Frogpocalypse Now - <AUTHOR> https://www.outsideonline.com/2167161/frogpocalypse-now <comment><USER2> I lived in Orlando for eight years. I find Florida an ecologically fascinating place. It's the only corner of the continental US that has an honest-to-God jungle climate, which makes it an unusual island in North America that is amenable to non-native species from many parts of South America, Africa, and Asia.

On top of that, Florida has a weird cultural history around exoticism. Florida used to be be a little slice of overseas tropical paradise that car-bound American vacationers could still get to. The kind of people who settled in Florida often came for that, or played it up. You had people owning all sorts of unusual exotic pets and fish. And, then, inevitably, they get discarded when the owners realize that, oops, that cute little baby python is now big enough to eat the family dog.

Drive around in south Florida, and you may run into swamp eels, snakehead, walking catfish, pacu, grass carp bigger than toddlers, hordes of lionfish blanketing reefs, Cuban treefrogs, cane toads, caiman, basilisks, chameleons, iguanas, geckos, nile monitors (up to five feet long), boas (ten feet), Burmese pythons (the largest was 17 feet!), ibises, parrots, macaws, cockatoos, parakeets, toucans, macaques, monkeys, and capybaras.

So now, strangely, Florida has actually become the exotic enclave the locals tried to emulate with their non-native pets. It increasingly feels like another world.

<comment><USER3> Someone imported and released Capybaras?

<comment><USER2> Imported, yes. According to this article, they escaped into the wild:

[https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/wild-things/capybaras- may-b...](https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/wild-things/capybaras-may-be- poised-be-florida%E2%80%99s-next-invasive-rodent)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> My first thought was: are they edible? The venom is in the skin and shoulders. & apparently the answer is yes, if you kill them in the freezer and skin them. [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2634736/How-like- CAN...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2634736/How-like-CANE-TOAD- cooked-Australian-food-blogger-uses-pest-species-cook-dishes-make-French- blush.html)

Harvesting for human or animal consumption or fertilizer is about the only thing we can do about the Asian carp invasion of the Mississippi River. There are now some commercial carp fisheries in Kentucky for this. You can't angle for them because they're filter feeders, but they can be snagged, netted, or bowfished. [http://www.citylab.com/work/2014/11/kentucky-hopes-youll- eat...](http://www.citylab.com/work/2014/11/kentucky-hopes-youll-eat-its- invasive-carp/382844/) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWYm_inOAgg&t=2s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWYm_inOAgg&t=2s)

<comment><USER5> Replace 'edible' with 'usable' ... as the leather apparently is quite tough, and there's been quite some good work on that front.

However, as TFA points out, there's 1.5 billion cane toads in AU, and even if we exported a whole lotta shoes, handbags, etc ... it's not going to make much of a dent in this frustratingly renewable resource.

Aside -- back to 'are they edible' \-- there is some interesting adaptive traits being observed[1] with native animals working out how to kill, and selectively consume components of these things, without dying. Unfortunately lots of animals are still dying after eating these things.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptations_of_Australian_anim...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptations_of_Australian_animals_to_cane_toads)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I started beekeeping a while back and put two hives in the back yard. I had one sitting on top of cinder blocks. Next thing I Knew, I had several Cane toads sitting in front of the hive gobbling up bees as they returned home.

</comment><comment><USER7> My college horticulture professor had us watch this hilarious, informative documentary on cane toads and I cannot recommend it enough.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SBLf1tsoaw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SBLf1tsoaw)

</comment><comment><USER8> _Cane toads have these things going for them: they are bigger than other toads (the biggest cane toad on record weighed 5 pounds 13 ounces, almost as much as a Kalashnikov rifle)_

Is that a bit of a Freudian slip indicating what the author wants to do with the toads?

<comment><USER9> That struck me as odd too. I know roughly how much one of those rifles weighs but I would imagine that the vast majority of the people reading this have never held one.

<comment><USER8> The more I think about it the odder the line. I've been around a lot of guns, but that is not one family of guns I have seen in person.

<comment><USER9> It's arguably the most common family of guns on the planet. I have owned some but it's still an odd unit of measure to me.

Along those lines, how many Libraries of Congress is that?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> > _Florida's cane toads are believed to descend from escapees from an > exotic-animal importer at the Miami airport, where a hundred of them got > away in 1955._

I've heard repeatedly that the hazards of inbreeding make it nearly impossible for a species to recover if the population drops too low. There's a theory that the human population bottlenecked down to 20,000 or so individuals 70,000 years ago, and that we nearly went extinct as a result; the scars are still visible today, in the low genetic diversity of modern humans.

So how does a breeding population of a mere 100 frogs remain a going concern dozens of generations later?

</comment><comment><USER11> I wish they included an actual picture of the cane toad in the article.

</comment><comment><USER12> Frogpocalypse was one of the Biblical curses on Egypt in Exodus. But not a curse described anywhere in The Revelation.

</comment><comment><USER13> The same thing happened in Australia decades ago. There is a 1988 documentary called "Cane Toads: An Unnatural History" that tells that story. Any information on the extend of the problem today?

<comment> riri-au That video is a classic, I'm pretty sure most Australians watched it in school, and remember this scene: [https://youtu.be/rm3hd1pxHME?t=44](https://youtu.be/rm3hd1pxHME?t=44)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I've long thought that if I had one "save the world" wish I'd have to think hard about confining invasive species to their native habitats. Admittedly, climate change, nuclear war, and space rocks are more dangerous, but man, getting rid of honeysuckle, kudzu, emerald ash borers, cane toads, etc would be quite an improvement.

<comment><USER15> This is just an arbitrary human whim that goes against nature.

That's not to say we shouldn't try to control where animals do or do not live.

But do not fool yourself into thinking that removing 'invasive' species is anything other than human avarice.

The natural order is for anything to live anywhere it can (like we do).

<comment><USER14> We caused most of the current problem in this area, so it's not entirely "natural". Of course life spreads wherever it can, but we actively pushed it into places faster than local flora and fauna could adjust to it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I wonder if efforts similar to mosquito control would work. Release sterilized males. Dry up breeding holes. Spray.

</comment><comment> why-el Otherwise known as Magnolia.</comment>


Is the iPod Touch the New XP? - <AUTHOR> http://www.markevanstech.com/2008/06/12/is-the-ipod-touch-the-new-xp/ <comment><USER2> Here's my count of how well they fixed the "places for improvement" Steve mentioned in the keynote:

1\. (3G) Done, though the other use of 3G they don't have covered is multimedia. (Their ad copy for the iTunes store still instructs you to "find a WiFi hotspot".)

2\. (Enterprise) Done.

3\. (Third Party Apps) More or less done, although there are a few capabilities missing: scheduled reminders; playing sound in the background (for music player-type apps).

4\. (More countries) They're doing it at an entirely reasonable pace.

5\. (More affordable) Cutting the down payment by $200 does not "more affordable" make. With $10 more a month for a 3G plan, you end up forking over _more_ cash than before over a two year period.

</comment><comment><USER3> Methinks that someone is jumping the gun. Yes, AT&T has "raised" the price of their wireless plan... but it's not an apples-to-apples comparison, since the new plan is 3G and the old one is not.

Now, if you want to argue that 3G isn't enough of an improvement to be worth the premium price, I'll hear you. I have no experience, myself, so I have no idea. I will note, though, that Apple has thoughtfully discounted the iPhone 3G to the point where the TCO over two years is within $30-$50 of what it has been. So even if 3G turns out to be nearly worthless, I'll only be paying about $3 extra per month over two years.

As for AT&T putting me over a barrel and raising their rates... I wouldn't put it past them, but it would surely be a very stupid move, calculated to ensure the loss of a double-digit percentage of their customers. And can they do that during my contract? Cell phone contracts may be drawn up by Mephistopheles and signed in blood, but they are _contracts_ , and I'm pretty sure that threatening to unilaterally raise prices will invalidate them.

<comment><USER4> To make a complete Apples to Apples comparison we need to see if the beefed up plan pricing applies to ALL AT&T phones using the 3G capabilities or only iPhone.

What would be nicer is if we could get an iPhone for the sprint network :P

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> This article is about the iPod touch, not the iPhone guys (serhei , dougp). The touch is not the new XP. XP was superceded by Vista whereas the touch and the iPhone are two distinct products.

I expect features from the new iPhone to slowly get rolled into the iPod touch (i.e. GPS) but not any time soon, so as not to steal the iPhone's thunder. The usual apple market strategy of changing a product or two slightly every six months will ensue.

<comment><USER6> Right but the article is comparing the iPhone to vista and the touch to xp. Basically he is saying that being locked in to a single service provider is an anti feature similar to all the drm in vista so we should all stick with xp (the touch)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> This metaphor is stretched to say the least.

</comment><comment><USER8> Do we have any numbers on iTouch sales so far? The plan on the iPhone 1.0, was on the expensive side, but I still assume that its adoption rate was higher than the iTouch(based on the fact that I know people that have iPhones but no one that owns an iTouch).

I just don't see the added value of the iTouch if there is no phone, and city wide(let alone nation wide) free wifi hotspots are still not realized, because there is no guarantee of connectivity.

<comment><USER3> If you lived in Vermont, where (last I knew) you still cannot get an AT&T wireless signal anywhere in the state, you might think differently.

<comment><USER9> Facing South (towards Rt 12), standing at the highest point overlooking Silver Lake in Barnard - I can get 1 bar with my iPhone - barely. Yes, AT&T's coverage is essentially non-existent in VT. When I'm up there though, this is a positive ...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I would hope that apple has some control over plan price increases. It would be very bad for apple if the carriers they wed themselves too start behaving "badly".

<comment><USER10> Looking at Apple's business with the music labels and now with the carriers, they seem to have taken "Where there's muck, there's brass" to heart (thanks, Paul). Their business model seems to be cleaning up the muck, first in music and now in telephony.

I expect an ongoing struggle between Apple's philosophy (simple, straightforward products and pricing) and their partners' philosophies (pay for a song, pay for a ringtone from that song, pay for the bits to move the song over the air, pay for the bits to move the ringtone over the air, system acccess fees, &c.)

