Gasoline direct injection, etc., makes electric cars irrelevant - <AUTHOR> http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090129.whGreenAutoMain0129/BNStory/specialGlobeAuto

<comment><USER3> The article mentions "40 miles a gallon (U.S.) or about 5.9 litres/100 km" for a medium sized car (think Toyota Corolla). Doesn't strike me as "super- efficient" at all, this is what cars have been doing for years already! Or am I missing something?

<comment><AUTHOR> _40 miles a gallon (U.S.) [...] Doesn't strike me as "super-efficient" at all, this is what cars have been doing for years already!_

The EPA fuel-economy test protocols have changed (to be more stringent) recently. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAFE#Calculations_of_MPG_overes...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAFE#Calculations_of_MPG_overestimated)

 _The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) laboratory measurements of MPG have consistently overestimated fuel economy.[ This results in a shortfall of about 15 percent in actual vs. measured CAFE goals. Starting with 2008-model vehicles, the EPA has adopted a new protocol for estimating the MPG figures presented to consumers. The new protocol includes driving cycles more closely representative of today's traffic and road conditions, as well as increased air conditioner usage._

The new (second generation) Honda Insight only achieves an EPA rating of 41 MPG combined. <http://news.google.com/news?q=honda+insight+mpg>

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Color me skeptical, but the only reason the auto-manufacturers are doing this is because if they don't, they will lose out to the hybrid and electric markets. Without the hybrid and electric markets, they wouldn't bother.

So there's your dilemma. Support the hybrid/electric market, even though you pay more and get less, or don't. If no one does, then the hybrid/electric option will implode, and the petroleum-only option will stop innovating.

Can anyone here suggest an alternative view? (I suspect yes)

(edited for typos)

<comment><AUTHOR> _Color me skeptical, but the only reason the auto-manufacturers are doing this is because if they don't, they will loos out to the hybrid and electric markets._

You are skeptical of GDI's effectiveness (to help competitiveness), based on your perception that it is in fact effective?

 _Without the hybrid and electric markets, they wouldn't bother._

There are no other market pressures to improve gasoline engine efficiency and performance? What about:

      Direct competition from other gasoline-engine makers.
      Fuel cost.
      Market-distorting legislation (CAFE, etc.).

<comment><USER4> Upon re-reading before submission, this is too long. I remind you of Pascal's lament. My apologies. It's also slightly rambly, and shows that it's been edited lots of times. Again, sorry. I don't have time now to take it out and write it more coherently.

I wrote: _Color me skeptical, but the only reason the auto-manufacturers are doing this is because if they don't, they will lose out to the hybrid and electric markets._

gravitycop wrote: _You are skeptical of GDI's effectiveness (to help competitiveness), based on your perception that it is in fact effective?_

No - you appear to have misunderstood my point. GDI is certainly effective at reducing fuel consumption. I don't exactly know all of the technological ins and outs, but I have seen reports that engines in Europe have had very similar technology for a long time. Certainly I get over 40mpg in my petrol car, and my wife gets over 60mpg in her diesel. I'm pretty sure it does work.

My point is that manufacturers haven't bothered seriously investigating things like this, because the market forces have not previously been sufficiently strong.

I wrote: _Without the hybrid and electric markets, they wouldn't bother._

gravitycop asked: _There are no other market pressures to improve gasoline engine efficiency and performance? What about:_

      Direct competition from other gasoline-engine makers.
      Fuel cost.
      Market-distorting legislation (CAFE, etc.).

I'm not claiming there are no other market forces. I do, however, believe that it is only since the wider availability of hybrid/electric vehicles that the petroleum-based engines in the USA have started to improve significantly. I do not have scientific evidence, but I do not believe this to be a coincidence. It is my opinion. It may be wrong.

I'm not particularly an advocate of either petrol of diesel, and my comment was not intended to indicate a preference. I simply believe that fuel efficiency has not been of _primary_ concern to manufacturers. Secondary, yes. Primary, no.

This is probably not the place to have an extended onversation about the topic, but, in short, I believe that the petroleum-based engine manufacturers in the USA are only now starting to take seriously the problem of producing efficient engines. I believe that engines in Europe are generally more efficient, and the USA manufacturers are starting to use similar technology and trumpet it as "all new and improved!!"

Whether my opinions on this are relevant to HN is doubtful. For completeness, I also believe their change of heart is primarily driven by the advent of affordable alternatives. Without the hybrid/electric alternative I believe they won't bother too much about fuel efficiency. I don't think the market forces even now would be strong enough. With the hybrid/electric alternative, they are. Hence the dilemma I tried to raise, probably badly.

I hope that makes my position clearer. It's also probably entirely irrelevant, and adds little value. I shan't reply again unless I think it will.

<comment><AUTHOR> _I have seen reports that engines in Europe have had very similar technology for a long time. Certainly I get over 40mpg in my petrol car_

[http://www.google.com/search?q=imperial+gallons+to+us+gallon...](http://www.google.com/search?q=imperial+gallons+to+us+gallons)

 _1 Imperial gallon = 1.20095042 US gallons_

[http://www.google.com/search?q=40+us+gallons+to+imperial+gal...](http://www.google.com/search?q=40+us+gallons+to+imperial+gallons)

 _40 US gallons = 33.3069536 Imperial gallons_

If you haven't corrected, you are achieving over 33.3 miles per U.S. gallon when driving your high-smog-pollution (i.e. European liberal smog-emission standard, which allows ceteris paribus for higher fuel economy) gasoline- powered car. [EDIT] If you _have_ corrected, your results are still not comparable, since they were achieve in a high-smog, and therefore illegal for the U.S. market, car.

<comment><USER4> Sorry for not specifying, but I've already corrected for that. I don't deny that the diesel car probably wouldn't meet the emission standards in the USA (which bit? Hmm) but that's not my point.

And I don't really care. I wish I hadn't bothered to comment. What happens to your replies if I delete my submissions/comments?

<comment><AUTHOR> _I don't deny that the diesel car probably wouldn't meet the emission standards in the USA_

Both the diesel and gasoline (petrol) cars, if made for the European market, do not meet U.S. smog-emission standards and therefore are not directly comparable in terms of fuel-economy.

<comment><USER4> Somehow this has turned into a Europe vs USA "discussion". That was not my intention. I have no particular axe to grind, being neither European, not American.

Further, it seems clear that the point I was trying to make is not going to be heard, and other points - no doubt valid, but nonetheless tangential - <USER2> going to dominate. Perhaps it's wrong, perhaps no one wants to hear it.

Perhaps I just can't express myself clearly enough.

So I'm simply going to walk away from this thread. You have made many valid points which I will remember. Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Virtually all diesel engines use direct fuel injection so a large percentage of European cars are already taking advantage of this technology (which, by the way, was invented in the 1950s).

<comment><AUTHOR> _Virtually all diesel engines use direct fuel injection so a large percentage of European cars are already taking advantage of this technology_

Diesel engines do not directly compete with gasoline engines in the United States. The reasons are:

      Poor performance.
      High cost.
      High mass.
      High bulk.
      High smog pollution.
      High noise pollution.

Gasoline direct injection is a new (not invented in the 1950s) and important technology that substantially improves the competitiveness of gasoline engines against diesels, electrics, air-cars, etc.

<comment><USER6> None of these things are true any more, nor have they been for some time: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_engine#Advantages_and_di...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_engine#Advantages_and_disadvantages_versus_spark- ignition_engines)

<comment><AUTHOR> _None of these [alleged drawbacks of diesels] are true any more_

Then why do diesels not dominate the auto market in the United States?

<comment><USER7> That's a real mystery to me. Seriously, it's baffling.

I live in the US and drive a diesel Passat, and I regularly get 40+ mpg without paying attention to how I drive or particularly close attention to whether my tires are fully inflated.

To address the comparisons you brought up above, some are clearly wrong:

      High mass-- irrelevant; gas mileage is higher.
      High bulk-- irrelevant; the car is normal sized.
      High smog pollution-- not since the introduction of ultra-low sulfur diesel in the US in 2007.

The particulates are still worse, but diesel wins on the rest, mostly through efficiency.

That leaves the causes of the poor market acceptance as

      Poor performance.
      High cost.
      High noise pollution.
      Something else we haven't thought of

I can't speak for anyone other than myself, but the performance is great; the acceleration is particularly good above 30 or 40 mph. From a maintenance perspective, I have done literally zero maintenance on the car in the 3 years I've owned it other than to fix a leak from a clogged roof drain.

On cost, I've been saving money on gas on a per-mile basis since I bought it. So far, I think I've saved around $1000 on gas. I don't know about the market price for diesels vs. equivalent gas cars across the market, but I'd be surprised if I lost on this.

The difference in engine noise is not noticeable inside the car; I don't know whether my neighbors hate it or not. I am quite certain that engine noise was not a factor in my purchasing decision at all.

So, I don't know, gravitycop. I'm as mystified as you are. If diesels are this great, why doesn't everyone in the US buy them?

