Vim Tips For Intermediate Users - <AUTHOR> http://ideasintosoftware.com/vim-productivity-tips/ <comment><USER2> I've found relative line numbering to be distracting, and I find myself wanting absolute line numbering far more often. The reason that people want relative line numbering is almost always for relative motions, e.g. `6j`. But I find that this is seldom actually all that useful; there are various alternatives; here are a few:

\- `}` to go forward by paragraph.

\- `zj` to go down to the next fold.

\- `gg` and `G` both accept a count (with which they are identical), so that `50gg` means "go to line 50", and so absolute line numbers suffice though the command will typically be a little longer; of course, unlike `6j`, this will go to the start of the line if 'startofline' is not unset, so it's not always ideal, but I find myself rather good at knowing at sight how many lines down and up I need to go anyway.

<comment><USER3> You can use a hybrid of absolute and relative numbering by setting both the 'number' and 'relativenumber' options (in vim 7.4). It displays the absolute number of the current line (instead of 0) but relative numbers of the other lines.

<comment><USER4> Care to give any links to this? This is probably my biggest annoyance with Vim right now, how my current line is 0 and having to add 1 every time I do any operation gets old quick.

<comment><USER5> I think what he means is just put both

set relativenumber

set number

In your .vimrc

<comment><USER6> Have a look at [http://myusuf3.github.io/numbers.vim/](http://myusuf3.github.io/numbers.vim/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Wow, I had no idea about the relative numbering.

One more thing that eases my daily frustration is

        set scrolloff=6

The above prevents getting the cursor stuck at the bottom or top of the screen, unless you're at the absolute bottom or top. 6 lines is perfect for me at 1920x1080, 13.3", 16pt Droid Sans Mono Regular.

It might help you if you find yourself scrolling down to move the view around, then scrolling up again to get where you want to edit.

<comment><USER8> Just a note that this affects H (jump to top line on the screen) and L (jump to bottom line on the screen).

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> If you're looking for keys to remap, these are prime candidates:

      s: synonym for cl
      <cr> (enter): synonym for j
      _: acts like ^ when given without a count, acts like <count>jk^ when given with a count
      <bs> (backspace): synonym for h
      <space>: synonym for l

Doubling up operators with non-motion characters works well, too. For example, operators like 'c' or 'd' probably shouldn't be rebound, and they're often doubled ('cc', 'dd') or accept a motion ('c$', 'd}'), but combining them with another non-motion isn't valid ('dc','cs'). This makes those combinations good candidates for custom bindings. A lot of plugins like surround.vim take advantage of those combinations.

Vimcasts covered this in more depth here: [http://vimcasts.org/blog/2014/02/follow-my- leader/](http://vimcasts.org/blog/2014/02/follow-my-leader/)

</comment><comment><USER10> I remap the semicolon to the colon in my .vimrc:

      nmap ; :

This makes it much easier to type commands, since you don't need to use a keyboard chord.

After using this for a year or so, I found out that the semicolon actually has its own function--it can refer to the current insertion point when writing ranges. But I've never used that; one could remap : to ; if desired.

<comment><USER11> In normal mode, after using f or F to jump to a character, ; repeats the motion and jumps to the next match. I find myself using this often enough that if I swapped mappings for : and ; I would be in a world of confusion.

<comment><USER12> Ha. I did as well, so I remapped <space> to ;. Now when I f, t, F, or T, and want to move to the next one, I hit space.

Come to think of it, maybe I should just remap <space> to : and leave ; alone?

<comment><USER13> I map <space> to : and it's been great. <space> is normally just a synonym for l, so I never used it; my only muscle memory issue is just an occasional : to enter command mode. Perhaps I should unmap :.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Being able to open up multiple files and arrange them precisely how I want (with the keyboard!) is my absolute favorite part of vim. I use the following shortcuts for opening a file to the right/left or above/below:

        nnoremap <Leader>or :set splitright<CR>:vs
        nnoremap <Leader>ol :set nosplitright<CR>:vs
        nnoremap <Leader>oa :set nosplitbelow<CR>:sp
        nnoremap <Leader>ob :set splitbelow<CR>:sp
        " Don't let vim change the setup when closing windows
        set noequalalways

So I can simply type ',or ' and then the name of a file to get a vertical split.

You can then use <C-w>w<number>+/\- to increase/decrease the height of a window and <C-w>w<number>'<'/'>' to change the width.

</comment><comment><USER5> Since I usually work with small laptop screens I tend to use vim tabs more than split. I find these key combinations quite comfortable:

nnoremap L :tabnext<CR>

nnoremap H :tabprevious<CR>

nnoremap <C-N> :tabnew<CR>

Also if you use offline docs (I only know Zeal) it would be pretty helpful to map the offline doc application to the K key depending on the language

nnoremap K :exec "!/usr/bin/zeal --query ".&ft.":".expand('<cword>')."&"

The above copies the word under the cursor and query it with zeal.

</comment><comment><USER15> Some more tips that can make your vim life more awesome:

\- Learn about registers

\- '.' is more powerful than you think

\- Having a hotkey to jump to your rc and auto resource the file on safe is awesome

\- Learn about quickfix (if you work with a compiled language, still renders a bit crap for Rust, but it works)

\- vim-dispatch (or neovim with jobs ext) is probably one of the nicest, time saving plugins around

\- If your vim is slow (repaints due to ill setup Syntastic conflicts is common), fix it. Vim has excellent profiling support.

</comment><comment><USER16> You can simply mark your text with Shift-v, then d to cut, y to paste (correction edit: p is for paste). This saved me so much time and energy than trying to count the lines. The relative numbering is cool unless your text goes off screen...

<comment><USER17> Wouldn't that be the following, in normal mode?: v (motion commands) d p

<comment><USER16> You are right, v will highlight per character, Shift-V highlights entire lines. Also, as you pointed out, I made a mistake on the paste, it's p, not y (which is copy).

<comment><USER17> Sorry, I should have simply tested shift-v

<comment><USER16> Hey no need to apologize, I didn't even know about v until I tried it. So thanks for that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> The most useful shortcut I have in my .vimrc is the ability to "sudo save":

        command W :execute ':silent w !sudo tee % > /dev/null' | :edit!

No more exiting vim to start it again with sudo.

<comment><AUTHOR> Huh. Well I kinda consider that `sudo` annoyance a feature. It tells me to think twice before potentially messing up badly. :-)

<comment><USER18> When I use :W is because I've been editing some system configuration files.. I know what I'm doing.

And messing up is half the fun of systems administration :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Isn't it much simpler to use tmux for the vertical split? Or are there any advantages of "vertical buffers" in VIM I should know about?

<comment><USER20> \- yanking/cutting and pasting between the two displayed buffers in the panes.

\- being able to quickly swap one pane to show a different file, then swap back to that same file again (or do it with the right pane)

\- being able to horizontally split either vertical pane, ie you can tile the panes exactly how you like very fast.

:mouse=a

and now you can drag the split around

\- showing differences between to versions you have open

:windo diffthis

highlights them - can't really do it at all with tmux

\- Having the whole thing inside a screen session you can resume it from where you left off over ssh remotely later.

\- Saving it as a vim session if you want to power the box down and resume from where you were, with precisely those splits and buffers open scrolled to what you see now.

\- Backgrounding the whole thing to do something else quickly.

Yeah, there's a few, I doubt that list is exhaustive and doing things that way means some other trade offs. Whether these advantages are actually things you want is a different question that only you + experimentation can answer..?

<comment><USER21> I see lots of discussion about using tmux and vim together. Most of the articles are more about configuring each instead of how that persons workflow. I get stuck on this problem; where to draw the line between tmux splits and vim splits (and by extension window management).

When do you do use tmux for splitting versus vim? What are your key bindings for creating, resizing, and navigating each?

Personally, I drop back to the shell constantly so I tend to launch a lot of separate vims. The only time I use vim splits are if it explicitly occurs to me or if I'm using vimdiff. This means I have a lot of problems copy/pasting or end up opening the same file in multiple vim sessions (but different tmux panes/windows).

<comment><USER19> Even without any configuration the workflow of using tmux for panes and windows and within I start and quit vim as required seems totally fine.

<comment><USER21> Oh yeah, it's not a problem or conflict. Many of the examples people give tend to remap similar or the same keys for splitting in vim and tmux or navigating between splits (alt or ctrl + hjkl for navigating them).

I'm looking for more of a mental model or workflow of when to use vimsplits over tmux splits and how to navigate. I generally avoid vimsplits because I haven't found a good workflow to use both and my muscle memory gets messed up when I mix them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is a longshot, but has anyone ever seen a way to drop into some sort of debugger for vim that is on a higher abstraction layer than gdb?

