How I monetized a blog in 30 days: what worked, and what didn't - <AUTHOR> http://www.lessannoyingcrm.com/articles/259/How_I_monetized_a_blog_in_30_days%3A_what_worked_and_what_didnt <comment><USER2> _On average we make $1 per order on Amazon, so what if instead of showing people Amazon ads, we offer them an awesome eBook for $1._

Why not try selling the eBook at a higher price, like $30?

<comment><AUTHOR> There are a two main reasons why I wanted to make the eBook so cheap:

1) Think of the $1 eBook as a minimum viable product. I hypothesized that our visitors would be willing to pay us for premium content, but I wanted to test it first. Given how few people were willing to pay $1, I decided my hypothesis was wrong. I realize that sometimes raising the price can actually increase demand, but I really doubt that's the case here.

2) I didn't know how long the traffic spike would last, so I wanted to get something out as quickly as possible. There wasn't time to create a real eBook worth $30.

<comment><USER3> Study after study has shown the biggest hurdle is getting someone to go from paying $0 to $1. After that, the actual price seems to matter much less (ie. if someone is willing to pay $1, they're probably willing to pay $10).

Since you're not trying to game any ranking lists (e.g. Amazon bestsellers, App Store), there doesn't seem to be any reason to sell at a "bargain basement" price. A quick glance at the preview recipe shows that your ebook does have valuable content for its target audience.

As others have suggested, $9.99 or so is probably going to be a sweet spot for you. Low enough for impulse buys, high enough to make decent money.

(The only other explanation for low sales might be the plethora of free recipe websites out there. But you're selling to a captive audience that's already on your website and likes your content, so it's probably going to be less of a factor.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Give some of the other affiliate networks (Commission Junction, ImpactRadius, ShareaSale, LinkShare, etc.) a try. You'll find better commissions through many merchants and often better deals.

If you need help ping me at keith [aaat] zorz [dooot] com - I've been doing affiliate marketing for years and would be happy to help.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, I'll definitely check those out. I've used Commission Junction before with the Groupon affiliate program and the terrible UI drove me away, but now that there's real traffic I guess it's worth giving it another shot.

The hardest part is finding affiliate programs that sell the things my mom actually uses in her posts. I don't think either of us would be willing to recommend products that she isn't using. Amazon is great for that since they sell pretty much everything that's ever been made.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, CJ's interface is rather terrible.

Actually, check out VigLink - they do link monetization and that might be a great alternative to try.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I think you (and your mom) have done a great job building a site with quality content. From the headline, I was afraid it was going to be a made-for-AdSense type of site, but that doesn't seem to be the case at all.

Also, I can't tell you how much I love the design. I'm far from the target audience, but even I think it's great. Simple, colorful, memorable.

Regarding the redesign - I think you made great choices there too. The old sidebar was definitely cluttered and not as useful. I did like the personal touch in the "letter" from your Mom, but I can see why you removed it. The only thing I might suggest adding is some sort of "social proof" - the old sidebar had the Facebook widget showing 3,000 fans which was good. A FeedBurner widget is probably out of place, but even a blurb about the 200,000+ pins on Pinterest would be an excellent way to demonstrate the quality of the site.

The only other thing I might suggest changing is the date-based part of the archives. A simple list of every post title would probably be more interesting and get more clicks. I don't have any data to back it up, but personally I never look through date-based archives (but I'll always skim a list of titles on a blog's archives). You could also include a short curated list of the "best" or most popular recipes (like what's already on the homepage sidebar, but longer or a text-based list).

EDIT: Just noticed the permalinks - you should really clean those up. Maybe teach your mom how to customize the post slug?

Current URL: [http://www.theyummylife.com/blog/2012/03/293/Overnight%2C+No...](http://www.theyummylife.com/blog/2012/03/293/Overnight%2C+No- Cook+Refrigerator+Oatmeal+--+A+healthy+breakfast+made+in+mason+jars+in+six+different+flavors)!

The /blog/ and date parts also feel bloated and entirely unnecessary. I don't usually like blogs that omit the date in the permalink, but recipes in particular are the perfect "evergreen" content that wouldn't need it. Heck, you could probably even kill the post ID.

Suggested improved URL: [http://www.theyummylife.com/overnight-no-cook- refrigerator-o...](http://www.theyummylife.com/overnight-no-cook-refrigerator- oatmeal)

I think it's as simple as /%post%/ on WordPress's permalinks options page.

(If you're worried about breaking existing links on Pinterest, there are many WordPress plugins that help you redirect the old URLs.)

I don't even know/care about the SEO of it, I just think shorter, cleaner URLs would help with remembering, bookmarking, and sharing links.

EDIT2: Just checked the source and realized it's not WordPress. What CMS is the site running? Movable Type?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, I'm glad you like the site! You make a lot of good points. Here are some thoughts/questions:

Regarding adding social proof to the site, I'm thinking that the non-post pages need a slightly different sidebar with an extra box forsocial buttons. The posts themselves have four social buttons on the left, so you see how many people like the post rather than how many people like our Facebook page. Do you think it would be overkill/confusing to have both on the same page?

I definitely agree that the date archives aren't all that useful for most people. I know a lot of sites have those and I'm guessing that it's so there's an easy way for someone to browse every post from the beginning of the site. This would only appeal to the most obsessed readers, so maybe it's better to just leave that out. To be honest, almost no one clicks on the archives so that's not near the top of my list of things to address, but I'll definitely keep your advice in mind for when I get to it.

As for the CMS, it's a homemade system. I know most people think it's crazy not to use an existing CMS like WordPress, but I like working on little side projects like this. It also made it really easy to build some cool customization like the recipe printing feature. You're right that I made a mess of the permalinks. That format is a holdover from a much earlier version of the CMS that I didn't bother to improve before launching The Yummy Life. I've added that to my list of things to address in the future.

Thanks again for all the feedback!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> How old is the site? And how frequently do new blog posts go up?

Thanks.

<comment><AUTHOR> The first post went up in August 2010. The domain is slightly older than that, but not much.

Right now there are one or two posts per week. My mom used to post more regularly but we found that it's more effective to focus on quality rather than quantity. It's generally pretty easy to predict in advance which posts will be popular, so she just puts more effort into those and leaves out the filler.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> from ux point of view: the scrolling amazon bar really annoys, you should position it fixed..

Great design though.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I've gone back and forth on the scrolling animation. There's definitely a balancing act between trying not to be annoying and trying to make money. At some point I'll have time to do a real A/B test and come to a more informed decision, but for now I'm thinking that the site is so free of the normal distractions (no pop-ups, only one section of ads, no video, no flash crap, etc.) that I'm comfortable being in-your-face with the scrolling animation. I'm on the fence though, so I guess I'll need to give it some more thought.

<comment><USER7> Personally I only think it's annoying if you're only skimming the article and scrolling fast. What about pinning the affiliate images fixed above, but scrolling a smaller, less intrusive "Find all the ingredients for this recipe here". And possibly instead of scrolling, fade it in. (Just my $0.02)

<comment><AUTHOR> That's a great idea. It actually solves a big problem that you might not have even thought about. One of the challenges with having the ads scroll with the page is that it means the ads can't take up much vertical space (because small screens wouldn't ever be able to scroll to see the bottom section of the ads). This means that we only show a maximum of four affiliate links per page which sometimes isn't enough to cover the core ingredients. With you idea we could have as many affiliate links as we wanted without losing the ability to find the ingredients after they've scrolled down.

I'd guess this would lower the click-through-rate, but it would probably increase the average orders per click, so it might work out. Thanks for the idea!</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Yourtaximeter.com - <AUTHOR> https://yourtaximeter.com/

<comment><USER2> A good idea, but room for improvement.

\- Get rid of that full-screen HTML5 video. Full-screen background videos are great for experience driven services, but distracting for utilities.

