Samsung Admits Galaxy Tab Sales Are 'Quite Small' - <AUTHOR> http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/01/31/samsung.admits.galaxy.tab.sales.poorer.than.claims/

<comment><USER2> Well I'm definitely on the Android side of things, but never would I recommend buying the Galaxy Tab over the iPad. The iPad got accused of being just a bigger iPod Touch, but here they've literally just put a phone OS, which isn't even the latest anymore, on a bigger screen. On top of that it's also smaller and more expensive than the iPad.

Things will get interesting with the arrival of Android 3.0 tablets, but for now I'd rather stay away from the Galaxy Tab.

<comment><USER3> The galaxy tab is frankly quite terrible. I tried one out in the local T-mobile store and was surprised at how awkward it felt. The keyboard was rather inaccurate and it was hard to do basic things like change the URL in the browser. Overall the experience felt very non intuitive, even though the interface looked polished.

Don't be deceived by the pretty screenshots, actually using the Galaxy tab is a pain.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I like my Tab for several reasons:

The form factor (it's perfect for reading eBooks at the gym or elsewhere), and the fact I can do what I'd like to easier with Android than with iOS. It does indeed feel like "just a big Galaxy S" (that will change with future tablets), but an Android phone feels a lot more like a real computer than an iOS device: I have a file system on it, I can copy files (eBooks, PDFs, media) to it manually from my Linux desktop, I can use an alternative media player (Winamp) or an alternative music store (Amazon MP3).

Perhaps these benefits make no sense to a regular consumer, but to a nerd like myself this is a major benefit: the iPad, to me, provides very little of the functionality that I'd look in a device of its size, the Galaxy Tab provides what more of what I am looking for.

It's true that there will better Android Tablets "tomorrow", but there will be even better ones "day after tomorrow". I wanted to read papers and eBooks, comfortably browse the web and watch video lectures at the gym; Galaxy Tab provides it now, there's no need for me to have the latest revision for that (I ran my entire site on a 40 mhz Sparc 10 running OpenBSD well into mid-2000s, as it handled mail, DNS and static web files just fine).

<comment><USER5> I also like my Tab for the same reasons.

It actually fits in the pocket of my jeans in a pinch. It's kind-of like putting a book in my pocket, but at least my hands are free.

The battery life on mine is ridiculously GOOD. I charge it maybe once a week, but I play games on it at night, I surf the web on it at various times throughout the day, and I'll read my books on it too.

I'd personally recommend the tab to anyone wanting a tablet. Maybe not to people who are in love with some of the games on iPhone, but otherwise, it's just slick and wonderful.

And dare I say ... FLASH. I can actually view Flash on websites when I need to. It's rare, but I can if I have to and that's a nice thing.

EDIT: Some Flash works. I can't watch Hulu yet for example. Not sure if that's a Flash thing or a Hulu thing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> This doesn't come as a surprise to me. I was super excited for the Galaxy Tab when I first heard about it, but the price point is way too high. A non-apple tablet needs to be much cheaper to beat the iPad (I was thinking $300 for the wifi-only model would be fair).

After hearing about Samsung's reluctance to update Android on the Galaxy phones, I don't think I would buy one of these even if the price did lower.

<comment><USER7> Exactly why I'm waiting for the Nook Color ROMs to become more stable. It's a great piece of hardware and the price is just right at $250.

$500 is way too expensive, and all of the other Android tablets are just _terrible_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I will only say this about the Tab: They're crazy durable. I've dropped mine an absurd number of times from absurd heights. That gorilla glass is something.

<comment><USER9> Interesting. Maybe the Tab can find niche use in harsh environments like warehouses or factory floors.

<comment><USER10> Touch screens suck in those environments.

We used to use a fancy touchscreen gadget in mining - where everything is covered in water, oid, dust and you wear gloves - genius idea!

<comment><USER11> There are touchscreen technologies that claim to work in these kinds of environments. Namely, infrared and surface acoustic wave. But I don't know how well they actually hold up in the real world.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The price is simply wrong (for me). I haven't bought an iPad because I think they're overpriced. If either of these devices were £250 ($400) I'd buy it in a heartbeat. I did it when Amazon dropped the price of the Kindle.

<comment><USER13> And yet, because the iPad is priced quite aggressively, you are not going to find yourself buying one for quite a while, and competitors like Samsung are between a rock and a hard place.

It's kind of remarkable how Apple's used its old reputation as overpriced as a competitive weapon here. If you're expecting a wifi-only tablet to cost significantly less than an iPad, then the subsidized version of the same gizmo on a contract can't cost any more than a Happy Meal. Nobody can make money selling that device.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> It makes sense. Nobody has the credibility Apple has in this space. When Apple put iPads in the stores, everyone paid attention and took for granted it was something potentially great. Samsung has no credibility, so they are fighting against the tablet novelty and a huge history of "me-too" devices put out to compete with Apple. (I'm thinking of the "iPhone competitor" phones many companies put out that were nothing but cell phones with a color interface, a gimmicky touch screen, some horrid interface for playing mp3s, and a crippled browser.)

Ordinary consumers will not feel comfortable buying non-Apple tablets until they have a better idea what a tablet actually is and how to shop for one.

<comment><USER15> "Ordinary consumers will not feel comfortable buying non-Apple tablets until they have a better idea what a tablet actually is and how to shop for one."

Bizarre.

The Tab hasn't sold well simply because it's not that great of a product (largely because it came with Froyo which is decidedly not ready for the form factor), sold at a really high price. I'm an Android guy, but I had zero interest in the device (just as I have no interest in the Nexus S).

The upcoming Honeycomb devices are far more convincing, however.

<comment><USER14> When expectations were on the order of millions of units, they must have expected some non-hacker consumers to buy the units for themselves or as gifts. Even if every Android guy and HNer in the world bought a Galaxy Tab, they still wouldn't sell a million without significant numbers of ordinary consumers deciding to buy one on the basis of ads, retail displays, and consumer electronics reviews. But that won't happen, because consumers won't pay several hundred dollars when they don't know how to distinguish a quality product from a crappy gimmick, especially when they know from past experience that (at least some) electronics manufacturers will rush to bring out a superficially similar competitor without waiting until they can replicate the technology.

Imagine if there was no Android -- you think there would be no competitors to the iPad? Someone would toss together something worthless based on Windows CE or Palm OS and call it an "iPad killer." Consumers do NOT want to fall for that, and the only way they know how to avoid it is to steer clear of non- Apple tablets for now.

Uptake of Android tablets will depend on tech-savvy folks buying them, showing them to their friends, who will buy Android tablets and show them to _their_ friends, and so on. It will be slow.

<comment><USER16> Geek opinion can go further than just the people who hold those opinions. For example, device enthusiasts' lack of acceptance means that everybody's "Guy who knows about computers/phones/electronic gizmos" is giving the Galaxy Tab a thumbs-down. When you're selling a pricier alternative to an established brand, you _need_ those cheerleaders.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I would have bought one, if it worked as a phone as well. I barely use the phone, but I don't want to have to carry a separate phone with me. It could be a trifle thinner, but it just about fitted in my inside jacket pocket

</comment><comment><USER18> The reason is it is the second best. It doesn't solve the problems the ipad solves any better.

If it tried to solve only slightly different problems, it could still have a good market share even if it wasn't as famous as the ipad.

</comment><comment><USER19> _I knew the Tab numbers were fishy._ in fact, I said as much today [1]. I've just never seen one in the wild and I had a hard believing Android had garnered a 22% segment of last quarter shipments.

I too agree the lack of a competitor for the $499 16GB Wifi iPad.

Plus I'm still not convinced the 7" form factor is going to have mass appeal.

Android manufacturers really do themselves a disservice with these kinds of lies ("mistruths" or "exaggerations" if you prefer).

I would be surprised if the iPad's market share was less than 90% of last quarter and 95% of total.

[1]: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2161624>

</comment><comment><USER20> They just dropped the price 20% here. Getting more tempting...

<comment><USER21> It's still not worth it at that price, IMO. The Tab was ahead of it's time, and now that its time is here it's behind. Wait for a real Honeycomb tablet; you'll be so upset if you don't.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How to setup a k8s cluster with virtualbox VMs - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> This question really doesn't belong here, as it's solved by basic searching, however look into [https://github.com/kubernetes/minikube](https://github.com/kubernetes/minikube)

</comment><comment><USER3> I would be interested in seeing some links to tutorials about this. In the book Kubernetes in Action, the author provides a very good example of accomplishing this with the Kubeadm tool.</comment>


What are some great truths of computer programming? - <AUTHOR> https://www.quora.com/What-are-some-great-truths-of-computer-programming/answer/Keshav-Garg-42?share=82d0a71f&srid=CJfc <comment><USER2> Those things mentioned are not "great truths" but one person's opinions.

</comment><comment><USER3> The problem is in your algorithm/code not the computer.</comment>


Ask HN: Are dev interviews hard or am I just incompetent? - <AUTHOR> Went to a few interviews. 1 was with amazon... ok I was expecting the interview to be quite hard.
Then went to some small companies and had the same complexity of technical tests with amazon. One of them asked me to code on a board.
Should I just look to change my occupation completely? Am I incompetent or people are asking way too much nowadays? <comment><USER2> I think it's cultural.

