Religion as a Helpful Delusion - <AUTHOR> https://aeon.co/ideas/religion-is-about-emotion-regulation-and-its-very-good-at-it <comment><USER2> I appreciate the lack of bias in this article, but do feel that it's missing depth.

Religion isn't a "delusion", and in fact believing or following a religion doesn't mean your life will be easier, it will probably be harder! I don't like how the author sees religion, because it's not just something that "manages emotions." These conversations can always come out so explosive, as I believe in God too.

Religion gives purpose to our lives, it helps us understand why something is happening to us or to the world. Without the purpose, I feel it's a bit shallow to suggest religion solely helps manage our emotions.

<comment><AUTHOR> Personally, I agree with you that religion does give purpose to our lives and that the author is a bit reductionist in his analysis. However, I found the article noteworthy exactly because the author is speaking from a "scientific" or "evidence-based" point of view, and was showing the positives of religious belief.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: What do I check out in Austin? - <AUTHOR>

I'm considering moving to a more tech heavy city.  Austin and Si Valley are on the list.  So I decided to fly to Austin this long weekend and check the city out.  Already did the food trucks and walked around downtown a bit.<p>Where can I check out more of the tech/startup culture? <comment><USER2> The Capitol Factory would be a good place. They help startups and have a coworking space. They also host most of the Tech meetups in the city. The only thing is they probably arent open this weekend.

Im also a fan of the East side so you can find food trucks there, lots of great bars, and of course live music (White Horse is a must). Check out www.do512.com and you can find some of the fun music happenings around town.

</comment><comment><USER3> Zilker Park. Barton Springs. 6th Street. Brushy Creek. Torchy's Tacos. Rudy's BBQ. Hula Hut. Carlos & Charlies on Lake Travis. The Iguana Grill, also on Lake Travis, home of the world's best salsa. Threadgill's Downtown. Waterloo Records. Whole Foods downtown. The Captial. Alamo Draft House. UT Campus. Fonda San Miguel.

</comment><comment><USER4> Sorta anti-tech, but if you have the urge to watch a movie, this place sounds fun: <http://boingboing.net/2011/06/07/movie-theater-turns.html></comment>


Winning at Ansible: How to manipulate items in a list - <AUTHOR> http://blog.caranna.works/2016/02/25/winning-at-ansible-how-to-manipulate-items-in-a-list/ <comment><USER2> I don't understand this.

If you need to iterate over the items you can just use "with_items" or "with_subelements" ([http://docs.ansible.com/ansible/playbooks_loops.html#looping...](http://docs.ansible.com/ansible/playbooks_loops.html#looping- over-subelements)) and the "{{ item }}_12345"

If you need a list for a template you can always loop it in the template and access the sublements there and template them as you wish.

One of the strong points of Ansible is that it can be read very easily. The moment you do:

"{{ important_files | map(attribute='file_name') | list | map('regex_replace','(.*)','\\\1_{{ file_suffix }}') | list }}"

you throw it away.

<comment><AUTHOR> The problem that I found with that approach for this particular use case (maybe using files wasn't a great example, since it has its own module and files can be templated) is that the variable itself is a list of dicts. I found that using with_subelements or with_items for this didn't reduce the complexity much since I still needed to resort to Jinja gymnastics to get what I needed and then needed to worry about taking that output and casting it to a list anyway.</comment></comment>


The Peter Principle Revisited: A Computational Study [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://arxiv.org/pdf/0907.0455v3

<comment><AUTHOR> This paper identifies two possibilities for someone's competence after a promotion: the Peter Principle – i.e. the competence after promotion is uncorrelated to the old competence – and the common sense approach – i.e. the competence after promotion is highly correlated to the old competence. Now you can run organizational simulations with different promotion rules: Promote the best, promote the worst, promote at random, promote either the best or worst at random.

As you might expect, promoting the best works well if future competence is correlated to past competence. Promoting the worst works best if future competence is uncorrelated with past competence. Promoting at random works no matter what the correlation really is, and promoting the best or worst can be made to produce the same overall outcome no matter what the future competence rule is.

I find this rather disquieting when you try and map this into real organizations. Could you really do promotions on a random basis ?

<comment><USER2> If there is an easy way to measure employee performance then the answer is no, random promotions are not possible. If employee X made 10 widgets in a year and employee Y made 20 widgets then X might have grounds to sue the company if Y was promoted instead.

However, it is rarely the case that things are so easy to measure. So-called "soft skills" such as communication and the ability (or willingness) to manage staff will often give organisations the additional leeway to promote a person who probably isn't actually very good at what they do. Sometimes (often?) this decision will be made because political alliances have been made. Other times it may be to fill a racial or sexual quota.

These additional factors probably introduce a good deal of randomness into the mix when measured over time and averaged over all appointments.</comment></comment>


TPP Threatens Security and Safety by Locking Down US Policy on Source Code Audit - <AUTHOR> https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/12/tpp-threatens-security-and-safety-locking-down-us-policy-source-code-audit <comment><USER2> So when the TPP says:

> No Party shall require the transfer of, or access to, source code of > software owned by a person of another Party, as a condition for the import, > distribution, sale or use of such software, or of products containing such > software, in its territory.

This means that requiring code audits is not allowed for _any_ software, not just imported software, right? Because I've seen quite a few people misled into thinking that similarly worded provisions apply only to imported goods.

If TPP was a legit trade treaty I would expect it to have anti-protectionism provisions (i.e. treating imported and home-produced software the same), not legislation-preventing ones.

One provision like that is disturbing, 6000 pages of them is horrifying.

<comment><USER3> > _If TPP was a legit trade treaty I would expect it to have anti- > protectionism provisions_

Indeed. An actual free-trade agreement would be really simple to implement. Just stop intervening in trade in any way, and you'll have Free Trade.

But that would be against a lot of cronies' interests and very much _in the people 's_ interests, so it's never going to happen.

On a related note: Stop intervening in what people do with their property, and you'll have a free market.

That would preclude taxation though, and so, a lot of people who believe they somehow _benefit_ from someone _forcefully_ taking their money would object.

<comment><USER4> > _Just stop intervening in trade in any way, and you 'll have Free Trade. > (...) Stop intervening in what people do with their property, and you'll > have a free market._

Well maybe, but you don't _really_ want a Free Market. Be happy that thanks to not having it, you can still eat food that, while crappy, is not downright poison.

<comment><USER3> When you get downvoted on HN for arguing _against_ freedom, you just _know_ you've screwed up pretty bad.. :p

<comment><USER4>
      HN moves in a mysterious way
      Its downvotes to perform...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The Software Freedom Law Center published an analysis of these provisions a couple weeks ago [1], and they didn't find any serious problems with them.

[1] [https://www.softwarefreedom.org/blog/2015/nov/23/TPP- Article...](https://www.softwarefreedom.org/blog/2015/nov/23/TPP-Article-14/)

<comment><USER6> Their analysis looks to me to be directed at a different issue: the question of whether TPP outlaws free and open source software, period. I agree with them that it doesn't; but that's not what the EFF is worried about. They're worried about the fact that, under TPP, the US government will have no way to force vendors of components like routers to reveal their source code to anyone --even government regulators. The SFLC analysis does not appear to me to address that issue.

<comment><USER7> I think the clause is there because China start to ask Tech company to open their source code if they want to do business there[0].

Which make me wonder, how do you distinguish between legitimate use of source code audit and the one that try to blatantly copy the source code?

[0] [http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech- talk/telecom/security/chinas-n...](http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech- talk/telecom/security/chinas-new-rules-ask-tech-firms-to-hand-over-source- code)

<comment><USER8> Do you seriously think that TPP going to stop China from stealing tech if they decide to actually use it stolen source code like that?

Come on. Source code audit is pretty standard procedure in case of any government usage around the globe and there also plenty of people have access to proprietary software source directly or not. Even big companies getting hacked by enthusiast with nearly zero budget and country have almost unlimited resources.

What's more important so far China was doing great just replacing exist products using hardware available on market and without copying anyone source code.

<comment><USER7> The idea is that source code audit will not be the barrier of import. If the government request foreign company for source code audit they need to ask nicely, not with threat of banning import and sales of said product.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm of two minds on this provision.

First is that I'm very uncertain that it is a good idea to allow a gov't regulatory agency to require access to source code as a condition of access to a marketplace. Especially if it is anything more than simple access, like some form of auditing. Who's going to pay for whatever the regulatory agency is doing with the code (most likely the code's owner)? Also how long is it going to take the agency to issue an authorization? How would this impact code delivered to web browsers? Especially something packaged up as a webassembly or native plugin?

So... any new regulatory body that requires the ability to examine source code seems like it would need to navigate a minefield of problems. I doubt that a gov't agency could strike the right balance, and the side effect would be a significant barriers to trading in software.

On the other hand, the recent spat of problems with automobile software (Volkswagen, Toyota) do seem to make the case that some regulatory action might be necessary. Certainly requiring source code access is not that unusual in court cases, but do we want to wait until these companies are getting sued? Also with the expectation that driverless cars are coming... well.. there's going to be a lot of safety concerns there.

On the gripping hand, the FDA's medical device regulations seem to handle the issue of software without requiring access to source code ([http://www.fda.gov/RegulatoryInformation/Guidances/ucm085281...](http://www.fda.gov/RegulatoryInformation/Guidances/ucm085281.htm)). The TPP doesn't prevent any sort of validation regime requirement for products containing software... so maybe that's the right approach for specific product types (life critical, security critical... though what about browsers?). The TPP also doesn't prevent source code access via a suit or enforcement action, so if a problem does appear an appropriate regulatory body could demand source code (eg. NTSB could take an enforcement action of "validation audit" which requires the validation records and associated source code).

So... yet another part of the TPP that I'm conflicted on... sigh.

