Ask HN: Is Google cataloging my girlfriends? - <AUTHOR>

	I recently did a search on Google using the "Wonder Wheel", which lists related queries as spokes off of your original query. When I searched with my girlfriend's name, one of the spokes was my own name. Not a problem here, as many search results point back and forth between the two of us (blog, twitter, etc).
However, another spoke off of my girlfriend's name was surprisingly my ex-girlfriend's name. Now, of course, this might make sense if they had any related search results, but they don't. There's absolutely nothing on the web that directly links one to the other or contains both of their names. Moreover, there's nothing on the web that links me to my ex, so it can't even be an indirect connection of that sort through me.
Point is, I'm concerned as to how Google came to link the two. Since my current girlfriend and ex have never, to the best of my knowledge communicated online in any way (publicly or privately), the only explanation I can come up with is that Google has taken note that my girlfriend and ex may have done Google searches on each other. Has an invasion of privacy gone on here? Can you think of any other possibilities?
UPDATE: If we don't come up with a reasonable explanation, how should I take this up with Google?
FURTHER UPDATE: Anyone interested in trying the search from themselves can leave contact info for me somewhere. As long as you seem trustworthy and will not share them with others, I'll send you an email with our names so you can confirm/investigate. <comment><USER2> Clearly this is an automated process. No one at Google has done research to determine who you have dated. It is possible that your parent, or friend or neighbor has done searches about both of them.

For example, an old friend may be curious if you are married so they search for you and your old GF names to see if you have a wedding website. Then by talking to a mutual friend at a later date they get your new girlfriends name and do a search for your new girlfriend.

And that is all it takes to make the connection.

<comment><AUTHOR> If I understand what you're saying then despite the decent amount of info about each of us online (I'm a technical author, my girlfriend is a well-known blogger, and my ex does freelance writing for numerous periodicals), the relatively low-volume and infrequent queries that some people are making and that produce no search results are allowing Google to establish the connection?

Yes, the title on this post was a bit facetious, I don't think Google is actually cataloging my girlfriends, but I still don't buy your explanation. There is so much more info out there on each of us, and so many easier and better connections to make, that I am left to suspect that Google is not using the method you described to connect us because it is weaker than other possible connections.

Worse, even if I did accept infrequent GET requests to a search engine as an explanation for Google's connecting the names on the Wonder Wheel, I don't take it as a justification of that act. If a search engine is okay with drawing and publishing connections from just a few searches made, than wow is that a loop hole for fairly private information (especially about lesser-known people) to get out.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Could it be as simple as Google knowing that someone (namely, you) has previously _searched_ for both these names, thereby establishing a connection between them?

I'm not sure whether that should be considered a privacy violation,

<comment><USER4> Yes, in my opinion, that would be a privacy violation.

<comment><USER3> Why exactly, though? And can you suggest a practical solution that does not involve banning query correlation entirely (I don't think anyone is opposed to the idea of showing "Fred Astaire" and "Ginger Rogers" as related because many people search for both of them)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> wonderwheelhuh emailed me the names and, just to confirm, I get the same results (so it doesn't appear to be a hold over from his Google settings/history).

One of the names (the ex's) is the same as a reasonably high profile writer (2K google hits) on the internet so there is a possibility that it is something she visited (perhaps Google reader?) has triggered the link. Edit: it seems his ex _is_ that writer. So the Google reader etc. idea is a red herring :)

The link is one way (it seems) from the current gf to the ex.

(I know that reiterate as lot of what he already said..)

But it does appear somehow Google has linked his ex's name to his gf by some algorithm/process.

<comment><USER6> Perhaps they were linked by one of them obsessively googling the other. I've received bitter comments about a current girlfriend's appearance, occupation, and religion from an ex with whom I shared none of that information. I did a Google search and came up with exactly the information my ex had. The same ex had, when she was my girlfriend, researched my previous ex and obsessed about her appearance, occupation, etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Maybe they met in secret to conspire against you.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ha, would that also imply Google even-more-secretly spying on them?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> One of the spokes off a wonder wheel for my name is "jonathan rockway fired". Does Google know something I don't!?

<comment><USER5> I'm even more concerned. Mine has "tom morton beatcroft" as a spoke....

Don't even know what that means!

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I'd prefer not to have to share their names, but honestly, if it means bringing a privacy violation to our attention, I will.

But yeah, for now, please see if you can come up with any other explanations.

<comment><USER9> Even if you decide to post the actual names, do it slowly. Remember that once you post the names here, all search results that you are talking about will get destroyed by this information now being available on a single page.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> > the only explanation I can come up with is that Google has taken note that > my girlfriend and ex may have done Google searches on each other

That seems.... unlikely. Mostly for logistical/practical reasons than anything else.

Were you logged in at the time? That seems more likely.

Did the name pull up actual results on your ex? Is there a more reasonable explanation (i.e. could it be someone else your GF is interested in).

<comment><AUTHOR> > Were you logged in at the time? That seems more likely.

I am not.

> Did the name pull up actual results on your ex?

It does not.

> Is there a more reasonable explanation (i.e. could it be someone else your > GF is interested in).

Of course some other connection between my girlfriend and ex may be possible, but none exist or are record online to the best of my knowledge. The problem with this answer is that all of us have considerably more readily associated information, and even if there is a rare case of indirect connection, it seems unreasonable that Google would weight it so greatly so as to make it one of the 8 Wonder Wheel connections.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Is it possible that each of them has searched both for her own name and for yours?

</comment><comment><USER11> One question, do you use GMail?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, my girlfriend and I use GMail.

I am unaware of whether my ex uses GMail or not. We were in school when we met and had uni email addresses.

<comment><AUTHOR> I just did a search and found that my ex does now use GMail.

I also searched through the contacts and conversations for both my GMail account and my girlfriend's (she consented, of course) - result: in neither did my ex show up.

<comment><USER12> Are you logged in to your google account while searching?

I have found that the results change when you are and it will promote things that you have search for and emailed about before.

<comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately not - I am not logged in when I make the query.

<comment><USER13> Could you try the same query after deleting all the google cookies?

<comment><USER14> And flash cookies from all google's domains. Youtube for example.

<comment><AUTHOR> I sent ErrantX the list of names via email and he has independently confirmed the results.

Looks like it's definitely not a personalized result.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The wonder wheel search is useless for my name... maybe it doesn't have a full index.

You might have overlooked that your ex could have posed information about you online. Google probably figured out that you were related to her in some way and it's why she shows up as a "personable" (and similar way you're linked to your current gf) link to you.

</comment><comment><USER16> I worked on Wonder Wheel, though on the frontend and not the backend. Drop me an e-mail with the queries. I don't know enough about the backend algorithms to guess what may be causing this (nor do I know if I could reveal them if I did), but I may be able to route this to someone who has a better idea than I do.

</comment><comment><USER17> Look up "Latent Semantic Indexing".

That should lead you to an explanation that'll ease your paranoia.

</comment><comment><USER18> I'm not sure if it's more or less sinister than Google tracking your searches, but it's also possible it's noting your most frequent email correspondence.

Maybe it takes into account words that show up frequently in your email?

<comment><AUTHOR> Some more info:

1) When I do the search described, I do it without being logged into any Google account.

2) To the absolute best of my knowledge, no email correspondences to my ex or about my ex have ever come out of my GMail account or my girlfriends.

I would consider email tracking more sinister for sure, so in some ways I'm glad it's not that.

That said, it's definitely not the volume of searches people are doing on anyone's names that have created the association (we all have a fair amount of individual web presence). So again, my only hunch is that Google has taken note that my girlfriend while logged in has searched for my ex (I have this confirmed) and that my ex likewise may have done the same.

If that is the case, I definitely 'feel' privacy violation going on since they're not using queries on aggregate to craft results, but instead are considering low-volume queries between users as a sign of association.

<comment><USER5> That seems a little unlikely - simply because, as you say, there is no link between the two girls. So why has Google made that link (when I am sure a large number of people with the same name exist).

What it could be is your girlfriend Googled her name while logged in (i.e. rather than matching the two it just recognizes it as something she searched for). Even that seems unlikely - how does Google know you mean that person when Googling her - does she even have her name registered with Google. and so forth.

There are so many variables I really think that, using Occams razor, it is a highly unlikely solution :)

Also; Wonder Wheel has always given very slap dash to me. I've not observed this level of sophistication in it before...

Would you consider giving the name(s) to someone you trust (but not nearby) for them to perform the same search. That might give us some better data to figure it out.

EDIT: email is on my profile if you want me to check.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Wonder wheel on my name shows my professional interests, and doesn't show any names of women at all. (My wife of twenty-six-plus years has little Internet presence.)

</comment><comment><USER20> Seems they finally copied <http://searchpoint.ijs.si/Result.aspx>

</comment><comment><USER21> If a third-party (you) searched for your current girlfriend and then for your ex (or vice versa) that could make them related queries. Click on the link at the end of the spoke and follow the six degrees of separation.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah, interesting possibility, but I don't think it could have been I who catalyzed it.