Many developers lack traditional credentials. Others have credentials but didn't really learn the material. Companies know that hiring bad developers can really hurt performance, morale, culture. So big tech firms that do lots of hiring decided to invent tests to screen applicants. Smaller firms decided to follow suit since large companies were doing it.

If you truly want the jobs on offer, you probably need to cram a bit to pass interview tests. This is easier than it sounds, remember that it's likely going to be tests about the basics of well-known structures and operations (tree traversals, hashing, et cetera). I know it's annoying since it rarely comes up day-to-day, but the worst case is you learn your craft better than you need to.

Another route, go into parts of the field that don't have this requirement. I've noticed that certain areas (ERP Development, SQL DBA, etc) don't tend to focus on this and are more concept oriented in interviews. I think it's because you don't really build the tooling, but rather use it solve problems. Also, the job usually isn't for a company that makes its money from software.

No judgement (I'm a former ERP developer turned SQL DBA, so I'd probably fail most of these interviews spectacularly).

</comment><comment><USER3> I would say you need to incorporate a mix of honesty and ingenuity into your response to these situations.

If you're asked to 'code a solution to this problem on the whiteboard', the honest answer would probably be that you normally use google for reference, old code etc. and the ingenuity would be for you to write some psuedo-code on the board, anyway.

I think this applies to lots of questions.. "Can you tell me how you would sort this data set?". "(honesty) I don't know how, off the top of my head but (ingenuity) I know I could utilise an algorithm and I would probably google/research which would be most appropriate".

I'll finish with an anecdote.. in my first IT interview (server builder) I was asked to tell the interviewer what RAID stood for, and which type I would use to ensure my data was safe if one drive blew up. In my inexperienced state of mind, I murmured and was clearly distressed. The interview interrupted and said "If you don't know the answer.. just tell me you don't know, and that you'll find out and tell me later".

The lesson there is, sometimes there isn't one clear answer to an interviewers question.

Good luck :)

</comment><comment><USER4> So far all you've said is that they asked you to code on a board and that they were "hard". Without knowing _why_ you found them hard it's impossible to provide any meaningful input.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry about that and the late response.

I was asked to balance a binary tree on a whiteboard!

I walked out of there instantly, but generally all the interviews I went to had very similar questions.

<comment><USER4> But what's the specific issue with a question like that?

I agree that it's rare that we have to write low-level functionality like this any more (I _have_ had to write such things, however). I argue that basic CS knowledge isn't useless and actually _does_ matter in the long run.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think that potential employers always wanna stress you a little to see, what you really can and what is bravado.

Good companies might still press to hard (but not give you penalties for failing way-too-hard questions).

Also it can be a tactic to see, how you handle stressful and unknown situations (which might occur often depending of your specific line of work and industry).

I have made interviews (as the employers' helper) with live coding exercises on a computer, and even if they technically failed I recommended hiring them anyways as I was obvious that their skills where okay but their performance "issue" was stress-related..

That said, I know nothing of your skill level, so YMMV...

Btw. small companies have similar problems, often just on a much smaller scale (not that it necessarily makes them easier to handle, especially because they have much tighter ressource constraints (less money))

<comment><USER6> Whiteboard coding is nothing at all like real work. In your real job you never code on a whiteboard with an arbitrarily short timeline, without access to the Internet while stressing about getting a job.

It's just a hazing ritual.

<comment><USER4> Whiteboard coding is one way to understand how a person thinks about a problem.

Regarding arbitrarily-short deadlines--the only difference is that IRL it wouldn't be on a whiteboard. Deadlines are still arbitrarily short, and people will be watching you work.

I've never asked someone to code on a whiteboard (I tend towards paper anyway) as anything remotely approaching hazing, which is specifically designed to humiliate, demean, or over-stress.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> They're hard, quality assessment (on both sides of the table) is hard, there are many incompetent managers (as there are many incompetant techies), and it's a frequently-visited topic on HN.

[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=interviews&sort=byPopularity&p...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=interviews&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story)

[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=recruiting&sort=byPopularity&p...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=recruiting&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story)

More generally, quality assessments of tacit knowledge are intrinsically hard.

</comment><comment><USER6> Whiteboard coding puzzles, and interviewing in general, are a distinct skill that usually has nothing to do with actual job performance. You can be bad at interviewing and still be a great employee, and vice versa you can be a great at interviewing and a bad employee.

You should treat it as a new skill to acquire, however annoying and pointless that is... or figure out ways to get a job without going through that. Some companies have better interview processes.

Re coding on a board, here's how I deal with those: [https://codewithoutrules.com/2016/04/04/interview- puzzles/](https://codewithoutrules.com/2016/04/04/interview-puzzles/)

<comment><USER8> I very much second this. I remember I had so much trouble landing my first internship that I was near the point of dropping out my CS degree to switch major.

After a few internships and also landing full time positions, I realize interviewing is really a distinct skill that's apart from your ability to perform on the job. Especially with companies that make you do coding puzzles, you have to treat it as a standardized test and put some effort into studying for it.

With more interview iterations, you'll also become better at presenting yourself and showing confidence (which I believe will have a major impact on people's first impression on you).

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Welcome to the job market :) you should run a quick search on HN people have been talking about that a lot lately.

Long story short - all the tech companies have adopted the google model in order to evaluate candidates. In other words, generalists are in high demand right now and of course in early 2017 there's a higher supply than demand. Companies, small, medium and large can pretty much do whathever the heck they want.

</comment><comment><USER10> So... You couldn't get hired by a top company so now you think you're incompetent...? I think I miss the logic here. You know, try interviewing at companies that do not belong to the top 5%.</comment>


Microsoft Altered Windows Sales: Moved $259 million from other units - <AUTHOR> http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/operatingsystems/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=228200850

<comment><USER2> This is an odd story, because it just as easily be reframed: "MS Downplaying Consumer Division Sales?"

One big thing that came out of the E&D shakeup was Media Center moved to Windows accounting, rather than E&D. I don't think Surface numbers had much to do with it.

Personally I would have kept the money in E&D. No one cares about Windows YoY growth, except that it doesn't fall off of a cliff. But everyone is watching the E&D growth/loss.

<comment><USER3> Windows is seen as critical to Microsoft's future and, apparently, Windows division has a lot of political power with the accounting folks. Any news that could put Windows sales in doubt could be seem as the always announced beginning of Microsoft's inevitable downfall.

I have no love for Microsoft, but I too get tired of people saying that Microsoft is dying. Of course it is. We too will die, hopefully a good many decades from now.

Besides that, what good would it do for Microsoft to downplay the entertainment division's revenue? It wouldn't make sense to title the article that way when Microsoft is most probably trying to make its numbers look a little better.

<comment><USER2> _Any news that could put Windows sales in doubt could be seem as the always announced beginning of Microsoft's inevitable downfall._

But $259M doesn't really change the discussion about Windows. Windows did $4.8B in the quarter, up from $2.9B a year ago. Making it $4.5B doesn't make anyone pause.

But would take E&D from $1.8B to $2.1B and show 50% YoY growth. That's impressive, and something that might begin to move the stock.

The fact of the matter is that everyone knows that Windows is not a growth area for MS. And if anything, they'd want to wait until a bad quarter to begin to shift earnings to Windows, not in a record-breaking quarter. Now they have less accounting games at their disposal in the inevitable future when Windows does begin to make less money.

In summary, what I'm saying is that this accounting has nothing to do with trying to make Windows look good (or E&D look bad). I think it is just internal restructuring of P&Ls that had a coincidental a minor effect on fiscal reporting.

<comment><USER3> > had a coincidental a minor effect on fiscal reporting.

It probably had a much more relevant impact on executive compensation ;-)

When someone goes out of his way to do something that makes no sense, it's probably because we don't understand why it was done and, after all, it actually makes lots of sense. As it is now, it's weird. But the problem is probably in our perception of its weirdness, not in the number manipulation itself.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Congressman calls survey "unscientific" because it is random - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/20/sunday-review/the-debate-over-the-american-community-survey.html

<comment><USER2> > "This is a program that intrudes on people's lives, just like the > Environmental Protection Agency or the bank regulators," said Daniel > Webster, a first-term Republican congressman from Florida who sponsored the > relevant legislation.

I guess I don't have to take this guy seriously anymore. Perhaps tomorrow he'll suggest disbanding police departments?

<comment><USER3> Yet he voted for the NDAA.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> In Canada, the prime minister did a similar thing, announcing soon before the census's administration that the long version (administered to a random subset) would no longer be mandatory due to "privacy-related complaints".

The decision prompted the resignation of the Chief Statistician, a man appointed to the position by the prime minister. The people in charge of the decision equivocated repeatedly over how and why it happened: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_2011_Census#Voluntary_lo...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_2011_Census#Voluntary_long- form_survey_controversy)

A cynic would say that the Prime Minister advocated for the position in order to take advantage of the resulting lack of data and potential for "truthiness", and only used liberty and privacy arguments as political cover.

