unless this happened at night?

</comment><comment><USER56> I think we need some sorta public domain tech that allows car sensors to talk to each other real time.</comment>


Fancy ML techniques don't matter - <AUTHOR> http://isomorphismes.tumblr.com/post/22940787200/netflix

<comment><USER2> The article mentions two videos on ML; I believe these are the two:

1\. Hinton on RBMs [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyzOUbkUf3M&feature=plcp](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyzOUbkUf3M&feature=plcp)

2\. Gilbert Strang on SVD: [http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mathematics/18-06sc- linear-algebr...](http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mathematics/18-06sc-linear- algebra-fall-2011/positive-definite-matrices-and-applications/singular-value- decomposition/)</comment>


What it means to be non-blocking in node.js - <AUTHOR> http://raynos.org/blog/13/What-it-means-to-be-non-blocking-in-node.

<comment><USER2> I don't understand why there seems to be so much confusion as to how node works. Here's my mental model:

1\. The basic part of the system is a single thread running an event loop. It has a queue of waiting events. Every time the event loop starts, it pops off all of the waiting events and then gives your code a chance to process them, one after the other. Once your code is done processing this batch of events, a new even loop starts. Any events that occurred while your code was running will now be processed.[1]

2\. Some kinds of work take place outside the event loop. I/O tasks such as sockets and file reading/writing are good examples. In Node.js, I/O calls automatically spawn a new thread, which goes off and does whatever task you wanted it to do. When it finishes, it pushes an event onto the event loop's event queue, which will be handled by the event loop the next time it starts a new loop. Other things, such as TCP servers, run perpetually in their own thread, but will push new events onto the event queue whenever something interesting happens (receiving new data, etc.).

3\. You, the user, cannot do work outside the event loop. You cannot spawn threads. That is something that the framework does automatically, and only for certain, built-in tasks like file I/O. Node might add support for arbitrary asynchronous work later on, but for the moment this is not possible.

4\. Remember from #1 that a new event loop only starts when the previous event loop has completed. Since an event loop is essentially "the code you have written to process events that you care about", if any of that code takes a very long time to complete, then there won't be another event loop for a long time. Any new events that occur during that time (such as new HTTP requests) will not be processed until a new event loop occurs.

[1] Exception: events that _your code_ emits are processed immediately.

<comment><AUTHOR> 3\. child_process API and bolting C++ extensions onto node allow you to do this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I think there is some confusion/conflation with "blocking IO" and "blocking the event loop". If some requests are more computationally intensive than others, you will see slower response times for the less computationally intensive requests. This is similar to the classic "queueing" problem with some load balancing algorithms, where a fast request can get queued up behind a slow request on one worker process, only to miss out on another worker process becoming available. Even if you load balance with node, each node is processing multiple requests so you can still have this problem.

One thing to note is that it's not inefficient. You will be maximizing your CPU's and will be processing work as efficiently as possible, but users will experience some requests having a variable response time. This can happen any time you have a pool of generalized worker processes btw, it's not just a "node thing".

Solutions? If some requests do significantly more computation than others, you can split the computation in half using process.nextTick(). This will let smaller requests go faster in exchange for the slower request going slower (remember, we're already at max efficiency, so it's not like everything is going to get faster). This is better than sending the work out to a separate process unless the job is so big that the serialization/IPC cost is negligible. Otherwise you're adding extra work and making everything slower.

But really, having to manually chop up your algorithms is kind of a special case. Most requests in your app probably take the same order of magnitude in terms of computation time, or they are obvious outliers (pdf generation, video encoding, etc) that you would want to move to a separate process.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's the whole point. Most requests have the same order of magnitude.

If you have two sets of requests that have different orders of magnitude then put these two sets on their own node worker process behind your load balancer.

As long as you send your requests to the worker process that handles requests of a similar order of magnitude you will never have the faster requests being stuck behind slower requests problem.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Well written post. I guess a lot of people don't understand the contexts under which node.js is useful. They treat it like a magic solution that will cure all their scaling issues. Node.js is useful for I/O bound apps which are not CPU intensive because then your event loop is nothing but a "manager" which manages multiple incoming requests, and hooks them upto the I/O in an asynchronous manner and when the I/O finishes, sends the result back. For such use cases, node.js is very efficient and scales well (in the sense that with just one node.js process, you can handle many requests).

<comment><USER5> Disagee this is a well written post.

Agree people don't understand the contexts under which a node.js type system is useful.

Personally, I think there are a million better options than server-side JavaScript.

<comment><USER4> If it boils down to a matter of personal preference, that's true for almost anything.

