Ask HN: how effective are job postings or Hacker News? - <AUTHOR>

I am curious about how many inquiries and applications the typical YC company job posting on Hacker News receives. How many of those are any good? Do you get more offers for designers, programmers, cofounders, etc? <comment><USER2> Not sure how it looks from the other end, but having applied to a handful, including solving a few nontrivial puzzles, I never even received a reply, even to say thanks for solving the puzzle, but you're not a good fit. Yc should have a seminar on business etiquette.

<comment><USER3> I just want to add this little tip. If you can't be better than your competition at anything else, you can always be better at caring about everyone that touches your brand.

Imagine if byoung2 had said instead, "Yeah, I applied to six, and no one replied except favorite_yc_startup." How much that does for the brand. Now multiple that by the thousands of people who interact with your brand each year.

<comment><USER2> I 100% agree with you. I imagine that the type of people who read HN and apply would be pretty influential in the startup scene. You don't want that crowd to think you treat your customers the same way I was treated as a job applicant.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What cool companies, products, and features originated at hackathons? - <AUTHOR>

Let's compile a list. If possible, it'd be interesting to know how long it took to build the first prototype, how many people were involved, and if possible, to see what the prototype looked like at first, compared to what it grew into later. Otherwise, just some names and links is enough.
I'd like to organize a hackathon among friends later this year. Would like a litany of cool projects that started at hackathons, to cite as evidence that great things have been started in a short time with few resources and a lot of passion.
Also welcome: examples of great things that have been built in insanely little time, period. For example, Tupac's last album was made in 7 days from writing to final production. The White Stripes' "Elephant" was made in 2 weeks. <comment><AUTHOR> Toggl.com is a great service. It was launched after being prototyped at a hackathon in Europe. Can no longer find the link.

According to this TechCrunch article ([http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/28/biz- stone-steps-back-from-t...](http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/28/biz-stone-steps- back-from-twitter-to-relaunch-obvious-with-ev-williams-and-jason-goldman/)), Twitter started as a side project at Odeo that came out of a hackathon. "Among the assets of Odeo was a little side project created during a hackathon, called Twitter."

</comment><comment><USER2> I'm pretty sure GroupMe was built at a TC Hackathon</comment>


IPhone 5 is Exactly what Apple Should Release - <AUTHOR> http://www.runthereset.com/2012/09/iphone-5-thoughts_13.html

<comment><USER2> I want a better enterprise security environment similar to Blackberry's. More business level productivity suites can be collaborative within a company if only the OS could support it. This is where Win8 holds most promise. Apple will retain market share with hipsters, girls and grandma, but power users are looking elsewhere. Nothing wrong with that.

<comment><USER3> Admittedly I know nothing of "business level productivity suites," but why would you think that WP8 holds the most promise? Judging by WP7, which I've been using for 2 months now, I would imagine WP8 hold no promise. I'd also imagine that apps like Glassboard hold the most promise.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This. None of the later iphone releases were revolution or amazing. The press is just bored of steady progress.

3G- new case, 3G, gps

3GS- faster. Better camera?

4- retina display

4s - Siri.

5- taller screen, thinner, faster.

<comment><USER5> I wrote a blog post that addresses this in more detail. [http://www.cocoacontrols.com/posts/punctuated-gradualism- and...](http://www.cocoacontrols.com/posts/punctuated-gradualism-and-iphone-5)</comment></comment>


DeepOpenStruct - Simple data structures from complex nested data in Ruby - <AUTHOR> http://github.com/aarongough/deepopenstruct

<comment><AUTHOR> Feedback welcomed! If anyone finds a data set that breaks this I would love to see it!</comment>


The myth of the lone genius - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20120316-the-myth-of-the-lone-genius <comment><USER2> Seems to be a trend nowadays attacking the fact that lone geniuses exist and tend to be outside the direct control of bankers and bureacratic corporations.

Crick and Watson never claimed to be lone geniuses working in their garage alone when they decoded DNA, so debunking that they are lone geniuses is not a particularly compelling argument. However, hallucinations brought on by LSD trips were a key factor, which is interesting and seems to have contributed more to their success than working in a well funded lab at a corporation, though that certainly had its own benefits as well as disadvantages.

It's also never been contested that lone geniuses do in fact build upon previous work and discoveries made throughout history, in addition to making their own contributions. So pointing that out is not debunking "the myth" of lone geniuses either.

Tesla, Erastothenes, Philo Farnsworth, even Einstein in the patent office all came up with original ideas.

It's interesting when there is a flurry of articles making coordinated attacks upon the very idea of creative individualism. Often when things are so coordinated there is a PR firm behind it. Who is their client is the question I ask.

<comment><USER3> I upvoted you because I agree with your main point, but I think you're veering into conspiracy teritory with that last paragraph. Who the heck would benefit from such a broad "attack" anyway? Much more likely that it's group dynamics (or trend or whatever you want to call it).

<comment><USER4> Agree, a coordinated conspiracy seems incredibly unlikely. :)

I think it may actually be very simple: a wast majority of people know they have no chance of being a "lone genius", and that it would therefore not be beneficial for them to promote geniality as a leadership quality.

<comment><USER5> The Media are a group (or several large groups) and as such as subject to group-think like any other group. I believe a lot of conspiracy related accusations could be attributable to the natural tendency toward group-think.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6>
        BBC Future (international version)

        We're sorry but this site is not accessible from the UK
        as it is part of our international service and is not funded
        by the licence fee.

Anyone got a transcript?

<comment><USER7> What a fabulous perversion of the licence fee concept! The fee is meant to enable the BBC to provide independent journalism in the UK, and so they now decide that something that's not funded by the fee is not available in the Uk???

How bizarrely stupid.

<comment><USER8> Region locking is not limited to only the BBC. Region locking is just run of the mill stupid.

<comment><USER9> Yeah, but locking out the region of origin is pretty comical.

<comment><USER7> Locking out the region that pays most of your company's salaries is especially comical...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Einstein. Newton. Leo Szilard. Good day, sir.

<comment><USER11> Wozniak

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I couldn't get past the backwards bending royal ass kissing.</comment>


Estimate for number of books sold per Kindle: 27 - <AUTHOR> http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=0AnyXnkmypIPBdGM5RUpPTW1Bckh6M3FMM0hJendYRUE&hl=en&single=true&gid=0&output=html <comment><USER2> Does books purchased over a 3-year timespan have any relevance to books purchased over a 30-day timespan? Unlike other kinds of purchases, most people usually consume books relatively slowly (at a rate of one per month or more). If your Kindle is 2 years old, 27 books per 24 months is roughly equivalent to the iPad's numbers...

Also, can anyone who owns/uses both an iPad and a Kindle chime in on how the reading experience differs between the two?

All I've heard is the obvious: that the iPad interface is slicker, but the Kindle is much better in direct sunlight.

I had a first-gen Kindle, and a Kindle DX. I've purchased maybe 20 books, but I've grown to despise the Kindle. It's interface is terrible; anything other than a book on it is miserable (newspaper, magazine article, etc.). I can't wait to get an iPad...

<comment><USER3> I had a Kindle DX (which I sold recently) and currently have an iPad.

Since you said to skip the obvious I will just comment on the actual experience of using the two devices. Theoretically I should love the Kindle, far more than the iPad, but in reality it just doesn't work that way. The Kindle has an e-ink display which is easier on the eyes than an LCD, it's very light and compact, it has free cellular internet access (WhisperNet), etc.

In reality though, I found the Kindle to be clunky. The screen is very slow to refresh which makes skimming or searching through a book almost impossible. The web browser ends up being nothing more than a toy, it can certainly render sites correctly, but you can't do anything interactive and even clicking on a link can end up taking dozens of clicks depending on the location on the page.

In contrast the iPad is a joy to use. Everything basically works like you would expect it to. The screen looks great and is easy to read on. Especially with the Kindle app where you can switch to white text on black background. It's maybe not quite as good as e ink, but close enough. I'm certainly not trying to claim that the iPad is a perfect device. What I am trying to say though is that the iPad is a good enough book reading device, and it blows the Kindle away in many other aspects, so in the end the Kindle went up for sale and I haven't missed it.

<comment><USER4> The iPad (which I've ordered but don't have yet) is heavier than the DX, and needs to be charged a lot more frequently (especially if you leave wireless off on the DX). I think that would take it from "book replacement" to "another phone-like device", where I need to worry about charging it every 1-2 days.

My plan is to just carry both, though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I made this estimate as a follow-up for this discussion: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1315149>. Please suggest how to make this more accurate, and whether you believe the assumptions above.

<comment><USER5> I think a problem is that people will initially load up on apps and books when they first purchase something. I think I bought 7 books when I got my KindleDX in Jan. I have a few more on there already. However, the initial burst of the iPad sales and the sustained KindleDX sales numbers are incomparable at this point imho (unless you can get the data for the Kindle right after it came out?)

