Elon Musk Publishes Plans for Colonizing Mars - <AUTHOR> https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/elon-musk-publishes-plans-for-colonizing-mars/ <comment><USER2> The Sahara desert is infinitely more hospitable than Mars. It's easier to get to. There's air to breath. There's water.

The main reason to terraform Mars (other than making humanity a multi-planet species) is that no one cares about Mars. If we want more water on Mars, we just throw a few hundred icebergs into it. And ignore the sonic booms, devastation, craters, etc. They can be fixed later.

But living on Mars is another prospect entirely. It's expensive to get there. Once there, you're damned closed to dying every minute of every day. If you forgot something on Earth, it will be 2 years before you can retrieve it.

It's sexy in science fiction, but the practicalities are pretty bad.

<comment><USER3> It's so easy to call out all the problems.

Let them die.

I'd go die on Mars. It's Mars.

I think there are just different kinds of people in the world. Some of us hear "It's Mars," and that's all the justification needed. Nothing else matters. Not the cost, not the danger, not the practicalities.

Your opinion is equally valid. But it's important to recognize the flipside.

On Mars, the frontier exists. I've wished for it all my life.

<comment><USER4> > Some of us hear "It's Mars," and that's all the justification needed. > Nothing else matters. Not the cost, not the danger, not the practicalities.

You sound like you know this is irrational, but you don't care.

<comment><USER3> Certainly. Our irrationality is why we're here. Launching a ship toward America was irrational. The scientists of the time could tell you with absolute certainty you'd die if your goal was to get to Asia by sailing west.

We won't be discovering any new land, nor will we be surprised by anything. But that energy -- the fact that people want to go there, and want to colonize it -- that's rare. That's why the Sahara isn't the frontier.

Love, in many ways, is completely irrational. There are countless advantages to spending your life alone. You'd conserve resources, you'd avoid heartbreak. If you want children, you can adopt. You could probably find someone to live with you, if you just want companionship.

But the irrationality makes the experience.

<comment><USER4> > Love, in many ways, is completely irrational

At least I know what love is. So when someone does something foolish for love, I understand.

But when someone tells me he wants to spend billions to live in a small box on a cold, airless desert planet constantly bombarded by lethal radiations, and when he justifies that by "that's mars, and that's the only justification I need", I tend to think that's quite an other level of irrationality.

<comment><USER5> Everyone is going to die, but few will be remembered. Those who first go to Mars will be remembered long after their deaths. Whether they are remembered as being crazy or colonizers, they will be remembered. For many that is enough.

<comment><USER4> Again, we're not talking about going to mars for the sake of it, like someone climbing the Everest because nobody has ever done it.

There's even a saying : "nobody remembers the second person who climbed the Everest".

We're talking about colonization, not Everest-like conquest. Most colonizers will be anonymous. Whatever goals they'll have, fame will not be one of them.

<comment><USER5> I'm not even sure who the first person was, but I bet Wikipedia can tell me their names. That's the kind of remembering I'm thinking of.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It seems to me that most of the negative attitudes towards this project stem from the idea that we're going to colonise Mars with 2017 technology and ideas.

That's the hard thing about reasoning about the future: by definition it doesn't look like the present, but you're a product of the present.

Many people talk about terraforming as taking "thousands of years". Go back a few thousand years and tell someone how you travelled to the other side of the earth in less than a day.

Genetic engineering. AI. Nanotech. Quantum Computers. And that's just the next 100 years.

Ain't no way we're gonna have to wait that long to build sandcastles on Mars.

<comment><USER7> This is why the world needs dreamers like Musk.

Nobody could have predicted the huge technological advances we've made in the last 100 years, let alone the speed at which they were developed.

If we just keep brushing ideas like this off as "totally impractical right now" then there's no goal to work towards.

It's no secret the our time on Earth is limited, and becoming more limited as the human race expands and evolves.

It really comes down to weather or not you believe the human race is capable of existing outside of Earth. I am in the camp of "we'll figure it out" just like we have up to this point. My fear is that most people fall into the "I'll die before it happens so why bother thinking about it" camp.

<comment><USER8> Lol, as if Musk is the first to dream of colonizing space. Please.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm continually unsold on this. Mars is far away, inhospitable, and feels like a run-before-we-walk kind of scenario to me. Merely _sending_ humans to Mars seems like a huge task, let alone keeping them alive there.

I've felt for a while that a more practical path would be along the lines of:

\- Asteroid capture around Earth to develop material processing/construction in space (seems way cheaper than launching ships and resources into orbit, makes space station construction practical?)

\- Robotic moon base with electromagnetic launcher (cheaply/easily launch resources from the moon, provide practical, closer, safer experience in constructing human habitation away from Earth?)

\- Mars/Venus.

Am I missing something here? Can SpaceX really make launches cheap enough that the benefits of construction in orbit aren't worth it? Is trying to move a biosphere to another planet easy enough with no prior experience?

<comment><USER10> It's funny that with all this talk recently about the rise of AI and robots, we continue to just assume that space exploration and colonization has to be done with human beings.. As if we've already exhausted the most robots could do with rovers and satellites.

From a economic and safety perspective, it would seem far more practical to establish a foothold in non-Earth environments with robots that do the initial habitat construction for humans. I fear we are hand-waving much of the risk the first batch of humans we send to Mars have to shoulder - think the Roanoke Colony of the 16th century

<comment><USER11> This. Humans are a terrible space faring species. I'm sure in a 100 years we'll figure out how to upload our consciousness into robots and build better space faring bodies.

I always think about Von Neumann probes. May be in a 100 years we'll figure out how to make them and we'll colonize the entire galaxy.

But first we need to figure out how to get to space in frequent reliable cheap trips.

<comment><USER10> I kinda blame it on our sci-fi fiction: so far we cannot imagine a space adventure where there are no humans at the frontier. Even the most recent space-themed games and movies fall to this trope. It's almost an ego sort of thing - the main characters have to be human, which comes with all the drama of first-alien-contact, life support, etc.

With robots, all that risk is mitigated since there's no risk of loss of life. At the worst we have our bots self-destruct or something.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm glad when I see I'm not the only one who thinks living on Mars would be awful. I only skimmed the article, but I didn't see any ideas on supplementing the 62.5% less gravity. I can't imagine what that'd do to your body after years of living in it. But the lack of nature (and Internet for that matter) would drive me crazy. I'm already too old to enjoy my PlayStation for more than an hour or so.

Maybe once we're able to terraform the planet to resemble the world we evolved on, or build enough Bio-Domes for his million people to enjoy (keeping in mind it only takes one Pauly Shore to ruin a dome), and compensate for the lack of gravity somehow, then I'd consider going.

<comment><USER13> > I didn't see any ideas on supplementing the 62.5% less gravity. I can't > imagine what that'd do to your body after years of living in it.

Another way of looking at it is that if you have medical problems that make it hard to walk in full gravity, low gravity might make the difference between being stuck in a wheelchair and being able to walk.

Ignoring for a moment the optics of sending our old people away to Mars, I think a Martian old folks home could actually be quite popular and successful.

<comment><USER14> There'd be a lot more flying triangle chokes in MMA, that's for sure.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I love how his various ventures all seems to be pointing to this one goal. The Boring Company? Makes sense that he would want to get experience with tunnel boring considering no one is living on the surface of mars for very long without exposing themselves to considerable radiation and near certain death. A tunnel can be sealed and regulated. The first few generations of Martians are going to be mole people.

</comment><comment><USER16> For all the complaining and pessimism I usually exhibit, this is a pretty exciting time to be alive. This gets me excited in a giddy little-kid way. I hope that I live to see the first human colonization of other planets.

</comment><comment><USER17> The plans: (pdf)

[http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/space.2017.2900...](http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/space.2017.29009.emu)

In the "Why Mars?" section, Musk writes:

> _It is a little cold, but we can warm it up._

In the very, very, long term we might be able to terraform Mars, but in the next few hundred years I think it would be more accurate to say that heating is a lot easier to manage than cooling.

We can survive in Martian temperatures that occur on Earth with nothing more than well-insulated clothing. But as Phoenix, AZ is discovering this week, even a few degrees over body temperature is really bad.

In the section on the importance of reusability, he writes:

> _However, with frequent flights, you can take an aircraft that costs $90 > million and buy a ticket on Southwest right now from Los Angeles to Vegas > for $43, including taxes._

That's because the casinos subsidize it. Flights to and from Vegas from anywhere are cheaper than others, even more frequent or shorter flights.

<comment><USER18> _That 's because the casinos subsidize it._

Vegas casinos subsidize public air travel? I didn't realize they did this...do you have a source for this?

<comment><USER17> You are correct, this is a remarkable claim...but it seems to be the simplest explanation.

