The Resume Is Dead  - <AUTHOR> http://www.chicagosean.com/2011/01/resume-is-dead.html

<comment><USER2> _If you put this kind of effort in, opportunities will come to you. People will recognize you and your work. Your well earned reputation will precede you before you even walk in the door._

 _sigh_ This works for high flying traders, it works for rockstar coders, or people applying at "indie" companies (i.e. ones with renegade hiring styles). And so on.

And, typically, someone in that high flying arena misconstrues what he is seeing around him as the future.

It could well be.

But it ignores the fact that the vast majority of people still submit a CV, then wait and hope for an interview. CV's are far from dead (should they be? who knows).

If you want to work at the top, you can't do what the rest of us do. If you don't want to work there, well, it's a waste of time.

<comment><USER3> Seriously. If the only way to get hired is to be in the top X% (for X << 100), then what exactly are the other (100 - X)% that make up the majority of the population supposed to do?

We can't _all_ be famous superhero rockstar coders.

That said, this is a viable strategy for getting a job- it just isn't grounds to declare resumes gone and buried, because it's impossible for everyone to secure their job this way.

<comment><USER4> Doing a good job and having a good reputation are not just for rockstars. I doubt this will ever go out of style.

The CV? The CV will always be around, just as many cultural artifacts remain, despite their obsolete functionality.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> _This is 2011. Resumes are how your daddy got interviews at Dunder Mifflin. HR reps get forwarded hundreds of resumes a day. My friends who work in HR tell me its actually the really crappy resumes that get noticed - but only so they can make fun of them and then toss them in the garbage. The good ones don't even grab attention - they just look like the hundreds of other good ones they've got on file._

Apparently, in 2011, HR departments make fun of bad resumes and toss them in the trash, rather than interviewing people with good resumes?

 _If you put this kind of effort in, opportunities will come to you. People will recognize you and your work. Your well earned reputation will precede you before you even walk in the door._

So the advice boils down to "be famous"? That's great, if you can manage it, but there's a finite amount of fame out there: it's a zero sum game.

Perhaps this is atypical, but I just have a bog-standard resume, no twitter account, and a blog that probably averages 2 hits per week. Despite that, I haven't had a problem getting interviews by submitting my resume through company job websites. As this guy would say, there's nothing that makes my resume stand out from all the others they have on file: I got a BS from a state school, an MS from another state school, and have a job at a small startup no one's ever heard of. And when I interview, just knowing algorithms 101 seems to be sufficient to get a job offer (and not even necessary unless I'm interviewing at a place like MS or Google).

This guy makes landing a job sound a lot harder than it actually is.

<comment><USER4> _So the advice boils down to "be famous"?_

I don't think that's fair. Why is "be famous" a better decoding than "be awesome?" Are you seriously telling me that you know of no one who, while they don't have celebrity status, isn't known in your community or subfield as someone awesome?

 _there's a finite amount of fame out there: it's a zero sum game._

I'm calling bullsh#t on this one. How in the world can you justify there's a finite amount of fame? Fame is basically the garnering of attention. Are you implying there's a finite amount of attention? How is this so in the face of increasing population and wealth? Not only are there more people, more of the people have more free time and access to information resources. There's more and more people able to pay more and more attention. Even if this were not true, fame still wouldn't be a _zero sum game_ unless you've shown that everyone's attention is saturated. I posit that there's still room for growth.

<comment><USER6> hahaha... if there's a finite number of people, there's a finite amount of attention.

<comment><USER4> Oh, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. It's not effectively a zero-sum game until you near saturation. Before that point, the dynamics are the same as for an infinite resource.

How's about a game of poker with grains of sand as chips?

Second, you already admitted that the amount of attention can grow. There's only a finite amount of wealth represented in the balance sheets of everyone alive on the planet right this second, but no one claims wealth is a Zero Sum Game because there's no clear upper bound.

Oh, and BTW, hahaha...

<comment><USER7> A finite number is always finite, even if it's so large that you can't comprehend it in normal human terms.

Oh, and arguably the amount of fame there is to be had is nowhere near unfathomable. I can list off the top of my head probably hundreds of "famous people", and I don't give a shit about celebrity. The only limit there is my memory, not a lack of famous people to think about. Our culture is absolutely _packed_ with famous people, it's pretty clearly saturated.

 _"no one claims wealth is a Zero Sum Game"_

 _Objectively_ wrong.

<comment><USER4> _A finite number is always finite, even if it's so large that you can't comprehend it in normal human terms._

You apparently misunderstood the point I made in the gp post. That has almost nothing to do with my argument. So, you are saying that any game where the scores at any moment are finite numbers is a zero-sum game.

Various economic activities are subject to _many iterations across time._

 _"no one claims wealth is a Zero Sum Game"

Objectively wrong._

Okay, not enough words for the slightly uninformed to understand. There are people historically who have put forth theories based on the idea that globally wealth is zero-sum. I don't think anyone in economics takes them seriously any more.

 _Our culture is absolutely packed with famous people, it's pretty clearly saturated._

The >culture< \-- meaning I presume, the general culture -- are you so soft- headed that you think this directly relates to the context of getting hired in a particular field or this discussion?

Exercise for the less than completely clued -- where in the previous discussion did I frame the _relevant_ context of notoriety. Locate that, and reframe your arguent in that context. Then I might consider this intellectually worthwhile. As it is, I keep on having to explain things to someone who half-understands arguments.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> If the job requires tangible skills that can be demonstrated in a 20 minute interview, the resume has never been that important. Similarly, if you are poaching someone with a proven track record from somewhere else, resumes have never been important.

But if the job requires intangible skills that cannot be demonstrated in a 20 minute interview, and the candidate does not have a proven track record, employers have to use some method to filter and find. Resumes are far from perfect, but they are one way to do this, and I expect any rumors of their death are greatly exaggerated.

</comment><comment><USER9> I'll share my secret for getting past HR. I have been consulting for the past 30 years, so I get to job hunt more frequently than most of you. I have a good resume, but I am older than most of you and I run into age bias in small startups. So I have most success with young companies with 100 to 300 employees where the first generation product hack has to be rewritten, extended or whatever. I have a resume for buzzword content, job history, and project stories. Experiments with content and style have shown me that it has little impact on securing initial interviews.

It's the cover letter that has the most impact. During the dot com implosion I was having little success with a cover letter targeting technical hiring managers. This was after all San Francisco and I was competing with laid off dotcomers and programmers for all the infrastructure companies.

I changed it to target HR and technical directors. I rewrote it to show a little wit and to soften the jargon. I even quoted a Johnny Cash song, "been everywhere". Immediately the interviews tripled, which is good when you are middle aged and expensive (putting three of your cohorts through college).

</comment><comment><USER10> Is this really the best article that HN has to offer today?

Resumes are not dead. It's just a summary of your accomplishments. If your accomplishments are outstanding, you'll get noticed. Otherwise, you don't.

</comment><comment><USER11> I just recently moved to a new job, the recruiting was based solely on reputation, I basically had the job before anyone talked to me or saw a resume. This was a new thing for me. To be completely honest it felt _great_ , a wonderful validation.

I'm hard on myself and while I take pride in my work and what I've accomplished I always focus on the things I'm not great at. That sounds negative, and it probably is, but I think it has its plus side, and I'm not sure I can be, or want to be, any other way. But apparently I've done enough good things, and handled myself in a way that really good people want to recommend me.

Gratifying, but also a little scary. I'm comfortable with the pressure I put on myself, but the prospect of letting other people down, people I think a lot of, is unsettling.

A recommendation is, and the more vocal it is (and the more of them there are) the more it becomes -- a very generous gift, and with it comes a lot of responsibility of a different kind.

The resume route might be harder, but it has its positives. Easier to exceed expectations.

</comment><comment><USER12> Contacts have always trumped resumes.

"It's not what you know, but who you know."

<comment><USER13> Actually, I think it is better said "It is who knows you".

Many have thought that the best way to get somebody to know you is through a resume. Really, the best way is through contacts. In my long career, I have had three "starting points" where I got a job without using my contacts network. And that was without really being conscious about it.

If you are in the programming profession (don't know about trading) then today's best way is to put up a web site with a project that you are building. Show your stuff.

(I can't believe how far off the rails this whole discussion has gone. And we aren't even to the "cover letters are more important that resumes" discussion.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> This is bullshit. There's only one thing a prop desk cares about when hiring a new trader: how much money did you make at your previous shop? This translates _extremely_ well on a CV. In fact, I can't think of anything better any prospective employer could ever hope to see on a CV. Thanks to the quantifiable nature of your performance, trading is one industry where you really can keep to yourself and don't need to build some kind of personal brand.

Of all the traders I know not a single one of them has a public web presence. Far from it. They are all extremely private and what they think and know they are not broadcasting on twitter.

</comment><comment><USER15> When I first graduated, I took all of the interesting things I had made over the years in my spare time (non school work material: a crappy threads library in C, a packet injector for an exotic network protocol, a patch to the linux kernel that got committed, etc) and put them on a web page and made sure people looked at it.

It was instrumental to help get me a job early in my career. I had no contacts and I do not interview well at all.

However, such portfolios need to be kept current with newer and better code. I've discovered that in my most recent job search, it did not help so much because most of the code is stagnant.

</comment><comment><USER16> The title should have been focused on how the HR department isn't they key to getting a job anymore. HR requires resumes so they can scan them and look for keywords. Then if you pass the keyword test you get to move on to the hiring manager.

Being awesome or having a solid reputation won't help you get through HR. The author is advocating skipping HR entirely, which is a fine proposition. But it's not about the resume. The resume is just part of the established process.

