Ask HN: How I can get out of a job that has me burned out and exhausted? - <AUTHOR> Four years ago I started a job and it was pretty good at first.  But due to some corporate changes everybody just got slammed with work. Upper management does not think it's wise to hire more people so they are burning everybody out and people are leaving. The workload is unmanageable and it just never ends.
It's time to move on but I am just too burned out.  I have even recently caught myself forgetting pretty basic stuff.  My weekend are just spent recovering from the week really.  I don't do much activity that I used to for fun because I am just so tired. I asked my psychiatrist and I am not depressed.
Any advice? <comment><USER3> There's another option. While doing the interviews, and preparing to GTFO, just go back down to 40 hours. Slow down. Increase code quality. And intentionally miss your deadlines.

This is something you can only do when things are crazy and out of control, and everyone else is leaving. You see, they cannot fire you because they cannot hire anyone to come in. Thus, you doing any work is better than having noone.

Make sure to communicate that these won't be done. Tell them that they need to make contingency plans and give them your own schedule of reasonable dates. (Of course, you need to make sure to make _these_ dates.)

If they bring you in for discipline, play the health card. "Health is something you cannot pay enough for me to exchange. I started having major health problems, and they were stress related. I cannot meet the given dates, and I am communicating that. It is your job to manage client expectations as a manager."

The current climate for programmers means that you can do this right now.

<comment><USER4> I've done this. It mostly worked - but I had to give up some of my management responsibilities because of my health problems. I'm still gainfully employed but my superiors don't look at me as being the number one player on my team anymore- probably the number two. Another guy who spends all of his time working on weekends and on nights has taken on that role.

It's always a trade off. The organization does what it can get away with. You can pull back to 40 hours but someone else will fill the vacuum that you left behind.

So: I agree. Tell your bosses that they need to better manage client expectations, but recognize that they won't because they think they don't have to (other people are doing the work right? Management's work/life balance is fine!) You might be giving up some upward mobility or your 'irreplacable status' in your team. If you're anything like me, this will be an acceptable price to pay for you to regain some work/life balance and your health.

<comment><USER5> I think his point was to only do this temporarily while preparing to leave for another company, whereas in your situation it seems you sought to stay at your current company while maintaining a lighter workload.

<comment><USER4> Yes, that's true - and I guess my point is that you can dial it back without necessarily planning to leave, but it comes at a cost. And, better yet, the cost may not be permanent - you could regain your former status by dialling the hours back up and making sure your superiors notice, or learning how to work smart as a substitute for working hard. The other people are bound to burn out eventually.

I guess I should provide the disclaimer that a lot of this depends on your history with the company. I singlehandedly got my company through a transitional period that has caused it to double in size since. That bought me a lot of capital. And while I have not been able to keep up that pace since then, my bosses remember even if their attitude seems to be, "What have you done for me lately?"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> 1\. I wish I had learned this earlier, but don't take things personally. It doesn't sound like you have in your post, but to reiterate, don't let resentment eat you up because you'll need the energy (and self-confidence) when applying to new jobs.

2\. Look for new jobs...passively, at first. Put up a LinkedIn...if you're a developer, put up a Github profile. If you're a Ruby/Rails/Python, _definitely_ put up a Github profile...I have a perfectly fine job but I keep getting recruitment emails from YC and big Valley companies simply because I have (pretty much non-used) repos that are classified as being Ruby.

3\. Don't piss off anyone at your current company. See #1 - reduce any resentment or frustration you're feeling. Meditation helps. But mostly, no matter what, remember that this is just temporary...any negative feelings you have now, you're going to look back in a month (from the perspective of your new job) and you'll think..."Why was I so down/angry ?" Negativity/pessimism isn't all bad...if it spurs you on to greater things. But it sounds like you're already on your way to looking for greater things, so no need to let negativity eat at you past that point.

Edit: riffing off of other advice in this thread

4\. If you aren't overworked, or even if you are, I would definitely work on some side projects, or find an open source project to contribute to. Not just for resume padding (which is frankly, not going to be enough motivation for you to work on it diligently), but to hone your skills, as it sounds like you're worried that the drain at work has caused you to regress a little. Aim for the side-projects to be as much of a win-win as possible...even if the side-project isn't popular or completely polished, have it at least be _useful_ to you, in your own life...not only is that kind of project fun to build, but it gives you something to be passionate to talk about, either in normal life or in interviews.

<comment><USER7> probably one of the most important things to remember in OP's shoes: 3. Don't piss off anyone at your current company.

<comment> rational-future It really depends. E.g. if you're a rockstar dev, you can afford to piss whoever you want, as long as they deserve it. Making the right enemies is also a very important social skill.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Here's some advice: Stop looking for advice. I don't mean to sound harsh. But considering that you had to ask your psychiatrist whether or not you were depressed (not to mention that you accepted his/her answer unquestioningly), and considering that you are asking the strangers of HN what to do, I would suggest that you aren't really in touch with your own mind and actions.

Advice will be helpful. But in the end, the only one who can leave your job is you. It sounds like you need to do it, so just do it. You'd be surprised how well you can think for yourself once you make yourself do it. :)

</comment><comment><USER9> Sometimes you're so burned out that you need to just stop working, and sit at home and do nothing for a few months.

So this time you'll need to take a chunk out of your savings. Don't even bother looking for a new job until you're two months in to your sabbatical.

Next time, get out before things get this bad.

Wikipedia has the Freudenberger and North model of burnout. I'm sure you'll find yourself on there:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burnout_(psychology)#Phases](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burnout_\(psychology\)#Phases)

</comment><comment><USER10> ">>> Upper management does not think it's wise to hire more people so they are burning everybody out and people are leaving."

If you see a large number of co-workers, especially good ones leaving. Its a sign something is wrong.

">>> It's time to move on but I am just too burned out."

If you know its time to move on. Leave. If you have savings, pay off your rent and bills for 3-4 months and rest. Take walks(seriously take slow walks and relax), take up a relaxing hobby, cook food (fresh food - no canned food), and get enough sleep (7-8 hours minimum),whilst looking for another job.

I love working hard and I enjoy challenges, but if it means risking your health/social life/family life to meet an unrealistic deadline, this is where I draw the line. I used to work for a big company during summer vacation and the upper management had the exact same attitude your said about hiring people. They wanted a 5 man team to do a 10 man job.Into the second month I was already depressed, hoping for the summer to finish quickly. Since the day I left the place, I told myself I'll never work for a place which has a crappy work/life balance again.

Remember you are replaceable and they know it.

<comment><AUTHOR> You're right. I am just worried on how I explain that 3-4 month vacation

<comment><USER11> "Job search".

You don't even have to lie if you don't want to. Every time I've gone looking for a job without a direct contact I could tap, it took several months. Looking for a job is a long slow process that takes maybe a couple of hours a day, even if you really work at it. It takes much less if you don't particularly push. It can be pretty much a vacation if you want it to be one.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> > Upper management does not think it's wise to hire more people so they are > burning everybody out and people are leaving.

It is in everyone's, and especially upper management's, best interest that the company does well. Rather than vilifying "upper management" and quitting and being bitter about it, can you have a constructive conversation with someone up the chain to help you AND the company out? If you're going to leave then what do you really have to lose?

