16th Century Book Can Be Read Six Different Ways - <AUTHOR> http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/16th-century-book-bound-dos-a-dos <comment><USER2> So if I'm understanding this correctly, it is a way to cleverly package 6 books as one unit so that there are six different ways to open the package, each way giving you access to a different one of the six books.

Is there any advantage in this method for the reader over the usual method of simply printing all 6 books in one normal volume, with something between each adjacent pair so you can quickly open it to the book you are interested in? Or is this just one of those "do it because it is cool" things?

<comment><USER3> i think the only advantage is that binding books back then was expensive as hell... so maybe this crazy 6-way binding could have cost 2x or 3x and it would still be cheaper then paying the normal 6x.

not to mention you save the weight of extra 10 front and back covers.

now, why they didn't simply make the 6 volumes in the same book and put some tabs protruding from the pages, i will never know. there is a russian book binder faux anecdote there...

<comment><USER4> I'm rather confident in saying that this was more of a novelty to show off book binding mastery and was probably some gift to a noble.

<comment><USER3> or that is the heavily modded 'workstation' of a geek that needed to travel with those 6 books?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> What I find most fascinating about things like that is that when you look at the pictures of the book you see an old, shriveled up, bent, corroded, bland, demure type of book; but I am sure that when this book was new it was an object of perfection.

It's kind of like how when we look at old pictures of "olden times" there is a certain perception or assumption about things and way of life because you are looking at images that are black and white and washed out and people have that corpse look to them simply due to the nature of the technology. Reality was quite different though, in reality that world that we think of as being black and white and populated with corpse looking people was more or less just as colorful as the world you and I live in.

I don't even know if it would be possible with this artifact, but I am sure you could assemble some master book binders and maybe some metallurgists or blacksmiths in order to painstakingly reconstruct the book using the same techniques and materials, yet without the possible exponentially more experienced skill level of the original master artisan.

The old masters or centuries ago, the men and women that created things by hand and skill that had been passed down for generations and which have largely been lost with industrialization have my utter most respect and reverence.

</comment><comment><USER5> That is pretty cool, now I just need Meade or someone to make a six subject notebook like this :-)

<comment><USER6> I'm in for two! Actually it would be good to see an instructable on how to make one.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Reminds me of the ancient Indian poet whose poems gave one meaning left to right and totally different meaning right to left

<comment><USER8> Indeed, Venkatadhvari's 17th century Sanskrit work _Raghava Yadaveeyam_ narrates the story of Ramayana (left-to-right) and Mahabharata (right-to-left) simultaneously.

[http://www.sanskritebooks.org/2009/09/raghava-yadaviyam- with...](http://www.sanskritebooks.org/2009/09/raghava-yadaviyam-with-english- translation/)

<comment><USER9> It's a whole genre actually.*

*[http://cup.columbia.edu/book/extreme-poetry/9780231151603](http://cup.columbia.edu/book/extreme-poetry/9780231151603)

<comment><USER10> there have been a number of simple examples in modern times -- poems that cycle through a pessimistic statement, a statement like "we will never see the day when", and an optimistic statement, and end with the line "now read from bottom to top" (which makes the middle line negate the pessimistic statement instead of the optimistic one.)

For example, [http://www.independent.co.uk/news/weird-news/14yearold- floor...](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/weird-news/14yearold-floors-the- world-with-deceptively-simple-poem-9158069.html)

<comment><USER11> I always found those super tacky. I wonder if it'll get posted on Hacker News in the year 5015 as an example of brilliant 21st century poetry. I also wonder if Venkatadhvari's contemporaries found him to be tacky.

<comment><USER12> From a different comment in this discussion:

> They were a whole genre of poems called "adhama kavyas." Literally, in > Sanskrit, it means 'inferior poems'.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This was basically built for Hopscotch [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hopscotch_(Julio_Cortázar_nove...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hopscotch_\(Julio_Cortázar_novel\))</comment>


Front end or Back end – what would you suggest I learn first in today's market? - <AUTHOR> im a college student with an interest in web development.<p>i am wondering if the field is saturated and if i should focus on one side primarily (or learn it first) and then learn the other later <comment><USER2> Both. Give it time. See where it goes. Learn what fits you. Learning both is the same amount of work...or maybe less because knowing one means you will struggle when and where it meets the other.

</comment><comment><USER3> Although it's a growing field, no, it's not saturated at all.

Start with whatever you feel most confortable with. Frontend is usually more rewarding at first because you end up with something visual you can show to others.</comment>


My day as a software engineer during quarantine - <AUTHOR> https://youtu.be/K2e9kkEiaSQ <comment><AUTHOR> This video is about my random day working from home as a developer.

Each day is different and it's taken some time to get used to the new situation, but the routines I've established definitely help.</comment>


Is it costly to develop a native application for the desktop? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> To do it yourself, no. It costs your time and whatever you might have made doing something else with that time.

To pay someone else to do it, yes. The cost _generally_ scales with the complexity of the app.

However.. I suspect the 'native' in the question means you're asking if native development costs more than hybrid development using Electron (or something similar). In that case the answer is that it's more expensive to write natively, but not by as much as you'd think. A lot of the work on an app is actually very reusable between platforms (art assets, sounds, business logic, algorithms, project management, etc). The code itself isn't very reusable, but that's usually only around 30% of the total budget, so writing a native app for two platforms ends up being _about_ 30% more than one platform because that's the bit you end up doing twice.</comment>


Why CMSes suck for front-end developers - <AUTHOR> http://www.onderhond.com/blog/work/cms-skinning-html

<comment><USER2> The solution to this is simple: Roll your own.

3rd party CMSs seem like such a great thing when you first implement them. But after a while you always run into the things the author describes. There are simply no options out there that can compete with a simple CMS that you build from scratch.

Keep it simple, as in, a few textareas that accept HTML and spit it out verbatim. Deal with all the SEO bits such as good urls, meta descriptions, etc. so that it works in the correct way. Incorporate it into your actual site shell, as opposed to trying to create a fragile little WordPress theme that sorta looks like your site. Make it modular enough that you can drop it into every new project you do from here on out.

It'll take you two days to do this. If it takes longer, you're overengineering. Stop and redesign from scratch for the whole thing to live in two tables with a half dozen fields each. You don't need a little tree structure where you can drag nodes around, jQuery style. You just need a table full of content and a way to display it.

From there, it's maybe a few hours per existing site to rip out the garbage CMS you're currently using and retrofit yours in its place. You'll never look back.

</comment><comment><USER3> Surely there must be a product out there which allows you to have complete control over every aspect of the templates, the HTML and the CSS. Anyone got any suggestions?

<comment><USER4> I work on one which gives developers total control of front-end views, and is mainly intended to make it easier to develop new models/behaviour, and add administration UI. But it gets dismissed because of the server-side language (Coldfusion). The framework/CMS is FarCry (<http://www.farcrycore.org/>).

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Simply don't use some prefab CMS. The reason there are about a gazillion CMS's out there is because it's really easy to write one, opposed to e.g. writing a really good search engine, which is difficult and there is only one of those.

Use a good web application framework and separate your front facing site from your content management system.

</comment><comment><USER6> I code a custom CMS when I can't find a CMS that does 99% of my required features out of the box. Otherwise it's simply not worth my time.

A CMS is lost if tries to dictate the HTML output, sadly most of them do.

My best bet is to use frameworks/libraries to achieve the needed features. I look at his as a Lego building project.</comment>


Why does Sweden have so many billionaires? - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/business/billion_to_one/2013/10/sweden_s_billionaires_they_have_more_per_capita_than_the_united_states.html <comment><USER5> "But they haven't stopped Swedish entrepreneurs from building giant firms like H&M, Ikea, and Tetra Pak."

Look at when the mentioned companies were founded:

IKEA - <USER2>

H&M - <USER3>

Tetra Pak - <USER4>

Then look at the historical tax-to-GDP ratio chart here:

[http://www.ekonomifakta.se/sv/Fakta/Skatter/Skattetryck/](http://www.ekonomifakta.se/sv/Fakta/Skatter/Skattetryck/)

The companies were founded in low-tax, pre-welfare Sweden.

<comment><USER6> Or, you know, it could be the fact that Sweden's industrial capacity survived WWII largely intact and so the country in general was better positioned than the rest of Europe to make money.

