Georgia Has a Coast? - <AUTHOR> https://bittersoutherner.com/georgia-has-a-coast-ben-galland <comment><USER2> St. Simon's Island was a childhood vacation spot for me. I loved it. Having gone back just this year for the first time in over 20 years, I realized I like it even more now that I can enjoy the small-beach-town atmosphere and the deep-rooted history.

It's not Orlando, It's not Miami, it's not even Jacksonville. It's a tiny little spot with decent beaches, a long history that's reasonably-well- preserved, and quiet relaxation.

The marsh that's pictured in this article (labelled "boardwalk over marsh") looks like the Bloody Marsh [0], the site of the battle that was the "last straw" for the Spanish in their attempts to claim land further up from Florida (which used to extend a bit farther north than it does today).

The colony of Georgia was chartered by Britain around this area in part as a response to that "invasion", in an attempt to protect the important British port of Charleston up in Carolina (before the NC/SC split). Of course, the other key motivation was to have a whole bunch of land to use as an alternative to overcrowded debtor's prisons, so there's that.

This is in part why Savannah (another beautiful historic coastal spot in Georgia, though a much larger one) was so significant to the state for so much of its early history: it was the first planned city in the state, as evidenced by the fact that it's home to the oldest still-standing building in the entire state (a gardener's shed built in the early 1700s, now part of a tourist-trap restaurant).

All this to say: yes, Georgia definitely has a coast, and it's worth seeing (in this HNer's opinion), and worth preserving.

<comment><USER3> Many people are probably familiar with St. Simon's from the 30th g8 summit, though they technically refer to it as Sea Island (more on that in a moment).

St Simon's has changed over the years. It's finally succumbing to development though they are being careful about it so as not to kill the golden goose (a very private feeling island). Most of the people that lived there prior to its rise in popularity have been driven out by high prices or cashed out if they were lucky enough to own land. The Eastern part of the island has become much more accessible to lower income populations. (edit: I've got this next sentence wrong as corrected in a comment below)Rich homeowners, as a result, erected a guarded gate in front of Sea Island (basically part of SSI) to keep everyone out.

I still love SSI. My only hope is that it doesn't continue on the path it's currently on. Privacy and exclusion are separate ideas. SSI can still be private, but it doesn't necessarily have to exclusive. My hope is that can change. However, my head tells me that everything I like about SSI is scarce and prices will only continue to climb, driving away those not fortunate enough to afford it.

<comment><USER4> I live on St Simons.

You're conflating two islands here -- Sea Island is a separate island that has been privately owned since at least the 1920s. You have to drive across St Simons to get to Sea Island. For sure, Sea Island is a high end, gated resort community of a few hundred people.

St Simons is home to about 12k people. It has been an expensive place to live since at least the 80s. I, too, share your concerns about the current development going on -- I'm not sure the developers are in fact being careful about killing the golden goose. Developers are cutting down our historic oak trees and indiscriminately putting up cheaply built condos as fast as the corrupt planning commission will let them.

This is the perfect opportunity to plug the St Simons Land Trust: [https://www.sslt.org/](https://www.sslt.org/)

<comment><USER5> This same attitude is why SF has a housing crisis.

<comment><USER6> Because currently profitable industries have consolidated themselves within a few nearby localities, leading to a population explosion that may not be sustainable should those industries not 'continue on an ever-upwards growth trajectory'?

Perhaps what's happening in the bay is the result of responsible, long sighted policies designed to mitigate or forestall a population collapse during a proverbial gold rush in what could become a future Rust Belt.

I'm curious to hear your views. Where should we meet to talk about it? Galveston, Atlantic City, Detroit, Buffalo, New Orleans...?

<comment><USER7> What you're neglecting in your argument is the weather of central coastal CA. Not only is it far more temperate, it also lacks the constant threat of hurricanes or blizzards. Small earthquake chance, but nothing serious so far. There's a reason the deep south is so cheap - no one wants to summer in our heat and humidity! And very few people enjoy surviving the winters of Detroit.

<comment><USER8> > Small earthquake chance, but nothing serious so far

You're forgetting the great quake of 1906 which destroyed nearly 80% of San Francisco, and the continuing threat of the San Andreas fault.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Drone photography is transforming how we tell visual stories. I've been doing photography since college and rather passionately for the past 15 years (some of my work here[0]).

 _I have literally changed my perspective, and I am obsessed with it. Shooting from a drone, with a straight-down vantage point, has allowed me to explore my coastal muse with a brand new eye_

To me along with mobile phone, the drones are transforming how ordinary people are able to capture and tell amazing stories.

You can argue drone photography, is the most important camera innovation of the past 100 years.

Sadly, there are a lot of backlashes against it. Before I became a convert, I found them annoying, too. People do not like the buzzing sound (which I agree and I'm glad companies like DJI are doing innovations to reduce the buzzing sound). There are a lot of privacy concerns, which is fair. But I don't see that privacy concern in public areas any worse than mobile phones.

I just hope that drone operators use common sense and be considerate and not ruin the use of this amazing technology, for the rest of us.

[0][https://www.eyeem.com/u/photojournalist](https://www.eyeem.com/u/photojournalist)

<comment><USER10> It gives a new perspective but it doesn't allow for very visually interesting photos. The shots are (by nature of drone photography) almost always composed exactly the same. The different landscapes in the article are beautiful, but there are basically two compositions in the article: the majority have a vertical composition looking straight down with a path or river going from top to bottom (sometimes it goes from left to right). There are a couple of shots that show a landscape from a non-vertical angle.

> _You can argue drone photography, is the most important camera innovation of > the past 100 years._

Really? I mean you could, but it seems silly. I'd say digital image sensors are by far a much more important innovation. Without those, you don't have drone photography, or you do, but it's so prohibitively expensive that it's not available to anyone who can do interesting things with it. Without digital image sensors you don't have camera phones, you don't have GoPros, you don't have dashcams, you don't have bodycams, you don't have drone cameras, you don't have cameras mounted on the sides of rockets, etc. You don't have the DSLR revolution that got high quality cameras in the hands of amateurs last decade.

<comment><USER11> Well, you _had_ the Estes Super 8 rockets. :-)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l65CvkeYowM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l65CvkeYowM)

<comment><USER12> Thanks for the link, that was very well made. Always wanted an Estes AstroCam when I was growing up in the late 80's early 90s.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> These are really beautiful photos, and now I am damn well hiking a barrier island this weekend. Being a lifelong lowcountry South Carolinian, it's nice to see the Georgia coast getting some love (Y'all tourists really should visit there :) ).

</comment><comment><USER14> These pictures from home are great to see on a California morning! It really is a special landscape and I'm glad to see it getting some attention.

I was extra excited to see the pictures of the Satilla River since it's a blackwater, something I feel like a lot of folks are unfamiliar with [0]. It's a really interesting feeling to swim or float down a blackwater that is clean and pure and full of fish and turtles pecking against your legs but whose tea- colored waters don't admit even a yard of visibility through.

0 - [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_river](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_river)

</comment><comment><USER15> The anecdote about geography that's summarized in the title isn't as interesting as the photographs themselves. They're magnificent. One of the tasks of great photography is to show an interesting or unique pespective. Composition is everything. These drone photos are awesome.

</comment><comment><USER16> Great photos!

I was struck by the seeming serenity in most of them and then imagined the great whining racket that the drone was probably emitting. :)

Nevertheless, I think the photos were worth the momentary disturbance.

</comment><comment><USER17> This question reveals much about the state of basic US history classrooms in Florida. How do you learn about the civil war and not hear about General Sherman's march to the sea? Especially if it happened in your basic area?

</comment><comment><USER18> Sure it does, on the Black Sea.

</comment><comment><USER19> > I stopped at a station with pay-first pumps

Are there pumps that aren't pay-first? Even in non self-service states they ask for payment first.

<comment><USER20> Every pump in the UK is pay after pump, unless it's pay at pump then you are limited to £99 usually but it's just a hold, it only charges when you reseat the pump handle. It freaks me out in Europe and the US when I come across a pay first pump, I don't know how much it's going to cost to fill up and then I need to go back in to get my change, ridiculous!

<comment><USER21> I don't understand. In every pump I've seen you just put in your credit card, wait for the authorization, and start pumping. What's the problem?

<comment><USER22> If you want to pay cash, sometimes you have to go in and give them money, then they have some way to tell the pump to only put out that much gas. And if you don't pick the right amount, you have to go back in and get your money back.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> With uMatrix in default config I see only a blank page. I really, really wish people that make websites wouldn't do this. Load what you need from your domain, don't include a lot of stuff off-domain, so I don't know what I need to enable just to see the text you wrote.

</comment><comment><USER24> Of course it does - there is always the Black Sea one ;-)

<comment><USER25> What!?, you don't just assume the USA when a loosely defined location is mentioned on a site that is available to the world?

<comment><USER26> The site is a regional publication for the Southeastern US, and it has "Southerner" in the name. So it's not vaguely geographically defined at all.

<comment><USER27> _has "Southerner" in the name._

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southerners_(Korean_politica...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southerners_\(Korean_political_faction\))

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southerner_(New_Zealand_trai...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southerner_\(New_Zealand_train\))

<comment><USER26> So your examples are a political faction that disappeared in the 1700s and a train in New Zealand?

Why would either of those things be bitter?

Even if you want to talk about Georgia vs. Georgia, the US state is almost 3x the size (in population) and the nation was "Republic of Georgia" as recently as the 90's.