Oh wait, I forgot: and what you pay differs depending on whether "over the air" is wifi or 3G. Muck indeed, Apple has an Augean task ahead of itself.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> 500 bucks for a 32GB iPod touch? Damn I can get an EEE PC for that price, install windows xp on it and have everything the iPhone has, xept I can plug DVDs into it.

This is pure insanity.

<comment><USER10> "I can get an EEE PC for that price, install windows xp on it and have everything the iPhone has"

I hope you realize that you can have everything the iPhone has _that you perceive you want_ , not everything the iPhone has. I trudge into this thread wearily, since I have been privy to this debate since the 1980s.

But do you think, just maybe, that while you do not care for it, there are others who value the design inherent in an iPod's hardware and software that gives them value compared to Windows XP?

<comment><USER4> Compared to XP yes. No question. I just dislike the fact that having an iPod or iPhone gives me a great piece of hardware that can't run any software, not because nobody makes it, but because Apple won't allow it.

With the EEE I am not limited to what Asus states are acceptable programs to run. Thats pretty much it. The down side of the EEE is that it does not fit in my pocket.</comment></comment></comment>


An introduction to variables in C++ for beginners - <AUTHOR> http://www.codingmix.com/2010/06/cplusplus-lesson-4-variables.html

<comment><USER2> Er, how is this either news, or something that satisfies one's intellectual curiosity?</comment>


A Thousand Pounds of Dynamite - <AUTHOR> https://magazine.atavist.com/a-thousand-pounds-of-dynamite <comment><USER2> Im not a fan of this style of writing. I don't mind a lead in paragraph which then skips to an earlier part of the story, but if you do that a second time im probably not going to hang around for the rest of the story.</comment>


Woman dies of superbug resistant to every available antibiotic - <AUTHOR> https://www.statnews.com/2017/01/12/nevada-woman-superbug-resistant/ <comment><AUTHOR> Clearly we need to incentivize development of various new antibiotics.</comment>


Ask HN: Service that connects to other API's - <AUTHOR> Hi All,
I am trying to find a service that has a load of pre-built API integrations e.g. Google Analytics, Salesforce, HubSpot etc and you can access them by an API rather having to build an integration for everything third party.
Does anyone know of anything like this?
Thanks <comment><USER2> [https://segment.com/catalog](https://segment.com/catalog) and [https://zapier.com/apps/integrations/](https://zapier.com/apps/integrations/) are in that space.

</comment><comment><USER3> Gearplug, gearplug.io

<comment><USER3> Gearplug have integrations for Hubspot, Salesforce and many more, it's specialized in CRM, marketing and sales tools integrations.</comment></comment>


How do you promote an outsourcing web development company? E - <AUTHOR>

We do web development outsourcing from Romania. We rarely work with end-user businesses, instead we tried to align our service with companies from western countries that do web development and pass the projects down to us.
We would like to expand our outsourcing efforts and grab more end-user clients. What are the best way to promote our service?
Where the service isn't a web application or some kind or product (no user signups, etc.) like many blogs write about where you could do email marketing, inbound marketing or even raising VC money... <comment><USER2> If I'm understanding correctly, you're looking to get more clients for projects that don't involve apps. We should talk. I used to work for an agency (who also outsourced development, by the way), and now I help companies with marketing. My contact info is in my profile.</comment>


Show HN: QuadTree model for generating random road networks - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/arun1729/road-network <comment><USER2> Are there really towns and cities that look like the generated maps in the readme? As a European, the maps look completely alien; but perhaps this looks like a US city?

<comment><USER3> Sorta. There are places that are almost completely on a grid, like Salt Lake City[0]. Even then, there is a dense downtown core, and sparser suburbs with more organic neighborhood streets further out (if not blocked by mountains), as opposed to random clusters dense roads that aren't anywhere near each other. Then there's Pittsburgh[1], whose topography prevents a large grid, and there are several colliding grids at different orientations, and the suburbs gave up.

[0] [https://www.google.com/maps/place/Salt+Lake+City,+email@example.com...](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Salt+Lake+City,+email@example.com,-111.9051077,13.33z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x87523d9488d131ed:0x5b53b7a0484d31ca!8m2!3d40.7607808!4d-111.8910313)

[1] [https://www.google.com/maps/place/Pittsburgh,+firstname.lastname@example.com...](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Pittsburgh,+email@example.com,-79.9691014,14.04z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x8834f16f48068503:0x8df915a15aa21b34!8m2!3d40.4406248!4d-79.9958864)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > For a given number n of nodes, the squares are randomly divided into four > quadrants, i.e. add four children to leaf nodes in the QuadTree. Each edge > of the square forms a road connecting two points.

If I understand this correctly, then the edges of every final quadtree node are assumed to be roads. As a result, if a given quadtree node isn't subdivided, its edges form a large square road 'box'. I think this makes the resultant road grids look artificial, at least for viewers who are used to twiddly networks that have developed organically over decades/centuries.</comment>


Web 2.0 investment slows - <AUTHOR> http://www.techconfidential.com/the-seed-stage/web-20/web-20-investment-slows.php

<comment><USER2> Would be great to know if this was aggregate $s invested or # of companies invested in.

<comment><USER3> And what they mean by "Web 2.0"

<comment><AUTHOR> "social networking and content-sharing platforms", from the article</comment></comment></comment>


How switching from Windows to Mac brought me to Linux - <AUTHOR> https://www.ribice.ba/win-to-mac/ <comment><USER2> Bit of an odd article, why didn't OP just go with Linux in the first place? It sounds like he/she already had experience with it anyway.

Personally I use a Mac in my sysadmin/devops role and have done for about 15 years now. Every OS has its drawbacks and flaws, personally I stuck with Mac as it's such a great all rounder: I can run all my scripts, use Vagrant, Docker and so on easily - all with beautiful hardware which gives a nice feeling (trackpad, screen quality etc).

I tried Linux on the desktop briefly, but it always feels slightly unpolished or clunky compared to Mac - but then Apple pour billions in to developing their OS and its UI/UX.

Linux is arguably the world's most important OS, but for me it belongs on a server, headless.

<comment><AUTHOR> OP here,

As mentioned I did use Linux on several occasions previously. On my previous work we used plenty of Oracle tools that were not available for Linux at that time, and older documentation is written in Word/Excel hence we were forced to use Windows.

When I moved I got a Mac, not by choice, so I had to use it for last 6 months (I didn't feel to comfortable to request a new laptop immediately after joining).

Once I felt comfortable I asked for a ThinkPad (x1 carbon 5th gen).

<comment><USER2> When I joined my company I got given a laptop which was utter shit. The keyboard barely worked, the display was awful, the hinge squeaked, the trackpad felt awful and the charging port broke - despite it costing a fortune.

I also didn't feel comfortable requesting a new laptop immediately, but eventually got a MBP. I didn't feel the need to write an article about it though.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Feather Bubble – interactive children's stories - <AUTHOR> https://www.featherbubble.com <comment><USER2> This is very nice. I really like the drawings and the page animations were pleasurable. I did notice that my screen resolution seemed to cause a bit of confusion, I would sometimes get the bouncing down arrow and other times there was content below, but no bouncing arrow. This was overall great. Thanks for sharing. (btw my screen is 1440x900)

<comment><AUTHOR> That's helpful, thank you. Navigation and transitions will improve on native platforms.

Also, I've gone back and forth on fitting each page into the viewport and eliminating scrolling, as Im not sure 3-5 yr olds can grok it. The downside is that it severely limits what control I have over the mise en scene. Curious if you (or anyone else) has thoughts on that?

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hi all, this is the pilot episode to an illustrated and interactive picture book series I'm working on. Making it has been an opportunity to combine a few things I love: writing, coding, illustration, and animation.

I'm beta testing the pilot online before distributing a fully featured app, that will be home to all future episodes. So feedback is much appreciated!

The style is an attempt to channel the warmth of books alongside the inventiveness of digital (eg. hand-drawn illustrations, gentle interactions, stories inspired by the natural world)...while introducing kids to a healthy relationship with the screen.

</comment><comment><USER3> My 5 year old loves this and wants more!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for that! It's inspiring. Will make more ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> TypeError: this.store.setEmail is not a function

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the heads up! Fixed now</comment></comment>


How Fake Money Saved Brazil - <AUTHOR> http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2010/10/04/130329523/how-fake-money-saved-brazil <comment><USER2> That's the problem with all currencies, even precious metals: they depend on the acceptance of people, on belief that they have some sort of value, when in fact they're just a fantasy. It's not real! If an epic catastrophe hit tomorrow, and one had Gold bars, they'd be utterly worthless: nobody would willingly trade their food and uncontaminated water reserves for currency (and if they did, they'd soon die of hunger or thirst); you can't eat or drink Gold, nor can you eat or drink money.</comment>


Show HN: Test prompts for OpenAI's GPT-3 API and text generation results - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/minimaxir/gpt-3-experiments <comment><USER2> Thanks for this. Without accessing the API oneself, it's currently pretty difficult to find examples of its output that one can be sure aren't cherry- picked or "cleaned up"</comment>


Exotic Probabilities - <AUTHOR> http://odd74.proboards.com/thread/11196/prob-stat-101?page=1&scrollTo=169139 <comment><USER2> It is intuitively obvious that requiring probabilities to sum to 1 is rather arbitrary (any other number would seem to do as well), and this is confirmed by many of the alternatives to Kolmogorov's axiomatization of probability theory.

For example, one may formulate axioms of probability theory as an extension of ordinary two-valued logic. From a handful of elementary axioms capturing what it means for degrees of belief in combinations of propositions (on some evidence) to be consistent, you can derive a differential equation whose solution is a functional representation of what is often taken as a definition of conditional probability in mathematical probability theory:

        c * f(X and Y | Z ) = f(X | Y and Z) * f(Y | Z)

Here _c_ is the constant of integration in the solution to the differential equation, and it turns out also to be the sum of the probabilities of all mutually exclusive events. It is not determined by any side conditions, so it is set to 1 by convention; but any other value would do. [0]

Negative probabilities are different beast, best viewed as algebraic extensions to probability theory in the manner that, e.g., the integers are algebraic extensions of the natural numbers (i.e., by including additive inverses). But I am not very knowledgeable on the subject, so I will say no more.