My concern first arose when I searched for my girlfriend and surprisingly spotted my ex as a spoke. The only other search I had done was for myself.</comment></comment>


CastTV Raises $3.1 Million To Revolutionize Video Search - <AUTHOR> http://corp.casttv.com/news/2007/04/23/casttv-closes-series-a-led-by-dfj/ <comment><USER2> Wow. That is a lot of money.</comment>


Why are GPUs necessary for training Deep Learning models? (2017) - <AUTHOR> https://www.analyticsvidhya.com/blog/2017/05/gpus-necessary-for-deep-learning/ <comment><AUTHOR> Most of you would have heard exciting stuff happening using deep learning. You would have also heard that Deep Learning requires a lot of hardware. I have seen people training a simple deep learning model for days on their laptops (typically without GPUs) which leads to an impression that Deep Learning requires big systems to run execute.</comment>


Thoughts on the Bitcoin Hard Fork - <AUTHOR> http://www.ryanyosua.me/bitcoin-hard-fork/ <comment><USER2> Hard forks are a feature of cryptocurrencies. Their overall impact is broadly positive.

In fact, Bitcoin Cash and Ethereum Classic bring some benefits and increased competition to the main blockchains, so we'll probably continue to see hard forks of Bitcoin and Ethereum.

<comment><AUTHOR> Agreed.</comment></comment>


Introduction to DNA-Based Data Storage and CATALOG - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiPvJfbq2No <comment><USER2> Just as with any medium, regardless of the life expectancy of the data storage - you'll still need a method to read it out.

Assuming you can store data in this for >1,000 years - and it is found, how can it be read?

Also, can you take this encoding method and get it spliced into say, the DNA of algea which will reproduce it?

Or maybe into yeast?</comment>


Android Teleportation (or silly location restrictions) - <AUTHOR> http://blog.gingerlime.com/2014/android-teleportation-or-silly-location-restrictions/ <comment><USER2> As annoying as location restrictions are, one reason is often taxation laws.

I would _love_ to offer my apps for sale in every country in the world, but as a non-European, to legally sell my apps on the Google Play store in European countries, I have to apply to an EU country to establish a business nexus there, and file VAT tax returns every few months. (Yes, the EU requires non-EU businesses to remit VAT on digital software sales, they regard online sales as occurring where the customer resides.) It's a ridiculous amount of bureaucracy for a 99c app that is unlikely to earn much anyway, so right now I just exclude sales to European countries instead.

There's a blog post from Retro Dreamer with more info on this, as one example of location restrictions being a result of tax laws: [http://retrodreamer.com/blog/2012/03/why-dont-we-have- paid-v...](http://retrodreamer.com/blog/2012/03/why-dont-we-have-paid- versions-on-the-android-market/)

So don't always blame the content creator, the bottleneck might be closer to where you are. I love Berlin, but it also has some of the worst geolocation restrictions due to local laws (look into GEMA blocking music on YouTube, if you haven't encountered it yet - even if the artist wants you to listen to it, GEMA can block the song because it hasn't been officially registered with authorities yet).

<comment><USER3> This is probably a stupid question but how would they go after you for not paying the tax if you don't even live in the country? Would they even be able to detect it? And is there any basis for blocking based on IP, instead of a disclaimer or some other method of identification?

<comment><USER2> If you don't live in an EU country, they generally can't / don't pursue you, but if you travel to Europe (as I do sometimes) they could arrest you when you cross the border. There was a case of that happening to a developer in the desktop software days, but I can't find a link to the news story now.

In practice, the EU pressured US-based payment gateways into handling it on behalf of developers (which is really best for everyone, and essentially what Apple & Amazon already does today).

If you don't mind ignoring EU laws, I'm sure most people on the Google Play store are also ignoring them and getting away with it. But there are lots of Nintendo IP infringements on the Google Play store as well, so the fact that it's common doesn't necessarily make it legal.

For some history, there's an old Business Of Software thread on the debate, including folks like Andy Brice & Patrick McKenzie chiming in with their views:

[http://discuss.joelonsoftware.com/default.asp?biz.5.465929.3...](http://discuss.joelonsoftware.com/default.asp?biz.5.465929.30)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is really annoying. While traveling in Europe last fall I couldn't download movies from Google Play on my device for the flight back, even though I had purchased them before leaving the US!

Really bad user experience.

</comment><comment><USER5> "Those location-based restrictions are totally silly. I can't figure out any logical reason to block people from accessing (and paying!) for your apps and content if they happen to be elsewhere."

Some apps depend on data that is country specific, or do things that other countries don't need or understand. Or perhaps there isn't much of a market for it there, so the number of users being low may make the app worthless.

Any time someone downloads an app and it doesn't work, they don't understand it, it's not in their language, or it doesn't provide them immediate value, you run the risk of a 1 star review.

</comment><comment><USER6> It's not silly at all.

The legal situation in some countries is dangerous or even crazy. If you can protect yourself from exposure to it when you're vulnerable, then you should consider doing so.

For instance, Japan has long copyright terms. Copyright extends to the end of the life of the author plus fifty years. But the EU has ludicrous copyright terms that are at least 20 years longer. Copyright in the USA is permanent (technically, the congress has to comply with Disney's lobbying every 20 years to keep extending it, but the vote is unanimous). So there's a lot of material .jp servers and apps might want to offer you that's illegal in the EU or USA.

Even worse than that, the USA has a patent system where in app purchase is covered by dozens of patents, online backup or storage is covered by thousands of patents, basic common UI elements are almost all patented, and so on. You can't write even a trivial app without either infringing or buying millions of dollars in licenses. App authors just have to be comfortable with infringing and accepting effectively unlimited liability.

Well, okay, I guess it is silly and crazy, but it's not the fault of Google or app publishers. The legal systems of modern nations as they apply to the internet are nasty and they're all different. Wise people might be reluctant to expose themselves unnecessarily.

<comment><AUTHOR> > Well, okay, I guess it is silly and crazy, but it's not the fault of Google > or app publishers. The legal systems of modern nations as they apply to the > internet are nasty and they're all different.

OP here. The fact that a media like (e)books become entangled in this mess is totally absurd. Think of a paper book suddenly becoming illegal (regardless of its contents) as soon as it crosses some border.

> Wise people might be reluctant to expose themselves unnecessarily.

Wise people should aim to please their customers, and build a good and honest relationship with them. I think those who embrace the new medium and understand its potential to reach a far wider audience would succeed. Sticking to old rules and regulations that fail to catch-up with progress won't solve any problem.

I also think consumers should aim to acquire media that is not bound to the delivery mechanism. And it should also be within the interest of authors and publishers.

Why can't I choose the app to read my ebook independently of the ebook itself??

<comment><USER6> >>The fact that a media like (e)books become entangled in this mess is totally absurd.

Yes, of course. But it's not Google's fault. The publishers and the governments set the rules.

>> Think of a paper book suddenly becoming illegal (regardless of its contents) as soon as it crosses some border.

One of the principal jobs of US Customs is seizing illegal books and other items that infringe on copyright, trademark, and patent privileges.

The Supreme Court recently reversed precedent to allow importation of textbooks that are legally published under license from US publishers. Until then, it was presumptively illegal and the court gave publishers a simple formula to make it illegal again. [0] It's also not legal to import items --presumably including books -- that may have trademarked logos imprinted on them without the consent of the trademark holder and those trademarks can be used to prevent importation of items (e.g. watches or books) whose function is unrelated to the trademark itself. [1]

>> Sticking to old rules and regulations that fail to catch-up with progress won't solve any problem.

It solves the problem where the people enforcing those rules can put you in jail.

>> I also think consumers should aim to acquire media that is not bound to the delivery mechanism.

Say goodbye to the cloud. Actually, that's not such a bad idea. [2] It sure limits your ability to access media, though. And subjects you to a lot of border searches.

[0] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirtsaeng_v._John_Wiley_%26_Son...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirtsaeng_v._John_Wiley_%26_Sons,_Inc).

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_S.A._v._Costco_Wholesale_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_S.A._v._Costco_Wholesale_Corp).

[2] [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/cloud-to-butt- plus...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/cloud-to-butt- plus/apmlngnhgbnjpajelfkmabhkfapgnoai?hl=en)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > Those location-based restrictions are totally silly. I can't figure out any > logical reason to block people from accessing (and paying!) for your apps > and content if they happen to be elsewhere.

To give you an example why this makes sense:

One of our apps uses local dialin numbers to allow our customers to make cheap calls to foreign countries.

Since we do not have local dialin numbers in every single country, we limit the access to those countries.

If we didn't limit the access the app would either be useless to some customers, or useless AND very expensive (if for example a US customer routed via German dialin number to his destination)

So to me, this is a feature, you often just don't have the information about the technical or regulatory reasons why an app is restricted.

</comment><comment><USER8> As a Canadian who endlessly faces geo-restrictions on US-based content, it seems inaccurate to hold DVD regionalization as some bygone oddity -- it is very much alive and well, maybe more prevalent than ever.

The logical reason is of course business optimization. The people who licensed content to a Japanese ebook bookseller don't want them taking sales from other licensees in other areas. The television program that is on Hulu doesn't want to be seen by Canadians, where entirely different licensees pay big money for a monopoly on the content. And so on.

And of course the Android store lets you limit apps to certain countries often for entirely practical reasons. When the Chromecast was only available in the US, the app was similarly restricted to only the US, presumably to avoid support and other issues outside of the country.

