Youngest kid, smartest kid? - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/elements/2013/09/youngest-kid-smartest-kid.html <comment><USER3> I went to a very small rural primary school when I was a kid. The entire school was only 20 or so children.

There was one full time teacher, and a second who was part time. That's actually a pretty good student to teacher ratio compared to the overfull classes of today.

Perhaps half the days activities were done in a single group and the other half we would be split in to two groups to do academic work.

I think that having mixed age group was very positive. It allowed kids to learn from the older ones but in addition everyone moved forward at their own pace. The school had to be designed to handle each student being at a different place in their education by it's very nature.

When I moved to a larger secondary school at age 11, I was miles ahead of my new peers. It was at least a couple more years before any of the content being taught caught up to what I had learned in primary school.

</comment><comment><USER4> I think the best solution is to not have rigid grades. Each kid should have their own dedicated teacher who teaches them at their own pace. That way each kid is kept at the perfect level of difficulty, enough that they need to try really hard, but not enough that they are overwhelmed.

This might be impractical now, but in the future as technology gets better, I think that kids would benefit from being directed from their own personalized computer teacher, with a real teacher there just to manage the environment and address any circumstances that the computer teacher can't deal with, and for necessary group activities. That way each kid has an education that is tailored to them and nobody is lost in the cracks, bored kids becoming lazy, or overwhelmed kids learning to hate school and thinking of themselves as inferior or stupid.

<comment><AUTHOR> _I think the best solution is to not have rigid grades._

I fully agree. That is the topic of my very oldest online FAQ, first composed in 1992.

[http://learninfreedom.org/age_grading_bad.html](http://learninfreedom.org/age_grading_bad.html)

Dividing up children into school grades by age is a modern form of insanity, which would have astonished educators in any earlier era.

<comment><USER5> We do it because it's practical and because it's scalable. We do it because we're a society that loves standards but doesn't really understand how they work. So we're comfortable painting everything as a bell curve.

The outcome is something resembling a lowest-common-denominator education for all. Outstanding students don't pull a class upward, but unproductive or struggling students _do_ slow a class down. That sucks for the student who's ahead of the class, because her potential is being wasted. It also sucks for the student at the bottom of the class, because he shouldn't be there. (That sounds harsh, but it's true).

Solving this problem will require implementing a scalable way to aggregate students by some level or set of criteria other than age. We need to organize them _somehow_ , because it's currently impractical to teach them all individually.

And it's tricky to organize them by _any_ "potential"-based criterion at an arbitrary age, because the brain is changing almost continuously throughout childhood. Plucking a group of "gifted" students apart from the pack at, say, age 2 is poorly predictive of who _actually_ turns out to have high potential later on. So we need to do better than that.

These are nontrivial challenges, but the solution would represent a giant leap forward in our society.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Huh, I had never thought about birthdate giving students a leg up in terms of mental capability.

I was in a gifted program in for elementary and middle school, and now that I think about it, in 8th grade, of the top 5 academically performing kids, 4 had birthdays in January or February, and 1 was redshirted... hmmm

I wonder if their parents planned that, or if it was a result of their developmental advantage/other environmental factors/own personality/aptitude?

Anyways, fascinating idea.

<comment><USER7> Logically, the most gifted and smartest kid will advance faster, and be placed in higher levels, resulting in them usually being the youngest in the class.

For example, if your school told you your 5 year old is smart enough to start 1st grade, you'll likely enroll it into 1st grade, making it younger than the average 6 year old 1st grader.

Unfortunately this has the problem of straining the kid, and rather than seeming and being exceptional, it'll appear average. Later on in life when grades, extracurriculars, become important for college admissions, the kid will be disadvantaged because of this, since age is usually never considered.

Moral of the story: it's better to be a big fish in a small pond.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> This sounds like a different version of smart kids being lazy because they learned that they can get away with it, while those who were taught to work hard as kids become successful.

<comment><AUTHOR> I would hope that no smart child ever gets the message that he can get away with being lazy, and yet I have seen school settings that produce that mistaken idea.

<comment><USER9> What is 'effort'? Why is it required? Why can't we learn freely with our own time and interest? Why should that be considered 'not being lazy'? Why are you judging children?

In our culture, laziness and curiosity are considered two of the three virtues of a programmer. (Hubris is the other, but I don't think that's as important)

Anecdotally, I know I for one got away with being lazy in school years. Generally I would do work in class only until I understood what was going on, then stop. Homework was avoided wherever possible. Requests from teachers for repetition of essentially mindless acts was considered a form of condescension and actively subverted wherever possible.

However, my curiosity meant that self-directed learning in my free time outside of school (computing, photography, geography, history, etc.) more than compensated.

My advice to children is this: Spend time on what you feel like (but don't waste opportunities to learn, and don't tread on other people's toes), feel free to ignore authorities (with modes of peaceful resistance), do something physical if you get the chance, but _use the internet_ to satisfy your curiosity about the world. Never let it die. Most adults you see have let it die, and sometimes they are like husks of true people... never a free moment, never an idle thought, never a playful tangent. Avoid that fate, and you will always be knowledgeable, always be fed, always be respected.

<comment><USER10> Most people have only two valuable assets - their brain and their time. Effort in education and experiences can make all of your future time more valuable.

<comment><USER9> _Most people have only two valuable assets - their brain and their time_

While I don't disagree I do think the statement itself is amusing for its inherent assumptions: that we can usefully generalize about all people, that it is logically coherant for strangers or society at large to attempt to value the activity of individuals, and that actions should be directed towards some commonly agreed upon goal. There are many cultures and philosophies out there that would reject such assumptions.

 _Effort in education and experiences can make all of your future time more valuable._

It depends how you choose to value your future time. Would you value it now, guessing at what you want in the future? Would you value it in the future, admitting that you may be totally ignorant of or worse - outright incorrect - about your future wants and needs, here and now?

If you go the defacto route of economic rationalism, then you'd usually be right (ie. 'education leads to more income' is still true in many circumstances, but more weakly of late) though one could draw in to question the associated costs in non-economically rationalizable experience, skill and thought, such as art and philosophy.

If you just relax about decisions in life, adding effort where curiosity deigns to dangle its carrot, would you be any worse off?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Have you read "Outliers" from Malcolm Gladwell? There he was mentioning that most of the successful hockey players have a pattern in their birthdays and I found it quite similar:

"in any elite group of hockey players the very best of the best 40 percent of the players will have been born between January and March,30 percent between April and June, 20 percent between July and September, and 10 percent between October and December."

"The explanation for this is quite simple. It has nothing to do with astrology, nor is there anything magical about the first three months of the year. It's simply that in Canada the eligibility cut off for age class hockey is January 1. A boy who turns ten on January2, then, could be playing along side someone who doesn't turn ten until the end of the year and at that age, in preadolescence, a twelve month gap in age represents anenormous difference in physical maturity."

</comment><comment><USER12> This is very interesting to me because I had the opposite experience - <USER2> parents had me start school early. I went to a private grade school that allowed me to start kindergarten while still 4, a few weeks before my 5th birthday (I was born in mid-September).

I don't think it was an issue at all academically - I was able to skip another grade, starting 2nd grade at 5. However, the school and my parents decided to stop it at that point, which was probably a good idea. However, I ended up starting middle school at 9, high school at 12, and college at 16, which made things difficult socially. Although things worked out, being any younger would probably have been detrimental to the experience.

<comment><USER13> You're saying you excelled academically despite always being the youngest? That's the point of the linked article.

<comment><USER12> My age was less of an issue at the grade school level, where students of multiple grade levels were in the same classroom (because it was a small school). However, things were not so easy socially once I moved to a public middle school, where everyone else in the classroom was of around the same age. The article refers to both social and academic benefits to being younger - my experience was the opposite for the former. Things were a lot easier when my classmates didn't know I was younger than them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I like that story because my kid has such a birthday that will make us have to decide.