<comment><USER23> Vim actually has a built in debugger and a couple extra features for debugging:

[http://inlehmansterms.net/2014/10/31/debugging- vim/](http://inlehmansterms.net/2014/10/31/debugging-vim/)

[http://vimdoc.sourceforge.net/htmldoc/repeat.html#debug- mode](http://vimdoc.sourceforge.net/htmldoc/repeat.html#debug-mode) ( or :h debug-mode )

I recall there being a few gotchas last time I used debug mode and they're mentioned in the doc, but unfortunately I don't quite remember what they were.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Is there any way to set relative numbering in Vim to be 1-indexed? I want to avoid mentally adding 1 every time I want to yank a few lines.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hm, probably not: [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9580617/vim-display- relat...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9580617/vim-display-relative- linenumbers-starting-with-1)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> The vertical split recommendation is really great. I agree with the author that I always forget and often times end up doing horizontal.

<comment><USER26> Several years ago[1] I requested an option called 'splitvertical' that would cause all window splits to be vertical by default. Christian Brabandt made me a patch I use to this day even though it was never merged: [https://github.com/chrisbra/vim-mq- patches/blob/master/verst...](https://github.com/chrisbra/vim-mq- patches/blob/master/verstplit).

It's still fairly straightforward to merge. Ping me if you need help (email in profile)

[1] [http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.editors.vim.devel/28395/focus=...](http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.editors.vim.devel/28395/focus=28535) [http://www.reddit.com/r/vim/comments/2irn8j/vertical_split_b...](http://www.reddit.com/r/vim/comments/2irn8j/vertical_split_by_default/cl5hv77)

</comment></comment><comment><USER2>
        nnoremap <leader>w <C-w>v<C-w>l

If you set 'splitright', you should remove the <C-w>l.

</comment><comment><USER27> This mapping makes my life much nicer:

      nnoremap Q @q

It turns 'Q' into a sort of enhanced '.' command that can repeat a sequence of multiple commands. To use it, first start recording a macro to the 'q' register. That's the easiest register because 'q' is also the command to start and stop recording a macro: to start recording you just simply press 'qq'. Then you make your changes and press 'q' to stop. Now you can repeat that sequence of commands with 'Q'.

It turns out that macros are really useful, but I would rarely use them because it's just so awkward to press '@' each time I want to apply one. Unfortunately, '.' doesn't repeat the '@' command to apply a macro. I would often find myself mechanically repeating things by hand, or else wasting time writing complicated sequences of :s/substitution/commands/. Now I use quick ad-hoc macros all the time.

The speed and convenience are the real key for me. You might call it synergy, or a tipping point, or the straw that breaks the camel's back. For me, 'qq' is just a little bit faster and easier than any other register. Repeating 'Q' is just a little bit nicer than typing '@q' followed by repeating '@@'. (It's also kinda nice that it's all the same key.) Macros are nice, but two carefully made choices that each are only slightly better than the alternatives combine to make something vastly more useful. In my mind, 'Q' is almost its own thing, separate from the idea of other macros.

Now that I use macros, I've discovered some useful patterns. One technique I often use is to include a final motion in my macro to move to the next place I want to change. For example, maybe I want to edit several lines in a row. I press 'qq', make my changes to the current line, then press 'j' to move down a line. Only then do I stop recording. After that, I can just hold down the shift key and press 'Q' repeatedly until I'm done. Even if my changes are simple enough that '.' would work, it saves me from making mistakes when bouncing back and forth: 'j.j.j.j.jj.'. Oops.

You can do that with any motion(s), and I often use 'n'. Sometimes finding some simple marker text on each problem line is easy, but using find-replace to make the actual changes requires a hideous regex. In those cases, I'll do the simple search, record a macro as I make the first change, and finally press 'n' to move to the next match. Then I just lean on 'Q' until I'm done.

Sometimes I'll also throw a 'zz' after the last motion to center the current line in the window so I don't have to look around to locate the cursor when a change scrolls the window.

Normally 'Q' enters Ex mode, but so far I haven't found much use for that. If that ever changes, I'll probably use a <leader> mapping to get Ex mode back. Using something even a little bit slower than 'Q' would destroy the effect. I forget where I originally learned this mapping.</comment>


Time to go (travel the world for a year) - <AUTHOR> http://www.tonywright.com/2013/time-to-go/

<comment><USER2> If you want to travel the world, you absolutely do not need to have had as much professional and financial success as the OP. Not even close.

To get started, read _Vagabonding_ by Rolf Potts.</comment>


Microsoft Introduces Tool for Avoiding Traffic Jams - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/10/technology/10maps.html?bl&ex=1208145600&en=2b94af83b6d6ba1c&ei=5087%0A

<comment><USER2> A plane?</comment>


The Alt-Right Hates Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Because of Course It Does - <AUTHOR> https://www.wired.com/2016/12/rogue-one-alt-right-boycott/ <comment><USER2> Hey look, it's yet another movie advertising campaign masquerading as social politics. Social media takes the bait, because of course they do.

</comment><comment><USER3> Member when wired was a tech zine?

<comment><USER4> Somehow I don't think it is just the alt-right that has trouble suspending disbelief with a social justice enthused media. There's a good reason why South Park has a character called 'Token'. These political messages are shoehorned so bluntly into fictional television shows there is no reason to hold back from describing them as political propaganda. I'm glad I catch only brief snippets here and there through Youtube and Netflix.

It's the recent BBC Sherlock that really took the biscuit though. Sherlock Holmes could not be less interested in solving crimes when it is a proto- feminist movement murdering men. Great job guys.</comment></comment>


Results from placebo-controlled LSD microdose human study - <AUTHOR> https://newatlas.com/lsd-microdose-human-placebo-trial/60177/ <comment><USER2> Yeah, this doesn't surprise me. LSD makes you _think_ you're developing truly profound thoughts and realizations but most people are unable to vocalize those realizations after coming down. Kind of like how every idea you come up with sounds like a great idea when you're on stimulants like cocaine.

Potentially one of the reasons that people like to take small amounts of LSD while they work is due to its slight stimulant effect. You'll note in the article that blood pressure increased with higher doses. LSD also reduces any sensation of need/wanting to sleep. So it will definitely perk you up better than a strong cup of coffee

<comment><USER3> I had genuinely profound thoughts and feelings when I was on lsd that I would say changed the course of my whole life in a positive way. That you can't describe them or put them into words doesn't make them meaningless or valueless, it makes them _ineffable_.

Most of the most amazing and important experiences of my life, the ones that I would choose if I were forced to say which were the ones that made life worth living, fall into that category.

<comment><USER2> Well, to provide a different opinion, I've never experienced anything lasting from it. I maybe had one realization, once, which is that everything in life is so silly I should just not get upset about it. Though on one of the 6 times I tried it I also had a very bad panic attack. To me, it's just that a drug is a drug, not a panacea.

There is nothing magic about it, and _lots_ of drugs make you think you're smarter than you really are.

<comment><USER4> You and the parent are both "right." Psychedelics are notoriously unpredictable YMMV things, which is part of why they haven't been mainstreamed as a treatment for anything. For mainstream drugs we usually want something as predictable as possible.

<comment><USER3> I think it's silly that we have to medicalize mind altering drugs. Why does it have to be a treatment for something?

<comment><USER5> Because it is a treatment for some things and we should treat it that way so those that can be helped get the medicine they need

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I have a mild objection to this headline: in context, "intriguing" plants the suggestion that there were positive results, or at least potential avenues of future research, whereas the article body states pretty clearly that there was no effect:

> In the end, the researchers conclude the LSD microdoses did not affect the > majority of mood, cognition and physiological measures that were examined.

It goes on to say:

> However, it is also noted this is not at all a final determination on the > ultimate veracity of LSD microdosing, either as a cognitive booster, or an > anti-depressant. This is merely the first step in trying to empirically > understand the acute effects of this oft-reported anecdotal phenomenon.

More research is always good, but it's important to remember that cases like this where the purported effects are on things like mood and creativity (which are tricky to measure and probably have significant day-to-day variation) are going to be especially vulnerable to placebo effects and wishful thinking. When you combine this with gwern's also-negative result, I don't think you can escape the conclusion that LSD microdosing probably does nothing.

<comment><USER7> If a "microdose" is defined as "a dose that has no perceivable effects", is there a term for a dose one step up from that: the weakest dose whose effect _can_ be perceived?

I have a feeling that a lot of the people who think microdosing works, are actually taking that level of dose, rather than a true microdose.