Even in the face of claims to the contrary: [https://m.lasvegassun.com/news/1997/nov/17/no-airline- subsid...](https://m.lasvegassun.com/news/1997/nov/17/no-airline-subsidies-to- come-to-lv/) the difference between air fares to Vegas and comparable cities and the difference in hotel rates clearly shows that there is something going on.

It may not be a true subsidy; perhaps the airlines found that the high volume of very price-sensitive travelers to Vegas justified thinner margins than to other cities. But the point stands that it's disingenuous to use a $43 flight to Vegas as a price point for the cost of air travel.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> While I think its extremely interesting and exciting to colonize Mars, both out of curiosity and the trickle down of new technologies that would be developed in the endeavor, I just don't personally feel any particular emotional drive to do so because humans might otherwise go extinct. I have a child and so have a very strong instinct of wanting to do everything I can to help him to survive as well as his children and grandchildren. Similarly I want people on the other side of the planet, whom I have never met, to survive simply because I know they exist now. Once I start to think beyond maybe 300 years these feeling deteriorate rapidly. If I think about our species being wiped out in 10,000 years I hardly have an emotional response at all.

Am I alone in feeling this way?

<comment><USER4> I think nobody can deny that, all other things being equal, short-term occurring events tend to matter more than long-term ones.

Therefore, no matter how bad one can feel about the prospect of humanity being wiped out, that feeling can be made arbitrarily low by delaying the expectation of its occurrence.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> "The threshold for a self-sustaining city on Mars or a civilization would be a million people. "

That number seems highly speculative ... But afaik, there is no self- sustaining city on earth, so I doubt there are more solid numbers on that topic. Economic cycles are quite complex, thats for fure.

But aside from that, I think the much more realistic plan, than building and leaving in a huge fleet at once and then see how it goes, would be sending robots first and let them build at least a rudimentary base first and mine resources and teleoperate the whole thing from a save distance ... if that works, we might be ready for colonisation.

And the needed technology is evolving right now on earth.

Maybe less spectacular, but more realistic in my opinion.

<comment><USER4> > there is no self-sustaining city on earth

Indeed. That's an other concept that I'm not sure Musk is fully aware of. Economies, industrial production systems are highly inter-dependent on Earth. In our "technological civilization", even to build something as simple as a pencil, you need lots of people collaborating from all over the planet [1]. So to me the idea of building a "self-sustaining technological civilization" on mars sounds quite ludicrous.

1\. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5Gppi-O3a8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5Gppi-O3a8)

<comment><USER21> Just because people collaborate from all over the planet to make the pencil, doesn't mean that's the way it has to be. This kind of collaboration simply enables economics of scale to kick in (and possibly improve quality as well).

<comment><USER4> "doesn't mean that's the way it has to be"

Sure, but it does show how speculative Musk's plan for a "self-sustaining city" is. There is no such city on Earth. What makes him think it would work on mars?

<comment><USER22> Every group of people was self sufficient (or dead) at some point. We just want to keep improving our quality of life at rate that demands more division of labor. Scale that back a bit, of course colonists with have a lower quality of life, they are colonists.

Then scale back from 100% self supporting and make a place on mars that is most self-supporting or self-supporting in an emergency. They don't need to be self sufficient from day 1, they need need to be self sufficient enough to eventually get by without constant injection of resources. At some point that can be part of this economy that makes it unprofitable to have self- sufficiency on Earth, but because of trade costs the economics will look different, but not impossible. Locally source will be 1% the cost so buying from Earth with done only for the most valuable items. Things like seeds or IP make perfect sense to buy across the gulf of space. Thing like bulk lumber and toilet paper do not and probably never will.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> He made electric cars sexy. He made rockets that come back to earth for a smooth landing. I'm betting that as crazy as this sounds he is the man to make this happen.

Go Elon!

</comment><comment><USER24> FYI - this is a PDF version of Musk's presentation at IAC in 2016.

<comment><USER25> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7Uyfqi_TE8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7Uyfqi_TE8)

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I interpret Musk's interest in this kind of thing as a form of ideological futurism rather than a pragmatic goal. I think he presents the idea of something very far out and very ambitious as a way to try and inspire people to think big and think about developing technology the likes of which we've never seen before.

It's an interesting strategy, but I think it has a major downside too. It strikes many people (me included) as a bit detached from reality and even cold to the concerns of the many people here on Earth that are struggling.

</comment><comment><USER27> PDF here: [http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/space.2017.2900...](http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/space.2017.29009.emu)

Interesting Venn diagram in Fig 2. If "COST OF TRIP TO MARS" = "INFINITE MONEY", shouldn't "CAN AFFORD TO GO" be an empty set?

</comment><comment><USER28> Don't print Musk's journal article in black and white: the copy editing is bad. Table 4 distinguishes Good/OK/Bad using colored circles -- it's undecipherable in black and white.

</comment><comment><USER29> Elon makes a good point that it is inevitable that Human should colonize another planet. I don't think Mars is the planet. We are solving a hard problem with the current technology, but we are missing the point that we may have a technology in the future that enables us to explore less hostile far planets that require one trip. Think about the first settlers who came to North America before the Europeans.

<comment><USER30> Let's reframe the problem for him. The main problem he is trying to solve is the risk of being tied to one planet. So he wants to buy insurance for humanity. How else can you solve this problem?

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I wish so bad I had the luck to be born into the circumstances and opportunity to create a company like SpaceX.

</comment><comment><USER32> The only hope for Mars is that a true libertarian society may arise. America's 21st century America.</comment>


Vue 3.0 Updates [slides] - <AUTHOR> https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1yhPGyhQrJcpJI2ZFvBme3pGKaGNiLi709c37svivv0o/preview?slide=id.p <comment><USER3> I think the best part about Vuejs is that how simple it is and everything just works!

A vue component is still as simple as {template: 'hi'}. You don't need webpack or any transliteration for it to work. Just drop the script tag like the good old jQuery and it's working! No wonder it was so easy to switch to it.

Transition from vue1 to vue2 was really simple. I'm sure the same will be true for v3.

<comment><USER4> Having started with vue, and now playing with react, I've found myself often thinking "this is so much simpler".

But maybe I just sucked at vue.

<comment><USER5> That's interesting, I started with React, and switched to Vue, and felt Vue was the simpler tool.

<comment><USER6> Agreed. When evaluating both of them, it looked like React and Vue implement the same concepts, but React did it in ways that made it more complicated than it needed to be. I specifically didn't like that Redux and it's docs were too heady for what it really is (it's just event triggering and handling, why does it have to be so complicated?), and the fact that React didn't have any official "here's is how to build a complete app" docs. It was always "well here are different choices and project layouts you could use". I don't want to care about using this templating system or that. I want batteries included. Vue did that well.

<comment><USER7> Hi, I'm a Redux maintainer. FWIW, we're looking at revamping the Redux docs in the near future (see [https://github.com/reduxjs/redux/issues/2590](https://github.com/reduxjs/redux/issues/2590) for plans ).

If you've got any specific suggestions for improvements, please let us know! I'm always looking for ways we can make the docs better.

As a side note, React is separate from Redux, and Redux is definitely not tied to React. Here's a recent post about a team that opted to use Redux with Vue: [https://snipcart.com/blog/redux-vue](https://snipcart.com/blog/redux-vue) .

<comment><USER6> Sorry I just saw this. If you see this comment, yes I know Redux and React are separate and that you can use other state management systems besides Redux with React. However, that doesn't help when evaluating the React ecosystem at first. I don't want to play "pick a library, build a framework". What I do most of the time is pretty common stuff: SPA with login, CRUD data manipulation, etc. I want a a framework that does 80% of that and has flexibility to create the other 20%. Many React/Redux tutorials are happy to oblige. But they are also all incomplete and unofficial. And by the time a large comprehensive tutorial is written by some kind soul, the APIs have changed, and you are back to SO looking for how to make the damn thing run.

Specifically with Redux, I would suggest clarifying stuff around reducers and possibly renaming them. As is, reducers sound like "a monad is a monoid in the class of ..." Vuex specifically does a very nice job of calling their equivalent thing "mutations" which is more intuitive.

My visualization of Redux/Vuex is basically an application of the event system to state management. Instead of manipulating global.state.foo directly, you ask the system to change the value of foo and a callback does it. A simple explanation like that from the start with some examples of benefits of it would be really helpful.

Also, Vuex has a less strict but more usable idea of not having to import actions. You just refer to them as strings.

Also also, examples of XHR/promises handled by Redux especially with error handling all the way from "server returned 404/400/500/etc." to how to hand that off to a UI element would be helpful. Takes way too long to discover the right pattern for action returning a promise.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm very happy to see React and Vue influence each other. They definitely are the highest quality frameworks out there and having two different research teams only improves the overall quality of the ecosystem.

I'm a React fan, yet I really applaud all the nice stuff which is coming in Vue 3. Well done.

