Elon Musk: 'Europe's rocket has no chance' - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-20389148 <comment><USER2> This shouldn't be a controversial statement. The Ariane 5 is one of the more expensive launch vehicles on the market right now. It's telling that CNES/ESA has brought the Soyuz to Guiana for launches, because it is massively cheaper than the Ariane 5.

2013 is going to be the defining year for SpaceX, I think. They've already proven that they are rather uniquely capable in banging out rockets and spacecraft that work at a tremendously low cost, but 2013 will prove their operational mettle, especially for commercial launches. It will show whether or not they can meet schedules, launch reliably, and maintain their existing cost structures. And if they do all of that, they will gain the trust of the people who hold the purse strings of the world's satellite launch budgets (although they already made a tremendous first effort in that regard).

More so, the Falcon Heavy and the Falcon 9 v1.1 are a much bigger deal than people give credit for. Things like the "grasshopper" Falcon 9 first stage reusability test-bed and the manned Dragon capsule development gain a lot of attention, but the v1.1 and the heavy are going to be the crowbars that utterly disrupt the spaceflight industry.

See, with Falcon 9 v1.0 they are already on a dramatically different cost structure. With v1.1 they will reduce their manufacturing costs, increase reliability, and increase the payload capacity by about 40%. This will make it a lot easier to do dual and multiple launches at extremely competitive prices. Also, it will allow them to underbid the competition incrementally while raking in massive profits. The Falcon Heavy will use just under 3x the components of a Falcon 9 v1.1 but it will have nearly 5x the payload capacity. This means that it can do multiple launches for crazy cheap. Also, it will be a pretty tempting target for governments to use for manned spaceflight. For example, it could be capable of sending a manned capsule into lunar orbit, which would be super useful for any sort of activities NASA decides to perform out there. Additionally, it might encourage folks to develop extremely massive payloads (next generation commsats or manned space station components) which are incapable of being launched by any other vehicle. SpaceX is rapidly moving into territory where they are untouchable. Already no other company (and no government either) can return large cargo from the ISS, for example. Soon they will be the only commercial company capable of sending astronauts into orbit. And just as soon they will be the only launch provider capable of putting 50 tonne payloads into LEO or 10 tonne payloads into GEO or on an interplanetary trajectory.

<comment><USER3> > it will allow them to underbid the competition incrementally while raking in > massive profits

I never thought of SpaceX as being something Musk was in for the money (based on interviews with him that I've read), but it sounds like if he can significantly lower costs and keep his technology secret, incrementally underbidding the competition will make him extremely rich.

<comment><USER2> You have to think about it several ways. The more profit they rake in the easier it will be to stick around. Also, the more they'll be able to spend on R&D for manned spaceflight, reusable launchers, future redesigns, Mars missions, etc. Apparently they're working on a next gen rocket engine which will probably be much larger and powered by methane and oxygen, which they might use as the basis of a super heavy lift launcher which would make manned Mars missions almost easy.

<comment><USER4> The big picture for Musk and SpaceX is Mars. The more profitability yields more R&D. The more R&D yields more capable rockets. The more capable rockets yields a better pathway to Mars. It's pretty much spelled out at the SpaceX website.

<comment><USER5> While that's all true, a Mars mission can't possibly funded by SpaceX itself, which means he's going to have to convince Congress or some international consortium that it's worth doing at probably $1T.

I don't see that happening. Space buffs are all excited over SpaceX (with good reason), but the general public has pretty much lost interest in manned space. Manned launches to the ISS don't even make the general news anymore despite NASA's rather formidable PR machine. The first manned Dragon launch will make the news, but only the first.

Politicians (particularly presidents) keep proposing Mars missions but always push funding decisions far enough into the future someone else is going to have to deal with paying for it. The public has caught on by now, so every new Mars mission proposal is greeted with a collective yawn.

<comment><USER6> The idea that a Mars mission would cost on the order of $1T is absurd. More reasonable estimates place it around $50 billion. The rest of your comment is ridiculous as it's based on such an absolutely outrageous estimate. SpaceX could probably do it alone if they have to. For example, Apple has enough in the bank to afford it alone right now. And we're talking about 10-15 years of SpaceX development and revenue before a Mars mission. Also note that most Mars mission costs include R&D to build a rocket to go there, of which SpaceX has _already_ done huge amounts.

Your figures are absurd FUD. Space travel is nowhere near that expensive.

<comment><USER5> >Your figures are absurd FUD. Space travel is nowhere near that expensive.

This is what I hate about space enthusiasts. You do a back-of-the-envelop calculation ignoring all the political wrangling, the on-again, off-again political support, the inevitable development setbacks, etc. In other words, you ignore the cost drivers of every single other space program in history and come up with a number that's an order of magnitude (at least) too low. If you actually got political approval for such a thing taxpayers would (justly) feel hoodwinked as program costs spiral upwards. It would be lucky to survive to completion.

Based on other big government projects (like the F-22, for instance), the $1T figure is probably a little on the low side. The idea you could send people to Mars and bring them back for $50Bn, less than it costs to build a HSR line from LA to San Francisco, is sheer stupidity.

<comment><USER6> The mission we're talking about _does not require political support_. All of your arguments stem from big government waste, taxpayer indecision, etc. And you'd be right, if we were talking about NASA. _But we're not_. Why are you comparing daring space missions to rail or airplanes?! How about comparing to other space missions? Take the Apollo program. The entire program, with _six_ moon landings, cost about $100 billion in 2010 dollars, and it was done half a century ago.

We have momentum, private industry that is not tied to taxpayer whims, and a half a century of technology and advancement. Yes, Mars is tougher than the Moon - but not _that_ much tougher. Space travel just isn't as expensive as you think it is. Not anymore.

<comment><USER5> >We have momentum, private industry that is not tied to taxpayer whims, and a half a century of technology and advancement.

That's a pipe dream. For private industry to do this there has to be a profit motive, and in this case there isn't. There's no way you can make money going to Mars, and getting sponsored by Red Bull isn't going to defray the costs much. When Elon Musk says Mars is the goal, he means he's intent on providing a capability the rest of us will be expected to pay for.

>Yes, Mars is tougher than the Moon - but not that much tougher. Space travel just isn't as expensive as you think it is. Not anymore.

There's a hell of a lot more to a Mars mission than getting everything to Mars. We couldn't do it today even if the rocket was free. And it won't be.

Even beyond the obvious engineering problems there are still a lot of things we just don't know how to do in the constraints of the vessel. We have no practical way of protecting the crew from the radiation they'll be exposed to, for example. We don't know how to build an environmental system that guaranteed (more or less) to work for five years. We don't know how to keep astronauts in good physical and mental condition over those kinds of time frames. The list is endless.

Mars is like Apollo in the same way an Everest ascent is like camping in your back yard. You are grossly underestimating the difficulty of what you're proposing, which is why you find your tiny cost estimate credible.

<comment><USER6> > That's a pipe dream. For private industry to do this there has to be a > profit motive, and in this case there isn't.

A ridiculous proposition. Anyone who can not think of a potential profit motive for going to Mars isn't thinking very big or very long. Making a list is left as an exercise to the reader.

> When Elon Musk says Mars is the goal, he means he's intent on providing a > capability the rest of us will be expected to pay for.

For colonization, yes. But that's fair - and it ties to a profit motive ("Live on Mars, for the price of a middle-class home!" the ad campaigns may go). But for the initial trip, whereby he proves his company and technology? Surely not.

> Even beyond the obvious engineering problems there are still a lot of things > we just don't know how to do in the constraints of the vessel. We have no > practical way of protecting the crew from the radiation they'll be exposed > to, for example. We don't know how to build an environmental system that > guaranteed (more or less) to work for five years. We don't know how to keep > astronauts in good physical and mental condition over those kinds of time > frames. The list is endless.

That's what the $50 billion and more-than-a-decade is for.

> Mars is like Apollo in the same way an Everest ascent is like camping in > your back yard.

I'm not going to even answer that. So absurd.

> You are grossly underestimating the difficulty of what you're proposing, > which is why you find your tiny cost estimate credible.

You are the only one on the planet who I have heard of who suggests the cost would approach anything near $1T. It is you who is way off the mark when compared to professional estimates.

<comment><USER7> > But for the initial trip, whereby he proves his company and technology? > Surely not.

So far, he hasn't even proven an ability to do that _in earth orbit_ without taxpayer money: SpaceX is almost entirely funded by government contracts. Wouldn't you want to see them prove financial independence there first, before speculating on whether they can get to Mars without taxpayer money? It might be possible, but so far the evidence for SpaceX being a viable concern purely on private-sector funding is weak imo.

<comment><USER6> > So far, he hasn't even proven an ability to do that in earth orbit without > taxpayer money

So far, no human has been put in orbit without taxpayer money, anywhere. That's the past, though. It would be silly to suggest that because that's the way things used to be, that things will always be that way. Or else, everyone could make that argument about every endeavour by every company, and you'd be stuck in an argument that _ONLY_ governments will ever be able to put humans into orbit. And of course that's nonsense.

> SpaceX is almost entirely dependent on government contracts.

False. Wouldn't you want to see their launch manifest first, before speculating on where their money comes from?

<http://www.spacex.com/launch_manifest.php>

<comment><USER7> Bills aren't paid by counting up _numbers_ of customers. Of those customers listed, most are small-fry, kicking in a few million here and there, while NASA is the main source of cash. Over the 10 years of SpaceX's existence, NASA has put in approximately as much money as _all_ other funders (Musk, his investors, and every non-NASA customer) combined. Private-sector customers account for less than 30% of revenues.

<comment><USER8> In other news, customers are customers, and government customers count.