0\. For details, see Cox (1961), /The Algebra of Probable Inference/ (recently back in print) or Jaynes (2003), /Probability Theory: The Logic of Science/. Both are excellent books, the former covering probability theory and entropy as extensions of logical reasoning, and the latter covering all that and much else of Bayesian probability and statistics.

<comment><USER3> > It is intuitively obvious that requiring probabilities to sum to 1 is rather > arbitrary (any other number would seem to do as well)

Well, you have basically two choices -- one and zero. Any nonzero real number is trivially equivalent to 1.

It's not obvious to me, though, that 0 would work just as well?

<comment><USER4> Not only 0 and 1 are Schelling points - default options you can assume pretty much everyone would chose - they're also special in the way that they define a (positive) range where numbers always stay inside that range under multiplication. Two numbers between 0 and 1 multiplied together will always give a number that's also between 0 and 1. That's why a lot of places in math like to transform domains into the 0...1 range.

<comment><USER5> This. Another way to express it is that for an interval [a, b], multiplying two numbers c, d within that interval will be within [aa, bb], and for 3 numbers [aaa, bbb], but it's super convenient to that for a=0 and b=1 these are always [0,1]. Other numbers would work, but would become cumbersome.

<comment><USER3> > for an interval [a, b], multiplying two numbers c, d within that interval > will be within [aa, bb]

This only works when a is nonnegative. For example, the range of [-1, 1] under self-multiplication is [-1, 1], not [1, 1].

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> black-scholes aka the financial equation that uses normal distributions to model non-gaussian systems.</comment>


Feynman on Fermat's Last Theorem (2016) - <AUTHOR> http://www.lbatalha.com/blog/feynman-on-fermats-last-theorem#email-newsletter <comment><USER2> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12018221](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12018221)

</comment><comment><USER3> How can he integrate the probability expression rather than do a summation? Surely there are many real values of x and y that lead to perfect powers? Yet the probability tends rapidly to zero.

</comment><comment><USER4> I think it would be fun to construct a similar conjecture where the same kind of probabilistic analysis says that it's very likely to be true but it is in fact false.</comment>


Cutting Through Spiritual Colonialism - <AUTHOR> https://docs.google.com/document/u/2/d/1PwRpfJiqus_h8Hyj006wtsLJDClsdWcb/mobilebasic <comment><USER2> Thanks to whoever posted this. I am the author of the text. Any questions?

<comment><USER3> Do you really believe B Gates and W Buffet made their wealth without armed bloodshed? I find it hard to believe that we are supposed to solve problems simultaneously adopting high moral accountability while also turning a blind eye to those who invested in and profited from the defense industry.

<comment><USER4> I think he means direct armed bloodshed as he was comparing them to the kings of old who would conquor with armies.

The author directly says capitalism is bloodshed in general whether it's profiting off of the defense industry or just exploiting people in foreign countries for iphones.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This was an interesting read. I kinda knew all these things already, but it was articulated in a very precise way, which helps to understand your own thoughts in a deeper way.</comment>


Ask HN: Attend a coding bootcamp or self study? - <AUTHOR> Are coding bootcamps still worth it? My brother-in-law is doing a career switch. He wants to accelerate his learning in coding; however, coding bootcamp tuition has gone up high already even for online. Do you know someone who attended a bootcamp recently, and is it still worth the time and money? <comment><USER2> I recently had to make this decision. It was a tough decision but in the end I made my own curriculum based off of the syllabus of the bootcamp I was accepted to. I'm already disciplined at self study and been remote working happily for years so a self-bootcamp works for me. It depends greatly on your brother's learning style and current life situation.

Also, I decided that online bootcamps at the price of offline is not worth it.

And these articles really helped me made the decision:

To learn more about bootcamps [https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/coding- bootcamp-handbook/](https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/coding-bootcamp- handbook/)

To help me make a long term decision [https://fs.blog/2014/02/decision- journal/](https://fs.blog/2014/02/decision-journal/)

Bootcamp ROI calculator [https://www.coursereport.com/blog/calculate-coding- bootcamp-...](https://www.coursereport.com/blog/calculate-coding-bootcamp-roi)

I also talked to a lot of alumni of the coding bootcamp I was considering and talked to other people online including those who self-studied and currently had a development job.

</comment><comment><USER3> I am an experienced iOS developer currently mentoring a friend. The time has come that we should look for an employer to get some working experience.

However this proves to be very hard, at least here in The Netherlands. If the boot camp comes with some sort of job guarantee, it might be worth it.</comment>


Ask YC: Recurring billing: 1. Paying resellers, 2. Switching gateway vendors - <AUTHOR>

SaaS Rails Kit (http://railskits.com/saas/) with Active Merchant used with gateways such as Braintree or Authorize.net seems like a flexible and cost-effective option for recurring billing. PayPal looks like a fast way to get started, bearing in mind the horror stories (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=198516 ).
Two questions:
1.	What solutions are available to automate tracking, reporting and payments to channel partners (resellers, distributors, affiliates) using the gateways or PayPal? I've heard that Avantgate (http://www.avangate.com) supports multiple tiers of distribution, but their fees (http://www.avangate.com/help/vendor-faq.php#bottom10) are higher than the gateways, and only the name "Avangate" appears on the buyer's CC statement. PayPal enables payments to affiliates using simple scripts with PayPal's Mass Pay, but you have to create your own reporting. Amazon FPS appears to only support per-transaction payments, not aggregation of payments (http://tinyurl.com/l6zvkd).
2.	How easy is it to switch gateway or platform vendors if they're storing the credit card info? If you're using Auth.net but want to switch to Braintree, how is the credit card info transferred so that you can continue billing monthly without interruption? This question has been asked before (http://tinyurl.com/mj9zgp) but not answered that I've seen, except that CC info can't be transferred from PayPal (http://tinyurl.com/lyupgg).
Thanks! <comment><AUTHOR> Resubmitting, hopefully replacing the
's:

SaaS Rails Kit (<http://railskits.com/saas/>) with Active Merchant used with gateways such as Braintree or Authorize.net seems like a flexible and cost- effective option for recurring billing. PayPal looks like a fast way to get started, bearing in mind the horror stories (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=198516> ).

Two questions:

1\. What solutions are available to automate tracking, reporting and payments to channel partners (resellers, distributors, affiliates) using the gateways or PayPal? I've heard that Avantgate (<http://www.avangate.com>) supports multiple tiers of distribution, but their fees (<http://www.avangate.com/help/vendor-faq.php#bottom10>) are higher than the gateways, and only the name "Avangate" appears on the buyer's CC statement. PayPal enables payments to affiliates using simple scripts with PayPal's Mass Pay, but you have to create your own reporting. Amazon FPS appears to only support per-transaction payments, not aggregation of payments (<http://tinyurl.com/l6zvkd>).

2\. How easy is it to switch gateway or platform vendors if they're storing the credit card info? If you're using Auth.net but want to switch to Braintree, how is the credit card info transferred so that you can continue billing monthly without interruption? This question has been asked before (<http://tinyurl.com/mj9zgp>) but not answered that I've seen, except that CC info can't be transferred from PayPal (<http://tinyurl.com/lyupgg>).

Thanks!

<comment><USER2> I recently added affiliate tracking to the SaaS Rails Kit as a starting point for tracking payments to affiliates, etc. It's not a full, automated solution of course, but at least you can track it.

Generally you can't get that stored card data back out of the gateway. You basically have three options for this: 1\. Just stick with the one you pick for the life of the app. This is the easiest. :) 2\. When you switch keep track of which gateway has the info, maintaining two gateway accounts. 3\. Ask users to re-enter their billing info when you switch.

<comment><AUTHOR> Following up on question 2 re switching gateways, I've been told by Braintree, TrustCommerce, and Plimus that they will export credit card data to another vendor for a fee. Of course you should confirm this with them yourself before relying on the info. Some others I contacted won't export, or can't because they don't retain the card data.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Hi,

Avangate has two main platforms: Avangate eCommerce and ARMS. If you are looking for a system to manage channel partners, invoicing, payments and reports you might find a solution in ARMS (Avangate Reseller Management System - <http://www.avangate.com/reseller-management-software/>). The pricing is different than the eCommerce platform (the link you've sent) and can be either a license cost if the payments are processed by your own payment system or a variable pricing scheme if the Avangate payment system is used.

In terms of what appears on the customer credit card, it's not just the string "Avangate" that will show on the statement, but also your website. Something like "avangate.com/ycombinator.com".

Hope my info helps.

\-- Cristian BADEA | Avangate CIO cristian.badea at avangate.com Tel: +31 20 890 8080 | Fax: +31 20 203 1309 <http://www.avangate.com>

</comment><comment><USER4> The best way to do this is to get a merchant account of your own and plug in with any one of the big IPSPs. Integration is typically less than half a days work.

PayPal is notoriously bad about charging recurring for services, I would never use them again for something like that (they once held a substantial amount of money for 6 months without any qualifications, just 'account closed' and 'because we can').

</comment><comment><USER5> if someone is storing the data for you, you are pretty much locked in. spending the extra time and managing the data yourself is probably a really good idea.

<comment><USER6> That's true for everything _except_ credit card data. If you have to ask, storing users' credit card data is almost always a bad idea. The information is very sensitive, and any compromise is very serious. That's why if you store payment information, you generally have to implement a number of best practices to achieve "PCI compliance". This costs you time & money, as well as additional policies and regulations at your company. Unless your revenue is reasonably significant (say, over a million per year), it's probably not worth the hassle. Outsource your payment processing.</comment></comment>


Ustream.tv Just Got a Redesign, But Justin.tv Is Still Beating Its Pants Off - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/01/ustreamtv-just-got-a-redesign-but-justintv-is-still-beating-its-pants-off/

<comment><USER2> I have been following both Ustream.tv and Justin.tv since they launched last year. They are both great sites, however, it is amazing how blatant Ustream copies Justin.tv's interface. Almomst every time Justin.tv comes up with some cool redesign for its site, Ustream.tv eventually copies them. Yeah the color schemes are different, but Ustream is stealing the principle layout of Justin.tv's redesigns. Take a look for yourself. Ustream.tv just launced a new version of their site. Now compare that with the current Justin.tv site. That should speak for itself.

