Ask HN: What are your opinions and experiences coding on a 13" or 15" laptop? - <AUTHOR> I am writing this on a 15" Dell laptop that I bought about 8 years ago. It has served me well for everything from gaming (dedicated graphics card inside) to coding to dual booting Windows and Ubuntu.. but it is time for an upgrade.
I do like the 15inch screen size but this Dell is big and clunky. It's pretty heavy too. It's been a while since I programmed on this one because it is a bit slow now.
I have also programmed on a 10" netbook. I did a lot of programming on it but I do think it is too small.
I am trying to decide between a 13" MacBook Pro and a 15" MacBook Pro. Obvious advantages of the 15" are i7, 16GB RAM and larger screen space! The 13 inch has an i5, 8 GB RAM.
I don't have to travel with it much but I will be attending an evening course once a week until Xmas so I do have to bring it out of the house for that. Do people still carry about 15 inch laptops?
When I get my new laptop (whichever one I choose) I will be starting a new project. The project will involve lots of text analysis, neural network stuff, web crawler, database stuff (PostgreSQL), front end web stuff (python/javascript), mobile app dev (iPhone & android). So with this very brief overview, do you have any recommendations? <comment><USER3> I guess I'm a bit of an outlier. I use a 13" laptop for most of my coding, and I don't think I've ever hooked it up to an external monitor (not counting projectors when I'm giving a talk). I used to be part of the "bigger monitors are better" crowd, but I find that _focus_ is my biggest challenge so I actively do not want to have any chat or email or other-distraction windows alongside the one in which I'm editing code. Even without power- and memory- sucking Retina/QHD resolutions, 13" is plenty for a decent edit window and a couple of smaller compile/general-purpose windows.

<comment><USER4> I'll confirm this. I also have more trouble focussing. So I have programmed for a very long time on a EEE 1005P, which has a 10" screen. I am now working on a 19" monitor because desktop, but still lower the resolution to 1440x900 in order to have less clutter on my screen. The thing is, you should never need to see more than 30-40 lines of code on your screen at once. If you do, the code needs to be cleaner.

<comment><USER5> For me, as a web developer, I like to have browser and code side-by-side.

Depending on what I'm building, I often want to have a full-screen browser, or at least a pretty wide one.

I work on an 18" laptop and typically I just alt-tab between vim in the terminal and my browser, but sometimes I align them side-by-side.

<comment><USER3> Yeah, for front-end and mobile stuff I'm sure it's a bit different, and more/larger screens make more sense. I don't know enough to make that translation myself, so I figured I'd just put my data point out there and others can best determine how well it applies to them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I have a 13" Retina MacBook Pro (2014) and a MacBook Air (2015), having previously worked on 14", 15", and 17" Linux and Windows laptops. My computers get smaller as the years go on, and I like that.

My MBP is the best computer I've ever worked on (and am typing this on). I've used my girlfriend's 15" MBP and I vastly prefer my 13".

I use BetterSnapTool[1] for window management: browser on the left half, SublimeText in the upper right 2/3 of the screen, and Terminal in the lower right 1/3 of the screen. It works great for me, and I can't imagine that another 2 inches would make much of a difference.

At work, I dock to a 24" Dell monitor of some sorts, and that's more than enough extra real estate for me.

[1][https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bettersnaptool/id417375580?m...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bettersnaptool/id417375580?mt=12)

<comment><USER7> wow, what a great (no sarcasm) recommendation for window management. Thanks!!!

<comment><USER6> Thanks. :) It's a pretty simple solution, I just took a fairly common IDE setup and configured my snap tool to let me easily put my windows where I need them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have a 22" external monitor hooked up to my 12" laptop and one of the main reasons for this is ergonomics - I put the monitor on a stand, so that the top edge of the screen is at the same height as my eyes, and the laptop's screen doesn't obscure the external monitor's screen.

The end result is that I have a tiny and lightweight laptop for travel and at the same time reasonably big screen for everyday work.

</comment><comment><USER9> I've used a 13" laptop as my main workhorse for 7 years now and can't imagine trading it for a bigger laptop.

The reason for choosing 13" is that I travel a lot for work and I want to get some work done when I'm on the road. I also find it the ideal size to still accommodate a decent-sized keyboard and trackpad. When I need some extra screen estate, I just hook it on an external monitor.

Because I do allot of programming on it, I've chosen one with a high resolution screen (1920x1080) so I don't trade in screen estate but that might be a bit too high for most people (e.g. everything tends to get a bit tiny).

</comment><comment><USER10> I used to use a 13" MBP but my work supplies 15" MBP's. Now that I have been on this machine for a while I can't go back. I have tried on my old machine and my wife's and really like the bigger screen.

With the MBP's the extra size really isnt a big deal because they are so light and thin. And with the 15" you can get a MUCH better dual graphics setup which helps with all the other non-coding things you might want to do (gaming).

TBH you probably done need the power you will get, but it is nice to have.

Another anecdote: a friend of mine just picked up a 15" MBP after having a 15" dell for ever. He loves it and was amazed that he could actually run Photoshop without closing other things. And if you have to do any graphics like that the extra space of the retina 15" is really good.

<comment><USER10> To clarify, dual graphics means there is not JUST the onboard graphics chip but an actual graphics card. [http://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/specs- retina/](http://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/specs-retina/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I just upgraded from a 13" MacBook Pro w/ Retina to the 15" version. Key Reasons:

\- Display Space: Even when set to the highest possible virtual resolution, there is still noticeable more space on the 15" version. It's still way worse than a 27" display, but the difference makes me more productive.

\- RAM: Retina eats RAM. I could run several browsers, VMs, editors etc. just fine on a 4GB MacBook Air. When I upgraded to a 13" MBPr, I was constantly running out of RAM, the machine began swapping and became barely usable. With the 16GB 15" MBPr, it's a _very_ noticeable difference. I easily run into >8GB RAM usage. In addition, when there's available physical RAM, OS X caches some stuff from the SSD which speeds it up further.

<comment><USER12> I did the sorta the same Wrote code for 4 years on 13" Air, switched to a 15" MBP (with dedicated GPU). Satisfied.

For me, the size or weight of the laptop isn't relevant. It's the "clumsyness of it". With unibody Apple made the larger ones easier to move around.

I'd buy a 17" MBP if they would still make them. I prefer laptops to an external monitor because I use the touchpad with gestures a lot, and I like the focus.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I have a 13 inch and I just got a 15 inch MacBook Pro. The 13 inch is by far much easier to travel with, but I like larger 15 inch MacBook for the screen size. I can open a bunch of iTerm windows and resize them to fit nicely. I did want the 16 GB and I thought I would run virtualbox but I ended up just using homebrew to install PostgreSQL etc. I am trying to figure out a laptop case that is weather proof and easy to travel with as either a shoulder bag or soft briefcase. Given the changes in the MacBook Pro over the years, its not always clear which case will fit which model.

</comment><comment><USER14> I had a 13" mbp for 5 years and it was great until the last 6 months. The only problem at the end was it needed more memory. Dual booting with linux was a pain, so I stuck with OSX which is a great OS once you get used to all the key commands and helpers (get used to using spotlight search).

I am on a macbook air now, but I would not suggest it for development. Its very thin (which is nice), but its noticeably slower, and I am worried I will run into the memory cap quickly.

The funny thing is that I have been looking at Dell's 13" XPS Developer Edition. Has anyone tried it?

<comment><USER15> I bought the 1st or 2nd gen (over 2 yrs ago now) It's a really good machine, but I found Dell pretty terrible to deal with. I want there to be an alternative for that reason, but the latest XPS 13 ubuntu machine still looks about the best bet for a linux development laptop.

Anyone else got the latest one? Or can anyone suggest alternatives to the latest one?

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> This is why I tend to buy 14" laptops.

15" is too big to fit in train and airplane seats comfortably, but 13" is too small to get lots of work done.

However, I guess that rules out a MacBook Pro - oh well.

<comment><USER17> I would agree with this. I love my 14" ThinkPad because it really does seem to be the perfect size for me, and also probably has the best keyboard of any current mainstream consumer laptop. 13" also cramps the keyboard in most cases (especially with small bezel laptops like the XPS 13) and 15" results in excess weight and size.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I've been coding on a 13" laptop for years now and I must say I would never switch it for anything bigger. Keep in mind that you might an external screen for design heavy projects but that's it.

Recently bought the new dell xps 13 with infinity display and that thing is just a pleasure to work on.

Your only limitation might be battery life if you're going to do a lot of neural network stuff while on battery.

<comment><AUTHOR> I can have it plugged in nearly 100% of the time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I bought a 13 inch MBP a few months ago.

So far, it seems great. Screen is amazing (although dim in bright sunlight), and I haven't had any issues with memory (right now, with 3 web browsers and a text editor open, I am using 5gb out of the 8gb total). The processor is very fast, although the integrated graphics card is slow (whether this matters or not depends on what you are doing... I wouldn't buy this if you want to play complex video games or do a lot of graphics work). The screen is big enough to run two windows side-by-side, a long as they don't have too many toolbars.

The one downside is the OS. Yosemite is extremely buggy. Drops wifi connections, hangs when logging out, etc. El Capitan is being released next week though - hopefully that will be better.

Whether or not you need more RAM and a faster processor really depends on what exactly you want to do with it. For me (text editor, multiple web browsers, terminal, MAMP, all running at the same time) it is fast and large enough.

