C++20 has been approved - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/PatriceRoy1/status/1302055575140945921 <comment><USER2> Even as a C++ programmer with too much spare time, it has become obvious that learning and using all of C++ is beyond impractical. To the point where I find that my C++ code more than ever before looks like C.

Nowadays I am using C++ mainly for the high-performance libraries, and only if I can't archive the same in jit-ed python, cython or rust.

The Java strategy of being very conservative about what you add to the frontend would have done C++ a lot of good after C++11 (or even before that).

<comment><USER3> >The Java strategy of being very conservative about what you add to the frontend would have done C++ a lot of good after C++11 (or even before that).

Java lost a lot of mindshare to C# and Kotlin due to that "strategy".

<comment><USER4> So C# definitely benefited with the second mover advantage. It learned a bunch of lessons from Java such as:

\- No checked exceptions

\- Properties (I wish Java would add this to the core language instead of relying on things like Lombok as it shouldn't change the IR and really is just syntactic sugar)

\- Partial classes. This really isn't in contrast to Java because Java has nothing like it. But it is a neat feature for partial code generation;

\- LINQ. Java eventually added streams but last I checked it still had performance issues and IMHO LINQ is just cleaner;

\- Conditional compilation. This is really a huge oversight. One of the huge benefits of the preprocessor in C/C++ was conditional compilation. It's great than C# included it. It's bizarre to me that Java hasn't.

\- Async/await. Honestly I still find C#'s version of this more awkward than Hack's. Experience has taught me that whenever you spawn a thread, you've probably made a mistake as subtle mutlithreading bugs are the devil and cooperative multitasking like you have in Go, C# and Hack is usually far safer and sufficient most of the time. Still, C# is still better than Java here.

\- C#'s reified generics vs Java's type erasure. I think it was the right decision to break backwards compatibility here (and I don't usually say this). This was pretty early too (IIRC generics were added in C# 2.0).

But all that being said, I still think Java has a large mindshare and install base than C# by a mile. it's not sexy so it gets less attention on HN but Java is still massive.

As for Kotlin? Much like Scala I see this as nothing more than a curiosity. Android developers seem to like it but I think it's a tiny fraction of Java still.

<comment><USER5> LINQ is cleaner, but I find streams to be more elegant when considering the language as a whole (its just a pure library - no new syntax/rules/etc to learn).

I feel like a lot of languages these days trend towards "kitchen sink" languages that toss in everything and the kitchen sink in the name of clean looking code. IMHO this tends to sacrifice language elegance. This is probably why I tend to like languages like Java/Go/Clojure.

<comment><USER6> There is not new syntax for LINQ either -- it's just fluent-style via extension methods. I don't know many people that use the SQL-like syntax any more -- and it only covers a tiny amount of the functionality.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Has anyone anything positive to say about C++, and more specifically C++20?

We all know the negative parts, any C++ related thread is always full of people repeating them over and over. What about some celebration time for now? A huge milestone for the language has been reached with C++20, can we share something positive about it for once?

<comment><USER7> As someone that really likes C++ templates (no other language seems to come close in power for such a compile-time typed system), I'm particularly looking forward to concepts, and I believe (correct me if I'm wrong) that they will make compiler errors for templated code much more straightforward, which will be a nice quality of life improvement even if not using concepts directly.

<comment><USER8> That strikes me as Stockholm Syndrome. No one in their right mind would consider C++ templates a good design for a meta-language. In fact the majority of older template patterns aren't based on good language design but hacks around conditional compiling via arrays of size -1 and crap like that.

A good meta programming language would be one that's as easy to program as a general language. lisp, nim, etc...

<comment><USER9> I think this is.. quite wrong. I don't think C++ is an amazing language (it's not in my top 3 personally, but I do work with it daily), but templates are one of the best things about the language IMO.

I have a lot of experience with many different types of metaprogramming (cl macros, Rust macros, template Haskell (and Typeable/Generic), ... even CLR code generation) and C++ templates are better than everything I've used other than Common Lisp once you really understand them. A really common C++ theme I see is people that don't understand things railing against them (I used to be in this camp myself, so I can identify with the sentiment).

Templates allow you to choose at will between nominal/structural subtyping (in a way), perform type-level logic, generate code that can be thread-safe or lock-free at the caller's whim... They are very powerful, much more than most devs realize, and if you understand C++, writing them is not difficult.

The "really understand them" part is, of course, the hard part. You need to understand the core language and the template language to be effective with them. I can see why even some experienced C++ developers shy away from templates.

<comment><USER10> Even if they're a good general design, half the uses of SFINAE are absolutely insane and from what I understand it's significantly harder than it should be to make a fully generic template across all kinds of edge case and corner case types.

The attitude with templates seems to be that if something is at all possible with hacks then there doesn't need to be any language support added, even if it would be vastly simpler to read and write and probably to compile. I don't think that works out well.

<comment><USER11> I wouldn't call myself a c++ expert but I have used the language for a long time. In my opinion, templates have a lot of awesome uses outside of SFINAE and if you find yourself reaching for SFINAE, that's probably code smell and you can probably simplify the design elsewhere to avoid it.

Generally I find the best use of templates is the most basic: you want to write some code that operates on duck-types. As long as one is able to control themselves and pick the right use cases for maintainability, templates are simple enough. In my experience, this is very doable.

Concepts are also a really cool way to rein in which types are accepted as a template parameter and have a lot of potential to make templates easier to understand and teach. To me, this is the most exciting c++20 feature.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Finally concepts !

But the module spec feels a bit weird ( [https://isocpp.org/files/papers/n4720.pdf](https://isocpp.org/files/papers/n4720.pdf) ).

I mean, "import M" should create a M namespace with the imported symbols. Here, it's more like "from M import *" in Python.

<comment><USER13> Python collapses the name of the module (usually the name of a file) and the name of the "namespace" on the importing side, while C++ modules add a level of indirection by specifying arbitrary namespaces for module content (independent of the name of the module).

Evidently, the complexity of finding the same namespace in multiple compilation units has been considered acceptable for C++ modules because it was already handled decently.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I've left C++ for C (and Python, and K, and others) somewhere around 2007 when it only started getting crazy. I sort-of keep track of the changes to the standard like lambdas, without which you can't read modern code.

But assuming I lose my sanity again and decide to go back to doing C++, which resource would you recommend for properly catching up the last 15 years of C++ changes?

<comment><USER15> Tour of C++ by Bjarne Stroustrup as others have mentioned.

Effective Modern C++ by Scott Meyers (esp. for the chapters on smart pointers).

Arthur O' Dwyer's "Mastering the C++17 STL"

David Vandervoode and Nicolai Josuttis etc.'s "Templates the Complete Guide"

The first chapter of "Elements of Programming" by Stepanov, and maybe the rest if you want.

I think also, just kinda glancing over the spec.

Bjarne's paper on the evolution of C++ from 2006 to 2020 is also important I think: [https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3386320](https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3386320)

As for talks, [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS2JddPq7GQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS2JddPq7GQ) is great for value categories and move semantics

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=St0MNEU5b0o&t=6s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=St0MNEU5b0o&t=6s) also move semantics, and also part 2 of that if you want

I'll add more talks here in a bit!

And honestly if you've liked C, you can get far by just starting with that then slowly adding things you want. I think the first things one may end up reaching for are std::vector / std::string etc.; then being able to attach methods to types, then some templates, some auto, some lambdas. The old vtables / RTTI approach I basically never use anymore.

<comment><USER15> Actually "C++ Crash Course: A Fast-Paced Introduction" by Josh Lospinoso seems to cover some good ground.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> There are a lot of changes:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%2B%2B20](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%2B%2B20)

[https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/compiler_support](https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/compiler_support)

<comment><USER17> Except for the memory model, rust is loosing a lot of it's competitive advantages over C++ here and more interestingly: C++ is pushing the frontier on what new features/optimizations should a high performance language get. I feel like some of those features will allow new kind of optimizations and it could have an impact on the performance of everyday programs like chromium or Firefox. Of course the adoption will take a few years

I really hope that Rust compiler team will investigate in great depth the expert changes in C++20 and backport the relevant stuff into rust

<comment><USER14> > Except for the memory model, rust is loosing a lot of it's competitive > advantages over C++ here

Rust's memory model is by far its most significant advantage over C++, and it cannot be added to C++ without breaking all backwards compatibility.

<comment><USER18> Right. Rust is the only of those languages where I feel comfortable handing tasks out to junior programmers and NOT having to hunt for memory errors later in code reviews. That's such a great reassurance and productivity gain for everyone that it seems hard to go back.

In addition to that it also protects against the majority of multithreading issues - which is something not even available in managed languages like C# or Java.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> >"Even as a C++ programmer with too much spare time, it has become obvious that learning and using all of C++ is beyond impractical."

Who says on must know and use all the features of a language (especially the monster like C++) to write good code / software. Check what you really need for your particular task and be happy. I've found modern C++ a breeze to use as long as I do not pretend to be a language guru. Writing some sophisticated STL like libraries is highly specific and involved task and person/s doing that are not doing much of anything else so they would know all the of relevant C++. Using those libraries however is way way easier, the code looks pretty clear.

I use modern C++ to write various business servers. To me it is a single tool or two with clear and relatively easy subset of a powerful language. When I compare it with the monstrosity of some standard "modern" back-end stacks/toolsets C++ is starting to look like a small fish.

