Google and Microsoft fight hotels' attempts to block personal WiFi - <AUTHOR> http://www.engadget.com/2014/12/23/tech-business-fights-hotel-attempts-to-block-personal-wifi/?ncid=rss_truncated <comment><AUTHOR> I have a question. People will use the USB or bluetooth tethering if this happens then what is the purpose of doing this?</comment>


British Students Attack Prince Charles After College Tuition Hike Vote Passes - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-12-09/cameron-coalition-set-to-face-first-test-as-lawmakers-vote-on-student-fees.html

<comment><USER2> I really don't understand this sense of entitlement these European protesters seem to have.

<comment><USER3> I really don't understand why people should sit by idly as wealth is transferred from those who don't have to those who have plenty.

<comment><USER4> I agree. Which is why I think higher tuition fees -- or, in other words, and end to subsidized postsecondary education -- is a good idea. Remember, _those who don't have_ are the ~50% of the population who don't go to postsecondary education.

(And don't try to claim that this is because they can't afford the associated costs; studies have repeatedly found that the costs of higher education are a very very minor factor in determining students' postsecondary attendance. The largest determining factor, by far, is the educational qualifications of students' parents.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I guess they ran out of cake.

<comment><USER6> <snicker></comment></comment>


Amazon Halo will charge a subscription fee to monitor the tone of your voice - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/08/amazon-halo-will-charge-a-subscription-fee-to-monitor-the-tone-of-your-voice/ <comment><AUTHOR> They claim all voice processing will be done on device and no processing will be done via the cloud. So why are they charging a monthly fee in addition to the hardware purchase price?

Also... it's it kind of weird for Amazon to have a timeline of my mood at all times?</comment>


A radio frequency exposure test finds an iPhone 11 Pro exceeds the FCC's limit - <AUTHOR> https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/telecom/wireless/radio-frequency-exposure-test-iphone-11-pro-double-fcc-limits <comment><USER2> _Testing phones from 5 millimeters away from the body may seem close, but for anyone carrying their phone in a pocket, the distance is closer to 2 millimeters. Because wireless power falls off exponentially with distance, what might be a safe amount of RF exposure at 5 millimeters could be much higher at 2 millimeters._

They mean to say that you should expect a power about 6 times higher, (5^2 / 2^2). This is rubbish.

The square of the distance model is for a pair of points. Phones in pockets at such closed distances are more closely modeled by a pair of infinite planes where the power falls off not at all. The real result will be in between, but very much closer to 1 than 6.

<comment><USER3> Well you are in the reactive near-field, so the antenna will de-tune, hence the power amplifier won't see it's ideal match, and not deliver as much power. All depends on antenna design and orientation, assuming they don't use active impedance tuning.

The base station also tells the phone to back-off. If the TX were running at full power, the battery will die quickly. Leave your phone in a metal, security cubby and your battery will die quickly; no power control and worse- case antenna loading.

Also the highly asymmetric data usage these days. Very little energy on the uplink.

FWIW I design antennas and amplifiers for a living. The only time I'd worry about RF exposure is to the cornea; that is a proven hazard. RF burns are a right of passage for PA designers, and are harmless as it's the outer skin layers.

<comment><USER4> > RF burns are a right of passage for PA designers, and are harmless as it's > the outer skin layers.

A literal example of skin effect?

<comment><USER3> Yep. Put your finger on the corner of the output coupling cap on a 50 Watt S-band PA. It will turn your skin black from the charring, but doesn't penetrate into the live tissue. Just don't leave it on too long.

Could probably gives non-permanent tattoos with this method.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > The SAR limit is primarily concerned with a phone's thermal > effects—essentially, the power is limited to 1.6 W/kg to ensure that no one > is burned by using their phone.

I should be worried about the heat generated from my phone? I thought maybe there was some issue with RF and my cells, but this seems like a complete nonissue to me. Am I being foolish for writing this off? The only time my phone is going to burn me is if the battery explodes, which doesn't seem to be a pervasive issue. So probably not. As someone else pointed out this is a marketing ploy.

<comment><USER6> Some people do believe that non ionizing radiation has effects other than those produced by the added thermal energy (or that the thermal effects are in some way significant). The actual scientific evidence for this is minimal though.

<comment><USER7> [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4676010/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4676010/)

Essentially EM fields alternating in the low to medium frequency bands (~100khz-1mhz) can disrupt cell processes by physically jiggling the polar molecules that make up portions of miotic spindles/microtubules. Among presumably other things this effect is being investigated as a cancer fighting mechanism called 'tumor treating fields'.

The carrier frequency of mobile phones is obviously far beyond the range in question, but there could be signal modulation components that alternate RF power levels in this frequency range.

<comment><USER8> If your phone emits any non-trivial amounts of RF power at 100 kHz-1MHz frequencies, regardless of whether this comes from intermodulation products or something else, it doesn't pass existing EMC regulations and can't be legally sold to consumers.

This is something that is already (or should be, in theory) rigorously tested for everything that's put on the consumer market (from your cheapest USB charger to your iPhone).

<comment><USER9> Not a given if said USB charger is cheaply produced in China.

<comment><USER8> Yes, you can debate how much imported (or for that matter, domestically produced) stuff is actually tested, but the fact remains that existing laws and regulations do cover this, even if enforcement is maybe lacking.

<comment><USER9> I'm an ham radio operator, and shortwave spectrum pollution is sadly a big problem despite very strict regulations.

The unfortunate reality is that the market is flooded with noisy devices, often cheaply produces overseas, that vastly exceed legal limits (chargers and other rectifiers, plasma televisions, powerline adapters, and much more).

Enforcement is difficult due to how widespread these devices are.

In many places, the noise floor is to high that long-range shortwave radio communications all but impossible.

<comment><USER10> I think police cars should measure it.

<comment><USER9> It can take hours to pinpoint the location of a specific transmitter with skilled equipment operators.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This an advertisement for their RF phone cases. In the article the premise is refuted.

<comment><USER12> > This an advertisement for their RF phone cases

This is on ieee.org. The article mentioned this[1] other test by the Chicago Tribune. This isn't purely an advertisement though it serves that purpose a bit.

It's disputed because they only tested 2 iPhones.

> There are reasons to take the results with a grain of salt, however. > McCaughey clarified that Penumbra supplied RF Exposure Labs with one iPhone > 7 and one iPhone 11 Pro for the tests—phones the company had purchased off > the shelf. He attributed not testing more phones to the cost of purchasing > multiple iPhones

This is also important:

> More notably, when the FCC conducted a follow-up investigation after the > Tribune published its story, the agency did not find evidence that any of > the phones exceeded SAR limits. That said, while the Tribune and Penumbra > both used off-the-shelf phones, the FCC largely tested phones supplied by > the manufacturers, including Apple.

It raises the question whether Apple and others supplied the FCC with phones that are different from what they sell.

[1] [https://www.chicagotribune.com/investigations/ct-cell- phone-...](https://www.chicagotribune.com/investigations/ct-cell-phone- radiation-testing-20190821-72qgu4nzlfda5kyuhteiieh4da-story.html)

<comment><USER13> A lot of these smartphones go through imperical tests in an anechoic chamber managed by a third party lab to see if they're bellow the allowed levels in each band. That sounds hackish but (IMO) isn't the end of the world.

What weirds me out is that they'll send them to these third party labs and repeatedly test some small number (possibly one) of devices until it's right up against what's allowed. _That_ feels less than scientific and probably wrong although I'm not sure what I'd change.

<comment><USER14> The "conspiracy" portion of my brain makes me wonder if it's possible that Apple phones have lower power levels if the location services determines that the phone is in a location with a known anechoic chamber. There can't be that many of them.

Such behavior has already been shown by automobile manufacturers during the "diesel-gate" incidents.

<comment><USER13> You don't have to do that, usually you'll run special test firmware on the device and say that this behaves appropriately (I've done this for other companies)

Remember that this is fundamentally a legal/social thing that involves engineering/science and not the other way around.

<comment><USER15> Right, you're supposed to test to the worst case and you get to define "worst case." Cheating would be as simple as defining a favorable "worst case."

Before the tin-foil crowd calls regulators stupid, I'd like to point out that in the absence of cheating this allows hardware engineers to do a better job & design a system that is robust to software shenanigans. That's a nice thing. Maybe we cannot have nice things, but if so, let's prove it rather than presuppose it.

I'd estimate the likelihood of cheating by looking to see if people are choosing phones on the basis of EIRP the way they choose cars based on MPG. I don't see that happening, so I estimate that the likelihood of cheating is low, and would vote to keep the cooperative model around.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> If the only possible negative effect is "burns", then it's easy to verify that people all over the world aren't getting burned by their phones, no? Testing and standards are still important, but it doesn't sound like there's some nefarious hidden effect we may just not know about.

</comment><comment><USER17> > That said, while the Tribune and Penumbra both used off-the-shelf phones, > the FCC largely tested phones supplied by the manufacturers, including > Apple.

This speaks to a method that can be used to game the system. What prevents manufacturers from providing phones that are somehow different from the off the shelf versions? I'm not suggesting that's happening here. Just that the testing process is easily hacked.

<comment><USER18> The manufacturer needs the phone certified in advance of shelf stocking.

There is nothing stopping the FCC from confirming their test results with retail units. Plus, the risk from cheating is enormous. It's a lot easier in the long run to just design properly working phones.

<comment><USER19> It didn't turn out to be easier to design a clean burning diesel.

<comment><USER20> VW (and others, historically) didn't make special vehicles to pass the test; all of their vehicles would be expected to pass the test as administered on a dynamometer and fail the test if administered on a road.

Designing to the test is different than carefully selecting (or altering) a sample that passes the test.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> To everyone who keeps repeating "it's non-ionizing radiation, so any other effect than thermal is impossible":

1\. saying something is impossible is not a scientific statement

2\. RF is capable of specifically affecting enzyme reactions, random example: [https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2014/nr/c4nr0...](https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2014/nr/c4nr00407h#!divAbstract)

<comment><USER22> This ignores the primary issue of needing empirical evidence before claiming discovery. If non-ionizing radiation of a certain level is hazardous then it is provable. Affecting enzyme reactions is an observed effect, but what is the health risk?