But it is a bit annoying that now there are conflicting statements: some research seems to claim the disadvantage of being the younger kid is statistically significant throughout the whole life (or at least university, not sure about jobs), and now this which claims the opposite.

I guess they cancel each other out. Perhaps it is best to not think about it at all and just let things run their "natural" course, and leave it to the kid to deal with whatever the world throws at him :-/

</comment><comment><USER15> I wondered through the whole thing, could it simply be that the children who start late have had their education postponed? We already know a young brain is very impressionable, and that starting things like reading early is good for kids. So why shouldn't enrolling in primary school earlier also be better? As opposed to the child that languishes until they are 6 to start kindergarten.

</comment><comment><USER16> Presumably, if the primary effect is having a slightly lower kid around, then younger siblings would also tend to outperform only children, or those with a sufficiently large gap to the next older sibling. Anyone know if there's any research on this?

<comment><USER17> In terms of birth order and IQ, the results show the opposite actually. Oldest children tend to have higher IQ's than their siblings, with the exception of youngest children when there's a large gap, who also show increased IQ.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I have a summer birthday, and our schools use a September cutoff, so my parents had me do kindergarten twice, so that I would be the oldest, rather than the youngest. Instead, I ended up skipping 1st grade after that, negating my age boost.

</comment><comment> why-el There is a whole chapter in Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers dedicated to this.

</comment><comment><USER19> Youngest kid is smartest, oldest kid is smartest... as an only child I reckon I win either way.

<comment><USER20> did you read the article? It's about relative age in the classroom, not between siblings.

<comment><USER19> Oops, I didn't. Nevermind then.

<comment><USER21> lol

<comment><USER19> I'm glad that I could entertain you so much that you made an account just to express your appreciation. :)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Oracle: Products A-Z - <AUTHOR> https://www.oracle.com/products/oracle-a-z.html

<comment><USER2> They have a lot of products but done of them actually end in "Z".</comment>


Air pollution is returning to pre-Covid levels - <AUTHOR> https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/09/05/air-pollution-is-returning-to-pre-covid-levels <comment><USER2> This is a single image. It has no sources or discussion and the axes are unlabelled.</comment>


Ask HN: Data on What Fraction of Startups are Profitable? - <AUTHOR>

Pretty much what it says in the title. Does anyone know where to find data on what fraction of (tech) startups are profitable? And just to be clear, by profitable I don't mean profitable for the investors or owners, but that the business makes more than it costs to run.<p>I'm asking specifically because entrepreneurship is often vaunted as an excellent career path for smart, ambitious people, but there is a lack of transparency about how many people succeed and how much of that success is due to building a real business vs getting acquired without real profit. <comment><USER2> :) some real serious question that is! Appreciate that you asked! Not me. Not anyone I know of, in my startup-friends' circle of about 10 firms!</comment>


Post-mortem on New Relic's Move to Ruby 1.9 - <AUTHOR> http://blog.newrelic.com/2012/10/23/eating-the-1-9-elephant

<comment><USER2> Hey, "post-mortem" means "after death" in Latin. Maybe we should start introducing some variety, for example the much more accurate "post-facto"?

It's kinda weird clicking on an article about the "post-mortem" analysis of a startup launch to find out it's doing good after all :)

</comment><comment><USER3> I can only guess at what horrors lie below New Relic's calm waters that it took them 8 months to convert their code to 1.9. It's not _that_ different! I have generally flipped over to 1.9 as part of Rails 3 upgrades, the rails part being far more work than the ruby part.

What on earth were you doing that took so long? Is it because NR's requirement to parse a lot of log files, so the changes to strings had outsize impact?

<comment><USER4> You're right, it's not that different - what killed us was unsupported gems that were wired deeply into our system, along with operations weaknesses that made changing ruby versions extremely challenging.

We took extra time to refactor those weaknesses out, so future changes like this one will be much simpler.

Incidentally, we don't parse log files - our agents send Thrift, JSON, and Ruby Marshaled data. String changes affected us a little bit, but the vast majority of the code in that tier is Java anyway. Only the front-end code is in Rails anymore.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Not sure 'Post-mortem' sets the right tone given the contents of the post.

<comment><USER6> That's generally the term used when someone is looking back and writing about something.

Don't quote me on that though.

<comment><USER7> Not just "something", but something that has "died" or ceases to exist in its prior form and the "postmortem" is generally the detailed analysis of what happened.

Also, <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/postmortem>

<comment><USER8> The second definition given does not refer to "death" at all and is commonly used in science and business contexts. It usually refers to the project (or the "event") being over at the point of discussion.

The term is overloaded nowadays, as can be seen on Wikipedia: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post- mortem_%28disambiguation%2...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post- mortem_%28disambiguation%29)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I always thought the 1.9 GC instrumentation was a little wonky. Glad they got that cleared up.

<comment><USER4> We had the same suspicion but only one customer had observed it repeatably in the wild. We turned out to be customer number two. :) If you're running 1.9, definitely get agent 3.5 as soon as you can.

<comment><USER9> Ha, no I was the agent developer who put the GC instrumentation in for 1.9 :) back in 'the day'</comment></comment></comment>


John McAfee Wiki Timeline - <AUTHOR> http://wecheck.org/wiki/John_McAfee

<comment><USER2> I heard about this, I wonder what really happened. This guy seems very interesting to follow.</comment>


Snowden lawyer: Bill of Rights was meant to make government's job more difficult - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/02/snowden-lawyer-bill-of-rights-was-meant-to-make-governments-job-more-difficult/ <comment><USER2> It's incredible how far we've come from the original intent of the Constitution. The reason the Bill of Rights isn't baked in is because the Constitution enumerated a small set of limited powers to the federal government, with the assumption (articulated in the Tenth Amendment) that all other powers were reserved for the states and for the people.

Thankfully the states demanded the Bill of Rights at ratification. Without it, we would have lost all of the rights listed by now, due to the rampant power- grabs of the federal government since the founding.

Although Snowden's lawyer claims the Bill of Rights was supposed to make the government's job "more difficult," he is missing a larger point: _almost all_ of what the federal government does today is not it's job at all! Nothing in the Constitution grants the federal government power to do most of its current functions.

<comment><USER3> Careful, there: you're falling victim to historical revisionism in assuming there was a clear unified "original intent" that we can discern, or that the fight was between "the federal government" and "the states". The writing of the Constitution, and the fight over its ratification and the initial amendments (which had opponents who worried just as equally about enumeration of rights being used to deny others later -- the Ninth Amendment tried to solve this but people today still argue "well, it's not in the Constitution so it's not a right") was complex and full of individuals with all sorts of motivations that can't easily be boiled down to such simple terms.

And that's without getting into the fights over the Elastic Clause, or the Commerce Clause, or the other bits that underlie many of the things the federal government does today.

<comment><USER4> There's nothing complex or ambiguous about it. The United States' organic law is based in the acknowledgment of natural rights. Academics can debate if this has any legal enforcement or if the right of revolution is valid, but it doesn't matter to me.

My rights existed prior to the Bill of Rights and the government. If a local, state, federal or international government tries to diminish or deny my rights, I will fight to alter or abolish their policies and their institutions.

The FBI, NSA and DHS as a whole are enemies of human freedom and a threat to classical liberalism. There is no enumerated power that gives the federal government the authority to create a federal police force and what the NSA has done is unequivocally a crime.

Pass a Constitutional Amendment to make it legal. Abolish the FBI. And build a new organization from the ground up.

In the future, there won't be ISIS and there won't be the FBI. That is, if the future is of a better world.

