Is jQuery Too Big For Mobile? - <AUTHOR> http://flippinawesome.org/2014/03/10/is-jquery-too-big-for-mobile/

<comment><USER2> A comment on the OP says:

> _Don't forget that if you're loading jQuery from a common CDN like Google's > or Microsoft's, you're likely introducing zero network latency as the > browser will almost certainly have it cached already._

This claim is frequently made, but I've also seen many people express skepticism of it. The many different versions of jquery, and several different CDNs, combined with actual typical user behavior patterns, the limited cache capacity of some mobile environments, etc…. it MAY still be true, but I'd really want to see some evidence one way or another before assuming it either way.

It's not an easy thing to measure though, because we are making claims about "most people's browsers", and there's no easy way to measure other peoples browsers. But is anyone aware of anyone trying to approach it?

Why does it matter? If the "cached in most people's browsers" theory is true, then we would _not_ want to concatenate JQuery into one big JS file (as the OP suggests), and we would _not_ want to customize JQuery to include only the AMD modules actually used (as the OP hints at considering), as either one would prevent cache reuse accross sites.

Me, being skeptical of the theory, I still choose to concatenate (I think it's clearly the way to go), and would consider modular customization in the future if it were more convenient for development workflow or it was for a site where size/speed were an absolute priority.

<comment><USER3> And to throw another cargo-culty idea into the mix: If you load resources from multiple domains it will lower your Google pagespeed (and YSlow) score. Which can negatively affect your pagerank. So they say. Another point for the "concatenate everything" team.

FWIW, this is the approach that I use. And I probably care about those pagespeed and yslow numbers probably way more than I should.

<comment><USER4> Why does loading from multiple domains lower pagespeed score? Wouldn't loading from multiple domains in parallel improve load time and thus improve pagespeed score?

<comment><USER5> This is just a guess (and so a completely worthless comment), but I'd expect that http pipelining has something to do with it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> One of the assumptions made by this article is that the user in question is loading your web page with jQuery on a mobile device running on a 4G network. In reality, however, it is unlikely that a user will be on a 4G network. In 2004, the 4G penetration is 25% in North America, and only 3% in Western Europe. [1] It's certainly growing on a yearly basis, but it's still not at the point where you can rely on users having 4G speeds on a mobile device.

The 4G worst-case scenario is still better than the best-case scenario for a 3G network, which is what you'll see with a majority of users. I'd like to see this analysis done with a 3G connection as well, because I suspect the real jQuery tax for a majority of mobile users is over a second.

I do like the point made about latency and the suggestions at the bottom of the article. It's a strong incentive for apps to introduce a real asset pipeline and js and css minifiers.

[1] [http://graphics.wsj.com/4g-european- investment/](http://graphics.wsj.com/4g-european-investment/)

<comment><USER7> 4G and 3G often falls back to Edge (or even GPRS with bad latency) in Europe. And with Edge you better make sure your JS file is smaller than 200kb (for a web app), otherwise your mobile user with Edge connection will have to wait some seconds (load time). jQuery itself is already 81kb (compressed).

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> jQuery is fine, but for the sake of your user experience you should customise it to only include things that you actually use. An extra 28k download, as well as the additional overhead of the browser parsing and running it, _does_ affect the experience to some degree. A minimal build of jQuery is better than the whole thing. "Don't use jQuery" is overkill, but "Use jQuery wisely" is common-sense.

The key thing to remember is that your time as a developer should be spent making software that the user will enjoy using - your job is not to make your own life as easy as possible by throwing in libraries with no thought about how it'll affect the user experience. Learn a build tool and use it to optimise your web apps.

</comment><comment><USER9> Do yourself a favor and use Zepto, it's already stripped down and you already know the API [http://zeptojs.com/](http://zeptojs.com/)

<comment> mike-cardwell Browser support: "Internet Explorer 10+"

<comment><USER10> I could never use this if I wanted to put it in any project I work on. For most projects I have worked on so far I have needed to support at least IE 8. That probably wont be changing anytime soon because some user still havent upgraded since they first had a laptop with Windows 7.

<comment> mike-cardwell Worth mentioning that IE8 is the latest version of IE that will run on Windows XP too.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7>
      Is "jQuery Mobile" too slow for mobile?

Slow tap performance, slow overall performance, [http://www.jquerymobile.com](http://www.jquerymobile.com)

      Is "jQuery" too slow for mobile?

Too big, a bit slow. The issue is the compressed file size. It's still huge (81kb) and mobile user will notice if your combined web app JS size goes beyond 200kb (speaking about mobile on Edge network, latency). It also slows down your web app, check out: [http://jsperf.com/popular#all- time](http://jsperf.com/popular#all-time)

      Do you really need "jQuery" in 2014 on mobile?

I would say no. I have recently coded a 30k HTML5 web app that runs on mobile as fast as native apps. So my advice is to just use native HTML5 JS API, it works fine. Introduction: [http://www.sitepoint.com/jquery-vs-raw- javascript-1-dom-form...](http://www.sitepoint.com/jquery-vs-raw- javascript-1-dom-forms/)

Edit: added "on mobile" in the last question

<comment><USER11> I think that last question needs to be "do you really need jQuery in 2014 on mobile?"

If we're talking mobile, then chances are you can do without jQuery. You can almost take for granted that the mobile device has a webkit-based browser. Yes, I say that knowing that there are non-webkit browsers in use and that some browsers are based on older webkit code.

If we're talking about non-mobile users across the spectrum of browsers, I would recommend still using jQuery. It's just too useful in dealing with browser inconsistencies and bugs not to use it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I don't a lot of web dev myself, but when I do I tend to stick with Bootstrap / Node.js / Jade / JQuery because all those things make stuff easier.

I could well be adding a bunch of crap to my pages that I don't need. What do proper web devs use for profiling their web sites? To test page size in bytes, amount of JavaScript you've loaded in libs that you don't use, etc.?

<comment><USER7> Use a tool that supports "dead code removal". E.g. Google Closure JS compiler with "ADVANCED_OPTIMIZATIONS" flag: [https://developers.google.com/closure/compiler/docs/compilat...](https://developers.google.com/closure/compiler/docs/compilation_levels)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> It seems like their answer to this question is "no", but that's hard to understand when I see this quote from the same article:

> _But let's get back to the numbers. Per the data above, a typical user on an > average device and network will take ~50ms to download jQuery and another > ~250ms to parse it._

An _average_ delay of 300ms is simply _unacceptable_. I have a hard time believing that 50ms to download jQuery is average, so I assume that the author isn't including round-trip time.

To be fair, this is also from the article:

> _And in my opinion, the painfully slow parsing and interpretation of scripts > on mobile browsers – particularly older Android ones – is the only > compelling reason to prefer tiny JavaScript libraries._

It's the author's opinion that this is the only compelling reason, but it is a VERY compelling reason.

<comment><USER14> I don't think the author understands how TCP works - the claim that jQuery takes "229ms to download on the worst mobile networks (1Mbsp)" completely ignores latency and TCP slow-start.

Even with a initial congestion window of 10 segments there's going to be at least two round trips, if the window is smaller then it's going to me more.

Using devtools on my office network connection it takes 1.3s to download jQuery from the site with the post

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> This post is asking the wrong question. Steve Souders (someone help me find the reference) from Google has done some measurement a few years back and concluded that you pretty much should just concat and minify every script into one file for mobile and forget about serving multiple scripts from a CDN. Setting up a connection and the latency involved on mobile is what's killing first load speed.

Having that said, the problem isn't that jQuery is too big for mobile. Lots of things incur a largish download size for mobile. Bootstrap's ginormous CSS bundle first comes to mind. The biggest headache with jQuery on mobile is that it's too damn slow in execution. On a tablet where you have tons of screen space to display lots of widgets, creating largish amount (> 200) jQuery contexts can easily kill your frame rate to something < 10fps.

</comment><comment><USER16> Not a Web guy here: why do people use <script src="foo.js" /> instead of just including the code inline in the script tag?

I understand that as a dev you definitely want your JS in separate files for practical reasons, but couldn't you just have separate .js files and have your framework stick them inline "at runtime"?

PS: Is there any talk with HTTP 2.0 of allowing data like images to be somehow "inlined"? It would then be possible to serve up a 21st century website with a single RTT, right

<comment><USER17> If I use foo.js, when the user reload the page, or goes to another page that also uses foo.js, the javascript file is in his cache and he won't need to re- download it. Given the size some of those js are, it makes a significant decrease. Especially in the mobile context this article talks about, when I visit my parents my phone's data connection is slow enough that 40kb of js make a huge difference.

Of course, that also needs a properly configured server (a very large number of sites out there don't see proper client caching so the browser still need to ask the server if the file has changed every single time, for example).

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Isn't this a tooling issue, namely using something like Google's Closure Compiler to perform dead-code elimination?

[https://developers.google.com/closure/compiler/docs/api- tuto...](https://developers.google.com/closure/compiler/docs/api-tutorial3)

<comment><USER19> the problem is that you will still include the whole of jquery given that it is passed in through an externs file to the compiler.

<comment><USER18> If the point is to perform dead code elimination, why would you declare it as an extern? It seems reasonable to me to just treat it as another of your javascript files to be included in the compilation run.

<comment><USER19> its a tad more complex that you would imagine from the get go. Certain coding patterns don't work well with closure; for example obj["name"] = a and elsewhere obj.name will cause issues. Of course it would make a lot of sense if they simply wrote it for AO, but I doubt that will happen.

tldr: The reason people pull it as an extern is because it does not work with advanced optimisations.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> TL;DR - No, it's not too big.

</comment><comment><USER21> Nice article. Good to finally see some numbers instead of people parroting that 'jQuery is slow' without any evidence. It's clear that you should worry more about latency and parsing time than the actual library size.

</comment><comment><USER22> Lulz: the CSS file used on the article page is 180kB...

</comment><comment><USER23> yes. for mobile pages, use minimal css and no javascript.

<comment><USER24> Are people still making mobile pages though?

<comment><USER25> Yes; a lot of companies that want to make their services available to mobile users (which is a pretty damn large market) but do not have the capacity or do not want to invest in native apps will want their developers to build a mobile webapp, responsive website, or hybrid app.