<comment><USER21> We don't know yet, so.. better safe than sorry, no?

<comment><USER23> Imagine if we said this about the food that comes out of every new restaurant.

Risk management is more than just universal risk aversion.

<comment><USER21> Yes, at least in my country, every restaurant is subject to stringent hygiene regulations and audits. Is it a problem for you?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Are they talking about the radiation from the Wi-Fi or cell radios? I would think that modern phones have very low duty cycles on those radios. The other radiation, e.g. from the clocking of the circuits should be extremely low, otherwise our batteries wouldn't last so long.

<comment><USER25> Cell radios. The wifi is much lower wattage than cellular so its effects will be marginal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I suspect this has something to do with the inferior intel modem that was used during the Qualcomm debacle. One of the main advantages of the next iPhone will be returning to a Qualcomm modem that isn't rubbish.

<comment><USER13> While I'm not a fan of what apple did it's a bit disturbing that there's literally just one company making cellular modems for US devices and that this company is really very hostile to users and device manufacturers.

<comment><USER27> [https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/302712-mediatek- announce...](https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/302712-mediatek-announces- dimensity-1000-arm-chip-with-integrated-5g-modem)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> I was confused by the "3.8W/kg" number. This Chi Trib article helped: it details "the federal safety limit, which is 1.6 watts per kilogram averaged over one gram of tissue." and explains how a former Qualcomm engineer did the testing.

[0] [https://www.chicagotribune.com/investigations/ct-cell- phone-...](https://www.chicagotribune.com/investigations/ct-cell-phone- radiation-testing-20190821-72qgu4nzlfda5kyuhteiieh4da- story.html#nt=interstitial-manual)

</comment><comment><USER29> I have posted this in the previous post that came up about this but I am quite concerned that the idustry may be currently self certifing its devices and getting phones past FCC regulations that do not meet the requirements just like Boeing and the FAA. We need proper funding for the FCC so they can do that job and not some industry paid company with a conflict of intrest.

</comment><comment><USER30> In my case the phone has never been in my pocket while in use. The phone may occasionally ping the cell tower. Otherwise it is just listening in standby mode, in plain words, not transmitting. The premise of the article is weak. In my opinion the article was not suitably vetted by _Spectrum_.

<comment> kube-system Plenty of people use hand-free devices with their phones in their pockets. Many others hold the phone against their head when talking on it. Additionally, there are many network-intensive applications which can be used while the phone is in your pocket, i.e. mobile hotspot.

Probably the least common scenario is for a phone to be transmitting at full power when it's _not_ in close contact with a human.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> EMR meters measure Volts/meter (V/m), milliwatts per square meter (mW/m²), and milliGauss (mG).

How do you convert to watts/kilogram?

Maybe measure the surface of my cross-section, multiply by mW/m², divide by my weight?

I have a Cornet ED88T, a GQ-390, and a Tenmars on order.

</comment><comment><USER32> If the phone has a strong wifi signal but a very poor cell signal, will it emit a lot of RF still?

<comment><USER25> Yes, the wattage required to reach the cell tower is unaffected by wifi coverage.

<comment><USER33> If there is WiFi, the radios will be much much less active or even switch away from LTE/5G.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> my father occupationally used to measure RF output from mountaintop cell repeaters. he was always pushing back on operators for pushing just a little outside the limits so they could pick up more calls.

<comment><USER35> I always assumed the phone to tower path would be the limit, not the tower to phone.

<comment><USER36> Right, in most cases, whatever side of a comms link that is hooked up to mains power isn't going that much about power usage. But there are limits on broadcasting power from the towers so as not to cause problems with farther away towers that want operate on the same frequencies. It's like how you usually want to not be on the same Wifi channel as your neighbor. It's going to take either more RF power to overcome their signal or take more time getting data through due to a less than perfect signal quality. Cell towers occupy a certain geographic cell so you want some overlap in signal between neighbors but you don't want it to extend much further than what it takes to leave enough time for someone in a car, for example, to have their conversation handed off to the neighboring tower. Cell tower operators might want to boost their signal power if they are bordering an area with low coverage but it's going to begin to interfere with cells outside their intended range. The FCC sets these limits for different applications and frequencies. An FM radio tower is going to have a massive output power as compared to a personal FM transmitter for your car and for good reason, no else one wants to hear your shitty music.</comment></comment></comment>


Macintosh Garden – Celebrating Macintosh Abandonware - <AUTHOR> http://macintoshgarden.org/ <comment><USER2> It's a shame that some publishers (ahem, Maxis [1]) won't allow their 20+ year old software to be hosted on the site. Macintosh Garden would be a great place to preserve and archive these old games.

[1] [http://macintoshgarden.org/author/maxis](http://macintoshgarden.org/author/maxis)

</comment><comment><USER3> Still a great site. A few months back I downloaded some handy utilities from it while down the nostalgia rabbit hole. [1]

After setting up Sheep Shaver (seems to be the best ppc emulator capable of running MacOS 9), I dusted off my old copies of Marathon 2 and Myth. It was rather enjoyable, running all that stuff on my 2012 MacBook Pro.

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12476605](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12476605)

<comment><USER4> You can run Marathon 2 on the latest macOS, Sierra [https://alephone.lhowon.org/](https://alephone.lhowon.org/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Somewhere I saw a 68k emulator that ran MacOS in the browser. It would be super cool if these guys linked that into their site so that every piece of software was running within the browser... :D

Edit: Not the one I remember, but: [https://jamesfriend.com.au/pce- js/](https://jamesfriend.com.au/pce-js/)

<comment><USER5> Oh looky, another site that almost does this with a JAVA emulator: [http://virtualapple.org](http://virtualapple.org) from [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13621524](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13621524)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Ah, a childhood spent fighting the good fight against dysentery - [http://macintoshgarden.org/games/the-oregon- trail](http://macintoshgarden.org/games/the-oregon-trail)

</comment><comment> crooked-v [http://www.pangeasoft.net/nano/](http://www.pangeasoft.net/nano/)

Nanosaur is still available for purchase, for anyone who has an OS 9 machine floating around.

<comment><USER7> I really like Nanosaur II and it still runs on OS X (at least it did in 2014). I installed it on my 2013 Macbook Air and it caused the fan to come on full blast.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> [http://macintoshgarden.org/games/kings- quest-6](http://macintoshgarden.org/games/kings-quest-6)

KQ6 wasn't only available on Mac - but I have such fond memories of this game!

</comment><comment><USER9> World Builder, wow, I have not seen that since I was a kid. Great memories, thanks!

<comment><USER10> William Appleton has an amazing body of work. World Builder, SuperCard, the core technologies behind the Cyberflix games.

Busy guy, very inspiring.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Cold Showers and Other Tricks - <AUTHOR>

I really love surfing, so recently I decided to start taking cold showers so it wouldn't be a huge shock when I jumped in the water in the winter months.  Wetsuit, or no wetsuit, believe me when I say that it's still a "special" feeling the first time cold water splashes you when you paddle out.
Anyways, I happened to take a cold shower one night before going to bed and I had the most amazing night's sleep.  Since then I've been religiously taking a cold shower before bed and it's great.
I just wanted to share this trick because I'm sure there's some people out in HN land that have a tough time with sleep.  I was also hoping you could share any tricks like this that you use in your life.
Thanks! <comment><USER2> The times I've tried this, I've felt quite warm afterwards. It definitely helps circulation.

Takes a lot of getting used to though - it's quite difficult to concentrate on getting clean when your body's concentrating on trying to breath :)

<comment><AUTHOR> I couldn't agree more on both points! Luckily since I'm in Florida, our water doesn't get _that_ cold, but it gets cold enough to make me yelp every time I jump in.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I prefer whiskey and crying.

<comment><USER2> I prefer self-flagellation.

<comment><USER2> :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Were you able to fall asleep faster or just had a deeper more refreshing sleep?

When you woke up, did you feel more rested?

Was it easier to get out of bed?

Just wondering what it was that made it "amazing".

<comment><AUTHOR> I fall asleep faster and I feel great the next morning (not as groggy). I'm not sure if I used to have trouble staying asleep, but I know for sure I had a real tough time falling asleep in the first place. Either way, I feel more energetic throughout the day now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I just heard Tim Ferris suggest this on his Mixergy interview about his new book.

<comment><AUTHOR> Here's link to that interview if anyone's interested: <http://mixergy.com/timothy-ferriss-four-hour-body-interview/>

I'll have to check out his book to see what else he says about it. Thanks!

<comment><USER6> I haven't finished the book yet but the chapter where he discusses the effects of cold temperatures on the body was the most interesting to me, being a Canadian.

But I'll skip the cold showers and ice baths. I get my share of shivering by just walking outside. ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Will try a "special" shower tonight, let you know if it works for me.</comment>


Extending unemployment benefits - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/2008/12/14/extending-unemployment-benefits/ <comment><USER2> _Why does it make the U.S. more competitive and vibrant if we tax working Americans to give money to non-working Americans?_

Because recipients of unemployment insurance are likely to spend the money right away. That's how stimulus works: The government must _spend money_ on _things_ , fast and furious, so that the manufacturers of the things will experience enough demand that they will keep their own factories open.

Otherwise you get the classic deflationary spiral of (e.g.) the 1930s.

For more explanation than I could possibly provide (dammit, I really _should_ have taken an econ class...) here's Bruce Bartlett at _Forbes_ :

[http://www.forbes.com/opinions/2008/12/04/depression- deflati...](http://www.forbes.com/opinions/2008/12/04/depression-deflation- velocity-oped-cx_bb_1205bartlett.html)

"Banks, businesses and households are all hoarding cash, not spending except for essentials. This is bringing on the deflation that is crippling the economy.

"The problem today is that velocity is falling faster than the Fed can pump up the money supply by buying financial assets, and very low market interest rates mean there has been little net increase in liquidity as a result of the actions the Fed has taken thus far.

