The Alter Bible - <AUTHOR> https://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/279344/robert-alter-bible <comment><USER2> Very interesting, and although I have little to no experience with reading the bible, I have to say that everything Alter is quoted as saying in this article makes obvious sense to me.

The difficulties translators have with any text should be a reminder of how painfully inadequate any language is as a mediator between two different brains. So much depends in context.

> Perhaps the first person to openly suggest otherwise was Baruch Spinoza, the > 17th-century Jewish philosopher, who daringly wrote that the books of the > Bible ought to be studied in just the same way we would study Greek and > Italian poetry.

This, 100 times. I am not a religious person at all. However, it makes me extremely sad if self-proclaimed "atheists" make fun of the the Bible / Torah / Koran by pointing out how unrealistic almost all of the texts are. Of course they are unrealistic - but so are the works of Shakespeare, or Dante, or Goethe, or any great poet in the last 3000 years. Yet nobody would ridicule Dante for assuming that hell lies in some cave in Tuscany. If you just dismiss these religious texts as opium for the dull medieval masses, you might miss some deep poetical truths about mankind that just cannot be stated explicitly because of the shortcomings of any human language described above.

<comment><USER3> >However, it makes me extremely sad if self-proclaimed "atheists" make fun of the the Bible / Torah / Koran by pointing out how unrealistic almost all of the texts are.

I don't think atheists would have a problem with anyone treating the Bible (or any religious text) as literature, since there would be a lot less religious violence in the event that religious doctrine couldn't be cited as an absolute authority.

But, many modern Christians insist that the Bible must be taken literally, and that it should be taught as science, or presented as an alternative to science. Those are the people atheists are making fun of, and they deserve the ridicule.

> If you just dismiss these religious texts as opium for the dull medieval > masses, you might miss some deep poetical truths about mankind that just > cannot be stated explicitly because of the shortcomings of any human > language described above.

What Karl Marx meant by that is not that religion makes people stupid and compliant (although sometimes it kind of can,) but that people use religion to soothe the burdens of life in an unjust and cruel world... and that the illusory comfort offered by religion often stands in the way of making real societal progress. People who believe that God alone will punish the wicked and reward the righteous and that every event, no matter how capricious or unjust, is part of some divine plan, will simply tolerate the world and trust God to change it, rather than try to change it themselves.

And yet much of what could be considered progressive moral change in society has occurred in spite of religion, either through secular or scientific ideas pushing against religious authority and supernaturalism, or through reform within the religious community itself.

<comment><USER4> Karl Marx, whose ideas have been used to justify so much mayhem, misery, and death - all in the name of 'progress'. I think we do without more of that sort of progress.

<comment><USER3> So you're advocating abandoning scientific and Enlightenment principles and returning to societies based on superstition and theocratic authoritarianism?

That seems like an odd stance to take given how much mayhem, misery and death religion has caused but to each their own, I guess.

<comment><USER4> Societies based on Marxism - are they not based on superstition and theocratic authoritarianism? Marxism is a non-falsifiable theory that appears to explain things, but in reality it's just wrong, as shown by the many experiments conducted to make it work.

Scientific and enlightenment principles got a huge push from the Bible. The Bible makes certain truth claims that make science possible, such as the claim that there is a physical universe that is worth studying in its own right. Many other belief systems emphasize that you can only know the physical through the metaphysical.

<comment><USER3> >Societies based on Marxism - are they not based on superstition and theocratic authoritarianism?

Neither my comment or the quote by Marx were referring to Marxism or advocating a society based on Marxism.

And no, a philosophy that rejects religion can't be based on theocratic authoritarianism, because theocratic authoritarianism draws its claim of authority from divine right.

>The Bible makes certain truth claims that make science possible, such as the claim that there is a physical universe that is worth studying in its own right.

The Bible claims that God created the earth and the universe in seven days, man directly from the dust of the earth, and woman from the rib of the first man. The Bible's claims certainly do not make science possible. No one needs the Bible to claim that there is a physical universe worth studying, to see that this is the case.

On the other hand, people _still_ believe evolution is heresy because of Genesis, and will pray themselves and their children to death believing God will cure them and that modern medical science is sinful. Belief in miasma theory and Platonism, while not Christian, were religious in nature and held back progress in various scientific fields and public health.

Religion may hold value in society as a medium for spreading cultural identity and moral teachings, but deserves no credit for the cause of science, except perhaps as the means by which early scientists and philosophers approached inquiry (as a means of better understanding God's creation.)

But even then, the inevitable result was not to understand God, but to expose and dismantle the facade of religion, claim by spurious claim.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > _Then there is Alter's preference for "between his legs" rather than > "between his feet," which is used in all three of the earlier versions > quoted above. A staff between Judah's feet sounds like it is planted firmly > on the ground, but a mace between his legs has a distinctly more phallic > implication, as Alter acknowledges in his note: "the image of the mace > between the legs surely suggests virile power in political leadership." This > is a vivid image of patriarchy, entirely appropriate for a speech in which a > father is passing sovereignty down to his sons._

It sounds like the ancient culture wasn't living up to the modern reader's expectations for how ancient literature was supposed to be read, so they burried some nuts so that the other modern readers could find them as they expected to.

<comment><USER6> Well it even gets better.

1 Kings 12:10 The young men who had grown up with him replied, "These people have said to you, 'Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but make our yoke lighter.' Now tell them, 'My little finger is thicker than my father's waist.

Little finger means his penis.

<comment><USER7> The Hebrew version does not mention a finger. It just says "my little" \- קָֽטָנִּ֥י

<comment><USER6> Well the English translations add finger for a specific reasons. It was really funny to talk about this in my second year of Hebrew. Hebrew is a really pictorial language and it just made me die laughing. Another not as fun one is to look at Noah and what it meant to have his son look at his father's nakedness.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Fascinating that this made it on to the front-page of HN. I feel sorry for this fellow in as much as his surname must cause some terrific confusion.

The King James version has remained popular as a result of its wonderful prose - to see someone approach the Hebrew Bible from a modern angle with the same intent is very interesting - I'll be having a read.

<comment><USER9> Trivia: the discussions that led to the suggestion to King James VI to create a new bible were held in a church a couple of miles from where I am currently sitting:

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

<comment><USER10> > Kink James VI

Quality Freudian slip here.

<comment><USER11> Reminds me of the Amboy Dukes song "Surrender To Your Kings", which on Amazon music is listed as "Surrender To Your Kinks". I wish there was some way to fix that because that error has propagated around the web.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Translating Bible is a difficult task. There are usually two camps of philosophy of Bible translation. There's the word-for-word style where words are translated literally, rather than its intended meaning -- such as the classic King James Version (1611 AD), and more modern NKJV, NASB and ESV. Then there's thought-for-thought style, where it is translated based on its connotation, intention, and geared for modern English -- such as the popular NIV, NLT, and more paraphrase-style translations. I prefer the more literal Bible, but it also makes reading certain passages more difficult, since the original word used may not have the same connotation in English, and there are ancient idioms that may not make sense in English.

<comment><USER13> Understanding the Bible by Stephen L. Harris is a great comprehensive textbook for any person trying to understand the historical and metaphorical meaning in the Bible. It's formatted like a college textbook but i found it very readable for casual learning.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I've always been fascinated by the difficulties of translation.

There is the issue of expressing the original thought. Already I've edited this post several times.

Then there is the issue of the surrounding context which will be different for different people. Even for people in the same culture at the same time in the same place.

Then the issue of the attitude of the reader. It's not uncommon to get different meanings from the same text on different days.

Now with the Biblical text we have copies of text from a different time, culture, and language. I like how this article shows how hard it is to handle even one sentence.

<comment><USER15> I'd prefer a translator that just gave me the words and sentences. As a receiver of that information I can learn to do my own interpretation. Imperfectly and only after some thought and experience, but at least the translator won't be 'in the way' changing the message.