My best guess is that people don't think of it as an option. They remember the loud, smelly diesels of the 70's and think, "Hell, no, I want a nice shiny Honda Accord!"

<comment><AUTHOR> <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=424877>

_12 points by demallien 20 days ago | link

Hey! Put some carriage returns in there! You're screwing up the page rendering..._

<comment><USER7> Fixed.

I was briefly irritated with whoever was screwing up the rendering. Then I realized it was me. Damn!

Thanks, gcop.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Palo Alto Idea Den - Office Space for Scrappy Startups - <AUTHOR>

Were looking for companies that want to open up shop into the Palo Alto Ideal Den.
Early stage startups are usually precious on resources and to survive in this market you have to be scrappy. However having a space in Silicon Valley to gain solid traction for your app, product, or service is very expensive endeavor.
The solution is the Palo Alto Idea Den (PAID) - a lair that harbors inception of startups and ideas behind them. The Den cost is $150 per person / month (just a bit more than a typical iPhone bill), and we provide you with a cozy work space equipped with WIFI, Printer, Fax, Power Cords, Conference Room, Pool, and Kitchen. The Palo Alto Idea Den is a place for the really scrappy who want to get there start in Silicon Valley with the lowest cost possible. Email me if you are interested in learning more and getting a Tour of the Palo Alto Idea Den at, chris.r.mccann [at] gmail.com
List of Amenities include: - WIFI - Printer - Fax - Power Cords - Conference Room - Pool - Kitchen - Possibly a Secretary <comment><USER2> This is pretty interesting. There are a lot of these in SF but not outside of the city.

Can you post pictures?

If any of you guys want something in the Peninsula, you can take a look at HackerDojo: <http://hackerdojo.pbworks.com/>

</comment><comment><USER3> Pretty cool idea. Too bad you guys aren't on the East Bay.</comment>


SEC Penalizes Yahoo $35M for Massive, Undisclosed Cyber Theft - <AUTHOR> https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/sec-penalizes-yahoo-35-million-for-20427/ <comment><USER3> In 2015 I was targeted by scammers who claimed to be from Microsoft and said that I had a virus on my Dell computer. Another graduate student had originally registered the computer with Dell technical support. When the hard drive failed I updated the phone number, but I had overlooked updating the name in the contact info. When the scammers called me they addressed me by the name of the other grad student. I tried to report this breach to Dell at the time, but I didn't get anywhere. Seeing this news reminded me of the incident and I searched to see if Dell had disclosed the breach. I found a few articles from early 2016 where others were reporting similar experiences but Dell was not admitting at that time that they had experienced a breach [1-3]. In May 2016 Dell still claimed that they had "no indication that customer information used in the scams has been obtained through an external attack" [4]. Does anyone know if they ever admitted to the breach? They ought to be sanctioned as well if they failed to disclose.

[1] [https://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/02/dell-to-customers- report...](https://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/02/dell-to-customers-report- service-tag-scams/)

[2] [https://www.cio.com/article/3020733/security/scammers- target...](https://www.cio.com/article/3020733/security/scammers-target-dell- customers-after-apparent-data-breach.html)

[3] [https://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2016/01/lates...](https://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2016/01/latest-tech-support-scam-stokes-concerns-dell-customer- data-was-breached/?comments=1)

[4] [https://blog.dell.com/en-us/dell-phone-tech-support- scams/](https://blog.dell.com/en-us/dell-phone-tech-support-scams/)

<comment><USER3> I found a couple Hacker News threads related to this breach [1,2]. Did anyone end up reporting it to the FTC? I just filed a tip with the SEC. Curious to see if they follow up.

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10841385](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10841385)

[2] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9881674](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9881674)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Hundreds of millions of users had their data stolen. Putting this fine at less than a dollar per user. Is that really what our private information and security is worth? Who cares if they're being fined when it's a slap on the wrist. To all those talking about billion dollar fines on Facebook: fat chance.

<comment><USER5> I mean, the crime here isn't against users, it's against investors right? That's why the SEC involved. I don't even know who enforces the meager consumer privacy protections we have these days.

<comment><USER6> > I don't even know who enforces the meager consumer privacy protections we > have these days.

Based on the fact that the ISPs lobbied to be able to sell browsing history... I don't think any government agency truly enforces consumer privacy protection.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> So about a $1 fine for every 100 accounts exposed [1]. Also the entire sum is less than what Marissa Mayer got every year in salary [2], as we well as a small fraction of what she got as compensation for selling Yahoo to Verizon [3].

[1] [http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/03/technology/business/yahoo- br...](http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/03/technology/business/yahoo- breach-3-billion-accounts/index.html)

[2] [https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/03/technology/yahoo- marissa-...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/03/technology/yahoo-marissa- mayer-compensation.html)

[3] [http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-yahoo- sn...](http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-yahoo- snap-20170425-story.html)

</comment><comment><USER8> The headline is rather misleading — the SEC penalized Yahoo for _not disclosing_ the breach to investors, not for the breach itself.

<comment><USER9> The word _undisclosed_ in the title is doing the work you're asking it to, as far as I can tell. How would you choose to word it differently?

<comment><USER5> It says "for adjective adjective cyber theft", which implies the undisclosed is just modifiyig the object they were fined for. GP is not alone in their confusion, top comment right now is talking about how it's a slap on the wrist _for the breach_ (and not for the lack of disclosure).

A better title would be "SEC Penalizes Yahoo for Failure to disclose Massive security breach"

Then failure to disclose is the object

<comment><USER9> Makes sense. Thanks for the alternate read.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Wow, I can't believe Marissa Mayer got away with all this, pocketing a nice lump sum and while still being portrayed as some heroic female icon. I paid a lot for her incompetence - Hackers took control of my bank accounts and I wasn't able to login into my net banking without visiting my nearest branch. I know I wasn't the only one. Fuck Yahoo. Fuck Mayer.

</comment><comment><USER11> Since it's the SEC, I'm assuming it's some fine for defrauding in the sale process to Verizon. So who's paying the fine?

UPDATE: Seems like it's Altaba that's paying the fine.

</comment><comment><USER12> I am looking forward to GDPR. At least then companies cannot delay disclosure anymore.

</comment><comment><USER13> So we have a management team, many of who could have blown the whistle on this. They act like scum. They suffer no personal penalty under law.

Wow we must have a sophisticated, moral civilisation here.

</comment><comment><USER14> Does this kind of stuff damage CEO's reputation in the job market? I'm trying to grasp what was at stake that made the executive(s) withhold publicizing the breach...

<comment><USER15> Not to get too cynical, but... it shows loyalty. A CEO that presided over a security breach, kept it as quiet as possible, and only cost the company $35MM. Like it or not, his job is to protect the company, not the users.

Compared to, say, Zuckerberg or Equifax's public raking over the coals.

<comment><USER16> >A CEO that presided over a security breach, kept it as quiet as possible, and only cost the company $35MM. Like it or not, his job is to protect the company, not the users.

Sorry to be pedantic but it'd be 'her job', in this case - Marissa Mayer was CEO at the time.

<comment><USER15> I wasn't sure which to say. Marissa was CEO at the time of the breach, and Tim Armstrong is CEO now.

She testified and took a lot of the blame, whereas the fine happened under Tim Armstrong. I figured I'd go with the latter since that's when the fine came down, but I think both deserve credit (good or bad).

<comment><USER17> 'they' is a useful gender-agnostic singular pronoun when you're not sure. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they)

<comment><USER18> English is not my first language, so forgive my asking, but isn't that sort of uncomfortable to use? Looking at the examples given, they're all PA announcements or something similarly detatched. It also seems easy to confuse with the plural. What's the point of decreasing the clarity and utility of language for the sake of a percent of a percent who might be bothered?

<comment><USER19> Yes, singular "they" is confusing and incorrect. "He" is gender neutral in that context.

<comment><USER20> Might I suggest you consult with professional linguists and grammarians on this topic? They will soon disabuse you of this prescriptivist nonsense about 'singular they'.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> node-bayarea $35M is peanuts.. this is how scam works in the valley.

</comment><comment><USER21> I wonder if this is related to their recent TOS change that requires arbitration and prohibits class action lawsuits.

</comment><comment><USER22> What is this site? Have they any reputation? I ask because they say - <USER2> illiterately:-

"While those factors may caution the public, many wonder if anyone reads what is often viewed as nothing but legalize".

I assume they mean "legalese".

</comment><comment><USER23> how much has Equifax paid in fines, to date?

</comment><comment><USER24> How do they even define these "breaches" as single discrete events? Can you even imagine the amount of data Yahoo has leaked over the past 20 years?</comment>


A Rare 240-year-old Map of New York is Reborn - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/17/nyregion/17map.html

<comment><USER2> The level of restoration is incredible, I wonder how much of this was simply redrawn.</comment>


Free Tool for Testing Startup Ideas - <AUTHOR> http://thenextweb.com/entrepreneur/2012/10/02/the-validation-board-a-free-tool-for-testing-new-startup-ideas-from-lean-startup-machine

<comment><USER2> Is this supposed to be used instead of the Business Model Canvas or alongside?

