Aviation industry tries to go green - <AUTHOR> https://phys.org/news/2020-02-flight-aviation-industry-green.html <comment><USER2> Aviation looks like the industry least likely to go green to me. I doubt electric planes are ever going to be viable for anything other than a short hop which would be better done by train. Synthetic fuels sounds interesting until you look at how much fuel they consume.

The trend is quite obviously in the wrong direction: [https://www.statista.com/statistics/655057/fuel- consumption-...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/655057/fuel-consumption- of-airlines-worldwide/)

It's often quoted as 2% of global emissions, my (admittedly back of the envelope) calculations come out 50% higher without the cost of burning it at high altitude nor refining the fuel nor the infrastructure on the ground to support air travel.

My guess is emissions from air travel will continue to rise as the world develops and they will take an increasing share of the total as other sectors decarbonise.

This all leads on to political problems, how are you going to convince the poor to reduce their emissions when they see their rich neighbours jetting across the world on holiday.

<comment><USER3> I think it's important to look at this from a different angle: sure their requirements are high, and they may not be able to go completely green in a short timeframe, but should we therefor not even attempt it?

It's not difficult to imagine a hybrid system at some point in the near future, and/or other ways of reducing the carbon footprint. Focus on those positive things, rather than "this will never be completely green, so why bother?"

<comment><USER2> _"this will never be completely green, so why bother?"_

You are putting words in my mouth, I never said that.

The industry has been reducing emissions per mile pretty much since it was founded. Looking at that graph I posted it is having the opposite effect to what we want. Jevon's paradox and all that.

My personal solution was to stop flying, I haven't got on a plane for 19 years. I'm not sure that is palatable to most people here though, it certainly isn't to the airline industry.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> It might be better to just capture CO2 from the Ocean or the air, and then use renewable energy to make jet fuel. While the efficiency of the process may not be super high, it will be carbon neutral. See [https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/02/bill-gates-to- strip-c...](https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/02/bill-gates-to- strip-c02-from-air-for-clean-fuel/) and [https://www.greencarcongress.com/2014/04/20140408-navy.html](https://www.greencarcongress.com/2014/04/20140408-navy.html).

</comment><comment><USER5> The big win would obviously be electric aircraft, but I doubt we'll see that in my lifetime (barring a massive breakthrough in battery technology).

The problem is even the best batteries have a much lower energy density compared with traditional fuels. Also, a battery that weighs 100kg when full weighs pretty much 100kg when empty.

Real Engineering did a pretty good video on the topic [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNvzZfsC13o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNvzZfsC13o)

<comment><USER6> I think hydrogen would be a candidate but then you have to deal with cooling.

<comment><USER7> The problem with hydrogen is that it has a lot of mass-specific energy but its density sucks. Jet-A has something like 35,000 MJ/m^3 while liquid hydrogen is a measly 8500.

<comment><USER6> Interesting! I didn't think about volume. Is that why the Saturn V first stage also used kerosene?

<comment><USER7> Oh, good question - not a rocket scientist but this history seems to say that's the case: [https://history.nasa.gov/SP-4206/ch7.htm](https://history.nasa.gov/SP-4206/ch7.htm)

 _"Liquid hydrogen was only one half as dense as kerosene. This density ratio indicated that, for the necessary propellant, an LH2 tank design would require a far larger tank volume than required for RP-1. The size would create unacceptable penalties in tank weight and aerodynamic design. So, RP-1 became the fuel."_

(RP-1 And Jet A are almost identical.)

In applications where cross-sectional area is an exponential factor (read: atmospheric flight), volume is significant!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Is a large part of this also a political issue? with subsidies and tax breaks on fuel the aviation industry is not really incentivised to innovate and cosumers are not incentivised to seek other modes of transport since flying is often the cheapest and fastest.

<comment><USER9> Every single mode of transport is subsidized so its hard to say if air transportation is getting more or less incentives. Using Swedish numbers and some estimates.

Tax on car owners only pay around 1/3 of the road network.

The ticket price on train, according to a person working in that space, said that the ticket paid about 2/3 of the costs that the train company paid for any given trip. The train network also get infusions from time to time by the government, and stations are supported/built using local taxes and fees.

Boats get tax breaks on fuel, and ports are usually subsidized when built. There might also be subsidizes involved in ice breaking, cleaning and management of the waters and channels around ports.

Planes get tax breaks on fuel, and airports are subsidized when built.

Out of those, I would guess that the train system is the least subsidized model but I have nothing to actually support that claim beyond a gut feeling. I would like to see a good summarize of what each sector get and where the money comes from.

<comment><USER8> Thanks for the detailed info. I honestly don't know the details well enough and hence framed my comment as a bit of an open question. This makes me wonder, in Germany it is possible to get a decently priced domestic train ticket or at least a comparable price to a domestic flight but one needs to book far in advance whereas this isn't the case when booking a flight. If it's not subsidies and taxes what is making train travel so uncompetitive with flying?

<comment><USER10> Infrastructure costs, they are absolutely massive compared to what you need for planes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The motivation for the 737MAX was it burns 15% less fuel.

<comment><USER12> Fuel saving solutions are always attractive in the industry. Originally it was thought jet engines would fail due to their fuel consumption, but the reduced maintenance requirements made them more attractive.

<comment><USER11> Yup. Piston aircraft engines indeed need tons of maintenance. A huge number of moving parts coupled with trying to minimize the weight and maximize the power is the cause.

In WW2 the Germans fitted aircraft engines to their tanks, which worked great when the engines ran, but too often they didn't due to battlefield conditions. (Germany was also terribly short of avgas, which crippled those tanks.)

<comment><USER13> > In WW2 the Germans fitted aircraft engines to their tanks, which worked > great when the engines ran, but too often they didn't due to battlefield > conditions. (Germany was also terribly short of avgas, which crippled those > tanks.)

This sounded interesting so I skimmed the tanks mentioned in [0] and only found mention of prototypes exploring use of a turboshaft engine [1] from [2]. [1] explicitly states "none of these was fitted operationally", so I don't get the impression that these ever even encountered battlefield conditions before Panther II was canceled.

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

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GT_101](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GT_101)

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panther_II_tank#Engine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panther_II_tank#Engine)

<comment><USER14> Don't know about the Germans, but the British used modified aero engines quite extensively in tanks - [https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Rolls- Royce_Meteor](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Rolls-Royce_Meteor)

<comment><USER15> Indeed, my grandfather was in one in Italy late in the war. From the stories he told, the crew one time got it up to 40MPH, then the crankshaft snapped.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Serious question, pardon my ignorance. How much is the per capita fuel consumption compared to a petrol car? Small steps are good too but I sincerely hope we can spend that effort in safety and perhaps speed. Societies progress as distances get shorter.

<comment><USER17> Airlines get about 40-60 passenger miles per gallon. Not sure if that answers your question.

<comment><USER16> It does exactly. Thank you. This is 4 times that of a singly occupied car. Probably more effort should go towards car pooling. And maybe electric scooters.

<comment><USER18> That's only a meaningful comparison if you drive across oceans to different continents. People tend to fly much much longer distances than they drive.

Supposedly a single long over ocean flight costs something the same as a whole year of driving in terms of carbon emission.

<comment><USER19> To put it in perspective, I live in Norway, and I live in the city where I work. Driving to and from work each day for a year would be roughly the same distance[1] as a single direct flight to and from New York.

Of course an ICE car doesn't get the same milage as that aircraft, but it's just a factor of 2-3 off. And then there's the difference in emissions and between a jet engine with its jet fuel vs the ICE car. For someone like me, even if I was driving to work, that single vacation would be a significant contribution to my travel CO2 footprint.

[1]: [https://www.airmilescalculator.com/distance/osl-to- jfk/](https://www.airmilescalculator.com/distance/osl-to-jfk/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> There are a number of other initiatives underway to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from commercial aviation. Synthetic kerosene can be manufactured using power and heat from renewable energy sources. Electric motors can be used for taxiing so that the turbines only have to be started immediately before takeoff. The electromagnetic catapults used on the latest Navy aircraft carriers can be scaled up to launch redesigned airliners from runways on land with lower accelerations.

But it will probably take many years until any of these innovations are widely deployed.

<comment><USER21> Shutting turbine engines down and starting them up is when most of the routine wear happens, it may actually be cheaper and greener to use the fuel.

<comment><USER20> The number of engine cycles would be the same. The only difference is that the pilots would wait to start the turbines until nearly ready to take off, and then shut down the turbines immediately after landing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> The best prospect for the future of clean aviation depends on moving to hydrogen fuel. The appeal of hydrogen arises from its _extreme_ energy-mass density: a kg of hydrogen offers several times the oxidized enthalpy of a kg of kerosene, with zero carbon pollution, so much less fuel would need to be hoisted up to 40,000 feet. Hydrogen-burning aircraft could devote the difference to more payload, or to the same payload with a much lighter airframe and smaller engines. Older aircraft simply could not compete. The hydrogen could power fuel cells for electric drive, or be burned in turbines, or some of both, e.g. turbines for takeoff, fuel cells for cruise.

The only problem with hydrogen is that, even liquified, it takes up a lot of space. This demands a change to an architecture with more interior space, such as a lifting body (or just a wider body), to provide room for more tankage. More tankage for carbon fuel would be pointless because the extra weight would displace cargo lifting capacity; anyway, present aircraft have enough range.

Liquid hydrogen tankage has become much more practical since the discovery of aerogels. Mass production of aerogel enables practical commercial liquid- hydrogen tankage.