<comment><USER7> In this case the money they're receiving is closer to grant money than payment from a customer. But in any case, the further-up-the-thread post was just arguing that whether SpaceX will go to Mars (or anywhere else) depends in significant part on convincing their one dominant "customer", the U.S. Federal Government, to spend taxpayer money on the goal. The alternative, funding a trip to Mars entirely from private-sector funds and private-sector customers, does not appear so far to be close to materializing, considering that they haven't even successfully funded a trip to low-earth orbit via that means.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Its hopeless for the ESA. On one hand you have a super nimble startup vs a nationalized industry whose decisions makers span different countries, all of whom have a political dog in this fight. SpaceX's biggest advantage isn't Musk or its team, its that its not hamstrung by the Congress and Senate on how to do things and historically their demands to move pork into their home states.

Nor is the air force demanding design requirements like they did with the shuttle.

Too many cooks for the ESA.

<comment><USER10> This comment would be a lot more worthwhile if you could point to _specific_ instances.

It's not that I find it terribly implausible, but I really get sick of rhetoric thrown around without any supporting details. As is it's just an anti-government rant.

<comment><USER11> IIRC, parts of the shuttle were manufactured in about 400 different electoral districts of the USA. It's extremely unlikely all the best prices were that evenly distributed.

<comment><USER12> Indeed the infamous o-rings sealed connections between pieces which logically wouldn't have been separate.

<comment><USER13> I believe this is incorrect. If I remember correctly, transport was not the only issue with building the solid rocket boosters in one piece: physically pouring a solid rocket motor of that size was infeasible.

<comment><USER12> I of course don't remember the details so I looked them up. Here's an interesting document that doesn't actually go into the fundamental question of why the engines were built in one place, partially assembled in another, then snapped together in a third:

[http://www.cedengineering.com/upload/Ethics%20Challenger%20D...](http://www.cedengineering.com/upload/Ethics%20Challenger%20Disaster.pdf)

The point being that if the rockets were welded and fueled near the launch pad there would have been no need for o-rings. The reason for o-rings was that cylinders full of fuel needed to be shipped around and welding them together would have meant too big a lump of explosives. Casting a big engine had nothing to do with it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It's cute that ESA tries to claim SpaceX will get more expensive and less reliable as they scale up to (sort of) mass production. Uh, no. If you're going for FUD, at least be plausible.

More likely would be "SpaceX might go out of business if the market softens or they hit serious technical problems, whereas EADS can guilt European governments into funding it indefinitely" (true) or "SpaceX won't customize launchers for unique European requirements" (wtf) or "EADS allows Europeans to maintain employment and skills in critical launch industries in the event ICBMs become necessary" (I really hope this is never the reason...).

<comment><USER7> > "EADS allows Europeans to maintain employment and skills in critical launch > industries in the event ICBMs become necessary"

EADS is the world's 2nd-largest producer of missiles, and produces a pretty large proportion of European militaries' missiles, so not entirely implausible. Of course, they could refocus: most of the missiles (the French Exocet, the British ASRAAM, etc.) are not ICBMs and don't share all that much technology with space launches.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> It may be a bold claim, but he is making a falsifiable statement.

(yet IMHO he is right - things are quite messed up in Europe at the moment - in France mostly)

However matching french Guyana launch site geographical advantage and infrastructure, and European funding, to Elon Musk ships could be a winning move.

</comment><comment><USER16> I was really pretty pessimistic about space travel when NASA announced they would shift some of their duties to the private sector, but Elon Musk has really made this idea exciting in the same way he did with electric cars. It really makes me believe that companies need a strong personality like his or Jobs' to get the public excited about new/revitalized sectors.

</comment><comment><USER17> "The upgrade of Ariane 5 - known as Ariane 5 ME"

I have a bad feeling about this…

<comment><USER18> "Take ME home"?

<comment><USER19> Windows ME

<comment><USER18> Yeah, that was the slogan.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Haha,

"12 years"

"soon as that"

"I don't want to be so old that I can't go" (to mars)

This guy does so much, so right. Unlike most people in high positions he doesn't seem to have a negative side at all. (not that it really matters too much if he did, its just really interesting.)

</comment><comment><USER21> ESA is in a difficult situation to compete with a privately owned, agile, startup in spirit company. I suspect ESA is not much different to NASA in operation. And as Musk pointed out, the latter has two major problems: 1) fear of innovation and 2) inefficient production. First is a catch 22 where no components can be used in space unless proven to work in space. Second is multiple chains of subcontractors until you reach a manufacturing process. It's fine tuned to cash extraction, not product efficiency.

I looked up some numbers. Falcon 9 costs about $5k per kg to launch. Falcon Heavy is expected at almost $2k. While competitors run at $10k and more. The only viable competitor seems to be the Russians with their trusted Soyuz and Angara series, currently in development.

</comment><comment><USER22> Just curious...can someone knowledgeable in these matters comment on how the Indian GSLV ( [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geosynchronous_Satellite_Launch...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geosynchronous_Satellite_Launch_Vehicle) ) compares to the SpaceX rockets?

</comment><comment><USER23> This is slightly off topic, but I would just _love_ to know how Musk manages his time. He has the same number of hours as the rest of us - how does he divide them between his personal research and actually getting stuff done? What percentage does he spend on marketing versus engineering, PR versus logistics, and on and on... Man I would love to have a drink with that guy. There has been no other contemporary person in any sphere of human endeavour I have been so fan-boyish about.

</comment><comment><USER24> With the grasshopper technology the cost of a flight to orbit basically is the cost of rocket fuel, which is 1% of the total cost of the flights currently going into orbit. That is 100x cost savings.

<comment><USER25> Even airlines flights aren't the cost of fuel. It's a promising technology, but it isn't _that_ promising.

<comment><USER26> They are mostly fuel and wages of (frequently unionized) employees. For example, numbers for Southwest for the last quarter, of the total $4.2 bil expense:

Fuel: $1.5 bil

Salaries: $1.2 bil

Depreciation + Maintenance: $0.5 bil (basically all airplane related expenses)

So, maintenance expenses are only 12% of the total, while fuel is 35% and salaries 28%.

If the cost of fuel in orbit launches was indeed just 1% of the total cost, then compared to air travel those launches are very inefficient and there may be a huge room for improvement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> My understanding is that one of the key advantages that Ariane has over it's rivals is it's launch site near the equator (<http://www.arianespace.com/spaceport-intro/overview.asp>). Is this saving negated by other factors, when compared to SpaceX?

<comment><USER2> That's only an incremental advantage. Note that SpaceX also has an equatorial launch site but they haven't used it since the Falcon 1 because it's just not as practical as operating out of Florida/California.

Comparatively, SpaceX is operating a much simpler rocket that is manufactured much less expensively than the Ariane 5, by about a factor of 10 or so.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> How about the ESA just starts using Falcons - then the prices will go down even further and they can focus more on actually putting good stuff in space rather on how to do it...

</comment><comment><USER29> ESA has to battle its 'cash cow syndrome'. This is going to be interesting.

</comment><comment><USER30> Actually, he was apparently misquoted: <https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/270776170184847360>

</comment><comment><USER31> no comments on the recent VEGA thingy? Was that DOA ?

<http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMBTKYXHYG_index_0.html>

<comment><USER32> 1,5000kg to LEO doesn't put it anywhere near F9 or FH.</comment></comment>


The Super Rich of Silicon Valley Have a Doomsday Escape Plan - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2018-rich-new-zealand-doomsday-preppers/?srnd=technology-vp <comment><USER3> >"It's become one of the places for people in Silicon Valley, mostly because it's not like Silicon Valley at all,"

Well folks, the writing is on the wall. Ask Denver and Austin what happened when people from CA figured out that their place was a nice place. I hope the kiwis enjoy it while it lasts. I'm only half joking here.

The article was a fun, if crazy, read. I guess the super-wealthy of silicon valley haven't figured out that survival when things get bad is heavily correlated with your social capital, something they don't seem to have much of. Being holed up in a bunker with a bunch of gold bars and guns won't help you if everyone outside hates you.

<comment><USER4> > Well folks, the writing is on the wall. Ask Denver and Austin what happened > when people from CA figured out that their place was a nice place.

I see CA license plates everywhere with an accompanying Uhaul. CityData and bloggers are REALLY screwing up this country.

A plea to any CA'ers about to move. SLOW YOUR DRIVING DOWN AND FIT IN - <USER2> BRING CA ATTITUDE WITH YOU. (it was hard to write that without expletives)

<comment><USER5> Where do you think most of the people in the Bay Area came from in the first place? There are few natives here.

<comment><USER4> Mostly? Large cities, East coast. I don't think you can explain the population explosions in some of the towns I come across as people moving back home. We're getting second move effects at this point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I am looking forward to the Netflix series, the trip to the Nevada airfield and ensuing drama of who makes it onto the plane would be enough for one full season.

</comment><comment><USER7> Here's another way to read this: to theorize about these hypothetical scenarios and how to escape is a way of displacing the fear and sense of responsibility that goes with the rampant inequality they have succeeded by. A nano machine uprising carries a lot less responsibility than an economy exorbitantly tilted toward a lucky few.

<comment><USER8> Here "another way to read this: to theorize about these hypothetical scenarios and how to escape", then open business for rich people that will always feel fear from the poor people. Even if it is just poor people. Then you will make money!!!

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The part I find particularly sad is that the elite referenced in the article are very clearly self-aware that the issue is a Bastille day or some revolution against the 1% (realistically 0.01%) which is feeding their paranoia.

Rather than work to better society and contribute, they instead focus on their bug out plans and lobbying politicians to cut taxes further when they could avoid this by focusing on the extreme wealth inequality that makes these paranoid fantasies (that's what they really are) a reality.

<comment><USER10> the upside is if they are right a lot of the right heads will roll.

<comment><USER11> And a lot of the wrong ones as well. Mobs are not good at justice as history tells us.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I laughed when I saw the guns in the bag and on the moped. SV rich people, do you know how to aim and fire those weapons? Can you reload them? Clear a malfunction? Clean them? Can you quarter and clean the animal that you kill? Can you preserve the meat? Well, you might be able to or you might not...but rural people can.