<comment><USER8> The study noted that the highest dose administered (25ug) was perceptible so I wonder if you could isolate the results of just the cohort that received that dose. That said, it would negate the blind on the study and all data would then be suspicious.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Not the first study, although it might be the first academic study. . .

This was on HN in 2013, and the same results were reported. [https://www.gwern.net/LSD-microdosing](https://www.gwern.net/LSD-microdosing)

<comment><USER10> Gwern thread here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6565869](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6565869)

First-everness struck from title above.

<comment><USER9> Props to OP.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> It's important to note: the study only had 20 participants, so it wouldn't have enough statistical power to detect a moderately large effect. Failure to find an effect is different from evidence there is no effect.

<comment><USER12> > It's important to note: the study only had 20 participants, so it wouldn't > have enough statistical power to detect a moderately large effect.

This is a within-subject experiment: each participant got all 4 possible doses. The paper ([https://www.gwern.net/docs/nootropics/2019-bershad.pdf](https://www.gwern.net/docs/nootropics/2019-bershad.pdf)) doesn't discuss power that I can see, but the power of a within-subject design will be a lot higher than the between-subject you're probably thinking of, where n=20 is generally way too little. So, might be decently powered after all.

<comment><USER13> So the article did not do a good job of explaining the study.

Also, why did they not go for a dose every 3-5 days like the anecdotes, but instead of went for every 7 days. And then say it might be different when done every few days. Were they trying to avoid testing on the weekends or something?

<comment><USER12> Washout. If you went more frequently, then the excuse would be that the LSD microdosing might still be having effects on the low-dose or placebo days.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> >did not affect the majority of mood, cognition and physiological measures that were examined.

Poor headline, the results are not actually intriguing.

<comment><USER10> Ok, no more intrigue in the title above.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Well, I'd like to see a long-term follow-up on the participants. Some people self-report lasting mental changes from hallucinogens.

<comment><USER12> They do... but typically from much larger doses, 'macrodosing', if you will.

<comment><USER15> Sure, but the premise of this study was that there are real, measurable effects of microdosing that are too subtle to be self-reported.

So it's worth following up if this study's finding is a lasting effect too, actually I almost think it'd be irresponsible not to.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Curious to see more studies like this on other hallucinogenic drugs like psilocybin (psilocybe cubensis i.e. magic mushrooms).</comment>


Cultural Revolution Shaped Xi Jinping, from Schoolboy to Survivor - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/25/world/asia/xi-jinping-china-cultural-revolution.html <comment><USER2> > Mr. Xi has often discussed the seven years he spent exiled to a rural > village during the latter part of the Cultural Revolution, including in a > speech in Seattle on Tuesday, casting that chapter of his life as an > uplifting story of a city boy who discovers the suffering of ordinary > Chinese in the countryside and resolves to make a difference.

As this was the main point of the Cultural Revolution's Down to the Countryside movement, I'd have to strike this as one of the successes of the Cultural Revolution.

<comment><USER3> From _The Three Body Problem_ , I get that the "Down to the Countryside" movement was more about getting the crazies out of the cities ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Woah, this flattering article of a Chinese ruler feels like something I'd read in the Chinese government-controlled news!

Does the nytimes feel pressured to write these flattering articles about Chinese rulers because of the attacks from China in the past few years? [1]

[1] [http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/technology/chinese- hackers...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/technology/chinese-hackers- infiltrate-new-york-times-computers.html)

<comment><USER5> Not really. It just read like a factual (or at least well researched) biography. Is there some rule that either every article written about China is unflattering or else it must be coerced?</comment></comment>


Why did I reimplement Jekyll using NoFlo - <AUTHOR> http://bergie.iki.fi/blog/noflo-jekyll/

<comment><USER2> Didn't know about NoFlo before this, previous discussions here:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6139509](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6139509)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6144951](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6144951)

The UI looks neat, but the kickstarter video was a mixed bag. Did somebody tell a bunch of people to talk very loudly? Was that the plan to make it "engaging"? Because it did unfortunately have a touch of bro-gramming.*

I'm not sure whether it really is the killer approach to writing software. Where I do see it is in customization. A lot of business logic programming relies on offering flexibility on an intermediary level. Providing the right components for software integrators seems like a very good idea. You'll still need text-based programmers to do the grunt- and architectural work, of course. Because no matter what the fancy graphics convey: Somebody is going to need to sit in front of a screen and type text into an editor.

Finally - all this and no online demo to check out? Am I missing the crucial link?

[Edit] Found this: [http://meemoo.org/dataflow/](http://meemoo.org/dataflow/)

*Not all of it did - I'm not going to call J Paul Morrison a bro-grammer - but I really don't need people to seem worked up in a video at all. It just seems somewhat artificial, like a comedian dying of laughter from a joke they have already told to hundreds of audiences.

<comment><USER3> I am not sure the kickstart video was designed for the target audience. Sorry, but "boxes and arrows" are not enough to convey what NoFlo actually is.

If anything, it reminds me of UML, even though I know it is not the same thing. But it does not get more technical than "boxes and arrows", so it is not possible to understand what it actually is all about.

The video is way, way dumbed down. It's supposed to be a tool, so explain how the tool works and what it does. A subway metaphor is not enough - we have had those every since UML came along.

Having said that, I think we need to be able to have multiple representations for code. Text is only one of the possibilities.

<comment><USER2> Fully agreed - I think the main problem of NoFlo is that I'm not sure who they're trying to get on board. Developers will be put off by the appeal for "popular" platforms and the dumbing down. But I'm not sure who else but developers is supposed to care about this stuff?

That's why I highlighted the "jargon" bit in my other reply - It seems like they have identified "people who manage or contract developers" as one (or maybe even "the") target audience.

I think that's worrying - at least if it is carried out in this tone. A good developer shouldn't need fancy flow charts to convey to you that she can or does deliver what you pay her to do. It might be what people _want_ to have - "If only somebody would solve this problem that I cannot understand developers and they're always misleading me" \- but that doesn't mean that you should pander to it. Because at its worst, you're simply giving out fancier tools for misleading clients.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Thanks for this post. It's a really cool example of using NoFlo to refactor a project. I'm actually about to start using Jekyll on a project, but since I'm more into Node I might go with the NoFlo implementation.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Repository is at [https://github.com/the-grid/noflo- jekyll](https://github.com/the-grid/noflo-jekyll)

</comment><comment><USER5> > _other data sources that the file system_

I think you mean "sources _than_ the" here.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, fix pushed!

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Why are they putting that pony-tail dude on every photo? Is he some sort of programming celebrity?

<comment><AUTHOR> Nope, but I started NoFlo. Among some other open source things :-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> great post! bad kerning :(</comment>


Retiring real estate on Google Maps - <AUTHOR> http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2011/01/retiring-real-estate-on-google-maps.html

<comment><USER2> While I agree that there are better sites for looking at _for-sale_ real estate, Google Maps was by far the best place for finding rentals for our recent move into the city of Chicago from the suburbs. I'll be sad to see it go, until a better apartment search consolidator pops up.

<comment><USER3> I'm a huge fan of PadMapper. Does a great job for apartment search. Far better than what Google Maps was doing. <http://www.padmapper.com>

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "In part due to low usage, the proliferation of excellent property-search tools on real estate websites, and the infrastructure challenge posed by the impending retirement of the Google Base API (used by listing providers to submit listings),"

Whatever happened to wanting to make all the world's data searchable?

Reasons 2 and 3 are pure cop outs.

Google has a real problem in that they seem to not be able to produce a best- in-breed class of software for highly competitive areas. If somebody came out with better search tomorrow would they just drop it?

</comment><comment><USER5> Hm, I didn't realize they were also deprecating the Base API in favor of vertical APIs. I suppose they're pulling back from their ambition to create an overarching taxonomy of everything in a single API?

</comment><comment><USER3> Based on this move I wonder how much truth there ever was to the rumor that Google was considering buying Trulia ([http://kara.allthingsd.com/20091218/open-house-google-has- al...](http://kara.allthingsd.com/20091218/open-house-google-has-also-been- eying-trulia-in-real-estate-search-play/)). The infrastructure they have is basically the same so they would have encountered the same infrastructure issues with the retirement of Google Base.

</comment><comment><USER6> It seems like Google is giving up on real estate by dropping the Base API. There is a new shopping API but it doesn't include real estate. I can remember when Base came out six years ago that it was going to "be the death of MLS". Yet now Base is going and we still have little pockets of data only available to Realtors.

<comment><USER7> Redfin does a good job showing info. (where redfin is anyhow)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I didn't even know that feature existed.