Hydrogen for aviation is much more practical than for other modes of transportation, because there is no distribution problem. Hydrogen can be produced anywhere using solar and wind generating systems, operating whenever the sun is out or the wind is blowing. The oxygen also produced, that would otherwise be vented, could also be liquified and and carried on board for cruise at very high altitudes, further improving efficiency. A few airports used by long-haul aircraft, locally supplied, would suffice to bootstrap the industry.

</comment><comment><USER23> It is definitely a good idea. The environment changes and we need to do something about it.

</comment><comment><USER24> Aviation more than any earlier transport mode is fundamentally based on high power-to-output engines and fuels with _both_ high volumetric _and_ weight energy density.

It's little surprise that within years of practicable petrol-fueled automobile engines, powered flight became a reality. Within a quarter century, propeller- driven craft had all but achieved their design zenith (the DC-3), and jet propulsion was being deployed within four decades.

Aerodynamics, controls, navigation, traffic control, and business systems around passenger, freight, and parcel delivery have accounted for most advances since.

Notable among failures have been both supersonic and lighter-than-air craft. Both see limited (mostly military) use. Commercial viability has been lacking.

The alternatives to the present subsonic, large-scale, heavier-than-air, fuel- based transports are ... limited.

Electric propulsion solves the power-to-weight problem (electric motors are remarkably poweful and efficient), but _not_ the energy-storage problem. Batteries have at best about 1/10th the energy storage by weight of hydrocarbon fuels.

Supersonic flight simply requires too much fuel, on top of other environmental concerns: noise, high-altitude pollution. Unscheduled subsonic jets achieve better flexibility than supersonic scheduled flights for those needing (and able to affort) it.

Lighter-than-air craft seem to fragile, finicky, dangerous, and expensive to operate. Changed air travel economics might address that last, but the fact that ultra-lightweight, tremendously voluminous structures capable of lifting only modest cargos and subject to extreme peril from high winds and inclement weather ... does not seem promising.

(Though Germany _did_ operate international Zeppelin service for much of the 1930s. I may be overly pessimistic.)

There are alternatives to fossil hydrocarbon fuels. Most have extreme shortcomings.

Hydrogen _as an energy carrier_ is possible but has remarkably low volumetric energy density, as well as poor storage and handling capabilities. It's unlikely to be utilised.

Biofuels can be effectively precise analogues of present avgas (petrol) and jet (kerosene) fuels. The problem is that _even the small fraction of energy demand represented by aviation fuel use is beyond the capabilities of agriculture to produce. In 2014, Boeing touted "the biggest breakthrough that there is out there" in biofuels.

At 75 gal/acre-yr (mean of reported production) and 16 billion gallons of aviation fuel consumption in the US (2013 BTS RITA estimate), 21.3 million acres would have to be under cultivation. That's about 330,000 mile2, or a region 577 miles on a side.

On the map, you could start in Shreveport, LA, head west to Hobbs, NM, north to Denver, CO, east to St. Joseph, MO, and south to Shreveport again, traversing seven states and completely bounding two (Kansas and Oklahoma).

[https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/1wo2hl/boeings...](https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/1wo2hl/boeings_biofuel_breakthrough_less_than/)

The one possible alternative I've seen, and one which isn't _obviously* impractical, is fuel synthesis: creating the liquid hydrocarbon fuels powered flight is dependent on from non-fossil sources.

The notion's not new -- it strongly resembles the coal-to-liquid-fuels process employed in Germany during WWII, and in South Africa since the 1950s. The notion was suggested by M. King Hubbert in 1964 ([http://www.hubbertpeak.com/hubbert/EnergyResources.pdf](http://www.hubbertpeak.com/hubbert/EnergyResources.pdf) (PDF) p. 139), and has been explored at the Brookhaven National Laboratory, M.I.T., US Naval Research Laboratory, and a Google X Projects startup (since folded), over the past five decades.

The chemistry is sound. Scaling to military or commercial capacities, and economics, have been found wanting.

There's not much in the energy situation which gives me much hope. This remains among the very few bright spots, despite 50+ years of less-than- overwhelming progress.

(I'd looked at a fair bit of the history and research a few years ago on Reddit, most represented in this search: [https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/search?q=fischer+tropsc...](https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/search?q=fischer+tropsch&restrict_sr=on) )</comment>


U.S. Needs Peace Officers Not Militarized Police - <AUTHOR> U.S. needs Peace Officers not Militarized Police, comments? <comment><USER2> How would this end up being different from today? Would it mean removing guns from the police? Would American police even allow that given that we have such a highly armed society?

While I agree with the point, I don't know how you define what you mean, and then how we get there. I can definitely see getting rid of lethal weapons as a good step, but they'd need some support like SWAT for situations like what happened Friday.

<comment><AUTHOR> replied under new submission 'Peace Officers Not Militarized Police' thank you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Yep, how could it fail? [http://media.townhall.com/Townhall/Car/b/cb100515dAPR2015100...](http://media.townhall.com/Townhall/Car/b/cb100515dAPR20151005084615.jpg)</comment>


Spore – Decentralized package manager on Ethereum and IPFS - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/mhhf/spore <comment><USER2> AppFS ( [http://appfs.rkeene.org/](http://appfs.rkeene.org/) ) is exactly a decentralized package manager, except it uses HTTP as a transport and does end to end verification (i.e. not like HTTPS where only the transport is verified) of all data using PKI.

</comment><comment><USER3> Can somebody ELI5 why we need Ethereum, too?

<comment><AUTHOR> So you can program your program's program while you program

<comment><USER3> I got it. Gx [0] looks simpler and better without the craptocurrency stuff.

[0]: [https://github.com/whyrusleeping/gx](https://github.com/whyrusleeping/gx)

<comment><USER4>
      $ gx import QmR5FHS9TpLbL9oYY8ZDR3A7UWcHTBawU1FJ6pu9SvTcPa

vs

      $ spore install mortal

This is a very important distinction that you gloss over when you use loaded terms like "craptocurrency".

<comment><USER3> Everything comes at a price. The first one is free and has a lot fewer dependencies to be used and operate - no Chinese miners required!

<comment><USER4> Why do you want to go down the rabbit hole of economic externalities?

Do you realize the sorts of unnecessary energy that is wasted just to protect the legal and financial infrastructure that even let's a company like npm exist in the first place?

You're making it seem like only cryptocurrencies have a downside. The truth of the matter is that there will always be a price to pay for state-making functions and that we can't build npm-like things without these state-making functions.

Cryptocurrencies might end up being one of the least wasteful manners in which a group of people can come up with decentralized consensus.

Someone should do a study to compare the infrastructure required to support storing and tracking all of the world's real estate property titles versus the infrastructure of all the Chinese miners in the world. I'm willing to bet that in kilowatt hours even the heavy-duty Bitcoin blockchain is much more efficient.

<comment><USER3> I don't have any interest in anything with a speculative value. Sorry, but Bitcoin didn't make it - "the next big thing", i.e. Ethereum will not make it either as people have zero interest in something that's at the mercy of low- quality speculators. In this case, I really don't want my business to have anything to do with a speculative technology. As I said, the only two requirements are authenticity and immutability and you don't need Ethereum to implement it.

<comment><USER4> Don't only think of it as having a speculative value. Think of it also as having the utility of being able to write to an immutable public ledger. Think of "Bitcoin the currency" as a commodity that lets you write to the Bitcoin blockchain like how ink is a commodity that let's you write on paper.

You don't need to use much Bitcoin in order to secure a lot of data with a timestamp and signature. This makes it great for synchronizing all sorts of transactional data across service boundaries meaning people can bring their ownership rights from provider to provider.

With something like keybase.io you're reliant on them to authorize the link between a name and your public key. You're also reliant on the DNS system. All of this adds unnecessary friction to the concept of individual ownership of digital properties like domain names to say nothing of owning the rights to a named module of published open source code.

The speculative value is what drives the mining process. It's a dirty little trick and yes, it encourages a bunch of people near cheap hydro power to buy a bunch of machines that do nothing other than play the SHA-256 lottery.

You can still have zero interest in the speculative value of Bitcoin. That's the miners concerns.

Your concerns can just be the transactional fees that let you embed your own data in the consensus ledger.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Obama announces nuclear breakthrough on landmark India trip - <AUTHOR> http://in.reuters.com/article/2015/01/25/india-obama-idINKBN0KY02020150125

<comment><USER2> Eh? how is this even possible considering that India did not sign the NPT also considering that technically in that weird hate-love 4 way between Russia, India, China and Pakistan the US is historically been supporting Pakistan while India had closer relations with Russia.

The NPT thing alone is like the US openly providing nuclear technology to Israel, or building nuclear reactors in Iran.

Not to mention that even tho this is purely "civilian"(like that thing actually exists) nuclear technology it sure will make Pakistan nervous, and when either India or Pakistan gets nervous Russia and China get on alert.

If the US actually opens trading in nuclear technology with a non NPT signatory what will prevent Russia from doing the same with N. Korea or what will prevent Iran from boasting see the Americans selling nuclear tech to a "rogue state" why can't we buy it as a NPT signatory?

This is either a very misquoted or misguided story, or a one big FU from the US to one of the most important treaties of the 20th century.

<comment><USER3> I'd bet on the FU ... but of course you can blame that on Bush ^_^ (those issues were ... finessed back then, this is about liability). As for:

" _Not to mention that even tho this is purely "civilian"(like that thing actually exists) nuclear technology_"

To a great degree it does exist with civilian reactor designs that can't easily change fuel, e.g. not the Canadian CANDU or Soviet RBMK (Chernobyl) ones. If you brew uranium fuel rods for much longer than a month, you get too much of two undesirable isotopes.