</comment><comment><USER3> Free for a tweet isn't free.

<comment><USER4> Does the "like/tweet/pin us to even try our product" appeal to a large group of people I'm not aware of? My initial reaction to these tactics is a mix of "Gee they must not think they're product is very good" and, "Oh, fuck off."

It's asking for a personal endorsement (one of the most valuable currencies at my disposal in the information economy) of something I do not yet have the option evaluate. I was really excited to try this, but I'm not going to. Ick.</comment></comment>


Silly benchmarks on completely untuned server code - <AUTHOR> https://rachelbythebay.com/w/2020/03/10/rps/ <comment><USER2> Thanks for this - but its the age-old argument of dynamic language vs static/compiled language mixed with hey bloated libraries! and hey bloated features! etc.

0\. Performance isn't everything, especially to a lot of companies where having _something_ at all is more important than just being the fastest

1\. Dynamic languages are generally require less LOC, which generally equates to faster implementations

2\. Rails, Django, <your favorite dynamic language framework> sure are generally bloated, but being able to drop in a library for nearly anything you need cannot be overlooked. Especially for small-midsize companies, spinning up another app server is generally easier than writing a whole bunch of multi- threaded code.

3\. The appserver is generally not the bottleneck, rather, of course, its the database.

<comment><USER3> If you want multi-datacenter consistency, then the best of transaction protocols will still measure latency in terms of the speed of light multiplied by the distance between datacenters.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> As mentioned last time, The modern Python async frameworks like Starlette would have no trouble handling this amount of traffic.

[https://www.starlette.io/](https://www.starlette.io/)

<comment><USER5> Exciting! I've never heard of Starlette. I set up example.py and ran the same `ab` commands mentioned in this post and got around 2600 RPS. I fresh started the server and threw 100k requests at it with `ab -c 100 -n 100000`, which timed out:

      apr_socket_recv: Operation timed out (60)
      Total of 49189 requests completed

Same thing when omit `-c 100`. Am I doing something wrong?

<comment><USER4> Not sure, I can't reproduce the timeout. I'm seeing "5829.85 [#/sec] (mean)" on my (nearly 10-year-old) computer which is doing other stuff. Not too shabby, I think.

<comment><USER5> A friend helped me figure it out: [https://danielmendel.github.io/blog/2013/04/07/benchmarkers-...](https://danielmendel.github.io/blog/2013/04/07/benchmarkers- beware-the-ephemeral-port-limit/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> With the machine she used, there are dozens of options. Node, go, Java, rust, crystal, h2o, will all _easily_ outperform those numbers while offering a ton of features and robust ecosystems.

Anyone can cook up a plain http server, making a real application out of it is the other 98% of the work.

<comment><USER5> I tried running as simple an HTTP server as possible with go:

      package main

      import (
          "fmt"
          "net/http"
      )

      func main() {
          http.HandleFunc("/", func (w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request) {
              fmt.Fprintf(w, "Foo")
          })

          http.ListenAndServe(":8088", nil)
      }

and when I run it with `ab -c 100 -n 100000`, it falls over before 10k requests:

      $ ab -c 100  -n 100000 http://127.0.0.1:8088/
      This is ApacheBench, Version 2.3 <$Revision: 1843412 $>
      Copyright 1996 Adam Twiss, Zeus Technology Ltd, http://www.zeustech.net/
      Licensed to The Apache Software Foundation, http://www.apache.org/

      Benchmarking 127.0.0.1 (be patient)
      apr_socket_recv: Operation timed out (60)
      Total of 6388 requests completed

I'm extremely new to go so maybe I'm doing something wrong. Could someone help me understand?

<comment><USER5> Ahh this explains it: [https://danielmendel.github.io/blog/2013/04/07/benchmarkers-...](https://danielmendel.github.io/blog/2013/04/07/benchmarkers- beware-the-ephemeral-port-limit/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Language / framework and DB choice does matter for performance. A lot.

[https://www.techempower.com/benchmarks/#section=data-r18&hw=...](https://www.techempower.com/benchmarks/#section=data-r18&hw=ph&test=db)

As you can see, the fastest Python implementation is just 11% of the top solution in Rust.

And your key/value store choice matters a lot. Redis is well known, but it's much slower than Tarantool or LMDB. Which is slower than RocksDB or Aerospike (though take this claim with a grain of salt, they can perform differently under different loads (writes, reads, updates, deletes) and different number of concurrent requests).

<comment><USER8> Redis is slower than LMDB? This sounds very hard to believe, since redis operates purely in memory, and all the data structures are designed with that in mind. LMDB does disk writes for every key value set operation. So I find it hard to believe redis is slower than LMDB

<comment><USER9> Redis writes it's replication log to disk.

<comment><USER8> That happens on a configured time interval, not on every request unlike lmdb.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I come from outside of the Python ecosystem, so I'm not familiar with the specific frameworks mentioned (I read the original post too).

Can someone simplify the argument that she's making about them? Something to do with maintaining separate, blocking threads in anticipation of requests vs spinning things up as you need them? Or is it a criticism of dynamic languages as HTTP servers in general (it's not clear what language was used in this article)?

<comment><USER11> Probably a bit of both, but python and other dynamic languages make doing the smart thing very difficult. While I continue to work professionally in both static and dynamic languages, I've observed a few limitations that prevent writing a fast python webserver

\- The Global Interpreter lock - you can't avoid forking processes in order to handle concurrent python code.

\- Threads are cheaper than processes. A default java thread carries 2MB overhead, a python process for a typical app can easily be 2GB without very careful memory consideration.

\- The pure single-threaded python runtime is 10-100x slower than your typical statically typed language, even when doing everything as carefully as possible you'll be 1-2 orders of magnitude off the best implementation in a statically typed language. Conversely a sloppy implementation in a statically typed language will probably work about as well as the best python implementation.

\- Foreign Function Interfaces(FFIs) are slow, in Python an int32 consumes 24 bytes of memory whereas in C the int32 consumes 4 bytes. Stringing together 2 C calls that manipulate an int with python would require 4 allocations and 4 casts. Applications that avoid this overhead have to adopt symbolic APIs that inform an underlying C program how to connect multiple function calls and will grind to a halt if there is any python control flow e.g. TensorFlow.

Most of these limitations tend to be common to other dynamically typed languages such as Ruby, PHP, and Perl. While one can theoretically "drop down to C", it's often not that straightforward in common development scenarios. For businesses that require high(er) throughput, or low(er) latency the time spent fighting the interpreter or the associated AWS bills may not be worth the productivity gains from dynamic types in 2020 when compilers can perform an incremental build in milliseconds.

<comment><USER10> I don't think it's productive to argue that non-dynamic languages are superior across the board. Everybody knows they're faster. For many people, they're still the right decision.

I think (or at least assumed) that the post's discussion is more interesting than that. A sibling comment seemed to be zeroing in on the crux of the issue. "Python is an order of magnitude slower but it's web server is _two_ orders of magnitude slower" is a meaningful and fruitful thing to talk about.

<comment><USER11> That's fair, however the python language is two orders of magnitude slower than it's static brethren for a variety of tasks. Pretty much any time you need to use the native language in the interpreter. [https://benchmarksgame- team.pages.debian.net/benchmarksgame/...](https://benchmarksgame- team.pages.debian.net/benchmarksgame/fastest/python3-java.html)

It may be worth looking at how this performance gap has trended over time. Anecdotally I recall the performance gap being much narrower 10 years ago.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I tried this out with unicorn and this minimal config.ru which I believe replicates the author's setup:

      class TestApp
        def self.call(env)
          [200, [], ['Blah']]
        end
      end

      run TestApp

ab -n 10000 [http://localhost:8080/](http://localhost:8080/) \--> ~1900 RPS (~8400 RPS)

ab -k -n 10000 [http://localhost:8080/](http://localhost:8080/) \--> ~1900 RPS (~26000 RPS)

ab -c 100 -n 10000 [http://localhost:8080/](http://localhost:8080/) \--> ~2500 RPS (~14500 RPS)

I have no idea why it performed better on the concurrent benchmark. This was on my 2.3GHz i5 mac book pro. I think about 1/5th the performance of something closer to the machine is quite decent.

</comment><comment><USER13> FWIW, as a Xoogler, I find I can get pretty far with 1) abseil, 2) grpc, 3) protobuf, and 4) groping around in every open source Google project to find the thing I need (for example, until recently, Cord could be found in random projects but not in abseil). I don't know what it's like for ex-bookfaces but this gets me a good way to my goal, and as a bonus I get to use stuff I wasn't able to at G, like C++17, or io_uring, or even jemalloc.

<comment><USER8> Outside of google, what other C++ libraries do you think help in writing services in C++. C++ lacks a huge amount of libraries compared to something like java, e.g, I can't even find a half decent http client which handles all the important stuff.