<comment><USER19> Also, I changed the resolution from the default 1280x800 to 1440x900. Makes text feel right size-wise, and also makes more room on the screen.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I have worked on everything between a 11" Macbook Air and a 17" Macbook Pro. I recently switched from a 13" MBP to the 15" one. Both had 16 GB of RAM but for my work, the quad core CPU that is only available in the 15" models made a noticeable difference and I'm happier now.

Portability: I travel a lot and the 15" is too heavy but the 13" Macbook Pro was heavy as well and in combination with everything else I'm carrying around, the difference doesn't really matter. I got a nice bag that I can convert to a backpack instead. The 15" doesn't feel very "clunky" to me. I was worried that I wouldn't want to sit on the couch with it like I used to with my 13" but here I am and I like it.

Screen size: the 15" screen is a little bit more convenient but the 13" was no problem for me either, you get used to it.

I would never do 11 or 17 " again, the 13 and 15" are both ok to work on.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! Any suggestions re bags?

<comment><USER20> For a convertible bag + backpack, I have a Qwstion bag: [http://www.qwstion.com](http://www.qwstion.com)

For a more ergonomic backpack when I have to walk more and carry a lot, I use a booq backpack (booq boa because I wanted it to have hip belts).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I recommend having two monitors, I like working with two monitors, it's better than working with only notebooks monitor.

<comment><USER22> I second you. I have 2 19" in front of me. I can not code on a laptop.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I used to look at my friends 13 inch laptop and thought "that's way too small, I could never program on that." Now I have a 13 inch laptop and it took me all of 20 minutes to get used to the smaller screen. I find it's a lot more portable too, since I ride to work on a motorcycle and it goes in my bag every day.

</comment><comment><USER24> Note that you can upgrade the RAM on the 13" model to 16GB, although you have to do this at purchase time, it's not possible to expand later with the current model.

I, personally, use a 13" with 16GB RAM and have external screens both at home and at work. It provides a good balance between portability and utility.

</comment><comment><USER25> Been on a 13" MacBook Air for the last two years, where I was using a 15" MacBook Pro for a few years previously. I only miss the 15" screen real estate when dealing with apps like Adobe suite or Unity. But for just dealing with text alone the 13" screen is just fine for me.

</comment><comment><USER26> If you're set on a laptop, my advice is to buy the smallest physical laptop that has the specs you require and then get a dock (something like [http://hengedocks.com/](http://hengedocks.com/)) and monitors for working at home.

<comment><USER27> Do you have a Henge? How do you like it? I've been on the fence about it - <USER2> reviews seem to be decidedly mixed.

<comment><USER28> I have a vertical Henge dock for my 2011 MBP and the Clique (keyboard + trackpad chassis).

I like it: a space saver and aesthetically pleasing, good build quality, and never had any issue plugging and unplugging (need to follow the setup instructions properly).

However, a bit inconvenient as you need to take out your MBP to power it on. The alternative is to leave your MBP on sleep (and it will wake on mouse / button click). Also, factor in a purchase of the display adaptor extension. I found that my existing Mini DP to HDMI does not fit on the dock.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I have had an Alienware M11X R3 since 2011. Best laptop ever. There is still nothing close to it on the market. It had a 11.6" screen with a GT540M which was great for its time.

Clevo chose to do an "on paper" GPU upgrade of on the WS230 which is their 13.3" laptop (860M and 960M are the same) with a 3200x1800 screen.

The Clevo 650SG is a nice 15.4" with a 4k matte and 980M option.

The Razer Blade 2015 is 14" with a 3200x1800 screen and 970M.

Give me a 12-14" laptop with a 980M and 4k screen and I'll be happy. Razer Blade is closest so far, maybe Razer Blade 2016?

No, 4k in 12-14" is not too small. We have had 1080P 5" phones for a while now and Sony has released 4k phones. So we should be able to have 4k laptops. I'd like an 8k laptop though ;)

</comment><comment><USER30> 13" Although personally I went with an 11" Air. It's docked 80% of the time so I don't have an issue. When I do need to be mobile or code on the couch or something the portability is sublime. Love it. I do a lot of .NET so I have VS in a VM and it doesn't skip a beat. Took a long time and read countless articles and I was hesitant the 11 wasn't going to be enough, but it is in my use case. So happy with it.

There isn't a hard and fast rule to what you need and what works for one person won't work for another. The only way you'll know is to try it for yourself. And even then you could argue either way depending totally on the context so it's a tough call for you to make.

</comment><comment><USER31> I bought a gaming laptop to use as a mobile linux development workstation. 4K display 15.6", 32Gb ram. pros: lots of screen real estate with super crisp fonts. pros: run many vm's/containers without strain. cons: 5.5 lbs and poor battery life.

</comment><comment><USER32> I use a 15" Lenovo and on the whole I'm quite happy with it. I like the fact that the keyboard has a number pad, and the screen is big enough that I can fit two Emacs buffers side-by-side without breaking up 80-char-lines. However, sometimes I would still like to have a bigger screen when programming, so I've just ordered an external 20" monitor.

Portability with the 15" is acceptable, but you need a dedicated carrier bag, I wouldn't carry it around in my backpack. That would be the one reason why I might go for a 13" next time I buy a laptop - as long as I have the external monitor at home, the small screen doesn't matter too much.

</comment><comment><USER33> Funny, I also have an old Dell laptop, and I LOVE the keyboard on that thing. It literally makes my fingers happy to use. It was a tough decision to finally adopt another solution (below), but I finally did it.

I use a de-Chromed Chrome book (acer c720) with xubuntu for personal projects these days. I do java/j2ee on a macbook pro for work, I never use it as a laptop, it's always docked. For personal projects on the chrome book, I code apache/python/django/vim, which run wonderfully on it. The smaller screen does take some getting used to, and the nonstandard keyboard takes some remapping. Otherwise, after 9 months, no complaints.

</comment><comment><USER34> A factor that can be overlooked is the screen resolution. Normally the 13" screens only go to 1366x768 which can feel like reduction in screen real estate, especially if you have your IDE set up with side panels etc. However I've found with a full 1920x1080 screen if you handle the smaller text everything lays out exactly as it would on your desktop monitor so it doesn't feel as squashed. Best of all nothing changes position when you dock back at your desk. Given the resolution of the 13" MacBook Air Retina is 2304x1440 as long as you can get the font the right size you'll have plenty of screen space.

</comment><comment><USER35> I have a 15" MBP from mid-2014. I tried the 13" and it was too small for my tastes. I'm _very_ happy with the 15". It is easy to travel with, even the 15" weighs next to nothing.

</comment><comment><USER36> The only factor you need to consider is portability vs. screen size. You can get the 13" version with 16GB, and for most kinds of coding the other performance differences don't matter.

I just switched from a 17" Macbook Pro to a 13" Macbook Pro. I miss the humongous screen when diffing files, but I just love how portable my 13" is! I don't travel much, but lugging that 17" machine around was such a pain...

I guess the 15" isn't as bad as the 17", but since you do plan on carrying it around I'd recommend to go with the more portable option.

</comment><comment><USER37> I use a 13" Macbook Air and find it to be perfect, though I don't think 15" is unwieldy, even if you're like me and work from couches/cafes frequently. Laptops are just so thin and light these days that 15" hardly seems less portable in most scenarios.

The main reason I use 13" is because I'd probably spend $1000 more for 15", and I try to limit the price of hardware in total that I have on me. My laptop and phone together cost about as much as a loaded 15" rMBP.

However, 15" seems to pay off when using IDEs with all their panes.

</comment><comment><USER38> A 13'' only useful for short coding sessions on a plane or small train seats, for other locations it is just too small, specially if you are into IDEs.

<comment><USER39> I travel a lot and coding (a lot) on my 11 inch Macbook air works very well, also for very long coding sessions. Not sure what the obsession is with programmers and big screens but I went from multi monitor setups to smaller and smaller over the years. The 11 inch air would be perfect if it had retina and 20 hour battery life. I would never buy anything else. Battery life just still sucks for small laptops unfortunately, that would be my only reason to buy something like a Thinkpad X250 with 3-4 6 cell batteries I can hotswap. But in general I find it way too big.

<comment><USER38> I never managed to work comfortably with Eclipse, Netbeans, Android Studio, Qt Creator or Visual Studio in tiny screens.

Specially when doing code navigation across multiple modules or UI design.

Also quite painful when using the debugger and being forced to context switch all the time between top level windows.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> I carry my 15" MBP Retina on a 1.5 hour commute. It's light enough that I really don't think too much about it. I carry a change of clothes and a few other items as well so it is not the majority of the bulk and weight. The adapter is heavy so I bought one for the office to avoid carrying it back and forth. I think I would feel cramped on a smaller screen, but that is based on being spoiled with this big screen.

<comment><USER36> Pro Tip: You can use the smaller power adapters (from the 11" Macbook Air) with the bigger laptops, as long as you're not running the GPU at full blast.

However, if your Mac needs more power than the adapter can provide, it'll take it from the battery.

Only downside: When your battery goes empty, the Macbook won't start immediately when a weak power adapter is connected. It will first charge the battery a bit, and only boot again after a few minutes. If you use the power adapter with the correct rating, the Macbook boots immediately after connecting it to power.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> A couple of things that I haven't seen mentioned here yet:

\- You might like getting a 4K external screen: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10168766](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10168766)

\- A 2ndhand desktop or previous-gen server in the corner can provide extra computational power; AWS et. al. throw in staggering network bandwidth and uptime guarantees.

