f.lux has been updated to a new version - <AUTHOR> http://justgetflux.com/news/pages/bigupdate/ <comment><USER3> And then there's Redshift, which is GPL'ed and has its source code available. Works like a charm on my Linux box.

[http://jonls.dk/redshift/](http://jonls.dk/redshift/)

[https://launchpad.net/redshift](https://launchpad.net/redshift)

<comment><USER4> also from the f.lux website:

> f.lux is patent pending. If you make a cell phone, display, or other cool > device, and want to talk about licensing f.lux?

<comment><USER5> Patent for what? Changing temperature of screen? That will not be granted because there are plenty of prior arts.

<comment><USER6> Such as? Doing it automatically?

This is, in my book, real innovation.

<comment><USER7> In broad terms for a patent to be granted an invention must be unique, innovative and non-obvious.

I am not sure if f.lux is entirely non-obvious...

<comment><USER8> I would say that changing color temperature based on time of day (and location on the planet) as a means to reduce late-night eyestrain and fatigue is something non-obvious, yes. I never even thought about color temperature and the influence of it on your sleeping patterns (esp. late at night) until the guy behind f.lux came by.

<comment><USER9> is it so non-obvious that it requires the state guarantee decades-long monopoly to ensure f.lux can make a return on the significant research & development costs?

could we expect no more non-obvious apps like f.lux get made if the state doesn't guarantee decades-long monopoly?

<comment><USER10> You've changed the question from "is the invention non-obvious, in the sense that current law requires to grand a patent?" to "do you agree with current patent laws and the value of patents?"

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> f.lux is one of my favorite pieces of software. It just does what it's supposed to and I hardly even think about it. Being near the 40th parallel, it rarely activates from April to October. At some point in October, as it did a week ago, it naturally and unobtrusively becomes indispensable again.

Something that happens quite frequently is non-technical friends see my laptop at night and ask "why it is orange?". When I temporarily deactivate f.lux, they shrink from the intrusive blue light and need no further explanation.

<comment><USER12> I have tried using f.lux several times as it is a recurring theme on HN, but it just does not work for me. All it does is give everything a red tinge, but the light intensity remains the same. I feel like it is cooking my eyeballs and blurring my vision.

I have working alternatives now neither of which work well with multi-screens and neither of which are sophisticated as f.lux, but they do reduce the intensity of my screens which is what I want.

One is "Dimmer" which I use on my left screen and the other is the built in Nvidia tool to reduce brightness, contrast/gamma etc, which I use on my right screen. Pretty primitive but works for me.

<comment><USER13> That is the point; it's all about color temperature, and not about brightness. If you feel like you're cooking your eyeballs, perhaps your screen brightness is just too high.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Heads up: not yet available for Linux and Mac.

<comment><USER15> Modified the text to say, yes, this is our Windows update. Many of the features are on Mac already, since we've done a dozen updates for it in the interim. But we're planning another Mac update soon.

<comment><USER16> What are the odds we'd see a Linux update at some point in the future? I _loved_ flux when I was running Windows, but at this point I'm fully off in Ubuntu land and haven't been had much luck getting flux to work right here. :(

<comment><USER17> You can try redshift by the way.

<comment><USER16> I didn't like redshift as much when I tried it a year-ish ago. The version I tried made me enter all the GPS coordinates manually and I never felt like it achieved the same effect as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Hard to run a neat tool like f.lux when you design for the web. Reason being that I need to "see" the web like my clients and their customers do. Same reason I don't run ad-blockers, or many browser add-ons that modify the browsing experience.

I found when using it for personal use, there are times when the time of day, doesn't align with my _energy_ levels and I ended up disabling it enough that it became a nuisance.

<comment><USER19> _I need to "see" the web like my clients and their customers do_

The only way that's possible is to do a lot of travel.

<comment><USER20> False. Apple computers use ColorSync, the whole point of which is to line up the perceived color on disparate devices in disparate locations:

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

In comparison, the color handling/prioritization in Windows and Linux is crap.

<comment><USER21> Not very relevant - a lot more people use Windows and Linux than Mac OS.

<comment><USER22> The discussion is around web design / development - a field with an extremely high number of people running OSX (I'd say that the majority run OSX, but I don't have any statistics to back that up, just observation).

<comment><USER23> No, the discussion is around web design _clients_ , the majority of whom in my experience run IE6 on Windows XP at 800x600 with the brightness turned up to 11.

<comment><USER24> Working on calibrated equipment is about having a neutral, uniform reference so that you can actually see what you're doing without having to second guess yourself. You can draw an analogy to reference monitors for sound mixing. Monitors have two properties: they reveal detail in the sound and they have a flat frequency response. The former is obviously important, and it's why as a designer you should have a nice monitor. The latter is important so that when you work in different locations, you don't have to recalibrate your expectations. There may also be non-linear perceptual illusions associated with certain aspects of the signal being attenuated or boosted, which would be another reason to have a calibrated/flat reference, but I'm not certain if this would be relevant at the scale we're talking about (between calibrated and the whole space of non-calibrated color profiles).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Being wary of using too much resources in my own programs I'm always a little surprised and disappointed when I see small utility programs like this use resources like a drunken sailor on shore leave. Flux is currently using 118 MB of real memory and 0.1% CPU.

Using otool -L /Applications/Flux.app/Contents/MacOS/Flux you can see an impressive number of frameworks included. I guess inclusion of the webkit framework is the biggest culprit. Why all this is needed to simply dim the light on my screen is beyond me.

That said, Flux is perfect functionality wise and very useful.

<comment><USER26> Takes around 25MB on windows. May be the UI graphics on mac are better ?

<comment><USER27> It's using 0.7 mb on my Surface Pro. However, its 6.15pm right now, maybe usage goes up when it actually starts dimming. I've never had noticeable performance issues because of it though, and I run it on my 7 year old Macbook Pro as well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> T-hawk f.lux is great, but I really really really wish it would allow custom control of the timing instead of pegging to sunset. I don't want my screen going red at 4:30 pm in the winter eight or more hours before bed. 10 pm would be about right. f.lux can be manually controlled, but that's much less useful since I'll never remember to turn it back to red at the times I want. "Disable for an hour" is useful once, and really tedious to repeat for six hours.

And in this update: "Movie mode ... lasts 2½ hours." Seriously? Why in the world not prompt for a time duration, or use a dropdown or flyout menu for various 30 minute intervals?

<comment><USER28> Just set your location to a place that's more compatible with your schedule. Living on the east coast, I get fine results setting it to a southern California zip code.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Awesome project, thank you!! It would be helpful if the creators listed the latest version number on their site so folks don't need to install it to see if it's e.g: version 23.0 or something else. FYI: the latest version seems to be 23.0 for mac at the moment.

<comment><USER30> Agree. A version suffixed download file should be easier. Currently, there's no update for Mac yet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Flux is fantastic. I just wish it were built into iOS too, so I can have something similar on my iPad/iPhone without jailbreaking.

<comment><USER32> An official Flux build exists for iOS, but you need to jailbreak. I used it before I upgraded to iOS 7 and it has been massively useful for me. It's the one thing I miss most from my jailbreak.

<comment><USER33> Flux is fantastic on my iPad - great for reading in the evening.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> I really wish someone would put f.lux in a TV or receiver. Sure, it's not ideal for critical viewing, but it'd be great for casual tv watching/gaming at night. Anyone found good solutions for that? I tried amber glasses but it's a bit of an awkward solution and somehow doesn't feel as effective as f.lux.

Would lowering the blue light in the TV's picture settings and the brightness accomplish everything f.lux does?

<comment><USER35> What sort of amber glasses? I've heard great feedback about Gunnar Optiks, though I've never tried them myself (for more than 30 seconds) and they're not very cheap. [http://www.gunnars.com/](http://www.gunnars.com/)

Disclaimer: I have met people from Gunnar a few times and I know one of their marketing agencies very well - but have never been paid by Gunnar for anything :)

<comment><USER36> According to friends who have tested them, Gunnars don't block blue light very well, but these $8 safety glasses do: [http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B000USRG90](http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B000USRG90)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I hear so much about f.lux, but to me I don't know if the science quite backs it up like everyone says it does. I've found it suffers from the, "They used the word science so it must be good" problem.

Why hasn't anyone done a study on _specifically_ what f.lux attempts to do? Sure, light at night causes people problems sleeping, but does f.lux actually make a difference? Can we quantify that difference in a way that controls for the fanboy (formerly known as placebo) effect?

<comment><USER38> Result from a quick pubmed search (I haven't actually read the paper):

[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24110034](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24110034)

> _Effects of LED-backlit computer screen and emotional selfregulation on > human melatonin production._

> _[...] Finally, we can also report that the blue light of LED-backlit > computer screen significantly suppress melatonin production (91%) more than > red light (78%) and no light_ (44%).

<comment><USER37> 5 participants, eh?

But hey, pubmed a.k.a. "science" says it, so it must be irrefutable.

<comment><USER38> _sigh_ Fine, here are more articles. If you don't want to believe in peer- reviewed academic literature, I'm not sure why I'm bothering. Statistically significant results can be obtained with few participants. Behold the power of math.

[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23926261](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23926261)

Nocturnal light exposure impairs affective responses in a wavelength-dependent manner.

> _Our results demonstrate that exposure to LAN influences behavior and > neuronal plasticity and that this effect is likely mediated by ipRGCs. > Modern sources of LAN that contain blue wavelengths may be particularly > disruptive to the circadian system, potentially contributing to altered mood > regulation._

[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23358248](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23358248)

Out of the lab and into the bathroom: evening short-term exposure to conventional light suppresses melatonin and increases alertness perception.

> _Subjective alertness was significantly increased after exposure to three of > the lighting conditions which included blue spectral components in their > spectra. Evening exposure to conventional lamps in an everyday setting > influences melatonin excretion and alertness perception within 30 min._

[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21298068](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21298068)

Non-visual effects of light on melatonin, alertness and cognitive performance: can blue-enriched light keep us alert?

