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OpenTracing and OpenCensus are merging into OpenTelemetry - manigandham
https://medium.com/opentracing/a-roadmap-to-convergence-b074e5815289
======
shaunpersad
I've used OpenTracing before with good results. Though at the time, 3rd party
support (like DataDog etc.) was lacking, and we didn't really want to host our
own Jaeger install.
I didn't know OpenCensus was a thing, but I hope this merger means that
adoption spreads. A lot of cloud providers provide their own tracing, and it
would be nice if they were all compatible.
------
Ramiro
This is great news! I do hope they had kept the Open Tracing name though,
instead of introducing a 3rd name to the mix.
------
tedsuo
Hi all! Author here; happy to answer any questions about the OpenTelemetry
merger.
~~~
nvartolomei
I don’t see C++ support mentioned, any particular reason it is ignored?
~~~
tedsuo
It's getting started soon: [https://github.com/open-
telemetry/community/blob/master/comm...](https://github.com/open-
telemetry/community/blob/master/community-members.md#c)
We have a very performant prototype!
One usde case I am excited about: taking the OpenTelemetry C++ SDK, and
binding it to the OpenTelemetry interfaces in other languages, such as Ruby
and Python.
Some runtimes may see a performance boost by running the observability code
independently from the GIL, GC, etc.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Where are the Wakemate reviews? - adelevie
I am so close to buying a Wakemate. I'm completely sold on the concept and it presents a compelling value proposition: sleep better, without taking meds, for $50.<p>However, I can't seem to find any actual hands-on reviews of the device. The website says the first devices shipped in January. Has anyone here used a Wakemate? Would you care to enlighten me about your experiences with it?
======
johnswamps
As far as I know it hasn't shipped. I pre-ordered it last year when it was
scheduled to ship at the end of January. They then delayed that and said Q1
2010. It still says that and they still haven't shipped. They made a post last
week on their facebook page saying they would tell us shipping details soon,
but haven't said anything since then.
~~~
adelevie
I hope it's not vaporware!
------
weaksauce
I got an email on March 11'th saying that they were shipping out the first
ones in March. I haven't heard anything since.
_Sorry for the radio silence ? we have some good news: the first run of units
will go out in March! We do not know how large the run will be right now, but
it will not fulfill all of the pre-orders. We'll let you know if you're in the
first batch as soon as we can. Thanks for your continued patience and interest
in WakeMate; we can't wait to show you what we've made!_
------
gnemeth
Hey Guys,
Greg from WakeMate here - Because we have not publicly shipped any units yet,
there are no reviews of units just yet. We will be shipping out the first
units at the end of the month so you should be seeing some reviews soon. More
detailed information will be posted to our website and blog.
------
rradu
Here's the TC article from that January delay:
<http://techcrunch.com/2010/01/23/wakemate-delay/>
Have you emailed them? [email protected]
~~~
adelevie
Haven't emailed them. I'm less worried about being the first to get one. I
want to let the early adopters figure out whether this thing is legit and then
I'll make my decision. I really hope it's the real deal.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Microsoft joins preemptive patent protection program - grellas
http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2011/06/microsoft-joins-pre-emptive-patent-protection-program.ars
======
dodo53
That is such a cool scheme. I'm glad somebody is actively seeking to
invalidate bogus patents. I'm not sure how they're getting money - is they
idea that people that join up donate to the cash pool they use to reward
people who find prior art on existing patents?
Also it doesn't go quite as far as I'd like - it reduces the incentive to
lodge bogus patents (as hopefully they'll stand for less time), but I'd still
like their to some level of penalty to the originator when bogus patents are
overturned (but that's a law change - somebody pointed out on a previous
thread apparently Texas now has a law penalizing people that bring frivolous
suits - not quite the same as filing for frivolous patents, but I still like
it).
Edit: ah, followed links to [http://arstechnica.com/tech-
policy/news/2008/11/startup-crow...](http://arstechnica.com/tech-
policy/news/2008/11/startup-crowdsources-patent-vetting-for-profit.ars)
Apparently they take research requests from clients, presumably for money. Not
quite as cool as I hoped - cost might still be out of realm of startup
defence. Also - Article One Partners applied for a patent for their system of
crowdsourcing patent invalidation :o)
~~~
rlpb
I'm not convinced that a penalty makes sense. It's not really the inventor's
fault for filing an obvious patent or one with prior art; it's the patent
office's fault for approving it.
------
bad_user
So it's OK for them to threaten others, but not OK when others come after
them.
~~~
TruthElixirX
The way the game is set up now it encourages people to go after one another,
even if they don't want to. Maybe Microsoft has decided that the best courses
of action rank as follows:
Go after no one under a new system.
Go after everyone under the current system.
Go after no one under the current system.
Currently only options 2 and 3 are available, but they would like to move to
option number one and this is their first step in making that a reality.
I don't know that is what they are doing, just saying...
~~~
bad_user
Considering how they are ripping off Android phone makers, I'd say this is
wishful thinking.
The way the game is set up now it encourages
people to go after one another
In what way are companies encouraged to do this? In what way was HTC a threat
to their "intellectual property"? Was it a threat in the sense that they can't
compete with Android in a free market?
Really, this is outstandingly hypocritical of them.
------
lurker19
Remember BountyQuest?
Everything old is new again. Has it been 10 years already?
<http://oreilly.com/news/patent_archive.html>
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
From encryption to darknets: As governments snoop, activists fight back - duck
http://arstechnica.com/business/the-networked-society/2012/02/from-encryption-to-darknets-as-governments-snoop-activists-fight-back.ars
======
CWuestefeld
_governments ... are actively trying to find out what is being said and
transmitted over their airwaves and networks._
Ahem... _their_ airwaves and networks? Perhaps part of the problem here is
that the governments believe that they own these communications channels. But
the airwaves and networks are like the seas and the atmosphere: some of it
happens to fall within a government's borders, but it's impossible to "own"
them.
~~~
stinkytaco
_They_ don't own them, but a compelling argument could be made that _we_ do.
We "own" the airwaves and networks because they traverse our property, either
personnel or collective. We use our agents -- the government -- to negotiate
on our behalf for the network's physical location and maintenance (through
right-of-way agreements or leasing of spectrum) and we expect that they are
run with the public interest in mind (free over the air programming, required
news broadcasts, etc.).
This is the reason it _infuriates_ me when telecoms start talking about the
"free market". There's nothing free about it, they are using public
thoroughfare and public airwaves to make money, essentially a state sponsored
monopoly. Their job is to operate in the public's interest.
~~~
CWuestefeld
_We "own" the airwaves and networks because they traverse our property, ... We
use our agents -- the government -- to negotiate on our behalf_
Our current conception of property rights does not recognize any ownership of
these resources. This is very similar to resources such as the atmosphere; and
rivers, lakes, and oceans. All these things are subject to "tragedy of the
commons" issues, as well as market failures due to externalized costs.
You're right that there's nothing free about the market in communications
spectrum. Because there is no recognized ownership, we must rely, as you note,
on the stewardship by our governmental agencies.
The problem with this, of course, is the inherent inefficiencies of
centralized control, as well as the errors created as a result of public
choice economics.
The Coase Theorem [1] demonstrates that if we were to recognize an ownership
interest in these resources, then we could expect that those problems could be
worked out by an actual market, where today there is none in operation.
[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coase_theorem>
~~~
wisty
> we could expect that those problems could be worked out by an actual market
Does that mean it's certain that an actual market will sort things out, or
simply that in one specific model (which is a gross simplification of how the
real world works), it's theoretically possible that these problems will be
solved?
------
tptacek
If you want a counterpoint to this, I have one:
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1690871>
The article touches on this towards the end.
~~~
etherael
Interesting perspective. If the alternative to pursuing tools in this area is
complete subjugation, perhaps some people are willing to bear the costs of
risking going against that. What use is your life if it's not really yours?
It's a position people at least ought to be able to choose for themselves.
~~~
wladimir
I think his argument is a very bad one. It starts with the usual "Adversaries
have more money and resources so it's better to just give up the fight". That
is no help unless you're already on the winning side and posturing.
While he certainly has a point that badly done circumvention tools give a
false feeling of safety, I don't think completely giving up is a solution
either.
No matter what, activists in such countries are already daring their lives
(through off-line activities). It is important to get some information out
there, through regimes' firewalls, and the only way might be through such
tools.
And only circumvention tools (such as TOR) that are public, open source, and
actively being used can be subject to scrutiny (otherwise it'd be a completely
academic exercise), which improves the security of the tools over the long
run.
Edit: Also, with the recent push for internet censorship even in western
countries it's starting to be pretty clear we need the tools here too.
~~~
tptacek
The response I hear you giving my argument sounds like the one I always hear:
"your argument is wrong because we need circumvention tools".
That's fallacious because our need for circumvention tools is irrelevant. You
are talking about moral imperatives and I'm talking about engineering.
The fact of the matter is, there is no way to build an assuredly secure
messaging system; every attempt to build cryptographically secured messaging
has failed, often multiple times. It isn't unlikely that every fielded
cryptographic system is broken right now, and we're just waiting to find out
how.
In the real world, resources matter. Nothing is perfect, so really we're
talking about a contest between two parties. Will the circumvention tool
authors figure out the flaws (that expose their messages, that allow attackers
to use technical flaws in their tools to mislead users into compromising
themselves, that allow attackers to easily pinpoint circumventing traffic,
&c), or inadvertently fix them by laying more countermeasures into their code?
Or will governments find those flaws first, and use them to turn the tools
against their users.
The governments we're talking --- Iran, Syria, China --- have zero scruples,
unlimited funds, and (if you're under the delusion that dictatorships have a
hard time finding technical talent or that money doesn't simply buy it like
anything else) demonstrated access to research and development skill in this
specific area.
It doesn't matter that we need these tools. I'm betting on the hostile
governments. If you think the dictatorships will win, you need to keep in mind
that the worst case _isn't_ "false sense of security". The worst case is, "run
this tool and a government computer somewhere silently puts your name on a
list".
~~~
wladimir
_I'm betting on the hostile governments._
Yes, that was very clear. I wish I could be amoral like you.
_The worst case is, "run this tool and a government computer somewhere
silently puts your name on a list"_
Not always a problem. If enough people use the tool (which will be
automatically the case as more ends up in the firewall), it's impossible to
distinguish the people that use it for serious purposes (like anti-govt
activism) or less serious purposes (like trolling anonymously or watching
porn...).
~~~
tptacek
What's amoral is recognizing that dictatorships have a structural advantage in
the contest over circumvention tool vulnerabilities but aggressively papering
over that fact because it doesn't fit a congenial narrative about geeks saving
the world.
Even circumvention tool authors --- I'm guessing I know more of them than you?
--- will tell you that's not an uncommon pathology.
~~~
wladimir
Even with a structural disadvantage it may make sense to fight back. Yes, it's
risky. But whether it's worth it, is everyone's own (moral, not engineering)
choice.
And I don't have any illusion that just geeks can "save the world", but they
can at least provide support in some areas, such as allowing journalists to
communicate with activists.
So you think the world would be a better place without any circumvention
tools?
~~~
tptacek
I think you are militantly avoiding my point. Also, it's amusing that you
think we're going to continue to discuss this after you called me "amoral".
------
bootload
_"... Security experts agree that trying to protect communications on a non-
smartphone is basically a lost cause... I think there's perhaps more anonymity
in a $20 phone. ..."_
Well they'd say that wouldn't they. Old school tradecraft: Using an 'output-
feedback mode stream cipher' (Pontifex) and a cheap phone gives you a secure
and anonymous, 1 to many messaging system. It was designed specifically for
covert 'dead-drops' communication. There are a few caveats, but it's lo-tech &
bruce reckons it works ~ <http://www.schneier.com/solitaire.html>
~~~
pyre
I'm not quite understanding this. I understand what Pontifex/Solitaire is, but
how do they fit together with the cheap phone and dead-drops?
I could see using Pontifex to encrypt text messages, but how do dead-drops fit
into this? Communicating the location of the drops? Dead-dropping the phone
with encrypted messages on it?
~~~
bootload
_"... how do they fit together with the cheap phone and dead-drops? ..."_
If you don't want anyone to know you are sending a message to another person
you encrypt a message & leave it at a specific place with a marker. I assume
you get this. But if you give a call with an an encrypted message on any phone
you potentially give the game away. With a cheap $20 phone used minimally or
once, sending a hand encrypted message using Solitaire you get anonymity and
security.
~~~
pyre
Ok. But,
1\. Where does the one-to-many part come in?
2\. Is there any reason other than plausible deniability to use a cheap
cellphone vs. anything else (piece of paper, memory card, etc)?
------
kijin
> _until late last year, no Android phone offered full-disk encryption._
AFAIK full-disk encryption offers the best protection against offline attacks.
How much good would it do in a mobile phone that is almost always turned on?
~~~
moxie
You have to combine it with online access control protection:
<http://www.whispersys.com/screenlock.html>
But it also makes a data wipe easier to do securely, and gives you an
additional last minute option when you see trouble coming (just turn your
phone off).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
$153,161.25 for a Snake Bite - Keverw
https://twitter.com/mcpheeceo/status/622179748685283328
======
naner
This same topic has 14k comments on reddit. Here is one of the attempts at
explanation by a physician:
[https://np.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/3dngld/this_is_the_cos...](https://np.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/3dngld/this_is_the_cost_of_a_rattlesnake_bite_in_america/ct71jme)
------
ryguytilidie
This is the biggest problem I have with Obamacare. Getting everyone insurance
isn't that impressive if the insured still have bills like this. Why not cut
out the middleman, reduce the waste of giving insurance companies tons of
money, and just make healthcare free?
~~~
notjimhalpert
In other nations, universal health care is actually cheaper for the state per
capita than our system in the US.
Source: [http://www-tc.pbs.org/prod-
media/newshour/photos/2012/10/02/...](http://www-tc.pbs.org/prod-
media/newshour/photos/2012/10/02/US_spends_much_more_on_health_than_what_might_be_expected_1_slideshow.jpg)
~~~
Veratyr
The US actually has higher per capita spending on healthcare and
pharmaceuticals than any other OECD nation and public expenditure is only
higher in the Netherlands and Norway.
Source:
[http://www.compareyourcountry.org/health?cr=oecd&cr1=oecd&lg...](http://www.compareyourcountry.org/health?cr=oecd&cr1=oecd&lg=en&page=2)
------
antonius
The possibility of becoming poor and/or bankrupt as a result of an injury is
the scariest part of being part of the American society. Hope this changes one
day.
~~~
slickwilli
Seems better than dying :/
~~~
jschwartzi
Given what a bankruptcy can do to your credit and job prospects, I might
seriously consider dying instead.
------
leighmcculloch
US health bills seem extraordinarily high, maybe 5x in comparison to other
first world countries. Why is this?
~~~
foolrush
Unfettered, for-profit medical system.
In short, capitalism.
The same toxic structure is at work in the US penal system.
~~~
maxharris
_Unfettered_
Are you for real? Nearly every aspect of medicine in America is regulated:
from the number of people entering training to become new doctors, to whether
a procedure will be reimbursed and at what rate, to what devices and drugs
will be permitted for sale, to whether or not physicians are allowed to
unionize, or discuss what their procedures cost (they are not in either case).
Whatever your ideology is, it doesn't change the fact that the health care is
one of the most heavily regulated industries in our economy.
~~~
foolrush
Unfettered in the capitalist sense and over-arching system, not necessarily
administration thereof. Also remember that it is precisely unfettered
capitalism that leads to layers of said administration, seeking profit at
every turn.
Turning over a few rocks and we can quickly see that the cost of
administration of medicine, including devices, pharmaceuticals, etc. is also
wound up in this dance of maximal profit at all cost. This doesn't even begin
to examine the cultural role capitalism has played in the legislation the
enshrines the administrative layers to preserve profits for the corporate
entities.
The last concern under such a system is the person and their health, or the
ethical-societal implications, because such a model provides no such metric.
~~~
maxharris
Capitalism unfettered by what?
Capitalism, in pure form, is a _political_ system (this is not a typo - I did
_not_ mean to write "economic") in which a strong central government protects
the individual rights of each of its citizens (mainly by going after people
who murder, theft, fraud). A capitalist government does not regulate industry.
Despite what you say above, what we have today is not capitalism. In
healthcare in the US today, it's 80% state control, 20% private (if not
90/10).
I'm not going to comment on the rest of what you've written because the above
is a more fundamental point, and we clearly don't agree on it.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Two Startup Guys Looking for a New Roommate in SF - jasonshen
http://www.jasonshen.com/2011/two-startup-guys-look-for-a-roommate-in-sf/
======
fido
I was just about to post here looking for roommates! I have already purchased
a one-way ticket to SF for February 3rd. My plan was to use Airbnb for a few
days until I found a place, but maybe we'll hit it off??
I recently moved out of Austin, and I'm working on a cool new telephony
startup. I'll send you a message via your site.
~~~
ahemphill
"A few days" might be optimistic but I'm sure HN can help — in fact, we have
an extra room if you need a temporary spot. (Jason knows how to get in touch
with me.)
------
jayzee
It is e. e. cummings and not E. E. Cummings. As Will Arnett would say in
arrested development, 'coooome oon!'
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Guide to Low Cost, High-Impact Websites - adrianwaj
http://blog.wajsbrem.com/index.php/guide-to-low-cost-high-impact-websites/
15 tips for kickstarting your web project. Almost 40 shopping sites listed at bottom.
======
joshwa
"work with and offer equity to a development partner who already has a team,
management processes, track record and infrastructure in place. Lowers some
risks and shortens time-to-market."
Has anyone here done this? Thoughts?
------
rms
That's a hell of a list. Thank you. May the internet gods grant you good
pagerank.
------
adrianwaj
Digg took the article out of the upcoming queue...
[http://digg.com/design/How_to_kickstart_a_low_cost_but_high_...](http://digg.com/design/How_to_kickstart_a_low_cost_but_high_impact_web_site)
Kevin Rose dug it so I messaged him on Facebook and await a reply. I doubt
this could be a site bug. Has it been censored and why...
~~~
rms
I doubt it is explicit censorship, you just got buried too many times...
~~~
adrianwaj
shame - although the 'internet gods' have so far given it about 5500 page
views.
------
sammyo
Ha, inbred are we? First link I clicked at random even had PG's photo!
------
nextmoveone
Great article!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
ShellCheck: Lint for Shell Scripts - sci_c0
https://github.com/koalaman/shellcheck
======
sci_c0
A Shell syntax (well sometimes beyond that) checking utility with variety of
supported formats viz. plugins for Sublime, Atom.
Installation in Debian, Windows or through Docker.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Seeking Big A.I. Advances, a Startup Turns to a Computer Chip - ghshephard
https://fortune.com/2019/08/19/ai-artificial-intelligence-cerebras-wafer-scale-chip/
======
ghshephard
400,000 cores, 1.5 kW - that’s a big chip.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The New Hexayurts - ph0rque
http://vinay.howtolivewiki.com/blog/other/the-new-hexayurts-2044
======
blahedo
This is clever! As soon as you realise that the roof of the original hexayurt
has the footprint of a regular hexagon, you can mine the entirety of the
platonic, archimedean, and semiregular solids for anything with hex and square
faces: bam, new no-waste building structure.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Gimp doesn't properly remove image data - cyptus
https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gimp/issues/4487
======
bootloop
Works as intended I guess. If I want to manipulate color I use the brush.
BUT, when saving the picture in a file format which doesn't support alpha it
should not fall back to the color information by default but instead use white
(or grey etc.), if not defined otherwise. And I think that's what Adobe PS is
doing?
I believe that's the actual problem if there is any.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Is the Fraternity/Sorority market too niche? - deepkut
Greeks have specific needs that Facebook and other sites do not meet. CollegeACB had 900,000 hits its 2nd day, now its down.<p>Greeks are:<p>1. Predictable: If they purchase stuff for an event one year, they will the next
2. Bulk: Everything they purchase is for their entire house
3. Lucrative: At UPenn, the average budget is ~$125,000 a semester, and that's money each house MUST spend.<p>How many customers must spend that much money, in predictable ways, in bulk? So the question begs, do these pros outweigh the con, the size of the market?
======
smacktoward
Devil's advocate checking in...
> Greeks have specific needs that Facebook and other sites do not meet.
Such as?
> At UPenn, the average budget is ~$125,000 a semester, and that's money each
> house MUST spend.
Perhaps, but what fraction of that do they spend on software, social
networking or otherwise? A frat budget of $125K becomes less interesting if
they spent $110K of that on Natty Light.
> CollegeACB had 900,000 hits its 2nd day, now its down.
I'm too old to have experienced it directly in school (thank God), but from
what I can tell CollegeACB was basically an anonymous message board that got
canned when the discussions (predictably, given the "anonymous" part) took a
turn for the offensive. Another previous site that did the same thing,
JuicyCampus, also failed in much the same way.
But neither of those sound like reasonable comparators to what you're talking
about anyway, since (1) they were both targeted towards students in general
rather than just towards Greeks, and (2) they were free, whereas you're
talking about charging. So it's kind of a lose-lose comparison; if your
product is like CollegeACB and JuicyCampus, it's likely to commit suicide via
user-generated douchebaggery; if it ISN'T like them, those 900,000 hits don't
really speak to the existence of a market for what you're selling.
~~~
joshstrange
> Greeks have specific needs that Facebook and other sites do not meet.
Online recruitment tools, online bill pay tools (LOTS of money here), Online
chapter management tools (Email/SMS blasts, calendars, philanthropy hours
tracking, event planning)
> At UPenn, the average budget is ~$125,000 a semester, and that's money each
> house MUST spend. > > Perhaps, but what fraction of that do they spend on
> software, social networking or otherwise? A frat budget of $125K becomes
> less interesting if they spent $110K of that on Natty Light.
Please don't fall prey to common stereotypes, not every dollar we collect goes
to alcohol, in fact 0% of my chapters budget goes to alcohol. Also "Frat" has
negative connotation, please refer to them as Fraternities.
> CollegeACB had 900,000 hits its 2nd day, now its down.
I never had and never will support CollegeACB/JuicyCampus type websites as all
they are used for is spreading rumors and hate. Any idiot can throw up a copy-
cat website in a few hours and slap ads on it to make a few bucks.
There is plenty of money to be made marketing to Fraternities and Sororities
as most of the companies operating in this sector are are doing a horrible job
and are years behind tech-wise. I would be happy to work with anyone who wants
to write web apps for Greek's.
-Josh Strange University of Kentucky FIJI - Phi Gamma Delta
~~~
carlsednaoui
Press on!
------
pkamb
I know that these guys do a large majority of Greek payments:
<https://www.greekbill.com/>
They're universally hated, although that might be hard to avoid as a
thousands-of-dollars-per-semester bill collection service.
I think they also contract with the national organization of the fraternity,
as opposed to each chapter house. Get in the contract that each chapter MUST
use that service.
Not to mention their major technology issues... such as passing the Username
and Password in plaintext in the URL when you log in.
~~~
joshstrange
Yes and there is also BillHighway which has signed almost ALL Sororities at
the national level, OmegaFi, LegFi (Based in Lexington), and I'm sure there
are a couple other that are less popular.
They all suck, majorly, we use LegFi and simple things like "I want to get an
email when anything is charged to me" is not available and they don't store my
CC info so I have to re-enter it each time, SMS support is non-existant even
thought I wrote a standalone implementation of how it could work and offered
to add it to their system FOR FREE... I never heard back. I was hoping that at
least I could make the product suck less for my chapter but that wasn't even
an option. I would love to start my own Greek dues collection company but
can't take the time to build it out only to have to fight for scraps (As in I
would have to sell it to each chapter). Note that the golden goose is that you
get paid Yearly/Semesterly so it's the gift that keeps on giving. (We are
talking $40-$60 PER member PER year/semester). Hit me up if you are
interested.
------
joshstrange
I am Greek (FIJI at UK) and a web developer and there is a LOT of money to be
made in the market. If you are interested in talking just email me
Josh[at]JoshStrange[dot]com
~~~
carlsednaoui
Love how there are 3 Fijis in this thread (including myself)
~~~
polyfractal
Oh god, another Fiji checking in.
To contribute something of substance, my chapter was very technical
(engineering school). We had our own website, servers, email listserv, shared
google docs, etc.
However, when we visited a few other chapters they were universally amazed by
our listserv. Many of them just had big mass email chains to do house
business, or no email lists at all.
I imagine there are quite a few houses that have no such service internally
but might be willing to pay for it externally.
The "fickle" comment mentioned earlier is legit though. Cabinet and house
turnover can drastically change where the house budget is spent. That said, if
you can lock down four years of service, it becomes "The Way Things Are Done",
and it is usually very hard to change.
If you have some more questions (I'm a recent grad), my email is in my profile
=)
------
brudgers
It's not just too niche, it's too fickle.
Even if you sell Robert Hoover today, next year Pinto Kroger becomes president
of Delta Tau Chi and you have to sell all over again.
Not to mention how do you compete with Costco on bulk?
~~~
SoftwareMaven
You don't compete with Costco, you partnership with them.
------
ariabov
It may be too niche if you are trying to build Twitter or Facebook, but I
believe it is large enough to generate passive income +
Are you trying to do web app or physical product?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Voting Software - marcodave
https://xkcd.com/2030/
======
JdeBP
The question mark and "a terrifying idea" are editorializations not in the
actual comic title.
~~~
dang
Yes. Submitted title was "(XKCD) Voting software? a terrifying idea". That
breaks two of the site guidelines: the one against editorializing in titles
and the one that asks you not to include the domain name in the title text
(since it shows up next to it anyway).
Submitters: accounts that break these rules eventually lose story submission
privileges, so please don't do that.
------
detaro
yesterday:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17717676](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17717676)
~~~
dang
Comments moved thither.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Two Tap (YC W14) Wants to Fix Mobile Checkouts - razvanr
http://techcrunch.com/2014/02/20/two-tap-makes-online-shopping-easier-with-global-shopping-cart-two-tap-checkout-on-hundreds-of-sites/
======
lnanek2
Don't really see anything distinguishing it from PayPal. You can generate a
PayPal button and slap it on your site for products and have it track
inventory quite easily, and far more people have PayPal accounts so they won't
have to register for a new service.
~~~
sradu
Two Tap is different than PayPal because:
* publishers/app devs can sell products from retailers inside their apps (users don't have to hit the merchant website). this is incredibly valuable, especially on mobile.
* merchants don't have to do anything to integrate us, and all the hard work is in on our end.
* TwoTap is a replacement for the whole checkout process, not only the billing part.
This means we can provide a unified buying experience on all platforms, at all
points of sale, and provide a truly universal wallet.
------
mrmch
Like the new name; 'two tap' checkout definitely sounds like something I want.
------
razvanr
We love it too!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Israel's Vice Prime Minister's Twitter hacked by Anonymous - saadmalik01
https://twitter.com/silvanshalom
======
saadmalik01
Looks like the account has been suspended. Here's some screenshots:
[http://gawker.com/5962371/the-israeli-vice-prime-minister-
wa...](http://gawker.com/5962371/the-israeli-vice-prime-minister-was-just-
twitter-and-facebook-hacked)
~~~
gasull
Where does it say it was Anonymous? (You didn't say that, but the parent did).
~~~
saadmalik01
@YourAnonNews: "o_O So what would happen if a certain vice prime ministers
email got released to the public? #OpIsrael #Anonymous"
[https://twitter.com/YourAnonNews/statuses/271058778038890496...](https://twitter.com/YourAnonNews/statuses/271058778038890496?tw_i=271058778038890496&tw_e=details&tw_p=tweetembed)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Psdash: A linux system information web dashboard using Psutils and Flask - r4um
https://github.com/Jahaja/psdash
======
shirro
Not picking on this tool specifically but I see these sorts of things posted
on HN a bit and I am struggling to understand the appeal. So genuine quesion:
I can understand it is a fun task to build but what advantages does it bring
in real world use? Is it just a novelty thing or do people use these sorts of
tools and if so why and what advantages do they have over ssh/cli?
My sysadmin brain is always looking to reduce the dependencies and the attack
surface. Ideally I want less services running on less ports. Less software to
install, maintain and secure. As a result I stick to ssh and shell most of the
time. Generally any admin tool that has big library dependencies (eg anything
python, node.js or ruby) is on my shit list. I am a bit more sympathetic to Go
because of the single static exe but otherwise I prefer plain old shell.
I understand historical graphs are nice to look at and time series data is one
of the areas where web tools are a win. Though I am probably more likely to
look at alerts based on triggers than watch a graph in real time. I don't
understand what advantage tables of process stats in html offers over the same
in the cli.
~~~
jahaja
I pretty much agree with you. The reason I built the tool was to give a system
overview for the vagrant box we use at my work. Especially one that could tail
and search logs (the one in supervisor is pretty useless).
And in the end; all devs aren't devops so it's easier to have it web-based.
Who knows, with time, maybe this tool can be extended to be useful for your
purposes as well.
~~~
shirro
Thanks. That makes sense as a tool for developers who don't have sophisticated
unix skills. I guess quite a lot of people are targeting Linux as a production
environment but come from quite different backgrounds and using different
platforms for development. Once you mention vagrant it all falls into place.
Nice one.
------
nathancahill
Use with caution. I was able to print my /etc/passwd file using /log/read.
~~~
SEJeff
FYI: /etc/passwd is world readable. You get get the same info with the
command:
getent passwd
Reading /etc/shadow is a real problem, /etc/passwd is really not a huge issue.
------
napsterbr
Seems interesting, but I need to see some charts. I think I will use psdash +
loadavg ([http://loadavg.com/](http://loadavg.com/)). Until now I was using
New Relic server monitoring.
------
ams6110
How much load do tools like this add to the system. Ideally you want
monitoring tools to be like using a voltmeter on an electronic circuit...
display what's happening but adding very little influence of its own.
~~~
d0ugie
Virtually none in this case, though letting the processes page run on my
system eats up 2% of the CPU (a long, updating list), versus 0% on everything
else. Uses Flask.
Do these things have a harder time pulling such figures off of VPSs?
~~~
ErikBjare
Sadly, the figure was not so conservative on my Raspberry Pi (closer to 25%).
~~~
jahaja
That's not very good. On all pages or just the process-list page?
I could add an option that disables the auto-updating. The only thing that's
currently polled by a background thread is some network information from
/proc/net/dev.
~~~
ErikBjare
Well I incidentally only checked while on the process page (and promptly
removed it), but nice work none the less.
------
saltyknuckles
This is awesome
------
rmchugh
looks interesting, will give it a try.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Real estate site Redfin files for IPO - realdlee
https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/30/real-estate-site-redfin-files-for-ipo/
======
bkjelden
I hope this company sees nothing but success.
I bought my house through Redfin last year, and not only did I save ~$5k in
commissions compared to a conventional realtor, I also felt the process was
much smoother and more pleasant than other times I've interacted with a
conventional realtor.
It's simply absurd that in an era where any buyer can view photos of a house
for sale online real estate agents still expect to receive 6% commission on
the sale of a house.
~~~
existencebox
Let me offer a different viewpoint.
Redfin absolutely serves a purpose, but in some markets, notably for my case
very hot markets, it's a significant impediment. I really wanted redfin to
work, shopping in seattle 2 years ago. I tried for almost a year, but they
would consistently be not as contactable or prompt as we wanted, and gave us
very erroneous advice when it came to crafting offers on some houses we
wanted. As a result we lost out on houses when we could have been competitive.
Eventually we got a very solid realtor, who was aggressive in finding us
houses that would slip through our normal searches (the house we ended up
buying had been on the market for a long time at a higher price than they
eventually relisted it for, in an area we had discounted.) When a bidding war
started, he worked with us by being connected with the selling agent, gave us
very accurate hints on how we'd need to push and what would work to our
advantage, and landed both the deal and some back and forth that happened
after.
Downside, this was after 2 years of searching and losing out on houses I
frankly today still regret not getting. An hour+ commute sucks, and I
attribute some of my early failures to not getting an
experienced/knowledgeable/active realtor earlier.
YMMV but that's the caveat from my experience.
~~~
aetherson
I bought a house in SF three years ago through Redfin. The realtor that Redfin
gave us was prompt, aggressive, and thorough in the bidding/closing process.
What he didn't do is drive us around to open houses or suggest places to us.
Which we didn't want anyway.
I suspect that the individual realtor you get through Redfin has a big impact
on your experience with the site. It sounds like you got a bad one and were
unhappy. We got a good one and were happy.
~~~
IshKebab
This is really confusing. I just bought a house in the UK, and the process is
as follows:
1\. Look for house on Rightmove or Zoopla. 2\. Call the estate agent or
private seller to arrange a viewing. 3\. Show up at the appropriate time. Look
at house. 4\. Make an offer. Offer gets accepted/rejected/they want more.
Repeat until you get it or get outbid or give up. 5\. Offer agreed
(hopefully). Now do all the actual buying through mortgage brokers and
solicitors.
The estate agents charge the sellers a percentage, which is cheeky because
they do almost nothing - the only reason you should ever use one is if you are
incapable of taking photos or really can't spare a few evenings to show people
around the house.
But nobody ever drives you to see houses or finds them for you. How does it
work in America?
~~~
existencebox
I can only speak of hot markets in America, which are VERY different than many
others, but at least within that:
A "reasonable" house goes on the market. ("reasonable" defined by <1 mil,
within an hour commute of a city center) This house will usually be sold
within a week or two. Usually less. Definitely less, if it's actually priced
within middle-class-affordability (and I laughably define that as ~400-500k).
I've seen houses sell the day they listed. The selling process involves
showing up at the house during an open house (viewings are possible but rarer
in hot markets as typically it's a race to get your offer in and sellers know
they don't need to be accommodating; even viewing my house during the closing
process was a "if we can fit it in" sort of thing from the seller side) You
don't really get to "repeat". If you're very lucky they MAY tell you a
competing bid went over your escalation threshold, but for 80% of the houses I
put offers on, they look at the escalation guidelines and offers and just make
a choice right there. Typically at least someone has offered +50/100k in cash
and is going without a loan, so they'll often nab the house without a back and
forth with any of the other offers. If the seller agrees, the closing begins.
The buyer usually gets 1 shot to make an impression for a given house, usually
having to put the offer together within 12 hours/a couple of days max, having
seen the house once, usually with a bunch of other people.
A real estate agent helped me in multiple steps of the above.
\- Having an offer ready ahead of time with lots of contingencies/tradeoffs
well understood so we could tune it quickly and get it out and under the wire.
\- Knowing how and where to look for houses before listing, IMMEDIATELY after
listing, and that may have been listed ages ago/at bad prices.
\- Able to get us contacts with the sellers if an open house time won't
work/if we need to ask questions.
\- When our BOA agent left us high and dry, he hooked us up with a trusted
local lender with a good reputation and used his prior working relationship
with her to get our file pushed through in a ridiculous timeline over a
weekend so that we could put in a competing bid. (as I said, timelines are
nutso)
\- Gave us advice on what parts of our offer would have what impact, to what
sellers. e.g. 5k vs 3k vs 10k escalation steps? What other caveats? Should
compromise on preinspection? etc.
\- If anything went wrong, if we had followup questions, needed contacts, he
would be extremely accessible, would give us contiguous care (and thus knew
what our preferences were, what we were looking for, what offers we were
comfortable with/what our finances were) which saved time in rehashing that
every few weeks with a new agent; and given that you WILL lose most of the
offers you make, this process can go on a very long time so continuity is
nice. (we were on the market 1-2 years)
~~~
balls187
Did you look at areas that haven't been gentrified?
Plenty within 1 hour of Seattle that are affordable.
~~~
existencebox
That's more or less where I ended up buying, and managed ~400 for a
respectable 3b2b. That being said, the gentrification is spreading so
aggressively and was already well in place even when I bought; in the last
month 3 of my neighbors went on sale, all sold within a week at far higher
prices than comparable for when I bought. (I only had... 2 other bidders, if I
recall, when I bought, so it's certainly less hot than redmond where 10-15
competing was common)
------
notadoc
I'm still waiting for someone to completely eliminate the realtor and charge a
reasonable flat fee ($1000?) to buy/sell a house and handle all the related
details.
Why do we need realtors at this point? Everyone finds houses themselves online
nowadays. Why does anyone need to pay a whopper commission to some middle-man?
~~~
toomuchtodo
"I'm still waiting for someone to completely eliminate the need for a software
engineer and charge a reasonable flat fee to bolt together some libraries and
handle all the related details.
Why do we even need software engineers at this point? Everyone can find the
libraries and open source tools they need online nowadays. Why does anyone
need to pay a whopper paycheck to some middle-man?"
You're paying for someone's expertise, like in most industries.
~~~
jjppott
I generally have a different opinion. I am somewhat in the industry
(construction side) and I feel that generally most realtors dont really have
much knowledge of what they are selling. Furthermore, it is relatively easy to
get a real estate license (at least where I live) and the handful of
acquaintances that have gotten their license really dont know more than the
average person.
I actually find the lack of knowledge of most realtors very surprising (not
that there arent some really good ones out there). When we were working with
one to find a home, we would walk into a place and our realtor would look
through the listing sheet and be like "oooh they supposedly have a good
quality insulation in their walls", I would then need to explain to him what
an R value means and that no they truly didnt have good insulation and what
they were using as a marketing point was in fact the minimum required by code.
I would then point out a few other items (jump ducts, hollow core doors, etc)
that would make me feel like I was walking into a Habitat for Humanity type of
home, not a $600,000+ residence.
Buying a home is the largest single investment people are likely to make in
their lifetime and they have almost 0 knowledge about what they are buying and
do almost no research into it other than the location. They then rely on input
from someone regarding what they are buying that has very little additional
information other than comparable sales and "knowledge" of the market. I wrote
a business plan a little while around this, but never took past just putting
some ideas on paper.
~~~
bhandziuk
This is so true. Not only do they typically not know anything more about nay
given home that you, the buyer, do. If they are on the selling side they will
also outright lie about home features. I experienced this so many times on
houses I visited and even on the house I ultimately purchased.
You just have you shrug your shoulders and fix whatever they misrepresented.
~~~
jrs235
In my state you should file a complaint against that agent with the
department/office that oversees real estate licensing. And you might be
eligible to be compensated for the agents misrepresentations if you can prove
them.
~~~
bhandziuk
I'd love to. Some of the things seem difficult to prove. Such as
> Welcome Home!!! Take a seat on the PORCH SWING on your COVERED DECK and
> enjoy the Fall Season! Come inside this cozy home and view it's OPEN FLOOR
> PLAN [calling this open floor plan is a big stretch], Original HARDWOOD
> Floors [and they are destroyed as a result. Water damage. literally cut
> through to put in a furnace in the basement in one place. Covered by a
> carpet in the living room and destroyed as a result] and FRESH Neutral
> Paint. Two bedrooms and a LARGE full bath [probably as small as it gets
> while still being a full bath] on the Main Floor with a SUNNY eat-in Kitchen
> and Conveniently located MUDROOM, additional bedroom/office in the basement
> [not legally a bedroom]. This home features Updated ELECTRICAL [in some
> places sure. Half the house is still crappy old cloth wrapped wire], Updated
> PLUMBING throughout, Living Room is WIRED for SURROUND SOUND, [broken]
> SPRINKLER SYSTEM and NEW Roof with a LIFETIME transferrable Warranty!
> Detached Garage has HEAT & A/C, Wired for Cable and LAN line [a CAT5 cable
> that terminates in the floor and is not accessible to be hooked up to
> anything because it's in the floor!], has Electric [electricity to the
> building no where near code because it is fed from two sources] and a HUGE
> Attic space to Provide LOTS of EXTRA STORAGE. This home has a Private
> COVERED PATIO in the back where you can relax and enjoy YOUR NEW HOME!