<comment><USER5> We had a random long version census in 2011 in Germany, too. It was mandatory. There was a moderately large political debate about the privacy implications. A very small number of people refused to participate, under a threat of penalty that, afaik, was never acted upon. I wasn't asked.

The last real census (in the western part, anyway) before 2011 was in 1987. It was originally planned for 1983, but had to be postponed and modified aftr it was met with _huge_ , widespread resistance. This culminated in the German supreme (ie. constitution,al) court issueing a landmark ruling on privacy rights, establishing informational self-determination as a fundamental right.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> The apparent total lack of understanding from the US congress about the very things they legislate upon strikes me lately.

I'm a Canadian myself and our current government isn't any better (or only slightly) in this regard. It seems to me that the basic step would be to ensure you understand what you're talking about before trying to make up laws.

What the hell is wrong with these people. Randomness in the chosen dataset is an inherent concept of statistics. Any high schooler is familiar with this for christ's sake.

<comment><USER7> What's intriguing is that his bio on his congress homepage says that he has an engineering background; it kinda makes you wonder what kind of engineering.

<http://webster.house.gov/Biography/>

<comment><USER8> Very few people I know are aware of statistical research and how it is to be done to avoid bias, etc.

I would not be surprised that Senator Webster is unaware. Especially since he has spent most of his working life as a politician.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think we should just explain that it's not totally random. The surveyors very carefully choose specific numbers of people from particular demographics and weight the responses, to make a representative picture of the population.

</comment><comment><USER10> >>"Knowing what's happening in our economy is so desperately important to keeping our economy functioning smoothly," said Maurine Haver, the chief executive and founder of Haver Analytics, a data analysis company. "The reason the Great Recession did not become another Great Depression is because of the more current economic data we have today that we didn't have in the 1930s."

Dr. Haver's "data analysis" company benefits enormously from the free availability of ACS data, freeing her & her clients from having to gather these data on their own. She is not exactly an impartial voice in this debate.

<comment><USER7> Sure, that means you should make sure you verify her claims more closely, but that doesn't automatically mean she is wrong.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: What's the best way to charge/discharge a laptop battery? - <AUTHOR>

Different people tell you different things, I want to hear your opinions. What's the best pattern for charging/use/charging cycles for a laptop battery to ensure maximum life as well as maximum usage between charges? Charge till full, use till empty, charge till full again? Charge till full, use till "x" % remaining, charge till full again? Charge till "y" % full, use till empty or "x"% empty, repeat? Suggestions, all of them given with rather convincing authority, are all over the place. <comment><USER2> Depends on the chemistry.

Assuming you're describing recent lithium batteries, it's good to discharge as shallow as possible, and charge as full as possible (according to Peukert curve) to preserve lifespan. Most modern laptops apply the proper charge impedance as part of their charging circuits.

Older laptops that used Ni-Cd would benefit from a full ('til it's dead) discharge before a recharge.</comment>


Essential C - <AUTHOR> http://cslibrary.stanford.edu/101/

<comment><USER2> C is an excellent first language when teaching in a CompSci type environment.

If the students are of a different discipline (not aiming to be CompSci grads) or much younger then i think there are better choices e.g. Python.

In a CompSci academic setting i think learning assembly first (that is first programming language but in parallel with the other classes such as computer architecture etc.) is also a valid approach.

Programming from the Ground Up [1] is a very accessible introduction to x86 ASM and even supposing you don't go any further than the examples in this book, you'll still feel the benefits.

[1] [http://ftp.igh.cnrs.fr/pub/nongnu/pgubook/ProgrammingGroundU...](http://ftp.igh.cnrs.fr/pub/nongnu/pgubook/ProgrammingGroundUp-1-0-booksize.pdf)

<comment><USER3> I am split on if I think C/assembler is the best introduction material for computer science, or if scheme is.

What I am rather certain of though is that just about everything in-between is not. You don't really see the best of both worlds, but rather the worse.

(I should probably clarify that I think there is a large disconnect between what makes a good language for teaching and what makes a good language for software development in a corporate environment.)

<comment><USER4> Those are two of the "pure" approaches, and recently there's a third one, something in the ML/Haskell orbit. C for the low-level/machine-oriented approach, Scheme for the lambda-calculus-esque approach, and ML/Haskell for the type-theory-oriented approach.

Whether the Scheme approach is the best theoretical introduction depends on part on how important you think type systems are to modern CS. Much of PLs thinks the answer is "very important", since they view types as the basis of rigorously specifying program behavior. Rob Harper has taken that view at CMU, for example, using Standard ML in his revamped intro course. (I'm not strongly opinionated on that subject myself.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Trying to write JavaScript that takes advantage of a single engine such as V8, hidden classes, type immutability, performance of 31 vs 32 bits, lack of 64 bit integer operations, cost of closures, etc. in the end, you spend so much time trying to work within this indirection that C begins to look far less wasteful and more direct, in terms of both human and machine time, especially if you have the general design of what you're trying to do figured out.

<comment><USER6> This gets at one of the reasons I like Common Lisp: Common Lisp allows you to program at a high level and then stepwise refine your program to make it more efficient, such as by adding type declarations, adding other declarations, changing your data types, and, at an extreme, changing your algorithms to run without CONSing (that is, eliminating dynamic allocation and garbage collection), not to mention whatever your specific implementation provides as an extension to the standard.

Most code can stay fairly high-level, but the tools are there and a standard part of the language if you need them.

<comment><USER7> I've seen some lispers going 'full stack' programming. Clojurians (like this guy <http://www.learningclojure.com/2010/09/clojure-is-fast.html>) also aim to cpu cycles when they program. It's an interesting workflow to prototype high and fast and the project it down baremetal.

<comment><USER4> The fact that Lisp systems have traditionally included an easy-to-use asm inspector right in the environment is an interesting aspect imo. It's actually _more_ common in my experience for Lispers to look at their generated asm than it is for (non-embedded) C coders to do so, because it's so easy to just (disassemble #'foo).

<comment><USER7> It's indeed nice to have direct connection between high and low. It's also in lisp culture to unfold layers of code transformations rather than stay in your own isolated layer and relying blindly on 'external tools' that will never be as integrated syntactically and systemically as ... well lisp.

Lisp aside, having this point of view seems to be a good goal to reach.

ps: There's also one very important lower layer, the memory/cache subsystem.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The document talks about C89, even though the last Copyright year is 2003. Isn't it about time that we start movin on? Where are the restricted pointers, the flexible array member and so on?

And, by the way, I think the comment at the bottom of page 27 is not correct:

 _The qualifier const can be added to the left of a variable or parameter type to declare that the code using the variable will not change the variable. As a practical matter, use of const is very sporadic in the C programming community. It does have one very handy use, which is to clarify the role of a parameter in a function prototype..._

Actually, the use of _const_ is encouraged as it helps the compiler to catch more errors as well as to enable some optimizations.

<comment><USER9> I just spent the past 4 months programming a library in C89. I would have MUCH preferred C99 if only for inline variable declaration.

The key issue for my project was being cross platform. Since Microsoft's compiler does not implement C99 and never will, my hands were tied.

Now that's just my library. Other programers might be willing to decide case by case which features of C99 to use. Still if the document dates back to 2003 then C99 support everywhere would have been even more primitive. C89 would thus be the right decision for a introduction to C to avoid confusion.

<comment><USER10> I'm curious: could you write your program in the subset of C99 that'll compile under C++, and then use C++ mode to compile it under Visual Studio?

<comment><USER9> I suppose I could but that'd be too complicated for my taste. In fact I wouldn't even need to go that far. Many of the most useful things are implemented as extensions to C89 in the popular compilers. Instead I stuck to pure C89 which I knew would be universally implemented. I like knowing that I can set GCC to ansi + pedantic and have a reasonable expectation of no drastic surprises.

C89 is primitive but charming in the simplicity. For instance while I disliked being forced to declare a function's variables before any code I now see that it encouraged me to keep functions very small. I would find ways to use fewer variables. Instead of 'for(int i = 0; i < max; i++)' I would use 'while(--max >= 0)', anything to avoid moving my cursor to the top of the function.

On the other hand I miss C++'s exceptions. Checking for errors all over the place gets ugly and bloats the codebase. What would otherwise be a two line copy operation between two objects gets two if blocks added which handle the miniscule chance of memory allocation failure in some other deeper frame.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I also thought C should be the first language anyone learns. Cause you learn the most (about the machine) and other languages are easy peasy compared (well except for assembler, of course).

<comment><USER6> > Cause you learn the most (about the machine)

Except when it comes to cache, pipelining, registers, non-uniform memory access in general (not just cache), out-of-order execution and opcode pairing rules, SIMD architectures, and the existence of the processor status word. Other than that, yeah, C exposes you to a lot of worrying about memory allocation when algorithm design would be a better use of your time.

> other languages are easy peasy compared

The only way you could possibly say this is if the only languages you know are imperative Algol-derived ones with minimal type systems and no support for logic or declarative programming. Learning C doesn't make Prolog meaningfully easier. Learning C doesn't even make learning a mainstream language like SQL easier.