Further, 60% of native English speakers are in the US and also _this is the exact headline used by a website for /by US Southerners_.

Should the headline have been, "Georgia, the state in the United States, has a coastline?"

Is this really a harmful or inexcusable example of US-centrism? Should publishers in the country of Georgia always explain that they're referring to the country and not the US state?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Is a jet ski a good way to explore these kinds of places? I've never boated but I'm really interested in getting out to places like these.

A kayak just doesn't seem to go fast enough to get too far.

<comment><USER29> Not if you want to observe animal life too. Jet skis are very loud, and not all that comfortable either. You'd be better off with a flat-bottom boat, like in that one photo. Whether you have an airboat or a small outboard motor, they operate a lot more quietly and give you enough space to bring along whatever supplies you'd like.

<comment><USER30> Airboats aren't quiet at all.... maybe you mean a canoe/kayak with an electric trolling motor? Newer PWCs aren't all that loud as long as you aren't going full throttle.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I work on St. Simons Island and enjoy the environment completely; great place for a vacation. I would also like to plug Jekyll island which is just south over the bridge - there is a fee to get onto the island and passes are available. Beaches, a water park, hotels and a largish island to explore. Good times.

</comment><comment><USER32> Used to live in Brunswick, now we're living in middle Georgia but my wife and I still love to fly our C182 down to grab some BBQ at Southern Soul (or cheesesteak at Skinny Pete's) every month or two. SSI is gorgeous and the airport is in a great location and staffed by some great folks.

</comment><comment><USER33> What's the best time of year to visit Georgia for beaches? September ish?

<comment><USER4> Yes, I live on the island mentioned in the article. This place gets insane with tourists during the Summer months, but gets much calmer during September. The weather is also nicer, with the highs averaging in the mid-80s(F). The summer months are generally hot and humid -- this is the deep South after all.

<comment><USER34> I'll have to defer since you live there, but I'm from South GA and my sisters live on SSI and I'd think September would be hotter than that & October would be nicer (my favorite month in GA overall).

Also, if you happen to live in the Northeast, I recommend a visit to SSI in the early spring to cure that endless winter misery that you get in March & sometimes April.

<comment><USER4> Fall in general is great. My perception (which I've not validated) is October is generally wetter. That may just be from anomolies the last yew years than the actual climate, though.

Just don't come the weekend of the Georgia-Florida football game in late October. 10,000 (newspaper's estimate, not mine) Georgia fans flock to the island and get drunk. We're not at all equipped to handle that many college kids all at once.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Massively incredible photos.

After my wife sees these pictures I'm going to have to figure out how to fit a drone in the budget.

</comment><comment><USER36> Beautiful pictures. They make me want to be there.

<comment><USER37> It does not look all that great from ground level. Not to say it is not that great, just does look differently.

(I live in Georgia and visit the coastal region BTW).

<comment><USER38> The Oregon coast looks much more fabulous, but I know where I would rather be on a small boat.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> +1 for the Sturgill Simpson reference

</comment><comment><USER40> Nobody heard of Savannah?

</comment><comment><USER41> I have visited the Bulgarian side of the Black Sea and found it quite fascinating, there was a time wild dolphins came not far from the coast. For sure I would love to visit the Georgian coast as well, have heard good things of the place and have never met a bad Georgian.

<comment><USER42> I believe here they're talking about Georgia in the United States.

<comment><USER41> Just realized that, my mistake. Every time I hear Georgia I immediately think about the country in the Caucasus. I am half asleep right now.

Georgia, USA, could be interesting too, although the only thing I know about it is they film "The Walking Dead" there.

<comment><USER43> ive seen a few shows filmed there, they have a made in Georgia segment at the credits

<comment><USER4> Yeah, the Atlanta area is home to a lot of movies and TV shows at this point. There's even a huge movie studio built south of Atlanta (Pinewood, opened in 2014).

Most of the recent Marvell movies were shot here.

Recent films shot in Georgia include: Godzilla: King of Monsters, the Ant Man movies, Guardians of the Galaxy 2, Captain America: Civil War, Avengers: Infinity War, Black Panther, Pitch Perfect 3, Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House and Spider-Man: Homecoming.

Some television shows shot here: Stranger Things, Ozark, The Walking Dead, MacGuyver and Atlanta.

There's definitely a booming production industry in the Atlanta area.

<comment><USER44> Wait they called their studios Pinewood? As in the same name as the famous British studios where they film James Bond and stuff? Come on Atlanta get your own studio name! [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinewood_Studios](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinewood_Studios)

<comment><USER4> It's the same group. Pinewood Atlanta was their first US location. There's also a Pinewood Malaysia.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> I saw this headline and really hoped it would be about the country; but no.

@samsolomon maybe next time you could put "... Georgia, US"</comment>


Laser Weapon to Go in Fighter Jet in 2021 - <AUTHOR> https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/aerospace/aviation/laser-weapon-to-go-in-fighter-jet-in-2021 <comment><USER2> "Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement. We pay for a single fighter with a half-million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. . . . This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron."

-Dwight Eisenhower; April 16th, 1953

</comment><comment><USER3> > The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) has issued a $26.3-million contract > to Lockheed Martin to design, develop, and build a high-energy laser for > tests in a tactical fighter jet by 2021.

So, if the recent history of Air Force procurement is anything to go by, we can infer that this laser will actually be ready for testing by 2029, the contact will actually cost $12 billion, and it will be an unreliable piece of junk when it does arrive. And that's just the prototype.

<comment> King-Aaron I don't disagree with the assessment you make, but still... It all sounds pretty cool.</comment></comment>


Azure Government and ICE - <AUTHOR> https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/azuregov/2018/01/24/federal-agencies-continue-to-advance-capabilities-with-azure-government/ <comment><USER2> Oh boy, why on earth would you boast about your collaboration with one of the most controversial US government agencies at a time when they're on the news for operating what is essentially concentration camps.

<comment><USER3> To be fair, this article is from January. Still a controversial/dumb time to brag about working with ICE, but it wasn't published during this press cycle.

<comment><USER2> Yep just noticed. Eh, still not cool to work with ICE I reckon. They've been pretty nasty for a while

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Looking at you, the 53 Microsoft employees who signed [https://neveragain.tech/](https://neveragain.tech/)

</comment><comment><USER5> Dated January 24th, for what it's worth.

<comment><USER6> Oh, so they've had time to get it in place and start trying it out. Maybe they can let us know how it's working. I wonder if that facial recognition has helped them catch any dangerous toddlers who tried to escape?

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> It's unfortunate how quickly this got flagged.

</comment><comment><USER8> What about Microsoft doing the right thing for once by not providing services to USA agencies performing crimes agaist humanity?

Don't know what are the implications of canceling their contract with ICE or Homeland Security, but they should know they can not become enablers of this criminal policy.

</comment><comment><USER9> I hate to say it, but demonizing ICE seems like the wrong thing. It's the executive administration that direct ICE and Congress that tells ICE the laws to enforce.

That's not to say they are blameless but we could point fingers at pretty much every federal agency. ICE is just in the crosshairs at the moment.

<comment><USER10> No, ICE and those who choose to work for them and carry out those orders are just as much to blame. "Following orders" is not an excuse.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This seems like the absolute worst time for anyone to be touting the amount of help they're giving to a federal agency, especially one that is ripping children away from their parents.

<comment><USER11> Well, to be fair, the linked post was published in January, well before any of the kid-snatching articles were in the news.

<comment><USER6> So this technology is probably currently in use to help massive human rights violations go better for the people perpetrating them.

<comment><USER12> It's not a "human right" to illegally enter a country. I happen to be pro-open borders, but understand the opposing side's view.

<comment><USER10> It is, however, a massive human rights violation to separate children and parents like that. Regardless of what the opposing side believes regarding entering the country, that action is simply barbaric.

<comment><USER12> Incorrect. If a parent commits murder, do we imprision the child with them? No.

People are breaking the law and their families are being separated because of it. This is squarely on the people breaking the law, not the people enforcing it.

<comment><USER10> "Incorrect. If a parent commits murder, do we imprision the child with them? No."

I cannot take a single thing you say seriously now that you are comparing murder to people fleeing from danger and trying to give their children a better life. You are supporting a needlessly cruel policy, and what's worse, you are hiding that, trying to justify it by saying that its the law, when there is exactly no law whatsoever that forces this action.

<comment><USER12> So you think we _should_ lock up the children of criminals when the criminal is arrested? That's all this is about. People are breaking the law, getting caught and being detained. No amount of hyperbole is going to help your case with people that aren't already deeply immersed in your philosophy. I wish you could objectively hear what your argument sounds like to someone who's neutral on this issue.

<comment><USER10> "So you think we should lock up the children of criminals when the criminal is arrested?"

And this is why I can't take you seriously; you are very clearly not arguing in good faith.

"I wish you could objectively hear what your argument sounds like to someone who's neutral on this issue."

You are very clearly not neutral on this issue. And quite frankly, I don't want to meet someone who's "neutral" on the idea of separating children from their parents, and locking them up.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> > The new FedRAMP High ATO validates that Azure Government meets all security > and compliance standards necessary to handle ICE's most sensitive > unclassified data, including data that supports the core Agency functions > and protects against loss of life.

I think most people would see this as a good thing. A far-left political outlook is over represented in tech, but Microsoft's customer base is much broader than that. It's actually kind of refreshing to see a company act in a non-overtly left-leaning manner. It makes Microsoft look more professional and politically neutral than say Google.