<comment><USER9> >research teams

Lol. Writing JS libs is not research.

<comment><USER10> What makes you say that? People are actively earning phds researching implementations in different languages. JS is different because it's useful? Runs in a browser?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> 3.0 is a huge milestone for vue.

Currently the architecture forces you to import the Vue object entirely , has Vue under the hood isn't really modular...

With 3.0 Vue has taken the typescript way and is using packages , similar to angular , it looks absolutely awesome to work with now.

I really hope class based components will be supported natively without compiling or transpiling.

Working "out of the box" has always been part of Vue philosophy , I really hope this continue.

This is really a big release , but it's still sad to see the 3.0-alpha branch is not visible on GitHub , i really would have loved to have a look at it.

<comment><USER12> Vue 3.0 is reported to support class-baed components natively: [https://medium.com/the-vue-point/plans-for-the-next- iteratio...](https://medium.com/the-vue-point/plans-for-the-next-iteration-of- vue-js-777ffea6fabf#60e3)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> My feeling is that most people who use Vue or React only need a template engine. Typical use case: You have an array of objects and a template how each object should look like.

So you do...

          {{ user.name }}

...to make Vue render the list of objects.

This is the only thing I ever use these frameworks for. Everything else I think I can implement in a better, leaner way myself. So I wonder if I should switch to a template engine instead.

What is the next most basic/common usecase for Vue?

<comment><USER14> as a React developer, SPAs in general are overused. Most LOB apps could (and should) still be written in a backend templated language. SPAs should be reserved for applications (or even individual components) with advanced interactive features, ie a proper web app.

<comment><USER15> That's also my conclusion after toying a bit with those frameworks. You want to use them for specific pages ressembling applications, but you still want the main structure of your frontend to be defined server-side, using the most standard technology.

This lets you split your interface into more isolated components, and makes you free to use different framework depending on the type of interaction your page needs, as well as be able to update your site progressively.

<comment><USER14> yeah, for most web apps that are primarily regular CRUD+routing interfaces, you can/should use SPA tech to progressively enhance your more advanced controls. There are cases where it makes sense to build a whole SPA (I'm working on an in-browser editor that wouldn't work very well as a backend app, for example) but the vast majority of cases where React is used, it just adds complexity and challenge.

React/Redux hasn't been around long enough for its best practices to solidify in the general industry so you'll often find that companies that picked up React have a hodge-podge of incorrectly used technologies included because they didn't know the use case for Thunks vs Sagas, how to use Reselect correctly, whether to store any given state in Redux or a Container, and so on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Vue 3 is a massive new update:

\- TypeScript

\- Double the performance

\- Half the size and memory consumption

\- New reactive system that supports classes a la MobX

\- Class based components

I've been using Vue for a couple of years and I'm very excited about this new release.

</comment><comment><USER17> It appears that there are similarities in Vue 3.0 with Aurelia, at least on the surface. Things like class based components, proxy-based observer mechanism* and the move towards typescript all remind me of Aurelia.

Been using Vue 2.0 for personal projects and Aurelia for a big work project over the past year and I have to say I am very happy with both. Personally I prefer the single file components in Vue but the class based style of writing them in Aurelia. Seeing these two things converge in Vue 3.0 together with the performance improvements looks very promising.

*Not sure that under the hood Vue 3.0 works the same way as Aurelia but the mentioned points in the slides lists array index / length mutation and later the observable function are familiar from Aurelia.

</comment><comment><USER18> The Typescript support is by far the thing I'm most interested in. Lack of useful Typescript support is, for me, the only downside of Vue right now, and it's a big enough downside for me to use React instead of Vue in a lot of cases.

Do you reckon we'll ever see Typescript support in the non-jsx templates? I do really like vue templates for e.g. if-conditionals. I really don't like using ternary operators for template logic. And then the alternative being to hoist things out of the single JSX template breaks make code less linear to read which kinda sucks

<comment><USER15> to me the biggest downside was how vuex and typescript didn't work well together by default. You had to rely to adding a few plumbing functions, and that felt really like dirty patching.

<comment><USER18> Yep, that as well, I agree. And the plumbing is super verbose

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Vue has a strong leader - and that is promising.

</comment><comment><USER20> Does someone have the talk (if there's one) which used this deck as well?

</comment><comment><USER21> How about the ability to create multiple components in the same .vue file? for instance I need to define a sub-component that will be used only inside my component, this is easy in React but with Vue I have to create another file to define this sub-component, this makes the project management becomes harder as the project grows

<comment><USER16> That is one of the few aspects I prefer in React over Vue.

But you can indeed create small inline components in .vue files.

There are different approaches: [https://codewithhugo.com/writing-multiple- vue-components-in-...](https://codewithhugo.com/writing-multiple-vue- components-in-a-single-file/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> > ... implementation re-written from the ground up

Rewriting a big project from scratch is often used as something to brag about: "Look at all the hard work we accomplished!". Except in software what matters is correctness and efficiency, not the age or the code or the size fo the rewrite. Rewriting "from the ground up" is throwing away years of bugfixes[1].

Maybe this new version is fine; I'm only suggesting that big re- implementations should be seen as an unknown risks, and that "carefully refactored problematic areas of the code" is something worth bragging about on a slide.

[1] [https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you- should-...](https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never- do-part-i/)

<comment><USER18> When your project is such a size that a single person can keep it all more or less in their head (in this case, Evan), clean slate rewrites end up being fairly efficient. It's a much different case than 20->200->2000 devs scale applications. It's vastly more easy to develop something from scratch if you'd put a lot of thought into it over time

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Happy to see this project move forward, but I get surprised when I read 100% speed improvement, since it was already super fast. I wonder how they manage.

</comment><comment><USER24> Slide 20 "flow -> typescript" is under making it more maintainable - <USER2> anyone have any thoughts on this?

I use flow because I am interested in soundness, have had a few issues with it, but nothing has suggested to me that typescript is more maintainable.

<comment><USER25> TS is more popular and has a bigger ecosystem. It could enable more contribution to the project.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Code? I've been toying with a very specific type of proxy-based observable, and I'd like to compare notes.

<comment><USER7> I'm interested in looking at the code for a very similar reason, but Evan said it's not open yet: [https://twitter.com/youyuxi/status/1063275580920135680](https://twitter.com/youyuxi/status/1063275580920135680)

</comment></comment><comment> crooked-v I'm happy to see another framework moving to Typescript.

<comment><USER27> In case there are any newcomers, it's probably worth noting that just the core framework is written in Typescript, and compiled to normal JS - you are not forced to use Typescript in your own Vue code unless you want to.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Any news on native support for fragments?

</comment><comment><USER29> .

<comment><USER30> FYI it takes 5.16 seconds to download the 5 megabytes of vendor JavaScript needed to view your landing page from a cold cache (and 2 for your app itself), not to mention the 6 seemingly needless Firebase API calls or the fact you're running the development version of the Firebase SDK.

No matter how awesome you think whatever framework is, this is a terrible, terrible experience.</comment></comment>


How to Filter Microsoft's Hitler-Loving AI - <AUTHOR> https://www.inversoft.com/blog/2016/03/30/filter-microsofts-hitler-loving-ai/ <comment><USER2> The hype of AI defeated common sense... curious what 'critical vulnerability' was exploited. Sounds like a PC way of saying we $@*#!# up. :-)

</comment><comment><USER3> Just dont fucking tweeter

<comment><USER4> Haha. Or don't let your AI out without parental supervision.</comment></comment>


Love-handle: A puzzle made with Web Components - <AUTHOR> https://love-handle.hack.gt/ <comment><AUTHOR> All of the components (with the exception of the chessboard) were made with hybrids ([https://hybrids.js.org/](https://hybrids.js.org/))</comment>


Elon Musk's tunnel project is a bad joke - <AUTHOR> https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/12/19/elon-musks-tunnel-project-in-los-angeles-is-bad-joke/ <comment><USER2> Not that I approve or disapprove Elon Musk's idea of building tunnels but this blog post seems to dismiss the entire idea just for the sake of being dismissive.

The Boring Company seems to be trying with different thoughts and ideas for making these tunnels a reality and they have been quite open to the public with these ideas. It feels to me that the author is taking advantage of this transparency and using it as a weapon for his own agenda.

The entire "demo" was a proof-of-concept that they can use as a model in order to see if it works or not, there is nothing wrong with it. It's not like they will be deploying the current idea to the general public of LA starting tomorrow.

> Some experts questioned whether the Boring Company had even succeeded at > improving the cost of tunnel boring. Right now, it's not altogether clear > that it did.

Well, they are still developing the technology, aren't they?

> But this design creates congestion at the front end while promising to > relieve it on the journey. Drivers will need to line up to wait their turn > on the elevator.