 _Exposure to light at 6500K induced greater melatonin suppression, together with enhanced subjective alertness, well-being and visual comfort. With respect to cognitive performance, light at 6500K led to significantly faster reaction times in tasks associated with sustained attention (Psychomotor Vigilance and GO /NOGO Task), but not in tasks associated with executive function (Paced Visual Serial Addition Task). [...] Our findings suggest that the sensitivity of the human alerting and cognitive response to polychromatic light at levels as low as 40 lux, is blue-shifted relative to the three-cone visual photopic system. Thus, the selection of commercially available compact fluorescent lights with different colour temperatures significantly impacts on circadian physiology and cognitive performance at home and in the workplace._

<comment><USER37> This trickery may work on Reddit (I know you're from Reddit because you use carets to denote quotations), but allow me to repeat myself:

Why hasn't anyone done a study on specifically what f.lux attempts to do? Sure, light at night causes people problems sleeping, but does f.lux actually make a difference? Can we quantify that difference in a way that controls for the fanboy (formerly known as placebo) effect?

<comment><USER38> Haha, what? That is the most bizarre insult? argument? that I've seen in a while. People use greater-than characters all the time for quotations. It's been used in email forever. But bonus points for trying to be edgy I guess.

To your question: All the studies are basically examining the principle that f.lux operates on. Shift colors away from blue and you can limit the decrease in melatonin production. I don't understand your question?

If you mean, "why has no one done a study on f.lux itself?", then I'm assuming no one has done a study on f.lux _per se_ because (I'm just guessing here) no serious academic researcher really gives two shits about a piece of software on the internet.

However, that doesn't mean their research cannot be applied. F.lux is applied science, working on a fairly solid base of academic research. Real science with, yunno, quantifiable and statistically significant results. It isn't "fanboyism" or "science"...it is peer-reviewed literature.

The articles I linked specifically talk about how spectral blue light decreases melatonin production (a hormone directly related to how sleepy you feel at night) and a corresponding increase in alertness.

Doing a little extrapolation, if you decrease the amount of blue light that you are exposed to in the evening you decrease the impact on melatonin production and increased alertness.

So sure, I doubt anyone has stuck a person in front of f.lux and measured salivatory melatonin levels...but they have done the equivalent with blue and red lights. It isn't reaching to say that f.lux is doing exactly the same thing.

<comment><USER37> Did you know monitors leak anywhere from some to a lot of white light, depending on age and quality (if you turn off the lights in your computer room some time and load up a black page, is it completely dark in the room? Ever wonder why not?)? F.lux can't change the color of that light, and so the question becomes: is that leaked white light enough to negate the benefit seen in the studies?

So I bet you can imagine my persistent confusion with your linking to what amount to irrelevant studies, when this question is the one I've been asking over and over again. When you say "have done the equivalent with blue and red lights", you are absolutely, 100% wrong. It is _extremely_ reaching to say that F.lux is doing the same thing, if you know how monitors work.

<comment><USER39> > "Melatonin is a circadian hormone transmitted via suprachiasmatic nucleus > (SCN) in the hypothalamus and sympathetic nervous system to the pineal > gland. It is a hormone necessary to many human functions such as immune, > cardiovascular, neuron and sleep/awake functions. Since melatonin > enhancement or suppression is reported to be closely related to the photic > information from retina, in this paper, we aim further to study both the > lighting condition and the emotional self-regulation in different lighting > conditions together with their effects on the production of human melatonin. > In this experiment, five participants are in three light exposure conditions > _by LED backlit computer screen_..."

Stop being an ass.

<comment><USER37> 5 participants.

Stop getting emotional.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> If you use Android, Twilight is also great (same concept but for your smartphone): [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.urbandroid...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.urbandroid.lux)

</comment><comment><USER41> What this page needs is a big "Download" link.

</comment><comment><USER42> Great update !

Now I'm just missing : "automatically disable if Photoshop is running" (I got caught a few times)

<comment><USER43> Same for watching videos.

<comment><USER44> From the linked page:

>Movie mode. This setting warms up your display, but it preserves shadow detail, skintones, and sky colors better than f.lux's typical colors. It lasts 2½ hours, which lets you watch most feature films

<comment><USER45> I thought f.lux was `cooling down' your display, not warming it up.

<comment><USER46> Colours perceived as "warmer" (yellows, reds etc) are produced at lower wavelength and therefore by a blackbody with lower temperature (hence colour temperature). F.lux is reducing the temperature, thus producing a "warmer" hue.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> I start work before 6:00 AM and f.lux is a godsend. I actually feel my body go _aahhhh_ as the sun comes up outside the window and my screen shifts to blue.

</comment><comment><USER48> The appearance on my setup if quite hilarious: [http://imgur.com/1VrPWNw](http://imgur.com/1VrPWNw)

The cheap Dell monitors got quite small horizontal visibility angle. Additionally, the USB adapter doesn't seem to be supported.

</comment><comment><USER49> If you like f.lux, and you use Android devices, you might enjoy Twilight.

[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.urbandroid...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.urbandroid.lux)

<comment><USER50> Twilight seems to get it wrong - all the blacks become red. (I think it does this by overlaying red on top of everything instead of doing real hue shifting)

Are there any other recommended mobile apps out there?

<comment><USER49> Hmm, I had noticed that the blacks become red, but I didn't think of it as "wrong". Despite that, I find it useful enough -- it still removes much of the blue light and makes my eyes feel better.

I would love to know about any better Android apps like this, though.

<comment><USER51> Lux can do a better job, if you also install the Nexus 4 plugin from the same developer. Of course, you'll need a Nexus 4. If you don't have one it still does the same sort of transparent overlay.

[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.vito.lux](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.vito.lux)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> > A simple schedule for Philips Hue, so you can f.lux your house

This sounds pretty cool! Has anyone who has a Hue tried this yet?

</comment><comment><USER53> As someone who has used f.lux for the last few years (and more so after I've started classes), any single one of these is a welcome update. Together? I'll take it as a late birthday present.

</comment><comment><USER54> The only thing that annoys me about f.lux is the lack of flexibility. Why can I only disable it for one hour? Why are there only two transition speeds - <USER2> and 60m?

</comment><comment><USER55> the alt-pg up/dwn feature to adjust brightness is pretty great. the fact that it rolls back in the morning is pretty clever, i always found myself having to fidget with settings on my monitor.

i wish more devices, like tvs, had flux baked in.

<comment><USER56> I'm speaking as a colorist working in film/television here. TV's already have enough issues destroying the look we carefully craft with "features" like dynamic lighting, motion smoothing, vivid mode, etc. A huge color shift is going to throw this off even more and dramatically change the look and tone to the detriment of the work. This is great for reading text on a screen, but should be disabled for viewing media - you wouldn't look at the Mona Lisa with amber glasses.

<comment><USER57> TV/Film colour grading does enough to try to destroy reality with the horrible OTT teal&orange gradings.

If the mona lisa was painted in duo-chrome I might not be upset at viewing it under different temperatures.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER58> I remember first looking at this, and thinking it was pretty stupid. I downloaded it out of curiousity and ran it on my work machine while doing a few late nights, and I noticed very quickly that my eyes were feeling a lot less tired near the end of a day than they usually were.

Now, I install it on every machine I use, and it's probably saved me a ton of (literal) headaches. I couldn't recommend it enough.

</comment><comment><USER59> Dumb question: does changing the image on the screen actually change the output of blue light? I was kind of under the impression it was a result of the light source.

For example I think neon light is actually greenish and it is just the human eye that adjusts the colors back to normal. But I don't think one could make neon light behave like another type of light simply by painting it with some color.

<comment><USER60> Yes it does. Your screen, presuming it's LED, is white light being filtered through colored gates (pixels). It is... easy to tune the colors of those gates...

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> For people who love f.lux, you may be interested to check out the work of Philippe Rahm: [http://philipperahm.com/](http://philipperahm.com/). He's built a number of spaces that explore how environmental conditions affect you physiologically. Along the lines of f.lux, he has some experiments that use specific qualities of light to affect your circadian rhythm, including an iPhone app and JavaScript library: [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/i-weather.org/id389364795?mt...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/i-weather.org/id389364795?mt=8).

This is a great example of where avant-garde art can be an inspiration for mass-market products, though who knows if the f.lux creators were directly or indirectly influenced by Rahm's work. Nevertheless, I believe there's a whole range of products that could come out of this conceptual framework.

</comment><comment><USER61> Might not be what this piece of software was created, but could a similar technique be used for an opposite effect: waking up in the morning? There are morning lights available that send 10.000 lux light, could you get a monitor to do this instead? would it have the same effect as those lights?

<comment><USER8> I do believe f.lux also can increase (blue-shift) the color balance on your screen during the day; my setting goes up to 6500K. Not sure if that's higher than the normal color temperature though.

I'm not sure if it's light intensity or color, myself. I do know that Philips is doing a lot of research in the area. If you have a Philips light that can change color (or can get one), turn it up to bright blue in the morning, and a pleasant / warm red in the evening. That should help.

I for one wouldn't mind a shifting color setup at home. Maybe I'll buy myself one of those lights sometime. Right now I mainly have reddish lights (woo, Lidl), but also because I mainly have lights on in the evening. And I don't generally have issues waking up in the morning. At least not once I'm out of bed, :p.

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> Neat. Flux has been one of my favorite tools for years. There have been times that I have had to use its "disable for an hour" function late at night and the sudden brightness change is actually painful. It's easy to forget just how bright monitors are.

</comment><comment><USER63> _WARNING_ : If you want to try this for the first time, wait until mid-day. The first transition is quite jarring, but trying it in the day will make it much smoother (to the point where, if you disable it at night, you will quickly curse and re-enable it).

</comment><comment><USER64> Just yesterday I was in the office late and was struggling with the bright monitor in a dimming room. The reminder that this software exists comes at a very nice time of year for those north of the tropics.

<comment><USER45> Even in the tropics, it's useful late at night.

