Building 2048 in AngularJS - <AUTHOR> http://www.ng-newsletter.com/posts/building-2048-in-angularjs.html

<comment><USER3> Compared to how the original 2048 is written - which is quite clean - <USER2> amount of clones (and the speed of their production) being a testament to that - this is disgustingly, unnecessarily complex.

<comment><USER4> The point isn't to make a clean copy of 2048. The point is to show how you build Angular apps and organize code for something more complex than a simple todo list app.

<comment><USER5> Then this is anti-advertising for Angular.

<comment><USER6> Is there a separated-concern library suitable for large applications that'd fare better for 2048?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> If ignore the 2048 hype and how well that's built framework-free, this is one of the most excellent writeups on how to build and organize an angular application that i have seen to date.

Seriously, screw TodoMVC. I cannot get a feel for a framework from that. This is almost the minimum complication level you need to be able to assess a framework's usage complexity.

The animations need work though, the feel of the game is less polished than the original, mostly because the original game keeps a copy of the most recent tile floating on top of the one that's merged away so that the full animation can run.

<comment><USER8> TodoMVC is more cryptic than finding your own way through JS libraries/frameworks. I never understood the point of that website. Maybe I'm missing something!

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Probably the best basic Angular Tutorial I have seen!

</comment><comment><USER10> Go TDD! Nice structuring of the application.

<comment><USER11> Thanks :) Glad you enjoyed!

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> not sure about the original being cleaner, this looks damn good to me

</comment><comment><USER13> This is awesome!</comment>


Ask HN: Apart DO and Linode, are there other good alternatives? - <AUTHOR>

I've been seeing several startups hosted in other companies than DO and Linode. It will be good to know for new companies to have few clues regarding other cheap services where you can host your development projects while you, well, 'develop' them.<p>I saw someone telling in another thread that, for example, RamNode.com is a well placed offer there, too. <comment><USER2> I recently discovered Vultr [1]. Slightly cheaper than DO with lots of location. I only had a couple instances running up for a bit while I benchmarked some code (I wasn't benchmarking them, so I didn't compare it to someone else). Was alright.

I run my own "everything" box at Hetzner [2] and I've used OVH (France, though they had a DC in Canada). OVH has gotten confusing, a lot of different brands (SoYouStart, OVH, Kimsufi and all types of stocking issues...so I'll let you google it if you really want). Both of these completely decimate pretty much anything else for the price.

Finally, there was a recent story about Atlantic.net offering a 0.99 SSD- backed VPS [3]

[1] [https://www.vultr.com/](https://www.vultr.com/)

[2] [http://www.hetzner.de/en/](http://www.hetzner.de/en/)

[3] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8389477](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8389477)

<comment><USER3> Just wish there was one option where I could download my snapshots. Untrap my images!

<comment><USER4> Isn't that a good use case for Docker?

<comment><USER5> Yes that's exactly what docker is about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> You can find many on [http://lowendbox.com](http://lowendbox.com)

<comment><USER7> Lowendbox was bought by ChicagoVPS and basically exists to serve as a shill forum for their many many brands. VPSBoard.com is a neutral third party site where many low end boxers went to.

<comment><USER8> ChicagoVPS who were hacked.

Many of their customers lost data including myself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> If you want the best bang for your buck, check out RunAbove [1] We've found them to be excellent: performant, good people behind them, and the value is unmatched.

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

Disclaimer: Really, really happy customer.

</comment><comment><USER10> [http://aws.amazon.com/free/](http://aws.amazon.com/free/)

If you're in an incubator/accelerator:

[http://www.softlayer.com/catalyst](http://www.softlayer.com/catalyst)

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

</comment><comment><USER4> If you're looking to save money... [http://lowendbox.com/](http://lowendbox.com/)

</comment><comment><USER11> I use Ramnode and I am really happy. The speeds and performance is really good. However Ramnode does not provide any API like Digital Ocean. They use SolusVM for VM management, which has some API endpoints, but nothing fancy.

</comment><comment><USER12> I run a few servers with Bytemark's BigV, which is very good. Definitely a solid alternative for UK-based cloud hosting. A bit more expensive than DO but much more customisable also.

I've heard good things about RamNode, especially performance-wise. Haven't tested them.

</comment><comment><USER13> Slicehost, now owned by Rackspace and rebranded accordingly I think, used to be almost exactly the same as Linode. To the point where, when I was picking my first VPS box, I narrowed it down to those two, and then ended up picking based on how pretty their websites were.

</comment><comment><USER14> OVH is awesome, super affordable but its dedicated boxes mostly.

Heroku is another option but quite expensive.

</comment><comment><USER15> Ramnode does not have a api if that matters.

Ec2 is an alternative. They have SSD these days.</comment>


The Science of the Creation Museum - <AUTHOR> http://www.viceland.com/blogs/en/2010/02/09/the-science-of-the-creation-museum/ <comment><USER2> That was creepy. The commentary is pretty priceless, though.

That "millions of years" wrecking ball thing does seem kind of backward.

</comment><comment><USER3> I wish dinosaurs were still around. I miss those guys.</comment>


Twitter Addresses Why They've Broken Twitter for Third-Party Clients - <AUTHOR> https://daringfireball.net/2018/08/twitter_third_party_clients <comment><USER2> Calling BS.

Say something pretty and move on.

Anyone care to speculate?</comment>


New, weird animal. - <AUTHOR> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science_and_environment/10088502.stm?ls

<comment><USER2> The naked mole rat is an interresting animal, but it isn't in anyway new.</comment>


Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Warehouses [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9m7d07k22A <comment><USER2> This...like most John Oliver episodes makes me scared for the future.</comment>


Man Unveils Interactive Toothpick Sculpture of SF That Took 35 Years to Create - <AUTHOR> http://thoughtcatalog.com/2011/man-unveils-interactive-toothpick-sculpture-of-san-francisco-that-took-35-years-to-create/ <comment><USER2> Haha, wow. Went to the Exploratorium today and saw this guy there with his sculpture. Now it's on the front page of Hacker News! What a coincidence.

He said that when people ask him when he started building it, he replies "Well, I got up _real_ early this morning."

</comment><comment><USER3> This just makes me thinking that people just have misplaced talent. Just imagine if cancer research and solving aids was as approachable as building things with toothpicks, we'd probably be way further than we are in solving the world's problems.

</comment><comment><USER4> I was impressed, but then I learned there are a dozen paths through. Now I'm baffled.

<comment><USER5> Likewise. For the first 45 seconds or so I was like "Oh, that's kinda neat" but it went on to show more and more tours interwoven together and his little hidden personal details in it... That's a thing of beauty right there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Not to be a pedant, but I believe that this is not a Ruth Goldberg machine, but rather, a Jolly Ball track: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4qlXjhUHvg>

<comment><USER7> Mr. Gorrell does indeed get this wrong. (It's 'Rube', btw)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I couldn't help but think of how fragile it is, and how I could never spend so much time making something if I knew it could (physically) break so easily.

<comment><USER9> Exactly what I was thinking. The thought of tripping and falling and destroying 35 years worth of work makes me really uncomfortable.

<comment><USER5> Tibetan Buddhism isn't for you then:

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

"Sand mandalas traditionally take several weeks to build, due to the large amount of work involved in laying down the sand in such intricate detail." "A sand mandala is ritualistically destroyed once it has been completed and its accompanying ceremonies and viewing are finished to symbolize the Buddhist doctrinal belief in the transitory nature of material life."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I've just recently returned from my first trip to SF. This video really made my day, and it feels so much more real now that I've actually seen most of this things.

Those of you who live in SF, you can't imagine how lucky you are! I envy you all!

</comment><comment><USER11> Don't ask for the 'Great Quake and Fire of 1906' path.

</comment><comment><USER12> I wonder how many people living in San Francisco actually know its beautiful history.

<comment><USER13> I think that may be waxing just a tad romantic. I know a thing or three about San Francisco's history, and I wouldn't call it _beautiful_.

<comment><USER14> I'm struggling to think of anywhere that has a history that I would call beautiful.

<comment><USER15> The Playboy mansion?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> What happens to the sculpture, now he has completed it? Does it go on permanent exhibition somewhere? Curious to know its fate. I would like to visit San Fran some time, and I would pay to go and see that sculpture if I did.

<comment><USER2> It's currently at the Exploratorium, but I have no idea how long it'll remain there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> the best part is the centrifugal force.

</comment><comment><USER18> You just made my Sunday night.

</comment><comment><USER19> Like most of these sorts of projects, it's a combination of "impressive" and "kinda sad".

edit: Removed bit about children

<comment><USER20> At 55 seconds he says the Toll Booth "has the time our son was born". This man achieved a work of art that is far from sad. It's very obvious that this has tons of sentimental value, but it is also a wonderful work of art. I hope I can achieve a long-term disciplined accomplishment like this in my lifetime (my children notwithstanding).</comment></comment>


Apple prohibiting iPhone apps which compete with own interests - <AUTHOR> http://gadgets.boingboing.net/2008/06/11/apples-way-or-the-hi.html

<comment><USER2> It'll be interesting to see how the restrictions on installing iPhone apps (such as Apple being able to restrict the types of apps available) play out in this market.

Mac OS X, obviously, has been a system where you can install anything, including competitors' applications (like Adobe Lightroom, Adobe Premiere, etc.) Windows Mobile has been a mostly free-install platform as well. Is the mobile market with the iPhone any different?</comment>


My first big project, Snake game in Go! - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/tristangoossens/snake-go/blob/master/README.md <comment><AUTHOR> As i am only 17, opinion means everything to me, so please leave a star on the github page if You like it!</comment>


Evaluating Ray: Distributed Python for Scalability - <AUTHOR> https://blog.dominodatalab.com/evaluating-ray-distributed-python-for-massive-scalability/ <comment><USER2> A quick browse and this looks interesting. Does anyone know if ray is hadoop- like (meaning it brings code to the existing data), or does it serialize the data to be processed amongst nodes? The docs indicates that it uses Apache Arrow to serialize state (which I assume to be the culminated state of the processed data), but doesn't mention the actual data to be processed.