</comment><comment><USER9> The low usage was due to the fact that nobody even knew it was there. I _always_ watch real estate, and only saw these on Google Maps once. (And was instantly enamored, and now it's going away. Sigh.)

</comment><comment><USER10> Heh, less than half a year since they started the service in Japan.

Are they going to acquire a company specialized in real estate search to replace it?

</comment><comment><USER11> Makes sense. They were never really going to compete with specialists like zillow.com.</comment>


Scores in N.C. are legally 'innocent,' yet still imprisoned - <AUTHOR> http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/story/2012-06-13/innocent-incarcerated-prisoners/55585176/1

<comment><USER2> '"We can't be outcome driven," said Anne Tompkins, the U.S. attorney in Charlotte.'

The quote seems like it may be out of context even in the article, but seems like a good capture of the problems with total dedication to process over discretion and justice described (or so I gather, have only read reviews of yet) in "The Collapse of American Criminal Justice" by William Stuntz.

<comment><USER3> Unfortunately, once a conviction is final, it's fairly hard for courts to use any sort of discretion; there are strict limits, made stricter by legislation in recent years, on what kinds of challenges they can consider. Though as the article notes, the exact scope of the limits as applied here is unclear, so they might conceivably be expanded.

On the other hand, executive pardons and commutations have always been intended as a partial safety valve against too process-focused jurisprudence: the idea is that a thoughtful executive has the power to say, "this is not the just outcome" in specific cases, approving exceptions outside of the usual proceedings of the law. Unfortunately for _that_ theory, though, in the past few decades pardons and commutations have become a big political risk. If you pardon someone, you get no major benefit (a handful of bleeding-heart liberals will like you, but not many), unless the person is really well-connected. But, you incur a bit potential risk if the person you pardoned ends up committing a future crime; the "Willie Horton problem". So the safe course of action is to let ten innocent people rot in jail, rather than risk pardoning a dangerous person (the exact opposite of the traditional maxim).

<comment><USER4> To add some perspective here, Justice Scalia went so far as to claim the government has the right to kill a known-to-be-innocent person so long as they were at some point found guilty by a habeas court.

Here's the quote:

"This court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is 'actually' innocent. Quite to the contrary, we have repeatedly left that question unresolved, while expressing considerable doubt that any claim based on alleged 'actual innocence' is constitutionally cognizable."

I personally loved Alan Dershowitz's retort, though it's a lot less relevant than the words of someone who sits on the Bench:

"Let us be clear precisely what this means. If a defendant were convicted, after a constitutionally unflawed trial, of murdering his wife, and then came to the Supreme Court with his very much alive wife at his side, and sought a new trial based on newly discovered evidence (namely that his wife was alive), these two justices would tell him, in effect: "Look, your wife may be alive as a matter of fact, but as a matter of constitutional law, she's dead, and as for you, Mr. Innocent Defendant, you're dead, too, since there is no constitutional right not to be executed merely because you're innocent.""

[http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2009/08/18/scalias- cat...](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2009/08/18/scalias-catholic- betrayal.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'd like to see the prosecutors of these cases jailed for the equivalent time lost by by those wrongfully imprisoned. "Sovereign immunity?" Sorry, I guess you should do your job then. If you find out later that you did your job so wrong that someone loses 10 years of their life, you sure as shit better be the first one in line unlocking their cell.

Public officials have great power, and there needs to be an equally great responsibility and _consequence_ for abusing that power. And yes, being ignorant or making the wrong decision counts as abuse of power.

<comment><USER6> They can never make mistakes, so either nobody does the job or they become even worse monsters since the system cannot admit to mistakes, ever.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Best example I know of to illustrate what happens when you don't have a guy with the authority to say 'this is insane, stop doing this'.

<comment><USER8> Governors have that power.

<comment><USER9> Actually Governors don't have that power in this situation, since it involves Federal law.

<comment><USER10> Then it would be the President.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Tig 2.0 (and 2.0.1) - <AUTHOR> http://jonas.nitro.dk/tig/NEWS.html I have been using tig for a long time now and love it. Some nice changes for the 2.0 release.
By the way, if you have a .tigrc, it will likely break. Check out "man tigrc" for how to set options in tig 2.0.
Here is my tigrc: https://gist.github.com/anonymous/11445566 <comment><AUTHOR> I have been using tig for a long time now and love it. Some nice changes for the 2.0 release like mouse support and completion in the prompt.

By the way, if you have a .tigrc, it will likely break. Check out "man tigrc" for how to set options in tig 2.0.

If you install it with homebrew like I did, be sure to pass in the --with-docs flag to generate man manpages like so:

brew install tig --with-docs

Here is my tigrc: [https://gist.github.com/anonymous/11445566](https://gist.github.com/anonymous/11445566)</comment>


Valve sponsors Mesa development - <AUTHOR> http://lunarg.com/glassymesa/ <comment><USER2> I don't quite understand how Mesa and device drivers play together... can someone explain this for me? I read the wiki ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesa_(computer_graphics)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesa_\(computer_graphics\))) and this ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Linux_kernel_and_OpenGL_vi...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Linux_kernel_and_OpenGL_video_games.svg)) graphic makes it clear that Mesa is the implementation of the OpenGL specification... what I don't get is the relationship between drivers and Mesa. Why aren't the drivers the implementation of the OpenGL specification? Is pushing bits from the GPU to the screen the only thing that the drivers do?

<comment><USER3> You may want to read this (long) article:

[http://blog.mecheye.net/2012/06/the-linux-graphics- stack/](http://blog.mecheye.net/2012/06/the-linux-graphics-stack/)

Not claiming I understand it all, but it's long because graphics are complicated :) I have been surprised at how device-dependent graphics software is.

I wonder if Windows or OS X has nicer graphics abstractions than Linux? i.e. that make it less of a mess?

<comment><USER4> I think the graphics stack is a sore point on most or all platforms that have to support multiple GPUs from multiple vendors, at least the stuff in between userland GL calls and the bare metal.

In an ideal world it would be obvious where to draw the line between the GPU- and vendor-independent bits and the common code shared by everyone, but not only is that very hard to do, it can change drastically over the years. Couple that with the fact that platform vendors have to maintain these imperfect interfaces for many years regardless, and that vendors can have their own abstraction layers in between the top layer of their driver code and the bare metal of all their GPUs, and you have a perfect storm of too many layers getting in the way and imperfectly defined interfaces to many of those layers, which necessitates occasional layering violations at every level of the stack if you want to avoid some pathological performance bottlenecks for some GPUs.

At best you end up with a bunch of ugly, imperfect, but generally functional software that more or less gets the job done at an acceptable level of performance.

I would imagine that the situation with Linux just adds yet more issues to that bag of hurt. GPU vendors don't always want to help out, and are likely to withhold valuable technical information that they don't want to be public. The whole process of defining how many layers there are, what functionality exists at what layer, and what interfaces are used between the layers is almost by definition (for GPU driver models at least) a bunch of questions for which there are no good answers, which is also a perfect storm for Open Source development. Any solution anyone comes up with is always going to have some caveats and gotchas, which for open, egalitarian development models means endless arguments and bikeshedding in which everyone involved is correct in pointing out the weaknesses of the system as designed, but there are no alternatives that anyone can point to that don't have similar problems in someone else's eyes.

For example, back in the '90s, for right or wrong I was very optimistic about GGI solving a lot of graphics problems for Linux, and that was limited to the 2D stuff (I can't imagine how controversial it would've been had it included 3D as well):

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Graphics_Interface](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Graphics_Interface)

It didn't pan out that way, but so much energy was burned by so many people arguing about it over so many years. :( I don't have authoritative knowledge of the whole thing, so maybe the doubters were correct, but at the time it felt like a bunch of people shooting down an imperfect solution while offering no solution at all.

EDIT: TL;DR designing a graphics stack that ultimately goes down to the metal is a set of very hard problems, many of which have no perfect answers. This, coupled with secretive vendors and the level of specialized knowledge required to even contribute to stuff like this, makes it an even harder problem in the Open Source world. Not an insurmountable obstacle, but a really hard set of problems nonetheless, for both technical and human reasons.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> If you were in the market for new hardware and wanted the purchase to support initiatives such as this--what would you buy?

I don't really game any more but like to support the ecosystem.

<comment><USER6> The standard response is AMD, but both their open source drivers and proprietary drivers are very bad. It's not performance, it's stability. AMD Linux drivers crash on all sorts of things. Having an accelerated desktop can do it.

I had a 7770 for a year before I switched to Nvidia. Better all around.

Still AMD do sponsor open source driver development, I'm told, so it's up to how much you're willing to sacrifice for this.

<comment><USER7> on older r600 GPUS (4000/5000 series) the open driver is much better than the closed source one, over the past while it has been improving massively.