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

<comment><USER7> The same thing helped out post-war America as well. Was isn't good for the economy on average, but when all of your industrialized competitors get bombs dropped all over them and/or occupied your relative advantage in manufactured goods goes way up.

<comment><USER8> This theory doesn't hold up at all. Germany nearly flattened, and yet, they had the Wirtschaftswunder ( [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirtschaftswunder](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirtschaftswunder) ). In fact, it wasn't just that Germany was bombed, but after the war their machinery and even their top talent were ruthlessly pillaged by both the West and the Soviets. And yet, Germany emerged just as well (or better by some measures) industrially than Sweden or the US.

If you want more counter-examples, look to Japan, nothern Italy, or Austria, whose industrial capacity and economy became exceedingly powerful after the war.

<comment><USER9> A lot has to do with the stability of your society; as long as your government and talent is relatively intact, you can rebuild quite quickly even from extreme catastrophes. Its only when you start "liquidating" the intelligentsia (Cambodia, Soviet purges) where you begin to take steps back, or maybe a prolonged multi-decade war or colonial occupation (Afghanistan, India).

<comment><USER10> I would wonder if the Marshall Plan didn't contribute greatly to the post-war success of Western Europe (as was the intention of the program). A cursory glance over the Effects section of the Wikipedia page shows that the effects of the plan greatly increased Western Europe's industrial and agricultural standing.

<comment><USER9> It sped things up, but I doubt much more than that. Look at the money we pump into Africa and the developing world; without the right society in place, that money just evaporates into short term fixes along with a lot of corruption and waste (not saying we should stop, but we have to do it better than we are).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The conventional story about Swedish wealth is a joke. In fact, wealth was primarily accumulated under a largely free market system between 1840 and 1970 or so. After that the welfare state started expanding in earnest and it has mostly been downhill from there, e.g. Sweden going from the fourth richest country to the fourteenth.

[http://meriksson.net/how-sweden-became-rich](http://meriksson.net/how-sweden- became-rich)

<comment><USER12> Sweden has acquired much more wealth since 60's than before. Something like 600 times more.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> "The authors contrasted American-style cutthroat capitalism with Nordic-style cuddly capitalism"

America hasn't had cut-throat Capitalism in a century.

Few seem to understand the difference between 19th century Capitalism, with actual free markets, and 21st century Socialism. You'd think the entire 19th century never happened, such that authors have no reference source for actual 'cut-throat' Capitalism.

We have soft European Socialism. The government system spends 40% of GDP ($6.7 trillion out of $17 trillion). We don't have a free market in nearly any sector, including the biggest such as: healthcare, education, banking, telecom, energy, utilities. When 80% of your economy lacks any _actual_ free markets, how can one claim Capitalism as the system?

In fact, our government spends so much we're bankrupt a few times over when you count entitlements + public debt, none of which can ever be paid in full. The public debt is of course laughable, we couldn't pay it down in a century of surpluses, even at 2% interest rates. We're currently in the process of actively defaulting on our debt, using QE (aka debt monetization) to devalue said debt.

The Federal Government alone spends so much, it's half the size of the entire Chinese economy.

We have the largest welfare system in world history, by far. We have the largest entitlement system in history, by far. We have the largest government- controlled health system in history, by far.

America has more regulations on its books than any other country, by far. We add thousands upon thousands of regulations annually. We have the most regulated economy in history, there isn't even a close #2.

Our taxes are worse than Canada (supposedly a semi-Socialist nation), and among the highest for industrialized nations when you count local + state + federal. We also have the largest and most convoluted tax system by far, the total IRS tax code is so large no human could ever reasonably read it.

Where's the Capitalism? It doesn't exist.

<comment><USER14> > 21st century Socialism

If you think that any major world economy is socialist, you're deluded.

> Our taxes are worse than Canada (supposedly a semi-Socialist nation)

Wait, what, no, it isn't. Why do you think this? Are you confusing socialism with social democracy, or something?

<comment><USER15> One thing you should understand about Americans is that the word 'socialist' means something a bit different to them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> > _Their reasoning was that high levels of inequality create financial > incentives for innovation_

>>[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbS9jZOlQjc](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbS9jZOlQjc)

Maybe we should tell those kids in somalia to "innovate" a steak or a hamburger...

American today are living off the golden age when a man could work his way up and actually move up in life. I say _actually_ because they had the means to do so.

If you are too poor you can't afford shit, you can't afford to go to college, to move to an area with better jobs (or less cancer) let alone dropping everything and building a startup.

Why you think YC started giving out $20k? so founders wouldn't starve during the 3 months they are skipping from work. It might be news for some here but most young people have no savings and their parents can't support them anymore.

Back in 1950 you could live off a part-time gig waiting tables while you were in college/building something, but today? don't make me laugh.

<comment><USER17> It's a myth that this is no longer possible. Want to know how I know? Because I did it.

I grew up poor. My parents told me if I was going to college, I'd have to figure out how to do it myself because they couldn't afford to help me. So I did. I worked hard in high school, scored a 30 on the ACT, got some scholarships and paid the rest myself from jobs worked during school and money saved during the summer.

I earned my CS degree, got out and found a job, and now I have a (different) job where I can afford a 2000 sq. ft. house that I currently owe just over $100k on and still have plenty of money to save up.

People today are generally either lazier or less imaginative. I'm not sure which.

<comment><USER18> I did it, therefore everyone can do it? This kind of thinking is completely counter-productive to working towards a solution where no-one _has_ to do it. Unfortunately such a myopic self-accountability for one's own situation is deeply ingrained in the American mythos. Ironically, this conception leads to some of the lowest socio-economic mobility amongst developed nations. After all, if anyone can get to where I am, anyone who isn't where I am is in their position because they're too lazy. No need to look at education, incarceration, safety net programs and healthcare.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socio- economic_mobility_in_the_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socio- economic_mobility_in_the_United_States#Comparisons_with_other_countries)

Key quote: ... 42 percent of American men raised in the bottom fifth of incomes stay there as adults. That shows a level of persistent disadvantage much higher than in Denmark (25 percent) and Britain (30 percent).

<comment><USER19> I think there is a position in the middle between you and the person you responded. I see a lot of kids now that have grown up with that attitude that it is never their fault. That leads to not taking responsibility for their own situation.

When I was growing up, it didn't matter if I was right. If a teacher called the house it was _always_ my fault and I was punished. Now it seems teachers are blamed for simply trying to do the right thing. Parents take their kids side even when they are grossly wrong. A local murder case where 2 teens shot and killed a guy after luring him to buy a truck has their parents and friends posting 'free <whatever the idiot thugs are called>' on facebook and twitter.

So while you are right that a lot of factors come into play when attempting to move up the ladder, you cannot completely absolve the individuals responsibility for their own situation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> One thing missed by the article is that Sweden was one of the few European highly industrialized nations that weren't ravaged by WWII (due to their neutrality, in turn due their perceived Arianism by Germany), so in 1946, they could start making and selling stuff to Europe which desperately needed, well, everything.

<comment><USER21> _due their perceived Arianism by Germany_

As opposed to Denmark and Norway? It's more likely that the Germans got what they wanted anyway (Sweden sold Germany a lot of steel) and didn't have resources to occupy Sweden just for the principle of it.

<comment><USER22> It's not like they had any particular interest in Norway, either. It was only about preventing the Brits from setting up shop, which they were in fact poised to do.

<comment><USER23> It was also about securing Narvik, a very important harbor at the time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> The article tells one story, and it is true, but it is not the story why Sweden has many billionaires. Many of facts mentioned in the article are quite recent reforms, and can in themselves not explain this.

I recall that in 1997 the social democratic government introduced tax exemptions for the very rich, put in front of the threat by Stefan Persson that H&M might move abroad otherwise

This old, Google-translated link to an article in Affärsvärlden (Sweden's "Financial Times") describes a more relevant piece to the puzzle.

[http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&pr...](http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&prev=_dd&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.affarsvarlden.se%2Fhem%2Fnyheter%2Farticle2561362.ece)

</comment><comment><USER25> This might be relevant: I've summarized a few lessons from when IKEA and H&M were startups:

[http://blog.trejdify.com/2012/08/lessons-learned-hm- startup....](http://blog.trejdify.com/2012/08/lessons-learned-hm-startup.html)

[http://blog.trejdify.com/2012/08/lessons-learned-ikea- startu...](http://blog.trejdify.com/2012/08/lessons-learned-ikea-startup.html)

</comment><comment><USER26> You could ask the Lithuanians, I'm sure they would have some colorful input.