The idea he presented in the press conference is that the tunnels would complement the current highways and public transportation system, it wouldn't be a full replacement for those.

Adding new lanes is incredibly difficult because it would require road work, blocking the entire road to traffic, and also because you are physically limited to the number of lanes that you can possibly add to the road.

The idea of tunnels is supposed to work around these limitations.

<comment><USER3> What was the "proof of concept"? When Boring was first unveiled, it was sold not as a tunnel for cars to drive through, but a system that included "electric skates" and subway-car-like pods: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5V_VzRrSBI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5V_VzRrSBI)

I doubt Boring would have gotten much hype at all if Musk had admitted up front that it'd be little different than an underground highway, something which people have been using for decades.

<comment><USER4> "Electric skates" sound cool, but if you've already got autonomous vehicles with perfectly good wheels why are they necessary?

Yes each tunnel is limited by the speed of the slowest vehicle, but if the tunneling cost is low enough (it certainly would be lower without skates and special tracks) you could have a "slow lane" and a "fast lane"

<comment><USER5> I pay a lot of attention to my car's maintenance and tire wear, but that wouldn't be true for everyone in the tunnels. High speeds are also more stressful on wheels and ancillary parts. The idea of skates seems like it would help normalize capabilities/limits of cars in the tunnels.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I really don't understand all the cynicism around this. It's a prototype of a bold idea, in all likelihood it will fail (like most bold new ideas), but at least they're trying something new. That's how change happens, through trial and error, not through foolproof, perfectly executed plans. For better or for worse, Elon Musk has a track record of taking difficult ideas and beating all odds to make them a reality.

If you wanna call out Elon Musk for something, call him out for his abusive management practices and erratic/abusive behavior on twitter. Calling him out for trying out bold ideas (with all the trial and error that entails) is really petty and counterproductive.

<comment><USER7> _> I really don't understand all the cynicism around this. It's a prototype of a bold idea, [...]_

Well, because it isn't. Tunnel boring is an established industry, it's just a new topic on HN, and apparently for Musk. People don't call him out for being bold, they are calling him out for doing bad and falling over his own hubris.

<comment><USER8> _Well, because it isn 't. Tunnel boring is an established industry_

Yes, but Elon's stock and trade has become:

        1) look at an established industry
        2) do a 1st principles analysis of how inexpensive the product could be
        3) analyze where the difference comes from
        4) $$$

This works especially well with overlooked industries where government regulation has thrown up barriers and established players have little competition. That _is_ bold. Following scientific principles to the truth and profiting from it is bold, flat out.

It's more admirable than imitation of previous successes, at any rate.

<comment><USER9> Ill add to this. If you listen to his interview with Kara Swisher on recode, he has a pretty compelling case on what he thinks the established industry is overlooking. According to him, the technology used for tunneling is very outdated. The Diesel engines could be replaced by something far more powerful without hitting thermal limits reducing drill time. Current technology also fills the tunnel with exhaust that needs to be pumped out with oxygen

It's not hard to see how trying something high powered and electric/lithium- ion based might change the cost/benefits of tunneling, and Elon/Tesla also seems like it might have a uniquely special knowledge of electric motors to succeed

I see no reason why this isn't worth the experiment.

<comment><USER10> Yea, that argument makes perfect sense, if you totally ignore that the speed of tunneling isn't dictated by the drill but by installing the support structures as you tunnel. The actual tunneling aspect is not the bottleneck (unless you're doing certain mountain ranges). The bottleneck is making sure what you just drilled doesn't immediately collapse on you. Along with evacuating the material out of the way. That's the reason tunneling takes so long. You have to support the new section of hole so it does't collapse due to pressure or a damn random earthquake happens to hit. To do that too, you need to properly get rid of the material out of your way so the structure is stabilized. The drills normally (80%-90% of the time) outpace the support structure building process already. You can only go so far until you have to wait for them to catch up.

Do I agree that electricity would potentially help? Yes. Mostly for exhaust. As long as you can equal out the torque as well. Motors that large don't always have the same amount of torque as their fuel counter parts. But massive batteries overheat as well and are an explosive risks. Diesel at least needs to be well aerated to pose as an extreme fire risk. Running a large battery for that long would be an issue. You still have the heat, but at least the exhaust problems are potentially not there. Even though large lithium batteries still produce fumes when run hot. But I'm not sure as to what ppm until those fumes are dangerous/equal to carbon monoxide.

<comment><USER8> _The bottleneck is making sure what you just drilled doesn 't immediately collapse on you. Along with evacuating the material out of the way. That's the reason tunneling takes so long._

From what I've read, Boring Company is very aware of this. Give me a 1st principles analysis for why those things can't be done cheaper and faster?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> There is a fatalism mentality when it comes to writing about big technology ambitions like this. Maybe people are just jaded and used to being let down so much. There is zero doubt in my mind that this endeavor will cost more than expected, take longer than expected, etc... but at the end of the day the effort alone is going to spur other tunneling companies to push for innovations as well. Who knows if any of these early prototypes prove useful, but it sure is clear that Elon sees a lot of room for improvement in the technology, and at this point I wouldn't bet against that.

<comment><USER12> There's fatalism about this because Elon hasn't actually proposed anything innovative. Literally everything Elon has said he wants his boring machine to do, other boring machine companies have already been doing for 2 or 3 decades.

The only remotely "innovative" thing that Elon has suggested is recovering the boring machine after tunnel digging. Even this isn't innovative--the reason most boring machines aren't recovered is because it would cost too much to extract them from the surface. Elon's proposed method of extraction (digging down from the surface) is the method the industry already uses in those situations where it is cost-effective to recover the machine.

The boring machines that BoringCo is using are used boring machines that were recovered using the "innovative" method that Elon proposed. It was cost effective to do so because they're relatively tiny, as far as boring machines go.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I don't understand why Musk is so invested in the idea of cars in tunnels. Does he really have a substantially better tunnel boring machine/tunnel boring workflow? If so, there are lots of things to use it for other than car tunnels. It's kind of like if he started making electric cars and then said, "I am launching the world's first all-electric pizza delivery service."

The O'Hare airport connector in Chicago is a better example of what cheap, fast tunneling could be used for than the car skate mechanism. This article points out how remarkable it would be if things go according to plan: [https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2018/06/for-1-billion...](https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2018/06/for-1-billion- elon-musks-tunnel-to-ohare-would-be-a-miracle/562841/)

<comment><USER14> I think his primary interest is around tunneling technology. If one follows his thoughts on developing extraterrestrial settlements, the need for experience in development of underground tunnels becomes obvious. That would be the best bet for inter-settlement transport infrastructure given the hazardous conditions anywhere outside our planet. From this prospective, the current project - the improvement of LA or whatever, is just an intermediary goal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I dunno.

It seems like we don't need a "revolution" in tunneling costs, even a 30% reduction would be material. The incumbents here have grown fat (like ULA in rockets) on cost plus contracts, it is not like going up against General Motors, Toyota, etc. where is really competitive.

Even if the technology only works in favorable ground (can't choose exactly where it goes), ultra-low-cost tunnels could be good for other uses such as storing parked cars. Los Angeles gets around a cubic kilometer of rainfall a year and if they just had a place to store it, they would not need to import water at all.

<comment><USER16> > Los Angeles gets around a cubic kilometer of rainfall a year and if they > just had a place to store it, they would not need to import water at all.

Now that's a bold idea but storing one cubic kilometer of water in an artificial reservoir seems rather complicated and I'm not really sure the technology developed by the Boring company would help greatly.

If I'm not mistaken and given a diameter of 3.8m you'd need 87 thousand kilometers of tunnels to store one cubic kilometer of water. You could circle the world more than two times with a tunnel that length.

<comment><USER15> You don't need to store the whole 1 cubic kilometer to make a big impact.

You could get that 1 cubic km of space by damming up the area where the Los Angeles River drains out out to where the depth of the ocean really drops off.

Practically it can be done on a small scale. Some communities are starting to realize that they can either spend $1M on upgrading their sewer line or spend $3M and get a really nice and verdant park.

<comment><USER16> Right, I'm not saying that's a bad idea, just that it only seems tangentially related to what the Boring company is doing. If you want to store water then those tunnels don't seem very appropriate. If you want to transport water then they seem too large.

Of course it's not like I have any expertise in the domain, I'd gladly be proven wrong.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I never found the idea compelling because all the distances spoken of were so short that getting to and getting out would eat much of the time saved.

that and this example is a paltry little tunnel in no way useful without the required safety of a parallel tunnel and such.

the real game changer going forward is still autonomous vehicles. combined with EV technology they will disrupt both the automotive industry on a scale many do not fully imagine as well as public transport and providing freedom for people to live further apart. it will give even more people the freedom of travel

<comment><USER18> You've clearly never lived in a city like LA or New York. Sometimes it takes 45 minutes to drive a few blocks.