<comment><USER8> Plus I can confirm that the open source driver is much more stable on pre- radeonsi hardware than it used to be.

I eventually ended up buying a radeonsi card and while the extra GPU oomph is nice, the lower stability is not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> More good news for open source and Linux.

Valve is probably the most influential single entity in PC gaming, for them to embrace open-source to this degree is massive...

</comment><comment><USER10> You would think with Steam banking it big with the Steambox that they would want people working on these sorts of projects, as it's not only Steam that wins big (having a FOSS OS to run their steam box on), but everyone else.

<comment><USER11> Valve understands that without other incentives for developers to target Linux, gamers will never switch. It's looking to be a huge win for the FOSS community.

<comment><USER12> It would be nice to play the Battlefield series on Linux.

<comment><USER10> The future games I see being game changers for Linux are Half Life 3, Portal 3 and the new Left 4 Dead - these are all games that would work well with the steam controller on the Linux box and would drive sales to the Steambox.

<comment><USER13> > work well with the steam controller on the Linux box and would drive sales > to the Steambox.

I am a gamer on Linux, but there's no reason these games will run better on Linux vs Windows or use the controller better (since they will probably support the controller drivers for Windows systems as well). Valve has repeatedly said they would not do any exclusive titles for any platform as well, so I don't think just a couple of great games will drive much Steambox sales. There are going to be several drivers for Steamboxes: 1) the hardware needs to be cheap enough 2) the experience needs to be seamless and AS GOOD as a console if not more 3) enough big games to ensure you do not miss too much by not staying on Windows.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I'm not conviced this will help that much for Intel GPUs. Developers from Intel have been optimizing shader compilers specifically for Dota 2 for some time without much impact on performance.

Dota 2 is probably memory bandwidth limited on Intel/Linux/OpenGL and that is likely the case for other games too.

So maybe modifying the OpenGL part of the game engine a bit to take memory bandwidth constraints of Intel GPUs into account would help more.

When I was looking into the issue of Intel GPU peformance on Linux many months ago there were no tools to profile memory bandwidth bottlenecks.

</comment><comment><USER15> Presently each SCM (Subsea Control Module) uses a specific protocol to communicate with the topside system. The topside system often polls the SCM for data. In the case of RRC there are currently three different types of SCM and these use the following protocols: 2000, 3000 and 1024. how we can program a common driver interface and that will include the three protocols and the top side don't three package to control the three different subsea module ?????

</comment><comment><USER16> Thought this was going to be an announcement about [http://www.blackmesasource.com](http://www.blackmesasource.com) or HL3

<comment><USER17> Maybe it's another ARG?

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> That was a joke, haha, fat chance.

</comment><comment><USER19> At first reading, I thought it was about Black Mesa [1], the Half-Life (first Valve game) remake made by the community.

[1] [http://www.blackmesasource.com/](http://www.blackmesasource.com/)</comment>


Magic Leap, which never stops raising VC money, just nabbed $461M more - <AUTHOR> https://www.fastcompany.com/40540829/magic-leap-which-never-stops-raising-vc-money-just-nabbed-461-million-more <comment><USER2> Investors must be seeing something that we ordinary peasants are missing. Has there been another company that raised so much money PRIOR to a commercial product launch ?

<comment><USER3> This is what people said about Theranos and uBeam.

When the upside is high enough, it makes sense to just throw money on it. The risk is almost infinitely high, but the reward is almost infinitely high. Or, at least in the cases of Theranos and uBeam, that was true.

Just because investors throw money at something doesn't mean that it's legit. They're gambling, they like the odds, and they have nothing to lose because they get paid either way (and this is only a tiny fraction of what they need to invest anyway).

<comment><USER4> People have been comparing magic leap to theranos for years but neglecting the major differences between the two. Magic leap will at least have a product out that does not need to meet stringent FDA guidelines. Magic leap is not being sued by its own investors (they've had separate legal issues but not that). And magic leap is not shuttering it's offices. They've revealed their product two months ago and are doing multiple public presentations in 2 weeks. It's looking more and more likely that a product is actually coming to market and that investors gave them that sum simply because it's a real product they see a future in.

<comment><USER3> I agree. My point was only that "investors are giving them money" doesn't prove anything.

<comment><USER4> While I somewhat agree, I also think that there is something to the argument that "investors have been giving them money for years". At a certain point it becomes clear that those investors are probably wiser than the armchair critics who have no insight. I'm sure those investors have heard the criticism a million times before plunking down more cash. If there were a problem the investing would have stopped years ago.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


6.01 Course Notes (MIT's intro EECS class) - <AUTHOR> http://mit.edu/6.01/mercurial/fall09/www/handouts/readings.pdf

<comment><USER2> I like the examples of 'turning' python into scheme!</comment>


L(earn) Your Dream Job. Offer Guaranteed - <AUTHOR> http://www.wunderbal.com <comment><USER2> This is _severely_ misleading. You're not guaranteed an offer - in fact it's the opposite. If you get an offer, you get your tuition back. So precisely those that are struggling to get an offer (and need education), they don't get any money back. This is a rich-get-richer sort of deal, which is unfortunate.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback. Our goal is to be extremely transparent, make education accessible and affordable, and help close the unemployment gap (especially for recent graduates and young professionals who are struggling with securing steady career-type jobs the most). So the fact that our value proposition got lost in translation means we definitely need to tighten our copy before moving forward.

The tuition kick-back is an extra incentive to motivate hungry job seekers to not only learn professional skills that are in demand and address industry gaps, but actively search for quality job offers that relate to their passions and interests on our platform as well. A common problem nowadays (and something I've experienced in the past myself) is active procrastination. Where you keep learning and learning, but never getting your hands dirty and doing anything. Our goal is to become as outcome-driven as possible.

Does that clear things up? Also, do you have any other suggestions? I'd love to send you an updated link once we tighten and clear things up.

<comment><USER2> Hey Erik, I hear you! It is clear from your website what your incentives and message are, but it was lost in the title for this post.

I think you're making a lot of heavy-handed assertions:

> _help close the unemployment gap_

is extremely different goal from

> _motivate hungry job seekers to not only learn professional skills that are > in demand and address industry gaps, but actively search for quality job > offers that relate to their passions and interests_

Can I ask - have you ever been unemployed? As in, for more than a day? And against your will? If you have, than you can empathize with how utterly terrifying it is to be jobless - especially if you have a mortgage and kids to take care of. Which contradicts:

> _A common problem nowadays (and something I 've experienced in the past > myself) is active procrastination. Where you keep learning and learning, but > never getting your hands dirty and doing anything._

Who is actively procrastinating while recently unemployed or underemployed? I can't see that being a realistic scenario. Now throw them into a society which has completely uplifted an entire industry (industrial manufacturing) that they were trained for, and expect them to _learn professional skills that are in demand_. How do you expect a GE factory worker of 25 years to just magically gain the confidence to tackle machine learning?

Your endeavor is noble. Your incentives are flawed. People are indeed clamoring for jobs. People are further attracted to hot fields like tech for their lucrative salaries, and they are understaffed in places like the United States. But come on - if I spent $500 or even $5000 and got a job, I'm not only getting my $500/$5000 back, but I'm getting a $80k job too, while the failing factory worker throws down $500 and no job, is now purely $500 in the hole.

I just don't see that as an ethical incentive, and I would strongly consider talking to your customers to understand and empathize with the situations they are in and how they arrived where they were, and what they need to do to get to the next step, particularly if you believe your customers are those who are trying to get themselves out of unemployment.

<comment><AUTHOR> I completely empathize (first-hand experience myself), hence the reason I'm personally tackling these massive problems head-on. Thanks for the new perspective, it always helps to get out of your own head and view things from a fresh set of lenses.

I'm actually working through problem/solution fit as we speak and after looking over my notes from roughly 200 customer development interviews and surveys (mostly with college students and recent graduates), I've uncovered some trends that mirror your points. When you're actively job hunting, more often than not money is tight. And by no means will I allow money to be a barrier to entry for motivated job seekers.

So get your popcorn ready, because I will pull this off.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Perhaps I am missing it, but I am not seeing any list of exactly what courses are being offered.

<comment><AUTHOR> We haven't publically released our course catalogue to the masses quite yet. That said, are there any skills you (or your employer) would like to learn? We're still putting the final touches on everything.</comment></comment>


Show HN: My first portfolio site and blog - <AUTHOR> http://chinmaya.pythonanywhere.com/ I have recently started learning Django. After completing the awesome Django tutorial, this was the first app I built. It's freely hosted on Pythonanywhere. <comment><USER2> Even if English is not his first language, one would think that he could use a basic spellcheck tool against his self-promoted page. ("Competititve"?)