"What Keynes figured out is that when conditions such as these exist, the federal government must step in to raise spending in the economy and thereby increase velocity. This means running a budget deficit, but that is only part of the solution. As noted earlier, spending just to buy financial assets does very little good.

"We also know from the experience with tax rebates in 1974, 2001 and 2008 that this doesn't do any good, either. People mostly save the money or pay down debts. Thus, rebates just become another form of exchanging assets that add little to spending (and hence velocity).

"Keynes argued that the only thing that will really work is if the federal government uses its resources to purchase goods and services. It must buy 'stuff' -- concrete, computers, paper, glass, steel -- anything as long as it is tangible. In other words, the government must spend the way households do, by buying things."

\---

One easy way for the government to spend like a household is to hand money to desperate households and have them spend it. The fact that this also helps newly unemployed people from growing hungry is just a nice side effect.

<comment><USER3> Federal government spending increased 47% under the Hoover administration and grew further under the Roosevelt administration (who had initially criticized Hoover's spending). This fits under the paradox "If something isn't working, do it more." I feel like depressions are very misunderstood phenomena, partly because there hasn't been a big one of late.</comment></comment>


Lesser Known Coding Fonts - <AUTHOR> https://vfoley.xyz/lesser-known-coding-fonts/ <comment><USER3> Every thread about programming fonts is not complete without mentioning the wonderful website [https://app.programmingfonts.org](https://app.programmingfonts.org) (no affiliation, I just find it really useful) which lists all the free programming-related fonts with live preview (for example every single font from the article, and every one mentioned so far in every comment in this thread is already there in the app) - it allows quick one-click preview with custom text on each font, and has direct links for downloading said fonts.

Every font from this thread is already there in the app so you might as well just try them all.

<comment><USER4> That is a truly fantastic site but it doesn't mention [https://dank.sh/](https://dank.sh/) which I first heard about in this thread.

Just to nitpick.

But I am right now going through every one of those fonts in the app to compare with the one I've used for almost a decade now.

<comment><USER5> Do you like it?

One of the things that really gets in the way of comprehension for me are typefaces with _too much_ personality. These cutesy italics etc. really seem to affect my ability to get on with the job at hand.

This is why, despite trying, I've yet to find something that can outdo Consolas on Windows. I tried Fira this and that, Source code pro and a bunch of others from Google Fonts. They all are inferior to Consolas in my eyes. They'll either be missing the slotted '0', or look crowded in small sizes etc.

<comment><USER6> I found it terrible, not only because of the surplus personality, but due to aesthetic and readability issues.

Readability - the r looks to me closer to an i, not the i of this font but a generic i, I find it confusing and it slows me down.

Aesthetically - the f character have space before it that in many combinations cuts a word to two, for example in the word delightful. Generally the font is mono-spaced, but the space between and after characters varies a lot.

<comment><USER7> I found it terribly incomplete. $40 and it can't cover all four standard weights: regular, bold, italic, and bold italic. I believe it was last one, bold italic, that it was missing and the website is careful to obscure that fact.

<comment><USER8> And the ridiculous of those italics glyphs. Like, who decided that the f and l should have huge decorative slings but not the g?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The 3 main things I look for in a "coding font" are whether I can differentiate between i,I,l,L,1 and 0,o,O characters, whether or not it is readable at tiny font size (7px to 9px range on my display) and that it is a monospaced font. first and second are nice to have in any font.

For over 4 years I have sworn by the _excellent_ Fira Mono font by Mozilla more specifically FiraCode (variant with added ligatures), before that it was Consolas. Beyond the three things I have mentioned I do not desire anything more from a font.

[0] [http://mozilla.github.io/Fira](http://mozilla.github.io/Fira)

<comment><USER10> The 0 and O are fairly ambiguous in that example. I pretty much require strikes or dots in the 0 for any font to be considered unambiguous.

<comment><USER9> You might be looking at the non monospaced variant in the Fira font family.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This rarely gets a mention but totally deserves one: Iosevka[0], a programming font with great ligatures, multiple weights, and customizable character variants to tune it to your preferences. It's more slender than most blocky monotypes which makes it stand apart especially from more traditional choices like Monaco and Consolas.

[0]: [https://typeof.net/Iosevka/](https://typeof.net/Iosevka/)

<comment><USER12> I'm 100% in the Iosevka camp, especially the serif version with Iosevka Slab.

Looks amazing on a Retina screen, and it's quite compact on the horizontal axis, many programming fonts are far too wide for my tastes.

<comment><USER13> Just curious, which font size do you use? I kinda feel that small font size + serif make text unreadable.

<comment><USER14> I think it's perhaps small font size + serif + low resolution. Serifs can improve readability at times.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Of all things in the world to say, congratulations to Microsoft for their work on Cascadia Code: [https://github.com/microsoft/cascadia- code](https://github.com/microsoft/cascadia-code)

It's hard to do these fonts justice via preview alone, but in whole it's very legible to read.

Aside: If you want fast access to a _ton_ of fixed-width (coding) fonts, pre- patched for powerline, you can grab them at [https://github.com/powerline/fonts](https://github.com/powerline/fonts).

If you do CJK (Chinese, Japanese, Korean) characters in the terminal and want crisp, bitmap ligatures, I recommend Wen Quan Yi Micro Hei. But it doesn't work well scaled up in HiDPI monitors unfortunately! CJK in the terminal is still kind of a mystery to me.

<comment><USER16> I don't like the Cascadia Code font! It feels difficult to read, full of fluffs and blings.

Cascadia Code looks like the Comic Sans of programming fonts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I see Input Mono is mentioned, but I actually really like using Input Sans, also from Font Bureau. It's a _proportional_ coding font. I feel like I'm living in the future.

You can get it here: [https://input.fontbureau.com](https://input.fontbureau.com)

And amazingly, you can personalize your font on download, such as choosing dotted vs slashed zeroes.

Not free, but free for personal, non-commercial use. (Check the terms)

<comment><USER18> I've been using proportional fonts for coding for years. Nobody notices when looking at my screen or when doing a screen sharing session. The few times I talk about it everybody agrees that it's easier to read. I'm not surprised, because nobody formats books, magazines, newspapers, web sites with monospaced fonts. The only problem is that it's impossible to align code on successive lines to the right of an equal sign. Not a big deal. It's also pretty impossible to write ASCII diagrams in comments. AFAIK there is no editor that can help with that, unless one wants to code inside a word processor.

I'll try Input Sans.

<comment><USER19> ASCII diagrams in comments/docstrings are doable if your editor supports custom faces. For example `M-x list-faces-display` on emacs tells me that (among other things) I can customize:

\- font-lock-comment-face \- font-lock-doc-face \- org-table (also depends on alignment)

</comment></comment></comment><comment> 0-_-0 When I was researching coding fonts for myself I've found the two I liked the most were _Iosevka_ and _Fira Code_ because of their ligature support ( _DejaVu Sans Mono_ is also good but typically doesn't have ligatures). The choice between them comes down to whether you value having more horizontal space (shorter lines) or vertical space. _Iosevka_ is horizontally compressed, meaning you can fit more characters into a given window width, and _Fira Code_ is more vertically compressed.

Also, in Visual Studio Code you can fine-tune your coding font using these options:

        "editor.fontFamily": "'Fira Code', monospace",
        "editor.fontSize": 14,
        "editor.lineHeight": 14,
        "editor.letterSpacing": -1.0,
        "editor.fontWeight": "300",
        "editor.fontLigatures": true,

I recommend tuning your _lineHeight_ and _letterSpacing_.

<comment><USER20> I really want to use Fira Mono/Code, but it sadly doesn't support italics, which is a deal-breaker for me, so instead I've been using Iosevka for a week. It's really pretty!

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Iosevka is the one that I always go back to: [https://typeof.net/Iosevka/](https://typeof.net/Iosevka/)

Both the standard and slab versions are great

<comment><USER22> Holy smokes!

For as long as I've been coding, I've never heard of this font. Thanks for mentioning it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Surprised nobody has mentioned PragmataPro

[https://www.fsd.it/shop/fonts/pragmatapro/](https://www.fsd.it/shop/fonts/pragmatapro/)

Probably the most complete and polished programming font I've seen. If you like Iosevka, you'll love PragmataPro.

I've been spoiled by Iosevka and PragmataPro's narrow characters, so now I can never go back to "normal" programming fonts...

<comment><USER24> I ended up going with Iosevka because it's basically PragmataPro without the 200EUR ($223) price tag. I just can't justify that much for a freaking font to myself, no matter how nice it looks.

<comment><USER25> You could just buy the normal and perhaps italic weights.

If you're a software engineer, $100 on a font that you look at 8 hours everyday for a living is a no brainer. You'd probably spend $80 on a mouse, $100 on a keyboard, $120 on a good pair of shoes, $1500 on a good mattress, fonts are one of those things. If you like it, there shouldn't be a hesitation for "oh...its just a font, why should I pay for it".

Typefaces are insanely hard to design and optimize. Sometimes, it takes a couple of years to develop one typeface.

<comment><USER24> I've heard this argument many times, and it would work in a vacuum. A $100 keyboard is probably better than a $10 keyboard.

This $200 font is not better than this other $0 font, and it has the same aesthetic. And good luck quantifying "better than" given a list of feature checkboxes that are common to all "programming fonts" including Fira Code, Source Code Pro, etc.

<comment><USER25> I wasn't trying to imply $200 font is better. I think you missed my point - which is that there is a stigma associated with paying for fonts and that usually comes from the fact that people do not know what goes into development of fonts due to the abundance of free fonts available on the internet. Sure, free fonts can be great - I did not say they can't be.

One of my favorite fonts is Isoveska which is free.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> This is missing Terminus[1], a wonderful bitmap font which is widely available on unices.

[1]: [https://sourceforge.net/projects/terminus- font/](https://sourceforge.net/projects/terminus-font/)

<comment><USER27> I really like Terminus and have been using it for years. My problem with it is the width -- it's just takes so much space that I can't read nicely 2 files side-by-side. Does anyone know similar font just bit narrower? Fonts that have been designed with anti-aliasing in mind fall out immediately.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I am still very happy with [https://github.com/i-tu/Hasklig](https://github.com/i-tu/Hasklig)

its nice and readable, but has ligatures, which makes things like == & -> very obvious.