<comment><USER3> It's a very different system. Hadoop was structured to compute over massive data sets, especially at a time when hardware forced moving compute to the data to optimize overall performance. (That's less true today; networks sometimes are faster than disk access!) In Ray, when you annotate a function to make it a remote task or annotate a class to make it a remote actor, _both_ the data passed to the function, or the data and object state for the actor, serialized together and moved to the node where execution will occur. Then results (or object/actor state) are retrieved with the `ray.get` method. So, the "chunks" of data are relatively small, compared to Hadoop, much more fine grained.

<comment><USER2> Thank you! Very informative answer.

I like this design, it seems much more "manageable" from a mere human's perspective.</comment></comment></comment>


Ten Things You Should Already Know By Now - <AUTHOR> http://www.howtogetagrip.com/2010/ten-things-you-should-already-know-by-now/

<comment><USER2> I disagree rather fervently with number seven. A person starving to death in the midst of a desert would see his life /quantifiably/ improved if given water, food and shelter. That's got less to do with his perspective and more to do with the fact that his probability of /dying/ is rather drastically decreased in the short term.

It gets a little murky when the fundamental necessities are taken care of, but it doesn't mean that the only reason a homeless person's not happy is because his or her perspective is wrong. Some things go a bit beyond internal factors.</comment>


China Just Won SimCity With Censorship - Bypassing 3D Baidu Maps - <AUTHOR> http://gizmodo.com/#!5773531/china-just-won-simcity-with-censorship+bypassing-3d-baidu-maps

<comment><AUTHOR> I just noticed the mark on the tiles, looks like <http://www.o.cn/> are responsible

it looks by the detail that this is all hand drawn, its very very well done

</comment><comment><USER2> I remember when that project was just starting out many years ago. They have come a very long way since then.</comment>


Exploiting prototype pollution - <AUTHOR> https://research.securitum.com/prototype-pollution-rce-kibana-cve-2019-7609/ <comment><USER2> The problem here is not prototyping, it's the service accepting executable code from the user.

<comment><USER3> Agree. Same in ruby

        Object.define_method('env') { { RUBYOPT: "-e puts 123" } }

Though ruby rejects it

        $ RUBYOPT="-e 'puts 123'" env ruby
        Traceback (most recent call last):
        ruby: invalid switch in RUBYOPT: -e (RuntimeError)

[https://github.com/ruby/ruby/blob/b753929806d0e42cdfde3f1a8d...](https://github.com/ruby/ruby/blob/b753929806d0e42cdfde3f1a8dcdbf678f937e44/test/ruby/test_rubyoptions.rb#L319)

And to use -r file needs to be .rb

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Prototype pollution is nasty. You can get into a state where your Node.js server is "poisoned" and all subsequent requests are owned by the attacker, depending on which object is polluted.

</comment><comment><USER5> "Prototype pollution is a vulnerability that is specific to programming languages with prototype-based inheritance (the most common one being JavaScript)."

Naming is a difficult but critical aspect of conceptualizing a solution [1]. Programming, even when ad-hoc, relies on an internal conceptual model to guide the programmer. It pays to be pedantic with language.

A "prototype" per common understanding and dictionary definition strongly implies the act of "copying". Per that sense, the "prototype" of an Object is distinct object with its own distinct life-cycle and state space trajectory.

So it should be clarified here that the OP exploit is not an inherent weakness of prototype based OO approach, in principle. The Javascript "prototype" is really a "parent delegate". It is a _Delegated-Parent Inheritance_ language, and the OP exploit _is_ a feature/bug of delegate based composition approaches, by definition.

This inability by otherwise (obviously) intelligent people in naming things is an unfortunate pattern in computer science and software development. A historic favorite is "dynamic programming".

[1]: [https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TwoHardThings.html](https://martinfowler.com/bliki/TwoHardThings.html)

<comment><USER3> I like "delegate", how would you call `Object.prototype`? And "parent delegate" looks a duplication for me. _Children-Parent Inheritance_ language (like receiving traits by children) and _Object With Delegates_ language:

        ({}).delegate === ({}).constructor.withDelegate
        ({}).parent === ({}).creation.withParent

Oh and `Object` - it is `ObjectConstructor` - though all regular functions are constructors

        constructor sum(a, b) { return a + b }

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> one thing to note:

      for (key in obj) // do

It's better to use the first method below (when initializing):

      obj = Object.create(null)
      obj = {}

So you don't inherit random keys from the chain, unless you intend to. Or use:

      Object.keys(obj).forEach(k

Which doesn't have this issue like the for-in loop version does.

<comment><USER7>
      obj = Object.create(null)
      obj = {}

is exactly the same as

      obj = {}

I would also do `Object.keys().forEach()`.

<comment><USER6> It's not. The null version won't have methods like hasOwnProperty etc.

If it wasn't clear, i was mentioning 2 ways of initializing, not that you should reassign immediately.

<comment><USER6> I see a lot of people accessing a map/dictionary using the "for (key in)" pattern, not realizing they are inheriting any method/prototype names along with their basic dictionary they've defined. Using Object.create(null) is an easy way to not only save memory, but reduce issues if using dynamic key names.

[https://stackoverflow.com/questions/500504/why-is-using- for-...](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/500504/why-is-using-for-in-with- array-iteration-a-bad-idea/500531#500531)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8>
        delete Object.prototype.__proto__;

Fixed.

<comment><USER9> Not at all:

        delete Object.prototype.__proto__;
        a = {};
        a.constructor.prototype.x = 1;
        a.x == 1

Outputs true</comment></comment>


1980 Plesetsk launch pad disaster - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_Plesetsk_launch_pad_disaster <comment><AUTHOR> _...a year later on 23 July 1981 after a second disaster of the same cause was narrowly avoided it was discovered that a design flaw in the fuel filters of the rocket were likely the cause of the 1980 disaster, although it was impossible to confirm which type of filters were used in the rocket that exploded. The catalytically active lead solder on the filters would cause an explosion upon contact with hydrogen peroxide.

Cover-up

The disaster was not reported in Soviet media at the time and only reached western media outlets in 1989 upon declassification. Pravda reported that the launch of the rocket was a success and did not say anything about the explosion._</comment>


Tech Giants Face Off Against 18F - <AUTHOR> http://www.govtech.com/civic/IT-Showdown-Tech-Giants-Face-Off-Against-18F.html <comment><USER3> A friend of mine in 18F was just telling me awesome stories of what they're doing. I remember reading horror stories on Slashdot a dozen years ago of how government IT contractors were paid so much and did all the work because full- timers were supposedly incompetent and wishing there were some way this could change. I'm very happy to see this administration making some proactive changes to attract talented people. 18F is rapidly becoming a highly regarded entity and I believe they give dignity to the term government service, as it should be. I'd rather the contractors have to fight hard to earn my tax dollars. Yes, the contractors have to jump through extra hurdles, but too many take advantage of their position. Yes, it's hard on those who have jumped through many hurdles to now have to contend with a changing landscape, but why should government contracting remain a cushy gig when the rest of us in the private sector have to rapidly adapt all the time? Not all contractors are bad, but it's nice to know 18F is raising the bar for them.

<comment><USER4> "I remember reading horror stories on Slashdot a dozen years ago of how government IT contractors were paid so much and did all the work because full- timers were supposedly incompetent and wishing there were some way this could change."

I think this is an often repeated phrase that amounts to a political talking point used by people who want the government to outsource more work to private contractors than might otherwise be fiscally prudent.

<comment><USER3> Yes, I definitely don't want to reinforce that and I do agree that narrative is used to give work to more contractors than necessary (I was just using that to paint a portrait of how people perceive contractors versus government employees).

Someone in the Marines isn't paid a lot in cash for what they do, but they do enjoy well-deserved honor and satisfaction in serving in a mission and other intangibles. I know there's a big difference between military and other government workers (members of the military put their lives on the line a lot more), but I do think that just as a Marine enjoys dignity in their work, it is possible to shift the perception of other government workers and give the positions more dignity by raising recruiting standards, empowering the workers to take on more responsibility and playing a stronger role in fulfilling the mission.

<comment><USER5> It's probably hard to be proud of your work when you know that at least half of your bosses (congress and a lot of political appointees) passionately hate that the fact that your job exists. I doubt that the quality of people the military hires is much different from the quality but military people know their service is appreciated.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is a great example of an entrenched incumbent/monopolist backlash against an earnest attempt to cut costs and increase the efficiency of government. This same story happens every day throughout the world in numerous ways, and solving it so the 'good guys' win is in my opinion one of the of the most important things a country can do to improve its institutions.

I've spoken to a number of developers who work in DC, and they pretty much tell the same story: huge tech companies/consulting firms who want to lock in a long-term contract use unnecessarily complex technologies and solutions (I'm looking at you, Java EE) that create big legacy codebases which are very difficult to switch away from, ensuring that the contractor has a job forever. Furthermore, once they've got the government agency 'by the balls' (AKA, the contractor has built a complex, poorly documented monster which only it can understand), it can charge a ridiculous amount of money for maintenance and new feature development.

<comment><USER7> Lots of successful websites use J2EE though. Picking on that seems kind of unfair. It's not like giant codebases written in Ruby or JavaScript or PHP are somehow easier to maintain or switch away from.

<comment><USER8> You're absolutely right. It's the people involved that make or break the codebase, and transitively, the project itself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It's hard to read this and not get the impression that firms used to lucrative government contracts are simply not keen at new competition and are lobbying to protect their privledged position. Despite the fact increased competition benefits the government and tax payers.