There was more in the listing than this but that's just the basic bio.
------
tabeth
I'm very interested in why many people believe a realtor should receive a
percentage of the home's sale price as compensation but not the:
\- inspector (arguably a good one is more useful than realtor by pointing out
foundation problems and other issues that can cost 10s of thousands)
\- attorney (again, arguably more useful. they can point out clauses and
things like flood zone, unpermitted work, liens on the property, etc.)
\- appraiser (you might not even be able to get a loan if the house appraises
for less than the purchase price, unless you can foot the difference and/or
waive appraisal contingency)
\- lender (unless you're paying all cash. some lenders have vastly different
interest rates they can offer you, given a credit score. this can save you 10s
of thousands).
Additionally, it doesn't really make sense. The realtor's value is not
proportional to the price of the home. Even if you believe a realtor is
extremely valuable, a house being twice as much in price wouldn't make them
twice as valuable.
Redfin is definitely an interesting step in the right direction towards fixed
fee realty.
~~~
gpawl
Same reason that app stores charge a 30% commission instead of a flat fee.
Prices are what the market will bear and prices are controlled by a cartel
that runs the marketplace (the MLS members)
------
wyc
Here's a great piece by Ben Thompson discussing the economics and markets of
such services:
Both limit growth: regular agents with a stake in the
current system steer home buyers away from Redfin
properties, and hiring and training agents who aren’t
interested in the upside from commission takes a lot of
time and money.
[https://stratechery.com/2016/opendoor-a-startup-worth-
emulat...](https://stratechery.com/2016/opendoor-a-startup-worth-emulating/)
Why the flat-fee brokerage Allre had to close shop:
All of these internet companies that profess to want to
disintermediate the real estate business – just as they
did with the travel agency business (everyone even uses
the same analogy) – forget one major fact: buying and/or
selling a home is often the largest, most complicated
transaction a person may undertake.
[https://therealdaily.com/editorials/allre-startup-thinks-
imm...](https://therealdaily.com/editorials/allre-startup-thinks-immune-
brokerage-laws-may-lose-main-partner-even-launch/)
~~~
opo
>Here's a great piece by Ben Thompson discussing the economics and markets of
such services:
Most of the article is about OpenDoor. I don't think that quote about Redfin
describes the situation very well.
I don't think there is evidence that agents with buyers steer them away from
Redfin and it wouldn't work very well since almost all buyers will go to a
site with MLS listings and see what is on the market. Redfin takes a lowered
commission on their business, they don't lower the commission to the buying
agent.
In terms of hiring, they allow agents to get away from the continual cold
calling/door knocking and self promotion they need to do to attract the next
customer and they offer a stable salary and a support staff to take care of
the mundane stuff like arranging inspections, etc. I don't think they have a
problem getting job applicants. (Not associated with Redfin, but a happy
customer.)
------
htedatsu
I had a superb experience with them in 2012 despite being a nightmare
customer. Chose Refin because their blog was so good. I bought a 2nd house in
the same neighborhood. It started out odd because part of their onboarding is
asking "Where do you want the check sent?", because, you know, you save so
much using them. I knew it would be fake but whatever. (It wasn't--I did
indeed get the $10K check almost immediately upon closing.) Problem is that my
bank thought I was a terrorist, despite the fact that I have literally 12
accounts with them (several businesses, savings, checking, etc.). I put down
20% on an $890K loan. My income is closer to $800K than $500K and my other
house in the neighborhood was already paid for. The simple act of moving the
$200K into an account ready to write the check spooked the bank and they
literally treated me like a terrorist. Suddenly everything took infinite
amounts of time to handle and resulted in triple the usual paperwork. It was
excruciating.
The bank (Bank of America, of course) caused so much trouble that I finally
decided to pull out and lose my $20K earnest money. (I had chosen B of A on
the theory that they already knew all about me, and also because they offered
a killer ARM.) The mortgage officer literally quit his job over his bank's
bungled handling of my sale. Somehow they came through, by this time, 3 months
after I had made the offer. I was actually paying $100/day to the sellers
because at this point they had moved out and were in a hotel and weren't able
to close on their own new house.
Anyway, my agent at Redfin was a champ, even when I told her I was quitting.
So she had way more trouble than a full-service agent with none of the upside.
The whole thing on Redfin's side was precisely as advertised.
------
strict9
Bought my house via redfin and very satisfied with the process. It's also a
bonus for buyers, they send you a refund check for a portion of the commission
that normally all goes to agents.
Their agents may have less experience or knowledge, but as long as you get
highly rated/reviewed service providers (lawyer/inspector/etc), that's all
that matters. When I sell my current house it will definitely be via redfin.
So much is now done online, why pay high commission to traditional realty
companies?
This is indeed an industry ripe for change, and redfin is definitely doing
just that.
------
biastoact
I bought through Redfin five years ago.
Actually, we offered on two houses, backed out after poor inspections, and
then purchased the third house in a competitive multi-bid environment all in a
few months. With Redfin I never felt the kind of sales/relationship pressure
to close a deal that I did when buying with traditional realtors. The only
reason we didn't sell our Condo through Redfin is I wanted someone in the
neighborhood who could help coordinate painting, staging, etc in the lead up
to the listing.
All and all a great experience.
------
jdross
Having completed thousands of home sales at Opendoor, I believe a system will
works better for most home sales, but local expertise works better for high-
end homes.
An agent always make you feel like their differentiation matters. Redfin
advertises their refined process across thousands of homes to sell faster for
more money. Your neighbor advertises their local expertise and awareness to
get you an edge.
We joke that real estate is like politics – Everyone hates real estate agents,
but loves their real estate agent.
~~~
probe
Does Opendoor primarily work with high-end homes or your "average" home
(relative to the area of course)?
Also thoughts on Ben Thompson's analysis on your company
([https://stratechery.com/2016/opendoor-a-startup-worth-
emulat...](https://stratechery.com/2016/opendoor-a-startup-worth-emulating/))?
~~~
jdross
Our average purchase price is in the low 200,000's. We work with the middle
80% of homeowners.
Huge Ben Thompson fan, and waking up to his analysis that morning was a joy
and big surprise.
Rob Hahn has also done some solid analysis on his blog: [http://www.notorious-
rob.com/2016/12/forest-for-the-trees-op...](http://www.notorious-
rob.com/2016/12/forest-for-the-trees-opendoor-edition/)
------
africajam
Realtors have for the longest time seen other realtors as competitors. Its
time they recognise that the true competition is from large sites like Redfin
that will use tech to gain an advantage over them.
I realised this after several conversations with realtors about this open
source project I've created to help them build decent websites:
[https://github.com/etewiah/property_web_builder](https://github.com/etewiah/property_web_builder)
Most of them figured if it was open source then any of their competitors could
use it and be just as good as them. They would say this even if they
recognised that my product would give them a better website than they
currently had. Pretty strange way of thinking if you ask me....
------
msielski
Some food for thought: "The future of employment: How susceptible are jobs to
computerisation?"[1] which has been discussed on HN previously, lists
"Appraisers and Assessors of Real Estate" at .9 probability of computerization
and "Real Estate Brokers" at .97. It's certainly not a solved problem, but
these two jobs are nearly at the top of the list (or bottom, as the list is in
reverse order).
[1] PDF:
[http://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/downloads/academic/The_Futu...](http://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/downloads/academic/The_Future_of_Employment.pdf)
------
debacle
Having worked in the real estate industry for a time, it's ripe for
disruption. Redfin is going to have a problem when it paves the way for a flat
rate competitor, but right now it's doing a massive service to buyers and
sellers.
~~~
maguirre
seriously curious as I am about to pay 10k+ for selling my house. what are
they doing that is so special?
~~~
bdamm
I think buyers could brave buying a home without a realtor. It's a little
crazy but doable.
Selling is another matter entirely. If you would like the peace of mind to
know that your home is actually in your past once the money is in your bank
account, use a broker. Having your past home haunt your future can be a
miserable prospect.
~~~
mac01021
Why can't my attorney provide me with that assurance while he's taking me
through the closing process? What extra thing is the broker doing?
~~~
harrumph
>What extra thing is the broker doing?
The broker is causing the closing to happen by finding and satisfying the
buyer along with the buyer's many, many issues with most properties.
------
paulie_a
Disclaimer: After a decade of working in the real estate industry in various
aspects I will say it is a sh*t show of incompetence, laziness and greed.
While most real estate sites are bad, zillow is awful and Realtor.com should
be considered a crime against humanity. I have to say redfin seems "ok"
On that note I am surprised that redfin is missing basic marketing messaging.
------
1024core
I like Redfin, but I have a couple of qualms with it:
1\. They will tag a house as "hot" arbitrarily. The cynic in me thinks this
tag is for sale.
2\. They tend to hide information. I've seen houses come on the market, not
sell for weeks, go out and then come back in the market for a lower price. But
their "history" section does not list "price reduced"; they just pretend like
the previous listing never existed. For example, the house at 110 Steiner
Street (
[https://www.google.com/search?q=110+Steiner+Street&ie=utf-8&...](https://www.google.com/search?q=110+Steiner+Street&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8)
). It came on the market, and now is nowhere to be found. But when it does
come back on the market, they will completely erase the history of this house
not having been sold.
3\. They allow you to filter with other criteria, but Walkscore is not one of
them. I have given them feedback several times, but no response.
~~~
everybodyknows
>2\. They tend to hide information. Redfin does this to comply with local MLS
rules. Zillow does not, so best to check both.
------
ransom1538
Redfin with its smaller cut of RE transactions on the seller side combined
with the ability to circumvent MLS with it's own listing system could be the
begining of the end for agents.
~~~
saimiam
While I don't disagree with you, Redfin has been in business since 2004. 13
years is a long time to take to kill off realtors.
I'm in the process of selling my place and I'm using a realtor (who nearly
matched Redfin's seller commission rate). The Redfin agent I first spoke to
proposed a generic, templatized method to sell my property - list on N realtor
sites, email my contacts, take nice pics - while the realtor I went with lives
two doors down from me, knew the quirks of the HOA, had working knowledge of
what potential buyers were looking for in my community based on recent deals
he had been part of.
~~~
vadym909
I agree. Realtors won't get killed- they'll just have their commissions
reduced. I've bought a house through Redfin which was easy enough, but used an
agent who agreed to Redfin level fees, but was much more knowledgeable and
better at selling my house. From dressing up the house, doing open houses to
following up with buyers, to negotiating. Redfin couldn't match him with their
inexperienced agents/helpers, high volume and cookie cutter methods that are
more suited to hot real estate markets where there's not much for realtors to
do.
~~~
GFischer
So the mere existence of Redfin has lowered their fees. Good for you :) and an
example of the market at work.
------
theprop
Redfin is a big pile of nothing. It's a glorified real estate agency which is
itself an anachronism or soon will be.
You can _easily_ find online or other brokers ready to "sell" your house which
just means listing it on the realtors' association multiple site listings for
1% or even a few hundred dollars. The realtors association still control
everything in terms of having all the data on homes for sale.
They could have some opportunity in giving buyers rebates i.e. having a 1-2%
margin for buyers which most agents don't give, mostly because it's a lot luck
to find a buyer than to represent the sell-side.
The idea that it's worth around 8x revenues...a low margin business as a real
estate agency is...is a stretch, though to be fair, their revenues are fast-
growing without that much of a marketing spend.
Not sure how their quarterly sales vary (seems like a lot in their
profitability at least) but their latest quarter was terrible with only $6 mn
in gross income on nearly $60 million in revenues and then $30 mn in operating
expenses.
They claim to have helped users buy/sell $40 billion in real estate last year
but showed just $270 mn in revenues which is something like .8% of that market
value (while it should be in the 1.5 to 2.5% range I think). Not sure why that
it is.
------
codebook
I am actively looking the house right now. And getting disappointed by Redfin
these days. Previously it showed listed price for sold properties but now it
has gone. Only sold price is shown. Not only this, but the property
disappeared from MLS then re-listed with higher price tag doesn't show
previously listed price.
Information should be transparent between seller and buyer but Redfin is
leaning to seller side at this moment.
So, I am using Zillow more frequently than before.
~~~
xenophon
I don't think that's true. If you scroll down to the "Property History"
section on any Redfin sold listing, you should see the full details for that
home, including list price, any price adjustments, and sold price. In some
markets, this information is only visible to logged-in users due to MLS
restrictions, so you may have to log into your account to view the data.
------
kevincennis
I had a positive experience with Redfin, but honestly feel like even with the
refund check, I still overpayed for their contribution.
I shopped online, went to open houses on my own, and Redfin basically just
contacted the seller on my behalf to present an offer. I'd be shocked if my
agent did more than a few hours total work over the entire duration of the
sale – though I liked him a lot, and he was super responsive the few times I
needed him.
------
everybodyknows
Guess how many California-licensed real estate _BROKERS_ Redfin employs? The
answer is here:
[http://www2.dre.ca.gov/PublicASP/pplinfo.asp?License_id=0152...](http://www2.dre.ca.gov/PublicASP/pplinfo.asp?License_id=01521930)
A total of six BROKERS. Helped out by 528 _SALESPERSONS_ , who have little or
no financial responsibility.
A curious fact that no RE agent or Realtor will tell you: Under California
law, the terms "real estate agent" or "Realtor" have no significance.
------
jhulla
Good for Redfin. Disruption in any business that charges 6% transaction fees
is great.
Having said that, real estate transactions are complex beasts with many moving
parts. A lot of this process can be scripted and templated. But there are many
situations where it cannot. Buyers and sellers are under immense stress as
they face very large financial and legal decisions. They don't understand the
process, the terminology, the legal and financial consequences, etc. There are
local regulations and conventions that differ from region to region. E.g:
Check out the differences in who pays fees across counties:
[http://chicagotitletransfertax.com/](http://chicagotitletransfertax.com/)
Good agents absolutely earn their fees when uncertainty and complexity arise.
I suspect Redfin is seeking to carve out the part of the market that comprises
straight-forward, template driven transactions.
~~~
hammock
>E.g: Check out the differences in who pays fees across counties:
[http://chicagotitletransfertax.com/](http://chicagotitletransfertax.com/)
The complexities can be and already are structured in a table format? Seems
like a job perfectly suited for a computer, not a human.
~~~
jhulla
Sometimes transactions stick at the strangest places. For example, a buyer
balks at paying a final $500 fee allotted to him because he has hit his
financial stress limit - potentially killing the entire transaction.
Good agents are not just facilitating the transaction, but also acting as
friends/confidants/therapists for buyers&sellers - helping them make
responsible decisions. Good agents also come up with creative solutions to
complete transactions - this pops up often in resolving inspection
contingencies. Say there is some leakage discovered underneath a bathroom sink
with some cabinetry damage. The buyer is getting cold feet. What do you do?
------
haberman
I'm closing literally today on a house I bought through Redfin. It's my third
Redfin buying experience. Redfin for buying is great. Their website makes it
easy to look for properties and get alerts when properties you might like go
on the market. No need to pay a realtor to do that part.
I'm still not using Redfin for selling. When you sell, you're paying for a
salesman, and a salesman can make a big difference on how much you sell for,
IMO. Redfin will save you 2%, so the question you have to ask yourself is:
will a traditional agent make me 2% or more, compared with Redfin? I think the
answer is yes, they likely can.
~~~
BadCookie
Indeed. When I needed to sell a house in the East Bay, the Redfin agent wanted
to list the property for almost 20% less than it sold for. When I told her
that I thought she was pricing it too low, she looked at me like I was crazy.
The local agent that we ended up using instead (who had recently sold 3-5
houses in our same neighborhood) had a much better idea of what the house was
actually worth, and also paid to stage the house--which Redfin would not have
done.
We used Redfin to purchase that house, and our purchase experience was very
positive, but selling the house with Redfin could have cost us a bundle. It
would probably have been fine if property prices had not been rising so
quickly at the time, but regardless, I am a believer in the value of staging
which is a service not covered by Redfin's fees.
~~~
ghughes
> The local agent that we ended up using instead ... also paid to stage the
> house--which Redfin would not have done.
You paid for that.
~~~
BadCookie
Yes, but it seems you've missed my main point entirely. If I had used Redfin,
the house could have sold for $80-90k less than it otherwise did, whereas
using the local agent cost me perhaps $5-6k more. The smaller point that I was
making is that you often can't compare Redfin's fees to the local agent fees
without also knowing if the local agent provides staging services, and many of
them do. Granted, staging is only a couple thousand for a modest house (from
what I understand), but it's something to be aware of.
~~~
BadCookie
I would guess that Redfin's problem is retaining talent. If an agent can make
more money going off on their own, they likely will. The agent who helped us
buy that house was amazing. But, guess what, he isn't at Redfin anymore. It's
too bad. I love Redfin's site and want them to succeed, but perhaps they don't
do enough to retain good agents (or their model financially prevents it).
That's just a guess, though. Also, their agents may have to cover a larger
geographic area than other agents, so it's not possible for them to be as
intimately familiar with particular neighborhoods.
------
sabujp
redfin maps + school ratings + real time alerts, and when I say real time I
mean I was in a house in fremont with my realtor and I got an alert during the
private viewing that the house just went pending, hah! In any case, this site
was instrumental in helping us find a house. RDFN is definitely going in my
portfolio.
------
aabajian
To get rid of real estate agents: You have to find a way to create a free
multiple listing service (satellite imagery maybe, looking for FOR SALE
signs?). It's the MLS monopoly that has kept the real estate industry in the
dark ages.
------
Grustaf
Ah, so that's why it was name dropped on Silicon Valley recently...
------
skynetv2
i purchased my house thru RedFin and it was an amazing experience. Yes, a bit
more hands on than conventional realtor but you never know how much a
conventional relator was working on your behalf anwyay
------
andrewhillman
Coming from a background in real estate as an active broker who has worked
with Redfin agents, I'd like to point out a few things. Redfin's biggest asset
is their website. It's a good user experience and grabs them a lot of leads.
However, Redfin agents tend to be subpar agents when representing sellers and
or buyers. Most wouldn't survive in a regular brokerage setting. If I am
hiring an agent, I want a hungry service oriented agents, not someone who is
fine with receiving a salary. Discounts are enticing to consumers, but from
what I have noticed these discounts come at a cost to their clients. Rather
than list a bunch of examples, from what I have witnessed, Redfin agents are
not all that skilled in negotiating. They are actually horrible. Redfin needs
to train better but training is a multi-faceted issue. They need experienced
brokers who have been beaten up and have seen it all. I was lucky to have a
mentor who played a significant role in redefining the industry back in 2001.
Let's just say, nobody knew what the concept of Exclusive Buyer Agency was
during the late 90s. Anyway, in order to have great agents, they need to learn
from smarter battle tested agents in the office. An agent needs good instincts
to represent clients well. This takes time - 10,000 hours easy and they need
to see a lot of deal flow. You learn from the ugly deals, not the smooth ones.
Fortunately, for Redfin most Redfin buyers/sellers won't realize how good
their agent is until they have something to compare it to. Redfin does not
have top agents nor can the attract high-quality agents. In order for them to
succeed in the public market, they will need to increase fees because the cost
of maintaining and attracting talent isn't cheap. Discounting gives companies
a good chance to obtain market share. But market share will go down once they
raise fees. Historically speaking, discount real estate companies don't do
well in public markets. Let's look at one example of a company associated with
discounts, Zip Realty. I think they did an IPO in 2004 or so. Over the years
things didn't go well so they were forced to merge. Now, you might say, REDFIN
is different. This is somewhat true but I am sure if you read the Redfin S1,
you will see some of the concerns I have addressed.
This is coming from a non-traditional broker. I have always gone against the
grain. I believe Redfin will need to evolve a lot to get the public market to
embrace them. If I had to guess they will become a little more "traditional"
overtime.
I hope Redfin trains better and figures things out. Otherwise, they will need
to merge post-IPO.
Sorry for the long comment. I could write forever on this topic. I may do this
on my site when I have a couple of hours.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Erlang and Trading Systems - yarapavan
http://groups.google.com/group/erlang-programming/browse_thread/thread/97fe15af680debfc?pli=1
======
gtani
also:
<http://www.maxdama.com/search/label/Automated%20Trading>
[http://groups.google.com/group/thinkerlang/msg/4546b551ef704...](http://groups.google.com/group/thinkerlang/msg/4546b551ef70494d)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
L.P.D.: Libertarian Police Department (2014) - mjwhansen
http://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/l-p-d-libertarian-police-department
======
eglover
In the case that anyone is wondering, this is a joke.
[http://hotmeme.net/media/i/4/f/d1Z-thats-not-how-it-works-
th...](http://hotmeme.net/media/i/4/f/d1Z-thats-not-how-it-works-thats-not-
how-any-of-this-works.jpg)
~~~
seanflyon
Is it making fun of people who make fun of Libertarians?
~~~
eglover
I don't know but it's BuzzFeed dumb.
------
ianstallings
_I get it. It ain 't making me laugh but I get it_ \- Meatwad
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Inbox Bliss - wj
https://www.startopz.com/blog/inbox-bliss/
======
deepak-kumar
Those email notification always seemed distraction to me.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Net Neutrality? Not so fast, says GOP - anigbrowl
http://rawstory.com/blog/2009/09/gop-senators-net-neutrality/
======
JCThoughtscream
As if we need another reason to distrust the GOP...
Seriously - one of the major arguments for net neutrality is that the lack
thereof serves as a serious /threat/ to commercial interests dependent on
internet accessibility. Given the GOP's business-friendly public image, you'd
think they'd be a bit more careful about picking this particular fight.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Android and the philosopher’s pencil - mbateman
http://www.asymco.com/2010/08/20/android-and-the-philosophers-pencil/
======
teilo
The premise of this argument is that Google's services require a Google-
supplied OS. This premise is false, and therefore this little article is just
plain silly.
It is in Google's best interests to see to it that there is a widely-
available, royalty-free platform upon which to build the thin clients
necessary to _use_ the services in the cloud. iOS works just as well. Use iOS
and you are in no way limited in the Google web services which you can use.
Apps are another story - and a key part of this puzzle. If you were Google,
would _you_ want to get locked into a single-vendor's platform? Of course not.
Thus we have Android - an open platform which keeps the industry honest.
Witness the Google Voice debacle: A freely available service that Google
_wanted_ to make usable on iOS, but Apple refused. Android is a direct
response to platform vendors refusing to support open standards.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: As a programmer, what do you wish you knew at 25? - FahadUddin92
What have you learned now that you wish when you started?
======
makecheck
The most carefully-constructed, architecturally-pure piece of code will still
break in the face of future requirements. And in a surprising number of cases,
it will break on the _very first_ new requirement. Keep it straightforward and
get it done.
You will almost never be working on something so performance-critical that it
truly needs cleverness and super-optimization. And you will rarely have time
to properly _measure_ a particular thing anyway. You _will_ be expected to
frequently change things and super-optimal code is a pain to modify.
You will work with programmers with a variety of skills and it will often be
impossible for them to maintain things of moderate complexity. Or, your team
will be using ancient tool versions that _can’t_ reliably do the spiffy new
thing in the language. Again, straightforward code wins.
When you write a test, first set up a case that fails to make sure your test
can actually catch a failure. Too much time is spent debugging things because
tests “pass” when the tests themselves just weren’t doing what they meant to
do.
The code is king: put everything you possibly can in there (comments, etc.).
Don’t let people set up external documentation that no one reads, because it
becomes wrong/misleading within a day. If you _must_ have things outside the
code, they _need_ to be revision-controlled alongside the code, in the same
repository.
------
avip
The most important take, which took me years to sink in, is that code does not
matter. So many things stem from that simple fact.
~~~
FahadUddin92
Huh? What do you mean?
------
krapp
To stop being obsessed with pointless BS and actually finish something. Even
if it's terrible.
Also, that I would _deeply_ regret going to school to learn progamming once
Udemy became a thing.
~~~
lnalx
> To stop being obsessed with pointless BS and actually finish something. Even
> if it's terrible.
Can you go deeper ?
~~~
krapp
Once my projects get complex enough, I have a habit of wanting to dump
everything and start over or else get sidetracked by tangents.
For instance, in trying to get my second game project finished (cloning
Berzerk) I got a decent bit of the way there but decided I hated everything.
I've since deleted and rewrote the ECS at least three times, added, deleted
and readded a Lua API (which I actually like but wasn't really necessary),
wrote and rewrote a font atlas for SDL's font library (again, fun, but not
necessary), and am currently on my whatever-th complete rewrite of the engine
because I decided it needs to be redesigned around sparse arrays and not
vectors of pointers.
So in the end I have piles of half-baked ideas and unimplemented code and
nothing finished. Turns out I like the code I don't write more than the code I
do.
------
vjsc
I wish I knew at 25 that programming is perhaps not my actual calling.
------
MrEfficiency
Here are some
>Yes I am a programmer, stop questioning it
>Stop avoiding learning to make macros and job automation, it will pay
dividends
>Javascript is fine, not great.
>Embedded systems should be my full-time hobby
>Stop avoiding capitalism and start charging money for my otherwise free
products.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Cool Things in Perl 6 - fogus
http://blogs.perl.org/users/ovid/2010/01/cool-things-in-perl-6.html
======
telemachos
I love Perl. Perl is my language of choice. So I promise that I am not
trolling. Let's just stipulate that I'm slow or inexperienced or very
confused.
What is the cool in that code? Can someone explain to me (apparently using
small words) why this is exciting?
~~~
chromatic
The example defines a subtype which represents a file on disk. Any parameter
conforming to that subtype must name a file that is present on disk.
Think of this subtype as a named precondition -- it's a concise, intention-
revealing way of reporting error conditions without cluttering the internals
of the function with duplicate error-handling code.
~~~
telemachos
Nicely explained. Thanks.
------
access_denied
This kind of posts just show how good the perl community is in terms of
marketing. Not loud or shrill, just sharing a cup of fresh mint tea at an
oasis.
------
andrewljohnson
This title should be "cool thing in Perl 6." It's just a tiny blogpost about
subsets. There are zero other new features mentioned.
And who uses Perl these days anyways? I can't think of a task I wouldn't
rather script in Python.
I remember the glory days of web scraping when all a man had was LWP,
Mechanize, and his own mastery of regex to work with. But those days are long
gone!
~~~
mock
Lots of us use Perl these days. For example those of us that care about speed,
stability, and sane backwards compatibility. WWW::Mechanize is still a great
tool when appropriate. Catalyst and Moose are pretty awesome to work with as
well. I'm pretty happy with the state of Perl these days, there are lots of
reasons to recommend it, but if Python works for you, that's cool too.
Slightly more on topic - when Ovid first posted this to his feed, Stevan
Little pointed out that you could already do it in Perl 5 (
<http://gist.github.com/268717> ). Watching the give and take between the Perl
6 language and the Modern Perl movement is (I think) one of the more
interesting and exciting areas of language development these days.
~~~
draegtun
Thanks for posting Stevan's gist... I hadn't seen that elsewhere.
When I first saw Ovid's post I could see a MooseX::Declare lightbulb going off
in my head ;-)
use 5.010;
use MooseX::Declare;
class Foo {
use MooseX::Types -declare => [ qw(Filename) ];
use MooseX::Types::Moose qw(Str);
BEGIN {
subtype Filename, as Str, where { -x $_ };
}
method file ( Filename $name ) {
say "Houston, we have a filename: $name";
}
}
my $foo = Foo->new;
my $perl = `which perl`; chomp $perl;
$foo->file( $perl );
$foo->file( 'no_such_file' );
Above throws the expected exeception on 'no_such_file'.
~~~
jrockway
This reminds me that it would be nice if someone wrote a module that produced
type constraints like:
File[Exists]
File[Readable, Executable]
Dir[Empty]
as an extension to MooseX::Types::Path::Class.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Read summaries of Hacker News links without leaving the front page - czzarr
http://tldr.io/extension
======
dy
As the creator of hnsummaries.com and former founder of a news summaries
business, seems like a nice middle-ground would be to give the user an
automated summary and then let them edit it if they choose to do so. As we
moved towards this model, we were able to be much more efficient (we were
doing it internally though).
You have a chicken-egg problem with real contributors (my guess is that you're
bootstrapping the content with editors?). Am excited to see where this goes!
~~~
louischatriot
Indeed, we have this chicken and egg problem. That's why we are focusing on
the HN community for now: it is feasible to be quite up to date for the
frontpage, even with just the three of us! But as you said, we are actively
trying to find contributors.
For now we are not giving automated summaries because we obeserved that people
tend not to edit summaries even if they are automatic and hence of lower
quality. What is your experience on this?
Thanks for the feedback!
------
bluetidepro
I don't like that I have to create an account to try it out. I realize you
answered in the comments that the summaries in your demo are not real, but
because of that it makes me want to try it out before I give you my email
since I don't actually know how it WILL work. You should just make it
installable without an account, then after it's installed encourage users to
create an account for future updates (probably why you would want signups?) or
more features maybe.
------
yread
It would be useful to have summaries of actual articles instead of funny jabs
at HN memes
~~~
czzarr
this is just for demo purposes, if you install the extension you will have the
summaries of the actual articles on the frontpage of HN
------
kilianba
Really useful
------
gabhubert
slick lightweight interface.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A Webpack plugin for wiring up prefetch – supports async chunks - zthomas
https://github.com/GoogleChrome/preload-webpack-plugin
======
zthomas
Trending on www.gitlogs.com today, new repo from Google
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Curious tilt of the sun traced to undiscovered planet - noyesno
http://phys.org/news/2016-10-curious-tilt-sun-undiscovered-planet.html
======
noyesno
I don't know about you but I find it incredible that while we can see galaxies
formed 13 billion years ago[0], we have completely missed the existence of a
large planet in our own solar system.
I can only guess what kind of theories the Nibiru/PlanetX[1] enthusiasts will
cook up based on this announcement.
[0] [http://www.space.com/32150-farthest-galaxy-smashes-cosmic-
di...](http://www.space.com/32150-farthest-galaxy-smashes-cosmic-distance-
record.html)
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nibiru_cataclysm](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nibiru_cataclysm)
~~~
amelius
Also, since the article says:
> It continues to amaze us; every time we look carefully we continue to find
> that Planet Nine explains something about the solar system that had long
> been a mystery
Why hasn't the existence of an additional planet been hypothesized before?
~~~
kartikkumar
It's not that it hadn't been hypothesized before, it's rather that the numbers
that they attribute to this hypothesis stack up well against a lot of Solar
System observations. In other words, the hypothesis is not merely that there
is another large, undiscovered planet in the far reaches of the Solar System,
but rather the details of its mass and orbit that make this a compelling case.
Part of the reason that this hypothesis wasn't possible before is because the
observational data to support these numbers was lacking. The amount of
knowledge we've gained about the Kuiper Belt over the last decade or so is
phenomenal and drives our understanding of what might have happened in the
early Solar System. It's worth reading the original paper to get a handle on
the rigour with which this hypothesis has been analyzed and the coupling with
observations of the Kuiper Belt [1].
[1] [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1304.5166.pdf](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1304.5166.pdf)
~~~
CoryG89
I think this is the same as the hypothesis for Planet X that has been around
since the 90s. Seems like they've just modified it slightly. They take
observations they can't explain, and then make something up out of thin air
that will explain the observations.
Not saying this is a bad strategy, just that in my view it's not much
different from hypotheses for additional planets which have come before.
------
dzdt
If you are just coming to the Planet Nine story, the best background
information is the scientists' blog at www.findplanetnine.com.
------
Tepix
See also: [http://www.space.com/34448-planet-nine-solar-system-
tilt.htm...](http://www.space.com/34448-planet-nine-solar-system-tilt.html)
------
dhruvasagar
Instead of it being a 9th Planet (formed along with others as our solar system
was created), it's perhaps just an enormous object (black hole?!) whose
gravitation causes the sun to tilt ?
~~~
dhruvasagar
Does the sun's tilt match it's position within the milky way galaxy ?
~~~
tempestn
I'm going to assume both of these options have been considered and ruled out.
Also, the article mentions that this Planet 9 explains the orbits of Kuiper
belt objects as well.
------
hanoz
Is there any reason, apart from not knowing exactly where to look, that we
can't find such a planet by watching for when it passes in front of stars?
~~~
KMag
I'm not an astronomer, but I imagine there are too many small untracked
objects, between Mars and Jupiter for instance, that periodically occlude
stars. I imagine the signal-to-noise ratio is too high to start a search every
time something blocks a star. How many millions of times per day must an
asteroid somewhere block a star as visible from Earth? Gravitational
perturbations are a smaller signal, but the signal-to-noise ratio is better, I
imagine.
~~~
hanoz
Maybe although I make a 10 times the size of earth planet at 20 times the
distance of Neptune equivalent to a 77km wide main belt asteroid, so maybe not
all that noisy. Plus the predicted orbit tilt must help a lot. Sounds like a
doable big data problem to me.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The extraordinary life and death of the world’s oldest known spider - okket
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2018/05/01/the-extraordinary-life-and-death-of-the-worlds-oldest-known-spider/
======
spyckie2
Surprisingly well written.
Was wondering why a 43 year old spider was in the news, it's not about the
spider itself but about the dedication of the people that study and track
these species, the connections they make with the world around them, and their
passion for ecological systems and the changes induced on them over time.
~~~
zomg
Arguably without a 43 year-old spider there wouldn't be a story... so it's
probably more so about the spider, no?
~~~
mannykannot
"I took a speed reading course... I was able to read 'War and Peace' in twenty
minutes. It's about Russia." \- Woody Allen.
------
tim333
Some prior discussion of spider 16 RIP
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16947089](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16947089)
------
JustSomeNobody
This was a fun read!
Then I got to the bottom and saw a link about people stoning a 'roo because it
wouldn't hop. wtf?
~~~
coldacid
Humans are a species of extremes. The comparison between this article and the
one about the murdered kangaroo is a great example of that.
------
sgillen
Makes me wonder how similar a spiders experience of the world is to our own.
~~~
ahazred8ta
["What is it like to be a spider?"](
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Nagel#What_is_it_like_t...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Nagel#What_is_it_like_to_be_a_something))
is surely a book waiting to be written.
~~~
tim333
I sometimes wonder if, assuming we are able to simulate brains and nervous
systems in software at some point in the future, if we'll be able to
experiment with mapping spider or bat nervous system states to human ones to
be able to investigate that experimentally. Which would be somewhat counter to
Nagel's arguments.
~~~
theprotocol
Some off topic: I'd use that experiential mapping tech to "show" the mentally
ill what a "normal" state of mind which they struggle to conceive of would be
like. I suspect that may be curative. I also suspect most criminality may be
cured in a similar way.
~~~
jrq
Isn't that an extremely dangerous thing to do to a person's mind?
Nobody is perfect, right? I believe that. That's an ancient biblical
principle. If we were to take someone we perceive as unhealthy and conform
their mind to someone we perceive as healthy, that person is being robbed of
their individual experience and opportunity at life.
It's one thing to denounce criminalized thoughts, it's another to disallow
them entirely. Regulating our thoughts and our actions is by definition living
our lives. Excluding that experience, what is left?
I'm sorry if what I'm saying is not well organized, but for whatever reason
this idea evokes something passionate in me. I don't think people should ever
be put through that.
~~~
icebraining
Agreed; it sounds like an aseptic version of Room 101.
"But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He
had won the victory over himself."
~~~
jrq
He truly loved big brother.
Yeah, I hadn't the bravery to include that, as I didn't want my response to
seem so reactionary, but that really is what it is. Really the only difference
is that in the book, he is coerced to perform the mental gymnastics through
suffering, but if we could just restrain someone and zap them.... That's
awful.
I'm glad others agree that this is at least controversial. The political
landscape (at least here in America, my own perspective) the idea of offensive
is seemingly headed down a path where people will want to bar themselves from
experiencing anything offensive.
When you get on the subway and the guy next to you has odor, doesn't it make
you appreciate your apartment even more?
Healthy dealings with unhealthy thoughts generally leads to healthy thoughts.
Carl Rogers pioneered Humanist Psychology like fifty years ago, and he talked
about that. Idk if he used the term self-talk, but that's what we call it now.
I think most neurodivergent people, particularly the criminally oriented ones,
they have a dialogue imbalance, not a chemical imbalance. They are having the
wrong conversations with themselves.
Anyways, the world is crazy.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Machine Learning for Human Memorization - danger
http://blog.smellthedata.com/2010/12/machine-learning-for-human-memorization.html
======
shef
I gave only a quick read, and I'm completely unfamiliar with Scrabble... but:
why not use a Markov chain? I would start looking at the two step case, using
only the most probable letter. In this case you have to remember a 26x26
matrix, if this doesn't work you can extend it to the top-n letters.
------
danger
Another question: are there other scenarios outside of playing Scrabble where
something like this would be useful?
~~~
jerf
In the abstract? Probably. But in human domains I suspect you're unlikely to
find something very amenable to this sort of approach without a lot of
looking. I actually think he's better off just memorizing because the words
are human words from human minds and just trusting to your own human mind is
going to work better than a simple math approach.
The one thing I'd consider adding is memorizing the tuple (word, origin),
because English's problem is that my first paragraph is simplified for
English; we actually use many different distinct human patterns, and helping
the brain partition the problem might be helpful.
------
rd108
hah, this is cool.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
TakeThisLollipop - really clever/creepy use of the Facebook API - wesleyzhao
http://www.takethislollipop.com/
======
slapshot
Looks like it's connected with the ad agency Evolution Bureau ("EVB")
(clients: [1]), the same people who did the Office Depot-braded "Elf Yourself"
sensation [2].
Why do I think it's EVB? This is the only other site on the same IP as
manipulation.com, and manipulation.com is registered clearly to EVB. The
agency's creative work is consistent with this project too.
[1] <http://evb.com/work/> [2] <http://elf.evb-archive.com/>
~~~
caryme
It's at least the same director as Elf Yourself, according to the actor in it
([https://twitter.com/#!/billoberstjr/status/12611132567074816...](https://twitter.com/#!/billoberstjr/status/126111325670748160)).
~~~
missing_cipher
Same guy from <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAihDAJX8Ow> ?
EDIT: Yup:
[http://www.fearnet.com/news/b23933_mastodon_premiere_twisted...](http://www.fearnet.com/news/b23933_mastodon_premiere_twisted_horror-
themed.html?utm_source=fearnet&utm_medium=rssfeeds&utm_campaign=rss_imdb)
------
0x12
Funny, my hosts file seems to interrupt the flow of this prank slightly.
We'll see how my s.o. reacts to it, but on my machine it does absolutely
nothing.
In case you're wondering what is in my hosts file:
127.0.0.1 www.facebook.com
127.0.0.1 facebook.com
127.0.0.1 connect.facebook.net
127.0.0.1 facebook.net
127.0.0.1 fbcdn.net
127.0.0.1 www.fbcdn.net
0.0.0.0 badge.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 blog.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 en-gb.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 developers.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 touch.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 de-de.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 stories.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 it-it.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 hu-hu.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 peace.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 et-ee.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 az-az.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 0.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 apps.facebook.com
A nice side-effect of this seems to be that the web has become a lot more
responsive. No more 'like' buttons popping up all over the place.
edit: regarding my s.o. it's been an interesting morning, this app seems to
have opened her eyes to facebook in a different way. No more apps.
~~~
JonnieCache
You can achieve a similar thing with the ghostery extension.
<http://www.ghostery.com/>
~~~
kgosser
Wow cool thanks for the link. Just installed it.
------
cubix
I saw a Second City improve last winter, and one of the better sketches
exploited Facebook similarly, albeit in a more lighthearted and humorous way.
Prior to the performance they would find an audience member's Facebook page
using their credit card or mailing address (presumably), and write a sketch
based on the details extracted from his or her page.