</comment><comment><USER10> As far as I can tell, this prevents countries from demanding source code to a closed source product as a condition for selling into a country. Seams reasonable?

If you want to audit a closed-source program for bugs and backdoors, people have been able to do this successfully hundreds (of thousands?) of times with standard tools like debuggers, disassemblers, and automated program analysis tools. The fact that a program is closed source has not stopped anyone from researching how it works. Ask ANY security researcher if it suddenly becomes impossible.

EFF for the win, again! Who the heck is advising these people?

<comment><USER11> > As far as I can tell, this prevents countries from demanding source code to > a closed source product as a condition for selling into a country. Seams > reasonable?

How could this possibly be reasonable?

Being able to look at the source code is a _huge_ part of regulating code in life-and-death applications. Medical devices, cars, planes, train systems, etc. all need to be held to safety standards, and not allowing regulators access to the source code significantly inhibits their ability to do their job.

> If you want to audit a closed-source program for bugs and backdoors, people > have been able to do this successfully hundreds (of thousands?) of times > with standard tools like debuggers, disassemblers, and automated program > analysis tools. The fact that a program is closed source has not stopped > anyone from researching how it works. Ask ANY security researcher if it > suddenly becomes impossible.

First of all, there are cases where you're just flat wrong. The Gauss virus contains an encrypted payload which is encrypted with a few system strings, meaning that when it runs in that system it will execute the encrypted code. It's impossible to audit the encrypted code without knowing the properties of the system it's intended to run on. Admittedly this is currently an unusual case, but given the incentives, it's unlikely that this will remain unusual. Hiding proof of code like the code in the Volkswagen emissions scandal[2] presents a large barrier to regulation, and it's not hard to imagine cases where it would make proving wrongdoing outright impossible.

Even in cases where an encrypted payload is not used, you cannot in good faith argue that the capability of auditing a binary is equivalent to the capability of auditing the source code. Yes, it's possible in most cases, but _obviously_ it's significantly harder to audit computer generated, optimized, and decompiled assembly code than it is to audit code written in, say, C. The skill and time required to audit a binary is such that it's cost prohibitive in most cases: in the Volkswagen case, they discovered the fraudulent code with a $50,000 study that white-box tested the code by driving the car.[3] My guess is that an audit of the C code could have revealed something like:

        if(car_is_being_emissions_tested()) {
            ...
        }

...and such an audit could have been done by a junior in college working at a $15/hour internship. As these ways to cheat regulation become more sophisticated, under-funded regulatory agencies will be unable to keep up. It may be mathematically possible to audit binaries effectively, but it's not monetarily or organizationally an effective way to do regulation.

In short, it's absolutely not reasonable to tie the hands of regulators by preventing them access to the source code. Doing so is equivalent giving up on regulating a large fraction of possible anti-regulation behaviors.

And this is only talking about regulation, when the binary being audited is produced by a company trying to skirt regulation. Even more concerns arise when the binary being audited might be partially created by a government. The NSA has well-known capabilities in this area, and we have no reason to believe that China (where many devices in the US are manufactured) has similar capabilities or will in the near future.

[1] [https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/33561/the-mystery- of-t...](https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/33561/the-mystery-of-the- encrypted-gauss-payload-5/)

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

[3] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal#U...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal#U.S._testing_conducted)

<comment><USER10> As I said, pretty sure that disassemblers and debuggers and emulators and binary code analysis tools are a thing. I've made a living off deconstructing binary code in the past.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Does TPP prevent the US from adopting a policy of preferring open source in the bidding process?

<comment><USER13> One could make the argument that a government bidding process that expressed such a requirement was an administrative rule that prevented parties from selling or distributing their software.

Given that the arbitration procedure outlined by the TPP is operated by private lawyers who are already unreasonably biased towards their corporate clients...

The entire treaty strikes me as a brazen giveaway of national sovereignty to private interests. And as such should be stopped.

<comment><USER14> Countries can withdraw from the treaty at any time. This complicates the argument that they are giving away any sovereignty.

Sovereignty is more about where final power rests, not about where immediate control happens to take place, so I think withdrawal is a useful counterpoint to concerns about giving up sovereignty.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It's pretty brazen: Now that we know for certain that US intelligence agencies buy and/or coerce US technology providers to install back doors, we shove a treaty through that globally prevents looking for those back doors. Nice.

</comment><comment><USER16> 4th amendment Threatens Security and Safety by Locking Down US Policy on Terrorist Information Retrieval (the onion)</comment>


How I hacked Paypal to create money - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@demircancelebi/how-i-hacked-paypal-to-create-money-c5856fa3907d <comment><USER2> Thanks for sharing. As a eBay Inc. developer, wish I had tried it before.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you. I was actually disappointed that eBay did not contact me again although they said they would (Paypal is in the eBay's Bug Bounty Program). Maybe it has something to do with their split with Paypal.</comment></comment>


Oculus GoBlack – How to Make Your Oculus Go Better - <AUTHOR> http://palmerluckey.com/oculus-goblack-how-to-make-your-oculus-go-better/ <comment><USER3> > wait just a little bit longer for the vestibular fix I have been talking > about.

If this is what I think it is, it is going to be huge. The buzz is that someone has discovered a cure for motion sickness, and it's incredibly simple: just wear a small vibrating device on the back of your head, sending a continuous vibration signal to your inner ear. For reasons unknown this seems to deactivate whatever part of the vestibular system is responsible for motion sickness. It is supposedly effective in >99% of people and does not disrupt balance.

Read the inventor's description here: [https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/9ywify/inventor_may...](https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/9ywify/inventor_may_have_cured_motion_sickness_without/eac264j/) Of course a cure for motion sickness will be great for VR but the applications in everyday life will be much, much bigger.

<comment><USER4> Motion sickness is only normally an issue in these 3DoF headsets.

You don't tend to get it with room-scale setups.

I'm hopeful that decent inside-out tracking will be a thing in 2019 - <USER2> it's off to the races.

Perfect inside-out tracking with hand tracking, mixed VR and AR - that's when consumer VR gets big.

<comment><USER5> Motion sickness is a problem for _all_ VR headsets.

Even if the headset tracks in 6-DoF most games still need some form of artificial locomotion. Rarely is it acceptable for the entire game to take place in the same 5ft x 5ft space, and introducing artificial movement causes motion sickness for some people. Just letting users teleport doesn't always cut it.

<comment><USER6> Yep, just fire up any free-walking VR game and try to move around. I never get motion sick but it still feels very strange to move without walking.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, that's a 3DoF - your location in the room is not being tracked.

The HTC Vive rarely gives you this feeling as you are free to walk about and there is a 1:1 relationship between the VR and real world.

<comment><USER6> That only works for games with a very limited player space, or games with a teleporting mechanic. Other games, like Onward allow you to both walk within your room with your location tracked, as well as free-walk using the joystick like a normal first person game, that's what I was talking about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I was feeling like a lazy hacker when I saw all the work this person put into the headset, then I realized who wrote the article and relaxed.

<comment><USER8> This person = Palmer Luckey = Oculus VR founder

<comment><USER9> And he literally didn't like and hacked his own product as a consumer?

<comment><USER10> He left the company last year.

<comment><USER11> Or rather was kicked out for links with the Alt-Right.

<comment><USER12> By which we mean he made a single $10,000 donation to an organization that at the time of his donation had put up one single anti-Hillary billboard.

<comment><USER13> Wasn't it more than that?

<comment><USER12> @wronghorse, If I'm reading that FEC page you linked to correctly, the only donations listed _before_ his firing were to Ted Cruz and Dana Rohrabacher, neither of whom is even vaguely alt-right.

Palmer's big donating spree happened after his firing, and those later donations still didn't go to alt-right causes/candidates, just Republican ones.

[edit: The post I was side replying to has been deleted. Sorry if this post now makes less sense.]

<comment><USER14> "Dana Rohrabacher, neither of whom is even vaguely alt-right"

Uhhh what now?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Removing the EMI shielding is just dumb.

<comment><USER16> For those that are thinking of doing this, you should realize that EMI shielding serves _two_ proposes.

One is indeed reducing emissions from the device.

The other is reducing the emissions from the environment which might affect high speed or otherwise sensitive circuits.

The shields themselves weigh very little, and there is a risk that you'll damage the board trying to remove them too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> The virtual desktop thing looks cool. Has anyone been able to use it as an external monitor for coding ? I have neck problems and this seems like a great replacement

<comment><USER18> Have you tried VR headsets for extended periods of time? My experience with both the Rift and Vive have been that they aren't easy on the neck and upper back muscles because the headsets are front-heavy. You could try to use it lying down though.

The other poster is also right about resolution issues. To get any decent amount of text on the screen, you'll cause a lot of eye strain.

<comment><USER19> Haven't tried them but an idea that just popped in my mind would be to add some counterweight at the back of the head. Increased weight but decreases the torque you have to fight. It is what the military uses when wearing NVGs IIRC

<comment><USER20> I've been wondering why more companies don't do this. Simply re-locating the battery to the back would go a long ways towards this.

<comment><USER21> I remember this came up in an Oculus keynote that John Carmack gave. I believe the reason given was because a significant portion of users use the headset while lying down and so nothing can really be on the back of the head?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> The Mobile Computing Keyboard is fascinating ! I'm curious of people's reactions in public transport.

<comment><USER23> I feel like at least one reaction would be to try to steal your shit while you're blinded.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I wonder what kinds of fumes the dye lets off when heated.

<comment><USER25> It's probably just Rit dye or a similar brand. It's a pretty stable dye.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> What is the field of view?

(Note that humans have 210 degrees FOV, and from the looks of those goggles, it seems to be a lot less, but I could be wrong)

</comment><comment><USER27> I wonder why the original headset wasn't just made in black?

<comment><USER28> He mentions in the article. Cost and time.