<comment><USER12> This still doesn't successfully counter the statement that C is the best language to start with.

I'm biased since C is my first language. Do you recommend another better suited for the purpose?

<comment><USER13> I would recommend almost anything with an interactive shell over a traditional C environment.

Python and irb are nice starting points because you can start out by claiming they are just a calculator, where you have to press return instead of =.

From there, you can go to variables (prevent you from having to type, e.g. the gravitational constant or a VAT percentage over and over), then to looping (print multiplication tables), to arrays (store them for later use, or as input for a loop to print year lengths for the planets, computed from their distance to the sun), and then to functions.

And all of that without having to teach people the difference between source, object code, and executable.

<comment><USER14> I agree that this is the case for casual programming. If you are teaching someone who has hardware experience (electrical engineer, etc), it is sometimes easier to build from the bottom up and C is as low as it goes without being assembly (a good and a bad thing).

<comment><USER15> For the low level stuff an assembly language is way better than C. C is still a LOT of magic that you won't be able to fully understand without understanding how the machine and the compiler works. In assembly a line corresponds to one instruction. What the assembler is doing is translating each line to an instruction number that the machine can interpret. That is a whole lot less magic than what happens in C. In addition, pointers are much easier to understand from a machine perspective than from a C perspective: they are just numbers indicating a location in memory. C makes that far too complicated with different data types, pointers to local variables (and higher up the call stack), confusing pointer declaration syntax, etc.

You can learn C syntax for assembly language idioms later. Starting out by learning the concepts plus the syntax at the same time leads to inefficient learning because when you're learning concepts like pointers it doesn't help to have to learn confusing stuff and syntax at the same time.

This does not apply to languages that cleanly abstract the machine like Scheme/Python/Haskell/what have you, but C lets the low level stuff shine through so much that you end up having to learn that anyway; you can't really learn it as an abstraction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I highly recommend this and a bunch of other C-related stuff in the Stanford CS library. Their pointer explanations helped me many, many years ago. <http://cslibrary.stanford.edu/>

<comment><USER17> Along with Kernighan and Ritchie, I would also highly recommend getting a copy of 'C: A reference manual' by Harbison and Steele. That book explains a lot of stuff by topic and with descriptive examples. Especially beneficial for a quick reference.

Highly recommended.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I've been trying to get through K&R for the past week or so. I think this will make things a lot easier. Thanks a lot!

<comment><USER19> Well, that kind of invalidates part of the comment I was going to write: "How is this any better than K&R's 'the C programming language'?". I guess it all depends on background and personal preference.

I've never become comfortable with C's pointer/reference/dereference syntax -- I much prefer Pascal in this sense. I recently had a look at Ada and was pleasantly surprised -- it has a very straightforward syntax.

As other's mention here, I think C should be learnt with assembler (and computer architecture - especially the bit about cache hits/misses). I find that:

      http://www.drpaulcarter.com/pcasm/

is a great introduction to assembler and C -- and how the two (can) interact.

Another thing I find frustrating with C is that it's still a bit of a pain to work with unicode/wide strings -- on my todo list is writing a short post on "Hellø wørld (with unicode)" -- with some examples of wide strings in C, (possibly Pascal) and ADA -- along with assembler output and a "pure" assembler version.

There is surprisingly little good material on the web for this (that I managed to find, anyway).

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> This looks like the perfect material to learn C if you already know how to program (or at least in C-like languages like Java and C#).

</comment><comment><USER21> Nick Parlante is an exceptional instructor. I highly recommend Google's Python Class he instructed.

</comment><comment><USER22> I really enjoy the short / succinct format of this, does anyone have links to similar documents for java / javascript / C++?

</comment><comment><USER23> Oh, this is fantastic. Thank you!</comment>


WebAssembly Startup Time Optimization for Apps - <AUTHOR> https://pspdfkit.com/blog/2018/optimize-webassembly-startup-performance <comment><USER2> PSPDFKit CTO here, we shipped a WebAssembly build of our Web SDK last year. With it all of the PDF loading, rendering and saving happens in-browser.

I'm personally massively bullish on WebAssembly - hopefully SharedArrayBuffer gets re-enabled soon.

Ask me anything, happy to answer.</comment>


Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak hopes Bitcoin will become global currency - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/04/apple-co-founder-steve-wozniak-hopes-bitcoin-will-become-global-currency.html <comment><USER2> Yeah, I'm not putting any weight behind this... ask him something more concrete like how to reduce the chip count on your disk drive controller.

</comment><comment><USER3> It won't though. It's a terrible currency.

<comment><AUTHOR> It will, it is an excellent currency

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I encourage everyone who supports Bitcoin to speak out about it! It makes it easy to know whose opinions to take with a pillar of salt.

<comment><USER5> I encourage everyone who supports Bitcoin to actually use it as a currency, instead of a sketchy investment vehicle

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> With all due respect to the guy but asking him is the equivalent of asking some random person on the street. He isn't an economist, civil servant or researcher who has actually invested significant thought on the matter. He is just someone who founded Apple decades ago and hasn't done much since.

Also it's really just a terrible idea. The volatility, the fraud and ease of theft, the lack of connection to something physical, the fact it undermines banks whom serve an important purpose. No thanks.

<comment> cup-of-tea > the lack of connection to something physical

Do you get paid in something physical? Do you think there are notes or precious metals sitting in a safe somewhere that you just never use? I suggest you study money. Also don't use the word whom unless you know how to.

<comment><USER6> I am referring to the use of Bitcoin as a mass market currency. Physical currency is still useful in many situations where there is (a) no/intermittent networking, (b) when the cost of the purchase is less than the financial overheads and (c) for truly anonymous purchases.

I could keep going. There is a reason that even in countries like Australia where we have widspread tap to pay that cash is still pervasive.

<comment> cup-of-tea There's no reason bitcoin can't coexist with physical currency. An interesting question is if bitcoin were accepted everywhere, what would people trust more? Bitcoin or bits of paper printed by the government?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Is bitcoin not already a global currency?

</comment><comment><USER8> Wozniak was a pretty amazing guy. Not sure what hes been up to lately.</comment>


Social Marketplace with a subscription model - <AUTHOR> https://www.storat.com <comment><AUTHOR> Our vision is to create a social ecommerce marketplace, where sellers and buyers are not locked inside and can communicate and transact freely on or off the market. Where the marketplace operator charges no margin, so sellers can provide their products and services at the lowest cost possible, while distinguishing themselves with a great brand, excellent customer service, and feedback.

We will make it easy for consumers and small businesses to setup online and mobile presence in minutes at no or very little cost with powerful, simple, and easy to use cloud-based solutions to connect with customers, run their business, and grow.

While our flagship product is a socially-enabled online marketplace, we are a technology company, a Cloud Distribution Company.

<comment><USER2> Craigslist for UAE?</comment></comment>


Demo: Incremental Parser in action - eliah-lakhin http://lakhin.com/projects/papa-carlo/demo

<comment> eliah-lakhin I would like to hear any feedback from you: good or bad.

Also, if you like this demo, please star the project on GitHub: [https://github.com/Eliah-Lakhin/papa-carlo](https://github.com/Eliah- Lakhin/papa-carlo)</comment>


Not Even Twitter Understands Twitter - <AUTHOR> http://www.baekdal.com/opinion/not-even-twitter-understands-twitter/ <comment><USER3> Twitter's problem is that they don't even have the basic understanding of why they're successful. In the past several years there hasn't been a single change they've implemented that has improved things. The goal I guess has always been to attract the non-user.

But when I really study things most of the stuff that people think as fundamentally part of the service was instead added by the community and initially rejected by those running Twitter like use of the pound sign.

In fact when you look at when Twitter really slowed its growth was when they turned their back on that very community, especially developers. Anyone here actually believe that their experience with Twitter wouldn't be far better if there were still independent clients?

Twitter imho would be far better served to improve the service for those using it than randomly try throwing stuff at the wall in an attempt to broaden its appeal.

<comment><USER4> I think the real core value prop of Twitter is the niche communities people can build around their interests. It's about the interest graph. I posted this in another article on the front page today, but I'll do it here also. I think they need to double down on growing communities within Twitter. It's just too hard right now.

Here's my proposal:

Twitter Rooms: [https://medium.com/@danielrakh/twitter- rooms-e6f34e843e9a](https://medium.com/@danielrakh/twitter-rooms-e6f34e843e9a)

<comment><USER3> What Twitter is lacking more succinctly is a thought pg expressed when talking about startups:

Better to make a few users love you than a lot ambivalent.

Twitter's strategy is to have lots of people to like it rather than to have a smaller group love it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > Or what about hashtags. This is a brilliant concept invented by Chris > Messina, which allowed people to group tweets from many different people > into a single collection.

Yeah, IRC channels never existed. I think I lost a few IQ points on this article.

Are bookmarks really not a thing anymore? Is such basic browser functionality, such as back buttons and bookmarks passé today? I mean, I guess we all collectively forgot IRC ever existed. Or Usenet. Or RSS. Why not forget bookmarks exist as well. Oh right. None of that can be monetized.