<comment><USER13> I don't know. I'd be very squicked out to expose a C++ HTTP client to the big bad world, i.e. as a web crawler. For private use, technically speaking gRPC contains an HTTP client.

More likely I'd fork a process in a safer language and direct it to make HTTP calls.

<comment><USER14> Boost Beast seems to be pretty robust. Personally, I'd feel fine using it. I know the author Vinnie is very active with the community and very receptive and responsive to bug reports.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Another great post! I'm curious what people would suggest as a tech stack that's not python/gunicorn. Something with a GC, decent ORM, that can replace database-backed services written in Python with similar high level code.

<comment><USER16> Ruby. It's the language with the most intuitive syntax and standard library, the most ergonomic external libraries and an extremely well polished web development ecosystem.

Close rivals might be PHP and Node.JS, there's pros and cons to all of them.

If something needs to be very performant you pluck it out into a little golang microservice.

<comment><USER17> The standard Ruby VM (MRI) is about the same speed as the standard Python VM (CPython), aka on the slow end. Twitter famously moved from Ruby to Java/Scala, largely for performance reasons.

Node.js is much faster because V8 is much faster, but it's still basically single threaded, so you need to run process-per-CPU, which is what the original blog post (to which this post is a follow-up) was complaining about.

<comment><USER16> Yeah, the Ruby VM certainly is slow, but that doesn't really matter for most realistic workloads. In Twitter's case it definitely made sense, but do keep in mind that besides switching to Ruby they also switched their entire architecture around to a paradigm that Ruby had no mature ecosystem for at the time.

Node.JS is much faster both because it has a fast VM, and because it has concurrency much better dealt with in its standard library than Ruby does (i.e. a proper event loop is built in and its use is idiomatic).

That's not what the original blog post was about though, it was about how bad Gunicorn is. I've written Python, but never web apps (since Ruby's superiority there is obvious), but I don't think it's really fair to judge the whole language based on the use of some popular library that's shitty. I think it's symptomatic of Python that the library is shitty, but that's my dislike of Python shining through. The reality is that there are most likely great Python libraries for dealing with concurrent web requests, and she didn't bother to learn them.

On Ruby the community would without hesitation recommend you to run Puma or Passenger or even Iodine or Falcon or whatever fancy stuff you have nowadays. These webservers all deal with concurrency, optimizing memory usage, load balancing and managing queues correctly. They don't have silly things like fork'ing before importing libraries, because good software architecture is something that's highly valued in the Ruby community.

<comment><USER17> > That's not what the original blog post was about though, it was about how > bad Gunicorn is.

Yes, the post starts out describing an issue with how Gunicorn listens for connections. Like you said, there are better libraries than Gunicorn so that's not a reason to jump to Ruby.

However, the article goes on to talk about other things, like the lack of real multithreading, import-time code execution, and overall efficiency, all of which also apply to Ruby.

I'm not saying Python or Ruby are a bad choice. It's just that MapleWalnut was soliciting an alternative that doesn't have the problems described in the original post, so Ruby doesn't qualify.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Extreme Formatting - <AUTHOR> http://prog21.dadgum.com/200.html

<comment><USER2> I am playing with condensed style more regularly. Data abstraction is a good gateway for it because the short names encourage you to "chunk" your usage of the abstraction into idioms(think of Lisp's CAR/CDR mnemonics).

Here is an example of some Haxe code I wrote today, a convenience to let me organize hierarchical data with tags and universal id numbers. [0] The code works properly in test, but there are two typos.

[0] [http://imgur.com/NlRzndB](http://imgur.com/NlRzndB)

</comment><comment><USER3> > Despite being misaligned with popular layout standards, is it really such a > mess?

Something that takes one afternoon to write and 1 week to decipher qualifies as "mess" in my book.

</comment><comment><USER4> Simple code (like CSS) is easier to read than that C code example. Keeping things short so you don't have to scroll is definitely a good thing. But once your code gets so big that you're going to have to scroll anyway, I expect clearer formatting will pay off.

</comment><comment><USER5> Once you really get into "the zone," this style of formatting is more efficient for reading and manipulating in your mind. But the moment that you walk away and do something else, you will start forgetting what the different pieces are for. It's not a good idea to write code like this because if you ever want to come back to the project in the future, you won't know where to start.

</comment><comment><USER6> Makes perfect sense for CSS to me, especially with syntax highlighting.

Not sure it's good for code, though.</comment>


Show HN: Reactive Resume, a free and open source resume builder - <AUTHOR> https://rxresu.me <comment><AUTHOR> It's with extreme excitement, happiness and relief that I can now say, introducing… Reactive Resume v2.

With nearly 1.7k stars on GitHub, around 100 closed issues and feature requests, I heard you loud and clear and revamped the project from the ground up, and boy, am I excited to hear what you guys think about this!

Without much ado, here's the link to the all new Reactive Resume: [https://rxresu.me](https://rxresu.me)

For those of you who are not aware of the project, here's the cliff note: Reactive Resume is a free, open source, ad-free, private app that focuses on making the mundane tasks of creating, updating and sharing your resume a piece of cake.

Here is a subset of features introduced in the all new revamp: \- Manage multiple resumes with one account, and sync your data across devices \- Sign in with Google, or sign in anonymously just to test the app \- Send your resume to others with a unique sharable link \- Structure sections and change layouts the way you want to \- Import your existing JSON Resume in one click \- Everything is still free, and always will be.

Please do take a few minutes to go through the app, and if you loved it, let me know in the comments below on what could be better. Thank you so much for all the support!</comment>


Long Term Contracting Role - <AUTHOR> In general contracting role are 3-6 months and the pay rate in average in London is 450£. What if we want to have someone long term working remotely but not hire him/her employee as permanent? Do this option exist? <comment><USER2> A contract can be for any duration that the parties agree to. In my experience it is not unusual to agree on a rolling 6 month contract. That is, it keeps getting renewed every 6 months for years if necessary.

I have found this arrangement preferable to an up-front multi-year contract as it allows for unforeseen changes in circumstances and requirements. For top- level management roles 3-5 year contracts are common.

You don't explain why you mention the London rate. Longer term contracts generally offer a lower rate due to the perceived increased annual income. But that is just another aspect to be negotiated.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I mentioned London, because it's a job market I know a bit better. The contractors I know in London they all told me they have 6 months / 1 year contract renew with the same rate. In some cases the rate can actually increase.</comment>


Show HN: Rate my Rately - <AUTHOR> http://rately.com

<comment><AUTHOR> I've been working on this for the past 3 months or so full time. Rails 3 + MongoDB. We're having trouble getting users to understand what a 'bookmarklet' is, so I'm having to create browser extensions (God help me when I get to IE).

It's marketed more towards women and the products they buy (they shop way more than men), but it can be used to save and compare just about anything that has a web page. I would love to know your first impressions or how to make it better/easier.

</comment><comment><USER2> Tiny suggestion: add some user-agent detection on the tour pages (e.g., if userAgent == firefox: show firefox screenshot; elsif userAgent == chrome: show chrome screenshot;).

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks... Actually I just finished that up today and it'll probably be pushed out sometime tomorrow.</comment></comment>


GitHub's Explore Email - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/explore/subscribe

<comment><USER2> As much as I love GitHub, I think the exploration paradigm could use a little work -- it seems to have something of a flywheel effect, where popular repositories receive more exposure, thus more stars/forks/watches, thus appear as 'trending', thus become more popular. (For example: currently trending as #3 in Python today is the official Django repository; and trending as #2 today is the official AirBNB javascript style guide, which has been boasting around 4,000 stars and hasn't been updated in around ten years.)

I'd kill for a GitHub StumbleUpon: click a button (filtering for, say, vertical or programming language) and get transported to a repository that has a baseline level of merit (say, at least three stars).

<comment><USER3> I've found one of the best ways to do the "stubmleupon" concept is to follow dozens of devs who star interesting repos (sometimes solely for that reason) and check your news stream often. I follow devs from a wide variety of backgrounds, which yields numerous libraries that I might not otherwise be aware of (and sometimes months ahead of HN exposure). One of the best things I've done with my GitHub account.

A solid example is: [https://github.com/fogus](https://github.com/fogus)

<comment><USER4> this is exactly what i do too.

Another great person to follow is Ilya Grigorik ... [https://github.com/igrigorik](https://github.com/igrigorik)

He spents a lot of time following repos, and literally built the github archive just to keep up with this.

<comment> mh- for the interested:

[http://www.githubarchive.org/](http://www.githubarchive.org/)

[http://us5.campaign- archive2.com/home/?u=439aa16a39e4b10e0b6...](http://us5.campaign- archive2.com/home/?u=439aa16a39e4b10e0b65ff2ef&id=0b82fec5c2)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Anyone else disappointed in the Explore page's redesign? It's harder to navigate and they deleted the Languages portal.