<comment><USER27> Is going black that much more costly?</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Average start-up salary & equity (Silicon Valley)? - <AUTHOR>

Not being from California, help educate a mid-westerner on tech start-ups in San Francisco and the surrounding areas.
What can an experienced nerd earn (in $ and equity) in the following positions?

  - Back-end developer

  - Front-end developer

  - Project manager
 <comment><USER2> depends, largely, on what you are worth at an established company.

If you have good experience, and you are going to work for a startup with milions in investment, expect a small fraction of a percent of the company (expect to be looked at funny when you ask for information that will allow you to figure out what percentage of the company you are getting rather than a number of shares, but that's what matters. I can have a billion shares, if I want, in a company that isn't worth anything at all.) But, expect around what you'd get as a valley engineer working for an established company; $100K+ per year base salary, depending on location and experience, of course.

Really, if you have good experience and job prospects, You probably don't want to be an employee of a startup without money. If you have good job prospects, insist on a reasonable salary /or/ become a founder. Being an employee rarely results in enough stock options to make a significantly below-market salary worth it.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I would assume there is a greater emphasis placed on equity, but how much?

(The typical "pay is competitive and the equity is generous" line in most ads isn't very descriptive.)

Thanks in advance for the start-up 101 lesson!</comment>


Show HN: Python program to clean up handwritten notes - <AUTHOR> https://mzucker.github.io/2016/09/20/noteshrink.html <comment><USER2> very cool

I was thinking, you could probably train a neural network to learn how to remove gridlines from the image also.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's actually easy to keep the lines out -- my challenge was to try to keep them in! Just a matter of shifting thresholds around.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Very cool. Great work!

</comment><comment><USER4> Sweet!</comment>


Why is [programming language] so...? - <AUTHOR> http://www.billthelizard.com/2014/01/why-is-programming-language-so.html <comment><USER2> "why is python documentation so bad" Really? Did not see that one coming

<comment><USER3> I'll tell you whats wrong with python docs. When I google for a function and I see from the search results that the page has exactly what I'm looking for, when I click on the link I am instead presented with a long page of irrelevant information that I then have to filter through. It's so bad that I actively avoid the official docs.

<comment><USER4> CTRL + f / Command + f => "module.function" and you are done.

<comment><USER5> He already searched, on google. He shouldn't have to search twice for the same thing.

<comment><USER6> google is not python docs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> "Why is [language] so popular" may have two meanings:

The person is curious about the popularity of a language.

The person is intrigued to why a bad language has become popular.

<comment><USER8> Same with "Why is [langauge] so bad?"

It could be "Gah, I'm frustrated working with [language], let's see if I can find some explanation for this insanity!"

Or it could be, "I've never encountered [language], but I keep hearing it's bad. Why are people saying that?"

I very much expect COBOL is overwhelmingly the result of the latter.

(Of course, neither of these is a good sign, just that they're somewhat different dynamics.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The "hard" languages are ASP.NET, C++, C#, Haskell, Lisp, and Objective-C.

Here's a breakdown of the languages with the number of positive/negative suggestions (popular was assumed to be a good thing):

ASP.NET : +1 -3 = -2

C++ : +1 -2 = -1

C# : +2 -1 = +1

COBOL : +0 -1 = -1

Erlang : +1 -1 = +0

FORTRAN : +2 -0 = +2

Haskell : +2 -2 = +0

Java : +2 -2 = +0

JS : +2 -2 = +0

Lisp : +3 -1 = +2

Obj-C : +0 -4 = -4

Perl : +0 -2 = -2

PHP : +1 -3 = -2

Python : +1 -2 = -1

Ruby : +2 -1 = +1

Smalltalk: +1 -0 = +1

VB.NET : +1 -1 = +0

By this metric, Objective-C is the worst language, twice as bad as PHP (oh my!), and Lisp and FORTRAN are the best languages.

<comment><USER10> So I guess my next project should be written in some arbitrary Lisp or Fortran.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> "Why is Go so..."

      Why is Go so slow
      Why is Go so hard for computers

I realized after a bit that the last was referring to the game :)

</comment><comment><USER12> "Why is fortran so fast" reminded me of this [1]

[1] [http://unriskinsight.blogspot.com/2014/06/fast-functional- go...](http://unriskinsight.blogspot.com/2014/06/fast-functional-goats-lions- and-wolves.html)

<comment><USER13> Fortran is fast because it has implicit "restrict".

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> "why is lua so"

      why is lua so fast
      why is lua so popular in games

Several other popular languages had nothing or only (subset of) fast/slow/hard/popular/powerful.

</comment><comment><USER15> I think that if people were more familiar with Smalltalk, the Objective-C would not get that bad rating. I find the Smalltalk message passing syntax is way more readable than more common function(args) syntax. ObjC is nothing more than a plain C with message passing in square brackets.

What might make it less attractive is the verbosity of Cocoa (formerly known as OpenStep), too many class name prefixes, missing native literal objects and use of pointers. This is problem of the framework, not the language itself though.

</comment><comment><USER16> "why is perlmonks so slow" made me chuckle. Perlmonks is indeed slow (used to be much slower), the user interface is ugly (but quite usable once you got used to it), but it's still the best place for deep discussions about Perl.

If you ask an interesting question (not just "how do join two files on a common column"), you often get several amazing answers.

<comment><USER17> perlmonks.org lost a lot of credit in my eyes because they store passwords in clear text. All passwords got hacked&leaked in 2009, they notified the users but continue to do it (tried today). This website is run by [any programming language] professionals?

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> It's a bit amusing that "why is Java so slow" is in there. I have to think that's coming from people who are familiar with Java from the horrible Java browser plug-in rather than server-side Java.

<comment><USER19> Java is quite fast compared to most languages but for some things it is still terribly slow compared to C / C++. I had to do some big integers crunching lately and tried: Java, Go, Go with GMP, C (GMP) and Haskell (using GMP under the hood). Eventually I went for good old C with the latest GMP version for it was the fastest for my use case (with Haskell and Go with GMP coming close but still not as fast as C).

Java was, for the computation I needed to do... Eight times slower than C! I know I was hitting a edge case for a very specific kind of computation but still. The situation is so bad that there are people who wrote wrappers calling GMP from within Java.

I think some Java devs don't realize how slow some of the Java API are for certain tasks. For example there's no way Java BigInteger can compete with GMP and there's no way GMP is getting ported to Java anytime soon (GMP is open source: just go and look at some of the optimization going on and you'll see what I'm talking about). Most Java devs don't realize how complex and optimized some libraries out there are and how low-level you need to go when you need the utmost performance.

Sure, server-side Java is fast for most things it's used for. But not everything is "server-side" and there are several domains where Java simply doesn't cut it compared to good old C + assembly.

And people finding Java being nearly one order of magnitude slower than the alternative for some tasks may be tempted to ask "Why is Java so slow...".

Now this isn't a criticism of Java: Java is the language I know best and used (and still use) the most. And I know it well enough to know when it's probably a good idea to try to find an alternative.

<comment><USER20> Last time I checked and did the math, I counted about 500 bytes of overhead in a java BigInteger.

Still, I wouldn't call that "java being slow", more, "java having a god awful BigInteger library class".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> One of the top three suggestions for me was, "Why is Scheme so pale and wan?" I had no idea one of my favorite languages was so . . . poetic.

</comment><comment><USER22> Hehe, Google want to correct "Why is golang so" to "Why golang is awesome".

</comment><comment><USER23> To have auto-suggestions is already a great achievement.

<comment><USER24> So far, I've never started typing until I knew what I wanted to ask, so I find them distracting. Sometimes I start reading them and then forget what my own query was.

<comment><USER23> I meant for a language :). The ones like Kotlin and Idris have no suggestions at all.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> It looks like some search terms are blocked. If you type "my penis" or "my boobs" nothing happens, but for "my finger" or "my toe" you get some results.

</comment><comment><USER26> >why is erlang so slow >why is erlang so fast

???</comment>


Musk's ventilator fiasco shows need for oversight of Gov. Newsom's mask deal - <AUTHOR> https://www.sacbee.com/article241982586.html <comment><USER2> I just heard this quote, "If you don't have all the answers, don't pretend you do."

Musk needs to heed this idea. He doesn't know everything and he should learn to stay out of areas where he will only get in the way. But he is making the mistake of believing his own press and now has an ego that keeps him from seeing that.

This is the case with the ventilators. He went in and got a few of the wrong machines and now there is a question of whether he will be able to get the number of machines he promised. I wouldn't be surprised if he got scammed by a supplier. But that only goes to show how he jumped into an area he does not know and should stay out.

Regarding the Governor not being careful enough: I have to give him a pass in this situation. He needs to act fast and can't always be there to make sure everything is 100% right. There will be mistakes, there is no doubt, but that's the cost of getting things done under the current situation.

I have no doubt that there will be many stories about how things should have been handled better after all of this is over but that should not get in the way of getting things done now.

<comment><USER3> I believe that he (like so many of us technical types) suffers from that affliction that we inherently believe we can do anything. We have an amazing imagination, we see the few starting steps and the end product and just gloss over the actual 95% in the middle.

BUT I imagine that for him it's worse because he's succeeded so often.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> >> "So, millions of Californians heard the governor announce Musk's heroic donation of "ventilators." Yet not one unit has been delivered – and Musk likely never had the real ventilators our hospitals need."

Amazing.

</comment><comment><USER4> And this is why it takes government a long time to make large procurements. If you try to buy it quick, you're subject to these sorts of risks or accusations of misspending the money.</comment>


Welcome to Bir Tawil, the land that no country wants - <AUTHOR> http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/03/welcome-to-the-land-that-no-country-wants-bir-tawil <comment><USER2> Planting a flag is meaningless, as this article shows.

There are two ways to claim land.