<comment><USER27> Why is that?

<comment><USER26> The housing market and quite a few banks are effectively being taken over by Swedish banks. People are buying property but the mortgages are paying into the pockets of non national banks, so money spent to have a home in Lithuania is leaving the country to pay for social services in Sweden.

It's a bit of a political debate for some.

<comment><USER28> > social services in Sweden

What's fun to note about social services in Sweden is that they're bleeding money like a motherfucker: more people are using the hospitals, schools, welfare checks, etc. More and more people are jobless and unproductive, even more unproductive people are being imported every year (over 140.000 immigrants are estimated to arrive during 2014), the services are prone to nepotism and very generous salaries for politicians and bosses (sometimes they're synonymous), etc.

The Swedish economy is a bomb waiting to explode, and Swedes are too afraid to speak about it for fear of being called racist or islamophobe or what not.

So... SNAFU. Just like the rest of Europe. Sucks to not be a politician / municipal boss right now. They're the only ones who have it blissfully easy.

<comment><USER29> Yes, there are a lot of immigrants in sweden. All of them that I have met (except for the ones from the E.U) have been productive members of society.

There's the turk system administrator, the iranian who's also going to be a system administrator (once he gets a visa and my employer can actually hire him), the chinese guys, the pakistanians and so on....

Ironically the people from the E.U. that I know have been the people that are actually abusing the system. Like the welshman who is being "burned out" (no, he's not), and the irish guy who keep bouncing between jobs, and there are more people like this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Sweden also have surprisingly many millionaires as well (69,800 millionaires) of a population of 9,5 million. The number have increased significantly the last years.

[http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=2054&art...](http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=2054&artikel=5568950)

As a Swede who have started businesses in Finland, South Korea and Lithuania, I do agree with the article that Sweden is the easiest country to start and run a company in. And the relative high taxes is nothing that bother me at all. I don't mind paying more if the service provided by it was justified.

</comment><comment><USER31> "No single Swede comes close to the epic wealth of a Bill Gates or a Warren Buffett." \-- wasn't Ingvar Kamprad (of IKEA fame) more wealthy than Gates at one point? Due to some currency being strong, iirc.

<comment><USER32> Hans Rausing of TetraPak is currently worth $11B according for Forbes. That's fairly close to Buffett's $55B.

<comment><USER33> In the same way that 20k a year and 100k a year are fairly close salaries ;)

<comment><USER34> 11 digits and 11 digits are the same order of magnitude, at least.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> If you look at multiple indexes that rank countries by competitiveness, low corruption and infrastructure, Sweden and other Nordic countries are usually in top 10.

If you think countries as companies, they would be like business parks. You can compete with low price or good infrastructure. Sweden is Google of countries. It provides highly educated people, good infrastructure, safety and low corruption with higher price. This will inevitability drive out low margin industries that rely on cheap labour but it will be good environment for high- and middle-tech companies.

</comment><comment><USER22> At a theoretical level you would expect a free market system to produce very few billionaires. Low regulatory barriers to entry and easy capital formation mean high profit margins get rapidly eaten by competitors.

If you look around the world today, in practice billionaires and big government do seem to go hand in hand. Consider the massive barriers to entry to the US financial system erected by very wealthy people. Or more egregiously look at the Russian oligarchs.

<comment><USER35> >If you look around the world today, in practice billionaires and big government do seem to go hand in hand.

Of course. The bigger and more powerful the government, the more likely powerful people will seek to control it to their own ends.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I read "Why does Snowden..." lol :)</comment>


DormItem: 50,000 listings (3,700 a week), how we got there, and where we're going - <AUTHOR> http://dormitem.com/blog/177

<comment><USER2> I know optimism is nice and all, but what makes you think Facebook isn't going to crush you?

<comment><USER3> If you are only after millions and not billions, there is generally always business room for a #2, 3, 4, etc. Different UI and customer acquisition processes will naturally create different niches. Even if these niches are way smaller than the biggest group, they could still make very lucrative businesses if operated intelligently.

In classifieds in particular, there is often incentive to list the item multiple places if you want to move it quickly. Spillover from the largest sites alone could create a nice business.

<comment><USER2> These are college classifieds. Most of their target market visits their main competitor _every day_. The number two or three general classifieds site could maybe make a dollar or two, but when you're that marginalized in a niche market, the chances of success are pretty slim.

I'm sure the people behind this site have other ideas, and the opportunity cost of continuing to pursue this one probably isn't worth it. Best of luck to them.

<comment><USER3> Well if they can get 100,000 live listings and they can get average views up to about 1 a day per listing (seems doable at their rate with organic traffic and such) and get $10CPM off of Adsense or whatever (~ what I get across my ad-based sites), then they're talking $1000/day or $365K a year. If it costs essentially $0 to operate and it is one or two people, that is a decent salary (especially for one). Additionally, if it costs hardly anything to maintain (including their time), they can run this thing for cash and work on other things at the same time.

Also most of their target market may visit FB every day, but not all. And some will just search the Internet for listings. Some of course go to craigslist and other sites. And plenty of non-college people could see the listings too through Internet searches and contact the college kids. There are lots of opportunities here.

I guess what I'm saying is if they want to give up and give me their site, I'm sure I can make some money off it given their decent start without trying to hard (read using much of my time) :)

<comment><USER4> Thanks for the shout out and ideas..I would put the emphasis on two things:

1 - with free listings (both on the FB marketplace and on other classified sites) there is no limit to where a student would post to get exposure

2- there is plenty of distribution/technology opportunities outside of Facebook. Granted facebook is a huge platform that is impossible to compete with - we know that. But people use other sites and always will, and there is always room for innovation. For example, Facebook doesn't have a global marketplace search.

-Dan DormItem</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What are startups working in field of Bionics and Biomechatronics? - <AUTHOR> I am quite interested in those field as well as interested in working for a startup. I want to know what is the future scope in those fields? <comment><USER2> A lot and not enough. My guess/hope is 40% of south Florida startups? 80% of Minneapolis St. Paul startups? 33% of San Diego startups? Look around those locations and Boston.

I used to do surgical AR. The immediate-now-future is nanodevices, rDNA pharma / gene therapy, and more exotic chemistry. Hardware and software only play a supporting role and smaller role in the final clinically approved therapy. No matter your background all require organic, molecular and various biochemistry or medical skills - probably not as much mechanical engineering as you hope now that CRISPR is here.

<comment><AUTHOR> But what about more hardware oriented bio support system. BIO+ MECHNICAL/ MECHATRONICS Like prosthesis, bionics arms, artificial limbs etc? The one you mentioned is more on bio and chemistry side which I don't have a long term focus and interest.

<comment><USER2> I would guess that the ability to grow new limbs and organs in a e.g. a petri dish is the end goal and where a lot of current development efforts are. My feelings are really influenced by a couple of ME's I've worked with with decades experience between them - they want to move towards software or biochem, the writing is on the wall. The only way you can do implements or tools is when you work with the creator of new medical procedures and they need something that doesn't exist - and willing to wait 5-10 years for it to pass FDA approval.

The DoD and VA are doing a lot of amazing work with biomech and limbs, if that's you're interest.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I was thinking about this today. Neuroprosthetics with feedback is the most exciting. The type where people can actually sense touch on the prosthetic limb...but it's probably still in the "research" phase. Any startup trying to do this may need to work with a doctor. You may also need to do surgery to access the nerves...or maybe there's a better way..

I'd love to work on something like this too!

<comment><AUTHOR> Exactly, neuriprosthetics is one, we also have exoskeleton, soft bionics too.. I think it's a pretty wide and active field to work in.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> israeli re:walk is perhaps the biggest player in the exoskeleton field</comment>


The mind readers - <AUTHOR> http://mosaicscience.com/story/mind-readers <comment><USER2>
         "My colleagues have been doing fMRI on my wife's tummy every
          week for a few weeks now to see if we can activate the fetus's
          brain," he writes

Craziness. A very thorough article on coma, vegetative states, methods and research in the area.</comment>


What are the benefits of using Bitcoin? - <AUTHOR> http://www.quora.com/What-are-the-benefits-of-using-Bitcoin

<comment><USER2> "Essentially, many of the same things that give gold value, give bitcoins value"

But gold is real, tangible. Bitcoins are... bits. Assume some kind of real social upheaval in the future. Computer networks, power grids collapse. Bitcoins will evaporate. Even paper currency will likely be worthless, as its value is not inherent. Or less apocalyptic, assume some clever person figures out how to hack bitcoins and counterfeit them easily. Poof, they are worthless.