<comment><USER10> That's exactly how I read it, myblake. I would hope that somebody on the House subcommittee said to the lobbyists something like "You, the lobbyist representing ITAPS, I see in my notes that ITAPS members include, among others, IBM, Deloitte, SAP, Xerox, and Microsoft. The 18F group has a staff of 185. If the companies you represent feel they can be out-performed by a staff of 185 then why have we been giving them billions of dollars all these years? Are they, in reality, completely incompetent?"

And regarding the conflict of interest issue, YC user zacharycohn, who says he works for 18F, wrote "As a government organization, not a private company, we can't respond to RFPs. No one is really sure where this claim that we help write and then respond to rfps comes from, but it's not true."

I don't see where the conflict of interest would come anyway even if 18F _was_ bidding on contracts. If I ask a plumber for an estimate to fix my sink, and then decide to do the job myself, I don't see anything unethical there. The plumber might not _like_ that I'm capable of doing the work myself, but there's nothing wrong with it. I could see a problem if the 18F staff stood to receive massive raises or bonuses if they decided to reject a vendor's bid and do the job themselves. But I don't think that's the way it works for government employees. At least not government employees at that level. The higher ups do make a good profit on campaign contributions or outright bribes. And that's why the software industry lobbyists will be listened to.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I don't live in the US but this would annoy me greatly.

Having worked in big companies where consulting firms like IBM and Deloitte have really screwed things up one thing has become abundantly clear to me.

Building yourself is always better. There are really no caveats to this. A team hired by you is a team aligned with you. A firm servicing a consulting contract will always milk the contract for whatever they can get, especially when they often do really sly things like settle for a lower initial cost but build in onerous clauses that drastically blow out costs for all sorts of reasons.

If anything they should expand 18F/USDS and eliminate the buy-first policy in favor of build-first. Only go to vendors when it's just not feasible to build it with the resources available.

<comment><USER12> I agree, it is better to have the government do their own websites rather than go outside. The only thing is the allegations seem to be that 18F is helping government agencies draft up procurement contracts and then bidding on the same contracts it helped draft.

The article says that 18F is alleged to be:

> acting as both a procurement policymaker and as a tech competitor

This seems like a severe conflict of interest in which they would write procurement contracts favoring themselves. I would be okay with it if they just made 18F the site builder and didn't have them compete with private companies on tender, but if the allegations are to be believed, that doesn't seem to be the case, it seems like 18F is a federal agency bidding against private contracts.

<comment><USER13> Huge potential conflict here unless the 18F consulting team that drafts the requirement is firewalled away from the bidding team.

I think once they clarify this, it would be all good.

<comment><USER10> Dalerus, as Zacharycohn says, the 18F group doesn't respond to RFPs. But I personally don't see that it would be a conflict of interest if they _were_ allowed to respond. I could see a conflict of interest if the 18F group was a private company employed by the government and allowed to both draft requirements and bid on contracts. I wouldn't want to see Microsoft drafting requirements _and_ bidding on them. But 18F is _part_ of the government.

Consider this scenario: The 18F team works with the Secretary of the Interior's office to draft requirements for a system needed by the Department of the Interior. They gather the requirements and conclude "This isn't a huge system. We can do this ourselves." Do the individuals working at 18F get raises or massive bonuses for doing the work, or do they continue to receive the same civil service graded salary they've always been receiving? It is certainly in the 18F department's interest to have work and continue to exist, but I don't see any huge payoff to the head of 18F the way there would be if a large company got a contract.

Or, to sort of repeat a scenario I offered earlier in this conversation, my wife wants our bathroom remodeled. I interview her and find out what she wants and write it all down. I go over it with a few companies that do bathroom remodeling. I receive their bids. I conclude that I'm capable of doing the work myself more quickly and more cheaply. I award the "contract" to myself. Where's the conflict of interest?

<comment><USER13> I posted that before they responded. Good to hear they don't respond to RFPs.

The point of RFPs are to allow fair competition between vendors. Also to allow the government agencies to compare bids apples to apples and score accordingly. You're example is fine as long as you are providing the other bidders with the same information. It breaks down if you have inside information that other bidders don't have.

For example, most RFPs don't include budget info, but often a large portion of the scoring is based around the budget. If 18F had worked to create the criteria, knowing information that wasn't public to bidders, then won said bid, that's where the conflict comes in.

But this is all for not, as 18F has clarified that they don't do this, which is great. I'm all for better requirements, transparency, and lower government spending.

I bid on a lot of RFPs and the process needs fixing for sure. Anything tobreduce the amount of work I need to do to draft a bid is welcomed. Goverment bids take an insane amount of man hours on our part.

Love the work 18F is doing in this space.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> There is a nuance here that many of you are missing. Up until 18F, the government procurement process was so byzantine that navigating it was core competency of a government contractors and one of their main competitive advantages.

What the lobbyists are complaining about is that 18F doesn't have to go through that process while everyone else does. OR more specifically, they believe that 18F is skipping the process but they don't know because of lack of transparency.

They want the playing field to be even -- either make 18F follow all the same rules or allow them to skirt the same rules.

Part of the reason those government contracts are worth so much is because of all the forms and paperwork you have to file just to get one.

So the issue isn't as black and white as all of us engineers want it to be.

Honestly, I'm all in favor of dropping all the regs for the contractors, but the downside to that is that the regs were put into place to stop corruption -- i.e all the contracts were just going to the (typically white rich male) friends of the government agents. A lot of those government regulations are there to make sure that women and minority owned businesses get some of those contracts (although there is a ton of corruption around pass through entities there, but that's a different issue).

<comment><USER15> I was under the impression that 18F follow processes as required for the project budget. If 18F is working a $500k job, there is a lot less process and paperwork than a $5m job.

If a "legacy" provider makes a particular project into a $5m job, and 18F see it as a $500k job, then that aint 18F skipping processes.

There are ways legacy contractors can "skirt the rules" by doing a "demo" and then completing the project while staying under the discretionary budget limits.

<comment><USER14> Yes that's true but what they are complaining about is that the process isn't transparent enough for them to know that is happening.

Also related is the fact that the admins at 18f are paid for by the government and so their cost isn't included in the project budget whereas the private contract needs to pay for the staff that processes the paperwork within the project budget.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Gov contractors are pissed that the government can build some of its own systems? HA!

The first job I had out of school was on a government contract. The gov employee that was suppose to oversee the technical decisions made was even less experienced than I was and worked about as hard as his salary suggested. Needless to say, our instructions were often to meet the letter of the contract whether it accomplished the intended goal or not. 18F's experience has long been needed.

</comment><comment><USER17> I recently helped meet an RFI to be considered for the pre-qualified vendor pool for the California project mentioned in the article. At least one cool thing that 18F inspired is that all of the vying vendors' prototypes (developed as an unpaid trial task) are located and indexed on GitHub. You can decide for yourself whether the big established players or the new, more nimble outfits produce better prototype work: [https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=chhs](https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=chhs).

<comment><USER18> Lets see: java, javascript, java, java, javascript, and PHP.

Yup, about what I'd expect from gov contractors.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Unreal. That was one of most one-sided pieces I've ever read of an attack on innovation within government. 18F is doing great work. They're pretty transparent, too, given they publish lots of their activities and reasoning. Nobody taking bribes either that I'm aware of. Whereas, the "lobbyists" and "representatives" in question are either delivering or taking bribes from big companies to ensure they get contracts to continue sucking money out of taxpayers for nothing. This organized, outdated corruption resisting something that threatens it. Of course, the article doesn't report on _that_ angle which is more important than anything policy-related.

Thing is, even the corruption aspect could be done better in a win-win way if they tried. They can still rake in the big profits on government systems. Just act as main contractors that interface with those government entities, subcontract out work to groups 18F would encourage, get good results, painlessly integrate it due to subcontractors' talent, and then deliver it to government with 30-50% profit for doing nothing. Continue to pull profits due to support/licensing. This has worked for defense contractors, including those named, for decades with subcontractors just using outdated or conservative methods. It could work on the newer approaches as well. They might as well go all in on such a better form of corruption as them loosing contracts due to efforts like 18F is only a matter of time. First mover advantage suggests they lock-in a new strategy immediately.

Note: Not that I prefer corruption. I just know it's not going away in an apathetic "democracy." So, I recommend stuff the corrupt parties might actually adopt vs something that eliminates their profits and re-elections respectively.

</comment><comment><USER20> So basically putting some competent tech people in charge of government technology has resulted in a cracking down on waste, fraud, abuse and general stupidity. And this is a bad thing because...?

<comment><USER21> What is good for society isn't necessarily good for an individual.

Here in Germany they often think about cracking down on private health care. But one of the arguments against it is "There are people living from sellings such insurances!"

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Just a quick note for folks interesting in joining 18F: it may be a much more fun place to work as engineer in the government, but it's still the government.

You start off with 2 weeks of paid leave accrued per year, and it'll be at least 15 years (last time I checked) of employment before you're up to 4 weeks per year. This pales in comparison to contracting shops in the DMV (DC, Maryland, Virginia) area, where the smallest I've seen is 4 weeks for brand- new employees. Over the years I've seen more and more switch to unlimited PTO.

More likely than not, you will inevitably have to deal with a "govvie" who prides one's self on doing nothing all day and getting paid more than you for it, simply because of seniority. This might sound like hyperbole, but after 6 years as a DoD contractor and getting fed up with all the bureacracy, I left for the fully private sector and I haven't looked back since in 2 years. YMMV.

<comment><USER23> _at least 15 years (last time I checked) of employment before you 're up to 4 weeks per year._

Except you can't get there, because you can't work at 18F for more than four years. Or at least that was what I was told when I looked into it last year.