</comment><comment><USER29> I may be an oddball here but I prefer and still use to this day the original IBM VGA8 BIOS bitmap font [0] for monospace everywhere including IDEs and text editors. I grew up in the late 1980s and 1990s staring at DOS text mode screens and this font was pretty much burned into my brain. Generally I try to keep it at its original 16px height and avoid any sort of non-integral scaling or antialiasing blurriness.

[0] [https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc- fonts/fontlist/](https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/fontlist/) \- the default font for that site; I use the PxPlus variant.

<comment><USER30> I do the same thing. It's very comforting to be using that font.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I'm a big fan of [https://github.com/belluzj/fantasque- sans/](https://github.com/belluzj/fantasque-sans/) the characters make me happy every day :)

<comment><USER32> Fantasque sans mono is my current font, as I've been using it for over a year, as it was the only font that I really like. It is slightly too fancy sometimes, and I go the one that renders "k" without the loop.

<comment><USER33> There's a download option to have Fantasque Sans Mono without the looped k.

[https://github.com/belluzj/fantasque- sans/releases/download/...](https://github.com/belluzj/fantasque- sans/releases/download/v1.7.2/FantasqueSansMono-NoLoopK.zip)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> I always use Dina font, except on HiDPI screens were I use Terminus. I even ported Dina to AmigaOS so I can enjoy it there as well. It is the most legible and non-tiring font for terminal/vi work for me.

Dina font: [https://www.dcmembers.com/jibsen/download/61/](https://www.dcmembers.com/jibsen/download/61/)

Dina font port on aminet: [http://aminet.net/package/text/bfont/Dina](http://aminet.net/package/text/bfont/Dina)

</comment><comment><USER35> I have used Sudo and Monoid for years. Other fonts I like are:

\- Luculent, [http://eastfarthing.com/luculent/](http://eastfarthing.com/luculent/)

\- Envy Code R, [https://damieng.com/blog/2008/05/26/envy-code-r- preview-7-co...](https://damieng.com/blog/2008/05/26/envy-code-r- preview-7-coding-font-released)

B612 Mono would be an excellent font if the glyphs were well aligned.

<comment><USER36> Adore Envy Code R. Wish it was something I could purchase and have maintained, one of the very few customisations I make on a new box is configuring things to use it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> My current favorite is the 8x16 Atari ST system font. Its thick strokes really help my aging eyes. Bitmap fonts for life.

<comment><USER38> I also love bitmap fonts, but when you're switching screen sizes it's annoying to have to change your config each time.

<comment><USER37> That's when you cheat and use a TrueType version of the bitmap font :)

<comment><USER38> But then it's not as crisp looking :(

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> I have tried lots of different coding fonts for fun (and when I change fonts, it just feels like using a brand new computer :-)), but my go-to font when I just don't want to think what I'm gonna using is SF Mono, from the San Francisco fonts by Apple[0].

It blends well with the macOS system fonts, and it's great.

[0] [https://developer.apple.com/fonts/](https://developer.apple.com/fonts/)

<comment><USER40> SF Mono is awesome. Using it for a long time.

The link you posted [https://developer.apple.com/fonts](https://developer.apple.com/fonts) offers to download and install .dmg -> .pkg. I usually install SF Mono via /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app/Contents/Resources/Fonts. This folder contains all SF Mono fonts in .otf format. If you open them and install, it vill be available everywhere. You can copy those files and install it on Windows or Linux computer.

Also this extension is musthave: [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/advanced-font- sett...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/advanced-font- settings/caclkomlalccbpcdllchkeecicepbmbm) I set SF Mono as default monospaced font for chrome. IDK why ugly Courier font is still default in many software.

<comment><USER41> FYI If you just want to change the 'monospace' font in Chrome, you can do that from chrome://settings/fonts and don't need an extension (I changed it from Courier New to something nicer as well).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Questions to ask, always.

Are capital and small letter I, large and small letter L, vertical bar |, and exclamation point !, clearly distinguishable.

Same for zero, large and small o.

Same for different brackets [ { ( <.

Same for colon, semicolon, comma, period.

If the font doesn't do this, then it's not very useful for programmers.

Extra points if multiple underscores, as in __FILE__ are separated so you can in the example count that there are two underscores before and after FILE.

<comment><USER42> Forget something. For the i I l L | !, don't forget numeral one 1.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> I do not think you can talk about typefaces separately from talking about color themes. Different typefaces will have completely different legibility depending on the background and foreground color. Low-contrast themes are terrible for legibility, and necessitate poor choice of font and font size to compensate.

In 2017, I decided to invest some time in font-shopping; so many good alternatives had appeared since I last looked in 2009. The unexpected result was that I stopped using vector fonts and switched almost everything I do to the X Window System bitmap misc-fixed font.¹ After looking at the alternatives, misc-fixed is still the best typeface for text density and extended computing sessions. It was a typeface designed for black-on-white CRT displays in the 1980s, but works just as well white-on-black on LCD displays today.

¹ Unfortunately Firefox font picker only lists vector fonts, I did not bother to try fixing that.

<comment><USER44> > Unfortunately Firefox font picker only lists vector fonts, I did not bother > to try fixing that.

Fontconfig on most distros is configured to reject bitmap fonts by default. On Debian, it's /etc/fonts/conf.d/70-no-bitmaps.conf. One way to fix that is enabling all bitmap fonts "dpkg-reconfigure fontconfig-config", which might be too much. Another is to explicitly enable Fixed in /etc/fonts/local.conf: [https://github.com/stevenrobertson/rc- files/blob/master/.con...](https://github.com/stevenrobertson/rc- files/blob/master/.config/font-manager/local.conf#L20-L22)

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> Taking the opportunity to mention Spleen, which I've been working on for the past year: [https://github.com/fcambus/spleen](https://github.com/fcambus/spleen)

It is a monospaced bitmap font available in several sizes, ranging from 5x8 up to 32x64.

</comment><comment><USER46> Give me Consolas or give me death.

I have tried many programming fonts. I love articles like this that expose to me to new, fun things to try. But alas Consolas is King.

<comment><USER47> I used to think this, until I went on my quest to find a better fonts. Microsoft did a really good job on Consolas to make it look great on Windows.

Unfortunately a lot of coding fonts dont hint well on Windows, or only look good in hiDPI...

Eventually I settled on Droid Sans Mono, which I modified to have a slashed Zero.

<comment><USER46> Yup. These days a shocking number of people never test on Windows or a 1080p monitor.

Windows is my primary dev environment. I don't think many people are even trying to look good there. So I'm not sure Consolas will ever be dethroned. Not for me at least.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> I'm team "operator mono". It costs a bit but damn is it beautiful

</comment><comment><USER49> I find it frustrating to objectively compare fonts when their heights and widths can vary so much.

My requirement are fairly simple:

I want the the largest & most readable font setup in 13" 1280x800 retina display, while still being able to fit at least 161 characters across, so that I can have 80+ characters in each editor in a split screen setup.

My current setup is: 14pt Monaco with 88% horizontal spacing. This gives me 181x39 characters in iTerm.

Another similar setup is Mensch @ 13pt @ 88% horizontal & 118% vertical. I like the bitstream/deja vu variations like Panic Sans or Mensch.

<comment><USER50> It's a shame you can't use bitmapped fonts - I find that Terminus at 9pts is the most legible whilst being still small on a range of DPIs. The truetype version of Terminus is truly awful and does not carry over the legibility of it's bitmapped counterpart.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> I settled on Inconsolata-g. I hate curly i's and l's.

I've only got two minor quibbles with it, I prefer a slashed zero instead of a dotted one, and the tilde ~ and back quote ` are a bit small/weak.

<comment><USER52> Somewhere I saw a version of Inconsolata with the slashed zero. There was a site at one time that collected all the Inconsolata permutations in one place, but I don't have it offhand.

<comment><USER53> I'm revising Inconsolata, making it into a variable font, and would like to gather data on the variants out there so I can make it satisfy the largest number of users. Feel free to file an issue on [https://github.com/googlefonts/Inconsolata](https://github.com/googlefonts/Inconsolata) simply stating your preference.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> I like 3270font, inspired on 3270 mainframe terminals: [https://github.com/rbanffy/3270font](https://github.com/rbanffy/3270font)

</comment><comment><USER55> Until reading this and learning about Go Mono - I hadn't ever thought to look for both serif and monospace attributes in a single font. I just assumed that monospace implied sans-serif.

I personally find serif fonts _far_ easier to read and aesthetically pleasing. I've switched my phone to using Serif fonts too (though annoyed that on Samsung/Android I needed to _purchase_ a font to make that happen - <USER2> expensive, but nonetheless).

This just might move me on from Source Code Pro for all my editing purposes.

<comment> mark-r The very first monospace font I ever saw, Courier, was a serif font.

<comment><USER55> You're right - it is indeed a serif font, which I've seen many times (but never considered using it as my daily driver).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> My favorite coding font is Monaco. Feels like the cleanest of them.

<comment><USER57> Monaco 9 in BBEdit :)

"Monoid" in the linked article made me think of it immediately.

<comment><USER58> Exactly what I was thinking - most of my earliest coding experiences involved editing 9-pt Monaco in BBEdit!! heheh :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> I would check out nerdfonts[1] it includes some of the ones listed in inside it

[1] [https://www.nerdfonts.com/](https://www.nerdfonts.com/)

<comment><USER60> What is the use case for all of the extra icons? Not criticizing, I'm just wondering if there's something that I missed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> I know it's mentioned in the article, but I've loved using Fira Code for awhile. It's made some parts of code much easier to read in ruby and javascript.

</comment><comment><USER62> Some of my favourites not mentioned on this thread yet include D2Coding by Naver ([https://github.com/naver/d2codingfont](https://github.com/naver/d2codingfont)) and Programma by Douglas Crockford ([https://github.com/douglascrockford/Programma](https://github.com/douglascrockford/Programma)).