<comment><AUTHOR> Similarly to my comment above, I think there's an unnecessary entanglement of delivery mechanism (the app) and content (the ebook).

Authors and publishers should realise the potential to reach audiences that would otherwise not be accessible, and make the most of it. Instead they lock themselves and take away one of the amazing benefits of this new format.

I think the DVD region protection has clearly failed. Most players can be switched to region-free mode, and it's much easier obtaining copies of the media via file sharing or otherwise (and in many cases it would be legal to do so if you own a copy of the DVD).

I was hoping that by now people will learn from the mistakes of the DVD region protection and the frustration it brought to customers who paid for your product and figure out something better by now. But this stupidity will likely to continue, until it fails again.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This thread is full of purely self-inflicted problems.

Stop. Patronizing. The. Dinosaurs.</comment>


Ask HN: What are some good examples of true Single Page Applications? - <AUTHOR> I'm currently playing around with Clojure/Script and am trying to build a simple SPA. I think I finally get the high level concept of it, but then I realized I don't really know any website that feels like a true single page application... It would be really helpful to see what good examples of SPAs are out there, if any. Also any recommendations for other resources about the topic of building/designing single page applications would be greatly appreciated. <comment><USER2> Check out music apps like Pandora, Spotify or Napster. All these are built as a single page app to ensure that music keeps on playing while browsing the catalogue.</comment>


Rhode Island now owns all of 38 Studios' IP - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2012/05/kingdoms-of-amalur-developer-lays-off-entire-staff/

<comment><USER3> How the hell did they burn through $75 million - and why did they hire 400 people to work on this game? If thats the kind of resources needed for a AAA game these days, somethings seriously gone wrong. That they sold 1.3 million copies and didn't break even shows that they did something very wrong - <USER2> games don't even sell that many copies! Certainly very few sell 3 million, which is (according to the article) what they needed to sell to break even.

Ok, so clearly most of that budget (and employees) went towards their MMO project, but history has shown MMO's to be very risky.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Related link to an article written before the Studio's default, detailing what happens to the IP:

[http://www.joystiq.com/2012/05/16/rhode-island- owns-38-studi...](http://www.joystiq.com/2012/05/16/rhode-island- owns-38-studios-intellectual-property/)</comment>


Show HN: Logarithmic Flappy 2048 - <AUTHOR> http://logarithmic-flappy-2048.ajf.me/ <comment><USER2> Quite a coincidence that I see this tonight. I was on the bus today and noticed someone playing a game on their phone, something simple where you have to trace over a pattern as closely as you can. It was frustrating to watch because every time the user wanted to repeat a level or move on to the next, they were forced to tap through a couple of intermediary screens with flashy stats that took up as much time to get through as playing a level. Contrast that to this game where starting over takes me 0.0 seconds. You jump right back into gameplay, forgetting all the frustration that came with messing up on your previous attempt. More games should take note.

<comment><USER3> Ah, but then when will you show users ads, or prompt them to buy 20 gems?

<comment><USER4> It's a very valid point, but you can't fit everything at once, on the same screen. Current and high score, goals, etc. They add to user experience and satisfaction.

<comment><USER5> For some users, for some games. In many casual games, a "zero-delay" _option_ would be a nice feature, and a nice bonus for a "remove ads" in-app purchase.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I would describe this as multiplicative rather than logarithmic. 2×2×2×2...

Or maybe exponential if you consider your score to be 2^(number of walls you've jumped).

I don't get logarithmic, though.

<comment><USER7> This is the exponential function, 2^x. Where the independent variable is the number of walls jumped. For instance, after 30 jumps, your score/tile reads 1073741824, or 2^30.

<comment><USER8> Or it's the logarithmic function lg(x), where the independent variable is the score and the dependent variable is roughly proportional to the number of times you've clicked.

<comment><USER7> Well yes, logbase2(x), where x is your score, does equal the number of wall jumps. But that doesn't account for how the game is laid out. Your score is a result of the number of jumps you've made. The number of jumps you've made is not the result of your score. Therefore, despite these two functions being the inversely related, the correct relationship is 2^x. That is just my opinion though.

<comment><USER8> I agree "exponential" would have been a more natural choice.

 _" Therefore, despite these two functions being the inversely related, the correct relationship is 2^x."_

There is no "correct relationship", there is a relationship that (depending on choice of variables) we can describe as y=2^x or y=lg(x).

<comment><USER9> Sure, score = 2^walls iff log_2(score) = walls. So, being equivalent statements, one alone can not be correct.

However, as you said, one choice of describing the relationship is certainly more natural. The exponential description assigns a score to every natural number. While the logarithmic description does not.

I would interpret correct in the way that it is sometimes said, "the correct way to think about X is..." which doesn't say other ways of thinking are wrong, but limited or not illuminating.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It is a bit odd when the numbers go into scientific notation. :)

[http://i.imgur.com/Q2qHoSs.png](http://i.imgur.com/Q2qHoSs.png)

Also, it seems that at a certain point length, the two score boxes will shift to being on top of one another instead of side by side[1], which moves the whole playfield's place in the window. Adds a bit of an added challenge!

[1] [http://i.imgur.com/BW6RV2e.png](http://i.imgur.com/BW6RV2e.png)

</comment><comment><USER11> Cool. I'm on a MBP with 1280x800 resolution and tapping up on the keyboard moves the page to the top, which cuts off the bottom of the game board. A little annoying :(

<comment><USER12> You can press _any_ key ;)

<comment><USER13> Where can I find the any-key?

<comment><USER14> all i see is catarl, pig-up, and esc

<comment><USER15> I just used one of those little water-bird things to play the game and won!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Inspired by this comment: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7431180](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7431180)

I literally just made the display code use Math.pow(2) on everything, after discovering that changing the internal score by doubling instead of incremental would increase the speed exponentially with each hop, rendering it unplayable.

</comment><comment><USER16> Welp. [http://cl.ly/image/13370z0l053H](http://cl.ly/image/13370z0l053H)

<comment><USER17> Score thread? Score thread. [http://i.imgur.com/aOf0Dxz.png](http://i.imgur.com/aOf0Dxz.png)

<comment><USER18> woot woot [http://i.imgur.com/MTNHbct.png](http://i.imgur.com/MTNHbct.png)

<comment><USER19> I'm glad I can just see these replies so I can actually not have to play, and not have to sit here wondering what happens if your score goes high enough.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Haha, I got a nice overflow when the score reached 68719476736.

<comment><USER21> I got to 576460752303423500 without a problem.

[http://i.imgur.com/WBdl0Qt.png](http://i.imgur.com/WBdl0Qt.png)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Is it just me or do the arrows not lock to the game and push the scrollbar up, making you not see the whole game? The previous game had the same problem.

</comment><comment><USER23> Alright, now I understand the appeal of flappy bird.

</comment><comment><USER24> Can someone compile a list of all the versions of 2048 that have come out in the past several days? I have an addiction.

<comment><USER25> There's some noise, but I think [http://www.reddit.com/r/2048/](http://www.reddit.com/r/2048/) is the go-to place.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I guess things like this can't be avoided. anyway, great idea, but I think you can add features that let's the flying tile hit numbered tile that can get the score higher. just suggesting. or not.

</comment><comment><USER27> Haha, this is surprisingly easier to get to 2048 than the original 2048.

</comment><comment><USER28> Only spent 5 seconds playing, but this is brilliant. Well done :)

</comment><comment><USER29> Zero regrets. [http://i.gyazo.com/6dbade70edecb79824bc1ebb70cc7e2d.png](http://i.gyazo.com/6dbade70edecb79824bc1ebb70cc7e2d.png)

</comment><comment><USER30> This was clearly developed on a very large monitor ... because when I press the up arrow, it scroll the document up and I can't see the bottom of the board.

I got 8096 btw!

<comment><USER31> and the rest of us [1366X768] are left behind

i can't believe you got 8096, i got like 8

edit: a new high, 16

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Got to e+99, now what. Shouldn't it just end at 2048?

</comment><comment><USER33> I'm sorry, isn't this just flappy bird?

</comment><comment><USER34> [http://i.imgur.com/Hi5CQf6.gif](http://i.imgur.com/Hi5CQf6.gif)

</comment><comment><USER35> Awaiting Doge and Dr. Who versions.

<comment><USER36> 50% complete: [http://doge2048.com/](http://doge2048.com/)

<comment><USER37> Cool. This version is more challenging since it's hard to remember the ordering of images. Also, I had to cheat to see the "final" image, the derp. That was a motivation, too: I wanted to see what the next image would be!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Only issue is when you press up it scrolls all the way up during the game and it gets cut off.

</comment><comment><USER15> This is actually significantly better than Flappy Bird because it has ACCURATE hit detection.

<comment><USER39> Why do you think the hit decetion is off in Flappy Bird? I think it's very accurate and fair and that that's one of the reasons it became such a hit.

</comment></comment><comment> 0-o >9000.

</comment><comment><USER40> OK, I LOLed this time.</comment>


Code for the User, Not for Yourself - <AUTHOR> http://www.yegor256.com/2015/02/12/top-down-design.html?2015-06 <comment><USER2> Oh man, this is so important.

Yesterday we had a meeting, and this one guy in the team couldn't even imagine that we are NOT the users, so he was unable to take a different point of view...