<comment><USER20> I don't know why this was voted down. C++ has a lot of tools for library writers which are unnecessary when writing application code but make libraries more adaptable. Also c++ keeps a lot of backward compatible code so old code continues to run (so there's less of the Python 2->3 anguish).

English is full of words I don't use on a daily basis but that doesn't make it bad.

(Not picking on python btw, just using a prominent example of an alternative path)

<comment><USER19> >"I don't know why this was voted down"

I suspect it was not because of C++ but me mentioning a monstrosity of some modern back end stacks. I think people get attached to the way of doing things and it becomes akin to religion.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> This fixes so many long-standing annoyances! Modules at last. String literals as template parameters. Ranges! C99 designated initialisers! Can't wait to be able to use this in about 5 years :-D

<comment><USER22> Looks like most of these features are already supported by the major compilers. A few might be hiding behind a flag or three but I expect them to be defaulted soon.

<comment><USER21> Right it's probably fine for hobby projects but for commercial projects you have to wait until it's supported on all platforms and the majority of your customers are happy with you using it. It can take a long time (e.g. std::optional was only supported on Mac in 2019ish).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Were the module problems ironed out? I remember reading some scathing criticism of the early designs.

<comment><USER24> [https://vector-of-bool.github.io/2019/03/04/modules- doa-2.ht...](https://vector-of-bool.github.io/2019/03/04/modules-doa-2.html)

The issue was that there's no language level definition of module implementation and layout so every build system may need to handle every single module implementation differently. The standard body decided to publish a technical report on this issue to ensure some level of interoperability across module implementations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I am reminded of this: [https://www.devever.net/~hl/nexuses](https://www.devever.net/~hl/nexuses)

"[...] because nobody programs in C++ — everyone programs in their own unique subset of the language. If you are told a program is written in C++, that leaves the following questions:

Does it use, or eschew, exceptions? Does it use, or eschew, C++ RTTI? Does it use operator overloading? Does it use, or eschew, the STL? Does it use, or eschew, C++11/C++14/etc. features? Does it use templates? Does it use virtual functions? Does it use multiple or virtual inheritance? Does it use static objects with constructors?"

<comment><USER26> isn't that great? nobody speaks English. we all speak our own subset of the language.

<comment><USER27> And yet people in _cough_ some _cough_ countries insist that their English is The English. Likewise, if we had and used a widespread definition of subsets of C++ it'd be pretty much okay. Haven't JavaScript gone this way ("good JavaScript")?

<comment><USER26> how much software in the world is written in C++, vs written in javascript, and how much of that is actually relevant, in that it contributes something meaningful to society?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Cool that real modules are now official. Preprocessor textual inclusion should have been left behind in the previous century!

<comment><USER29> The preprocessor is not gone. It still exists in the context of modules. Figuring out the details of that interaction has been a major issue when defining modules and the result is quite complex.

I doubt that we will see clean modules that are free of preprocessor shenanigans, especially when writing any non-trivial portable library. I am no prophet, but I currently assume that unless we get hygienic module friendly macros and better conditional compilation on a syntactic level than dumb textual #ifdef, modules will only end up adding complexity in practice.

<comment><USER30> The biggest reason that macros are not going away is backward compatibility (a very important reason of course). Adding hygenic macros or "module friendly" macros would not help one bit with that.

Also I belive that macros do not escape modules by default. That's a huge improvement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I'm looking forward to reflection and executors in 23. Then it will basically be the most powerful language. With compile-time reflection, you could add whatever language feature you want--almost as powerful as Common Lisp macros.

</comment><comment><USER32> C++ Core Guidelines [https://github.com/isocpp/CppCoreGuidelines](https://github.com/isocpp/CppCoreGuidelines)

Bjarne Stroustrup: C++ | Lex Fridman Podcast #48 [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTxRF5ag27A](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTxRF5ag27A)

</comment><comment><USER33> If msvc would support a more modern C, i predict a lot of people would use this instead of C++. (Thanks Herb)

<comment><USER34> C11 support is on the roadmap since a few weeks ago:

[https://developercommunity.visualstudio.com/idea/387315/add-...](https://developercommunity.visualstudio.com/idea/387315/add-c11-support.html)

I hope this also means the MSVC team had a change of mind regarding this very unfortunate blog post which IMHO did more damage to C than anything else in the last 20 years:

[https://herbsutter.com/2012/05/03/reader-qa-what-about-vc- an...](https://herbsutter.com/2012/05/03/reader-qa-what-about-vc-and-c99/)

<comment><USER35> And rightfully so, C code has no place in modern _secure_ computing besides UNIX kernel clones, and legacy code.

<comment><USER34> Security should be provided by a sandbox technology. Is it wise to implement the sandbox in C (or C++, because that really doesn't make a difference)? Probably not. For most other use cases it's fine to use "unsafe languages".

<comment><USER35> Sandoxes don't prevent security exploits due to internal memory corruption of the sandbox.

<comment><USER34> But bad actors won't use memory-safe languages either ;) The purpose of the sandbox is to keep the damage contained, no matter if this damage was intended or not.

<comment><USER35> The less memory unsafe languages get used the better, regardless of sandboxing.

Here C++ has an edge over C, because it offers the language features for memory safe array and string manipulation, and most C++ compilers do offer bounds checking support, enabled by default in debug mode, and selectively in release if one so wishes.

Ideally, Swift, Rust, Ada, .NET Native would have replaced all use cases, but we are far from that ideal, so 2nd best solution, C++ for the time being.

Note that Apple and Google also reduce to the minimum the usage of C, and equally advocate C++ instead, alongside their managed languages for their OSes.

So yeah, you get C11 in the box, pity that the OS APIs are a mix of C++ and their own languages.

<comment><USER34> C++ as OS APIs (which so far only Microsoft seems to do in their UWP wrapper APIs, which is a fairly exotic use case) can be dealt with the same way as Objective-C on macOS and iOS: put all the code which talks to OS APIs into separate C++ or Obj-C source files, and put that code behind a simple C-API.

It's also interesting to note that Microsoft is only using header-only C++ wrappers, under the hood it's all plain old C-APIs via COM (because it would be a bad idea to expose C++ APIs in system DLLs).

The usage rules for C++ in Google's Fuchsia are so limited [1] that it is essentially a "C with classes", and it also has the rule that all shared libraries must have C APIs. I really don't see the advantage of using C++ for the underlying implementation compared to plain C if C++ has to be stripped down that much, and the public APIs are C APIs anyway.

[1] [https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia- src/development/languages/c-cpp/...](https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia- src/development/languages/c-cpp/cxx)

<comment><USER30> Doesn't seem extremely limited at all:

\- Exceptions, RTTI, thread_local, Statically constructed object all require runtime support and are problematic in a kernel so it is not surprising \- Virtual inheritance: almost litterally nobody uses it. \- initializer lists require static storage which is also problematic in a kernel \- operator overloading and trailing return types are a stylistic choice, but at the end of the day they are a tiny bit of C++

Things that are allowed: actual OO classes inheritance (including multiple inheritance), virtual functions, RAII, templates (no restrictions at all), lambdas, all the recent goodies. I.e. all the things that make C++, well, C++.

So it is way less restricted than other guidelines I have seen for well known C++ projects.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Compiler support: [https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/compiler_support](https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/compiler_support)

Some features listed as supported are in their experimental versions still but it's coming along pretty well.

</comment><comment><USER37> As someone who's only had C++98 experience in a code base that leaned more towards a Java style, are there some good guides or books on a more modern C++ style?

<comment><AUTHOR> A Tour of C++ 2nd Edition, by Bjarne Stroustrup

[https://www.stroustrup.com/tour2.html](https://www.stroustrup.com/tour2.html)

> The ``tour'' is a quick (about 240 pages) tutorial overview of all of > standard C++ (language and standard library) at a moderately high level for > people who already know C++ or at least are experienced programmers. It > covers C++17 plus a few likely features of C++20.

I will add that it's a good way to have an overview of modern C++, you can then go deeper on some topics with more specialized resources. It's a good read IMHO, with a good pace.

<comment><USER37> Thank you!

<comment><AUTHOR> You're welcome :)

If at some point you're looking for more specific resources, I would suggest to ask on the C++ subreddit. I found people there to be helpful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> I'm actually actively learning modern c++ these days, and I like it so far.

On another note, Bjarne is 70 year old and he is still very active in c++ new features, very impressive. That gives me a hint that as a software engineer, I can be productive for many years to come as long as I keep studying.

I also hope Linus still maintains Linux kernel in the next 20 years.

</comment><comment><USER39> Well, wasn't there any other more informative link than a tweet?

<comment><AUTHOR> That's a tweet from a committee member, just when the version had been approved. You can find a lot of resources in the other comment threads if you want to see more details.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> Great, now we just have to wait for about 7-8 years or so for all of these features to be widely adopted, and then we're good to go!

<comment><AUTHOR> C++20 compiler support is already quite good among the main compilers (GCC, Clang, MSVC): [https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/compiler_support](https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/compiler_support)

<comment><USER40> I'm talking about:

1\. Adoption by users, including the larger, sluggish, corporate ones (and I'm being lenient with 8 years).

2\. Transition from headers to modules.

<comment><AUTHOR> > 2\. Transition from headers to modules.

Yeah, this one is likely to take a while...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> This is another sad day for us, C++ programmers. Even more features have been added to the language that we didn't ask for and that are nearly impossible to learn and use in practice.