Go, be awesome. But keep your resume updated so that you can keep track of your accomplishments and successes.

</comment><comment><USER17> The trend for HR to be inundated with so many resumes that the good ones fall through has much more to do with the current unemployment rate than with the resume being "dead"

</comment><comment><USER18> Any company that lets HR do the screening of the engineers is probably doing it wrong.

Every job I've gotten is from networking. Submitting my CV has just been an after-the-fact formality.

</comment><comment><USER19> I totally agree. I get much further showing my personal side projects than I do my resume.</comment>


The War on Sex Trafficking Is the New War on Drugs - <AUTHOR> https://reason.com/archives/2015/09/30/the-war-on-sex-trafficking-is <comment><USER2> Great piece -- well argued and timely. I certainly realize from reading it that I was insufficiently skeptical about the whole anti-trafficking thing.

It's not that actual sex slavery is not abhorrent -- of course it is. And it does exist. But as Ms. Brown explains, hard evidence that it is a large and growing problem is extremely hard to come by. And the efforts nominally being made to combat it are mostly actually going toward criminalizing ordinary prostitution. The vice squad has figured out how to turn on the money tap by pushing the emotional button labelled "slavery".

Indeed, I just the other day read an online appeal by a young woman arrested _for being a teenage prostitute_. The fact that that could happen -- and it's not a unique occurrence, as Ms. Brown mentions -- shows that the anti- trafficking story is a lie, because the rhetoric of the movement is that an underage prostitute is always a victim, never a criminal. Well, if you really think someone is a victim, the last thing you do is arrest them!</comment>


More microbursts are coming - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-07-29/forget-tornadoes-rain-bombs-are-coming-for-your-town <comment><USER2> Reminds me of this essay I read yesterday, which painted a pretty startling picture of how insane things could get:

[http://www.flassbeck-economics.com/how-climate-change-is- rap...](http://www.flassbeck-economics.com/how-climate-change-is-rapidly- taking-the-planet-apart/)

Here's a snippet showing how rapidly predictions are escalating:

* Late 2007: The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) announces that the planet will see a one degree Celsius temperature increase due to climate change by 2100.

* Late 2008: The Hadley Centre for Meteorological Research predicts a 2C increase by 2100.

* Mid-2009: The U.N. Environment Programme predicts a 3.5C increase by 2100. Such an increase would remove habitat for human beings on this planet, as nearly all the plankton in the oceans would be destroyed, and associated temperature swings would kill off many land plants. Humans have never lived on a planet at 3.5C above baseline.

* October 2009: The Hadley Centre for Meteorological Research releases an updated prediction, suggesting a 4C temperature increase by 2060.

* November 2009: The Global Carbon Project, which monitors the global carbon cycle, and the Copenhagen Diagnosis, a climate science report, predict 6C and 7C temperature increases, respectively, by 2100.

* December 2010: The U.N. Environment Programme predicts up to a 5C increase by 2050.

* 2012: The conservative International Energy Agency's World Energy Outlook report for that year states that we are on track to reach a 2C increase by 2017.

* November 2013: The International Energy Agency predicts a 3.5C increase by 2035.

<comment><USER3> America can reduce its carbon footprint by 5%, save 300,000 lives/year, and save about $400 Billion dollars a year without spending a nickel.

If the 66% of the American population that's obese or overweight would just stop overeating, all of the above could happen overnight.

<comment><USER4> It is a red herring.

It reminds me how soda companies shift blame on their customers: "exercise more, don't blame our sugar water". Actually, what and how much you eat/drink is much more important than the exercise, to fight obesity.

Another (BS) example: "shower less to save water" \-- compare the agricultural water consumption (giant) vs. the household needs (negligible by comparison).

If a corporation destroys the planet; its products should include the price today (e.g., via a tax): the problem fixes itself.

<comment><USER3> Nobody ever said exercise more. (That may be bad advice for obese people too, because it will make them hungrier and they may injure their already strained joints). Plus, it won't help the environment. (That's the subject here!)

Just eat less!

<comment><USER4> In case you are not playing stupid intentionally, my point: blame corporations, not people: _tax corporations_ that contribute to the global warming today (that may have a real effect even if it is almost impossible to implement -- it should be easier with each more frequent natural disaster) instead of suggesting _" eat less"_ to the whole population (that won't have nearly the same effect and it is even more impossible to implement).

<comment><USER5> He actually has a point. While corporations have their share of responsibility, so do individuals who choose the quick rewards of sugar/sodium/fat.

Not that asking an addict to quit is really helpful...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> As a farmer/rancher, I'm happy not to live in the "1930s" region of that graph. I've never understood why people in North America complain about rain. The land we have that is vulnerable to flooding is tiny in comparison to that which is vulnerable to desertification.

<comment><USER7> Just curious, are you a father/rancher and a software dev? How did you come across hn?

<comment><USER8> Haven't you heard about the dust-up about DRM on tractors? Tech is everywhere, even the unglamorous places

<comment><USER9> I'm of the opinion that the metropolis is the unglamorous place.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Flooding in Houston over the past 40 years has had more to do with development and flood control projects than changes in rainfall.

I really hate when people try to use Houston as an example of the effects of climate change, the behavior of economic clusters, or the effects of zoning. Most of what I've read shows people really have no clue about how those things actually work here.

</comment><comment><USER11> > roughly one in ten record-breaking events would not have occurred without > climate change

So 90% of these record breaking events are normal. Then why all the hyperbole? Oh right, saying "rain bomb" instead of "microburst" gets more clicks.

<comment><USER12> Because we've moved the climate in one direction or another by 10% already, and we've never polluted so heavily before. That's pretty significant.

That stat is also normalized over the past 30 years. Change is accelerating, so it would be more than 10% over the past 10 years.

<comment><USER11> This does not equate to a 10% change in climate, whatever that even means.

> Change is accelerating...

What change specifically is accelerating? Your base assumption that things are unquestionably getting worse is unscientific.

<comment><USER12> I don't... what?

Anyway...

Since the new thing is to yell at any post that doesn't provide a link, here - change is accelerating: [https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/mar/21/global-w...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/mar/21/global- warming-taking-place-at-an-alarming-rate-un-climate-body-warns)

But this isn't news. And it's all scientific.

<comment><USER11> [http://www.nasa.gov/press/2014/october/nasa-study-finds- eart...](http://www.nasa.gov/press/2014/october/nasa-study-finds-earth-s- ocean-abyss-has-not-warmed/#.V574F65Mvs3)

<comment><USER12> Says the same thing as the article I linked.

"Global surface temperatures in 2015 shattered all previous records by a wide margin, the report shows, sitting 0.76C above the 1961-90 average. Temperatures over land, over the ocean and in the top 700 and 2,000 metres of the ocean all set new records."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Here's what that looks like on the ground. Ellicott City, MD had a flash flood last night. The Patapsco River rose 14 feet in an hour and a half. The area has flooded before, but during hurricanes, for which there's more advance warning.

[1] [https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/severe-flash-flood- stri...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/severe-flash-flood-strikes- ellicott-city-overturning-cars-and-destroying- businesses/2016/07/31/a8e50184-5720-11e6-831d-0324760ca856_story.html)

<comment><USER14> Was that considered a microburst?

<comment><USER13> Unclear. One site says yes.[1] This just happened last night, so accurate analysis may be a few days away.

[1] [http://metroforensics.blogspot.com/2016/07/microbursts- cause...](http://metroforensics.blogspot.com/2016/07/microbursts-cause-flash- flooding-in-new.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I highly recommend the book "Collapse" by Jared Diamond on the matter. It is a highly detailed account of what happened in the past when societies collapsed. Most if the time they consumed more resources than what their environment would provide. Many of them then failed, wars and genocides occured that reduced the population to below sustainable levels, or people sinply starved. Others managed to turn around and started to manage resources properly. There's a talk by the author on Youtube that summarizes the book. [https://youtu.be/wpkS1xym0HA](https://youtu.be/wpkS1xym0HA)

</comment><comment><USER16> American cities need to learn a thing or two from Tokyo. 10 inches of rain in one day is a common occurrence in Japan during the summer, so they are prepared to handle it.

<comment><USER17> Yeah, that's sort of the point. This kind of weather hasn't been happening, so infrastructure hasn't been built to handle it.

For infrastructure that will last 50 years, it really doesn't make a lot of sense to build it to withstand events that happen roughly every 500 years. Of course things like nuclear plants and dams have to be built to withstand the most severe events, but not every culvert on a country road.

<comment><USER18> The counter argument is that it's cheaper to do things once than twice. Laying a one foot drainage pipe, then digging it up and replacing with three foot pipe, is way more expensive than just laying three foot pipe to start. Too many public works projects seem to be built right at the edge of confidence.

<comment><USER19> Doing things once is how you get suburban sprawl that everyone here loves to hate. Drive around some parts of the south and you'll see that the space set aside for infrastructure is only about 50% utilized. There's two and four lane roads with one and two lane widths of grass shoulder between them and the culverts and enough space for a culvert twice as wide before you have to move the sidewalk.

I'm a big fan of leaving room for expansion but everything is a tradeoff to some degree.

<comment><USER18> Is that really so terrible? A road with some grass along it?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> When last year was the hottest year on record, and this year is on track to be the hottest year on record, globally that is a cause for concern.

</comment><comment><USER9> Pretty sure Las Vegas would crumble if it ever got a macro burst. Many streets flood with seemingly any rainfall here. When they do flood, large rocks and debris wash onto the streets.