It was a long discussion but totally worth it.</comment>


World Models (the long version) - climate-code https://adgefficiency.com/world-models/ <comment><AUTHOR> Side point on the AWS cost for the project.

Total spend was $3.648 over 11 months. For that amount you can tailor a pretty powerful workstation these days, saving you quite a bit of AWS headaches and overheads (and yes, potentially trading those for others, I know).

Still, this seems like a decent candidate for omitting the cloud as at first sight I do not detect any asks that scream out cloud to me.

Thoughts?

<comment><USER2> I can't speak to the author's workflow but I also do ML research and I often need heavy bursts of computation with long stretches of nothing in between. So I might spend a few hundred bucks in a couple of days by using multiple very powerful instances at the same time. Even if the cost ends up being the same as a workstation over a year, when it matters the cloud gives me results faster than a workstation would and this enables fast iteration over ideas.

<comment><AUTHOR> Bursting is definitely a point. It wasn't clear to me from the data at first glance whether this was used here.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> World Models is a good paper, but is definitely not the top three most significant RL papers.

<comment><USER4> Which are the top three mist significant RL papers?

<comment><USER5> Other than the AlphaZero papers and DQN, maybe TRPO? (assuming we're talking about deep RL)</comment></comment></comment>


Eastgate Centre, Harare - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastgate_Centre,_Harare <comment><USER2> I was in Cairo a few years ago and in the old Islamic city there was a couple of big mosques. This dates back to the Islamic era (around 1359). Standing in the venue that separate the two mosques. Here is the location: [https://goo.gl/maps/ibwqwb33PcUJvm1K7](https://goo.gl/maps/ibwqwb33PcUJvm1K7)

It was in the Summer and Cairo was boiling hot. But interestingly the venue was pretty cool. There was two factors: The mosques shadowed each other in a way that you don't get exposed in the sun. Another factor, there was a cool air flow coming from somewhere(?). My guess would be that the two buildings where engineered to both protect from the sun and generate the airflow.

You can sit in the venue all day long and not be annoyed with the hot weather. The buildings themselves where pretty cool inside.

I think the question is: Why are we so inefficient today? It's not about looks either: We are building even uglier buildings. The building I'm living in right now is buzzing with air-conditioning units. It's wasteful and it's also an inferior solution (headaches, dry air, only inside is cool, etc...)

<comment><USER3> Most advanced passive cooling in traditional buildings I see seem to be in the Middle East and I don't recall every seeing any passive cooling in traditional Western architecture. The loss of passive cooling is probably a consequence of the homogenization of architectural styles we've experiencing for the past several centuries.

<comment><USER4> The ancient romans had implivium, [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impluvium](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impluvium), to do the same sort of job. The water in the pool would cool the surrounding air and air drawn in from the opening in the roof above would circulate it through the surrounding rooms.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> The HN policy of using the title name makes it difficult to appear interesting.

I posted this prompted by a comment discussing the cooling property of solar panels:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=20424275](https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=20424275)

<comment><USER5> Actually I would say it's the opposite: if there are some upvotes on a post such as this, I'm very much inclined to find out why an obscure Wikipedia article has made it to the front page. Some weeks ago someone else actually described this concept as a form of clickbait.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I wish the Wikipedia article had more information about the drawbacks of such a solution. The main ones I can think of are cost of design, limited sunlight, and that it's only a viable option in temperate climates, but I'm sure there's more.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> This is an interview with the architect:

[https://youtube.com/watch?v=VIKYjriWgiY](https://youtube.com/watch?v=VIKYjriWgiY)

What comes across is that the client was very keen to do this, is there any reason why there aren't many other buildings like this?

Mention is made of Portcullis House, office by the Houses of Parliament. Are they expensive to design? Just unusual for architects to design?

Shouldn't this be standard where possible?

<comment><AUTHOR> There's a website called Carbon Culture which shows the energy use of a building, and they have a page for Portcullis House which uses the same chimney method. Although I doubt cooling in London is as much of an issue as Harare.

[https://platform.carbonculture.net/places/portcullis- house/5...](https://platform.carbonculture.net/places/portcullis-house/51/)

Portcullis House Wikipedia entry, though doesn't seem interested in its energy use:

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

<comment><USER7> > Although I doubt cooling in London is as much of an issue as Harare.

The climate is similar in both cities.

Harare's average January (summer) daily mean is 21°C, London's (July) is 19°C.

The average highs are 26°C and 24°C. The high-low range, which looks to be important so the building can cool at night, is 10°C in both.

<comment><USER8> Harare is 15 degrees south and London is 50 degrees north of the equator. The sun is much more intense in Harare and occupies less of the day, allowing more time for the vents to cool the building. That said, this principle can be applied in London as well.

<comment><USER9> Does London even need cooling on 99% of days? 25 degrees is the temperatures air-conditioners are often set to in the tropical country I live in.

<comment><USER10> If your AC is producing 25-degree air, it'll be quite dry, which London is not. (But Harare is, I believe.) That said 25 should still be fine, but there are days which are 30 & humid, which are pretty uncomfortable. Not so many, but more than 1% I think.

Most buildings there are also designed much more for winter. The windows seal well but often don't open that wide, and there will be a fire door making sure you can't get cross-ventilation, etc.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> >Pearce's practice is in Harare, and he specialises in buildings which are low cost, low maintenance, and have low environmental impact. His projects try to make best use of locally available resources, and include Harare International School Arts Centre, Harare Hindoo Temple and Chinhoyi Provincial Hospital, Zimbabwe.

This sounds more like the architect's resume than a Wikipedia article.

</comment><comment><USER12> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawa_Mahal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawa_Mahal)

Hawa Mahal in India uses venturi effect for cooling.

</comment><comment><USER13> I've been to the Eastgate Centre a couple of times and think it's an excellent building -- aside from its passive cooling, its retail space is quite people- friendly and attractive. That said, it's probably worth noting that Harare is not a particularly hot city, courtesy of its altitude (1500m/5000ft.) I wonder if this would be as effective in a truly oppressively hot place like the Horn of Africa.

</comment><comment><USER14> Reminds me of Yakhchāl, the 2500 year old Persian "refrigerator." [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakhch%C4%81l](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakhch%C4%81l)

</comment><comment><USER15> On a smaller scale, the concept has been used in the Middle East: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windcatcher](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windcatcher)

If there is wind, you don't even need the fans that are used in the basement of the Eastgate Centre.

</comment><comment><USER16> A high efficiency high rise for a much less temperate climate that incorporates some of the same ideas:

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

</comment><comment><USER17> This building is a masterpiece and a towering (no pun intended) achievement. If I were 18 I would make this my career, and today would be the day I would talk about with journalists 20 years later when they asked where my ideas came from!

</comment><comment><USER18> The tower at PNC in Pittsburgh is a new skyscraper that has a similar solar chimney model and relies on passive aircon for 42% of the year. [https://www.architectmagazine.com/awards/r-d-awards/award- th...](https://www.architectmagazine.com/awards/r-d-awards/award-the-tower-at- pnc-plaza_o)

</comment><comment><USER19> _They said that no direct sunlight must fall on the external walls at all and the north façade [direction of summer sun] window-to-wall area must not exceed 25%._

Pass. Natural light (and tons of it!) are a hard requirement for anywhere I actually want to work. (Besides light and airy spaces being generally pleasant, I have mild SAD.)

In any case, I'd rather use modern air conditioning, which is stunningly efficient. It also actually produces temperatures I can live in. They don't quote actual interior temperatures (or humidities!) but I'll bet their "acceptable" is 78F+. Anything north of 70 and I am a sweaty mess. (If you're cold, put on a sweater; I can't exactly strip in the office and you wouldn't want to sit next to me anyway!)

Complaints about air conditioning are mostly a form of modern self- flagellation. If you're not suffering, you're not doing enough for Gaia. Cost/benefit calculations simply don't enter into it (if they did, someone might point out that eliminating all cooling whatsoever would not even move the needle on US energy. Consider [https://www.vox.com/energy-and- environment/2017/4/13/1526860...](https://www.vox.com/energy-and- environment/2017/4/13/15268604/american-energy-one-diagram) and [https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=1174&t=1](https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=1174&t=1), from which you can see that cooling is 9% of electricity, which is perhaps 38% of total energy usage.)

<comment><USER20> So any office you work in must be kept at 70F or below for your comfort, and your colleagues must wear sweaters?

Could there be a heath and fitness change you could make so the rest of the world wouldn't have to suffer in cold offices? Working perpetually cold is miserable, and extra layers is only a partial solution.

Also, no matter how efficient modern air conditioning is relative to older systems, it's still a financial expense that should be measured and minimized where possible.

<comment><USER21> I'm in the same boat as the person you're replying to. I have a really hard time in temperatures above 23-25C (sometimes slightly higher if it's really dry) and I _really_ wouldn't want to work in such an environment. I sweat extremely easily in the heat, even idle, which is deeply uncomfortable.

I'm noting how incredibly rude your reply is; implying that there's a fitness issue causing the condition (at least in my case, there is not), and implying that GP wants to impose "their rule" on people who won't like it.