</comment><comment><USER42> I develop on a 13" MBair it's the perfect size.

I would go with a 13" and then connect to a monitor at your main work area when you need side by side displays. I use a 23" Acer monitor from amazon and a rain mStand, wireless trackpad and keyboard, It's a great setup for my main work station. Having a 13" air is great for working in other locations, outside and at a coffee shop.

</comment><comment><USER43> I switched from an old dell inspiron to a shiny dell xps 15 ([http://www.dell.com/us/p/xps-15-9530/pd](http://www.dell.com/us/p/xps-15-9530/pd))

I bougth it during last black friday, and I've been happy with the purchase until now. Only caveat: had to disable the touchpad because i tend to touch it when typing

</comment><comment><USER44> I've switched from a maxxed out 15" Retina to a new 12" MacBook and I'm not having any problems. I don't do anything hardcore like iPhone development though or anything that requires compilation - just Web stuff and some Ruby and Rails. Now being used to the 12", I imagine the current 13" MBP would feel amazing in comparison :-D

</comment><comment><USER45> I own a 14" System76 and a 13" MacBook Air and I hardly find any difference while working on the two. Its even more jarring especially because the Air's resolution is far worse (Non-retina vs full hd).

I have always wanted to try out the Dell XPS 13, but its way too costly. For me, the choice is between a 13" laptop or something lower (12", perhaps).

<comment><USER32> What's your experience with System76? Are they worth their money?

<comment><USER45> I wrote a blog post after I bought it [0]. Its a pretty good machine, which has rarely ever given me software troubles. However, the hardware is kinda flimsy and not as good as a Mac. I also faced issues with the hard disk and battery recently, which has made me the brunt of many jokes for buying a Linux machine over a Mac.

[0]: [https://captnemo.in/blog/2014/07/04/galago-ultra-pro- review/](https://captnemo.in/blog/2014/07/04/galago-ultra-pro-review/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> I use a 17" laptop personally because I love the number pad on the keyboard and the bigger screen (and I do take it around with me).

I would get the more powerful laptop if possible due to the text analysis and neural network stuff you will be doing. Hook it up to an external monitor if you can. It really helps to have the display at eye level.

</comment><comment><USER47> I own a 2015 13" MBP (Retina) and it's a fine machine for coding. I don't ever hook it up to an external.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you use an IDE or text editor?

<comment><USER47> Usually just a text editor. For a while I was using Atom and now I'm on Visual Studio Code.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> I have a 13" Retina Macbook with 27" monitors both in my office and at home. Whilst the 13" is great to carry around and fits nicely into airplane and train tables - I did find my old 15" much better for displaying more workspaces in sublime and jumping into photoshop quickly etc.

</comment><comment><USER49> I use a 13" without an external screen for most coding and like it, just like many people say, it's easier to focus on one thing if you can't have more than two files open at the same time for me.

The computer is fast enough, the two extra cores are probably helpful, but the 13" is fast enough.

</comment><comment><USER50> For my main development laptop, I actually recently got a Thinkpad W550s at work -- 15.6" screen. I was worried about the size, but I have come to like it much better than the 12.1" I had before (Thinkpad X220). I guess I'm swinging between extremes more though. :)

</comment><comment><USER39> I have an 11 inch Macbook Air and 15 inch Macbook Pro. The battery life of the 15 inch is far too poor (but if you don't travel much you wouldn't mind) so I hardly ever touch it. I would go for the i7 though; I notice considerable difference when i'm compiling.

</comment><comment><USER51> Does the general consensus of HN believe the i7 option is worth the upgrade for the 13" MBP Retina? Standard software development; also been killing my air with powerpoint thanks to school lately, with the various simultaneous use of VMs to load windows programs

</comment><comment><USER52> I find them too small. I've got a 17" Mackbook Pro, and I'd buy them bigger if they existed. Unfortunately even the 17" is not being made anymore. No idea what I'll do when this one needs to be replaced. A Thinkpad perhaps?

</comment><comment><USER53> I use a 15" rMBP, but it's almost always hooked up to two 27" displays. I think coding without the monitors is doable, but at least in my case, I'm also doing design work so they're pretty necessary.

</comment><comment><USER54> Just ASKING: Why are you switching to a Mac instead of a more sane Linux dual boot machine? Mac's dual booting is a serious PAIN with my experience. The machine runs HOT and the battery drains FAST on anything but OS X.

<comment><USER55> He mentioned that he does iOS development, so Macs are the only way to go

<comment><USER54> You get an Mac Mini? That is the way I deal with iOS.

<comment><AUTHOR> How is the Mac Mini? To be honest, I don't know much about it besides what I looked up briefly. What specs do you have in it and do you use a mac/apple monitor?

<comment><USER54> I got a used one from a friend. I just needed it to compile my work really. I tried Xarmarin and Unity. Seems to work fine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> I went from a Macbook Pro 15" (pre-retina) to a 2015 Macbook Pro 13" Retina (with max resolution: 1680x1050), and I haven't been hindered at all.

I code on it daily. I did get some upgrades like the 16GB RAM.

</comment><comment><USER57> Maybe a useful suggestion: I sometimes add my ipad as second screen, using Duet. That software makes the ipad screen very responsive (needs usb cable). I have seen others doing this as well.

</comment><comment><USER58> I like having dual setups, but 13 inches is fine by me (MBA 13") Would I like 15? Probably, but I'm not missing the extra size when I can plug a second or third monitor

</comment><comment><USER59> I second @ramon's answer. . Usedto be with a 13" monitor but bought a 15" alongside it now Fulfilled. .!

</comment><comment><USER60> Hate it. My eyes are going, and I need to be able to quickly look at all of the tools I use "at a glance".

</comment><comment><USER61> Been thinking about upgrading to 15" from 13" after using El Capitan's split screen feature.

</comment><comment><USER62> If you move to a MacBook, beware of the keyboard. Especially the ENTER key can be rather tiny.</comment>


Show HN: Shoprocket – ECommerce from a Single Line of Code - <AUTHOR> https://www.shoprocket.co/ <comment><USER2> The landing page is nice and informative.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you mean the homepage? If so. Thanks. :)</comment></comment>


How Do Software Developers in NY, SF, London and Bangalore Differ? - <AUTHOR> http://stackoverflow.blog/2016/11/How-Do-Developers-in-New-York-San-Francisco-London-and-Bangalore-Differ/ <comment><AUTHOR> The thing that most surprises me is that the highest searched tag in Bangalore, India is JSP. Looks like offshore development is still a big thing in the city that is widely regarded as the "silicon valley of India"

<comment><USER2> Sure, but there are a large number of tech product startups in Bangalore too.</comment></comment>


CloudFlare review: The Real Thing or Marketing Bullshit? - <AUTHOR> http://amix.dk/blog/post/19627 <comment><USER2> I have heard very good things about CloudFlare. Also, the hacking group LulzSec uses CloudFlare on their website and they have gone out of their way on numerous occasions to point out how much CloudFlare has prevented their site from being taken down, which says something as there are many hackers out there that are trying to be the guys that "took down" LulzSec. This article discusses the issue further: [http://allthingsd.com/20110610/web-security- start-up-cloudfl...](http://allthingsd.com/20110610/web-security-start-up- cloudflare-gets-buzz-courtesy-of-lulzsec-hackers/)</comment>


How a "location API" allows cops to figure out where we all are in real-time - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/05/senator-furious-at-polices-easy-ability-to-get-real-time-mobile-location-data/ <comment><USER3> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17046632](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17046632)

</comment><comment><USER4> Here is the demo for tracking the current location of your phone: [https://www.locationsmart.com/try/](https://www.locationsmart.com/try/) . Note that the demo requires granting "consent", but is not 100% clear if the consent applies beyond the scope of the one-time demo.

If you've opted out of your carrier's privacy preference for "share location with advertisers", and this still works, what will the carrier say if you show them a screenshot of this third-party site providing your live location?

That site also claims to provide the location of Wi-Fi mac addresses.

</comment><comment><USER5> So if I move to the EU can I send a letter asking for them to remove all my data?

<comment><USER6> you definitely can do that. Doesn't mean that anyone will care about this letter, though. If the data aggregation company doesn't provide services and has no presence within EU, then they aren't affected by your letters. At this point, good luck figuring out where it all aggregated from and trying to chase for sources.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Wouldn't it be like two wrongs making a right, not to mention deliciously ironic, if these people and other personal data aggregators got prosecuted under FOSTA/SESTA. _"...a fine, a prison term of up to 10 years, or both—on a person who, using a facility or means of interstate or foreign commerce, owns, manages, or operates an interactive computer service (or attempts or conspires to do so) to promote or facilitate the prostitution of another person. "_

</comment><comment><USER8> So, question for the Cryptocurrency (and/or Tor) crowd:

The situation described from the article is bad enough as it is - <USER2> currently at least all the intermediaries are registered businesses with people behind them. With some effort, a jornalist (or investigator) can track them down, find some humans behind the operations and confront them.

The businesses, in turn, can't get away from that because payment probably still happens in dollars (or another fiat currency) and can be tracked.

In the world crypto advocates are envisaging, Securus, 3CInteractive, LocationSmart etc presumably wouldn't registered businesses at all - they'd just be anonymous web services ran by some people living anywhere in the world, taking payment via Bitcoin. They wouldn't even need legal excuses like Securos' "authorization documents" because it wouldn't even be clear which jurisdiction applies - not even talking about actually prosecuting anyone. They could simply grant anyone access who pays.