<comment><USER21> Los Cabos in mexico rarely gets rain and they do get floods whenever they get more than a couple inches of rain. at least thats what the locals told me last time I visited

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> The article questions "when the next one is coming", but it already came, last night in Ellicott City, MD. The whole downtown was wiped out (in an economic sense) by a flash flood caused by six inches of rain falling in three hours.

</comment><comment><USER23> I experienced what was eventually classified as a microburst and the effects on the ground were largely indistinguishable from a tornado. I'm not sure the article really made this clear, or if there are multiple, potentially different definitions for the term. This is also an area that frequently experiences tornado activity so we have ample experience with those events for comparison. We had winds that were likely in excess of 125mph and there were around 100+ houses damaged, 6-8 were completely destroyed and 30+ sustained severe damage. Flooding was not an issue but we have unique geography that makes that very unlikely.

</comment><comment><USER24> Heh, the Phoenix picture is impressive but that's every July-September for us - it's monsoon season. We get massive, violent storms that last a very short time, dump a massive amount of water on the city, and then are clear skies before you know what even happened.

If anything, it's been a particularly tame year this year. We've had a few good storms, but we haven't even gotten close to our annual flash floods.

</comment><comment><USER25> I live in the mountains in Central Arizona. A few summers ago we had a microburst in our neighborhood. For 20 minutes it was like a wall of water coming down. The house down hill from us got 3 feet of mud in the living room, major property damage. It took us about 5 hours to repair our yard but no real damage. Meanwhile, a friend living less that a mile away only had very light rain.

</comment><comment><USER26> The article makes the argument that there is more CO2 in the atmosphere, thus a hotter atmosphere, thus the atmosphere can hold more water.

Does that at all explain the increasingly frequent droughts? Could it be due to more water in the water cycle being stuck in the atmosphere instead of on earth's surface?

<comment><USER27> Weather is a dynamic system. Just because you have more water in the air doesn't mean you have more water everywhere.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Bloomberg is trying to invent new, scarier sounding terminology, and honestly it's quite silly. What they're referring to are microbursts.

<comment><USER29> New Yorkers are wimps when it comes to anything weather. There's a small thunderstorm? We call it a "doozie". Some snow in the forecast? We shut down the entire regional transportation system.

I'm originally from Chicago so I find it all very amusing. I don't recall the L ever shutting down, nor do I remember any news articles about thunderstorms unless there were tornados inside the city limits.

<comment><USER30> I've noticed this trend to be more and more alarmist about what used to be normal weather.

For example, I've lived in the midwest USA most of my life. Every July and August is hot and humid, with many days in the 90-degree (F) range. This used to just be normal summer weather and unremarkable. Now, anything over 85 degrees is a "heat advisory" and over 90 people are advised to stay indoors and avoid activity. They also publish absurd "feels like" temperature e.g. "today's high 91, _feels like 117_." I'm sorry, in no real world does 91 "feel like" 117.

<comment><USER31> > I'm sorry, in no real world does 91 "feel like" 117.

It does, and there's no voodoo needed to understand why. In a super-humid environment your body's way of dealing with the heat - sweat - just isn't as efficient. On a breezy day in the desert, 117 is... well, it's damn hot, but if you're staying hydrated and take steps to keep from getting sunburned, it's kind of surprising how tolerable it is. In that environment sweat works its magic quickly and effectively.

(I live in the midwest and I'd trade fifteen or twenty degrees for the humidity we get this time of year. My first visit to the Nevada desert was kind of an eye-opener)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Which PHP Framework? - <AUTHOR>

Hi. I am wondering what the best PHP framework is. I googled and found a few: CakePHP, Symfony and Zend. Which PHP framework do you use or like? Or, should I even bother implementing PHP framework at all? <comment><USER2> Yes you should bother. Two recommendations: <http://codeigniter.com> and <http://cakephp.org></comment>


Australia's new real-time banking payments platform - <AUTHOR> https://www.itnews.com.au/news/australias-new-payments-platform-goes-live-485045 <comment><USER2> Even before this, Australia still had direct person-to-person transfers. They'd just take a day, and required an account number and name.

I've written about this before, but American is terribly far behind on this:

[https://penguindreams.org/blog/the-american-banking- system-i...](https://penguindreams.org/blog/the-american-banking-system-is- still-in-the-1990s/)

The closest thing we have in the US is Zelle, which is not a government mandated standard (like ACH) but a private standard created by banks and which only a fraction of banks in the US currently support.

And of course there are services like Venmo/Paypal, but these are private opt- in services, where as most other countries have this system mandated and fee- free between banks via their government reserve banks.

<comment><USER3> The US is in dismal shape compared to the UK and now Australia--And its pretty infuriating.

Although from what I understand on March 16th, 2018 the US will at least get same-day ACH. However, it will still be batch processed only two times each day--During banking hours no less! [https://www.nacha.org/rules/same-day-ach- moving-payments-fas...](https://www.nacha.org/rules/same-day-ach-moving- payments-faster-phase-3)

There is a NPR planet money on why the US has such an archaic system: [https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2013/10/04/229224964/epis...](https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2013/10/04/229224964/episode-489-the- invisible-plumbing-of-our-economy)

Their hypothesis? Unsurprisingly, perverse incentives. Wire transfers in the US, which usually carry a high fee ($30) are very lucrative for banks so they don't have much interest in eliminating the need for wire transfers at the moment, but it appeared that there was growing interest in moving to real-time eventually.

<comment><USER4> > Wire transfers in the US, which usually carry a high fee ($30)

Is this for real ? This sounds incredibly expensive. We have free next-day wire transfers within the entire EU, and real-time transfers for free in The Netherlands. Even my business bank account only charges 2 cents per transfer.

How do Americans wire money to each other when it's so expensive ?

<comment><USER5> They send each other checks. Actual piece-of-paper checks.

To their credit, they've got it to the point where I can take a picture of the front/back of the check with my smartphone, upload the photos to my bank's website and deposit it that way, but the first time I did this I felt really weird about the whole thing...

<comment><USER2> On my backlog is to write an app that displays a check on a tablet where you can put in your details. Then have someone take a photo with their bank app of your tablet. I bet it would work .. and show how absolutely assine and archaic we are.

In every other country I lived in, I never ordered checks, or used checks. In the US, even if I bill pay via my bank, it mails out a physical check to company it doesn't have an ACH policy with (like landlords)

<comment><USER6> I imagine some of the pictures are randomly selected for manual review, and especially any pictures that the bank deems the least bit iffy.

Unless you'd like to hire lawyers to help you with a fraud case, I'd recommend not taking that our of your backlog.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Instant payments, aka "instant SEPA" will be available soon also in the EU

[https://www.europeanpaymentscouncil.eu/what-we-do/sepa- insta...](https://www.europeanpaymentscouncil.eu/what-we-do/sepa-instant- credit-transfer)

<comment><USER8> I couldn't find details on it, but will this system allow for transfers based on phone number or email or will it still be based on IBAN?

<comment><USER9> I'd actually prefer it if it was just IBAN. No need to entangle my phone and email into that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This sounds like the swedish product "swish" which is immensely popular. Nobody does bank transfers between people, everybody transfers to your mobile number. So far I think there are no fees for personal use, either, although they said it would come later a few years ago. Transfers are of course instant and you can see the recipients name before you send the money, which is a great pro compared to a bank transfer to an opaque number.

<comment><USER11> Do people really transfer that much money between them on a regular basis? Everyone was touting this as the selling point for some of the crypto currencies, but I've always thought this is a non-issue. It's anecdotal but I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I needed to transfer money to a person and not to a company.

<comment><USER12> ALL the time. It's the replacement for cash. Looking at the past 6 months in my history: Split numerous restaurant bills. Paid someone who bought me a concert ticket. Bought some crap in a flea market. Bought a set of used wheels for my car. Bought a hotdog at the son's hockey game cafeteria. Bet the office sports tournament pool. Bought food in a hospital ward. Bought soda in a vending machine. Of these many happened multiple times and the clear majority were to individuals. During these 6 months I have not touched cash.

<comment><USER13> Just asking, because I'm interested. Do you use it to pay Amazon? Your phone bill? You power provider? These are the areas I (Germany) currently use SEPA direct debit and would know how SEPA payments is used/replaced in other countries.

<comment><USER14> utility bills and other regular stuff like that can be delivered electronically to your bank account in Sweden, such that you just log in and approve them. domestic online purchases are commonly paid by card, by a direct bank transfer that's done integrated as part of the checkout, or through Klarna where your just approve the purchase and then sort it out with them afterwards.

<comment><USER13> Nice!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The two banks I've checked only allow you to use your mobile phone number or email address as your PayID (CBA and ING).

When paying somebody, when you enter a recipient's PayID, the bank confirms by showing the recipient account holder name.

So in effect, they've just implemented a nationwide number-to-name lookup system.

Separate to this, these two banks are pushing it hard. It feels like a land grab, since a single phone number can only be assigned to a single bank.

<comment><USER16> Westpac appears to be limiting it to mobile phone number, not even allowing email addresses. I'm okay with giving out an email address, but not my personal phone number that people can call & buzz me any time of day or night. I'd rather just give out my BSB / Account Number.

I'm happy to see real-time payments, though. That will make it easier to bounce money around between savings accounts at different banks, no more waiting 3 days for EFT to clear.

[1] [https://www.westpac.com.au/faq/payid-what-is- it/](https://www.westpac.com.au/faq/payid-what-is-it/)

<comment><USER17> It's not clear to me if the BSB / Account Number or BPAY payments will be in any way affected by this new system, or if they will remain as slow as ever.

<comment><USER18> They _should_ be faster, but I doubt it.

