How to Display Math and Code on Your Site - <AUTHOR>

I've written a couple tutorials on MathJax and Google Prettify for putting LaTeX and syntax highlighted code on your site.
Displaying Math: http://ethanglover.biz/blog/how-to-display-math-equations.php
Displaying Code: http://ethanglover.biz/blog/how-to-display-code-on-site.php
(Bonus) Creating Static Headers and Footers: http://ethanglover.biz/blog/how-to-create-static-header-footer.php <comment><USER2> What's the reasoning for making this a text post instead of submitting the URLs directly?

<comment><AUTHOR> Because it's three links, not one.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Thanks. I already use MathJax and it is good. Is there an equivalent to MathJax for mathematical charts (e.g. y = f(x) rather than a random scatter) and/or for plane geometry (e.g. calculate angle A in the shown triangle etc.)?

<comment><AUTHOR> MathJax has something called "JSXGraph" that I've never used. Looking at it, it might take some getting used to, but doesn't seem too bad.

[http://www.onemathematicalcat.org/JSXGraphDocs/JSXGraphDocs....](http://www.onemathematicalcat.org/JSXGraphDocs/JSXGraphDocs.htm)</comment></comment>


Management guru [Eric Ries] on the lean startup philosophy - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/video/management-guru-on-the-lean-startup-philosophy/B8C23745-6F6C-411D-8BE6-A9048EE76695.html

<comment><USER2> May I suggest an admin change the title to "Management guru [Eric Ries] on the lean startup philosophy" or something like that? I clicked through expecting someone other than the usual suspects talking about "lean startups" as was disappointed. WSJ readers may not, but I think most HN readers know who Eric Ries is. Their headline obscures information rather than providing it.

<comment><AUTHOR> Valid point. I changed the title as per your request - was not trying to be misleading and apologize if it came of as such.

<comment><USER2> Thank you, but no need to apologize. I wasn't offended in the least.</comment></comment></comment>


Hexing the technical interview - rudi-rau https://aphyr.com/posts/341-hexing-the-technical-interview <comment><AUTHOR> If you missed the previous installment: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13886626](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13886626)</comment>


CDN behavior testing with Dummy Origin - <AUTHOR> https://www.cdnplanet.com/blog/cdn-behavior-testing-dummy-origin/ <comment><AUTHOR> Dummy Origin is a free, open source tool (server) that makes it easier to evaluate the behavior of a content delivery network. GZip, range requests, arbitrary response header injection, a special error generator, and more.</comment>


8th - <AUTHOR> https://8th-dev.com/about8th.html <comment><USER2> If I understand it correctly, the build toolchain applies encryption and a runtime signature check to protect the compiled executable against tampering. Why would an attacker bother with those protections if they can easily replace the executable with another one compiled without 8th?

What's the threat model the encryption and signature tries to guard against?</comment>


Ask HN: How did you get better at unit testing? - <AUTHOR> Contracts I've worked in the past did not allow time for creating unit tests (sorry, non test-driven development shops). How did you learn how to write best-practice/elegant unit tests? Bonus points for python! <comment><USER2> A lot of it is having control of your tools/environment and also having a clear idea of what your code is supposed to do.

A bad case for unit testing is when you feel that you are fighting with the apis you are using. If you are not so sure where your program ends and the stuff around it starts, that is bad for testing.

On the other hand, it is easy to write unit tests for integer arithmetic, string parsing, compilers, etc. If a subsystem is "functional" in the sense of no side effects, then testing is easy.

The book "working effectively with legacy code" systematically deconstructs the excuses people have about why code is not testable and shows you how to make it testable. Although the title mentions legacy code, it applies every bit as much to new code.

</comment><comment><USER3> TDD actually takes _less_ time than not writing tests, if you do it correctly.

No matter what, when you're writing code, you're doing "testing". That can either mean "run my code and see if it does what it's supposed to," or it can mean, "run a test that I wrote."

If you do the latter, the upfront time is longer -- maybe an hour -- but you save time by having automatic tests instead of manual tests.</comment>


Ask HN: Do You Talk about Your Technical Interests with Your Partners? and How? - <AUTHOR> Hey there,
Today I was asking some coworkers how they share their interests and knowledge about their domain of expertise to their spouse/significant others/kids, and I was surprised to learn that the none of them do such a thing. I personally spent a huge amount of time with my partners discussing and sharing topics from theirs or mine, that's one of the main activity (not necessarily the main one, but definitely in the top 3-5). As an example we started recently to study the book "Introduction to Algorthms, 3rd ed." and spent Sunday afternoon discussing the first chapters and exercises.
So now I'm wondering, is it something that you do? If no, do you have a reason to not do it (too complicated, takes too much time, person expressed not being interested, ...)? If yes, how do you approach those discussions? Based on my personal experience it can be really time and energy consuming, but it's satisfying at the end to be able to have some discussions on what one of us is interested into.
Just interested to read about other people perspective on this :) <comment><USER2> In the past my spouse did not want to know anything about what I do. Too boring. Nerd stuff.

That is slowly changing, because I spend so much time working on personal open source projects. Also, my spouse has started working on CCENT/CCNA certification so there are basic networking questions that come up.</comment>


Psychologists have surprising advice for people who feel unmotivated - <AUTHOR> https://qz.com/work/1363911/two-psychologists-have-a-surprising-theory-on-how-to-get-motivated/ <comment><USER2> Yup...just asking people to contribute to something they don't think they are qualified to deal with, increases their confidence, enthusiasm, interest etc.

As anything with human psychology, good to think about and be mentally prepared for where it will work and where it wont. For example it can be counter productive if the people receiving advice reject, attack, misunderstand it or if advice is given to people who aren't looking for advice.</comment>


Weekly newsletter on the mobile app ecosystem - <AUTHOR> http://latticelabs.com/blog/2014/08/weekly-roundup-app-constellations-competitiveness-in-app-stores-personalizing-ui-and-more/

<comment><AUTHOR> Curated reading every week on design, growth, monetization of mobile apps and any newly published data about apps.</comment>


Timescale 1.3 release brings Continuous Aggregates - <AUTHOR> https://docs.timescale.com/v1.3/tutorials/continuous-aggs-tutorial <comment><USER2> Is this similar to pipelinedb's continuous aggregates?

<comment><USER3> Yep, we even gave them a heads up it was coming and they mention it in their sunsetting post[1]:

>TimescaleDB is a PostgreSQL extension that provides advanced and highly performant automated partitioning on time-series data, enabling you to ingest raw data at very high throughput as well as query it efficiently. Their next release includes a feature called "Continuous Aggregates" that, similar to PipelineDB's continuous views, materializes results of views over raw data, but also stores aggregates over the entire history of your data.

[1] [https://www.pipelinedb.com/blog/pipelinedb-is-joining- conflu...](https://www.pipelinedb.com/blog/pipelinedb-is-joining-confluent)</comment></comment>


The Making of Prince of Persia (2011) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://www.jordanmechner.com/downloads/makpopsample.pdf <comment><USER2> I actually met Jordan Mechner a couple of times, around 2011. I had a coworker/common friend who would throw big parties I recognized him oddly enough based on his drawing style, as a fan of his blog. he was sitting in one of the bedrooms at the party drawing in his sketchbook. We talked a bit about the last express, (another one of my all time favorites) and the various iterations of PoP. He was very shy and quiet but really wonderful to chat with. Funny enough, at this same party I met another hero of my youth, Dave Taylor, one of the original members of ID. most likely because they were both working on the Karateka remake together at the time. (these were fancy hollywood party with a few film celebrity type people... but me being a game nerd only recognized the game folks that showed up)

<comment><USER3> I've never met Jordan but I used to work with his brother, David, whom the motion capture is based on. He was always proud of his contribution to his brother's game. What a great experience for both of them to be involved with this in their youth.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> We had this game on a Mac in 7th grade. We'd play through the first part, then get to the copy protection scheme which was a room where you'd have to select the letter of the first sentence on page 7 or something. We'd guess constantly and occasionally get it right so we could play, but otherwise didn't have the manual.

<comment><USER5> I loved Prince of Persia for MSDOS because it made me learn to "hack" / "crack" at computers.

I remember also being stuck on the first level and then on the copy- protection. Until one day while pressing random keyboard combinations I noted that a game was saved. At the same point, my father had this XTree Gold program in the computer (like DOSSHell but better), and it had a HEX view... when you opened the .SAV file in this view, you had only like 8 or 9 bytes. I remember my excitement when I changed that 01 to 02 and boom! after loading the game I started in level 2 .

Back in school (I was in 6th grade at that time) my friends had no clue what had I done to get past that copy protection level.

It was downhill for me and cracking at that point... I was not interested in playing but more on doing reverse engineering on different games and programs.

<comment><USER6> There was a famous pool game with different formats (8-ball, 9-ball, snooker etc) in early 2000. The game-play was pretty realistic but it was demo version and it asked for 6 digit password to unlock all features. I just loaded the executable in editor and voila the only readable digits among the binary data was the password. It was pretty stupid of developers not to encrypt the password!

<comment><USER7> > It was pretty stupid of developers not to encrypt the password!

You are being very unfair to that era. Even cutting edge software like Norton Utilities did the same, although they XORed the passwords. That passed as encryption then.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> That's really interesting, here's the link to the full book:

[https://www.amazon.com/Making-Prince-Persia-Jordan- Mechner-e...](https://www.amazon.com/Making-Prince-Persia-Jordan-Mechner- ebook/dp/B005WUE6Q2)

I bought it immediately upon finishing the PDF, and my Kindle's battery is dead..

<comment><USER9> Making Prince of Persia is terrific. I'd also recommend Masters of Doom, a book about the heyday of id Software.

[https://www.amazon.com/Masters-Doom-Created-Transformed- Cult...](https://www.amazon.com/Masters-Doom-Created-Transformed- Culture/dp/0812972155)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Prince of Persia (1990) has found its way into the Internet archive. You can play it here on your browser (DOSbox emulator):

[https://archive.org/details/msdos_Prince_of_Persia_1990](https://archive.org/details/msdos_Prince_of_Persia_1990)

<comment><USER11> it doesn't work well on my mac with chrome unfortunately...