The author of the actual post that the OP is responding to did not quite get what async behavior meant in node.js - i.e. it's less to do with using process.nextTick() to buy you parallelism, and more to do with async I/O.

And, there are other server-side JavaScript engines than just node.js (although it's only node which is getting all the attention), so I wouldn't be making such a generic statement.

<comment><USER5> Oh I'm completely comfortable making such a generic statement.

Every time you use JavaScript God kills a bunny.

<comment><AUTHOR> Please take your troll attacks of JavaScript elsewhere.

Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> how do experienced people compare one (or 8, by the number of cores) threaded node.js performance with java's asynchronous IO servlets?

<http://tomcat.apache.org/tomcat-7.0-doc/aio.html>

<comment><AUTHOR> Is Java faster then JavaScript? Yes.

Is it easier to write performant code with node.js vs Java Async IO? Subjective.

<comment><USER7> Java is faster than Javascript on V8? This is accepted fact? Can you provide a reference?

<comment><AUTHOR> It's pretty well known that Java hovers around 1.1x the speed of C where as JS hovers around 2-3x the speed of C.

So yes Java is faster.

<comment><USER8> { 'offtopic' : "

I totally agree with you, but i just want to draw your attention to the phrase 'the speed of C'. You almost make it seem like it's a global constant, like the real C-for- _celeritas_ speed of light, some unobtainable blazingly fast mirage accessible only to quantum physicists and unix greybeards.. but we don't need a particle accelerator to beat the performance of C, just better JITters. There's not really anything in the language stopping the performance from being reached (okay, well for JS there's the type system.)

" }

<comment><AUTHOR> When I say the speed of C. I'm really comparing various language X compilers to the GCC compiler under the assumption that the GCC compiler is the best.

No it's not a magical constant but I think for a baseline comparison "how close your compiler X is to GCC" is a fair thing to compare.

I also doubt V8 or spidermonkey can get better then GCC _on average_

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It would be more interesting to compare it to goroutines, which are much cheaper than threads.

</comment><comment><USER10> Or you could examine the Twisted answer: Use Ampoule and defer long-running CPU-bound work to external processes which are bootstrapped into Python using your already-existing worker code. Node _does_ have subprocess controls; I just checked the documentation. If somebody hasn't built an Ampoule for Node, then maybe somebody should get on that.

(Or just use Twisted and Ampoule. Seriously, guys.)

<comment><USER2> No offense to the Twisted guys, but after developing a project using Twisted, you could not pay me to do so again.

Their documentation is a joke, they managed to completely gunk up their architecture with a crudely bootstrapped attempt to solder interfaces onto python, and their development community is not particularly...welcoming...to newcomers.

Suffice it to say that when the only real way to get anything done with a framework is to read the source and then ask questions in their IRC channel, then something is very, very wrong.

<comment><USER10> Hi, I'm currently doing Twisted documentation, as part of a project to recover divmod.org's contents. How could I improve Twisted's documentation for you?

I'm sorry you don't like zope.interface. Do you prefer ABCs? What would make interfaces better for you? Did you prefer Twisted's builtin interfaces to zope.interface?

How was the community unfriendly? What can we do to improve the community experience?

(Anecdote: The only way I've been productive with Django is through reading their source; their IRC channel and documentation are useless.)

<comment><USER2> 1\. Change this page [1] to have a single, canonical tutorial. Just one link. You can have links to other resources and third-party guides further down, but there should be one awesome entry point into "how to get shit done with Twisted".

2\. Make it short. As short as you can _possibly_ make it and still have it be a good tutorial. If someone has to spend 3 hours reading docs before they can even begin to start writing something, they're just going to go off and use some other framework. For example, the "introduction" section consists of three pages [2][3][4] that should all be cut. They're either fluff that no one except the developers are interested in reading, or provide information that is way too advanced for a newcomer to understand.

3\. Throw away the finger tutorial. Completely. It's about 5 times longer than it should be. It also makes the old mistake of "here's how to do it, no turns out that's the wrong way, here's the right way, no turns out THAT was the wrong way, HERE's the right way". You need a tutorial that's short, and that addresses the most common use-cases for your product. This will probably involve a TCP server or an HTTP server.

4\. Make sure that after reading your tutorial _and nothing else_ , someone could actually go build a small project, organized _in the correct style_. That means they're going to have to know about twistd, services, factories, protocols, reactors, zope interfaces, and more.

5\. If it seems like fulfilling #4 is going to be impossible, then there's a problem with the design of the system, i.e. it's too complex, and needs to hide more of its implementation details from the user.