<comment><USER5> > My rights existed prior to the Bill of Rights and the government

"Existed" in what sense!? Are they deducible by pure reason? Were they written on stone tablets?

Seriously though, the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence may refer to the idea of natural rights, but in my opinion this is due to the prevailing state of philosophy and political theory at the time, and doesn't bind Americans to forever understand their own rights in terms of "prior" natural rights that are "later" secured by the government.

<comment><USER6> That's what the documents say - natural rights codified. If we no longer believe that, we need a new set of documents.

And there are plenty of folks who believe that. If we were writing new founding documents, we'd have a pretty good idea of what 'should' be rights. Where does that come from?

<comment> vertex-four > Where does that come from?

It comes heavily from what you've been taught is important, which, funnily enough, is culture-dependent. A good many people would, for example, argue that a person has a right to shelter and sustenance, and to demand that from others when they can't access it - but other people will argue that people have a right to refuse to give resources to others, even up to the point of refusing taxation. One might argue that one has a right to work without discrimination or harassment - others might argue in favour of freedom of association and free speech, "if you don't like it you don't have to work for them".

To move even further away from currently implemented systems, one might argue that private property is not a right, which is actually entirely reasonable - property is solely a "right" to abridge others' rights, if we're going by the "what's a right is whatever you're allowed to do if nobody stopped you" definition. We could even argue that the ability to break a contract without retribution must be protected as a right, in some schools of thought. What rights "should" be protected - and in what circumstances - winds up being a matter of the opinion of the people who decide which rights to protect. There is no formal system of logic which starts off with no assumptions, and many of the ones which back politics start off with the goal - to protect people's rights, we must... protect people's rights.

Even the idea that a founding document should primarily enumerate rights is because of what you've been taught - why not enumerate duties as well, or instead? Why not write a manifesto with a general goal and proposed method of getting there and call that your founding document? What even is the goal of a founding document?

Why is abridging your ability to do whatever you want to any degree abhorrent - and why is abridging that ability in certain circumstances not so? Is it impossible to come up with a stable system which holds up a different ideal?

I don't really expect all these questions to be answered, as the exact answers are nearly entirely pointless - the point is that these questions can all be asked and different answers can be reached, many of which make sense.

For example, an argument that nobody has a duty to feed and shelter somebody on the edge of starvation, as that harms the person doing so, entirely ignores the harm that this protected right has on the person about to die of starvation - although of course to bring that up requires that the goal of your system of protected rights is to reduce harm, which may not be the case. However, the only way "we must protect all these listed rights at all costs, ignoring all other input" makes sense is if the goal of your system is solely to protect those rights. I don't personally feel that's a very useful thing to do, as it's tautological. A good many people will disagree.

<comment><USER7> Right, rights are a horrible way to express the limits we impose on governments. You can starve in a hellish jail despite all the god-given yada yada.

If 'right' is to mean anything, it has to basically be seen as a natural-law restatement of "If you infringe these freedoms (restrict food, etc) then the victim will try to kill you and we'll be on his side."

In that case, a right is anything you'll fight to provide to others. (That being the only long-term effective way to guarantee it for yourself as well.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > I'm not surprised when I see polls that say that Apple should turn over the > information to the FBI

Grr. This poll was completely biased and it's being cited all over the place as if it were a good gauge of public opinion.

The question is framed as if Apple only needs to unlock the phone. It does not mention that Apple would need to write new software and alter its product. [1]

The real question is, should the DOJ be allowed to force Apple to create new software that enables the phone to be unlocked. That is the question that is being put to the courts, and that is the question that needs to be asked of the American people if this is to become an election issue.

The poll question:

"As you may know, the FBI has said that accessing the iPhone is an important part of their ongoing investigation into the San Bernardino attacks while Apple has said that unlocking the iPhone could compromise the security of other users' information. Do you think Apple"

* Should unlock the iPhone (51) * Should NOT unlock the iPhone (38) * Don't know/Refused (11)

[1] [http://www.people- press.org/files/2016/02/2-22-2016-iPhone-r...](http://www.people- press.org/files/2016/02/2-22-2016-iPhone-release.pdf)

<comment><USER9> Basically Apple created the current problem by making it possible to push new firmware to a locked phone. I'm not saying that Apple is worse than industry standard, just that the backdoor already exists.

So what prevents the FBI from asking Apple to have a team visit the Apple offices, get access to all code that runs on the iPhone and the docs and signing keys?

The team will then unlock the phone and leave with nothing but the unlocked phone.

All of this, get Apple to appear as a third party witness already exists in the law.

<comment><USER10> Are you advocating for the government positions here? It sounds like you are, but it's not 100% clear.

<comment><USER11> The whole conversation is being muddied by people who insist that every observation and line of thinking is a form of advocacy for one of two positions, and should be interpreted through this. Witness the responses to Gate's comments.

The situation is more nuanced than the loudest voices would want us to believe.

<comment><USER12> It would be helpful to identify the nuances you aren't seeing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The structure of the US Government was born out of a centralization of power and thus was meant to be a decentralization of power.

It seems this fundamental aspect is lost on people and everyone gets caught up in a flurry of arguing over who to trust. The entire point in decentralization of power is trusting any one entity (or group with aligned incentives) as little as possible.

The simple, easy, and wrong answer is to try to optimize certain groups of people with aligned incentives by removing barriers to what they want. Those barriers, if at the service of the rest of the system are the very reason the system works.

<comment><USER14> Most Americans don't remember all the various other break off republics that Americans and American leadership wanted to spawn. The whole concept of a singular law via treaties, or large nations comprising of hundreds of millions of people is flawed. Nation States should be very small, a few million people and sovereign and independent and directly democratic. That way you can actually get some representation in how you want to live. As it is, you get virtually no representation.

<comment><USER15> I'm not the one who downvoted you, but I assume it's because you're advocating direct democracy, because everything else is spot on.

The problem with direct democracy is that people end up voting on things that don't affect them, which they don't have enough time or incentive to fully consider, but that severely harm other people.

Representative democracy (in sufficiently small communities) works because a representative can then afford to take the time to hear members of the community out before making a decision. And when the communities are _small_ , individuals actually have the capacity to make their grievances heard and can potentially personally sway enough other voters to change an election outcome.

<comment><USER14> Switzerland is an example of direct democracy that works just fine. There is also the idea of an Athenian democracy which I also support.

At the end of the day the representative democracy has similar problems, where the representatives represent those people funding them. Don't even bother reading the legislation they are passing. and so on.

<comment><USER15> There is direct democracy and then there is the ability to have a referendum. Switzerland has a legislature. And about 20% of the population of California, where referendums have been nothing but trouble.

The place where direct democracy works great is to give the public the ability to _repeal_ laws.

<comment><USER16> I think the big problem with the initiative system in California is that an initiative constitutional amendment needs only a bare majority to pass. While I believe the people should be able to amend the constitution, I think it should require a supermajority of at least 60%.

That would mean the vast majority of initiatives would be statutes, which could in principle be subsequently amended or overridden by the legislature. Of course, the legislature would presumably be reluctant to modify a popular initiative without a very good reason, as there would be a political cost to doing so, but at least it would be possible.

<comment><USER17> > That would mean the vast majority of initiatives would be statutes, which > could in principle be subsequently amended or overridden by the legislature.

No, they couldn't. The power of the legislature to legislate is a delegated power from the citizenry, and, based on that principle, initiative statutes cannot be repealed or modified by the legislature (the legislature can send a measure to the voters amending them), unless the initiative statue itself _expressly_ waives this protection.

<comment><USER16> Okay, but as long as we're talking about changing the initiative system, that could be changed too (in principle, of course -- I understand well how unlikely these proposals are to fly politically).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> History buff here. For those interested, take a look at the ratification debates. For a lot of people, it wasn't even clear why you'd need a Bill of Rights in the first place. The only reason it was included is to get the states to ratify.

