I have a question about organizing projects - <AUTHOR> http://github.com/raganwald/homoiconic/blob/master/2009-03-12/another_question.md#readme

<comment><USER2> In Monkeybars we decided to group all parts of the MVC tuple under the same directory because we mainly work with them as a set. It's too annoying to have to bounce around from a model dir to a controller dir to a view dir.

MVC|MVC|MVC is more natural grouping than MMM|VVV|CCC.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I ask myself "What does the each patten make easy? What does each pattern make difficult?" The standard or "verb-oriented" organization makes it easy to manage cross-cutting concerns, like rewriting all of your views in HAML instead of in erb, or adding a "created_at column to every model table. The refactored, or "noun-oriented" organization makes it easy to manage model concerns, like adding a new controller action with its associated views, model changes, tests, and migrations.

I find the latter happens far more often than the former for me, so it feels like a win even if I have no interest in sharing a model between applications.

<comment><USER3> Perhaps both schemes could be supported, using a system of symbolic links, or in its most elite case maybe even a specialized user-space filesystem. Now you have me thinking...

<comment><USER4> That's a classic matrix problem. Information fits nicely in two categories. How do you organize it? Choosing one or the other is mostly arbitrary. But current file systems force you to make a choice. BeOS a long time ago sort of wanted to fix that...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I actually do organize my plugins as raganwald suggests...and, as we've rolled out more products, and I'm seeing increasing commonality in pieces between then, am thinking more and more than 90+% of every one of our projects should be all plugin code.

<comment><USER6> Raganwald is also mentioning refactoring the code so that the data objects become responsible for persisting and displaying themselves though.

I don't necessarily have any problems with the persisting (that's how ActiveRecord works out of the box), but I'm not sure about the displaying, because I sometimes want to display things differently depending on the context.

<comment><AUTHOR> Well, I gave a very trivial example showing that, but I don't necessarily believe it should always work that way. Let me be more specific: _If_ you have a Persistanceamajig that know the difference between an account and a customer, then you might want to break it up. On the other hand, if the Persistancamajig can do its job by inspecting the things you pass to it, then it may be a very good idea to keep its implementation separate.

Likewise if you want a separate Displaythingie that can work out how to display an account or a customer on its own, great. If it needs to know a lot about accounst and custoemrs to do its job, but you want to swap it out or paramaterize it (e.g. one set of views for iPhone, one set for Safari), the classic organization makes a certain amount of sense.

All that being said, I have built a large, public-facing app with multiple views for multiple devices, and my experience is still that we did modifications across all of the things related to a model much more often than doing modifications to all of the views across all of the application.

JM2C.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Actually, I would say that the very first example is the correct organisation with proper separation of concerns. The reason they are often merged into the form of the second code sample is for convenience rather than for organisation. From a code design perspective, this is not a good thing (and I know many people who complain that Rails made a mistake with that). From a testing perspective, for instance, the coupling between the User object, the methods that save and load that object from the db, and the validation code, make it much harder to write cleanly isolated tests.

There are plenty of architectures where "data objects" are dumb and are passed to more intelligent objects that can save them, serialize them, etc.

MMM|VVV|CCC is a better system than MVC|MVC|MVC because it encourages separation of concerns, and loose coupling between concerns. Tight coupling between mostly unrelated pieces of functionality (why should the persistence code know anything about the controller?) is a very nasty code smell.

<comment><AUTHOR> > why should the persistence code know anything about the controller?

They don't know anything about each other. The question is not whether M,V, and C should be the same entity. The question is why they are scattered all over an application, such that adding a single field to a model involves going to one place to add a migration, another place to add validations and other model logic, a third place to change controller logic, a fourth place to change one or more views, and so forth.

Should they be separate files? Perhaps yes. Should they be far away from each other? That is what I am questioning. The "Separation of Concerns" you are describing is not a very persuasive argument in Rails apps, IMO, because I often have a concern like "add a field to this model" and I rarely have a concern like "Change from HTML 4.0 to XHTML" or "Add a created_at column to all tables."

<comment><USER7> In "separation of concerns" I'm talking about functionality, not human concerns. See: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Separation_of_concerns>

Separation of concerns aims to produce modular, loosely coupled code.

Now, if we start from the point of view that they should be in separate files anyway (in the ruby way, each file should contain one class rather than many - and I don't think it's helpful to change that), then I don't see what difference it makes whether the files are in the same directory or in separate directories.

If you have any sort of decent editor, opening the file you seek should be a matter of pressing a shortcut and typing part of the filename... Certainly, I rarely use the mouse to open files - except when i'm browsing through a new project, but that's a fairly rare use case.

Now, there's another problem I can see with your proposed organisation: although in some cases (even many) applications are built around resource objects, almost every non-trivial application has many edge cases of functionalities that are not directly attached to objects, or are attached to multiple kinds of objects, or are attached to objects but in a way that could be mapped to one object or to another, and is actually best thought of as being linked to something else.

Forcing the file system to be organised around resources like users, projects, items, etc would coerce us into trying to fit functions onto specific objects - and, importantly, it would remove the flexibility of being able to _not_ tie a function to an object.

As such, I think the current model is more flexible and offers something that your proposed model doesn't support and which is useful on most projects.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Django useses this Approach: app/ \---- models.py \---- views.py \---- urls.py \---- admin.py etc.

etc. I think it does indeed make more sense. Though the difference is not that big except for one case: Reusability of the code, that way you can easily just copy the directory to another site.

</comment><comment><USER9> Almost. I wouldn't keep the extra cruft of vendor, plugin, app and controllers for the simpler divisions of object (say those that are just 1 model, controller, and views), but I've often wondered about that in Rails.

</comment><comment><USER10> I would not give the refactoring recommendation you suggest. I would make both Account and Customer 'Displayable' and 'Persistable' ( still thinking in Java :( ). Then implement a kind of Strategy pattern to take a Displayable object. Same goes for Persistable.

That way you can focus on the domain objects as data, and how they are related to each other. You can also come up with cleaner (and more orthogonal) patterns of how to display, persist, or otherwise handle that data.

</comment><comment><USER11> Interesting, reminds me of the HMVC pattern (Hiearchical MVC) or the Presentation abstraction control

PAC : [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presentation-abstraction- contro...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presentation-abstraction-control) HMVC : [http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/jw-07-2000/jw-0721-hmvc.h...](http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/jw-07-2000/jw-0721-hmvc.html)

</comment><comment><USER12> Switch to an image-based system like Smalltalk or hybrid image/file-based system like Common Lisp. Seriously, a lot of the headaches of organization would go away if dev environments were more like Smalltalk.

</comment><comment><USER13> Visitor Pattern. To me it really depends on the context and how many "majigs" you're going to have, how flexible your application needs to be -- do you need to leave layers open to other implementations (different view, different transport, different persistence strategy)? I've gone both ways in the past with different projects, but if I were identify a rule for myself it would be that frameworks go the first way (easier to extend or swap components) while plugins go the second way (self-contained functionality).

If you can handle a larger number of classes you can sort of get around the question by using a good plugin loader that can associate the proper Persistamajig or Displayamajig with a particular object at run time.

</comment><comment><USER14> Oh, and for double-extra bonus points add in the fact that you might have more than one presenter for a single model -- content type negotiation, don'tchaknow.

</comment><comment><USER15> I can make no conclusive judgement in the example scenario until we're talking about specific algorithms and data.</comment>


Do you know of any well designed CRM? - <AUTHOR> I've tried dozens and none is able to strike a good balance between complexity and simplicity. It seems that none of these tams have good designers. Or maybe it's that the problem is to hard/complex?(many cos have different needs and is hard to balance all the needs and simplicity) <comment><USER2> In my opinion, the most reasonable path to a productive CRM for most businesses is to build your own. This is the central tool that non-programmer users need in your organization, and there's no reasonable way to make a one- size-fits-all one that makes sense to use-off-the-shelf except perhaps in certain verticals with well-defined business models (barber shops, dentist offices, etc.) or with extensive per-business customization (Salesforce).

Super-big businesses can pencil the budget out to make Salesforce and a team of salesforce admins work (and probably more cost-effectively than the dev/ops spend necessary to do it in-house). One-man shops can make do with manually querying databases and using one-off scripts. Everybody else probably needs a small Rails/Django (or similar) app developed in-house, and some commitment of dev resources to maintain it.

You mileage may of course vary, but the level of integration a custom CRM app, no matter how basic, allows, will allow you to do a lot more with a lot less elsewhere. Support, if you have that, will be massively streamlined. Sales, if you have that, will probably be massively more productive with a single tool that pulls in billing information, internal metrics, and all previous communication in a single place, doubly so if your sales staff is empowered with some kind of report-builder that they can use without waiting for dev work to complete.

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't know. Salesforce Classic seems just fine to me, but I wouldn't pay money for it.

I generally like a retro and semi-cluttered UI if it is quick and static.

I can't stand animations and anytjing "sleek" and bloated and I also can't stand anything cartoony.