They incorporated the lucky patron's inevitable reaction into the sketch under
the pretense of reprimanding him for disrupting the show. After letting him
squirm a bit under the spotlight, the punchline was projecting his Facebook
page on the screen across the stage.
------
Pfiffer
Care to explain for those without Facebook accounts?
~~~
wesleyzhao
Indeed. So basically someone made a very high quality video of a creepy dude
in a dark room creeping on Facebook and getting really mad. Then (with some
special effects they used) they make it look like (almost perfectly) the guy
is viewing your profile page, looking through your photos, and creeping on
your friends. Then he maps your last known location on Google Maps, looks
right at you, and drives over to your house.
It's eerily realistic.
Disclaimer: not my project, found it on the web.
~~~
ricefield
not to mention that, in the car, he has a print out of your profile picture,
and a screwdriver (or is it a box cutter) in his hand as he exits the car.
~~~
zaphar
I'm betting its a lollipop in his hand. The video doesn't make it clear but
the ending title screen shows a lollipop taped to something so I feel like
that was a hint.
------
SecretofMana
For me, this was rendered hilarious by some of the images people have tagged
me in on Facebook that don't actually have me in them. Seeing the serial
killer erotically stroke a picture of a T-Pain coffee mug is rather amusing.
That being said, is there any way I can be sure besides the disclaimer that
this isn't actually saving/using my personal data outside of the video? I
guess that's part of the point, that I really can't, though.
------
lukejduncan
I don't have facebook. Anyone mind writing a tldr?
~~~
Peroni
It's a facebook app. It asks your permission to access pretty much everything
on your profile and when you finally accept it cuts to a fullscreen, high
production video of an incredibly creepy actor on a computer in a really dingy
room. It then cuts to the computer screen and shows the creepy guy scrolling
through your profile page in a very realistic manner as well as clicking
through some of your photo's and friends. The guy looks more and more
irritated and angry and he goes and looks up your location on google maps
(with mixed results, mine was relatively close).
It then cuts to him driving with a picture of your profile pic stuck to his
dashboard, the whole time you get the feeling this guy is tracking you down
with the intention of hurting you.
Really creepy and incredibly well done and surprisingly not obvious in terms
of what they are promoting.
~~~
mvzink
What __are __they promoting?
~~~
Peroni
No idea to tell you the truth. This is probably one of those 'build the hype,
keep people guessing' campaigns and eventually it will all come out.
There really was nothing in the clip that indicated any form of a product or
brand. It could be a movie teaser or a teaser for a TV show and if it is, I
for one will watch it.
~~~
0x12
Whatever it was they should have anticipated the popularity a bit better, they
seem to be down/very slow for hours now.
------
flexd
This actually just freezes for me/nothing happens after I click "Connect with
Facebook". Chromium 12.0.742.112 (90304) Ubuntu 10.10.
~~~
ma2rten
I had the same. I looked at it in chrome inspector and it turned out the
reason was that I didn't allow the 2nd set of access rights, because it said
it was optitional.
~~~
Fliko
I didn't allow them and it still worked for me.
------
driverdan
Why would anyone authorize Facebook access for a random site like this? No
privacy policy, no about page, no terms. You have no idea what they're
actually doing with your data.
~~~
yangyang
Maybe that's the point of it - most people won't think twice about
authorizing, but might realise what they've opted into once they see it.
------
VonLipwig
That was amazing. You know its a joke.. but the production value is so high
your can't help but be really creeped out by it. I have removed every app
which I have signed up to from accessing my Facebook account. I have also
bolted my front door.
_shivers_
~~~
ltamake
I know, it's effing creepy.
I wasn't planning on sleeping tonight anyway!
------
rane
I gave the guy all those details and pics while authorizing the app!
There's no way too see those things without being my friend.
~~~
georgemcbay
There's at least _one_ other way... make a creepy viral lollipop site, get it
on the front page of hacker news, et al.
------
mindstab
One interesting thing about how this was designed, it for some reason doesn't
get your location from your facebook profile. It uses your IP address, which
led to hilarious results because while my facebook rightly says where I am, I
was using a SOCKS proxy to access this in a different city and when it showed
him looking at a map it showed the route to my SOCKS proxy instead of me. I
guess I'm safe and the crazy guy won't kill me :)
~~~
arnorhs
Not by IP, FWIW. I'm in Mountain View but the guy seemed to want to find me in
Reykjavik, Iceland, where I'm from. (I moved to the Bay Area a month ago, but
haven't update my FB)
~~~
rufibarbatus
This guy over here [1] claims the video tracked his last foursquare check-in.
I'm guessing the location algorithm tries to find a best guess of where you
might be — hence the inconsistent results.
[1] [http://www.jenders.com/2011/10/18/take-this-lollipop-and-
the...](http://www.jenders.com/2011/10/18/take-this-lollipop-and-the-
importance-of-facebook-privacy/)
------
stef25
I wonder if it would be possible to for the app to send you an sms (or even
call you!) with some creepy "I'm outside, baby" message at the end of the
movie.
~~~
Peroni
Very clever but I imagine it would be cost prohibiting given the amount of
people that will try the app out.
------
hiraki9
That was very, very well done.
How did they do video compositing on top of an embedded browser window in
Flash?
Perhaps they pre-rendered the webpages server-side using WebKit or some such
and sent a screenshot to Flash....
~~~
egiva
Flash has the capability of incorporating dynamic content in flash-driven
movies. See how to do it (easy example), here:
UPDATE: better link here: [http://flashexplained.com/actionscript/loading-
external-jpgs...](http://flashexplained.com/actionscript/loading-external-
jpgs-into-your-main-swf-movie/)
------
codezero
My guess is that this is an advertisement for LCD monitors... the guy went
crazy because he's still using a CRT... poor fella.
------
steilpass
Revoked access to tons of applications.
~~~
ljf
Likewise, found about 30 that I had allowed access to - no idea when I did
half of them! All gone now!
~~~
steilpass
Same here. And when I was at it I looked at Twitter.
------
strickjb9
This is a genius idea. I'm sure it will go viral and everyone (including their
mother) will give this site a test drive.
I can only assume that it is designed to do one thing - data mine.
~~~
dolphenstein
It has the power to post on your wall as well.
Removed the app before they pull that one....
------
robinduckett
It's nice that you can disallow the permissions granularly, for example, I
didn't mind it accessing all my data, but posting AS me on facebook? No.
Disabled. Happy days.
------
toast76
This could be exactly what I need to finally get my wife off Facebook....
------
bteitelb
The production value is very high. FB Open Graph Protocol meta tag found in
source:
<meta property="og:type" content="tv_show"/>
Perhaps it's a viral media stunt to promo a new TV show.
~~~
wesleyzhao
I'm not sure that it is, but now that you mention it I feel like this could
actually be a REALLY effective viral media stunt for a new TV Show/Movie...
------
paul9290
Here's a similar thing from summer 2010. You and your friends inserted into a
horror movie trailer.
<http://www2.lost-in-val-sinestra.com>
------
caryme
It looks like this was made by Jason Zada (<https://twitter.com/#!/jasonzada>)
according to a tweet by the actor
([https://twitter.com/#!/billoberstjr/status/12614080094496358...](https://twitter.com/#!/billoberstjr/status/126140800944963586)).
------
itsnotvalid
If you don't want sites like this to view your stuff, please also set the
privacy setting for applications your _friends_ use to a better one. Or else
you would be _next_.
P.S. Since you connect to that application by yourself, that is pretty clear
that they can read your friends list, your feed and post as you.
------
runn1ng
What exactly happens after the one hour on the end? Can't afford to wait right
now
~~~
wesleyzhao
he knocks on your door
~~~
robinduckett
Yeah, good luck to him finding "X5, Cardiff".
There isn't an "X5" postcode here, nor is it anywhere near where I was last
time I did a location based update. The inaccurate google map thing is what
made me lul.
~~~
estel
I /do/ share location with Facebook, but I sent the guy off looking for " ,
(null)". I doubt he'll get there soon.
------
sebastianhoitz
There was something similar with "Notruf Deutschland": <http://www.notruf-
deutschland.com/teaser/>
They had a similar "approach" :)
Still, very nicely done!
------
kennywinker
Oooh! Well played. I really want the candy, but I know they're going to do
something bad with the information they take from me... I'm still tempted.
Ok, so I did it and now I'm never sleeping again.
------
Hitchhiker
Brilliant.. could help people think more clearly. Another play on these
issues, <http://youropenbook.org>
------
klausjensen
Would seem like the viral success has overloaded the site... I can't get it to
play any longer, and it worked an hour ago.
------
ben_hall
What happens when the countdown gets to zero?
~~~
neoveller
I tested this out for you. It just stops at 00:00:00 and nothing happens at
all!
------
lzell
Google street view would have been a nice addition too, depending on the
accuracy of the geo lookup.
------
technogeek00
Quality is fantastic, I too am curious as to how they are generating the pages
into the movie.
------
hermannj314
It killed the mood when he searched for ,(null) in Google Maps, but otherwise
pretty freaky.
------
jmilloy
I don't think I get it... when I let a facebook app access my facebook, it
can... access my facebook and look at my pictures? anyone can look at my
pictures, anyways. i'm missing something here
~~~
darklajid
I seriously hope you're not serious.
1) Of course, you _can_ allow everyone to see your pictures. That's not
necessary though and one of the (many) privacy concerns this site seems to
focus on. If you share your pictures, you share a HUGE amount of data. Ignore
the passed out/joking stuff, you might tell me a lot about your place
(expensive stuff in the background? pictures that show a street name?) and
your habits (always going to his parents on weekends. currently on vacation).
This is, in theory, very easily exploitable, for someone with a criminal mind
and the balls to pull of a stunt.
2) Regarding Facebook apps: Well, don't allow those to access your data? You
saw what this app did (and automatically, without a human involved). It can
exploit the date your coughing up every day in ways that you probably didn't
think about before.
Bottom line: If you're the 'share with everything and play any FB game' type
this might not shock you, but others might wake up and stop being very
careless with their own private data.
------
gurraman
A little video that gives you the feeling of this, without the
personalization:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xBA0mpWuuo>
------
mikeburrelljr
Amazingly well done... Now, I'm going to cry myself to sleep.
~~~
skeletonjelly
In the same position. Had the new Walking Dead season playing on the TV in the
background. Great, great combination.
------
snaveint
That is impressively creepy. Wow. Anyone know the background?
~~~
davidw
He is seriously pissed off that you are advocating the use of Emacs over vim
in some Facebook group.
~~~
mahen23
haha, good one.
------
omid
My 64bit flash player 11 on Linux crashes right away!
------
Axsuul
Doesn't work for me? Do I not have enough info?
------
alanh
Hilarious that the content & domain name could lend this to being classified,
in some filters, as a “shock site” ;)
------
Cushman
Mobile Safari: "You need at least Flash Player 10 to view this page."
Apple saves the day again!
------
polemic
Keeps cutting out part way through, but VERY well done.
------
oscardelben
Geoffrey Grosenbach is next. Oops
------
chippy
crashes flash
------
tomasienrbc
This is a pretty disruptive use of the Facebook API. Personalized
entertainment content, I love it!
------
mahen23
Good luck finding me in the middle of the Indian Ocean dork
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Hacking language learning - Void_
http://blog.rinik.net/hacking-language
======
_feda_
The idea of 'hacking language learning' puts me in mind of Kato Lomb [1] a
hungarian linguist who worked for the UN as one of the world's first
simultaneous translators and knew around a dozen languages fluently. One of
the most interesting things about her is that she didn't take any interest in
languages before her adult life had begun; before that she was a physicist.
In one of her books she advocates reading foreign language texts without using
a dictionary at all, just trying to figure out the meaning from what little
you already know (of course you have to be at a certain level to even try
this, although you'd be surprised how little you need to know to start.)
This process forces you to think logically about who words are constructed,
and to use your own current knowledge to e figure out meanings of words. For
example, you might already know a small part of a compound word in german, and
use this along with the context of the sentence to figure out the meaning of
the whole word.
[1]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kat%C3%B3_Lomb>
------
tokenadult
This seems to be based on the idea that learning a language is mostly about
learning words. That has not been my experience as a language learner. (As
disclosed in my HN user profile, I am a native speaker of English who learned
Chinese to the proficiency that I was able to work as a translator and as a
Chinese-English interpreter.)
Words in one language do not have a one-to-one mapping with words in any other
language. As the saying goes, "The map is not the territory." Each language
has its own peculiarities of dividing up the Universe of experience into
words, and especially each language has a different approach to arranging
words into sentences and longer utterances with grammar and syntax.
I know of a Web page that lists some language-learning resources, especially
useful for the case of learning one Indo-European language (like the blog post
author's native langauge) while already knowing another.
<http://learninfreedom.org/languagebooks.html>
The best single bit of advice I can give for someone who wants to learn a
language thoroughly is to do a lot of what the blog post author is doing:
reading in the target language. The section "Suggestions for Study" in the
front matter of John DeFrancis's book Beginning Chinese Reader, Part I, which
I first used to learn Chinese back in 1975 has great advice: "Fluency in
reading can only be achieved by extensive practice on all the interrelated
aspects of the reading process. To accomplish this we must READ, READ, READ"
(capitalization as in original).
祝你好運。(Good luck!)
AFTER EDIT: The comment posted by _feda_ before this comment was posted that
it is important to read target language text for meaning beyond one's current
reading level, using context rather than a dictionary to figure things out, is
correct. That has much to do with improving understanding of the second
language, just grappling with the language directly a lot, not always relying
on bilingual reference books.
~~~
decode
> This seems to be based on the idea that learning a language is mostly about
> learning words. That has not been my experience as a language learner.
My experience, as a native English speaker who has learned German as an adult,
is that different stages in language learning benefit from different kinds of
study. There have been times where memorizing grammar rules have been
enormously helpful to me, others where reading a lot is what I needed, and
still others where holes in my vocabulary were holding me back. After a
certain level of proficiency, the only new thing you encounter in the language
is unknown words and phrases, so it makes sense to focus on learning them.
> Words in one language do not have a one-to-one mapping with words in any
> other language.
As you have mainly studied non-European languages, this might be more true in
your experience than for those who are focusing on European languages. There
are certainly many words that map one-to-one between German and English,
especially in common usage.
What I like about the author's technique is that it seems like a smart way of
priming the pump for real and detailed learning: when he encounters a new word
in the text, he has a general idea of what it means from the definition, but
he can sharpen that meaning with the particulars of the context where he finds
it. Otherwise, he might get only the vaguest sense of what a word means from
context, or have no clue at all.
~~~
johnwatson11218
I want to add that vocab would have helped me much more than the hours and
hours of French verb drills I did in high school and university. I wish they
would thrown so much vocab at you in school that retaining even 70-80% would
be considered top notch.
------
creamyhorror
In a similar vein, here's a Python script which someone wrote that does a word
analysis on Chinese texts:
[http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/34994-new-
too...](http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/34994-new-tool-for-
vocabulary-extraction/)
It provides a breakdown of the words in the text, and even does lookups to
supply definitions and frequency in an external corpus, so you know how common
that word is in a broad range of texts. You can then take the output and paste
it into a spreadsheet program, and from there import it into an SRS flashcard
system like Anki for long-term memorization. Kind of a DIY solution but it's
pretty handy for serious learners of Chinese.
It's also available as a web frontend here, under the "Wordlist" link:
<http://www.zhtoolkit.com/posts/tools/>
With full end-to-end integration with Anki and a mobile e-reader, it would be
very powerful indeed.
(I should also mention that the mobile app Pleco has a reader component that
allows directly adding words from an ebook into its flashcard system, along
with high-quality definitions. Pleco's probably the fullest Chinese-learning
suite available on smartphones.)
edit: For mouseover definitions of Chinese and Japanese words in your browser,
there's the extremely useful Perapera-kun Firefox addon. It allows you to add
words to a wordlist which you can then export as a text file along with
definitions. Tada, more cards for your Anki deck.
~~~
polemic
Anki is awesome! I've been using it to learn Finnish (<http://ankisrs.net/>)
~~~
johnwatson11218
I like Anki as well but I had several issues running it on android. I got
through the issues on my phone but I still can't use it on my Nexus 7. Also, I
was looking at German vocab and some of the translations were in Spanish,
while all the rest were English.
------
raamdev
This reminds me of an excellent article on Wired called 'Want to Remember
Everything You'll Ever Learn? Surrender to This Algorithm' [1] in which Piotr
Wozniak describes how he used the spacing effect to learn English, among other
things.
In 1985 (!) he wrote SuperMemo, a piece of software that utilized this spacing
effect:
"SuperMemo is based on the insight that there is an ideal moment to practice
what you've learned. Practice too soon and you waste your time. Practice too
late and you've forgotten the material and have to relearn it. The right time
to practice is just at the moment you're about to forget. Unfortunately, this
moment is different for every person and each bit of information."
The full article is a bit long but if you're interested in this stuff, it's
well worth the read.
SuperMemo seems to have fallen behind as far as software goes, but there are
great alternatives, like Anki [2] that use the same method.
1\.
[http://www.wired.com/medtech/health/magazine/16-05/ff_woznia...](http://www.wired.com/medtech/health/magazine/16-05/ff_wozniak?currentPage=all)
2\. <http://ankisrs.net/>
~~~
bjustin
I'm using Anki to learn Japanese, but since I started from scratch, I'm
learning the words here first[0]. Start with a word from there, use an
English-<Language> dictionary[1] and Google Translate together to
disambiguate, then search on Google Images in <Language> to find an image of
the term. Searching in the target language double checks that you have the
correct term. After that, just practice in Anki.
The method I described is from a Lifehacker post earlier this year[2].
As an aside, Anki is excellent. In the past few months version 2.0, a new
version deserving of a major version number, was released for
Windows/Mac/Linux, and just recently for iOS. The corresponding Android
version is a little behind but I imagine it will be out soon too.
[0]
[http://www.towerofbabelfish.com/Tower_of_Babelfish/Base_Voca...](http://www.towerofbabelfish.com/Tower_of_Babelfish/Base_Vocabulary_List.html)
[1] <http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/cgi-bin/wwwjdic.cgi> [2]
[http://lifehacker.com/5903288/i-learned-to-speak-four-
langua...](http://lifehacker.com/5903288/i-learned-to-speak-four-languages-in-
a-few-years-heres-how)
------
gliese1337
Neat! I sympathize, trying to read books in Russian. Tracking progress with
individual words reminds me of some of Michael Walmsley's work at the
University of Waikato:
[http://www.cs.waikato.ac.nz/genquery.php?linklevel=4&lin...](http://www.cs.waikato.ac.nz/genquery.php?linklevel=4&linklist=CS&linkname=PhD_Theses-0&linktype=report&listby=Researcher&lwhere=unique_record_id=156&children=Research)
His software actually picks things for you to read based on words that it
knows you still need to learn.
------
mixedbit
Once you have a database of words that you know, you could use it to help
select a next book to read (a book that does not have too large percentage of
words that you don't know). Several times I bought a book only to find out
that the language is way to advanced for my level. Very frustrating.
------
klochner
Not to steal your thunder, but this is a pretty amazing story that may inspire
your own tool creation:
[http://www.salon.com/2012/10/27/whats_the_secret_to_learning...](http://www.salon.com/2012/10/27/whats_the_secret_to_learning_a_second_lanuage/)
~~~
gknoy
Spaced repetition seems pretty powerful. It seems like doing this while
reading a book might be more repetitive than spaced repetition techniques
recommend, but on the other hand you also have ongoing repetition of some of
the more common words as you read the chapter. Thanks for the interesting
article!
~~~
goldfeld
I think Spaced Repetition is precisely a tool, in the context of languages,
for the words you don't get enough or constant enough contact through reading,
writing, listening and speaking. For words that you do, you don't really need
it since you'll memorize it from actual use/need.
------
abecedarius
Very cool!
At <https://github.com/darius/spaced-out> I tried to do something vaguely
similar: from an aligned parallel corpus, automatically make a prioritized
spaced-repetition deck for language learning. (I think I used Europarl.) So
you get examples of the words in context, plus they're sorted with the most
frequent ones first.
(There's also an SM2-based flashcard reviewer in Python. It's all very crude;
I decided I didn't want to learn Swedish enough.)
------
karmel
This is being done, not with books, but with news stories, which for me is one
step up from books-- I'm reading all this stuff anyways, may as well do it in
Spanish... Only in Spanish-English right now, but the in-line translation is
pretty good: <http://www.nulu.com/>
~~~
avaku
Thanks for the link, it's great! I see they are using the spacing algo in
their flashcards...
------
_feda_
I think the idea of the database that knows what words you know is kind of a
fascinating idea in a way, in that it goes beyond personal information into
personal knowledge, a digital reflection of your actual understanding which
corrects itself continuously to reflect it more accurately.
Anyway, if this was a service I could actually use online, I most definitely
would, and I might even pay for it (as I once did with smart.fm which became
paid for a year or two ago). I'm currently learning german quite intensively,
and anything that makes this highly laborious process (that of cramming new
knowledge into my mind and trying to make it stick) more efficient is
extremely useful to any language learner.
------
biscarch
Quick tip for anyone learning foreign words on memrise or anywhere you need to
type with a different keyboard layout for OSX.
System Preferences -> Language and Text -> Input Sources. Select the languages
you want in the list. click "Keyboard Shortcuts" and enable whatever keyboard
shortcut you desire to swap layouts.
ex: now I can press CMD+Space to switch keyboard layouts between Russian,
French and Spanish.
------
mikesmullin2
memrise.com does this. at least for mandarin chinese. i've been enjoying it.
~~~
Void_
Looks cool. I think also Quizlet.com deserves to be mentioned here -- helped
me so much during high school.
~~~
fusiongyro
Quizlet sucks. It's all fun and games until some assholes come along and start
tagging their worthless sets with tags you're following. "The Trolls of
Quizlet", really? This crap doesn't happen on Memrise, and the Memrise
interface is not set up to make it terribly rewarding for people to try it.
------
toonsend
I would highly recommend
[http://www.silinternational.com/lingualinks/LANGUAGELEARNING...](http://www.silinternational.com/lingualinks/LANGUAGELEARNING/BooksBackInPrint/SuccessWithForeignLanguages/success.pdf)
Interviews with successful language learners gives a great set of language
learning techniques and methodologies.
------
TeMPOraL
> The code is a mess, so I'll keep it to myself for now
:(.
It's not always about looking at code; some people could benefit from OP's
solution right now.
~~~
sartakdotorg
I've been developing a similar system for accelerating my Japanese study, and
I haven't been able to release it yet either. It has nothing to do with the
quality of the code, it's that right now it's designed specifically for
myself. It practically hardcodes my username and other details like that.
Maybe other programmers could use it, but preparing such a package for general
consumption takes lots more time and energy.
~~~
evoxed
Same situation here as well. I started with eventual distribution in mind (yet
another Japanese study app) but it's still a long way away from being what I'd
consider releasable. Too many features coded in that I forced myself to try
out and will eventually be modified, reconfigured, or whatever. I'll run out
of excuses soon enough ;)
------
netvarun
Off-topic: It's interesting that word 'countenance' appeared at the top in his
screenshoot. That's the only word I still remember from my word-memorization
spree while prepping for the GRE.
For those wondering: It mean's face (as in a person's face or like the 'face'
in facebook. Countenance-book anybody? :)
------
ZeroGravitas
I tried something similar with the text of classic video games (I speak
English, learning French), since things like Zelda often use archaic terms. It
worked quite well, even if you can only get text from other games in the
series rather than the one you're playing.
------
welebrity
Nice work. For almost all learning, there is a better solution out there . . .
it just takes individuals to go after a creative solution using their brain .
. . which is really language/dialect independent! Bravo.
------
jfaucett
nice app! I built myself a little cli program that would do some of the same
things a while back, this definately has a much prettier interface though :)
Also this has a learning adventure which is a good additional touch, I just
used a feedback loop on my previous choices and what I had previously marked
as "unsure".
I usually ended up being too lazy though to actually use it. I know exactly
what your talking about though with conversation vs. literary I use german
every day at work but still don't get half of what Thomas Mann or Goethe or
trying to say.
~~~
sentenza
It is funny that many people seem to have this idea at the same time. Must be
that the time has come for this.
A while back I wrote a bunch of python scripts that do the same thing for
subtitles for myself.
Regarding your problem with Goethe and Mann: Maybe you shouldn't try to start
with "the masters". I read books in various languages and have come to the
conclusion that after a hard day at work I just can't read a nobel prize
winner in a foreign language. What I can read, however, is a crime novel, or
something funny (Maybe even a comic book).
Here is a book that I would recommend for you to read if you want to read an
important, well-known but easy german novel:
"Der Schatz im Silbersee" by Karl May: This is an escapist western written in
the 19th century and actually one of the most read German novels of all times.
Rest assured that every famous German you know (including Einstein and the bad
one with the ridiculous beard) have read this in their youth.
~~~
jfaucett
you hit it right on the money with the nobel prize winners :) I have to
(guiltily) admit reading a krimi or bestseller is fun, you know the words,
you're done after a couple train rides, it was usually exiting - of course
then you forget it, because the contents where basically nothing. I have liked
max frisch though and Kafka is also surprisingly easy when you consider people
study him, also thanks for karl may suggestion I'll put it on my to read list.
The thing is sometimes you want something to think about and I know there's
many great german authors and I'd like to be able to "get" them like I do
Borges :)
------
euoia
Here's a tool that I wrote for practising French verb conjugation that also
uses Mac OS X speech synthesis. <https://github.com/euoia/ReVerb>
------
perlgeek
This is great, because it integrates learning with something that you want to
do anyway (reading), thus making it easier to come up with the motivation for
learning.
------
kentosi
Just a quick hint for anyone learning French: The Kindle reader comes with an
inbuilt French dictionary. Hovering over a word will show its definition (in
French).
------
teyc
Are there libraries that can turn voice into phonemes? It would be cool if I
had to say a phrase and the computer scored me on how close I got to it.
------
stream-media
Inspired by your idea, I created this web page: <http://vocabulate.me>
~~~
machinarium
Incredible. Thank you so much!
------
itsnotvalid
Any thoughts on non-spaced language such as Japanese (which I am learning) and
Chinese (which I speak)?
------
matthiasb
Brilliant! I believe this is how Rosetta Stone is teaching as well.
~~~
eric_bullington
No, but this is how Rosetta _should_ be teaching language. Instead they hawk
their "immersive" language learning. Immersion is great for children, but
adults learn differently (I say this as someone who learned a foreign language
as a child and two as an adult). It's not sexy, and it's not pretty, but to
build a foundation for learning a language as an adult, rote memorization of
vocabulary is by far the most effective route _in the beginning_. Once you
have a good base (say 500 of the most common words), you can start learning
grammar and then, slowly, starting to practice speaking, reading and writing.
But continuing to build up a vocabulary is vital to continuing to learn the
language. Once you reach about 1000 of the most common words, things will
start falling into place _if_ you have adequate exposure to the language. In
my opinion, it's only at this point that Rosetta Stone becomes worth using,
and then only if you don't have access to friends, family, or tv channels in
the language you're learning.
~~~
johnwatson11218
does anyone know the most common 500 words? Is it language neutral or does it
vary from language to language? I definitely agree that learning the 500 or so
most common words is a great start - even if some of the words are conjugated
verbs and you don't have the background to understand the conjugation.
~~~
ebiester
It varies from language to language, but those word lists are all around.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Frequency_lists> is a good place to
start.
I am not a believer in rote word memorization, but rather putting each word in
a sentence and using the sentence as the memorization route. Rote memorization
stores the word in a different part of the brain than the language center, and
using the sentence as the unit of flash card seems to override this.
I still see use for flash cards to re-trigger words in memory, but not for
actually learning new words. I can't tell you how much I struggled to de-link
certain words because I "memorized" them at the same time and so mixed up the
meanings of the two words.
------
aledalgrande
You can use the Collins API instead of that crappy synthesizer! ;)
------
xk_id
well done, man, well done. It warms my heart to see people who understood what
computers are for.
------
jalilos
it's a wonderfull idea to memorise some importants words
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
My Last Day of Social Skydiving (I made it) - darkxanthos
http://socialskydivingwithjustin.posterous.com/social-skydiving-day-30-wrapping-up-the-daily
======
darkxanthos
As an aside... I still need to finish my final project/exam but that's set to
take a couple weeks.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Design and Implementation of a 256-Core BrainFuck Computer [pdf] - bryanrasmussen
http://sigtbd.csail.mit.edu/pubs/veryconference-paper2.pdf
======
wybiral
> The BrainFuck computer is an attractive solution for servicing high
> throughput BrainFuck cloud services, both in terms of performance and cost.
BrainFuck as a Service?
------
zokier
> Considering each BrainFuck command on average takes 5 or more assembly
> instructions to implement, even assuming a perfect 1 instructions per second
> on a 3GHz processor, it would require almost one hundred cores to compete
> with this performance
I assume the authors intended to mean "1 instructions per cycle" here, but
even with that amendment isn't that pretty poor performance for modern CPU? I
was under the impression that modern CPUs have peak performance way above 1
IPC, although if that is realizable with BF interpreter is another question.
It would have been nice to see comparison to some reasonably high-performance
BF compiler.
~~~
DSingularity
Not way above, but yes. We use simultaneous multi threading and out of order
execution to enable superscalar execution I.e >1 instruction per cycle. But
it’s not likely to be more than 2-3 for a variety of reasons.
~~~
monocasa
Just adding that you can be superscalar, while not being out of order or
multithreaded.
The Xbox 360's cores fit that model, as well as the original Pentium. They'll
execute multiple instructions, but will serialize if there are dependencies
(or other constraints that are uarch specific).
------
elchief
I'm a simple man. I see an article about Brainfuck and I upvote it
------
notananthem
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brainfuck](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brainfuck)
For reference. This would basically let you almost use BrainFuck. If you
wanted to.
------
gorpomon
Would a mind greater than I please weigh in on a potential path to using
BrainFuck to do some type of meaningful task (simple server, cli tool, etc)?
From what I can tell, the best bet is using it to to write the source code for
another language and run that code since most examples seem to just print
strings or increment values.
Is there a meaningful set of primitives one can incrementally build on the
core language to make usable code?
~~~
shakna
Thanks to BFBASIC there's a small digital jewel safe running brainfuck as it's
core in a couple casinos.
It was doable, and matched security expectations, but it feels like twenty
years ago.
The tooling isn't quite there, so you end up working around the compiler and
injecting hand written bf, like we used to with assembly.
~~~
aeontech
That’s kind of amazing... could you share why? Just to prove it could be done?
~~~
shakna
Security requirements by the hotel. They wanted everything to be running
obfuscated code.
They gave me a choice of Malboge or Brainfuck, neither of which I knew before
the contract.
~~~
dkersten
That seems like a ridiculous security requirement, but also like a rather
interesting project to work on! The ultimate security through obscurity.
~~~
shakna
It was certainly fun at the beginning, and I think they were aiming for crazy
levels of security, and obscurity sounded nice to someone.
But the tooling really isn't there.
Ended up using 'make' and 'm4' as preprocessors to work around things.
------
tomsmeding
Come on, 5 instructions per BF operation? They're on x86 right? Let's assume
your memory pointer is in ebx. (Substitute rbx for x64 code) (nasm syntax)
+: inc byte [ebx]
-: dec byte [ebx]
>: inc ebx
<: dec ebx
[: cmp byte [ebx], 0
jz endlabel
startlabel:
]: cmp byte [ebx], 0
jnz startlabel
endlabel:
That's ignoring . and , which I expect do not occur very often. (If they did,
their compute-focused architecture wouldn't be a good choice anyway.)
This is more like 1.3 instructions per command. How did they get their "5"?
~~~
imtringued
Even basic optimizing compilers collapse consecutive + and - operations into a
single constant size instruction and does a dozen other optimizations so in
practice the instruction density is crazy high compared to naively executing
every BF operation individually. It could have been interesting if they used
an optimized ISA inspired by [1].
There's a reason why CPUs that can execute JVM bytecode directly never caught
on: They cannot apply any of the optimizations that a JIT or compiler can.
[1] [http://calmerthanyouare.org/2015/01/07/optimizing-
brainfuck....](http://calmerthanyouare.org/2015/01/07/optimizing-
brainfuck.html)
~~~
tomsmeding
Of course you collapse sequences of BF instructions, but then you get an even
lower cpu-instructions / bf-command ratio. The paper gives 5/1, I claim it's
at MOST 1.3/1, and with a basic optimising compiler you can get far below that
of course.
------
peterwwillis
Tuition well spent.
------
evadne
See
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12714846](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12714846)
------
monocasa
The architecture really reminds me of TIS-100.
~~~
yvdriess
Zach, if you're reading this, please make a Brainfuck expansion for TIS-100
[1] and Shenzhen I/O [2], your games are clearly not hard enough already ;)
[1] [http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/](http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/)
[2] [http://www.zachtronics.com/shenzhen-
io/](http://www.zachtronics.com/shenzhen-io/)
------
inteleng
Can't believe they misspelled Virtex.
------
kruhft
Nice.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Apple Maps Accidentally Revealed a Top Secret Military Base - lusob
http://gizmodo.com/5950391/apple-maps-accidentally-revealed-a-top-secret-military-base
======
bediger4000
From the gizmodo.com article: _Taiwan's secret radar, which was supplied by
Raytheon, was probably on China's metaphorical radar already_
"Probably"? I bet that the People's Republic knows the location at least as
well as the Taiwanese government, and I bet there's a treaty obligation to
tell. That was true of USA/USSR relationship during the cold war. "Secret"
missile silos were only secret from the ordinary citizens of the respective
countries. The military establishments knew locations of the other's missiles.
So, why keep it secret from their own citizens? Given that statistically
speaking, there's very few real national security secrets, keeping secrets
from citizens probably just enables fraud, waste, corruption and cover-ups at
biblical scale.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Technical note app that builds a knowledge base - mtbarta
http://monocorpus.com
======
TeMPOraL
No note-taking thread could be complete without someone mentioning Emacs and
org-mode, so let's be done with this already.
Comparing this app to Emacs/org-mode, I'd say that the core benefit of this
app is collaboration. For single-person use, org-mode blows everything out of
the water, being faster to use, much more feature-packed, and having better
integration with programming languages (e.g. allowing to run code straight
from your notes, in any language you've already set your Emacs up to work
with, and have such random blocks of code in the notes exchange data). But
there's no proper way of collaborating with this setup - both because lack of
structure (org-mode notes are just plaintext files), and the near-
impossibility to convince your co-workers to use Emacs if they aren't already.
Still, don't treat it as a negative comment, Emacs users are set for life and
aren't really your target audience :). If anything, take a look at org-mode
and see if you can steal some ideas.
~~~
matt-snider
I use vimwiki, and I'm really liking the simplicity of plain text notes
(markdown in my case). I've never used orgmode, but I prefer to use other
tools for to-dos and calendar/organization anyways. From reading about it, I
think the only feature I'd really like to have is literate programming, which
looks cool. Also, the tag search appears to support expressions, which vimwiki
doesn't.
One area that I'm struggling with is making my notes easily viewable, editable
and searchable on mobile. Syncthing + Markor for editing takes care of the
editable part, but they aren't displayed nicely or easily searchable by text
or tags. Exporting to HTML would make them nicer to read, but still not
searchable. App and browser based solutions are much nicer in this regard, but
I'm not willing to compromise on the other great benefits of programs like
vimwiki/orgmode.
If you or anyone else has experience or an opinion, I'd be glad to hear about
it.
~~~
patrickdavey
I made a little gem called vimwiki_ markdown which would help with the HTML
part.
[https://github.com/patrickdavey/vimwiki_markdown](https://github.com/patrickdavey/vimwiki_markdown)
~~~
matt-snider
I actually am already using vim_markdown - thanks! It works well in terms of
rendering, but I still have no ability to search, which I guess isn't the
responsibility of vimwiki/vimwiki_markdown, but might need to be some
postprocessing step.
------
voidhorse
I've tried a lot of different note taking solutions, org mode, vimwiki, apple
notes, etc. etc. But at some point I became dissatisfied with them all. My
distaste for digital solutions lies in their lack of flexibility: at the end
of the day, there's as of yet no digital means of note-taking, that I'm aware
of, that achieves the same degree of flexibility and tight feedback loop
offered by pen and paper.
Are my thoughts better captured in words or in images? No problem, with pen
and paper I can switch modes seamlessly, and, furthermore, mix them without
any hassle. Should I come up with tags and some appropriate naming convention
so I can find my notes later? No need—when everything is stowed away in a
compact notebook, I can quickly flip through and find a multitude of phrases
or doodles that indicate what subject I've explored. There's something
charming, too, about flipping through the musky contents of a forgotten
notebook that I find lacking when I peruse old digital files.
Plenty of people find digital solutions more appropriate, and sure, they do
eliminate some of the hassle of carrying around a notebook and pen, they make
notes easier to share with collaborators (this is where they excel!), and if
you have a large number of notes it may serve for better organization, but at
the end of the day, note-taking is one domain in which I've found newer tools
aren't necessarily better tools. Something about the tactile and fluid
experience of taking pen and paper notes still gets my neurons firing in the
right ways...I think the persistence of whiteboards in the workplace also
attests to the value of analog means for capturing our thoughts.
~~~
nekopa
The problem I had with musky notebooks is that I have too many of them. I have
literally 80~100 old moleskines in a draw filled with old notes and ideas.
Like you, I've tried most digital solutions, and they all came up lacking.
Nothing can beat hand written note-taking for me.
So, I thought "Why not both?" For the last 5 years I've used a Samsung Galaxy
note 8.0 with pen(the old tablet, not the phone). And the best app I found to
take notes on is the stock S-note app.
I can put ideas into their own 'book'. It has shape recognition (draw a crappy
square or line and it converts it into a nice clean one). Lots of
customization options for pen shape, color, transparency and size. I can take
or download photos to paste into the notebook.
But the killer feature for me has been the ability to import PDFs and write
over them. Not only do I use this feature for reading textbooks and keeping my
notes in them, but I can make custom "paper" backgrounds - think different
grids - dot, hex etc.
And last year when I started journaling, I found no journal system worked for
me exactly. So using Scribus (an open source DTP solution like InDesign) I can
make custom journals (think daily, weekly and monthly organization pages) as
PDFs to import and scribble on.
So now I have all my notes with me, able to scribble and doodle when I need,
backed up and easily searchable and importable to my laptop. Win-win.
S-note doesn't quite do everything I need it to, so I may try to create my own
solution - but it's 90% there.
------
trulyrandom
Looks interesting. It's good to see another note app that also has an open
source backend.
I'm personally using StandardNotes
([https://standardnotes.org](https://standardnotes.org)) for note taking,
which has been great. If you don't need the collaborative functionality of
MonoCorpus, it's worth checking out.
~~~
jszymborski
I was an avid user of StandardNotes (particularly a fan of the minimalism),
but I've since been really taken by Joplin[0] and end up evangelizing for it
whenever I can.
Joplin's FOSS, syncs using a number of methods, support E2E (I'm no crypto
expert, but they use AES in OCB mode which seems appropriate), and supports
things like LaTeX out of the box. Oh, and it has nice things like mobile apps
and web snip extensions for browsers.
Collaboration is apparently on the radar, but doesn't currently exist in a
meaningful way.
[0] [https://joplin.cozic.net/](https://joplin.cozic.net/)
EDIT: I had cast some vague arm-chair dispersions on StandardNote's crypto
claims which I've removed in light of the comment below regarding a security
audit. Apologies for not informing myself on the matter!