\- be clear about where you support. UK only - took me a while

\- Autocomplete on addressed. If not - show what format you expect. Hell, even placing markers on a map would be better then blind entering

</comment><comment><USER3> "we'll tell you how much it will cost" is a very bold thing to put on the front page to be followed by backpedalling on the FAQ page.

If you're not guaranteeing your fare estimates, what value does this add over calling my local minicab company or using their app?

<comment><USER4> Sometimes when I travel, I find that the taxi companies I rely on are not available in the area.

So the value proposition of this app could be, "send me a taxi using whatever taxi service is available where I am.'

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Thank you for all your comments - We will take them all onboard.

Not clearly displaying that we only operate within Great Britain is clearly an issue. Therefore I have now added a banner that should be displayed if you are outside of Great Britain. The geolocation isn't perfect but it's good enough for now, we will look into making this more accurate in the future.

We will certainly reconsider the video background and I can also confirm that autocomplete in the search boxes is currently on our roadmap as a high priority feature.

Your feedback is very much appreciated so keep it coming!

</comment><comment><USER6> How are you competing with new taxi apps? The trend today is moving towards hailing a cab through swiping a finger over a smartphone app whereas you are taking a step back to providing phone numbers like the older days? Is this based on user feedback that they are still willing to make taxi calls?

<comment><USER5> We started off as a taxi fare calculator several years ago. We are currently developing a booking system to be able to allow users to book a taxi within the website/app.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The video in the background is over the top but this is a cool service. I don't see what the other commenter is trying to say about "not guaranteeing the fare" since you are getting all the pricing information to calculate from either the taxi company or the local rates decided by law.

</comment><comment><USER8> \- Put UK only sign if it is

\- Remove ugly search indicator

\- Autocomplete on adresses fields

\- Try more focus on the content then background

Then you actually have a good idea :) Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER9> So it's like ubiCabs, but without the convenience?

</comment><comment><USER10> Hm, I entered in my street address + city in the from, and "SFO" in the destination, and I just got "Problem calculating the route".

</comment><comment><USER11> This is UK only

<comment><USER2> Yeah. This is crucial. Needs to be more clear. I was trying to enter in addressed, and didn't understand why it wasn't working.</comment></comment>


Density – Fast compression library - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/centaurean/density?q <comment><USER2> Excelent commentary and a faster implementation by the legendary Charles Bloom: [http://cbloomrants.blogspot.com/2015/03/03-25-15-density- cha...](http://cbloomrants.blogspot.com/2015/03/03-25-15-density- chameleon.html)

<comment><USER3> It's funny, over the last week I've repeatedly come across things from people working at RAD Game Tools. It looks like they've got quite a good group of people working there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> They seem to be symmetric in compression and decompression. In most workloads you actually need to decompress way more often than compress.

<comment><USER5> I think this, or something like it, would be really useful with zram (Linux RAM compression), which currently uses LZO.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Why no comparsion with common contestants: gzip, bzip, dd?

<comment><USER7> This popped up on reddit/r/programming yesterday, so I'll just copy my comment from over there:

        How well does density [perform] when there's competition
        for the I$ and L$? LZ4 in theory is slower than a number
        of competitors (like snappy). However, LZ4 actually
        handily outperforms them when put into a "live" situations
        where it's running as a service alongside the 'real'
        program.

The size of the in-memory data-structures is the real Achille's heal of most of the contenders to LZ4 I've seen.

<comment><USER8> Interesting. I've just been a casual observer to these types of things and haven't really considered total memory used but that's a big issue on devices like mobile, or even server environments where there many be many jobs concurrently.

It's too bad that the Squash benchmark, linked in the github repo, doesn't have total peak memory usage. Do you know what the best contenders are as far as that's concerned?

<comment><USER7> The last time I researched this, to sufficient depth, was about 3 years ago. LZ4 was, hands down, the winner---nothing was even close.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> How does it compare with Zstandard? [http://fastcompression.blogspot.com.es/2015/01/zstd- stronger...](http://fastcompression.blogspot.com.es/2015/01/zstd-stronger- compression-algorithm.html)</comment>


Show HN: Manly – explains how flags modify a commands behaviour - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/Zaab1t/manly <comment><AUTHOR> Hi everyone. For the last ~6 months I've been using this script I made to quickly find out what some flags do for a program. Saves me about 10 seconds every week :)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Also, I have not figured out a good way to test `manly` yet, but maybe someone creative here has an idea?</comment>


Google's book 'deal' has left me confused - <AUTHOR> http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/philip-hensher/philip-hensher-googles-book-deal-has-left-me-confused-1870949.html

<comment><USER2> Great piece, and a great reminder that revolutionaries (in this case, Google) are often a bit out of sync with the local populations (in this case, beleaguered authors). That the Google book deal has made it this far alive still boggles me.</comment>


AMD takes the video card war to an appalling new low - <AUTHOR> http://www.extremetech.com/computing/134409-amd-takes-the-video-card-war-to-an-appalling-new-low?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=amd-takes-the-video-card-war-to-an-appalling-new-low <comment><USER2> I couldn't really penetrate the writing style (something about virtuoso violinists), but the problem is apparently that old cards can't get a new BIOS update that makes the card run faster? This is not an appalling new low: this is what hardware manufacturers have done for eons.

I'm pleased to say that I have no idea how fast my CPU or GPU are. They work. I'll buy a new one in a few years. Relax and do something useful with your computer.

<comment><USER3> It seems even less bad imho, it's probably that all cards with an AMD reference design will get an update. But vendors with vendor-specific hardware might not provide an updated BIOS that works with those cards?

<comment><USER4> That's probably exactly it - ATI has usually used Sapphire to make their reference cards and ATI-manufactured cards. Many vendors make specific changes to the bios, use out-of-spec or pre-overclocked parts, etc.

To put this situation in better perspective: If Intel made bioses in addition to their current products, and they released a bios update for their motherboards (with Intel bios and Intel parts). Here, he's mad because he has an Asus motherboard with an Intel bios, and since Asus isn't releasing this bios update, he won't benefit.

<comment><USER5> Thanks for the clarification, I own a 7970 and the article kind of disturbed me. I hadn't thought about the fact that AMD isn't the only one to use the GPUs.

The fact of the matter is (for me at least) that I paid for the 7970 as it was on paper when I bought it. Of course I'd be mad if performance on it was artificially lowered, then members of the press were given a new BIOS to restore it to normal but that doesn't seem to be what's happening here at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> But you are still getting what you paid for when you bought it, you just aren't necessarily getting more than you paid for.

I'm struggling to see a problem here.

<comment><USER7> I don't see how giving certain users an upgrade could be extrapolated as bad - It's not like they are retroactively crippling people's existing hardware or anything. The reality of the situation is that certain companies are going to have different board/bios configurations on their GPUs and I don't think it is reasonable to expect AMD to provide a BIOS upgrade for all of these variations on their own.

Somethings tells me that the cards that are getting the BIOS upgrade are going to be the ones using reference designs (maybe it was stated as such in the article but the author's writing style is kind of bleh).

<comment><USER4> The author sounds like a videocard fanboy who's throwing a tantrum. He didn't get the bios update from his _favorite video card company_ that the reference cards got, so now he's calling them dirty names on the internet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> ExtremeTech takes journalistic clarity to appalling new low.

After reading this several times to work out what it meant, it does seem, as others have mentioned, that this is down to differing hardware implementations affecting compatibility, but can anyone find something in the soup where the author makes a stab at positing that or any other explaination as a reason, other than 'AMD are arbitrarily shitting on some people"?

It feels more like, decoding the 3rd paragraph, he's just finished a review of the card with the older BIOS, will now have to redo that review and is subsequently throwing his toys out of the pram about it.

</comment><comment><USER9> Extremetech has really gone down hill since laying off all of the good people in 2009. They've adopted a more tabloid journalism style, with provocative headlines and overheated articles. I miss Lloyd Case.