But maybe I'm just stuck in 2005.</comment>


Ask HN: Pls review my start-up Leads Genie. - <AUTHOR>

Anyone who reviews my startup and would value the service can have a free 12 month subscription.
"Leads Genie increases the volume of website leads generated from a B2B website."
On average 2% of B2B website visitors complete a CTA. Leads Genie lifts this insight and identifies 10-15% of Companies that visit a B2B website. These visitors/leads are presented via a web interface for customers to follow up.
Our site is: www.leadsgenie.co.uk and you can email me directly for a free login at firstname.lastname@example.com <comment><AUTHOR> why has this been posted to general news when the question is pre-fixed with Ask HN: ?</comment>


Ask HN: How do you prevent wasting time on the arbitrary details of web design? - <AUTHOR>

I'm extremely detailed when designing user interfaces in order to be pixel perfect. On the surface this seems like a good quality to have, however, I find my self wasting hours on the smallest, most minute details. I also have a hard time making decisions about the layout that are quite arbitrary (meaning either decision results in an acceptable design).
How do you handle these tiny details and decisions? Is this a common problem for designers, or am I simply too indecisive?
Thanks guys. <comment><USER2> A/B test them. Pick something arbitrary that looks pretty good for the initial version (like the initial top-ads color for Google's May 2010 websearch redesign was "Cosmic Latte", the average color of the universe). Make it configurable in the source code, either through template variables or frameworks like Sass. Then vary one parameter at a time and measure your business metrics, and do what the data tells you to do.

It's important for designers to get the big-picture stuff right, like page layout and interaction model. For pixel-perfectness, just do what the data tells you.

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree about the importance of A/B testing, but it's not realistic to split test details like 16pt vs 18pt font, slight gradient changes, small text positioning, etc.

But you're right about designers understanding and focusing on the big picture. It's just hard for my mind not to get lost in the details.

<comment><USER2> Why not? Google does that all the time. Those are perhaps the easiest details to test.

If you're using a framework like A/Bingo, it's literally one line of code.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I am so concerned about all the other work that has to be done that I tend to fall on the other side of the spectrum; get the design to an 'acceptable' place and move on.

My attitude is something along the lines of 'If you're not freaking out, you're not working hard enough'

That said, I still havent launched publically, mostly because of all the 'details' of which you speak (core product works but is ugly).

</comment><comment><USER4> I'm not sure how connected you are to the rest of your project.

But for me, I find that actually launching the product to users helps me focus a ton more. I stop caring about the colors of buttons, the positions of signup forms, and move on to the features that make the most impact.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm the only person involved with the project, so it's difficult because I have no input from anyone else. I also feel a strong sense of ownership over it, which makes me obsess on the details like button color, text positioning, etc. Overall though, I see what your saying. Those little details don't matter in the big picture.</comment></comment>


Arsenic life does not exist after all... - <AUTHOR> http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21328493.300-arsenic-life-does-not-exist-after-all.html

<comment><USER2> The claim that living things could use the usual molecules, just with arsenic switched for phosphorus in their DNA, was an extraordinary claim, and such a claim requires extraordinary evidence.

[http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2008/01/extraordinary-c.h...](http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2008/01/extraordinary-c.html)

But the first report about "arsenic-based life" was no more than a preliminary research finding announced in a press event by the study sponsor, and such an announcement is not enough to establish a new body of scientific fact.

<http://norvig.com/experiment-design.html>

The specific preliminary finding was criticized right away for sloppiness of technique and a rush to reach an unwarranted conclusion,

[http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/12/its_not_an_arseni...](http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/12/its_not_an_arsenic- based_life.php)

[http://rrresearch.fieldofscience.com/2011/08/first- evidence-...](http://rrresearch.fieldofscience.com/2011/08/first-evidence- refuting-wolfe-simon-et.html)

so the journal slated to publish the preliminary finding had to invite in critiques of the finding to save its own reputation.

[http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/05/science- publishes-...](http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/05/science-publishes- arsenic-is-life-responses-game-on/)

Science is all about reproducible results, so much so that there is a humor magazine for scientists called the Journal of Irreproducible Results.

<http://www.jir.com/>

The headline in New Scientist, a British popular magazine about science (something like Scientific American in the United States), which has been published since before I was born, is correct. There isn't any reliable evidence of arsenic-based life living anywhere within reach of scientists on earth. Not now, and not last year. The best summary of the current evidence, after the efforts of many more careful researchers, is "arsenic life does not exist after all," period (as an American would say), full stop (as a Briton might say).

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't think the scientific community really bought it in the first place. The original experiment wasn't especially rigorous; e.g. see Rosie Redfield's review [http://rrresearch.fieldofscience.com/2010/12/arsenic- associa...](http://rrresearch.fieldofscience.com/2010/12/arsenic-associated- bacteria-nasas.html)

And then the authors declined to respond in detail to any of the specific criticisms that had been made by other scientists, which is very rarely a good sign.

</comment><comment><USER4> Serious biologists were very skeptical from the start : [http://omicsomics.blogspot.com/2010/12/arsenic-and-new- micro...](http://omicsomics.blogspot.com/2010/12/arsenic-and-new- microbes.html)

Soon, there were lots of questions : [http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/2011/06/01/return_of_th...](http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/2011/06/01/return_of_the_arsenic_bacterium.php)

I'm thinking NASA is good at space exploration, not so good at biology.

</comment><comment><USER5> The title is a bit misleading. One other lab's failure to reproduce the results does not prove invalidity of the original publication. It certainly raises some eyebrows, but it makes sense to wait and see what comes of Wolfe- Simon's further analysis before we declare that arsenic life definitely does not exist.

<comment> Tim-Boss Agreed; a sensationalist title adds nothing to an otherwise accurate article!

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Even if the organisms were shown to swap out phosphorus for arsenic in some instances in their DNA, would that be surprising? Arsenic comes from the same column in the periodic table as phosphorus, and exhibits many of the same macro chemical properties as phosphorus.

It would be like a software engineer swapping out their optimized, say, C++ string library, for one that was less optimal but perhaps took less space or ran better in a constrained embedded environment. Arsenic might not be optimal but it's what's available, what can be used.

In the software case you'd probably be OK but run more slowly than otherwise, or else maybe you'd stumble when for some strange reason the sub-optimal string library didn't guarantee thread-safe read operations. The arsenic could similarly trip up the organism in some cases.

<comment><USER7> I think your analogy is not quite right. Although seemingly similar, inserting Arsenic into DNA would be like taking a very large and complicated piece of software that was fundamentally dependent on the precise API of a component, and then changing that API to make it largely incompatible, thus requiring a large piece of your software to be re-written. It is not just like swapping in a suboptimal component that has no downstream effects.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I've never heard of new scientist. Is it a real science journal or sensationalist? (based on this article I'd guess the latter)

<comment><USER9> It's an English magazine that's somewhere inbetween your two options. Generally their reporting is pretty good and they avoid headlines for the sake of headlines, however they do put a lot of focus on making their content understandable to non-scientists - it's aimed at smart, curious people, not scientists.

An example of this is their "last word" feature, where they take a question from a reader and let anyone write in with answers - these are usually random questions like "Why is the sky blue?" or "If it's raining, will I get less wet if I run than if I walk?" They've also released two or three Last Word compilation books.

<comment><USER10> If anyone is interested in the sound of this there is something similar over on this subreddit:

<http://reddit.com/r/askscience>

<comment><USER11> More direct, permanent link:

[http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/oxz9b/arsenic_life_...](http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/oxz9b/arsenic_life_does_not_exist_after_all/)

<comment><USER10> I wasn't talking about the article, but the 'ask for a scientific answer' type service.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Summary: Scientist B failed to replicate the results of Scientist A. Scientist A stands by her continuing research. Research continues and is not definitive yet. New Scientist has a slow news days and publishes said results, mucking up an extra controversy for the day and getting a few more clicks through to their website.</comment>


The book that inspired the birth of reddit - <AUTHOR> http://alexisohanian.com/the-book-that-inspired-the-birth-of-reddit <comment><USER3> _Masters of Doom_ was one the books that really steeled my resolve to get into game programming back when I'd read it in highschool. It's a fascinating story about the birth and development of ID Software (the folks that made Wolfenstein, Doom, Quake, and are near singlehandedly responsible for us having consumer-grade graphics cards of note today). It's a fun, easy read, and the personalities involved are quite amazing. Both Carmack and Romero are painted in very human lights, and it's a fascinating insight into how to run a growth company without venture capital.

It's the ultimate bootstrap and find market fit and make bank story you'll likely ever read.

~

Later, you should also read _Soul of a New Machine_ and _Dreaming in Code_ for a less calvinball approach to software development.

<comment><USER4> Soul of a New Machine is an excellent book. I'll second that recommendation.

<comment><USER5> I recommend Soul of a New Machine as an excellent example how not to manage knowledge workers for the long term. The book has a romantic "gung-ho" energy to it that might appeal to start-ups in crunch time, but the environment described in the book eats the seed corn. As mentioned in Peopleware, practically everyone on that team quit Data General after the Eagle project due to all the abuse. Peopleware actually references the book when explaining the "Spanish Theory" model of IT management that they contend doesn't work.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> _Masters of Doom_ is an awesome read. If you are into gaming, graphics or the history of id Software... order it today.

Here are some excerpts from the book that I particularly enjoyed:

 _" On a cold winter day, Carmack laced up his shoes, slipped on his jacket, and headed out into the Madison snow. The town was blanketed in the stuff, cars caked in frost, trees dangling ice. Carmack endured the chill because he had no car; he'd sold the MGB long before. It was easy enough for him to shut out the weather, just like he could, when necessary, shut Tom and Romero's antics out of his mind. He was on a mission.