The first is to conjure up some de jure rights (some way to justify legal ownership, such as 500 years ago your ancestors owned the land until someone illegally invaded or you inherited the title to the land from your great- great-great-* grandfather). It can be flimsy (or outright forged), but it needs to be recognized by other countries to be effective. Religious significance was once recognized as basis for de jure claims, but it is not anymore.

Then you have de facto control. If you can exert physical control of the territory, it's pretty much yours. There are companies you can pay who will do this. Reflex Responses might be one, but there are a number of them out there.

Of course having de jure rights without de facto control is pretty useless. It's a long game strategy. Spain one day hopes they will be able to take de facto control of the Gibraltar, but it won't be in the lifetime of anyone alive today.

<comment><USER3> The interesting thing is that exerting physical control of this place might not be that hard given the lack of anyone else trying to do the same. You'd probably just need to build a runway to be able to bring in supplies etc (no idea how hard that would be obviously).

Once you had control then maybe it would be possible to create a libertarian fantasy land of the kind envisioned by the sea-steading folks. Feels like controlling this desert will be easier than building a floating city.

<comment><USER4> From the long run perspective, this is worse than the floating city. As they describe it, Sudan and Egypt only avoid regulating it as part of a legal trick. Once that problem resolves, the special status evaporates. At least when you are on the high seas, the high seas aren't going to stop being the high seas in a few decades.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Its not a case of nobody wants it, but rather they both want something else more. This wiki extract summarises it quite well:

>Egypt claims the original border from 1899, the 22nd parallel, which would place the Hala'ib Triangle within Egypt and the Bir Tawil area within Sudan. Sudan however claims the administrative border of 1902, which would put Hala'ib within Sudan, and Bir Tawil within Egypt. As a result, both states claim the Hala'ib Triangle and neither claims the much less valuable Bir Tawil area

</comment><comment><USER6> >> But what he was not prepared for was an angry backlash by observers who regarded him not as a devoted father or a heroic pioneer but rather as a 21st- century imperialist.

Neither. The guy is just another adventure tourist. He didn't trek off into noman's land for his daughter. He was out to do something extreme and found something. It's like climbing Everest to "raise awareness" for some disease. You wanted to climb Everest and, like any determined adventure tourist, will adopt any cause that aids you in that quest. "For my Daughter" gets the headlines, but in my book the better parent is the one that doesn't disappear on dangerous vacations under the guise of fulfilling princess fantasises.

The princess thing is basically what DisneyWorld is all about. The $$,$$$ spent on this trip could buy your daughter the entire princess vacation package, castle included.

</comment><comment><USER7> This is similar to the pockets on the Croatian side of the Danube which Croatia says are Serbian and Serbia says are Croatian (with the exception that in the European case, Croatia exercises effective control over them).

</comment><comment><USER8> Great read, thanks.

</comment><comment><USER9> Instead of enabling his daughter to become a princess, he could have put her on a diet of Studio Ghibli films to teach her there are better things to do with her life:

[http://www.wired.com/2012/01/disney-vs- miyazaki/](http://www.wired.com/2012/01/disney-vs-miyazaki/)

</comment><comment><USER10> "No, I'm afraid you aren't quite beautiful and lovable enough, just the way you are, my daughter. I need to take thousands of dollars out of your college fund, traipse halfway through a country torn by decades of civil war and genocide, and drag your name and photograph through the international media, first -- for the sake of an abstraction I looked up on the internet. _Then_ you'll be my precious little princess."

<comment><USER11> From the article, I did not get a sense that his value-judgement of his daughter depended on the success of this little endeavor. It read more to me like he wanted a special experience with his daughter.</comment></comment>


10,000 people are playing CTF this weekend. Do you want to join them? - <AUTHOR> http://www.poly.edu/press-release/2013/09/18/nyu-poly-launches-worlds-biggest-hacking-competition

<comment><AUTHOR> Here's the list of people registered already: [https://ctf.isis.poly.edu/competitors/](https://ctf.isis.poly.edu/competitors/)

If you want to join, register here: [https://ctf.isis.poly.edu/register/](https://ctf.isis.poly.edu/register/)</comment>


Lessons in Managing Haskell Memory - <AUTHOR> https://tech.channable.com/posts/2020-04-07-lessons-in-managing-haskell-memory.html <comment><USER2> > But by pretending to need the region inside using touch#, after converting > the address back, we ensure that the compact region remains live from the > GCs point of view.

Wow, but this seems incredibly fragile to me. touch# is a primop that is very magical and, in the face of simplification, prone to being eliminated by the compiler. I remember some bug in which the compiler eliminated the touch# after deducing that the code is dead. Chaos ensues.

If it were me, I'd just keep a random object inside the compact region, and then refer to that object in the regular way (i.e. not via the custom hash table of raw addresses) in order to keep the compact region alive.

In fact, it seems that the main purpose of that complicated ST-like RankNTypes dance is to ensure liveness of the compact region, when objects in the compact region are being referred to using raw addresses. Then why not just keep some regular Haskell value inside the compact region and use that to keep track of regions instead of phantom types? That is, every `Entry` now contains some token that is stored inside the compact region, as well as the address of the data it actually points to. Then, whenever any Entry is reachable in GC, the entire compact region is reachable in GC.

Am I missing something?

<comment><USER3> I agree that storing a reference besides an Entry is probably safer than #touch. It's also similar to arrays slices, where we store reference to the array itself + offsets.

The ST-like region typing can be still useful though, because we get a static bound on the lifetime of a compact region. We'd prefer to avoid leaking space via large compact regions which survive beyond their intended life.

<comment><USER4> That would remove the need for touch#, but the point of Entry is that it _does not_ contain references to values that the GC has to follow. If we would add a reference to the region, then the GC will have to look into the Entry, which is what we want to avoid. :)

<comment><USER3> I thought the cost of GC following a pointer into a compact region is basically constant time, or is that incorrect?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I wonder if Haskell has a way to (optionally of course) put objects into manually allocated memory regions? I implemented this in 2006 for OCaml[1]. We used it for (what we would nowadays call) "big data" processing where we had a huge amount of static data for analysis and we didn't want the GC to be constantly traversing it. We could move this data into the manually allocated region we called the "ancient heap". It still appeared as regular OCaml objects, but when the GC saw a pointer that crossed into the ancient heap it would stop following it.

Of course the obvious down side is you have to remember to manually deallocate it :-)

[1] [https://opam.ocaml.org/packages/ancient/](https://opam.ocaml.org/packages/ancient/)

<comment><USER6> This is exactly what the article is describing no? This sounds like the "compact regions" feature the entire article is about.

<comment><USER5> Oh I see - on first reading I thought that compact regions were separately GC'd regions in the old generation. Skimming the paper ([http://ezyang.com/papers/ezyang15-cnf.pdf](http://ezyang.com/papers/ezyang15-cnf.pdf)) it does seem as if they independently rediscovered ocaml-ancient.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Is it possible to allocate an object directly into a compact region, rather than allocating outside and then copying it in?

<comment><USER5> If you explore ways it might work, I think you'll see that's not easy. For example, let's say you have an "alloc_compact" function. To put a tuple "directly" into the compact heap you might write:

        alloc_compact (1,2)

But wait! You've actually allocated (1,2) and then copied it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> You're almost trying to do C++ memory management, but do it in Haskell. This seems almost like masochism.

<comment><USER2> I think that, for many applications that need to deal with a large heap written in a GC'd language, sooner or later people realize the GC just isn't a good fit and reinvent manual memory management. This is the same regardless of whether you choose Haskell or Java or Go. Even in Java world you can find plenty of evidence that people find GC + large heap unsatisfactory and resort to alternatives like memory-mapped files or JNI or just moving the data out of the process. Same thing with Go. I wouldn't call it masochism.

<comment><USER8> "Any sufficiently complicated program in a garbage-collected language contains an ad hoc, informally-specified, bug-ridden, slow implementation of half of malloc and free"?</comment></comment></comment>


Geo Twitter (#ll) - Potentially new way of GeoTweeting - <AUTHOR> http://www.vcarrer.com/2009/05/geo-twitter-ll.html

<comment><USER2> I am not a GIS expert, but have a passing interest in it among other things. As well as in geocoded tweets.

One thing that jumped out at me was the unnecessary precision with which you post your #ll examples. Twitter, as you know is limited to 140 chars, so space is precious. In your examples you go to 15 decimal places. This seemed extreme. Apparently anything over 6 decimal places is.

.000001 degree of latitude = 0.3 feet or 0.11 meters or 4.32 inches or 11 centimeters. source: <http://www.abika.com/Reports/latitude_longitude_lookup.htm>

One's location within 4.32 inches seems pretty accurate for most things, especially if this is extended to GPS devices, which are usually only accurate within a few meters at best.

<comment><AUTHOR> @wmblatter: The point of this application is to be precise, if in future has more community support I will try to optimize this problem and to balance the precision.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Startups and independents, what do you do about health insurance? - <AUTHOR>

I am not working for a BigCorp for the first time in my life, and I have not had health insurance or benefits since leaving my last employer. Given that there are a lot of small startups and independent contractors on HN, I am seeking advice on the best options for insurance and benefits.<p>Who offers this to individuals or very small companies? <comment><USER2> I have an Anthem Blue Cross (California) family plan. It has a high deductible (7500), and is attached to an HSA. Most normal routine preventative maintenance is covered. My premium is $200/month. I treat this plan as 'major medical' and sock away as much money as possible into the HSA, which I use for EVERYTHING I CAN.