<comment><USER10> You understand that one of the old authors (Matthew Murray) wrote this story, right? :)

<comment><USER9> No, I did not know that. I still stand by my observation that Extremetech has gone down hill and I will note that writers must please their editors if they wish to get published.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Sounds to me like AMD simply improved the yield in production such that they are confident increasing the clock rate on new chips. An old chip may or may not be good enough to run at the higher rate.

</comment><comment><USER12> Caveat emptor, and I've always been aware that updates I get direct from the GPU manufacturer may not work on a particular implementation. It is highly likely that they just don't hardware qualify all the vendors that use their GPUs, so cannot state which ones will benefit. Sensible policy that says more about the vendors that integrate the GPU than it does about the supplier.

</comment><comment><USER13> I really wish sites like these weren't posted. The mobile (tablet) site is absolutely appalling and I don't see how anyone uses it.

</comment><comment><USER14> I think the author is upset because some of the new cards will only be upgradeable to 110 mega-breathless-hyperbolens/second.</comment>


Causal Inference [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://cdn1.sph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/1268/2020/07/ci_hernanrobins_31july20.pdf <comment><USER2> If you are interested in using causal inference in actual research practice rather than just talking about it in theory, this book (and not anything by Judea Pearl, for example) is the way to go! An earlier draft of this book was absolutely essential to my PhD thesis</comment>


Germany allows 'indeterminate' gender at birth  - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-24767225

<comment><USER2> This can only be good :)</comment>


Post from "weev" (AT&T/ipad data hacker) on his arrest and treatment - <AUTHOR> http://security.goatse.fr/hypocrites-and-pharisees

<comment><USER2> He seems to be unfamiliar with the legal process, and really needs to get a lawyer. From the partial scans of the US attorney's letter, it sounds like a federal grand jury would like to subpoena him as a witness to testify about the gathering of AT&T subscriber email addresses and "electronic chip IDs" (I think the letter is technically incorrect). The letter informed him that if he failed to appear he might also have criminal charges filed against him.

This is a normal part of the process of a federal criminal investigation. What happens first is that a grand jury is formed. The jury investigates evidence, calls witnesses, and tries to determine if a crime has been committed, and if so, who committed the crime. Then, the grand jury might issue a federal indictment, or it might just determine that no crime was committed and drop the case completely.

If he or someone else is federally indicted, then he would be formally arrested and have to go to federal court to stand trial as a criminal defendent. It sounds like it has not gotten close to this point yet.

Edit: I also wanted to mention that you have no right to an attorney as a witness of a grand jury. You may choose to have an attorney represent you and be present, however, the financial burden is in no way the federal governments to provide one for you. IF you are charged, then you may receive a public defender if you have insufficient financial means to pay for your own defense.

Federal cases take months and years to prosecute. By refusing to participate with the grand jury, he might be opening himself up to the fact that another witness could implicate him and he might be indicted. Of course, there is also the saying "if nobody talks, everybody walks."

He really needs to get good legal counsel and decide if he wants to testify in front of the grand jury, and decide what he wants to say.

Also, he's not helping his cause any by speaking out on the web. Mentioning his past anti-semite ramblings is also probably not the best way to gather sympathy.

I also think he does a disservice to the security community as a whole to advocate black hat ideology at hacker conferences, and then talk about "responsible disclosure" and how he was just trying to protect the poor customers of AT&T. This seems to be rewriting history.

</comment><comment><USER3>
      and found is in quotes for a good reason, as the drugs "found" near
      me were "found" in the execution of a warrant for computers only

For what it's worth, the Fourth Amendment protects against 'unreasonable' searches and seizures. Anything found in the reasonable execution of a search warrant is admissible.

I don't know where the myth came from that only evidence related to the probable cause of the warrant is admissible. This is an on-face absurd interpretation: by that logic, if the police entered a house to search for evidence of felony tax evasion and stumbled upon a murder in progress, that wouldn't be admissible because the police weren't in the house searching for a murderer.

There is plenty of case law establishing limits on reasonability. For instance, in the execution of a lawful search of an apartment looking for weapons, officers saw a stereo that 'didn't fit the furnishings'. They lifted up the bottom of the stereo to take down serial numbers, and the person was arrested for having stolen the stereo. The problem, of course, is that weapons aren't stored under the bottom of a flat-bottomed stereo, and certainly the serial numbers weren't a reasonable part of the search for weapons.

But having drugs out in the middle of the room in 'plain view' is clearly reasonable. Even from weev's own post, the drug evidence passes the _Horton_ test.

<comment><USER4> His point is that the original warrant had no probable cause. So _any_ evidence collected in its execution should be inadmissible.

<comment><USER3> The argument that there was no probable cause is very unlikely to hold up in practice. The law is very lenient to the issuance and execution of warrants.

      Warrants are favored in the law and utilization of them will not
      be thwarted by a hypertechnical reading of the supporting
      affidavit and supporting testimony. For the same reason,
      reviewing courts will accept evidence of a less "judicially
      competent or persuasive character than would have justified an
      officer in acting on his own without a warrant." Courts will
      sustain the determination of probable cause so long as "there
      was substantial basis for [the magistrate] to conclude that"
      there was probable cause.

[http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment04/...](http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment04/02.html), citing _United States v. Ventresca_ , _Jones v. United States_ , and _Aguilar v. Texas_.

If you're interested in some of the intricacies of 4th Ammendment jurisprudence, <http://www.law.yale.edu/documents/pdf/1994Fourth.pdf> is a phenomenal article.

<comment><USER5> Shouldn't the person the warrant applies to be served and/or notified of the warrant and given a copy? I was under the impression that a warrant was a way to give police rights that they do not typically have according to civil rights. It's a civil contract that they will not exceed the rights they are given, so I'd assume he should be given a copy with an explanation of why his rights are being lessened temporarily.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I think it's shameful that no one has stepped up to provide him with free, top notch legal assistance. I'm relatively familiar with the case (I know weev personally, too), and he is actually not exaggerating. This is exactly the kind of case the EFF exists to defend. Yes, weev is a troll and a media whore, but that doesn't automatically make him wrong.

Goatse behaved in the industry accepted standard way in popularizing a security vulnerability -- full disclosure. I personally would have done the same (although I would not have kept illegal drugs at my residence after doing so, but I also would probably ventilate anyone breaking into my home without clearly announcing a warrant...)

Free weev!

<comment><USER7> > Goatse behaved in the industry accepted standard way in popularizing a > security vulnerability

Well, as someone working in the security industry I take slight issue with this. They appear to have cashed in on the media coverage as much as possible rather than focus on proper disclosure practices. I (and a lot of people in my job, I think) would consider it just on the wrong side of unethical.

<comment><USER8> The defense of freedoms often involves defending those who exercise them in a way that we don't _approve_ of.

<comment><USER7> Agreed; and if he is being unfairly refused representation that is a serious matter.

Additionally if he has broken no actual laws then that needs to be cleared up and he needs to be apologized too.

However I feel there is an important distinction between defend and approve; I would, for example, represent him. But I don't condone his approach to disclosure :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> He definitely needs to get an attorney to prevent him from writing future statements/positions in public. Now whomever represents him will have a much harder time defending him since he's written an entire essay on the matter. Each and every word, sentence, statement, and position can and will be used against him.

</comment><comment><USER10> Full Disclosure != Free Speech.

You cannot just publish personal data and then call it 'free speech' and 'industry standard practice' of a 'journalist'.

Seriously .. where is the ethics in that?

How about actually trying to work with AT&T to get this fixed behind the scenes? Oh no, of course not, because that would not result in the right kind of exposure for these 'security experts'.

These things are all about ego and status. Hidden behind a thin shell of 'full disclosure'.

<comment><USER11> Well, it depends.

Testing/Evaluating/Disclosing an exploit isn't immoral in my mind, nor should it be illegal (in a perfect world).

Disclosing private details of third paries is certainly immoral in my mind, and should be illegal.

According to this logic publishing the exploit, so long as you're censoring output, is fine. If someone uses your exploit to download personal data, it's AT&T who is doing the immoral/hopefully-illegal disclosure. If that someone uses your exploit and then publishes the data or does some other naughty thing with it, book 'em.