~~~
mobitar
Standard Notes’ cryptography was audited by a third party security firm:
[https://listed.standardnotes.org/@sn/821/announcing-our-
secu...](https://listed.standardnotes.org/@sn/821/announcing-our-security-
audit-results)
~~~
jszymborski
That's actually awesome, was not aware.
------
stockkid
I find that the best way to take notes without slowing down the velocity is to
minimize the context switching by embedding note taking to the environment.
Note-taking shouldn't be done by an external application because then users
have to switch context from their current work. Rather, the tool should be
available in the command line, browser, and IDE.
I have been making and using dnote [0] for the past two years to build a
personal knowledge base, and this seems to work. I could just jot down things
inside my terminal or web browser within seconds and get back to work.
[0] - [https://github.com/dnote/cli](https://github.com/dnote/cli)
~~~
TeMPOraL
> _Note-taking shouldn 't be done by an external application because then
> users have to switch context from their current work. Rather, the tool
> should be available in the command line, browser, and IDE._
Some ways of working around that:
\- have your note-taking app always open, on the other screen if available
\- work in the same program you're using to take notes
I do the latter - there's one program that can do that, Emacs.
dnote doesn't look ergonomic enough for me to use directly (I don't spend
_that_ much time in raw terminal), but looks perfect for globally binding to a
key, with an ad-hoc popup UI (e.g. via your WM on Linux, or with AutoHotkey on
Windows - the latter makes it trivially easy to create a minimal GUI too.)
------
simonw
I know I'm playing armchair architect here, but MongoDB, PostgreSQL AND
Elasticsearch?
For an application like this I would expect just PostgreSQL with its built-in
JSON datatype and surprisingly capable full-text search to be enough on its
own. I'd love to know how you ended up deciding on all three.
~~~
PurpleRamen
From the look of it it seams postgresql is used by keycloak for usermanagment-
stuff, not by the app itself. So maybe this can be changed or even removed for
selfhosting?
------
erwan
Cool stuff, I would pay for that - even a single user - if you could provide
me with strong privacy guarantees.
I currently use my own code-note management app. It's crude and is essentially
like a Jupyter notebook.
I would be happy to switch over something better if I could feel safe that
this extension of my brain would be safe.
------
pleasecalllater
_...just dreaming_
I'd love to have storing PDFs (with searching), storing web pages as images
and as text (integrated with my browser), writing notes with markdown, latex,
asciidoc, adding links. All that should run locally (as it is my data) with an
online integration on a website, so people can edit the data as well. Also
teams, projects, content versioning, online conflicts resolution (if more
people edited the same file), categories, tagging... Configuring a custom
pipeline e.g. to build a pdf from my markdown/latex sources.
Additionally a nice keyboard-UI, so I don't need to click all day, as it slows
me down terribly.
I'd happily pay for this.
~~~
deniall
Honestly, Evernote does the vast majority of what you just listed. I’d highly
recommended it giving it a try if you haven’t already.
------
Quanttek
Does anyone know a similar app not geared so much for developers? i.e. (also)
interlinking nodes with full markdown support (incl embedded images) or even
files, a good search over all of them, preferably WYSIWYG-y (like Typora)
~~~
csytan
You should check out notion.so
~~~
carrollgt91
Second this. We use notion for all of our company knowledge-tracking and
documentation. It's even great for the more technical side of things, as it
supports code-formatting as well.
------
smashpanda
I built something like this to use locally and I found it to be one of the
most useful tools. For me the Search feature is what really did it, tagging
articles so I could look them up later was amazing.
I used
[https://github.com/olivernn/lunr.js/](https://github.com/olivernn/lunr.js/)
so the search had great functionality locally. Is there going to be anything
like that?
------
jgforbes
I see a lot of the note apps popping up - what is the fundamental problem that
people are trying to solve that hasn't been solved by all the other apps? Is
it collaboration or syncing or other?
------
indigodaddy
This looks quite good for my technical operations workflow actually.. ETA on
when it will be available?
~~~
mtbarta
the open source version is available if you want to use it immediately.
There's no team functionality, however.
I'm hoping to get a more fully-featured product out in a few months.
------
jookyboi
Might want to check out cacher.io for a team-based app that integrates with
VSCode, Atom and Sublime.
------
perishabledave
One of the screenshots doesn’t resize properly down to mobile. FYI.
~~~
mtbarta
Sorry about that! I jammed several gifs and a video into the template without
thinking about responsiveness. I know on Macs the video below the about
section doesn't seem to play.
I'll look at it asap.
------
cyneox
I use my Leuchtturm (bullet Journaling) + TiddlyWiki.
------
Telichkin
Sorry, but I can't understand why should I use this app instead of saving
notes in a source code?
~~~
mtbarta
Not all notes belong in shared source code. I take notes on overall code
structure and oddities, but also debug output, commands I've run, daily todos,
thoughts on papers, experimental results, etc.
I used to save markdown files to git, but 1.) search was difficult and 2.)
sometimes I wanted to see the evolution of a project while other times I
wanted notes by day.
This project aims to make it easier to record and recall knowledge that teams
need and take for granted. I tend to think about onboarding new members, how
projects are run, and very specific, technical challenges not on Stack
Overflow.
I'm open to feedback. I want to continue to push down a wiki/knowledge base
path, but i'm not sure how other teams currently manage stale knowledge and
dissemination of technical info.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
In a previously unpublished story, Kurt Vonnegut bellies up to the bar - edw519
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/arts/la-ca-kurt-vonnegut18-2009oct18,0,4119732,full.story
======
growt
SPOILERS AHEAD:
Maybe Vonnegut is over my head but throwing a cat over a wall that scratches
someone later and showing pictures of people to known paranoiacs with the
intention to get them killed seem like two very different things.
~~~
silentbicycle
Spoiler alert, dude.
~~~
growt
sorry didn't see that. fixed it.
~~~
silentbicycle
It's too late now, but using rot13 works well for that sort of thing.
------
hubb
this is the 2nd posthumous short story collection of his released, i think.
the first was one was a far cry from 'bagambo snuff box' and 'welcome to the
monkey house', but it offered an interesting window into his development as a
writer. i'll definitely pick this up when it's released
------
Confusion
It rather reminds me of the rather absurd/sinister stories by Roald Dahl.
~~~
jcl
It reminds me of Neil Gaiman's short story "We Can Get Them For You
Wholesale", which also features a killer and would-be client meeting in a bar.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Can_Get_Them_For_You_Wholesa...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Can_Get_Them_For_You_Wholesale)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: What are people using Steve Ballmer's USAFacts dataset for? - arikr
-
======
olivercreashe
I've seen people choking the rooster with it, and doing some cool machine
lesrning with it to see how much they can mine for bitcoin a la Martha Stewart
meets James Bond.
DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS!!!!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Hacking Business Model - subsystem
http://hackingbusinessmodel.info/
======
jzd131
Its an interesting concept. However, it may never work for one simple reason
"risk". When my partners and I started our company the risk that we took was
astronomical, leaving our high-paid jobs, masters, phd's to start a company.
This risk needs to be rewarded and it is via equity. Building a company that
is there only for its employees does not provide the founders with enough
reward to warrant the risk.
This does not include the stress it takes to start and run a company, that
stress should be equally as rewarded.
~~~
marcus_holmes
I've played around with co-operative business structures for this sort of
thing, and if the shares are awarded to each employee as a straight split each
year (so year 1 creates 100 shares, which are split 50% to the 2 founders,
then year 2 creates 100 shares which are split 33% each to 2 founders and 1
employee, and so on) then the founders tend to end up with an outsize lump of
shares, and the early employees do well too.
It ends up rewarding early employees more than the normal company structure,
but I think that's a good thing; they normally have to go through a lot of
disruption (and a fair amount of risk; the chances of the startup not being
able to make payroll occasionally are high) and are a key element to the
success of the organisation anyway.
------
swombat
A lot of this stuff sounds interesting - in the same ballpark as what we're
already doing at GrantTree, but some bits are jarringly wrong. For example:
> _The Company is primarily created to generate bonuses for the employees (not
> to get sold)._
Ugh. What an uninspiring company mission statement. Surely the company should
exist to do something worthwhile for its customers first. If it does no good
to the rest of the world, generating bonuses for its employees is... lame.
~~~
ringdabell
That's a bit too cynical...
I read that more as a "company should seek to provide sustainable financial
prosperity for the employees". What's wrong with that? It's hard to provide
for your customers if you and your employees are struggling.
> If it does no good to the rest of the world, generating bonuses for its
> employees is... lame.
I don't know. Not every business produces world-saving value. And that's fine.
You shouldn't need kool-aid level propaganda to validate your business and
motivate your employees...
A primary motivation for me and my business, is creating an institution that
enriches the lives of those part of it. I want to create the type of company
where everyone has some say, where the mission is bigger than any one
individual, and whose employees feel empowered and respected. I've worked too
many bigco jobs that wore and ground people down. My first job out of school
was at a management consultancy. The pay was excellent, the projects were
interesting (and truly made an impact), but the culture of the
industry/company was such that people were ground down to the point that they
became extremely jaded, materialist, negative, etc.
For my older co-workers and bosses that were married and had kids, I always
wondered how that impacted their lives at home and how they treated their love
ones, and in turn the ripple effect that would have.
From reading your blog, I know you have a similar background, so I think you
know what I'm talking about.
The startupbro culture sneers at these "lifestyle business" sentiments, but
there is no shame in a more modest (and I think, balanced) approach.
~~~
swombat
I certainly do know what you're talking about, and definitely agree that that
should be one of the primary objectives of a company... But I think if it's
the only one, then something's wrong.
The company should have an objective to do something good and worthwhile for
people outside of the business. Even "lifestyle businesses", whatever they may
be, should.
All three are fundamentally necessary, sine-qua-non: making money, doing
something worthwhile, and doing it in a way that builds people up rather than
grinding them down.
~~~
ringdabell
Fair enough. This is where I'm the cynical one in the sense that I don't see
the point of having a visionary mission statement if you have to resort to
spin and propaganda tactics to convince your employees to buy into it.
The qualification of "worthwhile" is really subjective to the point where
unless you're literally doing something truly impactful (which I define as
value + massive scale, e.g., cure to cancer, etc.), your value is at best a
surface scratch and at worst a fad.
Consumer oriented startups like Snapchat spring to mind, which seems to have
both a questionable mission statement + a shameless pursuit of founder
enrichment. Not judging (I'm jelly), but I do think it serves the greater
point I'm trying to make.
~~~
swombat
To give you a tangible example, GrantTree's mission has been, from day one, to
help UK startups, by being one of the better players in the UK startup
ecosystem. It's a tangible positive difference which we can all feel we're
making.
Of course, making money is also important, if only because money allows us to
hire better people and do a better job, and it was also a primary reason of
starting GrantTree... but it's not a good enough reason to put all the energy
to grow it past the stage where it is an extremely profitable hobby, to the
stage where it is a genuine business.
------
jorde
With the background of coming from Finland and now living in San Francisco, I
have to say that I'm a supporter of the "Default Employee Rules" section when
it comes to working hours and fixed vacation time. While unlimited vacation
policy is common among SF/SV startups it drives people to work all the time
and not actually take holidays (or you're working on your holiday). No matter
how much time you spend at the office people need rest.
The second author of the model is Michael Widenius, a Finn and co-founder of
MySQL.
------
marcus_holmes
I like it, except for the democracy bit. Voting sucks as a method of making
decisions. For quick unimportant decisions, sure, vote. But for important
decisions either involve everyone and make it a consensus (i.e. unanimous,
everyone has to agree) or give the authority and responsibility to one person.
Voting gives every vote the same weight, but some people are more
knowledgeable than others and in a better place to know the right course (this
is not 'some people are better than others' but 'some people have more
information than others'). Voting also disables unpopular-but-necessary
decisions, which will kill the company eventually.
I would replace it by either:
\- all decisions are made by one person (not the same person for each
decision). The management team select three appropriate employees to make the
decision, and an all-company vote selects which one will make the decision.
or:
\- the management team will make all decisions, but must provide post a
written explanation of the reasoning behind the decision to the rest of the
company, and any decision may be further discussed at a company meeting.
But that's just my thoughts after 5 mins thinking about it... someone else
probably has better ideas :)
------
Halfwake
This is not good. Almost everything, if not everything, in this document is
either specific nitpicking or uselessly vague.
> Transparent: We communicate in an honest and genuine way. Any information or
> process that can be made open, will be made open.
That's meaningless if a way of determining what can and can't be made open
isn't included. Here's one of the "concrete tools" that's supposed to help the
company be transparent.
> Corporate transparency - any information or process that can be made open,
> should be made open.
This is not helpful.
> The Company should make it as fun as possible to work for the Company.
Companies don't strive to make working less fun. This doesn't help.
> 2000 Euro hardware allowance at start of position (for laptop, desktop etc).
> 1000 Euro/year hardware allowance for everyone that requires new hardware to
> be be able to do their work.
The hardware allowances are just fixed numbers that don't take into account
different currencies, job positions, or how the price of parts may change over
time and differ by location. This is brittle.
> The Company should budget for at least 3 traveling meetings for every
> employee to ensure that people can work efficiently and get to know each
> other. One of the meetings should be an all company meeting.
It's possible that all employees don't require travel budgets. It's possible
that no employees require travel budgets.
------
_lex
I might be drinking crazy juice, but I see everything EXCEPT a business model.
How does this company make money? How do you attract customers? How do you
reach scale? What you've written down is a bunch of ways to spend money - not
a business. Most businesses do spend money, and some may even benefit from
some of the ideas presented, but please don't call it a business model.
------
viniciusspader
The spanish link is broken.
Would do you want help to translate it to portuguese?
------
sharemywin
Sounds like this would work for a marketplace like ebay.
------
czbond
This is fantastic.
------
maerF0x0
anyone know a list of companies following such model?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Catch the London underground with Google - adamcollingburn
http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2011/07/catch-london-underground-with-google.html
======
babul
The Transit Navigation android app is a welcome addition, but I wish these
types of android apps would work without constant need for data connection
(i.e. would cache results and work offline once route downloaded) as nothing
is worse than taking an underground train and losing all route information due
to loss of signal. On a side-note "Pubtran London" is another good (and free)
android app for London travel which also takes into account route/line
closures and can also find National Rail train times/route info (for entire
UK) from within same tool.
~~~
abraham
Google Maps has an experimental feature for downloading map information. I
don't think it currently includes transit yet but I'm sure it will in the
future.
[http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/07/download-map-
area-a...](http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/07/download-map-area-added-
to-labs-in.html)
For cities that provide the information to Google, Maps includes realtime
delays and closures.
[http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/06/know-when-your-
bus-...](http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/06/know-when-your-bus-is-late-
with-live.html)
------
ottbot
Looks very nice, but doesn't take into account tube status. This is especially
important on weekends where lots of closures occur due to engineering works.
Hopefully it will soon, otherwise the TfL site is the still the best bet if
you already have an idea of where you're going and just want to take a quick
look to see if anything will affect your journey.
------
andybak
Excellent. Now maybe we can start putting pressure on these bastards:
[http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2010-11/03/railtrack-
ope...](http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2010-11/03/railtrack-open-data-
apps)
[http://mocko.org.uk/b/2011/01/08/open-uk-rail-data-media-
cov...](http://mocko.org.uk/b/2011/01/08/open-uk-rail-data-media-coverage-
broken-appeals-process/)
Apologies for the bile the situation regarding access to UK Rail Network data
gets me really irritated.
~~~
adamcollingburn
Network rail arn't a touch on TFL.
..In terms of crappiness.
~~~
corin_
I could be wrong, but I suspect the reason Londoners think that is just
because they use it so regularly. If you're catching 2+ TFL tubes a day, and
national services maybe a few times a year, maybe even a couple of times a
week, if they both have pretty similar success rates then TFL will feel much
worse, because it will get so many more bad memories.
I probably go to London at least ten times a month (either for a day or just
for an evening), and have slightly more network rail trips a month (all my
trips to london are an hour away by train), and in my experience I have much
more trust for TFL.
~~~
toyg
This sort of perception is what makes one think that train services in other
countries are always better than in your own backyard. The truth is that, in
Europe, the average level of railway service is more or less the same
everywhere these days; the exception is recent high-speed technology, which is
only available in a handful of countries ( <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-
speed_rail_in_Europe> ).
~~~
corin_
Yep, and in other (non-travel) areas as well - grass is greener and all that.
------
JacobAldridge
This is great - I rarely use buses because it's just too much of a headache
trying to determine how far I need to walk to get one, when the next one is,
and how far I need to walk at the other end - then trying to compare mutliple
options against those criteria! In central London I just grab the Tube because
it's an easier decision - the visual element of this makes buses far easier to
assess as an option.
~~~
goatforce5
It's worth investing the time to familiarize yourself with London's bus
network. I'm a big fan of the "spider maps" they introduced a few years ago.
They're kind of like mini tube-style maps for each neighbourhood:
[http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/gettingaround/maps/buses/busdiagra...](http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/gettingaround/maps/buses/busdiagrams.asp?borough=WES)
------
nopassrecover
How is this only just happening? I live in Adelaide, Australia (1.2 million
approx) with some of the worst public transport I've experienced in the
developed world and we've had Google Maps with public transport integration
for years.
Incidentally, there was a cool iPhone app called TubeMap that made travelling
on the tube a breeze when I was there last which included service downtimes
which are apparently quite common, worked fine offline and was pretty fully
featured in all ways you could want. However, the Tube is only a small part of
the public transport for greater London.
~~~
avar
Because bureaucracies are slow, and it's taken this time for London to release
up-to-date and machine readable data.
~~~
nopassrecover
That's the easy and somewhat circular answer. I'd be curious to know what
rationale the service had for not integrating with Google Maps or vice versa.
Cost is the only legitimate one that comes to mind - I can't imagine concerns
about open data were a massive issue given that third parties have been using
and providing a subset of the same data for some time.
~~~
smackfu
Google didn't want more transit partners for a long time: the sign-up page
just said "check back later".
I think they are very concerned that the data feed will be bad or unreliable,
and that they will be providing bad directions. I know in NYC, the schedule
and such for subways is generally simple, but has crazy exception rules every
weekend for maintenance.
------
ollysb
Great to see but it didn't work that great for the couple of searches I tried.
For London Bridge to Marylebone it confused London Bridge with Tower Bridge,
much like Robert McCulloch ;)
~~~
nopassrecover
I wouldn't be too hard on them - any sentient AI would probably make the same
mistake on a first pass given how widespread the confusion is. For instance do
a Google Image search on London Bridge.
------
bhickey
This is worlds better than TfL's route planner. However, it seems to be
confused about where King's Cross/St. Pancras is located.
Moreover appears prone to suggesting some peculiar routes:
<http://bit.ly/qNyvHb>
~~~
panacea
That's not very peculiar though, is it? A short walk and a single direct bus.
On the weekend I prefer to catch buses over the underground (no pun intended)
even if it takes a bit longer.
I'm not in a rush and I enjoy the scenery (the front top seat of a double deck
bus is a very cheap VIP way to tour London).
I'd probably use that route.
------
dhess
When I was in London recently, I used the London Transport iPhone app for
getting around:
[http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/london-
transport/id393119892?...](http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/london-
transport/id393119892?mt=8)
It was a little quirky (the bus arrival times seemed to be off a bit), but
overall quite nice. It includes all forms of transport (bus, tube, DLR, ferry,
and even Boris's bikes), lets your limit your travel options to just certain
types (e.g., "I only want to see bus routes right now"), and has nice
heuristics like whether you prefer to walk, how fast a walker you are, etc.
------
juliano_q
I used it a few times here in São Paulo / Brazil to catch a bus and it worked
like a charm, but I would love some offline caching of routes since the 3G
sinal here is terrible and expensive.
------
bruceboughton
Doesn't seem to have London Overground
([http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?saddr=canonbury&daddr=west...](http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?saddr=canonbury&daddr=west+croydon&hl=en&sll=51.394465,-0.146805&sspn=0.08965,0.154324&mra=ls&dirflg=r&ttype=dep&date=28%2F07%2F11&time=12:52&noexp=0&noal=0&sort=def&z=12&start=0))
though it does have Tramlink.
------
corin_
Really awesome to see, I appreciate it so much whenever I'm in NYC or LA, good
to finally have it over here too.
------
beck5
All I can say is finally! It shouldn't have taken this long but will be very
welcome by everyone.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Best Friend – Animation Short Film - lawrenceyan
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j01Hg4QJ6NE
======
mtmail
I think this might be miscategorized. "Show HN is for something you've made
that other people can play with. HN users can try it out, give you feedback,
and ask questions in the thread."
------
federicoponzi
No english subtitles?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Website to share your startup - penbuzz
https://www.penbuzz.com/
======
penbuzz
We are a site for you to list your startup, post news about your startup and
allow people to search for your startup.
------
orliesaurus
Hey OP your site doesn't load properly on mobile
~~~
penbuzz
The site currently only works on PC/laptop.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
WikiLeaks Releases Fifth Estate Challenger: Mediastan - r0h1n
http://wikileaks.org/WikiLeaks-Releases-Fifth-Estate.html
======
milesf
Give me something I can print off and a way to attach it to a movie poster
without damaging the theatre owner's display case and I'll visit my local
theatres and make sure the URL and QR code to "Mediastan" is visible to all
patron who go to see "The Fifth Estate"
~~~
grumpycord
[http://www.scribd.com/doc/175613597/Wl-
Media](http://www.scribd.com/doc/175613597/Wl-Media)
~~~
milesf
That's kind of the idea, but I'm thinking something that send the message
about 5th Estate being fiction as well, so watch this movie after you see this
one.
Sorry, IANA designer or a copy writer.
------
selmnoo
Assange should do a Reddit AMA promoting this movie, seeing as Cumberbatch
just got done promoting The Fifth Estate yesterday on Reddit. The Cumberbatch
AMA was very disappointing, because all upvoted questions were just fawning
compliments from Cumberbatch fans.
~~~
elisee
For what it's worth, he did address a question regarding his portrayal of Mr
Assange with more than a few words:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1o8l5f/i_am_benedict_c...](http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1o8l5f/i_am_benedict_cumberbatch_ama/ccpqb90)
~~~
selmnoo
Given that he's pretty anti-Manning
([http://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/sep/14/benedict-
cumberb...](http://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/sep/14/benedict-cumberbatch-
interview-fifth-estate)) I strongly doubt that's a genuine response. Most
likely it was written by a PR manager.
A Redditor made a very discerning comment about possible motives behind the
movie here:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1o8l5f/i_am_benedict_c...](http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1o8l5f/i_am_benedict_cumberbatch_ama/ccpxfqv)
~~~
geofft
How is that anti-Manning?
The greatness in what Manning did is that she knew that she was breaking a law
and she knew that there was no way she'd be able to avoid punishment and she
did so anyway. To say "she broke a law" and "I don't see why Obama should
grant a pardon" is not anti-Manning in any way. If anything, it recognizes
that she knew what the consequences are when deciding on her actions.
Also, quoting from the first comment by GuardianMod:
> In a note sent to the Guardian after publication of this story, Benedict
> Cumberbatch said:
> > "I feel my views have been misrepresented. Do I think Manning should be
> pardoned? Yes. Do I think that's likely to happen? Sadly no. Re Snowdon I
> said in the interview that the use of threats to life as a reason to erode
> civil liberties through intrusive government surveillance can also be as
> dangerous to democracy as the terrorism such actions claim to be preventing.
> This wasn't printed for some reason."
So I think we're either positing a massive conspiracy where Benedict
Cumberbatch appears to be very pro-Manning/Snowden/Assange but isn't, and
employs a PR manager (with a distinctive writing style) to keep up that
appearance for some reason, or the state of the world in which he actually is.
~~~
anigbrowl
This sort of assumes Manning knew he would get caught, which might have been
something he feared but nevertheless hoped to avoid. Another possibility is
that he took action with the desire to get kicked out of the military role he
was trapped in.
BTW I'm using the male pronoun because all this took place prior to Manning's
announcement of changing gender identity. I don't see any logic in extending
the new identity backwards in time to before it was adopted, an approach which
has made Manning's Wikipedia page much harder to read.
~~~
GeneralMayhem
>I don't see any logic in extending the new identity backwards in time to
before it was adopted
Do you refer to gay people as straight when talking about the time before they
came out?
~~~
jeremysmyth
"He and his then wife..." \- sure, why not?
------
andor
This is a movie about freedom of speech, self-censorship in media, and which
people are really put at risk by publishing cables (hint: corruption and
organized crime).
Short summary, including spoilers:
A group of Wikileaks-affiliated journalists tries to find media partners in
the -stan countries that would publish Wikileaks cables locally. The meetings
with those organizations are set up as interviews about free speech in their
respective countries. As a surprise in those meetings, they are offered the
cables about their own country. They film the initial reactions, try to sign a
gentlemen's agreement about how the cables should be handled, and follow up if
any stories were published. It's really interesting to see what happens. Some
sign the agreement, but don't publish anything. One guy in Kazakhstan actually
says that he doesn't want democracy. The editor of a newspaper in Turkmenistan
that they speak to turns out to be a member of parliament. That newspaper has
a picture of Turkmenistan's president on it's front page every day.
Then, Alan Rusbridger from The Guardian and Bill Keller from the NYT are
interviewed. It's astonishing to see that media in the US and UK have similar
fears than those in the -stan countries. For example, Assange criticized that
The Guardian redacted the names of a mafia boss, who according to cables had
close ties with Uzbekistan's president. They apparently did this because they
fear libel lawsuits, in which the burden of proof would lie on the libeler.
------
teamgb
It's free this weekend for people in the UK, everyone else can rent it online
for just one pound (about $1.50) from Journeyman Pictures.
If you prefer to do things differently, a magnet link is available here:
[http://pastebin.com/6RVSpTAa](http://pastebin.com/6RVSpTAa)
------
aclevernickname
This is currently being shared on The Pirate Bay[1], for those of us not
living in the UK, and too poor to pay for a viewing/DRM.
[1]
[http://thepiratebay.sx/torrent/9039415/Mediastan](http://thepiratebay.sx/torrent/9039415/Mediastan)
~~~
andor
You can also just buy the movie from anywhere in the world, DRM-free, from
vimeo.
[https://vimeo.com/ondemand/mediastan](https://vimeo.com/ondemand/mediastan)
------
charlus
I saw this last week with a really fascinating Q&A from Assange, thought he
was very compelling. I'm not sure how the people of Sixteen Films will feel
about this "challenging" The Fifth Estate though.
It was a worthwhile doc as well, worth the watch - much better than the Alex
Gibney thing earlier this year, which felt very much phoned in.
------
grey-area
This is nothing like Fifth Estate, but it does look really interesting in its
own right. Not a drama so much as the diary of a road trip through central
asia with wikileaks workers along for the ride, interjecting with their own
stories and negotiating with journalists about the cable releases.
I've skipped through a few interviews, and it's enlightening (for me at least)
as an overview of the region's politics and the attitude of journalists to
publishing these cables. I'll be going back to watch it all.
[EDIT] The section on Afghanistan starting at 0:45 or so is particularly
interesting.
------
interstitial
You or someone you know probably suffers from a monoculture, statist-based
education. Dig through some pre-20th century civil thought and you will come
across: "Adversarial Systems"
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adversarial_system](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adversarial_system)
There you will find a natural remedy dating back thousands of years that holds
that subservience and conformity are poor forms of governance.
------
rwmj
Why doesn't he just release this as a video file?
------
cma
Written by michealochurch?
~~~
Surio
A clever pun/reference to michaelochurch's use of VC-istan here. :)
~~~
anigbrowl
I rather doubt it, given that multiple countries in Central Asia have names
ending in -stan (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan...). It just menas '-land'
in Urdu as far as I recall.
~~~
cma
Pedantistan
------
victorantos
watch it free this weekend if you are from UK
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gbenFTcisY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gbenFTcisY)
~~~
Theodores
Currently at 2426 views.
Only 910,883,012 more views to snatch the number two spot in the 'most watched
on YouTube' charts from Justin Bieber. Should be a snip...
~~~
anigbrowl
One of these things is not like the other.
------
askar_yu
This was one of those rare cases where I was ready to pay for the video; but
then I am confronted with _" Sorry, this film is not available in your
region."_ and the buy or rent buttons are disabled. But guess what, somebody
has uploaded it on Youtube:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hK6DDC4CV0s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hK6DDC4CV0s)
------
carlosdp
Why is an organization hell-bent on free information trying to censor a movie
because they don't like it? Isn't that entirely contradictory to their
mission?
~~~
koala_advert
They say it isn't the truth. They aren't trying to censor it, they're trying
to get the truth out. How is that censorship?
------
xanth
Lol, they have it free only if you have a UK ip. Wrong audience to do that to.
------
paul9290
Assange is sure helping with this movie's publicity.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
My Mindshare 10-Point Declaration - jimbursch
http://blog.mymindshare.com/2006/08/my_mindshare_10.html
======
danielha
The mind sharing concept is interesting. I see an inherent flaw in the
"traditional model" that you posted:
\---
Advertiser posts ad
Consumer views ad
Advertiser pays media
\---
You missed a crucial detail: the advertiser posts the ad to the media to
publish. It's a critical detail that bridges the next step.
When a potential customer sits and views your ad for a set wage, it's much
different than encountering the ad in a targeted environment. I noticed the
targeted aspect of your service, but it's difficult to gauge its effectiveness
just yet. As an advertising medium, I'm skeptical. The concept definitely has
merit in getting something of yours read or viewed.
------
jwecker
a little bit ironic that you're advertising your site to us...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Guy Builds A Star Trek Phaser - jalbertbowden
http://thecuriousbrain.com/?p=30918#.T8fyV_fODhU.hackernews
======
ChuckMcM
Easy when you use a blue pen pointer in a smokey room :-).
And while I think these portable lasers are cool, they are insanely dangerous,
to humans, to pets, and to video gear. (not to mention dark colored balloons).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
LulzSec Leaks 62,000 Email/Passwords of writerspace.com - unixroot
http://www.thehackernews.com/2011/06/lulzsec-leaks-62000-emailpasswords-of.html
======
palish
These kids seriously need to be punched in the face. "For the lulz," as it
were. Or perhaps "for great justice" would be more fitting.
Is there any way we can help these 62,000 people? I'm reading through the
password list now, and many of these passwords are to people's gmail accounts.
I see a comcast account too ... you could probably access billing info just
with that password alone.
It feels like our duty, somehow, as good internet citizens, to help these
people out. Many of them are probably mom'n'dad-types ... they have no idea
what a "Database" is, let alone what it means for one to be leaked.
But we can't just go and change their passwords, even if it's for their
protection, since it's the password to their email account and we have no way
of notifying them.
~~~
mattdeboard
Parse & collect email accounts, send emails (in serial) and weep as it gets
gobbled up by gmail's spam detection.
A more realistic alternative might be to notify Google with a machine-readable
list of email addresses the passwords for which have been compromised so they
can do a system notification of these users without fear of getting eaten by
spam filter.
~~~
nakkiel
It's done. Redditters took care of that.
------
mattdeboard
Prolific & brazen criminals = enormous egos. They won't stop until they are
stopped.
edit: My PR senses started tingling on further reflection.
The best way for LulzSec to be countered is in the PR arena. Since they're
already bad guys, and since they've already worn out their folk hero sheen, it
does no good to villify them.
The best way is to steal their thunder. An organization of people who make a
concerted, __publicized __effort to mitigate damage to the random victims
caught in LulzSec's blast radius would definitely steal the limelight.
It's similar to responding to a forum troll by making fun of them. Take away
their momentum and make them a pawn in your press releases.
~~~
gasull
Sadly, I doubt they can be stopped.
~~~
Wickk
No one is infallible, it's only a matter of time until they slip up. They're
making a rather large footprint
~~~
madmaze
I think calling it a "large" footprint is an understatement. My conspiracy
buddies are going nuts with the idea that its the government trying to
convince us to hand over our internet freedom to them. I wish i could laugh at
them with confidence
~~~
mattdeboard
Well said. I'm not completely convinced this isn't the government, and I'm
definitely not normally a tinfoil-hatter. I think the most likely scenario is
that, like the ATF's blind eye toward gun-runners on the Mexico border, an
agency or agencies have been ordered to turn a blind eye for now.
The chickens are coming home to roost on the ATF thing and I sincerely hope
that, if my suspicions are true, they do the same on this.
------
kabushikigaisha
Please stop upvoting this blogspam posted constantly by unixroot. He's clearly
doing this to promote his site, thehackernews.com
I imagine he's made a killing lately with all the Lulzsec drama that gets
reflex upvoted. Just more noise and blogspam. He submits several stories a day
exclusively from that domain, thehackernews.com
------
mrcharles
It's a great time to be a security specialist. People who know their shit can
probably make an absolute killing right now consulting for companies.
And all companies should be on red alert, because if nothing else, this is an
amazing wake-up call about security.
------
dsmithn
[http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/i16hm/lulzsec_j...](http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/i16hm/lulzsec_just_publicly_gave_away_62k_emails_and/c2019le)
------
petenixey
I'm not convinced these are real. A lot of the passwords are surprisingly
cryptic - not the usual collection of bananas and children's names you might
expect.
Assuming that most people use the same username and password for most things,
and that AOL users will be the least sophisticated I thought it would be
interesting to verify 10 of the combinations which had an AOL address against
AOL. Not a single one of them actually worked and I'm inclined to wonder
whether (happily) this isn't just a hoax.
------
jentulman
I've got to admit to finding a few of the things they do a little amusing in a
somewhat childish manner, but this sort of thing ruins what little (debatable)
good comes from their politics.
If they are going to keep on hitting targets like this just because they can
then, they could at least release only the email addresses and not the
passwords, which will illustrate the point and allow affected users a chance
to know they are at risk from the sites policies whilst reducing the immediate
risk to their data.
Obviously what the could actually do is just release nothing and work with
administrators to correct the errors, but then they wouldn't be garnering the
publicity they so obviously crave.
------
KeyBoardG
There's just no class (as if there could be any in hacking) with LulzSec. I
could be on the side of a hacker with cases like Kevin Mitnick. These guys are
just dicks.
------
iskander
I tried about a 100 password/login pairs and none worked. Perhaps they've all
been changed, or maybe this list is fake.
------
Luyt
Why o why do developers keep storing plain passwords in databases. They should
store hashes instead.
~~~
Jach
That's not good enough. Scrolling through the list, I haven't seen any
password that I can say with certainty couldn't be either brute forced,
dictionary attacked, or found in a rainbow table.
------
trotsky
You're just encouraging them.
------
sixothree
Would it be acceptable for someone to post a list of just the passwords? I
would love to add them to my collection of passwords that are not allowed.
------
dolvlo
So why isn't anyone upset that writerspace.com is storing passwords in
plaintext?
------
dolvlo
Honestly, the more you rage about this in comments here, the more they love
it. Stop caring, it's the only thing you can individually do to reduce their
power. Unless you're working for the cyber police.
------
shareme
Lets see LulzSec and Anonymous trying to out do one another.. and mixed in the
possibility that both are being played by government agents to get info on
wikileaks..
Nothing good will come of this..
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
.NET Garbage Collector Basics and Performance Hints (2003) - vikas0380
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms973837.aspx
======
alkonaut
If you are considering GC issues in an app, I think the reference code you
should look at now is Roslyn and how it uses pooled ImmutableArrays to work
with immutable collections almost without allocation overhead in most areas.
Most GC churn in most applications (I would think) is down to Linq and
collection use.
[https://github.com/dotnet/roslyn/blob/master/src/ExpressionE...](https://github.com/dotnet/roslyn/blob/master/src/ExpressionEvaluator/Core/Source/ResultProvider/Helpers/ArrayBuilder.cs)
------
yread
I wonder how much of the advice is still important with the improvements .NET
GC has received over the decades [1] [2]
[1] [http://scottdorman.github.io/2008/11/07/clr-4.0-garbage-
coll...](http://scottdorman.github.io/2008/11/07/clr-4.0-garbage-collection-
changes/)
[2] [https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2012/07/20/the-
net-f...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2012/07/20/the-net-
framework-4-5-includes-new-garbage-collector-enhancements-for-client-and-
server-apps/)
~~~
randseq
The optimizations improved GC performance in general reducing latency, but,
the advice in the article is still good. One thing that may seem dated is the
concern with Finalization, which is still a valid concern, but nowadays there
are very few cases in which one needs to create a finalizer for their types.
~~~
yread
Yes, they are all good tips. You will get the best performance if you don't
touch memory at all, but that's not practical. There is always a trade-off:
don't create large long-living objects mutable split them into smaller ones?
But then you have more long lived objects.
------
jconley
Back in 2005-2006 we ran into significant issues with the GC and pinned memory
related to Windows sockets when building a networked server for XMPP. I
believe the GC has improved since then for that scenario, but it was a big
surprise when it happened. It was a classic case of a leaky abstraction.
[http://blog.jdconley.com/2006/06/how-to-build-scalable-
net-s...](http://blog.jdconley.com/2006/06/how-to-build-scalable-net-
server.html)
~~~
zamalek
I was still in high school when I read that post. Thanks for writing it.
Buffer pooling is still incredibly relevant in .Net (as it is in many
languages).
~~~
gubbe
Just for the sake of reference:
[https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/system.servicemodel...](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/system.servicemodel.channels.buffermanager\(v=vs.110\).aspx)
~~~
markdoubleyou
Along these same lines, Microsoft.IO.RecyclableMemoryStream is also useful.
[https://github.com/Microsoft/Microsoft.IO.RecyclableMemorySt...](https://github.com/Microsoft/Microsoft.IO.RecyclableMemoryStream)
------
algorithmsRcool
For those interested in more details about .NET garbage collector here is some
reading.
Garbage Collection Overview
[https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/0xy59wtx(v=vs.110)....](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/0xy59wtx\(v=vs.110\).aspx)
Fundamentals of garbage collection
[https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/ee787088(v=vs.110)....](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/ee787088\(v=vs.110\).aspx)
Visualising the .NET Garbage Collector
[http://mattwarren.org/2016/06/20/Visualising-the-dotNET-
Garb...](http://mattwarren.org/2016/06/20/Visualising-the-dotNET-Garbage-
Collector/)
Clr Book of the runtime : Garbage Collection
[https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/blob/master/Documentation/...](https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/blob/master/Documentation/botr/garbage-
collection.md)
Maoni Stephen's Blog
[https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni)
[https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni/2004/06/15/using-
gc-e...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni/2004/06/15/using-gc-
efficiently-part-1/)
[https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni/2004/09/25/using-
gc-e...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni/2004/09/25/using-gc-
efficiently-part-2/)
[https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni/2004/12/19/using-
gc-e...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni/2004/12/19/using-gc-
efficiently-part-3/)
[https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni/2005/05/06/using-
gc-e...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/maoni/2005/05/06/using-gc-
efficiently-part-4/)
There is also a refactoring effort to standardize the GC<->EE interface
[https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/projects/3](https://github.com/dotnet/coreclr/projects/3)
I would link to the source code of the GC itself, but it's a single 35KSLOC
file.
------
mysterydip
This is timely as I'm troubleshooting a .NET app with randomly long garbage
collection times. I'm just the sysadmin in this scenario, without access to
the code, so I'm approaching it from Splunk and AppDynamics. If anyone has
suggestions beyond this article, I'd appreciate it :)
~~~
ZenoArrow
This may be of interest:
[http://www.red-gate.com/products/dotnet-development/ants-
mem...](http://www.red-gate.com/products/dotnet-development/ants-memory-
profiler/learning-memory-management/memory-management-fundamentals)
~~~
prefect42
That's a nice memory profiler, have good success with it. I've also used
DebugDiag, [https://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/download/details.aspx?id=499...](https://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/download/details.aspx?id=49924) and plain ol' perfmon and its performance
counters, to help track down GC-related issues.