*It is actually working fine after a refresh. shift + L for next level, shift + T for more lives (you have to ctrl quit and then start with Prince.exe megahit)

Thanks!

<comment><USER10> Yes, and Shift-W to float when falling.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> For someone who is into old games, I would also recommend book "It's behind you" which covers a story of porting R-Type to ZX-Spectrum:

[http://www.bizzley.com/](http://www.bizzley.com/)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R-Type](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R-Type)

<comment><USER13> Thanks for mentioning this. R-Type is one of my all time favorites, can't wait to give it a read.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> On a somewhat related note, there's a blog[1] that details how the Commodore 64 port of that game was made:

[1] [http://popc64.blogspot.com/](http://popc64.blogspot.com/)

<comment><USER15> That's a modern recreation based (in part) on reversing the original rather than a contemporary commercial port - a much crazier story than 'C64 port' might make it sound. Readers should also stick around for the post-credits scene where the original Apple ][ source is found well after the project is completed!

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> "On the one hand, if I live at home for much longer I'll go stir-crazy. What I need is a place to go. Friends. Work. Moving to Marin and doing another game for Broderbund would give me that...the games business is drying up.

Karateka may make me as little as $75,000 all told, and it's at the top of the charts. Tere's no guarantee the new game will be as successful."

What. $75,000 for a 21 year old in 1985? ($180,000 today.)

Why did he seem so upset about that?

<comment><USER17> Probably not, but expectations change through time - especially if you make such a successful game. Quoting from The Making of Karateka Journals:

"February 13, 1982 Scott Barnes from Hayden called. Will they ever publish Asteroids? It's been over a year — fifteen months — since I submitted it and they accepted it. (Sigh.) If they only sell 1,000 copies, I'll make $4,500 — if they sell 5,000, I'll make $22,500 — ridiculously high sums of money. Right now I only have $500, counting everything. So why am I not on the phone with them every morning, pushing, pushing? Oh well. When I finish Deathbounce and sell it, I'll be rich and then I can stop worrying about money for the next few years."

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> The DOS version had a CGA port, which runs extremely slow. Seems to be about 5-8 fps on a 4.77MHz machine, probably 8-12 fps on an 8MHz machine. The technical document doesn't seem to say how the sprites were done on the Apple II (I could be wrong, but I don't think the Apple II had sprite hardware either). It looks to be about 12 fps on the Apple II and a whole lot more colourful. It's amazing how smooth that looks. But I wonder if they used a sprite compiler or not. There's not a huge number of sprites on the screen, so it could potentially have been very, very smooth.

<comment><USER18> Looking at the description of the C64 port, it looks like each frame of the character in the DOS and Apple II versions were just drawn over the scene and the pixels affected just redrawn when he moves (including blocks that obscure his view). So, no sprite compiler.

<comment><USER19> With the cheat mode enabled, you can see this in-game by pressing Shift + B. Static parts of the level go dark, only the animated characters and their surroundings are rendered.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I'd love to read more development diaries of games and software in general. Is there a list/collection of some?

<comment><USER20> While not something to read, I really enjoy GDC classic game postmortems. One of my favourites is Populous. [1] I find it fascinating how such a successful game came out of experimentation without a real plan ahead of time.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIaK6y5kdro](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIaK6y5kdro)

<comment><USER21> I like these too. Here's Jordan Mechner on Prince of Persia:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjE4JyfMVLc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjE4JyfMVLc)

Also for Fallout fans (the first game): (EDIT: unrelated to Prince of Persia, I just like Fallout) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2OxO-4YLRk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2OxO-4YLRk)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> We're all bad negotiators when we're young. Poor kid got taken to town by the jerks at Brøderbund.

<comment><USER23> Is this intimated in the linked PDF? (I haven't read it yet).

I agree about being poor negotiators when we're young - and young is only a function of how long you have spent in the field you're negotiating.

<comment><USER24> > and young is only a function of how long you have spent in the field you're > negotiating

Not only in the field, i think it's also about general life experience and dealing with people.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> To me it's a mystery how one can sustain an effort for so long and not losing faith along the way and throw everything through the window... I know it's tenacity that wins the race in the end, but still, it's always impressive to read those stories.

<comment><USER26> You might like this talk by Jonathan Blow on "Deep Work": [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uUl_aTbOzQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uUl_aTbOzQ)

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> This was pretty much the only game on my computer in the 1990s when I was a little boy. I must have played and replayed it a thousand times!

<comment><USER11> Same here, it was the game of my childhood.

<comment><USER28> Same here starting in 1990, me and my then-6-year old daughter spending many happy hours playing PoP on her Macintosh. "Oregon Trail" was our #2.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I remember it very well on my Amiga 500, together with Another World the movements felt wonderfully fluid and natural. Used it as reference when paining sprites in Deluxe Paint, my brother coding in Amos etc. good times.

</comment><comment><USER30> I've never played the original, but I had the Genesis version as a kid. That game was hard, so ridiculously hard and when I did finally manage to make it to the end, i didn't have enough time left to kill the boss and finish the game. You had 60 minutes or something like that to beat it. I spent a lot of time playing it though, I think I did beat it eventually but if I did it was overshadowed by that first time making it to the end with just not quite enough time. I tried from that last password over and over again and just couldn't do it.

</comment><comment><USER11> > There's no guarantee the new game will be as successful. Or that there will > even be a computer games market a couple of years from now.

One of those things that you look back at and can't believe it.

</comment><comment><USER31> 'There's no guarantee the new game will be as successful. Or that there will even be a computer games market a couple of years from now.'

\- JULY 5, 1985

I love reading stuff like this.

</comment><comment><USER32> "I restrained myself from taking all my work papers home with me yesterday... and I'm restraining myself from going to work today. There must be Balance"

I can't help but feel that the generation before mine was a lot more well rounded as individuals.

</comment><comment><USER33> Just here to say I loved this game. Afew years back I stuck it in a virtual machine so I could pause it and actually finished the game!

<comment><USER34> How pause it will give you an edge?

<comment><USER35> I take it to mean they paused the VM, allowing them to complete the game in sections when they had the time.

<comment><USER36> Actually there is a trick with ingame pause that can be used to bypass the blade traps. If you walk as close to the blade trap as possible, pause the game constantly until the blades are completely shut, then press the movement arrow, the game will unpause and you will perfectly go past the blades trap.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> >> I'm getting to the point where I want to rush out and buy a video camera, a VCR and a digitizer and get to work.

What was that back in 1984 dollars? I remember my dad buying just a VCR from Fretter electronics when I was a kid and it was like $700.

</comment><comment><USER38> I remember the game was hard, I used to know some cheat codes

<comment><USER39> Does prince.exe /megahits ring a bell? Prince of Persia was the very first PC game I ever played. Fun days of booting my 486 with a dos floppy disk and running the game off of a different set of floppy disks.

<comment><USER38> It rings some bells, yes it does. Back when I was playing PP I it was out of reach to play the original and I came by a hack/crack to pass the potions part of the game got which you had to have the originals game booklet to look up certain words on pages, remember that excitement. Games were superior in estetics IMO and now they got complicated and lost the magic, I look at my nephew playing some horrible games and wonder..

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> How did Mechner get access to a rotoscope?

<comment><USER41> Fairly sure he just painted on transparent paper over a film projection and then manually digitized or something like that, no fancy equipment.

<comment><USER42> He talks about the process here (for Karateka) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wnutf4XObWk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wnutf4XObWk) Not mentioned in the video, but the process for getting from the tracing paper to digital was a Versawriter tablet, which looks like a pantograph - you can see one here [http://blog.lonaday.com/2007/02/graphics- tablets.html](http://blog.lonaday.com/2007/02/graphics-tablets.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> I mistook the title to refer to the Prince of Persia (2008) reboot of the franchise haha. Cool read though.

</comment><comment><USER44> Disclaimer: This is a 41 page sample.</comment>


How Apple Squeezes Four Times the Number of Pixels - <AUTHOR> http://www.displaysearchblog.com/2012/03/how-apple-squeezes-four-times-the-number-of-pixels-into-its-new-ipad-retina-display/ <comment><USER2> Well for the iBooks example:

left image (429x569): [http://images.apple.com/ipad/features/images/retina_gallery_...](http://images.apple.com/ipad/features/images/retina_gallery_1_left.jpg)

right image under the loupe (1536x2048): <http://www.apple.com/ipad/features/images/loupehr1.jpg></comment>


C/C++ pointers: pointers abuse in Windows kernel - <AUTHOR> http://yurichev.com/blog/ptrs3/ <comment><USER2> Linux uses a similar thing: functions that return pointers and that can fail typically return the negated error code cast directly into a pointer: [http://lxr.free- electrons.com/source/include/linux/err.h#L23](http://lxr.free- electrons.com/source/include/linux/err.h#L23)

</comment><comment><USER3> I find it a bit odd that the source of the site is written in m4. What an odd choice of language.</comment>


Why hi5 Might Have an Edge on Facebook - <AUTHOR> http://20bits.com/articles/why-hi5-might-have-an-edge-on-facebook/ <comment><USER2> You'd think there'd be a pretty large market for professional internet headline writers these days since it seems to be all you need to do to get some traction for an otherwise absurd post

<comment><USER3> Hey, thanks for the constructive feedback. I really appreciate it. :)

Is there anything specific you disagree with, or do you just think it's absurd in general?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I dunno... I have a hard time believing that charging actual money for pictures of flowers and puppies is really the game-changing business plan Facebook has been looking for. If they can find some 'virtual goods' that have value beyond 'aww, that's cute,' my opinion might change. Any ideas?

<comment><USER5> > If they can find some 'virtual goods' that have value beyond 'aww, that's > cute,' my opinion might change.