The internet is fucking doomed. We've moved from the promise of open networks, federated protocols, and decentralization to centralized services, advertising everywhere, and tracking your every movement to sell to the highest bidder. And people are _worried_ Twitter might die. Yeah, it's really so sad they won't live another day to track you or sell you useless shit. Sob story of the eyeball economy, right there folks.

<comment><USER6> > Yeah, IRC channels never existed. I think I lost a few IQ points on this > article.

Huh? Hashtags are only superficially related to IRC channels. For one, you don't need to be "joined" to a hashtag to see messages on it.

<comment><USER7> Plus IRC channels existed in a bounded scope which kept them relevant to the interests of their participants.

Twitter hashtags are global in scope which makes many of them useless due to dilution.

I encountered a particular Twitter hashtag the other day: #fog

Imagine every global reference to fog being tagged thus. It's a mess.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8>
      When you favorite a tweet, you mostly do so for your
      own consumption. It is a way for you to tell yourself
      that this tweet is something you want to get back to,
      or remember for later use.

That sure ain't how I use it. Two reasons. (1) Favorites are public. (2) I don't need to get back to a tweet or remember it for later use; they're short, so I remember them in my brain.

I saw the article was much longer, but the author lost me at that point.

<comment><USER9> Same here. Who is this Thomas Baekdal to tell me what I mean what I favorite a tweet?! Maybe that's why he does it, but how does he know about me?

I favorite a tweet to tell the tweeter that I liked what they said. I know they're gonna get an email saying I favorited their tweet.

I've totally forgotten that someone could use favoriting as a bookmarking system; I'm too busy to go back and look at lists of bookmarked tweets.

<comment><USER10> This does seem to divide people. My own instant response to the favourite system was that it was obviously a means of expressing approval, without bombarding your followers' timelines with other people's stuff. "This tweet is a favourite of mine" = "I like this tweet". Eventually somebody favourited one of my tweets and I got an email telling me they'd done it, which just reinforced this idea for me.

Then after about 4 years somebody pointed out that it actually stored your favourites. And that meant you could use them as a kind of bookmark. Well! Who'd have thought? (I don't use Internet Explorer, which is my excuse for not spotting the favourite = bookmark connection.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I disagree with the statement that people don't use it for chitchat. That is _also_ something people use it for: I have a lot of friends on Twitter who tweet whimsical things (and whom I tweet whimsical things to).

But this still makes Twitter very different from Facebook. On Twitter, I follow people who tweet about interesting things or who share some common interest with me. Facebook, on the other hand, is something I use to talk to the people I met at high school and Uni. Thus Twitter is always a fun place to go to, filled with content that will appeal to me. Facebook, on the other hand, is mostly lowest-common-denominator plagiarised content and life updates I probably don't care much about.

Facebook is a place that represents some of your existing relationships. Twitter is a place where you make new ones.

</comment><comment><USER12> Twitter moments could be so awesome, I have a feeling they will get it right, but its not quite there yet.

Especially for sports, when I'm watching a game I usually have twitter open to see people's jokes & analysis. Sometimes, I look at the moment the day after just cause I'm curious, but the moment doesn't reflect my game experience at all.

Here is the twitter moment for the 1st day of the NBA season. [https://twitter.com/i/moments/659130295396896768](https://twitter.com/i/moments/659130295396896768) \-- its mostly just pictures from official nba and team accounts. There are no jokes, and there is very little analysis. It has some random highlights from games. But the biggest highlight of the night ( game winning block on Lebron ) is missing for some reason.

Same with this moment on the most recent GOP debate: [https://twitter.com/i/moments/659492422137827328?lang=en](https://twitter.com/i/moments/659492422137827328?lang=en) There are no jokes at all. There had to have been at least 1 donald trump joke out there that should have been included.

I think they are working on curation tools so anyone can curate moments, and I think that will really help if enough interesting people take the time to do it. But I really think it could be the newspaper or the 'reddit' of a lot of topics.

</comment><comment><USER13> They changed it because people were using them as likes rather than favourites.

I originally used them as "favourites" (for links that I was interested in but didn't have time to read now) but others didn't. Twitter catered for the majority and made the list of your favourites harder to get at and started putting things you favourite into other people's timelines.

Whilst I preferred how it was originally it is clear to me that this change was motivated by how the community at large used the feature.

</comment><comment><USER14> I should include a disclaimer to this comment that despite attempting to use Twitter multiple times, I still cannot find a use for it, so I would not consider myself a "Twitter user". That said, the criticism of the favorite -> like change makes no sense to me.

> Favorite (old) = neutral statement related to the importance of the tweet > for you. It's mostly a bookmark, not really an endorsement.

> Favoriting a tweet didn't mean it was her favorite (as Twitter apparently > believes)

Oh yeah? If that's true, that's a _terrible_ UX. Any time you have to say "xxx doesn't actually _mean_ xxx", you should stop and think extra hard about what you're saying. "Favoriting" a tweet should mean exactly what it says it means.

And considering how favoriting a tweet notifies the recipient, and a person's favorites are public, I don't buy that favoriting a tweet was a neutral reaction to a tweet. If I got a notification that said Bob favorited tweet yyy, I would take that to mean endorsement.

Just because some users are using it as a bookmarking service doesn't mean that's what most people use it as or what Twitter intends it to be used as.

</comment><comment><USER15> Ironically, Not even this guy understands how people (other than marketers like himself) use Twitter. It's rare to see anyone favoriting a tweet to "reference" it later. Most people use favorite as a token of acknowledgement (I saw this and approve). Favorites are not endorsements either, since it doesn't get broadcasted to my followers.

<comment><USER16> I do what he does. I see something interesting about design or development posted by someone else, I'll favorite it so I can find it easier later, not to endorse it (although usually I would endorse that it's worth checking out).

That being said, I've used 'like's' in that way too, so I don't particularly care about this change.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Twitter succeeds because it takes a feature everyone already likes - <USER2> - and breaks down the walls. Hash tags serve to group users into "rooms", following groups users, favorites (<3) invite users into your conversation. The brilliance is in making it universal so everyone clicks Twitter's Ruby.

</comment><comment><USER11> A realisation I just had: Twitter and Tumblr are similar in many respects. Both are microblogging (though the former more micro) services, both are interest-based networks, both work fairly similarly (retweets/posts, hashtags/tags, etc.). The demographics are different (Twitter's is broader than Tumblr's, which is largely just young people), but they're not fundamentally different services.

Yet their corporate masters differ. Tumblr, the company, totally _gets_ Tumblr, the community. They understand why the site is popular, what people want. Twitter, though, believes it is Facebook.

</comment><comment><USER18> Twitter is only interesting because it happens to be the current iteration of instant messenger / community chatroom. Kik, AOL IM, ICQ, IRC.. there's no particular innovation from Twitter keeping users there. It just happened to be in the right place at the right time, and right now it seems as though anything with a half decent design UI and interesting set of features could sprout up to draw migration from twitters core/casual userbase.

</comment><comment><USER19> Not having people use your product the way you expected it is not a problem. _This_ is in fact the greatest lesson from Twitter history: you don't make your product; your users will.

The problem here is that Twitter is slow to respond to these usage patterns; we don't really know if they realize how people use their product and they seem to try random things to satisfy investors and/or users.

</comment><comment><USER20> Some people consider the fav button as a marker, the expression of feeling is not necessarily what they want. I understand this UX change might bring more users because it made others subconsciously feel being endorsed, but personally I don't like it, it's like twitter claims that I have something which I don't.

</comment><comment><USER21> Are people still complaining about the icon change that has no functional differences whatsoever? Star, heart, whatever, it saves the tweet in a list for later access.

<comment><USER22> There is a pretty big semantic difference, that the OP explains very thoroughly. Could you explain how you disagree?

<comment><USER21> I'm not clear on what the semantic difference is between favoriting and liking. Publicly doing either carries a connotation of approval, and the function is unchanged.

Is anyone _really, actually, demonstrably_ confused by this change?

<comment><USER23> Facebook added options to their "Like" button because "Liking" a post about your best friends' husband dying isn't something many people felt comfortable with doing even with understanding what "liking" something does.

I've favorited nothing since the heart change. Because many of the things I favorite are not things I "love" \- which is what the heart implies.

 _> Is anyone really, actually, demonstrably confused by this change?_

I'm confused why they felt the need to change it _at all_. So you can lump me in with people being actually, demonstrably confused.

<comment><USER21> _I 've favorited nothing since the heart change._

Why? You know what the function does, and the way you worded your comment implies that there are still things you want to like/favorite, so why not?

<comment><USER24> Imagine the icon would change to a skull, or some kind of symbolic cross, without changing the functionality at all. Do you think people would use it as before? The heart icon implies a certain emotion, and many people feel that emotion to be stronger than what they feel towards the tweet.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This just reinforces my belief (and I'm a broken record on this) that Twitter would have been far better as a protocol than as a company.

</comment><comment><USER26> Best article I've read in awhile. How many points will there stock fall Monday?