As an interesting side note. I was talking to my doctor, who happens to have the same health insurance as me. He said that I am better off using my HSA in most cases. For example, his practice charges $130 for a routine visit if I pay directly from the HSA. If I charge it to my insurance, its more like $1300. Why? 1, because dealing with insurance, by his own admission, is a PITA, and 2, he will ALWAYS charge the maximum that will be covered by insurance... its how business is done. But for cash (HSA) payments, the administrative overhead is so low and the risk factors for nonpayment (insurance denies the claim, etc) are so low and the A/P cycle is so short, he would rather get paid $130 NOW (on my way out) than get $1300 90 days net IF insurance approves the claim. He said a lot of doctors and dentists do it this way and I should ALWAYS ask 'whats the cash price' because some have tiered rates like he does. Most people don't care that its cheaper to pay cash because for most people, their primary concern is out of pocket expense. Most people would rather charge their insurance $1300 so long as they don't have to pay anything than to pay $130 and not 'overpay' (albeit opaquely)

<comment><AUTHOR> Interesting. I would have guessed the opposite - that the insurance companies get a "volume discount" of sorts.

What about with prescriptions? Is it better to pay cash price via HSA, or can you get a cheaper rate through your provider?

<comment><USER2> As far as prescriptions, I have a couple cost effective choices: Compounding Pharmacy and Mexico. The compounding pharmacy that my doctor referred me is very reasonable and they can 'custom make' drugs. Mexico is a very good option (I live in San Diego) because I can go get a generic equivalent for 1/5 to 1/10 of the price in the US, and I can use my HSA card to pay for drugs in Mexico.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I bought a Blue Cross Blue Shield plan privately. For less than $500, I got full dental and medical, including maternity, for my wife and 3 children.

<comment><USER4> That's excellent - what state are you in (if I may ask)?

<comment><USER3> I'm in Florida, where I hear Humana has great plans as well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm taking my chances.

I've already moved halfway around the world (my startup needs cheap labor) and run a much higher risk of death than in the US. Why should I worry about a financial hit on top of death?

(Amusingly, my Mom worried about the Mumbai bombings 150km away from me. In reality, she should worry about me looking the wrong way while crossing the street.)

<comment><USER6> You moved to my home city, Mumbai? :)

It's an awesome city though not always cheap. More likely you're somewhere else in India hopefully!

<comment><USER5> Pune, not Mumbai. But I described Pune to her as "a satellite city of Mumbai".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you are a US citizen, you have COBRA coverage. Which can get pricey, but at least its something.

How old are you? My parents health/dental/vision coverage extends to all children until 26, and I think one of the benefits of Obama healthcare overhaul is that all health care plans must cover children until 26.

</comment><comment><USER8> In SF here and just signed up for individual health insurance, HealthNet PPO ($70/month) after getting recommended to an agent through Dave Ramsey's web site. It's a high deductible plan (around $7,500), but the premiums seem low. I personally feel less at risk of being in the hospital; I don't commute right now; I'm a fairly healthy individual. I would have signed up for the Health Savings Account, but it was a bit more expensive. Maybe later.

</comment><comment><USER9> If you have a Tax ID and at least two people that want the insurance, you can get a small business policy. Just do a google search for brokers.

</comment><comment><USER10> I used to have an international insurance with bupa.com. They are very good and not that expensive but I believe you need to have an address outside the US</comment>


4-Day Fast - <AUTHOR> http://48things.com/2017/02/09/four-day-fast.html <comment><USER2> The whole amino-acids thing that the author talked about made me cringe a little bit. "Amino-acids" is just basically the fancy word for "proteins" (I know there are amino-acids that aren't proteins, but let's not be nitpicking here) and in turns, "proteins" is just another fancy word for "shit we eat everyday." It doesn't matter that much what form it is (meat, plants, milk, powder), when digested in your body, it's proteins. Proteins give your body energy. Proteins are not some magical alternative shit to your food, it's actually food.

"Oh I don't eat, but I '''take in''' amino-acids" is like saying "Oh I don't drink, but '''take in''' dihydrogen monoxide."

<comment><USER3> Yep - in the intermittent fasting community, BCAAs (which the author was probably taking) are known to kick you out of the fasting state.

<comment><USER4> Literally anything except water does that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > Steve Jobs was a regular faster.

He also died of cancer at a fairly young age after trying to treat it with diet instead of medical treatment. Probably not the best health role model.

<comment><USER6> To be fair, pancreatic cancer doesn't offer much hope even with treatment.

<comment><USER7> Steve had the only form that was treatable and didn't treat it until it was too late.

"In spite of pleas from family and friends, he tried to cure himself through acupuncture sessions, drinking special fruit juices, visiting "spiritualists" and using other treatments he found on the internet.

Some cancer experts have said that Mr Jobs may have extended his life or even survived if he had promptly tackled his cancer aggressively with scientifically proven medical treatments."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I fast for three days before I travel. I've done so since reading[0] that it might strengthen the immune response, and I loathe illness while traveling.

Frankly, I am just happy to see HN talking about diet and health. My my inclination is to believe any medication or therapy must either overcome my diet or support it. I can think of nothing with a bigger impact on our physiochemistry.

0\. [https://news.usc.edu/63669/fasting-triggers-stem-cell- regene...](https://news.usc.edu/63669/fasting-triggers-stem-cell-regeneration- of-damaged-old-immune-system/)

</comment><comment><USER9> Can we contrast fasting like the op is describing (with coconut milk, protein supplements and bone broth) vs. fasting with _literally zero_ calories ?

If you're pursuing "weight loss" or fat loss or general fitness/wellness/lightness, I think any form of fasting is useful and interesting.

However, it seems to me that if you are optimizing for starving cancer cells, forcing weak cells into apoptosis, depleting your sugar stores, resetting insulin resistance, etc. ... that is to say, if you're pursuing the more interesting, second order benefits of fasting - you really should be doing the zero calorie kind.

I do a 24 hour fast once weekly with just (black) coffee and water ... I guess I cannot speak to how difficult zero calories would be for 2-4 days ...

<comment><USER4> Consuming anything else than water will actually break the fast. Yes that includes black coffee.

People who "fast" while consuming coffee, broth, exogenous ketones, and other caloric substances still experience the benefits from caloric restriction. Still not actually fasting though.

<comment><USER9> "People who "fast" while consuming coffee, broth, exogenous ketones, and other caloric substances still experience the benefits from caloric restriction. Still not actually fasting though."

If the coffee is black it has zero calories and is identical (in terms of caloric restriction) to tea or water ... so I don't think it belongs in the same group as broth ...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> _Well, I lost 6.7 pounds and 1.9% body fat during my 4-day fast._

How much of that went back on again shortly afterwards, though? I have sometimes lost several pounds very quickly as a result of dehydration, but this is generally not healthy and the loss is temporary. I've sometimes been sick and not had much of an appetite, resulting in staying in bed for several days and hardly eating anything. Again, I lost several pounds, but even with a modest and very healthy food intake for the next few days, much of the weight then went back on again as my body recovered.

<comment><USER11> That is the really important question here. I wish the author would answer you.

I believe fasting has long-term health benefits but I am not at all sure it can actually help with regular weight loss and general health re-balancing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I enjoy reading stories about people fasting. Someday I may try it myself, but I know I tend toward a sort of sensory disconnect, so I'm biased toward such hyperbolic stuff. I wish I could be more like some of my friends who are more balanced in their routine; fasting is foreign to them, but they are naturally fit and kind of Zen in their own way. They can just do "normal" very well and no experiments seem necessary.

</comment><comment><USER13> Well, anatomically modern humans evolved around discontinuous food availability, so fasting may play a more important role than we think in our metabolism.

For example insulin and the growth hormones interact, and being well fed can have counter-intuitive consequences.

e.g: Overfeeding kids might be counterproductive for their growth.

</comment><comment><USER14> It's the exogenous ketones bit that I'm interested in. Dr Richard Veech has had some interesting publications out on dextro-betahydroxybutyrate [0]. In short, d-bhb is like an entirely separate macronutrient (not fat/carb/protein/alcohol) that is readily metabolizable and has higher thermodynamic efficiency- this translates to lower-metabolic damage post brain trauma, much better underwater breath holding times, something like a couple % power output increase for athletes, etc.

Thing is, the d-bhb production process is really expensive, and it's also pretty unpalatable (and needs to be eaten en masse).

[0] [http://drveech.com/](http://drveech.com/)

</comment><comment><USER15> Fasting is definitely underappreciated. As are cold showers and deep breathing a la Wim Hof.

<comment><USER16> Hot baths are also good for your body. Any activity where your body has to work hard to establish homeostasis is a form of exercise.

<comment><USER14> Like.. almost dying? ;)

<comment><USER17> Ah, the Saiyan way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Anecdotal but I noticed that when I travel abroad for over a week I always lose some weight (enough to be considered weight loss and stay for a while). Even if I feel like I make unhealthier choices during my trip. Is it possible that a change of diet habits has the similar effects and essentially all we need is constantly changing routine?

</comment><comment><USER19> I definitely sleep poorly on days when I fast. Often I wake up 2-3 hours earlier than usual and am wide awake.

<comment><USER20> Do you feel tired that day?

<comment><USER19> Yes, I feel about the same as if I had gone to bed late the night before.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Hey Guy! Just read your post. Can you tell me whether Ketones/amino acid supplements are supposed to prevent you from your muscles breaking down? I am losing crazy muscle (lost like 20+ pounds in 4 months) and would love a solution to prevent it from happening.

<comment><USER22> See a doctor. This isn't normal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> _There are two main sources of fuel for the human body: ketones (derived from fat) and glucose (derived from carbohydrates)._

Ketones aren't a fuel, they are byproduct of burning fatty acids.

As an analogy, Ketones aren't wood (fuel), they are ashes (byproduct).

<comment><USER24> beta-hydroxybutarate, a ketone, is the primary energy source while in a fasted state, and is analogous to glucose in use by organs. It directly provides energy to the brain and the heart.