The anti-federalists (those opposed to the new constitution) made all kinds of arguments about the things that would happen. The federal government would take over most of the power. There would be a standing army. Language would be stretched to take the government far beyond the bounds that were initially established.

There are two especially interesting things about this. First, the anti- federalists, like libertarians recently, were considered the tin foil hats of the day. Who could believe such silliness would ever happen here? Yet, like our recent example, they were proven right.

The second thing that's interesting is the depth of conversation and debate that was going on almost 250 years ago. The debaters understood which structural flaws the government might or might not have and were arguing about weaknesses that in some cases took many decades to eventually show up. I seriously wonder if such a well-reasoned and supported by history discussion could happen today.

</comment><comment><USER19> Of course. The whole points of a) the bill of rights and b) the entire system of checks and balances is to make things more "difficult". This is as the framers intended, explicitly to avoid things like judicial overreach as is happening in the iPhone case.

The "inefficiency" caused by the system of checks and balances is by design... sort of like a delay after the entry of an incorrect password.

<comment><USER20> > The "inefficiency" caused by the system of checks and balances is by > design... sort of like a delay after the entry of an incorrect password.

I think that shows an important insight: The FBI believes that both the Constitution and the "PIN delay" are "making its job more difficult", because it would rather not have to follow any laws and just do whatever it wants every time, anytime.

Both rise from the same type of thinking that's happening at the FBI and most other intelligence and law enforcement bodies in the US = the laws don't apply to us.

<comment><USER21> If it were really the case that the FBI "would rather not have to follow any laws and just do whatever it wants every time, anytime," they would have already raided Apple's headquarters and taken what they wanted at gunpoint. Obviously, they believe their position _is_ legally justifiable.

<comment><USER22> Or it could be that the FBI expects compliance from Apple as they expect compliance from all of us _and_ they know that raiding Apple's headquarters to take what they want (what? what would they take?) at gunpoint would cause many currently compliant citizens to become less compliant.

Our system depends on many lies to keep lurching along for the benefit of the elite and anything that causes those lies to be uncovered for more and more people is best avoided, according to the status quo.

<comment><USER21> It seems obvious to me that the FBI considers their position here to be legal. All I'm saying is, if it were truly the case that they didn't care about the law at all, there are probably more direct and effective extralegal methods they could try.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> He's right. Part of the purpose of the Bill of Rights is to give the Government less power than the Government would like. Law enforcement needs to be a bit frustrated on a regular basis.

</comment><comment><USER24> Exactly, law enforcement isn't exactly supposed to be a super easy job.

<comment><USER25> Most programmers actually hate computers and now just want "cloud APIs" for everything so they don't have to think about how networking/systems/storage all works together.

Most law enforcement officers actually hate the law and just want "privacy APIs" for everything so they don't have to think about how searches/seizures/privacy all works together.

<comment><USER26> The difference being, when I use the AWS API, I'm not perpetrating a crime against the citizenry...

<comment><USER27> That's debatable depending upon what you're using it for.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> >I have been urging colleagues to respond any time anybody asks about FBI and San Bernardino to say: the real conversation is about China wanting to unlock the phone of a US Embassy employee who they suspect is a CIA agent and don't we want Apple to be able to say they can't do that.

Wanting Apple not to be able to comply doesn't mean they shouldn't comply when they can. They should comply, and make sure they can't comply on newer models (i.e. make secure enclave nonupdatable without wiping keys or unlocking first).

<comment><USER8> If they comply here that's a step towards the DOJ being able to ask them to always _be able to comply_ in the future. It's a slippery slope

Plus, compliance now may reveal some of their trade secrets which may hurt other elements of their future products' security. I trust Cook on this

<comment><USER28> "Obeying the law when you agree with it is a slippery slope to obeying it when you disagree!"

Doesn't your argument imply nobody should ever obey the law?

And Apple has the option to do everything on their own facilities, so no trade secrets need to be revealed.

<comment><USER8> > Doesn't your argument imply nobody should ever obey the law?

No..

> And Apple has the option to do everything on their own facilities, so no > trade secrets need to be revealed.

Serving DOJ requests within Apple's facility does not mean the newly created software will not get out into the wild. We know the DOJ wants to unlock hundreds or thousands of phones. Apple will need to hire more staff to handle such requests, come up with a procedure for doing it securely, etc. None of this is without risk, and it is much more risky than not doing it at all.

There are bad actors, foreign entities, who would love a copy of the software that the DOJ is asking Apple to produce. They will try their hardest to get their hands on it. Furthermore, if the US successfully forces Apple to unlock iPhones, China will ask for the unlock feature as well. We do not want this tool in the hands of oppressive regimes. We do not want to internationally set a precedent that it is okay to install backdoors on phones or computers.

<comment><USER28> >Apple will need to hire more staff to handle such requests, come up with a procedure for doing it securely, etc. None of this is without risk, and it is much more risky than not doing it at all.

This still seems like a general argument for never complying with warrants. After all, then the government will get more warrants, we'll need to hire people to comply with the warrants, and that's a security risk!

Every large company has people employed solely to respond to requests from law enforcement.

>We do not want to internationally set a precedent that it is okay to install backdoors on phones or computers.

Then pass a law that bans backdoors like the one Apple has on all its devices, if you think backdoors are not ok. As is, Apple has a backdoor, and the FBI is effectively asking for the key.

>There are bad actors, foreign entities, who would love a copy of the software that the DOJ is asking Apple to produce. They will try their hardest to get their hands on it.

Remember, the only piece that's difficult to get is Apple's key. Once you have that, the software is easy to create. That's something that _already_ exists, and making the software doesn't make it any easier for someone to steal the key.

<comment><USER8> > Then pass a law that bans backdoors like the one Apple has on all its > devices, if you think backdoors are not ok

That's not even on the table. Congress passes laws and this case is in court.

I support Apple in standing up to the DOJ. They should not be forced to write software that weakens their device's security. The semantics of whether we say a backdoor already exists or not do not matter. The fact is Apple will have to create something that does not yet exist in order to fulfill this request, and there is a risk that that can get out into the wild. Nobody understands the risk of that possibility better than Apple. I stand by them because I feel the time to support them is now. There may not be a later. You're free to disagree.

<comment><USER28> >That's not even on the table. Congress passes laws and this case is in court.

That's exactly my point. If you don't want companies to have the ability to put in backdoors, that's something you need to get Congress to pass. Not wanting backdoors is not relevant to the legal question here.

>The fact is Apple will have to create something that does not yet exist in order to fulfill this request, and there is a risk that that can get out into the wild.

As I and others have said, the risk is not increased by the software being created. That's not too hard to do. The only thing that can't be done is sign the update to install it on the device. There's no risk being added by that signing, because Apple anyway signs every new iOS release.

If Apple doesn't want to create new software, I'm sure the FBI will be happy for them to hand over the key, and the FBI can create the software themself.

<comment><USER8> > If you don't want companies to have the ability to put in backdoors, that's > something you need to get Congress to pass

(1) I don't want that and (2) it wouldn't be constitutional. Congress shall make no law abridging free speech. Code has been ruled free speech.

> the risk is not increased by the software being created

That's fine if you don't believe what Tim Cook says about his product. I do. Regardless, whether or not the DOJ can compel a company to weaken its product is the question being asked. Handing over software or a signing key are both trade secrets Apple has a right to protect. Handing over the signing key certainly increases risk.

<comment><USER28> I know enough about the system to know that every installation requires a signature by Apple. There's no "belief" required here.