<comment><USER17> The new payment type will be called "Osko", which can only be used with a PayID. The old payment types will apparently continue to operate the same as ever.

Banks may offer smaller maximum transaction sizes for Osko, or delay the first payment to a new account by up to 24 hours, in an attempt to reduce fraud.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> This article woefully undersells this development. As of today, Australia is the proud new owner of the world's most advanced payment system. This thing has it all, central directories, fraud sharing services, and an infrastructure BUILT for access by the private sector. There's some governance items and constraints here and there, but otherwise this is insanely advanced.

<comment><USER20> Real-time payment platforms that interconnect all the banks in the country are not new.

Heck, Nigeria rolled out a very advanced one about 7 years ago

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16374597](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16374597)

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> In India , similar system called IMPS is pretty popular for small to medium transactions. UPI is also getting popular and it's based on IMPS

<comment><USER22> How does it work? Can I use an Android app to send money? Do I just enter the recipient's mobile phone number or is there something else that identifies the recipient?

<comment><USER21> For plain IMPS, you need to use your bank's App. For UPI, you can use any app eg google tez, or WhatsApp. One requirement for both is you need to link mobile number with your bank account and for plain IMPS you need additional id called MMID for transfer. UPI does not need it. It also has cool feature of requesting money from other UPI addressses.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Can anyone post a rough breakdown on how $1B can be spent to build such a system?

<comment><USER24> Look you "myki" on Wikipedia. This sort of thing is normal here in Australia. I assume it's corruption. So frustrating that I'm paying for all these this shit.

<comment><USER25> You misspelled "NBN".

<comment><USER26> I doubt he got them mixed up; myki is a pre-loaded NFC smart card payment system for public transport in Victoria, Australia. go cards are another similar system.

NBN is a completely different beast, being an internet carrier and service wholesaler with ambitious and expensive last-mile infrastructure concerns, for one thing.

<comment><USER24> Correct. I didn't get the mixed up, was just bringing up another example of stupid spending we do here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Reading about this and some of the comments here and the enthusiasm, it's a great development for sure.

But I just hope that we don't leave out those who prefer to deal with physical currency in the name of "progress"

<comment><USER28> A lot of governments want to do away with physical currency as it is simply much more difficult to track than electronic transactions. I believe it is one of the reasons China put a lot of effort in developing their mobile payment systems.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Mexico has had an instant payment system across all banks for quite q while now (spei)[1]. Does anyone knows how this compares to that? [1] [http://www.banxico.org.mx/sistemas-de- pago/servicios/sistema...](http://www.banxico.org.mx/sistemas-de- pago/servicios/sistema-de-pagos-electronicos-interbancarios-spei/interbanking- electronic-payme.html)

</comment><comment><USER30> How is it different from UPI?

<comment><USER17> UPI is apparently something in India and this is something in Australia?

<comment><USER31> How is Australia different from India - +3 funny - oh hang on this isn't slashdot damn

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Interesting bit is the 280 characters of test data you can include, enough for a small amount of JSON.

I worked on a hackathon for NAB where we proposed banks could be an auth provider for payments that require ID, e.g. Buying a SIM card, signing a waiver etc at the point of sale

</comment><comment><USER33> Did I just read that they spent a billion dollars on it?

<comment><USER34> Probably collectively.

And has someone who has worked for Australian banks it is probably on the cheap side.

Many of the core systems that needed upgrading are old and there isn't necessarily the people around who worked on them. And so there are a lot of costs that go into upgrading.

<comment><USER35> It just seems absurd that it should be so complicated and expensive to build a system which on a basic level is just about maintaining a large table of numbers (the ledger of bank account balances) and doing simple arithmetic on it. And I say this as someone who develops banking systems for a living.

I think/hope the banking and financial sector in the future will be much more lean and optimized, both in terms of systems and management.

<comment><USER36> > on a basic level is _just_ about maintaining a large table

The most dangerous word in software development.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> This seems like a way to incentivize people to replace use of cash with use of bank accounts, thus enabling the State and the IRS to better control people lives.

</comment><comment><USER38> Not sure why it says Commonwealth Bank is the only one open at launch. I'm with ING and got an email about it being active this morning.

<comment><USER39> Commonwealth own ing. They have for a faire while. That's why Commonwealth customers could use ing ATMs for free back when they still had fees

<comment><USER40> You're thinking of Bankwest

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> [http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/25/business/business- advanced...](http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/25/business/business-advanced- online-banking-born-of-necessity.html)

</comment><comment><USER42> Here's the press release from the Reserve Bank of Australia:

[https://www.rba.gov.au/media- releases/2018/mr-18-02.html](https://www.rba.gov.au/media- releases/2018/mr-18-02.html)

</comment><comment><USER43> Does this just boil down to faster BSB/account number transfers between banks?

I feel they're a little to late to the party for PayPal-like payments to a email or number.

<comment><USER44> Yeah, the basic idea of it is faster payments + the ability to transfer to an email address/phone number/ABN. The value is in it being supported by all the various banks and being instant, so you can just log into your banking app and instantly transfer to someone's account using only their email address, for example.

Source: I work on the account resolution service that is part of this.

<comment><USER45> Interesting. I am one of (what I assume to be) a very small subset of people that manged to enter their email address before there was any input validation. (my account is with one of the big four). Despite using internet banking my registered email address ends with @127.0.0.1

Would this prevent me receiving payments?

<comment><USER44> Ha, that's interesting - validation and normalisation is the responsibility of the banks so would depend on whether the bank of the person doing the lookup accepts it as a valid email address

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Meanwhile, I still can't get access to a read only API for my own accounts (Commonwealth Bank).

</comment><comment><USER47> Is this similar to the Zelle push US banks are, well, pushing for?

<comment><USER19> No, the NPP is a backend settlement infrastructure used by the central bank. Zelle would be an example of an overlay service, utility or interface to engage with the settlement system. The Clearing House's RTP, UK's FPS, or Singapore's FAST would be more akin to the NPP. NOTE: Zelle is not currently using RTP, but will likely use it in the coming months or years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> Meanwhile in the EU: Wait more than 48 hours between countries and in the same country wait up to 24 hours. And let's not think about weekends in between ;)

<comment><USER49> Old-school SEPA transfers take only a few hours between modern banks, even across borders.

SCT inst is gradually coming. Bear in mind the SEPA area covers some 500 million people, it's no small feat compared to much smaller domestic markets (Nordic European countries have been ahead of Australia in this regard).

<comment><USER48> I've never ever seen a SEPA transfer real cross border go through in a few hours in my life!

<comment><USER9> 12 hours was the fastest for me...

<comment><USER48> ok, that I've seen I think :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> They spent one billion Australian Dollars to implement a national system for instant payments and have yet to convince banks to adopt it? And it forces users to hand out their phone number or email to strangers?

Given that, Bitcoins $140B market cap does not seem too unreasonable. As it is international and gives users better privacy controls.

<comment><USER51> Bitcoin: a bargain at $40 per transaction in fees!

Edit: And several hours to clear

<comment><USER52> >$40 per transaction in fees!

[https://bitcoinfees.earn.com/](https://bitcoinfees.earn.com/)

what?</comment></comment></comment>


Property Listing site for india - <AUTHOR> http://rentsellmyhouse.com

<comment><AUTHOR> i have created it in drupal. please provide your feedback or feel free to ask any questions.</comment>


Ask HN: What is the ideal day to launch on? - <AUTHOR>

Hey guys - I've read a few posts on this but would like to ask the community. What is the best day to launch a start up? Is there any? Reasons?<p>Thanks! <comment><USER2> The best day to launch? When your product is good enough to make a difference for people, and the really painful bugs are out. It's not like a day will make a difference, since you will be doing more than one day of promotion unless you're a superstar.

</comment><comment><USER3> I've never found that it matters. Its not like you'll be hit with a rush of traffic (unless you have carefully orchestrated PR and marketing campaigns ahead of time).

Most sites will go live, then just build, promote, and repeat.</comment>


200OK: Entertainment website for developers - <AUTHOR> http://22x0.com <comment><AUTHOR> Hi,

I really enjoy coding and I also enjoy comments with a good sense of humor. So, recently I developed a website filled with hilarious comments. My goal is to build a community around it.

I would like to know your honest opinion about this idea and about this website.

Thank you!</comment>


Is the Immediate Playback of Events Changing Children's Memories? - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/well/family/video-altering-memory.html <comment><USER2> This is similar to the point made in Ted Chiang's short story "The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling." When writing replaced oral storytelling, people's memories and experiences shifted as well. He makes the case that having one's experiences always available for playback will create another kind of shift.

<comment><USER3> I used to be able to remember lots of phone numbers. Now I don't even know the numbers of close friends and relatives. I've outsourced that job to my phone.

<comment><USER4> Your brain my not remember the phone numbers, but it contains the location of (or the pointers to) the object that contains the phone numbers.

Sort of reminds me of the "extended mind thesis"

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

<comment><USER5> Yeah, I've noticed that I remember a lot more information these days as... external references? Breadcrumbs? Like, I have no idea what that person's called but I know I got an email from them last Thursday so I can look it up if I need to. Or I don't know the exact phrasing of a quote but I know the exact search term I'd use to find it on the web.

<comment><USER6> Now, what happens when, say, memories of conversations turn into pointers to chat logs that are stored on the central server, where they can be modified, deleted, or your access taken away by the service or nowadays often by the other party?

