Ask HN: Taking the next 6 months off, advice? - <AUTHOR>

Hey everyone.
You guys might remember me from a post I made about a year ago, asking if there as a point in continuing school: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1182512
I've been at the university for two quarters now, and I'm beginning to wonder what I'm doing here. The course loads are ridiculous, they leave me very little time to do much else let alone code. It's not that the courses are too difficult, I just can't find a good reason to devote that much time to school.
So I have decided to take the next quarter off which gives me, including summer, 6 months of total off time. During this time I want to do is build my skill set and launch a product (I have a few things in mind).
What advice would you give someone in my position,, and what would be the best way to spend my time during these next 6 months? <comment><USER2> Be extremely frugal (move in with parents if possible), try lots of things, iterate quickly, work your face off.

Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER3> _I just can't find a good reason to devote that much time to school._

Cast a wide net. Coding up some pet projects can be fun, but don't forget to check out that volunteering group or rock climbing class you've been interested in. Take a week to read some non-technical books. Visit your parents (if you don't live with them!) and enjoy some home cooking.

This isn't just advice for your time off, by the way. Cast a wide net once you return to UW. Take some art theory or music appreciation classes. Join intramural sports or a comedy troupe. You have a golden ticket here, a once- in-a-lifetime opportunity to _explore_ while building human capital. Don't waste your time killing yourself over an A- in an unimportant course.

Oh, and don't listen to those people who say college isn't worth it. Try to socialize, party, and have as much fun as possible. It'll pay off.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for all the tips!

I will definitely like to do some non-programming things on the side, such as read some books I've been meaning to and perhaps some martial arts as well.

These next few months will be a good time to explore.

</comment><comment><USER4> Try tackling new problems, don't be afraid to fail, and travel. You're young -- keep your mind open.

</comment><comment><USER5> May I ask how old are you?

<comment><AUTHOR> 18

<comment><USER5> Cool, I will just simply tell you my opinion, in the end it is you who should make the decision, for me school is for people who don't have imagination and courage to learn by themselves. But in early age and with lack of experience it is easy to get carried away and take the wrong direction.

If you already found your passion and you are sure that whatever is it, it is what you want to do for next few years of your life. Take the 6 months off and go explore in that direction and see what you get. Otherwise if you are not sure yet, stay in school and try to find what you like to do, you still have long way and if the next 6 months are not them, be patient sooner or later you will find what you like to do. Then everything is going to be clear.

Explore and try to meet people and talk to them whether in school or off school.

Check this video: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1R-jKKp3NA>

Good Luck.</comment></comment></comment>


Real-time server visualization with canvas and processing.js - <AUTHOR> https://www.cloudkick.com/blog/2010/apr/27/cloudkick_server_visualization_in_html5_canvas/

<comment><USER3> It looks cool but it's not actually any more usable than just a table / gridview list...

Consider :-

1\. A list can quickly be filtered to show only critical state servers - <USER2> probably don't care about servers which aren't doing anything

2\. If I want to look for a specific server - I have _no_ idea which one it is - I have to click to find it. A grid means I can look for it instantly

3\. The info being displayed takes a while to digest as to what I'm seeing on the 3d axes with regards to ping etc... A grid just gives me the numbers and I can read them quickly.

Yet again a use of pretty graphics where it really isn't needed

<comment><USER4> Disclaimer: I work at Cloudkick.

Imagine looking at a list of 500 servers and trying to determine how their aggregate memory usage was trending in real-time.

To quickly address your concerns:

1\. Servers that are critical turn red and blink - there's no need to filter anything since your eyes have already done it.

2\. This tool isn't really designed to be a gateway to arbitrary servers; it's showing you anomalies, problems, and aggregate trending.

3\. I think this could be a fair point, but with only 3 (clearly labeled) axes, I think it's hard to suggest that the learning curve for digestion the information is incredibly steep. If you actually think how it's set up at the moment is too confusing, I'd love to hear suggestions.

We leave this up on the big screen at the office and it makes it very easy to tell when something untoward is happening with our servers, without really having to devote direct attention to the visualization. We designed it so problems stand out and make themselves known to you.

One of our guiding principles is to move quickly and take user feedback though, so if you've got any constructive criticism, let's keep the discussion going!!!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm looking at the Mozilla example on my laptop without a mouse, and I get a little bit annoyed when I'm hovering a certain node trying to click on it and the visualization keeps on moving and makes it hard to click on it. So maybe it could be possible to have a simple option to freeze the view?

And maybe an easy way of instantly changing to some near optimal viewpoint for viewing the data in terms of a given axis? (Ie. CPU or memory usage).

But this, combined with normal alerts would be cool. Oh, and what about showing trace lines once I've selected a given node? :)

</comment><comment><USER6> Neat tech, terrible interface - utterly pointless. Flat graphs, which are configured to show outliers/only problematic nodes would provide a far more efficient interface to someone trying to work out where the bottlenecks and issues are. Showing lots of data for the sake of it might be pretty but it's not helpful, choosing what to present is an important part of the visualisation development process as how it is presented.

</comment><comment><USER7> It looks like it was fun to make, but I can't see how it's particularly useful. I can't see anything useful in a 3D visualization like that.

> "and it's the first cloud monitoring system in the world that you can watch > in real-time as it checks your servers."

Yeah Cacti does that with an HTTP refresh every few seconds. 'realtime' enough for most instances.

</comment><comment><USER8> I saw this a while back at the sfcloudhackers hack day; simply amazing.</comment>


Alex Payne — My Get-Back-To-Work Hack - <AUTHOR> http://al3x.net/2009/09/14/my-get-back-to-work-hack.html <comment><USER2> I wrote a shell script that controls and logs your internet usage, hope someone will find it useful.

netctrl script: <http://gist.github.com/187318>

Basically you set up a cron job (use "netctrl -c") to take your computer online and offline at sometime automatically, and when you want to use internet when you are not supposed to, you have to specify a reason to do so (use "netctrl -u"), and the reason is logged.

<comment><USER3> This is exactly what I would love to use, sadly won't work with Vista :(

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Pretty cool app I found for Mac. <http://getconcentrating.com>

_Concentrate helps you work and study more productively by eliminating distractions.

To start, create an activity (design, study, write, etc) and choose actions (shown below) to run every time you concentrate. When ready, just click "concentrate." All your distractions will disappear and a timer will appear to help you stay focused._

<comment><USER5> I use it - even tried to buy it but my credit card was rejected.

Works great for me. The only added feature I would like is to be able to schedule activities, ie. 9-5 daily block distractions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> So, everytime I take a break and actually don't mind wasting time on reddit, I have to comment out parts of my /etc/hosts ?

<comment><USER7> you can have two /etc/hosts (hosts - hosts.restricted), and a script switches each.

implementation is left as an exercise for the reader.

<comment><USER8> Or you can just install rescue time. I think this is a new feature now.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> My Keep-Working Hack: 2 computers. One for work. One for internet. In different rooms. An egg timer. 48 minutes of work. 12 minutes of break.

[http://successbeginstoday.org/wordpress/2006/09/the-power- of...](http://successbeginstoday.org/wordpress/2006/09/the-power- of-48-minutes/)

<http://www.paulgraham.com/distraction.html>

<comment><USER10> That works for those of us with two computers. I wish there was a way of routinely disabling the Internet, rather than having me manually do it.

<comment><USER11> If you're on a Mac, check out Freedom: <http://macfreedom.com/>

It does exactly what you want. I think I first heard about it on a HN thread a while ago...

<comment><USER10> Problem with Freedom is I have to manually activate it. I never do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> How about just get back to work instead of spending time on this hack? That would save you at least 15 minutes.

<comment><USER13> I think to call this a 'hack' is to devaluate the term.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Instead of blocking the distracting sites permanently, using iptables might work little better by restricting access by time of day or duration.

[edit] I found the following: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=192953>

</comment><comment><USER15> I use rescue time. It is amazing. Having fun to do work also helps. Well that is it for this comment, I need to get back to work.

<comment><USER16> I wish it would work with Snow Leopard. Crashes on startup for me (even the special Snow Leopard version they posted).

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I think about money going into my bank account. Makes the distractions seem more expensive (I'm currently salaried and it still works).

</comment><comment><USER18> I drag the favicon of my current project to the home button (to set it as my home page). Everytime I open a new browser window I am reminded of what I should really be doing.

When that task is finished, I change the home page to the next task.

</comment><comment><USER19> Every time I see something like this I'm reminded of the idea of trying stop drug addicts by maEvery time I see something like this I'm reminded of the idea of trying stop drug addicts by making drugs harder to get. Somehow, some way, you're going to get the drug.

The problem is not to restrict your access, but to change your desire. There's a much deeper problem if you require hand-slapping to stop you viewing sites like reddit while at work.

</comment><comment><USER20> Is there any way to do this without changing the user Apache runs as? I'm having problems with that...

</comment><comment><USER21> My hack: run bittorrent during work time. Every site gets a lot slower. For me, the increase in latency makes distractions less enjoyable, but full access is still there if I really need it. On a few occasions, I've found important work-related stuff on HN.

</comment><comment><USER22> Psst. Why is al3x.net loading an external gif every 20 seconds? It's distracting to see my browser indicate that it's loading something when I didn't interact with anything :)

</comment><comment><USER23> Spending hours or minutes working out yet another restriction on distractions instead of learning how to focus and concentrate properly? What good can this possibly ever do.

</comment><comment><USER24> The best get-back-to-work hack I've ever had is to work on something that interests you. If you're able to do that, you won't need any hacks.