Note that the creator of cydia, the software that pretty much every jailbroken iPhone runs to install packages, has said that Cook is lying in the letter. He's also said that many people, including him, could create the software in less than a week, and all they need is the signing key.

You can trust Cook, but perhaps educate yourself to the point you don't need to trust anyone. Read [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SHSH_blob](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SHSH_blob) and [https://www.theiphonewiki.com/wiki/SHSH](https://www.theiphonewiki.com/wiki/SHSH), and you'll see how there's no additional risk by creating the software, as long as the key is not released.

<comment><USER8> The cydia creator, while accomplished, is not right to call Cook a liar. Cook says the OS does not exist and that only Apple could make it work on the iPhone. What's untrue about that? The DOJ did not ask for a signing key. They asked for special software.

Regardless of the semantics, the question is should Apple be forced to weaken the security of its product which is used globally. It doesn't matter if you think Apple only needs to hand over a signing key. The result is the same. Anyway, neither the DOJ nor Apple are saying what you or the cydia creator are saying.

<comment><USER28> >"The problem I have is with stuff like their answer to the question "Could Apple build this operating system just once, for this iPhone, and never use it again?", which essentially is outright lying: the "master key" in question is their signing key, not some piece of trivial software they develop (and then sign) in order to automate this process for the FBI. Apple already has the only master key of relevance: that key already exists; the idea that the master key is something that they need to "build" and then would have to "protect" is them trying to divert attention from what is actually important."

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11158036](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11158036)

Yes, the OS does not exist. But to claim that creating the software means it can somehow get "out there" and be used without Apple's control is false.

<comment><USER8> Again, both the DOJ and Apple are talking about creating a custom OS. Nobody is saying it's just a signing key except the Cydia guy, who by the way has been at odds with Apple for years. He's not exactly unbiased, and he is not more knowledgeable about Apple software than Apple, as much as he loves to claim to be.

It sounds like you believe that Apple can service these requests from the DOJ without any increased risk of either a "signing key" or the OS being released into the wild. I disagree and that's _okay_

<comment><USER28> We're not saying it's just the signing key. We're saying it's trivial to make those changes.

For the record, I made this claim before I saw anything from saurik. The changes are very minor, just disable erasure and the delay, plus something to allow remote password attempts.

Re "OS being released" that's not something that matters, because the OS is useless without the key. The only risk is compromise of the signing key, and that's the same as any iOS update.

Do you have any other justification for your belief other than trusting Tim Cook?

I'm not claiming he's more knowledgeable, but that Cook lied. This may just be poor phrasing or dumbing down on Cook's part, but the implication is wrong.

<comment><USER8> > The only risk is compromise of the signing key, and that's the same as any > iOS update.

I disagree. If the DOJ gets a signed copy of the software, that's a very different level of risk. There are all kinds of issues with software development we often underestimate. The issues aren't always technical matters. Sometimes they are human.

This court case isn't just about software development. It's also about what the DOJ can demand, and how that impacts software development. The DOJ could very well demand that Apple hand over a signed version of the customized OS. After that, how can Apple be expected to secure their product? They can't.

The last relevant case using AWA was USA vs. New York Telephone. Have you read OK's review of that case as it pertains to a potential USA vs. Apple? [1]

This is from the judges' concluding remarks, which help define the AWA as it will be used today and in the future:

"We agree that the power of federal courts to impose duties upon third parties is not without limits; unreasonable burdens may not be imposed"

"The order provided that the Company be fully reimbursed at prevailing rates, and compliance with it required minimal effort on the part of the Company and no disruption to its operations."

n.b. _compliance with it required minimal effort on the part of the Company_

Consider the burden Tim Cook and Apply will bear when he compels his software engineers to remove password-entry safeguards and release the signing key that they have guarded so carefully. Employee morale will tank.

> Do you have any other justification for your belief other than trusting Tim > Cook?

I trust Tim and stand behind him when he says it's time to stand up to the DOJ. These cases have been heard behind closed doors for years, decades, have hurt business such as Yahoo, Skype etc. and have never been shown the spotlight that this case has. _Everyone_ knows what an iPhone is, from the US to Cambodia, and they will all be following this case closely. It's time to share what we know as techies about the inner workings of the devices in people's pockets and the unchecked surveillance systems of our government.

[1] [https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh- conspiracy/wp/201...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh- conspiracy/wp/2016/02/19/preliminary-thoughts-on-the-apple-iphone-order-in- the-san-bernardino-case-part-2-the-all-writs-act/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Dare I say; The Constitution is an Objective Document, that is (forthrightly), been subjected through interpretation. . .ergo, opinions and power grab's. The US. Constitution is simple and elegant, but cruel and antithetic to the Federal Government's power hungry tendencies of knowing what is best for all. . . so the interpretation of the document. Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution is the most misinterpreted section of the US.CONST. Example: the NOT enumerated power (a summary to say the least, of the actually enumerated powers) "general welfare of the USA" or the "to regulate commerce clause"... this article words it great "This is patently obvious: the power to "regulate" commerce cannot include the power to compel commerce!. . ." [http://blog.chron.com/txpotomac/2012/04/ron-paul-says- suprem...](http://blog.chron.com/txpotomac/2012/04/ron-paul-says-supreme- court-has-utterly-abused-commerce-clause-but-hopes-it-will-overturn-obamacare- abomination/)

</comment><comment><USER30> "respond any time anybody asks about FBI and San Bernardino to say: the real conversation is about China wanting to unlock the phone of a US Embassy employee who they suspect is a CIA agent and don't we want Apple to be able to say they can't do that."

<comment><USER31> Even if the ability existed, the answer would be still be "no". Nation states have no recourse beyond economic/military actions. I don't understand the potential threat of China requesting information we _won 't_ give them anyways.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> It is undemocratic to secretly steal freedom - they must make us beg them to take it away.

</comment><comment><USER33> WTF does this have anything to do with China?

> Don't we want Apple to be able to say that they can't help China track the > communications of dissidents or other repressive regimes?

People are more worried about the US' being the "repressive regime".

The poll released is telling of how power is kept in the US. You don't have to have 100% support, just over 50%. Here we see that the FBI is far more sophisticated than they let on, and supported by a more cohesive program considering support for them is just north of 50%.</comment>


Ask HN: How do you protect your children? - <AUTHOR>

I have a young child of my own (20 months), but my wife and I have recently become registered foster carers and one of the things that is on our 'must do before children arrive' check list is to safe-guard the internet connection from the typical online nasties. My only knowledge of this area is from [the days of?] Net Nanny and Cyber Sitter, both of which I recall being a bit naff and not really effective. I think there's going to be some kind of proxying involved, but I can't really find any 'ready made' solutions and time is against me. It has to be something proactive and I don't really want to use something crude like blocking rude patterns in URLs... Surely this is a problem a lot of hacker parents have? So what do you guys do/use? <comment><USER3> Simplest method (what we do) is to set up OpenDNS Home ([http://www.opendns.com/home-solutions/parental- controls/](http://www.opendns.com/home-solutions/parental-controls/)) as your home router's DNS server, which should then propagate to all your machines.

It only blocks the most egregious stuff and doesn't do anything about monitoring/blocking chat, etc., but at least you have some basic peace of mind.

(Of course, a determined budding hacker could easily get around it if they can change a local machine's DNS settings.)

<comment><AUTHOR> This sounds like an awesome idea. I checked the settings on my stock router, from my ISP, and it doesn't permit you to change DNS! Totally gutted. Time to get a new router, I think. Good advice though, thank you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Model good practices.

Be present with your child when she is using the internet.

Shut down the electronics and put them away at night.

Discuss the facts of the world openly and honestly. Don't lie.

It's just basic parenting stuff - no different than cable TV or DVD's. It's all in the relationship.

There's no techno-fix. Or rather, the techno fix doesn't substitute for actual engagement.