<comment><USER16> I am left jumping to the conclusion that you don't speak a second (living) language. There are very often thoughts in one language that can not be directly expressed in another specific language. I have those problems quite often between English and German (meaning the modern versions). Sometimes you need multiple sentences to explain, even in approximate terms, things that need only a single word in the other language (e.x.: "genau" or "gemutlichkeit" in German, or "subtle" in English). And here I am not talking about idiom (which can change rapidly). And German and English are contemporary languages, with cultures that are driving them together (think all of the U.S. films that are translated into German).

Now add that the Bible was written in a few now-dead languages, with 1900-2200 years since it was first written, and you are going to get a lot of differences in thought, much of which requires you to have knowledge that you are not going to be able to come up with thinking through it yourself.

Two examples of how fast things can change: 1\. When I first went to Germany the word "geil" explicitly meant someone who was attractive, or good at sex. So it was not really part of polite speech. 10 years later I went back to the same part of Germany and the word now was used in normal conversations and meant "really good", without any sexual connotations. 2\. If you look at American Pilgrim literature you see a lot of references to "God is great", usually alongside the phrase "God fearing" when talking about religious people. This is because just a few hundred years ago the word "great" in English specifically meant "powerful" in a violent way. Nowadays if you listen to a Christian sermon in the U.S. they will still say "God is great", but will be talking about how gentle and loving God is.

Language can move really fast, and thinking that you understand something that someone wrote hundreds of years ago without a good interpreter is unrealistic. There is always going to be an interpreter in the way. And one who just "translates the words" is not doing you any favors.

<comment><USER15> Oh yes historical language, that's a deep subject.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> >Alter's Bible doesn't seek that kind of canonical status; it is not out to replace the Hebrew Bible, but to engage in a dialogue with it.

The idea of engaging in a dialogue with the Bible is very important. It should not be viewed as books set in stone, but as living documents that speak to us today.

'Then said he unto them, Therefore every scribe which is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old.' (Matthew 13:52)

</comment><comment><USER18> Orthodox Jew here who went through the Yeshiva system (~10 years of full-time study).

If you haven't read the Bible in the original Hebrew here's an analogy: imagine the tactile, raw feel of Robert Frost, how the language he employs and the deliberate choice of words makes his poems feel as if they rhyme. Now compact all that into the extreme terseness of Emily Dickinson.

My weekly highlight is the public reading of the Prophets in the synagogue every Sabbath. The language, the rhythm, it's beautiful.

</comment><comment><USER19> It reminds me of "The Book of Genesis Illustrated by R. Crumb" ([https://www.amazon.com/Book-Genesis-Illustrated-R- Crumb/dp/0...](https://www.amazon.com/Book-Genesis-Illustrated-R- Crumb/dp/0393061027)), which I enjoyed.

He, as an atheist, tries to present it in the raw form, without "explaining the hidden message" or any religious interpretation (neither Jewish nor Christian).</comment>


Storefront by Fancy - <AUTHOR> http://fancy.com/about/merchant

<comment><USER2> Anyone have and idea what the prices are for the full fulfillment service?</comment>


The horror of blimps (2003) - <AUTHOR> http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=160851 <comment><USER3> I'm all for keeping HN high quality - I hope it never loses its focus on technical discussion, regardless of how much userbase influx there may be from other online communities.

But this kind of thing perfectly matches the calibre of HN, despite the subject matter.

Thanks.

</comment><comment><USER4> Once upon a time I was given a helium foil balloon as part of a goodie bag from a job interview (long story - I also got an ipad, one of the first in the UK). I brought the helium balloon home with me, just for its novelty - <USER2> hadn't had a helium balloon in many, many years.

I weighted it for neutral buoyancy - this required slight re-weighting every so often as it lost volume. It became almost like a pet, following people around the house in their wake, drifting around depending on the airflow - this often leads upstairs because warm air rises - and yes, one night it did make its way into the bedroom.

It was more charming in an anthropomorphised sense, though, and in no way scary or disturbing.

</comment><comment><USER5> Oh man, there are so many hilarious threads buried in the Straight Dope archives. I have no idea how that forum managed to maintain such a high concentration of genuinely witty posters for so long, but it was a great crowd for years. (Might still be, I dunno.)

</comment><comment><USER6> All I can say is: if you've not read this yet _do so_. It's a quick read, and it's completely worth the time. Best thing I've read on the Internet today, honestly.

</comment><comment><USER7> This is amazing and oddly comforting at the same time.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Have read it when it was first published, but it's something of an evergreen (and very well written for a "mere" thread post).

</comment><comment><USER8> I've stumbled on this several times over the years. Always funny. Also, I kinda want a blimp.

<comment><USER9> It would probably be pretty easy to build one from scratch. Fun weekend project?

<comment><USER10> And give it an AI now you're at it. No harm can come from it.

<comment><USER9> Yeah, and let's give it a bb gun and train it to shoot down other balooons! Hopefully it's able to distinguish baloons from other baloon-shaped objects...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I remember this from when I stumbled upon it way back (2003?). Back then under the title "when zeppelins attack".

It is indeed a nice internet evergreen. Once in awhile these pop up (in original or updated form) for a new generation.

</comment><comment><USER12> I wonder which studio has secured the movie rights to this story.</comment>


Cascading Shit Show by fat [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iniwPUEbPUM

<comment><USER2> This is by far the most fun tech talk I've ever seen!</comment>


The World Economy Runs on GPS. It Needs a Backup Plan - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-07-25/the-world-economy-runs-on-gps-it-needs-a-backup-plan <comment><USER3> Apparently Galileo, GLONASS and BeiDou don't count, because the backups for this backbone of the _global_ economy have to be American?

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

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_(satellite_navigation)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_\(satellite_navigation\))

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

I do wonder how many of these are supported by common hardware like mobile phones, anybody have a pointer to a compatibility list? I know the Chinese government had been prodding its manufacturers to add BeiDou support pretty hard.

<comment><USER4> All satellite nagivation systems are trivially jammable. They use DSSS to spread out codes and resist jamming but signal levels are still so weak at the surface it's trivial to block.

Most phones are compatible with GPS(US) +Galileo(Europe)+Glonass(Russia). Most of them also report which constellation the locks are from. GPS status and toolbox on android is a fun way to see what you're connected to.

What we need, and will probably get soon, is inertial guidance based on laser ring or fibre optic gyros in mobiles. You get a location fix every week or so and it starts out much more accurate than gps.

The US system was first by maybe a decade or more so support is nearly universal. The other systems are largely copycat, purposely compatible with existing GPS receivers.

That's why it seems like we're relying on the US for GPS, they invented it and had a full constellation in orbit before anyone else even thought of it.

Of course we're on the internet which was also invented by the US govt so I'm not so surprised why "the backups for this backbone of the global economy have to be American" in reference to GPS at least

<comment><USER5> > What we need, and will probably get soon, is inertial guidance based on > laser ring or fibre optic gyros in mobiles. You get a location fix every > week or so and it starts out much more accurate than gps.

Corrections every week? This isn't possible given the drift rates of high end FOG or Lazer ring IMUs. A high-end marine-grade INS can cost over 1 million dollars. These systems will typically provide un-aided navigation solution drifts that are less than 1.8 km per day. This means that if the device were left stationary for one day, due to slight errors in the sensors and imperfect sensor calibrations, after integrating the position solution, the calculated position after one day would be 1800 meters away from the sensors actual position.

With ones that you can affordably put in a phone within minutes the drift will be huge. You need something to regularly correct for the drift and currently this is GPS.

<comment><USER6> So this is why my smartwatch can tell me my speed before it has a GPS lock, including indoors? Very cool! But of course, as you say, the reports of my absolute position are very inaccurate.