<comment><USER25> That is disingenuous. In any job/work, even if you love it, there are tasks that blow. Documentation, bug hunting, administrivia, the boilerplate crap that crops up are all examples of this. Some or all of them are required, and since they are not fun, it is easy to get distracted and procrastinate. Some people are just prone to such things. Is it not better that they figure out how to not procrastinate, or that they search for the elusive (possibly mythical) work that has 0% sucky tasks?

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Even better would be if when you tried to open a web that's a distraction, the browser opened your text editor.

I'm kinda dreaming...

<comment><USER27> It's kind of what Alex's setup is doing by opening Things.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I use a proxy (Pivoxy) to block requests to distracting sites. not the most effective method, but it works pretty good for me.

</comment><comment><USER29> my hax: [http://untitledz.wordpress.com/2009/02/08/the-coworking- pact...](http://untitledz.wordpress.com/2009/02/08/the-coworking-pact/) [http://untitledz.wordpress.com/2009/02/12/dont-cowork- pair-p...](http://untitledz.wordpress.com/2009/02/12/dont-cowork-pair- program/)

</comment><comment><USER30> Why do all that, why not use freedom? <http://macfreedom.com/>

<comment><USER31> While this is no doubt useful, its hilarious that something that actually removes a feature from your computer is being billed as "the most wonderful software ever invented." (not by you, by someone quoted on their homepage.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Concentrate app for mac users breaks the procrastination cycle.

</comment><comment><USER32> I do something similar. I use LeechBlock, an add-on for Firefox. I have it set to let me view sites, such as HN, before 7:30 (a reward for getting in early), during lunch (hopefully, that means between 11:30-Noon:30), and after 4:30 (brain is probably mush at this point anyways). LeechBlock even lets you redirect to a different site instead of a blacklisted one. I picked my companies web site. I must say, I have conditioned myself doing this. The urge to check time-sinks have dropped significantly since I have been doing this.

After reading this, I feel editing /etc/hosts is a better option.</comment>


Ask HN: is there any place where I can submit my ideas? - <AUTHOR>

I have some ideas for startups and I would like to test them. So, the other day I was thinking: is there any place where I can submit questionnaires, landing pages, etc? PS: I know that HN is a good place to do it, but the links I submit get mixed with world news and other stuff. I'm talking about a place exclusively for this purpose. <comment><USER2> <http://halfbakery.com>

<http://reddit.com/r/somebodymakethis>

<comment><AUTHOR> Nice! Thank you! I had been looking around on reddit but didn't find this forum ;)</comment></comment>


Kevin O'Leary-the only ones making money out of his 27companies have female CEOs - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/kevin-olearys-female-ceos-make-all-the-money-2015-5

<comment><AUTHOR> "Shark Tank" investing star Kevin O'Leary says women lead all of his companies that are showing returns.

"All the cash in the last two quarters is coming from companies run by women," he told Business Insider at a recent event for the startup Honeyfund, in which he is an investor.

"I don't have a single company run by a man right now that's outperformed the ones run by women."

<comment><USER2> This is a story how?

<comment><USER3> He's trying to make up for getting rolled on Celebrity Jeopardy?</comment></comment></comment>


Krugman on Bitcoin's problems with deflation (2011) - <AUTHOR> http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/07/golden-cyberfetters/

<comment><USER2> The whole point of having a country with a central bank that can print money at will (fiat currency), is to have full control over inflation/deflation. When the increase/decrease of the monetary supply is controlled by outside factors, whether it's tied to shiny yellow rocks, or computed bits, or another country's currency, then you run into problems like this:

\- Bank runs. It's standard practice that banks will loan out more money than they have in deposits, because it's unlikely that all their loans will go bad at once, and/or it's unlikely that all their deposits will want their money back at once (this is known as fractional reserve banking[0]). But if your currency is anchored to something fixed, this can happen. FDIC insurance is guaranteed in the US because even in some absurd financial economic meltdown scenario, Ben Bernanke can print out USDs to make every depositor whole, if necessary. The only "cost" to that kind of "bailout" is the potential inflation. But you can't do this as a government if your monetary supply is limited because it's fixed to something you can't directly control. The government can borrow money and then make depositors whole, but those that you borrow money from may impose conditions, and those conditions may exacerbate the problem you're trying to solve. See: Cyprus[1].

\- The deflation-debt spiral[2]. Yes, inflation "punishes savings," but deflation punishes debt. Generally, debt becomes a big problem in recessions. If you owe $20,000 on your car, and you get a 20% wage cut because your company can only sell goods at 20% of the price they were previously able to, your debt does not go down to $16,000. It's still $20,000. So more of your income will go to paying off debt, which means less of it will go to discretionary spending, which means even more economic slowdown, which means more deflation, which means more wage cuts, which means debt becomes an even bigger burden, etc.

The only real danger to a fiat currency is whether your government's central bank will be so irresponsible with the money supply that inflation spirals out of control. If you're a resident of a third-world country like Zimbabwe[3], transacting in bitcoins will be great because you'll happily trade potential deflationary pain for not being at the whim of a dictator that will print money to increase inflation to one thousand trillion bazillion percent. But if you're the resident of a first-world country which has a responsible central bank, then increasing the monetary supply to fight off deflation is a very good thing.

[0] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractional_reserve_banking>

[1] [http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/03/why- the-...](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/03/why-the-euro-is- doomed-in-4-steps/274470/)

[2] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt_deflation>

[3] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperinflation_in_Zimbabwe>

<comment><USER3> >> "The whole point of having a country with a central bank that can print money at will (fiat currency), is to have full control over inflation/deflation."

This exact idea is at the heart of George Soros' description and prescription for the Euro financial crisis, whereby individual Euro members do not control the European Central Banks and cannot control their own situation to their likings: [http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/george-soros- on-t...](http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/george-soros-on-the-euro- crisis-germany-must-lead-or-leave-a-855270.html)

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> TL;DR Bitcoin mimicks the gold standard, so you'll see the problems with the gold standard play out all over again.

<comment><USER4> If by the gold standard you mean the one that millions of people all over the world voluntarily chose over the course of thousands of years? Well, at least until it was co-opted by fiat currencies in many countries. I'd rather have the problems that come with a free currency than those that come with a fiat one.

<comment><USER5> Can you eat gold? No. Can you make anything useful with it, other than some component in electronics? No. Gold was only valuable because it didn't corrode, and was scarce in the ancient world, therefore making it an ideal medium of exchange in an environment of weak central governments and zero ability to stop counterfeiters.

If a zombie apocalypse happened today, and somebody tried to buy food or weapons from me with gold, I'd tell them off. Gold has ZERO inherent value. When you understand that the purpose of a currency is simply to facilitate exchange of goods and services as efficiently as possible, you reach a conclusion that a gold standard is stupid, because it prevents governments from increasing quantity in times where hoarding is occurring.

<comment><USER4> Can you eat dollars? Can you make anything useful with them, other than small fires or cocaine straws? If there was a zombie apocalypse today and somebody tried to buy food or weapons from me with dollars, I'd tell them off. Dollars have ZERO inherent value.

When you understand that the purposes (PLURAL) for a currency are (according to wikipedia and many other places) a medium of exchange; a unit of account; a store of value; you'll reach the conclusion that the dollar standard is stupid because it cannot be a store of value so long as there is a printing press. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money>

<comment><USER6> > Can you eat dollars? Can you make anything useful with them, other than > small fires or cocaine straws? If there was a zombie apocalypse today and > somebody tried to buy food or weapons from me with dollars, I'd tell them > off. Dollars have ZERO inherent value.

Yes, precisely. Gold is just another kind of 'fiat' currency. You're catching on.

Given the choice between two kinds of arbitrary, intrinsically valueless currency, I'll take the one whose supply we have far more control over.

<comment><USER7> > Given the choice between two kinds of arbitrary, intrinsically valueless > currency, I'll take the one whose supply we have far more control over.

* Who is this "we" you are referring to? You seem to be implying that the people have some control over the currency when the reality is that the Federal Reserve and in fact all centralized currencies are incredibly corrupt and machined and manipulated for very powerful people. When interest rates are manipulated or certain banks get access to loans and getting money and bailouts through these central banks, that's so obviously not for the people. Gold can't be manipulated in this way, but paper can. That's why the government loves its paper. It can pay for wars and anything it wants through inflation instead of raising taxes. But the end result of wealth getting sucked out of peoples' hands is the same.

* For the record, everything is intrinsically and inherently valueless. You can't use a microscope to examine any type of object and find a tiny particle called "value". All value people place on everything in an economy is subjective in nature, whether its gold or paper or corn or milk or iron or wood. Your argument here for gold being valueless doesn't make a point because that's inherent in anything and everything.

* That being said, gold has successfully been used as a currency throughout the planet's history. It was accepted worldwide with no barriers to its ability to trade throughout countries.

* The argument that people make against gold being suitable as a currency because of its lack of stability compared to paper is unbelievably laughable. What type of event is more likely: gold somehow losing its application in all kinds of industries/mass quantities of gold being suddenly discovered that alters its fundamental market value (events never before seen in human history) or somehow corrupt politicians and powerful people that manage these paper currencies manipulating the currency for their own benefit?

* That being said, regarding this larger argument about Bitcoin, these coins lack any practical value as far as I can see outside of perhaps anonymity. I say perhaps because Bitcoin isn't actually an anonymous currency, but all transactions can ultimately be traced in some fashion. So it remains to be seen if this will work as a currency long-term.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Deflationary, sure. But where are the problems? More people are CHOOSING to conduct transactions in bitcoin. If we can tolerate 2-8% inflation yearly surely we could tolerate that much deflation.

<comment><USER5> Deflation will pretty much guarantee that Bitcoin will never replace a "real" currency.

It prevents a key economic activity: borrowing money. I'll let you put together why deflation kills incentives to loan money, hence making it impossible for people to borrow.