It will help to think through where your limits are. What are your options when a 13 year old boy visits Pornhub to watch teen lesbian videos?

Do you call a counselor? Ignore it as a normal part of sexual expression? Lay hands on to remove the devil? Talk about it? Ignore it?

Is your response different if it's bondage? Forced sex? Latex gimp dwarf porn?

There's no shortcuts. Parenting is pretty simple and very hard. You protect them by teaching them to make healthy choices and leave the helicopter in the hanger as often as possible.

Good luck.

<comment><AUTHOR> I completely agree with this! But these aren't my kids, they're other peoples... ;) I can't knowingly allow a child in my care to view sexually explicit images, whether I consider it to be healthy or not.

<comment><USER4> If you must prevent it, then unplug the house from the internet. That's the way parenting works.

If that seems too drastic, then you think about how you might deal with Australian dildo babes in a more reasonable manner. That's also the way parenting works.

There's theory and there's reality. In the reality, what matters is what actually benefits a specific living breathing individual child who is experiencing both normal maturation and stressful social/family circumstances. What matters is what really matters.

To put it another way, for some kids the only responsible course of action might be cutting the wire. For others, the only responsible course may be buying more bandwidth. Once they're in your home, kids cease being an abstraction.

But before going any further, stop and consider that most foster parents and actual parents aren't building the great firewall on their home networks. Instead, they're dealing with it in the great tradition of parenting - <USER2> muddling along until a reaction is necessary.

Uber parenting requires exerting no more force than necessary.

<comment><USER5> He mentioned he was a foster parent. He may be legally required to implement a technical block.

<comment><USER4> If so, the social worker would have provided resources. Now think about how such a requirement would play out among the pool of foster parents. The image of ordinary people setting up local DNS servers is absurd in a world where the speaker jack has to be color coded.

The underlying current feels like a fear of liability. A pity if so.

<comment><USER5> Don't get me wrong; I probably won't put any sort of proxy on the network when I have kids, I'll probably just monitor / restrict their use when they're young, and make sure they know what they need to know as they grow up.

I was just pointing out that as a foster parent, the children are wards of the state, so precisely what is appropriate or not isn't necessarily up to the foster parent.

<comment><USER4> Actually, I think there is a misinterpretation of the foster parent's obligation. It is not to act in the interest of the state. It is to act in the interest of the child. Foster parents are vetted for suitability to act on behalf of the children in their care, not for their ability to carry out directives of the state child welfare apparatus. They are chosen because they will act with reasonable discretion, not bureaucratic zeal. The standard is reasonableness and the metric for reason is the individual child's interest.

To put it another way, there are some foster children for whom any internet access may be inappropriate - e.g. a child who might initiate contact with an adult for the purpose of sexual congress. In such cases, even a flip phone might be placed off limits.

It's not a series of if thens. Judgment is required.

<comment><AUTHOR> I also loved your responses, but I think they're still wide of the mark and relatively typical from a zealous parent - which is awesome! - with no hands- on experience of actual foster care.

The circumstances under which we foster children varies dramatically. In some cases the children have almost-daily communication with their birth parents. Our home, and our embrace, is simply a vessel for them whilst their real home gets back on its feet. There's no animosity or judgement. The kids just need removing from a toxic environment for a length of time, usually under 6 months, so their parents - not them - can rehabilitate, back to the standard required by the local authority.

To say "That's the way parenting works" is kind of unfair, because in the example I gave we are _not_ these children's parents and we're not a replacement for them. In fact, the term 'foster parent' is rarely used anymore.

A better example would be if my child had a friend over for dinner. I will treat that child with respect and warmth, and whilst they are in my home their safety and well-being are my responsibilities. My child is very 'web savvy', but I have no idea what kinds of influence another child can have, so I need to be cautious. In our reality, not being cautious could lose us a placement; or worse, my wife's career.

So yeah, maybe pulling the plug is the best idea in certain situations.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> You probably want to ask this question to happy parents of happy children, not just any parents, including overcontrolling parents who makes their own and their children's lives miserable.</comment>


Executing SQL Statements Using HTTP - <AUTHOR> http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa226559.aspx

<comment><USER2> OMG WHY????

But seriously, what real-world application would you need to use this 'feature' of IIS for? And how would it be faster/better than simply accessing the database directly and having it output XML to your application?

</comment><comment><USER3> Better, faster SQL injection!</comment>


Show HN: Reading Packet suggests articles based on the time you'll be reading - <AUTHOR> http://reading-packet.samrat.me/

<comment><USER2> * Reading Packet suggests articles from your Pocket Reading List based on how much time you've got.

Thanks for this as it introduced me to Pocket Reading List.

Have you thought about doing this for RSS as well? Some days I have 200+ new articles and have 10 minutes free. Maybe you can suggest the shorter ones to me then?

<comment><AUTHOR> > Have you thought about doing this for RSS as well?

I'll consider this idea.</comment></comment>


Disturbed sleep patterns may be key to ADHD, study finds - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/sep/02/disturbed-sleep-patterns-may-be-key-to-adhd <comment><USER2> They buried the lede:

"Once we can do that, we may be able to treat some ADHD by non-pharmacological methods, such as changing light..."

It's not sleep, per se, that matters: it's (real) darkness, consistently obtained. Sleeping extra hours every day harms health, it doesn't help it. We've known about intrinsically photosensitive retinal ganglion cells (ipRGCs), for many years now. But somehow people keep thinking "more sleep" when the evidence says "more darkness."</comment>


Ask HN: Why can't I upvote articles in HN search results? - <AUTHOR>

I find it frustrating that if I find a submission in the search result particularly nice, I need to visit the comment thread to upvote it. Why can't the search interface allow upvoting especially since it displays the arrow? <comment><USER2> It seems you didn't notice that the search feature on HN (news.ycombinator.com) is actually handled on an external site (www.hnsearch.com). The tech behind the HN search feature (thriftdb) was created by the amazing folks at Octopart, which is one of the very early YC funded companies.</comment>


Show HN: Create color by number pixel art in the browser - <AUTHOR> https://codepen.io/mathhulk/pen/VwaXOXR <comment><AUTHOR> Hello HackerNews!

This was my first post here on HN, but I've been a frequest visitor for almost a year now. Recently, I've been trying to dive into different ideas and gain experience working with vanilla JavaScript and the HTML5 canvas.

I thought I would share a quick web app I made which allows you to turn any image into color by number pixel art.

Feel free to leave feedback! I'm always looking for ways to improve. :)</comment>


Godaddy now refuses to confirm domain registration - <AUTHOR>

Godaddy have recently as of Jan 1, 2014 stopped sending out system generated emails confirming domain registration. There answer to my enquiry as how one can proove that they are legit owners of a domain in the evnt of a domain dispute were time and time again fobbed off. They have suggested I be content with the receipt available for download by logging into my account but that is nothing but acknowledgemnet of receiving payment for an order placed with them to register a certain domain but is definitely not a certificate of regsitration or another similar.They just point blank refuse to answer my emails despite numerous phone calls all lasting over 45 mins a pop. SO BEWARE ! - shall i transfer all my domains pronto ? - this is INSANE <comment><USER2> Leave GoDaddy.</comment>


Ask HN: Hacker News Homepage down? - <AUTHOR>

Go to https://news.ycombinator.com/<p>The homepage won't load. I thought HN had been down for days... <comment><USER2> Clear your cache.</comment>


Ask HN: What non-profits might the HN crowd be interested in? - <AUTHOR>

Christmas is a great time to re-up on generosity and giving. What non-profits are there that are particularly of interest to the HN crowd? e.g. YC non-profits, or program to help low-income students learn through code <comment><USER2> MSF response against ebola:

[http://www.msf.org/diseases/ebola](http://www.msf.org/diseases/ebola)

Watsi:

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

Bayes Impact:

[http://www.bayesimpact.org/how-it-works](http://www.bayesimpact.org/how-it- works)

</comment><comment><USER3> Check out [http://www.givewell.org/charities/top- charities](http://www.givewell.org/charities/top-charities) if you want to maximize the impact of your donations regardless of the target domain.