</comment></comment><comment><USER65> I use f.lux all the time (on OS X). The only thing that frustrates me about it, is that "disable for an hour" actually means "use daytime settings for an hour". I reduced the daytime temperature to 4500K, but when I need to do graphical work, I want flux to disable completely. And yes, I know, I can simply quit the app, but then I forget to re-enable it.

</comment><comment><USER66> Can I pay these people yet? This is an awesome piece of software, and they should not have to buy their own beer anymore at the very least.

<comment><USER67> The technology is patent-pending, so I suspect they want f.lux as widely used as possible so they can license the patent to device makers for a lot of money once they are well-known enough.

</comment></comment><comment><USER68> I know an update isn't available for OS X yet, but did anyone else get notified of an upgrade of their OS X version? The most recent OS X version of the Flux.app file says it was created Oct 4, 2013. I'm pretty sure this update has caused my Macbook Air to hang momentarily when trying to put it to sleep. Kind of annoying.

</comment><comment><USER69> If you find yourself not able to fall asleep until later than you'd like, I recommend trying the warmer flux setting. I've been using RedScreen + a little script I wrote instead of flux because it gets far redder, and for me works far better.

It looks like flux still only goes down to 2200 on Mac, so I may continue using RedScreen.

</comment><comment> k-mcgrady I used to use this but my issue was that I usually watch TV/Movies on my laptop before bed. I had to disable flux to do that which made it kind of pointless for me. During my time using it I never noticed any benefits (probably because, like I said, I turned it off late at night).

Has anyone seen real benefits to using it?

<comment><USER70> Why do you have to disable flux to do that? Try looking at your phone after using your fluxed(?) laptop for an hour or so. The blue will burn your eyes out...

<comment><USER45> There are options available for the phone now. (Twilight for Android phones, for example.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER71> I teach a class at Arizona State University and one of my students asked why my laptop screen was pink. I then proceeded to give the class a 10 minute sales pitch on f.lux and how blue light inhibits melatonin production. It still surprises me what a profound sales channel raving fans can be.

</comment><comment><USER72> For a project designed to reduce eyestrain, a white website with light gray text is pretty hard on the eyes.

</comment><comment><USER73> Does anyone know if this update is for windows only? I can't seem to find a Mac version of the update.

<comment><USER74> jrnkntl notes above that this update is not available for Mac or Linux.

</comment></comment><comment><USER75> > A simple schedule for Philips Hue, so you can f.lux your house

You can pair your Philips Hue bulbs with f.lux! This is awesome! This kind of thing is very helpful for people who sleep odd hours or just have trouble going to sleep and waking up. Has anyone tried this or knows how it works?

<comment><USER76> Shameless self promotion: I'm the creator of an Android app for the Hue called LampShade.io that also supports this (and a ton of other features!)

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> I just tried out the f.lux for Philips Hue feature and it is highly impractical because it arbitrarily adjusts the brightness of all Hue lights in your house...

Disclaimer: I'm the creator of LampShade.io, an Android app for the Hue that has a similar feature (and many others too)

</comment><comment><USER77> I've been wearing orange tinted safety glasses to reduce my exposure to blue light at night. Is there a good option that's more suited to wearing outside the home/hackerspace? Rose colored glasses, of course, but with better peripheral coverage?

</comment><comment><USER78> Just a heads up: f.lux is a great tool, but remember to turn it off during video games. Your experience with some games can be affected by the temperature of your screen. For me, that was definitely true when playing left4dead2.

</comment><comment><USER79> "A map to help you find your location"

I hope this isn't the start of feature bloat.

</comment><comment><USER80> Maybe I'm just weird but I previously tried flux for a few days and hated it. I can always tell the colors are wrong and it drives me crazy. At no point did my brain adjust to white being red.

Anyone else have this problem?

<comment><USER81> It took some time to get used to, but now I don't even notice it. Totally worth the adjustment period. New people always seem to comment how orange/warm my screen looks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER82> I was interested in using the expanded range, but it needs to access administrator privileges which I can't use on my locked-down work laptop. The normal version is a lifesaver though!

</comment><comment> ezequiel-garzon Is this supposed to become a commercial product? I'm confused about their business model, if any. If they don't have one, an open-source approach would be more common. Any ideas?

</comment><comment><USER83> Interesting application, but it seems to me that it only really works well if you rely on natural light.

I'm in an office with bright neon lights, does it still help?

<comment><USER84> Neon lights in an office? I'm used to neon in bars/pubs, but I haven't heard of neon being used for general purpose lighting. That sounds painful, neon lights are generally very harsh in my experience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER85> My eye fatigue was so bad a month I thought of changing professions. I wouldn't say f.lux has cured it completely but it has helped significantly.

</comment><comment><USER86> Note: The update is only for Windows and not OS X.

</comment><comment><USER87> As someone with insomnia AND eye problems, this makes monitors a lot less painful for me. Downloading the new version now!

</comment><comment><USER88> Sounds like some of the new features are Windows-only? eg, I can't figure out how to activate darkroom mode on OS X.

</comment><comment><USER89> Would like to see a feature where the software takes local cloud cover into account and dims with the sun during the day.

<comment><USER90> Why not use something like Calise[1], which dims the screen based a camera plugged in? Even if it's a desktop, plugging in a cheap webcam and pointing it at a wall/ceiling doesn't seem very onerous.

[1] [http://sourceforge.net/projects/calise/](http://sourceforge.net/projects/calise/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER91> It seems that the new updated features are not ready for Mac OS yet? I tried updating but have not noticed anything new?

<comment><USER92> Yes, the update is only for windows.

</comment></comment><comment><USER93> I would love to see an option to specify a different time zone. It would be useful for when I travel, and I'm lazy.

</comment><comment><USER94> Love f.lux.

A simple program but solves a common problem. My eyes are always shocked when i switch off flux for color intensive work.

</comment><comment><USER95> I really, really wish flux was compatible with the ipad. Using an ipad at night is a painful experience.

<comment><USER96> It is if you jailbreak.

</comment></comment><comment><USER97> If only I could get it back onto my phone... Jailbreak can't come soon enough.

</comment><comment><USER98> iOS devs, please submit radars to Apple for iOS support without jailbreak. (IDGAF whether it's native or third-party support for changing the whitepoint, I just don't want my phone to blind me at night.)

</comment><comment><USER99> So I just downloaded - why can't i figure out where TV mode is...hmmmm

</comment><comment><USER100> I'm kind of curious, why is a restart necessary to extend the range?

<comment><USER101> Windows requires a restart to turn itself after updates most times. It's expected.

In all seriousness though, I wonder if they install drivers?

</comment></comment><comment><USER102> Anyone ported this or something like it to phones/tablets, yet?

</comment><comment><USER103> Not updated for Mac yet?

</comment><comment><USER104> This update is for Windows only. The update for Mac is due soon.

</comment><comment><USER105> Oh man, this would be perfect if it tied into my Hue lights!

<comment><USER106> Apparently it does. 10\. A simple schedule for Philips Hue, so you can f.lux your house

Waiting on the linux version so I can try it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER107> Very useful software. Willing to donate.

</comment><comment><USER108> Where is the download link?

</comment><comment><USER109> f.lux for iOS next please!</comment>


Never mind the iPad – where are the full-time Android tablet users? - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@charlesarthur/never-mind-the-ipad-where-are-the-full-time-android-tablet-users-a9923aebc305 <comment><USER2> I have bought two Samsung Galaxy Tabs (from different generations) for my mother and they are obviously subpar devices. Windows will minimize and close left and right; basic text editing it jumpy and therefore takes forever; clicks don't always register; the screen randomly auto-rotates; they ship with outdated versions of Android and receive no OS updates, etc. Mind you, the Samsung Galaxy Tabs are considered mid-range Android tablets so I can't imagine how awful cheaper tablets are.

So no, I can't imagine using Android tablets as a professional considering they work so poorly for even the most basic usage.

<comment><AUTHOR> If the Galaxy Tabs are considered "mid-range", who's making the high-end ones, and what are they? I thought Samsung was meant to be the contender here.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: What are the best remote-friendly job sites for engineers? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Check out:

[https://weworkremotely.com](https://weworkremotely.com)

[http://jobs.remotive.io](http://jobs.remotive.io)

[http://remoteok.io](http://remoteok.io)

<comment><USER3> thanks for posting - this is helpful to me

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm going to assume that OP is interested in this question because he wants to find a good remote job (not an unreasonable assumption, heh.)

For that: you might want to think about applying to tech startups directly even if they don't advertise remote jobs (as long as you actually are an extremely good match though and a good way to tell is if the job advertisement is simply a restatement of your resume.) The reason is: a lot of startups are open to this kind of arrangement to the right applicant (and I really do mean the right applicant here.) For example, if the job advertisement is for say - a PHP developer and it doesn't specifically state remote work, then its unlikely they will be open to that kind of arrangement simply because there isn't exactly a shortage of high quality local applicants (PHP is very common.)

On the other hand: if you're applying for a highly specialized job and you can make a persuasive argument as to why you would be an ideal match for the company - the company may be open to your offer. In the end: the only way to know for certain is to ask which you should definitely go for if you specialize.

<comment><USER5> Being the only remote developer on a team is very hard. You are often forgotten and left out of hallway conversations and over-the-shoulder meetings. Working remotely requires a very different set of self-motivation and prioritization skills in addition to communication skills. Someone offering to be the only remote worker as their first remote work experience is setting themselves up for failure.

I'm not saying it can't be done, but taking OPs advise will be much harder than working for a company that has established remotees.

<comment><USER6> I can't second this enough: if you haven't worked remotely before, you should definitely start out with a company that has a remote working culture.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> [http://remoteok.io](http://remoteok.io) is the most extensive that I know of. It aggregates from other sites. There are 22 listings from the past 24 hours.

[http://workingnomads.co](http://workingnomads.co) is a curated remote jobs board with fewer listings than remoteOK. There are 9 from the past 24 hours.

Both of those only let you search by title, rather than the details from the descriptions.