Gold will always be gold.

<comment><USER3> Gold has no inherent value, either. Without some kind of government guaranteeing that gold will work as money, I'm not giving you anything of actual value (like food, fuel, livestock, weapons, or ammo) in exchange for gold in the post apocalyptic world.</comment></comment>


An equation that takes Pythagoras to a new level - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/starts-with-a-bang/this-one-equation-10%C2%B2-11%C2%B2-12%C2%B2-13%C2%B2-14%C2%B2-takes-pythagoras-to-a-whole-new-level-ff588f1d13b6 <comment><USER2> The linked paper [https://fermatslibrary.com/s/proof-without-words- pythagorean...](https://fermatslibrary.com/s/proof-without-words-pythagorean- runs) gives you the formula and I am much more a symbols guy than a geometry guy so I will prove it that way, first rearrange it:

(4T_n)^2=(4T_n+1)^2-(4T_n-1)^2+....(4T_n+n)^2-(4T_n-n)^2

Now, (4T_n+k)^2-(4T_n-k)^2=16T_nk (this, of course, shows up in the geometric proof as four rectangles where one side is 4T_n and the other is k)

so this is equivalent to

16T_nT_n = 16 T_n (1+...n)

which is equvialent to:

T_n=1+...n

But that is the very definition of T_n. Q.e.d.

Also if you want to take Pythagoras to a new level, Edsger W. Dijkstra who is much better known for his work in CS has a very interesting formulation [https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/E...](https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD09xx/EWD975.html) proving sgn(alpha+beta-gamma)=sgn(a^2+b^2-c^2) which includes and extends the Pythagoras theorem.

<comment><USER3> Wow, fermatslibrary has gone further downhill. It's almost unusable now with all the engagement stuff.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The caption "The equation 1⁰² + 1¹² + 1²² = 1³² + 1⁴², whose answer is that both sides equal 365, was immortalized in a different form in this 1895 painting: "Mental Arithmetic. In the Public School of S. Rachinsky." (NIKOLAY BOGDANOV-BELSKY)" has funky exponents. Medium requires that I make an account to say that, so I am saying it here.

<comment><USER5> I think the equation on the board is ( 10^2 + 11^2 + 12^2 +13^2 + 14^2 ) / 365 which solves for 2.

The students are expected solve this with "Mental Arithmetic". Try that in your head!

<comment><USER6> Assuming one's memorized a table of squares already.

10^2 = 100

11^2 + 13^2 = 121 + 169 = 290

12^2 + 14^2 = 144 + 196 = 340

100 + 290 + 340 = 730

730 / 365 = 2

<comment><USER7> You can also "walk it up" if you haven't memorized them:

          10^2*5
        + (10+11)*4
        + (11+12)*3
        + (12+13)*2
        + (13+14)
        </comment></comment></comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>

           500
         +  84
         +  69
         +  50
         +  27
         -----
           730

It's a bit of detail to juggle in your head but not too bad if you hang on to your current subtotal and remember where you are in the sequence to compute the next addend, and you know it's easier to add multi-digit numbers left-to- right than-right to-left.

You only carry from the ones place twice.

</comment><comment><USER8> Ptolemy's theorem is another Pythagoras on steroids

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bJOuzqu3MUQ](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bJOuzqu3MUQ)

</comment><comment><USER9> I thought this was going to help me with Project Euler 261 [0], but it's not exactly the same, so no luck so far. Cool article anyway; linking geometry and algebra is always satisfactory.

[0] [https://projecteuler.net/problem=261](https://projecteuler.net/problem=261)

<comment><USER7> How much CPU time and number theory do problems in that range generally require?

Brute force search of 10^10 (with some automatic monitoring of how wide a range of 'm' to scan at each candidate) is a lot but not a lot of a lot, if you code in a CPU efficient language and maybe use parallel computation and are willing to wait a while.

<comment><USER9> The difficulty and the required run time vary a lot starting from problem 150 or so. This one seems particularly difficult (it's rated at 85% difficulty, which is also the highest I've managed to solve). The problem here is that the search space is not 10^10, but higher, since if you iterate over k you don't know which values of m or n need to be tested. For m=1 it's clear that you can just use Pythagorean triples, but for bigger values I don't know if there is a reliable procedure to generate solutions.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Also 3^3 + 4^3 + 5^3 = 6^3

</comment><comment><USER11> Beautiful.

Pythagoreans believed that the world was made of math -- and that the harmonies of mathematics revealed the harmonies of the universe. Pretty good for 6th century BC.

</comment><comment><USER12> Medium has paywalled me. Any non-paywall links?

<comment><USER13> That is the reason I really don't like Medium. So many click-bait articles and paywall

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> > Medium has paywalled me. Any non-paywall links?

The link works here in Firefox with NoScript, also in Dillo (no JS support).</comment>


Actual Causality (2016) - <AUTHOR> https://www.cs.cornell.edu/home/halpern/papers/causalitybook-ch1-3.html <comment><USER2> I think this is a very important area with applications to legal issues; in the computer systems domain, a close application I can think of is troubleshooting / root-cause analysis.

In legal situations and troubleshooting alike, one is often interested not in the "general" causes of why things happen (e.g., an increase in load will contribute an increase in latency), but causes that explain specific cases (e.g., the increase in latency on this incident was because of an increase in file system latency at the backend.)

These concepts are quite interesting; one linked article discusses many variations and refinements in detail: [https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/causation- law/](https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/causation-law/). I found these useful mental models to organize my thoughts when troubleshooting systems and doing root-cause analysis:

\- But-for cause: We can say that A is the actual cause of B when the following holds: If not for A, not B. To avoid pathologies like "If not for _big bang_ , this B wouldn't have happened", we have ...

\- Proximal cause: In the causal chain of explanations: If not for A1, not A2; if not for A2, not A3, ..., the proximal cause of A(k) is the closest, i.e., A(k-1).

\- Necessary element of a sufficient set (NESS criterion): Things get interesting here if we need a conjunction of many events to happen simultaneously for a desired effect. For simplicity, assume that events are boolean, and causal relationships can be defined using boolean formulae. Here, A is a cause of B in the NESS sense, when B = (A and C1) OR (C2 and C3) OR ... A here is "necessary" in the sufficient set {A, C1} for B to happen.

<comment><USER3> Okay, so this is going to be a contraversial question but... How is any of that not obvious to someone who is investigating the cause of something?

<comment><USER4> Most people have some vague sense that these aspects are important, and would probably come up with a similar taxonomy if pressed, eventually. But getting the details right and using consistent terminology matters; we don't usually notice how woolly our thinking is until we make a real effort to be precise. Think of something like the SemVer standard: "everyone knew" this was what version numbers meant, but writing it out explicitly in a precise way was actually really valuable.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Thanks for the link, I've started reading it.

The complexity of defining and determining "actual causality" is a good justification for mathematicians' avoiding the whole thing and using material implication instead. As most of you already know, material implication A -> B ("A implies B") is a boolean operation, which is the same as ((not A) OR B), see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Material_implication_(rule_of_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Material_implication_\(rule_of_inference\)) . Material implication avoids all this complexity.. but because it's simpler, it _cannot_ by itself represent our notions of causality. Material implication even has some "weird" surprises, e.g., "All Martians are green" and "All Martians are not green" are both true when defined using material implication. I created an "allsome" quantifier to deal with this problem: [https://dwheeler.com/essays/allsome.html](https://dwheeler.com/essays/allsome.html) . But it'd be nice to learn about other alternatives, so I started reading this.

I've only started reading this book, but the approach does seem a little odd. Its definition of causality embeds a model, which has embedded causality in it. In section 2.1 [https://www.cs.cornell.edu/home/halpern/papers/causalitybook...](https://www.cs.cornell.edu/home/halpern/papers/causalitybook- ch1-3.html#head2.2) it notes this issue: "It may seem somewhat circular to use causal models, which clearly already encode causal relationships, to define causality. There is some validity to this concern... Nevertheless, I would claim that this definition is useful."

I don't have a better idea, and I can see the value in making the use of models clear. But it does seem to weaken the idea of defining causality. Is this considered reasonable? Is there a possibly better approach?