<comment><USER7> I automatically backup all of my tweets to a google sheet that I then download periodically. I don't necessarily do it for the reason that you gave, but that's definitely a reason to to something like this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm not sure if I agree with the reshaping idea. I do share the opinion that a person gains more self awareness for how others see them when examining the self from third person. Although, I don't assume the past first-person memories would be modified or altered and if they were ingrained moments. The brain doesn't know to overlap memories by some hidden timestamp of oh these both happened at the same time! Another way of looking at it is if I hated some type of vegetable young and enjoy it now. I still remember how I used to hate it when I was young. Furthermore, I think kids have an advantage nowadays if they want to master some type of choreography by examining how people view them on stage.

<comment><USER9> > The brain doesn't know to overlap memories by some hidden timestamp of oh > these both happened at the same time!

It kind of does. Each time you recollect something you change the memory of the event (this is also mentioned in the article). Repeated recollection can have varied effects from (simplified) "I don't recall the original event, I recall the last time I thought of it" all the way up to creating false memories. I think there's been quite a bit of research on how this relates to interrogation techniques and the reliability of eyewitness testimony.

<comment><USER10> I caused a car accident 25 years ago when I drove through a stop sign and was hit in the side by another car. Other than being rattled quite hard I suffered no ill effects although it totalled both my car and the car that hit me. I'd driven that same route several times over the past year, I had just been in a daze or something on that occassion.

I spent a few days recuperating at home, sore as hell. During that time I replayed the incident several times in my head, and thought I had a clear idea of the stop sign I missed and what it looked like. I went back later, and the intersection was nothing like I had convinced myself I had remembered it being. Specifically I'd convinced myself the stop sign was partially obscured, and it wasn't.

This experience shook me for a long time, and gave me a deep distrust of my own memories. There's a reason why eye witness aren't entirely reliable, I'd experienced it myself.

<comment><USER11> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automaticity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automaticity)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Seems to run contrary to the concept of human memory being supremely _unreliable,_ and that our subconscious has a tendency - beyond the feeling everyone's familiar with of memories being "vague" and "difficult to remember" \- to actually _edit and reshape_ the concrete details from the way they actually happened. Obviously, given a certain context, this can result in terrible consequences. I remember this being discussed at length in the book "Subliminal: How Your Unconscious Mind Rules Your Behavior"[1] w/r/t eyewitness testimony of criminal acts, but perhaps in some cases, our distorted perception of reality may be a important mechanism to our own self- esteem, provided that it doesn't go too far.

[1] [https://www.amazon.com/Subliminal-Your-Unconscious-Rules- Beh...](https://www.amazon.com/Subliminal-Your-Unconscious-Rules- Behavior/dp/0307472256)

<comment><USER13> Does it? I think it corroborates that concept, showing that you might immediately "edit" your memory based on video of the events.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Is there a workaround for the NYT paywall that I'm missing? They're blocking incognito windows now somehow.

<comment><USER15> Best workaround is to pay to be a subscriber, and support quality journalism

<comment><USER16> Where can I buy quality journalism from? I don't think the NYT qualifies, and I'm saying that because most articles lack substance, not because I'm bothered by its bias.

<comment><USER17> WaPo is pretty good, as is Reuters. Forbes is also decent in my experience.

<comment><USER18> Forbes is good and bad. It's good when written by Forbes, but half of the articles I come across there these days are from "contributors" which can be just as bad as reading HuffPo.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Every Man Is Responsible For His Own Soul - <AUTHOR> http://www.redditblog.com/2014/09/every-man-is-responsible-for-his-own.html

<comment><USER2> I don't have a dog in this fight, but this really does seem confusing to me. They write this big blog post about being hands off, but then immediately ban the subreddits for hacked celeb nudes? How does that make sense? Pick one or the other, but this is trying to have it both ways...

<comment><USER3> It's obvious that hosting a free-speech service in America (and at a .com) is simply impossible. People are so deadly afraid of lawyers, nobody really has balls anymore.

<comment><USER4> Sharing private photos that don't belong to you is not free speech. Your rights end where the next person's rights begin.

<comment><USER3> It is. Plus, if you post a photo and a make a comment on it (which could be bashing the poster, let's say) and which comment is not violating anybody's right, banning the whole subreddit is suppressing my right of free speech.

<comment><USER5> [http://xkcd.com/1357/](http://xkcd.com/1357/)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Get Superhuman Abilities with Biohacking - <AUTHOR> https://humanizing.tech/get-superhuman-abilities-with-biohacking-5a453a4508f5 <comment><USER2> I'm still very amazed on how few useful things I could find that lend themselfes to sense substitution.

It is really easy to map a compass to a vibrating belt (someone did it) and learn to feel it instinctively.

But for useful things: Either the sensor is too big (like radar, might be changing right now), or the bandwidth to high (most camera things) to sense through the skin or ears (you don't want to occupy a whole eye), or it's just not useful (e.g. infrared thermometer to vibration for remote temperature sensing).

Our body is made for this world, it's pretty good at sensing it.

<comment><USER3> There are things we just don't sense. Obviously they weren't significant in our evolutionary history but they could be of use to us in the modern age, or to our successors. As you mention, giving up existing sensors doesn't make much sense so it would have to be extra sensors.

An electromagnetic sense could be so much richer than a compass direction. Wonderful to sense the actions of machines and electrical systems around us, and have a boost to navigation. Furthermore ideally I think we'd need to upgrade our internal systems to have a better intuitive understanding of frequency-domain phenomena at high (megahertz) frequencies.

Ionising radiation is scary partly because you just can't sense it. Internal scintillation crystals + additional optical tissue based on our current design = a whole new sense. Obviously with a little redundancy and care of placement you could get alpha, beta, gamma and an energy spectrum. Useful for spacefarers, perhaps.

Interfaces to technological devices would be nice to have. Perhaps you wouldn't call it a sense but in a way it's so much more. Wouldn't want to be stuck with an obsolete protocol in my brain implant chip, though - the format wars would be _intense_.

<comment><USER2> A friend of mine has a magnet in one of his fingertips, he can feel vibration in the electric field. (he can tell whether a hard drive is running by hovering withhis finger over it). There are special nerves for vibration.

The brain interface is more distant in the future and more scary. I prefer going through a normal sense for simple values. You can ignore, rationalize and somewhat isolate a sensation, but not a thought.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The "Where This Is Headed" section sounds mostly like science fiction to me. But, hey, if someone does figure out how to give people the ability to photosynthesize from sunlight, sign me up ;)

<comment><USER5> I recommend just eating.</comment></comment>


The World's first data base for matter - <AUTHOR> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/903107259/scio-your-sixth-sense-a-pocket-molecular-sensor-fo?ref=live Very cool new product will bring the power of a spectrometer into your pocket and allow you to interact with the world like never before. Seems like a very groundbreaking technology and I can't wait to see how many different applications it can be used for. <comment><USER2> Definitely _not_ the world's "first". Others include:

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

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


The Truth Is Paywalled but the Lies Are Free - <AUTHOR> https://blog.licensezero.com/2020/08/03/truth-paywall.html <comment><USER2> Also submitted here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24035203](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24035203)

Edit: different article with exact same title. A bit confusing at a first glance.

</comment><comment><USER3> How do we know the paywalled content is the truth? Didn't paper (commercial) newspapers brought us to the current situation?</comment>


Warren Buffett Shares the Secrets to Wealth in America - <AUTHOR> http://time.com/5087360/warren-buffett-shares-the-secrets-to-wealth-in-america/ <comment><USER2> Unfortunately he doesn't share the secrets to wealth in America. The main claim is innovation, which isn't a secret and, on an individual level, is certainly less likely to generate wealth than knowing the right people.

And he doesn't discuss the way that wealth has been confiscated in America, financialization, because he and his friends benefit tremendously from it.</comment>


Clearview AI's source code and app data exposed in cybersecurity lapse - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2020/4/17/21224718/clearview-ai-exposed-server-source-code-windows-ios-android-mac-apps-cloud-storage <comment><USER2> Does anyone have the source code?

Clearview's argument is that they are scraping publicly available pictures. It is only fair to hold them to the same standards with regards to their code (which was publicly accessible during a brief period).</comment>


What happened in Wuhan when there weren't enough test kits and hospital beds - <AUTHOR> https://www.covid19readings.com/articles/2020/02/02/Those-Outside-Of-The-Statistics <comment><USER2> The Wuhan situation is emblematic of our habit of running societies at 100%. Everything is 'just in time', there are just enough hospital beds to minimize costs, markets leveraged to the max, no slack in the system, no redundancy or robustness, critical supply chains for vital goods can come down without preparation etc.

It makes you think of systems thinkers like Donella Meadows and her writing on ecological systems, growth and leverage points. You can go straight from lack of sick leave, to viral spread at the workplace, to shutting down trade routes, to lack of masks in the hospital, to doctors themselves being infected, reinforcing and multiplying the situation and so on.

The question will be if people after this finally go back to the drawing board and we ask ourselves if we need to make systemic changes to how we organise ourselves because even after this situation is over, there's the chance we get something ten times worse in the future. As Russ Ackoff said, an architect designs the house before they improve the rooms but I sadly doubt we'll be wiser this time.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, it definitely is problematic to have everything "just in time", but, the problem with this virus is that it's basically a DDoS attack on the medical system. Wuhan is not a poor city. They average 7.38 hospital beds per 1000 persons by 2018 data. In comparison, the US averages 2.4 beds per 1000 persons in 2016. On top of the strict quarantine, China had to build two 1000-bed hospitals in 2 weeks, convert multiple public spaces into field hospitals, and send thousands of medical professionals from all over the country to get the situation under control in Wuhan. I shudder to think what would happen if we fail to mitigate the spread here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Can't count the number of downvotes I've received for pointing out that the official Chinese numbers are hugely underreported. This article is just the tip of the iceberg.

