JuNest: Arch Linux-based distro that runs on any Linux OS, without root access - <AUTHOR> http://fsquillace.github.io/junest-site/ <comment><USER2> JuNest is what made our department computers usable for me. With it, I could run my favorite TeX editor (we don't have root access on these machines).

On a philosophical note, I second vortico's question of why common Linux distros require root access to be at all usable. In particular, how did it come to not being able to install a package without sudo?

I could download something, compile it, and run it, but not install from a package. It doesn't make sense to me. If I can run it, I should be able to "install" it locally, whatever the word "install" means (obviously, it wouldn't mean writing to directories to which I don't have access otherwise).

JuNest simply proves this point.

<comment><USER3> It's only certain package managers. For instance, pkgsrc and portage don't require root access.

<comment><USER2> The "certain package managers" happen to be "every single package manager I've encounter on a system I don't own".

I'll be content in knowing the history of "apt-get install" requiring sudo.

There's is this thread, but I don't understand how nobody in charge of anything ever figured this all of that this design is bollocks if you want to have true multi-tenancy on a system.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> See also:

\- Nix: purely functional package manager that runs on multiple distros. 7/10 awesome ideas but difficult to work with.

\- Guix: like Nix, but with Guile Scheme, and different packages. Seems to require system-wide installation and a daemon; also burdened with "freedom". ??/10 haven't tried it, but sounds iffy.

\- Linuxbrew: Linux port/fork of the popular Homebrew package manager for macOS. 4/10 same problems as Homebrew itself.

\- Gentoo Portage Prefix: build and run Gentoo packages in a $PREFIX, without root and on many different OSs. ??/10 haven't tried it.

<comment><USER5> I am curious to know what are the problem of homebrew itself ? As a generic user who has never done anything really complex with it, homebrew is a joy, it has never failed me.

<comment><USER6> Typically the problem areas would be in versioning of dependencies (in particular, resolving conflicting version requirements for different packages, where dependencies form a DAG rather than a tree) or around install hooks (where installation / removal can't be represented simply by existence / absence of whole files on the filesystem).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I use this at work and it's great if you don't have root access but still want to install packages. (Why do you need to be root to install packages locally on all distros anyway??) The Windows equivalent is MSYS2, where you have a POSIX shell, pacman, and many packages thanks to the active maintainers.

<comment><USER8> > Why do you need to be root to install packages locally on all distros > anyway??

On most distros you just can't install packages locally.

On Fedora you can install packages globally without root btw: Try `pkcon install pidgin` for example.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Junest is so useful if your project requires recent compilers or libs and your contributors are under some old Debian Stable or Ubuntu.

</comment><comment><USER10> Would this be a viable alternative to containers?

<comment><USER11> from the documentation it sounds like it uses namespaces where available, just like containers. chroot otherwise.

<comment><USER12> I was actually wondering what advantage this has over a container or chroot. The answer is that it actually is one of those under the hood?

<comment> d-- I've tested JuNest extensively (with the idea of getting new gcc compiler features on a cluster running an old red hat version).

Unfortunately, JuNest adds a lot more overhead than containers. Specifically, when it comes to high-throughput network applications. At 10GBit an application running on JuNest used several cores at 100%, while without JuNest (underlying red hat) the app was at 10% cpu load (network i/o bound).

All that load was due to PRoot.

<comment><AUTHOR> Have you tried with Linux namespaces instead of PRoot?

[https://github.com/fsquillace/junest#linux-namespaces- based](https://github.com/fsquillace/junest#linux-namespaces-based)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> So is this a form of usermode linux? I'm not enough of a linux wizard to understand linux-on-linux, chroot, etc...

<comment><USER14> This uses systemd-containers, but can fall back to using a chroot, which requires root.

Usermode linux involves running a linux-kernel as just another piece of software under linux. By telling software to access the usermode linux, you can give it a different "view" of the system. That linux kernel process must communicate with the real-kernel, doing things like forwarding network traffic to the "real" kernels network devices. It introduces overhead.

A chroot interrupts one system call (or set of system calls?), making any program you call think "/" is a different directory. It literally changes root. That being said, all it changes is where programs think the root dir is. If you have software in the chroot that runs as root, it actually runs as root on your entire system. It can do things like load custom kernel modules. It can't break out of the chroot, chroots aren't a security feature.

Containers, like systemd-nspawn, use cgroups along with a more-aggressive chroot-like thing, that gives programs a different view of all system calls, not just calls to the filesystem. This means you can run software as "root" in a container without privilege escalation.

Of course it doesn't need to be a full container. Firejail can use those same mechanisms to do things like isolate just your web browser. [https://firejail.wordpress.com/](https://firejail.wordpress.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I used to use systemd-nspawn with a simple distro subtree.

<comment><USER16>
        $ systemd-nspawn
        Need to be root.

<comment><USER15> oh that's why it doesn't work anymore

<comment><USER17> It does if your kernel has userns enabled.

<comment><USER18> Are there any distros who ship with that enabled in the default config? (or plan a future release configured like that?)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Please fill this out to help us learn more about our customers. - <AUTHOR> https://spreadsheets.google.com/a/getzazu.com/viewform?hl=en&formkey=dHBoU0Y5b0VRdGQ0WElockNjUHBmWkE6MQ#gid=0

<comment><AUTHOR> We'd really appreciate your feedback! Check us out at <http://getzazu.com>. Also, if y'all stop by #startups on irc.freenode.com I'll give you an invite code :-)

</comment><comment><USER2> Please create a mailinglist and put me in it :) I have no time to test it but would like a notice when it's publicly released. I know people who would glady pay for this.

</comment><comment><USER3> You forgot to ask if I have a smart phone or not.</comment>


Ask HN: Web development without internet? - <AUTHOR>

Let me preface this: I'm a noob.
Now: I've only ever developed by coding in eclipse, then uploading files via FTP to a domain. (Then I see the changes just by visiting the domain.)
I now this is probably a shitty way to do this. How should I be doing this? How can I develop even when I don't have internet? (In other words, how can I run/try website code without FTP/internet?)
Please be as detailed and creative as you'd lke. <comment><USER2> \- Use a distributed version control system. Set up f.ex. a Mercurial repository on bitbucket.org and start using it right away. You can commit changes offline (locally) without access and have control over your source revisions even if you don't push it to the repository. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, toread: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributed_revision_control> and <http://hginit.com>

_Revision control is not technically needed to work, but you'll need it anyway ;) so start using right away_

\- Set up a local server, possibly a popular one for your technology of choice (keywords: localhost, apache, nginx, etc.) Set up database systems of you choice (mysql, postgresql, sqlite).

\- Commit often, push when sure.

\- On your remote server, grab code from your repository (clone it) to your working directory. Pull/update changes manually or set a cron job to do it from time to time, so you got your working copy online (better update manually if it's on production).

\- Always keep a separate file for your localhost project settings, which you don't commit to the repository (ignore), so everything works fine with your settings locally, but works with another settings on the remote server.

good luck

</comment><comment><USER3> when you develop on a "domain", you put the files on a server, which is a computer running a webserver (like apache e.g). a webserver is nothing but a program. so you can install a webserver (and database server, whatever you need) on your own computer as well. this way you can skip the ftp uploading part, which takes a lot of time. you only have to put the files you are working on, in a directory which the webserver handles. so if you save a file you can reload the browser...

this is a tutorial for installing apache on windows: <http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.0/platform/windows.html>

hope that helps, martin

<comment><USER4> And if you want an easy WAMP stack, get wampserver: <http://www.wampserver.com/en/>

<comment><USER5> I wish I had found this a week ago. I just got finished setting up PHP, MySQL, and Apache on Windows 7 manually.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I run a local dev environment with php and apache (mamp for os x). I also run mongodb locally, works like a charm.

</comment><comment><USER7> UNIX: edit /etc/hosts

Windows: %SystemRoot%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts

Set foo.local to 127.0.0.1

</comment><comment><USER8> These days, I typically edit stuff live on the hosting site. But I used to routinely write code offline by hand in Notepad, save a jillion different versions (mypage; mypage1; mypage1a; mypage1b; mypage2; mypage2a...etc...for versioning) and then only upload the one I liked at the end. I think I largely stopped doing that after I began using so many "includes" files because you really can't tell what it will look like without them. Now, I seem to be transitioning most of my sites to Wordpress, and, as far as I know, that also can't really be coded offline (though I guess I could write drafts of new content offline, so far, I really haven't).