If it were me I would approach someone and say something along the lines of:

"I'm quite concerned for the well being of the company/organization/whatever. I noticed that there were some corporate changes recently and since then many employees, myself included, have felt burnt out and some have even started leaving. I think this is due to the fact that we are understaffed and this problem is only going to be exacerbated as people leave. What do you think?"

This could result in a number of things including decreased workload, more hires, or nothing. In the positive cases everyone is happy and in the third you don't lose anything and can still quit your job.

Best of luck!

<comment><USER13> > Rather than vilifying "upper management" and quitting and being bitter about > it, can you have a constructive conversation with someone up the chain to > help you AND the company out?

While this may theoretically work in some situations and is arguably "worth a shot" for someone with so little to lose, I've seen workplaces similar to the ones the original post is describing and the times I've seen this happen talking things out with management was not fruitful.

In my experience (admittedly anecdotal and a relatively small sample size), in a company that goes sideways as described by OP you have 1-3 levels of manager on top of you who are just as frazzled by the whole situation as you are. They will commiserate, throw their hands in the air and tell you they've tried pushing for changes, realistic release dates and/or hiring more resources and have been denied by levels above them. Talking directly to _their_ managers (VP or perhaps higher at this point) ends up in a pleasant conversation about vague, nebulous reasons why things can't change right now and everyone has to buckle down to help the company toward the brighter future that is right around the corner. They will rarely-to-never give you direct reasons, eg. the company is running out of money and seriously can't afford any extra resources, and the next release is a hail mary attempt to save the business and that's why it needs to be out on date X because the runway is totally gone at X+Y where Y is a laughably small number if you ever actually learn it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> If you aren't doing so already, start a daily exercise routine before deciding your next step.

Jogging, workout, walking, cycling, swimming...whatever you like at whatever time and duration are convenient to you.

They give you a kind of physical and mental high that'll help cope with stress.

I felt short term boosts in self-confidence and more long term improvements in memory and recall (YMMV, of course).

<comment><USER15> This is great advice for high stress situations. But if it is overwork, it can be impossible to take up an exercise routine when you are working 36 - <USER2> hours straight every other week. I've been there and remember just trying to stay conscious let alone going for a run.

<comment><USER14> Need not be anything strenuous. Just a dozen pushups are good enough and take hardly half a minute. Jumping up and down like a little kid is fine too! The idea is to divert the mind away from the source of stress.

<comment><USER15> Right, but when it is exhaustion from not sleeping for days at a time and working 14+ hours days 7 days a week for weeks at a time it stops being about stress and simply trying to stay physically and mentally conscious. It sounded to me original question was about dealing more with exhaustion than stress. For stress, I would consider exercise an excellent suggestion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I suggest the following:

1 get off work no later than 6pm

2 walk/jog/exercise

3 cook your own tasty+healthy dinner and share it with friends

4 read a bit

5 find some hobbies

Do this for a few weeks. Then figure out what you want to do next.

Oh yeah, watch "Office space". Seriously.

<comment><USER17> I handed in my resignation recently. Can confirm, watching "Office Space" then buying the soundtrack and repeatedly listening to "Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangster" was great moral support.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Is there any reason why you can't walk into your manager's office tomorrow and say "this is my two weeks notice"?

<comment><USER19> Yes. If there isn't a reason, do this. There are plenty of other companies that would love to have you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> How long can you go without working?

Just quit.

Or... take unpaid leave, medical if need be, and have some time off.

Just quit, have a vacation, apply someplace else.

</comment><comment><USER21> Had the same issue, just moved to another country changed job. Started going to the gym, started going to meetups. Take a long vacation and think about what you want to do before you jump ship.

</comment><comment><USER22> I mean, the obvious answer is 'do something else', but it's kinda up to you what that is, and also depends on your situation.

If you are single with no dependants, then it can be anything you want. Do something where you don't take work home. I burned out on Sys Admin work and worked as a bartender for a year and loved it and came back as a .Net developer.

If you have a family...Um... That's a much more complicated scenario. Definitely do something new, but navigating that is going to be a lot trickier.

</comment><comment><USER23> Could I ask, is there a "bullying culture" where you are now?

The reason I ask is because that is the only way I could reconcile "The workload is unmanageable and it just never ends." It's hard for people who haven't experienced it to explain why you can't just start saying no to requests and leaving the office on time (even though this is possibly the only way to salvage the situation).

<comment><AUTHOR> What do you mean by bullying culture? There are times when somebody wants something done, you explain to them that it's not possible or that it can be done but it may take some time due to current queue and they go directly to to the CIO/CTO and complain. I consider that a form of bullying so if that's what you mean then yes it's rampant. Some do it some don't.

<comment><USER23> If you just agree due to fear of repercussions, and "they" know this and manipulate it to their advantage then yes, that's probably bullying. Best case you're working with sociopaths.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> What are your skill sets? If you're a good programmer you can easily land another job these days. If you don't have time to look and apply for jobs then may be you should quit your current job to look for a new one. It may sound like a bad idea now but in retrospect it'll may be worth it. Just think of the opportunity costs associated with staying at current job or leaving it. Good luck!

<comment><USER25> There's a middle ground, you could just take any minimally acceptable contracting job. You won't be mentally committed to it, as no one would think you were obligated to stay past the initial contract period. Just find something that's not overly demanding. This will get you out of the rut that's your current job, and hopefully give you time and rest to consider your next real position.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Having been in a similar situation myself, it's obvious to me that you're working for a company that's circling the drain. Low employee retention is toxic even when management is actively recruiting to fill the gaps that are left, and the fact that they aren't suggests to me that either the company is in dire financial straits already, or else it is being so badly mismanaged that it soon will be.

In such a situation, the only thing I can recommend is: make it your top priority to find another job. The longer you stay, the worse it's going to get, and the greater share of the blame you will be lumped with when things go pear shaped.

If you can't find one quickly that matches your current seniority and salary, would you be prepared to consider something a bit lower down the scale as a stopgap? This wouldn't have to be long term -- just as an interim for a couple of months or so until you can find something closer to your expectations that you can make a bit more permanent.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think in terms of IT ( development including) they have always circled the drain. But other departments which are the majority of the companies function keep it afloat.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> _How I can get out of a job that has me burned out and exhausted?_

To give you the honest truth, speak up or quit. You are not doing yourself or your employer any favours staying and burning yourself out.

I was in the same situation about 6 months ago myself. I was part of a small team that was increasingly being overworked and expected to deliver in unrealistic amounts of time. Overtime was being factored into estimates and instead of overtime being a sometimes thing, eventually all projects were actually taking into account weekends. Nobody was being paid for the extra time and once new management came in, unless TOIL (time off in lieu) was agreed upon in advance, you were not given time off at a later date.

I left and while it was hard because I loved the people I worked alongside, I did it for myself, my career and my family. You are not doing yourself any favours by staying, so stop asking for advice and make a decision.

</comment><comment><USER28> Commenters, please note that the author did not say "overtime" or "long hours".

My advice: start working on a side project which will give you satisfaction from every half hour of your work. Does not need to be an IT project. You'll think of something.