I work at home, FWIW, and my girlfriend doesn't like heat either. It's a good arrangement. You didn't get the chance to make assumptions about me, but please don't make assumptions about GP either.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Eastgate centre is one of the most popular houses in the area. I would like to live in the house similar to Eastgate centre. I know that find a house like that is practically impossible, however, you can find the house great to live in online. I just visited Pin](https://pin.tt/realestate/residential-sale/">Pin) and found myself a cool house to rent.

</comment><comment><USER22> Eastgate centre is one of the most popular houses in the area. I would like to live in the house similar to Eastgate centre. I know that find a house like that is practically impossible, however, you can find the house great to live in online. I just visited [https://pin.tt/realestate/residential- sale/](https://pin.tt/realestate/residential-sale/) and found myself a cool house to rent.</comment>


Microsoft-Yahoo Search Deal: The Most Important Facts (And Some Opinion)  - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/29/microsoft-yahoo-search-deal-the-most-important-facts-and-some-opinion/?awesm=tcrn.ch_1VPs&utm_campaign=techcrunch&utm_medium=tcrn.ch-twitter&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_content=twitter-publisher-plugin <comment><USER2> Dinosaurs mating</comment>


Google Preps Maps App for Apple iPhones - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424127887324595904578121361589950722-lMyQjAxMTAyMDEwNTExNDUyWj.html

<comment><USER2> Fantastic. This might finally allow iOS 5 hold-outs to upgrade to iOS 6.

<comment><USER3> Unless you rely on an app that uses MapKit for an embedded app. They will still use the Apple one.

<comment><USER4> Google could be well be working on a drop in MapKit replacement as well. As least I would if I were them.

<comment><USER3> That would require the developer to rebuild their app with the Google map in there instead of (or as well as) MapKit which, will possible, seems unlikely for most apps.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Why? Shouldn't this be a benefit to using Android? I just ditched my iPhone for an Android phone and Apple Maps was a major reason why I didn't go for the iPhone 5. Now that I've owned an Android phone, I couldn't be happier and more impressed with the device.

<comment><USER6> Amazon sells a lot of Kindle books on the iOS application I am sure. This is a similar strategy.

<comment><USER7> Amazon sells a lot of Kindle books that are read with the iOS application. Amazon hasn't sold any books on the iOS application for over a year (and, arguably, never has because even before the IAP controversy the Kindle app buy button sent you to Amazon's website in Safari).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> If that's true, the decision to remove the stagnant Google powered Maps was the best decision. Now, if Google releases a mapping app, it will _have_ to include turn-by-turn navigation and better overall experience.

<comment><USER9> But since it can never be set as the default mapping app it will always be a sub-par experience. What happens when you open your contacts and want to map your contacts address? Or when you are using any other app and want to map an included address?

<comment><USER10> Once the users that have been clamoring for Google Maps realize this problem there will probably be some pressure on Apple to come out with customizable defaults for something like Maps. I kind of doubt they would ever copy a fully flexible system like Android's Intents, but I could see them allowing some limited choices for a few tasks. Though probably not for mapping since they seem to think that is strategic for them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Good. Apples map data is OK, but their search sucks.

<comment><USER12> Their map data is useless here in Vietnam. Even in downtown Saigon there's hardly any detail.

<comment><USER13> Google Maps saved my hide several times when I was staying in Saigon. The cab drivers can't find their way around District 7 even when they aren't trying to take the long route.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> What's with the iPhone photo they used? Did they go out of their way to find the dirtiest smudged-with-fingerprints picture they could find?

<comment><USER15> True, it doesn't look like an Apple marketing photo; it looks like every iPhone I've ever seen in the real world.

Instead of using Apple PR imagery, they took a picture of an actual iPhone in its natural state.</comment></comment>


CompSci 101 - Big-O notation - <AUTHOR> http://recursive-design.com/blog/2010/12/07/comp-sci-101-big-o-notation/

<comment><USER2> While a good description of Big O notation in relation to time he doesn't mention that Big O notation is also used in relation to other factors such as memory.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback - I've updated the post to reflect the fact that it only relates to runtime.

<comment><USER2> Keep up the good work I look forward to your next article.</comment></comment></comment>


Geothermal Energy and the Weather - <AUTHOR> https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/02/02/geothermal-energy-and-the-weather-2/ <comment><USER2> Glacier covered volcanoes and snow around hot springs?

<comment><AUTHOR> Air is a good insulator and water is a good conductor, or?</comment></comment>


Towel Day - Don't forget your towel - <AUTHOR> http://towelday.org/ For the best and craziest sci-fi book I ever read <comment><USER2> "A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value - you can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapours; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a mini raft down the slow heavy river Moth; wet it for use in hand-to- hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or to avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (a mindboggingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can't see it, it can't see you - daft as a bush, but very ravenous); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.

More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitch hiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitch hiker might accidentally have "lost". What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with."

<http://www.towel.org.uk/>

<comment><USER3> Reminds me of Evelyn Waugh's observation, after the Battle of Crete, that a pillow is the most important thing an officer can take to war.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I bought a few towels yesterday, and while I walked through the store with them draped over my arm, I felt like I was ready for anything.

</comment><comment><USER5> My wife packed a towel today on her way out to the airport. The boy packed one on his way to school. You people --- by "you" I include Erin & the boy --- are weird.

</comment><comment><USER6> I didn't know that this had something to do with Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I honestly thought it was about Towelie from South Park.

<comment><USER4> This, ladies and gentlemen, is what's known as a "generation gap"

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Never heard of towel day. This may explain the guy on the bus who got on, towel only. Respect.

<comment><USER8> He perhaps is just a loon wearing a towel and not a towel day observer.

<comment><USER9> A loon wearing a towel can still observe the towel day!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Thanks for reminder! I almost forgot, being so absorbed in watching NASA TV, as Dragon has just been captured by the ISS.

</comment><comment><USER11> I always carry at least one towel in my backpack. It has indeed proven to be massively useful over the years.

</comment><comment><USER12> Remembered to bring my towel and it proved quite useful for an improv trip to the beach. Amazing how happy people can be when you come to their rescue with a dry towel</comment>


Return Gmail Full Screens, Great Design, and Distraction-free Email - <AUTHOR> http://home.oldcompose.com/ <comment><USER2> Is this something more than the plugin that sends the IE8 user agent to gmail?

I hope so, that way it will work when google finally takes the IE8 trick away.

lol, no, this is the entire plugin, seriously, it took them far longer to make that webpage

       if (host.indexOf("mail.google.com") == 0)      {
          var agent = "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.0)";
          httpChannel.setRequestHeader("User-Agent", agent, false);
       }

<comment><USER3> That appears to be only the case for the Firefox version. The Chrome version looks legit - the main implementation is in gmail.js inside the extension folder (%LOCALAPPDATA%\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Extensions\fcnoahpalppomkbilmlkhiimjfmpmgpk\ on Windows).

<comment><USER2> I can't download the chrome version right now but look at their code carefully - is that code perhaps there to translate IE8 compatibility to Chrome? Is that all it is doing or is there something more? Because I am betting it is just IE8 compatibility. Would be happy to be wrong.

<comment><USER3> It's using MutationObservers to look for the compose window showing up, then click the fullscreen button on the compose window and do a couple of other things. Here's the code:

[https://gist.github.com/anonymous/7d24b19158f33c179086](https://gist.github.com/anonymous/7d24b19158f33c179086)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> You can also just...

* Have shortcuts on and hit "d" \-- open a new compose [browser] tab

* Hold Shift and hit "c" (or click "Compose") -- open compose in a popup

* Hold Shift+Ctrl and click "Compose" \-- open a compose that fills 90% of the viewport

<comment><USER5> None of this is sufficient if, like me, you frequently have emails to reply to.

I have to remember to shift-click "Reply" to get the larger window and _then also_ select "Edit Subject" from a dropdown to see what I'm replying to (which, bizarrely, causes not only the subject line but also the body of the email to appear. Perhaps they forgot to hide it?), or click the inane "..." they put at the bottom to see the thread. Rarely has a UI caused so much black bile to accumulate within me.

<comment><USER4> Nothing is more efficient than, like me, frequently replying to email with "r" and typing my response. That which I'm replying to is directly above, so I'm not sure I follow what you are looking for.

I don't know that this extension purports to "fix" reply. I don't recall Gmail's reply ever working much differently than it does -- an inline textarea under the thread. Unclear what you are gaining from shift-click replying. Anything but inane... and hardly anything near one of the worst UIs... very revisionist.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Of course you could just check 'Default to full-screen' next to the little trash can on the bottom right of every new Gmail message (no plugin required)...

</comment><comment><USER7> I'm glad you made something you really like and use. Congrats on getting on Hacker News too!

However, I love the smaller compose box. I can't tell you how many times I needed to look an another email while writing one. I was ecstatic when gmail added the feature!

And let's be serious, the "tiny Gmail compose box" really isn't that tiny.

<comment><USER8> +1/this.

I didn't like the new gmail at first, who likes when the things they use everyday change. But "pop out reply" is fantastic, for exactly the reason you cite: I can my emails search for context, for additional info, and move seamlessly back and forth between the compose area and the email area - it's like having a non-intrusive "always on top" window for note taking when doing research.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> For distraction-free composition in Gmail, I always keep this bookmarked: [https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?view=cm&fs=1&tf=1](https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?view=cm&fs=1&tf=1)

</comment><comment><USER10> The smaller compose window enhances productivity. With the smaller compose window, users can view many emails while composing a single one, and the compose window stays out of the way. No back and forth to get the details you need.