One encourages fission, and even in weapons grade plutonium precludes gun assembly warhead designs like Little Boy, the other gives off a lot of heat which is useful in powering deep space probes but otherwise is ranges from a pain in weapons grade to giving off 100kW of heat per what I've read.

<comment><USER2> Not very familiar with the RBMK design, but the CANDU reactor is a heavy water breeder reactor it does produces weapons grade plutonium in quite good amounts.

It's fuel cycle isn't optimized for doing so, and they actually intentionally have a burn stage in which the WG PU oxide is mixed with Uranium to burn it out of the spent fuel. But if you tweak the fuel cycle slightly, and forgo the burn phase you are getting a very good PU 239 factory.

If anything trade in nuclear technology has to be done with countries like India and Pakistan it should be in nuclear fail safes, and command and control systems.

The US system has so many fail safes and checks that even the president unlike in the movies can't launch a nuke with a button, ground silos can be launched within 30-45min, subs can take hours with the new regulations and launch prep.

On the other hand no one knows which nuclear fail safes Indian or Pakistani nukes have if any, and their command and control system is completely none existent, India launched a central network in 2009 but as far as it goes for both of those countries nuclear launch capabilities still remain within the hands of local field commanders once the forces go on launch ready alert.

Blame Bush, Obama or Osama frankly my dear i don't care, but the worlds first nuclear power, and the defacto "world police" should not trade in nuclear technologies with a country who didn't sign the NPT, especially when it has a nuclear armed neighbor that could turn into an AQ run state over night.

<comment><USER3> Apparently the RBMK design was in part based on the Soviet Union's much better ability to make pipes than truly large pressure vessels. It's graphite moderated, water is a neutron poison (+ positive void coefficient = outlawed in the the US by demand of Edward Teller, along with any but the newest of the CANDU designs), the pipes containing the fuel are vertical and can be individuality serviced, thanks of course due to its now notorious lack of containment. Almost certainly intended as a dual use reactor, although I wouldn't be surprised if only some of them were used to breed plutonium.

I would hope we have more knowledge of e.g. the Indian and Pakistani nuke systems, then again the simple fact that 90% of the CIA's employees work in the US is enough to make you highly skeptical of our nation's HUMINT. Then again we the US are primarily concerned with them falling into the wrong hands (a parochialism that does not enhance regional or ultimately world stability), and I heard back in the '80s from some friends who were in a position to know that we leaked to the Soviets everything they needed to know about Permissive Action Links to safeguard their nukes. And this of course eventually devolves to a people problem ... a very good argument against NP.

As for your last point, while I don't necessarily agree with it, I think the theory is that India isn't going to forswear nukes (South Africa is the only nation that has after developing them), India isn't an enemy, potential or real, like the other "nuclear rogue states" or likely ones in the future, so cozying up to them in this area is not going to produce the moral hazard WRT to the NPT and NP like, e.g., our tacit acceptance of Iran's imminent completion of warheads. And I'd note that on the other hand, our arranging the deposing and likely, although not inevitable death of Muammar Gaddafi demonstrated a very harsh lesson on giving up your WMD programs, undoing whatever good was done here WRT Saddam Hussein.

Of course, you could argue that the current situation with Iran is the sort of thing you'd expect by our not continuing an ultra hard line on NP. Me, I'm going to continue to keep handy my copies of _Nuclear War Survival Skills_ along with all the other stuff I collected during the Cold War, including my mother's Civil Defense Block Mother sign, back from the late '60s when we still cared about the survival of the nation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The new deal resolved differences over the liability of suppliers to India in the event of a nuclear accident and U.S. demands on tracking the whereabouts of material supplied to the country.

"You can always count on Americans to do the right thing - after they've tried everything else." \--Winston Churchill

</comment><comment><USER5> By breakthrough they're sadly not talking about a scientific discovery, but about a trade agreement.

<comment><USER6> Mh, it's unclear in the article, but perhaps the US nuclear energy companies will finally be able to install the new and safer designs they haven't been able to build because of the high-profile fuckups of the old, unsafe designs?

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Obama announces India breakthrough on landmark nuclear trip

Obama announces nuclear India on landmark breakthrough trip

India breakthrough nuclear trip on landmark Obama announce

</comment><comment><USER7> Headline bait. I was expecting some exciting breakthrough in nuclear reactor technology or something.</comment>


Ask HN: What parts of the web is HN unfamiliar with? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Anything enterprise.

Unless you are a hyperscaler, or a social network aiming for exponential growth, private cloud cloud can be much, much more performant, and less expensive once you are operating non-trivial infrastructure.</comment>


Porting PineTime Watch Face from C to Rust on Riot with LVGL - <AUTHOR> https://lupyuen.github.io/pinetime-rust-riot/articles/watch_face <comment><AUTHOR> Converting Embedded C to Rust is not that hard... Here's how we convert a PineTime Watch Face with LVGL from C to Rust on RIOT

[https://lupyuen.github.io/pinetime-rust- riot/articles/watch_...](https://lupyuen.github.io/pinetime-rust- riot/articles/watch_face)</comment>


Why We're Suing Facebook For $25 Million In Statutory Damages - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/03/31/why-were-suing-facebook-for-25-million-in-statutory-damages/ <comment><USER2> April Fools. Read to the bottom and it's clearly a joke.

But it's a day early (though to be fair, it _is_ April 1st in some parts of a world)

Please please please don't post every single April Fools joke you see on the internet tomorrow. If it's particularly hacker-worthy, then sure. This is not.

<comment><USER3> Let's just restrict it to jokes that are actually funny. That should weed out most of them. (Including this one.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "We'll be filing the lawsuit tomorrow" isn't the punchline.

"I can say without hubris that I am a very important person" is. ;)

<comment><USER5> haha..I lolz

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm so freaking Gullible, I was about to write a big long comment referring to Facebook. Touche Michael Arrington!

<comment><USER6> Bastards, I only realized I got fooled at: "Later on, he also unfriended me."

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Dammit. I was really hoping to have ONE legitimate news story to follow tomorrow.

</comment><comment><USER8> Is this a joke? or is this guy serious...

<comment><USER9> Its a joke.

Though I have to admit he had me up until he started talking about second degree burns.

<comment><USER10> Triple soy latte was a great touch... hahaha</comment></comment></comment>


A new way to control experimentation with dreams - <AUTHOR> http://news.mit.edu/2020/targeted-dream-incubation-dormio-mit-media-lab-0721 <comment><USER2> I used to lucid dream a lot. Probably the most wonderful experiences of my life. I did everything you could think of. Flying, visit impossible places, superhero, wreck stuff, bang movie stars, deepest oceans, space. Sometimes you get into a wierd head space where everything is hyper real. Impossible colors, undescribable textures. I got good at keeping myself from waking up, and had lucid dreams that lasted seemingly hours.

It seems I've lost the ability with age :( . They became less common in middle age and I haven't had one in years now. How I wish I could have that skill back

<comment><USER3> Did you consciously develop lucid dreaming skill? Or was it natural? Any good/bad side effects?

Also, why do you think you lost it with age? Is this like physical abilities that degrade with age?

<comment><USER4> You can develop lucid dreaming abilities.

I don't think it goes with age.

Basically the problem is with dream recall after you wake up. And establishing a routine so frequent you could witness that routine even in dream, so that you can spot anomaly in the routine in the dream.

Basically there are certain things you can't do properly in a dream. Things like adding numbers, counting, reading a watch correctly twice in a row etc. For some reasons our brains seem to have a hard time maintaining state in dreams. So you establish a stateful routine in wakefulness which would not be possible in dream, making you realize you are now in a dream.

As you can see there are a range of things that need to happen. Routines in wakefullness(like counting, repeating clock check), well rested body, low stress, ability to remember a dream etc.

I think with age a lot of parameters are hard to keep up with.

<comment><USER5> I have had it very rarely but it is quite amazing how much control one has over how the dream pays out, what you want to see etc. I could literally do a walkthrough in a house, checking out rooms one by one, houses I was familiar with.

I have heard that you cannot see your face reflected in a mirror in a dream. So sure enough when I got my next one I had to try it. I did not see my face, but not sure how much of that was affected by my expectation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Here is the PDF of the thesis dissertation for the project:

[https://dam-prod.media.mit.edu/x/2020/06/09/Incubating+Dream...](https://dam- prod.media.mit.edu/x/2020/06/09/Incubating+Dreams+Awakening+Creativity+Adam+Haar+Thesis+8.5.19-compressed.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER7> Last night I had a dream that I woke up from and went to my computer to find a video file of that dream. I went to watch it but then I woke up for real. Kinda funny.

<comment><USER8> Had something similar where I had a terrible nightmare about some humanoid thing and woke up as it grabbed me.

I remember feeling a huge relief as I opened my eyes to see my bedroom and be in bed, only to tilt my chin and see the thing sitting on my chest, which then lept at my face.

I woke up for real, almost falling out of bed shouting expletives.

That's the only time I have had a dream (or sub-dream?) so lucid it felt no different to real life ( for that brief moment).

<comment><USER9> I've had very similar experience - a dream that turned into horror (I was visiting family when I remembered my grandpa is dead and they all turned into zombies and started pursuing me) - then I "woke up", sit up in my bed (and my room mate seen me sit up with open eyes), I looked at him, and he turned into a zombie and attacked me, then I woke up for real, already siting.