<comment><USER29> > The workload is unmanageable and it just never ends.

I'm not sure there is another good way to interpret that statement.

<comment><AUTHOR> Reef is actually right. There's not much overtime. Now while that to many may seem like a great job where there should be no burn out. I can say that it is still very stressful. The reason being there can just be so many things going on at once. Projects that should take hours to days end up taking weeks to months due to just the sheer number of them and the constant barrage of interruptions. Context switches are expensive. Every time somebody else has nothing better to do they feel like they should bother you.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> First, start working the hours that they actually pay you for.

Take a personal day.

Understand that you have a _business_ relationship with your employer. Mentally, you have to be ready to tell your employer that "I'm sorry, but I'm really not in a position to subsidize your business any further."

If you haven't already, contact the colleagues that left and connect with them (add them to linked-in, etc). Ask them if you can use them as a reference, see if they have any job leads. Get the contacts of the people you still work with - before _they_ leave.

Do not waste energy trying to fix the company you work for. You just can't. Yes it sucks but that is reality.

<comment><AUTHOR> I really love this line "I'm sorry, but I'm really not in a position to subsidize your business any further."

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Lots of people will tell you to take it easy, to reduce your workload, slow down, etc.

That's fine and all. Sometimes you need to do that.

But, more often than not, the following advice is more beneficial:

Stop waiting for life to get easier. Stop wishing for things to slow down and for you not to be so tired and burned out.

Chances are life will get faster and more difficult. Chances are things will not get easier.

So, instead, focus on getting stronger.

One thing is in your control the other is not.

"Don't wish it was easier wish you were better. Don't wish for less problems wish for more skills. Don't wish for less challenge wish for more wisdom"

― Jim Rohn

<comment><USER31> I'll add one last thing before this gets down-voted into oblivion. You are a hell of a lot stronger than you think.

The human spirit is indomitable.

Remember that.

<comment><USER32> I'll add another:

It doesn't matter where you go, until you change, everything will remain the same.

edit: For relevant context: if you're thinking about quitting, your alternatives are 1) give two weeks and leave, for another job or not.

2) stay and say nothing, hope it gets better

3) Risk it. Talk to your boss. Apply for other jobs quietly if you want some security.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> +1 to the exercise / walking. Has changed my mindset. Way fresher at complex problem solving. About 20min into a long walk and ideas are just popping!

Also, scale back your time. Communicate this to management: "I just can't do this anymore". Last time I did that (2005) they said they would start looking for my replacement. A few months later they were still looking and I had a new 30h/week job+3weeks+healthcare at a bank walking distance from my apt.

Treat yourself correctly and the world will do the same.

</comment><comment><USER34> It would help to know about your location, most things relating to HR are location dependent. If you're burned out and exhausted I think some sick leave to begin with would be entirely appropriate, assuming you're going to be paid while on sick leave. Then, when you've recovered a bit would be a good time to evaluate your options. When stressed out or tired do not make important decisions if you do not absolutely have to.

</comment><comment><USER35> Sleep! Mindfulness-based meditation is easy to learn and even if you have trouble focusing at first, it's still helpful for getting in touch with your stress/anxiety level (so it doesn't creep up on you over months and years next time). Finally I'm sort of an introvert but I've learned being social is so important to my happiness and sanity. Anyway, good luck!

</comment><comment><USER36> Pretty much the same answer as 'how do I find a job, I'm unemployed'. I'm sure you could answer that question more or less.

Let us know if there's any specifics that make your situation unique.

In any case, I'd make a schedule. For example make a plan to quit in two months. That'll give you some relief as it's something to work towards. Use up any vacation days you've got left. Tell your boss in a month from now you're quitting. And save up every penny the next two months you can to build a bit of a buffer. Try to save up enough to pay rent and food and such for a few months.

And really, start applying for other jobs. When you do tell your boss you're quitting, tell him you disagree with the current workload and that you'll be quitting in 4 weeks unless you can work something out. Perhaps they can propose a middle ground, if not you can leave.

In general do everything you can to not be dependent on your current job, meaning: find alternative jobs + build up some savings.

</comment><comment><USER37> You should start working less until you feel better and then move on to another company.

<comment><USER38> I would agree with this. work less. spend time more on yourself. in my case I look for something new to learn. go to gym more often. and also take it easy and look for a new job.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Hit the brakes. 9 to 5. If your boss has an issue just let him fire you.

</comment><comment><USER40> > and it just never ends

It ends at 5pm. Job searching starts at 5:30pm. Don't wait too long to find another job or else you'll be desperate and take another bad job or sacrifice negotiating power.

<comment><AUTHOR> I really don't work more than the normal 40-45 hours a week. It's just the work at work never stops piling in and then it overlaps. Then hearing the people complaining.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Kevin the CTO of Mattermark here. A lot of people have had good success using our product to find cool companies to work at. I'm also happy to help you out with application / interview tips. Email me if you want a hand email@example.com

<comment><USER42> Wow only $4799/yr to "find cool companies"? Where do I sign up

<comment><USER32> I was going to snark and say "monster.com"

Then I went to Mattermark and read about it a bit... could be useful. Maybe a bit excessive to get more than the free trial for a job search, but, for investing, it could be useful.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> If you are able to quit, please post the name of the company here.

</comment><comment><USER44> start interviewing, taking days off.</comment>


Facebook passes Google sites in total user minutes - <AUTHOR> http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129762892

<comment><USER2> I'm not surprised; Google is an information intermediary (you go there to find something else) whereas Facebook is information (you go there to find out about your friends).

<comment><USER3> Yeah - no real reason to be on Google for more than a few seconds at a time. Plus, facebook encourages you to keep your browser window open (persistent chat, live feed updates etc).</comment></comment>


Asynchronous Timewarp Examined - <AUTHOR> https://www.oculus.com/blog/asynchronous-timewarp/

<comment><USER2> Is this using optical flow to make better interpolated frames? [http://gpu4vision.icg.tugraz.at/papers/2011/werlberger_emmcv...](http://gpu4vision.icg.tugraz.at/papers/2011/werlberger_emmcvpr2011.pdf)

There are two commercially available retimers (atleast) that use optical flow for frame interpolation

Twixtor [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxF4lSmkRW8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxF4lSmkRW8)

Kronos [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lX3ki0CzBCM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lX3ki0CzBCM)</comment>


Ongoing · Concur.next — Eleven Theses on Clojure - <AUTHOR> http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2009/12/01/Clojure-Theses <comment><USER2> One of the inventors of XML has a hard time reading s-expressions. Okay.

<comment><USER2> It is a very good writeup. I like his point that Clojure sets a high bar for concurrency features. His dislike of Lisp is my only disagreement.

<comment><USER3> I think he's going to get a lot of grief for that (his Lisp hating) here, but it's hard to disagree with "most people (will) struggle with it".

I think the point is that most people will just tell him (me, also) to suck it up and learn it anyway.

Fairs fair.

<comment><USER4> I thought the point was that readability is important. There's a difference between one's willingness and ability to learn a new language and read code written in it and what is a good idea to foist upon the many others who will read, extend, and maintain that code.