For reading the mail as you are typing it, most humans find their eyes get tired after reading lines longer than 120 characters. A full screen compose window, could mean 200-250 characters. The current smaller popup wraps text after 72 characters, which is easier to proofread when writing (many novels wrap around 60-100 characters for this very reason).

</comment><comment><USER11> There was a time not long ago when the gmail compose window would flexibly configure (at least with mozilla/firefox) to some GTK rc "theme". so one could configure keys to do useful shortcut vi/emacs-like things, like delete a whole line. alas, no more. so "oldcompose.com" bring that functionality back and i'll join ye.

<comment><USER12> The main part of the gmail compose window is simply a div element with contenteditable attribute. Your browser is free to do whatever it wants there, including vi or emacs key bindings. It's up to your browser.

<comment><USER11> along about early 2013 google/gmail changed something that they will only say no longer plays happily with the edit window widget that (at least) firefox uses (i had one javascript 'expert' tell me that gmail didn't want anyone using other than their own single-key shortcuts)

[https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/gmail/ymngoPD...](https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/gmail/ymngoPDiiFI) "That one should stop working, because the new composer doesn't use a TEXTAREA for message body editor."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I use GMelius, and love it.

Website: [http://gmelius.com/](http://gmelius.com/) Chrome store: [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/gmelius/dheionainn...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/gmelius/dheionainndbbpoacpnopgmnihkcmnkl?hl=en)

</comment><comment><USER14> Is there anyone that, like me, likes the outlook interface better than chrome? The gmail apps and mobile website might be better, but in a normal browser outlook is just much easier to use

</comment><comment><USER15> OR

\- Hit down arrow in bottom right corner of (crappy little) compose window

\- Select "Default to Full-Screen"

<comment><USER16> Yes, this works pretty well. It still isn't technically _full_ screen, but it's much larger than the default one. I do wish it was possible to open a gmail compose window without the whole gmail back-end behind it, so that I could pop open a compose tab without waiting the few seconds it takes for gmail to load, but I guess if I cared enough I could just find some lightweight smtp client.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> It breaks the labels on the promotions, updates, forums tabs.

</comment><comment><USER18> Heading: "Team Culturally Diverse"

Contents: Three white guys with no content about culture or diversity. Rather an odd thing to feature on the app's main page.

<comment><USER2> 100% positive it was an attempt at humor.</comment></comment>


Startup Quote: Fred Wilson, Co-founder, Union Square Ventures - <AUTHOR> http://startupquote.com/post/8159225017

<comment><AUTHOR> Ideas that most people derided as ridiculous have produced the best outcomes. Don't do the obvious thing.

\- Fred Wilson (@fredwilson)

<http://startupquote.com/post/8159225017></comment>


The Mathematics of Inequality - <AUTHOR> http://now.tufts.edu/articles/mathematics-inequality <comment><USER2> The main problem with economic theory is that people aren't rational economic actors.

A rational billionaire would realize that he have nothing to gain from more wealth and would live the rest of his life in lavish and luxury (while donating 99.9% of it if he cares about public opinion), aiming to spend all of it before he dies. So if billionaires were rational we wouldn't have such a large inequality.

Similarly if poor people were rational they would organize against rich people, forcing them to share their wealth in one way or another. This could either be via violence or they could democratically elect representatives who will distribute it for them or they could even unionize to gain power.

The question then isn't how we stop inequality when all actors are rational, but how we stop inequality when some people have irrational tendencies to hoard wealth while others irrationally prefers to vote for those who stands for some abstract ideals rather than those who would give them the most monetary rewards.

<comment><USER3> > _democratically elect representatives who will distribute it for them..._

good thing we live in a "republic". This line smacks of wanton theft. The poor should have a reason to be "given" money other than just being "poor" (as the standard reasoning with 'wealth distributors'), similarly, the rich should have a good reason to have their money stolen other than just being "rich".

Bezos BUILT something, Oprah BUILT something. Just because they're rich and you're not doesn't mean you deserve to be. This country (USA) - at least in theory - is about equal OPPORTUNITY - NOT "Equal _Outcome_ ".

Life Isn't FAIR. Stop trying to make everyone equal when they clearly aren't. Some people put in more work, have better ideas, better skills, attention to details, and follow through, while others do not.

 _You_ may never steal directly from your neighbor or friend, but voting for the government to do it is the same thing.

<comment><USER4> When voters elect representatives to move money from the wealthy to themselves it is theft.

When wealthy donors, lobbyists, and corporations pour money into the political system to affect laws, distribution, incentives, outcomes it is "speech."

If life isn't fair, then why do you care about something you call theft? I'm not reading a self-consistent critique here.

<comment><USER3> you're not reading it because you're _looking_ to justify your own position and don't _want_ to see it.

when someone CHOOSES to give money towards a cause, it _IS_ speech. (granted, most don't agree the citizens united ruling, but mainly because it allows a corporation to have "more" speech than you or I). This is not a problem with the law, this is a problem with money in politics. Solve that problem (like only money from companies/people from _within_ the district is allowed or something), and you solve the 'citizens united' problem.

Just because life isn't fair doesn't mean I GIVE You my money. I should have every right to keep it without being robbed at gunpoint (IRS) - by lazy socialists who don't understand how business works, have never run a business or "democratic-mob-rules-socialists-who-abuse-government-to-do-their-dirty- work".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> "Two people enter into a series of transactions, and both have the same probability of winning some amount of wealth from the other, just as in a free-market transaction."

I don't really think this is a great description of free market transactions at all. Do you regret the decision anywhere close to 50% of the time when you buy groceries, pay rent, or buy new boots? Does the grocer, landlord or shoe store owner regret it anywhere close to 50% if the time? The answer is no in both cases.

</comment><comment><USER6> I think that this is a pretty obvious fact, once you ignore the ideological explanations. The rich can borrow at a lower interest, the rich can have their money beget more money in riskier opportunities. Those with no money to their name can't afford that.</comment>


Designing Docs for Developers - <AUTHOR> http://trigger.io/cross-platform-application-development-blog/2012/07/06/designing-docs-for-developers/

<comment><USER2> nice top-level categories. Too many doc pages can't even correctly do something that simple.

One thing I hate is fixed headers. If I'm scrolling down the page, I want to read whats on the page, not have you shove your branding down my throat while also reducing the amount of content on my screen. If your stuff is good, i'll happily scroll up and click on your stuff, but don't force it on me (this is a problem with blogs too).

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd be satisfied if most documentation looked more like stripe's: <https://stripe.com/docs/api>

<comment><USER4> That was... perfect.

-> You send us X

<\- We give you Y

Why is it so many api docs fail on this basic level?</comment></comment>


Linux RNG flaws - <AUTHOR> https://bugs.chromium.org/p/project-zero/issues/detail?id=1559 <comment><USER2> The flaws only applied for keys generated during early boot. Jann and I looked, but we didn't find a way that this could be turned into a practical exploit, which is why we considered, but decided against, doing any kind of coordinated disclosure. The potential weakness applies before you see crng_init=2 message, and in practice on many machines this happens well before a minute --- on my laptop, in under 10 seconds.

The main problem with the fix is that there are some userspace applications which assumed they could get cryptographic randomness super-early during system startup, and with a patched kernel, those userspace applications would block --- and in some cases, block the boot altogether. With no activity, there is no entropy to harness, and the boot scripts essentially deadlock waiting for the random pool to be initialized.

So for some hardware, and some distributions, we're getting some boot hangs that we now need to try to workaround or fix somehow. In general, the best thing to do is not to rely on cryptographic strength random number generation during early boot. Key generation should be done lazily, and deferred for as long as possible.

<comment><USER3> What reasons are there not to implement the OpenBSD model where the bootloader passes the kernel a seed that the kernel generated previously?

<comment><USER4> There is no reason not to try it, but you would still want to cater for the initial boot when you have no previous entropy to read.

<comment><USER3> Couldn't the installer write the initial seed?

<comment><USER5> There's not always an installer, I make heavily use of live images. On other machines of mine, first boot is made from a copied image.

<comment><USER6> You may know this but for others who may not: there are tools like virt- sysprep that can (among other things) inject a random seed into disk images.

If you clone/generate VMs from one "master" image, running virt-sysprep (or similar) is one of the steps you should do right before launching a new instance (inject a new random seed, wipe out any SSH host keys, etc.)

Even DigitalOcean missed doing this step a while back.

<comment><USER7> I was about to mention the same thing. A pass to make an image unique before bootstrapping it is, or should be, a well-known thing. Remember the hoo-hah over unique machine SIDs in Windows NT. And there is of course the Freedesktop world's systemd-firstboot for making unique machine IDs in images in D-Bus and systemd.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> On RHEL 7 (and derivatives), by default, SSH keys are generated on first boot and with entropy acquired from /dev/urandom.

It is possible, however, to force it sshd-keygen, sshd, et al., to use /dev/random instead (by setting "SSH_USE_STRONG_RNG" in /etc/sysconfig/sshd to a value >= 14). In this case, would keys still potentially be at risk?