Source: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta- Hydroxybutyric_acid](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta-Hydroxybutyric_acid)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> If you want the fast to have a detoxing effect, skip the 2 - 4 cups of coffee per day

<comment><USER26> There is no such thing as a "detox". It's a myth.

[http://www.webmd.com/diet/a-z/detox- diets](http://www.webmd.com/diet/a-z/detox-diets)

[https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/dec/05/detox-m...](https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/dec/05/detox- myth-health-diet-science-ignorance)

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> Breaking a 4 day fast with a starbucks sandwich is so 2017...

</comment><comment><USER28> ->"The biggest thing that this fast has taught me is just how much I eat out of habit or boredom instead of actual hunger." . For some people(like me) it takes only a bit of education and careful diet plan to realise this. For the author it took a 4-day fasting.

</comment><comment><USER29> Kind of odd how the author reads into his sugar free gum and and ketosis so deeply but didn't say anything about missing two regular workouts and losing so much weight.

<comment><USER30> The weight loss is completely normal and expected. A lot of the weight came from water bound up in the starch reserves, it'll come right back after eating carbs for a few days. Similar weight "loss" would be seen transitioning into a diet with <100g carbs per day but with normal, or even excessive caloric intake.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Loyalty to Company, Loyalty to Employees - <AUTHOR> I work at a company which has a history of capricious-seeming firings / layoffs / terminations.  Recently, an entire business unit was closed down without warning; where the board demanded "drastic" action and a single executive determined what that would mean.  Multiple highly valued people who straddled the line between that business unit and the rest of the company have quit because of the new roles they were given.  Morale has fallen across the company, and deadlines have been slipping.<p>Our executive castigated a large group, complaining that we aren't so dedicated to the company as to skip our December vacations just to meet arbitrarily-chosen deadlines.  Which makes me wonder.  The company is clearly not dedicated to its people.  Why should we be dedicated to the company?  That's a rhetorical question, and what I really wonder is, how can we get through to this executive before he chases away the few remaining skilled employees? <comment><USER2> Why are you not looking for a new job instead?

<comment><AUTHOR> Love of the actual work that I do, and in small part, loyalty to some peers. I believe in what the company does, but at times, it seems that our leadership is ruining everything.</comment></comment>


Google threatens to pull Street View from Switzerland - <AUTHOR> http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/05/11/will.appeal.to.swiss.high.court.to.overturn.ruling/ <comment><USER2> The word "threaten" in the headline is misleading. If someone said "you can't do X unless you pay me 100 billion dollars", then replying with, "well, I guess I won't do X" is not a threat -- it's just a matter-of-fact declaration.

The Swiss government is asking Google for an unreasonable amount of work in order for Street View to be allowed in Switzerland, and Google is saying they won't be able to comply because the request is, after all, unreasonable. That's all there is to it.

<comment><USER3> The court is, by the way, aware of that. They write in their opinion (<http://links.weblaw.ch/BVGer-A-7040/2009>, German) that Google's ability to offer Street View in Switzerland is in this case immaterial to their decision. The right to publicity is more important.

They specifically say that Google is, for example, free to charge users of Street View for access if they are unable to offer the service for free. The amount of work is only unreasonable in the framework of Google's business model.

(I personally think that the algorithmic review is good enough, at least in this case, but I also think that this view probably doesn't square with the law in Switzerland as it currently stands. Lobbyists, no lawyers, are needed.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The article seems to imply that the Swiss authorities want Google to use a manual blurring technique instead of automating the process (rather than in addition to). If that's the case, I'd be hard-pressed to explain how the Swiss privacy watchdog would think that human-operated blurring would lead to a better than 99% success rate.

<comment><USER5> You don't have to explain it, because they don't.

<comment><USER5> I don't get the downvotes, but whatever. Is it really hard to believe that the watchdog group in question really hasn't considered that there is a difference between "blurring 100% of faces" and "blurring is performed manually?" It's likely they think that, if you force Google to perform manual blurring, then every face they photograph will be blurred. It's even more likely we've already thought about this issue far more than they have.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Privacy has traditionally been taken very seriously in Switzerland due to the Swiss' love of financial privacy. As far as I know it's one of the few countries where the right to privacy is defined in the _constitution_.

</comment><comment><USER7> More interesting to me was the info about Google using Street View cars to collect wifi access point data. Makes total sense but I did not know they did this.

<comment><USER8> Did you really miss all the discussions and hearings last year about them accidently recording some WLAN traffic as well?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Street_View#Privacy_issu...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Street_View#Privacy_issues) [http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/wifi-data- collection-...](http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/wifi-data-collection- update.html)

<comment><USER7> I really did. Looks like it was much more of a European concern which would explain why I didn't hear about it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Why do they want them to blur license plate number? What's the big deal about those?

<comment><USER10> In Switzerland it is simple to search which license plate number is registered to whom [1].

Which makes license plates as bad as faces when it comes to personally identifiable information.

[1] [http://www.stva.zh.ch/internet/sicherheitsdirektion/stva/de/...](http://www.stva.zh.ch/internet/sicherheitsdirektion/stva/de/StVAfz/FZindex/FZeindex.html)

<comment><USER3> I didn't even know that. I think that independent of that, license plates would be personal information even without a central database. There is no central database of faces yet they are still clearly personal information. License plates are similarly associated with one person (or, unlike faces, a few people).</comment></comment></comment>


Just How Much Are America's Teachers Getting Paid? - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/american-teacher-pay-2010-10

<comment><USER2> The author of this article has clearly never been a teacher. The teacher has, on average 5 hours a day in the classroom.

The really bad ones, however, will put in another 3 hours a day in prep work, grading, staying up to date on their topic, leading extracurriculars, meetings, etc. For the good ones it will be much more. The average teacher actually spends much closer to 10 or 12 hours a day working, and often puts in a few hours on the weekend catching up on grading and preparation to boot.

Let's recalculate his numbers, just assuming a more realistic number of work hours. We'll assume 8 hours a day five days a week - the bad teacher minimum. That brings it down to $43 an hour. For the absolute minimum amount of work. Before pension and benefits and all that.

Let's check for a good teacher. I had teachers who would come in at 6 am to do prep work and leave the school at 6 pm after extra curricular activities nearly every day. And they didn't really have lesson prep time in all of that, which adds another 4 to 6 hours on. Their hours could easily reach 16 a day, we'll use 12 ave (which is probably too low for many). And now we're down to $29 an hour. For a 60 hour work week.

This post is disingenous at worse and at best shows a complete lack of understanding of what it takes to be a teacher. I recommend the author try being a teacher, or at least interview some teachers about the amount of time they put into their job, before arguing that they are paid too much.</comment>


Ask HN: I think I am grossly underpaid. Question on work/life balance? - <AUTHOR> I work for one of the top tech company in Seattle/Redmond area.  I have nearly ten years of software dev. experience. I am getting $130k as base and 20k in stock each year.
I am not an engineer, though. I lead a remote team located outside of US. My workload is really awful. I usually work 55 hrs to 60 hrs per week. Additionally, my commute takes 90 min. on daily basis. I still have very good knowledge of technologies and I do coding in my leisure time.
Every day I wake up with feeling bad about myself. I took this job because of some personal reasons. I have no personal life, no hobbies, no interests. I can't remember when I laughed last time. It's work -->home-->gym-->work-->sleep--> repeat cycle for me.
I want to move into the management. I have discussed this issue and work hours multiple times with my manager, who just makes excuses every time we discuss and shows false hope.I am young and very enthusiastic about technology and making difference to lives of millions of people. I equally like making money as well.
What shall I do?  I don't have a mentor or good friend to discuss these issues. Should I continue the job and see how it pans out or should I start looking for another tech company? I don't know if I am overreacting?
In my opinion worst thing is that, I can not stop thinking about the work. My autopilot on brain keeps thinking about the work, even though I don't want to. I tried observing my thoughts but that does not work for me.
Could anyone with enough experience under the belt please advise? <comment><USER2> Your pay doesn't seem massively outside current industry norms.

If I were you I'd probably do two things:

1\. I'd try and save enough money for a couple of years runway in case I wanted to do my own thing/start consulting.

2\. I'd look around to see if there are other jobs that might be interesting. My biggest regrets are jobs I've stayed at too long, not the ones I left too quickly. Experience at many companies is great. Now, when you can take or leave a new job, is a good low stress time to look.

</comment><comment><USER3> > my commute takes 90 min

The long commute in itself is not good for your health and a good reason to change jobs or negotiate some remote/home working. If your team is offshore, do you need to be at the office every day?

> I have no personal life, no hobbies, no interests. I can't remember when I > laughed last time

A definite indication it's time to change.

> manager, who just makes excuses every time we discuss and shows false hope

Sounds like not much chance of moving forward in your current job.

> Should I continue the job and see how it pans out?

As you are an experienced tech professional in the US I think you will have no problems finding a position that aligns more with your life goals. Have you searched/applied/interviewed for any other roles? If so, have you had any offers or responses?

What about looking for Software Dev Manager or Architect positions at other companies closer to your home or with remote working options?

</comment><comment><USER4> I think, first an for most, do you enjoy what you are doing?

A lot of the other stuff can be worked out. You can move closer to work or better yet negotiate a remote working environment ( if possible ) You can find a hobby , granted that's not so easy to do. And increases in salary are inevitable and can be negotiated.

What i would suggest is talking directly with HR and not your manager. These are trained professionals who sometimes have really good insight into the peripheral aspects of the work environment. If you do stay and they see you have potential for a management role, or you push yourself into that direction i.e MBA night school etc, the more time you have with company the greater chance of that happening, as well as being fully prepared to move into the position when it presents itself.

In the end though go with what feels right for you ( i know that sounds cliche, but in the end it is your life) I just quit my job, but not for salary reasons so it was a lot easy to decide. $130k with equity does not sound bad, but i guess it all depends on your previous experience and qualifications.