If you are building a system that you can't develop and maintain by yourself, you have to think about what other people will "struggle with".</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Navy Solid State Laser - lases boat - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/04/video-navy-laser-sets-ship-on-fire/

<comment><AUTHOR> This is a technology I've been following for a while, its the solid state laser system (as opposed to the free electron laser that is targeting a megawatt). In littoral combat situations this capability could adequately defend against gun boats, and it would be pretty hellish on pirates in Somalia as well.

The news however is the ever increasing power available in semi-conductor based lasers. These are made by Northrup Grumand as part of the JHSSP [1]

One of the investigations in the DARPA program is a 'backpack' laser which could replace a sniper rifle with a device that would not require a spotter nor any ballistics calculations.

It will be interesting if we get cheaper bandwidth out of this work as well, reducing the number of repeaters needed to get a signal through a trans- oceanic able would be an improvment.

[1] [http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-04-maritime-laser-navy- clos...](http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-04-maritime-laser-navy-closer- lasers.html)</comment>


Chrome/macOS users in The Netherlands cannot visit google.com or google.nl - <AUTHOR> Users cannot visit google.com or google.nl in The Netherlands on Mac OSX & Chrome in the latest update, our whole company is experiencing this issue since this morning.
For those experiencing this issue, disable the following setting in chrome://flags/ :
Experimental QUIC protocol Mac, Windows, Linux, Chrome OS, Android Enable experimental QUIC protocol support. #enable-quic <comment><USER2> Quicker link to the setting: chrome://flags/#enable-quic

I had the same problem this morning. Disabling QUIC solved it.

<comment><USER3> I experienced problems with several Google services from DK after upgrading Chrome this morning.

Disabling QIUC as parent links to unbroke things for me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> same here in Germany on windows this morning.. also had to disable QUIC.

Funnily I switched to Microsoft Edge for a short while, but have once again realized why its unusable. After about 1-2 minutes using it, the entire browser became unresponsive for about 60 seconds. Afterwards I couldnt press sign-in on YouTube because an invisible IFrame from the OneNote Web Clipper Extension was overlaying it. Nobody seems to be testing those either :)

<comment><USER5> No dedicated testing team is ever going to beat the developers dogfooding the tool daily. I wish I had access to metrics from stackoverflow et al, to see if Microsoft inhouse developers use Edge

<comment><USER6> I don't think they use Office either.

The only software where you can tell that they dogfood it is Visual Studio. Every change makes sense, is useful, user friendly and corresponds to problems I have met.

The other software that you would assume they dogfood but it doesn't show is Windows 10...

<comment><USER7> What? I'm sure they use Office at MS, it's used in every other non-sv office I've ever worked at.

<comment><USER6> The 2007 UI was a major step backward in term of productivity. Everyone I know who uses Office extensively still miss the 2003 UI.

Also there are lots of use cases that they never bothered fixing or improving, which show they don't really use it. Like non resizable windows in excel (eg function wizard). Linking a powerpoint deck to an excel model (no good solution now). No way to do placeholders within a textbox in powerpoint (like you can in word). VBA not having evolved in nearly 20 years. You don't see this sort of "I don't give a shit" attitude with Visual Studio.

I am sure someone in the finance or marketing department at Microsoft uses office and is as frustrated as every other power user. But the developers in the office team clearly do not use their own product. If there are still any dev in the office team. The only changes I see from version to version are purely cosmetic.

<comment><USER8> Pretty much everyone I know likes the Ribbon UI, you don't have to drill down in nearly as much menus. Granted, it only really started to get better after 2011, but its excellent now. There's a reason there's such a huge pressure on LibreOffice to come with some kind of interface paradigm that doesn't feel like it's from the 90s.

<comment><USER9> My main and continuing complaint with the Ribbon is that using it is slow. It encourages mouse usage and if you have to use a mouse for an operation, the operation is slow.

Not to mention that the action of the Ribbon is kind of seizure inducing as the entire thing is in constant change as various objects are selected thereby unhiding specialized menus.

I've taken to minimizing the entire Ribbon so I don't have to see it, requiring me to re-learn and re-memorize the multi-key keyboard shortcuts since they are different than the 2003 version.

If I could kill the Ribbon with fire, I would.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Direct fiber connection to Level 3 (Columbus, Ohio) here at work. Had to disable QUIC as I am getting the same errors as well when trying to access Google. Using local DNS, not sure what upstream DNS we are using though.

<comment><USER11> It's happening in Minneapolis on Comcast as well. Requests will hang for a while and eventually fail with "ERR_QUIC_PROTOCOL_ERROR".

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Regardless of this issue, the QUIC protocol is still fascination and deserves some attention: [https://ma.ttias.be/googles-quic-protocol-moving-web-tcp- udp...](https://ma.ttias.be/googles-quic-protocol-moving-web-tcp-udp/)

This looks like an implementation error, either client or server-side.

</comment><comment><USER13> Had the same issue. Restart didn't work and Safari was working fine.

For me what worked was removing Google's DNS server 22.214.171.124 from my network settings and voila; it worked.

</comment><comment><USER14> Is there a more detailed write-up about what exactly is causing the problem?

<comment><USER15> If there is, please submit it to HN and let's get an accurate summary of what's happening, i.e. 'Some Dutch and German providers break QUIC'.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Map overview shows that Berlin might be experiencing the same issue: [http://allestoringen.be/problemen/google/kaart/](http://allestoringen.be/problemen/google/kaart/)

<comment><USER16> Indeed. I had this problem yesterday.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I've had problems with QUIC in various networks (corp, home) mainly in Singapore for more than a year. Until the point I disable QUIC as one of the first steps when I encounter GMail connectivity problems from Chrome/Chromium on a fresh machine.

I find it odd that QUIC is enabled by default when it apparently has poor fallback capabilities to "non-QUIC" mode.

<comment><USER18> The internet is in a pretty sad state if a simple UDP stream isn't possible any more because of interfering middleboxes. It's not like QUIC is a new IP protocol. One of the reasons for lack of good fallback is probably an expectation that basic IP operations are functional.

<comment><USER19> I'm guessing NAT has a lot to do with UDP issues on the interwebz.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I am on Ubuntu and have exactly the same issue for google.nl, youtube.com and google.com.

So it is not only on Mac OS X

Edit: And it started working again :)

</comment><comment><USER21> Any explaination about this?

<comment><USER22> QUIC is quite interesting [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QUIC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QUIC)

<comment><USER23> So.. Dutch ISPs - or someone else along the route - interfering with UDP traffic?

<comment><USER24> I suspect they are throttling UDP traffic on "non-web" ports, traffic might look like torrent encrypted stream :). Anyway you can test whats going on with [https://github.com/lucas-clemente/quic-go](https://github.com/lucas- clemente/quic-go)

<comment><USER25> This is probably not the case, as traffic shaping is illegal in The Netherlands.

<comment><USER26> In a world where every router has the capability to do things which are illegal in various countries, do you think that Netherlands ISPs always obey the law? In the US, convention center operators keep on getting busted for sending deauth packets to "rogue" WiFi access points, i.e. those brought in by conference attendees and exhibitors.