For something specifically of interest to hackers and entrepreneurs take a look at CFAR ([http://rationality.org/](http://rationality.org/)). They are a non-profit that teaches decision making skills.

</comment><comment><USER4> [http://khodeup.org/](http://khodeup.org/)</comment>


Ask HN: Code Rails in the browser? - <AUTHOR>

I'd like to be able to link up to my git account, run the server and code in the browser (pushing to heroku would be great too).  Anyone know of something I can do this with? <comment><USER2> You can use an ajax terminal, I think, to accomplish what you're doing. There are a lot of them out there. This was the first Google result:

<http://anyterm.org/>

I know Linode uses an ajax shell, but I can't think of the name of it right now.

</comment><comment> saiko-chriskun <http://koding.com> looks like it'll be your best bet.

</comment><comment><USER3> Maybe this: <https://kodingen.com/>

I have no experience with it though.</comment>


Show HN: Side Racket - create, discover & join amazing projects - <AUTHOR> https://sideracket.com

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi HN, first post. Shit, here we go. Hi.

5 months ago, we started Side Racket to help people do more of what they love. It's a community where it's simple to create, discover and join amazing projects. We launched out of beta today!

We've found it works for connecting all the right players to web projects, but also art/film collaborations or charity things. Side Racket is for the mish- mash of stuff the world does in it's spare time.

Would love to hear what you think!

Thanks,

Mark (and the crew at [https://sideracket.com/side- racket](https://sideracket.com/side-racket))

</comment><comment><USER2> Looks like you've got lots of projects on there already, which was my first concern. How do you go about re-engaging & activating users?

</comment><comment><USER3> Nice one Mark!

</comment><comment><USER4> Love it!</comment>


What's up with the Beep driver in Windows 7? (2010) - <AUTHOR> https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/larryosterman/2010/01/04/whats-up-with-the-beep-driver-in-windows-7/ <comment><USER2> That is a pretty awesome tour de force. Somewhere deep inside your computer is an (emulated) PC/AT trying to get out :-).

An interesting lesson about the use of 'beep' for the assistive technologies. I see those sorts of things in architectures which have grown up over time and I wonder whether or not you could know at the time "Hey we're using this weird thing, please deprecated at your earliest convenience" or if it was more "there I fixed it."

Compatibility at the GPIO level was so ingrained in the PC community early on (there was even a code name for it, "Is it FlightSim compatible?" which referred to Microsoft Flightsim, a game that tested the compatibility limits of clones.) So as a tenet to the community all sorts of hacks could be committed in its name. Something like "Well we can depend on this, if they changed it then it would break compatibility and they can't do that."

Also an interesting take on how much Microsoft has had to unwind in a compatible way over the years.

Finally, the Linux console used to beep the speaker this way (I have no idea if it still does) and sometimes when I lay there sleeping I would hear my server softly feeping, yes feeping on its console bell. Sadly it wouldn't stop until I got up and logged in and figured out what was complaining.

<comment><USER3> > Also an interesting take on how much Microsoft has had to unwind in a > compatible way over the years.

It's very much self-inflicted technical debt. From a Spolsky on Software article from 2004:

> _Raymond Chen is a developer on the Windows team at Microsoft. He 's been > there since 1992, and his weblog The Old New Thing is chock-full of detailed > technical stories about why certain things are the way they are in Windows, > even silly things, which turn out to have very good reasons._

> _The most impressive things to read on Raymond 's weblog are the stories of > the incredible efforts the Windows team has made over the years to support > backwards compatibility:_

        Look at the scenario from the customer's standpoint. You bought programs X,
        Y and Z. You then upgraded to Windows XP. Your computer now crashes
        randomly, and program Z doesn't work at all. You're going to tell your
        friends, "Don't upgrade to Windows XP. It crashes randomly, and it's not
        compatible with program Z." Are you going to debug your system to determine
        that program X is causing the crashes, and that program Z doesn't work
        because it is using undocumented window messages? Of course not. You're
        going to return the Windows XP box for a refund. (You bought programs X, Y,
        and Z some months ago. The 30-day return policy no longer applies to them.
        The only thing you can return is Windows XP.)

> _I first heard about this from one of the developers of the hit game > SimCity, who told me that there was a critical bug in his application: it > used memory right after freeing it, a major no-no that happened to work OK > on DOS but would not work under Windows where memory that is freed is likely > to be snatched up by another running application right away. The testers on > the Windows team were going through various popular applications, testing > them to make sure they worked OK, but SimCity kept crashing. They reported > this to the Windows developers, who disassembled SimCity, stepped through it > in a debugger, found the bug, and_ added special code _that checked if > SimCity was running, and if it did,_ ran the memory allocator in a special > mode in which you could still use memory after freeing it.

> _This was not an unusual case. The Windows testing team is huge and one of > their most important responsibilities is guaranteeing that everyone can > safely upgrade their operating system, no matter what applications they have > installed, and those applications will continue to run, even if those > applications do bad things or use undocumented functions or rely on buggy > behavior that happens to be buggy in Windows n but is no longer buggy in > Windows n+1._

[http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/APIWar.html](http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/APIWar.html)

<comment><USER4> Well, an update is needed: the Windows testing team _was_ huge. Now, if they remark at all a program has a problem, it will just be silently uninstalled during the next major Windows upgrade.

<comment><USER5> The answer to that question is a lot less obvious than one would expect.

Windows installation upgrades (hereafter "migration") have been blocking setup if a known-incompatible program[1] is detected during installation, telling the user to uninstall it prior to allowing the upgrade to continue.

For Windows 10, the goal was to make the migration process (which would take ~40 hours to gather/apply on a typical system from Vista -> 7, the same process takes 20 minutes to an hour on upgrades to modern 10 nowadays) a lot faster, and a lot more seamless, as to get as many users as possible on the latest OS release to reduce effort supporting other software versions[2] and such.

Of course, blocking the installation with a known-incompatible program would result in popping up to the user, say, 'hi, this update can't install until you uninstall this program. please do so!', and they of course will respond 'what update? I don't want to uninstall my program so you can install an update! [I don't trust this at all/I'll forget/...]', and therefore said update (which wouldn't just be from 7/8 -> 10, but also cross-build on 10 itself) would never get installed.

There is no sane way to ask the user, since this will reduce adoption of new builds further than what people not understanding/accepting Microsoft's POV on this will attempt by 'not upgrading'.

[1] A common case to cite is the deinstallation of the product 'Speccy', which, funnily, will cause a system crash in a kernel driver shipped with the product if said older version is later installed on the new OS version and run. Given the chance people will have odd ways to automatically start this, and that people's systems will instantly crash if run, it makes sense to block the installation on this product. [2] I maintained a hobby product that worked with fringe cases in the OS for a long period of time, and over time as I moved to newer OS versions myself, I'd end up having a large amount of features break on downlevel systems due to depending on new implementations/refactors done in 8, 8.1 or 10 with regards to those components of the OS.

<comment><USER4> That's an "interesting" approach. Unfortunately, it is made worst by the fact MS laid off tons of testing engineers a few years ago, and now release clearly buggy versions of Windows. To add insult to the injury, it now does so (adding new bugs and new incompatibilities with perfectly fine programs) every few months...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Anyone else remember that driver that allowed the internal speaker to output wave sound?

