The myth of the well-rounded scientist - <AUTHOR> http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/career_magazine/previous_issues/articles/2012_12_14/caredit.a1200137

<comment><USER2> _Mathematician Paul Erdős famously spent 19 hours a day doing math_

Mathematician Paul Erdős famously took amphetamines regularly.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Erd%C5%91s> "Ron Graham bet him $500 that he could not stop taking the drug for a month. Erdős won the bet, but complained that during his abstinence mathematics had been set back by a month: 'Before, when I looked at a piece of blank paper my mind was filled with ideas. Now all I see is a blank piece of paper.' After he won the bet, he promptly resumed his amphetamine use."

<comment><USER3> This is not the main point of the article and there are more examples of scientists spending a lot of time working and not taking amphetamines.

<comment><USER4> It's a great piece of chat none-the less

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think this has very much to do with culture, and very little to do with 'science'. As a scientist, I've been in institutions where this single- mindedness tends to be the case. Currently I'm at an institution where this is far from the case. Each person here is a whole person. Each person here is an award-winning scientist, a family person, and excellent at something else or two too. It breeds itself - and those who were not "well-rounded scientists" would not fit in here.

When writing up my own resumes and applications, I wrote in a way designed to weed out those places that wouldn't revel in that well-roundedness. I did not 'pretend' to be something I was not - to do otherwise only invites disatisfaction. I knew my application wouldn't be accepted by people who were not themselves well-rounded - but I wouldn't be happy at those places anyway.

There are singled-minded scientists, like there are single-minded <insert profession here>. There are well-rounded scientists like everyone else too. Cultures breed one and another. Likely you'll enjoy work and life most if you find the culture that fits you. Further, I also don't think it's particularly correlated with talent in the field either. There are both fantastic and crappy institutions with very different cultures, ethics and expectations.

</comment><comment><USER6> Nobody cares if you're "well-rounded". It's a gimmick that's been used for generations [1] to preserve the ethnic / cultural make-up of various groups. A simple way to verify this is by noticing that not all extracurriculars are created equal. With e.g. sports, you'd have to go to East Asia to find a place where, say, badminton and tennis are equally highly regarded. And good luck equating leadership in a WoW guild of hundreds of people with captainship of the local lacrosse team.

[1] At least since early 20th century Ivy League admissions got switched to the "interview / recommendations / extracurriculars" process in order to keep out Jewish applicants [http://www.amazon.com/review/R2CVQUI4C0VDUQ/ref=cm_cr_pr_per...](http://www.amazon.com/review/R2CVQUI4C0VDUQ/ref=cm_cr_pr_perm?ie=UTF8&ASIN=0618574581&linkCode=&nodeID=&tag=)

<comment><USER7> I care; people with a variety of interests are more fun to talk to and work with. Those interests need not align with my own. If anything, some variance makes for pleasant unplanned learning. Of course, I'm speaking of real interests that one might have; not things you might do just to pad a resume.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Many people, not only in science, first want obedience and predictability.

If you have any "extracurricular activity", you are categorized as a threat because it demonstrates both a) that you have a free spirit, and b) that you have the capability to achieve the same most people do in a given time, only in less time and with other thoughts on your mind - ie that you are a strong competitor.

Some people don't want competition from people more able than them - especially if they could also easily use their free spirit to see the obvious failings. Usually these are not the brightest bulbs around (and they know it, but you don't!)

In the government, public sector and large companies, they seem to be more concentrated.

The article poster learned this difference exists, but not how to spot it yet. He learned he can present himself differently based on the bias of his interlocutor.

I would like to suggest the alternative - do not pretend to be someone else, because you can then use that as a signalling strategy to filter out poor work environments.

<comment><USER9> I am a rather somewhat prolific open source developer. I sometimes feel that this fact keeps me from getting jobs. People talk about in this industry that you can send off 10 resumes and get 10 job offers very easily. For me, I send off 10 resume's and get maybe 1 job offer, despite my extensive and verifiable experience. I think you may be on to something.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Great article. The underlying reasons that some in the workplace may frown upon the personal projects and hobbies of their subordinates and peers, I think, is simply related to the fact that some people are "all business" while at work", and not interested in your personal life until the annual Christmas party; and then they're still probably not all that interested.

If you can produce, and can show that you produce, then what you do on your own time probably doesn't matter to anyone who matters.

The problem, I think, is when there is a perception that people who work longer and harder, provide more value to a project. This perception can be hard to shake. This is mostly because for your average scientist, engineer, programmer or what have you - the contributions of one individual versus another are not at all easily established -- which invites human speculation, which invites irrational judgment.

<comment><USER11> I agree. This culture also manifests at college campuses. If you aren't taking seven classes at once, you aren't working hard enough.

<http://thetartan.org/2012/12/3/forum/mentalhealth>

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I remember an undergraduate advisor recommending that I drop my D1 track and field bullet point from my resume (for grad school applications). No way! I don't want to work with anyone who would judge me negatively because of something that I do in my own time; it will be better for both of us if I never get to know you in the first place.

There are very few people* who can work with non-stop dedication on one sort of task for years on end. Everyone else (I've discovered) is faking it. You may be "working" for 12 hours a day -- minus the 2 hour lunch break, and the 3 hours on Facebook, and all the news articles that you're sure are making you smarter. But you can easily tell who these people are because they get less done in 10 hours than I do in two. And then these same people want to make some sort of judgment about those who actually enjoy free time?

People who are always talking about how hard they work and how they're such a martyr for their work rub me the wrong way.

* Some people _are_ legitimately intensely focused on whatever they're interested in (especially start-up culture). But how often do these people whine about how much they're working? If they are that into it, then they're probably really enjoying their job.

<comment><USER13> If track and field is not relevant to what you are applying for, and is only something you do in your spare time, then what good reason is there to put it on your resume?

<comment><USER14> I think you missed the point of the article, or are you trolling?

How about: in addition to being a well-rounded person, someone who has been on a Division 1 track and field team knows how to push him or herself beyond the limits and endure discomfort few people can comprehend, is dedicated, disciplined, and knows how to handle competition. Actually, having been on a D1 team in a demanding sport is some of the best proof of these qualities that I can think of and is a stellar thing to put on a resume.

<comment><USER15> Faculty at universities are notoriously biased on this subject, tho. They _hate_ d1 athletics, for the most part. This is worth knowing, if at least in passing. Its not at all impossible that that might color an application review. Either (a) they think the student expects to get a break/has already benefitted etc; or (b) they just don;t want to listen to another view. TLDR any "too red-blooded"activity (track, foot/basket/ball, etc) is not academic. This kind of petty/banal stuff is pretty typical for academic politics. (Not supporting, just explaining).

<comment><USER12> Yeah, I realize there's a lot of academics that hate athletics. But it's good for me if they let me know this up front, so we don't end up working together.

I should mention though, they miss out on a lot of good people. On the men's track team, there were about 4 people who had 4.0's (which is very rare at a top 5 engineering school). One of these guys ended up doing some really amazing research in grad school. In fact, the whole track team average GPA was higher than the school average. If you can manage these grades plus 3 hours of practice each day, I would think that would be a positive trait. But to each their own I guess.

<comment><USER13> If you are applying for a job in (say) mechanical engineering, your experience in track and field should not outweigh greater experience in mechanical engineering. This isn't a bias against track and field, it is simply an observation that track and field has no demonstrable link to being better at mechanical engineering.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> > But other schools said, "Um … 100% focused on molecular biology, please. The > sheer fact that we're having this conversation means that you possess > communication skills, upon which we frown."

Um, what?

> The campus newspaper had just published a little profile of the stand-up- > comedy-performing grad student, and my adviser happened to read it. Over the > next 10 minutes, I learned that my hobby was an embarrassment to the > department, that there was no way I could properly focus on biology, and > that every negative lab result I ever produced was a direct result of > telling jokes at night.

What the...? This doesn't sound remotely like my department, or indeed, any department I have ever heard of. Is this a biology thing? At GMU we would have adored that kind of student.

After reading the above two quotes, I got a very strong sense of "there's probably another side to this story". It's so completely alien to my personal experience as a PhD student and later as a professor that I have to wonder if it's really true. And my experience watching other researchers, including, yes, at least one stand-up comic.

<comment><USER17> it totally depends on the advisor. I've definitely heard stories similar to the TFA from people in multiple disciplines and from multiple schools. I'd say that it's less common of an attitude than it might have been thirty years ago, but that it is far from extinct.

<comment><USER16> I guess so, but it was the "communications skills" thing that rang the bias alarm bell. Communications skills are extraordinarily valuable to a Ph.D.: you have to be able to write, to present, to defend a thesis, and so on. Absolutely everyone knows this. And yet _multiple schools_ told him communications skills were a negative?

<comment><USER18> It was fairly apparent to me that these quotes were exaggerated for comedic effect.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I got picked up for residency this week. I had been doing a research project in my chosen field. For about 9 months. IRB proposal written, respected research institute collaborators. Waiting to present to IRB. I was, in so many words, told to drop it. "Extracurricular". Maybe shelve it and think about it in 18 months.

<comment><USER20> This is so damn frustrating to hear. How is an extra interest to do research in your own field a bad thing? I don't understand how the older generation of scientists and doctors even compute the cost benefit analysis here.