Guns, like seeds and so many other survival items, are only useful if you know how to use them. Having a bodyguard that knows how to use guns isn't a solution, either. A bodyguard with a gun--in apocalyptic times--is your new boss.

Rich people would be better off hoarding ammunition, not G550s.

I've said this here before, but ammunition is the ultimate doomsday currency. It doesn't go bad and can be stored (properly) for decades. It can be traded. It can get you food by killing animals or taking it from those who have it. Ammo can be reloaded but not with gunpowder, so you will need to have a big supply of it or be able to trade something of value for it.

<comment><USER13> > Ammo can be reloaded but not with gunpowder

Primers are a much bigger problem.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> _...a bunker on the northern tip of the South Island that would accommodate about 300 people. The price: $35,000 a head.

That's a bargain compared with the most expensive bunker Lynch's Rising S has shipped to New Zealand — $8 million._

Back on earth, $10.5M > $8M.

</comment><comment><USER15> Can we fake an apocalypse to get them to go away?

<comment><USER16> PKD wrote The Penultimate Truth about that.

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

Unfortunately the wall won't stop the super rich from returning from Burning Man in their corporate jets.

[http://megagogo.co/](http://megagogo.co/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I upvoted this for the slick hypercomic intro before the article body, and now I'm going back to read the rest of the article. While reading it I might decide it's a crappy article, but it still has a neat intro, and other people seeing it and writing better articles (possibly including myself in this, someday) might be inspired by it to make more neat intros. I have to remind myself all the time that doing something in isolation is not much different from doing nothing at all, and therefore, presentation is important.

</comment><comment><USER18> Kiwi's weren't massively impressed by Peter Thiel buying his way in to NZ (and I doubt it would have happened if the current government were in power at the time).

[https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&...](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11883554)

</comment><comment><USER19> Why do most articles from Bloomberg that make it to the front page of HN are about "the rich" somehow screwing over "the people"? Like, that's the only kind I see here.

Regardless, the article is BS clickbait. Just because two rich idiots bought bunkers in New Zealand doesn't mean everyone who has property there is preparing for some doomsday scenario.

 _> "He has a go bag stuffed with a gun, antibiotics, batteries, water, blankets, a tent and gas masks."_

Rich people stockpile batteries! _Surely_ they they are planning for a world- wide proletariat uprising or bio-warfare Armageddon.

<comment><USER20> It plays very well with "the people".

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> The super rich have always had a good plan. Sell a basket of social goods and grant all of our tax money to themselves. Disenfranchise enough voters and gerrymander the crap out of the country so they stay in power regardless. This has been the plan for 40 years.

</comment><comment><USER22> If SHTF, will the infrastructure be available for 6000+ mile flights?

<comment><USER15> If you're gassed up and ready to go I guess you just take off right?

<comment><USER22> Assuming aviation fuel is available, and the runways are in working order, the USG hasn't shut down all flights, and you can actually get to your plane, then sure. But I don't think those are all a given if there is really a situation in America where people literally need to flee the country at a moments notice.

<comment><USER14> Do they really think the Kiwis don't have anti-aircraft guns? If USA goes to shit, none of us will be welcome there. Also as you hinted fairly few private planes are capable of that journey nonstop.

<comment><USER15> Are they going to shoot down a plane full of refugee billionaires?

<comment><USER5> If the shit really hit the fan, are they still billionaires? Or rather, does billionaire status still mean anything?

<comment><USER15> Would gold still have value? Would bullets be the new gold?

<comment><USER14> Refugees are easily separated from gold. 'Twere ever thus.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I'm not super rich, but I have a doomsday plan too: guns and lots of ammo. Bring it on, baby!

</comment><comment><USER24> What does SHTF really look like? An invading army? Some sort of nuclear exchange? Everyone losing their jobs and hyperinflation over the course of weeks/months?

What are some examples from history? The Japanese invasion of Manchuria? The great depression and WWII? Venezuela today?

Is the real story the psychological purpose these preparations serve? Is this a sort of Revelation of Saint John for atheists? A story of doom where some are saved to provide a sense of control in an increasing incomprehensible world?

<comment><USER5> I think this counts:

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

 _The Black Death is estimated to have killed 30–60% of Europe 's total population. In total, the plague may have reduced the world population from an estimated 450 million down to 350–375 million in the 14th century. It took 200 years for the world population to recover to its previous level._

A modern pandemic would spread much faster due to modern transportation, and while modern medical science would help at first, medical services would quickly become overwhelmed. If critical infrastructure starts failing due to lack of workers (either they are sick or staying home to take care of family or avoid the illness), then things will get much worse very quickly.

Assuming you escape infection, having a secure isolated bunker with a couple years of food may actually help you survive.</comment></comment>


Great Barrier Reef headed for 'massive death' - <AUTHOR> https://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2018/08/world/great-barrier-reef/ <comment><USER2> I met a coral researcher last year who said we just have to get over the fact that it's all over for coral as it exists now, and try to learn as much as possible from it so we can re-design it later ourselves. They were very calm about this suggesting they were way past the grieving period. It was quite shocking to me.

<comment><USER3> I'm pretty sure we can create artificial coral reefs in a controlled environment. They won't go extinct.

<comment><USER4> There are already attempts to do that.

There are a few corals which manage this.

But their not going extinct is not the problem.

The environment is like a jumbled stack of stilts holding up a house.

There's enough stilts that if a few of them get eaten by termites, there's enough redundancy to keep the house upright. The system is interconnected and deep enough to end up fine.

What're happening is that many supports are dead, others are rotten and still more are weakening.

This means that eventually, one support will collapse and set off a contagion. A collapse chain, similar to what happened during the 2008 crisis.

Reef collapse means a whole chunk of ecosystem dies - and it's never coming back in multiple human life times. This impacts every creature that depends on that ecosystem.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> We're going on holiday to the Great Barrier Reef in a few months. I think it's quite likely to be the first and last time I see it in any state worth visiting for many years.

Irrespective of how successful or unsuccessful the far-rights are in maintaining Australia's CO2 emission levels, I believe it's already too late - we've crossed from 'recovery is possible' to 'rebuilding is the only way' and that will take decades if not centuries.

/opinion

<comment><USER6> The far right have been advocating or at least partial to Nuclear power since as far back as the late Howard government in '07\. Cory Bernardi has a bill before the Senate right now titled "Nuclear Fuel Cycle (Facilitation) Bill 2017". France with nuclear remains the first world country with the cheapest, cleanest, and probably safest power.

There is no branch of politics committed to "maintaining Australia's CO2 emission levels". There is a branch that wants cheap, and a branch that wants specific technologies. And the status quo seems to be holding until Australia decides which option is better.

<comment><USER7> > France with nuclear remains the first world country with the cheapest, …

France had a nationalized electricity grid when it build its nuclear fleet. So, the demand side was nationalized (EDF), and they made sure to nationalize the supply side of nuclear as well (Areva).

This was probably the main reason why Nuclear is cheap in France: They standardized the design on the supply side (only two designs in 30 years) and they could deploy top-down without having to pay anyone to shut down the pre- existing plants (since they already owned them).

In a free market setting, nuclear is not going to be cheap.

<comment><USER6> > In a free market setting, nuclear is not going to be cheap.

Costs haven't stopped Germany trying to jump ship to solar, and that hasn't turned out half as well as France from an economic or environmental perspective. Australia is one close election away from the Greens pushing something similar on to us.

Australia is composed of unusually large, flat, desolate geotechnically stable areas. We produce large amounts of raw materials, including steel, and have some of the most extensive uranium deposits currently known about. We have a highly educated population.

The next time we have one of those big once-in-a-generation crashes and the government is looking for a great big expensive infrastructure project to soak up some excess capacity, it would be absolutely fantastic if a nuclear plant was at least on the cards.

Currently, it is banned. It is banned for no good reason. And banning something because the peanut gallery thinks it might be expensive is not a good move. And, and this is my central point in this thread, none of this is because the far right has an irrational love of coal.

<comment><USER4> What does nuclear power have to do with the coral reefs?

As far is know, it was ocean acidification which is killing corals, and then run off/pollution?

<comment><USER6> Not a huge amount; but I got riled up reading "the far-rights are ... maintaining Australia's CO2 emission levels". I sometimes get called far right in political discussion, and as far as I'm concerned Australia has a perfectly good option to lower CO2 emissions that is being blocked by the far left. I want to see more nuclear power stations, they look like a good idea to me.

There is a big coal mine in the works (Adani) and any outflows from that mine have some potential to add further stress to the reef ecosystem, so coal v. nuclear might be tangentially related there.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> As a Brisbane resident I've been lucky enough to visit the north central reef twice in the last 30 years. If you are a casual visitor (as I was) the damage is for many people, theoretical because you have no basis to compare, and the reef charter boats go to the best places you can find to see the best diversity. I know it's real. It harder too see and understand it's extent.

Also, much tourism runs in the northern-central reef, but the southern reef is actually visitable, if slightly less spectacular and less developed onshore for tourism and hospitality. You can still see a rich diverse reef from heron island or lady Musgrave. It's not as "wow" as up north.

TL;DR yes, the reef is highly damaged and in extreme danger. Come visit anyway: you'll have fun, you will still see a rich diverse ecosystem (albiet in stress and failing globally) and the reef community needs your dollars.

Its worse if you don't come visit.

<comment><USER9> How does visiting help?

<comment><USER10> Tourism dollars. The pollys would think more about saving it if money was on the line.

And it is a spectacular place to visit.

<comment><USER11> It doesn't matter, Australian politicians can't save the reef no matter what they do. The reef isn't dying because of pollution or whatever, it's dying because the ocean temperature is increasing and nothing we do will stop that in time.

<comment><USER8> All the more reason to visit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Why are those guys in the videos touching and tugging on the coral?

Quite certain that's a no-no, and setting a terrible example for others.