</comment><comment><USER8> I build a aggregator for remote working jobs. [https://workasnomad.com/](https://workasnomad.com/)

</comment><comment><USER9> [http://careers.stackoverflow.com/](http://careers.stackoverflow.com/) and [https://weworkremotely.com](https://weworkremotely.com)

</comment><comment><USER10> We love remote engineers at StyleSeat! (I'm the cofounder and CTO) We also love creativity, collaboration, diversity, making a difference, python, angularjs, html5, a/b testing, learning every day and having lots of fun while building a massive business. Engineers feel free to email me directly dan at styleseat or [http://styleseat.com/jobs](http://styleseat.com/jobs) (within USA timezones only pls)

<comment><USER11> Like with this post, the monthly "Who's Hiring" threads also have many listings where the HN user says "Remote Available," but when browsing to the linked jobs listing, all the positions list a specific geographic location. It always makes me wonder if there's really a remote culture at the company. (See the concerns elsewhere in this thread about being the only remote dev in an organization). When I was looking, it made me think twice about applying for the position. Yes, I imagine it's usually just some 3rd-party HR software that requires a location in the job listing. But if you're looking to hire people, I think removing any doubt in the potential candidate's mind about wether or not there really are remote positions available might be in the company's best interest.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> How does working remotely..work exactly? I know there is a contract but assuming you are from the other part of the world, aren't you at risk of not getting paid if something happens to the company or they start acting unethically? Lawyers can get involved but at that point lawyers might cost more than what you need to recover. Example: US company and European programmer.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Also checkout [http://offsite.careers](http://offsite.careers)

</comment><comment><USER13> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8825308](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8825308) curated list of remote job boards

</comment><comment><USER14> [http://weworkremotely.com](http://weworkremotely.com) is probably your best starting point.

Do you have a specific type of company in mind?

</comment><comment><USER15> Http://area301.com</comment>


Are you happy with your current issue management SaaS? - <AUTHOR> http://aguidrevitch.blogspot.com/2013/10/are-you-happy-with-your-current-issue-tracking-saas.html

<comment><AUTHOR> I guess everybody is happy ?</comment>


Stop 'feeding' your users - <AUTHOR> https://ux.shopify.com/stop-feeding-your-users-a859730a86d6 <comment><USER2> This is one of the reasons I work on the project I am on currently: It's not fair to kids to be subjected to machine learned algorithms that maximize screen/watch time or media consumption in general. They use the same tactics as casinos except their target audience usually consists of minors.</comment>


Ask HN: What are some email providers more people should know about? - <AUTHOR> I'm looking to create a new e-mail address for various reasons. Posteo and Protonmail were my favorites, but none of the variations of firstname.lastname@provider were available for me. What are some other email providers, paid or free, that provide a reliable service and ideally have a short domain? <comment><USER2> Wouldn't it be best to have your own domain and use ProtonMail to deal with the mail? That way, your address is portable and you have far more flexibility (catch all addresses, custom security, etc.) Domains are cheap.

</comment><comment><USER3> I run my own using [https://mailinabox.email/](https://mailinabox.email/) \- not everyone's cup of tea.

</comment><comment><USER4> I am using

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

It is very good email provider.</comment>


DynamoDB Is Not a Database - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@dvassallo/dynamodb-is-not-a-database-8e9729bee3d3 <comment><USER2> "it is immediately consistent"

"Unless you know for sure that you won't ever exceed this limit, you should avoid local indexes... ...global indexes don't constrain your table size in any way, but reading from them is eventually consistent"</comment>


Show HN: HN Filter – automatically mark web link score from decade HN data - <AUTHOR> https://hackernewsfilter.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> Hi guys, I am the creator - Hacker New Filter ( [https://hackernewsfilter.com/](https://hackernewsfilter.com/) ) , which connects your web and HN community automatically and safely, to enhance your web reading experience by HN decade data. If you can try it and send some feedback, it will be very helpful to me. The FAQ can be find here [https://hackernewsfilter.com/faq/](https://hackernewsfilter.com/faq/) . Or you can directly install the extension in chrome web store: [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hacker-news- filter...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hacker-news- filter/agohmjkdphojdlhkjejgmoicdpnlajam) Thanks!</comment>


Crush, Texas - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crush,_Texas <comment><USER2> I just spent a few months parked in West, TX, very near the site of this happening. I didn't know about it, or I would have gone to visit the site! But, there's a more recent somewhat famous explosion at a fertilizer plant in West, as well, that killed 15 people and injured 200 others. ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West%2C_Texas#2013_explosion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West%2C_Texas#2013_explosion))

That specific part of Texas might have more than its fair share of crazy explosions, but I've noticed in my travels that even small obscure towns often have some kind of surprising history. Cults, infamous battles between indigenous peoples and settlers, racist enclaves, all sorts of bizarre events, crazy publicity stunts, etc. are so common in the US and most people are rarely aware of the history of the land they're on. Sometimes it feels like the United States is one long story of hucksters and crazies bamboozling and recklessly endangering their neighbors' lives.

<comment><USER3> If you were in West, you were near Dinosaur Valley State Park. It's not quite the same as stories go, but it has obvious attraction.

<comment><USER4> Right outside Dino Valley (at least in the late 1990s) was the Creation Evidence Museum. It was housed in a double-wide trailer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I have no doubt that we as a species today would still happily line up for this kind of awesomely stupid spectacle, most of us with our smartphones out. The difference from 1896 is we have enough regulations to prevent such a thing.

Another fun detail from the event's aftermath that likely wouldn't happen today:

> _Crush was immediately fired from the Katy railroad. In light of a lack of > negative publicity, however, he was rehired the next day._

edit: the Wikipedia entry has some nice footnote/sources. I didn't read them all but the one from wacohistory.org has even more interesting details:

[http://www.wacohistory.org/items/show/70](http://www.wacohistory.org/items/show/70)

I think I'll bookmark this article for the times when people complain about how much dumber and shallower we are compared to folks from the olden days:

> _Two people died and at least six other people were seriously injured by > flying debris, including a Waco photojournalist, Jarvis Deane, who lost an > eye. While the railway moved in quickly to remove the larger wreckage, > souvenir hunters swarmed over the site, carrying off most of the remains > despite burning their hands on the shrapnel._

<comment><USER6> Oh, this kind of thing definitely still happens today. Just not in the US. There's this:

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

I've been twice. The climax of the event involves pushing three-meter paper- mache bulls through crowds of tens of thousands of drunk people, all the while shooting out rockets and other not-even-remotely-safe-or-sane fireworks in what looks like a cluster bomb explosion. I saw dozens of people get seriously injured... and they come back every year.

Personally, I could do without some of the regulations. It's liberating to go someplace that doesn't feel toddler-proofed.

<comment><USER5> > _It 's liberating to go someplace that doesn't feel toddler-proofed._

Agree that America feels "toddler-proofed" relative to developing nations. However, I had a great experience at St. Louis's City Museum. Even if the experience may be relatively tame to what you can find overseas, it was still astonishing to me that such a place of interest existed in America with so few safeguards.

Here's a great WSJ article about the thrills and trials of the City Museum: [http://web.archive.org/web/20150612052257/https://www.wsj.co...](http://web.archive.org/web/20150612052257/https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304159304575183463721620890)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> It was not such a dumb idea. Between the mid-1890's and the mid 1920's, Joe Connolly (known as Head-On Joe) staged more than 50 similar events with more than 1 million paid admissions and not a single injury ever!

<comment><USER7> Video of a staged crash at the Iowa State Fair, 1932:

[http://juiceboxinteractive.com/ideas/creating-an-iowa- state-...](http://juiceboxinteractive.com/ideas/creating-an-iowa-state-fair- spectacle/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Interesting article about the marketing of the disaster and the accompanying music piece

[http://blogs.baylor.edu/digitalcollections/2012/04/19/scott-...](http://blogs.baylor.edu/digitalcollections/2012/04/19/scott- joplin%E2%80%99s-%E2%80%9Cgreat-crush-collision-march-and-the-memorialization- of-a-marketing-spectacle/)

</comment><comment> compiler-guy You may have heard the classic blues song "She caught the Katy" which opens the Blues Brothers movie. It's about this railroad.

She caught the Katy / Left me a mule to ride

</comment><comment><USER9> Burning Man is a week of crazy spectacles in the desert.

I went for the first time in 2007. On one of the first nights there, I went to see the Man itself and was in line waiting to climb up into it. The people waiting behind me were discussing the fact that someone had fallen off an art car and died. I couldn't help overhearing, and clueslessly was like "oh, no! does this risk the event not happening next year???"

The group laughed and informed me that people die almost every year, if only one person bit it during a particular burning man that would be a good year.

</comment><comment><USER10> At least they didn't electrocute an elephant, as folks in New York did for public spectacle. Topsy was its name.

</comment><comment><USER11> Thats cool and all, but now do it with a hyperloop

</comment><comment><USER12> all fun and games until somebody loses an eye</comment>


Economy Looks Like It's Picking Up Which Could Mean a Slowdown in Tech Investing - <AUTHOR> http://recode.net/2015/05/19/the-economy-looks-like-its-picking-up-which-could-mean-a-slowdown-in-tech-investing/ <comment><USER2> I'm wondering if the issue here is not 'the economy is picking up, let's invest elsewhere', but rather that investors don't have investment vehicles to put their money into other areas of the economy that need it most. The public markets are booming, and so is the tech sector, which I am guessing has a greater chance of a liquidity event than businesses in most other industries. While these two areas are doing fine, the small business sector, which is the largest portion of our economy, continues to struggle to get access to capital. Many of these small businesses could generate 20-30% returns, but investors have no way to easily get their money back out of the business - they'll never IPO, and a private acquisition is rare. This lack of liquidity in one of the largest asset classes of our economy seems to be the major bottleneck we're facing right now.

EDIT: I should add....the JOBS act and Crowdfunding are giving small businesses and entrepreneurs more options for finding funding, but getting a return on that investment still remains a question. In addition, crowdfunding as an industry is somewhere maybe in the billions, whereas the financial services sector is in the trillions, so the impact is still relatively small, although growing fast.