~~~
gumaflux
Agreed. Starting point PerfMon and PerfCounters, as an addition to great
suggested profilers I would also have a look at PerfView / ETW.
[https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2012/10/09/improving...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2012/10/09/improving-
your-apps-performance-with-perfview/)
------
gus_massa
This article is from 2003.
~~~
thomasz
It's still solid advise, though.
~~~
gus_massa
I agree, but if the OP or a mod adds (2003) to the title then it's easier to
realize that it's an old version. Perhaps the current version has a few more
tricks. Perhaps someone makes a comparison with the current JVM garbage
collector, and it would be "unfair" to compare the 2017 version of one against
the 2003 version of the other.
------
jstimpfle
It's ".NET" Garbage collector, not "Net".
~~~
jstimpfle
No need to downvote, the title has been fixed. Thanks.
------
osd
This is a really weird article. It manages to "cover" a huge amount of ground
while simultaneously saying pretty much nothing.
~~~
barrkel
It has a bunch of concrete recommendations, and its explanation of how the GC
works lets you see the rationale behind those recommendations, and extend them
to novel situations.
It explains the middle-age death problem, a direct consequence of the
generations, by giving you a mental framework to reason about the .net GC.
I used the insights in this article to build an application server back in
2005 or so that spent about 2% of its time in GC at full load.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Canadian Copyright Bill Coming Thursday - jgoguen
http://www.jgoguen.ca/2010/5/copyright-bill-coming-thursday
======
RyanMcGreal
Headline error; should read: "American Copyright Bill Coming to Canada
Thursday".
------
mrcharles
Good to know that despite the ridiculous amount of anti-bill sentiment from
the voters, the Conservative government is going to try and ram it through
anyway.
Ahh voting, what is it good for.
~~~
redstripe
Unfortunately it's good for nothing in this case since the Liberals have
similar aspirations (and I say that as a liberal voter). The two parties
differ on crime/environment/tax issues, but when it comes to pandering to big
business they are both the same.
I've been thinking about setting up a social site where youth voters who
generally don't vote could be convinced that their vote could actually count
in some of the swing ridings. In this minority parliament maybe we could scare
the parties into actually considering the will of the voters.
~~~
mrcharles
That's not a bad idea, but I believe people have tried something similar and
run in to legal problems. If your site can be viewed as coercing a vote, it'll
get shut down by elections canada.
Power to you though, a site where people can enter where they live and be told
if their vote matters might be an interesting proposition.
~~~
nkassis
Well what about a site that has polls with young voters about issues such as
this and provide some "neutral" resources such as wikipedia about these
issues. With enough participation it could have weight.
(I'm also Canadian and would like to participate, let me know if ever get it
started.)
~~~
pedalpete
I've actually been building this over the last few days. Hoping to get a
tester out later in the week to gauge interest.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Wtfstarter.com – A Crowdfunding campaign parody generator - drcursor
http://www.wtfstarter.com
======
drcursor
An easy way to share those ridiculous crowdfunding ideas you have without
having to spam kickstarter.com / indiegogo.com with yet another fake
kickstarter campaign.
------
richerlariviere
I absolutely love the "About this project" section text. Great idea. I agree
with what drcursor said so I hope this would help to remove a couple of fake
campaigns on kickstarter.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
America May Get Broadband for Free, But Porn Will Cost You - qhoxie
http://gigaom.com/2008/10/13/america-may-get-broadband-for-free-but-porn-will-cost-you/
======
netcan
Back to the opt-out vs opt-in debate.
One that should drive the pure theory guys nuts. In theory, it shouldn't make
any difference. In practice, it would.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Is the black bar at the top of HN now a G+ joke? - reso
That just occurred to me.
======
ColinWright
Please, people, do a search before asking questions like this. It's been 6 or
10 times already, and just makes you look crass, insensitive, stupid or lazy.
Perhaps all four.
Added in edit: I understand why I'm getting downvotes, although I (obviously)
disagree with them, but think, people, think. I'm trying to add value by
preventing yet more repeats of the same bloody question over and over again.
It's pooluting the "newest" page, and disrespectful.
I'm really disappointed in the mob mentality and unwillingness to show even a
modicum of thought or initiative.
Shame on you. No doubt you'll now pile on because you are offended by my
attitude. Defy the mob! Think for yourself! Pause before downvoting and ask
yourself why you're doing it.
Or give over to the mob mentality. I really no longer care.
------
Khao
Nope. Someone died. <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2712469>
~~~
pspeter3
That makes a lot more sense. That's a lot more reasonable than copying Google+
------
zoowar
Maybe the black bar should be clickable to the announcement.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
HTTP security headers - mgdo
https://blog.appcanary.com/2017/http-security-headers.html
======
ivanr
For some time now I've been working on a new project with the idea that you
want to use a single testing tool that can give you comprehensive, coherent,
and deep advice. It's early days and there's a lot to add still, but even now
it's pretty good: [https://www.hardenize.com](https://www.hardenize.com)
Hardenize starts with the domain name (WHOIS), then DNS/DNSSEC/CAA, then email
configuration (SMTP/STARTTLS/DANE/SPF/DMARC), then your web application
(TLS/COOKIES/HSTS/HPKP/CSP/various headers, etc).
Before Hardenize, I built SSL Labs.
~~~
SamUK96
This sounds very interesting for budding platform developers.
One problem is testing the more bespoke vuln routes - that's to say, the
buffer overflows, the old package exploits, the strange oddities. By the
sounds of it, you are building an "obvious security pitfalls" testing bot,
which is in itself very valuable don't get me wrong, but i'm pushed to say
that it's an NP problem to test bespoke vuln routes, which means the kind of
testing process you are developing (linear-time problem solver) will struggle
with testing the non-linear-time problems of bespoke vulns.
However, I wish you luck, hats off to this, it's a great idea!
~~~
ivanr
My goal is to promote good engineering and security practices, and to make it
easy to adopt them and deploy them correctly. I feel that's one area that
doesn't get enough attention. At the same time, it's the only direction that
will actually improve things in the long run. Chasing vulnerabilities is a
fact of life, but even if you could eradicate them from your software today,
you're not going to be safer tomorrow.
To that end, Hardenize doesn't check for vulnerabilities. There's plenty of
existing tools that do; I don't want to reinvent that wheel.
------
brianjking
Great writeup! Another resource that scans your site for various security
headers is [https://securityheaders.io/](https://securityheaders.io/).
~~~
simplehuman
This site does not seem to inspect http meta equiv headers.
~~~
zlynx
Meta headers are unreliable and mostly useless.
------
est
I feel HTTP access control (CORS) is missing
[https://developer.mozilla.org/en-
US/docs/Web/HTTP/Access_con...](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-
US/docs/Web/HTTP/Access_control_CORS)
~~~
kijin
If you don't return any CORS headers, all cross-origin requests will be
blocked by default. If that's the behavior you want, there is no need to
return any CORS headers.
~~~
deathanatos
> _all cross-origin requests will be blocked by default_
"all" is a strong word. In the general case, you can make cross origin
requests by doing
<img src="http://api.the-latest-unicorn.io/v2/produce/rainbows">
or even
<script src="...">
It's cross-origin, and it's a request, cookies _will_ be sent with it, and if
your GET requests have side-effects, you're going to have a bad time. You can
even do POST requests, by making a <form> and auto-submitting it to the API
with JavaScript. Of course, you're limited to certain MIME types, and notably
not JSON. (And thank God for that.)
Even if we assume that you only meant requests made by JavaScript via XHR, you
can _still_ make cross-origin requests. If you make an XHR request that
_looks_ like any of the above (specifically, if it meets the criteria for a
"Simple Request"[1]), the browser will send it. It might not allow the JS that
sent the request to view the response (if the response doesn't have the
appropriate CORS headers), but the request still gets sent (because the
response has to get received), and any side-effects can still happen.
Thankfully, if you're writing a bog-standard JSON API, these usually don't
apply … as long as you check your Content-Type header prior to decoding as
JSON.
(You are completely right, I think, that not returning any CORS headers is the
most restricted — as far as CORS is concerned. My point being that sometimes,
it's the response that gets blocked, not so much the request.)
[1]: [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-
US/docs/Web/HTTP/Access_con...](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-
US/docs/Web/HTTP/Access_control_CORS#Simple_requests)
~~~
kijin
You're right, it's the response not the request that gets blocked.
What's even worse, modern browsers will make an OPTIONS "preflight request" if
you try to make a non-simple cross-origin request with XHR, whether with or
without CORS. The actual GET or POST request might be blocked, but OPTIONS
always goes through. So if your webapp doesn't distinguish between GET and
OPTIONS, and if your GET actions have side effects, you're in for a nasty
surprise!
------
jwilk
HSTS is great... until the site's certificates expires, and then you have no
way to override the security warning.
Or if you want to untrust a shady CA, but you can't, because one of the site
you (rarely) visits uses this CA + HSTS.
------
hdhzy
Mozilla had an excellent resource [0] for security headers, especially Content
Security Policy with examples for different use cases (e.g. APIs).
See also Google's CSP Evaluator [1] and a blog post outlining security best
practices [2]. It's surprisingly easy to make insecure policy that on the
surface looks good, usually due to JSON-P endpoints on foreign endpoints.
[0]:
[https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Guidelines/Web_Security#Co...](https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Guidelines/Web_Security#Content_Security_Policy)
[1]: [https://csp-evaluator.withgoogle.com/](https://csp-
evaluator.withgoogle.com/)
[2]: [https://security.googleblog.com/2016/09/reshaping-web-
defens...](https://security.googleblog.com/2016/09/reshaping-web-defenses-
with-strict.html?m=1)
------
systematical
[http://securityheaders.io](http://securityheaders.io)
------
nemothekid
I _think_ `X-XSS-Protection: 1; mode=block` is enabled by default in Chrome
for all sites. I remember sending a malicious payload to one of my own pages
and having the entire page blocked by Chrome (but not by Firefox).
~~~
cknight
Firefox has never supported the X-XSS-Protection header.
------
Aaron1011
> Unfortunately, as of writing, SameSite cookies are available only in Chrome
> and Opera, so you may want to ignore them for now.
IIRC, the SameSite attribute is simply ignored by unsupported browsers. Is
there any downside to setting it?
~~~
rossy
I thought the same and I don't think there's a downside. I've been setting
SameSite=strict for the session cookie in a B2B app for about a year and no
one has complained. It's silently ignored by IE10 and Firefox, at least.
------
5706906c06c
Isn't X-Frame-Options deprecated? Pretty sure we're supposed to use Content-
Security-Policy instead?
~~~
hdhzy
Yes but there are still browsers that support only XFO so it's mostly for
them.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Getting an Amiga 1000 Online - erickhill
https://amigalove.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=300
======
Boothroid
Anything involving an Amiga gets my vote. Apart from someone taking their old
Amiga to the recycling centre, like I did :(
~~~
Jupe
Bummer.
I bought an Amiga 3000 for $1200. Three years later, I sold it for $1200.
~~~
nobleach
My company paid $4800 for an Amiga 4000 with Video Toaster in 1996. As far as
I know, that thing lasted another 10 years!
~~~
lnx01
Incredible. I can imagine that in 1996 there was some sort of utility for such
a device; for it to remain so until 2006 or so is quite something!
~~~
digi_owl
How it is in the corporate world. Anything bought is expected to be in use for
decades and decades. Something i feel the FOSS world really need to
internalize rather than think that bling is what will bring the users.
~~~
Boothroid
Not always true. I think most places start to get nervous when their hardware
is out of support.
~~~
digi_owl
Kinda.
I ran into a company selling floppy drive emulators some years ago.
Their main market were computerized looms and such. Basically an automatic
loom with a desktop PC bolted to it.
We are talking 286 or even older generation CPUs and such.
What these emulators did was take some sort of input in the front (be it from
floppy images stored on USB, a serial cable, or even wired or wireless
networks on their newest models), and pretend to be a floppy in the back.
Basically they were embedded computers that could fit in a 5.25 bay.
Similarly you will find old DOS installs running experiments in university
labs the world over, because the sensors software etc only properly work when
it has direct access to the serial port hardware or some such.
It is a crazy world out there once you get out of the valley.
~~~
Boothroid
Sure, ok, but I've worked in companies large and small that are ruthless about
their hardware landscape, and this wasn't tech or SV.
------
bwldrbst
I've been getting my Amiga 2000 online just this week but I suspect it was
easier for me as I've got 20MB RAM and a 68030 CPU.
I used a null modem cable connected to an RS232 to USB adaptor plugged into a
Raspberry PI running pppd. I can't really justify the cost of a network card
just now. I'm saving for a Vampire.
I was hoping to post this comment using the Amiga but the only browsers that
will run on it don't support the required SSL version :)
~~~
erickhill
Author here: I use the same WIFI modem in the post on my 1000 as I do my 2000
(I have 4 different Amiga models). I have to remove the gender-changer but
other than that it's super easy.
On the 2000 I just have to put the 64Door term disk in df0: and flip on the
power. Within ~30-45 seconds I'm on the 64 BBSes. But the null-modem cable is
an awesome way to go as it literally costs nothing... besides the cost of the
cable. I find the modem approach, though, is more seamless of an experience
with most term software.
~~~
bwldrbst
I've also got a 500, 1000 and 1200, all pretty much stock. I made a pretty
rough looking plipbox that worked ok with the 1200 but I haven't been able to
get it to work with the 2000. Some of my dodgy soldering probably failed.
I bought the 1200 new when I was a teenager and had a 4000 in the late
nineties but didn't know about the dangers of leaking batteries and it died.
I've got interested in Amigas again in the last couple of years after a 15
year break.
I'm going to have to check out some BBSes - I do miss them, not that I got
heavily into them before the Internet came along and didn't really get a
chance to join the community.
~~~
erickhill
Hah! You and I have the exact same disease - I mean gear. I also have a 500,
1000, 2000 and 1200 (all of mine are NTSC). My 2000 is beefed up with an 030
GeForce card and 18MB of RAM. My 1200 is bananas with an ACA1221 set to 21Mhz
and maxed out RAM of (I think) 63MB. It's about 10X more than it really needs
to be, to be honest. I really spend most of my time these days on the 2000 or
1000, and prefer OS 1.3. It just feels right to me. But to each his/her own.
The BBS scene - when you find the right boards - can be a ton of fun. I really
enjoy it. The sad truth is, there are a ton out there that are just being
ignored and are like digital ghost towns. If more people popped back in there
it's be even more fun. Hope to see you around! (I go by 'intric8' or
'amigalove'
Cheers
------
myth_drannon
Anything involving classic computers is crazy expensive on Ebay. I regret I
threw it all away many years ago.
~~~
sixothree
I had an Entex Adventure Vision. Units sold 50,757. Regrets.
------
walterbell
2017 documentary,
[https://www.google.com/amp/s/arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/01/...](https://www.google.com/amp/s/arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/01/people-
still-use-the-amiga-today-and-new-viva-amiga-documentary-shows-why/%3famp=1)
_" Viva Amiga is a wonderful look at the the history of the platform, the
people who built it, and the users who loved it. The opening title says it
all: "One Amazing Computer. One chance to save the company. One chance to win
the PC wars."_
------
Clubber
IIRC the Amiga 500 was much preferred to the 1000 because the 1000 cost a lot
more to upgrade to 1M? of memory which many games required. I had both, but
bought an Amiga 1000 first not knowing this issue.
Good days. Back then, it was just us nerds.
~~~
lomnakkus
My first self-owned computer was an Amiga 500[0], and I played this:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zgkf6wooDmw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zgkf6wooDmw)
(To be fair, I played Commando on the C64 before, but, goddamn, Another
World[1] showed me what was possible.)
[0] I'd played with an Amstrad "Something", playing with mates who had a
Vic20, and a C64.
[1] ... and Shadow of The Beast. Awful game, but what amazing sound and
graphics!
EDIT: Oh, crap, didn't mention: I, along with a friend, programmed that
Amstrad to play a basic Roulette game in some sort of BASIC variant -- Trust
me, the ASCII graphics were _amazing_! On the Amiga, I started with a little
draw-a-chart-type-thing based on reprogramming the on-screen characters (or
was that actually the C64? Hard to remember at this point). Maybe I'm an
absolute liar and I actually started out with a C64? I _definitely_ remember
programming my first ray-tracer in Turbo Pascal on a xNNN (N=digit) PC with a
VGA card + grey-scale monitor. Memories are hard in both senses of the word
:(.
~~~
lathiat
My favourite Amiga game was Gods followed by Flashback
~~~
ekianjo
Gods was awesome but Speedball 2 from the same devs was a brutally fun game
especially with 2 players.
------
aidos
Man, that brings back some memories.
Dialling in to the local BBS on my mates Amiga 1000 (or was it 500?) back in
1991 was a total revolution. We used to cycle to the BBS owners house to give
him cash for access credits.
------
nunobrito
This was a good article. Never had an Amiga but certainly got more interested
on the BBS access that is still possible today.
------
Jaruzel
I keep meaning to do something like this with my Amiga 1000. When I do get
around to it, I think I'll do the Serial->PC[1]->Ethernet route as it's
easier.
Not mentioned, that I saw, in the article, is the A1000 serial port carries
12v on Pin 23 - which if you are not careful can completely fry anything you
connect to it!
\---
[1] Running some sort of Serial<->Ethernet proxy/bridge software.
~~~
eltoozero
tcpser[0] is popular
[0]: [https://github.com/FozzTexx/tcpser](https://github.com/FozzTexx/tcpser)
------
QAPereo
The Keep! I'm having BBS flashbacks and giggling like a nut.
~~~
mapster
_< >_<> _< >_ The SYSOP would like to chat _< >_<> _< >_
~~~
VectorLock
Give me more file credits.
------
vhodges
I still have my 1000... in pieces :(. _and_ I hacked up the front in an
abortive case mod project from a long time ago now. Don't remember what
happened to my Dad's. I had a 1200 for a while too.
Looking forward to the VampireV4 Standalone (Or a MiST, it makes a nice 1200).
------
seanonymous
Connecting to a BBS over WiFi? But you're missing out on the sqleulchy
screechy modem sounds! :)
I remember using SLIP and PPP to get my Amiga 1200 onto the web with the
Mosaic browser. Fun times!
------
lathiat
For those that prefer to consume content in video form; LGR did an episode on
the same WiFi modem from Paul Rickards:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsS0E4G310Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsS0E4G310Y)
I feel like a dial-up sound simulator is strongly required
------
exogeny
Time to listen to mods by Jester/Sanity and Uncle Tom for a few hours!
------
edem
I have a working Amiga 1200. How much does it worth?
~~~
0x4a42
I would say, between $200-$350, if you are lucky. :)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Yagol, a Game of Life sandbox built with React.js - Sarcadass
https://sarcadass.github.io/yagol/
======
kjeetgill
If you're mesmerized by the "Game of Life" like I am your going to enjoy the
Continuously Domain versions like smooth life. Check out the video[0], and an
implementation in python[1] on HN.
[0]:
[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KJe9H6qS82I](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KJe9H6qS82I)
[1]:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17152481](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17152481)
------
gakos
Well done! Have you considered a menu to change the automata rules?
~~~
Sarcadass
Thank you :). Yes I have considered it, I will maybe implement it later if
this project is liked by the community.
------
owlninja
If anyone else was also puzzled:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life)
~~~
ng12
I'm always surprised by how few programmers are familiar with the Game of
Life. It used to be that anyone with a degree in Comp Sci would have come
across it at some point in their education -- maybe it's a casualty of the
shift from hard computer science to software development?
------
DonHopkins
"Life? Don't talk to me about life." ;)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAA67a2-Klk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAA67a2-Klk)
------
earle
double glider
eyJuYW1lIjoiZG91YmxlIGdsaWRlciIsInNoYXBlU2l6ZSI6WzUsNV0sImxpZmVNYXAiOlsyMCwxNSwxMCw1LDAsNiwxMiwxOCwyNCwxOSwxNCw5LDRdfQ==
~~~
Sarcadass
Nice double glider :). You can add it as a default shape if you want :
[https://github.com/sarcadass/yagol/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING....](https://github.com/sarcadass/yagol/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md#adding-
a-default-shape)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Best DB for power outages? - Killah911
There are rolling blackouts where I'm planning on deploying a lightweight DB on a regular PC. Which DB would be the most well behaved in case of sudden power failure? (So far I know of SQLite & FireBird to be the top contenders)
======
justincormack
On a regular PC suggests you might be using consumer disks which may not be
100% reliable about committing transactions it is hard to know. You should
probably test first. Some SSDs hve enough capacitors to commit in flight
commands on power failure.
I would be inclined to use Postgres. Built for robustness.
------
ameenafon
Are you thinking firebird is a good choice due to this:
<http://www.firebirdfaq.org/faq43> ? You can still have hard drive corruption
and when you restart firebird can go into a bad state
------
nodata
Any ACID database will work. Make sure your app uses transactions properly.
------
Killah911
Bueller? Bueller? Anyone?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Massren – multi-rename tool using your text editor - laurent123456
https://github.com/laurent22/massren
======
peterjmag
This is awesome! Really great work. I can think of about five different
instances in the last couple weeks where this could've really helped me out.
Oftentimes, I ended up just using something like NameMangler[1] instead and
pining for the flexibility of my editor.
For the other commenters in this thread that don't see the appeal or keep
comparing it to other alternatives, here's what's so compelling to me:
\- Editor agnostic. This isn't just for vim, people. ST2 is awesome for this
kind of thing.
\- Undo. _Easy_ undo. That's a killer feature, and I wouldn't be surprised if
it's unique to this tool.
Effusive praise aside, I ran into a couple small issues on OS X:
$ massren --config editor 'subl'
massren: Config has been changed: "editor" = "subl"
$ massren
massren: exec: "subl": executable file not found in $PATH
subl is indeed in my $PATH, but it's actually just a symlink to the ST2
application directory, as the ST2 docs suggest [2]. I solved this by just
adding the app directory to my $PATH, but it'd be nice to keep it out of there
if possible.
Also, I'd like to be able to pass switches along with my editor command, like
git config's core.editor [3]. However, this doesn't seem to work:
massren: exec: "subl -wn": executable file not found in $PATH
Anyway, great work once again, and thanks for releasing such a cool tool!
[1] [http://manytricks.com/namemangler/](http://manytricks.com/namemangler/)
[2]
[http://www.sublimetext.com/docs/2/osx_command_line.html](http://www.sublimetext.com/docs/2/osx_command_line.html)
[3] [https://help.github.com/articles/using-sublime-text-2-as-
you...](https://help.github.com/articles/using-sublime-text-2-as-your-default-
editor)
~~~
laurent123456
Thanks for the feedback! I would have expected Go to find the subl executable
if it's in the PATH, even if it's a symlink but apparently not. I will check
if this can be improved.
At the moment, the tool indeed doesn't support parameters for the text editor,
though it's quite trivial to implement. I'm going to add this soon.
------
limmeau
Emacs users can use wdired in a dired buffer instead.
M-x wdired-change-to-wdired-mode
(not to spoil the fun of creating a useful command-line tool with Issue9 ;)
~~~
swah
Sorry, but what is Issue9?
~~~
autofill
Looks like it's a Go joke/shot:
[https://code.google.com/p/go/issues/detail?id=9](https://code.google.com/p/go/issues/detail?id=9)
------
felixr
You should also have a look 'vidir' from Joey Hess' moreutils [1]. I think it
is very similar.
Moretutils also includes 'vipe' (edit pipe in text editor) and other useful
utilities.
[1] [https://joeyh.name/code/moreutils/](https://joeyh.name/code/moreutils/)
~~~
e12e
Thanks for this. I've been using rename[1] (not actually from [2]) from time
to time, but I find it is annoying beyond the simplest of cases (eg: change
names to all lowercase).
vidir will probably serve me better.
[1] A utility that is distributed with perl (on Debian as /usr/bin/prename,
with a listing in /etc/alternatives for "rename")
[2] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Util-
linux](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Util-linux)
------
atmosx
Smart :-)
Since "
_wget[https://raw.github.com/laurent22/massren/master/install/inst...](https://raw.github.com/laurent22/massren/master/install/install.osx.sh*")
comes out with certification error, because wget doesn't know github's
certification, you need to either add an ignore-cert option or you might wanna
change that option to '_curl -O
[https://raw.github.com/laurent22/massren/master/install/inst...](https://raw.github.com/laurent22/massren/master/install/install.osx.sh*")
which will not came out with an error. Also, curl is installed by default on
MacOSX while wget is not :-)
Cheers!
~~~
laurent123456
Thanks! I've updated the command lines to use curl instead of wget.
------
blueblob
This is cool. There is already a command called rename[1] that can do some of
this but this is much more interactive (and probably more intuitive for vi
users). Is this scriptable?
[1] [http://linux.die.net/man/1/rename](http://linux.die.net/man/1/rename)
~~~
laurent123456
Thanks, actually I've started developing massren after having tried `rename`,
after I realized I had no idea what flavor of regex and syntax I was supposed
to be using :) The advantage of using one's own text editor is that it's
always familiar.
Currently, the command is not really scriptable, but I'd be open to any
suggestion.
~~~
blueblob
I think the syntax is pcrepattern[1] though I may very well be wrong. I
definitely agree to the strength being that you know your editor.
I suppose scripting would be hard to do without knowing the editor. I
artificially applied vim as the editor because that was what you used in the
example. I very recently found vimcat[2] from another thread and thought that
something similar could be done with this. I guess it may not be much more
effective than just using sed and a for loop in <insert shell here> though.
[1]
[http://linux.die.net/man/3/pcrepattern](http://linux.die.net/man/3/pcrepattern)
[2]
[http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=4325](http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=4325)
------
b6fan
There is a vim plugin: rename.vim [1] which basically do the same job but
without go dependency.
[1]
[http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=1721](http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=1721)
~~~
TomNomNom
FWIW there is no Go 'dependency' unless you want to build from source.
Admittedly if there's no binary available for your platform then you need to
build from source.
------
p0ckets
How is this different from qmv?
[http://community.linuxmint.com/software/view/renameutils](http://community.linuxmint.com/software/view/renameutils)
~~~
laurent123456
I'm not familiar with qmv so I cannot tell but, if it's Linux-only, then one
advantage of massren is that it can work on any platform supported by Go
(currently tested on Windows, OSX and Ubuntu).
~~~
raimue
No, of course renameutils is not specific to Linux Why do you assume that? You
can get it from MacPorts or Homebrew for OS X and cygwin for Windows.
------
dewey
Would be great if someone could add it to homebrew. [0]
[0] [http://brew.sh/](http://brew.sh/)
~~~
msane
I would also like to be able to brew install this.
~~~
laurent123456
I've just submitted the homebrew package, let's see if they accept it -
[https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew/pull/26819](https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew/pull/26819)
~~~
seivan
Nice work!
------
bhousel
holy crap, it has an --undo switch!
Why don't more commands have this?
~~~
codereflection
Nice catch!
~~~
bhousel
Yeah I was impressed, I dug into the code a little to see how they accomplish
this. They store a sqlite database in ~/.config/massren that contains the
rename history and other configuration options. Pretty slick! The app is
written in very readable Go.
~~~
e12e
That's a nice feature to have. I would say that "undo" really should be
something in the filesystem, though. Like with nilfs2:
[http://www.nilfs.org/en/about_nilfs.html](http://www.nilfs.org/en/about_nilfs.html)
------
grimgrin
It seems like there is a neat thing that could be done with this sort of thing
+ id3 tags.
------
mcovey
One program I missed when I moved from Windows to Linux was Freename -
[http://freename.sourceforge.net/](http://freename.sourceforge.net/) \- which
does exactly this.
My solution was a bit hackier, a bash script that did spit out a bunch of
lines for each file in a directory, each with "(mv|cp) 'foo.bar' ''", ready
for me to edit and then paste back into a terminal window.
------
jweir
Great tool.
This wasn't clear from the README, but this will work with files across
directories (which is both useful and confusing)
massren __/ *foo.rb
Will rename matching files in different directories, but there is no
indication of what directories those are in the editor.
<snark>Also, how could you build something so useful without
generics!?</snark>
------
seniorsassycat
I wrote a hack that uses sed to rename files and I've been pretty happy with
it despite its simplicity.
[https://github.com/everett1992/utils/blob/master/sed-
utils/m...](https://github.com/everett1992/utils/blob/master/sed-utils/mv-sed)
------
seivan
Hmm should I look into getting this on homebrew? Would anyone other than me be
interested?
------
xbryanx
NameChanger is another great tool that helps with this family of tasks on OS
X.
[http://www.mrrsoftware.com/MRRSoftware/NameChanger.html](http://www.mrrsoftware.com/MRRSoftware/NameChanger.html)
------
aashishkoirala
Neat! Were you inspired somewhat by Git's interactive rebase or something
similar?
~~~
laurent123456
Yes! I think the interface of rebase is great. There are probably other
similar "complex" operations that can be simplified by opening a text editor.
------
dnr
It looks like there are lots of implementations of this idea or there. Here's
mine in 30 lines of bash:
[http://dnr.im/tech/articles/mvdir/](http://dnr.im/tech/articles/mvdir/)
------
spc476
You might also consider checking for the environment variable $EDITOR. It's
defined by POSIX and there are existing tools that use it.
------
rsync
I have been using the tool 'vimv' for years now ... how is this
different/worse/better ?
Perhaps the ability to define any editor ?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Künstliche Intelligenz 2016 – Was in diesem Jahr geschah - flezzfx
http://ki-blog.de/wissen/2016/das-jahr-2016-was-bisher-geschah-minsky-tay-turing-sxsw-openai-alpha-volkswagen/
======
mtmail
welcome to Hacker News. Please submit English articles only
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Mother of All Demos (1968) - Malfunction92
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJDv-zdhzMY
======
EricE
For more on this and what lead up to it I highly recommend:
[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/722412.The_Dream_Machine](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/722412.The_Dream_Machine)
------
welcome_dragon
That this was over 50 years ago will never cease to amaze me
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Would HN be interested in an adapter, that can prevent BadUSB-attacks? - jpidea
Let me first give some context:<p>I am part of a group of 'highschool' students (actually the equivalent of this in Germany) and we are currently searching for ideas for a startup-project, in where we are founding our own little company and try to bring it to some success. Our seed capital is 1000€ gathered through selling shares.<p>Due to the recent concerns about the abuse of USB devices as attack vector, we were thinking about creating an adapter, which let's you configure, which kind of devices are allowed to connect to it. We only have limited time, so I just skimmed the complexity of the project and we came to the conclusion, that we could do it, though we maybe are maybe only looking at the interfaces and, based on time, money and complexity, not lookup the exact HID-device through usage tables. It will have a small program/driver for atleast Windows and Linux to control as what the device is allowed to connect (multiple inputs possible) and an 'admin mode', so users will only allowed to use certain devices. Maybe we would also add a small button, so you can select it manually on the device.<p>This device might never happen, because only a few ideas will at the end be selected (we also need people who understand stuff like his), but any opinions or tips (like manufactures, suiting microchips, if we would be able to do it etc) are always appreciated.<p>Of course, it's a rather big project for on year, and we might be too incompetent, but hope dies last :)
======
jloughry
This could have applications outside the narrow use case you've outlined. I
encourage you to think about security in both directions: (1) protecting
storage devices from computers, and (2) protecting computers from storage
devices. This sounds to me like a product that I'd like to have _built in_ to
computers in sensitive locations, where I'm worried about users bringing in
uncontrolled USB devices from home. Contrariwise, when I'm travelling, I don't
trust any computer I don't own, so I'm loath to insert my personally owned USB
device into it: in that case, I need your exact product.
~~~
jpidea
Good Idea. For 1) I could use a small switch and for 2) then this driver?
------
gburt
Is that what this is?
[http://int3.cc/products/usbcondoms](http://int3.cc/products/usbcondoms)
~~~
sharth
The USB Condom basically cuts the data ports to the endpoint device. So the
host (or device) can't communicate at all.
They seem to be talking about making a device / application that causes a USB
port to only talk to keyboards for example (or perhaps they'll get further in
and that will become only HID devices).
------
stevekemp
You could look a look at some related discussion which happened recently:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8216068](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8216068)
~~~
rahimnathwani
Please re-read the comment text (which is clearer than the title).
That discussion was about protecting the USB device, by preventing data flow.
This thread is about something different: protecting the USB host, by
restricting which types of devices can be used (including ones which use the
data pins).
------
The_ZaZ_Man
i like this. this would be great for a small company with little to no
background check ups on employees.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
GNU Toolchain Update – Fall 2017 - rayascott
https://developers.redhat.com/blog/2017/11/03/fall-2017-gnu-toolchain-update/
======
lima
Red Hat is doing a great job keeping RHEL/CentOS 7 up to date with latest
technologies while not introducing regressions. Very welcome, they used to be
more conservative.
The Software Collections are particularly useful - you can use them to
install, for example, Python 3.6 or GCC 7 without introducing third party
repositories (and thus additional attack surface).
[https://www.softwarecollections.org](https://www.softwarecollections.org)
7.4 even had a OpenSSL rebase for HTTP/2 and it was painless. Hats off (heh)
to their QA department!
------
davemp
I didn’t even know about __builtin_clz(0) being undefined and I use it
regularly (for code challenge BS mostly). That’s really painful.
It looks like it’s something to do with log(0) being undefined and hardware
vendors just couldn’t agree on wether to set a flag or just count the number
of leading zeros.
------
fizixer
Coming from redhat and they aren't advocating calling GNU/linux by a new name
systemd/linux. What a nice surprise.
Or maybe they still working on it.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Now is the Time to cash in on your passion - datums
http://cdn3.libsyn.com/carsonified/Now_is_the_Time_to_Cash_in_on_Your_Passion.mp3?nvb=20091013194148&nva=20091014195148&t=00451d1a34484856bda13
======
BigCanOfTuna
Here is the video of this presentation. Excellent, actually.
[http://carsonified.com/blog/web-apps/now-is-the-time-to-
cash...](http://carsonified.com/blog/web-apps/now-is-the-time-to-cash-in-on-
your-passion-by-gary-vaynerchuk/)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Jean-Marie Hullot has died - mrpippy
https://www.inria.fr/actualite/actualites-inria/jean-marie-hullot-informaticien-visionnaire-technologiste-exceptionnel
======
mrpippy
Created Interface Builder at NeXT, among other pioneering research
Translation:
[https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=https...](https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.inria.fr%2Factualite%2Factualites-
inria%2Fjean-marie-hullot-informaticien-visionnaire-technologiste-
exceptionnel)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Feynman's Vision: The Next 50 Years - vinutheraj
http://tedxcaltech.com
======
raintrees
Teasers?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A day after claiming total power, Trump caves in - Farbodkhz
https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/14/opinions/trump-claims-total-power-and-then-caves-in-filipovic/index.html
======
8bitsrule
Ahab's been pacing the decks again.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
New Gap logo was not social media theatre, but part of a year-long rebrand. - thesethings
http://thesethings.posterous.com/gap-did-they-mean-to-do-that
======
thesethings
Not earth shattering, but I posted this 'coz I've seen a few suggestions that
the Gap logo launch + reversal was planned social media genius. Nope. They
sincerely launched that new logo as part of something bigger that's been in
the works for at least a year.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Google has made Usenet archives impossible to search - tarr11
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/google-a-search-company-has-made-its-internet-archive-impossible-to-search
======
th0ma5
This has been fixed
[https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/apps/JEIYhpk7aa...](https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/apps/JEIYhpk7aaE/VqPInidInb0J)
------
sigmonsays
Its been fixed people...read the google groups thread....
~~~
joe_the_user
Links please
~~~
th0ma5
Read here:
[https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/apps/JEIYhpk7aa...](https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/apps/JEIYhpk7aaE/VqPInidInb0J)
------
smt88
The usability of almost all Google products is on a baffling nosedive. Google
search now reinterprets the words searches so thoroughly that my own keywords
appear far from the top of the results. "Ok Google" worked amazingly well on
my 2013 Moto X, but it's terrible on my 2015 Moto X. It misunderstands almost
everything I say, and it doesn't tell me what I've just done the way it used
to.
There are myriad small examples of this, and I think we've all seen the Google
support forum posts where someone has suggested a seemingly obvious fix, and
Google ignores it (even as the +1's number into the thousands).
It's incredibly frustrating to have my live absolutely saturated by a company
that doesn't seem to care at all how usable their products are.
And don't even get me started on the worst usability disaster of the last 5
years: Material design.
~~~
harryf
> And don't even get me started on the worst usability disaster of the last 5
> years: Material design.
Would be interested to hear it. To me it seems to work pretty well in the
Google Maps app on mobile - mostly intuitive. What problems do you see?
~~~
smt88
Material has the same issues as any flat design. It doesn't provide
affordances[1]. If something is just a rectangle, you don't know whether it's
button or not. Sometimes, things look like text but are actually clickable.
There's a Google app (I can't remember which) where a text-entry box is the
same color as the top bar. So you just see the red top bar, and then an arrow
that indicates "go back". That's it. If you tap the top bar, suddenly a cursor
appears, and you realize you can enter text. I constantly find myself confused
in Google apps because of that exact issue.
Problems with flat (and Material) design have been written about
extensively[2][3][4]. Recently, there was even a study showing that young
people are more confused by UIs than they used to be because of flat design.
It takes them longer to figure out where to click.
1\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affordance#As_perceived_action...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affordance#As_perceived_action_possibilities)
2\. [https://www.nngroup.com/articles/clickable-
elements/](https://www.nngroup.com/articles/clickable-elements/)
3\. [https://medium.com/tech-in-asia/material-design-why-the-
floa...](https://medium.com/tech-in-asia/material-design-why-the-floating-
action-button-is-bad-ux-design-acd5b32c5ef)
4\. [http://www.matthewmooredesign.com/almost-flat-
design/](http://www.matthewmooredesign.com/almost-flat-design/)
------
pmoriarty
The title is hyperbole. Rather that being impossible to search at all, the
problem is that "the 'before:YYYY/MM/DD' and 'after:YYYY/MM/DD' terms have
stopped working, and it also appears to no longer be possible to search by
date."
That said, Google's web interface to Usenet has always been garbage compared
to the standalone news readers of even 20 years ago. I've long wondered when
the day would come that Google stopped seeing it worth their bother to
maintain their Usenet archive. Hopefully when that day comes they'll donate it
to a more capable institution.
~~~
cpeterso
The Internet Archive would be an ideal Usenet custodian.
~~~
pmoriarty
That I'm not so sure of. The Internet Archive itself has recently made a
rather controversial Web 2.0 style makeover of their own site.
~~~
tennysonmach
Those are weasel words ("some people say").
They've spent a lot of effort on improving playback and media discovery, and
on the contrary, I've heard a lot of positives.
If there's some specific or large deviation from their mission that you
perceive from their re-design, I'd like to hear it. I have a great interest in
internet preservation, and even though I'm not associated with IA, I would
hope to learn more about how people are using the collected work of
organizations of the IA and how to better serve those people.
~~~
sillysaurus3
When I go to archive.org, I care about one thing: Pasting a URL to a now-
broken site into their search bar.
I don't know how other people use it. But for me, that's their central
function. And their redesigns have sometimes made that more difficult.
The current version is okay. One of their previous versions hid the search bar
somewhere else, and that was very annoying.
As for the rest of the site, I've never used it.
~~~
y4mi
why would you browse to their homepage for that? its exactly why custom search
engines exist, and its sure as hell is faster to write "ia ctrl-v" into your
address bar than navigating there...
~~~
sillysaurus3
[http://i.imgur.com/vv8LuDZ.png](http://i.imgur.com/vv8LuDZ.png)
Because it's not default, and learning how to tweak a browser isn't fun to me.