<comment><USER25> The Dutch internet market is not really comparable to the US market. We do not have data limits for cable/dsl/fiber and I've never had issues downloading torrents at full speed, even before the net neutrality law.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Is this the reason googleapis is having trouble? Maps and fonts are really slow for me today.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, we experienced the same issue with our clients. Disabling QUIC solves this issue.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Dutch here. I can confirm the issue. Problem also appears on Chromebook and Linux. Solution as proposed in an other comment in thread solves the problem.

</comment><comment><USER29> Ah so that's what was going on. The issue insofar I could perceive it is fixed now though. All googly sites are up again.

</comment><comment><USER30> I happen to be in the Netherlands today and have had no problem using Google on OS X & Chrome

</comment><comment><USER31> I have started experimenting the same last year on our Android devices at a customer network, thanks to QUIC we weren't able to use their network authentication any longer.

For some reason, even disabling it did not help.

Our workaround, was to use the old system browser for authentication and then switch to using chrome after being authenticated.

</comment><comment><USER32> El Capitan latest public beta, with Version 58.0.3029.19 beta (64-bit) no problems.

</comment><comment><USER33> This is happening for me in the US East Coast and disabling QUIC fixed the issue.

</comment><comment><USER34> Danish google down as well..

<comment><USER35> Google.dk works fine from my newly updated Chrome on macOS.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Anyone got a packet capture and can tell what's the problem?

</comment><comment><USER36> Same here in Belgium :-(

</comment><comment><USER37> Having the same issue (behind a company network) in Germany.

</comment><comment><USER38> We had no issues today - but we are IPv6

<comment><USER38> Also those of you who have disabled QUIC - you should enable it again. It has a serious benefit for most of Google services.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Works for me...

</comment><comment><USER40> Confirm issue here as well

</comment><comment><USER41> ok mom

</comment><comment><USER42> The title is misleading, Google has not broken anything, Dutch providers have. I hope Google will do nothing, and the providers will be pressured into fixing their shitty hardware.

<comment><USER12> I work a Belgian hosting provider, directly uplinked to our datacenter via Cogent/TINET. The same happened here.

There's no hardware cause, it appears to be a minor chrome update combined with a QUIC server-side update (unconfirmed) that caused issues. As soon as Chrome auto-updates to the next minor release, things appear better (but not fully fixed).

It's entirely in the browser <-> Google server-side, ISPs have nothing to do with this.

<comment><USER42> Alright, thanks, and sorry for implicating you. I guess it's the history of ISP's messing with transport layer protocols that got me finger pointing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> fuc u nunbs jajajdjajdja

</comment><comment><USER43> good time to switch to startpage.com....

</comment><comment><USER44> No problems here. Must be one of the shitty providers like ziggo or kpn

</comment><comment><USER45> I'm going to hijack this thread to describe something weird that's happened to me yesterday w/ Google: just connected on my usual BT (UK) wifi, and when I opened google.com, Safari complained about an invalid SSL certificate: it was self-signed, with expiration in 2111. After a dozen refreshes, everything started to work, with the correct certificate.

Anybody seen anything like that? Is it possible that a corrupted packet could appear as a self-signed certificate? Did some MITM screw up?

<comment><USER46> You should post the certificate details here. Issuer, fingerprint, etc.

<comment><USER45> I was so weirded out I totally forgot. How dumb of me. I'll just ascribe it to a glitch in the matrix.</comment></comment></comment>


Curiosity: Monitoring Execution of Space Craft Flight Software - <AUTHOR> http://compass.informatik.rwth-aachen.de/ws-slides/havelund.pdf

<comment><USER2> Here's the paper: <http://www.havelund.com/Publications/logscope10.pdf>

And a number of interesting articles citing it. <http://goo.gl/LGZnT>

A Few applications:

\- Formally verifying programs not designed for formal verification. See for <http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~howard/Papers/ruler-tutorial.pdf> example to instrument Java programs for runtime verification using AspectJ

\- Using automata for log-analysis, immediately useful to any internet company with large amounts of logs, imagine an automata DSL to analyze data flows from Flume/Scribe into Hadoop</comment>


Show HN: Gitscout – A Beautiful GitHub Issues Experience for MacOS - <AUTHOR> https://gitscout.com/ <comment><USER2> There's a little bit of marketing dissonance between the request that people help build Gitscout by using Github and the absence of a Github repository for Gitscout itself because the implication of using Github issues for bug reports and feature requests is that the rest of the project is also accessible to users.

I get that there's a business model behind the decision and that business model is ok by me. Using Github for issues also seems like a reasonable business decision. What is likely to create backlash is the _appearance_ that Gitscout is trying to exploit the goodwill developers feel toward opensource while keeping the code closed. There's no 'giving back' to go with the 'contributing'.

My advice is to demphasize that aspect of your marketing. It's a distraction anyway because it's not a feature for users. Solicit feedback but not in a way that might be interpreted as 'bait and switch'. The ill will it is likely to generate will probably do more harm than good.

Good luck.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hello brudgers. Thanks for pointing that out! I understand your point, but we actually made sure to avoid any misunderstanding by asking to "share your feedback on our Github" on a repository called "gitscout-feedback" with the following description: "This repo is a place to report bugs, give feedback and share ideas on how we can improve Gitscout"  That being said, if it's not clear enough we'll definitely pay more attention on how to phrase our request for feedback. Thanks!

<comment><USER2> The emphasis that the link was a link to Github created an expectation. That expectation was stronger because the project is about Github. The link and it's presentation did not meet my expectations because they are contrary to the values I associate with Github...e.g. open source.

For someone considering your project, the experience may be reading the title and thinking "Github, that's good"; looking at the issues link and thinking "Github, that's good"; and then following the link and thinking "WTF? where's the code."

That's kind of my experience, except that I was not investigating tools, just looking at your post. If I had been investigating tools, it would probably have been enough to stop looking at yours even if I closed source tools were acceptable. The reason is that there's a 'sense' that it is a violation of trust.

Anyway, good luck again.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ok I think I understand a bit more what you mean. Don't you think removing the Github link in the header would make it less deceiptive? Thanks

<comment><USER2> My advice is to avoid anything that might possibly create an expectation that the project is open source. Pitching a closed source product to Github users is probably tough enough without creating an excuse for people to have a negative reaction.

Less deceptive isn't the best way to phrase it. Be upfront. Let people get to 'no' quickly if closed source rules the product out. That will let you validate your business decision to make the product closed source. At some point potential users will learn the product is closed source. Respect their time, don't waste it.

In the end, your customers are going to be people who are ok with closed source. An approximated sales pipeline:

1\. People who hear about your product are an approximation of prospects.

2\. Prospects who hear about your product and are ok with closed source are an approximation of leads.

3\. Leads who are _shopping_ for a product like yours and are comfortable with your price are an approximation of qualified leads.

4\. Your sales will only be to the approximation of qualified leads.