</comment><comment><USER63> Tweaking the coding fonts is the ultimate form of productivity porn. Don't do that unless you see any actual problems with your current font.

<comment><USER5> I think switching up how you do things from time to time keeps things fresh. Change your wallpaper! Rearrange your office! Go without syntax highlighting for a day! And, yeah, change your programming font.

</comment></comment><comment><USER64> Go Mono looks very much like Luxi Mono, one of my favorites. I'll have to give it a try.

<comment><USER65> Both were designed by the same studio, and the Go fonts are clearly inspired by the Luxi family: [https://twitter.com/0intro/status/799230797601525765](https://twitter.com/0intro/status/799230797601525765)

</comment></comment><comment><USER66> Has anyone used IBM's Plex Mono[1] for an extended period of time? If so, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

[1] [https://app.programmingfonts.org/#plex- mono](https://app.programmingfonts.org/#plex-mono)

<comment><USER67> Yes, for about a year now, both in the console (alacritty) and vscode, and I think it's great. Granted, I mostly ignore it, which is a good thing.

I frequently change the term emulator font size, and each size oddly changes the "aspect ratio" – for lack of a better term – of both Plex and any other monospace font. I find it weird, but it does sometimes help to have a somewhat narrower variant of Plex, especially for side-by-side terminals.

</comment></comment><comment><USER68> There should be more variable-width coding fonts.

<comment><USER69> As someone who's never used a variable width font for writing code, I have to ask why would you want that?

<comment><USER70> The kerning is easier in your eyes, and is also much more space efficient. The only drawback is the inability to do ascii art.

<comment><USER71> While I wouldn't say it's THAT significant, there is one other advantage to fixed-width fonts that I've experienced. Due to the fact that they align vertically, sometimes they expose mistakes if you're constructing data in a table-like fashion. Or when you have a bunch of copy/pasted lines that differ only in the parameter values. Like, "Hey wait a minute... this line is 1 char wider than the previous one. Oh, whoops, I fat-fingered something there".

I wish I had more specific examples and could quantify it better, but I know I've caught quite a few errors this way.

<comment><USER72> This exactly. Most recently I had a script that was calling functions with fixed width data sets (IDs, credit card numbers, birthdates, etc..), and typos were significantly easier to find due to the data and fonts both being fixed width.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER73> It displays better on some systems then others, but I like 'Liberation Mono'.

[https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Liberation_fonts](https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Liberation_fonts)

</comment><comment><USER74> For those who found almost the right font but not quite, FontForge is a free and open source editor that's pretty easy to use and even has a tutorial on editing and design:

[https://fontforge.github.io/en-US/](https://fontforge.github.io/en-US/) [http://designwithfontforge.com/en- US/index.html](http://designwithfontforge.com/en-US/index.html)

Editing glyphs is just like using any image editor. You can mod any existing font or even combine glyphs from multiple fonts together into one.

</comment><comment><USER75> Seems a bit superfluous to suggest commercial fonts when there are so many good free ones, but I am very fond of FontFont Attribute Mono ([https://www.fontshop.com/families/ff-attribute- mono](https://www.fontshop.com/families/ff-attribute-mono)) by Viktor Nübel. It's cheerful, friendly and characterful without being too eccentric, and very easy to read.

</comment><comment><USER76> Tried them all over the years.

Then I bought Triplicate from mbtype.com and since then it's been my mono font of choice in everything. Nothing comes close on HiDpi screens

</comment><comment><USER77> My favorite for programming and terminal, Luculent:

[http://eastfarthing.com/luculent](http://eastfarthing.com/luculent)

</comment><comment><USER78> Can anyone recommend a good font which has good differentiation between lowercase letters and uppercase letters (when dealing with both lower/upper unicode subscripts and superscripts)

Presumably lowercase letters would have a rounder o, and uppercase a flatter/blockier O, i.e. all lower/upper have some differentiation, and no lowercase character where it is just a scaled down version of the upper.

would be eternally grateful.

</comment><comment><USER79> I just switched to Monoid and I like it so far. But it is quite a change. Compared to my previous font (Fira code) it is really different.

This is a really hard feeling to explain, I wouldn't say that Monoid is easier or faster to read, but it distract me less. I feel like I am more focused on what I read while still being able to scan a file to find what I want.

</comment><comment><USER80> For a brief while I tried using Comic Sans in my IDE. I did that because it was made to be super readable. It was in fact super readable, but I just couldn't get over the lack of mono spacing.

Then I switched to FiraCode and it's been great.

I still use Comic Sans in all of my chat programs though (IMessage, Slack, IRC, etc.) I actually really enjoy it.

<comment><USER81> Check out Fantasque Sans Mono, it is a monospaced Comic Sans.

<comment><USER82> Seconded; it's exactly what I use with Comic Neue.

I wouldn't say it's _exactly_ a monospaced Comic Sans; there are substantial differences. It definitely has a lot of the same advantages, though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER83> Nice article.

I think most just stick with fonts they've used in the past. In my case, I can't get myself to use anything other than Apple's Terminal (which uses SF Mono). Maybe later in the future I may budge and move off of it (iTerm2 for some reason can't quite exactly get SF Mono right, even though I import it).

<comment><USER84> What about it is wrong? Apart from a different weight (which you can disable if you'd like) I've found SF Mono to work quite well in iTerm.

</comment></comment><comment><USER85> Ubuntu Mono remains my favorite for coding/terminals. It has a great mix of character and minimalism and of course is completely free/libre. [https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Ubuntu+Mono](https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Ubuntu+Mono)

<comment><USER86> The only thing I don't like about Ubuntu mono is tiny minus ("-") character. It is way too narrow.

Bront Ubuntu Mono fixes this, but breaks other things: some letters, for unclear reasons, are weirdly stretched (see "l")

</comment></comment><comment><USER87> Agave[1] and Lekton[2] are among my favorites.

[1]: [https://app.programmingfonts.org/#agave](https://app.programmingfonts.org/#agave)

[2]: [https://app.programmingfonts.org/#lekton](https://app.programmingfonts.org/#lekton)

<comment><USER88> used consolas so far, tried Iosevka but felt like something was off, this Agave thing is great!! Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER89> It's good to see that many of these fonts distinguish well between open/close quote characters - this is a personal bugbear of mine. For example, Input Mono fails for me on this aspect. Hyphens and the two dashes are usually problematic, too - unfortunately, no examples of those in this post.

</comment><comment><USER90> I would really like to use a proportional font that has coding ligatures (such as -> becomes an arrow). Is there such a thing? Is there a way I could combine two fonts, a normal proportional font, and the ligatures from something like Fira Code , to create a hybrid font, perhaps with a script?

<comment><USER91> Not entirely sure I understand, but maybe Pragmata Pro? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PragmataPro](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PragmataPro)

</comment></comment><comment><USER92> I found fonts to be not all that important so I switched to Andale Mono or it's free variant (not sure) .

It is a very old one from the ie4 Era. Looks a bit more retro but mostly like all the other typical programming fonts.

I switched to it because I own a watch using this font and liked the idea of matching it to my system.

</comment><comment><USER93> This is definitely missing Dank: [https://dank.sh](https://dank.sh)

It's my favorite programming font, made by a good friend of mine. It has awesome ligatures and the italic version is beautiful, similar to Operator Mono!

<comment><USER60> I really like it overall, but I think the f going below the baseline and the italic l not starting at the baseline would drive me crazy.

I wonder how hard it would be for me to change just those characters.

<comment><USER94> Easy. A basic font editor can do it. I for example experimented with changing the weight of parenthesis, thinking they're not evil in Lisp, just tuned badly for that purpose.

<comment><USER95> Larger or smaller weight?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER96> I really like consolas. It looks beautiful, there is no ambiguity between characters, the spacing and sizes are perfect. It comes pre installed with Windows, and I even use it on Linux, which is my primary development environment.

</comment><comment><USER97> My favorite lately is iA Writer Mono: [https://ia.net/writer/blog/a-typographic- christmas](https://ia.net/writer/blog/a-typographic-christmas)

</comment><comment><USER98> So glad to see Go Mono mentioned here. I'm a happy user for many years now.

</comment><comment> ur-whale My favorite lesser known coding font is Monofur:

[https://www.slant.co/options/228/~monofur- review](https://www.slant.co/options/228/~monofur-review)

<comment><USER99> My favorite too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER100> Any love for Anonymous Pro?

[https://www.marksimonson.com/fonts/view/anonymous- pro](https://www.marksimonson.com/fonts/view/anonymous-pro)

</comment><comment><USER101> [https://youtu.be/_WgrfEaAM4Y?t=1206](https://youtu.be/_WgrfEaAM4Y?t=1206) Anyone know this font/theme name? Looks solid to me.

<comment><USER33> That's Hack [1].

[1] [https://sourcefoundry.org/hack/](https://sourcefoundry.org/hack/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER102> This is what I keep in the archived monospaced fonts file: [https://i.imgur.com/ljIsGBV.png](https://i.imgur.com/ljIsGBV.png)

<comment><USER102> Cant edit anymore, here is the archive: [https://filebin.net/95tzseyosis5dnua](https://filebin.net/95tzseyosis5dnua)

</comment></comment><comment><USER103> I've really been enjoying the Overpass fonts from RedHat - [https://overpassfont.org](https://overpassfont.org)

<comment><USER104> I don't really like their mono font but the others look pretty good, just not for coding. Thanks for sharing. I didn't know about them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER105> I'd really like to see a monospace font with variable stroke width (i.e. with stroke width contrast). Current monospace typefaces seem to converge towards a single point in the configuration space, and by now occupy a pretty narrow range of variation—rather evident in the 'Programming Fonts Test Drive.' My eye pines for some elegance among the ubiquitous brutish utilitarian letterforms.

Variable stroke width is really uncommon in sans-serif fonts, so that some people associate sans-serif with fixed-width strokes. But no, such fonts exist, only they are mostly used for display, i.e. big titles and posters. While monospace is not equal to sans-serif, it for some reason rejects variable stroke widths even more strongly.