It was very scary. It might have something to do with the fact that we were studying before an exam late into night and I drank about 2 liters of pretty strong tea to keep studying (and fell asleep anyway eventually).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> No doubt this can help do some "creative work" while sleeping, but does it also mean that you wake up tired?

</comment><comment><USER11> > sleep-tracking device that can alter dreams by tracking hypnagogia and then > delivering audio cues based on incoming physiological data

Neither the press release article nor the actual paper abstract seem to mention how is a hypnagogia phase detected? Anyone with access to the full paper can expand on this?

For what is effectively the most important/novel part of this device it seems fairly handwavy on details.

<comment><USER12> In the early 2010s I remember reading about a eye mask that detected when you were in REM sleep by the literal rapid movements of your eyeballs while you slept. When REM was sufficiently detected it would flash three red LEDs over your eyes. The idea being that in your dream you would see the three red LEDs faintly, and realise that you were in a dream.

I'm not sure if this actually works or how accurate it was however.

<comment><USER11> But Rapid-Eye-Movement cycles happens at some point in between deeper sleep cycles.

In this case they claim to detect hypnagogia which from the article is the early transition from wakefulness to sleep.

In this stage you might have muscle relaxation or breathing pattern changes but probably not rapid eye movement.

<comment><USER12> I see

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Aside, but I find it fascinating that the inventor of Modafinil, Michel Jouvet[1], was also a dream researcher and even wrote a novel on dreams.

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

</comment><comment><USER13> in ancient times, dreaming was rare, says the legend. when a king had a dream, it was seen as a great sign

</comment><comment><USER14> I've talked to some neuroscience friends and was interested to learn that lucid dreaming hasn't been studied much if at all in lab conditions. I welcome such research and hope more people get inspired to study deeper.

<comment><USER15> Not at all true, there's been a ton of study on lucid dreams. Check out a summary of the research by Jennifer Windt: [https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/dreaming](https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/dreaming)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Basically "Inception" alpha version.

<comment><USER17> > a sleep-tracking device that can alter dreams by tracking hypnagogia and > then delivering audio cues based on incoming physiological data, at precise > times in the sleep cycle, to make dream direction possible.

Inception via smart speaker.

<comment><USER18> >Inception via smart speaker.

add small electrical impulses upon the muscles (electronic massager style) and you will feel running. Add temperature changing clothes/blankets - and you're running away from a polar bear... Especially if to add a smell of the bear.</comment></comment></comment>


German police raid homes of Tor-linked group's board members - <AUTHOR> https://www.zdnet.com/article/german-police-raid-homes-of-tor-linked-groups-board-members/ <comment><USER2> Heavily discussed 1-2 days ago:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17456289](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17456289) (333 points/130 comments)

</comment><comment><USER3> another example of tried overreach: a branch of the federal police, "staatsschutz", raided the posteo office in 2013 and claimed to have a warrant to seize _everything_. posteo immediatedly pushed back and it turned out that the police only had a warrant for a single document [0](in german, tho). like the investigating officers wouldn't be aware of this. it's their modus operandi.

what they also like to do is to adjust events in hindsight such that it suits their story. the case I have in mind concerns the NRW state police, but that, too, seems to be common strategy. in this case, which is very recent, a protester was arrested and police claimed, in their official report, that the protester physically assaulted the officer and resisted arrest. the protester disputed this, but without evidence would not have stood a chance in court. moreover, the protester was badly injured during the whole ordeal. now a video turns up and what do you see?: no physical assault, no resistance [1](also in german). in such cases, i am glad that we live in the age of mobile phones, where anyone can take recordings.

[0] [https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posteo](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posteo) [1] [http://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/wuppertal-fall-von- polize...](http://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/wuppertal-fall-von- polizeigewalt-erregt-nordrhein-westfalen-1.4040203)

</comment><comment><USER4> Wow, imagine being raided by police and having all your stuff stolen, just because the police allege that you helped someone do something "anti- government".

Tor board, I would offer you my help, but I'm an American, so we would probably all be sent to Guantanamo

<comment><USER5> I don't have to. It happened to me in 2010 in the middle of the USA. 6am no- knock raid by regional FBI agents with guns drawn. They stole all of my computer equipment and my flatmate's computer equipment too.

There were never any charges brought. We never got our stuff back. The local police were brought in to try to charge me with something, anything, and the best they could come up with was a city ordinance called "Maintaining a disorderly house." \-- yeah, it tends to be a bit messy after the feds have trashed it.

Of course back then the feds were really up in arms trying to squash any and all grassroots political organizations (ie, wikileaks + occupy). Even more than now.

<comment><USER6> Police raided my home in South Australia. It was drug related, and I was dealing, so fair enough. They later dropped the charges, _nolle prosequi_.

But did they have to make such a mess? I mean, they had had my keys and still busted open locks, pulled everything out of everything and threw it across the room, upturned everything that wasn't bolted down. And they still didn't find some of the drugs in plain sight, and a substantial amount of cash that was barely hidden.

More recently they forced their way in to my home Sunday night at 12am and dragged me off before I had a chance to get out of my pajamas to charge me with assault on allegations I pushed someone over in to 2 feet of fresh snow. Held me till midday Monday forcing me to miss a day at work and appear in court in my bed clothes. Yeah, they dropped those charges too.

The police are _the enemy_. And an incompetent, gun wielding, violent enemy immune to the law.

<comment><USER4> The government quite literally hires goons to be... well... armed goons.

I am so, so sorry to hear about what you went through. These guys are overpaid thugs with a lot of public support shockingly

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I guess a big lesson here is: keeping the data on paper made it less secure.

The police made overreach on top of overreach and grabbed as much as they could, far exceeding their warrant. They now have historical donor records for an unrelated organization, when the warrant should have limited them in scope and history. But the police can't compel them to unlock their encrypted hard drives. If they kept that info on encrypted disk it would have been safe.

</comment><comment><USER8> I'm not speaking about the events in the OP, but generally I think people do their cause harm when they say things such as the following (there are several more examples in the article):

 _After the raids, Bartl was forced to take a break from work. He said that he assumes, given his work on digital rights issues, that he may be under surveillance. Bartl also expressed concern that future donors may also face scrutiny, financially hurting the group 's projects._

Sometimes (I know nothing about these incidents), some of the reasons for these actions are to intimidate you and disrupt your work. Letting them know you are intimidated and disrupted not only encourages the bully, it spreads those consequences much more widely than just you: It demoralizing people who follow you, who depend on you, and who are in similar positions; and via the news article it spreads the intimidation and disruption to a much wider audience. How many on HN will now have second thoughts? The better response, I think, is _f- that; we won 't be stopped or intimidated_.

</comment><comment><USER9> This law enforcement overreach and breach of civil freedoms is fucked up.

How is it fair to just sit back and not wage war after persecution like this? If I were in the CCC I'd be fuming and scheming right now. Not sure what sort what the war would look like exactly, but I'd be thinking of something.

</comment><comment><USER10> > But, under pressure from tax authorities, the organization had compiled > paper receipts with names and passport numbers of those the project had > reimbursed.

> Bartl said those records have been compromised, putting the identities of > those involved at risk.

Pretty sure those records have been compromised the moment you handed them over to the tax authorities.</comment>


Test All the (Network) Things - <AUTHOR> http://bits.shutterstock.com/2013/10/10/test-all-the-network-things/

<comment><USER2> Very interesting approach.</comment>


Self-interview after leaving the NetBSD board - <AUTHOR> http://julipedia.meroh.net/2013/06/self-interview-after-leaving-netbsd.html

<comment><USER2> _But let 's just take the migration away from CVS as an example. The current view on the topic is that no existing VCS can replace CVS and keep some of the properties that CVS has. Therefore, if we were to switch away from CVS, a bunch of developers attached to those old properties would possibly abandon the project._

A major open source project fighting about keeping CVS? Wow.

<comment><USER3> At least they are not trying to reimplement CVS [http://www.opencvs.org/](http://www.opencvs.org/)

> (Have you tried telling anyone in person that NetBSD still uses CVS? No? Try > it and observe their faces.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I was hoping for a Q+A interview format, where the interviewer and the interviewee are the same person.

Glenn Gould, the prodigy pianist, famously interviewed himself: [http://www.angelfire.com/in/eimaj/interviews/glenn.gould.htm...](http://www.angelfire.com/in/eimaj/interviews/glenn.gould.html)

Does anyone know other examples of this expository format?

<comment><USER5> Jon Bentley did this in the epilog of Programming Pearls (the first edition, at least).

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I guess he's writing for die-hard NetBSD users, because he doesn't make much of an effort to explain why anyone should care about the project anymore. (I would be interested to know why.)

</comment><comment><USER7> This rings eerily similar to the state of the Gnome foundation and other long- in-the-tooth FLOSS projects. Sad to read but I really don't know how one responds to "no innovation." Is "come up with good ideas" really a thing?

</comment><comment> m-r-a-m I can't think of a good reason to use NetBSD [1] over Linux [2] for any architectures that Linux supports. I guess licensing is an issue for some companies. If there's another reason, the NetBSD project needs to communicate it better to attract new users.