6\. Pages like these [5][6] are going to scare most of your users away. They seem to exemplify the worst of the Enterprise Java interface-for-a-factory-of- factories code bloat that most web developers live in fear of. If this is really the "right way" to develop Twisted apps, then that needs to be explained sooner, and more concisely.

7\. Look at your competition! The documentation for Node.js is sparse (a little too sparse) but it's not bad. Check out their synopsis page [7] (useful!). The entire API docs are fairly well-commented, have lots of examples, and (and this is important) never nest more than one level. The front page is itself the minimum viable documentation. If they had a couple extra pages on how to use modules correctly and how to run a node as a system service and it would be doing pretty great.

8\. My issue with Twisted's use of interfaces is that it makes the API documentation really hard to read. Every function or class I want to use requires an ISomething that I've never heard of and don't know how to create. Then it turns out that my service or factory or whatever actually _is_ an ISomething, but I didn't know that because the thing that created it returns an ISomethingElse BUT because I asked for it to be a TCP server it's actually an instance of SomeClass, which also happens to implement ISomething. Which I only find out by asking in the IRC channel.

9\. In my experience, asking questions in the IRC channel makes you feel stupid. The people there tend to give off the feeling of "oh _god_ , this is so _simple_ , why don't you know that to start a Foo you need to pass it an IBar, which your particular service counts as because ..., DUH". Maybe the IRC channel is not supposed to be for support, in which case...you need better documentation :p

Good luck! Documentation writers are the unsung heroes of many a project, forging success and popularity with little recognition. Twisted also has a lot of cool features that Node does not; I would be happy to see them succeed.

[1] <http://twistedmatrix.com/trac/wiki/Documentation>

[2] [http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/vision...](http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/vision.html)

[3] [http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/overvi...](http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/overview.html)

[4] [http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/intern...](http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/internet- overview.html)

[5] [http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/tutori...](http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/tutorial/components.html)

[6] [http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/tutori...](http://twistedmatrix.com/documents/current/core/howto/tutorial/backends.html)

[7] <http://nodejs.org/docs/v0.5.10/api/synopsis.html>

<comment><USER11> Thanks for the thorough critique! Obviously doing all of this is a ton of work, so it's not going to get done right away, but none of this is inconsistent with our existing long-term plans for Twisted's documentation. I hope that if you do get forced to work with Twisted again we will have made the learning experience considerably smoother :-).</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Hong Kong Is Showing Symptoms of a Failed State - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2020-02-09/coronavirus-hong-kong-shows-symptoms-of-a-failed-state <comment><USER2> Singapore which implemented quarantine order like China, restricted purchase of essentials at supermarkets and in spite of having more cases is more effective in managing nCOV and public panic buying. Supermarkets are replenished again quickly.

Hong Kong is operating as free market economy where anyone can buy what they need, so most people stock up as much as they need and during this panic none of the big private players are capable to handle it, as they want to profit from it. In this scenario planned economy like China and Singapore works much better than free market economy. So probably it's a failure of Hong Kong's free market economy.

In Hong Kong many healthcare staff assigned to take care of infected people resign and many go on a strike when a collective response to handle an epidemic is needed. They went on a strike to close borders and ask local government not to bring back Hong Kong residents and people stuck in Mainland.

<comment><USER3> In a true free market economy, those striking workers would either be offered more salary to work, or their other demands would be met.

Likewise, in a truly free market, supermarket shelves wouldn't be empty - prices would just be very high for the scarse goods.

<comment><USER2> In truly free market when government do not intervene shelves will always be kept at the minimum to profit from panic. It's because demand and supply is controlled by rich and high price exclude the non rich. That's the reason systems are crumbling in Hong Kong.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Hong Kong shows that the CCP claim they care about stability is a lie

They are happy to destroy HK for a little more power

</comment><comment> _-___________-_ The picture of the empty shelves is quite misleading. I haven't had any trouble buying necessities (and even non-necessities).

</comment><comment><USER5> I feel like failed state symptoms due to pandemic is pretty far removed from failed state that should be operating "normally".

</comment><comment><USER6> Still cannot find any tiolet paper. But unlike all the states he said HK is more individualist than say Singapore. The failure of the state is in a sense not that true but failure of the top tier of the government. and it is not a failure to act but it is overstep of them that is problem, not the failure of the overall state (all government organisation, gov sponsored org. etc ) and civil society. if they do not change, the overall government (not just top tier and police) would collapse with the civil society.

We still fighting the top tier and the germ. As said it is not hope we have. It is by trying we might have hope.