For reference, see "Coral Etiquette" [0]:

        Simply touching corals to see
        what they feel like can cause
        the death of an entire colony.
        Oils from your skin can
        disturb the delicate mucous
        membranes which protect the
        animals from disease.

[0] [https://sailhawaii.com/hawaii-wildlife/coral- hawaii/](https://sailhawaii.com/hawaii-wildlife/coral-hawaii/)

<comment><USER13> How could something that dies at a mere human touch have survived for so long?

<comment><USER14> That's a bit relativistic; no? How could something that dies at a mere gram of arsenic have survived for so long?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It first looked like after the last mass wipe-out 1998 corals adapted or new resilient variants took over:

[http://www.wri.org/sites/default/files/reefs_at_risk_3-1.jpg](http://www.wri.org/sites/default/files/reefs_at_risk_3-1.jpg)

But can they keep up with the change?

</comment><comment><USER16> Well, we've just had another "coup" here in Australia... our 6th Prime Minister in 10 years, so yeah there's definitely a steady hand on the tiller of Australian climate policy...

<comment><USER17> Oh, come on now. The previous prime minister Mal (and current deputy leader Josh) gave the great barrier reef $444m. They are doing their very best to save it.

I mean sure, the charity they gave it to never asked for it, and have only 6 people working for them. And of course they were good friends of the party, ex-exxon, ex-origin (gas fracking), ex-jbp (most corrupt gov in aus history). No oversight, no investigation, no input from the environment minister, just a big lump of cash... "for the reef". But they probably will do _something_ with it.[0]

[0] [https://newmatilda.com/2018/08/20/turnbull-govt-implodes- sti...](https://newmatilda.com/2018/08/20/turnbull-govt-implodes-still-making- policy-just-really-really-bad-policy/#attachment_57600)

<comment><USER18> It doesn't matter. There's no way that Australia could "save" the reef. At best, maybe they could bioengineer something that looked enough like a reef to keep tourists happy. Or maybe just replace it with plastic and stuff ;)

<comment><USER19> We could be global leaders committed to reducing green house gas emissions ASAP.

No we could not single handily turn the ship around, nobody ever said we could.

But we could be leaders and work hard for the greater good. Many many people have said we should do that.

<comment><USER18> Those are admirable sentiments. And it's great to be optimistic. But if the models are at all relevant, it's probably already too late.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Not that the headline exactly matches the article, but at this point is there any well educated forward-thinking person who _doesn 't_ think the planet is headed for a catastrophe?

The population of humans is booming.. and surely any intelligent person can see that eventually, at some point something will have to give. Maybe it will be when there are 10 billion of us, or 20, or 100, but surely, at some point something's going to break in a very big way.

<comment><USER21> UN world population projection for 2100 is 11.2B. Stop with the Malthusianism.

[https://www.un.org/development/desa/publications/world- popul...](https://www.un.org/development/desa/publications/world-population- prospects-the-2017-revision.html)

<comment><USER22> For 2050, they expected:

* in 1998: 8.9 B

* in 2006: 9.2 B

* in 2010: 9.3 B

* in 2012: 9.6 B

* in 2017: 9.8 B

That means that they constantly have to revise upwards their scenario because it does not happen as expected and the population grows each time faster. In 20 years, they had to add 1 extra billion people to their forecast...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Interesting article, but man is there a ton of bloat on that page. I could feel my phone heating up in my hand.

<comment><USER24> my 2007 macbook could barely load it.

<comment><USER25> I enable Reader by default on all websites (you can then opt out on those it does not play well with). Of course that's only if you use Safari.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Are there any studies on the contribution of Monsanto/Bayer pesticides on coral death?

</comment><comment><USER26> Is it just me, or does it seem like there is big business to be had in climate change and climate denial?

A lot of money appears to be flowing into these two camps.

<comment><USER27> The decidability factor is exploited by the side with skin in the game. Those that would be bankrupted by expensive restrictions on behavior, or restrictions designed to prevent such business entirely, know that they can point to unpreventable externalities like caldera volcanos and extinction event asteroids as a means to arm consumers with a toolkit to rationalize hedonism.

As if to say, live well now, because what if any of these other catastrophies strike, and obviate your life savings and insurance policies. You could have spent that money on good times today, but living with your means, and planning for a future that possibly doesn't exist will leave you kicking yourself during the rapture.

The other side also has existential skin in the game, in the sense that a destroyed inhospitable biosphere is the figurative eating of our only free lunch, and understands the optics of the decision, but hasn't come up with selfish motives to prey upon the undisciplined weakness of the unwashed masses. Mostly because such principles of psychological exploitation for personal gain (the joy of living in a world where the ice caps don't melt and unleash category six hurricanes on a monthly basis in every quadrant of the world) are unrelatable to their own motivations to good conduct.

This asymmetry of operations means an unfair fight, and thus a waiting game, each biding everyone's time until it's too late, but undeniable.

Until then, the level of money poured into this system is only equalized by the perception of threat on the part of the hedonists. The more they feel threatened, the more they spend to fight the shadow of the obvious truth that will ultimate rob them of all inaction anyway. They aren't even fighting their do-gooder counterpart. They're fighting their own capacity to continue typical behavior, with diminishing returns. Shooting themselves in the foot, to maintain a gun collection of foot guns.

<comment><USER26> I see, I was more referring to the people / think tanks and charity groups who are "raking" it in.

I am almost tempted to setup a research project to prove that climate change is making people's Cats more aloof. Maybe I will get some free money :)

Then I can setup another initiative proving that Dogs are consistently happy, debunking the cat /climate research.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> The sci-fi writer in me envisions a story about a future where humans exist, and there is only one species of fish in the ocean, and everyone is sick of eating it.

<comment><USER29> Apparently the medusas will eat whatever is left from the fish. They thrive in high acidity.

<comment><USER30> Ocean acidification frightens me more than climate change. Moving Miami is doable. Look at how fast Dubai was built. Sea walls and flood control are also things we know how to do. Ocean ecosystem collapse could be absolutely catastrophic and there is no mitigation.

<comment><USER31> In theory if you could mix the oceans faster (I know lol), you could begin dissolving the deposited calcium carbonate at the bottom and buffering the oceans with even more bicarbonate ions. Unfortunately this happens naturally on the time scale of centuries, which is super fast for geology but not great news for corals.

<comment><USER30> Maybe if we all collect our unused and expired baking soda...

<comment><USER32> Cocaine's a hell of a drug...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> The actual title of the article is: _Great Barrier Reef headed for 'massive death'_ , and that's what the article is about. There are only cursory mentions of climate change in general.

<comment><AUTHOR> The title on CNN's main page, from where I copied it, is precisely the submitted title.

Yes, I hate how media outfits use several titles for the same piece. Readable heading vs. HTML title tag (which the bookmarklet uses) is another discrepancy.

But I mostly hate it because you just know that someone on HN will not understand this reality and try to give you a hard time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Those that predicted "no catastrophe, business as usual" were outcompeted in the quest for catchy headlines!

</comment><comment><USER35> It's cognitive dissidents. We all know this is happening to every aspect of our enviornment and that we as humans are behind it. But of course we're not going to give up our material world, and we'll continue to disbelieve only because it threatens our very nature of the animal that minipulates materials. The planet isn't doomed, we are. We're creating conditions that are feeding back on us in a negitive way. We will be our own distruction; probably be creating a nice warm enviornment for some disease to mutate and run rampant, where the only humans left will be some isolated populations of humans. To Moburg in Hunter S. Thompson's "Rum Diaries, "The only animals to claim a god, yet behave the least lile they have one."

<comment><USER36> Fairly morose even for internet standards. The Earth is plenty capable of plunging into an ice age without human intervention. Also no matter what an asteroid is eventually going to destroy the earth or it will get swallowed up by some exploding star.

Those facts still should paralyze you. We are all plenty capable of improving the lives of ourselves and others today. What's stopping you?

<comment><USER18> Isn't that whataboutism?

None of those things are relevant for you and your children and grandchildren. But global climate change and ecological collapse almost certainly will be.</comment></comment></comment>


Hack - Getting a Scholarship to Law School that Doesn't Exist - <AUTHOR> http://www.cameronkeng.com/2012/05/03/creating-exceptions-getting-a-law-school-scholarship-that-doesnt-exist/

<comment><USER2> Well, its hard to say its a shortcut kind of hack to have to have been such an achiever before going to law school...

<comment><AUTHOR> True.. but, the audience here usually has at the very least the ability to achieve similar results or they've already done something equally impressive.

If this was to the general public, then it would've been a moot point. But, everyone here is generally exceptional. Thats why we stick around and read each other's nerdy stuff lol</comment></comment>


Google and Austin are hosting a shindig. Could Austin be getting Google Fiber? - <AUTHOR> http://gigaom.com/2013/04/05/google-and-the-city-of-austin-are-hosting-a-shindig-could-austin-be-getting-a-gigabit-network/

<comment><USER2> Grande has been pretty decent as a local ISP in my experience, though they're not available everywhere. But this should be much faster and better, and anything to chip away at TWC and AT&T is nice.

<comment><USER3> We just switched to Grande from TWC for our home internet and couldn't be happier for the service they provide at a fraction of the cost of our previous, slower TWC plan. That said, I think it will be hard to stay on Grande if Google Fiber really gets rolled out here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I wish I could afford to take a CS course at UT and get plugged into the culture there. Working in Austin would be amazing... and probably much more feasible (since it's a two hour-ish drive) than California.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Really hoping for Google Fiber here in Austin

<comment><USER5> Our whole office went crazy with excitement when we saw this article. I really hope it is fiber. I can't wait to get out from under I current ISPs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> This would be incredible, please happen!</comment>


AWS Certificate Manager Launches Private Certificate Authority - <AUTHOR> https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/aws-certificate-manager-launches-private-certificate-authority/ <comment><AUTHOR> Anyone else surprised by the cost? $400/mo is too much for a shared CA infrastructure.

Does anyone know of well priced alternatives for a private CA in the market?