Linux Biolinum is one sans-serif example that can be used as body font. It's a straightforward antiqua with serifs chopped off: [http://libertine- fonts.org/show-me/](http://libertine-fonts.org/show-me/)

Humanistic Rosario has almost imperceptible, subliminal stroke contrast: [https://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/rosario](https://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/rosario) (The font suffers a bit from sub-ideal kerning.)

Optima is a classical example, also reminiscent of antiqua. Lucida Grande (iirc) has hints of variable strokes.

The brain begins to panic at first when it sees stroke contrast but no serifs—but such fonts do tickle me somehow, especially with modern humanist approach. It's a pity they're mostly present on loud posters. Would be splendid to have me a homely playful and eye-pleasing font in the editor and terminal.

</comment><comment><USER106> Just to note, numerals five and six and lowercase-B look alike in some fonts:

        5b6

</comment><comment><USER107> I swear by Source Code Pro.

</comment><comment><USER108> what do you guys think is the best editor theme in bright light? I have been always using monokai but recently I have to work in bright light sometimes and it's quite hard to read.

<comment><USER109> Check out Dracula At Night for VS Code. I swear by it for every IDE possible. I'm honestly surprised it's only got around ~52k installs. I don't remember where I first found it, but I'm glad I did.

</comment></comment><comment><USER110> Anyone still able to access the website? Seems to be down right now.

<comment><USER33> It's up now (10:04am EDT), but this is the first article on my site that has this much traffic, so it's possible the small Linode instance I use was not able to keep up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER111> Sudo is awesome. Thank you for mentioning about it.

</comment><comment><USER112> I love the APL333 font! Thanks mate!

</comment><comment><USER113> that not make any sense

</comment><comment><USER114> I compiled a large list of monospace coding fonts a couple years ago. Includes screenshots and links:

[http://charlesleifer.com/blog/monospace-font- favorites/](http://charlesleifer.com/blog/monospace-font-favorites/)

Hope someone else finds it useful.

</comment><comment><USER115> Personal Favorites

\- Iosevka Term Slab \- Envy Code R \- DaddyTimeMono \- M+ 1mn \- Consolas

<comment><USER116> finally someone mentioning "Daddy Time Mono" font. Cheers!!

</comment></comment><comment><USER117> Hmm, I submitted this a short while ago. I wonder if something is up with the HN dupe detector...: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21300971](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21300971)</comment>


Microsoft rejection letter, 1987 - <AUTHOR> http://www.scripting.com/stories/2010/04/10/microsoftRejectionLetter19.html <comment><USER2> This story reminded me of Panic software's story about Audion and their meeting(s) with Apple. The bits about Steve Jobs are actually really telling for his current moves over Flash and Android. "It's like you guys are a little push-cart going down the railroad tracks, and we're a giant steam engine about to run you down."

<http://www.panic.com/extras/audionstory/>

</comment><comment><USER3> Here's a cache - [http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.scripting.com/stories/2010/04/10/microsoftRejectionLetter19.html)

</comment><comment><USER4> Powerpoint seems to have worked out well for MS, no doubt it is the standard for presentation software. Alternate timelines would be incredibly educational if we could see them: if MS had purchased this instead of powerpoint would they still be the market leader? Or was inclusion with Word and Excel in the Office Suite the true reason they dominate this market today. I need a 'What If' machine....

</comment><comment><USER5> Living Videotext, creators of MORE, ended up merging with Symantic the same year. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MORE_(application)>

</comment><comment><USER6> I'd be interested to know why the change of heart on Microsoft's part: was it just the sudden price change in the stock, as the post implies, or was there another reason?</comment>


How (and when) to motivate yourself - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.hbr.org/bregman/2010/05/how-and-when-to-motivate-yours.html

<comment><USER2> It's commonsense that motivation comes before action; but in reality, action comes before motivation (where motivation is the _feeling_ of wanting to do it; you can decide to do something whether you feel like it or not).

Some argue that this applies to other feelings, even to love; that if you act as if you love something, then the feeling of love will follow: _love is a verb_. Here's a striking clip from _Paris Je T'aime_ that demonstrates it (though not, of course, proves it): <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIa0454xfyI>

<comment><USER3> That's a very moving fragment, I'll have to go see the rest of the movie now. Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Good article, it gels with my own experience.

People often ask me how I manage to stay vegan (especially as I travel a lot). The answer is simple I don't need will-power all day I just need it for the 30 seconds when I'm ordering a meal or shopping for food.

<comment><USER5> I used to be a personal trainer, and the saying goes that 99% of getting in shape is just showing up to the gym. Once you get there, the exercise is easy and usually fun.

<comment><USER6> I found that having some equipment at home helps too. I am using Total Gym and it was the best investment of $200 I have made so far.

<comment><USER7> You'd be surprised how many people have equipment at home, but never use it. There's still required the equivalent move of "going to the gym", that spark of motivation/movement to get one's ass off the couch.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I can usually argue with myself to get motivated. The problem is when I cheat and pretend I already had the internal conversation and decided not to bother.

</comment><comment><USER9> Anyone can fit in a 15 minute workout, but committing to an hour at the gym can seem daunting.

Setting up these micro-commitments helps me get started on things that I would otherwise be making excuses about.

</comment><comment><USER10> His story reminds me of the Bhagavad Gita, which talks a lot about motivation.

<comment><USER2> Can you elaborate? Sounds interesting.

<comment><USER11> You might be more familiar with it than you think:

<http://humanscience.wikia.com/wiki/Legend_of_Bagger_Vance>

<comment><USER2> OK, that's awesome. Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Seems to me that this is what the GTD Weekly Review is all about - you take stock of your world once a week, decide what is important and then spend the rest of the week executing those decisions - you are not allowed to second- guess yourself because GTD is all about having "integrity in the moment of choice" regarding your decisions.

</comment><comment><USER13> I use a similar trick to the scheduling - if I'm undecided, I just start and do all the weighing up while I'm getting on with it. Once you've started, chances are you'll continue as you've already done the hard bit. If not, you don't feel like you've cheated, which, for me at least, is for too easy a habit to fall into.

</comment><comment><USER14> I was in this exact same scenario yesterday: standing outside my building under the awning with my bike watching the rain come down. I tricked myself into doing it since the rain and sort of been off and on, and in the worst case I could just check out the farmer's market near me and then head home. As it turned out, 10 or 15 minutes into my time outside the rain stopped and I ended up riding for more than two hours. I was really glad I sucked it up instead of going back inside, where I might not have gone back out when the weather got better.

</comment><comment><USER15> once begun, you're half done.</comment>


Innovators take note. - <AUTHOR> http://blog.transloc.com/?p=63

<comment><USER2> On a semi-related note, one of the interesting parts of the Xanadu rule set was this:

 __Permission to link to a document is explicitly granted by the act of publication. __

<comment><USER3> > Permission to link to a document is explicitly granted by the act of > publication.

No one thought that you needed permission to cite someone else's work before the intertubes.

A link is an actionable citation, but the action is under the complete control of linked-to site which presumably owns relevant rights to the document in question.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Another example of this is the Python 2 to Python 3 transition. Python 3 is just too radical a change. Many features from it were backported to 2.7 to make the transition easier.

<comment><USER5> I think the Wave protocol had a similar problem. I decide to make an agent and just going through all the detailed protocol stuff discouraged me from digging in right away. I figured if it becomes big, I'll jump in again. On the other hand, I learnt plain-text SMTP as a kid and over time picked up MIME, TLS/PGP etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> The Xanadu versus HTML choice is more complicated than the number of innovations. The Xanadu vision made you buy into the authors POV whereas HTML didn't.</comment>


Tell HN: Beware of Dropbox Upgrade Mail - <AUTHOR>

Hi,
If you just received a localized and authentic looking email from dropbox (email@example.com) informing you that you're running an old version of dropbox on your computer, including the name of your computer in it, DO NOT OPEN IT!
It's probably the deployment of a botnet, some malware or similar.
Headers:

     Return-Path: <email@example.com>
     X-Greylist: delayed 337 seconds by postgrey-1.34 at dd32100; Mon, 18 Aug 2014 02:40:55 CEST
     X-policyd-weight: using cached result; rate: -7
     Received: from sjd-rb12-12d.dropboxmail.com (sjd-rb12-12d.sjc.dropbox.com [18.104.22.168]) 	for <redacted>; Mon, 18 Aug 2014 02:40:55 +0200 (CEST)
     Received: from snt-ra10-20c.sjc.dropbox.com (snt-ra10-20c.sjc.dropbox.com [10.12.10.187]) 	by sjd-rb12-12d.dropboxmail.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id F124F2008DD8A 	for <redacted>; Mon, 18 Aug 2014 00:35:15 +0000 (UTC)
     MIME-Version: 1.0
     From: Dropbox <email@example.com>
 Thanks and have a nice day! <comment> Anaid-Dropbox Hi guys,

I work with the support team at Dropbox (you can verify that on our forums :D).

My apologies for the concern this has raised, the email is legitimate and @dropboxmail.com is one of our official domains. You can see it here:

[https://www.dropbox.com/help/217](https://www.dropbox.com/help/217)

I made a post in our forums explaining the situation: [https://forums.dropbox.com/topic.php?id=119186](https://forums.dropbox.com/topic.php?id=119186)

Please let me know if you have additional questions about this.

Thanks!

</comment><comment><USER2> The mail headers seem authentic. dropboxmail.com is registered to Dropbox, Inc.[1]

Maybe you should contact Dropbox to confirm whether that e-mail is legitimate before telling everyone that it's not?

[1] [http://www.whois.com/whois/dropboxmail.com](http://www.whois.com/whois/dropboxmail.com)

</comment><comment><USER3> Got the same message & did some googling which resulted in finding this forum thread: [http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=58&p=909267](http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=58&p=909267)

Sounds dodgy to me.

</comment><comment><USER4> It felt dodgy but it seems legit. They should use the app directly to inform the user.

[https://www.dropbox.com/help/6252](https://www.dropbox.com/help/6252)</comment>


The Neophyte's Guide to Scala - <AUTHOR> http://danielwestheide.com/scala/neophytes.html <comment><USER2> The good news is you don't have to bookmark this blog because when you're writing scala and googling questions, it's going to come up on page one, because it's one of the best.