(I have nothing against 18F, by the way -- if it's something you're interested in you should definitely look into working there, and some awesome people I know are currently there)

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Let me get this straight. Government contractors are concerned about the lack of transparency of 18F/USDS and also that they're developing capabilities that the incumbents cannot possibly offer and are asking for more regulation? Funny considering how byzantine and convoluted myself and others have found it to start contracting for the government despite the best of our intentions that would require incredible amounts of overhead compared to even an enterprise software vendor relationship contract when you're a 2-person company (you typically wind up sub-contracted under a massive prime contractor anyway, and that removes a lot of your political weight immediately while favoring the big one). Isn't one of the best things you can do for the federal government is to be accommodating and flexible to their needs in their best interest as a guiding principle? There's some pretty serious cognitive dissonance happening.

There's also a false dichotomy that people get the impression that government contractors have traditionally gotten a cushy job - this is not the full story. Smaller contractors constantly are folding or being forced to sell due to how difficult the market is to negotiate now as a small company, particularly for defense (I am shocked that the article only cites $80 Bn for government contractors pretending that defense contractors don't exist - <USER2> add up Lockheed and SAIC alone and you'd get far, far beyond that). One of the top reasons for companies folding is simply loss of budget into exploratory programs that can justify more "cutting edge" technology such as Hadoop-based or Spark-based analytics stacks and HTML5 instead of ColdFusion based user facing applications. After having worked for and alongside some great smaller contractors that just couldn't hack it, I'm pretty much done with government at this point though and would rather let the next generation of engineers that are more hopeful and nowhere near as disenchanted as myself show up.

I think 18F / USDS limiting the service times is a Good Idea though because it can limit the amount of negativity that can accumulate from just a few engineers having poor experiences. Furthermore, this kind of "term limit" is a great way to prevent entrenchment by any entity working with the government. Unfortunately, many key initiatives are simply too important _not_ to get the government entrenched and a long-term relationship to exist (granted, I'd also argue that the government should simply own these outright instead of attempting to half-ass privatize, which leads to political models closer to Mussolini's ideas of fascism).

<comment><USER25> > Let me get this straight. Government contractors are concerned about the > lack of transparency of 18F/US

No, I believe they are complaining about the transparency of 18F (e.g. blanket purchasing requirements, allowing open source, etc).

1\. Make government more screwed up 2\. Complain that the government is screwed up 3\. Get a sweet contact to privatize something 4\. Profit!

Assholes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I once had to call the help desk for a US government system. They were actually surprisingly responsive and helpful, on a weekend even. After speaking a bit of technical jargon the person on the other end of the line understood that I wasn't an idiot and did indeed have a real issue. I asked if anyone else had such a problem with the system and the response was:

"Sir, this is a government IT system and it works about as well as you'd expect a government IT system to work." We both laughed. I'm happy the people at 18F are making progress in changing the validity of that stereotype.

</comment><comment><USER26> 18F is still very small at 185 and the headcount includes the Presidential Innovation Fellows program; at the end of 2014, the total headcount was 95.

Source: [https://fcw.com/articles/2014/10/27/18f-consulting- group.asp...](https://fcw.com/articles/2014/10/27/18f-consulting-group.aspx)

</comment><comment><USER27> This is great. This is how you know you're doing things right. All they have to do now is avoid becoming the thing they're currently fixing. Every institution at some point becomes a propagator of the problem it was meant to solve but 18F seems to be a bunch of smart folks so maybe they can avoid that fate.

</comment><comment><USER28> Folks who believe in 18F and want it to continue the work it is doing: please please PLEASE actually write to your legislators and let them know that you are their constituent, that you are a tech worker, and that you support it. Unless you do, they will think that it is some niche issue that the general public doesn't care about. When that happens, the only things legislators have to base their decisions on are:

1) Their own (non-existent) expertise in software development and procurement.

2) Their advice of whatever experts they can find.

3) The outcome of this hearing by the House Oversight Comittee: [https://oversight.house.gov/hearing/18f-and-u-s-digital- serv...](https://oversight.house.gov/hearing/18f-and-u-s-digital-service- oversight/) and follow-up hearings

And what #2 really means is lobbyists, paid for by these same contractors. They will present themselves as the voice of the industry and unless a bunch of actual software engineers speak up, legislators would have every reason to believe them.

So please, find your congresscritter and let them know that you care about this: [http://openstates.org/find_your_legislator/](http://openstates.org/find_your_legislator/)

Especially do this if you live in the district of one of the members of the house oversight committee: [https://oversight.house.gov/subcommittee/full- committee/](https://oversight.house.gov/subcommittee/full-committee/)

\- Carolyn Maloney of NY-12, Brooklyn Heights, Williamsburg and the east side of Manhattan

\- MARK DESAULNIER CA-11: Just west of Berkley

\- William Lacy Clay of MO-1, Greater St Louis

\- Stephen Lynch of MA-8, Boston and South Shore

\- Jim Cooper of TN-5, Nashville and some areas to the west

\- Gerald E. Connoly of VA-11, suburbs between Arlington and Manassas

\- Matt Cartwright of PA-17: Scranton, Schuylkill, and Munroe

\- Tammy Duckworth of IL-8: Northwest Chicago

\- Robin Kelly IL-2: South East Chicago

\- Brenda Lawrence MI-14: A weird gerrymander northish of Detroit but also the lake coast

\- Ted Lieu CA-33: A wide swath of pacific coast near Venice Beach

\- Bonnie Watson Coleman NJ-12: Princeton, Trenton, and environs

\- Brendan F. Boyle PA-13: North and Northeast of Philadelphia.

\- Peter Welch for the entirety of Vermont

\- Michelle Lujan Grisham NM-1: Albuquerque and areas southeast of it.

\- Trey Gowdy SC-4: Spartanburg and Greenville area

\- Mark Meadows NC-11: Asheville and the blue ridge mountains

\- Jim Jordan OH-4: a weird gerrymander northwest of Columbus and south of Cleveland

\- John Mica of FL-7, north of Orlando

\- Michael Turner of OH-10, north of Cincinnati

\- John Duncan TN-2: Jefferson city and area around it.

\- Tim Walberg MI-7: Rural area and suburbs south-west of Detroit.

\- Justin Amash MI-3: Grand Rapids and rural areas between it and Lansing. (frame all arguments from a libertarian perspective)

\- Blake Farnthold TX-27: Corpus Cristi, Lockhart, and a bunch of gulf coast.

\- Cynthia Lummis, for the entirety of Wyoming

\- Thomas Massie KY-4: A weird gerrymander north of Lexington and south of Cincinnati

\- Ron Desantis FL-6: Daytona Beach area

\- Mick Mulvaney SC-5: Rock Hill and rural area north of Columbia

\- Ken Buck CO-4: the eastern 3rd of the state

\- Mark Walker NC-6: Greensboro and rural areas north of Durham & Winston- salem

\- Rod Blum IA-1: Cedar Rapids and the areas in the northeast of the state.

\- Jody Hice GA-10: Rural area between Atlanta and Augusta

\- Steve Russel OK-5: Oklahoma City, Seminole, and a bunch of rural area around that.

\- Buddy Carter GA-1: The southeast corner of the state and atlantic coast

\- Glenn Grothman WI-6: rural area north of Madison and Milwaukee

\- William Hurd TX-23: El Paso and all the area between it and San Antonio

\- Gary J. Palmer AL-6: A weird gerrymander of the rural area surrounding Birmingham

\- Paul Gosar AZ-4: Prescott and the western border of the state.

\- Scott Desharlais TN-4: The south-central part of the state. Areas Northeast of Chattanooga.

\- Eleanor Holmes Norton: DC

\- Stacey E. Plaskett: US Virgin Islands

<comment><USER29> > \- Carolyn Maloney of NY-12, Brooklyn Heights, Williamsburg and the east > side of Manhattan

Sorry but I live in Congresswoman Maloney's district and this is not an accurate description of her district [0].

In Brooklyn, NY-12 includes Greenpoint and only a sliver of Williamsburg. Brooklyn Heights and most of Williamsburg falls in NY-7 (Nydia Velazquez).

In Queens, which you left out entirely, NY-12 includes Long Island City, Astoria (minus Ditmars/Steinway) and parts of Woodside.

In Manhattan, NY-12 extends to areas that are decidedly not "east side," namely Midtown and half of Chelsea. Oh, and it also includes Roosevelt Island, but everybody forgets about Roosevelt Island.

Getting these things right is hard, especially with redistricting every 10 years, so I recommend linking to a congresscritter lookup page instead [1]. Certainly better than bungling the very first entry in a big list of representatives and their districts.

[0] [https://maloney.house.gov/about/new-yorks-12th- congressional...](https://maloney.house.gov/about/new-yorks-12th- congressional-district) [1] [http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/](http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/)

<comment><USER30> > _Sorry but I live in Congresswoman Maloney 's district and this is not an > accurate description of her district [0]._

Respectfully, does any government agency release congressional district maps as Google Map overlays? Or are such things limited to congressmen who, e.g., represent the most affluent neighborhoods of New York? (I note there is only one such person given in the list, which would make your recommendation ineffective.)

<comment><USER29> My recommendation was a zip code to congressperson lookup tool. I linked to one such tool hosted on house.gov. Did you find it unsatisfactory?

As to your weak attempt to make this about class, I'll point out West Virginia's congressional district Google Maps overlay: [http://www.sos.wv.gov/elections/Vote/Districts/Pages/Distric...](http://www.sos.wv.gov/elections/Vote/Districts/Pages/Districts_Congressional.aspx)

Or is West Virginia too rich for you? I can find more, I just google searched that and found it in 30 seconds. It seems you don't have the time to do your own research but you do have the time to make inflammatory comments.

<comment><USER30> > _Did you find it unsatisfactory?_

It does not give descriptions or representations, given congressional districts. It requires a completely disjoint input: postal districts. So unless you recommend a counterpart district-to-ZIP lookup tool, I can't see how it's useful for a description of districts _because you still need to know which ZIP codes are within it to do so._ Strange that the webapp doesn't use permalinks, or allow unique identifiers of districts as a search variable, no? This makes it largely unuseful for this contextual district-to-(neighborhood- level)map/description requirement.