<comment><USER2> Sounds like you get an HSM behind the scenes (rather than KMS for some reason) so that explains the cost.</comment></comment>


Intel's Kaby Lake CPU: The Good, the Bad, and the Meh - <AUTHOR> http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/intels-kaby-lake-cpu-good-bad-meh/ <comment><USER2> The author of this article says that Kaby Lake is an 'anomaly' when it comes to the tick-tock strategy that Intel has been following. However, this is not the case. Following the rollout of Intel's 14nm lineup, Intel realized that it was no longer feasible to move to a smaller processing node every 2 years. And so tick-tock died.

It is currently not expected that after Kaby Lake or the 14nm node, that Intel will move back to the tick-tock model. Kaby Lake is no anomaly - it's a normal architecture update in the post 14nm world.

<comment><USER3> I am all for such updates, especially when they bring new important features. For some reason people always think it's all about clock speed, performance, etc. It isn't. Kaby Lake new features introduce:

Native USB 3.1 Generation 2 (10 Gbit/s) support (personal favorite)

200 Series chipset (Union Point)

Support for 16 PCI Express 3.0 lanes from CPU, 24 PCI Express 3.0 lanes from PCH (LGA 1151)

Support for Thunderbolt 3

Support for Intel Optane Technology

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

<comment><USER4> You forgot HEVC 10-bit hardware decode, VP9 10-bit hardware decode

<comment><USER5> Does it mean support for h264 Hi10P profile too?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> What does it even mean for a processor to "not support Windows 7"? Does this mean it's not fully x86 backward compatible, or is this just marketing speak for "we have a strategic alliance with Microsoft, and they don't want you to run Windows 7, so we've put hooks into our hardware to prevent it"

<comment><USER7> Intel removed EHCI support for USB in it's chips with Skylake in favor of xHCI. This has been a long time coming and not a malicious or insidious act. Windows 7 doesn't natively have XHCI support and Microsoft isn't adding features to Windows 7. So, on Skylake, you can't install Windows 7 via USB and you can't use a USB keyboard or mouse during installation because the USB drivers are incompatible.

I suspect there are many other incompatibilities that exist and Microsoft has just drawn a line in the sand.

Hardware and software don't always evolve in lockstep. Sometimes new hardware arrives that breaks something or it doesn't keep up with the evolution of software. Microsoft has taken somewhat bizarre actions in the past to correct this situation when it happens.

In the 90s just a year after Windows 95 was launched you saw USB, AGP, UDMA, PCI and other hardware advances come to market. Windows 95 supported none of it. They released Windows 95 OSR2 to OEMs to add support for all the new hardware. Windows 98 was a long way out and they needed to take action to support new hardware or face being displaced in the market.

With all of the hardware advances of the late 90s and the rapid decline of the 16bit CPU, ISA, and a lot of other legacy systems, Microsoft wanted to make a clean break in the 00s. Windows XP wasn't going to support any of the old cruft of the 80s and early 90s. The problem was that in the years leading up to XP, OEMs refused to start shipping PCs that met the minimum requirements. They were still shipping with legacy hardware that wasn't compatible. So Microsoft stopped shipping Windows 98 and instead replaced it with the crap fest known as Windows ME. WinME was a rebranded Win98 with one key difference, it had all of the "legacy" drivers removed giving it the same minimum specs as WinXP. Unfortunately some of that legacy was so ingrained that WinME was incredibly unstable.

<comment><USER8> No way to add/override driver on pre-install stage ? (memories of 2K era setups)

<comment><USER9> Yes, you can still add drivers, however, someone (Intel probably) would have to release those drivers for Windows 7.

If they are built for Windows 10 and use Windows 10 kernel-mode APIs, they won't work on Windows 7.

However, I don't think Intel won't build drivers for Windows 7. It's against their own interest. Intel just wants to sell hardware.

<comment><USER8> I was thinking of a non corporate effort, maybe some people from the linux world. I don't think Intel cares because they surely have ties with MS ensure Win10 on Kaby Lake boxes.

<comment><USER9> In today's mobile world I'd guess most Kaby Lake boxes are sold to enterprise customers, who care a lot about Windows 7. It's just a guess though.

Porting/using as reference Linux drivers (a lot of which are written by Intel people anyway) to Windows just doesn't seem to happen very often. Technical difficulty aside, which is significant (I've written both Windows and Unix (although not Linux) kernel mode drivers for years), nobody seems to care about such things, so I wouldn't get my hopes up.

<comment><AUTHOR> One option could be running Linux as the host operating system on Kaby Lake hardware, then running Windows 7 in a VM where drivers would mainly need to support virtual hardware. CPU/microcode compatibility may still be an issue.

<comment><USER10> > then running Windows 7 in a VM

With the added benefit of being able to run on immutable disk images or to roll them back to safe states in case some malware decides to take residence.

<comment><USER7> My mom works for a health insurance company and all of their machines boot off immutable network images. The only downside seems to be longer boot times and immutable desktop icons.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This article is written by someone who clearly doesn't understand the industry well. And 10 nm for Intel is not directly comparable with 10 nm for TMC. Intel still maintains their fab lead by pretty much a whole process generation.

<comment><USER10> Can you explain the differences in a muggle-friendly way?

<comment><USER11> "TSMC's 10nm shrink would retain a 20nm minimum feature size, while its 7nm would deliver a 14nm minimum feature size (10/20 and 7/14, respectively)."[1]

Intel is the only company with a "true" 14nm and 10nm process.

[1] [http://www.extremetech.com/computing/228806-arm-announces- ne...](http://www.extremetech.com/computing/228806-arm-announces-new-artemis- cpu-core-first-10nm-test-chip-built-at-tsmc)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Microsoft could improve sales of Windows 10 by leaps and bounds by coming out with a No Analytics edition. They may think its a techy problem, but I keep having normal people tell me they won't upgrade because "it spies on you and snoops your credit cards". This is getting silly and stupid.

<comment><USER13> Those same people use Google and Facebook without any qualms. Microsoft should hire their marketing psych people.

<comment><USER12> I don't disagree, but it feels a bit different when its something you supposedly own. Frankly, some of the Facebook posts are a bit on the fringe side, but we're talking about PCs here so they're instruments of the Twilight Zone to begin with.

I keep thinking some Linux / BSD group would get it together and go for this still big market, but they are worse at marketing than Microsoft. I had such high hopes for ARM-based PCs.

<comment><USER10> You own the physical media. You are free to try to install it on your computer (and, if you have a PS/2 meyboard/mouse, that can even work)

> some Linux / BSD group would get it together and go for this still big > market

I don't think they'd be interested in writing Windows drivers and the NDAs they'd need to sign would probably end their careers in open-source. What you can do is to install a thin supported OS that can host VMs and install Windows 7 on one. Oracle's VirtualBox even has some support for GPUs.

<comment><USER12> Uhm... I must of really missed on that - I don't want them writing Windows drivers - I wanted someone to come up with an amazing alternative to Windows boxes for end users.

<comment><USER10> The ReactOS guys are trying.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> What's all this talk of "the CPU won't run Windows 7"? Is this just a confused blogspam site?

<comment><USER15> I believe it comes from here: [https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2016/01/15/windo...](https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2016/01/15/windows-10-embracing- silicon-innovation/)

"Going forward, as new silicon generations are introduced, they will require the latest Windows platform at that time for support....For example, Windows 10 will be the only supported Windows platform on Intel's upcoming "Kaby Lake" silicon, Qualcomm's upcoming "8996" silicon, and AMD's upcoming "Bristol Ridge" silicon."

<comment><USER14> This isn't saying anything either.

<comment><USER16> That clearly says that if you have a Kaby Lake CPU, you can only run Windows 10. Not 7. Not 8 or 8.1. Only 10.

<comment><USER17> The difficulty people have with the statement is that the relationship is inverted: it's Windows 7 which does not support the new processor. The processor does not have some explicit blacklist that prevents Windows 7 from running. Rather, the processor does things that Windows 7 was never designed to deal with, as Windows 7 is a decade old.

<comment><USER18> But can you run MS-DOS on it? Lilo? Grub? Does it no longer boot in 8086 mode?

If windows 10 is the only supported OS, why not get rid of 16bit real mode and 32bit protected mode, leaving only 64bit long mode as the only execution environment?

<comment><USER19> While Microsoft has been trying to push for being able to run 64-bit Windows without the 32-bit parts installed (starting with 2008 R2, the WoW64 bits are optional for Server Core), I'm pretty certain that you can't (yet) get a complete interactive environment using only 64-bit mode.

Just looking at the list of Microsoft applications currently running on my 64-bit Win10 desktop, there's still at least a half-dozen different Windows desktop services that are running in 32-bit mode - including the "Microsoft Bing Service".

I'm sure they'll eventually want to reach a point where they can cut that off, presuming that a hybrid approach like x32 doesn't turn out to have phenomenal benefits, but it's not yet here.

<comment><USER18> When I said removing 32bit protected mode, I meant the original 32bit protected mode which is now called "legacy mode". I believe you cannot exit long mode after enabling it, but there's a sub-mode in 64bit long mode that allows running in 32 bits - which is distinct from legacy 32bit protected mode.

I guess I should have said, "leaving only long mode" (which can be 64bit or 32bit)

<comment><USER19> Ah, my apologies.

I wonder how much they'd actually save, in die area, if they removed 32bit mode while leaving in the ability to run 32bit code in 64bit mode. If it's just decoding to similar microops with slightly different parameters depending on the mode they're returning to, probably not that much, except in the decoder itself...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> The linked website makeusof.com goes on the "never visit" list right next to Forbes.com due to a buzzing full screen with no close options ad.</comment>


The sunk cost fallacy: Devs describe how it almost destroyed them - <AUTHOR> https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/310063/The_sunk_cost_fallacy_Devs_describe_how_it_almost_destroyed_them.php <comment><USER2> And for every article like this, there's another article explaining how Apple got big because they insisted on perfection.