<comment><USER3> Why not just pay a dividend?

<comment><USER2> Not entirely sure, but I am guessing it's for the same reason debt isn't a super desirable form of financing for small businesses - cash flow is hard to manage.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> In Europe, we should not forget that the situation of Greece has not yet been resolved and the country has resorted to shuffling every internal bank account in order to pay the IMF.

The next final demand notice arrives on June 5. [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11617208/Greek-...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11617208/Greek- default-woes-hit-the-euro.html)

</comment><comment> the-dude I think the premise the economy will 'pick up' is highly questionable. Furthermore I think we will see very low interest rates in the US and Europe for a long long time.

<comment><USER5> In the United States I am questioning the need to keep the federal interest rate so low. Yes, it might have brought us out of depression?(I still wonder what the outcome would have been if Bush let the banks go bankrupt?)

Back to these low interest rates. At this point in the recovery, I am just seeing rich people playing with essentially free money--taking some big risks, but I don't see it trickling down to the middle class and poor--in most cases.

I see this essentially free money being funneled into the stock market, because there's no where else to put the money, except real estate, and speculative VC investments. That's fine and dandy, but the poor and middle class are having a hell of a time getting loans. They are essentially locked out of the party? Yes, the middle class is greatful their Company retirement plan is soaring, but it will drop.

Many of us(poor, middle class) speculate in CD's, and in my case I am getting .1 percent per year-- on my meager account. I can't afford to speculate. I don't think I am alone. I counted on the interest I used to make. It's gone. I now pay the bank more in fees than I get in interest. In my case, I have a negative rate of return on my money.

My point is I don't see this essentially free money the rich are getting trickling down, with the exception of the tech industry. You guys seem to be doing great, and you guys deserve it. And yes, their are hot spots like the Bay Area where houses are way up in value, but so are rents. Rents have gone up so high long term residents are being forced to relocate.

What I am trying to convey--poorly--is I don't think the economy is doing that great. Food stamp usage is at an all time high? The unemployment number is beyond skewed because they stop including you in that figure once that check stops--I believe? Student loans are at an all time high. Small and medium sized business are having a hard time securing those low interest loans. I see so many Homeless. I my county, section 8 housing is closed, and there's a three year waiting list. I honestly don't see the variety of jobs like I did before the ression. People are so desperate for work they are buying newer(2008) four door cars in order to work for Uber. Non profits are closing --some deserve to close, but some of the better ones are not getting the donations like in years past. I can go on, but getting tired.

My major point is so many of us are losing net value in this low interest rate economy. The renters who rely of cd's to hold their money are hurting. I don't blame anyone politically. I'm glad medically uninsurable home owners don't need to risk losing their home in a medical judgement attachment thanks to Obama, and a Supreme Court justice.(forget his name, but he is a kind man, and a Rebublican!)

I see another ression coming real quick. I hope families stick together, and pool their resources--and don't blame the wrong people when the chit hits. I'm usually 180 degrees wrong when it come to money--so I'll dummy up. Sorry--just venting!

<comment><USER6> I'm not going to deny that much of what you describe is occurring. America is a harsh, dog eat dog place. I'll only comment that it isn't unique to this point in time, and isn't a result of Fed actions regarding the Great Recession (post hoc, ergo propter hoc).

But what does irk me a bit is:

 _" My major point is so many of us are losing net value in this low interest rate economy."_

This is a weak form of Bastiat's broken window fallacy in action. You see the money _you_ are losing, but don't consider what higher rates mean for others, like less discretionary money in the economy because more income is going towards car loans, student loans, credit cards, mortgages. There could even be less entrepreneurship occurring due to the higher hurdle rate. Have you included this in your net value calculation?

You don't "deserve" to earn more interest on your CD any more than I "deserve" to pay less interest on my mortgage.

<comment><USER7> The UK is pretty much copying the US with low interest rates. It was recently reported that since 2007, the richest thousand people in the UK have doubled their net worth, while normal people are suffering austerity.

My assumption is that they haven't worked twice as hard. And as the UK economy isn't really picking up, they clearly haven't added double the value to it.

<comment><USER8> Low interest rate are good thing for normal people. Normal people do not make significant amount of money from the interest of their savings, at least not enough to offset the cost of the money they need to borrow for their mortgage, car/student/credit car loans, ...

The only problem that may have caused in the UK is making the ISA account look less attractive, which could impact the rate people save. (the money you put on your ISA is 'locked away', which mean you are less likely to spend it)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> If you look closer at all the jobs being created, they're mostly part-time and for the elderly. The US government is lying. The economy is not recovering.

The FED can't raise rates without sending the economy back into recession. QE 4 will soon be here.

<comment><USER10> The US has added six million full-time jobs in four years.

Almost all job growth has been in full-time employment.

Source: BLS

[http://i.imgur.com/AUkWSN9.png](http://i.imgur.com/AUkWSN9.png)

It's not a question of if the economy has recovered. It has. The question is whether the gains can be kept and added to.

<comment><USER11> The number of jobs has gone up, its just that they'll all shit jobs. Your graph does a disservice by omitting the wages paid by those new jobs.

[http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/05/the- new-...](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/05/the-new-normal- for-young-workers/393560/?google_editors_picks=true)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The problem with this analysis is that the VC's investing money in companies aren't choosing between various asset classes - they have funds committed to their investment thesis, so they aren't going to go invest somewhere else if returns start looking better in other sectors. It's the LPs who theoretically may allocate less money to the VC's if they see better yields elsewhere, but their fund commitments are long term and take a long time to change. Funds have a life of 7-10 years and lots of folks have just raised new funds, so there's a lot locked in that will keep going into startups for a while now.

<comment><USER13> Right, but where does VCs' money come from? The money gets to choose asset classes. VCs aren't the money, they just choose how to invest the money. All of which is not to say I agree with the analysis.

<comment><USER12> right, my point is just that the money is already committed to the VCs for the next 7-10 years so can't change that quickly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> the US economy is not doing well; As long as interest rates remain so low, ever more money will plow into VCs/startup investing to get better returns.</comment>


Ask HN: Programmer satisfaction by field - <AUTHOR> Have you ever wondered if it's true that that devs in field X in general are miserable, while the people in field are having a great time? Me too, and I've decided to make a survey about it! Let's gather data on this! Please take 30 seconds to answer this one question survey:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/3LSJMB7
The results are publicly available at any time:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/results/SM-GVHWDLNR/ <comment><USER2> Hey all you happy systems programmers, I have always been interested. Can you enlighten me? I currently do fullstack web / data monkey stuff

<comment><USER3> What aspect of systems programming would you like to be enlightened about? I do a lot of consumer electronics programming, which I think falls into that category.

I grew up learning programming on a Commodore 64, where getting anything done meant twiddling bits and writing to registers of various hardware devices. Writing device drivers today can provide the same sort of thrill, since the work is quite similar. A lot of my time in high school and college in the 90's was spent learning all about UNIX and Linux, so it feels very natural today when I develop user-space tools that bring value to the user. Outside of nostalgia, there's plenty of bleeding-edge work to keep things interesting -- audio/video processing, extending platforms such as Android, security, etc.

<comment><USER4> Sounds exciting. I want to know how to make a switch, if one can. I am in the same position (mostly webdev) as the gp. I do understand that "systems programming" is very broad.

<comment><USER3> I get the impression that most people I've worked with in the CE world come from non-CE programming backgrounds, so I doubt there are major obstacles. The biggest help would be familiarity with C/C++ programming, and being comfortable with the practices needed to use these languages properly (e.g. explicit memory management in C, RAII idioms in C++). (Next-generation systems languages like Rust can't come fast enough, in my opinion.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> You can stop responding now - apparently the surveymonkey has a limit of 100 responses on their free plan, and upgrade would cost me hundreds of dollars. Anyone with a paid account is willing to redo this survey later? (we're already at 205 responses after less than 12 hours, of which only a 100 is shown).

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> For much nicer formatted results, see here:

[https://www.surveymonkey.com/results/SM- VT2RQJNR/](https://www.surveymonkey.com/results/SM-VT2RQJNR/)

(Sorry, the original post is too old and I cannot edit it anymore).

</comment><comment><USER5> The results are confusing. I can't tell which bar is which number, 1-5.

<comment><AUTHOR> Indeed, thanks for pointing out. I've reconfigured the results page, I think the visibility is pretty good now. You need a new link to see it though:

[https://www.surveymonkey.com/results/SM- VT2RQJNR/](https://www.surveymonkey.com/results/SM-VT2RQJNR/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I was a little unsure of which category to choose for my work as a developer of consumer electronics software. "Embedded" means different things to different people -- some people reserve the term for microcontroller-level devices. "Systems programming" seems closer, but the "/ Desktop apps" bit had me running back to the embedded category.

For what it's worth, I think it's a great part of the programming world to be in. :)

<comment><USER6> I picked multiple, based on what I have to do. I write NLP software, so I ticked front-end (make GUIs in Angular), back-end (make REST/WebSocket APIs for gluing our software together), AI/ML (that is the core of most advanced NLP software), and systems/desktop (since we need to package and deploy our software in self-contained packages).

I hope I didn't screw up the metrics. :/

<comment><USER7> I did the same as you. For instance, when I do webdev I'm mostly unhappy (web frontend sucks big time for me!), but when doing desktop or other, I change my "happiness" numbers.. Don't know if it screws the metrics as well..

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I see numerous problems.

Shouldn't there be 2 separate questions? "What field are you in?" and "Disregarding salary, how happy are you with your field?" Would prevent confusion.

How did you come up with this list of fields? Where does academia fit in? Why are systems programming and desktop apps in the same category?

<comment><AUTHOR> If I made it into two separate questions, I doubt I'd be able to make a meaningul report out of it with survey monkey. Plus, I don't think it's that confusing really - if you give your answer for a given field, it means that you're working in it.

There is no academia (as in academic career track) - I am only asking about programmers, not researchers. If you work in academia as a programmer (say implement stuff at CERN), you can answer according to the nature of your job - ex. if you help scientists write simulations, you select "scientific/numeric", if you mainly work on massive data pipelines, you select "big data" etc.