<comment> loup-vaillant They don't. Once the activity pattern matches with "not ordered by the hierarchy", it goes automatically in the "no good" bucket. Rationalization like this "extracurricular" pretext may follow, but the actual decision is based on a very quick, perceptive, and biased judgement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I experienced this first-hand as a well-rounded undergraduate working in a graduate lab. It was frowned upon if you did anything other than live and breathe whatever work was done in the lab. There was some kind of competition on to see who was more dedicated and self-sacrificing of leisure time, hobbies, friends, family, etc. I'd always be dead last playing that particular game. I value my work/life balance and invest a great deal in my side projects and hobbyist pursuits.

The same general disdain for people with well-rounded interests occurs at some companies so this effect certainly isn't limited to science.

Ultimately, the solution is to change the culture of the lab (or workplace) you are working in... not always an easy thing to do from the bottom up, mind you.

</comment><comment><USER22> 'Are future scientists ... to be found by chance among the most serious students who apply themselves, the winners of prizes and the winners of competitions? At times, yes, but not always. ... A good deal more worthy of preference by the clear-sighted teacher will be those students who are somewhat headstrong, con- temptuous of first place, insensible to the inducements of vanity, and who being endowed with an abundance of restless imagination spend their energy in the pursuit of literature, art, philosophy, and all the recreations of mind and body. To him who observes them from afar. it appears as though they are scattering and dissipating their energies, while in reality they are channeling and strengthening them.' ( Santiago Ramon y Cajal)

</comment><comment><USER23> What a horrible uncommitted scientist Richard Feynman must have been. His hobbies included drumming, safecracking and many more. Also, he was a ladies man.

</comment><comment><USER24> I for one don't or barely talk about what I do in my spare time at work anymore. In two instances, I was stared at in disbelief when I admitted I don't do much programming in my spare time (once to a colleague, once to a manager. The manager has been ill for six months due to overworking / stress and gave up his management position). They almost made me feel guilty for not continuing with my work after work hours - almost, because they're wrong.

And second because I don't really train bears or do stand-up comedy, my personal life is pretty dull :p.

</comment><comment><USER25> The highly competitive academic research environment selects for faculty who are 100% dedicated to their research and thus able to publish the most and bring in the most grant money. Such faculty, of course, expect the same dedication from their graduate students. The worst nightmare for a researcher is to have a graduate student that makes slow progress, constantly depends on the researcher for oversight, and produces few results of value. This graduate student is wasting time and resources and has little hope of successful completion.

The more assured a researcher can be that a student is completely dedicated to research, the more likely he or she will be to accept the student. For this reason, it makes sense to only list your experience in the field on your CV. But if, once you enter, you are able to work efficiently and produce good results, it should not matter what extracurricular activities you participate in. If your adviser told you to quit your part-time job, I think that it is more likely that he's frustrated by your lack of progress than that he is embarrassed that you have outside interests.

<comment><USER12> 100% dedicated to research and spending 16 hours in the lab are mutually exclusive concepts.

Edit: Just realized you never said that. Maybe I was reading another post...

<comment><USER25> I agree. Any adviser that judges your capabilities based on how long you spend in the lab is a fool.

But I think that in cases similar to the original author's, the student incorrectly perceives the pressure on him to be to spend more time in the lab and less on other things, whereas it is actually to be more productive and focused. Being dedicated and having outside interests are not mutually exclusive.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I see this sometimes in my field (software dev) when it comes to job applicants; they say that they want someone who "thinks outside the box" but for whatever reason they weed out applicants that do.

I've seen the opposite as well. At one place I interviewed with at, the first question in an interview was "Tell us about Porsches!" - that was a great place to work.

</comment><comment><USER27> I don't recognise this. No one ever told me to cut my outside activities down, indeed I used the flexibility of the PhD hours compared to a job to go to all sorts of distracting things in the first year (you know, the type of political meetings which are technically "open" but at 3:30pm on a Wednesday?)

Of course, of my own accord I have cut down on all my "other" activities during weekdays (except perhaps meeting someone for lunch or a drink in the evening) in order to make sure I actually get enough done. Time management skills, acquired (maybe).

But seriously, no one ever said this to me, in UK universities. My entire department does loads of sport, debating, and random things with their spare time.

</comment><comment><USER28> The fact that scientists have to be "always on" these days is an interesting development. Its probably largely down to the fact that the academic job market is so terrible that only those who are fanatically dedicated can succeed.

In some ways, this is a good thing for science: only those who are truly dedicated (and thus likely very good at it) will become professional scientists. On the other hand, the poor academic job market also means that its tempting for smart people interested in science (who could be very good at it) are likely to go and do other, more lucrative activities (e.g. software, finance, etc.)

<comment><USER20> This is not a good thing for science. If anything, a confirmation bias here will only mask the harm this causes to the scientific community overall.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> The guy is clearly just working in the wrong lab, and should find more suitable co-workers. In my lab, I love that everyone works long hours and their main interest revolves around the science we do. It makes for a fast- paced and exciting workplace. That's not for everyone, and prospective scientists should think carefully about whether they will fit in with the ethos of a group before they join, rather than bitching about hard working people wanting to be around other hard working people.

</comment><comment><USER30> Hypothetically, if you were hiring a front end developer, would you see his stand up comedy hobby as a detriment? Asking for a friend.</comment>


Why People Delete Their Facebook Accounts - <AUTHOR> http://www.powersiteblog.com/why-people-delete-their-facebook-accounts/#sthash.NCD9wxxH.UXgZvB8b.dpbs

<comment><USER2> As my FB usage has declined due to lack of quality content, the rate they spam me has increased, to the point that I'll eventually ragequit and delete my account again.</comment>


The Aging of Science - <AUTHOR> http://euraeka.com/articles/6268285-The-Aging-of-Science

<comment><USER2> Surprisingly, but the same IMHO is true for the industry. No teenager prodigies in garage can change modern landscape, owned by big corps an research establishments.</comment>


What happened to Magic Leap? - <AUTHOR> There was a company named MagicLeap going around creating great hype about their technology (mixed reality) sometimes back. What happened to the company delivering anything? Was it just a big hype? <comment><USER2> See [https://www.engadget.com/2017/07/11/magic-leaps-mixed- realit...](https://www.engadget.com/2017/07/11/magic-leaps-mixed-reality/)

Definitely there is a Deadpool on for this company and the odds are worse than Uber.</comment>


Tim Bray: "The buzz around OpenID is becoming impossible to ignore." - <AUTHOR> http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2007/02/24/OpenID <comment><USER2> I've been thinking about this in relation to my startup-- it would be great to have a really low-friction way for my users to create accounts, and to say, "well, if you already have an AIM account or a LiveJournal account, just use those credentials".

But I think the average user might need some education on this, as they might suspect that my site is just a phishing scheme? I.e. why would I be asking for their password to another site?

I wonder if I could autodiscover existing openID credentials/other accounts as part of my signup process? Kind of how 30boxes can autodiscover myspace accounts based on an email address... I'm trying to envision what that user experience could be like.

Ideas, anyone?</comment>


Show HN: Neovide, a No Nonsense Neovim Client in Rust - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/Kethku/neovide <comment><AUTHOR> I've been working on Neovide for a couple months, it supports ligatures, emoji, and a nifty smear animated cursor. Maybe some folks here would find it useful or interesting.

Technically it uses Vulkan and is based on Google's Skia rendering library. Further it uses HarfBuzz for shaping and Winit for window management.

<comment><USER2> That cursor animation is a surprisingly strong selling point.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's interesting that you say that. To you is it the nifty-ness of it or the functionality? I'm considering new features now that the issue tidal wave has calmed down and trying to prioritize which ideas to tackle next.

<comment><USER2> Both. Nifty-ness feels somehow _fun_ , or rather enjoyable to watch. Functionally this solves a very small but ever-present issue with using vim; perhaps most importantly, the animation is sufficiently fast to be _actually unobtrusive_ , a very rare feat for most such UX changes, and absolutely vital to it's potential to be useful.

It is perhaps the single most impressive text editing visual design change I've ever seen (maybe second to kakoune's verb-noun reordering allowing selection-before-editing visualization). But while most such changes are functional but dull (eg sublime multiline editting), I can confidently say I _like_ looking at this thing go (and the utility is minor, but obvious and good)...

<comment><USER3> Just from looking at the animation, the 'transition'/jump from on the buffer to the minibuffer looks very useful. And in general, it looks a useful way of drawing attention to the cursor if you don't know where the cursor is going to be.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The Gifted Adult: Self-Knowledge and Self-Esteem - <AUTHOR> http://www.stephanietolan.com/self-knowledge.htm <comment><USER3> I'm sure the author knows what she's talking about and to some extent I agree with her, but humbleness is a useful quality too, in gifted people especially. Being skeptical about your own innate gifts makes you work harder in applying them, which elevates the quality of what you produce. When you start to believe you're better than "normal" people and you can do no wrong thanks to your awesome superpowers, that's usually when the wheels come off the wagon.

Low self-esteem is a drag but I often produce my best work when I feel like I'm a fraud and I have to convince myself that I'm not.

<comment><USER4> The more you learn, the more you begin to realize how little you know.