<comment><USER42> What features weren't asked for as opposed to what was implemented that was asked for?</comment></comment>


How You Can Be a Memory Champion - <AUTHOR> http://motyar.blogspot.com/2012/05/how-you-can-be-memory-champion.html

<comment><USER2> Ed Cooke - the memory champion Joshua Foer writes and talks about (in part) - has co-founded a site with cognitive scientist Greg Detre for memorising vocabulary (or indeed any "word set" users create). The principle is the same as that which forms the basis of Foer's talk - transforming the information you want to remember into something vivid or extreme in any sensorial aspect, and then revisiting that memory to firm it up. It certainly works for me: <http://www.memrise.com>

</comment><comment><USER3> Can a moderator edit the link and change it to the ted one? [http://www.ted.com/talks/joshua_foer_feats_of_memory_anyone_...](http://www.ted.com/talks/joshua_foer_feats_of_memory_anyone_can_do.html)

Also, what is the karma threshold to edit other people's posts?

<comment><USER4> Yes, post is blogspam.

 _Please submit the original source. If a blog post reports on something they found on another site, submit the latter._

<http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html></comment></comment>


Dance in a Year - <AUTHOR> http://danceinayear.com/ <comment><USER2> "When they score the winning point or sell their company for millions — you're seeing them in their moment of glory. What you don't see is the thousands of hours of preparation. You don't see the self doubt, the lost sleep, the lonely nights spent working. You don't see the moment they started. The moment they were just like you, wondering how they could ever be good."

This. Too often we hyperbolize the achievement at the expense of the work. Important to realize and appreciate that no one backs into success accidentally.

<comment><USER3> This reminds me of what Einstein had to say about discovering Relativity.. "In light of knowledge attained, the happy achievement seems almost a matter of course, and any intelligent student can grasp it without too much trouble. But the years of anxious searching in the dark, with their intense longing, their alterations of confidence and exhaustion and the final emergence into the light -- only those who have experienced it can understand it."

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The key part of the article for me is this:

 _I don 't practice every day because I'm disciplined. I practice every day because I'm obsessed. I love dancing and my body craves it. If I didn't have this raw hunger, there's no way I would've had the discipline to practice every day._

This raw hunger is the part you can't fake. You might think you want something, but once you take a few steps toward it, you lose your drive. The trick seems to be connecting with a deep-down genuine intuitive desire and going with it. Once you're on that train, it's hard to imagine not walking the path towards your goal every day. More interesting than how to walk the path, for me, is how to find genuine hunger inside yourself...

<comment><USER5> Hey, I'm the dancer in the video. Totally agree with connecting with that deep-down hunger. I've tried many things - and quit many things. It's okay to quit. Quitting gives you the freedom to find the thing that you are truly passionate about.

<comment><USER6> That's a great point. I think we hear "winners never quit" so often that we think quitting is a "bad thing". But it's important to quit what you don't like to do so you don't lose that passion.

Passion is something that has been coming up in job interviews lately. Recruiters and managers keep saying "Your technical skills are great, but we didn't think you were passionate enough" and asking "What is it that really drives you?".

After spending my teens and 20s learning to accept that I can't have what I want, I'm having it thrust in front of me with people asking why I don't act like I want it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Her post is spot on. Daily practice does pay off and can work for any discipline.

I often say this to my guys whenever they ask me how I'm able to write code so fast and elegantly. Back story, I'm much younger than they are (29 as opposed to 35+). I was decent at writing software, but still wasn't that great. I'm a lot better than I am two years ago, but it was the result of learning little things everyday.

There's a fundamental to doing very well at something.

1) Know where you want to go 2) Spending time with your goal

Its exactly like a kid who wants to be a pro baseball player. He just doesn't think he can do it. He has posters of his favorite player in his room. Has his favorite team's hat on. Never leaves home with out a ball and a glove. Learns the lingo. Mimicks his favorite players' batting stance and throwing motion (on and off the field). Looks up stats. Looks up tutorials and common practices (for in game and for training). Oh and watches the games.

Its all about putting yourself in that world. A lady in a recent TED talk mentioned that you should "Fake it until you become it", not "Fake it until you make it". Its the embodiment. If you want to be great at dance, just start dancing. Same for sports, politics, medicine. ANYTHING! Spend time in your chosen field, even if its for 10mins a day. You'd be surprise how much you'd grown.

Many people cannot get out of their daily routine. So they are experts of just living. But one can only imagine how amazing it is to change things up. A whole new world opens up. And to me, that's fantastic!

<comment><USER8> So the obvious question: What _did_ you focus on that let you improve way more than other people? I do write code and learn something new every day and while I would say that I have improved a lot in the last few years I am still ways away of where I would like to be. Somehow I have the feeling this is not going to change.

I imagine that everyone has to decide specifically where they want to improve and figure out how to work precisely on that, but I would be interested to hear what exactly has worked for you?

<comment><USER7> paulkoer, what I did to become better was not to study techniques. I've actually did two specific things...

1) On the job full stack developing (by force). I had no choice really. All the other developers left leaving me as the loan developer. At that time I thought of ... a) Leaving the organization myself - Since my skill level wasn't that great (Only thing I knew was how to build web pages with Microsoft's VS tools) I would've became a junior developer somewhere else. Or worse, went back to help desk. I easily passed on that idea.

       b) Learning all there is about the current environment that I'm developing on at work. This was tough especially since I was the only developer and working as a help desk tech. To do so I had to go through a lot of sleepless nights and hair pulling to deliver the product. I also showed up on the weekend at my office to finish up projects even though I didn't get paid for that work. I also had to really pinpoint the things I was afraid of (e.g. taking on tough tasks, JavaScript, asp.net 4.0, setting up databases, deploying systems in different environments, documentation, reading other people's code, reading/using open source software, etc.). It sounds silly to me now, but before that decision I really didn't want to deal with the pain of learning that stuff (and was glad to let the senior guys deal with).

2) Work on projects of my own outside the work. I started working on my site (artJutsu.com which is just a prototype of an idea right now) around the time the developers at work were leaving the organization. I wanted to get better, but I hate just reading tutorial after tutorial. The best way for me to learn something is to create something, get stuck, and then overcome it. The whole "Scratch your own itch".

This ended up not only helping me skill wise, but helping the organization that I work with. I'm able to develop software very quickly and (most importantly) correctly. Not only that but with these new skills, I am able to correct a lot of outstanding problems as well as build applications much more robustly. Its amazing what I've learned in the past 2 years just by surrounding myself in this field.

I've always wanted to start a business, and you don't do that just by thinking about it. You have to "put your nose to the grindstone". Now you don't have to go all out like I did. I would suggest to do #2 on my list. Think of a project (or join mines lol) and get yourself into some trouble with it (and you will :D). Think through it, and overcome. Trust me you're a lot smarter than you think, but it does take some work. Some "blood, sweat, and tears".

The good thing to know is that you are not alone. There are other people out there going through the same thing. The ones who are good and efficient are usually willing to help. All you have to do is ask.

(sorry for the long post)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This reminded me a lot of a previous HN story about a guy who did a sketch and painting every day for a year. The results from start to finish were stunning:

[http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=870](http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=870)

<comment><USER10> Was a fascinating journey, if you are like me and want to see a quick before- after without combing through 70 pages of forum posts, here is how good the gentleman got: [http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=870&p=3460...](http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=870&p=3460424#post3460424)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> > I don't practice every day because I'm disciplined. I practice every day > because I'm obsessed. I love dancing and my body craves it. If I didn't have > this raw hunger, there's no way I would've had the discipline to practice > every day.

Oh, come on. Enough with the personal development/startup advice bullshit habit of redefining every word to make a point.

Especially when two lines of text later you can read: "If you practice something every day, you're guaranteed to get good at it."

Obsession is a mental activity that consumes people. Discipline to act on this obsession often translate into improvement in the physical world but obsession and motivation alone don't make it. Discipline which brings continuous repeat of the activity is the source of improvement.

Nice story though :)

</comment><comment><USER12> Some of us continuously have to get better at new things or learn new things in our professional life, which might be making it harder to learn new things outside of work. There are so many things that I would like to invest a year to get better at, outside of work. For some reason, I cannot manage the process of simultaneously self learning new things in completely different domains. Either one or both of the self-learning threads get sloppy for me. Perhaps, because self-learning is also an exploratory process so it needs time investment in large chunks, or because our learning resources are limited.

<comment><USER13> I think you're creating a false dichotomy in your mind though, since a lot of these other things you learn will actually be part of your down-time so to speak and they will cross-pollinate more than you think.

In this video you see more than just learning to dance for example, you see someone going from being afraid to fully express herself to purposefully giving everything she's got in the moment; a very powerful skill to have.

I recently started a writing course for example and I've been finding parallels between writing and coding that've been incredibly helpful in starting to do persuasive copy in my startup.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Or you could just, y'know, dance. However you want. Like children do, before we tell them they should be ashamed. _" Dance like no-one's watching"_ is really easy to do when you're on your own.

But this seems good too.

EDIT: upon reading this again I realise it's a pretty worthless and stupid thing to say, but I can't really delete it now because someone's replied. Sorry people.

<comment><USER11> Those "we" that tell others they should be ashamed are still a PITA. They are the one preventing others to dance however they want.

<comment><USER15> It's not just dancing though. I dance as well, and sometimes people tell me to stop, but I frankly don't care about those people. If you want to dance, dance. If you want to sing, sing. If you want to program, program. And frankly, I used to dance horribly in the beginning.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> One of my favorite books is _The Last Samurai_ by Helen DeWitt, and one of my favorite quotes from it is:

      The secret of success is to complete a single simple task on a daily basis.