As for coming up with a list - I compiled it myself, trying to bundle together work that seems close enough in nature. For me, desktop programming looks similar to systems programming - i.e. it's mostly C++/C/other compiled languages, working against OS APIs, no garbage collection, expectation of reasonably low latency.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'd be interested in a satisfaction by industry - or better, a combination of industry and field.</comment>


Trump tweet 'Hacked' by buying expired domain - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/190093504939163648 <comment><USER2> The perils and consequences of hot linking. Just because a link is live and safe today, doesn't mean it always will be.

The following link is SFW, but in turn contains potentially NSFW links.

[http://www.niallkennedy.com/blog/2006/12/microsoft- copyright...](http://www.niallkennedy.com/blog/2006/12/microsoft-copyright- photograph.html)</comment>


Genetically modified mosquitoes used to fight dengue, zika in Brazil - <AUTHOR> http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/health/2016/01/27/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-used-to-fight-dengue-zika-in-brazil/ <comment><USER2> There was a relevant article in 2010 about the concept of eradicating ALL mosquitoes. The author of the study surmised you could do so with minimal ecological impact.

[http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100721/full/466432a.html](http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100721/full/466432a.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> So how are they breeding these "800,000 genetically modified Aedes aegypti mosquitoes per week" if they by design cannot produce offspring? Through a virus?

<comment><USER4> The mosquitoes are genetically altered to need a particular chemical in order for their offspring to be non-sterile. (Tetracycline IIRC) Without tetracycline in their food, any offspring the have will be sterile. (I'm afraid I don't know the details of how this works genetically, but there are probably papers in the literature.)

So the company can happily breed their mosquitoes to keep a stock, feeding them on feedstock that contains tetracycline & then can take a portion of the breeding stock & eliminate tetracycline from their diet - their sterile male offspring can then be released into the wild to mate with fertile wild female mosquitoes.

I've heard that one of their client labs had trouble generating sterile males using Oxitec's protocol: they eventually discovered that the feedstock they were using came from factory farmed chickens which had large amounts of tetracycline in their diet (as an antibiotic it's used to boost growth rates in factory farmed animals).

(A neighbour works for them, so if anyone has any really pressing questions I can probably ask :) )

Edit: There's a review paper which looks like it might answer some of your technical questions here: [http://longnow.org/revive/wp- content/uploads/2015/02/Alphey-...](http://longnow.org/revive/wp- content/uploads/2015/02/Alphey-AnnRevEnt-2014-genetic-control-of-mosquitoes- copy.pdf)

<comment><USER5> "The mosquitoes are genetically altered to need a particular chemical in order for their offspring to be non-sterile."

Life, uh, finds a way.

<comment><USER6> >Life, uh, finds a way.

But what is the failure scenario? Mosquitos in the wild? There are already mosquitos in the wild, and they are infected with zika and dengue.

Worst case scenario is better than the status quo.

<comment><USER5> Sorry, that was a popular culture reference.

<comment><USER7> You were so concerned with with whether or not you could make a pop culture reference, you didn't stop to think if you should.

<comment><USER5> Wow, I wasn't expecting the Spanish Inquisition!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I think it's only a matter of time before someone decides to release a gene- drive mosquito into the wild: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_drive](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_drive)

<comment><USER9> Complete eradication of mosquitoes would be counter productive, especially given that mosquitoes are a major reason some places such as tropical forests have low human activity - [http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-35408835](http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-35408835). Selectively countering the harmful traits of mosquitoes appears to be the best way to go about it.

<comment><USER8> Gene drives do not have to be used to eradicate mosquitos (although they can be used that way). They can be used to spread malaria resistance genes to mosquitoes, thereby rendering mosquito populations immune to malaria infection.

[http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1521077112](http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1521077112)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The only issue I see is that this treatment (by its nature) cannot be self sustaining. Then again, from a business perspective, that's probably a plus.

<comment><USER11> Yes, as long as even a tiny breeding population survives, this pest will come back. It's probably going to take an annual treatment to keep it under control, at least until such time as we find a permanent solution to rid the world of blood sucking parasites, like blast the surface with a nuclear holocaust, then selectively reseed the planet with only desirable species.

<comment><USER12> If it lasts for long enough that people stops spreading poisons around to kill the mosquito and let predators grow in number, that'll be already a gain.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> It would be nice to have _something_ in our arsenal against dengue fever. I will be interested to see how effective this is.

<comment><USER14> Dengue vaccines are in last-stage trials and early deployment.

<comment><USER13> Thanks, I had no idea!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I'm sure there's a movie or two that start with a similar headline...

</comment><comment><USER16> It seems that Brazil likes a lot to modify insects, they did it too with the Africanized bees: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africanized_bee](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africanized_bee)

</comment><comment><USER17> This is how the zombie apocalypse begins...

<comment><USER18> Powerful new viruses will continue to birth as the Earth warms. A zombie apocalypse might occur regardless of human intervention at this stage.</comment></comment>


Nokia Sues Apple in Europe and the US for Infringement of Nokia Patents - <AUTHOR> https://finance.yahoo.com/news/nokia-sues-apple-europe-us-181355390.html <comment><AUTHOR> note that in the background, Apple has also sued some patent trolls for colluding with Nokia:

[http://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2016/12/apple- fi...](http://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2016/12/apple-files-a- major-antitrust-case-against-acacia-research-corporation-pointing-to-a- conspiracy-with-nokia-corporation.html)

<comment><USER2> Some kind of retaliation or counter-suit to develop leverage?</comment></comment>


Programatically-generated landing pages.  Where are the limits? - <AUTHOR>

We know that this is part and parcel of lots of operations.  Surely there have to be limits in terms of when Google (and others) will take a look at these auto-magic pages and simply ignore them.  Or, worst, trigger a site de-listing for being "spammy".
Any sense of where the limits might be?
Hypothetical example:
You are trying to get people to a site that gives you instant quotes on airplane flights within various cities in the US.
One could very easily write a piece of code that would spit out thousands of legal city combinations in the form pages named:
"price-to-fly-from-<city 1>-to-<city 2>.html"
Pepper each one with a few variations of a story and you have hundreds or thousands of pages to feed people into your sign-up form.
I am sure this doesn't work quite like that any more.  Where are the limits?  When does it become dangerous (de-listing).
Not trying to game the system at my end, just trying to understand how not to get into trouble by simply not being up to speed on what the search gods have deemed to be acceptable or not.  Considering how totalitarian the approach can be it is prudent to seek feedback on this before launching a hundred landing pages only to end-up de-listed. <comment><USER2> This kind of stuff used to work well in years past, but no more. You're likely to get a duplicate content penalty for doing stuff like this now.

</comment><comment><USER3> Pages like "price-to-fly-from-<city 1>-to-<city 2>.html" is the main reason for organic traffic decline of many of our e-commerce SEO clients.

These pages don't add value as you can simply have a form and enter both cities and get results. Panda refreshes usually smash these sort of pages hard.

<comment><USER4> You can use them to land customers from advertisements. Also, ask google not to index those.

Although you wont get any SEO benefit from these pages, your ads will see relevant landing pages and not a single landing page for all ads.</comment></comment>


YC Feedback - <AUTHOR> How to get feedback for my YC application? I know this could be a typical one for you. I'm a beginner, care to help? Anyone? <comment><USER2> Try to contact firstname.lastname@example.com . (I guess no. For some not very similar activity the time to write a nice and easy to understand feedback is x10 the time to make a decision.)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I want feedback for the application before submitting it.</comment>


How to compose apps using WebSockets - <AUTHOR> http://www.rabbitmq.com/blog/2012/02/23/how-to-compose-apps-using-websockets/

<comment><USER2> I like the sound of SockJS. I wanted to use WebSockets in my HTML5-based app but shied away from socket.io because the library was so big (and my requirements were so small).

Once I implemented it I realised that Chrome and the iPhone browser use different versions of the WebSockets protocol, so it was impossible to debug in the browser. Sounds like SockJS might help with that.

</comment><comment><USER3> I still don't really understand the difference between sockjs and socket.io.. or is it just aesthetic??

<comment><AUTHOR> (I'm the SockJS author.)

To some extent yes: aesthetics are an important difference :)

Functionally you can do the same things on Socket.io as SockJS (but not the other way around).

Socket.io provides high-level messaging abstractions, including really-high- level things like clustering with the redis backend.

SockJS is only providing a WebSocket abstraction. SockJS has a well defined on-the-wire-http-fallbacks protocol: <https://github.com/sockjs/sockjs- protocol> and thus there are SockJS server implementations for any language you pick. Finally, SockJS does work behind loadbalancers.

So although the general functionality in Socket.io and SockJS is quite similar, the focus of the projects is different.

<comment><USER4> Majke, does SockJS do reconnects and heartbeats? I really appreciate the client automatically reconnecting to the server after a server restart. With that said, I agree with your sentiments on Socket.IO's API. It's also worth noting that Socket.IO has some serious stability issues (read the 161 issues on Github)that would make me consider using SockJS.

<comment><AUTHOR> > does SockJS do reconnects?

No. WebSocket API doesn't do automatic reconnects. Also, it is impossible to get have it built-in: every single application will need to behave differently after reconnection! For example - you may want to make sure that your web app synchronised state after the reconnection (and that's very application specific thing).

So, as with WebSockets, reconnecting is your responsibility. You're free to implement exponential backoff or any other thing you want. Frankly - that's quite simple.

> does SockJS do heartbeats?

SockJS server is expected to send simple frames once in a while to make sure that load balancer won't kill the long-polling connection. But this is not exposed to the user.