You get moral brownie points under this logic if you notify the target after you discover the exploit. It's not required, because disclosure _is_ notification. Nefarious-types aren't going to call up a bank to say "hey, we're stealing all your customer records", nor will they disclose this hole to the world.

Unpopular statement ahead: if you collect personal details, it's _your_ job to secure _your_ systems, and it's _your_ fault if _your_ systems leak them. Of course there's no such thing as 100% secure, but you're the one doing the risk analysis and design.

<comment><USER7> > It's not required, because disclosure is notification.

In this case it doesn't entirely work because it is trivial to recover in the information (so the disclosure/fix is hour sensitive rather than days sensitive)

Also, in Full Disclosure it is accepted ethical practice to notify the affected vendor and give them a reasonable time to fix it (In this case... I'd give them 2 days).

It is also very definitely _not_ ethical to hand the data you got to the media. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I don't know anything about the story, but right now, it somehow looks like he's quite a nutjob. Writing shorter, more precise and in a chronological order of the events would really help the text to be more understandable and get the point across.

The situation is probably quite stressful for him, but he somebody should really help him work on the text so others understand what it's all about.

<comment><USER13> His personal blog is worth a read for some context: <http://weev.livejournal.com>

He has some posts which suggest the FBI was bugging his apartment and covertly following him around town. This was months prior to the release of the iPad accounts. So, yes, I suspect he is dealing with some mental issues.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> If his claims are accurate, and only minimally influenced by hyperbole, it appears he's at the center of a massive miscarriage of justice.

I'd be interested to see an analysis by someone who knows more about the law than I do.

</comment><comment><USER15> "Big law firm did it but didn't get punished, yet I did it and got raided."

Really? Are you really going for this elementary school argument?

Doesn't help when you distort the concept of 'full disclosure' and related practices, either.

No sympathy vote from me.

</comment><comment><USER7> I am highly suspicious of the fact that this deals a lot with other cases and his past run ins with the government and very little with the actual case (at times it even seems to deliberately skip details).

As always; this is one side of the story and (thought I hate to say this) from a somewhat troublesome person. I think it is reasonable to treat this as a serious matter, but there needs to be a lot more objective insight before I'd send him some money :)

</comment><comment><USER10> This whole article is not good for his case. I stopped reading halfway because it looks like the typical crazy person rant.

What he needs to do is get proper legal counsel.

<comment><USER11> You didn't read far enough, because he's being denied legal counsel.

<comment><USER6> He's being denied legal counsel for the drugs charges -- according to the letter, they are all minor misdemeanors, although originally he was alleged to have felony weight on him. That's actually a victory for him, so far.

The problem is there are potential actual felony charges under discussion, related to the original computer crime warrant. While he hasn't been charged, he doesn't get a public defender. If he's charged, he gets a public defender.

If I were in his shoes, I would absolutely be getting a lawyer (and I sent him $100 toward that, and asked some friends who are lawyers to consider it).

Honestly, not getting an _Arkansas Public Defender_ is probably a victory for him, too. I would rather represent myself than rely on AR PD to defend me in a case like this.

<comment><USER9> I upvoted you for bringing clarity to why he was denied a public defender.

The fact that he can't get a public defender because no charges higher than the misdemeanors were filed against him is, like you said, a good thing. He misunderstood, and creates a conspiracy theory around it. This is likely the case with most of his other points in the essay as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Just because you don't "like" someone is no reason to violate the hell out of his rights. If they do it to him, they _will_ do it to you. And your being "liked" won't help you one damned bit.

<comment><USER9> I'm still not convinced that his rights were violated. He _says_ they are, but this is a guy who wrote a giant essay about his case, and then published it on the net, and ended it with a plea for donations/money. If I were in his shoes, I'd have spent the time calling the EFF to see if they can help, and asking for referrals. It almost seems like he is seeking attention.

Also, he seems to be able to obtain documents and requests from the gov to print online, yet also claims he can't get access to them but mentions some deadline. If you're not able to read the request/denied access to it, no judge will hold the deadline over you. That's just conspiracy/crazy talk.

<comment><USER16> Of course he's seeking attention. So would you if you were being handled as he says he is. And who says the EFF has the manpower right now to handle his case? This is like people who turn to Legal Aid at the last minute and are shocked to find out they have limited resources, if not an outright waiting list. And given the behavior of both the government post-9/11 and Apple several years ago suing a rumor site out of existence, I'd rather bet on him than either of them.

<comment><USER9> Disagree. He's not being "handled". It's essentially all in his head. And no, I wouldn't seek attention like this. There is no upside. You fight the case in court. That's where the battle is. His essay only hurts him.

To be clear, he's just being asked to serve as a witness and _hasn't been charged with anything related to the iPad security_. He just doesn't understand the legal process and is requesting things he is not entitled to yet, such as a public defender, and spinning conspiracy theories when they are denied. As of this moment, he is only facing a misdemeanor related to the drugs the police found.

It's not clear whether or not the EFF has the manpower to help him. The essay he wrote doesn't seem like he even tried. However, the EFF is usually very helpful with referrals or pointers. This is from personal experience.

If you want to bet on him over the government or Apple, that's your choice. Based on his actions so far (black hat approach to security disclosure; writing a long, ranting essay filled with conspiracy theories about the case and the way he is being "handled" and publishing it on the net), I'd most certainly call your bet and laugh all the way to the bank.

<comment><USER16> Fair enough.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Unfortunate domain name. Almost didn't click it. But it is legit.

<comment><USER18> Unfortunate site logo as well. Between his writing style, the content of some of his posts, and the choice of name and logo, I'm finding it very difficult to take this author seriously.

<comment><USER19> Civil rights are actually not dependent on domain name, writing style, content of writing, name, logo, or in general any damm thing at all. They are called "unalienable rights" for a reason.

As Americans declared in a few days ago in 1776, "But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."

If what he says is true, then it is our right, and our duty, to stand up for weev. If the government is this far in the wrong, then that is more important than any single individual's actions. Give him some cash (<http://security.goatse.fr/help>); write to the EFF; call your congressman; ask an America you know to do the same; but please, find another thread for discussing logos, e.g. <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1493603>

If he is lying, then we need evidence he is lying, not that he has bad taste in logos.

EDIT: I clarified the above to add the "If what he says is true... // If he is lying..." without marking the edit, which I am now doing. I apologise if I edited after the children had posted.

<comment><USER20> Of course civil rights aren't dependent on anything. But whether we believe his story that his civil rights are being violated is partially dependent on his credibility, which seems at first glance to be pretty close to zero.

He claims that his civil rights are being violated in the same breath that he claims that it happens to him all the time and that anti-semitism is okay. Why should we believe any of this, exactly?

EDIT: Okay you edited your post to be conditional on him telling the truth and requesting of evidence that he's lying. My point is just that crankishness is typically evidence that someone is lying, or at least good reason to not take things that people are saying at face value and to wait for independent confirmation for whoever cares to look for it. There's a burden of proof issue here.

<comment><USER19> Kindly retract that he said "anti-semitism is okay."

Screenshot 1 and 2 of the threatened indictment seemed believable and imply he is in legal trouble over a security disclosure. A quick search online implies the disclosure was responsible, proportionate and AT&T are pissed about it (e.g. [http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/13/att-explains- ipad-s...](http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/13/att-explains-ipad- security-breach/)). So, from those two things, coupled with the fact legal aid is being denied to him, implies he is serious about needing help with a lawyer.

Is he already on some kind of FBI shitlist? Maybe, maybe not, it's irrelevant. Would it have been better not to mention it? Probably. Is he credible? I don't see why not given the corroborating evidence.

<comment><USER20> > Kindly retract that he said "anti-semitism is okay."