And Boring Company plans on using parallel tunnels, for safety and for increased capacity (two directions of travel).

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Obviously Elon likes publicity stunts like this, and the current prototype is very far off from something that can compete with traditional subways, but it's not obvious to me the idea of many "dumb" tunnels with many small to medium-sized autonomous vehicles is a bad idea.

Subways are kind of like circuit switched networks (more raw capacity), this is more like a packet switched network (more flexibility/overall efficiency). And with cheap enough tunneling it becomes horizontally scalable.

</comment><comment><USER19> Hmm gotta agree with the authors that it pretty much looks like a subway without the actual efficiency of one. Purely from layman's perspective it doesn't seem plausible that subway could be replaced with a tunnel full of people driving their own cars. The space, the logistics, the everything. Subways and their tunnels are very much utilized to their maximum, could a tunnel full of separate cars have the same throughput of people? I'd say it's highly improbable.

But, as the article mentions Boring Company seems pivoting more to "a tunnel for rich people to drive in". That seems like a more plausible use-case. Or well just build a subway. And as another perspective as European, public transportation is pretty cool also. No need for expensive tunnels. Would probably help with the congestion too although it seems like a lost cause in the US.

<comment><USER20> How many cities in the U.S. would actually benefit from a Subway system? The density of most U.S. cities isn't high enough to support NYC or DC style metros. It's completely unrealistic to expect cities to invest in them when people are already spread out over mass expanses of suburbia. Face it, America was built around the car. Most of our cities developed long after the car was already a staple. Building tunnels for cars, to solve traffic, is very smart. There are many cities where there's little room to expand highways. A tunnel network that avoids a lot of the exhaust problems (due to restricting traffic to electric vehicles) would encourage the adoption of electric vehicles, would relieve traffic on main highways, and would be practical for most cities, without the maintenance costs of a Subway system.

<comment><USER12> Why would it be cost effective for a city that isn't dense enough for a subway to waste time and money digging an underground tunnel for 1 lane of cars instead of just expanding their existing streets by 1 lane for a fraction of the time and cost?

<comment><USER20> Because in many cases the highways are as wide as they can get and they would have to imminent domain a ton of private property to expand...which is time consuming, prone to litigation and increases the cost of highway construction...plus you have the three-four year disruption in existing traffic flows.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I give Musk credit for at least mostly/nearly meeting his previously tweeted deadline of Dec. 10. Being sincere here, because I thought it likely it'd end up as late/unfulfilled as his estimates about self-driving, albeit tunneling is a safer goal than self-driving.

[0] [https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1054164543922823168?lang...](https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1054164543922823168?lang=en)

</comment><comment><USER16> I think the author mostly makes a compelling case (especially the point about how it's effectively a subway but less efficient and for rich people) but I don't get this particular point:

>L.A.'s highways are congested. Simply putting new ones underground doesn't really solve this problem.

I mean, more capacity should mean less congestion, shouldn't it?

>Drivers will need to line up to wait their turn on the elevator. If the tunnels were really able to deliver lightning fast commutes across Los Angeles, demand would likely be quite high.

That also doesn't make sense to me. The tunnel will be unsuccessful because it'll be too successful? People won't want to use the tunnel because too many people will use the tunnel? If Musk reaches that point he'll probably already have won.

<comment><USER21> > I mean, more capacity should mean less congestion, shouldn't it?

Somewhat counter-intuitively, the answer to that is often "no", due to induced demand[1].

> That also doesn't make sense to me. The tunnel will be unsuccessful because > it'll be too successful? People won't want to use the tunnel because too > many people will use the tunnel? If Musk reaches that point he'll probably > already have won.

I think the point being made here is that ingress/egress imposes such a significant bottleneck that total throughput will still be low, and very few people would actually be able to benefit.

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

<comment><USER16> >Somewhat counter-intuitively, the answer to that is often "no", due to induced demand[1].

I see what you mean but couldn't you raise the same objection if somebody wanted to, say, create a new subway system or something similar? More people in the new transport system means fewer people in cars on the streets means induced demand... I don't see why this particular project is different.

>I think the point being made here is that ingress/egress imposes such a significant bottleneck that total throughput will still be low, and very few people would actually be able to benefit.

I agree with that, it's also a problem with hyperloop. It seems like Musk's vision of the future is great if you're rich, not so much if you're poor.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Just let the man build some tunnels. Also, just because the demo shows a Tesla model X doesn't mean that other services like the pods are discluded, as the article states. It's simply a matter getting some 7+ seat cars and stuffing a bunch of people in them.

</comment><comment><USER23> > But reporters arrived to find out plans have apparently changed from a > public transit system to a private system for rich drivers.

The author missed a solid opportunity to make a Stonecutters joke.

<comment><USER24> a private road network? the libertarians will be all over this..

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> "A full build out of the concept could end up being a private uncontested highway system mirroring the congested public one for use only by a very rich few."

That was exactly my thought when I read about the test. I have a hard time seeing how this can scale in capacity. But getting _himself_ out of the gridlock...now that's...something at least. Speed similar to a helicopter ride above the traffic without all the hassle of getting on and off and finding a place to land.

Not sure it's a good thing.

<comment><USER26> Yes, I think this is what people defending Elon and other would-be disruptors neglect. The criticism isn't just that certain attempts at innovation are stupid or likely to fail, but that they betray the privilege or insular perspective of the innovator.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> [http://existentialcomics.com/comic/other/17](http://existentialcomics.com/comic/other/17)

</comment><comment><USER28> I don't get Musk's math on this one.

Even if the tunnels were significantly cheaper than building new freeway lanes, a tunnel is a single lane, with single entry and exits. Ingress and egress overwhelm any gains from potential speed improvements in the tunnel.

Besides this, it doesn't matter how much improvement in traffic capacity is gained from tunnels, or lanes. Induced demand always renders improvements in capacity moot over the longer term.

</comment><comment><USER29> Since this is the second hit piece on Elon today added to the HN frontpage I am really curious about something.

What on Earth did Elon do to attract the ire of the far left? Because obviously both articles were written by people who are evidently into far left ideology according to their Twitter feeds.

I suppose everybody else either don't really give a crap about his experiments or think they are useless but pretty cool (hello, personal flamethrower), across these circles SpaceX is considered to be pretty rad, and while Tesla might not be perfect I'm pretty sure they are one of the trailblazers towards a future of self driving electric cars.

So can anyone explain to me - and I mean this genuinely - why the raging hate from this particular part of the ideological spectrum?

Thanks.

</comment><comment><USER30> When I saw the video yesterday, have a lot of laughter.

Real breakthrough!!

</comment><comment><USER31> Has the Boring Company even said anything about how they plan on so dramatically cutting the cost per mile of tunnel building?

<comment><USER32> Yes, there is a pretty good video of an interview with Musk and the chief engineer on the project:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwX9G38vdCE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwX9G38vdCE)

From memory, the important points: 1\. They want to have the drill work continuously. Apparently current technology winds up drilling less than half the time, partially because the drills stop when putting in the wall sections that make up the tunnel. 2\. Switch the drill and the waste train (that takes the dirt from the drill) to electric using batteries that the train brings in. This reduces the construction of pipes and infrastructure in the tunnel during construction. 3\. Work to speed up the drill head by using the materials scientists from SpaceX. 4\. Make bricks out of the waster material on-site. Right now disposing of the waste material is a big headache/cost.

<comment><USER12> The thing that Elon and his "chief engineer" did not bother to learn before making that video is that boring machines are already electric. They are merely suggesting replacing the electrical wires with batteries. The consequences of this is that the drill still only drills half the time, because you have to stop to swap out batteries. And unless Elon has access to superbatteries that he hasn't revealed yet, they'll be swapping batteries once or twice an hour for any boring machine large enough to construct subway-sized tunnels.

Also, the reason the drill stops to put in walls sections every X feet is because in soft-soil like LA, the tunnel will collapse without walls. Unlike the Elontunnel, the walls built by the machine during this stage are the final walls, which is why they take so long--they're subject to the full construction process (measuring, building, remeasuring, inspections, sign- offs, etc.) before the tunnel digs a new section.

When you're digging under other people's property, it's better to go slowly and do things right the first time. It's more expensive to fix something like a tunnel after the fact, and that's something BoringCo is about to learn.

As for number 3: different materials require different drill heads and speeds. For example--with soft soil drilling to fast can "liquefy" the soil. Material science won't change that--it's physics that the boring industry has decades of research in.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> The real joke is people who can't recognize how early stages of development look like. That's because the details are usually hidden from view by business people who insist it is embarassing. It is not. This is how real world r&d looks like.</comment>


Show HN: Git-vendor, manage dependencies with git-subtree - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/brettlangdon/git-vendor <comment><AUTHOR> For anyone interested, here is a great article on git-subtree and where I learned about it from:

[https://developer.atlassian.com/blog/2015/05/the-power-of- gi...](https://developer.atlassian.com/blog/2015/05/the-power-of-git-subtree/)

</comment><comment><USER2> Why subtree over submodule?