Again, WebSocket API does not expose heartbeats AFAIK. And once again, implementing that on the application layer is not terribly complex and allows you to have behaviour that perfectly suits your needs.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Are We Becoming A Gadget Addicted Generation? - <AUTHOR> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1221281/Are-gadget-addicted-generation.html

<comment><USER2> I've talked with a philosophy professor about this. She doesn't see a dividing line between "modern technology" and "natural living." An "addiction" to a Blackberry or iPhone is no more unnatural than a dependence on indoor plumbing or grocery stores. Even language itself is a communication technology; no myth of a noble savage should convince us to give up real, material benefits like instant research on any subject from anywhere, or never getting lost.</comment>


Apple Launches Official Battery Life Enhancing Case for the iPhone 6s - <AUTHOR> http://www.macrumors.com/2015/12/08/apple-unveils-battery-life-case-iphone-6s/ <comment><USER2> "this is the best phone you can buy"... if you need a phone for less than 8 hours a day ;)</comment>


TeX Live 2012 released - <AUTHOR> http://www.latex-community.org/home/news/46-news-latex-distributions/448-texlive-2012 <comment><USER2> I've dealt with Packaging of Texlive for a Linux distro. My god, it was the worst experience I ever had. They should first fix this mess. Because of this mess every distro at least has an outdated Texlive.

<comment><USER3> This is why I am eternally grateful to Norbert Preining...

<comment><USER2> I know him (not personal tough), but I read several documents and how-to's of him. As you mentioned I think he has really done an extra ordinary work.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> It is very unfortunate that ubuntu 12.04 is still only shipping texlive 2009.

I think 12.10 will include texlive 2011 or 2012 (hopefully).

<comment><USER5> Maybe not quite directed at you but this touches on a different negative experience I have had.

One of the interesting problems I have had with various parts of the TexLive community (not sure if it is everywhere) is an unwillingness to discuss support for older versions.

It is one thing to desire that cutting-edge releases release relatively cutting-edge versions. It is very different to insist that long term support distros keep up with the cutting edge.

My software runs on servers. I have no expectation that we will see current TexLive versions installed and every expectation that we won't. Yet we do the best we can and when something blows up (xelatex complaining about being outdated and having to be configured from the command-line) we address it. It's just discouraging to hear over and over that we should be requiring the latest and greatest.

<comment><USER6> Support for older versions, good question. Yeah, I understand the need, but there is a simple reason, manpower. We are quite overloaded with keeping the normal process running. Doing this in parallel is not something we can do.

But, the scripts we use to build the stuff etc are all in the archive and documented, so anyone can checkout the 2010 or older release, and start a separate repository putting only fixes in. I don't see any reason not to do it, besides that nobody _will_ do it.

<comment><USER5> Just to clarify.....

If I am working on an older version, I don't expect you to backport bugfixes of CTAN packages. However, if I am asking for help because latex won't run without extra configuration because it says it is too old, getting an idea of how to fix it instead of being reflexively told "upgrade" would be nice. In the end when that happened to me I had to figure it out on my own.

Here's the thing "that's a bug that was more recently fixed. You might try going about this in a different way." is perfectly valid support for server software. It would even be enough to say "that package seems to work for me on a newer version."

But when it comes to running LaTeX and there is a time-bomb in the program, it is nice to know how to get around it in an automated, non-interactive environment.

<comment><USER6> Oh that one ... we had that down there in Debian at some point. I guess that is easy to fix in latex.ltx from which the format is dumped. Yeah, this time- bomb is a strange thing. I am not happy about it ... but who wants to discuss with the LaTeX maintainers ;-)

<comment><USER5> It's a lot harder to deal with in non-interactive environments. What I had to do was something like cd to the texmf directory and run the commands that it said were failing (primarily latex and xetex-related). It took me a while to figure it out.

Oh well, got it documented at least. I was mostly annoyed at the responses I got to requests for help. :-)

Just to be clear, we've had version-related issues with other thins in the past too, such as Perl arbitrary math libs changing behavior in ways that caused crashes, the way PostgreSQL changed stuff in 8.3 and 9.1 and a few others. This sort of thing is normal and we can all accept that things change and that if you are going to deal with supporting a range of versions, you are going to have to deal with the fact that behavior won't be the same.

It's more a criticism of the culture I encountered when I asked for help.

Anyway TexLive on the whole has made my life easier with the rare exception. I am a huge LaTeX and XeTeX fan. I have written books using it. And aside from the issues relating to upgrading, the culture around it is very helpful and professional. Thanks for listening to my gripes. On the whole the community rocks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> For OS/X it looks like TexShop has an update also: <http://pages.uoregon.edu/koch/texshop/>

I have written several books using TexShop - love it.

</comment><comment><USER8> Does anyone see a good reason for MikTeX users to switch to TeX Live?

<comment><USER9> See the discussion here: <http://tex.stackexchange.com/q/20036/243>

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Has anyone who used the pre-test build had trouble with this switch? Since the `pretest` repository that I was using went away, I had to switch repositories, so:

        $ tlmgr option repository http://ctan.mackichan.com/

but then:

        $ tlmgr update --self
        tlmgr: Cannot load TeX Live database from http://ctan.mackichan.com/

This doesn't seem to be an issue with the specific mirror; browsing to the mirror manually shows that it is live, and changing the mirror doesn't help. `tlmgr` has been updating just fine (from the old `pretest` mirror) for months, so I don't think it's an installation issue.

<comment><USER6> That is a CTAN mirror, and not a path to a tlnet. You have to use <http://ctan.mackichan.com/systems/texlive/tlnet> and that works fine.

<comment><USER10> Ha, I always forget that! Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> <http://tug.org/texlive/></comment>


Solar cells thinner than wavelengths of light hold huge power potential - <AUTHOR> http://news.stanford.edu/news/2010/september/nanoscale-solar-cells-092710.html

<comment><USER2> I wish all these solar tech announcements would turn into products. Two years ago I was reading about new solar paint that would revolutionise solar power. Then it was printable panels that would drive down solar panel costs. There's always these announcements coming out, yet buying a solar panel still has a very long term payoff because of the high cost. I'd be solar-ed up tomorrow if I could make the numbers add up. Tired of the hype - show us products to buy.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is BS, we already have 30+% efficient solar cells and _10 times more energy from sunlight_ would = 3x energy gain.

<comment><USER4> 30% of what was theoretically possible with thick film. I think this research is saying that what is theoretically possibly with the newer technology could be 10 times more.

<comment><USER5> Yeah, I would like to see real percentages of all the sunlight hitting a given cell that is converted to electricity.

<comment><USER6> And of course, sunlight has a wide range of wavelengths and it's almost impossible to convert >1000 nM light to electricity, so you can't get close to 100%.

The problem with current cells isn't efficiency but cost. 5% efficient cells that were cheap (including mounting & protection) would be a breakthrough.

<comment><USER7> > The problem with current cells isn't efficiency but cost. 5% efficient cells > that were cheap (including mounting & protection) would be a breakthrough.

It depends. My house has a finite amount of roof space.

If a solar farm has to be too big, it can only be very remote and then there's a distribution problem. (Consider road sign lights. You'd rather not run wires to them, so "on sign" solar is a natural, but size matters.)

<comment><USER6> You're right about remote applications, of course. I'm thinking about replacing coal with solar on a large scale.

Roofs are a silly place to put solar cells. Like everyone growing wheat on their roofs. Farms are the right model for harnessing lots of sunlight to grow food or make electricity.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Using CouchDB with Django - <AUTHOR> http://www.eflorenzano.com/blog/post/using-couchdb-django/

<comment><USER2> Motivation:

 _Originally this was going to be written in the standard Django way--write some models, fill it with data, and slice and dice that data to make it pretty. After thinking about it, I decided not to go that route. Why? Well, let's go over it: There needs to be a Twitter model, that's for sure. I also want a Pownce model, and a Flickr model. Already this is becoming tedious!_

Result:

 _I've open sourced all of the code that has been written so far for the upcoming lifestream portion of this site, even though right now it only supports Twitter and Pownce._

It doesn't really seem like he solved his problem.</comment>


Why Google Is Going All in on Diabetes - <AUTHOR> http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/09/06/437570402/why-google-is-going-all-in-on-diabetes <comment><USER2> There is nothing in the article that suggests that Google is going anywhere near "all in" on Diabetes. NPR loses a lot of credit with clickbaity titles like this.</comment>


Building a Content-Based Search Engine IV: Earth Mover's Distance - <AUTHOR> http://www.deepideas.net/building-content-based-search-engine-earth-movers-distance/ <comment><USER2> There is a paper that indicates Earth mover, aka Wasserstein-1 is better for convergence of GANs: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1701.07875.pdf](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1701.07875.pdf)

I tried it out on one of the Udacity Deep learning assignments using the Wasserstein loss functions built into tensorflow. I was unsuccessful in my limited use. The discriminator always 'won out' rather than the combo finding a saddle point. I eventually got my project to work without it, and did not go back to compare against just swapping EM back in.

</comment><comment><USER3> EMD is something that really needs more, better implementations.

The one that everyone uses from Python isn't the easiest thing to install, doesn't have a great API and isn't easy to extend.

I think Gensim recently added it, but I think they use the same backend solver.

Edit: this is a better article on EMD anyway: [https://markroxor.github.io/gensim/static/notebooks/WMD_tuto...](https://markroxor.github.io/gensim/static/notebooks/WMD_tutorial.html)

Edit 2: I forget Textacy has an implmentation built on Spacy. Still uses the same backend solver, but the API is nice ([https://chartbeat- labs.github.io/textacy/api_reference.html#...](https://chartbeat- labs.github.io/textacy/api_reference.html#textacy.similarity.word_movers))

<comment> cup-of-tea It needs the Hungarian algorithm to solve it and it's not the easiest algorithm to implement. In fact, it's by far the hardest algorithm I've implemented (I can't exactly remember why). I wrote it in Common Lisp and worked on the performance quite a bit. It's still an O(n^3) algorithm, though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Sentence similarity were my explorations with WMD too, reached a setup in Keras with a siamese configuration, Wasserstein + KL loss (have a known vocabulary and feeding both word vector sequences as well as their LDA distributions as input). Post training cosine distance between encodings of such sequences look pretty decent - with one issue I've spotted though: WMD really seems to like about the same number of valid tokens in both sentences which is not how real world looks like - eager to see results of EM distance between image feature vectors, cheers.