Fair enough. He didn't say anti-semitism is okay. What he did do, which prompted my inaccurate comment, is admit to make "joking" videos about the genocide of Jews which are in egregiously poor taste. And then go on to make paranoid comments about the FBI manipulating the Jewish lobby and Jewish reporters to alleging that he bombs synagogues, or something (I wasn't too clear on this part).

<comment><USER19> Thank you. He certainly did make such videos which he claimed to be parody adding useful balance to the Israel/Palestine debate -- I think we would agree that this was not useful, but I don't believe his intentions were anti- Semitic.

<comment><USER7> It's hard to really say what his intentions are.

He does (going on his online postings) regularly spout anti-semitic nonsense, but then he is a very troll like person. So it is hard to figure where his real beliefs lie - he often _sounds_ serious, but then he may just be a serious troll.

(and, also, I suppose it is arguable his intentions [trolling or meaning it] are irrelevant because it still goes out there and communicates to people without being clearly ironic)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Dude is nuttier than a baby ruth. He even somehow managed to pull the "zionists" card.

</comment><comment><USER22> A goatse symbol as his logo, makes anti-israel videos, has drugs lying around his apartment, describes his own blog posts as excellent, and apparently publicized some type of private information.

This is not a housewife being attacked by a SWAT team, it's someone who is likely to drift in and out of such problems who happens to have drifted in.

</comment><comment><USER23> He seems to be an unabashed anarchist when things are going his way. Now that they aren't he's crying out about his rights.

</comment><comment><USER24> There is no doubt some ego-based confusion in his mind. It's evident from the first sentences: "...I'm sure you're all familiar with from my previous excellent blog posts"

</comment><comment><USER25> Link to cached copy [http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://security.goatse.fr/hypocrites- and-pharisees)

</comment><comment><USER26> I feel sorry for the dude. He is asking for our help via cash or writing to our local, state and national representatives. That's a rock and hard place.</comment>


Soulver – Notepad, meet calculator - <AUTHOR> https://soulver.app/ <comment><USER2> I personally use Numi, which is very similar. I like the ability to assign variables and reuse them (and change the value of the variable on the fly, instantly redoing all other calculations).

[https://numi.io/](https://numi.io/)

<comment><USER3> Seconded (though I'm tentatively switching to dc[0], reverse polish notation ftw), can anyone who has used both Numi and Soulver point out the differences between the two? They look super similar to me.

[0] [https://www.computerhope.com/unix/udc.htm](https://www.computerhope.com/unix/udc.htm)

<comment><USER4> I like dc too, and wrote this plugin for Vim: [https://github.com/fcpg/vim- colddeck](https://github.com/fcpg/vim-colddeck)

The power of old tools :)

<comment><USER5> For me the currency conversion, easy 'totalling', syntax highlighting, and mixing Markdown text inline (which gets ignored) is the key feature for these notepad/numi apps.

These still could be done in Vim but it's more than just a unixy calculator or text-editor spreadsheet.

<comment><USER4> To each his own I guess. As far as I'm concerned, I'm mainly interested in the one-column spreadsheet, tweaking a few input rows and checking how it impacts some other rows. I still use instacalc from time to time, but now I often reach for vim instead.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I've been using Soulver for ages, I have Soulver 2 from the Mac App Store. It's a terrific little scratch pad, I love the ability to naturally interleave notes/language with arithmetic. I was unaware that there was a Soulver 3, however, as apparently they are no longer using the MAS as a distribution channel. Just a little top level note for anybody else like me that came here off the vague title alone and wasn't aware of Soulver 3.

<comment><USER7> And another FYI: Soulver 2 is still available on the Mac App Store for $9. Whereas Soulver 3 is on their website for $30.

<comment><USER8> Why would anyone buy Soulver outside the Mac App Store? Any compelling new features that warrants the higher price and risk?

<comment><USER9> > Why would anyone buy [any app] outside the Mac App Store?

I almost never buy an app from the Mac App Store when it's also available directly. I'd rather that the developer gets to keep the extra 30%.

Free apps I typically get from the store when available for the convenience of the updating system (though sparkle has made non-app store app updating pretty painless).

I don't find v3 a compelling upgrade _for me_ but will upgrade anyway once syncing to iOS works again (important feature for me) just to support the dev.

<comment><USER10> > I almost never buy an app from the Mac App Store when it's also available > directly.

Unpopular opinion, but I always try to buy Apps from the Mac App Store. It is easy to purchase and with buyer protection. You can easily install the app on another Mac and it updates automatically and all my apps are in the same place with just one account. But most importantly, Mac App Store Apps must run in a sandbox which is much more secure, than just downloading an app from the internet which might run with root privileges on your Mac.

I did purchase Soulver 3 though because I wanted to support the developer as I have been using Soulver 2 almost daily for 10 years. But sure enough, the in- app purchase experience did not work and crashed when going to PayPal. Ended up purchasing through the web-site. The downside now, is that my Soulver 3 App has megabytes of Paddle API frameworks embedded in it that is not used, and Little Snitch reports that Soulver 3 tries to connect to paddle 2 times every freaking time I start the app. Very annoying and unnecessary.

Soulver 3 has actually been a bit of a disappointment. They rewrote the parser and math engine in Swift and a lot of functionality has been lost in the process. I'm sure this will be addressed in further releases, but for now, it has no iCloud sharing and you cannot share documents with the iOS app. Bit flicking operators does not work anymore, which was so useful for programming. It has gained support for date time calculation which is very nice, like 'today + 30 days', but Numi does this better and also has a 'now' variable for current time you can do calculations with. The new Soulver 3 UI could be better and I especially find it annoying that the window has a rather large fixed min-width and I also don't like the different color for the right column. Numi is a a copy of Soulver, but has bypassed the original. Unfortunately, I found Numi after I purchased Soulver 3, but I have ditched Soulver 3 for Numi. Numi has more functionality, looks much better and has fewer bugs. Edit: I don't like that Numi is not available on the App Store either. Numi is created by a developer from Belarus, which is a country only slightly better than DPRK and I would very much like to have Numi in a sandbox.

<comment><USER11> Ha-ha. ))) C' mon man! So superficial about Belarus. )) I just don't want to bother with MAS, so it's much easier to automate all stuff. Btw all recent updates are notarized.

<comment><USER10> > I just don't want to bother with MAS, so it's much easier to automate all > stuff.

That might sound good to you, but not to your users. Please put it in a sandbox and on the MAS. There is no reason for a calculator to _not_ run in a sandbox. Discoverability and sales will probably improve as well on the App Store. I for one, would purchase in an instance, whereas now the only purchase option is a paddle (sic) preorder button.

> Btw all recent updates are notarized.

That is nice.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The problem I have with this type of app is that I am never sure what will work and what will not. It's "natural language" only after you learn which subset of language the app actually understands.

I still can't find anything that beats my HP 50g (either physical or running in one of the emulators) for just about any kind of computation involving several pieces of data. For more data, a spreadsheet is really hard to beat.

<comment><USER13> I mean, I use PCalc[1] all the time too, but I love Soulver b/c unlike Excel —- which is great but can be a lot —- it's super easy to just jot stuff down and have it calculated, just like a spreadsheet.

You're not wrong on the syntax stuff, but as long as the math operations are there, it'll do what you want. The special stuff for currency or other conversions isn't very hard to get the hang of once you start using an app.

Really, the frustrating thing is when I'm on a machine that's not mine and I hit my Soulver system-wide shortcut and can't open up my scratchpad. But that's my problem.

[1]: [https://www.pcalc.com/](https://www.pcalc.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I wrote [https://dedo.io/](https://dedo.io/) as a web version of this, since there's no good equivalent for linux

<comment><USER15> Have you seen NaSC?

[https://parnold-x.github.io/nasc/](https://parnold-x.github.io/nasc/)

<comment><USER16> Wow, that seems super cool.

A little tangential, but also really cool how elementary os is really coming to be the MacOS alternative it has set out to be.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I've been using Soulver for like 12 years and it's one of my favorite and most-used apps.