I really, really wish people would stop boiling "Virtual Goods" down to "cute pictures of cats". If it were that simple, there wouldn't be a 9-figure virtual good economy on Facebook today.

What value do people get out of Virtual Goods? Good question. Let's ask Jeremy Liew - <http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123395867963658435.html>

He boils it down to three big categories - Doing More, Building Relationships, and Establishing identity. Of course, these are all things that we realistically lots of money for in the real world. Therefore it's not a stretch that there is a subset of people who are willing to pay money for these things online.

In the same way MySpace has proven that US social-network traffic can be monetized by ads, tencent has proven that Chinese social-network traffic can be monetized by virtual goods. To the tune of 800M and 1B respectively. The question isn't "is the value there", the question is - are you monetizing your international traffic sufficiently?

<comment><USER4> > I really, really wish people would stop boiling "Virtual Goods" down to > "cute pictures of cats". If it were that simple, there wouldn't be a > 9-figure virtual good economy on Facebook today.

It's 8 figures (between $28,500,000 and $43,500,000: <http://news.cnet.com/8301-13846_3-10030354-62.html> ), and consists almost entirely of cute pictures of cats (and dogs and hearts and thongs).

> He boils it down to three big categories - Doing More, Building > Relationships, and Establishing identity.

It will be interesting to see if Facebook can expand their strategy to include these. I contend that they are not really doing so now - GIF's on a FB wall are not meaningful ways of building or maintaining a relationship, and I pity/dread a world in which they are.

Doing More - Can FB legitimately charge for certain features on their site? I would pay to remove ads, but I can't think of much else. Since they have an free/open apps API, almost any feature they could think to charge for could easily be replaced by a free app, no?

Building Relationships - Again, I think people will soon realize that gifts on walls do not actually provide any tangible relationship value. Are there any services they can provide that do? I can think of one - networking, hooking me up to potential employers, partners, VC's, etc. The problem here is asymmetric power structures: I might pay a little money to meet some local people who share some of my same interests and hobbies, and so might they. However, I'd also pay money to get my name in front of a big VC, but what incentive would the VC have to pay attention and follow up?

Establishing Identity - I'd bet that 90% of users today are happy with the 'identity' that the standard facebook profile gives them, and those who aren't can add apps to augment it. The only niche I see is enabling custom page layouts and designs for paying users, and seeing as how they've held out on this for many years (even with lots of pressure), I don't see it happening anytime soon.

I'd gladly take this a little more seriously if you could come up with some concrete examples of virtual goods FB could provide. Whether you call the current economy of virtual goods "relationship-builders" or "silly," it is currently comprised almost entirely of image-based "gifts." Unless these sites figure out some meaningful ways to augment them, I'd bet this revenue stream turns out to be mostly unsustainable.

<comment><USER6> Virtual goods sold on Facebook extend beyond what Facebook themselves sell, because of third-party apps. (Think in-Facebook RPGs where users can real cash to buy items, or flash games where you can use real cash to buy a new gun)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Mathbreakers does state machines with trains - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@mathbreakers/state-machine-trains-2458a5ce626b

<comment><USER2> This reminds me of Manufactoria (an old Flash game):

[http://pleasingfungus.com/Manufactoria/](http://pleasingfungus.com/Manufactoria/)</comment>


Loading Chrome Extensions in Brave - <AUTHOR> https://blog.brave.com/loading-chrome-extensions-in-brave/ <comment><USER2> Haha, so to use extensions I have to download the source code, manually download the extensions with an npm package I have to install, and then use actual code to register it.

It's nice that it supports extensions, but I probably would have skipped the blog post before there's a more convenient method.

Also, the only distinguishing features mentioned seem to be a built in Adblocker and Https redirect?

<comment><AUTHOR> Worth noting that this article is for developers wishing to assist the Brave team in determining whether an extension can be supported straight-away. This is not intended for your average user.

<comment><USER2> Ok that makes more sense then.

Still, I would recommend implementing some crappy UI only enabled on dev to do this.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's a fair request; I'll take it to the team for consideration. Thank you for the feedback!

<comment><USER2> That would most certainly make it easier to quickly test out various extensions.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's a challenging issue; Extensions run in multiple contexts. As such, some gaps in support may be realized in the browser's engine, the browser's chrome, or in UX/UI artifacts.

We have been researching ways to more easily test extensions, and will continue to explore this in the future.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Full source of 130k+ extensions: [https://crx.dam.io/](https://crx.dam.io/)

Github repo: [https://github.com/mdamien/chrome-extensions- archive](https://github.com/mdamien/chrome-extensions-archive)

<comment><USER4> Neat!

Fun fact: The main way to peruse the source of the various Mozilla projects[1] was to use MXR[2], and we[3] tried to get Mozilla Corp to index the extensions that are published through addons.mozilla.org, but they weren't willing to provide any support. This was a big problem because if you recall, every time a new Firefox release dropped, it would cause massive breakage because APIs would be obsoleted and removed within the same release cycle. As a Mozilla contributor, even if you wanted to bend over backwards and check which extensions you would be breaking with any given patch to mozilla-central (and maybe send fixes to the extension maintainers if you were really nice), there was no way to do it short of setting up a crawler yourself (to spider AMO) and either running an instance of some shiny code indexing tool yourself on localhost, or more likely just dumping all extensions' source off a subdirectory of $HOME and running a slow recursive grep every time you wanted to check on some symbol use. It would be hard to overstate how many patches never got written and upstreamed because of this.

As a Mozilla contributor, you had the choice of either throwing in and piling on to the bonfire of wanton breakage, or quietly opting to take no action when running into instances where you could improve and even stabilize the underlying "platform". The former was actually an uneasy thing to think about, because it was clear that TPTB didn't give a damn about one of the single biggest driving forces behind Firefox user retention, which was the extension ecosystem[4]. Opting for the latter was "safer" because although it kept the codebase in a poorer state than it could have been in, it might stem the flow just enough so that the number of users bleeding out wasn't so bad as to cause Mozilla to lose its negotiating power. And when the future is still not guaranteed, you can hold out hope that maybe people will come around and start doing the right thing.

Eventually, an index of add-on sources did get built and grafted onto MXR. Only problem is Mozilla allowed proprietary add-ons to be published on AMO, and whoever set it up chose to put those in the index, too. So they threw it behind an HTTP auth wall that you could only get through by logging in with your LDAP password. Just another example of the uphill battle it was to be working on Mozilla but not from behind an @mozilla.com email address.

1\. For example, Firefox, SpiderMonkey, the web properties, and less popular client software like Thunderbird and SeaMonkey

2\. MXR was a heavily modified version of the LXR tool, which itself was meant to make it less painful to browse and search the Linux kernel sources

3\. "We" here just means the set of people who pushed for this over the years, not like a consolidated effort coming from a single team that I happened to be part of or anything

4\. To some, this will probably read as run-of-the-mill lamentations of someone's pet use case not being prioritized and coddled, but it's not so. I'm not and never have been a heavy extension user, but a) it was stupid not to recognize that extensions were highly valued by both the vocal minority and silent majority that were responsible for the number of Firefox holdouts, and b) making an end-user-hackable browser was, like, the natural consequence to be working on if you were serious about all rhetoric the people from your camp were spewing about making something that really was aiming to be a "user agent" meant to "put end users in control" so they could "experience the web on their own terms".

\----

Anyway, this got really long. That link to the repo of Chrome extensions is a nice thing. I'm on record as not being too much of a fan of GitHub, but it's neat how it enables something like this to exist, even if it still takes a lot of manual work to keep things reasonably up to date. If it had been clearer that git was going to win the DVCS battle and the timing were better so that cheap symbol lookup (in the form of GitHub's code search) were available in the timeframe when all this was taking place, then it would have been nice to throw something like this together for extensions in the Mozilla add-on ecosystem, back when it could have made a difference.

<comment><USER5> IMHO your rant does boil down to the fact that making the browser "end-user- hackable" through extensions was an untenable situation. I mean, you're both saying

"This was a big problem because if you recall, every time a new Firefox release dropped, it would cause massive breakage because APIs would be obsoleted and removed within the same release cycle."

and

"it was stupid not to recognize that extensions were highly valued by both the vocal minority and silent majority that were responsible for the number of Firefox holdouts, and b) making an end-user-hackable browser was, like, the natural consequence to be working on if you were serious about all rhetoric the people from your camp were spewing about making something that really was aiming to be a "user agent" meant to "put end users in control" so they could "experience the web on their own terms"."

I don't buy the argument that a searchable source index is what made or broke this. For starters, the approach you describe obviously doesn't scale. It's fixing a leaking roof with buckets. Resources _were_ in fact better spent elsewhere, so yes, it's exactly "run-of-the-mill lamentations of someone's pet use case not being prioritized and coddled".

The idea that Firefox's add-on ecosystem was an asset rather than a liability did much to set the browser and the users' experience with it back for years, and it'll continue to do so as users lash out when their unrealistic expectations of XUL addons continuing to work are broken.

<comment><USER4> > making the browser "end-user-hackable" through extensions was an untenable > situation

This is in response to a blog post where extension support is being _added_. And those extensions exist in great numbers. Targeting the most popular browser in the world. And there's no sign that they are being deprecated. So how untenable are extensions? Is Chrome untenable?

> I don't buy the argument that a searchable source index is what made or > broke this.

I'm very glad, then, that I didn't say that.

> it's exactly "run-of-the-mill lamentations of someone's pet use case not > being prioritized and coddled"

I'm flummoxed at this comment. There's no way this is an instance of that, nor would it even be possible for it to be, because it's not even my use case. I think I made that clear enough in my original comment.

<comment><USER5> _So how untenable are extensions?_

An extension API that has a well-delineated API border and limits the internal surface that is exposed is obviously tenable.

A full "end-user-hackable" browser where add-ons can access all browser internals is not.