<comment><USER7> No, any position-solution produced before a GPS lock will be due to the approximation produced by either using the last-known position or the cell- tower triangulation. That information is also used as a seed for the GPS lock to speed up the time-to-fix.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The longer I am alive the more I learn about how much of human civilization depends on good faith and trust. Nearly every major system in use today is chock-full of single points of failure that could have catastrophic consequences but we keep chugging along, rarely stopping to think about the "risk debt" we have accumulated - right up until a catastrophe. I don't know if that should make me feel more secure or terrified.

Take power plants for example: they are all interconnected in large regional grids and deal with such large quantities of power that bringing a power plant online is a dangerous process that has to be coordinated with the rest of the system. You have to spin up the power plant and make sure that you are in phase with the grid before connecting your power output - all while accounting for geographic distribution losses, predicted load changes, and so on. Theoretically, any discrepancies (like power flow being too high due to phase difference) would activate breakers and other safeties should an adversarial actor decide to bring a power plant online online willy-nilly. Unfortunately, the last few decades have shown that those safeties are barely able to handle common scenarios, let alone an attack. There is a serious risk that a single power plant could cause systemic damage to many devices in a region's grid but for the entire history of the US, we have just assumed that anyone with tens of millions of dollars to invest in a power plant is just too profit-driven to pull off anything like that.

If the last few years (decades it seems) have taught me anything, it's that we have to reevaluate many of the assumptions we have been holding about reality and our peers. From the Target/Home Depot/Equifax breaches to Facebook's Cambridge Analytica fiasco, we have just been way too lucky and way too trusting. GPS is just one of many such cases, although a surprising one. I never thought the world would put so much trust in a system created by and for the US armed forces.

<comment><USER9> A default trust society can be much more successful than default deceive/don't trust society. The cost of default don't trust is high. I would say that the wide adoption of the Christian value of honesty with everyone is probably one of the main reasons for the rise of western Civilization. If we decide to go back to a default don't trust society, we will loose something very valuable. We should try very hard to avoid that.

<comment><USER10> It's a bit parochial to hear someone in the twenty-first century describe honesty as a particularly Christian value. You do know you're talking to the whole world here? Most human cultures have valued honesty to a similar degree. Even many animal communities value honesty.

<comment><USER11> Religion has historically and continues to play a major role in geopolitics... there's nothing parochial about it. The Christian belief system was objectively instrumental in the creation of the West's institutions, system of government, beliefs about trade, etc. You don't have to be religious (as I am not) for this to be true.

<comment><USER12> People, especially Americans, conflate Christianity with Western culture. But this is erroneous thinking:

1) Western liberal values are not co-extensive with Christianity. Christianity is geographically much larger. This has been true historically, and even more true today with the rise of Christian nations like South Korea and various nations in Southern Africa.

2) Western liberal values came to predominate in Europe centuries, even millennia, after Europe was Christianized.

3) Many Western liberal values are easily traced to pre-Christian movements, such as Greek Stoicism.

4) The Christianity of most Western Europeans today is not the Christianity of centuries ago, let alone millennia ago. The Protestant Revolution was like a giant flask where people took Christian doctrines and mixed them together with contemporary civil and philosophical values which emerged from the Enlightenment and then the dawn of the scientific and industrial ages. It's one thing to say that Christianity was conducive to the emergence of those other phenomena; it's quite another to say that they _were_ Christian.

<comment><USER11> 1) Christianity has been a major export of the West through missionaries and colonization. It was hardly the native religion of, say, Mexico or the Philippines.

2) That's hardly a compelling case against the influence of religion on Western values. It could even be a contributor, or neutral.

3) These values were well-documented but, for whatever reason, did not spread to the Muslim or Hindu world first. Islam had its brief progressive renaissance but was not able to sustain liberal values over the long-term. There are some small exceptions - Ismaili Muslims are quite liberal - <USER2> they're a tiny fraction of the Islamic world.

4) America was essentially founded by religious zealots and/or adherents to marginalized religions. The very architecture of early America - the gothic styling of Boston, for example - is of that era and persists. You can't wipe out that kind of influence in 100 years.

I'm not saying religion is the ONLY factor, but I find it odd that people try to ignore the impact it's had on the shaping of the modern world. I'm an atheist so I view this more as a historical fact - I'm not a fan of organized religion and would be perfectly happy if it went away.

<comment><USER13> It's a problem of timing and geography. Eastern Orthodox falls under the Christian religious umbrella, but it's very different under the surface demonstrating how western culture has influenced Christianity.

The Protestant Reformation was a religious movement, but ended up importing a lot of western beliefs into Christianity. Democracy for example is a western belief, Christianity is closely tied to Kings.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> A few good possibilities:

1\. Cell sites have their own high precision clock, so they can go at least 10-20 minutes and probably longer without any difficulty.

2\. The site really only needs to see a single satellite to get time synchronization if it has the almanac and ephemeris because it knows exactly where it is and how far away the satellite is. In fact, in the presence of noise, it can integrate over a long period to pull a jammed signal out from under the noise floor.

3\. There are already a number of other terrestrial sources of time. TV stations have precise timing, and a defined offset to GPS time. They also have huge output power that is more difficult to jam.

4\. The cell networks can synchronize with each other. If the network simply adjusts the time to be an average of neighboring cells and its own clock, they will stay in sync. It's not required for the mobile phone network to have correct absolute time, only correct time relative to other nearby network elements.

<comment><USER15> Does anyone know if a hobbyist can pull the time from TV signals like you can with an RPi/GPS-hat/etc? I'd love to have a bedside clock that pulls from TV signal for no other reason than I didn't even know that existed until now.

<comment><USER16> A quick Google struggled to find much. I did find that DVB-T has a transport stream called "System_clock_descriptor" with identifier 0x0B [1].

[1] Pg. 22 [https://freeviewnz.tv/media/1216/freeview_dtt_transmission_r...](https://freeviewnz.tv/media/1216/freeview_dtt_transmission_rules_3.pdf)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> We often use GPS as a way to synchronize time accross distances. Even Google's data centers use GPS (and an atomic clock) for synchronization - [https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2...](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2012/11/26/3692392/google- spanner-atomic-clocks-GPS)

GPS is such a weak signal that almost anyone transmitting ground based signals on the right frequency could easily drown out GPS - and do spoofing with a little extra research. So theoretically you could spoof near a data center and mess up a lot of data powering 1000s of applications.

On top of this civilian GPS is made to be jammed and innacurate - there's a better one the military has moved onto because of this (see the m-code section: [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPS_Block_IIIA](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPS_Block_IIIA))

So yes, relying on an easily jammed atomic clock hurtling through space seems like a bad idea... But it's kind of the best we've got right now. At least until the cost of putting your own satellite into orbit goes down.

<comment><USER18> Although the US has always fantasised about its military having a much better GPS than everybody else, and it seems technically to be in a position to arrange this, the reality is always that a $5 civilian device is available in every store and the $8000 military device is back-ordered and won't be in stock until after the war is won, so you use the civilian device even though it's theoretically worse.

"Selective Availability" was the first incarnation of this pipe dream. Civilian GPS would be deliberately corrupted by up to 100 metres and the correct offset would be transmitted separately to authorised military devices. But, see above, in practice when the US military needed GPS it found civilian devices were available while accurate military ones were not, so it reduces the induced error to zero and bought civilian kit for the Gulf War.

The M-code won't be deployed until 2022 (probably later, these things always get delayed). That's when those Block IIIA birds "go live" even though some will be in orbit for years before that.

Jamming the M-code is not really harder than jamming other codes, this is a broadcast radio signal you can easily transmit a more powerful signal yourself. The Block IIIA birds have an extra transmitter so they can increase power... but they still can't drown out even a relatively disposable local jammer.