I wonder if there is a way to put in the newspaper & magazine that Kindle readers are getting -- though I am at work and my laptop is broken.

Interesting discussion, I plan to monitor closely.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Ah come on, all these assumptions make your numbers worthless. I recently bought a nook: reading my first book on it gave me the same feeling I had when I efirst used an MP3 player. You immediately realize this is the future, it's soooo much better and there is no way back.

The only tragic thing is: publishers didn't realize that yet and the number of books you can buy is still so limited.

<comment><USER7> _reading my first book on it gave me the same feeling I had when I efirst used an MP3 player. You immediately realize this is the future, it's soooo much better and there is no way back._

Agreed. The ability to highlight a word in iBooks and look up the definition is a new _must have_ for me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> When I owned my Kindle, I had about 80 books on it. I'd paid for 2 of them, "Les Miserables" and "The Count of Monte Cristo."

The rest I got by combing the top sellers list and "buying" all the books listed as free.

<comment><AUTHOR> Well, do you know that both of these books are available for free? <http://www.gutenberg.org/> and <http://calibre-ebook.com/> are your friends.

<comment><USER9> Sometimes I'd rather pay $0.99 for an e-book that is formatted well than acquire it for free in a messy unfriendly e-book.

<comment><USER10> How can you tell when its going to be well formatted versus just a paywalled copy of the free one?

<comment><USER11> Both Kindle and the iBookstore offer free samples.

They usually work really well though they do sometimes have problems, such as cutting off before the main text starts due to a long introduction. (And I downloaded a sample of the famously footnoted Infinite Jest from iBooks... didn't include any footnotes. Anybody know if that's just a limitation of the sample? My purchase decision depends on how easy it is to get to/back from the footnotes...)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I don't think you can really draw any useful information about how much people prefer each device for reading by comparing the average number of books sold per device.

Everyone who buys a Kindle buys it to read books on. Some people who buy iPads don't care about e-books at all. That doesn't say anything about its capability as an e-reader, it just means that the device appeals to a wider audience.

</comment><comment><USER13> I have already bought 15 book at Kindle Store, and I don't even own a Kindle—I read them on the iPhone and my Macs. I am really looking forward to get iPad—Kindle for iPad looks much nicer than their Mac version.

<comment><USER14> Same here. The Kindle app was what convinced me to upgrade from a Touch to an iPhone. Above all else I use it as a reader.

The GoodReader app is my preferred reader for .PDFs such as the MEAP edition of _Joy of Clojure_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> You have to keep in mind the Kindle has been out for a long time. Why would people buy 27 books on the iPad when they have not had it for more than a month?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, that's a fair comment. Anecdotally, though, I bought a dozen or so books in the very first week - that's why the iBooks number looks so low to me.

<comment><USER16> Are you a very fast reader, or did you buy them to read later? I suspect people will buy books as they finish reading them... hence, comparing books sold on iPad/Kindle isn't indicative of anything.

<comment><AUTHOR> I usually buy them in batches, esp. if friends recommend them. Knowing that I have some unread books stimulates my reading :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> That does seem a bit high but I wouldn't say that it's impossible. If someone is going to spend hundreds on a device that's meant soley for reading, they probably read a lot of books.

Anecdotally, I just got an iPad and bought 3 books I've been meaning to read for a while. Before that, I hadn't bought a book in months. In a way it's like the app store but for books - looking for and buying a book was so easy that I'll probably buy more than if I had to go to the store every time.

</comment><comment><USER18> This post and all the replies are full of misconceptions.

I suspect the average book price is way off.

I have 98 digital books in my kindle library.

My average book price for the 98 books was $3.46.

39 books were free.

The average book price for my non-free books was $5.87.

As far as kindle vs iPad, I have both.

The kindle is MUCH better for actual reading. It's possible when you're 10 years old that you can read novels by moonlight, but as you get older having a well-lit book is a much better experience.

Reading on the kindle, with a bright light over your shoulder is wonderful.

The kindle does have a clunky interface, but I don't have to use it much. I usually peruse books in the amazon store on my computer (or sometimes on my iphone).

I can buy and send it to my kindle in one click.

But mostly, I send books to my kindle using the "send sample" feature. I don't buy books until I'm sure I want to buy them. I send a sample. Then when I go to my kindle, there's a big queue of books that might or might not be interesting. I start reading them, and if I like it I get to the end of the sample and click the buy button they embedded there.

Oh, one more thing -- in the beginning I got a lot of free books for my kindle. My library is now cluttered up with a bunch of books that seemed good at the time, but now I can't get rid of.

In the end, the kindle may have a clunky interface, but it excels at being a book. It's my preferred way to read.

I also have an iPad, and it's just not as good a reading experience for text. You can see the pixels in the characters, and the LCD display isn't as easy to read. I'm sure apple will remedy this going forward as their display gets brighter and higher-resolution. However, I don't know if it can get as good as the kindle with a good reading light. The iPad will never compare to the kindle in sunlight.

However, the iPad excels with color or animated books. For example, the kids books for the iPad are wonderful (look at the free Alice in Wonderland or Toy Story books). For textbooks, I can imagine it can only get better, maybe redefining what a book is. I can imagine physics textbooks with built-in calculations, graphing and demonstrations. The line between app and book is getting pretty fuzzy.

<comment><USER19> Just so you know you can get rid of the free books by moving the clicking thing to the left (or maybe right) on the book you want to delete an option will come up. I think it is also a menu item as well as being able to remove it by usb. (So long as you are talking about an actual kindle and not on apple things as I have no experience there.)

<comment><USER18> I meant my library of archived items, not my home screen. (but thanks for the thought!)

<comment><USER19> Just delete them by usb then :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I'd like to see a poll of HN users created. But before someone does, it would be nice to figure out a good set of questions.

My suggested format:

1) Do you own an iPad?

1a) How many books have you purchased from the iBookstore?

1b) How many were books that you already own?

1c) How many free books have you got from Apple, other than Winnie The Pooh?

1d) How many books from another source have you transferred to the iPad?

2) Do you own a Kindle or use a Kindle app? (Please specify.)

2a) How many books have you bought from the Kindle store?

2b) How many were books that you already own?

2c) How many free books have you got from the Kindle store?

2d) How many books from another source have you transferred to the Kindle device or app?

3) Did DRM influence your purchasing decisions?

My answers:

1) Do you own an iPad? --> Yes.

1a) How many books have you purchased from the iBookstore? --> 3.

1b) How many were books that you already own? --> 2.

1c) How many free books have you got from Apple, other than Winnie The Pooh? --> 0.

1d) How many books from another source have you transferred to the iPad? --> 8.

2) Do you own a Kindle or use a Kindle app? (Please specify.) --> No.

3) Did DRM influence your purchasing decisions? --> Yes. Very much so.

</comment><comment><USER21> USD 800M seems pretty high for their sales, especially considering: "At the same time, Amazon.com, seller of the Kindle e-book reading device, may boost digital book sales by 83 percent this year to $248 million from $135 million last year, the analysts said in a note today"

<comment><AUTHOR> That's a valid point, although you should note that 800M is a _gross_ number; what Amazon may report in their digital book sales is just their 30% share of the sell.

I clearly need to investigate it some more.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have a Kindle (bought 1 when it first came out, gave a 2 as a gift, now DX); plus kindle app on an ipod touch and on mac. iPad is enroute. Eagerly awaiting an Android app.

I have about ~150 books paid for (maybe more? I see 10 pages with 15 items per page). 1-2 books per week are consumed, but I tend to buy 5-10 at a time.

</comment><comment><USER22> The Kindle hasn't increased the amount of books I purchase, but I do find myself subscribing to far more publications because of how trivial it is to do on the device. Never again will I wait seven weeks to receive the first issue of a magazine.

</comment><comment><USER23> You buy a kindle to read books. You have to have books. Plenty of them.

You buy an iPad to play games mostly, to surf the web and to read books.

I bet you the iPad has a better ratio of games/iPad than books/kindle.

So, my nailclipper clip my nails and my toothbrush brush my teeth.

</comment><comment><USER24> 27 books per kindle looks kind of unrealistic. I have own kindle for last 6 months and I have bought only 3 books and few free ones. I have also bought few printed editions because they are not available on kindle.

<comment><USER25> I've had a Kindle for about a year and a half and have over 80 paid books.

I read a lot of books and the Kindle paid for itself in savings on books in a few months.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Does anyone have a reference for Amazon's percentage of physical book sales in the US?</comment>


Detect iPad Mini in HTML5? - <AUTHOR> http://stackoverflow.com/questions/13248493/detect-ipad-mini-in-html5 <comment><USER3>
        +</comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>-----+
        |   Are you using an    |
        |      iPad mini?       |
        |                       |
        |  [yes]        [ No ]  |
        |                       |
        +</comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>-----+

<comment><USER4> Most people will just click yes or no to get past this screen. Better to ask "What iPad device are you using?" With options (with pictures?) of "iPad Mini" and "iPad 1/2/3"

<comment><USER5> /4

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> You shouldn't need to know if it's an iPad Mini.