It really is about making slow, meaningful progress. No one wakes up a prodigy.

<comment><USER17> That's exactly what I'm doing on my latest side project. I'm the type of guy that keeps attempting side projects. I'm passionate at first and then all at once I lose interest and stop. Or I realize I should rewrite and lose interest in the middle of the rewrite. This time I'm doing it differently. Ever since I've started I try to work on as little as possible but I work on it every day. So far so good. I have the urge to restart using cooler technology but I've been resisting.

I'm a little concerned though because I'm about to go on a trip where I won't be able to work on it for 5 days. I hope I don't come back from the trip and lose all interest.

<comment><USER16> Maybe try sitting down for X minutes and just brainstorming, or thinking about, your project? I've often found that it's sometimes just keeping the idea in your mind every day is effective in continuing the chain.

<comment><USER17> I'll try that. Wish me luck :)

<comment><USER16> Good luck!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Some people don't like the style of dance in the video (especially on the YouTube video, but I suppose the lesson to be learnt here is to never read YouTube comments), but complaining about that is completely missing the point. The approach she used to get there works for any other style of dance and many other things in life. It's why I have five juggling balls...

</comment><comment><USER19> A year is much too long. I wanted to learn to swing dance, coming from a starting point of absolute incompetence. I took lessons once a week for about 20 weeks, and practiced 3 nights a week. Halfway through I was very comfortable, and could have continued without the lessons. By the end I was very good. It's not that hard. And if I knew it was that easy...

<comment><USER20> Same thing with lifting, I dropped over 100 lb and got crazy strong in just under a year. 315lb squat, 450 deadlift, 225 bench and I shed all the fat.

Anything you dedicate around a year on, you'll get good at.

<comment><USER21> At what age?

<comment><USER12> Don't get stuck to age. Just talk with your doctor, and ramp up slowly. A friend started at 65 after retirement, and he is doing great. Although, he was able to hire a coach, and he was already active before that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I started doing Salsa over a year ago, and more recently Bachata. Probably the single best scary decision I've ever made.

It's my view that when you're dancing, I mean _really_ dancing, everything else just fades away. It's just you, the music, and if it's a partner dance, your partner. It's practically a form of meditation. Probably one of the ultimate cures for depression.

<comment><USER23> I also suggest trying Kizomba. Whole new interesting experience.

<comment><USER22> I've done a couple of taster classes at clubs, but haven't done any proper lessons yet. I do like the sensuality of it though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Dan has been working for 3 years now toward completing 10,000 hours of practice with the goal of getting into the PGA - [http://thedanplan.com/about/](http://thedanplan.com/about/)

<comment><USER24> It looks like he's been stalled in the 5.5 - 6.0 handicap range for the past year. [http://thedanplan.com/statistics-2/](http://thedanplan.com/statistics-2/)

Michael Jordan, on the other hand, reached a 3 handicap in far fewer hours while still playing basketball professionally. Talent matters.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> In addition to the specific type of dance, also take ballet technique classes. While it's unlikely to reach a performance level of ballet in one year the core physical habits that are trained carry over to all types of dance. Check the resume of any of the pros or contestants on the various tv competitions and you'll see ballet training.

But don't worry, the 10k hours rule is certainly in effect buy it really does not take a full year to get great results and have fun, just dance anywhere you can! Dance like no one is watching. Just Dance.

<comment><USER15> 5 hours a day for a year does still boil down to 2k of those hours, 8 hours would bring you close to 3k.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I got much inspiration from this. I like the Nietzche quote at the end which is quite different from the usual übermench stuff everybody uses:

"We should consider every day lost on which we have not danced at least once."

I found the other part to be equally true:

"And we should call every truth false which was not accompanied by at least one laugh.""

Our body/brain needs its learning time. You can't rush things. But you can't force things either. If repeating stuff every day feels like a chore, you should try to find other way to do it. Like learning computer stuff: from a book, a blog post, experimenting with random code from Github.

When the thing you are trying to learn becomes something you can't feel like not doing, learning will happen without consious effort. Variety and interest are hard to conjure if you fail all the time or your resistance to change (be it in strength or memory) is great, but finding a different tack on things can make things easy again.

Sometimes the best thing is to do nothing and let things lie for a bit. When you have a goal, you move closer to it just by it being there. Measuring your progress externally (like this video, bugging friends to read your stuff, pull requests to open source projects) helps you learn from mistakes. Mistakes are better way to progress, since I can easily analyze them as opposed to success: what I did _do_ to succeed?

</comment><comment><USER27> I can only agree with this post. When I got to college, I somehow ended up signing up for the Ballroom Dance Team (yes there is such a thing as competitive ballroom dancing). It's not something that I would have ever dreamt I would end up doing and people that know me usually have a hard time believing that I do ballroom. Nevertheless, it has been the single most fun activity I've ever participated in and it is a great way to get my mind off work.

</comment><comment><USER28> This is so San Francisco.

</comment><comment><USER29> I did the same thing when I passed the Morse code exams for ham radio license years ago. 20 minutes of CW practice in the morning and evening, every day for several months. When I sat for the exams, the test was ridiculously easy.

</comment><comment><USER30> Is this a Lift.do viral?

<comment><USER5> Hi, I'm in the dancer in the video. I don't work for Lift, I'm a user. I found that once I started using it, I really didn't want to miss a day of dance. Something about having a 90+ day streak that other people are holding you accountable to makes you want to keep it up.

<comment><USER31> Hell yeah, I'm a lift user as well. Love it!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Looking backwards the motivation to capture the process makes sense. I wonder what was the motivation in the early days?

<comment><USER5> Hi, I'm the dancer in the video. Minikomi is right, I wanted to check my progress. Because I started out awkwardly though, I didn't take many videos in the beginning. I wish I had taken more.

<comment><USER33> Slightly O.T. but seeing as you're here and the youtube comments are unsurprisingly full of bile, props for not only 'dancing like no-one's watching' but going out and doing it in an out of context place where everybody definitely will be.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> The take home concept here is great: Work hard at something and practice, practice, practice.

I took a break from C++ for years.

I wanted to write a video game.

So I started everyday doing something in C++ on the game and I am now a few months into it and I NEED to work on it everyday.

Karen. Thanks for sharing this. Valuable.

PS. Where did you get that weekly planner you use as a journal. I like the layout!!

</comment><comment><USER35> This page and video are really really good.

I'm pretty sure that more than a few people are going to watch this and choose to not quit learning how to dance, as it can be super frustrating and seemingly impossible at first.

</comment><comment><USER36> That was awesome all the way down...

</comment><comment><USER37> Can she do the Melbourne shuffle?

<comment><USER15> The Melbourne shuffle isn't that hard, you can learn it in a week or so.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> this is awesome - i think personally doing something totally out of my element (like dancing) crossed with learning something new (like dancing) might be double beneficial

<comment><USER15> There are "born" dancers out there, which just kinda grew into it. The rest learned the stuff, and hell did it look akward in the beginning. If you want to dance, just start doing some moves, see how you can make them look good, and then see what other cool moves there are.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Nice story, you dance well, but you should definitely choose better dance for your final dance in the video. What you showed looked like you really wanted to use bathroom but tehre wasn't any... Sorry about that, but otherwise, very nice.

<comment><USER40> This is why you dance like nobody's watching, because giving a shit that someone thinks you look like you have to go to the bathroom or something is retarded. You are part of the problem!</comment></comment>


Google is getting rid of gendered pronouns - <AUTHOR> https://www.the-pool.com/news-views/opinion/2018/48/artificial-intelligence-gender-pronouns-daisy-buchanan <comment><USER2> Its not clear to me from the article if google is purposely not suggesting gendered pronouns, or it doesn't know what to suggest, and so doesn't.

Its interesting to think how gendering influences stereotypes etc though. I suppose Orwell had come to realise this as evidenced by newspeak.

I'm trying to read through the back catalogue of [http://www.filfre.net](http://www.filfre.net), it always jumps out when they put 'she' rather than the more usual 'he'. Is that just that my internal monologue is male? Is it that the male form is the default? (eg mankind) Is it bad that the masculine is the default though? To avoid it, do we genderise everything (actor/actress) or degenderise everything (postperson)? At what point does that become newspeak?

Edit: Correct web address</comment>


Show HN: We are building a home for questions too subjective for Stack Overflow - <AUTHOR> Hey guys,
Would really appreciate some feedback on a site we are working on that deals with programming/tech questions with no definitive answer.
The concept is that while there may be no definitive answer to "Best X for Y", knowing the pros/cons of the different options and their use-cases is useful when making a decision.
We also took a different approach to Q&A and went very collaborative, so one person doesn't have to write everything and we can improve/update it over time.
Thanks!
www.slant.co <comment><USER2> I do think there's a gap that you can fill here, if you do it carefully. I think you're also liable to go down the same road of Stack Overflow in the pursuit of quality control.

So let me ask you this: what makes a bad question on Slant? I was in the suggested questions and I found the following question that I think would be good for a discussion.

The question in question: WHAT IS THE BEST OS TO RUN ON A RASPBERRY PI? (an aside: you might want to use an all-caps font rather than forcing titles to upper case. I just copied and pasted that title)

So my first question is: is that question a good fit for your site? I think we can both agree that without context, there's no answer to that question. Not just that it's subjective, but that there isn't even enough to inform your subjective opinion.

That's all fine and good if the point is to list pros and cons of the options. Maybe I should view each viewpoint as an analysis in and of itself. The viewpoint on Raspbian will say it's good for general-purpose stuff, etc.