This is why I don't entirely trust their claimed recovery. Because an authoritarian government requires respect and/or fear in order to rule, face becomes a priority above all else. You simply cannot trust such governments. This wouldn't be the first time that the Chinese government has lied about something significant, and the Soviet Union is also an appropriate precedent.</comment>


6 Sources of Residual Income for the Web Developer - <AUTHOR> http://blog.nodeping.com/2011/09/26/6-sources-of-residual-income-for-the-web-developer/

<comment><USER2> Or by posting a post on hacker news filled with affiliate links! It's ingenious I tell you :)</comment>


Google Has a Secret Interview Process and It Landed Me a Job - <AUTHOR> http://thehustle.co/the-secret-google-interview-that-landed-me-a-job <comment><USER2> I have a serious question : If google uses a person's search results internally to determine that they are a person of interest for hiring, whose to say they aren't using a similar process to strip Intellectual property from searches as it relates to projects they are working on?

i.e : They are internally working on self driving cars and, in particular, are looking for ways to integrate algorithm 'X' in their solution. So, google decides to setup a special filter for searches related to certain profiles that search for 'X and self driving ....Results get fed to the group conducting the work. In effect, allowing them to internally see what 'profiles of interest' are up to as it relates to Google's flagged area of interest.

It would appear that this could easily be made 'legal' under the premise that the individuals are anonymized. However, it does give google a unique advantage in being able to see 'what everyone is up to'.

The fact that they are already using people's specialized searches for flagging them for interviewing makes me strongly believe they are already internally snagging people's searches/clicked links to give them advantage on projects.

I think everyone should take a pause and consider the implications of this as they are quite damning.

<comment><USER3> I agree. These kind of posts make me a little nauseated to be honest. The only reason this person is bragging about being tracked and monitored online is because it resulted in a job at a prestigious marketing company. The vast majority are just being tracked and monitored, no job offered.

<comment><USER4> It is nauseating because it's a 1000 word humblebrag.

Look at this guy's bio:

> Max has a degree in mathematics from Yale University where he received > multiple awards from the math department including the Barge Prize and the > Runk Prize. He previously worked at The Boston Consulting Group where he > worked on projects in computer hardware and biopharmaceuticals. His > interests include data analysis, hiking, pad thai, and skiing.

This essay reads like he is just discovering the magic of the internet for the first time, and is swept away by the user experience that Google has provided _just for him_!

No, somehow I suspect that he would have gotten a job wherever he decided to apply.

But apropos of the first comment, I wonder how much Google already knew about him before the challenge was displayed. In other words, is it just triggered by keywords? Or does the algorithm also take into account what else is known about the user doing the searching?

<comment> at-fates-hands >>>> Google already knew about him before the challenge was displayed.

This seems a little unsettling when you think about it. As if they had been tracking him and just waiting for the right moment to spring this on him. I wonder how receptive he would have been had they approached him in a more traditional manner. Perhaps because of the uniqueness of their approach he was more receptive to going along with it?

Had this happened to me, I probably would have done an Elliot Alderson and tossed my PC in the microwave.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> So first of all this is not "a secret" at all and you don't need to be "special" to do it. And of course you don't get targeted personally but they do an automated/anonymous match on your search history. It's just one of many inbound HR/recruiting funnels and it was featured in an internal newsletter that went out to all of Eng some time ago.

Second, they tell every applicant that openly discussing the interview process (esp blogging about it) will get you disqualified/blacklisted from any future positions at google. So if you have posted this before your first day and didn't discuss it with your recruiter/hr person at the G, it was probably not a very smart move.

PS: It really isn't too hard to get into their interview process. If you create a github account and push some code one of their recruiters will probably approach you after a while. You can also just send them your CV and I am pretty sure you get the same process/treatment as anybody else.

<comment><USER6> > Second, they tell every applicant that openly discussing the interview > process (esp blogging about it) will get you disqualified/blacklisted from > any future positions at google.

Wow, it's like they're fully aware of how poor many of their interviewing procedures have been over the years, and instead of making them more employee- friendly to compete with the rest of the industry, they'd rather just punish the employees instead.

Right in line with Google's reputation.

<comment><USER5> I honestly think their process is pretty good (at least it was for me). There are no bullshit questions and they are honest in their feedback/telling you what you should and should not expect. A lot of people are pissed because they didn't get in and feel it's google's fault for having a 'broken interview process'. But reality is that google is one of the most profitable/successful companies in the world and gets voted "top employer" year after year. A lot of people want to work for them, so they can afford to be picky in the interview process; but that doesn't mean anything is broken. Quite the opposite actually.

As per the secrecy; I reckon they want to keep part of their process secret so that people don't try to game it. At the scale they are operating (millions of applications per year) you obviously need some standardized tech testing for the first interview rounds (where no engineer is present yet) and if everybody just posted their questions and answers online you could kind of forget about that.

<comment><USER7> "A lot of people are pissed because they didn't get in and feel it's google's fault for having a 'broken interview process'. "

I think that's a mischaracterization of what people dislike about Google's interview process. People dislike that it takes a very long time for Google to follow up and that the process wastes a lot of their time.

Yes Google is profitable and a lot of people want to work there but that doesn't mean their interview process is great too.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > _Google's recruiting process is well documented online, and from this point > my experience was pretty typical.The only difference is that I didn't need > to go through a technical phone screen since I had already demonstrated some > proficiency with coding through the foo.bar exercises._

> _For my interview, I spent a day at Google headquarters in Mountain View > solving problems on a white board._

So what's the point? A phone screen takes what, 30 minutes? This is a lot of time to put in only to have to do it all again on a whiteboard.

I guess it would be better than a phone screen for Google, but this seems like just another hoop for candidates to jump through.

One of my gripes with the tech industry is that companies keep adding more onto the funnel part of the hiring process, but once you get the interview none of it matters. You can contribute to open source, have substantial github projects, complete coding challenges, have years of experience: all of this just helps you _get_ the interview. Once you are in the companies hiring pipeline everyone is put through the same process, none of the other stuff really matters after that point.

Maybe I'm just bitter that my team just hired one candidate over another because they did better in the whiteboard interviews (but had no side projects or real code to show us) while the other person had a lot of (good) code and pretty creative projects to look at.

<comment><USER9> What is absolutely baffling to me is that companies assign coding tests as a _pre-qualifier_ for the usual whiteboard interview despite the coding test being a far more adequate measure of the abilities of an engineer. I've had interviewers tell me that my coding samples went above and beyond what they usually receive (exhaustive docstrings, tests that make sense) and yet rather than discuss, say, how my code worked or why I chose one algorithm over another, they insist on making me solve puzzles on the whiteboard as the ultimate decider.

The ideal hiring process for me would be introductory culture fit phone call, in which working hours, benefits, vacation policy etc are discussed to see if there is a lifestyle fit between prospective hire and employee (not 'Do you rock climb and crush brews?' culture BS), then a coding challenge, and then an in-person discussion of your code. The in-person discussion could involve throwing new requirements and hypotheticals at the problem to see how the candidate thinks on their feet, but it would still be relevant to the work they did at hand rather than some arbitrary puzzle pulled from Cracking the Coding Interview.

I would be interested to know how the hoop-jumping-to-whiteboard process came to be standard. To me it does not make any sense why the determining factor for receiving an offer for a software engineering job should be dependent on one's improvisational problem solving abilities over actually writing code that runs and satisfies requirements. Is it because a whiteboard interview is much more cut and dry than code evaluation? Because every software company wants to think that they are Google?

<comment><USER10> > What is absolutely baffling to me is that companies assign coding tests as a > pre-qualifier for the usual whiteboard interview despite the coding test > being a far more adequate measure of the abilities of an engineer.

A coding test doesn't tell you how well a candidate can collaborate. Can you toss them an idea, and have them successfully expand it and put it to use? Can you give them a couple of half ideas, and they expand them to full ideas? Would they be able to work together with you? Can they understand you? Can you uderstand them?

Those are all vital components to success, and you can't see those answers from a test. But white boarding is excellent for answering all those questions.

A quick word about hoop jumping. Being willing to jump through hoops means you're willing to cooperate and go the extra mile, and that you want to work at the company in question. This is a useful filter for the employer. They might lose some of the least patient and dedicated engineers (and perhaps some of the most talented) developers in the process.

<comment><USER8> > _A coding test doesn 't tell you how well a candidate can collaborate._

Agreed.

> _But white boarding is excellent for answering all those questions._

I disagree. There is no team social dynamic in a white-board interview. There is one person in a position of power who is judging you with a critical eye. The other person is being judged and either really wants this job or, worse, _needs_ the job.

That is the social dynamic in the room.

That doesn't go away by saying "Let's play pretend like we are working on a project as equals".

Interviewers will often discuss their rationale as if the candidates know what it is, or that they should be able to know it.

For instance, "I want to see if they can take suggestions and run with it".

Great, how does the candidate know that's what you want? Maybe the last interview they were in wanted to see if they could take bad advice and quickly explain why that strategy wouldn't work.

Those both look the same from a candidate's point of view. They need to toss the dice and assume they interpret your intentions clearly.

> _Being willing to jump through hoops means you 're willing to cooperate and > go the extra mile_

I don't know if I fully agree, but working at a big company _does_ involve a lot of hoop jumping in your day-to-day, so I guess it _is_ something good to test for.

<comment><USER11> > I disagree. There is no team social dynamic in a white-board interview. > There is one person in a position of power who is judging you with a > critical eye. The other person is being judged and either really wants this > job or, worse, needs the job.