So, if all the hopes of the crypto community came true, how would we shut down (or even just "opt-out") of a service like this one?

<comment><USER9> Don't use a smartphone. There are already numerous people who disavow their use because of security concerns. Join their ranks.

<comment><USER8> And once they find another way of tracking me, let's say by identifying my face on any kind of photo or video feed they can purchase, the solution is obviously not having a face, or what?

Also, what does any of this have to do with my original question?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Is there a way to opt out of this?

<comment><USER11> Turn your cell phone off when you don't need it. I used to turn my phone off more, and should probably resume that habit.

<comment><USER12> How do you know it's off?

<comment><USER13> If you really need to be sure, you have to get a phone with a removable battery.

<comment><USER14> But also make sure to discharge those capacitors.

Or turn it off and wrap it in tinfoil.

<comment><USER15> This is a funny use case. Like, obviously I don't want my location tracked, but clearly I have just accepted that it's happening in exchange for being able to text my girlfriend.

But, I'm trying to think of when this would actually be useful in my life. Maybe if I've been accused of a crime and the jail sentence is really steep, I become a fugitive and run away to live in the woods. But I still want to watch videos and take photos on my device offline? So i keep my phone in tinfoil when im using it?? haha

<comment><USER14> Yes, if you use some more tinfoil, you can wrap it around yourself _and_ your phone, and you'll be able to still use it. If you'd wrap the tinfoil around you _and_ your gf, then you'd be able to text each other over wifi. You can also include e.g. family for even greater utility.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Procedural colors for video games - <AUTHOR> http://blog.noctua-software.com/procedural-colors-for-game.html

<comment><USER2> Plugging HUSL [1], a color space created for this very purpose.

[http://www.boronine.com/husl/](http://www.boronine.com/husl/)

</comment><comment><USER3> Create a color fence. You can create a polygonal fence that describes your preferred color set and calculate an intersection from the hue value in HSV. If my hue is 320, then I could find a nice shade of orange/red along the polygonal fence. This should give you controlled useable colors. The intersection length is the value, and you could store variable saturation on the fence points if you want to control the level of saturation.

[https://www.evernote.com/shard/s6/sh/c48da69a-7056-4ee0-9bcf...](https://www.evernote.com/shard/s6/sh/c48da69a-7056-4ee0-9bcf-60ce346ca67f/6c1dd47660961c12d8ba91eefc13b7b5)

<comment><USER3> Here is a codepen example, this code was thrown together. You can add modify the fence line in the colorFence array

[http://codepen.io/anon/pen/ycqpI?editors=101](http://codepen.io/anon/pen/ycqpI?editors=101)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> That's pretty cool. Ages ago I made a procedural platformer that colorized random tilesets in a similar way (I don't have any screenshots handy, sorry) and it worked out really well. I used the same random colorscheme code for a procedural landscape generator:

[http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2010/12/19/some- planets/](http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2010/12/19/some-planets/)

If anyone cares, the code is here:

[https://code.google.com/p/ld48jovoc/source/browse/ld19_disco...](https://code.google.com/p/ld48jovoc/source/browse/ld19_discovery/pally.cpp)

</comment><comment><USER5> Good to see that the OP is getting acquainted with color theory.

Just one thing: Is this color scheme used elsewhere in the game? This might be OK for a menu, but it's almost impossible to extract any encoded information out of it, if you have any mild form of color blindness. The difference between factory/jungle just doesn't work out in any version.

Having different lightness values actually helps as a factor to maximize uniqueness of each distinct color in the set.

See the simulated example in similar case and how to fix it [http://wearecolorblind.com/example/trainyard/](http://wearecolorblind.com/example/trainyard/)

<comment><USER6> I also found the difference between "Factory" and "Jungle" colors to be very difficult to discern in the example images.

Any design, be it for software, physical interfaces, traffic lights, or anything else that relies on colors for conveying information should also provide alternate means of encoding the same information. You can use shape, texture, lightness/saturation, order, or a number of other properties. The 4-5% of the population who are colorblind or have color vision deficiency will thank you.

<comment><AUTHOR> I hear you guys. In that case it is not a problem, since the color does not convey any information. In the game the difference in lightness of the elements should be enough so that colorblind people can still play without any trouble.

<comment><USER7> "should be"—have you tried setting your monitor to grayscale? (It's not quite accurate, but fairly close).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Seems to be overloaded: [https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http:/...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://blog.noctua- software.com/procedural-colors-for-game.html)

<comment><AUTHOR> Yep, sorry my server is completely overloaded now :( I am trying to fix that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Does anyone know how to get an X amount of colors that visually are as much different from each other as possible? While setting boundary conditions such as allowed lightness values.

</comment><comment><USER10> Procedural colours might also make daltonization[0] easier.

[0] [http://www.daltonize.org/p/about.html](http://www.daltonize.org/p/about.html)</comment>


Ask HN: Is my business idea going in the right direction? - <AUTHOR>

I have spent about a year now to build the technology behind this and to find my first 1.000 users. I want to flip-around the recruiting process, by making companies inquire with matching individuals. It's like a mix of match.com with LinkedIn, in a way. Here's a video: http://www.twentypeople.com/site/page?view=employer
I know, the video should be better, I need to get a proper speaker and refine it. But I am at a point where I need to figure out if the idea needs further tweaking, like seriously, or if I can shift over and start polishing/marketing as full-time now.
I am a former Microsoft product planner and started this business almost a year ago. In the process, I created a bunch of spin-off ideas, most notably pareer.com - which is using the API I created with twentypeople.com.
This is more than a skill matching index... I have resume parsers worked out, accepting all major file formats, using statistics (over 80.000 skills trained) to figure out characteristics of someone who is able to program, say, in Ruby, CSS3 and also has a github account. With a good 1.000 users, I have enough data to make sense of the data and do stuff with it. I can tell you, as an individual, how unique your skill set is, if it's general or specialist knowledge, etc.
I am running this all by myself now, since I struggle finding the right folks to take on board, and more importantly, I wanted to clear up financing first to actually pay a worthwhile salary and get better talent.
Anyways, I'm ready to get burned now, internet. I would really, really, really love to hear any of your feedback, the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Thanks guys, HN is the absolute most rewarding resource I can think of, being a founder.
Also, if you want me to look at your project (and I am aware of the fact that this could lead to a few hundred hours of work now) - I would be happy to do so. Tweet me at @mittermayr
Thanks. <comment><USER2> So, I am not a programmer or a designer but have spent several years as a manager needing to hire talent so my two cents is from that perspective. I see your site like a self-serve online recruiter and it reminds me of the days that I would submit a job posting on Monster.com - only more detail and it looks like, better features. I especially like the ability to 'match' my employer needs in detail with an applicant's talent (similar to Match.com). I would use this if I needed to find tech talent! As far as the idea, design, and UI are concerned, nothing stood out as being unfriendly or difficult. I might suggest though that you change the icon for 'easy to use' to something different than the universal sign for 'handicapped'. My only other note is that psychologically ... you might want to consider adjusting the color scheme - black and grey are 'dark' and not necessarily conducive to a feeling of professional _sharpness_. You could change that by replacing the 'tan' color bars to match the bright blue ones that you use on other parts of the site. Hope this helped a little!

<comment><AUTHOR> hey, thanks so much for your feedback. I totally thought nobody responded since I was traveling, then this! Thanks a lot! And yes, I agree, agree and agree. Had two of your suggestions on my TODO, so that motivates to jump at this now. Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Hey mittermayr,

I like the website and the progress you have made thus far. 1.000 users is a great mark be at and I definitely agree that this is a substantive base to survey for feedback. If they like the direction of things thus far, continue in that direction. Use their feedback (to some extent) to lead your product development.

Since I see that you are focusing on twentypeople.com, what is the status of pareer.com. Is this a site that you are currently working on or is it simply just up and running? What are your goals for pareer.com?

</comment><comment><USER2> You need to follow me in order for me to message you on Twitter! I will take you up on your offer to comment on my project ... <http://www.uencounter.me> _smile_

</comment><comment><USER4> If you have 1,000 users, I would turn to them to ask this question. Do a survey, offer an incentive to respond. Even try contacting several of your fanatical users directly and talking with them.

<comment><AUTHOR> i myself rarely respond to such things, but you do have a point. who better to ask than those who believed in it from day one ... good point. will see what i can come up with, but this sounds reasonable!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Clickable: <http://www.twentypeople.com/site/page?view=employer>

<comment><AUTHOR> thanks man!</comment></comment>


What caused the rapid growth of early supermassive black holes? - <AUTHOR> http://www.cmu.edu/homepage/computing/2011/fall/shedding-light.shtml <comment><USER2> The simulation they ran sounds really impressive:

To find out exactly how these supermassive black holes came to be, Di Matteo, Croft and Carnegie Mellon post-doctoral researcher Nishikanta Khandai created the largest cosmological simulation to date. Called MassiveBlack, the simulation focused on recreating the first billion years after the Big Bang.

"This simulation is truly gigantic. It's the largest in terms of the level of physics and the actual volume. We did that because we were interested in looking at rare things in the universe, like the first black holes. Because they are so rare, you need to search over a large volume of space," Di Matteo said.

They began by running the simulation under conditions set under the standard model of cosmology — the accepted theories and laws of modern day physics governing the formation and growth of the universe.