</comment><comment><USER6> Thanks for sharing. I'm a sucker for anything advancing causal reasoning amongst technical folks :)

<comment><USER7> Me too! Any other resources you can share?

<comment><USER8> Anything by Judea Pearl, but especially the Book of Why[1], is good. He comes at causality from a CS perspective, which I think would make sense for most people on here.

Economists also have a big causality literature which might be less accessible for HN folks but I think is still interesting and important. For a good intro to all that, I suggest Scott Cunningham's "Causal Inference: The Mixtape."[2]

[1] [https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780465097609](https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780465097609)

[2] [https://scunning.com/causalinference_norap.pdf](https://scunning.com/causalinference_norap.pdf)

<comment><USER9> Pearls model based causality is from a set up the same as structural econometric models of the economists. Here, economists largely care about identification and partial identification (check work by Manski), which is at the same time related to causation but also a more practical matter of data and model choice.

Very interesting stuff all this

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm familiar with the usual potential outcomes framework, and some of the high level machinery of Pearl's version too, but this 'type causality' vs 'actual causality' mentioned in the intro seems like a very unnecessary complication that just confuses things.

They use "smoking causes lung cancer" as an example of type causality. A counterpart in actual causality would be "Dave's smoking caused him to get lung cancer." Then they go on to talk about how these are such different kinds of causality.

They're no more different than "Dave has $35 in his pocket" and "the average american has $21 in their wallet."

Seems totally unnecessary. Am I missing something?

<comment><USER11> Perhaps Dave is suing his employer for compensation because he developed cancer after working with material which was later found to be carcinogenic. Dave's employer argues that since Dave was a smoker, his smoking caused his lung cancer, and they are not liable. Dave admits thats smoking causes lung cancer, but argues that it did not cause his lung cancer.

<comment><USER10> Right, and that fits in the usual potential outcomes framework without needing to distinguish two types of causality.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Intermittently 404.

</comment><comment><USER13> A book on casualty with no any single hint on mutual information.. hm

<comment><USER11> Not surprising, since mutual information is a fundamentally non-causal concept. This is easily seen by nothing that the mutual information of X and Y is the same as the mutual information of Y and X, which means that mutual information can't distinguish between "X causes Y" and "Y causes X".

<comment><USER14> There are causal accounts that use mutual information and its variants though. A lot of them introduce notions of directed mutual information and other similar concepts.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: FaceGuard – Kill the Habit - <AUTHOR> https://www.faceguard.app/ <comment><USER2> Without offering an alternative for how to deal with an itching face this will not be well received, I guess.

<comment><USER3> Willpower: [https://nationaleczema.org/mind-body-techniques-to-stop- scra...](https://nationaleczema.org/mind-body-techniques-to-stop-scratching/)</comment></comment>


AS3 Bitwise gems - fast integer math - <AUTHOR> http://lab.polygonal.de/2007/05/10/bitwise-gems-fast-integer-math/ <comment><USER2> Interested parties can also look at how the Tamarin VM implements those bitwise opcodes natively.

<http://www.mozilla.org/projects/tamarin/>

Flash opcodes into Nanojit IR:

[http://hg.mozilla.org/tamarin-central/raw- file/4eb9f961a087/...](http://hg.mozilla.org/tamarin-central/raw- file/4eb9f961a087/nanojit/LIR.h)

Nanojit IR to native x86 translation tables?

[http://hg.mozilla.org/tamarin-central/raw- file/4eb9f961a087/...](http://hg.mozilla.org/tamarin-central/raw- file/4eb9f961a087/nanojit/Nativei386.h)

<comment><AUTHOR> Nice! That's great to hear, since it's always perplexing when native code ISN'T the fastest... Kind of makes you have to ask, "If there is a better way, why isn't that the native way?" But, for Tamarin, that question will be moot.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I don't do flash, but I was under the impression that there's some kind of compilation going on and ActionScript isn't just interpreted. How on earth does a modern compiler not optimise

      a / 64

to

      a >> 6

? I could understand it in a dynamically typed language, where a, and therefore the result, could be non-integer, but ActionScript seems to have static type declarations for variables.

<comment><USER4> This isn't even "modern" in compiler terms, it's a simple peephole optimization. (grep through the IR, check for "X / 2^n", replace by "X >> n") To get it right when you have

        int a;
        int b = 64;
        a / b

requires dataflow analysis so you can do constant propagation, copy propagation, and dead code elimination. This is more work to get right, but that's not a very good excuse for not at least doing the peephole optimization.</comment></comment>


WePay Withholds Funds From Sick Woman Due To Offer Of Porn For Donations - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2014/05/17/wepay-eden-alexander/

<comment><USER2> I'm fed up with credit card and payment processors deciding that they don't want to serve everyone unless he/she is doing actually illegal things.

Hell, I'm fine with CC processors e.g. declining business for cow meat sale in India (iirc slaughtering/eating cows is banned by law there), but as long as the service being paid for is legal in the country of the merchant and the customer, then a CC processor/payment network should be obliged to provide payment.

Providing essential services and infrastructure should be discrimination-free. This in my opinion includes cannabis vendors and growers, too. If sensible regulation existed in the US (or, even better, laws which _require_ infrastructure providers to enter contracts!), then a whole host of problems could be avoided.

@Techcrunch: what crazy JS fuck do you do? On my netbook, the text flashes up for ~1-2sec, then the WHOLE PAGE goes gray for 30-50 seconds and then the text appears again. Is this active discrimination against Adblock users?

</comment><comment><USER3> Previous Discussion From Yesterday:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7761346](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7761346)

Includes WePay response.</comment>


Ask HN: I just dropped out of college, should I do a coding bootcamp? - <AUTHOR> I recently dropped out of college (I was a CS major). Without getting into too much detail, I know that leaving college is the right decision for me personally and I'm ready to move on to new things.
I want to work for a startup and eventually start my own (or start my own as soon as possible), because the corporate life doesn't appeal to me. The problem is that my CS program was woefully inadequate--the standard Java/C++ stuff with little exposure to many of the real world tools and practices (we never even learned how to use version control!).
I've been teaching myself Python and Django for the last few weeks, but I'm seriously considering one of the coding bootcamps like Hack Reactor/Dev Bootcamp/App Academy. I think they could really give me a good jump in the direction I want to go. The only downside is that attending one would basically eat up all the money I've saved up. Does anyone have any advice? Are these bootcamps worth it? I feel like at this point I'm not at the stage where I'm hirable to a startup or have the technical skills to start my own, and I'm hoping the bootcamps can get me to that baseline. <comment><USER2> In terms of paying for these bootcamps, I don't think you are the target market. You have CS exposure and you are already getting fluent with Python and Django. The target market for these bootcamps is people with little development experience. You are better off going through the many online resources. Your best bet is to target companies that do Python and/or Django development. I would focus on getting even better with these technologies.

I would also recommend that you finish your program. When we don't have a concrete plan for something else, the path we are on currently is usually still the best. In your case, it doesn't look like you have a startup that you are building and has investors, traction, etc. So, you didn't leave because there was much greater return on value on your time doing something else.

Now, I'm sure the material in the program is lower on the scale of reasons you are leaving and you have other reasons that are valid for you. But, it would be worth re-evaluating. It's hard sometimes to finish these things but it shows that you have determination and persistence. You can continue to do your side learning and improving your skills while still in school. Having a degree is still relevant. I know that here it sometimes seems like everybody gets work regardless of their education but that's not the norm.

</comment><comment><USER3> Tools and language change quickly. Engineering basics and methodologies remain. You might not like my advice, but reconsider your decision and show that you have the discipline and endurance to finish things, even or especially if they don't appeal to you all the way.

<comment><AUTHOR> I hear what you're saying, but I feel the issue is that I'm not really learning the engineering basics or methodologies in my CS program. Basically, the program is geared to churn out mediocre Java developers, and it does a pretty good job of that.

It's incredibly frustrating to work on abstract coding projects only to have them reviewed by the TA and then thrown away. I'd much prefer to be working on real world stuff with impact, where I could learn by doing. And when I consider the amount of time in classes, it just seems incredibly inefficient compared to what I could be doing on my own or with the help of a bootcamp.

<comment><USER4> You misunderstand the world. The world largely doesn't care about skill or talent. It cares about credentials.