Well, it _could_ be like that, and that's the popular conception, but it doesn't _need_ to be like that. If it was handled more like a small meeting with them all contributing (but the interviewers possibly holding back some as needed to allow the interviewee to contribute), you could probably get a fairly good idea of how quickly they grasp concepts from other, how familiar they are with what they are trying to to, and how well they collaborate.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Are they only doing this if your IP belongs to a well known university? I'm sure lots of people here are googling programming topics everyday, and I'd assume it would've come up before this.

<comment><USER13> No, I got it a couple months ago and I live in Louisiana. I might have been searching stuff for Angular at the time. Didn't go through much of it though. I'm not fond of Python, and really didn't care for writing Java at the time. Also not looking to move across country.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> It's too bad they don't allow regular candidates this path of bypassing their atrocious phone interviews that ask you to write code in Word (lately) while someone sits huffing and puffing on the other wait impatiently. That's of course, if they even manage to call at the right time. Sorry, but the only impressive thing here is Google's continuing stupidity in this area (not that they're alone).

EDIT: Word == Google doc

</comment><comment><USER15> While this is a great idea from Google I would be concerned that the Google recruiter would also receive a list of my search history queries which do not always include programming topics at all ;-) Interesting thought though, will Google check my search history if I apply with a known Gmail adress?

<comment> nappy-doo No.

Editing to add: One of the quickest ways to get fired at Google is to violate someone's privacy.

<comment><USER16> > One of the quickest ways to get fired at Google is to violate someone's > privacy.

I expect it's more about violating a corporate- _policy_ than violating customer-privacy.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> "Aaaaannnnnnnnnnd you're fired." Just kidding. But if none of his friends (including Google employees) knew about this, maybe they (Google) intended for this to be not known. I hope he didn't shoot his own foot by blogging about it. :-)

<comment><USER18> A lot of people are posting some variant on this, but, go back and read the post. The only things in the post are 1. this path exists 2. it uses Java and Python 3. it works in a fake shell. But that's it; no problems, no solutions, not even _hints_. Google probably rotates the problems anyhow.

Overall, Google can hardly expect this sort of thing to not get out over time, and... honestly... do you think Google recruiting is _upset_ that this got posted to HN?

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> This creeps me out for several reasons. One, we don't know why they're targeting certain people. It could be based on their search term, it could be based on their search history. It's a little coincidental that this guy happened to need a job at the appropriate level.

Secondly, it's trying to make this horrible recruitment-hoop-jumping bullshit fun. Imagine asking a worker from...basically any other industry to do exercises for 2 weeks before you'll consider them for an interview. You'll be quickly told where to go.

<comment><USER20> > Secondly, it's trying to make this horrible recruitment-hoop-jumping > bullshit fun. Imagine asking a worker from...basically any other industry to > do exercises for 2 weeks before you'll consider them for an interview.

So true.

I was not sure if I was missing something or plain cynical when when I read he had worked for 2 weeks to get an interview.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> this was posted on HN 9 months ago. looks like he didn't get the job [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8588080](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8588080)

<comment><USER22> The screenshot in the article is one I posted 9 months ago, and is being used without attribution: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8593050](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8593050)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I've done like the first 3 levels in the past. This stuff takes a lot of time, if I wanted to get a job at Google I'd probably go with the phone screen instead...

</comment><comment><USER24> _Google used it to identify me before I had even applied anywhere else_

At a point where the author would be in a weak negotiating position because he wouldn't have other offers to take (besides staying in his current job, but applying for a new job indicates he wasn't _entirely_ happy with that.)

 _and they made me feel important while doing so._

Doing a search that matches a regular expression is all that it takes to make you feel important? Really?

<comment><USER25> Well, it evokes The Last Starfighter movie kind of feel, where a kid beats a video game and thus proves he's ready for something greater, so I can understand feeling special "for being chosen", no matter how automatic that criteria likely was (the human brain can deceive itself into thinking events are more deliberately chosen and less random than they actually are)

<comment><USER26> In the film it's referred to as "Excalibur".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I'm pretty sure my Google search history would give a completely misleading idea of my technical abilities. Anyone else here feel the same? (I mean for your own abilities, not mine).

At work, I'm using Perl 95+% of the time, with infrequent spurts of PHP and JavaScript. Occasionally some Python might be thrown in, and very rarely some Java.

Because I'm only in those languages infrequently I sometimes forget some basic syntax, or mix it up with syntax from one of the other languages from that list. I end up Googling newbie things like "write array literal in php" or "concatenate strings in javascript".

<comment><USER28> Newbies don't search for things like "array literal", for whatever it's worth.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I'm disappointed, going to [https://www.google.com/foobar/](https://www.google.com/foobar/) is not enough.

<comment><USER30> Are you logged into Gmail? Just click "log in."

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Secret? It was talked about a _lot_ here for a while. It started with a secret IP address in a trailer for The Imitation Game. Here's a later discussion.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8589835](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8589835)

</comment><comment><USER31> I could have sworn I saw a few mysterious ads on corkboards around MTV internally recruiting people to work on a project like this last spring, just before I left Google. I never followed up to try to figure out what it was, so I can't be sure, but it could definitely have been this.

</comment><comment><USER32> At one place I worked, in the days when Firebug was still new, we used show a discrete a web developer job ad if we detected window.console.firebug ... didn't actually lead to any hires but it made us feel clever ;)

</comment><comment><USER33> If they truly care about your search history I think I'm blacklisted from working in Google for life :-)

</comment><comment><USER34> All that work just to skip a telephone interview ey. I suppose it was for fun initially anyway.

</comment><comment><USER35> > _" Google used it to identify me before I had even applied anywhere else"_

Add another item to the list of anti-trust charges Google is facing around the world.

> _" they respected my privacy"_

No they didn't. Not even close. But if Google is full of people with these notions I understand the major disconnect Google has with privacy regulators outside the US.

<comment><USER36> > Add another item to the list of anti-trust charges Google is facing around > the world.

How, specifically, does that violate anti-trust law?

<comment><USER35> (Wow, even an attempt to engage by asking a question gets downvoted by HN's pro-Google brigade...)

Anyway, assuming you believe Google effectively has a monopoly (as the EU commission does), this is yet another example where Google abuses that position to favour itself over everyone else trying to recruit. Very similar to the way Google manipulates shopping results (but sneakier).

I'm not even saying I agree with that logic, but it will almost certainly be added to the things various regulatory bodies will investigate. Apparently it's already taboo to even mention that on HN.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I've googled all of those things numerous times and never seen a prompt for a challenge.

<comment><USER16> They only accept people who aren't security- and privacy-conscious... Because it relies on you being logged-in and letting them build a profile of your search activities and trends.

<comment><USER37> I don't even know if Google would really be my bag, I would prefer to work at a smaller company but I am interested in coding challenges.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> How long till someone builds a bot to try to game this?

</comment><comment><USER39> So, does this only happen on chrome or something?

</comment><comment><USER40> ITT: people complaining about google's interview process that never made it all the way through

IMHO if you think google is wasting your time with their interviews just don't apply with them, nobodies forcing you. complaining about how bad and broken it was after you got rejected makes you look like a sore looser</comment>


Show HN: Attribute.pro – A cross-domain traffic attribution solution - <AUTHOR> https://Attribute.pro <comment><AUTHOR> I had someone ask: "Can you give more examples of (link: [https://attribute.pro/](https://attribute.pro/)) attribute.pro and why someone would use it?"

My answer:

Client X is a SaaS. They have all marketing pages on "root.com"

Their signup flow is on "accounts.root.com"

Their actual SaaS app (which has Mixpanel installed) is on: "app.root.com"

Outline of Problem:

\- You want to drive traffic to their homepage (root.com, root.com/case- studies...)

\- You want to use UTM variables to track ad performance from Google Ads.

\- You have to get those UTM variables down into "app.root.com" (and inside mixpanel)- so we know which people are attributed to which campaigns/sets/ads.

This tool is allowing me to do what I need: Attribute.pro - it allows me to drop a tag on "root.com", use UTM links, then re-call those UTM links from "app.root.com" (or any other domain)

How would you solve this problem?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hi HN; Just sharing a thing I built.

[https://Attribute.pro](https://Attribute.pro)

Why? I needed a solution for a client, and I wanted to make it re-usable.

Built with 1 single Cloudflare worker. No server, no database.</comment>


Ask HN: Pointless learning? - <AUTHOR>

I often find myself reading up on a language/technology that I probably will never use, and wonder if this pointless learning and whether I should be using my time more effectively?
For example, over the weekend I started reading up on common lisp and the next thing had installed SBCL, Emacs and had started on the Practical Common Lisp book.
I am a graphic designer by trade, and am still getting a handle on Ruby and JavaScript, so my concern is that the time I spent investigating Lisp could be better used learning more about these languages and working on personal projects I already have underway using them.
Or is any learning beneficial and having a curiosity about other languages healthy? <comment><USER2> The standard response-- especially, I think, in popular books about Lisp and functional languages-- is that learning a new language helps you think and program better in other languages.

My own experience supports that idea, but not strongly enough to "justify" the time I've spent investigating other languages. However, I don't worry too much about justifying the time, since it's just something I enjoy doing.

From that point of view, I would say that if you enjoy learning Lisp, go for it. If as a hobby you brewed beer, or biked, or read Homer in the original, or played with your kids, would you feel bad that you weren't using that time to study Ruby and Javascript?

The only counter-argument I can think of is this. How many personal projects do you have under way? Could you be running into a problem where you start many projects but finish none of them? In that case, you might want to dig into the root causes of that. But it would have nothing to do with learning new languages-- that might just be a symptom of a problem that really might have something to do with "pointless" effort.