If you are willing/able to code in Notepad, all you have to do is save it as .html instead of .txt and it will open as a webpage in your browser, without any internet access. It makes for a cool little sandbox.</comment>


The Greatest Machine That Never Was - <AUTHOR> http://blog.jgc.org/2012/04/greatest-machine-that-never-was.html

<comment><USER2> What a super talk and what a super project.

be sure to check out the faq:

[http://blog.jgc.org/2010/10/plan-28-analytical-engine- faq.ht...](http://blog.jgc.org/2010/10/plan-28-analytical-engine-faq.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> Can't wait to see this beast in action and hear the little ding when it's done :)

Maybe spacebars can be ported and we can play it with the plotter

</comment><comment><USER4> I hope this doesn't sound too stalker-ish, and I'm not sure if it's a compliment or insult or neither, but having never met you or seen you on video before, you're dressed exactly as I would imagine you.

<comment><AUTHOR> :-) You missed the part where I cycled over to Imperial College in my padded cycle shorts and worn out lycra T-shirt. You only get to see the bit where I'd changed into smart stuff.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I would disagree about the computer x calculator thing, or more precisely about Babbage's machine begin computer instead of calculator. I don't think if-then is enough.

I think first actual computer emerged when Von Neumann architecture was born, when program and data became one. That was in theory when Turing machine was extended to do that (I don't know when), and in practice with SSEM (or Baby) built by Turing and co. in 1948, combining both no data - program distinction, and sufficiently strong computation capabilities.

<comment><USER6> It's a computer in any sense of the word. The only difference between the Analytical Engine and what you call an "actual computer" is speed. It had selection, iteration and sequence, it had working memory and it could load data and instuctions from punched cards.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Really interesting talk. TED do some great talks in general imo.

</comment><comment><USER8> I was thinking of Memex.</comment>


Ford Tries to Shut Down Independent Repair Tool with Copyright - <AUTHOR> https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/01/ford-tries-shut-down-third-party-repair-tool-copyright <comment><USER2> Ford looks even worse when you see how Tesla and Toyota behave. Ford is trying to take the most hostile to customers action it can get away with under the broken copyright system. Meanwhile Tesla and Toyota are giving away patent rights in order to encourage innovation and help customers.

This is just a very visible example of how Ford thinks and how Tesla and Toyota think. Sadly Ford's behavior is a very common USA management practice while Tesla and Toyota are rare. It is short sighted thinking and results in many less visible bad decisions that cripple companies in the long term.

<comment><USER3> Patents aren't everything though:

From ToyoDIY: December 6, 2009 The diagrams are no longer available on this site per demands of Toyota Motor Sales Inc.

Yes, they still have part number listings/search (which is awesome), but they did use to have more.

<comment><USER4> This site has extracted the databases of the "Toyota EPC" application and put them on the internet with a web usable UI.

If you want this material, one place I know you can find it is rutracker and you should simply search for "Toyota EPC."

A site called 'realoem' did the same thing with BMW's database, and seems to have had no trouble for the years that it's been online.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> As the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) article kindly submitted here points out, there is just about surely no copyright protection under United States law for the Ford FFData file, so this effort on Ford's part should fail if litigated. But pulling in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act as an additional layer of protection for Ford's data file complicates the legal analysis, and I'm glad that the EFF is on this case to urge a clarification of how that act applies to cases like this, so that buyers of cars can have choices in seeking service for their cars.

Of course, on my part I am appalled that Ford is even trying this, and so as a consumer I am now less likely to suggest to any of my friends that they should consider buying Ford cars. (Disclosure: we own two Toyota vehicles, both bought new from the local Toyota dealer in the last few years. Before we bought the first one, we shopped at a Ford dealership but didn't like the cars we tried as well as the Toyota cars we tried.)

<comment><USER4> The app that this data was "stolen" from is a big java mess. The files are encrypted with AES but it takes about three seconds to find the key in the jar file. It doesn't really take any thought or effort to get.

The app also contains material from other carmakers, because of mergers and acquisitions. For instance, there is material from BMW so that Ford is able to support certain Land Rovers built by BMW which have BMW engines and electronics.

I'm sure that the developers of the free "Forscan" app have examined the material in question too.

<comment><USER6> Remember, you don't have to have a good copyright protection scheme to limit circumvention. You could rot13 something and the DMCA applies.

<comment><USER7> Is that literally true?

<comment><USER8> Sort of, _`(B) a technological measure `effectively controls access to a work ' if the measure, in the ordinary course of its operation, requires the application of information, or a process or a treatment, with the authority of the copyright owner, to gain access to the work._

However, as ROT13 is not limited to just protecting copy-write works and is reversible you could have an effective tool with other works. _(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing protection afforded by a technological measure that effectively protects a right of a copyright owner under this title in a work or a portion thereof;_ [http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi- bin/query/F?c105:1:./temp/~c105eDJ...](http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi- bin/query/F?c105:1:./temp/~c105eDJ19j:e2850):

On the other hand, if you only apply ROT13 to part of a file then it probably does qualify for protection.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Having a family owned auto shop, I'll chime in here.

I didn't read everything but here is what the facts seem to be:

I found it odd that a "part list" is the root of the issue here since common repair software has lots of "lists" and diagrams. ex: [http://www.ondemand5.com/](http://www.ondemand5.com/) yet Ford isn't suing them...

The issue seems to be that this company hacked/stole/cracked/reverse engineered Ford's own software and is now giving non public data to the public. You really can't think that this is right... They clearly had to circumvent some kind of encryption. An obvious sign that you shouldn't be doing this... (hence why the encryption is there, no matter how simple)

Competition is a big issue in the automotive industry. There will be no "github" for your vehicle. Auto repair and manufacturing is a totally different world. And plus lives are at stake here. You can't have people unofficially getting part specifications and blindly stamping out inferior (and unauthorized) replicas.

Protection of IP is a big thing still in many industries. Even at my family's small shop, we get regular calls from people that download $10k auto repair software from bittorrent and call up the shop asking if they can install some "awesome" software for our shop for a low price of $500... There is a lot of money to be made by stealing in the auto industry.

<comment><USER10> > You can't have people unofficially getting part specifications and blindly > stamping out inferior (and unauthorized) replicas.

Why not? If the part itself is not patented, and the branding is clear, and any safety regulations apply to the competing part, it's just competition and should result in cheaper, better, safter parts.

<comment><USER9> The point is that a part manufacture has to go through the right channel (ie, get certified, inspected regularly) to have the 'right' to make parts.

You wouldn't want parts of questionable quality being put on an airplane, some goes for your car too.

Even certified after market parts have their issues too and seem to get worse (in quality) every year.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> That is pretty shady of Ford. They were one of the few American car companies I kind of respected. Not anymore.

> Autel violated the anti-circumvention provisions of the Digital Millennium > Copyright Act by writing a program to defeat the "encryption technology and > obfuscation" that Ford used to make the file difficult to read.

This sounds a lot like Sega Enterprises Ltd. v. Accolade, Inc.

Check out [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade)

<comment><USER12> It is like Sega v. Accolade, in the sense that it's clear abuse of IP law to limit competition. But there are two major differences: Although there were accusations of unauthorized copying in Sega v. Accolade, the major issue was that Sega forced the console to display their trademark upon successfully loading a game, and then claimed that Accolade was committing trademark infringement by making a game that could successfully boot. Additionally, the DMCA didn't exist back then, so violating copy protection wasn't actually against the law on its own.

There have actually been several copyright cases with good results (Sega v. Accolade, Galoob v. Nintendo, Sony v. Bleem, Sony v. Connectix, Lexmark v. Static Control), but so many cases that have ended in a negative result (Blizzard v. Jung, Universal v. Reimerdes, Macrovision v. Sima) did so largely due to the DMCA. This is why, although I hope Ford loses this case, I hope even more for active effort to fix the DMCA through Congress, not the judiciary.

<comment><USER11> Thank you for the response. I have not heard of some of those cases. I'm looking forward to reading up on those.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Massachusetts tackled this with a ballot initiative and legislation, so they can't do that here.

Supposedly there's a "memorandum of understanding" that would prohibit it in all 50 states (but no federal legislation signed yet) I'm guessing this is a violation of the MOU.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_Vehicle_Owners%27_Right_t...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_Vehicle_Owners%27_Right_to_Repair_Act)

</comment><comment><USER14> Is there any sort of "frivolous claims" counter one can make for bad DMCA requests? Perhaps some sort of exponential backoff for companies who submit requests which are found to be bad, e.g.,

* 1 bad DMCA take-down, no action.

* 2 bad DMCA take-downs, 1 month until future DMCA take-downs accepted.

* 3 bad DMCA take-downs, 2 months...