Disclosure: I'm rebuilding a pretty big BackboneJS app (which I started building two years ago with a team that grew to two dozen people) into an AngularJS-based mobile webapp.

Note also that AngularJS is a whopping 700 KB before minification and gzipping (270 KB minified/gzipped).

<comment><USER26> Did you add an extra zero in gzipped size for a previous version ? Current AngularJS is 36KB minified/gzipped, 100KB minified

Here is the file [http://code.angularjs.org/1.2.14/angular.min.js](http://code.angularjs.org/1.2.14/angular.min.js) And here you can get the gzipped size [http://closure- compiler.appspot.com/home](http://closure-compiler.appspot.com/home)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> No, but Dojo is.</comment>


America's 'Fried Chicken War' - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20200429-americas-fried-chicken-war <comment><USER2> For those in the SE US, I recommend trying Publix fried chicken, if you haven't already. I get a whole fried chicken for less than $10, and it's better than anything I've had in a restaurant. The trick is to call an hour ahead, and have them make it fresh for you. That's half a fried chicken, plus another half as fixin's!

<comment><USER3> grocery store fried chicken can be amazing. A local store in my old neighborhood ( SW Dallas ) would cook a fresh batch on Saturday afternoons. so good and very affordable.

<comment><USER4> Safeway has some of the best chicken tenders.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Love that they use lard vs. the unhealthy vegetable seed oils that all places use nowadays.

Just like how McDonald's used to use beef tallow.

Best fried chicken has to be Korean fried chicken at this point. Double frying it gives the inside the tenderness temperature while the outside is perfectly crispy.

<comment><USER6> I've been curious about McDonald's fries since I think they are tasty. There are many articles around that still say they use beef products in their french fries. According to their website they do not use beef, but a "beef flavoring" that contains milk products and not beef product.

[https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/product/small-french- frie...](https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/product/small-french-fries.html)

<comment><USER7> Yes this is true. It's a beef flavoring. My father spent the majority of his career in food-processing engineering working in a factory that made McDonald's french fries and confirmed this was the case. They're also par- cooked (pre-fried) before being flash frozen, and they don't use a batter or seasoning. Interesting tidbit, all of their competitors had their fries made in the same facility. I believe most of them even used the same type of potatoes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I moved to SF last year from SC and it has been a royal pain to find a good fried chicken joint.

Friends, if you find yourselves in the southeast do your best to get into a Bojangles.

Any suggestions for a good chicken joint in the Bay Area?

<comment><USER9> I know this is kind of heresy but there isn't good fried chicken in the Bay Area and I've traveled the country in search of fried chicken. I can't tell you how many times people have said "omigod you have to try so and sos" only to be disappointed over and over.

The best I've found in the US is Howlin Rays in LA (obviously) followed by Ms T in Chicago followed by the Gus's chain.

In the Bay Area, KFC is still the most reliable.

<comment><USER10> I'd agree SF could have better Southern-style fried chicken. But at the KFC level Krispy Krunchy Chicken is pretty damn great :)

<comment><USER9> I haven't tried KKC yet. It's on my list. Also, Thomas Keller's fried chicken is wildly overrated also. Perfect fry but very unseasoned. Not worth a trip up.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> II-V-I I'd love to choose a side. Sadly, I'm living in Copenhagen after living in the U.S. for many years and there's no fried chicken war and barely any fried chicken. I recently found one joint where you can get a decent fried chicken sandwich, though that's about as far as it goes.

It's such a shame because the chicken you can buy here is, to my taste, of much higher quality compared to that in the U.S. The tenderness is incredible, and it's so moist it's almost impossible to overcook. I'm not really sure why it hasn't caught on here. Perhaps it's simply a matter of preference/taste.

<comment><USER11> I'd love to know which place serves fried chicken sanwiches in Copenhagen, could you share that?

<comment> II-V-I Of course. Jagger [1] is the one I'm speaking of.

[1]: [https://jaggerfastfood.com/menu](https://jaggerfastfood.com/menu)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I don't know if it is any good by discerning fried-chicken standards, but I would be amiss not to put in a plug for the American fried-chicken destination of my youth: Frankenmuth, MI (AKA Michigan's little Bavaria):

[https://www.frankenmuth.org/dining/world-famous- chicken/](https://www.frankenmuth.org/dining/world-famous-chicken/)

<comment><USER13> The blandest chicken you can get. It's such a soulless midwestern plain Jane place to eat (Zehnder's)

<comment><USER12> I believe you, and I would probably agree if had it again today, but nostalgia has its own flavor, ya know?

These days I guess they'd at least give you Tabasco or Sriracha on the side?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Chicken Mary's is the only place I've ever been offered fried chicken with a side of spaghetti. It's good, too.

<comment><USER15> Jollibee's also has fried chicken with spaghetti! It's a Filipino thing and it's super good. Not sure where they have locations other than California, though.

<comment><USER16> They have a NYC branch.

I argue that they use entirely too much sugar in their spaghetti. Not that I have some moral outrage about sugar in the stuff, but it was actively very sweet.

<comment><USER17> Yes, Filipino spaghetti is definitely intended to be sweet--it uses banana ketchup in the sauce. Bananas were used as a substitute for tomatoes due to the Philippines' relative abundance of the former.

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

<comment><USER18> Banana ketchup usage for Filipino spaghetti came about during a tomato sauce shortage in the Second World War:

[https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/filipino- cuisine...](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/filipino-cuisine- asian-fusion-180954947/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The best I've eaten was from a stand at a Dominican Republic heritage festival in Providence, RI sometime between 1989-1991. A little, old, Dominican woman cooked the chicken. It was loaded with flavor including some spice.

Recently I picked up friend chicken from a small restaurant in Providence, RI called North. It was their take on chicken karaage. It was crispy but tender and was spiced with something mildly hot. It's my new favorite.

I prefer sticking with the small places. They're not afraid to spice to local tastes rather than spice for the median person in the US.

</comment><comment><USER20> Another Kansas chicken place worth mentioning is the Brookville Hotel. It's two lies for the price of one—no longer in Brookville (now in Abilene) and no longer a hotel (but they have some old rooms preserved as a museum). But it serves half a fried chicken per person, plus all the fixings (creamed corn, mashed potatoes, coleslaw, and more), at a sit-down white tablecloth establishment, for under 20 per plate.

<comment><USER21> You want to talk value... Harolds fried chicken in the south side of Chicago has half a fried chicken, a bed of fries, two slices of wonderbread and a shot of coleslaw all smothered in mild sauce for less than 5 dollars.

I'm sure some pedant is about to come out with "oh really, the cole slaw is smothered in mild sauce?" Yes. Nothing in that bag avoids the sweet tang of mild sauce shoved through bulletproof glass.

It's the greatest food in the world.

<comment><USER22> Harolds is really good, but if you're in Minneapolis go high dollar and get the Tennessee Hot from Revival.

<comment><USER21> Ooh - I will be in Minneapolis once this whole global shutdown thing is over, so I'll definitely head that way

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> The only way to make fried chicken fast preserving its inner moisture is using a pressure fryer. That's the innovation that enabled KFC to become a fast food chain.

<comment><USER24> And here I thought it was buttermilk...

<comment> blaser-waffle I thought it was the 11 secret herbs and spices

<comment><USER24> You probably think you're getting fresh chicken when you pull through the KFC drive thru window right before it closes too....

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Coincidentally I was just last night reading about another "Fried Chicken War", which was a rivalry between two hotels in the Catskill Mountains arising from a guest/manager dispute.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catskill_Mountain_House#The_Fr...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catskill_Mountain_House#The_Fried_Chicken_War)

</comment><comment><USER26> I've been searching long and hard for the best fried chicken for all my life. I'll need to give Chicken Mary's and Chicken Annie's a try the next chance I get.

So far, the best has by far been Willie Mae's Scotch House - and the country's food critics seem to agree. [1]

[1] [https://thehighestcritic.com/munchies/the-fried-chicken- buck...](https://thehighestcritic.com/munchies/the-fried-chicken-bucket-list- best-fried-chicken-restaurants-america-ranked/)

</comment><comment><USER27> Babe's in North Texas, several locations near Dallas, has got to be the best fried chicken I've ever had. Easily.

<comment><USER28> Should have read more. Beat me to it. I agree

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> [https://ifunny.co/picture/how-to-find-kentucky-on-a-map- hat-...](https://ifunny.co/picture/how-to-find-kentucky-on-a-map-hat-head- kentucky-bOMrAKuc6)

</comment><comment><USER30> if you're in Bangkok try the chicken from [https://www.instagram.com/phonjaroen/](https://www.instagram.com/phonjaroen/) behind the Thai boxing stadium.

</comment><comment><USER28> For those in Dallas, TX I suggest Babe's Chicken or Bubba's (same owner).

</comment><comment><USER24> They always say you've moved to New Orleans when you stop at Popeye's on the way home after getting $250 worth of groceries

<comment><USER31> Oh man now I want to get Popeyes for lunch. I swear they put some sort of drug in their red beans and rice, I just can't get enough of that with some spicy chicken!

Definitely try Popeyes if you get the chance, we've got them all the way up here in Kansas City, so I'm not sure how wide their range is.

<comment><USER24> One time I was driving back from Boulder to New Orleans. I think this was somewhere on US-84 in Texas or I-25 in Colorado (I think the latter). My fan had conked out (my AC had quit on the leg in). After a few hundred miles of driving with the window down I saw Popeyes on the blue sign at the next exit and pulled off at the exit. The moment I turned left to cross the overpass and laid eyes on the Popeyes sign on the other side of the Interstate my fan croaked back to life. I call it Al Copeland's miracle.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> What do people think of KFC's fried chicken in the US?

<comment><USER33> Personally, it's trash chicken that's usually poorly fried that comes with awful sides, with the best spice blend of any chicken I have ever had that wasn't coated in a sauce. The corporate suits have found a way to basically destroy the product by doing everything as cheaply as possible yet there is still a glimmer of what must have been an amazing product.