There is some pretty good scuba diving around Seattle ... just for a hobby suggestion. I found scuba diving to be super peaceful and relaxing.

</comment><comment><USER5> [https://xkcd.com/1768/](https://xkcd.com/1768/)

It sounds like you are heading down the path of burnout which often lands in the realm of depression. If you wait until your breaking point, it becomes 10x harder to make the change you need, not to mention presenting yourself as marketable.

It's much easier to find a new job while currently employed at a top tech company as oppose to having just come off a 6 month recovery hiatus.

You say you can't stop thinking about your work. Perhaps constantly keeping your mind busy with work is your subconscious trying to avoiding having to deal with how unhappy you are, and how big of a anxiety causing life change it will be to try and find a new job?

If I were you, I would spruce up the resume and start sending it out. Worst case, nothing comes of it and you stay exactly where you are.</comment>


Learnings from open-sourcing Bootstrap - <AUTHOR> http://www.markdotto.com/2012/04/02/learnings-from-open-sourcing-bootstrap/

<comment><USER2> While I think Bootstrap is great and I use it frequently, I feel like it's initial popularity has been in large part because it has the backing of Twitter. What I'd be curious in reading about is how relatively unknown developers are able to get their open source projects seen and known.

<comment><USER3> I think the project itself just hit a nerve. Twitter has released plenty of code in the past that hasn't become this popular. Personally, Bootstrap fills a very valuable niche in my work, and a large part of that had to do with the polish and completeness it had out of the gate (you can use it as a self- documenting style guide, e.g.), so maybe this can be ascribed to Twitter in terms of resources. Despite this, I think it's more "right time, right place" than anything else here.</comment></comment>


Why Is It Socially Acceptable To Be Bad At Math? - <AUTHOR> http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/finding-the-next-einstein/201203/why-is-it-socially-acceptable-be-bad-math

<comment><USER2> I think it also comes across as socially acceptable to be bad at history, physics, chemistry, biology, economics, nutrition (both theoretical and applied), literature (not reading, per se, but knowledge of important works of literature), public speaking, music, computer science, painting, sculpture...

Basically, I guess fundamental reading and writing (though not necessarily with good penmanship) are the only skills we actually expect other people to have?</comment>


New body armour promises to transform fighting sports - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21697212-new-body-armour-promises-transform-fighting-sports-modern-gladiators?fsrc=scn%2Ffb%2Fte%2Fpe%2Fed%2Fmoderngladiators <comment><USER2> Having done some SCA heavy, those open inner thighs make me twitch (armpits too, but less could be done about that).

One thing SCA has figured out that the sports industry seems to have failed to is how helms work. It turns out the best way to extend the reduce the impact of hits to the head is NOT cushioning or crumpling to extend impulse but rather just having a lot of mass to move. I've been smashed over the head at full force (with a full wieght sword) while wearing full helm and been more harmed by the gong-like ringing than the impact itself.

If you have not had a chance to try or watch SCA heavy, It is essentially full contact re-enactment (slightly less formalized than HEMA) and only using blunt (but full weight) weapons.

<comment><USER3> > watch SCA heavy

Holy shit, these guys don't fuck around [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RiQR60-5gs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RiQR60-5gs)

<comment><USER4> IMO nothing compares with longsword fighting. By comparison, SCA looks like a bunch of big guys wailing on each other in the middle of a scrum. Longsword fighting has a much more competitive environment with well defined technique and strategy: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhbcntqyiSo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhbcntqyiSo)

<comment><USER5> _"...bunch of big guys wailing on each other..."_

Add in death and dismemberment and you have what war actually probably looked like for thousands of years - pure, unadulterated mayhem.

<comment><USER4> Fair enough. I'd imagine the guys fighting had a lot more fitness and probably weren't struggling with obesity though.

<comment><USER6> There was something on HN a year or two ago that said that gladiators tended to be on the fat side. On the other hand, given the distances marched, I doubt the hoplites and legionaries had much excess fat.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> A small amount of video from the test event:

[http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/78468512/Weaponis...](http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/78468512/Weaponised- martial-arts-bouts-pave-way-for-new-spectator-sport)

The umpire carries a shield and a hand axe!

There's also a few other videos on a YouTube channel:

[https://www.youtube.com/user/UnifiedWeaponsMaster/videos](https://www.youtube.com/user/UnifiedWeaponsMaster/videos)

</comment><comment><USER8> The designers and advertisers have gone full mental on this site:

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

This is after I dismissed the "click this to add this to your reading list" popover.

<comment><USER9> Why you should use adblock:

[http://imgur.com/vKOQXOc](http://imgur.com/vKOQXOc)

<comment><USER10> Extremely sound advice.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I like the idea of using real-time cgi to render shiny suits of armour and the consequence of "hits". As grim as watching decapitation might be, I expect the ratings would be huge.

<comment><USER12> > As grim as watching decapitation might be, I expect the ratings would be > huge.

I don't recommend watching it. Someone I know posted an ISIS (or similar) video on Facebook, which popped up into my feed while I was doing something on the other monitor, and it auto-played. By the time I realized that it wasn't fake (it wasn't a clean, axe-lop decapitation, but rather done via sawing away with what appeared to be a camp knife) and it literally froze me, then left me quite out of myself.

I consider myself fairly stoic, and entirely un-squeamish, but that bothered me in a way that I didn't realize anything could. For your own sanity, I recommend avoiding it where possible.

<comment><USER13> Imagine what it's like for the poor people that moderate those posts.

[http://www.wired.com/2014/10/content- moderation/](http://www.wired.com/2014/10/content-moderation/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Maybe it calculates the fractures and other injuries, but if the goal is realism, as a wounded figther is likely to be less efficient, they should also find a way of hampering movement for the wounded parts.

<comment><USER15> Like in enders game. The suit froze that part of the body. Which Ender used to effect.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Strange that they didn't mention the indiegogo campaign they have going on. 54% funded. Sadly, the only part of the armour as a perk is a prototype helmet at $25k. Campaign here [https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/unified-weapons- master/#/](https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/unified-weapons-master/#/)

</comment><comment><USER17> I was expecting this to be D3O gel armor. It's a new material that is gel-like and flexible but turns rock hard on impact. It is used in motorcycle protectors as well as industrial and defense applications.

I'm waiting to get equestrian protective vests from this material but I've only found some very expensive competition jackets. The motorcycle protectors don't have adequate protection to the sides for when you've fallen and get hit by hooves.

[http://www.d3o.com](http://www.d3o.com)

</comment><comment><USER18> So like football, you can gird your loins so that your loins can be exploded by even harder impact. This is insanity.

The only way to make "fighting sports" safe is to ban hits to damage-prone areas of the body. But the organizing body's in those sports are unwilling to go far enough - apparently we want, nay, _need_ to see blood, spit, injury and yes, death in our "fighting sports".

</comment><comment><USER19> Interesting,19 kilos is still fairly significant weight to be carrying around. It'll have a material impact on the way a person fights.

<comment><USER20> It is hardly impressive. Mediaval armour had about the same weight:

> _A complete suit of plate armour made from well-tempered steel would weigh > around 15–25 kg(33-55 pounds).[2] The wearer remained highly agile and could > jump, run and otherwise move freely as the weight of the armour was spread > evenly throughout the body._

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

<comment><USER21> If I'm not mistaken plate armour wasn't all that great against blunt weapons though, since it probably does not distribute the impact very well. Whereas I'd suspect this kevlar armour to basically swallow those punches over a larger area, no?

<comment><USER22> No personal armor (so far) is good against blunt trauma. The reason for that is conservation of momentum. Blunt weapons often rely on large amount of momentum. Only thing you can do is to make the armor bouncy. So you can try to turn it into elastic collision.

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

But then again they often added small spikes and rough surfaces to the tips of such weapons, to turn it into inelastic collision. [http://www.medievalcollectibles.com/images/Product/large/AH-...](http://www.medievalcollectibles.com/images/Product/large/AH-4130.png) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inelastic_collision](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inelastic_collision)

The bad shit for the weapon is that it's very difficult to change the direction of war-hammer mid course. So it's easier to block.

Kevlar makes armor of similar effectiveness lighter. But there is nothing fundamentally better than old plate armors. It's still just distributing force to larger area. With penetrating weapons this is potentially very effective, as there is relatively little momentum and energy. The idea is to have very high local pressure at the tip of the weapon and this normally cuts deep into flesh.

<comment><USER23> So morning star would be the weapon of choice there I suppose. Sword may win "by points" but with morning star you'd have a solid chance of actually neutralizing opponent.

<comment><USER24> Historically, the weapon of choice for defeating plate armour was the pollaxe.

\- [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pollaxe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pollaxe) \- Fiore's azza: [http://scholasaintgeorge.org/training_docs/Basic%20Poleaxe%2...](http://scholasaintgeorge.org/training_docs/Basic%20Poleaxe%20in%20Fiore%202010.pdf)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I wonder how soon until this develops [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream_Park](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream_Park)

</comment><comment><USER26> Why is there no "buy now"-button? I want this. For reasons.

</comment><comment><USER27> I wonder which will win first to allow for intense sports like this: a 100% safe armor/guard or a solidly realistic VR version of the same thing?

</comment><comment><USER28> Quite interesting that the words "new body armour" brings "sport" associated before other stuff...

</comment><comment><USER29> Thats some heavy armor. Big guys are going the to advantaged to this.

</comment><comment><USER30> Cool, kind of a blend between gaming and real sports</comment>


An experience with Ubuntu Touch development - <AUTHOR> http://zxstudio.org/blog/2016/04/06/experience-ubuntu-touch-development/ <comment><USER3> I'll answer any basic questions anyone has about using the Ubuntu phone - <USER2> using it for over 18 months now. Never have actually owned an Android/iOS phone and hope to keep it that way. It does everything I want it to. Not 'beautifully', but it does it. It's cheap, open and supports free software.