"We didn't put anything crazy in. There's no magic physics, no extra stuff. It's the same physics that forms galaxies in simulations of the later universe," Croft said.

"But magically, these early quasars, just as had been observed, appear. We didn't know they were going to show up. It was amazing to measure their masses and go 'Wow! These are the exact right size and show up exactly at the right point in time.' It's a success story for the modern theory of cosmology."

<comment><USER2> Also, this gigapan image of the simulation is cool: <http://gigapan.org/gigapans/76215/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> _This enabled them to easily pan across the simulated universe as it formed and move back and forth through time as necessary. They could then zoom in on events that looked interesting, viewing them in greater detail than could be seen using a telescope._

Your task for the day: prove we aren't living in somebody's simulated universe.</comment>


Sir Ian McKellen's Lord of the Rings Production Blogs - <AUTHOR> http://mckellen.com/cinema/lotr/990820.htm <comment><USER2> It's a great read.

Web archive link as the blog faced hug of death this weekend.

[https://web.archive.org/web/20190609094448/http://mckellen.c...](https://web.archive.org/web/20190609094448/http://mckellen.com/cinema/lotr/journal.htm)

Ian post on 20th anniversary.

[https://twitter.com/IanMcKellen/status/1215709543272812544](https://twitter.com/IanMcKellen/status/1215709543272812544)

<comment><USER3> I recall him mentioning these posts on some of the bonus content that came with the movies, cool to see it pop up again. Thanks for the archive link, site is under heavy load it seems.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This intro line and supporting one are fantastic:

>There is a general assumption that the main professional concern of actors is the parts they play. That is not true of this actor...

>It's rather that I invariably look at the job as a whole - who will direct, who will be cast, how long will it take,do I want to work in Leeds (or Toronto or now Wellington)

I would venture to say that I bet quite a number of actors have been burned by wanting to play a role so bad they didn't look at the endeavor as a whole.

Ian is a true legend. Thanks for posting!

<comment><USER5> probably so

[https://twitter.com/data_bayes/status/1209350964232237056](https://twitter.com/data_bayes/status/1209350964232237056)

>I would venture to say that I bet quite a number of actors have been burned by wanting to play a role so bad they didn't look at the endeavor as a whole.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Reading the title a bit fast I almost had a heart attack thinking that he had passed away.

</comment><comment><USER7> > never having imagined that I would ever play any sort of wizard

Strange to hear from the most wizardly living actor I can possibly think of

<comment><USER8> "Wizardry" wasn't a popular thing in theatre and movie circles for most of his career, particularly in Britain.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> If you haven't seen it yet, his episode in the show "Extras" is fantastic.

<comment><USER10> "Peter Jackson comes from New Zealand, says to me, 'Sir Ian, I want you to be Gandalf the wizard,' and I said to him, 'You are aware that I am not really a wizard.'" \- [https://youtu.be/7DtlTeheCjk](https://youtu.be/7DtlTeheCjk)

"Never have I laughed out of place, ever." \- [https://youtu.be/lWM4xiEbmgo?t=366](https://youtu.be/lWM4xiEbmgo?t=366)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Blog, not blogs

<comment><USER12> Some people (many Brits) think each blogpost is called "a blog".

The design is quite adorable, I'm surprised it's being maintained by a professional [http://www.keithstern.net/](http://www.keithstern.net/)</comment></comment>


Elon Musk and Grimes Named Their Kid X Æ A-12 - <AUTHOR> https://jalopnik.com/elon-musk-and-grimes-named-their-kid-x-a-12-so-heres-1843261276 <comment><USER2> Never figured Musk for a Unicode warrior.</comment>


Google Thought I Was a Man - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/issue/52/the-hive/google-thought-i-was-a-man <comment><USER2> Google thought I was a dog or maybe a god, dunno...either way it was probably as tragic as the article.

</comment><comment><USER3> I try to obfuscate and throw out as much confusing personal data as I can about myself, but I wonder if it ever does any good.

</comment><comment><USER4> As an advertiser, it is awful when the right to be advertised (accurately) to is impinged upon.

</comment><comment><USER5> Happened to me as well.

I am disinclined to correct their misinformation.

</comment><comment><USER6> There are real problems in the world. This is not one of them.</comment>


Ask HN: What's your most reliable source for news? - <AUTHOR> I'm looking for websites, apps, blogs, newsletters anything that's reliable and interesting. HN is definitely a good source for some things. You can break it down by topic. <comment><USER2> In terms of what American media calls "news", I found this essay very illuminating:

[http://www.dobelli.com/en/essays/news- diet/](http://www.dobelli.com/en/essays/news-diet/)</comment>


Twitter Flight - <AUTHOR> https://www.twitterflight.com

<comment><USER2> A Twitter conference for developers? So does this mean that half of the developers who buy a ticket and spend all their time and money getting to the conference will have their tickets revoked halfway through the conference and get kicked out with no explanation?

<comment><USER3> It probably would have been more appropriate for them to call it "Clipped Wings" instead of Flight.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I've always wondered what kinds of developers attend such events? Companies whose revenue is based entirely on Twitter? I see twitter having a conference for marketing people but developers?</comment>


Allegations: Google drastically rolled back diversity and inclusion programs - <AUTHOR> https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/current-ex-employees-allege-google-drastically-rolled-back-diversity-inclusion-n1206181 <comment><USER2> I had to take that program in Switzerland, designed in the USA, which was telling me how I can date my coworkers even outside the company.

It may be OK in the US, but what it was asking from me was unconstitutional in Switzerland.

Of course I didn't say anyting, as I liked the job. A coworker of mine just clicked through the training without reading any of it.

Also diversity became the main topic (without being on the official agenda) of big cross-team meetings, so I learned not to go there, which meant that I didn't know after some time what other teams are doing.

<comment><USER3> Why would talking about diversity in a cross team meeting cause you to dislike attending them?

<comment><USER2> Think about a meeting of hundreds of people between 10 offices in the world who I will never in my life talk to/meet. They are boring for me anyways as a software engineer, as they don't discuss the engineering details, just everything on the product level. They don't help me in my job, but I would be there as a respect to other teams. But if the first 30 minutes is taken by the diversity without it being written in the official meeting agenda, that means a lack of respect from the company leadership.

Actually Larry Page himself said years ago (before the diversity trainings) that if we think that a meeting is wasting our time from being productive, we're allowed to go away from it.

For me the interesting meetings were about setting up production pipelines, fixing training-serving skew in the models (it's a huge problem for online training, when the training data is changing all the time), understanding the production setup of the deep learning pipeline, understanding the tradeoff, and planning capacity of the TPUs. But people in these meetings didn't talk about these for me hard problems.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> the funniest thing is how some people view simply discussing biases and such as a form of oppression or discrimination in and of itself

<comment><USER5> I attended one program and I found it amusing that it assumed that I had a deep-seated biases simple because my skin had a particular hue while apparently other people with different hues didn't have biases.

<comment><USER6> This sounds like a pretty dramatic exaggeration. I absolutely believe you _felt_ that way, which is worth a lot. But I think the vast majority of diversity programs do not state "you (yes you, individually, benjohnson) have deep-seated biases, and it is because of your skin tone. Also, nobody with skin tones other than yours have biases."

<comment><USER7> Seems like at Google they did though.

"Sojourn, a comprehensive racial justice program created for employees to learn about implicit bias"

I doubt this course dwelled on implicit bias of black people against whites/asians.

"Two other diversity training programs at Google, DEI for Managers, a primer to build skills around navigating issues of race on their teams, and Allyship 101, a program to learn about different types of oppressed groups and ways of supporting them"

I doubt these courses spent time on the oppression of white/asian men.

"... a speaker event hosted by Google on the topic of how white people can better navigate conversations about racism and privilege in the workplace"

"There was a meme going around that said white fragility shuts down discussions of white fragility"

"Three current employees said they felt the newer programs introduced from outside vendors lack the framework that previous training programs had to help orient white people to conversations about racial justice"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Good. I've never seen a non-emotional argument for diversity and inclusovity programs.

A company has no need to represent society as a whole, or worse, a duty to equalize societies inequalities.

Any attempt to do so inherently harms as many people as it helps, it just moved the harm to groups unprotected by emotional arguments

<comment><USER9> There are studies that found that companies earn more when their boards and management are 50/50 men and women.

[https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-08/more-women-means- more...](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-08/more-women-means-more-money- for-companies-study/7228444)

[https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/02/why-companies-with-female- ma...](https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/02/why-companies-with-female-managers- make-more-money.html)

<comment><USER10> This is backwards thinking. Companies who have 50/50 male/female management are likely smarter companies, picking up smart women who are looked over for other roles and because they are smart enough to do that they likely do other smart things. It is the effect of a well run company not the cause of it. If your company is working working the other way they are dumb.

<comment><USER6> I completely agree that you can't better a body of people by forcing it to modify its constituents into a defined range of racial/gender ratios (and it may even be the case that you will worsen it on average). However, there is another goal: To help the individuals who would not have been hired. Of course, there's an argument to be made that any harm you might do to the body would then ultimately harm the individuals you helped to be placed in it, but I tend to believe that these opposing forces balance out on the net good side for the individuals.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> It's interesting that the article blame Google not wanting to upset conservatives, because as far as I can tell the most recent public controversy involving Google's diversity and inclusion exercises around implicit bias was this, which had nothing to do with conservatives at all: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21935706](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21935706) (Actually, that might even be the only public controversy about them. The Damore stuff was more about recruitment if I remember rightly.)