\---

For a while now, I've been generating my SSH host keys at the end of the kickstart installation process (for physical hosts) with SSH_USE_STRONG_RNG=32 (in a "%post" script).

Virtual guests (KVM) still generate theirs on first boot, but they have the benefit of access to the host's /dev/random and also get a random seed "injected" into their disk image just before first boot -- although I'm not sure if that helps with this issue.

</comment><comment><USER8> Just to be sure I understand fully, if I take a small embedded router running OpenWRT, that maybe take ~1min for the urandom pool to be ready. [https://git.openwrt.org/?p=openwrt/openwrt.git;a=commitdiff;...](https://git.openwrt.org/?p=openwrt/openwrt.git;a=commitdiff;h=3946a5529132c80793a9e5ee665a3cd6b0835310;hp=e408abd7fb8e2a8842726345f393236c53496933) On the first boot we save 512 bytes from getrandom(). On the second boot we restore the seed (cat seed > /dev/urandom) before almost all the user space starts. Many daemons (dropbear/openvpn) will read from /dev/urandom before urandom pool is considered ready, but after the seed is restored.

With the new patches, are the daemons benefiting from the seed ?

<comment><USER9> Note that Dropbear will read urandom upon each incoming connection so that should be mitigated in many circumstances. (Hopefully some systems are using the delayed hostkey generation option too)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Seeing that `i % len` in [https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/lin...](https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/drivers/char/random.c?id=dc12baacb95f205948f64dc936a47d89ee110117) makes me uncomfortable. This is performing a non-constant modulus on every loop iteration, which seems quite excessive even for a slow path. Performing wraparounds using a separate branch would be more efficient.

<comment><USER6> You should submit a patch.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> It's worth noting that FreeBSD also had some RNG troubles quite recently (2017)[0] (talk: [1]). Personally, I don't think they were as severe as this. (But I am biased, I do FreeBSD development.) What I'm trying to say is, getting random right is hard. It's easy to produce something random-looking that isn't good enough.

JMG's FreeBSD 2017 RNG talk Tl;dr:

1\. Boot-time entropy might leak on either UFS or ZFS; might be re-used in a byzantine ZFS environment. (Not addressed, as far as I know.)

2\. Input entropy data (pre-whitening) had only about 0.18 bits of entropy per byte of input. NIST likes to see 4-6 bits per byte. (Not really an issue due to sufficient input volume.) Partially due to:

3\. All the fast, high-quality sources of random entropy were accidentally disabled(!). (All the PURE_* ones, including x86 RDRAND.) Fixed in r324394.

4\. Other low entropy structures were getting mixed in. Probably harmless, but reduces entropy-per-byte measure that NIST cares about. Fixed in r324372.

The earlier 2015 FreeBSD RNG issues were probably as severe as this Linux issue[2]:

> URGENT: RNG broken for last 4 months

> If you are running a current kernel r273872 or later, please upgrade your > kernel to r278907 or later immediately and regenerate keys.

> I discovered an issue where the new framework code was not calling > randomdev_init_reader, which means that read_random(9) was not returning > good random data. read_random(9) is used by arc4random(9) which is the > primary method that arc4random(3) is seeded from.

> This means most/all keys generated may be predictable and must be > regenerated. This includes, but not limited to, ssh keys and keys generated > by openssl. This is purely a kernel issue, and a simple kernel upgrade w/ > the patch is sufficient to fix the issue.

[0]: [https://www.funkthat.com/~jmg/vbsdcon_2017_ddfreebsdrng_slid...](https://www.funkthat.com/~jmg/vbsdcon_2017_ddfreebsdrng_slides.pdf)

[1]: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A41cDCE6pTc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A41cDCE6pTc)

[2]: [https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd- current/2015-Feb...](https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd- current/2015-February/054580.html)

</comment><comment><USER12> 4795 b2242bd 30230fc 9fb6ae d7 7d 69 69 73 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 73 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 6e 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 69 5140 f a a a 5 a a a a 5 a

Nice.

</comment><comment><USER13> Tldr?

<comment><USER14> From TFA:

        > == Discarded early randomness, including device randomness ==
        > == RNG is treated as cryptographically safe too early ==
        > == Interaction between kernel and entropy-persisting userspace is broken ==
        > == No entropy is fed into NUMA CRNGs between rand_initialize() initcall and crng_init==2 ==
        > == initcall can propagate entropy into primary and NUMA CRNGs while crng_init==1 ==

and

        > == Impact ==
        > I have spent a few days attempting to figure out how bad these issues are.
        > I believe that on an Intel Grass Canyon system, with RDRAND disabled,
        > ASLR disabled, fast boot enabled, no connected devices, with boot on power,
        > some frequency scaling options disabled, and the fan set to maximum,
        > it should be possible to express the entropy in the used RDTSC samples in around
        > 105 bits or less. (I'm not sure which parts of this configuration actually
        > influence the amount of entropy; but ASLR certainly does influence it, since the
        > one interrupt sample that is fed into the RNG before the RNG initialization
        > contains an instruction pointer.)

<comment><USER15> "105 bits" isn't too shabby.

I'd only start to worry when it gets to say 70 bits or less. That's the kind of size a state actor could precompute ssh host keys for each of the initial random number states in a common distro for example.

If a state actor could compute ssh keys in 50 milliseconds on custom hardware, and they had 100,000 machines generating those keys, they could generate enough keys to have a 1 in 1 million chance for 70 bits of entropy after 20 years.

<comment><USER11> Emphasis on "or less." Anyway, far far below expected entropy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> man urandom

> When read during early boot time, /dev/urandom may return data prior to the > entropy pool being initialized.

I see no bugs here. Just repeating what is written in the man page.

<comment><USER17> If you continue to the next sentence in that man page:

> If this is of concern in your application, use getrandom(2) or /dev/random > instead.

These bugs affect getrandom too.

<comment><USER16> Where is it written? Could you pin point it? I see urandom everywhere.

<comment><USER17> I got it from this part, unless I'm misreading:

> Multiple callers, including sys_getrandom(..., flags=0), attempt to wait for > the

> RNG to become cryptographically safe before reading from it by checking for

> crng_ready() and waiting if necessary. However, crng_ready() only checks for

> `crng_init > 0`, and `crng_init==1` does not imply that the RNG is

> cryptographically safe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Wasn't there a popular article with the author vehemently supporting the use of /dev/urandom because of it's nonblocking characteristics? I vividly remember it.

Also I think it's common knowledge that there's little entropy available during startup but developers have no control over it regardless.

I _didn 't_ know it was _that_ bad though. That's really bad.</comment>


Python for All Scientific Needs - <AUTHOR> http://openwetware.org/index.php?title=Julius_B._Lucks/Projects/Python_All_A_Scientist_Needs&oldid=187310

<comment><USER2> Nice, mention Perl and genomics, but ignore BioPerl while pushing BioPython.

</comment><comment><USER3> Don't miss <http://www.scipy.org/Cookbook>

<comment><USER2> The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request.

Please contact the server administrator, email@example.com and inform them of the time the error occurred, and anything you might have done that may have caused the error.

More information about this error may be available in the server error log.</comment></comment>


Death of RIM/Blackberry massively overstated as it has its best ever quarter - <AUTHOR> http://www.neowin.net/news/rim-growth-breaks-analyst-predictions-and-records-dont-look-at-torch

<comment><USER2> Coasting / running on momentum is not enough to defend the future prospects - stock prices are based on future expectations, not present success!</comment>


Taking stock of startup innovation in the Netherlands - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2015/07/05/the-netherlands-a-look-at-the-worlds-high-tech-startup-capital/?ncid=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29 <comment><USER2> The Netherlands is quite a few things, one thing it isn't is "The World's High-Tech Startup Capital".

We have some (very) neat start-ups but we're very far still from reaching our potential and compared to countries around us and of course the US we need to make significant moves if NL is to remain a player in the future.

On the plus side: access to capital is getting easier all the time (but there is still a long long way to go before we can begin to claim parity with the real High-Tech Startup Capital, Silicon Valley), on the down side, the big companies are just as effective (if not even more effective) here in recruiting Dutch talent to work for them directly or to emigrate.

Yes, we have a bit of an advantage being small on the language front (just being able to speak Dutch is pretty much un-heard of, at a minimum the Dutch will typically speak passable English and probably either German, French or both).

The 'success story' when it comes to funding is heavily skewed by two very large deals totalling 275 million out of the 500 million.

The majority of the deals here is sub $1M!

So even if all the information out there can be used to paint a rosy picture the fact is that we're definitely not a leader in much of anything and a ton of work remains to be done.

The good news is most people in the start-up scene here are painfully aware of this and working hard at improving it.

So that one day we may be able to do justice by the title.

<comment><USER3> It's funny. This article paints a picture of incredible industrial innovation, but if you look at dutchstartupjobs.com, the majority of the startups here seem to be social media or marketing related, just like the rest of the country.

It's the service industry capital of the world.

Of course, some of the high tech startups/SMB's that do exist here can be pretty damn impressive! The list of Dutch startups on this site gives me hope: [http://www.climate-kic.org/start-ups/](http://www.climate-kic.org/start-ups/)

<comment><USER4> There are two very different "startup scences" in the Netherlands. The social/cultural/financial startups seem to aggregate around Amsterdam. For the more interesting and high tech stuff you have to look at Delft, Twente, and in particular the Eindhoven areas. For food and agricultural stuff, the place to be is the Wageningen area. Often, from an international or Hollandish perspective, the Netherlands is equated to Amsterdam and vice versa, but that results in a very skewed image of the Netherlands and the startup scene in particular.