Ideally I'm still looking for some alternative device that matches or surpasses the N900 in terms of functionality and openness. But I'm of course not holding my breath. With UT I get SSH and terminal access, but it is slightly hamstrung in terms of what can be installed from repos, unless I forego the OTA updates.

A quick ideal-world scenario: a phone/mobile PC store on the highstreet where you can browse great hardware running Red Hat, Debian and the BSDs. All dirt simple to use with the ability to pop the hood (terminal, repos) whenever you needed a little more tooling. Devices perhaps in two parts, one pocket-size and one bag/large-pocket size, slotting together for storage and charging.

UT is still working on convergence, and has made great strides from what I can tell, but it's still some way off being a useful reality for any more than a handful of devs.

<comment><USER4> How often do you use the terminal and/or SSH, and what for?

I kept hearing for a long time how great $this or $that android ssh-client or terminal was, but they were all terrible IME. I am quite picky though, and spend >1/2 my day in terminal. All I want is a good terminal session, with ssh, on my phone.

<comment><USER3> I actually use it for personal more than work stuff. Connecting to the pi@home to restart kodi, set up a torrent, check IMs/IRC.

Changed a shortcut in tmux to get around the quirks with not having a keyboard (it offers a menu for Esc and common Ctrl+ shortcuts).

I won't tell you it's perfect, sure you're not expecting that. Serviceable though. Setting it up in 'convergence mode' could actually work for you, perhaps with a tablet instead of phone, if you're so terminal-based. Reminder: the phone cost ~£100.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think they need to support more flagship phones, or popular ones like the MotoG of Nexus phones. That takes away risk, you can buy a good Android Phone and play with Ubuntu Touch. The Meizu's are not so appealing to me.

Currently the OnePlus3 port is under development [0], I think it would be great if that starts to work. The OP3 also has 6 GB of RAM, making it very well suited for Convergence (their name for getting a desktop interface when attaching mouse/keyboard/monitor).

[0] [https://devices.ubports.com/#/op3](https://devices.ubports.com/#/op3)

<comment><USER6> They seem to have the same problem Jolla has – a phone OS without devices. Every once in a while a smaller hardware manufacturer (BQ, PuzzlePhone, FairPhone, Turing Phone, etc) makes some promises or actual releases a model with some support, but those companies are struggling themselves for any real market share – or mind-share. I guess the margins are too low to grow fast enough and get leverage against the big manufacturers and the default Android choice.

I really hope one of these more open-source friendly companies gets a foothold in the phone space, even if it happens by courting markets in countries like Russia and China who are politically less than thrilled about handing over too much information to American companies like Google and Apple.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I hope this project takes off. Would love to have a completely open source mobile phone or tablet.

I think the key is low entry barrier for developers. Developing an SDK/IDE is too much work, and personally I feel _locked in_ and rather use the command line instead. A fast emulator or a KVM image would also be nice.

<comment><USER8> You do you do great UI design with the command line?

<comment><USER9> I've had a marvelous experience building HTML5 UIs in my command-line vim.

<comment><USER8> I bet you had lots of productive hours save/browser refresh fun cycles making something like Material design with that workflow.

What about the users, have they had a marvelous experience using that UI?

<comment><USER10> There exist tools outside of your apparent zone of comfort that let us do whatever we damn please from the command line. I think you'd be surprised how much user facing code was written using Emacs/Vim.

<comment><USER8> I was already coding in the 80's, back then it was called VI.

So I know pretty well how the UNIX System V experience for GUI programming looks like.

<comment><USER11> And I used Windows already back in the 90s, so I know exactly what the PC experience looks like with all its BSODs and token rings.

<comment><USER8> At least it already had RAD GUI tools that cared about usability while most UNIX terminals that I was still using in 1994 were green phosphor ones.

<comment><USER11> Well, speak for yourself. About the same time, our local university had very impressive Irix X-terminals with a rock solid GUI.

It might be that you have only had a small glimpse of the things beyond PCs back then. And that seems to still have an impact on your perception of things on the "Unix" side ;)

<comment><USER8> You mean like this in 1991?

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGhfB- NICzg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGhfB-NICzg)

I would have rather used the GUI tooling of a NeXT, which eschews the UNIX traditions even though it builds partially on top of them, than the Solaris way of programming GUIs, if given the option.

Just because I could only access green phosphor terminals, doesn't mean I wasn't aware of other, more expensive, options.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I feel like the ease in which developers can make applications for a new system plays a pretty vital role in that system's success.

For example, the Sega Saturn (from my understanding) was ridiculously hard to program for, and consequently a lot of the games for it were objectively worse than their PlayStation counterparts (with some exceptions).

My point here is that if Ubuntu wants to compete, I think it's incredibly smart to make it approachable for devs to just jump right in; I know the entire experience isn't polished right now as evidenced by this article, but it doesn't look insurmountable, and I'm optimistic.

<comment><USER13> The Saturn had 8 processors! Two main processors, two sound processors, two graphics processors, a processor for controlling the bus and interconnect, and a processor dedicated to the cd-rom.

<comment><USER12> That's what I mean!

We're only now getting to a point where people really know how to take full advantage of multi(core/processor) systems and are given nice frameworks in which to do so; in the mid-90's I'm pretty sure that that was a really difficult task!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> What I really want to know is what the adoption rate of Ubuntu Touch is among the hacker/hobbyist/diehard Linux crowd. Firefox OS has lost its official support on smartphone, no idea where Sailfish OS is at, so Canonical should be doing everything they can to make their platform the alternative to the big 2. Are they?

<comment><USER15> It seems quite low I think. Part of the problem is that Android is just so ubiquitous. As the article mentions "Developing for Ubuntu Touch right now is not easy, mainly because of lack of documentation and examples". Android has a million examples, libraries, first and third party documentation, a load people at Google improving the tools all the time (though this churn can also be a bad thing of course...) Canonical has less of this and the development plan seems focused on Web apps.

Another problem is that there are no Ubuntu phones currently available to buy new. The Meizu mentioned in the article is no longer sold, and installing on semi-supported hardware is flakey. For example, you can buy a Meizu phone that has Android and reflash it with Ubuntu Touch, but then future OTA updates don't work and you have to reflash each time. Devices sold on ebay might not be the so-called "international version" and therefore have a locked bootloader, you don't know until you buy one.

The way updates are handled and the community support seem much more organised than with Firefox OS though. That was a complete disaster, with the first gen ZTE phones receiving no updates at all and even the Flame (a developer device) being pretty much abandoned right away. At least Canonical keep pushing OTAs for the official BQ and Meizu devices, and builds for Nexus devices are still produced so you can flash it on semi-common hardware if you're feeling brave.

I know it's easy to say and very difficult to do, but really what Canonical need is a phone that has some long-term availability. You often hear Alan Pope on podcasts use the excuse that it is not Canonical's problem that devices are not being sold, it is up to the manufacturers. But if there are no devices to buy then how is UT ever going to gain any real traction?

<comment><USER16> You can actually flash a Meizu and continue to get OTA updates now.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Google cache mirror [http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:qComzDs...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:qComzDs4uSAJ:zxstudio.org/blog/2016/04/06/experience- ubuntu-touch-development/)

</comment><comment><USER18> How does Ubuntu Touch compare performance wise (battery and speed) and developer friendlyness with that other open OS Tizen, which uses Wayland instead of Mir for display operations? Does Ubuntu Touch have an Android compatibility layer?

As Rasterman (Carsten Haitzler of Enlightenment fame) is involved and Samsung intends to run it on every device I think it might be more efficient. It also has a socalled 'Ultra Power Saving Mode' built in.

The Tizen Samsung Z2 has been released for 70 euro in India last week and in Africa soon Tizen might be destined to take a significant portion of the mobile space. The development tools seem open enough, you could even run UE4 html5 games (that goes for both Ubuntu One and Tizen I assume) [https://wiki.tizen.org/wiki/Game_development](https://wiki.tizen.org/wiki/Game_development)

<comment><USER8> Tizen already went through so many reboots on their SDK stack that I wouldn't bother with it.

It started with Meego adoption, then they brought the BADA OS SDK C++ (think Symbian C++ like experience), followed by re-writing everything in C, and offering a new C++ API on top of it when developers rebelled to go back to C.

Also regarding the HTML5 stack, there are lots of dead mobile OSes that tried that route already.

I doubt anyone in the markets where Tizen was released is bothered to target it instead of Android, unless Samsung is paying them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I would love to know if there are any developers out there writing for Ubuntu Touch. I got a Aquaris BQ M10 tablet and it has virtually no apps available. What comes preinstalled is anaemic and barely works. And the promised 'desktop' feature is DOA.

It's gathering dust until some more developers come and make stuff for it!

<comment><USER20> there are some apps for the tablet and phones [https://uappexplorer.com/apps?sort=-points](https://uappexplorer.com/apps?sort=-points)

<comment><USER19> Thanks! That links broken for me though.

<comment><USER21> Could it be your browser / https / an extension? It works for me in Firefox and Chrome but not ie.

<comment><USER19> Oh yeah it works in Chrome but not on my mobile browser (I just got a blank screen).

<comment><USER22> A JS issue perhaps? Seems it shows crap all without it turned on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Ubuntu Touch and the idea of a device capable of fulfilling two modalities (active typing, passive reading) is wonderful.

Unfortunately most hardware and firmware is as awful as software. I pity Intel network driver writers and Android ROM writers...

Companies spend millions working around the imperfections of software logic and hardware creations. In a bubble Ubuntu philosophy is wonderful. In reality, it seems, we are collectively far from realizing the brilliance of our own creations in simple terms.</comment>