Carmack stepped into the local bank and requested a cashier's check for $11,000. The money was for a NeXT computer, the latest machine from Steve Jobs, cocreator of Apple. The NeXT, a stealth black cube, surpassed the promise of Jobs's earlier machines by incorporating NeXTSTEP, a powerful system tailor-made for custom software development. The market for PCs and games was exploding, and this was the perfect tool to create more dynamic titles for the increasingly viable gaming platform. It was the ultimate Christmas present for the ultimate in young graphics programmers, Carmack."_

Of course, the book wouldn't be complete without Ferrari details and discussion:

 _" At a showroom, they admired a gleaming new Testarossa that listed at $90,000. Carmack was treating cars like he treated his games; he had already grown somewhat tired of his current engine. What he really wanted was one of these. [...] Carmack paid cash for a red one to match his 328.

[...]

But Carmack's Ferrari didn't stay in the lot for long. Within days he drove it over to Norwood Autocraft and started on the modifications - he wanted to get the car, which ran at four hundred horsepower, at least twice as strong. Bob Norwood, who had become Carmack's automotive mentor, had a master plan: to install a twin turbo system that would not just double but triple the car's horsepower. For added energy, they put in a computer-controlled device that would inject a burst of nitrous oxide."_

</comment><comment><USER7> _Read at least one book this summer, you 'll be better for it_

This is such a refreshing thing to read in a tech community that seems to so unfairly decry literature. (And, no, rereading 1984 doesn't count.)

I also recommend people check out Alexis's short eBook, _Make Something People Love_ : ([http://www.hyperink.com/Make-Something-People-Love- Lessons-F...](http://www.hyperink.com/Make-Something-People-Love-Lessons-From- A-Startup-Guy-b1478)). It's ten bucks and something like seventy pages: easy to cruise through on a lazy afternoon, and has a very pleasant perspective on the philosophy behind creation. Alexis is a gifted writer, and you certainly feel his personality on the pages.

<comment><USER8> > (And, no, rereading 1984 doesn't count.)

I think (re-)reading 1984 probably counts a lot more than reading a great amount of business/self-help books.

<comment><USER9> Yeah, I have to agree. I get the GP's point, that 1984 is the polemic pamphlet for anti-authoritarians...but it's a fine piece of literature on its own ground, one that I've always found new insight or a previously unnoticed turn of phrase on each reading.

However, if you're tired of 1984 but are still on an Orwell kick, his non- fiction is equally fantastic.

<comment><USER10> >I get the GP's point, that 1984 is the polemic pamphlet for anti- authoritarians...

Hmmm, I thought the point was you're wasting time on a book a) you've already read and b) everyone else you know has already read. Regardless of how good the book is, you're unlikely to gain any _unique_ insight.

<comment><USER11> I read it first when I was in my late teens. I read it again after the war on terror (tm) had started... let's just say it was the difference between reading a book about sex as a virgin and as a man. Books of that caliber, that are that short, are rare enough IMHO, and reading them every decade can't hurt? Anyway, you can't know if you get something new out of it unless you tried it at least once ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I loved the book. This quote by Carmack sums up it up for me:

>In the information age, the barriers [to entry into programming] just aren't there. The barriers are self imposed. If you want to set off and go develop some grand new thing, you don't need millions of dollars of capitalization. You need enough pizza and Diet Coke to stick in your refrigerator, a cheap PC to work on, and the dedication to go through with it. We slept on floors. We waded across rivers.

He's making a larger point about low barriers to entry, but honestly there's something romantic about the image of all day cowboy coding sessions fueled by junk food.

<comment><USER12> Serious question: Has anyone ever written a "let your husband change the goddamn world!"-type book. Cause my wife is my barrier. Sure, I'll eat junk food, sit at the PC all day, sleep on the couch. But then half of the PC and half of the couch won't be mine for much longer...

<comment><USER13> I'll go ahead and write this - Perhaps completely ignoring your wife isn't the way to go.

Did that help. I don't really have time for a whole book.

/the wife would get mad at me.

<comment><USER12> Oh you misunderstood. I meant to explain the "romantic" part of how you can be sitting there in the zone and getting things done and yet to her it just looks like you're at any old regular HuffingtonPost-machine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I thoroughly enjoyed Masters of Doom.

At the time, I recall a number of people who read the book bemoaning 1991 as a bygone era of opportunity, as if all the good ideas and opportunities to invent had been "used up". Interesting how different people take the same text as self-defeating vs inspiring.

Also, on the topic of inspirational books, I always have to mention Skunk Works[0], one of my all-time favorites.

0: [http://www.amazon.com/dp/0316743003](http://www.amazon.com/dp/0316743003)

</comment><comment><USER15> Love this. I just ordered a copy.

I've been under the weather for a while, so I took the opportunity to read some. I can't emphasize enough how important regular reading is. If for no other reason than to climb out of your own problems and into an author's head for a bit, especially one with something important to say.

For anybody interested, the books I read over the past 2-3 weeks were War and Peace, Gone Girl, and God's Chinese Son. I've got about 35 more on-deck waiting for me to start on them.

<comment><USER16> I started reading The Romance Of Three Kingdoms - the Chinese equivalent to the Iliad. It's one of the handful classics of old Chinese literature, and an amazing window into that culture.

It's not an easy read, because the style is so peculiar, there's a ton of characters, and... well... it's not a culture I'm very familiar with. But it's still fascinating.

There's a movie that was made after this book, it's called Red Cliff. It captures the battle of Red Cliff, a peak moment in the book, and the events leading up to it. It's hugely, hugely EPIC. I'm a sucker for this genre, so I loved it. Also, it convinced me that John Woo can make great movies - <USER2> he's at home, operating within the realm of his native culture. When in Hollywood, he seems merely okay. If you watch this movie, make sure it's the original two-disk version, not the abridged single-disk one. The events depicted in it have a factual basis, with the required dramatic embellishments on top.

<comment><USER17> Red Cliff is an awesome movie! I loved it because it focused on the strategy and politics of war, rather than the warriors or fighting.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Not sure if this is verbatim, but one of my favourite quotes is a Carmack quote:

"If you want to set off and go develop some grand new thing, you don't need millions of dollars of cpitalization. you need enough pizza and Diet Coke to stick in your regrigerator, a cheap PC to work on and the dedication to go through with it."

</comment><comment><USER19> The Social Network also has the same sort of feeling as Masters of Doom, both very inspirational. I just love the feeling of "we're on to something big here", just wish I can have that feeling at least once in my life.

<comment> kai-zer You should read the book the movie was based on:

[http://www.amazon.com/dp/0307740986](http://www.amazon.com/dp/0307740986)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Masters of Doom is a fantastic read, I had the kindle edition and had to track down a hardback copy after reading it. I wanted it on my shelf.

The author has a new novel out titled Jacked which I believe tells the story of Rockstar games but I haven't read it yet. Has anyone else? Is it good?

I feel like it would be lacking some of the nostalgia and lure of Masters of Doom. The celebrity and talent of Carmack is legendary in our industry and Romero's arc makes him a compelling foil later in the story. Additionally, id software's games are the games that I grew up playing as opposed to Rockstar's games which I have only seen in passing.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh! I didn't know about Jacked. Will take a gander. Thanks.

I'm so careful about the Carmack/Romero comparison for Me/Steve precisely because things go so spectacularly bad for Romero...and I'm no Carmack.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> The audiobook version of this is excellent, read by Wil Wheaton. One of the best books I've read in the last few years, and also one of the most entertaining audiobook narrations.

<comment><AUTHOR> Speaking of that awesome narrator, we commissioned him for the audiobook of a recent breadpig publication: Trial of the Clone by Zach Weinersmith. [http://tinmangames.com.au/blog/?p=3239](http://tinmangames.com.au/blog/?p=3239)

He did an outstanding job. I want Wil to narrate my entire life.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I thought pg gave you the idea to start reddit?

"Paul Graham, co-founder of Y Combinator, rejected their original idea: a mobile food ordering service called MyMobileMenu. Instead, Graham told them, "You guys need to build the front page of the Internet.""

[http://www.inc.com/magazine/201206/christine- lagorio/alexis-...](http://www.inc.com/magazine/201206/christine- lagorio/alexis-ohanian-reddit-how-i-did-it.html)

<comment><USER23> I think PG told them to work on (what became) the reddit idea instead of the food ordering idea. The redditors came up with both ideas.

<comment><AUTHOR> This is correct. Masters of Doom made me want to be an entrepreneur.

<comment><USER24> What career path did you have your sights on before wanting to become an entrepreneur?

<comment><AUTHOR> This is quickly turning into a book press stop! I wanted to be an immigration lawyer -- obsessing over my GPA for the first couple of years at UVA. It all changed when I walked out of an LSAT prep course one Saturday morning to get waffles at Waffle House instead.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


A bar owner in the UK has built a Faraday cage to stop customers using phones - <AUTHOR> http://www.sciencealert.com/a-talented-bar-owner-in-the-uk-has-built-a-faraday-cage-to-stop-customers-using-their-phones <comment><USER2> He's committed a crime that means he could face up to two years in prison.