<comment><USER13> The was a good book the title I forgot about, how IBM almost went bankrupt before thriving because of political contracts with Nazi party to design and deliver system to clasify prisoners in concentration camps during Hitler's era. Seriously this is not a poor-taste joke!!

<comment><USER12> That book is called _IBM and The Holocaust_ and it is indeed very good. IBM wasn't going bankrupt before working with the Nazi's though. It talks about how IBM rolled out punch-card technology originally developed for the census to the Nazi's via its German subsidiaries.

I don't see the parallels here though. Nazi's were detaining and murdering their own citizens. ICE is enforcing existing laws against illegal immigration and it's doing so with transparency. The laws it is enforcing may be controversial to some, but it's not the executive branch's place to write new laws.

<comment><USER13> > The laws it is enforcing may be controversial to some, but it's not the > executive branch's place to write new laws.

I just showed this to my grandfather (he is German) and he told me to tell you that it was exactly the same reasoning when Nazis started War War 2 in September of 1939.

Many of his friends and family members were saying back then that if you have something against executive branch murdering Polish people, then you should vote Chancellor Hitler out in the next election, because German soldiers are only executing given orders.

<comment><USER12> We're talking about enforcing an existing law against illegal immigration (which every company has a concept of) and not murdering our own citizens so the two are in no way comparable.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Microsoft making progress towards IPv6-only - <AUTHOR> https://blog.apnic.net/2018/09/17/microsoft-making-progress-towards-ipv6-only/ <comment><USER2> I attended a conference in August 2018 that had IPv6 only access. I was unable to present links to websites during my talk as they were IPv4 only.</comment>


5 Techniques To Deal With Spam: Open Letter To Twitter - <AUTHOR> http://cloudcomputing.blogspot.com/2011/06/5-techniques-to-deal-with-spam-open.html

<comment><USER2> I enjoyed this post and thought it had some pretty good ideas (particularly the last one), but I disagree with the idea of any major limits on non- verified accounts (if verification were made more open) as many would not want to input some personal detail like a credit card to verify a social networking account, I think. Though, admittedly, I'm not an expert–Second Life did this and eventually got rid of it as I suspect it deterred sign ups.

Also, I don't at all like the idea of displaying a CAPTCHA–I'm sure the other ideas mentioned can deter spam enough to not irritate the many more legitimate users. Part of the process of discovering other users on Twitter, I think, includes being able to easily and freely reply to someone else.</comment>


Linux Journal Archive: 1994 – 2017 - <AUTHOR> http://lj.mybigcommerce.com/linux-journal-archive-1994-2017/ <comment><USER2> They opened up the archives (free) after announcing it would be ceasing publication: [https://www.linuxjournal.com/content/linux-journal-ceases- pu...](https://www.linuxjournal.com/content/linux-journal-ceases-publication)

If you don't care to click on the OP's pay-per-download link: [https://secure2.linuxjournal.com/pdf/dljdownload.php](https://secure2.linuxjournal.com/pdf/dljdownload.php)

</comment><comment><USER3> How large is the archive file? I couldn't see that info listed anywhere.

<comment><USER4> It's downloadable archive (searchable HTML format), file size is 707MB, the download link will be provided via email, it can be used up to 6 times before it expires forever ;-)

You can directly save the file to Dropbox.

BTW: Linux Journal is an important part of the Linux story, personally I've learned a lot from time to time searching or surfing the Internet (since 2001). Haven't really subscribed to the magazine but I would like to show my respect to LJ by buying the entire digital archive. I really hope some rich Silicon Valley dude can pick it up and continue the Linux Journal journey.</comment></comment>


Ray Tracing Without Ray Tracing API - <AUTHOR> https://diaryofagraphicsprogrammer.blogspot.com/2018/09/ray-tracing-without-ray-tracing-api.html <comment><USER2> _based on the last 20+ years of graphics development, it is easy to project that when a large part of the ray tracing codebase is owned by a hardware vendor, there will be various bugs introduced with each driver release._

also based on last 20+ years in graphics development, in real-time applications you're using APIs with vendor-specific implementations for quite some time now, and you're dependant on driver quality for quite some time now as well. So, what's the author's point?

In offline rendering, people do write their own everything with code paths to accelerate certain stuff where possible by vendor (embree, gpgpu...). You can bet people will, already are in fact, implement support for RTX as well. Implementing your own crap on compute/shade paths will NOT utilise the chip core in RTX cards - which is meant for these new accelerations, the RTCore.

<comment><USER3> The likelihood of a feature being functional is usually based on two things: its hidden complexity, and how frequently used it is. HW ray tracing suffers on both of these counts (for now). It won't be truly common outside of major engines for years, and it hides a lot.

Any developer who is in the awkward middle ground of building their own technology without the resources of a major engine (both in terms of manpower and in relevance to hardware vendors) should expect everything on the bleeding edge to be partially or fully broken, often with no timely recourse. I'm not faulting the vendors too much- the software x hardware situation is absurdly complicated, and spending limited driver resources on a smaller company's use case instead of, say, Unreal and Unity, doesn't make a lot of sense.

But if you're one of those smaller companies, you pretty much have to build the fallback implementation first using common low level primitives that have been tested a million times across the industry. If you don't, your product simply won't work for many (and sometimes most) users. Even when their hardware is supposed to support it.

And speaking from unfortunate experience, the up-front cost of building the fallbacks is often less than trying to make the fancier things work consistently, even though the fancier thing is ostensibly doing the work for you.

<comment><USER4> I'm not convinced the part of ray tracing implemented in hardware on the new NVidia cards (primarily bvh traversal and ray triangle intersection) is significantly more complex than things that are already implemented in hardware (rasterization, anisotropic filtering, tesselation, scheduling, compression, etc.) and those tend to be pretty solid.

I also expect the hardware ray tracing to be heavily used for offline rendering before it becomes mainstream for real time so there will be plenty of usage from demanding customers to iron out any issues.

<comment><USER3> It's true that features of similar or greater complexity do tend to work pretty well already, but those features tend to be the ones that are practically fundamental and used everywhere. (edit: but I have hit bugs with scheduling too- and maybe tessellation and anisotropic filtering, but those cases were weird enough where it was hard to tease out the true cause.)

Ray tracing has a good shot at getting there (and probably in less than 5-10 years), and developers who can afford the suffering will hopefully pave the way, but early adopters should be very wary.

To be clear, I'm not catastrophically pessimistic. I intend to do some work with it, but I'm not under any illusions. I once encountered five distinct blocking driver bugs in the span of a single week. I just assume everything is broken until proven otherwise.

<comment><USER4> I think drivers tend to be more problematic than hardware, I'd actually expect more issues with driver implemented support for ray tracing APIs running as compute shaders than with the hardware accelerated support.

<comment><USER3> Yup, that's definitely true. It's going to be a fun transition period.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Using hardware-provided APIs might take more QA later, but I'm sure creating your own ray tracing implementation from scratch costs way more developer and QA time up front (assuming similar quality).

<comment><USER6> I had the same thought during the SIGGRAPH presentation. The API they are providing is a step back, too high-level, like going from Vulkan back to OpenGL.

It is nice to have for starters, but in the near future it will die quickly if somebody comes up with an improved incompatible technique, that can be implemented over existing low-level.

<comment><USER7> Who is they? NVIDIA provides multiple APIs which are accessible through various APIs or natively the point of the hardware is to provide specific interfaces and data types which make RT faster these are not limited to a specific graphical API.

You can use it trough Optix which is proprietary low level C++ API based on CUDA, you can use it with Vulkan or DX12 DXR the levels of abstraction are dependent on what API/interface you'll be using.

On top of that NVIDIA provides ready to use hybrid ray tracing libraries which are built on top of Microsoft DXR currently with Vulkan coming within the next 2-3 months.

But you don't have to use their hybrid path tracing or denoiser you can develop it completely on your own.

<comment><USER6> I was talking specifically about DXR.

<comment><USER7> DXR doesn't seem to be any more high level than Vulkan RT, if you want you can go native but it isn't clear to me what advantages you would even get considering the already low level DX12 provides.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Just noting that ray tracing doesnt belong to anyone and article is taking shot on real-time ray tracing hype recently deployed into daily hardware.</comment>


An Introduction to Google's Go Programming Language - <AUTHOR> http://www.thebitsource.com/articles/google-go-programming-introduction/ <comment><USER3> Goroutines seem nifty as hell; is anyone here using Go for anything yet? Pet projects? How mature does it seem?

<comment><USER4> Some friends and I are building a specialized database in Go as our senior project in college. Our code has lots of fiddly bits and currently weighs in at about 4,000 lines of Go (4,000 more of Python) with a lot more code on the way. We plan to release parts of it this summer.

So far, the language feels great. After a week of regular use, it feels very natural. Error reporting is wonderful. As mentioned elsewhere, library support is lacking, but it's been a good experience for us to build a lot of that stuff ourselves. The interface and package systems feel just right. We will likely try to contribute to the standard library in the future.

The only thing we're really missing is generics. We are having trouble generalizing some data structures and ended up duplicating some for multiple data types. I hear that those issues will go away this year, though.

<comment><USER3> How's calling go from Python (and vice versa)? Did you have to roll something or is there something already available?

Python for UI and non-perf sensitive stuff and Go for the under-the-hood stuff seems like the perfect mix for my future pet projects(having not used Go yet; perhaps that will change).