<comment><USER8> Nonsense. You can simply state that can simply agree to pay back an amount of bitcoin equivalent to a certain amount of gold, the most stable commodity there is. Or dollars. Or bread sticks. Or anything else you prefer.

<comment><USER5> What you are describing is a currency peg. This is what the Silk Road does with the black market items people buy on there with bitcoins. This is an acknowledgement by the Silk Road of bitcoins being a great medium of exchange due to the difficulty of tracing them, but a horrible holder of value due to their volatility.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Someone who knows more about this stuff than me: would it be possible to create a crypto-currency that avoids the problems existing currencies have with (inf|def)lation?

I'm thinking of a system like bitcoin that also acts like a central banker in regulating the money supply, perhaps by linking the availability of new coins to the current supply/demand.

<comment><USER10> Yes, and from what I understand some people have made Bitcoin competitors that tend to grow.

They haven't taken off, because 1) we already have a crypto-currency, and 2) they don't have the "get rich quick with this new currency" because they aren't deflationary so they don't attract the speculators.

Some people will say "we need the speculators in order to start the market," but the speculators have ruined the ability to use Bitcoin as a currency. Just because the light is better over there instead of here where you lost your keys doesn't mean you should look over there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Is there any way to measure the "Gross Bitcoin Product"? Krugman mentions that as of that writing (2011) the GBP was falling. Is that still the case?

<comment><USER12> <http://blockchain.info/charts></comment></comment>


Speaking Up on Racism - <AUTHOR> https://www.apple.com/speaking-up-on-racism/ <comment><USER2> Am I the only one who's tired of these statements from corporations? I guess they're a relatively positive thing, but they feel so hollow. I got one from DoorDash yesterday, and it's tough not to roll my eyes at a company that has worked so hard to screw their drivers, many of whom are minorities, talk about how a food delivery service is fighting racism.

<comment><USER3> It's all empty gestures to me. Just like how VCs are _now_ starting to invest in minorities. Spare me your fake sympathy.

<comment><USER4> 'Now starting to invest' is the opposite of an Emory gesture.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I understand that Apple is a brand first and foremost, so it's no surprise that they're going to release token PR efforts and publicize their tax shelter non-profits.

I also understand that activists, if they actually knew of the severity of working conditions in the Foxconn factories in Shenzen or the child slaves working in illegal cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to power their smartphones and laptops, they'd stop buying Apple products immediately, full stop.

It's a tragedy to me that a video taken by a smartphone, the privileged end product of the slavery, dehumanization, and political repression of hundreds of thousands outside the West takes precedence over those same anonymous sacrificial lives--anonymous only because they _don 't_ live in the West where recording and spreading evidence of violence is trivial.

Here's a tangential fact that should chill every human alive to the bone: George Bush, his administration, and the instruments of his war machine still walk free, without charges, after launching a foreign war of aggression that killed directly and indirectly hundreds of thousands, displaced millions, legitimated _torture_ , indefinite detentions, and drone strikes.

The Patriot Act and the lead-up to the War in Iraq led directly to ICE, the Department of Homeland Security, the militarization of the police, the rejection of the sacrosanctness of civil rights, and the total unaccountability of public officials to the media. Alternate Facts and Fake News began in 2002 with the lies of WMDs in Iraq.

Where is the rioting, the UN pressure, the international protests for charges to be brought against George Bush, the single most responsible individual outside of Derek Chauvin and his fellow officers for the death of George Floyd and hundreds of thousands of others?

<comment><USER6> ICE was preceded by the INS. I'm under the vague impression they did the same sort of stuff, but I admit I'm not really familiar with the practical differences between the former INS and ICE.

> _Alternate Facts and Fake News began in 2002 with the lies of WMDs in Iraq._

This stuff definitely isn't new though. Those terms are nothing more than euphemisms for lies and propaganda, and the Second Iraq War definitely isn't the first time America dabbled in those things. For instance consider this incident in the runup to the First Iraq War: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nayirah_testimony](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nayirah_testimony) And the Vietnam War started after the so called "Gulf of Tonkin incident", a pair of attacks on the US Navy in the span of two days... except Robert McNamara admitted decades later that the second attack never actually happened. Going back much further than that, the Spanish American War was the result of a strong propaganda campaign waged by America's yellow press; and the USS Maine explosion was almost certainly not enemy action (there were people in the Navy pointing that out from the start.) With respects to the First World War, there is probably something to be said about exactly what the RMS Lusitania was actually carrying...

<comment><USER5> Oh, certainly. The United States (and every other country with a hawkish foreign policy) uses atrocity propaganda to justify their wars to their citizens. The difference between Nayirah, the Gulf of Tonkin, the RMS Lusitania, et. al and the 2003 Invasion of Iraq is that American citizens and international observers _knew_ the pretense was fabricated _at the time_. These same citizens and international observers protested the fabrication, the ensuring invasion, the total capture of the media by the administration, etc. The only people to whom it was an _actual_ surprise that Iraq did not have WMDs were Bush's low-information voting constituents.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> To save people time, this is the percent of people in leadership positions at Apple (from [https://www.apple.com/diversity/](https://www.apple.com/diversity/), 2018):

63% White

26% Asian

3% Black

7% Hispanic

1% Multiracial

0% Native American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander

<comment><USER3> Not good enough.

<comment><USER7> How should it look like according to you to be good?

<comment><USER8> Oscillating near the racial distribution of the population should be good enough.

<comment><USER9> In Hungary, in the 1920 a new legislation was introduced called "Numerus Clausus". This limited the admission to universities and public offices by the percentage of the ethnic ration within the country.

> Its aim was to restrict the number of Jews to 6 percent, which was their > proportion in Hungary at that time; the rate of Jewish students was > approximately 15% in the 1910s. In 1928 – also because of the pressure of > liberal capital and League of Nations – the act was modified and the passage > of the ethnicity quota had been eliminated. [1]

Until recently, this act was considered a racist by the liberal and left- leaning thinkers, now it is considered a progressive one by the very same.

\- [1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numerus_clausus#Hungary](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numerus_clausus#Hungary)

<comment><USER7> Many American Universities are trying to do the same thing though, but since they are spineless and don't want to admit the existence of a quota, they are resorting to shady tactics like qualifying applicants on "positive personality," likability, courage, kindness".

[https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/15/us/harvard- universities-p...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/15/us/harvard-universities- personality-criteria-admissions.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Making this about racism is a self-serving distraction for many. This is about unaccountable abuse of power - something that Apple as a trillion-dollar gorilla is no stranger to.

</comment><comment><USER10> "We commit to continuing to fight the forces of environmental injustice — like climate change — which disproportionately harm Black communities and other communities of color. "

I'm not sure what's more racist and insulting - for Apple to believe that many black people will appreciate them taking this as another opportunity to play PC bingo or for them to think that it doesn't matter if they do or not.

</comment><comment><USER11> At first I wanted to dismiss this as empty corporate posturing. Which I am not going to entirely dismiss.

But then I paused because this wasn't an Apple PR announcement, but from the CEO himself, and one of the things I've found important in impacting change in large organizations is a loud, clear and consistent statement from Senior Leadership, if for no other reason than it gives the scurrying middle managers an idea of what they should try and focus on promoting and reporting, which then trickle down to the rest of the workers.

But again on the other hand what is Apple realistically going to do to change racism across America, after all Tim Cook and Apple aren't seen as societal but technology leaders, so maybe it is just empty virtue signaling to try and appeal to customers.

Can I also point out one other thing, among people that I know that lean more conservatively it appeared that they had a stronger reaction and seemed more united around the message of ending police brutality and police overreach and immunity than around the message of racism.

That's probably a complicated topic worthy of discussion in it's own right, but if we were to change the branding of this from ending racism to reforming and rethinking policing maybe we could get more traction. Although it might not address the underlying problem any improvement is good, after all a brick wall is built one brick at a time.

</comment><comment><USER12> I've seen a lot of people comment about their employers in different forums that they are upset that the employer did not make any statement at all about the current situation

I'd like to ask you folks on what you guys think and feel about employers deciding to make statements or not make statements at all

</comment><comment><USER13> better than nothing, but so corporate-speak that it's hard to take seriously (as much as i'm bought in to the apple ecosystem).

it's a vision statement, not an action plan. that's ok, but it doesn't really put any skin in the game. it especially doesn't lay out any concrete outcomes they're committed to achieving. granted, it's not solely apple's job to change the world, but either commit or hold your chips. hedging doesn't help.

so mostly branding, like most CSR† initiatives (again, better than nothing, but not much).

† corporate social responsibility

</comment><comment><USER14> When are they going to speak up about Hong Kong, Uighur concentration camps, Tiannamen, etc?

<comment><USER7> Never, that is not good for business. Simple.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is a very brave and controversial stance of Apple to take. I shall be purchasing more of their brand.

<comment><USER11> I too feel the same way. Before the only thing that stopped me from buying an overpriced laptop with diminishing features and utility was ambiguity over the racism of the CEO. But now that I know the CEO of Apple is not racist because he made a webpage that said he was not racist I intend to convert my whole ecosystem over to Apple, I will be buying their new top of the line MacBook Pro with its sleep 16 inch screen and up to 8 core i7 processor.

<comment><USER15> What about a phone?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> This is cool and black lives do matter but has anybody seen Apple's diversity numbers?

<comment><USER4> Of course, because they are public and trivial to google: [https://www.apple.com/diversity/](https://www.apple.com/diversity/)

<comment><USER3> But no improvement in over 3 years.

Not good enough.

I look forward to their 2020 numbers. Do better Apple.

<comment><USER4> Compared to who?

<comment><USER3> No.