<comment><USER6> You're probably looking at the wrong page. Have a look here instead: [https://github.com/trending?l=javascript](https://github.com/trending?l=javascript)

<comment><USER7> You can't see the list of the most popular languages anymore.

<comment><USER8> The following search displays the top 10 languages on the left side of the page:

[https://github.com/search?q=stars%3A%3E=0](https://github.com/search?q=stars%3A%3E=0)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> A bit confusing that there isn't any submit button or other indicator that shows me that my preference is saved.

Otherwise, a cool feature; didn't know about it until now.

<comment><USER10> You do get immediate feedback "Subscribed!" directly below the radio button when you click it, and the box you choose turns green.

It felt pretty obvious to me.

<comment><USER11> the box turning green feels as having selected something, not actually submitted, and the "Subscribed!" line is far from the where you did the action, and disappears after a moment.

I don't know if this is a good design or not, just sharing my opinion as someone else who took a bit to understand I had actually subscribed.

I also was sort of expecting the example to change :/

<comment><USER12> I had the exact same feeling - I was unsure of whether I should be seeing a "save" button or not - and I didn't know whether the site had saved my response automatically.

It's a very subtle approach, but it's a little too subtle for my taste.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Like it! Let's hope it comes in right time (before morning/during night in Spain) so I can read it with the morning coffee.

However, I would have loved to select which language/languages I'm interested in since if a project is in Python it's not as interesting for me as if it was in JavaScript.

<comment><USER13> We deliver these emails in the user's time zone so you'll receive it at 9am local time and have something fresh to start the day with.

<comment><USER14> I'm also an advocate of receiving the email sooner. Why not send it shortly after midnight in the users timezone so it sits in the users inbox when he wakes up.

At 9AM I'm already at work, had 2 cups of coffee, finished my morning tech news and started getting in the zone.

<comment><USER15> Ideally the user would choose the time the mail gets delivered. I have to have my phone on during the night in case of emergency and there is nothing more infuriating to me than a company that sends me email in the middle of the night, causing my phone to beep and wake me up.

<comment><USER16> Take control of your phone: use an app like Tasker to set up profiles to silence notifications except for ones you specify, like phone calls and messages from certain numbers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I really like the way github is doing this. I'm irritated by the way other sites (linkedin, quora) automatically assume I must want their emails every _X_ interval. I like that with github I can choose how frequently I get emails and that it's opt-in.

</comment><comment><USER18> I built an iPhone app that shows you all of the trending repositories that use the languages you like. It's called Repo; if you're interested in checking it out, you can download it (for free) by going to:

[http://appstore.com/repo](http://appstore.com/repo)

</comment><comment><USER19> I really liked the design that you use to choose which level of newsletter subscription you want to sign up for. Clean, simple, and straightforward.

</comment><comment><USER20> Would be pretty great to have this as an RSS feed (one daily/weekly/monthly item). I hesitate to subscribe to the email, but I wouldn't mind getting a the daily version in my RSS feeds.

Now that I mention it, some kind of service where I could get all emails from as RSS would be pretty neat.

EDIT: Seems like there is one! [http://www.mmmmail.com/](http://www.mmmmail.com/) However, I'm hardly able to just change my github email to that and have password reset emails etc be available to the public in the RSS feed. Best solution would be some kind of Gmail filter, where all emails with a specific tag would be available in the feed.

</comment><comment><USER21> Would I just get emails for rethinkdb forever?

<realtalk>Bring back the old trending page!</realtalk>

</comment><comment><USER22> It would be awesome if they tracked something like most used repositories, not just most starred. Like [https://sourcegraph.com/repos](https://sourcegraph.com/repos)

</comment><comment><USER23> For some reason I have a suspicion that Github Trending is game-able. I tweeted once about this suspect repo that had 3000+ stars and all it said was something like "Hello to all github trending viewers" or something along those lines.

Link to the author of that repo: [https://github.com/mandatoryprogrammer](https://github.com/mandatoryprogrammer)

What remains of the repo is visible in his profile.

Anybody have a clue as to how he did it?

<comment><USER24> The author details how he did it here:

[http://thehackerblog.com/how-i-got-5000-github-followers- in-...](http://thehackerblog.com/how-i-got-5000-github-followers-in-less- than-24-hours/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Firstly, I really love github explore. Having said that I still have yet to feel the need for one of these services that blindsides me with content just because I forgot I need it.

I understand that it drives more traffic to the site, but is it really worth saving the time of typing [https://github.com/explore](https://github.com/explore)?

<comment><USER26> I guess that's the reason it's opt-in. Some people want "push" some people want "pull".

Personally, I intentionally keep my incoming stream very lean. I like aggregators like this, Ruby Weekly, JS Weekly, etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> I've been subscribing to GithubArchive for awhile now, they send me top new & watched repos right in my inbox daily. I think we should check it out:

[http://www.githubarchive.org/](http://www.githubarchive.org/)

</comment><comment><USER26> Kudos for having the smoothest subscription process I've ever seen. One click, instant!

</comment><comment><USER28> What about a filter which allows me to exclude repositories that use certain languages?

</comment><comment><USER29> Is there a way to set the Explore emails to go to a different address than the primary? I set my primary as my work address, because most of my repos are work-related, but I'd like this email to go to my gmail.

</comment><comment><USER30> I love to use [http://www.githubarchive.org/](http://www.githubarchive.org/) . Found it on 'Show HN' half a year ago or so.

</comment><comment><USER31> Cool idea. I thought every day wouldn't be as special, so I went for every week. I'm looking forward to seeing some new projects...maybe some to contribute to.

</comment><comment><USER32> I don't know everyone but exploring github day to day is an entertainment for me. Your thought about mail is good but doesn't work for some people.

</comment><comment><USER33> I wish GitHub had a page like this: [http://stackoverflow.com/users](http://stackoverflow.com/users)

<comment><USER34> [https://github.com/search?q=repos%3A%3E0&type=Users&ref=sear...](https://github.com/search?q=repos%3A%3E0&type=Users&ref=searchresults)

Users with at least one repo - sorted by magical "Best Match".

<comment><USER33> That's great, thank you!

Just needs a prominent link somewhere and this would be super-useful as a starting point. Especially in the Enterprise product.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> How about an RSS/Atom feed? I'm not crazy about signing up for another email.

And what happened to the 'Ref Log'?

</comment><comment><USER36> Now that is the proper way to get someone to subscribe to emails.. so easy with great options.

</comment><comment><USER37> My email is already too full -- how about a Twitter feed? My friend did this one:

[https://twitter.com/mathisonian/status/399348431291817985](https://twitter.com/mathisonian/status/399348431291817985)

<comment><USER38> My twitter feed is too full already -- I'll stick with the email. Twitter is particularly annoying at limiting the amount of entries in my timeline that it will show from the past as it is.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Super duper. :)</comment>


Beijing grants Tesla exemption from auto tax - <AUTHOR> https://www.ft.com/content/5eb496a6-cb1c-11e9-a1f4-3669401ba76f <comment><USER2> ...So they can reverse engineer Teslas?</comment>


Rich Internet Application Plugin Statistics - <AUTHOR> http://riastats.com/

<comment><USER2> I don't trust the data at all. This says that 10% of _Windows 95_ users have Silverlight installed.

</comment><comment><USER3> While an interesting tool, it was running very slow for me. I don't see why this needed to be a flash application.</comment>


A decade before there was JavaScript, there was NeWS [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/pdf/sun/NeWS/The_NeWS_Book_1989.pdf <comment><USER2> This links to the manual "The NeWS Book: An Introduction to the Network/extensible Window System".

NeWS is a windowing system based on PostScript, so this title is more correct as "A decade before there was JavaScript, there was PostScript".

Or, more meaningfully (and paraphrasing [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NeWS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NeWS) ) a decade before AJAX there was NeWS.</comment>


What if we let philanthropies operate like businesses? - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444017504577647502309260064.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_LEFTTopStories

<comment><USER2> This essay complements "Why nonprofits are more like businesses than you realize:" <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4468824> .</comment>


Million-Year-Old 'Hero Bug' Emerges From Cave - happy-go-lucky http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2016/12/10/504691357/million-year-old-hero-bug-emerges-from-cave <comment><AUTHOR> > "It changed our understanding because it means antibiotic resistance didn't > evolve in the clinic through our use. The resistance is hardwired," she > says.

But if that was true wouldn't bacteria always have been resistant to these "natural" antibiotics (the majority of those that we use, according to this article) and this they never would have been effective in the first place? And if that's true, how was this built-in resistance suddenly switched on to the extent that scientists are now talking about a future where bacteria we could easily treat a few decades ago will be unstoppable? I think either I'm missing some important details, or this article is.

<comment><USER2> Well for starters you can't use this bacteria and all bacteria interchangeably.

Secondly bacteria of all sorts live in different eco systems. But all bacteria doesn't live in every eco system. They're not subject to the same stresses, attacks, and naturally don't develop immunity to things they're not exposed to and all bacteria aren't always exposed to everything...