<comment><USER15> Ostensibly DMCA claims are made under threat of perjury which is supposed to be the check and balance. That being said I can't think of a single case of that portion of the law being enforced. Unfortunately if a group were to take the action that you suggest, they would forfeit their safe harbor and be able to be sued just as had as the original "infringer". You don't get hardly any leeway in responding to DMCA requests.

<comment><USER16> I don't think perjury is an enforceable solution because there is no way to prove that you _knew_ that the claim was invalid. "It seems I was mistaken" or "I disagree with the court's decision" is an iron-clad defense.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> IANAL, but I'm not sure Ford actually has a leg to stand on.

1) If I understand it correctly this data could be considered a list of facts and thus isn't copyrightable (just like a table of contents, or the list of ingredients in recipe). If it's not copyrightable, then the DMCA doesn't apply. See Lexmark Int'l v. Static Control Components.

2) The DMCA has a specific exemption for "interoperability purposes" which I could see this falling under as well but that's a weaker argument.

<comment><USER4> There is a little more. I believe that in every firstworld country, there are legislative mandates that car makers must make proprietary information required for servicing their products available. This is colloquially known in the USA as 'right to repair' and the idea is to prevent a situation where independent mechanics, or owners themselves, will be unable to repair vehicles because the information and tools to do so are held only by the manufacturer or his agent (dealer.)

Some other carmakers have apparently decided that leaked/extracted information or software is not really a big problem for them. I know that one carmaker that I have worked with views that situation as a sales driver for car parts, and would rather be on friendly terms with its customers anyway. Ford Motor Company, on the other hand, simply refuses to support old cars. They seem to have a very efficient system to landfill old parts inventory as soon as they are no longer legally required to support the cars that those parts apply to. While other carmakers shift production of parts for old cars to secondary vendors, I have not seen any examples of Ford doing this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> DMCA was created to defend platforms not creative authors. And Ford cars and ecosphere is a platform the same way like for example Apple's iPhone/iOS/iTune/etc ecosphere. Independent auto-repair shops, after-market parts manufacturers and the likes have to be ready to start paying a "Ford(GM/Toyota/etc) tax" similar to the "Apple tax".

</comment><comment><USER18> Does anyone have a reference for the EFF claim that factual data collections can only be copyrighted "if the selection and arrangement are sufficiently creative"? I always thought the method of acquiring these facts was also important. Isn't that the point of inserting trap streets[1] and other fake entries[2] into your data, a practice that many tech companies including Google[3] still do?

[1] - [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trap_street](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trap_street) [2] - [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fictitious_entry](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fictitious_entry) [3] - [http://searchengineland.com/google-bing-is-cheating- copying-...](http://searchengineland.com/google-bing-is-cheating-copying-our- search-results-62914)

<comment><USER19> Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co., 499 U.S. 340 (1991)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> In the last few years, Ford has bought spots on some tech podcasts, talking up their tech-savvy CEO and geek-friendly innovations.

If they want to appeal to geeks, "you can't examine and fix your vehicle" is a bullet to the foot.

</comment><comment><USER20> this is not just about Ford. eff is pointing out a common business practice of using DCMA to undermine competition and maintain market share. The link at the end of the article is laundry list of what i view as disturbing behavior. [https://www.eff.org/pages/unintended-consequences-fifteen- ye...](https://www.eff.org/pages/unintended-consequences-fifteen-years-under- dmca)</comment>


Suicide on Campus and the Pressure of Perfection - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/02/education/edlife/stress-social-media-and-suicide-on-campus.html <comment><USER2> ESPN did an amazing longform article about the track star mentioned in the OP, Madison Holleran:

[http://espn.go.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/12833146/instagra...](http://espn.go.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/12833146/instagram- account-university-pennsylvania-runner-showed-only-part-story)

One of the themes of that story, as in the OP, is how social media distorts the reality of experience, making people think that everything is exciting and upbeat in others' lives...I think for better or worse, this effect is stronger in Instagram, and not just because of the literal "filters"...what makes Instagram more appealing in general than Facebook is that, being so focused on images and impulse sharing, it's much harder to get into political spats/debates...but it's much more difficult to convey "meh" or other negative emotions. If you focus on someone's Instagram, you can come away with a very distorted assessment of that person's life and emotions.

<comment><USER3> I came across this one a while back:

"How many takes did you do before you posted the #nomakeupselfie that you were proud of showing to the world? I can't believe you just scrubbed your make-up off, took a photo, and published it within 10 seconds. Did you?"[1]

In the poll results, 23% said "at least 3 times" and 44% said they lost count. The "ideal" life that everyone is portraying is a joke and a fraud to make themselves feel better because everyone else looks so good because they're making themselves feel better. It's effectively an arms race. (no pun intended)

[1] [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/10713599/No- mak...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/10713599/No-make-up- selfies-How-many-times-did-you-take-your-no-make-up-selfie-before-you- ACTUALLY-posted-it.html)

<comment><USER4> Most social apps (Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat) thrive off of narcissism and the need for validation. Its a terribly large social experiment in progress.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> At Stanford, this is known as the "duck syndrome." Ducks appear to glide easily on the water, but beneath the surface they are paddling like mad.

In a similar way, students may appear to be happy and content when chatting with them in person, but are actually dealing with larger issues that they don't show.

<comment><USER6> That's in the article:

> While the appellation is unique to Penn, the behavior is not. In 2003, Duke > jolted academe with a report describing how its female students felt > pressure to be "effortlessly perfect": smart, accomplished, fit, beautiful > and popular, all without visible effort. At Stanford, it's called the Duck > Syndrome. A duck appears to glide calmly across the water, while beneath the > surface it frantically, relentlessly paddles.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> > Nationally, the suicide rate among 15- to 24-year-olds has increased > modestly but steadily since 2007: from 9.6 deaths per 100,000 to 11.1, in > 2013 (the latest year available from the Centers for Disease Control and > Prevention).

I possibly missed it but how does that compare to on campus? the supposed point of the article.

<comment><USER8> Also, one alternative is people not striving to succeed and then being depressed about not having achieved anything, relatively. Or perhaps there is a middle where everyone is happy being average like everyone else.

That said, if there is an uptick in this symptom of society at large, society should try to figure out the cause and then decide if this is a deal we're willing to make.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm not a fan of this trend of presuming causes for suicides. The brain is an incredibly complex system with many failure modes, and some of them are just _weird_. You don't necessarily posses the hardware to begin to comprehend what a particular suicide victim experienced, which is not to say you shouldn't try, but humility is appropriate.

People project their pet social critiques onto the youth suicide rate. I've heard everything from high-stakes testing to too much Instagram to the rise of atheism to too little punishment. In the context of statistics this might be an appropriate national conversation. In the context of a specific person, speculation on a cause beyond what they've written is patronizing at best.

The only generalization I'm willing to make about a suicide is that the subjective experience of being inside the person's head was excruciatingly painful for too long. This kind of pain is probably not a scalar quantity across individuals, so ideas of normal and abnormal tolerance for it may not even make sense. Perception of time is also subjective, so don't think you can judge "too long" either. There is probably a 16-year-old who has struggled for 3 years with an experience that would have killed you in a week, just as someone has probably killed themselves to escape pain you would have considered trivial.

There may not _be_ a truthy-sounding causal story for the origin of that pain, even for its victim. If they had one, even wrote it down, it might have been an explanation they latched on to but not the root cause, which may be as complex as the sum total of a lifetime of experiences or as banal as chemistry.

I hope that we as a culture can show some respect for the dead and the complexity of their experiences, and stop using them as soapboxes for our ideas of what's wrong with kids these days.

</comment><comment><USER10> From the article: _" Several times in high school she had found herself attracted to other girls, but believing her parents and church did not fully accept homosexuality, she had pushed aside those feelings."_

This reads more like a gay issue than a school pressure issue. The author of the article may have an agenda - by the same author, "A University Recognizes a Third Gender: Neutral", "A Gender-Neutral Glossary", and "Writing Around Gender".[1]

The Huffington Post has an article about suicides at MIT: "It's not good enough to be "very good" or God forbid, just "good." Excellence has become the new average. What a burden for kids, especially those whose boats don't rise with the tide of increased expectations and higher and higher standards."[2]

Here in Silicon Valley, there are now suicide-watch guards at the three railroad crossings near Palo Alto's Paly and Gunn high schools. Infrared cameras are being installed.[3]

[1] [http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s...](http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/julie_scelfo/index.html)

[2] [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jerome-schultz/lowering-the- pr...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jerome-schultz/lowering-the-pressure-in- _b_6889466.html)

[3] [http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2015/09/02/caltrain- begin...](http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2015/09/02/caltrain-begins- improvements-aimed-at-preventing-deaths-by-suicides)

<comment><USER11> _The author of the article may have an agenda_

Or maybe they are a journalist with a beat. Not saying that's definitely the case here, but someone writing on the same topic repeatedly is hardly rare - it's usually because it's something they've researched deeply and are knowledgeable in.