Don't start that, Apple's data from 2016 to 2019 overall, Blacks in Apple has been stuck at 9% overall for 3 years.

Leadership positions stuck at 3%.

Tech positions went down to 6%.

The only positions that have reached double digits are Retail and Non-tech, not even retail leadership.

I will say it again, not good enough Apple.

<comment><USER4> Don't start what?

You seem to be manufacturing outrage against Apple based on nothing at all.

Did you actually read what Tim Cook said?

"We can do better."

So it seems like you are in agreement with him that they can improve. Is there someone who you think is doing better, who Apple could learn from? Do you have any suggestions as to what has been shown to work?

<comment><USER3> Looks like the data means nothing to you then. I just told you they just aren't good enough.

Anyone can say "We can do better.", it's just another empty response.

You know what they should do. Show me some improvements in the diversity numbers, then we can talk.

<comment><USER4> 'They aren't good enough' is just as empty as 'we can do better' is it not?

The difference is that Apple is at least showing their numbers, bad as they are.

 _Anyone can say_ 'not good enough'.

You say that I know what they should do. I don't, but the implication is that you do. There may be others here who also don't.

Please tell us what they should do, if you know.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Designing a Subscription Patreon or Substack - <AUTHOR> https://www.patreon.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> Looking for people with experience building Patreon accounts or businesses that are subscription based for lifestyle content.</comment>


Ask HN: How can you tell fear from useful gut feeling? - <AUTHOR> This is a broad question, but I'll give you an example based on my situation: I'm working with a client as IT/marketing consultant.
I've had a strange feeling about it since day one, but it's my main source of revenue and I ignored it.
In this project I'm also stretching my capabilities - I'm doing some things I've never done before, I want to grow as a professional so I thought the gut feeling was just fear of getting out of my comfort zone.
Now I'm torn: the strange feeling is growing by the day, and I'm not sure whether it's because I don't know whether I can deliver on some objectives or because I don't like my relationship with the client.
Do you have any key questions you ask yourself in this case? Any useful advice? Thanks. <comment><USER2> Great Question. "Experience." Sorry, but that's the answer because intuition is based on accumulated experience. So if you don't yet have the experience, particularly in a given field or with a given personality type the best you can do is try to bring in someone with far more expertise/experience, briefly, to get their "gut check" on the situation.</comment>


Asteroid ice hints at rocky start to life on Earth - <AUTHOR> http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100428/full/news.2010.207.html

<comment><AUTHOR> Original paper: [http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v464/n7293/full/nature0...](http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v464/n7293/full/nature09028.html#/)</comment>


Show HN: My last-minute project for last-minute Christmas shoppers - <AUTHOR> http://SantaRoulette.com/

<comment><USER3> Nice. A couple of bugs though:

* The close button on the intro note doesn't do anything on my iPhone

* Also on my iPhone, I can't see the whole "Who's the gift for?" pop up, and since it goes off the screen I feel like there's a button at the bottom that I'm supposed to press

And you might want to explain about the "TO:" tag in the intro note.

<comment><AUTHOR> All noted, thanks. One other thing - it doesn't look that good in Firefox, I think I'm using webkit-specific CSS for some things.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> For those interested in the tech: Bottle.py on EC2 (static stuff on S3) backed by the Amazon Product API (cached in MongoDB)

For those interested in the UI: layout designed in Fireworks, snowy hills in the background made in Blender

For those interested in the idea: eh, it's not that interesting, just a pretty wrapper around Amazon products

</comment><comment><USER4> On my 15 inch screen the "not quite" and "perfect" buttons are not visible so I'll have to scroll every time i want to use the controls. I'd move them to the top or add keyboard controls.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah yes keyboard controls are a great idea - I'll add them in a few minutes.

edit: Updated. <Space> to show a new gift, <Return> to choose it. edit2: Also made the image smaller for smaller screens to help the vertical sizing a bit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I really really like it. Agree that the buttons could be higher up somehow, but the illustration is gorgeous.

Maybe you could take this further by having a set of filters that limit the results by category (e.g. I know I want to get my brother a book, but I don't know which - I don't need to see random products, just books...)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! It's actually my first self-illustrated site (I usually stick to developing)

There are "person" categories if you click on the gift tag (not sure how noticeable that is)... but product categories could be pretty useful too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Good job!

But there's one feature that every site I've seen like this is missing - <USER2> history state so you can go back. I always find that I "next" something that I wish I could go back and check, would be nice to do this with the back button (or a history on the page).

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree, it'd suck if you liked something a few items back and can't get back to it. I'll probably eventually have Backbone handle loading the items, so it can also manage history for that sake.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Suggested Cards Against Humanity for a 5-8 year old boy. Heh...</comment>


You Don't Have What It Takes to Be a Founder - <AUTHOR> http://calacanis.com/2015/09/20/you-dont-have-what-it-takes <comment><USER2> Saying "you don't have what it takes to be a founder" is a lot like saying "you don't have what it takes to win at slots". Winning is (almost) purely random, but the more resources you have (in terms of wealth, social capital, and temerity) the more chances you get to take.

The (implicit) meme in HN posts that success is mostly a function of skill rather than mostly a function of luck is not merely misleading but actively dangerous. We need to be fully aware that business (particularly business in the middle of a bubble, or business where stocks are involved, or business where you're borrowing money from investors) is essentially a form of gambling, and can have very similar consequences for anyone who isn't exceedingly lucky. We need to stop paying attention to success stories (with a big enough pool, a series of miracles is inevitable) and pay attention to the average case (which is to say, miserable failure).

<comment><AUTHOR> As PG wrote - persistence is key ([http://www.paulgraham.com/really.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/really.html)). Resources (runway, personal savings) can let you outlast the competition or exist long enough to let the industry you are changing/creating catch up to your innovation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I don't like how the article makes it seem like "self-sacrifice" is the _only_ thing necessary for a successful founder. If you have a terrible idea, or terrible execution, it doesn't matter how much of your money and your time and your _life_ you put in to the startup, it's still going to fail miserably.

There is no magic road to a successful startup, not even by cutting off your own arm (hopefully in a metaphorical sense).</comment>


Bash Startup Explained - <AUTHOR> https://zwischenzugs.com/2019/02/27/bash-startup-explained/ <comment><USER2> That's a nice complement to the brief outline I wrote some time ago:

[https://www.solipsys.co.uk/new/BashInitialisationFiles.html?...](https://www.solipsys.co.uk/new/BashInitialisationFiles.html?sb27h)

As the author describes, I was trying to figure out why something wasn't working, and draw this chart to help me try to trace what was supposed to happen in each case, then figured - why not put it on-line?

So I did. I might look to expand it, but I thought I'd mention it in case someone finds it a useful companion to the lunk article.

<comment><USER3> That looks great. What I really struggled with was capturing 95% of use cases accurately without complicating the story so much that no-one could make sense of it reading relatively casually.

I skipped a bunch of detail as a result, like other options available, and bash_logout.

It feels like quite an art to get the balance right for pedagogical purposes!

<comment><USER2> It would be diminishing returns, but you could have an overview with even _less_ detail than you have here, and then a collection of posts that each expands on a single case. That could be a useful resource, especially if it's richly interconnected. Something like a "Choose Your Own Adventure" where you follow the symptoms or context to find out more.

Just thinking out loud - I seriously doubt it would be worth it, but it would/could be a great repository of this arcane knowledge.</comment></comment></comment>


NSA_b_gone: A linux script to improve privacy on public wifi - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/tobykurien/NSA_b_gone <comment><USER2> I am not sure whether I should laugh or cry... This randomises your MAC and hostname and then prevents outgoing connections. Unless you think the NSA is running nmap on every public WiFi it does not even do what is printed on the tin. I am trying to imagine what threat model this is trying to address and why this particular set of options was chosen, as I can't see them being particularly effective and the general annoyances of step three in the process will tend to have this script nuked by the user within 72 hours.

</comment><comment><USER3> This may be a bit of a tangent; but if you wish for them to not watch your traffic (as much), encapsulate all of your data in pictures. Oh, you think I am about to suggest Stego? No way, super obvious!

You will need to get a volunteer or volunteers to help you create a few thousand variations of tubgirl with different facial expressions and different ingredients. There might be a couple folks that will watch those pictures specifically, but most of them prefer the breast and penis pics that you are all sexting back and forth. It won't stop all the snooping, but it will reduce the number of people snooping dramatically.

Each facial expression represents a different utf-8 or utf-16 character. You are going to need to make a LOT of pictures unless your messages are really simple. Each different color fluid could represent different voice inflections or perhaps a different character-set-of-the-day.

If I could get a volunteer, we could write the first "Hello World".

</comment><comment><USER4> NSA be gone? good luck with that. They define themselves as a "capabilities oriented organization", and that basically translates into discovering and hiding backdoors into everything.

</comment><comment><USER5> The trouble with a completely random hostname (or username---mine is pc2g4d after all) is that they're used by few enough people, and when sufficiently long are easily distinguished from non-random strings, that maybe they can actually reduce anonymity.

For example, if you see the following pool of usernames:

      alice
      bob
      charlie
      W2zwAe3W9oVkRK9aSXWnTsxLj

And then in another context you see another pool of identifiers:

      doug
      erin
      filipa
      iA4PrG7jtp6hmNQNVDCqk36C

Which of these don't belong? It seems at least possible that the random identifiers were generated by the same person, or at least the same type of person.

The fact that an identifier provides no information is itself information. I wouldn't be surprised if this could be a useful signal for linking accounts that are meant to remain totally unlinked.

So totally random MAC addresses or hostnames could just cause you to stand out.