But then what are the upvotes _actually_ measuring? It's not fitness for a specific purpose, it's just popularity, right? And how do I choose something as "best", when I myself might argue that three options are "best" given what I'm trying to do?

<comment><USER3> ! This question has been closed as being too constructive. As it currently stands, this question is not a good fit for our argumentative format. We expect answers that can't be supported by facts, references, or specific expertise, but this question will likely solicit objective facts, statistics, and definitive answers. If you feel that this question can be improved and possibly reopened, see the FAQ for guidance. !

You could just scrape SO to find all closed questions. Remember me when you're rich.

<comment><AUTHOR> :) Great idea. Thank you mate. Any other feedback on the site?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Good idea. I often have questions where I'd like to canvas the views of other developers. Given the popularity of a lot of closed questions on SO, I'm guessing I'm not the only one.

Don't much like the drill-down aspect. When you click on a question (/topics/blahblah), I'd rather see one long single-column page with everything on it. The Select Viewpoint nav bar could stay with you, as you scroll, for convenience.

<comment><AUTHOR> > Good idea.

Thank you!!

I see where you're coming from with the drill down. The tradeoff we had to make is to handle these types of topics:

<http://slant.co/topics/what-is-the-best-programming-font>

Where there are only a little bit of text and mainly overviews.

And these types of topics:

[http://slant.co/topics/what-is-the-best-architecture-for- bui...](http://slant.co/topics/what-is-the-best-architecture-for-building-a- web-service/opinions/rest)

That are more long form. It's hard to create a view to handle both use-cases, but we will definitely try as you're right that it would be better.

> The Select Viewpoint nav bar could stay with you, as you scroll, for > convenience.

Will test that, thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I really like the idea behind this website, there are few interesting topics. One suggestion: in "Select viewport" section add number of upvotes for each viewport (so you don't have to click on every viewport to see number of upvotes).

<comment><AUTHOR> >I really like the idea behind this website, there are few interesting topics.

:) Thanks mate.

> One suggestion: in "Select viewport" section add number of upvotes for each > viewport (so you don't have to click on every viewport to see number of > upvotes).

If you hover over the piechart you can see what % votes each got. But I do like that idea as well, a little more obvious. Will put it on the to-do.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Clickable link: <http://www.slant.co>

</comment><comment><USER6> Its a great idea, but the UI seems a bit confusing. I got lost in there.

<comment><AUTHOR> Also: [http://slant.co/topics/best-resources-for-startups-to- learn-...](http://slant.co/topics/best-resources-for-startups-to-learn-about- pr/opinions/marketing-bits)

Thanks for writing all that, very helpful.

<comment><USER6> Oh, how nice of you. Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Stackexchange already has a site that is for these kind of questions: <http://programmers.stackexchange.com/>

</comment><comment><USER8> Cool site! Would love it if you had a topic on finding the cheapest international shipping rates.

</comment><comment><USER9> I really like the design.

<comment><AUTHOR> :) our front-end dev who learnt design while on the job just said "woot, thank you"

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> fails miserably to render in IE8. I like the idea btw.

<comment><AUTHOR> I know :( really sorry about that, we are working on browser compatibly ASAP. Any chance you can check it out on another browser?

<comment><USER10> no worries. Not at home right now where I use Firefox/Chrome. IE8 is a forced requirement :) for another 2-3 hours. will check it out later today.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Shame about the name being a derogatory term.

<comment><AUTHOR> Does it make you think straight away that the content is biased? We are more going for objective reasons for your Viewpoints.

<comment><USER2> I think OP was more referring to "slant" being an offensive term for Asian people. I don't find it _(the domain name)_ offensive, but I'm not Asian (and I've never heard an Asian person called that before).

Personally I think you make things worse if you say that people can't use a term for its non-offensive meaning because it's also used in an unrelated, derogatory way. At that point you're simply promoting using the term for its offensive purpose.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh, thanks for clarifying!</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Portugal electricity generation temporarily reaches 100% renewable - <AUTHOR> https://reneweconomy.com.au/portugal-reaches-100-renewables-ends-fossil-fuel-subsidies-32820/ <comment><USER2> I see a number of people in this thread include biodiesel and wood burning with other renewable energy sources. While in theory biodiesel and wood burning are carbon neutral, the way they are used in Europe is anything but!

I wanted to warn you all that many countries in the EU currently enforce renewable resource quotas. This is what you want, however the incentives are incorrect, and the quotas are met by _importing_ the wood/diesel from somewhere else. The EU does not oversee the reforestation/replanting of the combustible matter that is burned. So there's no guarantee that the wood/biodiesel consumed is actually carbon neutral. For all I know we're burning forests down but not planting them back. Not to mention that the biodiesel is competing with human food...

<comment><USER3> You should read about the Ash-for-Cash scandal in Northern Ireland. It was a scheme to get people using renewables for heat but the end result was some people wasting vast amounts of energy heating empty sheds to make a profit... a little like crypto-mining in a way..

[https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern- ireland/far...](https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern- ireland/farmer-gets-1m-of-public-cash-to-heat-empty-shed-catastrophic-blunder- threatening-to-drain-hundreds-of-millions-from-northern-irelands-block- grant-34856610.html)

edit: If they just had proper checks and balances and worked out the reward correctly it could have worked.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Currently we are passing through an atypical wind and rain period. Our dams are full and pouring out water as we are producing more energy than we consume.

Despite all of this energy prices don't drop as they are bound to one of the few legal monopolies in Europe: the grid operation cartel (REN in the article, there is only one allowed for each EU country).

Also this feels as fake news since we have a few very old (and historically insecure, like sines power plant and carregado power plant) fossil fuel power plants that are still operating with no signs of slowing down while making profits through several scams in chemical engineering their way into the 0 emissions lot.

<comment><USER5> Sines is the only coal plant in the country. Carregado has been converted to a combined cycle natural gas plant. The remaining thermal power plants all burn natural gas/biomass.

<comment><USER4> Thanks, i edited my comment accordingly :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Portugal's gas and electricity the most expensive in Europe

[https://algarvedailynews.com/news/8958-portugal-s-gas-and- el...](https://algarvedailynews.com/news/8958-portugal-s-gas-and-electricity- the-most-expensive-in-europe)

Portuguese with highest standardized energy bills in the EU [http://www.theportugalnews.com/news/portuguese-with- highest-...](http://www.theportugalnews.com/news/portuguese-with-highest- standardised-energy-bills-in-the-eu/38360)

</comment><comment><USER7> "That shows how ridiculous a 27% target for 2030 is" Yeah well, if your country has plenty of wind coming from the ocean and you are not a big industrial nation with a lot of energy demand, then 27% seems to be a low goal...

<comment><USER8> These statements are utterly infuriating. Yeah Iceland has been 100% RE for years, guess what when your country can do 40MWh/person/year on hydro alone and isn't even at 100% hydro capacity yet _it kinda fucking helps_.

<comment><USER9> > 40MWh/person/year of hydro

 _That can't be right...._

<Google...google...google>

 _Well shit._

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> That is brilliant. Right now, Portugal is getting 14% of its electricity from gas and 8% from coal. But then it is also exporting 19% to Spain so it is very close to being completely renewable.

[https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&rem...](https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&remote=true&wind=false&countryCode=PT)

</comment><comment><USER11> The complete history is that we had a drought in the Iberian Peninsula that made electricity cost skyrocket last year.

Now last two months we had an abnormal rain season with lots of snow and rain, so dams and water reservoirs are getting more water, and rivers Tagus and Duero-Douro could carry more water to Portugal as the dams upstream are getting full, like it should for this time of the year.

The complete history is that in the Iberian Peninsula there are three months with almost no rain: June-July and August because of the Azores high and you can not depend on hydro generation there.

<comment><USER12> Hydro generation can happen even without rain, that's what reservoirs are for. The problem is if this drought extends beyond that, as it did last year.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> The article omits the fact that as a consequence Portugal has one of the highest energy prices in europe and that fact played a significant role in the portuguese economic crisis that started back in 2008 and culminated in the 2011 banktuptcy and subsequent bailout program.

<comment><USER14> >The article omits the fact that as a consequence Portugal has one of the highest energy prices in europe

It's in the Top 6, yet only slightly more then Euro-area average. [0]

Though it might be higher if you take average income into account.

[0] [http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics- explained/images/7/7...](http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics- explained/images/7/79/Electricity_prices_for_household_consumers%2C_first_half_2017_%28EUR_per_kWh%29.png)

from [http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics- explained/index.php/...](http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics- explained/index.php/Electricity_price_statistics)

<comment><USER15> Before taxes it's even below EU average.

<comment><USER16> Which doesn't matter because you have to pay taxes.

<comment><USER15> It matters if you want to judge whether renewable energy makes production more expensive or not.

<comment><USER13> You're missing the point. The portuguese state levies energy taxes as part of the public-private partnership deals which subsidize corporations that took a part of the national renewable energy program.

Those taxes are so eggregious that even the IMF demanded that the portuguese government should lower them as they harmed the economic recovery.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> On the one hand this is great news. On the other, (hydroelectric) dams appear to me to be very invasive, with high costs for the environments and the populations around them.