I'd rather study history, or how to write well.
I also have an irrational sense that bypassing someone's website is wrong. By
avoiding their homepage, I'd also be avoiding their plea for donations, for
example. But I realize this is an irrational feeling, and the only reason I'm
voicing it is because you asked why I personally won't do that.
------
TactiFail
I always feel like I missed out on a pretty exciting era whenever I read about
Usenet. I envy those who have strong memories around comp.* and wish that I
could have been a part of it.
~~~
steven2012
Take reddit and remove all the karma whoring, and you have the Usenet. I think
reddit is essentially Usenet 2.0 for all intents and purposes. You get all of
the good and bad associated with Usenet, but in a much more easily accessible
format.
~~~
DanBC
Reddit is a much worse form of Usenet.
You're limited to the reddit clients; you're limited to what admins allow; and
you're limited to what mods allow.
~~~
steven2012
I disagree. I think reddit is much, much more accessible, and because of that,
some of the communities on reddit are thriving in a way that was never
possible with the Usenet.
------
harryf
Kinda ironic that Google employs Vint Cerf who spends his time trying to raise
awareness of bit rot -
[http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/feb/13/google-
bos...](http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/feb/13/google-boss-warns-
forgotten-century-email-photos-vint-cerf)
------
yuhong
I once reported the now fixed
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10236987](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10236987)
here on HN.
------
mr-ron
I am really upset there is no good way of searching archives of usenet. It is
a fascinating piece of history.
I used to have a pretty good screen scraper that would search queries on the
Google Groups Usenet archives. Inspired by images like this
[http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/Doom_clones?file=Doom_clone_vs_fi...](http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/Doom_clones?file=Doom_clone_vs_first_person_shooter.png)
I was able to dredge some pretty amazing historic articles. Some examples:
First impressions of the GNU manifesto:
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.arts.animation/n...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.arts.animation/nKfkfLmfzM4)
Furst impressions of SNES
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.games.video/gt3T...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.games.video/gt3TN5_EnPY)
First impressions of PERL
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/comp.sources.d/QPt28...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/comp.sources.d/QPt288ya0QI)
First impressions of Eminem
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.music.hip-
hop/oL...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.music.hip-
hop/oLAW4Mlt8Sk)
Steve jobs leaves in 85
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/net.micro.mac/93SYtB...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/net.micro.mac/93SYtBQKEQw)
First impressions of Doom:
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/comp.sys.ibm.pc.game...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action/331R_W597JA)
People pissed at apple in 84
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/net.flame/e4-wxFKyUu...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/net.flame/e4-wxFKyUuE)
WWW first announced:
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/comp.sys.next.announ...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/comp.sys.next.announce/avWAjISncfw)
~~~
tarr11
On a lighter note, Elon Musk sharing Virtua Fighter tips:
[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/rec.games.video.arcade...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/rec.games.video.arcade/QRFJiSJHN0k/BJv6bXiFBbAJ)
~~~
mr-ron
hah nice! There are also articles of linus torvalds asking for Computer help
pre linux
------
dang
The article is from Feb. 2015. Has the situation changed since then?
~~~
tarr11
Looks like you can now use the "before:" operator again, but there's no
documentation of it in Google Groups Help.
It used to be part of the UI, they've removed / hidden it. But at least it is
back.
------
kev009
I run a public Usenet node, it's not that hard and is kind of fun:
[http://csiph.com](http://csiph.com)
One of my goals is to eventually build a web frontend that doesn't suck..
Google Groups is pretty terrible. I would love to find a way to crawl and
archive Google's Usenet archive but they rate limited it many years ago.
Highwinds/easynews has complete text retention back to 2003 or so, and I think
that's the oldest I've seen elsewhere.
I released a SaltStack formula [https://github.com/kev009/salt-
innd](https://github.com/kev009/salt-innd) so you can see what an inn config
looks like and set up your own. Without peering, it would be a pretty nice way
to do company discussion.. new employees can see all the old topics which
mailing lists are often not ideal for.
Feel free to PM me for posting access or peering, would be nice to get more
discussion and eyeballs in the comp.* space.
------
peter303
Usesnet is still alive, but mostly unused. Its posts were not immediately
displayed like Hacker News. Imwas a user in 1990s.
~~~
kseistrup
What do you mean “its posts were not immediately displayed”? You were always
able to see you own posts immediately, and it would take just a few seconds
for a post to propagate globally.
------
blackguardx
It was a sad day when Google shut down Deja News. Google's replacement was
definitely inferior and ultimately turned me away from Usenet for good.
------
ipadbluesfor_dl
it's not just google. it applies to innumerable apps in the App store as well.
The term "upgrade" should only apply to things that have the option to revert
back to a previous version. Only then is it a true upgrade, a term supposed to
indicate enhancement.
otherwise, it is brazenly a false upgrade.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Am I just burnt out or should I find a new career? - amiburntout
Hey HN,<p>Since I was a little kid I was fascinated by computers and loved tinkering with them. I always saw them as a hobby and always thought it was kind of cool that I could make them do things. I went to college and got myself a liberal arts degree.<p>After graduating I found a job for a small IT consulting firm. The firm was in desperate need of IT talent, and I could scrabble together some code to make things happen so I became a technical resource.<p>Since then I have gotten a tremendous amount of mentorship and support, and I feel like I have the respect of some of the more senior developers. The company is still strapped for technical resources, and I feel like I'm being pushed to work 10 hours days to fill the gaps. The challenges of writing software that I used to find exciting and pleasurable are consuming my life.<p>Should I be looking for a job in another industry and keep programming as a hobby? Should I be looking for a role in a product company, where my value add to my company isn't the billable hours that I put on my timesheet? Is it feasible to find a decent job without going backwards since I don't have a CS degree?
======
TDL
If I was in your position I would begin looking for a position in another
company in a similar role (it's not clear what type of projects your are
taking on.) It's great that you have been provided with mentorship & support,
_but_ , working 10 hours a day is not sustainable over the long term. This
company sounds like many others in consulting; get bodies in chairs, sign on
more business than can be handled, and crack the whip.
Start out attending technical meetups (the language your are writing in or a
topic your are interested in, preferebly both) in your locale. Build your
professional network and don't feel bad about asking if a company/startup is
hiring. I would also start saving every last dime in case you get to the point
where you are completely burnt out and just have to quit (not ideal, but might
happen.) You are probably going to have to slog through a bit more before you
find an opportunity.
------
JSeymourATL
> Am I just burnt out or should I find a new career?
When the work and long days are no longer enjoyable, and your role is
perceived as low-value-- yes, that's an obvious signal for change in status
quo.
> Is it feasible to find a decent job?
Yes, of course-- Can you now find a way to leverage your experience into
something more rewarding? Where do you belong?
On this subject, Peter Drucker offers excellent food--for-thought >
[http://academic.udayton.edu/lawrenceulrich/LeaderArticles/Dr...](http://academic.udayton.edu/lawrenceulrich/LeaderArticles/Drucker%20Managing%20Oneself.pdf)
------
saluki
That's why they call it work.
Sometimes you'll run in to patches where development work isn't fun, but most
people don't find their work fun.
I, like you, do enjoy being a developer but there are patches/tasks that come
up that are definitely work.
Look at your current position:
What do you have:
Are you paid well?
Are you learning new things?
Do you have some flexibility in your schedule?
Are you being taken advantage of?
What are your goals:
Working on different projects?
Learning a new language?
Working Remotely?
Think about your goals and what you can change/do to achieve them.
Talking to your boss:
I wouldn't approach it as I'm burned out or I can't do this.
If you would like to manage someone I'd approach it as I need someone under me
that I can manage to do some of the busy work, minor tasks. This will free you
up for more complex work, sounds like you're having to do it all. You could
transition into a sr. dev role and become one of the mentors.
If you're not interested or know they wouldn't hire someone under you, or
maybe your company isn't setup like that you could approach it as I'm spending
too much time on busy work and not able to focus on the more complex technical
tasks.
Sometimes it's good to level up by changing jobs. But be careful of the grass
is greener syndrome. Typically changing jobs is leveling up in pay and
responsibilities.
Or you might just need a vacation or a hobby or more activities outside of
work to be more of your focus instead of work being a major focus.
Good luck figuring it out.
------
notduncansmith
Get recommendations from the senior developers you mentioned, take a vacation,
and find a job at a product company, or a consultancy that bills by the day
rather than the hour.
Don't worry about the degree - I don't have one at all and I found my way out
of a situation similar to yours. Anyone who would reject you based on the lack
of a CS degree is someone you don't want to work for.
------
coroxout
Sorry I can't offer much advice but I hope you find a way out of this rut.
How long have you been with this company? If you've been there for over a year
(and/or have a good portfolio, github profile, etc) I'd say that would help
your chances to be hired without a CS degree.
However, if you're not close to that and the job is really bringing you down
that much, don't stay just to get to a milestone like that. Sadly overlong
days do seem (in my opinion) to be quite prevalent in IT, though, so try to
get a good feel for the work/life balance at any new job before moving on.
I'm afraid since I don't do hiring and am probably in a different country (I
assume you're in the US) I don't know what the market will be like otherwise,
but hopefully someone else will reply soon...
------
realtarget
Well, to be honest, nearly all other answers say: Search a new job. But this
will be just an escape from a usually solvable problem.
Just try to speak to your boss and tell him your wishes and demands. A
satisfied worker is always better than somebody who resigns or burns out.
~~~
amiburntout
I was considering something like this. I guess I'm worried that saying I can't
handle the workload will make me less likely to be looked at for new projects.
Have you, or anyone else reading this thread, had success with a conversation
like this and have any pointers?
~~~
realtarget
Not me in person, but a colleague. The boss was very open minded and told him
that he did not recognize that he was overloaded. It's important to
differentiate between overchallenged and overloaded. You seem to be overloaded
but not overchallenged - and this needs to be communicated to your prinipal
(absolutely certain!).
------
Zelmor
Don't worry about the degree. Create a decent linked in profile, connect your
github page if any and cut back on workhours. Firefighting without proper
resources is not worth it, and companies sacrifice individuals easily this way
- one bit at a time.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Poweliks: the persistent malware without a file - miles
https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/poweliks-the-persistent-malware-without-a-file.html
======
halfcat
This is exactly why, on a Windows computer, you should:
1\. Never run under an administrator account unless you are performing
administrative duties (i.e. temporarily admin to intentionally install an app,
and not opening Word docs).
2\. Use Software Restriction Policy to only allow executables to run out of
C:\Windows, "C:\Program Files", and "C:\Program Files (x86)".
If I had to pick one or the other for my grandmother - antivirus software or
the non-admin/SRP config - I would choose non-admin/SRP hands down and sleep
easy. It's that effective. Unfortunately almost no one operates in this state
because it's not default when you buy a new Windows PC. Companies selling
antivirus software might go out of business if this were the default
configuration.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: What were your naiveté's in your twenties? - notoriousarun
======
parasthinker
Labeling myself as nihilist.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Jim Keller Joins Intel to Lead Silicon Engineering - kasabali
https://newsroom.intel.com/news-releases/jim-keller-joins-intel-lead-silicon-engineering/
======
sctb
Previous discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16928975](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16928975).
~~~
kasabali
IMO these two are different and not a dupe. That article (and discussion) is
about Tesla while in this one the real news is Jim Keller joining Intel.
------
chollida1
Man this guys career should be exhibit #1 when asking if Non compete clauses
should be valid. I mean, he's worked for most of hte big names in silicon
design during his career.
Imagine if he was stopped from moving from DEC to AMD early in his career?
From Wikipedia.....
> Jim Keller worked at DEC until 1998, where he was involved in designing the
> Alpha 21164 and 21264 processors.
> In 1998 he moved to AMD, where he worked to launch the AMD Athlon (K7)
> processor and was the lead architect of the AMD K8 microarchitecture,[17]
> which also included designing the x86-64 instruction set and HyperTransport
> interconnect mainly used for multiprocessor communications.
> In 1999, he left AMD to work at SiByte to design MIPS-based processors for 1
> Gbit/s network interfaces and other devices. In November 2000, SiByte was
> acquired by Broadcom,[19] where he continued as chief architect[9] until
> 2004.[3]
> In 2004 he moved to serve as the Vice President of Engineering at P.A.
> Semi,[3][11] a company specializing in low-power mobile processors.[4] P.A.
> Semi was acquired by Apple in 2008, and Keller followed,[6][17] becoming
> part of a team to design the Apple A4 and A5 system-on-a-chip mobile
> processors. These processors were used in several Apple products, including
> iPhone 4, 4S, iPad and iPad 2.
> In August 2012, Jim Keller returned to AMD, where his primary task was to
> design a new generation microarchitecture[5][11][15] called Zen.[14] After
> years of being unable to compete with Intel in the high-end CPU market, the
> new generation of Zen processors is hoped to restore AMD's position in the
> high-end x86-64 processor market.[3][13] On September 18, 2015, Keller
> departed from AMD to pursue other opportunities, ending his three-year
> employment at AMD.[20]
> In January 2016, Keller joined Tesla, Inc. as Vice President of Autopilot
> Hardware Engineering.[1]
> In April 2018, Keller joined Intel.
~~~
Teknoman117
I think the problem is that the vast majority of non-competes just end up
preventing people from making reasonable decisions with their careers. There
are people like Keller where is would seem that some form on non-compete
should exist (considering he's come to be known as an invaluable employee),
but the vast majority of employees (regardless of what they'd like to think)
don't pose some kind of existential threat to the company as sharing trade
secrets and intellectual property has nothing to do with non-compete. Non-
competes seem to just get used to prevent employees from seeking out (or being
sought out by) a better job if their current one doesn't suit them.
One example of an overzealous non-compete I saw when I lived in Alabama (a
place with practically zero restrictions on the scope or duration of non-
compete agreements) was that of a close friend's mom. She was a telecom tech
working for Bellsouth when AT&T bought them out in early 2007. Most of the
local employees got laid off and at least she had a non-compete contract
saying she couldn't work in anything related to telecom for two years in the
geographic region - and it was valid whether you quit, got fired, or got laid
off.
I tend to be of the opinion where if the loss of an individual poses an
existential risk to a company, the company should do everything they can to
make sure that person wants to stay. I'd also consider it a failing of a
company if a single individual gained that much singular importance.
------
aresant
Fascinating that Keller was essentially brought in to stop gap Tesla's loss /
end of relationship with Mobileye who previously supplied the EyeQ3 chipset
that was the core of Tesla's autopilot.
At the time speculation was the CEO of Mobileye was uncomfortable in how Tesla
pushed the limits of autopilot marketing and use (1) - they had always defined
EyeQ3 as a "eyes on" technology (2).
And then last year Intel paid ~$15b to buy out mobileye (3) which gave them an
immediate and broad entry into one of the most exciting chipset markets.
Keller moving over to Intel with the resources of mobileye, and a vision
forged from executing Tesla's own efforts seems like a considerable coup for
Intel.
(1) [https://www.wsj.com/articles/mobileye-ends-partnership-
with-...](https://www.wsj.com/articles/mobileye-ends-partnership-with-
tesla-1469544028)
(2) [https://www.mobileye.com/our-technology/evolution-eyeq-
chip/](https://www.mobileye.com/our-technology/evolution-eyeq-chip/)
(3) [https://techcrunch.com/2017/03/13/reports-intel-buying-
mobil...](https://techcrunch.com/2017/03/13/reports-intel-buying-mobileye-for-
up-to-16b-to-expand-in-self-driving-tech/)
~~~
dogma1138
It doesn't appear that he'll be working on that, MobilEye is an "Intel
company" an autonomous (pun intended) subsidiary not a division of Intel, they
don't even manufacture their chips at Intel fabs.
JK is joining Intel proper looks like he'll be working on SoC design.
I'm also not sure if the analysis that JK was there to bridge the gap was
correct they've bridged that gap with NVIDIA in fact they've already switched
to NVIDIA before the fallout with MobilEye which is likely the main reason why
MobilEye didn't took it quietly since they were already sleeping in separate
beds.
The rumor was always that JK was joined Tesla to design and build their own AI
SoC and doesn't look like it panned out, hopefully for the better I don't
think Tesla should add ASIC design and manufacturing to their list of
"achievements".
------
kregasaurusrex
Dude's in his 50s and has been at the helm developing great products that have
pushed the limit of what microprocessors can do. I wish these companies would
allow more blog-style posts of how they overcome difficult problems; but
Intel's notorious about disclosing what goes on behind the curtains as we've
seen with Spectre+Meltdown. Makes you wonder how much further along we could
be in this space if NDAs allowed people talk more about what they've done
after leaving their previous company/companies.
------
obl
very curious if anyone has info on what he will be working on if it's any
specific chip family. mainline x86 ? GEN gpus ? phis ? something else ?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Low-income housing has no impact on nearby home values (2016) - gerbler
https://www.trulia.com/research/low-income-housing/
======
netcan
Short & medium term effects on real estate prices is only part of the issue.
Ultimately, NIMBYism exists for a bunch of reasons... and the reasons don't
matter much.
Once you have actual organized NIMBYism, you are selling to existing property
owners and residents. They have no real reason to "buy" this story. Either low
cost housing doesn't affect anything, or it is against their interests. In no
scenario does benefit them, so why shouldn't they object... just to be safe?
At the least, construction is noisy and unsightly.
I think NIMBYism should be accepted as-is. Existing housing has an interest in
preventing new housing by default, especially down market of them. That's how
organised NIMBYs see it. That's how it plays out in practice. YIMBYs are not
going to beat NIMBYs locally.
NIMBYism exists. The relevant questions are about how to build despite of
NIMBYism, not how to reason with it.
~~~
chii
> how to build despite of NIMBYism, not how to reason with it.
i think it's "easy" \- pay the existing NIMBY people the equivalent in lost
value when constructing objects in their "backyard".
~~~
AnthonyMouse
> i think it's "easy" \- pay the existing NIMBY people the equivalent in lost
> value when constructing objects in their "backyard".
Suppose the difference is actually large. Their currently million dollar house
will be worth half a million dollars.
Who is paying this money? Low income people who need housing? They haven't got
it, that was the original problem. Local taxpayers? That's just the original
homeowners paying themselves.
~~~
darawk
If the government believes that it's in the public interest to have low income
housing, then the government should pay for it. It's not exactly the same as
the homeowners paying themselves, either. Structuring it this way ensures that
the cost is allocated fairly across all of society. If we believe that it is
in _societies_ interest to have low income housing, then society as a whole
should pay for it. The cost shouldn't just fall on a few unlucky homeowners.
Making the cost widely and evenly shared makes it equitable.
~~~
Waterfall
Who's gonna pay for it? The government? How do they get money? Taxes? So we
pay the government (they of course pay the federal employees and some pork
barreling) to pay for affordable housing? In the end who will really pay for
it aside from the people who will live in affordable housing?
~~~
darawk
My whole comment was an answer to that exact question. The government pays,
because the government paying smooths out the hit. The cost is more equitably
distributed over the whole population, as opposed to being concentrated in a
few unlucky neighborhoods.
~~~
Waterfall
My point is the government never really pays, we pay the government after all,
but I understand your point too.
~~~
imtringued
The people who pay for affordable housing are those who caused the housing
market to be unaffordable. That's only fair.
~~~
Waterfall
If candy bars are too expensive it's the buyers fault? That's fair?
~~~
Waterfall
Sorry I misread your comment!
------
Waterfall
>In the nation’s 20 least affordable markets, our analysis of 3,083 low-income
housing projects from 1996 to 2006 found no significant effect on home values
located near a low-income housing project, with a few exceptions.
Talk about cherry picked years. Why don't they analyse from 1998 to 2008 and
say the same thing? Did it really take until 2020 to post this?
>Of the 20 markets examined, Denver was the only metro area where homes
located near low-income housing projects registered a positive effect in terms
of price per square foot after a project was completed.
And the absence of serious, critical thought. Has trulia never heard of
correlation vs causation?
~~~
stepstop
> And the absence of serious, critical thought. Has trulia never heard of
> correlation vs causation?
They probably don’t teach that in data science boot camps
~~~
Waterfall
They had to cherry pick it. This article is intentionally misleading.
------
bb2018
I am in favor of looser zoning laws and generally consider myself a YIMBY.
However, I wouldn't say it is good politically to only support local low-
income housing conditional on the fact that there is no negatives. I think
that is the best policy but also acknowledge that there will be some
tradeoffs.
As others have said I don't think looking at home values in major cities like
Boston or Seattle is that interesting. Cities are used to having very rich
areas next to poor ones. I grew up in a town of about 20,000 that had close to
no housing that wasn't zoned as single family. As a result, the median income
was very high, property taxes stayed extremely low as a percentage (since
everyone was contributing a lot), and the schools were considered great
despite people not having to pay a lot in taxes. The neighboring town had
higher taxes (because the median property value was significantly lower) and
the schools were known to be bad. I wish there was more state level funding at
the time - but there wasn't and don't think there is now.
~~~
pydry
>However, I wouldn't say it is good politically to only support local low-
income housing conditional on the fact that there is no negatives.
It obviously isn't but the history of progressive politics demonstrates that
ideological purity is a great way of never getting anything real done.
E.g. planned Parenthood's murky beginnings, food stamps (buyer of last resort
for leftover agricultural produce), schools (training kids to be obedient
factory workers).
I doubt there are any progressive institutions which aren't partly borne out
of an uneasy alliance with some powerful but unethical group whose interests
either align or are at least aren't all that badly affected.
------
AlexTWithBeard
This is an interesting example of a pseudo-research article. It indeed looks
like it's using scientific approach to an important problem, but the method is
questionable:
\- why did the authors pick 2,000 feet and 4,000 feet as thresholds? They
refer to another article, but that article doesn't shed much light onto the
problem as well
\- why does the research cover the range of 1996-2006?
\- the article looks at the low-income housing project built in 1996-2006.
What's about the projects built before that?
\- what was located on the site before the project was built?
------
thinkingkong
The low income property makes almost no difference. What matters is low income
by _density_. If you spread out low income housing then you get to build it
and it has no effect on prices or perceived value. If you had tons of dense
blocks of housing, then I could see how youd end up with a deteriorating
situation.
------
OneGuy123
This study is useless because it looks at this on only a 10 year span.
To go from a "good neighbourhood" to a "bad neighbourhood" takes longer time
than just 10 years since more and more houses are build graudually and people
move in over longer periods of time until the majority of the population there
is low-income.
~~~
Waterfall
Do you have a study where it shows what happens over a longer period of time?
The period of 1996-2006 is very suspect too.
------
mdoms
In the markets with already extremely high demand, arguably markets where
value and price are already fully uncoupled (eg bubble markets). An analysis
on more "normal" markets would, I suspect, paint a very different picture.
~~~
stormbrew
Ok? But the studied markets are the ones where low income housing is both most
needed and also often staunchly opposed by nimbys.
~~~
remarkEon
Yeah, but that's the point the parent is making. "Most needed" just means
"high demand market", and in markets like that it's almost impossible to do
anything to upset the trajectory of housing costs - unless we have another
2008-style mortgage crash because of fraud. The lesson to take here is that
putting affordable housing in excessively expensive markets might actually be
a really smart idea.
~~~
woah
It tends to be excessively expensive to build in those markets, which is what
has led to the excessively high prices in the first place.
------
ergocoder
Unless they expect low-income people to cause issues, why would housing price
decrease?
It should increase because the amount of land of normal price decreases.
Also, I always joke that you can help lower housing price in the area by
causing non-offense nuisance. Walking shirtless and talking gibberish to
yourself loudly. It will probably help a little.
~~~
AnthonyMouse
> Unless they expect low-income people to cause issues, why would housing
> price decrease?
In principle, by supply and demand. If there is more housing then people don't
have to outbid each other for the existing housing and the prices decrease.
Obviously this only applies if there is enough new housing to move the needle,
which for housing projects like this there often isn't, but that's also the
exact reason why programs like this are so ineffective. You have a city of a
million households, a quarter of a million can't afford housing (or are having
to scrimp in order to afford it), then you build a thousand units and imagine
that will do something. What about the other 249,000?
Anything actually effective at making housing more affordable would reduce
housing prices, because that's literally what "more affordable" means.
~~~
bananaface
I mean the bigger problem is that if amount of housing determined price,
cities would be waaaaaaaaaaaaay cheaper than towns. Available housing may
drive population growth, pushing _up_ the price, since for whatever reason
people like to aggregate.
~~~
AnthonyMouse
Price is determined by supply and demand. There is more demand in cities so
you need more supply to get the same price.
People want to live near other people/businesses, but that's what cities are
already, which is why there is already more demand there. There is a limit to
the amount of housing you can add before you end up on the other side of the
curve and prices start going back down again.
There is also a matter of general policy. If hypothetically one city (and no
others) added a lot of new housing so that the cost of housing there was lower
there than in other cities then many people might move there, because they'd
get to live in a city for less than it costs anywhere else, which would drive
prices back up to near equilibrium. But if every city added housing then you
wouldn't have that sort of migration because people could get into new housing
without moving to another city, and then prices would decline everywhere.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Auto-BAHN App still sends Messages when Cellular and the Internet Fails - luigionline
http://www.i4u.com/47440/auto-bahn-app-uses-wi-fi-and-bluetooth-send-messages-if-cellular-and-internet-fails
======
iqster
DTNs (delay tolerant networks) have been studied to death in academia _sigh_.
I'm a bit jaded by this line of work. People keep talking about how useful
this would be in the case of disasters. How the heck will we recharge all our
batteries?
The most reasonable solution I've seen for diaster communication is that
implemented by the folks in Berkeley (and I'm sure adjoining towns as well ..
don't recall details). They have (or are planning to) have sheds spread around
the town that have HAM radios, manuals for emergency situation handling, even
some fuel. The idea is that if a disaster occurs (i.e. the Big One), people in
a neighbourhood can communicate with others via these sheds. I saw a prototype
of this at an Intel Research Berkeley (RIP) open house a few years back. Now
that was a decent idea!
~~~
pavel_lishin
What are the odds of these sheds not being raided and destroyed by short-
sighted assholes?
------
jfricker
Disaster is only one obvious use case.
How about "oppressive government threw the kill switch".
Or, "profit mongering telco under built facilities".
Peer-to-peer relay messaging is a good concept, but in any use case it will
need to be ubiquitous (i.e. built into the OS) for it to be effective.
------
shimsham
yay. I can now reactivate my uucp-style email addressing.
------
mildweed
Old ideas, new context! Its like BBS relay mail!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ubuntu's Shuttleworth: "I don't think anyone can make money from the Linux desktop." - qhoxie
http://blogs.computerworld.com/ubuntus_shuttleworth_i_dont_think_anyone_can_make_money_from_the_linux_desktop
======
amix
Mozilla is making millions on advertising from Firefox search and I think the
same business model can be applied to Ubuntu. For example, by adding a search
bar directly on the desktop.
~~~
mdasen
Better yet, since they are free to make modifications to Firefox, they could
always change the account to an Ubuntu one rather than leaving the Mozilla one
in there for search.
Wouldn't be so nice to Mozilla, but that is the nature of open-source. In
fact, if you have a company with lots of employees who use Firefox, it might
make sense for you to alter that. Of course, probably isn't worth the effort
considering how little you'd make back.
~~~
maw
They're not free to make that sort of modification to Firefox. Patches for
Firefox (and a number of other Mozilla products) need to be vetted by MoCo,
and I doubt they'd be approved.
They are, of course, allowed to rebrand and then make all the modifications
they wish.
This was the impetus for the creation of Iceweasel.
------
Create
"we have no plans to create a traditional desktop product for the consumer
market in the foreseeable future." -- redhat, 2008/04/16
[http://www.press.redhat.com/2008/04/16/whats-going-on-
with-r...](http://www.press.redhat.com/2008/04/16/whats-going-on-with-red-hat-
desktop-systems-an-update/)
------
olefoo
The question is not who makes money _from_ linux on the desktop, the questions
is, who makes money _because_of_ linux on the desktop.
Canonical's profits are going to come from training, certification and
consulting partnerships; but they aren't the only ones who will be making
money from the existence of capable linux desktops.
Any org that has a large number of client installations would probably save
money (easiest way to make it) by implementing a linux desktop.
------
jhancock
Is there any big player still trying to make money off a Linux desktop? I
thought this issue was resolved long ago. I agree with Shuttleworth, I just
don't think this is new news.
------
startingup
I am partial to BSD as a basis for hosting a browser, which is all I want my
OS to do. My ideal would be BSD + Chrome mated to be one small, light kick-ass
web top. I gave up on Linux a long while ago on the client side. It is chasing
Windows, which I think is backward looking.
Keep in mind that BSD underpins Mac OS X.
------
utnick
I disagree
As computers get better I think there could be a market for a really slick
compviz style linux desktop with a ton a tools packaged and integrated with
it, including virtualbox so you can run your windows xp partition in parallel.
I think there surely is a market for mac osx, even seperated from mac hardware
( if apple would allow that to happen ), likewise there is a market for a
linux desktop, we just haven't seen one good enough yet. But we are close.
------
cstejerean
given the problems with Vista and the success of Macs with OS X I expect some
of the other players (Dell, etc) to start looking at investing money in Linux
development so they have a compelling OS to ship with their machines, which
tells me there should be plenty of opportunities to make money from a Linux
desktop.
------
mattmaroon
If you remove the last word from that sentence, you get my opinion.
------
known
Ubuntu may try exclusive tie-ups with OEMs like Microsoft does.
------
ohhmaagawd
20XX is the year of the linux desktop!
~~~
Anon84
if $current_year == $current_year + 1 then:
now is the year of linux
------
thras
He's talking about selling Linux OS in a shrinkwrap package. On the other
hand, Shuttleworth says that services are where the money is at -- something
that companies like Red Hat have known for a long time.
Shuttleworth's most interesting comment was a suggestion that XP is being
given away for free to certain OEMs. That would be a bold move by Microsoft.
The whole ecosystem could change if Microsoft changed XP over to the Firefox
model of making money from software.
~~~
13ren
Yes, MS already sell XP Home OEM for $40 for the eeePC... they have the
capacity for brutality. From sales so far, it doesn't seem to need to be any
cheaper (in fact, a higher price would probably be OK). The ecosystem built on
XP's platform is still worth a lot.
What could kill them is a crossover to the web as a platform... ie. as the
desktop.
Implementations of Flash, Javascript and Java are getting faster and adding
features needed for the desktop (e.g. client-side persistence). It seems
inevitable that the old settop box dream will be realized. It was such a cool
idea!
The OS might even be non-linux, if it has other features that are needed more.
e.g. faster, more power efficient, maybe intrinsically multicore, so it can
work on cheaper, lighter devices, requiring less power - like a phone. Linux
has bloated, through evolving in the same rich hardware environment as
Windows.
~~~
jbert
> Linux has bloated, through evolving in the same rich hardware environment as
> Windows.
I'm not disputing your point directly, but I'd be interested in your data.
For example, there are Linux distros which run well on what I consider low-
power devices (I'm thinking of ARM-powered NSLU-2 or WRT54 devices) with, say,
32Mbyte RAM.
I'm also not sure what you mean by 'intrinsically multicore' - are you
implying that Linux doesn't make use of multiple cores? Or doesn't do it well?
~~~
astine
Linux can be made to be far more lightweight than Windows or OSX, but who uses
those distros? Most people use Ubuntu or something similar and those distros
are fairly heavy, not as heavy as Vista, but still much heavier than they
could be. Things like Compiz and KDE/Gnome really weigh a system down.
~~~
jbert
> Things like Compiz and KDE/Gnome really weigh a system down.
If you're looking for a modern desktop operating system, then yes, it is tuned
for a modern(-ish) desktop.
But if you're talking about using "a different OS" (as the OP was), then
you're already further from the mainstream than using a linux distro tuned for
your needs.
I'm just checking on the substance of the "Linux is bloated" claim, and trying
to find out what alternatives there might be.
~~~
13ren
Also, I believe that the kernel has also grown much larger, especially in
recent years (don't have data or links, just from articles I've read).
Concurrency isn't really a solved problem. If someone did solve it, and formed
an OS around it, that would be what I mean by _intrinsically multi-core_. It
might also involve an entirely different CPU architecture, and view of the
hardware, which the fundamental concepts of linux just didn't map to
efficiently (e.g. no filesystem). Hypothetically speaking. But if you could
make it look the same to webapps, it wouldn't matter.
My point isn't that linux is bad in any way, but that if your platform is the
web, then the OS doesn't matter. BTW: I also don't believe that linux is the
ultimate OS - it's just an OS, and it's possible to have something better. In
practice, the alternative might be based on linux (or at least compatible).
Not because linux is perfect, but it's there already and because of the
ecosystem of software that relies on it (borrowed from unix). Linux is a
market success - by which I mean many people use it.
The only alternatives I can think off the top of my head are: BSD, solaris,
minix, QNX, Plan 9, AmigaOS and there are also some really "weird" OS's in
academia, many no longer used.
I believe Plan 9 was written by the creators of unix... as an improvement. But
it lacked market success.
_EDIT_ BTW I'm not claiming that linux is _as_ bloated as Windows - just that
it has increased significantly in size, and due to the same cause: there is no
real need not to.
~~~
jbert
> Also, I believe that the kernel has also grown much larger, especially in
> recent years (don't have data or links, just from articles I've read).
OK. The kernel runs happily on a 32Mbyte ARM system I have to hand. dmesg
tells me the kernel usage (a 2.6.21) at boot time is ~2Mbytes:
<5>Memory: 30292KB available (1912K code, 153K data, 84K init)
I don't think that justifies being called 'much larger', unless you're
comparing with mid-90s kernel versions or something.
The source code for Linux is much larger, but I think that's mostly due to
broader support for hardware and other optional components.
~~~
13ren
That's pretty impressive, though I was thinking from the beginning, and
"recent years" being the last 10 years, and also of the kernel size (not its
RAM usage). I agree that kernel size matters less than RAM usage.
But to share my perspective: My first computer was a ZX81, with 1K RAM total
(i.e. 1024 bytes). 32*24=768 bytes were used for video in the worst case (it
was compressed, newline style). To be fair, it didn't have a filesystem (no
disks) or multitasking. In truth, I found 1K just too limiting, and went for
the 16K rampack addon.
Regarding my main point: I doubt the massive software base can be given up at
this point (even the disruptive technology of cell phones switch to linux when
they get powerful enough) - it's just my yearning for those days of daring
frugality, when a byte was worth fighting for.
~~~
jbert
> it's just my yearning for those days of daring frugality, when a byte was
> worth fighting for.
Which I certainly share :-) I borrowed a ZX-80&ZX-81 and then got my own
Spectrum...
Perhaps buy yourself an NSLU-2 <http://www.nslu2-linux.org/>, they're pretty
cheap, low power devices with 1 ethernet and 2 usb ports. There's good support
for plugging lots of things into the usb ports (you can stick a usb hard drive
or flash stick in for storage, usb sound card for media player, printer
server, etc). Just don't expect them to do too much (the CPU isn't powerful).
I use one as a low-power 'always on' file/ssh/git server.
And you can then once more have fun writing software which will run well in a
restricted memory environment :-)
~~~
13ren
My main PC is currently an eeePC, which is not all that far from that! I
predict another generation which is even lighter, lower wattage and cheaper.
Those dime-sized java devices appealed to me - can't find the one I mean, but
here's similar: <http://www.jopdesign.com/cyclone/index.jsp> and
[http://wireless.sensorsmag.com/sensorswireless/Wireless+News...](http://wireless.sensorsmag.com/sensorswireless/Wireless+News/Worldrsquos-
Smallest-Java-Based-Computers-to-Debut/ArticleStandard/Article/detail/514140)
~~~
13ren
WARNING: RAVE
It's the simplicity of the ZX81 that appeals to me - especially the small
number of commands available, in BASIC and Z-80 machine code. It's concrete
and graspable, and possible to get on top of to master some of it perfectly -
a toy world, a tiny playground to play in. The small universe makes it easier
to be sure you've got the best solution, and limited options make choices
clearer and easier to evaluate.
I've managed to get some of that feeling from Java and discrete mathematics -
though that essential thrill of efficiency and certainty is missing...
In my current project, I'm trying to create that kind of playground for users,
where the choices are concrete and combine orthogonally. I'm aiming for it to
appeal to "my people" (i.e. who appreciate what I do), instead of to the
naysayers, or opinions about how you "should" do things.
I think it requires a kind of genius, to make the abstract concrete. To me,
it's a worthy goal. Fortunately, you can create a work of genius without
actually being a genius - provided that (1) you spend a lot of time and
effort; (2) you make definite progress; and (3) can link those pieces of
progress together, so you build higher and higher. Well, I sure _hope_ I can.
:-)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Teaching Business People How To Hack - jevgeni
I work in a team of financial analysts in a large company. My team came to the conclusion, that adhering to enterprise "solutions" for our results is really unproductive. So a lot of stuff we do is now solved by lightweight home-hacked implementations.<p>Being the designated "tech savvy" person, I now have the task to teach people the tech skills required for this. Most of them handle SQL on a daily basis and know a bit of VBA. My goal is to teach them a programming language (probably Python), some lightweight OOP concepts and most importantly the methods and the habits of a good software developer, i.e. version control, writing code for long-term readability, fast iteration development and just general care for their workflow.<p>Could you guys recommend any good resources (i.e. podcasts, articles, whatever), that you, personally, find extraordinarily good? The kind of succinct explanation of the above concepts, that made you personally fall in love with the thing being explained?
======
mjhea0
Python is the way to go. This is exactly how I got into Python: I worked as a
Financial Analyst, automating giant reports with VBA. I quickly found out just
how much easier Python was, compared to VBA, and I could then hook directly up
to the Quickbooks API to grab data.
New Boston
[http://thenewboston.org/list.php?cat=36](http://thenewboston.org/list.php?cat=36)
is a good place to start. People can get their feet wet. Learn Python the Hard
Way [http://learnpythonthehardway.org/](http://learnpythonthehardway.org/) is
one of the best beginner tutorials. The problem, though, is that the examples
are a bit boring because the focus is not so much on the examples, but on
repetition - for learning the syntax. Most have to power through this. I would
highly recommend it.
I am also the author/co-founder of a Python training series called Real Python
[http://www.realpython.com](http://www.realpython.com). We start with the
syntax, then move into web development.
The first course would be great for your team. It's got excellent examples,
many of which are relevant to your field.
Additionally, I have been training people in Python for a number of years now,
so I can create custom training material as well, specifically or your needs.
Since my background is in analytics, I understand what is needed to take
someone from that Excel/SQL level and get them going with just enough Python
to automate much of their jobs. From there, they can take their Python
learning to the next level.
Feel free to contact me at michael (at) realpython (dot) com.
Cheers!
~~~
jevgeni
Oh, awesome! I'll check that out. Thank you very much.
------
rifinio
Hi there, i recommend to you
[http://thenewboston.org](http://thenewboston.org) it has a dosen of video
tutorials about programming languages. for example this is the Python course
link
[http://thenewboston.org/list.php?cat=36](http://thenewboston.org/list.php?cat=36)
best of luck (y)
~~~
jevgeni
Oh, very cool. Thanks!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How texting is changing the world [infographics] - Teresag
http://blog.nexmo.com/post/11340724199/how-texting-is-chaging-the-world
======
ajanuary
What's their obsession with blonde people not texting?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
First Impressions of a $9 CHIP Computer - ingve
https://spin.atomicobject.com/2016/03/27/chip-computer-review/
======
noonespecial
I'm going to go ahead and say it. It doesn't count until I can buy them in any
quantity at any time for $9 each. Shipping to a few backers doesn't count.