There was a huge amount of time between Soulver 2 and 3 so I gladly paid for version 3 (even though it doesn't sync with iOS which isn't a big deal, and some features haven't made their way over so I still keep 2 installed).

There might be decent alternatives but at this point, I'm so used to Soulver I don't want anything else. Plus, the new Alfred workflow is really good.

<comment><USER17> Me too, but don't you find the way Soulver 3 manages documents a bit weird? I much preferred the old way where you could save document wherever you wanted, whereas version 3 seems to want to control all of that for you. Unlike the previous version I couldn't wrap my head around how it was supposed to work quickly, and went back to version 2. I was happy to pay for a new version just to make sure Soulver isn't abandoned because my working life would be noticeably more difficult without it.

<comment><USER13> Yeah it took me a bit of time and I admit I still use 2 a lot but I'm trying to force myself to use 3. I think part of it is the 9 years or whatever that I used 2.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> My editor JOE has a built-in calculator equivalent to a Casio scientific: for example it can do statistics (sum, count, average, standard deviation) on a block of numbers you select in the edit buffer. I use this all the time.

In another project, I wrote a preprocessor for TeX- somewhat like Markdown, so that you can make TeX documents with an easier syntax. One of its features is a built-in calculator/spreadsheet. The idea is that \\{1+2+3} is expanded with 6. You can also assign and reference variables \\{a=3}. If these appear in a table, you can reference other cells: \\{RRD+7} "Get first expression from cell two to the Right Right one Down and add 7 to it".

[https://github.com/jhallen/joes- sandbox/tree/master/doc/nice...](https://github.com/jhallen/joes- sandbox/tree/master/doc/nicetex)

Anyway, I'd like this capability in the editor, will add it someday..

<comment><USER19> Is this the same JOE editor I was using when I first started using Linux around 1999?

<comment><USER18> Yes.

<comment><USER20> That puts the sentence _" will add it someday.."_ in perspective.

<comment><USER18> Everyone should have a long term project..

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> A great option which is similar but different and which I enjoy very much is:

[https://speedcrunch.org/](https://speedcrunch.org/)

<comment><USER22> I second this, it's a great cross-platform scratchpad.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> As Marco Arment once said, if Soulver isn't open he's not working. Rings true for me as well. I almost always have it running to help me through some calculation or more complex modeling. Highly recommended.

</comment><comment><USER24> I reimplemented a simplified version of it 7 years ago (wow, time flies) and open sourced it, if people are interested. [https://github.com/vjeux/soulver.js](https://github.com/vjeux/soulver.js)

<comment><USER25> Watch out:

> $22 for lunch + 10% sales tax

Displays $32.00 instead of $24.20 or something. Other issues: it does not support units on the right nor euros (€).

Nice anyway :-)

<comment><USER26> To be pedantic, 10% = 0.10, which is has no unit, so it can't be added to a dollar amount.

<comment><USER25> Sure, but 25 + 10% = 27.5 for:

\- Soulver, according to the screenshots (and the goal of this project seems to match Soulver's behavior),

\- the calculator on my phone,

\- KRunner, the launcher in KDE, and KCalc, its calculator

\- gcalc, the Gnome calculator

\- qalc, that shows "25 * (110 * percent) = 27,5".

\- The TI-106 solar calculator that I happen to have [1].

Thinking about it, we are probably talking about some kind of "\+ %" operator, where x + y % = x + x × y / 100.

Interestingly, 10% = 0 for the TI-106 (but 25*10% = 2.5). % alone does not seem to mean anything for it.

This little calculator will probably outlive me.

[1] [http://www.datamath.org/BASIC/LCD_Modern/TI-106_2.htm](http://www.datamath.org/BASIC/LCD_Modern/TI-106_2.htm)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> The funny thing is that Excel would basically meet this need perfectly if it didn't take 5 seconds to open.

<comment><USER28> This. Excel as a notepad would be great. Don't know enough about windows desktop development to implement my own solution, but I'm surprised that nothing currently exists.

<comment><USER29> [http://blockpad.net](http://blockpad.net) might be what you are looking for

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I've used Soulver for several years and just upgraded so I guess I like it. I have to confess I originally bought it simply because I was delighted someone was reimagining the calculator interface and I wanted to support that. But I do use it every day.

It's not my automatic go-to calculator (that's either dc or RPN pcalc). But if I want to do any slightly complicated calculation but don't need the overhead of Excel/Numbers or Mathmatica (or am on my phone!) it's really nice to lay out some variables (cost/m2, length width, blah blah) and be able to tweak them. And I can fiddle on my computer and then see the model on my phone where it's also easy to edit.

Not a tool for everyone, but surprisingly good as both a programmer and general purpose calculator.

</comment><comment><USER30> Really like [https://calca.io](https://calca.io)

<comment><USER31> I really like Calca and still use it a bunch, but it has a few annoyances (some of which cause incorrect answers) and seems to get updated about once every 4 years.

Putting the answers inline rather than over in a separate column (ala Soulver and Numi) makes more sense to me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> I've been a Soulver user since 2012, and it's been an integral part of my works, even acting as a scratch pad for ideas with numbers.

The UX is the plus here - I am aware that there have been several other apps that have offered a polished UX since then, but the convenience and my learned affinity to Soulver makes me keep it.

</comment><comment><USER33> It looks neat but I wish it had physics calculations - I want to be able to write something like

10m * 1000kg * 9.8m/s^2 in kWh

and see a correct result

<comment><USER34> Not as polished as Soulver and Numi, but maybe Frink is something for you: [https://frinklang.org/](https://frinklang.org/)

<comment><USER35> As a student project, I once prototyped a Soulver-like interface that used Frink for its calculations: [https://github.com/roryokane/CalcuDoc/wiki/About- CalcuDoc](https://github.com/roryokane/CalcuDoc/wiki/About-CalcuDoc). You can see screenshots and get the code from that link.

I didn't continue working on it after the class finished, though – I lost all interest after I realized that the Frink programming language, despite being free, is not open source.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I never knew there were so many people into notebook/repl style calculators, for lack of an accepted term. How did these never take over from the skeuomorphic style? There clearly seems to be a market below the spreadsheet/Jupyter notebook use case.

</comment><comment><USER37> Slightly off topic:

Back in the early days of the Newton, there was an app that let you manipulate algebraic expressions by dragging and dropping individual elements of the expression. Think factoring out a common factor represented by the expression sprouting parentheses with the factor out front. There was a later effort called MathDrag'n but that seemed to run out of steam.

Does anyone know if a similar thing exists and is maintained now?

<comment><USER38> The old (pre-OS X) Macintosh app Graphing Calculator did this. I really miss it.

<comment><USER39> It's still around -

[https://www.pacifict.com/WhatsNew.html](https://www.pacifict.com/WhatsNew.html)

<comment><USER38> Hey thanks!!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> What's new between Soulver 2 and 3? I can't seem to find out any info.

This type of app seems like it would be useful, and I know I'm basically asking for free candy, but I don't find 30 day trials that useful. I'll toy around with it now, but 35 days later think about it for serious work and ever really get to evaluate it. Or, I'll drop $30 on it now and never think about it again.

</comment><comment><USER41> Org-mode: Notepad, meet calculator, spreadsheet, mind map, literate programming tool, blogging/Web CMS, presentation builder...

<comment><USER42> I really can't find a good way to recreate what I have with something like soulver.

With tables I don't see the formulas at glance. Only alternative would be a real programming language but than something like time is a pain again.

<comment><USER43> You can evaluate emacs lisp everywhere in the editor with C-x C-e. C-u C-x C-e pastes into the buffer. IDK if that fits your use case or not but I hope it's helpful.

<comment><USER42> what does this correspond to? I'm on spacemacs

<comment><USER43> eval-last-sexp, which I believe is , e s in Spacemacs. Also, most Emacs defaults like that are carried over to Spacemacs so you can try SPC h d k C-x C-e and get info that way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> This looks neat, but I'm struggling with the landing page.