It taste better in other countries but not because they do a better job replicating the original, but because it just taste like a completely different chicken place with the same logo. It's like getting Fanta in a different country.

<comment><USER31> Oh neat, thanks for the heads up, the next time I travel out of the country I'll have to make a point of trying KFCs to taste the difference.

I think KFC provides a baseline for other chicken restaurants though, like a "your chicken must be at least this good to have a chicken restaurant". You have to get your MVP (Minimum Viable Poultry).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> > To keep her family from starving, Annie began selling ham and veal > sandwiches for a few pennies to miners passing the front of her house.

It seems like an editor at the BBC missed something here. This should have probably read "To keep her family from destitution" \- if they had ham and veal to sell, they presumably had it to eat themselves.

<comment><USER34> It could be a sustainability thing:

If you butcher an animal, you have X lbs of meat now. Maybe you don't need all of that immediately just to survive.

If you only need Y < X to feed yourself, you can sell the excess and buy a new animal plus food to fatten it up.

This converts a onetime benefit (killing an animal you have now) into a sustainable way to provide for yourself.

<comment><USER12> That explanation makes sense, but the author's phrasing still seems clumsy to me.</comment></comment></comment>


Hosting files in url minifiers - <AUTHOR> https://fulmicoton.com/posts/urlminifier/ <comment><USER2> Reminds me of [itty.bitty.site]([https://itty.bitty.site/#About/XQAAAAI9BwAAAAAAAAAeHMqHyTY4P...](https://itty.bitty.site/#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))

</comment><comment><USER3> There are many places where you can store infinite data "in the cracks" so to speak.

Someone created a wiki-based filesystem that stored data as random wiki pages (wikipedia and other wikis).

They automated account creation, and then created pages with large chunks of base64 encoded encrypted content.

Doing this stuff doesn't make you clever, it just makes you an asshole.

There are also places where you can store large amounts of data for free, not even in the cracks.

For example, dockerhub lets you upload large bundles of data (gigabytes of data with no issue) for free. It's s3 backed, so effectively it's free s3 storage.

Image storage sites, like imgur, let you upload tons of images, and you could easily store data steganographically (edit, typo fixed).

<comment><USER4> Google Drive, for example, re-encodes in place every video file you upload (!). So I wouldn't be surprised if imgur was doing something similar to combat steganography.

<comment><USER5> Well, you could give them really annoying video formats that they don't have hardware decoding for…

<comment><USER3> I mean, in the case of google drive you could also just upload .tar.gz files containing whatever.

It's not like google drive only lets you upload videos.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I heard about someone circumventing disk quota by encoding the data in the file names, having only empty files.

<comment><USER7> Could be a different story, but I have this vague recollection of someone who, by taking advantage of sloppy wording, won a bet against someone else who said he couldn't compress random data.

This was a long time ago, maybe as long as twenty years ago. I'd love to find it again, though.

<comment><USER8> Do you mean this - [1]? Yes, this was pretty cool! I esp liked how Mike, the person initiating the bet, initially was super-confident he'd win:

 _It would be very easy to point out to him the impossibility of his task, but far more interesting to see how long he will struggle with the problem before realizing it for himself._

[1] [http://www.patrickcraig.co.uk/other/compression.php](http://www.patrickcraig.co.uk/other/compression.php)

<comment><USER7> Yes, that's it. Thanks, and thanks too to pianom4n.

And, yeah, Mike ought to have paid.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I made [https://spectre-writer.herokuapp.com](https://spectre- writer.herokuapp.com) to let people store text forever online for free. source here [https://github.com/wilsonrocks/spectre- writer](https://github.com/wilsonrocks/spectre-writer) fwiw

</comment><comment><USER10> Similarly, I made this a few years ago, initially meant to show more info on mouseover in a 140-char tweet: because.a.tweet.doesnt.fit.lucb1e.com

More info using itself as demo: [http://because.a.tweet.doesnt.fit.lucb1e.com/?text=Useful+fo...](http://because.a.tweet.doesnt.fit.lucb1e.com/?text=Useful+for+adding+footnotes+if+the+platform+does+not+support+footnotes%2C+or+on+Twitter+if+you+want+to+share+a+few+kilobytes+in+a+tweet+instead+of+140%2C+240+or+%28in+a+few+years%2C+probably%29+480+characters.+Ideally%2C+we+would+standardise+this+and+have+URLs+like+data%3Atext%2Fplain%2Cyour%2Btext%2Bhere+shortened+so+that+you+don%27t+have+to+rely+on+a+%28third+party%29+service%2C+but+that+is+currently+not+supported).

<comment><USER11> Your service badly needs `<meta charset=utf-8>`.

<comment><USER10> Ah, I usually add that but apparently forgot, thanks for the tip!

</comment></comment></comment><comment> martin-adams Reminds me of being able to store files in DNS.

[https://blog.benjojo.co.uk/post/dns-filesystem-true-cloud- st...](https://blog.benjojo.co.uk/post/dns-filesystem-true-cloud-storage- dnsfs)

</comment><comment><USER12> Reminded me of this: [https://ralsina.me/weblog/posts/locche-the-untouchable- paste...](https://ralsina.me/weblog/posts/locche-the-untouchable- pastebin.html)

</comment><comment><USER13> > One can really store 4KB of arbitrary data with a url minifier system and > share it for free.

Free for you, not free for the minifier service.

That's like saying "One day while I was at Chick-Fil-A I had an epiphany while putting honey on my biscuit. I thought: 'Chick-Fil-A is really nice to provide all this honey for free.' And then it struck me... One can really take all the honey they want and use it to refill their bottles at home one honey packet at a time."

<comment><USER14> If you think your getting some great deal by going into fast food places and taking all the packets of condiments you can get then your playing yourself. That food chain already won by getting your feet in there. I doubt these companies fret of such things including the url minifier service.

<comment><USER15> Doesn't mean that said companies are OK with this. The difference is scale. Companies don't care until these tactics get popular enough to affect the bottom line. Chick-fil-a doesn't care about the honey because the "hack" isn't popular and hasn't been done at scale (yet). If it does get popular, you can bet that it will get banned.

See also: Salad towers in China [https://kotaku.com/how-chinese-ingenuity- destroyed-salad-bar...](https://kotaku.com/how-chinese-ingenuity-destroyed- salad-bars-at-pizza-hut-834835079)</comment></comment></comment>


Smartly manage all your creative files with just one tool, for free - <AUTHOR> https://www.bynder.com/orbit/ <comment><AUTHOR> We believe that everyone needs an easier way to manage their creative files—that's why we reinvented digital file storage.

With Bynder Orbit you can professionally manage all your creative files, images, videos, and documents with bigger storage and unlimited users--that's free forever.

No more hassle with duplicates, folders in folders, wrong versions and permissions, Bynder Orbit helps you to be more efficient and secured with your creative files.</comment>


Has Microsoft picked the wrong CEO? - <AUTHOR> http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20140204222910-64875646-has-microsoft-picked-the-wrong-ceo-right-and-should-bill-gates-have-stepped-down?trk=tod-home-art-list-large_0

<comment><AUTHOR> I personally feel that most people don't recognize the upward trajectory Microsoft currently appears to be on. They talk about needing a 'revolutionary leader', but I think much of that revolution is already in place.

As I mentioned not long ago, I wanted to buy a Surface 2 Pro, but they're sold out everywhere, people have been unable to buy type-covers, also sold out. Phone sales are growing considerably. Azure is praised as a great service (though I'm yet to try it).

Microsoft has never been the 'spin on a dime and lead the industry' type of company, they make many small bets and iterate until they win. They quietly lead with things like Windows Tablet, and Windows Mobile. They lost those markets to a surging Apple, and then Google. But the market is far from lost, and it appears Microsoft is just now gaining steam.

I had never heard of Satya Nadella before today, but watching the intro video of him, I appreciate his somewhat quiet demeanour and understated excitability. In fact, he reminds me a lot of Bill Gates, and lets us leave behind the boisterous attitude of Steve Ballmer.</comment>


Show HN: Snapcraft – Free builds and hosted binaries of every GitHub commit - <AUTHOR> https://build.snapcraft.io <comment><AUTHOR> Hi, Evan from the Snapcraft team here. We're really excited to launch [https://build.snapcraft.io](https://build.snapcraft.io) today. It'll automatically build and publish your software every time you push a commit to GitHub.

You can then promote any build as a release, installable on the tens of millions of Linux systems that already support snaps.

You just have to provide a config and you're off:

\- [https://github.com/popey/emoji/blob/master/snapcraft.yaml](https://github.com/popey/emoji/blob/master/snapcraft.yaml)

\- [https://github.com/abacao/packer- snap/blob/master/snapcraft....](https://github.com/abacao/packer- snap/blob/master/snapcraft.yaml)

\- [https://github.com/RocketChat/Rocket.Chat/blob/develop/.snap...](https://github.com/RocketChat/Rocket.Chat/blob/develop/.snapcraft/stable/snapcraft.yaml)

Keen to hear what you think of it or any feedback you have. Also happy to answer questions.

</comment><comment><USER2> Whoa, that's pretty awesome!

I'm already using this with Launchpad.net, but that's really cool that I can use Github, too.

Dustin</comment>


Ask HN: How much do you sleep? - <AUTHOR> And how does that impact your productivity? <comment><USER3> My biggest problem with sleep is the fixed working schedule I have to follow. The 9-to-5 is killing me. It's not that there isn't enough time to sleep, it's that I cannot convince my body to go to sleep if it doesn't feel like it. Just last night I stood awake till 5 a.m. unable to fall asleep despite all efforts. The problem is that my natural clock seems to be working on a 26-7 hours per day cycle and I cannot fit this properly into the regular working hours. This leads to general accumulation of tiredness during the week and on Friday I need a total reset by going to bed early. At least now I know what to look for in future job opportunities.

<comment><USER4> Wake up at the same time every day. Pick that time and stick to it. Whether you get too little sleep or not.

<comment><USER5> I've tried doing that. Even if it is possible, I really don't like it. When married to a fixed schedule, life just isn't as much fun for me.

<comment><USER6> Have you considered a polyphasic sleep schedule? If you truly do have a non- standard circadian rhythm, you should be able to adapt one of the dual core schedules towards it.