</comment><comment><USER6> Yeah, Nah;

Maybe something like this is more useful to you if you wish to control what services have internet access: [https://github.com/subgraph/fw- daemon](https://github.com/subgraph/fw-daemon)

</comment><comment><USER7> Considering that tracking also occurs based on browser cookies or even more indirect methods, seems this tool's primary effectiveness would just be deterring profiling by public wifi AP operators.

</comment><comment><USER8> To really improve privacy you should use Tor Browser and only HTTPS websites.</comment>


Archery company sues LARPer over patents, then files gag motion to silence him - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/02/archery-company-sues-larper-over-patents-then-files-gag-motion-to-silence-him/ <comment><AUTHOR> This guy has a GoFundMe campaign for helping with his attorney fees:

[https://www.gofundme.com/savelarparchery](https://www.gofundme.com/savelarparchery)</comment>


Toward an exploratory medium for mathematics - <AUTHOR> http://cognitivemedium.com/emm/emm.html <comment><USER2> Are these videos of an functioning piece of software, or mockups? There are a lot of interactions that are glossed over, and it's not obvious to me how this software would function.

I'm also skeptical about the characterization of an exploration of the properties of a single 2D matrix as "real mathematical work."

</comment><comment><USER3> this looks really cool!

I think it's weird that the author dings matlab and mathematica for being unable to do counterfactual reasoning. matlab and mathematica are computational tools, they don't do "reasoning" the way that say coq or other proof assistants do. and proof assistants can do counterfactual reasoning, so what's the deal? beyond that it would take a lot of work to encode these graphical diagrams into coq I guess...

<comment><USER4> I think he is arguing that they don't aid in counterfactual reasoning. They provide no facilities to help you yourself discover contradictions. This isn't about automating proofs, just helping you think through the problem.

<comment><USER4> Bah, I totally wrote this wrong. What I really meant to say was that it is not an automated system for doing a proof. It is a tool that helps you do reasoning and thinking. Augmenting human intelligence rather than replacing it.

<comment><USER3> I think the proponents of proof assistants would say that the proof assistant is also there to help you do reasoning and thinking.

<comment><USER4> I think they would! But a proof assistant aides you by checking your abstract thinking; you are still responsible for doing all the thinking yourself. This kind of tool aides in reasoning via a concrete example that can be tweaked in real time to see different sides of the problem.

<comment><USER5> > But a proof assistant aides you by checking your abstract thinking; you are > still responsible for doing all the thinking yourself.

This isn't really true. Nowadays, Coq can automate much of the process of coming up with a full proof - which is exactly what requires "abstract thinking". (Of course, you still need to identify "strategic lemmas", but even these lemmas can often be proven mostly automatically.) The downside is that machine-generated proofs are often gibberish from the point of view of human intelligibility, but that's okay if you're only interested in the truth of what is being proven.

> This kind of tool aides in reasoning via a concrete example

Actually, going from a concrete example to a more general abstract concept requires you to do the thinking yourself. At least if you want the result of the generalization process to be valid.

<comment><USER4> Surely Coq can fill in the wholes, but it is completely abstract; it doesn't use concrete examples to do this, and anyways, you really have to understand what it is doing.

The point of this kind of work is that it augments your thinking by allowing you to visualize and manipulate your concrete example. Before, you'd just have pen and paper for that, with no assistance from the computer at all. The whole formal kick really comes after you have enough intuition about the problem, this comes before that and aides in the intuition accumulation process.

<comment><USER5> Why do I need an intuition when I can just manipulate formulas?

<comment><USER4> Hey, isn't that it? Some people can just spend all their time in abstracting thinking land, manipulating formulas without concrete examples providing any context, because they have some amazing super power that many of us (maybe most?) don't have.

Others need context. We need to see concrete examples of the problem, play around with them, explore them, until our brains can "get" a generalization.

And in the end, maybe we all benefit from concrete context? When you are manipulating formulas, do you impose a concrete example in your head to guide that manipulation? Wouldn't it be great to get that out onto the computer somehow?

<comment><USER5> I see two concerns being conflated here: (0) how to motivate the study of a formal system, and (1) how to actually study the formal system.

To _motivate_ the study of a formal system, that is, to convince someone that the system is _useful_ , obviosuly you need examples and applications. To a non-mathematician like me, that motivation must come from outside mathematics, e.g., how to design and write reliable programs that are easy to understand and maintain.

But, once you have decided that a formal system is useful, you really need to understand it in its own terms. You seem to view formulas as "too abstract", and in need of "explanation" (not just motivation) in terms of something "more concrete". I don't see why. By itself, a formula is nothing but a well-formed syntax tree, that is, a data structure just like lists or arrays (though usually with more complex internal invariants). Do you think lists and arrays are in need of "explanation"? The rules for manipulating formulas are themselves also fairly mechanical and concrete, just like the rules for manipulating lists and arrays.

Or am I missing something?

<comment><USER4> This isn't about motivation. Its not even about study, rather how do you go about doing formal reasoning at all? Prove X has property P, what is even the first step? How do we get to the second step, and so on? Doing a proof is not a mechanical process, there isn't an algorithm for deciding what to do next to reach your goal!

Programming is a great example of this. Those lists and arrays don't appear out of nowhere. Someone has to write the code, how do they write the code? Why use a list to store those elements? Programs are generalized to operate on a wide variety of inputs to create a wide variety of outputs, but when you are writing code, you are thinking about just a few examples of those, you imagine them in your head and they guide the code you write. But perhaps the computer could help there as well.

<comment><USER5> > This isn't about motivation. Its not even about study, rather how do you go > about doing formal reasoning at all? Prove X has property P, what is even > the first step? How do we get to the second step, and so on? Doing a proof > is not a mechanical process, there isn't an algorithm for deciding what to > do next to reach your goal!

Yep, there's no general algorithm for coming up with proofs. Practice, experience and good heuristics help, though. And if they don't, then you redesign the formal system until they do.

> Programming is a great example of this. Those lists and arrays don't appear > out of nowhere. Someone has to write the code, how do they write the code?

Same as above. Just replace "proofs" with "programs", and "formal system" with "programming language".

> Why use a list to store those elements?

The desired invariants (see below) and complexity bounds for your code will tell you what data structures might be more convenient than others.

> Programs are generalized to operate on a wide variety of inputs to create a > wide variety of outputs, but when you are writing code, you are thinking > about just a few examples of those, you imagine them in your head and they > guide the code you write.

I can't speak for others, but I really don't think that way. When I'm designing an algorithm, or when I'm trying to understand someone else's design, what matters to me first and foremost is its _invariants_ \- what the program _preserves_ , even though the process' state is changing. Only if I can't see what the invariants are, then I might use some examples to generate plausible candidates, but the job isn't done until I have found and confirmed the invariants themselves. In other words, I don't conflate "works for these few examples" with "works in general".

<comment><USER4> > Practice, experience and good heuristics help, though. And if they don't, > then you redesign the formal system until they do.

I'm not sure anyone really understands the cognitive processes behind doing math. But maybe?

> The desired invariants (see below) and complexity bounds for your code will > tell you what data structures might be more convenient than others.

I rarely write code where I even need to think about complexity bounds! I'd be surprised if that was a dominating concern for even a significant fraction of programmers (systems HPC programmers, for sure, but...UI programmers?).

> Only if I can't see what the invariants are, then I might use some examples > to generate plausible candidates, but the job isn't done until I have found > and confirmed the invariants themselves. In other words, I don't conflate > "works for these few examples" with "works in general".

We don't. But you need to start somewhere. Don't underestimate the value of a few good examples in the problem solving process.

<comment><USER5> > I'm not sure anyone really understands the cognitive processes behind doing > math.

As long as we all play by the rules of the symbolic game, I don't really need to understand what's going on inside anyone else's (or even my own) head.

> I rarely write code where I even need to think about complexity bounds! I'd > be surprised if that was a dominating concern for even a significant > fraction of programmers (systems HPC programmers, for sure, but...UI > programmers?).

Invariants still remain, e.g., "the textboxes Red, Green, Blue, Hue, Saturation and Brightness must contain each a number between 0 and 255 inclusive; additionally, these numbers must satisfy the following equations (...)".

> We don't. But you need to start somewhere. Don't underestimate the value of > a few good examples in the problem solving process.

Oh, sure, examples can be a useful tool for finding the general rule, as I mentioned in my previous comment. But they don't replace the general rule.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Can anyone summarize?

<comment><USER7> Many useful mathematical proofs can be derived based on proving the impossibility of a contradictory assumption. I can try to disprove the triangle angle sum theorem (that the sum of the three angles in any triangle is 180) by attempting to draw a triangle that contradicts that assumption. I may begin by drawing two 90 degree angles. In doing so, I instead demonstrate that the 2 unconnected lines will never intersect in 2D space, and thus the figure cannot be triangle. This is a useful step along the way of formally proving that the sum of angles in any triangle is 180. My attempt at drawing an impossible figure can help visualize exactly why such a figure is impossible.

This suspension of constraint enforcement is easy on pen and paper. I can attempt to draw whatever I wish. However, there is no easy way to experiment in this way with modern mathematical software. How do you formalize a proof by contradiction in software that has these constraints pre-programmed?

<comment><USER5> That the internal angles of a triangle on the Euclidean plane add up to pi, can be derived directly, without resorting to proof by contradiction. (Hint: Draw a parallel line to one of the edges, which passes through the vertex not contained in that edge.)

Also, a proof by contradiction of an equality is unsatisfactory in constructive mathematics, because, in general, you can't go from "that A and B are not equal implies a contradiction" to "A and B are equal". (This would require equality to be decidable.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The way the term medium is used here really bothers me. For one, because I was taught that a medium is a _oneway_ communication channel. Further more, because the plural media has an idiomatic meaning in English, that is the publishing industry. I find it Ironic that it's in the name of the site, even, although I should judge the content by its merit. I don't because it's tl;dr and I got lost around the explanation of SVD (a link to wikipedia would be enough).