"The use of any apparatus, whether or not wireless telegraphy apparatus, for the purpose of interfering with any wireless telegraphy, is an offence under the Wireless Telegraphy Act 2006. It is an indictable offence that on conviction in Crown Court carries a maximum penalty of two years imprisonment and/or an unlimited fine. The courts can also order forfeit of any apparatus used in the commission of the offence."

[http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/enforcement/spectrum- enforc...](http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/enforcement/spectrum- enforcement/jammers/)

<comment><USER3> A Faraday cage is not a jammer. As the article points out:

> Faraday cages are different from electronic jamming devices, which work by > actively blasting out an electromagnetic signal that stops someone from > receiving radio waves.

> Those jamming devices are illegal, but Faraday cages don't break the law, > seeing as they passively filter out phone signals - although you can imagine > that blocking all phone reception at the pub isn't something that would go > down particularly well.

The article also points out, "You most likely have a type of Faraday cage in your house right now in the form of your microwave. That metal mesh you can see in between the glass in the door is there to stop microwaves from escaping."

Any metal container acts as a Faraday cage, including metal vessel hulls. Obviously these are not all banned by the law you pointed out, which only applies to a wireless telegraphy station, or wireless telegraphy apparatus.

<comment><USER2> Building a Faraday cage _specifically to block phone signals_ is a very different act compared to building a Faraday cage. It's the "to block phone signals" bit that makes it illegal.

<comment><USER3> Here is the law: [http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2006/36/section/8](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2006/36/section/8)

It refers to "telegraph station" and "apparatus". A Faraday cage is not a telegraph station, so it must be an apparatus to be covered under that law.

What does that mean? I think it's defined in [http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2016/426/regulation/3/mad...](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2016/426/regulation/3/made) :

> "apparatus" means any finished appliance or combination of appliances, > liable to generate electromagnetic disturbance, or the performance of which > is liable to be affected by such disturbance, and which generates, or is > designed to generate, or is liable to generate fortuitously, electromagnetic > energy at frequencies not exceeding 3,000 gigahertz and includes—

> (a) components or sub-assemblies intended for incorporation into an > apparatus by an end-user, which are liable to generate electromagnetic > disturbance, or the performance of which is liable to be affected by such > disturbance;

> (b) mobile installations defined as a combination of apparatus and, where > applicable, other devices, intended to be moved and operated in a range of > locations;

Are you arguing that a Faraday cage is a "finished appliance or combination of appliances"? And it "generates, or is designed to generate, or is liable to generate fortuitously, electromagnetic energy"?

If not, then it is not an apparatus, and so not regulated under the law you pointed to.

If you still think it is illegal, then please cite the actual law, and not some commentary about the law, as commentaries are more open to misinterpretation.

<comment><USER4> It generates electromagnetic energy in the same sense that noise cancelling headphones generate sound. The net effect is that it interferes destructively with the original incoming waves, never adding on to them. Whether that legally counts as generating interference, I have no idea.

(all that assuming I actually understand how Faraday cages work)

Addendum: maybe "generates" isn't the right word, since noise cancelling headphones make their own sounds from a power source, while this is totally passive redirection. You wouldn't say a mirror generates light, after all.

<comment><USER3> Your addendum is correct. A Faraday cage is much more like a passive mirror, or sound absorbing foam, than it is an active, powered, noise cancelling headphones.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This feels a bit myopic to me. I rely on my phone to do all sorts of things that I need to get notifications for, even when I'm socializing.

I totally understand the desire to avoid having cell phones out during a social event, but I'm not sure it's the venue's responsibility to enforce social convention -- especially in a way that could impair critical services...

<comment><USER6> Then don't frequent that bar. It is absolutely the venue's prerogative to set the atmosphere in any way they like that doesn't violate the law. The customers vote with their dollars. Time will tell if there's enough people who value a tech free social experience to keep the place running.

<comment><USER7> >Then don't frequent that bar. The customers vote with their dollars.

You're talking like he was suggesting beating the bar owners to death. He just said they shouldn't set up the cage.

>Taking a shit on the bar sounds rather unappealing

Then don't frequent that bar!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The article appears to have some sort of bad science.

> This effect was first discovered back in 1836 by physicist Michael Faraday, > and it works in a similar way to noise-cancelling headphones, which block > out noise by emitting the opposite wavelengths of sound.

> So, when electromagnetic radiation - such as a phone signal - hits the > outside of a Faraday cage, it causes electrons in the metal to move and > create an electromagnetic field that exactly opposes and cancels out that > wavelength of radiation.

They make it sound like the mesh is actively generating an opposing signal to cancel out the cell phone signals, which is pretty far from the truth. I think the article writer looked up info on how faraday cages use charge imbalances and then figured they were just like active noise cancellation headphones.. somehow.</comment>


How to Save Cleveland - <AUTHOR> http://reason.com/archives/2010/05/24/how-to-save-cleveland <comment><USER2> An article on saving Cleveland without the mention of LeBron James? Ironic.</comment>


FastClick - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/ftlabs/fastclick

<comment><USER2> This seems useful in a subset of circumstances but should really be used on a limited basis.

A lot of careful design and thought went into existing behavior. The default delay is there for a reason - to better understand user intent and give access to additional features. Users are also used to the delay and may be frustrated or confused rather than delighted at the change, and some touch-hold functionality may be affected.

<comment><USER3> I'd argue the opposite, native controls on most mobile platforms have a very low delay and almost always respond faster than web interfaces. The delay perpetuates the stereotype of unresponsive web apps on mobile devices.

<comment><USER2> I agree in part.

This is not something to throw into your average mobilized web page, but into an HTML application designed for mobile. Facebook clearly does something like this for their mobile app.

<comment><USER3> That's actually what I'm working on (phone gap app) and why I plan on using this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Use at your own risk. On our website it brought a lot of small unanticipated errors in the user interface that we only uncovered slowly.

It didn't work in IE8 out of the box. Some users reported they had to double tap very fast on iPad to actually activate any link (I couldn't reproduce it on my iPad). On some older Android devices it made links and menus behave erratically.

In the end we disabled FastClick completely.

<comment><USER3> Given that this library is specifically aimed at mobile browsers, why would you have problems with ie8?

Your other complaints seem inconclusive.

By default, you're wasting 300ms of most peoples time every time they click, this kind of default automatically puts any standard HTML you do on mobile behind native controls.

On android for instance, you should almost never expect your user to double tap as that result is now typically proceed with long presses.

<comment><USER5> You can load it conditionally for mobile safari only. IE, something like this (using the lightweight head.js loader):

            // load fast click if mobile safari
            if(navigator.userAgent.match(/(iPhone|iPod|iPad)/i) {
              head.js("js/fastclick.min.js", function() {});
            }

or include it in your main compressed js assets but only execute if mobile safari

<comment><USER6> syntax error, missing ) after the if statement. I always do that too.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> FastClick dev here. We're trying to support as many platforms as possible, so if you notice any problems while testing please file an issue, even if your platform is IE8. I typically fix really bad bugs within about 24 hours. The version on GitHub is the same one that's used by the FT web app, which is built to support Android, Chrome, IE, Firefox, Safari and so on.

</comment><comment><USER8> This should be of interest as well:

<https://developers.google.com/mobile/articles/fast_buttons>

<comment><USER3> Double clicking makes little sense on mobile as it is, and the delay should be done away with by default.

Thanks for the reference, and thanks to the OP

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Great job!

One of the concerns to use it might be: if the user want's to zoom in, and happens to be double tap on the FastClick enabled button, two separate click events would be triggered instead.

I am wondering if it's possible to use this technique only on UI, but still delay the event handling. A timer can be used to determine whether it's an independent click or a double-tap-to-zoom-in event. In this way, the double- tap is not broken, but UI feels much more responsive.

</comment><comment><USER10> Nice implementation. For those not wanting to use a library you can achieve the same functionality by binding to the touchStart/touchMove events instead of 'click'.

<comment><USER3> Do mouse clicks active those events too?

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I wrote a similar library for some mobile web apps I'm working on.

<https://github.com/kikinteractive/clickable>

It has support for:

* "fast" clicking

* managing downstate in CSS (like :active)

* using the native disabled property

* sticky downstates

</comment><comment><USER12> I made a jQuery plugin like this a while back [1] but this looks more polished. I'd recommend against using something like this unless you're sure you need it.

[1] <https://github.com/dave1010/jquery-fast-click>

</comment><comment><USER13> Why do the mobile devices not implement this by default?

<comment><USER8> A built in delay is making sure that you actually want to tap, and not swipe or double tap.

<comment><USER14> So it's safe to say this library might annoy users with accidental clicks.

<comment><USER8> I guess that depends on how you use it. Probably unwise to use it on every link, but certain UI elements could benefit from it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The impact this makes on perceived speed is impressive.

However, a word of caution. We tried this for a while and found it interfered with scrolling behaviour on link-heavy pages, not to mention making event capture for swipeable elements difficult.

The technique is a useful one to be aware of, but I'd be wary of using a library for this - it didn't work out for us, and I'll hazard it is unlikely to work as well it initially appears to.

That initial 300ms speedup is astounding, though :)

<comment><USER8> It also conflicts with tap/click markers, when initiating animations on click event.