[1] [http://www.netbsd.org/ports/#ports-by- cpu](http://www.netbsd.org/ports/#ports-by-cpu)

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Linux_supported_archit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Linux_supported_architectures)

<comment><USER8> You can use both - you can run NetBSD in userspace under Linux [http://www.netbsd.org/docs/rump/](http://www.netbsd.org/docs/rump/) \- eg to run userspace filesystem drivers or a userspace IP stack... you can't do that with Linux.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have very recently started using NetBSD, after having been interested for a while (had a tendency to go to the Fosdem talks on it for a few years). I think defining what the aim is (other than "runs anywhere") would be helpful; as would not cvs. All the BSDs have a user issue, with the dominance of Linux, and they have to find larger niches.

</comment><comment><USER9> I found the part about CVS surprising to say the least.

</comment><comment><USER10> People should not forget - it runs on many architectures. Especially a toaster. I think the Apple Airport Extreme is ( was ) running NetBSD

<comment><USER11> Yes, but so does Linux. Actually, given the tremendous industry support for Linux and the increasing obscurity of NetBSD, it wouldn't surprise me at all if Linux ran on more architectures now...

<comment><USER12> NetBSD supports 10 CPU[1] architectures; Linux supports 27[2]

[1][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NetBSD](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NetBSD) [2][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Linux_supported_archite...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Linux_supported_architectures)

In terms of other hardware I believe it bends even more in Linux's favour. I'm not sure if any Linux distribution has as many ports as NetBSD though. Gentoo and Debian probably come close.

<comment><USER13> What you've said doesn't even agree with the NetBSD article you linked to (which suggests 15 processor architectures).

Even if you could create figures that seem accurate, you really lose some of the nuance with a comparison like this. Questions like which OS you're better off with if you're attacking an architecture without an MMU (linux for sure) or which software distribution treats your old SPARC workstation, for example, as a first-class platform (OpenBSD or NetBSD) instead of an oddball orphan seem more interesting.

Similarly, it'd be interesting to know WHY so many new platforms are using Linux instead of *BSD for embedded stuff. Is it something inherent to Linux, just momentum, driver vendor lockin from the vendors, name recognition, or what?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Where there are humans, there will be a politics..

<comment><USER15> seems the human element wont be a problem for netbsd for much longer.</comment></comment>


The Polls Are All Wrong. A Startup Called Civis Is Our Best Hope to Fix Them - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2016/06/civis-election-polling-clinton-sanders-trump/ <comment><USER2> No-one really benefits from accurate polls except (possibly) politicians. This is a non-problem. It's also probably insoluble. If you ask 10,000 people now how they're going to vote, that won't always be a reliable guide to how 40 million people are going to vote in 3 months' time. There's just no fix for that. People change their minds, and samples will not always be representative.</comment>


HubSpot CEO: We would've struggled on the West Coast - <AUTHOR> http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/blog/startups/2013/05/hubspot-silicon-valley-boston-marketing.html?page=all <comment><USER2> It's an interesting point. You could say the same about Austin, Chicago, Atlanta, Charlotte, Toronto, etc., maybe even Seattle and Vancouver, not to mention any number of smaller towns with a startup culture presence.

I'd add two more bad things about the valley: faddish thinking / groupthink, and completely insane costs. I can only speak second-hand, but the Valley strikes me as very much a bubble with its own internal echo chamber and groupthink. If you're in the Valley, you are likely to get sucked into chasing trends that everyone else is chasing instead of finding a unique niche nobody's thought about. And the cost of living is simply absurd: think Manhattan except car ownership is an almost must-have.

I also hear that the availability of funding in the Valley is overstated. Early-round funding is scarce, and funding might be even more faddish than the startups themselves.

The advantage of the valley though is the talent pool. It's fresh, large, and highly skilled, though perhaps a bit fickle as the interview mentions.

Finally, having lived in Boston/Cambridge, I can mention one distinct _disadvantage_ of that particular place: it's somewhat antisocial and has a conservative investor climate. I found it a somewhat stifling place to live. People don't have friends. They have colleagues. And investors there tend to be more risk-averse than California.

If I wanted a big startup hub that is not the Valley I would honestly pick Austin: lowish cost of living, lots of tech talent, nicer climate than the Northeast, and more fun than Boston. New York might be a possibility too, as it's more fun and diverse than Boston and probably less conservative.

<comment><USER3> > And the cost of living is simply absurd

I'd agree compared to many places, but Boston is hardly cheaper than the Valley! It's cheaper than SF, but more expensive than Mountain View, San Jose, Santa Clara, etc. At least as far as apartment rentals go; I haven't looked at how purchasing a house would compare.

There are Boston suburbs which are cheaper, but unlike in the Valley, there is not much going on there. The South Bay has a bunch of tech companies (Apple, nVidia, etc.), community spaces like the Hacker Dojo, coworking spaces like NextSpace, etc. The parts of Boston where you can find an apartment for San- Jose-level rents don't really have anything like that.

<comment><USER4> No tech companies in the suburbs of boston? There is Autodesk, RedHat, EMC and many others.

Edit: For a more complete list, see: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Route_128#The_hig...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Route_128#The_high- tech_region)

<comment><USER5> Yeah - that person doesn't know what they are talking about. Route 128 rivals the Valley in that sense... just about anyone that grew up in that economy knows that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Incidentally Bill Gates chose not to move Microsoft to the Valley (from Albuquerque, New Mexico) because he saw the way people changed jobs each year and figured this would not be good for his young company (From Paul Allen's book 'Idea Man')

<comment><USER7> Maybe Microsoft would have some more interesting products if they had more employee churn...

<comment><USER8> No employee churn == horrible code. I'm living it right now. They do not understand best practice... It's like they live in a bubble.

<comment><USER9> Too much employee churn == horrible code.

Launch-and-flee, fast firing, brutal deadlines, and corporate behaviors that don't instill loyalty, all are pretty bad for code quality.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Boston suits HubSpot as a company. Because it is such a big, diverse college town they have been able to hire great, hard-working sales and CRM people right out of school, which is truly that company's core competency.

It's not their engineering that has made them successful but a combination of sales/CRM and evangelical style marketing. I'm not sure SV could provide that - but please correct me if I'm wrong.

</comment><comment><USER10> This feels like there is definitely a bit of a chip on his shoulder about the Bay Area. Having said that, I think he makes valid points. Mostly around employee retention and loyalty. Boston is also really "two cities". Once you get on the other side of the 128 people are the opposite of transient. They're there for life. What's interesting to me is that we're even having this discussion. For the longest time Boston was the Number 2 after the Bay Area. It has really slipped though relative to New York, Austin and other secondary markets over the last 5 years. It's a "no nonsense" place (the weather and puritan streak will do that to you) that values intellectualism. So it's no wonder with the explosion of mobile and consumer/media apps it's fallen behind and still focuses on B2B and medical.

</comment><comment><USER11> This comes across strangely for me. As as a founder of a startup who moved from the west coast to the east coast, I certainly didn't do so to be a big fish in a small pond. Personally, I find that a bit of a copout--if what you are doing is awesome you'll work hard to make it work even in a tough environment. That said, I suppose it objectively makes sense.

I moved my project to the east coast for completely different reasons, primarily to make good use of the strong medical community in the Boston area. The advisors and collaborators we have here are amazing, and they understand some of the special challenges of being a medical/life science company (things like scientific validation).

Sure, you can do arbitrage with geographically distributed startup resources, but imo it's more important to focus on expertise and mindsets pertinent to your work.

</comment><comment><USER8> We need more Texas startups!

</comment><comment><USER9> Honestly, I think that VC-istan companies do a horrible job of instilling loyalty. Equity percentages are low enough that I'd rather take a full salary. True business partnership is worth going down in salary to "buy in", but if you don't get to know the cap table or at least know that there isn't some VP of NTWTFK (Non-Technical Who The Fuck Knows) getting 20x as much, then what's the point? You're getting paid in lottery tickets, you can be cliffed, the offer may be rescinded if you start asking about liquidation preferences, etc.

Also, these companies generally have tight deadlines (because they grew too fast and blew up their burn rate) and can never invest any time in doing things right, much less employee mentoring. With no loyalty to employees, these startups get none back.

Finally, when you're forced to implement bad practices (technical debt plus unhealthy work conditions) to meet these deadlines, you want to _run_ as soon as you hit a macroscopic target, in order to (a) cash in while there's a glow on your face, making that social bump permanent, and (b) avoid suffering or being embarrassed when things start to fall to pieces.</comment>


Ask HN: Help Needed with Creating a Subscribers Only Area - <AUTHOR>

Hi there,
I am managing a local information sharing site (php-based) without any technical help for some time. I can do small, in fact very very small php stuff but when it comes to real Php work, I am all at sea. I wanted to create a subscribers-only area, which would have special free downloads for subscribers. To subscribe, users just have to submit their email, which will be verified, a link sent to the email id, on clicking of which the user is taken to the subscribers area.
And, how do I send daily/weekly feed updates via email to subscribers. I have some idea about how it could be done but I would appreciate your help in finding some easy-to-handle code or help.
Thanks a ton. <comment><USER2> You'll need to implement some kind of session management. Google for "php session management".

As for sending emails, you'll need an SMTP relay such as smptd or postfix (if on *nix). There's bound to be php modules that can help you too.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks a lot. I will give it a try.</comment></comment>


100M Messages a Day Milestone for IronMQ - <AUTHOR> http://blog.iron.io/2012/12/ironmq-handles-100-million-messages-day.html

<comment><USER2> Really nice work, Iron.io team. I particularly like that you put those numbers in perspective to other popular services at scale.

There's something comforting about knowing that any one site's individual requirements are a small fraction of the total capacity of a system. I may be preaching to the choir here, but that's one of the things that I like most about using (and building) cloud services.