Spoof genuinely is harder with an extra code... and this is the supposed benefit with owning any of the GNSS systems, you can keep a secret shared key that makes your system spoof proof until bad guys learn the key. But again, in practice when war breaks out you turn out not to have thousands of expensive military-only devices with the shared secret, so you rely on the civilian stuff anyway.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Well, the aviation world still has VHF omnidirectional range (VOR) navigation [1], where you can determine what direction you are to a VHF radio transmitter based on phase difference. Unfortunately, the FAA seems hell-bent on phasing them out in the USA, likely because money.

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

2: [https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all- news/2015/november/2...](https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all- news/2015/november/24/faa-begins-decommissioning-vors)

<comment><USER20> And Non-Directional Beacons [1]. Maybe not so popular in the USA, but common around the rest of the world, and comparatively very cheap to run.

1: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non- directional_beacon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-directional_beacon)

<comment><USER19> Yep, the FAA has already decommissioned most, if not all, of our NDBs. They seem very excited about making sure there's a single point of failure for all non-visual airborne navigation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Actually gaming GPS is well within the pockets of anyone.

[https://www.rtl-sdr.com/using-a-hackrf-to-spoof-gps- navigati...](https://www.rtl-sdr.com/using-a-hackrf-to-spoof-gps-navigation- in-cars-and-divert-drivers/)

The same principle is likely applicable to other standards as well, until the day they add encryption, which will probably need a lot of time and research to overcome the inevitable associated timing problems.

If doable at military level, the possible scenarios are catastrophic: country A launches say 5 test missiles, country B from nearby hidden submarine launches 5 much smaller and stealth jamming missiles. The jamming missiles approach the bigger ones then jam them into believing they're slightly off course forcing them to adjust, while in reality they're being slowly directed to country C. Of course any loss of control by ground base should be interpreted as self destruct by the missile, so it'd be near impossible to do it actually, but if other signals could be spoofed as well as positioning, then that would be a problem.

<comment><USER22> This is why missiles don't use GPS. (at least U.S. ones as far as I know)

They use a highly precise inertial measurement unit to track their location since launch.

<comment><USER23> They use GPS and a lot of different technique because the IMU need regular correction. But the main source of trust is the IMU. By jamming the GPS signal you can induce more drifting, but you would have to jam it for a long time to induce a very big drifting (and even them, it might be compensated by the other technique employed).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> US, Russia, and China all have intependant "Global Positioning" Systems, GPS, GLONASS and BDS.

All similar in function and implementation.

The coolest part about GPS is the fact that temporal relativity is employed to establish a 3D location from accurate flying clock radios, that's rad.

<comment><USER25> There's a relativity correction step for communication between Iridium satellites and mobiles. I always thought that was really cool.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> People do not truly understand not only the dependency on GPS as a canonical source of both position and time. Navigation and nationally productivity can totally break down if it were to disappear.

But that's an extreme case. Localized and targeted GPS spoofing is not science fiction. What's worse - the GPS spoofing can be designed to warp world geometry in particularly nefarious ways to coerce the trajectory of objects for specific purposes. It's not even that expensive, it's just a different algorithmic problem.

Those algorithms _will_ become trivial in the future - and they will have not been tested by most (if any) of the various autonomous service providers.

<comment> cup-of-tea Some people do understand. That's why many countries have made their own independent "GPS" systems.

<comment><USER27> More of the same easily-jammable schemes is not a real solution. But all wireless location/navigation/time-distribution mechanisms will be easily jammed. The only solution is fantastic improvements in inertial navigation devices.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Made me think of an old Phrack article, "Low Cost and Portable GPS Jammer". Worth a read!

[http://phrack.org/issues/60/13.html#article](http://phrack.org/issues/60/13.html#article)

</comment><comment><USER29> Not shocking to anyone who set up GPS systems in the early days. Or anyone who lives in a city with lots of shiny buildings. Or lives near a military facility. Or drives the Beltway around D.C. Or...

</comment><comment><USER30> BeiDou is actually more advanced as it supports full-duplex communication, which essentially allows you to send message to the satellites.

<comment><USER31> And then what? A.la. personal emergency beacons?

<comment><USER15> Satellite based SMS would be pretty amazing for hikers/campers/etc.

<comment><USER32> [https://www.globaltelesat.co.uk/isatphone-2-satellite- phone-...](https://www.globaltelesat.co.uk/isatphone-2-satellite-phone-rental)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> brian-armstrong If you're curious how GPS works, this is a surprisingly approachable guide where a guy built his own and detailed lots of the knowledge [http://lea.hamradio.si/~s53mv/navsats/theory.html](http://lea.hamradio.si/~s53mv/navsats/theory.html)

</comment><comment><USER33> FYI the 24 GPS satellites are all in Low Earth Orbit. Well within the reach of missile technology today. These will be taken out within minutes of the next war. This is why the Naval Academy as of 2 years ago teaches navigation by sextant. Was in the Army as late as 2013, and they (at least that unit) almost never let us use GPS during training (only USGS maps, protractors and compass) for this reason.

<comment><USER34> Once all the GPS (or similar) satellites are knocked out, uh, what are you going to use now fight the war?

On _either_ side?

And anyways, what country has the budget to knock out _twenty four_ satellites in quick succession?

And what if this doesn't work? I'm having a hard time thinking the US Gov. doesn't have a shadow GPS constellation up there, somewhere, but I will concede this is the most wahoo part of my meanderings...

I think knocking out GPS is a rather risky move to even try.

<comment><USER35> > what country has the budget to knock out twenty four satellites in quick > succession?

The only countries between whom a war would be a globally consequential event: the United States, China, and Russia.

<comment><USER36> Actually any country with a nuclear weapon should be on that list.

And that is quite a few: Israel, UK, France, India with North Korea/Iran not that far behind.

<comment><USER37> That's not enough - you also have to be able to deliver the warhead to the satellite.

It's not very easy to do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> FOAM [1] is trying to solve this. They're using a distributed network of radio beacons which offer location services using time synchronization.

[https://foam.space](https://foam.space)

<comment><USER39> Every day I discover a new use case crammed into a blockchain with a sledgehammer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> These blockchain fellas and are working on an Ethereum's alternative.

[https://blog.foam.space/introduction-to-proof-of- location-6b...](https://blog.foam.space/introduction-to-proof-of- location-6b4c77928022)</comment>


Git enhanced: Numbered shortcuts from status, autojump-like repository index - <AUTHOR> http://madebynathan.com/2011/10/18/git-shortcuts-like-youve-never-seen-before

<comment><AUTHOR> Supports bash and zsh, on Linux and OS X</comment>


Why a standard resume is not enough for hiring - <AUTHOR> http://www.inc.com/magazine/201405/jason-fried/hiring-based-on-effort-not-resumes.html

<comment><USER2> Interesting concept, now I'm wondering how to apply it to a typical advert where the screening is done by HR using keywords on the resume.</comment>


Ask HN: Is it even possible? Es6 shim arrow function - <AUTHOR>

Probably going to get let me google that for you but with my current understanding of JS I don't even understand how it would be possible to introduce arrow functions via a shim. If it is possible how? If not what will your requirements of browser adoption be before using them? <comment><USER2> StackOverflow is probably a better source of this type of information.

[https://stackoverflow.com/questions/28029523/es6-arrow- funct...](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/28029523/es6-arrow-function- lexical-this-in-v8)</comment>


Advice for Coding Bootcamp Graduates - <AUTHOR> https://thinkfaster.co/2018/02/my-advice-for-coding-bootcamp-graduates/ <comment><USER2> I am a cofounder of a bootcamp (Hack Reactor) that teaches Big O. I believe our average grad knows more about it than I did when I graduated with a CS degree.