<comment><USER3> How charming. The friendly version would've been "check your spelling".

On topic: I know it is a thing to link resume pdfs as gdrive view links, but I don't like it. If my browser can handle Googles UI without distracting delay, it could've handled the pure pdf equally well.</comment></comment>


Powering a Mainframe - <AUTHOR> https://blog.mainframe.dev/2019/07/powering-mainframe.html <comment><USER2> I hate big power. When I was an IBM engineer, power into the computer room was a big deal. Big diesel generators feeding into the main switchboard along with redundant mains connections.

One incident I remember is when an electrician was working on one of the power feeds while it was live. Foolish, but the kind of thing people did when getting approval to shut off power was a bureaucratic nightmare.

The sparky was tightening down a bolt on one of the phases with a big crescent spanner when he inadvertantly made contact with another phase.

There was a flash that lit up the room and a loud bang. His crescent spanner literally melted in the middle. Incredibly he was uninjured, although he did take the whole room down, which was an extremely serious matter.

Modern computers that plug into the wall socket are much more pleasant to work on.

<comment><USER3> Nice, my favorite big power story was a technician who was bringing up the next set of "rows" in a very large web scale data center.

One component of that task was running thousands of feet of CAT-6e cable. Of course you want to be sure your spool of CAT-6e cable has no wire breaks in it before you start using it[1] to wire up racks so there was a step that involved putting a connector on the stub of cable that was inside the reel, and a connector on the end of the cable that came off the reel, and then hooking up an instrument between them to measure the resistance/propagation/etc.

It is convenient to work at waist height for this, so our hapless technician had the cable spool put on a convenient big square brick like metal structure outside the building. He added the connectors, hooked up the tester, and the tester exploded. (well not completely but it did experience some rapid unplanned disassembly due to a large number of capacitors suddenly not existing.

The "brick like structure" that the technician was using as a table top happened to be one of the transformers that was converting high voltage down to 440V 3-phase for the data center. When he effectively shorted the cable loop with his tester he air coupled into the field around the transformer and put > 400V into the tester. Whoops!

[1] tracking down a bad network cable is not a lot of fun.

<comment><USER4> With that much power floating around, I would have expected the transformer to have better shielding/warnings. Or is that not practical?

<comment><USER3> It had the required shielding and warnings about opening the box. That said, the spool of cable was likely 2500' of CAT-6e cable. In the root cause analysis it was estimated the voltage potential on the cable was between 210 and 280V and the current levels could have reached 500mA (a bit more than 100W of 'leakage'). That was well outside the what the test gear was "expecting" from a cable that it was testing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> If anyone is in Victoria, Australia and wants to play with an IBM z9 mainframe, i picked one up for about $500 and although I've managed to power and boot it, i haven't managed to load zOS on it properly. Got some time to spend on it and would love it if anyone else is interested in experimenting/getting it up and running. I also bought the relevant storage array (but no disks). Unfortunately that takes up a heap of space and I'm looking to offload it, it's free if anyone wants it, otherwise ill probably have to scrap it :(

I usually lurk here but feel free to reach out via twitter (same username)

</comment><comment><USER6> I've seen those "support element" laptops hanging off of racks before, but I always assumed that in this case (IBM mainframe, IBM support element, vertical integration) they were not laptops as such, but rather thin clients in the most literal sense: just IO interfaces with a ribbon cable feeding back to the mainframe, where the framebuffer of the mainframe's dom0/maintenance VM was pushed over VGA and keyboard+mouse+peripherals were returned over USB. Essentially as if the support element were a Thunderbolt Display with USB HID devices plugged into it. Like a modern VT100!

I'm honestly surprised to learn that I'm wrong, as having the laptop be a real laptop would introduce all sorts of headaches compared to having the laptop be a dumb terminal—it'd have active components like disks and fans that could to burn out (and not be hot-swappable like the server's own components are); and more importantly, it'd have to talk to the server using some form of network interface (unless it's just a glorified glass terminal for a USB-serial adapter.) In which case, bad behaviour on the server—exactly the case where you need a local admin console—could block or steal resources from your connection attempt. You may as well just be SSHing into the dom0 from across the room over the SBC VLAN at that point.

<comment><USER7> Support element has to be more or less full-blown computer as the mainframe itself does not have any real firmware to boot^H^H^H^HIPL itself. Before support elements the IPL process involved initalizing various things by toggling switches on the console.

Also why the mainframe would even have a framebuffer?

Providing a console interface (ie. 3270 terminal emulator) to whatever OS runs on the mainframe is only small part of what SE does.

<comment><USER8> > _real firmware to boot^H^H^H^HIPL itself._

Have you considered using ^W?

<comment><USER9> Just a word of caution for anyone reading this. I highly discourage anyone from actually learning ^w. I learned it, then had to forcefully un-learn it when I kept accidentally closing tabs on my browser, other people's browsers, my file manager, etc. etc. ad nauseam. Don't make the same mistake I did, just press backspace a lot. I know life is short but the sudden rage of having unexpectedly closed a tab is just not worth the added efficiency. I am passionate about this subject; however, I mean no disrespect for those who have (somehow) managed to use ^w productively.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I like seeing posts like this showing that there is still interest in operating with mainframes and bare-metal servers these days.

My biggest fear is that you are in the minority of developers that can single- handedly operate one in the age of buzzword-ridden lingo such as AWS, GCP, Heroku, etc which forces a dogma to run rampant in our industry to host all of your startup/company only on other peoples's servers rather than to setup up your own in-house bare-metal servers instead.

So I am very impressed to see this, as an added bonus it is a mainframe. Please post more of this.

<comment><USER11> It's not about clouds. The problem is with mainframe manufacturers. Their prices are ridiculous, so no sane man with limited budgets would buy it. I can build incredible powerful server from a desktop or workstation components for a few thousand dollars. Probably can reduce it to hundreds with using old parts. I can increase price to x2 and buy some HP or Dell blade and that would be real server hardware. But nobody is going to increase price to x100 and buy mainframe. That's just too much.

<comment><USER12> IBM is dead until it gets a mainframe in AWS region data centers. Mainframe is still king of CA in CAP.

<comment><USER13> Last time I checked IBM was alive and doing well.

<comment><USER14> They've been in a 10+ year turnaround. "Doing well" is debatable.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is a fascinating bit of nerdery. Would someone be willing to explain what mainframes are used for in a modern context, and how they compare to a really high-capacity x86 machine? I know that one difference is that you can hot-swap pretty much any component on a mainframe, but would be very curious to learn more about these beasts.

<comment><USER6> A "really high-capacity x86 machine" is really just a machine with a lot of CPUs and memory. It _is not_ a machine that can feed each one of those CPUs, or DMA to each one of those memories, from separate network or disk IO sources, all at once. Basically, there's only one PCI-e bus, and it's a bottleneck. That's why, for IO-intensive operations like search indexing, you don't scale x86 vertically, but rather horizontally, with map-reduce strategies: you need each core and each DIMM of memory to have a commensurate IO bandwidth available to it. And that's also why a 64-vCPU VM on shared hosting will always underperform a 64-core dedicated instance from the same provider: with the dedicated single-tenant host machine, you're not fighting over an "oversubscribed" PCI-e bus.

Mainframes are built differently, such that each CPU and NUMA zone of memory has its own (virtual) private bus to its own (dynamically) dedicated IO peripherals—it's like a little circuit-switched network with CPUs "placing calls" to peripherals. And, because of this, mainframes _do_ let you just scale your problem vertically, without IO bandwidth limitations ever getting in the way. They function less like like one computer, and more like a Mosix cluster that all happens to be running on a common backplane. But, unlike Mosix and its ilk, the DC only sees one SNMP node with one set of traps, and the whole thing provides hotswap robustness against itself rather than that robustness being partitioned per machine.

<comment><USER16> The other day I described a modern mainframe as something that resembles a cluster where CPUs are connected through very high-speed low-latency buses (to the point they can behave like a single-image NUMA machine or be partitioned into multiple smaller ones) connected to multiple networks of specialized computers each running their own tiny specialized OSs that manage IO over different buses. It's common for them to have hundreds of PCI-e buses (and cards connected to storage, communications, other mainframes - for failover or clustering - etc).

An x86 server is a computer built around its CPU. A mainframe is a computer built around its buses.

<comment><USER17> "Single system image" is a real approach to clustering, if a bit of an experimental one. There used to be a variety of toolsets attempting to provide this functionality under Linux (e.g. OpenMosix, OpenSSI) but they all seem to have bitrotted by now.