There are a bunch of animated gifs that show off how Soulver works - great! But just as they finish the exercise and show the result, they immediately blank and restart. I don't get any time to figure out what just happened. It's incredibly frustrating.

Put a 5s pause at the "complete" frame.

<comment><USER35> It's also annoying that each example on the landing page only fades in when it is scrolled almost to the top of the window. I have enough vertical space to see two examples at once, but it always hides the bottom one to look "mysterious". This is especially disorienting when scrolling up or down a page at a time.

Apple's marketing pages do this type of fade-in better – the fade-in happens quickly as soon as the page is scrolled to a certain point, and after that, the faded-in item doesn't fade out again unless you refresh the page.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> Soulver is great, but there's one feature that seriously makes me hate using it.

I often open up "scratchpad" text documents. I Paste some text, edit it, Select All, then Cut. I press CMD-W to close the window. Because the document is blank, I'm not prompted to save the unsaved File.

If I try to do the same thing with Soulver, when I close the (blank) window the app pops up a modal dialog asking me where I want to save the (blank, never-saved, scratchpad-only) File. So annoying.

It seriously prevents me from quickly opening up or using Soulver just because I don't want to deal with clicking through that modal once I'm done. I'll just use a Text document instead or put the math equation into the Chrome omnibox.

<comment><USER35> In the save confirmation dialog of any Mac app, the keyboard shortcut Command- Delete (⌘⌫) chooses Delete for you. I found such dialogs much less annoying after I learned that.

So when you want to close a window without saving:

1\. Hit ⌘W

2\. Wait a moment for the dialog to open

3\. Hit ⌘⌫

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> A tangent, but there is an unspoken need for natural language processing/interpretation in EHR charting for nurses.

Very often, you enter values manually into a flow sheet around that status of a patient (ie vitals, PQRST for pain, assessments) but you may also enter a supporting note around the circumstances of your charting.

It would be beyond helpful to have an interpreter to pull in data within that note to place it within the appropriate data fields. It would eliminate a significant portion of duplicate charting.

I am putting it out there, because this is beyond me to solve this issue from a technical standpoint.

Soulver looks like a tiny step in that direction/way of thinking.

<comment><USER47> Is this really a good solution? My biggest concern is more psychological than technical. If the error rate of interpretation is too high, then it obviously won't reduce the effort. However, if the error rate is low, then the errors are much more likely to be overlooked.

The enemy of good may be perfect, but it seems that the closer to (without being) perfect the interpreter, the worse the outcome for the patient.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> Shameless plug, I made [https://instacalc.com](https://instacalc.com) (pastebin for calcs) for back-of-the-envelope number crunching. Fast, free, gets out of your way.

</comment><comment><USER49> I'd love to see a VS Code extension that does this. Anyone heard of one?

</comment><comment><USER50> Like the concept, but I'm on Windows so I'll try out some of the alternatives mentioned in these comments.

My solution for Windows has been the NppCalc plugin for Notepad++. It is not quite as advanced, but does have a lot of functions that the alternatives don't (like some common encryption algorithms which came in useful recently)

[https://sourceforge.net/p/nppcalc/wiki/Home/](https://sourceforge.net/p/nppcalc/wiki/Home/)

</comment><comment><USER51> I do this kind of thing a lot...this is a tool that I didn't know I needed. Like excel-lite.

Too bad it's mac only. And so is Numi.

Any linux (preferred) or windows alternatives?

<comment><USER52> [https://github.com/parnold-x/nasc](https://github.com/parnold-x/nasc) for GTK

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> Eva(luate) [https://github.com/NerdyPepper/eva](https://github.com/NerdyPepper/eva)

</comment><comment><USER54> I've used this sometimes, and still use it sometimes (a few times a year, probably). But I find it not very intuitive (beyond the basics of typing some names, numbers and operators in a list), and I couldn't figure out how to _easily_ do subtotals in a long list (I don't want to write a long formula adding every other item above). Better documentation and examples could help.

</comment><comment><USER55> Cool idea, but but does every website nowadays insist on lazy loading every single part of the site? It just makes everything feel so _slow_.

</comment><comment> crooked-v I wish there was an app like this that would work with dense text with embedded math, so I could use it for tabletop game character sheets.

<comment><USER56> Maybe try to use this from a comment elsewhere in this thread:

build your own reactive editor or content with data streams using TagleJS: [http://worrydream.com/Tangle/](http://worrydream.com/Tangle/) and it is open source. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER57> I'm using a thing called microMath+ on Android (available on F-Droid) but it's kind of clumsy. I haven't tried hacking on it yet to improve the UI, but I'm wondering if there might be something else out there that's already better. (Not proprietary software, obviously.)

<comment><USER35> I don't see the app on F-Droid – the listing on [https://www.f-droid.org/en/packages/32/index.html](https://www.f-droid.org/en/packages/32/index.html) skips from "Microchip" to "Microphone". I can't find the app's website or code by searching the web either – all I found was this C++ project from 2012: [https://github.com/candycode/micromath](https://github.com/candycode/micromath).

<comment><USER57> Sorry, it's spelled with a Greek lowercase mu.

<comment><USER35> It wasn't clear what part of "microMath+" you meant should be replaced by μ, but I eventually found the app. It's μMath+, on F-Droid at [https://www.f-droid.org/en/packages/com.mkulesh.micromath.pl...](https://www.f-droid.org/en/packages/com.mkulesh.micromath.plus/) and on GitHub at [https://github.com/mkulesh/microMathematics](https://github.com/mkulesh/microMathematics).

<comment><USER57> That's right. I'm sorry I didn't post the correct name in the first place; I don't have [https://github.com/kragen/xcompose](https://github.com/kragen/xcompose) set up on my hand computer (because it doesn't run X).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER58> I don't use Soulver that much anymore other than while travelling, but it's great for tracking my travel budget on my phone: able to clearly list what I've bought, for how much, what the grand total is in my home currency and leave comments on things.

</comment><comment><USER59> It's funny that in the very first image showing how it works, they have a wage calculation for four days worked, but there are five days.

"There are two hard problems in programming: naming, cache maintenance, and off-by-one errors."

Not just in programming.

</comment><comment><USER60> you can build your own reactive editor or content with data streams using TagleJS: [http://worrydream.com/Tangle/](http://worrydream.com/Tangle/) and it is open source. :)

Not just calculator.

<comment><USER20> Isn't that a slightly different kind of thing though? That makes a static document interactive.

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> I feel that with non-standard syntax like $100 + 25% tip it become very confusing whether the answer would be 100.25 or 125. I'll end up spending a lot of time trying to verify the answer.

</comment><comment><USER62> Type annotated calculator. If the author had a Windows version he would probably sell many more licenses, but understandably that's probably not high on their priority list.

<comment><USER63> You got Speedcrunch which is both crossplatform and opensource

<comment><USER62> I love Speedcrunch and it's an integral part of my Windows workflow, but not as flexible as Numi or Soulver. I would incorporate either of those two into my Windows workflow if they were available as such with the same responsiveness and footprint.

<comment><USER64> For Windows you might want to checkout OpalCalc. The website is horrible, but the product is actually good (if ugly).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER65> Has anyone found anything remotely comparable for Android? I'd love to have a Soulver or Numi analog on my phone. I don't even need it to sync with anything.

</comment><comment><USER66> I wish the gifs on the page would pause a little longer at the end. It loops back to the beginning too fast for me to really grok what is happening.

</comment><comment><USER67> I've used this for years, and use it to tally up my outgoings quickly, and changing a linked value will update all the related items

</comment><comment><USER68> Mac only? Oh well

</comment><comment><USER69> Mac only? Really.

<comment><USER70> Since getting a Mac I've been finding that there's a whole market of mac only apps and I get the sense that it's just choosing your demographic: people who buy macs are more likely to pay for software.

</comment></comment><comment><USER71> I've also been using Soulver for years, mostly on my iPhone. I like how it's basically Jupyter-for-arithmetic.