</comment><comment><USER27> I'm confused. The article apparently thinks that it's fine to favorite something you don't actually think is your favorite, contra twitter. But then why not heart something you don't actually like? The logic doesn't seem to work out.

<comment><USER28> When you add your online banking site to your browser _favourites_ is it really because it's your favorite site on the internet?

<comment><USER14> When I favorite my banking website, a notification isn't sent to the website telling them I favorited them, nor are my browser favorites public for anyone to see. The semantics, and thus the meaning, are totally different.

Chrome doesn't even use the term favorites. It uses the (more accurate, imo) term bookmarks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Can I heart this?

This post is spot on.

<comment><USER30> You can't 'heart' this but you can 'upvote' it. Which I think it quite an interesting thing; we have 'likes', 'favourites', 'upvotes' and more, across different sites and they serve different purposes. But often, users conflate them and use them incorrectly. A good example of this would be the 'upvote' and 'downvote' on reddit and HN. Many users will use these buttons to express agreement or disagreement, even though that is explicitly wrong as defined by the owners of the site.

It's a journey, I think, that developers and users are taking right now. We're both searching for the right language to express ourselves, a language that we can use to our advantage. Are we converging on a common language between startup owners and users? No I don't think we are - but perhaps we should be.

<comment><USER14> > Many users will use these buttons to express agreement or disagreement, even > though that is explicitly wrong as defined by the owners of the site.

Interestingly enough, downvoting to express disagreement is not against the hacker news guidelines[1].

A few subreddits I visit pop up a message right next to the comment when you downvote it, saying you should only do so when it does not contribute to the discussion. I think that's a pretty good solution for educating users about the intended purpose of downvoting. I also think HN's idea of only letting older users downvote is a healthy idea.

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

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> From the article:

"Last year it had a revenue of $1.4 billion, but it's [sic] operational costs was [sic] $1.9 billion"

How on earth could it cost 1.9 Billion to run "Twitter"? 50 WhatsApp engineers and 100 Elixer servers could handle everything. That's just insane. They need to cut costs NOW.</comment>


Recent Services Interruptions - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/blog/767-recent-services-interruptions <comment><USER2> Ways three days with shaky service? Does anyone know a good alternative to github?

<comment><USER3> There's bitbucket.org. But they're not so hot on reliability either. You can also try Unfuddle, if you don't care much for the "social" part of github.</comment></comment>


Inside a Hacked SEO Backlink Network - <AUTHOR> http://www.elite-strategies.com/inside-a-hacked-seo-backlink-network/ <comment><AUTHOR> This got me intrigued: "we got a notification from Google that stated a client website was hacked" \- so Google actually does have some kind of an algorithm that detects this. And - what - kindly informs webmasters? Nice...

<comment><USER2> Thanks for reading really appreciate it. Yes Google sends a notification via email via Google search console ( formerly known as Google Webmaster Tools) a lot of times when a site gets hacked. A lot of times they catch it long before the webmaster does most of the time it is a shared hosting with an absentee admin or webmaster.

I know a lot of people in this crowd probably run across these situations all the time but a lot of people don't realize why exactly their sites got hacked and what the purpose is. Thank you so much again for reading and checking this out.

<comment><USER3> that's a bold statement. Google does notice that when they see some link network get too big. or maybe they have honey pots and they consider your server hacked if they see your pages linking to that honey pot.

but thinking they know when a server if hacked is giving them too much credit. they may know when it's part of a widely know black link network. in fact, most search engines seems to know that.

reason your links are for Japanese sites is because there everyone uses the cellphone operator default search, which is crappy, but still better than Google for native language. they may be slower to react or worse at detecting black link networks.

disclaimer: i work for one of the biggest western search sites in Japan. but this is my opinion.

<comment><USER4> Google analyzes pages for malware in some cases. [https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/45449?hl=en](https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/45449?hl=en)

They even warn you, I've seen an interstitial popup (from google) before for one of my sites that was compromised.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I really wonder how effective these link networks are at SEO nowadays. Obviously it's a short term strategy either way, but can you get to first page of google for competitive terms by doing this stuff?

<comment><USER6> This is 100% not effective anymore. This is just a slightly more malicious version of the the spam bots that post back links in wordpress comments, except in this case they were adding entire html pages to the sites. This is a violation of Google's duplicate content rules and if anything would be viewed negatively by Google.

The efficacy of this hack is nil as the "money domains" that were profiting from these backlinks had little domain authority or relevant traffic according to the author's article.

The only only way that linking strategies are viable anymore are gaining links from domains with authority or huge numbers of links.

Maybe if the hacker would have created tens of thousands of back links from vulnerable fashion blogs (same category of site as the money sites) they would've gotten some SEO juice.

<comment><USER7> I work in webhosting so I get to see a lot of this shit. What's interesting is seeing how backlinking has changed. These days, I think that it hurts your ranking to have a bunch of junk backlinks. This doesn't mean it's not effective for SEO though.

If I'm on page 2 of a search and I want to get into that precious top 10 I can spam the site which is ranking above me until I'm there. Or I can threaten to do a really shitty job trying to blackhat SEO optimize someones site unless they pay me $x.

We often get abuse@ emails from people who have their link spammed on one of our clients domains and want it removed. We just link them to [https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/disavow-links- main](https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/disavow-links-main) and wish them luck. In some cases these people paid for that 'service' in the past and now regret it.

<comment><USER5> I have a friend who worked in coupons and the first part of his day, every day, was to sit and go through their backlinks and basically disavow everything. Coupons is so competitive literally everyone is link-bombing each other trying to trigger a Google penalty.

<comment><USER6> Wow. Reporting blackhat seo websites (of competitors) used to be one of the worst parts of my job. Having to defend myself against blackhat seo attacks on a daily basis would have sucked my soul...</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The scandal of the Alabama poor cut off from water - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16037798

<comment><USER3> The real scandal is the long pattern of corrupt political leadership of Birmingham.

Birmingham was once an industrial capital, and in the middle of the last century was bigger than Atlanta, and in many ways better positioned economically to lead the south east. High taxes and a corrupt political culture drove Birmingham into the dirt. A couple generations later, Atlanta has one of the busiest airports in America, world-class universities, and hosted the Olympics, while Birmingham can't provide running water.

Elections matter.

<comment><USER4> And this is why instead of a large city of Birmingham, you have a large amount of spun off mini-cities in the area each with their own schools and municipal infrastructure (Hoover, Mountain Brook, etc). Of the many friends I know that live in Birmingham, none of them actually technically live in the city of Birmingham.

<comment><USER5> The separate school districts of Birmingham suburbs aren't exactly due to corruption... many of them emerged in the 1950s-70s as a way of evading desegregation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> _He says he finds it cheaper to buy drums of water from a petrol station and pay a sanitation company about $14 a month to remove waste from his "porta- potty" than pay the combined sewer and water rate bill, which some months can reach $300._

What really happens at the very end after all of the brouhaha about derivatives, crooked politics, and mortgage disasters? _The people go back to using outhouses._ Pardon the pun: Shit just got real.

<comment><USER7> More like the market made something that should be more expensive cheaper due to crony behavior.

<comment><USER8> Ironically the creditors are going to force the city to face FTA potentially 10-25% yearly increases in sewer rates, they'll never make their money back because the portable toilet distributor is going to start selling water by the drum too.

Once people see their neighbour doing it, they'll do it. Especially when it's potentially saving them hundreds of dollars. So then the creditors will want hikes of 50-100% annually.

It's an awful mess of crooks and greed. I don't get why the creditors decided to fight these people in court and add in legal expenses when they could have just said "we'll cut the interest rate if you pay over a longer term".

I'm sorry but my business mind tells me that some money is better than no money.

<comment><USER9> Looks like the bankers did agree to forgive $1 billion and refinance another $2 billion. The higher rates are part of the plan to avoid bankruptcy even under those terms, though.

[http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44552659/ns/us_news- life/#.TulFl...](http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44552659/ns/us_news- life/#.TulFlFy9glh)

<comment><USER8> Given that the budget was set at $300 million, any payments over $1 billion are absurd by even the worst crooks in regular government.

A 1000% markup on a project should be illegal however it happens. Sorry, if a company wants to overrun the same should apply as to my mechanic 30% above estimate and you pay the rest. Government would have paid $400 million, sounds about right for a cost overrun to me, not $3 billion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> So, corrupt banks corrupted some politicians. Again.

And, now I read that Goldman Sachs is literally hoarding aluminum in gigantic warehouses to manipulate the market.

I wonder when people start to realize that concentrating money like this is not a good idea.

<comment><USER11> You say the banks "corrupted" politicians, like those politicians were clean and just hung around with the 'bad banking' crowd one afternoon.

<comment><USER12> It's still true that had the banks not bribeed them, they wouldn't have made this specifc decison that caused this specific mess.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> _But the bill soared to $3.1bn after construction problems and a series of bond and derivatives deals that went sour in the financial meltdown of 2008._

 _Investment bank JP Morgan Securities and two of its former directors have been fined for offering bribes to Jefferson County workers and politicians to win business financing the sewer upgrade._

Fined? That level of punishment seems insufficient.