<comment><USER18> They are but a lot of the old dams, fallen into disuse long ago are being removed. A few new big ones are a nuisance but there's thousands upon thousands that hinder small rivers

Here's a map, though nothing on Portugal, the Spanish map is quite impressive

[https://damremoval.eu](https://damremoval.eu)

<comment><USER17> Amazing resource, thank you. To quote[0] on the environmental impacts alone:

 _\- Dams impact every aspect of healthy rivers._

 _\- Dams lead to loss of river habitat as the river is transferred into impoundments, (impoundments or reservoirs are not lakes)._

 _\- Dams lead to loss of river habitat as the hydro and sediments dynamics in the river are severely modified. This impact can reach hundreds of kilometres down the river and affect deltas._

 _\- Dams seriously impede the migrations of fish and this leads directly to the decline and even local extinction of many species. If we want to keep certain fish species in Europe, like eel, sturgeon, salmon, it is of great importance to restore connectivity from sea to source. However, we tend to focus on fish in relation to dam impacts; but many other species living in the water and on land depend on natural rivers and would benefit from free- flowing rivers._

 _\- Modification of water dynamics do also alter habitats and thereby favouring different, often invasive species_

[0]: [https://damremoval.eu/about/](https://damremoval.eu/about/)

<comment><USER12> Yes. In fact, the biggest dam in Portugal (Alqueva) has probably had a negative impact on multiple species of land carnivores, including endangered species like the Iberian lynx, due to its large extension of flooded land.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> >temporarily reaches

And that's a problem. You don't want "temporarily". If it is temporarily then it is if it doesn't exist at all - there has to be a prepared reserve (read power plants operating) for the cases when renewable doesn't reach 100%.

AFAIK, energy distributors have to have the equal amount of production capacity in regular power plants as there is renewable energy (well, not renewable but wind+solar - the ones that variate the most).

Until battery packs become widely available, I would say that solar+wind is quite a poor choice to reduce CO2 (assuming that it is the reason why we do renewable at all).

<comment><USER20> If you read the article, you will see that 55% of the power in question was hydro, so your comment seems a little beside the point, since we are not talking about wind+solar, but wind+solar+hydro.

Though obviously it's spring so this isn't a year-round possibility.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> > ends fossil fuel subsidies

With much teeth grinding from companies that sold all its production to the network, and then bought the energy they needed at lower price. The subsidies did their job, the installed capacity is now large enough.

<comment><USER12> From what I can tell, they weren't ended, just suspended pending the reply of the EU about whether they don't break the rules regarding public financing of the energy sector.

Source (Portuguese): [https://dre.pt/web/guest/home/-/dre/114949214/details/maximi...](https://dre.pt/web/guest/home/-/dre/114949214/details/maximized)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is great news. I'm especially happy to see fossil fuel subsidies disappear as well. Energy sources should compete based on efficiency, and efficiency gets mangled by interference on cost of goods. Renewables will dominate soon as cost of production beats out fossils, and this is a great thing for our wallets and our planet.

</comment><comment><USER23> >The group noted that while fossil fuel plants still worked for short periods to complement the electricity supply, those were fully compensated by other periods of greater renewable production.

Portugal produced enough renewable energy in a month to cover their electrical demand for that month if the demand had been at convenient times. They also produced energy in non-renewable ways to meet short-term electrical demand within that month.

</comment><comment><USER24> Scotland managed it from wind alone.

"On one day in particular, 15 May, output from turbines generated enough electricity to power 190% of homes or 99% of Scotland's total electricity demand."

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-40149604](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk- scotland-40149604)

</comment><comment><USER25> Let's hope more EU countries follow the path

<comment><USER26> Unfortunately the problem with renewables is that they work well only in countries with a specific climate. For example in Poland, none of the renewables are really worth it as much as it is in other countries. We don't have enough sunny days to make solar great, we don't have enough strong winds to make wind farms great and we don't have enough rivers to make hydro plants great :(

<comment><USER27> > We don't have enough sunny days to make solar great

That's what people say about Germany too, but they keep breaking surprising solar records. Looking at the maps at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Germany#/media/...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Germany#/media/File:SolarGIS- Solar-map-Germany-en.png) and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Poland#/media/F...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Poland#/media/File:SolarGIS- Solar-map-Poland-en.png) it looks like the potential is not _that_ different, though Southern Germany does have some areas with more peak sun. But those are not the only areas where they have solar installations in Germany.

EDIT: Let me qualify this a bit, the colors are somewhat misleading in direct comparison. Looking at the numbers, most of Poland seems to be roughly comparable to the northern half of Germany in terms of solar potential. And that potential _is_ used in Germany, even in the north.

> we don't have enough strong winds

I'm really just guessing here, but my impression was that having access to the sea basically guarantees offshore wind power potential. Also, all of Eastern Europe is basically a single flat pancake, you should get strong wind straight from Russia, I think. That was the case when I was living in Eastern Austria, at least (where there is a bunch of wind power).

<comment><USER28> _all of Eastern Europe is basically a single flat pancake_

The steppe, it's called. But don't forget the Urals.

<comment><USER29> Which are in Russia

<comment><USER28> ... so will affect winds coming from Russia

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I wish I could say the same about Spain... [https://www.quora.com/Has-Spain- really-banned-private-solar-...](https://www.quora.com/Has-Spain-really- banned-private-solar-panels)

</comment><comment><USER31> It's sad that they could only end the fossil fuel subsidies when they had already reached 100% renewable power.

Hopefully other countries will end fossil fuel subsidies much sooner than that.

<comment><USER12> Actually, the subsidies weren't ended, just suspended while the government waits for EU decision about whether they are in accordance to the EU directives. If the EU says they are, they will be resumed. The government does say they plan to review them, but hasn't yet.

Still, the subsidies are just to ensure that the plants are kept ready to assist if there's a need.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> This is a great achievement, but the headline is misleading because it's only Portugal's ELECTRICITY GENERATION that (temporarily) reached 100% renewable, and electricity constitutes only about 25% of Portugal's energy consumption (source: Eurostat). A further 15% or so of Portgual's energy consumption is renewable in other forms (wood burning, biodiesel), but that leaves a large majority of fossil fuels (about 50% petroleum for transport and 10% natural gas for heating).

<comment><USER33> You're absolutely right that the article title is incorrect, but reaching 100% renewables including heating and transport would be a sci-fi feat at this stage so it's not really that misleading. The fact it's electrical generation is almost implied by logic. Almost.

Still, it should be corrected for clarity. But it seems a remarkable achievement.

On the fact that it's temporary, I'm curious to see how long any country or even region takes to reach 100% permanent renewable generation. That could be similarly sci-fi-ish, even if there's some recent hope in battery-related news stories.

<comment><USER34> If you have mountains, you have batteries. Pump water up the mountain when you have extra juice, pump it down when you need extra. I was also curious about a sort of spinning mass energy storage. Get a big cylinder of concrete or lead spinning with the extra juice, then generate the energy back.

<comment><USER33> You're thinking of flywheel storage. There are a few of these running. One pretty big one in Ontario for example.

<comment><USER35> Tangentially, some car manufacturers have done prototypes of this as well. Look up the Porsche GT3R Hybrid or the Volvo S60 prototype for an example... Unfortunately it appears that for one reason or another no one has decided to move forward with these into actual consumer cars.

<comment><USER36> There are a few reasons including weight, safety, cost, package size, etc. A flywheel that can hold appreciable energy requires high speed or high mass as well as a low drag / bearing friction environment. The passengers must be protected from catastrophic failure of the flywheel by some strong casing ( more weight ) and cant be 'turned off' in an emergency. In race cars where heavy braking and acceleration are the norm and cost is not a factor, light, strong, fast flywheels can do a good job provided they run on active bearings in a low pressure casing. In a heavy road car the additional weight required makes the engine less efficient in terms of mpg, and probably less safe during a crash ( or if similarly safe, much heavier due to casing requirements ). Combine this with the inability to externally charge the flywheel and there arent really any great reasons to use it over electric energy storage

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> While I don't want to take anything away from Portugal, we should maintain objectivity. The Netherlands for example have a poor rating in regards to renewable energy source.

Looking back at Portugal, their main source is a hydroelectric dam and their second is wind.

The netherlands have basically no elevation, so they literally can't make an (efficient) dam.

The Netherlands also have extremely bad ratio between landmass/population, so there's quite literally little space for mass Wind turbines.

Portugal also has the luxury of not sharing their coast, while the netherlands have to share the (small) northern sea with multiple countries (England for one) so they literally can't build wind turbines randomly in the sea without breaking a treaty.

Netherlands and England as well are not exactly sunny countries thus solar is also inherently more inefficient than countries closer to the equator.

Then there's general climate arguments (annual wind amounts and speeds)

I think these are very important factors because the variable for a coal plant is the same, so a direct comparison between Portugal and The Netherlands and potentially other eu countries is somewhat apples and oranges.</comment>


Android "Donut" makes its first delicious appearance, packed with new toys  - <AUTHOR> http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2009/07/25/android-donut-makes-its-first-delicious-appearance-packed-with-new-toys/ <comment><USER2> I'd say "packed" is a bit of an overstatement. Here's the list:

        * Support for CDMA phones (Hello, Sprint!)
        * Text-to-speech
        * Loads of new widgets, including one that allows for WiFi/Bluetooth/GPS/Email toggling and Brightness adjustment right from the homescreen.
        * Official support for multitouch (This was previously available through hackery - we're not sure yet if this will be in the final build)
        * "Search integrated into everything"
        * WPA Enterprise WiFi encryption support
        * VPN support
        * Automated backups
        * "Tons of performance [tweaks]"

It's good to see progress, but that's hardly earth shaking...