</comment><comment><USER12> Turns out we were all right about James Damore. He was being endlessly catered to and didn't even know it.</comment>


Edward Snowden: It's Only Getting Better (HITRECORD X ACLU) [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysCQfx-UEpA <comment><USER2> That was surprisingly uplifting, I guess I have associated Snowden to doom and gloom as most things I read with his name attached make me feel worse about things in general, mostly in regards to the truth hurting.</comment>


Google and blogs: "Shit." - <AUTHOR> http://www.marco.org/2015/02/16/google-and-blogs-shit

<comment><USER2> > Everyone's spending increasingly more consumption time dicking around in > apps and snacking on bite-sized social content instead of browsing websites > and searching Google.

True, but Google makes it very hard to find interesting websites. Search for just about any given topic and finding a website from an enthusiast and not a corporate entity is like searching for a needle in a haystack. The indie web might exist but it's buried under a pile of SEO garbage.

</comment><comment><USER3> I've had a blog since 1999 and it was the #1 google result for my name, now it's at the bottom of the first page and the first results are from people sharing the name from IMDB, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.

<comment><USER4> By design. Plus recall google got slapped for highlighting blogs with their own adwords service attached.

<comment><USER3> I know they are doing it on purpose although it doesn't seem like a good algorithm to me. (Also I never had any ads on my blog).</comment></comment></comment>


Why Are Human Teeth So Messed Up? - <AUTHOR> https://aeon.co/ideas/its-not-that-your-teeth-are-too-big-your-jaw-is-too-small <comment><USER2> It always struck me as funny that if you want to get into Medicine you can either do the normal MD course that covers 95% of the body (obviously, you may be able to specialize much later on) OR you can do the other 5% as a Dentist (and again, you may chose to specialize later).

Teeth suck, I'm hanging out for "I can't believe they're not teeth" implants so I can stop worrying about the damn things.

<comment><USER3> I have an "I can't believe it's not a tooth" implant, after I lost a front tooth when I crashed a tiny motorcycle.

They drilled a hole in my jaw, beefed it up with a "cadaver bone" from a pig, threaded a titanium bolt into the hole, and then threaded a tooth-lookalike into the titanium bolt.

The installation is a bit... industrial, but you'd never know it wasn't a real tooth. It cost £3,000 though.

<comment><USER2> Neato, from a 'user' perspective how is it? Does it feel or work any different to a usual tooth?

<comment><USER3> Just like a normal tooth, except the surrounding part of my mouth is a little "bulkier" at the back where the cadaver bone was placed.

No complaints at all.

<comment><USER2> Interesting! Thanks for the info though, always been something I found quite interesting

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Semi-related: When I was in the canyons of New Mexico learning about various tribes and their lifestyles, I learned that many died from tooth-related infections. This is because the mortars they used were made from softer stone that crumbled in the grinding process (when they grind maize). These tiny pieces of stone essentially ground down their teeth.

If I remember correctly, because of this their average lifespan was just over 30 yrs.

<comment><USER5> Most people using stone grinding wheels throughout history has the same issue, from the beginning of farming up until a couple hundred years ago in Europe say. Archeologists use the amount of wear on a skeletons teeth to determine their age quite accurately.

<comment><USER6> This is also part of why white bread was historically considered healthier - removing the wheat germ and bran kind of faked the look of stone-grain-free bread.

<comment><USER7> Would you happen to have a reference on that?

<comment><USER8> A quick Google Books search found,

      Tosefta Berachot: Translated Into English with a Commentary

      https://books.google.com/books?id=ronqNAPipaEC&pg=PA189

<comment><USER8> Ah, an even better reference, from 1906, which also mentions teeth.

      Lieut.-Colonel Allan Cunningham desired to contrast the
      highly scientific process of grinding in use at the present
      day in all civilised counties with the unscientific process
      of grinding on a very large scale amongst the huge
      population of North-West India, which was essentially a
      wheat-eating population. The wheat was ground there in hand
      stone mills; the grinding was coarse, and separation of the
      bran very imperfect, there being a good deal of bran in the
      so-called flour. The bread was unleavened bread, whereas the
      bread eaten in this country was leavened bread, which made
      in immense difference in its effect on the constitution. The
      native flour was simply kneaded with water, and quickly
      heated over a griddle. With the addition of a little milk,
      butter, and salt, that was the staple food of the
      population.  The effect of the diet was that the population
      were inferior on the whole in physique to Europeans, but it
      must remembered that they did not have a varied diet. The
      people had extremely beautiful teeth which they carefully
      cleaned. One very curious effect, which was always ascribed
      to the eating of the native ground what, was that the
      natives were extraordinarily subject to stone, even little
      children frequently having bigs stones in the bladder.

      Journal of the Society of Arts, December 21, 1906.

      https://books.google.com/books?id=DfpFAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA127

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The standard approach to orthodontics is to extract teeth to make room and then move the remaining teeth into place. There is an alternative approach which involves enlarging the jaw, either through expanders, surgery or a combination of both.

Unfortunately this is an area where the patient or parent often has to make the decision because specialists only know about what they do. As a related example, I asked a dentist and an orthodontist what was more suitable for me, Invisalign or braces. They could each tell me about the time and likely result of their own specialty, but refused to offer any opinion on what was better for me and my situation.

Somewhat related, there was an interesting article about the wildly different advice given to someone who visited 50 different dentists [1].

Bottom line is seek out multiple opinions and don't expect someone else to guide you on the bigger picture.

[1] [https://www.dentistat.com/ReaderDigestArticle.pdf](https://www.dentistat.com/ReaderDigestArticle.pdf)

<comment><USER10> There's a larger truth hidden in here: experts disagree. It was one of the things that took me by surprise when building Machine Learning systems, but it makes sense if you think about it. For all but the most trivial matters, it's the job of the expert to exercise personal judgement. It's why they're experts, not because they have a solid understanding of the "knowns", but because they have developed methods and intuitions about the "unknowns". Ask 10 different experts a complex question in their field of interest, and you'll likely get widely varying answers. My guess is that it also played a role in the early expert systems AI bust (AI winter). There are interesting papers published about this as well, e.g. [http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0951832007...](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0951832007001007) the money shot is in this chart [http://imgur.com/a/shaii](http://imgur.com/a/shaii) but you'll see similar distributions everywhere where expert judgement is warranted.

<comment><USER11> There is a corollary prediction: AIs will disagree.

Too many people imagine AIs are somehow "perfectly rational" and therefore will never disagree, they'll just tap into a unified decision making engine and automatically integrate all of their knowledge.

In order to integrate knowledge you need more knowledge. And in order to integrate that you need more still. It's turtles all the way down. If anything, AIs are at a disadvantage to humans, because we at least share a body, an emotional palette, and to some extent a cultural timeline. AIs have nothing to ground the beliefs of the other in.

<comment><USER12> If AI is to agree they need all the facts. And as we keep adding facts almost daily, there is simply no chance that the AI will have all the facts.

We like to think of logic as 1+1=2. But logic is more like A+B-C*D/E=F. Where any number of those being either completely unknown (we sometimes do not even know we are missing them), or some wide range of potential values.

<comment><USER11> You need a third model to map facts from one model into facts in another model. Doesn't really solve the problem.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I'm going to take this moment to rant at dentists!

Going to the doctor they get the excuse that they rarely do anything that could possibly hurt. Dentists on the other hand are practically doing minor surgery every time you visit them.

I know many of you will never have had any bad experiences at the dentist but I've had tons and what's extremely frustrating is many of them are preventable but dentists seem to have almost zero standards.

Examples:

Lukewarm water please. Many dentists just have tap water (maybe filtered) squirting into your mouth for rinsing. If that water happens to be cold gawd help you if you have a cold sensitive spot.

Similarly they have that suction hose which creates a draft. A draft that can cool sensitive teeth to the point they scream in pain.

One of the last dentists I went to connected something to my right cheek of my mount the hold it open. He'd turn around in his chair to get something behind him and yank my head off the headrest.

Another dentist I went to recently started cleaning my teeth. It felt like she was taking an ice pick and stabbing my gums. Needs to say I stopped her after about 30 seconds and left.

Went to a dentist that was supposed to specialize in painless-ness. He didn't have any kind of topical to numb you gums before injecting the anaesthetic. Not that it helps. It always burns like crazy when they inject that stuff for me. It does eventually make that part of my mouth numb though often not numb enough so when they get deep and they have to do it again.

When they hit pay dirt it feels like someone took a 6 inch white hot nail and using a hammer pounded it 4 inches deep into my head. The pain is searing. I'm not exaggerating. On a scale of 1 to 10 it's a 45 in pain.

I have lots more horror stories. And yes I brush twice a day, floss, and do other things to maintain my teeth. My teeth aren't normally painful but every visit to the dentist is hugely scary for me.

Someone __PLEASE __fix dentistry.

<comment><USER14> I don't actually agree with your examples but I wanted to add one of my own.

I went to a dentist complaining of sensitive teeth. He identified the problem as small cavities caused by chewing in my sleep, drilled them out, and added fillings.

A few months later those fillings fell out and I went to another dentist to get them replaced.