<comment><USER12> Programmers have passion but journalists have agendas!

<comment><USER13> Programmers don't have the same ability to influence many people with their work.

<comment><USER11> Oh, but they do. What algorithm organises your Facebook feed? What content does it prioritise?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Those years can be hard, with or without social media, etc. My wife knew in college a number of young women who committed suicide over men; this was well before even email was generally available. For that matter, about 90 years ago a college president wrote that a wave of suicides among college men was due to "too much Mencken", causing a memorable reply from H.L. Mencken.

</comment><comment><USER6> We need to talk about suicide but articles like this possibly raise risk. The detailed description of a person and her reasons; mention of methods; mention of locations; etc all are possibly harmful.

That leading photo is of an exhibition that IMO would significantly increase risk.

The author makes no mention of gender differences in rates of completed suicide (far more common in males). (And it's not just a difference in methods).

Most of the article is speculation - sometimes by people working in suicide prevention but still speculation. It would be nice to see more rigorous research being used.

There are some good bits about the article: there's a message of hope.

But not including the contact details of suicide prevention services in an article like this is dangerous and irresponsible.

<comment><USER15> Case in point: "The Complete Manual of Suicide" (Kanzen Jisatsu Manual -- 完全自殺マニュアル) which many people in Japan have used to great effect.

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

[http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2059673.Kanzen_Jisatsu_Ma...](http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2059673.Kanzen_Jisatsu_Manyuaru_The_Complete_Suicide_Manual)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I wonder how much of this stress is caused by technological advances. I bet Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, etc. is making these poor kids neurotic.

<comment><USER17> The article calls this out pretty explicitly:

 _In the era of social media, such comparisons take place on a screen with carefully curated depictions that don't provide the full picture. Mobile devices escalate the comparisons from occasional to nearly constant...Madison Holleran's suicide provided what might be the ultimate contrast between a shiny Instagram feed and interior darkness. Ms. Holleran posted images that show her smiling, dappled in sunshine or kicking back at a party. But according to her older sister, Ashley, Madison judged her social life as inferior to what she saw in the online posts of her high school friends. An hour before she killed herself, she posted a dreamy final photo of white holiday lights twinkling in the trees of Rittenhouse Square._

I'm 22 (just graduated) and I got rid of my Instagram, Facebook, and Snapchat about a year ago. It feels fantastic. I do miss messenger sometimes, but the benefit of not having my time/energy sucked out by Facebook far outweighs messenger's convenience.

<comment><USER18> _Madison judged her social life as inferior to what she saw in the online posts of her high school friends._

I'm 32 and still feel shitty about life compared against everybody else posting their amazingly perfect success-success-success lives online.

Computers used to be the domain of nerds, then they became _too_ common and now it's a permanent social status ranking high school game you never get to exit and can't even completely opt out of either.

Maybe we could make a viral game like the ice bucket challenge except this challenge is to _not_ post online when something amazing happens in your life. Just be quiet and know you got away with something.

<comment><USER19> How can one not completely opt out? I'm completely opted out of it all. All I've got left is a facebook profile I haven't updated in over 5 years.

<comment><USER20> I mostly opted out. I became much happier when I stopped looking at other people's feeds & instead only email/text to keep in contact.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Running App RunKeeper Pro Looks Beyond Running And Apps - <AUTHOR> http://gigaom.com/2011/02/04/running-app-runkeeper-pro-looks-beyond-running-and-apps/

<comment><AUTHOR> "Jacobs said RunKeeper is poised to hit 5 million users this month, compared to 2 million at the start of the year. After a big spike of one million downloads in the first week of January, new users are still up five times since going free. Interestingly, RunKeeper's premium $20-a-year Elite service, has also seen a three times increase in purchases, though Jacobs said that, overall, the company is seeing less immediate revenue than prior to the switch."</comment>


New desktop concept BumpTop, TED talk - <AUTHOR> http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/131

<comment><USER2> Ohh... shiny - but not all that useful. I'm sure ideas from this will end up in future UIs that people actually enjoy using, but as shown it takes away many of the advantages digital information has over analog storage methods.

<comment><AUTHOR> As a general interface this probably isn't the way to go, but I think this idea could be applied to more specific areas like presentations and product demos.

In any case it would be a lot of fun to play with.</comment></comment>


Nearley – Simple and fast Earley parser for JavaScript - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/Hardmath123/nearley <comment><USER2> I finally understood how to do a reverse polish notation from an example of a parser project. This is the kind of Open-Source projects README we should read everywhere. We understand what the project do, how it does it and why it's better than other solutions, plus we have very good examples completely commented and explained.

Really good work ! :)

</comment><comment><USER3> Thanks for sharing! I didn't know what an Earley parser [0] was!

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

</comment><comment><USER4> Very interesting project. Thanks for sharing!</comment>


Videos from European Common Lisp Meeting 2011 - <AUTHOR> http://blip.tv/eclm

<comment><AUTHOR> And some comments: [http://lisp-univ-etc.blogspot.com/2011/11/videos-from- eclm-2...](http://lisp-univ-etc.blogspot.com/2011/11/videos-from- eclm-2011.html)

</comment><comment><USER2> For those who prefer to watch at the gym

<http://blip.tv/eclm/rss/itunes></comment>


Google Off 5%: Q2 Misses as 'Cost-Per-Click' Falls 6% - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.barrons.com/techtraderdaily/2013/07/18/google-off-5-q2-misses-as-cost-per-click-falls-6/ <comment><USER3> Probably the reason they're pulling a dick move and forcing everyone to Enhanced Campaigns which, among other things, forces you to bid on tablets and desktops together rather than allowing you to split them. They claim that conversions are virtually identical across these devices. However, our conversion on tablets is probably 1/10 that of desktop because we mfg & sell highly technical products for diy home remodeling and most tablet users end up just browsing casually for the info.

<comment><USER4> Then just set Bid adjustment to -100% for mobile devices and tablets with full browsers.

<comment><USER3> from what i understand (and on conference calls with our google reps), there's no more "tablets", it's a single category "desktops/tablets", but you can do "-100%" to exclude "mobile" (phones)

we were compelled to make the switch today, actually. it's gonna be an expensive Jul/Aug for us. we've adjusted some of our checkout pipeline so there's less typing for tablet users...eg paypal/amzn payment are shown first in list, less steps overall also. but it's not going to boost anything by an order of magnitude - basically just damage mitigation :(

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I never understand this phenomenon of how shares instantly drop in value based on a single quarter of earnings that don't meet 'estimates.' Suffice it to say, I do understand a bit about markets, but maybe somebody can educate me further.

There is no way that individual investors are moving the stock enough in the minutes to hours post-earnings report to actually affect the price, so I'm assuming this is 'market makers' that are selling off shares and pushing the price down. But my question is... are they selling shares because they predict other people will sell shares and so they are simply 'beating' the rest of the market to avoid the predicted loss? Or are they selling the shares because they actually believe they are worth less due to the report?

<comment><USER6> Massively over-simplifying, the price of shares is what the last trade was at. So it does not require a high volume to change the price - just buyers and sellers agreeing on a different value.

And what is that value? The value of a share is the market's best estimate of the present value of the future revenue earned from owning that share. Those earnings can happen from dividends, stock buybacks, a takeover bid, etc. But fundamentally they are an estimate of future profits.

So why does it move so fast? If you tell me that a major metric, the revenue/ad, dropped 5% and all else held the same, unless you have a good explanation for the anomaly, my simplest estimates of your future revenue just dropped 5%. If I am afraid that the drop could be a long-term trend, my estimates might drop further. If I believe that the metric has reasons to recover, my estimates might drop less.

But the natural tendency is to base estimates of future revenue on current rates of revenue. So a one quarter drop in current revenue results in a corresponding drop in share price. (And vice versa.)

<comment><USER7> BTW Google don't pay dividends and promises to don't pay "in the foreseeable future".

[http://investor.google.com/corporate/faq.html#toc- dividend](http://investor.google.com/corporate/faq.html#toc-dividend)

<comment><USER6> This is true. However 5 years ago the same could be said for a number of other tech companies including CISCO, Oracle, and Apple. Yet all have since paid dividends or done stock buybacks.

The market operates under the assumption that all other companies that stay profitable long enough will eventually do the same. And as long as management is seen as competent, is indifferent about whether "eventually" comes tomorrow or 20 years from now.