Some comments:

1\. If you're a bootcamp grad, be aware that impostor syndrome / low confidence / "maybe I'll be ready to interview after I take one more class" is a FAR GREATER RISK than not knowing big o. When you read an essay like this, consider it as useful input. Big O is useful, and is a special point of interest to interviewers, but do NOT listen to any of the voices (especially those in your head) telling you "you're not a real engineer until you XYZ". So, by all means, internalize this essay if your takeaway is "nudge big o up on the study list". Reject this essay and everything it stands for if your takeaway is "I am not ready to be a software engineer yet".

2\. A dissenting viewpoint from me: this is good advice for interviewees, but interviewer focus on Big O / data structures / etc is a part of the same culture that fetishizes CS degrees from tier-1 schools and mistakenly believes that the most difficult/valuable part of software engineering is computer science. In reality, the most difficult/valuable parts of software engineering are craftsmanship (measured in decades of real work, not built at schools except those named waterloo) and working effectively in teams. Big O is not uniquely useful to your work or uniquely difficult to learn on-the-job. You should study it anyway because many interviewers believe that it is.

<comment><USER3> Hi Shawn! I think I interviewed with you as a student when HackReactor was calling itself Catalyst. Anyway:

> not built at schools except those named waterloo

I was in Vancouver once and visiting a friend at his workplace. They mentioned that they hire a lot of University of Waterloo graduates and I asked, innocently, "is that a good engineering school?"

I got a blank stare from everyone before they flatly responded, "Yes."

I know Waterloo's prestigious reputation better now, but I'm curious what experiences do you have with Waterloo grads that makes them the exception to this rule?

<comment><USER2> Hey there :)

Waterloo does one thing uniquely well: the co-op program [1]. Their grads have a ton of real-world experience before they graduate, which puts them head-and- shoulders above their peers. (This is connected to my broader worldview.)

[1] [https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/future-undergraduate-students/co- op-...](https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/future-undergraduate-students/co-op-and- regular)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I've been doing full stack web programming and server administration for the past 20 years, and I almost never encounter "Big O" notation and algorithm problem solving except in interviews.

99% of the things I have built in the past (and continue to build on a daily basis) consist of just gluing things like APIs together, or building user interfaces that essentially just allow users to display and modify data in various databases.

I've had to learn tools like Docker, Git, Travis, Ansible, and Kubernetes. I've had to be able to learn the basics of languages like Javascript and Python and Ruby in a matter of months or even weeks. I've had to pick up frameworks like Angular and React and whatever new shiny thing exists, at the drop of a hat.

I have built large web-based software projects that power multi-million dollar companies, and that handle millions of users on a daily basis.

I don't have a college degree, and my knowledge of advanced math ends at Algebra. But that didn't stop me from assembling and launching a machine learning platform for the company I work for.

But yeah. I don't know shit about algorithms or your "Big O" that you love so dearly and love to judge every "programmer" by.

</comment><comment><USER5> Bootcamp dev here:

The camp I went to was very small and went under after my class graduated. There were just 4 of us in the class. 2 of us now are devs. The other guy who became a dev had a good amount of IT experience coming in, but needed more hands on work with development. The other students just weren't picking up the stuff fast enough and quickly fell behind and didn't recover. I have met a decent amount of people from other camps that had similar experiences, sometimes coding isn't for everyone.

After graduation, I had to do a few more months of solo studying/project work before I reached hire-able level. I got lucky and got hired by a startup that needed a junior dev ASAP. I had a great boss at this startup and learned a lot while also getting the chance to work on features.

Now getting work is easy because I have worked before.

TLDR: You have to put in more work than just the bootcamp to go from no experience to hire-able. And some people just aren't made to be devs, and they may be able to get into a boot camp but they won't be able to contribute when hired. Hopefully I don't come off as conceited/cocky, but that's just my 2 cents.

</comment><comment><USER6> Slightly off topic, but I'm working on putting together a newsletter aimed at career advice for junior software engineers and bootcamp graduates. It will focus more on the soft skills side of engineering. I've gained enough experience in my career where I feel I can offer advice for career advancement for people just starting out their careers. It's something I never had when I first started and I haven't been able to find a lot of solid advice more than a blog post here and there.

If you're interested you can take a look at the first post and subscribe if you think it would he helpful. [https://exponentialbackoff.substack.com/](https://exponentialbackoff.substack.com/)

</comment><comment><USER7> My advice for them?

Don't tell people you paid for a coding bootcamp.

Without fail, every single "code bootcamp" that has applied for a job here has had a horrible resume. They didn't have _anything_ on their resume that wasn't from the bootcamp, and even that was horrible.

And they generally failed our "use Flickr's API to get some images" test that we give out. Miserably.

I think we ended up interviewing 1 of them, out of dozens, and they just weren't worth trying out.

So now, when I see that on a resume, I groan. I still go look at whatever's on their Github, but I'm already primed to fail them. They would have been better off having nothing on the resume and _anything_ in their portfolio.

<comment><USER8> \- Why would you expect them to have more than the bootcamp on their resume? Most people don't have prior programming experience, and most bootcamps are demanding, such that they wouldn't have time for side projects.

\- Is the test using a language they're familiar with? An editor they're familiar with? Is it pair programming, or are they just given a computer and a desk? Are they allowed to use Google/SO/etc?

\- Why do you expect them to have a curated and up-to-date GitHub? Most of the code on there will only be stuff related to their bootcamp program.

Without knowing the specifics of your interview or the particular bootcamps you're hiring from, it sounds like your expectations are mismatched with what the bootcamps are teaching.

<comment><USER7> We expect them to be able to code at a junior level. They cannot. I wouldn't even consider most of them for an internship, and the rest only grudgingly.

Yes, I expect them to have more projects in their Github account than just what the bootcamp forced them to do. If they don't care enough about programming to do that, then they probably don't care enough about programming for us to hire them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> FLUX-YOU This article treads lightly around calling bootcamp grads inferior on average, when actually, very little is standing between the company itself turning the bootcamp grads into the engineers that they want.

After all, you already have ample evidence someone can learn software development concepts on a compressed timeline compared to college, surely another week or so covering time/space complexity and data structures topics is worth the time if the candidate is otherwise a good fit.

But I don't know, maybe their idea of junior development tasks is "find and fix deadlock or race condition that occurs 0.00001% of the time"

<comment><USER9> Author here: I don't believe anyone is inherently inferior. Given the same amount of time invested, I think everyone has a shot at performing well.

But a computer science graduate typically has 4 years under his or her belt in an engineering heavy curriculum, and because of that time invested, they seem to be stronger in problem solving.

We use Big-O as a signal for problem solving ability. Whether or not that signal is problematic is another question - you could argue that it is.

So yes, I would say that someone who has invested 4 years into problem solving is going to have an advantage over someone who has only put in 6 months, even if those 6 months are dedicated.

But the bootcamp graduate could equal the C.S. graduate with a little more investment.

<comment> FLUX-YOU But why don't you hire them, make that little investment yourself, and have them fix things they're capable of fixing while they catch up?

This just seems like such a small obstacle that the technical parts would end up taking a back seat to other hiring criteria.

<comment><USER9> Hiring someone who doesn't work out is unbelievably expensive. It can be a disaster for your team.

When we hire someone, we have no way of knowing if they'll be the life-long learner type who will aggressively consume new knowledge and learn as much as they possibly can. In other words, we have no way of knowing if we can effectively train them, and it's crazy expensive if we can't.

We've tried to hire 1 or 2 of them as interns, but usually they're not interested in being interns.

<comment> FLUX-YOU But I don't think that trait would be discoverable in CS grads more often than boot camp grads. If it is, and you get a reliable source of candidates from CS grads, why not just filter on that and not bother with the time spent interviewing boot camp grads? And I'm not sure a couple of courses would change that in a person. That's distinctly out of the technical set of qualities.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I started this non-profit to address the bootcamp problem: [https://garagescript.org/](https://garagescript.org/)

After trying out different methods of teaching, here's what works for us: 1\. We do peer to peer teaching. If a student learns arrays, he/she is in charge of teaching it to new students. This builds the ability to communicate technically.