> _As to your weak attempt to make this about class, I 'll point out West > Virginia's congressional district Google Maps overlay_

Well, it was more of a statement about using anecdotal examples which are not representative of congressional office websites. (It could be a statement about class, but this was not my point.) It's obvious the offices are doing these maps themselves because there exists no viable alternative, and it still appears uncommon for the offices to do so. While my remarks may be inflammatory, it is nonetheless evident that your suggestion to direct the users to congressional office websites (or dozens of unaffiliated and state and local websites), as well as a ZIP-to-district tool, would be ineffective in this context.

<comment><USER29> The point wasn't to help OP generate a list of congressional district descriptions, because that's useless in general and nobody wants that. Except maybe you I guess.

The OP had a list of names of congresspersons in a committee (useful) and wanted to help their audience determine if they were represented by members of that committee (useful). Most politically active individuals know the name of their congressperson or at least the name of their district, so they were already satisfied by the original list. For those that don't know who their congressperson is, they want to know who their congressperson is, not read a list of geographical descriptions of congressional districts. Which is why I recommended a tool to look up one's congressperson.

You seem to be focusing very heavily on a different problem that nobody cares about, namely how to create precise descriptions of congressional districts based on geographical landmarks. If you really want a tool that generates precise descriptions of congressional districts, by all means go make one, but I don't know who would want such a tool other than yourself.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I work for a mid sized contracting company (think Deloitte but much smaller) and 18F has been such a breath of fresh air. Working (well, dealing) with a group of competent people who are setting modern goals in such an terribly outdated environment is awesome.

18F is pushing my company to invest more in real technologies rather than Salesforce for everything. This is going to have a ton of great effects on my company and seemingly the industry in general.

</comment><comment><USER32> "lobbyists from the IT Alliance for Public Sector (ITAPS) and the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) alleged that 18F is hindering profits"

Why should I care about that? Why should anyone who's not those companies care about it? If 18F is making it chalet for the government to do these things, that's good for everyone else.

</comment><comment><USER33> Can anyone explain to me what a "buy first" policy is? Is this the same as no- bid contracts?

If history is any guide, the entrenched players will step up their lobbying efforts and the current system will be preserved. In Washington money comes first, party comes second and the people you are supposed to represent come dead last.

<comment><USER34> "buy first" means to have a policy of not doing it in-house unless there is no other option. In other words, they want 18F to subcontract out the work unless no one is able to meet their requirements. Whether this is a actually a good policy for a government to have is not at all clear to me.

<comment><USER32> It's not. It removes the ability to look at a situation, and come up with the best solution for it. Sometimes it's better to outsource, sometimes it's better to do it yourself.

<comment><USER23> Sure it's a terrible policy.

But that's never how it's presented. It's presented as "Why does _the government_ need a software shop? Isn't this just yet more _government overreach_ and _unfair meddling with the free market_?"

So, y'know, next time you see someone arguing along those lines, remember the real argument they're making is "this has the potential to help people and save taxpayer money, but it would cut off a fat government check to me or my buddies, so I have to find a moral argument against it".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> This is the most definitive statement I have seen that 18f is working. I wasn't sure before, but now I'm sure.</comment>


The present and future of semantic code search - <AUTHOR> https://www.sourcesort.com/interview/hamel-husain-on-semantic-code-search <comment><USER2> Hi, this is Hamel. I'm happy to answer any questions about the dataset or the project. I think this dataset is exciting for the following reasons:

\- Its really large: Parallel corpus is 2M code snippets, and the unpaired corpus is 6M code snippets Its real data generated by people in the wild and gives everyone a chance to exercise skills with cleaning a messy dataset.

\- Its unique: its [code, comment] pairs; part natural language, part code. This presents unique challenges. This data has seen very little utilization so far which means lots of opportunities for the community to make tools for code navigation, search, bug detection, automated documentation, and program synthesis (some of the problems being significantly harder than others).

\- Other niche datasets from specific domains require a non-trivial amount of domain knowledge before being effective with the dataset. For example, to utilize radiology images it is extremely helpful to learn a little about the domain to help with cleaning and exploring the data and debugging your models. However, many machine learning folks are already familiar with writing code so you have a head start!

\- The most painful part of cleaning the data is done for you: parsing the code and separating out the comments from the code.

We are really excited about the possibilities of this dataset and what folks are able to do with it. Looking forward to your questions.

<comment><USER3> What is semantics in this context? When I use the word, I generally think about "what I mean" when I use a word, or a symbol. Then there is the alternative "interpretations" of that symbol. The hope with good semantic tooling is that these things match up. If they don't then there is ambiguity. At what levels are you attempting to resolve ambiguity? Concept, code, etc. And what challenges remain?

Finally, with your findings you could theoretically turn around and produce your own "semantics friendly" language/toolings, are there plans for that?

Thanks for your time.</comment></comment>


Why Microsoft turned Office into a Game. - <AUTHOR> http://www.slideshare.net/danctheduck/wordcamp-2010-public

<comment><USER2> Most interesting take-away from me is the idea that _failure_ is important to the process. As long as that failure comes with great feedback (in a game, the 'character' doing something other than what you want) a user can learn.

This would seem to extend beyond turning your interface into a 'game'... maybe it means that we should be much more focused on providing meaningful feedback. When a user does something wrong, translate that into an action, comment, or something that clearly provides an opportunity for learning. Makes sense...

Interestingly, I've experimented with something like that in one of our products. Instead of trying to provide the _shortest_ path to complete an action, I designed the interface to take the user through the same steps they'll use when actually managing the stuff they create (with lots of helpful prompting). This isn't necessarily new, but it was new for me. The early returns have been pretty good with this approach.

One thing I might take a stab at changing: Instead of providing immediate prompts for the user, let them click around and only display the prompts after enough (failure) time has elapsed....

<comment><USER3> I seem to remember having user experiences where the first couple of times I did something wrong, I got a short warning sound or flashing menu bar, and after a couple of more of them, a dialog box popped up with a more elaborate description. I didn't think about it at the time, but I do believe that encourages clicking around more than getting the dialog box every time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Yeah, but if you do it wrong, then it just feels as though the program talks down to you.

I agree that designing the architecture to be easy to explore and learn is a great idea, to me it seems that the best application to a help interact was if one added the option to play with things before the instructions for how to do them. Not if one removed the instructions entirely.

You don't want to be doing something, and then be distracted by the help screen and come back to the initial thing an hour later forgetting what it was you wanted to do.

Sometimes less engaging functionality has a greater capacity to engage.

</comment><comment><USER5> I want Vim Hero!

This is a great presentation - thanks for posting.

<comment><USER6> snake is vi hero

Apparently, it was designed to teach the hjkl keys. It's likely a few other vim games already exist (vim has every feature you can imagine, and then some). After I've played some video games, Vim actually _feels_ like a video game to me.

Except for its learning cliff. However, when I put together regular expressions, I use new features by trial and error at first, and this is quite like a game. Try it, press u, edit and try again, press u. That's a feedback loop, as in the game; just turn-based instead of real-time. lisp/python/ruby/bash etc REPLs are similar.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> It's a very interesting perspective. They are dead-on about video games. You startup the game with basically no instructions and quickly have to figure out how to play.

I'm curious how well this type of thing would do in a corporate environment, especially those switching from Office 2003 or earlier to 2010. I can see how this would be much more helpful than the standard training classes I've seen.

<comment><USER8> Video games are the most tradition-bound interface in all of computerdom. There is basically NO exploration going on. Every button on the controller has to do what the user expects from every other game or the they get frustrated and don't buy the game. Even when ported to a PC the games stink of "console".

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Unnecessary rock thrown at the iPhone (almost literally). Still a very good presentation.

Since Office on the Mac sucks and has subtle compatibility issues whenever I share files with PC users, I am considering giving the web app a try as my new "have to use MS Office" escape hatch.

<comment><USER2> Ya, because maybe the iPhone is the best example of exactly what he's talking about. The iPhone has always been something of an enigma to me. In all of the short-term usability testing I've seen (and done), it's performed really poorly. Yet the overall engagement is through the roof.

I would argue it's primarily because the iPhone feels like a game when you play it. It rewards you for doing the right thing. It provides a lot of feedback. It's smooth and quick... It's exactly what the author is talking about.

<comment><USER10> He also talks about the success of a plugin system, like iApps, in shrinking the skill pyramid.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> For those interested in reading more:

The presenter is Daniel Cook (Danc) who worked for Epic Megagames long ago doing game art and design.

Some of his essays have made it to HN before, those and some of his art can be found at his site: <http://www.lostgarden.com/>

</comment><comment><USER12> This is so full of corporate bullcrap that it makes me shudder... Game mechanics in crappy apps -> ???? -> PROFIT!

<comment><USER8> I detest whimsical crap like this - especially when its shoved into your face like that insufferable paperclip guy.

The ribbon may be a happy happy joy joy thing for fluffy folks, but I just see a crappy toolbar with half a dozen fonts and no clear way to search for the randomly-distributed features. I detest it.

<comment><USER9> Give me Excel 2003. That was the most usable version for me. (Actually I was the most productive by far in Lotus 1-2-3. The reason I believe was the lack of a mouse.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> this is one of the most inspiring talks about ui design I have read in quite a while, and from microsoft of all people.</comment>


Security flaw in Android (by design) - <AUTHOR> https://plus.google.com/112114512050260382816/posts/iUsf1SmDqb1

<comment><USER3> How is this a security flaw? Mobile devices are not meant to be shared - <USER2> don't have multiple user accounts - meaning you theoretically are not supposed to give the tablet to anyone else. People can use your FB & Twitter account etc. What the OP wants is a guest account, which I support. But this is a choice Google made, no security flaw.

<comment><AUTHOR> for a non-technical user, this is a security flaw. You buy a tablet, activate it with your gmail account, and next thing is your private email is exposed to your party guests.