[https://www.polyphasicsociety.com](https://www.polyphasicsociety.com)

<comment><USER5> Maybe? I was thinking more that stuff comes up that affects my schedule, and I don't be forced into living with the constraints of a 10 p.m. bedtime (or whatever time I set). More to the point, I am more disciplined about getting to bed before 12 a.m. I do not want to go bed at a fixed time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Between 7-8 hours usually. My son tends to get up at 5:30am, so the rest of the household does too. It was 4:30am this morning, though. Teething pain :(

That pretty much means my wife and I went from about a midnight bedtime to 9pm, which makes us feel really old & boring but it's the only way to make sure we have enough sleep to have a happy, productive day.

If I don't get enough sleep, my Tourette Syndrome gets worse. I also tend to get depressed & a little grouchy. It affects my decision making, and I have too many people depending on me to let that happen.

</comment><comment><USER8> 6.5 to 7 hours during the work week, and I notice my productivity drops off after two days or so. Productivity drop off manifests as worsened ability to focus and making decisions, and by my mood getting bad in general, which can also affect collaboration with others.

On the weekend I sleep up to 11 or even 12 hours in the first night, and 9 to 10 in the second. During holidays, 9 hours seem to be the sweet spot for me, which adjusts itself to be between 2.30am and 11.30am.

I'd like to sleep more during the week, but I just cannot get myself into bed before midnight. I don't feel tired enough and frankly I'm afraid of lying awake too long and being alone with my thoughts.

I'm also guaranteed to have a bad day when I don't have enough time before leaving for work. I need at least 1, better 1.5 hours between getting out of bed and leaving for work, plus a 30 minute commute by bike. This also limits my ability to sleep enough during the week.

</comment><comment><USER9> 7-9 hours. I require less sleep when I look after my body and eat healthily. For those who struggle to sleep, you may want to look into meditation when you are in bed. Effectively you focus on a single point and slowly your mind clears, kinda feels like it's shutting down regions. Then sleep comes naturally after, takes me about 20 mins with this technique. Concentrate on your heartbeat or breathing, and know that the more you do it the easier it gets.

<comment><USER10> This my sound strange, but has anyone tried this and had that sensation that if you stop thinking about your heart or breathing, they will stop?

Jesus, I must be filled with anxiety.

<comment><USER9> I actually find it quite relaxing, as they are both constants. You may just have to do it a few times to remove your anxiety.

<comment><USER10> Perhaps, but I think it just isn't for me. It feels unnnatural to think about it, even though I know that a lot of people say this helps them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> 8 hours when I have time. 7 to 4 in a crunch. I try to control the sleep debt and pay it off ASAP, or next weekends.

Lack of sleep has a noticeable effect on productivity (especially error rate). When I was younger I did not notice it so vividly, which I ascribe strictly to improved introspection.

One of the best vacations in my life, after a particularly hard project, involved having 12-16 hours of sleep every day, for two weeks, without any drugs; just a calm winter forest away from civilization. It did wonders to my productivity and cognitive ability. In 6 months past it I quickly learned a huge bunch of apparently hard things that propelled me for years after that.

</comment><comment><USER12> I try to get 8-9 hours a night. I usually go to bed at 10pm and wake at 7am. I wish I could sleep less, but I just feel terrible when I do. At least I hope that I'm more productive the time I'm actually awake.

<comment><USER13> I had this same problem. But having to wake up to get the kid to the bus left me little choice.

Take a look at your diet. I cut out refined sugars and switched to a (mostly) LCHF diet and I can now function at nearly 100% on as little as 4 hours of sleep. Most nights I get 5-6 hours and can usually function at 100% as long as I get a good 7-8 hours once every week or so.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> While running Camarades/ww.com I got by with 3 to 5 hours of sleep per night, usually because I could not fall asleep and then finally I'd fall asleep near daybreak and then sleep until 11 am. This was pretty terrible, combined with flying back and forth between Canada and the Netherlands it really drained me. It's not that I spent less time in bed, I just could not sleep until I was physically overwhelmed.

I'm in better physical shape now than back then, cycle more, eat better and no longer have the crazy travel schedule and I'm sleeping much better now, usually 6 to 7 hours but it still isn't 'normal' in that I often am awake in the middle of the night and sleep during the day, especially when work is more demanding.

Productivity has never really been an issue, no matter what the sleep regime was.

</comment><comment><USER15> 8 hours minimum, anything less than that I feel like crap. I also NEVER get sick. Ever.

<comment><USER16> FLW!

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> 6 to 7 hours during the week, on weekends mostly 7..8, rarely up to 10 hours. In my teens and twenties I had a hard time getting up early, but this gets better with age ;)

PS: productivity is only affected if I only get 3..4 hrs sleep for 2 or 3 days. I'm basically useless then. The more important decision was to get up early and not working late, this reduced 'latent burnout' symptoms dramatically.

</comment><comment><USER18> I started measuring my sleep this year.

The data is as follows:

I feel well and I can focus if I sleep for 8:00-8:30 hours. If I sleep less than 7:00-7:30 hours per day I feel unwell and I cannot concentrate. In between 7:30-8:00 hours I can somewhat concentrate but not for too long.

Sleeping longer over weekends does not work for me, since I still wake up at (usually) about the same time every day. So I still sleep about the same time every day.

</comment><comment><USER19> I sleep for 7 hours, my partner sleeps for ~ 8.5.

Things I've noted:

\- My sleep "schedule" doesn't have enough hours in the day. Monday I'm asleep at 10, Tuesday 11, Wednesday 12... etc

\- Lying in bed when not tired destroys any chance of a good nights sleep.

\- Lack of sleep = angry/bad mood. Bad mood = flustered/annoyed at things (noise/distraction/annoying problem) = No productivity.

</comment><comment><USER20> During the week? 6 hours. Weekends are closer to 8. My time in the Army destroyed my ability to sleep in :(

<comment><USER21> Why did your time in the Army destroy your ability to sleep?

I've heard rumors that if anything the exhaustion taught you how to fall asleep at anywhere/anywhere.

<comment><USER20> Not sleep in the general sense, but sleeping late into the morning. Years of having to be in formation at 0600 every morning have trained me to rise before dawn :(

On the upside, some of my most productive coding time is during the quiet morning hours before the wife and kids get up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Quite good question. I used to sleep 8~9 hours, less (and more as someone already pointed) meant i was not very productive, made more mistakes, and i was irritated whole next day.

But for more then a year I'm a father, so now much changed. Now I sleep 5-7 hours, often with breaks during night. For example, tonight we had some problem and o lot of crying due to daughter's ear infection. I sleep 5,5hrs with 2 breaks.

How do I feel now? Unexpectedly well. I need little longer sturt-up in the morning - plus good coffee. I know that my productivity, creativity, and susceptibility to errors are little down, but I can tell that my body switched to new scheme and it's not such a bad think as i thought.

Also, all my troubles with falling asleep, etc, all are gone now. I know that you can handle much more then you think :)

</comment><comment><USER23> 5 hours on a bad night. 7 on a good night. Not including the 50 or so minutes awake in the middle of the night.

I'm extremely unproductive on the days I get 5 hours, and can work around 4 hours/day when I get 7. I'd probably be extremely productive if I can get 9 hours of sleep.

</comment><comment><USER24> About six hours per night. Never more than seven. I've been working from home on my own schedule for years, so productivity is probably not impacted either way. I seem to be consistently waking up at 0425 in the mornings. I'm 31, more or less male-bodied, and I've taken exercise only once in the last two years -- biking 70 miles to see the eclipse. I suspect I'm too much of an outlier to be of any use to this discussion, but I would like to suggest that the "early to bed, early to rise" phrase has some truth to it. I also think that proper sleep is more important than anyone's business schedule, but I don't know how well that one might go over with employers.

</comment><comment><USER25> At 46 I used to be well and good with just 4h sleep.

Four months ago I started a new job at a nearby university campus and there are secure bike lanes the whole 7 miles from my home to the office. In the middle of the traject there is a park with outdoor fitness equipment where I make a stop and do some pull-ups and push-ups.

Since I started biking to the work I have a lower level of energy unless I rest for at least 7-8 hours. I don't know if is the age kicking in or if it is the less sedentary lifestyle.

The change in the sleep pattern combined with my 4yo autistic kid demanding my full attention at home (he was diagnosed early and is doing very well) diminished my availability for side projects.

</comment><comment><USER26> Based on my experience:

Apart from number of hours, it is also important that you sleep sound. 7 hrs of sleep for a person with no sleep disorder and person with sleep apnea has different impact on productivity.

For me this is what I have found age < 20: Sleep hours never impacted my productivity, even if awake all night. 20-30 Years of age: Min 5 Hrs of sleep and I was 100% productive. 30-35+: Productivity got impacted if I slept less than 6. At present(35-40): I am 100% ONLY if I sleep more than 7.5 Hrs.

Every now and then we see studies come out and researchers tell us the importance of sleep and its impact on our brains. I found it to be true in my case.

</comment><comment><USER27> Pretty much always between 7 to 8 hours, if less then it becomes super difficult on second part of the, if too long then strangely it's harder in the first part of the day. Might be related to sleep cycles from which i wake up.

</comment><comment><USER28> I usually go to bed between 10-11 and read (non-light emitting eink screen). Lights out is almost always around 11:45. I wake anywhen from 6:30 to 7:30 usually.

My kids (both on the autism spectrum) use 1-3mg Melatonin and have from a young age, otherwise they would never sleep. If I'm travelling or find I have a few nights in a row with trouble getting to sleep I'll take it for a few days too. Works well.

The quality of your sleep is an important factor too. If you suspect you may have obstructive sleep apnea then go get it checked out. It may be the cause of all manner of irregularities in your sleep routine.

</comment><comment><USER29> Many activity trackers will provide stats about how much you sleep, and how you compare with the rest of the population. I appreciate your question is about HN readers rather than fitness nerds, but there might be an overlap.