<comment><USER9> People have gone to prison over this scandal

[http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2010/09/five_men_convicted_in_je...](http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2010/09/five_men_convicted_in_jefferso.html)

<comment><USER9> Including commissioner Chris McNair, whose daughter was one of the four little girls killed in that KKK church bombing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> One wonders if the 'fine' for this sort of behavior could be 'JP Morgan will provide the city of Birmingham the infrastructure to provide sewer and water service to the town, once complete they will transfer all titles and interest over to the town at no charge.'

The current consequence of 'pay some fines' doesn't serve the public, nor does it discourage the abuse. Restitution here is that the city doesn't have a sewer and water system. By having JP Morgan fund the building and provisioning of such a system and then handing it over debt/bond free to the city, the city is made whole (they have their sewer system), JP Morgan is punished (they paid for it), and hopefully they are discouraged from future attempts at bribing folks.

<comment><USER15> It's pretty clear from the article that JP Morgan is not the sole cause of these problems:

"But the bill soared to $3.1bn after _construction problems_ and a series of bond and derivatives deals that went sour in the financial meltdown of 2008...[the county] faces a budget shortfall next year of $40m after a _local tax was declared illegal_."

Clearly, someone involved with the construction is partially at fault, as are politicians for basing their budget on an illegal tax.

So it would certainly be excessive and unfair for JP Morgan to foot the bill for the entire sewer and water system.

<comment><USER16> I live in Birmingham, so I need to correct a couple things. First, the "illegal" tax has been around a long time. In this particular case, it was overturned on a technicality [1]. However, because the state government is hostile to Birmingham, it has been impossible to replace the lost revenue. However, that's relatively unimportant, because the sewer budget is separate, and funded only by sewer system revenues.

Secondly, the construction problems, common among massive public projects, really weren't the problem. The problem is that County Commissioners were BRIBED by bankers into taking out unwise interest rate swaps in 2003. I believe all five commissioners from that period have been convicted of corruption, particularly Larry Langford, commission president. [2]

The reason for the bankruptcy is less that interest rates rose, but primarily the freezing of the market for municipal bonds during the 2008-2009 recession. Bloomberg explains, "After some bond insurers incurred losses on subprime- related securities, threatening the credit ratings they used to guarantee other Jefferson debts, investors in 2008 dumped the sewer securities on banks that had agreed to act as buyers of last resort. That triggered contractual requirements for the county to pay off $850 million of the debt in four years instead of the 30 or 40 under the original agreements, according to government records." [3]

So it is clear that BOTH bankers and our local politicians are at fault for this problem. Both acted illegally. Our politicians are in jail, but the guilty bankers are not. So, yes, I think JP Morgan should pay a substantial penalty for this.

1: [http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2011/03/alabama_supreme_court_ru...](http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2011/03/alabama_supreme_court_rules_je.html) 2: [http://www.inthepublicinterest.org/case/jp-morgan- investment...](http://www.inthepublicinterest.org/case/jp-morgan-investment- consulting-fraud) 3: [http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-09/alabama-s- jefferson...](http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-09/alabama-s-jefferson- county-votes-for-biggest-municipal-bankruptcy-in-u-s-.html)

<comment><USER15> According to your link [2]:

"The county paid $120 million in fees -- six times the prevailing rate - <USER2> buy interest-rate swaps from J.P. Morgan, Bank of America, Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns.

Within five years, the bad advice had increased the county's debt by $277 million."

Hmm, let me do some quick arithmetic - is $277M < $3.1B? I believe it is, and I therefore stand by my claim that JP Morgan is not solely responsible for this problem. However, I'm all in favor of sending anyone involved in bribery to jail.

It looks like the real problem is that the county decided to make long bets on housing and lost.

<comment><USER16> For the record, I'm certainly not saying that JP Morgan is the only responsible party. Clearly our politicians are at fault, and thus the voters as well.

But if you'll read [3] (far more explanatory than [2] about the details), you'll see that the problem isn't the size of the debt that brought the county down -- it's the contractual obligation to pay it off early.

You're right - the county did make long bets on housing. They attempted to expand the sewer system to growing areas to boost revenue. But the bankruptcy was primarily a result of the interest rate swaps.

EDIT: The original reason for the debt was a court order to reduce the pollution from the sewer system. The county also tried to expand the sewer system at the same time to increase the revenue base. The debt was unavoidable (though larger than it could have been without the additional expansion). The interest rate swaps were applied to the debt later. These are what JP Morgan sold, and what caused the bankruptcy.

<comment><USER15> _These are what JP Morgan sold, and what caused the bankruptcy._

Yes, but that doesn't mean JP Morgan is responsible for the bad decisions of the county. Similarly, if the county bet $3.1B at the horse races, they'd have no right to go complain to the racetrack when their horse lost.

That would be true even if the racetrack let some county employees sit in the VIP box.

<comment><USER16> I disagree. The racetrack is a bad analogy, particularly when bankers are specifically hired for their advice. If I sell you a car I designed and the car blows up from a design flaw several years later, I'm culpable. If you hired me specifically to advise you on which car to buy, I'm even more culpable. And If I bribed you to pay me four times the going rate for this really bad advice, then I'm REALLY culpable.

And this bribery wasn't some minor ethics violation. They didn't give away free meals. The president of the county commission received $236,000 in gifts from an investment banker.

<comment><USER15> I never disputed that JPM deserves penalties for the acts of bribery performed by their consultants. However, the penalty for bribery should be proportional to the $227M they gained from bribery. About 91% of the county's debt, or $2.8B, has nothing to do with acts of bribery.

And in general, giving advice does not make you culpable for movements of the market. A car can be expected to drive reliably within certain parameters, but investment vehicles are not cars. TD Ameritrade gives me investment ideas all the time, but I don't get to demand they pay me if I buy AAPL and it goes down.

There are exceptions for negligence - e.g., if I say "I want a long position", and they advised me to buy a put.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> At the risk of being accused of trolling:

Am I the only one here that believes that running water is a luxury, not a right?

I've been in some pretty shitty situations myself, though none as tough as this. That much I freely admit. But the overall tone of the article seems to be one of horror that people might not have a ceramic toilet which flushes the waste away to a sewage treatment plant. Also, an attitude of "This is a first world country; this shouldn't be happening to anyone". (Yes, I noticed the sidebar on "corruption")

Does everybody else think that running water/sewage is a right?

<comment><USER18> Certainly from a libertarian perspective, water and sewage are not. For philosophers like Rothbard, humans have a natural right to not being aggressed against--but not a right to, say, health. Similarly so for authors like Hoppe and Nozick.

All of them believing in libertarianism for consequentialist reasons as well, they would probably view this story as testament to the failures of government, and what happens when it is coopted by businesses.

Edit: I also want to disagree with the other commenters that issues of 'rights' don't matter. Sure, if you're only judging things by their consequences, then that discussion is moot. But having a moral position against the coercion of government (I'm going to take your money to build sewers, roads, engage in multiple wars, etc) is a legitimate stance--even if you disagree with it.

<comment><USER19> Well, you can draw further distinctions between Rothbard and Nozick (don't know too much about Hoppe). Nozick would support a minimal state whose sole job was to protect property and was financed by government coercion.

Rothbard would go further, though, and say even that minimal state is too much, as it is still coercing people to fund government activity (police protection of property). Even as that end of property enforcement is just, it's still using an immoral means to achieve it.

Which just goes to show that one man's right that deserves government protection is another's coercion. I respect Rothbard's consistency, because it's quite problematic for the run-of-the-mill libertarian to argue for some forms of positive liberty (the right to government provision of property enforcement) while saying that other forms of positive liberty are categorically unjust (such as, say, the right to government provision of running water).

<comment><USER20> Rothbard is like Plato. Interesting thinker from a historical perspective, but it's not like we still take the Earth, Wind, Fire, Water thing seriously.

That particular strain of libertarianism is indefensible on anything other than religious grounds ("Property is a god-given right while water isn't") or something equally metaphysical.

<comment><USER19> Hmmm, I agree and disagree with you.

I doubt Rothboard would describe his viewpoint as being simply that "property is a god-given right while water isn't," even if you exclude the god-given part. It's more that property is an institution that develops from organic human action and self-organization. And in his vision people end up self- organizing into groups that will defend some version of property rights using threat of violence if necessary, and he goes further and thinks that, due to the nature of the market of violence, most will converge onto roughly similar versions of property that are best suited for human living.

My take on that is that this has already happened, but as it turns out the market of violence lends itself to aggregation and monopoly. We call this monopoly supplier of violence the State, which has found it utility maximizing to form a set of contracts, implicit and explicit, with most of the different parts of society, including price discrimination, loss leaders, etc.

In other words, Rothbard left out public choice and the economics of the firm, and when you add those into anarcho-capitalism you get... social democracy.

I deeply admire, though, his capability to imagine a different, more decentralized, and free-er world. Like most visionaries, his greatest flaw and strength is his utopianism.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> So I wonder...should I point and laugh or sit down and cry. It's not my country, and I would never want to live in the US. How a country treats it's least fortunate says a lot about the country in general.