<comment><AUTHOR> I only have a couple of personal projects, which are still under way, and there is definitely room to add another one.

Thanks for the feedback though, I guess my hobby would be 'tinkering' so putting it that way, no I wouldn't feel bad enjoying my hobby instead of studying ... which is still tinkering in a way.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Whenever I have a hankering to learn something new, I usually try to incorporate it into a project somehow. Usually it's made up just for that purpose. That way I get the feeling of being productive and the enjoyment of learning something new. The downside to this method is you spend less time on the fundamentals of the new language, so you might bring in old ways of thinking that are as efficient.</comment>


The Secret Syndicate Behind Nancy Drew - <AUTHOR> https://daily.jstor.org/the-secret-syndicate-behind-nancy-drew/ <comment> le-mark I often wonder why, in this age of reboots and cinematic universes, no one has mined this series, and the Hardy Boys for material. Iirc, there was a tv series for each in the '70s.

Related; there was some really great writing for television back then; Circus Boy and The Rifleman are two examples.

<comment><USER2> > I often wonder why, in this age of reboots and cinematic universes, no one > has mined this series, and the Hardy Boys for material.

As of last year, a Nancy Drew series whose pilot had been rejected by CBS was in development at NBC.

> Iirc, there was a tv series for each in the '70s.

Also (and they flopped) the 1990s (in Canada, I believe.)

And Nancy Drew had an ABC TV movie intended to launch a series in 2002, but no series emerged.

And there was a 2007 Nancy Drew movie.

So, it's not exactly a property that's been ignored, even if there hasn't been much success with it since the 1970s.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> The Stratemeyer syndicate also published, in addition to the Hardy Boys books mentioned in the article, the Tom Swift SF juveniles.

<comment><USER4> And the Rover Boys, the Bobbsey Twins, and others.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I read some nancy drew from the local library as a kid but I preferred the hardy boys. They had a secret hideout in their junkyard, a caravan buried under junk. The bad guys always seemed to drive a black sedan though I had no idea what a sedan was.

<comment><USER6> I'm totally there for you on "sedan" and other throwback words.

I'm 48, so I read the Hardy Boys books mostly in the mid to late 70s. That whole era seemed to be stuck in time; lots of pop culture sort of pushed as "current" was clearly from at least 10 to 20 years before, but even as a kid it was pretty clear there was a disconnect. The Hardys never watched TV, for example. They used terms like "jalopy" and "sedan". Etc.

I assume the mismatch was partly because of the rapid societal changes that took root starting in the 60s, plus a sort of refusal to acknowledge those by the generation just ahead of the boomers that were really still in fundamental control through the 80s.

<comment><USER7> > They used terms like "jalopy" and "sedan". Etc.

And Chet was rarely fat, but often 'portly', 'heavy-set', 'chunky' or 'stout'. :)

<comment><USER5> I was thinking of chuck but you're right it was chet!

<comment><USER8> ...or Chester, as his aunt (I believe) insisted on calling him - probably the only person to use his given name!

In retrospect (I read 75-80 Hardy Boys books as a kid, many of them over and over), it is amazing how formula-based the story trajectories were and how one-dimensional all the characters were. I bet with some practice, an author could churn out a book in the time it took me to read one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The Hardy Boys series had to be rewritten hastily in the 1970s due to phrases like "there's a [n-word] in the woodpile".

Many of the bad guys in Tom Swift and the Hardy Boys were described as "swarthy". My girlfriend's father, who was a truly lovely man, would go on to use that word to describe me back in the 1980s. She and her mother were horrified but I thought it was hilarious.

<comment><USER9> Does "swarthy" have offensive / embarrassing connotations? It doesn't matter, because I never use it, but I didn't know that until now.

<comment><USER10> It means dark-skinned (e.g. Mediterranean) and so tends to be seen as racist now.

<comment><USER11> Holy shit. I always thought it meant somebody with a rough, rugged sort of appearance, that you'd get from a drunken wind-swept life.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I often felt that 'Goosebumps' must have done a similar thing. I never thought even as a kid that 'R.L. Stine' was a real person.

Edit: I'm shocked to find out from the Wiki article that it seems as though he really did write them!

<comment><USER13> Check out the various fairies series by "Daisy Meadows" \- there has to be at least a thousand of them. They mine a theme/set with a book for each element (the seasons, rainbow colors, precious gems, etc) and they follow the exact same plot for each one. My wife and I used to joke that "D.A.I.S.Y. M.E.A.D.O.W.S. has got to be a acronym for the computer program that writes them all.

<comment><USER14> If I've learned one thing from YouTube, it's that there are definitely content creators whose brains are built in such a way that what they want out of life is to put tons of effort into building up a library of highly-structured and predictable content. (I'm not talking about the "putting pre-fabbed CG parts together to make a buck on infants" videos here; I'm talking about things like the infinite stream of nail-art tutorials, or things like SummoningSalt's timelines of speedrunning efforts of a particular game.)

Such people _could_ vary their formula—they're not doing this as work-for-hire with strict requirements under a producer, this is just the stuff they publish as a hobby. And you'd expect a "normal" person in such a situation to get bored and _want_ to vary their formula, especially as they gain more followers. Most creators do, but these ones don't. They just keep on makin' what they're makin', to a strict standard that lets them continue to pump out a _lot_ of it, rather than making each successive work more of a production than before. It's what they like doing.

I'm not a psychiatrist, so I can't say for sure _what 's_ going on with such people (though I've heard the phrase "systematizing personality" before and it _sounds_ applicable here.) But I can say for sure that such people certainly do exist.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Was expecting some algorithmic analysis of the books to cluster the works to different authors and attempt to match them to other works with known authors. But thats not the case. Entertaining background about the business though.</comment>


How to Improve Database Performance Without Changing Code - <AUTHOR> http://thomaslarock.com/2012/01/how-to-improve-database-performance-without-changing-code/

<comment><USER2> Change your Windows power settings? Are you freaking kidding me?

Maybe they should have put included "Make sure the janitor doesn't turn off the desktop", "Getting slow? Reboot!" or "Ignore those snobby tech guys saying MS-Access isn't a real database".

Maybe the article should have been titled "Database helpz your salez LOZL"

</comment><comment><USER3> Seems to me some of those solutions are worse (more expensive) than just fixing poorly performing queries.

<comment><AUTHOR> Absolutely, but there are also times when you can't touch code. For example: Sharepoint. Lots of vendors tell you to keep your hands off their code. When that happens, you may be forced to take action.</comment></comment>


Lua VM cross-compiled to JavaScript (1.4mb - takes a while to load) - <AUTHOR> http://syntensity.com/static/lua.html

<comment><USER2> Wow. The backend, emscripten (<http://code.google.com/p/emscripten/wiki/GettingStarted>), seems really nice. Wonder how it will work out with Rubinius....

Edit: Guess i just found it out :( <http://code.google.com/p/emscripten/issues/detail?id=1>

<comment><USER3> In principle it should be possible to get Rubinius to work with Emscripten - I'd be excited to see that happen. In fact it should work better than compiling a language's VM (which is what happens in the Lua demo).

But it will be hard to do without help from someone that knows Rubinius well (I don't).

<comment><USER4> There is also a Lua frontend for the LLVM.

Lua code compiled to LLVM bytecode then to Javascript using Emscripten will most probably be faster than code interpreted on the fly in the browser, but I wonder by how much.

<http://code.google.com/p/llvm-lua/>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Thanks for the feedback in the comments here!

I made a few fixes to Emscripten, and the code that was mentioned that doesn't work, should now work in the demo, for example |for x = 1,10 do print(x) end|.

</comment><comment><USER5> It breaks for input as simple as "for x = 1,10 do print(x) end". It's a shame I can't use Lua for browser scripting instead of JS.

<comment><USER6> I tried "for k,v in pairs(_G) do print("->", k,v) end" (I was curious what is and isn't sandboxed) and it just gave me an error.

<comment><AUTHOR> There's no sandbox. This is the Lua virtual machine, compiled to LLVM bitcode with llvm-gcc/clang and then compiled to JavaScript with emscripten.

It's all client-side.

<comment><USER7> I don't think (s)he was implying it was using a plugin or anything.

An occasional feature of other languages-in-Javascript is some kind of sandboxing for security - eg the Valija Javascript subset that runs in the Caja sandbox (which in turn is implemented in Javascript): [http://code.google.com/p/google- caja/wiki/SubsetRelationship...](http://code.google.com/p/google- caja/wiki/SubsetRelationships)

<comment><USER6> Yes. Rather, I meant, which libraries were available. I figured that it'd at least have the core stdlib; that was just my first step exploring. It's a bad sign that the first statement I tried didn't work, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> another interpreted language running inside of an interpreted language... sweet. All we need now is to write a perl interpreter in Lua and then run it inside of the javascript Lua interpreter and we'll really see the scripts slow down to a crawl.

<comment><USER9> It would still run about as well as Tcl. [ducks]

<comment><USER10> Lets add an Io interpreter to the mix!

(For those who don't know: Io is very powerful, but also very slow.)

<comment><USER11> Steve Dekorte (creator of Io) has already been thinking about an Io implementation on top of Javascript.

ref: <http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/iolanguage/message/12526>

<comment><USER10> Should be a relatively good fit, with both languages having prototypal oo. I wonder how he would implement the metaprogramming parts of Io.

<comment><USER11> I see its actually more than just _thinking_ because he has a repo called "Io port to Javascript (node.js)" on github: <https://github.com/stevedekorte/oia></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>