Effort spent on moving people with an aversion to closed source down the pipeline is an inefficient use of resources if there actually is a market for the product. It is inefficient because you have to sell your product _and_ convince the person they are wrong about closed source.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Can Technology Be Society's Economic Engine? - <AUTHOR> http://www.livestream.com/techonomy/video?clipId=pla_e0493fff-f62c-4a9c-bf6b-2844f9ad8d58 <comment><AUTHOR> Submitting this because I think it's a really great discussion. My own question in response to this chat: Are there declining marginal values to innovation? Cowen says we aren't making the progress we made during his grandma's lifetime. Is that because we're moving down the curve toward more incremental innovation gains?</comment>


Ask HN: I got a copyright infringement notice, what should I do? - <AUTHOR> I received this mail today. I download this file few days back on a digital ocean server and then deleted it. Today I got this infringement notice. Is it serious? How screwed I am? I am currently in Trinidad and Tobago. Please help guys. What I am unable to understand is how they know whats on my server? Is digital ocean allowed to scan content of my VPS?<p>The email I received: http://pastebin.com/X8Nx6X3A <comment><USER2> Know thy enemy:

[https://torrentlawyer.wordpress.com/2013/02/22/ceg-tek- dmca-...](https://torrentlawyer.wordpress.com/2013/02/22/ceg-tek-dmca-ira- siegel-chances-of-being-sued/)

[https://torrentlawyer.wordpress.com/tag/ira- siegel/](https://torrentlawyer.wordpress.com/tag/ira-siegel/)

And yes. VPS's almost always store your files in a way that anyone with root to the host can look through your files. They often have automated systems that search everything you store for "bad" files and won't hesitate to contact you when found.

<comment><AUTHOR> your links helped alot. Generally I research on everything, every person I encounter but missed searching for these people after getting the email, may be I was a little scared. thanks again

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> It looks like you downloaded the file using bittorrent. They could have detected the IP address from that, and using a list of IPs owned by Digital Ocean, sent a notice to DO based on that.

</comment><comment><USER4> You have two options:

1\. Access the settlement. This is like an admission of guilt as they _will_ record that you viewed the settlement. If you access the settlement and subsequently reject it, they will almost certainly sue you and win in court. The settlement offer is likely $1,750 USD or so per infringement.

2\. Do not access the settlement and go underground. Then you're hoping that you don't win the lawsuit lottery of the people to whom they've sent settlement offers.

Of course, since you have admitted guilt here in a public setting, your only ethical and moral option is number 1. That said, since you have _also_ admitted to destroying evidence in comments here, the settlement may no longer be an option, and you may have subjected yourself to many thousands of additional damages and possible criminal penalties if you haven't sufficiently anonymized yourself.

There is also a third option of disputing the cease and desist (i.e. arguing that they are mistaken), but I would wager that you would lose that argument.

</comment><comment><USER5> Hey,

I am not a lawyer but I did grow up next door to you (in St. Lucia) and I ran a series of movie, anime and video game download sites in the early to mid 2000's. I got these notices all the time.

When I got one I would simply remove the content from one server onto another and all would be well. The end.

Yes I know I was blatantly infringing copyrights, but I was young and didn't care. Also maybe things have changed but my understanding is that there was no way for you to be prosecuted in T&T. At worst your server gets shut down (which did happen to me) and you are banned from using their services.

I think you'll be fine.

</comment><comment><USER6> I haven't seen this before and am not a lawyer.

1\. I would contact an attorney.

Some quick thoughts, but always consult your attorney first before taking any actions.

2\. Would NOT access the settlement offer, have your attorney check it out if he recommends it from his computer/IP.

3\. Delete and scrub your droplet at Digital Ocean.

4\. Maybe delete your Digital Ocean account and open a new one under a new email or use linode for a while.

I expect if you remove your droplet and aren't active on that IP and don't host any of their files or torrent activity in the future this might go away.

Good luck with it.

<comment><AUTHOR> cleaned the VPS using srm and then deleted the account on Digital Ocean. Thanks for the advice.

BTW do you know any secure and anonymous VPS? thanks

<comment><USER6> Just remember nothing is secure and/or anonymous.

Or as Obi Wan would say:

(wave hand) You don't need a secure and anonymous VPS.

(wave hand) You want to go home and rethink your life.

Video Response: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1EkOsY8p_8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1EkOsY8p_8)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> First, I am not a lawyer, and you should probably consult one if you're worried.

Second, I would "cease and desist" running that service (as stated in the letter), be it a torrent proxy or whatever. It's possible for files you torrent to be traced to you (it's traceable at the ISP level.)

That settlement letter is very curious, although accessing it may constitute a form of receipt - and be somehow binding.

Talk to a lawyer. Also I'm sure others on the web have been hit with this sort of thing before.

</comment><comment><USER8> It's simple: Since you're not in the US, US law doesn't apply to you.</comment>


Hard Books Are Overrated - <AUTHOR> http://rs.io/2014/04/22/are-hard-books-overrated.html

<comment><USER2> In mathematics, my experience falls emphatically on this explanation: "Hard texts are that much better than anything else." Books like Rudin's Principles of Mathematical Analysis are mathematics; their more accessible counterparts are more "about mathematics." As to why successful people don't read more difficult books, well, being a great mathematician just isn't that important to success. Reading Rudin sets you on the path to being very good at mathematics, but that isn't most people's goal. If your goal is material success then yes, hard books are probably overrated.

The programmers here may appreciate this analogy: reading Rudin is like reading the source code, whereas more gentle texts read more like documentation or UML. That's not to say good doc can't be enlightening, but in the end only the source code matters. The doc can be wrong, or misleading, or incomplete. If you want to really understand what's going on, you need to read the source. It's the same way in mathematics.

<comment><USER3> PoMA presents a mathematical approach that's done in countless other analysis textbooks. What people (students) hate is that the author makes leaps in his proofs. But that's not something unique to Rudin's style. And who says these students wouldn't be capable of making these leaps later on? Please explain to me how "Rudin sets you on the path to being very good at mathematics" (more so than any of the "easier" books), if you agree with my claim that there is in fact nothing unique about his book. If you don't agree, please tell me what is unique.

"As to why successful people don't read more difficult books, well, being a great mathematician just isn't that important to success."

???

"Rudin is like reading the source code"

Rudin's book is incomplete to a beginner. The analogy doesn't work at all.

<comment><USER2> Ah, I think we are responding to two separate issues. I was referring to Rudin as a mathematical treatment of calculus, in the definition-theorem-proof style, to be contrasted with the more popular and easy heuristic approach. I contend that the Rudin style is a qualitatively better way to learn mathematics. It is also undoubtedly harder to read--but that is because it treats the material in a rigorous, correct way, which is inherently more difficult than heuristics.

Your argument is that Rudin is hard for incidental reasons: he skips steps in his proofs. I personally did not feel this way when I read the book. But I am open to the idea that Rudin is imperfect. I personally admire Rudin's concision, but that may just be my personal aesthetic preference.

My point, and perhaps I did not convey it well, is simply that some subjects (in particular mathematics!) are inherently difficult. And if you want to learn them well, you have to face that difficult head on: you have to read hard books. Euclid's old saying comes to mind: "there is no royal road to mathematics!"

<comment><USER3> I just told you: most analysis textbooks treat the topic in a nearly identical manner (maybe not in full generality). Do you want to dispute this? Why are you pretending like we're arguing separate issues?

"Your argument is that Rudin is hard for incidental reasons: he skips steps in his proofs. I personally did not feel this way when I read the book. But I am open to the idea that Rudin is imperfect. I personally admire Rudin's concision, but that may just be my personal aesthetic preference."