Understanding something deeply enough to explain it to others yet never having contributed something unique to the field does not make you a fraud, it makes you someone who understands something deeply.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I'm still relatively new here, so I'm not sure if it's common to comment on one's own submission.

After reading the article about the 10-year-old kid, Moshe, and the essay Danielle Fong wrote in response, I wanted to share this essay by Stephanie S. Tolan with you all, because it largely addresses the "imposter's syndrome" that Danielle mentioned.

This article was enormously influential in my life, and I hope that you guys will appreciate it as well.

<comment><USER5> As long as your comments contribute to the discussion about your submission, the community here is pretty reasonable. Also, they seem to be pretty good about downmodding comments that are unreasonable or otherwise unhelpful - <USER2> if you 'step out of line' someone is always happy to let you know.

<comment><USER6> I nearly spit out my pacifier and fell out of my high chair when I saw PG modded below zero several times in one thread -- about _Arc_ of all things.

It seems to be seasonal. Around YC application deadlines, even his offhand comments get praised as fonts of celestial wisdom.

So the constituency of the community here tends to whip around randomly like a man in a nude suit riding a dangling firehose, spraying mud and rocks everywhere.

<comment><USER7> Yes, all bets are off when it comes to PG here. He has way too many fans that will mod him high simply because it says "by pg".

That being said though, the site is pretty consistent for every other user, although as it grows I've certainly noticed a relaxing in what is considered "off topic".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> So... do I have a low self-esteem because I'm 'gifted', or is it due to some other factors?

<comment><USER9> Nah, you just suck. It's all the others who are gifted ;-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Does anyone else find it hard to read the text against the (yuck) background texture?

<comment><USER11> Use Opera and stick it in "User Mode". Voila, no nasty backgrounds or hideous fonts!

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Brilliant article. Thank you very much for posting it. Without excessive arrogance, I've often had this impostor syndrome, though I didn't have a name for it, as have some of my friends. It's heartening to see this is quite common amongst "gifted" people :-)

Daniel

</comment><comment> daniel-cussen I remember reading that gifted kids who got tracked ended up being happy, functioning adults. Also, that child prodigies turned out all right for the most part (Bobby Fischer and child actors notwithstanding). But I can't find the sources.</comment>


Show HN: Notify – CLI to notify your phone - <AUTHOR> https://mashlol.github.io/notify/ <comment><USER2> Really like the idea!

Im trying it out right now and the Android app told me to use an identifier that starts with a '9'. I typed `notify -r <my_identifier>`. When I try running `notify` however, it gives me this:

[notify] Encountered an error: ParseError { code: 141, message: 'Error 112: Channel name must start with a letter: <my_identifier>' }

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah, this is interesting, didn't encounter this during testing. Working on a fix, thanks for reporting!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Are these your keys? [https://github.com/mashlol/notify/blob/master/node/notify.js](https://github.com/mashlol/notify/blob/master/node/notify.js)

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes they are the parse app keys, they are meant to be public.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Just a heads up that that the app gives the following example:

      $ someLongRunningCommand || notify

      This will send a push to your phone when the command has completed, regardless of success or failure.

Obviously that will only notify upon command failure. It looks like the webpage is accurate (uses a ;) so perhaps the app just hasn't been updated yet.

</comment><comment><USER5> For those like me who wonder how to use npm without being root, here's an answer that worked for me on Debian:

[http://stackoverflow.com/a/21712034/323094](http://stackoverflow.com/a/21712034/323094)

<comment><USER4> FYI you don't need root at all. Just download the node tarball and unpack it somewhere in your user dir.

Then add the following to your .profile (or .bashrc or whatever you prefer):

      # add node.js bin to PATH
      npath=~/Applications/node-v4.2.1-linux-x64/bin
      if [ -d "$npath" ]; then
          PATH=$npath${PATH:+:$PATH}
      fi

Then add the following to your .manpath if you want access to node manpages:

      # node.js
      MANPATH_MAP    ~/Applications/node-v4.2.1-linux-x64/bin    ~/Applications/node-v4.2.1-linux-x64/share/man
      MANPATH_MAP    ~/Applications/node-v4.2.1-linux-x64/bin    ~/Applications/node-v4.2.1-linux-x64/lib/node_modules/npm/man

Then to install:

      npm install -g notify-cli

Obviously you may need to update the particulars.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Great idea.

Is it possible to customize the notification text?

Small error: Rotating the phone while in the app changes the text to "Your identifier is: Hello World!" and you have to completely quit the app to fix it.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah good find with the Android bug, I forgot Android re-draws everything on rotates. As of 0.0.3 it is now possible to customize the text with -t.

<comment><USER4> I also got the "Your identifier is: Hello World!" upon startup (while internet was disabled).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> How does this work? Is the notifications sent via your server which finds the correct device and pushes the message?

<comment><AUTHOR> When you download the app, it registers with Parse, which generates a registration ID for your device. When you use the CLI, it goes to Parse with the key you received from the app and queries for your installation, sending the notification to that specific installation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> What is the difference between this solution and Pushover?

Do I have to install an app on my mobile?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes you have to install an app (soon to come is email fallback if you don't have the app, and Chrome push notifications on Android, which don't require an app downloaded).

While I hadn't heard of it until you mentioned it, the main difference between this and Pushover seems to be that 1) Pushover seems to have more features and available platforms, and 2) Pushover costs money while this is free & opensource.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Lovely idea! Please post an update here when the iOS app is available! :)

<comment><USER10> Here's hoping it's compatible with older versions of iOS as well

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Love the idea! Nice tool missing in developers life :)</comment>


Why I switched my blog from Blogger to WordPress: terminated Google services - <AUTHOR> http://blog.markwatson.com/?p=1106

<comment><USER2> The key isn't so much using paid alternatives (although I personally think that's a good solution).

The important bit is to always use your own domain where possible. Gmail can be used with your own domain. If you leave Gmail no one is disrupted, because you just move your mail hosting business somewhere else, and point your domain there.</comment>


Gamification to improve myself - <AUTHOR> http://productivity.stackexchange.com/questions/2972/gamification-to-improve-myself <comment><USER2> I like games very much, but the idea of gamification eludes me.

This gamification stuff looks nice and sounds plausible, but it's just a model of self-evaluation.

Since it is just a model of your state and not your real state, it's always opened to be "gamed" (pun intended).

It's the same stuff managers do to people all the time. There are some criterias and you have to meet them to get your promotion. Many smart people think "well I can get good 'for real' or just be good enough for the system... but I think the last one is easier".

Gamification is the same, it just looks modern.</comment>


Show HN: Proseful – A simple blogging platform - <AUTHOR> https://proseful.com <comment><USER2> Looks similar to [https://write.as/](https://write.as/), which was featured on HN many moons ago. I'm left to wonder if the mass exodus from Medium will spawn more of these types of smaller platforms.

<comment><USER3> And, IMO, yet another blogging platform (similar to write.as) that charges quite a lot for paid subscriptions. I can't get why personal blogs that need custom domains and a few different flairs need such a service that costs a lot more than most email services cost (I know write.as has a basic plan at $1 per month, but it seems limited).

<comment><USER4> Customers find these services valuable enough to pay their prices, and services optimize for that audience. But what would be your ideal price for a personal blog?

<comment><USER3> Most personal blogs don't usually have a lot of content on a continuous basis. People starts blogs with enthusiasm, then life catches up (or writer's block or distractions). They usually don't get a lot of traffic either (including from search engines). Of course, there are many personal blogs where people put a lot of effort to write often and grow the audience. But that's a minuscule percentage. With that perspective, and considering that most personal blogs are primarily text and don't use too many large images or embedded videos (storage is not a big concern), I'd say that $10 or €10 a year would be sort of ok. I'm just throwing this pseudorandom figure to get it close to what some of the cheapest domains cost and how much some of the cheapest paid email services cost. This is not intended to be a (de)valuation of the software behind the platform and the effort to maintain the platform.

WordPress (wordpress.com) provides a custom domain and an ad free blog for less than $20 (AFAIK) a year.

<comment><USER4> > This is not intended to be a (de)valuation of the software behind the > platform and the effort to maintain the platform.

That's the rub. If you were running the service, just speaking practically, how many customers would you need at $10 / €10 per year to pay for the servers? How about to pay your salary? What if you wanted to hire one additional employee?

(Also, WordPress.com shows you ads unless you pay at least $36 / year -- and they're large enough that they could reduce the price to whatever they want, unlike a bootstrapped service starting from $0.)

But there's also the valid point you mention, which is that many people have no more than a passing interest in blogging, and thus might not value a blogging platform at more than the price you suggested. We see this happen with Write.as. But then it might actually make more sense for platforms to charge more -- think about if you were just starting out a workout routine. Would you be more willing to go to the gym regularly if you were paying just $1 per month for a membership, or $40 per month? An investment in the tool helps you invest in the habit.

<comment><USER3> I hadn't realized earlier that you're the founder of Write.as. I completely get the cost factors for small, bootstrapped platforms and also how larger players can have loss leaders in their offerings. Pricing is experimental, in my view. A seller ought to try different pricing to capture more income from different segments of users who have different valuations and needs (this may not be very easy to do).

In the case of Write.as, I see some points that seem weird to me.