<comment><USER3> Exactly same observation. It's very well written and I have been referring to it quite a lot!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> for anyone interested in learning Scala, i highly recommend this set of (~15 or so) blog posts. i started working through them in early 2013 as they were posted. The posts on path-dependent types and the post on type classes are particularly good. The author clearly has a deep understanding of the key parts of the language.

</comment><comment><USER5> Found this site really useful when I was working with Scala. In particular I remember the descriptions of Option/Either/Try were very clear.

</comment><comment><USER6> The author writes about "path-dependent types", but all I can see is plain existentials.

<comment><USER7> a1.B and a2.B in the example are path-dependent types - you couldn't express them as just existentials (you could express the types of a1 and a2 as existentials, but you couldn't write "a1.b = Some(b1)" in a purely existential typing system - you need some way to "get the type out").

<comment><USER6> Not with Haskell-style (or, rather, System F-omega-style) existentials, sure. But why not with strong existentials, like what you get with first-class modules in OCaml or 1ML?

<comment><USER7> At that point this is just semantics. I find the phrase "path-dependent types" useful and intuitive (though admittedly easily confused with "dependent types"); maybe we could use that phrase to describe what OCaml has too?</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: egress-operator, a simple way to control Kubernetes egress traffic - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/monzo/egress-operator <comment><USER2> How does this compare to istio egress controls?

Can it be used with Network policy?

<comment><AUTHOR> The idea is that this uses a little more 'vanilla' Kubernetes because you control the access to the endpoint using NetworkPolicies and not any new kind of policy specification. That's what I like about it, it uses the controls you're used to using</comment></comment>


Ask YC: "Hacker-testing" service? - <AUTHOR>

I've been working on a web startup with one other co-founder, and I am the only programmer.  I try my best to make things as secure as I can, but it is always better to have another set of eyes looking over things to make sure I am not overlooking something obvious.  Is there any security-auditing or "hacker-testing" services you would suggest that we can use?  We're willing to pay something for this, but we don't have a lot of extra cash to throw around right now.<p>If you can't think of any services like this that you would use, what would you do in my place?  Any advice is greatly appreciated - thank you! <comment><USER2> Hiring a security expert is generally like most other things you hire an expert for - expensive. There's a lot to making a website "safe" and it involves looking at many different aspects from all sorts of different aspects (time consuming).

If you're trying to determine the hardness of your machines against known vulns there are two free (oss?) programs I'd recommend: Nessus and Snort. That may buy you time until you get big enough that you have something more than script kiddies knocking at your server's doors.

<comment><USER3> > there are two free (oss?) programs I'd recommend: Nessus and Snort

Yeah sure, let me know how that goes for you... Nessus doesn't test websites and isn't open source (it's free for home use), and Snort isn't a vulnerability scanner!

To the OP: If you want to test your website for security flaws, you can do the following (in no particular order):

\- Read the OWASP Top 10: <http://www.owasp.org/index.php/Top_10_2007>

\- Request a free scan from Qualys: [http://www.qualys.com/forms/trials/qualysguard_trial/?lsid=6...](http://www.qualys.com/forms/trials/qualysguard_trial/?lsid=6390)

\- Download and run w3af: <http://w3af.sourceforge.net/>

\- Buy Burp v1.2 (when it comes out, soon. it's only about $150) and run Burp Scanner: <http://portswigger.net/suite/>

\- Download Acunetix for a free XSS scanner: [http://www.acunetix.com/cross- site-scripting/Copy-scanner.ht...](http://www.acunetix.com/cross-site- scripting/Copy-scanner.htm)

\- Download SQLiX for a free SQL injection scanner: <http://www.owasp.org/index.php/Category:OWASP_SQLiX_Project>

\- ratproxy is a largely passive web application security audit tool: <http://code.google.com/p/ratproxy/> and <http://isisblogs.poly.edu/2008/07/05/ratproxy-151-tutorial/>

\- Test it by hand yourself:

OWASP Testing Guide: [http://www.owasp.org/index.php/Category:OWASP_Testing_Projec...](http://www.owasp.org/index.php/Category:OWASP_Testing_Project)

OWASP Guide to Building Secure Web Applications: <http://www.owasp.org/index.php/Category:OWASP_Guide_Project>

OWASP AppSec FAQ: <http://www.owasp.org/index.php/OWASP_AppSec_FAQ>

> Hiring a security expert is generally like most other things you hire an > expert for - expensive. There's a lot to making a website "safe" and it > involves looking at many different aspects from all sorts of different > aspects (time consuming).

Dude, wrong again. The OP probably doesn't have an overly complicated website given that its just him and his buddy coding for a startup. An expert will likely estimate the amount of time it takes to test his website in a matter of [single-digit] hours. Also, webapp testing is the least expensive type of security testing there is.

<comment><AUTHOR> awesome - thanks very much for your help

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I remember a few years ago, Yahoo Aussie hired penetration testing IT consultant to do the "test". As many have pointed out, it's expensive. I forgot the name of the company but you can google it for "penetration test". dguido said a few cheaper solutions too.</comment>


Amazon's worker tracking system can fire people without human interaction - <AUTHOR> https://www.thisisinsider.com/amazon-system-automatically-fires-warehouse-workers-time-off-task-2019-4 <comment><USER2> People is not machine therefor they cannot judge by machines,

Some of those workers maybe they have to deal some problems, maybe they lost someone they love or some another life problems, a machine how can understant those life things?

</comment><comment><USER3> We imagined a world where machines will work for us. We may be wrong.</comment>


Chinese air pollution dimmed sunlight enough to impact solar panels - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/07/air-pollution-costs-china-1-9-billion-in-solar-electricity-each-year/ <comment><USER2> Reminds me of "global dimming", which _may_ counteract global warming. BBC Horizon had an episode about it a long time ago.

> Global dimming also creates a cooling effect that may have partially > counteracted the effect of greenhouse gases on global warming.

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

<comment><USER3> I think this highlights why these discussions have shifted from "global warming" to "climate change", as stuff like this might give people the impression that global dimming will solve the issues caused by greenhouse gas emissions.

Edit, was reading through it - I find it'd be interesting to note that in some cases the dimming effect actually amplifies warming:

>Brown clouds have been found to amplify global warming according to Veerabhadran Ramanathan, an atmospheric chemist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, CA. "The conventional thinking is that brown clouds have masked as much as 50 percent of global warming by greenhouse gases through so-called global dimming... While this is true globally, this study reveals that over southern and eastern Asia, the soot particles in the brown clouds are in fact amplifying the atmospheric warming trend caused by greenhouse gases by as much as 50 percent."

<comment><USER4> > as stuff like this might give people the impression that global dimming will > solve the issues

It did in the Matrix. oh wait...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Lol. This doesn't bode well for our collective future.

<comment><USER6> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_di...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita)

Emissions neglect exports also. So despite exporting most of the worlds shiny new things, China is doing pretty damn well. Which country do you represent and do you think it "bodes" well for our collective future given it's comparative environmental damage?

<comment><USER7> Carbon dioxide is colorless and not responsible for the dimming.

Still, pointing the finger on China because of pollution is shortsighted. People in developed nations produce much more overall emissions. Especially if you look at averages.

We just currently don't really have experience or solutions for developing countries without a certain amount of pollution. And if they reach a fully developed level, it is pretty certain, that their overall emissions are significantly higher.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> so..are we now willing to admit that they are contributing significantly to global climate change and overall pollution?

</comment><comment><USER9> It would be ironic if that "dimming" was caused by increased manufacturing demand for solar panels...</comment>


Teller Reveals His Secrets - <AUTHOR> https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/teller-reveals-his-secrets-100744801/ <comment><AUTHOR> > 2\. Make the secret a lot more trouble than the trick seems worth. You will > be fooled by a trick if it involves more time, money and practice than you > (or any other sane onlooker) would be willing to invest.

Universal advice pretty much.

This link was shared by Prof. Shriram Krishnamurthi in his talk "Curriculum Design as an Engineering Problem" at EPFL. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rM_E2IwlprY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rM_E2IwlprY). People who're interested in questions like what is a good first programming language, how to teach programming effectively, and how to be better programmers ourselves, will find many practical insights in his talk.

</comment><comment><USER2> > If you are given a choice, you believe you have acted freely.

This works really well on kids. "Would you like to brush your teeth with the red toothbrush or the blue toothbrush?"

</comment><comment><USER3> Oh, that Teller! I thought it was Edward with so-far unrevealed manuscripts.</comment>


My burnout and me - <AUTHOR> http://danilocampos.com/2014/03/my-burnout-and-me/

<comment><USER2> As someone who has/still is coping with burnout, I still find relaxing to be very difficult most of the time. I exercise now, eat better, my day job is no longer in programming, but while relaxing I still feel like I am being unproductive and that I should either get some work done or feel bad. It's gotten better, but almost 1.5 years after I really burnt out, it's still a struggle.

Having friends and family who you explain this to (and actually understand) helps immensely. You need someone who drags you into relaxation and keeps you there until you really do enjoy it and who forces you to try new things. IMO that's the best advice of this article.

</comment><comment><USER3> That sounds somehow... familiar.</comment>


Have a Nice Day - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/16/opinion/16friedman.html?_r=1

<comment><USER2> I don't understand why Friedman would prefer to produce solar panels in America than ship them from China. Trading between nations makes sense for the same reason trading between individuals makes sense: specialization is efficient, leading everyone to greater wealth.

He mentions that China will have a great export platform in renewable energy technology as the world adds 2.5 billion more people. So he's anticipating future demand. It seems to me that that is useful information for entrepreneurs, but it's nothing that demands government action. If entrepreneurs decide it would be profitable to supply that impending demand, then they will. If the government has to subsidize to make that happen, then maybe it shouldn't happen.

Just because there will be future demand for something doesn't mean we need government action to supply it. I'm sure those billions of people will want pants and meat and toothbrushes too, but there's no particular reason why America has to be the place to produce those. Just let people produce whatever they decide is most profitable for them to produce, and we're likely to get a more efficient outcome than one decided by central planning.