If your fonts / buttons are too small, then just make them bigger. Easy.

This will then mean it will be even more accessible on the 10" device.

Plus we've never bothered to know the PPI of the screens before, I've got a 15" screen that is 1920x1080 as well as a 50" screen. But I don't see anyone checking for that. Just stick to reasonable sized fonts and buttons and you should be good.

<comment><USER7> Dilemma: the size of a finger doesn't change just because your screen is higher resolution. A button and interface designed for the mini might look goofy on the larger device; an interface designed for the larger iPad might be entirely unusable on the Mini. And it's reasonable for designers to want to solve that problem.

Furthermore, your example is anecdotal and fairly meaningless. I've got a 15" screen that's 2880x1800, so what of it? I definitely don't run it at native resolution—it's scaled 2x, or 1.5x down. And it Just Works because there are APIs for native applications and in CSS that expose the pixel density so that developers can deal with it gracefully. Why not do the same for other devices which are also supposed to be high resolution—and more importantly—resolution independent?

The truth is, all of these devices have different pixel densities, and we're supposed to be moving in a resolution-independent direction, such that the physical size of the device and the number of pixels on its screen are completely arbitrary and controllable variables. Especially on mobile, interfaces depend on physical size, not on resolution; the size of a the main input mechanism does not depend on screen resolution or device size—it is static. It is a finger. We should be able to control the UI correctly instead of kludging around the problem.

This idea that you shouldn't need to design apps correctly is simply an excuse for the lack of means to do so. It's a poor argument.

<comment><USER8> The size difference between an iPad and iPad mini is nowhere near 1920x1200 vs 1280x800 on a 15" screen, it's only 20% smaller (44px vs 36px).

<http://jsbin.com/inuxah/1>

<comment><USER7> What if they made a device that was 2 inches smaller than that with the same resolution? Surely that would be unimaginable.

The need for good standards remains.

<comment><USER8> They wouldn't, because it would have too high DPI. That's why they went for a multiple with Retina screens. I remember seeing an Android with a 1280x800 display or similar, using "mobile-optimized" sites was a pain.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I imagine this is an intentional omission based on Apple's own research. Personally, while I'm not in the market for an iPad mini it would irritate me if developers tried to treat it as a separate target for layouts. The whole point is it's supposed to be a (slightly) more compact iPad but behave identically.

<comment><USER10> Or based on the frustration of iPhone users being punted onto second rate "mobile sites" when the full site in Safari with a bit of zooming is absolutely fine.

Don't give people any more information which they're likely to use to do dumb things?

<comment><USER11> This is the paradox of platforms in general: the more you empower smart, nice devs, the more you also empower not-so-smart, not-so-nice devs.

<comment><USER10> Agreed.

With this though I'm not hearing any argument that suggests there's a compelling reason to distinguish based on this platform. I'm not saying that there isn't one, just that in a situation like that the chances are there will be a lot more implementations that do something stupid with it than do something good.

<comment><USER11> I tend to side with empowering devs by default (of course), but I see your point. Readability should be addressed with adjustable fonts on all devices anyway. The only possible case I could see is augmented-reality stuff where the real size matters, maybe such as rendering a ruler to the screen. An edge case, admittedly, but if it were my edge case, I'd be pissed.

<comment><USER10> I'd certainly never say don't do something because devs can't be trusted with it, though I don't think that's Apple's logic here.

If it's an intentional thing I think they genuinely (possibly mistakenly but genuinely) believe that it's unnecessary rather than that it would be useful but abused.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Already posted it on SO but here goes:

Play a stereo audio file and compare the accelerometer response when volume is high on the right channel and on the left channel - iPad2 had mono speakers and iPad Mini has stereo speakers built in

<comment><USER13> I assumed that was a joke.

While this might work, wouldn't the sound have to be audible to the user in order for this to work? And therefore when you browse to a web-site it is going to let out a bloop on LOUD just to test the device?

Personally if that happened to me I would never visit your web-site again.

<comment><USER12> iOS audio will only play in response to user generated event (click for example) never when the site loads.

And I am not saying it has to be a random noise or very loud the accelerometer on the iDevices since the iPhone 4 is superb a very low sound will probably be sufficient. The sound can be easily integrated into the natural flow of the site, as many sites already do small beeps or play music etc to provide feedback to the user.

<comment><USER14> If you play the sound using the Web Audio API, you're not restricted by user interaction.

<comment><USER15> This specifically arrived for MobileSafari only in IOS6, right? Do you have an example of a page demonstrating a sound without interaction for testing?

<comment><USER16> If they are running a version of iOS older than 6.0, they are definitely not using an iPad Mini, so you have answered the question in that case.

<comment><USER15> My interest is in the digression -- playing sound without a user click to initiate -- rather than the Mini-detection. So still interested in a clarification/example of where this is possible.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17>
        iPhone 3GS: 160dpi
        iPad Mini: 163dpi
        iPad 2: 129dpi

The iOS guidelines are 40 points for a button on all devices. So a button on an iPad mini is the same physical size as a button on an iPhone. Complaints about fixed finger sizes don't really make sense to me. If buttons on the iPad mini are too small, so are the buttons on every iPhone app made since 2007.

<comment><USER18> Some sites have device-specific designs, and so they present different designs for the iPad 2 and iPhone. Your comment would be applicable if the iPad Mini were indistinguishable from the _iPhone_ and were served designs meant for the iPhone as they have roughly the same pixel density, but as it stands it is indistinguishable from the iPad 2 and thus it would be served a design not meant for its pixel density.

<comment><USER17> You're missing the point entirely.

If you're concerned about the size of touch targets on the iPad mini, they are already the EXACT same size as the touch targets on an iPhone since the two share the same pixel density and recommended touch target size (40px).

<comment><USER18> Re-read my comment. If someone has an iPad 2 specific design which uses buttons which are 40 points wide on an iPad 2, those buttons will be _less than_ 40 points wide when that design is inevitably served to an iPad Mini user.

If iPad Minis are served iPhone-specific designs, then you're right—it doesn't matter. And perhaps the solution is "you shouldn't be making iPad 2/iPhone- specific designs," but that's not what I'm getting at.

<comment><USER17> It will be less than 40 points wide, but the physical size of that button is still big enough. It is the exact same size as buttons on the iPhone.

You're saying that buttons on the iPad mini must be physically larger than buttons on the iPhone? For what reason?

<comment><USER18> It is the exact same size as buttons on the iPhone _if_ you are rendering the iPad 2 design on the iPhone as well, but in that case the button on the iPhone would be less than 40 points wide and also too small by Apple's guidelines. I am saying that it would be against Apple's guidelines on _both_ the iPhone and the iPad 2.

That's why I mentioned an iPhone-specific design, as well. The iPhone's pixel density isn't a problem because it can be distinguished from the iPad 2. And, as you've shown, if the iPhone-specific design is displayed on the iPad Mini then there is no problem at all. The issue is that there is no way to distinguish between the iPad 2 and the iPad Mini.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Device fragmentation is a massive problem for Apple developers.

<comment><USER6> I'm going to take that as sarcasm...

<comment><USER20> It's actually becoming more of a problem. The longer screen of the new iphone for example.

<comment><USER21> Also, the fact that you need to keep devices around just to test older OS versions. iOS has good upgrade stats but a lot of people are not upgrading to iOS 6 yet, and Apple is also marooning some well used devices like the iPad 1.

<comment><USER22> Just to put some numbers to the upgrade stats you mentioned, Chitika reported 61% of iOS users were on iOS6 in late October about one month after its release.

9% were on iOS 4

4% on iOS 5

25% on iOS 5.1

[http://bgr.com/2012/10/22/ios-6-adoption-rate-60-percent- iph...](http://bgr.com/2012/10/22/ios-6-adoption-rate-60-percent-iphone-ipad/)

<comment><USER21> The main issue is how fast those 5.1 people are moving on. Some of them are on iPad 1, so they will never upgrade. Other people are just indifferent to iOS upgrades, or don't have enough free space, or just plain don't want the upgrade due to the Maps and YouTube changes.

Honestly, the main driver of the iOS 6 adoption at this point just seems to be selling new devices that come with it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Perhaps the following solutions are possible:

\- Hardware fingerprinting with the canvas-tag ( <http://cseweb.ucsd.edu/~hovav/dist/canvas.pdf> )

\- Somehow check which assets are preferred downloads:

      rel="apple-touch-icon" sizes="144x144"
      rel="apple-touch-icon" sizes="114x114"
      rel="apple-touch-icon" sizes="72x72"

</comment><comment><USER24> Please don't. The iPad mini is an iPad. It should run everything exactly the same way. Please don't fracture the experience. The whole point of the mini is that the screen size is large enough that it doesn't need to be a compromise.