You're kind of going all or nothing for millions of species of bacteria and that's obviously overly simplistic. You might as well make the argument that because cheetahs can run 60mph, so shouldn't all vertebrates be capable of that?

<comment><USER3> I would think that having a resistance an antibiotic meant that a bacteria was losing out on a different advantage. This is why resistant bacteria only exist in places where having the resistance, hospitals etc., is more beneficial than what it lost to get the resistance.

For example if a cheetah developed a larger body at the cost of speed. It wouldn't survive as well unless there was a benefit to being larger but slower.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> So, you're saying that you opened up this cave and found that the only form of life was this "hero" bug that seems to kill off all other forms of life. I think I saw this in a movie once and it didn't end well for us fleshy folk.

<comment><USER5> The bacteria is benign, it says so in the article.

<comment><USER6> They also said dinosaurs couldn't reproduce in Jurassic Park.

<comment><USER7> Jurassic Park was also fiction.

<comment><USER6> Come on it was funny.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> A bit off topic, but Lechuguilla Cave, where the bacteria was found, is an incredible sight. Large portions of Planet Earth: Caves was filmed there, and since access to the cave is extremely restricted it's the only way most of us will get to see it. The formations they found there are breathtaking.

If memory serves me correctly, it's also where they found what they dubbed "snotcicles", giant bacteria colonies that had grown so big they were dripping from the ceiling, and whose growth was fueled by strong acidic compounds. I don't know if that was this bacteria or something a bit more garden-variety, but it just goes to show you what kind of wild stuff happens in tiny, sealed- off ecosystems.

</comment><comment><USER9> Forgive me in my ignorance of how antibacterials work, but wouldn't an equally plausible explanation be that these bacteria's simply haven't developed characteristics that modern antibacterial drugs target?

<comment><USER10> That might be true for narrow-spectrum antibiotics, but broad-spectrum antibiotics target fundamental features that evolved very early so they're universal in bacteria, eg. beta-lactams such as penicillin target the enzymes that bacteria use to make their cell walls. In this case resistance occurs by attacking the antibiotic itself, producing extra enzyme so there's some spare, or tweaking the enzyme so the antibiotic can't harm it. It would be a much bigger story if bacteria were found with a completely different method of cell wall construction.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Probably just evolved to be resistant to penicillin, either it never evolved to be susceptible or it evolved to not be susceptible.

In either case, the cave environment had something to do with it. I wouldn't suspect this is too news worthy.</comment>


Symbols Found in Ice Age Caves Across Europe (2015) - <AUTHOR> https://digventures.com/2015/12/these-32-symbols-are-found-in-ice-age-caves-across-europe-but-what-do-they-mean/ <comment><USER5> For more substance and less self-promotion, see her master's thesis here: [http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.929...](http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.929.671&rep=rep1&type=pdf)

There's also a better graphical overview of the signs here: [https://frontiers-of- anthropology.blogspot.com.br/2014/08/ge...](https://frontiers-of- anthropology.blogspot.com.br/2014/08/geometric-signs-from-genevieve- von.html?m=1)

<comment><USER6> Non-mobile link for the latter: [https://frontiers-of- anthropology.blogspot.com.br/2014/08/ge...](https://frontiers-of- anthropology.blogspot.com.br/2014/08/geometric-signs-from-genevieve-von.html)

(Also the former link seems to be broken?)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Maybes mods could add (2015). Seems little more than a regurgitation of the TED talk it links to multiple times entitled "Why are these 32 symbols found in ancient caves all over Europe?" which can be found here:

[https://www.ted.com/talks/genevieve_von_petzinger_why_are_th...](https://www.ted.com/talks/genevieve_von_petzinger_why_are_these_32_symbols_found_in_ancient_caves_all_over_europe/transcript)

<comment><AUTHOR> You're right. I still thought it was ok to post the link since it does include a nice graphic of the symbols at the start of the article.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Not only across Europe, they are more or less similar all over the world.

[https://visual.ly/community/infographic/science/prehistoric-...](https://visual.ly/community/infographic/science/prehistoric- writing-stone-age-jottings)

<comment><USER9> I was ready to write this off as early humans ancestors depicting basic shapes of objects in their surroundings, until I got to the upside down and right side up "brush shapes". I'm not sure what that would mean, something descending and ascending with some type of force or vitesse?

<comment><USER10> A lot of the signs can be seen as symbols that are easy to draw with the hands. For example, there's the 5-dots and 6-dots symbols. Those are: "every finger of one hand" and "three fingers from each hand". The brush shapes are "bring all fingers together". There may very well be a communicative aspect to the symbols, but I think they were derived from decorative primitives that are kinesiologically-determined.

<comment><USER11> That would help account for consistency over place and time.

But meaning? I'm guessing something like "# was here".

<comment><USER12> Possibly ad-hoc way finding, and reference points when lost, to help detect if you're going in circles, or if a change of direction is necessary.

If there are N number of confusing junctions, it would require the same number of markings as a unique mnemonic device to register the steps to escape the confusing area, and jog one's memory of how directions were negotiated the last time.

<comment><USER13> Or perhaps locations of good sources of food, shelter and so forth

<comment><USER14> Ancient hobo signs makes a lot of sense, wonder which one says "Tell pitiful story for food."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Seems to be offline right now, here's a cached version:

[https://archive.is/oqGa5](https://archive.is/oqGa5)

</comment><comment><USER16> One explanation for the universality of these symbols is that they are entopic images - artifacts of the eye and visual system that are perceived during trance/psychedelic states. Maybe associated with a widespread shamanic religion of this time period?

[http://entheology.com/research/entoptic-imagery-and- altered-...](http://entheology.com/research/entoptic-imagery-and-altered- states-of-consciousness/)

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

</comment><comment><USER17> Haven't watched the linked TED video, but this:

>"The fact that the same 32 symbols are repeated across sites that span 30,000 years and an entire content is nothing less than mindblowing. "

Is both quite intriguing (if implication is true) but also raises the question of authenticity (if we're unkind) or at least accurate dating (if we're charitable).

Maybe the video goes into detail. (Apparently, it's claimed that upwards of 60% of the symbols/signs were expressed during the 30 thousand year span --which seems pretty incredible. I mean, the invariability seems somewhat preternatural.)

</comment><comment><USER18> Slashdotted. Archive link: [http://web.archive.org/web/20171227051630/https://digventure...](http://web.archive.org/web/20171227051630/https://digventures.com/2015/12/these-32-symbols- are-found-in-ice-age-caves-across-europe-but-what-do-they-mean/)

<comment><USER19> We call it 'The hug of death' here.

<comment><USER20> 'slashdotted' works just as well (and is even preferred by many)

<comment><USER21> Except that Slashdot doesn't have a userbase capable of bringing a server to it's knees anymore.

<comment><USER22> Hardly a unique phenomenon. In society we have so many terms as a nod to their (deceased) inventor(s), or as a nod to a (deceased) person of interest.

<comment><USER23> "She had her moment in the limelight." \- "Limelight" hasn't been used for stage lighting (or anything like it) in over a century.

"The application is tied up in red tape." \- "Red tape" as a binding for important documents is now little used outside of handful of places.

"The company bigwigs fired half the staff." \- Once upon a time, people in authority wore wigs as a symbol of authority. Now it's limited to a few legal and parliamentary systems; CEOs and the like don't wear them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> The signs painted in caves have been preserved to this day but at the time I guess that they were also used outside, on rocks and on trees, and that they were lost to time...

With perhaps the exception of dance, the classic arts really are prehistoric mnemonic/communication devices which were made obsolete when writing was invented.

They were so useful though that craving them has been carved in our genes, and we still like a good story/song to this day.

<comment><USER25> I had never thought about song, story, and dance in a genetic sense before as you laid out here. Thanks for sharing that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Reminds me of the also unbroken Indus script. With all this computational power, I'm surprised that we haven't been able to crack ancient proto-writing.

<comment><USER27> It's also similar to the Old Hungarian alphabet. Some of the symbols seem to be the same. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Hungarian_alphabet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Hungarian_alphabet)

<comment><USER28> That was my impression as well (I am likely biased - I'm Hungarian). What's your nationality if I may ask?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> > Among the elaborate horses, bulls, bears and hunters, there are some other > rather less captivating designs – small geometric motifs, etched onto the > walls. Until now, they've not received much attention.

I would have expected the opposite.

Someone drawing animals and hunters could easily be explained simply by them drawing what they see everyday.

Those other things, though, are harder to explain as merely drawings of things they see.

<comment><USER30> Not hard to explain: they were simply drawing the glow discharges they saw in the sky. The growing body of theory–research isn't well known yet; for an introduction, see Peratt's groundbreaking paper from 2003:

 _Characteristics for the Occurrence of a High-Current, Z-Pinch Aurora as Recorded in Antiquity_

[http://plasmauniverse.info/downloadsCosmo/PerattTPSv31-2003c...](http://plasmauniverse.info/downloadsCosmo/PerattTPSv31-2003clr.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I bet the omnipresent "Sun"-symbol is removed from results, to conform with German Laws and general sentiments. You can find it on Nordic Runes and Tibetan tapestry and American Indian tepee decorations. And it always means "Sun" or "Good Luck" or something positive.