I don't think lowering the standard of living is going to get us very far in this world. What we desperately need is for everyone to contribute to society. This is usually done by having healthy citizens with a high level of education so we can find better ways of solving today's problems.

But sure...two steps back, one step forward.

<comment><USER22> This isn't a matter of how the country treats it's least fortunate. The issue is biggest county bankruptcy in the history of the country. And the issue that caused that is a level of fraud of massive proportions. The county has $4.1 billion dollars of debt.

Unfortunately services provided by private companies are not a right. You can call access to water a "right" and that's a reasonable claim. Now what does that actually mean. Do I have the right to demand free water from a private company riddled with debt? Do I have the right to demand free water from you personally? Or for you to pay my bill? Or for my bill to be reduced to zero? Or for someone to work at a utility company for free so that the utility company can provide a free service? Does that then mean that the utility company has a right to demand free parts from local supplies companies so that the can provide a free service?

Maybe the utility companies should be nationalized and all citizens can contribute tax dollars to the service. It wouldn't surprise me if that's how it's done in a lot of Eurozone countries? I'm not sure. I don't even really understand how the fraud occured and who is on the hook for the bill. It is however fair to say that it's way more complicated than "how a country treat's it's least fortunate".

<comment><USER16> I'm confused - are you suggesting the sewer is provided by a private company? The sewer system in Jefferson County is publicly run.

And maybe that's part of the problem. Presumably a private sewer company could declare bankruptcy, sell its infrastructure, and let someone else provide the service. But with a public utility, we're stuck.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> There are people who form groups that voluntarily get off of the grid to seek independence. No city water, no city sewage, no grocery shopping.

It seems to me that if most of these people are on welfare in an area with a pretty good climate and what appears to be (from the photos) low population density, this would lend itself very nicely to getting off of the grid.

Instead of relying on the government to support them, they could farm. Instead of worrying about running water and sewage, they could irrigate and fertilize. Instead of worrying about hydro bills for lighting they could use small scale solar.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permaculture>

</comment><comment><USER24> _How a country treats it's least fortunate says a lot about the country in general.

what a disgrace!!! the richest country in the world can't provide running water to its citizens... what a shame!!!_

Did anyone else notice that the linked article doesn't come right out and tell us how many people are using outhouses instead of the city sewer? One lady who may cut off service, one guy who has. The number of guys like this is said to be growing.

Outrage is fine and dandy.

But shouldn't you find dig around so you know what you're outraged about?

<comment><USER25> I'm a resident of Jefferson County and a ratepayer for the sewer system, and as such I can confirm that while the portion of this article dealing with the political history and issues was fine, the opening personal part was quite misleading.

If you have a $300 water/sewer bill you're doing something absurd. We're a family of 6, and I am by no means conservative with my showers, wife takes a bath every night, 4 kids bathing regularly, and our bill has never been more than $100 for a month.

Having the sewer portion of the bill be the same as the water portion is bad, and there's no doubt it's a screwed up situation, but this is a typical case of a reporter seeking out outliers and presenting them as commonplace.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Didn't Alabama just export virtually all of it's migrant workers recently too?

Some crazy decisions going on there.

Let's see if people keep voting against themselves.

</comment><comment><USER27> This might be a cultural difference. I'm from India.

But 'poor' people have cars in America(From the photos)? You guys get $600 per month for doing nothing(Social security)? Don't pay taxes and yet infrastructure benefits must reach you?

I don't really know what more the country can do for you guys. I mean paying individuals $600 per month for doing nothing, with which they can afford home, cars, food and clothing all this when the individual isn't even working.

I mean if this isn't sufficient, what is?

You really must come out of US and check the definition of 'poor' in other countries.

Here is a reason why you guys can never beat China. Because there people tend to be happy with ever little they get. But here in this case you have people complaining for stuff which is offered to them free at the first place.

P.S : I am software engineer here, who can barely afford a motorcycle and fuel. Let alone a car.

<comment> mkr-hn Social security is paid for by payroll taxes (making it closer to insurance than a handout). And those cars are old and not worth much. You could buy one after a few weeks of donating blood. Sewers and water are usually paid for by a fee or taxes.

I could go and dispel more misconceptions for you, but I think you've read enough to know that you have a few things wrong and will wisely avoid judging the entirety of a nation's poor based on a single photograph.

ETA: Most poor people have cars because most poor neighborhoods don't have any reasonably priced grocery store. It's cheaper to own a car (with all the potential it brings) than to shop locally.

<comment><USER27> I don't know much about America, but if you could afford a car by doing as simple a thing you mentioned than my friend you are in heaven. You have no clue how bad this part of the world is.

Just come to Mumbai or any urban metro in India and see for yourself how people travel. Majority of them are herded like sheep in busy trains and buses.

That is why I said, it might be just a cultural thing. Here too, we need to pay for water and sewers.

But I understand that your barrier for entry when it comes to measuring poverty is very different than ours. By your definition 95% of whole India may fall into poverty.

<comment> mkr-hn It's best not to assume people have no clue, even if it seems like they don't. Because I _do_ have a clue. Many of them. I am laden with clues. I don't know the transportation situation in most poor places here, but I doubt it's good if people are choosing a car over a bus or train. I know the poorest places in this suburban town are a mile or more from the grocery store across dangerous roads, and the nearest mass transit option is 20 miles away.

<comment><USER27> _I know the poorest places in this suburban town are a mile or more from the grocery store across dangerous roads, and the nearest mass transit option is 20 miles away._

That doesn't even begin to describe poor according to my definitions of poor.

But I agree, we have different yard sticks to measuring what exactly poor is.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Larry Langford For Life!! [http://www.bhamweekly.com/birmingham/article-1190-the- life-a...](http://www.bhamweekly.com/birmingham/article-1190-the-life-and- crimes-of-larry-langford.html)

</comment><comment><USER29> I suffered in Birmingham for almost 3yrs of my life. I realized the error in my ways and moved. The closet thing to a real politician was forced out a few years ago. Everyone else is bought

<comment><USER16> What politician are you referring to?

And just for the record, I really like Birmingham. It's a good city. It has had some really terrible politicians, but despite that, it's a really nice place to live. (Though, I must confess, I don't have to pay a water bill).

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Does this remind anyone else of "Brave New World?"

<comment><USER31> It's admittedly been a while since I've read _Brave New World_ , but I don't see the connection at all. Care to elaborate?

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> what a disgrace!!! the richest country in the world can't provide running water to its citizens... what a shame!!!

<comment><USER33> That was my initial reaction too. But then I saw that the real problem is that they were gambling on derivatives to fund critical infrastructure projects. The obvious solution is more bailouts. The libertarian solution would be to let them 'stew in their own juices'. I suspect there is no 'right' answer because the people who created this disaster. can never repay the money, even if they wanted to.

<comment><USER34> The problem is that the people making the bad decisions and the people suffering for those decisions are not the same people.

<comment><USER35> The people suffering elected the people who made the bad decisions.

<comment><USER36> Of course the people they elected ran on detailed platform of how to use derivatives to fund infrastructure projects and those voters are very familiar with complex financial instruments!

<comment><USER35> I don't think it is asking too much to not elect people who will be bribed into screwing you over. At the community level candidate integrity should still be measurable. But the likely problem, given voter apathy, is not that they elected the losers, but that they sat by and allowed them to be elected.

<comment><USER33> I was in the UK when they had their lowedt voter turnout since World War 2. A couple of months later 9/11 happened and Tony Blair was leading the country into war. All of a sudden a lot of people who hadn't voted were saying "hang on... we're not sure we want this muppet in charge during wartime".

The problem is that not all elections are equally important, and it is easy for the voters to either (a) go to sleep at the wheel or (b) vote themselves more pork.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


How to Get Better at Coding Interviews - <AUTHOR> https://www.algodaily.com/lessons/how-to-get-better-at-coding-interviews <comment><USER2> Don't waste time on this. Instead build a project, code an app, launch your startup. 6 months of that is better spent than "coding interview" preparation.

<comment><USER3> If the goal is to get a job at a FANG, then coding interview preparation is much more valuable than building a startup.

In fact, most of the work launching a startup will be on the business side anyway. Most of the coding is done in the very beginning, the rest is sales, marketing, and partnerships.

<comment><USER2> I'd hire someone who did a useful project over the summer rather than spent it studying coding interview tricks.</comment></comment></comment>


IEDM 2017: AMD's grand vision for the future of HPC – WikiChip Fuse - <AUTHOR> https://fuse.wikichip.org/news/523/iedm-2017-amds-grand-vision-for-the-future-of-hpc/ <comment><USER2> Really interesting slide on page 3 near the bottom:

"AMD reported close to 2x cost per yielded mm² for a 250mm² die" for 7nm vs 14nm/16nm. The subtext there is that MCM is the future and they are leading the industry. If they are right it could mean a huge shift in market share for them.

<comment><AUTHOR> There is a lot of tiny details out today. The newest Xeon Phi has the virtualization extensions unlike its predecessors, making it useful for more general purpose servers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Interesting emphasis upon 3D stacking, do they plan to use TSVs?</comment>