<comment><USER25> Yes, please do.

If someone is playing a game on an iPad, the buttons for controlling the character should not be huge on the screen. They need to be shrunk down and moved off to the corners so the thumbs can easily reach and touch them.

<comment><USER8> The recommended minimum target size for iPad (44px) is fine on an iPad mini. You don't need to change it unless it's already too small on the iPad.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Or just design your touch targets to be acceptable on both.

Visual size is much less of a concern as people will simple tend to hold a 7" tablet closer than a 10" tablet.

<comment><USER27> Honestly, that sucks and is really unacceptable. We are talking about significantly changing the size of buttons/text between these two tablets. You should be able to design for both.

<comment><USER10> I don't think we are. Every iPad mini review I've seen so far says existing applications work fine and touch targets aren't an issue.

Font size is the only thing I've seen mentioned and there's a large element of that which is user preference (hence the adjustable fonts in iBooks, Kindle, Instapaper etc.).

The answer would seem to be sensible sized touch targets that work on both and adjustable font sizes which are actually beneficial to everyone regardless of what device they're using.

<comment><USER28> Exactly - Apple have always been completely crystal clear that your touch targets should be a minimum of 40x40pts. Your graphics themselves might be smaller, but the touchable area should be at least 40x40.

Text size, certainly, but touchable targets shouldn't be a problem _assuming_ you're following Apple's guidelines. I appreciate that may not always be the case, but then you only have yourself to blame.

<comment><USER21> This question is about doing it in HTML5 though, so it's not like the iOS app guidelines are particularly followed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Breaking the "cm" units in CSS is inexcusable.

<comment><USER30> It's actually required by the CSS spec[1]: _1px is equal to 1/96th of 1in, 1pt is equal to 1/72nd of 1in_

So, given that hard requirement, you have three options:

\- make your hardware have 96 dpi (or a multiple thereof).

\- have 1 'px' equal to 1 screen pixel (or point) but 'cm', 'in' etc. not equal to real-world centimetres, inches etc.

\- have 'cm', 'in' etc. identical to real-world centimetres, inches etc., but 'px' without a direct relation to a screen pixel (or point).

Apple (and everyone else except perhaps printers) chose the second of those options.

[1]<http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-values/#absolute-lengths>

<comment><USER31> In CSS, px does _not_ have a direct relation to screen pixel. From your reference:

> The reference pixel is the visual angle of one pixel on a device with a > pixel density of 96dpi and a distance from the reader of an arm's length. > For a nominal arm's length of 28 inches, the visual angle is therefore about > 0.0213 degrees. For reading at arm's length, 1px thus corresponds to about > 0.26 mm (1/96 inch).

<comment><USER30> True, but, also from there:

 _For lower-resolution devices, and devices with unusual viewing distances, it is recommended instead that the anchor unit be the pixel unit. For such devices it is recommended that the pixel unit refer to the whole number of device pixels that best approximates the reference pixel._

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> This question is making me really wonder how anything useful ever gets done on StackOverflow: every time I look back at it, there is some new answer with 50+ upvotes that is just as wrong as every other answer. Are people seriously upvoting things because they "sound right"? There also tend to be a bunch of comments from people with rampant speculation as to why various behaviors occur, without having even taken the time to just test whether the things they are talking about actually happen on real devices, or continue to happen if you mess with the device some between tests (such as rotating it).

<comment><USER21> Obviously stuff that gets linked externally all over the place has different kind of answers and voting than your average SO question. Seems silly to judge the whole site on it.

<comment><USER33> The average question is probably either one of the following anyway:

• How can I parse a bit of information from a HTML page? [regex] [php]

• Why does the compiler complain here? [c#]

• Regex question [regex]

• How to add two numbers in jQuery? [jquery] [html]

• What does this operator do? [java]

The long tail of not-very-highly voted questions is mostly beginner questions about a particular language or environment. As for me, it gets tiring explaining exactly the same thing in slight variations (adapted to the problem) three times a day.

<comment><USER21> And actual hard questions that can't be answered by Googling just sit there with no answers. And then I win the Tumbleweed badge: <http://stackoverflow.com/badges/63/tumbleweed>

That kind of thing is the problem with SO, not the ones with 5k views and hundreds of votes.

<comment><USER34> Most questions on SO fit into one of three buckets:

1\. Trivial aka Dozens of answers aka Fastest gun in the west

2\. Hard aka Unanswered

3\. Interesting aka Closed

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> One user posted a link to this blog post which describes a seemingly quick and easy Javascript detection method: [http://konstruktors.com/blog/web- design/4396-detect-ipad-min...](http://konstruktors.com/blog/web- design/4396-detect-ipad-mini-javascript/)

I can't confirm it for myself, but if what the blog post says is true, isn't this an easy method for detection? Though, I can't imagine that all of the people who have deemed it impossible glossed over this.

</comment><comment><USER35> > we may want to scale certain images or buttons

Start with iPad2 mode. Add some invisible areas around those images and buttons. If the user keeps touching these areas instead of actual UI, switch to iPad Mini mode. This is also good for iPad2 users who have big and/or clumsy fingers.

<comment><USER10> If you have that space available why not just make it part of the touch target in the first place?

<comment><USER35> You could do that and keep track of touches that are not very close to the target's center instead. But it seems a bit more complicated to implement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> [http://konstruktors.com/blog/web-design/4396-detect-ipad- min...](http://konstruktors.com/blog/web-design/4396-detect-ipad-mini- javascript/#comment-24726)

iPad Mini: screen.availWidth = 768 screen.availHeight = 1004

iPad 2: screen.availWidth = 748 screen.availHeight = 1024

</comment><comment><USER37> I think the approach of asking a user if they are using an iPad Mini or an iPad 2 is a good one. Apple values the UX so much that anything which degrades it will be noticed and updated.

</comment><comment><USER38> Get Raymond Chen to patch iOs.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I updated the question and gave a bit more reasoning to why it's ridiculous that we aren't able to properly tell the difference between an iPad Mini and an iPad 2.

Short version: It's not just about size. It's about weight and form factor. The iPad mini can and will be used differently, like being held with one hand. Designers/ developers such as myself should be able to provide users with a different default controlscheme for the Mini that could make advantage of this situation (such as using tap to walk instead of a virtual thumbstick - <USER2> that's just an arbitrary example).

</comment><comment><USER39> Is there a difference in the default font size of iPad 2 and iPad Mini? Seeing as the latter has a higher pixel density, it would make sense to me (but you never know).

Anyway, if that is indeed the case, you could use CSS media queries built with ems instead of pixels. I think it makes much more sense than the regular pixel-based approach as our mobile devices get increasingly higher resolutions and pixel densities.

</comment><comment><USER40> window.screen.availHeight and window.screen.availWidth look like the best bet.

</comment><comment><USER41> Is everyone forgetting that you can easily zoom on any iOS device?

<comment><USER42> Most sites that are device specific disable zooming.

<comment><USER41> Which drives me crazy. If I want to zoom, let me. I don't care of the designer wants a pixel perfect layout, that's not the web.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Some way down in the answers is the proposition to simply ask the user. As spartan and elegantly simple it is, I'm not sure the user will always be accurate, what then ?

</comment><comment><USER44> All comments focus on the 'rendering' issue, what about log/traffic analyses ? The root of the problem is Apple not following standards and pushing 'native apps'.

</comment><comment><USER45> If a dev can ensure that the app works correctly (in terms of size proportions) on the Mini, would it not also ensure it works on the non-Mini?

</comment><comment><USER46> Measure finger size:

<http://stackoverflow.com/a/13381781/576311>

</comment><comment><USER47> The iPad 2 is ever so slightly faster: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YpV8AoToeHs>

Would a JS micro-benchmark work e.g. some integer calculation ? Of course performance may change depending on the other apps the user has open but maybe it doesn't.</comment>


Matt Cutts answers the question: "Does Google consider SEO to be spam?" - <AUTHOR> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BS75vhGO-kk <comment><USER2> The GoogleWebmasterHelp has some great videos on things you can do to help improve your site rankings. They may be common knowledge to the folks here, but I think they will be an great source of knowledge for non-technical business owners.</comment>


Artificial intelligence pioneer says we need to start over - <AUTHOR> https://www.axios.com/ai-pioneer-advocates-starting-over-2485537027.html <comment><USER2> Machine learning may be nearing its ceiling.

The history of AI goes in cycles. Someone has a good idea which solves some problems, followed by "strong AI Real Soon Now" enthusiasm, followed by that idea hitting its ceiling. AI has been through search, backtracking, the General Problem Solver, hill-climbing, and expert systems. Each was overhyped at the time, and each hit its ceiling.