For an extreme example, the markets have long rewarded Berkshire Hathaway for its growth in profits, even though no money was returned in any way to investors for 40 years. (There has since been a small buyback.)

<comment><USER8> Dividends are only one way to value to companies. If Apple fired everyone tomorrow and stopped selling products, their stock would still have value because of the cash (and real estate, etc) they have on the books.

Buffet basically assumes that he is a better investor than his shareholders and by not paying taxes twice (corporate and individual) on dividends he will do better investing the profits and growing book value than his shareholders. Pretty good assumption so far.

<comment><USER6> Actually, no. Dividends don't give companies value. (In fact every time you pay one, your stock price drops by the amount of the dividend.) They return value to shareholders.

Yes, you're right about Buffet. And because the market is indifferent about when money gets redistributed, they are happy at this point to pay around $100K/share despite those shares having value tied up in a company that has shown very little willingness to distribute any earnings to investors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Because it affects earning estimates going forward, if they "beat", analyst can raise estimates looking out 5 years [so the results look like they are on track to be way better than estimated], or vice-versa, when you miss you have to take down your future estimates of growth. Then its discounted to the present. Thats why it moves, its not about this quarter, its about adjusting all the expectations of the future down and to the present, all wrapped up nicely in a stock price.

</comment><comment><USER10> Perhaps they should reconsider some of their AdWords bans (not AdSense).

We got an apparently lifetime ban for misspelling "iphone" as "iiphone" when our ad mananger didn't understand why everyone else could put up ads for iPhones and we couldn't and kept getting these ads blocked (supposedly for trademark reasons, but our use was 100% legitimate).

Now there's no chance to talk to anyone in charge (typical Google "service") and they've lost a customer who has been spending 6 figure amounts/year. I am biased, but somehow I don't see what Google is gaining from this.

</comment><comment><USER11> Really off topic (sorry), but maybe G's quarterly results reflect the overall economy?

I was hiking with some friends today and someone raved about the stock market. I said that I am getting out (I did this also in 2007) because I expected another recession. I hope I am wrong, but I think we are going to see another 2008 event, but larger. This would also effect tech stocks.

<comment><USER12> I really doubt it. If anything I think it speaks to the value placed on online advertising, which I'm rather pessimistic about in general. It is a huge leap to go from slightly missed quarterly results to a downturn in the overall economy.

Do you have anything to substantiate this feeling that there's a second recession coming?

<comment><USER11> To, be honest, it is just a strong feeling that I am personally acting on. I am not offering investment advice.

<comment><USER12> That's fair, and I agree with you to some extent. Detroit filing for bankruptcy is certainly indicative of future trends as pension obligations and other long term expenses begin to mount, but the extent to which it affects the overall economy I'm not so sure about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I think the interesting question here is whether the 6% drop in cost-per-click is the beginning of a problem for Google.

Is the market justified in worrying about a drop in the average cost-per click, even when the number of paid clicks is rising?

<comment><USER13> Doubtful... my guess (since I don't care enough to actually read their financial statements) is that the lower CPC is because mobile is growing faster than desktops.. and so they're getting more mobile clicks (which pay less). So in this case, after it's averaged out, they end up with a lower CPC.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> There was a discussion on "How Google is Killing Organic Search" [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5971560](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5971560) by essentially having all ads on the first page. I wonder for how long can Google keep doing that, before users and site owners revolt and leave /promote another engine?

Looking at their press release, ad clicks increased by 23% over the last year and 4% over the last quarter. What are they going to do for the next quarter when search already looks like this [http://www.searchenginejournal.com/wp- content/uploads/2011/1...](http://www.searchenginejournal.com/wp- content/uploads/2011/12/Google-Adwords-HD-Monitor.jpg) and [https://gs1.wac.edgecastcdn.net/8019B6/data.tumblr.com/28762...](https://gs1.wac.edgecastcdn.net/8019B6/data.tumblr.com/28762be645878e424f6c67d68fbf2e6a/tumblr_inline_mp48v9dXx01qz4rgp.png) ? Add even more ads?

Google, as a company, desperately needs new sources of revenue, Google Search is already over-monetized. I wouldn't touch Google at current stock prices.

Edit: Turns out that most people do not even realize that they clicked on ads, given how similarly they are displayed. FTC warned them and others to distinguish results from ads [http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-26/ftc- tells-google-le...](http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-26/ftc-tells-google- led-search-providers-to-distinguish-ads-clearly.html)

<comment> at-fates-hands >>>>Google, as a company, desperately needs new sources of revenue

It seems like every time they try and branch out from search and monatize some of their products, they fail miserably and then the pundits jump on them and tell them they should just stick with what makes them money - search.

It's a nasty cycle they're in.

<comment><USER15> Contrary to what they say about themselves, they can't really innovate. Search is what makes them. Can you imagine Google without it?

They'd be nothing.

All their existing products are copycat/published with the search leverage.

Imagine a rich kid who starts his own business. He thinks he's successful but it's his parents who feed him cash and make it easy for him. He never had to really fight for it.

It's the same with Google products - they can't fight for themselves, instead they rely on their daddy(search) to achieve success.

Now look at Apple or Samsung - they have many different products that are relatively successful. Meanwhile the big G only has one cow to milk - <USER2> search and they burden it with more and more ads with each quarter. They can't do it ad infinitum because too many people would run away from them. And it's not really improving, just abusing the previous success until it's still possible.

Larry Page should stop doing what he's doing. It's going to destroy this company sooner or later.

Does the stock price has to always rise? How much money do you really need? Just ignore cash and try to build something great, maybe then you will be able to truly innovate?</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: BoomFilters – Probabilistic data structures for processing streams - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/tylertreat/BoomFilters

<comment><USER2> _/ / The InverseBloomFilter may report a false negative but can never report a false positive._

This is actually not true and not possible. There is a good explanation here: [http://cstheory.stackexchange.com/a/14455/43](http://cstheory.stackexchange.com/a/14455/43)

There will be a low probability of false positives ~ 2^32*k. (Also it's not an inverse-bloom filter, it's a cache).

<comment><USER3> Well, I'm looking at the code and it looks like it doesn't report false positives. I understand that you expect it to hash the content down and store only the hash, but it doesn't do that.

EDIT: I suppose my point was just that there is a difference between "I think you chose a bad name for your class" and "This is actually not true and not possible". It seems both true and possible (and arguably inappropriately named).

<comment><USER4> Then it doesn't do it in constant space. Constant space is the property that makes it not a true inverse bloom filter, and instead is just a cache with an interesting hashed based eviction method.

That said, this is just a silly definition issue. You can provide a data structure with no false positives, and some false negatives, but you can't do it in constant space. I'm not aware of if you can absolutely bound the rate of false negatives.

<comment><USER2> I guess it's storing the pointer to the data? That sounds pretty bad.

At any-rate it's one of two things, either you store the whole item or you store a hash. If you're storing the whole item it's not a filter and you don't get constant space guarantees as you mentioned. If you store a hash - it's possible to have false positives.

You can always get a bound for false-negatives (or none at all) same as it with any hash-table. If you wanted to, you could Cuckoo hash before eviction and you should be able to get a pretty-good theoretical bound for false- negatives ([http://infoweekly.blogspot.com/2010/02/cuckoo- hashing.html](http://infoweekly.blogspot.com/2010/02/cuckoo-hashing.html)).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> That InverseBloomFilter sounds like an LRU cache of hashes. A true inverse bloom filter can be proven to be impossible, sadly.

</comment><comment><USER6> _With enough data, a traditional Bloom filter "fills up", after which it has a false-positive probability of 1._

I don't think this correct. The false-positive probability wouldn't become 1, it's just that every query would return positive, regardless if it's a true or false positive. I think what you meant to say was that the positive probability is 1, not the false-positive probability.

</comment><comment><USER7> Why does the readme use Boom and Bloom interchangeably? Is it just a typo that for some reason is randomly scattered throughout the document (and in the repo name itself)? Or is there meant to be a difference? I don't see anywhere that the difference is explained, if it's intentional.

<comment><USER8> Looks consistently used to me. The project is a collection of stream-optimized bloom filters and the project or its filters, as a whole, are referred to as "Boom Filters" in comparison to the "Classic Bloom Filters" referenced in the paragraph directly above. Basically, use "bloom" except when referring to this exact source code or library name.