</comment><comment><USER42> for Windows: OpalCalc

more than nostalgic website but actively maintained: [https://www.skytopia.com/software/opalcalc/](https://www.skytopia.com/software/opalcalc/)

calcing with time is a bit jumpy at times, but other than that I love it for quick napkin calcing stuff

costs 15 bucks

</comment><comment><USER72> This is awesome! I was actually looking around for something a few days ago! Perfect timing.

</comment><comment><USER73> UI is impressive!

But, how is the functionality provided better than tons of free spreadsheet apps out there?

<comment><USER64> Spreadsheets force you to pick cells, and the formulas are hidden. They are non-linear, this is linear. They also take a lot of screen space, this is tiny.

</comment></comment><comment><USER74> Anyone know of a good Linux version? For Windows, OpalCalc is pretty good.

</comment><comment> vincent-toups C-X X-E evaluates any s-expression in any emacs buffer using emacs lisp.

<comment><USER75> Or C-x * for calc-dispatch? I guess the point of this app is the input doesn't have to be precise. Not sure emacs can do that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> Part of me thinks this needs to be a plugin or something for VS Code...

</comment><comment><USER77> Lovely! Congratulations :)

</comment><comment><USER78> looks like a great app but a little disappointing it requires MacOs 10.14. There are a non-insignificant number of people still using older machines.

</comment><comment><USER79> Just like emacs in the 1980´s.

</comment><comment><USER80> I usually use Mathematica for this kind of thing.

<comment><USER80> Not sure why I got downvoted here, so I'll explain that Mathematica makes a really good proxy for this.

I can do a decent amount of this in Notebooks or the terminal with Wolframscript and I'm not limited to simple things either.

I'm sure this tool is better if you just need something really simple as it is much cheaper and certainly lighter weight than Mathematica.

</comment></comment><comment><USER81> Why wouldn't I just use something like orgmode?

<comment><USER82> I'm also an Emacs user. But there are people who don't use Emacs. Or _gasp_ don't even have it installed! Believe it or not.

</comment></comment><comment><USER83> A paid, Mac only app which could fairly easily be implemented as a plugin to any popular text editor... I'm not sure I understand the appeal - what am I missing here, please? :)

<comment><USER84> This is like comparing Dropbox to "having an FTP account, mounting it locally with curlftpfs, and then using SVN or CVS on the mounted filesystem".

Yes, you could. Or you could use something that's polished and works, with a clean UI and years of real world testing.

<comment><USER85> For anyone missing the joke, when the Dropbox announcement was posted to HN, that was exactly the reaction it got.</comment></comment></comment>


Prop 203 for Medical Marijuana passed in Arizona - <AUTHOR> http://azstarnet.com/article_4a2acfa6-fef9-5104-ac14-422eb139a327.html

<comment><USER2> It seems weird that the medical use of a virtually harmless substance is something that is put to a public vote. It should be up to doctors and researchers to determine if a substance (a) has a legitimate medical application and (b) is not so harmful as to make its medical application not worth it. In fact, the Controlled Substances Act describes Schedule I substances (the most controlled—no prescriptions may be written for these) as such:

        The findings required for each of the schedules are as follows:
        (1) Schedule I.—
        (A) The drug or other substance has a high potential for abuse.
        (B) The drug or other substance has no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States.
        (C) There is a lack of accepted safety for use of the drug or other substance under medical supervision.

"Accepted medical use in treatment in the United States" seems to mean it is up to the medical community, and not to lawmakers or law enforcement.

<comment><USER3> A very small amount of people actually are smoking pot for the health effects. The rest just want to get high. Why can't smokers just admit why they want it legalized?

Which makes me think that there aren't really any health benefits. The only studies I've seen are completely biased. The proponents are also very religious about legalizing it and will not listen to any opposing views, which makes me question their motives.

You also say it's your body and you can do what you want. The law proposed in California would make it difficult to fire someone that smokes pot. I don't agree with this. This takes away my right as a business owner.

<comment><USER4> >You also say it's your body and you can do what you want. The law proposed in California would make it difficult to fire someone that smokes pot. I don't agree with this. This takes away my right as a business owner.

So do you consider your right as a business owner to be more important than the fundamental right to do whatever you want to your body? Seriously?

And EVERYBODY IS DRUGGED in this country. Some drink coffee. Some drink alcohol. Some take anti-depressants. Some take anxiolytics. The performance of your workers should be your only concern; the "why" behind their performance should not bother you. If someone gets high all the time and is able to produce amazing output, then why would you fire him? On the other hand, if someone gets high all the time and is terrible at his job, you have a reason to fire him that is cause-independent: he is not performing well. Why would you care how people like to cope with reality? The only thing that should matter for you is how useful they are to you for a given purpose.

Reality is harsh. People try to cope with it with their own tools. Different tools work for different people. Drugs are such tools.

<comment><USER3> "So do you consider your right as a business owner to be more important than the fundamental right to do whatever you want to your body? Seriously?"

If it makes it impossible for me to fire you because you are smoking pot as a result of productivity loss, it's impeding on my rights, sorry. The California law would have made it "discrimination" to do so, which is just ridiculous.

"If someone gets high all the time and is able to produce amazing output, then why would you fire him?"

Do you want someone under the influence flying airplanes, driving a school bus, or operating machinery that could potentially harm others? Seriously? I've seen enough people high to know how scary a thought this truly is.

"The only thing that should matter for you is how useful they are to you for a given purpose."

Right. Because a drug that many times causes short-term memory loss and paranoia is going to help someone's productivity.

"Reality is harsh. People try to cope with it with their own tools. Different tools work for different people. Drugs are such tools."

It's funny because you are so dead set on freedoms and rights. But when your rights take away the rights of other people, you see no problem with it.

<comment><USER4> "If it makes it impossible for me to fire you because you are smoking pot as a result of productivity loss, it's impeding on my rights, sorry. The California law would have made it "discrimination" to do so, which is just ridiculous."

So you're saying that you're unable to fire someone who doesn't perform as well as you wanted (be it because of pot or sheer incompetence)? I don't think that's actually true... Sorry.

"Do you want someone under the influence flying airplanes, driving a school bus, or operating machinery that could potentially harm others? Seriously? I've seen enough people high to know how scary a thought this truly is."

Do you want someone under the influence of alcohol flying airplanes, driving a school bus, or operating machinery that could potentially harm others? Seriously? I've seen enough people drunk to know how scary a thought this truly is.

Wait...

"Right. Because a drug that many times causes short-term memory loss and paranoia is going to help someone's productivity."

Yeah, as we all know no drugs ever have negative side effects while still having positive effects. But okay, I agree that high people are less likely to perform well. All that is, however, besides the point: if they don't work well, you can fire them. You don't have to bring up pot to make your case; they aren't doing their job well, they're out. The law allows you to kick people out because they don't do the job well.

Again, how many people do you see coming to work drunk? I'd guess not many. Why do they not come to work drunk? Because they wouldn't be able to perform very well. Why do they care about performing well? Because they want to keep their jobs. I don't see how anything would be different with marijuana.

<comment><USER3> "Yeah, as we all know no drugs ever have negative side effects while still having positive effects. But okay, I agree that high people are less likely to perform well. All that is, however, besides the point: if they don't work well, you can fire them. You don't have to bring up pot to make your case; they aren't doing their job well, they're out. The law allows you to kick people out because they don't do the job well."

What I'm saying is the wording of the law that didn't pass in Cali was such that it would allow for people that were pot users to not be discriminated against in the work place. Since it was fairly vague, it could easily be used against the employer if those people were ever fired.

"Again, how many people do you see coming to work drunk? I'd guess not many. Why do they not come to work drunk?"

Are there any specific laws that say that an alcoholic can't be discriminated against by a potential employer? I don't think there are. This is the difference.

Also, it's much easier to detect if a person is drunk (smelling it on their breath, motor skills are affected). I know lots of people that smoke instead of drink because they don't want to get a DUI.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>