The big difference this time is that the ceiling with machine learning is high enough for large-scale profitable applications. That wasn't the case with the previous rounds. AI used to be a dinky field - about 30-50 people each at Stanford, CMU, and MIT, plus a few tiny groups elsewhere. Now it's a huge field with big companies and big profits. That makes it self-sustaining.

Hinton has a point in that we're missing something. Back-propagation is an extremely inefficient method, especially since the slower you do it, the better it seems to work. More generally, most of machine learning is "turn the problem into an optimization problem and bang on it really hard with lots of compute power". This works for a useful class of problems. But it has limits.

How long until the next big idea? The last "AI winter", after expert systems, was 15 years.

<comment><USER3> >The big difference this time is that the ceiling with machine learning is high enough for large-scale profitable applications. That wasn't the case with the previous rounds.

My company (fortune 500) depends on expert systems, some even date back to the 80's AI boom. Doing what we do, at the scale we do it, would simply not be possible without them.

Lots of companies make a lot of money with expert systems, but they have no incentive to fund AI research since expert systems have hit a clear capability ceiling.

<comment><USER4> > Lots of companies make a lot of money with expert systems, but they have no > incentive to fund AI research since expert systems have hit a clear > capability ceiling.

I'm not sure I follow the reasoning here. Is the suggestion that AI cannot do better than expert systems?

<comment><USER5> I think the point is that just because companies are making money off of AI advances, that doesn't necessarily mean we won't hit another AI winter once we hit a ceiling with current techniques.

<comment><USER4> Okay but what's the relevance of expert systems to this argument?

<comment><USER6> This isn't the first round of AI that's been useful for "large-scale profitable applications"

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Back in the nineteen-nineties I'd built a neural-net creator using a method other than back-propogation that was able to create nets with about a hundred neurons that played tic-tac-toe well or perfectly (depending on the net created that day.) This was on a 12 mhz 286 using what I called static point multiplication (based on shift instructions, not multiplication instructions.) So I went to Toronto to see Professor Hinton, to share. My not being a big back-propagation fan was one thing that divided us before meeting him, but otherwise I thought we'd be pretty much on the same page.

It didn't go well. I happened to mention that I thought parallel programming would be a big help speeding up neural nets, and that I'd toured such a multi- processor computer in Alberta. He blew up. I never got to explain what I'd done with neural nets. He tossed me out of his office summarily and wouldn't listen to another word I had to say - somehow he'd gotten the idea in his head that I was a salesman for the company whose machine I'd seen, which machine was too weird to be considered anyway, and absolutely nothing I could say would persuade him that I wasn't a salesman. So the nets I'd created and methods other than back-propagation never got mentioned. Weirdest meeting of my life, and the end of my desire to do anything with neural nets, since other academic departments were even more violently rejecting of the idea back then.

<comment><USER8> What's the idea? Sounds interesting? Publish a paper on it? Or put up a blog post?

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Obviously a clickbait headline, few people think current tech will lead to AGI, but while we all wait on a new breakthrough in AI, we can build much more impressive systems with what we have now than even a few years ago.

I went to a talk from people who had built more scalable training algorithms for Restricted Boltzmann Mahcines (which Hinton was a pioneer in) a few months ago and asked them why they had chosen to use RBMs. Besides the waffly answers about how generative models were more interpretable than discriminative models, the real answer seems to have been that this was a research program that had started when RBMs were still in vogue, and their funding was tied to it, and once it ran out they were going to switch to investigating Generative Adversarial Networks like everyone else.

<comment><USER10> I don't think that's correct. There are a lot of people _who should know better_ that think that the current ml technology will lead to agi.

<comment><USER11> Let me guess. You think so, because we don't know what the general intelligence is, but the current approaches of ML are surely can't be extended to produce it.

<comment><USER10> We have some simple models of not even general intelligence that ml can't do. To steal from hofstadter:. Let's say I have a function that maps two strings. I'll give you an example function. "abc" -> "abd". What does "efg" map to? And how do you train current generation of ml to solve those problems in one shot like you just did?

I don't want to knock machine learning. There's a very huge set of very interesting problems that it does solve that were basically intractable till now and we haven't even scratched the surface of applications for. But the existing techniques have understandable restrictions to the scope of soluble problem.

I would also not be surprised if the best models included current ml strategies in some way, for example, in supervisor threads or initial processing of complicated input data into semantic-ish vector valued forms.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Brief description of the issue for non-experts:

Supervised learning

You can judge the output of your network against ground truth. You say that's a cat? Nope, it's a dog! And then slightly adjust your network so it's less likely to give that wrong answer in the future. How exactly you adjust the network is what backpropagation describes (in combination with something called a learning rate).

Unsupervised learning

You need to learn without someone telling you what the answer is. Most of the time for biological intelligence there isn't an oracle describing the truth at every moment of life to judge actions/decisions against. If you don't have someone telling you you've made a mistake, how can you know when to adjust your network? And if you don't know what the truth is, exactly how to adjust the network becomes tricky.

Somehow biological brains work without that oracle, and there are lots of ideas about how it does that. But right now for artificial intelligence none of those ideas has been shown to work so amazingly well that it has taken off like backprop has in the supervised learning world.

Hinton wants to find that amazing algorithm.

<comment><USER13> Actually:

>>Most of the time for biological intelligence there isn't an oracle describing the truth at every moment of life

This is false for most of learning of human intelligence. Most of schooled human intelligence looks like supervised learning.

Innate intelligence and other animal intelligence looks like pre-trained models and some reinforcement learning.

<comment><USER14> I think innate intelligence/ animal intelligence is developed by evolutionary algorithm. You don't need to do back prop for it. If the network is wrong, the animal just dies.

<comment><USER15> I would agree with this approach. In evolution, it would be the equivalent to a conditional lethal mutation. In humans and even non-humans, may behaviors are learned through a form of adaptive behavior that oftentimes becomes a form of abductive reasoning. What is learned is "good enough" to serve as ground truth until there is evidence to contradict.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> 52-6F-62 Everything Hinton says echoes strongly Kuhn's philosophy on the scientific paradigm. I guess it's not too much of a surprise that he thinks this is the case, but it also shows how intelligent (and shockingly humble) he is to make such a statement.

I wish I'd heard of the conference, dammit!

<comment><USER16> I think it's great that top researchers are actually learning from Kuhn's observations. I have hope that humanity can indeed learn from its earlier historical mistakes, but it requires us to be very aware of them in order to collectively avoid them.

<comment> 52-6F-62 I agree.

Mr Hinton was somewhat vague and brief in his statements here, though. What do you think the crisis point is that he's reached exactly? (It must be sure enough for the man who introduced the paradigm in the first place to have caught on, yet the change of thought process unclear enough for him to recognize that it will be somebody newer who will have to introduce something else)

<comment><USER17> I think his quote is out of context. If he is saying that back propagation networks alone are insufficient for AGI, that is neither surprising nor controversial. Hinton has never been working on the AGI problem. It sounds more like the author is making use of the quotes he/she got from Hinton in the most clickbaity way possible.

<comment> 52-6F-62 I get what you're saying, but I don't think he was speaking explicitly about AGI. To me it didn't sound like they were leaving the applied problems he has worked on. Maybe I'm reading too much between the lines, but so far there haven't been any major successes in un-supervised learning models and he's suggesting here that rather than continue with the models that have had success up to this point, it would be more worth the energy to start again at a lower level, rethinking the problem, in order to achieve similar results unsupervised.

This may be where my limited knowledge is my handicap, but I didn't think you would need an AGI in order to achieve unsupervised learning. There would still be an input and an output as there is now -- but instead of massive datasets used in training the models could simple experience the problem in real time, adjusting and learning based upon new results. Of course unsupervised learning models could contribute greatly to the pursuit of AGI, but I didn't think AGI predicate unsupervised learning models (which is what I am taking from the article -- or more like article abstract -- here).

<comment><USER17> > Maybe I'm reading too much between the lines, but so far there haven't been > any major successes in un-supervised learning models

Word2vec, a variant of which is Transform, Google's new machine translation framework which beats the pants off every other approach, to name one. The system it is replacing is also unsupervised.

<comment><USER18> Transformer is heavily reliant on supervised learning. Not sure where you're getting that from.

<comment><USER17> I was talking about word2vec.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> So it says "In 1986, Geoffrey Hinton co-authored a paper that, four decades later, is central to the explosion of artificial intelligence." Is it just me that considers that 3 decades? I am curious which is the typo. Was it 76? or 3 decades?

<comment><USER20> I was trying to rationalize it this way:

1980's - first decade

1990's - second decade

2000's - third decade

2010's - fourth decade

I guess, technically, the third decade of age for this paper ended in 2016, making 2017 the fourth.

But this seems like silly ways to rationalize it. Genuinely seems like a typo.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> It is fantastic to hear this from a seasoned academic about his own field-- People get trapped in orthodoxy and become unconsciously unwilling to explore bold ideas in favor to minor tweaks. The framework of thinking itself becomes precious, but big advances usually come from discarding the old framework in favor of something radically new. The kind of humility and bold thinking needed for that kind of change is rare and hard to foster (especially while still remaining grounded by empiricism).