"One per customer, supplies limited" doesn't count. 6 month waiting time,
"special" shipping charges/handling fees/only available as part of a more
expensive "kit"... you get the idea.
This is a bog-standard device in a sea of similar SBC's. The entire magic here
is the price. Honestly, I don't even "believe" in the Pi zero yet. It could
still turn out to be a publicity stunt produced in a very limited quantity
just to get everyone talking.
Until its a product you buy a dozen at a time and leave behind in the projects
in your wake, the magic hasn't happened yet. Otherwise, you pull it out of
those projects because its a rare specimen you might not be able to get
another of any time soon. It doesn't matter if it only cost $9 if you can't
get any more of them.
But I _want_ to believe!
~~~
sixothree
I couldn't be more disappointed with Raspberry Pi regarding their availability
of the Zero. It's been four months since they announced "immediate
availability" and seemingly the only way you can get a $5 Pi is to buy a $40
bundle. If you can't buy it in numbers needed then it simply doesn't exist.
~~~
j1vms
Firstly, only kudos to them for having designed the Zero in the first place,
and I'm sure they intended it to be available in volume this many months after
release.
However, until they can reach volume on a major released project (e.g. the
Zero), they should be careful about getting too much press visibility on said
product. As of 2016, Raspberry Pi is world-wide name with international name
recognition, and it can only hurt the organization when its products marketed
at a $5 USD price point are, in practice, only really available at $40+ USD,
to the majority of its potential customers, and this many months after
release.
~~~
MarcScott
On the plus side - all the donations the Raspberry Pi Foundation received from
sales of the Zero helped fund a teacher training course that is being rolled
out across the United States.
~~~
j1vms
That is a indeed a plus. Indeed in the gparent comment I only wished to point
out 1 way in which the organization could improve should they wish. Getting
open source design part-sourced, assembled and then shipped in volume levels
is still a business process in nascency. I'm sure they face abundant
challenges on the supplier-side. Regardless, I do hope that against all odds,
volume manufactured open source hardware becomes a force to be reckoned with
in the decades to come - perhaps analogously to how FOSS Linux dominated in
its own and ever-expanding arena.
------
chime
Wow! Built-in Wifi + 4GB storage for $9? This changes the entire scope of my
repeatedly-postponed environmental monitoring project. I can wire a $10
temperature/humidity sensor and put 40-50 of these devices around the building
for $1k. I would easily pay $50 for a pre-made device that:
1) Is built using CHIP and has a simply case + power adapter
2) Is wired to
[https://www.sparkfun.com/products/10167](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/10167)
3) Has an easy Wifi setup process and does DHCP
4) Lets me do a GET [http://ip/status](http://ip/status) and gives me JSON of
the current temperature and humidity.
Then all I have to worry about is setting up a cron job that wgets all 50
devices and logs the result to DB.
FYI equivalent systems, even non-NIST-calibrated ones cost $500/device or
more.
~~~
gh02t
Not $50, you can do all of that with a $5 ESP8266. The CHIP is IMO enormously
overpowered for what you're describing. The ESPs can do HTTP/MQTT/etc directly
themselves, but I think an ideal use for the CHIP is as a hub with the ESP's
reporting sensor data and the CHIP logging data.
Also, as a warning from experience the DHT22's aren't that great and they have
been a headache. They are relatively expensive, not very precise and also I've
seen a huge variation in their manufacturing quality. The relative humidity
readings in particular are wildly inaccurate. There are better temperature
sensors that cost less than a dollar (DS18) and to get reliable humidity
readings you really need something nicer like the SHT-31.
~~~
djhworld
I'm always curious about these sorts of answers, because from an outsiders
perspective, you may as well be talking in another language.
From what I can tell the ESP8266 is some sort of wifi enabled...chip? That you
need to solder onto something or plug onto a breadboard, then you need an
arduino for some unstated reason. What is an arduino? how do you make these
two things interact? How do you provide power to these things? why are there
so many arduinos?
I think the advantage of these single board computers are they are a much
lower barrier to entry if you don't have that much knowledge of electronics,
but have more experience of navigating Linux systems and writing software.
~~~
kweks
The ESP8266 is actually a system on a board, too. Essentially, it's a tiny
microcontroller, with Wifi and a few GPIO connections, in a very small form
factor, for a very small price.
You don't need to solder it to anything (it already comes soldered on its own
board). You don't an external microcontroller to use it. It is standalone. It
is compatible with the 'Arduino'. The Arduino is a family of microcontrollers
built from the ground up to be easy to use. Easy to use software, easy to
program (Variant of C) - and more importantly, heaps of support and tutorials
online.
Honestly, the most difficult thing about using the ESP is powering and
programming it. It takes 3.3V - and only 3.3V, so finding an appropriate power
supply can be trickly. It programs over serial, so you need to use a USB >
serial module - $1.30 [1]
The modules themselves are super cheap: - $1.50 [0] There's a very strong
community behind the module:
[http://www.esp8266.com/](http://www.esp8266.com/)
Essentially: Don't be scared: there's an initial learning curve that is very
gentle, and you'll suddenly find unlimited uses for these tiny little modules.
I've got modules that show build statuses, affiliate account activity.. etc.
They also work, as mentioned, exceptionally well in a flock reporting to a
main system - which may be a CHIP system, Raspberry PI, OpenWRT router, etc.
[0] [http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Free-Shipping-2pcs-lot-
ESP826...](http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Free-Shipping-2pcs-lot-
ESP8266-remote-serial-Port-WIFI-wireless-module-through-walls-Wang-
ESP-12/32256161821.html) [1]
[http://www.aliexpress.com/wholesale?catId=0&initiative_id=SB...](http://www.aliexpress.com/wholesale?catId=0&initiative_id=SB_20160328010733&SearchText=FT232RL)
~~~
david-given
Technically the ESP8266 is a modular wifi controller, isn't it? That is, it's
one of those gadgets that's supposed to sit on a daughterboard and provide
wifi services with embedded TCP/IP stack to another microprocessor. (I hear.)
It just so happens that it's own processor is powerful enough and flexible
enough to be useful as a microprocessor in its own right.
I wonder what other common bits of electronics might have useful amounts of
processing power...
~~~
gvb
$50 (or less) WiFi enabled SD cards (intended for use in cameras to
automatically upload pictures) have an ARM processor running linux.
[http://haxit.blogspot.ch/2013/08/hacking-transcend-wifi-
sd-c...](http://haxit.blogspot.ch/2013/08/hacking-transcend-wifi-sd-
cards.html)
[http://www.amazon.com/Transcend-Wi-Fi-Class-Memory-
TS32GWSDH...](http://www.amazon.com/Transcend-Wi-Fi-Class-Memory-
TS32GWSDHC10/dp/B00A659ILQ)
------
JoshuaJB
I have a friend who has one of these, and he's stopped using it entirely
because of unreliability. The WiFi performed poorly (e.g. in same room, on
same router, multi-second latency) and the radios seemed to crash to the point
of requiring a hard reset after a few days. Another thing he mentioned as an
annoyance (that may be fixed now) was that the power state can't be controlled
from software (e.g. shutdown -r will hang when it actually tells the hw to
power-cycle).
~~~
smitec
For what it's worth I have 2 and have yet to experience any need to hard reset
after roughly a week of being connected to the same network. I've also been
able to use shutdown -r without any issue. I used them as beacons to mock up
an indoor location app recently an they performed well during all of my
testing. YMMV but thats my 2c.
------
Artemis2
I backed their Kickstarter and I love them.
They have consistently delivered updates to backers and have always been on
schedule (they are even ahead of schedule now!). I'm not sure how they do it,
but they just solve problems.
Initially, the shipping cost for their Kickstarter was too high ($9 computer +
$20 shipping to Europe). They lowered shipping costs (to $14 for me) just
before the end of their Kickstarter. Even though I had the expectation of
paying $29 to get a C.H.I.P to my door, they let everyone use the difference
with what they paid to buy more boards or accessories, so I got two C.H.I.P.s
for $32 instead. [1]
They encountered issues with the CPU they planned on using, and had to replace
it with a bigger version that didn't fit the front of the board. They had to
put it on the back, and added small cases to everyone's orders so the
computers could lay flat as expected. [2]
The hardware and software initially had issues for some people. They quickly
released a simple flashing tool for Windows, OS X and Linux. For hardware
problems, they flat out offered to swap defective C.H.I.P.s. [3]
I've truly appreciated their level of professionalism and their customer
support work. The computer in itself is fine, and much more economical than
the Raspberry Pi (integrated networking capabilities).
[1] : [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-
wor...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-worlds-
first-9-computer/posts/1250255)
[2] : [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-
wor...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-worlds-
first-9-computer/posts/1428989)
[3] : [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-
wor...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-worlds-
first-9-computer/posts/1459547)
~~~
hutzlibu
Blame the bad world, if it isn't true, but your post feels a little bit like
paid enthusiasm...
~~~
FroshKiller
I agree with Artemis2. I also backed this project, and it has absolutely been
one the most well managed, communicative projects I've supported. I've been
very pleased.
------
febed
Just 9$ for a 1Ghz ARM processor, 512MB of RAM with integrated WiFi and
Bluetooth! At prices that cheap I would be super interested in a ultra cheap
mobile phone with e-ink display that last several weeks on a single charge.
~~~
LAMike
Solar powered would be a bonus
~~~
makomk
Well, it does have built-in support for a lithium ion battery, so if you can
figure out some way to hook it up to a solar panel...
Though I suspect there'd be practical issues with getting enough energy to
keep it charged.
------
riobard
The USB TTY idea is really nice!
~~~
Kadin
Yeah I would really like to see the Raspberry series integrate that feature.
~~~
sklogic
RPi got an SPI interface, which can be used with a standalone FTDI USB-to-SPI.
~~~
david-given
You don't even need that --- the RPi has got a proper TTL UART. Two, in fact,
although as you can only use one at a time that doesn't get you much. Any TTL
serial adapter will just plug straight in.
------
bdcravens
Has anyone priced out the components? How is $9 possible?
~~~
tyingq
>Has anyone priced out the components?
Yes. The BOM is well over $9. You could reasonably debate if it's $12, or $20,
or $15. But it's not less than $9. Not even with sweetheart deals all around.
Here's the BOM: [https://github.com/NextThingCo/CHIP-
Hardware/raw/master/CHIP...](https://github.com/NextThingCo/CHIP-
Hardware/raw/master/CHIP%5Bv1_0%5D/CHIP_v1_0_BOM_20151030.pdf)
The R8 CPU + 4GB NAND FLASH + 512M DDR3 alone would be close to $9. The
RTL8723 wifi/bt chip is at least a dollar. The rest is cheap individually, but
there's a lot of connectors, resistors, caps, etc. It adds up.
Also, the BOM doesn't include any of the costs for the PCB itself,assembly,
the employees, engineering time, etc.
>How is $9 possible?
Loss leader. Make it up in shipping and accessories.
Edit: Don't believe it? Enter your own prices here. I put in "sweetheart deal"
prices for the 4 items mentioned above, and assumed $0.01 unit cost for
everything else (which is not realistic). That unrealistic approach totals
$12.19.
[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1HPjX9_H2NIkR4l1l34JT...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1HPjX9_H2NIkR4l1l34JTLuUn8sQYiyJYiyd4WmD6K7o/edit?usp=sharing)
So, if you're going to claim it's somehow less than $9, clone the spreadsheet,
update the prices, and show us how :) Oh, and throw in what you think the bare
PCB + assembly costs.
~~~
bdcravens
Makes sense. But how can a Kickstarted project be a loss leader? Or are they
bootstrapped, and using Kickstarter funds to subsidize loss?
~~~
tyingq
>>how can a Kickstarted project be a loss leader
Looks like some combination of padded shipping prices, plus sales of
accessories that appear to actually be priced above cost. (PocketChip, VGA,
HDMI, etc).
So, you can pledge for just a $9 CHIP, but they are subsidizing the losses
there with the other pledges + shipping margin.
------
chx
Our condo has an entryphone working over normal phone line. I really wanted
for a very long time a simple system which can a) authenticate via HTTPS b)
after auth, for a few minutes if someone (like me) rings the phone it would
answer the phone c) dials 6 to let me in. There is no dialtone or such
involved.
Most solutions I were able to find are ridiculously expensive compared to how
simple this ought to be. Now we have an adequately cheap computer ... is there
a modem you can drive from the GPIO? Or is that crazy.
~~~
Kliment
You can attach a USB modem to a SBC and go from there, that's probably the
simplest way to approach it.
The more complex way is to have an interface/isolation circuit using two GPIO
pins (one input for ring detection, one output that switches a relay into the
rest of the circuit and also takes the line off the hook). You then have a
single DAC or PWM output that plays the tone into the isolation transformer.
If you are interested in more info on this sort of thing, contact me.
~~~
chx
That's where the "ridiculously expensive" part kicks in: the only modems that
mention Linux support are 40+ USD. (Zoom 3095 etc)
~~~
tyingq
These $9/shipped generic USB modems worked on Linux for me:
[http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Adroit-New-
USB-56K-V-90-V-92-...](http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Adroit-New-
USB-56K-V-90-V-92-External-Dial-Up-Voice-Fax-Data-Modem-for/32604327115.html)
Not great quality, but it sounds like you just want to go off hook and send a
single DTMF tone. (ATH1, then ATD6). It should work fine.
~~~
chx
Thanks! I will need to figure out how to configure mgetty to do an ATDT6 on
dial.
~~~
tyingq
Sure. Looking at mgetty's man page, it looks like you would want to
a) Disable Auto Answer on the modem, manually: ATS0=0
b) Set the "answer-chat" setting in mgetty to send the ATH1 then ATDT6
I imagine you'll also have tons of errors, since no actual modem-to-modem data
connection will ever get established in this scenario. So maybe some options
to suppress all that.
------
MaggieL
Java? Scala? Yes, please. See my slide deck from NEScala at
[https://goo.gl/2t5hBX](https://goo.gl/2t5hBX)
------
bsharitt
I don't do preorders, but I'd like to pick one of these up if/when they ever
become generally available. I guess the storage/bluetooth/wife are worth the
extra $4 over the Pi Zero, and the USB TTY be default is handy too.
------
webXL
Gotta love the guy who chimed in with "The worst part of the CHIP is the GPU,
which is more than trash."
Phewww! I almost spent a whopping $9 on a tiny computer that cannot process
media as well as computers 50x more expensive and 10x as big. I'll just wait
until those shrink down and cost the same so I only ever need to buy one
computer for all my projects.
------
hinkley
Maybe I'm crazy, but I feel like the big inflection point with these single
board computers will really come when they have PCI express slots on them.
There's a whole bunch you can do with peripherals and networking over PCIe
that would make those chips useful for a new set of situations.
~~~
aidenn0
Other than graphics, is there anything available over PCIe that isn't
available over USB?
~~~
wtallis
Just because you _can_ do it over USB doesn't mean you should. PCIe gets you
more bandwidth and vastly better latency, and the peripherals that use PCIe
tend to be higher quality and have better drivers than their USB competition.
Just compare any USB NIC against Intel Ethernet or Atheros WiFi, or NVMe and
AHCI devices against the mess that is UASP. You can't build a decent router or
NAS around USB devices.
(And DisplayLink offers graphics over USB, but it's so bad that in almost any
other context it should be regarded as _not counting_.)
~~~
greglindahl
DisplayLink has a large number of customers, so obviously it works well enough
for a lot of use-cases. I've used it for status displays, and the additional
monitors that most engineers like to have. I can't even remember which one of
the two monitors in my home office is DisplayLink. I'd imagine that I'd notice
if I tried to play a game...
------
vessenes
Those are compelling. I am lusting after the wire friendly gpio mounts from
the picture, too.
------
tmaly
I ordered mine last year. It was the first purchase I ever made on
kickstarter. I went with the VGA adapter, but it seems everything is HDMI
these days. Everything is still back ordered, but I am excited to see what
this system can do.
------
edgarvm
Looks very interesting, too bad they don't accept paypal
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Some Thoughts on Facebook Groups - Anon84
http://www.25hoursaday.com/weblog/2010/10/08/SomeThoughtsOnFacebookGroups.aspx
======
jdp23
Great points from Dare Obasanjo, noting how Facebook groups may not respond
particularly well to a weakness Google's been trying to exploit. His
conclusion:
"Facebook Groups cranks the awkwardness of dealing with this up to 11. Let’s
say I create a group for “People who work on social at Microsoft who regularly
have lunch” and after a few months to years some of these people leave the
company, get promoted or switch roles. As the owner of the group what do I do?
Do I kick them out? Do I keep blathering on in private discussions that I know
are no longer relevant for half of the recipients and in some cases actually
violates work ethics since some of these people have left the company? What
happens when I stop working on social at Microsoft?
Facebook Groups may solve some problems users have with Facebook but I suspect
it is not the silver bullet that addresses the problem of people having friend
groups that they’d like to keep separate on Facebook especially since it
introduces a new set of problems for users. Time will tell if I’m right or
wrong on this suspicion."
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: What causes some people to be left-handed? - zvanness
Does anyone have a solid theory on why there is such an unbalanced ratio between the number of right-handed people and left-handed people. Why is the default to be right-handed? What really causes people to be left-handed?
======
devfeed
I can't answer your first question about why left-handed people exist, but I
can provide some clues about the proportions:
Left-handedness is a disadvantage in society where everything is designed for
the right-handed person. However, there is one advantage to being left-handed:
in hand to hand or sword to sword combat, the southpaw has an advantage in
being unfamiliar.
This article
[http://www.economist.com/node/3471297](http://www.economist.com/node/3471297)
(Economist, 2004) describes an empirical finding: in societies that were
historically more violent, the left-handedness proportion is higher.
Perhaps this is also why left-handed people even exist. They have an advantage
in historical person-to-person violent conflicts. This advantage would go away
as their proportion gets higher. I presume (this is conjecture) that the
minority proportion that it is, is the steady state equilibrium where the
violent advantage outweights the other disadvantages of being out of sync with
society.
------
jballanc
Ah! I get to plug one of my favorite websites, OMIM (Online Mendelian
Inheritance in Man): [http://www.omim.org](http://www.omim.org)
Their article on left handedness goes into great detail as to the biology
behind hand preference. In short, it's related to brain patterning and the
direction the hair on your head swirls (seriously!):
[http://omim.org/entry/139900](http://omim.org/entry/139900)
As for the evolutionary reason, the most recent research suggests that it may
have to do with cooperation. Simply put, it's easier to cooperate when
everyone (or most everyone) uses the same hand for most activities. More
details here:
[http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2012/04/left-...](http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2012/04/left-
handed-minority.html)
------
draker
[http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/1j7db9/why_are_m...](http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/1j7db9/why_are_most_people_right_handed/)
Answer from an individual that studies "handedness".
------
essessv
This is a question appropriate for Quora, I feel.
------
wglb
This is highly anecdotal.
My uncle was born right-handed. When he was young, he broke his collarbone on
the right side. While this was healing, he used his left hand, and continued
to do so from then on.
Then, working on farm machinery, he ran his left hand through a V-belt,
injuring it badly. While that was healing, he went back to using his right
hand again.
Probably not very typical.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Fine-Grained Language Composition: A Case Study - matt_d
http://soft-dev.org/pubs/html/barrett_bolz_diekmann_tratt__fine_grained_language_composition/
======
zackmorris
This is great. I often miss the asm blocks of C, and think the benefits of
mainly working in a higher level language and dropping down to a lower level
language for performance reasons have been lost in current times (mobile apps
- I’m looking at you). We've also been distracted by very hands-on approaches
to composition like language binding and writing interfaces which require so
much boilerplate when the interpreter could do the heavy lifting for us.
Don't lecture me about performance when computers today are on the order of
1000 times faster than when I learned programming, and when even non-JIT
scripting languages are 100-200 times slower than native code, we still have
an order of magnitude speedup over native apps of the 80s. IMHO all that
matters today is developer time, which is being squandered by languages like
Swift and Rust that encourage a trees over forest view of productivity. My
favorite non-mainstream languages are HyperTalk (AppleScript, ActionScript)
and MATLAB (Octave) which provide tremendous leverage in few lines of code. Or
better yet, code-less functional environments like Excel or FileMaker where
you only drop down to a macro language when necessary. Or even better that
than, declarative environments like the web that were built with relational
data models and markup before AJAX opened the floodgates to callback hell and
all the workarounds since (why the web lost WYSIWYG editing is a profound
tragedy to me).
This turned into a rant but I simply don’t think code is supposed to be the
way it is today. We’ve made a mistake. Yes, it has advanced computer science
remarkably. But the opportunity cost of that is that we spend our days writing
boilerplate and dealing with nondeterministic distributed computing issues
informally rather than working at an appropriate level of abstraction.
~~~
jestar_jokin
Yes, yes, yes! I despair at the lack of options for Rapid Application
Development. Web development is a problem that has been solved a million times
over; why is it still so hard? (Sure, you could say browsers, scaling, and
interactivity all need special consideration.)
I believe there are certain personalities drawn to software development, who
are very detail-oriented and love technical challenges, to the detriment of
the end result - forest vs trees. Just look at people who want to make games
and end up writing a game engine, vs people who jump into Flash and make do
with the tools available.
Personally, I would much prefer to just feed in a specification, or set of
constraints, to a program, and have it spit out a working program. Program
synthesis seems like an interesting area of research, but fairly basic at the
moment. I imagine any useful synthesis will be domain-specific - generating a
JSON web service/API will be quite different to writing a music visualizer.
~~~
niftich
Great points, but, rapid website development is a solved problem with
templated builders. The problem comes when we need a more complex site/app
than something Wix or Weebly or Wordpress can provide.
Then in current practice, it's often back to square one, but it shouldn't be.
We have opininated frameworks like Rails and Django that save a lot of time,
but only cover the featureset of a CRUD app. There is a lack of opinionated
frameworks that work at a higher level, but still below that of drag-and-drop
templated website generators.
------
piemonkey
My first thought is: Neat! Languages with different grammars, syntax, and
libraries have different expressivities; my first thought is always compiler
implementation in OCaml. I would love, for example, to (effortlessly!) dip
into OCaml or Haskell while writing a high-performance C++ program, for
example.
I am very intrigued by Lia [0] as an example for how languages can be embedded
inside of one another for useful effects. See Will Crichton's great blog post
for more [1].
However, I am wondering why Python and PHP were chosen. I can't think of a
compelling use for having both languages simultaneously. They are both dynamic
scripting languages with similar design objectives.
[0] [https://github.com/willcrichton/lia](https://github.com/willcrichton/lia)
[1] [http://notes.willcrichton.net/the-coming-age-of-the-
polyglot...](http://notes.willcrichton.net/the-coming-age-of-the-polyglot-
programmer/)
~~~
ltratt
Why Python and PHP? There are several reasons, but the major ones were: we had
to start _somewhere_ ; we had an excellent Python interpreter available to us,
as well as a fairly decent PHP interpreter; and PHP and Python turn out to be
rather different languages with a number of tricky challenges. We certainly
look forward to other people composing together even more distinct languages
(e.g. we've also done a composition of Python and Prolog
[http://goo.gl/p1opSl](http://goo.gl/p1opSl), though, compared to PyHyp, it is
rather simplistic).
~~~
nerdponx
I'd love to see Python and R, the top two data analysis languages. Obviously
this will only appeal to a subset of users, but language interoperability for
data work is a hot issue right now.
~~~
chubot
Yeah I would love to see this too. Some differences:
\- R has lazy evaluation semantics (with caveats), and Python is eagerly
evaluated. The ggplot library in Python recently posted to HN sheds some light
on these issues.
\- R has like 2 or 3 class systems; Python has a C++-like class system
(without static typing, but gaining it in Python 3)
\- They differ in semantics with respect to closures (Python 3 changed things
a bit)
\- R's built-in types are all vectorized, but that might be a good thing, so
you can use Python semantics for scalars and R semantics for vectors/data
frames/matrices, etc ?
\- Python has decorators, generators, coroutines, etc.
I tend to write my Python and R in a pretty small common subset, but yeah they
are in fact quite different.
~~~
ltratt
A crude R/Python composition would be fairly simple
([http://goo.gl/p1opSl](http://goo.gl/p1opSl) shows that a strict and lazy
language can be crudely put together pretty easily, though you miss good
performance and all the programmer-friendly features of PyHyp).
Closures/generators are unlikely to be a big deal (PyHyp has good suggestions
for both). Although I don't know much about R's class system(s), I expect that
we can probably do OK on those. However, I have no idea how R's vectorised
types might be handled -- those could be painful to deal with, or they might
just fall out of the hat, and I'd have to know more about them in order to
make an informed guess. However, this isn't on our roadmap at the moment, as
it doesn't fit in with our current funding, unless anyone wants to change our
minds!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Measles: Four European nations lose eradication status - pseudolus
https://www.bbc.com/news/health-49507253
======
bla3
The four nations are Albania, the Czech Republic, Greece and the UK.
~~~
pjc50
Three failed states with endemic poverty problems, and the Czech Republic.
------
Covzire
"All regions of the world showed an increase in measles bar the Americas,
which saw a minor decline - although the US registered its highest number of
cases in 25 years."
This surprised me, I thought the US was the epicenter of the anti-vax
movement? Or is it just how things appear because of the constant news topics?
~~~
stevesimmons
"'The Americas' is lower, USA is higher" is perfectly consistent with the US
being the epicenter of the anti-vax movement, no?
~~~
Covzire
Ah that makes sense.
------
s9w
Everyone knows the reason for this, but no one is allowed to say it. This is
quite a comedy.
~~~
Freak_NL
Not really. The reason (dropping vaccination rates caused by an increase in
disinformation) is both well-known and heavily debated and criticized.
In at least one of these four countries (the UK) there is absolutely no ban on
talking about this problem, and it has seen solid coverage in the media for
years.
~~~
s9w
Yeah that is not it
------
makomk
This isn't mentioned in the article, but the UK at least was only declared to
have eradicated measles in 2017 - it was a very short-lived "eradication" that
might just have been based on a temporary drop in the number of measles cases
(they went up again quite substantially in 2017-2018):
[https://publichealthmatters.blog.gov.uk/2019/08/19/measles-i...](https://publichealthmatters.blog.gov.uk/2019/08/19/measles-
in-england/) Also, measles didn't exactly return here, we had quite a few
outbreaks even during the period where it was supposedly eliminated, there
just wasn't evidence it was endemic to the UK during that time period.
------
kwhitefoot
What struck me about the map of Europe was not how many countries had lost the
eradicated status but the number who have never had it. That seems more
shocking to me than a possibly temporary loss of that status.
The map is actually on the Daily Mail!
[https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-7403803/Four-
coun...](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-7403803/Four-countries-
lost-measles-free-status-Europe-2018.html)
------
pjc50
Vaccines never used to be mandatory because mandatory medical treatment has a
very bad track record. Medical treatment requires informed consent to be
ethical.
Unfortunately, there is a new viral threat - or rather, a memetic one. A meme
that encourages people to immunocompromise themselves and their children.
We're not so good at vaccinating against lethal memes, but perhaps this is the
pandemic of the 21st century.
It's not just an internet phenomenon; the originator was Andrew Wakefield,
with the help of lots of traditional sensationalist poor quality news
publications.
Edit: this is more controversial than I was expecting .. I don't normally ask
for explanations of downvotes, and I know it's frowned upon, and normally when
I get downvoted I know exactly which audience I'm offending and why. But I
don't understand it here.
~~~
starvingbear
Andrew Wakefield was simply an expert in gut health he didnt even want into
the vaccine debate. He did very fair research that proved a link between
between what he found in the gut and autism at the request of parents bringing
their kids to him that was signed off as fully accurate by 12 scientists that
assisted the research. It scared a pharma sponsor and got pulled from
publication. That's all his story was and it turned into the all time anti
vaxxer conspiracy somehow.
~~~
pjc50
He spent years promoting the idea, and achieved a level of misconduct that got
him disqualified from practicing medicine. Relevant chunk of Wikipedia:
> After the publication of the paper, other researchers were unable to
> reproduce Wakefield's findings or confirm his hypothesis of an association
> between the MMR vaccine and autism,[8] or autism and gastrointestinal
> disease.[9] A 2004 investigation by Sunday Times reporter Brian Deer
> identified undisclosed financial conflicts of interest on Wakefield's
> part,[10] and most of his co-authors then withdrew their support for the
> study's interpretations.[11] The British General Medical Council (GMC)
> conducted an inquiry into allegations of misconduct against Wakefield and
> two former colleagues.[12] The investigation centred on Deer's findings,
> including that children with autism were subjected to unnecessary invasive
> medical procedures such as colonoscopies and lumbar punctures,[13] and that
> Wakefield acted without the required ethical approval from an institutional
> review board.
> On 28 January 2010, a five-member statutory tribunal of the GMC found three
> dozen charges proved, including four counts of dishonesty and twelve counts
> involving the abuse of developmentally delayed children.[14] The panel ruled
> that Wakefield had "failed in his duties as a responsible consultant", acted
> against the interests of his patients, and acted "dishonestly and
> irresponsibly" in his published research.[15][16][17] The Lancet fully
> retracted the 1998 publication on the basis of the GMC's findings, noting
> that elements of the manuscript had been falsified.[18] The Lancet's editor-
> in-chief Richard Horton said the paper was "utterly false" and that the
> journal had been "deceived".[19] Three months following The Lancet's
> retraction, Wakefield was struck off the UK medical register, with a
> statement identifying deliberate falsification in the research published in
> The Lancet,[20] and was thereby barred from practising medicine in the
> UK.[21] A British Administrative Court Justice noted in a related
> decision—"There is now no respectable body of opinion which supports (Dr.
> Wakefield's) hypothesis, that MMR vaccine and autism/enterocolitis are
> causally linked".[22]
~~~
starvingbear
Fair enough. His conduct afterward could be looked at (though going beyond
wikipedia may be necessary). But the original hysteria definitely painted a
huge target on his back with a lot of misinformation. I don't think that's
deniable
------
ralusek
On a population scale, anti-vax movement is self-regulating. People are anti-
vax now because they have the privilege to be. When disease becomes a real
threat to the survival of you and your family, watch how quickly this movement
dies.
The problem is, on the path to this equilibrium, people die unnecessarily.
------
wjsetzer
I can't understand why vaccinations aren't mandatory for non-allergic, non-
immunocompromised children at this point. You shouldn't have the option to
kill your kid, and especially others' kids.
~~~
DC-3
Given how recently democratic western governments have conducted eugenics
programs, I would be uncomfortable with any law that enforces mandatory
injections for children - even for vaccines.
~~~
realusername
Your comment does not make any sense, what's the link between Nazi eugenics
programs and vaccination campaigns?
~~~
lxwang
One reason people refuse vaccination is that they are worried the vaccines are
secretly an attempt to sterilize undesirable segments of the population. For
example, see what happened with the tetanus vaccine in Kenya in 2014.
[https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/tetanus-vaccine-
sterilizat...](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/tetanus-vaccine-
sterilization/)
------
csuld
Seems like another topic that has a suspiciously polarising effect on people -
i.e. people on both sides refuse to listen to each or are intrinsically are
upset by the opposing view. Both sides have a point in my opinion, definitely
more nuanced than this article portrays.
~~~
lolc
What is the point of not vaccinating?
~~~
csuld
the real question is why do people 'take a side'? I mean in all polarising
debates not just this one.
~~~
lolc
Because people care about the welfare of the group but disagree about how to
achieve it. It is a matter of safety versus personal liberty and you're not
going to get easy answers.
------
k__
Anti-vax, flat earth, alt right... I often ask myself, are these the same kind
of movements that brought down the civilizations before us?
~~~
Freak_NL
What makes the current situation unique is the ubiquitous presence of the
internet as a very robust and very efficient infection vector for
disinformation.
We've just never had something quite like it.
~~~
colmvp
It's funny, having been part of the generation that was educated as a
youngster midway through the rise of the Internet, I can't help but feel
envious of young people now who have access to a wealth of resources I never
had growing up.
Nowadays, one can go online and find PDFs of textbooks, online lectures from
prestigious professors teaching useful subjects, videos from conferences to
learn latest findings, tutorials on practically every subject matter, Discord
groups / subreddits from other enthusiasts, YouTube videos explaining
practically every esoteric subject matter... I could've used so many of these
resources when I was struggling in high school with classes taught by smart
but bad teachers.
I guess I've felt like it hasn't been that hard to separate the 'good'
information from the misinformation.
~~~
mistermann
I wonder if we'll see to some degree much wider variance in intelligence in
kids growing up with access to these resources. I was a fairly nerdy kid, but
all I had access to was a crappy library, I was starving for interesting
information.
But then again, if I was growing up now I very well may have become addicted
to iPad games.
------
spraak
Could it be - in part - due to the virus changing? Other vaccines with high
coverage are known to have lost effect due to mutation, such as pertussis.
There is also the example of the best-guess flu vaccine of the season. The
article mentions it is in highly vaccinated populations, which contradicts the
heard immunity idea, as well as would equate to a high selective pressure on
the virus to change. Also looking into this I've learned about how prior to
the vaccine, mothers would pass on a temporary immunity to their children but
that this is lost with the vaccine - could that also be at play here?
~~~
starvingbear
This may be valid. After both the last 2 measles outbreaks that hit the news
in the US it was discovered in many of the kids tested that the strain of
measles was actually from the vaccine itself. Not sure if that's classified as
a mutation but I don't think thats supposed to be able to happen and spread
that way. Will follow up with sources after I'm off mobile
Edit: Here are a couple of sources. The first claims to have proven that
someone on the vaccine schedule spread measles in 2011. However I will correct
that I thought the disney case was similar but I think that one may have been
wild measles and only a few vaccinated were infected. These are just food for
thoughts
[https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/58/9/1205/2895266](https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/58/9/1205/2895266)
This one is more scientific and dry but is from the CDC I believe and showed
among other things an increase in sporadic measles outbreaks among vaccinated
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC228449/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC228449/)
The whooping cough is more interesting. You can find multiple cases of
outbreaks among highly vaccinated people but the symptoms are allegedly milder
so the vaccine is possibly doing something positive about it. The CDC is
warning the vaccine is losing effectiveness.
[https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/allthemoms/2019/03/14/wh...](https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/allthemoms/2019/03/14/whooping-
cough-vaccine-less-effective-cdc-warns-as-outbreaks-hit-schools/3161859002/)
[https://www.livescience.com/53359-whooping-cough-outbreak-
ra...](https://www.livescience.com/53359-whooping-cough-outbreak-raises-
questions-vaccine-effectiveness.html)
Anyway interested in any takes on that. I'm not wildly anti-vax but even these
mild questions on it were immediately downvoted. I think its a complicated and
fascinating thing to talk about when people aren't crybabies about it
~~~
spraak
That's very interesting, I didn't know that. Looking forward to the sources,
thank you
~~~
SketchySeaBeast
I'm interested as well, as I did some searching and found nothing like those
claims.
~~~
rscho
Yes, because it's wrong. The measles is a live attenuated vaccine, meaning
that in some extremely rare cases it could be transmitted and can cause minor
symptoms. This is _of course_ tested for and monitored, and current vaccine
technology allows vaccines with a good safety profile.
~~~
SketchySeaBeast
That's my understanding as well, but as someone who tries their best to be a
rational skeptic, I'm more than willing to reconsider my understanding given
sufficient evidence (the key there being "sufficient"), so if such evidence
exists I'd like to see it.
------
StavrosK
It's interesting how few unvaccinated people are required for the virus to
come back. Here in Greece, I only know one person who doesn't vaccinate their
child, but apparently such low densities are enough for viruses to propagate.
~~~
moviuro
According to the French ministry of health, "the elimination of measles
requires a 95 per cent immunization coverage level for young children." [0]
I've tried finding some good resource about mathematical modelling of
infectious disease, but they're rather dry[1] or clearly biased.
[0] [https://solidarites-sante.gouv.fr/prevention-en-
sante/preser...](https://solidarites-sante.gouv.fr/prevention-en-
sante/preserver-sa-sante/vaccination/vaccins-obligatoires/article/11-vaccins-
obligatoires-en-2018)
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_modelling_of_infe...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_modelling_of_infectious_disease)
------
wtdata
The article tries to have us believe it's the anti vax movement doing this.
Although that's probably true in the UK, are we really going to pretend the
problem in Greece is also some non vaccination movement? This is absolutely
Orwellian.
------
ophsj
Why is it legal not to vaccinate your child? Seems stupid.
~~~
mieseratte
> Why is it legal not to vaccinate your child? Seems stupid.
Why do you feel you have the right to tell me what to do with my body? My
body, my choice!
~~~
saiya-jin
Your rights and freedom end where my begin, and with such an approach you are
attempting to kill me and my family by your negligence.
~~~
joey_bob
Is you/your family immuno-compromised?
~~~
rscho
Not relevant. Measles represents a substantial risk of death even in
immunologically normal individuals.
~~~
joey_bob
Well if you have a normal immune system, you can get the MMR vaccine. Which if
it is effective, should significantly reduce your risk of contracting measles
as a disease, no? If the vaccine is effective, there are two casez in which
ggp commenter's life is threatened by gggp commenter's rights: a) they have a
immunologically normal, but have refused the vaccine for whatever reason,
which is puts the risk on their shoulders, b) they have a compromised immune
system, and cannot get the MMR vaccine, in which case gggp may actually
represent a threat to their life not preventable by normal action.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Daring Fireball: Regarding the Idea of iPad Apps Running on Mac OS X - barredo
http://daringfireball.net/2010/11/ipad_apps_mac_os_x
======
warwick
In the iPhone HIG, there's a section on bringing a desktop application to
iOS[1]. The entire HIG spends a fair amount of time talking about the
different needs of mobile and desktop users. Until Apple releases a document
tailored for them, any iOS developers who are planning to port their app to
the Mac might want to reread the HIG, this time looking out for what's
expected from a desktop app.
[1]
[http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#documentation/UserEx...](http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#documentation/UserExperience/Conceptual/MobileHIG/DevelopingSoftware/DevelopingSoftware.html%23//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40006556-CH5-SW9)
~~~
d_r
For anyone who is interested, this is the corresponding HIG document for Mac
OS:
[http://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/UserEx...](http://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/UserExperience/Conceptual/AppleHIGuidelines/XHIGIntro/XHIGIntro.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP30000894-TP6)
(Easiest way to read both of these is to click the "PDF" button in the top-
right to download the whole document.)
------
alexknight
Couldn't have said it better myself. Really think Gruber's response is very
astute and spot on. iPad apps that work exactly the same on OSX? Um ya don't
think so.
------
rahoulb
The key point being that Apple's strategy is the exact opposite of write-once
run-anywhere
~~~
program
I don't think so. Right now you can write universal applications for
iPhone/iPad changing the view controllers, resources (textures) with the same
underlying core code. I think that Apple next big step will be an unified
architecture which will allow developers to build cross-platform applications
that will run on iPhone/iPad/Mac using an hybrid UIKit/AppKit. Maybe in OS X
10.8, time will tell.
~~~
mithaler
"Write once, run anywhere" is a phrase that historically has referred to
multiple platforms by multiple vendors--that is, platforms other than ones
maintained by a single company. That is, not just Macs and iOS. Even if they
do unify their development interface for all of _their_ platforms, that still
will be far from WORA, since I don't see them coming up with an easy way to
port their apps to Android or Windows or Ubuntu anytime soon.
While you didn't use that phrase yourself, the implication that it could be
applied to Apple's offerings reeks of co-option to me--I think Gruber's right
about that, since Apple appears to focus on providing the best experience for
each individual device (and devices from other vendors aren't even an issue
for them--why should they be?). That said, however, I think you're right in
that it would certainly be sensible from their perspective to make it easier
for developers of one of their platforms to pick up development for their
other ones.