<comment><USER4> For non technical users the browsing history gets exposed too along with chat logs... I would be a lot more worried about those. Basically the problem would be the lack of guest accounts or guest mode. Every time I let someone use my laptop for browsing I open up an incognito window in Chrome.

<comment><AUTHOR> well, that too, of course. So Ubuntu rules anyway :)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Why Garbagemen Should Earn More Than Bankers - <AUTHOR> http://evonomics.com/why-garbage-men-should-earn-more-than-bankers/ <comment><USER3> > Nearly a century ago, economist John Maynard Keynes famously predicted that > we would work fifteen-hour weeks by the year 2030

In 1930, when Keynes predicted the 15 hour work week, the average American earned $1,368/year which is roughly $19,500/year in todays dollars.

19500/52 = $375/week. In 1930, in manufacturing, the average person worked 50.6 hours per week. ([https://eh.net/encyclopedia/hours-of-work-in-u-s- history/](https://eh.net/encyclopedia/hours-of-work-in-u-s-history/)). so about $7.50/hour

In 2015 the average family income was $53657. 53657/52 = $1031/week But in 2015 the average person worked on average only 34.4 hours per week ([http://fortune.com/2015/11/11/chart-work-week- oecd/](http://fortune.com/2015/11/11/chart-work-week-oecd/)) so just shy of $30/hour.

If modern Americans were content living at the same level of consumption as their 1930's counterparts they would only have to work 12.5 hours per week to earn that same $375 in purchasing power. Outdoing Keynes' prediction 15 years ahead of schedule.

<comment><USER4> 60% of families are dual income. [1]

(53657/1.6) / 52 = $644. That makes the hourly rate $18.72.

So around 20 hours to make 1930's purchasing power.

Keynes prediction still ahead.

[1] [http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/06/18/5-facts- abou...](http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/06/18/5-facts-about-todays- fathers/ft_dual-income-households-1960-2012-2/)

<comment><USER3> Very true, I just did a quick Google search. Thanks for the link!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> My father told the story once of a secretary who told him "my pay is a disgrace. Even garbage men get paid more than me!" To which my father replied "why don't you quit and get a garbage man job?" And the secretary says "are you kidding? That's a filthy, dirty job!"

</comment><comment><USER4> [http://money.cnn.com/2016/02/24/news/economy/trash- workers-h...](http://money.cnn.com/2016/02/24/news/economy/trash-workers-high- pay/)

Some garbagemen do make $100000, more than some bankers (and some software engineers), as they rightly should, as described in this article.

<comment><USER6> Garbageman used to be a very highly sought-after job a few years ago in my city.

160.000 out of a population of a million registered for a lottery to be considered for one of the 200 spots back in 2006.

It helped that they had an employment contract that basically guaranteed them employment for life and several perks.

Nowadays the city government privatized most of the garbage collection, so it's not such a great deal anymore (the employees they hired before on advantageous conditions are still employed and working though).

[http://www.espectador.com/sociedad/83328/se-realiza-el- sorte...](http://www.espectador.com/sociedad/83328/se-realiza-el-sorteo-entre- los-anotados-para-la-imm)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Where is the money coming from, hmm? The author describes finance as a "tax on the population", but how could such taxation possibly work? The HFT firms are taxing ordinary people's retirement accounts by... undercutting the human market-makers, providing a much better service while employing fewer traders? Um, yeah.

No doubt there are inefficient companies - those with an excess of management (say) or some other kind of employees in "bullshit jobs" that aren't adding value. That's ok; those companies will be competed out of the marketplace. We're already seeing plenty of SV companies experimenting with different management models, for example.

In some cases "bullshit jobs" are forced upon companies. If we have so many more lawyers than Japan, maybe we need to simplify or otherwise improve our legal system. Or maybe not - maybe the Japanese have a worse quality of life as a result - certainly I've heard complaints about e.g. the treatment of people who suffer serious injuries, or even the ability of small businesses to break into markets that are dominated by racketeers.

But in many cases, if a job really is "bullshit", who is paying for it, and why? It's not like banking isn't competitive - you only have to look at the recent quarterly results to see how much effort the industry has put into cutting costs (much of which comes in the form of employing fewer people).

</comment><comment><USER8> One of the most important jobs in a hospital, is the cleaner. To help prevent the spread of infections like MRSI, to help keep outbreaks of vomiting virus under control, and help reduce the number of admitted and post procedure patients dying as a direct result of infection acquired in the hospital itself.

And yet, they are treated as the lowest employees there, well, most are not even employees, outsourced three or four levels removed as a cost to be cut to the cheapest provider, damn the consequences.

Society has some warped views sometimes.

<comment><USER9> > Society has some warped views sometimes.

At the moment, stopping to help a homeless person isn't worth anything. We should live in a society where helping someone in need makes you a millionaire. Where people are out hunting down the homeless, fighting to help them.

A society where helping a kid to become happy makes you rich. Making a classroom of kids happy and teach them something at the same time earns you tens of millions a year.

<comment><USER10> Talk about rose tinted glasses! You would need to invent some new product that did those things for kids and convince parents to buy it, otherwise no one will ever pay you millions to make kids happy and teach them something.

<comment><USER9> That's the point I was making. In a post money society (think reddit karma or Star Trek) this could be a thing.

The money loving capitalist couldn't imagine being rewarded for helping someone. It makes me sad.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Garbagemen are paid from taxer money, bankers aren't. If you don't like bankers, don't give them your money. Problem solved. I get more angry at people with cushy bullshit government jobs than at bankers.

The example of the Irish pubs seems to show that actually bankers do something of value. Otherwise anybody could have replaced them, instead it was Irish Pub owners because they had knowledge of their customers financial situation.

</comment><comment><USER12> The thing about markets is that they cut through all of the fuzzy thinking about what jobs "should" pay more than others, and tell us what we actually pay - what we collectively find valuable.

That reality escapes most people.

<comment><USER13> That's probably 90% true, but there are phenomena that defy this.

Imagine you live in a society where the population is mainly composed of two segments. Members of the first segment enjoy consuming service A. Members of the second segment would benefit tremendously from service B, but all the money is held by the first segment. Which service are you going to spend your time offering to the public?

This is at least part of the reason that, as a software engineer, I am much better off selling my time to an advertising company than (say) running a programming/compsci dojo for middle school kids in a low-income urban community.

You'll say, of course, that advertising is so lucrative because businesses around the world (and therefore the society made up of them) value the extra income that advertising provides. You'll say that society as a whole does, in fact, want more, better advertisements. But I suspect that there is a segment of the population just as large that would rather everyone in the advertising industry do something else. Only that segment can't pay.

<comment><USER14> > selling my time to an advertising company than (say) running a > programming/compsci dojo for middle school kids

There are lucrative teaching jobs, and lucrative consumer products bought by low-income communities. But in this case, teaching dojos don't scale the same way ads do.

Also, high-income communities can often incubate products that eventually become available to low-income communities, after they get over initial cost burdens.

Advertising _is_ a good example though: If everyone uses ads, there is no individual (company) advantage to using ads, but you still have to use them to compete.

<comment><USER13> At the risk of hurting my case, advertising is probably not quite as good an example as you're making it out to be.

In particular, competition between two brands of the same product need not be a zero sum game. If every beer company runs ads in which beautiful women fawn over a guy drinking beer, the outcome might be that _every_ company sees higher profits than in a world without any ads at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> > Some law firms even make a practice of buying up patents for products they > have no intention of producing, purely to enable them to sue people for > copyright infringement.

 _sigh_ copyright != patent

</comment><comment><USER16> A strike of HFT traders would actually make some news. HFT is in a fragile balance. Markets disturbance would be enormous.

</comment><comment><USER17> I remember when they did this in Marseille a few years back and it didn't take a week but just a few days before huge trash piles in the streets, set on fire by bored kids, got cleaned up by the army.

</comment><comment><USER18> My grandfather recalled once how his Latin teacher told him the most important job in society is that of the garbage collector - how can it function properly if everywhere is piled high with waste?

<comment><USER14> > how can it function properly if everywhere is piled high with waste?

Reminds me of [http://joek.com/jokes/joke_102.shtml](http://joek.com/jokes/joke_102.shtml)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> The writer thinks of money as something people give to you, and so he's never going to make much of it.

He's totally right that no one would mourn a strike of lobbyists or high- frequency traders. But those guys aren't waiting to be handed money--they're actively finding ways to get it, for better or worse.

<comment><USER20> Exactly the problem the author is writing about: because of the way the system works - people are striving to make money, not value.

<comment><USER7> Those two things should be aligned - that's how capitalism works. There are cases where we create the wrong incentives - e.g. the whole HFT industry exists because the sub-penny rule forbids market-makers from competing on price - but let's fix those. Fundamentally the best way to make money should be - and in my view largely is - by creating value for your clients.

<comment><USER21> > _Fundamentally the best way to make money should be - and in my view largely > is - by creating value for your clients._

Should be - yes. And to a great extent it was - that's why capitalism is undeniably responsible for propelling (most of) us into the age of prosperity we now enjoy. But I disagree creating (social, not just economic) value for clients is the best way to make money now. Profit and value motives are increasingly misaligned. It is to be expected - we've picked up all low- hanging fruits years ago. Now the money is being made on gaming the system, on exploiting the fact that profit is only a proxy for value.

Companies nowadays know that they can get away with almost anything because the market has _very_ short memory. They also know they can sell any kind of bullshit with enough advertising, and that marketing expenses have much better ROI than actually delivering a working product. In contemporary marketplace, providing _honest value_ to customers is not a competitive strategy - <USER2> less and less of it happens (it's painfully visible in our industry - it's why most Internet startups are bullshit).

<comment><USER7> > In contemporary marketplace, providing honest value to customers is not a > competitive strategy - hence less and less of it happens (it's painfully > visible in our industry - it's why most Internet startups are bullshit).