<comment><USER22> I currently work in DNA analysis. I wholeheartedly agree.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> That article is pretty light on details. I wonder if he pointed towards a specific form of unsupervised learning.

Anyway it's pretty funny in light of an intro I remembered from one of his old papers:

"It would be truly wonderful if randomly connected neural networks could turn themselves into useful computing devices by using some simple rule to modify the strength of synapses. This was the hope that lay behind the original Hebb learning rule and it is the vision that has driven neural network modelers for half a century. Initially, researchers tried simulating various rules to see what would happen. _After a decade or two of messing around, researchers realized that there was a much better way to explore the space of possible learning rules: First write down an objective function [...] and then use elementary calculus to derive a learning rule that will improve the objective function._ " [1]

ie. backprop

So actually backprop was the solution to all that initial "messing around" with unsupervised rules. Though of course to be fair (if I understand correctly) those rules had very little to do with modern "unsupervised learning" methods (e.g. autoencoders, which still rely on backprop or similar optimization).

[1] [http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~fritz/absps/hebbdot.pdf](http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~fritz/absps/hebbdot.pdf) published in 2003

</comment><comment><USER24> At first glance, the obvious solution seems to be to create intelligence the same way nature did: some sort of evolution. Some sort of algorithm where multiple "networks" mutate and reproduce in some way, in response to some fitness function. Mutations that make a network more fit result in an increased reproductive rate, while other mutations decrease that rate.

Evolutionary algorithms have been around for a while but haven't really taken off. Maybe the problem is that you can't get from zero to intelligence with a single fitness function.

Think about it: the "fitness function" for our single-called ancestors was not how well they could thrive in a post-industrial service economy. Nor was it how well they could thrive as hunter-gatherers in the African Savannah. It was a very, very different fitness function.

To get from zero to humans, nature had to evolve single-called organisms, then mitochondria, then basic multi-celled organisms, then animals that lived in the ocean, then amphibious ones, then land-dwelling ones, then mammals, then apes, then early humans, then modern humans.

By the way, I left out the overwhelming majority of the steps.

At each step, the evolutionary pressures on these organisms were wildly different. Each set of pressures was necessary in order for the next layer of complexity to evolve.

I think that if we want to evolve an intelligent entity, we would probably have to do it like this.

<comment><USER25> What makes you think that our brains or intelligence is the most efficient or most effective? We happened to evolved a brain that allowed us to think on what we consider sophisticated. This doesn't mean that it's a great system. We also evolved to have a spine, which is a terrible design. There's a ton of other examples of evolution designing things that are terrible and ineffective, but get the job done. Is that what we're striving for?

<comment><USER26> Why pooh-pooh ideas if you're not sure either? Let's explore, combine, and mutate the iterations that each party thinks may be successful.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> To be fair, reinforcement learning can be done with neural networks and can be seen as a form of "unsupervised learning". The results aren't as spectacular (yet?) as what we've seen in unsupervised learning, but it has potential.

I think the main problem is that we're incredibly dependent on advances in computing power to make advances in deep learning. IMHO, we've only made incremental _software_ progress in using deep networks since the advent of convolutional networks.

</comment><comment> bra-ket If you are interested in biologically plausible models of cognition check out 'vector symbolic architectures' and 'associative memory' research of the 90s.

<comment><USER16> Biological plausibility is just silly. What it mostly does is just put artificial constraints on the problem that doesn't need to be there. It's all mathematics. However you want to interpret or metaphorize the mathematics is up to each math-phobic field, but constraining yourself to what randomly evolved serves little good.

<comment> 52-6F-62 While it's likely true that there are other ways to approach the problem, we're yet unsure of how to get there. The existing biological model has as least proven itself to work to some level, at least insofar as Descartes has lead us to believe.

<comment><USER16> I would bet a lot of money that engineers testing model after model in a state of flow, without any concern for biological validity, will yield a better result than any biologically inspired thing will. Time efficiency is also an important factor here. The model that will win is the one that is first to "market" (academic paper).

<comment> 52-6F-62 Can't say I'm disagreeing with you. In fact, I'm not. To illustrate, I think it is far more likely we'll have "Jarvis" before we are building our own analogues of the human brain (or better).

I do want it to happen, though. And I think it will, in spite of whatever model wins. It's just too interesting a problem. How that takes shape, I can't dream of predicting. (eg. How soon will or understanding of the use of organics in computing advance to such a level)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> What we lack is an AI equivalent of a theory of aerodynamics. At the moment we're just brute forcing random solution when we have perfectly good systems we should be trying to reverse engineer: biological brains. This will likely require genetic & evutionary algorithms, a developmental genotype-phenotype mapping, and competitive ecological systems for open ended evolution. Right now we have back propogration which is effectively reinforcement learning-- just one piece of the puzzle. I actually applied to Hinton's lab in 2009 for a postdoct position to address these very issues. He said they didn't have any money and were not taking new postdocs.

<comment><USER25> I've never understood this about "AI". Why do we think that our brains or animal brains are the most effective models for intelligence? Just because we evolved to have a brain that works a certain way doesn't mean it's the most efficient or even efficient at all. Of course, I don't have much experience with AI other than what I've read.

<comment><USER26> Do you have much experience with brains? Are you aware of the ratio of computational capacity to energy requirements that is as yet unmatched in power?

Not to mention that, as a system, the brain is highly efficient in reusing modular structures for increasingly complex tasks.

I have a feeling when people mention "AI modelled after a brain" they consider a simplification of neuronal dynamics to be how to achieve that. But that is a very naïve way to do it. Looking at it from the system level is the more fruitful approach, IMHO.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I don't know. I think backprop is probably utilized a lot in biological networks. Isn't that why we take tests in school? Obviously backprop doesn't make sense in an unsupervised setting. There's no label to backprop on.

But here's an example:

I see a stove eye is black when cold, then when I see it turn red, I touch it. Ow, it hurts. That's supervised learning. Don't touch things that are glowing red when they don't normally glow red. Now, I see an iron pole glowing red. It's not a spiral like the stove eye, but it's not normally glowing red and now it is. I'd better not touch it. I can deduce that these two objects are made out of a similar material since they're normally black or gray and now glow red. I can also deduce that something glowing red means it's hot. That's unsupervised learning.

To me, unsupervised learning is looking at a fluffy object with four legs, eyes, a nose, tail, it moves, etc. and knowing that it's some kind of animal. Creating groups of things like k-means. Supervised learning is your mom telling you that this one example is a tiger. Unsupervised learning is understanding the delta between your one labeled example and the rest of the examples in your animal group is largest when the animal is NOT a tiger.

<comment><USER14> I think Unsupervised Learning is fundamentally connected with the mission/goal of the AI. Whatever the mission is give to AI, it need to start learning information landscape by itself and make classification and use that knowledge to make predictions and act accordingly to optimized the outcome of the mission its given.

<comment><USER30> But you can't even 'give an AI a mission' without a model of the world! And, if you expect the AI to achieve its mission in a way that's acceptable to you, you better be supplying it with a big enough model for it to reasonably be able to hit that tiny target in the space of possibilities.

Take self-driving cars as an example. Do you not think that any AI that will be able to do this will be essentially 'given' a huge set of knowledge before it's expected to learn anything by itself?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I should point out that OpenAI put out a blog post / paper suggesting that genetic algorithms can perform similarly to backpropagation for Atari/Q-Learning tasks:

[https://blog.openai.com/evolution- strategies/](https://blog.openai.com/evolution-strategies/)

</comment><comment><USER32> It's time we begin to incorporate meso to large scale structure into neural nets. The human brain is able to accomplish what it can because of the way it organizes neurons into clusters and sub organs (thalamus, Broca's area etc.)

</comment><comment><USER25> I think it's silly to think that modeling AI after how a brain works is silly. We happened to develop the brain we have over many random iterations over billions of years. I don't understand why we think the human brain is the optimal model or method for intelligence. I guess it gives us something we kinda sorta understand to use as an example, but it seems silly to think our brain and how it works is a good model.

</comment><comment><USER33> I agree with the article. Throwing more cycles at a problem using the existing models isn't that answer. Better, more efficient models are needed.

And yes, I'm working toward that goal.

<comment><USER26> Can you share something about your work? Or how I may get involved?

<comment><USER33> Not yet ready to share, but I will put out a bunch a data when the time is right.

The hardest part is finding interesting challenges for the AI to conquer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> there was this tutorial on how to implement a more biological accurate neuron in javascript.

[https://medium.com/javascript-scene/how-to-build-a-neuron- ex...](https://medium.com/javascript-scene/how-to-build-a-neuron-exploring-ai- in-javascript-pt-2-2f2acb9747ed)

I asked the author how to put it into use, how to train it? because clearly this biological neuron is not a smooth function. but I didn't get any response.