See also: references section at the bottom of the readme for background on bloom filters, examples, etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> You should checkout Tyler's blog. Good solid content for the concurrency geeks.</comment>


Ask HN: Store price as integer or decimal? - <AUTHOR> For an e-commerce website, how would you store products' price in DB? decimal? pence integer? <comment><USER2> In the db, it's ok to store as decimal, since it's internally an integer. However, unless your language/framework has built-in support for money, you should use a library to deal with it (Or build one). Specifically, you do NOT want to treat them as floats, so you will probably end up handling them as integer cents. Because of this, you might as well do the same in the db for consistency. Also mind that some db-layers may automatically convert decimal into floats in your application language. So the safer choice is probably to just store as integer cents. It seems to be the most common scheme, to my recall.

While you're at it, keep a currency-symbol/code together with your cents in the same value-object. Just like time is incomplete without a time zone, money is incomplete without a currency. You will thank me later.

For inspiration, [RubyMoney]([https://github.com/RubyMoney/money](https://github.com/RubyMoney/money)) is a very well-designed library dealing with this in the context of Ruby.

</comment><comment><USER3> Decimal, because it's straightforward. I prefer to err on the side of minimizing computations and manipulations involving price, and simple things are easier to add complexity to later if the need arises compared to the other way around.

\+ [https://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.7/en/fixed-point- types.ht...](https://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.7/en/fixed-point-types.html)

> _The DECIMAL and NUMERIC types store exact numeric data values. These types > are used when it is important to preserve exact precision, for example with > monetary data. In MySQL, NUMERIC is implemented as DECIMAL, so the following > remarks about DECIMAL apply equally to NUMERIC._

</comment><comment><USER4> Integer, divide by 100 to get actual value.

<comment><USER5> I'm curious as to what makes you say this? IMO this just adds unnecessary complexity, every time you display a price you'd have to perform an additional computation. Same goes for persisting the data if you have an administrative portal for the site - you'd have to edit as decimal store as integer?</comment></comment>


Auto-lock your Mac when your iPhone cable is disconnected - <AUTHOR> https://bitbucket.org/tschuermans/osx-lockscreen/overview

<comment><USER2> That thunderbolt port..Heh.</comment>


Google Hinting at Its Own Social Network? - <AUTHOR> http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2007/10/google-hinting-at-its-own-social-network.html <comment><USER2> google already has a social network (kind of). anyone heard of orkut?

please, heed my advice and dont get an account. whatever email you use will be _immediately and forever_ pummeled with brazilian spam.</comment>


Scientists Have Detected an Enormous Cavity Growing Beneath Antarctica - <AUTHOR> https://www.sciencealert.com/giant-void-identified-under-antarctica-reveals-a-monumental-hidden-ice-retreat <comment><USER2> That's the expansion works at the secret Nazi Base in Antarctica.

[https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/antarctica/antartica24.ht...](https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/antarctica/antartica24.htm)

</comment><comment><USER3> An enormous dentist would help here.</comment>


Closer to Truth: Scott Aaronson - <AUTHOR> http://closertotruth.com/contributor/scott-aaronson/profile <comment><USER2> Scott Aaronson is currently at University of Texas at Austin, so the affiliation in the title needs to be updated.</comment>


Trump plans withdrawal from South Korea free trade deal - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/09/02/trump-plans-withdrawal-from-south-korea-trade-deal/ <comment><USER2> It's completely consistent with the economic nationalism and populist rhetoric: improving the ability to act selfishly or even vindictively, without wide scale repercussions, is good. This isn't an economic policy, it's both political and religious based.

 _Jan-Werner Muller noted that populists do not like having to cope with any form of political opposition or constraint: "when ruling, [populists] refuse to recognize any opposition as legitimate. The populist logic also implies that whoever does not support populist parties might not be a proper part of the people — always defined as righteous and morally pure."_ [https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/03/09/...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/03/09/why- the-trump-administration-hates-multilateral-trade-agreements-the-most/)

This is directly linkable to dominionist evangelicalism, and prosperity theology. Only about 1/3 of planet can be saved anyway, broad agreement by getting most countries on the same page is not only unexpected but suspicious, hence paranoid conspiracy theories about globalism, one world government, etc.

Trump has slid into the evangelical role of ungodly people who do God's work. That's why they don't condemn him for anything. [https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-most- evangelical...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-most-evangelicals- dont-condemn-trump/2017/09/01/64baab1c-8e79-11e7-91d5-ab4e4bb76a3a_story.html)

This isn't a new Trump thing either. It's been going on a while. [http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/02/23/u-s- religiou...](http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/02/23/u-s-religious- groups-and-their-political- leanings/ft_16-02-22_religionpoliticalaffiliation_640px-2/)

And VP Pence is a evangelical. He won't be alone with a woman unless his wife is present. [http://fortune.com/2017/04/05/mike-pence-wife- dinner/](http://fortune.com/2017/04/05/mike-pence-wife-dinner/)</comment>


Is United Airlines really that bad? (2014) - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver/2014/11/passenger-satisfaction

<comment><USER2> We did it to ourselves.

People just go to flight aggregator sites, sort by price, glance at time, and hit book. Then get "surprise" fees at the gate. If these sites showed baggage fees right on the page (like eBay now shows shipping), or they included seat pitch and seat width, you might see different consumer behaviour but as it stands you have one metric to judge a flight: price.

This actually hurts airlines trying to differentiate themselves, as those differences are only known by visiting their first party website and consuming their marketing. If you only view them through the lens of a generic flight aggregator, then you'll never know why their flight is 1.5x as expensive.

Virgin Atlantic is a pretty nice airline. In particular their business class is fantastic ("Upper Class"), even compared to some airline's first class, and I even find their economy class less unpleasant than most US-based airlines. I think European airlines are an interesting mix of "cheap as chips" (e.g. Easyjet, Ryanair) and old-style comforts (e.g. BA).

</comment><comment><USER3> I can't follow the argument - increase competition in an industry that is already operating at a net loss? This will decrease prices even further. Instead, the US domestic market is big and closed enough that the government can set better rules for all players in the system that would benefit everybody - e.g. mandate that ticket prices are always shown without any hidden extra costs. If you offer an interchangeable product wirh low entry barriers in the service industry, those who operate the service will suffer. Period. That's why all over the world taxis are regulated and artificial barriers like licenses and standard rates are put in place to keep some profit in the industry.</comment>


All-caps in legal texts: make it small-caps - <AUTHOR> http://ilyabirman.net/meanwhile/all/legal-all-caps/

<comment><USER2> If I remember correctly, it's not some arbitrary choice of the lawyers, but it can be required by law (under some interpretations?)

You should check with the lawyers if tampering with font size or spacing does not go against the reasons for using caps in the first place.

Edit: The reason this is done is the "Conspicuous" part at <http://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc/1/1-201.html> \-- note in particular " Language in the body of a form is "conspicuous" if it is in larger or other contrasting type or color" -- your solution makes the capslock text _smaller_ than the normal text, which would possibly invalidate it. But, of course, IANAL, which is also why I don't tamper with my lawyers' texts without checking with them.

<comment><USER3> You can use bold-faced text instead of all caps. If you have a true bold typeface (instead of applying a bold faux effect), then this will look nicer to read.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Did your A/B testing lead you to the conclusion that the all caps text in your legal docs was losing signups?</comment>


Water-Recycling Shower - <AUTHOR> http://www.cnn.com/2013/11/11/tech/innovation/futuristic-water-recycling-shower-orbsys/index.html

<comment><AUTHOR> [http://orbital-systems.com/technology/](http://orbital- systems.com/technology/)

</comment><comment><USER2> To recycle a phrase popular in the '60s: "save water, shower with a friend".</comment>


Ballistic Recovery Systems - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballistic_Recovery_Systems

<comment><USER2> I worked for a while in the Flight Test department at Cirrus Aircraft, the manufacturer who is probably best known for these systems (all planes they manufacture come with them). The picture on the right side of the Wikipedia page is of one of their first tests of the system. The test pilot who did that exact pictured test told me that it was a pretty exciting experience; they had done all the calculations and static load tests possible, but they couldn't be sure exactly what would happen until the 'pulled the handle' for the first time. The parachute straps could have pulled out of their mounting points, the parachute could have failed to fully inflate or gotten tangled on the empennage, etc. The test pilot had to wear his own parachute in case things went badly and he had to bail out of the plane (the test plane had a special system to blow the doors off to facility emergency egress). Happily it worked well, although the deployment is a little bumpy :) The chute system has a mechanically-activated rocket that busts out a panel over the chute tube which is intentionally weakly mounted, and then proceeds to pull the uninflated chute fully out through the open hole about 100 feet, and then there's a special 'slow-inflation' ring on the chute rigging to slow down the inflation of the chute so that it doesn't put excessive force on the chute mounting and/or hurt the passengers. To prevent serious injury to the passengers when the plane hits the ground (it's still moving at a good clip), the seatbelts have airbags and the base of the seat is a few inches of aluminum honeycomb to absorb energy. The landing gear and wings are also designed to fracture/crush in a way that reduces the amount of force transmitted to the passengers. Although it's not uncommon to walk away with broken limbs or some sort of back pain, it's better than the alternative :) Cirrus is currently working on a Very Light Jet, the 5-person + 2kid Vision SF50 ([http://cirrusaircraft.com/vision/](http://cirrusaircraft.com/vision/)) which also has a parachute - but it's a lot bigger than the ones on their existing 4-person SR-20/22 prop planes! I can try to answer any questions as best as I can remember...