 _There 's no way this is an instance of that, nor would it even be possible for it to be, because it's not even my use case. I think I made that clear enough in my original comment._

Your use case was to try to limit the breakage caused by changing the exposed internals. You explicitly said so. This use case entirely hinges on maintaining a fundamentally broken design.

Firefox's XUL add-on system is a perfect example of sunk cost fallacy.

<comment><USER6> > _A full "end-user-hackable" browser where add-ons can access all browser > internals is not [tenable]._

Why not? Please explain.

You seem to imply that Mozilla's continously-breaking-extensions problem is proof that this is untenable, but I don't see any obvious connection between the two.

<comment><USER5> _You seem to imply that Mozilla 's continously-breaking-extensions problem is proof that this is untenable, but I don't see any obvious connection between the two._

Because the breakage is inevitable as internals invariably change. That's why Firefox extensions break: the internals change, and add-ons depend on them. This causes a huge add-on churn each time the browser significantly changes, leads to abandoned add-ons, user and ecosystem frustration. It causes a pushback on the developers to make far-reaching changes (e10s being a clear example). It adds overhead as others try to mitigate the compatibility impact of changes (which was what the original poster was attempting and failing at doing, as was Mozilla's AMO team). The unrestricted power of the add-ons also leads to huge review queues, causing more ecosystem frustration.

Mozilla has given up on it. I would say the burden of proof is now on someone else to say it can work, because there's no more examples left: everyone who came after Firefox saw the problem and enforced a stable add-ons API that limits the internals' exposure.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> My favorite thing about Brave on Android is that it is basically Chrome with ad blocking. Firefox with uBlock on Android becomes unbearably slow and chugs after using it for a bit on my brand new Pixel. Opera crashed on me twice in the span of two days. And I don't particularly trust any of the other third party browsers out there.

I just want the speed and quality of Chrome but no obnoxious ads while I surf. Brave gives me exactly that. The only thing missing from my total joy is some sort of 1password integration. Hopefully extensions can give us that.

<comment><USER8> Try Warp Browser for Android too,

[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.em.warp.br...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.em.warp.browser&hl=en)

It includes ad blocking, Do Not Track, and other privacy features. It's based off Chromium and is just as fast and reliable as stock Chrome is on my Pixel.

<comment><USER9> this seems shady. Who is this eMbience Inc? I would be careful trusting unknown browser companies.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Disclaimer: I am also a Brave Software employee :)

Jonathan Sampson, author of the article, has been using similar methods to test popular extensions with Brave to ensure we have support for them (and if not, to identify what's missing).

You can track the progress that he and team have made here: [https://github.com/brave/browser- laptop/projects/1](https://github.com/brave/browser-laptop/projects/1)

</comment><comment><USER11> I have been looking for a new browser to replace Chrome (2017 is the year when I try to get some distance from all those Google services) and gave a change to Brave. I tried to add my own extension by naively copying their folder inside the Brave extension folder, but it failed.

I'm currently using Vivaldi and even set it as my current browser for now, because of the ease of adding extensions.

</comment><comment><USER12> Time to port the Ask Toolbar to Brave

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

<comment><AUTHOR> Run through the document; let me know how well it works :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Originally, I was opposed to the model used to build the Brave browser. A payment and ad-replacement system seemed like something better suited for a browser plug-in than a browser fork. It seems harder to convince users to change browsers than to install a plug-in. Looking at the scope of changes and features listed today, it makes more sense to me now why they chose to fork.

It does seem odd to me that they chose to fork Chromium instead of Firefox. Google is obviously vested in keeping the existing ad revenue streams flowing, so Brave getting traction could be seen as a threat to Google's revenue. Google also seems fairly well placed with Chrome to be able to apply pressure on Brave. Is that a realistic concern for Brave? Could Google make life difficult for Brave? Firefox seems like a safer place to start, fewer conflicted interests. Maybe Brave would be able to pivot before Google could apply pressure.

The Brave privacy page mentions their "Ad Replacement" feature ([https://brave.com/about_ad_replacement.html](https://brave.com/about_ad_replacement.html)). I've seen people complain about it before on HN. As far as I can tell, the replaced advertisement doesn't generate any revenue for the viewed website. It's a clever way to make more money for Brave, but it doesn't really feel like fair play. I wonder if that would cause publishers to view the Brave browser poorly.

Thinking about what would happen if Brave gained serious traction... Brave works well for publishers if more people who currently use ad blockers switch to Brave instead. Brave works poorly for publishers if people who currently don't use ad blockers switch to Brave. In theory users could add their own money to Brave which could cause publishers to realize similar or larger revenue, although I wouldn't expect enough users to do that for it to matter. So overall, it seems like Brave would shrink the revenue available to publishers. Publishers may come to this conclusion and want to discourage the use of Brave. With the ad-blocker detection tricks gaining popularity, I wonder if publishers would just block Brave users. Maybe that's part of why Brave no longer uses a unique user agent string ([https://github.com/brave/browser- laptop/blob/master/CHANGELO...](https://github.com/brave/browser- laptop/blob/master/CHANGELOG.md)).

I am also a little concerned about Brave's ability to respond to security issues. I trust Google and Mozilla with Browser security based on how they have handled issues. Since Brave is a fork of Chromium I expect a lag time when security patches are released. The lag time is mentioned here ([https://github.com/brave/browser- laptop/issues/840](https://github.com/brave/browser-laptop/issues/840)). I don't have good a insight into how Brave security tests the code they add/modify, so I can't comment there.

FWIW I don't plan to use Brave, but I am very interested to see how it evolves. It's a fantastic idea.

<comment><USER5> _It does seem odd to me that they chose to fork Chromium instead of Firefox_

WebKit/Blink/Chromium have a large webcompat advantage due to superior marketshare, and Firefox's embedding story is weak. WebKit is big enough that it's hard for Google to bully out users even if they can make piggy-backing on Blink more annoying. It depends on how hard you depend on Chromium vs how hard you depend on the underlying rendering engine.

IIRC at least their first Android browser did fork Firefox, simply because it had a much superior embedding/customization story than the desktop version.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Opera has a similar plugin:

[https://addons.opera.com/en/extensions/details/download- chro...](https://addons.opera.com/en/extensions/details/download-chrome- extension-9/)

The fact that these browsers share similar bones is really nice from a functionality perspective.

</comment><comment><USER15> One thing that's lacking in Brave that I miss from Opera: the arrow button that appears on the right side when you scroll that takes to the top/bottom of the page. This is so handy and I hope Brave adds the feature.

</comment><comment><USER16> Has anyone tested the Dashlane extension in this way for Brave? If so, I would consider using it as my desktop browser. I currently use Brave on mobile, and it is great.

<comment><USER17> That's how I ended up briefly moving to [Vivaldi]([https://vivaldi.com](https://vivaldi.com)). It's basically chromium with new browser chrome. It was fun playing with the new UI, but it seemed to suck down memory like no ones business. It is compatible with all the chrome extensions though.

<comment><USER18> It is surprisingly slow.

<comment><AUTHOR> Brave is surprisingly slow? If so, I'd love to have more information so I can file issues, and we can work to improve. Thanks!

<comment><USER19> I think the parent was talking Vivaldi, not Brave.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> the only struggle I have with many of this really nice browsers, is that many don't offer a way for plugins to change the new tab page. I do not want your speed dial. I want mine. Chrome seems and Firefox to be the only ones that do it.

</comment><comment><USER21> Completely off topic: What are the chances that I would type "brave" to search on this page precicely at the moment the cartoon playing for my children on the TV will say "brave".

<comment><AUTHOR> It's a sign; download Brave today and give it a week

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Why Brave does not enable DNT by default?

<comment><AUTHOR> With it being off for so many others (including Edge), it would be a means by which Brave users could be fingerprinted. Not to mention, it isn't really effective. Brave prevents tracking not by polite request, but by forcefully ripping it out of the user's session ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Is this related to the Brave Sentry spyware?

<comment><AUTHOR> This is related to the Brave Browser; a JavaScript-based browsing environment that blocks ads, trackers, and more out-of-the-box. Check it out online at [https://brave.com](https://brave.com).

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Been working with brave for a while. God they are a bunch of badd$ss.... Super impressed with the vision and what we have built.</comment>


Typeface by Toyota. The iQ font Designed By A Moving Car. - <AUTHOR> http://ifitshipitshere.blogspot.com/2009/07/font-designed-by-car-toyota-iq.html <comment><USER2> figured I'd jump in on HN since I've been lurking for a while (and loving this site), and mention that I wrote the software for this, which is tracking the four colors on the car.

It's using openframeworks (openframeworks.cc) an open source, cross platform c++ toolkit (which I am helping develop). the source code for the car tracking software is here:

[http://www.openframeworks.cc/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=...](http://www.openframeworks.cc/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=2314&hilit=iq+font)

and you can check out openframeworks at

<http://openframeworks.cc>

<http://openframeworks.cc/download>

It was quite fun to work on this -- the driver and type designers blew me away with how good they were.

<comment><USER3> how did you end up working on this project?

are you a freelance software engineer? do you generally work on creative projects like these?

<comment><USER2> Sorry if this is a long answer ;)

I work primarily as a software artist and teacher, and we (as in the folks who work on openframeworks) sometimes we do commercial projects / freelance work. Because of the nature of what we do (computer vision, interaction design, realtime software) we get invited to work on very diverse projects.

For this particular project, Theo, who is part of the OF team, had already been working on something IQ related with the advertising company Happiness Brussels, which was postponed because of the economy. When they thought of this project, they contacted Theo, who put them in touch with me as I happened to be in Brussels teaching a workshop and thought this would be fun to help with. Everything clicked from there.

If it's helpful, here are some links to other projects (so you can see what kind of stuff I work on):

<http://vimeo.com/4706049> / <http://vimeo.com/4732884> / <http://vimeo.com/2892576> / <http://vimeo.com/2375069>

and I'm currently working on a project covered a few days ago on hacker news ;)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=720146>

<comment><USER3> are you trained as an artist or as a software engineer? hmm, maybe what i want to ask is, from which "side" did you get into being a software artist?