Tl; dr

The top tier can let in mask long time ago and we will not have problem now. The top tier can follow medical advice and close the border like Singapore and even macau or ... Wuhan. Instead we have a hard time to buy it overseas. In fact we still do as the top tier failed and in the way.

you may think that is an argument of words. But it is not. If you want even more stronger state fit an event ultimately rely upon individual to stay alert and healthy, instead still go around to do hot pot with your family from china and got at least 7 out of 20 infected, you need some top tier action but also some citizen action. But that is not in.

Instead it try to a strong and in fact a police state. They ask for scouts even to quarantine centre but not police. Because the police still acting like they are just nothing happened. And just arrest 119 people in remembrance of a protestor.

the top tier should know police cannot do all things. but they cannot fulfill their duty, except continue to arrest people in peaceful gathering. Just arrest 119 for a remembrance...

No it is not a failure of the state in the sense it failed. It is the success they think that is the problem. The top tier just too strong on one agenda. Hence the fix is not the success of the state. But the change strategy of the state. If not, the whole system no matter his strong the civil society is cannot survive.

</comment><comment><USER7> Arguably so is America, but it's hard to see what's in front of your nose.

</comment><comment><USER8> "failed" is not the same as deliberately sabotaged - CN is actively restricting resources, treatment, medical access, and beating any occupants who disagree.

<comment><USER9> I'm not sure why this is being voted down. Citizens of HK were asking for the border to be sealed for weeks before Lam did anything.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> So is Kentucky

</comment><comment><USER11> Maybe they deserve this? Maybe Hong Kong should fail?

* They firebombed a hospital/building that would've served as the quarantine location. This could've saved them, but instead, their stupidity doomed them.

* They destroyed city services without realizing, or caring, of their precarious situation.

* Their political backers wanted their city to fail, in order to be the sacrificial lamb, so that China could be destroyed. Interestingly enough, their dreams may be getting closer. And all it took was a novel little virus. The loss of life will be very high indeed, including their own, but they don't care, nor do their political backers.

* The doctors and nurses abandoned their positions during a crisis, but they have a civic responsibility, and are the first responders to a health crisis. But they just left their posts. Now the people must fend for themselves. What about when this actually becomes real? Are they going to run too? It looks like they will.

I don't have the answers, nor do I want Hong Kong to fail. But Mother Nature is on deck, and she's going to take her toll.

<comment><USER4> Thanks CCP

I'm sure the communist government had nothing to do with any of this

<comment><USER11> You should post your conspiracy theories on reddit. They'll happily entertain your nonsense over there.</comment></comment></comment>


Building Slack Bots for Fun: A Serverless Release Gong - <AUTHOR> https://www.stackery.io/blog/serverless-gong/ <comment><USER2> Slack bots are fun and pretty easy to build! We're running one on an rpi at the office which monitors our #travis channel for failed builds and then powers a revolving light for a couple seconds :)

Small nitpick, the author should've used the `@slack/client` package though, `slack-node` is old and unmaintained.

<comment><USER3> Nice! I built something similar for AWS CodeBuild and ECS where we get channel notifications when builds start/succeed/fail and when ECS tasks start or die. It also shows who made the commit and what it relates to by pulling info from GitHub. I haven't gone the flashing light route quite yet but I've considered it.

Or maybe a loud noise directed at the developer who submitted the commit that caused the build to fail.

<comment><USER4> Just what people need, more physical distractions in the office!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I've also created a slack bot for fun to allow slack teammates to play chess within slack: [https://github.com/cjsaylor/chessbot](https://github.com/cjsaylor/chessbot). The bot I built is a more traditional server setup, however I did briefly consider using a serverless setup for it.

The serverless pipeline seems a lot more complex than the actual application to send the message to a slack channel. I wonder if things like Github's actions would replace the need to have a serverless thing for notifications of this kind (at least within the confines of Github's ecosystem).

<comment><USER6> That's funny, I built the same thing for our Slack (I wish I'd known about notnil/chess; I tediously wrote out the rules for chess). I managed to do without assets, though, except for a typeface that had chess piece glyphs. :)

<comment><USER5> I first started down the text path, but not being able to "highlight" previous plays and check turned me towards generating graphics instead.

<comment><USER6> Oh, it's not text; I render a PNG too. I just use the glyphs from the typeface for the pieces, and draw the board in code.

<comment><USER5> I think I tried the same thing, but shipping with the font included presented some licensing concerns. Also, I had a hard time getting it to line up exactly how I wanted, so ultimately I went on to assets.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: My awful Kickstarter campaign. Good idea, terrible presentation. - <AUTHOR> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1141308765/jsonloops-open-source-real-time-multiuser-audio-se

<comment><USER2> "The best thing about this project is that we're not trying to retain ownership of it"

What? That's like a tiny little asterisk point down at the bottom of your feature list. The best thing about your project should be that it's useful for doing X.