<comment><USER3> Have you ever tried using submodules, in a repository that multiple people commit to?

<comment><USER2> Yeah, it was extremely frustrating for actively changing code and not an issue for third party dependencies. I wonder what the trade offs between submodules and subtrees are for this use case.</comment></comment></comment>


Tracking Time - <AUTHOR> https://email@example.com/tracking-time-1a58bf10ec79?source=tags<comment>---1 </comment><comment><AUTHOR> This looks like a great time tracking solution: [https://wakatime.com](https://wakatime.com)</comment>


Show HN: Shortcut Roulette – Dangerous, unhelpful shortcut for iOS 12 - <AUTHOR> http://shortcutroulette.com <comment><USER2> This reminds me of a drinking game my friends played in high school.

System32 Roulette is a drinking game where you get a fresh install of Windows 98 on some crappy Pentium 2 in your friend's mom's basement. Each player takes a turn deleting a random file out of System32 (we disabled protections, I forget how), then reboots and tries to play a game of minesweeper. If you can, everyone else takes a drink. If you can't, you finish your drink and the game starts over with a clean install.

I really ought to formalize it and make a container based version of the game. But it's far more fun to do on a real computer from the era.

<comment><USER3> That sounds like a wonderfully well-paced drinking game.

Kids today would get wasted with an SSD :)

<comment><USER2> It's true. It was uncanny just how balanced the game was. And there was a meta-layer where the drunker you get, the more awful it was to reinstall Windows 98. We had two computers going to cut down on install time.

I think once we mapped a Thrustmaster snowboard to the mouse and had to use that to navigate. It was awful.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is absolutely brilliant.

In its current form, it seems more conceptual than practical, but I think an engaging and potentially fun-to-play ("fun"?) gaming product can come out of this.

Classify shortcuts into tiers/difficulty levels

1\. baby (little to no real consequence)

2\. teenager (slight potential embarrassment)

3\. reckless (mortifying but not career- or relationship damaging)

4\. daredevil (would require apologies and other face-saving actions to recover)

5\. drunken (even with face-saving would inflict career- or -relationship damage)

6\. destroyer (guaranteed social consequence; possibly career- or -relationship ending)

7\. just no (immoral and illegal in many jurisdictions)

Let opponents create and join the game with real stakes (money, labor, product, reputation, etc.).

Make sure your EULA is ironclad in case any users litigate after having woken up with a massive hangover and finding the entire world angry at them.

UPDATE: The tiers should be additive, so level 4, for example, would include shortcuts from levels 1 through 3.

EDIT: formatting; swap categories 4 and 5; punctuation; number agreement; grammar; add UPDATE

<comment><USER5> And hook it up to a breathalyzer peripheral so that the level goes up the more you drink.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Some preview of possible outcomes is here: [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1oxkvHCRrCh4LxY29KowN...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1oxkvHCRrCh4LxY29KowNvN9t12z2De- JNyPcE5TZSFQ/edit)

<comment><AUTHOR> Pasting the stuff for 0.2.0 in now and allowing people to comment any bugs

<comment><USER7> I can help test apple pay stuff, I have a US apple account and live in Ams.

<comment><AUTHOR> hmu at firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This is a great/dumb idea. Let's brainstorm some more life ruining actions:

* Create an alarm to go off for every 5 mins for the rest of the day

* Share what you last copied to clipboard on Social Media

* Text a sexual suggestive gif to a random contact

<comment><USER9> * Send a message saying "I have {insert random STI}, best get yourself checked out..." to a random contact in your phone.

* Send "So, I've been thinking... How about we try friends with benefits?" To a random contact.

* If you have anyone in your phone as Boss, Manager etc, send them an email with a template of a fairly harsh notice of resignation.

* If it's a woman, send to Mum / Mom / Dad "Hey, I'm going to be a mother! No idea who the father is but it's exciting!".

* If it's a man, send to Mum / Mom / Dad "Hey, so I drunkenly hooked up with some stranger from a bar and I've knocked her up... What to do?"

* Select 2 random contacts A & B. Send to A something about how B won't shut up about wanting to sleep with A.

<comment><USER10> * Select 2 random contacts A & B. Swap their details (phone no, email etc)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> See, this is what's so brilliant about technology. We all know that social media is (okay, probably) going to be the death of society, and these bright sparks have worked out a way to "shortcut"[1] the process.

No death throes of the Republic, we can just move straight to being social outcasts and speed up the atomisation of our society.

F __k, I wish I was joking.

[1]: See what I did there? :-)

</comment><comment><USER12> reminds me of Social Roulette [1] which was also brilliant. this seems like a much more involved (and potentially life-ruining) version of that. cheers to making something interesting!

[1] [http://socialroulette.net/](http://socialroulette.net/)

<comment><AUTHOR> This is amazing

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Like the rod of wonder, but worse. amazing.

[https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Rod_of_Wonder](https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Rod_of_Wonder)

<comment><USER14> This has a lot of potential - imagine a "Book of many things" following the concept of this app!

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I have no words for how dumb/brilliant that is.

</comment><comment><USER16> How does "send selfie to a contact" work when the user physically has to press send for imessages? As far as I'm aware you cannot get iOS to send SMS's or iMessages on behalf of the user.

<comment><AUTHOR> In this case, I've chosen to have all the messages show up with the user having to confirm with the send button. However, this isn't necessary for all information. I've built a shortcut that can take contact data, put it in a message, and send it to a predetermined number without a preview showing.

here it is: [https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/a62bc8f849ff4534a4a77812302...](https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/a62bc8f849ff4534a4a77812302cf2fc)

(it sends to a dummy number)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> This is an absolutely horrible idea.

... I love it!

</comment><comment><USER18> With proper execution and promotion it will be a pop culture highlight for decades.

<comment><AUTHOR> shame we won't ever give it either

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Bravo. I would play this, and likely lose very fast.

</comment><comment><USER20> Oh, no.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm so sorry for this

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Can I make this into an app is that possible I'll give it out for free?

</comment><comment><USER22> This is hilarious. Thanks for sharing! :)

</comment><comment> murph-almighty I want to meet this product team and look them in the eyes so I can see what an empty abyss looks like.

<comment><USER23> ... so they can implement it!

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> That is so awesome!</comment>


The next moves in the developing Spooks v. News Cold War - <AUTHOR> http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2013/08/the-next-moves-in-the-spooks-v.html

<comment><USER2> How much of this is "News" in general, and how much is the Guardian in particular? They seem to be way further out on this than any other publication. The fact that their corporate structure is so unusual is part of why their role is so fascinating. I wonder how relevant the latter is to how they practice journalism—it must be, but to what extent?

<comment><AUTHOR> The Guardian has been pioneering the wikileaks/NSA investigative stuff; they're also making a _huge_ play to become the #1 left/liberal online news source of the English-speaking web (nipping at the heels of the much more staid NY Times).

The existence of the Trust enables them to do stuff that would be toxic to other newspapers, namely to push agendas that advertisers wouldn't approve of. But the main thing I think they're doing is that they've recognized the general decline of investigative journalism in the USA and (to a lesser extent) the UK, and identified it as _a gap in the market_ that gives them a niche to expand into.

(Here the USA's lack of genuine national newspapers -- USA Today doesn't count -- plays against it; it means The Guardian, a national paper from a nation of 61 million people, can punch at or above the weight of any regional US paper.)</comment></comment>


iCloud Beta Incorporates iOS 7 Look and Feel - <AUTHOR> http://beta.icloud.com <comment><USER2> I've been hearing it since it was announced, and I've yet to see for myself, but I really am starting to agree that a lot of the disagreements with the design decisions of iOS7 will go away once people start using the OS. Of course, there are still elements that seem half-baked at best, but it's interesting to see how some of the interfaces really shine when it's your own information being displayed instead of screenshots of information you ignore. I'm actually excited to see how I adapt to the new changes once iOS7 come out.

(Yes, I am a developer and could install the developer preview, but I only have one iOS device right now and no way am I installing a developer beta on my one device)

<comment><USER3> I've been using iOS7 since Beta 2, and I still hate it.

I don't like the look, but this might be personal. So putting this aside, to me iOS7 is actually harder to use. The flat buttons (which are just labels now) are harder to press. I do not know if this is psychological since they appear smaller, or is it that the target area is actually smaller now. Toggles are grayed out in their off state, so they appear disabled, as in "you are not supposed to be pressing it now" (see Speaker control in the Voice Memos app).