<comment><USER2> I was trained as an artist and got into computers / programming accidentally... now I teach artists how to code (and sometimes CS students more artistic potentials of software / programming).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I don't really care for the font, but the marketing stunt was executed beautifully and reading about the process was fascinating. This is a very cool idea to get techies talking about your product.

<comment><USER5> Definitely agree. The font itself looks out of focus and starts giving me a headache if I stare at it too long but the idea itself was genius.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Very clever idea. I'm not sure how readable it will be in practice... but definitely cool.

</comment><comment><USER7> Cool idea! I guess iQ would not be available in US?

</comment><comment><USER8> EVIL MARKETING. But I love it!

</comment><comment><USER9> Q looks too much like 0. otherwise cool.

<comment><USER10> Q doesn't look like 0 at all in this font; Q is large and has a line across it and 0 is small and has no line across it.</comment></comment>


I.Q. Rising - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/education/edlife/james-r-flynn-on-rising-iqs.html

<comment><USER2> Funny someone posts this just as I received an email with the subject line:

"Researchers say Western IQs dropped 14 points over last century." ([http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/researchers-western- iqs...](http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/researchers-western-iqs- dropped-14-points-over-last-180634194.html))

I'm actually surprised it's that low.

IQ falling, drastically. I was browsing the Twitter feed of a friend from high school and in five minutes I was bombared with statements like "instagram straight flexin", "poppin mollies", "fuck the police", "we on that vine all night baby".

Background: the guy is 28 years old, white, grew up in Beverly Hills, works at real estate firm. Wears suite & tie all day. Went to college.

My brain is bleeding.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is the kind of link bait that strokes the collective ego of humanity.

It's not too overt, it avoids referring to 'you' or 'we' but it plays on the same emotions.</comment>


Dropping jQuery UI, and Refactoring Backbone.js Views - <AUTHOR> https://planscope.io/blog/2012/07/12/dropping-jquery-ui-and-refactoring-backbone-js-views

<comment><USER2> How did this even get to the front page of HN....

<comment><USER3> It's an interesting case study from a real world perspective: "I did A+B+C with the best intentions, after a while it got slow so I did X+Y+Z to fix it."

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This post can be summarized as:

"I wrote shitty code, t'was slow, then I fixed it. No longer quite as slow."

Same level of detail/usefulness too.

HN is officially the collective unfiltered RSS feed of a gaggle of aspiring bloggers, wantrepreneurs and assorted startups.</comment>


No Follow-up Questions from YC Application. Bad Sign? - <AUTHOR>

Saw that some applicants were asked to clarify some things. Is it generally a bad sign if I've heard nothing from the YC team? <comment><USER2> I wouldn't say that, it could just be your application was so clear that they could easily extract all the information they needed.

That being said, we had to answer a follow-up question since we made a lot of outlandish claims for what our technology could do without explaining how. In our case, the how is not obvious at all, hence the follow-up, but if yours is, than I wouldn't read into it.

Best of luck!</comment>


Ask HN: 4 YC Founder Team? - <AUTHOR>

My cofounders and I have been considering applying to YC. We've been working on the project for 2 years, paying the bills by performing industry specific services, and plan to have a sellable prototype by December (we're a hardware startup, which is why we've taken so long).
But, we have 4 founders in our current state. I understand that YC prefers 2 or 3 founders, but we've been bootstrapping for 2 years with 4, so does that balance out the higher risk of the 4 founder? Thanks in advance for your thoughts.
Also, just to clarify, our team consists of a hardcore embedded linux/os dev, a back end dev, a front end dev/designer, and a sales/marketing guy (who's learned enough coding to write simple CRUD apps). Disclaimer: I'm the marketing guy. <comment><USER2> I'm personally not a YC founder, but I have gone through another high-profile accelerator.

In the vast majority of cases, the "rules" are just a starting guideline. There are _always_ exceptions.

Just like there have been (rare) cases of single founders, the opposite of four founders is likely an option.

The one thing that matters is the same thing that has always mattered. Are you rockstars? YC - like others - invest in people.

If you're an amazing set of people and work great together on an idea that you've been working on for two years, but all means apply. You literally have nothing to lose.

<comment><USER3> I agree with the above post. Not dying after 2 years is enough for me to say you guys definitely should apply.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Parse (YC S11) is doing well: <https://www.parse.com/about>

</comment><comment><USER5> Seems balanced enough. Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER6> Not sure if this is relevant, but I just spent the summer with a YC startup that had 4 founders. In fact when the final papers for the US version of the company were made it had like 7 due to investor type people.

<comment><USER7> Ditto. We went through as a 4 founder team in summer 07.</comment></comment>


On Sexual Harassment in the Tech Industry - <AUTHOR> http://thenextweb.com/voice/2014/08/20/sexual-harrassment-tech-industry/

<comment><USER2> > I apologise for them and I am ready to apologise again in person with a big > bouquet of flowers.

Apologizing for sexual harassment in-person with what's generally considered a romantic gesture? Fuck this guy.</comment>


Ask HN: Is Node.js.org down? - <AUTHOR> Trying to download a version of ndoe from nodejs.org shows a 522 response from Cloudflare. https://nodejs.org/dist/v4.4.7/node-v4.4.7-linux-x64.tar.xz <comment><USER2> Yes: [https://github.com/nodejs/nodejs.org/issues/1191](https://github.com/nodejs/nodejs.org/issues/1191)

<comment><USER3> funny how apparently everyones CI is downloading it directly from the servers, instead of having local caches. Bandwidth is cheap.

<comment><USER4> We still haven't learnt our lessons. I guess we can tolerate a blackout once in a while.</comment></comment></comment>


Microsoft's Mysterious 'Modern OS' - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/futuresin/microsofts-mysterious-modern-os-7e2da93d3774 <comment><USER2> > So is Microsoft really working on a next generation cloud-based OS? It > certainly looks like it…

This would be awesome. Flutter on mobile & desktop would be nice to write once run many, but a distributed cloud os seems like what we should be solving now rather the left over problems that we made ourselves.

<comment><AUTHOR> Indeed :)</comment></comment>


Do Millennial Men Want Stay-At-Home Wives? - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/31/opinion/sunday/do-millennial-men-want-stay-at-home-wives.html <comment><USER2> Oh thank goodness, the article opens with explaining the utter uselessness of the term "millennial". I (32) have next to nothing in common with someone who was born when I was graduating high school. It's an absurd category.

Anyway, it's still silly to take this particular question as a proxy for views on gender equality. I think there's an obvious desire for it to be economically feasible for one partner to be able to take time off to raise children in their early years. It's usually not possible anymore.

<comment><USER3> Absolutely. What happened to Generation Y? If Gen X cuts off at 1980, wouldn't Gen Y be from 1980 to early/mid '90s? Millenials are kids who don't remember dial-up, and perhaps even wired ethernet.

<comment><USER4> I'm considered a millennial and I was born in 1985. The most common I've heard is it is anyone who turned 18 on or after 2000.

Also, I very definitely remember dial-up... and cassette tapes, and VHS, and walkmans, diskmans, CRT monitors, playing outside, etc :)

<comment><USER5> Born in 93, is playing outside really not common anymore or are you just joking?

<comment><USER4> I am half joking on that one. But yes, I get the distinct feeling playing outside is becoming increasingly less common.

And when kids do play outside their parents hover over them and they can't explore or take risks.

Speaking purely from the perspective of someone in the US. I know other countries are very different.

<comment><USER6> I hover over my kid when he plays outside... but then, he's 18 months old.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> As incomes rise in the US (mostly in high productivity sectors), child care costs increase even though the productivity of child care stays stagnant. As a result, per dollar spent, the quality of child care has been getting worse. On top of that, the best nannies/day cares/schools are being bided up by more market forces in those sectors. As a result, the point at which increasing family income by a secondary earner is no longer net positive (especially when considering tax implications.. someplace where unpaid household labor majorly wins).

Improved educational attainment may have just made Millennials act more economically 'rational' than their previous versions.

<comment><USER8> Those who in high productivity sectors make more than enough to warrant working instead of staying at home. My wife is in this category. And you need to think of this more than a simple one year ROI.

Leaving the workforce for 5-7 years (or more) can shave hundreds of thousands or millions off of lifetime earnings. You are talking about leaving the workforce in prime of your career and not getting experience and promotions for several years. My daughter is 2.5, and my wife has been promoted twice since she was born. Leaving the workforce from the ages of 30 to 37 could be fairly catastrophic to one's lifetime earnings.

We live in the Washington, DC area, with the highest childcare costs in the U.S., and the long-term financial impact of her not working would be staggering, even if working versus not working was a complete push while we had pre-school age kids.

There are reasons why a spouse may want to stay at home to raise kids, but rarely does it make long-term financial sense.

<comment><USER9> What do you say to people who decry the concentration of high incomes in our governments capital?

<comment><USER8> If your area has a low concentration of good paying jobs, it's probably a structural and cultural issue that could be worked on.

Washington, DC is the capital of the wealthiest country on Earth and it has a massive concentration of high quality higher education. Why wouldn't the economy be strong here?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> As a working mom with a stay-at-home husband, I don't love the wording of the question. There's no way to tell which respondents think women shouldn't work, and which ones simply value the work of stay-at-home parents. I know they've asked the same question with the same wording for decades, but I'd still like to see what results they got with a gender-neutral statement like "It is much better for everyone involved if one spouse works outside the home and the other takes care of the home and family."

</comment><comment><USER11> I'm a homeschooling SAHM (was a software engineer for 6 years, have a MS in CS) expecting our 4 child, born in 1982. This is not surprising to me, I know many women choosing being at home over a lucrative & promising career. Both my parents are MDs, and I was raised by nannies. Here's the thing about nannies - you don't know a situation is really bad until it's too late. Also, the second shift is a very real, exhausting phenomenon. Lots of smart women with smart early wave feminist moms have looked at our own childhoods and said, "I'd rather be significantly poorer and spend the time with my kids. I missed my mom when I was a kid and it hurt. I don't want the stress of working a full day followed afterschool pickup followed by homework and extracurriculars followed by dinner and cleaning." Not shockingly, I married a guy who agrees with me on this.