One is the character limit in the pricing tables. I don't know if anyone is going to look at that and decide which option to go for. The 100000 character limit in the lowest tier would probably be around 15000 words or so. That's a very high limit for most blog posts, and is in the long form article territory. So I don't think that anyone looking only at character count for a blog would need anything more.

The other part is not having a price tier between $12 a year and $60 a year. That's a big gap if you're focusing on personal blogs.

Lastly, on the point of the gym membership comparison, I've heard this logic of commitment being tied to loss aversion. But I've practically seen it work badly (not as expected at all), and resulting in more loss aversion that prevents people from signing up for anything with a larger commitment next time. That's just been my observation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The blogs don't seem to have an RSS feed. I might be old-fashioned but I think that's one of the first requirements of a blog platform no?

<comment><AUTHOR> I didn't get around to RSS for the MVP, but it's definitely going in–I want it for my personal blog. Consider me old-fashioned too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> This looks nice. Are you planning on keeping it as individualized blogs or will you be going the Medium/Blogger route and trying to get readers to make an account and read other blogs?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! Individual blogs for now. I'd like to focus on making a great blogging/writing experience first.

<comment><USER6> I actually hope you _don 't_ go the route of Medium! Good luck, I'll show this to a few of my friends who have been looking for a new blogging platform.

<comment><AUTHOR> Much appreciated!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Any connection to [http://prose.io/](http://prose.io/) ?

</comment><comment><USER8> Can I host it myself? I'd pay a few bucks for that.

</comment><comment><USER9> How does it work with SEO? Can you still show up in google if you target a specific topic?

</comment><comment><USER10> How is this different from blogger?

<comment><USER11> Or Ghost?

This looks more modern than blogger

<comment><AUTHOR> Versus Ghost: Over time, I think Proseful will steadily set itself apart due to different ideas, opinions and target audience. Since I've kept it basic for the MVP, there's not much at the moment. Open-source Ghost is targeting a much different type of user, as is hosted Ghost with a price point starting at $29-36/month.</comment></comment></comment>


SOMA office space + traffic to your prototype site - <AUTHOR> http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/cps/318910022.html <comment><USER2> That is really, really weird. Equity in return for Digg-spamming, or something like that. The thing is, how could you even be sure the traffic was real? Could be a botnet; how would you know?

<comment><USER3> What's most interesting is they ask what your revenue goals are. Does that mean in addition to spamming your site with traffic they'll click on some ads too?

Sounds like a disaster if you ask me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have an even better deal for you. Since you're working out of your apartment and don't need the office space, I'll let you use my spam bot registers and will give you 200,000 fake registrations in exchange for your all your brilliant ideas.

I hope no one here is desperate enough for free office space to send their ideas to an anonymous craigslist poster. Too bad there isn't a requirement for users here to post at least x number of real comments before being able to spam the site.

</comment><comment><USER5> Anyone care to go undercover and unmask them? :-)

</comment><comment><USER6> This is ridiculous!</comment>


Ignition: An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants (1972) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://www.sciencemadness.org/library/books/ignition.pdf <comment><USER2> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20729115](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20729115) was 9 months ago. Reposts are fine after a year or so: [https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html).

It's best to check HN search, for example like this: [https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...](https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=comments%3E0%20Ignition%20informal&sort=byDate&type=story)

See also:

2017: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15155394](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15155394)

2015: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10683778](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10683778)

</comment><comment><USER3> On chlorine trifluoride:

"It is, of course, extremely toxic, but that's the least of the problem. It is hypergolic with every known fuel, and so rapidly hypergolic that no ignition delay has ever been measured. It is also hypergolic with such things as cloth, wood, and test engineers, not to mention asbestos, sand, and water-with which it reacts explosively. It can be kept in some of the ordinary structural metals-steel, copper, aluminium, etc.-because of the formation of a thin film of insoluble metal fluoride which protects the bulk of the metal, just as the invisible coat of oxide on aluminium keeps it from burning up in the atmosphere. If, however, this coat is melted or scrubbed off, and has no chance to reform, the operator is confronted with the problem of coping with a metal-fluorine fire. For dealing with this situation, I have always recommended a good pair of running shoes."

(via [https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2008/02/26/sa...](https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2008/02/26/sand_wont_save_you_this_time))

<comment><USER4> I've read every _Things I Won 't Work With_ and I wish Lowe would write more; he's the Dave Barry of chemistry.

<comment><USER5> I spent years following Lowe for the Things he Won't Work With, but somewhere a few weeks ago I was made aware of his coverage of COVID drug development, which has been phenomenal (and is what he actually does work with).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This book is way more entertaining than one would expect of a book from 1972 about rocket propellants. It's now back in print, probably because Musk called it "fun".

In addition to the infamous section about chlorine trifluoride and running shoes, I learned a lot about hydrogen peroxide as an oxidizer and monopropellant, as well as enjoyed a section on nuclear rockets.

If you're into this sort of nerdery, you might enjoy The Orbital Index, my weekly newsletter about the space industry. [https://orbitalindex.com](https://orbitalindex.com)

<comment><USER6> Scott Manley has a good video about hypergolic fuels too: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFLmqQ5ceS8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFLmqQ5ceS8)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> This is a classic. Although it's a subject with absolutely no relevance to the vast majority of readers, it's written in a funny dry style (for a good example, see e.g. the quote posted in another comment).

It's also interesting to reflect on rocket fuels since the publication of the book.

\- Military rockets have mostly shifted from hypergolics to solid fuels.

\- Orbital rockets mostly use LOX + suitable fuel. For the fuel, seems to be good arguments for and against everything from hydrogen to heavier hydrocarbons like kerosene.

\- Exotics (flourine, boron, etc.) have disappeared.

\- For hypergolics, the remaining use is mostly RCS's, deep space stuff, but not "main" propulsion. And the oxidizer is mostly NTO rather than acid that seemed to be Clark's favorite.

<comment><USER8> Regarding hypergols, I love the fact that you are absolutely correct that they're mostly relegated to places where you _need_ autoignition these days, but then you look at the Proton rocket family...

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proton_(rocket_family)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proton_\(rocket_family\))

<comment><USER7> I should have made it clearer that I was writing about trends, not absolutes.

So yes, hypergolic powered rockets are still around, but mostly they are old designs on the way out. The Proton family you mention was on the drawing board before the book was published, and is to be replaced by the kerolox powered Angara family.

Similarly, the Chinese hypergolic Long March 2/3 families are old designs in the process of being replaced by the kerolox powered Long March 5/6/7 families.

<comment><USER8> Ha, TIL!

I'm not too familiar with the Long March family but that does make sense.

More random engine nerdery:

\- It's really exciting to see all of the development going into full-flow combustion metholox engines these days; BE-4 and Raptor have been incredible projects to follow.

\- The Rocketdyne F-1 is still the most impressive rocket engine to me, although the RS-25 is a very close second. Watching videos of the Apollo launches and seeing those things in action is absolutely awe-inspiring.

<comment><USER7> Yes, the staged combustion methalox engines under development are interesting.

Though there's value in keeping it simple too. Gas generator engines got us to the moon and back.

And if the goal is routine travel to Mars, I think we really need nuclear propulsion.

And yeah, F1 is really impressive. Heck, the entire Apollo program was an astounding achievement in so many ways.

Though the geek in me is disappointed that kerolox engines produce so much soot that you can't see the Mach diamonds..

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> If you like this (and you should), I also recommend:

Gergel, M. G. (1979). Excuse me sir, would you like to buy a kilo of isopropyl bromide? Retrieved from [http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/gergel_isopr...](http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/gergel_isopropyl_bromide.pdf)

 _We had never had such a dreadful assignment. Anyone working with this "superstink" is branded and given a wide berth. No matter how amorous his spouse may be, passion crumples despite baths, Chlorox and Dentine. For a while we made isovaleroyl chloride at Cedar Terrace. It created pandemonium among residents who first sniffed each other, came to the plant to sniff us, and then sniffled to their lawyers._

<comment><USER10> Also see Selenophenol:

> The biggest stinker I have run across... Imagine 6 skunks wrapped in rubber > innertubes and the whole thing is set ablaze. That might approach the > metaphysical stench of this material.

> I believe that this lovely compound is commercially available (if you're > anywhere close to anyone making it, you'll know about it)

From [https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2012/05/15/th...](https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2012/05/15/things_i_wont_work_with_selenophenol)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> The most jaw dropping but easily missed story I remember from that book:

"That was the case once, when we were all seated around the table in the middle of the lab, having lunch. I glanced up, and noticed that the contents of one flask was turning a little brown. "Who owns that one?" [...they hit the deck as it exploded]

Who eats lunch in a chemistry lab?

<comment><USER12> That's how etorphine was discovered! Well, having tea and stirring it with a "clean" glass rod.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> If you liked Ignition you may also like Eric Schlosser's _Command and Control_. I thought it was well written and enjoyed his style of weaving the story throughout the book.

</comment><comment><USER14> For context, this book was out of print for a long time and the only way to get it was via PDF. The recent re-interest in rockets has led to it being re- published.

[https://smile.amazon.com/Ignition-Informal-Propellants- Unive...](https://smile.amazon.com/Ignition-Informal-Propellants-University- Classics/dp/0813595835/)

<comment><USER15> I found the reprint _extremely_ difficult to read due to poor layout decisions. In particular, the font they used for subscripts (the 3 in ClF₃) is tiny and illegible. And there are rather a lot of those in a chemistry book....