<comment><USER4> We are simply passing JSON back and forth over Unix pipes. JSON support in both languages is great.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I've did a small application called "go runner" - instead of writing Makefile to run the .go application - it's kind of smart and does it for you - <USER2> type "go something" and it would compile (if needed) and run it, if "something.go" requies other .go modules it would compiled them too.

It's basically using the Go's own libraries to parse the given .go file, and detect what additional files needed to be compiled.

<http://github.com/malkia/go-runner>

But that won't compile with latest Go. I've stopped using Go, as I got busy with other things, but might come back at it.

<comment><USER6> A friend of mine actually forked a project that is similar to what you describe. I believe it currently can build most Go projects, with the exception of libraries and Go code that calls C. Here's the link to his fork: <http://github.com/timtadh/gobuild-fork>

<comment><USER4> Tim is also working on the project I mentioned elsewhere in the comments. We couldn't find a build tool we liked, so he forked gobuild and made a series of changes to make it more functional. We will try to get the maintainer to pull from us when we are sure the whole thing is stable and documented.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> bad taste in names:

type FloatArray []float

type StringArray []string

type Interface interface {</comment>


When did I ask Google to read my purchase details - <AUTHOR> https://kanoki.org/2019/01/01/data-privacy/ <comment><USER2> Although google still collects an inexcusable amount of data, they have at least become a little more obvious about it lately. When the new year rolled in, my phone gave me a super creepy map with a timeline of everywhere I'd been this year - _I_ knew they were collecting this, but it might be a wakeup call for the average user. What ticks me off about their policies is that they require permission to collect & use data that is seemingly unrelated to a provided service on Google Assistant. I have the ability to "send text to [person]" off for this - it wanted some ridiculous unrelated permission (I think maybe the ability to store search history?).

Despite their efforts to be more transparent about what they are collecting, I'd still say that Google has gone full-blown anti-"don't be evil" these days due to the coercive way that they try to convince users to allow them to collect the data they want.

</comment><comment><USER3> The purchase history is connected to an email more than likely. Delete the email, and the transaction 'should' be gone. But what if you want the keep the email? export to pdf? afaik, google has no plans to fix this.

</comment><comment><USER4> this is scanned from your emails and you gave permission when you signed up and accepted the terms of service.

I love this feature since the data is already in gmail and they're breaking it out into a more visible location. I wish it was complete (it misses a lot of purchases) and accurate (it doesn't handle cancelled purchases well).</comment>


Ask HN: Recommendations for Computer-Science Fiction? - <AUTHOR>

In this recent post (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9447097), the author talks about CS works that seem so advanced as to be science fiction. The following quote comes up:<p>> This term stands in contrast to Computer-Science Fiction, which is indeed fiction about computer science.<p>Any recommendations for Computer-Science Fiction, that is, interesting, well-written fiction about CS? I'd love to read good fiction that tackles hard CS in an informed way. <comment><USER2> Vernor Vinge's Rainbows End deals with the occurrence of an AI singularity (among other things).</comment>


No-contract $30 / $45 Straight Talk wireless plans storm Walmart - <AUTHOR> http://www.engadgetmobile.com/2009/10/14/no-contract-30-straight-talk-wireless-plans-storm-walmart/

<comment><USER2> Here's a much more mature analysis of what's going on.

<http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20091014-711422.html>

Posted article is fairly shallow, and this deserves some better analysis.

<comment><USER2> Apologies for the link - requires a subscription if you don't hit it from a Google search for "Wal-Mart Expands Cheap No-Contract Wireless Plan". Thanks Rupert.

<comment><USER3> You mean: "thanks", Rupert.

But a _sincere thanks_ to you for explaining to get there via a google search.

Which raises questions (besides the 'why am i out of loop'?):

• How did you know about the "via google" phenomenon for this article?

• Is that true for all/many wsj articles?

• Why does Rupert love Google referrals?

<comment><USER4> "Cloaking" is a naughty SEO tactic of showing one thing (like an article) to search engines and a different thing (like a login screen) to humans. Google bans cloaking; their punishment is de-indexing. But there is a loophole: showing the same thing to Googlebot and regular browsers with a Google referer isn't considered cloaking. The NY Times also uses this technique.

I can't tell you why you're out of the loop, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Living in Europe, I'm amazed that $30/$45 for non-handset tariffs are considered "ultra cheap", especially as landline services have historically been far more expensive in Europe than the other side of the Atlantic. What exactly is stopping carriers in the US from providing cheaper services? I gather network coverage/signal quality isn't even that great in populated areas, so is the lesser population density really that much of a burden? Or should I be thinking 'nefarious anti-competitive behaviour'?

<comment><USER6> There's a history in the US of the government giving large corporations money to do something, but then not attaching any requirements to it. So the corporations, obviously, act in their own best interest. Communication networks that otherwise wouldn't have existed are built on taxpayer money, and the company that controls it is now in a hugely advantageous position, having been "bootstrapped" on someone else's dollar.

<comment><USER7> s/attaching/enforcing/ at least in some instances, e.g. with SBC now renamed AT&T (ignore the purchased name; the culture is SBC). They, along with, I believe, the other "baby Bells" and perhaps some other entrenched interests, received hundreds of millions of dollars in concessions, in return for pledges of network build-out and competitors' access to their physical networks.

They then progressively reneged on those pledges, and hired lobbyists to push legislative changes to eliminate their obligations.

It's another aspect of what is in the U.S. commonly termed "corporate welfare". Or corruption. Choose your moniker.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Anyone know whether re you stuck with Verizon's lousy phone OS (or a rebranding of same)?</comment>


Biggest BitTorrent Downloading Case in U.S. History Targets 23,000 Defendants - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/05/biggest-bittorrent-case/

<comment><USER2> That's an interesting business model.

1\. Make a terrible low-budget porno that few would ever actually buy.

2\. Wait for it to hit the torrent networks

3\. Harvest IP addresses

4\. Sue for millions

It's possible some of these firms will make more money this way than they would have from regular sales.

<comment><USER3> I think that's essentially what the EFF is arguing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I wonder how many people read the article and saw "The Expendables" and breathed a sigh of relief.

I just checked Wikipedia and realized that "The Expendables" was a pretty big hit (80 mil USD to make, 103 mil USD made domestically, 274 mil USD world- wide). Who knew...

</comment><comment><USER5> In other news

[http://torrentfreak.com/ip-address-not-a-person- bittorrent-c...](http://torrentfreak.com/ip-address-not-a-person-bittorrent- case-judge-says-110503/)

<comment><USER3> Yeah, they apparently didn't get the memo.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> When they sue you, isn't it actually for the uploading (the "posting" of copyrighted material by allowing other torrent users to download bits of the file from your computer) and not the actual downloading?

Is that why they don't target DDL users of sites like Rapidshare and Hotfile, because the file is only downloaded but not uploaded by the user, unlike on torrents? I'm sure trying to seize the user logs of DDL sites through some form of legal action might be difficult as well.

<comment><USER6> Sorry to reply to my own post, but I'm now wondering if they can sue you for just downloading from DDLs or USENET (without the uploading activity inherent to torrents,) couldn't they theoretically also sue users of youtube or other video sites for the playing of copyrighted material, which I imagine from a legal perspective is essentially the same as downloading it from a DDL?

<comment><USER3> I think the idea is that while downloading a copyrighted work is still illegal, uploading is distribution, which is one of the indicators of "willfulness" which exposes you to the high statutory limits.

<comment><USER7> Yea. If they were to sue you for downloading (but not uploading) they could have huge landmark cases for millions of dollars in damages. Because the current math goes like:

      statutory damage limit = $150k
      people we *think* you distributed to = 1 million people
      damages = $150k * 1m = profit!

You would have a hard time convincing a judge that either: a) the copyright owner suffered millions in damages over a single download of a movie or b) that the person needs millions of dollars in damages to 'teach people a lesson.'

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> \--- Film companies pay snoops to troll BitTorrent sites, dip into active torrents and capture the IP addresses of the peers who are downloading and uploading pieces of the files. \--- This is a very vague way of gathering evidence. I am sure that the ISPs don't hold logs of the actual connections each IP is making, so I am wondering how is it possible to prove that the accused person actually downloaded the files in the torrent. Unless the snoops use a hacked BT client that downloads a whole file from only one specific peer, which is highly unlikely and will take a huge amount of time for all 23000 people.

<comment><USER9> I'm fairly certain that deep packet inspection would be required for an ISP to connect customer to IP address to visited resource. That being said, it would be trivial for an ISP to log the date and time each customer held a given IP address. If a plaintiff were to provide that date and time information, it seems at least technically possible to link that activity to a subscriber account.

What I don't see though is how you prove that the person listed on the account was the one performing the activity. Then again, all it takes is convincing a few people (6 for a civil trial jury?) who weren't clever enough to get out of jury duty.

<comment><USER8> What I was implying is that a snapshot of the peers in a given torrent is not exactly hard evidence that each of those peers has a 100% downloaded copy of the files. For example, I remember that some torrent clients have a "super- seed" mode, where they appear as a normal peer with less than 100% completion. I know this sounds a bit like "the dog ate my homework" excuse but it sets a bad precedent of what constitutes an infringement - is it downloading a whole copy, uploading a whole copy, or just a part (unusable by itself) of the work?