~~~
rahoulb
Actually - good point.
Historically Next/OpenStep ran on Windows and there were always rumours that
Cocoa for Windows (aka Yellowbox) would be released. And there was GNUStep,
which was an independent open-source clone of OpenStep. I wonder if they have
maintained Yellowbox in the same way as they maintained the Intel version of
Mac OSX?
Meanwhile, Apple's Windows UI strategy with iTunes is to mimic the Mac as much
as possible - presumably to try and ease things for people if/when they
switch.
But the net effect is that their Windows software is just awful - proof that
one UI to rule them all doesn't work.
------
cshenoy
I was thinking the same when Jobs presented but thought I was being a bit rash
and naive. I guess not.
------
RyanMcGreal
I suspect this will remain true right up to the point at which Macs start
shipping with touchscreens.
~~~
petsos
During the latest keynote Jobs said that this is not going to happen. It is
kind of obvious too, just do the following experiment: Pretend your laptop or
desktop screen is multitouch and start touching and "moving" things just for 1
minute (time yourself). It is exhausting.
~~~
bradleyland
That's not exactly what he said. He said that touch surfaces want to be
horizontal.
Here's my (purely speculative) take:
Fullscreen apps in OS X are a transitional component. Future Macs are going to
be dual mode. Remember the patent Apple filed with an iMac that converted from
vertical to horizontal (1)? So imagine you've got an iMac on your desk. You're
working away in OS X as you always would with a mouse and keyboard. You pull
your iMac toward you and it pivots to a horizontal orientation. Sensors in the
hinge signal the app to switch to fullscreen mode and you begin using the app
through a touch interface using your fingers. When you're done, you return the
display to the vertical position and move back to your mouse and keyboard.
My level of certainty isn't terribly high here, because I think there are
ergonomic challenges to a pivoting touch screen device that sits on a desk.
When using my iPad, the ideal position is definitively not at desk height. The
device needs to be very, very close to you in order to avoid the fatigue
associated with reaching. A pivoting iMac is still going to require some
reach.
I'm also realistic about the fact that not every patent Apple files makes it
to production. It's just some idle pondering.
1 - [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/7961480/Apple-
fi...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/7961480/Apple-files-iMac-
touch-patent.html)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: ccPing, a secure messenger - dnqthao
http://ccping.com
With the 2 prominent features:
- Encrypted Chat: your chat will be encrypted with a password so only when you type in the correct password then it will be unlocked.<p>- Ephemeral Chat: your messages will be self-destructed after a few minutes.
======
KMag
99% of people don't know that they don't know enough to know this is providing
a false sense of security. People running illegal underground charities in
West Whereisitstan are almost certainly not crypto experts, and are all
probably fairly naive in the way one has to be naive in order to do charity
work in West Whereisitstan. "Caveat emptor" doesn't cut it.
Single DES is absurd in this day and age, and password-based encryption is
worse. Jack the Ripper renders this no stronger than a secret decoder ring,
and a thousand times more dangerous because of the false sense of security.
Edit: I'm probably overly sensitive. One of my ex girlfriends has several
uncles, three of whom went to prison for not belonging to the state religion.
Thankfully they didn't live in one of the countries where such things are
currently capital offenses, and were able to immigrate to more tolerant
countries.
Perfect forward secrecy needs to be the default, perhaps with an option to
switch to a stored history mode. Use 256-bit AES in GCM mode.
For the stored mode, don't use password-based-encryption, but rather generate
a GnuPG key pair on each device the first time the client is used. 4096-bit
RSA/El Gamal or 256-bit ECC should be the minimum key sizes. The first time a
new device is added to an account, upload its public key and tell the user
they need to "authorize" this device from one of their existing devices in
order to see past conversations. When they log in from another device, ask
them if they've really added the new device, and if they respond that they
have, have the old device add the new device as a recipient to all of the
existing messages. This can be done by sending only the preamble of each
message to the old client for it to decrypt the symmetric key, and re-encrypt
the session key for the new recipient, and send the encrypted session key back
to the server. Don't take any shortcuts. If a conversation is between Alice
and Bob, and Alice adds a new device, never ask Bob to re-encrypt old
conversations for Alice's new device, because Bob's answer will always be
"Mein StasiPhone? I dunno if Alice added a new device. Fuck it, sure, why
wouldn't I give Alice's new phone access?"
If your product as currently implemented gets many users, it's a statistical
certainty that some of them will go to prison due to the false sense of
security you're giving them. I hope they're all going to nice prisons in
respectable countries and for doing things that are objectively evil.
~~~
KMag
Oh, and the right way for Alice and Bob to prove to each other that the
holders of their public keys both know the secret password is to use an
Augmented PAKE [1] (Password Authenticated Key Exchange) protocol, replacing
the password with Scrypt( Concatenate(Alice's public key, Bob's public key),
Password ). (The concatenation of the public keys is used for the Scrypt
salt.) That way, at the successful conclusion of the Augmented PAKE exchange,
Alice and Bob haven't proved to each other knowledge of the password, but
rather have tied the proof to their two public keys, and each can be assured
that the holder of the other public key knows the password. If there's later a
flaw found in the Augmented PAKE algorithm you choose that leaks the
"password" used for the Augmented PAKE protocol, at least you've only leaked a
memory-hard password hash of the real Password.
[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Password-
authenticated_key_agre...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Password-
authenticated_key_agreement)
Don't get creative and start rolling your own zero-knowledge proof of
passwords here. It's really easy to get wrong. Use a very-well peer-reviewed
Augmented PAKE algorithm.
THE NAIVE WRONG WAY for Alice to prove to Bob that she knows the Password (but
might look good at first glance) is for Alice to send to Bob HMAC(Password,
Alice's Public Key) because then if Bob doesn't know Password, he can still
start bruit-forcing guesses without further interaction with Alice. On
average, it will take the Stasi an afternoon to bruit-force Password after
pretending once to be Bob, and after that they can impersonate Alice when
talking to Bob. It's very unlikely Alice will ever mention to Bob the one
failed authentication, and nearly impossible that she'll mention it within the
window of time they have before the Stasi bruit-force the password.
Use an Augmented PAKE instead of a balanced PAKE, because you should use an
Augmented PAKE for users to authenticate themselves to you, and that way you
can share one implementation for both purposes and expose yourself to half the
potential bugs. With a Balanced PAKE, if an attacker gets read-only access to
your server's password store, they could immediately authenticate themselves
to your service and upload more public keys as the user. An Augmented PAKE in
this case would slow down an attacker by forcing the attacker to bruit-force
the passwords, and would completely save the 1% of your users who use
passwords with 80 or more bits of entropy.
------
gnur
Interesting, but without any technical details I'm not going to use it.
There isn't even any mention of it being encrypted.
------
altandotme
A highly detailed explanation on how encryption is used and what type etc, is
most definitely needed on the products website to make anyone vaguely trust
this.
IMO, the app interface needs improving.
------
richo
"secure"
I weep for all the claims this makes about security.
~~~
dnqthao
Maybe you can elaborate more on this.
~~~
cwoac
Okay, what form and key size of encryption is in use? What implementation is
it? Does it do PFS? is it salted? Where/for how long/how are messages stored?
Who has access to the encrypted form of the messages? What block mode is being
used here? How are you handling the iv initialisation? Per message? per
person? per conversation? What are you using to determine the IV value?
~~~
dnqthao
The encryption use is PKCS #5 (5.3 PBE with MD5 and DES). The algorithms are
outdated but in the subsequent release we can update it to SHA-2 and AES-256.
We cannot do PFS because we have the feature that a person can login to
different devices and can still see the same messages and continue the chat (
given that he knows the chat password)
~~~
richo
This alone should have blocked your launch. Crypto done right is innately
pluggable, by virtue of being composable primitives.
Between this and your "but we totes destroy ciphertext after T seconds" (which
is just flat out untennable, and unprovable) I'm pretty spectacularly weary.
I'm also pretty curious to know how you're deriving keys from the users
passwords. How is the exchange of key material handled?
------
bugmen0t
You can have closed-source or you can have secure. This is the former.
------
reganrob
"ONLY you and your partners, who know the password, can access the secure
messages"
Maybe I missed something, but how exactly is this "secure"? I'm assuming
ccPing will still store these messages in a database which will be vulnerable
to attack.
I mean, is this going through the TOR network or something?
~~~
dnqthao
The message will be encrypted on the client side (iphone , android or PC ) ,
so the message sent over the network are already encrypted using the password
provided by the user. So only when the user type in the correct password then
he can decrypted it. If he forgot the password , so sad, the message cannot be
read anymore.
~~~
reganrob
Could you go into more technical detail? How are the messages encrypted? I
mean, is it subject to a brute force?
~~~
cwoac
Given way the password is distributed, I doubt the encryption is salted.
------
pubby
What type of encryption is this using?
~~~
gnur
I believe there isn't any, the word encryption isn't even on the website.
~~~
dnqthao
We are using PBE for the messages in the secure chat ( you can choose whether
to start a normal chat or a secure one ).
The encryption is done on the client side, so the message going through the
network ,storing on the server are all encrypted. Only when you type the
correct password then you can decrypt the message.
~~~
dnqthao
An example:
[https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=263620283790579&set=...](https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=263620283790579&set=a.263620280457246.1073741829.263590463793561&type=1&theater)
------
dallagi
Yet another closed-source "secure" messenger. That's interesting, but if I was
a chinese dissident I would never trust a closed-source messenger.
(btw I would try it for sure if you'll port it to BB10!)
------
dallagi
I'd love to see a similar project developed by a foundation such as FSF,
Mozilla or EFF
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Student loan for international students? - rustymirror
Hi All,
I got an offer for MS CS at NYU. You know any loan provider that give loan of around $70k without an US Cosigner? It's really difficult to get a loan of such huge amount in my country.
======
coreyp_1
$70K for a Master's is too much (IMO). Surely there are better options!
1.) Go to a less expensive school
([http://www.news.gatech.edu/2013/05/14/georgia-tech-
announces...](http://www.news.gatech.edu/2013/05/14/georgia-tech-announces-
massive-online-masters-degree-computer-science) for ~$7k, all online)
([http://cs.mwsu.edu/](http://cs.mwsu.edu/) ~$10K/yr. in Texas, did my MS
there)
2.) Go for a PhD instead. Just about every good school will pay you a stipend
to attend and waive your tuition. You often earn a Master's on the way up, and
I have known some people to quit after earning the Masters (although the
school will not encourage this).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
PG's Arc Lessons - nickb
http://www.paulgraham.com/arclessons.html
======
Jd
Aren't these the same Arc lessons that have been available for awhile now?
Just because something is posted over at reddit that doesn't mean it has to
come here...
;)
~~~
fallintothis
The same thoughts I had as I jumped over from reddit to here. Though the
discussion on reddit
(<http://programming.reddit.com/info/280e9/comments/c028101>) does once again
raise the age old topic that people seem so fond of (at least over there):
bashing Arc for 'not bringing anything new to the table'. Though, as you point
out, I don't think this particular article really needs to spend a few days on
news.yc since it's kind of dated and seems an awful lot like a copy-over from
whatever is posted on reddit, I would like to know about this.
I know that Paul's offered that Arc is terser - to the point of having the
terseness standardized. I really do see the value in that and don't share in
the "just make CL macros" sentiment that seems to pervade people lately. In
fact, I'm excited to perhaps someday be able to use Arc. However, I WOULD like
to know what Paul (and other commentators, though again there are more over at
reddit so far as that goes) thinks about the vitriolic remarks. Are they even
worth paying attention to? There always seems to be wanton backlash against
things that get posted to sufficiently large news sites (Slashdot, reddit,
etc.). Yet it also seems like a legitimate matter to consider, though it could
just be the case that the public-at-large doesn't see the entire picture for
not having access to the language. So, thoughts on this phenomenon, anyone?
~~~
Jd
I think it would be very interesting to see Pg address some of the criticisms
of Arc.
I did notice the comments on the original reddit posting, of which several
seemed well considered. CL seems to generate so many branches that it does not
seem worthwhile to study the specifics of each one. Can anything really be
that new?
What I would be really interested in is hearing who the next McCarthy might
be. CL is interesting, but wordiness does not seem to be its primary problem.
If Pg disagrees I'd be quite interested to hear his opinion.
Perhaps people have other thoughts about the primary shortcomings of Lisp?
~~~
pg
If the problem with Arc is that it's not different enough from existing Lisp
dialects like CL or Scheme, all I can say is that being different is not my
goal. I'm trying to make it good, not original. So it will only be as original
as it has to be to be the best language for writing programs (as opposed to
pleasing managers, or writing papers about, or seeming comfortingly familiar).
~~~
Jd
Agreed. One follow-up question might be:
Do you believe that the best language for writing programs would be universal,
or might there be one best for you (syntax you like and find convenient) and a
different best for me (syntax I like and find convenient)?
My uneducated guess is that much of Lisp dialect proliferation amounts to a
confusion between syntax and logic. I would distinguish as follows, 'syntax'
is arbitrary elements which are used to describe program logic. Logic is the
underlying computational processes which drive the language.
As a consequence, I would suggest that some language designers may be
confusing syntactical and logical elements when they claim their language is
'better' than other variants. Where the syntax varies according to preference
and not because of an improvement in logic, I would say that this is a
contextual 'better' and not a mathematical (and hence, universal) 'better.'
Anyways, I wouldn't pay the reddit critique much heed, as much of it mirrors
the endless debates over vim vs. emacs. Which is to say, I don't find it very
helpful and don't know why Pg would either.
Thx for the response.
~~~
pg
I think there might be several optimal languages for different domains. Not
100% sure yet whether that's also true for different users. I know I'm not
planning to protect users from themselves. If there is a genuine need for
that, then different languages might be better for different users even in the
same problem domain.
~~~
Jd
Wanted to clarify my earlier discussion of syntax with the following example.
Suppose we have three users: (AS) Andy Smith (BS) Andy Smith's brother Bobby
Smith who can telepathically communicate with his computer (CS) An alien
computer scientist
Because the process of programming involves the translation from natural
language to machine language (logic), there will necessarily be various
syntactical preferences depending on the natural language of the programmer
and the input method.
For this example we will assume AS and BS have the same basic cognitive
structure and natural language. The only difference is that BS is
telepathically linked to his computer, whereas AS must use a keyboard.
Presumably there now is no barrier for BS to use a purer translation of
natural language to machine language. Because there is no time cost for
typing, BS can represent lambda as 'lambda' instead of 'l' or simply parens.
However, AS will likely choose abbreviations, since to them they represent an
ease of use in the translation process from natural language to machine
language. However, probably he will use only English language derived
abbreviations of no less than three characters, as anything else would be
outside his cognitive context.
Because our alien programmer (CS) thinks in a completely different language,
the preferred syntax will also be different. Perhaps CS will want to represent
concepts (such as lambda) as a hexadecimal number. This can hardly be said to
be better or worse as machine logic does not change, only the
representation/syntax changes.
So I think if I had to rewrite my earlier statement I would get rid of the
word 'preferences,' which implies subjectivity. Rather, I would suggest there
are different optimal syntaxes depending on the point of origin (or point of
translation from natural language to machine language) but likely only one
optimal representation as machine logic (per problem).
------
brlewis
Finding the right balance between brevity and hygiene isn't easy. Sounds like
the implicit variables / macros issue is resolving on the hygiene side. I look
forward to hearing how that works out.
------
neilk
Short operators, explicitly local variables, more operators are favored rather
than overloading, and a built-in hashtable type? This sounds alarmingly like
Perl. ;)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Wikiclaim – an Encyclopedia for Claims - devinplatt
https://www.wikiclaim.org
======
qwerty456127
Cool! I wish tis is going to become popular. I always dreamed of a global
collaborative think-tank where everybody can publish an idea and other people
would submit constructive comments about why/how is it right or wrong.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Elon Musk of Assisted Suicide, Whose Machine Lets You Kill Yourself Anywhere - hbcondo714
http://www.newsweek.com/elon-musk-assisted-suicide-machine-727874
======
n8n3k
> intended to convince its user that he or she is journeying to the great
> beyond, he said.
wtf? nothing with suicide, but ...
------
grawprog
They finally invented Futurama's suicide booths!
~~~
QAPereo
Slow and Gruesome here I come!
~~~
guywaffle
You want to place a collect call?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Why is Rick Santorum Using a Picture of 4Chan Founder Moot on His Website? - gnarls_manson
http://betabeat.com/2012/11/why-is-former-presidential-candidate-rick-santorum-using-a-picture-of-4chan-founder-moot-on-his-website/
======
JonnieCache
Because, class war. (Obviously for "goatse" read "moot's face")
_"In this scenario, the dialogic image must be reduced to a short-hand:
Goatse, the in-joke, provides that. Within Goatse, the dialogic image is
covert; unable to exercise any significant level of authorial control within
the design process, the designer forces the critical dissonance by tapping
into the in-joke. Rather than a critical dialogue between worker and employer
being an open one, it has become a secretive conflict; rather than a critical
design image being a conscious attempt to demystify design as a mediated
process, it becomes an attempt to undermine and destroy the design process.
Adopting the supposedly most efficient working process for capital has pushed
design to eat itself. The dialogic image has become the weaponisation of
ridicule; the designer has become a postfordist saboteur of the industrial
process, and the ever-present spectre of sabotage as the unspoken clot of
class-war clogs another artery of capital."_
[http://deterritorialsupportgroup.wordpress.com/2011/09/27/go...](http://deterritorialsupportgroup.wordpress.com/2011/09/27/goatse-
as-industrial-sabotage/)
for the record I like this article more because it amuses me than because I
agree with it. although it is a good point.
~~~
alanh
What a wonderful rabbit hole your link provides. Cheers.
~~~
astral303
I love a comment in that link: "This is the most wordy, pretentious way to say
'they do it for the lulz.'"
What a contrast in the writing style! Whereas I normally toil to be most
concise, to pack the most semantic value into a sentence, this article dishes
out a marathon of Olympic-strength verbal acrobatics.
~~~
yuchi
Could you point some places where you find such acrobatics?
I found it pretty linear.
~~~
im3w1l
He refers to unrelated, poorly explained concepts: dialogic image,
emancipatory media, criticality.
He has important hypothesis that he doesn't provide support for:
>it is a secretive conflict
>Goatse acts as a rejection of ... an ideology of post-fordist labour
~~~
zachrose
See also: International Art English
"IAE rebukes English for its lack of nouns: Visual becomes visuality, global
becomes globality, potential becomes potentiality, experience
becomes...experiencability."
<http://canopycanopycanopy.com/16/international_art_english>
~~~
yuchi
I'm italian, so I can not feel it. Also latin-derived languages like italian
passed a process where longer words (visuality vs visual) were considered the
most elegant, if you say that that article uses such kind of deformation...
well, it means that it looks like italian :)
------
drewmck
Same reason this happened: [http://i.usatoday.net/communitymanager/_photos/on-
politics/2...](http://i.usatoday.net/communitymanager/_photos/on-
politics/2012/05/30/romney-typox-inset-community.jpg)
His website was designed by agency. The agency tasked a designer to create
layout, including 'patriot' photos. The designer, perhaps someone who
disagrees with Santorum's politics, decided to add a photo of Moot as their
own personal jab.
~~~
mikegioia
That took me way too long to catch.
~~~
Falling3
Care to help me out? I'm not seeing it.
~~~
starnixgod
AMERCIA
~~~
pyre
Well, you _could_ read it as "America is going to the Latinos" therefore
'Americia' is the Latin-ification of "America" (really the US, as
Central/South _America_ are also 'America'). There is also the tinfoil hat
interpretation:
AmeriCIA... They're watching you...
------
terhechte
I don't know how long that's already been there, but if it's been some time
than that's quite telling. Because then it took a long time until a person who
knows the face of Moot dared to step onto Santorum's website. Says a lot about
the visitors of his website.
------
georgemcbay
"Why does Rick Santorum have a pic of 4Chan's Moot on his website?"
For the epic lulz, of course.
~~~
mynameishere
Doesn't seem epic enough to get fired over.
~~~
dasil003
Depends how much you value your job. The notoriety could arguably be a net
gain.
~~~
smsm42
Whatever the politics is, I would never hire a designer that would use my site
as a platform for his jokes. It is a breach of trust. If you hate him, don't
take the job. If you take the job, do it honestly.
~~~
jordanb
The designer has plausible deniability though: "I didn't know who that guy
was, I was just looking for photos of clean-cut Republican-looking white
people."
~~~
smsm42
Sure. "And we're just firing you because of bad economic situation". Plausible
deniability only works when it's plausible.
------
josh2600
Now I normally wouldn't upvote something like this on HackerNews, but that's
superbly ironic.
------
javert
"It’s hard to believe that anyone working at such a well-established
Republican media arm would be outwardly anti-Santorum."
That's a pretty ridiculous and insulting thing to say, betabeat. There are
lots of Republicans who are not major proponents of violating womens' rights
and other nasty socially conservative measures.
~~~
Retric
I don't think your reading that correctly. The important point is 'outwardly'
and 'well-established Republican media arm'. Overall the Republicans have been
vary good about staying on message and even if they don't support a candidate
will vary rarely badmouth a fellow republican outside of primary's.
~~~
javert
You're probably right about how the sentence should be read. Of course, under
that logic, the incident at hand was not "outward," anyway. It was subtle. So,
yeah... poor writing.
------
intropic
I'm not at all clear on why this is at the top on HN. This triviality is more
appropriate for other forums.
~~~
protomyth
As MartinCron pointed out, it is important to know the source of your images
when farming out work. This article is a topical demonstration of that
principal. It will cause some embarrassment. It is also a great way, in this
soundbite culture, to dismiss a person without having to actually go through
the motions of a debate. This same thing can happen to your startup. Imagine
some designer not liking your business and slipping in a photo of a serial
killer on your site. Or if you're running an amusement park and a photo of a
child molester is on your site.
Given all the things that can happen with stock photos, I believe folks should
probably hire a photographer or get the photos from staff that swears they
took them themselves. Get some releases signed if people are in the photos and
be done with it.
~~~
bcoates
Why? It's one thing if it can be framed as something you intentionally did,
but as long as it's deniable, there's lots of folks for whom there's no such
thing as bad publicity. As a politician trying to stay in the limelight
Santorum qualifies.
~~~
protomyth
"As long as its deniable" "no such thing as bad publicity"
Neither of those are actually true in politics. Any slip, any misstatement,
any gaffe can be used multiple times in short soundbites. Bad publicity sinks
campaigns and denials are not often heard. If you aren't well liked by the
press expect the incident on page 1 and explanation to be buried in the home
and garden section. Heck, look at all the total BS we have heard about birth
certificates and Mormonism. People catch the soundbite and believe this crap.
------
JeremyMorgan
Maybe they knew 4chan, Reddit and the rest of the internet would start linking
to his site once they found it.
Who's laughing now?
~~~
DanBC
> Who's laughing now?
Whoever charges them for the bandwidth used to serve pages to people who have
no intention of voting Santorum?
~~~
wilfra
Santorum has said it is his hope this election cycle would push his websites
above the frothy mix in search engine rankings. This would seem to be aiding
that.
~~~
DanBC
Until it gets out, and every website then posts links to his website, and to
the frothy mix websites, thus boosting those and reinforcing the santorum
frothy mix meme.
------
jbooth
Santorum just cannot catch a break on the internet.
~~~
slantyyz
It would be even funnier if Moot and/or the original photographer sued
Santorum because the site published a photo without his permission or a model
release.
~~~
mirkules
They already have permission -- I believe Wikipedia content is licensed under
the CC Attribution license.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Moot_smiling_at_ROFLCon_II...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Moot_smiling_at_ROFLCon_II.jpg)
On a related note, I didn't see any attributions.
------
MartinCron
The more serious lesson to take from this is that you should make it your job
to know how your graphic designers are sourcing the images used in high-
profile public-facing web sites. So often, the directive is just "get me happy
old people" or "get me people who look patriotic".
This can also keep you out of hot water with copyright issues, where the
production graphic person just does a Flickr search to find the pictures to
use.
------
praptak
Maybe it is someone's followup on the campain for "santorum" neologism, which
was a revenge for his gay bashing:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campaign_for_%22santorum%22_neo...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campaign_for_%22santorum%22_neologism)
------
fideloper
#include jokes.h
But seriously. The world has no sense of humor anymore?
~~~
veb
Yeah... I'm pretty the world does otherwise nobody would care about this. It's
pretty funny.
------
fnordfnordfnord
trolled softly.
------
algad
Why the fuck should I care about what is on Rick Santorum's web site??
And why the fuck should this be on Hacker News??
------
patrickgzill
LOLWUT
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Shaving Your RTT with TCP Fast Open - bradleyfalzon
https://bradleyf.id.au/nix/shaving-your-rtt-wth-tfo/
======
d0ugie
Regarding client support, why does only Google appear to be interested?
Talking about saving a round trip here...
To try with NGINX, you may need to add compile it with --with-cc-
opt="-DTCP_FASTOPEN=[X]" otherwise just adding fastopen=23 into your server
block may be problematic. [https://www.ruby-
forum.com/topic/5392464](https://www.ruby-forum.com/topic/5392464)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Era of Symbol Fonts - robin_reala
http://alistapart.com/article/the-era-of-symbol-fonts
For what it’s worth the Timepiece ligature demo appears to have been hacked - I’ve let ALA know and submitted it to Google’s malware checker. Would probably avoid visiting that link for the time being.
======
Samuel_Michon
Using icons in a navbar instead of labels tends to make it harder to use, not
easier.
Look at the example this article uses. It shows a house without a door, a
calculator, a multi-story building and a shopping cart.
The house usually means 'Home', 'Exit', or 'Location'. The shopping cart
usually means 'Purchase', 'Cart' or 'Checkout'. Those are fairly clear. But
then, why would you use a calculator for 'Contact'? And how is the multi-story
building different from the house?
More often than not, when I visit a website that uses symbols in its navbar
instead of text, I need to mouseover to find out what the heck the buttons are
for.
When symbols are used in tandem with text links, I do find it often makes
navbars easier to use, but to replace the text links altogether, the symbols
need to be completely unambiguous – and that's hard to accomplish if your
navbar consists of multiple similar links like 'order', 'checkout', 'cart',
'currency', 'shipping', etc.
~~~
calinet6
Yeah yeah, everyone should know about the perils of "Mystery Meat Navigation"
from the 1996 book "Web Pages That Suck."
I'm sure that the icons were being used only as demonstration here, and that
no one would actually do such a thing in this day and age.
~~~
Samuel_Michon
_"no one would actually do such a thing in this day and age"_
You'd think!
<http://www.cardiffcontemporary.co.uk/content.asp> (Do try the 'Accessibility'
link)
Also: <http://explore.bfi.org.uk/> (Keep scrolling...)
------
potatolicious
I've been away from the frontlines of webdev for a few years now - is there a
reason why we're not all using SVGs yet?
Symbol fonts (even though I use them myself in native mobile apps) seem like a
bridge hack, not a sustainable, long-term thing.
It seems incredibly silly to model images as characters when we already have
the concept of images built into HTML. I'd very happily ditch symbol fonts as
soon as iOS supports SVGs...
~~~
rjh29
If you copy and paste the clock (or if a non-JS supporting screen reader or
search engine encounters it), you get a time such as 12:04:37. That's pretty
cool, and I'd be interested to know if SVG can do something similar.
~~~
potatolicious
That seems to be an _incredibly_ fringe use case to justify the "wrong"
implementation (i.e., modeling images as text when your protocol already has
affordances for images).
------
cbr
I'm skeptical that most websites would see a performance improvement in
switching from images to symbol fonts. Github is doing it close to optimally:
\- custom webfont that has exactly what they need (26k)
\- loaded in js to minimize downloads (only one of woff and eot)
\- served with very long cache lifetime
\- served via cdn
But even then they have the problem that all text display has to wait for the
font to download.
Most sites are going to skip some of these, so I expect the change to symbol
fonts to hurt most websites that try it.
If you do try it, definitely A/B test it to make sure it really is speeding up
pageloads for your users.
~~~
crazygringo
For me, the #1 concern is mobile zooming and retina displays.
No more blurry pixellated edges that suddenly make your site look like total
crap. Instead, it's as sharp as a printed page!
For me, improving page loading speeds are a secondary concern -- and as long
as symbol fonts don't make the page noticeably _slower_ to load, all is good.
~~~
cbr
I agree: the vector sharpness of symbol fonts is their strongest selling
point. I'm just worried that the article leading with "improving performance
is a constant process" is going to make people think symbol fonts will speed
up their pages.
------
iconfinder
I still believe using fonts to show icons is a hack. When we have better
support for SVG files in browsers I believe that will be the most popular way
of displaying icons. Simply because icon fonts are harder to user and edit.
With SVG files the icons are delivered in XML format that can easily be
manipulated by eg. JS. The downside is of course the many server requests it
will require - one per icon.
~~~
robin_reala
Not if you use fragment URLs: a single SVG with all your icons then reference
icons.svg#telephone_icon or whatever. More info at [http://www.broken-
links.com/2012/08/14/better-svg-sprites-wi...](http://www.broken-
links.com/2012/08/14/better-svg-sprites-with-fragment-identifiers/)
~~~
cbr
This is Firefox and IE10 only so far: <http://caniuse.com/#feat=svg-fragment>
------
brazzy
Whoa! First time I've heard of using ligatures to render meaningful text as
icons. That's a pretty cool hack!
Probably not fit for mainstream use though - hard to maintain, especially if
you factor in i18n...
------
protomyth
Although we keep saying SVG will fix this, doesn't this seem like SVG has
failed and maybe we need to come up with a new way to do vector on the web?
~~~
lignuist
I think SVG is finally arriving. Look at D3 for instance.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Startup Book Publisher Unbound Raises $2M For Kickstarter For Authors Platform - elie_CH
http://techcrunch.com/2013/10/22/startup-book-publisher-unbound-raises-2m-for-kickstarter-for-authors-platform/
======
pmtarantino
I really like the idea. A few months ago, I used IndieGogo for the same: a
book project - and it was an amazing experience. I sent proof copies, sketchs,
etc., and share more with my readers.
It is a better experience for the author (you know there are people who really
want to read what you have to say!) and for the readers, who can share more of
the creation process.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
MIT Media Lab Design Innovation Workshop 2013 in India - shrikrishna
http://mitdi2013.pes.edu/
PES Institute Of Technology, Bangalore is collaborating with MIT Media Lab to host the third “Design and Innovation” workshop in Bangalore from 21st to 25th of January, 2013. The aim of this workshop is to enthrall and inspire Indian Youth to proactively involve themselves in designing a better future. The weeklong tour will involve engaging activities including, but not limited to ideation, design, and implementation of prototypes together with MIT Media Lab and local mentors.
======
daralthus
Awesome! In the FAQ they say there is an opportunity for other universities
for similar programs in collaboration with mit media lab.
So how would somebody approach his head of institute at the uni he attends for
something like that?
~~~
sandeep080
I am sure your head of institute will know about MIT and the Media Lab (if not
show him this <http://goo.gl/Vj4KF> and <http://goo.gl/jlF4o> :P). Write a
nice proposal saying why your institute deserves this event and how it will
help the students of the institute. Rig up a nice presentation about kind of
works carried out in the previous MIT Design Innovation workshops conducted...
and there you go... your institute's head will he more than willing to conduct
this workshop! :D
------
rasagy
PS: In case you are unsure about attending: Do attend. Lots of new things to
learn, great mentors, and great conversations among participants. (I attended
the first edition in Pune (COEP). One of the best events I've been to).
------
phalgun_g
Interesting. Are we supposed to bring any kits of our own?
And the schedule doesn't say much about the specific talks.
~~~
shrikrishna
> Interesting. Are we supposed to bring any kits of our own?
If you have an idea beforehand, and if there is any specific need of a tool
for the implementation of the idea that is sparsely available, you have to
bring it yourselves. Otherwise, the necessary tools will be provided in the
venue
> And the schedule doesn't say much about the specific talks.
There are just five 'tracks' and each track will focus on that specific field.
All talks and activities will remain within the scope of that track's
description
~~~
phalgun_g
Sweet. Is there a provision for delegates to talk about their hacks?
~~~
shrikrishna
Yes. The last day is when the hacks developed during the entire course of the
event will be showcased in front of industry, academia, and the media, and the
delegates will demonstrate the hacks they developed out of the things they
learnt during the workshop
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: If you had to build Facebook from scratch, what stack would you use? - nestorherre
and why? I have an idea of a social network and would like to get some insights on the technical side.
======
drewrv
If the question is about handling their scale, then I would suggest you avoid
premature optimization and worry about more immediate problems.
If the question is about their features, I think most modern frameworks will
be able to handle it all just fine. Use what you know best, so you'll start on
solid footing and be able to roll out features faster.
Personally, I'm about equally proficient at ASP.NET and Django. I'd probably
go with Django on this one because the Django Admin would let me put off
building sophisticated moderation tools at first.
~~~
nestorherre
Was thinking mainly about scaling and such, but you're right, maybe I should
worry about that when the time comes if it even gets to that point. Also just
wanted to take different POV's in general aspects.
Thanks for your input!
------
farnsworthy
Boring is better.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: WP Offload S3 – Offload Your Assets to S3 and Cloudfront - sgallant
https://deliciousbrains.com/wp-offload-s3/
======
codeddesign
How is this really different than the many other wp-to-s3 plugins out there?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Sony Finally Beat the Hackers in Latest Breach (Sort Of) - jjp9999
http://techzwn.com/2011/10/sony-finally-beat-the-hackers-in-latest-breach/
======
pavel_lishin
> hackers use a “massive set of sign-in IDs and passwords against our network
> database,” while repeatedly failing.
Sony detects script kiddies brute-forcing their servers, film at 11.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
All work and no play makes Jack a dull startup - jgrebski
http://www.betabeat.com/2011/11/30/return-of-the-diaspora-after-a-taste-of-the-valley-new-york-techies-are-coming-home/
======
AznHisoka
I dunno.. it's not like NYC is any better. Sure there's lots to do, and lots
of people, but it can get more lonely when 99.999% of your daily interactions
are with ppl you don't know. Lots of dehumanization.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
In New York City, What’s the Difference Between a $240 and a $6.95 Sushi Roll? - MarlonPro
https://psmag.com/in-new-york-city-whats-the-difference-between-a-240-sushi-roll-and-a-6-95-sushi-roll-cd057bfa3a29#.e310bj5pt
======
msie
I skimmed the article and didn't find the answer. I guess, nothing?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: I wrote a remote story estimation tool - confused-candle
http://home.1358.io
======
utsav91292
This looks awesome. UI is great. The only thing is I would have to start a new
session(which means share the link again) instead of continuing the same
session for estimating the other stories. Take a look at Pointing Poker.
~~~
confused-candle
Thanks for the feedback, glad you like it :) When you go to the next game, it
automatically brings everyone else who with you in the previous game.
Although, admittedly, it's not obvious until you've done it once.
Will look at changing this functionality so that you keep the same game id
throughout multiple rounds soon. Like Pointing Poker.
~~~
confused-candle
I've done this now, you keep the same game id throughout.
------
rahimnathwani
This looks awesome. I love the visual style, and the fact that you use
ephemeral rooms instead of sign-up.
~~~
confused-candle
Thank you, that's great to hear! I built it with my partner and one thing we
really wanted was simplicity and a low barrier to entry.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Antirez Suggestion: “Redis Labs Sharing License” - rectang
https://twitter.com/antirez/status/1034435239651815424
======
rectang
Thank you, antirez -- your suggested naming change would address the primary
concerns of many of us. I hope that Redis Labs follows through with either
that name or a similar one in the spirit of your tweet.
The ASF provides guidance for how to create your own license starting from the
Apache License 2.0 as a point of departure:
[http://www.apache.org/foundation/license-faq.html#mod-
licens...](http://www.apache.org/foundation/license-faq.html#mod-license)
Ensuring that "Apache" does not appear in the name of the modified license is
one of the constraints.
The content of the Commons Clause is interesting as source-available license
which allows certain freedoms yet attempts to target specific commercial use
cases. Hopefully continued discussion of business models which support
developers working on FOSS will prove fruitful.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A rare LHC tour - stickhandle
http://arstechnica.com/science/2015/04/a-rare-lhc-tour-avoiding-radiation-to-see-scientific-history-up-close/1/
======
gus_massa
> _when the LHC runs, the chambers housing the detectors experience intense
> radiation_
I thought that it was very energetic but low intensity radiation (outside the
main tunnel). Does anyone have more data about this? How many "normal
radiography" equivalents do you get for standing there for a minute?
~~~
stox
Anywhere around the accelerator you are going to have massive cyclotron
radiation ( ie. the photons emitted when you coerce of near light speed proton
out of a straight line).
In addition, at the detectors themselves, you have all sorts of radiation from
the collisions. Muon, gamma, etc.
The author does pass on a good point, the biggest danger is oxygen deprivation
from liquid helium, argon, and I assume Nitrogen ( though not mentioned ).
~~~
Trumpet6
Well no, the biggest risk is falls according to a CERN safety presentation
from this year:
[https://indico.cern.ch/event/383674/contribution/6/material/...](https://indico.cern.ch/event/383674/contribution/6/material/slides/1.pdf)
(page 42)
(Handling is pretty vague though, and it was hard enough to track down this
paltry statistics, so I'm glad falls won)
But oxygen deprivation is probably the biggest "exotic" hazard.
------
nmc
You can actually visit many CERN sites with Google Street View:
CMS:
[https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-...](https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-
compact-muon-solenoid-cms)
Atlas:
[https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-...](https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-
atlas)
Alice:
[https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-...](https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-
alice)
LHC:
[https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-...](https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-
large-hadron-collider-tunnel)
LHCb:
[https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-...](https://www.google.com/maps/views/view/streetview/cern/cern-
large-hadron-collider-beauty-lhcb)
------
takeda
On the last image on the last page there's image of some copper devices with a
description:
> These strange copper devices help take electric energy and convert it into
> kinetic energy of particles.
Pardon my ignorance, but isn't that just a fancy way of saying that it is a
motor or some kind of pump?
~~~
jasmcole
Those are radio frequency cavities which accelerate the protons. A standing
electromagnetic wave is formed which oscillates at just the right frequency so
that the bunches are always accelerated as they pass from one section to the
next.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Pundi X Debuts New Decentralized Mobile OS and Device - sanefive
https://beincrypto.com/pundi-x-debuts-decentralized-mobile-os-device/
======
physicsyogi
This phone sounds interesting. It also reminds me of the Pied Piper platform
from the Silicon Valley show.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
A browser extension that replaces offensive words with Indian food dish names - keyur1610
https://whatthefalooda.swiggy.com/
======
Hackbraten
What’s the matter with censoring profanity in North America? In Europe, it’s
just part of life and most people don’t give a fuck. I honestly would love to
know why so many Americans go to such great lengths to avoid swear words in
media.
~~~
ksaj
Western "swearing" has a weird past. Look at the word "piss." We are taught to
say "pee" as if kids can't figure out that it's the initial letter of the word
they are trying (not) to say, putting it in the same category as "the eff
word."
Where it gets wild is how often the word appears in the Bible, in the phrase
"he who pisseth against the wall," which referred specifically to men, as
opposed to women who wouldn't typically urinate in this fashion. As a kid, I
used to use the word "pee-eth" as a joke because of it.
------
zhte415
Has this been done before? Would it lead to these words used as understood
synonyms and in-jokes?
Why not randomise to prevent synonyms? And use lots of foods from around the
world? Then some could get distracted, learn a bit, calm down.
------
ksaj
I'll install it if it replaces 'dang' with 'chapati' or 'papad' (which would
subsequently be pronounced Papa-D).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
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