Examples? People might not like what Facebook/Snapchat/Uber/Amazon/etc. are doing (and in some cases I would agree with the criticism - I certainly think startups whose business model involves getting people to break the law need to be held to account), but they're undeniably providing a lot of honest value to their users.

<comment><USER21> I wasn't thinking about Facebook, Snapchat, Amazon or even Uber - those are examples of companies that do provide a lot of honest value (not to mention I wouldn't call either of them a startup now). I meant all your random SaaS businesses that try to "change the world" by doing something utterly irrelevant that's only meant to give them enough growth to have a shot at getting acquihired by an established corporation.

<comment><USER7> You're going to have to give some concrete examples. All the "typical" SV startups I can think of were very much about creating value for the user. (If anything the lacuna in the business model tends to be around getting the user to pay for that value).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> As someone who does not live in a high-density urban environment, I would rather keep my bank than my garbage man.

My waste is about half compostable and the other half, through a slight change in purchasing decisions, could easily consist solely of easily-burnable paper and cardboard.

Meanwhile, if I had noone to finance the purchase of my house or manage my retirement savings then I would be considerably worse off.

</comment><comment> Sam</comment><comment>-- IMO this is wrong: Most any banker can become a garbageman. They are way overpaid, that's why there is a lottery for the jobs. Is the reverse true?

Relying on strike time to tragedy is complete BS. As we saw in 2007/8 when banker messed up the consequences are indeed harsh.

None of this works without gov putting its thumb on the scales. Where do you think the lack of innovation came from?

<comment><USER22> > IMO this is wrong: Most any banker can become a garbageman. They are way > overpaid, that's why there is a lottery for the jobs. Is the reverse true?

The article actually states exactly this as part of it's "bullshit jobs" discussion.

> Relying on strike time to tragedy is complete BS. As we saw in 2007/8 when > banker messed up the consequences are indeed harsh.

You're mixing up a strike with a very complex series of events that can arguably be described somewhere on a scale between "messed up" and "maliciously and fraudulently manipulated markets for their own profiteering at the expense of everyone else". However, determining exactly where on that scale they sit is a much bigger discussion than HN allows in a comment. Eitherway, the article again compares a garbage collection strike with a banking strike, which is a fairer comparison, and suggests that the biggest losers from that strike were the bankers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I wish there was a way to get rid of these bullshit jobs. Also, I wish there was a way to make entertainment business such as singing, acting, and sports much much less profitable.

<comment><USER24> The problem with entertainement isn't that it's too profitable, it's that the top earner are taking a huge part of the pie while the majority is fighting for crumbs. It's easy to see the few soccer stars making millions by the dozen, but there are way more people playing soccer professionally that are barely getting by.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> If some people are getting paid highly without making a positive contribution to society, they are either: \- Taking advantage of gullible customers or, \- Exploiting loopholes in the system, as with HFT.

In the latter case, regulation should take care of these people.</comment>


Slack is Down for Chrome due to CDN issue - <AUTHOR> https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByaKKJwF1jFsWjdCZ0FFR3lqVU0/view?usp=sharing <comment><AUTHOR> Oddly issue only seems to be affecting Chrome - not Internet Explorer.... can't believe they use a different CDN on different browsers....

<comment><USER2> Unlikely. Perhaps a HTTPS cert issue that the other browsers can handle?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> What? I see it on FF and Safari as well.</comment>


An enormous theorem: the classification of finite simple groups (2006) - ur-whale https://plus.maths.org/content/enormous-theorem-classification-finite-simple-groups <comment><AUTHOR> This is why we need to move _away_ from depending on just humans to verify proofs. The goal shouldn't be "does a human fully understand the whole thing" but "is it proven to be true?"

There are a number of computer-based tools that can verify proofs, including HOL Light, Isabelle, Coq, Mizar, ProofPower and Lean. We should be working towards the day where running a proof through that kind of tool is what's required for publication: [http://www.cs.ru.nl/%7Efreek/100/](http://www.cs.ru.nl/%7Efreek/100/)

I do a lot with Metamath. The largest Metamath database, which uses classical logic & ZFC set theory, can be seen here: [http://us.metamath.org/mpeuni/mmset.html](http://us.metamath.org/mpeuni/mmset.html) Every one of its proofs routinely verified by 5 different programs written in 5 different programming languages by more than 5 different people. Humans still need to check the axioms and definitions (to ensure they are "what is meant"), check that the claims are what is desired, and in general humans need to create at least part of the proofs. But _no_ one needs to "understand everything". Instead, you can see whatever you want to see, and be confident that every step is thoroughly verified.

A Metamath-specific video overview is here: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WH4Rd4UKGE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WH4Rd4UKGE)

THAT is where we need to go. We aren't ready for it yet, but part of the problem is that we need to agree that this the proper destination.

<comment><USER2> Human understanding is critical. See what Bill Thurston said:"The rapid advance of computers has helped dramatize this point, because computers and people are very different. For instance, when Appel and Haken completed a proof of the 4-color map theorem using a massive automatic computation, it evoked much controversy. I interpret the controversy as having little to do with doubt people had as to the veracity of the theorem or the correctness of the proof. Rather, it reflected a continuing desire for human understanding of a proof, in addition to knowledge that the theorem is true." From Bill Thurston: "On Proof and Progress in Mathematics", Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, 30(2), 161-177 [https://arxiv.org/pdf/math/9404236](https://arxiv.org/pdf/math/9404236)

<comment><AUTHOR> Some mathematicians think that human understanding of every step is critical. That doesn't actually make it critical.

At one time it was very important to have humans weave cloth. Now we generally expect machines to do that. Computers will not eliminate the need for human mathematicians. It will merely change what they do. In many ways it will be more freeing, because no one will need to review a proof to see if its steps are correct.

Mathematicians will still need to develop definitions and determine what is important to prove, and at least in the short-term they will need to do much of the proving since machines are not yet very good at that. Many other fields have changed with computers, there's no reason to believe mathematics cannot be changed.

<comment><USER2> Well, if you think knowledge is same as truth, computer verifications can do. Today, at least the consensus in philosophy of science is not centered on truth. It is true that a falsity can't be knowledge. There is more to knowledge than truth.

<comment><AUTHOR> But that is the problem: we are claiming that we "know" things are absolutely true, but we are using methods that are known to be inadequate for that purpose.

Mathematicians are smart, but they are human. They make mistakes and miss others'. Math has increasingly become too complex to entrust mere human verification as being adequately trustworthy. Human verification has already been repeatedly demonstrated as inadequate.

We must choose between truth or easier-to-understand claims that are sometimes false because we depend on fragile human verification. I think we should choose truth.

Where we can get human understandability as well as truth, great! But formal verification should become the minimum over time, because truth should be the minimum.

We can't do that all at once right now. But knowing the goal is the first step.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Friend of mine is older Russian mathematician - algebraist, in his late 70's. He has small picture of John G. Thompson on his work table. Thompson made an enormous contribution to the proof. From what I remember reading, part of the proof was formally verified.

It is intersecting to think, that we have proofs that are impossible to grasp in a lifetime. Though, it would be possible to use the results !

Imagine, sometime in a future, humanity would loose the original proof due to some catastrophic event, but it would be know that theorem still holds true.

<comment><USER2> If humanity were to loose the original proof of some theorem X in 3000 AD, the only fact is known to them is that X is true, how on earth one should believe it? Just because that theorem X was proved in the West?

Just reverse the case, and replace the West with Africa or China. Everyone in the West would laugh at claims that "Some Chinese/African proved a theorem in 300 BC, but that proof doesn't exist anymore".

That's why Bill Thurston says this: "There is another effect caused by the big differences between how we think about mathematics and how we write it. A group of mathematicians interacting with each other can keep a collection of mathematical ideas alive for a period of years, even though the recorded version of their mathematical work differs from their actual thinking, having much greater emphasis on language, symbols, logic and formalism. But as new batches of mathematicians learn about the subject they tend to interpret what they read and hear more literally, so that the more easily recorded and communicated formalism and machinery tend to gradually take over from other modes of thinking.

There are two counters to this trend, so that mathematics does not become entirely mired down in formalism. First, younger generations of mathematicians are continually discovering and rediscovering insights on their own, thus reinjecting diverse modes of human thought into mathematics. "

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Here is a Coq mechanized proof of the Odd order theorem, a (huge) step towards the classification: [https://github.com/math-comp/odd- order](https://github.com/math-comp/odd-order)

The paper is here: [https://hal.archives- ouvertes.fr/hal-00816699/](https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00816699/)

</comment><comment> ur-whale An amazing theorem because - reportedly - no single human holds its overall proof in his head.

<comment><USER5> That article has a comment from someone involved in the proof who disagrees:

"This article is very well written, but I must object to the implications of the statement that "no-one in the world today completely understands the whole proof." Of course, complete understanding is a high benchmark to set. But I would argue that Thompson, Aschbacher and Lyons understand the proof at least as well as Danny Gorenstein did, and Steve Smith and I (and probably several others) come pretty close. See our book which received the AMS Steele Prize for Mathematical Exposition. Danny Gorenstein deserves enormous credit for conceiving and daring to articulate the strategy of the proof back in 1971-72. But his overall perspective did not die with him.

Ron Solomon"

<comment><USER3> I see his point, but explaining this proof to people outside of this group becomes a challenge and rightfully so.

<comment><USER6> > I see his point, but explaining this proof to people outside of this group > becomes a challenge and rightfully so.

That's probably true for any interesting proof, maybe all the more so for less famous proofs than this one where it's not clear the effort invested to understand it will be worth it!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The author's picture at the bottom does not look like a good advertisement for benefits of mathematical learning.

<comment><USER8> You may be downvoted because it sounds like an ad hominem.