Good god.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> > This one could really go either way. A broad selection of fifty popular > science texts will teach a person more than one really hard book

This statement seems obviously false. No amount of reading analogies about science will teach you any actual science. Also, the author seems fixated on measuring learning by "things" (facts?). That's a terrible metric, unless you're trying to collect facts, in which case, you'd probably be better of reading the encyclopedia.

</comment><comment><USER5> When I was in college, both SICP and Knuth's books were on the recommended reading lists. I didn't buy the former until years later, but did buy Knuth's books (individually and at a time when I could ill afford them) and read them through. They are hard and it was very slow going. There's still a lot I don't understand. But I learned a huge amount, continue to do so and would absolutely recommend them to anyone with enough interest in the field. Similarly, when I finally bought and read SICP, I wondered why I hadn't read it sooner. I still read both books, along with many other "hard" books and enjoy them. I don't think I would be the programmer I am today if I had not read those books.

I disagree with the author. I certainly understand that reading "hard" books takes a lot of effort that may not seem worthwhile, but would not say they are overrated. However, like anything else, they aren't for everyone. Just those who are ready for them.

</comment><comment><USER6> "Easy" is about proximity to the subject (As in Rich Hickey's Simple Made Easy). Hard books are any books you aren't ready for, and I don't recommend them either.

One of the learning buzzwords is "Zone of Proximal Development" which basically means the concepts that are 'nearby' what the learner already knows, and can be learned with help.

The author has some keen insights when talking about Familiarity causing recommendation problems. We compress that knowledge down into a very powerful but compact form, and often have a lot of trouble decompressing it when describing something. "What do you mean, 'what is a function?', it's a function, it just is!"

I also agree that sometimes people recommend books, even books they have not read, that make them seem smart, which is often unhelpful. Other books have useful content, but are just badly written. We use them if we have too, but we prefer better writing.

On the other hand, books like Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs are beautiful, useful, amazing works that when explored at the right time, can be eye opening, profound experiences.

A given book may be recommended because it is a simple beautiful elegant work. Simple doesn't mean easy, that's separate. You have to be ready for the book and its concepts before you can benefit from it fully. A good book can challenge you to understand simple, but deep ideas. A good book can be a lot of work and exploration, and may go slowly. But a good book at the right time will be worth your while.

So hard books are overrated, but maybe that hard overrated book you rejected before may be more approachable today. Keep in mind when recommending texts to others that they may not be ready for the advanced text yet.

</comment><comment><USER7> I think his success spirals advice is great. You tend to build up skills iteratively and incrementally.

But comparing SICP to baby Rudin is extremely out of point. SICP is a conceptual book. Rudin is a super-synthetic Bourbaki-like text. A lot of intuition has been removed. In general this is bad unless you're going through the topic for the n-th time.

</comment><comment><USER8> All I can say in reply is that I wish that I had had access to the best presentations of the subject matter that interested me when I was young. I learned calculus from some atrocious "IB HL math manual" over a weekend. I would have been grateful to have had a copy of baby Rudin at that time. Many of today's young (especially in rich areas such as SV) now have the privilege of unfettered and instant access to knowledge, and have been spared the horrors of a public school education drawing on sources full of dumbed-down and inaccurate information. I think this culture is gradually forgetting that the acquisition of knowledge is worth struggling for.

</comment><comment><USER3> A lot of university students are clueless about this sort of thing. If it's possible to complete the homework by just relying on lecture, then there's no reason to be reading the book. That's a common sentiment, even in some math classes.

Somebody, at some point, declared a book to be "great". And now you have a bunch of people recommending that "great" book because that's all they're familiar with (and why would this top notch faculty force us to use this book if it wasn't great anyway?). Few professors actually make an effort to structure classes in a pedagogical way.

</comment><comment><USER9> I haven't read SICP (shame on me!), but I didn't think it had a reputation of a "hard book". Isn't it designed to be introductory textbook for freshmen students?

<comment><USER10> SICP is an interesting case because some of its "hardness" is actually incidental to the subject matter. It is written by, and for, people who enjoy pure mathematics and numerical functions. That describes a lot of incoming CS students, but not all of them.

Almost all the examples in the first few chapters are things like estimating the values of convergent series, and a less mathematically-inclined student will spend more time puzzling over the problem definitions than over the concepts of recursion and encapsulation that the problems are trying to demonstrate.

I think the book would be much stronger with a broader diversity of examples, especially early on. I'm not advocating completely getting rid of the pure- math ones, but a wider range of problem domains would very likely help the concepts "click" more quickly for a larger set of students.

There is certainly the "CS is a branch of mathematics" viewpoint that suggests that someone who hasn't already mastered basic calculus as a university freshman has no business pursuing a CS degree in the first place, but I don't personally subscribe to that idea.

<comment><USER11> " _It is written by, and for, people who enjoy pure mathematics and numerical functions._ "

The latter wasn't strictly true of CS focused MIT undergraduates back then ^_^, but by definition they could do math at that level. It was a common background Ableson and Sussman could safely assume everyone taking the course could do without much sweat, i.e. it avoided accidental complexity to focus on teaching the CS concepts they cared about. Just like the very simple syntax of Scheme takes a whole lot less time to grok than the Algol family standards, at least of the day (have not learned Python so I'm not qualified to comment there, but from what little I've seen it's still more complicated).

A broader diversity of examples would indeed be a good thing, and I'd be surprised if no one has done some work in that direction. On the other hand, as is it works for any CS program with a strong, non-optional EE component, e.g. MIT and I gather UC Berkeley, and once upon a time as I recall it was the intro course for CalTech, which is a lot more mathematically intense than MIT (when you show up you're expected to know single variable calculus and are dumped into Apostol, with an option to finish in a more applied track, or so was the case the last time I checked a few years ago).

As for your later point, I've very unsure a grounding in continuous mathematics (no matter how fun it is, at least conceptually) is essential for mastering a lot of CS, I thought the most relevant domains were in the area of discrete mathematics, with of course various areas dipping back into continuous math.</comment></comment></comment>


UK's 2021 census could be the last, statistics chief reveals - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51468919 <comment><USER3> Talk about about being cheap! 900M is like 90M per year, that's a cheap price for understanding the structure and characteristics of a population. You can never repliacte a census using random surveys. It's the holy Grail of data.

Data from U.S. census from centuries ago is still being used to teach econometrics. But hey, if they were stupid enough to leave the EU then they're capable of doing anything.

<comment><USER4> > But hey, if they were stupid enough to leave the EU than they're capable of > doing anything.

This is quite offensive. Please don't tar the entire country with the same brush.

This was - and still is - a highly controversial & divisive subject. It was only voted in by 51.89% vs 48.11% of the population ...at the time - <USER2> recent polling suggests it has flipped (1)

1 - [https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit- second...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-second- referendum-latest-poll-remain-ten-points-leave-bmg-a8114406.html)

<comment><USER5> It still aptly demonstrate the ability of the UK to shoot itself in the foot. Nobody believes that this necessary reflects badly on any _individual_ British citizen. Unfortunately, in a democracy it only takes the barest of majorities to make bad decisions.