Except after 1945 it does not.

<comment><USER32> > And it always means "Sun" or "Good Luck" or something positive. Except after > 1945 it does not.

The swastika was already quite firmly linked with fascism in Europe by the late 1920s.

<comment><USER33> > The swastika was already quite firmly linked with fascism in Europe by the > late 1920s.

It wasn't. If anything, it was linked to preservation of tradition and conservatism. I know from my grandparents, who are Polish Highlanders, that it also doubles for holy cross, and thus was used in sacral contexts or on tombstones:

[https://slowianowierstwo.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/1095605...](https://slowianowierstwo.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/10956059_1081186278573980_3615515725378902038_n.jpg) [https://slowianowierstwo.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/76313_3...](https://slowianowierstwo.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/76313_398757823544879_1848103189_n.jpg) [https://slowianowierstwo.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/1274539...](https://slowianowierstwo.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/1274539_645443875496433_1826066696_o.jpg)

European fascism builds on pride and glorification of national symbols, and reuse of those. For example here's Polish Fascists symbol that dates to '30s:

[https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Green_flag_with_symb...](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Green_flag_with_symbol_of_falanga.svg)

This is arm holding sword, and symbol was created as replacement for original symbol that was legendary sword that first polish king used to strike the gates of Kiev as he was establishing borders of first Polish Kingdom.

Likewise symbol of Italian fascists was the Fasces (notice ), roman symbol for power and rule of their government.

Spanish fascists used crests of their past royal family, the Falanga:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bandera_FE_JONS.svg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bandera_FE_JONS.svg)

Here's Croatian fascists symbol:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Usta%C5%A1e_symbol.svg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Usta%C5%A1e_symbol.svg)

Swastika was something that Germans adapted for their fascist movement, and it spread from there after the war, but saying that before war the swastika was already firmly linked with fascism is not true.

<comment><USER34> The Nazi party adopted the hakenkreuz (swastika) in 1920. So yes, swastikas were associated with fascism long before WW2.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika#Nazism](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika#Nazism)

<comment><USER32> Thank you for understanding my point, which wasn't that the swastika was a longtime fascist symbol, but rather that the Nazi Party had accomplished its transformation into one by the late 1920s.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> This really reminds me of "hobo signs" : [http://www.angelfire.com/folk/famoustramp/signs.html](http://www.angelfire.com/folk/famoustramp/signs.html)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hobo#Hobo_signs_(symbols)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hobo#Hobo_signs_\(symbols\))

</comment><comment><USER36> Every time I see something like this, I'm reminded of one of my favourite crackpot/artists of all time, Stanislaw Szukalski and his mad theories about "Protong", the proto-language of a civilisation that was destroyed by a cataclysm some 65,000 years ago, which - according to him - was the language of the first human civilisation across the globe, and which survived - <USER2> - as a 'forgotten remembered language' in ancient pre-historic glyphs.

In a nutshell, "Protong" was the global human language that was spoken across the globe - until the planet suffered an enormous 'flood-like' cataclysm that split this civilisation into shards and pieces around the world. The survivors of this cataclysm clawed their way back to land, and in an effort to warn future humans of the danger, encoded many of the glyphs of Protong into their cave art. Per Szukalski this can be demonstrated by the fact of many common glyphs among a wide distribution of different cave paintings - the fact that the 'neck ring' is a key element in many paintings vastly separated by geographic distances, and the significance of such glyphs as a 'cup or water vessel', and so on.

Szukalski believed he was able to decipher these glyphs in a way that hadn't occurred to researchers before him, and he made an entire philosophy out of his personal discoveries.

While I still remain highly sceptical of his ideas - and I am especially dissuaded by the racist form of this philosophy that later evolved from Szukalskis explorations into ancient/pre-history art (Zermatism, the idea that the human species is in competition with another race, "Yeti-like", which brings about perpetual downfall among all "noble societies"), I nevertheless remain fascinated by the idea of using "Protong" as a means of appreciating the meaning of pre-history. From the Programmers Mind, its kind of like discovering the mnemonics for machine code, after having spoken nothing but Lua.

So, I do wonder if he wasn't onto something with the idea of Protong being an underpinning to all ancient/pre-historic art forms. If this sort of thing is of interest - and I mean it in the most casual sense, because I have absolutely no interest in promoting the racist Zermatism - then I encourage HN readers to have a look at Protong. The book on the subject "Behold - <USER3> Protong!!" is a wonderful coffee-table item, if you care for these things. I don't know of any other on-line resources which cover Protong - its a kooky subject indeed, so this is very surprising to me - but I do encourage the casually-interested to have a glance. It may - or may not, indeed - provide a bit of context to understanding pre-historic cave art. As a fan of this, I think its neat.

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2118037.Behold_the_Proto...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2118037.Behold_the_Protong)

More on Szukalski here:

[https://www.kookscience.com/arch/Zermatic.html](https://www.kookscience.com/arch/Zermatic.html)

Warning: definitely kook science, but a fascinating though experiment nevertheless.

<comment><USER37> I had no idea Yetis were into Communism! :-)

Thanks for this, it makes entertaining reading on a cold winter's day in front of a roaring fire.

<comment><USER36> It is, indeed, a rabbit-hole. But I like the Protong bit personally!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> To under exaggerate this time, one rectangle is drawn inside a cave and another rectangle is drawn inside another cave 1000 years later. 25,000 years later modern man finds these rectangles drawn on the walls and is astonished? Is it not just kinda a given that before speech communication there was drawn image communication (like point at images and grunt)? I mention the 1000 year gap only to point out that they probably moved around and other groups took over caves that were inhabited by other groups before...thus why there are mimicked across europe. ((25000 also being just an arbitrary number for discussion purpose because im not an anthropologist or geologist))

<comment><USER39> > _Is it not just kinda a given that before speech communication there was > drawn image communication (like point at images and grunt)?_

No, not really a given at all.

And those are not images -- they form a symbolic language. If we're merely talking about "point to images and grunt" it would concern drawings of animals and stuff, not abstract symbols. Those are already a kind of language.

And even if it was, having the same stock library of symbols used more or less across continents and ages is important enough in itself.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> What are the corresponding Unicode code points?

<comment><USER41> Here's a try:

Aviform: ︷ U+FE37 PRESENTATION FORM FOR VERTICAL LEFT CURLY

Circle: ◯ U+25EF LARGE CIRCLE

Claviform: 1 U+0031 DIGIT ONE (Or anything confusable with it [1])

Cordiform: U+2661 WHITE HEART SUIT

Crosshatch: # U+0023 NUMBER SIGN

Cruciform: × U+00D7 MULTIPLICATION SIGN (or anything confusable with it [2])

Cupule: U+26AC MEDIUM SMALL WHITE CIRCLE

Dot: · U+00B7 MIDDLE DOT (or anything confusable with it [3])

Half Circle: ◡ U+25E1 LOWER HALF CIRCLE

Line: ⎯ U+23AF HORIZONTAL LINE EXTENSION

Negative Hand: U+1F91A RAISED BACK OF HAND

Open Angle: ⦣ U+29A3 REVERSED ANGLE

Oval: ⭖ U+2B56 HEAVY OVAL WITH OVAL INSIDE

Positive Hand: U+270B RAISED HAND

Quadrangle: ▭ U+25AD WHITE RECTANGLE

Serpentiform: U+1F40D SNAKE

Spiral: 1F300 CYCLONE

Tectiform: ⤉ U+2909 UPWARDS ARROW WITH HORIZONTAL STROKE

Triangle: ▽ U+25BD WHITE DOWN-POINTING TRIANGLE

Zigzag: ⦚ U+299A VERTICAL ZIGZAG LINE

Edit: formatting.

[1]: [https://unicode.org/cldr/utility/confusables.jsp?a=1&r=IDNA2...](https://unicode.org/cldr/utility/confusables.jsp?a=1&r=IDNA2008)

[2]: [https://unicode.org/cldr/utility/confusables.jsp?a=%C3%97&r=...](https://unicode.org/cldr/utility/confusables.jsp?a=%C3%97&r=IDNA2008)

[3]: [https://unicode.org/cldr/utility/confusables.jsp?a=%C2%B7&r=...](https://unicode.org/cldr/utility/confusables.jsp?a=%C2%B7&r=None)

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> All the symbols are simple, I wouldn't be surprised if many children around the world scribble similar signs while doodling. It seems likely to me that the signs arose in disparate locations through sheer coincidence instead of through an active Paleolithic common culture or a miraculously preserved memory of some ancient heritage - the ultimate source of the symbols - <USER4> by far flung groups.