I never got as far as finding out what X actually was, and why this was going to be better than the existing tools out there.

But I did learn what file format you save projects in. Yikes. Developers, stop talking about development stuff. Nobody cares about the technical details. Nobody cares about Open Source. Talk about your _product_.

</comment><comment><USER3> Uh, first of all, get rid of the glasses and the dude on the left sitting with his mouse open. Then, focus on the demo.

One of the best things I learned from Presenting to Win is that one of the first things you have to do in a product pitch is show what problem you are solving for the audience. This is the best way to capture their attention, and will get them interested in what you are trying to do and how you are going to do it.

<comment><AUTHOR> By "dude on the left", did you mean <https://github.com/hij1nx> or <https://github.com/tmpvar>?

I'm not keen on getting rid of either of them. :-(

<comment><USER3> You don't have to get rid of them, make them participate more actively in the movie and or demo.

Sitting there while you're doing all the talking makes you look like bad because you don't seem to want to do it alone, and makes them look bad, because they don't do any talking.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> It's too much focused on the technical side, I'd present it as a multiuser audio sequencer, with an awesome demo and what would you do with the cash. Technical details are available on Github for people interested in.

edit: By the way, great project !

<comment><USER5> Yeah, try being less technical and more "look at this cool thing!"

Also, $20k seems like a lot.

<comment><AUTHOR> I don't think it's unreasonable to assume it will take at least 1,000 development hours to get JSONloops to v1.0.0.

1000 hours / $20,000 = $20.00 per hour for developers on average

Is that too much to ask for?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> My last comment wasn't constructive, so I deleted it.

You should put the code up online so people can play with the sequencer. Let people save out the tracks..

Maybe even make it into a game of some sort.

This reminds me of Mario Paint. I think a lot of people would like it if it were online & playable.

<comment><AUTHOR> The code is online, at github...<http://github.com/marak/JSONloops>

An online demo where people can play with the software without having to install Node.js is planned, but there are several issues which need to be addressed first.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you're going to do it anyway, consider using Flattr. I'd pay you.

Edit: and if you do, twitter me at @mariuskempe and I'll start donating.

</comment><comment><USER8> Also, why have a $1 donation, that makes you look desperate! Read the post on the front page of HN titled "We don't get out of bed for $10K".

<comment><USER9> This great (long) article was posted a while back, about how to get what you want out of Kickstarter. <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1552952> Under the heading "Defining the Pledge Tiers" is the result of an informal survey showing how easy it is to get money at various levels.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> seems like you are asking to get dissed.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> At the behest of the development team I've taken down the old video.

I'll try and take your advice and revamp the campaign.</comment>


Ask HN: Why does a bachelor degree in business sucks so much? - <AUTHOR> I truly think that majoring in business is a really bad choice. I was discussing this topic with a friend and I presented a few arguments. However, I would like to listen to HN community. I think most of you will agree with my position. If so, which arguments would you use? <comment><USER2> _I think most of you will agree with my position._

You might be surprised. I personally don't see any problem with majoring in business _depending on what your goals are_. I mean, if you want to analyze it simply in terms of "expected lifetime economic return", then majoring in business probably actually comes out ahead of majoring in computer science when you consider that most CEOs of large companies come from a "business" function within their enterprise, and not engineering. And CEOs tend to get paid a LOT more than engineers.

Of course, there possible exception is the "founder / CEO" who has a tech background and founds a startup and remains CEO. So there are clearly multiple paths to success, depending on how you define success.

All of that said, I think there's a lot to be said for having both engineering knowledge/skills AND business knowledge / skills. In my ideal world, I'd have liked to have gotten a B.S. with a triple major in like C.S., business (or marketing) and applied mathematics (or maybe statistics), or something like that.

Of course, one could always get an undergrad degree in a technical field (cs, ee, math, etc.) then go back and do a separate degree in business - perhaps an "executive MBA" for the time crunched.

Anyway, I'd put Business ahead of "women's studies", "medieval history" and any number of other majors in terms of economic value. BUT... again, for any given individual, economic value may not be the sole criteria they're evaluating things on. So it's really down to the individual.

</comment><comment><USER3> Getting a technical/scientific undergraduate degree teaches you to think more logically and gives you the tools to understand the technical underpinnings of the modern world.

I have a friend with a BS and MS in Software Engineering and now his company pays his tuition as he pursues an MBA and he is managing a team of about 15 to 20 engineers and developers within a Fortune 500 company. It feels like that combination is really powerful.

</comment><comment><USER4> "Conjoined triangles of success." Enough said. (note I'm software engineer and a business major)</comment>