<comment><USER7> Will you file an issue with a reduced test case please?

<comment><USER8> It's specific to the iPad. The marker indicating a tap, will show on specific UI elements, since everything is shifting due to the animation. The case is from Google's implementation, not this one.

Not really something we can do anything about - it's an edge case.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Other methods mentioned in the thread such as Google's fast button or binding touchstart/touchend don't handle everything this does, such as input fields/checkboxes. This works also well with responsive AngularJS web apps without needing any custom directives for taps/clicks.

</comment><comment><USER16> Great idea and nice implementation!</comment>


Show HN: MSFT Interns to Live Stream Crowd-Controlled Video from Stratosphere - <AUTHOR> http://www.gonimb.us/

<comment><USER2> While this looks really cool. The site is janky for mobile. The tweet 'div' having overflow scroll and the website also scrolling causes for some weird UX/UI.

<comment><USER3> What platform/browser are you on?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> You should blog about your tech stack and how you're accomplishing live streaming. APRS isn't sufficient for video, so do you have a satellite uplink?

<comment><USER3> We're planning on it! We'll be doing a write-up of the whole process and stack, to be posted after the launch. We're actually using an analog transceiver designed for FPV use to transmit video to the ground, and a separate digital transceiver to send telemetry down and receive commands.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> If you have a logo, you should probably change the favicon from the default ASP.NET one. It's the little things...

</comment><comment><USER6> Will I be able to view this on my phone? I might not have a computer handy live unfortunately!

</comment><comment><USER7> Thank heavens for Microsoft!

<comment><USER8> Thank Microsoft for heavens!

All the point of the page is to present the counter. Nice. Somebody could have put there at least a link to some description of whatever is going to be controlled, so at least my visit to the page wouldn't be limited to seeing the Great Counter of Heavens.

<comment><USER3> Sorry, we meant for the text beneath the counter and the tweet feed to give details on the event. You'll be able to control where our camera points during the flight.</comment></comment></comment>


The Answer for Startups Is Often "Brute Force" - <AUTHOR> http://lunarmobiscuit.com/brute-force/

<comment><USER2> Is Googling around for names and email addresses to use for marketing purposes even legal?

<comment><USER3> Its legal in the US so long as you follow the CAN-SPAM rules:

Federal rules require the following for commercial email sent to your mobile phone:

\- Identification – The email must be clearly identified as a solicitation or advertisement for products or services;

\- Opt-Out – The email must provide easily-accessible, legitimate, and free ways for you to reject future messages from that sender;

\- Return Address – The email must contain legitimate return email addresses, as well as the sender's postal address.

[http://www.fcc.gov/guides/spam-unwanted-text-messages-and- em...](http://www.fcc.gov/guides/spam-unwanted-text-messages-and-email)</comment></comment>


FOSS Zombies - <AUTHOR> https://davidalfonso.es/posts/foss-zombies <comment><USER3> If you come across such a Zombie, please ask for it to be added to the Code Shelter ([https://www.codeshelter.co/](https://www.codeshelter.co/)) so projects can be resurrected later. Also, I would encourage you to join yourself, since we always need more maintainers. There's no work requirement, you can simply maintain projects if and when one excites you.

</comment><comment><USER4> I'm not sure I get the drama. The beauty of FOSS is that nothing usually stops you from just forking the project and continuing to maintain it the way you see fit. If the original project is dead in the water, people looking for new releases or fixes will find you very soon and will be grateful. Just leave some links in the comments to the issues that you fixed in your fork and people will find it.

I've done this several times and never really bothered to get an "official" redirection from the original project. In most of the cases, Google just picked it up and eventually prioritized my maintained fork over the original zombie, as people posted more and more links to it. A couple of times the original author noticed and shared a quick update of "hey, this dude is maintaining the project now, kudos to him, go to his site for the latest build".

</comment><comment><USER5> The opening example is not actually of FOSS zombies... because _you_ are someone who knows the project and is interested in pushing it forward (and conceivably, might maintain it).

Real FOSS zombies have _users_ depending on them, and expecting to see maintenance or updates, but nobody to carry those tasks out. The linked-to article is more about "Zombie project steering". IMHO.

<comment><USER6> Those users could pay for someone to pick up maintenance and support.

<comment><USER7> I'm not sure some of the users actually knows the state of the FOSS project. I would bet there are more than a few businesses that have software they paid for that has some code from these projects.

<comment><USER8> If it works well enough that nobody has noticed support has stopped... Maybe the software is done?

<comment><USER7> In general, I would agree, but you are one OS upgrade from failure (see Mac OS Catalina). I would imagine some testing will surface that the company needs to act.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> > It's important to distinguish between a "FOSS zombie" and a project which is > simply done. If that's the case, you'll find out easily by reading the > documentation.

I'm glad they mentioned that. Package managers and developers routinely neglect this possibility.

<comment><USER10> This! One of my pet peeves is when someone recommends a software and then someone else looks at its GitHub commits or last release date and claims that the project is unmaintained because there has been no activity in it for a while.

Some projects do not need any maintenance. They work as is. Lack of activity does not imply bad software.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Some indicators mentioned would trigger on mature and complete software.

<comment><USER12> From the section "Conclusions":

> It's important to distinguish between a "FOSS zombie" and a project which is > simply done. If that's the case, you'll find out easily by reading the > documentation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Serious question, because I'm not very well-versed in open-source philosophy.

Isn't this around the time that you make a fork of the zombie?

<comment><USER14> Yes, it's often the time to fork and take over. But it's a big project in itself, not everyone wants to be the new developer-in-chief.

Sometimes, a project can stay at the borderline of death and alive - <USER2> still can be minimum maintenance by a not-so-active developer, major distributions still have packages for it, etc. I recently sent a patch to a project - it took 11 months, but it was eventually merged when a developer with commit access finally noticed it. There was no motivation for me to fork it since all I wanted to merge was a simple fix, I was not planning to take over the project.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I'll be waiting for FLOSS Zombies & Open-Source (not FREE) Zombies.

</comment><comment><USER16> David, what is your point writing this?</comment>


The Human Wealth of Nations - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304355104579236150801599552#printMode <comment><USER2> I have listened to a great deal of hand wringing since the PISA reports dropped and I think it is easy to concentrate on the negative and overlook the positive news from these results.

Three points I think we should keep in mind.

One, the results were VERY uneven among the states. More importantly, if you look at the Northeast, (Massachusetts, NY, NJ etc), and the western Midwest, (Minnesota, Wisconsin), the scores were pretty competitive relative the top performing nations actually. For instance, in Massachusetts, even if you only counted the scores of black students, the Math and Science average was higher than Finland, which is continuously touted as a model of educational efficiency!

Two, teens in Mississippi, Texas, California and Washington are pretty much the same as teens in Minnesota, New Jersey and Massachusetts. This is good news, as it indicates that there are models out there that can be employed to better the performance of students in other areas of the country.

Lastly, something about the US creates an openness in its citizens that drives a good deal of activity beneficial to society. The article references, for instance, "... America's entrepreneurial energies, its openness to innovation and creative destruction ...". This "Creativity" has some value, which I would admittedly be challenged to quantify. It is the sort of thing tests will overlook. Which is curious, because in the future I think it will be one of the most important skills, (or, 'traits' perhaps), of the high value worker.

My last point had only a tangential relevance to the PISA, I just thought it was an important point to make. That aside, I think the first two points are clearly cause for a cautious optimism here.

<comment><USER3> Thanks for the context. These statistics favor monocultural societies and collectivist societies over individualist ones. Your point on innovation is but one overlooked factor that these stats don't account for.

I'd love to get some global statistics on educational knowledge of 18 year olds in all of these countries, and also get statistics on the per capita numbers on new businesses opening up by this age group in these countries as well. Just a thought that IMO may not skew these stats so much towards monocultural/collectivist societies so much.

<comment><USER4> The U.S. actually ranks pretty low among OECD countries in terms of rate of entrepreneurship. There is a strong correlation between a strong safety net and entrepreneurship.

<comment><USER3> And I'm sure innovation in general is even harder to monitor.

Well I still stand by my observation that the top rated countries are on average more monocultural and collectivistic (which would lead to better safety nets I'd hope).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Another article that misleadingly cites PISA scores without adjusting for demographics: [http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer- sheet/research/how-p...](http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer- sheet/research/how-poverty-affected-us-pisa-s.html), [http://super- economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-abou...](http://super- economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-about-pisa-scores-usa.html).

The U.S. has problems, but the problems are not schools, teachers, or funding. The problem is Chicago, Philly, L.A., Detroit, etc. Places that have levels of crime and social dysfunction that simply _do not exist_ at that scale in other OECD countries.

I live in Wilmington, DE. A city of 71,000 people. Last year, it had 26 murders. London, a city of 8 million people, had 99. That's a 30x higher murder rate (and 2x higher than Bogota, Colombia!).[1] These are mostly 20-somethings killed in gang wars. There's a pipeline from the schools here straight into these gangs. I'm not surprised that test scores aren't the first thing on the minds of kids here.