<comment><USER9> I don't know who erroneously taught you that a medium is always a one-way channel.

In the creative sense, it's a cliche to talk about exploring something "through the medium of dance" or to refer to painting or drawing as a medium. The blackboard is a traditional mathematical medium.</comment></comment>


My Experience Interning at a YC Startup - <AUTHOR> http://akshaybudhkar.me/2015/04/29/my-experience-of-working-at-a-yc-startup/ <comment> atom-morgan FarmLogs seems to have a nice company culture. They brought someone in who seems to have been unfamiliar with many of the technologies they use. Yet with good mentors and some patience, it looks like everything worked out.

<comment><USER2> We've had some really amazing interns and ask a lot from them. As Akshay says, they basically have the same responsibilities and opportunities to make an impact as full timers. It's awesome that they get a lot out of it too. We'll miss you Akshay!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> That routing detection you're doing for the tractors looks very similar to a 2d GCode.

Maybe there's room for new tractors in the industry. How about autonomous tractors? Make them small, cheap, and autonomous. Instead of the farmer driving one huge $1mill machine, instead have the farmer watch from a web interface the 10 mini tractors that swarm.

<comment><USER4> I think with tractors you need some heft so they have sufficient traction to pull the equipment behind them. Also with ten small units you have 10x the parts which can break down. But maybe there ate mitigating factors and maybe crops like beans could be planted with smaller tractors.

<comment><USER5> This. We have a small farm but small tractors don't have the horespower needed to pull and power the equipment needed up and down hills. Most people forget that not every farm is flat. We have significant hills in this part of the country and need the power to climb, pull several thousand pounds of rolling equipment plus provide it power in many cases.

<comment><USER6> Are you by any chance working in the tech industry + having a small farm? If yes, is it a viable lifestyle? Did you choose it or is it a family business? Sorry for the many questions, I'm curious because I've always been attracted to compaginating work as engineer with something more "traditional" and closer to the nature.

<comment><USER5> Yes, we are both (my wife and I) are in tech. I'm an analytics/conversion consultant and she is a principle engineer with an aerospace company. Early mornings are answering email and putting out fires, then farm work during the day and then 'paid work' in the afternoon / evenings. We stay very busy but our 'jobs' = 20 to 30 hours a week the rest is spent playing in the dirt. We raise a lot of birds to release in to the wild (Quail/Guinea/Ducks) and we in the process of adding beef cattle this year. It is a lot of work and very satisfying to work in tech and dirt at the same time. I added my email to my profile if anyone wants to get more detailed info or advice.

<comment><USER6> That's amazing! I'm going to write you some more questions during the weekend.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> You will be missed Akshay! Hope we work together again someday :)

</comment><comment><USER8> This is a much better writeup than the report that the UW Co-op office forces all students to produce by the end of their internships.

</comment><comment><USER9> "People cook, play, and work out together, and everyone enjoys coming to work everyday. It's hard to imagine what my life would have been without these memories with them."

What is this I feel.. envy?

While I cannot do this anymore because of family constrains, I do miss the days where I could hang around my colleagues all day long (who are still my best friends till date).

</comment><comment><USER10> Advice to anyone looking for an internship, make it clear you have a blog during your interview process. That's an intangible part of the interview process but surely it will help.

<comment><USER11> I am looking for an internship but my blog has semi-ranty posts. I link to it in my resume, but could that hurt me?

<comment><USER12> As long as the rants aren't inappropriate and are related to whatever professional area you're in, I wouldn't think they're a problem. e.g. ranting about the webdev toolchain would be reasonable, ranting about current events or personal viewpoints could raise red flags.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> We <3 you Akshay!

Pssst... farmlogs.com/jobs ;)

<comment><USER14> And yet you haven't posted on the "Who's Hiring" thread, even with all your cool tech :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've been told by people that my sense of humor is actually pretty normal/average.</comment>


PHP Must Die - <AUTHOR> http://www.steike.com/code/php-must-die/ <comment><USER2> PHP like any other language has its shortcomings and its strong points.

The market place decides. If you want to get rid of PHP (or 'kill' it) you will have to displace it with something better.

The other alternative is to send in a patch for this bug or simply report it. I've used PHP for many years and while I certainly don't love some of its more subtle problems you can build an amazing amount of stuff in it.

I have personally had good success reporting bugs to the PHP devs.

That's a lot more productive than 'blogging' about it.

In case it isn't clear why the 08 does not print anything, the 8 is an illegal character in an octal string and is discarded.

A suitable error message would be 'invalid character in octal sequence' instead of a silent discard.

<comment><USER3> If PHP is to be improved, the new language must be easy enough a 13 year old can do it and web oriented.

These are I think its two strongest points.

<comment><USER2> That and the ease of deployment, which is possibly the strongest factor. Most hosting companies will provide you with PHP on apache even if you don't ask for it.

<comment><USER3> Oh, and good documentation too. PHP.net is awesome. It's probably the largest contributing factor to PHP being easy to use.

<comment><USER4> I'd say that greatest data structure in all languages is PHP array().

It's actually an ordered dictionary with default implicit natural number keys. Efficient enough to represent concepts such as arrays, sets, queues, stacks, trees, graphs without bothering with hashtables, linked lists, reallocations and other underlying data structures tailored for specific purpose.

<comment><USER5> You must be joking.

<comment><USER4> Nope. I honestly think that that this is one of the main reasons PHP is popular and is able to power even the most complex websites with ease.

Before PHP I did Basic (Atari), 6502 Assember, Logo, ACTION!, Pascal (Kyan, Turbo), C++ (Turbo, Borland) , Java, C#. After PHP I did JavaScript and Python.

First I've met PHP-like arrays in awk and was astonished with its versatility.

I still believe that data structure that allows person to make a queue, stack, tree, even graph easily without knowing any theory and planning anything is one of the greatest things I've encountered in programming languages.

I am very dissatisfied that python does not have standard ordered dictionary and strongly differentiates between tuple, array, set and dict even though they provide just overlapping subsets of odict functionality.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The site itself is implemented with PHP. Why doesn't the author draw a conclusion from his insight, abandons PHP, and starts eating his own dogfood?

<comment><USER7> In a world where you have to eat, sleep, and work, sometimes you have to live with a bit of imperfection. If the code works, and you will never need to modify it, it doesn't matter how clean it is. (This is why I use UNIX. It sucks, but it is pretty easy to paper over the suckage. If I used a properly- designed OS, I wouldn't be able to browse the web, program, etc., etc.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I think there's a more relevant issue here: can we please stop designing languages that use prefix-zero to signify octal? It's a horrible trap lying in wait for those just learning their first language, and then you have to keep it in mind whenever you learn another one, to see whether it's "supported" in this new one as well.

Perhaps, instead, we can come up with some unified representation of a way to attach a base to a number, such as, say, [base]b[number], e.g. 2b0110001 or 16bFF, and use it in every language? (I'd say something about subscripts and their natural use née mathematics, but I'll hold that comment until the iTablet's soft keyboard layout makes people start rethinking APL-like languages.)

<comment><USER9> Python 3 has, I believe, done away with the 0 prefix for octal and uses a consistent prefix system for different-base literals: "0x" for hex, "0o" for octal, "0b" for binary.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I think "PHP Must Die" is a lot exaggerated, I think "PHP should be improved" is a better title!

<comment><USER11> The problem is most of the broken behavior in PHP is never going to be fixed because it would break compatibility.

<comment><USER2> Printing a warning would be easy enough, you could disable the warning if you want it to work like this. Leave that for one generation with a 'deprecated' attached to it, remove in the major release after that.

Lots of things that were wrong have been changed like that.

The biggest one remaining of the 'old' bugs which I think really would break too much is the strpos return value in case of no match (which is 'false' but 0 is a legal return value as well, -1 would have been a far better choice).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> If you don't like PHP, you're allowed not to use it.

<comment><USER13> I disagree. One who must use it on a regular basis has every right to despise it.

On the other hand, if you've _never_ used it, you have no right to an opinion in the first place.

So long as your opinion is tempered with experience, you have every right to it.

But, then, I'm also of the opinion that if you _like_ PHP, you have no right to write code of any sort.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> PHP's yacc grammar is a good read, just as an example of how not to implement a yacc grammar. Changing one constant, for example, would make PHP's parse error messages about 1000x easier to understand and resolve. (I sent a patch for this many years ago, but it apparently never made it in.)

The number of things that work by coincidence, like support for octal numbers, is shocking. It's clear that PHP is optimized for something other than correctness.

<comment><USER2> Hehe, don't get me started :) How about:

\- naming conventions

\- globals (or, better yet, scope in general)

\- 'objects' (I use the term lightly)

And a host of other things.

They could do a lot better still, but as long as nobody comes along and starts to make serious inroads into their user base I doubt this will change much.

What is surprising is not how much is broken, but how far they made it with so much stuff as broken as it is.

I've always thought that if python would have used braces, dropped the whitespace bullshit and came with a ready to go plug-in for apache with a similar ease of deployment that it would have kicked PHPs ass long ago.

<comment><USER7> PHP appeals to the people that don't really understand programming, so I doubt making the language better in a programming-language-designer way is going to convert users. The next language that's as popular as PHP will be "easier" in some way that's appealing to average users.

Perl was there first; you could "require 'cgi-lib.pl'" and start writing a web application.

Then PHP made that even easier, by making HTML pages valid programs. (You could add code "later"; your scripts didn't have to live in cgi-bin isolated from plain HTML files.)