<comment><USER9> Well, what's a worse precedent? Being technically innocent of infringement since you skipped a single bit on the end of a download or the court ignoring your intent? Intent has been the cornerstone of many copyright infringement defenses. It would seem a bad move to claim that intent is irrelevant at this point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Ooops...

Erm, what should I be using instead?

<comment><USER11> Apparently you missed the direct download movement a couple years back. BT is history for the leading edge consumer pirates, DD sites are the next wave and are not long for this world given how popular they have become.

<comment><USER12> Disagree. For niche content, private torrent sites are still king.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> $3K claim letter to 23K defendants is $69M in potential revenue. The defendant has potential liability of $150K and probably has to pay more than $3K in legal fees to defend themselves. My SWAG is 10-20% pay for a $7M - $14M payday for the lawyers.

</comment><comment><USER14> There doesn't seem to be any mention of what tracker(s) these IP addresses were harvested from.

</comment><comment><USER15> And THIS is what you call a turning point, let's see what comes out of all this.

</comment><comment><USER16> A friend of mine is in this list. And he didn't download anything.

(I know for sure because he's a vocal proponent of copyrights)</comment>


Work from home is here to stay after coronavirus - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/11/work-from-home-is-here-to-stay-after-coronavirus.html <comment><USER2> So let's count the benefits:

No more wasted times commuting

More time spent with family

Men and women equalize pay and home responsibilities

Personal freedom and comfort

Cuts down on the #1 source of fossil fuel pollution

Benefits for employers:

Geographical restrictions lifted

Bigger talent pool

Save on office space, equipment, workers comp insurance

Save on transportation subsidies (parking spots etc.)</comment>


Uber Flunks the Better Business Bureau Test - <AUTHOR> http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/09/uber-flunks-the-better-business-bureau-test <comment><USER3> The BBB is basically a protection racket with excellent PR.

Get a customer complaint? BBB contacts you to pay for membership. Don't want to pay for membership? You must not care about your customers, so you get an F-. Pay for membership and the score immediately goes up to a B.

But with a name like the "Better Business Bureau", it's no wonder that people get suckered into thinking it's a legitimate organization.

More info: [http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_customer/2010/12/...](http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_customer/2010/12/busted_watchdog.html) [https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110919/14221016016/criti...](https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110919/14221016016/criticize- better-business-bureau-theyll-pull-your-accreditation.shtml)

</comment><comment><USER4> On the Android app, surge pricing is VERY clearly labeled. You have to agree to the rate before service is dispatched and you have the option to wait until the surge ends if you so choose.

The problem with the BBB is that nobody goes there to report positive experiences. Only jaded customers use it to slam businesses with which they have a vendetta. Everybody other than an aging legacy group uses Yelp or other analogs.

Uber may fight dirty, but their product is outstanding. I'm firmly convinced that when regulators discover how amazing it is they will attempt to either legislate it out of existence or shake them down until their rates are no better than taxis.

<comment><USER5> > or shake them down until their rates are no better than taxis.

Despite their advertising to the contrary, Uber's rates are _not_ always lower than yellow medallion cabs in NYC. For certain trips it may be cheaper, but oftentimes it is just as expensive, if not more[0].

Uber's pricing structure is different from the ones that the medallion cabs use[1], so it's not a one-to-one comparison. This makes it very easy to pick and choose certain trips which would make Uber look cheaper (which they do), and it's also easy to pick and choose trips which make them look more expensive.

In addition, Uber is venture-funded and can easily operate below-cost right now (I would be shocked if they did otherwise).

So it's worth keeping in mind that Uber's rates are arguably _already_ be no better than taxis', depending on the city, depending on the trip, and especially if we assume they had to operate in the black.

[0] This is hard to verify as Uber explicitly prohibits using their API for price comparison, specifically to discourage this. Though there was a project on HN a few weeks back which did do this, and the results were mixed (Uber won sometimes, but not always).

[1] Which are set by the government, not by individual cabbies: [http://www.dailydot.com/technology/uber-nyc-taxi-cheaper- pri...](http://www.dailydot.com/technology/uber-nyc-taxi-cheaper-price-war/)

<comment><USER6> > Despite their advertising to the contrary, Uber's rates are not always > better than yellow medallion cabs in NYC

To be honest, I'd use Uber even if it was more expensive than taxis. User experience is leaps and bounds ahead of any taxi I've ever used.

Three things make Uber a far superior product compared to taxis for me:

      * no awkwardness/timesuck around payment, I arrive, I walk away

      * feedback how long I'll be waiting - when I'm in a hurry, seeing where exactly the car is and how long it's gonna take them to get to me helps calm me down, eases my nerves, even if it doesn't make the car arrive any faster (it *feels* faster though)

      * call cab while still getting ready to walk outside, again something that only works because I know how far the car is

<comment><USER7> I agree.. except in NYC. Cabs are literally everywhere, even in the outer boroughs (I used to live in Queens) its as easy as walking out the door to find a cab in many places.

That said, I use Uber almost exclusively in Boston/Cambridge.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Uber gets an F, for _90_ out of a million customer complaints, for providing a clear service but Comcast has a B-?

<comment><USER9> BBB is bullshit. It's pay-to-play extortion just like Yelp. Clearly Comcast has paid their dues.

[http://business.time.com/2013/03/19/why-the-better- business-...](http://business.time.com/2013/03/19/why-the-better-business- bureau-should-give-itself-a-bad-grade/)

[http://kitchenette.jezebel.com/a-court-has-ruled-its- totally...](http://kitchenette.jezebel.com/a-court-has-ruled-its-totally-cool- for-yelp-to-extort-b-1632255482)

<comment><USER10> BBB is bullshit, agreed, but Yelp has made recent attempts to dispel the accusations of extortion, see [http://www.yelp.com/advertiser_faq](http://www.yelp.com/advertiser_faq). This includes an independent academic study, [http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2293164%2...](http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2293164%20).

I'm not claiming this evidence is conclusive (I haven't looked at it closely enough), but it's worth being aware of before making accusations like that.

<comment><USER9> I only read the abstract of that paper, but it doesn't address the extortion. It only addresses _user_ fraud, such as leaving a bad rating on a competitor.

It doesn't address the fact that Yelp can manipulate reviews however they please, as the court ruled.

<comment><USER10> You're right that the abstract doesn't mention it, but check out section 3.4.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Given that "The Better Business Bureau, which was founded in 1912, is not a government agency, nor does it have regulatory or enforcement power," what implications does this have?

<comment><USER12> The BBB sells higher ratings to those businesses that will pay, and will often ignore legitimate complaints against those businesses.

<comment><USER13> Source?

<comment><USER12> Personal experience. And ask anyone else who has experience with the BBB (other commenters on here). Just observe their "accredited business" program.

Haha, I just found this: Terror Group Gets 'A' Rating From Better Business Bureau?

[http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/business-bureau-best- ratings-m...](http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/business-bureau-best-ratings- money-buy/story?id=12123843)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Does anyone under the age of 65 actually place any faith in the BBB?

<comment><USER9> I used it to complain about a horrible ISP I had a few years ago. It got the ISPs attention when I otherwise couldn't. Other than that, it has no value to me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I think it's a usability problem with the app - you can't easily see how much the trip is going to cost. It's actually not even completely apparent that you've booked a trip. The app should be redesigned to always show the quote before booking and a very clear button that says "Book Now". The pickup location UI could also use some work - the GPS isn't always accurate and noticing that it's wrong and changing it isn't very intuitive. But apart from the problematic app, I've found the service itself quite impressive - <USER2> they always manage to find me and it always ends up costing less than I think it will.

<comment><USER16> Not sure if this was updated recently, but:

With surge pricing, they always show the multiplier at the time of booking.

And it's easy to tap "quote fare" button to see the price. I agree that it should be there all the time, as soon as you select the destination, but that's the thing, lots of my rides do not have destination before I get into the car.

<comment><USER17> The quoted price doesn't include the surge. Uber goes to very very great lengths to not show you how much you're paying when surge pricing is in play, abstracting it away to a multiplier always.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> The BBB gives Uber an "F" rating based on a handful of complaints? Uber serves over a million users a month! And I'd guess most of their customers are repeat - one sign that customers are happy with the service.

</comment><comment><USER19> Yes. Uber flunks the BBB test by not paying up. Why is this news?

</comment><comment><USER20> This is ridiculous. Uber clearly details the price of the ride when you request it. People accept the estimated price, get picked up, driven to their location, then complain to BBB and want a refund because the price was "too high"? How dumb are these people, and why is the BBB validating their claims?

</comment><comment><USER21> To be fair the BBB is mostly a collusive organization of businesses who pay dues to whitewash their problems while pretending to be objective.

If you want a laugh look for ratings and reviews on home warranty companies.

</comment><comment><USER22> When I have to accept surge pricing, I have to jump through hoops. Was this not always the case? At least currently, people shouldn't accidentally accept unless they click Accept compulsively.

<comment><USER23> They now require you to type in a specified number (the surcharge factor) before you can even book during surge pricing, so there's no excuse for not knowing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> our entire financialized wall street economy flunks the bbb test as well.

</comment><comment><USER24> our ENTIRE FINANCIALIZED WALL STREET economy flunks the better common sense bureau test.</comment>


Ask HN: stand up comedy course or MBA? - <AUTHOR>

I am generally thought of by colleagues as a bright hacker with good ideas and implementation. What I suck at is speaking publicly. What course would make me build this skill better? <comment><USER2> As an MBA and actor, I'd advise an improv comedy course! Stand-up is great, but, doesn't teach you the importance of listening and playing off of others, which is pretty critical to speaking well, imho.