I don't think anyone proofed it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> An absolute classic: people may not be aware it got reprinted, and is therefore available in dead-tree (and ebook) format again.

<comment><USER16> There is also an audio-book. I enjoyed the narrator's take on it, his occasional dead-pan reading of something ridiculous reduced me to giggles.

[https://www.audible.com/pd/Ignition- Audiobook/B07CTTXLL6](https://www.audible.com/pd/Ignition- Audiobook/B07CTTXLL6)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I read the book cover to cover after finding references to it by Derek Lowe on his pipeline blog [1]. Learned a lot about chemistry and the enormous investment that went into the space age (mostly because of overlapping technology for ICBMs and other rocket powered weapons) which is daunting as this book ONLY covers what's been declassified as of the 80s in propelants.

[1] blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/

</comment><comment><USER18> If you enjoy this stuff, NileRed did a video a year and a half ago on hypergolic chemicals and experimented with making nozzles out of test tubes:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OszX18NLtrY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OszX18NLtrY)

</comment><comment><USER19> It seems this book is best if you read some small excerpts. I tried to read the whole book but I found the author to be a little too full of himself to make the book enjoyable.

<comment><USER20> I guess that's an YMMV thing, I had no issue reading Ignition! and very much enjoyed the trip.

<comment><USER21> Same here. The day I discovered it in the engineering library, I sat down in the stack and read it cover to cover. Very difficult to put down.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> It's always a pleasure to see Sciencemadness linked here. The link is usually to this book, and with good reason. It's a classic. You don't have to be a chemist to enjoy it (though that helps). I have a main account here but I never comment on Sciencemadness submissions through it because the site so easily reveals my real-life identity.

I first discovered _Ignition!_ on the shelves of the Medford, Oregon public library when I was 10 years old. I was hooked on my first reading and would go on to read it several more times before I entered my teens. It was tied with Tenney L. Davis's _The Chemistry of Powder and Explosives_ as my favorite non- fiction book.

I started the Sciencemadness library [1] a long time ago, before the big book- scanning initiatives like Google Books started. The library still contains a large number of books that are unremarkable except for the fact that they were among the first digitized books covering certain facets of chemistry to be made available online.

The library _does_ contain a couple of books less famous than _Ignition!_ but also potentially interesting to non-chemist readers:

 _Excuse Me Sir, Would You Like to Buy a Kilo of Isopropyl Bromide?_

This is an anecdotal, autobiographical sketch of Max Gergel and his adventures as a young (then older) mad scientist building the business Columbia Organic Chemicals.

Columbia Organic Chemicals and its founder, Max Gergel, had the unusual honor of mention and praise by name in Kary Mullis's Nobel lecture [2]:

"I never tired of tinkering in labs. During the summer breaks from Georgia Tech, Al Montgomery and I built an organic synthesis lab in an old chicken house on the edge of town where we made research chemicals to sell. Most of them were noxious or either explosive. No one else wanted to make them, somebody wanted them, and so their production became our domain. We suffered no boredom and no boss. We made enough money to buy new equipment. Max Gergel, who ran Columbia Organic Chemicals Company, and who was an unusually nice man, encouraged us and bought most of our products, which he resold. There were no government regulators to stifle our fledgling efforts, and it was a golden age, but we didn't notice it. We learned a lot of organic chemistry."

The chicken coop lab full of noxious chemicals isn't far removed from how Max Gergel got his start in the chemistry business either.

In this humorous, anecdotal chronicle of Max's life from high school mad scientist to successful operator of a chemical supply business, you'll learn where metallic potassium should NOT be stored, how to prepare perfectly alcohol-free n-dodecyl bromide, and why one man would be crazy enough to want a preparative scale procedure for methyl isocyanide. You'll also learn, humorously but quite clearly, how the golden age of "no government regulators" contained the seeds of its own destruction, as horrendous odors, accidental poisonings, dumpings, fires, and miscellaneous accidents and occupational hazards take their toll on Gergel and his employees, neighbors, and surrounding environs.

[http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/gergel_isopr...](http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/gergel_isopropyl_bromide.pdf)

 _The Scientific Method: A Personal Account of Unusual Projects in War and in Peace_

Famed Harvard chemistry professor Louis Fieser's personal history of development of incendiary weapons during WW II, including the infamous Bat Bomb, plus development of cortisone, antimalarial drugs, and educational material for students.

Louis Fieser joined the American war effort before America had even officially entered World War II, as one of 20 professor invited to the house of Roger Adams in October 1940 to join the National Defense Research Committee. He was instructed early on to work on chemical vesicants but, considering them inhumane, quickly made a lateral move to begin development of gelled gasoline incendiary weapons. He led the research effort behind napalm, several other components of large-scale incendiary ordnance, and smaller special purpose incendiary devices for use by spies and saboteurs.

Fieser's strangest project was development of the Bat Bomb: a cluster-bomb arrangement of hibernating bats carrying time-delayed incendiaries. As the bats fell from bombers over enemy cities, they would rouse from hibernation mid-air and seek shelter in attics of the city below. Their incendiaries would then start concealed, hard-to-fight fires. The project was surprisingly successful for one never deployed, and included the own-goal immolation of an administrative building during testing.

When Fieser was not working on setting fires he also had time to begin work on the first edition of his organic chemistry textbook, research cortisone chemistry, and work on antimalarial drugs. The information given late in the book about getting cats to pose for photographs with chemical apparatus is invaluable because it comes from real experience.

[http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/the_scientif...](http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/the_scientific_method.pdf)

[1] [http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/](http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/)

[2]

<comment><USER23> Thanks for your efforts. I often wonder how many teen boys get recruited into declaring a chemistry or chemical engineering major due to those classic books. I know it worked on me and several other people.

Chemistry is pretty cool. A little harder to do at home as an amateur than something like computer science; maybe that challenge makes it more rewarding?

<comment><USER22> When I was a kid in the 1980s it didn't seem harder than my other hobby, programming a Commodore 64. The _relative_ difficulty is probably higher now, and of course your friends/neighbors/postal carrier may be more paranoid that anyone with chemistry equipment is a "drug cook."

My hands-on work with chemistry started by growing crystals when I was in the second grade. By third grade I was making very simple fireworks. I remember showing some of them off to classmates at my birthday party when I turned 9. By the time I was 10 I had taken over half of the family garage for my home lab.

I double majored in chemistry and computer science in college. I went on to graduate school afterward, working with computational chemistry and HPC. That's where I faced up to the reality of the job market. I didn't want to be an overworked, underpaid postdoc. Competition for academic tenure is brutal. The job prospects for non-academic chemists did not look promising. Since I had already been writing software for 15 years at that point, it was easy to transition to software as a career when I was done with school. I still love chemistry and would work in it or an allied field if it offered pay/perks comparable to software development.

Even software-in-the-field-of-chemistry underpays: when I started applying for software jobs Schrödinger made me an offer, but the pay was a third less than an entry level backend developer position for a West Coast startup. And they wanted me to relocate to New York City at my own expense.

Even though I am glum about the employment prospects for chemists in the USA, I still love chemistry and encourage any interest I find. If you are looking to encourage a child -- or even take it up as a hobby yourself -- a good place to start is Robert Bruce Thompson's _Illustrated Guide to Home Chemistry Experiments_ :

[http://shop.oreilly.com/product/9780596514921.do](http://shop.oreilly.com/product/9780596514921.do)

For more advanced hobbyists there are still a few forums around like that on Sciencemadness. (I think that Sciencemadness is probably the best one in English, but I am biased.)

Forum: [https://www.sciencemadness.org/whisper/](https://www.sciencemadness.org/whisper/)

You'll need to send an email requesting an account if you want to sign up. Trying to keep up with playing whack-a-mole against automated link-spam bots was too exhausting.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Awesome book! I have this (in digital form). Derek Lowe mentions it in one of my favorite _In the Pipeline_ articles: [https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2008/02/26/sa...](https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2008/02/26/sand_wont_save_you_this_time)

</comment><comment><USER25> Such a great book.</comment>


You and Your Research (1986) - <AUTHOR> http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html <comment><USER2> Many previous threads: [https://hn.algolia.com/?query=%22You%20and%20Your%20Research...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=%22You%20and%20Your%20Research%22%20points%3E10&sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=story&storyText=false&prefix=false&page=0)

(I feel like there have been larger ones, though...)

</comment><comment><USER3> youtube version (1995, 44 mins), from Hamming's _Learning to Learn_ course

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1zDuOPkMSw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1zDuOPkMSw)

(The original linked text has a good Q&A session, worth reading.)

<comment><USER4> What I remember from the talk: 1) Don't be a drunken sailor that aimlessly wanders from one topic to another; 2) There are millions of competitions out there, pick one, and become the best. It's an excellent talk.

<comment><USER5> > Don't be a drunken sailor that aimlessly wanders from one topic to another

This is a pity because new people often have fresh insights.