<comment><USER3> Relevance? You can seek perfection while ignoring sunk costs.

Avoiding the fallacy just means you compare the costs of reaching "perfection" from your current position to the value of reaching perfection. The cost you ignore is the cost you've spent to reach your current position, because that cost was incurred regardless of your decisions now.

<comment><USER4> On how to deal with sunk costs, Seth Godin once said [1]

"Everything you own, all the clothing in your closet, your academic achievements and beyond is simply a gift. It is a gift that your past self is giving to your present self, and it's up to you to decide whether you want that gift today.

It is as simple as that–you owe your past self nothing, other than the consideration of whether these gifts are helpful in the here and now."

I use this way of framing business decisions a lot nowadays. It's a very effective way of removing the emotional baggage that sunk costs come with, and focus on the actual goals you should be achieving.

1 [http://www.breakthetwitch.com/gift-past- self/](http://www.breakthetwitch.com/gift-past-self/)

<comment><USER5> I must admit, I've been put off Seth Godin recently.

But that quote you posted is something worth remembering.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> sounds like banner saga didn't need a ps vita port so much as it needed a vita re-implementation

<comment><USER7> Kinda sounds like it needed a performant reimplementation, period. This is what the game looks like. There's just a flat isometric plane of squares with animated sprites in it.

[https://youtu.be/OBsRPhCm5sU?t=899](https://youtu.be/OBsRPhCm5sU?t=899)

The Vita and the PSP both have a lot of tactical RPGs that are a _lot_ higher in complexity, with actual 3D environments as well as randomly generated ones (much harder to handle than pre-made hard-coded ones).

Compare with best-in-class on that platform: [https://youtu.be/nUhspS9VddQ?t=3539](https://youtu.be/nUhspS9VddQ?t=3539)

<comment><USER8> This reminds me of Binding of Isaac. The game kept getting re-written poorly so it never ran well on some devices, such as the DS.

<comment><USER7> Yep. That one i wanted to play, but never could, since it literally wouldn't run at 60 fps anywhere ever.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> What a painful process and with the promise of only a small return. It'd be better working for a bank or something.

<comment><USER10> Such is the wild life of a game programmer...

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I love throwing out code. It makes me feel clean. :)

<comment><USER12> Throwing out code is easy, throwing out hours you've spent investing into something is hard (e.g. learning, promoting, developing, money, etc).

These aren't technical issues with technical solutions, these are issues relating to people's egos and their willingness to throw out acquired skills and effort.

For one example, you could go from being the biggest expert in that area to being behind others just by turning against a technology you've helped spearhead. I've seen it happen (and people resist it who knew they'd gone down a dead end).

<comment><USER11> I fully get what you are saying, but pruning code is a valid thing to do on it's own, and it doesn't necessarily mean changing tech or whatever.</comment></comment></comment>


Anon Posts Silicon Valley Officials' Private Information Online - <AUTHOR> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/07/anonymous-attacks-oakland_n_1260403.html

<comment><USER2> Oakland isn't Silicon Valley. Fix the headline.</comment>


The OpenIndiana community - <AUTHOR> https://ezcrypt.it/Ig5n#fjJaG6fHivOZsKzHzwScxU2Q

<comment><USER2> The author of this post has not stated who he spoke to. I suspect he has spoken to a random from #openindiana on irc.freenode.net, who is not actually an active developer.

The OpenIndiana developers collaborate on #oi-dev on irc.freenode.net.

Also the Solaris kernel is excellent and has features that put it ahead of the game in many areas. Take Solaris Zones, the fully virtualised network stack (crossbow), the COMSTAR SCSI (iSCSI/FCoE) target framework, the Fault Management Architecture (FMA), along with a whole host of other advantages, put it significantly ahead of the game. Also thanks to Joyent the illumos kernel supports KVM, something FreeBSD does not.

</comment><comment><USER3> I spent just a few minutes in the OpenIndiana code base and found it rife with potential issues. For example, in the hsfs file system, there are no pointer assertions to protect against null pointers:

[http://src.illumos.org/source/xref/illumos- gate/usr/src/comm...](http://src.illumos.org/source/xref/illumos- gate/usr/src/common/fs/hsfs.c)

lines 158 thru 171... are just one example.

While yes, you could find this anywhere in any code base, we're talking about OpenIndiana. If this kind of issue is present in the file system handler, there's NO way this project is ready for prime time, never mind a production release.

<comment><USER4> The Solaris kernel isn't great. The only reason anyone's using Illumos based stuff is ZFS and possibly dtrace.

<comment><USER5> FreeBSD has good ports of ZFS and Dtrace now.

I still like Solaris for SMF, but I consider the policies of Oracle, and the ...uncertainty... of illumos to be important considerations.</comment></comment></comment>


Apples and PCs: Who innovates more, Apple or HP? - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2010/08/apples_and_pcs <comment><USER2> I think we need a better definition of innovation, how many releases of systems per period doesn't really cut it. Is a slightly faster clock cycle innovative?

<comment><USER3> You might be surprised to see how much innovation goes into getting a slightly faster clock cycle.

<comment><USER4> But how much value is there to the user?

I think Apple's biggest innovation is right there - that the checkbox mentality of marketing computers was in its heyday when Computer Shopper was 1500 pages every month, and has long passed.

Now people value

\- quality of the experience

\- having everything work the same

\- user-centric software

\- standards-driven software

I have 3 macs, but I also have 2 windows machines, and I much prefer the mac experience. I like that I have unix, and a apt-like package manager, rather than some windows "innovation." I like that I can print PDFs out of the box, rather than having to deal with some shareware. I basically feel like windows has now managed to require more "sysadmin-ing" than unix, somehow.

I keep the PCs for games. And that's about it.

<comment><USER5> > _the checkbox mentality of marketing computers was in its heyday when > Computer Shopper was 1500 pages every month_

That's not true ... I see lots of people still thinking about the best configuration for them, asking friends, searching on google, doing comparisons.

Companies like HP / Dell are still using checkboxes because it is a marketing strategy that still works for more than 90% of consumers.

And BTW ... Apple does not emphasize on experience, but rather on fashion.

> _I like that I have unix, and a apt-like package manager_

Yeah, that's pretty cool, but MacPorts is a far cry from being apt-like.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Right from the top, the article is all about the reporter. "Hey, remember those ads on TV? Not that I watch it or anything, I'm too busy using (parentheses)."

And what a strange concept of "innovation": whether the maker ships each Intel CPU.

<comment><AUTHOR> See my other comment: it's not actually 'innovation', but who ships quicker and cheaper with newer, fancier gear.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> This article had nothing to do with actually USING either a Mac or PC and at the points where to glance at user experience the statements are speculative at best. Their definition of innovation is numbers on the back of a box.

</comment><comment><USER8> And this is why I canceled my subscription to the economist.</comment>


How to solve a hard programming interview question - <AUTHOR> https://dailycodingproblem.com/2017/11/29/how-to-solve-coding-interview-problem.html <comment><USER2> IMO, the first thing one needs to do in order to be high functioning with challenge is take the mindset that it is ok to underperform in an interview session and not get a particular job. Taking the stress out and focusing on clarity of deep thought helps almost everyone in almost all situations (I hesitate to say everyone since some people do thrive under pressure).

It is one thing to read disciplined approaches to solving a problem - it is another thing to control oneself while under strong emotional states.

<comment><USER3> I find it useful to remind myself that I am interviewing them while they are interviewing me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > I often find it's not enough to just be able to solve the question; you > really need to vocalize your thought process.

I interview candidates regularly, and I can't overstate how important this is. If I ask you a hard interview question, and you sit silently for 10 minutes and then write out a perfect solution on the board without any discussion of how you got there, all I've learned is that you knew the answer. I have very little evidence for why I should hire you.

Talking through your problem solving out loud does not come naturally to a lot of people, but it's an important skill to master for interviewing (as well as for working through real problems in small groups).

<comment><USER5> Does it really matter though? What if I solve problems by eating a piece of toast? There's really no way you can understand how someone else thinks in an hour. All you're really going to look for is "Does this person think the same way that I do?"

<comment><USER6> I concur - it does matter.

I'm not looking for "thinks the same way that I do" \- I'm looking for "thinks". And specifically, how. I want to see you evaluate & discard ideas. I want to know that you quickly identified the "brute force"solution and discarded it, rather than sitting there for 10 minutes, not knowing how to even start.

You must realize, if the problem is hard, I don't even expect you to solve it. You're suspicious if you do. I don't have half an hour to sit on a single problem - that's not the purpose of the interview.

<comment><USER7> and that's what makes it ridiculous. In my whole career I have not been forced to vocalize hard problems on a whiteboard in one hour, getting judged for how good of a dog and pony show I put on with "evaluating and discarding ideas" on the fly, out loud, in an interrogation setup. This is so artificial. Not even close to how real teams work. My best ideas start to really form after thinking about a hard problem for days, including in off hours, background mode. Often I have to talk to many people, including non-programmers, to cover all angles of a hard problem.

These "hard interview problems" that must be solved through some artificially staged contemplation really are useful for two reasons:

* it's sadly the only way to quickly try to get a random reading of a person in a semi-standardized way while minimizing time commitment, kind of like fast food is the quickest way to fill oneself, and

* people who pass these at least demonstrate that they can drill/memorize or otherwise prepare for a challenging activity, which takes time and discipline, which in general are desirable characteristics

that's it, pretending like this in any way models real work or has any other benefits is not right.

<comment><USER8> That's why I think that interview challenges should be "easy". E.g. something like "Make a number guessing game."

1\. It's easy enough so you can talk and explain while solving it.

2\. It can show your ability to split problems into smaller subproblems.

3\. It maybe filters people that just memorize a bunch of solutions, since it's open how exactly you solve it.

<comment><USER6> Depends what you're testing for. If I'm testing for problem-solving skills, I will pick increasingly harder problems, until you can't solve them. I will judge you on how well you performed on the one you couldn't solve.