You've also thrown away your chance at meeting cofounders, because now your social circles are going to consist of workers who are largely not willing to give up their salaried jobs to take a chance, or they're in so much debt that they won't be able to even if they want to.

If you wanted to apply to YC with a cofounder, then they'll understand "we met in college." They won't understand "we worked together for 3 months at a random job." Relationships forged in college are much stronger than relationships found at work, so it's inherently risky to bet that you and your coworker won't get into a founder squabble and tank the company unless you've known eachother for years.

Good luck to you.

<comment><USER5> Well yes, YC likes the "we met in college" and I see your point but it doesn't mean it's flawless. Stronger relationships? Yes, the only way? No. There is always a risk when it comes to startups. Just accepting that scenario only is stupid and misses a lot of potential out there.

If you believe that only a certain pattern can truly change the world you are mistaken. In fact, that is the crucial mistake every incubator is doing. True innovation almost always comes from unexpected places.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The only time I think people should drop out of college is if they're building a company that's becoming crazy successful and making a boatload of money to the point that running that business makes more sense then college.

<comment><USER5> And you believe the billionaires who dropped out of college were 100% they would become rich in the future?

When it comes to startups there are no guarantees. Risk is high almost always, with some exceptions.

<comment><USER7> One data point: Mark Zuckerberg did not drop out of Harvard when he left to do Facebook. He took a leave of absence and _he did not permanently drop out until November 2005, by which time Facebook was well on its way to success_ , with a 100MM valuation and a position as the 10th most trafficked website.

So at least for him, he was probably pretty sure of his success (a cushy acquisition as the very least).

[http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2005/11/1/zuckerberg-to- le...](http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2005/11/1/zuckerberg-to-leave- harvard-indefinitely-mark/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> "my CS program was woefully inadequate--the standard Java/C++ stuff"

That is the foundation for everything else. You will write much better Python if you are competent with C/C++. The truth is that the major languages are very similar. Yes one manages memory, one does not. One supports the ++ operator, one does not. And so on, but at a fundamental level they are essentially the same. The reason why C/C++ and Java are taught is because these languages are good for teaching the fundamentals: how memory works, data structures, functional vs object-oriented, etc.

Like others have recommended, an internship is a great way to get real-world experience. This is exactly what I did, and it helped me immensely. In particular, I worked for Delphi-Delco Electronics who make electronic automotive parts. My job was to automate testing of the automobile's main computer. Due to safety and regulations, testing was very rigorous so I had to learn how to be rigorous. That skill has helped me immensely throughout my career.

BUT that internship was no replacement for my degree. Without the degree I would be good at testing, but it would be quite hard for me to build an efficient web server because I wouldn't really understand how the CPU, RAM, etc work. While it is possible to learn all the fundamentals on your own, it requires immense discipline which most of us (myself included) do not possess.

That is my two cents. I wish you the best whatever you decide!

</comment><comment><USER9> Why don't you try getting an internship? Don't mention to companies that you've dropped out, just say you're taking a break to focus on personal development or something. After the internship, you should be able to get a job. I don't recommend doing a bootcamp if it will significantly deplete your cash. If you have around 6 months of expenses saved up + the fees for the course, then go for it! App Academy does not have an up-front charge as well, so it sounds perfect for your situation.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's a really good idea. I'll look into that, thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Starting a startup is not just a matter of technical skills and getting hired as a coder might be difficult if you dropped out of college.

A few ideas, straight out of my mind (please don't flame): \- You should start a blog to document your journey anyway. Maybe you'll write a book about the whole experience later. \- Build a website for college dropouts meetups? Maybe you can build something that's bigger than you. \- Learn something, and become an expert at it. Learn Git/GitHub then write about it. Start a "become a Git hero in 6 weeks" blog? \- teach yourself a niche technology, rather than Ruby on Rails: socket.io mastery on node.js maybe? or mongodb admin? or nginx admin?

Don't spread yourself too thin: you can't teach yourself everything at once. Get a Wordpress.com blog instead of hosting one... except if you want to learn it and then teach how to host your own Wordpress :)

Teach yourself something thoroughly, a skill that's rare enough (if you're THE guy who wrote a book on sails.js, who cares you dropped out of college?). D3.js could be another option.

HN is definitely the right place to target the perfect technological niche. I've only suggested a few that I've looked into myself.

Remember, you don't have much to lose yet. But DO something, learn something. You can be bold, but you must ship.

<comment><USER11> Write a blog howto setup a wordpress website. That's something new.

Where I'm from a college degree doesn't mean you are good in something. But show you are someone who can follow through on something instead of being a quitter.

Off course if there is something else you could show that you can reach a significant goal that needed some persistence please pursue it.

<comment><USER10> "blog howto setup a wordpress website. That's something new"

Irony I guess :) Hosting a wordpress site (on a VPS for instance) would be more interesting, somewhat less common. I suggested hosting, not setup :) It requires comparing VPS offers, choosing a distro, securing the server (iptables/ssh), setup for MySql & Apache, installation of Wordpress, setup of a cache (with memcached?), backup strategy... It could be much more than just a blog post, and I know many professionals who are stuck with shared web hosting and who would love some help with a VPS for their hosting needs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I recommend freelancing.

I am currently taking a year off from college and am on the path to leaving entirely because I started freelancing a few months before making the decision to take a hiatus.

In school, I was not learning enough in a way and speed that matched my needs or mindset. I like to dive into topics and immerse myself in them quickly, while building cool things - I also like to make a living while doing so. A few months before I made the decision to take time off, I tried freelancing and gave myself a goal - if I could consistently make $X/month, then I would take a year off and work full time on freelancing to explore my options. Although this sentence could be an entire book, the short story is that I hit that goal and even started writing a book & building an audience^1.

Anyway, I decided to take the 1-year-long leave and start freelancing/writing full time. I quickly learned two things: The first is that I love to learn. The second is that learning from quality sources can be free or extremely cheap. Since college, the only direct payment I make for my education is $9/month to TeamTreehouse. Through things like TeamTreehouse, building clients' and personal projects, I've taken my skill level of creating iOS apps from beginner to advanced, which helped me increase freelancing income and gave me the knowledge to write a book.

In short, freelancing will allow you to learn more about a technology you're interested in, learn about building a business, make some kind of income, and hopefully connect you with some cool people and opportunities.

^1: I wrote a whole post about how I got into freelancing and writing a book on my website, but the main point is that you should start by building a small portfolio of projects and target businesses (especially local) that have money to spend. Freelancing/consulting is a science, and you can start making a decent amount of money relatively quickly if done right.

</comment><comment><USER13> If you only have enough money for one of these programs I suggest you save it and use free or cheap resources to learn the same skills. Build things that stretch your current abilities, bit by bit.

You need experience, keep launching things so that you get a feel for real world development and the problems that come up outside of programming tutorials.

Look at some available programming jobs and read up on the specifics that they are looking for (I've seen API integrations mentioned a lot, etc), then learn that stuff.

If you are going to program for web then I suggest learning to love JavaScript and the DOM as soon as possible.

[I dropped out of UCF (Comp Sci) in 2007 because the company I co-owned was succeeding so much that I could no longer pass classes _and_ keep up with the business]

</comment><comment><USER14> To add to others' advice, I'm going to recommend a subscription to Safari Books Online. (no affiliation) I consider it to be a great platform for reading technical books at an affordable price. (access to latest editions, etc.)

The 'Head First' book series includes books for Python and Django as well as many other programming languages. You may also find that a good design patterns book will be valuable to your CS career.

I'm gonna assume you are aware of such online learning platforms as Codecademy, Khan Academy, Udacity, etc. These can be good starting points depending on your level of proficiency with basic syntax.

Beyond these recommendations, I'd say study open source code and code libraries.

</comment><comment><USER15> In lieu of a finished degree you'll need a track record of completed and shipped projects. Make that the focus of your Github, community and other involvements, whether you code, or not.

</comment><comment><USER7> 1\. Java and C++ are quite foundational, I think. I don't think it is a problem at all that you don't learn version control in school. Version control is quite simple conceptually and is a simple matter of memorizing the API/commands.

2\. I'm familiar with the programs that you mentioned and the general hiring climate in SV/SF. Email me (listed in my profile) for a deeper discussion on your options.

</comment><comment><USER16> I think you are dissatisfied with the program you were in, which is understandable. My sincere advice would be to transfer to another college that has a CS program you're interested in, on the west coast if you're so inclined. do your research and find a few colleges that match your criteria. Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER17> I would say yes, but choose the bootcamp carefully.