</comment><comment><USER30> I sleep about 5-6 hours on average. Generally, I feel well rested with this amount, but I can function on 3-4 hours per night for a few weeks without serious ill effect. I just feel slightly groggy, although at the end, I will have a "hard crash" where I sleep more than 12 hours. If I'm ill, I will sleep 8-10 hours a night. I think this is mostly genetic, because my father has been going to bed at 9 or 10 PM and waking up at 3 AM for as long as I can remember. I usually stay up later, but sleep about the same amount.

</comment><comment><USER31> I used to sleep usually on average 7 hrs when i worked the regular 10 am to 6pm shift. However , working 1 pm to 11 pm shift nowdays and tend to turn in much late than before however wake up earlier than 7 hrs to study for an exam that i am preparing for alongside. I I have observed my productivity in view of this routine to be at peak later in the day rather night when lesser to no distractions or people in office. However am trying to balance out my routine to get the magic number 7 hrs of sleep.

</comment><comment><USER32> 7-8 hours every night. If I sleep 4 to 5 hours I am equally as productive as when I sleep 7 to 8 hours however I can only keep that up for a couple days, before loss of productivity.

<comment><USER33> Yeah pretty much this; on average I sleep 7 hours, but I can go in to "overdrive" mode and sleep less hours while not losing focus/drive to produce, this only lasts 2 days though, after that I really need to "recalibrate"

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I used to be a bad sleeper , like sleeping only for 3-4 hrs work week. it badly affected my digestion, I got fat, I was weak, I ate junk and I drank more coffee and I was always dizzy and confused. The day I decided I need to sleep more and started to sleep for 6-7hrs every day and doing this consistently have improved my focus , less coffee and no frustration and I am active and lost few pounds. This is my personal opinion. things improve if you sleep more. 6-8 hrs is good.

</comment><comment><USER35> When things are going well I sleep about 8 or 9 good hours, and I feel rested and able to cope with the day ahead.

When things are not so good I sleep maybe 4 hours of broken sleep.

When things are bad I might get one or two hours across a 72 hour stretch. That has pretty severe impact on my ability to function.

I have an understanding GP who knows that I make sure my "sleep hygiene" is good when I'm having problems, so when I ask for a few zopiclone it's because I'm at risk of other stuff happening.

</comment><comment><USER36> Around 8.5 hours (lights off to alarm ringing).

Productivity is a bit complex to relate in a direct way (I can be "productive" also with less sleep), but I know for sure that this is the amount I need to be 100% of my potential.

Interestingly, I estimate that doing sports (which I do heavily) accounts for 30 to 60 minutes of my sleep - in other words, if I didn't do sports, I could sleep such amount less and be equally "productive", although obviously, my body would slowly decay.

</comment><comment><USER37> I try my best to hit 8 hours a night, used to keep 10PM-6AM every day even on weekends to keep things consistent. But with a partner that works from home (and therefore wakes up much later) its kind of hard most nights so it ends up being more like midnight to 7AM if I'm lucky.

I take ZMA as part of my supplement regime, and coincidentally I do notice that it helps with my sleep a bit - or at least it helps me stay asleep and not wake up several times a night.

</comment><comment><USER38> I've had sleeping issues since I was a kid so mine are probably a bit skewed. Weekdays, on a good night, 4-6 hours. Anything below 4 hours is a bad night and does happen more than I wish. Weekends: 6-8 hours

If I get 4 or less hours of sleep, it affects me pretty heavily and I honestly feel somewhat 'hungover' and it can be hard to get meaningful work done. For me, 5-6 hours is the sweet spot.

</comment><comment><USER39> 7 to 8 hours during the work week, 9 if possible on the weekend. A couple of nights of 6 do not have a good effect, one night of less than 6 hurts.

</comment><comment><USER40> Used to sleep for 8 hours, now its down to 7. Less sleep definitely affects productivity, but i can stretch couple of days with very less sleep (<5 hours), after that I hit a block and see a drastic decrease in productivity if I don't get a good night sleep.

Are you are feeling low productivity, and blaming lack of sleep? There is a chance it could be something else as well.. pls seek help if needed.

</comment><comment><USER41> 6-9 hours. It depends. I need to be well slept to be productive. It's not the number of hours but the feeling that matters. I have taken naps at the office when I had a bad night to bump my productivity. If I don't, I'm just warming up a seat.

Thankfully I have lot's of flexibility regarding working hours. That helps a lot. I don't think I could work fixed hours for long.

</comment><comment><USER42> Less and 7 hours kills my productivity. It's can be a real problem, and I know that a lot of people on here use Modafinil to deal with it.

</comment><comment><USER43> 6.5 to 7 hours. Staying longer in bed makes me feel worse than getting less sleep so I'm usually pretty sharp at getting up.

</comment><comment><USER44> Used to be 9h per day for decades. Any more and I'd feel strangely groggy (unproductive), my body cannot deal with oversleeping.

Lately I experimented with a 1h nap after lunch (I'm getting old!), and can report that I feel equally refreshed with only 6h of sleep a night.

So, 7h total now, but split into two 1+6 sessions. It feels great to have 2 extra hours per day!

</comment><comment><USER45> Well, I go to bed between 01:00 and 02:00, my alarm clock first goes off at 06:00 to get my daughter out of bed and up and running to go to school (and sometimes bring her to the station in case the weather is horrid), 06:30 to wake my wife, 07:30 to wake my other daughter to bring her to school. I guess I get around 4 to 4½ hours of sleep a night. I never slept much, not as a child either. I used to listen to the radio while reading, the programming generally turned boring around 24:00 with something for truckers, something for 'cultured people' and something which I never understood who it was for. I still remember the signature tunes for those programs and the haste with which I used to turn off the radio when they came on...

[edit: I just looked up one of those programs, the trucker show ('Krieken med Adje' [1]). Turns out it was scheduled between 04:00 and 07:00, this was when I used to get up at 07:00 to go to school. No, I did not sleep much as a child either... ]

[1] [http://www.jingleweb.nl/index.php/category/ad- roland/](http://www.jingleweb.nl/index.php/category/ad-roland/)

</comment><comment><USER46> 6-7 hours. Probably averaging 6.5. But I also commute for an hour both ways by bus - I'll often get a half hour or more of sleep both ways. Probably not great sleep (no REM) but better than nothing.

I sometimes notice as the week goes on I get a little more tired - <USER2> make it up on the weekends by sleeping around 9 hours.

</comment><comment><USER47> About 6~7 hours a night, more trending towards 6 hours and less. It impacts my productivity greatly, I wake up still wanting to sleep more and am tired for most of the day, which causes me to be distracted more easily (open office...) and get way less work done. Also stress affects me more when I sleep less

</comment><comment><USER48> I sleep at around midnight and I wake up at 06:00 every day with no exceptions (e.g weekends or vacations ). I average about 6 hours of sleep. If I sleep for 7 hours I definitely feel better and think "faster" the following day. Sleep is good for you.

</comment><comment><USER49> I try to get to be around 10:00 or 10:30, and typically wake up 6:00 or 6:15. I find the older I get the better I operate on 7.5 to 8 hours of sleep. I also seem to get sick less often, and be an all around nicer guy to to family, friends and coworkers.

</comment><comment><USER50> I'm pretty useless if I get less than 5 hours of sleep. Anymore than that and I'm good to go. I shoot for about 9ish hours of sleep a night, I typically have a sleepless night every 10 days where I'm up at 330 until the next sleep.

</comment><comment><USER51> Trying for 12 hours every night due to a recent concussion. Second in two years. Sleep is one of the best things for mTBI/PCS.

Productivity impact is annoying in the short term but it's definitely the optimal long-term chocie.

Normally I get 7-8 hours.

</comment><comment><USER52> 5-7 hours on work weeks, 8 hours on weekends. I don't think my productivity at work is affected, but I feel like a zombie when I get home at ~7pm. I fall asleep within seconds after hitting the bed. Dreamless sleep too.

</comment><comment><USER53> 8hrs minimum, sometimes 9hrs. Anything less and I drag all day until I get a nap.

</comment><comment><USER54> I sleep somewhere between 3-5 hours on weekdays, and 8-10 hours on weekends. If I had to put a number on it, I'd say my productivity decreases linearly by roughly 10-15% every weekday.

</comment><comment><USER55> 4-6 hour on weekday and 7-9 hours on weekend can sleep and wake up pretty easy but lack of sleep will just make me a zombie the whole day

</comment><comment><USER56> 5-7 hours on weekedays 7-8 hours on weekends

Prolonged (3+ days) sleep at <6 hours eventually leads to me crashing at the weekend.

crash = a good 10 hour sleep

</comment><comment><USER57> I sleep at least for 7 Hours. Whenever I sleep less or when I don't get quality sleep, it's very difficult to focus.

</comment><comment><USER58> I try to get 7-8 hrs but sometimes I can only get 5-6. It is a negative to my productivity if I only get 5-6.

</comment><comment><USER59> 7-10 hours. I work from home and have no alarm clock or kids.

</comment><comment><USER60> 8-10 solid hours a day. No alarm clock. Work from home.

</comment><comment><USER61> Anywhere from 5 hours to 11 hours. Yes, I'm young.

</comment><comment><USER62> 5 hours a night. Physically can't sleep more.

<comment><USER63> That would be me.

Productivity for me depends more on other factors like: relationship status, familymembers wellbeing, drinks & feeling in or out of control.

</comment></comment><comment><USER64> something around 6 and 8. less than 5 and I'm not ok at work. more than 8 and I'm not ok at bed.</comment>


Ask HN: Open-source codebases you've known and loved (learned from)? - <AUTHOR> I'm at a point in my career where I'd like to spend more time learning by reading well-architected, organized, maintainable and productive code.
Are there any open-source codebases that you think are noteworthy for having (reasonably) good style or idiomatic code or organization?
This is a totally language and paradigm agnostic query :) <comment><USER2> SQLite is one of the projects always mentioned in threads like this. It has 711 times as much test code as regular code.

[https://www.sqlite.org/testing.html](https://www.sqlite.org/testing.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> [https://bearssl.org/](https://bearssl.org/) \- best C library I've ever seen.

<comment><USER4> Wow you weren't kidding that's some good stuff. Clean code and excellent documentation.