<comment><USER16> I almost forgot about those. I'll have to re-read a couple papers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I looked at the author's previous post where he details the process of buying the thing. A fair amount of it goes over my head, I must admit. But that final price tag.... You've gotta really love mainframes. I can't imagine the utility bills for it. The power usage was _reduced_ to 1.7kW. I guess some people buy a sports car and some buy a mainframe. Personally, I'd never be able to drop that kind of money for a hobby. I think emulating a mainframe on a fancy PC would scratch my itch. But to each their own.

<comment><USER19> If you asked me how much I thought 700kg of computer should cost, I probably would have guessed more than $12k. Is this thing modern? Specs don't seem too impressive but I don't know anything about these things.

<comment><USER20> In a previous post he said it's 8 years old

<comment> yjftsjthsd-h I was about to think that was old, but then I remembered that mainframes, as I understand it, can aim for decade+ uptime, so that might actually be reasonably fresh?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Interesting it runs straight off normal 3phase mains - the only mainframe I worked (a bit ) on was a small Unisys one and it had its own 400v supply as part of the set up.

<comment><USER22> 400 V is normal 3 phase mains in about 85 % of the world, but whether consumers have 3 phases available or get 1 or 2 phases varies.

<comment><USER21> Ah yes I should have been specific I should have said a 400v DC.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I was a former mechanical maintenance tech for an auto manufacturer, so this story feels familiar to connecting a CNC lathe, or a multi-axis mill, but reading this guys ham-fisted accounts made me pretty livid..

>The datacenter staff, not needing a forklift in their day-to-day, had managed to solicit the services of a forklift, the associated operator, and some very handy folks to help navigate the mainframe from the storage space to its final location.

Since this thing can approach the cost of a rolls-royce,and weighs half as much as a prius, movers and millwrights should have been called in. watching two chubby guys in tennis shoes and no gloves move a 700 kilo server in reverse would have given me a heart attack.

> The various guides did hint towards how the phases are connected to various > Bulk Power Regulators (BPR) but nothing was very definite.

that should have been your clue to hire an electrician. there is no such thing as a bulk power regulator. this is a BUCK POWER REGULATOR.

>I tried to do my best to construct a power cable

Make sure you tell your building supervisor and the fire brigade you "tried your best." there is no "tried your best" section in the electrical code. You either construct a cable to spec, or not.

>Now, I assumed that given there is no neutral it has to be a delta system

Since youre handling voltages that can kill you, perhaps a meter?

>The uncertainty was which phase-pair powered the lowest BPR? I guessed A-B

OR your BPR explodes, your HV breaker trips, and you wipe out power for half the building. Christ on his throne.

<comment><USER24> > there is no such thing as a bulk power regulator. this is a BUCK POWER > REGULATOR

No, in IBM mainframes, the rack component that takes the mains AC and starts doing something with it is, indeed, called a "bulk power regulator". For example, IBM part number 6186-7040, "Bulk Power Regulator".

> that should have been your clue to hire an electrician

Note in the article he did say "I confirmed the wiring scheme with some friends I have that do the power installations at Dreamhack, and even had them do the wiring as they have all the qualifications needed to do so safely and legally."

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I'd love to play with one as well and look forward to the later posts in this series.

There has been a lot of mainframe related posts on HN lately.

<comment><USER26> You could download the Hercules emulator and either a very old legal copy of MVS, or a not-legal torrent of z/OS.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> TL;DR put it where you want it and plug it into a 3-phase outlet.*

*which slightly more complicated in Europe.

<comment><USER28> Why? It shouldn't be. They use 3-phase in Europe just like in the US, for industrial locations. The differences in residential or lower-voltage standards really have nothing to do with industrial power availability.

<comment><USER27> The author described some shenanigans he had to go through when wiring the power cord to get the power supplies (which expected voltage that is typical in the US) to run right. In the US it would have been a simple matter of using a power cord in the standard configuration and plugging it into the wall.

<comment><USER28> Looking closely at the photo of the power supply in the article, it looks like it's quite flexible and can handle different voltages, as long as they're 3-phase. It even lists different amp draws for the different voltage levels. In addition, it looks like it can handle 380-570V DC. With today's switching power supply technology, it's not hard to make them able to accept widely differing input voltages, so this is commonly done so you only need one part to cover the entire worldwide market. It looks to me like you can just plug this thing into any 3-phase power you want really.

As for a "standard configuration" in the US, there really isn't such a thing for 3-phase power. There are a few NEMA standards used in industrial applications, but a lot of times, things like that are hard-wired. This isn't a home appliance.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Way to Get Laid Off - <AUTHOR> No judgement here. Just want to get laid off from my company as quickly as possible. <comment><USER2> Explain why it would cost more money to keep you than it would to have you stay.

For example, you make $100 doing the work that a $40 person could do. Plus, your bonus is 20% of your salary and comes due in 4 months. Then, performance reviews are coming and if your annual adjustment kicks in, based on performance, your cost is only going up. Additionally, you've been in role for 3 years and are looking for a path to the next level, because you've topped out in your role and pay grade. Also, if you're aware of any impending headwinds, site the mutual.benefit of said solution (cash flow is tight, the last several quarters were soft, etc.)

Do all the math and then ask if there's a better way to part on good terms, at a specified time, for an agreed upon rate. However, before having a conversation like that, realize it might just be the fast track to getting fired.

</comment><comment><USER3> That's not... really how it works.

You can succeed in getting yourself fired, but laid off has more to do with overall company situation and very little to do with you.

I guess if you think a layoff is coming, try to get reassigned to a project that's clearly failing and likely to get cut?

Honestly, if you're asking this question you should stop wasting your time and just quit. There's plenty of opportunity out there.

<comment><USER4> That can be how it works. I know someone who engineered their own layoff, by asking for it, to get a year's salary and tax benefits of doing so. It is possible but it depends on a lot of factors.

If you live in SV and the next job is paying crazy money it might not be worth it, as hanging around trying to get a payout is an opportunity cost. But in some circumstances it is worth considering.

<comment><USER5> So then the OP should ask.

I think they will find the company situation does matter, as does their relationship with them.

The only voluntary layoffs I have seen was when the company was already committed to doing some layoffs.

Generally this is not a thing you get to choose nor something you can engineer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> To get laid off and not fired the company usually has to be performing badly and closing offices, downsizing or something along those lines. For you to be laid off you personally have to be seen expendable in whatever spreadsheet the higher ups are looking at.

Getting fired is much easier, but depending on where and how you get fired there could be some lost benefits like holiday pay, long service leave, etc.

</comment><comment><USER7> If there's a layoff coming, usually they have a target number of people (or total salary) that they want to get rid of. The staff doesn't really enjoy having to pick who will lose their job. You can go to your boss and say "Hey, I hear that layoffs are coming. If so, you can feel free to pick me to be one of the ones laid off. I'll be fine with it." This gives management one less hard decision to have to make.

</comment><comment><USER8> As has been mentioned before, that's not how it works. Your desire to be laid off is (often) an incentive for the company to keep you on. Eventually, you'll tire of waiting and do the reasonably thing (financially speaking, from the company's perspective) and resign.

If you're unhappy, develop your exit strategy. Do not dally, do not add to your discontent, do not make your own life more miserable in hopes of some payout, or favorable employment status, or some sort of guilt free closure. Go for what you want and accept the consequences.

FYI - mainly sharing based on my personal experiences. I do not know your situation nor the source of your desire...

</comment><comment><USER9> You should just resign. If you really want to do this, I'm sure there are ways and means but at the expense of your reputation, references and professional contacts.

<comment><USER10> They want unemployment obviously.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Do you specifically want to get laid off?

</comment><comment><USER12> Have a good relationship with your MD/GM and ask them.</comment>


A better way to convert dog years to human years, scientists say - <AUTHOR> https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/11/here-s-better-way-convert-dog-years-human-years-scientists-say?rss=1 <comment><USER2> That doesn't really work though. According to the calculator, 74 dog years is ~100 human years. There are plenty of humans who are 100+ years old, but there are no dogs that are anywhere even close to 74 years old. The longest lived dog known died at 29.</comment>


Recovery.Gov -- tracking "how and where we spend taxpayer dollars". - <AUTHOR> http://recovery.gov/ <comment><USER2> I hope they get detailed on spending. I always hated it when "modernization" of schools and hospitals means using a $2000 LCD to display the lunch menu.

<comment><USER3> Or buying entire sets of computers...usually from Dell.

I mean, Dell's fine, but seriously, it's not like they're going to dealcatcher to find the PCs for cheap. They get them cheap _er_ than "official" retail price, at a bulk order price.