</comment><comment><USER43> Hashtag was popular back then :) [https://imgur.com/OUDrRjy](https://imgur.com/OUDrRjy)

<comment><USER44> The had to invent it, otherwise they wouldn't be able to write shell scripts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> The mainstream view of our history has some massive unexplained mysteries. For example the ability of ancient people to work with massive slabs of stone in a way we'd struggle to do now even with modern machinery. Not just the Pyramids and Stonehenge, but the stone foundations at Cuzco and also Baalbeck temple which apparently has foundational stones estimated to weigh 1000 tons.

<comment><USER46> This is just 'ancient astronaut' nonsense. If you gave modern people some incentive to move big stones around without heavy machinery they would figure out how to do it in a couple of months. It's just not hard to do, and people have been moving much larger pieces of stone during recorded history, so we know the techniques used perfectly well.

Lots of the obelisks in Rome are far larger than any prehistoric stones moved or worked, and we know how they did it and it's impressive. Impressive isn't the same as an unexplained mystery.

<comment><USER45> Who mentioned ancient astronauts?

Archeologists don't seem to be as blasé as you about this:

> Nothing puzzles archaeologists so much as impracticality, and although the > karst topography of Baalbek demands strong foundation stones, and although > one big stone is easier to move than many smaller stones, the pillars > holding up the temple's podium, van Ess says, are bigger than they need to > be. In fact, Baalbek is one of a series of ancient projects that are under > rigorous study by the Germans for being unnecessarily large.

[https://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/baalbek-myth- megalit...](https://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/baalbek-myth-megalith)

<comment><USER47> Many gothic cathedrals still standing also are stronger than they have to be. Reason? Building was still guesswork at the time and the ones built too weak have long collapsed. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beauvais_Cathedral](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beauvais_Cathedral) is an edge case.

So, it may be lack of structural engineering knowledge. They also may have intended to build something bigger, but realised they ran out of time or money, or the "something bigger" collapsed, and this is a rebuild, reusing parts.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Because humans existed and traveled for hundreds of thousands of years (beyond what most average modern folks can conceptualize). We don't fully give ancient peoples enough credit cause they didn't completely fuck the environment up and didn't leave much evidence. Not at all shocking...only our true ignorance being shocking.

</comment><comment><USER48> could anyone find actual pics of the symbols on cave walls? I spent a few minutes looking and couldn't find any.

</comment><comment><USER49> They immediately reminded me of "Hoboglyphs", [https://weburbanist.com/2010/06/03/hoboglyphs-secret- transie...](https://weburbanist.com/2010/06/03/hoboglyphs-secret-transient- symbols-modern-nomad-codes/)

</comment><comment><USER50> Why link a blogpost when you can link the research itself, or its presentation on ted

</comment><comment><USER51> History keeps getting older..

<comment><USER52> Technically, history begins with the writing system, around 6000 years ago [1]. Before that is what we call "pre-history".

1: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuneiform_script#Proto- literat...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuneiform_script#Proto- literate_period)

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> Top 32 cave symbols that will blow your mind!

What these researchers found in caves will amaze you!

32 sure signs you're in a European ice age cave!

Discover these cave-dwelling secrets that your real estate developer doesn't want you to know!

<comment><USER54> What your archaeologist doesn't know about cave symbols can KILL YOU

<comment><USER37> You may be interested in the podcast audio drama "The White Vault".

It's very well produced.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> Michelin Guide for the modern caveman?

</comment><comment><USER56> 32 = with 5 finger chording or gestures you can get every symbol, should be enough for everybody

</comment><comment><USER57> I find it suspicious that the set of the most common symbols doesn't contain a dick. Why wouldn't the most common modern wall ornament (in my experience) be popular at that time?

<comment><USER58> People were probably not talking (or telling stories) about their dicks that much, as opposed to something like "man and woman".

<comment><USER23> FWIW, the Romans draw lots of phalluses. [http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1113411682/ancient- roma...](http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1113411682/ancient-romans-drew- penises-on-everything-and-heres-why-122715/) contains many examples.

<comment><USER59> The Ancient Egyptians did too. I recall examples on a temple wall that illustrate decreasing virility (semen volume) as age increases.

[http://www.seiglefamily.com/2008egypt/IMG_4997%20hieroglyphi...](http://www.seiglefamily.com/2008egypt/IMG_4997%20hieroglyphics%20detail.JPG)

<comment><USER60> In the tomb of Ti at Saqqara, in a mural depicting a battle, there is a hieroglyph comprising a stylised phallus entering an even more stylised vulva. It is an insult that one warrior is hurling at his enemy. Apparently it is usually translated, somewhat primly, as "Come here, you copulator"; in his _Scorn: With Added Vitriol_ (a collection of invective across the ages), Matthew Parris prefers the earthier "Come 'ere, you fucker."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER61> Is this the start of Prometheus??!

</comment><comment><USER62> _they don't quite seem to form a written language_

Must be a programming language of some sort :)

</comment><comment><USER63> Short on Crypto (roughly translated)

</comment><comment><USER64> Its "interesting" how one of these symbols ended up in one of the unresolved cases of project "Blue book".

[https://imgur.com/NB45sQ6](https://imgur.com/NB45sQ6)

It would be a great start of a movie script :)

<comment><USER52> No, that is not even remotely resembling what you claim.

<comment><USER64> Look again, I know the picture isnt the best, but its spot on.

<comment><USER65> Ahhhhh no, but you might want to check your confirmation bias.

<comment><USER66> Please don't post snarky dismissals to HN, regardless of how wrong someone else is. It only makes the thread even worse.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

<comment><USER67> Dang, could you please unban my account? Thanks.

<comment><USER66> You weren't banned, but your comments were caught by a software filter. Sorry—new accounts are subjected to extra filters because of past abuses by trolls. We've marked your account legit so this won't happen again.

All: it's much better to email issues like this to email@example.com, as the site guidelines ask: [https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html). It's pretty random what we do and don't see on the site, but we see all the emails.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER68> Being respectful to the researcher(s) and her/their work, I was thinking that if this a GoT promo, I would be soooooooo angry (and impressed) :)

</comment><comment><USER69> Thunderbolts project offers an interesting theory on these symbols [https://www.thunderbolts.info](https://www.thunderbolts.info)

<comment><USER70> For anyone else wondering what that site is about, it's pseudoscience:

[https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Electric_Universe](https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Electric_Universe)

<comment><USER69> if you're able to entertain an idea without accepting it, Thunderbolts project has hours of interesting content and some compelling if controversial theories. if the notion that some of your core beliefs are wrong bothers you that much then you'll appreciate the rationalwiki for saving you some time, I guess.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Can you help me find a previous HN post? - <AUTHOR> So I read a post here earlier this year which was so useful, but I can't find it again despite spending hours searching on HN and my browser history.
Any chance you can help me find the post I'm talking about? Christmas cheer and all that!
This is what I remember about the post
 - the post linked to a long Google Doc which was a guide of how to run a startup
 - there was lots of advice on how to run different meetings eg. team meetings, 1:1s etc
 - the Google Doc was created by an executive/CEO/startup coach with lots of experience
 - the post was created in 2018
Any ideas? Any help would be massively appreciated <comment><USER2> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17446839](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17446839)

<comment><AUTHOR> PS... how did you find it? Keen to learn from my failures...

<comment><USER2> I remembered the article you were describing and knew I would recognize it if I saw the title. I just Googled "run a startup advice site:news.ycombinator.com" with time set to "Past Year", visually scanned for visited (purple) links, it was the second result for me.</comment></comment></comment>


Codeable Objects - <AUTHOR> http://hlt.media.mit.edu/?p=2254 Codeable Objects is a library for Processing that enables novice coders, designers and artists to rapidly design, customize and construct an artifact using geometric computation using geometric computation and digital fabrication <comment><USER2> Different, but related; Computational Origami.

There's a great documentary, Between the Folds ([http://movies.netflix.com/movie/Independent-Lens-Between- the...](http://movies.netflix.com/movie/Independent-Lens-Between-the- Folds/70120179)), that interviews Erik Demaine of MIT (<http://erikdemaine.org/>) on this topic.</comment>


Ask HN: Where to find a great web designer for front end UX? - <AUTHOR>

Ask HN: Where to find a great web designer for a site that needs to be very user friendly / simple to use  and rather pretty in a simple way.<p>Would love some suggestions of people, resources and where to turn in the sea of designers? <comment><USER2> This Quora thread might be an interesting starting point if you're looking for freelancers:

\- [http://www.quora.com/Who-are-the-best-web-designers- under-25...](http://www.quora.com/Who-are-the-best-web-designers- under-25?q=Best+designers)

Strolling through Dribble might also give you some inspiration:

\- <http://dribbble.com/>

The UX world gathers on blogs like:

\- <http://uxbooth.com>

\- <http://konigi.com>

\- <http://usabilitypost.com>

\- <http://uxdesign.smashingmagazine.com>

\- <http://johnnyholland.org>

Some of them might offer job postings as well.</comment>