(For example, on the website you refer to, there seems to be only one Eindhoven area job and that's for front-end development to boot. Apparently, this website does not give a good representation of start-up jobs in the Netherlands, but focuses on Randstad webdevelopment jobs instead.)

<comment><USER5> Anything interesting happening up in Groningen?

<comment><USER6> HackerOne is located in Groningen

[http://techcrunch.com/2015/06/24/hackerone-bags-25m-as- secur...](http://techcrunch.com/2015/06/24/hackerone-bags-25m-as-security- info-sharing-mainstreams/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm getting very bored with the start-up cheerleading industry in Europe: a small but very vocal number of publications (Tech.eu, The Next Web, TechCrunch EU) and event organisers constantly championing random cities in Europe as up- and-coming technology epicentres to rival Silicon Valley. Even London, which is by any reasonable measure the largest hub of start-up activity in Europe and has seen the most significant exits, comes nowhere close to Silicon Valley in terms of deal volume, capital availability, density of senior talent, etc. Sure, tech start-ups exist in Amsterdam and in Berlin, and in Stockholm, and in Barcelona, but these cities aren't technology hubs, creating self- sustaining economies driven by meaningful exits and the development of world- leading domain expertise: many of the start-ups in these cities are only sustainable because VCs in Europe are primarily funded by European governments. That's what a "hub" is; take away the hype and the government money and it still exists.

<comment><USER8> I agree with most of the message, but remember that in the US everything is funded by the government too (direct investments, state contracts, research contracts, tax-breaks etc).

<comment><USER9> Well... there is a lot of tech stuff in the US funded by the government, but the wildly successful Silicon Valley style "startup scene" usually isn't really where that money is sent. More like SpaceX/Tesla/etc, a few solar panel manufacturers, and large businesses.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Interesting article but I fundamentally disagree with the notion that the excellent school system is the cause of the good English skills of the Dutch (which undoubtedly exist). It's far more likely that the major reason is the non-subbed TV/movies imo (well a combination of both)

I've always associated the Netherlands with being a tech saavy nation. They always had a vivid hacking scene for example. Additionally the Dutch tend to be citizens of the world and pretty open minded which is a good mix. I completely agree with the assessment of Amsterdam. Nice city, not overly expensive, pretty great for youngish people -> good competitive edge (Berlin is similar but Amsterdam has more of a startupy general vibe imo).

<comment><USER11> >It's far more likely that the major reason is the non-subbed TV/movies imo

For the current set of people in their twenties I agree. However, a lot more kids TV these days is dubbed instead of subtitled. I notice that English with 14 year olds these days seems less advanced then ten years ago.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Having studied in Delft I can attest to the change occurring on campus. YES!Delft has changed significantly over the last few years and there are quite a few disruptive companies coming out of the incubator program. I regularly talk to a few of the resident entrepreneurs and I get the feeling that it's the lack of capital that's really hindering growth. For a previous startup that I abandoned, the advice I got was to prepare my pitch and fly out to SV, only because investors seem to be following instead of leading in The Netherlands.

I'm not working on another startup and I've gotten some great advice. It's made me realize that certain sectors are probably easier to raise money for. In this low-interest rate environment, there's probably a lot more capital seeking investment across the board.

Curious if anyone in Delft or elsewhere in the country has an investors perspective on what the fundraising environment will be like within the next 12 months.

</comment><comment><USER13> I've interviewed with some startups in Amsterdam, and many seem to want to pay below market rates with no equity. I think this is hindering the startup scene in the Netherlands. Philips and other big companies are taking all the entry level talent because they pay more, leaving startups with less offerings. For example, of all the talented students graduating CS at TU Eindhoven this year, I'm not aware of any who are considering startups (Except me! PM if you know of openings!). When Philips and KPMG and the other big players offer 2x salary, it's hard to turn them down.

<comment><USER14> Even at traditional companies software engineering salaries are not particularly high.

That's why most CS students choose to go towards consultancy job, and never write a line of code in the rest of their careers. (Those who want to do engineering choose hardware, which is much more respected and better paid.)

As a result, most software startups are started by MBA's and rarely by engineers, which perpetuates the circle of undervaluing software engineering skills.

<comment><USER3> I dunno. What's particularly high? Salaries here aren't on par with Silicon Valley for sure, but they're not bad either in a lot of the places I've looked into or worked at. It's easy to get 50k+ EUR/year, sometimes up to 70 or even higher for senior roles.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Not sure if we should give most software companies the label "high tech". I think that should be reserved for really innovative companies in the fields of energy or biology, or... software if it is truly innovative.

If a company is working with HTML and CSS and perhaps some tools pulled of github, then, imho, that's not high-tech. Or what would we call a company working on nuclear fusion, or on protein synthesis?

</comment><comment><USER16> Interesting. Was wondering how hard it is to get a work visa?

<comment><USER17> If you are from the US or Japan you should absolutely check out DAFT: the Dutch-American Friendship Treaty:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DAFT_%28treaty%29](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DAFT_%28treaty%29)

[https://ind.nl/EN/individuals/residence- wizard/work/working-...](https://ind.nl/EN/individuals/residence- wizard/work/working-on-a-self-employed-basis)

It allows you to be a freelancer in Holland. No citizenship, but you do get a residency permit that is up for renewal every 2 years, as long as you satisfy the requirements (no social benefits, only freelancing, &c).

<comment><USER18> Unfortunately the "friendship" is not mutual :(

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> One thing I noticed while touring the university in Eindhoven was that students are pretty much brainwashed to serve the lighting industry. I really disagreed with the sentiment that there was any so-called "innovation" to be made in the field. This might sound ridiculous, but if The Netherlands wants to create actual change, they'll need to move beyond LEDs.</comment>


Microsoft to shut down Wunderlist in favor of its new app, To-Do - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2017/04/19/microsoft-to-shut-down-wunderlist-in-favor-of-its-new-app-to-do/ <comment><USER2> Odd, Don't see it in the Canada App Store.</comment>


PiCluster: Simple Container Orchestration - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/rusher81572/picluster <comment><USER4> PXE support: [https://github.com/rusher81572/picluster/issues/1](https://github.com/rusher81572/picluster/issues/1)

</comment><comment><USER5> Nice! Takes 5 minutes to read through all code and all makes sense - <USER2> probably all works too.

Kubernetes and nomad are a bear to get started with in comparison.

<comment><USER6> The new kubeadm tool makes it a little easier, but I've always run into issues setting up networking. Truth be told though, I've found kubernetes fits in better as a piece of the orchestration puzzle rather than the end of it - <USER3> managed to get OpenShift (Origin) deployed in under 2 hours on 6 CentOS Atomic hosts (3 masters, 3 schedulable nodes) and got all the k8s goodness with a bunch of nice extras on top (same day we deployed 2 node.js apps to it and my team was super excited when I had them push to git, OpenShift automatically build and deployed the docker image and the new releases were live in moments).

Seriously, if you want Kubernetes, look at just deploying openshift, there's ansible playbooks out there and even an installer to write the ansible inventory on your behalf to make it super easy, and the OpenVSwitch configuration is just magic compared to getting flannel set up right for k8s.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Hashicorp Nomad[0] is surprisingly simple yet powerful. It fits quite nicely between Swarm and Kubernetes/Mesos, as this project mentions.

I'm not sure that it can run on the Raspberry Pi, but it is definitely worth a try.

[0] [https://www.nomadproject.io](https://www.nomadproject.io)

</comment><comment><USER8> Worth mentioning "Raspberry" in the title.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good idea. However, PiCluster will work perfectly fine on regular x86 hardware.

<comment><USER8> Oh! Then I misunderstood the github project. My bad.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Docker only, which is a shame.

<comment><AUTHOR> I can easily add another runtime. What were you thinking?

<comment><USER9> Thanks for the reply. Can you work with plain LXC/LCD?

<comment><AUTHOR> Right now, the server simply sends Docker engine commands to the agent nodes. If you know the equivilant commands for "docker build" and "Docker run", I should be able to add it</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Thawing permafrost produces more methane than expected - <AUTHOR> https://phys.org/news/2018-03-permafrost-methane.html <comment><USER2> I wonder how much this affects the clathrate gun hypothesis: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis)</comment>


StartupEmpire – Canada's Conference for Startups - <AUTHOR> http://startupempire.ca/ <comment><USER2> They should have used 'dominion' instead of 'empire', to riff off the better name canada used to have <http://www.filibustercartoons.com/dominion.htm>

<comment><USER3> hah! StartupColony perhaps? ;-)</comment></comment>


In Tech – How to Fire Your Enemies, or How to Avoid a Layoff - <AUTHOR> http://youexec.com/articles/in-tech-how-to-fire-your-enemies-or-how-to-avoid-a-layoff-tsp6a?r=yc <comment><USER2> Poe's Law in action. I can't tell if this blog is satirizing Machiavellian corporate environments, or if it's trying to offer useful advice.

Guess there's no reason it can't be both.</comment>