<comment><USER4> If you browse for a while and come up with an interdisciplinary fresh idea, I don't think he would mind at all, as long as you stick with it as your main focus :).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> dj-wonk I formatted the text for printing in landscape mode with a two column layout. I shared the PDF here: [https://github.com/bluemont/hamming-on- research](https://github.com/bluemont/hamming-on-research)

<comment><USER6> piggybacking your comment (and fine work!) to point to my own re-hosting of this transcript that makes minor formatting improvements to the original, primarily for scanning width: [https://wcarss.ca/reading/you_and_your_research/](https://wcarss.ca/reading/you_and_your_research/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Long, but incredible talk. Thank you for posting it!</comment>


Lessons from the failure of Livejournal: when not to listen to your users - <AUTHOR> http://arvindn.livejournal.com/96382.html

<comment><USER2> It's interesting to read this, since I was a member of the fandom contingent of LJ from 2002 to about 2005. I guess that makes me a social deviant. ;-)

Anyway, there's a grain of truth to this. The fandom community is disproportionately early adopters. After all, people with mainstream interests can hang out with their friends in real life instead of meeting them online. Many of my fandom friends were among the first users of GMail (I got my invite from one of them), they were among the first to switch to FaceBook when it opened up to non-college students, and now they're the ones that are on Twitter and checking out FriendFeed.

However, I think there were many, many other problems with LiveJournal that prevented it from gaining mainstream adoption:

1.) Until about 2005-2006, the front page never really explained what LiveJournal does or why you should have one. If you didn't have friends that were already on LiveJournal, you didn't know how to use it.

2.) It was plagued by perpetual scaling problems - in 02-04, it was virtually impossible to get your friends page to display. It was as bad as Friendster, and worse than nearly every other social networking site.

3.) Their decision to open-source their code meant that whenever they did anything controversial, someone would set up a competing site and a large fraction of their userbase would migrate, coming back when that site went out of business. When they had their scaling woes and required invite codes to get a new account, everyone went to DeadJournal. When they lowered the number of free icons, everyone went to GreatestJournal for icon hosting. When they pissed off the dev community by calling them ("Nobody but me could run this site" -- Brad Fitzpatrick), Plogs.net got started. When they banned fandom_wank, it just migrated to Journalfen.net. It's really not a brilliant idea to charge money for your service and then give away your source code for free.

4.) They were just too early. Same reason that YouTube, Comcast, and Verizon Fios got rich providing the same service that Enron Broadband had wasted billions on. Mainstream adopters were not ready to shift their social lives online in 2002.

In particular, the article suggests that if they'd let you import external RSS feeds into your LJ friends page, they could've become the default feedreader for the web. There're good reasons to believe this isn't true, notably:

a.) This describes Bloglines, which came out in 2003 and wasn't notably more successful.

b.) It does _not_ describe FaceBook or MySpace, which _were_ successful. Really, the whole "feed" concept seems to be a bust among mainstream users - PointCast failed in Web 1.0, RSS never caught on outside the technorati, and FriendFeed is early-adopter only.

c.) They _did_ let you import external RSS feeds into your Friends page - it's just that free users were limited to no more than 3 feeds (paid users still had a limit, but it was higher), making it not so useful.

The article also mentions pingback support - my friend implemented trackback support for LiveJournal in 2003, and it sat in the CVS repository for _2 years_ without ever being merged into the production codebase.

Really, if I had to pick a reason LJ went nowhere, it's simply that it was too early. And it's not like it was a super-huge failure too: the founder still got his f-u money.

</comment><comment><USER3> Always listen to your users. Don't always do what they ask.

When I took a course on software usability many years ago the first principle was how to work from what a user asked for to what they wanted to do. So, a user might say, "Can I have a checkbox to turn off feature Y?" What that meant was, "The way feature Y is implemented annoys me." And the solution is often to rethink feature Y and what it's supposed to do.

<comment><USER4> Exactly. Henry Ford heard "I want a faster horse" but gave people an automobile. Because he heard "I want to go faster."

<comment><USER3> To be clear, Henry Ford was a great innovator in production and assembly techniques, but Karl Benz created the first automobile 23 years before the Model T. I suspect what Ford heard was, "I want an automobile." He figured out how to do that cheaply and on a large scale.

<comment><USER5> _Karl Benz created the first automobile_

The first automobile was created before Karl Benz was born.

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

Benz created the first _production_ automobile in 1888, 3 years after his (and, respectively, Daimler's and Maybach's) first automobile, and 20 years before the first production Model T was built at the Piquette Plant on September 27, 1908.

<comment><USER4> oh my god, you guys. way to miss the point.

<comment><USER6> No, stop. It is important to be able to object precisely and factually. It is trivial to look up information, and leaving misinformation in a comment because you can't be bothered to check the Wikipedia articel is as jarring as that typo I didn't bother to correct a few words ago.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> LiveJournal isn't a failure! It has millions of users! It is responsible for substantial open source projects! It pioneered social media! It made a few people rich!

I don't drive a Model T, but a lot of people did.

Show some respect.

<comment><USER8> Hear, hear.

Memcached is damn useful, and Perlbal saved me from server meltdown and banning many a time when it was still my favorite language to write the hackish, duct-taped monstrosities I called "web applications."

LiveJournal hasn't been the same since bradfitz stopped working on it, but it was a milestone as far as interactivity on the Internet is concerned.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This post misses the main reason LiveJournal is a niche site today: they were invite-only for years. LJ had severe performance issues during the first couple of years, and to keep the system usable during that period new accounts could only be created if you procured an invite from an existing user. By the time they fixed the problems and removed the invite system, LiveJournal had been eclipsed by the growth of other social-networking sites.

<comment><AUTHOR> They opened up to the public in 2003, which is when I signed on. They had memcached by then. My analysis is about the last 5 years. Other social networking sites did exist, but they didn't let you blog or read feeds. LJ had something unique.

<comment><USER9> Unfortunately, MySpace started up about six months before LiveJournal removed the invite system, and clobbered LJ by seeding themselves with 20 million accounts on the first day. At that time the demographics for MySpace and LJ were roughly the same, and most people simply followed their friends onto MySpace. The coup de grace came a month after the invite system was removed, when Facebook was launched.

I'm not saying that the invite system was the only mistake they made, but it cost a year or two of lead time and allowed competitors with much deeper pockets to make up the gap.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Its interesting that there's no mention of SixApart. My theory would be that SA bought them to kill them.

<comment><USER11> Does that really make any sense? Once they owned LJ any success it had was theirs. "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity."

<comment><USER10> Companies are made up as individuals, and the actions of a large company are often not just the actions of the top management. And I didn't mean to suggest malice rather than stupidity, because it could have been entirely due to "institutional" stupidity.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Didn't Livejournal create Memcached?

<comment><AUTHOR> You're not the only one to mention memcached. Please go read the article, that's part of what I'm complaining about. They had memcached, and so many other things, including a very advanced commenting system, and yet they lost the opportunity to scale and go mainstream, and remained a niche site which consists largely of support groups and fanfiction. (Again, nothing wrong with that, but it could have been so much more.)</comment></comment>


How to set up a Git repository locally and on a remote server - <AUTHOR> http://blog.davidecoppola.com/2016/12/how-to-set-up-a-git-repository-locally-and-on-a-remote-server/ <comment><USER2> If you want to understand Git better, check out this talk on Git basics by our trainer Mike Weilgart: [https://youtu.be/j6Se3jH60dA](https://youtu.be/j6Se3jH60dA)</comment>


Interns can Run your Business - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/p/88c935a1bd24

<comment><USER2> very impressive. I wonder what the most effective means of communication/best practices was for an intern in a vastly different time zone.</comment>


Meat Is Killing Our Planet and We Won't Even Talk About It - <AUTHOR> http://collindonnell.com/2016/07/07/meat-is-killing-our-planet-and-we-wont-even-talk-about-it/ <comment><USER2> Well, now we are doing it (talking about meat, here and in the Washington Post).

<comment><USER3> The Cowspiracy documentary linked to is also quite good. It's very slanted, but it does a good job of presenting questions while being light hearted and not trying to make you feel massively guilty.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > If you eat meat while failing to accept the impact your choices have, you > not only are contributing to the problem, you are a climate change denier.

Any quantity of meat, any type of meat?

It is the same eating cow and pork in every meal than eating some days meat?

When people acts in the way that you're with me or against me and see the world in black and white we have a problem

</comment><comment><USER5> No it isn't. The planet will survive anything we do to it. Life will also survive. Homo sapiens will also survive, probably.

</comment><comment><USER6> If the problem is mostly cows (as this article says) then it's not just meat that's the problem, but milk too

</comment><comment><USER7> Oh yes, methane and greenhouse effect. It's not that the water in the atmosphere has much greater effect on the climate than methane and CO2 combined together. No, it's human activity surely.

<comment><USER4> Is the amount of water in the atmosphere growing?

<comment><USER7> Is the heat amount stored in CO2 and methane any higher than _fluctuations_ of heat capacity of water in the atmosphere? If no, then it doesn't matter if their level rises or not. And as I remember, it was a difference of orders of magnitude.

<comment><USER4> Can you link to any paper were I can see that the temperature rising is not related to CO2 but to water?

If not, can you link to any paper with an alternative theory to the temperature growing that is not related to greenhouse gases?