Also, I'll note that the U.S. has one of the highest fertility rates in the OECD, just behind Mexico and Turkey. I don't think its unreasonable to assume that this has an impact on the demographic distribution of children in schools. That is to say, I'm willing to bet that children in schools in other OECD countries were more likely to be planned and born to parents who intended to take care and properly educate them than children in American schools.

[1] Four major U.S. cities (five if you count Puerto Rico as part of the U.S.) make the list of the 50 most murderous cities in the world: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_by_murder_rate](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_by_murder_rate). The only countries with cities on that list that aren't in Latin America are Jamaica, South Africa, and Iraq.

<comment><USER6> Probably close to 90% of the murders on that chart are related to the drug trade. Notice how they are mostly in Central/South America.

<comment><USER5> Sure, and Wilmington is on I-95, a major drug trafficking corridor. Kids get caught up in gangs, and the gangs are minor or major players in that drug trade, and the gangs are a major presence in the schools.

I'd bet that ending the drug war and destroying the drug trade would have a much larger impact on test scores in the U.S. than even drastic improvements in school funding or teacher quality.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> """Some 7% of U.S. students reached the top two scientific performance levels, compared with 17% in Finland and an amazing 27% in Shanghai."""

I'm not normally a stickler for this kind of statistical bullshit, but this is particularly bad. They compared a country of 300mil with a country of 5mil with a city of 14mil. I think the percentages are interesting, but this is ACTUALLY comparing apples and oranges. I'd be interested to see how Boston (or whatever US city with the highest "scientific performance level") does in that mix though.

<comment><USER8> It would be interesting to discuss the target percentage. Yes I'm sure 100% would be nice in an abstract sense, but there are a lot of things that would be nice.

I can assure you that my favorite waitress having a bachelors degree in early childhood education doesn't make my food arrive at the table any quicker, or her recitation of scripts sound any better. Or my favorite coffee barista who has some liberal arts degree or another doesn't make coffee any better than the illegal who can't read or write. Perhaps if all lunchroom ladies were competent FPGA programmers then they would shovel canned peaches onto trays better, or something.

So I'm not seeing how the hotel desk clerk in Shanghai having memorized the periodic table is going to improve anything in any way.

<comment><USER9> You're rather nastily assuming that people who currently hold low-level jobs _should_ hold those jobs, for their entire careers, and that therefore, any education unnecessary for their menial jobs is unnecessary for them as human beings.

That's one small step for illogic, one giant leap for inhumanity to other people.

<comment><USER8> One fundamental problem is massive underemployment. Another is a failing educational system in bubble mode means no one on the planet pays more while getting less. Another problem (related to #2) is the monetary costs of the failing educational system are financially crippling our youth and the guaranteed loans that will never be paid back will financially cripple everyone else.

So your solution is individuals who are headed for a cliff, should step on the gas and to fling over it faster. After all, if it doesn't work, keep trying it over and over until it does. And I'm the inhumane one LOL.

I will say if a system is inevitably crashing, then its best to accelerate the process so as to reach the recovery quicker. The sooner we have a big crash, the sooner we can pick up the pieces and start living again. So in that way you are correct, the best thing kids can do "for everyone" is financially immolate themselves, because in the long run that'll bring on the crash (and hopefully, recovery) quicker. If that is your analysis then by its conditions, I admit you are correct, under those specific conditions, although I'd hate to be one of the individuals being crushed for the betterment of everyone else.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> "Economies grow by exploiting scarce resources, people most of all."

No, they don't. Economies grow because of cheap inputs. Every economic revolution is the result of something becoming ridiculously cheap; the last one was oil, the current one is computation.

<comment><USER11> In the case of the US you could throw in centuries of free slave labor.

<comment><USER8> That would imply that immediately before the civil war the south was a boomtown and the slaveless north was a rustbelt.

<comment><USER12> Not necessarily. Slavery might have indirectly assisted the north's industrialization in at least a couple ways. (1) Accumulation of financial capital in the hands of an investment class (2) Cheap cotton gave northern factories a competitive advantage.

<comment><USER8> That is a good point although there should also be a way to compare and contrast with other countries that didn't have slavery as an "advantage". Then you could try to back-apply the model to other countries, like if the English outright owned the Irish then economic growth would have increased ... or would it have?

<comment><USER12> Good question. It would take some serious time studying history to have even a decent guess.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The results (png): [http://i.imgur.com/mZ8Tj0kh.png](http://i.imgur.com/mZ8Tj0kh.png)

Report (pdf): [http://www.oecd.org/pisa/keyfindings/pisa-2012-results- overv...](http://www.oecd.org/pisa/keyfindings/pisa-2012-results-overview.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER8> "Since 1998, the Program for International Student Assessment, or Pisa, has ranked 15-year-old kids around the world"

Every American 15 year old kid? Probably darn close. Every Vietnamese 15 year old kid? LOL.

For a heavily class based country, the USA has quite a blind spot to how other countries organize more heavily by class starting at a rather young age.

</comment><comment><USER14> I love the smell of a Rupert Murdoch propaganda piece in the morning.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Weird that India did not participate.

</comment><comment><USER15> Here's a terrifying thought (which I believe to be correct).

I don't think US schools are _that_ bad on fundamentals. They're probably quite good on average. Of course, a large percentage of what makes a school good or bad is the other students, not the teachers or material. I'll get to that...

These indifferent, underachieving students (disproportionately, but not entirely, in poor areas) aren't stupid or bad people. I think they're just _rational_. They see what society has to offer them even if they do succeed and conclude that it's not worth the effort for them. If middle-class, college-educated people are applying for jobs in fast food, then what should a low-income student, who _might_ be able to scrape together enough scholarships to get through undergrad with merely moderately crippling debt, expect? They see people far ahead of them in the socioeconomic queue ending up miserable and disappointed, and conclude that there's no chance of success for them. Most of them are probably right.

This country has a deep-seated morale problem, expressed at the top through corruption and dishonesty and nepotism, and at the bottom through indifference and underperformance-- which is most measurable and upsetting in the schools because that's before society has formally given up on people. It stems from fundamentals that will take a long time to fix.

<comment><USER16> I strongly disagree.

US schools are pretty bad on fundamentals. Period. Talking to parents who are here from Asia (for business, grad school), they are shocked how behind the grades are compared to their home countries.

And about the underachieving students supposedly not trying harder because they see college educated people applying for fast food jobs, I think that's just not true. And if they really do think that way, I'm sorry but they deserve the poverty they are stuck with.

I have history of an entire nation to to prove that people don't stop (and should not stop) studying in school because they see other college grads stuck with low paying or no jobs.

S Korea at end of the Korean War (1950-53) was a complete disaster. There were college educated kids in 50's, 60's and 70's but no jobs for them. The country was still largely surviving on foreign aid.

The job market was bad enough that when S Korean govt recruited people to go to West Germany to work as 'miners' (mainly to earn foreign currency) in 1963, 2894 men applied. Out of 2894 men, 375 got the job. Basically 1 was selected out of 7. The competition was so fierce that names of who got in were published on national newspaper. Over 60% had completed high school or tertiary education.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koreans_in_Germany](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koreans_in_Germany) [http://www.zum.de/whkmla/sp/0708/giyoon/giyoon1.html](http://www.zum.de/whkmla/sp/0708/giyoon/giyoon1.html)

So did the south Korean kids in school stop studying because they saw how college grads were so desperate for jobs that they were willing to go abroad to work as coal miners? Of course not.

If the American kids really are afraid of ending up like the other college grads being stuck without jobs, they should study harder, be it in college or vocational training etc.

<comment><USER8> "If the American kids really are afraid of ending up like the other college grads being stuck without jobs, they should study harder, "

This is hilarious and can be compared to: There are thirty NBA teams and twenty million teenagers so the obvious national educational and employment strategy should be to tell all twenty million teens to just practice harder if they don't want to end up unemployed.

If as per the pigeonhole principle, if the numbers don't match up, just handwave away the unlucky ones, let them eat cake.

<comment><USER16> Using example of NBA doesn't really work imo because of the skewed statistics. No one is saying high school students shouldn't study because only a very small percentage will ultimately earn PhDs. That's not what the OP and my comment is about.

What handwaving? An entire generation S Koreans in 1950 - 80 basically 'studied' their way out of extreme poverty. They have no oil or any other useful natural resource to speak of.

Obviously studying hard in school wasn't the only reason as they got a few other lucky breaks, but ultimately it was the education that got them out of poverty.

<comment><USER8> "but ultimately it was the education that got them out of poverty"

How? What is your economic system wide reaction mechanism? I think the problem is confusing macro and micro. On a micro level yes one individual can rise above others in that way. However, on a macro level diverting capital out of productive enterprises into merely increasing existing underemployment stats makes the overall situation worse for everyone, not better.

I'm not saying education is worthless, or underemployment should be 0% (or maybe it should?).

Think about this analogy. Maximum productivity resulting in maximum wealth for everyone involved happens when a factory produces 1000 cars. I know, lets produce 1500 cars, and also increase prices 10% per year, then having those unsold cars sit on the lot will make society as a whole wealthier because ... err, I guess it makes society as a whole substantially poorer. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying producing 1500 is a disaster therefore producing 500 would be genius, that would also be pretty bad. I'm also not making any moral or ethical or environmental value judgement about manufacturing cars.

Its basically the economic broken window fallacy.