<comment><USER3> I have a somewhat off topic question about airplane companies' attitude towards engines. As a private pilot who flies Cirruses, it's always baffled me that a FADEC is not standard equipment. For non-pilots, starting a plane requires priming the engine by injecting fuel into the lines, and fiddling with the fuel/air mixture until the engine fires. Totally different from a modern car where a computer electronically controls the injection to get the engine started almost immediately. Is the attitude in the industry still that FADECs are dangerous because of bugs/malfunctions? Or is it more of a certification issue?

<comment><USER4> Fellow Cirrus owner here. My assumption has always been the deterrents are cost (both development and production; many fewer engines to amortize over) and reliability (if you lose all electrical power in a FADEC system, the engine dies; not so with magnetos).

<comment><USER2> For FADECs on single engine piston planes, in addition to being powered by either alternator automatically, there's usually a dedicated FADEC emergency battery good enough for 1+ hours of engine runtime.

<comment><USER4> Of course. I stand by my original statement, however.

<comment><USER2> Understood :) As a fun note, i just remembered that the emergency FADEC power on the turbine engines is provided by a tiny hydro generator powered by the fuel flow itself, so it can run in case of total electrical failure. The throttle position sensors are energized by the same emergency circuit so they continue to work too :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm taking flying lessons, and the Flight Design CTLS I'm in has one of these systems. I believe you can use it up to like 80 knots or more. I have to remember to take the pin out at the end of the run up, and back in when shutting down.

When they first came out, there was some reports that they they caused just as much loss of life as they prevented, but I think the stats are now in favor of them. They're not really meant to protect the plane but the pilot and passengers.

As far as a rule of thumb I think my instructor said that once something goes wrong in flight, it's the insurance company's plane, so just try like hell to survive and forget about aircraft damage. There have also been many incidents where the chute was used, and the plane eventually flew again.

</comment><comment><USER6> As I was told when taking flight lessons and being introduced to this system, it's a device of absolute last resort, since you lose all control of the aircraft once you pop that chute. There's a lot of emergencies you can handle without having to pop the chute in an aircraft. Sadly, there are also a lot of emergencies where a chute would do you no good (such as stalling on approach or take off, the two phases of flight where most (56%) of crashes occur).

Fascinating tool though, and if I purchased a plane, I wouldn't mind having one for those "just in case" times. Of course, aircraft with this installed are generally over $200,000 new, so it's not on my radar anytime soon.

<comment><USER7> I think where BRS shines is that it helps flight in situations where the risks were otherwise too great. Flying day VFR over prairie is pretty survivable if you have an engine out, but the chances of getting through a situation like that while flying at night, in IFR, over mountains, VFR OTT, through known icing, etc., is much lower.

Light multi-engine aircraft were born for those situations but, ironically, they're not much better than single engine aircraft for survivability. There's a saying that a twin just gets you to the scene of the accident faster.

So, yeah, it's not a panacea, but improving the odds of living through the other 44% of flight accidents is still a good thing.

<comment><USER8> > Flying day VFR over prairie is pretty survivable if you have an engine out, > but the chances of getting through a situation like that while flying at > night, in IFR, over mountains, VFR OTT, through known icing, etc., is much > lower.

Not trying to put words in your mouth but interestingly, this comment highlights one of the hazards of this system. It can give people the confidence to do things they should absolutely avoid doing and KNOW they should avoid doing. Things like a new and more effective wing deicer sometimes have a similar effect.

<comment><USER7> Yeah, pilots should know what they're getting into and be aware if it exceeds their experience. I didn't mean it to be an endorsement of unsafe behavior.

If the capabilities of the airframe and the pilots skill are sufficient for the conditions, like if your plane is certified for flight into known icing conditions and you have experience doing so, then it's not a huge risk to fly into these situations.

But if your plane has pneumatic deicing boots that require engine power and your engine quits, you may be in over your head in a hurry if ice starts building up while you're trying to perform an emergency landing.

In that situation it would be nice to be able to just pop the chute.

<comment><USER8> > like if your plane is certified for flight into known icing conditions and > you have experience doing so, then it's not a huge risk to fly into these > situations.

But it's not a binary condition such that you can make a really clear distinction like that, right? That seems like the big risk to me. If it were as easy as "those are icing conditions but we have to equipment to deal with icing conditions," okay, no problem.

I expect the risk assessment process involves more variables and is more along the lines of: "sure, that weather system is more dangerous than we'd ordinarily fly into but we've got a better deicer this time, we're in a hurry, we're experienced pilots so... let's do it." (admittedly, I have no idea how specifically a weather system's risk and a deicer's performance can be quantified beforehand... maybe it's a piece of cake)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> If I ever buy a light GA plane, I'd love to have something like this for additional safety. Unfortunately in GA, there are a lot of safety innovations which never get implemented, due to strict regulations and cost. Things like un-stallable/un-spinable airplanes (like the Ercoupe or the Long-EZ), could potentially make the dreaded spin on the base to final leg non-existent, but they aren't mainstream because they're too expensive to bring to market.

It's kind of a catch-22; people are afraid of flying because of safety issues, but you need scale to spread the costs of making planes safer.

*edit: corrected typo

<comment><USER10> Seems to me that the main things keeping people away from GA flying are cost, accessibility, impracticality, and lack of interest.

Which is to say: GA is painfully expensive (how many people are going to start a hobby that costs $150/hour?) hard to find (how far away is your nearest local airport that offers basic flight training?) useless (how many people are going to get to the point where they can travel for business or vacation using their own airplane?) and not something people care about too much anyway (flying is seen as boring).

I'm not aware of many people who want to get into GA but don't because they're scared of it. I have seen a _lot_ of people leave or simply never pursue it because of the rest, though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> There are some videos of these in use; they are very effective when used within the chute's operational parameters: when the airplane is at altitude and moving at an appropriate (not too fast) speed, particularly over harsh terrain.

However, like all emergency devices, they are not a panacea. They don't protect against one of the most common fatal GA accident scenarios: loss of control at low altitude (base/final turn when landing). In that case, there is not enough time for the parachute to inflate before the airplane hits the ground.

I'm all in favor of BRS being available as options and after-market STCs on all small airplanes, but we also need to make sure emergency training isn't reduced to just "pull the chute", since there's a lot that can still go wrong outside of the chute's operational parameters.

<comment><USER12> Agreed - the 'chute seems like a fringe case for sure.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> This particular standard feature has been a huge selling point for Cirrus, makers of a very nice, very expensive, high performance aircraft that has been heavily marketed toward wealthy, low time pilots that in many instances have no business being at the controls of such a challenging airplane. There is an argument to be made that this feature has created overconfident pilots that use the chute as an excuse for making otherwise poor or dangerous go/no-go decisions in the face of weather, terrain, etc. Cirrus' accident rate has been higher than the average for comparable aircraft, and it probably doesn't help that they used the chute as an excuse to skip proper spin testing of the aircraft.

<comment><USER4> > marketed toward wealthy ... pilots

Should they be targeting the poor ones with their "very expensive" aircraft?

> low time pilots

Can you provide ANY evidence that Cirrus targets "low time pilots?" Of course, the customer's insurance company has some say in this, too.

> There is an argument to be made that this feature has created overconfident > pilots ...

Sure, but, again, where's your evidence?

> it probably doesn't help that they used the chute as an excuse to skip > proper spin testing of the aircraft.

??? The SR20 was spun _60_ times, with 60 recoveries, as part of European certification: [https://www.cirruspilots.org/copa/safety_programs/m/copa_saf...](https://www.cirruspilots.org/copa/safety_programs/m/copa_safety/file/default.aspx#)!

<comment><USER14> The issue is that Cirrus is marketed as a personal transportation vehicle to people who aren't already pilots.