Maybe this is one of reasons why Ustream is so far behind in terms of traffic. As a lot of you may already know, building a website without unique design principles, usually puts a site in perpetual cathup mode. And you never want to play this game with a competitor.

<comment><USER3> Imitation is the greatest form of flattery. (And a sure way to stay months behind your competition)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The friends I know who use Justin.TV all use it to watch sports, e.g. NBA Finals, Eurocup 2008, Olympic Trials.

</comment><comment><USER5> The problem with Justin.TV is the illegal content - the NBA Finals, etc. can't stay there forever. It can't survive on that - it'll get crushed. uStream's content is higher quality and legal.

Of course, maybe its legality just doesn't matter on the net.

<comment><USER6> A fair piece of youtube's success owes to illegal, copyrighted content (yes, including the rickroll).

<comment><USER7> Might as well just start selling crack around the corner. That seems easier.

<comment><USER6> In the case of youtube it seems most copyright owners tacitly accept the presence of their material, probably because they recognize the promotional value.

It's a weird situation now where people casually link to illegal material, like a Family Guy episode or a clip from Office Space, and nobody even blinks.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Twitter style StackOverflow? - <AUTHOR>

Every time I ask something on StackOverflow, or on any other forum for that matter, I keep on refreshing the page to see if anyone posted any replies. Just now it came to my mind - could this be done via Twitter (hashtags, to be specific)?
To ask a question, just add a hash tag to your question (lets say #someonepleaseanswerthisasap, or something better) and tweet it. People can just track this hashtag, and answer whatever they feel like answering.
Might sound like like Aardvark, but on top of Twitter. Does this sound weird, or possible? <comment><USER2> What is the purpose? If you do it on twitter you lose lot's of stuff that makes stackoverflow good: reputation, voting, a competent userbase etc.

What you want probably is a notification when someone anwers a question. If email isnt' fast enough build your own notification system using their API

</comment><comment><USER3> 140 characters isn't enough for support questions. True, some people are long- winded. So _some_ limit would probably be good. (143 characters.)</comment>


Cache across domains with a file hash - <AUTHOR> http://alexchamberlain.co.uk/opinion/2012/09/13/cache-across-domains.html <comment><USER2> I've coded something similar up in WebKit and considered landing it in Chrome, although I was more concerned with being able to use HTTP resources securely in HTTPS pages.

Firstly you need a way to incrementally verify a file: you don't want to have to download and buffer the whole file before figuring out whether it's good. Thankfully you can do this with Merkle trees: just make them `degenerate' (every left child is a leaf node).

If you make the browser cache content addressable (as the post suggests) then you need to do more than look at the caching header. Consider a site with Content Security Policy enabled: If an attacker found an XSS, they could inject <script href="<http://correct.origin.com/foo.js> digest="degen- hash:sha256:123abc...">. That would match the CSP origin restrictions without the server ever having to serve foo.js. (Thanks to abarth for pointing that out.)

So I believe content addressable caches would need a separate hash:// URL scheme for this. But I didn't attempt to make the cache content addressable in my code.

I don't know what to do about img srcsets[1]. There's no obviously good place to put the hashes in the HTML.

And lastly, and possibly fatally for the "secure HTTP resources in HTTPS pages" use case, many networks will now transcode images on the fly (and possibly other files too). So matching a known hash will result in broken pages for users on those networks.

[1] [http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-apps/current- work/multipage/...](http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-apps/current- work/multipage/embedded-content-1.html#attr-img-srcset)

<comment><USER3> > Firstly you need a way to incrementally verify a file

Following the proposal of the article, you don't really need that. If you don't have the hash in your local cache, you should assume that the link provided by the site is correct and resume as you normally would without the hash present. When it's downloaded, you verify the downloaded contents with the hash, and add the file to the cache if the verification succeeds.

If you already had the hash in the local cache, then you already have the entire file and there's no need for incremental verification.

As I understand it, the point of the hash is purely for caching purposes, not strictly for validating that the downloaded file matches it.

<comment><USER4> > As I understand it, the point of the hash is purely for caching purposes, > not strictly for validating that the downloaded file matches it.

That is a very useful consequence that prevents malicious content.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Anything like this is going to need a mandatory Cache-control header that indicates whether the content can be shared cross-domain. Otherwise you can just probe the cache for arbitrary resources, similar to stuff like the a:visited browser history attack.

Or have we just given up trying to deal with all the privacy leaking side- channels in browsers these days?

Another way to do this would be to allow multiple alternative src urls for a resource. Then the browser could pick the best (for as yet undetermined values of best) source the resource.

This has the extra bonus of advantage of looking mostly like a normal <link> or <script> tag and doesn't introduce yet another way to probe across domains.

<comment><USER6> Only links with a hash initially get put in the addressable cache. So if I download foo.js without a hash in the script tag, it is effectively a different document than foo.js with the script tag. The cache address hash would include the file hash, if you will.

This would effectively mean the person serving the files gets to determine if you are succeptible to this. If I serve you foo.js and don't want others to know you've seen it, I just make sure not to put a hash.

Although, overloading the hash this way sounds wrong. I'd rather see a "shared_cache='public|domain|none' property. I still like the consuming HTML being responsible for deciding that, though.

<comment><USER7> I think it would actually make more sense for the sha256 to be in the headers for setting it. It seems a bit weird for a property on a link tag pointing at a file to determine what we think the hash of that file is (not to mention quite un-fun to maintain).

Of course, that means without duplicating it you would still need a request similar to If-Modified-Since - something like If-Hash-Differs: <sha256 hash>, but still better than downloading the whole file.

I've thought about this exact problem before and one nice way to solve it would be through some kind of signing process - so you instead tell the browser "I need com.jquery.1.7.2" and there would be some way of verifying that a given instance of that file was legitimate, and could thus be cached across multiple URIs.

<comment><USER6> I agree the thing serving foo.js should be setting its sha hash in the headers. The client can validate that the header hash and the actual contents match, if it so desires.

On the web application side, by putting a "sha" tag in the script tag, the app is saying, "Fail if foo.js isn't the one I expect, regardless of where it comes from." By putting a "shared_cached" in the script tag, the app is telling the client where it is allowed to look for and to put foo.js.

Finally, a client should be able to ignore any shared cache requests and make everything private at the user's request.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm apprehensive to the idea of a cached version of X for Y based on the hash value (could be secure but assuming eventual collisions in SHA-256 it wouldn't be hard to setup a poisoned copy of a library that would live on for a long time).

An alternative use of this would be to validate the script that is being downloaded from the remote source. If you're delegating to Google or any other CDN for a javascript library you really expect it to be the one you requested. Assuming you're not pointing at the HEAD/latest version versus a specific (which would already be pretty amateur for a real site) then you expect it to always be exactly the same (ex: jquery-1.8.1.min.js should always be the same file ... if a bug is fixed it's a new version). It'd be a security improvement to have a way to have the browser verify that.

<script src="<https://some-cdn.example.com/some-library-1.2.3.js> hash="[secure hash of contents]">

If the downloaded file's hash does not match the expected one then the browser would flag a security warning or simply not load the file.

<comment><USER4> Great idea! Could the browser include the libraries and authenticate them in some way?

<comment><USER8> That's kind of the idea. The hash would be there so the browser could verify it is what is expected. Assuming the source page is delivered via HTTPS (w/ compression disabled :D) then the client could verify the hash against what it received to confirm it's valid.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This trivially exposes browser history to any site on the Internet. That's probably a non-starter. (Edit: I see alex beat me to this, below. He's detailed the attack, too.)

</comment><comment><USER10> Would this allow some kind of mine-by-SHA cross-site attacks? (sidenote: I've not thought this through, this is just an off-the-cuff thought.)

<comment><USER4> If you could find a malicious file that had the same hash as the current jQuery before the next one was released, then yes. I don't think this is possible, but I'm no expert!

<comment><USER11> "If you fear SHA-256 collisions but do not keep with you a loaded shotgun at all times, then you are getting your priorities wrong." <http://stackoverflow.com/a/4681221>

<comment><USER12> I think that quote is appropriate if you fear collisions with your own data set. The worry with a cache scheme like this is people would be actively seeking to find cache collisions.

<comment><USER4> That answer clearly explains why you can't, using current techniques and hardware.

<comment><USER13> > current techniques

We're talking about a long-term standard.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Having URI types that are content-centric rather than location-centric has been typical of P2P networks for over a decade... but web browser support has been spotty. (It's sometimes been faked via a localhost HTTP proxy.)

A new chance for this to change soon may be come alongside the forthcoming browser-to-browser connectivity standards under the heading "WebRTC". Then you won't just have to hope a matching file might be in your local cache... you can cooperate with other nearby nodes to find reliable replicas (like the P2P networks do), triggered by a content-hash-specifying URI scheme.

</comment><comment><USER15> Should be used for static assets over HTTPS. Where the main page could specify the sha for the various resources and avoid bothering with encryption and letting http proxies cache them.

</comment><comment><USER16> If you want to use content-addressable resources, why not use a content- addressable network, like Kademlia?

</comment><comment><USER17> This is just another addressing system for the Internet. At some level this has to be about one URL for one resource. The new indexing system just tells you which URL to use. At that point why not just use normal URLs, and implement everything else in Javascript and ETags?

</comment><comment><USER18> Assuming this is safe and works well, an interesting side-effect is that the need/recommendation of aggregating CSS files would be at least partially obviated.

</comment><comment><USER4> Are there any security experts that could confirm whether, given current estimates and knowledge, whether a collision attack by a botnet would likely succeed?

</comment><comment><USER19> Why all the worry about collisions? They will be rare enough that they could be worked around with a hard-coded blacklist in the browser.

</comment><comment><USER20> Something like a lightweight low-latency bittorrent for browsers would be the ultimate caching solution.