It's interesting to me how they use "Object oriented C". I guess it makes sense if you want objects but also want to target many many embedded platforms? But I'm sure what advantages that approach has over using a smallish subset of C++.

<comment><USER3> Sorry I just saw this reply. I had a discussion with Thomas Pornin (the author of BearSSL) and my understanding that the choice of OO boils down to allowing easy excising of code. So you can select exactly which implementations of algorithms you want in the final executable. Check out the cool size calculator: [https://www.bearssl.org/sizes.html](https://www.bearssl.org/sizes.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I learned a lot from the Flask codebase. I always recommend that to people I know who are learning Python.

</comment><comment><USER6> I read and enjoyed [https://github.com/kohsuke/args4j](https://github.com/kohsuke/args4j). I don't know if it's the "best" code put there but it was comprehensible and I learned a lot from it when I was new to Java.</comment>


DNA Can Survive Reentry from Space - <AUTHOR> http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/dna-can-survive-reentry-from-space/ <comment><USER2> Just note that DNA itself is code and completely useless without an interpreter/compiler. The DNA is just a storage mechanism, the true complexity relies on the cell.

See: [http://ds9a.nl/amazing-dna/](http://ds9a.nl/amazing-dna/)

If we lost all cells but had DNA, we could not do anything with it. The same way that source code is useless if you don't have a compiler.

<comment><USER3> Too bad they didn't test RNA... self replicating RNA doesn't need a compiler. ;)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viroid](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viroid) (possible relics from the theoretical RNA world still around today)

<comment><USER4> RNA is highly unstable.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> _Temperatures on the exterior of the rocket reached as high as 115.4 degrees Celsius during liftoff and 128.3 degrees Celsius during atmospheric reentry_

Doesn't that re-entry temperature seem way too low? I get that its probably a rear-facing surface, but still...

<comment><USER6> Yes, it's _extremely_ low - even a "rear-facing surface" would get hot enough to melt metals such as aluminium during a typical reentry. That's why the space shuttle has all those insulating tiles.

<comment><USER7> Maybe not?

Aluminium melts at 660.32 °C / 1220.58 °F [1]. I guess aluminium alloys probably melt at slightly higher temperatures. Unless, of course, there's an aluminium alloy eutectic - I don't know.

"Felt reusable surface insulation (FRSI). White Nomex felt blankets on the upper payload bay doors, portions of the midfuselage and aft fuselage sides, portions of the upper wing surface and a portion of the OMS/RCS pods. Used where temperatures stayed below 371 °C (700 °F)."[2]

"The Space Shuttle thermal protection system (TPS) is the barrier that protected the Space Shuttle Orbiter during the searing 1,650 °C (3,000 °F) heat of atmospheric reentry."[2]

1\. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium)

2\. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_thermal_protectio...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_thermal_protection_system)

(Edit: added bit about eutectic)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The recent Cosmos remake has a good episode that touches on this. I think it's [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Immortals_%28Cosmos:_A_Spac...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Immortals_%28Cosmos:_A_Spacetime_Odyssey%29)

One theory set forth is that earlier in Earth's history, while bacteria were first evolving meteors would periodically strike and extinguish life, but cast rocks with dormant bacteria into space that would later re-enter and re-seed the planet after the dust settled. First time I heard the idea but it's intriguing, and segues into the whole idea of panspermia.

<comment><USER9> That's fine and dandy, but it doesn't solve how the first lifeform sparked into existence.

<comment><USER10> Miller Urey expt.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%E2%80%93Urey_experiment#...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%E2%80%93Urey_experiment#Other_experiments)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I've wondered this for many years: could the idea that life originated here on Earth be the final geocentrism?

This is really quite interesting too:

[http://www.technologyreview.com/view/513781/moores-law- and-t...](http://www.technologyreview.com/view/513781/moores-law-and-the- origin-of-life/)

All this is pure hypothesis and speculation until we can find some life out there and engage in some comparative analysis. If we found life elsewhere and it appeared to trace back to a common ancestor, then this would suggest that life originated far back in the history of the cosmos rather than independently in many places. Perhaps life -- if interpreted as a phase of matter -- arose along with all the other phases of matter during the early cooling of the universe?

<comment><USER12> The problem with life evolving this early is that life absolutely requires the higher-mass elements from the supernovae arising from the first few stellar generations. The early universe was an inhospitable desert of Hydrogen.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> This could make more plausible the theory that life on Earth is coming from space and then it evolved from there, rather than being born from scratch on Earth.

<comment><USER14> By Occams Razor, however, it's probably better to assume that it formed spontaneously on Earth: "Just turning on the spark in a basic pre-biotic experiment will yield 11 out of 20 amino acids." [1]

[1]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%E2%80%93Urey_experiment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%E2%80%93Urey_experiment)

<comment><USER15> Hmm, I wonder if Occam's razor is really applicable. Is it simpler for life to form on multiple planets, or one and spread? I would guess your interpretation is more likely, but I suppose we don't know

<comment><USER14> It's applicable if one hypothesis is simpler than the other. Panspermia simply defers the origin of life elsewhere and now you have to explain how seeds survived travelling through the hostile environment of space and impacting on Earth, which complicates it quite a bit.

<comment><USER16> Ockham's razor is either useless, or a special case of Bayes' Rule. People argue endlessly about it because they fail to recognize they are assuming different priors.

If the Urey experiment is reasonably representative of conditions on primordial Earth, no further work is required to get amino acids. So for some people P(terrestrial primordial amino acids) is ~1

If the Murchison meteor and other evidence is correct, amino acids are common in the universe. Data from the Philae lander may tell us more about this. So for some people P(extra-terrestrial primordial amino acids) is ~1

Nor are these exclusive groups. It appears amino acids aren't all that hard to make, so they may have both fallen from the sky and been created on Earth.

But... amino acids are not life. There is a further step that is required for the actual pan-spermia hypothesis: the synthesis of more complex molecules, like RNA and DNA. If you think P(RNA|amino acids) ~ 1 then pan-spermia becomes at best irrelevant: not impossible, but not very interesting.

If you think P(R/DNA|amino acids) ~ ε then pan-spermia becomes very important, because it is far more likely than not that life on Earth is due to RNA or DNA that descend from an original synthesis that happened elsewhere.

Evidence suggests RNA synthesis given amino acids is not very probable. I don't believe it has ever been observed to happen spontaneously the way amino acids are spontaneously synthesized in the Urey experiment. So pan-spermia cannot be dismissed on the basis that it is uninteresting.

DNA propogating itself across the universe is also not very probable, so the two hypotheses remain in competition, and it isn't obvious which is more plausible. Pan-spermia requires things like "DNA can survive re-entry." So the OP is correct: discovering that DNA can survive re-entry makes "Life originated elsewhere" more plausible.

You'll notice I never used the word "simplicity" in any of this. There is no simplicity: only probability and plausibility. Evidence is more or less probable. Propositions are more or less plausible. Bayes' rule is the only way to update our beliefs consistently, such that no matter what order we get the evidence we come to the conclusion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Good, now let's rebuild Cmdr. Shepard

</comment><comment><USER15> Proof we possibly originated from extraterrestrial life!

 _edit_ oh, grow up, downvoters. panspermia is a real concept [http://www.livescience.com/13363-7-theories-origin- life.html](http://www.livescience.com/13363-7-theories-origin-life.html)

<comment><USER18> I guess you are being downvoted, because the fact "DNA can survive (re?)entry from space" is not a _proof_.

<comment><USER19> I think "Proof (that we) Possibly" kinda sums it up. This is "Proof" that there is a possibility (does not rule it out). He's being down voted because people are splitting hairs about the wording. What he said was generally correct however the word "proof" has a strong pull in one direction.

<comment><USER20> "Proof we possibly" is an oxymoron, like "60% of the time it works every time." It's not so much splitting hairs as it is attempting vainly to understand phrasing that inherently makes no sense.

<comment><USER19> I agree it was bad phrasing, that was not my point. I was simply pointing out that even though his wording was bad what he was trying to get across (Proof that is's still a viable hypothesis) was technically correct. Here i'll fix it for you "This is proof that that DNA can survive re-entry from space, due to this finding there is still a possibility that life came from somewhere else"</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Who are the most successful non-technical founders of tech companies? - <AUTHOR>

After learning that Dennis Crowley started both Foursquare and Dodgeball as a non-technical founder, I am curious to know if there are any others. <comment><USER2> Reddit's founder Alexis Ohanian was not technical at all, he just took care of PR/marketing.

Incidentally I graduated from the same high school as Dennis Crowley, from what I've gathered he was pseudo technical - he had the domain knowledge and had built products but hired others to build those particular products you named.

<comment><USER2> I also think some of the most successful iphone app companies are founded by non-technical people who outsource their software development.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Mark Cuban wasn't very technical (although self-taught programmer) and had a multi-million and billion dollar exit before 2000.

The AirBnb founders are designers AFAIK. Jason Fried is non-technical (strong design and writing skills though), as well.

</comment><comment><USER4> Steve Jobs?

<comment><USER5> I would go as far to say in today's meaning of technical Steve wasn't.

I agree.</comment></comment>


2017 in commits (automated webcam trigger per commit) - <AUTHOR> https://www.facebook.com/pichsenmeister/videos/1767105636666904/ <comment><AUTHOR> click on "not now" if the fb register overlay pops up.</comment>


Equifax's CSO and CIO retiring immediately - <AUTHOR> https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2017/09/15/equifax-security-and-information-officers-retire-effective-immediately/672042001/ <comment><USER2> Equifax "Chief Security Officer" Susan Mauldin has a bachelor's degree and a master of fine arts degree in music composition from the University of Georgia. Her LinkedIn professional profile lists no education related to technology or security.

[https://www.google.nl/amp/www.marketwatch.com/amp/story/guid...](https://www.google.nl/amp/www.marketwatch.com/amp/story/guid/766FA70C-9A38-11E7-B604-EDFD35AE15F2)</comment>


Google Releases API for Website Optimizer: A/B & Multivariate Testing for All - <AUTHOR> http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/google_releases_api_for_website_optimizer_ab_multi.php <comment><USER2> this has rather large implications for any app developer thinking of entering (or already operating...) in this space.

the one area that I thought a standalone app provider could trump Google's A/B testing tools is to build an API so we don't have to use a clunky web interface... and now Google has done it themselves.