2\. Students are code reviewed from the first line of code they write. As challenges get harder, inefficiencies are caught through code reviews and explained to them by their mentors.

3\. Rather than building their own ideas, students build products that everyone on the team use on a daily basis. We have our own internal hosting, our own email, stackoverflow, and student progress, all built by the team of students. By making students work together on one big project that runs exactly like an engineering team (with sprint planning, code reviews, project discussions), students not only get work experience but also get to learn with others through trial-by-fire. Its incredibly fun for everyone.

4\. Since we are so young, we have only graduated 3 students, but each of them love their jobs and were able to jump right in to their issues and get stuff done. They were also able to have in-depth discussions with their teammates.

Having worked with so many engineers, I personally value technical soft skills. When I work with engineers who can communicate / collaborate well, I feel that I can teach them anything.

</comment><comment><USER11> After going through a web dev bootcamp myself where we actually devoted a decent amount of time to algorithms and their time/space complexity -- this has been the thing I have used the least in my professional career.

<comment><USER12> Maybe your not working on professional things? Also what is a decent ammount of time?

<comment><USER13> Not OP but I did a 3 month boot camp, where the final month was spent on a big group project (which was great) and then algorithm optimization, red-black trees, and a bunch of stuff that I didn't actually think I needed on the job for 2 years.

Sometime in my third year on the job I had to find the duplicates in an array. My beautiful solution "arr.select{|x| arr.count(x) > 1}.uniq" didn't work because I had 100,000 items in the array. My solution was O(n^2), and that finally made sense to me, and it actually mattered.

I would say this was when I didn't feel like a Bootcamp beginner anymore, and thought of myself as an intermediate professional programmer.

<comment><USER14> Yup. Understanding fundamental computer science is a good example of the Dunning-Kruger effect. If you don't understand it, you likely don't even realize that you're missing something important.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The author has the right idea. The company I work at hires junior engineers somewhat regularly, and the quality of bootcamp grads varies wildly. It'd be awesome to see additional CS courses on a resumé, as fundamentals like time/space complexity are usually the biggest weaknesses of the bootcamp grads we interview.

</comment><comment> FLUX-YOU Google Cached: [https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:soISHS...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:soISHS9sP6EJ:https://thinkfaster.co/2018/02/my- advice-for-coding-bootcamp-graduates/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us)

</comment><comment><USER16> I'm a bootcamp grad and am about to finish my first year as a dev at a well- known, medium size start-up in San Francisco.

The advice the author gives is spot on. Taking the time after finishing the program, working through multiple algo textbooks, and taking an online course on data structures and algorithms definitely helped seal the deal.

To those deriding bootcamps, you are missing out on lots of great developers. The trick is to determine whether the individual worked hard during/after the bootcamp.

Lastly, if you're considering a bootcamp, do your homework, pick a good one, and work relentlessly (I was there generally 8am-11pm every day). It has turned out to be one of the best decisions I've ever made in my life.

<comment><USER17> Which online course on data structures and algorithms did you take?

<comment><USER16> Stanford one on Coursera -> [https://www.coursera.org/specializations/algorithms](https://www.coursera.org/specializations/algorithms)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I am a bootcamp grad with several years of experience now. I agree with the article that the two of the weakest areas for bootcamp grads are data structures and algorithms.

However, my advice would be to interview at places that have focus less on these areas instead of taking coursework. At the end of the day if you are bootcamp grad you are probably not in the financial situation to take extra coursework. It's better to lower your standards a bit to get your first job and then pick up these skills on the job.

You will still have to grind out algorithm prep by using sites like Leetcode and Cracking the Coding Interview, but it's probably a better idea to focus on companies that focus less on this area.

</comment><comment><USER19> "Error establishing database connection"

<comment><USER20> Ironically that's the most common error that bootcamp graduate see when they first deploy their app.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Have interviewed a bunch of bootcampers. Goal is to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Without fail, they lack the fundamental knowledge needed to excel. Not because the classes or assignments are bad, but because there is so much hard-earned experience and "instinct" that only comes with time in front of a keyboard.

</comment><comment><USER22> The advice to include online MOOC courses on your CV runs counter to every piece of advice I've ever received in regards to putting online courses on a CV. I've always been told that that is seen as a red flag and that you might get docked 'points' for having something like that on a resume.

<comment><USER23> Does anyone have more opinions on this?

I'm a coding boot camp dev with a few years of experience at startups and half of my resume consists of online MOOCS (Udacity's machine learning, Udacity's Linear Algebra, Fast.ai's deep learning, and Cloud Academy's Certified AWS Developer)

I'm curious as to what HR from Big Tech companies and small startups think about a resume filled with MOOCs like this.

<comment><USER24> I don't hire engineers, but I am one. I've never heard this advice about not putting MOOCs on your resume, and if I were hiring, I would likely consider any MOOC (with a decent grade if applicable) to be better than nothing. Can the OP of the comment say more about the reasoning?

<comment><USER22> Am OP of comment, I believe the reasoning is that the quality of MOOCs varies wildly and there is often no way to confirm that a student actually completed the content or how well they did? Another reason could be that the sheer number of MOOCs that a student might take would just add noise to your resume?

I'm not sure that's accurate, but I've had many people tell me to avoid putting anything about MOOCs on a resume.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> In over a dozen years as a professional web developer, I've never once needed to use Big O notation outside of an interview. Sounds like this guy doesn't know how to interview, knows that he doesn't know, but still doesn't want to admit it. No wonder he can't find anyone.

<comment><USER26> I think it's more about simply having an awareness of algorithmic complexity. I'm talking about writing a doubly nested 'for' loop and being able to realise that you've just written an O(N^2) algorithm if you're iterating over the original collection again. This sort of stuff is blindingly obvious to experienced programmers but for bootcamp grads who haven't built up that intuition, a short course on Big O notation exposes them to it.

<comment><USER27> Or, since you're hiring Junior devs, someone could like, take 10 minutes to explain why what they did is wrong and point them towards some resource to help them get on the right track.

This whole thing is part of the circular logic problem with hiring: you have people making these hiring decisions that aren't trained in hiring, so they just go with "what makes sense to them" or hiring a younger version of someone who looks exactly like them for a junior role. It's fine, it works for the company, but it's why people will miss long term talent.

<comment><USER28> Do you have any resources would you recommend for becoming better at hiring? It's an area I think I definitely have room for improvement in

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> > A coding bootcamp person could perform as well as a CS graduate if he or she > took 2 more courses:

> 1\. Data Structures and Algorithms

> 2\. Probability and Statistics.

> You could take them at either a community college or online for minimal > expense.

Are there any specific online courses for these subjects that you recommend?

</comment><comment><USER29> Coders who don't have enough statistical expertise is a problem why? I understand the importance of O notation, but didn't know that stats/probability was important for things like web design and other coding jobs. Can someone help me understand this part?

<comment><USER18> I think the basics of it (i.e. recognizing n vs n^2 vs exponential) is important for back end developers. After a few years of doing back end I've definitely had to have awareness in how I design things like my loops to optimize.

It's not a biggie for most companies, but you should have a general awareness. Unlike the author of the article, though, I do believe you can learn this on the job. Also, you don't have to necessarily know the big 0 notation, it's a good idea to write a load test which will give you a more relevant stat anyways. But sometimes its good to recognize "Oh I don't need a 2nd inner loop that will change this to O(n^2)".

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Curious as to where this demographic gets hired, as it is rare for me to find a JD out there that doesn't ask for a degree in comp sci/soft eng.

</comment><comment><USER31> "if you take one of the 6 month programs, you'll get a similar amount of experience as in an undergrad curriculum."