I remember days of playing SimCity 2000 and Doom without a sound card, so it was just beeps and buzzes. Then one day I discovered that driver and started to enjoy small sounding wave sound

<comment><USER7> Not exactly that but a similar story for you. I was a huge dork in high school and figured out the sound API on my HP-48G which was just really a way to play a sound from the internal speaker at a frequency and duration. I programmed the first parts of Holst's Jupiter using my calculator and a friend's calculator. Man that was real fun to do. Created an API on top of that to simplify it to play notes at a certain length.

That calculator was amazing. Real nice programming environment there for a high school kid that didn't have programming everywhere like we do today.

<comment><USER8> I did something similar with an Arduino. I managed to get an okay Star Wars out of it.

As for calculators, my school unfortunately standardized in TI: You guys had RPL, we have TI-Basic, which is worse than actual BASIC. And our calculators cost more! (Second-hand, anyways, because let's face it, nobody buys their calculators new)

<comment><USER9> I like to think my TI-83+ from 15 years ago is still being used by some kid who bought it off some kid who bought it off some kid who's the guy that bought it off me when I finished college.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This 8254 mention made me curious. Does anyone know which other parts of the original PC hardware are still present in modern machines for compatibility? (Real mode in CPUs, A20, ...)

<comment><USER11> Intel finally got rid of hardware A20 gating in Haskell. Real mode still exists, and iirc, the processor still defaults to it. You just can't jump into real mode from x64 mode, you need a virtualized environment in 32 bit mode to do that.

<comment><USER12> > Intel finally got rid of hardware A20 gating in Haskell.

Has _w_ ell?

<comment><USER11> Haswell. Curse you, autocorrect.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> david-given ...way back when, a lot of sound cards had a connector on the top which could be hooked up to your CD drive, so that the drive could play Red Book audio which would be sent (as analogue) to your speakers.

Clever me noticed that the pinout of the CD drive matched the pinout of the PC's internal speaker. Aha, I thought; I can connect it up so that the internal speaker noises come out through my sound system.

Turns out that full-voltage square-wave 5V, amplified and pushed through a set of decent speakers, is... slightly loud.

(I was actually lucky not to damage the speakers. Or have a heart attack.)

</comment><comment><USER13> Vaguely related, can anybody explain why the Linux pcspkr driver lives under drivers/input?

<comment><USER14> Because the speaker output is on an integrated circuit with the keyboard controller in many machines.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> The big problem with Beep(), or so did thirteen-year-old me think, was that unless you were on Windows NT it ignored the arguments, always producing a sound with the same frequency and duration. It meant that, despite it seeming like a straightforward replacement, you couldn't really use Beep() to port MS- DOS code that relied on Borland Pascal's CRT unit [1] to produce sound effects with the PC speaker.

[1] [http://putka.upm.si/langref/turboPascal/0698.html](http://putka.upm.si/langref/turboPascal/0698.html)

</comment><comment><USER16> Another problem of using hardware beeper is that when you are using a terminal, you may not hear the beep from the motherboard (which may be located in the next room or even miles away)

</comment><comment><USER17> Simpler times (after a fashion).

</comment><comment><USER18> From 2010.

</comment><comment><USER19> >It turns out that they couldn't. And the answer to why they couldn't came from a totally unexpected place. The American's with Disabilities Act.

I wonder how much this act has cost society. Just in this particular instance, let's say keeping this chip on PC motherboards adds 5¢ to the cost of each motherboard. Multiply by a billion PCs sold in the last 10 years (The actual number is higher, but maybe some don't have the chip. Macs and stuff.). Did having the PC beep provide $50M worth of utility to society over the last ten years? I doubt it. $50M of research into e.g. sight restoration technology would also likely have been more useful to blind people in general.

<comment><USER20> You're making lots of wrong assumptions and insulting remarks here.

This act is not just about 'blind people', but people with all kinds of disabilities. If you read the article, you'll see that Beep() API is used for assistive technologies, which can be anything, from devices for motor impairment to deafness. Not everyone who is disabled is blind.

If this API would have suddenly disappeared the 'cost to society' would have been much higher than the assumed figure of $50M that you're stating here. Imagine if you'd wake up one day and your mouse doesn't work anymore because it's no longer compatible. That's how important assistive technologies can be to disabled people.

Furthermore, the suggestion that blindness can be 'fixed' by donating $50M to 'sight restoration technology' (whatever that is) grossly underestimates the complexities and variety of sight related disabilities. Vision is not a switch you can turn on again with an operation.

<comment><USER19> I'm well aware of the ADA and its effects. There was recently a good report about legal trolls suing small businesses for minor parking space violations under the ADA, so I took the chance to refresh my memory on the act.

>Imagine if you'd wake up one day and your mouse doesn't work anymore because it's no longer compatible.

Huh? This analogy doesn't make any sense. Things aren't compatible because of the ADA; they're compatible thanks to standards bodies and market pressure.

> That's how important assistive technologies can be to disabled people.

Only a small fraction of people need the beeper, and from what I understand based on a presentation from a deaf coworker a few years back, the best assistive technologies are those that emerged naturally, not from archaic ADA- imposed requirements. She cited OS X's accessibility features.

>Vision is not a switch you can turn on again with an operation.

I'm aware. I never said $50M in research would cure blindness; I said it would do more for blind people than a little beeper in the PC chassis. $50M is also quite a conservative estimate.</comment></comment></comment>


Late Applications - <AUTHOR> http://blog.ycombinator.com/late-applications <comment><USER2> We applied late for this batch after hitting key milestones. Submitted last week for Semantic Press (edtech). Ok, back to code..</comment>


A Month Designing in VR - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/facebook-design/a-month-designing-in-vr-62474aef1f1c

<comment><USER2> > Unity provides no way to immediately view full-screen unless you actually > build a standalone OS X or Android app every time.

This has finally been resolved since Unity 5.1.0p1 (12 June 2015), which renders live to a DK2 while in the Editor. This greatly improves the prototyping and development workflow.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd be interested in a little more background on why Unity was dismissed (the immediate feedback is a great point but fixed in the latest Unity). We use Unity for our student VR projects (I think it was initially selected by gut feeling pretty much and sticked around) but I never considered Origami. I'd love some more detail on the VR-UI prototyping flow with Origami.

It's also interesting that the author used mostly "high fidelity". We're currently experimenting with the exact opposite approach by constraining students to use basic geometric forms and encouraging rapid prototyping of the actual interactions. In a college setting students tend to focus too much on creating perfect models etc. from our experience. It just started so I can't report any results.

</comment><comment><USER4> The account makes the current formulation of VR goggles sound like the ideal interface for playing Cyclops from the X-Men. (He seems to have his hand on his goggles a lot, so the Gear VR side trackpad would fit. His power also seems to be about what he's directly looking at.)

This is to say, it seems like for many other tasks, different forms of input are going to be beneficial, if not crucial. Really good contextual voice recognition could be a part of this. The controllers that allow gesturing with the hands will be very helpful.

</comment><comment><USER5> This is great stuff. As VR design becomes more common I hope that there will be some more resources on the topic of 3D UX. can anybody link to any active forums on the topic?

</comment><comment><USER6> "Photoshop → CINEMA 4d → Unity → code".

I have never worked on a 3D project before, so I guess I never considered that you would start off a 3D design in a 2D platform such as photoshop.

<comment><USER7> Photoshop 3D has been a thing for a while.

[https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/how-to/3d-overview- photosh...](https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/how-to/3d-overview- photoshop.html)

Photoshop to generate lightweight mocks and objects -> C4D generates scenes (and/or objects) -> Unity for animation or interactivity

<comment><USER8> To be honest I would have thought that Photoshop would only be used for textures, modelling and mocking up in C4D is very easy and fast for 3D meshes.</comment></comment></comment>