Thanks

Because you're not denying that temperatures are rising, isn't?</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Portal's physics engine rebuilt in 25KB—on a graphing calculator - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2012/12/portals-physics-engine-rebuilt-in-50kb-on-a-graphing-calculator/

<comment><USER2> Not quite--this is more a recreation of the Flash Portal clone. i.e. it's all 2D graphics and 2D physics.

I got my hopes up for a moment, preparing to be awestruck. Since I have a TI-89, that's what I think of when I hear "graphing calculator". My TI-89 can do 3D stuff (for instance this fun maze generator game <http://www.ticalc.org/pub/89/asm/games/amaz89.zip>), it would blow my mind to have anything close to a Portal 3D engine on it.

It's still awesome but not as mindblowing as the title suggests...

<comment><USER3> It would not be that hard to write a 3D physics engine for a TI-89 calculator (Assuming you already know how to write a 3D physics engine, which I do). Problem is, it would be useless since it will probably take tens of seconds (if not more) to calculate each frame.

<comment><USER4> I would not be so sure. It really all depends on how much physics you want your "physics engine" to have. Rag-dolls? Not likely. Quake 1? Sure, you could do physics to that extent on an 89. The 89's are more powerful than you may suspect, unlike the 84 (seen in the article), they have Motorola 68k's.

Here is an idea of what you can do with a 84's Zilog z80 (warning: long animated gif): [http://benryves.com/images/nostromo/bsp/2010.11.28/Walkthrou...](http://benryves.com/images/nostromo/bsp/2010.11.28/Walkthrough.gif)

(corresponding blog entry: <http://benryves.com/journal/3739423>)

You can get a lot more out of an M68k. (Actually, to be fair, the M68k calculators' larger screen size works against them, but if you are willing to sacrifice graphics you can easily surpass that demo.)

<comment><USER5> I remember playing a lot with my old TI-83. One of the most impressive games was DOOM: <http://www.ticalc.org/archives/files/fileinfo/238/23843.html> Best video I can find: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuupoxmeQ6U>

Unfortunately I never had a TI-89. Would've been awesome if I had one back in the day, and then test these games: <http://www.ticalc.org/archives/files/fileinfo/405/40593.html> and <http://www.ticalc.org/archives/files/fileinfo/323/32318.html>

<comment><USER4> Ah yeah, good stuff. I was always partial to Gemini and Wolf on the 83+ (<http://www.ticalc.org/archives/files/fileinfo/247/24742.html>, <http://www.ticalc.org/archives/files/fileinfo/277/27767.html>). Wolf even had an on-calculator level editor!

<comment><USER6> Gemini blew the socks off of all my middle school friends, but I'm embarrassed by the amount of time I spent on Galaxian in math class. Maybe one of these days, I'll dig out my 83+ and complete the no laser, no death run that I was always aiming for, just for old time's sake.

In hindsight, I wish I had spent that time learning Z80 instead...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The memory limitations are a bitch. It isn't that difficult to build your engine in that amount of space, but storing any decent graphics or level maps are nigh impossible. I had to quit working on a Zelda clone and JRPG because of memory issues. To this day, I've only seen one long game actually worth a crap and that's Joltima - <http://www.ticalc.org/archives/files/fileinfo/34/3456.html> Karneges had to use every trick in the book (huffman compression on 4 bit tilemaps) to fit it into 32K of RAM.

Still, it's impressive to do anything like Portal on the calculator. Glad that someone picked it up, even if the headlines are sensational.

<comment><USER8> You can absolutely page in data from Flash memory as needed, it's just non- trivial (and not handled by the "OS"). On devices with flash memory as an extension of RAM (TI 83+, 89, and 89 titanium), this could help for read-only level data that isn't needed all of the time.

Edit: Of course, Joltima targets the TI-83 (different from the 83+), which doesn't have any flash memory. Bravo, Justin Karneges.

<comment><USER4> You can also go the "App" route and make the whole thing an application that runs straight from flash.

Advantages are you can use many flash pages so your application can be massive, and your program will be easier to launch/distribute. We have the App signing keys so these days this route is pretty simple.

On the other hand you have to "allocate" ram to write to or scrounge for ram in predetermined areas in the address space. With regular assembly programs you can have "static" allocations that you can write to. Also programs don't take up a minimum of a single page, so they are generally preferred by people who are more comfortable with their calculator.

Damn, now I really want to revisit that z80 scheme implementation I was working on a few years ago...

<comment><USER7> Paging really, really sucks to manage on a TI calculator.

That being said, I loved working with the 32KB limit and optimizing every single byte out of my code. You got to learn all of the tricks like "XOR A" = 1 byte vs "LD A,0" = 2 bytes. However, some things sucked, like having to frequently write new sprite routines or tilemap scroller routines. I even ended up writing a logo style scripting language to handle animations in a RPG just to save a few KB.

Yes, this is clearly the 3% case for Knuth's quote, "... 97% of the time: premature optimization is the root of all evil"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> > While programming for graphing calculators admittedly doesn't give > Marcolina's work a wide reach

Are they joking? Those TI 83's will be used by high school students in the US/Canada as long as TI has this chokehold on schools. They've outlasted god- knows how many versions of Mac's, PC's, Nintendos, Xboxes, PS's.

<comment><USER10> How is the TI-83 still a thing? iPod is superior in every way: CPU display size and color, flexibility, cost (well, if they produced a last-gen version for the down market, it would be)

<comment><USER11> Battery life. Durability.

Also, don't underestimate the value of a UI and hardware keyboard centered around a specific workflow. Calculators are almost the opposite of a tablet/phone, computers specialized to programming and user input, with communication and content consumption as an afterthought at most.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> That is an excessively sensationalist headline. Portal, physics and graphics- wise, does way more than that graphing calculator.

To imply that they are equivalent is shameful and ignorant.

<comment><USER13> I don't see any claims of recreating Portal's graphics. I think yours is an excessively sensationalist criticism.

<comment><USER14> Claiming to recreate the physics engine implies that somebody remade the Source engine on a calculator. This is a massive exaggeration.

<comment><USER13> The title says 'in 25kb on a graphing calculator'. The only way it's "amazing" is if you know what a graphing calculator is, and if you know that, then it's pretty obvious that the title is a mild form of poetic license rather than a sensationalist attempt to mislead. And really, when people think of "Portal physics", for the most part they think of 'a hole between two non-adjacent surfaces you can travel through', not 'a realistic 3D world where objects behave according to newtonian physics', because the latter is a dime a dozen.

Honestly, how many people who know what a graphic calculator was would _seriously_ think that they "remade the Source engine", misled by the 'sensationalist' title?

<comment><USER10> The technically fascinating aspect of implementing narbuncular/portal physics is the optics of looking into a portal, not the trivial translation/rotation of passing through a portal in a platformer sideview.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Awesome! Too bad I gave my TI84 to some girl, after leaving college :(

</comment><comment><USER16> I have doom on my TI Nspire CAS :) Unfortunately the crappy screen is no good for playing it.

I've seen all sorts of hacks like this over the years but to be honest, I've fallen in love with the HP50g for hackability. The thing is awesome.

Not sure if its just me but I seem to accumulate calculators.

</comment><comment><USER17> Watching that demo on the calculator makes me want to play Portal.

</comment><comment><USER18> Wow that is so awesome. It's running on 6Mhz after all!

</comment><comment><USER19> TI-83+ was my only hand-held programming system. In high school, I wrote Blackjack, Trapshoot, and a Whac-a-mole clone on it, along with a few originals. I hope that touchdevelop takes off-- it might be the only reason I'd get a tablet.

</comment><comment><USER20> Not quite...

</comment><comment><USER21> It's an awesome achievement, worthy of geek praise. But even if I'm being very generous I wouldn't call this a physics engine.

<comment><USER18> There is however another approach by the same guy. Called Zedd Physics Library: <http://www.ticalc.org/archives/files/fileinfo/441/44185.html>

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> This looks more like a standard 2d platformer.

</comment><comment><USER23> The graphics are terrible.

<comment><USER4> It's a 96x64 B/W screen.

<comment><USER24> I think that's the joke...

<comment><USER4> Ah. People here are being rather negative so I took it as a sincere criticism.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> More like Portal: Flash Version 2D

<http://portal.wecreatestuff.com/>

Weird that this portal-dedicated person and Are Technica hadn't heard of Portal 2D.

</comment><comment><USER25> Oh how I wish I still had a usb-TI83 cable, still have the calculator just not the cord to plug it into my computer...

<comment><USER26> This one? <http://www.amazon.com/☺/dp/B00006BXBS>

<comment><USER27> ok, i have to ask - how do you get smiley-face amazon urls?

[update: huh, so it can be arbitrary text. what's it for?]

<comment><USER26> I didn't want the original (very long) URL which included the product name at that place (the technical term might be SEO-friendly URLs). So I first replaced it by an underscore to keep it short and then tried whether I can put something nicer in there. This wasn't generated by Amazon ☺</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Nasa reveals dozens of areas in danger of running out of water - <AUTHOR> https://www.ft.com/content/c2f6ab6a-5915-11e8-b8b2-d6ceb45fa9d0?tagToFollow=24ad2c58-14fb-4217-b6f7-7ef88ac51375 <comment><USER2> If you're going to post paywalled articles please indicate this in your headline so I know to ignore it/you.