</comment><comment><USER35> Does anyone have a more substantive link?

</comment><comment><USER36> They also need to start over on all that wiring behind Dr Hinton in the photo.

</comment><comment><USER37> I like this guy!

Yes back-propagation can help classify and predict many things.

But semantic information needs more research. For now the state of the art is Cyc.</comment>


The Most Innovative Startups In Augmented Reality - <AUTHOR> http://fundersandfounders.com/life-3-0

<comment><AUTHOR> Looking forward to meet CEO of cool startups</comment>


Jolly Ranchers, Sage and Breath Mints (A closer look at drug field tests) - <AUTHOR> https://www.themarshallproject.org/2015/04/02/jolly-ranchers-sage-and-breath-mints

<comment><USER2> I once registered 0.0259 BAC (the limit for my license is 0) when I was pulled over at the bottom of my street. The cop had been setup there several times over the course of a few weeks, and consistently pulled me over for a random breath test. I had not had any alcohol for over 24 hours, and when I had some alcohol the day before it was less than 3 drinks.

I asked for a second reading, as the first must be incorrect but yet it was the exact same. Maybe the device was faulty or something, but it showed me that at any point, whether you think you are doing something safely or even legally, it does not mean that you will actually be doing so in the eyes of these tools that the police rely so heavily on. He let me go on my way, I could have easily lost my license because of that. Once you have a drinking driving or drug flag on your license, you will be pulled over and checked far more than those that do not, even if you are not charged with anything.</comment>


New Firefox faces backlash due to missing features and few supported extensions - <AUTHOR> https://www.androidpolice.com/2020/08/31/firefox-update-faces-backlash-due-to-missing-features-and-few-supported-extensions/ <comment><USER2> It's mostly been fine -- ublock origin is available, pages load/view fine (except I couldn't log in to ebay; could be ublock). what's really been bugging me is that viewing PDFs seems to have gotten much worse. I don't _THINK_ there used to be a built in PDF viewer, but the flow from browser to Android's built in PDF viewer used to be smooth. I think the difference is, I have to explicitly download and then open the PDF.

What I wish I understood is why it was necessary to permit only the handful of authorized extensions. Do most of them just not work? why not?</comment>


The String Memory Gotcha (2005) - <AUTHOR> http://fishbowl.pastiche.org/2005/04/27/the_string_memory_gotcha/

<comment><USER2> An interesting read and still worth thinking about, although as some of the comments note, some of the specific behavior the post talks about changed in Java 1.5 (the post is from 2005).

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for noting. Edited the title to make it easier to see (I certainly missed this fact). Howerver, some points it makes are still current, specially about substring chains (which also apply to sub-collections). Most people who use profiles with memory profiling learn these things the hard way...

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Does anyone know which database driver's license prohibits publishing profiling data? Just wanted to check, so I know what to not recommend or use.

<comment><USER4> Shouldn't you take into account WHY they have restrictions?

Last time I looked at these kind of restrictions in databases or app servers (some of those have them too), it was clear that some of them were there to protect against the others.

Consider that when company X prohibits this, it immediately gives them an advantage over their competitors, as X can publish benchmarks showing that X is better than the competitors, and the competitors can't run counter benchmarks.

Because of this I've seen where company Y would then add restrictions, but they would not actually prohibit publishing, but rather would require that if company X publishes, the publication must include complete hardware and software configuration information to allow reproduction of the test, and X must grant Y permission to publish benchmark's of X's product on the same terms, regardless of any restriction in X's license.

<comment><USER3> That is an interesting scenario. Still, it seems like a rather underhanded tactic. Also, I think the OP is talking about a license like the X you mention because I it sounds like he was trying to publish before and after benchmarks, not comparisons with competitors.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> And that is the main reason why dfsch's substring copies the data (and there is also another operation that explicitly shares the buffer which work only on mutable byte strings).

</comment><comment><USER6> just proves that implementation details do matter.

<comment><USER7> Sometimes they do matter, but what I gruently had to realize is how few times this is the case (the blog post is a good example - plenty of people here had used Java extensively and never hit these issues).</comment></comment>


Searx – a privacy-respecting, hackable metasearch engine - <AUTHOR> https://searx.me <comment><USER2> dear god I used files and typed 'mpg' AND WTF??? got top three pageranks of Lolita Rape, Gang Rape and Dog Fuckers - is this why they need to respect privacy??? Abort! Abort! ...okay 15 minutes later edit: for checking the preferences - I disabled Bing engine and something a less OMFGWTF came up.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm using the trouvons.org instance and it's working really well, especially enabling reddit search so you can get very random but interresting answers about the subject. I just miss the !g shortcut of ddg so I can always fallback to google.

<comment><USER4> !g still works in ddg though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I used this as my primary search engine for a little over 6 months, eventually I switched off because of a bug. I would make a search and it would return no results, then I would re-run the search and it would work. Other than that, I had no major complaints about it.

<comment><USER6> There is a global timeout. If for some reason, all engines doesn't response before the global timeout, there is no result.

Usually it's work on the second try because the HTTPS connection are already established (which may be not the case on the first try).

One idea to avoid the annoying refresh : if there is no result before the global timeout, searx could wait longer.

<comment><USER5> Appreciate you raising the issue! I will be sure to follow it.

<comment><USER5> Also, maybe calling it a bug was a little unfair; if it is a timeout, it seems to be working as expected. We'll see. Either way, I really liked it while I was using it, hopefully it gets resolved! Good work SearX contributors! :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> See also: [http://yacy.net](http://yacy.net), free distributed search engine.

</comment><comment><USER8> I'm missing the shopping tab

</comment><comment><USER9> Not sure why, but the comment linking to the source code is dead [0].

The source code of the project is available here:

[https://github.com/asciimoo/searx](https://github.com/asciimoo/searx)

[0] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14579854](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14579854)

<comment><USER10> Sometimes legitimate accounts trip a spam filter and get shadow banned, if you go directly to the comment's page (click the time link) there's a `vouch` link you can click to vouch for that person and restore their account.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> The source code of the project is available here: [https://github.com/asciimoo/searx](https://github.com/asciimoo/searx)</comment>


The Value of Human Life (In $) - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_of_life#Estimates_of_the_value_of_life <comment><USER2> Every life is infinitely valuable. End of.</comment>


Lenovo phone beams virtual keyboard - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-32914764

<comment><USER2> To have a virtual keyboard, it must have some other sensor. The laser can also be used as a 20x projector.</comment>


Richard Stallman Resigns as FSF President - <AUTHOR> https://www.stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#16_September_2019_ <comment><USER2> Dupe: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20990583](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20990583)

</comment><comment><USER3> While some will think this is about a single recent event, Stallman has consistently said and done inapprotiate things for years. Most people I know who have spent extensive time with him say it has put them off working with the FSF, and he is the reason many people have resigned.

While he did start a great movement, at this point he hurts the FSF much more then he helps it.

(I'm on my phone, so won't put a huge list of references here, but such things aren't hard to find. For example, see [https://mobile.twitter.com/mjg59](https://mobile.twitter.com/mjg59) for a major open source contributor who has been discussing the problems with Stallman for years)

<comment><USER4> This is a decades-long story; actually the whole "Open Source" name appeared because some people believed that Stallman and "Free Software" puts other off. But in the end you can satisfy everybody and there will always be people put off by someone or something.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm baffled it took a twitter critical mass of people for this to happen. Stallman has been detrimental to the image of the FSF for years.

Someone you have to explain the concept of coercive consent to (in recent "entirely willing" comments, and whenever he argues for pedophilia) should not be in a position of power. Then again it seems like nobody managed to do so even now.

<comment><USER6> It took a mass of people who just ignored the "presented herself as" part, and don't want to listen to an explanation.

Was bound to happen sooner or later, he was never much of a political correctness guy.

<comment><USER5> Intent matters. What do you think was the intent behind these comments?

<comment><USER4> The intent was that before we collectively declare the dead man a rapist and pedophile, let us at least make a minimal effort to find out what really happened.

<comment><USER5> Making the one hypothetical you express the most favourable for the accused is not a neutral action.

<comment><USER4> If I consider one of the options the most probable, should I be afraid to express it because someone will judge me just like you did and I will lose my job? Yes, I think it's not only a neutral action, but a positive one, because you value seeking the truth more than social conformity.

By the way, the sad joke here is that Minsky was not even accused of anything. What we know by now is that Epstein asked the girl and a witness says he refused:

[https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/339725/](https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/339725/)

<comment><USER5> Good source, definitely not one of the most biased things you could be pulling out.

[https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Pajamas_Media](https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Pajamas_Media)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I have no opinion on Stallman, he could very well be that awful person.

The twitter discussion[0] seemed to me to be very polarized and targeting rage with all the common traits of typical fake news/mass hysteria communication. Maybe it is just the way these things naturally come to daylight.