</comment><comment><USER21> I've proposed that to W3C HTML WG few months ago:

[http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public- html/2012Jun/0094...](http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public- html/2012Jun/0094.html)</comment>


Zuckerberg Loses $7B as Firms Boycott Facebook Ads - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-27/mark-zuckerberg-loses-7-billion-as-companies-drop-facebook-ads <comment><USER2> God this headline is so fucking incorrect I'm about to blow a gasket</comment>


Show HN: my collection of HN plugins - <AUTHOR>

I created this 3 plugins to create a better personal experience with HN, they are not made to create a nice UI, in fact, it might make it more confusing, but they help me to find more interesting things to read and have a general better experience.
HNTagger: https://bitbucket.org/Duiker101/hntagger
Tag users, there is also a file with some tag ready to be used. I like knowing who am I talking to, like if it's a dev of some company, a marketing person etc..
HNNewest: https://bitbucket.org/Duiker101/hnnewest
Highlights on the /newest page the posts with some comment or more than 1 point. Also highlight Ask HN, Show HN and text posts.
HNReRead: https://bitbucket.org/Duiker101/hnreread
Shows the number of comments/score since you refreshed the page(orange) or when you opened the thread(blue)
There is also the HNBox, which is all of them together: https://bitbucket.org/Duiker101/hnbox als avaible on the Chrome store https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hnbox/bphebkcfkkmdemhbbomehjbopofkhmib
This plugins were created for me but I hope will be helpful for someone else also.
Enjoy. <comment><AUTHOR> clicky:

HNTagger: <https://bitbucket.org/Duiker101/hntagger>

HNNewest: <https://bitbucket.org/Duiker101/hnnewest>

HNReRead: <https://bitbucket.org/Duiker101/hnreread>

HNBox: <https://bitbucket.org/Duiker101/hnbox>

HNBox on chrome: [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hnbox/bphebkcfkkmd...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hnbox/bphebkcfkkmdemhbbomehjbopofkhmib)</comment>


This Man Memorized a 60,000-Word Poem Using Deep Encoding - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/blog/this-man-memorized-a-60000_word-poem-using-deep-encoding <comment><USER2> Not just any poem. Milton's _Paradise Lost_.</comment>


Immediate Cardioprotective Benefits of Exercise Preconditioning - <AUTHOR> https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/article-abstract/2664268?utm_source=TWITTER&utm_medium=social_jn&utm_term=1192981764&utm_content=content_engagement%7carticle_engagement&utm_campaign=article_alert&linkId=45429834 <comment><USER2> Having a bit of trouble on mobile, can someone tell me what an "episode of exercise" is? Does running a mile count? What about a walk/bike ride to work?

</comment><comment><USER3> This title is deliberately misleading and does not reflect the actual title of the article: "Association of Exercise Preconditioning With Immediate Cardioprotection"

<comment><AUTHOR> The title was (automatically) taken from the web page title defined by the journal itself. It seems to me to have substantially the same meaning as the article title.

<comment><USER3> No. An "association" is not a "benefit". It can _suggest_ or even _imply_ a benefit, but they are not the same thing. The former is the result of the study, the latter is misleading and incorrect.

I feel like I need a picture of Bart Simpson writing "correlation does not imply causation" on a blackboard to post on these occasions.

<comment><AUTHOR> Now try reading the article. The authors argue for causation in many places, suggesting what they feel are plausible mechanisms. Again, the title is not deceptive, deliberately or otherwise.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


I'm thinking of writing a CMS for semi-technical folks - <AUTHOR>

I'd like to know if you think this would be worth it (i.e. have business potential); if you might use something like this; if something like this already exists and works (and I just don't happen to know about it). I may well write this anyway, as I was initially thinking, for my own benefit anyway; but I'm open to advice on working this towards perhaps my own company...
So here's the idea:
Right now, when I make a website, I'vdde gotten to the point of setting up template pages (shared headers and navigation and other features) with an area for that particular page's content.
My latest experiment, which really works well for small sites, is to stick everything in a single php file and redirect 404 to it and let it figure out what path the visitor wanted and go there (i.e. it detects that you tried to access /aboutus/ and returns the proper page, built from the various parts). Even CSS is called this way, and I properly output the css file to the browser via php...
So I'm thinking of trying to automate this a little bit:
1. Store page contents in a database - but I'd be storing html, with a text interface to work on the files, not a GUI.
2. Have a page navigation structure with automatically generated navigation menus.
3. Allow for multiple page templates
4. Allow for multiple widgets/plugins that I'm currently thinking would be how a template is made. So this could be things like a list of the most recently updated pages to a calendar of events, or... I'm not totally sure yet.
5. Have page/widget/not sure what other level of variables - like for pages, an associated "page title" variable that the page header widget would look for and use somewhere in the graphical header area of the rendered page, as well as put in the html 'head' section so it appears in the browser's titlebar...
I suppose I want to be a little inspired by Wordpress and its concept of pages (as opposed to posts) and its widgets and customizeable sidebar; but try to make it easier to write useful plugins, and make the page templates themselves a part of what's stored in the database.
Does this make sense so far? Am I giving too much info or not enough? And what do you think? <comment><USER3> What advantage would your system have over any of the existing CMS systems? There's a dozen of good, well-established CMS systems out there (CMS made simple, Drupal, e107, Joomla!, Typo, Plone, and so on and so forth)...

<comment><AUTHOR> I've used Plone; I've looked a Drupal, Joomla, and Typo.

In my mind, these systems try to offer a complete GUI development interface. They're complex and difficult to learn.

Basically, I think there's a need for something far simpler.

The first step would be to write something that simply stores the main content portion of each page in a database, loading the correct content during the page building process.

So my page template might look like:

Sitename

<?=$pagetitle?>

<?=$pagecontent?>

stuff

There would be a backend interface to generate new pages and define the variables, like page title; a textbox to work with the page's HTML code... read/write this from/to database.

Complexity could grow from that - but that's the _basic_ idea.

Are you aware of CMS that work from that point of view? Just the sheer simplicity of the system, in my mind, is different.

For example, you _can_ work in HTML mode in Wordpress, but there's all the rest of it that goes with Wordpress that's not needed for a small site - <USER2> gets in the way.

<comment><USER3> Well, I don't think a GUI is more complex than editing nearly the same stuff in a text editor. But that might be just me.

However, if you want to go down to bare-bones stuff, give a try to <http://ikiwiki.info/>.

Quite a few solutions exist for such scenarios aswell.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Addendum: To some degree, I'm really inspired by WordPress. I think: WordPress makes it really easy to make a functional and useful website; although pages feel like they were a little strapped on; and making new page templates is a little hard; it's geared towards blogs.

So a lot of what WordPress does, I like. But my idea would be geared towards making websites for small local businesses, for example; rather than blogs.

<comment><USER4> The trend over the past 1-2 years has been to move away from a blog look and feel with Wordpress installs. You can absolutely run small businesses with Wordpress installations and very easily pick a snazzy design up for $50 or so that comes complete with industry-specific pages. I've used <http://woothemes.com/> for that sort of stuff - really spotlights how malleable WP can be.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, I'll give that a looksee.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Have you had a look at NestaCMS? Markdown, textile, or HAML support. Text files as your interface/storage.

<http://effectif.com/nesta>

<comment><AUTHOR> I'll check that out, although I haven't played with Ruby at all - I'm a PHP guy. :-)</comment></comment>


California bans per-minute billing; Tesla Superchargers will need displays - <AUTHOR> https://electrek.co/2019/12/24/california-bans-per-minute-billing-tesla-superchargers-will-need-displays/ <comment><USER2> What better display than the 15" to 17" screen directly in front of you on the dash in the Tesla while waiting out the charging session, which already shows all charging data including price? I mean even trains are going away from physical signs along the tracks to everything just showing on a screen for the driver.

<comment><AUTHOR> The idea is to ensure that users are informed about the amount of electricity they're paying for. The number of kilowatt hours drawn from the charger is not the same as the number of kilowatt hours that end up in the battery.

Here's a demonstration on an Ionity charger with a Tesla Model 3:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPrVZtzAqX4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPrVZtzAqX4)

In the end the charger delivered 65.5 kWh but only 61 kWh was added to the battery. 4.5 kWh is a difference worth knowing about.

<comment><USER3> Being billed for kWh at all and not time seems like a far more important part of regulation.

<comment><AUTHOR> All the parts are important. It's regulation that has to be followed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> California passing regulation to restrict innovation and progress as usual.</comment>


World's thinnest piezoelectricity generator - <AUTHOR> http://www.kurzweilai.net/worlds-thinnest-piezoelectricity-generator <comment><USER2> This is a potentially useful development, especially considering the possibilities of the _reverse_ piezoelectric effect. That is, applying a current causes the material to change shape, the inverse of current generation. That could be a key to creating new products.

In fact, Epson patented just such a mechanism used in their inkjet printers. The mechanical force of current-activated piezoelectric material is used to propel droplets of colorant toward the ink-receptive surface.

Epson's success in the printer market has been notable, especially in the domain of photo printing. Because of the patents, other manufacturers, notably Canon, had to invent an alternative way to squirt colorants. Their solution was the "bubble-jet" process, heating a tiny amount of aqueous ink to vaporize it generates pressure to force droplets out of the print head.

The new, very thin piezoelectric material may have properties of this kind that can be exploited. Imagine, for example, tiny valves or actuators that could have uses in health care, robotics, etc. Combined with described piezoelectronic properties, there are a mind-boggling number of possibilities.

<comment><USER3> > considering the possibilities of the reverse piezoelectric effect. That is, > applying a current causes the material to change shape.

This is already quite common in some industries such as precise mechanical stages for scientific equipment ([http://www.piezostage.net/](http://www.piezostage.net/))

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Would be good if it were to use more environmentally-friendly materials. The piezoelectric material as described in the article is molybdenum disulfide. This could be a huge disadvantage, since molybdenum is not so abundant in nature (scarcer than lithium). There are already concerns regarding the use of lithium, and whether its availability would be able to sustain global production (rechargeable batteries, mainly) in the next hundred years or so.

I gained a huge interest on piezoelectric materials upon learning of solar piezoelectric thermoacoustic generators. Not really as efficient as solar panels, but could be far cheaper and more environmentally-friendly.</comment>


Calling Yourself 'Humbled' Doesn't Sound as Humble as It Used To - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/24/magazine/calling-yourself-humbled-doesnt-sound-as-humble-as-it-used-to.html <comment><USER2> Most egregious example are the 'status' updates by young entrepreneurs on how humbled they are to appear within Forbes 30 under 30, etc. Always written as if they are congratulating their peers (the future world leaders).