</comment><comment><USER5> The problem is WMD/EMD is that solving it is very slow.

Currently it's unfeasible to implement even simple real time search engine using it.

</comment><comment><USER6> Wmd seems to be the best metric to use for similarity

<comment><USER7> WMD as in word movers distance?</comment></comment>


Apple has to stop selling iPhones/iPads in Germany (German source) - hendrik-xdest http://stadt-bremerhaven.de/urteil-motorola-kann-verkauf-von-iphone-und-ipad-in-deutschland-stoppen It seems that today a German court ruled in favor of Motorola and ordered Apple to stop selling iPhones and iPads on the German market.It relates to a patent for GPRS protocol packets, apparently. <comment><AUTHOR> Headline is not true. Motorola won a patent case and now _can_ make Apple stop selling iPhones/iPads, they didn't yet. At that point Apple's lawyers will appeal the ruling and who knows where it goes from there.

</comment><comment><USER2> Florian has more insight, and in english: [http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2011/12/motorola-mobility- wi...](http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2011/12/motorola-mobility-wins-german- patent.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> No they don't. They _could_ have to stop...and that isn't the same thing.

</comment><comment><USER4> Autotranslation: [http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&...](http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fstadt- bremerhaven.de%2Furteil-motorola-kann-verkauf-von-iphone-und-ipad-in- deutschland-stoppen)

<comment><USER5> and the best part: _Das ganze Fallobst weg vom Markt?_ > _The whole case away from the fruit market?_</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How to decide tech stack for a project? - <AUTHOR> How do you do it? What are the criterions that need to be considered? <comment><USER2> All depends on what you are going to build. Is it a SaaS offering or on- premise? What kind of hosting do you need? What kind of talent pool can you tap into? Is it a concurrent application or transactional?

Most important is probably the talent pool limitation and then how it will be "sold" or delivered....</comment>


Is this Twitter's new profile design? - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/DanielleMorrill <comment><USER2> I don't understand how they can make something as simple as Twitter so cluttered. Though this is an improvement.</comment>


Telecommute – Walls Have Ears - <AUTHOR> https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/telecommute-walls-have-ears-lawrence-manickam <comment><USER2> Use a separate SSID for your work laptop - which is then connected to what, the same network as everything else? And the same pipe? Ugh. Change the SSID password once a week - what? Restart the router twice a day - WHAT.

This is a DevOps company founder? That's pure cargo cult advice!</comment>


A Rust binding of the wxWidgets cross platform toolkit. - <AUTHOR> https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/rust-dev/2013-September/005772.html

<comment><USER2> How up to date is wxc these days? Last time I checked it was very raw.

Regardless, this is an exciting development. Once it's reasonably stable I will migrate my hobby project ([http://spek.cc](http://spek.cc)) to use it!

<comment><USER3> Well, don't know exactly but it's obvious that wxWidgets came to a point where they are now developing some rust..

Sorry.</comment></comment>


Beauty in Mathematics: Modular Multiplication Tables - happy-go-lucky https://friendlyfieldsandopenmaps.com/2017/09/07/beauty-in-mathematics-modular-multiplication-tables/ <comment><AUTHOR> These are definitely interesting. They make me wonder what the underlying continuous function is, and if it's the same function for all the pictures.

These mostly look like aliasing to me. Which makes sense, perhaps is nearly obvious, because that's what you get when you plot the mod of a multiply on a grid.

It's pretty easy to reproduce something close to the large image (prime 9973), by just plotting the continuous function "(x * y) % 2", or even sin(x * y):

[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3eayuknh1urayay/001.jpg?dl=0](https://www.dropbox.com/s/3eayuknh1urayay/001.jpg?dl=0)

As a graphics person, what I normally do is try to remove that aliasing by using more samples.

[https://www.dropbox.com/s/imx6njdek3wello/002.jpg?dl=0](https://www.dropbox.com/s/imx6njdek3wello/002.jpg?dl=0)

And for nasty functions like this one, you find out that more samples doesn't fix the aliasing. See the hints of it still there far away from the center?

That's when you get into the fun signal processing math and have to use a better filter function to remove all aliasing:

[https://www.dropbox.com/s/ysoibo3v8j9b2gg/003_gauss.png?dl=0](https://www.dropbox.com/s/ysoibo3v8j9b2gg/003_gauss.png?dl=0)

<comment><USER2> Could you elaborate on the signal processing and the filter function?

<comment><USER3> This video will give you a quick overview of aliasing and an anti-aliasing filter: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7qjeUFxVwQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7qjeUFxVwQ)

<comment><USER3> If you have more time, this is more thorough: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWqrx08UeUs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWqrx08UeUs)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> A while back, Noah Vawter was using this to make ultra-fast math at the cost of accuracy. [1] He computed each bit of an output function such as addition and multiplication as a function of any two of the N inputs of both operands. Then generated approximations using single-operator functions (and, or, nand, etc.) that minimized error. The result was single-cycle approximations.

For example, he claims 44% accuracy (not sure how this is measured) for 7-bit multiplies _in a single cycle_.

[1] [http://gweep.net/~shifty/](http://gweep.net/~shifty/)

<comment><USER5> Do you have a more direct link? That one just goes to Noah's home page and for the life of me I couldn't navigate to the ultra-fast math page nor find it via Google.

Edit: I think I've found it: [http://www.gweep.net/~shifty/portfolio/oddsvf/index.html](http://www.gweep.net/~shifty/portfolio/oddsvf/index.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Tao's undergrad analysis book has a great derivation of integers and rationals from the basics of Peano axioms for natural numbers. Highly reccommend it for somebody who wants to learn some basic but elegant mathematics.

<comment><USER7> Thank you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Site is down; archive/cache/mirror/ctrl-f: [http://archive.is/NHBkq](http://archive.is/NHBkq)

</comment><comment><USER9> Parametric equation for a hamburger:

      x(t) = Sin(Tan(t))
      y(t) = Cos(t)

Add a multiplier to x to get a submarine sandwich. Courtesy of Uncyclopedia.

<comment><AUTHOR> Your burger, sir: [https://www.dropbox.com/s/3iyakwegodne9gl/burger.jpg?dl=0](https://www.dropbox.com/s/3iyakwegodne9gl/burger.jpg?dl=0)

A fun side-note, zoom out to see this is an infinite burger stack, where every other burger is upside-down: [https://www.dropbox.com/s/lz53ybz3pmchh9s/burgerStack.jpg?dl...](https://www.dropbox.com/s/lz53ybz3pmchh9s/burgerStack.jpg?dl=0)

<comment><USER9> Cool! That's more of a 3D look. When I plot it I get a line drawing of a burger.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Some of these remind me of Chladni patterns.

</comment><comment><USER11> the primes look similar to sqrt(x*y)

</comment><comment><USER12> how about general galois fields?

<comment><USER13> on a field you have two tables, one for sum and the other one for product, which one are you talking about ?

each of these tables is the table of a group, thus they will look like the tables of other finite groups

<comment><USER12> As with prime fields, The additive group will look pretty boring. Are the multiplicative groups necessarily isomorphic to the multiplicative groups on (z/nz)*?

<comment><USER13> The multiplicative group is a finite abelian group, so it is certainly as "boring" as the additive group. The interesting pictures appear when you take into account a particular _ordering_ of the elements of the group.

<comment><USER12> Yes of course lexicographic ordering is assumed, and the pattern will depend on the polynomial used to mod out multiplication. The boringness of the additive group presumes lexicographic ordering.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Philadelphia didn't cancel parade during 1918 pandemic. Results were devastating - <AUTHOR> https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/15/us/philadelphia-1918-spanish-flu-trnd/index.html <comment><USER2> [https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/03/17/spanish- fl...](https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/03/17/spanish-flu-lessons- coronavirus-133888)

This article goes into more detail, and describes how some of the political corruption in the city resulted in the Spanish Flu having a greater impact.

</comment><comment><USER3> Compare to spring break in Florida going on right now. And look at the numbers of seniors living there.</comment>


The Intellectual Capacity of Women (1990) - <AUTHOR> http://gerryonolan.com/public_html/stove/women.html <comment><USER2> Is there a tldr for this?</comment>


KDE's Akademy 2018 to be held in Vienna, 11-17 August - <AUTHOR> https://dot.kde.org/2017/11/17/akademy-2018-vienna-austria-11-17-august <comment><USER2> I wish the KDE team would prioritize stability over functionalities.

A few months ago I tried Fedora KDE, KDE Neon and KaOS. I encountered showstopping bugs in the first 10 minutes of trying them (just customizing the taskbar gave me a black screen on one of them).

I think I'd have to go back to Windows 95 or 98 era to find such a poor user experience.</comment>


Violent video game saved kids - <AUTHOR> http://www.cdn.ph/photostore/news_details.php?id=16528

<comment><USER2> Makes you think about the differences around the world. Heck, I was amazed when I found an arrowhead as a child, I couldn't image a grenade. /unproductiveDiscussion</comment>


APNewsBreak: Tesla in Autopilot sped up before Utah crash - <AUTHOR> https://www.yahoo.com/news/police-report-tesla-autopilot-sped-235859893.html <comment><AUTHOR> Also note, Elon Musk previously addressed this specific situation [1] [2],

> Radar sees through rain, fog, snow, dust, and essentially quite easily. So > even if you are driving down the road and the visibility was very low and > there was a big multi-car pileup or something like that and you can't see > it, the radar would and it would initiate braking in time to avoid your car > being added to the multi-car pileup.

[1] [https://insideevs.com/elon-musk-on-autopilot-8-0-if-the- car-...](https://insideevs.com/elon-musk-on-autopilot-8-0-if-the-car-in-front- of-you-suddenly-swerves-model-s-x-are-ready/)

[2] [https://electrek.co/2016/09/11/elon-musk-autopilot-update- ca...](https://electrek.co/2016/09/11/elon-musk-autopilot-update-can-now-sees- ahead-of-the-car-in-front-of-you/)</comment>