As a G1 owner my list of priorities looks quite different, too. I'd prefer if they fixed the outstanding bugs in core functionality and added a calendar that deserves the name. Multitouch, well, can't say I ever missed it.</comment>


Why Are Americans Not Included in the Panama Papers? - <AUTHOR> http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/panama-papers/why-are-americans-not-included-panama-papers-n551081 <comment><USER2> [https://twitter.com/mathewi/status/716771686482202625](https://twitter.com/mathewi/status/716771686482202625)

> The Editor in Chief of Süddeutsche Zeitung responded to the lack of United > States individuals in the documents, saying to "Just wait for what is coming > next".</comment>


React.js three renderer example - <AUTHOR> http://toxicfork.github.io/react-three-renderer-example/ <comment><USER2> Any info on the performance of react-three-renderer? Does it make things slower / quicker compared to similar setups with only three.js ?

<comment><USER3> Two of the linked examples are benchmarks that let you compare the React renderer with direct updates. I saw no difference (both were at 60 fps for me).

<comment><USER4> Did you try increasing the amount of cubes? There's a dropdown at the top.

React drops to ~30fps for me on 1500 cubes, direct update stays at a solid 60fps. The delta increases as cube count increases.

<comment><USER5> Indeed. For me at 500 cubes, React is already about 2x slower (44fps -> 23fps).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm guessing the reason that I only get between 3fps and 7fps on a 3rd-gen iPad from 3 years ago is that the webgl support is not much on tablets, or at least on older tablets? I get the same canvas 3d experience in these demos as I get in my own demos that don't use React at all. Maybe on newer tablets it would be far different.

<comment><USER7> Is that on all of the examples?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Interesting idea. In theory it would be possible to port a scene description language like the one used in Persistence of Vision across to something like this. That might be fun.

</comment><comment> aps-sids Firefox 42 on OSX crashes repeatedly on switching the examples.

<comment><USER9> Same here in Windows 7.

<comment><USER7> I'll take a look, it's probably because of webgl context disposal, also crashes in android Firefox :(

<comment><USER7> Yep, it is. I have reported the bug to Mozilla, hopefully they will be able to fix it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Why does the title have React.js when they are WebGL examples?

<comment><USER11> Something about making 3D primitives into a DOM-like hierarchy with update- able props: [https://github.com/toxicFork/react-three- renderer#implementa...](https://github.com/toxicFork/react-three- renderer#implementation-details)

Still wrapping my head around it.

<comment><USER12> React has been ported a few times, React Native is the most well known. Since React is basically describing components as functions of props and state, what's returned doesn't have to be DOM.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Hi! Author here, thanks for posting this :D I'm happy to answer any questions you may have :) I'll read through the comments when I have time!

</comment><comment><USER13> Can this be used on React-Native?

<comment><USER14> > Can this be used on React-Native?

Does react-native uses WebGL ? of course not , since WebGL is a browser API.

But you can start coding the same stuff for openGL on mobile.</comment></comment>


Meet the People Who Listen to Podcasts at Super-Fast Speeds - <AUTHOR> https://www.buzzfeed.com/doree/meet-the-people-who-listen-to-podcasts-at-super-fast-speeds <comment><USER2> Back when I was binge watching a lot of TV shows I would do the same thing -- run them at anywhere from 1.6x to 2.5x (though most often no more than 2x), with close captions on. In fact, I was surprised to hear that the "super-fast" listeners were in a similar range to me, because it doesn't feel like anything "super" after you do it for awhile.

At one point the article remarks on a relationship between playback speed and pitch, but in my experience most speed-altering playback software now keeps the perceived pitch the same while altering playback speed. It's true that if all you have is a cassette deck or a record player that's what happens, but not in vlc, in the browser or in podcast apps.</comment>


TurboTax maker spending millions to kill simplified IRS tax filing - <AUTHOR> http://rt.com/usa/turbo-tax-harder-than-necessary-500/

<comment><USER2> Guess I won't be buying any more copies of QuickBooks!

Anyone know of a good alternative?

<comment><USER3> It would be interesting to see an open source alternative. I guess it wouldn't attract any contributors outside of the US, though...</comment></comment>


Tesla Responds to Chinese Hack with a Major Security Upgrade - <AUTHOR> https://www.wired.com/2016/09/tesla-responds-chinese-hack-major-security-upgrade/ <comment><AUTHOR> tl;dr: Remote attack of Tesla Model S demonstrated, triggers brakes while in motion. Tesla deploys code signing of all firmware updates in response.</comment>


Ask HN: OSS projects/communities we should learn from for Eve - <AUTHOR> Hey folks,<p>As we settle down into a version of Eve that we mean to stick with, we want to make sure we set ourselves up to be a great OSS project and community. We learned a lot in terms of things to do and things not to do with Light Table, but I'm curious to hear about examples that you guys find particularly good or bad and why. While emulating a community wholesale isn't likely to work, I imagine there are many things that we can borrow from others while finding our own identity. <comment><USER2> It would be informative as well to have your list of things that did and did not work with Light Table.

</comment><comment><USER3> I think the Eve community still needs some kickstarting (to pardon a pun). The biggest issue I have is that often questions in the Eve Google Group go ignored. Even if questions can't be answered it is good to get a response, as this will kick off interesting discussions

</comment><comment><USER4> ZeroMQ , Pieter Hintjens Blog and Talks has some more details.

</comment><comment><USER5> look at Docker...

<comment><USER3> Specifically what did Docker do in the community that was so great?

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Ember.js, Swift</comment>


Gas mileage is measured in square meters - <AUTHOR> https://what-if.xkcd.com/11/ <comment><USER2> I remember hearing about this many years ago, and then finally writing about it[0]. I should have written about it earlier, and by the time I did, of course XKCD had already got there.

Oh well. I thought I'd mention it.

[0] [http://www.solipsys.co.uk/new/MilesPerGallon.html?si23hn](http://www.solipsys.co.uk/new/MilesPerGallon.html?si23hn)</comment>


SigOpt (YC W15) Helps Customers Optimize Everything from Ads to Shaving Cream - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2015/02/12/sigopt-launch/ <comment><USER2> I'm one of the founders of SigOpt. Let me know if you have any questions about what we do, how we do it, or the math behind SigOpt. We'll be in the thread all night and are happy to answer any questions.

<comment><USER3> > Even more intriguingly, SigOpt helps you optimize physical experiments. For > example, Clark said one of his initial customers is using SigOpt to test > different chemical combinations in creating shaving creams. It shouldn't > matter what you're testing — Clark said SigOpt's technology just uses your > data and "builds up this model of what it thinks the world looks like. … > It's designed to be a very general system."

This is really vague, can you give some more technical details on what's actually happening?

<comment><USER2> Great question. We build off of research in Design of Experiments [1] in general and Optimal Learning [2] in particular. Our algorithms attempt to make the tradeoff between exploration (learning more about the space we are optimizing in) and exploitation (using the information we have to achieve the best values) to find optimal parameter configurations for experiments as quickly and efficiently as possible.

This has been an active field in academia for the last few decades, and the seminal paper behind some of our algorithms was published in 1998 [3]. There have been many successful applications in different fields from drug discovery [4] to nanotechnology experiments [5].

We wrap these powerful techniques behind an API and web interface to let anyone start running optimal experiments and leverage this research right away for any experiment they are trying to optimize. We have some more examples and a use case on our site [6].

[1]: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_of_experiments](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_of_experiments)

[2]: [http://optimallearning.princeton.edu](http://optimallearning.princeton.edu)

[3]: [http://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1008306431147#pag...](http://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1008306431147#page-1)

[4]: [http://people.orie.cornell.edu/pfrazier/Presentations/2014.1...](http://people.orie.cornell.edu/pfrazier/Presentations/2014.10.CAM- web.pdf)

[5]: [http://optimallearning.princeton.edu/tutorialsciences.htm](http://optimallearning.princeton.edu/tutorialsciences.htm)

[6]: [https://sigopt.com/cases/physical_experiment](https://sigopt.com/cases/physical_experiment)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> A very minor point, but your FAQs state you get 3 experiments in the free tier ([https://sigopt.com/faq#How-much-does-SigOpt- cost](https://sigopt.com/faq#How-much-does-SigOpt-cost)) while the pricing page says you get just 1 ([https://sigopt.com/pricing](https://sigopt.com/pricing)).

<comment><USER5> Oops! Thanks for the heads up. We'll make sure that gets fixed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> A mathematician at the helm. This is cool.

<comment><USER2> Thanks! Let me know if you have any questions about SigOpt or the math behind it. I'm happy to explain things or provide references!

<comment><USER6> Will do. The list of references in the other comments is enough to digest for now.</comment></comment></comment>


JPMorgan, BofA Ban Cryptocurrency Transactions on Credit Cards - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-02-02/bofa-to-decline-all-cryptocurrency-transactions-on-credit-cards <comment><USER2> This is highly amusing to me. IRS rules that crypto currencies are not, in fact, currency, but commodities and treated like property for taxation purposes. A couple of banks are now saying, "we won't let you purchase said commodities with credit cards". It's an arbitrary restriction. It goes to show you just how much control large centralized banks have over our purchasing decisions...which, to me, just reinforces the need for decentralized financial technology.

A lot of folks on here are proponents of net neutrality. I think banking should be neutral, too.

<comment><USER3> They are not blocking purchasing of these from all accounts, just credit accounts. You can still purchase via ACH and debit. What they are doing is not allowing you to use their money to buy:

>The move doesn't affect debit cards, according to Betty Riess, a spokeswoman for the Charlotte, North Carolina-based lender.