The average users jumped ship from Perl to PHP pretty quickly, despite Perl having more features, more modules, a better runtime, etc. They wanted to know as little about programming as possible, and PHP got them there. Inexperienced programmers want to micro-optimize for things like deployment or runtime speed, and PHP gives them that.

The next Popular Language will make one of those things even easier.

(Ruby on Rails almost did this, but it went overboard with the advanced programming language concepts, and is now a small niche again. It alienated the experienced programmers, who went with Merb, _and_ the inexperienced programmers, who couldn't wrap their head around concepts like exceptions and just stuck with PHP, which lets you ignore errors if you prefix the line with an @ sign.)

Anyway, what I'm getting at is, "just leave the PHP users alone". Those that want something better will find it. Those that don't, won't.

<comment><USER2> PHP is used by plenty of people that (at least think they do, looking at myself ;) ) do understand programming, they just use it because they literally got used to it.

The perl community was pretty abrasive when I first looked in to it, the PHP community was the opposite so I ended up programming a large amount of stuff in PHP.

But before that I already coded my way around for about 15 years or so in lots of other languages, projects including cad systems, low level communcations drivers for weird bits of hardware, an OS and a whole slew of other stuff.

Basically my take on it was 'it's good enough for what it's for', web programming and making money.

To this day a good part of <http://ww.com/> (possibly nsfw so don't go there if you are on your boss' line) is written in PHP, I've recently gone over the whole thing in order to clean it up readying it for a port to something a little bit more clean.

It was quite amusing to see how many hoops we had to jump through 11 years ago when it was first built compared to how easy you could do some of that today.

For plenty of people it is just a means to earn a living, language aesthetics and purity or expressiveness don't enter in to the equation, it is whatever their boss tells them to use, C#, PHP or Java.

And perl definitely suffered because of the attitude perl aficionados take, both with respect to other languages as well as to those that do not fully grok perl just yet.

Community is a huge part of any programming environment, possibly even more important than the language itself.

<comment><USER7> Community is important, and that is the main reason why I tolerate Perl's various annoyances. There are simply a lot of Perl programmers that give me excellent code for free (see <http://github.com/languages>) and that makes it all worthwhile.

The same does not appear to be true of PHP. PHP's community is more talkative ("How to cut-n-paste code to hash passwords"), where Perl's is more programming-oriented ("Authen::Passphrase"). As a programmer, I prefer to stick with the programming-oriented community.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Go to his home page, this link is from 2004!

Sep 1 2004 PHP Must Die A comparison of how different scripting languages treat their users.

</comment><comment><USER15> Title is troll, and not even original.

A more interesting discussion would be how more advanced, especially functional, patterns can be used in php. Right now I'm returning in php after many years of java and some time with lisp and clojure, and I'd be very curious to know if any of you managed to apply a more lispish mindset to it.

</comment><comment><USER16> I chuckled at the subtle unspoken complaint about the required semicolons.

</comment><comment><USER17> As one of my favourite friends (also a programmer) once said:

"languages are like women; if you dont treat them in ways they like then prepare for unpredictability"

:)

EDIT: replaced "designed" with "like" - much better phrasing

</comment><comment><USER18> This reminds me of that old joke:

"Doctor, doctor, every time I lift my arm it hurts! What should I do?"

Doctor: "Don't lift your arm."

Instead:

"Every time I get lazy and expect Language <x> to catch my problems, it doesn't respond the way I think it should. What should I do?"

Don't be so lazy. Code it right in the first place.

<comment><USER7> People make mistakes. Computers don't. So people program computers to catch their mistakes, before those mistakes become problems like "crashing" or "losing money".

If you give the compiler invalid input, a subtly-broken program should not be the output. The output should be an error pointing you to your mistake.

<comment><USER19> True, but in this case PHP _corrected_ its error (it now returns null for this use case, as it should)... this is why you don't rely on undocumented behaviour as canonical. If it says it should return null, but returns zero instead, _check this result always_.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do you take notes? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER4> Two ways:

* Preferred: On paper, with a pen. I can still write faster than I type. And I can doodle when the speaker is boring.

* In a text editor or word processor. That gives me spelling correction, lets me create bullets or numbering. And later I can copy and paste the notes into whatever the end-product might be (usually another word processing document).

I have two ways to take notes, depending on the context. One is to turn off my inner analyst and just write down what the speaker is saying: treat myself as a recorder. I don't try to evaluate or comment on the text unless my Muse insists. (e.g. "rest of the panel looks dubious" or "this seems like her key point") I do this when I have no idea how valuable the information or speaker might be, such as at a conference panel.

The other way to take notes is to listen for the meat of each person's message. That means I'm evaluating while I'm listening, and picking out the relevant bits from the speaker. (Blah blah blah but what really matters to this project is that everything is painted red blah blah) That's more appropriate when I'm in a team wherein I know who the players are and what they want. And especially where I know what I want.

...Is that what you're looking for?

</comment><comment><USER5> I have a 5.5 X 8.5 moleskin I always keep in my bag.

When I read, I get ideas and wrote them down. Maybe they're related to the book or a project I'm working on, or maybe they're unrelated. Books I remember I want to buy, an email to send to someone, a new test I want to run - <USER2> over the map.

I also try to wrote down my thoughts in the morning and at the end of the day in this psuedo-journal. Things I'm thinking about, what happened that day, etc...

<comment><USER6> Nice - I also started (but only a few days back) to jot down my ideas being from a book or for an app or something but I found that there's still some getting used to with this setup.

Also I'm interested of your morning/evening ritual of writing things down - what were your main "benefits" you've seen since you've started to do so?

<comment><USER5> I've tried to do consistently many times, and usually fail. I'm trying to do this consistently now. I'm reading the Checklist Manifesto, so I have a checklist of things I want to do after I wake up and things I want to do before bed. It's pretty simple, like write something and read something before picking up your phone. I'm keeping it really simple and subjective so I keep up with it.

In 2017, I want to improve my memory and be more thorough, and I hope this will help.

This may sound trivial, but when I get into the office and someone asks me what I did over the weekend, I don't typically have an answer on the tip of my tongue. After trying this a few times, it's quicker for me to answer before going to the copout answer of "nothing". Usually, my nights are pretty boring though, lol - gym, reading, bath/reading, writing, coding, sleep - in a random order.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I want to have a decent process, but suck so bad. The process usually goes...

1\. Resolve to take notes using {notebook, evernote, whatever}.

2\. If not a notebook spend a week thinking about how to do it right.

3\. Take a couple notes and feel dissatisfied.

4\. Repeat.

The method that ended up sticking was using nvAlt synced with Simple note. On my laptop it's basically a small collection of text files, on my phone it's rendered as if it were markdown. Most my notes are either things I only expect to look at over the course of a week/month, or running logs.

Would love to find something for notes I'd want to revisit over years, though.

</comment><comment><USER8> Very recent, previous thread: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13218918](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13218918)

</comment><comment><USER6> Up until about 3 month or so I've been using mainly Evernote - but for me the app has started to be old, laggy and it's a lot of clutter.

Since then I tried a few different tiny apps but none of them seemed to do the trick until I started using Microsoft's OneNote. I was a bit skeptical at first but I found OneNote to be such a great way to take notes, tag, organise all of it in different folders and for sure there are other features I'll discover down the road.

Also - for 2017 I want to also start taking notes on paper - the old fashioned way.

</comment><comment><USER9> I'm currently working on the Udacity "Self-Driving Car Engineer" nanodegree.

In the past when doing a MOOC I would try to take notes using a text editor; this worked ok, but this time around I decided to see if I took notes "the old fashion way" (ie - by hand) if it would help with my retention of knowledge.

For taking notes, I'm using 8.5 x 11 4-square/inch quad-rule spiral-bound notebooks of 100 pages; I figured that for the class, this would be useful, as there was certainly going to be graphs, charts, etc that might need to be reproduced in some manner; the quad-rule would help on this.

When I started, I just took notes in my usual style - re-writing what was said by instructors in the videos, taking other notes from what I read on other pages (non-video). Very linear, paragraphical and full sentences. A lot of writing, in fact. Charts and other stuff were interspersed throughout.

My wife noticed this and said I had a strange was of taking notes, and told me I should try something she had done before - splitting the page. She described the process, where one side (left) becomes "headlines" or "topics", and the other side (right) becomes "details" \- where you right down terse small in- your-own words details about the topic to the left. She couldn't remember everything, though, so I did some research.

I found that the method is called the "Cornell System" \- and there are a ton of variants, but all share a common thread similar to the above. In the true system, you also have a header (for title and other info) and a "footer" (for a summary description).

Ultimately I found that this style is working well for the lessons. While in many cases I can't make things super-terse (try to make a description of back- prop and partial derivatives terse while capturing everything needed to remember the equations - unless you're a whiz at calc - which I am not - <USER3> probably isn't possible - but if anyone has any suggestions, let me know!) - but in others I can.

I've found that using this, as well as taking page-captures of the lessons (and organizing all of my data for the class on my computer), things have worked out well so far.

I would suggest looking into this method - I don't know if it would translate well outside of handwritten notes (maybe using a spreadsheet? Maybe there's a note-taking app that uses the method?) - but I think knowing about it might inspire you to create something that works as well.

</comment><comment><USER10> If we're talking about lectures - Personally I don't really take notes but instead try to write a summary of the lecture afterwards. I feel that this helps my memory further than taking notes during and going back to them afterwards

<comment><USER4> My fear -- which comes out of entirely too much experience -- is that the speaker will say, "There are three really important points to remember..." and later I look at my notes where I wrote, "#1 blah blah #2 blah blah."

...#3? I see no #3 here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I use TiddlyWiki ([http://tiddlywiki.com](http://tiddlywiki.com)). Its all kept in one html file and is useful for mapping disparate notes.