There are also a lot of other things they changed during the redesign for worse from my perspective. For example: in the Voice Memos app I used to be able to record and play back a sequence quickly. Now * I stop recording a sample * Press Done * Am forced to label it (why!!) * Expand the memo I just recorded (why is it collapsed - I am still working on it) * Hit play

I record 20+ samples a day I need to listen to quickly, and this is so frustrating.

There are other things like this throughout the OS. In calendar for example you can't expand the Notes on the meeting, so god forbid someone puts important meeting information there.

It seems to me like people at Apple actually stopped using their phones. These little things scream at you once you actually try to get something done.

<comment><USER4> I had issues with the controls that appear during a phone call. I've been an iPhone user since day 1, but the borderless buttons made me hesitate and hunt around for the button I actually wanted to press. Apple fixed this in Beta 4 or 5 and I feel much better about it.

I still find the Repeat/Shuffle buttons confusing in Music.app and I hope they gets fixed before GM.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> So I guess we're stuck with the Reminders and Contacts icons looking that way. I know it's a silly thing to be upset about but damn if they ain't two of the more hideous icon redesigns for iOS 7.

Notes has this subtle textured background. I'm not a visual designer so I don't understand the reasoning behind why but shouldn't it be a clean white like the calendar, more in keeping with the iOS 7 aesthetic?

<comment> k-mcgrady What are your objections to the contacts icon? I'm not fond of the reminders one but contacts doesn't look too bad. My only problem with it would be that it still maintains a slightly skeuomorphic look with the ABCD tabs down the side.

<comment><USER5> That's my primary objection. While the rest of the icons look so light and minimalist, the Contacts icon feels heavier, more complex.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Anyone else wobble their Macbook back and forth to see if the background shifts in response? (it doesn't)

<comment><USER7> Going to [https://beta.icloud.com/?crazyAwesome](https://beta.icloud.com/?crazyAwesome) does give you a similar (exaggerated) effect you can play around with using your cursor.

<comment><USER8> I'm curious; how did you know that?

Edit: Ah, of course it's in the source.

<comment><USER7> Yeah, just poking around curious as to how they were implementing the animation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The wireframe icons, the blues in the mail, the red in the calendar. It looks interesting and terrible at the same time. I just don't like it. Maybe I don't because of the sparseness, starkness and of course the notorious gradients. Next to the iWork icons you can tell that the ios7 design update does make the old style look dated, but that doesn't mean it's appealing.

</comment><comment><USER10> Is the contrast[1] as bad as the screenshot in The Verge article[2]??

[1][http://contrastrebellion.com/](http://contrastrebellion.com/)

[2][http://www.theverge.com/2013/8/14/4621422/beta-icloud- websit...](http://www.theverge.com/2013/8/14/4621422/beta-icloud-website- overhauled-with-ios-7-design)

</comment><comment><USER11> Find My iPhone is still using Google Maps. Guess they don't have Apple Maps set up for web embedding.

<comment> UVB-76 This will likely come with OS X Mavericks, which will introduce a Maps app

<comment><USER12> Why would a JS library to show maps on the web come at the same time as a Maps app?

<comment><USER13> The Maps app could use the JS library for rendering. It's possible the app could have a chrome with different features, but use Web Kit to render the actual map.

<comment><USER14>
        % otool -L /System/Library/Frameworks/MapKit.framework/MapKit | grep Web
        %

Nope.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I guess it's a nice design but I really think it's wrong, really wrong to design a webapp like a native app and their apps look empty. For instance, I personally don't care about different kinds of templates in Pages, what I want is collaboration between different users, this is the whole point of the internet to enable synchronization, live updates and sharing... And imitating a desktop with sticky notes on it, it's unbelievable. I wonder if real people use their online apps, I can't imagine this is the case. All it shows to me is how much they don't get the Web and how much it's not in their DNA, it's scary.

<comment> k-mcgrady >> "For instance, I personally don't care about different kinds of templates in Pages, what I want is collaboration between different users"

On the other hand I'm sure a lot of people do care about templates and would never use collaboration. I'm one of them. I don't create text documents often and have never needed to collaborate on one. Collaboration seems like more of an enterprise/business feature to me and that's a market Pages really doesn't seem meant for.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> It also has iOS-style notification popovers at least for mail and calendar.

</comment><comment><USER17> I have never understood why I can't get to photostream through this.

</comment><comment> k-mcgrady Interestingly it looks like they're still using Google Maps in Find My iPhone. I wish they'd also change the name of that seeing as it finds iPhone's, iPad's, and Mac's.

</comment><comment><USER18> This is a good way to see the general direction Apple is taking. I can't wait to see what they're going to do with OS X.

<comment><USER19> Just for fun, this is not a real peek: [http://9to5mac.com/2013/08/08/a-look- at-what-an-ios-7-inspir...](http://9to5mac.com/2013/08/08/a-look-at-what-an- ios-7-inspired-os-x-could-look-like-gallery/)

<comment><USER20> That looks more like what Windows 8 should've looked like in some alternative universe, rather than an upcoming copy of OS X. (Which is, I think, telling about the aesthetic movement going on right now.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Helvetica Neue - that wonderful font again.

Sorry for being off-topic: can anyone please recommend a (legal/accepted) way for licensed use of Helvetica Neue on websites/apps without having to purchase it from expensive font vendors like Adobe or Myfonts?

<comment><USER22> Web use appears to start at 29$:

[http://www.fonts.com/font/linotype/neue- helvetica](http://www.fonts.com/font/linotype/neue-helvetica)

[http://www.linotype.com/1266/neuehelvetica- family.html](http://www.linotype.com/1266/neuehelvetica-family.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I'm curious what technologies are being used for the web version of Keynote / Pages / Numbers. Is Apple using a javascript implementation of Foundation / CoreGraphics, etc. - similar to Objective-J / Cappuccino?

<comment><USER7> Still seems to be based on SproutCore. You can see the list of acknowledgements at the top of one of iWork's source files ([https://beta.icloud.com/applications/iw/1ABeta108/editor/1AB...](https://beta.icloud.com/applications/iw/1ABeta108/editor/1ABeta108/en- us/javascript-packed.js)) to get a rough idea of what they're using.

</comment></comment><comment> k-mcgrady I really like this redesign. The old one was horrible imo and I was worried they'd update iOS 7 and forget about iCloud (even though I don't use the website that often it would still bug me).

</comment><comment><USER24> Seems like it's still being built in Sproutcore, FWIW.

</comment><comment><USER25> I'm still curious what they're going to do about these apps: Find my friends, Airport Utility, Apple Remote, iTunes Connect Mobile, Apple Store.

<comment><USER26> Probably update them after iOS7 ships.

It wouldn't surprise me if they are in the same position as external developers i.e. have to wait until iOS7 GM before the App Store will accept the binary.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> So… how are they doing the blur before you log in? Quick poke around, can't see any -webkit-filter, and can't see any canvas…

<comment><USER28> looks like they are doing it in javascript with data:image/png;base64 urls. Not sure if the blurs are precomputed/stored or computed in the browser.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Is there a way to enable EMACS style bindings in the iCloud Beta iWorks programs? They work in iCloud Mail.

</comment><comment><USER30> I like the new look. They still need to update the iWork icons though.

<comment><USER31> They need to update the iWork suite as a whole. All the iCloud bits have the new UI (Mail, Calendar, Contacts, Reminders, Find my Phone) but the iWork bits all have old UI.

Maybe it's going to be an overhaul of the iWork UI across all their systems?

<comment> k-mcgrady It's strange they created it using the old look when it was presumably in development around the same time as iOS 7. I imagine the iWork team saw iOS 7 announced at the keynote and though "shit, why did nobody tell us?".

<comment><USER32> Judging by class names in the div soup of iWork webapp it supports theming, so presumably they'll flip the switch "when it's ready".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Works quite well in FireFox, which is nice until you use the find my phone which requires Google API for some reason (which I have blocked). I prefer developers to use their own javascript. Why wouldn't they?

</comment><comment><USER34> Correction: iCloud Beta Incorporates windows (Metro) look and feel.

<comment><USER35> Except not at all. This has a very different look and feel.

Everything with a modern design is not a copy of Metro. Windows wasn't the first to do flat designs, and most designs (like this) that people say look like metro don't resemble it.

<comment><USER36> But it is Microsoft who made it trendy among web designers and even influenced Apple. Ironically this trend started by a company which was remarked as "tasteless" by Steve Jobs.

<comment><USER37> There really wasn't one company that made flat design trendy. Microsoft wanted to use web technologies as part of their main OS and flat design was already popular. Microsoft went with the flow like everyone else and they didn't set any trends.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Good Guys Bring Down the Mega-D Botnet - <AUTHOR> http://www.pcworld.com/article/185122/good_guys_bring_down_the_megad_botnet.html <comment><USER2> It seems like the major email providers could justify paying security experts to take down other botnets. 11% drop in spam has to have a positive impact on their bottom line. If you are MS, Google, or Yahoo with millions of accounts all that spam must represent a chunk of bandwidth, storage, and processing power.