It's the opposite of being humbled. It's amusing (and a little disturbing) that it can be dressed up the way it is.

<comment><USER3> Often it's the exact opposite: a way to brag and draw attention to things that people would otherwise not much care about or consider admirable.

Pretending to be humbled is basically lying about the amount of recognition you receive in the hopes that new people will be tricked to really consider you important. Perhaps similar to tagging everything with #blessed on instagram.

"I'm so humbled and honored and surprised to be/serve as X and I want to thank my parents / offer mentoring to the less fortunate of you" often after aggressive pursuit, self-nomination or unacknowledged massive help / connections to get whatever the thing was.

<comment><USER4> It's the real life version of saying you don't expect upvotes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This goes back pretty far: "Now the man Moses was very humble, more than any man who was on the face of the earth." Num 12:3 - Written by Moses

<comment><USER6> Awesome. Whoever wrote the Bible was setting up today's assholes for a "I'm basically Moses"

<comment><USER7> The Bible and other religious texts have a lot of accumulated wisdom in them. I think of them as the Wikipedias of their time, edited by everyone, partly useful information, partly full of shit, accepted uncritically by the more naive

<comment><USER8> Interesting but I disagree. Basically the entire Old Testament is edited and to enforce a certain interpretation of the Israelites' history, namely that turning away from God caused bad things to happen. It has a fairly consistent and coherent agenda.

<comment><USER7> I would love to talk about that more. It's been a long time since I have read the Old Testament. I meant to buy the "Five Books of Moses" translation a few years back.

<comment><USER8> Hi, it's something I learned about when I took this class: [https://www.coursera.org/learn/bible- history](https://www.coursera.org/learn/bible-history)

It looks like it's actually being offered again, and just started this week if you're interested.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> You think you're really righteous? You think you're pure at heart? Well, I know I'm a million times as humble as thou art.

<comment><USER10> Never thought I'd see a Weird Al quote on HN.

<comment><USER11> My favourite line from that song is "On my knees day and night scorin' points for the afterlife".

<comment><USER12> Another apropos line: "So don't be vain, and don't be whiny, or my brother I might have to get medieval on your hiney!"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Did it ever sound humble? Complimenting oneself publicly on one's supposedly exceptional humility has always seemed an unintentional sarcasm to me.

<comment><USER14> I think there's a difference between saying something was "a humbling experience" and "I am exceptionally humble".

<comment><USER15> "The best at being humble. Everyone's talking about how humble I am."

<comment><USER16> "in a way, being gracious is my weakness" :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> With the risk of feeling the power of the ban hammer, here is the obligatory reference

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzUKcXxbU4U](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzUKcXxbU4U)

</comment><comment><USER18> Sonia Sotomayor said that she was "very humbled" when President Obama nominated her for the Supreme Court. I'm sure it's really humbling when the President calls you up and tells you that you're the best judge in the country. ;-)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonia_Sotomayor_Supreme_Court_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonia_Sotomayor_Supreme_Court_nomination#Day_1_.28July_13.29)

<comment><USER19> A more appropriate word would be "honored".

<comment><USER20> I prefer to go with "proud" myself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Overuse has killed the actual meaning of a lot of words. Don't even get me started on 'genius'.

<comment><USER21> And all the "gourmet" items to be found in the discount aisle of the grocery store.

<comment><USER7> There's no such thing as gourmet coffee, gourmet rolls or gourmet pizza. Gourmet means one thing: "We're going to charge you more." The same is true of the word cuisine. The difference between food and cuisine is sixty dollars.

\- George Carlin

<comment><USER22> I like a George Carlin quote as much as the next guy, but this doesn't make sense. If gourmet means it costs more, then there absolutely is gourmet coffee, rolls and pizza.

<comment><USER23> He means the difference is not in the coffee — that "gourmet" is a price tag modifier, not a food modifier.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> One good example of this bullshit is the last years of Bill Gates PR. People "spontaneously" coming to social networks to state how great and humble he is.

E.G this fantastic piece of "interview": [http://imgur.com/gallery/DTDsH0P](http://imgur.com/gallery/DTDsH0P)

I still wonder how it can remotely work. But it does. Read the comments below the pictures, it's crazy.

It's like in big announcements when people are jumping around saying they are all "so excited". I usually stop listening after somebody used those 2 worlds, there are people finding this is a demonstration of enthusiasm.

<comment><USER25> Why do you think he's not humble? Of all the billionaires I've seen talk he appears to be a pretty decent and grounded person.

<comment><USER24> Have you read the same interview ?

It's like you try to get a job and the ask "what's you biggest weakness ?" and you answer "I can't say, but people usually say I'm too invested in my work".

Why do I even have to explain that ?

Gates PR works so well I even have to rewrite the list of all the horrible stuff he's responsible for in the 90's because people keep forgetting. This is terrible, and a reason politicians and big companies manage to get away again and again with bad behavior.

<comment><USER26> I'll excuse all his technical and business misdeeds from 20-30 years ago if he _cures malaria_. Or even if he scrapes a double-digit percentage gain against the disease. The world has much bigger problems than some dickhead breaking a standard to get a leg-up on his competition. Or buying a competitor and preventing some bullshit technology from budding as early as it otherwise would have.

<comment><USER24> Corrupting governments is not misdeeds.

And by the way, I got malaria. While working for the Gates foundation in Africa.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I had a bit when I was 10 or so where I'd go to great lengths to explain the magnitude of my humility. If 10-year-old me was cynical enough to develop a routine about it... how has it ever worked?

Humility, grace, rudeness, attractiveness... these are all judgments that can't be made about yourself, only by/about others.

</comment><comment><USER27> If you're looking for an easy drop-in word, I recommend "privileged"

It's certainly a privilege... I'm privileged to be a part of... etc

It seems to be an effective device for communicating your feelings without coming across as arrogant

<comment><USER28> I generally agree, although the term has started to become somewhat politically overloaded these days - white privilege, check your privilege, etc. Using it in the way you suggest should be rather uncontroversial but I would make sure to consider your audience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Ah, the 'ol humble brag. If you call yourself humble, you're basically saying other people think you're awesome. I don't bother anymore, I just accept compliments, and if people ask me if I think I'm awesome, I say yes, even though I'm aware of my own failures (to be fair, everyone has them, so it doesn't detract from one's awesomeness).

</comment><comment><USER30> Test this, next time someone offers you a compliment answer "I think you are right, Thank You," or "I agree, Thank You."

</comment><comment><USER31> When an athlete says they are humbled, it's the most genuine use -- because to perform at a top level, you have to 'go back to your roots' \- the lonely/early/late days that got you there. So they say it simply to remind themselves that the basics that got them there, is not forgotten and has to be implemented everyday.

<comment><USER32> Also physical performance for most sports is objective and earned, whereas most other scenarios it was a subjective process decided by other humans.

<comment><USER7> Until every sport adopts the powerlifting or MMA model where there are drugs and non-drug competitions there is no way of knowing. There's a Lance Armstrong in every sport.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> One phrase that I've noticed (over)used in NFL broadcasts is "give credit". After a win, a star player will often "give credit" to the other team, their defense, lesser-known players, etc. It seems to be a decent way to act humble when you're the center of attention, without saying "humbled".

<comment><USER34> I agree. In current usage "humbled" just seems to mean "I'm staying humble despite my achievement" rather than what the word actually means. Even if it's over-used, it shows class to give credit to the people around you. Everyone helped at least a little.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Heh, the next article I read on HN after this one was:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13487175](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13487175)

[http://www.military.com/daily-news/2017/01/19/army-picks- sig...](http://www.military.com/daily-news/2017/01/19/army-picks-sig-sauer- replace-m9-service-pistol.html)

Within a few sentences I read:

 _" We are both humbled and proud that the P320 was selected by the U.S. Army as its weapon of choice," Ron Cohen, chief executive officer of Sig Sauer, said in a statement to Military.com"_

</comment><comment><USER36> > "We are living in humbling times. People are humbled all over the place. > Lately it's pro forma (...) for politicians, athletes, celebrities and other > public figures to be vocally and vigorously humbled by every honor awarded, > prize won, job offered, record broken, pound lost, shout-out received, > "like" copped and thumb upped.

Everything that becomes a commonplace looses it's strength. Be it "honored", "humble", "didn't expect", "didn't think I would deserve it" and so on.

</comment><comment><USER37> Reminds me of that classic article "On Smarm"

[http://gawker.com/on-smarm-1476594977](http://gawker.com/on-smarm-1476594977)

</comment><comment><USER38> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1R42mFx3_ss](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1R42mFx3_ss)

</comment><comment><USER39> Here's another overused word: passion.

<comment><USER40> Which in a more literal sense means you have amorous feelings toward the thing you're passionate about.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Somebody's been listening to the Hello Internet podcast.

</comment><comment><USER42> For those of you looking for a tl;dr version, here's a quote that gives you the general tone:

 _We live in a rabidly anti-elitist society that is also in slack-jawed, slavish thrall to elites, and it's no joke to try to maintain homeostasis between "Look at me!" and "Who, me?"_

I'm trying to remember who it was that once talked about judging a community by two things: its actual behavior, and what it holds up as ideal behavior. I think it's actually a good thing that society started to hold up as an ideal the idea of being humbled by success.

I found the superior, smug tone of the article annoying. Some attempt at sounding more humble would have produced a better article.

</comment><comment><USER43> Modesty is my best quality.

<comment><USER44> There's nobody more humble than me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> i'm ever so humble

</comment><comment><USER46> I'm more humble than they are!

</comment><comment><USER47> I am awe-inspiringly great at being humble! Nobody does humble like I do. Call in the next 10 minutes and get my "Awesome Humility in 40 days" starter kit for half off!</comment>


ArnoldC: Programming language based on the one-liners of Arnold Schwarzenegger - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/lhartikk/ArnoldC

<comment><USER2> I can see it now:

Interviewer: _gives you fizzbuzz_. Feel free to use any language you are comfortable with.