</comment><comment><USER18> What were your grades in the CS classes you took?

</comment><comment><USER19> Where are you located?

<comment><AUTHOR> Northeast, but I'd like to move to the west coast when possible.</comment></comment>


os.js: JavaScript Cloud/Web Desktop Platform - <AUTHOR> http://os.js.org/ <comment><USER2> The whole thing is 194KB ,a normal TODOmvc demo of your favourite Js framework goes above 250KB . Really Impressive stuff.

really motivates to build slimmer web apps

<comment><USER3> amazing that its 194kb and you think this is very small. what world are ver living in that web development has made us so sloppy and inefficient, when MB's of script downloads are considered slim.

<comment><USER4> Yes, because in 2015 194kb is so incredibly much.

Maybe the carriers' are sloppy and inefficient. See, whatever I do, when I access anything web-based on my mobile phone, it is slow. And I live in Paris.

It's funny how suposedly the 3G/4G stuff should be fast but in reality it is not, I believe that is mostly because in large areas the access points are overcrowded.

In other words, the technology used to access internet is saturated, and developpers should be blamed for having websites >200kb heavy!

Who's crazy now?

<comment><USER5> I don't disagree that the main culprit is the carriers, but access points would not be so saturated if websites were smaller.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> There was a similar early YC company called YouOS (they "finally" shut down about 7 years ago: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=260267](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=260267))

</comment><comment><USER7> An example for the "why" question -- the "web desktop with apps" style seems to work for NAS control panels (namely QNAP and Synology). As far as I know, they are using Sencha ExtJS for the UI -- which, although pretty complete and mature, doesn't get a lot of developer love.

[https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=qnap+control+panel](https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=qnap+control+panel)

[https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=synology+control+pa...](https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=synology+control+panel)

Here is a QNAP demo, if you search around you may also find a Synology one that works. [http://www.qnapworks.com/live- demos.asp](http://www.qnapworks.com/live-demos.asp)

<comment><USER8> It's not really clear to me what functional, or even user experience benefit there is from having "draggable windows" in something like that?

<comment><USER7> I couldn't say really, can't say I'm a big fan, but it's relevant that multiple big companies are using this kind of interface. I would hope they have some reasons beyond UI flashiness and copying their competitors.

Whatever the reasons, when a customer says "build me one of those" it's useful to have a good library to call upon.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> While it looks like a nice exercise in front end JS, and looks cool, does it solve any problems? Do users actually need some more abstraction layers on top of Google Drive / Dropbx, etc? Either I am getting too sleepy, or they didn't provide any actual use cases in the homepage.

It provides some sort of API ("simple, modilarized and flexible JavaScript APIs so you can easily make changes, extend functionality and create applications") but is it just a new look for single page applications?

I am not trying to be cynical or anything, just curious :)

<comment><USER10> A few use cases:

1/ Make a modular backoffice for CMS based website. Make an app to manage users, an app to manage content, an app to upload and manage gallery of media etc.

2/ Make a distributed OS. All services can scale and use backend power beyond what a single node can provide. If you need to burst in the cloud due to a heavy process for instance.

3/ Could use it to provide a separation between the OS and the GUI, providing a UX I may like even if the backend server has to be Windows or Centos or ... Or remotely operating a part of my machine at home?

4/ What about reducing the cost of HW it needs to run? Chromebook style.

5/ What about being less tied in my Web App to Google Drive API + friends by adding a abstract VFS layer in between like a OS does? Same for texting, emailing? Sure it only uses part of this and don't need the client, but the architecture is well splited on this project between the two.

6/ It is multi-user as its core, so it can be shared across an organization and not only on one computer. You could even create one account per project/team and share a set of common tools / organization / folders that way across online services.

With the rise of web apps, it seems interesting to investigate the possibility of a web OS to administrate and make those ones collaborate more nicely. Or at least the possibility of separating the UX and the execution on two different nodes for general purpose systems as well.

<comment><USER11> > 4/ What about reducing the cost of HW it needs to run? Chromebook style.

How so? At least for me the window moving is slightly laggy and is probably going to worse on low-end systems.

<comment><USER12> It's quite snappy on my own Samsung Chromebook. However, I did grasp the irony of running a web OS inside of another web OS.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> And there's this thing: [http://www.windows93.net/](http://www.windows93.net/)

<comment><USER14> Most evil-feeling OS experience ever. Impressive, if only for that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Too bad browser JS is single-threaded. If you switch windows the background application stops. Kind of limits its ability as a desktop replacement no matter how much effort they put into it.

<comment><USER16> What is the reason for requiring the single thread of execution in JavaScript? Trading race conditions for callback hell?

Even the concurrency provided by web workers, suffer from the same issues, you communicate with them via messages and they will not respond to messages if they are looping away somewhere else.

I'd love to have some simple pre-emption in JavaScript. Suspend code execution at one point and pick it up at another. Instead of having threads, have the fundamentals that allow threads. Has this been discussed and rejected by the JavaScript community?

I'd really like to know what the deal is here

<comment><USER17> The single thread limitation is caused by the global interpreter lock[0] that's common to most interpreted languages. Along with JS, it also appears in CPython and Ruby MRI, the reference implementation of Python and Ruby respectively.

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

<comment><USER6> That's not the reason.

As I understand it, the GIL is an implementation detail of certain interpreters that prevents threads from running on multiple OS threads (and thus multiple CPUs).

JavaScript has explicitly chosen not to support preemptive multithreading at all (aside from Web Workers which don't share memory), while Ruby and Python do have it, even if it can't fully utilize multicore processors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Nice to see my project on hackernews :D

Thanks for checking it out guys. It-s something I enjoy working on in my spare-time

<comment><USER19> It's been a while since I've checked up on the project. How's everything going? Have you gotten any adoption? Did the backend stuff ever get completely ported over to node from PHP?

<comment><USER18> Yes, there is a company that will make use of OS.js in a commercial product. More news about that will surface this year, so stay tuned! :)

And the Node backend is pretty much identical to the PHP one now... and PHP will probably be deprecated in the near future (at least from the main repository)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Very nice, although it must have been a lot of work for uncertain benefits.

It also reminds to what eyeOS ([http://eyeos.com](http://eyeos.com)) were doing a few years ago.

</comment><comment><USER21> Reminds me of the now-defunct g.ho.st (an early cloud desktop of sorts), and michaelv.org (JS recreation of Windows 3.1 UI).

Incidentally, I've been wanting to recreate Windows 95's interface for ages now. I should get back to that.

</comment><comment><USER22> Looks cool! Certainly fits the "why not" category of why it exists though I can't figure out a way to make it useable; without a proper window manager (which can't be done inside of a web browser) using apps inside of the window becomes more difficult than simply having a tab for each app. In fact if every app opened up full screen and into a new tab that could almost be handy depending on the extension API, etc.

<comment><USER2> I could see a use as some sort of a Control panel.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I must say that is a very nice domain name (js.org)

<comment><USER24> The demo domain is cool too : 0o.no

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> That's interesting, it's an operating system emulation running in the browser, and the one thing missing is.. a browser.

<comment><USER26> Would definitely be interesting how many levels we could go down.

I'm going to assume 2.

<comment><USER27> Why 2?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Reminds me of something I saw way back in the late '90s called MyWebOS, which looked cool but never caught on.

Also, I see the Internet has unleashed its usual brand of stupidity on the demo. There are files in the shared directory with names like "Got any good porn.txt" and "dicksmoker.odoc".

</comment><comment><USER29> I cant really see any good use cases.

But WOW am i impressed that, is one of the cooler things i have seen on the web.

<comment><USER30> Always cool to see these in action, but multiple "online desktops" have come and gone since the mid-2000s. I personally built one myself in 2010 only to realize it had been tried and failed a few times. My next instinct was that to get attention and attract users I'd need a mobile-style UI. My instincts were wrong, and your gut is right. There wasn't a strong enough use case.

The motivator for these projects is typically something along the lines of, "it would be great if there was just one OS or interface I could use on any device." As engineers it's very easy for us to see the usage pattern of apps, the speed, power and ubiquity of web tooling + JavaScript and say, "aha! The next logical evolution is _all_ of your client logic on the web!"

Alas, if it were only that easy.