</comment><comment><USER3> Stand up comedy. As a business school graduate, I can say that there aren't enough courses doing speaking. I'm signing up for an improv course next month so that I can get better.</comment>


Ask HN: Chinese equivalent of Techcrunch - <AUTHOR>

Does anyone know of any good chinese sites covering tech news in China? <comment><USER2> <http://chinese.engadget.com/> is the Chinese sister site of tech blog Engadget. They're probably focused more on gadgets, but may cover other tech news as well.</comment>


Intelligence and the Stereotype Threat - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/07/opinion/sunday/intelligence-and-the-stereotype-threat.html <comment><USER3> One interesting implication of this work (obvious caveats [1]), those who are more likely to suffer from stereotype thread will underperform those who don't. Thus, even if one measures equal ability among applicants, he should prefer those from a group which is stereotypically superior [2].

An interesting question this raises is how much collectivist attitudes play a role in this effect. For example - consider two hypothetical individuals from a stereotypically underperforming group. Individual A is a collectivist and strongly cares about the perception and welfare of his group. Individual B is an individualist and holds no special affection for his group relative to any other.

Will A be more vulnerable to stereotype thread than B? It's reasonable to hypothesize that individual B might care about stereotypes less than A, and therefore might be less affected.

A fairly straightforward way to test this would be to repeat stereotype threat experiments using dimensions on which people are not typically collectivist (e.g., blood type rather than tribal affiliation).

[1] Assuming the effect survives outside the laboratory, wouldn't necessarily apply in a hypothetical world with different stereotypes, etc.

[2] I'm focusing solely on maximizing group performance, ignoring legal risks, moral issues, etc.

<comment><USER4> As an interesting aside, blood type is actually considered to be a predictor of a person's personality, temperament, etc in Japan - <USER2> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_types_in_Japanese_culture>

<comment><USER5> As is the birth month in European culture. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrology>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Though it's not yet published (and still under review), Wicherts and de Haan have a paper titled "A meta-analysis of the effects of stereotype threat on the cognitive test performance of African Americans"[1] which compares all published and unpublished studies on the stereotype threat. After examining the studies' methodologies, sample sizes, and other quality indicators, they found that the only variable correlated with publication is whether the study supported the existence of a significant stereotype threat.

In other words, the studies are suffering from massive publication bias, which is leading some researchers to question the very existence of the stereotype threat.

[1] The paper is referenced on Wicherts' CV: <http://wicherts.socsci.uva.nl/CVJMW.pdf>

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the link (which I have shared as a direct Facebook friend with the author of the New York Times piece submitted here). Jelte Wicherts is a straight shooter and a very good researcher. I look forward to the publication of another forthcoming article listed on the CV:

Kan, K. J., Wicherts, J. M., van der Maas, H. L. J., & Widaman, K. F. (under review). A genetic origin of Black-White mean IQ differences? Weak inferences based on ambiguous results.

<comment><USER6> Good to hear you passed this reference along -- hopefully its results are widely discussed and don't fall victim to the same publication bias, which would be quite ironic.

And I agree about Jelte Wicherts. I especially like his commitment to open data and data sharing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Anecdotally, this seems to be a serious hinderance in the American primary and secondary systems: student sees a setback and deduces he simply isn't "smart enough to study math" and this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy through the mechanisms described in this article. Obviously mathematics and heavily mathematical sciences _are_ very much cognitively demanding, but the students arriving to this conclusion aren't usually studying the kind of math that's beyond the limits of an average college bound students: in other words, "not being good at math" is valid reason to drop abstract algebra or complex analysis during the junior year of college, but it's not a reason to accept a C in high school[1] algebra, declare yourself "bad at math", and then choose a major that involves very little math (even if excludes subject fields they're truly passionate about and excel at).

AP Calculus and AP Physics were the most dreaded classes in high school and students were discouraged to take them. I did take AP Calculus (for obvious reasons I was already familiar with functions that take other functions as parameters and return yet other functions) but I followed conventional wisdom and held-off on AP Physics.

Oddly, however, when I got to college I got better grades in _more difficult_ calculus classes (multivariate, vector calculus, differential equations) in college and did well in Physics (which was meant to serve as a "weed-out" class, i.e., forced-curved such that at least 25-50% would fail). I think the psychology had much to do with this: this is a freshman class full of people, why _shouldn't_ I master this material?

I wonder what would happen if instead high school students were told "these are the very basics of modern physics and mathematics and every technical major or minor -- at colleges that are far less selective than where many of you are headed -- is expected to pass them."

[1] When I came to the US in seventh grade from former USSR (where I was already studying algebra, geometry, physics and chemistry at the time) I had a math "placement test" tossed me the first day without any warning and scored two points below the threshold to place me into a "pre-Algebra class" that would merely qualify me for the privilege of studying algebra in 8th grade! I had to take a course at a local community college and pass two additional placement tests over the summer vacation to place into 8th grade algebra. It's no wonder that students assume they're "bad at math" given such an environment.

</comment><comment><USER8> There is a psychological test sometimes alleged to detect hidden stereotyping called the 'Implicit Association Test' (IAT):

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implicit_Association_Test>

The usual interpretation of the IAT is that delays or errors in associating certain categories with positive/negative traits indicates hidden bias. But if a stereotype threat effect is also present when taking the IAT, then delays/errors may be arising from a (self-fulfilling) fear of confirming negative stereotypes about bias, moreso than any actual bias.

Since the IAT is often introduced as a way to detect subtle and stigmatized biases, test-takers are explicitly primed to worry about stereotypes-about- stereotyping. In this kind of use, the IAT might thus be more like a "push poll" (or a Scientologist's 'E-meter'), designed to create effects in the test-taker, than an objective measure of unprimed attitudes.

</comment><comment><USER9> So it's a social problem. And it should be solved with telling kids this: Quote: " And we should ensure that the social climate at our children's schools is one of warmth and trust, not competition and exclusion."

That'll work. sure. Getting your papers graded above average is competition and with competition comes fierceness and willingness to learn and fight. How about a nice debate? Oh we can't because that would make two viewpoints compete against one another.

<comment><USER10> I think it's fairly well proven by now that praising children for, and reinforcing, hard work and persistence, has much better results than splitting them into smart and stupid.

<comment><USER11> I think you are completely right!

One thing I wonder about, is how to avoid promoting useless work just for works sake. Like how many people say you should track accomplishments, not hours.

What do you think?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> This phenomenon sounds like a combination of a negative placebo effect and learned helplessness.

</comment><comment> Digit-Al So the basic conclusion seems to be "anxiety makes people perform worse". Hardly a new finding.

<comment><USER13> I think the point is to show that stereotypes generate anxiety that subsequently affects performance, something which most people who do not face stereotypes in their day to day lives take into account.

It would be really interesting to see if positive stereotypes like the Asian model minority stereotype have the opposite impact of improving test performance.

<comment><USER14> I'd suggest that at the very least it creates extra pressure to perform and that pressure by itself can help to generate better results.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I personally take stereotypes as a challenge to prove someone wrong.

I guess it is just how you respond to the stressors of a possible static constraint implied upon you. Do you accept their conclusion or decide to find your own?

<comment><USER5> If I say "I'm going to analyze your traits and habits, and model your personality relative to those similar to you", I've observed that most people would tentatively agree to the process.

However, if I say "I'm going to group you with your stereotype", most people become rebellious or contrary.

"Stereotype" seems like a hot-button keyword. We react to the term, not to the concept behind it. Why?

<comment><USER16> Because "stereotype" != "analyze your traits and habits, and model your personality." That's called personality analysis and modelling.

Stereotypes involve using unrelated culturally-bound flags to pretend like you've done a personality analysis on someone. It's not stereotyping to notice someone doesn't wear a lot of makeup, and then declare that that person doesn't like to wear makeup, at least in the contexts that you've seen them in. It's stereotyping to notice someone doesn't wear makeup, then declare them a lesbian.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> thanks for sharing this article, i cosntantly felt threatened and suffered lack of condifence growing up and my performances were often affected by "conditional stupidity"

</comment><comment><USER18> So if you want a fair test, and some people are going to feel threatened no matter what... how about the solution of trying to rattle _everybody_? :)

<comment><USER19> Well, you'd be giving an advantage to people who perform better than others when under stress. But then, that's not necessarily a bad thing is it?

As an aside, I've noticed that people respond to stress in extremely varying ways. I've seen smart and talented people completely fail at tests because they were stressed(even though I can personally attest to the fact that when not under stress they would've performed perfectly). I've also seen others who can be completely under-prepared for a test, not know how to answer half the questions they encounter and yet still not panic and somehow squeeze by and not fail(I know I've been in that position countless times because of my reluctance to study throughout school). I remember reading an article(though I can't find it now) a while back about how this was due to a fundamentally different internal attitude, one that refuses to rise up to challenges and simply declare themselves a failure and another that enjoys challenges and manages to rise up to meet them.</comment></comment>


Docker Build from Dockerfile – Compendium - <AUTHOR> https://knowledgepill.it/posts/docker_build_from_dockerfile/ <comment><AUTHOR> How to build docker image? What is dockerfile, how to use it? All dockerfile commands widely described :) Please feel free to share and comment - <USER2> opinions are very appreciate</comment>


Twitter Said To Be Abandoning Ruby on Rails - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/05/01/twitter-said-to-be-abandoning-ruby-on-rails/

<comment><AUTHOR> If true, this is a pretty big blow to the viability of RoR as a large-scale platform, at least as it is right now.