Me: Hmm, sure.

IT'S SHOWTIME

HEY CHRISTMAS TREE isLessThan100 YOU SET US UP @NO PROBLEMO HEY CHRISTMAS TREE n YOU SET US UP 0 HEY CHRISTMAS TREE multiple YOU SET US UP @NO PROBLEMO

STICK AROUND isLessThan100 GET TO THE CHOPPER n HERE IS MY INVITATION n GET UP 1 ENOUGH TALK

GET TO THE CHOPPER isLessThan100 HERE IS MY INVITATION 100 LET OFF SOME STEAM BENNET n ENOUGH TALK

GET YOUR ASS TO MARS multiple DO IT NOW divisible n 15 BECAUSE I'M GOING TO SAY PLEASE multiple TALK TO THE HAND "FizzBuzz" BULLSHIT GET YOUR ASS TO MARS multiple DO IT NOW divisible n 3 BECAUSE I'M GOING TO SAY PLEASE multiple TALK TO THE HAND "Fizz" BULLSHIT GET YOUR ASS TO MARS multiple DO IT NOW divisible n 5 BECAUSE I'M GOING TO SAY PLEASE multiple TALK TO THE HAND "Buzz" BULLSHIT TALK TO THE HAND n YOU HAVE NO RESPECT FOR LOGIC YOU HAVE NO RESPECT FOR LOGIC YOU HAVE NO RESPECT FOR LOGIC CHILL

YOU HAVE BEEN TERMINATED

LISTEN TO ME VERY CAREFULLY modulo I NEED YOUR CLOTHES YOUR BOOTS AND YOUR MOTORCYCLE dividend I NEED YOUR CLOTHES YOUR BOOTS AND YOUR MOTORCYCLE divisor GIVE THESE PEOPLE AIR HEY CHRISTMAS TREE quotient YOU SET US UP 0 HEY CHRISTMAS TREE remainder YOU SET US UP 0 HEY CHRISTMAS TREE product YOU SET US UP 0 GET TO THE CHOPPER quotient HERE IS MY INVITATION dividend HE HAD TO SPLIT divisor ENOUGH TALK GET TO THE CHOPPER product HERE IS MY INVITATION divisor YOU'RE FIRED quotient ENOUGH TALK GET TO THE CHOPPER remainder HERE IS MY INVITATION dividend GET DOWN product ENOUGH TALK I'LL BE BACK remainder HASTA LA VISTA, BABY

LISTEN TO ME VERY CAREFULLY divisible I NEED YOUR CLOTHES YOUR BOOTS AND YOUR MOTORCYCLE dividend I NEED YOUR CLOTHES YOUR BOOTS AND YOUR MOTORCYCLE divisor GIVE THESE PEOPLE AIR

HEY CHRISTMAS TREE result YOU SET US UP 0 GET YOUR ASS TO MARS result DO IT NOW modulo dividend divisor

HEY CHRISTMAS TREE isZero YOU SET US UP 0 GET TO THE CHOPPER isZero HERE IS MY INVITATION result YOU ARE NOT YOU YOU ARE ME 0 ENOUGH TALK

I'LL BE BACK isZero HASTA LA VISTA, BABY

<comment><USER3> Reformatted:

      IT'S SHOWTIME

      HEY CHRISTMAS TREE isLessThan100
      YOU SET US UP @NO PROBLEMO
      HEY CHRISTMAS TREE n
      YOU SET US UP 0
      HEY CHRISTMAS TREE multiple
      YOU SET US UP @NO PROBLEMO

      STICK AROUND isLessThan100
        GET TO THE CHOPPER n
         HERE IS MY INVITATION n
         GET UP 1
        ENOUGH TALK

        GET TO THE CHOPPER isLessThan100
         HERE IS MY INVITATION 100
         LET OFF SOME STEAM BENNET n
        ENOUGH TALK

        GET YOUR ASS TO MARS multiple
        DO IT NOW divisible n 15
        BECAUSE I'M GOING TO SAY PLEASE multiple
          TALK TO THE HAND "FizzBuzz"
        BULLSHIT
          GET YOUR ASS TO MARS multiple
          DO IT NOW divisible n 3
          BECAUSE I'M GOING TO SAY PLEASE multiple
            TALK TO THE HAND "Fizz"
          BULLSHIT
            GET YOUR ASS TO MARS multiple
            DO IT NOW divisible n 5
            BECAUSE I'M GOING TO SAY PLEASE multiple
              TALK TO THE HAND "Buzz"
            BULLSHIT
              TALK TO THE HAND n
            YOU HAVE NO RESPECT FOR LOGIC
          YOU HAVE NO RESPECT FOR LOGIC
        YOU HAVE NO RESPECT FOR LOGIC
      CHILL

      YOU HAVE BEEN TERMINATED

      LISTEN TO ME VERY CAREFULLY modulo
         I NEED YOUR CLOTHES YOUR BOOTS AND YOUR MOTORCYCLE dividend
         I NEED YOUR CLOTHES YOUR BOOTS AND YOUR MOTORCYCLE divisor
       GIVE THESE PEOPLE AIR
       HEY CHRISTMAS TREE quotient
       YOU SET US UP 0
       HEY CHRISTMAS TREE remainder
       YOU SET US UP 0
       HEY CHRISTMAS TREE product
       YOU SET US UP 0
       GET TO THE CHOPPER quotient
        HERE IS MY INVITATION dividend
        HE HAD TO SPLIT divisor
       ENOUGH TALK
       GET TO THE CHOPPER product
        HERE IS MY INVITATION divisor
        YOU'RE FIRED quotient
       ENOUGH TALK
       GET TO THE CHOPPER remainder
        HERE IS MY INVITATION dividend
        GET DOWN product
       ENOUGH TALK
       I'LL BE BACK remainder
      HASTA LA VISTA, BABY

      LISTEN TO ME VERY CAREFULLY divisible
         I NEED YOUR CLOTHES YOUR BOOTS AND YOUR MOTORCYCLE dividend
         I NEED YOUR CLOTHES YOUR BOOTS AND YOUR MOTORCYCLE divisor
       GIVE THESE PEOPLE AIR

       HEY CHRISTMAS TREE result
       YOU SET US UP 0
       GET YOUR ASS TO MARS result
       DO IT NOW modulo dividend divisor

       HEY CHRISTMAS TREE isZero
       YOU SET US UP 0
       GET TO THE CHOPPER isZero
        HERE IS MY INVITATION result
        YOU ARE NOT YOU YOU ARE ME 0
       ENOUGH TALK

       I'LL BE BACK isZero
      HASTA LA VISTA, BABY

(Original source appears to be: [https://gist.github.com/georg/9224355](https://gist.github.com/georg/9224355))

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> An ironically verbose language given the origin :-)

</comment><comment><USER5> I saw this a while ago (about a year) and I wrote a hello world and another small program in it. Shortly after I had a job interview for a software dev. spot for one of my schools research labs and I brought this up in the interview, my future boss thought it was halarious!

</comment><comment><USER6> This is great -- now I'd like to know what movies the keyword quotes were taken from.

<comment><USER7> If you click on the original keyword name, it links to a YouTube video of the quote, which usually has the movie name in the title.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Goodness! I didn't even know there were enough lines to have a fairly complete grammar and tokens. Honestly, this would have been perfect and a better assignment to give in a Compilers course instead of asking students to build some C-like language--at least this language seems fun!

</comment><comment><USER9> I feel like it should have assertion testing, announced as 'COME WITH ME IF YOU WANT TO LIVE:'

<comment><USER10> That's a proposed syntax for try/catch.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> The only music appropriate to listen to while programming in ArnoldC: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbtlPCbhVGw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbtlPCbhVGw)

<comment><USER12> But what about: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlicWUDf5MM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlicWUDf5MM)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I thought CPAN included something like this, but I might've been thinking of Acme::DonMartin

</comment><comment><USER14> I always wanted to make a whole movie out of Arnie one-liners. This is awesome :)

</comment><comment><USER15> Those keyword quotes are amazing. I'm in stitches.

</comment><comment><USER16> This is completely hilarious. Kudos!

</comment><comment><USER17> Has me cracking up! Great job!</comment>


Web App and REST API with Express, PostgreSQL and Nunjucks on Yarn - <AUTHOR> https://www.zaiste.net/2016/10/web_app_rest_api_with_express_postgresql_and_nunjucks_on_yarn/ <comment><USER2> An excellent intro, easy to follow. Reading this, and comparing it to the (Java) Spring/JPA/ORM stuff we're using at work is startling. Obviously, this demo has no security or business logic in it, just bare-bones HTTP <-> DB. However, it's nice to see code that is between 1/2 and 1/10th the size of the equivalent "ENTERPRISE!!!" silly walk.

My first gig back in the mid 80s was also an interpreted language, so running (a much smaller piece of) code to check it doesn't scare me :-)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you. I write those articles mainly for my co-workers. I tend to use « simple English » only focusing on a particular aspect. If there is enough people in need, I'll gladly write more with broader coverage.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Nice job! I've spend the last 2 months learning React and other tools in the ecosystem and was baffled at how complicated most of the tutorials were. I appreciate that this one is simple to follow yet powerful. Maybe for a part 2 you can show how to integrate React (client and/or server side).

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for nice words. Yes, that's my plan. I'll do either React or Preact.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: What are the best conferences to learn Software Engineering - <AUTHOR> Is there a conference I can go to to learn about topics things that come up in the day to day work of a professional software engineer. Things like: - clean coding principles - testing - debugging techniques - working with distributed systems - design patterns - software architecture <comment><USER2> Look for [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_craftsmanship](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_craftsmanship), there's a conference in April [https://scna.softwarecraftsmanship.org/](https://scna.softwarecraftsmanship.org/)</comment>


Linus - I'm a bastard Speech (2000) - <AUTHOR> http://lwn.net/2000/0914/a/lt-debugger.php3

<comment><USER2> Personally, I find arguments against using debuggers to be absurd. More importantly, I think they tend to promote ponitification over science.

Using a debugger is, effectively, taking a scientific approach to understanding a software system. It's similar to using a microscope to examine bacteria. The programmer sets up an experiment, and then uses the debugger to observe the software system and learn about how it works.