"Unfortunately, this ability to see patterns can prove catastrophic as you attempt to build your own company. The more you generalize the solution to a particular pain, the further removed it becomes from that specific pain. While it might end up being able to solve a lot of pains, it won't be very good at solving any particular one." [1]

A shared, web-based environment is probably where everything _is_ going. I mean we're more than halfway there with most operating systems, cloud backups, tons of SPAs, etc. The problem is there's no consumer-driven need for a fast transition to a JavaScript "OS" environment. Everything is just good enough, and offloading all device logic to the web, for the end user, is barely noticeable (if not a minor detriment as older devices still have rendering issues). It's likely that everything will converge on this sort of environment (but without the desktop metaphor) because _engineers_ want to head towards elegant solutions, but it will take time. (You won't convince people to start switching with software alone if it means they have to figure out how to open Chrome / Safari / Whatever on their phones, first.)

FirefoxOS [2] is probably getting pretty close. The sooner we get to an OS just being a glorified web browser, the more we drive development spending way down and cut costs for the consumer. Then the software will already exist, packaged with the phone. But you need the phone first --- not the software. That's the product. That drives consumer demand. "JavaScript OS" becomes a reality as soon as web-rendering matches native performance on ubiquitous, low-end devices. The software will exist to sell the product, not vice-versa. (We'll also have a Cambrian explosion of offline-first front-end tooling. ;))

... Yeah, I've done a lot of thinking about this. ;) Was my first big pet project.

[1] [http://degoes.net/articles/engineer- entrepreneur/](http://degoes.net/articles/engineer-entrepreneur/)

[2] [https://developer.mozilla.org/en- US/docs/Mozilla/Firefox_OS](https://developer.mozilla.org/en- US/docs/Mozilla/Firefox_OS)

<comment><USER31> > The motivator for these projects is typically something along the lines of, > "it would be great if there was just one OS or interface I could use on any > device."

A lot of people do have this dream, but in practice it's horrible. The UI on my watch has to be very different than the UI on my flatscreen TV.

This notion that things will move to a web based environment because "engineers want to head towards elegant solutions" has two problems.

The first is that "what engineers want" doesn't matter in the least. We saw this with Windows 8: a single OS that tries to scale from tablets through workstations. That's an engineer's design and an engineer's dream, but users hated it, and Microsoft has since backed off.

The second problem is this notion that the web is "elegant." It has some nice properties, but it's layered hacks upon hacks. Demos like this are impressive because they work _despite_ the web's limitations.

> The sooner we get to an OS just being a glorified web browser, the more we > drive development spending way down and cut costs for the consumer.

This is frankly delusional. If web apps cost less, it's because they do less, or do it less well.

<comment><USER30> It seems like you read the first couple of lines of my post and then skimmed through the rest of it. :) You reiterated points I made as though you're arguing with me, I'm a bit confused.

Re: dev spending. We drive development spending down because it costs far less to write software once and deploy everywhere than it does to write it for two, three or more platforms. The "elegant" goal is one compilation and/or deployment target, whether _you_ like it or not doesn't matter, and it seems like JavaScript (or some related cousin) is going to fill that niche. Pretty silly to think that's delusional when it's already happening.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Pretty impressive UI/UX. If that's possible using "web technologies" (JS + HTML + CSS, I gather), shouldn't it be possible to create such things on mobile? All the mobile-optimized web stuff I see still feels sub-optimal.

<comment><USER22> > All the mobile-optimized web stuff I see still feels sub-optimal.

That's probably because all of the mobile browsers are terribly inefficient when compared to desktop browsers. It makes creating a mobile experience that's fluid and fast.

<comment><USER32> Aren't the JS/HTML/CSS engines pretty much identical?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> From 1999:

[http://www.zdnet.com/article/will-mywebos-com-catch- on/](http://www.zdnet.com/article/will-mywebos-com-catch-on/)

</comment><comment><USER34> Impressive but everything is _very_ slow for me - I've tried on my late 2015 5k iMac i7 and 2015 Macbook, both take almost a minute to load to the desktop in Firefox, granted I have a very slow internet connection at 18Mbit down 2Mbit up but given that it appears to be quite small in size something must be awry?

<comment><USER35> Maybe the server was just under load? It was pretty much instant for me, on a similar internet connection.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> When I worked in a telecom company, there were a lot of servers where a GUI was exposed which mimicked a Gnome 2 environment (through Citrix if I remember correctly). It was painfully slow and really a time waster. I wonder if this is faster than that. If it is, so many companies can use it.

</comment><comment><USER37> Compare this(and the response to it) to the overall perception of JavaScript 5 years ago. It's interesting to see how decent tooling and some good language changes can move the perspective from largely disparaged to greatly desired.

</comment><comment><USER38> Really Cool. A similar app I know of is called Synaptop.

Also, jQuery Desktop is pretty cool too although its just a UI and doesn't do anything

</comment><comment><USER39> Back to the future. I have been very happy to leave the desktop metaphor behind.

<comment><USER30> I don't even think I _use_ my "desktop" anymore. It's where screenshots save to automatically before I figure out where to put them, and that's it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> What about an X11 server?

<comment><USER41> Just an X11-client would be interesting. It would theoretically allow you to transparently offload UNIX applications to a remote server.

<comment><USER42> Im no linux person (gawd no) and so dont know EXACTLY what you mean, but is this the sort of thing you meant?.....

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd73b-Twf4I](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd73b-Twf4I)

Mentioned....

[https://www.reddit.com/r/javascript/comments/3yo754/osjs_a_j...](https://www.reddit.com/r/javascript/comments/3yo754/osjs_a_javascript_web_desktop_implementation_for/cyflj8i)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/javascript/comments/3yo754/osjs_a_j...](https://www.reddit.com/r/javascript/comments/3yo754/osjs_a_javascript_web_desktop_implementation_for/cyfjxkd)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Would be nice if the page mentioned how this differs from/improve on projects like Lively Kernel?:

[https://www.lively-kernel.org/](https://www.lively-kernel.org/)

</comment><comment><USER44> 2016 is less than 48 hours away. Why is curl [http://](http://) | sh still a thing? Why is the Windows installer delivered without HTTPS, and does it really have no digital signature, or have I been MITM'd? I don't know about you, but I wouldn't touch this with a barge pole, let alone a computer.

<comment><USER45> because everyone knows that curl [http://](http://) | sh is the most async</comment></comment>


Flowblade – Free and Libre Video Editor - <AUTHOR> https://jliljebl.github.io/flowblade/ <comment><USER2> Video editing software has always been somewhat lacking on Linux. None of the big proprietary ones like Premiere or Final Cut are available on Linux, and the open source options are mostly either missing features, buggy, hard to use, or ancient and unsupported.

This certainly _looks_ quite professional and polished, but I can't speak for the features and usability compared to other options.

</comment><comment><USER3> BlackMagic Design's DaVinci Resolve is free, and an amazing NLE/compositing/mograph/color grading kit. Like Blender meets FCP.

Windows, MacOS, and Linux.

[https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/](https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/)

</comment><comment><USER4> How does this compare with Shotcut[0]? I just recently found out, through use, that Shotcut does not have multiselect/multimove abilities, making it utterly worthless for anything more complicated than one or two tracks of video.

[0]:[https://shotcut.org/](https://shotcut.org/)

</comment><comment><USER5> This looks pretty cool. However I feel like if they want this to be adopted by the mainstream population, they'll need to add support for Mac And Windows. Or at least an easy process to get this to run inside the Linux of this OS's.

<comment><USER2> Not sure how much they care about it getting widespread adoption, or if they're just looking to fill a need that is lacking on Linux.

Kind surprising to see them only releasing it on Linux though, considering it's built with Python and Gtk it should be easy enough to build on Windows/Mac. Gtk is notoriously not great on other platforms though, and I assume if it's a team of Linux users building it, they don't want to go to the effort of building it for other platforms, let alone building multiple UI stacks so that it looks good on every OS.

On the plus side, it's open source, so I'm sure they wouldn't object to someone trying to build it for Windows/Mac, submitting a PR, or at least reporting the specific issues that prevent it from working on other OSs. A brief scan through their GitHub requests makes it look like they're not against supporting other OSs, they just aren't interested in putting time into it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I was surprised to learn that many folks swear by Blender's NLE.

<comment><USER7> I edited a feature length movie using it. Most of the problems I encountered were poor source footage, not Blender.

That said, adding things like titles and scrolling credits were unique puzzles.</comment></comment>