I've always thought RoR's tight coupling with traditional SQL would be a serious scaling issue. RDBMSs in the traditional sense just dont scale easily. Google figured this out a while ago (hence BigTable). And RoR reads and writes soo much that you are left with a burden on the DB that might have been better mitigated by doing more of the processing client side and persisting with a simplified cloud-based service rather than a single, central RDBMS.

Not to stir up a hornets nest, but I really think this is a limitation of RoR that should be addressed in the future. Abstract out the SQL so other methods of persistence are possible.

 _EDIT: I am not trolling RoR. I am simply proposing that it might be better to be able to use it with something other than traditional SQL for persistence of data, so that traditional RDBMS can be replaced with a simplified cloud- based service such as SimpleDB.

I speculate this might be possible now using Ruby -> JRuby -> JPA -> SimpleJPA (or any other MySQL/SimpleDB wrapper) -> SimpleDB. I dont want to even get into how much work that would be though. It needs to be easier I think.

Startup idea maybe?_

<comment><USER2> Rails, and the alternatives mentioned don't really make sense for a messaging application. You wouldn't write the back end for Gchat or AIM in Rails (or PHP, or Django), either. Rails would be fine as the web front end that talked to another messaging system. I've interviewed with the twitter guys and been to their talks and they definitely are NOT doing the right thing. However, "the right thing" is not easy and there are few people around and available who can do it.

edit: their best bet is to try to find someone who is burned out from working on wall street applications.

<comment><USER3> Just curious, what would you write the backend for AIM in? I don't have any experience developing messaging-type apps.

<comment><USER4> Erlang is a fine option. So is C.

<comment><USER5> Dang - I was going to say Erlang. This is an ideal application for Erlang... scalability and uptime. There's a reason it's heritage is in the teleco industry.

<comment><USER6> I went and had a look at the slides for their 'scaling twitter' presentation, and it looks like they had a look at Erlang and reacted with some silly "ooh, it looks ugly" sort of comment. Seems pretty silly to reject something out of hand that is very much along the lines of what you need.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Twitter always struck me as a little lower on the complexity scale and a little higher on the throughput scale than where RoR's sweet spot lies.

Since their requirements seem like they're pretty static now, I would think writing a backend in C wouldn't be out of the question.

<comment><USER8> The question is, do they have the skillset in-house for that sort of undertaking?

<comment><USER9> skillset is a really good word

i am really surprised how facebook, so quikly found the skillset to build a 10,000 server site and how come, twitter didnt! just why ...

its the skillset, but again why was facebook successful in aquiring the skillset when twitter wasnt! ... why is twitter considering a rewrite and facebook didnt ... they just grew !!

<comment><USER10> Having 10,000 servers doesn't say 'skillful' to me.

<comment><USER11> Facebook's system is also 1000x times more complicated than twitter's simple message passing system!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Yeah for people having never heard of Erlang.

When I wonder why Facebook doesn't have problem scaling their chat? Oh, erlang + flat files.

I can't wait for Twitter to move to Java or PHP so people finally STFU about Rails.

Twitter moving away from rails doens't make rails look bad, it makes everyone at Twitter look like the biggest jackasses in history.

"We can't get this wrench to hit this nail hard enough, so lets buy another brand of wrench instead of a hammer and see if that works."

<comment><USER13> Do you have any more info on Facebook's chat architecture or were you just speculating?

A quick Google of "erlang facebook chat flat file" returns your initial post, would love to read more about that if have anything.

<comment><USER12> My knowledge of Facebook's chat architecture comes from drunken conversations with Facebook engineers at bars. So no, I don't _think_ I know any more than that. _hiccup_

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> ev: FWIW: Twitter currently has no plans to abandon RoR. Lots of our code is not in RoR, already, though. Maybe that's why people are confused.

<http://twitter.com/ev/statuses/801530348>

(Ironically, Twitter was down when I first tried to get the URL for this.)

<comment><USER15> Currently: 500 Internal Server Error.

(With an HTTP Status header being dumped to the screen instead of, you know, sent as a header.)

<comment><USER16> Do you obsessively check the headers for proper status codes whenever you land on a page? I'm always amazed how people find out header problems like this just by browsing.

<comment><USER17> He probably has firebug.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Michael Arrington loves taking things out of context.

I hate it when non-programmers write about programming! It's a giant festival of stupid.

<comment><USER19> "I hate it when non-programmers write about programming!"

It doesn't matter what he says. All that matters is that you notice.

After 30 minutes, you are the #1 response to the #2 thread.

So people click through.

Cha-ching.

<comment><USER20> True journalism, indeed.

<comment><USER21> Michael never claimed to be a journalist. You're likely mixing up the professions because you think TechCrunch has gotten so big that it has and cares about its reputation. That wouldn't be the case, he just writes whatever he can to continue to generate pageviews.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I'm embarrassed by a lot of comments here. I thought people on this forum would know better. It's like I'm watching a car, with smoke and flames pouring out from under the hood, pull over to the side of the road and people running up and checking if maybe it needs new tires.

You could probably rewrite the front end in applescript and you'd see little difference, and if you did just throw more servers at it. The problem is probably that theres a DB at the heart of all the message crazyness, you can't do that and expect to scale.

<comment><USER23> I am Ruby learner. The way ruby works with DB is problem for novice. If programmer don't do careful coding for caching then it is bound to cause problem. Ruby hype is all around auto code generation and simple coding/scripting. But when you are writing enterprise level apps then there is more to consider.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Totally amused he threw Zed Shaw in there. From what I remember, Zed trashed several members of the rails core team, not the framework itself or even the entire community.

Surely they are just rewriting the slower core areas of the API in something faster/more distributed. There is no reason they'd have to rewrite the entire thing from scratch.

<comment><USER25> Zed certainly did trash the community. Take a look at

"This is exactly what makes Rails a ghetto. A bunch of half-trained former PHP morons who never bother to sit down and really learn the computer science they were too good to study in college. [...]

After this, I started thinking, since it was the first realization that I picked the absolute last wrong community to make my living in. They were all pricks, morons, assholes, and arrogant fucks who didn't care about the art or the craft.

They were all a bunch of little ghetto fabulous princesses trying to make it in this tiny little Rails world and not enough brains between them all to make it happen."

and about the framework

"Now, DHH tells me that he's got 400 restarts a mother fucking day. That's 1 restart about ever 4 minutes bitches. These restarts went away after I exposed bugs in the GC and Threads which Mentalguy fixed with fastthread (like a Ninja, Mentalguy is awesome).

If anyone had known Rails was that unstable they would have laughed in his face. Think about it further, this means that the creator of Rails in his flagship products could not keep them running for longer than 4 minutes on average."

Although he does add that

" [...] Rails is a pretty nice idea, and it demolished the Java world I hated so much."

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> It shouldn't be an all-or-nothing situation. There are obviously parts of Twitter that would work best as non-Rails. Ruby is too slow for certain things, and so you determine which of those certain things are in your application and you build them in C or Java.

For Twitter, I think some parts of the API need to be in C. But the whole service? I doubt it.

</comment><comment><USER27> Twitter has components in several languages (even erlang for xmpp)

They say most of their traffic is API requests, and I would expect that they would want to optimize that porition of their system. Rails is composed of many components, many of which you don't need for a REST service that talks json/xml. Blaine and other twitters have talked about their experimentments: other app servers (Thin), queueing systems (before building starling), ...

</comment><comment><USER28> I seriously doubt they are actually going to rewrite Twitter in another language. That's a pretty dumb statement and prediction, and Michael Arrington just lost another notch of respect from me (he lost the previous one for his vicious attacks on that Blaine dude who archtected Twitter).

Sounds to me like Mr Arrington has an axe to grind and is putting that ahead of objective journalism.

Daniel

<comment><USER10> Why not? It'd probably take a week or so to rewrite in a different language, similar to Reddit when they rewrote in python :/

Has ror become a cult or something? It's just a language, and if it doesn't fit well with the application, best to move on and try something else.

<comment><USER29> Rails is probably not their problem. The way twitter works is the problem. (In other words, they need a better backend, not a better frontend.)

<comment><USER10> I was under the impression rails was the backend and was tightly coupled to a db. Is that not the case? :/ By 'better backend', what do you mean?

<comment><USER29> I assume the difficulty is storing the data and then retrieving the right data when generating a page. Yeah, you can use a SQL database, but that doesn't seem to be working very well. So they probably need to write some custom storage backend that is actually designed for the load that is put on it. Relational databases are general solutions. General solutions are good for general problems, but not necessarily specific problems.

Anyway, if the problem happens to be that the Rails frontend is too slow, speeding that up isn't going to buy them anything long-term. Eventually the database is going to bog them down even if the web GUI is hand-optimized assembly.

JMHO, obviously I have no idea what the twitter codebase looks like or what specific problems they are having. I also don't use Ruby or Rails, but I doubt that's their problem.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Regardless of the reason, if something doesn't work for you, you need to identify the root cause of the problem and don't be too arrogant to move forward even if it questions your core beliefs

</comment><comment><USER31> A bike shed (any colour will do) on greener grass...