The approach Linus advocates is one of "ponitification", where the wise pontif examines his scrolls, and makes a declaration of truth.

Its interesting to note that the barrier to understanding how software works via experimentation is much lower than the barrier to understanding it by reading every line of source code.

In the mail, Linus states that his goals in excluding debuggers from the main kernel sources is to discourage people from using debuggers to develop features, because developing with a sense of deep understanding results in better software. However, it also excludes one of the most useful tools for developing that sense of understanding.

I can't speak to personal motivations, because I don't know the man, but that type of behavior does smell somewhat of self-preservation. Ensuring that it is difficult to acquire a complete understanding of Linux, makes it more difficult for him to loose his position of influence.

Regardless of his motivations, however, lies the central fact that barriers to knowledge are detrimental to an open society.

Given the value that the linux community places on "openness", "freedom", and "egalitarnisim", and his position as a leader in that community, I would think he should want to eliminate those barriers.

If that increases the burden of incorporating change into the kernel, because the quality of developers is diluted by use of debuggers, than so be it.

This is equivalent to the notion that the burden of proof in acquiring a criminal conviction is placed on the state, not the defendant. Yes this means that everyone needs to work harder at justice, and that sometimes guilty people go free. However, in the end, it ensures that people actually remain free.

</comment><comment><USER3> Linus's general attitude "developer time does not matter" is appropriate only when you have free slave labor that you can afford to waste.

<comment><USER4> Sure, developer time matters. But you've got to be able to recognise sunk cost, the product of 100 hours work should only ship if it is better than what came before. The end result matters more than the developers time - if it fails, there won't be any money to pay the developer, no matter how long he has been working.

<comment><USER3> I'm not talking about "sunk cost", but developer productivity. He doesn't care about it, but most people should.

<comment><USER5> I believe productivity does matter to him. It's just that he wants people who can a-ha their way out of the problem, the gifted people.

So loosing thousands of good/average people in favor of couple of elites is the price he is willing to pay. Meaning he does care for productivity.

It's just that this "care" manifests in a utterly devious and fiendish manner.

Because he is a bastard. And I understand, because I am a bastard. And I don't care either. We don't care about being nice, because being nice to weak people doesn't help anyone. Weak people fail if you are nice to them or not. Strong people don't care if you are nice. If you are not nice they will challenge you. If you are strong you earn respect and allies. If your a weak wise guy, you better GTFO :).

Essentially it's about being nice to weak people (giving debugger). And in the world of Elite it doesn't make sense.

Think thermopylae It's an wonderful example of what a group of elites can do. And I believe the Spartans weren't known as nice and understanding bunch.

<comment><USER6> What's your company called? I'd like to avoid doing business with it.

<comment><USER5> Sadly, the company I work for is full of weak, ordinary people :).

Now you see, what I said above could only be understood by people who are fundamentally different.

Should everybody be like that? No way! Are people like that suitable for any job? No way! But there are jobs that they CAN and DO better than other people.

The whole weak/strong argument does not mean that people like us kick old ladies. But it's pretty likely that we are willing to go against the odds to prove a point or make a difference.

I'm sad that you don't understand the underlying meaning, but I will not shed a tear.

<comment><USER7> I see what you're saying. I've felt that way myself sometimes.

It's usually called "arrogance". ;-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I would like to mock propose the following idea: A Debugger License. Like a driver's license, you have to have a certain amount of experience and qualification to operate a debugger. Improper use of your debugger may incur fines and penalties up to the revocation of your license.

Licensing should involve operational demonstration of design capacity, testing, and reasoning. After passing the initial phase of licensing, you may operate the debugger under supervision to learn the full spectrum of debugger capabilities (no point using a tool poorly, after all). [/tongue:cheek]

I don't really blame people for using debuggers badly though. They're one of the few practical coding tools that time is actually spent on in university classes. In my experience, we were expected to use them to understand the operation of the stack frame and heap in decoding a program especially built around having funny tricks. To throw back to my analogy, it's a bit like teaching a new driver how to do a powerslide before teaching them to obey stop signs.

</comment><comment><USER9> That speech fed into an interesting discussion on the merits of debuggers at <http://www.perlmonks.org/?node_id=48495>. Note that "merlyn" in that discussion is Randal Schwartz, who is well-known in both Perl and Smalltalk circles.

</comment><comment><USER10> hm. "And sure, when things crash and you fsck and you didn't even get a clue about what went wrong, you get frustrated."

It seems that a serial console, even though it doesn't give you as much info as a full kernel dump, would at least give you the panic message and a back trace, which is usually enough clue to figure out what happened or to ask for help.

<comment><USER11> Putting aside the live debugger issue, most UNIXes support generating a full kernel core dump that can be used post-facto to debug the panic using the standard debugging tools -- you get full access to the memory contents, machine state, a backtrace, etc.

It's very, very useful when you have a difficult to reproduce problem that only occurs on a small subset of your machines while in production.

Up until relatively recently, Linux had no support for this, and I believe still has no official support. RedHat EL ships a modified system with crash dump support, and other hacked in implementations exist.

When we had Linux machines regularly crashing once every couple weeks in ~2003, we couldn't even get a usable oops out of them -- we just gave up and rebooted them regularly. When we saw the same thing occur on a new FreeBSD release a few years later, we enabled crash dumps and found and fixed the issue immediately.

Linus is intelligent, but his oft-unchecked arrogance begets some particularly unfortunate foolishness.

<comment><USER10> you did not get an oops or a backtrace out of your logging serial consoles? I mean, I understand that a kernel dump does give you even more information, but a logging serial console does give you a lot of information, usually enough.

the kernel support for kdump is in the upstream kernel.org tree, I believe. you've gotta monkey with your initrd and the userland tools, though, last time I looked. It does seem pretty silly that linux seems to want to change the standard way to do crash dumps every two years. *BSD is much cleaner in this regard. But in my experience, a logging console is usually as useful (and sometimes more useful; logging consoles help in cases when the problem isn't a kernel panic, but is instead a weird network issue.) than kernel dumps. I remember last time I tried to debug an issue with kdump, the kernel would crash, then it would load the kdump kernel, but that, too would crash before dumping the kernel. (It turns out it was a hardware issue with the raid controller. Dumping to disk when disk is the problem doesn't work so well.)

But then, I'm a computer janitor, and not a kernel developer. I imagine there are reasons to get a full kernel dump when you are concerned with more than "Is this a kernel issue or is it bad hardware?"

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> _"I happen to believe that not having a kernel debugger forces people to think about their problem on a different level than with a debugger. I think that without a debugger, you don't get into that mindset where you know how it behaves, and then you fix it from there. Without a debugger, you tend to think about problems another way. You want to understand things on a different _level_."_

This seems to be the most worthwhile part of the post. I've never gotten into the habit of using debuggers myself, so I can't say how strong his argument is.

<comment><USER13> I also find that a debugger encourages a technique of just tracing through the code until " _a-hah_ , _that's_ where fooBing get reset to dingy. I should add a clause to reset it to dingy only if barBong is set."

Without a debugger, I would have to write tests, clean up the code until it made sense, or design it in such a way that that particular kind of bug could not occur.

<comment><USER11> _I also find that a debugger encourages a technique of just tracing through the code until "a-hah, that's where fooBing get reset to dingy. I should add a clause to reset it to dingy only if barBong is set."_

Someone actually skilled in their craft would say:

"a-hah, that's where fooBing get reset to dingy. now I understand _what's_ happening, let's understand _why_ ".

Remember, this is kernel code we're talking about here. In user-space, I rarely need to use a debugger because nearly all issues are caught during initial development by unit and regression testing.

However, there are still times where something goes terribly wrong -- sometimes in vendor code (or in the case of the kernel, hardware) -- and I wouldn't give up my debugger for the world.

<comment><USER13> No disagreement that debuggers are helpful, but they allow unskilled people to do more crap work without having to learn or think or improve, and _that_ is what I believe Linus is going on about.

By all means, I don't _agree_ with him that debuggers should be forbidden, but I believe I know where he's coming from.

<comment><USER14> Do you mean that, only masochistic programmers ought to survive? Or, didn't we all start out as an unskilled programmer before we gained any skill?

<comment><USER13> No.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Present Like Steve Jobs – The Art of Persuasive Presentations - <AUTHOR> https://www.konsus.com/blog/persuasive-presentations/ <comment><AUTHOR> would love to see other examples of persuasive presentations, you guys have come across.</comment>


The State of Open Source E-commerce 2014 - <AUTHOR>

Lately I've been working on a lot of E-commerce projects and have been experimenting with different open source solutions that will allow me to build a quick E-commerce platform for my clients without investing lots of time. I have to say that I have been largely disappointed by the lack of quality that is available out there. Things like Magneto are just too big and clunky which appear to be over engineered and complicated. Other solutions such as Open Cart don't seem to be much easier either. Surely in 2014 there has to be a better, more modern platform than these?
The only option I've found that I really like is Shopify as its really user friendly and allows me to build templates quickly. The only problem with Shopify is that you have to pay and its not open source to host on my clients servers etc.
I wanted to reach out to the Hacker News community and see what your thoughts on the subject are and if you know of any solutions that work well for you? <comment><USER2> Stripe has a nice payments api that is quite easy to build into your own platform. They also have a long list of integrations that would take a bit of time to sort through but may have what you are looking for!</comment>


Pentagon Bans Fitness and GPS Trackers for Deployed Personnel - <AUTHOR> https://www.npr.org/2018/08/07/636274330/pentagon-bans-fitness-and-gps-trackers-for-deployed-personnel <comment><USER2> Discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17702119](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17702119)</comment>


Should you TDD on a Lean Startup? - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/tech-talk/e810d9b4fb02

<comment><USER3> I do promote TDD, but it's hard to convince yourself (or managers) that you need to spend a couple of hours to fix issues regarding the test suite(s) and not the actual product. Those problems are rare, but they do happen. Just my two cents.

Tests is additional code, additional layer and cognitive load to manage. If you iterate in the velocity I think you would in a startup, then a test suite might be a hindrance.

I consider doing a lean startup/product very much like a feature spike - <USER2> you've settled THEN you can start writing tests.</comment>