I am sorry, what?

Look, I know that people are all about "disrupting" the world. But, for the love of hard-work and whatever goodness left in your heart, can you please stop insulting people?

I once worked as TA for an introductory class in Computer Science. It takes about a semester for students to wrap their heads about what is "programming." It takes at minimum another semester of honest to goodness to absorb the fundamentals of computer science (incl. formal languages, basic complexity theories, and basic algorithm). It takes at least another semester to work through how the computer (you know, the silicon?) works.

Of course, I have only talked about the theory side the programming world. A good CS program also needs to introduce at least 2 (if not 3: one introductory, one system, one industrial) programming languages, plus at least 3 paradigms (corresponding the languages above: functional, system/procedural, and OOP), plus some discussion over the industry. And they should ensure that the students get stock overflow at least once, infinite loops at least a few times, and (on the verge of?) kicking their classmates/teammates at least once on some stupid bugs.

More challenges: a brain isn't a hard drive. Cramming is about the worst way possible to induce understanding. All of these above need time and space to work themselves through various layers of consciousness.

(BTW, all of the above are just the basics; if you notice, I have not brought up any "sexy" topics like networking or cloud computing or AI or what-have- you)

Imagine for a minute: what happens if a person walks up to newly minted chemical or mechanical or even electrical engineers and tells them that their 4 years of education can be done in 6 months. What would the new engineers think? Well, here is the nice version: such "disrupter" is laughed out of the room. The less nice version involves some honor-defense beating. The pragmatic version probably involves some lawsuits over how such claim is a fraud and may endanger the consumers (not to mention co-workers).

And yet, here we are. Software engineers, who spent years to acquire immensely complicated skills, are forced to sit through and agree with such insults, then to give comments like "oh yeah, maybe you should learn more about big-O notation." You know what I think about big-O notation? It's about as useful as calculus. Remember, doing something twice does NOT cost as much as doing it once (and this is before factor in goodies like cache miss and waiting for OS and whatnots). It's like push-ups: good mental exercise, but not actually used. So, telling someone "you need to learn big-O notation after 6-month bootcamp" is like saying "learn football for 6 months, add some push-ups, and you are ready for NFL." Am I the only one finding this ridiculous?</comment>


Xiaomi open sources its kernel for MI3 and Redmi - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/MiCode/Xiaomi_Kernel_OpenSource

<comment><USER2> Interesting; I've been eyeing the Xiaomi devices for a while. The github issues are saying that some drivers are missing though.

<comment><AUTHOR> I have been using MI3 for a while now, I can say the device is great. The only problem with it is that no other custom rom is available for it, so I have to stick with MIUI. It is going to change now that they have made the kernel sources available

<comment><USER3> A quick google showed the following cyanogen mod flash on the MI3.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQaoUAYo- ec](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQaoUAYo-ec)

<comment><AUTHOR> that ROM is not stable. It has many bugs along with random reboots.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


A 9th Grader Takes a Leap that Terrifies MBA Students - <AUTHOR> http://danielodio.com/a-9th-grader-takes-a-leap-that-terrifies-mba-students

<comment><USER2> "It's almost like some switch gets flipped at some point in college that causes many students to stop seeing opportunities to be entrepreneurial, and become afraid to try jumping into the ones they do see."

Yes, that would be the "I'm not living at home with Mom and Dad anymore and I'm going to have to buy my own food and shelter from here on out, so I had better find a reliable source of income" switch.

EDIT: This wasn't meant to be negative towards entrepreneurial high schoolers, MBAs or biz school students; I just think it's strange that the author ignores the differences in real risk being taken on by the two groups.

<comment><USER3> Came to say that exact same thing. Basically its this fearlessness again. If you cannot see what you'd be doing when this thing your trying fails, you fear trying it. Especially if you're trying to make rent, buy food, etc. When you are living at home it is easy to see what happens when you fail, well you will still be living at home. Similarly with failing at a business when you are in college, it isn't your "real" job, its something you are trying out.

It is a very very very scary thing to do that when 'failing' has connotations of standing by the side of the road asking for handouts from people who didn't quit their 9-5 jobs. How do you explain that to your parents? your spouse? your kids?

What is worse, the longer you pay attention, the more likely you are to see one or more ideas you thought were really really great fail. And that can completely freeze you into inaction.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> A reason this disparity sprigs to mind has to do with age. I'm reminded that the translation of _sophomore_ from the Greek is "wise fool": it's possible high school students at the ages of 15-18 are more willing to plow ahead with ideas that others think through and then dismiss. Of course, there are famous contrarian ideas that flourished and have changed the world, and most of us know that execution of an idea, along with pivoting, is a road to success. But I would never form nor invest in a company that hands out umbrellas when it rains for the same reason I don't sell Gatorade at little league baseball games: limited, fixed market, no barrier of entry, etc. Isn't it more likely an MBA considers ideas akin to this, thinks through the angles, and then discards them many times over, such that it appears to the outside observer they are timorous?</comment>


Lambda crabs, part 1: A mathematical introduction to lifetimes and regions - <AUTHOR> http://ticki.github.io/blog/lambda_crabs_1/ <comment><USER3> These articles explain the mathematical underpinnings of Rust's borrow checker. The explanation is actually fairly simple, but it assumes prior familiarity with abstract algebra.

For people who are unfamiliar with posets, lattices, etc., this introduction might help a bit: [http://old.iseclab.org/people/enji/infosys/lattice_tutorial....](http://old.iseclab.org/people/enji/infosys/lattice_tutorial.pdf) (PDF)

For introduction to how Rust's ownership/borrowing/lifetimes system works, see the three chapters starting here: [https://doc.rust- lang.org/book/ownership.html](https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/ownership.html)

And a "standard disclaimer" for math: To understand this material, you may need to read slowly, look things up, and work through each example. Math is often very simple, but that doesn't mean that it's easy. The trick is usually to stare at it from enough different directions that the underlying simplicity finally "clicks," and you wonder how you could have ever been confused. If you're unfamiliar with the topics in question, a page per day can be a perfectly acceptable reading speed.

</comment><comment><USER4> Part 2 here: [http://ticki.github.io/blog/lambda_crabs_2/](http://ticki.github.io/blog/lambda_crabs_2/)

<comment><USER5> My goodness! A Lattice (not the linear algebra kind, the abstract algebra kind) being used in the wild? I genuinely never thought I'd see those again outside my analysis textbook.

Ticki does really great work in Rust. I think the only thing he's doing that I disagree with is his RFC for a keyword for dynamic dispatch (all we really need is to distinguish trait objects - dynamic dispatch is just the symptom).

<comment><USER6> Lattices are used to provide a theoretical basis for dataflow analysis in compilers. See Chapter 9 of Aho et al.'s book on compilers.

Ordered sets also occur in denotational semantics [http://homepage.cs.uiowa.edu/~slonnegr/plf/Book/Chapter10.pd...](http://homepage.cs.uiowa.edu/~slonnegr/plf/Book/Chapter10.pdf)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I think this might be relevant:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11746913](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11746913)

[http://arxiv.org/pdf/1503.07199v1.pdf](http://arxiv.org/pdf/1503.07199v1.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER8> How did this make it to the front page? It is so esoteric to begin with, and so poorly explained beyond that... it's not even useful to most of the people it is intended.

All that aside, can we stop making up new words for things that already have words? -- correction, can we stop re-purposing old words for old things and acting like they're new? I mean really, "outlives or equals to"?

<comment><USER9> > It is so esoteric to begin with

If abstract algebra is so "esoteric" for you, I'm afraid you should rather read Trump speeches instead of following HN.

> I mean really, "outlives or equals to"?

Suggest a better alternative and prove that we should throw away decades worth of papers and start using your new terminology.