<comment><USER3> Disclaimer: I wrote an OSS alternative to Website Optimizer (GWO).

GWO is probably the worst Google-branded software I have ever had the displeasure of using. The end-user experience is terrible (page redirects to do variations). The developer experience is like pulling teeth -- I've written an A/B testing library before and I'm not even sure I understand them, but if I do understand them, it looks like it is probably going to take close to a day of work just to do something stupidly trivial like varying a call to action on your site.

Their quick start guide gets you about as far as authenticating to the service, which is wonderful, but you didn't crack open your IDE in the hopes of making some sweet authentication code, now did you?

Having the API doesn't reduce the risk in giving your conversion data to your #1 source of traffic and (possibly) your biggest single vendor.

And to put a cherry on top, you're limited to 10k accesses a day, which is suitable for a hobby site but which will be quickly exhausted in many actual businesses. (Some quick back of the envelope math suggests I'd be on the bubble.)

<comment><USER4> Huh! I did not know that. Re: the 10k access problem, that would completely negate the use of the API for enterprise sites, would it not? When I wrote the post, I said that enterprise would be the most likely users, too.

Not everything Google releases is a gem; disappointing to know that actual users of GWO aren't impressed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The documentation seems to be incomplete ( <http://code.google.com/intl/da- DK/apis/analytics/docs/gwo/> ). It seems to mostly cover authentication and reading of a feed?

<comment><USER6> Theres some expandable options on the left side with more details and available calls. Try "standard tracking" for starters.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Full documentation here: [http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/gwo/commonTasks.h...](http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/gwo/commonTasks.html)</comment>


Re-Engineering the Earth - <AUTHOR> http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200907/climate-engineering <comment><USER2> The amount of global warming we're experiencing is still a matter of debate, and certainly the specific climatic responses are mostly unknown. One day it's "we'll see increased hurricane activity due to global warming", and then it's 180 degrees around to saying that hurricane activity will decrease.

My point isn't to deny global warming, but to show that we don't really understand very well how climate works. We may be on a deadend path right now. But people who want a radical change -- whether it's one of the suggestions in this article, or simply an enormous decline in CO2 emissions -- may turn us off that dead end, but they do so by closing their eyes and hitting the gas pedal simultaneously. Nobody _really_ knows where we'd wind up.

The article points out that the effects may be uneven. But I think it's worse than that.

Returning CO2 levels to historic lows, or blocking solar radiation, might not be able to return the system to its original state: these reactions may not be reversible. Our environment has many factors that keep us at equilibrium, and many of these things have been working diligently to take up slack. Why should we think that these things will simply unwind back to their original state?

<comment><USER3> > Returning CO2 levels to historic lows, or blocking solar radiation, might > not be able to return the system to its original state: these reactions may > not be reversible.

I thought that it was generally agreed that CO2 levels had been much higher in prehistoric times. If so, it's unclear why recovering from lower levels in the future would be irreversible when we got here from there before.

<comment><USER2> Well, surely the CO2 level itself could be reversed. But what other elements of the system's equilibrium will be changed in the meantime.

For example, the actual amount of temperature increase observed is less than the CO2 level increase would suggest. Suppose that whatever agency has tempered the temperature increase has "woken up", and continues to do so as CO2 decreases. Then a return to "proper" CO2 levels (if you can call any level proper) would mean serious global _cooling_. And this might not be evident until it's too late.

Of course, I'm making that up, but there's no reason to think that it's implausible.

<comment><USER3> > Suppose that whatever agency has tempered the temperature increase has > "woken up", and continues to do so as CO2 decreases.

Why is that a reasonable thing to suppose?

We're assuming that we got to here from there before. Why is it reasonable to assume that we can't do so again?

Yes, maybe something else has changed, but shouldn't you at least go to the trouble of identifying actual possibilities instead of just assuming that they exist?

<comment><USER2> There are any number of processes that will occur easily in one direction, but can have... dramatic... results in the other direction. Consider, by analogy, breaking H2O into hydrogen and oxygen, vs. recombining them. Or, for more fun, consider a girl wearing a skirt, jumping on a trampoline. The process of going up is ordinary, but what happens on the way down is quite a bit different.

It's easy to dream up scenarios in the environment that might work this way. Algal blooms that have been pushed along by increased CO2 will affect the equilibrium between other types of sea life -- plankton up the line through large predatory fish. Moving up the food chain, creatures use input food less efficiently (carnivores need to kill much more food by mass than bunnies). So the algae enables plankton, which in turn feeds mackerel which in turn enable more sharks, but turning it around, as the algae recedes, the mackerel are pressured by the already-larger shark population, so they may well be decimated by the CO2 decrease. (I don't know if this specific example is correct -- it's certainly oversimplified -- but the concept is certainly conceivable).

Reiterating: it's very complex, we don't really know.

<comment><USER3> > There are any number of processes that will occur easily in one direction, > but can have... dramatic... results in the other direction. Consider, by > analogy, breaking H2O into hydrogen and oxygen, vs. recombining them.

Ooh, dramatic. Except that the issue is irreversible.

You can split and combine hydrogen and oxygen repeatedly and the same thing happens every time.

We don't see evidence of dramatic effects from the last time CO2 levels were high and went down. (We also don't see evidence of the predicte runaway temperatures either, but I digress.)

If you're going to argue that this time will be different, shouldn't you have something better than "we don't know"?

Yes, we might see species changes. However, niches don't stay empty. And, the claim was "irreversible temperature changes".

<comment><USER2> > Yes, we might see species changes. And, the claim was "irreversible > temperature changes".

Ahh, I think I expressed myself badly. I didn't mean that temperatures could return, _period_ (although on second reading, my text does convey that). I meant that things couldn't be reversed as in a movie being played backwards, returning things to their original state.

I think we're actually in agreement, but talking past each other due to my poor initial phrasing.

<comment><USER3> > I meant that things couldn't be reversed as in a movie being played > backwards, returning things to their original state.

Even if aliens took all of the "excess" CO2 out of the atmosphere tomorrow, manipulated the climate so it was always 1969 weather-wise (because that's the definition of perfection), and gave us an endless supply of dilithium crystals, things 10 years from now would be different than they are today.

Change always happens. The relevant question is good vs bad. (I don't see how one can assume that new species will necessarily be bad.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> We could turn the major deserts into forests if we wanted to. Geoff Lawton did this in the lowest, saltiest place in the Dead Sea, on 10 acres, with nothing but passive water harvesting earthworks, and selective planting. Now, that 10 acres is completely green, and produces enough food for quite a few families, and neighbors.

Imagine the rainforest, and 90% of it being edible. Seasonal and successional plantings, so when you walk through it, you can't help but stepping on food. Cassava, Potato, etc, all underneath the ground where you can't see as well.

<comment><USER5> Thanks for the tip, Dylan. Google reveals this excellent video: <http://www.blog.thesietch.org/wp-content/permaculture.swf>

Very cool stuff, worth checking out. And much better than pumping sulfur into the atmosphere . . .

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Umm...sulfur dioxide causes acid rain. Why would anyone seriously think that pumping it into the atmosphere in mass amounts could even be an option? Seriously..is there something I'm missing here?

</comment><comment><USER7> The article fails to mention one low-risk, high side-benefit idea: plant more trees.

<comment><USER8> The article did mention this. The problem is that, while trees absorb a lot of CO2 in the spring, they emit most of it in the fall. Freeman Dyson had proposed a solution whereby we breed a special kind of tree that stores most of the CO2 in its roots, rather than emitting it in the fall.

For what it's worth, that is the most pleasant method the article mentioned.

<comment><USER9> That might turn out to be a feature - more carbon in the winter and less in the summer could = smoothing out seasonal variation, if my wild speculation is correct.

At any rate, I don't see how you could turn a desert or a field into a high biomass forest without sucking up lots of CO2. Of course, once it's full-grown it will be in equilibrium, losing carbon as fast as it gains it.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do YOU define maintainable CSS? - <AUTHOR>

I'm writing a blog post about making CSS more maintainable for large websites and I'd love to hear what others think about the subject. <comment><USER2> Jonathan Snook wrote a bunch of great stuff about this topic over at <http://smacss.com/>.

Also, take a look at Object Oriented CSS => <https://github.com/stubbornella/oocss/wiki></comment>


Signatures of positive selection in autism spectrum disorder genes - <AUTHOR> http://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?rev=2&id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1006618 <comment><USER3> Speaking as an evolutionary genomicist, you shouldn't read much into this result for the following reasons :

1\. The authors only show an association between phenotype (autism) and a rare genetic variant. They do not prove any kind of adaptive function to that variant, or use any method to infer adaptive function of that variant. Thus, this isn't finding positive selection, it is finding an association. Associationed locis effect on phenotype can be positive, negative or completely null. All an association is, is a sign post pointing the way to something interesting. It doesn't mean the associated SNP itself is functional.

2\. The PGC ASD dataset does not have the power to detect associations at genome-wide base-pair resolution. They had 16,000 individuals, but used a genotyping array. This is great work by PGC and an extremely important dataset, but it is best suited to finding larger associations with disease (spanning thousands of bases), not individual associated causitive nucleotides. It is for this reason that I don't trust claims of an adaptive single-nucleotide loci in the absence of any functional studies or adaptive inference.

3\. Nobody in genetics takes GO Term enrichment at face value. It is an extremely noisy analysis that often turns up false positives. It sometimes points you in the right direction, but it really isn't a good analysis to hinge your paper on. This is usually interpreted among colleagues as grasping blindly for a meaningful result.

4\. The autism-SNPs->intelligence link is just wholly speculative (edited for clarity).

<comment><USER4> 1 & 2: This is setting the bar rather high, no? I hate GWAS, but am surrounded by people who do them all the time. To show any kind of function for a SNP is hard, to do it in humans is very, very hard for something like this involving nervous system function, and to prove the difference in function is "adaptive" virtually impossible. The furthest people go, and fairly rarely, is to show an eQTL and spin some unconvincing tale about how the difference in expression might have some effect.