If you look at the accidents, there are quite a few head-scratchers (pilot gets lost and deploys BRS, or pilot gets disoriented in IMC and deploys BRS). It's not just one or two, but quite a lot like this. The Cirrus seems to be the new doctor killer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've always been shocked about the danger of general aviation. I always see needless deaths, and it makes me nervous. I would love to pursue this as a hobby, but stories like this:

[http://www.wbir.com/story/news/2014/02/03/fire-chief-no- surv...](http://www.wbir.com/story/news/2014/02/03/fire-chief-no-survivors-in- middle-tenn-plane-crash/5193777/)

make me think we need a ballistic recovery system.

</comment><comment><USER16> I'm surprised nobody has linked a very famous deployment of a ballistic parachute: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXQKaxp6Rlk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXQKaxp6Rlk)

In the above video, a pilots propeller hits another aircraft's glider towline which then wraps itself around the prop and engine disabling it.

I'm not a pilot, but this probably would have been fatal if it wasnt for the BRS.

<comment><USER10> I don't see why that would have been fatal without a BRS. Shut the engine down (if it's still doing anything after that much abuse) and glide to a landing somewhere.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> From a physics point of view, how would this scale up to commercial jets? Presumably you would need multiple parachutes to distribute the load, but still, how large would they have to be to support that weight?

<comment><USER18> How about Star Wars-style escape pods or parachutes for each passenger row?</comment></comment>


Free Geek – Free/Cheap Computers Recycled by Volunteers For The Community - <AUTHOR> https://www.freegeek.org/ <comment><AUTHOR> Link above is for originating location in Portland. They're also located in some other places:

Minneapolis: [http://freegeektwincities.org/](http://freegeektwincities.org/)

Chicago: [http://freegeekchicago.org/](http://freegeekchicago.org/)

Providence: [http://www.freegeekprovidence.org/](http://www.freegeekprovidence.org/)

Fayetteville, AR: [https://www.freegeekarkansas.org/](https://www.freegeekarkansas.org/)

Toronto: [https://www.freegeektoronto.org/](https://www.freegeektoronto.org/)

Detroit: [https://motorcityfreegeek.net/](https://motorcityfreegeek.net/)

etc.

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


Show HN: A Site Integration API for LaTeX Code Examples. - <AUTHOR> http://spandex.io/blog/announce-simple-site-integration

<comment><USER2> I met the guys behind this project the other weekend and they were extremely cool. This is an awesome project and everyone I've shown it too has been extremely impressed.

Keep up the good work gentlemen.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the kind words!</comment></comment>


A Selfie with a Serial Killer - <AUTHOR> https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2019/11/a-selfie-with-a-serial-killer/ <comment><USER2> I'm kind of perplexed to find this at the top of the front page of Hacker News. It seems, if not entirely devoid of actual information, then pretty close. Is there some context I'm not aware of, that would explain its popularity?

<comment><USER3> I think the purpose is to bring attention to the kind of digital world we live in where we have so many digital images with others intentionally or unintentionally taken by us or others that may end up going viral someday causing harm to an individual's reputation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Yes you can't judge for acquaintance with someone who turns out to be an evil person. You can't know. My best friend I've lost contact with for a few years, went down the wrong path and ended up in jail ... what does it say about me?

Sadly, it will always be an effective technique to take down your political opponents because of how our brain processes that information. It's also guaranteed to generate clicks for any journalist who takes the effort to find some dirt on a famous person.

A downside of selfie and photo obsession culture we're living in now.

<comment><USER5> For someone inadvertently in a photo, even if they were in a bad association or activity: while I think that trust should be based only on behavior over time, I know that forgiveness is required of all of us, and what we are is more important than what we used to be.

(To avoid overly long opinions, I wrote more about trust and forgiveness here, in hopefully a skimmable (a very simple site), for what it may be worth. It represents my collected notes and thinking from over a long time: [http://lukecall.net/e-9223372036854602995.html](http://lukecall.net/e-9223372036854602995.html) )

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Right. So I assume we shouldn't judge someone on the basis of a photograph they've taken with someone else. Guilt by association and all that.

Seems fair.

<comment><USER7> Yep, but in the heat of a witch-hunt you can bet that any such photograph will be weaponised.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Is this meant to be some commentary on the Prince Andrew thing?</comment>


The Future of Go - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpHggcP-L5M <comment><USER2> Mentions reporting problems with Go on the Experience Reports, probably at this page:

[https://github.com/golang/go/wiki/ExperienceReports](https://github.com/golang/go/wiki/ExperienceReports)</comment>


Flutter (YC W12) Gesture App featured as one of the Best Apps of 2012 by Apple - <AUTHOR> http://ycombinator.posterous.com/flutter-yc-w12-is-featured-as-one-of-the-best

<comment><USER2> I enjoy the idea of Flutter and the technology it demonstrates is quite impressive. I will say, however, it just doesn't seem like something that I could actually use on a day-to-day basis as it's faster and better on the battery to just press the play/pause or next/previous buttons on the keyboard (provided you have them). In fact, when I downloaded it, the only times I turned it on were to show my friends for novelty's sake.

<comment><USER3> I agree this seems to fall in the category of "neat but seemingly useless" since it actually takes more power and effort to do a simple task.

But its more interesting to look at these "novelty" interaction patterns as stepping stones and building blocks to future interfaces. Most new things look novel and useless until someone cherry-picks the bits and pieces and makes something really revolutionary with them.

tl;dr More weird things, please!

<comment><USER4> Yep. I very much agree.

I'll attempt to make a prediction: gesture based and other natural computer interactions will become common-place by 2020, primarily in living room and personal robotics applications.

And right now, it is at the stage slightly ahead of the time when touch screens were first introduced: [http://www.vintagecomputing.com/wp- content/images/retroscan/...](http://www.vintagecomputing.com/wp- content/images/retroscan/hp150_large.jpg)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Webcam on all the time concerning to you too? Privacy info: <https://flutterapp.com/privacy/>

<comment><USER6> Our app works locally on your pc/mac so no webcam images ever leave your computer.

<comment><USER5> Cool. I was curious and figured others would be as well. I like the idea. Effect on battery life? App is free, what's the model?

<comment><USER7> It's basically a front for all the cool research they're doing behind the scenes in Computer Vision (the company consists of 3 PhDs). The app itself isn't necessarily to make money.

Think of it as a technology demo that's cool and can be used by anyone to demonstrate the research they're doing (though most people just think of it as a cool app, they don't know the backstory).

I'm almost certain they have a bigger picture for the long term.

<comment><USER6> We indeed have a bigger vision.

That said, this is the first niche use case that we wanted to solve. Actually, we have significant number of daily & weekly active users who use this product everyday. We've tracked (through analytics) 25M gestures already. We have 5 star rating on mac app store, users in 150+ countries worldwide and large number of users (more than many mobile apps)!

We will be releasing volume gestures very soon to complete basic remote gestures for the app. We are also working mute, like, and scrolling gestures.

Flutter is product driven research company. Meaning that our mission is to take Computer Vision research and use engineering to turn this into real usable apps.

Use cases that real users have send us emails about:

Dance Teacher - playing/pausing and replaying song from distance while practicing.

Surgeon - Listening to music while doing a medical surgery.

Architects - Listening to music from distance while building your models.

Students - listening to music while reading from bed or while laying down.

Father - using Flutter to control music while rocking his baby.

Usability is in freeing you from your computer!</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do I determine if my airline is using the 737Max so I can cancel? - <AUTHOR> Would rather not die. <comment><USER2> If you're trying to not die, the most important thing is to choose a reputable airline. One that hires and retains experienced pilots with rigorous training programs. (Most major US airlines meet this standard).

<comment><USER3> And non-suicidal pilots ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanwings_Flight_9525](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanwings_Flight_9525))

<comment><USER2> Yep. That's a big one. It also helps to avoid flying over areas with widespread use of surface-to-air missiles.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> flightaware.com seems to know what airplane is being used.</comment>


You should read manuals like you read love letters (1982) - <AUTHOR> http://www.robelle.com/smugbook/manual.html <comment><USER2> I am sure that I am not alone on HN and having never received a love letter.</comment>


Kim Jong Il's likely successor - <AUTHOR> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Jong_Un

<comment><USER2> Something tells me the North Korean Generals aren't about to take orders from a 20 year old.</comment>


Google parent company Alphabet sees its first revenue decline in history - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2020/7/30/21345014/google-youtube-alphabet-revenue-decline-q2 <comment><USER2> Google's ad revenue had declined 8% in the second quarter. Revenue and profit also dropped year-over-year. [https://news.alphastreet.com/alphabet-goog- googl-q2-2020-ear...](https://news.alphastreet.com/alphabet-goog- googl-q2-2020-earnings-the-most-important-numbers/)</comment>