I think solar energy is great. If we want it, all we have to do is worry about the demand side, not the supply side. That is, consumers and governments should buy the best, cheapest solar panels available. I don't think it matters where the production, or the R&D, happens.

He suggests that trading solar panels with China might be similar to trading oil with Saudi Arabia. I don't understand why. Trading with Saudi Arabia is considered a problem because the money is thought to fuel terrorism. China doesn't have the nicest foreign policy on the planet, but I'd love to make them more rich, not less, because they seem to be becoming more peaceful as they grow richer. And if China ever starts funding terrorism, it is much easier to set up new solar panel factories than it is to set up new oil fields.

<comment><USER3> _China doesn't have the nicest foreign policy on the planet_

The Chinese policy of non-interference in foreign affairs has shocked people who look at Chinese relationships with N. Korea and Burma. However, I personally feel that Chinese foreign policy is no worse than that of Britain, France or America.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is just silly. The problem with columnists/pundits who argue for investing in xyz "because we're falling behind" particularly where it relates to immature technologies is that governments have a notoriously bad track record at playing/picking favorites that ultimately win out.

Taking this column specifically, what if it turns out that natural gas is far cheaper and far more abundant than solar - at least in the mid and near term? (after you factor in recent shale gas discoveries, it is). Why not instead develop technologies through companies that enable solar like Applied Materials and in the meantime buy subsidized panels from other countries if that's your cup of tea?

I should note that many of us here are also aware and even aim to replace longstanding competitors who are larger, often better capitalized and are certainly more entrenched with technologies that are cheaper, without the legacy overhead costs and are more agile. Why shouldn't this happen in solar/energy?

In solar in particular, look at thin film solar firms like Nanosolar - [http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/09/nanosolar-solar- powe...](http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/09/nanosolar-solar-power- efficiency-germany-factory-mass-production.php) \- yes, one of their robotic plant may be in Germany, but it is a US developed technology that may end up being far cheaper than traditional solar panels. If anything, American firms have shown when the incentive exists, they can play catch up and they can do it quickly and generally better as US dominance across an array of industries shows (disclosure: I'm a Canadian).

This, incidentally is what can happen when the subsidies go away: <http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125193815050081615.html>

</comment><comment><USER5> The title is politically loaded. There's something that article is trying to say vis-a-vis government subsidies and free trade, but it never quite materializes, at least I couldn't understand it. But I had no trouble understanding the political outrage it is dripping with.

<comment><USER6> He's mad that even though the government is administering a massive Keynesian stimulus as are a lot of others right now, including China, unlike those countries none of it seems to be routed towards solar power eagerly enough to create a big market for it here, and the resultant manufacturing jobs. So if you decide to bet the farm on solar and cover the roof of your house/commercial building with panels, you'll have to import them which negatively affects our balance of trade - even if you want to buy an American brand like AM.

I personally don't have a manufacturing fetish, but a lot of people are deeply worried about the comparative advantage in cheap labor that exists in China and neighboring countries, because not so long ago you could make a good living and provide for your family with a skilled labor job in an American factory, and many of those jobs have evaporated or been devalued as manufacturing has been exported.

There is not as much money in service work and IP creation doesn't involve as many people as manufacturing, so there's a lot of quite skilled and hard- working people who are unable to get decent and dignified work. A young or single person can easily contemplate relocating to an area of greater economic activity, but if you're middle-aged and have a family that may not be a practical option. This is reason there are so many crappy little web development and design companies out there, people who saw the change coming in time have tried to switch towards digital manufacturing with varying degrees of success. But many feel there's a lot less money in digital development than in physical manufacturing - after all, physical manufacturing doesn't employ just factory works, but machinists, construction workers, truckers, truck builders and so on.

Think of it like the dustbowl agricultural failure that led to mass migration during the great depression, but with factories instead of farms. If employment doesn't recover within the next 12 months, there will be a great deal of pressure after the 2010 elections for punitive tariffs on imports _a la_ Smoot-Hawley, which will include computer equipment since most of it is manufactured in Asia. Outsourcing will continue apace, not least because it's currently absurdly cheap to ship the stuff from there to here, exacerbating the problem.

Outsourcing manufacturing has been _very_ good for consumers and I feel that evolving towards a more globalized economy is a Good Thing, but while large wage differentials persist it's very destructive of small-scale wealth that depended on wages from local manufacturing. Most people are not, and don't want to be, entrepreneurs, and are angry because they invested a lot of hard work in building up their family's capital only to see their 'business model' (work hard, get paid) shredded.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> "the utility has to buy the power for a predictable period at a price that is a no-brainer good deal for the family or business putting the solar panels on their rooftop."

Sadly, it is not a no-brainer good deal for the tax payer who ultimately pays for it. It is all well to have the biggest solar power industry, but what if it is all just virtual and breaks down once the subsidies stop?

</comment><comment><USER8> Importing solar panels from China is not even remotely similar to importing oil from the Middle East. If we derived our energy primarily from solar power, we wouldn't need a constant stream of solar panels to keep doing it, the way we need a constant stream of oil now. Also, since the company that makes the machines that makes solar panels, we could easily start producing them for ourselves if China suddenly decided to increase the price the way OPEC has the power to do with oil.

<comment><USER6> Quite true, buying solar panels is a capital spend rather than an operating cost. But if a trade war broke out, it would take a year or two to build the physical manufacturing facilities here, and we'd be at a competitive disadvanatage until that is done.

If you think of trade economic warfare - and a great many people do, whether we agree or not - then physical goods are the ammunition. We do not fully understand a software-based economy yet, and for the foreseeable future software still has to run on a physical substrate, most of which takes place overseas.

Suppose, just for example, we had a trade war with China and began levying punitive tariffs. China responds by, say, telling the companies that currently manufacture iPhone hardware to stop supplying Apple and start building a 4g version for the Chinese market. The government there has the economic and political heft to do that. It would not be a rational decision, but remember that rationality in war = predictability and thus defeatability. Surprise is a key strategic element.

Well, where would Apple be if their suppliers suddenly cut them off? Sure, they could take their designs to manufacturers in other countries, even in the US. But it would probably take a year to ramp up production with sufficient quality control. What do you think would happen to their stock price?

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> "If we want to launch a solar industry here, big-time, we need to offer the kind of long-term certainty that Germany does..."

The problem here is that there are no long-term certainties in a free-market economy. Providing energy is a competitive business and if solar energy is to grow it has to be a better choice for the consumer economically than the current alternatives at the true unsubsidized cost.

</comment><comment><USER10> I don't think the article is about solar panels, not really.

It's how America doesn't produce anything anymore.

The USA is "Consumers 1.0" but 2.0 is taking over elsewhere.

The next leap in solar might not even be invented in the USA, it certainly won't be produced here.

<comment><USER11> > It's how America doesn't produce anything anymore.

This article is about an American company that _produces_ equipment that makes solar panels and microchips.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> _In October, Applied will be opening the world's largest solar research center in Xian, China. Gotta go where the customers are._

??? Don't you just have to be where the sun is?</comment>


Show HN: Apijack – API of All Trades - <AUTHOR> http://apijack.com/docs/ <comment><AUTHOR> Maybe you are like us, tired of spending hours on complicated APIs with incomprehensible documentation. We decided it was time to fix this. We are trying to make it easier to be a developer in 2020 and beyond, by making functionality available through an API. This way, you won't need to implement it yourself or use a library that might break upon updates or other weird stuff.

What do we do for you?

* Lots of reusable things to use to make your own software faster * The API will always be compatible with previous issues * Technical Support - talk with our engineers whenever you need us * Provide you with documentation just the way you want it

Try it for free without having to submit any credit card details. You can signup here [https://app.apijack.com/accounts/signup/](https://app.apijack.com/accounts/signup/) and see our documentation here: [https://apijack.com/docs/](https://apijack.com/docs/)

I'd love to hear from you - what can you use, what can't you use?

Did you find any bug? Is there anything that you'd love us to add? Any specific API you'd like to have integrated in apiJack?

Don't be shy! Send us your feedback!

</comment><comment><USER2> I have some feedback from reading your docs.

1.) Don't use httpie for the examples. It isn't standard and it is confusing for those who have no experience with it. I had to navigate to the httpie website to see how the tool works just to look at your documentation because you say that JSON is required but your documentation doesn't use valid JSON because httpie does the work for you. I would suggest using curl for the examples.

2.) I'm curious as to why you are using POST for almost all the requests.

3.) Are you adding more endpoints to this service? I'm curious the motivation behind the current functionality as most of it seems to be very niche in how applicable it is.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for taking the time to read and go write this super beneficial feedback Jetti!

1.) The reason why I choose httpie over curl is that it is a lot shorter and just show the essential instead of setting the applicaton/json and having json as a string, but you're right. I'll translate all the examples to curl in the next coming time.

2.) The APIs do not fit the standard CRUD/Resource (Rest) approach. Our small team discussed a lot about how to do it and tried different ways but it made it harder to remember was it with a POST, or GET? Both kinda made sense, and what when you wanted parameters with as GET?

3.) We will be adding a tonne. First, we wanted the platform up and running as basic as possible. We got inspired by the "API Marketplaces" where everyone can upload an API, but we want to address the problems with poor quality, latency, and documentation. The idea is to have one place to use/pay/do.

Almost nobody signed up compared to the visitors we got from HN. Can I ask you if you signed up or not and how come?

<comment><USER2> As for number 2, I think it may be more confusing for potential users since it doesn't follow a pattern that is typical.

I did not sign up. I don't have any need for anything you provide at the moment. I think some of the endpoints are going to be very niche. I have never needed to post anything to pastebin. Most languages provide functionality for a UUID as well.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks again Jetti!</comment></comment></comment></comment>


On the Metal: Jeff Rothschild - <AUTHOR> https://oxide.computer/blog/on-the-metal-1-jeff-rothschild/ <comment><USER2> I've always enjoyed reading Bryan Cantrill's stuff and watching his talks. That goes for this first episode of their new podcast as well. Interesting tidbits of computing history.</comment>