And then with a new set of computers, elementary schools don't know what to do next. Word process and web browse...

Oh well.

<comment><USER4> "I mean, Dell's fine, but seriously, it's not like they're going to dealcatcher to find the PCs for cheap. They get them cheaper than "official" retail price, at a bulk order price."

I used to know a guy who did IT work, and he explained why his place always bought Dells. If he ordered 100 Dell Foo2000 boxen, he knew they would all have the same video card, same motherboard, same hardware top to bottom.

This meant one could roll out new software or upgrades and not be stymied when this machine behaved differently from that because of weird subtle driver issues on different hardware.

I don't know if this is still true (or really if it was ever true) but it seemed a good way to reduce overall maintenance issues.

<comment><USER5> Right. It has nothing to do with a company not bothering to go to some discount code site -- the point is that a large enterprise has different needs from some guy buying a computer to put in his den.

There's a reason Dell has different product lines for consumers and businesses, and that businesses buy the latter despite the higher price. To sell consumer PCs so cheaply, Dell has to use the cheapest hardware available at the time of manufacture. (Also, they have to agree to install various crapware from EarthLink and AOL and Real Networks, but that's another story.) This means that the hardware used in the consumer products changes frequently, and that it's not necessarily the highest quality or of the best-known brand. The business lines, like OptiPlex, have longer lifecycles and use more reputable, name-brand components.

For a consumer, price is the most important factor, so the home product is fine. But in an enterprise, those savings would be quickly wiped out by administrative overhead and perhaps worse reliability. A decent IT department tests new software on every hardware/OS configuration on which it will be used prior to deployment, and they'll have a standardized desktop build process based on a cloning product (e.g. Ghost), Remote Installation Service, or something similar. Good luck doing those things if you have 287 different hardware configurations in your environment, or if your computers have some off-brand NIC that doesn't support PXE booting, etc.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> When did the .GOV namespace become a wide open frontier for politicking? recovery.gov as a name flies directly in the face of the rules and suggestions for .gov, being a general and vague word. Although I will admit, its not nearly as bad as change.gov, featuring the phony Office of the President Elect nonsense.

It is also a political opinion statement, with the implicit assumptions that recovery is needed from something, and that the government should do it.

Why can't the BLS or Treasury or anything else host a website to explain this stuff? Or why not go one step further and create a US Economics website to teach people economics and track and explain current US statistics?

And don't even get me started on the new whitehouse.gov.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> From the HTML source:

http://WhiteHouse.gov...](http://WhiteHouse.gov);

http://USA.gov
](http://USA.gov);

Whoops.

<comment><USER7> Yeah, I'd have to say this one's a little less exciting web-design-wise than whitehouse.gov. Body text as img, and two people that were maybe a little overly proud of their accomplishment in the source.

(not that my html & css skillz are so hot either, but...)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Man, I wish I knew what our government was really spending those insanely high tax rates on. Plus, the economic downturn is sending governments across Europe on spending sprees that I fear I'll be paying for for the rest of my life. (oh and that state pension I have to pay into? Yeah, doubt I'll ever be seeing any of that)

<comment><USER9> Mostly, it's interest on debt plus SS / Medicare / Medicare which moves money around but are not direct spending. ~68% of what's left is Military spending.

<http://www.wallstats.com/deathandtaxes/> is a good place to start for the US Federal budget, but that's just the major branches I don't know of a good breakdown for say the number of LCD's the government buys. The picture on the bottom right is a good summary.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Looks interesting that we might have an opportunity of transparency in government.

</comment><comment><USER11> I get the feeling that this will get killed...

Why don't they get Community Wizard back?</comment>


Big Data Is Nudging You to Buy - <AUTHOR> https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/consumed/201608/big-data-is-nudging-you <comment><USER2> This is hardly new stuff, but it was a good article nonetheless.

Seen similar things with sales on old-ish products happen in stores where I live. "30% Sales on all our ( insert brand here ) products for a limited time!!!" And then they just blatantly and shamelessly leave those prices as they are even after the "sale" ends.

Not sure why such advertisement is allowed and why people aren't more outraged, but eh.

<comment><AUTHOR> The part about calling you up when it was clear you wanted to give them your info was what really concerned me. It's an easy way to scare your customers away.

As he said, the creep factor was high. If you were to do something like that it should be clear that your information is being captured or give you the ability to opt out right next to your phone number. That would still be a LinkedIn like deceitful UX experience but slightly better.</comment></comment>


IBM Watson in Setback for Artificial Intelligence in Medicine - <AUTHOR> https://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2017/02/19/md-anderson-benches-ibm-watson-in-setback-for-artificial-intelligence-in-medicine/ <comment><USER2> The consensus seems to be that failure was inevitable given the mis-management and non-understanding of the entire project. Stake-holders not on board, no decent data to work on, requirements changes, and more.

There was some discussion 5 days ago:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13683360](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13683360) (9 comments)

And just _so_ many other submissions:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13699403](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13699403) (2 comments)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13693523](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13693523) (1 comment)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13683910](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13683910) (1 comment)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13731098](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13731098)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13695799](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13695799)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13694788](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13694788)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13689483](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13689483)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13687982](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13687982)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13686861](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13686861)</comment>


Namecoin: distributed domain registration system based on Bitcoin - <AUTHOR> http://namecoin.bitcoin-contact.org/

<comment><USER2> This was submitted 12 days ago (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2546815>)

I'm so thrilled that instead of reading almost identical bitcoin stories I can now read actually identical bitcoin stories.

At this point I'm almost hoping everyone who uses bitcoin gets picked up by the IRS for tax evasion just so no one will submit any more stories to HN.

<comment><USER3> There once was a bot which caught the reposts and commented on them.

But it was so offensive to have the reposts mentioned that the author shut it down, and perhaps even left HN. I haven't seen him around for a long time.

<comment><USER2> That was RiderOfGiraffes. He left a while ago for greener pastures. To be honest, my comment is probably one he would have objected to and I'm personally surprised at all the upvotes it has gotten. I think it reflects that there is an extremely vocal minority of people who care about Bitcoin and a lot of people don't care and just want them to take it somewhere else.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This text uses language I've seen a lot in discussion around Bitcoin:

>It allows you to ... be the only person to be able to modify it (no possible external control)

Using the cryptographic algorithms believed to be the best does not make bad things impossible, for three reasons:

1\. Encryption is rarely the weakest point in security. How do the authors of Namecoin know that I won't manage my keys incompetently if I use their software?

2\. We don't know what unknown flaws there are in our most trusted algorithms. The worst flaws in RSA were discovered a long time after the algorithm were made public; perhaps we will find worse flaws in AES quite soon.

3\. Moore's law tells us that keys have a lifetime. The Bitcoin reaction to this and other protocol problems involves something based on network majority consent. This does not sound safe to me.

I know that anyone who uses such language as "no possible external control" is either ignorant or careless. Even careless bothers me.

</comment><comment><USER5> Brilliant. This is an equally useful application of the block chain concept as the Bitcoin currency, and should be much less controversial.

<comment><USER6> Maybe but things like domain squatting and the inability to shut down domains pointing to illegal or controversial sites is likely to be quite controversial.

<comment><USER7> I think the inability to shut down domains is the main point. (And quite a good one, in my opinion.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's funny how the word "coin" in that name is essentially used to refer to this distributed computational process whose purpose it is to get people to agree on some version of the state of things (i.e. what is "real").

Next thing you know, kids in 2050 refer to _reality_ as some sort of "heavily coined world".

</comment><comment> X-Istence So does this mean that to keep a domain I have to keep running the namecoin service thereby using up CPU time that could be better spent serving requests from users?

<comment><USER9> Not really. It's bitcoin-like, so "the network" of miners would collaboratively re-enforce your control of your domains. You'd only need to use up CPU (/GPU) time to _create_ new name coins for free - you could also purchase them from people who had mined them previously, and hadn't used them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Despite people likely being able to break this 50 years in the future, I am willing to bet that ICE couldn't sieze a .bit domain right now.

</comment><comment><USER11> Has anyone setup a .bit proxy yet so I can browse them without setting it up?

<comment><USER12> bitname.org

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Can't resolve any of those. Not on my Internets.

</comment><comment><USER14> If you ignore it, it will disappear.</comment>


Dr Alex Karp of Palantir Meeting Donald Trump - <AUTHOR> http://boingboing.net/2016/12/14/trump-meets-with-tech-elite-fr.html <comment><AUTHOR> He's not named but you can see him sitting beside Eric Schmidt. Why have Palantir been elevated to sit at the top table when Thiel's already there?</comment>