</comment><comment><USER32> not true: <http://twitter.com/ev/statuses/801530348>

</comment><comment><USER14> +1 for PHP + memcache + Thrift.

</comment><comment><USER33> Arrington is a bag of douche.

</comment><comment><USER29> People still consider PHP and Java for rewrites? Usually that's what you rewrite _out of_ , not in to.

<comment><USER34> Stop. There's nothing wrong with PHP, and it's proven to scale.

<comment><USER29> Well, yeah. What would prevent a _language_ from scaling?

The reason you'd ditch Java or PHP is because they are lacking a lot of higher-order constructs. (PHP epsecially. Statically-scoped variables? First class functions? An object system that isn't a hilarious joke? Unicode support? PHP doesn't have 'em.)</comment></comment></comment>


Collision detection benchmarks - <AUTHOR> http://0fps.net/2015/01/23/collision-detection-part-3-benchmarks/

<comment><USER2> We were building a game for Nickelodeon that was designed to run on the iPad 1 in the browser. The first pass of the game used Box2D for collision detection, under the assumption that they'd done a ton of work optimizing it with AABB trees/etc and everything would just work.

It didn't. The first version of the game was brutally slow and every time we did a touch collision detection, it would lag like crazy.

Out of frustration, we ripped out Box2D entirely and replaced it with naive O(n) box testing and hand-written motion code, thinking that we'd add in some optimizations later on to make it more performant. It turns out that this was fast enough without any further optimizations and we shipped it. The overhead of using a physics system was enough to bog down the iPad 1's poor non-JIT JS engine.

Fortunately there's enough spare cycles in modern tablets that a little bit of overhead from a physics engine isn't going to be a problem, although I'd wager there's a handful of Android tablets out there still as weak as the iPad 1.

<comment><USER3> What were the reasons for you to use the JS version of Box2D instad of the native version (with bindings)? In my experience, the native version runs just fine on low-end Android devices and the iPad 1.

<comment><USER2> It was a browser-only game so native code was not an option. The goal for them was to avoid app stores and give kids the ability to drop into games casually from the browser like they did with desktop flash at the time.

<comment><USER4> FWIW, I'm pretty sure Safari on iOS has always had a JIT, although web views embedded into App Store apps didn't have access to it for security reasons.

edit: I'm wrong

<comment><USER2> Nope -- JIT was new in iOS 4.3:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safari_%28web_browser%29#New_in...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safari_%28web_browser%29#New_in_iOS_4.3)

It's been around for a while, but we were doing some bleeding-edge stuff (and getting cut the whole way!).

<comment><USER4> Whoa. My memory really had a hole in it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I am a tad surprised that Box2D only "Supports sweep-and-prune and brute force for broad phase collision detection." I've seen the world's simplest and most naive spatial grids work well enough for broad phase in production, and you can cook these up in 50 lines (or less) of code.

<comment><USER6> That's only the JS port as far as I can see. The original potentially supports more.

<comment><USER7> You should verify that with the port you're using.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Does anyone know if there are any Go libraries for collision detection yet? I'd like to use some.</comment>


Cannabis is now legal in South Africa - <AUTHOR> https://www.iafrikan.com/2018/09/18/cannabis-south-africa-science-legal/ <comment><USER2> The title is kind of misleading.

Cannabis is to be decriminalised, and parliament has two years to adapt existing legislation to make this a reality.

Legalisation is another thing entirely.</comment>


Tis-interpreter – find subtle bugs in programs written in standard C - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/TrustInSoft/tis-interpreter <comment><USER2> Many of these bugs exist only because compiler writers take unjustified liberties with the C++ standard. That the standard permits compilers to interpret memset(0, 0, 0) as __builtin_unreachable() does not justify compilers actually doing so and violating programmer expectations.

I'm sick of victim-blaming here. Packages like tis-interpreter are very clever ways to solve problems that shouldn't exist in the first place. The C standard needs to be changed to redefine a bunch of currently undefined behavior as unspecified or completely defined.

<comment><USER3> I'm gonna rant for a bit. I see posts like this from time-to-time, and while they're certainly well-meaning there's a good reason why you're not writing the C standard. :-)

> compiler writers take unjustified liberties

How are implementations wrt undefined behaviors unjustified? It's spec'd that way, it's documented that way, there's a good reason why it is that way.

> That the standard permits compilers to interpret memset(0, 0, 0) as > __builtin_unreachable() does not justify compilers actually doing so

__builtin_unreachable() is a compile-time hint to the compiler, so for (say) GCC to interpret it that way you'd have to literally write memset(0,0,0) with all constants. Weird example.

Oh by the way, C11 has memset_s, where you can be explicit about what you want. C is good for being explicit. memset() should not try to guess what you mean in an error condition.

> violating programmer expectations.

It's hard to violate expectations that a programmer doesn't have.

While we're talking about "expectations," let's redefine floating point so that 0.1+0.2==0.3.

> The C standard needs to be changed to redefine a bunch of currently > undefined behavior as unspecified or completely defined.

I'd be interested to know how you define, say, signed integer overflow (keep in mind, most DSP architectures don't use two's complement) and invalid pointer dereferences (many embedded CPUs don't have MMUs, please remember them). How about shifting a uint32_t by 32 bits? (x86 and POWER differ on what this does, and I imagine others do too)

C runs on a lot of stuff. Undefined behavior is undefined explicitly _because_ there's not a good solution for every architecture. C gives the programmer the freedom to do what makes the most sense on their architecture and for their use case. Build different higher-level abstractions for desktops and the little signal processor in your phone's modem. There isn't gonna be a solution that works for both. C is for writing fast code in a moderately high-level language. It's not here to make your assumptions for you.

> I'm sick of victim-blaming here.

Alright, I'm sick of this shit on _Hacker_ News. Say something intelligent or don't say anything. Don't use loaded terms like "victim blaming" to cover for your ill-informed opinions on how C should be. If anything, that only downplays _real_ victim-blaming. I don't give a shit what you think C should be. _You're not a victim, you're ignorant_.

<comment><USER4> You got so worked up about specific examples that you missed the point somewhat.

Consider this mini example:

        void myfunc (int * p)  {
         int t = *p;
         if(p == NULL) { return;}
         *p = t + 1;
       }

Accessing p before null check is undefined, and causes compilers to deduce that the null check isn't required. It can therefore be stripped, which most programmers would find very surprising.

Edit: yes, the replies are right, I meant to dereference *p rather than just copy the pointer. Fixed and somewhat simplified.

I was trying (badly) to remember this example: [http://blog.llvm.org/2011/05/what-every-c-programmer- should-...](http://blog.llvm.org/2011/05/what-every-c-programmer-should- know_14.html)

<comment><USER5> One that often gets people is this:

        struct foo {
            int bar;
        }

        void myfunc(struct foo *p) {
            int *t = &p->bar;
            if(p == NULL) return;
            *t = 5;
        }

Is this undefined? Probably. Absent compiler optimizations, it won't cause a crash on any system you're ever likely to encounter because it's not actually dereferencing the pointer, but some versions of gcc have caused security issues in Linux by optimising away NULL checks like this.

<comment><USER3> I'm not sure that's undefined though. It's equivalent to

      ...

      void myfunc(struct foo *p) {
        int *t = (int *)((char *)p + offsetof(p->bar));
        ...
      }

right? In the C abstract machine taking the address of an offset of a pointer is always defined, I think.

<comment><USER6> It is not always defined. It's defined to take an address to a pointer with an offset within the object's space plus one. Subtracting two pointers to distinct objects is undefined. This is to allow for segmented memory architectures. It's also to allow implementation of garbage collectors by the compiler</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The Inside Story of Airbnb's Management Shakeup - <AUTHOR> https://skift.com/2018/02/06/the-inside-story-of-airbnbs-management-shakeup-and-battle-to-stay-private/ <comment><USER2> The interesting thing I read from reddit was that 30% of Airbnb's cash flow last year came from an internal hedge fund holding currencies, equities, fixed income. This hedge fund was set up by their ex-CFO, so it's an interesting model for generating income. They take money from guests immediately, but do not pay out to hosts until the guests check in, this delay can be up to many months in advance. This gives them time to invest those assets how they see fit.

The danger here is that 30% of their cash flow is the result of an incredible bull market, so what happens to Airbnb when we hit a recession?</comment>


Controlling more than iTunes with Bluetooth headset - <AUTHOR>

I find myself using iTunes less and less these days and yet the media controls on my Bluetooth headset are hard coded to that program. After searching online, there were no solutions that were better than going as far to modify the iTunes binary. I've opened up a project that I've been working on for a little bit that solves this problem. My goal was to make the media buttons on the headset act the same way the ones on the keyboard work; which ever media app that's open at the time will gain the ability to be controlled. https://github.com/JamesFator/BTHSControl This ended up being a project that I did for myself, but if anyone can get any use out of it, that would be awesome. <comment><USER2> Eep. It's no doubt a cool hack, but distributing AVRCPAgent isn't going to end well. Do you have a way that your installer could patch the existing AVRCPAgent? Also, how do people restore the original file after running your install.sh?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the reply! The thing about it, is that the AVRCPAgent is replaced by something else in 10.10 now, so I've been able to run it kind of on the side. It's definitely a hacky solution, but that's why I brought it here to hopefully get some advice.

</comment></comment><comment><USER2> Next time you might want to have [https://github.com/JamesFator/BTHSControl](https://github.com/JamesFator/BTHSControl) as the story link instead of making this a text only post</comment>