But array-based methods do have one advantage which is that the 450K for example is heavily concentrated in genes and promoters. So the variant, which indeed does not span just one nucleotide, does have at least putative functions, which are simply the known functions of the gene, although yes, you cannot say whether the variant itself is helpful, harmful, or null on the functions of the gene. It is at least a step up from people who come to me (bioinformatics) and ask me to use my divining rod to guess what their SNP 100Kbp from the nearest gene might do.

3\. Putting it in an abstract is fairly desperate, I agree. But broadly speaking the way you know you aren't getting total nonsense is if a lot of related terms cluster towards the top. Which looks to be what they got. It looks a lot cleaner than most GOEA results I see.

Perhaps you could educate me on what would be proof of positive selection. Would it be at least convincing evidence, if not proof, if you showed that phenotype P is associated with variant V, and variant V is associated with positive traits X,Y,and Z after controlling for P (so you can rule out direct links between P and X/Y/Z which bypass V)? From what I have seen, investigations into functions of individual SNPs are almost invariably a waste of time ending in handwavy stories so I wonder if there is a better approach.

<comment><USER3> >This is setting the bar rather high, no?

I understand what you are saying, but "signatures of positive selection" has a very specific technical definition and associations are not it. It means allele fixation in a population due to quantifiable selective pressure (or quantifiable selective pressure proxy statistics).

When it comes to quantifying evolution, I want to see them attempt to validate molecularly or an attempt to infer selection mathematically. For example, show that the SNP is non-synonymous and causes protein change, and then rescue. Show that it's in a promoter, splice site or enhancer and rescue. Show extended runs of haplotype homozygosity thats significant. Show a selective sweep in the region, or a peak of LD. Show a higher than expected diversity in the target gene between species, and a derth within-species. Run PAML or do some comparative genomics to show the SNP being novel and adaptive. Show me a skewed allele frequency spectrum. There are lots of ways to show positive selection that are outside the toolbox of a lot of GWAS people. HAR1 for example was an absolutely beautiful story of a bioinformatic prediction of adaptive evolution, followed by amazingly solid functional validation : [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16915236](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16915236)

Alternatively, this paper is a tour-de-force of detecting adaptive evolution bioinformatically. [https://www.nature.com/articles/nature10944](https://www.nature.com/articles/nature10944)

If feel like there is this big disconnect between the world of GWAS and the world of population genomics, and this paper was really frustrating because I was open to the hypothesis but it fell flat on the delivery.

Anyway, if you want to know more, check out [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16285858](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16285858) this review. It's by one of the eminent population geneticists in the field and really covers the different signals of selection well, and intuitively.

> It is at least a step up from people who come to me (bioinformatics) and ask > me to use my divining rod to guess what their SNP 100Kbp from the nearest > gene might do.

Hey, I feel you. I know the struggle all too well.

<comment><USER4> Thanks for the links, I will check them out. An embarassing correction: the 450K is (as you well know) not a SNP array. Can you tell I've been doing more than my fair share of methylation stuff recently?

The fundamental problem I have with your reply, though, is that the authors were not really concerned with any particular SNP. They wanted to make statements about the _group_ of ASD-related SNPs. Clearly it is infeasible to do most of the things you have suggested here with >100 SNPs. Given that, what do you suggest they should have done?

<comment><USER3> > Given that, what do you suggest they should have done

Not used the term positive selection. If they hadn't done that this would have been boring, but fine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This suggests exactly what I've been thinking about these things, but I'd go one step further than this:

>> Accordingly, we hypothesize that certain ASD risk alleles were under positive selection during human evolution due to their involvement in neurogenesis and cognitive ability.

I don't think they "were under positive selection", I think they still ARE. So many people like to think that humans evolved to our present state and then act like the process has stopped. The wording here echos that a bit.

<comment><USER6> There's less selection pressure now because there's less mortality. A lot of people get to pass on their defective genes now that would not have been able to a couple hundred years ago.

<comment><USER7> There is huge selection pressure now in that many people don't even have kids. Any gene (or other inheritable trait like culture) which increases the probability of having kids will be strongly selected for.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Thank you for this research. There is an unfortunate simplistic perception of the evolutionary process where if an adaptation evolves, it's all positive. There is no reason for it to be that way. You can easily have mutations where you gain intelligence 80% of the time, but suffer a penalty 20% of the time, and still have that mutation spread through the population. The same gene that grants you gifts, can penalize as well, depending on environment. We're starting to tackle problems that don't have simple solutions like vaccines, antibiotics, drugs, and proper hygiene. How do you fix genes that are responsible for our greatest accomplishments, but also inflict terrible suffering at the roll of the dice?

<comment><AUTHOR> I think in this case the simplistic perception is correct. 'autism spectrum disorder' here is not severe autism but more of a symptom scale which includes such dreaded symptoms as being able to think logically and systematically; in other words, diagnostic heterogeneity: "Common risk variants identified in autism spectrum disorder" [https://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/11/25/224774](https://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/11/25/224774) , Grove et al 2017. So I think in this case, there actually is selection for _intelligence_ and it's only the diagnostic heterogeneity which makes it look like selection for 'autism'.

<comment><USER9> I think there's a contradiction here.

In selecting for intelligence a harm is acquired: the risk of sevre autism.

So "simplistic perception" is not correct. By selecting for intelligence, we incidentally acquire a problem.

<comment><AUTHOR> > In selecting for intelligence a harm is acquired: the risk of sevre autism.

Not sure what you mean here. You can have simultaneous selection for and against 'autism spectrum disorder', if it is heterogeneous. If for example it is a mix of actual social dysfunctionality/brain damage and greater intelligence/abstracting/systematizing, you could have selection against the former and selection for the former, and the net measured effect on the mixture could go either way.

(This is not as odd as it sounds. We seem to see something very similar with the Neuroticism trait: the overall trait appear bad for you, which makes sense since it's usually seen as not very good to have a lot of, but if you break it down into its 'facets', some of them are good for you: "Genetic contribution to two factors of neuroticism is associated with affluence, better health, and longer life" [http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/06/06/146787](http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/06/06/146787) , Hill et al 2017. It's analogous to how there are minimal sex differences on Big Five personality when examined at the Big Five factor level, but when broken down to their sub-factors, sex differences jump out at you.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> A recent but now deleted comment asked for a more layman's explanation of this paper. Would someone mind providing a summary or pointing to another reference that does so?

<comment><USER11> I'll give it a go.

Background: Brains are complicated. We don't have an "autism gene" or a "smart gene" or a "schizophrenia gene." Rather, it is a network of genes acting in concert that give rise to these traits (autism, smart, schizophrenia, etc).

The researchers looked at the genes that are involved in autism - <USER2> "alleles" (versions of a gene) are correlated with autism.

They were surprised to find that several of these autism-related alleles were also associated with increased intelligence. That is, having one or more "autism-like" alleles may boost your intelligence, without necessarily causing autism.

They then looked at the prevalence of these autism-related alleles, and found that it was significantly higher than you would expect to see by random chance. From this, they can conclude that there is positive selection occurring - having at least one autism-related allele results in you being more likely to pass your genetics on to your children.

I may be missing a few things; I read the paper pretty quickly.</comment></comment>


For The Win, At the Berkeley CSUA Hackathon - <AUTHOR> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/marissa-louie/for-the-win-at-the-berkel_b_844749.html

<comment><AUTHOR> I posted this coverage of the CSUA Hackathon on Huffington Post today. Feel free to take a look at what the 10 student teams hacked on.</comment>


Consider the Wombat - <AUTHOR> https://www.lrb.co.uk/v40/n19/katherine-rundell/consider-the-wombat <comment><USER2> It's good to hear numbers of Northern Hairy Nose wombats are picking up. There was a dingo attack (maybe a single dingo) that wiped out 10% of the entire population in 2002.

This site has a lote of information about the Northern Hairy Nose wombat. [https://www.ehp.qld.gov.au/wildlife/threatened- species/endan...](https://www.ehp.qld.gov.au/wildlife/threatened- species/endangered/northern_hairynosed_wombat/)

</comment><comment><USER3> Having just found the Digger comic, it's amusing to see this come up. Sad to hear they're so endangered.

[http://diggercomic.com/blog/2007/02/01/wombat1-gnorf/](http://diggercomic.com/blog/2007/02/01/wombat1-gnorf/)

<comment><USER4> They're not -- the common wombat is, true to its name, still very common, and it's only the northern hairy-nosed wombat that's endangered.

They are, however, all now protected from hunting, so wombat hams no longer feature on Australian menus.

<comment><USER5> hm, the article says the opposite about the common wombat.

> Now, despite its name, the common wombat is no longer common. Overgrazing > and the destruction of their natural habitat has caused a sharp drop in > their numbers; all species of wombat are now protected, and the northern > hairy-nosed wombat is critically endangered.

<comment><USER4> Yes, that's what the article says, but the IUCN disagrees: [http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/40556/0](http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/40556/0)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Thank you, Mr. Belson. But you're still fired.

<comment><USER7> Consider the Elephant

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Can't believe this article missed the most delightful factoid regarding wombats' cubic poo.

<comment><USER9> ODE TO THE WOMBAT — Anon.

As you pound along the track

Eyes wide open and ears pinned back

You may have noticed those queer square turds

And thought if not expressed in words

The pain of such defecation

Baffles the imagination

But it ain't done to entertain us

The wombat has an oblong anus

So if at night you hear pained cries

Outside your tent, feel no surprise

With eyes shut tight, teeth clenched with pain

A wombat's gone and crapped again!

(The 'cubic poo' is such a feature of the Overland Track in Tasmania's Cradle Mountain National Park it has inspired the above poem... I originally saw it posted on the walls of a drop toilet at a campsite on the track)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> >> He bought a toucan, which he trained to ride a llama.

OK.

</comment><comment><USER11> I always think back to Ze Frank's "True Facts": [https://youtu.be/gNqQL-1gZF8](https://youtu.be/gNqQL-1gZF8)

</comment><comment><USER12> The what?</comment>