Something that fizx and I have observed while building websolr.com (our hosted Solr search service) is that as you scale the larger aggregate, the challenges of the average use case become increasingly trivial. For example, we're serving hundreds of millions of requests per day, and indexing billions of documents. That's a few orders of magnitude larger than any one of our customers, but they get all the benefits of a system that's designed to operate at that scale.

Put another way: how often do you really take the time to benchmark your message queue (or search engine, or whatever) to make sure it can scale to 10x or 100x growth over what you currently need? Or take the time to actually scale it to that capacity? Does that even make business sense? And yet, in a properly built cloud service, a 10x or 100x growth for any average customer is going to be a much smaller marginal increase against the aggregate.

</comment><comment><USER3> Well done guys. Distributed and parallel processing with hardly any effort on the side of the developer, amazing.

</comment><comment><USER4> Best cloud MQ...now a real substitute to redis with the features of real MQ's

</comment><comment><USER5> Yeah, but doesn't support message groups (exclusive consumer): <http://activemq.apache.org/message-groups.html>

</comment><comment><USER6> These guys are doing Good Things.

</comment><comment><USER7> Congrats!

</comment><comment><USER8> Cool!</comment>


Show HN: Good Stock – Powerful Free Stock Photos - <AUTHOR> http://www.goodstock.photo/blog/free-stock-images

<comment><AUTHOR> This is also our launch day so we're giving away 15 free hi-res photos for free!</comment>


Does anyone have a clue to earn the $15 000? HackMyFortress 15 000$ REWARD - <AUTHOR> http://hackmyfortress.com/ <comment><USER2> I got as far as getting the login/password combination for the admin pages and I tried using those multiple ways, but I am definitely not well-versed enough to go further. An intrusion attempt is detected each time.</comment>


Commodity Web Startups (personal reflections on a web startup's fundraising) - <AUTHOR> http://www.stubbleblog.com/index.php/2007/10/commodity-web-s/

<comment><USER2> It is really denotationally impossible for a start up to me a commodity. Come on folks, you are in business; you really need to stop mucking up the fundamental concepts of economics.

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

(Don't tell me its a metaphor either, because it makes really terrible one.)

</comment><comment><USER3> One reason he might need funding is to stay ahead of the competition. He has identified a good market, but now that the word is out, competition will emerge. And if he doesn't move fast enough he might lose his niche to faster competitors.

<comment><USER4> In software, though, having more resources often makes you move _slower_. Your communication overhead scales with the square of team size, yet work done only increases linearly. This has been known since _The Mythical Man Month_ was published 35 years ago, yet people still think that raising $5M and hiring 20 programmers makes you faster.

I'm not scared of a big company or a venture-backed startup, because I've worked at both big companies and 10-20 person venture-backed startups, and know how slowly both of them move. Any feature they implement, I can implement in a couple of days. I _am_ scared of a couple guys in a garage that start with a slightly different take, positioning themselves in an angle I don't expect that gives them an advantage in market share.

It's a lot like sailing, I guess. A dinghy will outsail a yacht nearly every time. However, among dinghies, initial positioning at the start of the race is _crucial_. If you find yourself too close to the edge of the line and the wind shifts, you can lose so much time tacking and trying to get back in line that the race is practically over before you start.

<comment><USER3> Funding can slow you down, or make you faster. It depends on how you use it. I know what you're talking about; and yes, if used the wrong way, more resources are actually bad for you. But notice my emphasis on "speed", not number of employees.

For his case, he's losing time to consulting work which distracts him from his main product. Also, he's doing the development and marketing at the same time. A little funding that allows him to focus on building his product and hire one or two people to pick up the marketing tasks could make him faster.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I love posts like this! Finally, case studies that make sense for this audience. Keep 'em coming.

<comment><USER6> It was a great article. I think the most important part was:

"Software development got cheaper but communication didn't. Pure idea/sales/marketing founders are losing value against founders who can build their own product."

<comment><USER3> This is a very good observation, and being a programmer I do see and feel the change. However, there is another force at play at the same time which pulls in the other direction: because software development got cheaper, there is more competition, and that makes it more critical than ever to be able to get the word out and build market share quickly before the other 50 competitors take it. So, the marketing guys can still make a huge difference. The idea guys, probably not so much.

<comment><USER5> "there is more competition"

Maybe. OTOH, you can find a more fertile niche. I'm one of those idealists who still believes that all of us can win.

"Two roads diverged in a wood and I took the road less travelled by and that has made all the difference." - Robert Frost

I know it sounds nerdy, but I really believe those words are as applicable now as ever.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Omega Ophthalmics is an eye implant platform with the power of continuous AR - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/04/ophthalmics-is-an-eye-implant-with-the-power-of-continuous-ar/ <comment><USER2> I recall a character from a Neal Stephenson novel who killed themselves after their retina implant got hacked and they were shown non-stop advertisements even when sleeping.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm into this as a concept--customizable vision enhancements--but VR/AR? I don't want anything with a standard network connection in my head unless security gets way better. Hacking my phone is one thing; hacking my _eyes_ is something else entirely.

<comment><USER4> I'm less concerned about rogue hacking than I am about legitimized, persistent, permanent data mining that seems fine now but I'll regret later. The kind that props up most of the biggest internet companies and spy agencies.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> ...and then you can record anything you see, and then here is a way to rewatch it, and then it's a black mirror episode.

Paranoia apart, I'll tend to agree with other comments here.

A device like Google glasses, well why not after all, since you can choose to put them in a drawer (not debating on the fact that you potentially record other people, which is really bad). But having a device you might loose control over and can't switch off ?

It's like those webcam on laptop that can be switch on by a hacker or your OS without you knowing it. First thing I do is to put a paper on it.

Security matters. And I'm finally perhaps a bit paranoid after all.

</comment><comment><USER6> It wasn't clear to me: is the idea that you install the hardware housing with a more invasive surgery upfront and then could swap out the hardware more easily down the road? Would a second surgery be required for that?

<comment><USER7> I got visian ICL surgery 2 years back and this was my question as well.

You can't really change anything without opening up the eye, which damages the cornea a little and takes months to heal with permanent side effects in low light situations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> So, they have created an empty box to later put tech in? That seems like the _easy_ part - not that surgery like this is easy, but making AR tech that small is a much bigger order.

<comment><USER9> Especially the battery part.

<comment><USER7> i wonder if piezoelectrics work with rapid eye movement...</comment></comment></comment>


Apple licences key fingerprint sensor patent from IDEX - <AUTHOR> http://www.idex.no/#!/news/companynews/idex-announce-unique-fingerprint-sensor-patent-license-with-apple-and-authentec/

<comment><USER2> I seriously hope the new iPhone or any iPhone doesn't have a fingerprint scanner, it's gimmicky and really only serves a purpose on an IBM Thinkpad. But to be honest, a fingerprint scanner is the only thing modern phones have yet to add and no doubt if an iPhone does have one, Apple will make it a key selling point. It'll be interesting to see what applications Apple ends up using fingerprint identification for.

<comment><AUTHOR> If Apple decides to include a fingerprint sensor, it will surely not be gimmicky. Every sensor in the iPhone today (eg. magnetometer) has a real purpose for improving user experience (directional geolocation), but the implementation (apps) can be somewhat gimmicky (compass app). I believe it will be totally invisible to the user, improve security (more secure than PIN) while improving user experience (no need to enter pass lock PIN, itunes password, etc).

I've read speculation that the sensor itself would be placed under the home button, but I think it makes more sense to have it placed directly beneath (or inside) the screen. (Does it make more sense to push the home button to authenticate, or to just slide your finger to unlock?)

Apple has the possibility to add an passbook-style app which can store your passwords and be a front end authenticator for other apps/websites (kinda like OS X Keychain). A 1Password for the regular guy.</comment></comment>


The Fallacy of Cracking Contests (1998) - <AUTHOR> https://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-9812.html#contests <comment><USER2> I assume this is about Telegram?

<comment><USER3> Indeed. Here's a critique of the Telegram challenge and how it relates to this article: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6931922](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6931922)

If it's mistaken or isn't comprehensive enough, then I'd be relieved if you'd correct it.

<comment><USER4> Your analysis is correct. Their terms and conditions rule out just about every form of attack.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This may be unrelated, but one of the things I've always thought is that contests, bug bounties, and things like it kind of give a free pass to hacking attempts, don't they?

Is this a well-understood part of these kinds of programs? Even the ones that say "color inside these lines" can be used to say, "Oh, sorry, I didn't know I was outside of the boundaries" if a person ever gets caught trying to get into a bad place.

So you've got all kinds of logs of me trying to break into your system, but as long as I fail I can just pretend like I was going after the bounty you've placed, right?

<comment><USER6> Except that, if you're going after the bounty, you'll have read the rules, which define the particular attempts you're making as out of bounds, i.e., still malicious.

I'm trying, but failing, to find a recent article about a guy who found a password in a dropbox for another company that had a "hack us" contest, and subsequently was indirectly accused of potentially illegal conduct (they settled on sending him a shirt instead of money).

<comment><USER5> That's my point though, he certainly didn't go to jail, did he?

These are still new enough that a person could mask any legitimate hacking attempts in the guise of "I didn't know I couldn't do that". So you get to be as malicious as you'd like, and no one's going to come after you, lest an Internet mob forms or something.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> On the flipside, it sounds like every company looking to prove their security _should_ offer a cracking contest for the very reasons described in this article, because: 1) Investors will love it 2) No one in their right mind will attempt to crack it 3) in the rare event that someone does crack it, a nominal prize of 5k - 10k is probably still worth the good PR and the confidence it would give investors.