</comment><comment><USER12> I would say the Dutch (as is often the case) probably have it about right: married women with kids frequently work about 20 hours a week and the man works a 40 hours that actually ends up being closer to 50-60 hours away from the family (Figure commutes alone easily adds 5).

Anecdotally, my wife couldn't stand to stay at home, but it's also physically impossible to work full time and cover the kids' schedules, groceries, etc.

It doesn't have to be the woman either. We have friends where the woman works and the husband stays home. But they also adopted, so she _never_ stayed home to recover, breastfeed, etc.

<comment><USER13> What kinds of jobs allow 20 hours/week?

I can't remember ever seeing a single software development job (which wasn't contracting) where the employer advertised less than 40 hour weeks.

<comment><USER14> Europe has a much stronger culture of respecting part time work than the US.

I was surprised to hear that my parttime friends in Europe had benefits equivalent to their fulltime colleagues.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> i hate how this article confuses 'wanting a stay at home wife' with gender equality. so according to this article, having this preference must mean they are not in favor of gender equality.

<comment><USER16> NYT becoming more and more like BuzzFeed.

<comment><USER17> actually becoming more and more like Fox News, except "liberal" instead of "conservative".

<comment><USER18> That was always the case.

<comment><USER19> The New York Times has endorsed Republican presidential candidates in the past.

<comment><USER18> Hahahaha, yeah. Last time: Eisenhower in 1956.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I guess I'm in this category. My wife quit her job when we had our second kid. It was our decision. She's planning on going back to work when the younger one turns 4. Parent > Paid Caregiver for taking care of a child. Could be either parent.

<comment><USER6> > Parent > Paid Caregiver for taking care of a child. Could be either parent.

Maybe ideally, or commonly, or on average, but that really depends on the parent(s) and the potential paid caregiver under consideration.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Women have expectations now (for the better imho) that simply weren't there 50 or 60 years ago. I know the career sacrifice that my wife would have to make to stay at home and raise our kids would shatter her sense of wellbeing, so I _want_ her to get back into the workforce when she is able: in the long term, a happy, fulfilled wife is going to make for a happier marriage, and I am all about a peaceful life at home.

It also means that at any given time, either of us could support the family in case of disruption (e.g. I start a major project that takes a few years to generate revenue, or she decides to take time off active research to write a book). I value the flexibility that having both spouses work brings our family.

</comment><comment><USER21> I imagine that gay millennial men don't, but who knows, it could work.

Leaving that aside, I want a co-equal partner, but that doesn't necessarily exclude someone who stays at home for any number of reasons. I think gender equality should also be pursued by undoing the devaluation of what has been historically considered "women's work" (caring for loved ones, housework, etc).

<comment><USER22> I fall in this category and I would love to be a stay at home husband, not sure about wanting kids though. I'd do all the domestic duties happily and work on my own projects with my freetime, what a dream that would be!

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> From a financial stand point unless a parent makes significantly more than the cost of child care it makes since for them to stay at home.

<comment> norea-armozel I was thinking the same thing at least from the point of view of someone who came from a state where the job market has been shrinking or at least not growing in pace with the population. I don't think I knew anyone around my age or a little older who were married where only one spouse was working. It seemed back home almost everyone worked full time if they could and possibly an additional part-time job to cover costs especially if they had children.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I have one. Her choice though as we homeschool 3 kids.

<comment><USER25> If she wanted to work, would you stay home to homeschool, or would you stop homeschooling?

<comment><USER24> It depends, likely she would work part-time and we could continue homeschooling. But if she wanted to go FT, then yeah we would need to send the kids to school/daycare.

<comment><USER25> Thanks for the reply. I know for some people homeschooling is non-negotiable, so was curious to know your approach. My aunt in Alaska homeschooled her kids, but mostly "because the local school wasn't very good."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm an older millennial (barely even in the group). My wife has a career and so do I. Plus we have a small child. It would certainly be easier if one of us stayed home (not necessarily her). But I think it would be even better if we could both have a healthy work life balance.

</comment><comment><USER26> My girlfriend has a minimum wage job in retail. She doesn't particularly enjoy it. But I guess she can take comfort in the knowledge that she is participating in a "gender revolution". Not like those traitorous stay-at-home wives.

</comment><comment><USER27> Millennial Men wants to be Stay at Home Husbands!

</comment><comment><USER28> I do.

<comment><USER29> Me too. And have. And am happy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Perhaps because it has become harder for families to afford so it is now seen as a luxury? And people want luxuries...

</comment><comment><USER6> Sometimes my wife and I joke that we could use a stay-at-home wife...

</comment><comment><USER31> What's the comparative divorce rate between families with stay at home dads vs stay at home moms?

</comment><comment><USER32> I don't.

<comment><USER33> It's interesting how you get downvoted with "I don't" while the comment saying "I do" gets upvoted. It seems this crowd doesn't just see this as a matter of opinion but would rather silence one view - namely the view of men who don't want their wives to be stay-at-home moms. This lends quite a bit of credibility to the hypothesis that millennials strongly prefer traditional gender roles.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> If the Millennial Men have kids and want the best for them, then, yeah. Hard to argue that a mother is better than a baby sitter.

<comment><USER34> The men could just as easily be the one staying home.

<comment> trey-jones "just as easily" is not exactly true. Sure mom can pump and leave breastmilk (an inconvenience, some might say!), but there is at least one good reason that moms are moms, at least for the first year. Hard to argue with biology.

<comment><USER35> If a woman is only staying at home for the first year of an infant's life, I really wouldn't call that a "Stay-at-home-wife". That's more of an extended maternity leave. I've always seen "Stay-at-home" wife/mom used to describe women who choose to stay home long-term, usually in place of a full-time career.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> While we should treat genders equally with respect, we should not pretend genders are interchangeable. Men are not good moms, for us and all species. Women have a much harder choice than men with work, and we should not pretend they don't.</comment>


The New Technorati - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/14/the-new-technorati/

<comment><USER2> I haven't actually been to technorati.com in ages! Maybe I'm just out of the blogging circle...

<comment><USER3> It's not just you. I think Technorati sort of lost their way a while ago.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: As a novice data scientist, is it useful to take CS classes? - <AUTHOR>

Hello,
I am currently a bio E grad student teaching myself the basics of data science using resources such as Introduction to Statistical Learning, Andrew Ng's Machine Learning Course, The Coursera Data Science Track etc.
I have heard mixed views on whether it is useful for new data scientists to take CS coursework. What are your thoughts? <comment><USER2> I think it's extremely useful, if for no other reason than as a data scientist you're going to be dealing with CS types and having some common vocabulary and experience will smooth the relationship.

Of course, I also think a data scientist (and most other people) should take some courses in ethics and philosophy, and lots of people think that's bunk, so YMMV.</comment>


Talkwalker Alerts - Free alternative to Google Alerts - <AUTHOR> http://www.talkwalker.com/alerts?ref=hnews

<comment><USER2> Over the past weeks, Google sent me 1 mail per day containing 1 single result. So I will definitely try out this alternative

</comment><comment><USER3> great alternative !!!</comment>


Things which aren't magic – Flask and app.route – Part 2 - <AUTHOR> http://ains.co/blog/things-which-arent-magic-flask-part-2.html

<comment><USER2> Another great read, just like part 1.

</comment><comment><USER3> I like this series so far!</comment>


China has backtracked on nearly all aspects of the US draft trade agreement - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/08/china-backtracked-on-nearly-all-aspects-of-us-trade-deal-sources.html <comment><USER2> > "Lighthizer has pushed hard for an enforcement regime more like those used > for punitive economic sanctions – such as those imposed on North Korea or > Iran – than a typical trade deal."

Anything that looks like the good old days "foreign aggression" are sure to be well-received by China... Not.

Are the US genuinely looking for a deal? Or do habits die hard?

<comment><USER3> Given China's long history of violating trade agreements a requirement for verification is not unreasonable.

<comment><USER2> Long history?

For political and historical reasons I don't see China agreeing to be under 'inspections' from a foreign country, and rightly so.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> It would be unsurprising to find the US trade deal was asymmetric. The TPP was massively asymmetric favouring the US and a better deal without the US</comment>


Hints of life on Venus: Scientists detect phosphine molecules in cloud decks - <AUTHOR> https://phys.org/news/2020-09-hints-life-venus-scientists-phosphine.html <comment><AUTHOR> Here is their research published in Nature: [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-020-1174-4](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-020-1174-4)</comment>


Climate Change Will Cost Us Even More Than We Think - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/23/opinion/climate-change-costs.html <comment><USER2> (disclaimer: I work in a Climate&Energy research group)

I just want to remind everyone that there _are_ solutions to climate change. We know how to produce clean energy and sequester CO2. The current free market does not make those solutions profitable for investors, though, and we will have to change that.

Solving climate change can be as simple as getting a carbon price adopted. It needs to ramp up over time, allow a secondary market for offsets, and create a cross-border network effect (e.g. carbon free trade zone), but it can actually be that simple.

A "carbon tax" may be infeasible given current political norms, but a revenue neutral "carbon dividend" would have the same effect while being more progressive.

So, if you are curious what you can do to solve climate change, consider contacting your representative.

<comment><USER3> Before any tax is issued, I'd like to know the exact percentage breakdown between man-made climate change and natural climate cycles? Can anyone break the percentage down for me, between man-made CO2 and natural CO2 being outgassed by oceans, and then breakdown the difference between CO2 induced warming and variations in the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, the cosmic ray flux and it's impact on cloud cover as a result of variations in solar magnetic cycles, volcanic activity, and the El Nino Southern Oscillation? Can anyone break that down by percentages for me?