<comment><USER8> The problem is that you can't just solve the hard problems (e.g. those from hackerrack) like that by just thinking about it for some time (it would probably need hours or days of research).

You just have to learn and remember some obscure algorithm to solve them. That just filter for "unexperienced" people that have enough time to actually learn a lot of algorithms by heart.

I.e. that would be fresh graduates. But then you could just look at their uni grades, if you want people who are good at learning.

<comment><USER6> > The problem is that you can't just solve the hard problems

Which is why I said I don't expect them to solve the problem, I'm interested to see:

\- the general thought process \- whether the candidate is inclined to jump at the solution or clarify the problem (neither approach is "disqualifying", btw! but for a senior position I do kinda' expect the candidate to recognize when a specification is incomplete, and I will provide increasingly ambiguous problems/questions to see when he stops making assumptions) \- that the candidate is capable to identify some "leads"/ subproblems that need to be solved first/ to reduce the problem to a different one/ etc.

> But then you could just look at their uni grades, if you want people who are > good at learning.

If only it was so simple... some people are good at learning, they just don't have good grades (e.g. they have to work to support themselves and don't care much about some grades); while others are good at getting generally good grades without actually being good learners (extreme example: cheaters).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> A systematic approach like this or others (Gayle Laakmann Macdowell's BUD) seem to reduce the risk of underperforming, but I haven't had success with it. Instead, problem identification has been most helpful to me.

The approaches for solving Dynamic Programming problems are different than those that require a fundamental data structure (like a heap). Recognizing the heart of the problem is harder, probably what the interviewer is really testing for, and in my opinion differentiates oneself better than following a step by step guide.

<comment><USER10> Care to elaborate how do you go about problem identification?

<comment><USER9> Hm, here is an example:

// 1\. Explore the possibility of a recurrence relation. If the problem can be solved as a function of sub problems, then candidate techniques are DP, backtracking, greedy, and divide/conquer

// 1a. Explore DP. If it's DP, then optimal solutions of its subproblems are all that's necessary. Confirm that subproblems are repeated so that I can reason for memoization and later leave room for a bottom up implementation.

// 1b. Explore backtracking. If it's a backtracking problem, then I should be able to test for the viability of a partial solution quickly.

...and so on

<comment><USER11> I think your example can be simplified :)

Recursion + memoization provides most of the benefits of dynamic programming, including usually the same running time and well backtracking is recursion so the strategy can very well be -- Explore the possibility of a recurrence relation, if the possibility exists, try recursion :D

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Am I missing something, or couldn't you just merge the lists like you would in merge sort?

Begin with a pointer at the start of each list, find the minimum of the elements being pointed at and increment that pointer, until all pointers are at the end of their respective lists. You could possibly even do it in place.

That was my first thought anyway.

<comment><USER13> > find the minimum of the elements being pointed at

Can you describe how you would do this and talk about how it would impact the time complexity of the algorithm?

<comment><USER14> I would guess the time complexity is the crux with this issue: Without knowing the nature of what the algorithm is used for in practice, you're left guessing. If you assume continuous memory "lists", cheap comparisons and a relatively small set of lists, you're not necessarily wrong to pick a brute- force approach, since maintaining the heap will result in much bigger constant factors in the complexity formula (even due to prefetching and so on).

It's basically the same problem that peeks its head in every std::vector vs linked list discussion (and it's really amazing how many items you need before std::vector ceases to be a good pick for almost any problem).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The first question one should be asking is:

What relevance does the question actually have to do with the job in question?

The second question to ask is:

Will this be of benefit for the end-user population?

I find that I have no wish to join an IT related part of the organisation when it becomes obvious during the interview that they have no interest in serving the end-user community. They rather want to dictate what the end-user will be using, irrespective of all end-user needs.

So for many years, I have worked on behalf of the end-user to get them to a point that they can do their actual jobs. With the advent of large corporate IT systems, one has seen an increasing amount of null work being required of the company staff (its purpose is to feed the egos of management, instead of actually getting things done). What was that movie??

If what you are doing doesn't enable the end-user to be more productive then what on earth are you doing? Interviewers who are not focussed on building teams to solve end-user problems are failing in their jobs.

End rant.

</comment><comment><USER16> Scrolling down we are greeted with

>Only accepting 98 more subscribers.

>Subscribe for $9.99 / month

Which then slowly ticks down. I was very sceptical about this and refreshed and I found that it just resetted to 100 again and started ticking down again. In other words, it's just a timer.

I thought the article was of good value and that you provide a good service, but then this is contrasted by this scummy, predatory, and dishonest advertising trick.

Thoughts?

<comment><USER17> What about using some ad blockers? I only see text :)

<comment><USER18> I'm not sure what your point is. Parent says that the article signals it isnt credible by employing a dishonest sales tactic. Your answer is to ignore the potentially valuable signal?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I tend to find problems like this one, where the brute force solution is straightforward and then you can improve it by using a special data structure, easy. The ones I struggle with are the puzzle-like ones, where solving the problem depends on having some single flash of insight.

<comment><USER20> Conversely, if you just happen to know the answer because you saw it before, it feels a little bit like cheating. Quite honestly, I wonder how useful those kind of questions are to test someone's capacity to do the job.

<comment><USER19> Yeah, I do not think they are very useful. I know a lot of people, myself included, who perform worse than their true ability during interviews. It can be an anxiety thing, but also some people just prefer to take their time and deliver solutions in writing vs. work things out in real time on a whiteboard.

I think a good alternative is to give the candidate a nontrivial project that should take around 8 hours, and pay them a day's wage to do it.

<comment><USER21> That's better, but probably still not exactly indicative of real-world work... so much of on-the-job work is teamwork. Perhaps you could interview a group of candidates together and as a group assign a project that you know no one person could finish on their own, but would be manageable broken up. The people that form groups and work well together could presumably bubble up.

<comment><USER19> But then if one candidate is an asshole, they ruin it for everyone...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is the basic core of a sort-merge. It depends if the sorted lists are on disk (usually are with each about as big as memory), and how many you merge at once (which is about dividing all available memory into disk buffers, or the disk bandwidth, whichever is the bottleneck), and merging the memory resident lists using a treelike structure to be compute efficient. Also depending on the OS it can take parameter twiddling to achieve full sequential bandwidth.

If the lists are on other nodes, like in a petabyte sort, that's where it gets complicated because you need to recover from node failures during the sort.

</comment><comment><USER23> With all do respect, I think the author is missing an important point: he is talking about communication, but he seems to be the only one talking... IMHO you should first figure out why it's needed, and optimise for it's use case. F.e. if it's only used once a year and a simple merge+sort takes half an hour, it wouldn't be worth implementing it yourself.

IME good (10x?) developers are way more efficient because they reason from first principles: don't start from the solution space, but from the problem space, and optimise based on constraints and requirements.

<comment><USER24> Good engineering skills and good interviewing skills are not necessarily identical.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I tend to solve programming problems when I visualize them. So for me the steps are:

1\. Draw the input list on a sheet of paper

2\. Try some solution methods _on paper_ , writing them down so I can later re-examine them with new findings.

</comment><comment><USER26> In my experience, when interviewers do grade based on algorithmic performance, they want to see low time complexity, and care much less about space complexity.

In this example, you could actually accomplish the solution in linear time using a hashmap and keeping track of the min/max vals; O(max-min)

Something like...

      let map = {};
      let minVal = null;
      let maxVal = null;

      for (let a of arrays) {
        for (let v of a) {
          if (minVal === null) minVal = v;
          else minVal = Math.min(minVal, v);
          if (maxVal === null) maxVal = v;
          else maxVal = Math.max(maxVal, v);
          if (!map[v]) map[v] = 0;
          map[v]++;
        }
      }

      let result = [];
      for (let i = minVal; i <= maxVal; i++) {
        for (let n = map[i] || 0; n > 0; n--) {
          result.push(i);
        }
      }

      return result;

Haven't ran the above, just an example

<comment><USER27> But you have to quantify the max-min, cause it's quite easy for the data to make that way more expensive then "merge then sort". I.e., run your algo on [[0, 1000000000], [1, 2]]

<comment><USER26> Good point :)

Perhaps add a check to see if min-max is greater than K*N, and if so then use alternative method (e.g. merge sort)

<comment><USER28> What about continuous data (real numbers, strings)? Your approach has rather limited application. On a different note, merge/sort approach (O(n log n)) is in general less efficient than the heap approach (O(n log a)), and may be impractical or wasteful of space (O(n) vs O(a)) if dealing with realtime data for example.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Why are those interview questions mostly random algorithms?

Wouldn't it be more sensible to ask for design patterns? At least you can use them in real life.

Or refactoring patterns. Like give them a page of shitty code and ask them to make it nice.

Forcing people to memorize obscure algorithms and solve them on a whiteboard seems like the worst possible solution. Unless you are really looking for some expert on algorithms.

</comment><comment><USER29> Hey Lawrence, might wanna point out that the result should be sorted too. Currently, that is not listed as a requirement.

<comment><USER30> Yeah, I was reading through and when he talked about the output being sorted it jumped out at me as a "Wait, what? No, probably not" thing. Perhaps his definition of "merge" is different from mine.

Even for his example I don't believe it's correct - he comes out with 10, 12, 15, 15, 17, 20 but I believe if it's basically zipping the lists I'd expect it to be 10, 12, 17, 15, 15, 20.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I wrote a similar article a little while ago, which you may enjoy if you liked this:

[https://codeformore.com/technical-interviews-show- working/](https://codeformore.com/technical-interviews-show-working/)

</comment><comment><USER32> I'd like to see algorithm questions replaced by architecture questions, as IMHO they are more important and can also invoke algorithm knowledge.

</comment><comment><USER33> disregarding the performance, if someone asked me to write it pythonic i'd just do:

sorted([i for i in chain(*lists)])

<comment> half-kh-hacker Yeah, this is what I thought too.