"You've had large holes drilled on top of your teeth so I'll have to replace them, but these fillings were totally unneccesary. If you get sensitivity like that again, just use a sensitive toothpaste. With your chewing you'll lose these fillings after about a year, and each time we'll need to drill out a little more, until by the time you are 40 you'll lose the teeth"

<comment><USER15> Chewing in your sleep (or even when awake), called Bruxism, is extremely common for many people in stress causing professions. eg probably many people here

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

Did your dentist discuss getting a mouth guard/splint to wear at night?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruxism#Dental_guards_and_occl...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruxism#Dental_guards_and_occlusal_splints)

Asking because that's what I went with, and for me it works well. Without it when I wake up I feel as if I've not slept all (very unrested), with it I can actually feel rested after sleep.

That's only during stressful times though. ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Stephan Guyenet had a series of blog posts called "Malocclusion: Disease of Civilization" on dental health. As I remember, as usual, decline in dental health was linked to moving away from traditional diets. The problem with teeth "overcrowding" was linked, basically, to not chewing enough of tough foods. People that ate plenty of tough foods as part of their diets had better developed jaws and space enough for all their teeth.

[http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.dk/search/label/dental%20h...](http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.dk/search/label/dental%20health)

<comment><USER17> How about people who chew on gum all day?

<comment><USER18> As usual, too much of anything is bad for you. Chewing gum all day leads to many other (severe) issues.

<comment><USER19> Don't chew all day = have one set of problems

Chew all day = another set of problems

We can't win, can we?

<comment><USER20> For many human movements, the relation between intensity and injury is a u-curve with high risk at extremely low intensity (atrophy) and extremely high intensity (overuse/repetitive strain), and low risk at moderate intensity.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> This dentist Dr. Palmer (who died a few years back) had a theory that breastfeeding is of crucial importance in shaping the jaw, [http://www.brianpalmerdds.com/summary.htm](http://www.brianpalmerdds.com/summary.htm) though I've seen some theorizing elsewhere that nutrient deficiency might also be a cause (in addition to the theory from TFA about chewing hard foods).

<comment><USER22> I might add that the shape of the baby bottle nipple is crucially important for correct development of the palate as well.

I only know of the german company NUK making these. They are recommended by orthodontists. More info here: [https://www.nuk.de/de_en/about-nuk/nuk- concepts/the-nuk-shap...](https://www.nuk.de/de_en/about-nuk/nuk-concepts/the- nuk-shape.html)

Also available in the US: [http://www.nuk-usa.com/orthodontic- pacifier/orthodontic-paci...](http://www.nuk-usa.com/orthodontic- pacifier/orthodontic-pacifier.html)

<comment><USER23> NSFW warning, autoplaying breast-feeding video with audio. ;)

<comment><USER24> Ugh, that's disgusting. Who in their right mind wants auto-playing video with audio?

<comment><USER25> I know HN isn't the place for jokes, but this one genuinely made me chuckle.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Why does the author's wife think that chewing meat causes choking? This seems like a rather bizarre belief - does this have any basis in reality? If anything I'd think that learning to chew your food well from a young age would make you less likely to choke. (and more likely to moderate your food intake)

It seem like the equivalent of "don't let them walk, they will just fall and get a concussion"

<comment><USER27> Do you have kids? Everybody thinks everything causes choking. People stop you on the street to tell you how to feed your toddlers. Grapes were particularly suspect in our neighborhood. People cut them in half, believing it was safer.

You are right, I'm sure, about chewing being important to learn; and it would have to be a tiny piece in order for it to be hard to choke on it, anyway, so cutting it small certainly won't usually help.

<comment><USER28> Well, grapes do cause choking in young kids. Just the right size to wedge in the airway. But yeah I'm sure many warnings are overdone.

<comment><USER27> I don't doubt it! I just can't imagine that half a grape is safer than a whole grape for small kids.

<comment><USER28> A half is _much safer_ because the skin is split.

The whole reason that grapes are dangerous for small kids is that the throat can't break the skin.

Of course, better to tell them to bite first.

I cringe a bit when I see people do the throwing the grape in the air and catch it in their mouths.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> When I see old human skeletons always wonder how they kept their teeth so good. Without toothpaste, toothbrush or floss. What are we doing wrong?

<comment><USER30> There's evidence that cleaning with toothpaste is no better than cleaning with water alone (keyword for search "dentifrice": [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27513809](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27513809)

There's evidence that plant root fiber toothbrushes are at least as good as nylon bristle toothbrushes (keywords for search "miswak", "chewing stick"), eg: [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15643758](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15643758) (in my personal experience they work just fine, but they are more hassle than nylon toothbrushes because the bristles point in the same direction as the handle instead of to the side)

There's also evidence that flossing+brushing has no advantage over brushing alone: [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19138178](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19138178)

Of course, medical research is notoriously unreliable, but it's at least plausible that ancient humans had all the technology needed to keep their teeth in good condition.

<comment><USER31> Also, they didn't have refined sugar in their diet.

<comment><USER32> Id say this is the most important part.The sugar epidemic of our age is pretty crazy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I had to get my front molars and wisdom teeth removed to make room in my jaw (got braces, all good)

Saw the x-ray of my wisdoms. The tops were facing my front teeth, ie 90 degrees rotated

<comment><USER34> I have the same issue with my wisdoms. Seems to be a common thing. Weird.

Was it painful to remove wisdoms?

<comment><USER35> Wisdom teeth spread their roots the older they get.

Basically the roots look like this at first || and after they get settled in, they're more like this: _/\\_ and at that point getting them out WILL suck.

So if you have any family history of your wisdom teeth being f'd up, get them removed as soon as possible. My top two wisdom teeth were out before I even noticed the dentist was doing anything.

Then I got stupid and chickened out, waited too long, and the bottom ones were an hour each to dig out piece by piece. Not fun.

<comment><USER36> I had the opposite problem: they were still very low down when they started impacting the other teeth, and as a result they were still rooted in the cranial nerve. I had to wait longer for them to grow out further and impact even harder before I could get them taken out without high risk of facial paralysis. As it was I still lost feeling in one half of my tongue.

<comment><USER37> And you still have lost feeling? Do you bite it a lot?

<comment><USER36> It was worse in the beginning, now it is more like the front-left 1/3 is numb. No, I don't really bite it. It made speaking in the beginning difficult, but I've learned how to work around it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> I wonder what else might be going wrong with our bodies as a result of our childhood habits. For instance, are my hips genetically shallow or did I spend too little time outside running about as a kid?

<comment><USER39> What do you big toes look like? Do they line up with the Extensor Hallucis Longus Tendon, the major ridge the runs along the interior of the top of your foot, or do they curve inward?

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> This is interesting. Teeth are of pretermined shape and size to fit the jaw, or the jaw the teeth "assume" will be there. The jaw's shape and size is determined by what/how you eat. For humans with a "traditional" diet, that assumption is correct. For us, it isn't.

This is very specific to humans though, and the specific problem of "overcrowded" mouths. But teeth have other issues, and in other species too. For many animals, teeth are the thing that fails at old age effectively capping lifespan.

</comment><comment><USER41> I'd like to know what are the "[f]or adults, surgical options for stimulating bone growth are gaining momentum, too, and can lead to shorter treatment times." .. referred to in the third-to-last paragraph? Is this something more than breaking the jaw and extending it like is sometimes done with legs to treat severe growth problems?

<comment><USER25> That was always the recommendation I got, even as a teenager pre-braces. In the end, my parents opted for braces, which I had to wear twice for a total of 9 years. In the end, my 4 lower front teeth lost bone, so they were dangerously loose. I had a massive retainer to keep them stable for about 6 years. Last year, I finally had them removed and replaced with implants and crowns. I am much happier now, but it took over 15 years of pain, and roughly $30k. I have an expensive mouth.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> I remember talking to an army recruiter at school when I was about 14 - not to recruit us, but to show how "cool" a career in the military could be, in case book-lernin didn't work out. Anyhow, the one thing I remember him saying is in boot camp they were made to chew every bite of food 50 times. The drill sergeant would count and punish anyone who swallowed before they got to fifty.

Fast-forward 30 years and I STILL continue to chew my food an inordinate number of times because of that one interaction. However, I've never been able to verify whether or not he was pulling my leg. I don't have a particularly large jaw, but I have noticed (anecdotally, of course) that I have fewer stomach issues than my peers who tend to chew-chew-gulp everything.

<comment><USER43> My mum's number was 32, which meant early on (age 3) I learnt binary halving to know if I was a quarter done, halfway done, etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> when to start giving babies beef jerky

</comment><comment><USER20> Sidenote: I recently finished reading _The Story of the Human Body_ by Daniel Lieberman, in which he addresses this issue (among many others). The book is absolutely fantastic, an engaging, highly-readable page-turner packed with insights and epiphanies about how we can think about contemporary challenges from an evolutionary perspective.

</comment><comment><USER3> It has always amazed me that teeth have such a high failure rate when they contain 0 moving parts. There's also no biological or chemical processes that need to happen. They're literally just an inanimate object that you use for biting. How can they be so unreliable??

<comment><USER40> Teeth themselves maybe, but that's kind of like saying a drill bit is inanimate without moving parts.

<comment><USER3> But it's not the jaw that fails... it's the teeth, or the tooth-jaw interface. Neither of which have any moving parts!

<comment><USER45> Drill bits break much more often than drills themselves do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Is there any recomendation of chewing exercices for children? duration, frequency and a chewing "device" (it could be a specially tough vegetable too).

I guess a couple of minutes of strong chewing before each meal could improve the growth of the jaw in small kids.