I agree that it is an unflattering choice and do not understand what makes people use images like this to represent themselves to the largest audience possible (i.e. anyone with internet access). There is no easier way to positively influence what others imagine than by _not_ choosing an unflattering image. If someone really does not like any image of themselves, they can still leave it away and let people's imagination run free instead.</comment></comment>


"I Want Hue" – Colors for Data Scientists - <AUTHOR> http://tools.medialab.sciences-po.fr/iwanthue/ <comment><USER2> I really like the interaction and flexibility, but I failed to generate a set of colors as nice as those provided by Color Brewer (<http://colorbrewer2.org/>). Sure, Color Brewer doesn't dynamically generate color schemes, but the set of colors it provides looks damn good in just about any context. I might use this new app in cases where I need more than 12 colors (Color Brewer's limit), but I don't think dynamic color scheme generation adds much. The JSON and CSS exports do seem very useful, however, and a big improvement over Color Brewer's interface.

<comment><USER3> Here are Color Brewer palettes in CSS and JSON: <https://github.com/mbostock/d3/tree/master/lib/colorbrewer>

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is really nice! And attractive.

One of the reasons I'll probably stick with ColorBrewer palettes for now is that I can easily find color schemes that are safe for people with colorblindness or for display in particular environments.

<comment><USER5> I appreciate this. For a deficiency that affects so many men, I'm always dismayed by the lack if awareness.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Cool! I also really like <http://colorschemedesigner.com/>

</comment><comment><USER7> It's interesting they've started this médialab in Science Po, which is (as the name implies) a social sciences _university_ [0] in Paris [1].

Looking at the team [2] the name of Bruno Latour as a director seems a bit out of place. After his controversial views on the social construction of science [3] I find it astonishing that he is put at the head of the department that is in charge of bridging the world of the social scientists with that of the quantitative methods and hard sciences.

[1] Grande école actually.

[0] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sciences_Po>

[2] <http://www.medialab.sciences-po.fr/en/team/>

[3] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruno_Latour#Laboratory_Life>

<comment><USER8> I don't see Latour as a particularly bad choice for bridging those worlds. One of his main points is paying close _empirical_ attention to both how scientists actually work, and how non-human things work. Unlike a lot of humanities theorists of science, he actually went into laboratories and wrote down what seem like pretty honest accounts of what he found there. He's fairly controversial among pure social constructionists partly as a result. For example, he had a dispute with David Bloor some years ago [1] over Latour's insistence on including nonhuman objects in his explanation of how science works (rather than treating science as a purely social process). More recently, he's been attacking the tendency, born of the legacy of critical theory, to treat intellectual activity as a series of de-maskings of something the scholar will always find to be "naive" [2].

I mean, the last thing we should want, as scientists, is to have blind faith in a quasi-religious, idealized view of how science works, rather than empirically investigating how it actually works. Plus he seems pretty interested lately in tying in some philosophical ideas with quantitative network-analysis methods: [http://www.bruno- latour.fr/sites/default/files/123-WHOLE-PAR...](http://www.bruno- latour.fr/sites/default/files/123-WHOLE-PART-FINAL.pdf)

[1] Bloor's attack on Latour, [http://reclus.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/bloor-anti- latour....](http://reclus.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/bloor-anti-latour.pdf), and a reply, [http://www.melissa.ens-cachan.fr/IMG/pdf/latour_- _reponse_a_...](http://www.melissa.ens-cachan.fr/IMG/pdf/latour_- _reponse_a_bloor.pdf)

[2] <http://www.pathguy.com/Latour.pdf>

<comment><USER9> This probably isn't the place to have a debate on Latour, but let me just say that it is possible to read him unsympathetically (as Sokal does) or sympathetically, to try to understand the viewpoint he is trying to get across. I've found it worthwhile to do the latter, but YMMV.

<comment><USER8> I more or less agree. I used to have a more negative view, but I realized that what you get from Sokal et al is a fairly inaccurate and biased reading.

Actually, while I thought the Sokal hoax itself was brilliant, I'm in retrospect quite disappointed by his follow-up book. It reads like a bit of a lazy hatchet-job by someone trying to put together an "attack" piece without having read the stuff he's attacking, and certainly not trying to read it sympathetically.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I've used something similar in matlab, which I though worked a little better. It started out with red green blue, colors frequently considered maximally distinct, at least on color monitors for the non-colorblind. Then it just found maximally distant points in the color cube. I found it worked nicely and you could also seed it with your own starting color(s).

Edit: found out it is based on Lab color space.

<comment><USER11> I'm no color expert but I'm pretty sure color distance in RGB space is a pretty poor metric compared to other color models (at least some of them). Looking at an RGB color cube I see big splashes of near-identical colors while the entire spectrum of oranges is hard to even find.

<comment><USER10> Looking closer, it uses the Lab colorspace. Here is what I was using: <http://www.mathworks.us/matlabcentral/fileexchange/29702>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I prefer <http://www.colorschemer.com/online.html> and <http://www.workwithcolor.com/hsl-color-schemer-01.htm>

</comment><comment><USER13> As someone who has put together figures for a scientific paper, I can safely say that the last thing I want are a wide-range of colors to use. Many people are color-blind, and many people print on black & white printers. So when I design the figures, I stick with pure colors. Pure red (255,0,0) or pure green (0,255,0) or pure blue (0,0,255). I suppose it would be smarter to design a set of color codes where even if someone were missing one of the three color receptors in their eye, they would still be able to discern each individual color as distinct. Perhaps (128,128,0), (128,0,128), (0,128,128).

<comment><USER14> This will sound snarky, but there's just too much that's wrong with this comment to let it stand. For people reading this: please don't do any the above.

Go here for good color scales and spare yourself the risk of getting it all wrong: <http://colorbrewer2.org>

If you're going to not use colorbrewer, please, either know what you're doing (and if you're reading this comment, you don't) you either stick with black and white, or you at least use orange and blue (orange and blue is a combination that's safe with most common types of color-blindness, and also tends to separate well in black-and-white conversions).

Just as importantly: don't try to guess what colors look like for colorblind people, either (and don't do it in RGB space like the original post suggested either! RGB is a device-centric coordinate system; please use something like Lab or Luv). The rightest, simplest way to simulate different types of color blindness is to use define 2D affine subspaces of Lab space, like here: [http://www.inf.ufrgs.br/%7Eoliveira/pubs_files/CVD_Mass_Spri...](http://www.inf.ufrgs.br/%7Eoliveira/pubs_files/CVD_Mass_Spring/CVD_Mass_Spring.html) (figure 2, in page 3)

<comment><USER3> Are there any particular resources you'd recommend on getting to know this stuff?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Aw, so sorry to tell you but it doesn't work in the latest version of IE. I'm not even sure if you should bother trying to get it to work but at minimum just put up a message to IE users telling them to use another browser.

</comment><comment><USER16> Great tool, it heavily uses chroma.js

<http://vis4.net/blog/posts/avoid-equidistant-hsv-colors/>

<https://github.com/gka/chroma.js>

The HCL color space is also available in this d3 module: <https://github.com/d3/d3-plugins/tree/master/cie>

</comment><comment><USER17> This is an interesting tool, it fails at 16 colors. Which is surprising. (it may be the gamut of my display of course but I would think 16 would be within its abilities). That is probably the most number of distinct colors I've needed in a graph. Works nicely for numbers 10 and below.

<comment><USER18> Hmm...the linked page worked for me on several tries for 16, 20, and 22 colors, even restricting the luminance somewhat.

I used the protovis categorical colors (<http://mbostock.github.com/protovis/docs/color.html>, see at the bottom of the page) when I needed a 20-color map recently.

<comment><USER17> Those are nice, I've bookmarked the protovis ones. Re-running my experiment, I seem to get two nearly identical magentas or two nearly identical greens every time I re-roll. It is entirely possible its my monitor though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Great work! Is there already an API to use? It would be great to use it directly and credit this website for the algorithms used. The dynamical palette would become very useful in that case.

</comment><comment><USER20> Is it hard to automatically generate a large (say 100+) palette of colors of increasing intensity that go well together? Do you have pointers to any algorithms for this?

</comment><comment><USER21> The color section (after creating a palette) looks very similar to <http://www.colourlovers.com/colors>

</comment><comment><USER22> Recently I was looking for something like this for a visualization. I had to find 16 nice looking distinct colors, which turned out to be pretty hard. Thanks!

</comment><comment><USER23> Ohhh man I feel like I have been waiting years for this to exist

</comment><comment><USER24> Love this, even just for website palettes. Nice work.

</comment><comment><USER25> Lovely UX, more like this please.

</comment><comment><USER26> I'm glad it's not a Mordekaiser circle jerk.

</comment><comment><USER27> Any solutions for colour blind scientists?

<comment><USER28> Check out <http://colorbrewer2.org/></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Review my startup (tool for social network power users) - <AUTHOR>

Hi,
A couple of months ago I launched a "field trial" of my startup (http://welshare.com). It's a project I'm doing on the side (I'm working as a full-time Java developer) and it's a tool for social network power users (like me).
Since then I've been using it extensively, fixing some issues and adding some features. But that's about it - I don't have more than 10 users using the service. So I might say I've just launched it.
I've shared the technical details in my blog: http://techblog.bozho.net/?p=346
I created it because I was trying to find a tool that does all I want, and couldn't find any. There are many tools out there - tweetdeck, hootsuite, seesmic, etc., but they either have a different focus (business users) or they lack features other than the basic ones.
What I need to do now is obtain validation. Whether the thing would really be useful to more people than just me, and whether it is a good product in its current form.
I would also like to get your feedback on how to improve it. Thanks in advance. <comment><USER2> Clickable: <http://welshare.com></comment>


Earth and Moon as seen from Saturn - <AUTHOR> https://plus.google.com/u/0/113118420661689340672/posts/7cFLNEWZxVj

<comment><USER2> may anyone explain why earth is shining like a star? is it reflecting the sun beam?

and why no stars on the background?</comment>