</comment><comment><USER12> All programming-related notes — Quiver

For daily research — Evernote (though I dislike it)

For brainstorm — paper moleskine

If anyone knows a good solution for organizing your own wiki — I'd very grateful!

<comment><USER13> You can try tiddly wiki: [http://tiddlywiki.com/](http://tiddlywiki.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> OneNote for digital, access-from-anywhere text. Thick, cheap drawing notebooks and pencil for diagrams and design.

</comment><comment><USER15> My only computer is my Nexus 6P.

I use Keep.

</comment><comment><USER16> synced text files

actually: flat file markdown wiki on pc, raw markdown files on my mobile

</comment><comment><USER17> org mode</comment>


Ask HN: What's the location specific job board you use? - <AUTHOR>

My friend recently pointed me to a Rails job board in Austin made by the local group AustinOnRails http://lists.austinonrails.org/pipermail/jobs-austinonrails.org/2012-January/thread.html.  I was wondering if HN knew about more of these hidden gems. <comment><USER2> Not in a single place but mostly in Boulder and New York. <http://www.techstars.com/about/jobs/></comment>


Where can I find code for this website's animation? - <AUTHOR> Hello everyone,
I feel so excited to share this website for two things.
https://students.brown.edu/seeing-theory/
It serves as a very good introduction to probability & statistics.
Secondly & more importantly, it has a VERY beautiful animation.
May I ask which library or framework have they used for creating that animation? Is it jQuery?
I also would like to find the code of this animation.
This particular website has motivated me so much that I would like to learn website animation.
Dear HN folks, please help me in getting started with this. <comment><USER2> The animation is done via a HTML5 canvas element. They load in the D3.js library on the page, and the source for the actual animation also:

[https://students.brown.edu/seeing- theory/js/balls.js](https://students.brown.edu/seeing-theory/js/balls.js)

From the attribution in the comment, the effect comes from this: [https://bl.ocks.org/mbostock/3231307](https://bl.ocks.org/mbostock/3231307)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks fiiv, you are a life saver! :)

Would you kindly help me with [https://www.lightelligence.ai/](https://www.lightelligence.ai/) ?

This site too has stunningly mesmerizing animation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> it says what they are using right on that page, _and_ links to the source code behind it...</comment>


Twitter, American Express Partner For Hashtag Purchases - <AUTHOR> http://www.fastcompany.com/3005721/sold-twitter-american-express-partner-hashtag-purchases

<comment><USER2> what about fraud?</comment>


Why are iPad games so ugly? - <AUTHOR>

This may be a stupid question, since I don't know much about game creation or iOS (or anything at all, really), but why are iPad games so ugly?
Is it just something simple like the graphics card? Or is it something else, like the language doesn't present itself well? Or is it something entirely different, like the return on time invested isn't high enough?
Or am I just not looking at the right games?
I NEED ANSWERS!!!
Thanks, I'll hang up and listen. <comment><USER2> What games are you looking at and what, exactly, do you mean by "ugly"?

</comment><comment><USER3> There are bad and ugly games on every single platform.

</comment><comment><USER4> They're just low budget. There's a difference.</comment>


Ask HN: has NSA given commercially sensitive info to US companies - <AUTHOR>

The estimates of 35bn loss to cloud companies - does that include the idea that companies might have their secrets handed over to US competitors?<p>Edit : I wanted to say is there any evidence but ran out of chars <comment><USER2> They're reported to have fed back to Boeing details of an Airbus bid: [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/820758.stm](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/820758.stm)

</comment><comment><USER3> I think we should wait for Snowden leak, 99% I guarantee there are this type evidence. I am more interested in that, is there evidence when stolen secrets by NSA are patented by US company and then sued original creator.

</comment><comment><USER4> >The estimates of 35bn loss to cloud companies

Where did you get this info?

<comment><USER5> [https://www.google.cl/search?q=35bn+loss+to+cloud+companies&...](https://www.google.cl/search?q=35bn+loss+to+cloud+companies&oq=35bn+loss+to+cloud+companies)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you - unless I comment in my own submission I never get a prod someone has commented.

But I must admit its not clear if that 35 bn prices in my concerns or not</comment></comment></comment>


All Things Digital's Take on WakeMate - <AUTHOR> http://voices.allthingsd.com/20101222/wakemate-finally-ships-will-you-sleep-better-now-that-its-watching-you/

<comment><USER2> Sell the product at break even so you can gather the world's largest pool of sleep information to sell? Hmm...

"On the macro level, we're really doing the biggest sleep study that has ever been done," he said. "We'll be able to tell you how people are sleeping in San Francisco versus New York, based on seasons and all kinds of things."

<http://wakemate.com/docs/privacy/>

Based on this they could be a huge marketing funnel for sleep aid companies, stress medications, etc...</comment>


Donald Trump's presidency is going to be a disaster for the white working class - <AUTHOR> http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/9/13572172/donald-trump-white-working-class <comment><USER2> That's a pretty bold statement for them to make, but Vox has been so rabidly anti-Trump that I'm not surprised to see even more. Lots of links! to other Vox articles. They're saying that he's just going to cut off health care for millions of people, but even Bloomberg says "Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said that as president he would use Medicaid to cover poor people who can't afford private health insurance, and make birth control available without a prescription."

This is pretty much a big rehash of Vox's previous anti-Trump talking points. Now that Clinton lost, that's about all they have to cling to.

<comment><USER3> > but even Bloomberg says "Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said > that as president he would use Medicaid to cover poor people who can't > afford private health insurance,

He might try, but haven't the Reps fought exactly that? "It's single payer!" Or maybe "we thought of it so it's OK" will kick in.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> So the guys who didn't see the outcome of the election coming are now predicting the entire next 4 years. Some people never learn huh?

<comment><USER5> Do you have any particular policy points or data-based disagreements with the argument?</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Is capitalization in names of technologies one of your pet peeves? - <AUTHOR> Do you cringe when you see Iphone (vs. iPhone) or JAVA (vs. Java)? <comment><USER2> I can definitely relate to that, my biggest pet peeve is probably people writing ElasticSearch instead of Elasticsearch - even though it isn't written like that anywhere on the official website.</comment>


Ask HN: GitHub font color - <AUTHOR> Did GitHub just change their calm blue link font color to bright-omg-blue-#1269D3 ? <comment><USER2> Yes they did, the colors are so much brighter than my future

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm not sure I like it. Maybe I'll get used to it.

There's been a few css changes on Github lately that I've noticed, like the menu bar at the top going dark and the fixed navbar in profiles.

</comment><comment><USER4> Yeah, I believe so!</comment>


Framed, Arrested and Robbed by the Police in Frankfurt - <AUTHOR> https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/framed-arrested-and-robbed-by-the-police-in-frankfurt_us_5a58f270e4b01ccdd48b5bbf <comment><USER2> Calling police Nazis is going to get you criminal charges. How surprising.

The rest of the article is basically just drama-seeking filler.

See also [http://www.dw.com/en/is-it-illegal-to-call-someone-a- nazi/a-...](http://www.dw.com/en/is-it-illegal-to-call-someone-a- nazi/a-42313527)</comment>


SQL transaction isolation levels explained - <AUTHOR> https://elliot.land/sql-transaction-isolation-levels-explained <comment><USER3> There are some controversy about definitions of isolation levels in SQL standard. For example absence of mentioned phenomenas doesn't guarantees serialisability, as it shown in Berenson paper [1]. Implementation independent description of weak isolation levels can be found in Adya phd thesis [2] (and that's a tough read). Also nice evaluation of modern databases in terms of [2] can be found in Martin Kleppmann's github [3].

[1] [https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/research/publication/a-criti...](https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/research/publication/a-critique-of-ansi-sql-isolation-levels/) [2] [http://pmg.csail.mit.edu/papers/adya- phd.pdf](http://pmg.csail.mit.edu/papers/adya-phd.pdf) [3] [https://github.com/ept/hermitage](https://github.com/ept/hermitage)

</comment><comment><USER4> Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought that under Repeatable Reads you also could get rollbacks and had to make sure that the transaction would be retried?

Also, I would like to point out that at least MySQL sand Postgres also support explicit named locks. This can often be a better choice than trying to rely on the implicit locks associated with the isolation levels when dealing with large "objects" \- that is things like an order on a shopping site that spans many tables and rows. Unless you are very careful, concurrent transactions against things like this would access them in different order, causing deadlocks. Creating an explicit named lock for the whole object is often a very good way to fix this.

<comment><USER5> You can get rollbacks anywhere. Repeatable Read isn't going to stop that...

Under repeatable read, read and write locks will be held till then end of the transaction. You can get deadlocks in SQL Server if you have a transaction you run over multiple sessions that do a SELECT on a set of rows that you then later update.

This occurs because the SELECT puts shared locks on the rows, then attempts to upgrade this lock to an update lock with the UPDATE statement. However, as another transaction also holds a shared lock on the same rows, then your transaction waits for the shared lock to be ended from the other transaction before it runs the update -and of course so does the other transaction, so you get a read/update deadlock.

You get around that by forcing the SELECT to use an update lock.

You can also get a cycle deadlock.

I'm not entirely following what you mean by named locks vs. implicit locks. This sounds like lock hinting, where you specify the type of lock that each query runs. Isolation levels only really specify what locks are held for the duration of the transaction.

You can actually enforce a serializable isolation level on an individual table in SQL Server from a transaction that runs a different isolation level - <USER2> prevent phantom reads in repeatable read transactions use the hint WITH (UPDLOCK, HOLDLOCK) - the HOLDLOCK will put a key range lock on the table. This prevents anyone inserting rows into that range, thus ensuring you always get the same results from the SELECT on that particular range you care about.</comment></comment>