[0] [https://twitter.com/sarahmei/status/1172283772428906496](https://twitter.com/sarahmei/status/1172283772428906496)

</comment><comment><USER8> Introspection may be a strong point of lisp, but it has never been a strong point of Stallman's

</comment><comment><USER9> I am having trouble finding this news - all I see is this:

\</comment><comment>

To the MIT community,

I am resigning effective immediately from my position in CSAIL at MIT. I am doing this due to pressure on MIT and me over a series of misunderstandings and mischaracterizations.

Richard Stallman

\</comment><comment>

Is this somehow connected to his role as FSF president?

(edit: formatting)

<comment><USER10> [https://itsfoss.com/richard-stallman- controversy/](https://itsfoss.com/richard-stallman-controversy/)

<comment><USER11> I think the lesson here is, if you are a scientist or engineer (i.e typically not a people person), then never say anything publicly about anything non- technical... ever.

Which is sad.

<comment><USER10> And if you really have to, express yourself in the less ambiguous way possible because nowadays the public feels first, and understands later.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> That makes me sad.

</comment><comment><USER13> — deleted —

<comment><USER10> It's about a comment he made on the Minsky case.

<comment><USER14> It's about a long string of behavior like the comment he made on the Minsky case over the course of like 15 years. If this was the first time he had done something that he'd be called out for "being inappropriate" for I doubt it would have led to his resignation.

It's not as obvious to people who haven't been in/around FSF/GNU circles for a while I don't think, and the sort of semantic picking he's doing here is honestly kind of his whole thing.

I have my doubts as to whether he really gets what people are pissed about, but this same sort of thing has happened enough from him for people to have had enough.

<comment><USER15> If the other "incidents" are like this one, then the problem isn't him, it's the community's puritanical streak.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is a travesty.</comment>


Is your browser holding you back? - <AUTHOR> http://www.futuremark.com/pressroom/pressreleases/55615/

<comment><USER2> Yawn. It's a press release about yet another JS benchmark. Where's the beef?</comment>


Startup Blogging Data & Observations - <AUTHOR> http://priceonomics.com/stats/

<comment><USER2> It's a bit surprising that rank on HN and general traffic/mentions aren't very well correlated.

<comment><USER3> Its actually not that surprising upon closer inspection. The articles that were focused more general topics (The Cost of Cracking, How to Make it on Craigslist) were generally correlated, while the post that were more hacker specific (Minimum Viable SEO, Headphones for Hackers) did well on HN, but did not receive a lot of general traffic.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Very interesting post. How has the blog impacted your user growth? Given the effort involved in writing each post, has it been worth it in terms of growing the business?</comment>


Multi-User Video Conference with WebRTC - <AUTHOR> https://mgechev-webrtc.herokuapp.com/ <comment><USER2> What is the benefit (if any) of using WebRTC over plain old web sockets? I ask because I'm currently working on a project that uses web sockets, and it's been really easy to use. Now, if there is valid reason for me to switch over, I'm all ears?

<comment><USER3> WebRTC establishes p2p connection over which you can transfer media streams or other data via the data channels provided by the API.

Using WebSockets you cannot make two browsers communicate directly without using any proxy in the middle.

So WebRTC has the following benefits:

\- establish p2p connection between two browsers (not necessary required to be browsers)

\- transfer media (audio/video) efficiently

\- allows data streaming over UDP/TCP/SCTP (you can use one, depending on your application type - for example UDP if you're looking for performance over reliability)

And the following drawbacks:

\- requires more complex architecture (for the NAT traversal procedures via ICE)

\- you have no guarantee that the connection between the peers will be established (in case of symmetric NATs in front of the peers you want to connect)

\- has more complex API

<comment><USER4> This still doesn't really answer why one would use webrtc for multi-user video conferencing - without working multicast (which I still think is a given between most pairs of randomly choosen dsl subscribers, not sure if it would be an option for webrtc anyway) - you'd need to transfer N-1 __bitrate up from each N participant in the multi-user conference. Not sure that 's workable for ten 720p streams of reasonable quality - let alone for more participants? Clearly there are trade-offs - but do they make as much sense for multi-user conferencing? The teamspeak model of muxing streams on the server seem to make more sense?

Edit: I see this is actually addressed in the linked article[1] - basically a webrtc gateway can be used. No mention of any support for (cryptographic) authentication and of peers and encryption of streams as far as I csn tell, though. Which makes it a bit worse than chatting over ham radio...

Edit2: Apparently webrtc is "secure" by default [2] - that is the streams are encrypted with a session key - but there's no (working) way to authenticate - or prevent/detect mitm. Obviously a gateway would need access to the (plain) streams for muxing (barring some creative N-way p2p key setup and just blasting encrypted data (eg by not supporting more than one peer to transmit - but with typical latencies this would probably dictate some form of manual "passing-the-mic" moderation).

[1] [http://blog.mgechev.com/2014/12/26/multi-user-video- conferen...](http://blog.mgechev.com/2014/12/26/multi-user-video-conference- webrtc-angularjs-yeoman/)

[2] [http://blog.erbbysam.com/?p=149](http://blog.erbbysam.com/?p=149)

<comment><USER5> Having designed a decentralized social networking system, I have become firmly convinced that - unlike bitcoin - it actually helps to have a server for each conversstion, in order to both have efficiency in the network topology as well as much more easily implement things people har come to expect, such as fair message ordering and no client able to mess up the others in a conversation. Mental poker is possible but clients still need to trust each other. May as well designate one as a server then.

The CAP theorem is likewise addressed by partitioning all the messages by conversation. There is little need for total consistency between conversations, only within them.

If you want me to elaborate further, you have to email me because there's too much to say.

<comment><USER4> [Edit: never mind, I think I misread what you were saying - you're also advocating one "client"/participant to be on a dedicated "server" (aka daemon on a well-connected/always connected host?

Leaving the rest as it might have some value either way for those considering conference solutions and topologies...]

You're commenting on the parts about authentication? Because I don't see how setting up some dsl subscriber (or 4g mobile client) in (say) Japan is going to be very helpful in splitting two dozen 720p video streams across the global Internet for a modest multi-user video conference. Never mind the issues with the connection dropping for everyone if the designated "server" experience network (or other) issues..?

The original Planetside game from SOE bundled TeamSpeak (which is not p2p, but client-through-central-gateway/server) - but the bundled version was pretty much unusable in part because it meant one player hosted the server. Worked fine with a dedicated TeamsSpeak server (eg on a vps etc).

For many uses I can also see optional recording of conferences might be useful - but that could probaly be accommodated using a dedicated recording client (probably on a "server").

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The original blog post: [http://blog.mgechev.com/2014/12/26/multi-user-video- conferen...](http://blog.mgechev.com/2014/12/26/multi-user-video-conference- webrtc-angularjs-yeoman/)

</comment><comment><USER7> It might be a better idea to give longer and non-predictable room ids

</comment><comment><USER8> [https://mgechev-webrtc.herokuapp.com/#/room/471](https://mgechev- webrtc.herokuapp.com/#/room/471)

<comment><USER9> I will stay a little in this room to test if this works. BTW if you see me say "hi", I'm friendly :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This looks pretty nice. I might use this as my next example app I port over to GHCJS for a comparison :-)

<comment><USER11> That would be very interesting to see!

<comment><USER12> agreed, hope you post it here if you do. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I assume this uses the old WebRTC API, not the newer, more Javascript-focused ORTC?

<comment><USER14> So far no browser supports ORTC, how could it?

<comment><USER15> Looks like there's a shim: [https://github.com/openpeer/ortc-js- shim](https://github.com/openpeer/ortc-js-shim)

<comment><USER14> that's a link to an empty repository. there might be a shim at some point but so far not.

<comment><USER15> Whoops, should have looked more closely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Destroyed by the traffic. Can someone post a link to the github repo if one exists?

<comment><USER10> Here you go: [https://github.com/mgechev/angular- webrtc](https://github.com/mgechev/angular-webrtc)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> For those of us who might not know, this is using Node.js, correct?

<comment><USER18> Yeah, JavaScript on both - front-end and back-end.

<comment><USER17> Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Not anything against this. But I don't see the part that is ~300 lines of Javascript. All I see is two minified files (which look to add up to around 300kb's of JS). And a 80 loc file.

Which one should I be looking at?

<comment><AUTHOR> Take a look at the source code at GitHub, this is only the demo [https://github.com/mgechev/angular- webrtc](https://github.com/mgechev/angular-webrtc)</comment></comment>


Women Founders Investors Leaders SV Tech  - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/women-founders-investors-leaders-sv-tech-2014-3#grace-garey-2 <comment><USER2> It's great that a list like this exists, to start, but it would be even better if it provided some info about the educations and backgrounds of each woman listed. That would really help younger women or those not yet involved in startups & tech to find out about paths they could follow.</comment>