<comment><USER3> It would probably be worth it for the other bot-net operators to pay for that service as well. Unless there's some sort of honor among bot-net operators.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> That is pretty fascinating. It reminds me of an article I read some months back about one security specialist who got a sample of a bot, hacked into it, figured out how it communicated with the server via an IRC chat link and then created a "fake bot" which allowed him to spy on what the spammers were using the bots for (in this case to launch DDOS attacks). Eventually he made contact with the owner of the bot net and threatened him into shutting it down. It was some 13 year old kid.

<comment><USER5> Maybe Steve Gibson? This article was linked here two weeks ago:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=992830>

<comment><USER4> That's it. Thanks for finding it! I'm going to bookmark this for the future.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Can virus scanners prevent computers from being infected from this stuff? If so, the government should provide free virus scan for all computers. Increase taxes if necessary, but this will secure the capitalistic infrastructure that make jobs, specifically in the tech industry, better by saving money for those companies that would otherwise be spent on futile individually divided attempts at securing the internet.

We spend money on local law enforcement and the military to secure us from physical threats, but digital attacks can probably have the potential to damage our infrastructure (especially as we move more towards a digital dependency) just as much as a physical attack. So I think it makes sense that computer security should become a right for the country as a whole.

At the very least a distributed "virus scan" that's present on all US computers, and controlled by the good guys can be used to undermine the bad guys who have illegitimately infected people's computers.

<comment><USER7> In addition to the good concerns about exactly who has the power to run privileged code on your computer, I will also point out that:

A: If you are serious about 'mandating', you just toasted alternative operating systems, and have grotesquely complicated server operators lives, among others; the world is full of more situations than could even begin to be covered by such a policy.

B: What you want won't work anyhow, as your first premise is false: "virus scanners prevent computers from being infected from this stuff". They aren't perfect. Mandating a monoculture of security software simply means that people have to use hacks that work against the current software. (Or a de facto monoculture brought on by a small set of legal choices, or a de facto monoculture brought on by a wide array of choices but one "default" choice. Note that "allowing people to opt out" is simply recreating the current situation, only with a lot more government for no apparent reason.)

Of course, quite a lot of those hacks will involve forging the presence of the software, making it look like the anti-virus is still running when it actually isn't. A task that is very difficult today, you made easy by "mandating" which software it needs to be, which is whatever the gov provides by default.

Even beyond the legitimate concerns expressed by the other posters, your idea is worthless from a security point of view. Security problems go well beyond "not everybody is running a virus scanner", or any other set of defined software, and you would actually make things worse, not better.

Of course you will disagree, because in your head security software is perfect and you can't perceive the massive problems that would result from your suggestion, since you're working with mental ideation primitives that don't correspond to anything that exists in the real world. There isn't much I can do about that, other than point it out.

<comment><USER6> Perhaps "mandating" is too strong a word. Simply subsidizing or allowing security software to be obtained free would achieve the same effect. I meant "to make into law" when I said "mandate."

When I say "opt out", I simply mean that the security software is freely available, but not forced onto your computer. I'm not proposing some sort of communistic action plan. I'm simply suggesting that if the the government provided security software for free, more people would have access to it, and the effect of viruses on businesses can be curtailed.

> Of course you will disagree, because in your head security software is > perfect and you can't perceive the massive problems that would result from > your suggestion, since you're working with mental ideation primitives that > don't correspond to anything that exists in the real world.

You're absolutely right. My suggestion is predicated upon the idealization of antivirus software. _Which is exactly why I started out my suggestion with a question about whether or not virus scans can detect this stuff that cause botnets._ And then I followed with an _if this is true_ ... then take my suggestion seriously. I never meant to imply that I know much about the efficacy of a virus scanner. In fact, I use a mac, so my exposure to them has been limited.

I don't know how you got a look inside my head, but you clearly need glasses.

Second of all I think you, and a lot of other people who down-modded me may have jumped to conclusions when I used the words "mandate" and suggested the government do something for the greater good. I'm not suggesting something akin to the communist green dam software. My suggestion is probably less controversial than the healthcare plan, since it would be cheaper to implement. It's more like the government digital converter box subsidy program if anything.

So assuming if everyone had virus scan, would it help? If it doesn't, then why did I waste money on Norton antivirus on my PC? Surely virus scan must be able to do something. Definitions can be easily updated across the installed base to counter the latest zombie virus. If you have evidence that this would all be futile, then I retract all my statements about giving this supposedly useless product out to everyone. You probably know more about virus scanners than I do, and I'm not here to argue with you about their efficacy. So unlike what you thought I wiould do, I am not going to disagree with you about their efficacy.

<comment><USER8> Doesn't Windows already come with a virus scanner, provided for free by Microsoft? I don't know for sure, since I only boot XP to play games, but it keeps nagging me about having all their security things enabled.

<comment><USER6> I'm pretty sure xp doesn't have one. But if windows 7 has one then that would be a nice group who can receive virus definitions to root out botnets right? I mean this potentially larger pool of virus scan enabled computers can be used to push updates to. Otherwise they'll be stuck to blocking out dns right?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Consultants Don't Pivot, Founders Do - <AUTHOR> http://steveblank.com/2010/05/13/consultants-don%E2%80%99t-pivot-founders-do/

<comment><USER2> > "Great, but we're having a bit of a problem getting traction." (Anytime I > hear an entrepreneur talking in euphemisms, I get nervous.)

Haha, I love that line. It's so true

<comment><USER3> Exactly. If you're having problem getting traction it cannot be going great.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> As a consultant that does understand customer development (unlike the example which paints all contractors with the same brush) I feel like this Steve post is based on iffy logic.

Our clients pay us to be highly opinionated; in fact, they hired us over the other guy because we were willing to give them the straight goods even when the news isn't good.

In a properly functioning founder-consultant relationship, it is the founder's job to take all of the factors into consideration and pivot when appropriate. The consultant has no business making this call; we can only inform and opine.

What we can and should do (as consultants) is help the founder exercise control over the scope, thereby allowing the Blank-approved Minimum Viable Product to actually be minimal.

In fact, we're in a better position to help scope growth than a founder/developer, or someone working for a founder. We're emotionally more removed (but still passionate) such that we can say no to features that distract from the core value of the business proposition.

Pivoting is much harder when development strays from the minimum viable product.

</comment><comment><USER5> Most product managers don't pivot either, unfortunately. Pivoting is even harder than keeping things simple (which most product managers can't do, either).

<comment><USER6> Why the random dig on product managers? Most [fill in the blank]s don't pivot either.

I think it really comes down to the organization's culture and the executive leadership. PMs will often be asked to create a roadmap, and then that roadmap gets approved, and then features get executed against that. If that is the structure then it is hard for _anyone_ to pivot.

<comment><USER7> (Speaking as a PM) --- because it's the PM's job to pivot.

<comment><USER6> Not disputing that but sometimes the org around a PM just won't allow for it.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


chkservice – A tool for managing systemd units from the linux terminal - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/linuxenko/chkservice <comment><USER2> It is of course _not_ a GUI, as its doco claims. It is a TUI.

And apparently only Debian Linux users get a manual for it.</comment>


TC39: Open and Incremental Approach Improves Standards Process - <AUTHOR> https://www.sitepen.com/blog/2017/04/06/tc39-open-and-incremental-approach-improves-standards-process <comment><USER2> The TC39 process isn't perfect, but it's definitely _much_ better than what it used to be. Particularly, the effort to bring discussions into light and provide the ability to engage in the development of the various proposals[1] has – I believe – really improved the state of affairs. Mailing lists are a terrible format for this I think. A clear definition of the stages[2] also doesn't hurt. Recently, a decision was made to ensure all stage 1 proposals (i.e. anything above strawmen) are migrated to the TC39 repo[3], which is I think a good example of how the process is incrementally improved. This is easily the kind of thing that could've been discussed and decided upon behind closed doors, but instead it's in the open for anyone to read and get involved. Kudos.

Unfortunately, the same can't necessarily be said for the other bodies. WHATWG for instance may put things online and discuss things in the open, but unless you're an editor or one of the blessed few I get the distinct feeling that your contributions are more of a nuisance than anything else, making the whole thing look like process theatre to me. I may well be wrong, but that's my impression. (Note: I haven't been personally affected by this, it's just my impression from reading the discussion on various WHATWG specs.)

[1]: [https://github.com/tc39/proposals](https://github.com/tc39/proposals)

[2]: [https://tc39.github.io/process-document](https://tc39.github.io/process- document)

[3]: [https://github.com/tc39/proposals/issues/44](https://github.com/tc39/proposals/issues/44)</comment>