<comment><USER10> FTA: "Regions have an outlive relation defined on them." Typo? Should that be outlives?

We say equality, inequality, equivalence (equal valence, i.e. value) relation. To be equal -> equality. To outlive -> ? Valid question, outlives doesn't quite fit? To exceed the lifetime, to go beyond the region -> an excession relation, an overboundedness relation? I jest (in part). Naming things is hard! One of the two hard things in programming, as they say.

> Suggest a better alternative and prove that we should throw away decades > worth of papers and start using your new terminology.

"outlives or equals to" -> "outlives or is equal to in scope/duration" reads better to my ears.

So it's not even to outlive, it's to live for the same amount as or outlive.

GP has valid language use concerns. And yes, abstract algebra is esoteric.

ps: The Trump swipe is crass.

<comment><USER9> Ok, I see, 'outlives' is much better. But I guess he's complaining about the very choice of the relationship names, not nitpicking about grammar.

> abstract algebra is esoteric.

How is it so? It's fundamental and essential. "Esoteric" implies "mostly useless", which is definitely not true.

<comment><USER10> Cool. No way am I saying that abstract algebra is mostly useless, not at all. There's another sense for `esoteric'[2] which means hidden (or secret?) or highly specialised[0] or rare or unconventional. Which I think is what is being got at here, a sort of math-cult[1] if you will :)

[0] [http://www.thefreedictionary.com/esoterica](http://www.thefreedictionary.com/esoterica)

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

[2] [http://www.thefreedictionary.com/esoteric](http://www.thefreedictionary.com/esoteric)

edit: I agree, abstract algebra is fundamental, beautiful, and essential - <USER2> in fairness, it is highly domain specific and if Rust's type system can be explained as exactly and succinctly with terms closer to home thenwe ought to give it a shot

<comment><USER9> > it is highly domain specific

It is "domain specific" to pretty much all the domains in existence.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Yogurl – easy src urls for your files and code - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/720kb/yogurl <comment><AUTHOR> The CLI quick example: [http://i.imgur.com/ujrIpEv.gif](http://i.imgur.com/ujrIpEv.gif)

Yogurl is meant for developers, please use it with moderation.

Any feedback, bug report, issue, doubt is appreciated.</comment>


Ask HN: Who is looking for a Co-Founder? ( Dec'11 ) - <AUTHOR>

After having been to about 20 hacker meetups and other such events, I just wonder what the best online founder dating sites are. <comment><USER2> Just curious to hear what you think you received from attending ~20 hacker meetups? Such as 20 solid contacts? Possibly these people could get the word out for you or refer you.

<comment><AUTHOR> most of the meet-ups either have people that are not coders and are looking for a technical co-founder, or are developers very interested in their own projects. it's nearly impossible to find someone with the right skills, and the right interests.

this is one of the shitiest parts of 'absolutely' needing a co-founder.

i wish there was a y-combinator just for single founders.

<comment><USER3> heh I have to agree with you wholeheartedly, which is why I haven't actually gone to one of the meet-ups. Every time a new one is held I look over the attendees list and notice the same pattern: People looking for co-founders for their startup but never anyone actually looking to be a co-founder. I am actually doing fine without a co-founder, but obviously will need one if I ever want to join an incubator or accelerator as they don't take single founders (unless you created Google/Facebook or Twitter prior to applying). If you ever find a place where people come because they WANT to be a co-founder please share!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> github

<comment><AUTHOR> I am going to try to push more work and make it open source.</comment></comment>


Einstein's Note on Happiness, Given to Bellboy in 1922, Fetches $1.6M - <AUTHOR> http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/10/25/560004689/einsteins-note-on-happiness-given-to-bellboy-in-1922-fetches-1-6-million <comment><USER2> tl;dr: The note said:

"A calm and modest life brings more happiness than the pursuit of success combined with constant restlessness."

On a second sheet, he wrote another message: "Where there's a will there's a way."

<comment><USER3> Totally agree with the message

But I dont understand why people nowaday need to bring wiseness from Einstein.

If someone is good in physic, that is not a proof by itself that he is right in other fields. Same thing with rich people. Why people trust more someone who have the opportinity/chance to successfully win big amount of money? I mean that is impressive but still?

Both the scientific an the rich deserve more respect than others actually, but it is not a reason to treat them as gurus

<comment> King-Aaron > Both the scientific an the rich deserve more respect than others actually

Respect is earned, not bought. Which is why I can respect a scientist I haven't directly met, but rarely respect a rich person I haven't met.

In saying that, there are people with large net worths whom I have met, and hold in high regard because they're great people. And there are people I've met in the scientific community who are complete and utter numb-skulls.

I do agree that people as a whole tend to show respect for these people. But yeah, I think respect needs to be well-placed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Presumably the bellhop refused the tip as this was Japan and I believe they do not have a culture of tipping there?

</comment><comment><USER5> Seems his theories on time and space were proven true, as he told the bellhop they may be worth something in the future, lol.</comment>


Ask HN: OCR Solutions - <AUTHOR> Does anyone have a recommendation for an OCR solution that can take in bank accounts and extract the data from it reliably? Ideally as SASS.
Tesseract OCR(backed by Google) is not accurate enough for my needs.
I looked into outsourcing it via Mechanical Turk and http://arcgate.com/services/
Best solution so far seems to upload the doc to Google Drive and download the extracted text; http://computers.tutsplus.com/tutorials/how-to-ocr-documents-for-free-in-google-drive--cms-20460 <comment><USER2> It really depends on how structured and diverse your input images/documents are.

I've worked with just about all the tools out there and my conclusion is:

OCR engines by themselves don't differ much in accuracy. The vast majority of my tests involving tesseract, ABBYY's Cloud OCR API, Microsoft's Cloud OCR third party API, etc., have all produced nearly identical results.

If you're extracting data from predictable, structured or semi-structured input images/documents, the best approach by far is to use data extraction software with zonal or relational OCR capabilities, like ABBYY FlexiCapture or Nuance Omnipage. Neither offer cloud API's but they do sell SDK's if you want to build something out yourself. They are expensive, however. I believe the majority of, say, automatic invoice recognition systems use these or something like them on the back-end. ABBYY is very lenient with the duration of trial licenses. You can purchase a license to FlexiCapture's standalone product and automate around it, which I've done successfully, but it processes everything sequentially and can't multiprocess (you need the SDK for that). OmniPage is much cheaper but they are way less lenient about extending the trial license.

The technically correct explanation for why is frankly above my head, but I'll represent that adding zonal/relational OCR into the mix dramatically increases accuracy in almost very application. The difference between it and programatically parsing the text or hOCR output from a given engine is night and day.

Unfortunately, the above tools are all tethered to Windows VM's. If you need to run on Linux you could try to build something with OpenKM (Java) or OCRopus (multiple language bindings). For my own uses, the build/buy analysis seemed to always favor buying, even something turnkey.

I would consider a BPO solution (human workers on the back-end) to be a last resort. When I ran a battery of tests with Mechanical Turk, I found the response times too variable and long to work well in any situation where you need to reliably get the data quickly.

Let me know if you want to talk further and I'll shoot you an email.

</comment><comment><USER3> For a commercial solution, Abbyy is the best. For a free solution, [https://ocr.a9t9.com/](https://ocr.a9t9.com/) is almost as good. It uses Microsoft OCR and can easily scan bank statements or receipts.

<comment><USER2> Maybe it's just my particular use case, but I tried that Microsoft one and the output was identical to Tesseract and ABBYY Cloud OCR.</comment></comment>


My Raspberry Pi Based VCR with RSS, youtube-dl and svtplay-dl - <AUTHOR> https://www.helloper.com/blog/2017/01/vcrss/ <comment><USER2> If it meets the guidelines, this might make a good 'Show HN'. Show HN guidelines: [https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html)</comment>