Another way to look at it, is if you know about control system theory, taking an unstable system and pushing it hard in an even more unstable direction is not going to work well.

WRT the Korean example, as a cheap hobby or time filling past time, there's nothing inherently wrong with education, it didn't hold them back as far as I know. Nobody was spending money on liberal arts professors instead of spending the same money on welding robots and conveyor belts. Not that there's anything wrong with the liberal arts and making life worth living, just that it is orthogonal to economic productivity.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: StartupFeed.co - <AUTHOR> http://www.startupfeed.co

<comment><USER2> Why not just make a subreddit with a script that automatically posts everything from these RSS feeds?

and then have the domain redirect to it.

</comment><comment><USER3> you're using bootstrap so why not use fontawesome and use chevron-up or something instead of that ugly blue arrow</comment>


Ask HN: Do you ask for feedback on job interview? - <AUTHOR> Found this app on PH today(https://www.producthunt.com/posts/after-interview-2-0) and got curious how many people actually ask for feedback on job interviews. Do you? <comment><USER2> I always ask for feedback. Some of it wouldn't be useful due to the fact that each company is different. However feedback on communication, presentation, and in some cases technical performance can be useful ways to calibrate for future interviews.

I've got feedback twice out of the last dozen interviews I've been on.

</comment><comment><USER3> I've solicited feedback a few times but never actually got any. Either just didn't hear back, or was told that they were unable to provide any. Which didn't really surprise me.</comment>


Kids Should Know How to Code - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-08-11/kids-should-know-how-to-code <comment><USER2> There has to be previous discussions on HN about this. Does anyone have a link?

I'm probably going against the grain here, but do we need to teach kids to code? Heck, does Tim Cook know how to code?

It's been 20+ years now where kids have had access to computers in schools. In the late 90's they taught typing, Word, Excel, and Power Point.* Looking at most of my friends from high school who aren't in tech, that's all they use-- if that. I was a bit surprised when my brother in law mentioned my nephews, who are about to go into high school, had never used a desktop computer. I was a bit surprised at first, but don't think it'll be a problem for them and it's probably common.

I _think_ the expectation 25 years ago is that the average workhorse applications would be way more scriptable. So "a little" computer science could be done to automate repetitive things and lead to more computer science. I hear about Excel wizards and I've seen managers who are fantastic with pulling data into Power Point, but they seem very specialized to their profession. I've never had to use VBA inside of a Microsoft app. Every time I try and use AppleScript I have to dive in way more than the average person would bother (and I don't see options like that for Windows). Outside of work I might write a small Python/Shell script to scrape some web pages, or sort some data. I just can't see someone who had a class in high school doing anything useful.

I do think it's good to get exposure to computer basics and even programming if they're interested. Maybe, like the article says, it's comparable to higher level math and science classes.

* I thought it was a bit silly they were teaching Microsoft programs because who knows what would be around 5 years from then--I was wrong about that

<comment><USER3> There's a chicken-and-egg problem with scripting support in desktop applications: if more of the customers were comfortable writing small programs, the companies creating them would see more value in providing decent scripting interfaces.

For example the Adobe applications like Photoshop and Illustrator have obviously had a fair amount of effort put into the scripting interfaces at some point, but it's fallen short.

They've done the 90% of the work which is embedding a sort-of-javascript engine and exposing the applications' functionality to it; they just need to do the other 90% to make it practical to maintain and share scripts, and glue them up to the UI, and so on.

<comment><USER2> I feel like my industry might be a window to that. I work in visual effects. Almost all of our applications (Maya, Nuke, Houdini) have a built-in Python interpreter and every facility over probably 20 people use it extensively all the way up to the Pixars, Wetas, and ILMs. Often the application UI is written in Python and could be fully customized, including adding/modifying menus, they have a console, and a shelf (for small, clickable scripts). They even have a cool think where you can see it print out the commands that get executed when you click buttons in the UI. I've also been responsible for scripting in Photoshop and it's miserable (not just because of Javascript).

I have junior artists ask if they should learn Python/programming or focus on their discipline and my recommendation is, "if you think scripting is going to be one of your primary responsibilities, learn it. If not, focus on getting better at your discipline." My experience in working with artists is that they have no idea what goes on under the hood. The amount of effort needed to even write simple scripts is enormous. There are artists who can crack open a console and write or modify a simple script, but more often than not they came from a solid technical background it's just no longer their day-to-day job.

Even in those programs, there's not just the hurdle of knowing what a variable, loop, or string is, but looking up the API for the application, how things are structured, and troubleshooting.

I think Excel is the most ideal example you'll ever get. The feedback loop is tight and there's a gradual slope to some insane programming. While there are a lot of amazing Excel gurus, the average person using Excel may not even need to know what a formula is. Their job is filling out and reading boxes that were put together by a manager. I don't see this changing in 20 years.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Knowing how to code seems like maybe a bit too far for most people.

I think knowing how to use the kind of computers they're going to encounter would be most of the way there.

Simple things; the concept of files and directories, what the typical OS desktop window managers are actually presenting and how to work with them. What the command line is and how to use it; how to search for files, how to move files, grepping and viewing and so forth. How simple configurations work, maybe even the very basics of automating some tasks using very simple scripts (edging just barely into programming there).

I think people could get much, much further if they simply knew how to use typical computer systems they will be working with (which for most people basically means Windows), rather than just knew how to use some of the more common applications. The majority of people using computers just need to know how to use the computer, and can get a very long way before they need to write any code themselves if they can get some understanding and step outside the bubble of Microsoft Word or whatever they spend most time in.

</comment><comment><USER5> I'm a positive guy and more is more...

Nope, for one this is a zero sum game and making coding a priority means other things have less budget - not money that may or may not be found but simply time of the kid. Coding is time intensive so where do we take that time away? Math? Reading? Writing? Kids struggling often with the basics...

And is there really such a huge need for coders? Considering the retiring baby-boomers a much stronger argument could be made for nurses. And unlike nursing coding can be off-shored...

It would make sense make studies and plans how do it effectively before cargo cult coding school on primary level just after that fad fizzled out.

</comment><comment><USER6> No.

Kids, and computer programmers, should be taught how to think and analyse.

Coding is what comes after analysis.

<comment><USER7> But coding, taught in tandem, can facilitate and reinforce analytical thinking.

<comment><USER6> So can literary criticism.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> 100% agree, programming is a very powerful and practical skill for just about everyone in modern society.

</comment><comment><USER9> For example of how children can be taught to program at a surprisingly high level with a paucity of resources, see this blog post on CS in Vietnam: [https://neil.fraser.name/news/2013/03/16/](https://neil.fraser.name/news/2013/03/16/)

People need to raise their expectations of what children are capable of when given the right resources and environment.

</comment><comment><USER10> The question is, what should be sacrificed in order to teach kids to code? They have a limited amount of time at school, so some other subject must be reduced significantly, to allow for enough time to actually teach them anything useful.

</comment><comment><USER11> Sure but I think they should also be taught practical things as well like driving, taxes, light house maintenance, and other skills most of need for everyday life over abstract math and social science.

I'm a big fan of the Japanese model.</comment>


Ask HN: How to find a short term programmer? - <AUTHOR>

Hi
I'm wondering if anyone here knows a good way to find a programmer for a short term assignment (3 - 6 months) in India?  The company I'm working is looking for someone to work on something.
If anyone here is interested I'll put a quick description of the job (apologies if this is taboo, if it is please let me know):
> C programmer
> 3 - 6 months
> Willing to live in India (back and forth between Chennai and Bangalore).
> Pretty good at math (able to take a model and translate it to code).
Edit: One more
> Working on taking a risk model created by some mathematicians and "coding it up."
Thanks <comment><USER2> Ooh that sounds like interesting work.. I'm not looking but I'd be interested in learning how to do this.

Any suggestions?

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, not sure I get your question...

Are you asking

1) How you could get this is position? If you are interested, you can send a mail to random2718 [at] gmail [dot] com and I'll forward it along. No promises or anything obviously... Note: its probably almost but not quite a deal breaker that you'd need to be willing to live in India. I'm here now (for 3 months so far, lived in the US before) and I'm enjoying it.

2) How to get into working with mathematical models? They come up a lot in finance, so you can look at technology jobs there. There is a difficulty in finding interesting jobs though because a) in large companies the basic models are already in place and I'm not sure how much more you would add and b) in small companies they many not have the need (or understand the power of) a good system for this. If you go the small company route though, be sure to study up some finance first!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> You can always try odesk.com.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! This looks like a great website with a neat way to get things done. I'll check with my boss to see if we're ok with having someone work remotely.</comment></comment>


Facebook testing service to let strangers pay to message you - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2012/12/20/3788508/facebook-messaging-filters-pay-per-message-test <comment><USER2> Add a little "sponsored" part that is easy to see and this should be fine. Same thing Google has used for years.</comment>


The Effort to Bring "Habitat" Back to Life - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2014/10/restoring-habitat/

<comment><USER2> The full 10+ hour stream is available on Twitch: www.twitch.tv/themadeoakland/b/573016870</comment>


Analog Memory Desk - <AUTHOR> http://kcamara.com/analog-memory-desk <comment><USER2> It's kind of funny to see HNers talking about the failings of this desk, and gradually re-designing it - make it smaller, make the top sheet removable to remove coffee stains, etc -until they end up with something that already exists.