>Allowing purchases of cryptocurrencies can create big headaches for card lenders, which can be left on the hook if a borrower bets wrong and can't repay. There's also the risk that thieves will abuse cards that were purloined or based on stolen identities, turning them into crypto hoards. Banks also are required by regulators to monitor customer transactions for signs of money laundering -- which isn't as easy once dollars are converted into digital coins.

<comment><USER4> what other kind of property can't you buy with credit cards...

<comment><USER5> cash (fiat currency). cash advances are limited in amount, and treated differently in terms of interest.

<comment><USER4> but cash is a currency... unlike bitcoin (according to the IRS)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I don't blame them in the slightest for this. The "immutable" (for lack of a better term) nature of many cryptocurrencies means that any purchases made on credit can't be easily taken back.

And I'm pretty sure it's always been "technically not allowed" to buy another currency with credit cards (or it's technically allowed, but treated as a "cash advance")

<comment><USER7> Is that true? If coinbase detects a chargeback due to fraud from a bitcoin purchase in your account couldn't they just freeze your account and prevent any outbound transfer from happening?

<comment><USER8> Chargebacks may arrive at the merchant up to about 3 months from the transaction.

<comment><USER9> That's too low.

The baseline for most credit cards is 120 days for the cardholder to dispute a charge in the US, or 180 days internationally. Some specific dispute categories for some credit cards have a shorter limit, and some effectively have longer limits because the starting point is some date after the transaction.

On top of that, there may be consumer protection laws in some areas that affect this. For example, in California it is one year for certain types of dispute [1].

Note that the above is how long for the cardholder to dispute the charge. Add to that however long it takes the card company to process things before the merchant sees the chargeback.

I've seen one that arrived at the merchant over a year after the transaction, although I think that is rare.

[1] [https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/general/credit-cards-dispute- ch...](https://oag.ca.gov/consumers/general/credit-cards-dispute-charge)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Credit cards and crypto currency never really mixed well anyway. If you sell crypto currency for a credit card payment you take a huge risk because the buyer can reverse the transaction but you can't. This typically means that (for credit card payments) the markup is unreasonably high or the seller is running some kind of scam.

<comment><USER11> "If it's too good to be true, the seller is probably using it to launder stolen coins." This theory gets floated frequently in the various crypto subreddits.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm not very familiar with restrictions on credit card purchases - are there other high-risk purchases that are routinely blocked on credit cards?

I understand the stated reasoning, but if this is the first such restriction (again, I don't know if it is), it's a pretty remarkable deviation relative to most credit card policies, i.e. we will happily finance whatever ridiculous decisions you choose to make. I wonder if they are seeing spiking default rates?

<comment><USER13> Purchasing high volumes of gift cards or other cash equivalents will often get you shut down. Do this too much with Chase and you'll end up blacklisted.

<comment><USER14> Really? They're sold in volume for people to use in rewards and promotions programs, I'm assuming this doesn't involve showing up at the gift card mill with a chest of doubloons. How does that work?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Makes sense to me. You can't buy many cash equivalents with credit card and can't usually get cash advances from a credit card, so this is just correctly implementing that policy. Can you buy stock with a credit card?

<comment><USER16> I've never had a credit card that didn't let me take out cash (at 20% APR of course).

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> The news for me was that until now they _were_ allowing these transactions.

</comment><comment><USER18> Heads up. I recently added funds into Coinbase using their instant debit card option via a Chase checking account debit card. Lord behold a few days later I had a $5.00 cash advance fee in my checking account. I called Chase and they reversed the fee, but they suggested that I contact Coinbase because indeed they are not doing a debit card debit, but a cash advance. Moral of the story, stay away from Coinbase if you can avoid them.

<comment><USER19> The payment provider Coinbase uses to transfer to/from US bank accounts (Plaid) asks for your online banking credentials and scrapes your data (income, historical balance data and more) for resale[1].

1\. see "Products" on [https://plaid.com](https://plaid.com)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Ah, this is too bad.

I successfully churned about 60K credit card points at the end of last year. (Buy $X + fees and sell when it covered the fees/principal)

<comment><USER21> Sounds like an enormous risk to take on for credit card points.

<comment><USER22> Why?

Buy Bitcoin on credit. Sell immediately. Deposit to bank account. Pay credit card bill. Repeat.

<comment><USER23> Because iMuzz said "sell when it covered the fees/principal". If you sold immediately, you'd be down a little bit each time because of cash advance fees/coinbase fees. So instead, s/he was just getting lucky buying bitcoin as the price kept rising. That same plan would not have done well so far in 2018..

<comment><USER22> Fees weren't that high until recently. 10k miles for a few bucks is a deal most frequent flyer optimizers would sell their grandma for.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> This has pretty much always been the case.

The only difference here is that they're explicitly saying it's banned.

</comment><comment><USER25> JPMorgan timeline :

1\. "Bitcoin is used only for fraud and by criminals"

2\. JPMorgan proved to be money laundering.

3\. "Bitcoin is actually not all that bad... We are going to look into it."

4\. JPMorgan "bans" cryptocurrencies.

</comment><comment><USER26> Well, nobody should get into debt to buy crypto.

But I'm not sure what the motives are here. I'm pretty sure banks like it when their customers get into debt?

<comment><USER27> A credit line is pretty much just a loan.

They price the credit line (set the interest rate) based on some level of expected risk.

If they believe an activity will cost them more in bad loans (and whatever else) than they will earn in interest, they will adjust the terms of the loan to forbid that activity.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Well. Surely, this is what cryptocurrencies are for: to route around the evil monopoly banks. One assumes the way that cryptocurrency exchanges handle this will reveal once and for all the true utility of cryptocurrency in the modern economy.

</comment><comment><USER29> Don't most large exchanges disallow credit cards anyhow?

</comment><comment><USER30> How about go fuck yourself, this train isn't stopping. God, I hope they burn.

<comment><USER31> I appreciate the many wonderful story submissions you've made to Hacker News over the years, but if you continue to break the rules in comments here, we're going to end up banning you. It wouldn't be fair to other users otherwise. So could you please (re-)read [https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html) and post civilly and substantively, or not at all, from now on? Just like every HN user needs to.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> the entire model of credit cards is so rife with fraud that they don't want to handle cryto purchases. sad.

<comment><USER33> This seems like more of a condemnation of cryptocurrency than credit cards.

<comment><USER32> really? you can't rely on others good will, your money should be cryptographically secure and require you to send it instead of anyone with a number being able to pull your money. its like having an API with no login or password on it.

I totally agree with your previous comments on the EFF and peoples right to privacy and secure data. Shouldn't this extend to their money as well?

<comment><USER34> If you can't rely on others' goodwill, then for any purchases you need a solid mechanism to ensure that you can reverse the transaction if you get cheated. Credit cards provide such a system, pure cryptocurrencies ("code is law") do not - for that you need at least a cryptocurrency plus a _trusted_ escrow system, and even that doesn't give you equivalent protection since non-escrow payments are still possible, allowing you to lose your money if hacked.

Credit cards isn't a system where "anyone with a number being able to pull your money" \- merchants can _ask_ for that money, but they're not certain to get it, you can veto that transaction, you'll get it reversed (with legal guarantees) if its fraudulent, and you can get it reversed if you were sold goods that aren't what you were promised. Not so with crypto, where once you send it to someone for whatever technical reason (including a compromised number) it's gone.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> I think they know some will make 15-20% on their transaction thus being able to pay off debt faster. If they ban crypto tranactions, they keep things as is. Why do they care where you spend your money? If they allow one to buy some collectables on ebay that will generate no value, then they should not care about crypto, especially since long term investments see great returns.

Think about it. Wide adoption at the end of 2017, bit licenses, crypto-funds, etc etc. Look at the data. It does not lie. It's a good investment and they see some consumers using this as tool to reduce their debt faster.

Again, buying some plastic toys on ebay is ok, but crpyto is bad? It's bs.

They want $.</comment>


Show HN: Free tool for bnb hosts to sync bookings from different platforms - <AUTHOR> http://hostic.co <comment><AUTHOR> I finally launched Hostic.co , a free tool for bnb hosts to help them manage their bookings.

Hostic aggregates all bookings under one handy schedule that can be easily shared with the team. They can add notes and mark guests as checked in & out. Our bot sends notifications to the chat group and he will keep everyone updated.

I would appreciate if you could have a look and give me some feedback

Thank you very much!</comment>


HTML5 Video With Bumper Ads - <AUTHOR> http://www.bitcontrol.org/2010/06/13/html5-video-with-bumper-ads/

<comment><USER2> I'd like to see a server-side system that spliced video clips together to create a custom, downloadable video file.

Of course, you wouldn't be able to stop users from skipping the ads...

<comment><USER3> Sure you can, you just embed cue points in the video to tell your player when the ad is...oops, nevermind.</comment></comment>


Google's Earth: how the tech giant is helping the state spy on us - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/dec/20/googles-earth-how-the-tech-giant-is-helping-the-state-spy-on-us <comment><USER2> Interesting article. I have never heard of Keyhole before. Was that acquisition discussed a lot when Google bought them and shipped Google Earth?

<comment><USER3> They had some visibility before the Google acquisition from getting their watermark on the evening news. The k in KML also stands for Keyhole</comment></comment>


FAME - Win Twitter Fame for a Day - <AUTHOR> http://play-fame.com/8497287c

<comment><AUTHOR> Has anyone tried this? So far I've been pleased with who they have picked.</comment>