<comment><USER8> 2) No one in their right mind will attempt to crack it

What are you saying? Does offering cash decrease the chances of cracking?

<comment><USER7> What I'm trying to say is that these cracking contests offer great PR, and you don't actually need to worry about the security of your site. So it's great for companies who are trying to instill investor/consumer confidence in their security, even if they are not confident in their security. (I'm not condoning a company using this technique as a ploy to prove their non-existant security is secure, but if they are strategic, they could absolutely hold a cracking contest to do just that.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> If it's so difficult and expensive to break the system and no one is willing to do it for the prize money, doesn't that show it is relatively secure?

<comment><USER10> It just shows it is too difficult and expensive to break the system _given the prize value and the constraints put on what are acceptable attacks_.

Any system can be proven secured by such a contest if you limit acceptable attacks to the parts where you know the system is the strongest... but a real attacker will always aim at the weakest part.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Why are .io domains bad for SEO? - <AUTHOR> What are your thoughts on .io, .website, .biz, etc domain?
And why does Google hate the .io, .biz domains? Because I've often see .io domains rank lower than .com domains (i.e. the main product site being eclipsed by some .com review site). What is the thinking behind that?
What are your thoughts? Those with .io domains, do you feel your site takes the SEO hit? <comment><USER2> Google provides a ranking boost to local domains. So .co.uk domains get a ranking boost for searches made in the United Kingdom. Reason being that local domains are more likely to return a relevant search result. For example if you searched for 'Google Pixel Review' in Google UK you're likely to see .co.uk sites appear at the top of the search results as the reviews may contain UK release dates and pricing that's more relevant than a US site.

.io is a country top level domain assigned to the British Indian Ocean Territory, so having a .io domain will only give you a ranking boost for that specific country.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> > I've often see .io domains rank lower than .com domains (i.e. the main > product site being eclipsed by some .com review site)

Sorry forgot to give you an example. Search for example "videopal". You'll see that the actual website (videopal.io) is ranking at 4th or 5th. I've also seen this for many other sites too.

Disclaimer: It's just a random site I picked. I don't have anything to do with it.

</comment><comment><USER3> This might be a case of correlation, not causation.

</comment><comment><USER4> You have evidence .io domains take a hit?

</comment><comment><USER5> because .oi domains are much newer... many .coms have been around for year, so they have better SEO factors</comment>


Live: NYC picks Cornell/Technion for new Campus - <AUTHOR> http://on.nyc.gov/oCBLjD

<comment><AUTHOR> In a city full of Very Big Deals (TM), this is a Very Big Deal for NYC. Looking forward to what they are going to do.</comment>


Is Running Bad for Your Knees? Maybe Not - <AUTHOR> http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1948208,00.html

<comment><USER2> I used to run daily and I have chronic problems with my knees stemming from a childhood accident. Anecdotally, I have much less pain using an elliptical machine.</comment>


Ask HN: What's the point with so many stupid people in the world? - <AUTHOR>

Have you ever tried to sit and write code in a bar? It's nice. It's a hell of a lot more conducive to creativity than working in an office cubicle. You got your drink, you got your smoke. You sit at a table with wifi and a plug and you're invincible until about six drinks in. You look out over the patio at the mountains and you think...this is what life's all about.
Then at about 6pm the soccer game starts. Suddenly, the owner of the bar comes out and unplugs your laptop, turns on the TV, and cranks the volume up to 7000000. Even though there's no one there. You say, "Man, that's too loud." And he says, "when they show up, that's what they're gonna want."
Sure enough, about 3 minutes before the game starts, the patio goes from empty to packed. People are trying to move your table, your laptop bag. Then suddenly they're all staring, slackjawed, at this stupid TV that's blasting the same shitty commercials it was showing yesterday, last week, last month.
HN readers, I'm sitting in that bar right now, trying to write a piece of code that crosses a Quaternion with a euler matrix. Why? I'm an alcoholic. My girlfriend has a massive infection, and I'm stuck in a tourist town until we can travel again. Why? Because I smoke. Because I won't work in an office. Because I hate doing anything on anybody's schedule other than mine.
Every night for a week, my nice quiet place has been invaded by British YOBs that just scream and howl at the soccer game on TV as if it means SHIT. They're all here on vacation, and their flight cost about 30 pounds. And you know what? I finally understand what it means that there are too many people on Earth and nothing to do with them. If I had to watch any two of these people having sex with each other, it would probably fuck me up for the rest of my life. What do you do? You can't kill them.. you can't make them work more than 50 weeks a year... my GOD man... could anything be a bigger waste of AIR??? <comment><USER2> i understand your frustration. however, like you said, they're on _vacation_ ; one of the great things about that is you can relax and be yourself, and if you enjoy hollering at football in a bar, more power to ya!

there are plenty of very smart, dedicated people i know who work hard all day, but once quitting time comes they want sports and beer. they're not a waste of space for indulging; they work hard doing important things, and enjoy themselves when they're done.

sounds like you're frustrated with the overall situation, though (stuck in a foreign town, girlfriend is sick, etc.). you may find yourself more resilient if things weren't so stressful in life!

</comment><comment><USER3> You suffer from depression. Go see a doctor and stop self medicating with alcohol.

<comment><AUTHOR> For all I know, you suffer from being a sanctimonious snob with a pathological obsession for impersonating medical professionals, and you should be tied to a chair and fed fruit loops 18 hours a day.

<comment><USER3> Yes, what was I thinking... you seem perfectly balanced.

<comment><AUTHOR> BTW -- how about addressing the point? You got a vested interest in idiots watching soccer or something? You took the wrong left turn at Albuquerque when you aimed at my intelligence or mental acuity, so let's try why you feel a reflexive impulse to defend idiotic behavior to the degree that your first instinct is to attack anybody who points it out? What's your deal, anyway? Who the hell are you?

<comment><USER4> Lash out for perceived slights much?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Well, there are over billion people on this planet living their daily lives according to a religion which states that beating your wife is an excellent idea.

Does that frustrate you more?

</comment><comment><USER6> It's a public place - you probably should be somewhat less surprised and/or begrudging when it fills up with members of the public (and that's regardless of whether or not they are your kind of people, too).</comment>


Show HN: Instant and Accountless, Always on IRC - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/toc-irc/jbnc <comment><USER2> " Bouncers are hard to configure. I felt that we needed an easier one in this world." - initially i wanted to be a smartass and point out that a psyBNC can easily be installed and configured, only to realise the latest paybnc release appears to be as old as 2005! How time flies! Will give this project a go. Generally speaking I think IRC should be revived as an in-house chat solution for privacy aware teams, and the CTCP protocol extended to allow for web audio and video chat.

<comment><AUTHOR> I definitely agree with everything you said!

I also wanted to add what's cool about this is there is literally no configuration required.

Try connecting to irc.dns.live SSL 9998 and enter a password in the password field of your client. Whenever you disconnect and reconnect, you will be reconnected to the same session without losing any messages!

<comment><USER2> Sounds good - that is one missing feature in the standard IRC protocol that prevented me from using it at work: seeing channel and private messages received while offline. will def give this a go! installing and ircd takes a few minutes, and i suppose the same server can host this bouncer. if it goes well i will suggest we use this instead of slack, we are all pretty old school anyway in our team!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> [https://github.com/toc- irc/jbnc/blob/master/bouncer.js](https://github.com/toc- irc/jbnc/blob/master/bouncer.js) have you considered running a linter on this (and maybe not having 1k of lines in 1 file?)</comment>


About 56% of users dislike systemd - <AUTHOR> http://distrowatch.com/polls.php?poll=8 <comment><USER2> Dislike is not usually the best measurement.

Next time try this kind of voting questions:

I use systemd and like it

I use upstart and like it

I use launchd and like it

I use traditional init daemon and and like it

30% of like should be quite impressive

</comment><comment><USER3> This is ... very suspect.

I suspect the vast majority of users haven't the faintest idea what init system their OS is using, or even know what an init system is.

Even amongst knowledgeable users who _do_ know (e.g., me), I'd guess most don't care one way or another as long as their system boots and they can get on with things (and systemd does just fine in that regard).

</comment><comment><USER4> I would argue that the sample of users on DistroWatch might be more savvy than 'users', which might skew this data.

</comment><comment><USER5> If you don't know what systemd is, than why would you even care or know enough to vote on it. Distrowatch users, who really know and love Linux, are arguably more competent to make a determination than "regular" users.

My guess is that number is higher than only 56%, but most people feel powerless vs distro team members who were probably just trying to choose the least of two evils in an uncontroversial way; a referendum might have been a reasonable way to move forward.

The irony is that there are many good alternatives to systemd, but no one system does everything that systemd does.. by design. Systemd has a philosophy that has more in common with Windows than _the UNIX way_.

</comment><comment><USER6> The whining about systemd seems never to get old. Is this on the way to become part of Internet folklore (like Gnu Hurt, etc.)?

<comment><USER7> Whining? What a way to invalidate those disagreeing with the philosophy of systemd.</comment></comment>


Astronomers Need Your Help To Find Planets Outside Our Solar System - <AUTHOR> http://www.sciencedaily.com/videos/2007/0512-searching_for_extrasolar_planets.htm <comment><USER2> Warning: Auto-starting video

Finding which tab out of 30 tabs in 5 browser windows is annoyingly difficult.</comment>


Altair developer Ed Roberts dies in Ga. - <AUTHOR> http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/top/all/6940303.html

<comment><USER2> Can I just say this made me admire the man even more...