</comment><comment><USER47> If you want a more simplistic overview of the cause of cavities, this seemed to be quite accessible. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtdwHR7Fpyo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtdwHR7Fpyo)

</comment><comment><USER48> Can this really be true? Is there any science on this beyond a blog post?

<comment><USER49> There are literally links to scientific research in the article.

This isn't an opinion piece. The author is a researcher in the field.

<comment><USER48> Thanks, couldn't see the links on my phone but re-opened on computer (I was quite surprised by your response -- thanks!) and there they were.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Just had two wisdom teeth out last week. I hadnt been to the dentist in years and years (my old dentist died years ago) I went to a new one because of some pain, turns out one of my lower wisdom teeth was burrowing into the molar in front of it and causing a cavity under the gum which was the source of the pain. Now I need to see if I can get that cavity fixed, or else have that molar pulled too.

</comment><comment><USER50> Blogspam of

[https://aeon.co/ideas/its-not-that-your-teeth-are-too-big- yo...](https://aeon.co/ideas/its-not-that-your-teeth-are-too-big-your-jaw-is- too-small)

<comment><USER51> What is "blogspam"? New to HN, and trying to maintain good posting etiquette. I posted the same link from sapiens.org a while back.

<comment><USER50> Using "blogspam" in this context was inappropriately harsh, and I apologize.

But when submitting to HN one should use _original sources_ wherever possible. In this case, the original source was stated right in the opening of the article.

True blogspam is when blogs (sometimes, even entire sites), trolling for clicks and presentations, copy content and/or misdirect readers for the purpose of garnering undeserved presentations.

Some of these even misroute you to malware using URL shorteners. There is no legitimate reason to use URL shorteners here.

<comment><USER51> Got it. Thanks for the clarification:)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Pervasive functional translation of noncanonical human open reading frames - <AUTHOR> https://science.sciencemag.org/content/367/6482/1140 <comment><AUTHOR> [https://sci-hub.tw/10.1126/science.aay0262](https://sci- hub.tw/10.1126/science.aay0262)</comment>


Picolibc – Libc for Embedded Systems - <AUTHOR> https://keithp.com/blogs/picolibc/ <comment><USER2> I wish we could do away with (parts of) libc entirely. Many of its design principles and limitations date back to its inception and don't make sense today, even on "embedded" systems.

\- function names limited to 6 characters (because of compiler/linker memory limits at the time?)

\- non-reentrency of many functions (strtok(), errno...)

\- dangerous string manipulation functions (see the various iterations of strcpy())

\- and so much more...

Of course, I'm missing the point. Libc continues on because it's standard and backwards-compatible, and lets you leverage 50 years of software ecosystem.

Nevertheless, I'd love to see what a modern clean-slate implementation might look like. I'm sure there'd be much disagreement about what warrants replacement and what doesn't ;)

<comment><USER3> > I'm sure there'd be much disagreement about what warrants replacement and > what doesn't ;

How many backwards incompatible variations of C++ std::string have there been, simply in terms of the standard (not extensions). Two? Three?

glibc has been turning their nose up at strlcpy(3) for literally 20 years, and yet _still_ doesn't provide a comparable one-liner alternative that guarantees to always leave a NUL-terminated string behind (i.e. doesn't leave a loaded gun lying around).

A good string interface is impossible to pin down because a "string" is the anti-thesis of a proper data structure. C dipped its toes in the better string library waters with Annex K, which saw almost no uptake; even the original sponsor, Microsoft, never shipped a complete implementation. C would be wise to avoid chasing the mirage of a better string library. In general if you're thinking in terms of "strings", C is the wrong language. C being an inconvenient language for programming with that mindset is a good thing.

(I would love to see strlcpy added, but the fact it's so divisive is maybe a strong hint that there's no way to placate a substantial minority of people, not even the most pragmatic of users. Anything involving the str* API is a lose-lose at this point.)

What C really needs are some primitives for bounded arrays and slices. There are some very good, very simple proposals out there, but no compiler vendor has actually shipped them and the C committee has been burned several times before by standardizing de novo interfaces.

<comment><USER4> Regarding strlcpy and co [https://developers.redhat.com/blog/2019/08/12/efficient- stri...](https://developers.redhat.com/blog/2019/08/12/efficient-string- copying-and-concatenation-in-c/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> If you missed it, this is from Keith Packard, big-time X Window System developer.

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

</comment><comment><USER6> The biggest news is probably the fact that it's BSD licensed. Having some GPL parts had driven me away from newlib before.

<comment><USER7> If I were in the market for such a library, I'd still have serious concerns. The GPL license still appears in the root of the repo as if the entire codebase might be subject to GPL; It appears to be a fork of newlib (GPL) and that means it might not qualify as a "clean room implementation" of GPL'd code - the legal team in a corporation is going to insist on a ton of due diligence on Picolibc before they allow it to be used.

<comment><USER8> Quoting the README:

> Remove[d] unused code with non-BSD licenses. There's still a pile of unused > code hanging around, but all non-BSD licensed bits have been removed to make > the licensing situation clear. Picolibc is BSD licensed.

From my understanding, Newlib is a GPL-licensed _project_ that has some GPL- licensed _contributions_ and some BSD-licensed _contributions_ (in the sense that these aren't original code written by contributors, but rather are copy- and-paste inclusions of pieces from various GPL- and BSD-licensed codebases.)

The author created Picolibc by (doing the moral equivalent of) cherry-picking out a small base of the commits to Newlib—all of which were copy-and-pastes from BSD-licensed codebases.

\---

In some sense, Newlib is very similar to how a Linux distro works, repackaging upstream code components (of various licenses) together.

Picolibc, then, would be a lot like creating a new Linux distro, derived "from" Ubuntu, that happens to use only the packages in Ubuntu that are themselves directly copied in from upstream Debian (pretending for a moment that Ubuntu does this rather than re-signing packages with their own keys.) Is such a distro really "derived from Ubuntu"? Or is it derived "from" Debian, with an Ubuntu mirror server just serving as a pipe that some _Debian_ packages went through on their trip "from" Debian's hands "into" the hands of the new distro?

\---

Either way, worries that the GPL could infect this effort are misplaced—even if it comes to a legal battle, at any point, the same codebase could be recreated (with a bit of a schlep) by just going to all the same BSD-licensed upstream sources that Newlib's contributors pulled from, and doing the same copy-and-pasting that Newlib's contributors did.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Most of the big chip vendors provide a libc implementation along with the proprietary compilers that they maintain for their chips. On the TI MSP430, I've had some projects that were too big to fit into flash if I used the libc (newlib) that's bundled with the open source MSP430-GCC compiler[1]. By contrast, if I compiled with the proprietary TI compiler[2] and its libc, the binary was small enough to fit. My experience is a bit dated at this point, so newlib and the GCC fork may have improved enough to reach parity by now.

The dominance of GCC and LLVM on x86[-64] machines has conditioned many of us to take great open source build toolchains for granted, but embedded systems are comparatively the wild west - there are still a lot of proprietary build toolchains out there. Obviously this is a negative if you're committed to using open source tools, but one positive is that it's a niche where companies can still make money selling compilers (and therefore employing engineers who work on compilers).

[1] [http://www.ti.com/tool/MSP430-GCC- OPENSOURCE](http://www.ti.com/tool/MSP430-GCC-OPENSOURCE)

[2] [http://www.ti.com/tool/MSP-CGT](http://www.ti.com/tool/MSP-CGT)

</comment><comment><USER10> This is an excellent libc for embedded systems. I am looking to add it to a self hosted tcc (Bellard's C compiler) on ARM Cortex-M systems.

</comment><comment><USER11> An interesting non-free alternative is the SEGGER Runtime Library [1] which works with GCC, but with smaller code size than newlib-nano and significantly faster floating point emulation [2] for processors like the Cortex M3 or RISCV wih no FPU. It would be interesting to see if newlib-nano or picolibc could use these tricks.

[1] [https://www.segger.com/products/development-tools/runtime- li...](https://www.segger.com/products/development-tools/runtime-library/) [2] [https://blog.segger.com/floating-point-face- off/](https://blog.segger.com/floating-point-face-off/)

</comment><comment><USER12> Looks like it can save a good chunk of memory compared to newlib: [https://github.com/RIOT-OS/RIOT/pull/12305](https://github.com/RIOT- OS/RIOT/pull/12305)

</comment><comment><USER13> I didn't see this addressed in the post, but why not musl?

<comment><USER14> For what it's worth: musl is much larger than newlib-nano or picolibc. Most of the embedded projects I've worked on could not afford to use musl.

<comment><USER15> So the inverse--could an OS distribution like alpine profit from using picolib instead of musl? What would be the tradeoffs (presumably performance for size, but to what degree)?

<comment><USER16> Along with performance, there's probably other ABI issues and maybe even API extensions to the C library that just aren't present in these tiny implementations. You can work around the ABI stuff by recompiling with the new c library of course, but that won't work if you've got a closed source binary or if the software needs something not provided.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Needs to have a strong overlap with WASI.

<comment><USER18> Why?</comment></comment>


IdeaStorm Forces Dell Once Again, This Time to Bring Windows XP Back - <AUTHOR> http://startupmeme.com/2007/04/19/ideastorm-forces-dell-once-again-this-time-to-bring-windows-xp-back/ <comment><USER2> I wonder what recently happened within Dell management that has caused them suddenly to start listening to their customers.</comment>