<comment><USER4> Here is a video that adresses some of your points. [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FBF6F4Bi6Sg](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FBF6F4Bi6Sg)

<comment><USER5> Nice, the video addresses myths such as: "Climate Change -- Isn't it natural?"

Made by a former geologist, science journalists for 25 years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm fascinated by this graph of the growth of solar as compared to International Agency Predictions.

Year after year, the IEA massively underestimated the growth of solar. Last year, at a workshop with the World Bank I heard an expert in energy investments say "even just 5 years ago none of us ever thought the price of solar could go this low this fast".

GRAPH: [https://steinbuch.files.wordpress.com/2017/06/iea-vs- reality...](https://steinbuch.files.wordpress.com/2017/06/iea-vs-reality- photovoltaics-2018.png?w=1102)

I'm curious if there's something similar for the changing climate. Just how much are we underestimating the changing climate? Has anyone seen a graph like the one above, but regarding climate predictions?

For example, the rate of Greeland's massive ice melt was as high as the worst climate predictions for 2070, decades into the future. [1][2] It seems even the scientific predictions can be too conservative.

[1] [https://twitter.com/xavierfettweis/status/115648786895048294...](https://twitter.com/xavierfettweis/status/1156487868950482945) [2] [https://twitter.com/xavierfettweis/status/115648786895048294...](https://twitter.com/xavierfettweis/status/1156487868950482945)

<comment><USER6> That melt isn't as unprecedented as the Forbes blagger makes it out to be. Follow the chain and you find out that it is reasonably comparable to one that happened in…2012:

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2019/08/01/greenland-...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2019/08/01/greenland- ice-sheet-poured-billion-tons-water-into-north-atlantic-july-alone/)

If it ends up part of even a 2 year pattern, that's already concerning, I'm not dismissing the issue, I'm just slagging Forbes links.

<comment><USER5> Following up here:

The reference to 2070 seems to relate to the rate of melting (ablation rate), which was greater than the 2012 melt.

The rate of the recent melt was modeled as the average daily melting rate in 2070 in SSP585: [https://twitter.com/xavierfettweis/status/115648786895048294...](https://twitter.com/xavierfettweis/status/1156487868950482945)

Oh so this looks interesting. Here's what SSP585 refers to, it's a hardcore model for 2000 ppm by 2200: [https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Relation- of-C4MIP-simula...](https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Relation-of-C4MIP- simulations-to-CMIP6-DECK-and-historical-simulations-and-the- ssp585-and_fig1_306920281)

I haven't found the source for linking that to the ablation rate besides the above xavierfettweis tweet tho. But he has a followup tweet in that thread saying it was related to the melting rate overall.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Without criticizing the article at all, I want to point out that headlines like this go viral and make money, while the opposite ones would go nowhere.

In other words, the news you see is selected by virality, not by how well they describe the real world.

I have no cure or even complaint for this. I just think it's a very important thing to keep in mind.

<comment><USER8> I may have seen this exact headline maybe once a month for the past 10-15 years.

<comment><USER9> Maybe soon someone will take notice and do something

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It's going to happen faster than we've been told. I expect in 10 years global panic will set in.

<comment><USER11> Can you support this opinion?

<comment><USER5> Greenland's massive ice melt wasn't supposed to happen until 2070.

It seems even the scientific predictions can be too conservative. The changing climate isn't a linear system, it's more like a step function. Once the ice melts it's much harder to get back.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottsnowden/2019/08/16/greenla...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottsnowden/2019/08/16/greenlands- massive-ice-melt-wasnt-supposed-to-happen-until-2070/#73bd18274894)

<comment><USER11> It is interesting to note that just about 1000 years ago the Vikings were growing barley in Greenland [0].

> "Now we can see that the Vikings could grow corn, and this was very > important for their nourishment and survival,"

Barley seems to do ok in late Spring conditions in the NE United States [1]. I'm not certain you could grow barley or corn in Tundra conditions.

I bring this up when people mention warming global conditions because the planet has, in the past, been much warmer than it is now.

[0] [https://sciencenordic.com/agriculture-archaeology- denmark/vi...](https://sciencenordic.com/agriculture-archaeology- denmark/vikings-grew-barley-in-greenland/1447746)

[1] [https://plants.usda.gov/plantguide/pdf/ccpg_horde.pdf](https://plants.usda.gov/plantguide/pdf/ccpg_horde.pdf)

<comment><USER12> It was a well-known and understood roughly 300-year _localized_ warmer period[1] in Western Europe and the North Atlantic. The planet has been globally warmer than what it is now but that was long before _H. sapiens_ and has nothing to do with the Vikings or barley.

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I am trying to find the source I read a few years ago where climate scientists are intentionally scaling back their predictions so they aren't discounted as crazy doomsday predictions. I think that there are many accurate predictions out there but we mostly see the most mild ones because they figure some action is better than being written off completely.

<comment><USER5> Would love to see that! See my post above about IEA solar power predictions, interested to learn more about predictions over the years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Dropping in here just to say: if this got you worried, come work with us over at [http://climateaction.tech/](http://climateaction.tech/) We are a global community of tech professionals using our skills, expertise and platforms to support solutions to the climate crisis.

<comment><USER15> Looks interesting but what are you actually doing (projects)? I couldn't find in your site.

<comment><USER14> The core of the climateAction.tech at the moment is in a Slack, where different projects are moved forward by the community. There are a bunch of different things happening but recently some of our members where behind the [https://digital.globalclimatestrike.net](https://digital.globalclimatestrike.net). A couple of things I know are being worked on include putting more pressure on AWS to switch to renewables faster and an idea for a green open-source license

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Im not sure why anyone expects these estimates to hold any water at all.

From what I gather, pressure from the establishment has systematically caused scientists to lowball impact estimates and ignore second (and higher) order effects. Meanwhile the complexity and far reach of impact is beyond anything we can model.

Consider how all the experts were surprised in the 2008 economic crisis. That was just an economic crisis, primarily involving things we can easily count (dollars) on a very small timescale (years).

Now we are talking about many interlocking systems we cannot model well, on a timescale we cannot fathom. How good could those estimates ever be? Maybe +/\- 6 orders of magnitude.

<comment><USER16> Downvoters please help me understand your angle here

<comment><USER5> I upvoted, FWIW. Maybe help explain your perspective some more? It sounds like you're just kind of saying "we can't model anything so why bother?".

We can model what we can. Sure, the big recession catches the world by surprise, but people are working constantly to model these systems, and it seems to be better than doing nothing.

Climate models for example tell us that carbon dioxide is indeed a greenhouse gas, and gives us an idea of the amount of warming we'll see at various levels.

+/\- 6 orders of magnitude seems like a lot. Like that seems like we don't know whether we'll have 400 ppm or 400,000,000 ppm in the future?

<comment><USER16> Thanks! My order of magnitude range is extreme, but I was thinking of "total cost to humanity" estimate not ppms.

I do think trying to put a price tag on climate change's "total cost to humanity" is truly a hopeless task, and results are bound to be meaningless, due to sheer complexity combine with subjectivity.

How can we meaningfully price biodiversity, the anguish of future generations, permanently escalating geopolitical stress, and the vast flock of black swan events that will result from these changes, in a single dollar amount? I believe such efforts are pure hogwash.

<comment><USER5> Glad you responded! Lots of thoughts on this.

The estimates are sure to be not exactly right. But I don't let that hold me up!

I see sooooo many people get stuck because they can't figure out "Well is it 700 billion tons of carbon in the air or 900? Will the the warming 4 degrees C or 5?". "I can't do anything if I don't know exactly what it is".

To me it's all just an excuse to do nothing. And I understand it, it's a relief to feel powerless sometimes, "I can't do anything about this, oh well". But we have to fight that. I know there's more carbon in the air than we know what to do with, and we have to take it out. Current capacities are so much smaller than any estimate of the order of magnitude, that my role is building, not predicting.

We do need more modelers and monitors. However, there is a diminishing return to modeling and modeling and modeling. So we need 10X more modeler and 100,000X people building and taking action.

<comment><USER16> I think we agree, all Im saying in addition is, "total cost to humanity" is extremely hard to model, far harder than a physical climate model, so hard its near meaningless.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Every time a climate change article hits the front page of HN, I cheer a bit. Are there any other awesome tech + climate communities around?

</comment><comment><USER17> This is a very wide ranging piece by the two academics Naomi Oreskes and Nicholas Stern.

Oreskes: '...contrary to popular belief, there is no single scientific method. Rather, the trustworthiness of scientific claims derives from the social process by which they are rigorously vetted against'. It comes down to trust...

[http://www.lse.ac.uk/GranthamInstitute/event/why-trust- scien...](http://www.lse.ac.uk/GranthamInstitute/event/why-trust-science-a- talk-by-professor-naomi-oreskes/)

</comment><comment><USER18> I still think many models are missing volcanic winters. We know they have crazy cooling effects, but they are something we don't yet control.

More $$$ money needs to go into Vulcanering. Crazy, but if we can make ash spread 20% more that's years of cooling.

<comment><USER19> If I understand correctly, currently anthropogenically accumulated extra CO2 takes some hundreds of thousands of years to return to geological circulation, while the faster biological circulation won't withhold it all, and seas are getting saturated (and will acidify beyond supporting current lifeforms in the process). [see eg. Hot Earth Dreams]

Also, if I understood correctly a single article I'll try to dig up a link to later, the kickback effect of stopping a temporary cooling measure and returning to the warming trend caused by the CO2 still in air will have stronger harmful effects. If these hold, it might prove tricky to keep up a moderate, safe cooling effect long enough, even if some technical measure to cause volcanic winter was found. [[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-017-0431-0?utm_source...](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-017-0431-0?utm_source=commission_junction&utm_medium=affiliate) via [https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics- features/devi...](https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics- features/devils-bargain-why-aerosols-pose-a-deadly-climate-change- threat-126855/)]

I would hope this or some other measure would prove successful. but I'm not yet able to put all my faith on any of them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Opened the article expecting it to be a more abstract cost. Turns out it's about economics. Christ alive.