But he never lost his interest in modern technology, even asking about Apple's highly anticipated iPad from his sick bed.

"He was interested to see one," said Roberts, who called his father "a true renaissance man."

That's how I want to go out...loving technology to the very last second. RIP Mr. Roberts

</comment><comment><USER3> Bill Gates wrote about him as well:

<http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Thinking/article.aspx?ID=126>

</comment><comment><USER4> He was more visionary than people realize.

To me, the S100 bus always represented a parallel universe in personal computing. An elegant alternative to the puzzling layout of the 5150.

There is no doubt in my mind had the S100 prevailed, all developers today would easily recognize the relationship between hardware and software as being a Viennese Waltz as opposed to a freshman dance in the gym.

Dr. Roberts was correct to be upset with Gates and Allen for embracing the IBM PC. They weren't abandoning him or the Altair, they were abandoning the architecture and its abundant possibilities.

My condolences to his family. May he RIP.

<comment><USER5> _To me, the S100 bus always represented a parallel universe in personal computing. An elegant alternative to the puzzling layout of the 5150._

I'm too young/ignorant to know why or how the s100 was superior. Could you elaborate?

<comment><USER4> The bus (a backplane really) was the system. And everything plugged into it.

Here's a picture of the original Altair: [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/01/Altair_88...](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/01/Altair_8800_Computer.jpg)

Everything you needed was on a separate card that plugged into the backplane. CPU, memory, controllers.

The IBM PC changed all that. The motherboard became the system. The amount of memory was limited because the number of surface mounts was limited. The number of devices was limited because you didn't have the expansion slots. There's room in the Altair's chassis for 10 cards -- in 1977!. But where the PC removed options, the weight of IBM created a standard which for better or worse is still with us today.

In the picture, the two cards in the middle look like internal RAM. The total amount is based upon the capacity of each chip. But there it is -- a memory array. With greater capacity than the computer found on Apollo. On the desktop. You could buy the boards and chips from Jameco or anybody else (they came in long plastic tubes) and carefully populate the board wearing static straps on your wrists. Need more memory, add another card. 8" floppy drive? Add a controller. Tape drive? Add a controller. Console terminal? Add a controller. Upgrade the processor? Install a math co-processor.

The third party market for parts and devices was robust because the bus was standard and open.

The introduction of the IBM PC (model 5150) hit the S100 market hard. Ed Roberts knew the S100 architecture was more flexible and invited greater participation and innovation by inventors and hobbyists so you can see why he might take exception to Gates and Allen providing an operating system and programming language to its competition. But the arrival of the PC really meant the paradigm had shifted -- from hobbyists to business and Gates and Allen shifted with it.

For fun, let's look at the picture and try to guess at what's going on. There is a DB25 connector in the upper left corner. That's where the serial console plugged in. Usually a teletype device of some kind (like the devices in this picture: <http://www.netbsd.org/images/machines/vax/vax11-780.jpg>). Looks like the pinouts were hand soldered. It's what you did. The back panel has plenty of expansion for other DB25 connectors to support printers, other terminals (multi-user O/S) and more.

The power supply is attached to the back in the upper right. The power bus is immediately to its left. You'd recognize that as the white block on today's motherboards. Note the quality of the bearings on the fan and how it's wired. The thing moved air.

The device underneath the main chassis is an 8" floppy drive. It's powered up, the disk is enabled (notched in the corner) but the heads look retracted (parked).

Note some of the switches in front. On/Off, reset and single step (to walk through each instruction). This is an 8 bit machine and each instruction is displayed in byte order (right to left). It looks like one set of lights displays the "address" (a0-a7) and the other displays the "data" value found at the address (d0-d7).

So we are currently in single step mode, at address location 10110110 (B6 hex) and it contains the value 11111111 (FF hex). Hit the single step switch again and let's debug the next instruction.

<comment><USER6> Buses like the S100 have a problem: plug-and-play is next to impossible with them. When you plug a memory board, you have to set the switches to its address and the same happens with I/O and storage - everything must be configured more or less by hand. The S-100 is, more or less, the naked processor bus.

The ISA bus is a lot like S-100 - it was possible to buy a PC on a card and plug it into a PC backplane along your other cards.

But I agree. The 5150 was an abomination.

<comment><USER4> DEC did well with the Q-22 bus on their PDP's, MicroVax I and II products. Motorola did well with the VME bus as well.

Address collisions on the backplane were part of the process.

But you're right. It's not cool anymore to ask grandma to set switches right out of the box.

<comment><USER6> By the mid 70's, it was perfectly OK to ask a computer-using grandma to set switches ;-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Ah, I remember Altair ads in Byte magazine, right next to code listings for "Hunt the Wumpus." <pang>

</comment><comment><USER8> 01010010 01001001 01010000

</comment><comment><USER9> RIP

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYDL_ZHMdvU&feature=relat...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYDL_ZHMdvU&feature=related)

</comment><comment><USER6> I am deeply saddened to hear this. The ones who start revolutions without wanting to, those are the most precious.

</comment><comment><USER10> Damn, the mind behind Altair is dead?. I loved Assassin's Creed!... oh, nvm.</comment>


Ask HN: How is Buxfer doing? - <AUTHOR>

I really like the personal online accounting system, buxfer ( www.buxfer.com) which was founded by Y-incubator so much that I recently upgraded my PLUS account.
But how is it doing lately? Is it a successful startup by any measurement?
P/S: I've a problem with my American Express account synchronization and the issue I raised was dead in water for 4 days already (http://getsatisfaction.com/buxfer/topics/cannot_synchronize_my_american_express_with_buxfer). Hmm.... <comment><AUTHOR> No news? Seems to me like it's not really moving.. hmm...

<comment><USER2> The founder is my college senior. Hold on for a while and I am sure he will address your issues.</comment></comment>


Receiptful receipt supercharger launches Builder 2.0 - <AUTHOR> https://receiptful.com/builder.html

<comment><USER2> Thanks for posting this @spark3k.

I'm the founder of Receiptful and happy to answer any questions here. :)</comment>


What the Hell Is Wonder Valley? - <AUTHOR> http://www.williamhillyard.com/WonderValley <comment><AUTHOR> Drove through here on a US roadtrip a couple of days ago and found this page after wondering about all the decrepit shacks in the area.

The entrepreneur in me wonders what could be done with the area and those little cabins. The realist wonders if the abandoned buildings shouldn't just be razed to accelerate the reclaiming by the desert.

Wonder valley indeed!</comment>


A visual hint at just how big Facebook's photo library is. [img] - <AUTHOR> http://i.imgur.com/StBHE.png

<comment><AUTHOR> Here's the source (I hope): [http://1000memories.com/blog/94-number-of-photos- ever-taken-...](http://1000memories.com/blog/94-number-of-photos-ever-taken- digital-and-analog-in-shoebox)</comment>


Hacker News Blocked in China - <AUTHOR> http://www.chinafirewalltest.com/?siteurl=news.ycombinator.com <comment><USER2> Again?

<comment><USER3> I can not even remember when was last time HN can be accessed directly from china.</comment></comment>


SQLite Professional for OS X is now pay what you want - <AUTHOR> https://www.sqlitepro.com/

<comment><USER2> I wonder if naming a product "SQLite Professional", when the company has no affiliation with the SQLite Consortium or HWACI (the company that originally developed SQLite and does sell commercial extensions), is a trademark violation. If I hadn't gone and checked the copyright notice at the bottom of the web page, I would have assumed that this was a product of HWACI.

<comment><USER3> Considering that SQLite is licensed public domain with the express permission of others selling modifications of it without restrictions (even without acknowledging the original authors), I'd be surprised they mind.

<comment><USER4> For the sake of the user base, I hope they do mind. It is confusing to have SQLite and SQLite Pro when they are not from the same people.

<comment><USER5> Not really, SQLite Pro is not a database, but a management tool. Pretty hard to confuse the two unless you're someone who's not likely to use either.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> 4.5 star rated sqlite development tool. The pay what you want feature is only available via the web store, as apple does not offer any such service.

</comment><comment><USER6> How does this compare to Base[0]? I bought and have been using Base for years and it's been awesome. Granted I don't do much sqlite work so Base may be a little "simple" but I don't see much in SQLite Pro that rivals what it offers.

[0] [http://menial.co.uk/base/](http://menial.co.uk/base/)

<comment><AUTHOR> A few things that SQLite Professional does that Base does not.

1\. Get results for multiple queries at once. A simple example would be SELECT 'hello'; select 'world'; which will return two result sets, where base will only return the first one.

2\. If your select query contains a tables primary keys, then the results from a query can be edited inline. Example if you run SELECT * FROM myTable WHERE id IN (1,2,3) then you can actually edit the results directly without needing to switch back to the data view.

3\. If you have a trigger or view that depends on a specific column or table, and the column/table gets renamed, SQLite Professional will prompt you with the details and alter the underlying trigger/views to be updated with the new proper information.

4\. SQLite Professional will automatically reload if your database is modified by an external app (such a directly via a sqlite3 prompt, a php script, etc).

That said, Base is a great app. If you already own a copy of it and the above functionality does not interest you, I would probably just suggest keeping with it.

<comment><USER6> Thanks for the quick reply, I'll be sure to check it out!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you only need a management UI for SQLite, the Firefox addon SQLite Manager[0] is a good choice, and it's free.

[0] [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/sqlite- manage...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/sqlite-manager/)</comment>