But to cheer you up: it's still better than in the US, where it's entirely possible to screw the country with slightly _less_ than a majority (or even plurality).

<comment><USER6> I'd rather not be part of an organisation that feels the need to set an example to scare other members from the idea leaving. Yea the UK will suffer but partly because the EU is being vindictive.

<comment><USER7> > set an example to scare other members

Ok, that attitude is fine. If I thought the EU was doing that, I would've moved to Canada.

Trouble if, the only thing the EU has the _power_ to do is to remove U.K. access to EU membership benefits. That's not "vindictive", it's what the UK voted for after being repeatedly told this would happen.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> [https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10584385](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10584385) "National census in 2011 could be last of its kind"

[https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/thelastcensus](https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/thelastcensus) "the enduring problems with the 2001 count may mean that after 200 years it could be the last one in its present form. It may have demonstrated that measuring population in our more mobile society is just too difficult."

</comment><comment><USER9> So the 2021 census is projected to cost twice as much as the 2011 one did, but unfortunately the cause of this isn't explored in the article. However it does note that there's "a drive to get most people to complete next year's census online".

Could it be the the UK govt has yet again had an IT project spiral into runaway costs?

<comment><USER10> The population is higher, and the pound is worth less.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> The census is used as the baseline for a lot of statistical models. It's not cheap but it is extremely accurate. So if your model starts with garbage data you get garbagr results. Hell, even the guy in charge of it doesn't appear convinced. Like we're going to "magic science" our way out of having to do it.

</comment><comment><USER12> Datashine is probably the best representation of the previous (2011) UK census data:

[https://datashine.org.uk](https://datashine.org.uk)

I'm somewhat amused sibling comments have been downvoted for pointing out the demographic shift these censuses illustrate, reason enough imo to think the decision to end them could be more political than from a concern for what they might cost.

Peter Thiel after all predicts the future for European countries is to end up as either surveillance or Islamic states, something I'm guessing the natives would neither take kindly to nor be too comfortable knowing the likely consequence of this for their offspring. This is the elephant in the room & the deciding factor that led to the Brexit vote, & you can pick any of Angela Merkels recklessness, Daves dodgy timing or the Saudi / Turkish / UAE funding of mosques that encourage next to no mixing or liberalisation of this demographic to thank for that.

</comment><comment><USER13> Why do we even need to take a census in the age of omnipresent state surveillance? Our governments already know exactly where we are and what we're doing practically at all times, tracking our web activity, listening in through our phones and devices, reading our mail, tapping into the data servers of the few tech companies that won't happily hand over our private data directly to governments with a smile. And in a few years the mass deployment of facial recognition software and self-driving cars will allow governments to correlate race and gender to our travel and purchase habits down to the last second and foot.

An actual census seems like a quaint atavism. The UK can just ask the NSA to count its citizens and provide whatever demographic data is required, and the US can ask the same of the UK. Problem solved.

<comment><USER14> Publicly admitting that is probably something that they don't want to do.

On the other hand, stopping a census for dumb reasons is one way to do it without publicly admitting they already have the data.

<comment><USER13> They don't need to publicly admit anything, thanks to Wikileaks and Snowden, it's a matter of public record.

Since we don't have any choice about whether or not to participate in the panopticon, and it's clear no one is going to do anything to stop it, then it should at least serve some public good. Offer a public API and let Western countries build services directly on top of it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It's funny to think that there was a time when the only way to get massive amounts of data about the population was to go door-to-door and ask questions to people.

On the other hand relying on indirect data or even surveys can have serious limitations, especially if you base administrative/budgetary decisions on the data collected this way.

<comment><USER16> 7% of households in the UK still don't have internet access:

[https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/househol...](https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/householdcharacteristics/homeinternetandsocialmediausage/bulletins/internetaccesshouseholdsandindividuals/2019)

<comment><USER17> After the census, it will be 6.732%

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> What's the ideal _implementation_ of a modern census?

We now have multiple demographic databases accounting for all peoples, both living and dead, updated in near real time.

Facebook & Google, telcos, credit rating agencies, data aggregators, NSA, law enforcement, credit card companies, voter registrations, medical records, etc.

Instead of sending people around with clipboards and surveys, why don't we just run some queries on the databases we already have?

</comment><comment><USER19> I wonder if they'll think, well, other countries manage without, why do we need it?

But the UK doesn't necessarily have what those countries do. Sweden doesn't need a census because it forces everyone to register their address and family relationships with the central government within 7 days of those changing. The UK by contrast has many disparate single-purpose databases which do not form a coherent whole.

</comment><comment><USER20> Isn't it surprising that the government cannot send a text message to whole population:

Please fill in this online census questionnaire [https://[unique_link_here]](https://\[unique_link_here\])

Some ads/incentives here and there to remind people to fill it and one should have 90%+ completion rate.

</comment><comment><USER21> But how will we track the evolution of the jedi religion in the UK without it?

</comment><comment><USER22> It's hard to comprehend how these things could possibly cost as much as they do. A billion pounds to send some letters? Huh

<comment><USER7> £1bn total is about £15/person. Delivery has to be guaranteed because the letters are a legal requirement. If each delivery covers two people, but sending out and returning are both paid for by the government, and if it counts as a 100-250g large letter 2nd class, that's already £2.52/person without the cost of printing, processing, or storage.

<comment><USER23> If everyone answered their one letter I'm sure the census would be a lot cheaper, but I think most of the real cost comes from employing thousands of people who go around the country knocking on the doors of those who haven't responded yet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> > said an estimated £906m would be spent

I wonder how exactly it costs this much? What is the money spent on?

Lets imagine the 'MVP' census. A printed 10 page document (£0.45), mailed to each household (£0.61), in an envelope (£0.02), times 27.6 million houses. Return mailing costs another £0.61+0.02. Scan every sheet. OCR it (free). Hand-enter 1% of responses where OCR errors are excessive. 276,000 documents hand entered at 5 minutes per document, £10/hr. £0.0083/household. Total costs: £47M

Cost of running a few trial runs of one 10,000 house town or city to perfect the process: £100k

Pay for a year 1 statistician to make graphs, one social scientist to design questions, one manager for the team of printing/scanning/hand-entering people, one IT person to keep/archive the data and get it on the web, and a head of department. Also a little office. Total fixed costs £800k.

The whole thing can seemingly be done for 5% of the quoted cost. And that excludes any potential efficiencies gained by having an app to collect responses, or bulk discounts from postage companies. Also, while a redacted version of the full dataset is published, I would expect the government department to also offer commercial statistics services on the non-redacted dataset where such analysis doesn't impact customer privacy. That should earn them tens of millions at least.

<comment><USER25> These are more or less the absolute minimum cost for doing it - and when has anything beyond an MVP cost the absolute minimum?

Any real-world project, especially at that scale has much more external costs. There is also enforcement, publicising, security handling, approvals, way more than 1 person to come up with the questions (1 random employee designing the census would be such a waste if you get an average social scientist, that it's ridiculous to propose), compliance, double-checking, etc. etc.

Going from 47m to 906m - when you account for the costs that exist in the real world for something as big and comprehensive like this - is actually fairly reasonable.</comment></comment>


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