I guess in an interview you'd have to ask whether to favour performance or readability, though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> In C#, List<List<T>>, foreach, AddRange, OrderBy, ToList

<comment><USER35> That's not the optimal solution by runtime complexity, which is often the point of these interview questions.

<comment><USER34> Microoptimizations... waste of time

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> This is not new advice. People have been giving this same advice for years. And frankly, people are sick of hearing it, and it borders on patronizing.

However, that's not to say that it's a bad idea to aim for. The problem with this kind of advice though, is it only tells you what proficiency to aim for, and not how to get there.

People only have so much brainpower to use during an interview. If you have to use every ounce of it in order to solve a "hard" problem in the first place, then diverting some of it to explaining things will distract the candidate.

The real secret here is to make sure that you have that extra brainpower, so that you do not have to expend your brain's full capacity while solving that hard problem. So the first step is to practice interview problems until they're second nature. The second step is to practice doing those same problems, while explaining a thought process. Once that is second nature, you can further practice by throwing in unique types of explanations, or using the opportunity to make the conversation more interesting, to make the interviewer more impressed.

I hope that some readers out there understand as well as I do, that the entire job interview process is a farce, and selects for sales skills more than it does for engineering skills. The pervasive idea that you have to explain your work only serves those who learn the type of methodology I described above. There are many brilliant candidates out there who believe that it would be a huge waste of their time to refine these skills, instead of engineering skills or other things that they may want to learn. After all, it would only serve to increase your odds of getting your foot in the door at those companies that use such irrational means to select their employees, and why would a brilliant engineer want to join such a team?

This is the ultimate tragedy for (some, but not all) who are passionate about engineering and rationality, but not necessarily passionate about money. I think we can do better, folks.</comment>


To find what you love, immerse yourself in "worlds" - <AUTHOR> http://mmoorejones.com/2011/05/07/to-find-what-you-love-immerse-yourself-in-worlds/

<comment><USER2> _Immersion in "worlds" is how you truly understand something_

You could actually argue the opposite- once you truly understand something, then you know enough to perceive a "world" and yourself immersed in it.

Disclaimer: I only read the first and last paragraphs (as usual of well- written pieces like this)

</comment><comment><USER3> Get 10,000 hours, right?</comment>


CodeAbbey - website for really newbie programmers - <AUTHOR>

Hi, Friends!
Few months ago I've started developing a web-site with a goal to provide some help to newcomers in programming.
http://codeabbey.com
In its core it is a collection of programming problems - to solve them users should write some code, process random input data and submit correct result (so it is result which is checked).
After a while I decided it would be useful to allow people to see each other's solutions - of course only after the given problem is solved by this particular user - so one can learn something comparing other's code with one's own.
Later I came to idea it may be useful to allow comments under solutions, so people can write some messages pointing out potential problems or disadvantages etc.
This functionality was added only few days ago.
As you see, I'm a bit slowpoke in inventing features to my site. So I would be glad to be hinted with more ideas about things to be probably added to it.
For example right now I have no clear idea how to popularize comments system just implemented. Probably commenting should give some "compassion points" to user and some tasks should require spending some of these special points for solving. Not quite sure it would be good.
Thanks in advance for all your hints, advice and ideas. <comment><USER3> Hi! congrats on your new site. I think it's a lovely effort, and very worthwhile. One piece of input, at least from my end, is to provide your users not only with the answers, but also with some elaborations on things they should / shouldn't do when writing code. This will be of course more evident when they tackle problems when they have to work with string or collections and things like that. Instilling some good principles, even just slightly, at the very beginning is something which will dividends for people learning to program just a bit down the road. Just my two cents, and once again - <USER2> job and best of luck!

<comment><AUTHOR> > some elaborations on things they should / shouldn't do when writing code

Hm-m-m... Not sure whether I get you right, but your hint give me the following idea:

after submitting an answer, if it is correct, the user should be able to view some editorial remarks at the results page - discussing good and bad approaches to the problem.

For example some people here used each-by-each comparison (with O(N^2) performance) to filter out non-unique words in a string instead of hashmap...

Thanks, this looks like important feature I should add!</comment></comment>


House in Walla Walla completely surrounded by Spiderwebs - <AUTHOR> http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-03-07/spiderwebs-surround-house-in-wagga-fields/3872772 A house is surrounded by spider webs next to flood waters in Wagga Wagga, NSW, March 6, 2012. <comment><USER2> HN title misspelled as Walla Walla (implying in Washington state) -- it's Wagga Wagga in New South Wales, Australia.</comment>


JQuery: Basics - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/MartinChavez/jQueryBasics

<comment><AUTHOR> jQuery: Basics

A project aimed to help the user learn the basic topics of jQuery. Each unit contains a tutorial with concepts, examples and best practices.

Topics:

\- Installation and Setup \- Javascript and DOM \- DOM Manipulation \- DOM Interaction \- DOM Events \- Mouse Events \- Keyboard Events \- The Event Object \- Filter Selectors \- Descendant Selectors \- Traversing DOM \- Class Manipulation \- HTML5 Data Attributes \- Styling \- Animations \- Reusability \- Best Practices</comment>


Twitch unleashes scorched-earth attack to unveil malicious spambot creator - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/04/twitch-unleashes-scorched-earth-attack-to-unveil-malicious-spambot-creator/ <comment><USER2> It is interesting to see the 'official' approach to doxing in relation to the unofficial version (calling them out on places like 4chan). Krebs does a lot of this sort of sleuth work and given the obvious market for people who feel harmed I'm wondering if there is the internet equivalent of a private deteective. People who most closely meet that criteria that I know are generally on retainer to lawyers it seems.

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't understand why twitch can't easily nip this in the bud? I assume to comment you have to be a logged in user. Simply throttle comments per account and put tighter throttling on newer accounts. Am I missing something?</comment>


Can I safely eat 4 eggs a day? - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@markmoschel/can-i-safely-eat-4-eggs-a-day-56d25380d186 <comment><USER2> 'The Roosevelts,' Ken Burns' Latest PBS Documentary said that Teddy Roosevelt ate a dozen eggs for breakfast every morning.

At _" U.S. Presidents Eating Breakfast"_

[https://www.mrbreakfast.com/breakfast/presidents-eating- brea...](https://www.mrbreakfast.com/breakfast/presidents-eating-breakfast/)

it says:

"Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909)

President Teddy Roosevelt was pretty set in his ways when it came to breakfast. He'd have hard-boiled eggs and homemade rolls. He insisted that the eggs be cooked until solid throughout. Medium or soft-boiled eggs wouldn't cut it. As for the rolls, they had to be fresh and there had to be a lot of them. In the rare times that he'd deviate from his routine, it was usually in favor of hominy with butter and salt."

<comment><USER3> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominy)</comment></comment>


Marriage rates are going down in China - <AUTHOR> https://www.forbes.com/sites/ywang/2017/10/17/no-one-in-china-wants-to-get-married-anymore-and-its-making-beijing-nervous/ <comment><USER2> Well I've been here for 17 years and I personally know a lot of people who aren't considering marriage as they aren't considered marriageable as they can't afford a house and don't want to work soul-draining hours for substandard pay.

The two Chinas: affluent business owners, government beneficiaries, and a small ultra-professional and investing class versus the average joe are really far apart.

This means for young people the choices are stark: relax with your friends, maybe make some money now and then or flutter between jobs you see as more of a passing interest or do something small for cash (part time work, online selling, art, piecework translation or media, etc.), taking the ire of your parents who wished you would work harder, or face a truly depressing grind and probably move alone to a polluted overpriced east coast megacity.

I don't think the choices are as bad in western countries, since although the work ethic may be high the hours in China are long and unpaid overtime and deference to managers is certainly expected for the upwardly mobile. Also in the west you usually don't have to move for a decent income, with the social isolation that entails.

There are also a small but increasing number of gay and lesbian couples.

<comment><USER3> I'll never get the whole "wait until you can afford to be married" thing because isn't one of the great advantages of marriage the joining of two incomes and the lessening of personal expenses (sharing expenses means less per person)?

<comment><USER4> As long as you have the money to pay for the wedding, sure.

In my case, my fiancée and I are not doing a traditional wedding; we're just registering in a courtroom, and then having a big party with a rented venue, etc. It's still going to cost a few grand.

Marriage is not cheap.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The graphs say 13m declined to 11.xm

so this is a 10% decline over 5 years. the rate of divorce increased more rapidly in % terms. So, the problem may not be 'does not want to get married' as much as 'does not want to get married under duress, to the wrong person, for the wrong reasons'

</comment><comment><USER6> Not a lot to see here. Pretty much says women becoming more independent, birth rates down, aging population. So same as most other places.

<comment><USER7> The reasons why women in China are becoming independent are quite different from their counterparts in the West.

<comment><USER6> Sure, but I don't think the article really communicates the nuances of this very well. I imagine the article would be a lot longer if you hoped to communicate the details to an audience outside of China</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Where to sell software? - <AUTHOR>

Which hosted eCommerce services you suggest to sell my own semi-pro shareware software? <comment><USER2> Try FastSpring :)</comment>


Reddit Playlister - <AUTHOR> http://redditplayer.phoenixforgotten.com/

<comment><USER2> It would be nice if the title of the current track was displayed somewhere in the top of the page so you don't have to scroll down to find it.</comment>


My Facebook News Prediction Game App (beta, feedback wanted) - <AUTHOR> http://apps.facebook.com/newspredictiongame/

<comment><AUTHOR> Is it clear what this simple game is all about?</comment>


Show HN: HN Who Is Hiring Thread - Sorted, Filtered and Searchable - <AUTHOR> http://gitrecruiter.com/hn-who-is-hiring

<comment><USER2> The page is blank for me. I see the header and footer but no content. Browsing on iPhone safari.

<comment><USER3> same here. endless loading

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> do you have an API? I would like to import the angular jobs to [http://AngJobs.com](http://AngJobs.com)</comment>