Yes, yes I know the apologist arguments. "How would you propose The Financial Times structures it's business model?" Thankfully that's not my job. Life is too short for wasting time talking about this. I'm not signing up for The Financial Times or the WSJ. If you honestly think there's nothing wrong with what you're doing, make it clear in the headline. All dozen FT subscribers who also read HN can follow it.

</comment><comment><USER3> Paywalled

<comment><USER4> I was for me too but when I found a link in duckduckgo it was fine let me in first click.</comment></comment>


White Coke - vezzy-fnord https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Coke <comment><AUTHOR> I like the implication that it was considered more socially acceptable to chug vodka than Coca Cola.

<comment><USER2> That really stuck out at me too. I wonder when he drank the stuff, though. If it was just at parties, no big deal. If he was drinking it at work, then the implication would be pretty wacky.

<comment><USER3> _Not_ consuming "social" quantities of vodka at work would be far more questionable in the old time USSR.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Zhukov seemed to "pop" up repeatedly in important WWII battles (and other, more unexpected footnotes, apparently).

Might be an interesting biography to read...

This also sounds like the Khrushchev/video game connection:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10171304](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10171304)

<comment><USER5> Zhukov is one of the greatest generals of World War II. He made Stalin jealous.

<comment><USER4> It's surprising he was even around, then, considering [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge). (Gonna read that bio sometime.)

<comment><USER6> He became too much of a war hero.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Can't seem to find a photo of one, too bad.

</comment><comment><USER8> So, whereas a lot of people masquerade their spirits within soda cans, Zhukov was masquerading his soda as vodka. I love it!

</comment><comment><USER9> Why do we call it white when the correct term is clear?

<comment><USER10> >The colorless version of Coca-Cola was bottled using straight, clear glass bottles sporting a white cap with a red star in the middle.

Maybe it was because of the white cap?

<comment><USER11> Vodka and Gin are sometimes called white spirits.

[http://www.ginvodka.org/factsheets/UK_White_Spirits_Market.a...](http://www.ginvodka.org/factsheets/UK_White_Spirits_Market.asp)

And white spirits - the cleaning product - is called white spirits.

<comment><USER12> Both white and clear matter re-transmit all the light they receive, so neither of them have their own characteristic color.

Maybe that's why they are often mixed up.

<comment><USER13> Color and clarity are orthogonal qualities. A liquid can be either clear or opaque (or somewhere in between) regardless of it's color, and can be any color regardless of it's opacity.

Cranberry juice is both red and clear. Blood is red and opaque. Milk is white and opaque, and vodka is white and clear.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> >That is, Coca-Cola supplies and products were required to transit a Soviet occupation zone, while being transported between the Lambach bottling plant and the Vienna warehouse

man, what a logistical nightmare. can't imagine having to deal with something like that if I was trying to get coca-cola from A to B. they must have been grateful for the "unusual consequence" of almost no soviet-zone stoppage.

</comment><comment><USER15> Reminds me of Nuka-Cola. :)

<comment><USER16> If the cold war had taken wrong turn on probably one of the 10 possible points in history, it might as well have been ...

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Similarly, Fanta started out in Nazi Germany:

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

</comment><comment><USER18> Too bad there is not a single picture depicting the product in that wikipedia page.

</comment><comment><USER19> essentially crystal pepsi?

<comment><USER20> Well, the other way around, since Crystal Pepsi came far (50 years) later.

Edit: And it seems Crystal Pepsi was also caffeine-free. The only difference between White Coke and regular Coke was the coloring.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Sounds tasty.</comment>


A New U.S. Style Travel Authorisation For EU Visitors Coming In 2021 - <AUTHOR> https://etias.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> "Starting in 2021, the European Commission will roll out a U.S. style electronic travel authorisation system for visitors from countries that are currently not part of the EU."</comment>


Show HN: Compiler using Lisp's macro system for metaprogramming C-like languages - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/kiselgra/c-mera <comment><USER2> Reminds me of an older (unfinished) project of mine, sxc:

[https://github.com/burtonsamograd/sxc](https://github.com/burtonsamograd/sxc)

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't understand, what are lisp/scheme/racket/haskell being used for? I mean how are those languages good from a software engineering point of view? From a project management point of view?

Is it possible to hear bad things about those languages? Why aren't they used? Is it because they are too hard to use, or to difficult to approach for a beginner?

<comment><USER4> Haskell and friends (Elm, ..) are fantastic, and perhaps the absolute best programming languages for software engineering. Except there's a small problem: Haskell is either write-only or read-only, depending on what you're looking at. That is, beautiful Haskell code is easy enough to read, but very very difficult to write, while working code you might write may not be very readable at all. Of course, that can happen in any language, but it seems to me that Haskell leads to that sort of situation very easily. On the other hand, the nice thing about Haskell is that once your code compiles it also probably does what you want it to :)

I would stay away from dynamically-typed languages (e.g., the Lisp and Scheme families) for software engineering. Dynamic typing means more run-time errors, which means a higher support burden, which is very much what you want to lower when you're a software engineer. And this is why I like Haskell: it's statically-typed. (The main appeal of Lisp is its macro system, really. Haskell gives you the sort of power that the Lisp macro system gives you anyways, though at the cost of more compile-time processing.)

If you can't use Haskell, then your best bets are Rust and C/C++.

In any case, a software engineer almost necessarily has to be familiar with all of these, and able to use any of them. You really want a strong foundation at the lowest layers (C, and even ASM) in order to work the full stack (libraries, applications, compilers, OS). You don't have to be a full stack engineer, naturally, but it sure helps to be able to adapt to working at different layers, and for this you need a strong conceptual foundation. A lot of layers in a full stack are written in C/C++, but web front-ends involve JavaScript, which is dynamically-typed, so you'll really need to be familiar with all of these, and that's just to get started.

<comment><USER5> My opinion: If you can't use Haskell, you should definitely use a null-free language for safety in this day and age, which means Rust and definitely _not_ C/C++.

<comment><USER4> Yes, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't be able to use C/C++ as needed -- sometimes you have no choice.

<comment><USER5> As always, pragmatism is good. If you are good at C/C++, use it and be happy and productive. I presumed the context of this discussion, however, was wanting to use Haskell for its particular benefits, and in my opinion the null-free nature is a key benefit, which would not be achieved by using C/C++.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I think the title might be misleading here. It doesn't really transpile Common Lisp to C, it requires you to write in a C-like Lisp dialect so it gets translated to C. Might as well have been an entire Lisp dialect with a compiler of its own.

<comment><USER7> I think the idea is that you write C-with-sexpr-syntax, but by embedding those s-expressions in Common Lisp, you can make use of macros written in Lisp to generate C code. Essentially, it's a saner preprocessor for C that requires you to write in funky syntax.

I think this would be even more interesting if it could do the C -> s-expression transformation, so that code already written in C could integrate calls to Lisp macros without needing a full rewrite.

<comment><USER4> A C->S-expression compiler would have to produce very obvious and simple mappings in order for a macro system to be usable. Another way of saying this is that a simple and standard AST would be nice.

<comment><USER8> The Vacietis ([https://github.com/vsedach/Vacietis/](https://github.com/vsedach/Vacietis/)) reader can be easily adapted to do that. You can see examples in the unit tests:

[https://github.com/vsedach/Vacietis/blob/master/test/reader-...](https://github.com/vsedach/Vacietis/blob/master/test/reader- tests.lisp)

As-is, C block constructs get mapped directly to Common Lisp special forms like _tagbody_ and _prog_ because those implement a superset of C control flow semantics. Pick different names in _vacietis.c_ and you have an AST.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> TLDR -- there is nothing so special about Lisp (in terms of metaprogramming) other than a syntax that is easy to parse. All languages have tools to manipulate code at the source code level, but people rarely use them. These guys did.</comment>


Newborn Mice's Hearts Can Heal Themselves, Study Finds - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/01/science/01obmice.html <comment><USER2> Why is this news? We know our bodies have the ability to regen but we lose it almost immediate upon birth. We all do..every living thing has the ability to regen and lose it at various times and in some cases like the Glass Lizard can regen an entire limb.

And now.. with the aid of stemcells. We should be able to regen any and all parts of the body....

Wonder what this world will be like in 50-100yrs when we have the ability to regen any part of our body that's failing or simply needs "refreshed".

</comment><comment><USER3> Its all mind over matter. Whenever I think good about someone, a movie or a song, within hours to a couple days, that factor comes across my life. Here is a secret to heal your own heart, close your eyes and imagine your body to be blue, all the red spots you see are on the image of yourself need to be healed. Force the blue to overcome the red and then blow it out like releasing a deep breathe, MAGIC! You have now mastered the ancient form of self healing. Science is understanding what the mind already knows, an extraction process of unique information.</comment>


Gitlab Critical Security Release: 13.0.4, 12.10.9, 12.9.9 - <AUTHOR> https://about.gitlab.com/releases/2020/06/03/critical-security-release-13-0-4-released/ <comment><AUTHOR> Any guesses on how to interpret the description?

> An authorization issue discovered in the CI jobs token handling allowed read > access to public projects with restricted repositories. This issue is now > mitigated in the latest release and is waiting for a CVE ID to be assigned.

A GitLab project can have multiple repositories? I don't think so. Is this just s/project/group/?</comment>