These are called "Desk Pads" or "Desk Mats". [http://www.staples.co.uk/calendar-desk-mat- refill/cbs/413046...](http://www.staples.co.uk/calendar-desk-mat- refill/cbs/413046.html?promoCode=200200555&Effort_Code=WW&Find_Number=413046)

You don't buy them. Your supplier buys them and has them branded and sends them to you with a bunch of calendars and wall charts.

EDIT: I do love the desk though. I'd use the hell out of it. I like the scrolling aspect even though that'd make things harder to find. I'm gently worried about the strength of butcher's paper. there was a link on HN the other day about how people used to use rolls instead of books, and was talking about cookery scrolls. I thought then of a miniature version of this desk for cookery books. With a wipeclean glass top it could be used in the kitchen without gloop messing up your favourite book.

<comment><USER3> Desk pads, when branded thoughtfully, can be a really nice freebie from suppliers, and is one of the few items for which I'd break my `no gifts' rule. The problem I find is that a lot of suppliers go completely overboard on the branding and decoration, and leave almost no space for writing on. The last two years we received them at my old work, the recruitment agency supplying them had covered about 80% of the surface with black gradients, green `starbursts', and various other bits of advertising information, leaving a tiny island of usable space --- perhaps the size of a sheet of A4 paper --- in the middle of the pad. They ended up in the recycling because, for most people, an A4 pad was more useful.

As for the strength of butcher-paper, all that I've encountered in the UK has been pretty strong, and resists breaking/ripping when pulled from either end. The downside is I've never seen it for sale by the roll in anything other than kraft/brown, which might limit its usefulness in this case.

<comment><USER4> White butcher paper definitely exists. (Staples carries it.) I've seen it used for disposable tablecloths.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The cognitive overhead of sketching a diagram or jotting a todo is hard to beat.

I'd love to have a setup like this. I would probably let small objects pile up on its surface though, which would make it hard to turn.

<comment><USER6> Looking at my desk: Not being able to accumulate to much stuff might actually be a feature...

<comment><USER3> I'd agree with that. My desks tend to quickly end up buried under books, papers, desk tools, mail, and everything else that I lay there ``just until I put it away''. About half of the people I know do the same thing, especially when it's their desk at home. This desk almost seems to be designed to _not_ allow that to happen, which is counts as a feature rather than a bug to my mind.

A nice compromise would be to use butcher-paper that's less wide than your desk is deep, leaving perhaps the back third of the desk uncovered. That way, you can put your various permanent pieces of desk furniture --- pen-pots, charger cables, paper trays, whatever else --- at the back of your desk and still have the front two-thirds as a rolling writing surface.

That also probably makes it easier to use 100% of the depth of the writing surface, because reaching right to the back of the desk isn't really practical. A relatively standard UK desk is about 800mm, or ~32", deep, so having the back 300mm/~11" uncovered would work out pretty well.

 _Edit:_ Just realised that this comment describes a solution that's functionally equivalent to panic's comment one level above[0], though does vary a little in the method of implementation.

[0]: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9202054](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9202054)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm not sure that remembering a whole lot of coffee stains is worth tipping my monitor onto the floor everyday, but hey, I'll give it a whirl.

<comment><USER8> Try a small fold away table with a top with sides like a tray for the coffee. I remember those from childhood. They went out of fashion in the 60s.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> My setup is a bit similiar, except that I don't use paper. I just write or draw directly on my desk with a pencil. Most of my notes are only needed for a few minutes and they can be easily erased without any tools.

<comment><USER3> I used to do the same with a grease-pencil at my old job, and found it a pretty good method for very fleeting information. It did, however, draw appalled looks from my co-workers, and was ultimately stopped by a new manager who refused to allow it (``This isn't a f---ing primary school, stop drawing on your desk!'')

<comment><USER9> I've noticed that a lot of people seem to think there is something fundamentally wrong with it. Some have told me to stop doing it despite having never seen my desk. Whenever I mention it to people (which I seldom do nowadays) I'm told to just write on paper like everybody else. Thus far nobody has been able to explain me what I stand to gain from the switch. Few people seem to accept my justification (I find dealing with pieces of paper inconvinient) for my behavior either.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I see no advantage over keeping a notebook. When you finish your notebook, throw it in a stack of notebooks.

<comment><USER11> Yeah, both are write-only... Except you mean electronic Notebooks ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Looks good, but if it's the desk I'd use daily it needs more legroom, more storage, and I'd put so much stuff on top that it'd become impractical to rotate it.

</comment><comment><USER8> Looks lovely. Could be used in art galleries for comments & doodles about the exhibits (then unrolled to make an exhibit itself).

I have been thinking about the inverse idea: a small desk with a plain pine plank top with a sheet of acrylic over that. A large piece of paper between the two with schedule/calendar/mind map for a several month project written on it. Papers archived after project completed. Important changes noted by lifting the acrylic.

<comment><USER13> I have a large glass over my desktop. Its main use is supposed to be to cut leather/patterns on it, but I end up putting papers below it to remind me of stuff. So, it is a handy idea. I prefer glass, even if it is somewhat unwieldy to lift up (weights a bit)

<comment><USER14> Do you ever get airlock issues where the glass slides around too much? Have been considering a glass layer on a desk project for a while but I'm concerned one wrong move and it could end up on the floor!

<comment><USER15> Install corner brackets (permanent) or an edge lip on three sides with a rotating lock on the fourth (semi-permanent) or get it drilled for flat hinges (liftable).

Or use double-sided tape in a color matching the underlayer.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> A really nice project, I might build one for my daughter.

I used to have something similar when I studied Architecture: my drawing table was always covered with thick yellow paper kept in place with painter's tape, on which I jotted down notes and sketches. This is much more practical, as you don't have to cut a new sheet of paper when the old one is too dirty/full.

</comment><comment><USER17> If the authors are here, I suggest them to do a KickStarter project.

I think it would be valuable.

</comment><comment><USER18> Add a line scanner on one edge.

</comment><comment><USER19> Certainly interesting and, personally, I find it nice as well.

Wouldn't work for me I guess but maybe a smaller version would do?

I have also considered a strictly personal blog. It would need to be thoroughly searchable and did I mention personal.

I came across this idea a few years ago when I worked on a solution for someone with amnesia.

<comment><USER20> > Wouldn't work for me I guess but maybe a smaller version would do?

Yes, and it is called a whiteboard.

The usability of this thing is a nightmare, good luck clearing your desk everytime you want fresh paper...

How about something less hipster, make it vertical, attach a linear scanner to one end of the roll to digitize it as it advances.

If you had one of these things in your conference room, after a meeting you could automatically email to all participants a copy of what was written.

<comment><USER8> Whiteboard and phone camera works quite well for recording what was doodled in a problem solving meeting.

Your vertical roller version with digitiser suggests the use of a continuous loop of dry marker roller (this used to exist as canvas painted with a heavy paint that could take dry marker pens. The paint used to crack after some years though) so after being scanned, the marks are erased...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I would use the fuck out of something like this. In fact, I might build it into the desk I want to build one day when I have my own place. Maybe not the whole desk, because as others have pointed out I'd like to have some room to store things.

</comment><comment><USER22> I think this would be super-interesting to have and use in practice - you'd probably end up with a kind of stream-of-conscious scroll of your daily activities!

</comment><comment><USER23> That'd just have coffee rings and skid marks from that odd black shit that comes off the bottom of mice all over it.

Cone to think of it if you spilled something, game over.

</comment><comment><USER24> Actually, its best use could be to remove at once all stuff sitting on my desk :)

</comment><comment><USER25> I use a pad of paper. I have lots of pads of paper. None of them did I have to purchase. They were given to me at work or elsewhere for free. So refills are free, too. Without cranking.

And I get to use my favorite desk. I can clutter it up if I want.</comment>


Draw AWS Diagrams with Cloudcraft - <AUTHOR> https://cloudcraft.co/ <comment><USER2> Interesting... but alot of things missing from my own stack:

-Elastic Beanstalk

-Kinesis

-Firehose

-DataPipeline

-EMR</comment>


The Gas-Generator Cycle Engine, or How Rocket Science Really Works - <AUTHOR> http://wiki.nasa.gov/cm/blog/J2X/posts/post_1292427437018.html <comment><AUTHOR> For those who found this article interesting, the following may be of use:

<http://www.braeunig.us/space/propuls.htm>

<http://www.pwrengineering.com/articles/heart.htm>

<http://www.pwrengineering.com/articles/longterm.htm>

</comment><comment><USER2> Very interesting. I dont think I have ever pondered upon what it means fro something to be called an engine. Truely impressive article</comment>


Leaf Is a "Plug N' Plant" Box to Automatically Grow Pot in Your Home - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2015/09/22/leaf-is-a-plug-n-plant-box-to-automatically-grow-pot-in-your-home/ <comment><USER2> Funny as it is, i have developed exactly the same product as a side project. My box is fully functioning and just lacking investors (and fitting legislation in my country). Looks like i even got some bonus features.

Anyway, i wish these guys the very best.

As a personal conclusion - side projects are difficult to transform into products if you reside in a country with no real tech startup support. The USA may have the best climate for tech startups.</comment>