"Yeah, billions are gonna die, but what really matters is my house prices are gonna go down."

<comment><USER21> Who said that billions are gonna die?

Frankly, if the solution to climate change will slow economic growth, I think that the highest human cost will come from the lack of growth. To put it in clear terms: lack of growth means that a sewage system, or a hospital, don't get built. This _will_ cause victims.

<comment><USER22> Eh. While I'm optimistic that solutions will be found, in principle a shifting climate can radically alter food production. Billions could die. I don't think they will, but in principle they could, and I lack the necessary background in agricultural science to tell what "likely" is.

<comment><USER21> I doubt that climate can shift so quickly that humans can't adapt at least their most important cultures. We're very good at this, and very quick, and we don't need to produce food anywhere near where it's consumed.

Although of course the ships that bring immense amounts of food across the globe have been built, and are operated, with fossil fuels. As is our agriculture. Again, increase the cost of the fuel that makes both possible, and people will die.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> We always had climate change. Not having climate change is the exception. Is it man made? Is it caused by CO2? Ist it getting warmer? Is this a good or a bad thing? Can we and should we do something about it? This are many questions and climate change is one of the most complex phenomenons. I have a STEM PhD and would not be able to make a quick judgement.

"Climate Change Will Cost Us Even More Than We Think"

Given that all the statements are true, something that is seldom discussed, who is "We"? People with real estate in NYC, Amsterdam and Miami? Maybe. People in super hot climates? Probably.

How about people in Greenland? Russia? Canada?

<comment><USER5> That the climate is changing is not a complex question. The impacts are less known, but an unstable climate seems net negative for the average person on Earth.

Heat wave deaths in Serbia and Canada: [https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2019/07/02/climate- chang...](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2019/07/02/climate-change- heatwave-strikes-serbia-central-and-eastern-europe/1627412001/)

[https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/climate-change- canada-1.4...](https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/climate-change- canada-1.4878263)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Climate change will create the first trillionaire.

Find every machine that eats fossil fuels and electrify it. Find every crop that requires stable land and predictable weather and farm it in a shipping container. Find every underlying infrastructure that requires decades to pay off and decentralize it.

Instead of water line pipes, pull water out of the air. Instead of fiber optic cables make LEO satellites. Instead of refrigerated transportation, grow food in your pocket or your stomach. Instead of roads, take to the air. Instead of high power transmission lines that cause fires and burn down trees, build island-mode ready microgrids.

Build a better world, a template for all worlds to come.

<comment><USER10> > Climate change will create the first trillionaire.

Is that a good thing?

<comment><USER24> everything described above is a good thing. Why do you care that someone will become insanely rich by improving lives for millions?

<comment><USER10> It's funny how my comment questioning the concentration of wealth as being a condemnation of business in principle.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: CSSHumor.com - <AUTHOR> http://csshumor.com/

<comment><USER2> Execution is nice, but I don't get the jokes. :(

<comment><AUTHOR> It's a bit of niche humor. The jokes are sort of like word puns based on CSS properties and values. If you're not familiar with CSS, it probably won't be funny at all. But thanks for the kind words!</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Best places to advertise for developers (non-startup) - <AUTHOR> The big recruitment groups (Stackoverflow, github etc) tend to be startup/large corporates.<p>Where should smaller companies, who have different requirements advertise? <comment><USER2> I dont know Your situation nor location but why you dont host local meetup groups and let the group know that you are hiring?

</comment><comment><USER3> What makes you think you have different requirements?

</comment><comment><USER4> I think there are regional differences to be accounted for. NY VS SF Bay may actually be more similar then, say somewhere in alabama or ohio. And I suspect things are very different in the UK, though probably not as much as in eastern europe, south america, or asia.

So I think you should quantify your question. Otherwise expect a fair bit of bias based on the locality of the commenter.

</comment><comment><USER5> LinkedIn is very resourceful for both Recruiting and Job Searching. Doesn't matter if you're looking for big or small their database is large enough to find niche markets for both the employee and employer.

</comment><comment><USER6> Linkedin seems popular for small companies. What is your location?

</comment><comment><USER7> Indeed has given me some good engineers and you can also try writing and sharing a post on LI/ adding pics helps!

</comment><comment><USER8> Reddit! :D a gigantic number are technically savvy

<comment><USER9> Where specifically?

<comment><USER8> [https://www.reddit.com/advertising](https://www.reddit.com/advertising)

You can narrow down to subreddits like r/programming, r/python, r/machinelearning etc</comment></comment></comment>


Testing a Truncated RSS Feed on Above the Law: The Results Are In  - <AUTHOR> http://breakingmedia.com/2010/06/testing-a-truncated-rss-feed-on-above-the-law-the-results-are-in/

<comment><USER2> I've seen a couple of my favorite sites turn off full feeds, and the results always seems to be the same for me. I visit the site less often when I don't get enough information to draw me in. It doesn't have to be the full content of the blog post, but it should be enough that gets me interested.

I usually click through even if it is the full post, but only if I find the content interesting. Usually I'm going to read the comments.

Hacker News is pretty much the only feed I have where I don't get any content in the RSS feed and yet I still visit the site for a high percentage of the posts.

I really don't want his stats to be true for the general case.

<comment><USER3> My reaction to feeds I subscribe to moving to teaser-only goes in two directions. I either:

a) Unsubscribe. Probably not a bad thing for my productivity anyway; it implies I was remaining subscribed purely because of inertia.

b) Spend five minutes to create a Yahoo Pipe for the feed, which grabs the full content and regurgitates it as a replacement RSS feed. (If possible; the target article is, in many cases, too large for Pipes' maximum file size.)

I've tried making myself "just deal with it", but I simply end up frustrated by the experience, and most content just isn't worth the headache to me.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Appointment Booking Software? - <AUTHOR>

Hey all, can anyone recommend software for booking appointments on behalf of clients? Most of the systems I'm coming across seem clunky or short on features. I'm looking for: - Flexible appointment reminders (email, SMS) - Calendar invite - Allow multiple staff/clients to individually set their own availability, and integrate with their own calendars - Easy to use
Any recommendations?
Many thanks. <comment><USER2> One of the famous HN users patio11 runs a similar company. Check it out

[https://www.appointmentreminder.org/](https://www.appointmentreminder.org/)

<comment><AUTHOR> I need something that works in Australia.

<comment><USER3> Outlook?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Take a look at [http://www.appointmind.com/](http://www.appointmind.com/)

SMS reminders are in the making and the rest is already available. I'm not sure, though, what you mean by "Calendar invite".

</comment><comment><USER5> Disclaimer: I know some of the people who built this and haven't actually used their product.

[http://coconutcalendar.com/](http://coconutcalendar.com/)

</comment><comment><USER6> Disclaimer: I know some people who work at this company but have never used their product.

[https://www.schedulicity.com/](https://www.schedulicity.com/)

</comment><comment><USER7> BookingBug is aimed at this space. I don't know whether it has calendar integration.</comment>


I Got an Offer at Facebook, Turned It Down, and Moved On - <AUTHOR> https://iuliangulea.com/blog/how-i-got-an-offer-at-facebook-turned-it-down-and-went-on/ <comment><USER2> I admire the grit. Although turning down the Developer Support Engineer offer from Facebook to be a SWE at PepsiCo sounds like Jon Snow turning down the Steward role he was offered by the Lord Commander.

<comment><AUTHOR> Depends on the priorities. I would rather write code all day at PepsiCo instead of writing code 2-3 hours and writing documentation and answering emails in the other 5-6 hours at Facebook. Besides, the transition to an SWE at FB takes 2-3 years. I believe sometimes you have to take a step back in order to make 2 steps forward later. But I saw that as more than 1 step I had to make backwards.

<comment><USER2> I wouldn't view it as a step backwards at all. FAANG employees are just about the most pampered workers on earth and they know how hard freelancing can be. Only thing that really matters is having engineer in the title. Everyone does the dishes. Two to three years is like the blink of a eye.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> just-juan-post [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NbZBpMW4Iw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NbZBpMW4Iw)</comment>


If it's not improving my life in some way, it's mental clutter and it's out - <AUTHOR> http://www.christopherhawkins.com/2007/07/withdrawing-echo-chamber-clearing-mental-clutter/ <comment><USER2> Your examples of "getting rid of clutter" seems more like a play to kill your crack dealer to me. You haven't really solved any problems since everything you tried to get rid of still exists and can be added back again. You just need discipline.</comment>


Stephen Hawking 'boycotts' major Israel conference - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22446054

<comment><USER2> Israeli aggressions against Palestinians and mostly civilians are overwhelming to the point that the list of boycotting people and entities is only increasing by time.

</comment><comment><USER3> Sorry, but why is this on hacker news?

<comment><USER4> Someone wanted to start a flamewar.(?)

<comment><USER3> Yeah, I guess so. I'm just annoyed that people treat hacker news like it's the front page of reddit or something.

But whatever.. I don't have the ability to downvote stupid posts, and apparently when I question why they're here I just get downvoted.

<comment><USER4> You and me both, amigo.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> No, he doesnt. He sent a letter that he wouldn't go there for health reasons, but the news agencies told the story incorrectly - for whatever reasons.

<comment><USER5> [http://www.algemeiner.com/2013/05/08/report-hawking- israel-b...](http://www.algemeiner.com/2013/05/08/report-hawking-israel- boycott-story-was-a-fraud-trip-canceled-for-health-reasons/)

<comment><USER4> Unfortunately... "UPDATE: In an about-face, Cambridge University has now confirmed that Hawking is indeed boycotting Israel."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> And no, the only aggressive people are the real muslims there who attack Israel and other countries all the time.

<comment><USER6> All kinds of people attack all other kinds of people in other countries all the time.

I've got Jewish friends who've come to the U.S.A. and left Israel because Israel is the one of the few countries where people want to kill you because you're Jewish, and both Israelis and Palestinians are to blame for that situation.</comment></comment>